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DESCRIBE YOUR SUPERB OWL EXPERIENCE

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I was at the gym due to a combination of travel and family constraints. Surprisingly it was not on any TVs—MSNBC was a higher priority I guess? I streamed a bit on my phone.

Watched the end at home with my spouse, who was surprisingly invested for pop music reasons.

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I was pulling for KC myself for reasons I can’t quite explain; I was a big Steve Young fan as a kid in the midwest.

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Wife and I got massages.

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Pretty good, and very competitive game. I don't have a problem with good defense. Tougher breaks for 49ers with injuries. Was pulling as always for the 49ers, and felt at the time that failing to put more points on the board from 2 1/2 quarters of out-playing the Chiefs would come back to bite then, and it did.

Mahomes is just plain good. Have to respect that.

Had a great pizza for dinner in the second half.

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I'm an agnostic pro football fan. Grew up a Dolphins fan in the Bay Area at the height of Montana/Walsh worship, so hated the Niners with a fervor. I gave up on the Fins around Ricky Williams/Jay Feely. And now I'm just indifferent to the Niners. They've got a few players I really like and respect. But I was in a house full of belligerent (and misguided) Raiders fans, who settled on the Chiefs as the better of two evils. Only two fans rooting for the Niners--one of who was a young teen. Losses like that are really crushing the younger you are. He was crushed and drunk folks we're making him feel it harder. I doubt he'll be back next year if the Niners make it again.

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I was the only person at my watch party pulling for the Chiefs. I remained quiet and respectful during the entire game with no gloating when they scored in OT.

Lobster Mac n cheese

3 kinda of wings with homemade bleu cheese and ranch

Queso

Buffalo chicken dip

Crudite with onion dip

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I hate that this game now allows everyone to continue the stupid negative memes and narratives about Shanahan and Purdy. Goddamn it.

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Everything I saw on Twitter after the game was shitting on Shanahan for his game management. Did not see anything negative about Purdy

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I don't think you can criticize Brock Purdy very much. Play calling was another thing at times, but not always (the TD pass to McCaffrey was brilliant, even if there was a man down field [that wasn't called, but there were problem calls/spots/no calls both ways]}.

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Yeah, and even for Shanahan . . . he made mistakes but I didn't think his management was THAT bad. He got some bad breaks and was up against Mahomes. It happens!

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I had a problem with how they came out of halftime. I was hoping they would run the ball some, which is their strength and KC’s weakness. Instead, he threw the ball on 8 of the first 9 plays. The result:

Three consecutive 3 & outs, -2 total yards, and an enormous missed opportunity to extend, which was needed considering #15. Then the enormous punt that the idiot rookie gets too close to and the rest is history. Ballgame.

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Agreed, I also would have ran CMC on the 3rd and 4 at the 2 minute warning. Kills clock and if you don’t get the 1st you might consider going for it on 4th down there.

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Exactly.

D was gassed. You CAN’T give the ball back to Mahomes. You have to keep him off the field. They gave it back to him not once but twice.

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Yes, I noted below that this and the bad defensive scheme at the end were the mistakes I'd point to. And worth noting that Shanahan did see the problem and involve McCaffrey much more in the 4th quarter and beyond.

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Lots of things went wrong, but once McDuffie came untouched on the 3rd and 4 coming out of the 2-minute warning, the Chiefs were winning. Just a matter of time.

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Counterpoint: Shanahan has done it before. He doesn't learn from past experience, and he repeated that behavior which cost his teams TWO Super Bowl wins.

Predictable nonsense is predictable.

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I'm not going to argue that he doesn't have clear flaws. My position is that the good well outweighs the bad with him, and the flaws only become magnified because he's gotten so close to winning it all. You don't just write off a successful coach like that because of the lingering issues.

Andy Reid was in a similar spot for a long time, before he broke through.

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Andy Reid was in Philadelphia for years and couldn't get over the hump. He had to leave Philly to become the 3 time Super Bowl winning coach with Kansas City.

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No 3 came up for his mom's bday and also the superb owl. Bought ribeye steaks and hot links to grill.

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Nachos, burgers, beers at a Chiefs bar. People were perfectly nice to me, if I don't count the guy next to me who kept farting

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I assume you didn't refer to him as Stinky.

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managed not to break my television the 73rd time Taylor Swift flashed onto the screen. I wish her happiness in life but please please please go away. Also, Travis Kelce? Meathead douchebag extraordinaire? Life choices, dear. smh

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You can’t give Mahomes multiple chances to win the game.

