Proof that few in government today have a clue...

Two stories in today's news show how out-of-touch government is...

-First the EPA which prevents the economy from growing by outlawing lightbulbs, shutting down the American oil & coal industries, and similarly closing down other entire industries as well -- now says they need to hire 230,000 more government employees just to keep up with the enforcement of their own rules.
Thus they want to hire nearly a quarter of a million people JUST SO they can keep putting other millions of people in America out of work.
Is it any wonder that candidates like Herman Cain are popular? Unless you happen to be one of those government workers with cushy, overpaid jobs then you are sick and tired of the government people taking taxpayers' hard earned cash and wasting it on things that kill jobs.

http://www.redstate.com/aglanon/2011/09/26/epa-calls-compliance-with-own-law-absurd-or-impossible-and-requests-230k-new-employees/

-The other one is local -- government big wigs who claim to be the watchdogs helping you are handing out bonuses and raises to their buddies..

http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=news/politics&id=8368602

http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2011/09/26/business-us-comptroller-treasurer-pay-raises-illinois_8701142.html

While everyone else in America worries about their job and hardly anyone is hiring - guess what??
The number of people since the 2008 elections who now work for the federal government is up 7%!
In other words -- the recession sure hasn't stopped this administration and the government from spending more money and hiring more of their buddies and cronies.

I am ready to vote for anyone who vows to shrink government and get them off our backs!

Speculation on the starting lineup and some actual facts and a look into Geno's track record

Let's talk starting lineup -- there's been some extra talk here and there ever since this comment was made in the paper...
"Shayok Shayok has stood out so far and appears destined for a starting spot"

BUT -- Bradley's starting lineup has historically been very hard to predict for a number of reasons...

The first and foremost reason right now is the fact that we have a NEW head coach and numerous new players.
How do we really know what's going on in Geno Ford's mind? We'll probably just have to wait and see....but if Taylor Brown makes a STRONG comeback, then he'd also be a strong consideration for a starting spot and he plays a relatively similar frontcourt position as Shayok Shayok plays....however neither plays a true center spot so you'd have to pencil in Jordan Prosser also as having a good shot to start.

But then, that makes three frontcourt players if all three of those guys start, and is Geno going to start with only two guards? Let's look at Geno's history in this area.

BUT before we do -- as most know we've done a starting lineup pick-em on BradleyFans for the past FIVE seasons, and the outcome has been pretty amazing and confirms how hard it is to pick the starting lineups.

This year's thread containing the starting lineup Pick-em - has 20 guesses so far and we're still several weeks from the first game, and eleven different player combinations have been guessed, and only ONE combination has been selected by more than THREE fans.
And that combination has two freshmen in the starting lineup - something I have my doubts about.

Then -- of the past years -- recall that every year we've had 35-40 different pick-em guesses and in ALL BUT one season NOBODY got the starting lineup right -- NOBODY!
In the one and only season that anyone got it right -- ONLY ONE GUY was right with his guess.
Of course unforseen injuries, player issues, and as happened one season - the unforseen use of four guards in the starting lineup - threw everyone off.

SO -- in the PAST four seasons - over 140 combined guesses have resulted in only ONE guy getting it right -- thus - I wouldn't look for a whole bunch of people to get it right again this year.


SO -- here's a look at Geno Ford's pattern of choosing starters. This is a fact-based look at what type of players have been his early season starters in the other years he's been head coach...and the findings going back over several seasons of Geno being head coach are pretty consistent.
That doesn't mean he can't change gears and do something different but let's be reasonable - most coaches don't make startling or major changes from what's worked in the past.

Just last season - in 2010-2011 at Kent State, their starters in the first exhibition game were:
3 guards - Sherman, Guyton, Porrini...one forward - Justin Greene...and one center - Justin Manns...ALL were juniors and seniors....none were freshman or sophomores.
Geno then went with the same starters in the first regular season game and those same five guys started the first dozen games, before a sophomore, Randall Holt, then took a starting spot.
Of Geno's four freshmen last year only two ever started any games and each started only ONCE, so it looks like Geno does not necessarily go big, and he does not look to start kids without experience.

Then in 2009-2010 at Kent State...
His early season starters were Evans, Simpson, McKee, Sherman, and Greene.
Later Singletary and Henry-Ala got quite a few starts for different reasons.
Again -- he mostly went with a 3-guard lineup and no true center.
And again - the newcomers to D-I got very few starts over the course of the entire season.

In Geno's first year at Kent State, 2008-2009:
First game starters were Sullinger, Parks, Singletary, Fisher, Mincy - again 3 guards, a forward, and a center.
Those same five remained starters most of the season...so again it can be seen that Geno favored 3 guards. Also - three were seniors, two juniors, and the underclassmen did not get many starts all season.

Before that Geno coached at Muskingum in 2005-2006 and 2006-2007.
Here's something interesting -- in Geno's first game coached at Muskingum (2005-2006), his team played Redlands - and the final score was ..
Muskingum 148 - Redlands 125....
yup that's no typo for you typo police.
Here's the box score --
http://www.muskingum.edu/athletics/basketball_m/2005games/GAME1.HTM

As one can see from the box score, the players who STARTED and played the most, and who also launched massive quantities of shots were:
Ady-guard, Ross-guard (19-23 from the floor!), Glass-forward, Todd-guard (15-18 from the floor!), and Pittis-center..and despite 85 shots taken ONLY ONE was from the 3-pt arc!
BUT again -- Geno's going with 3 guards...and he carried that pattern thru the season....and again NONE of the starters all year were freshmen!

In 2006-2007 at Muskingum, he again started 4 guards - Todd, Ady, Byrne, Scott....and one Forward - Dicken.
So year after year he plays a 3 guard or even a 4-guard lineup and the guards constitute most of his shooting and scoring...and they all tend to be juniors and seniors - very few sophomores and virtually never a freshman starter.

Now -- I do not mean to say that proves anything - as you can draw your own conclusions....
Geno Ford has a documented track record with three seasons at Kent State and two more at smaller Muskingum, playing 3 guards most of the way....and favoring the most experienced players
However - now at Bradley -- he does have some pretty solid and experienced frontcourt players in Jordan Prosser, Taylor Brown, but I still think he's gonna go with three guards and two front court players.....but time will tell.

Note that of the 20 guesses in the pick-em thread - the most popular combination has just two guards, and fully 12 of the 20 of them have 3 guys starting in the frontcourt and ONLY TWO GUARDS.
So it seems that even though I can't find much evidence that Geno has ever gone with just a 2-guard lineup -- our fans still largely think Geno's going to "go big" and use just two guards in the starting lineup.....interesting....

In the same context - the Bradley fans taking guesses in the pick-em thread, also largely think Geno will utilize freshmen early on.
Of the 20 guesses, 17 of them have at least ONE FRESHMAN in the starting lineup....
and NINE of them have TWO freshmen as starters! Will Geno make that bold of a move and change that much from his long held pattern of using guards and upperclassmen predominantly? It will be interesting......




ISU's latest verbal, Aaron Simpson - the 5-11 kid from Chicago who's not a true point guard but who seems to have a hard time passing up any available shot - is the focus of a Sun Times blog article...
The Sun Times writer calls him a 4-year varsity player but one other article I saw said he did not play varsity for the major part of his freshman year but was brought up to varsity for the final two games as a frosh.
Much of the coverage talks of Simpson's efforts to get qualified and suggests he isn't there yet and might have had his share of struggles in that area thus far.
Recall, ISU does NOT appear to have an open scholarship for Simpson anyway -- so does Jank already kinda know Simpson isn't coming but is taking a chance just in case someone currently on the roster bolts and Simpson surprisingly blows up and gets qualified?
Time will tell.
In North Chicago's two games at the Civic Center during March Madness last spring...
He took 40 shots and made only 12 (30% shooting) and his assist to turnover ratio was 2 to 9 (0.22)...with North Chicago LOSING both games..and finishing 17-15.



Lastly - this whole nit-picking gotcha-issue pointing out typos and blowing it all up into a federal case is a great side show. Especially coming from people whose posts use some of the most horrifically improper grammar and mindboggling misspellings. They never fail to amuse.
But then, folks at Bradley and others who are close to the team have found out the hard way that some who masquerade as "fans" are just the garden variety message board attack dogs who can't take a breath without going off on some tangent of attack about inane issues. They are not supporters of Bradley basketball as can be seen in other areas but are just trying to please their egos.

The brand new Athlon 2011-2012 Preseason Basketball Preview Issue - Verdict = thumbs down

Now we have the ATHLON Preview....but I am going to start right off and tell you DO NOT WASTE a bit of time nor money on it UNLESS you are a BIG ACC fan or North Carolina fan...
Gotta wonder just who they are aiming this stuff at if half their issue really is devoted to just the players and coaches in one league.

Cover has Illinois' Brandon Paul, Notre Dame's Eric Atkins, and Northwestern's John Shurna.

Then of all the features in the 1st half of the magazine - as I said most have something to do with Roy Williams, North Carolina, Harrison Barnes, etc... and a little more about a few items in the Big East & ACC.

But here are a couple other items of interest --

One page listed the Top 10 things to watch this season...
-Of course #1 was to watch North Carolina and see them run the table and win it all
-#2 was watch Butler fall significantly and never even hit the top 25
-#3 was all about Calipari's stud players
-#5 was that Kansas loses too much and won't win the Big 12
-#8 will be that Florida will use a 4 guard offense this season - Brad Beal, Mike Rosario, then returnees Walker & Boynton.

Then the listing of coaches on the HOT SEAT has Carmody at Northwestern, Doc Sadler at Nebraska, Chris Lowery at SIU (for the 3rd or 4th year in a row), and again it has Bruce Weber of Illinois.

Among a page of Key Transfers are Anthony Booker at Iowa State and Sam Maniscalco at Illinois.

They give some 2010-2011 awards and one - the BEST NEW COACH is Indiana State's Greg Lansing. Dana Altman was 4th.

