Gheorghemas: Day Nine

On the Ninth Day of Gheorghemas, Big Gheorghe gave to me: 

Nine college coaching vacancies* 
Eight Films Explaining

Seven Books for Reading

Six random time-wasting recommendations

Five (Green and) Golden Things

Four songs by “the Chairman of the Board” on his birthday

Three Beauties

Two Types of Stories

A Bald Guy with two Pupp-ies

*There’s more than that, but we’re focusing on mid-season firings. Work with me here. 

The college football coaching carousel spun earlier and faster this season, thanks in no small part to the confluence of an expanded playoff format, increasing eight-figure payouts from television revenue, and administrators and fanbases with the patience and judgment of meth addicts. A handful of big names suddenly found themselves looking for their next gig before Halloween, while their former employers got a head start on searches and buyout clause structures for successors. 

The biggest names to get turfed early were James Franklin at Penn State and Brian Kelly at LSU, who were owed a combined $104 million in buyout settlements. Mike Gundy lasted only three games into his 21st season at Oklahoma State, where he was the school’s winningest coach. DeShaun Foster at UCLA and Brent Pry at Virginia Tech also were canned just three games into the season. Twenty-five percent of the Southeastern Conference had mid-season coach openings, with Billy Napier at Florida, Hugh Freeze at Auburn and Sam Pittman at Arkansas joining Kelly in the unemployment line. Alabama Birmingham demonstrated that lower tier D1 programs can be just as trigger happy, firing Trent Dilfer after a 9-21 record over just two-plus seasons. 

Now, that’s not to say that any of the pink slips were without merit. Several coaches underperformed relative to their surroundings. A couple reached their sell-by dates. Some were poor fits that weren’t evident until they were on the job. All tried to navigate a shifting landscape at schools whose aims rest somewhere between aspirational and delusional. 

It brings to mind a line from former Florida athletic director Jeremy Foley – he cribbed it from Secretary of State and President Whisperer Henry Kissinger – about the proper time to fire a coach: What must be done eventually should be done immediately. 

The culprits, in many ways, were money and opportunity. The money that schools receive from massive TV and media rights deals, along with out-in-the-open salaries and expenditures for players and roster makeup, and the exposure and accompanying riches from a playoff format that’s 12 teams on its way to 16, have accelerated the demand for immediate results. Even schools that don’t have access to Power 4 Conference resources get swept up in the wave. Factor in what might be called The Cignetti Effect and here we are. 

It’s simplistic to say that Curt Cignetti ruined coaching hires for everybody else, but it’s not entirely inaccurate. He immediately transformed Indiana from one of the dispirited programs in the history of college football to national relevance and back-to-back playoff appearances. Every other administration and fanbase with an itch says, “Why can’t we have that?” and now grades on an even more demanding curve. 

The current cycle also further deepens the fiction of major college football as amateur undertaking, where plenty still argue that players should not be compensated beyond scholarships and meager stipends. Hundreds of millions of dollars are part of the equation, however, for facilities, salaries, players and sometimes for coaches given the heave-ho. When the Darjalians from the nearby Canis Major galaxy take over our decaying planet, they’ll look at American sports and emit a series of grunts and squeals that roughly translate to: “Christ on a bike, your species can be astonishingly shallow and petty. You devoted more time and resources to *that* shit than taking care of fellow humans? It’s a miracle you ever climbed out of caves and trees.” 

This year’s coaching churn swept up both well known and more obscure figures. Franklin is viewed by many of his peers, according to acquaintances in the coaching profession, a bit like a cryptocurrency hawker. He’s an able recruiter who would have trouble constructing a ham-and-cheese sandwich while standing behind a deli counter. He was successful by many metrics, going 104-45 with major bowl appearances and helped lift the Nittany Lions program from the hangover of the Jerry Sandusky scandal, as well as a near miraculous stint at Vanderbilt where he made the Commodores competitive. Coming off a semifinal appearance in last year’s playoff, they began the season 3-0 and ranked No. 2, with national championship aspirations. But a double-overtime loss to No. 6 Oregon dropped Franklin’s record to 4-21 vs. top-10 teams, and successive losses to UCLA and its own interim head coach and Northwestern prompted the Big Hats to pull the plug. Penn State brass decided that a $48-million buyout and a search for the Next Guy was preferable to the status quo (Franklin and the school negotiated a buyout settlement of $9 million, just before he was hired at Virginia Tech). 

