Merry March Madness

Welcome to March!! This Thursday/Friday mark the unofficial best days of the year for all hardcore, semi-hardcore and not-so-hardcore sports fans. And the madness has truly begun. Last week during the conference championship tournaments there were tons of upsets and great games. Some future pro stars came up big, while others were out-classed by guys who will never even get a sniff of the league. It was a lot of fun and a great lead in to this weeks official beginning of March Madness. I have a few things for you in store. First, we will get to my 5 Bold Predictions Sure to Go Wrong. Second, I will give you my first round upsets. And lastly, I will give everyone a link to play along in with our first View From the Upper Bowl March Madness Tournament Pool (I know the name is too long). Let's get right to it:

5 Bold Predictions Sure to Go Wrong:

The first thing you should know about my "expertise" with the tournament is that I have never won an office pool, yet I would be willing to bet that I pay more attention than virtually anyone you know to College Basketball. So with that said, research and study will get you nowhere in the annual office pool.

#1. Kansas is the best team in the country, with the best combination of senior leadership and NBA talent and therefore will cut down the nets in Indianapolis when the Big Dance is all over.

#2. BYU has an actual chance at going to the Elite 8, possibly even the Final 4. This is totally because of matchups. Both Florida (1st round match up) and Kansas St. (potential 2nd round match up) are teams that play right into BYU's game. They are up tempo and lack any true big man. If BYU were to win those 2 games, they would get to play the next two in Salt Lake City. Talk about home court. I have BYU in the Elite 8.

#3. Baylor will play in the final four. They are super athletic and really played well in the Big 12 all year.

#4. For one of the first times in years don't pick a 12 seed to beat a 5 seed. The 12's are always a sexy upset pick. I just don't see it this year. Utah State isn't quite good enough. Cornell is good but the smart kids don't get it done this time. New Mexico St. can't compete with Michigan St. And UTEP is full of athletes but Butler is a legitimate Elite 8 contender.

#5. Duke will fall short of the final four yet again. This one is for lots of reasons, but mainly because I hate Duke.

First Round Upsets:

Here are the upsets I expect in the first round, (this wont take long).

Midwest:

#9 Northern Iowa over #8 UNLV - UNLV gets too much respect, UNI is actually good.

#10 Georgia Tech over #7 Oklahoma St. - Georgia Tech got hot at the right time, and Derrick Favors is a beast in the middle.

West:

No first round upsets.

East:

No first round upsets.

South:

#9 Louisville over #8 California - Louisville is from the Big East, Cal from the Pac-10... Enough Said.

#13 Siena over #4 Purdue - Siena has been to the dance the past 2 years and won games both times, meanwhile Purdue's best player is out for the year.

That is all the upsets that I expect. There are certainly many other possible upsets to be aware of. Feel free to argue with me all you want.

Tournament Pool:

Our tournament pool is being held through Yahoo. Go on to check it out if you are interested. There is no buy in, but the winner will get an "awesome" trophy and the immense pride that comes with beating all the rest of us. If you are interested in having some fun go to yahoo and find our group using the info below. If you are having difficulty let me know and I will shoot you an email.

Group ID#: 24103

Password: upperbowl

Join us and have some fun. Good luck in your guessing!

Post Super Bowl Thoughts

Ok I know we have been absent here at the Upper Bowl for far too long. So I figured I would take this time while I am waiting for my physics professor to get to something actually important to get us back on track. For those loyal followers whom we have left feeling abandoned over the past month lets get to it.

The NFL
In case you missed it the Super Bowl took place yesterday. The game was mega hyped, and mostly lived up to the billing. The QB's were very good for most of the game, the defenses were ok, some young guys made some bad plays, and the Saints head coach made one really gutsy call. All in all, the Saints outplayed the Colts. There were 2 plays that were not made by Colts WR's that played a big part in the game, but not big enough to change the outcome completely. The on sides kick took a lot of intestinal fortitude and it paid off, if they don't recover that ball, they give the ball to Peyton Manning on the 40 yard line and it would have been game over. But that is not how it went. Now I have made it very clear that I am a Colts fan, a new one at that because of Austin Collie's addition to the team (by the way he had a brilliant rookie year, including 2 post season TD's). But fellow Upper Bowl contributor Chris, is a die hard Colts fan who I am sure is in a dark place today, having felt a disappointment that I can only relate to being a Jazz fan during the 1998 campaign that ended with the infamous "push off" from MJ. All that being said, my first season as a Colts fan was a good one, and assuming they keep my boy Collie around, I will be a Colts fan for many more years.

