🍑 Tubz Unfiltered - Volume 101
Booty Patrol; Craig Counsell to the Cubs; RIP Bob Knight
Happy Tuesday, y’all!
Hellen Keller once said, “The best and most beautiful things in the world can’t be seen or even touched, they must be felt with the heart.”
That was especially true for Hellen back in her heyday (read: practically her entire life).
🛁 EXTRA BUBBLES 🛁
Driver of ‘Booty Patrol’ truck that resembled Border Patrol is cited in Florida
Cited for what? Chasing tail? I know it is against the law to change one’s vehicle to impersonate law enforcement — the vehicle was impersonating Border Patrol — but sometimes the po-po has gotta live a little bit and be more understanding.
The culprit is likely going through a dry spell, perhaps even a drought, so he decides to take things into his own hands by creating the Booty Patrol to catcall women. Do I condone such acts? I do not, but that does not mean I would give him a citation. I would tell him to touch some grass, read a book (or two), and ask, “So how long has it been, brother? Because driving around in the Booty Patrol will not get you any closer.”
🏆 SPORTZ 🏆
CRAIG COUNSELL TO THE CUBS
I don’t know whether I am more sad or more angry, but here is the reality: Craig Counsell’s reign as Mr. Milwaukee is over. It died on November 6, 2023. Mister Judas reincarnated reportedly received an offer of $5.5 million per year to stay with the Milwaukee Brewers, which would have made him the highest-paid manager in MLB history, but he decided to stab the state of Wisconsin in the back and twist the knife as he will be the new manager of the Chicago Cubs. His new deal is for five years, worth $40 million. He reportedly wanted to completely reset the market for MLB managers, as some stupid [expletive] crusader for his fellow managers, and he did just that.
Counsel is a jive turkey. He’s a rich jive turkey and a jive turkey that made a move that was in his best financial interest, but a jive turkey nevertheless. If he had secured the bag from literally any other team, I would have commended that man for doing so and thanked him for his services as the best manager that the Brewers have ever had. I also, under no circumstances, would have called him a jive turkey.
That’s obviously not the case, because he went to the gotdamn Cubs. OF ALL TEAMS. This is right up there with Brett Favre going to the Minnesota Vikings. Enjoy the Chicago dogs, you soon-to-be fat slob.
Should the Brewers have ever let Counsell’s contract situation get to this point? No; it seems like they f*cked around and found out. It is unclear whether the Brewers had the opportunity to match the Cubs’ offer, but reading between the lines, it appears that owner Mark “Pinchin’ Pennies” Attanasio wasn’t going to go that much higher than the reported offer of $5.5 million per year in annual average salary. Sad and disgraceful. We’re talking an initial difference of $2.5 million and $12.5 million total over the life of the contract. If Attanasio wasn’t willing to invest that amount of money into the team by re-upping Counsell, then what the hell is the point of owning a team? To simply sit on the investment and receive a massive payday when he sells the team? That’s a massive slap in the face to fans, the paying customers.
The 2023 Brewers were not a very good team on paper. Pitcher Brandon Woodruff missed a majority of the season; pitchers Corbin Burnes and Freddy Peralta were up-and-down; the pitching staff as a whole dealt with a bunch of injuries; and the offense was a joke. Yet, the team won 92 games and made the playoffs for the fifth time in the last six seasons, largely due to Counsell’s managerial touch. Prior to Counsell taking over at the helm, the Crew made the playoffs only three times in the history of the franchise (1982, 2008, and 2011).
It is possible that Attanasio’s cost-saving move sets the Brewers back to where they were when Attanasio originally bought the team.
Dear Jackson Chourio, please save us. Asking a 19-year-old to save one of my favorite teams might be over the top, while also being practically an impossible feat in and of itself, but desperate times call for desperate measures.
Attanasio said in that same conference call, presumably from his Ivory Tower, “We’re all here today because we lost Craig, but I’ve reflected on this — Craig has lost us and he’s lost our community also.” Spicy, but also somewhat delusional.
Counsell is one of the best managers in baseball — he was named as one of three finalists for the NL Manager of the Year (#awkward) on Monday — and is with the Cubs now. I am sick. I hope that Bartman goes to an important Cubs playoff game and pulls the same move he did back in 2003.
CFB WEEK 10 RECAP
ALABAMA 42 LSU 28: Aaaaaand just like that, the Alabama Crimson Tide and head coach Nick Saban have announced to the college football world that their demise was greatly exaggerated. Yes, LSU’s defense is next-level bad, but quarterback Jalen Milroe looked like a friggin’ locomotive on Saturday night, totaling 155 yards and four touchdowns on the ground to go along with 200+ yards through the air.
Down 35-28 early in the fourth quarter, LSU QB Jayden Daniels’ pass was tipped and intercepted. The Tide scored a touchdown on the ensuing drive. On the Tigers’ next possession, Daniels was smoked by future first-round Dallas Turner with a hit so bad, that you and I would be sipping our food through a straw for weeks on end. Daniels left the game and LSU couldn’t get anything going offensively thereafter.
I would not want to play Alabama in December.
