CONGRATULATIONS, GAINES

Gaines Adams was the 4th overall pick in this year's draft, overcoming the Mighy Quinn and all his courage. Pending any possible trade, he is now a member of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

BASKETBALL FUTURE ASPLODE?

MAYS DECLARING FOR DRAFT

James Mays has announced that he will test the waters of the NBA Draft but will not hire an agent, leaving the door open for a possible return for his senior season if he withdraws from the draft before June 18. I was pretty surprised when I first heard the news, but it makes sense from the standpoint that he will be able to attend pre-draft camps to hone his skills and see where he stacks up to the top players in the country. This will probably provide him with better practice than Clemson's off season shoot arounds and conditioning. Clearly this is exactly what Mays has in mind, judging from his quote in the Charleston Post & Courier: "This will give me an opportunity to evaluate where I stand as a player. If I don't do as well as I hope to, by not signing with an agent, I will have a great opportunity to remain at Clemson and finish my college career."

I was discussing the issue with some friends over drinks last night and one brought up the fact that Mays had already flunked out once and perhaps his declaring for the draft is a preemptive strike and that maybe he has hit academic troubles again and wouldn't be able to return next year even if he wanted to. Of course this is a completely unsubstantiated theory, but hey, that's what blogs are for.


DENDY DISSES CLEMSON CAGERS

Laron Dendy, he of the four star recruiting ranking and four schools in three years high school standing, has decided to decommit to the Clemson basketball program. He was ranked the 18th best power forward in the nation and was to join Clemson for the 07-08 season before questionable academics caused him to be reclassified as a junior. Schools he is now interested in include Sakerlina, Arizona, Maryland, Texas, and Florida (oh, and still Clemson).

He had been committed to the Tigers for over two years. Apparently two years worth of weekly recruiting letters filled with all sorts of big, confusing words was enough of a turnoff for this guy to make him think of trying to take his game to less scrupulous coaches like Gary Williams, who we all know will give a scholly to anyone who can ball regardless of the fact that their IQ falls in Forrest Gump territory. Okay, maybe that's a little harsh on Dendy, I don't know the kid, maybe he got caught up in the wrong sort of "diploma-mills" like Prince Ave Prep in Pickens and can't help that his academic responsibilities have been neglected by those who are supposed to have his best interests in mind but probably on have future signing bonuses floating in their heads. I hope he gets his academics in order and ends up at some school, and I hope it's Clemson, but with the departure of his main recruiter on the Tiger staff, this is looking less and less likely.

GO MINNESOTA STATE SCREAMING EAGLES!

I don't know what you're doing today, but I'm going to go play the greatest arcade game of the 1990's... Coach: Dauber's Revenge.

KNOW YOUR NOLES: POST SPRING BALL EDITION

Mediocre Photoshop... check.


First photoshop ever. I think the picture itself paints a perfect picture of what's been extremely popular among Noles fans everywhere: Lowriders with FSU themed paint jobs.

Continuing my ongoing series, I bring you "Know Your Noles". It's a pretty cut and dry Q&A with one of the top Florida State blogs in preparation for the Labor Day match up between FSU and Clemson that is just 131 days away. The first article, done with ChantRant.com can be found here. This second edition has been brought to you by our good friend and Blogger-In-Arms NoleCC over at ScalpEm.com. Our questions for their segment of "Know Your Tigers" can be found here.

DFIG: How has the new coaching staff melded together? Any signs of struggle or trouble?

Scalp Em': I think we're still at the honeymoon stage for the coaching staff. There were two noticeable differences in this staff though. The first is that these coaches get in players' faces. No more coddling, no more hand holding, just do your job and get it done right. Personally, I like that. The second is that when Bobby Bowden was asked about the QBs, he deferred to Jimbo Fisher. That says a lot, considering it was usually Jeff Bowden deferring to his daddy.

Depending on how the season opens, this story might change, but right now things are peachy.

DFIG: Is the quarterback picture for next year any clearer?

SE: For me, yes. For everybody else, no it’s not any clearer. After watching the spring game, it became obvious that Weatherford is ahead of Xavier Lee. Noles fans everywhere just wish that Drew had XL's arm. Weatherford did a much better job of buying some time in and out of the pocket, and made very accurate throws on Jimbo's crossing routes.

