I Lost My Phone...

...but there's a happy ending. This only has to do with football in the very most remote sense, but what the heck. You're reading anyway.

My phone fell out of the pocket of one of our equipment bags. I think it actually happened before practice started. But I didn't notice it missing until after practice, then persuaded myself that it was somewhere else in the bag, or that I'd hadn't brought the thing with me anyway.

(I mean, with Weis and Crennel on board now, I'm just not getting the number calls from Todd that I used to get during practice last year, so I should be fine leaving the phone at home.)

So believing the phone safely at home - a fancy Verizon droid phone mind you, with way more stuff than I really know how to use - I left. It was hot, I was tired, and I figured if it wasn't at home it was in one of the  football bags or my clipboard and I'd find it later.

You do this don't you? If you can't find your phone, you call it? I have a rather, ahem, distinctive ringtone that one of my children established for me. Even if I knew how to change it, I probably wouldn't, because it deeply embarrasses my other children and my wife. And that's what I live for.

So I called my missing phone, listening intently for waka waka waaaaaka waka waka waaaaaka waka waka waaaaaka waaaaaaa. (I told you. Distinctive.)

It didn't ring. It didn't ring in the car, or either football bag, or anyplace else in my home.

Now for ordinary football coaches, this would be a nightmare scenario. You've come home from goofing off all night at football practice, and you've lost your fancy cell phone.

"Why Jim" you say, "You don't goof off at practice. You and all the coaches work very hard with our children to give them a great practice, even in the heat and when things are difficult. You're patient, and kind, and the kids have fun, and it certainly doesn't seem to take all night.. you don't seem to be goofing off at all!" To which I respond, yes, thank you so much for noticing and no, it does not seem like goofing off to me at all, except that I must confess - I think practice is fun. By definition you see, anything that I think is fun is defined as 'goofing off' in our household. You may use your imagination to determine which family member of mine might hold this opinion. 


But no, as I said, I'm no ordinary football coach. I am, in fact, a card-carrying, pocket-protecting, bona-fide, full-on, unabashed Geek - and yes, that's Geek with a capital G.

This deep Geekiness has caused me to install several really useful 'apps' upon my Droid phone. App is short-hand for 'application' and it means a little program that runs on a phone. The app that saved my bacon last night is called, as you might expect, FindMyPhone.

FindMyPhone is, at its heart, a text answering machine. When I installed the FindMyPhone application, I told it to do two things, and it does those two things very happily. First, I told it that whenever it receives a text from any phone that says a very special keyword, it will ring like crazy. It will ring even if the phone is on silent. So no matter where I've lost the blamed thing in my house, the waaka waka etc. will reunite me with my cell phone.

Second, I set up another keyword that texts a reply back the exact GPS coordinates of my phone every five minutes, until I tell it to stop.

This is way cool. Because Google maps will show you, within just a couple of feet, the precise location of a set of GPS coordinates.

Last night I sent my text-me-back keyword to my phone from my son's cell phone, and a couple of minutes later he received a text with the following coordinates: 38.92975778333336,-94.82969685

If you key those GPS coordinates into Google Maps, and then switch to their satellite imagery map, you'll get a picture like this one:

Can you see the green arrow? No, no, not the comic book character. The green arrow right beside the long jump runway.

That's where it said my phone was.

By the time I managed to get FindMyPhone to cough up this information, it was dark. (It isn't dark on the picture Mom, because that's an old image, and they just superimposed the arrow over it. They didn't really task me a satellite, so please don't tell Dad that I have that type of power.) So I went back out there with another cell phone, texted the ring command, and sure enough it bird-dogged me right to it. Buried in a deep patch of grass about a foot away from the green arrow location, there was my expensive black phone, upside down and all but invisible to the naked eye.

Like I said, this doesn't have much to do with football, other than the field. But it is sort of a neat story, if you're into that sort of stuff. Plus, I wanted to write about it. More goofing off I guess.

Down, Set....

GO!

At 6:00 p.m. tonight the FCCJC teams of the ONW Ravens 2018 Football Club will gather for their first non-contact practices of 2010. We'll meet on the JV field, inside the track just east of the school. It might not hurt to be five minutes early to help everyone get their forms turned in.

We're expecting 49 players this evening. That's a great number for the three teams. When you add the 18 expected players for the Blue Valley team that will start the following week, we're up to 67 players in the club.

Remember water, helmet, cleats, shorts, t-shirt, and your player contract and physical form (if the contract has been signed by your health care provider, you don't need the physical form.)

