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A & M to be deprived of Johnny Football for one-half against Rice, sources say.

Okay Johnny, which wrist would you like us to slap? Oh. Of course, we wouldn’t want to slap your passing arm even though the slap will be more like a finger tap.

I know I should tread lightly talking about Texas A & M and it’s headline-making quarterback Johnny Manziel. Half of my family went to A & M and a close friend from college days is a big fan since our college is only what is now called a “Football Championship Series” team and not a BCS one.

Johnny Football after June 2012 arrest for fighting and fake identification. / Photograph courtesy of Brazos County's Judicial Records Search at http://justiceweb.co.brazos.tx.us
Johnny Football after June 2012 arrest for fighting and fake identification. / Photograph courtesy of Brazos County’s Judicial Records Search at http://justiceweb.co.brazos.tx.us

But if all the reports this afternoon are right then it seems Heisman Trophy winner “Johnny Football” will have to sit out one half of the Aggies season opener against Rice. This news comes from ESPN and other media outlets, based on a Twitter feed from an Aggie insider.

The one-half suspension will permanently shut the door on allegations Manziel was paid to sign more than 4,000 autographs. Scott Van Pelt said on his ESPN radio show this afternoon that autograph brokers who snitched on Manziel to the media would not talk to NCAA investigators. At least that is a popular theory. The reason is that, allegedly, the Aggies quarterback was devaluing his autographs by signing so many.

Might one say that they smell a rat in Indianapolis, home of the NCAA?

A second Heisman season is possible for Manziel and there is an outside chance he might lead the Aggies to a national championship season, this being the team’s second in Southeastern Conference play.

With this chapter in Manziel’s history apparently closed, plus putting his legal problems to bed, this might be quite a season for Johnny Football. After this season Mr. Football will be eligible for the NFL draft. And he seems eager to let the draft madness begin and escape College Station. If he can just keep out of trouble …

 

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This is not just another story about “Johnny Football”

 

Many sports news readers are probably sick, by now, of the off-field exploits of Texas A & M Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Johnny Manziel, a.k.a. “Johnny Football.” Maybe not so much if you are a die-hard Texas Longhorns fan or supporter of other Southeast Conference schools.

Note: If you give even one little hoot about this story, this ESPN.com “Outside The Lines” story by Wright Thompson is a must read.

My first journalism job was writing sports for my hometown newspaper. I liked some sports although my closest rub with playing was as an equipment manager in junior varsity football — although I also helped during varsity games — and was varsity basketball manager. I lettered in basketball though I never played a quarter. Two of the four fingers and toes I have broken in my life came from pick-up games of basketball, so I know some of the danger of sports, although that would be later in life.

I knew less about writing sports stories in high school than I did about playing them. I did know how to read, fortunately, thus I borrowed my style for writing from the local sports writers of the day. This was some 40 years ago. I am sure I have a copy somewhere, but I am horrified to read it for fear it had to be awful. Then again a friend gave me a great compliment on an article from those days that made me think about writing and writing for others in general.

Arthur has been a friend of mine since grade school when we played cops and robbers — actually Bonnie and Clyde but pay no attention to the gender issue we were just kids. I saw Arthur at a class reunion several years ago. Arthur played most of the school’s sports but he was particularly good in baseball. He told me: “You know I have a story you wrote about me playing baseball.” I found that odd that he kept it. I told him it must have been terribly written. But he said it was good. Besides, the fact he kept the story around for 40 years must mean something.

My friend’s keepsake reminded me how journalists, such as I, have an impact on others that we seldom ponder.

Sports reporting has changed immeasurably. If I was advising a young journalist who eyed a sports-writing career, I would tell him or her to read the great sports writers — everyone from Red Smith to Dan Jenkins to Rick Reilly — and I would likewise tell the budding scribe to study police reporting. The latter suggestion seems cynical or an attempt at humor but it is my authentic advice.

Fortunately and unfortunately, sports writing has melded into more specialized  journalism, like, say, environmental and military reporting. I pick those two beats because they were my specialties at one time.

But I also wrote up a police blotter item – during my time as a crime reporter — about a young guy busted for evading arrest. The young dude was allegedly smoking pot when the cops rudely interruped a party he was attending. The perp happened to be a talented running back for the Division I school in my town. But he also had a history of legal troubles. He was suspended from the team and I couldn’t tell you what happened to him after that.

Even “game stories” have changed, some for the better, and others for the worse.

It is unfortunate that the omnipresent media — from 24/7 cable to Twitter — seem to focus on the bad in sports. It is the reason I advise budding sports writers to learn how to read a police blotter, learn about the criminal justice process while doing the regular investigating that is part of a job in journalism.

At the same time, we are fortunate that sports news of today educates the public on the more serious matters of sports: Performance-enhancing drugs, the long-term medical effects of sports such as concussions from football, even collective-bargaining agreements. All of these are wrapped up in your newspaper, Web page or on a TV-teleprompter.