Lee, on the other hand didn't look like he was ready to play. His throws were generally inaccurate, he didn't generally step up in the pocket and he just didn't look "smart" out there. If history is any indicator, Weatherford will be hitting the playbook, film and gym all summer and will be the clear cut #1 in the fall. Many Seminole fans are in Xavier's camp still, but he threw another INT that looked like the Duke pick-six in the G&G game. I just don't think he's ever going to "get it."

On a side note, I really wish we could have seen Christian Ponder work with the first team. He throws a very pretty ball.

DFIG: Right now, who is/are the single best offensive/defensive player(s).

SE: Offense - Antone Smith is light years ahead of any other running back on the depth chart. He looked strong last year, and was a better option than Lorenzo Booker. Now that he finally has his shot, free and clear from anyone more senior than him, he'll make some big plays.

Defense - Andre Fluellen is going to be a force in the middle of the line. If he doesn't wreak havoc, then everyone else on the Defensive Line will this season, thanks to Fluellen, who will draw a lot of attention from other teams.

As for the next two years... go ahead and fill Myron Rolle in as your answer.

Myron Rolle giving the ol' Deacon Jones treatment to a teammate.

DFIG: Have the pitchfork mobs subsided since last season, or is there even more bloodlust for Bobby.

SE: I think that everyone in Seminole Territory is optimistic. So, the bloodlust is gone for now. Where I think it might return is when the Noles struggle (and they will here and there) and it becomes obvious that FSU's goal this year should be an ACC Title and not an MNC. The guys that will go nuts are the overly optimistic ones saying that FSU is going to win 12 games this year. Quite frankly, that's crazy talk. 9 wins with FSU's schedule (only 5 home games) would be a huge improvement over the last 5 or 6 years.

DFIG: If Bobby has another bad year (if you can call an average year a bad year), does he hang it up?

SE: The only way he hangs it up is if his health goes, or if he wins another MNC. Otherwise, Bobby isn't going anywhere. And, contrary to the pitchfork masses’ desire, you can't get rid of the guy you name the field after. Too bad. Next time wait for him to retire before you name the field after him if you're so worried about it.

DFIG: Planet Earth on the Discovery Channel, discuss your thoughts.

SE: It's rare that a mini-series evokes an emotional response out of me. The only other one that has, is Band of Brothers. Planet Earth has been fascinating, horrifying, disgusting and beautiful, all at the same time. I enjoyed 'Shallow Seas' the most so far, but last Sunday's 'Caves' episode is a close second.

What blows my mind is how great Discovery Theater HD looks on a standard 480i Sony Wega. It'll be great to watch it again in HD someday when I have an HDTV.

SUPER BLOWOUT LABOR DAY BIG GAME BOWDEN BOWL BET

That's what we're calling it. We've entered into a bet with NoleCC over at ScalpEm.com to spice up the Labor Day match up. The stipulations are as follows:

Victory by < 7 = a single day of Purple and Orange gracing the front page of Scalp Em'.

Victory by 7-14 = 2 days of searing, contrasting, retina burning colors for NoleCC.

Victory by 14 or more = 3 days of beautiful color on that FSU rag sheet.

WEEKEND NEWS RECAP

- Last week, the Baseball team really stunk it up, losing at #4 South Carolina on Wednesday, and dropping two this weekend to #6 Virginia before pulling one out on Sunday to salvage the home series. This turn of events drop us to 26 - 13 overall and 11 - 7 in ACC play. Granted we lost to teams ranked higher than us, but it's time to start accepting the fact that we just aren't as good as we were this time last year. We're not playing poorly, a lot of other teams are just having outstanding seasons. You can't win em all. I am impressed with our bullpen, after they were kind of written off at the beginning of the year. I think we should be happy with what we've got going on right now. We are consistently a top ranked team and we consistently send a players to the majors and farm leagues almost every year. I think Jack has done a great job with our program and it's just so damned hard to hate him. We'll win a CWS soon enough with him at the helm. Hey, at least the baseball season hasn't turned into a disaster like the football season did... yet. This week we play five home games as follows:

Elon, Tuesday @ 7:15
South Carolina, Wednesday @ 7:15
Georgia Tech, Friday @ 7:15
Georgia Tech, Saturday @ 7:00
Georgia Tech, Sunday @ 2:00

- Our Men's Track team came in second at the ACC Outdoor Track & Field Championships with 118 points. Florida State won it's third straight ACC Championship with crazy mad score of 166.5 points... I think it's safe to say they blew everyone else out of the water. On an interesting note, Boston College scored a four. FOUR POINTS. Should they even have a Track team??? I think that they should just pack it in and replace the team because that is just shameful. In individual notes, Jacoby Ford was disqualified in the 100m due to a false start while CJ Spiller was a 100m dash all-ACC performer. Travis Padgett continues to burn through free Nikes as he took home the ACC 100m dash title.

