cactus i.v.

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
Sunday Afternoon—4:19 p.m.—Ty’s Apartment:
……(silence)……(dumbfounded look)……(silence)……(look at score on television)……(silence)……(chug remainder of Bud Select bottle)……(silence)……(double-check score on TV)……(slowly straggle to fridge, open a new Bud Select, quickly down entire contents)……(silence)……(check score for third time, unchanging: Chargers 28, Colts 24)……(silence)……(rip off Manning jersey, search for lighter fluid and […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
I’ve gotta admit, I’ve been pretty hard on Brett Favre this year. I’ve called him “Grandpa.” I’ve suggested he be the next Cialis spokesman. I’ve wondered if the workers at the Santa Maria nursing home in Green Bay are mad when he comes in late after a Monday Night […]

When I was in eighth grade or so, I liked the Miami Dolphins — but that had nothing to do with Dan Marino, who was a QB, not a commentator, at the time. It had to do with Jonathan Brandis.
My friends and I were crushing on him hard. I can still probably recite lines from […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
This weekend we welcome the new year with a slate of first-round playoff games that vary in levels of interest (or disinterest, as the case may be). Is it just me or do Wild Card Weekend games kind of suck? I always feel like people really hype up the […]

By SOOZ
yanxchick(at)gmail.com
Everyone these days wants to be a poker player. Who can blame them? Watching poker players splash around chips like it was nothing has its appeal.
Former tennis champ Boris Becker is throwing himself into the mix. The 40-year-old international star has been training to become a tournament poker player. Either his training is paying […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
It took 20 months and millions of dollars, but the MLB finally released it’s highly anticipated Mitchell Report last week. Headed by former Senator George Mitchell, this 409-page tome was supposed to shake baseball to its core, proving that countless baseball players had taken steroids, HGH, or elephant tranquilizers. I guess you could […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
Don’t kid yourself; unless the Patriots are playing the Colts, I have zero interest in watching New England on TV. I have seen its scores in the paper, its SportsCenter highlights, its countless “best team of all-time” articles online. I get it.
But to me, seeing the Patriots play […]

Michael Vick got 23 months in jail for running an underground dog fighting ring.
He doesn’t get the “Newsmaker of the Day” cactus for that.
Instead, we give it to some random online comment poster using the screen name Mosiemoyoung
Our dear Mosiemo commented the story on aol.com, so profoundly saying, 01:42:19 PM Dec 10 2007
Report This! Didn’t […]

Last night, two undefeated boxers met in the ring. Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Ricky Hatton were both a lot and oh going in, but one would end up with a blemish on his winning record.
Hatton, because he has an accent, would have been my pick; but, when I saw the hits his face has taken […]

Most people thought the Buffalo Bill tight end wouldn’t make it after taking a bad hit early in the season.
But Kevin Everett proved people wrong. His spinal cord injury isn’t holding him back. In fact, Everett was walking on his own, it was said today.
According to Yahoo! News, “Everett was paralyzed from the neck down […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
I googled “Suicides in West Virginia after football loss to Pittsburgh.” There were 210,000 results. I expected more; I mean, just put yourself in the mindset of a Mountaineers fan as he/she walked into Milan Pusker Stadium on Saturday night: “Holy crap! If you would have told me that we would be one […]

So today’s “Newsmaker of the Day” isn’t just one person, today, we give it to the entire Washington Redskins’ team.
Earlier this week, Redskins free safety Sean Taylor was shot and killed at his home. His funeral is tomorrow. And, instead of mourning his death in a melancholy way on the first game day after his […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
Over the Thanksgiving holiday, my fiance, parents and I were in Memphis. While in the 8th-most dangerous city in America (according to CQ Press, a unit of Congressional Quarterly Inc), we dediced to take in a Grizzlies game. We got to the game an hour ahead of gametime, soley so I could run […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
Watching the Colts/Chargers game go down to the wire two Sunday nights ago, I was reveling in witnessing my beloved Ponies creep closer to the end zone and coming within sheer yards of taking a last-minute lead in a game they deserved to win as much as A-Rod getting BINGO in an old […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
32. Miami Dolphins (0-9): If they go “defeated” (0-16), does it single-handedly cancel out their perfect 1972 season?
31. New York Jets (1-8): Still trying to think of something to say about them…
30. San Fran 49ers (2-6): Could be worse for the Bay Area, I mean, what if Oakland was […]

