Hope your Valentine's Day was better than UF's

I was at the UF basketball loss to UGA Saturday and could not believe what I was seeing. For a Georgia squad that failed to score 54 points in three SEC games this year to post it in one half on UF was inconceivable. Only two Gator points in the final 5:52 was hard to believe as well. Whatever has hapened to Dan Werner, the reality is this team can not count on meaningful contributions from him yet he still has to play because of the lack of bodies. UF now has to win both of their home games this week or they're in a lot of trouble. I still think they will and stay viable for the NCAAs, but there's no getting around the fact this is a flawed lineup and can't be fixed until next year when Vernon Macklin becomes eligible and Kenny Boynton arrives.

Thanks to Preston Parker's weed fixation, FSU already had a significant WR depth issue. It just got much worse, as Taiwan Easterling ruptured his left Achilles in workouts. Best case scenario would have him back for a portion of the season but he'll miss all spring and likely all of summer conditioning and workouts as well. They'd better hope Preston hasn't invited Bert Reed for any ride alongs at 4 AM lately or things will officially become disastrous.

One side effect of the never ending steroids fallout is that people should begin to appreciate the career of Ken Griffey Junior more. At one time he was being ripped for the fact his numbers fell off as got older and that he got injured frequently. But you're SUPPOSED to be more injury prone and see your numbers drop as you grow older, not suddenly double your career best mark. This is one guy who no one has ever tied to steroids, and nothing in his body or numbers says that we should. Now it looks like Griffey may continue his career as an Atlanta Brave, which would be following in his dad's footsteps again. I hope he does - wouldn't mind getting over there to see him play at some point.

The craziness known as the A-11 offense, something I wrote about previously here, has basically been put out to pasture by the National High School Athletic Associations. It always seemed way too crazy for anyone above a high school level to commit to it, but I did think we might see some element of it show up in college at some point. There will be a new gimmick scheme soon - there always is.

The economy has taken a big bite out of Las Vegas. It seems like everyday I get at least a couple of emailed offers for rates on rooms and package deals which would have been unheard of at the same hotels even six month ago. I could do four nights at a fancy place like the Venetian now for less than I could have done two at New York New York some other year. So what can the places which already were considered the lowest part of the Strip do to try and convince people to stay with them? How's a 25 dollar, all you can eat all day long buffet sound? It might sound good, as long as you don't know it's at the Excalibur. They'd have to pay me 25 dollars to set foot in that dump.