Your weekly dose of Notre Dame news, opinion, and other stuff.
Top News
The College Football Playoff will be expanding to 12 teams but most do not expect it to happen before the current contract runs out after the 2025 season. The new media deal for the future 12-team College Football Playoff is expected to fetch in the neighborhood of $2.2 billion annually.
10.5 million people watched the Saturday night primetime opener between our beloved Irish and Ohio State.
Wake Forest quarterback Sam Hartman had surgery to remove a blood clot and could be back in the lineup this weekend against Vanderbilt.
LSU defensive lineman Maason Smith tore his ACL and is out for the season after celebrating a tackle against Florida State on Sunday.
Liberty quarterback Charlie Brewer is out 6-8 weeks with a broken hand.
Syracuse lost 2 starters last week in linebacker Stefon Thompson and tight end Chris Elmore who are done for 2022.
Cincinnati is getting out of its 2023/2029 series with NC State.
Pat McAfee is joining ESPN College GameDay in a full-time role beginning this weekend in Austin for Texas-Alabama.
Not only did Virginia Tech lose to Old Dominion on Saturday, they had several items missing from their locker room afterward.
Oklahoma will be building a new $175 million practice facility in the future.
Uniform of the Week
Clark Lea is DGT™ and has the Commodores 2-0 while scoring 105 points so far in 2022. Will it last? Probably not at all! This past Saturday they wore all-black uniforms which included a black helmet with a black logo outlined in gold. It wasn’t that great. However, this all-white outfit from their opener at Hawaii are super fresh. I wasn’t a big fan of the new Vanderbilt logo they unveiled this off-season. I liked their old star logo on the helmet but definitely hated the skinner “V” that Lea went with last year.
I can’t speak enough about solid color numbers and how nice they look. I wish Notre Dame would wear simple white numbers at home and blue on the road–no outline. There’s just enough gold on these Vanderbilt uniforms and I now like the way their fatter “V” logo looks on the helmet. I would still bring the stars back, though.
Recruiting
Texas A&M picked up one of the nation’s top corners in Bravion Rogers (0.9822) on Tuesday.
Defensive lineman A’mauri Washington (0.9331) committed to Oregon. The Ducks also picked up linebacker Blake Purchase (0.9070).
Offensive tackle Zalance Heard (0.9756) committed to LSU.
Interior offensive lineman TJ Shanahan (0.9371) has committed to Texas A&M.
In the 2024 cycle, LSU picked up a commitment from corner Zion Ferguson (0.9324) and Texas gained a verbal from athlete Hunter Moddon (0.9426).
YouTube Channel
I love talking about which hand is the strongest for people and how it differs in things they do in life. For me, I write with my right hand but I throw with my left hand. I play golf and hockey left-handed, but tennis right-handed but with a sick two-handed backhand. I wear my watch on my right wrist (which people think means I write left-handed) but I’ve always done that because it felt more natural and it always felt weird to throw something with a watch on that arm. I started wearing a watch daily in 1997 and at the time the cool thing to do was to wear it slightly loose and trust me it’s not fun trying to throw a football around with a watch flapping all about.
Also, I play guitar right-handed, but I have more dexterity in my right hand for the fret board, only to feel like strumming with my left hand is impossibly unnatural. I’m similar with drums. Playing right-handed feels normal but going left-handed isn’t that unfamiliar.
I always say that I’m not really left-handed except for throwing a ball. I even bowl with my right hand. Sports like hockey and golf it’s your upper right hand that brings all the power and finesse and that’s what I’ve always thought should be considered the dominant hand. I also look at how people open a door. If both of my hands are free, I’m turning a door knob with my right hand. I’m cutting meat with the knife in my right hand. Scissors, again right hand. Tell me about your handness, readers.
Tunes
Last week I talked about a bright guitar tone. This is the wheelhouse for rock band Vampire Weekend who exploded on to the music scene in 2008 with some of the most high-tone mixed bright hollow body guitar sound this century. A couple years later, they came back with a very similar sound before dropping the 2013 album Modern Vampires of the City which was a much more mature and experimental sound that moved away from the guitar-driven tracks in the past. A few years ago, VW released Father of the Bride and it struck a perfect balance between their former and newer sounds.
