Category / Sports

by Greg

This Is New…

I was checking out our Buffalo Bills Review page at the iTunes store tonight. A few people have added some reviews of our show, which I think helps people find and decide to subscribe to the show. That’s cool, and we appreciate the comments/reviews.

But I noticed in the “bread crumb” navigation at the top that there was a new main category called “Amateur”. That’s new. One of the amazing things about iTunes for podcasters is that everything is equal. Our show is just as available as one put out by ESPN. And, it still is that way… but I wonder if they might be moving toward separating them?

Just for fun, I clicked on the Amateur tab and found out that our show is one of the Featured Podcasts! So, that’s pretty neat.

But overall, I really hope they don’t separate the “amateur” and the “professional”. I know I don’t get paid to do BBR, but man, I think it’s (at least pretty close to) professional quality? (Have a listen if you’ve never caught an episode. Good stuff… especially for Bills fans.) There are way too many super bad amateur podcasts on iTunes, so I understand the idea of separating them, but I would hope that they don’t ever completely separate them. We’ll just have to see…

But for now, we’re a featured Amateur podcast! Sweet! 🙂

by Greg

Two Days

Bills Fans
Are you ready for some football??? Man, we are!!! I can’t believe it, but by the time you are reading this, there are only TWO DAYS until the Bills start training camp! TWO DAYS!!! We’ll be heading out to see them practice on Friday with the Drake family (Dave of Buffalo Bills Review fame) and perhaps another friend or two.

There is always reason for optimism this early in the season, but have a look at some stuff on my Buffalo Bills site at some of the actual reasons for optimism. I might write one more article this week as the beginning of the season approaches, but for now there’s plenty of good stuff up there.

We’ll be starting up our show again if not this weekend, next weekend. If you haven’t checked it out yet, I encourage you too. We’re have some new segments planned, a new host or two, and we’ll hopefully be working in many interviews throughout the season.

Fun stuff! Football is almost here!!! WHOOHOO!!!!!

by Greg

Various Endeavors

There’s been a bunch of randomness this week. Things are in a “down time”, or a “lull” in the web design world, so I have been taking advantage of that by working on some other projects that I ordinarily would not be able to give time to. Some of those include:

  • Trailer Refurbishment
    We decided to sell our basic trailer, since we have not used it (except as storage for our musical things) since February of 2005!! It is still in decent condition, and should sell for a decent price. I had to replace the thing on the front that raises and lowers it. The handle had snapped off, so the whole thing needed to be replaced. And since I was doing that, I ended up painting the whole front hitch assembly part. And the fiberglass top that had faded. My neighbor has been helping as well, and he helped re-fasten the loose light on the left side. I’m even taking off and cleaning/painting the tires! It’s been a bigger job than I thought it would be… but the trailer is going to look nice very soon!

    If anyone is interested in a 6 x 10 cargo trailer in very good condition, please let me know. I’ll be putting it on CraigsList.com as soon as it’s ready (very soon, once it stops RAINING!) so let me know before that. Just click the e-mail me links (top, and right column).

  • Blog Updates
    As mentioned recently, I have also been updating the right column of this site. Adding links to my various websites and just cleaning things up a bit.
  • Buffalo Bills Review
    The Bills season is upon us! Training camp starts in less than a WEEK! So I have been updating our website (BuffaloBillsReview.com) as well as doing a bunch of other behind the scenes things. We even decided to make some “staff” t-shirts (which I might make available to the general public later). We’ll wear them on visits to training camp, and pre-season games… a little advertising ploy… 😉 I’ll have a link up on the Bills Review site soon with a photo of the shirt, and maybe a link to order some.
  • There’s The Steeple… Here’s The Church Audiobook Podcast
    I have also had time to get a little ahead in the audiobook recording. Been posting chapters/episodes weekly. You can download them at gregshead.net/church or, just go straight to iTunes. This week’s chapter is actually part two of last week’s “A Bigger View of Church”. Includes an article by Wayne Jacobsen titled, “Living in the Relational Church”.
  • Selling Tickets
    One of the updates I made to our Buffalo Bills Review site was to add some “sponsors” down the right side. OK, they’re not really sponsors… but I am an affiliate of some sort for most of them, so when people click on banners those and use their services, we will receive a commission of some sort. Pretty neat!

