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Huckleberry

Certifiably Surly
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Posts posted by Huckleberry

  1. I liked both my parents, still like my dad but mom's death kind of put a dent in our relationship.

    As for my kids, I like them all, but I absolutely have a favorite. I argue with my wife about this sometimes. I told her if you take any three people in the world that you know, you will like one of them more than the other two. That's just how it works, but somehow that's magically not supposed to apply to my kids?

    For the record, my kids know my theory on this, but I just tell each of them they're my favorite when they ask who it is. And Alexa has been programmed to respond with one of our dog's names when she's asked who my favorite kid is.

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  2. A&M's response will be to send all their underprivileged students to the State Legislature to beg for money personally instead of through administrators. Turns out the plan to balloon enrollment to 80,000 solely to have more graduates donate to the athletics program in the future was fucking stupid just like everyone told them it was fucking stupid.

    Did I mention they're fucking stupid?

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  3. On 7/6/2019 at 6:42 PM, Sandlot said:

    I’m glad you guys took the time out of your busy NBA coaching schedules to chime in on such things as rotations and so forth. Maybe all you excellent coaches can give Coach Aston some pointers on how to coach.

    lulz

    Basketball is harder than rocket science! It's like neurosurgery except with a bouncing ball!

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  4. Okay, so I'm having a little too much fun playing with the rankings. To show what an automatic pass this has made into the hex, if the USA loses all four of their CONCACAF Nations League matches to Cuba and Canada this coming fall, their FIFA point total will only drop from 1546 (calculated above after the Gold Cup) to 1499. I.e., there is almost no way to miss the hex.

    I really don't think FIFA understands the ratings inflation that is going to happen due to that knockout round rule. As well as the penalty shootout rule (you get a 0.75 game score for winning a penalty shootout and a 0.5 game score - instead of 0.25 - for losing in a penalty shootout). They have guaranteed ratings points inflation with these ad hoc tweaks to the math.

  5. By the way, the new system also helps the USA and Mexico because continental competitions are worth more than the Nations League. So the fact we have two Gold Cups every cycle is a slight boost. But even more interesting is this:

    image.png.9afc2934d3a4cc89326340525e55d4a4.png

    ORLY? If CONCACAF wants to do something right and game the rankings, then there's no reason not to make the Gold Cup 8 groups of 4 teams and then everyone advances to the knockout round, seeded based on group results. Then have it every year. Positive feedback loop would start shooting CONCACAF teams up the rankings. Just sayin'.

  6. 1 hour ago, Captain Ron said:

    I don't see how this helps anyone at all. A shitty as the FIFA rankings are handled, this takes away prime qualification games for teams like the US and Mexico. That was the point of the whole system before because it fattened up teams in points/rankings for the top teams to beat up on. Last go around the US and Mexico had 16 games in qualifying. Sure, 6 were in the 4th round, but it still gave them a chance to increase their rankings.

    The old system really needed to be scrapped, but this is a step backwards, not forwards.

    With the 2018 changes to the formula this actually doesn't hurt as much as it would have before, possibly not at all. Let's take the 2018 qualifying fourth round that actually happened then plug in the current (pre-Gold Cup) FIFA rankings values

    Points before the 4th round: USA 1495, TNT 1260, GUA 1072, SVG 954

    USA 6, SVG 1 - USA moves from 1495 points to 1498 points, SVG from 954 to 951
    GUA 1, TNT 2 - GUA from 1072 to 1064, TNT from 1260 to 1268

    SVG 0, GUA 4 - SVG to 941, GUA to 1074
    TNT 0, USA 0 - TNT to 1273, USA to 1493

    SVG 2, TNT 3 - SVG to 936, TNT to 1278
    GUA 2, USA 0 - GUA to 1095, USA to 1472

    TNT 6, SVG 0 - TNT to 1283, SVG to 931
    USA 4, GUA 0 - USA to 1477, GUA to 1090

    SVG 0, USA 6 - SVG to 928, USA to 1480
    TNT 2, GUA 2 - TNT to 1279, GUA to 1094

    USA 4, TNT 0 - USA to 1485, TNT to 1275
    GUA 9, SVG 3 - GUA to 1099, SVG to 922

    Forgive the rounding. The bottom line is that the USA went 4-1-1 in the fourth round and in the new ranking system would have dropped from 1495 ranking points down to 1485. This reflects a drop from #30 to tied for #33. The new ranking system is better but has flaws, of course. There is no accounting for home versus road matches. This works out for the USA because we play a lot of home matches in the Gold Cup. We should work the system by also scheduling every friendly match between now and 2022 at home.

    Limiting the top teams' opponents to the highest ranked teams actually helps in the new formula. The loss to Guatemala in the fourth round above made it literally impossible for the United States to increase their point total no matter what happened in their last 3 matches of the round. Last three matches were wins by a total of 14-0 and the final point total was still a drop of 10 points for the full fourth round.

  7. 1 hour ago, gecko said:

    When I put my 3 kids through UT (first one entered 2007 last one walked 2014) I was earning over double the $65K threshold and it was dam f**king hard to pay tuition and associated living costs + keep a modest household going, pay taxes and basically do life.  I'm glad the PUF is being put to good use but what about using those $$ to moderate tuition costs for all students not just make it free for a few.

    I guess the current approach makes better headlines (it made the local news in NYC this morning) and makes us all feel good about ourselves...but whatever...put me down as not impressed.

    You could always trade places with a household making $65K. I'm sure plenty would take you up on the offer.

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  8. Sounds like all the fringe teams between 5 and 8 in the last rankings need to analyze them to determine their best chance to accumulate points in the next year. They need to schedule matches against teams they think are overrated in the rankings or whom they match up well with. 

  9. 1 minute ago, Zavala said:

    Yeah man, the left ALWAYS has the moral high ground.

    It's just a matter of linguistics to you guys, pretty pathetic. You aren't killing unborn children, you are keeping OLD MEN from making WOMEN HEALTHCARE DECISIONS. It goes on and on like this until you are where you are right now - normal people who don't care about politics at all are disgusted by the left's insanity.  

    Wait, I thought you were all about topical posts.

  10. I don't have a problem with offense. I have a problem with boring offense. Earl Weaver baseball is effective but boring.

    I mentioned fewer strikeouts for a reason. More actual action on the field is exciting. Deaden the ball but also lower the seams. More balls in play is what we need (that's what your mom said). More defensive plays, more baserunners, more actual action.

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