A Jack & John Investigation: Did Kevin’s homer clear the 25′ high net?

On Monday, Jack could barely contain his emotions as he tried to grasp the possibility that KLIN ”Drive Time Lincoln” producer Kevin Thomas hit a slow-pitch softball home run over a 25′ tall catch net at the Union College fields at 56th and Calvert.  Like former New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison, Jack tried to convince John that this was a story of great significance and that such a feat – if it did happen – was worthy of front page consideration in a local newspaper.

But like Garrison-to-JFK murder, Jack’s words seemed to fall on deaf ears despite his public and off-air pleads.

Sadly, an Abraham Zapruder film of the incident is not available.  There were no cameras rolling at the time of the moment.  But KLIN’s John Bishop, dogged investigatory journalist that he is, finally succumbed to Jack’s cries of attention (emphasis on “cries”) as he returns to the scene of the incident and attempts to put the pieces back together in this now infamous incident.

Please forgive John as he thinks he has channelled the spirit of the late Walter Cronkite during his narration (and he didn’t even bother to attempt a Cronkite impersonation.)

PART 1

PART 2

Truth, like gold, is to be obtained not by its growth, but by washing away from it all that is not gold.  ~Leo Tolstoy

Celebrity Look-Alikes: You Decide

Unlike whether or not Kevin Thomas’s homerun actually cleared the catch-net at the Union College fields at 56th and Calvert, the guys have stumbled upon yet another trivial arguement that needs solving by the “Jack & John in the Morning” audience.

Jack insists that Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan looks like comedic actor Kevin James.  So much so, that he swears the two were separated at birth or that Kagan is actually James in drag.

John think Jack is smoking crack (poetry intended) and says that Big 12 Commissioner Dan Beebe looks more like actor Andy Buckley (who plays Michael Scott’s former boss David Wallace on the NBC series “The Office”) than Kagan resembles James.

So it’s up to you.  Check out the pictures and then vote.  Winner gets bragging rights and if Jack wins, that means at least another three days on the air talking about how Kevin’s titanic homerun really didn’t clear the catch fence at 56th and Calvert.

Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan

Actor Kevin James from "King of Queens"

Actor Andy Buckley (a.k.a. David Wallace from "The Office")

Big 12 Commissioner Dan "God Bless (the University of) Texas" Beebe

 

 

Show Rewind 6/25: Fremont, Facial Hair and Free Food

-Today was the day Jack shaved his beard into the styling as you, the listeners selected.  Scroll down or click here for the slightly disturbing results.  In the afternoon, Jack went with another style, that was, well, interesting.

-We officially opened up entries for the “Bun in the Oven” contest, where our listeners have the chance to win a $50 gift certificate from the Oven restaurant in Lincoln if they can correctly guess the gender of Jack’s soon-to-be-here baby and make the closest guess to the actual date/time the baby arrives.  Today, Jack’s wife Meagan joined the guys to give her thoughts on Jack using their child for the purpose of a radio contest.  She also provided some inside information for those wanting an edge in making their predictions. Hear that interview here.  If you’d like to enter the contest and try your hand and winning a bunch of free food, follow the simple instructions here.

-We interviewed Kris Kobach the Kansas City attorney and UMKC law professor who wrote the controversial Fremont immigration ordinance.  In addition to responding to some of the arguments made by ACLU Nebraska legal director Amy Miller, he refuted the Omaha World  Herald article claiming that the city of Fremont’s insurer had decided against using Kobach as counsel on the soon-to-come lawsuit.  Hear the interview here.

We’ll leave you with this:  a goosebump-inducing video of Americans around the world reacting the late-game Landon Donovan goal in the World Cup on Wednesday–and it starts right here in Lincoln.

The Voters Have Spoken!

Jack rocking the "Chester Arthur"

This new look for Jack had us wondering all morning where we have seen this look before.  Then, right after the show, Dane seemed to remember.

See if you agree.

Yep.  I thought that look was familiar.

The Official Baby Mitchell Arrival Pool

If you hadn’t heard yet, Jack has a new baby son or daughter on the way, and if you know Jack & John, they always find any event just a little more exciting when there’s a some action on it.  So, today we’re unveiling the official Jack & John in the Morning Baby Mitchell arrival pool.  The pool winner is going to score a $50 gift certificate at the Oven in Lincoln (we thought it appropriate, given the ‘bun in the oven’ metaphors).

All you need to do to enter is guess:

1.  The gender of the baby, and

2.  The date and time (to the minute) he/she will be born

In order to win, you’ve got to get the gender right and be the closest to the actual birth time.

