 Malik
(9/7/10)The Seahawks are in a weird state of reality, rumor, and fantasy all trying to ram into each other in a way where nothing is as it seems. I mean the rumors were that Julius Jones would be gone before the weekend was over. He's still here. At least it's with a reworked contract, just like Leroy Hill went through with his problems. I'd rather know that Seattle is not burning money on worthless players. Speaking of which, Houshmandzadeh is now with the Ravens, who are probably enjoying the simple weirdness of the entire issue. I mean Seattle has to pay the difference between 7 million and the veteran minimum that the Ravens probably are paying Housh, due to his Seattle contract. Unfortunately, this was just a guarantee losing problem for Seattle. Then again, Seattle is good at finding no win situations. In this case, Housh is a great receiver...but he just can't get into the West Coast Offense that Jim Mora and Pete Carroll both know and love. It also doesn't help matters that Housh and Hasselbeck just didn't seem to connect too well on passing routes. Anyway, with all of the changes going on this close to the season starting, I feel a bit uneasy with the entire situation. I mean about half of the squad from 2009 is no longer with the Seahawks. That type of shake-up is fine when taking a team like the Seahawks of 2009. However, I hate to see people like Kelly Jennings and Julius Jones both sticking around despite their problems on the field. Most of all, I hate to see these changes after the camps and pre-season are done, since it will give a lot less time for such a large number of new players to get used to the Seattle game plan. Still, you sometimes have to have some faith in your team's coach to do what he does best (I mean win...not what he does best in the past in the NFL). On a different note, I just have to say the Boise/Virginia Tech game last night was a great start to the college season. I mean this was the first major matchup of the season, and it ended with one hell of a suspense level involved. Being semi-local, I'm a fan of Boise (at least when it's not a matter of UW playing), who do a great job of playing the role of the relatively unknown team in many cases. Anyway, I'm talking a lot of sports right now for two reasons. It is the right time of year, as my level of football hype is at record levels (the hype dam will burst on Sunday when the Seahawks have their season opener against San Francisco). On the other hand, I'm in need of entertainment that's easy to access and enjoy while I deal with a broken TV. My main gaming TV, which is also my main watching TV, decided to die...on Friday night...right before a three day holiday weekend filled with the first college football games of the year. I'm supposed to have the TV checked out sometime soon, so I don't want to move my massive jungle of cables from the broken TV to any substitute. When you have about 12 electronics all attached to one TV, the less you have to move them, the better. The one nice thing is that this TV is the one place where Velveta decided to play the "idiot lottery" with my money...and it paid off huge! When I got the TV (a 52" DLP Mitsubishi), she demanded a five year extended warrantee. That added a whopping $330 onto the price. However, Fry's (where I bought the TV) has/had a nice deal where warrantees (at least at that time) covered bulbs. So, I've saved the price of the warrantee, and then some, on two replacement bulbs so far. Best of all, the TV broke with only a few months left under service (expires in January). It was a perfect dose of timing. This TV, I should add, is one that only handles 1080i for HD (no 720p even), and is my main gaming TV. This means I can't play most PS3 games (unless they are patched) in HD and am stuck with 480p. Plus, once the warrantee ends, I will have to buy bulbs once each couple of years. However, this TV is no longer made (no 1080i only sets have been made for close to 5 years). So, if all goes well and the TV is bad beyond recognition, there will be no choice but for the TV to be replaced, under warrantee. This means I'd need to get a new TV of equivalent value. Considering what the price of a 1080i DLP 52" was five years ago, and what you can get for that price now (46-52" 1080p LCD, sometimes rocking 120hz), I'm really hoping that the TV is toast...or at least that my DLP is considered "too expensive" to justify fixing. For once, I'm hoping the bottom line is enforced, and in my favor. I just hope that the worst case scenario doesn't happen, where the only replacement sets available fall into being a type of display that sucks. Luckily, I can avoid DLP, since DLP sets smaller than 65" are hard to find, and I could never handle that size in my home. I'm talking about plasma. I have a plasma set in my bedroom, and it's damned nice. Good bright images, with great black levels. However, for gaming, the response rate is just way too slow. I mean I was getting over 60ms on calibrating GH2 on my plasma. With anything in that range, not only is fast paced action bad for games without visual calibration, it also alters visual effects on rhythm games (play GH or Rock Band with a large number calibration...if just looks wrong even if the timing is right). One way or another, all that really matters, however, is having a big TV in my home again for the Seahawks opener. Malik |
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