(from Packers.com) The Green Bay Packers play their final preseason contest of 2007 in Tennessee against the Titans, an annual preseason foe since 2002. The Packers aim to finish the preseason 3-1, which would be their best mark since '02. That year, the Packers used the momentum of a 3-1 preseason to catapult them to a 12-4 regular season mark and NFC North crown.
I did not realize that the 3-1 preseason was the catapult to 12-4? I always thought the "catapult" was Brett Favre aided by Ahman Green. Tim, any way to add "Favre" to the spellchecker?
Monday, August 27, 2007
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
This just in, Randy is slower than a dinosaur (by the transitive property)
LONDON, England (Reuters) -- The smallest dinosaur could reach speeds of nearly 40 miles per hour and even the lumbering Tyrannosaurus rex would have been able to outrun most modern-day sportsmen, according to research published on Wednesday.
Even T-rex, who wasn't incredibly fast, could chase down footballer David Beckham.
Scientists using computer models calculated the top speeds for five meat-eating dinosaurs in a study they say can also illustrate how animals cope with climate change and extinction.
The velociraptor, whose speed and ferocity was highlighted in the film "Jurassic Park", reached 24 miles per hour while the T-rex could muster speeds of up to 18 miles per hour, the study published in the Royal Society's Biological Sciences showed.
"Our research, which used the minimum leg-muscle mass T-rex required for movement, suggests that while not incredibly fast, this carnivore was certainly capable of running and would have little difficulty in chasing down footballer David Beckham, for instance," said Phil Manning, a paleontologist at the University of Manchester, who worked on the study.
The smallest dinosaur -- the Compsognathus -- could run nearly 40 miles per hour, about 5 miles per hour faster than the computer's estimate for the fastest living animal on two legs, the ostrich.
A top human sprinter can reach a speed of about 25 miles per hour.
The researchers used a computer model to calculate the running speeds of the five dinosaurs that varied in size from the 6.6 pound Compsognathus to a six-ton Tyrannosaurus.
They fed information about the skeletal and muscular structure of the dinosaurs into the computer and ran a simulation tens of millions of times to see how fast the animals moved, said William Sellers, a zoologist at the University of Manchester, who led the study.
They checked their method by inputting data of a human with the muscle and bone structure of a professional sportsman and found the computer accurately spat out a top running speed just behind T-rex's pace.
"People have estimated speeds before but they have always been indirect estimates and hard to verify," Sellers said. "What we found is they were all perfectly capable of running."
Looking at how these ancient animals lived and died out is also important in trying to predict how modern day species may cope with future climate change, Sellers added.
This study helps to build a biological picture that scientists can use to better understand how dinosaurs adapted to changes in the weather just before they went extinct some 65 million years ago, he said.
"Knowing how these animals coped over the past millions of years will give us clues to what is going to happen over the next thousand years," he said. "That is why there has been more recent interest in biology of these animals."
Even T-rex, who wasn't incredibly fast, could chase down footballer David Beckham.
Scientists using computer models calculated the top speeds for five meat-eating dinosaurs in a study they say can also illustrate how animals cope with climate change and extinction.
The velociraptor, whose speed and ferocity was highlighted in the film "Jurassic Park", reached 24 miles per hour while the T-rex could muster speeds of up to 18 miles per hour, the study published in the Royal Society's Biological Sciences showed.
"Our research, which used the minimum leg-muscle mass T-rex required for movement, suggests that while not incredibly fast, this carnivore was certainly capable of running and would have little difficulty in chasing down footballer David Beckham, for instance," said Phil Manning, a paleontologist at the University of Manchester, who worked on the study.
The smallest dinosaur -- the Compsognathus -- could run nearly 40 miles per hour, about 5 miles per hour faster than the computer's estimate for the fastest living animal on two legs, the ostrich.
A top human sprinter can reach a speed of about 25 miles per hour.
The researchers used a computer model to calculate the running speeds of the five dinosaurs that varied in size from the 6.6 pound Compsognathus to a six-ton Tyrannosaurus.
They fed information about the skeletal and muscular structure of the dinosaurs into the computer and ran a simulation tens of millions of times to see how fast the animals moved, said William Sellers, a zoologist at the University of Manchester, who led the study.
They checked their method by inputting data of a human with the muscle and bone structure of a professional sportsman and found the computer accurately spat out a top running speed just behind T-rex's pace.
"People have estimated speeds before but they have always been indirect estimates and hard to verify," Sellers said. "What we found is they were all perfectly capable of running."
Looking at how these ancient animals lived and died out is also important in trying to predict how modern day species may cope with future climate change, Sellers added.
This study helps to build a biological picture that scientists can use to better understand how dinosaurs adapted to changes in the weather just before they went extinct some 65 million years ago, he said.
"Knowing how these animals coped over the past millions of years will give us clues to what is going to happen over the next thousand years," he said. "That is why there has been more recent interest in biology of these animals."
Friday, August 17, 2007
Bob Ferguson Good Riddance
The change to #87 didn't work out to well.
Seemed like your injuries always came when the WR core was thin.
Broken Foot (Koren Robinson suspension 06)
Bum Knee (shortly after Javon Walker knee 05)
Just about broken neck (right before playoffs 04)
Injured Hamstring (unproven rookie 01)
Bad Back (rookie preseason, off to wrong foot after controversial Sherman pick)
Monday, August 13, 2007
July/August All-Stars
One month since last all-stars
1B FIELDER/Howard, Pujols
2B Utley/Uggla, Phillips
3B Cabrera/BRAUN, Chipper
SS Reyes/Rollins, Ramirez
OF Holliday, Lee, Bonds/Griffey, Rowand, Duncan
C Martin/McCann
P Peavy/Young, Penny, Webb, Hudson, Zambrano, Gorzelanny
RP Saito, Valverde, Hoffman, Wagner, CCordero
Again all 16 teams represented, next edition will be with ~15-20 games and only contending teams will be elgible. (32->25 spots)
1B FIELDER/Howard, Pujols
2B Utley/Uggla, Phillips
3B Cabrera/BRAUN, Chipper
SS Reyes/Rollins, Ramirez
OF Holliday, Lee, Bonds/Griffey, Rowand, Duncan
C Martin/McCann
P Peavy/Young, Penny, Webb, Hudson, Zambrano, Gorzelanny
RP Saito, Valverde, Hoffman, Wagner, CCordero
Again all 16 teams represented, next edition will be with ~15-20 games and only contending teams will be elgible. (32->25 spots)
Saturday, August 4, 2007
Where is the Season Opener Countdown Ticker?
Brett Favre wants to know where the ticker is to the kickoff of his record setting 238th consecutive start?
Does ESPN the Magazine have a jinx?
I just went to the espn.com website and saw that Prince Fielder will grace the cover the August 13th issue. I definitely think Prince is a talent that the Milwaukee Brewers are lucky to have and hopefully can keep for a good portion of his career. I hope there isn't any sort of negative jinx associated with being on the cover of ESPN the Magazine. I was thinking about Prince though and any sort of jinx and honestly he has not really been playing great to begin with since the all-star break. I mean he has only hit two (2) home runs since the all-star break and had 12 RBIs through 22 games. The team's record is not as strong as it had been and the Brewers are now in a daily game of chicken between themselves and the dreaded Chicago Cubs to see who will be atop the division at the end of the day. Maybe his mug being on the cover of "the Mag" will propel him into an anti-jinx status where he begins playing out of his mind for the remainder of the year. Any thoughts?