Hungover from the season? The Payoff Pitch can help!

Note: This column was published in the Nov. 30 edition of the Daily Evergreen.

The WSU football team is not going to a bowl game.

If I said this after our win against UCLA, WSU fans would question my sanity. But after three straight losses, the Cougars finished with a 6-6 record and are now completely out of the bowl game picture.

Now I’m not here to point fingers. I’m here to help you. Help you get over another season without a winning record. Help you get over another season not ending with a bowl game. Help you get over one of the biggest collapses in Cougars football history.

So now that the season is over, you may be trying to find ways to get over such a devastating turn of events that our beloved Cougars football suffered.

Well, The Payoff Pitch is here to help you cope with the expected hangover resulting from the muddled 2006 season. Think of it as a guide from one disgruntled Cougars fan to another.

“The WSU Sports Fan’s Guide to… Getting Over Another Mediocre Season.”

Option #1: Cry

Pretty self-explanatory here.

Option #2: Play NCAA Football 2007

If crying doesn’t work, do what any college student would do to escape their problems: play video games. Replay the entire 2006 season for the Cougars in NCAA Football 2007. Adjust the settings and play at whatever difficulty you wish, but I would highly recommend turning injuries off and playing at the “Junior Varsity” level. The most beneficial feature about playing the season over in a video game is that you control the team the way you wanted it to be all season long! You can throw to Jason Hill 50% of the time and start Gary Rogers (until you get mad and put Alex Brink back in). You can call fair catches with Michael Bumpus and eliminate the screen pass out of the playbook. You can even bench Loren Langley in week one! Everything you wanted to happen this season is possible. So, go out there, play the season over and win that Fiesta Bowl. We have high expectations for you.

Option #3: Create a Facebook group

Ranking high on the “Awesomeness Scale” and possibly the most mature way to vent your anger is to create a Facebook group. With a Facebook group, you can argue any point you want and make up every excuse for the season. You can even offer unreasonable and absurd suggestions for the team. Whatever your cyber desires entail, please remember to use correct grammar. Groups such as “IF YOUR A HUSKIE THEN YOU CAN’T PLAY FOOTBALL GOOD” are just embarrassing and if you can’t figure out what’s wrong with that title, then please just skip Option #3.

Option #4: Root on Pac-10 teams in bowl games

Show your Pac-10 spirit by rooting on our conference representatives in their bowl games. If the Pac-10 teams find success in their games, then it will give the Cougars something to brag about. It also opens up the opportunity for WSU fans to use this line: “We don’t need a bowl game, we beat the Sun Bowl champions in the regular season.” That’s at least one thing that WSU fans can say that UW fans can’t.

Option #5: Watch the basketball team

When you get sick of the trash talk directed at the WSU football team, you can counter with: “Well our men’s basketball team is undefeated!” Wait, what? The men’s basketball team is undefeated? The Cougars are off to their best start since the 1993-94 season with a 6-0 record so far. Enjoy it while it lasts. The team begins a rigorous Pac-10 schedule at UCLA on Dec. 28.

Option #6: Vote for Butch

He’s in the quarterfinals at capitalonebowl.com. Hey, we might actually win something this season!

If all these fail, then, for lack of an original phrase, I guess there's always next season.

The Rotten Apple Cup

What a freaky game. After watching the Huskies charge the high school field we call Martin Stadium, all I I could was stand there and mutter those words to myself.

There was a blocked punt that bounced perfectly into the endzone, a kick returned for a touchdown, two bread and butter plays going for long touchdowns and Cody Ellis' catch, that seemed to hit off six different body parts and looked straight out of Madden 2007.

(Speaking of Madden, has EA Sports ever thought of a way to fight this curse by putting a player on the cover that nobody cares about? Madden has no NFL competition in video gaming, so sales won't drop if you put Chris Weinke on the cover. Seriously, I'd still buy it and when the curse hits him, the only people that would care would be the Madden-curse obsessed media and Weinke himself. No gamers will care. Or maybe sub the Weinke picture with a picture of Giants quarterback Jesse Palmer on "The Bachelor" to reach out to the female audience. Ok, i'm getting too far into this, back to the column.)