Kelly was shown the door after a 49-25 dump trucking at home to Texas A&M dropped the Tigers’ record to 5-3 and concluded a four-year mismatch of coach and program. When he bolted Notre Dame, he was lured by a program that he believed had a better path toward a national championship, while LSU was attracted by a guy who succeeded at another blue blood program. But Kelly was a poor fit from the start, witness the Massachusetts native and career Midwesterner affecting a Southern accent in one of his first public appearances that matched Kevin Costner’s English accent in “Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves” on the cringe-o-meter. After losing three of four, culminating with the A&M beatdown, his overall record of 34-14, 19-10 in the SEC, wasn’t good enough for a program that believes, justifiably, that it should compete for nattys. 

Napier never gained traction at another program with championship pedigree in one of the most fertile recruiting areas in the country. Likewise Pry, who was unable to approach the success of Hokies’ icon Frank Beamer’s heyday. Auburn overlooked Freeze’s sketchy past as it attempted to keep up with Alabama and the SEC’s expanded upper tier. He and Pittman and Foster were in over their heads. UCLA’s athletic director even admitted that Foster, a former Bruins star, was in an untenable position with the school’s entry into the Big Ten Conference, yet wasn’t even given two full seasons. It's all confirmation that choosing a coach is at best inexact. Sometimes you get a Kiffin, sometimes you get a Charlie Weis, and once in a blue moon you get a Cignetti. As schools chase success, expect the present rate of turnover to continue, if not accelerate. After all, you can’t get to the next mistake without moving on from the current one.

For the Gheorghies, and Those That Aspire to Be

I can see a better time. When all our dreams come true.

Gheorghemas Media Interlude

We interrupt the holiday jollity to remind you that it was always a matter of when, not if. When CBS News’s parent company, Paramount Global, installed right-wing masseuse Bari Weiss as head of the news division this fall, staff anxiety spiked about how heavy-handed she would be and if she would permit the network’s veteran reporters and producers to do their jobs. 

Weiss inserted herself into the lineup recently when she hosted Erika Kirk, the widow of slain conservative mouthpiece and flamethrower Charlie Kirk, for a mostly forgettable CBS town hall short on both journalism and substance. Separately, longtime “60 Minutes” reporter Scott Pelley said that the show had experienced “no corporate interference” thus far. Sunday evening, however, Weiss pulled a scheduled “60 Minutes” segment about the Trump administration’s practice of shipping immigrants to a notorious El Salvador prison known for torturing and abusing prisoners. 

Weiss said that the story needed additional reporting, which is standard newsroom practice, while correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi said the decision to pull the piece wasn’t “editorial” but “political.” In a note to colleagues obtained by multiple outlets, Alfonsi said that the story was screened five times and vetted by network attorneys and the company’s Standards and Practices department. Weiss said that she wanted Trump administration voices as part of the story. Alfonsi had sought to interview officials from the White House, State Department and Dept. of Homeland Security but none chose to discuss the subject. 

“If the administration’s refusal to participate becomes a valid reason to spike a story, we have effectively handed them a ‘kill switch’ for any reporting they find inconvenient,” Alfonsi wrote. Weiss said that the New York Times had already reported on the prison’s conditions and abuses, as if somehow that disqualified a venerated television news magazine from, ya know, doing its own reporting and talking to prisoners and victims on camera. Also, the most cruel and mendacious administration in our lifetime has pretty much forfeited any imprimatur of supposed balance or fairness, particularly if officials decline to talk. 

Apropos of nothing really

I speak from experience when I say that reporters can be thin-skinned and defensive about their stories, often believing them complete and above reproach. I can’t tell you the number of times editors improved my stuff by requiring extra voices or more reporting. That said, the 41-year-old Weiss is the furthest thing from a respected, veteran editor and steward. Her experience is mostly as a whiny, sloppy opinion writer who left the NY Times in a snit because she didn’t feel that she was sufficiently valued and then as a figurehead of a supposedly “independent” news startup bankrolled by mostly conservative money. 

