Footbawful! Only one end zone will be used at Wrigley Field for tomorrow night's Northwestern/Illinois football game. Here are the rules that will be followed to accomodate such a ridiculous effort. Big Ten Commissioner James E. Delany explained: “Both Illinois and Northwestern did significant due diligence over the past 18 months, but after seeing the actual layout of the field, all parties felt that it was appropriate to adjust the rules to further enhance the safety of our student-athletes." Well, apparently their due diligence wasn't significant enough! What did they do? Forego actually measuring stuff out and drawing up a blueprint or a CAD model? I mean, I'm sure it was cheaper to just have some guy walk onto the field and go "yeah, this looks like it'll fit," but there's got to be a better due diligence strategy than that.
Some of the best Twitter reactions to this news:
espn_page2: This seems... less than ideal.
bruce_arthur: First rule of Northwestern-Illinois game: Nobody throw any interceptions! Second rule: Nobody fumble! Third rule: No blocked kicks! #christ
bomani_jones: so i understand: it actually took someone PUTTING THE GOALPOST ON THE BRICK WALL to see what a bad idea this was?
bomani_jones: i also imagine that field, someone making a horrified face, and an engineer saying, "wait, you don't like it?"
espn_page2: Maybe Northwestern-Illinois can be like old-school video games, where when a player intercepts a pass, the whole field spins around.
HardyVision: Big deal, Ron Zook's played plenty of games where there only was scoring in 1 endzone...
Of course, this isn't the only epic fail seen this week in Chicago. Behold:
Worst of the Night in Pictures:
Nationally Televised Friday Games:
Thunder at Celtics, ESPN, 7pm: Per Lisa Salters: "Kevin Durant tells me he is 50-50 for tonite. Turned his left ankle WED v. Houston. MRI yesterday negative." And suddenly this game threatened to become 800% less interesting.
Bulls at Mavericks, ESPN, 9:30pm: The Circus Trip continues! You know you want to watch.
All The Other Friday Games:
Bucks at 76ers, 7pm: This game on the other hand... you know you don't want to watch.
Grizzlies at
Rockets at Craptors, 7pm: Speaking of injuries, it sounds like Yao Ming will be out at least another two weeks. So that means it'll be three weeks until he begins his next stint on the injured list.
Bobcraps at Heat, 7:30pm: From what I gather, the Heat will need the guys at The Basketball Jones to make a smack video about Chris Bosh every gameday to motivate him. Good luck with that.
Cavaliers at Hornets, 8pm: Food for thought: the Cavaliers bench has been leading the league in bench scoring at 44 ppg. Maybe all the stuff about LeBron never having a good supporting cast was just a tiny bit overblown?
Lakers at Timberwolves, 8pm: And thus ends the miraculous two-game stretch of Darko not playing like Darko.
Spurs at Jazz, 9pm: Anyone else excited to see Tony Parker the next few games? I'm going to keep an eye out for pictures of him trying to seduce women in the stands, particularly in the wives and girlfriends section.
Nyets at Kings, 10pm: The Nyets' defense has been surprisingly good. Unfortunately, their offense is offensively horrible. They must be overjoyed to get a chance to play against the Purple Paupers to help turn things around!
Bricks at Warriors, 10:30pm: _efense! (clap clap) _efense! (clap clap) Also, this video cracks me the hell up.
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Nationally Televised Saturday Games:
Mavericks at Hawks, NBA TV, 8pm: Interesting stats... Dallas is not a terribly high scoring offense (23rd in the league at 97.3PPG), but they are 6th in the league in assists (22.7 APG). By the numbers, that is efficient, quality ball movement. However, I haven't actually sat down and watched a Mavs game yet this year. Can anyone confirm?
All The Other Saturday Games:
Magic at Pacers, 7pm: Well, at least we have an entertaining coach to make this game interesting. (Thank you, Stan Van Gundy) Speaking of entertaining coaches, why was I unaware of this coach until after he retired? This guy is awesome:
Suns at Bobcraps, 7pm: Oh please please please tell me Nash will be healthy for this game. I don't think I could stand another embarrassing loss right now.
Heat at Grizzlies, 8pm: Do people in Tennessee really even care about the Grizzlies? (I suppose I could drive the 4 hours to Memphis to find out, but why???) College sports are huge in this general area, however, so I assume this would be of bigger news to Tennessee basketball fans: Bruce Pearl has been suspended for the first 8 SEC games of Tennessee's season. All because he had some kid over for a barbeque. (Gross oversimplifcation, but just go with it) All I can say is that better damn well have been one awesome barbeque. If they smoked some ribs and a whole pork shoulder or something, it's totally worth it.
Thunder at Bucks, 8:30pm: Good time for the Bucks to catch the Thunder. They'll be on the second night of a back-to-back (both road games) after a game against the Celtics, not to mention Durant isn't 100%. If they have anything resembling offense, now would be a good time to prove it.
Cavaliers at Spurs, 8:30pm: Cleveland is pretty awful at rebounding at the moment (28th in the NBA). Have fun, Tim Duncan, DeJuan Blair, and Antonio McDyess!
Nyets at Nuggets, 9pm: Anyone else just not that interested in seeing Melo go through the motions like a prostitute on her fourth john of the day?
Jazz at Frail Blazers, 10pm: Just FYI Jazz fans, Baron Davis has got this shit under control. Great scott!
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Nationally Televised Sunday Games:
Hornets at Kings, NBA TV, 6pm: According to Bill Simmons, "...I never realized how much Cousins would struggle to stay on the court. Through nine games: 196 minutes, 40 fouls. That's 9.8 fouls per 48 minutes, which (if it held) would be the highest number for anyone averaging 16-plus minutes since Danny Fortson's legendary 12.0 in 2005." Greg Oden might be hurt, but his foul-the-bejesus-out-of-everyone spirit lives on.
All The Other Sunday Games:
Celtics at Craptors, 1pm: Rondo's going to be handing out more dimes than the people passing by the Salvation Army bucket going into the grocery store.
Warriors at Lakers, 9:30pm: While I am pleasantly surprised to see the Warriors are actually halfway good this year, I have to admit... it's really a bummer to go through the game pictures each day and not have guaranteed comedy from pictures of Don Nelson coaching.
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