Harbaugh Wants More TV Time For The 49ers

Jim Harbaugh might want to "win with cruelty" while he's with the San Francisco 49ers if he's going to serve notice to various media outlets.

Harbaugh was a little miffed when he noticed that there weren't too many Niners highlights while he was doing a little channel surfing.

“Kind of flipped through the channels, the NFL Network, the highlight express, and the ESPN blitz, and never caught one highlight of the 49ers on any of those,” Harbaugh said today.



Harbaugh said the lack of 49ers highlights on TV demonstrates the perception that the 49ers aren’t a good team.


“I mean, just kind of documents what you know. What the perception is of our team around the league and around the country,” Harbaugh said. “It’ll be up to us to do something about that. We can take control of that and that’s something we need to do.”

I can't blame network execs for the lack of 49er highlights. They've been borderline horrible for the past decade. Besides, the only highlights they had yesterday were the Ted Ginn kick and punt returns. Other than that there wasn't too much to recap. Harbaugh should worry more about winning games rather than how many highlights get on television or risk being shown the door like his predecessors (Mike Nolan, Mike Singletary)



  

Jerry Kill Has A Seizure On The Sideline

Minnesota Golden Gophers head football coach Jerry Kill had to leave the game with New Mexico State after collapsing on the sidelines. Apparently Kill had a seizure and taken from TCF Bank Stadium by ambulance Saturday night after collapsing on the sidelines with 20 seconds to go in the game.

Team doctor Pat Smith says Kill "was at no time under any risk in any way.''


Smith says the 90-degree temperature coupled with dehydration might have played a role in the seizure.

The Golden Gophers were driving for a potential tying score when Kill fell to the sidelines, his legs kicking and his head moving back and forth as medical personnel rushed to his side, according to a Minneapolis Star-Tribune report.


Kill was taken to a local hospital and is reported to be in stable condition. He had a previous seziure in 2005, which had been his second in four years.

This would be a blow to the Gophers who are trying to rebuild their program. The Gophers have been crippled since they decided to jettison Glen Mason as coach. When you are perpetually rebuilding, you need any kind of stability you can get. Having something like this happen doesn't make it any easier to lure recruits to a school that has a hard time getting quality, big time players.

A Fan Refers To Baylor As "She"

With the demise of the Big 12 nearly coming to fruition, Baylor is determined to be the fly in the ointment. They won't let Texas A&M go without a fight which sets up for an interesting football game. Now Baylor is "confident" they will be able to latch on with the Big East if the Big 12 folds.

There are some, including me, who feel that Baylor is talking out of both sides of their mouth. They weren't talking about preserving decades of Texas football when the old SWC disbanded and left Houston, Rice, TCU, and SMU on the side of the road.

One fan sums up how they feel about Baylor and likens the school to a girl.

artisan3m says:



Sep 8, 2011 4:38 PM

Baylor doesn’t belong in the Big 12 ~ never has and never will be a perennial powerhouse in football. Basketball and baseball/softball, yes. Football, no. She should be in a conference where she has at least an even chance of earning a football championship. That will never happen in a league where Baylor has a hard time finishing 1-4 in its own division on an annual basis. This will not be warmly received, but Baylor is a leech on the state universities she competes with. Her fans are fair weather supporters and if the Bears lose two games before October, it is not unlikely that the visitors will put more butts in the seats than Baylor will. She ought to be in CUSA or MWC and she is hardly a BcS contender in any conference.
 
All of this is football driven and it's true that Baylor wants to save it's own hide and keep their AQ money. The football program would be better served building themselves up in the Mountain West or Conference USA. They might be able to contend in the Big East with their current edition of teams there. The basketball program is up and coming so that could balance out what the Bears lack in football. But in all of this, who cares about basketball? 





    

Nets Owner Prokhorov Has His Bank Raided

New Jersey Nets Owner Mikhail Prokhorov has major money. So much he can sign Travis Outlaw to one of the most ridiculous contracts in the offseason and not miss it. Contracts like those are why the NBA is in a lockout right now.

Even with all that money bad things can happen. Like when your bank is raided. Prokhorov co-owns the International Finance Club bank, known by its Russian acronym MFK, with a 27.7 percent share.

Information from Reuters.com.

The head of the International Finance Club bank, known by its Russian acronym MFK, said the evening raid on the bank's office in central Moscow had nothing to do with Prokhorov's Right Cause party or even with the bank's operations.



"Investigative actions were conducted in relation to one of our borrowers. This has nothing to with Right Cause or Onexim," the bank's chief, Oksana Lifar, told Reuters by telephone. Onexim is Prokhorov's investment vehicle.

A lawyer for the bank, Dmitry Kharitonov, said he could not rule out a link to the party, which Prokhorov took charge of in June, making a controversial political debut ahead of the parliamentary vote and a March 2012 presidential election.



Several luxury cars drew up outside the bank on a busy boulevard near the Kremlin and law enforcement officers, some wearing masks and carrying guns, entered and ordered employees and clients not to leave, Kharitonov said.


"They put all the employees in one area and kept them there for an hour without explaining what was going on," he told reporters. "After an hour, they said there were no claims against the bank, and no searches were carried out."