Now, we can give you some assistance.  The baby’s due date is July 23rd, and that date has stayed the same throughout the pregnancy.  Also, Jack’s wife is going to be on the show tomorrow at 7:20 to offer some additional assistance for contestants.  FWIW, Jack’s got one other child, a 5-year old son, who was born 3 days in advance of his due date.

You can enter either by commenting below (please include your first name, last initial and an email address) or by emailing an entry to JackandJohn@klin.com.

Yes, Tornadoes Do Hit Cities

Last week while we were watching the aftermath of another Midwest tornado, my wife commented how “these things always seem to hit the little towns and never the big cities.”  Well, the folks in Billings, Montana will pause to disagree.

Sure, we’ve seen tornadoes hit big cities before.  Oklahoma City.  Salt Lake City.  Lubbock, Texas.  Omaha.  But the storms tend to find the smaller towns more often.  Either way, it’s a good reminder that when severe weather happens it needs to be taken seriously.

And if you think you are safe inside a large arena, watch this video of the roof being torn off Billings 12,000 seat arena and consider what it would have been like to be in there at the time.  Thankfully, there was no event going on at the time.

You Decide 2010: Jack’s Facial Hair

So after three months, Jack is finally ready to get rid of the beard (much to his mother’s delight).  But, before getting rid of it for good, it has been suggested that Jack use the opportunity to parlay his exisiting facial hair into something even more attention-getting.  So, on Friday morning, Jack will be rocking a ‘novelty facial hair styling’, and you can decide which you’d like to see.  Of course, we’ll post plenty of pictures and video.

 

 

Mustache

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fu Manchu

 

 

Amish-Style beard w/o mustache

 

 

 

Mutton Chops into Mustache

  

 

Soul Patch

 

Show Rewind 6/22/10-Fremont Speaks

Outside of Jack’s controversial insinuation that interest in having a rain gauge at one’s house correlates with advanced age, today’s show, for the most part, focused on the big news out of Fremont last night. In case you somehow missed it, Fremont’s citizens passed the proposed illegal immigration ordinance by a margin of 57/43.  After Jack was done gloating that he had previously predicted the outcome to the exact percentage point, the guys still have a lot of questions about the ordinance that are more practical than philosophical.  For instance, it has been said that a large driver of illegal immigrants into Fremont has been the meat packing jobs at big outfits like Hormel and Fremont Beef.  Both of these businesses, however, are a) outside of city limits and not subject to the requirement to use e-verify or abide by its results and b) apparently both are already using e-verify anyway.  So, these businesses are somehow both already using this method to prevent the hiring of illegal immigrants, but there’s still a big enough problem with the issue in Fremont that this ordinance was born.  So, obviously making every employer use the methods these meat-packing plants are using will certainly be effective, right?  It doesn’t add up.

Further, from reading the ordinance it seems that the ‘occupancy licenses’ provision may provide some serious enforcement problems.  If you note the language, it indicates that one applying for a license only need to sign a statement saying that he/she is a citizen or national of the United States.  As long as the applicant signs that statement, there is no further verification that the applicant is responding truthfully.  A search of the Federal database is only triggered when the applicant declares him/herself to be an immigrant. While we realize this section was probably crafted to avoid legal challenges alleging racial profiling, as the  ’human element’ is essentially removed from the entire process, it’s not  difficult to imagine illegal immigrants easily scheming around this system’s provisions.  Perhaps this difficulty in finding the equilibrium between legality and effectiveness is part of the reason there haven’t been more localities successfully attempting a journey into the world of immigration enforcement.

All that is to say nothing of the amounts that it will cost the city of Fremont to defend this ordinance in court, perhaps before it’s ever actually put into practice.  This is probably a good time to mention the guys will have ACLU Nebraska’s legal director, Amy Miller in studio at 7:35 on Wednesday to make her case for the illegality of the Fremont ordinance.

In the end, while emotional rhetoric dominates the discussion of this issue, we think practical & logistical issues will, in the end, determine the wisdom of Fremont’s decision.

Show Rewind 4/16/10-Mayor vs. Auditor & “The (712)”

Before getting into today’s show, I want to take a moment to thank everyone for the anniversary wishes.  I mentioned on the show this morning that my wife Meagan (a frequent show guest) and I are celebrating 9 years of marriage today, and I’ve received several nice messages.  Meagan I are now on a mission to outlast Al & Tipper Gore.  Wish us well.

