Rippee Writes: Friday Scoop
Let's play two, March Madness, Ole Miss Pro Day
A Happy Friday to all. If you live in the South, I hope you stayed safe during the weather yesterday and enjoy some sun this weekend. Today is a light newsletter as I originally planned to have a baseball game to talk about. But we’ve got a surprise LBs special from Greg himself, a little spring football and more.
Here we go.
Let’s play two
Ole Miss’ Thursday night game against Alabama was postponed to a Friday doubleheader because of severe weather. First pitch is at 2 p.m. CT with the game two starting 45 minutes after the end of game one. For all of you schmucks who have office jobs like I do now, this is a bummer from a viewing perspective, but probably a better outcome for Ole Miss than trying to play last night, getting interrupted after two innings and having Gunnar Hoglund on the shelf for the rest of the weekend having only collected six outs. I don’t know what the weather actually did in Tuscaloosa last night and it is a shame I am not there to ask Mike Bianco about it because, as I mentioned before, it’s his favorite topic and he would have loved to have gotten such a question, from me in particular.
I’ll refer you to yesterday’s newsletter for baseball tidbits. I gave an Alabama scouting report, some Ole Miss notes and outlined how the doubleheader might affect the bullpen. Check it out here. Collin Brister and I also recorded a lengthy podcast discussing all things Ole Miss-Alabama, spring football and more.
Moore shines at Pro Day
A little breaking news to start your Friday: Elijah Moore ran fast, caught footballs and impressed scouts at Pro Day yesterday.
Chad Kelly also threw passes to Moore, Damarkus Lodge, Damore’ea Stringfellow and Floyd Allen. I had heard Lodge and Stringfellow were going to be there but did not know about Allen. He’s a great dude who has a pretty incredible story that we wrote about at SuperTalk two years ago. I hope he gets a shot somewhere.
Here’s some numbers and other notes from Pro Day. I am assuming Luke Logan’s benchpress numbers were simply too large to enter into the system.
Ole Miss is two practices into spring ball
There isn’t much to react to yet, but here’s Lane Kiffin talking shop about Pro Day, spring and other things.
Otis Reese got royally screwed by the NCAA last year. He kept a great attitude and when the most useless organization in sports finally ruled him eligible with two games left (and eventually a bowl game), he made the most of it. Reese is a good player that is going to make Ole Miss’ secondary better in the fall.
Grilling season gets better with Greg:
Greg called yesterday and would like to thank everyone for coming by the store in the last week. He would like to express that by adding on to the spicy ribeye sausage special. If you go by the store this weekend and show last week’s promo code OR, if you’re a new signup, show the automated email you got upon subscribing, you can get a $10 prime stripe (more than half off) to go along with it. To quote the man himself, “So for $10 at LBs this weekend, your subscribers can get a prime strip and a pack of sausage. What a f***ing deal.” Thanks for subscribing and enjoy. Go by LBs on University Avenue across from Kroger. There is so much great stuff to try and buy. Best place in Mississippi to get meat.
March Madness returns this weekend
All four of my Final Four teams are still in. Not to brag, simply a statement of fact. I’ve got Houston, Florida State, Baylor and Gonzaga. I’ll stick with my picks, BUT, if I were to start firing off upset picks, I would go with Loyola Chicago to get to the Final Four and Syracuse to beat Houston. Creighton-Gonzaga is going to be awesome and Florida State-Alabama has the potential to be the best game played this year. What a weekend of hoops we have this weekend. Enjoy it while it is here because it goes by fast.
If having some skin in the game is your thing, I’ve got just the place to steer you. Go see my friends at SkyBox Sports Picks and use my promo code “Rippee”. They’ve got a package for you.
Socially Acceptable or Sociopath:
A little social conflict to kickstart your weekend. This isn’t one of the better ones, but I am trying to work this segment in once a week if possible. Earlier this week, I was in the drive thru line at Starbucks. I am not a Starbucks guy, mostly because I will take caffeine in cheaper forms than five dollar coffee and ordering off their menu is like trying to crack a second language. Is small, medium, large not exciting enough? You’re a coffee shop. But anyway, my boss gave me a gift card so I decided to use it.
The line was long, but when I finally got up to the window, the guy on the register said, “the car in front of you paid for yours.” I was a little confused and asked why they did that and the cashier said, “It’s a pay it forward type of thing. That was the 10th car in a row to pay for the car behind them.” He said this in the most ‘you should continue this streak or you’re the world’s biggest jackass’ tone possible.
So I said “Okay, I guess I will pay for the car behind me.”
Cashier: “Great, that will be $35.50,” with the smuggest grin I have ever seen in my life.
**puts 10 dollar gift card up and pulls out debit card as if I am being held up against my will**
Well that’s just great. I came for a $5 cup of coffee and left with a $35 cup of coffee. So I ask you: Would it have been socially acceptable for me to simply pay for my own and break the streak? Does the pay it forward schtick even work in a drive thru? The car in front of me got a way better deal. This seems more like a scam than anything else and the cashier was in on the job. I don’t understand. I want to pay for what I bought and leave. Maybe that means I am a grinch and I don’t understand the minds of the high society coffee elites. The cashier enjoyed the hell out of coercing me into this. I was grumpy about this for a day and a half. Oh well.
On the horizon
Huge Mailbag Sunday podcast with Collin recapping the weekend series and much more
LBs specials next week
Five more newsletters.
We grew a TON this week. Thanks for subscribing and following along. Feedback is welcome as always. Tell all your friends to join the party.