You’d think that someone who publicly blasted the Times on her way out the door would be only too happy to plant a flag with visible, visceral images that the Gray Lady cannot match. Again, her justification rings hollow and is a tell on where she stands. Just beneath the surface of this newsroom taffy pull is billion-dollar mergers and acquisitions and the Orange Oaf’s ego. 

Paramount Global’s boss, David Ellison, is the son of gazillionaire Oracle co-founder and Trump supporter Larry Ellison. David Ellison and by extension, Weiss, have implemented layoffs and restructuring at CBS, including the insertion of a former Trump appointee and loyalist as the network’s ombudsman. Ellison the younger also seeks to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery, which owns CNN, though the prize is Warner Bros. movie and TV vaults. 

Get a load of these cartoon villains

The Warner Bros. board has urged shareholders to accept a $72-billion, cash-and-stock offer from streaming giant Netflix. But Ellison and his newly minted Paramount Skydance conglomerate are angling for a hostile takeover, sweetened by a promise from dad Larry to be personally responsible for $40.4 billion of equity financing that supposedly pushes their bid to $77.9 billion total. 

The Wall Street Journal also reported that David Ellison conveyed to Trump that if he and his compliant FCC do not approve the Netflix bid and instead sign off on the PSKY deal, he would overhaul CNN. Such a move would appeal to the president, since he still consumes cable news and has long viewed the network as unfairly critical. 

Per usual, everything with TFG is a transactional, zero-sum equation predicated on power – the diametric opposite of good governance. He enriches himself and gets his way because he sits in the Oval Office and has staffed his Cabinet and regulatory agencies and the courts with loyalists and suck-ups. He traffics in grievance and outrage at a time when media corporatization neuters, if not entirely removes, accountability. Compromised national news organizations such as CBS and, if it comes to pass, CNN further erodes any hope of an informed electorate and with it, a functioning democracy.

[Coda: In what could only be described as an entirely predictable outcome, Weiss's inexperience and incompetence came back to bite her and CBS, and she failed to consider the network's significant non-U.S. broadcast arrangements when she spiked the 60 Minutes story. Almost as if on cue, the full piece began airing via Canadian streaming outlets, and despite CBS' efforts to stop it, the full story is now widely available, including here. Weiss has "succeeded" in ensuring millions of people who wouldn't have otherwise been exposed to it will now see it. Well played.]

The Twelve Days of Gheorghemas: Day Eight

On the eighth day of Gheorghemas, Big Gheorghe gave to me

Eight Films Explaining
Seven Books for Reading

Six random time-wasting recommendations

Five (Green and) Golden Things

Four songs by “the Chairman of the Board” on his birthday

Three Beauties

Two Types of Stories

A Bald Guy with two Pupp-ies

You may have seen the announcement earlier this week from the White House that the President intends to stage the Patriot Games this summer to commemorate the nation's 250th birthday. The competition will bring together tributes, er, athletes from each state and territory in a competition in Washington, D.C. this summer. Seems the big guy likes "The Hunger Games", and/or thinks it's a documentary.

We know he's a starfucker, desperate for approval from famous folks, so it stands to reason movies are an inspiration for his plans and policies. That, and racism, sexism, bigotry of all sorts, and just base ignorant cruelty. But this is a post about movies. Specifically, seven other movies that serve as a roadmap for Trumpian instincts.

Clearly, "The Purge" is the blueprint for ICE's run-amok terrorization of immigrant communities. DHS agents' relentless pursuit of the other surely seems to be the product of enforcement policy based on vengeance first, compassion and order second.

In another corner of the administration's dungeon we find the Secretary of Health and Human Services, who obviously enjoyed the oddball humor of "Outbreak", and seeks a reprise on a broader scale. 

You might think that the existence of "Wag the Dog" as a cautionary tale would give the administration some pause before starting a dubious conflict to distract from unsavory and unflattering disclosures. You'd be wrong, mostly because the decision-makers in charge are too stupid to understand the irony.

