Cougars in Springtime: Lots of new faces!

Getting to know the local football team

Hello there!

For many years, the Seattle Mariners have run a series of tv commercials that always end with the team’s ever-fluid catch phrase. Back in the day, it was “You gotta love these guys.” Today, I think it’s something like “Sea us Rise” or whatever. At one point, it was “True to the Blue.” After one offseason when there was another tranche of unknown additions, many Mariner fans tweaked the slogan to “True to the Who?” Well, I did, anyway.

That memory resurfaced again this morning as I read through spring scrimmage recaps, courtesy of Jamie Vinnick and Greg Woods, I was rather struck by the amount of names I’d never heard of. Names like Tony Freeman, Trey Leckner, Johnny Lester, Noah Dunham and Branden Ganashamoorthy (in the military we’d call him G14) dotted Saturday’s two-deep as the Cougs went live under a sun-splashed day on the Palouse. Needless to say, 2024 is going to look a lot different for Cougar football, both on the micro level with the roster changes, and the macro level with, well, let’s just move on.

Another new name Saturday was Frank Cusano, whom I hereby deem the Palouse Paisan. Cusano is a linebacker who hails from Granite Bay, California, and arrived at WSU as an early enrollee in January after choosing to attend WSU over offers from a couple service academies, Columbia and Idaho. And although he hasn’t quite cracked the two-deep, seeing as how WSU has a decent amount of linebacker talent on the roster, the Palouse Paisan(TM) made a name for himself Saturday.

From Greg Woods’ recap:

If there was one individual standout, though, it was Cusano. A true freshman from northern California, he has put together a sterling spring , playing well enough that if the season started now, he would be traveling with the team, WSU coach Jake Dickert said.

Cusano looked the part in Saturday’s scrimmage, the Cougars’ second of the spring schedule and their 12th of 15 practices, standing out with a sack and one pass breakup – in addition to the pick-six he snagged in the team’s first scrimmage. He helped anchor a defense that recorded several key stops, including a couple at the goal line, and one interception from junior defensive back Cole Norah.

While he may have a tough time getting game snaps on defense, Cusano seems like the prototype special teams impact player, and I’m guessing we’ll hear his name more than a few times in the kicking game.

Elsewhere, Vinnick reports that the two quarterbacks vying for the top spot, John Mateer and Zevi Eckhaus, combined to complete 21 of 35 passes for 274 yards and two touchdowns. Unfortunately, WSU didn’t publish any official stats, but Vinnick reports that 17 different receivers caught passes. The official website did type up a brief summary which included some numbers from the scrimmage.

The Cougs wrap up their seemingly least publicized spring session in years next Saturday with the annual spring game. The action will begin at 3 p.m. PDT and if you aren’t able to make it over, you can catch the action on whatever is left of the Pac-12 Network. For real though, Dickert may want to tell the players to keep those tape strips with last names on teh helmets for the first few games of the actual season.

Off the field, but far more importantly as far as real life goes, Dave Boling profiled Steve Gleason’s forthcoming book “A Life Impossible.” In case you weren’t aware of what a remarkable person Gleason is, he wrote a 320-page book using his eyes. I just…I can’t even imagine the amount of time and effort that took.

Steve Gleason remains immeasurably amazing.

BVB 09 Fan Since Forever

Die Schwarzgelben have had a rough go of things during the 2023-24 Bundesliga season, insofar as historic performance has gone. A year after crapping the bed on the season’s final day with the Meisterschale (Champions’ Bowl) on the line, Dortmund currently sits fifth in the standings. As with every other season, a team needs to be in the top four of the final standings in order to qualify for the next rendition of the UEFA Champions League.

But, BUT!! about that Champions League. For some reason, Dortmund has been far better during the Intra-European tournament than it’s been in the Bundesliga. When pool play kicked off, Dortmund found itself amid the “group of death” what with Arab oil money-funded Paris St. Germain and Newcastle, as well as Italian stalwart AC Milan making up the other three teams. But somehow, some way, Dortmund won three of its final five games and took top spot in the group!

