Lotsa Hot Dogs

So in perusing old blog entries, I came across my post about last year's hot dog eating contest, and I realized I didn't enlighten our readers about the competition from this year.  And, considering that anyone reading this was likely in the contest, you probably are interested in it.

The 2011 hot dog competition was held in Northeast D.C. and featured 4 competitors and one spectator/photographer, Evan Egri.  Despite my best efforts, I could not convince Evan Egri, a vegetarian of about fifteen years, to participate.  So it was the four of us, Twin #2, Dallas E., Buzz B, and myself, competing for the title of 2011 Family & Friends Hebrew National Hot Dog Eating Contest champion.

The dogs were cooked and ready to go, the timer was set, and the participants were hungry--it was time to start.  From the opening moment, it was clear who was, again, taking it most seriously.  I had made a point to not eat since the night before, and to drink plenty of water to expand my stomach.  In the meantime, the other participants gorged themselves on Fourth of July waffles that morning, which admittedly looked quite delicious.

Therefore, it was no surprise when I claimed victory in the fourth annual competition.  I inhaled a record 6 1/8 hot dogs and buns, while Twin #2 placed second with 5 1/4.  Although that may seem close, the contest was never really in doubt as I took an early lead and held on to it throughout.  Buzz B did not put in much effort whatsoever, and came in a distant third with 2 1/8 hot dogs and buns.  Buzz B was followed by Dallas E., who put forth a similarly disappointing effort and came in fourth with only 2.

I'm looking forward to next year already.

2010 Hot Dog Eating Contest

Before I get started on this post, I have to share my thoughts on Glen Perkins.  After a poor showing yesterday, I would not be surprised to never see him again in a Twins uniform.  The guy struggled mightily in 2009, apparently did not communicate properly about any injuries he had last season, and then filed a grievance against the Twins, all before he started throwing batting practice at AAA this year.  Now he finally got another opportunity with Minnesota, and not only does he predictably piece together an awful start, he hit Carlos Quentin twice, presumably on purpose.  The last time a Twins pitcher purposefully threw at an opposing hitter, he was verbally attacked by a very angry Delmon Young, and the rest of the team backed Young up, including Ron Gardenhire.  I just don't see how all of that adds up to Perkins getting another game in a Twins uniform, even if he is a homegrown product.

On the other hand, the latest news that Jose Mijares is headed to the DL means he may stick around a little longer.  I have to agree with Nick Nelson on this one, as Perkins has no business on a big-league roster.

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To continue yesterday's theme of completing posts that have been in my queue for far too long, I wanted to write about our family's annual hot dog-eating competition.  It was started in 2008, and we've now done each of the last 3 years on 4th of July weekend.  This year, with July 4th being a Sunday, we did on Independence Day itself, although it was expanded to include friends since most of the family was in Spain.

The Family & Friends Hebrew National Hot Dog Eating Contest is different from the official competition you see on ESPN.  For one, we use Hebrew National hot dogs rather than Nathan's, simply because they are the most delicious.  The more significant change is that we only have four minutes to eat as many was we can, since none of us are professional eaters and thus do not want to subject ourselves to ten minutes of torture.  Otherwise, though, the rules are the same.  Competitors are allowed an unlimited amount of the drink of their choice, but dunking the buns is HIGHLY discouraged.  This is because Non-Twin #1 (our little sister) used that strategy in the inaugural competition, proceeded to almost vomit, and cost everyone about a full minute of eating due to the hilarity of the situation.

To the results, though:

1. Twin #1 - 6 hot dogs and buns
2. Twin #2 - 4 hot dogs and buns
3. J.A. Canada - 3 hot dogs and buns
4. Dallas E. - 1 hot dog and bun

As much as I would like to revel in my victory, I must admit that none of the other contenders took it seriously this year.  On the other hand, I did still break the record (which previously was 5 1/2) and had to stop because we ran out of hot dogs, due to the number the six spectators ate.  Not that I could have eaten another six, but I easily could have downed another half a hot dog and maybe a whole one.  We do measure down to 1/8 inch preciseness--it just so happened no one ate a partial hot dog.