    Anyhoo, one of them is StubHub.com. It’s a ticket reselling marketplace. So, you have tickets, you can offer them up for sale. You want tickets – to about ANYTHING – you can find them there! We purchased Bills season tickets and have been selling the ones to games we won’t be going to. It actually has worked out to make our tickets to the games we’re going to a bit cheaper! Fantastic! So, most of the ones we have listed are gone, but there are a few left! Head over to my Buffalo Bills Review site and check out StubHub.com! (Our tickets are in section 225, if you want those…) 😉

  • Making Ice Cream!
    I’ve kind of mentioned this already, but man, we’ve made more ice cream this summer than ever! Last night’s vanilla turned out awesome! The strawberry not as much, but it was still pretty good! The consistency is absolutely the hardest thing to master. I’m getting better, but still have much room for improvement. Oh well… guess I have to make more ice cream…. 🙂

The one thing I keep feeling the urge to do but have not taken the time to do yet is to work on our One Man, One Woman book. Several things recently have reminded me of the very cool lessons in trusting God contained in that book (that is not yet written). I think it may be time to flesh it out a bit more. I have more on trusting (or not trusting) God… but that’s for another upcoming post to GregsHead.net. Stay tuned…

Till then… time for some more odd jobs! 🙂

by Greg

Sabres Schedule Announced

Sabres Schedule
The Buffalo Sabres today announced their 2007-2008 schedule. (Didn’t they just finish playing the 2006-2007 season??) 🙂 We were really hoping that the Sabres (1) would play the San Jose Sharks this year, and (2) that they would play IN San Jose, and then (3) that it would coincide with our trip out there this fall.

BUT, alas… they will be on a road trip during that week… and they do play in San Jose this year… just, not at the same time.

November 15th is already circled on my calendar. First game against the Senators. The first games against Drury and Briere’s new teams will be interesting as well. The season opens with a “home and home” against the NY Islanders, whom the Sabres ousted in round one of last year’s playoffs.

Bring on the hockey season! (Football first… but hockey a close second!)

by Greg

Free Agency in Sports

Chris Drury and Daniel Briere
As you most likely know by now, Chris Drury and Daniel Briere have moved on from the Buffalo Sabres to $$$Greener Pastures$$$. They were signed by two different teams (Rangers and Flyers) for a combined $84 million!!! Holy cow, that’s a lot of moola! The Sabres were unable and/or unwilling to match that, and in the case of Drury, he just chose to go to the Rangers (they were his favorite childhood team) instead of stay in Buffalo (who would have matched the Rangers’ offer.

So, good for those guys… at least financially. But this brings up yet again the sad state of sports with free agency and salary caps. There are many factors, and I really don’t want to get into it here, but I do want to say that I am not a fan of free agency.

I understand that it is very cool for the player. They get more money for sure, they also get the chance to determine where they will play (like Drury). But both Drury and Briere were captains on the President Trophy winning Sabres (for the best record in hockey) and they left that behind (understandably, in many ways) to pursue their goals. Not those of the team.

Does any player care about the game, or the team, or the city anymore? Perhaps that is unfair. Both of these guys said they would like to stay in Buffalo. Particularly Briere. But in the end, he was offered $25 million over 5 years by the Sabres, and the Flyers offered him $52 million over 7 years.

Yeah, I would too.

I think. Part of me says I wouldn’t. I would take the “paltry” $25M and stay with the team that I had helped build. I would not move the family and start over again… I would be OK with $25 MILLION DOLLARS. But, why take $25M when you can double it?!? So crazy.

It’s sad that this is hurting sports in so many ways. Small market teams are unable to keep up as they can not charge as much for tickets, and don’t have other sources of revenue to keep up with the larger salary caps. It’s also just raising the price of tickets in general across all the sports leagues. Many sports writers are prediciting we’ll just be seeing another lock out in the not-too-distant future if the NHL continues this way.

What if players decided they love the game, and love to win, and build a championship team. What if teams fairly compensated those players who made a commitment to stay with one team for their careers? We will likely never see a team that can repeat what the Bills did from 1990-1993, going to four straight Super Bowls … mostly due to free agency.

It might sound like sour grapes, but even before we lost Drury, Briere, and even Zubrus a couple days later, I was not a fan of free agency. Maybe it’s because my team is one of those “small market teams”, but I think it’s cause I love the idea of buildinig a team of guys you know and can root for for at least a good chunk of their careers. Now when you buy a jersey (like, #23 or #48) it’s obsolete in 3 years or less.

Too bad.

The Sabres did manage to hold on to Thomas Vanek last week, matching an offer that came in from Edmonton. They were not going to lose another one! Good for them.

I read a great article on this at NHL.com today. Check it out if you’ve got time.

The Sabres will go on. As will the Bills, and every other team. It’s the path that pro sports have chosen. I do wish there was some happy medium where players could be happy, not at the expense of the team, city, fans, owner… and vice versa. I don’t think we’ve found that just yet.

by Greg

Goal!

