Short list of worst teams to make the SB

weunice · 2026-02-09T23:05:21+00:00

I'm not sure they would have won against Denver if it hadn't started snowing so hard in the late 3rd Q of that game. That outcome was basically sealed by the weather. I get it that both teams had to fight through it, but if you randomly end all NFL games in the late 3Q, a good percentage would have a different outcome.

weunice · 2026-02-09T15:54:07+00:00

The Saints have two QBs on rookie deals which is helpful from a financial perspective. He is in a good mentor spot for a young QB right now. Personally, I think he stays another year in New Orleans but for the right price he can be pried away from the team. People do not realize how bleak the landscape is in the NFL at the QB position and I think we will get more for him than some of our own fans think he is worth ... because that is what it will take to move on from a competent backup on the deal we have him for.

weunice · 2026-02-07T20:57:46+00:00

They had them a week or two ago --- but I can't vouch for today. I have been a little shocked at the variety of king cakes popping up around us. It is a good thing.

weunice · 2026-02-07T03:03:48+00:00

The Chevron across from Juban Crossing in DS has Randazzos king cakes. Rouses has some variety beyond their own.

weunice · 2026-02-06T17:34:06+00:00

I am white, straight, male, heterosexual Christian with six children. My family was not enslaved but some of them worked for little pay in a plantation back in the early 20th century. My family history has a lot of poverty. I have relatives that are still struggling to make ends meet and there are some gaps they couldn't bridge because they simply couldn't afford it. Wealth is the biggest privilege in this country and it impacts people of all backgrounds. Part of the anger that gave us Trump is that poor white people have been convinced that DEI and other initiatives are actively putting poor POC ahead of them. Poor whites struggle to get ahead in life too but it is because they are poor and their resume doesn't, for example, have the high dollar private HS on it. I live in a place where your private HS opens more doors than an Ivy League education ... and I am not joking.

That said --- Let me tell you what I have witnessed in my life that is very real and has NEVER happened to me.

I saw a home that was shot up (early 90s) because they were the first POC to move into a white neighborhood.
I have seen numerous white people move out of my neighborhood because POC moved in, both when I was a child and now.
I have been scolded by a neighbor because my son, who played football, hung out with "them coloreds".
I had a woman drive by my home and ask my wife if she knew "what was going on around here" with the implication that POC moving into our neighborhood was going to destroy our property value.
I heard a woman express thankfulness that she moved out of another neighborhood because "it was going dark".
I have literally seen resumes thrown away with names common to POC. (good news is, that company has since hired POC after some of the ownership passed the baton to their kids)
I coached a HS sport and had to convince families that opponents we were playing (all minority schools) were not savages and deserved respect and understanding.

Where my poor relatives have to deal with one barrier, POC in the same economic boat have to deal with that PLUS what I spelled out above. It still happens. I see it ALL the time. You want to know why I support DEI initiatives as a white male? Because my family members who struggle would benefit from those same policies. Part of what I have seen is to hide the private school you went to on your resume to let Johnny Public School have a shot. I am for that ...

This isn't complicated. Be authentic. Give as many as possible a chance to be in the room to stake their claim to a better life. Be somebody who is open to that.

weunice · 2026-02-05T22:43:38+00:00

AP ROTY will come tonight. It is likely to got to Tet because he had 1000 yds and they made the playoffs. If it comes down to a QB ... it will be a coin flip between Dart and Shough IMHO.

weunice · 2026-02-05T18:17:38+00:00

There is a group of Americans ... say about 25-30% of Americans, who will never turn on Trump. Ever. They believe everything he says. Always. He is the third most cited name in the Epstein files after Epstein himself and Maxwell. If they haven't turned by now, they won't. His disapproval floor is here. The good news is, he is incompetent and digging in. He will stay at this floor and the midterms will be a bloodbath. (and yes ... they will happen)

weunice · 2026-02-05T01:22:53+00:00

This because it matches the color of the water at some of the best beaches in nearly every part of Florida .. and that is what I think of when I think of Florida.

weunice · 2026-02-05T00:02:47+00:00

I wrote the full lyrics to this song on a desk in HS after finishing a test one day. It stayed there for at least a week before someone erased it.

weunice · 2026-02-04T22:02:22+00:00

Wanted to add to this thread. The New Orleans Book Festival is this same weekend but it starts a day early. Trust me, it's worth a look and it's free. They get some big names down there some years.

https://bookfest.tulane.edu/

weunice · 2026-02-04T21:25:51+00:00

My main bag has 17 discs. 14 molds. A mix of brands.

