The Bocker.com

Between you and me, what they don’t tell you about blogging is that you have to actually write things from time to time. Who’d have thought, you know? I’m just very thankful that Anthony has filled in the gaps while I’ve been over here wasting time. I’ll get you a cookie or something Anthony, for your troubles. It will be in the mail. Anyway, I’m sitting here thinking about what current event I would rip on this evening when I realized it was a perfect time for my beloved Wallace’s Thoughts. So let’s take a trip through a few items that have been bothering me in recent days.

In case you haven’t heard, last week Toshiba announced that they would no longer produce HD-DVD players thusly ending the “battle” with Sony and their next-generation technology, Blu-Ray. I stood by my prediction that Blu-Ray would win out in the end because of the simple fact that it’s name is much more fun to say than HD-DVD. I mean honestly, which sounds better? Say them out loud and you can tell me. What this means to you the consumer is that you no longer have to worry about which format to buy because Blu-Ray is the only show in town if you want to watch your movies in High Definition. After seeing the new Blu-Ray discs for myself I have to say watching movies at home is now officially better than going to the theater. If you are lucky enough to own a big screen TV, or know a friend perhaps, you’ll understand what I’m talking about. The Blu-Ray transfer makes the picture on your screen crisp and vibrant and it’s much better than the still fuzzy looking films you’ll see at your local cineplex. Blu-Ray discs are still a bit pricier than DVDs but their price will eventually go down and it’s worth the investment if you can afford it. For a movie guy like me it’s one of the best innovations of the year.

I just read today that Ralph Nader has decided to join the presidential race. You may know him as the man that single handedly lost the election for Al Gore in 2000 by taking around 3% of the Democratic vote, though Nader still denies his influence. Personally I think his late entry into the race is a lot of grand standing. I’m all for third party candidates and an open election with many different choices, but if Nader was really serious about changing politics and this country he would have entered the race months ago. By entering now he can get maximum media coverage and can get his name back in the news for a few weeks. I don’t really believe he wants to fix this country as much as he wants people to know he exists. Ron Paul was essentially a third party candidate and he ran from Day 1 promoting his ideals even though they went against the mainstream. That’s how a legitimate candidate runs a campaign. They don’t wait around until the field is pared down so that they can stick their head out and wave their arms to gain our interest. I really wish Ralph Nader would stop pretending and just go back to doing whatever it is he does.

The NFL combine was over the weekend and I was going to write a whole piece about it. But nobody wants to hear me rip into the combine for being a waste of time and the absurdity of rating a guy based on a 40 time and his bench press reps. Even Peter King of si.com admits that most teams use game film more than combine numbers. I only want to highlight the absurdity of grading guys based on 40 times. They measure these guys to the nearest 100th of a second, which can change on any given day depending on a whole lot of factors. Not to mention they don’t time guys in pads, they let them wear running shorts and track shoes, even though during games they will be wearing pads and cleats and the playing surface differs from stadium to stadium. Lets take those factors out it for a minute and I’ll ask you one simple question. Is there really a difference between a 4.27 seconds and 4.35 seconds? The answer is no. When you can run sub 4.5 seconds in the 40 yard dash you’re fast. Period. The whole thing is a bunch of nonsense and it’s amazing to me that over 400 media credentials are given out for the event. What a waste of time.

On ESPN.com today I noticed a little story about the Devil Rays talking to Barry Bonds. The funny part is that on the sidebar on ESPN it said “Rays skipper admits ‘minor’ Bonds talk”, as if he had a substance abuse problem and was finally coming clean. It’s insane to me that anyone would touch Bonds with a ten foot pole let alone admit to it in public. But if there had to be a team that did so why not one that changed their name to “The Rays” because they were trying to forget over a decade of being the worst franchise in baseball. Signing Bonds would get people to forget for a while that the Rays are still garbage. The problem is that once you see the team play you remember why you never watched them before in the first place.

Say, why don’t we end on that note. Thanks for coming along for the ride. I plan to be back tomorrow with something more substantial. Or I may take a nap. Oh the choices.

NFL Combine photo courtesy of NFL.com.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on this, or any other post. Email us at editor@thebocker.com