The NBA
The Association has been putting out a fantastic product as of late. The Cleveland Lebron's have won 11 in a row (their last lost came courtesy of Sundiata Gaines and the Utah Jazz). The Lakers have been injured and faltering (which is always a fantastic thing). The Nuggets have been stellar despite not having Carmelo for 8 games now. But what drives our love at the Upper Bowl of the NBA is most definitely the phenomenal play of the Utah Jazz. Winners of their last 8, and 12 out of 13, the Jazz have been absolutely regulating teams on the hardwood. The Jazz have climbed in the power rankings from ESPN (seen here http://espn.go.com/nba/powerrankings?year=2010&week=15) and NBA.com (seen here http://www.nba.com/powerrankings/). The "experts" are noticing the Jazz. And the biggest reason for this improved play is one rejuvenated Andrei Kirilenko. Yes, Carlos Boozer/Paul Milsap have been very good in the low post. Yes, CJ Miles has shown some good signs, has Wesley Matthews has continued to be a huge boost. Yes, Deron Williams is absolutely killing people (see this clip on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkUtcOiw3w4). But the absolute reason the Jazz are winning and playing so well, is the resurgence of Andrei Kirilenko. He has reverted back to his All-Star form, shooting a very high percentage and being extremely active defensively. I hate to get too geeked up about this team, but right now the Jazz are winning on the road, winning at home and are doing so in a dominant fashion. If they can continue this mentality (which remains to be seen) the Jazz could very well end up in the 2nd seed in the west and then who knows what would happen.

With College Football over, we are left with regular season College Basketball and the NBA to look forward to. For those of you who can't watch the regular season College Basketball, don't worry March is right around the corner. Until then enjoy the Jazz and all the NFL Draft talk you can handle. We will be back again soon. But for now that is the View From the Upper Bowl.

2010's first look from the Upper Bowl

Happy New Year!! It has been a couple of weeks since our last post. The holidays were fun and busy and we here at the Upper Bowl were too busy filling our pie holes to blog. So here we have the first blog of the new year and it is filled with a bunch of stuff. So lets get to it.

The NFL:

We have had a couple of exciting weeks in the NFL, ok not really, but kind of. The Colts and Saints had wrapped up their respective #1 seeds and home field throughout the playoffs before the 15th game and as a result they have both gone half speed and lost their last two games. The Chargers are the only other team that I have any faith in right now. As far as I am concerned I think the super bowl is a 3 horse race between the Colts, Chargers and Saints. The Colts and Chargers are light years ahead of everyone else too. And unfortunately they will have a AFC championship show down in Indianapolis before the Super Bowl. As for this weekends match ups, The Jets/Bengals game is the most intriguing. I hope that the Bengals can bounce back and win that one. The NFC games are boring but I have the Packers over the Cardinals and the Eagles over the Cowboys (because I hate Dallas). As for the last game, I think the Ravens should pound the Patriots. Mostly because of Wes Welkers injury, Tom Brady wont know what to do with himself without his pacifier of a wide receiver.

The NBA:

Suffice it to say, my interest in the professional version of the worlds greatest game is waning right now. This can be blamed partially on the fact that I have been out of town, but mostly on the fact that the Jazz are imploding in front of our eyes. Ever since the Jazz were deemed team of the week 3 weeks ago by ESPN and NBA.com they have been no better than an unorganized group of street ball players getting beat by nearly everyone. Case and point, on Saturday last week the Jazz were beat badly by the Nuggets. The Nuggets are a good team and there is no shame in that except that Carmelo Anthony and Chauncey Billups didn't play. So the Jazz lost at home to a team of back ups!! Ridiculous. I have been saying this for some time but I think it makes more sense than ever now, trade everyone. Ok not everyone, but at least a few people, we need to trade some of the following: Boozer, Okur, Brewer, Miles, Korver, Koufus. Any combination will do. I have been particularly disappointed in Okur and Brewer, two of my personal favorites. Now is the time to rebuild, clearly these players either aren't very good are aren't very motivated. We need to fix this. In the meantime, at least the Cavs are playing well, hopefully Lebron can repeat as MVP and this time as world champ.