"American Beauty" offers us a slightly grosser frame, but you just know that Trump watched it when it came out in 1999 and tried to figure out how to meet Mena Suvari. Likely placed a call to his pal Jeffrey.

The rate we're pissing away America's fortune, and the increasingly bizarre ways we're doing it is a clear nod to "Brewster's Millions", only a lot less endearing.

Speaking of documentaries, a film about a narcissistic boss who favors gaudy celebrations and self-aggrandizement is on point for the current situation. And so "The Devil Wears Prada" seems appropriate, though it may be recast as "The Devil Reads Pravda".

There are a ton of characters in our current drama, none as repellent as the Gollumesque Stephen Miller. "Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Rings" is appropriate to the moment, except that Trump/Sauron wants his precious Nobel Peace Prize.

Gheorghemas: Day Seven

On the seventh day of Gheorghemas, Big George gave to me . . .

Seven books for reading

Six random time-wasting recommendations

Five (Green and) Golden Things

Four songs by “the Chairman of the Board” on his birthday

Three Beauties

Two Types of Stories

A Bald Guy with two Pupp-ies

Another year, another bunch of book recommendations. 

I'll try to explain what you're getting into . . .

1) This is the book everyone should read, but most people won't because it's a depressing topic and certainly not something you want to think about-- and aren't some powerful people smarter than us dealing with this situation? 

Well . . . not really . . . that's the point.

One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar El Akkad

Akkad's indictment of the liberal media and the governmental response to the Israel/Palestine conflict is surprisingly readable, despite the violence, suppression, terrorism, displacement, starvation, military incursions, explosions, and horror. . . . his point, that the logical, moral position is not halfway between the right and the left-- as they are both ignoring reality-- and the center is as morally repugnant in its policy and more milquetoast and unfocused, especially when atrocities are being committed and a people are being displaced and destroyed. I don't see a happy ending to this story, now or in the future, but Akkad wants, at the very least, people to stop looking away from the horror, especially the horror in Gaza, perpetrated by what he views as the ugly business of imperialism, supported by the U.S. military-industrial complex, political machinery, and media.

2) The book that seems like fun literary sci-fi and has titillating robot/human sex scenes but then turns out to be about autonomy, slavery, women's rights, and consciousness.

Annie Bot by Sierra Greer

3) The well-researched non-fiction tour-de-force that is WAY too much fun to read because it's so batshit crazy, despite the horrific indictment of our special forces, our military in general, and the grim portrayal of the morally corrupt entanglements that are the costs of perpetual war and a perpetual war military-industrial complex.

The Fort Bragg Cartel: Drug Trafficking and Murder in the Special Forces by Seth Harp

4) The best fucking undercover cop mystery book by our best living mystery writer.

The Likeness by Tana French

5) The book to read if you live in Virginia and wonder if you could ever be sucked into a life of crime . . .

King of Ashes by S.A. Cosby

6) If you're looking for some heralded Sicilian literary fiction (with some history thrown in)

The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa

7) Fun and fantastic horror set in Florida in the 1970s with lots of teenage pregnancy . . .

Witchcraft for Wayward Girls by Grady Hendrix

Happy Gheorghemas and Happy Reading. 

I could use some book recs in the comments, not sure what I want to read over Winter Break . . .

Gheorghemas: Day Six

On the sixth day of Gheorghemas, Big Gheorghe gave to me

Six random time wasting recommendations

Five (Green and) Golden Things

Four songs by “the Chairman of the Board” on his birthday

Three Beauties

Two Types of Stories

A Bald Guy with two Pupp-ies

I have social media accounts but I stay off most of it. I rarely post, more of a longer time lurker. But there is some good stuff out there if you are so inclined. After Arstechnica, Substack seems to be my go to for random goodness. So here are some potential worthy substackers, in my eyes, to waste some time on and other random sites. I’m a cheap bastard so I only do the free subscriptions. 

I really cannot remember how I stumbled on the first two sites but I have yet to unsubscribe from their weekly emails/posts.