The scariest part of this game was the fact that the Huskies wanted this win more. No way did they want to lose three straight Apple Cups to the Cougars. No way did they want the Cougars to shimmy into a bowl game. No way were the Huskies going leave Martin Stadium without stomping in celebration after the game; an act that they had to suffer through when the Cougars beat them last season in Seattle.

Why was this so scary? The Cougars needed to win this game and had all the motivation in the world to do so. Not only was it senior night at the Apple Cup, the Cougars could have solidified a bowl game appearance with a win. So why were they out-played and out-performed by the Huskies?

The Huskies wanted it more. They wanted to prove that the Stanford game was a fluke. They wanted to prove that they could play through turmoil. They wanted to prove that they could win without Isaiah Stanback. And they wanted to prove that their program is made of winners once again.

No Pac-10 team can overlook their conference foes. This season has been a crazy one for the Pac-10 and was kind of like your office's fantasy football league. No matter who you played, you still had a shot to win. Think of some of the upsets in the Pac this season. WSU over Oregon? Oregon State over USC? Arizona over WSU, Cal and Oregon? Stanford over UW? And finally the Apple Cup. Who saw any of these coming?

Think of the Cougars' season being like the plot of Million Dollar Baby. The Cougars (played by Hilary Swank) are a team on the rise, proving people wrong left and right. Until suddenly, they start to fall and have their final match, in which they both get beaten by stools. (Are high-fives still cool? If so, I really need one right now.)

Whether or not the Cougars get to a bowl game this season, their is no excuse for their late season collapse, other than they over-looked their opponents.

After the UCLA game, it was obvious that this team deserved to be in a bowl game, a relatively prestigious one at that.

But judging by their last three games, I wouldn't say that this team deserves one anymore.

Entering the season, the coaching staff pushed one thing to this team. Finish. Finish what they started.

They started this season well, but did not finish it that way.

Think of this season as a wake-up call for the Cougars. They know that they can compete with any team in the nation. They know that they need to approach every game with the same mindset.

Most importantly, they know that they need to finish everything that they have started.

Alex Brink deserves this win

Note to reader: This column was published in the Nov. 18 edition of the Daily Evergreen's sports weekend.

It has been a rocky season for WSU redshirt junior quarterback Alex Brink. He has played in an offense that has suffered injuries at virtually every position, while fending off sophomore backup Gary Rogers and fans calling for a quarterback switch.

While playing through these factors, Brink seems unfazed and as focused as ever. The result? Brink has enjoyed great success and, most importantly, he has become a winner along the way.

This weekend’s much anticipated Apple Cup is at a level it has never been at before. Not only will the Cougars be fighting to get into a bowl game they have strove for all season long, but a victory would mark the first time in school history that WSU has won the rivalry game in three consecutive seasons.

And who led the Cougars to triumphs over the Huskies these past two seasons? Brink did.

With a victory on Saturday, Brink will have accomplished a feat no other WSU quarterback has. And that is no minor feat.

Former Cougars quarterback Drew Bledsoe defeated UW once, and Ryan Leaf did so twice. Two other WSU legends, Jack Thompson and Jason Gesser, never led their team to an Apple Cup victory.

However, Brink has the opportunity to win his third Apple Cup, which would amount to the total number of victories of Bledsoe, Leaf, Thompson and Gesser combined in the Apple Cup.

Nonetheless, chants for Rogers are still heard after every simple mistake Brink makes. Unbelievable.

This is Brink’s team. Rogers’ time will come, but Brink’s time is now and has been all season.

Brink isn’t there yet, but with one year of eligibility left, he has a chance to join the upper echelon of WSU quarterbacks.

After the Arizona State game last weekend, Brink needs 101 completions, 2,064 yards and 23 touchdown passes to surpass Jason Gesser’s school records in those three categories. He could also become the only quarterback in school history to lead the Cougars to four Apple Cup victories.