Now, to today’s show:

-Mayor Beutler joined us and had some strong words about State Auditor Mike Foley’s plans to audit the Haymarket Arena.  He said that not only would a State audit be duplicative of an annual private financial audit that is already planned, but also that this sort of an audit is outside the legislatively-defined role of a State Auditor.  Beutler revealed he is asking the city law department to determine what the extent of the Foley’s authority is, and he didn’t rule out going back to the Legislature to further clarify the issue.  This should be interesting.  Don’t miss the audio here.

-We’ve been speculating for days on how Iowa fans feel about the soon-to-be-realized Iowa/Nebraska rivalry, so we went to Des Moines Register sports columnist Sean Keeler to get the pulse of the Hawkeye State.  In addition to surmising that Iowa fans wouldn’t be ready to replace Minnesota with Nebraska for their end-of-season game, he also said most Cyclone fans and their athletic department alike realize that Nebraska took an opportunity that they would have also taken if offered, so there isn’t any particular bad blood outside of the  inevitable gameday trash talk.  Perhaps most importantly, Sean & Jack exchanged stories of spending formative years in Sioux City, or, as Sean called it “The 712″.  Hear the full interview here.  Also, Keeler’s posted a poll question for Hawkeye fans about who they’d most prefer as their end-of-season matchup.

-Finally, we were happy to see our interview with Harvey Perlman cited in both Lee Barfknecht’s piece in the OWH today and Brian Christopherson’s piece in the Journal Star.  In fact, in Brian’s piece, the LJS broke their long-standing practice of citing news broken on our show without actually mentioning the show by name, in favor of something like “a local radio station” or “KLIN’s early morning show”.  We thank Brian for giving us the full cite, as we try to do for our sources.  We also think Brian wears cool retro baseball caps while covering Husker football practices, so he’s also got that going for him, which is nice.

Perlman on KLIN & Some Final (?) Thoughts

 

LISTEN TO PERLMAN’S INTERVIEW WITH JACK & JOHN HERE 

UNL Chancellor Harvey Perlman never took a snap from center, but he has led the Huskers to perhaps its most important victory ever.

Chancellor Harvey Perlman has been raked over the coals in recent years for a couple of decisions that infuriated many Nebraskans.  First was the Steve Pederson fiasco – though at the time Perlman was lauded for hiring “the ideal candidate” for athletic director.  Second was the move to take over the State Fairgrounds for UNL’s Innovation Campus, thus shipping the State Fair to Grand Island away from its 100 year home in Lincoln. 

But bygones are mostly bygones today after Perlman helped engineer Nebraska’s move into the most powerful major college conference, the Big Ten.  And it didn’t hurt that Perlman aggressively spelled out his case for leaving Texas behind in front of a statewide audience at the NU Board of Regents meeting last Friday. 

While the remaining Big 12 (Southwest Conference, Part II) members are heading for a potentially lucrative deal, Nebraska gets the cash, the clout, the partners, and the stability that it has sought.  There is no question that NU is the biggest winner in all of this conference shakedown 2010.  It is the only school to improve both its academic and athletic finances and standing.  It is the only school that is not wondering about tomorrow, both short and long-term. 

But Nebraska is not the only winner.  Texas has also won.  They have exactly what they wanted, their own conference.  Nebraskans had fought for years to deny that Texas was in control of the Big 12.  Let there be no confusion from hence forward – you can call it Big 12, you could call it Great Plains League, or (my recommendation) the Southwest Conference – but this is Texas’s personal playground and the other 9 schools are just happy to be invited.  The Longhorns will get more money, they’ll get their own television network and they’ll get to spin that they saved the Big 12 and were “looking out for their conference brothers.”  Now, we all know that last part is Bevo droppings considering the Longhorns were playing footsie with three other leagues (SEC, Big Ten, Pac 10) in a game of college athletics Texas Hold ‘Em, but to the casual observer Texas looks like Superman.  They put an end to the radical movements in college athletics that could have left Kansas without a major conference, preserved long-time rivalries and (for the college football purists) kept the college football playoff reality from an accelerated timeline.  

I still think this revised Big 12 is doomed to fail, but Texas found out through this process that no matter what happens in the next go-around in conference musical chairs that they will have a place to land.  They have muscled their way to the top along with Notre Dame as the two programs who carry the most influence in college athletics.  For the surviving members of the Big 12, they had better hope that they treat this New Texas Order with the kind hand of a benevolent dictator. 