Then a bunch of TOP TEN's..
Marquette's Darius Johnson-Odom (who was very close to coming to BU) was #5 best scorer.
#8 among the BEST SLASHERS is Kyle Weems - otherwise there's barely a mention of anyone from a midmajor in anything at all so far in this preview.

Then they move to the various special articles, each covering something about this coming season but almost all of them dealing with players & teams east of the Alleghenies.....

Then the Preseason TOP 25 - all BCS schools no Valley teams nor any mid-major..
Then the 68 teams in the NCAA Tournament - and they give the MVC two teams - Creighton with the automatic bid as a #8 seed - beating Purdue then losing to UNC, while Wichita State - a #11 seed losing their first game to Texas A&M.
They slate UNI & Indiana State as NIT Teams.
and then the list of All Americans all the way to 3rd Team and Hon. Mention has not one mid-major player...

So -- now about 90 pages deep into this issue we finally get to the various conferences...
but guess which conference is not only highlighted FIRST but also gets about 40 pages -- yup the ACC with special articles on each player especially Harrison Barnes.

I glanced at the Big East section -= DePaul picked 16th...
Then the Big Ten - Wisconsin picked to win, Illinois 5th, Indiana 9th..
and in the one-page section about Illinois they do have a really nice blurb about Sam Maniscalco - a team leader, smart kid, should help Illinois.
Illinois is picked to get an at-large bid but lose their only NCAA game.

SO......finally - yawn -- I battle fatigue and get to the Missouri Valley section and REALLY am disappointed.
The whole Valley section is 3 pages long...
1st page just picks the finish, describes the overview of teams, and lists All Conference players, then nearly a page on Creighton, then a page for Wichita, UNI, & Indiana State, then the very next page is Mountain West Conference, - and you realize, that Athlon must think the MVC has only four teams !!!!
NOTHING at all - not a mention - of anyone other than the top 4 finishers!!

Their predicted finish:
Creighton
Wichita State
Indiana State
UNI
Evansville
Missouri State
Drake
SIU
ISU
Bradley - picked last - I guess I might have expected it.

In their overview they have one tiny mention that BU has a new coach and will be dealing with injuries as they note Will's knee and Taylor's uncertain status.

Then the final few pages rank the recruits for 2011, 2012, and 2013...no surprises but...
Remy Abell is #101 in 2011, Jabari Parker is #1 in 2013.

Overall recap -- worst preview I have seen yet in every regard - especially in regard to fairness to 99% of the NATION that are NOT North Carolina or ACC worshippers.
And even in regards to the info on the Valley - not one single tiny iota of news or info that I am sure ALL of you didn't know back in June.

A look at Creighton

OK -- getting back to checking out BU's future opponents, today I will mention a few things about Creighton.
I am picking Creighton since I have been contacted by a Creighton fan who readily admits to poring over every single blog entry on this site, scouring every word for the tiniest of errors to refute, and then he has started his own sparsely used blog site dedicated ONLY to trying to debunk what he seems to think are gross errors made here on BUBravesBlogger. I won't give the link to this guy's blog, because it would surely multiply his traffic 100-fold - as his blog is so obscure and unvisited with so few readable entries except a couple aimed directly at me or someone he things is me, he must have to dust off cobwebs each time he posts a new entry.
One of his recent issues was to drag up Daniel Ruffin's arrest and completely mischaracterize it claiming things like choking and felony...so the guy had to be corrected that it was a simple misdemeanor and DRuff completed the deferred prosecution and charges were dropped. Not even on his record any more...and surely the guy has to know that Greg McDermott is by no means a stranger to player issues with drugs, arrests, and players kicked off the team -- in fact - over the past 5 seaosns (4 of which were at Iowa State) McDermott surely had to be the NATION's LEADR among D-I head coaches with players misbehaving and getting booted elsewhere - but that's not my point.

Which brings me to the main point of even mentioning him, that he started his blog six months ago and has only like four actual entries that challenge anything.... and all of his arguments are simple differences of opinion with zero references of any kind, and not any real issue with a single fact!
In other words - the guy claims to scour every word on this blog and over the past six months he hasn't found a single thing to bit*h about except 3 or 4 things I have posted such as that I said ISU would be better off without Justin Clark (a career 18% 3-pt shooter) on the roster or that their team are the "Bluejays" and not the "Blue Jays" - even tho I have never said they were ....NEVER!

So - I fully expect said obscure blogger will really go after me on this one - but here goes...


If you want to swallow a couple of the preseason magazines and previews hook, line, and sinker - then we might just as well cancel the 2011-2012 Missouri Valley Conference season and just go ahead and hand the trophy now to Creighton.

BUT I am not willing to do that just yet. Sure, Creighton has a good shot at being the best team in the Valley - but all TEN Valley teams are still undefeated in Valley Conference play so I would say just that about all TEN teams.

And I will agree that Doug McDermott is a fine player - and likely to get a lot of attention as preseason Player of the Year in the Valley (if, for some reason, anyone who votes happens to forget that Kyle Weems has not graduated nor transferred and will still be playing this year for Missouri State).
BUT here is my summary of Creighton for 2011-2012.

They had Doug McDermott last year and he was teamed with the 2010 MVC Preseason Player of the Year Kenny Lawson and other fine players, and yet Creighton did NOT win the Valley.
They finished 10-8 - middle-of-the-pack in the MVC, the exact same finish & record or within ONE GAME of what Bradley had in 2007, 2008, 2009, AND 2010 -- all four years of which the BU fans booed and hissed and said we need to do better or FIRE THE COACH!!
So if Creighton did no better than Bradley did in any of those four seasons that a segment of the self-proclaimed "best" BU fans were moaning and griping about mediocrity - then are now going to apply a totally different standard to a 10-8 record?
Hey - and Creighton did NOT have injuries to use as an excuse! NINE of their top ten players in playing time played EVERY single game that they were eligible for!
PLUS - the only player with an injury was a non-starter who averaged 5 ppg on 37% shooting.

PLUS - right at the end of the year when BU was wearing down, had lost three starters - with Jordan Prosser carried to the locker room, and were playing on fumes, yet we still played as many games into the MVC Tourney as Creighton did - losing to WSU - as they lost to Missouri State, and our best players did NOT get shut down like McDermott did (only 9 pts vs. MSU) - as Dyricus shined with a 26 pt/9 reb game and Andrew was steady and at least hit his scoring average.

BUT I do not deny that Creighton returns several good players and will be one of the teams to beat - and I am not simply here to trash any team - let alone Creighton - like the Bluejay blogger seems to do...
BUT -- let's see who do they have??

Greg McDermott's son, Doug, coming off a freshman season of 14.9 ppg, 7.2 rpg.
When translated to per-40-minute averages that's...
20.5 pts per 40 minutes and 9.9 rebs per 40 minutes.

Kenny Lawson - who didn't play anywhere near as much time on the court as McDermott - and who was barely mentioned by anyone as having a good season - his numbers work out to....
19.0 pts per 40 minutes & 11.34 rebs per 40 minutes -
so arguably Lawson did everything McDermott did but wasn't given the chance to run up his numbers by playing 35 minutes per game!

A couple more comparisons... here are the averages per 40 minutes for ...

- Missouri State's Kyle Weems - 20.64 pts per 40 minutes & 8.83 rebs per 40 minutes
(almost identical to Dougie's)

- ISU's Jackie Carmichael - 16.8 pts per 40 minutes & 9.3 rebs per 40 minutes - hmmmm not a whole lot different!

- SIU's Mamadou Seck nabs 11.03 rebs per 40 minutes!

BUT - don't get me wrong -- I really like Doug McDermott -- I see him as sort of a great athletic scorer/rebounder like Taylor Brown on his best days like this game when he had 27 pts and 8 rebs against - of all teams - Creighton - LINK

But also a heady kid whose hard work & attitude makes the most of his God-given talent -- like this kid -




The other players that will round out Creighton's starting lineup are..
-Antoine Young - one of the best point guards in the Valley
-Greg Echenique - 105ppg/5.8 rpg last year
-Jahenns Manigat started 16 games last year but he may be replaced as starter by one of the newcomers - maybe Gonzaga transfer Grant Gibbs or one of the freshmen.
-Then if they want to go really big they can use a true center like Will Artino or go with small forward Ethan Wragge if he's made his comeback from injury.

Echenique played this summer with his National Team from Venezuela, and in their 8 games this summer (4-4 in FIBA Americas) he averaged 6.1 ppg (7th best on the team) and 5.3 rpg (2nd best)...maybe a little of a surprise given the weakness of some of the opponents like Panama, Cuba,...and that his playing time was among the top 5 guys on the squad.

Creighton as a team, also went to the Bahamas on a summer exhibition tour and whalloped four pretty overmatched Bahamian club-team opponents by an average margin of victory of 27 points per game.
They played everyone a bunch and the best players on the tour were:
-McD 24 ppg, 9.8 rpg
-Artino 10 ppg, 10.5 rpg
-Gibbs 8 ppg, 3 rpg
-Young 8.5 ppg, 1 rpg
-Wragge 7 ppg, 1.8 rpg

So anyone can see, if you figure some way to stop Doug McDermott then you will have discovered something none of those short and slow Bahamian squads figured out.


Creighton's schedule this year has a lot of creampuffs like Chicago State, North Carolina A&T, Campbell (yup they're a D-I school) and Houston Baptist, but the Bluejays also have Nebraska (Big Ten now but still ordinary in basketball), Northwestern, Tulsa, St. Joe's, San Diego State, UAB, and Iowa.
Thus their overall schedule still ranks as one of the best among Valley members.

So I predict Creighton will be among the top three in the Valley - but injuries and other factors are going to play a part this year, as the two most valuable players they have - Young and McDermott - are among the returning player with the MOST minutes played per game.
Antoine Young's 36.2 minutes per game are 4 MORE per game than the NEXT closest player returning in Valley play!
Coach Mac has a long history of playing his main guys a ton and exhausting them, and it was why so many of his strong UNI teams tuckered out at the end of the season and failed to make a peep in the Valley tourney or post-season.

