Seth Kolloen

Owen Schmitt, the 24-year-old starting fullback for the Seattle Seahawks, opened a gushing wound on his forehead during Sunday's pre-game introductions when he decided to repeatedly whack himself with his helmet as he ran onto the field. Video!

This is pretty awesome in a tribal way, and apparently psyched up Schmitt's teammates. "That got us going," linebacker Lofa Tatupu told the P-I's Greg Johns. "A man willing to bloody his own face, you know how much he's willing to put on the line."

Then again, as childhood friend David pointed out later that night, it also shows why football players struggle to adjust to the working world once their playing careers are over. A pre-event self-bloodying may inspire football teammates, but see how well it works before your next company-wide health coverage informational. 

Ex-Husky Bobby Jones: NCAA hoops "like slavery"

Halfway around the world, a 25-year-old former Husky is giving serious thought to how athletes fit into society. Bobby Jones, a defensive whiz for the 2002-06 Washington basketball team, is questioning his career choice--and expressing serious misgivings about the institution of college athletics--as he begins his first season playing professionally in Italy.

"Can you imagine working on becoming a doctor or a lawyer at the age of 10? And you just know your going to become one so all you do is put all your time into that craft? ... Trust me, it’s that intense if you allow it to be," Jones writes on his blog My Adventures and Beliefs While in Italy.

Let's say you’re lucky enough to use that craft you been working on to get a free education and go to college. You should be thankful right? You should, but at the same time what you sign up for is having other people telling you what you going to do from the moment you wake up till about 6-7pm at night ... If for some reason you don’t perform like our coaches think you should ... they just want to get rid of you. ... Sounds like modern-day slavery if you ask me. It also sounds like a job but you don’t get paid for it even though you’re making the institution a shit load of money.

Jones is not the first person to charge that big-money D1 athletes are being exploited. A test case that could lead to some form of payment for college athletes got filed this July by former UCLA hoopster Ed O'Bannon. The class-action suit focuses on royalty payments for using players' likenesses in video games, but could extend to other areas where colleges make money of off players.

All those Washington #10 football jerseys fans (and their kids) wear? You don't see Jake Locker's name on the back, but that number's popularity has way more to do with him than with some city-wide deca-obsession. And Locker won't see a penny of the money Nike and the UW are making from his talent--or from the physical or emotional sacrifices he makes as a D1 athlete.

After the Huskies' overtime loss to Notre Dame two weeks ago, Locker refused to make himself available to reporters after the game. "I didn't feel like I was in the best emotional state to answer questions," Locker said later. "I felt like it was in my best interest and the team's best interest to take some time to cool down."

Locker was probably wise to stay away from the media that day, but the hyper-emotional state that goes along with high-stakes D1 athletics isn't going to fly if Locker ever tries to use the degree he'll (hopefully) earn--after, in Bobby Jones' words, UW treated him like a slave.

Jones doesn't know how he'd fix the problem. In an interview with the terrific new Husky hoops blog Montlake Madness, he says he doesn't "have an answer yet" for how the NCAA might more fairly reimburse athletes. But apparently he's thinking about it. Better than just hitting his head against a helmet.

The main reason why you never leave a college football game early: College football is played by college students.

And college students, are, for the most part, idiots. (Moments from my freshman year: drinking a 40 oz. Budweiser and then singing "I Feel Pretty" from West Side Story while pirouetting around my dorm room. This led to vomiting and enforced celibacy.)

So you'll get moments like we had Saturday night at Husky Stadium: Arizona QB Nick Foles, who should've been handing the ball off to run down the clock, winging an ill-advised pass to a covered receiver, and having it bounce off the receiver's foot into the waiting arms of UW linebacker Mason Foster -- himself in the area because he'd decided to ignore his coaches' orders and blitz on the play--who grabs the ball and runs it into the end zone for a go-ahead score. (Here's a great breakdown of the play by the P-I's Greg Johns.)

They're calling it "The Immaculate Interception." Here's incredible video from the field-level: Foster comes right at you.

This never happens in the NFL. In the NFL, Foles hands off. Foster never blitzes. And the people who left a 12-point game with less than five minutes left don't feel silly when they flip the radio on in their cars and hear that the Huskies have scored 15 points in 18 seconds.

All you people who left: The drunk girl who'd been screaming for the Huskies (and refusing repeated entreaties to sit down) the entire game, the lunkhead who makes it his personal mission to urge our section to stand for every damn defensive third down--you fail at life.