The 7th track “Unbearably White” has grown on me so much that it may be my favorite song on the album. Immediately, there is a classic bright tone guitar and a sound that is pretty familiar for the band. But, it’s not a real happy song or reminiscent of their more pop-flavored work. There’s a sudden scream at 0:50 in the song which everyone should experience at full-volume with headphones on. What a song.
Trivia
Who are the 2 quarterbacks in Notre Dame history to throw for 500 or more yards in a single game?
The Other Football
The transfer window shut this past weekend as striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang moves from Barcelona to Chelsea for $13 million.
New American owner Todd Boehly has wasted no time pumping money into Chelsea, including spending a Premier League-high $290 million in this summer transfer window. On Wednesday morning, Chelsea sacked manager Thomas Tuchel and they are now rumored to be speaking with Brighton manager Graham Potter. In total, Chelsea could pay $30 million for the pair of buyouts.
We won’t get round 2 later this year 🙁
American fullback Sergino Dest was moved to AC Milan on loan from Barcelona until next summer.
UEFA fined PSG 10 million Euros for Financial Fair Play misdeeds. A quote from a club spokesman said, “Oh no, now what will we ever do with these harsh penalties?”
Manchester United have come alive with a 3-1 win over Arsenal on Sunday. The only remaining unbeaten teams in the EPL are Manchester City and mighty Tottenham.
Brighton trounced Leicester 5-2 and manager Brendan Rogers (1 point from 6 games) may not stay much longer with the Foxes.
The group stage of the Champion’s League kicked off this week with Dinamo Zagreb beating Chelsea 1-0 (hence Tuchel’s firing), and PSG 2-1 over Juventus as the key matches in the Tuesday’s games. On Wednesday night Liverpool lost 4-1 to Napoli (what is going on at Anfield this year!?), Spurs beat Marseille 2-0, and Sporting beat last year’s Europa League champions Frankfurt 3-0.
Streaming
I was terrified of the Wicked Witch of the West until about 8 or 9 years old. There’s no denying that Margaret Hamilton in this role with the the black robes, pointy hat, green skin, and broom is one of the top 10 most important costumes in movie history. The decision to deviate in most ways from the original children’s book released in 1900 for this outfit has provided us with the entire modern conception of what a witch looks like. For me, it’s those soulless, dark black eyes that sent a shiver down my spine as a kid.
I finally got my girls to sit down and watch the movie in one sitting. Well, we had to fast forward through the black and white beginning after a couple minutes.–other than that we got through it all! We were watching on HBO Max and I noticed this movie was digitally remastered impeccably. We weren’t even watching on our good TV! This was on our smaller TV that the kids touch with their grubby hands and I’ve given up trying to clean. Somehow, with all that clarity the wicked witch became so less scarier and so much more human. Something about being little with a grainy 1987 broadcast on ABC hit differently to a small boy.
A Look Back
I will never forget the 2010 Notre Dame vs. Army game played at Yankee Stadium due to the interview in the 1st half with Notre Dame legend Johnny Lujack. This was just under 7 years before the university would unveil a jumbotron inside Notre Dame Stadium. And this night, the school made a concerted effort to use the video board for a lot of stuff with the NBC cameras panning to it several times during the broadcast. Back then, the anti-jumbotron folks were just livid. Oh man, remember the years of fear-mongering that once a video board goes in then the advertising will come and blah, blah, blah.
My favorite conspiracy theory from the loons was that Lujack was rolled out to the sidelines specifically to support the jumbotron. He’s speaking at 40:16 of this video and you’ll notice he doesn’t even bring it up. Alex Flanagan simply states, “And you like the jumbotron, too” as she starts another question. Lujack said nothing about it. How could Notre Dame ever do something so terrible?? Also, I miss Alex Flanagan.
18S Paddock Club
Ferrari team principal Mattia Binotto was asked about his team strategy against Red Bull prior to the Dutch Grand Prix and immediately brought up Mercedes. During practice Verstappen had a gearbox problem and didn’t really get a good run on the Zandvoort track until FP3. During qualifying, a tight battle ensued with Vertsappen taking poll by 0.021 seconds over Leclerc in the Ferrari.
At the start of the race, Verstappen used soft tires like Leclerc and kept the lead through the first corner. On a circuit expected to provide decent strategy for a one-stop that would prove to be futile on Sunday. By lap 15, over half the grid had already made their first pit stops. When Leclerc came in on lap 17, Verstappen’s lead was nearly 5 seconds.
