Colt Brennan's Nightmare

I came across some old videos. This is probably one of the more frequently requested videos of the ones I used to make.

Isner Loses in 2nd Round of French Open

John Isner fell to Paul Henri-Mathieu in another epic grand slam five set match 6-7, 6-4, 6-4, 3-6, 18-16. I really hate it when I'm right. Here's what I said last night:

This will not be easy, but it's a match Isner should win. I don't think we'll see as routine an outing as John had in round 1. In fact, this could be one of those long matches John has become known for.

I still stand by all of that. This is a match that Isner should have won. He had 98 unforced errors. 98! Granted, 45 came in the 5th set which was 34 games long (that's more games than the first three sets combined). John just didn't have his A game in the 2nd or 3rd set. He got back into a groove in the 4th. In the 5th, Mathieu had the huge advantage of serving first in the fifth set of a grand slam. It's so hard to constantly be playing from behind when you have to win by two.

This probably sounds like sour grapes at the moment, but I think it's time for all grand slams to play a tiebreaker in the 5th like the US Open does. I'm not alone here either.

No tie breaks was the tradition, that doesn't make it right. Whoever wins this match is cooked for the next one, you can't train for this.

— Martina Navratilova (@Martina) May 31, 2012

What really concerns me for John is that the marathon Wimbledon match a few years ago pretty much ruined the rest of his year. Now, that match was much longer and spanned three days. So while this match won't take the same toll, it will still be a significant one. I'd like to see John get some rest and play less tournaments in the hard court season. Specifically, I'd like to see him skip the Winston-Salem tournament right before the US Open, but there is no way he will skip a tournament that close to his home town. Hopefully he will take some measures to rest up and get his body right.

John Isner: French Open Round 2 Schedule

John Isner is scheduled to play Paul-Henri Mathieu of France on center court in round 2 of the French Open on Thursday. Matches start at 11 AM local time, which is 5 AM Eastern. Isner vs. Mathieu will be the third match of the day on center court. If I had to guess, I'd say Isner's match will start somewhere between 8 and 10 AM Eastern.

As I said before, John will be playing against both Mathieu and the partisan crowd. As you can see in the video below, the French crowd loves this guy. Now just imagine the support he'll get on a much larger center court.

This will not be easy, but it's a match Isner should win. I don't think we'll see as routine an outing as John had in round 1. In fact, this could be one of those long matches John has become known for.

Here's the Fed Ex ATP Head 2 Head between Isner and Mathieu.

AJC Fail in Donte' Williams Story

It's good to know that the update to this story was made from Chip Towers's iPhone.

This is what happens when you give technology to print media.

Updates from The Deaner

The Deaner sent me a couple things that I wanted to make sure everyone is aware of.

First up, I saw this tweet from George Foster the other day:

Let da Mrs. pray for me, now hittin da road, jack. Journey begins. #Indy

— George Foster (@GeorgeFoster72) May 28, 2012

I assumed that meant Foster was heading to the Colts, but the Deaner confirmed it by passing this along:

Roster move,signed free agent offensive tackle George Foster and waived fullback Ryan Mahaffey.

— Jim Irsay (@JimIrsay) May 29, 2012

It also sounds like Rennie Curran has a pretty good shot to make the Bucs roster this year. From the Tampa Bay Times:

Though it could be temporary, LB Rennie Curran often has been running with the first team during practices, continuing his attempt to restart his career. The 2010 third-round pick of the Titans spent last season on the sideline after Tennessee cut him. The former Georgia standout is 23 and seems a good fit at weak-side linebacker, where he is lining up. Rookie Lavonte David, on second team, could eventually assume the starting role.

John Isner: French Open Round 1 Schedule

John Isner is scheduled to play in the third match on court 2 tomorrow (Monday) against Rogerio Dutra Silva of Brazil. Play on court 2 begins at 11 am local time. If you have DirecTV, I think you can catch the match on channel 706. Otherwise, you'll need to rely on network coverage. The French Open will be on either ESPN2 or Tennis Channel depending on what time the match starts. Here's the Fed Ex ATP Head 2 Head between Isner and Silva.

French Open Draw Released: Isner's Path to the Quarterfinals

The French Open draw was released today, and I think it sets up nicely for John Isner. For the past few years, tennis has been dominated by the "big four" of Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic, and Andy Murray. Only one of those four, Andy Murray, has yet to win a grand slam tournament. Isner landed in Murray's section of the draw, which is where you want to be.

I think a realistic goal for Isner would be to make the quarterfinals. To do this, he would likely only have to "upset" one opponent. Let's take a look at what Isner's path to the quarterfinals could look like.

For the sake of projecting players forward, I used seed or current ranking. The only exception is with Mathieu over Phau. I just have a feeling the Frenchman will advance in that spot. If this holds, John is facing a player that plays predominantly on clay in every round shown.

Mathieu could be a tough out in round 2. John would be playing against both Mathieu and the partisan crowd. Sticking to the predictions above, Isner would then have to face Spaniards in back to back rounds in Marcel Granollers and David Ferrer.