1 - The Art of Noticing - Rob Walker

I like this site just to remind myself to take the time to look around. There is randomness everywhere, in my eyes, that is someone’s normal. Case in point dumpsters and opening your ears. And just saw two blue jays hanging out in my backyard in winter. No idea what that means if anything.

2 - Letters of Note - Austin Kleon

He typically reprints lost letters of famous people, art collages, mix tapes but the weekly digest “10 Things worth sharing this week” usually includes recommendations for books and music I would not normally listen to. Great for expanding the mind. And every once in a while he completes the yin/yang with a little yang with “20 Books I did not read this year”.

3 - Starship Causal

Not a fan of the name of this substack but if you are a Wilco or Jeff Tweedy fan this one is for you. His posts are sporadic but hearing acoustic covers and outtakes make my day, whenever they show up.

Most of the covers are either subscriber requests like Devo’s Freedom of Choice or song covers of the recently departed like War Pigs after Ozzy’s passing. (Might be pay-walled, sorry)

4 - Numero Group

Archival record label out of Chicago, London and Los Angeles with genres spanning 'eccentric soul', 'holiday vibes', 'for the punks', 'gospel', 'necessary new age & ambient', 'country & folk', 'for the dads, 'rock 45s', 'mid-century modern', and 'party starters'. Basically electric mishmash of music. Something for everyone.

They curate three types of releases: essential compilations, grail releases and deep dives. The album that clued me in to them was a deep dive. Husker Du, 1985: The MIracle Year. A thought lost live recording from the vault. The fury of a live band in their full glory that I never got to hear live.

More importantly, if you need to jack-up/fuck with your spotify algorithm check out their playlists. There is someone for everyone. You can also sign up for their email blast that includes links to recent playlists if you are too lazy to visit the website.

And for you yacht loving dudes: Seafaring Strangers: Numero Group Guide to Yacht Rock

5 - ArsTechnica

You do not have to be a hardcore nerd to enjoy this site. It’s got a little bit of everything and the writing is usually good, unlike this post. The stories simplify some of the more sciency topics but really the comments section has actual normal discourse with different view points. There are jackass posters but those voices get drown out pretty quick. 

You can get articles on the science of swearing, stock SUV testing in the desert, important space moments, and ads in all the streaming services. The last one makes me want to install a Pi-Hole on the home network.

6 - I was going to throw in a podcast or two but two of the three podcasts I typically listen to got cancelled this year. RIP WTF and Indiecast. Let’s hope Professor G. Truck stays strong and continues on.

So number six of my random recommendations is user generated, get to in the comments section and recommend some podcasts I should check out.

Merry Gheorghemas!

Gheorghemas Minor Chords: Random Idiots unleash a sad new single

Feeling pretty good, are you? 

Yeah?

Amid all of this Gheorghemas good cheer -- and we did enjoy Day 5 and its upswing of Tribe-related positivity -- we have a new song to share from the minds that brought you:

• "Dr. Seuss" in 1991
• "Hey Evan" in 2004
• "Dear Ozzy (Thanks for Nothing)" in 2009
• "Where's Johnny?" in 2022

...and many more. 

I highlight those songs beyond the rest of the mess because (a) they're brilliant, but moreso (b) because they are tributes to friends of ours who have tragically fallen by the wayside.

Okay, technically, the third one simply references Ozzy Osbourne in the title, who died this year, and the protagonist in the song is at the end of their life. But it's a fun song and hasn't been dredged up in a while. 

And yes, I know, Dr. Seuss was not technically our "friend," but he shared a birthday with Dave, and Dave celebrates with the good doctor every year, and Theodor Geisel's passing sparked one of the true mountaintops of the Random Idiots range when we musically memorialized him... sort of. 

Anyway, Dave and I, as Random Idiots in name and behavior, have had a habit of writing and recording songs about our actual friends who have died. And goddammit, we really had a bad run of losing friends early on in life. First Evan on a motorcycle in the summer of 2001, then Lud and Scoop two months later in 9/11. Flynn went in '06, and Johnny in 2021. There were others along the way. 

And our tribute tunes, in a way, help keep their spirits alive.

But it does beg the question.

A legitimate question, we feel.

Enjoy, and be safe out there.