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I have criticized Adrian Peterson for his choice of words when discussing the tension between the NFL players and owners. Now, in the spirit of helpfulness, I want to give Mr. Peterson (or his agent) some ideas for what he should have said. He needs to craft his speeches a bit more carefully.

I have no clue if he or anyone near him is going to read this, but here are my suggestions for what to say to improve how he is perceived. Note: I put in the end of the previous answer, taken from the Adrian Peterson interview on Yahoo, in order to give some context to the statements (“SC” stands for Shutdown Corner – the area of Yahoo! Sports that published the interview):

Original Quote – Trying to Generate Sympathy

AP: …. The owners are making so much money off of us to begin with.

SC: It’s nothing that I haven’t heard from other players, believe me.

AP: It’s modern-day slavery, you know? People kind of laugh at that, but there are people working at regular jobs who get treated the same way, too. With all the money … the owners are trying to get a different percentage, and bring in more money. I understand that; these are business-minded people…

The problem with that is the same problem Marie Antoinette had. Peterson is essentially complaining about caviar while the general public is going hungry. Or rather, the players and owners are arguing about how to slice the cake, while the people who make the cake can’t even afford bread.

Improvement – Get on the People’s Side

AP: …. The owners are making so much money off of us to begin with.

SC: It’s nothing that I haven’t heard from other players, believe me.

AP: A lot of players feel that way, but we’re making enough money to be comfortable. With all the money … the owners are trying to get a different percentage, and bring in more money. The problem with that is that the money is coming from the fans. The average guy out there isn’t getting a pay raise, so why should any of us in the NFL? That’s why I’m trying to work with the players and the owners to see what both sides can give up in order to lower ticket prices for the fans. More fans means more business and it’s better for everybody.

Do you think anyone out there would disagree with Adrian Peterson if he had said that? Anything else that A.P. should have said?

Click on the image to see a full-size version (and zoom if your browser shrinks it to fit). It might be easier to read that way.

Transcript
Bog: Hey Marsh!
Marsh: Hi Bog.
B: What’s going on?
M: I’m angry! Just like every other year…
B: It’s time for Marsh madness again?
M: Yep.
B: Hey, I was talking with Creek and Swamp, and they wanted to know if…
M: No! Tell them I don’t want to help them make a deeper area of water again.
B: Okay, so you’re not participating in the pool this year?
M: No. Go away.
B: At least tell me why you’re so mad.
M: You know how we’re close to the Gulf Coast and all…
B: Right.
M: Well, I’m used to just the right amount of seawater mixed in here. But it’s way off this season.
B: Oh, you’re not happy with your brakish.
M: Not at all. And another thing…
B: Go on…
M: All these shrubs and weeds are sprouting in all the wrong spots!
B: Let me see…the seeding’s all messed up?
M: You got it. Who put those together anyway?
B: It is hard to please everyone.
M: Wait, where was the word-play in that last line?
B: There wasn’t one – you’ve had enough punishment for one day.

All the radio stations were discussing a certain NFL player’s comments calling his situation “modern-day slavery”. Since everyone else seems to be offering opinions on his comments, I didn’t want to feel left out. So here are my thoughts:

An Open Letter to Professional Athletes

For what it’s worth, I think his comments were nothing more than poorly-planned choice of words. Maybe, maybe not. I’m not angry with the player, nor am I offended. I just felt it was an opportune time to highlight a real problem to contrast with the so-called problem of an NFL lockout or strike.

There – I have done my slacktivism duty.

And I know some NFL players already do go to Africa and help needy kids. Good for them. Let’s have more of that and less of the complaining about your contract. Millionaires don’t get much sympathy, especially not now.

Getting back to the NFL … I do not like the plan to go to 18 games for the regular season. Go ahead and drop the pre-season games from 4 to 2, but don’t increase the regular season – that would water down the season.

It may have been 9 below zero this morning, but spring training has started so I know winter’s demise is imminent.

I don’t really follow baseball, so I’m surprised that I know that spring training has started. And you may be surprised to know that I got a sneak peek at the new lineup for the 2011 baseball season.

That’s right, I have the exclusive scoop on who will be starting for Detroit. Without further ado, here is the starting lineup for the Detroit Tigers.

Click on the picture for a full-size version. It’s much easier to read.

And sorry about the verse – there are lions in the Bible but no tigers.