The modern sports news consumer is tremendously informed about sports and all that surrounds it compared to the trite phrases I would write about games — the Ws and Ls — when stringing for my hometown weekly. It’s evolution. But it isn’t always pretty. That’s why I try to avoid seeing my sports articles from 40 years ago.

 

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There are good eats at the end. Trust me. You’ll gain a few pounds.

It’s the weekend. Time to cut a rug. Or cut a tree. Or cut a big ol’ piece of pe-can pie. That reminds me. A week or two ago I had an appointment with my neurologist at the VA hospital in Houston. I stayed the day before at a hotel near the Texas Medical Center, where my hospital is located.

During that trip I managed to meet up for lunch with my good friends from Missouri City. That is a suburb of Houston, I suppose you’d call it. It is right next door to Southwest Houston, in Fort Bend County.

It’s been quite awhile since I’ve seen my friends Tere and Marcy. We all went to college around the same time though not exactly together. Maybe my friend Tere will let me write about how we know each other someday. If she does, maybe I will let me write about it. It’s been a year or more since we’ve all seen each other though. And I really like their company. They are some enjoyable ladies whom I am proud to call friends.

With that said, we met up for lunch that day before my appointment. We had not exactly decided where we were going to eat. Actually, we had not decided at all as it turned out. It was more like let’s go to this place and we ended up going to a place next to that place. Ultimately we chose a Pappas Bar-B-Q near Reliant Stadium, also near where I was staying.

As we were going inside, or perhaps as we were choosing to eat at Pappas, I told my friends I had eaten there long ago. As it turns out, I was wrong. I may have eaten at Pappas somewhere. Hell, they’re all over Houston, not to mention the Pappas Bros. Steakhouse, Pappadeaux Seafood, Pappas Burger and more, under the umbrella Pappas Restaurants all originating from a Greek family. Some of the family ended up in Houston selling beer coolers. Now the company is comprised of 8 different restaurants in 80 different locations in the Southwest, South and Midwest.

I didn’t know all that when I thought I had been there before and wrongly told my friends. I have been to Pappadeaux, located just down the highway from me here in Beaumont. No, I was thinking about another family which run the Goode Company.

The Goode Company Barbeque on Kirby Drive in Houston was the place I was thinking about. I rode there in a limo one night with some friends, one of whom was to be married the next day. I think our party lasted longer than the wedding did. Nonetheless, we pulled up outside and had some barbecue that night back in the last century. The barbecue was good. It was all good.

I have since been to the same good Goode barbecue place as well as the nearby Armadillo Palace, another of the Goode label. A very spiffy little bar and grill it is. In 2011 I would be made to move my pickup within the establishment’s parking lot so a limo could pull up. Inside the limo was some member of the Baltimore Ravens, who had beaten the Texans that next day. I should have just waited until I was finished with my meal. Or, until security came.

Before I get too way off track, as Tere, Marcy and I were checking out of Pappas we happened to notice these almost-larger-than-life desserts for sale. One was a cheesecake. The other a Pe-can pie. I bet five people could have eaten that pie. About one-fifth of that thing looked scrumptious. My blood sugar levels spiked just looking at them. We did not eat the dessert. We probably put on three pounds just looking at it. Just so you know, a whole pe-can pie is $13.95. You could probably feed a whole North African village with one.

I wrote all of this, just for the ending. Happy weekend.

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They came for diplomacy and a basketball game broke out

Had you been reading my blog over the past week instead of looking on the Internets at pictures of nekkid men, women and dogs you would know this is the definitive source for news in the isolated Communist nation North Korea. Well, maybe not definitive. Not even exhaustive. I suppose you could say I look at the nation’s goofy state Web page every now and then.

I had no idea why former NBA star and all-around strange dog Dennis Rodman was in North Korea on a self-appointed goodwill tour with ruler and new BFF Kim Up Chuck. No wait, it’s Kim Jong Un, mighty ruler of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the DPRK. I never really learned in my minor study of political science how communist nations fell into the oxymoronic practice of calling themselves “democratic republics.” Or maybe I did and just forgot it. I notice that I say that a lot. But I digest digress.

Former Chicago Bull Dennis Rodman on a red hair day. Photo copyrighted by Steve Lipofsky, Basketball.com and Wikimedia Commons.
Former Chicago Bull Dennis Rodman on a weird hair day. Photo copyrighted by Steve Lipofsky, Basketball.com and Wikimedia Commons.

The Rodman goodwill tour got off to a grand start with Kim and Rodman having a gay old time watching a Harlem Globetrotters game. No inference is to be drawn from “gay old time,” mind you. The outing went spectacularly until the Globetrotters pulled that old trick where they end up throwing a bucket full of confetti at the crowd after missing another player. It is a move designed to make those in the audience feel as if they are about to get drenched with the bucket’s content. Even after the 20,000th time the prank is played by the barnstorming team it is funny. However, the team must have forgotten they were in North Korea and when the designated Globetrotter threw out the confetti  from the bucket at Rodman and Kim, the unfortunate player was gunned down by plain clothes (very, very plain) security men belonging to Kim.

