-3rd Quarter ended at my school, thus epic grading commenced.
-Band is on a mini-break to focus on school/work related duties.
-Online poker has completely died and shut down, but it looks like player funds will be returnable.
-I’ve been playing the Nintendo DS in 2011 already more than I played it in 2010.
-I logged into triple triad extremefor the first time in a few years.
-Gave John my address, so he probably is sending me something notable.
-I’ve been actively trying to buy Marvel vs. Capcom 3
-I got my tax return.
-The Dodgers got taken over my Major League Baseball because their ownership is too inept.

Podcast worthy? Nah not yet. I do have the NBA Playoff Preview that Dan and I recorded to throw up here. Then I have an NFL draft special to do, and maybe a spacetalk. After that, expect a pretty cool guest that nearly all of my readers/listeners know, but haven’t heard from in a year or two.

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Download Here (Right Click, Save As)

The YouTube video that saved the JOPKast.

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“The Room” on Rotten Tomatoes

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Download Here (Right Click, Save As)

Download Here (Right Click, Save As)

Download Here (Right Click, Save As)

As a lifelong Dodgers (no explanation) fan, my interest in baseball has never really picked up until June or July every year. Maybe it’s because I’m too engrossed in the infancies of new auto racing seasons (shout out to Sebastian Vettel for picking up where he left off in the Formula1 race over the weekend). Maybe it’s because I’m preparing for another heartbreak in the playoffs of the NHL and NBA (thank you for sparing me this year Avs and Jazz). Maybe it’s just because the season is so damn long, in a sport that you simply cannot find any true indicators because even a month of baseball is just too small a sample size, that the first three months of the season are irrelevant (2008 Orioles).

But for the first time I can ever really remember, I can’t wait for the start of baseball. I couldn’t pick a worse season to get excited about as a Dodgers fan; the team is an absolute shitstorm. No one really knows who the owner(s) is/are thanks to a court ruling giving Jamie McCourt half of her husbands team through divorce settlements. This equates to deflated payroll, which leads to a depleted roster. Normally, teams can sense rebuilding years approaching a few years in advance, and can harvest draft picks and develop a strong farm system to rebuild from the bottom up. We saw this many years ago in 2003 with the Marlins and Twins, 2008 with the Brewers and Rays, last season with the Giants and Padres, potentially this season again with the Marlins, and one day down the road hopefully for teams like the Royals, Nationals, and Mariners.

But the Dodgers were thrown into this so suddenly, there was no time to prepare any future stars. All hope of any kind of minor league prospects were traded away to acquire free agents, with hopes of reaching the world series for the first time in twenty years. A total of 21 minor league prospects have been traded away since 2006; the Dodgers had Manny Ramirez, Jeff Kent, Jim Thome, Scott Posednik, Jason Schmidt, Ronnie Belliard, Juan Castro, Mark Loretta, Orlando Hudson, Randy Wolf, George Sherrill, Doug Mientkiewicz, and Jeff Weaver. None of those players wear the blue any more, so the Dodgers, a team just 16 months removed from the NLCS, is in disarray.

I’m not a fair weather fan. I can deal with losing. I openly root for the Buccaneers and Raiders through difficult decisions and unjustified coach and personnel changes. My favorite NASCAR drivers of all time (Sterling Marlin, Jamie McMurray) have a combined 16 wins amidst 19 seasons of watching the sport. That works out to about one win every forty races. The Avalanche have been awful for the better part of five years, and the Jazz are in a similar, if not worse, free-fall than the Dodgers. My favorite MLS team went bankrupt and moved to a different city. Not even the teams that I remotely root for can beat teams I absolutely hate (Yankees, Phillies, Giants, Lakers, Red Wings, Penguins, Steelers, Saints, Packers, Lakers, Celtics, Jimmie Johnson)

But the Dodgers just have this aura of hopelessness around them that I’ve seen in very few teams. The 98-99 Bulls looked this awful, but that’s because half the roster and the coach left because they revolted against management after winning a sixth title. The 1998 Marlins looked pathetic, but that’s because they couldn’t afford any of the salaries that the players demanded after a miracle World Series Run. The Dodgers don’t have the recent memories of glory that these teams had, they just had the floor fall out from below them. Joe Torre jumped ship at the perfect moment, sadly Don Mattingly won’t get a fair shot at a manager role ever again. It’s impossible to tell when, or if, the team will ever reclaim the division. It’s like they declared that they were in rebuilding mode, after they traded everything they could build with away. If you had control of your least favorite baseball team for one month, and your goal was to run it into the ground for as long as you could so that they would be screwed for as long as possible, you would have done what the Dodgers did last August.

So why am I so stoked about Major League Baseball then? Why now, when the only team I’ve ever really loved (although I’ll always have a hometown affinity with the O’s, it will never be the same) is doomed before the season begins? Because it will be the first sports season outside of football in which my expectations won’t be let down.

Other than football this year (the Raiders and Bucs both impressed the casual onlooker who didn’t see it coming), and NASCAR last year (although McMurray missing the chase is probably disappointing given his huge wins), I’ve been pumped for every sport, every season, with hopes of my team finally breaking through. The Los Angeles Dodgers, Colorado Avalanche, Utah Jazz, Tampa Bay Buccaneers (sans 2010), Oakland Raiders (sans 2010), and Jamie McMurray have been letting down their fans on an annual basis. Every year, there is a glimmer of hope, a winning streak, a new signing, a trademark win, an unforgettable performance, that raises expectations to “satisfactory” levels for fans of big teams from large cities. Every year, I’m always left with so many questions unanswered.

But for once, the Dodgers, when they win their first game, will be the highlight of my night. The same applies for their second, third and fourth. I know 2011 won’t be the rock bottom for such a storied franchise; at least some of their best assets were still under contract for this year. But in 2012 and 2013, when the old talent moves on, and there’s no young talent to replace it, hopefully I’ll have found a way to cope with the fact that the Dodgers will be uncompetitive for quite a while.

If I need any help, I’m sure I could probably find a Orioles fan to teach me.

The game finally came out today. Definitely the most promising looking NASCAR game in quite a while. Expect a complete review on a podcast later this week (by Topher and I more than likely). Here’s the trailer.