ONE MO' THING, 8/23/11 EDITION

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A FEW MO' THING, 8/23/11 EDITION
Namath still gets it.

Programming Notes:  I will not be on ESPN1530 until next Thursday.  However, in 36 days I start the on everyday thing. (That might change to 37 days because I might take the day we're supposed to start off.  I have a killer work ethic. 

Tonight, we'll be at Dave and Busters watching the Reds play the Marlins.  It's our final Reds Watch Party of the season, at least until the playoffs.  My buddy Jamie Ramsey off Better Off Red Fame will be there.  We will have free Reds t-shirts for everyone who attends, and we'll have prizes for those who send the most tweets using the #HatsoffCIN hashtag. 

What's the #HatsoffCIN hashtag?  Glad you asked.  As Jamie explained on his blog....

Help support kids playing baseball in the Cincinnati area by including the hashtag #HatsOffCIN when sending our your tweets through the end of August.  Each use of #HatsOffCIN on twitter generates a point for our Reds.  The team with the most points wins $50,000 for their Reviving Baseball in Inner Cities program.  For details on the contest, visit www.facebook.com/headandshouldersformen

We'll have prizes, the new and improved Dave and Buster's menu, plenty of cold beverages, and more.   I think we have a decent chance to outdraw the actual game, so join us tonight.  Dave and Buster's is located at 11775 Commons Drive, in Springdale.

A few other quick items....

Chatting. Tomorrow.  9:30.  Here.

Beer.  I'm serving some at the St. Agnes Festival in Fort Wright Friday night, starting at 7:00.

Beating MS. be at Camp Kern Saturday for "Bike MS: Venture the Valley 2011." Donate here.

Doing the same with Autism.  I'm emceeing the auction at the "What A Difference A Day Makes" event Sunday night.  Get tickets here.

The Bengals continue to tweak the D, trading for Taylor Mays.  The 49ers had such a terrific defense last season that it only makes sense to steal as many of their players as possible.  Mays might be more suited to play linebacker, and is probably just as good as the collection of schleps they have at safety, and perhaps better.  Therefore this news registered with me for about 12 seconds before I went back to discussing pies with my grandmother last night.

(My grandmother can talk about pie like I can talk about Springsteen albums by the way.  The lady talked about some church classmate's cherry pie for 20 minutes.  If we ever develop a talk show that revolves around pies, she's a shoo-in.)

-Saturday night, I went to a casino.  Casino trips carry with them very low expectations for me.  I expect to inhale voluminous amounts of second-hand smoke, I anticipate terrible buffet food, and I go in knowing that I'll probably lose money.  Two of these things happened Saturday, I increased my chances of getting lung cancer by about 8000% and the food was slightly more edible than what's served at your average elementary cafeteria.  Fortunately, I did come away a winner, rallying from a big deficit to win a couple of bucks playing craps.  It was a win, even though I now smell like Marge Schott's living room recliner. 

Anyway I bring this up because I went in expecting to lose, because that's usually what happens when you visit a casino...a dealer wearing a really ugly shirt takes your money.  Since I know this going in, when I walk out lighter in the wallet, I'm not angry.  Nor am I disappointed or discouraged, and I certainly don't spend the immediate aftermath yelling about how much the casino sucks and how immediate and pressing changes must be made immediately.

Same thing with this year's Bengals through two preseason games.  My expectations are as low as they've ever been (heavy statement, by the way), with forecast for three to five wins, no meaningful games after the World Series, plenty of empty seats at PBS, and us clinging to the hope that by the end of the season we feel a little better about this team's direction than we did last January. 

In short, I think the Bengals will suck.

Against Detroit, they sucked.

Against the Jets, they sucked a little less than they did against Detroit and we did see some small, incremental improvements, but they suck quotient was still pretty high.

So in two preseason games, they've pretty much met my expectations. 

I don't see how you can be angry or disappointed in that.

Would I prefer they surprise me and look the part of contender? Yes.  Do I see the off balancing act of a team that requires some patience and an organization that has exhausted it?  Of course. But if you aren't expecting much from a team, can you really get all that worked up when they give you almost exactly what you're expecting? 

No.

I can get angry at the Bengals for a lot of things, but this group of players doesn't deserve it, simply because they aren't good enough to have earned it.

-Aside from the impact their success has had on the local nine, watching the Brewers continually kick the hell out of inferior teams has been fun to watch.  (Last night's loss to the Pirates not withstanding)  Aside from their head-to-head success against the Cardinals, watching them pull away by beating up on the NL's worst reminds me of what the Reds did a year ago.

Remember the Reds from a year ago? 

Yeah.  Me too.

(Sigh)

-There's a Carson Palmer question?

Let's make a deal, let's take Carson Palmer and put him on the same shelf with Pete Rose, Bob Huggins, Brian Kelly, topics involving the Mt. Rushmore of anything, the debate as to whether Xavier is a mid-major, and any discussion on how to fix the MLB All-Star Game, ok?

-Here's help if you're trying to figure out which NFL team to root for this season.

-My guys at Look At Me Shirts have some cool Cincinnati-based vintage shirts.  It is about time someone sold a Cincinnati Stingers shirt.

-The NFL's biggest problem, post-lockout, is the ongoing violence among fans at, and around, games.  The clown who runs the 49ers thinks the solution to this problem is to add regular season games.  Dumb.

-Mike Lopresti looks at stadium violence.

-This probably only matters to me, and if there's no season they won't matter, but here are your 2011-'12 Knicks City Dancers.

-Speaking of the NBA, and the lockout, this Malcolm Gladwell piece is excellent.

-There are still plenty of reasons to pay attention to baseball the rest of the way.

-Rich dude makes his girlfriend sit at the kids' table.

-I watched last night as Tony LaRussa managed to out-manage himself last night.

-The annoying kid in the background really makes it hard for me to take this report about Kim Kardashian's wedding seriously.

-I'm now going to go do something else.  Follow me on Twitter, please.  And listen to this musical masterpiece from Nicole Scherzinger.