Category: The Mine

There is a lot of confusion out there.  So, let me kind of simplify. Beginning at least with Moses and The Lord, thou shalt not murder was in the Top Ten of laws.  It is still, right there at or near the top in our modern-day justice system. Anyone who is a murderer, or intent on murder has already decided that the perhaps number one law of all does not matter.  And the difference between murder and other crimes is enormous.  Like murder is in a whole new ball park.  So, what methods they use, and any laws regarding them are only going to cause them to adjust their method.  Each and every one of us knows that the ways to kill people are limited only by imagination.  Airliners can become guided missiles.  A simple addition of a spring in a butt stock can allow a rifle to fire at an automatic rate.  That little adaptation and others will be quickly outlawed.  Just so that you know, a belt loop can be used pretty effectively to do pretty much the same thing.  Imagination can’t be outlawed.  Murder is.  Mass murder is outlawed and yet the imagination is endless when it comes to ways to kill lots of people.  But, people, even though their brains can think of it do it because murder is just wrong.  Murder is so wrong it goes before the Ten Commandments.  In the very first societies one of the first thing that had to be agreed upon was to not just kill each other.  Those who did, were called murderers.  They were dealt with.

The only way to prevent murders, or mass murders, is for murderers to decide not to murder.  Those who try to keep murderers from being able to murder play a ridiculous game of whack a mole.  Will there always be murderers?  Yes.  Does it mean that we can do nothing?  Nope. The starting point is getting back to convincing fellow humans that murder is more than just against the law.  Is that hard to do.  Yes, it is, but is is no harder than trying to guess what the next mass murderer will come up with, and then keeping them from being able to carry it out or adapt to whatever changes are needed to do the murdering they want.

“Well, we don’t want you to be able to kill us with a gun!”, you say. Can you hear the stupidity in that.  OK.  How about this glowing red-hot fireplace poker shoved up your ass?  Better?  I don’t want you to kill me, isn’t silly at all, though.  So, rather than making laws to take from people things they would never use to hurt those people wanting to take them, unless they tried to impose their silliness upon them and tried to take them, that energy should be spent on promoting the original idea that murder is totally wrong and unacceptable.

I would much rather see late night hosts and celebrities spend as much of their time and energy making it clear that MURDER IS WRONG.  MURDER IS THE PROBLEM AND NOT THE WEAPON USED!  It wasn’t O.J.’s evil knife that slit throats.  It was a murderer!  That knife was doing absolutely nothing.  OJ was!  It wasn’t because that knife was a “weapon of war” or an “assault” knife.  It would be scary looking to some.  But to most, it would simply be a knife.  If you are stupid enough to be worrying about flash suppressors, adjustable stocks, rail mounts and such I hope dull knives don’t send you into a closet to hide, too.  Because the dull knife is just as dangerous or more so.  A pointed rock is an assault rock as opposed to a nice smooth river rock smashing a skull!?

From what he said, he made it pretty clear that he was brought back to put in place someone who knows how to run the day to day operations along with Nate Poss, and I think more than anything else, to try and stop the bleeding of the fan loss. He said that he didn’t think Stull wanted to completely rearrange the offense, and that the players were recruited and were used to this offense. In a very classy move, unlike some, he not only didn’t disparage the previous coach, he immediately , as a leader knows how to do, stood up for his men, his new staff. He basically said that the players needed to step up and make plays.

Now, Coach Price is as charming a man as you will find. You almost wouldn’t know that he is a fierce competitor because he is really good at letting people see what he wants them to see. But, make no mistake. He is as competitive as it gets. So, his job will be to take the team he has, the style it was recruited for, and turn it from a loser into a winner. Seems like magic. Using the same players, coaches, and style of play and win where Kugler was losing.

I know that some of the players may be very upset at losing their coach and even more so about how they found out, but if you think Mike Price can charm a snake, know this, he is a football guy from the ground up, inside out, and you just wait until he has a chance to work with them. He is what nowadays is called a “player’s coach”. I can here it where I sit, “Big Play!” shouts CMP after an especially good play during practice, and the cheer is repeated by all. No one doubts the character of these players. Kugler must be giver his due credit for that. Mike, and just three days of practice is all he will need to pull these fine young men together. They won’t go into the Western Kentucky game with their heads down. He will have them not only ready to fight, but looking forward to the fun of it. That is his magic.