College Football:

Bowl season is all but wrapped up, with just the Orange Bowl (yawn) and the National Championship to come. As for the teams we care about, things have gone pretty well until last night. Wyoming (from the MWC) was a 10 point underdog to Fresno St, and they won by 7. BYU was a 3.5 point underdog to Oregon St, BYU won by 24. Utah was a 2.5 underdog to California, Utah won by 10. Air Force was a 4.5 point underdog to Houston (once ranked 13 in the country) and Air Force won by 27. A resounding 4-0. Looking very impressive. Now the only think left was the big one, TCU vs BSU in the Fiesta Bowl, and with the world watching, TCU laid an egg. Andy Dalton looked like he did as a sophomore. Their wide receivers dropped about 1/2 the balls that hit their hands including a big would-be TD. The defense was stellar, and unfortunately for them they lose 3 seniors on their defense, all of which are studs. As a result BSU tricked their way into another big win, with the fake punt (beautiful pass) that led to the game winning TD. Give BSU credit, they played stellar defense, but that also had something to do with TCU's ineptness. As for the big picture, TCU let the Mountain West down last night. It was a bad showing for the conference that is barking the loudest about getting into the BCS automatic qualifying group. The 4-0 record from everyone should still help, but the conference needs another team to get into the BCS Bowls next year and that isn't easy. As for BSU, they should be ranked top 10 to start the year, possibly top 5, if they do and they run the table they could be in the National Title game for sure.

I think that is enough ranting for now.

Post Weekend/Pre-Christmas Thoughts

Merry Christmas! Happy Hanuka! Happy Kwanzaa! We know we have a diverse readership here at the View from the Upper Bowl so use whichever holiday title floats your boat. Lets jump into the action.

The NFL: Well this weekend was a pretty crazy one. We had a Thursday night game that saw the Colts win a crazy back and forth game. My boy Austin Collie caught another TD, he leads all rookies in TD's (7) and receptions (53) and is having quite the year. We also had a Saturday night game featuring the leagues other undefeated team, the Saints. The Saints failed to show up early enough in that one and got beat by the erratic Cowboys. The Saints had been flirting with a loss for weeks, to bad teams as well. Well it finally caught up with them and they are no longer in the pursuit of perfection. It might actually help a team like the Saints be able to focus and play with less pressure. Amongst the other top teams, the Vikings got shellacked by the Panthers who were starting a back up QB Matt Moore (who?? Exactly). The Bengals lost a tough game to the streaking Chargers and played tough despite teammate Chris Henry dying in an accident earlier in the week. If I had to put money on 2 teams in the NFL right now it would be the Colts and the Chargers.

The NBA: The Jazz follower up their awful loss to Minnesota last Monday with a ok win at New Jersey (the worst team in the league), a blow out loss in Atlanta and another ok win in Charlotte. The Jazz just looked ok last week. To me the Jazz look like a team that is struggling to find enough minutes for everyone who deserves some time (Korver, Miles, Matthews, Brewer) and as a result everyone appears a little lackluster. Interesting stat I saw today, Deron Williams leads the league in games with 20+ pts and 10+ assists. He should definitely be an all-star, but the coaches will have to select him as one because the genius fans that vote for the All-Star team currently have Tracy McGrady as a starter, yes, the same Tracy McGrady who hasn't played 1 minute this year due to injury. Ridiculous!! I am a huge proponent of getting rid of fan voting for the All-Star game because the majority of people are morons!