Time will tell - but I would be very surprised if they finished below 3rd - and so should Bluejay fans.

Nice story on TB by CBSSports and some other news..

A few short things..

Taylor Brown is the subject of a really nice, long piece by CBSSports this morning -- a lot of info and video about Taylor we have not yet seen even from local coverage!
http://twitter.com/#!/xb7/status/116896244806332417


Some links to updated info on BU's pros playing internationally

-Chris Roberts -
http://bradleyfans.com/vb/showthread.php?p=236613#post236613

-Patrick O'Bryant -
http://bradleyfans.com/vb/showthread.php?p=236614#post236614

-Andrew Warren -
http://bradleyfans.com/vb/showthread.php?p=236608#post236608


Here's a lesson on discipline - one D-I has two players arrested for assaulting other students on campus -- and yet the school has said they are NOT going to suspend the kids and they are handing down absolutely ZERO discipline.>
This is reminiscent of SIU's and ISU's discipline on lawbreakers when a couple of their kids got DUI's and then played the next day!
http://rushthecourt.net/2011/09/21/quinnipiac-keeps-two-players-charged-with-assault-on-the-team/

Some info on Misouri State - plus it's gotta be global warming, right?

How about a preseason look at Missouri State basketball....
They still have Kyle Weems but they almost didn't as he entertained thoughts of transferring.

But for a guy who is and deserves the Valley Player of the Year - he is still a bit inconsistent and he won't have much to team with him this season also - something I am sure most Missouri State fans are reluctant to see.

Here's a few examples of MSU's late season faltering...

Down the stretch run when Missouri State had the chance to literally put away Wichita State and run away with the Valley - they lose at Evansville by double digits (77-65) although this wasn't all Weems' fault but he did fail to get his teammates involved as he had no assists, and the rest of his team were just 15-36 and 5-19 from 3-pt.

Then a BracketBuster loss at Valpo that would have possibly had them in line for an AT LARGE BID from the NCAA - and Valpo comes away with a pretty easy 80-67 win, leading by 10-15 most of the last 25 minutes.
Weems going 7-21 (1-8 from downtown) really hurt them.

But the single worst stunner was in St. Louis - where Missouri State handed off a win to undermatched Indiana State with Kyle Weems pretty much taking the day and the entire MVC Conference Championship Tournament off.
Only 3 made baskets in 36 minutes might show how teams are going to beat them this year -- just guard Weems and the rest of the team simply can't help much.
Weems' shooting percentage over the final half dozen games was just over 31% showing he wore down carrying too much of the load, and it won't get easier this year.

In fact - in all of those THREE games I just cited, the entire bench combined for only 30 pts and 16 rebounds -- that just 10 pts & 5 rebs a game from what's left for Weems to team with this year because the rest of all the starters are all gone!

In the MVC Tourney loss the bench contributed a mere 5 pts & 4 rebs.....a scary sign of what the future is going to be like for Weems when he has to play this season without any talent on the floor except himself.

But right after the MVC Tourney loss then their coach, Cuonzo Martin bolts to become Bruce Pearl's replacement at Tennessee and the Bears dip back into the Purdue assistant pool to land Paul Lusk.

This year's roster has a lot of new names...and senior Will Creekmore was denied a special NCAA 6th year waiver for an extra year of college ball - as it should have been since the ONLY year he lost was due to transfer - not injury.

The addition of DePaul transfer Mike Bizoukas isn't likely to help a lot. Returnee Nathan Scheer (soph) is a good shooter but he won't be enough by himself...although maybe one of the newcomers (jucos Anthony Downing, Corbin Thomas, & Jarmar Gulley, and a handful of freshmen) will help a bit. They also have returning Caleb Patterson, who along with Isiah Rhine provide a tiny bit of frontcourt experience.
New head coach Paul Lusk with have a tough task.

One starter is certain - Kyle Weems and at least two others Scheer & Caleb Patterson return with a fair amount of experience from last year. But guessing the other two starters is tough. Bizoukas transferred from DePaul as a grad student (like Sam Maniscalco did so he's eligible immediately) so he's somewhat experienced but he didn't play much at DePaul and averaged just 2 ppg.
My guess is that Biz will start at PG and then the other SG might be Keith Pickens who returns from an injury...or maybe one of the juco kids could earn time in the starting lineup.
They are holding tryouts for walk-ons - so you never know...
http://www.missouristatebears.com/sports/m-baskbl/spec-rel/091311aab.html

They should struggle early on against one of the Valley's best non-conference slates, until they figure out who their best players are to go with Weems.
They do host Oklahoma State and Tulsa early on, and they go to New Mexico & Nevada, and also play in a tough Las Vegas Tourney where they'll face West Virginia and St. Mary's...


Here's one interesting tidbit -- Missouri State is doing something this year that D-I schools NEVER get to do...
They are playing THREE open, public pre-season exhibition games.
Ordinarily teams are limited to TWO such games but Missouri State has received special permission to play an additional exhibition against D-II Missouri Southern IN Joplin, Missouri to help benefit those who were hurt by the tornado's devastation.
http://ozarksfirst.com/fulltext/?nxd_id=474417

http://www.cbssports.com/mcc/blogs/entry/26283066/30168642





All this heat -- surely this has been the hottest year on record -- in fact prepare yourself because I am sure that's what everyone in the media is gonna say!
If you ask anyone in the entire state if this has been a warmer than usual year for Illinois, I am sure 99% will say yes and 95% will say they are 100% sure it has been.

BUT -- what do the actual FACTS say???
Here are the precise facts from numerous temperature stations in every county in Illinois - thousands of precise data points..(not the crap that the feds make up or hand pick to prove what they want)

It comes from this data bank...
http://mcc.sws.uiuc.edu/cliwatch/watch.htm#

Which tabulates data in Illinois from 117 different data recording and reporting sites. This data is precise and cannot be faked - Here are those 117 different sites throughout the state:
http://www.isws.illinois.edu/data/climatedb/


But let's look at the one figure they call "Departure from the Mean" which is the one indicator whether this year has been hotter than normal (or average).

Here we see proof that last winter we were way cooler than usual
http://mcc.sws.uiuc.edu/cliwatch/seasons/djf.tdev.png

Then in spring - again much cooler than "normal" throughout Illinois
http://mcc.sws.uiuc.edu/cliwatch/seasons/mam.tdev.png

Summer - yup it was hotter than usual..we all know that...
http://mcc.sws.uiuc.edu/cliwatch/seasons/jja.tdev.png

September thus far, however, is back to being VERY cool..as was the last part of August
http://mcc.sws.uiuc.edu/cliwatch/mtd/month.tdev.png

And if we just look at the temp departure last 30 days is -1 to -2 degrees (BELOW historical average) nearly statewide
http://mrcc.sws.uiuc.edu/state_climatologists/illinois/tmeandev-30days.png

So WHAT does the overall picture for Illinois in 2011 show???
....the temperature departure for the State of Illinois over the entire year of 2011.......is............
........ZERO...
http://mrcc.sws.uiuc.edu/state_climatologists/illinois/tempytd2.png

It has NOT been the hottest year ever, and it hasn't even been a "hot year" -- it has been precisely at the average or mean temperature here in Illinois if you actually look at the real and not imagined data!!!

So just as I predicted - even though everyone thinks it is hotter than usual this year - they are WRONG.
It was hotter than usual this summer but the cooler temps statewide the entire rest of the year cause the average temperature departure for virtually the ENTIRE State of Illinois to be ZERO.

So this is a classic example of someone using a short term factor to assume a long term trend when the real long term trend is that 7 of the 9 months we have had so far in Illinois in 2011 have actually been COOLER than usual and the long term trend therefore is NOT warming!

So how about other midwestern states? What you find is pretty amazing...
Iowa - for example - has had a relatively cool year - and even over the last 3 months, their temperature averages have been right on the averages with an average temperature departure of ZERO despite seemingly everyone saying it's record hot!
http://mrcc.isws.illinois.edu/state_climatologists/iowa/tmeandev-90days.png

Other midwest states are the same -- mostly right around the norm - despite the hot summer since the entire rest of 2011 was pretty cool.

So you cannot prove global warming with any data from the midwest - regardless of what you hear now or what you will hear from alarmists down the road.
Sure there were some hot spots in certain places like Texas - which we heard endlessly about on news reports, but there were other spots like Minnesota (which we never seemed to hear about) where the entire first 6 months of 2011 had almost all parts of Minnesota at 3-6 degrees below average over that entire span!
http://mrcc.isws.illinois.edu/cliwatch/seasons/mam.tdev.pnghttp://mrcc.isws.illinois.edu/cliwatch/seasons/djf.tdev.png


BTW -- for those who might still think we have been having drought - the facts also prove that totally wrong...precip. departure - is above norm all over the state, AND way ABOVE for the Southern half of Illinois.
http://mrcc.sws.uiuc.edu/state_climatologists/illinois/prcpytd2.png

So I don't really care what people believe but they should check real facts, that's all. I guess I learned long ago that almost everyone in government and in media has a bias and has an agenda. So if your information or your beliefs come from such a biased and limited source then just beware of how wrong you might be.

BUT - here I have presented pure data -- facts from literally hundreds of separate and independent sites that are used and relied on for accuracy by all the Illinois farmers and other people. If you want to claim all this data is wrong - then feel free but you are making a total fool of yourself if that's what you believe.

Some early preseason thoughts about SIU

SIU ended last season on a down note - something that was hard to do given how bad their season was...with poor shooting, bad play, and sparse offense.
BUT -- they beat ISU in the Thursday night game and then had TOP SEED Missouri State all but buried on Friday before horribly blowing a 9 point lead inside of the final 3 minutes to let Missouri State escape by scoring the final 11 points of the game, and put the final nail in their coffin of a bad year.

Of their top 12 scorers from last season...

--Three have graduated - Carlton Fay, Jack Crowder, John Freeman. Fay was their leading scorer and team leader.