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No 3 and his GF had a prop bet. How long she was shown during the game. I think the O/U was around 52.5 seconds. He took the over and she took the under. So we were counting seconds during the game. I don't know if it was over, especially since he didn't score a TD, but he said he was going to let her take the win.

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Smart kid.

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They didn't show her much at all until the third quarter when Kelce and the Chiefs offense starting clicking. I was fine with it.

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Yeah, it wasn’t as obnoxious as I thought it would be

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She chugged a beer when they showed her on camera. I hate the Chiefs, love Taylor Swift, but all this nonsense is a big nothing burger. Who TF cares.

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Lots of Swifties do. And the NFL & networks & the advertisers, who pay the bills.

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No I meant I don’t care that she’s a figure up in the box, or on the telecasts, etc. Good for her. I understand the economics of the situation, Andy…she’s literally a one-person economy.

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There was a group of woo-girls sitting next to me who drank every time she was on screen. They got pretty drunk.

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Sad to say, but I only watched intermittently for that reason. Also not a fan of either team or the game hype in general.

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Made some good nachos tho. Its become a SB tradition as everyone in the family likes it. So that’s a win.

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Sadly as expected. The usual Shanahan choke job in the 4th.

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By my reckoning, the choke job was in the 3rd quarter. Three straight 3-and-outs. In that group, one designed rush and a Brock Purdy scramble. Lots of incomplete passes.

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That 3rd and 4 call though…that is possibly the worst play call I have ever seen

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He really should have ran CMC on that 3rd and 4. If he doesn’t get the first but gets you close, you can then go for it on 4th to basically win the game.

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It's here and backing off the receivers for the last Chiefs drives in the 4th Q and OT that were the real mistakes IMO, not so much the timeouts near halftime or the choice on the coin flip. I did not understand why Wilks had gone away from the tight coverage that was working (because the KC WRs are not very good) and allowed Mahomes to just operate freely with short passes underneath in crunch time. Inexplicable.

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Prevent defense prevents victory. Wilks was practicing conventional wisdom in using a prevent defense with a lead late in the game. Clearly,his fears dominated his playcalling in crunch time when playing to your defense's strengths were called for.

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I do not understand playing "prevent" when the other team only needs a field goal and they have Mahomes and Butker (who can make kicks from 60 yards away) on their side. You play prevent if you're up by multiple scores and just want the clock to run out, not if you actively need a stop.

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Losing Greenlaw was focking devastating.

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Yeah, that’s why I think you saw Wilks change up his coverage.

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Once Dre Greenlaw went down, Oren Burks filled in for him. Here’s how he did in coverage:

• 9 targets

• 9 catches allowed

• 1 touchdown

• 134.7 passer rating when targeted

• 32.1 PFF coverage grade

The underneath just completely opened up for Mahomes with Dre out.

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USHER

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Usher's "Yeah" is over 20 years old

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The are doing a movie remake of the musical Wicked. The original with Kristin Chenoweth and Indian Menzel also premiered over 20 years ago. See Superb Owl commercials.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1dvX9Vs0ns

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Missed his show while getting the BBQ ready. How was it?

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Not at all close to my genre, so it didn't do much for me, but production wise, it was great, as you would expect in Las Vegas, where they have people who know how to do shows. Setup, flow, sound, change overs, lights were all impressive and pretty seamless.

You either like the type of program Usher does or you don't have any connection on that level.

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It’s not my preferred musical genre but I thought he was great - put on a real spectacle

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Some people that he's washed up. My wife thought that it started off slow because he sang a lesser known song. I thought he was great, had a ton of great guests, brought 110%, sang live rather than lip-synched, and clearly put in the work (and sweat a lot because of it).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7hYbrdC_-s8

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Everyone at my watch party, myself included thought Usher was great. I do agree that it did start a bit slow.

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He held onto Alicia Keys as long and as tight as Donovan Smith held onto Nick Bosa on every damn play. Every. Damn. Play.

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Was your wife one of the woo-girls?

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Brother - you know that I'm more than enough woo-girl for my relationship. She is appropriately sober, responsible, and civil.

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pqtm. true.

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SUPER BOWL COMMERCIALS

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Overall, fairly good. Not much that was great. Disney did one that had to have cost them at least $20 to produce. General grade C+. I don't think nearly the creative investment is being made as used to be.

