The Purple Bizon

I've been trying to find a more clever title then prairie sports and I've settled on The Purple Bizon.

So if you stumble on here and are interested in joining the fray come on over.

Bringin my stick to the party

A few days I did a catch post about some of the major sports headlines that I had missed. In that post I hinted about a specific topic from the NFL scouting combine that I was going to go full length on. With this being free agency week the chatter on the draft has been diminished so I think now is as good a time as any to get in on it.

I do sincerely hate to beat a dead horse and with all the coverage the draft has already gotten that's what I'm doing by going this direction, but hopefully I can get a more personal spin on it so it's not all the same as has been reported.

Now to the point, I'm talking about the darling of the draft process. The potential #1 QB in this years draft class. The kid from the little school.

Carson Wentz.

So let's get on with it huh!

Checking it off

What may or may not be news is that the NFL's free agent period started yesterday afternoon.

As there are always are, there were some surprising signings in the first hours of eligibility. But I don't feel like talking about Brock Osweiler to the Texans or the disasterous possibility of RG3 going to Denver or really any moves but one.

The signing of an offensive lineman.

Sexy right? No, not really but it's the most personally significant so I'm going to run with it.

Keepin it real.

Rules.

Every sport has them.

Varying based on the nature of the competition.

No matter how detailed the rules become they are still applied by people, generally men though some women now. Based on what those people are able to see and remember of the rules, the games happen.

It's way too easy and cliche to rip officials for bad calls and seemingly simple mistakes but I'm a rube and I want to keep it real.

Refs screw up way too much. Even with the installation of review technology mistakes happen way too often on every level and in every form of sport.

I know that even in the NFL the officials aren't full time employees, which is just dumb, but if you're going to take the responsibility (and the pay) then it needs to be done well.

Just last night I was watching a college basketball game where the refs almost decided the game's outcome without second guessing.

I'll get into the specific's and more after the break!

Highlights

I didn't intend to take a two week hiatus from writing up about the big time sports topics, nonetheless it happened. Instead of doing a recap of 2 weeks I'm just going to hit a couple of the highlights here.

The thing which I consider to be most noteworthy broke today. The end of an era. The sheriff's hanging up his equipment. It is being reported that one and only Peyton Manning is calling an end to his storied career.
Coming from a non-AFC region I've seen as many, if not more of Peyton's commercials then actual games but the end of an all time great career can't be over looked by anyone who calls themselves a sports fan. There are probably already some out there who want to use some of the recent negative stories that have come out about the man as reason to not give him credit but get real. That perspective completely ignores the fact that none of it came out until after he won his second super bowl. The second super bowl which lifted him into even more rarified air then he had already existed in. Over his 20 year NFL career I've never heard any negatives about him then after he finally gets number two people start smearing him. It's crap and yeah I use that word intentionally.
He was elite through out his career. Is the holder of an obnoxious number of NFL quarterback records. And he went out as a winner. The story book ending. The NFL will not ever be the same. Farewell Peyton.

But what else happened over the last few weeks?

I'll get into that after the break.

31 flavors, all gone

There are very few things in life that are constant. When it comes to sports, that fact is undeniably true. Sure there are times during which some teams have a lot of success and are generally consistent but it always changes eventually. Think of the Lakers or Celtics from the NBA, the Yankees from the MLB or the 49ers from the NFL.

Those are all pro teams that have experienced a lot of success in the past but the coin always flips and none have won championships in many years.

When it comes to college level sports, teams are able to sustain high levels of success for much longer but even that can come to an end.

For the Tennessee Volunteers the turn may have just come. After 31 years, the lady Vols are now unranked. 31 years of being in the top 25 teams in the country. Respect! It's quite possible that it's not even the longest streak in the sports history but that's still an astounding level of consistency and performance. So while the 31's all gone now, it should definitely be recognized for what it was!

Welcome back Wolves

Well it's been a few days since the NBA started it's "second half."My favorite team has played 2 games, Friday and Saturday night. While the Wolves won 3 of the 4 games before the break and then dominated the all star events that they were apart of the success has not translated in the ensuing days.

Playing fringe post season teams from both conferences, the pups came up small. I'm not going to break down either of the games since nothing too special happened but over the early weekend they were the only sports team worth reporting on.

So here goes

Minnesota fast break

So I know I said I'd be doing a break down type post of the Timberwolves/ Grizzlies game tonight as my next post and presumably will be doing just that in my next next post. Something came up yesterday that I could not ignore. It involves the big university down in Minneapolis that I so accurately disparaged the other day.
For one day the gopher's men's basketball team was the talk of the biggest national sports network. Which does NOT happen.
If you were busy and missed the news then let me break it down for you


AFTER the break!

Tough day for top teams

After spending the last 2 days on stories local and regional it's time to go national again. There was an impressive docket of college basketball games on Wednesday night.

For those who don't know, the national ranking is the in the parenthesis.
(20) Duke played (5) North Carolina
(3) Oklahoma played Texas Tech
(4) Iowa played Penn St.
(8) Xavier played (23) Providence
(15) Dayton played St. Joe's

Some of the games went the way the predictors would have said, some did not AKA upsets. That is one of the things that makes college basketball and especially the tournament one of the most popular parts of sports.

I can only claim to have seen one of those five games and won't get to all five here cause I just don't have opinions worthy of conveying about the ones that I'll skip. So here goes!

Three Ball

Last night I hit on an elite Women's college basketball player well tonight I'm going to go even more small time, with the biggest part of sports there is - prep. I'll be going into detail on one specific high school story that just wrapped up last night.

As a part of this post I looked into lists of scorers in Minnesota high school basketball history. A thousand points doesn't come close to being near the top and I'm sure there are schools in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area that have had the same experience as the school that I'm talking about right now. But there in lies the caveat, this isn't a metro school. It's not even a public school.

It's a Christian, private, boarding school in Fergus Falls, MN. The average attendance is sub 200 for grades 7 - 12 yet they've had three 1000+ point scorers in the last four years. The first did it as a junior or there would be 3 in 3.

Minnie Miracle Maker

When looking at the landscape of hearland sports, the University of Minnesota Golden Gophers are pretty a joke all the around. It's no news flash that Football and Basketball are the two most popular college sports nationwide, but as far as each goes on the Ski-U-Mah it's pretty pathetic. Sure they have some coaches with name recognition and the football team has had some players get drafted but those are not enough things to translate to success on the playing surface.

But this isn't actually about ripping the U. Just the opposite in fact!

I don't know where Women's college basketball would fall in the list of sports popularity but my guess would be that it isn't high on the list. Despite the level of popularity I've heard of a young woman doing pretty astounding things for their basketball team.

More on that after the break!

T(WIN) CITIES WEEKEND

News flash sports fans: The NBA all star weekend just happened.
Some may consider the actual all star game the pinnacle of the weekend. I personally think it was the 5th best event of the weekend.
1. Dunk contest
2. 3 point shooting contest
3. Rising stars game
4. Skills competition
5. All-Star game

Check the highlights if you didn't see the events live and let me know what you think! I'm going to keep the videos top four. First up: Skills highlights.

Down the drain

As much as I'd like to jump start this blog with a positive story I think it's important to set the precedent that it's not going to be all from a rosy perspective because that would be unrealistic.

Talent and potential going unfulfilled is no new thing in major sports but for such an iconic athlete to already be on the verge of not only losing his spot in sports but possibly losing his life is a true tragedy.

In case you haven't guessed who I'm talking about by now, check the video and then you'll know.