Yet again it was a fun event and I hope it continues to be an annual tradition.

Going to Regionals!

After beating The George Washington University 12 to 10 at sectionals yesterday, the Georgetown ultimate team will be going to regionals for the first time in team history. We won all four games in pool play on Saturday by a combined score of 52-11 in order to make the championship bracket on Sunday. With three teams from each section advancing to regionals, an appearance in the championship game would be enough to secure a berth. Therefore, a win in the first game on Sunday would be enough to put us into regionals for the first time ever. After trading points early on, GW got a couple of breaks near the end of the first half. The two teams continued trading points until GW led 9-7, when Georgetown turned the tide and got both breaks back to take a 10 to 9 lead. Then GW scored a point to re-tie it, and with the soft cap on the game would be played to 12 instead of 13. We managed to score on the ensuing O point, which meant that one more break would seal the victory and a trip to Princeton for regionals, and after a huck out of the end zone, we had our chance. The disc seemed to hang in the air forever as three players raced downfield after it, and as one bid into the endzone and caught it fully outstretched just over the line, there was pandemonium as Georgetown ultimate celebrated its first ever trip to regionals.

More details: http://www.upa.org/scores/tourn.cgi?div=18&id=5864


Catholic Justice

Random Notes

The blog has been pretty light recently, partially because of a lack of Twins-related news and partially because of a lack of interest. I can't speak for #1, but personally I hope to get back to more regular posting once spring break arrives (3/6). I've got a busy 10 days or so before then, though, with an essay, a few midterms, and other assorted homework. By then, it'll be only a month until the start of the season, so there should be more to talk about and more time for me to do it.

The big news over the weekend for the Twins was the signing of 3B Joe Crede. Despite Boras's talk of $7 million guaranteed, it was obvious that Crede would not get that much, and in the end it's clear that Bill Smith got the former White Sock at his price: only $2.5 million guaranteed, with another $4.5 million in playing time incentives. To me, the price was right and there is not much downside to this deal. Crede, if healthy, should provide a significant, though not huge, upgrade over the Brian Buscher-Brendan Harris platoon. If he's not healthy, the Twins are still only down $2.5 million and have the serviceable Buscher-Harris fallback option.

In other news, Boof Bonser announced today that he's going to need to undergo exploratory shoulder surgery that will sideline him for a few weeks, with the potential for a much longer absence if there is found to be a serious problem. I still think Bonser has a chance to turn into a productive major league reliever, but at this point the Twins have a few different guys capable of putting up numbers similar to his so it shouldn't be too big a blow if they lose him.

Assuming Bonser is not ready for opening day, I'd predict the Twins 25-man roster to look like this:
SP: Scott Baker, Kevin Slowey, Francisco Liriano, Glen Perkins, Nick Blackburn.
RP: Joe Nathan, Matt Guerrier, Luis Ayala, Jesse Crain, Craig Breslow, Jose Mijares, Phil Humber.
C: Joe Mauer, Mike Redmond.
IF: Justin Morneau, Nick Punto, Joe Crede, Alexi Casilla, Brendan Harris, Brian Buscher.
OF: Carlos Gomez, Denard Span, Delmon Young, Michael Cuddyer, Jason Kubel.

Finally, in non-Twins news, the Georgetown ultimate team had a great tournament this past weekend in Harrisonburg, VA, home of James Madison University. The team won its first six games en route to the championship game where they were defeated by Ohio State 14-7. We drove down Saturday morning and it was about as good weather as you could ask for in the middle of February: 50 degrees, no precipitation, and only a light wind. In our first game of the day, we used the modified hard cap rules to our advantage in a stirring comeback against Bucknell. Down 12-8 with the cap on, we scored five straight to win the opener 13-12. The next game was against Michigan State. We stuck with the 1-3-3 zone that sparked our comeback against Bucknell and managed to hold off MSU 11-8. Afterwards, we got a nice break from playing as RPI did not show up for the tournament, so instead we played the JMU alumni team in what was counting as a win by forfeit regardless. This meant that we got to try playing different positions and using throws that weren't necessarily game-ready (i.e., I got to throw a hammer, a couple hucks, and even pull). As we started our next game against Elon, it seemed that this time off to goof around might come back to hurt us as they jumped out to a 6-2 lead against our 1-3-3 zone defense. However, a change to agressive man-to-man defense led to a quick turnaround, and we scored the next 8 points to take control of the game and end day 1 of the tournament undefeated.