College Football: Bowl season is officially underway. BYU faces off with Oregon St tomorrow in the Las Vegas bowl. Utah faces off with California in the Poinsettia bowl on Wednesday. Cal has announced that stud running back Jahvid Best will not play in that game because of a brutal concussion received about 6 games ago. With that said the Utes should roll in that one. BYU on the other hand never plays well in bowl games. And I expect much of the same tomorrow. Max should play well against a sloppy Oregon St secondary. But BYU will have no answer for Jacquizz Rodgers, the RB at OSU. Expect a high scoring affair with our beloved Cougars taking the L in this one. As a side note Wyoming beat Fresno St on Saturday. So to recap, the 5th best team in the Mountain West beat the 2nd best team in the WAC. Is there any question that the MWC is far far far better than the WAC? No.

That is all for now, have a happy holiday season everyone!!

Thoughts on the Sports World: Wednesday Edition

This post is super late this week. Sorry about that for all you faithful followers. We can blame it on finals week and a surge in business at work. So with that lets jump right into the action.

College Football:

Not much going on in the world of college pigskin this week except for the college awards were handed out. Congrats to Dennis Pitta, he was named the 1st team All-American tight end. No other local guys took home awards. Mark Ingram running back for Alabama won the Heisman, he probably deserved it. He was the best player on the best team, and all the usual suspects put up poor numbers. It would have been cool to see Toby Gerhardt win it because he is a white kid from Stanford but I am ok with Ingram winning. Next week starts the bowl season, BYU and Utah both have games, should be a lot of fun.

The NBA:

In local NBA action, the Jazz had a fantastic week last week. They posted wins over the Spurs, Magic and Lakers and really just had one awful quarter in LA that kept them from having a chance against the Lakers in LA. But in typical Jazz fashion, they kicked off this week by losing to the sad, terrible Timberwolves... for the second freaking time this year!! It was a little ridiculous. It is so maddening as a fan to see your team beat the best teams in the league and lose to the worst within 72 hours, but such is life as a Jazz fan. I maintain that this team needs to make some trades and do it now. Mehmet Okur, Carlos Boozer, Kyle Korver and Ronnie Brewer should all be shopped (don't trade all of them). This team can not contend as presently constituted and needs a shake up. And as a side note, if Deron Williams isn't an All-Star this year then the whole thing is a sham.

The NFL:

The NFL had another good weekend of action. The Colts cruised past the Broncos, with my boy Austin Collie getting yet another TD (6 on the year now). The Saints escaped again in Atlanta, Atlanta didn't have their QB or top RB. This looks more and more like the Colts are the best team in the league, they just aren't struggling like the Saints against lower level opponents. The best match up of the week was the Vikings/Bengals and the Vikings rolled in that one. Adrian Peterson finally was involved some in the offense as the Vikings decided to take off some pressure off of Brett Favre. I feel like the Vikings would beat the Saints with a balanced attack like that. The MVP race seems to be tipping towards Drew Brees of the Saints, Peyton seems to be losing steam nationally, I am not sure why. Probably because the national people seem to know that Peyton is going to play less and less now that the Colts have home field advantage wrapped up. Oh and quick fantasy update, I am in the semifinals of both of my league playoffs. So go me.

College Basketball:

Quick NCAA update. The MWC college basketball scene is looking pretty good as of right now. New Mexico (17th) and UNLV (21st) are both ranked and BYU is close to being ranked (29th). There are some great looking prospects around the country that are really playing well. John Wall at Kentucky is unreal and Xavier Henry at Kansas has been shooting lights out. Henry in particular is interesting and may be a guy targeted by the Jazz with the pick that they receive from the New York Knicks. I personally love College Basketball and watch it whenever I get a chance so there should be some more updates coming.

For now that is the View From the Upper Bowl

NFL MVP Race is insane!

