"The Time Has Come," the Walrus Said, "to Admit Your Team Was Lame."

I dislike Aaron Rodgers.

You may wonder why.  The guy seems to be so likable after all to the rest of the nation, appearing in commercials, winning a Super Bowl and being arguably the best quarterback in the NFL.  You probably insist that I am either jealous or allowing my love of the Bears to influence my hatred of a rival, nay, the rival team's quarterback.  While I have nothing against his commercials and certainly recognize his stellar play, my dislike of the Packers' #12 is based on a fairly simple, fairly solid sports principle that I adhere to: act like you've been there before.

I am no fan of celebration.  Strike that, I love to celebrate and do so as often as I can and expect a team that just scored a touchdown to celebrate as well.  What I dislike is choreographed celebrations.  Getting together with your teammates and jumping around and high-fiving as you make your way back to the bench is great.  Spontaneous joy over an achievement is perfectly acceptable. Such celebrations can even take the form of recurring traditions and still hold their charm in my mind.  Just to show I have no ill will (on this subject matter, at least) against the Packers, I will use their Lambeau Leap as an example.  When one of their players scores a touchdown, they jump up into the waiting arms of the fans in the end zone to celebrate.  That is a fantastic tradition.  That I can abide.

This I cannot:

Behold the Discount Double Check

When you have a prepared celebratory move devised, you are, in my book, a douche bag.  This goes double when your touchdown celebration involves a symbolic proclamation to be a heavyweight champion and triple when it involves a forward crotch thrust.  Aaron Rodgers is guilty of all three.  (Note: any defensive players performing the Discount Double Check after sacking Rodgers are also, for the record, lame based both on the grounding principle of this argument as well as the fact that they are even less original for just copying an opposing player's move)

But the offenses against subtlety by the Packers' QB do not end there.  He has been spotted by yours truly celebrating a few other on-field accomplishments as of late that manage to somehow be even more annoying.

TGD's Fantas(y)tic Offer

The most intense sports season of all is nearly upon us.  No other sporting contest tells you more about yourself and your competitors.  Loyalties are tested, friends become mortal enemies and even kin turn their back on one another for the chance at victory.

Yes, it is time to begin prepping for the fantasy football season.  And nobody can do it alone.  The sooner you accept the fact that you need help, the sooner I can help you.

I don't pretend to have advice to offer you about who to draft, who not to draft or who to draft if that one guy you were going to draft has already been drafted.  There are countless websites and publications out there you can reference to get such advice.  No, the help I so generously extend my hand and offer today concerns something many overlook.  It involves the first thing anyone will notice about your fantasy team.  It is your first chance to make an impression upon your opponent, whether it be to intimidate or confuse.

I want to name your fantasy team.

I made this same offer to my readers in a post from last year.  However, nobody accepted my offer.  Now, it's possible that the ranks of fantasy football leagues out there were peppered with some of the gems that I let slip in that post and that would be fine.  But my true hope is that you readers out there might comment on this post, telling me a little about yourself and giving me insight into your personality (your football philosophy, favorite hobby, book, movie, or brand of cereal), and that I may then offer a few potential names for you to choose from.  I'm thinking each comment gets three potential names.

But you doubt my abilities, don't you?  I can't say that I blame you.  And so, as a gesture of good faith, I will throw another few beauties out there that you can choose to steal for your own team if you are too shy to leave a comment.  Here are just a few I thought of at random in no particular order...

• Secret Apprentice
• Dungeons & Defensive Backs
• Kobiyashi Maru
• Mean Machine
• Tusken Raiders
• KHHHHHHHAAAAANNNNNNNN!
• The Horse You Rode in On
• The Wreck of the Larry Fitzgerald
• Boom Bang Pow
• Previously Unreleased Yardage
• Brick by Brick
• Something Completely Different
• Unimpeded to Your Quarterback
• Mandalorians
• Herald of Galactus

...and I'm spent.

But seriously folks, that took a matter of two minutes.  If you comment on this post and ask for a customized name for your fantasy team, I guarantee that I will spend at least five minutes thinking up three potential names just for you.  That's more than one minute per name!

Regardless of your naming decision, I wish you all luck this season.  May the Force be with you...ooh, that's another one!  "Force With a Capital F."  Ok, I'm done.

Sometimes There is No Bad Guy, Just a Bad Game

The end has come to one of the most rewarding summer activities of my life.  My wife and I undertook the challenge of coaching both my sons as they played pee-wee baseball together this year.  Our top priority from the start was to help every kid on the team gain confidence and learn how to play the game while still having fun.  The winning, we figured, would follow.

