FB: Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference

[emma17]

Interesting link about the devastating global Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918 and football was played.

https://tommiesports.com/sports/fball/2019-20/releases/20200506lmfwml

Johnnies suck...

I know there are more important issues for MN at the moment, but this article was just a blast to read. Thanks for sharing.
Foot-ball.

[OzJohnnie]

jknezek and faunch

Wow! You guys are seeing this stuff first hand. I only see it on the TV news.
When the rioters (thugs) burn cars, break windows, throw objects at the police and loot stores, what are they protesting? Am I missing something here?
I have my own thoughts on all these protests (riots). I better keep them to my self.
Faunch - appreciate the pictures, really shows the reality of the situation. Thanks.
You guys stay safe. If the rioters go home, we'll all stay safe! 😔

In regards to the first bolded part, this gets into the philosophical and/or the political, which this is not the place to discuss. Psychologically though, mob mentality is a well known and explored condition. It is, essentially, the mentality of a group gravitating to the most base emotion of the least or loudest member. You know the phrase "one bad apple spoils the barrel"? Mob mentality is the constant reminder of the power of that sad state in humanity.

As for the second bolded part, most likely true for the vast majority of Americans. Not so true for the constant trickle of Black Americans like George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery and hundreds upon hundreds more.

You know things have turned crazy when Joan Baez, of all people, would be burned at the stake for her biggest hit.

[Mr. Ypsi]

jknezek and faunch

Wow! You guys are seeing this stuff first hand. I only see it on the TV news.
When the rioters (thugs) burn cars, break windows, throw objects at the police and loot stores, what are they protesting? Am I missing something here?
I have my own thoughts on all these protests (riots). I better keep them to my self.
Faunch - appreciate the pictures, really shows the reality of the situation. Thanks.
You guys stay safe. If the rioters go home, we'll all stay safe! 😔

As Old Auggie noted, the rioters/looters and the protesters are (mostly) NOT the same people (except in Trump's mind).  The great majority of people protesting are indeed peacefully protesting the murder of George Floyd.  A very few of them may get caught up in the excitement and join in the rioting (as jknesek noted about 'mob mentality'), but that is NOT true of most of the protesters. 

The looters/rioters are opportunists riding on the protests for their own purposes.  In many cases (in many cities, not just Minneapolis/St. Paul), they are showing up with U-Haul trailers!  These are well-organized thieves taking advantage of other people's grief.  The rioters are mostly agitators of the extreme left and/or the extreme right (at some degree, their antipathy to government becomes essentially indistinguishable from one another); being well-rehearsed, they generally hit and run and disappear before the cops can respond, leaving legitimate protesters to take the tear-gas and the arrests.

I fully support the protesters.  The rioters and looters can burn in hell for all I care.

[faunch]

jknezek and faunch

Wow! You guys are seeing this stuff first hand. I only see it on the TV news.
When the rioters (thugs) burn cars, break windows, throw objects at the police and loot stores, what are they protesting? Am I missing something here?
I have my own thoughts on all these protests (riots). I better keep them to my self.
Faunch - appreciate the pictures, really shows the reality of the situation. Thanks.
You guys stay safe. If the rioters go home, we'll all stay safe! 😔

As Old Auggie noted, the rioters/looters and the protesters are (mostly) NOT the same people (except in Trump's mind).  The great majority of people protesting are indeed peacefully protesting the murder of George Floyd.  A very few of them may get caught up in the excitement and join in the rioting (as jknesek noted about 'mob mentality'), but that is NOT true of most of the protesters. 

The looters/rioters are opportunists riding on the protests for their own purposes.  In many cases (in many cities, not just Minneapolis/St. Paul), they are showing up with U-Haul trailers!  These are well-organized thieves taking advantage of other people's grief.  The rioters are mostly agitators of the extreme left and/or the extreme right (at some degree, their antipathy to government becomes essentially indistinguishable from one another); being well-rehearsed, they generally hit and run and disappear before the cops can respond, leaving legitimate protesters to take the tear-gas and the arrests.

I fully support the protesters.  The rioters and looters can burn in hell for all I care.

Reports of people finding water bottles and containers filled with gasoline and accelerants in alleys in St. Paul...like a few blocks from my house. It terrifies me to think that these a-holes might hit homes and neighborhoods. Also many of the older buildings and new mixed use building have people f-ck-ng living in them. I've also heard the the Cooper's Grocery store on W. 7th has armed civilians standing guard. It's an independently owned store and is literally the only grocery for two miles. They previously had one at the other end of W. 7th and also have one left in Chaska. I think it was also featured as a Red Owl in the movie A Serious Man.

[emma17]

In other news, 22 people were killed and more than 60 wounded last weekend in Chicago.

[SagatagSam]

I know there is a lot of attention being paid to Minneapolis and the protests and riots going on around the country. I'm not trying to diminish the importance of what's going on, but I also need a chance to escape it. That's why I'm here and posting what I'm posting. No disrespect intended.

That being said, I have a question to pose. Assuming the MIAC continues the divisional format (with same alignments) and scheduling formula for the next ten years, how many times will SJU play a crossover game against Macalester?

If the over/under were set at 0.5, I think I'd still take the under.

Or, looking at the top of the Skyline Division, how many times will Bethel play a crossover game against St. Scholastica over the next ten years?

I'm thinking an appropriate over/under for the number of BU-CSS matchups would be 2.5. I think CSS will improve in the MIAC and be able to work its way into the 4 spot in the division (or maybe even the 3, if they catch some breaks) and catch BU during an off year or two.

