SL Xpress

He and Shaka's early round face plants will be the wind beneath my wings.

I have no interest in the dynamics of Austin neighborhoods/high schools, but I still loved this post so much.

The issues I have with Justin Bronk's conclusions as I'm reading them here are: 1) it's not like the Ukraine air force's current planes are facing less challenges than the western fighters that might replace them. They're somehow managing to keep them up in the air, even in a limited way. I assume the same strategies being utilized for their MiGs and SUs would be used for western fighter jets. The key thing from an armchair perspective is that we know the US and allies have a ton of F16s that could be spared, especially as we're about to transition to the F35. 2) the real problem isn't a need for an increased quantity of planes, or a qualitative increase in the type of fighters Ukrainians can fly - although those would be obvious pleasant side effects. The real problem is that Ukraine is running out of ammunition for their Soviet style planes, with no way to replace it. To have ANY armed air presence at some point is going to require western planes. It's no wonder the Ukrainians aren't real picky about which planes are given to them, as long as the ammunition comes with it. The Ukrainians want to be able to use missile intercept armament that the western planes can be armed with, that can't be on the fighters they have now. Yes, Western support is a finite resource. But not being able to scramble ANY kind of effective air presence compared to being able to scramble a limited air presence, is an EXTREMELY significant difference. The specification of F-18s and Gripens sounds like it's coming from an airplane nerd who isn't sufficiently taking into account the conditions on the battlefield or the political realities of beggars not being choosers.

There's a religious fervor regarding A-10s. I understand it, but they're simply not practical even a little bit unless you have overwhelming air superiority including other aircraft, SAMs, and even MANPADs. Whatever else Russia has been incompetent about, their SAM systems are no joke. I have a religious fervor for Apaches, but that ain't happening, either, for a ton of reasons.

What's your difficulty? I assume we will eventually, but I don't have any trouble understanding it. I don't agree with it, but I understand it.

I do not understand how Turkiye and Saudi Arabia can get too involved. Turkiye is fighting Iranian proxies in Syria. Saudi is fighting Iranian proxies in Yemen. Both of them would love to see Israel not exist any more, but not enough to help Iran. That's the simple explanation. There's way more complexity than that, especially given that Saudi has Mecca and Medina, but is criticized for being a US/western toadie. Saudi is one of the worst human rights violators in the world, and one of the ways they violate human rights is by consistently executing religious leaders critical of the regime. Often after torture. This has gone on for years. Turkiye under Erodogan is more aligned with the Muslim world than the western, but as he's shown over and over again, he's not exactly ready to chop off his dealings with the West. He likes his cake and he likes to eat it, too, as much as possible. Azerbaijan's biggest supporter is Turkiye, but they're not going to invade Iran on Azerbaijan's behalf. Russia tries to be supportive of both Armenia and Azerbaijan, but to put it in Animal Farm terms, their support for Armenia is a little equaler. And it's not like they're in a great position to do anything to support anyone right now. The Middle East is always a cauldron. No doubt about that. But when the Ottoman Empire broke up the West's biggest goal among the powers in the region was to make sure they were as divided as possible with internal conflicts preventing them from uniting again, with no one powerful enough to unify the rest. Whatever else the West has gotten wrong in the Middle East - and it's plenty, without any doubt - that part is working to a T. I just don't see anyone suddenly getting behind Iran after these attacks to do anything to escalate the situation. There's certainly some mixed feelings about the attack. No one in the region wants to embolden the Israelis regarding flying into sovereign air space, even if its Iran. But Iran has put themselves in a position where no one is on their side enough to want to escalate things, either. Sometimes you have to figure out what hill you want to die on, and Iran simply isn't it for anyone else in the region. Honestly, I bet Israel could run these attacks on a regular basis until the United States finally says that's enough, and it wouldn't do much to escalate anything. There would probably be consequences later, but who knows what those will be. The biggest thing are the proxies Iran supports like Hamas fighting Israel, but that's already going so bad in the shitter with Netanyahu in charge and Abbas pretty much completely emasculated - and aged 87 to boot - that like I said before, tensions are already pegged at the max. I don't know how much more Iran, Hamas et al are going to be motivated to do beyond what they're already motivated to do. Certainly nothing that leads to WWIII.