Guys the NFL regular season is winding down and as it draws closer to the playoffs the MVP convo is going to heat up. I can't remember a time when the race was so close. Everywhere you look there are guys putting up HUGE numbers while leading their teams to gaudy records. Obviously the big three are Brett Favre, Drew Brees and Peyton Manning. If the Titans didn't get off to such a slow start I think Chris Johnson would be talked about more and is definitely deserving of recognition (I think the league should come out with awards like the golden glove in baseball. I guess being named on the All Pro Team is the same thing, but it doesn't sound as cool). I also think it's crappy that defensive players have a hard time getting into this debate, but it's a quarterback league and it's hard to argue that any one defensive player matters more to his team than those three gentleman. Regardless, I want to give my props to Jared Allen, Elvis Dumerville, Darren Sharper and my man Dwight Freeney for making QB's shit their pants all season. Anyway, I wanted to look at each of the big three and see what their chances are of putting that trophy on their mantle.

Brett Favre
If perhaps the most beloved and celebrated signal caller of all time has his best season shouldn't it be a no brainer that he should get the MVP award? With a QB rating of 108.5, 69% completion percentage, 26 TD's and a mind blowing 5 int's it would be hard to argue with giving him some more hardware for his gigantic trophy case. Maybe his biggest stat is that he's doing this all at the ripe age of 40!

Drew Brees
How to you get into the MVP conversation with the likes of Peyton Manning and Brett Favre? I dunno. How about lead a historically bad franchise to a currently undefeated season, while blowing out teams all along the way. Maybe lead the league in passer rating and touchdowns while showing the world that you command the leagues most explosive offense. It doesn't hurt to beat the Patriots so badly that Bill Belichick looked like Jim Zorn and Tom Brady looked like Rex Grossman. Does Mr Brees deserve the regular season's most coveted trophy? Absolutely. Will he get it? Only time will tell.

Peyton Manning
If you are the reigning MVP how do you top what you did last season? How about doing something, the likes of which have never been seen by reeling off 21 straight regular season victories (yes they are tied with the Pats, but not for much longer). Maybe take a slew of rookies that have been thrown into playing time before they are ready and make them look like fantasy favorites. You could also throw for more yards that anyone at a 70% clip even though the opposing defense knows your running game is shaky. Truth is no one does more with less and no player matters more to his teams success than Peyton does to the Colts. Peyton could win this award every year and no one would bat an eye.

Obviously I'm a Colts fan and, therefore, a bit biased towards Peyton. But, truth be told I wouldn't argue with Favre or Brees getting the accolades in 2009. Just don't do a three way tie...that would be lame.

Post Weekend Thoughts: Tuesday Edition

This past weekend had some good and some bad. The good was covered mostly by Nic with his excellent NFL post so I wont cover the NFL much in this recap. The bad was a little spread out, with that in mind lets get to it.

The NBA: So as we have made pretty clear here at the Upper Bowl we basically care a lot about the Jazz and a little about the rest of the NBA. As a result it would make sense that we here at the Upper Bowl were disgusted by what happened to the Jazz on Saturday. Just in case you missed it, the Jazz lost to the 2-17 Minnesota Timberwolves! Now one of the other wins that the Timberwolves have on this year is at Denver, so the loss while embarrassing is not the disgusting part. The disgusting part of this loss is that it is so typical of what the Jazz do. Case in point, the Jazz just won their 3rd straight game against the San Antonio Spurs last night, a quality opponent. The Jazz also have won 7 out of 9 games. They are a very talented team that apparently just decides not to show up on certain losses (example: Losses to OKC, Sacramento, Minnesota, Houston). Without those embarrassing losses the Jazz would be a mere 1/2 game behind the Lakers. So as a Jazz fan it is so frustrating to love a team that is so wildly inconsistent. The good from last weekend was the Jerseys that the Jazz wore on Friday night, the retro green jerseys are phenomenal, and I read this morning that they will be worn 9 more times this year. That is something to be excited about.

