ODDS AND ENDS | There is a three part interview with AD Kirby Hocutt on Double-T 104.3 that was pretty darned good. He said a lot of interesting things, including that there was a 91% renewal rate for season tickets for football, very conversational and I enjoyed it.
I had no idea that the Isle of Man motorcycle race even existed before yesterday (via Kottke). The Isle of Man is actually an island, or isle if you prefer, and is a self-governing Crown Dependency in the UK and these are highlights of the race. I should warn you that the motorcycles are going 200 mph and there are wrecks, but nothing gruesome. Just riders literally flying off the road.
CONFERENCE REALIGNMENT | Bring On the Cats has a fantastic three-part series on realignment: Part 1: Why is this happening, Part 2: What matters in realignment and Part 3: Reflect on past predictions. I'd also like to point your direction to Blatant Homerism discussing UT not wanting to add any more teams because they don't want to play in a conference championship game:
For all the posturing that takes place during these realignment shenanigans, I don't see any reason to doubt Dodds and Mack Brown when they say they truly do want to remain at 10 teams. They view a 10-team league as the easiest route to possible shot at the national championship.
It's a microcosm of Texas football. The Longhorns enjoy significant competitive advantages over 99 percent of the institutions around the country. Yet, like kids who complain about doing chores around the house for longer than it takes to actually do them, Dodds and the Texas brass appear to waste inordinate time and energy trying to make sure they get every conceivable edge and consideration possible. (Consider the ham-handed defense of efforts to televise high school games on the Longhorn Network, for example.) In this case, rather than simply just, yanno, playing a conference championship game and trying to win it, UT would prefer to eliminate the possibility of losing it. Yes, it's a Chauncey position to take, but it strikes me as par for the course.
FYI, I think I have heard head coach Tommy Tuberville has said that he is in favor of a conference championship game.
WOMEN'S BASKETBALL | How about that, Texas Tech signee Minta Spears was named as a Parade All-American and then last night she led her Blue Team with 21 points in the TABC all-star game.
BASEBALL | SB Nation Astros blog Crawfish Boxes has a draft profile on CF Barrett Barnes.
FOOTBALL | NewsOK's Berry Tramel ranks the Big 12 schedules and has Texas Tech dead last. Texas Tech's non-conference should be dead last, so I can't complain, but it has traditionally been less than stellar since Dykes retired.
RRS.com's Mike Graham does a Q&A with WR Dominique Wheeler that is free for your perusal.
Via SB Nation, when the drug scandal hit at TCU and they last a couple of players, I wasn't that concerned, but now the player count is at seven. That's a lot of significant players to lose, some starters, some heavy contributors.
This is all pretty much football pron (misspelling intentional): CBS Sports Bruce Feldman does a Q&A with SmartFootball . . . Shakin The Southland with lots of good stuff on the Pistol Formation . . .