From Deep in the Archives - Men in Motion

Hat tip to the New York Times

Even back in 1921, there were issues to settle.

Heisman and Walter Camp Argue About Men in Motion

We're Popular

We have thirty-two players signed up as of today for FCCJC teams. Tomorrow's registration will indicate whether that number will top out in the mid forties, or perhaps even approach fifty players. Coach Swinford reports that the Blue Valley team has eighteen players already, and may not be done yet.

Whatever happens over these last three registrations, we're well on our way to over sixty 5th grade football players in the ONW area.

When I think back to our start in July of 2008, I remember that we had only fourteen ONW boys, and were fortunate the league sent us two out-of-area players to push us up to sixteen.

We've certainly come a long way. ONW Raven football is popular now because, first and foremost, the boys have had fun. Nearly as importantly, our  parents find the club pretty well organized and receptive, and notice that the coaches seem to care that the players learn and that they play safely.

When you combine all of those things - we boil it down as Have Fun, Get Better, Be Safe - you create an environment that is bound to grow.

Kids want to Have Fun. As parents, we like for our kids to have fun too, and we certainly don't mind that organized athletics seems to be a great way to do that.

Kids also understand that coaches are there to try to help them. Most of them this year will discover (if they hadn't already) that success in the game comes with improving their abilities. At just this age kids really begin to grasp the point of athletics beyond participation. This is the age where they earnestly begin to apply the techniques and strategies that coaches give them to make them better players.

As a teacher, that's a rush. A handful of kids at any given moment last year could use those techniques and strategies for greater success. When I consider that SO MANY of them will be able to take that step this year... well, I can hardly wait to get started helping them Get Better. I think parents really like to see that as their kids participate - that's really one of best parts for us.

And of course, we have to Be Safe. There will be bumps and bruises along the way, but we really watch for the dangerous stuff like improper use of the helmet and heat-related issues. If a player or his parent doesn't feel like we're being safe, we're probably not going to have the player very long anyway.

I think by focusing on those three things we've created a growing program. When organizations are in growth mode, their gravity increases. Parents and kids are pulled in to look because they want to know, "Why are so many of our classmates playing football? What's the big deal?" As they discover us, and find that things are pretty much just the way we said they'd be, they get a great feeling about both the sport and the club.

Notes from Pac 10 Country

I'm here in Estes Park, Colorado, and you're not - more's the pity for you.  While I was driving across I-70 Saturday with my youngest and getting pelted with rain, the FCCJC sign up was interrupted, then canceled due to the same weather.

Only two of our players made it through, so the rest of us will have June 26th, July 10th, and July24th, as the three remaining sign up dates. Plenty of chances yet. Please let us know if none of those remaining dates work for you, and we can see about some alternative arrangement.

If you're not familiar with it, Estes Park is a very pretty little town just at the foot of the Rocky Mountain National Park. It is also just north of Boulder, which officially became Pac 10 country last week.

The locals here seem more interested in the outdoors than what conference their local college team calls home. I think that's one of the criticisms of Colorado college sports, but I also think that makes them fit just nicely with their new Pac 10 brethren.

I'm not sure what to think of the new deal. The Big 10 is taking a breath, and I assume the Pac 10 will too. But will the Big 10 make another play for Notre Dame?  Will they use the threat of asking Missouri, Rutgers, Syracuse and Pittsburgh to force Notre Dame's hand? And then will they go ahead and do it?

Nebraska is in for another year, and Colorado is in for two more, last I heard. Will the Big XII look to replace either or both? Would any school in its right mind join this conference, held together as it is with spitballs and bailing wire?

For our age group, I hear rumors of a top-flight team thinking of leaving the Blue Valley League and joining FCCJC. This is piled on top of rumors I heard throughout the spring of who was leaving FCCJC for Blue Valley.

Really, we're just like the big boys - just less money involved.

Finally, dad and baseball coach Joe Pavlovich made me laugh with this drawing of the Big XII's new logo. Hope all of you are having a great summer, and travel safely!

FCCJC Registration #2 on Saturday

The second FCCJC registration day will be this Saturday, from 9:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. at the Heritage Park Football complex at 162nd and Pflumm. Be sure to bring a checkbook and either an FCCJC registration card from a previous season, or a copy of your son's most recent grade card and birth certificate.

Kansas, K-State, Iowa State, and Missouri will be there checking in for their new division, the Leftover Lightweights. Baylor has not been admitted to this point, though sources say the 8th grade National division has made inquiries.

