Welcome to Mr. Sparkle Saturday. My name is David Arnott, and I'll be bringing you at least four posts today on whatever the hell I damn well please (as long as Zach doesn't kill me first). If you are interested in distributing Mr. Sparkle in your home prefecture, or if you want to suggest an item, shoot an email to mrsparklesaturday at gmail dot com.

1:22am -- With apologies to Daniel Quinn, Douglas Adams, and George Lucas...

June 2007

…Because it was backed by darkness, the glass in this window was black—opaque, reflective. Bill made no attempt to see beyond it as he approached; he was the spectacle under observation. On arrival, he continued to gaze into his own eyes for a moment, then rolled the focus forward beyond the glass—and found himself looking into another pair of eyes.

He fell back, startled. Then, recognizing what he’d seen, he fell back again, now a little frightened.

The creature on the other side of the glass was a full grown gorilla.

The gorilla said, “Football carries emotional weight in your culture. I want to talk about the game in a way bereft of Mother Culture whispering in your ear. Bill, there are two immutable laws of football victory, from Pop Warner to the NFL. What is the first?”

Bill thought for a moment.

“The team that executes wins football games?”

“No! Think!” the gorilla raged, “You’re talking about a goal when I asked you about a law!”

The gorilla looked at the ceiling and began tapping his fingers on the hardwood floor.

“Look,” the gorilla said, “You know this, because it’s right in front of you and it’s always been right in front of you, but Mother Culture whispers in your ear about ‘three yards and a cloud of dust’, ‘run to set up the pass’, ‘DVOA’, and so forth. Think!”

Bill looked at the gorilla’s hands, resting on the floor. Laws. Not goals. Bill thought about every game he’d ever coached. There were always goals. In order to defeat a given team, he’d have his men achieve a certain goal or benchmark. Don’t think about goals.

“I don’t know,” Bill said.

“Pick up that bag,” the gorilla said, pointing to the floor behind Bill. There was a cloth sack closed tight at the top by a drawstring. Bill picked it up. It was full of small, hard, objects. “Go ahead. Look inside.”

Bill loosened the string and peered in. Scrabble tiles.

“Close the bag and shake it up,” the gorilla said.

Bill did as he was told. After a few seconds, the gorilla told him to stop.

“Bill, somewhere in your brain, you have the answers, only you don’t know it. Reach into the bag and pull out letters, laying them on the ground one by one until I tell you to stop.”

Bill reached into the bag and pulled out a W, then an H, then an E, R, E, C, A, N, T, Y, O, U, T, H, R, O, and a W before the gorilla told him to stop. Bill thought he saw the great ape smile.

“Where can’t you throw?” the gorilla asked.

Bill looked at the tiles and laughed. Of course!

“Don’t throw at Asante Samuel,” he said.

“Yes!” the gorilla crowed, “Yes! Don’t throw at Asante Samuel!”

Bill said, “I’ve always designed defenses with this law in mind, but I’ve never articulated it before. Even Peyton Manning is subject to this law. Just look at the AFC Championship Game. Wow. Thank you, gorilla!”

“I am not here to receive thanks, but to teach. You are here to learn. We will discuss the second immutable law of football, but first, I need to take a nap.”

(TO BE CONTINUED)

1:15pm -- Tales and Travails of a Charlotte Bobcats Season Ticket Holder

Last night was opening night for the Charlotte Bobcats. Ben and I are season ticket holders; we went in on cheap seats with four other co-workers. However, we weren't in our upper deck seats last night. Some friends invited us to a luxury suite, so that's where I took in Charlotte's 102-99 victory over the Milwaukee Bucks.

Thanks to our season ticket draft, I only have one other game in November, but I've got a bunch of December games, including LeBron on December 8. Anyway, there were several lessons learned last night:

1) Emeka Okafor is a beast. Do not mess with him. If the first rule of sports is "Don't throw at Asante Samuel," and the second rule is "Don't give a high fastball to Gary Sheffield," then the third rule is "Don't drive on Emeka Okafor." (Video)

2) Yi is gonna be good. Maybe not a superduperstar, but he won't be an embarrassment. The dude looks like he's got good court sense on the offensive end, even though he's nothing special right now, but on the defensive end, the guy has the capacity to be extraordinary right now. I'm telling you, he was active, right in his man's face and then crashing the boards on most plays, he's quick enough on his feet to stay with smaller guys running around the perimeter, and his height will make forwards hesitate to post him up. One game, I know. One game. But still...