After their miracle comeback win, which set Husky fans to honking horns and shouting for at least 30 minutes after gametime, the Dawgs find themselves back in the Pac-10 conference race.

If the Huskies win at Arizona State next week--and the Sun Devils do not have most formidable home advantage as home advantages go--the Washington/Oregon game at Husky Stadium on October 24 would be for a share of the Pac-10 lead.

We await this weekend's football games like we would a root canal. Anxious, terrified, and just wanting it to be over.

Boy-band 'do or no, Nick Foles scares me

Realpolitik talk: Both the Huskies and Seahawks must win this weekend if they have any hope of postseason play. I'm not going to get into the numbers, just accept this as fact and keep reading.

On Saturday night, the Huskies host the the Arizona Wildcats and their frightening passing attack. Given the Huskies' secondary issues, this would be awful enough, but it's even worse because the Dawgs won't have either of their starting safeties. Free safety Justin Glenn is out for the season after breaking his leg against Notre Dame, and strong safety Nate Williams won't play after suffering a concussion in the same game. Two backups and even a true frosh will mix in at safety.

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This just as Arizona seems to have found a quarterback: Soph. Nick Foles, who was 25/34 with 3 TDs and 0 interceptions in the 'Cats win at OSU last weekend. That's a 165 quarterback rating. Yipes.

Meanwhile the Seahawks are responding to their must-win status by rushing injured QB Matt Hasselbeck into action. Hasselbeck says he can throw despite his broken rib, which would be fine if he were a baseball player. Unfortunately, football is a contact sport, and the man protecting Hass's blind side is a third-stringer who is also playing hurt.

The Jaguars, the Hawks' opponent on Sunday, will overwhelm the left side of the Seahawks line, they will hit Hasselbeck, and only then will we really see how well that rib is healed.

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Both teams will have to rely on their betters on other side of the ball to get them the win. In the Huskies' case, they'll need Jake Locker and the offense to control the ball, put up touchdowns, and limit Arizona's possessions. The Seahawks need their defense to create turnovers and hopefully points.

And I need a stiff drink.

Along with the ever-exciting baseball playoffs and must-win games for our top two local football teams, sports fans can enjoy a couple of non-sports events this weekend.

Sonics Movie

Well "enjoy" may be the wrong word for the emotions you'll feel at the premiere of Sonicsgate. The film about the Sonics' departure from Seattle, featuring interviews with major players like Slade Gorton, Kevin Calabro and Sleepy Sam Perkins, debuts tonight at SIFF, with an encore presentation Saturday at Pacific Place. Friday's screening is sold out, but you can get tickets for Saturday's here.

Tonight the film's producers are hosting an after-party at Spitfire, here are the details on that.

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Seahawks Book

Mark Tye Turner, author of the Seahawks "fan-oir" Notes from a Twelfth Man, will be reading from and hosting a trivia contest surrounding his book tonight at F.X. McRory's. The trivia is free; first prize is a round of drinks and a $25 F.X. McRory's gift certificate. Should be a fun time and a moment to send happy thoughts to Matt Hasselbeck's ribs.

 

Little O helped lead the stellar '90 M's defense

The M's scored only 640 runs this season, their lowest non-strike-year total since 1990, but were a joy to watch for a baseball purist like me. I loved to watch that 1990 team too, for the same reason I loved these M's: Great defense.

The 1990 M's fielded a dazzling up-the-middle trio of Harold Reynolds, Ken Griffey Jr. and Omar Vizquel, who'd end up with 24 Gold Gloves between them. Reynolds and Griffey both won gilded mitts that year. Pete O'Brien, an above-average defender, held down first base, and a still-spry Edgar Martinez played third. 

The '90 M's finished 77-85, with ten fewer wins than this year's M's. But by one metric, they were actually a better team.

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1990 Mariners--Fewer Wins, Better Team?

Both the 1990 and 2009 Mariners scored 640 runs. But while the 1990 M's allowed just 680 runs, the '09 M's gave up 692.

The critical difference came in one-run games. The '90 M's went 20-28 in such games, the '09 M's 35-20.

So I ask you: What made the '09 Mariners so much better in one-run games? Your answer--well, Jack Zduriencik's answer--will shape the future of the franchise.