Can John get through all of these players and face Andy Murray in the quarterfinals? He can, but I would have felt a lot better about it if you'd asked me that question a month ago. However, the odds of this portion of the draw looking like I have it are slim to none. Someone will be upset. I think the winner of the Haase / Youzhny match (no offense to James Blake) has a legitimate shot at taking out Ferrer in the third round.

Play begins on Sunday 5/27, but I don't know when Isner plays yet. The first round is played over three days, so he could play his first round match as late as Tuesday. Bulldawg Blawg will keep you up to date throughout the tournament as long as Isner is involved. Let's hope that is all the way through it!

Isner Ousted from Open de Nice Côte d'Azur

John Isner fell to Nikolay Davydenko 6-4, 7-6(4) today. There was a clear path to the finals for John, as he would be facing American qualifier Brian Baker in the semifinals.

At this point you really have to question Isner's decision to even play in this tournament rather than getting some extra rest for the French Open. It has to be disappointing to only win one match as the number 1 seed. I don't think that is going to give John the confidence boost he was looking for.

Let's hope John can bring back that flow he had going earlier in the clay court season where he downed both Roger Federer and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in Davis Cup, as well as Novak Djokovic at Indian Wells.

Fox Hires Jonas Hayes

Jonas Hayes has been hired as the program coordinator. I'm not exactly sure what that means, but I think I like it. I especially like that I have an excuse to post this basketball card (yes I still have the whole set including Mike Dean's make-up picture). Welcome back Jonas!

Isner Through to Round 3 in Nice

John Isner defeated Xavier Malisse of Belgium 7-6 (3), 7-6 (5) in the 2nd round of the Open de Nice Côte d’Azur today. Tomorrow John will face Nikolay Davydenko of Russia. Davydenko is currently ranked number 53 in the world. He upset the number 7 seed and world number 42 Denis Istomin 6-4, 1-6, 6-3 to earn a crack at Isner. Isner and Davydenko are slated to play on center court after the conclusion of the Thomaz Bellucci vs Gilles Simon match. That match will begin no earlier than 1 pm local time.

Isner is 2-2 against Davydenko for his career. Here's a snapshot of the two head to head from atpworldtour.com.

John Isner in Nice

John Isner decided to play one more tune up prior to the French Open. He is the number one seed in the Open de Nice Côte d’Azur played in Nice, France. Since this is a smaller tournament (only 28 players in the singles draw) the top four seeds get a bye into the second round. John plays his first match against Xavier Malisse of Belgium tomorrow no earlier than 2:30 pm local time on center court. I'll post the results tomorrow.

The AM/PM Retweet

To be blunt, the practice of retweeting your own article multiple times has been annoying me lately. I'm constantly reading the same tweets over and over again. The biggest offenders are people that need page views to be successful. I'm mostly talking about mainstream media here. I haven't witnessed this practice from bloggers so much.

To the right we have exhibit A, a search of my timeline for the phrase "AM RT." Here we see both Bruce Feldman (@bfeldmancbs) and Pete Thamel (@PeteThamelNYT) retweeting links to their own stories. Again, I was annoyed, but should I have been?

Look, I get it. Page views equal money for these guys. They need them to stay employed. It is highly possible that someone could have missed their tweet in the evening and caught the AM RT. This makes the second tweet worth it for the writer, but annoying to me.

Since I was torn as to whether my annoyance was justified, I reached out to social media expert Greg Tirico (@gregt12) to get his thoughts on the matter. Here's what Greg had to say:

I do see duplicate content/retweets at different times of the day. This is totally normal and an accepted practice. The theory being that most people follow hundreds, if not thousands, of accounts. With that much noise you need to say something more than once to get anywhere close to full attention. My personal practices have led me to never post the same thing twice on the same day. But, I will throw up stuff twice (with a different quick spin/perspective) if I notice it getting a lot of retweets or mentions.

Tirico went on to say:

So, yeah...the journalists you follow are compensated based on page view. No doubt about that and it gives them a monetary incentive to tweet often. Duplicated tweets (AM/PM RT) make a lot of sense for them even if they are being slightly annoying. If they spaced it out over a few days (like I do) then the half life of their stories might be an issue. Who cares that Kessler signed at UGA (@marcweiszer PM RT pictured left) two days from now? It's old news at that point from a Twitter perspective.

So, after my exchange with Greg Tirico, I've decided to lay off on Feldman, Thamel, and Weiszer for their practice of AM/PM retweeting. Even if it annoys some people, myself included, it's probably worth the risk of getting more pageviews for their story. Plus, it's not like I've gone and un-followed any of these guys. So how bad could it really have been?

John Isner Falls: Internazionali BNL d'Italia Day Three

John Isner fell to Andreas Seppi of Italy today 2-6, 7-6 (5), 7-5. You can catch a few highlights from the match here. Isner's match starts at around the 3:40 mark.

This is a disappointing exit for John. I thought he'd make it until at least the 3rd round if not the 4th. Let's hope the big guy is able to rest up for a run at Roland Garros. I'll post John's seed and where he lands in the draw for the French Open when it is released.