Crucially, both Verstappen and Leclerc would choose medium tires while the Mercedes’ cars of Hamilton and Russell opted for hard tires trying for a sneaky one-stop. Half way through the race, Verstappen’s lead over Leclerc hovered around 8.5 seconds but the hard tire for Mercedes was looking strong. On lap 46, Verstappen’s lead was 12.1 seconds when AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda briefly brought a Virtual Safety Car but he got the car back on track and into the pit lane. Ferrari, made the blunder of bringing in Leclerc for hard tires right after the green flag only for Tsunoda to stop again on track to bring out another VSC.
Ferrari forgets a wheel and Verstappen zooms past Hamilton.
This allowed Verstappen to come in for hard tires, and with such a big gap, remain in the lead. When the VSC ended on lap 50 his lead was 12.5 seconds over Hamilton who switched to medium tires. Five laps later, Hamilton cut that lead to 11.1 seconds and it looked like maybe a wild charge could happen over the final 17 laps. However, Bottas’ Alfa Romeo stopped on the main straight bringing out a full Safety Car. Verstappen would stop yet again for soft tires, Mercedes kept Hamilton out on his mediums, while Russell stopped for softs on the 2nd lap as the Safety Care drove through the pit lane.
Hamilton led the grand prix when the Safety Car came in on lap 61 but Verstappen on the better tires immediately overtook him down the main straight into turn 1. Hamilton’s teammate and Leclerc would also pass him to complete the podium places. Four straight wins for Verstappen and his 10th in 2022. Sheesh.
Sainz started 3rd and finished 8th with a terrible pit stop (his mechanics forgot a tire on a late call to pit) which also bought a 5-second time penalty for an unsafe release. Perez was off the pace all weekend finishing 5th, the Alpine boys finished 6th and 9th, Norris in 7th, with Stroll grabbing the final point.
Monza Preview: To the Temple of Speed we go and the return to the 72nd running of the Italian Grand Prix in Monza just to the northeast of Milan. No rain is in the forecast and the weather should be beautiful for the last race before a mini-September break.
The high speed track has Red Bull watering at the mouth looking for another dominant victory. Although, this can be a notoriously tricky circuit to overtake on and can bring in setups that can confuse drivers as engineers try to bolt on the least amount of downforce at the rear wing as possible.
Italian Grand Prix
The Monza Circuit
FP1 9/9 8:00 AM ET
FP2 9/9 11:00 AM ET
FP3 9/10 7:00 AM ET
Qualifying 9/10 10:00 AM ET
Race 9/11 9:00 AM ET
We’ll also be without the Sprint race this year which spiced things up at Monza last year. As always, at this time of year we can expect some power unit penalties and other things, such as Tsunoda picking up a 10-place grid penalty for his 5th reprimand after loosening his seatbelt after the debacle at Zandvoort.
3 Questions for Monza:
1) Yellow-clad Ferrari is going to win celebrating 75 years of their team and 100 years of Monza, right? RIGHT!?
This is a big weekend for Ferrari. It’s the first race at Monza after the pandemic rules have been relaxed and the team is juggling dual anniversaries on their home track. To celebrate, they’ve debuted a special livery, black fire suits, yellow race suits, and yellow helmets in their Giallo Modena hue.
Rumors of an all-yellow livery were false.
The team is reportedly bringing a new low downforce rear wing and set to crank their engines all the way up in a bid to win the race. There won’t be as much hype for Carlos Sainz who is bringing an ERS upgrade and power unit penalties. However, all eyes will be on Charles Leclerc to bring it home for the Tifosi. What could go wrong?
2) Are there any surprise podium member this year?
Last year, both Mercedes cars led qualifying but the McLaren’s were good early on finishing 4th and 5th. Hamilton had a poor start from 2nd and never recovered which allowed Danny Ricciardo to finish 3rd in the sprint race. On Sunday, Bottas took an engine penalty and the crash (see below) from the top 2 fastest cars in the championship fight opened the door to Ricciardo’s jubilant victory.
Now, Ricciardo is being kicked out at McLaren after this year and his teammate Lando Norris (finished 2nd at Monza last year) is the only non-Red Bull/Ferrari/Mercedes driver to pick up a podium in 2022. We need some random and fun podiums this year, come on!