WASHINGTON 52 USC 42: Defense was optional in this one! The Huskies, like the teams before them, had their way with the Trojans’ defense as running back Dillon Johnson looked like Walter Payton in his heyday. He finished with 26 carries for 256 yards and four touchdowns. USC’s defensive performance was the straw that broke the camel’s back because Lincoln Riley finally had enough and fired defensive coordinator Alex Grinch on Sunday, per Yahoo! Sports’ Ross Dellenger. Too little, too late.
Also, the 2022 Heisman winner and the potential No. 1 pick in the 2024 NFL Draft, QB Caleb Williams was shown sobbing in the stands on his mom’s shoulder after the game. He also told reporters that he just wanted to cuddle with his dog after the loss. This man is Drake. Best of luck to whichever team lands him.
HOUSE v. NCAA
A massive antitrust lawsuit that could potentially flip college athletics upside down. Judge Claudia Wilken in the Ninth Circuit certified class-action status for more than 10,000 “student” athletes who played D-1 athletics from 2016 until today. There are three groups: men’s basketball and football players, women’s basketball players, and the rest of the players.
The suit challenges the association’s remaining rules regarding athletes’ ability to make money from their names, images and likenesses and seeks damages based on the share of television-rights money and the social media earnings it claims athletes would have received if the NCAA’s previous limits on name-image-and-likeness (NIL) compensation had not existed.
Attorneys for the NCAA and the conferences had written in legal filings that the athletes are seeking more than $1.4 billion. The filings did not specify whether that figure takes into account the tripling of damages awards that occurs in successful antitrust cases. If it does not, then more than $4.2 billion could be at stake in the case.
$4.2 billion!? Sheesh.
The NCAA took a big fat L in O’Bannon v. NCAA, which led to “student” athletes getting more money in their pockets as long as that money was tied to educational expenses (e.g., full cost-of-attendance scholarships).
They took another fat L in NCAA v. Alston, which in part led to some schools setting aside a pool of money to give to “student” athletes if they hit certain educational benchmarks — up to $5,980 per year per “student” athlete. (If you’re interested, you can read Wisconsin’s 2022-23 policy here.) That case also eventually paved the way for NIL payments to emerge.
If House v. NCAA is the final nail in the coffin, the organization has no one to blame but themselves. Good luck, Charlie Baker.
NFL WEEK 9 RECAP
TEXANS 39 Buccanneers 37: Remember when people knocked C.J. Stroud for not testing well on the silly S2 Cognition test? (You may have not, but now you do.) Remember when the Carolina Panthers took QB Bryce Young, who is five-foot-nothing and threw three INTs (two pick-sixes) on Sunday, over Stroud?
Big ole yikes.
Stroud shredded the Bucs like Shawn White on the slopes, passing for 470 yards (an NFL record for a rookie QB) and five touchdowns, including the game-winning pass with six seconds left, with ZERO interceptions. He orchestrated that last drive to perfection — 75 yards in roughly 45 seconds, and it looked effortless.
But the real difference maker in Sunday’s victory for the Texans was not Stroud. Sorry, not sorry. It was former Badger running back Dare Ogunbowale, who kicked a 29-yard field goal with roughly nine minutes left in the game to give the Texans a three-point lead. (The Texans kicker suffered a quad injury earlier in the game.)
VIKINGS 31 Falcons 28: QB Josh Dobbs was acquired by the Viqueens on Tuesday on the trade deadline. The rocket scientist (literally) did not take any first-team snaps leading up to Sunday’s game and was holding a clipboard as QB2 until Jaran Hall got pulverized near the goal line during a scramble and exited the game in the first quarter.
Despite those perceived shortcomings, Dobbs led the team in rushing (66 yards) and marched ‘em right down the field late in the game (they got the ball with just over two minutes left), including picking up a third down with his arm, a fourth down with legs (a 12-yard gain), and another third down with his arm — the game-winning score.
WORLD SERIES
Not gonna lie, folks, it was pretty sick to watch the Rangers clinch the World Series, the franchise’s first, at a bar in Dallas. Game 5 was a pitcher’s duel like you read about, as Texas was without a hit through the first six innings. The team eventually started putting balls in play, capped off by four runs in the ninth inning. The victory was the Rangers’ 11th straight postseason win away from home, a record.
The Rangers spent a bunch of money over the last two years and convinced manager Bruce Boochy, one of the best managers of all time, to come out of retirement. What a novel concept.
Shortstop Corey Seager, who slashed .318/.451/1.133 during the postseason, took home MVP honors, making him the first player in the history of the sport to win the award in both leagues and only the fifth player to win two World Series MVPs. Sharp-lookin’ dude and unreal at baseball. Good for him.
🤓 BATH TIME READING 🤓
Legendary coach Bob Knight sadly passed away last week. He was 83. ESPN’s Jay Bilas wrote a beautiful (did I just type that word?) piece on Knight, which I encourage you to read.
If you chuckled and/or enjoyed it, make sure to forward it to others and/or share it on social. Any corrections, omissions, suggestions, etc., send 'em my way. Much love. -Tubz
Nothing better than finding out the Cubs stole one from the Brewers. Counsell was probably finally fed up that the franchise celebrated game 163 from 2018 like it was the world series. Time to go to a real franchise that will spend money on players (Corbin Burns will look good in Cubbie Blue). I never thought Jed Hoyer would have the stones to fire David Ross. Glad he did it.