John Isner Update: Internazionali BNL d'Italia Day Two

John Isner and Sam Querrey lost their first round doubles match to Jurgen Melzer of Austria and Philipp Petzschner of Germany 3-6, 7-6 (7), 10-5. I can't say that I'm surprised by this loss, especially considering Querrey won his singles match against Jarkko Nieminen of Finland 7-6 (4), 5-7, 6-4 earlier today. It's tough to go right back out there and play doubles after a tough 3 setter like that.

Up next for John in singles is Andreas Seppi of Italy. Seppi is currently ranked number 30 in the world. Isner and Seppi are scheduled to be the fourth match played on Pietrangeli court. Play on this court begins at 11AM local time, which is 5AM Eastern. So to be honest, I have no idea when this match will start! My best suggestion is to follow Courtney Nguyen (@SI_BTBaseline). Courtney is all over the ATP, and will likely tweet when the match is set to begin.

Tennis Channel has had great coverage thus far. You should be able to catch the match live depending on who else is playing at the same time. Tennis Channel is on channel 217 for DirecTV subscribers. Check with your provider if you have another service. If you can't get Tennis Channel, you could also get a one month subscription to TennisTV.com for $19.99.

John Isner Update: Internazionali BNL d'Italia Day One

John Isner defeated Philipp Kohlschreiber of Germany in his first round match at the Internazionali BNL d'Italia 2-6, 7-6 (3), 6-2. You can catch a few highlights here. Up next for John is Andreas Seppi of Italy. Seppi is currently ranked number 30 in the world.

Should Isner continue to advance, his likely opponents would be number nine seed Janko Tipsarevic of Serbia in the round of 16, followed by some guy named Roger Federer in the quarterfinals. Isner would most likely then face world number one Novak Djokovic in the semi-finals, followed by some other guy named Rafael Nadal in the finals. Here is a link to the draw if you would like to look at other scenarios.

That all may seem a little ridiculous, but let's not forget Isner has already defeated both Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic earlier this year.

John has tomorrow off as far as single goes, but he will be playing doubles with Sam Querrey. They will face off against Jurgen Melzer of Austria and Philipp Petzschner of Germany.

I'll be sure to keep you posted on John's progress through this tournament. If you have the Tennis Channel, you can catch the matches live. Once Wednesday's schedule of play is announced, I'll post John's match time.

The Return of Deadspin?

The irony of having "the return of" anything in the title of my first post since December is not lost on me. But, I've been reading Deadspin more lately, and who knows maybe that is at least part of the reason I've felt like starting this site back up.

Let's face it, Deadspin pretty much sucked after Will Leitch left. Was Will Leitch the greatest writer there ever was? Not really. But, I always enjoyed reading his take. And for some reason, I think I enjoyed the fact that he referred to himself as "we." (Side note: it took me months of reading his posts before I realized he was talking about himself) At any rate, if Will Leitch wrote it, I was reading it.

(If you haven't read Leitch's book God Save the Fan, it's a good read)

When Leitch left, it wasn't a slow decline. From my perspective, the site took an instant dive and never recovered. That is until recently ... What brought me back to Deadspin? The Sarah Phillips coverage! When this story broke, I couldn't get enough. I found myself going back to Deadspin multiple times a day looking for updates. This was the first time I'd hit up Deadspin more than once in a day since I don't know when.

At this point the story seems to have died down, but I've found myself perusing Deadspin again. I'm not sure if I'll be a Deadspin reader again, but I'm going to give it another shot for now. How about you?

2012 Football Schedule

Combining the non conference slate from SicEmDawgs.com with the official SEC schedule, I came up with this.

Date	Opponent
9/1	Buffalo
9/8	@ Missouri
9/15	Florida Atlantic
9/22	Vanderbilt
9/29	Tennessee
10/6	@ South Carolina
10/13	Bye
10/20	@ Kentucky
10/27	Florida (Jax)
11/3	Ole Miss
11/10	@ Auburn
11/17	Georgia Southern
1/24	Georgia Tech

Don't Get ESPN3.com? No Problem...

Don't get CSS? Having problems watching tonight's game? If you have a lame internet service provider that doesn't allow you to access ESPN3.com like mine, don't worry. There is still hope. All you need is a friend that can access ESPN3.com. Go over to said friend's house, and log on to ESPN3.com. First, verify that you can watch a live event. After that, create an ESPN.com account (don't worry it is free). After you have created your account and are logged in, click on the Remote Access Link. This will allow you to sync your account to remember that you are able to watch ESPN3 events. That's it. When you get back home, just go back to ESPN3.com and sign in to your account. If you can't watch events immediately, click on the Remote Access link again, and you should be golden!

Flea Flicker?

I've heard a lot of people saying Caleb King's fumble was on a flea flicker. I think this video proves that theory wrong, but I'll let you decide for yourself.



My opinion is Caleb never had the ball. When he realized this, he turned away from the oncoming defender to shield himself and attempt to regain possession.

What a Catch

So that game stunk, but AJ's catch was unreal. The video I saw on YouTube was of the video tape your tv variety, so I figured I'd put this up.