- I must send out apologies for my lack of posting. Chili has been carrying the blog on his back once again. Reason being, I had an allergic reaction to a drug with Sulfa in it that I was taking for a skin infection. Long story short, I got Stevens-Johnson Syndrome and nearly died. Yadda, yadda, yadda, saw the light, etc. Needless to say, Chili was ever vigilant during my hospital visits. In fact, when I finally came to, he was there by my bedside. You remember the scene from Rocky II? That's EXACTLY how it played out. I told him to go "Win" and well, there was no fight... so, I think he broke doctor's face in. I'm not sure. All I know is that this will be the last time I ever go through the doors of Redfern Health Center under my own free will.

FYI, Chili went on to defeat Apollo Creed in the final seconds of the bout.

MAP OF IPTAY LOTS ON GOOGLE EARTH

The map omits the secret parking lot under the stadium where I park. Didn't know about that one? Yeah, 'cause you can't afford it. Only Triple Platinum IPTAY members allowed. It's just me and the dude that founded Hooters.

Eddie Venter, friend of DFIG, posted this great overlay for Google Earth showing all IPTAY parking lots around Death Valley. Here's a direct link to the KML file. It's nice to see Google Earth finally obtained some higher resolution shots of Clemson, it used to look like a puddle of split pea soup but now I can see all the places where Willy Mac and I used to go drinking, and that one place where he ripped the gutter off of that building, you know the one I'm talking about. Thanks to Eddie for this one.

SOME THOUGHTS ON THE VT REACTION

Hokies in our hearts.

Today we are all Hokies.

If you’ve been on the internet since the chilling and deplorable massacre in Blacksburg you’ve no doubt seen people use these slogans hundreds of times. There are logos out there for virtually every school which incorporate the VT logo and a black ribbon. All of these gestures mean well and they are probably heartfelt, but there’s something about them that makes me really think, and I felt like I would share my thoughts on the matter. These are kind of my raw thoughts, so forgive me if it's a little "stream of consciousness."

First of all how insane was it that NBC and other news outlets have been playing Cho Seung-Hui's video non-stop? NBC has it all over the place, yet Imus is too inappropriate for air. It goes to show you just how messed up this country is when news networks are airing these videos in their entirety yet bleeping out when Cho says "fuck" -- like that's the inappropriate thing about the goddamned videos.

Now back to my thoughts on people's reactions to the event. The reactions to the tragedy I’m speaking of here are not those of the Virginia Tech “family,” that being those related to the victims, VT students, staff, alumni, and the surviving victims themselves. Their grief is real, it’s palpable and the media is feeding off of it with reckless abandon. This event has hit them in ways I cannot begin to imagine.

I’m speaking of the average messageboard poster, a type of person with which we are all familiar. To the majority of people, the Virginia Tech killings have been reduced to a bumper sticker. I’ve seen more internet posts mostly consisting of “Hokies in our hearts” with little real commentary or insight about the tragedy. This has become a “Support Our Troops” sort of thing. It’s become just something people say because they think they’re supposed to without giving real support, without opening themselves up to the facts and events behind the catch phrase. People ignore the realities of the VT massacre the same way they ignore the war. What this saying has essentially become is a buffer for real discourse about the event. Now I don’t expect some expertly nuanced debate about psychiatric treatment in America and the rights of professors to demand treatment for students they feel are in need of it or about gun control, though even political posturing is a more honest reaction to the event than just ignoring them and slapping a sticker on your truck.

I promise you this guy has no less than 4 ribbon stickers on his tailgate.

The point I’m getting at is people need to forget about the slogans, think about the shooting, don’t just fucking copy-paste a gif image or some slogan. Think of the victims and their families. Think of what drove the shooter to this dire end. Read the more insightful media coverage out there, not the sick sensationalist shit on Nancy Grace or Fox News. If the only reaction you have to the event is to act like a sheep and spit out the same thing you’ve seen posted a million times then just shut the hell up. You bring nothing to the table and don’t feel like you have to inject yourself into the tragedy. You don’t have to post anything at all about the events of this week. The entire country feels for these victims and their families, don’t trivialize it with some cliché.