As with in any game, winners must be counterbalanced with losers and there are a few.  Missouri stands out like a black and gold thumb.  The Tigers were not bashful about their displeasure with the Big 12′s revenue sharing plan.  Their state politicians all but dropped to their knees to the Big Ten, begging for admission, but in the end no invite was coming.  It does ease the pain that the Tigers won’t be left totally in the cold, but it has come at a terrific price.  Their long-held dreams of Big Ten admission are busted for many years, maybe permanently and now as the other 8 teams feel a debt of gratitude to Texas, Missouri is going to feel down right subservient.  If you want to compare this “new” Big 12 to a mafia family, Mizzou is Fredo Corleone after Michael found out about the betrayal.  If I were Missouri AD Mike Alden, I wouldn’t schedule any fishing trips anytime soon. 

KU, OU, Mizzou, ISU, Okie State, K-State: Welcome to your nightmare

Kansas basketball fans are breathing easier today, as they should.  Their beloved team will still play in a good basketball conference and retain the prestige within their sport that they have earned since Dr. Naismith invented the game.  But when you look at the global picture, KU hoops and Bill Self got a major jolt to the system that they are a smaller fish in a much bigger pond.  The fact that KU came thisclose to being relegated to January and February conference dates with BYU, Air Force and Colorado State should scare Self to the point where he should make close friends with Turner Gill and convince his players to not mess with the football team anytime soon.  Self may be the most decorated and popular man on campus, but it’s Gill (or whoever runs the football program) who wields the real power.  Without a viable football program, Kansas is just another school.  

Finally, I have to ask where Oklahoma was during this process?  I thought they were a major player in college football?  The Sooners silence on this subject and their apparent latching onto whatever Texas did is not totally surprising considering their rivalry, but if OU wanted to keep the Big 12 intact they seemed to exert zero influence over the situation.  Maybe they didn’t care if Nebraska stayed or went.  But even Oklahoma has to understand that a conference with themselves, Texas and Nebraska is better than a conference without the Huskers.  And if they didn’t want NU to leave, then why couldn’t they have played a mediator as the two powers stared each other down?  Of course, we weren’t privy to all the things behind the scenes, but Oklahoma was strangely silent and seemingly ambivalent to all the things blowing around them like a tornado.  Even though OU stands to make upper-tier money along with UT and A&M, they still come across today as another one of Texas’s dwarves. 

Now onto the future.  The Big Ten.  Plenty of opinions will be given on the alignment of the Big Ten’s divisions.  While I understand the desire for geographic balance, this new day for the Big Ten allows for an opportunity to see things in a new way.  The Big Ten now brags the #1 (Michigan), #4 (Nebraska), #5 (Ohio State) and #9 (Penn State) winningest programs of all time.  This conference has a golden opportunity to showcase these four teams in a way that nobody else can.  I believe the divisions must reflect that.  With that said, I am for putting Ohio State and Michigan in one division and Penn State and Nebraska in another.  Then, take advantage of those divisional matchups by having a Super Saturday where the Saturday before Thanksgiving you have the traditional OSU/Michigan war along with the new division rivalry between the Huskers and Nittany Lions.  With that said, here are my proposed divisional alignments. 

Division A – Nebraska, Penn State, Iowa, Purdue, Minnesota, Michigan State 

Division B – Michigan, Ohio State, Indiana, Wisconsin, Northwestern, Illinois 

Then, I would follow the SEC’s crossover formula allowing for the continuation of annual rivalry games.  They would be: 

Michigan-Michigan State 

Minnesota-Wisconsin 

Purdue-Indiana 

Then an every two-year home-and-home rotation between Division A teams Nebraska, Penn State and Iowa and Division B teams Ohio State, Northwestern and Illinois. 

There will no doubt be sentiment that the Big Ten football championship should be contested in a dome that is conducive to fan travel.  That narrows your choices to Detroit, Minneapolis and Indianapolis.  Nothing against any of those cities.  But now that the NFL has shown a willingness to take a chance with an outdoor, cold weather site Super Bowl (New York/New Jersey), I don’t think you can rule out a once-every-five-years attempt to play in two of the most iconic football locales – Soldier Field and Lambeau Field. 

Cold?  You bet your frost-bitten butt.  But any football player that doesn’t want to play on the field once graced by Walter Payton or Vince Lombardi isn’t someone who would want to play in the Big Ten in the first place. 

The only thing better than Big Red in Green Bay?  The Huskers scheduling their own game with Northwestern in Wrigley Field. 

Just dreaming.  It’s fun to dream in the Big Ten.  And no more Texas nightmares. 

I know nine other schools that are waking up to visions of orange cows dancing in their heads.