It's not that surprising if you know Rodney Terry. But you've heard me on that broken record enough to be tired of it already. I wish I could stop. I really do. It's not like I dislike the guy as a person. But I most definitely have a massive anti Terry compulsion as the head coach that isn't going anywhere. The best I can do is limit it somewhat.

When you say Iran and Israel may start going at it, what does that mean? Prior to this attack there had already been an escalation of violence among the Israelis and Palestinians. The Iranian proxy groups there might escalate, but it won't be to an extent that will deter or lead to World War III any more than it has previously. There's not going to be direct confrontation with ground troops. Israel just demonstrated in about as blatant a way as possible that they can enter Iranian air space with impunity. Can Iran do the same? We know the answer to that. There's not a lot more that can be done "if the gloves are off." The main thing preventing Israel from being more aggressive with their attacks on Iran through the air is the US holding them back. Not anything Iran can do. I don't see this leading to a wider, more far reaching conflict. It would if the Middle East was more united in their goals. And while Muslims can agree they'd like to see Israel removed from the planet, they'd like to see a Pan Arabic/Pan Islamic identity with a Caliph in charge, the differences in how to go about it, the exact identity of what it should be, or most importantly, who should be the person who leads it, is the source of a massive amount of dissension and conflict that isn't going away. This attack will do very little to galvanize support for Iran beyond maybe some public reprimands for Israel for so blatantly disregarding another sovereign country's air space. To which Israel will shrug their collective shoulders and say, "Stop me." Frankly, as this thread shows, Iran has its own massive issues internally. They're simply not in a great situation to escalate anything with Israel in a way that changes the game materially. I do see things getting way way worse in the West Bank and Gaza. But that's going to happen regardless of the strikes on Iran. I guess it motivates Iran even more to support their proxies more aggressively, but if the motivation is already pegged to the max, how much farther can it go? I guess their internal government entities collectively move the needle to 11? If anything, what this does is give people an excuse to blame Israel's strike on Iran for events that were going to transpire in the West Bank and Gaza regardless. That's my take, anyway.

It's more than their nutsack, although that could be part of it. Beard built this team to pressure the perimeter aggressively. Everyone can switch. There's a lot of athleticism. He designs defenses to force the opponent to operate out of one side of the court, and then trains his players to respond to reversals quickly. If you can't effectively defend the perimeter aggressively - and this team can't any longer with Beard not around - then everything begins to break down. The best defense for undersized big men is pressuring the inbounds pass. Since we're now terrible at defending the ball, we're certainly not defending the inbounds pass well. It's practically a free pass at this point. There's no telling how this team would have responded if Beard had remained the head coach, but Terry as head coach is not as capable of leading this team without an effective big man in the middle, which we lack for the most part. Honestly, this team isn't as good as last year's team as a defensive squad any more, when they should be way better from a player personnel perspective. They just don't have the right coaching any more.

Lots more rumblings about US fighter jets. https://www.politico.com/news/2023/01/28/pentagon-send-f-16s-ukraine-00080045 This article even gives a number - 24 F16s. https://www.yahoo.com/now/ukraine-expects-receive-24-modern-145700504.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAABlja0AAPbMfkP32nX_lRimo3ZXL_EjTGE0cJjXHdgkw8Fu0VNV1UQlxyBH85SuR2rTwZa-TdoilRV1f2nlA-1QsSTyMXdZcrgP161V7ptzgMJF-CWuBdVC05vzLoqmz9wRhIX-Q6h6RmS90mqaNZznopaLmAyThjO_ySHZIc0FN Also, I'm seeing in the comments across social media platforms I frequent, including blogs and so forth, a bunch of folks saying they work in the Defense Department on air force bases, and they've already been seeing Ukrainian pilots training for months. Maybe my retired colonel "friend" knew what he was talking about after all. I want to believe.