--Four more have been dismissed or sent packing in one way or another - Gene Teague, Troy Long, Mykel Cleveland, Jordan Myers.

--And three more will start the season under suspension according to several reports - Diamond Taylor, Davante Drinkard, Kendall Brown-Surles - with the latter two possibly being ineligible all semester.

That means only their 2nd (Mamadou Seck) and their 5th (Justin Bocot) best scorers return from their 13-19 campaign to start this season.

The rest of their current roster shows -

- FIVE freshman (Tony Bryer, Dantiel Daniels, Treg Setty, Josh Swan, and Harry Whitt)

- and a few new juco transfers (Early, Lindsay, Goff)

- Plus even the bench will have a different look with two new assistants - Ron Smith and Anthony Stewart.

Lance Irvin - supposedly their lead Chicago area recruiter - has been sent packing as well in addition to one other assistant Marcus Belcher.
Irvin may well have been canned - perhaps in response to how terribly all the Chicago area kids like Dillard and Hare turned out. In fact - given that Irvin's specialty was to land the top Chicago kids - and since SIU never gets or keeps any of those kids, I guess Irvin was expendable, making SIU the EIGHTH D-I program he's left in just a little over a decade.

This all makes me recall when that hyped recruiting class was coming in with Hare, Dillard and Top-30 recruit Booker - more than a few Bradley fans wailed that they wish we could land players like that.....ahem -- yeah right.......still wish for that??

Thankfully, though, the SIU people saw this coming and scheduled according to the ISU plan - pencilling in such cupcakes and NON-Division I opponents as Ohio Dominican, Northeastern, Chicago State, NIU, and SIUE in the early going....
Only home games with Saint Louis and Western Kentucky should produce much challenge even to their weakened squad...

But they had better get their ineligible players miraculously cleared by Dec. 22 because they will face Kansas State then UTEP or Clemson in the ESPN Diamond Head Classic.

Plus -- just look at the last few seasons as well -
The number of key players & starters who have left with eligibility remaining is well into double digits.... (Dillard, Booker, Evans, Hare, Cornelius, Roundtree, Bone, Wood, not to mention Foster & Dale...)

So needless to say fans want some change but this year's prospects look pretty slim given the lack of recognizable players.
And their press hasn't been kind either -- just this morning this column appeared....pretty much equating SIU's reluctance to address all the rumors of ineligibility with the fact that they are true and SIU wants to delay the inevitable fan reaction as long as possible.

http://thesouthern.com/college/siu/article_96d12104-e1ae-11e0-90e2-001cc4c002e0.html

It's hard to pick a possible starting lineup with just two experienced players returning & eligible.
But here goes...
Seck, Bocot, Lindsay, Early, Daniels

Then I would have to say they are going to be just about everyone's favorite to finish 10th in the Valley - so I predict that's where they'll be picked and not much that I have seen nor heard makes me think they're going to surprise anyone.

Lastly - the SIU message board is a place that you really just don't want to go. It is so filled with infighting, attacks, and hateful criticism of their own team and players, that there are no other boards anywhere in the Valley - maybe even all of D-I that compare -- although one was headed that way before being recently saved from self destruction by a few hard-handed slaps on the violators.

Anyway - even some of the hateful and miserable threads from a year ago are being brought back and nobody dares say anything positive without getting ripped by the haters. SIU fans are vicious.

Just a few thoughts about ISU from a Braves fan

Just a look at ISU and what they have from a Bradley fan's perspective...and I know the Redbird folks will disagree with most of my thoughts - but I have pretty good sources and references for what's here...

-THE SCHEDULE -- By virtue of having one BCS opponent, even though it is Rutgers (who are picked to finish near the bottom of the Big East), and the possibility that ISU might face Illinois in Cancun, then this is marginally the toughest schedule in five years for Jankovich.
The rest of the non-conference opponents are really awful so overall the schedule is still pretty bad -- SIUE, Fresno, Lipscomb, Bethune-Cookman, Chicago State, UNCW, Norfolk State, UALR, Morehead....wow -- most of then are also at home for ISU so they ought to actually breeze to wins in all of those games.


-Their roster this year is almost all guards - Allen, Blue, Brown, Clark, Cousin, Hill, Moore, Upshaw, Zeisloft, and even John Wilkins is listed as a guard (likely at his request).
http://www.goredbirds.com/sports/m-baskbl/mtt/ilsu-m-baskbl-mtt.html

They have 3 forwards listed (Carmichael, Ekey, and Jones - although we are hearing that Jones is not going to gain eligibility) and one center (Threloft).

They have no seniors so on paper they have NO open scholarships until 2013 when Wilkins, Blue, Brown, Carmichael, Clark, and Cousin all finish up -- which means they will lose SIX players - all of whom will likely be key players by then who were getting decent playing time. So Jank has his recruiting classes really screwed up and unbalanced. You just can't lose 6 players at once - all of whom will be either starters or key rotation players and then expect in 2013 to be any good.

But that also means despite being picked LAST in the MVC this year by some preseason preview publications, then just maybe Coach Jankovich is looking forward to next year, 2012-2013 when he'll have all those guys as seniors, thinking that might then be the year with high expectations...if he is still around given brewing discontent with many issues.

BUT THEN...we know someone will be leaving (probably already Jones is gone) before then since ISU just got a verbal from Anthony Beane for 2012...

http://bradleyfans.com/vb/showthread.php?p=236107#post236107

BUT at least one ISU fans dares touch on the sensitive subject...what if ISU finishes poorly this year and Tim Jankovich and staff are fired?
Then that means that Anthony Beane's dad who is Jank's assistant will be gone, and of course so would the little A-Beane.

http://redbirdfan.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=78&start=75

As noted above - they should be able to sleep walk thru their non-conference season and start their conference season (incl. BracketBuster) at around 10-1 or 9-2...then let's say they go 6-12 and lose the first game Thursday nite in St. Louis - then ...if that happens - a 17-14 season - Jank might just be been canned with a 100-64 career record at ISU.
That would still place Jank among the all time best coaches ISU has had record-wise.

As far as recruiting - where Bradley has been getting top kids onto campus - Larry Austin, Peyton Allen, Nate Taphorn, and many more -- news of ISU's recruiting has been scarce - save for the announcement that one of the assistant coach's son is gonna verbal there -- something everyone and their mother already knew.
What I have heard behind the scenes about Jank & ISU's recruiting is that Jank relegates most of it to his assistants. And where Geno has been getting major inroads into the Chicago recruiting scene and other in-state kids, Jank and his assistants are struggling...and of course the lack of open scholarships for the near future hurts too. But since they'll have gobs of rides open for 2013 then why are they not at least lining up a few bigger names??


-OK let's have a little fun -- try to guess ISU's starting lineup. This is not easy as even Jackie Carmichael - who absolutely kills BU - was NOT a full time starter last year. Nobody started more than 25 of their 31 games...
And the tendency for Tim Jankovich to juggle the starting lineup just about every other game tends to show even HE has no clue who his best players are as subs led them in scoring almost all the time -- and this schizoid lineup changing surely must be hard for the players to settle in and feel comfortable. One bad game often meant some poor guy got dropped 5-6 places on the depth chart!! (Although JW sure seemed to always get a lot of playing time - maybe fulfilling a promise made)
Obviously this makes players pretty danged hesitant to take a shot or take any chance anywhere on the court for fear of paying big time in playing time loss.
They also experimented with different lineups and rotations on their Canadian tour.

But I will project Carmichael (PF), Ekey (F), Wilkins (SG/SF), Brown (SG), and Cousin (PG), as starters.


-And how will they do this year?? Unlike the preseason mags that have come out - I DON'T think they will finish 9th or 10th...I think they'll do a little better than that. Their shooting was atrocious last year - 42.5% overall and just 31.0% from 3-pt range.
They are solid in the frontcourt with returnees Carmichael (although Jackie averaged only 6 points per game in the final 9 games) & Ekey,
but lacking a bit in the backcourt despite the numerous rostered guards...and of course they lost their TOP SCORER and only reliable scorer and only guy who could create shots - Austin Hill.
Only one player (Cousin) has had any experience playing PG at the college level - and he got just 2 assists per game last year, and that means they might again be at the bottom of the Valley in assist statistics...unless freshman Nic Moore can surprise everyone - and he sure didn't on their Canadian trip where he was effectively a turnover-waiting-to happen.
There was lots of speculation that Jankovich would land a juco point guard but he did NOT and instead loaded up even more on juco shooting guards who can't hit three's...
Also - I just can't see anyone on their roster suddenly lifting their shooting statistics very much.
Why Zeke Upshaw is still on the team is a stumper - since now three years into his college career he still looks to be deep in the rotation...not scoring ONE single point last year over the final TWO MONTHS of the season!!!


Lastly -- I will carefully address something that's been hanging around as rumors for quite some time.....and that is that ISU has some serious "chemistry issues" and issues among their personnel that affect their play on the court.
This isn't rare - as it has happened at times to many schools - even BU.
This blends right in with the constant lineup changing as guys were janked from the lineup for issues that were not openly discussed in press conferences.

Note this one quote by Tim Jankovich when they got thumped on Thursday night in St. Louis by a woeful SIU team...
"We were not good enough offensively. We will have to get back to more like the teams of the past. That doesn't happen playing video games and lying around on the couch."

Apparently he is referring to some lazy work ethics that have been rumored to exist, players who dodge their assigned times in the weight room and play video games instead, and some players who simply don't want to do what the coaches ask of them - including players who refuse to play the position on the court they are assigned.
If this recurs again this season then ISU will finish last -- it just hurts a team way too much.

More Government Corruption

Have you read about Solyndra...a company whose founders & owners are close buddies and financial supporters of the current President.
A company that wasn't even valued at $100 million but got a GUARANTEED loan from the federal government for well over $500 million even at a time that they were financially insolvent and the government's OWN REGULATIONS should have prohibited giving that much money to them because it was VERY bad risk.