Was it the bullpens? This year's M's had a stellar one, with David Aardsma recording 38 saves. The '90 M's also had a good bullpen, with Bill Swift, Mike Jackson, and screwballer Keith Comstock setting up for the M's first 30-save closer, Mike Schooler. But while the '90 M's bullpen ERA was about league-average (3.87 ERA; lg. avg., 3.92), the '09 M's 'pen was considerably better--compiling a 3.83 ERA when the league average was 4.46.

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What about clubhouse chemistry? The '09 M's surely had it, but my recollection is that the 1990 M's did too, with veterans like Reynolds and Jeff Leonard shepherding future superstars Griffey and Vizquel.

Or was it just luck? The 2007 M's went 27-20 in one-run games; in '08, with largely the same roster, they went 18-30.

The 1990 Mariners came back the next season and posted the franchise's first winning record. Then, before the '92 season, GM Woody Woodward dismantled the bullpen to get Kevin Mitchell, who was horrible, and the team sunk back to familiar 100-loss territory.

What does Jack Zduriencik ascribe the team's success to? Bullpen? Chemistry? Luck? We'll soon start to find out.

You can buy that 1990 Score Young Superstars Omar Vizquel for 99 cents at CheckOutMyCards.com.

When I tell you that the highlight of the Seattle sports weekend was giving a standing ovation to a third-place team, you may think it wasn't much of a weekend. But it was epic, notably for our sports teams getting the worst Indiana lambasting since the Kerry campaign.

Notre Dame 37, Washington 30 (OT)

As I headed to Teddy's to watch Washington vs. Notre Dame (live from South Bend, Indiana), I wondered exactly how empty the bandwagon would be. Coming off the USC win, the bar was packed for Stanford. But after losing that game, how would it look? Let's let pictures tell the story:

Crowd at Teddy's for UW/Stanford

Crowd at Teddy's for UW/Notre Dame

So--yeah, Seattle sports fans, you are some fairweather sons of bitches. And you missed an amazing game, one that will always be remembered for the stunning inability of the Huskies to score one touchdown from twelve tries inside the one-yard-line. If you have a Husky fan at your office, I recommend putting his morning coffee three feet behind a white line and see if he starts having PTSD flashbacks.

David celebrates Donald Butler's interception with the nearest object

Scoring just one of those touchdowns would've put the game away for the Huskies, but they instead ended up allowing a go-ahead touchdown to the Irish. THEN the Dawgs embarked on a last-minute drive to get a game-tying field goal, for which I was so terrified I crawled under one of those tables. Eric "Clutch" Folk made the kick, but the Dawgs lost in OT.

And this all in the final five minutes. The game itself was a back-and-forth affair featuring two amazing individual performances: Notre Dame's Golden Tate set a new mark for a Husky opponent for receiving yards in a game--Tate had nine catches for 244 yards. And Washington's Chris Polk had 136 yards rushing yards on 22 carries, continuing to establish himself as hands-down the best Husky back since Corey Dillon.

The game had six lead changes, three turnovers and 19 penalties, two critical ref calls overturned by instant replay, and just overall was about the most exhausting football game I can remember watching. At the end I was left muttering to myself and kicking fire hydrants on my way back to the house, but this remains a better feeling than last year's Notre Dame game, a 33-7 shellacking that I left early in the third quarter.

Seahawks Disaster

Sunday was a whole Seattle sports marathon--since I wanted to catch Griffey's (potential) last game, I watched the Seahawks/Colts down the street from Safeco at Hawks' Nest. On my way there I passed this photo mural on the side of Qwest Field.

Can you guess what all three of these players have in common? Neither Matt Hasselbeck, Walter Jones and Marcus Trufant were going to play in the game I was about to watch. Those three, arguably the best three players on the team and inarguably among the top ten, are injured--along with linebacker Leroy Hill and right tackle Sean Locklear, who are also among the team's best players. The Seahawks got a much better turnout than the Huskies did, that's for sure, but they didn't perform nearly as well. The defense couldn't stop Peyton Manning, who threw for 353 yards. The offense was utterly anemic, managing a mere field goal until two late drives when the game was completely out of reach.

Jim Mora told reporters after the game that the injuries are killing his team's chances: "We knew that it was going to be tough. We know with our situation being what it is, it was going to be tough until we get back to full strength. [...] I believe we’re a good football team that has had some things go against it."

Perhaps. But the Seahawks are now 1-3, and don't have a timetable for the return of Hasselbeck or Jones. This is getting close to another lost season, and fodder for the fans who argued the Seahawks should've taken a quarterback in the first round of last year's draft.