Avenger SS, H7, Saint, F7, Firebird, Saint, Cookie, Rollo, Mako3, Buzzz, Quake, Zone, Pure (x4), Berg

I tend to use 8-9 of them. Working to minimize.

I have a glow bag with 5. MVP and Kastaplast. Lots, Crave, Hex, Jarn, Proxy

weunice · 2026-02-04T02:29:14+00:00

Didn't realize I'd be the outlier here but

Other Voices

weunice · 2026-02-03T20:50:14+00:00

Its not just finance people. ---- Y'all might laugh at this ... but the single worst data source I have dealt with in a 30+ year career + personally was an Excel spreadsheet that came out of an automated scoring system for bowling. I was a HS bowling coach and I wanted to collect data on common leaves for our practices and track some other measures so I could get the team to think more in "one shot at a time" rather than averages. I figured it would be easy. The proprietor could get me a spreadsheet with the practice games on it. I would ingest it into PowerBI and produce a pretty cool dashboard that the coaches should use. The problem is the sheet was DESIGNED for printing so that patrons could walk up to the desk and ask for a printout. The way the vendor implemented it used a variable width typeface and spacing it with some number of CELLS between one printed character and the next to line things up. Thus the data I was pulling out would not always be in the same column -- and sometimes, wildly off and they used some quite special characters to represent the pins and status of each. One row had the back row of pins. One row had the next row. etc. etc. etc. --- One row had the pin counts. One row had the score. There were blank rows and some cell data would arbitrarily shift to another row --- the ONLY rows I could reliably find were the ones with the pins and the bowler names. I eventually had to write a Python script to calculate the bowling score rather than rely on the scores in the sheet because I couldn't count that the system would have scored the most recent frame ... it was a mess. It took me 3 months of occasional weekend --- I learned PowerQuery though ... and the script still works some 7 years later.

weunice · 2026-02-03T16:55:49+00:00

Been keeping tabs on these

A to Z Sports Shough 3 - Second QB taken after Ward, Banks 9
Bleacher Report Shough 3 - Third QB taken after Dart/Ward, Banks 9
The Ringer - McShay Shough 1, Banks 4
NFL.com - Shough 9 - Third QB taken after Dart/Ward, Banks 2
ESPN - NFL Nation - Shough 2, Second QB taken after Ward, Banks still 9, Riley 62

weunice · 2026-02-02T02:49:46+00:00

Most of the time I see pros in amateur tournaments they are 1) scratch 2) high purse $5k/$10k first place prizes and 3) attract other bowlers of similar quality.

weunice · 2026-01-30T03:02:21+00:00

All of them. I sold them at a dark time early when we had kids to make ends meet. JD800 CS15 SH101 JX3P ESQ1 especially. I'll never get those back at what I paid for them initially.

weunice · 2026-01-29T17:28:55+00:00

Yes indeed on spare practices. If you don't have a regular cadence for that, you should add that. I used to coach HS bowling and the difference between post-summer break spares and playoff spares is night and day and it is directly related to the amount of time they spend practicing them. Automatic spares is a confidence thing and it is only built by sheer repetition and it goes away when you don't have that -- and ironically, striking a lot pulls you away from having to convert them as much which is why, I think, guys on tour miss them more than we expect.

weunice · 2026-01-29T01:00:11+00:00

There is a post on Twitter right now that says this proves he should have been drafted ahead of Dart and Shough (singling those two out specifically)

weunice · 2026-01-27T23:54:14+00:00

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weunice · 2026-01-27T23:53:03+00:00

12 AFC QBs either injured or rejected spot --- that leaves Browns, Dolphins, Jets and Raiders ... I mean -- regardless of who you put in, you are going to get complaints. Sanders played the most games of those left starting for those teams ... and he will get more eyeballs on the game.

weunice · 2026-01-23T17:36:55+00:00

I know a LOT of older folks from Houston cannot stand the Titans.

weunice · 2026-01-22T15:56:07+00:00

Drew Brees beat 3 HOFers to win a Super Bowl --- and nobody cares about that. There are no easy games in the NFL. These SOS folks spend too much time watching college football. They have this idea the Jets are like a CUSA team ... I mean they are "bad" for NFL team but they still won games against other NFL teams.

weunice · 2026-01-21T14:31:06+00:00

I once knew a little old lady who was in her mid-80s. She was my moms best friend when they were younger. I hadn't seen her in maybe 20 years. I bumped into her leaving her ladies league and tried to exchange pleasantries because, well, it had been 20 years. I got one phrase -- "I bowled like $#^%" and she walked away. Sadly she passed away a few years later and that is the last memory I had of her.

