Misc - United States

Every day (or almost every day) I put the coolest factoids I can find (thanks mostly to ESPN) to the left of this page. Anytime I can find something that is related to Kansas City in some way, it will have a higher priority. Sometimes, they are just too long to fit into a single factoid, so I break them up into parts. Sometimes they are too long for that, so I can’t include them. This is one of those.

State Theater - My first date.Mitch Webster was appointed Midwest Regional Scouting Supervisor for the Kansas City Royals on Thursday. I have to be honest. I have no idea what that job entails other than what each of the four words mean. But, neither do I care. This isn’t about that. Mitch Webster is from Larned, Kansas (pop. 4,200), but he’s not the only sports star from Larned – my old stomping grounds.

PokerThe World Series of Poker Championship was yesterday and ESPN carried it. The question is commonly asked whether or not Poker is a sport. I don’t know whether it should be called one or not. I happen to be a huge poker fan – not so much the typical game you see on the tube, but rather a fan of unique poker games with a bunch of friends. We’ve met every third Friday of the month for 21 years (this January). Even though we don’t play the traditional games – pretty much only what we have created ourselves, poker is still interesting on the tube – especially when Mi$$ion$ are at stake.

Air McNairI’m a stats fanatic. Obviously, sport is one outlet for that passion, but so are finance and weather. I crunch lots of numbers on both and would be nearly as at home on a financial blog or weather blog as UFR. For this particular post, I decided to talk about something that is number-oriented even though it is only barely related to sports. Asking me to completely avoid non-sports related statistical data for this blog is like asking a cow not to moo (thanks Simon).

Here are some of the things I’m working on and will be reporting about over the next few weeks. If you have an interest in any of these, please make sure to check back. It’s the dog days of summer – you know the time when the NBA is over, the NFL hasn’t begun, the Royals stink and no college sports. Personally, I like NASCAR and have a reasonable tolerance level for golf. But, otherwise…

Who's the guy on the left?I have to admit, when Woods came from behind today, I was thinking it was one of the rare times he has done so. It wasn’t. This was his 20th comeback – meaning trailing after 54 holes. I was confusing it in my mind with his astonishing record in the majors where he is yet to come from behind to win after 54 and he has also never lost a lead after 54. Anyway, it’s a good time to take a quick look at his place in history since I don’t recall having written a word about him yet on UFR. He is, after all, in the category of Michael Jordan or Muhammad Ali, so some digital ink is more than warranted.

Fountain of Youth… something almost happened today that would have been unprecedented – not just at the Masters – not just in a major golf tournament – but in any major sporting event… EVER. How close did it come? Within inches.

Paige SpangenbergThis post is strictly of personal interest, so I'll keep it short, especially since I titled the post with a Journey reference. But, hey, that song was reclaimed by The Sopranos.