5 Thoughts for January 5, 2016

1. Oregon Ducks Football: You know how that final Cody Kessler pass in the Holiday Bowl encapsulated the Trojans' season? A similar thing happened to the Oregon Ducks at the Alamo Bowl. As Vernon Adams' health goes, so do the Ducks' chances; when he got knocked out of playing because of a broken finger, Jeff Lockie came in and failed to win consistently; likewise, when VA got knocked out of the Alamo from a concussion, the team just collapsed. Never has a team in the history of bowl games, gone from leading 31-0, to losing -- the worst kind of record you want to be known for. As I told a friend, Jeff Lockie -- the quarterback who had been the backup in place for VA all this season -- might as well transfer if he wanted to continue to play football, because there's just no way he's going to play next year at Oregon as a starter, with Dakota Prekop coming in as a graduate transfer. As TCU head coach Gary Patterson commented after the game, once they saw that VA was out of the game, they decided to press their defense against Oregon's run game and force Lockie to beat them with his arm -- and it worked. Obviously they saw Ducks game film. Oregon Ducks had 376 yards of offense in the first half with VA; with Lockie, they managed just 23 yards in the second half, if you can believe that.
2. Seattle Seahawks: That dismantling of Arizona, 36-6, in Glendale was spectacular, and was completed in the first half of the game, when the score stood 30-6. It was also the first game where Seattle had all three phases of their game, working at 100%. Four punt returns for Tyler Lockett, averaging 39 yards, set up Seattle's offense for relatively easy scores against a pretty good defense. I think Seattle is poised to make it to the Super Bowl. Carolina is the hottest team, but is tops in just one category: Turnover margin. Assuming Seattle beats Minnesota (again) in Minneapolis (odds have Seattle the highest favorite of winning, of all the wildcard games), the match-up of Seattle and Carolina seems to favor Seattle's resurgent defense, ranked 2nd or 1st in all major categories (total defense, downs, rushing defense and passing defense) and Seattle's blistering offense in the last 7 games.
3. Burns Oregon: Seriously, why are people from out of state, sticking their noses into other people's business? Really, do they not see the irony of out-of-state people, protesting against federal control of lands, that were once Indian reservations for the Northern Paiute? Their grievance is tantamount to demanding that the feds give away someone else's land, to a bunch of white landowners. To highlight this irony, imagine if Native Americans showed up in protest against these outsiders, demanding that these outsiders end their illegal occupation of their land! Now, according to Ammon Bundy (progeny of Clive Bundy), the authority rests with the local sheriff, and though the sheriff has demanded that these folks leave immediately, they continue to remain, uninvited and unwelcome. What these folks are demanding, is a federal giveaway (of land that was set aside for Native Americans) to ranchers. Ridiculous! 
4. Saudi-Iran: Call this for what it is, a Sunni-Shiite fight for control of influence in the Middle-East. The reason why the Saudis didn't want the nuclear deal to go forward, was a fear that doing so would unleash Iran's economic influence in the region. You can see the same issues playing out in Yemen, where both Iran and Saudi Arabia are supporting two different sides in a 3-way conflict between the Sana'a gov't, Al Qaeda and the Houthi rebels. These people need to figure out how to get along and stop supporting extremism.
5. Music: The other week, I was browsing the Google Play Store's selection of free albums, and came across Andra Day, listened to it, and downloaded it for free. Absolutely fabulous singer, whose voice sounds like an R&B soul icon. I was completely blown away by her voice and music. I was embarrassed that I got her album for free, so I bought her Winter Wonderland song, which is itself a great recording!