Lute Olson is taking a leave of absence from coaching the University of Arizona’s mens basketball team.
The 73-year-old was quoted by the Associated Press saying, “For the past 25 years, I have always given 110 percent to the team and this job,” Olson said.
Here’s the thing: No matter how many years you’ve been coaching, you […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
Continuing from last week, the following are my Bestern Conference predictions as well as my pick for the 2007-08 NBA Champ. Keep in mind that although the East got better over the summer, they are still the Dunkin’ Donuts to the West’s Krispy Kreme.
WESTERN CONFERENCE
Northwest Division

Denver Nugs: […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
I am from Indiana, which means three things: one) I am a Hoosier, two) I couldn’t tell you with 100-percent certainty what “Hoosier” really means, and three) basketball is my favorite sport.
Although I am a huge supporter of football (and my 7-0 Ponies) and baseball (and my all-their-good-stuff-happened-before-I-was-born […]

As Told To By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
FADE IN:
INT. FOX NETWORK HEADQUARTERS – NIGHT – OCTOBER 21
A group of old, uptight Fox network executives huddle around a plasma television that sits in the corner of a large but empty-feeling boardroom. The television is playing Game 7 of the ALCS between the Boston Red Sox and the Cleveland […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
Wouldn’t it be great if there were an NFL poll done by the media and/or coaches like they have for college football? Obviously, it wouldn’t change the playoff structure (as the best records would still advance), but don’t you think there would be even more “upsets” if such a list existed? Doesn’t it […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
What if I told you I have the secret to winning so much money at gambling that you can build an addition to your house that is nothing but a giant room filled with dollar bills and Sacagawea coins that you could dive into, kind of like what Scrooge McDuck had in DuckTails? […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
It is just me or does baseball season go by the quickest? Is it possible that Opening Day was six months ago? It seems like just yesterday my Reds started the season 1-0 and seemed destined to bring me the extremely rare occurrence that is the Sports Trifecta of Championships, as my Spurs […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
This article is kind of long, so I won’t bother with a witty, elaborate intro. The following are my team rankings for the NFL after three weeks:
32. Atlanta Falcons (0-3) – Which is worse for the city? A) Vick is going to jail, B) Vick’s former backup is now […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
The past week has been so crazy, I don’t know where to start. Between the cheatin’ Pats, OJ and James Spader beating James Gandolfini for Best Actor, it seems the world has been walking the fine line between “quirky” and “weird as s***.” It makes me just want to sit down […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
Writing for the cactus puts me in an awkward scheduling predicament; my articles are due by noon on Monday and run on Tuesday. Thus, because of said deadlines, I will never have the chance to do any post-game analysis on Monday Night Football games (unless I decide to write about a game […]

By Ty Freer
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
Like everyone else in the country, I chose to get away on Labor Day weekend. And like everyone else in the country, I chose to make the gorgeous, exciting and construction-free paradise of Milwaukee my weekend destination (if that didn’t make you laugh then you either a) are from Milwaukee or b) have […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
Alas, here is Part Two of Ty’s Inaugural NFL Preview. Last week I knocked out the vastly superior AFC, going as far as picking the hated Patriots to make it to the Big Game. This week I will pick the lackluster NFC’s best team, which is kind of […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
Here it is, Ty’s Inaugural NFL Preview! I thought I would do mine a few weeks before the season started so you wouldn’t say things like, “Ty, you piece of crap, you just copied off of Sports Illustrated! Think for yourself, man!” Because this is long, I […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer@yahoo.comIn the “Washed Up” department, a sudden rise in Old NBA Players/Old Guys Screaming Nonsense in the Liquor Store Parking Lot wanting to make a comeback has developed.
Last week, Penny “Can We Go Back to 1995, Please?” Hardaway signed with the Heat, despite the fact that he is 36 and has only played […]

By TY FREER
ty_freer(at)yahoo.com
On Saturday night in San Diego, a plumber named Adam Hughes snatched Barry Bonds’ all-time-record-tying 755th home run ball as it bounced into the lower left-field seats of Petco Park. All indications are that Hughes will sell the ball/put it up for auction in the near future, where […]