In fact, we planned to have the winning follow a long time after the beginning of the season.  Our league placed us in the unique position of making the playoffs no matter what our record.  On top of that, all six teams would be randomly seeded, so we had just as much chance of earning a first round bye as any other team.

So the season rolled on and we piled up losses like Rush Limbaugh stockpiles oxycodone.  I reckoned that we would take winning more seriously once the playoffs arrived and that if we didn’t manage to turn things around then, at least the kids would be used to losing and take it in stride.

What happened in our first playoff game made me feel like a genius.

Sometimes, the Bad Sport Wins

Over the last several years, I have watched as the St. Louis Cardinals and Green Bay Packers, teams that are direct rivals of teams that I root for, have won championships.  But the stinging pain or jealousy that forced me to avoid watching Sports Center for weeks at a time and grit my teeth at the mere mention of their success pales in comparison to how I felt recently.

Last Thursday night, the Miami Heat won the NBA Finals, Lebron James won his first professional title and my summer of sulking over what might have been officially began.

I did not watch the final game.  I couldn’t bring myself to do it.  The news came as I arrived at work for the night, checked my trusty ESPN Score Center app and cursed the heavens, much to the bewilderment of my coworkers.  Never had I hoped more for a win out of the Western Conference, but Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and James Harden (don’t forget ex-Bull and defensive specialist Thabo Sefolosha) had let me down.

As I sat at work and tried to harness my fury into the constructive task of staring blazing laser holes into the tabletop in front of me, I realized that my anger over the Miami Heat’s success was not like the frustration I felt over the Cardinals and Packers.  I wasn’t dreading the fact that I was going to hear it from Heat fans.  It was not the fuel of rivalry that stoked my frustration of the Heat’s win.  No, I was legitimately upset because Lebron James won.

The Bad, Worse & Ugly of Sports

For a well-rounded individual, life is not all about sports.  Instead, sports teach us about life.


It has been a momentous week in the world of sports from my perspective.  Some national headlines deserve mention and the local, more household obsession of mine requires wrapping up.


Thus, Transformer Generation Dad plans on roaring back into the blogosphere from which he has been so noticeably absent over the past month (you did notice, right?) by writing several posts over the next twenty-four hours regarding sports and the lessons, sometimes profound and sometimes painful, that they teach us.


Buckle up because TGD Sports Day starts now.

How Sweet It Is

It has been a long baseball season.  Practices and games galore have left little free time for my usual pastimes of writing blog posts, drinking beer and playing video games.  To add to the frustration of the commitment I made at the beginning of the season to coach my sons’ team, the time and effort put in has not always yielded results.  During sixteen games this season, we won only two.

As a pee-wee coach, my responsibility has been to place the progression of my young players above all else, including winning.  I explained this to all of my players early on and have repeated it over and over.  While they watched as their peers on other teams celebrated wins, my players consoled themselves with the reassurance that they were learning.  While kids said openly, “You guys stink, we creamed you last time,” my players muttered to themselves, “These games don’t count.”  While one team pitched the same three kids all season long, every kid on our team who wanted to pitch got an opportunity.  While that same team held their kids at static positions, our players were rotating in and out of the infield and getting valuable experience, even at the risk of their own personal safety and the potential of taking a line drive to the noggin while they scribbled their own name into the infield dirt.

Unsportsmanlike Sentiment

Before I was the walking, talking encyclopedia of sports etiquette that I pretend to be in front of my sons and the rest of their pee wee baseball teammates, I was a young boy with a few thing to learn about sportsmanship.  For a time early on in my fleeting sports career my frustration over my own lack of skill or teasing from my older brother (whom I have yet to beat in a one on one basketball game and at this point doubt I ever will) would leave me wanting to stomp my feet and scream at the top of my lungs that I swore off playing whatever sport I was currently participating in for good.

It took time before the greater lesson of sports sunk in through my thick skull.  Only after experiencing both losing and winning (but mostly losing) repeatedly was I able to do either with grace.  Eventually, I realized it was about playing the game and challenging oneself to become better each time, not just about winning.  Over time, I came to be able to hold my head high based not on my performance but solely on how well I handled defeat or victory (but mostly defeat).