Well -- that money is ALL gone, and the company just went belly-up.
This is a serious scandal -- had this been Halliburton or Dick Cheney - well you know it would have been dragged in the headlines for months & years - instead you have to check the deep back pages of some newspapers to even find the story.
This is classic government cronyism and corruption at its best - and it a far larger scale of what we saw right here in Peoria with Firefly...
Taxpayers' money being casually and irresponsibly given to crooked people because of who they know in government - then criminally spiriting the massive amounts of cash to who-knows-where - likely their own foreign bank accounts - then going belly up and filing bankruptcy!
The press is also complicit in this by NOT reporting major facts that do expose those both in government and at the corporations who have been negligent, immoral, and even criminal.

http://bradleyfans.com/vb/showthread.php?p=233359#post233359


Does anyone doubt for a second that all this new corruption mixed with horrific regulations and government red tape is what's killing jobs!
http://www.worldmag.com/articles/18621

Sean Harris immediately scooped up by perennial NCAA Tourney team without playing a game in three years

September 15, 2011, 8:00AM-

Not a whole lot of news in college basketball but some thoughts...

Ex-BU recruit Sean Harris - a kid who hasn't even played a college basketball game in three years - just verballed to Utah State.
He visited their campus last weekend - they were tremendously impressed, they offered and Sean accepted.

"Harris is described as a skilled and “relentless” power forward with a good jumper and three-point range. He recently returned from an LDS Church mission, and visited the Logan campus last weekend. That, along with Utah State’s tradition, was enough to get him to commit.

“He loves that Utah State is a top-25 team almost every year,” Cornelius told the Tribune. “He visited there, and he thought it was a great fit. He got along well with the guys and he loved it there. He’s a big forward, the ultimate four man. He’ll be about 220 pounds by the time he gets to Utah State. The fans there are going to love how hard he plays. He’s relentless.”
http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/sports/52585507-77/season-harris-cornelius-forward.html.csp

If you read the whole article -- it notes that Utah State - a team that finished inside of the TOP 25 RPI rankings each of the past TWO seasons and who went to the NCAA both years, and who have WON their conference and gone to the NCAA each of the past THREE seasons and played somewhere in the post-season NINE years running....expects to start Sean at their 4-position next year!


So with that info and with news of how impressive Sean was that led to Utah State offering - we'd have to conclude he might well have been a starter here, something that doubters are not going to like to hear.

It appears that Sam Maniscalco is going to be a starter for Illinois, and at the same time the talk at Indiana is that Remy Abell has been so impressive thus far in the preseason that he is going to be a starter there for the Hoosiers.
Seriously - if we lost those two players who become starters for Big Ten teams, then obviously they would have both been starters here, it's a no brainer.
The other player lost, Sean Harris, is, of course, open to debate how much he would have played - but with the absence of Will Egolf, and with TWO other potential starters (TB & Prosser) both ending last season unable to play and their status currently is still not determined -- then it is actually quite likely that had we landed the older, talented, high scoring 6-8 juco forward Harris - that surely he'd have played an important role this season also. He may have actually had to be a starter by default as we will begin the season thin or hobbled in our front court.

And some claim they do not see any evidence of "fallout" from the coaching change -- duhh.....how absolutely blind does one have to be to not see we lost possible THREE starters!



Each sport & every endeavor has it's all-time superstars....
Golf - Tiger
Baseball - Babe Ruth
Basketball - Michael Jordan
Hockey - Wayne Gretzky
Message boards - BradleyFans.com - ;)

But -- did you know there's a new, emerging all-time superstar in one sport that you may not have heard of.

In competitive bass fishing we have 20-year old Jacob Wheeler.
He's just a kid but racking up victory after victory - and cementing his name already among the best ever in his sport!

Who'd have ever thunk you can make a decent living just casting bait -- but Jacob just won a $100,000 tourney prize!!!

http://fishing.outdoorzy.com/20-year-old-is-youngest-bass-fishing-champ/

http://jacobwheelerfishing.com/about-jacob

Pretty soon young kids will be wanting his rookie card and pretending to be Jacob Wheeler out in their back yards....I just hope superstardom doesn't negatively affect Jacob like it has to Barry Bonds, Tiger Woods, and Manny Ramirez!

Summary of non-conference schedule and the disaster that is Peoria District 150

FWIW - Here's the summary of all the preseason thoughts I have posted about our NON-CONFERENCE opponents:

UMKC .. and MORE
SEMO
North Dakota
Wofford
Wisconsin
BYU or Nevada
Wyoming
Northeastern
George Washington
Drexel
Western Carolina
Michigan



And I just can't ignore the front page story for the PJ Star the past two days running...
how badly the Peoria public schools are doing...

Here are the locations of those two articles...I did not make them a hyperlink - but you can find your way there:

http://www.pjstar.com/news/x948305928/Only-four-District-150-schools-meet-state-testing-standards

http://www.pjstar.com/news/x948306178/Look-at-test-scores-shows-District-150-making-some-progress

Basically they demonstrate that 22 of 26 Peoria public schools is FAILING -- or fall below the MINIMUM testing guidelines!!!

Remember this?? - LINK

That story pointed out how all those failing schools actually get rewarded by the government using tax dollars to buy free breakfast and free lunch for EVERY child in each of those failing schools!!
In other words...if they fail - let's reward them!!!

Someone needs to step up and be accountable. We have privately run schools locally that have WON national and statewide awards for their academic excellence.

http://www.peoriaacademy.org/news/view/congratulations-scholastic-bowl-team/
http://www.peoriaacademy.org/news/http://www.pjstar.com/news/x1742291335/Peoria-Christian-named-2009-Blue-Ribbon-School
http://www.pjstar.com/features/neighbors/x1192320142/Peoria-Christian-gets-award-from-ACT

So.....why are the people who run District 150 or the citizens whose children that distrcit serves -- still willing to allow such POOR performance to persist and such terrible leadership to continue to sit there and collect their HALF-MILLION dollar paycheck??
Nice job Grenita -- didn't you vow we'd see better than this?? Didn't you stake your reputation and career on it?
BTW - District 150 landed millions of dollars in Obama's stimulus money -- where'd it go??

And why are the terms of her million+ dollar contract being kept SECRET???
http://centralillinoisproud.com/fulltext/?nxd_id=182937

http://tellpeoria.com/peoriapundit/tag/grenita-lathan/

http://www.peoriamagazines.com/ibi/2010/aug/dr-grenita-lathan

Need I say -- just about everything associated with District 150 from the TOP on down is an embarrassment to the community.... how can kids who get horrible education ever be expected to get or hold a job or support their families?

Prediction - watch the finger-pointing continue...

Bradley's final non-conference opponent Michigan

Just about everyone who follows Bradley knows by now that we got a nice deal to play Michigan there this year, then next year they'll be coming to Peoria!
I don't need to tell you they're going to be very hard to beat up there.

In 2010-2011 they were a "blue collar team" and won by beating opponents physically. They were 10th in the Big Ten in scoring - ahead of only Penn State (66.5 ppg)...and they were down at the bottom on rebounding as well.
They didn't lead the Big Ten in anything and were middle-of-the-pack in almost all other stats.

Their best 3-pt shooter was Zach Novak at around 38%


Michigan is picked to be in the upper half of the Big Ten. They lost only one player - PG Darius Morris and return everyone else.
Bradley has Pat Beilein as an assistant coach - and he's the son of Michigan's head coach John Beilein. Pat was introduced at the Bradley Community Event with his name pronounced...
"BEE - LINE"...not "BY - LINE"...just for those who want to know.

Zack Novak is a tough kid who Bradley recruited, and now he's become their team leader, a good scorer and their top rebounder.

Their PG Stu Douglass has a little of the same tough style as Novak.

Their best player and their guy that might have the best chance of being in the NBA is Tim Hardaway, Jr. - an explosive scoring guard - not a point guard like his father.

Their other two projected starters are Center Jordan Morgan (also NBA potential) - who had a nice sophomore season and then either Matt Vogrich (6-4 SG) or Evan Smotrycz (6-9 SF) depending on whether they want to big or small.

I would be surprised if Peoria Notre Dame's Max Bielfeldt, a freshman at Michigan, gets much playing time early on but I think he'll get into some games and do OK.
Here's a story from last week in the Michigan press about Max...
http://www.freep.com/article/20110905/SPORTS06/109050348/Four-U-M-freshman-hoopsters-work-game-over-summer

Here' some potential bad news for Max -- Michigan is making a big push to land Mitch McGary - a very similar player to Max - but ranked way higher -- inside the Top 5 NATIONALLY.
http://is.gd/cozTf1


Michigan's history - they have one National Championship in 1989 over Seton Hall - the year Illinois was also in the Final Four.
They have two legacies -- the Fab Five that everyone still seems to talk about, and then the scandal that ultimately hurt them for a whole decade when it was finally proven that those Fab Five guys were all paid big time.
They've had a lot of great players over the years - Cazzie Russel, Rudy Tomjanovich, Glen Rice, Jalen Rose, Chris Webber...and more but...
they've had a DEFINITE drop off in quality players over the past two decades...
They have not had an All American since 1994 (Jalen Rose), and in the last decade they haven't had a single player head to the NBA and much if any impact!


Here's the Hoopsreport preview of Michigan:
http://www.thehoopsreport.com/article.aspx?id=784

Lindy's Preseason College Basketball Preview Magazine - and a 6-year followup of the NCAA investigating Bradley in the summer of 2005

The 2nd 2011-2012 College Basketball Preview issue is out, Lindy's.

Here's a short review of it from a Missouri Valley perspective...and much of the info relevant to the Missouri Valley is written by and contributed by Steve Pivovar - the beat writer for the Creighton Bluejays, so it stands to NO surprise that Creighton players kinda dominate all the preseason teams and Creighton is rated so highly...

The cover of the local issue has Illinois' Brandon Paul and DePaul's Brandon Young.

In the National preseason Top 25 - they have Creighton at #23.