College Football: There were some pretty good games last week. The Thursday night game between Oregon and Oregon St was fantastic. The Cincinnati and Pittsburgh game Saturday was full of great offense and high drama. And the Texas and Nebraska game was a nail biter that went the wrong way at the end. With all the action wrapping up the end of the regular season the BCS Bowl bids were decided and the other bowl bids handed out. Here is a quick look at the matchups we care about here:

BCS National Championship: Alabama vs Texas
Rose Bowl: Ohio St vs Oregon
Orange Bowl: Georgia Tech vs Iowa
Sugar Bowl: Florida vs Cincinnati
Fiesta Bowl: TCU vs BSU
Las Vegas Bowl: BYU vs Oregon St
Poinsettia Bowl: Utah vs Cal

I think BYU and Utah both received good opponents in their respective bowls. I should say now that I think Utah definitely has the easier game, Cal is without their superstar running back Jahvid Best, and their passing game isn't very effective. Utah should continue their bowl game dominance. BYU however has a very good Oregon State team that has one heck of play maker in the backfield. I am not sure who I think will win this one yet. More to come on that another day. The matchup's that I really want to focus on right now are in the BCS National Championship, Fiesta Bowl and Sugar Bowl. First of all, after the performance Alabama had on Saturday look for them to win the championship in terribly lopsided fashion, Texas is no more deserving of the National Championship bid than TCU, BSU or Cincinnati. The real injustice of the BCS comes in the Sugar Bowl and Fiesta Bowl pairings. The 4 teams participating in those games are all deserving of BCS spots, however TCU getting paired with BSU in the Fiesta Bowl is a slap in the face to all Non-BCS schools. Here is a similitude to help you understand why. TCU and BSU are like 2 young teenagers at a big family gathering at Thanksgiving. You know how big family Thanksgivings go, the adults are at the big table and the kids are at a fold up card table in a spill safe area in another room of the house. The big table gets all the really good food while the card table gets a lot of the food but a lot of stuff just never makes it over to the card table. The oldest kids are always stuck in a precarious position. As they reach 16 or so they have shown that they are definitely too big to sit at the card table and they have behaved well enough to deserve a spot at the big table and finally get access to all the food and grown up conversation that is at the big table. But the adults kind of like the way things are and they like the somewhat exclusive nature of the big table. They do understand however that the oldest kids need to get a little something to keep them happy. Now the adults have tried having one of the oldest kids at a time at the big table. This has worked OK except now the oldest kids are really showing that they deserve to be there and they seem to really really enjoy it. Well the adults don't exactly like this so this year they have decided to sit the two oldest kids at the big table, kind of. This year the adults come up with a brilliant idea, lets have the two oldest kids sit at a different card table that is in the same room as the the big table. This way the oldest kids get access to all of the same things the adults do but none of the adults have to be embarrassed by having one of the oldest kids out eat them or show that they deserve to be there perhaps even more than the adults. And as a little twist the adults decide to make the two oldest kids compete in an eating contest, the one who wins will get some respect, but not that much because they just out ate another kid, not an adult.

Now this may or may not have been what your families Thanksgivings are like (my bet is it's not) but this is very much like what the BCS has done to BSU and TCU this year. The two teams had stellar years and TCU in particular could play with anyone in the country. But despite all of the past success by Non-BCS teams, Utah and Boise St in particular, TCU and BSU are getting the ultimate slap in the face and being told that they are invited to the "big table" but they have to play each other! They don't get an opportunity to prove themselves against bigger name teams like Florida or Cincinnati. That way they would have had the opportunity to both go home winners and carry the Non-BCS banner into the next year. But now they will compete and one will lose and the team that wins will get very little respect for their win. In a year that we all thought that the BCS was really feeling the pressure to change soon the BCS has found a way to win yet again. Showing us even more definitively that we will never achieve a playoff in college football and the little guy will always be the little guy. BCS: 1 Million Non-BCS: 3 (the number of wins they have in BCS games)

And that is our View from the Upper Bowl for now.

Great NFL Sunday!

Since I am the resident NFL lover, I took it upon myself to comment on yesterday's games. All of the teams I want to lose, lost (besides the Broncos). And all of the teams I wanted to win, won (other than Washington)

Examples:

The Colts beat the Titans
The Patriots lost to the Dolphins
The Steelers lost, but not to just any team. The Raiders! (yes, you read that correctly)
The Cowgirls lost to the Giants.
My beloved Seahawks won over division rival San Fran.

Sure Denver looked like they just might be righting the ship. But remember it was over the lowly Chiefs. Don't put too much stock in that game. They will still lose at least 2 of their next 4.