[OzJohnnie]

@Sam

You would think that they would normally miss 1/2 of the time but I bet Mac plays SJU once every three years or less (assuming they don’t fix up the conferences again in two years). I bet there will be the official divisions which we know about and unofficial divisions of highly competitive and not competitor maintained with scheduling.

I don’t really mind if they do that. I think it could be healthy overall as we don’t want football disparities to make the conference unworkable for a school such that other sports suffer. And this allows the lesser programs, or less nationally ambitious programs, to stay involved with the sport and the recruiting/enrolment it brings.  I reckon this approach has a good chance of being very successful. We’ll see how it goes over the first two years.

Perhaps the Tommies will give it a good launch by beating every easy beat into the turf and making them cry uncle this year.

[OzJohnnie]

Actually, Sam, your post made me think about hazzben's epic insight post near the beginning of the UST affair. There were three complaints, from memory, that motivated the Outers. 1. Personalities; 2. Doomed to be cellar dwellers, and; 3. Beat downs or the "St Olaf punching bags".

The schedule addresses the cellar dweller problem as championship week gives every side a meaningful and level matchup to finish the season. It would make recruiting a lot easier for schools who's current pitch is "you get to use the gym during the week and get smashed on Saturday. It's a hoot!"  And the vote addressed the personality complaint (with a blunt instrument, no doubt).  But the punching bags continues. I wonder if there will be a rules change (clock automatically doesn't stop after a certain lead, must kick for an extra point of up by some amount, etc) or if a gentleman's agreement will keep the beat downs in n check a little better.

[SagatagSam]

This was before my time at SJU, but I thought I have heard explanations for Gagliardi running up the score in the 80s and early 90s. It went like so: the playoffs in those days were limited, there were no auto bids, style points mattered, so beating up on MAC 72-0 (as opposed to say, 50-0) gives a higher probability of getting a bid to the playoffs.

Does this return now with an objectively weaker league in 2021?

[OzJohnnie]

This was before my time at SJU, but I thought I have heard explanations for Gagliardi running up the score in the 80s and early 90s. It went like so: the playoffs in those days were limited, there were no auto bids, style points mattered, so beating up on MAC 72-0 (as opposed to say, 50-0) gives a higher probability of getting a bid to the playoffs.

Does this return now with an objectively weaker league in 2021?

I doubt it will return.  I think that beat downs are something which will be actively avoided in MIAC competition.

Scoring differential is the first tie breaker in every Australian sport I can think of.  My girls have learned to deal with getting utterly smashed in the local netball leagues.  And when their teams have had a turn on top then they have run up the scores with gusto, making up for past thrashings.  It's a system that works well if there's a reasonable chance that everyone will have the opportunity to experience both getting creamed and doing the creaming.  Good for building resilience, I think.

But if you're in a situation where you're getting hammered season after season with no prospect of improving then the free-for-all isn't as useful.  And in the MIAC there are some schools who I think will always have a lesser commitment to creating champion programs.  The disparity between top and bottom will be largely static and quite big.  I think the MIAC needs to keep an environment where teams of vastly different capabilities can compete and still get some value from the competition.

[faunch]

This was before my time at SJU, but I thought I have heard explanations for Gagliardi running up the score in the 80s and early 90s. It went like so: the playoffs in those days were limited, there were no auto bids, style points mattered, so beating up on MAC 72-0 (as opposed to say, 50-0) gives a higher probability of getting a bid to the playoffs.

Does this return now with an objectively weaker league in 2021?

There will still be beat downs...I was at the 98-0 game against CSS. Maybe it's because my team was winning but it didn't seem that bad. I remember sitting there and suddenly thinking how did the score get up to 98? I'm not a fan of running time...the backups (3,4,5th) team players should get a chance to play. One of the problems that day in Collegeville was that it was extremely hot. CSS wasn't very good and their starters were exhausted and the Johnnie reserves were fresh and ran right over them.

[57Johnnie]

Our rec center reopened with a few restrictions. Another codger buddy of mine, originally from Nordeast, and I were the only two people in the cardio area. After about 3 months off, it took us at least 10 minutes to get up to speed 
He went up to the weight area after cardio and said there was only one other fellow up there. We noted that all the pickleball courts were occupied. Truth!

[repete]

This was before my time at SJU, but I thought I have heard explanations for Gagliardi running up the score in the 80s and early 90s. It went like so: the playoffs in those days were limited, there were no auto bids, style points mattered, so beating up on MAC 72-0 (as opposed to say, 50-0) gives a higher probability of getting a bid to the playoffs.

Does this return now with an objectively weaker league in 2021?

Goes back beyond the '80s and '90s. SJU was 9-0 in 1962 and sat ... then we saw what the next season's team did. Likewise, UMD had a 10-0 team that dominated. leading D2 in scoring offense and defense. Northern Sun's soft rep apparently kept that team out of postseason.

[OzJohnnie]

Our rec center reopened with a few restrictions. Another codger buddy of mine, originally from Nordeast, and I were the only two people in the cardio area. After about 3 months off, it took us at least 10 minutes to get up to speed 
He went up to the weight area after cardio and said there was only one other fellow up there. We noted that all the pickleball courts were occupied. Truth!

I don't know if you're a Seinfeld fan or not, 57, but this opportunity can't be resisted.

[57Johnnie]

Our rec center reopened with a few restrictions. Another codger buddy of mine, originally from Nordeast, and I were the only two people in the cardio area. After about 3 months off, it took us at least 10 minutes to get up to speed 
He went up to the weight area after cardio and said there was only one other fellow up there. We noted that all the pickleball courts were occupied. Truth!

I don't know if you're a Seinfeld fan or not, 57, but this opportunity can't be resisted.

+k Oz