In the prediction of the NCAA Tourney bids, they have two MVC teams in, both losing before the 2nd round of Regionals, Creighton as Valley winner and Wichita State as an at large team.
They rank the Valley as the #11 strongest conference, behind all the BCS conferences, CUSA, A-10, MWC, and WCC (which now includes BYU).

Among preseason accolades for individual players, they have BOTH Wichita State's Carl Hall and Memphis' Stan Simpson labelled among the TOP transfers (they include juco transfers and D-I transfers).

On their listing of Top 10 Mid-major players they include both Doug McDermott & Kyle Weems.

Then they rank the Top 20 players nationally at each position...
Creighton's Antoine Young is ranked as #24 best point guard in all of Division-I

..but they also list ex-Saluki Brandon Wood as the #9 best shooting guard in the ENTIRE NATION -- seriously!!
And they have Robbie Hummel - even coming off double knee surgery - something virtually nobody has ever done before - ranked as #11 best small forward nationally.


In the Valley here's how they see the finish..
1- Creighton
2- Wichita State
3- Indiana State
4- Drake
5- Northern Iowa
6- Evansville
7- Missouri State
8- Bradley
9- SIU
10- Illinois State

Then the 1st Team preseason All Valley:
Antoine Young-Creighton, Toure Murry-Wichita, Dwayne Lathan-Indiana State, Kyle Weems-Missouri State, Doug McDermott-Creighton

2nd Team - Dyricus Simms Edwards, Jake Odum, Colt Ryan, Mamadou Seck, Greg Echenique

3rd Team - BRADLEY's Taylor Brown, UNI's Anthony James, Rayvonte Rice, Garrett Stutz, Jackie Carmichael

Player of the Year - Doug McDermott
Newcomer of the Year - Carl Hall
Best Defender - Jake Odum
Best NBA Prospect - Doug McDermott (OK - someone name the last mid-major white kid who was a 6-7 power forward that made the NBA? - ;))

Not much of note in any of the individual team sections that everyone doesn't already know except the writer seems to think Will Egolf is still coming back this season - and calls him just questionable and says our front court will struggle if he isn't back.
He also lists the departure of Sam Maniscalco as one of the things that has happened "since Geno Ford was hired"...
when we all know Sammy was gone well before that.

Again -- if I thought there was much for any Bradley fan to like or enjoy reading or keeping - I would have bought the issue. Instead I just previewed it and decided against spending the money.
If you're a big time Shaka Smart fan or if you are a Creighton Bluejays fan then buy it because half the issue will be to your liking.



It was 6 years ago this summer and something that I have never heard of either BEFORE or SINCE happened - and it happened to Bradley. And I challenge anyone to find even one other example of this same kind of occurrence even in MAJOR NCAA CASES......
The NCAA swooped onto Bradley's campus unannounced to dig like crazy for something they thought was happening -- something that they must have thought so SEVERE and URGENT that they used unprecedented actions - actions they have never used before or since!!!

First - the NCAA is involved with checking on issues at member schools constantly -- and full blown investigations are occurring at every incresing frequency.

BUT -- here's how the process goes....IT ALWAYS follows a slow, open process....

First the NCAA needs to be notified or made aware of an issue somewhere. Sometimes that's an incident of self-reporting, sometimes (and lately it's a LOT) it's an issue that's made widely PUBLIC by the media or bloggers (like the payoffs at USC, OHIO STATE, and UCONN), and sometimes it is something the NCAA decides to investigate because of confidential and even ANONYMOUS tips...

BUT -- before the NCAA begins an investigation, they first make some calls, ask some questions - they need to know more because it is clearly unfair to go after an NCAA member based on a tip or an unfounded report - especially if it comes from some disgruntled person, and they even send ADVANCED official notice to the schools ALL THE TIME to tell them of the issue and even ask for more data, records, etc...
In other words - secret, planned on-campus investigaitons are just NOT the NCAA's way --

In all of the history of the NCAA - I am unaware of even a single incident where the NCAA swooped into town, came unannounced onto campus, showed up with NO prior notice, and started asking for specific info, files, and demanding answers and intreviews...
Does anyone else know of even one other example???

THIS HAS NEVER, NEVER, EVER happened.....that is except ONCE....

This did happen once in all of history -- so it surely must have been some massive cheating scandal -- something so urgent and at the highest level of intentional cheating that it warranted this once-in-a-century plan of action....

So what happened in the summer of 2005 that the NCAA somehow got wind of something so terrible, so massive, so sinister, so damaging to the game and to the integrity of the sport that it warranted an IMPRESSIVE sneak investigation by NOT ONE....
but TWO of the NCAA's TOP investigators and field agents??

Well -- the answer has become a little bit more clear over the past six years, but it has still never been made known very widely - and many of the people who knew the details and facts are now gone or moved on -- but further info has come to light that has never been made known previously since some of the people who have moved on are now discreetly and cautiously revealing some facts.

Seems that someone ratted on Bradley by making claims to the NCAA of some violations that were supposedly occurring and being hidden on campus (someone with an axe to grind?) -- AND YET -- after the NCAA came, searched, dug for weeks, asked all kinds of questions, they ended up concluding that those "anonymous tips" that led to this unprecedented investigation were unfounded.

That Bradley was NOT cheating..... As you all know, the only thing they did find was the inadvertent and previously unknown summer job overpay....but since the NCAA was so embarrassed by jumping the gun on everything else, they decided to blow the whole summer job thing that was truly a minor accoutning error - into a major issue.
Well - I have more info that I will discuss privately - info that obviously has never been revealed - especially about who was it that sicked the NCAA attack dogs on Bradley and why. You can connect the dots but you'll have to catch up with more elsewhere, discreetly, and off the record....catch ya later.........

The clear answer to a major medical "mystery"

I am sure everyone has seen headlines like this...

"Life threatening Peanut Allergy..."
http://is.gd/j5s1r6

And even this...
"Teen with peanut allergy dies after kiss"
..after simply kissing someone who had previously eaten peanuts...
http://is.gd/Q91vbQ

And more...who'd have ever thought a simple allergy could create such chaos...
http://is.gd/0Erf6D

And I am sure you have also often wondered
...."where did this come from???
When I was a kid I never heard of peanut allergy but now it seems to be a major topic and it's all over the place"...
and ..."I never heard of anything like this until just the past few years..."

But I am going to give you some simple info and evidence for you to draw your own conclusions...
Wouldn't you think if some severe, life threatening condition like this was increasing rapidly in frequency and actually killing young people in their prime...that someone would express a little interest in ...
WHY IS IT HAPPENING??
...OR WHAT IS THE CAUSE AND WHY ARE WE NOT HEARING ANYONE SPEAK OF THE CAUSE???

I think the following links will provide the evidence you will need to find the answer and also find the reason the answer is being hidden.


--First - the standard "company line" or the answer coming from "experts" and government people is this...
"We just don't know the reason but it sure is NOT associated with childhood vaccines"

Also those experts will claim there's NOTHING associated with the many, many vaccines kids get and are REQUIRED to receive that would in any way cause these life threatening allergies.


--Second -- I think we can all easily agree that the single purpose of a vaccine is to trigger an immune reaction by the recipient and if given over and over it does indeed create a big immune boost and the ability for the body to vigorously attack the substance they're attempting to create immunity against - so that they become MUCH MORE immune to the ingredients in the vaccine. This is the whole reason they are given.


--Then - what is an allergy? -- simply put it is an aggressive immune action to attack and destroy some perceived threat entering the body - even if that threat is NOT DANGEROUS.
In other words....all allergies are because the host's immune system sees and does not like something that is perceived as a threat or an attacker and the immune system goes hard after that attacker causing the reaction.
It is truly unfortunate if the reaction then becomes FAR MORE dangerous to the host than the perceived attacker would have ever been.

In fact - the very word "allergy" was coined about 100 years ago as a term to describe the undesired immune effect OF VACCINES because they cause UNINTENDED immune boosts that backfire and cause problems.
http://is.gd/yB1Ojo


--OK - then how might we, as a society, be causing kids to develop allergies and even die - while at the same time someone is hiding or denying the cause and we keep right on giving it to the vast majority of our children?


I think your answers are clear - here they are...

--Peanut allergies historically were never seen nor heard of until 1921 when the very first such peanut allergy was described. This was 20 years after vaccines for many childhood diseases were being given. BUT STILL - such allergies were exceedingly rare all the way until the 1960's and 1970's when many states began mandating numerous vaccinations on a repeated basis for every kid -- until now every kid gets somewhere between 50 and 100 different vaccinations and immune boosts (by shot) before he finishes school. Many vaccines give up to 6, 8, and even MORE separate "immune boosts" with each single shot.
http://www.dukehealth.org/health_library/news/10188


--many early vaccines were not very effective until stabilizing agents and adjuvants could be found and added so that the active immune ingredient could remain stable in the bottle and after it was injected under the recipient's skin.
Over time many such additives to vaccines were tried but one of the most successful was peanut oil...or a derivative of peanut oil.
Deny if you want - but it is still used widely today and ....
BECAUSE it is NOT considered by the government to be an active ingredient - the government allows the vaccines to be marketed and dispensed without saying on the label that it contains PEANUT products.


--the industries that make vaccines are very thankful that governments have mandated the use of their products. Wow - that means MILLIONS of customers and clients automatically created by the stroke of a pen when legislation requires TENS of MILLIONS of kids to get these various vaccines every since year!
LOTS of money involved - so lot sof reason to downplay any potential negatives - right?
The amount of money in play here is in the BILLIONS of dollars so you can bet that both government people and vaccine industry people have a lot hanging in the balance.


--despite denials from the vaccine industry claiming there's nothing in any vaccine that could possibly have anything to do with peanuts...
The TRUTH is absolutely, 100% the opposite.
I guess one could conclude then that the vaccine industry and/or the government are lying - but you can draw your own conclusions - recall that we are talking BILLIONS of DOLLARS that make the vaccine industry profitable and similar billions that people in government may be able to have at their disposal through lobbying efforts of those giant pharmaceutical companies.


