Get With The NIT Wit

I format the rhymes, step by step
Make em sound def to maintain my rep

The Buffs had a trip to the NIT Finals and a date with the Shockers (would most people want a date where a shocker is involved?) a mere 15 seconds from happenning. But alas, a defensive lapse allowed Bama to take the lead and the Buffs' Alec Burks jumper at the horn was long.

Was the Buffs' trip to the NIT semifinals more or less valubale than the NCAA bid that was criminally stolen from them?

The NIT provided the Buffs with three sellouts at the Foam Doam, three games on national TV, and invaluable playing time for the younger players on the team (although Burks and the three seniors got most of the playing time, with the four of them and 95% of the scoring gone in 11-12. Good luck with that Tad.) It got alums and fans excited about the future of the program, it got Chauncey Billups face time on TV (nice red shirt Chauncey. Can someone get this guy any type of CU merch? And if Melo would've shown up to watch the game last night there's a good chance someone would've leased a Concord jet, flown to NYC and kicked him in the package), and will most likely sell some tickets for the inaugural Pac 12 hoops season.

(On a positive note, Buffs fans repped hard at MSG last night with a decided advantage in the crowd. The flip side is the team lost in front of their NYC base, but not as hard of a flop as the football team did in the Bay Area versus Cal with over 10k Buff fans on hand. If this trend continues, I hope we play well in front of our huge southern hemisphere contingent in the World Cricket Finals.)

Who'd want a trip to the NCAA anyway? The Buffs would've got that #11 seed, had to play in a "play in" game and go from there. They'd be buried with the rest of the field. I mean, what chance does and undersized and outmanned #11 seed have anyway?

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Tyler, the Creator - "Yonkers"

The SG is feeling the vibe and direction that Odd Future and Tyler, the Creator is bringing to the still blinging/money chasing Hip Hop realm in 2011. Listen for the BoB diss among other gems about dancing in pink panties and his therapist's phone number. Although we love the track and visual, it is still hard to fathom that 30 years back when Kool Herc was just strating this Hip Hop thing that he envisioned some dude eating a bug and yakking it up.

Boulder's Friendly Skies

I find it fun to smash MCs into fine bits...

The CU Athletic Department is in talks with Frontier Airlines about the possible naming rights of Folsom Field. Some perks that may come along with the deal:

-Good news: Beer will be brought back to the stadium. Bad news: it will cost $5 per can and exact change is appreciated.

-The PA announcer will go from a clear, booming, voice over a state of the art system to a mumbled, mouth breather that sounds like a drive thru from a 1980s Dairy Queen. ("Cheerleaders please buckle in some turbulence is ahead" (?)")

-The size of the bags of peanuts will be shrinking. A lot.

-Barf bags will be available throughout the stadium. While this is a nice gesture, they would've been a lot more handy during the Dan Hawkins' era.

-Metal detectors used at the entrances will not yield any weapons, but will turn up enough booze to fuel Mardi Gras for a week.

-Each seat will be equiped with a tray table. However, if you have the tray table down during the last two minutes of each half an attendant will smugly ask you to please fold it up. And don't even think about using your iPod during that time!

-BuffVision will be replaced by some Mathew McCounaghy romantic comedy.

-Mile High Club? In Boulder that takes a whole different meeting.

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Bloodied Up

I got one in store for hardcore fanatics
Bangin from basement to attic put static if ya got dramatics...

The Nuggets took it to a team named after a 90s blockbuster movie from a foreign country last night, being up by nearly 30 points at halftime. A collective cheer masked by yawns grasped teh Rocky Mountains.

Meanwhile, half a continent away, our old buddy Camelo Anthony and the Knicks (sorry Chauncey) were frittering away a lead versus the veteran Celtics on the hallowed MSG (that's Madison Square Garden, they aren't playing on a court of Chinese food waste products) floor.

What was more exciting to Nuggets' fans? The anhilation of the Toronto Forest Gumps was fun to watch, even if most of the crowd was so disinterested by the 3rd quarter that they couldn't even bother to clap after a Nugs' basket.

But to see a bloodied Carmelo Anthony completely misfire in the 4th quarter and see that attention seeker crumble to another L on the world's biggest stage was pretty fun too. For those keeping score at home: 10-4 > 7-9.