3) After Verstappen landed on top of Hamilton here last year, is the rivalry back on again?
People around F1 believe a combination of poor upgrades and the new Technical Directive banning the flexi-floor planks have really stunted Ferrari’s race pace. Over the last 2 races, Mercedes has truly shown they can chase down the Prancing Horses even if the latter can put together strong qualifying laps. It’s possible Mercedes has their eyes set on Red Bull just like 2021.
Last time out at Monza.
However, this probably isn’t the best track for Mercedes who experience too much drag on straights, but still. They’ve quietly improved their car in 2022 and we seem to be inching closer to a win from Hamilton or Russell. That is, if Verstappen ever stops winning.
Trivia Answer:
Joe Theismann, 526, USC, 1970
Jack Coan, 509, Oklahoma State, 2021
🙁
🙂
The lows and the highs are so close together in this week’s rambler!
Also, 100% right handed. I can barely get gloves on both hands I’m that bad with my left hand.
That reminds me of my dilemma with my Apple Watch.
It’s on my right wrist (as mentioned in the article), but when it comes to doing anything besides pushing a button, I am so bad at using my left hand to operate it.
Happened a few days ago, but Foo Fighters had a tribute concert to Taylor Hakwins and had his son come play drums on “Hero”. That kid nailed it. Very cool to see.
https://youtu.be/P2KnD7sfpoA
I saw that! Very cool.
(Sorry I’m blowing up this post)
Re: Wizard of Oz
Return to Oz might be one of the scariest movies I’ve ever seen geared towards/for children.
Nightmare fuel.
And that probably doesn’t make the top 100 creepiest and scariest things in the movie.
(Also, just learned the lead is the same girl that’s in The Craft, which makes sense, in hindsight)
Everything right handed. “Sports like hockey and golf it’s your upper right hand that brings all the power and finesse” I assume you mean upper hand? Even then I’m not sure I agree. At least when I shoot a puck or hit a golf ball it doesn’t seem so.
Can’t stand the singer’s voice in Vampire Weekend.
I’ve never heard a Vampire Weekend I’ve not enjoyed, yet I don’t think I’d consider myself a Vampire Weekend fan.
Yeah, for me as a “lefty” in golf or hockey.
The upper (right) hand brings all the power. The left hand (especially in golf) is very loose and delicate on the club/stick.
They both should be loose. I think I have more trouble with the finesse part than the power. I think more golfers would be lefties if that were true.
My cousin played golf for years lefty. He was a damn good college baseball player and batted left. The first time I played golf with him, I said to him that he looked like I think I would look if I tried golf lefthanded. He was totally frustrated with the game so, he gave righty a shot and within a year had halved his handicap. (26-13) He said it felt awkward for quite a while but the results were there.
More golfers should be lefties, no question about it.
Also, you could say his voice is…..unbearably white.
Ezra Koenig is no Delbert McClinton
Extremely right-dominant here in everything. My left hand might as well be an oven mitt.
November 20, 2010 was a fun day of bad football in baseball stadiums. Illinois-Northwestern at Wrigley in the afternoon, and ND-Army at Yankee Stadium at night. Gameday went to the Illinois game and was broadcasting from a McDonald’s parking lot — that was before the Cubs built Suburban Cubsneyland all up and down Clark.
That’s more frightening than Return to Oz!
Were wheelers involved?
What are the only two sports that you only allowed to play right handed?
Field hockey is one.
The other….hmmm…..I’m going to say Jai alai??
the other is polo
Jai Alai is correct
Are there 3 sports then!??
What about arm wrestling?
Four sports!
On the FCS v FBS front, Indiana is paying Idaho an eye-popping (for FCS games) $1.3 million this year and paid $1.2 million last year to come to Bloomington. Payouts to FCS teams usually range from $300-600+k. The contract was signed in 2015 when Idaho was a Group of Five team in the SunBelt and fully guaranteed. When the SunBelt dropped Idaho and NM State, Idaho went to Independent, then to FCS Big Sky conference for almost all their athletic teams to control costs for their football program. Indiana never re-negotiated the contract.
Idaho additionally got $675k to play Oregon St last year and $575k to play Washington State this year. The Moscow Idaho athletic department has brought in about $1.7k for each of those two years. In addition to playing regional games now, Idaho also saves expenses in FCS with a limit of 63 scholarship players.