My grandfather, Don Wolgamott, ran the big Iranian helicopter base in Isfahan for the Shah from 1972 to 1975. It's interesting to me that the drone manufacturing is located there. A couple of stories from that time. More than anything it was a training base. My grandfather was considered an expert trainer with extensive management experience both in the military and as a civilian, so that's the reason he was tapped for the job through his employment at Bell Helicopter based out of Fort Worth. He told me the trainees would come in and immediately ask, "Can you make us as good as the Israelis?" My grandfather was the blunt sort - charming, but extremely blunt. He'd tell them, "No. But I can help you be the best helicopter pilot you were meant to be." Not to rag on any Muslims on the board, but to my grandfather, a part of the issue was the culture. When he'd try to exhort his students to pay attention to something that was critical to being a good pilot, too often he got the response, "God be willing. If God wants this to happen it will." For him too often their religious belief structure was getting into the way of their self agency. I'm not saying that was true for everyone, but for him it was true a lot of the time, and it hampered their ability to be good pilots. One of the stories he loved to tell is about one particular student. Granddad didn't spend much time on individual pilots, but he had a system where pilots would rotate through instructors, especially if they were struggling. In his experience different students responded differently to different instructors, and vice versa. If they struggled with multiple instructors he'd take them on a check ride to see if in his opinion there was potential there, or in his opinion they had to be washed out (pronounced warshed out, btw). His goal in these situations - and this wasn't just at the Iranian training base, this came from back when he was training US pilots for Vietnam - was to put the pilot in a situation where they realized if he wasn't there to bail them out, they would have died because they responded to the circumstances inappropriately. So he takes this guy who has been struggling - we'll call him Arash. He thinks, maybe it's a matter of confidence. So they go through some basic stuff pre flight, take off, and steady flight. Arash isn't exactly passing with flying colors, but he's surviving. Granddad gives him a bit of a compliment before they do some manuevers. "Son, it looks like you have the makings of a good pilot. You're handling yourself pretty well up here." And the guy responds, "Yes yes. I suppose I am." At which point Granddad figured out that whatever the guy's issues, confidence wasn't really one of them. BTW, the guy did warsh out that day.

Oh, yeah. For sure on Putin's health. Comparing the casualties to WWI and talking about the common Russian as complete innocents were a little tough to swallow, I'll say that much. But the Putin having cancer is very believable. And like I said, I want to believe we're training the Ukrainians on the F-15. People talk about the A-10 all the time. What I'd really love to hear about is possibly sending Longbows. My cousin retired from the Army as an instructor on the Apache. Those are some serious serious death machines. He was frustrated during his tours in Afghanistan because the local commander never wanted to risk losing one. Too expensive. But the few times he was able to unleash they created hell on earth for the enemy. Boy are they apparently tricky to fly, though. It's a pipedream, though. I don't see us ever sending over Apaches to Ukraine. A man can dream.

So do you think we're training the Ukrainians right now? That article is about authorizing the money for it. All I know is that I want to believe.

I bet David Carradine wishes he'd been shot by a dog.

So here's a load of shit I'm passing on, because while completely unverifiable and I don't believe it for a second, it was interesting to me. I went to a funeral at the Houston Veteran's Memorial Cemetery today. A couple I've known for about 30 years died one day apart. I'd never been there before. I have mixed feelings about the place, but I'm glad it's there. They have a respect for the people buried there, and that's what's important, regardless of the amount of bureaucracy involved. The wife, whom I knew the best of the two, was a native German. Her first husband was there. He met her in Berlin working as an Air Force Intelligence officer. His deployment there was during the 6 Days War, so 1967. Later retired as a colonel. I'd met him a few times before, but hadn't really talked much to him. He's a bit of a blowhard, but harmless really. I asked him about his thoughts on Ukraine, because...well...I ask everyone for their thoughts on Ukraine. Normally I get a glassy eyed look, but this guy dived right in. We'll call him Bill, because that's his real name. He says he's a part of a group that talks online about what's "really" happening. Proceeded to tell me Russia has lost more troops than were lost in World War I. I tried to get him to clarify that statement, but he was off to the races and I couldn't get him to backtrack. Not sure it really matters what clarification he made, because there's pretty much no way that's true any way you want to slice it. Especially when you add in Russia was in a really big fucking civil war before WWI was over. He talked about how it's not the Russian people we're fighting against. The Russian people are fine. It's Putin we're fighting against, and he's dying of cancer so it won't matter for much longer. That seems less like a fantasy than the amount of war deaths. I've seen a broad amount of speculation on it. I've even seen people positing that part of the motivation for the invasion in the first place was Putin's passion for righting what he considers a historical wrong before he croaks. But the level of certainty Bill was expressing appeared manic to me. What I can tell you is that as far as I'm concerned a large portion of the Russian population can go get fucked right along with Putin. He tried to educate me about the 300,000 Russian mobilized, which I pretended was new top secret information only he had access to. Here's the interesting part. He insisted that the US was already training Ukrainians on US fighter jets. He claimed they were training on the F-15s. I asked him, not the F-14s or the F-16s, but the F-15s? He insisted. He says they're waiting until they're trained on them before they make an announcement. Proceeded to tell me how it's not that hard once you're a fighter jet to become accustomed to another fighter jet suite. I challenged him hard on a lot of this, because, well, I'm an asshole. Remember, we're at a funeral service for his first wife. He's always had a reputation as a flaky sort, which is why his wife divorced him and married her husband she was buried with today. His kids didn't talk to him during the entire service. I don't believe a word of it, but I'll tell you this much. If the US announces they're sending US fighter jets to Ukraine during the next few months, I'm going to remember this conversation. Mostly, though, I think he was absolutely full of shit. Now that I've wasted you guys' time with this stuff, I feel a lot better. Good talk.

