As always, a collection of random thoughts I collected this week (oh, you collected things to a collection? HOW NOVEL!) but didn’t warrant their own post.
Enjoy!
I wrote a little bit about the NFL Draft, and assuredly will do so again. But one thing I wrote was that the 49ers really needed an offensive lineman and it jarred me that they didn’t draft one at the end of the third round when they first got on the board. But then, I read this in the Athletic by Randy Mueller, a former NFL GM, about the Dolphins draft. It’s long but it’s worth it, I think:
One of the other things that jumped out at me was the post-draft negative narrative brought against the Miami Dolphins for their first selection, corner Cam Smith from South Carolina, over an offensive tackle to protect their prized QB Tua Tagovailoa.
With no first-round pick, the Dolphins’ initial selection came in the second round at pick 51. Some fans and media had determined the need was greater for an offensive tackle, and much like in fantasy football, you just fill your greatest need, right? Sorry, that’s not the way it works in building an NFL team.
…
Reaching to fill a need is going to get you fired in the NFL more times than not. It’s one thing to do that when the players being considered are valued the same. You stack your board with this in mind. Obviously you take the player at your greatest area of need if the players in focus are equal in all other areas. But it’s problematic to pass over better players in order to fill a need with a player of lesser talent. I’ve been around that philosophy, and what you end up with is a team of backups and a very tidy-looking depth chart — one of positional balance but lacking in quality.
Well stated. Also, if you don’t subscribe to The Athletic and like sports at ALL, you should. It’s really good stuff of the highest quality, and we should all be supporting that. You can even try it for free for 30 days, using this link I have as a subscriber. (Note: My sources are telling me each link can only be used once, so if you try that and it fails, just message me!)
I bemoaned this season of Ted Lasso in an earlier post, and then noticed that two episodes - “Sunflowers” and “Boxes” for those watching - were a return to form. Sadly, this last week was another miss for me. So many stories, just such a mess overall. The Keeley story bores the pants off of me and I’m getting concerned that there’s only four left - presumably in the entire series - and nothing is remotely resolved. That either means they’re NOT ending the series this season, which feels like a bad, money-driven decision, or the last few episodes are gonna be WAY too neat and tidy. We will see.
On the other hand, we know Succession is in fact ending this season and it also only has four episodes left - but its positioned itself in a way that I utterly trust it knows where its going and there’s always been a plan (or at least one from some time ago.) I feel like every episode this season has had at least one masterclass in acting (sometimes more) and it’s managed to expand the story while staying true to itself. Without spoilers, the quote from Logan Roy to his children that “I love you, but you’re not serious people” — that might be the theme of the season and the series.
I live in the Bay Area, and like the rest of California, we’ve been in a massive and dangerous drought for years. That’s finally over with the winter we had which seemed to be non-stop rain. It was very much needed (and also exposed that despite this massive drought the local water management has not nearly done what it should to create reservoirs and other storage). But it rained this week. Indeed, in the East Bay it HAILED at one point. Guys, it’s May. I feel just slightly like I’m in an episode of Nathan For You and I don’t know it yet. Can we just have a springtime? A summer? OK thanks.
And finally, here’s a joke written by ChatGPT:
Prompt: write a joke about golf and stupid guys
Why did the golfer bring a ladder to the golf course?
Because he heard it was a "hole in one" tournament and he wanted to make sure he could reach the top of the leaderboard... unlike some other "tee-rific" guys we know!
Yikes. Here’s the second joke it tried:
Why did the golfer bring two pairs of pants to the golf course?
Because he got a hole-in-one and didn't want to look stupid walking around with only one pant leg!
Also yikes! I think comedy writers are safe … for now.
If ChatGPT's second joke was simply:
Why did the golfer bring two pairs of pants to the golf course?
Because he got a hole-in-one
We would have slow clapped.
Less is always more.