FUMBLE!!

Punxsutawney Phil

Yea or Nay? We'll know soon.

Snow Snickers

In honor of the first significant snowfall in East Tennessee in 14 years, here is an homage to my favorite cartoon strip of all time. Calvin & Hobbes:

Here they come...

The Lane Kiffin jokes are starting to pop up. Props to Judy from Facebook for posting one that actually made me chuckle.

"Richard Rice REPORTS FROM LA say Layla Kiffin believes Big Orange fans hated her hubby from the beginning: "Every store I went to, even when we first got to Knoxville, had "FIRE LANE" painted in the parking lot!! Can you believe that???"
LOL!"

Mud Football

Honestly. Did you ever think you'd see the day a Republican took the former Senate seat of Ted Kennedy? To me, politics is kinda like playing football in the mud. I don't want to do it, but it's fun to watch.

The next few weeks and months should be interesting to say the least.

Until now, I've seen very little video from the earthquake devastation in Haiti. I've read several stories and thought I understood just how unbelievably bad it really is.

Then I saw 60 Minutes Sunday night.

Spend 11 minutes focused on nothing but the 60 Minutes story. The destruction, death, and dire circumstances now found in the island country, are simply incomprehensible.

And it's seemingly getting worse every day.

Farewell Fiasco

A few hours after former Vol head football coach Lane Kiffin said "sayonara, adios, and later dude" to the University of Tennessee, he wanted to meet with the media one last time. Kiffin didn't want his comments broadcast live, or even recorded at first.

He wanted to speak to the media on the record, but off the recorder, then let the cameras roll to tape his goodbyes. Normally, the media will ban together and refuse such demands, but this time it was obvious that getting something from Kiffin was much better than getting nothing, so most agreed. The drama began when a tv news director refused to meet Kiffin's demands and said his camera would record from the moment the former coach walked in. His argument was, why should tv cameras but forced off, when radio and newspaper tape recorders would be rolling.

Thankfully, someone was recording the pre-presser drama, which turned into an absolute fiasco. A fitting end to Kiffin's tenure at Tennessee.

Later Vols

Lane Kiffin got the opportunity of his lifetime, and he took it. Honestly, I don't blame the guy. Who in their right mind would turn down their "dream job?" No one, that's who. Many Tennessee fans are wildly upset. Honestly, I don't blame them either. I'm upset to, I fully understand that reaction. What I'm curious about is why are we mad.

Is there anger because we were excited that the football program appeared to be heading in the right direction?

Is it because there was no warning about Kiffin's departure and it literally blew out of nowhere?

Embarrassment?

Maybe it's the way the situation was handled by Kiffin. He hastily called a news conference to make the announcement, then demanded there be no cameras present (our photog didn't budge) nor did he take any questions. Heck, he didn't even sit down at the press conference. Why not just make the announcement by posting on Facebook?

Facebook post: Lane Kiffin is leaving Tennessee and joining USC! (243,967 vol fan dislike this)

Kiffin had Tennessee fans from day one. Most of us loved the way he stirred the pot from time to time, (singing Rocky Top all night long" ring a bell?) We loved the enthusiasm and dedication of his assistants, he even appears to be a pretty good coach himself.

The one thing missing?

USC is his dream job, not Tennessee. And there's really no one to blame for that. But we sure as heck can be mad about it.

Time to "Fess-Up"

OK, be honest. Raise your hand if you really thought the Tennessee basketball team had a legitimate shot at beating the number one ranked Kansas Jayhawks Sunday night.

For the record, my hand is at my side. I even thought it would be considered a good performance if Tennessee could stay within ten points of the Jayhawks.

Final score, Tennessee 76, Kansas 68. Boy, being wrong never felt so good, and now I must tell Bruce and the Boys that I am truly sorry.

Sorry for thinking that having four players arrested and removed from the team would be too much of a distraction to overcome. Not realizing that a basketball game might be the perfect safe haven from all the team turmoil.

Sorry for thinking that, even without the Tennessee suspensions, Kansas was likely the better team. Forgetting that it's not the size of the players, but the size of the heart in the player that is really important.

Sorry for thinking that the season went up in smoke on New Year's Day. Reminding myself now that "you just never know," and that's why the games are played.

Whew....I feel better.

Moments after the huge win, Coach Pearl told the team to "never settle." After Sunday's gritty and determined effort, I really doubt that is going to be an issue the rest of the season.

TMZ, Rarely Wrong - Conan Out, Leno Back In

Gossip website or not, TMZ often scoops the big boy news agencies and is often correct with their scoops. Here's their latest big name headline: NBC Shakeup -- Jay Leno Comes Out on Top

The Decade's Best

Seems we always hear about the negative side of sports, it's easy to forget there's an emotionally wonderful aspect of the games too.

Here are some of the decade's best.

High Flying

It's not very often that I have one of those days where, at least for a brief moment, I wish I had done something different in my career.

Wednesday, was one of those days.

I interviewed Barry Wilmore Wednesday morning. Barry is from Mount Juliet and a graduate of UT. He is married and now lives in Houston, Texas.

And oh yeah, he's capable of piloting the Space Shuttle. Pretty cool, huh?

Barry was behind the controls when the Shuttle Atlantis blasted off on November 16, 2009 heading to the International Space Station. He also guided the Shuttle to a picture perfect landing 11 days later. "I wasn't afraid, we are well trained and I was ready. I knew my role during launch, we do multiple training events where we train for malfunction scenarios. It is a comforting feeling knowing that your trainers and the system NASA has, gets you ready to go and you feel comfortable with anything that might happen."

The astronaut says the four and a half million pound shuttle flies through space at 17,500 miles per hour. There are no speed traps and no red light cameras to worry about. Just one heck of a view of the world literally zipping by. "It was strange to look out the window and see Australia, then a couple of a minutes later you look out the window and there's Hawaii. An hour later you see China, then Japan is floating by underneath you. It's unreal."

He's ready, willing and able, but with the shuttle program being phased out by NASA, there are no space missions in Barry's future. And he's quite okay with that. "For me, flying in space is not the end all, be all. As a wordily experience, I don't know what could top it. But as far as the big scheme of things, and when I think about my eternal existence and the reason I'm here, to glorify my Lord, it is very insignificant."

Unless someone makes a huge mistake, I'll never sit in space ship and I'll never orbit the earth. But for a few minutes during my interview with an astronaut, I got about as close as possible. And in my world, that's pretty cool as well.