The knockout stage featured a fortunate matchup with Eindhoven, and Dortmund dispatched of the Dutch squad rather easily, setting up a quarterfinal pairing with Atletico Madrid. In the first leg, Dortmund went down 2-1, and headed home needing a two-goal win to advance. And wouldn’t you know it, after one half, BVB led 2-0! Then, in what felt like 20 seconds, Madrid evened the score, taking a 4-3 aggregate lead and leaving Dortmund fans in a state of depression. Atletico seemed to have all the momentum, but then there was a beautiful header from season-long disappointment Niclas Füllkrug, followed by a great strike from Austria’s own Marcel Sabitzer!

Suddenly Dortmund is up 5-4 on aggregate! Thus proving once again that momentum in sports does not exist! The Black and Yellows bled off the last few minutes and just like that, a trip to the semis and a rematch against PSG lies on the horizon. Hell MF’ing yes.

Not only that, but with Germany’s success in UEFA tournament play this season, the Bundesliga has a great chance to get its fifth-place team into next season’s Champions League, now that it’s expanding. Guess who currently sits fifth??!! When I heard that the Champions League was set to expand, in a clear example of a UEFA money grab, I wasn’t enthused. But now I AM VERY MUCH IN FAVOR OF EXPANSION VIA SOME BIZARRE AND HYPER-COMPLICATED FORMULA WAY TO GO EUFA!!!

In the meantime, HEJA BVB! Take down the oil money once again!

This However Long it’s been in Parenting

Been a minute, so buckle up.

We were sitting at dinner one night a while back when we began giving the teenager some crap about his girlfriend. Yes, he apparently has a girlfriend. He says her name is Kallie but none of us have actually met her so I can’t confirm whether she actually exists or if he just met her in Canada last summer. Anyway, the 12 year-old pounced on the opportunity to give his brother the business about a girl, prompting mom and me to drill down on the 12 year-old’s lady pursuits.

After some back and forth, he couldn’t help himself, and his ego took over. “I just got that rizz” he retorted. I had no idea what he was talking about. Thankfully, I regularly interact with early twenty-somethings at work, and when I was teaching them some aviation academics, I took the opportunity to get a translation. Sources indicate that “rizz” is a term for someone who has skills with the opposite sex. In my day, the term was “game.” Well, I think it was. I never had any. The young people also informed me that “rizz” is short for charisma. Turns out there’s a lot to be learned from the young’uns.

It was also at that meal that the 12 year-old told us that he plans to major in Philosophy when he goes to college, “because I like to argue.” I told Craig about this, and he didn’t even feign surprise, knowing that the apple doesn’t fall far.

Team Kendall spent spring break apart, and then together, and then apart. I was in Omaha for the first part, as they headed to Colorado on Friday while I drank with Craig watched basketball in Nebraska. Mrs. Kendall’s sister and family live in Denver, and were renting a place in Winter Park, so we decided to give the boys a shot at skiing for the first time. So out and up they went on Friday while Craig and I gawked at the mighty Omaha Prime meat trolley.

The oldest took ski lessons while the other kiddo wanted to try snowboarding. The snowboarding was a catastrophic failure, which meant that I may as well have take three Benjamins and set them on fire.

Related – I learned over the course of a few days that this skiing thing is insanely expensive. How the hell does anyone afford it? You’ll be stunned to learn that Winter Park is mostly filled with white people driving Subarus or Land Rovers, but I digress.

All in all, the boys took to skiing rather well. Their aunt/uncle/cousin are seasoned vets, and were happy to show the boys the slopes. On Saturday, they’d never been on a snow ski. By Tuesday, the 12 year-old was waking up to ask, “Any fresh powder last night?” Most importantly, there were no major injuries.

Mrs. Kendall had to hit the road from Colorado early for work, so the boys and I went back to Florida after a few days on the slopes. I’d booked their flights a couple months prior, but didn’t reserve my seat for a while, since I had to wait to find out where WSU would be and when. As we walked to our flight from DFW to Pensacola, the 12 year-old said, “Dad, my app says I don’t board for another hour.” “Your phone probably didn’t update,” I replied. Welp, I’m an idiot.

When we got to the gate, I was fortunate enough to get an upgrade, so I asked the agent if the teenager could sit in my exit row seat. Try as she might, she couldn’t locate his seat. It was then that I learned my kids were not booked on my flight, and instead were going home on the next one in about 90 minutes. Yep, old dad here isn’t smart enough to pull off the simple task of matching flights. Hooray, me. So back to the lounge we went. I’d be lying if I said the kids were bummed about having to get more free brownies and cookies.