The above paragraph didn’t happen except that Kim and Rodman did attend a Globetrotters’ game. Forgive me, I just emerged from my hyperbolic chamber. And since this post is No. 3,200 for Eight Feet Deep, I feel we are given a little license to exaggerates a bit (and use bad grammah !) Wow, I’m all combobulated and s**t.

I searched my favorite North Korean news source, “News From Korean Central News Agency” a.k.a. “Korean News Service” for in-depth coverage of the Rodman goodwill tour, but I was disappointed to find only this brief:

 DPRK, U.S. Basketball Players Have Joint Training

Pyongyang, February 27 (KCNA) — Basketball players of the DPRK and the U.S. conducted a joint training in Ryugyong Jong Ju Yong Gymnasium here on Wednesday.

Participating in it were U-18 players of the DPRK and ex-player of the NBA of the U.S. Dennis Rodman and his party.

Match tactics, training mode and technique movement of the players of the two countries were exchanged at the joint training.

A workshop on basketball technique took place that day.

I bet when Dennis Rodman sees this his feelings will be hurt. After all, the Basketball legend buffoon Hall of Fame player reportedly told Kim: “You have a friend for life.” Of course, in North Korea, life is very fleeting. I suppose one has to take whatever they can get when it comes to basketball diplomacy between the likes of Kim and Rodman.

 

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Super Bowl madness yields too little music, so far

Lots of sports and lots of nothing have graced the magical electronic airwaves this week from Super Bowl in New Orleans. We know almost everything about the two brothers Harbaugh coaching against each other almost to the point that I fear we will learn about each one’s success at toilet training. We know the San Francisco 49ers player, who don’t seem to be as much of a “player” as he thinks, who said we “the team” ain’t got no gays! Okay he didn’t say it exactly like that. But he is so much of a non-story that I will not bother to look up his name so excuse me if I don’t quote him verbatim.

And we’ve had Ravens perhaps Hall of Fame-to-be linebacker turned street preacher Ray Lewis accused of using a potion from deer antlers. Give me a break. This guy got a lesser charge of obstructing justice on a murder rap! It’s supposedly the last season for Ray Lewis. But we’ve heard that before from some who just can’t kill the golden goose even though he … sorry. Forgive me pastor, for being so cynical.

What we’ve not heard a lot of or a lot about is music. New Orleans is music. The vaunted Mardi Gras Carnival time is now. A few parades were shifted around to accommodate the big game. So what comes to your mind when you hear “New Orleans?” “Oh when the Saints go marching in … ” perhaps? Well, maybe you think “Katrina.” Bad vibe indeed. Let’s just say when you think of New Orleans music a song will come with it.

All large U.S. cities have songs written about them or in their title or lyrics: “New York, New York these vagabond shoes they are longing to stray … ” Or maybe a little “Chicago, Chicago that toddlin’ town … ” Even jump on down to the No. 10th largest city, “Deep within my heart lies a melody, a song of old San Antone, San Antone … ” Okay, it’s actually San Antonio, but give me some license Jack!

New Orleans is a large U.S. — not as large as before Katrina hit. Actually, U.S. Census figures show NOLA was declining in population before Katrina. The city ranked 24th in the ’90 Census but shrank to 31st in the 2000 Census. Today it is 51st in the U.S. However, rebuilding and repopulating has made the Crescent City the fastest growing large city in the U.S., according to the 2010 decennial tally.

Hey, all that stuff don’t mean a thing. Well it does to some. It means something to many to be exact. But even if New Orleans was a just a tiny photograph of itself the city would still be playing music and folks would be singing “Iko, Iko” or a jazz band would still be blasting away as some soul was carried to his final resting place. Well, providing no more Katrinas come along.

Songs remain in our minds and on our musicians fingers and hands and lips so we all hear songs about New Orleans or with a New Orleans reference like just a half-dozen of my favorites:

“New Orleans Lady,” Le Roux (Louisiana’s Le Roux)

“Battle of New Orleans,” Johnny Horton

“Hey, Hey, (Indian’s comin’)” The Wild Tchoupitoulas

“Walking to New Orleans” Fats Domino

“House of the Rising Sun” The Animals

“Louisiana 1927 (The river had busted through clear down to Plaqemines/Six feet of water in the streets of Evangeline.)” Randy Newman

Well, all six songs may “technically” not about New Orleans proper but it don’ madda.

Sorry, I’m just not up to linking all the songs. If you want to hear them, you know what to do. Oh, and as for the songs about big cities. I am flying to Dallas next week but I, hopefully, won’t be flying at night and definitely will not be flying on a DC-9 at night.