It is time once again to update Some Blog Site readers on the results of my Some Fun Site project to create a more accurate football prediction method.

The 2010 NFL season is over, and here are the most accurate methods for predicting regular-season game results:

That’s right – it was a three-way tie for first place. For the ideas behind the methods, please visit the Some Fun Site page.
My methods were not as superior as they were last year, but they were still in first place (even if it was a tie).

Since Beta enjoyed last season’s hockey game so much, we scheduled another one for this year.

Parking

First off, parking was a hassle. It was very easy to get lost. Just look at this poor guy:

And if not being able to find a parking spot wasn’t bad enough, people added insult to injury by throwing hockey pucks at the guy.

(more…)

Okay, okay, it is 2011 at this point, but the results are headlines as 2010 because they match with the 2010 predictions made in 2010 for the 2010 season. Also, the results are not all-haiku, just the predictions were. A more accurate title would be “Results for the All-Haiku Predictions made in 2010”.

Before the bowl games commenced for this past college football season, I made some predictions. Here, for your reading enjoyment, is the tally of those predictions. Note that the results are not in haiku form, in contrast to the predictions.

Results

Here is the list (correct predictions in green, incorrect in red):

BYU over UTEP

Northern Illinois over Fresno State

Ohio over Troy

Louisville over Southern Miss

Boise St. over Utah

San Diego State over Navy

Hawaii over Tulsa

Toledo over Florida International

Air Force over Georgia Tech

N.C. State over West Virginia

Missouri over Iowa

Maryland over East Carolina

Baylor over Illinois

Oklahoma State over Arizona

SMU over Army

Kansas State over Syracuse

North Carolina over Tennessee

Nebraska over Washington

South Florida over Clemson

Notre Dame over Miami (F)

Georgia over UCF

South Carolina over Florida State

Northwestern over Texas Tech

Penn State over Florida

Michigan State over Alabama

Mississippi State over Michigan

Wisconsin over TCU

Oklahoma over Connecticut

Stanford over Virginia Tech

Arkansas over Ohio State

Miami (O) over Middle Tenn. State

LSU over Texas A&M

Pittsburgh over Kentucky

Nevada over Boston College

Oregon over Auburn

And here are the results of the various forecasting methodologies (see the first year for description of the methodologies) (also, use the word methodologies if you want to sound important; methods would work just as well and is shorter) :

• Some Blog Site picks were 19-16 (better than last year!)
• CBS120 picks were 21-14
• HTW was 16-19 for the official Home Team Wins (HTW)
• HTW was 15-20 for the Geographical Home Team (GHT)
• Isaacson-Tarbell Postulate (ITP) was 21-14 if using HTW
• ITP was 23-12 if using GHT

I won’t analyze the results as much as I did last year, mainly because I had more time and more sleep last year. But it was a bad year again for GHT. And my predictions keep getting better. At this rate, I’ll be 100% correct by the year 2018.

Thoughts on the season’s results

1. That was a nice playoff round. Now let’s have the championship game between TCU and Auburn.
2. The B1G TEN is going to have a championship game next year, so we’ll know who their best team will be. Not that they’ll be playing for the national title, but it is a step in the right direction.
3. On the other hand, the Big 12 had better hope for a clear winner of its conference.
4. You know what? – we should just skip the national championship game and give the title to the winner of the SEC.

Conferences

Since the strength of the conference has something to do with the results, I thought I would tally each conference’s bowl game record for the 2010 (and the first bit of 2011) season.

• ACC: 3-5
• Big 10: 3-5
• Big 12: 3-5
• Big East: 4-2
• Independent: 2-1
• MAC: 2-2
• MW: 4-1
• PAC10: 2-2
• SEC: 5-5
• Sun Belt: 2-1
• USA: 3-4
• WAC: 2-2

So the best conference was the Mt. West (they won 80% of their bowl games again) and the worst was the ACC or Big Ten or Big 12 because they won only 38% of their bowl games.

Or maybe the worst was the MAC or the WAC or the PAC. If your conference ended in “AC”, then you had a bad year because you didn’t qualify very many teams.

Perhaps you could say that the SEC was the best because they had ten teams go to bowls (again) and won the championship (again). Or you could say the SEC was just the most popular conference.

My vote is for the Mountain West, especially next year when Boise St. joins them. If a MWC team goes to a bowl game, they usually win.