So what’s not to like about Brink?

Many believe Rogers’ arm strength and size gives him an advantage over Brink. This may be true, but Brink has those special, intangible skills coaches love to have in their quarterbacks.

He makes smart decisions, creates plays and is a natural leader. Oh, and his 57.1-percent career completion percentage isn’t too bad, either.

As the Huskies struggle with their current quarterback situation for the Apple Cup, the Cougars' decision at quarterback has been obvious all season long.

Brink is the right guy for the Cougars’ offense right now. No one else could have led this team the way Brink has. No one else could have led this offense the way Brink does.

And if all goes well on Saturday, no one else will have won in the Apple Cup as much as Brink has.

There would be no better ending to Brink's season than beating the Huskies. What Brink has been through, and how he has handled himself and the team this season, is admirable. He deserves this victory.

5 reasons why $51.1 million isn't too much

Tonight, Red Sox Nation
was graced with the news that the Red Sox won the bidding to negotiate with Japanese ace Daisuke Matsuzaka. What was the winning bid? $51.1 million. Aside from the many press releases and articles carrying the news, the only readings about the victorous Red Sox put a negative light on the team. Yahoo! Sports writer Jeff Passan believes that beginning with Matsuzaka, baseball is entering a mad new world. ESPN shows that the Red Sox could have built an entire pitching staff for $51.1 million. But who cares? As the national media (excluding the Boston media of course) scratches their heads, I've been high-fiving myself since 8:00 eastern time. But why? Here are five reasons why the Red Sox have made a smart investment.

5. Matsuzaka can't become a Yankee

Boston winning the rights to Matsuzaka is like already breaking into the win column for the 2007 season. The Yankees were heavily pursuing Matsuzaka to add to their Far East collection, which already contains stars Hideki Matsui and Chien-Ming Wang. Many baseball experts believed that Matsuzaka was, in fact, heading to the Yankees. However, with the Red Sox getting the ace, it will have similar effects to the Yankees signing former Sox outfielder Johnny Damon last offseason.

4. Matsuzaka is a clutch pitcher

Baseball analysts believe that Matsuzaka would not be able to perform under the big lights of a Fenway Park or a Yankee Stadium. Wrong. Does anybody remember the World Baseball Classic? Matsuzaka made the best baseball players in the world look silly and helped Japan win the WBC championship. Oh, and he was the MVP of the tournament. Personally, I don't see any signs as to why Matsuzaka won't be able to pitch under pressure in the big leagues.

3. Matsuzaka will connect the Far East market to Boston

The talented and growing Far East market is turning into a very looked-upon resource for Major League talent. After the Mariners signed Ichiro, they have also rounded up former Rookie of the Year Kazuhiro Sasaki as well as catcher Kenji Johjima. Now the Red Sox can look to the Far East to get key free agents and these players will pinpoint Boston as a possible location.

2. Matsuzaka will make the Red Sox money

Not only will Red Sox Nation want to see this guy pitch, the entire nation of Japan will as well. Think of all the money a Matsuzaka-Matsui matchup will make for the Red Sox in Japan? Also, keep in mind how much the Red Sox will market their new ace? The Mariners did it with Ichiro and have ended up building their franchise around him. There are many possibilities in marketing Matsuzaka and over his tenure in Boston, just being in a Red Sox uniform will easily cover the $51.1 million to negotiate.

1. Matsuzaka gives the Red Sox one of the best and young pitching staffs in the MLB

Matsuzaka is 26. Josh Beckett is 26. Jonathan Papelbon is 26. Jon Lester is 22. This staff is very young and very talented. This staff will be very strong next season with Curt Schilling and Tim Wakefield. However, when these two leave, their positions will be filled by Lester and a first round pick in last years draft, Daniel Bard, who's fastball has supposedly been clocked at 100 miles per hour recently.


Regardless of what the national media is saying, paying $51.1 million just to talk to Daisuke Matsuzaka was a smart move by Theo Epstein and the Red Sox organization. I beg you to differ.