No matter whom it was I lost to or how badly I lost, I never held any ill will toward my opponent.  It was all, “Good game,” and, “Good luck,” on my part then I would retire to the solitude of my locker room or dugout before cursing and breaking things.  Even as a spectator I try never to talk badly about or wish bad things on an opposing team.  When my team loses, I generally root for the team that defeated us so that I can claim we were beaten by the best.  If my team is out of contention, I will pick a team I like for a certain reason and root for them, but, as a rule, not against any specific team because I dislike them.

At least that’s how I used to feel until Lebron James went to the Miami Heat.  Correction: until Lebron James made such a shameless spectacle of the fact that he chose to grace the Miami Heat with his presence.

Dreams & Nightmares of Pee Wee Glory

During a rainy evening in March, the inklings that I had made a grave miscalculation began to creep up on me.  I sat that night on a rusty metal folding chair in a large, echoing room in a musty park district field house and listened as the names of the children who would constitute my Pee Wee baseball team were read off to me.  I had only begun to realize how completely managing said baseball team would consume my life.

But I remained positive and shortly after our team’s first practice, I began to have the dreams.

We had won the league championship and the tiny arms of my players, strengthened by the adrenaline of their victory, hoisted me into the air as the crowd cheered wildly.  The parents who had been skeptical at first of my abilities as a manager rushed to be the first to pat me on the back and I rode off into the sunset on the motorcycle they had all chipped in to buy me in appreciation for my hard work and dedication throughout the season.

The night following our first game, the nightmares took over.

Scorebook of Spells

No doubt, all you nerds out there understand what it feels like to become consumed by something.  It might be Dungeons & Dragons sessions running into the wee hours of the morning fueled by pizza and Mountain Dew, building and prgramming your own fighting robot, researching the process of brewing your favorite beer and trying to recreate it at home or knowing everything about every member and every song from your favorite band.  Regardless of what form it takes, the nerd inside us all drives us to find out more than we have any reason to know about the objects of our current obsession.


After receiving the Obsessed with Marvel trivia book some time ago, my family barely saw me.  I spent so much time alone with it, trying to up my score that the toilet seat in my bathroom was beginning to conform to my rear end like a couch cushion.  Whenever I wasn't trying my hand at questions, I was paging through the Marvel Encyclopedia so that I would be ready for that section of questions regarding Howard the Duck.

Third Person Thursday: The Manager's Speech

As the sun beat down upon his brow and the wind swept through the grass, the manager stalked back and forth.  He had made them run, throw, bat and catch nonstop all practice.  Now his players sat silently before him in right field, some still trying to catch their breath.

He stared them down one by one without a word.  Each made eye contact as he passed, afraid of what might happen if they failed to do so.  The manager liked what he saw.  The players were tired.  They were worn out.  They were broken.  They were his.

He decided the time was right and began his speech.  “The preseason is over, gentlemen,” he began.  “The real thing starts with our first game on Tuesday.  No more fun and games.”

He paused dramatically.  He saw the reality sinking in on each face.  Some nodded.  He continued, “From this point on, when you play lazy, when you don’t give it your all, when you screw up,” he raised his voice there and paused again, his eyes wide, “you aren’t just robbing yourself of practice time anymore.  You aren’t just hurting yourself, you’re hurting the whole team.”

The players all stared at the manager as he suddenly jogged off to the side and grabbed a glove from near the foul line.  He jogged back in front of the group and started again.  “When you say, ‘I’m just gonna jog over and get that foul ball,’” he said sarcastically as he loped toward the line, mocking a half effort, “and then you blow the play, you just left your pitcher hanging.  That was an out you could have gotten him that you let slide.”

He ripped the glove from his hand, threw it into foul territory and shouted, “That is unacceptable!”  He noticed a few of them jump and smiled, but only on the inside.  “We look out for our teammates around here.  We never give up.  We give all our effort and leave everything on the field.  We play for one another, not just ourselves and not one of your better forget that.”

He pointed a rigid finger at them and glared.  The players sat spellbound.  They were putty in his hands now.  He could smell victory.  He could smell the championship.

It's Tough, but I Manage

I’ve heard it said that being the manager of a professional baseball team is not easy.  It takes years, if not decades of baseball experience to excel at the position.  Planning, analysis and gut feelings all must intertwine to help any big league manager get an edge.

But you would never know that from looking at them.

For the most part the iconic managers (the LaRussa’s, Lasorda’s, Pinella’s and the Cox’s) stand at the railing of the dugout staring stoic and statue-like out at the action.  They spit every now and then and make a few silent hand gestures.  At their most animated they run out onto the field to swear in the face of the umpire and kick dirt.

