Twitter Tuesday: the best one yet has Chiefs, Border War, hobbits, Royals, referees, Gisele, Todd Haley, storming the court, and the best decathlon ever

3 months, 1 week ago

Twitter Tuesday: the best one yet has Chiefs, Border War, hobbits, Royals, referees, Gisele, Todd Haley, storming the court, and the best decathlon ever

Sam Mellinger

Let’s just get right to it:

@davidmwhited Inspite of a being a former Chief assistant, I was surprised with the Mcarthy hire in GB, but now he’s a top notch HC.

This is a reference, of course, to the Chiefs hiring Brian Daboll as offensive coordinator and it’s a fair point.

Daboll has been fired twice in three years, but it’s also true that he happened to be joining coaching staffs on the way out. You bring up Packers coach Mike McCarthy, and it’s a good example, but the most famous is obviously Bill Belichick failing in Cleveland and then going HAM on the football world in New England.

The NFL is more about fit than I think any of us really understand, especially with coaches and quarterbacks.

So, yes, like I said in the column, this might be a good hire. There’s just nothing substantial you can take from either of his two previous tries as offensive coordinator to be convinced of it.

In that strange way, Daboll is on his third OC job, and still being projected on potential.

@EvanUebe 2012 Final 4, NBA Finals, WS, and next Supre Bowl predictions. Just for the hell of it.

That’s easy: Kentucky, Syracuse, Missouri and Kansas^; Heat-Thunder; Angels-Cardinals; Packers-Texans^^.

^ This might break Kansas City’s corner of the internet.

^^ I reserve the right to change my mind on any and all of these, as soon as five minutes from now. Basically, these are what I think would be the most interesting matchups.

@EricHe1091 in case you forgot mine, it was which will happen first: chiefs making afc championship game, or royals winning their division?

Common theme here on Twitter Tuesdays is measuring the two teams’ building process, and I’m not sure I have a consistent answer as much as a consistent thought:

Very generally speaking, the Royals have done more to make themselves a contender but the Chiefs are in the right league to make a quick jump up.

Depending on how quickly the Tigers age and a few other factors, the Royals could conceivably be the division favorites as early as next year. Either way, I do think they’ll make the playoffs at least once in what we might refer to from here on out as The Eric Hosmer Window^.

^ Defined as the six years remaining until he becomes a free agent and signs a $100 million contract with someone.

And for the Chiefs to make the AFC championship game, you’re asking them to win at least one playoff game, depending on whether they get a first-round bye. You might’ve heard they haven’t won a playoff game since 1993.

So I’m going with the Royals. At least today.

Ask next week and I might change my stupid mind.

@ApexToApex Please include something that tells any of my fellow KU fans blaming the refs for the loss to MU that they are ignorant.

Blaming the referees, in any sport, is almost always the loser’s lament. It’s lazy, if nothing else. I’m not really sure if the charge on Taylor was a good call or not. Most of the time I think it wasn’t. But it was close, close enough that you can reasonably expect that call in Columbia but the same play might be a block in Lawrence^.

^ Here is a DKTM recommended read on this and many other subjects.

Bottom line, KU was up eight with three minutes left. Gotta finish. Blaming the refs after blowing a lead like that is a bad look.

@The_TimboSlice what a job, watch sports and write about it. Run out of ideas, ask people for permission to steal theirs…

SHHHHH!!!!

@TweetsbyVamosi how far are the #Chiefs from the Super Bowl in this age of parity? it seems pretty far and are the bizzaro #Patriots

That came to me the other night at the game. Watching those two teams, I mean, to me the Chiefs are OBVIOUSLY inferior to both. A couple things that hit me:

One of the Chiefs’ biggest strengths is their wide receivers and tight end, but are Matt Cassel’s options any better than Eli Manning’s or Tom Brady’s. No. I’d say worse.
One of the Chiefs’ biggest strengths is Tamba Hali, but the Giants have four badass pass rushers. The Patriots have two guys who got 10 sacks.

Aside from the Patriots’ laughable secondary, there isn’t a glaring weakness on either team^ like the Chiefs have with depth or the offensive line. And both teams, of course, have a much better quarterback.

^ You could say the Giants’ rushing attack, but Ahmad Bradshaw is really good when healthy. He just hasn’t been healthy.

So I guess my answer is honest but one that could also be read as a cop-out: right now, I feel like they’re a long way off. But in the NFL, teams seem to close gaps pretty quickly.

@Martin26M Gisele needs to learn to eat a sandwich without puking it up after. Who does she blame for the safety and 9 points it cost

Gisele can do whatever she wants with that sandwich.

@patronaut0709 Actually I have a serious question. How much are the Steelers going to regret hiring Toddy haley?

I think I’m in the minority, but I think Todd can be a really good coach in the right situation. He’s certainly not blameless for how it dissolved in Kansas City, but he’s a smart guy, motivated, gutsy, and I think improved a lot from the time he arrived to the time he was fired.

The Steelers don’t make a lot of mistakes, and you can pretty easily imagine that being OC of that team — Todd’s father’s team — is close to a dream job.

So I actually think Todd will be good there.

@CowboyAtLaw #Aggies vs #Horns bigger game than #BorderWar … Ready Go!

False.

@TheBeertree Over under ku winning by 10 points on the ku/mu game in lawrence?

Right now, I’d take the over, because of the rhythm of college basketball and the craziness of Allen Fieldhouse and the vision of KU controlling 34 minutes of the game in Columbia.

@Williams_RC Should KU put pride aside and play MU after this year?

YES!!!

I strongly disagree with what Bill Self said after the game the other night about fans not driving the bus. I hope he’d take that comment back if given a chance, because it’s a bad look. Fans are the reason he makes $3 million a year and gets to coach home games in one of the country’s best atmospheres.

