Brian Fowler

Putting this here, but it also applies in basketball and theoretically all other college sports. The House v NCAA settlement has been officially approved, schools can now pay players directly. With it comes the new NIL Clearinghouse which will theoretically regulate deals to only be legitimately for NIL, not pay for play circumventing the NCAA salary cap, and also for them all being "market value." Countdown to the first lawsuit after they declare a kid is overpaid for a marketing deal and the Clearinghouse gets defanged begins.... Now.

I was eleven when I saw Jurassic Park in a theater and that was, up to that point in my life, quite possibly the single most jaw dropping thing I had ever seen. Not just in a movie, but period.

Tyrese Haliburton does not die easy.

The Thunder are -700 to win this series, tied for the seventh biggest favorite ever, along with the 1986 Celtics (who beat the Rockets in six) and the 2004 Lakers (who got demolished in the biggest finals upset in NBA history by the Pistons in five.) 04 is the only upset amongst the top ten longest odds list, so it's a real uphill climb for Indiana but it has been done once.

Under the terms of WB/Discovery/whatever the fuck the company is called, the board has the final say, not the shareholders. It really is a strictly symbolic vote, the shareholders merely "advise" the board.

I know this kind of horrible thing happens everywhere, but it's kinda striking to me that this is now the fourth Big Ten team to have a "doctor sexually assaulted athletes" scandal. And that, of course, isn't even counting Penn State. (Michigan with football, Ohio State with wrestling, and Michigan State along with the entire US Gymnastics program with, obviously, gymnastics.)

I think the reason it went straight to HBO is because Armstrong wanted it out quick. It went from idea to on HBO in less than 6 months, and there's almost no chance it could've hit theaters that fast.

The other wrinkle is, if we had one of those two models the previous 4 years, the only power conference that would've had less bids in the 4+4+2+2+1+3 format versus the 5+11 model is the Big Ten. So the self serving model actually would've been worse for them and better for everybody else.

There's an interesting bit of a standoff happening over potential formats for the CFP starting in 2026. The two main proposals, assuming a 16 team field, are 5+11 (top five conference champions plus eleven at large bids, clean and simple, decided by the committee) or a convoluted 4+4+2+2+3 format where the Big Ten and the SEC would get four auto bids, the ACC and Big 12 would each get two auto bids, one autobid for the top G6 champion, and three at large spots. The SEC and Big Ten have a bit of a strange disagreement though. The SEC mostly would prefer the 5+11, which the ACC and Big 12 also prefer (why the Big 12 wouldn't want two bids guaranteed is beyond me) but would prefer the convoluted version if they expand to 9 conference games, to avoid teams losing ground if they get an extra loss. Meanwhile, the Big Ten would prefer the 4+4+2+2+1+3 model, but would accept the 5+11 willingly if the SEC goes to nine conference games, not wanting the SEC to benefit from most schools only playing nine power conference opponents while over half the Big Ten teams are playing ten.

Who is available that is really good at developing bench players into decent rotation pieces? Because the Knicks bench kinda sucks, and Thibs was the absolute worst guy to improve the players there. Their starters finished 1st, 3rd, 5th, 14th, and 20th in minutes per game this year.

Sounds like he was having a really difficult time deciding if he wanted to/physically could play another year. But, yeah, the timing blows.

Frank Ragnow announced his retirement. Leaves a big hole for the Lions to fill at center.

Wait, what is The Beatles reference in Wake Up Dead Man?

I mentioned it elsewhere (and many other times over the last twenty some years on this board) but his Supergirl is my favorite long run any writer has ever had on a book.

No. Each country can have one player from each NFL team.

That sound you hear is David Stern rolling over in his grave

Pretty sure it's only New York and L.A. this weekend.

I know it's 4K and not just regular Blu-ray, but it's nuts that the Anderson box, with ten movies and twenty discs, has a MSRP $200 higher than the Ingmar Bergman's Cinema box that had 30 discs, 39 movies, and two TV miniseries in it.

Caught #Friendship, Bring Her Back, and Karate Kid Legends tonight. #Friendship is funny and well acted, but it pulls its punches at the end. Bring Her Back is pleasantly creepy and kinda feels like a throwback to early 00s horror, but isn't doing anything new or whatever. KKL is what exactly what you think it is.

Also, wouldn't he need the approval of whoever actually owns the copyrighted work to release it? Just because he has a copy (if he does) that doesn't mean he can just sell it to the highest bidding boutique label and sell it on Blu-ray.

Also on the weird tip: so far in this post season, the Knicks are 3-5 at MSG, but 6-2 on the road.

What a weird series this was. OKC on average won by about six points a game, despite winning 4-1 with three blowouts.

I can't remember who the older black man was in relation to QT, but he tells a story about how the whole speech that Dennis Hopper tells Christopher Walken in True Romance was almost verbatim what that man had told him as a kid, and when the guy saw the movie he was like "that's true! I told him that!" (If you aren't familiar with the scene, Hopper's character basically weaponizes the racism of the Italian Mafia by talking about why they have darker complexions and hair. It's certainly not unproblematic.)

Dogs is pretty low on my QT rankings, but it's got some damn memorable moments. Hey, City on Fire should finally be legally available in the United States again this summer, so you can see the movie he most lifted it from.

That Nesmith injury changed everything man