A lil something a lil laid back for Friday of a week I haven't posted nearly as much as I should've, but screw it, holler at your boy!
- First off, by far the most important thing - arguably ever - to hit the newstands, is Tyrell Sutton's run-in with the law. Northwestern churns out hardened criminals, the type of dudes who get into serious crap, such as fishing without a license, a crime glorified by today's hip-hop artists and video games such as Grand Theft Auto IV. You're probably saying "hey, fishing without a license isn't that bad," but the way I see it, fishing without a license is a gateway crime that leads into more serious offenses like murder, homicide, manslaughter, and double murder, so don't be surprised if Sutton has a body count in the dozens by next weekend.
- Mike Kafka has been absolutely ripping nonsense up with his pre-draft stuff, and he's gotten relatively high on people's draft boards. Like, seventh-best QB high. Now, that isn't really that high in the grand scheme of things - what, maybe third round, if he's extraordinarily lucky? - but think about where you might have imagined Kafka's post-graduation plans last August, that is to say, debating whether to declare for the possibly existent UFL draft or apply for grad school. Things done changed.
- I apologize for the lack of bunched panties over spring ball. Sadly, there's not really much I provide, not having been to any practices or done any interviews, and even if I had been to practices, NU isn't big on you just repeating what you see verbatim, so, we're basically limited to NU's practice reports, which are monumentally unrevealing, the Rittenblog, more Rittenblog, the profiles and whatnot coming out of spring ball for the Trib and Sun-Times. I'll get more in depth, but basically, what we need to know now is: Persa. Persa Persa Persa. The rest, it appears, is a lil bit up for grabs. I'm just not buying Arby Fields as the No. 1 all the time back, so I'm not reading much into anything revolving around him.
- I read articles like this one from Deadspin - great stuff, ignited by similar articles in the Sun-Times and Tribune - and you know what happens? I cry. I friggin cry. I go to a Big Ten university, not a fifteen minute train ride from the city limits of the city of Chicago. I could conceivably walk to Chicago. If I held it in long enough, I could probably pee from my dorm room and hit Chicago. Yeah, we're "in Evanston", but Evanston is a joke. This school is in Chicago. And yet, our basketball program is completely, totally, brutally disassociated from the fantastic basketball recruiting playpen that is the Chicago Public League. If Bill Carmody was fired, resigned, or in some way offed, and his replacement was announced tomorrow as Oliver Purnell, nobody would bat their eyes as to how the hiring would effect NU's pipeline to the CPL. I'm from New York. I'm ill at ease calling any place besides my hometown a basketball area. But I look at Chicago, and I see this fantastic outpouring of basketball talent. And yet we time and time again cast our fishing rod into the suburbs - which, mind you, aren't wanting for basketball talent if that Jon Scheyer fella taught us anything Monday night - rather than the city, the big, glorious city that is essentially our home. I highly doubt Carmody has connections with any of the coaches and power brokers important in Chicago basketball. Chicago players are not important to our basketball program. Yeah, we have Juice Thompson, and seemingly no plans of acquiring anybody else. And that makes me bitterly sad.
- I'm up early enough to have this posted by 10 even though I don't have class till 11. Why? Well, long story short, there's no way in hell I'm sleeping through my chance to get Talib Kweli tickets. I don't care if he's just opening, I'm going for him. Also, there's no way he plays the song below, and Talib is arguably the worst part of the song, but I advise all of you listen, especially if you think that rap music can't be beautiful.
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