A poster brought up the point that in October, when the Tigers take on the Hokies at Death Valley, they expect the entire crowd to cheer for VT when they take the field. Several posters expressed the same feeling, while one or two disagreed and were belittled. I’m with the naysayers. By October, the media will have long since moved on, and with it goes the short attention span of today’s media consumers. ESPN will do a piece on the Hokies’ first game and then will forget about it. God forbid new tragedies occur, but surely something will have pushed this event far out of the way in everyone’s mind but the VT family, on whose lives this tragedy has rendered an indelible scar.

Yes, come October many people may stand up and cheer for the Hokies, but only if they have a jumbotron to tell them to.

Discuss this at The Rant.

THURSDAY NEWS

Football:

WestZone project may resume in 08.

This phase will move all football operations currently held in the Jervey and McFadden buildings into the WestZone, as well as add a small zoo containing various breeds of tigers, a BBQ smoke pit, a world-class spa, and a holodeck. Oh, and a room full of strippers. Funny that the headline of the Greenville News article says the project could begin in 08, yet mentions that it is vastly more likely to begin in 09.

IPTAY sells out.

IPTAY has kicked long-time donors in the balls, as expected, and changed their season ticket policy to give better seats to those who give more, as opposed to the previous policy that awarded those who had continuously donated to the organization. While I understand the move and can respect it from a purely financial standpoint, Clemson has made plenty of moves lately that have been less than fan friendly (raising ticket prices, stricter parking regulations for games, keeping Bowden) and I can only hope we have a great season this year or all this shit might backfire.

Cullen Harper separates from the pack.

Harper was 15-24 with 3 TDs in the Orange & Purple game in leading the Orange team to a 35-16 victory over the Purple squad. This performance finally created some distance in what was a tight race for starting QB. Harper had the best numbers throughout the spring practice season, according to Tigernet.

Rendrick Taylor injured again.

This time it is much less severe than his broken wrist of 2005 or broken arm of last year. He tore ligaments in one of his fingers early in the Orange & Purple game and will undergo a six week rehab for the injury.

Second-team Sapp.

The heir apparent to Gaines Adams has hit some snags in the offseason and has been demoted to second string for the time being with rising senior Kwam Williams taking the first-string spot. The State article mentions that both have had moments of excellence in the offseason but Kwam has the edge for now.

Basketball:

Tyler to transfer

AJ Tyler, who averaged just 5.1 minutes a game in 30 games last season, is unhappy with his place on the Tiger basketball team. "I went into it expecting to be here for four years, but I realized this wasn't going to be the situation I thought it'd be," Tyler was quoted in the Charleston P&C as saying. He is expected to transfer to either Central Florida or South Florida.

CONDOLENCES

No jokes today, just seriously disheartening news from our ACC brother-in-arms. Virginia Tech has suffered a huge loss today at the hands of a lone gunman, who killed about 31 people on two separate shooting sprees. Virginia Tech big wigs have closed the campus for the time being, according to their homepage. We're not big on the prayer request thing, you know, but just keep the families and such in your thoughts. God be with VT right now.

ATTENTION

The Orange and White... er... Purple game is tomorrow and neither Willy Mac (severe illness) nor I will be able to attend. We need one of our readers to report on the game for us. If you will be attending the game and will be sober enough to remember what occurred, please email chili at dannyfordisgod.com and let me know ASAP, and send your take on the scrimmage sometime this weekend so we can have some coverage.

Thanks,

Chili

WEDNESDAY RANDOMNESS

You just know there's some Allman Brothers playing in the background.

Paw painting is one of Clemson's most well-known traditions and has been going on strong since 1971. I'll write a little more about it later, but for now here are two photos, one from the early-mid 80s and one from 2005, of members of Sigma Phi Epsilon painting the famous Tiger Paws on Clemson's roads and highways.

(I should also mention that the photo below is just a small fraction of current membership, I think SigEp is running about 70-80 strong about now, about 120 or so in membership in the above photo)

Probably O.A.R. this time around.

AT LEAST WE STILL HAVE SOME OF OUR DIGNITY

People from West Virginia being illiterate? Shocker.