This might be a column at some point, but for now, I’ll repeat what I’ve said on here before: KU-MU is fun and interesting, and sports need more of that, not less. It’s also damn profitable, no matter the nonsense I hear from some KU fans about making as much or more money playing Davidson or whatever.

And I also don’t want to hear from Mizzou fans about not caring about the rivalry. Or KU fans, for that matter. If people didn’t care about the rivalry, my inbox wouldn’t look like it does, Mizzou Arena wouldn’t have felt like it did, and there wouldn’t be $50,000 KU donors who either can’t get tickets or can only get one or two to the game on Feb. 25.

Play the freaking game. Embrace the hatred.

@katiehollar Twitter Tuesday: If I had an Olympic decathlon with teams from the NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB and MLS competing, who wins?

I’m working off the assumption that every athlete in each of these leagues is down, and will give their very best effort. Just to refresh, the decathlon events are:

100 meters, long jump, shot put, high jump, 400 meters, 110 meter hurdles, discus, pole vault, javelin, and 1500 meters.

I’m eliminating baseball right away. There are some terrific athletes in baseball, obviously, but not the same depth and their sport is too specific to translate to these types of events.

I’m also taking off MLS. Very generally, MLS players probably look the most like Olympic decathletes. I’d expect them to win the 1500 meters and show well in some of the other events, but you presented this as a team deal, so I think there isn’t as much variety to choose from as the other sports.

That brings us down to the NFL and NBA. Tale of the tape:

100 meters: Chris Johnson vs Derrick Rose. Johnson gets to take his pads off, Rose gets to run without a ball. I’m taking Johnson, but I might be swayed by the lack of a chain around Rose’s neck bragging about this 40-time.

Long jump: Knowshon Moreno vs Serge Ibaka. Purposely used Ibaka here, and not Jordan or Dr. J or any of the other more famous free throw line dunks to drive home the point that a LOT of guys in the NBA can do this. Advantage NBA.

Shot put: Ben Wallace vs. Casey Hampton. Wallace is more cut, but Hampton looks more like the guys you see in the Olympics. Girth wins. NFL.

High jump: Jerome Simpson vs. LeBron James.. LeBron is the NBA’s best argument in this. He could be in just about any of these events. NBA^.

^ I’m running out of video clips worth your time, so the rest of these will be less specific.

400 meters: I have no idea what the exact matchup would be, but the longer the distance the more I lean toward NBA guys. Theirs is a much more fluid sport, so the bursts that NFL players are used to grow less and less relevant.

110 meter hurdles: If it was Derrick Rose against Calvin Johnson, that’d be pretty sweet, right? I’m taking Rose’s explosion and athleticism. Easy to forget Johnson’s only two inches taller.

Discus: This requires strength. NFL.

Pole vault: No idea. Neither do you. I’ll guess NBA.

Javelin: Another strength event, and it’s pretty easy to imagine a defensive end, linebacker or tight end being tough here. NFL.

1500 meters: I go back to the burst nature of the NFL, so the answer is the better stamina of NBA guys.

Final score: NBA 6, NFL 4.

That’s science.

@SteveMac5000 Watching the Giants makes me want to draft 6 DL in April. #TT.

Gil Brandt brings up a good point that’s easy lose with all our focus on quarterbacks: since 2002, not only has every Super Bowl champion had a very good quarterback, but they’ve also had at least two strong pass rushers.

The Giants have at least three, depending on how you look at it.

The Chiefs have one, depending on how you look at it.

@Alolli707 how does the ap poll justify #ku moving up one spot after a loss?

Because Duke, which was ahead of KU, lost to Miami. At home. KU lost a close game to a top five team that happens to be their biggest rival on the road. That’s about as good a loss as you can have.

Also, rankings mean squat.

@davidgfunk What the best way to tell someone that you want to choke slam their life?

That seems like the kind of message you should deliver in person. A text message would be too impersonal.

@bdn723 How many road losses does KU have since Self arrived that didn’t result in the court getting stormed? Says a lot about Self. #TT

Not storming the court is the new storming the court. I’m not sure exactly when this happened, but we passed a tipping point where storming the court — or, more specifically, NOT storming the court — became a status symbol.

Fans at most programs storm the court. Fans at the best programs do not.

It used to be a celebration, all in good fun to storm the court, but now the act of not storming the court says even more.

It was interesting to see Kim English and a few other MU players holding their arms up to stop the fans from storming the other night.

I forget what game it was^, but a few years back KU had a big win at home, and after a few fans stormed the court the rest of them in the stands booed them off.

^ @mike_blur points out it was the Nick Collison game back in 2003.

It’s telling.

@EricHe1091 Royals will win the division this year if ______.

To me it’s all about the rotation. That’s the obvious answer, but sometimes the obvious answer is the right answer.

They need Jonathan Sanchez or Luke Hochevar, especially, to be a front-line kind of guy. The Royals don’t have Justin Verlander here, but they need to at least have an All-Star type of guy.

@shaunk3000 Any chance Pioli tries to bring Gisele to KC next year to make excuses for Cassel #PatriotWay #twitterTuesday

OK, that’s not bad.

@jeremyneely Follow-up on the CJs trip. On a hotness scale of 1 to 10 (with 10 as the hottest), where do your wing orders typically fall?

Love the hot. My sweet spot is probably an eight or a nine, but the key is to have the spice be tasty, rather than just gratuitous spice for spice’s sake. Nobody pulls this off better than the Peanut.

Also, does C.J.’s really close at 8 p.m. on regular Saturday nights? That’s one of the most bizarre things I’ve ever heard.