It's finally game week

As I was watching some of the fifth year anniversary coverage of the Katrina disaster on the Gulf Coast, I was thinking about Danny Wuerffel. The former UF QB had seen not only his house but the Desire Street ministry school project he had worked so hard to build up destroyed by the floodwaters in New Orleans. I was filling in for Todd Wright on his "All Night" program on ESPN Radio Labor Day night and was able to get Danny to join me for what at that point was his first national interview. Somehow, even after a personal loss like that, Wuerffel was able to keep himself focused on the task at hand. David Whitley updates what Danny's done in the five years since the disaster, and it really is amazing. There are tons of good charities that could use your assistance, including others working to rebuild New Orleans, but Desire Street is one you can always feel good about helping.

ESPN went crazy with high school football coverage this weekend, something I've always opposed. There are high school coaches making six figures now, and Texas schools dropping sixty million dollars on stadiums. The level of commercialism creeping into what is supposed to be a high school extracurricular activity is insane, and getting worse. You may think the additional coverage is well worth it if it helps the schools out financially, right? According to the Sacramento Bee, the total money ESPN gave the two schools in the game it broadcast from there was three thousand dollars. They also demanded they use a certain sports drink's branded coolers and bottles on the sidelines. Think that even after production costs ESPN made a little more money on that broadcast than three grand? The attendance for the game might have been more if it wasn't on TV, so they may have cost the school money there as well. Remind me why is this supposed to be a good thing?

An admitted Ponzi schemer claims he's writing a book that will expose NCAA violations in the Miami football program. The 41 year old loser is stunned to learn that the college football playing kids twenty years younger than him weren't really his pals after they got their own money and didn't need his. (It'll be really tough on this tool when he finds out the Hooters waitresses didn't really think his jokes were all funny.) Assuming this guy can assemble enough crap on paper to call it a "book", it's doubtful any publisher will want to put out a manuscript from a confessed con artist without extensive documentation of its claims, a problem fellow felon Tim Donaghy ran into. My guess is he's not likely to have enough to make them happy. This guy may very well know about violations by members of the Hurricanes, but unless he's willing to talk to the NCAA without a check I doubt much comes of this.

The Seattle Times conducted a survey of roughly a quarter of the FCS level head coaches on a variety of issues. One question: which coach do you have the least regard for. Of those who answered, only one guy got multiple votes. You guessed it, it's Lane Kiffin. No one will feel any pity if someone runs the score up on Lane now that he's in charge of the Trojans, and my guess is at least one coach is going to do just that. There are some interesting restaurant suggestions from the coaches in there too in case you're a traveler.

No link on this, and it won't mean anything to those of you who read this outside of the Gainesville TV market, but I wanted to congratulate TV 20 on their hiring of Chris Price to be the sports director there. Price works harder and genuinely cares about doing his best work far more than that particular outlet deserves. They're very fortunate to have him. (Given the way their news director treats people, they're actually fortunate to have anyone.)