Nothing But Iron: It’s a Game of (the) Runs by Steven R. Lagman, M.D., C.A.S.W. February 4, 2006 Here is my hockey observation for the year: I heard a rumor that the Badgers have been contacted by Pfizer. According to an unreliable, but creative source, the pharmaceutical manufacturer wants to feature the team in one of its Viagra commercials, which would open with clips of the Badgers being swept at home by Minnesota. Voice over: "Having a hard time keeping it up? Viagra can help." My only comment is that the person who thought of this is not very nice or at least is not very hockey fan. As male-enhancement ads go, it could have been worse, given that the sport that is played with guys holding sticks. I suppose the basketball Badgers could have auditioned for the same commercial, but at least nobody had ever entertained thoughts of them being the best team in the country. And besides, I care about basketball, so it’s harder for me to poke fun at it, no pun intended. I have unshakable faith in Bo Ryan’s methods. He remains a model educator, superb strategist, and a good guy who knows my name and yours for no particular reason. If anyone can coax a championship or something close out of these players, he can. If he does not, and Wisconsin suffers its first season in five years without a tangible plaque or trophy, we will get over it. I missed the game against Illinois. It was trumped by my son’s game, which ran concurrently, so I watched the TiVo version when I got home. Illinois is a good team, however, I thought this was Wisconsin’s worst game of the season so far. (I missed the loss against North Dakota State because of coaching duties, and did not bother to go back and watch it because I was too busy sticking shards of glass up my nose.) Of the meaningful games I have seen, Illinois was the worst because of the home-loss magnification factor, because it revealed so many deficiencies, because it crushed the tail and possibly one other appendage of my unrealistically high season expectations, and because it was Illinois. Here is what TiVo showed me: 1) Wisconsin’s on-ball defense is as poor as I have seen it since pre-Bennett days. Far too much dribble penetration is allowed. For example: How a guy gets baseline around Ray Nixon astounds me. That is not a criticism of Nixon’s effort, it’s just that I am so surprised when I see it. 2) UW’s help defense is inadequate, so penetration often results in scoring. The loss of Greg Stiemsma has not helped. 3) The Badgers have trouble defending around ball screens. I probably lack the expertise to say this, but it appears that they get caught in bad mismatches off of switches, it appears that they don’t recover well on help-and-recover attempts (temporary switch to get around a screen, then switch back), and worst of all, it appears that other teams have learned to manipulate what is either confusion or slowness. I am pretty sure that help and recover is ineffective without good help defense down below, but we didn’t have that in med school, so I will again clarify this as possibly inaccurate. 4) Wisconsin can get hot, but it does not, with the possible exception of Kammron Taylor, have a reliably good shooter from anywhere on the court including the free throw line. Note for wish list: a pair of 90-per-cent free throw shooters like Michigan has. I could be way off base on all these assessments, because it turns out that my TiVo is malfunctioning. I say this because there were multiple times when it spontaneously went into slow motion, but only on part of the screen. The effect was bizarre: It appeared that one of the UW players–a high profile, high-scoring starter–was jogging. I hit the replay button several times, and each time, it looked like he was jogging. Jogging in transition defense. Jogging around screens. Meanwhile Illinois was jogging my memories of last years losses. I fast forwarded to the next play, and it looked like the same player was watching. Watching is fine if you are on the bench, but not when your opponents are rebounding or driving to the basket. Damn TiVo! I am sure those of you who watched in real time saw this player play with intensity and hustle at both ends of the court. I know what I saw was a TiVo goof and not an actual observation because Badgers don’t jog and Badgers don’t watch. Since it was a mechanical problem, I won’t name the seemingly affected player, but I will say that for some odd reason TiVo was able to demonstrate that Brian Butch (warms my heart to see a guy his size diving over photographers), Kammron Taylor, Joe Krabbenhoft and Michael Flowers played hard. They didn’t always play well, but I can live with hard. Hey, enough with the Viagra commercial already. What does it all mean? It means the Badgers are 15-6, 5-3 in the conference