--SEVERE and LIFE THREATENING peanut and other food allergies that are killing kids - are tripling faster than every decade...
http://is.gd/Q4PFL0


--the rise and severity in peanut allergies is directly proportional to the increase in the number of mandated shots kids have to get that have the peanut products in them - despite the denials from the industry.
Let's face it - if the main purpose of these shots is to boost the immunity to the stuff that's in the shots, then every kid in AMERICA is getting many booster shots to make him more allergic to peanuts. It's a wonder we aren't all allergic to them but science has shown only that it is actually quite hard to gain allergy to certain substances but if we keep trying hard enough we might just achieve it!

Here's proof that the peanut products are in those vaccines even if the vaccine people and government people say otherwise...the evidence is pretty overwhelming...

http://is.gd/GeTru4
http://is.gd/qjR8QV
http://is.gd/s22iiH
http://is.gd/sqxoPF
http://is.gd/nPsbSo
http://is.gd/GNKop9


Here's a time line proving the rise in the allergies is so closely related to the use of the peanut products in vaccines that the correlation is virtually undeniable...
http://is.gd/TKZdcG


Now - I'm NOT saying just stop giving vaccines -- all I am saying is look at the evidence, consider the adverse effects of what we're doing -- demand the industry and government be honest and give us the facts, and make informed decision -- and demand safer products.
Peanut allergies - and other food allergies - have virtually come out of nowhere and are a REAL pubic health issue.
If baby car seats or air bags kill even one kid or if a toy has toxic paint or choke-able parts, the feds go bananas and it's all over the headlines. But here we have an issue that a lot of the very people who are making huge profits off the vaccines are also somewhat in charge of whether you know what's in those vaccines and what they are doing to people.
Certainly at the very least - the vaccines and boosters that are widely argued are NOT NECESSARY (the Hepatitis vaccine, chickenpox vaccine, human papilloma virus vaccine...etc...) should be the first ones to consider maybe you should JUST SAY NO.

Catching up with Mark Vershaw and recruiting ...

I happened to bump into Mark Vershaw this morning -- his kids and my kids go the the same school...and we chatted.
Most know he grew up in East Peoria leading Robein Junior Hi to the IESA (8th grade) Championship game, and also leading his EPCHS high school team to prominence back in the mid '90's.
He then went on to a nice college career at Wisconin - playing for then coach Dick Bennett (who Mark still frequently keeps in touch with).
Mark has since been in the assistant coaching ranks with a couple years at ICC then Washington State (he was wearing a Washington State sweatshirt this morning), then Cornell, then four years as HEAD COACH at Monmouth College.

Now he keeps busy with his family, his wife Natalie (an avid runner and a teacher in District 150) and his daughter & preschool son. BUT -- he does supposedly have a new job in the works....

As we talked and discussed who's gonna win the Big Ten, how silly it is for the teams in the Big Ten to be in the "Legends" and "Leaders" divisions, and how the Valley will fare this year....
And he also talked about when he played off season/AAU ball back when there really weren't a lot of AAU teams...
He played for Coach Terry Knapp -- who many I am sure know, and whose son Nick Knapp was also on the team.
Others on that mid-90's AAU team included Richwoods' Mike Robinson (who averaged 30 ppg & 10 rpg his senior year and went to Purdue) & Ryan Schmidgall...
BTW -- Robinson also seriously considered Bradley -

http://is.gd/XhXzWT

Anyway -- then Mark revealed his new job that's in the works is on staff at Illinois State University as an administrative assistant.
Rules will prevent Mark from doing any recruiting, scouting, or on floor coaching but he and his new "bosses" hope that he can have some valuable input -- and leadership.
His name should soon appear on the ISU web site but currently it lists ten administrative assistants but Mark's name is not on the list as it exists now.

I also asked Mark how his brother Jim Vershaw is doing - Jim played two years for Bradley.
Ex-Brave Jim is doing just fine in the insurance business...
http://www.countryfinancial.com/jim.vershaw

In time Mark might even help a little in coaching some basketball at his son's school - but he figures that may be a way off....he also says he still rarely sees and keeps in touch with Coach Mo...who recruited him vigorously in high school - Link -
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1996-11-14/sports/9611140205_1_recruits-prospects-guard

Since he now lives here in Central Illinois and will be looking to get back into coaching, I suspect we will hear more on Mark. He's a great guy and I enjoyed chatting with him.



I saw some comments where people think Bradley has done a terrible job recruiting Chicago lately as compared to other area schools.
Well -- as usual people just don't do their homework and say silly things...
Bradley definitely isn't and hasn't been ignoring Chicago -- but as every other school in Illinois has experienced - it isn't easy for the downstate schools to land kids from Chicago for many reasons..
BTW - Of the recruits BU has landed since last spring - Shayok never played in Chicago - he's a Canadian kid and Hodges & Bell are suburban kids - not really Chicago kids....so I guess one issue is where you draw the line...

Actually, Bradley had 2 Chicago kids last year, which is more than a number of other D1 schools in Illinois.
And it's more than Coach Mo generally had on the roster as well.

Sure, I'd love to get the top Chicago kids - but wake me up when that starts happening regularly. I know Bradley hasn't had a lot of Chicago kids, but other area schools haven't fared much better....

Illinois did not have a single Chicago kid on the roster last year but they did have a couple suburban kids- and they notoriously until recently had big time trouble getting those Chicago recruits.

Loyola, which sits right in the middle of the fertile Chicago recruiting area, had only one Chicago kid, and it was a player named Jon Gac, a kid who certainly hasn't turned their program around and I suspect if he were at BU - we'd be hearing complaints about that as well.

UIC has several Chicago kids, but not a single one of them would have been on Bradley's radar screen - and if you differ, let me know which of the kids on their roster we'd have benefited from.

Northwestern has several Cook County and surrounding area kids, but not a single Chicago kid!-

Northern Illinois has only 3 kids on their roster that are even from Illinois, and only 1 from Chicago, an obscure kid who won't likely be getting any playing time anyway.

And the same is true for all the rest of the D1 schools in Illinois.

ISU has a couple and might actually be said among all Illinois schools they are one of the ones to have had the most success but only one was recruited right out of high school, and he is not a key player for the Redbirds.

WIU, EIU, and even SIU have flirted with a little success but all their Chicago kids stay maybe a year then bolt or get booted...so in the end really no success at all...
In fact I recall all the whining a couple years ago when SIU landed Hare, Dillard, etc...
People raged with "hey, why can't we get those kids and be as successful as SIU is gonna be..."
Hmmmm...look what it got them -- the three worst years of bad play and turmoil in their D-I history!
sorry -- can't use them as an example of someone doing a better job landing the Chicago talent.

Chicago State has a lot of Chicago kids, but I wouldn't particularly want a single one of them as a Bradley recruit, would you?

So instead of just criticizing Bradley and our coaches for not getting kids from some certain area - it would be nice to see folks throw their support UNCONDITIONALLY behind the coach and the team NO MATTER where they hail from.
I'd like to hear an example of who we've missed on from Chicago that ended up going elsewhere and causing us woes...
If we get a whole team of Chicago kids we'd hear complaints that we are not getting the downstate kids. If we get the downstate or Peoria kids, then some complain that we aren't recruiting nationally or that we're ignoring Chicago.
No wonder it takes $ a million to get a guy to want to come here and coach ....geez...

PS - there is one Chicago kid that did get away, DJ Cooper - a great point guard that Geno knows well....and oddly - Ka'Darryl Bell is described by some as a bigger version of DJ Cooper -- so then I guess we all ought to be happy we got KB!!

Some great lockeroom bulletin board material for Bradley & other Illinois teams

The very first of the fall College Basketball Preview editions is out...
and I will give a simple Valley-centric review of it....
The Sporting News 2011-2012 College Basketball Preview Edition can currently be found at Peoria's Barnes & Noble, but the cover sure won't boost sales any. I guess they figure the Illinois market might be swayed by a Big Ten cover - but some player from Iowa won't give their Central Illinois sales much of a boost.

They start with a lot of coverage of the best teams for 2011-2012 and they rank the preseason Top 25 -- no Valley teams included.
Here's their top ten...
1- UNC
2- Kentucky
3- Ohio State
4- UConn
5- Duke
6- Syracuse
7- Florida
8- Memphis
9- Baylor
10- Vanderbilt

In their preseason 1st Team All Americans - they list pretty much all players from the top 10 teams including Kentucky's Anthony Davis out of Chicago.

The 2nd Team All Americans include a couple Big Ten players John Shurna & Jordan Taylor.

3rd Team includes Creighton's Doug McDermott...a nice honor for the Creighton sophomore. But this is an indirect way of saying they don't think Missouri State's Kyle Weems is going to be the Valley POY.

In their picks for the NCAA Tourney - they do project the Valley getting two teams in.
Creighton is their pick to get the automatic bid but the Jays land just a #9 seed.
Also listed and getting a #10 seed are the Wichita State Shockers.

The only other conference besides the Valley that I looked much at was the Big Ten. They don't rate the Big Ten very highly and outside of Ohio State, the seem to suggest every other Big Ten team will struggle outside their conference.
Here's how the pick the Big Ten --- so I think a lot of fans are going to be unhappy - especially Illini, Michigan State, and Tubby Smith fans...

1- Ohio State
2- Wisconsin
3- Michigan
4- Purdue
5- Michigan State
6- Indiana
7- Northwestern
8- Minnesota
9- Illinois - Illini fans will have their bulletin board material as well
10- Iowa
11- Nebraska
12- Penn State

Among other schools in Illinois - WIU, NIU, etc...this preview doesn't appear to give any of them much of a chance this year.
Then as you will subsequently see, the three Valley teams that reside in Illinois are also lumped conspicuously all at the bottom of the league.
They don't pick any of the D-I Illinois schools to do diddley-squat this year -- so I sure hope they're wrong!


Now on to the Valley...