Asked whether the raid could have been related to Prokhorov's involvement in Right Cause, Kharitonov said, "I cannot rule it out. I don't know, but I think nothing can be ruled out."


So this could all be a political power play. Who really knows the truth.I'm kind of speechless about it. This was straight out of Hollywood all we were missing was Bruce Willis to come and save everyone.

Baylor Wants The Big 12 To Stay Together

As the Big 12 continues to go down in flames all around them, Baylor is singing like Al Green. It's not too much of a shock that the people at Baylor want the conference to stay together. No one has been pulling at Baylor's coattails, so they've started a campaign to keep things together.

Nothing is more beloved in Texas than Texas football. Entire towns travel to neighboring communities on Friday nights as rivals meet under the Friday night lights; Saturday mornings find families rushing out to pee wee football games and spending their afternoons with friends tailgating or watching some of the most historic and storied football rivalries in the nation; Sunday afternoons see families gathered in living rooms across the state to cheer on the Cowboys or the Texans.



Football in Texas is more than a passing interest, it is a part of the fabric of this great state.


Will Texans stand by and watch hundred-year-old rivalries be cast aside as the state's largest universities align themselves with other states across the country?


Will Texans sit and watch as Texas' flagship universities pledge their loyalties to other states?


Will Texans stand by as our most promising student athletes are lured out of Texas by new rivals?


Will Texans watch as our most precious resources—the great minds of the next generation—are exported to new conference institutions?


Texans must stand up and call the leadership of the University of Texas, Texas A&M, and Texas Tech to clear-headed thinking about the state's future. Texas' flagship institutions of higher learning are the guardians of the state's future—their loyalties must first be to Texas and to her citizens. Ask these leaders to take a stand for Texas and to stop this madness that will lead to the dissolution of the Big 12 and the end of an era for Texas.

This is the only stand Baylor can take or they face being left out of a BCS conference and going at it in Conference USA or the Mountain West and even that's not guaranteed. If it wasn't for Ann Richards, Baylor wouldn't have been in the Big 12 in the first place (Texas Tech also got in for political reasons too).

Now you want to do what's best for "Texas football"? Why didn't you think about TCU, Houston, Rice, and SMU back in the 90's? You didn't stick up for them and now you may be the jilted bride. Of course Baylor wants the Big 12 to stick together. The problem is that the reason they want to stay together is the same reason that nobody will listen to them. They don't have any pull in the conference and nobody has been knocking down their door to invite them into their conference. The were lumped in with the other Texas teams when the Big 8 was expanded to the Big 12 and they will be lumped into Conference USA or something like that. They are starting to come around slowly in athletics but they are still no where close to contending year after year.

Isn't this poetic justice?

Adam Loewen Reinvents Himself

Adam Loewen was once the highest Canadian player drafted in Major League Baseball. He was the number four pick in the 2002 draft and made it to the bigs with the Baltimore Orioles in 2006. He was thought to be a fixture in their rotation for the future. That was as a pitcher.

After two stress fractures to his left elbow, it was too early for Loewen to give up on his baseball dreams. So Loewen went the Rick Ankiel route and reinvented himself as an outfielder. Loewen was one of the Toronto Blue Jays' September call-ups after hitting .311, with 16 home runs and 79 RBI, for the Las Vegas 51s, the Blue Jays’ farm team in the Pacific Coast League.

Pretty impressive for someone whose career was thought to be over.

“Adam’s done a great job,” said Tony LaCava, the Blue Jays’ assistant general manager, who is with the Jays for a three-game series against the Seattle Mariners before he and GM Alex Anthopoulos arrive in Vancouver on Thursday to check out the Jays’ single-A prospects. “It’s very unusual what he’s done — going from major league pitcher to minor league outfielder. He’s another Rick Ankiel. Not many have done it, but he’s really put himself in a good spot. I think he’s certainly on the verge of becoming a viable major league player.”


Granted, he has been hitting minor league pitching and playing in minor league parks, specifically the one in Las Vegas. The people that matter in the Blue Jays organization think Loewen has a future with the team. Maybe a platoon outfielder? Who knows.

Toronto does plan on giving Loewen a few starts to see if he's worth keeping around.

Could Nene Go To The Heat When The Lockout Ends?

No knows if there is going to be an end to the NBA lockout. It seems as if no one really cares if it does end. Everyday there are players jumping ship to some random foreign league so they can keep their skills sharp or keep the money rolling in.

The lockout still hasn't put an end to rumors or speculation regarding trades and free agency. News out of Miami is that the Heat could pursue Denver Nuggets  free agent big man Nene.

Many call this possibility a longshot. Maybe not. Nene says that he wants to win a title. Miami is loaded for a title run. He also says it's not about the money. Now usually when someone says that, it's about the money when it comes time to sign a contract. Nene says that's not the case.

Nene told The Denver Post: “If people think it’s about money, they’re wrong. I’ve saved my money. I could retire today.”

There would be a $6 million dollar mid-level exception available and Nene would be leaving plenty of money on the table.


If Nene did sign with Miami, that could be the move to put Miami over the top. Nene could start at center, Chris Bosh permanently at the 4 spot and Udonis Haslem coming off the bench to strengthen that area. This could possibly make Heat haters' head's explode.