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The "He gets us" Jesus ads were funded by a lobby group created by the founder of Hobby Lobby, which also donated $50m to an anti-LGBTQ hate group in 2016 that seeks to criminalize homosexuality in the US and abroad.

https://www.splcenter.org/news/2020/04/10/why-alliance-defending-freedom-hate-group

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I had never seen any of these ads before.

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They have been around for a while now.

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I guess I don't watch much live TV and I download all my tv shows so all the commercials are edited out. So I guess that's the benefit of doing that.

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My son and I were having a competition to see who could identify the “jesus” ads faster

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Feb 12Liked by SGBear

My fave was the Dunkin with Bennifer Brady and Good Will

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That was a really good one.

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OUR CRUMBLING DEMOCRACY

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TFG brags about how good of a negotiator he would be vis-a-vis NATO. So good, he'd start WW3.

https://twitter.com/BidenHQ/status/1756414506723320127

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The special election to replace George Santos is tomorrow. The GOP has a seven seat House majority (219 vs 219 DEM vs. 4 vacancies). Polls are a technical deadheat (Suozi-D +4 over Pilip-R, +/- 4 error).

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Huge snowstorm forecast and early voters are Dem by a huge margin (like 12 pts) so the GOP bias against early voting may come to bite them in the ass.

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Good. Serves 'em right.

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Netherlands' Former Prime Minister and his wife go Dutch on their final date

https://sports.yahoo.com/former-dutch-prime-minister-wife-162028656.html

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PRO

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Chiefs come from behind in TO to defeat the 49ers 25-22. One could have pointed to any one of the little gaffes that ended up costing the Niners a ring.

https://sports.yahoo.com/super-bowl-2024-chiefs-beat-49ers-in-ot-thriller-on-walk-off-td-pass-by-patrick-mahomes-035151467.html

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Spongebob takes the piss out of Leo DiCap

https://twitter.com/DiscussingFilm/status/1756876557325390104

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Shanny decides to not run in the 3rd quarter. He has no fucking idea how to play to win rather than not to lose.

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I’m not sure it was a case of playing not to lose so much as it was a case of being too impatient and not playing to your strengths

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I will only add to this to say that I have no fear of my prediction in this space being contradicted, ever. Kyle Shanahan will not win a super Bowl with the 49ers. Period. End of statement.

He effectively repeated behavior that lost two previous Super Bowls: as OC with the Falcons in Super Bowl LI (blew 25 point lead against New England to lose in OT), and as HC with San Francisco in Super Bowl LIV (blew 10 point lead in the 4th quarter against Kansas City to lose 31-20).

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This. A thousand times, this.

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This is easy for me to say not being a fan of either team, but it was a toss up game. I don’t think the Niners should beat themselves up too much when the result just as easily could have been the opposite. Because the win-loss result is all or nothing the media portrays everything the winner does as great and everything the loser did as tragic, but really the result here was pretty random. I would avoid doing anything rash if I were the Niners

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And people are still complaining it was all scripted. Niners had all the chances.

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KC had a bunch of boners, too, it’s not like they played mistake free. That INT by Mahomes was all on him

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That's exactly my point. The game was favorable for the Niners. They should have won but they let it slip away.

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Right! Meant to Agree with you

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Oh ok. Sorry.

Yeah at the end of the day Mahomes is too experienced and Chiefs offense started converting after that INT to begin the second half.

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I need to just embrace this Dark Timeline

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Drive killing holding by rookie Braden Willis in OT

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Shanahan decides to receive the ball despite winning the OT coin toss

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since both teams are now guaranteed a possession, regardless if a TD is scored, it is the right decision. Cause if you're tied after the first set of possessions, it is sudden death after that and having the ball is an advantage

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I still think it was a mistake. The option value of going second and knowing whether you had to go for it on 4th down is exceptionally valuable - an option that the Chiefs used - going for it on 4th and 1 on their own 34 - something you'd never do if you went first.

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I agree with this. I still think going 2nd is more of an advantage because you know how many points you need to score to extend or win the game so you have all 4 downs to score.

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TIL… in the playoffs it’s sudden death if it’s tied after the first set of possessions (I also wondered why Niners opted to receive). Good knowledge - Thank you!

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Excellent point.

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I was weirdly OK with this

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Yeah, I think people are making too big a deal out of this.

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Moody's low XP is blocked

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...aaaand there's your difference making play.

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One of the biggest difference makers for sure.

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Dre Greenlaw tearing his achilles going onto the field. He's probably out next season.

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The ball going off rookie's Darrel Luter's foot on a punt return

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PAIN

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I would be more upset but I am a Cal Bears fan

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Has prepared the average Cal fan for a disappointing life in general rather well. At least its not anything new when it happens.