Goal! The Dream BeginsWell I just finished watching the movie, “Goal! The Dream Begins” I had gotten it from the library last year around the World Cup time… but never got around to watching it. I saw the preview and thought it looked worth the watch… and had even planned on watching with my boys, who had really been enjoying the World Cup matches until I saw it was PG-13. So, with no time to watch, and probably stuff the boys needn’t see at 7 and 4… I passed.

But I had the chance to move it to the top of the ol’ Netflix queue this past week, and I am so glad I did!

Sometimes I fall asleep during movies. Or at least nod off. As you can tell from the time stamp on this article… I did not fall asleep, nor am I even sleepy! It was a great sports movie with your classic sports ending. But you don’t get there the classic way. It’s a great story of perseverence, character, dreams, and some great soccer, to boot! 🙂

There are a few moments that make it PG-13, but for adults I highly recommend. Highly.

One thing I noticed in the flick… there’s a strained relationship between the father and the son. They love each other but see life differently. So, I think maybe a while back I might have seen myself as the son (actually not saying anything about my dad, or our relationship… though it’s pretty true that we see life differently!) but now with four kids of my own, and them all growing up and stuff… I think I identify with the dads of movies. The main character was the son, and I think the emotions you feel with/for him… I was putting my son in his place, and just hoping that I can love and encourage my son to pursue the dreams God has placed in his heart. I think he will… I just found it interesting how I’ve definitely accepted my place as “the dad”.

So… to bed for me, since we’ve some friends comin’ for a bit o’ chill and grill in the late mornin’, and before they arrive I need to mow the lawn. It’s a bit shaggy.

Check your local library… put it in your Netflix queue… download it from iTunes. If you like sports movies, soccer, and just great stories… check out “GOAL! The Dream Begins”.

(And I saw tonight that “GOAL II: Living The Dream” will hit theaters Sep 2nd, 2007! Gotta love it…) 🙂

by Greg

Skyline Party (with an NFL QB???)

Skyline Chili!One of our favorite foods is Skyline Chili. It’s a regional delicacy for Southwestern Ohio. Specifically from Cincinnati. There are many brands of “Cincinnati-style chili” but we like to think Skyline is the best. (Of course, Chi might tell you it’s Empress Chili… but I’m sticking with Skyline.) Over the years I have taken a recipe for Skyline chili that I received from (I think?) my mother-in-law, through my sister-in-law (Jen’s entire family are Skyline afficionados…) and added, subtracted, monkeyed with, and attempted to match the real deal as best I can.

I’m close… but still not quite there.

Still… it is a fantastic thing that I can make GALLONS of Skyline-like Chili in my own house!!!

Well, this weekend, we’re headed to Clarence for a little family party (celebrating the graduation of one of our neices, among other things). It was requested that I make and bring the main course – Skyline Chili!!!

There are many things being celebrated this weekend. There’s Megan’s graduation. 🙂 And a church that my in-laws have lent their musical and preaching talents to on numerous occasions is celebrating 100 years of existence. So we’re celebrating that with them. My in-laws will be leaving soon for their summer travels, so it will be a good-bye party of sorts… and since they’ll be gone for my father-in-law’s birthday and their anniversary (same day), I’m sure we’ll be celebrating that too…..

But that just wasn’t enough.

My mother-in-law is very gifted. She can play the piano like nobody’s business. She has probably sewn (or do you just make?) THOUSANDS of quilts in her lifetime. She can sew anything. AND, she can cook. Add to that the fact that she loves to do all of those things for people, and she keeps herself pretty busy! 🙂 Well, she had been trying to have the Holcomb family over for dinner, where our family could join them – and we’d get to meet a (former) Buffalo Bills, NFL QB!

The problem is that little “former” word back there…

Kelly was traded to Philadelphia a while ago. His family still lives here in Buffalo area, and they attend the various functions at the Clarence Church of Christ (where Jen’s family attends, and Dad was the preacher for 31 years!). Jen’s Mom has been trying for awhile to get together with them again, and found out that they are headed to Philly very soon. SO…

They’re coming to our party! 🙂

So now we’re celebrating everything above … AND it’s a “going away party” for the Holcombs! 🙂

This morning as I was adding all the right seasonings to the giant vat of Skyline, I was thinking, “Kelly Holcomb – #10 for the Buffalo Bills – will get to eat my Skyline… CRAZY!” 🙂 It’s certainly a fun addition to an already fun weekend… and as you can guess, the boys are quite excited to have a meal with KELLY HOLCOMB. 🙂

I wonder if we’ll get to play a little football??? 🙂

So, that’s part of what we’re looking forward to this weekend. I’m sure I’ll have some kind of a report here by Monday.

Hope your weekend is full of Skyline, family celebrations and milestones, and meals with NFL QBs also!!