The lesson, as always: Dad is an idiot.

Shortly after we got back, my parents came to visit, which meant that I was able to pay even less attention to the kids than usual since their attention was focused on asking for and receiving whatever they wanted from the grandparents.

We’re now amid spring sports season, which means that the older kid threw the javelin every now and then, and the younger kid is playing baseball. Javelin season is over, but baseball is still in its infancy. Mom and I missed one of the games last week, because we opted to go to dinner with visiting friends, which means that we’ll only witness 1,954 kid baseball games instead of 1,955.

During the game we missed, the umpire and the teenager got to talking, and before I knew what was happening, the kid had signed on to be a little league umpire. Great. His first assignment was to call a couple tee-ball games. I told him the best thing he could do was learn the rulebook backward and forward. “They didn’t give me a rulebook.” Super. He seemed to do ok with a little guidance, but I had to scoot off to the other kid’s baseball game. After the two tee-ball games, he had to help out with a 10U baseball game, which didn’t start until 7 p.m. Between innings, he decided to text me, in case you were wondering how things were going.

Splendid.

So there I sat, past 8:30 on a school night, waiting for my driver’s-licenseless kid to finish helping call a game WHOSE SCORE WAS 18 TO GODDAMN NOTHING BUT THEY’RE STILL CHANGING PITCHERS WITH TWO OUTS IN THE LAST INNING. But it’s for the kids, or whatever. The one thing I learned – it’s just as nerve-racking to watch your kid umpire a game as it is to watch your kid to play in a game.

The mighty Rays have struggled to open the 2024 campaign, but on Tuesday, the coach signed off on allowing the kids to choose walkup music. So I asked the 12 year-old what he wanted, and he chose…this?

As always, I had no idea who this band was and had never heard the song. But…BUT!!! I bounced the song off resident young people Emma and Morgan, and it received overwhelming approval!

On the diamond, it’s been a struggle, with the Rays losing two and tying one. But Thursday night was different. The 12 year-old took the mound to face the Braves and, while wobbling a bit, gutted his way to an 8-8 tie after two innings. The opponent’s runs were largely unearned due to defensive ineptitude, which wasn’t frustrating at all. The lowlight came in the bottom of the 2nd when, with a runner on 3rd and one out, the kiddo threw a wild pitch, then ran toward home to cover the plate, and stood hopelessly as the catcher was unable to get the loose ball in time. In the meantime, the runner – someone who seems destined to play nose tackle in a couple years, if you get my drift – barreled toward home. Instead of sliding, he opted to plow directly into the 12 year-old, sending him ass-over-tea kettle toward the backstop. As a result, the runner was ruled out. Way to take one for the team, buddy!

Thanks to a couple timely hits and several walks, the Rays led 14-8 going into the last half inning. The coach sent the 12 year-old back out, and thanks to accurate pitching and good fielding (finally), we had two outs quickly. It was then that the wheels fell off, slid into a ditch and exploded. The kid lost it, walking several batters. Just like that, the bases were loaded. Out came the coach for a mound visit, and I figured the kid was done. But the coach…left him in?

He, somehow, got to a 1-2 count! And then, the coach heads back to the mound? It was then I learned that the kid had reached his 85-pitch limit, needing one damn strike to go the distance. Then the reliever came in and, while inheriting a 1-2 count, walked the next batter. Thankfully the next kid whiffed and the Rays picked up their first win! The kid received the game ball. Unfortunately it was not filled with ice, because between getting blasted at home plate and throwing 85 pitches, he sure could have used some.

Non-Sports

Would We Do Better? Hubris and Validation in Ukraine – War on the Rocks
The hapless Russians are flailing in Ukraine. Their poorly prepared, unprofessional soldiers are incapable of modern combined arms warfare.

“Too Soft”: America’s Failure to Learn from Germany in Iraq – War on the Rocks
“By nightfall, you’ll have driven 30,000 to 50,000 Baathists underground. And in six months, you’ll really regret this.”

O.J. Simpson dead: The biggest misunderstanding of his legacy.
Yes, Black people cheered the verdict. But white people were his real fans.

A Vigilante Hacker Took Down North Korea’s Internet. Now He’s Taking Off His Mask | WIRED As “P4x,” Alejandro Caceres single-handedly disrupted the internet of an entire country. Then he tried to show the US military how it can—and should—adopt his methods.