Warning - Another College Football Conference Re-Alignment Post

Rumors are moving VERY rapidly in college football. We've had confirmation of Texas-Big Ten discussions from leaked E-Mails, deadlines imposed on MU and Nebraska, offers rumored on the way from the PAC 10 for six or more Big XII - all this in the last 48 hours!
 
Are we headed toward four 16-team super conferences?
 
One rumor has the Pac 10 inviting half the Big XII (Texas, Texas A&M,  Colorado, Oklahoma, and Oklahoma State) into it's conference. Presumably then Missouri and Nebraska would bolt to the Big 10. If Rutgers from the Big East says yes to the Big 10 as well, that would put them momentarily at fourteen teams.
 
There are two major BCS conferences in the east - the Big East, with eight football playing teams, and the ACC with 12. And the big cheese in all this is the Southeastern conference, with 12 teams and the best football in the country.

Question 1 - will the Southeastern conference sit idly by while the Big XII is pillaged, without making a play for Texas, the Oklahoma schools, or at least A&M?  Question 2, and perhaps the answer to question 1 - will the television contract already in place for the SEC bind them from expansion during this round of expansion free-for-all? Or will they bite the bullet and make a play for four of the Texas/Oklahoma schools?

Back to the east - the ACC is the stronger football league compared to the Big East. Rutgers is already rumored to the Big 10, leaving the Big East with just seven. The football plum remaining in the vulnerable Big East is oddly South Florida - put them down as a target for a sooner-or-later forced-to-expand SEC. The ACC could go after the top four of the remaining six - with it's basketball panache, imagine Syracuse, U-Conn, Louisville, and Cincinnati being in the cross-hairs for the ACC.
 
That would leave Pittsburgh as easy pickings for the Big Ten. Confused? To help clarify (or muddy things further, depending on your point of view) here are the members of what seem to be the target conferences. For the Big East, I've listed the football schools. Remeber, we're talking about four 16-team super conferences - you have to play both football and basketball to be a member.

The 20 Targets

Big 12	Big 12	Big East (fb)	Big East (fb)
Texas	Missouri	South Florida	Rutgers
Texas A&M	Nebraska	Louisville	Pittsburgh
Oklahoma	Colorado	Syracuse	Cincinnati
Oklahoma St	Kansas	U Conn	West Virginia
Texas Tech	Kansas State
Baylor	Iowa State

Let's examine what I call the Pac 10 Grab. In this scenario the Pac 10 successfully swipes the four Big 12 schools they are rumored to desire, and several of the Big East teams move off to greener pastures.

Pac 10 Grab

Pac 10 W	Big 10 W	SEC W	ACC Atlantic
Washington	Missouri	Arkansas	BC
Washington St	Nebraska	Ole Miss	Clemson
Oregon	Iowa	Mississippi St	Florida St
Oregon St	Illinois	LSU	Maryland
Cal	Northwestern	Auburn	NC State
Stanford	Wisconsin	Alabama	Wake Forest
USC	Minnesota	?	Syracuse
UCLA	?	?	UConn
Pac 10 E	Big 10 E	SEC E	ACC Coastal
Arizona	Indiana	Florida	Va Tech
Arizona St	Purdue	Georgia	Ga Tech
Texas	Michigan	Kentucky	Miami
Texas A&M	Michigan St	South Carolina	Virginia
Oklahoma	Ohio St	Tennessee	UNC
Oklahoma St	Penn St	Vanderbuilt	Duke
Texas Tech	Rutgers	South Florida	Louisville
Colorado	?	?	Cincinnati

That scenario leaves two openings in the Big 10 and three openings (someday) in the SEC.
 
Big 10 Commissioner Delaney would give his eye teeth, left gonad, and his mother's wedding ring to get Notre Dame into that open slot in his eastern division. But Notre Dame is already BCS automatic, already has its own TV network, and probably won't budge. They are comfortable as a major independent.
 
Assuming the Irish stand pat, there are six other remaining current automatic BCS teams without a chair as the music winds down. KU and K-State are a nice pair for a basketball conference, but neither the SEC nor the Big 10 think basketball first. KU and Iowa State are members of the American Association of Universities - Baylor and K-State are not. I think those two are both great schools, but somehow the Big Ten seems to think membership in that club is important.  Pittsburgh is an AAU member and OUGHT to be attractive, but they're a private school in a pro-sports, blue-collar type of town. West Virginia has had some football success, and Huggins is an interesting basketball coach - but they're also firmly on the BCS bubble, and not an AAU member.
 