which, I think is the same number of wins the Badgers had in total in the 1980's. In other words, it could be a lot worse. In other words, it’s not even bad. With even-keel, stay-the-course, common-sense Ryan always poised to tap the Badgers with his over-achievers wand, along with a favorable second half schedule–and throw in a good TiVo repair shop–anything could happen. Ryan has said many times, basketball is a game of runs. So goes the season too. But, wait. There is still more football. We should talk about that. First, let us parents of child athletes gather to give thanks to Peyton Manning, one of the best players of the decade, and perhaps, someday–but not this day–a great leader. We express our gratitude toward Peyton for this opportunity to teach our children the difference. A great leader would have resisted the temptation, in the aftermath of his team’s season-killing home loss to the Steelers last weekend, to blame his offensive line for his own poor productivity. That he did it publically magnifies the error in judgement a hundred fold. My hope is that Manning allows me the chance to complete the lesson by 1) issuing a public apology to his teammates, 2) never committing the same mistake again, 3) congratulating the Steelers on their superb preparation, and 4) leading his team to a Super Bowl win someday. Footnote: How many times, even in a dismal 4-12 season, have you heard Brett Favre blame his teammates? I can count them on the fingers of one eyebrow. Maybe that’s why Brett has a ring. Let’s also thank Manning and his team for this lesson: Where you have been (13-0) has no bearing on where you are going (home). Having been reminded of this principle, I vow to not let it go to my head if I win a Pulitzer Prize for this column. Insightful (for his advanced physiologic age) commentary from brother Bruce: The Indianapolis loss will change the way that home-field-clinching playoff teams finish their seasons. Bruce attributes the loss to the Colts "not playing a real game for five weeks" prior to their first playoff game. He believes that teams will be much less likely to coast. I agree with Bruce’s assessment, but disagree that teams will change all that much. First season-ending injury to a franchise player and Coach Givemhell is in the soup line. The risk of injury may be worth it, at least from the fan’s point of view. The alternative of a healthy one-and-done is just too unpalatable. Related question: At this point in the season, do you feel better as a Colts fan, or better as a Packers fan? Bears fan? I had decided as far back as October, when Green Bay’s destiny was all but sealed, that I would not waste time caring about Super Bowl XL, even though it is the first Super Bowl in modern history to use the ancient history number L in its title. The Steelers, who took down successive AFC heavies without the seemingly trivial benefit of home-field advantage, have messed up my plans. Now I care. Now I want the Steelers to win. Nothing against Mike Holmgren, whose skills as a coach and GM are legitimate, but the chapters of the Steelers story like Roethlisberger, Cowher and Bettis are all too much fun to ignore. If only the game could be played in Seattle. In the spirit of public service, not to mention private humility, I offer a parking ramp story. It qualifies as a sports story only because there was physical exertion and profanity. My experience is good news for those of you who hesitate to make that career change because you think you lack the intellect for a medical career. I have proven that the village idiot can become a doctor, or at least that a doctor can become the village idiot. The story will never make it into my Proud Moments file, but it may amuse you. It began innocuously enough with a week in Arizona. It was a solo venture to visit my family. The trip was complicated only by a wrong turn out of Sky Harbor Airport that became apparent when I noticed the Los Angeles, 371 miles sign, and by a mom’s forgotten purse that extended rush hours (it’s plural in Phoenix) just a bit. The rest of the week was relaxing and full of fun. I had scheduled my return flight into Milwaukee on Thursday so I would be back in time to coach Connor’s basketball practice. I was pleased that my flight had landed a few minutes early. I would have plenty of time to make the 80 minute drive to Madison to be there for the beginning of practice. Earlier that day I had a fleeting thought about having neglected to make mental or physical note of the location of my car when I left it in the General Mitchell Airport ramp a week earlier. I concluded that this would not be a problem. The parking areas were color coded and I was 99 per cent certain than my car was in Blue. A picture of Blue 2 flashed prominently in my