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RIP Nate Dogg

Hip Hop lost another great as Nate Dogg passed away this past week. It got me to thinking of the relationship between rappers and hooks throughout the genre's history. It isn't a newer trend that started with pop heavyweights like Rhianna or Justin Timberlake singing on hooks. Go back to the days of the Juice Crew and TJ Swan, or Rob Base using singers on his hits. Take the mid 90s with unknowns or up and comers like Brian McKnight or Mary J Blige signing on tracks. Even the East Coast scene had DV Alias Khrist, pretty much their Nate answer. Fast forward to today with Akon and the like. Yet none of them quite had the flair and lyrical presence that Nate Dogg had. You'd be hard pressed to find a singed in any arena with the clarity in their voice as Nate. I was never a huge G-funk fan, but Nate complemented Snoop Dogg unlike any partner/side kick in the game. RIP.

March Sadness

It's been more than 36 hours since the raw dog f*cking of the CU Hoops team by the incompetents on the NCAA Selection Committee. Some of the thoughts that went through my head in that period:

-I want to puke.

-Maybe I should run a puke scam like that Lard Ass kid in Stand By Me, with the selection committee being right in the vomit path.

-Seriously, we didn't get a bid? (Then I started to look around my family room, like the bid was hiding in there somewhere. "Oh, look, no need to worry, the #11 seed was right over here behind the Elmo doll." This actually happenned.)

-Dude, this Gene Smith guy looks like a cross between Steve Harvey and the black dude from Barney Miller.

-Dude, this Gene Smith guy just talked about CU for a couple minutes and he might as well been reciting Spanish poetry. Do they make Cliff Notes for NCAA Jiberish Bullshit?

-Someone just punched me in gut.

-Oh wait, that was the neighbor's cat who lept onto my lap.

-Dammit, the cat just got a #15 seed.

-I hope Tad and Mrs Boyle saved some receipts, because there might be a lot of deli meat and potato salad that doesn't get ate.

-This is a grand conspiracy. Big 12 Commissioner is bitter, Wake Forest AD is bitter, Big Sky Commissioner is preoccupied. They all staged the moon landing.

-Man, Jay Bilas is pissed. If only their was a Super Robot Bilas we could unleash on the committee to take down their evilness.

-Man, Dick Vitale is worked up too. Wow, every damn analyst in the world is filled with angst. Someone must've promised them a case of Rocky Mountain Oysters or something.

-This is Dan Hawkins' fault.

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SG Brackets Caper '11

I provide bright flava, so you could sketch me
Do me a favor, dont try and catch me...

If everything you look at from your breakfast danishes to the flow charts at the office suddenly look like a bracket, that must mean it is time for the 4th Annual Slushy Gutter Bracket Challenge.

The annual contest sees any SG reader, hanger on, or just random person, eligible to win the SG Challenge. And if you win it all? You get absolutely freaking nothing. A heaping portion of nada. What else!? Nothing!

To be fair, we will give the winner the title of Hoops Master for one year. Although that and $1 will get you a McValue Menu hamburger.

As per tradition, Commish CH and four time Slushy Gutter Winner T-Dub will renew their yearly wager. In 08, we saw TW rock the Mummy look; 09 saw CH lose the bet and had to go Count Chocula, and the rubber match last year saw CH lose again and go Hulkster on everyone. Toned down in 2011 the lower score between the two will force him to wear a cape to one CU home football game. That's it, that simple: wear a cape. So simple, yet so stupid.

YAHOO SLUSHY GUTTER BRACKETS 2011

LINK

ID: 66205

Password: beer

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Down By Law

A T-bone steak, cheese eggs and Welch's grape...

Our great state of Colorado has some of the strangest liquor sales laws. The past few days have seen our new Guv, a former brewer himself, step into the fray and start going Chicago-style politics on the suds rules. Of course, opponents of the Guv and the other side of the issue have collectively pissed their pants and the wheels of government have once again turned a simple issue into a quagmire.

The gist (that word is kind of creepy, a little too close to bodily function) of the matter is the testing of beer at bars as opposed to convenience stores. Why not have some fun with it? Incorporate a drinking game into the controversary.

DRINK ______ IF:

-1 if while you're at a bar the white coat scientists beat up the bartender to test his low alcohol beer.
-1 if you join in the fight simply to get free brew.
-3 if after a few beers you can say 'Hickenlooper' five times fast.
-5 if after a few beers you can work 'Hickenlooper' into a Ghostface-style rhyme.
-2 if you get a C-store clerk to comprehensively break down his favorite double IPA beer.
-1 if after the white coat scientists test your beer and you say "well, am I pregnant?"
-5 if you mistakenly identify the scientist as Bill Nye.
-3 if you mistakenly identify the scientist as C. Everett Koop.
-1 if your local C-store gets shipments messed up and is doling out Coors flavored Icees.
-2 if you use the testing instrument to mainline the beer into your veins.
-1 if you are so blitzed that your bartender serves you water and tells you it's new water-flavored low alcohol beer.
-8 if you pick Hickenlooper or the scientists to win your NCAA brackets.