Indiana as a Big Ten team does not have to skimp. Last year’s payout to Idaho was the most guaranteed payout in 2021. Good for the Vandals.
Also, good on the Hoosiers. Not an altruistic move, but still.
Those Vandals, always plundering and pillaging.
My parents were both right handed. Out of six kids, four turned out to be left handed. I wonder what the odds are of that? I am right handed although could bat left handed but preferred right. My wife is also right handed. My son is left handed though. Again what are the odds?
Anyone here take a genetics class? My understanding is that hand dominance travels on the X chromosome. So Men get their hand dominance from their mothers. Women get the X from the father and then one or the other X from the mother. GBSK, my guess is the four kids that are left handed are all male, because your mother could have an X that is left, and and X that is right, and since right is dominant, she would be right handed. However could pass the X for left onto sons, any female siblings would be right handed, as they received the X from your father that is right handed. All women that have a right handed father should be right handed, or possibly ambidextrous. Also the chromosones are the reason more men are left handed than women. They have to go with the X they get, right or left.
I’m right handed and can’t do much with my left hand at all other than support the tasks my right hand is doing.
That’s very interesting and something I didn’t know.
I read somewhere and now can’t remember where that they believe your handedness was actually dependent on eyesight. It made sense when they described it, but not sure what the validity is.
It’s interesting that they showed the picture of the left hemisphere with Broca’s and Wernicke’s areas labeled but didn’t explain the correlation of language centers with hand dominance. If you are right handed your language areas are 93% of time in the left hemisphere and if you are left handed it’s 55% (33% on right side, 12% bilateral) of time in the right hemisphere. Not that it matters but since communication and language is so specialized in humans, you wonder if it plays a part?
Outside of consideration for the extent of a stroke and its type – ischemic v hemorrhagic – I would imagine being left-handed may give you a better chance at recovery in Broca’s and Wernicke’s areas and their functions. Perhaps the best chances are in someone who exercises both sides for different functions. The genetics of an ambidextrous male passing his X chromosome to his daughters is beyond me.
Weekly Rambler has become my favorite series on this site.
I’m so glad it wasn’t just an off-season thing.
I love reading all the articles here, but it’s been good fun arguing about the best Rolling Stones song or retro video game instead of hand wringing about our latest qb/decomit/coach/etc. throughout the year.
The Rambler during football season:
I guess I would say ambidextrous. I write, throw and eat with my left hand, but do most other things right handed (play guitar, play golf, hit a baseball, kick a ball with my right foot, etc.). I can also throw a ball right handed pretty well, and have def played softball games with a right handed glove when I forgot my glove a few times over the years.
I honestly think that it stems from when I was a kid – my parents got divorced when I was 3 or 4, so when my dad taught me to play baseball he didn’t know that I was left handed, so he taught me right handed. I played the first 2 or 3 years right handed, before someone noticed that when I didn’t have a glove on I was throwing the ball with my left hand. Yah for divorce!
Do you hook when writing?
I enjoy the handedness discussion because I see a lot of similarities. I consider myself “left-handed” because it is my writing and eating hand.
Most sports, though, are right handed and right footed. Baseball and golf I attribute to lack of left handed supplies as a kid. Tennis (which i almost never play) and ping pong are similar: serve with the right, use both interchangeably.
If you do the test to see what footed you are for snowboards (be pushed form behind, and see what foot you stop yourself with) I am “goofy footed” although right is my dominant foot for soccer.
I naturally want to shoot shotguns and rifles as a lefty, but due to lack of them (and getting powder in my eye from a shotgun), I now almost exclusively shoot like a righty.
Finally, my son is 5, and uses both hands for writing and drawing, so lets see where that goes.
Nature or nurture, or a little of both?
Is F1 Qualifying not on network TV this week? I’m seeing P1, P2, P3 and the GP (all ESPN2) but not Q…
Looks like qualifying will be on ESPNEWS.
Or, F1TV too. Best value for the money!
TIL Fubo doesn’t carry ESPNEWS (what happened to the other N)? Streaming licensing is weird!
I can only throw and bat right-handed, can only write left handed, am very left-foot dominant kicking, but the weirdest is that playing tennis I play both sides as normal single-handed forehands.