Rants and Ranks

Here's my new pride and joy.  If you're a ROH fan, check it out.  It's an easy and fun read.  You may not agree entirely, but that's the fun part.  It's exclusively at Amazon.com, and only 99 cents.  Here's a sample chapter: 9. Kevin Steen   The facts: ROH tenure 2005 (Five appearances), 2007-Present ROH World Champion ROH World Tag Team Champion (w/ El Generico) Notable Rivalries: El Generico, Colt Cabana, Briscoes, Davey Richards, Jim Cornette Key Matches: vs. Nigel McGuinness Northern Navigation, vs. El Generico Final Battle 2010, vs. Davey Richards Border Wars 2012 Wrestling’s Worst Nightmare...   Tag teams aside, when Steen was given the ball to run as a singles star, he usually delivered.   His matches against Nigel McGuinness in 2008 are some of the most underrated outings in ROH history.   Then, in what was probably the most infamous heel turn in ROH, Steen turned on his ...

In no particular order: 1. Can the Heat make their fourth straight Finals appearance (and win their 3rd)?  It hasn't happened since the Celtics went to four straight in '84-'87. 2. How much potential does this Knicks team have to be a train wreck?  I wrote this last year, and you can pretty much apply it to this season, just add the king of crazy Ron Artest to the mix.  3. A follow up to that question is how much of pain is J.R. Smith going to be this year?  Always a loose cannon, the train started to fly off the tracks during the post-season last year, and he hasn't done anything during the offseason to prove it's going to get any better.  In fact I'm almost positive it's getting worse.  I hate my team! 4. When will the injured superstars come back, and what affect will they have?  Rose is back, and looks good, but will it last?  Kobe I'm sure will be back next.  Westbrook had to have a second surgery.  ...

After nine years, I'm making a big change.  If you hate my writings, I got some bad news for you because you're about to see a whole lot more.  That aside, it's strange to look back at everything that I've went through at Hy-Vee land over the years.  I started at Hy-Vee at the ripe old age of 18, ready to start college and eager to meet some babes.  Well I did meet some babes, and eventually met a pretty special one.  Because of Hy-Vee I met my wife, and obviously my life would be drastically different had I not worked there.  For that I am forever indebted.  (Love you honey!)   I also met a great many friends from working there, some who I haven't spoken to since they walked out the door, and some that I formed lasting friendships with.  I'll look back fondly on people like: Reuben Merringer, Tyler Warfield, Curt Tuley, Brett and Megan Graham, Paul Anderson, Will Anderson, Marc Bradshaw, Eric Buller, Jeremy Young, Danna Palen, ...

This past week Nirvana's In Utero was re-released in "deluxe" formats, similar to that of Nevermind's re-release 2 years ago.  With that being said, In Utero will always be unfairly compared to the juggernaut known as "Nevermind."  Nevermind was a one in a million album no doubt, but In Utero is really good too.  It was purposely made to sound different to alienate the sheep that clung to Nevermind because it was the popular thing to like at the time.  A cool bonus with the super deluxe version is the "Live and Loud" performance from December 13, 1993 (my birthday no less).  This has never been released before, and you can only find certain clips on YouTube.  Everything I've seen of it, it looks like a great performance.  Kurt's voice sounds great, and the In Utero songs translate really well to a live setting.  (Much better than a lot of the Nevermind songs) If you got a Nirvana fan in the house, this would be a good Christmas present...

I've been thinking about this for a while now.  What to say about my reflection on the one year anniversary of Amelia's passing.  I wish I had something profound to say.  However I really don't have much to say that I haven't already written about in the past.  Upon re-reading what I wrote last year (Click here to read it) I can't write anything better than that.  I'm more proud of that than anything else I've done.  I'm usually my own worst critic, but to me that is as close to perfection as I'll ever get.  I wrote it one week after she died, with tears streaming down my face the whole time.  If anything ever truly came from my heart, it was that.  Rest in peace Amelia, I love you so much!

  I've been out of the loop for a while, and this is why.  I've been working on this little e-book.  It's a compilation of poems I wrote during college.  If poetry is your bag, then please check it out!  It's free for the next few days, so how can you beat that?  Otherwise it will be .99, and let's face it, you can find that in your couch cushions.  Enjoy! 

Watch this video .  In hindsight this one move seemingly destroyed Benjamin's confidence and his career never recovered.  He's had his moments don't get me wrong, but I better start from the beginning before I dive too deep. Shelton Benjamin was supposed to be the next big superstar following his 2004 draft to Monday Night Raw, splitting him from his tag partner Charlie Haas.  And for about a year he was.  He was a solid mid-card guy having great matches and holding on to the IC title for a lengthy reign, and stole the show in the first ever Money in the Bank Ladder match .  This was the apex of Benjamin's success, and I even thought that he would be main eventing the next year's WrestleMania.  Well the previously mentioned botched dive was just 2 months after MITB and sent Benjamin into a tailspin. I'm not exaggerating about this.  You can search other Benjamin boneheaded maneuvers following that one; ones that were seemingly nonex...

At the end of the day, The White Album is worth owning, click the picture to buy it.  For me the "White Album" is so polarizing.  It literally has some of the Beatles worst work ever, but also some of their best.  For any crazed Beatle fan, they know the reasons why.  But for those that don't I'll explain it briefly.  I've read enough Beatle books, magazines, polls, lists, countdowns etc. to have came to the conclusion that Sgt. Pepper is considered their finest work (duh).  Then followed closely behind is Revolver.  It gets a little bit more heated after that, usually with Abbey Road or The White Album coming in third.  Abbey Road is my personal favorite, so obviously the higher it's ranked the better as far as I'm concerned.  That notwithstanding, I couldn't rank The White Album ahead of it, let alone Magical Mystery Tour (their most underrated album for sure) just because of all the trash that is on it.  Let me start at the b...

From what I can tell, every championship team has had these roles defined.  One guy could probably play more than one role at a time, but a true team has different man assuming each role, thus making it truly a championship "team" rather than, "we have the best guy on the court".  (Which obviously doesn't hurt either.) 1. Leader I was going to call this category "Superstar" but the '04 Chauncey Billups- led Pistons kept creeping into my mind.  In case you don't get it, Chauncey was a great player, but no where near a "superstar."  And the only thing Rasheed Wallace is a superstar at is getting technical fouls.  He may be the "Michael Jordan" of that actually.  But I digress. Obvious this is the most important thing to have.  Someone has to lead the team.  Someone has to rally the troops when they are down.  Someone has to take the big shot at the end of regulation.  This someone also has to lead by example, but also k...

A year ago I stated that "things were looking up in Minneapolis."  (If you don't believe me read it here )  Well unfortunately for them, it may have to wait at least one more year.  Why do you ask?  I can sum it up in one word: INJURIES Here's what the I/R looked like for this tumultuous season: Brandon Roy missed 77 games Chase Budinger missed 66 games Alexey Shved missed 10 games Nikola Pekovic missed 23 games Ricky Rubio missed 32 games Kevin Love missed 64 games Andrei Kirilenko missed 18 games JJ Barea missed 8 games That's basically their entire rotation hurt at one point or another.  The only guy who didn't miss a game this season was Luke Ridnour.  Ridnour was the model of consistency for them this year.  He started at both guard positions throughout the year, depending on Rubio's injury, and put up 12 points, 4 assists, and 3 rebounds a game.  I would call him their MVP if it weren't for Rubio going on a tear the latt...