I don't like Washington, but I was hoping by them beating the Saints, everyone would stop giving credit to the Saints. The Saints are good, but they are not in the same league as the Colts. If they both go undefeated and end up in the Superbowl together, watch for a very lopsided Colts victory.

All in all, it was a good day. The only thing that would have made it perfect (besides the two games mentioned above) would be if Tom Brady would have got cleated in the eye; ruining not only his NFL career, but his modeling career as well!

Sloan signed for another year

Coming across the wires this morning is the news that Jerry Sloan has signed on as the head coach of the Utah Jazz for his 23rd year next season and is under contract through the 2010-2011 season. With the recent firing of Lawrence Frank, head coach of the Nets, Jerry Sloan has now out lasted 235 other NBA coaches. That is there have been exactly 235 coaching changes in the NBA since the last time there was one in Utah. My question is, Is it the right move? Is Jerry still the right guy for the job? Is there something to be said for loyalty from an organization? Is this too much like the Bobby Bowden or Joe Paterno situations? The Jazz aren't going to win a championship any time soon, so are we OK with not making a coaching change? Personally I think that Jerry deserves to go on his own terms, furthermore I don't feel that any one else would do a better job than Jerry is. I have always been proud to be a Jazz fan, and part of that pride comes from the loyalty that they are willing to show. They are very much unlike most pro sports organizations in that regard. In short I am happy to see Jerry at the helm for as long as he will be do it. After all the Jazz need someone who is a mean son of a gun on the team.

Agree or disagree?

Post Turkey Weekend Thoughts

What a GREAT weekend (well at least for me)!! Had a fantastic Thanksgiving day(s) feast and a great time up in Logan at the in-laws. Sports were great! All of my teams posted victories with exception of my fantasy teams that got skunked. With that in mind lets get into this mostly cheery recap of the weekends action.

The NBA:
This weekend in the was a good one for the Jazz. After their dismal performance on Tuesday night against the OKC Thunder, the Jazz bounced back with a couple of resounding victories over Chicago and Portland respectively. Surprisingly it appears as though the Jazz are playing better because Deron Williams and Carlos Boozer are at least pretending to like each other and as a they are playing beautiful. You gotta see this fantastic pass (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RtAzQQUYAE) at the 1:37 point of this highlight. Overall in the NBA it seems like a surprising year so far, the Suns and Hawks are among the leagues best while the Spurs are really struggling.

The NFL:
Once again the Colts come from behind to win a big game on the road. My boy Austin Collie had a nice game 4 catches for 70 yards, but more importantly the Colts came through again. The Vikings look awfully awfully good. I have been hesitant on this but I think I might finally admit that Brett Favre deserves to be in with Peyton and Drew Brees for MVP. Also I can't wait to see what happens with the Saints vs Patriots tonight. My guess is that the Pats win this one and if they do then the NFL pecking order should be Colts, Vikings, Saints, Pats. Quite the top 4.

College Football:
The Unholy War has been decided. Our predictions here at the Upper Bowl look pretty good in hindsight. BYU won 26-23 (our prediction was 27-21) and Max Hall was not eaten up by the Utah defense, as was predicted by us. (Nothing wrong with a little bit of honking our own horn when we get something right) On top of the exciting game that we were blessed to be witnesses to we got some more fuel for the rivalry from Max Hall. In case you have missed what Max Hall said here is a link you can go to and listen to his comments (http://www.kjzz.com/fansports/audio/dj-and-pk/77951307.html?video=pop&t=a','video','scrollbars=yes,width=800,height=630,screenx=15,screeny=15). Here is my take on Max's comments, I am glad he spoke his mind. This is a rivalry, and a bitter one at that. There is no need to be politically correct. However, I do not agree with his comments. I think he stepped over the line when he blanketed the whole university and it's organization. Anyways with the Unholy War being over we can look forward to bowl season. It looks like BYU will go to the Vegas Bowl, Utah to the Poinsettia Bowl and TCU hopefully gets into the National Championship.

So that is our View from the Upper Bowl this week