Tackling

I watched a lot of football this weekend; NCAA championship games and some key games in the NFL. Plus, my wife is out of town. She’s quite happy to have me watching football, and Formula 1, but…

The Packers/Bears game was classic Packers/Bears. I lived in Milwaukee for some years and was, of course, a Packers fan. But I digress. There were a couple of awesome, textbook tackles in that game yesterday which made the announcers go crazy (largely because such things are so rare). 

I really enjoyed them, because generally I find tackling in both college and pro football today to be appallingly shabby. They seem to think that if you run real fast or dive past a ball carrier he will panic and fall down.

When I was playing football there were four key points made by the coaches who taught me to tackle. Follow theses four points, I was told, and you will seldom miss a tackle and very seldom will anyone be hurt.

1. Head up until and during contact; you cannot hit what you cannot see.
2. Contact must be made with your shoulder pad, never your helmet.
3. The target area is between his knees and shoulders.
4. Feet must never leave the ground before contact.

Violating #4, which is actually rather tempting, is the most embarrassing failure of the bunch. Just as you leave your feet the ball carrier steps nimbly to one side, and you go flying past him and lie on the ground wishing you could disappear into it as he tiptoes happily down the field. I did it once, maybe twice in six years. I see it happen a dozen times in every game these days, and they never seem to learn.

North Texas @ Tulane

Tulane, not noted as a football powerhouse, is not high on my NCAA watchlist, but it was facing North Texas for the American Conference championship last night, so I tuned in. (Despite never having heard of the American Conference.) My father obtained his medical degree at Tulane and it’s where he first met my mother, so my presence on this planet owes something to that school, and my ears always perk up when the name is mentioned.

It was an interesting game, and rather fun to watch. NTU averages scoring 51 points per game. They scored 7, until Tulane sort of went to sleep with a 34-point lead and let them score 14 more. Sort of gifted them with a couple of touchdowns in the 4th quarter. The announcers were sort of gibbering because the game was not going as predicted and they’d had to throw their script out the window.

I hate football game announcers. They think they know more than the coaches, and keep telling the coaches what they should do. Fortunately, the coaches can’t hear them. Unfortunately, I can. The coach who wins the game almost never does what  the announcers told him he should do.

These announcers passionately wanted the game to get back on script and for NTU to start winning. They are smarter than the officials, too, and they kept calling penalties against Tulane that the officials did not see. I didn’t see them either. They got very upset that the officials didn’t listen to them and penalize the Tulane players.

There were two touchdowns by Tulane which the announcers claimed were not touchdowns because of a fumble or penalty. They screamed passionately during the replays that it had to be the way they saw it, and expressed profound disappointment when the officials did not call it their way. I was embarrassed for them, and I didn’t even like them.

What amazed me was that, in their passion to support NTU, they forgot the rules of football. (If they knew them in the first place.) Tulane punted, and kicked away from the single NTU receiver. The receiver was running toward where the ball was descending and ran into a Tulane player. The ball hit another NTU player and was recovered by Tulane. The officials awarded possession to Tulane.

The announcers immediately began screaming about “kick catch interference” and calling a penalty, returning possession to NTU. I promptly thought that, “No, the rule only protects a player in the act of catching the ball.”  They turned to their “rules analyst” expert, who confirmed that, yes, that absolutey, positively was a penalty for “kick catch interference” even though the receiver was running across the field when the collision occurred. 

I looked up the rule in the NCAA rule book and found that it says that, “the player must be in a position to catch the kick.”  When you are running across the field toward a descending ball, you are not “in a position to catch the kick.” To clarify the case, you are running toward such a position, but you are not in it.

Another case of partisanship overriding sanity?

Knowledge is knowing that tomato is a fruit.

Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad. 

Philosophy is pondering upon whether or not catsup is a smoothie. 

 

F1 Weekend

Unlike American football, my enjoyment of Formula 1 is actually enhanced by its event announcers. (Don’t get me started on Tony Romo.)  David Croft is, among other things, perhaps the only person in my experience who knows that the plural of “Grand Prix” is “Grand Prix,” not the utterly absurd “Grands Prix.”  

This past weekend, F1 was at Mexico City, at an altitude of 7350 feet. David Croft and others spent a good bit of time discussing the effect of altitude on the cars, which is significant, and on people. One effect on people is that the Sun feels hot, which Croft kept saying was because, “we are closer to the Sun” due to the altitude. Really, Crofty? 

The Sun is 93 million miles away. 7300 feet corresponds to, roughly, one mile, and means that instead of 93 million miles, they were 92,999,999 miles away from the Sun. I tried to divide 1 by 93 million to determine how much closer they were as a percentage, and my calculator blew up. Seems the percentage is a number too small for the human mind to comprehend.

By Sunday’s race Croft was no longer talking about being closer to the Sun, so someone must have chatted with him about solar radiation being attenuated by less atmosphere and therefore containing greater energy at high altitudes.

That’s okay, unlike football announcers, David Croft very seldom says silly things, has a lively and delightful sense of humor, and his presence adds to the pleasure of a Formula 1 Grand Prix.

Maybe I’m Not Going Crazy

I keep following issues in which I see fundamental flaws of logic or connection to reality which no one else seems to see, and at times I wonder if maybe I am the one who has gone nuts. It’s true, of course, that you can’t “go nuts” if you started out that way, which undoubtedly I did, but I have always maintained some contact with the real world, a quality which seems to be in rare supply these days.