3) NBA coaches make odd decisions, and everyone just kind of accepts it. Andrew Bogut fouled out with a few minutes left in a close game. So, who did Larry Krystkowiak put on his front line in crunch time? Not Yi. Not Charlie Villanueva. Try Michael Ruffin. And Jake Voskuhl for about thirty seconds. I'm not making this up. Michael Ruffin! Jake Voskuhl! Other than Other Coach K, I don't think anyone thought that was a good idea.

7:00 -- College footballpocalypse is not upon us... yet. In this humble commenter's mind, the problem is that there are only a few acceptable championship game participants, and the BCS has eliminated several of them. To wit, Boston College has a very real chance of barging into the title game despite barely scraping the edge of acceptability, while Florida is totally out of the championship game picture, despite being on same subjective level of acceptability. Here's the top 15 (plus 2) of the BCS, separated into three tiers. BCS ranks are listed in parentheses.

PATENTLY ACCEPTABLE - If They're In The Game, They're In The Game
(1) tOSU - Tremendous defense, and an offense that won't scare the better teams, but is good enough to cause problems for said teams.
(3) LSU - Tremendous defense, and an offense that should scare even the better teams, because their running game is a thing of beauty when rotating the ballcarriers. Forcing the Tigers' offense to pass is the only way to beat them, and even then Matt Flynn isn't exactly Tarvaris Jackson in the pocket.
(5) Oregon - Before the season, I believed Dennis Dixon was not a pro quarterback prospect. While his Heisman-caliber season may not have launched him into the first day of the draft, it almost certainly has saved him from an NFL career as an exclusive wide receiver. Right now, Dixon is as dynamic an offensive player as anyone else in the country. In the Mike Bellotti era, Oregon has always had strong athletes, and this looks like a year similar to Joey Harrington's final season, when the Ducks simply put it all together.
(7) West Virginia - They have one loss, at South Florida, during which their quarterback was injured. Other than that, they've beaten all comers handily, including shellackings at College Park and Piscataway. They're as under-the-radar as an elite team can be right now.

SEMI-ACCEPTABLE - Prove Your Worthiness!
(2) Boston College - There's Matt Ryan, a weak schedule, and... well... yeah. The win over Virginia Tech is their most impressive victory thus far, and an undefeated season isn't anything to sneeze at. However, I'm waiting until their game at Clemson. If they remain undefeated through that weekend, they will have passed some serious tests and shown they definitely belong in the discussion.

(4) Arizona State - I'm still waiting to see them in action, but, again, an undefeated season is nothing to dismiss out of hand. Tonight's game against Oregon has the makings of an epic, but, of course, everyone not on the west coast will ignore the game and then declare it invalid due to the little known rule that Pac10 games aren't really college football.

(8) Kansas - I like offenses that put up video game scores. Demerits have been applied for playing in the Crappy XII.

(19) USC - I'm still convinced, despite two losses, that USC is one of the six or seven best teams in the nation. On a neutral field, do you think USC is losing to Kansas? You probably paused to think about it, and that's all you need to know that they're in the discussion. Obviously, they won't play for the title, but if there were a committee and a tournament like college basketball, they would be a higher seed than a bunch of teams ranked ahead of them in the BCS.

(20) Florida - Three losses! I know their defense is shaky, but Tim Tebow is the only other player in the country who is playing at Dennis Dixon's level. As long as Tebow is in the game, that offense can score on anyone. Again, the shaky defense keeps them in my second tier, but even the most ardent Gator Hater has to admit that the Florida offense can give fits to even the best defenses.