head, so that’s where I started to look. I walked to the ramp, luggage in tow. Thankfully the two largest pieces were wheeled, and I was able to clip a third small bag to one of the wheeled pieces, leaving only my camera backpack to shoulder. I reached Blue 2 and went to the spot that best matched the image in my mind. My car was not there. I was surprised, but calm. I walked up that row, and back in the next row over. There were many cars, but none of them matched the keys I held in my hand. I shifted to a different row and walked that. Same result. I stopped to ponder my options. The best approach, I reasoned, was to continue to expand my search systematically, so I would not inadvertently pass the one stall that contained my vehicle. Thirty minutes passed quickly. If I had found my car at that point, I could have still made practice on time, but I was still stumped. Maybe, I thought, I misjudged the level. The thought that I misjudged the color was too overwhelming. After a very brief foray into Yellow, I abandoned that thought. I climbed the stairs to level 3, which looked a lot like level 2. I used the same process–up one row, down the other, carefully making note of where I had been. I covered the entire blue section, about a dozen rows. No luck. An hour had passed. Now there was no way I would make practice, and my mood was not as positive as it once was. At that point I decided to seek help. I remembered the traveler assistance desk on the third floor just inside the terminal. The lady there was sympathetic, but I could tell she had not seen this problem before. She called parking and handed me the telephone. The man asked me for my car’s license plate number. I then realized that this is a number I don’t often use. I tried to look it up in my Palm Pilot, but I realized I had stored it in the same database as next-year’s winning Powerball numbers, which I couldn’t find either. I rattled off a license number that I thought might be right, but knew was not. The guy said he didn’t see it on file. Just then Kelly called me on my cell phone. I would have had her give me the number, but I lost the call. I wasn’t convinced it would matter anyway. How would the parking guy, even with the license, know where it was? Before I hung up, I gave him a description of the vehicle. He told me to look on Blue 2 F, so I thanked the help desk lady and dragged my luggage back to Blue. Shortly after reaching F I muttered something that started with F. Bright idea No. 723: Retrace my steps. I walked to the ramp entrance, peered over the wall and nodded. This was where I entered. I remembered veering right and going up. I just had to be close. I considered for an instant going down to level 1, but from the overlook I could see rental cars being returned there. It made sense that the first level was for rental cars. I decided I should try to reach Kelly again. This time the call connected and I explained where I was and why I was still there. I was certain she tease me, but instead, her degree of empathy reminded me of why I married her. She immediately pointed out that I was post call on the day that I departed, and even though my plight had less to do with sleep deprivation than the fact that I got all the blonde genes in a mostly-dark family, it made me feel better to hear it. You probably realize that I am not writing this issue from the airport. I did not have to hitchhike or rent a car or take the bus home. The way I found my car was so simple and anti-climatic that it almost hurts to write it. I asked Kelly to look for the license number in the car file. I called directory assistance to get the number for the parking guy. I gave him the correct number. It took him a full three seconds to tell me my car was in Blue 1, row J. And there it was. One section over from the rental car return. In summary: 1) Know your license plate number. I think I’ll get a vanity plate. Possibilities include: ESTR EGG, RMMBR ME, LOSTNSPC, ABSNTMND, DUMBDR, MAKAMAP 2) Persistence is a double-edged sword. Henceforth I will limit all persistence to 15 minutes, then call someone who can help. 3) For my friends: Friends don’t let friends park in parking ramps. 4) For my readers: Writers who never lose their cars miss the chance to write about it. _________________ Nothing But Iron is an amateur sports column. The author, who knows many intelligent blonde people, apologizes for his comments, all intended in good fun, about the UW hockey team. (Hey, nice bounce back at MinnDu.) Even when it is not apparent, he wishes all UW athletes success. The author apologizes for being critical of TiVo shortcomings and has confidence that they can be fixed soon. Lastly, the author apologizes for jogging through this lame closing. ©2006 DrTM Enterprises. All rights reserved.