Take, for instance, the Formula 1 race cars of the “hybrid era,” and especially the model being developed for 2026. The current car develops 70% of its power from an internal combustion engine (V6) and 30% from battery power. So there are times during a race, in theory, that the race car only has some 40% of its motive power available when the V6 is recharging the battery. Actually, it never becomes that dire, but still… This is a race car?

Then I found out why this “hybrid” standard was developed, when I read an article discussing the F1 management conference at which it was adopted, specifically that, “some form of electrification would have to be included to provide synergies with road car technologies.”

Road car technologies. Really. Take a look at a Formula 1 race car and at, say, a 2011 Ford Fairlane and tell me how much “synergy” you can see between those two vehicles. The car’s profile? Windshield? Tires?

Next year, 2026, the power will be 50% from the V6 and 50% from the battery, and from the day that was announced I have asked how that would work on a race circuit where the cars are at full throttle for 75% or more of the circuit. When will they be able to charge the battery?

Again, reading an article of F1 management discussion, I read that the specs have had to, “embrace adaptive aerodynamic devices to mitigate potential power shortfalls on the straights.” Potential power loss? Well, that’s going to delight both the drivers and the fans, isn’t it.

The discussion went on to say that, “It’s understood that the solution envisioned by the FIA is to move to an 80:20 ratio in favor of the ICU, or even 90:10.” But that will require three years of development, so we are stuck with the 50:50 ratio until at least 2030.

Then there’s the mania for trashing health insurance companies. A recent article started off, “The six largest health insurers reported more than $1 trillion in revenue and more than $31 billion in net income,” and went on at some length about how horrible it was for a company to make $31 billion in profit.

First of all, it wasn’t one company, it was the total profit made by six companies. Secondly, that number represents a 3.1% profit margin, 3 cents on every dollar. On what planet is that not acceptable?

But more important, insurance companies do not create health care costs. Insurance companies pay health care costs. Admittedly, they don’t pay all of them. If they tried to do that there would be no more insurance companies, and nobody but consumers would be paying any health care costs.

Tyson on Cats

Not always a fan of Neal deGreaase Tyson’s style, he comes across at times as pedantic and arrogant. But he usually knows what he’s talking about. And he likes cats.

He tells us that “Evolutionary biology reveals cats are near-perfect hunters whose design has barely changed for millions of years. From lions to housecats, felines have evolved into a nearly flawless design—at least, according to evolutionary biologist Anjali Goswami.

Cats, she argues, are “evolutionarily perfect” because of their consistency: while other animals diversify and adapt in myriad ways, cats have mastered one ecological role—being sleek, solitary, hyper-efficient predators—and stuck to it. Whether it's a Bengal kitten or a Bengal tiger, the differences are mostly in size, not function or form. Even their skulls are virtually indistinguishable across species, signaling just how little cats have needed to change over millions of years.

This evolutionary stasis isn’t a sign of limitation—it’s a sign of success. In contrast to animals like bears, which have splintered into niche lifestyles from panda to polar bear, cats simply refine one model that works astonishingly well. Despite global habitat shifts and the emergence of rivals, few creatures can match their effectiveness. 

Evolution, Goswami says, doesn’t always reward variety. Sometimes, perfection is just doing one thing better than anyone else—for millions of years.”

Modern Techno Crap

There is, I think, a general acceptance that modern times involves technology which, despite making products more expensive, improves their position in our lives overall. One would have to be something of a Luddite to think otherwise. Between the technology itself, however, and the way business implements it, we seem to be reaching a point which might make an old man like myself begin to wish for the good old days. To give you a couple of examples.

My wife took her car in the other day to be “smog tested.” It passed, for the most part, and does not need any repairs to correct any issue, but it cannot be given a certificate allowing it’s license to be renewed for another year. To correct the problem, the car must be driven for approximately 3 hours per day for two days at 55 mph to “reset the catalytic converter.” 55 mph. No slower, and no faster. Precisely 55 mph, after which it will pass and may be licensed for another year.

Driving 55 mph on California freeways, by the way, where average speed is 75 mph, is scary as hell, and quite dangerous. One can get run over doing that. 

Anyway, the next day our water heater failed. Not leaking or anything, just not producing hot water. There is a light on the gas valve which is blinking red instead of blue. The water heater was installed just under 5 years ago, and when I saw the blinking light on the gas valve, I had a sinking feeling that thing was going to be a problem somehow. Yes, it certainly is. Turns out the valve cannot be replaced because it is no longer available. For a water heater manufactured five years ago. Parts for the valve are available, but they have to be shipped from afar and it takes two weeks or more to get them.

So we are replacing a water heater today, some ten years before the end of it’s design lifetime, because the gas valve on it failed and cannot feasibly be repaired. If the valve could be replaced the cost would be about $500. The new water heater is costing us about $1200 more than that.

This is becoming ridiculous.

Why?

Why does Goodyear spend a whole bunch of money to send its blimp to fly around and provide "aerial coverage" of a football game which is played in a domed stadium? The "aerial coverage" is not actually of the football game, which cannot be seen from outside the stadium, it is of the inanimate stadium itself, and could be provided at any time of day on any day of the tear.