I respectfully suggest that managing a Major League Baseball club cannot be half as difficult as managing a pee-wee team.  I submit my argument below for your approval.

O-spam-a

Transformer Generation Dad is all about the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament.  It is one of my favorite sporting events of each year and the inspiration behind TGD's Geek Tournament.


Another thing I am into is respect for the Presidency.  Everyone is entitled to their opinion about any President, but when it comes down to it, whomever wins the election has my support and respect for four years to follow.  At the very least, I am willing to here them out.  I feel that the leader of our country ought to look good to the rest of the world.


So it was that I decided to participate in Barrack Obama's NCAA Tournament Challenge a few weeks ago.  What a fun idea, I thought.  It was an opportunity to fill out a bracket and see if I couldn't outsmart, or at least make more lucky guesses than, the leader of the free world.  It was the sort of down to earth thing that endears you to a public figure, whether you happened to care much for them prior to that or not.


I was completely unprepared for what was to come.

Don't Bully Tebow, Even Though I Know You Totally Want To

I am not a Tim Tebow fan.  I have absolutely no personal interest in him.  That’s not to say I hate him, but I can see how people are annoyed by him.

Take a guy who is not the prototypical NFL quarterback, who is actually not a particularly good quarterback,  and surround him with a media circus despite the fact that he is a back up (likely the most talked about second string QB in the league’s history) and you are bound to get sports fans upset.  They want to hear about the good players, not have personal interest stories rule Sports Center every night.

Perhaps even more polarizing is Tebow’s religion.  Let me be clear, God does not give a crap which team wins…ever.  Whatever all-powerful deity you believe in stays out of such matters.  They probably already know what the outcome will be and, if they really cared that much, would keep you from getting your hopes up.  If you think your god cares about sports, then you must either believe that Cubs fans are being punished for their evil ways (the North side of Chicago existing as a virtual Sodom and/or Gomorrah) or they are the chosen people and the past 100-plus years have been their own version of wandering through the desert in search of the land of milk and honey.  Maybe they’ll get there next year.

My Boys of Summer

Leaves are budding on the trees.  The voices of children can be heard frolicking outside.  Tiny black ants are being massacred by the dozens around the perimeter of my home as they make their futile attempts at invasion.


What does this all mean?  Spring is in the air, which, in turn, means baseball season is upon us.  You may be the type of person who enjoys watching spoiled millionaires spit and grab their crotches in public, and I will not deny you that guilty pleasure.  However, it is not MLB Spring Training of which I speak, but something infinitely more important: Little League!

That Other Tournament

I have a confession.  The concept of a tournament during the month of March is not something I came up with on my own.  Don't tell anyone.


Sure, Transformer Generation Dad's Geek Tournament might be the best bracket-style contest going on this month, but the inspiration behind it is one of my favorite sporting events every year, the NCAA Men's Basketball Championship Tournament.  Thus, I feel an obligation to discus my predictions for that tournament this month too.


For anyone hoping to fill out a better bracket than me, I have posted mine on Google Documents and you can challenge me here.  However, no super cool sponsor like Cobra Electronics wanted anything to do with my predictions on the tournament (and I can't really blame them) so the only thing you will win by defeating me is bragging rights.


Of course, should you decide to pit your basketball prowess against someone of more importance, President Obama is running his own contest which you can participate in here.  Of course, he's not offering you anything but bragging right for beating him either, so on that front he and I are even.  Of course, he's also sending you directly to a form to donate to his campaign fund as soon as you complete your bracket while I'm not asking you for any money.  Of course, I would not be so presumptuous as to suggest that makes my challenge more American.  I will, however, graciously accept any comments by readers to suggest that might be the case...of course.


However you choose to participate in it, celebrate it or watch it, enjoy the tournament and good luck with your brackets.

2012 Geek Tournament Official Details

This year’s Geek Tournament has undergone a drastic overhaul since last year’s inaugural event.  Instead of a single winner being declared amongst numerous randomly paired items, this year we will have four winners, one from each of the following categories:

• Universe
• Ship
• Captain
• Crew

-       There are a total of 16 contestants, each with an entrant competing for the title in the aforementioned categories (a master list for anyone without a PhD in Science Fiction is available here).  This shall result in a total of four rounds of voting during which you, our loyal reader, will help determine the outcome of each matchup.

Voting is set to begin March 4^th and each round will last one week.  The updated matchups for each round will be posted here on Sundays until the ultimate winners are determined.