You KNOW it's well organized.

Yes. Those hard right people in Europe.

Yeah, that SBU shit is a known factor for a long time. The military also has issues with Russian sympathizers/loyalists, but it was never as ubiquitous as in the SBU. Both services had their history as part of the Soviets, and then even after independence there was a lot of interoperability and cross communication. But with the SBU and the FSB it was far greater. Every time Yanukovych took power he strengthened the SBU with huge budgets, increased manpower, better equipment, while leaving the AFU to rot for the most part. Given that he was pretty much a Russian stooge, of course there was a huge propensity for the people hired - and certainly promoted - to be sympathetic, if not outright cheerleaders, for Russia. The article talks about 2010, but it's fairer to say that was the case right up to Yanukovych's departure in February 2014. I'd say this and Ukraine's endemic corruption - which they're also trying to fight all while prosecuting a massive war in their own territory - are the two big issues for Ukraine internally that aren't directly related to the military. I don't see any reasonable way to eliminate either one, but if they can just be seen as fighting it and making examples of people, hopefully that will help.

I keep reading on twitter that Spain is going to send 53 older Leopard 2s. The A4 variant, versus the A6 variant Germany and Poland are sending. Here's the best article I could find about it: https://www.madridmetropolitan.com/spain-to-send-leopard-tanks-to-ukraine/ Honestly, it's not as clear cut as I want it to be based on the article, but at least there's some indication for a pretty healthy donation coming Ukrainians' way from Spain if they move forward with this.

I simply don't know that that's true. There aren't a whole lot of test cases to go by. I do know there have been coaches fired for less. I'm glad Texas fired him, but I'm not lauding the administration for being something special for doing so.

Maybe. I just can't think of many situations where a head coach was arrested for felony domestic abuse and yet kept his job. If you can think of any, it would help me with the narrative that Texas has a higher standard. I'd argue Texas simply has the standard all other schools do in this situation, until somebody proves me wrong. I do feel like Texas had a higher standard at one point on any number of fronts. But the reality of competing in big time athletics has chiseled away at nearly all of them. At this stage of the game I'd say Stanford is competitive for the most part while still maintaining a legitimate student athlete environment, but I don't know how many others could say the same. And they aren't able to be competitive at a high level consistently in football and men's basketball. I certainly do not feel like firing Chris Beard is an example of UT's higher standards. And ask bitterwhiteguy about UT's higher standards regarding player behavior. I have never agreed with his stance, but he's certainly been passionate about it.

You have a nice night as well. It's been a bad decade. Plenty of more talented players. Really crappy coaching. I'd like to see a different head coach than Rodney Terry in place at the end of the season, whatever that takes. Hey, enjoy the season. Maybe put me on ignore, either literally or figuratively. The bitchassedness isn't going away. My posting volume on this board has gone down considerably since the arrest. That's the best you're going to get.