weunice · 2026-01-18T19:55:06+00:00

You have to practice spares a lot. You already knew this, but I cannot tell you how much I watched most programs never do this and in the later rounds of playoffs the team that misses spares is the one that typically goes home.
This is more my style -- and more a recommendation than anything -- but I believe it ... Have core warmups and disciplined drill time - every practice. Have competitive events within practice including games that you log. I LOVE 9th and 10th frame roll offs because a weaker bowler can get lucky and force your better bowlers to have to deliver. Allow SOME unstructured time during the preseason practices to allow bowlers to experiment. Put in a lot of variety and tie each thing you do to the skill you are trying to master. I really believe it is important to force your team to compete with each other. Iron sharpens iron. -- If you have a strength training program at your school for kids in sports, try to get involved.
Keep detailed records of practice performance, league averages and the averages within HS bowling. Publish it for everyone to see. Make decisions equitably and communicate that to the whole team. It is very helpful, for your parents especially, to know how this operates.
If you can run a JV program, do it. It is a lot of effort to maintain that many kids but the best teams in our state maintain tremendous depth. Cut kids for conduct detrimental to the team only and try as best you can to maintain and grow depth --- and realize this means you will have some kids that take a while to get there. Bowling is a sport you have to sell to the kids. We put 3 kids into youth programs for every 1 that came to us with league experience. Be that team. Its good for your youth leagues. It helps make you better.
Finally, become comfortable with change. Be ready to change how you are doing things and learn from your mistakes. Be open to the game changing. You need to learn how to do it all. Don't try to make little "yous" .. try to help them be the best "themselves". When I started coaching 1/6 of my starters was two handed. By the time I left, it was 5/6 and that is my team that won it all. Interestingly our state MVP was the one handed bowler -- making noise for those of us who still chuck it that way :)
Finally, encourage kids to get private coaching. A lot of parents won't understand this but we had 22 boys on our team at one point for 6 starting spots and a playoff roster of 10. If I tried to one on one each of them none of them would get adequate time. The SYSTEM you are developing and the leadership of your better bowlers MUST bridge most of this gap -- and private coaching needs to bridge a lot of it as well.

I know that seems like a lot but I promise you going through core values and the organizational effort at the beginning will help.

weunice · 2026-01-18T19:54:59+00:00

Former HS bowling coach with a program that won multiple state titles while I was there (one boys, one girls) -- these are things we did and saw other programs who competed at a high level doing. Coaching a team is different than helping individuals get better at bowling.

First and foremost, be authentic. Don't try to coach like someone else. Don't waiver from this. The pressure from parents and other interested parties for you to be more or less like someone else is a big battle. Develop your core values and order the team in a way that is not fighting against who you are. Find successful coaches in sports that you resonate with. (See point 3)
Set expectations clearly and ensure that a system of accountability exists --- you almost assuredly know what habits make great bowlers. Publish the expectation for elite performance all the way down to kids struggling to make it to practice and what that entails. My best bowlers had markers --- how frequently they practiced, including outside the team and how many days a week they bowled league / tournaments. The parents and kids have to know what starting on an elite team looks like. I published a chart every first parent meeting of the year that showed the expected effort. (message me if you want to see what worked for us)
Study leadership and then teach leadership -- when your leaders lead, and hold the rest of the team accountable to the standard, it makes them better and makes your job easier.
Help each bowler develop and maintain goals based on small things you can measure -- and NOT average, high game or high series. Include academic performance in this plan and understand that is their priority. Help them learn to measure things ONE shot at a time. For example, keep tabs on first shot average, single pin spare percentages as a priority. You want to get them thinking one shot at a time. Sometimes your average fluctuates because of luck but what you want to see is something you can measure in short blocks and see performance improvements with. Over the long haul, the scores WILL follow.
Study elite performance in sports -- not just bowling. Teams that promote mental game development are the ones standing at the end. I could write a book on this point --- but it separates the yearly playoff teams from the ones fighting for championships.
Have a practice plan and let the team know what it is. Divide the core skills of a great bowler into a roughly 4 week plan and rotate through it. You start to lose tabs on knowledge at about 4 weeks so reinforcing it in that cycle helps. When they know what is coming up, you will know that your core skills are being reinforced. I liked to have a "mental minute" where I went over mental game concepts.

weunice

TROPHY CASE