Safeco Field: Era of Good Feelings

The primary reason for going to the last Mariner game of the year was to see what might've been Ken Griffey Jr.'s final game. The other was to see Felix Hernandez' final start of the season. King Felix was terrific once again, getting his 19th win of the year.

Griffey got a standing ovation all four times at bat, and the M's marketing team played "Hip-Hop Hooray," just like they did back at the Dome in Junior's younger days. In his last at-bat of the day, Griffey laced a single up the middle.

The real fun came after the game, when fans stood and cheered and cheered and cheered after David Aardsma recorded his 38th save. Then, at the suggestion of Mike Sweeney, the M's jogged around the perimeter of the field, tossing balls and other miscellaneous items onto the field. As they reached home plate, some guys had the idea of lifting Griffey on their shoulders. Ichiro got the same treatment, leading to this incredible, joyous moment, captured by Seattle Times photographer Mark Harrison, which has immediately become my desktop wallpaper and one of my favorite images in Seattle sports history.

And, yeah, that's Carlos Silva, who last year threatened to grab an unnamed, supposedly selfish teammate generally accepted to be Ichiro, "and throw him into a wall," carrying the hit king on his shoulders.

The Mariners finished with 85 wins, 24 more than last season, and despite a third-place finish earned a well-deserved ten-minute ovation.

Sounders Won!

Meanwhile, out in Columbus, in a game I didn't have time to watch, the Sounders gave their playoff hopes a big push by beating the Crew. Former USL Sounder Roger Levesque had the only goal of the game--his first in MLS. If the season ended today, the Sounders would be the fourth of eight teams to make the playoffs. They are five points ahead of ninth place D.C. United.

Looking Ahead

A couple of huge football games coming up this weekend, both in town:

• The Huskies host Arizona Saturday. They must win to have any realistic hope of making a bowl game.
• The Seahawks host Jacksonville. They must win to have any realistic hope of making the playoffs.
• Also of note: The undefeated #3 Washington volleyball team plays at #9 Cal on Friday and #11 Stanford on Saturday.
• The Sounders have a bye.

Somehow this music video featuring Eastside Catholic High School's football team got all the way to national sports site Deadspin before we saw it. Once again, we taste the sharp sting of blogger failure. On the bright side, the video is amazing. Put on your eye-black and get ready to rock.

The Mariners have secured the 12th winning season in franchise history thanks to three-run homers on consecutive nights by Ken Griffey Jr. Both homers were no-doubters that had Griffey adopting his familiar slow walk toward first base. Here's video of Tuesday's and video of Wednesday's.

Griffey now has 18 homers for the year--and if he's wanting to leave a positive impression in his bosses' minds when they draw up 2010 contracts, he's picked the right time to get hot.

Statswise, Griffey hasn't made the case. His .408 slugging percentage places him 11th among AL DHs (didja ever think you'd see the day that Carlos Guillen outslugged Griffey?).

Personality-wise, he has. Last year's Mariners' clubhouse was full of backbiting whiners, this year Griffey has helped turn the "office" into a joyous ticklefest.

And 100-loss Mariners of last season now have an outside chance of capturing second place in the AL West. They are three games behind Texas with four to play--three of them against the Rangers.

Our brain says that the Mariners' defense is behind the turnaround. We've seen it all season, especially in the outfield where Franklin Gutierrez, Ichiro and a revolving door of speedy leftfielders have made triples die. The M's have the best defense of the decade, according to Dave Cameron of USS Mariner and FanGraphs.

Our heart would like to ascribe the turnaround to the clubhouse presence of Griffey and Mike Sweeney, whose earnest, hokey creation of "L. Ben Show" the bench show to bring together the team's backups is our favorite off-field wackiness of the year.

Our brain is winning. We expect Sunday will be Griffey's final game in a Mariner uniform, so childhood friend David and I will be there cheering him on and hoping beyond hope for one more home run.

I need Bo Eason to tell me it's okay to watch football.

After seeing Eason's engrossing one-man show at ACT on Thursday, I don't know if I can do so guilt-free again. Watching the former NFL player act out the injury that helped end his career actually made me physically ill. No joke: Sweat pouring out of me, I excused myself down my row, and hustled to the bathroom to splash water on my face. I thought about the real scars on Eason's actor knees, about seeing him inject himself there on stage, as he did before games during his playing days.