UNACCEPTABLE - Hell No
(6) Oklahoma, (9) Missouri, (15) Texas - Oklahoma's most impressive wins are over Missouri and Texas. The Longhorns wouldn't be ranked as high as they are if they accomplished exactly the same things and had "North Texas" written on their jerseys, and while Missouri has put up a fairly impressive run, they still play in the Crappy XII. All these teams suffer because, as when playing in the MAC, you can't really crow about beating up the "better" teams in your own weak conference. Out of conference, the best win among the three is Missouri's win at Illinois in the season opener. Oooooookay.

(10) Georgia, (11) Virginia Tech - Two losses each, all deservedly so. Georgia is ranked this high in the polls mainly because they started out so high thanks to the boost every SEC team gets. Don't get me wrong, they're talented and frisky, as the win over Florida demonstrates, but an elite team that deserves to play for the national title? Not unless Matt Stafford makes the leap next year. VaTech also benefits from a high preseason ranking, but with the quarterback situation so unsettled, and one of their "impressive" games being a loss at home to BC (the other being a win at Clemson), the Hokies simply don't have a track record of meeting challenges.

(12) Michigan - Appalachian State. However, the Oregon loss doesn't look so bad anymore. If they remain unbeaten in Big Ten/Eleven play--meaning they hold off Michigan State tonight and then beat tOSU at home to close the season--they will have completed a remarkable turnaround that could see them in a BCS bowl game.

(13) Connecticut, (14) Hawaii - The schedule strength just isn't there. Hawaii plays in the WAC, and UConn lost its first major challenge on the road, at Virginia, then came out and won at home over South Florida. If the Huskies win out, they will have beaten Rutgers at home, Cincinnati on the road, and West Virginia on the road. If that happens, I will buy an Emeka Okafor jersey and do cartwheels in my front yard while singing "Soulja Boy".

Later tonight, I'll post the conclusion of the gorilla story...

9:07pm -- Concluding the Gorilla Saga

The gorilla awoke and looked around the room. Bill was still standing there.

"Ah, yes. Where were we? Football," the gorilla said.

Bill shifted his weight. The gorilla grabbed a shoot and stuck it in his mouth.

"We have discussed the first immutable law of football victory..."

"Don't throw at Asante Samuel," Bill said.

"Yes," the gorilla said, "And now you must figure out the second immutable law of football victory. This is also a fact that has been sitting in front of us for years, but Mother Culture refuses to let us see it for what it is. Bill, who throws at Asante Samuel?"

"Mangini?" said Bill.

"Eric Mangini does not throw the ball. Think literally for a moment."

"Quarterbacks."

"Correct. Quarterbacks throw at Asante Samuel. When they don't throw at Asante Samuel, victory is possible. Now, name a quarterback who has never thrown at Asante Samuel."

Bill looked at the gorilla. What answer did he want?

"I am confused," Bill said, "There are numerous answers to this question."

The gorilla sighed.

"You know that there are only two real answers. Now, stand on your head."

"What?"

"Stand on your head!"

Bill turned around, and using the wall for support, stood on his head, his grey sweatshirt flopping down, exposing his belly.

The gorilla said, "Concentrate. Feel the energy flow. Yes. Good. Calm, yes. Through your energy, you will see things. Other places. The future. The past. Old games long won or lost."

Bill grimaced, and then fell in a heap.

"What happened?" said the gorilla.

"Tom! Peyton! I saw a field covered with plastic. They were in pain."

"You see the future."

"Future? Tom and Peyton are in pain?"

"All quarterbacks are in pain in every game. But what do those quarterbacks have in common?"

"They... they... they don't throw at Asante Samuel."

"That is correct. Tom has never thrown at Asante Samuel in a game, and Peyton has learned to not throw at Asante Samuel. Now, what does that mean?"

"That's easy," said Bill, "It means both are enlightened, and neither is better than the other. We spend so much time arguing over whether Tom or Peyton deserves to impregnate more virgins to repopulate the earth after the apocalypse that we've lost sight of their actual greatness, that they're both the best for different reasons. It's no copout to say something like that, as there's only so much we can see and measure. By what we can measure, Peyton might be a little ahead of Tom, and by what we can see, Tom might be a little ahead of Peyton, but such things don't really matter because no one will ever have to choose between having one or the other in his prime."

"Enlightenment is not just for quarterbacks, Bill," said the gorilla.

Bill smiled.

"I love you."

"I know."