On paper I thought they'd be a national championship contending team. Then I saw them on the court. Like I said before, if you're unathletic, you don't have anyone who can take their defender off the dribble, you don't have any kind of reliable 3 point shooting, you're not a good rebounding team, what's left? You slow the game down, win the turnover battle, and be more efficient on the offensive end than the opponent. Which is what Texas did. A la, maximizing their potential. Citing preseason accolades as a basis for them not reaching their potential is silly. It was all based on the transfers coming in and what they'd done at their previous school. Like I said last year, it's as if in the NBA you were able to form an all star team made up of the best players who had never made the playoffs. I'm not saying it couldn't be a really good team, but there's a reason their teams didn't make the playoffs. I can't even believe you're trying to bring up Marcus Fucking Carr as evidence last year's team underachieved. Part of the reason he's thriving this year is because of the work he put into his game under Beard. And this team would be WAAAAAAAAAY better if Hunter was still performing the role he had at the beginning of the season rather than the shell of himself he's become. I also feel like this team is way too dependent on Carr, just like Pittsburgh and especially Minnesota were. It's not a better team because Carr has been unleashed. In my opinion it's a worse team. I absolutely believe Beard was an Xs and Os wizard last year. I said as much on the regular throughout last year while most fans were loudly complaining, so it's not like this is coming from out of the blue. I also feel like he was doing more of the same this year prior to getting arrested and then fired. He's not a perfect coach, but he was a great fit for Texas and it's going to be tough to find a near equivalent.

I get it. It's problematic for me. But there's still a sense of innocent until proven guilty. If the court system drops the charge, the fiancee continues to spout the narrative it was all a huge mistake on her part, he didn't do anything wrong, she never should have called the police. He comes out with faux apologies for any decisions he made which put everyone in a bad position, without actually apologizing for anything specific he did. He's really gifted at coming across as a "straight shooter" while pushing out bullshit. The key thing is if he's ever involved in anything like this again. He will always be viewed under a different microscope now. But people love a comeback story. Including Texas. Sarkisian was fired for literally being drunk at a football practice. Regularly. That's not the same as domestic abuse, but the difference is there's no one disputing that's exactly what happened. If the only two people who were at Beard's house eventually insist nothing ever happened like what was alleged in the charges, and that Beard was wrongfully arrested, there's way more wiggle room. People are going to believe what they want to believe, and a lot of times what they want to believe is what's in their best interests. My biggest point is that there's a different standard for the school where events transpired, than there is for the school that subsequently hires him. That's just the way it is. Texas would have fired Sarkisian under the same circumstances, just like USC did. USC basketball would have fired Beard. But USC basketball is just as likely to hire Beard if he's completely exonerated as Texas was willing to hire Sarkisian. It's just how things work.

I don't think of it as a false narrative. Terry has been around the program for a long time. He was an assistant under Barnes during our great run from 2002-2008, finally leaving after the 2011 season for the Fresno State gig. I had this opinion of him as an assistant, and nothing he did at either Fresno State nor UTEP changed my mind. Not to mention what I'm seeing on the floor since he took over. You are more than welcome to keep an open mind. I, on the other hand, already have a good feel for what we have in Terry, regardless of the eventual results of this season. If he wins enough, particularly a deep enough run in the tournament, you have to keep him. Certainly a Final Four run would cement things, but as has been alluded, even an Elite Eight or Sweet Sixteen run would be impressive for the program in its current state. But regardless of the reasons, I'm not going to be happy with Terry as our head coach moving forward. That's my prerogative. Everyone else, including you, are welcome to have a more open mind about it and push back against "false narratives" as you're putting it. I also am not in favor at all of keeping a guy just because of a recruiting class. Either he's the right guy or not. I'd rather get someone else in who could be the right guy, than to keep someone who most certainly isn't. Someone else posted a few days ago you keep him on a one or two year contract. That's not how it works. If we keep Terry he's going to get at least 4 years. 3 years even if things go completely sideways. I'd prefer to roll the dice now, rather than wait 4 years to roll it then. I want a hall of fame level coach here. I know they don't exactly grow on trees, but it's all we're really lacking (although actually Barnes has a good chance of making it in based on career win totals alone). We've taken the steps in my lifetime to get there. We just need that last missing piece. Terry is not that last missing piece.