Mike Price knows football. He knows that the wider field of college football allows the offense to spread the defense out further to open up gaps. It allows him to do more with less, a situation he has known and used to get to where he has gotten to in his career. What is kind of funny, is that he is not some kind of offensive genius, with all kinds of intricate plays. When early on after Stull had let Mike know that I was getting too much video and was afraid it could be used to spy on the team, Eric laughed and told me that they ran about 25 plays and anyone could get plenty of video tape of their plays by looking at game films. My reason for mentioning this is to make it clear that, the magic touch that Mike Price has always brought with him is the spark, the energy that he brings. His energy becomes the player’s energy on the field.

It was that energy that needed success in order to maintain itself that faded with time, perhaps the last time. But I think you will see a little of his magic, his energy along with the enormous weight lifted from the players backs, psychologically, in the first game. The coaches all seemed to believe that they were just a few plays here and there from winning, their way. Well, players and coaches, Mike Price and his Big Play, have some fun at practice, and energy is just that extra jolt you were looking for.

I had predicted a big loss. Vegas has the Miners as 18.5 point dogs. I’ve never been much of a gambler, but I would be very tempted to put some money on that spread. Mike Price is one of those coaches that could win with the other team’s players. I don’t know what the final score will be, but I truly believe the team will play with a spark. I believe Kugler had his troops, great soldiers, prepared for battle. As Kugler said, they would compete. They will have that character and strength that Kugler gave them. But, hey will have that special spark, the jolt of energy and inspiration that Mike Price will give them. May I remind you of what the football felt like during the end of the Nord era. Now, remember how the same players did under Price.  He won’t be changing things much.  But, it may be flat out amazing what a little change can make for a team perhaps just needing a little something.

Go Miners!

 

Join the discussion at the Den;http://kyyotesden.com/den/index.php?board=1.0

He is and always will be a Miner, so I wish him the very best. I hated the way he started and thought that he could have done all of the right things without having to besmirch the previous coaches and players as he did. But, his failure to pass the fricken ball down field was just inexplicable. For whatever reason/excuse. I honestly felt like he was in over his head and would have had considerably more empathy for him had he not set the tone for empathy for coaches, himself at the start. Won’t it be interesting watching this one play out. The coaching fraternity is very tightly knit and they are all connected. There are AD’s that come from inside the fraternity and there are those who come from outside. It is no surprise that those AD’s that come from the coaching fraternity look to their immediate coaching family first, quite often. Business people approach it very differently. Stull had already planned to give the new AD the problem of dealing with Kugler, or there was already an agreement in place between the two regarding Kugler and Stull. So, I don’t see Stull jumping in to hire anyone. My guess is he will leave that open for the new AD. By the way, I strongly believe that the new AD is probably already chosen and the powers that be are going through the necessary motions.

Hope is an amazing thing.  It finds a way to exist where it would seem impossible.  It hangs in when it shouldn’t.  In the blackness of the blackest night, the light of hope appears out of nowhere.  For those looking for the way out of the darkness, it can be the light that shows the way, it can just be knowledge that there is more than just the darkness, and perhaps most often, it can be just a flicker.  It can tease those using it to show the way.  It can leave those that know there is more than darkness wondering, maddeningly why it seems  it is so elusive and uncontrollable. And when it seems to have faded, and darkness seems complete, it appears.

Hope, when it comes to a fan of a team that is in the Top Ten losing teams, is a vicious tormentor.  Like a cat chasing a laser light dot in the hands of a sadistic dog, we are in our chase for success always, forever frustrated.  We chase so hard and with such abandonment of our own self-awareness in our surroundings that we lose control and wear down from exhaustion.  Closed eyes bring dreams of success, and when we awake, the cycle begins once again.  Like Groundhog Day, fans are on a continuous loop.  Eyes open and brings the light of hope.  The events that follow are repeated again as the have for what seems like forever, and with the end of the day, the light of hope gives way to the darkness of night.

This morning, having my first cup of coffee, I decided to look at the betting odds to see if the change in UTEP’s Offensive Coordinator had had any affect on the odds.  I don’t know if it has or not.  It has changed in that UTEP is now one point more of an underdog than they were before the announced change.  Kugler’s statement that the team would return to the running game may have made it impossible to tell.  However, as I sat there, I found my self thinking, what if the team came out with a fire, and started running and passing, doing whatever they want, for big chunks of yardage!  Gawd, I’ve had those thoughts so many times.  Gawd damn!, I have those thoughts so many times before!  Ridiculous!  I mean, good gawd, how many times can a person fall for the same trick?!  Fool me once, fool me a hundred times?  Shame?  Come on, how much further past shame can it get! Fucking hope.  I’m sure.  Nope, not this time.  That hope is like a gorilla stuffed in a trash can and my brain is sitting on the lid.  Hope!  That’s my new name for the damned gorilla.  The thing is, I know that bastard is going to get out again, before the game ends, and night brings darkness and Hope goes back to sleep.