The SEC could invite nearly any of them of course when their television contract expires, and without anywhere else to go, any of them would jump. But perhaps the SEC goes after all four Texas schools to make the Texas legislature happy. That would throw a wrench in the Pac 10's plans, though Colorado and the Oklahoma schools would still be in play for them. But they'd need two more, and KU and K-State would be just sitting there.
 
That scenario I would call the SEC Swallows Texas, and it looks like this:

SEC Swallows Texas

Pac 10 W	Big 10 W	SEC W	ACC Atlantic
Washington	Missouri	Arkansas	BC
Washington St	Nebraska	Ole Miss	Clemson
Oregon	Iowa	Mississippi St	Florida St
Oregon St	Illinois	LSU	Maryland
Cal	Northwestern	Texas	NC State
Stanford	Wisconsin	Texas Tech	Wake Forest
USC	Minnesota	Baylor	Syracuse
UCLA	?	Texas A&M	UConn
Pac 10 E	Big 10 E	SEC E	ACC Coastal
Arizona	Indiana	Florida	Va Tech
Arizona St	Purdue	Georgia	Ga Tech
Colorado	Michigan	Kentucky	Miami
Oklahoma	Michigan St	South Carolina	Virginia
Oklahoma St	Ohio St	Tennessee	UNC
?	Penn St	Vanderbuilt	Duke
?	Rutgers	Alabama	Louisville
?	?	Auburn	Cincinnati

Nothing says the Pac 10 couldn't counter such an SEC play by dumping their bid for Colorado, holding their noses, and offering Baylor - a scenario that should be extremely worrisome to CU.

By the way, no disrespect on my part for Baylor - great school - it's just that Californians aren't clamoring to hang around with Baptists from Waco, TX (and more's the pity - it would be a big cultural improvement for them.)

The flaw in this I think is that the SEC would have trouble breaking OU from Texas - they seem to like playing each other. But since you probably can't break OU and OSU, and you clearly can't break Texas and the Aggies, whether the SEC could get any or all of those, assuming they wanted them, would then probably depend on the Texas legislature.

My latest scenario I call the BigPac.
 
In this alignment, the Big 12 southwest six to the Pac 10 was never really going to happen - it was a rumor designed to flush MU and Nebraska out, as they seemed to be headed that way anyway. The Pac 10 and Big 12 defend themselves against further attrition by jettisoning those two upper Midwestern schools off to colder confines, leaving the remainder free to create a 20 team western super conference. The BigPac would have a Big division and a Pac division. Could this dramatic step have been what Cal-Berkeley Chancellor Rober Birgeneau was alluding to when he predicted a revolution in college athletics?
 
In football each team would play 9 division games games, then a 'tournament' game - 10 plays 10, 9 plays 9, etc. against the other division at the end of the year. The 1 v 1 game is the conference championship, and would move around. Obviously the remaining Big 12 teams all play each other, and the Pac 10 plays all its long-time rivalries, and then there would be the end-of-the-year game. The host for the cross-division game would be determined as each match up was determined, based on whichever team had hosted fewer end-of-the-year games in conference history. In case of tie, the second tie breaker would be evening up the division hosting. You'd do a coin flip after that.


In basketball you'd play your division twice (18) and the other side once (10) creating 28 games. There would be very little non-conference season, absolutely maximizing basketball revenue.

The revolutionary aspect is that it is an entire level beyond what anyone else is thinking. The natural progression of four 16-team super conferences has everybody agog. But does Texas really want to travel further? Do they really want to dump Baylor victories from their schedule? I think this would be an incredibly appealing, have-cake-and-eat-it-too outcome for them. Suddenly they're in a conference that has more competition than the SEC and a full 20 of the 65 auto-bcs teams under it's umbrella. That's quite a sandbox for the Horns to play in.

But for this to happen, the Big 12 and Pac 10 have to know that Nebraska and MU are gone. If those two schools want to stick around and see whether this bigger thing would be a better thing, then fine and we go from there. But Texas really doesn't want to play footsie much more. They have players to buy and championships to win, and all of that is needlessly complicated and delayed while these second-tier programs are fiddling around.

That may be why there is a deadline. Commit - and it's a big financial commitment, you can bet - or go, and don't let the door hit you on the way out.

As a Kansas fan I like this BigPac scenario second best. My first preference is status quo. But you may accuse me of whistling past the graveyard, and you could be right.