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The Points Locked Down

COLORADO SPORTS:

-Will the lockout affect the Denver Broncos negatively? Does Charlie Sheen like snorting drugs into every orifice? One simple fact about football is that you need a defensive line to play it, and right now the Donks don't have many bodies after cutting Justin Bannan and Jamal Williams. Two, unless you are running some colliegiate style offense, it might be wise to have a tight end, and after cutting Dan Graham, they are low on those too. Think young Mr Tebow might benefit from coaching at OTAs rather than some dude in a windbreaker at a "training center"? And where will Knowshon Moreno rather be hurt? The practice field at Dove Valley or at the local park in Athens Georgia?

HIP HOP:
-The only MC to ever rock the padlock look was Naughty By Nature's Treach, and given his stature, no one was gonna give him any crap over it. (Did Naughty By Nature save East Coast Hip Hop when they dropped in 1991? I've never really understood that argument, but they certainly proved it could be commercially viable, as they rode the wave for nearly four years. They might not have saved it, but they helped a rebirth of the region with their style and rugged sound and look.) I always felt Treach never got his due as one of the era's top lyricists, as he proved his flow was unmatched (peep his verse on two non-Naughty records: D-Nice's "Time To Flow" and Queen Latifah's "Rough", where he effortlessly steals the attention from the title MCs.)

BEER:
-Today starts a stretch of boozing events to turn a simple bender into a full blown trip to rehab. Fat Tuesday and plenty of "show me your titties" moments descends today, followed by the St Paddy's Day Parade, the NCAA tourney, and the actual St. Patrick's Day. SG recommended beers: for Fat Tuesday Louisiana brewed Abita; for the Parade you need to go stealth and pour it into a paper coffee cup and the mass brews taste like butt when in those. Go with something a wee bit stronger like a Killians Red, which is still cheap enough to swill lare quantities. For the tourney when you are sitting in front of the TV you gotta roll with someting that fits in your fat slob on the couch lifestyle, say a tall can or 40 of something. Finally you can step it up on St Paddy's Day and rock the Guiness or mass pints of Harp. SG has it on lock, see you in detox.

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Altitude Adjustment

My man Clarence Cricket sent this little tibit to me:

When Husker head coach Doc Sadler was asked about the altitude during Monday's Big 12 coaches teleconference with the media, he responded:

"I think we play inside, don't we?" Sadler said. "I don't think altitude is something that effects you inside the building. I think it's something that effects you outside the building."

I give CU and their engineering (CU is the largest NASA-funded university in the country; more astronauts than any other school) college all the props in the world for completely de-pressurizing the Coors Event Center. The thought of them spending millions on making the CEC immune from the altitude makes all of us alums and fans proud. Enjoy your full breaths of air, Doc.

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Salty Rockies

It is early in Spring Training but the undoubted star of the spring thus far is the Rockies new complex in Scottsdale, Salt River Fields at Talking Stick. Some little known SG facts about the new digs:

--The warning track is a mixture of Arizona clay, recycled tires, and burnt Carmelo jersies.

--During the seventh inning stretch of Wedsnesday games, George Frazier and Drew Goodman perform in an 80's glam metal band called Frazier's Lazer.

--Underneath the right field stands there's a doctor who will examine anyone and find a malady for any fan to get out of work/date/yard work/etc. He used to be Larry Walker's personal physician.

--Douchebags who make any jokes about their penis being a "talking stick" are banned for life.

--They tried to bring the humidor to the facility, but the desert air actually turned the baseballs into chocalate covered marshmallows. Dante Bichette was called in to eat the mess.

--Salt River Fields At Talking Stick? I think Ghostface Killah wouldn't even be able to work that into a rhyme.

--The Party Deck is a big hit. Jason Giambi will join you for a beer during the third inning of each game on the deck, but only if he is playing. First base is then manned by a parking cone.

--Great Fan Interaction: to help Todd Helton's aching back, fans are encouraged to lean over the railings and pelt him with horse switches.

--Taco Bell gives out four for a buck tacos if anyone in any Spring Training games actually looks like they aren't counting down the hours till their late afternoon tee time.

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