After a relaxing night at the overcrowded EconoLodge spent watching Hitch, we opened Sunday with a chance for the championship after winning our pool on Saturday. The first game was against Wake Forest, though it was not much of one. We jumped out to a quick 4-0 lead and never looked back, as we cruised to a 15-3 victory. This left us plenty of time to watch the Dickinson-NYU game, the winner of which we would play next. Unlike our game, theirs went well into the hard cap, while we rested comfortably on the sidelines. After we jumped out to another early lead, it became obvious that Dickinson had nothing left after their hard-fought victory over NYU. Their man defense turned into nothing more than a non-moving zone, as defenders simply stood in the lane and made little attempt to cover anyone. Of course, this strategy did not work too well, and we cruised to the finals with another 15-3 victory. In the finals, we played against a strong Ohio State team, and they picked up a break on the very first point. After that we hung around and tried to get back in it, going to half down 7-5, but the game was never really in doubt as OSU took the championship game 14-7. All in all, though, it was a great tournament for Georgetown ultimate, and hopefully one that can be built on as we work our way through the spring schedule.

It Does Rain in the Desert

Total precipitation in Las Vegas in 2008: 2.64 inches
Rain on February 7, 2009 -- a record for that day: 0.58 inches

As you can see from the numbers above, my trip with the ultimate team to Las Vegas did not exactly come through with the expected beautiful weather, with rainfall on Saturday accumulating to over 1/5 of the total rainfall for all of 2008. The forecasts had been predicting this in the week leading up to the tournament, but as I was greeted in Vegas with clear skies and warm weather on Thursday night, I continued to hold out hope that the forecasters were wrong. (As a side note, don't fly US Airways if you can avoid it. They did not even give us one free drink on an over 4 hour flight from Pittsburgh to Vegas.) Sure enough, though, the sky was gray and overcast on Friday morning when I woke up for the first game of the day. And then as we pulled up to the fields, something happened that would emerge as a trend for all three days of the tournament: the sun managed to show up for the first game of the day. With no wind and sunny skies, we easily handled New Mexico and went on to face UCLA when another trend emerged: bad weather. The wind really picked up after a couple points of that game, and whoever's reading this probably hasn't played ultimate, but you can imagine the havoc that heavy wind wreaks on a frisbee. UCLA was up 6-4 when the hard cap went on (basically, the game ends after 1 more point because it's taking too long), and scored the last point to win 7-4 after 80 minutes of game play. For reference, the games were being played to 13, and we had just beaten New Mexico in about an hour. The final two games of the day were even worse, because the fields were turned so that they were going in the same direction as the wind, but we did (somehow) manage a couple upwind breaks in each game and beat Whitworth and New Mexico (yes, we had to play the same team twice in the largest ultimate tournament in the country with about 120 teams).