The MVC section was written by a guy named Tony Jiminez, a writer for the Topeka Capital-Journal. Maybe Tony wrote this piece back in April or maybe he doesn't know much about any team outside of his own state - but whatever - he makes many, many GLARING and ridiculous mistakes. Some of his errors simply have no explanation except that he didn't do any homework and simply went on what he remembered from his summer reading.

Anyway -- I won't pick apart every mistake the guy makes but I will list a few of the significant errors since maybe not knowing who got severely injured over the summer or who got hurt or suspended could be accepted.

Here's how he picks the Valley to finish.......

1- Creighton - he seems to think they've got the Valley going away

2- Wichita State - he really likes Toure Murry

3- Indiana State - (I expect the recent Lathan injury was subsequent to his press deadline)

4- UNI

5- Evansville - the writer kinda thinks they're going to be a scoring machine with Colt Ryan

6- Missouri State - glosses over that they lost 4 starters

7- Drake - seems to hint at chemistry issues

8- Illinois State - picks Nic Moore as best newcomer

9- Southern Illinois - says despite not returning anyone who can score, their defense and rebounding will win games

10- Bradley - basically says Geno has nothing to work with - an empty cupboard. I sure hope the BU players and staff cut this column out and paste or tack it up in the lockeroom and read it every day!


Yup - that's right, he calls Bradley at 10th place just a bit below ISU & SIU.
I sure hope he's way wrong, and I honestly think he will be since his reasoning is quite flawed by his inaccurate knowledge.
Given he's a Valley beat writer - he surely should know things like..

- Jalen Crawford is NOT the only incoming freshman that Bradley has

- Justin Clark will not be one of ISU's top returning players and potential starter. He left the team over 2 months ago

-saying UNI's Johnny Moran is one of the Valley's all time top career 3-pt shooters - he's a great kid but his career 3-pt pct. is 33% - below the national average of all players

- Taylor Brown is NOT really a 5th year senior - he's only been in college for four years, although his clock runs out this year


Anyway - back to the preview...
Their 1st Team All Valley - Doug McDermott (about whom roughly half of the entire MVC section is about), Toure Murry, Jake Odum, Kyle Weems, Antoine Young.
Can't argue, but I sure hope Dyricus has something to say about this.

They list a few other honors - but none mention a Bradley player. In reality - Taylor Brown is one of the top scoring and top rebounding players who is playing in the Valley this season, but the writer apparently thinks TB will have a completely lack-luster year as he barely mentions him.
They do rank ISU's Nic Moore as the Valley's top incoming freshman,
and SIU's Chris Lowery is the "Coach on the Hot Seat".

The teams picked at the top of the Valley get a bit more text in their sections - actually quite a bit.
The teams at the bottom get very little as is the case with Bradley...
But not knowing about Will Egolf's injury and saying things like this...

"Geno Ford was able to sign just one recruit, Jalen Crawford"
...means this writer simply does not know much about Bradley or know that Geno landed a FIVE man recruiting class and three of them WERE landed and SIGNED by Geno!

http://is.gd/vJ7x4z

All in all, it's about on par with most preseason publications -- spending an inordinate amount of ink on the top teams and very little of any benefit on everyone else. But - since it's the first one to hit the market - I at least had to read it...but, ahem, I enjoyed the ambiance and some hot chocolate at Barnes & Noble while reading it but I saved the $8 and did not buy the magazine.

Some discipline thoughts and more on Labor Day

We've seen a lot of issues lately with kids on D-I basketball teams getting suspended for legal issues.
Just about everyone has an opinion but most that I have seen are very inconsistent...very hypocritical..but I have been consistent for as long as I have followed college sports.
I go by two separate reasoning points -

-First that any violation of team rules needs to be identified and disciplined right away. So many fans and coaches use the "let's see how this will play out", or "we'll let the legal system run its course", or "we will handle this internally" excuses...
And of course those lines are just another way of saying...
"we need this guy bad enough that I really don't want him to miss any games".

Also as we have seen at places like Mississippi State, SIU, and just about anywhere Bob Huggins is - that non-essential players get strong discipline or get booted, but the stars are coddled and pampered...rarely ever missing any games or even exhibitions.
Lastly on this - coaches who hide the info about players' violations then who only discipline the players when it comes to light publicly or when a blogger mentions it (as has happened at ISU & SIU) are not to be trusted in this realm. They are clearly NOT good disciplinarians.
I can still recall the public statement a couple years ago by the ISU head coach when one of his underage (19 year old) players got a DUI -- he said the player was immediately and totally suspended from all team activities...
BUT -- the very next day the local news reporter went to their practice/"boot camp" and the video shown on TV displayed that very player fully participating in all activities -- exactly what the coach had said was NOT going to happen.
How can you believe or trust a guy who does this?

-Second - every kid, if his violation is not a premediatated attack on someone, deserves redemption and another chance.
Petty crimes, arguments, he said-she said issues (especially when no injury occurred or where the worst thing is a "bust-lip"), and substance use issues fall into the "give them a 2nd or even a 3rd chance" realm - but raping underage girls, repeated drug use or peddling, and brutal attacks & bar fights should be grounds for instant dismissal.
All too often we see players doing these big time crimes getting off with little or no discipline.
Despite all the wailing and whining by the bashers, not one single issue at Bradley has ever fallen into the 2nd category - not one.
So point fingers if you want - but BU thankfully has never had to deal with a serious issue...not even a DUI or drug arrest at any time.



Then back to the Labor Day thought....
Labor is being celebrated because hard work pays off and is the foundation upon which this nation is built.

So what's with this program that's touted on the front page of the paper like it's really great for this nation??
The article is titled...

"More than a free lunch" - LINK

I won't bore you - but in short this US Dept. of Agriculture handout program is summed up in this one short statement...
"Nearly 11,000 students in Peoria District 150 are receiving free breakfast and lunch at school thanks to a pilot program introduced by the U.S. Department of Agriculture this year.
The program allows schools in which 40 percent or more of students qualify for free or reduced meals to provide daily free meals to every student regardless of need.
Twenty-two of the district's 28 schools are part of the program."

11,000 kids whether they need it or not get free lunch & breakfast. 11,000 every day at a cost of at least $15 a week (that's their claim) - that's at least $165,000 a week!! If the school year is 40 weeks long, then just do the math -- Peoria alone costs taxpayers almost $7 million.

So even if Donald Trump's kids were at one of those schools, then the taxpayers would still have to foot the bill to provide FREE BREAKFAST and FREE LUNCH to every single kid in the entire school??

Are you serious?? I don't remember getting free lunch when I was in school, and almost everyone in my class did fine and graduated!
We didn't even get free milk -- we had to bring our milk money - so why do kids need FREE LUNCH?
Some say it helps them perform better in school. Yeah - right - where the heck is the evidence of that?? These schools for the most part are doing terribly.
In fact in almost ALL the schools where this is being done -- separate studies show the kids are performing quite poorly!
The typical liberal line is then we need to give them more help - more freebies, maybe even free clothes, a free calculator, a free computer, heck - why not just give them the day off and some money to go shopping for whatever they want??

Has anyone given thought to the concept that we are creating an entire generation of lazy kids who expect freebies and handouts?
If we create millions of lazy school kids who are always expecting a FREE lunch "regardless of need" then could it JUST POSSIBLY BE that those kids won't bother to try very hard on their own -- at anything??
Are we not creating the very problem these ill intended programs are claiming to target? I am convinced we are -- these federal programs are locking kids into a handout and welfare mentality.
If any kid of mine was in one of those schools (a premise that makes me giggle to begin with) I would either take them out or send them with their own food and teach my kids we don't need handouts, we will work for what we have and we won't be a lifelong burden to others who are working (Labor Day, remember) and paying taxes!

If you read that article they actually seem to be saying it IS GOOD if those schools have more than the 40% minimum of qualifying kids - so that the whole school can eat for free. Yeah -- that's really GREAT!!!! Nice job Grenita -- keep up the good work!!

I might not have said a word if the kids who qualify for free meals were the only ones getting them - but this is an insane idea that if just 40% of the kids qualify then we'll give the freebies to everyone!!

BUT -- are these lunches really free??
Of course not - someone pays for them and the price is staggering...
first someone pays the cost of the meals, and we all know how efficient government spenders are -- what with their $1200 toilet seats...
BUT - even worse is the multilevel web of government agencies that cost taxpayers BILLIONS of dollars!!
Just the manual that says who qualifies for free meals is WELL OVER 100 pages long...
http://www.fns.usda.gov/cnd/Governance/notices/iegs/EligibilityManual.pdf
...the actual law and all the accompanying regulations is over 1000 pages!
This bureaucracy costs more than anyone can calculate!

So in the end that carton of milk probably cost $10, and the banana the kid gets was $15...and that doesn't include the cost of this kind of crap -- that one kid gets sick and sues the entire school district for MILLIONS!!!
It is happening everywhere!
http://www.wthr.com/Global/story.asp?s=11287249&clienttype=printable

The final question I have is how can some schools (mainly private ones) educate their kids for less than half the cost per pupil that public schools spend, and yet those same private schools have nearly 100% graduation rates and ACT/SAT averages that are 20-40% better on average than kids on public schools?
How can they do it for half the cost but end up with FAR, FAR better results?
Main answer is that they are NOT letting the government and social engineers do it for them. But sadly the feds don't care how others are getting it done - because they always think they know better.

Sadly parents already kinda know all this but still send their kids to those schools where their kids are given a bad education...

"Despite 18 months of press love, yesterday's Gallup/Phi Delta Kappa poll shows Americans completing a resoundingly negative report card on Obama's education initiatives, with a mere 34 percent giving the president a "B" or better, and 59 percent giving him a C, D, or F.

With similar clarity, the public overwhelming rejected point by point the aggressive, market-ideological thuggery comprising Duncan's arsenal of "school reform" tactics: paying students for grades, mass firings, using punitive funding schemes, etc.

So far the main result of Obama and Duncan's adventures in school reform is that now a startling 80 percent of respondents believe the federal government should play no role in school accountability."
http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/10140