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Niner fans have merely adopted the dark; Cal fans were born in it, moulded by it.

- Cal Bears Bane

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We are a mordant bunch, aren't we?

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🤣

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CAL

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Cal women's basketball team gets road sweep over UW and WSU to keep their slim post season hopes alive. The Bears are now 15-10 overall, 7th in the conference at 5-8. They have five regular season games left, three of which are winnable (the Arizona schools at home and U of O in Eugene) and two very difficult ones (Furd and OSU both away). Need to win three and probably at least on Pac 12 tourney game to go dancing. Assured of WNIT if they don't make it.

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Feb 12Liked by SGBear

Just about done yesterday and a guy went running by me just cruising. After he was past me I saw he was wearing a Cal hat backwards. I had on a Cal hat too since it was raining lightly. About a half mile later he had stopped and was looking at his phone. I gave him a Go Bears and got an enthusiastic Go Bears in return. Turns out he ran track at Cal and was meeting up another former Cal runner who later ran for Georgetown. It’s good when someone has the correct response, especially an enthusiastic one.

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Feb 12Liked by SGBear

Go Bears!!!

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[WTEN] Cal beats Washington 4-1, but it doesn't count as a conference win

https://calbears.com/news/2024/2/11/womens-tennis-no-15-cal-beats-no-21-washington-4-1.aspx

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[MTEN] Cal beat a pretty bad Pepperdine squad 4-0

https://calbears.com/news/2024/2/11/mens-tennis-cal-blanks-pepperdine-4-0.aspx

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Feb 12·edited Feb 12Author

[WGYM] Cal comes from behind to beat #17 Arizona as the Bears depth comes to shine in the floor routine. Arizona's worst floor performer cost her team the victory by giving up over a point.

https://calbears.com/documents/2024/2/11/California_vs_Arizona_-_KZhSqqj2fo___2_11_2024___02_48_21_pm_PST.pdf

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Testy series between #21 Louisiana and Cal softball in the Louisiana Classics series. First game featured LA fans booing Cal for kneeling for the national anthem. The second game featured assistant coach and Cal catcher getting ejected in a bench-clearer. But Cal gets delicious revenge by winning on a suicide squeeze in the top of the 8th. This an the shit talking that FSU fans have already started is a great preview to the culture-clash Cal will have going into the ACC. I think there will be no problem hating our new rivals.

https://twitter.com/Schultzycast/status/1756763174135545950

https://twitter.com/Cesarqu34298528/status/1756820200106954957

https://calbears.com/news/2024/2/11/softball-bears-take-down-no-21-louisiana.aspx

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ELSEWHERE IN COLLEGE

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UCLA names their RB coach DeShaun Foster as their new head coach. I don't know him but looks like he played at UCLA.

Would it be similar to having Gould becoming out HC when Tedford was let go?

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Feels like perhaps an over correction for stability ("We gotta get a UCLA guy") after the Kelly disaster, but at least he's relatively young and more likely to work his tail off recruiting and getting the base re-engaged. If I'm a UCLA fan I'm disappointed knowing that they could have landed a bigger fish if Kelly left at any other time. As a very non-UCLA fan, it definitely doesn't have me shaking in my boots.

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Similar to an overreaction from Oregon alums who wanted to hire Wilcox .

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Yup.

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Feb 12·edited Feb 12Author

Seems like a desperation move. The coaching carousel has already came to a stop, so there aren't many great obvious replacements. He has no head coaching experience at any level and only seen two different regimes under his six years as a running back position coach under Kliff Kingsbury (1 season) and Chip Kelly (7 seasons). I frequently say that HC is a very different job that position coaching and he unlikely to have the skills to do it well. I suspect he'll need to lean on consultants and position coaches.

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But to be fair, given the circumstances, he probably one of the better hires they can make now.

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Hmm...interesting. He'd better hire damn good DC and OCs. How many of them are there left? I suppose he could poach an up and comer from a small school, though I would imagine most of them have been taken.

We have a perfectly good, used Sirmon available.

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UW OC Ryan Grubb reneges on Alabama offer and becomes Seattle Seahawk's OC

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/39494674/seahawks-hiring-ryan-grubb-offensive-coordinator

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Grubb retained a lot of goodwill in Seattle by releasing a thoughtful statement when leaving UW… unlike DeBoer.

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Bama is a tire fire. DeBoer lasts 3 seasons, max.

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