After the first day of games, I made my first trip to In-N-Out, which I've heard many people rave about. I'm not a big fan of burgers, so I wasn't too surprised that it wasn't my favorite place. It was good, but certainly not something that you should go out of your way to get. After dinner, I went to bed early in preparations for the first round of games at 8 AM the next morning. Once again, the day started off warm and clear, as we trounced Chico State in the opener. At this point we were still alive for the championship, needing 7 straight wins on Saturday to get into the championship bracket on Sunday. Of course, as we walked over to a different field to face off against Virginia Tech, a team that had already beaten us twice in the fall, the skies opened up. At first it was just a drizzle, but as the game wore on the already dirt fields turned to mud and it really began to pour. The players who were in were getting soaked, and those on the sideline were all huddled together with garbage bags on. Eventually Va Tech finished the game off, and we hurried back to the tents to see what the rest of our wet day would look like. Then, for the first time at one of these tournaments, I was happy to hear the following news: we were done for the day. As we piled back into the van and headed for the hotel, rain continued to fall and didn't stop until the night. Since we had finished at 11 am, there was plenty of time to make my first trip down to the strip (we were staying in "old" Vegas for monetary reasons, which is like a 10 minute drive). The entire team went searching for a never-to-be-found $10 buffet that someone had told us about, but we eventually got (a late) lunch at a $13 buffet in the Imperial Palace. As is the case with Leo's, most people thought it was bad, but I really enjoyed my meal there. After lunch, we headed back to the hotel, and I almost did some work until I found out that it was only my room that lacked ESPN. Most everyone went out that night, but I stayed in because we had another early morning start on Sunday.

Sunday morning came, and not many people were excited to wake up at 6:30 and head to the fields. For most, it was because it had been a late night for them, but for me, it was because I was thinking about the swamps that we'd be playing in. Sure enough, when we got back to the tournament, there wasn't much in the way of fields; it was all mud. The fields were so bad that for once I actually was not that excited to play ultimate. However, the sun was out all day, and though it got a little windy after the first game, it wasn't that bad and Sunday was the best day of the three. Our first game was against the university in whose hospital I was born, the University of Vermont. We dominated the first half and then went back and forth with them in the second to win by a few points. The next two games were against MIT and Minnesota-Duluth. We dominated MIT in much the same manner that we dispatched with Princeton in the Maryland tournament in the fall, and then held on to a 1 or 2 point victory in a low-scoring affair against Minnesota-Duluth.

All in all, the trip was not as good as I expected as a result of the weather, but it was still fun and I'd do it again next year if I get the chance. The plane ride back was uneventful, though I did realize that Pittsburgh seems to be the only airport with reasonable food prices (by the way, there's a great Seinfeld bit about airport prices) and I got my first ever glance of Chitown during my layover at O'Hare. Of course, United gave us drinks and TV on the way back (I even noticed 30 Rock on once when I woke up), but I slept the entire time and didn't get to take advantage of it.


Picture of the mountains surrounding the fields.

Radio Appearance

On Monday, I'll be making my radio debut on Hold On! I'm Coming!, hosted by JonJacobJingle. The show is from 4-6 PM on Georgetown radio, and you can listen online by clicking here. I should be going on around 5, and we'll be interspersing music with discussion about the Super Bowl over the next hour.

Quick Santana Update

I've been following the Johan Santana trade rumors almost 24/7 the past couple days (though I did manage to make it to Georgetown's 61-49 victory in the Battle of the Jesuits against Fairfield). Sorry I haven't posted anything, but there is just so much going on, I don't know what specifically to post about.

At this point, I would be happy accepting pitching prospect Phillip Hughes, centerfielder Melky Cabrera, outfield prospect Austin Jackson, and shortstop prospect Alberto Gonzalez from the Yankees, but I'm not sure they're offering that much. Reports right now are that they're offering Hughes, Cabrera, and a prospect not named Chamberlain, Kennedy, Tabata, or Horne. There were also some more talks with the Red Sox at some point today. According to Buster Olney, the Red Sox had some "new ideas" in these talks, but gave no hint to what those were, and I have not found any rumors anywhere of something changing from the package of Lester, Lowrie, Crisp, and Masterson/Bowden.

One last note: it is really annoying me how Red Sox and Yankee fans are acting like it would be better for the other team to get Santana. Yes, I understand how it is better to force the other team to give up more prospects by getting into a bidding war with them. However, this does not mean that the other team is getting worse by acquiring Santana. I just don't understand how these fans can be happy about their rival acquiring the best pitcher in the game.