And I thought about Curtis Williams, who in 2000 absorbed a fatal hit playing in a football game for the University of Washington. "He fell to his back and went into convulsions," teammate Anthony Kelley relates in Derek Johnson's The Dawgs of War , which I'd read earlier that week . "He was mouthing the words 'I can't breathe .' ... Then Curtis began spitting up and shaking, and his eyes rolled up in the back of his head." Williams died of his injuries 18 months later.

This weekend, a 17-year-old Spokane kid died playing football. Today, the NFL announced a study showing that former players are 19 times more likely to get dementia than me.

"There's always a price to pay," Eason tells me over the phone, hours before Tuesday night's performance of Runt of the Litter . "I watch [football players] and I go 'Wow...the one part that's invisible is the blood, body parts, surgery after surgery and the committment to the training.' All we see is these young guys that look like Superman. We're not thinking about the years off their life that they take."

 

Bo Eason as Jack Henry in "Runt of the Litter" (Photo: Chris Bennion)

Eason's largely autobiographical show stars him as Jack Henry, an undersized Houston Oilers safety who, overshadowed by his star quarterback brother, made it to the NFL by training harder and tackling more violently than anyone else. Henry is in the locker room 45 minutes before he is to meet his brother's team for the AFC Championship.

The autobiographical parts: Bo Eason was an undersized Houston Oilers safety who, overshadowed by his star quarterback brother Tony , made it to the NFL by training harder and tackling more violently than anyone else. The non-autobiographical parts: the two Easons never played against each other.

Runt of the Litter is in part about the price we pay for success. And it's not just football players who pay it: The Yale kid taking adderall to fuel an all-night study sessions gets erectile dysfuction. The executive working stress-filled 80-hour weeks has a heart attack.

But I didn't derive entertainment from the impotent student and the dead businessperson, like I did from the paralyzed football player. Eason's shown me that I can't bear to watch the physical aftermath of a football game; yet I'm happy to cheer on the young men who play. Am I a disgusting person?

Eason says no--that athletics are part of human nature. And that they serve a valuable purpose.

"I think men have a lot of aggression inside of them and if there's nowhere to put that, it's a dangerous thing." Eason contends that football, and now acting, have saved him from far worse pursuits. "I put all this TNT inside of me on the field. Now I put it on the stage. If I don't have an outlet, I'm going to be in trouble. I found the two professions where it's okay."

Lest I give the wrong impression: Eason's show is not a jeremiad against modern athletics. It celebrates them. Eason relates hilarious stories of unforgettable teammates, of locker room hijinks. Partly, I suspect, to recapture the camaraderie he says he's missed since retiring from the NFL because of injury in 1987. It's a compelling 90 minutes of theater that's paced well and doesn't get dull. The ending is one you'll be thinking about the next day--at least that was true for my companion and I. (Also, Eason mentions former Seahawk Kenny Easley as one of his heroes, which earns him major points with me.)

Football fan or not, you should check it out.

And, with Eason's approval, I'll watch football this weekend. Guilt-free? Talk to me next time there's another Curtis Williams.

Runt of the Litter plays every day except Monday through October 11 at ACT Theatre.

Twenty-six years ago yesterday, we Mariner fans made our poorest showing of all time: only 3,360 of us came out to a late-season game against the Royals. (I have an excuse, I was only six years old and had spent my entire allowance on Colorforms.)

Take a seat, any seat

We'll never see a baseball crowd that small again (unless the M's bring back Bill Bavasi as GM), but we could see the smallest crowd in Safeco Field history this week.

The low turnout in Safeco Field history is 15,818, last May 6 in a game against Texas. But the stars are aligning for an even lower number tonight or tomorrow as the M's face the Oakland A's.

Three crowds from the M's recent mid-week series against Chicago took their place among the ten lowest in Safeco history; the 16,336 who showed up Thursday now represent the 4th-smallest crowd the stadium has ever seen.

Now the M's play a team with an even smaller fan base than the White Sox, and the temperature has dropped to the mid-50s.

I'm going, I've got season tickets and this one landed on my docket. The only good news is: 1) Felix Hernandez is pitching, and 2) The A's are starting a right-handed pitcher, so Griffey will likely start.

Neither of those things are likely to inspire a large walk-up crowd, especially when fans will have to brave rain on the walk.

None of this can compare to the bad old days of the Kingdome, when the M's were lucky to draw even 10,000 fans. In fact, in each the 11 seasons from 1978-88, the M's average attendance was smaller than the lowest-ever crowd at Safeco.

Wouldn't mind a little indoor action for this game, but I'll be fleeced up and ready to go. Who's with me? ... anyone?