Speaking of ultimate winners, Cobra Electronics has graciously agreed to supply one lucky contestant with a Cobra iRadar system for use with their iPhone or Android phone (depending on which company to which you have chosen to pledge your allegiance).  That means, like last year, I will be accepting brackets for those of you bold enough to attempt to predict whom the winners might be.  Unlike last year, you will get something infinitely cooler than a crappy t-shirt for your troubles.  (Prize recipients are limited to those in the Continental United States)

Brackets are now available in Microsoft Excel and PDF format.  Once you have completed your bracket, submissions will be accepted in just about any imaginable manner.  Ideally, you should email it to madcap1417@gmail.com, but you could also leave a detailed list in the comment section of one of my blog posts, send TGD a Facebook inbox message or communicate in some other way I have not had the foresight to suggest here.  Basically, if I get it and can read it, it will count as an entry.  The entry deadline is Sunday, March 4^th 2012 at 11:59 PM CST.

Of course, this now burdens me with the responsibility of explaining how the brackets will be scored.  Each correctly placed bracket slot from the first round of voting will receive two points, the second round four points, the third round six points and the correct identification of each final bracket champion will result in ten points resulting in a possible one hundred and sixteen points.  In the event of a tie, the winner shall be determined by the total number of correct entries regardless of round.  In the event that this also results in a tie, the winner’s submitted screen names will be placed in alphabetical order a coin flipped to determine whether to begin from A (heads) or Z (tails) and a D20 then rolled in order to decide how far from said starting letter to begin.  Is that part confusing?  Good, it is meant to be.

No doubt, the bracket seedings will cause some disagreement.  By disagreement, I mean rage.  More than likely, I will receive some very angry emails and comments.  While I welcome such "constructive" feedback, in a more than likely futile attempt to quell any uprising, later this week I plan to give you an unprecedented glimpse into the minds of the selection committee and myself by sharing with you some of the comments passed back and forth while ranking the contestants.  I hope you might laugh at them as much as I did.

With business now handled, it is time to let the festivities begin.  Submit your bracket for a chance to win a Cobra iRadar (and guaranteed fun) today!

No Moral High Ground to Stand on With This Pick...Or Is There?

Well, the Transformer Generation Dad Moral High Ground Picks for this season's NFL PLayoffs have not gone so well.  Certainly, the two most evil teams (the Baltimore Ravens by their association with a murderer and the Green Bay Packers by their association with the opposite of the Bears) were dispatched.  However, I cannot say that I can assuredly rest my high and mighty laurels upon the likes of either team left to represent their respective conference in the championship game.


But I'll sure as hell try.

Conference Championship Round Moral High Ground Picks

There's nothing like taking the moral high ground when you can't decide something by becoming educated on the matter.  Thus, as we have done all playoffs, TGD is here to provide you with the Moral High Ground picks for today's NFL PLayoff games.


Baltimore Ravens at New England Patriots
This battle of arrogant alleged cheaters versus a murderer (yeah I said it, Ray Lewis, because the likelihood that I will ever come face to face with you is slim and the likelihood that you would have read this blog post is nearly non-existant) is similar to ever political race I've ever witnessed in that it is a matter of choosing to support the lesser of two evils.  In the end, you must pick the team that will prove the weakest obstacle to whomever wins the NFC.
TGD Moral High Ground Pick: New England Patriots


New York Giants at San Francisco 49ers
New York is inherently evil, which I admit I think only because I am from Chicago, but I believe nonetheless.  Besides, Jim Harbaugh has given his team self confidence when they lacked it and that's the feel good story of the year amongst over paid millionaires.
TGD Moral High Ground Pick: San Francisco 49ers


Good luck today regardless of which teams you are rooting for.  Both should be entertaining games at least.  Celebrate responsibly.  By that I mean not the way Ray Lewis did.  By that I mean by having your night end with you and your friends stabbing someone to death and attempting to cover it up.  By that I mean...actually, that last part was pretty clear, I think.

Divisional Round Moral High Ground Picks

Another weekend is here and I know you're looking for guidance on who to root for in this round of the NFL Playoffs.  Look no further as the moral high ground has arrived to light your way via Transformer Generation Dad.  Yes, much like Tim Tebow converses with God on the sidelines, I have been endowed with a finely tuned moral compass (at least when it comes to matters of sport) and am more than willing to inform you of which way it is pointing.


This weekend's games are bookended by unique match-ups.  It will start with a game with two acceptable winners and end with a game in which a win for either team is a victory for evil.