Words from General Schwarzkopf

@ArmyWP_Football put this out on Wednesday, and I love it so much that I can’t stop watching it.

Believe It. pic.twitter.com/DbY9emIjXQ

— Army WP Football (@ArmyWP_Football) August 30, 2017

Army Football Preview: Fordham

It’s been eight months since Army’s defense knocked down a last second pass in overtime to secure victory over North Texas in the Heart of Dallas Bowl.  Heading into the fourth year of the Jeff Monken Era, expectations for the Black Knights are as high as I can remember them.  Army fans want to see their team build on the success it had last season, and they think they have both the team and the favorable schedule to see it happen.

2017 Schedule

The Black Knights open their season this week against perennial cross-Hudson foes the Fordham Rams.  Though the Rams are an FCS school, they’re familiar with Army’s triple option offense, and they always seem to play the Black Knights tough.  Army is heavily favored, but this game will still be an important early-season test.

"...Never try to regain the past, the fire will have become ashes." – Douglas MacArthur pic.twitter.com/ihgM0db2pV

— Army WP Football (@ArmyWP_Football) August 23, 2017

What kind of team will the Black Knights field in 2017?  

We’ll get our first glimpse under the lights at Michie Stadium on Friday night.

NFL Preview: NFC West

It’s our fourth and final week of the joint Casa Cabeza / Hoosier on the Potomac NFL Preview.  If you’ve missed any of the preceding weeks’ previews, you can find them through the links below:

 -- NFC East

 -- AFC East

 -- NFC North

 -- AFC North

 -- NFC South

 -- AFC South

This week, we’re looking at the NFC West.  It’s a conference with some good teams and some teams with some serious question marks.  

Who’s gonna win?  

Eh.  My thoughts are below, along with links to highlight clips from each team’s 3rd preseason game.  The NFL disabled embedded clips, so the best I can do is provide the links.

Postcards from Maine

Greetings from Maine!

I hope you guys are all doing well.  We've been having a great time, save that I swam through a bunch of lily pads the other day--this was not intentional--and managed to pick up an annoying case of Swimmer's Itch.  It's right on my head!  

It's been driving me crazy.  Seriously.  Because of all the damned ducks up here.

Anyway, we've had a good time, especially yesterday, when we accidentally went on a much longer bike ride than intended.  It was perfect for me, but the pour kids pooped out a bit somewhere around Mile 15.  It's always that one last, unexpected climb.  Still, they were troopers, climbing something like 700 feet at the start over the course of nearly seven miles of unbroken inclines.  Honestly, that first stretch was mindbogglingly long, especially since we had no idea where we were or how much further we had to go before we hit the apex.

Three cheers for map reconnaissance.

We thought this was near the top.  Then we climbed another three miles.

Needless to say, it was a nice, long descent.

Anyway, we've hiked some and biked a lot, and I've swum a few miles in Green Lake.  All of which has been wonderful.  Word to the wise, though: don't swim with the ducks unless you're prepared to pay the price.

That price is... itchy.

I put some pics after the jump.  If you follow me on Instagram, you've probably seen some of these.  Others are new.  Hope you like them.

NFL Preview: NFC South

It’s Week 3 of the joint Casa Cabeza / Hoosier on the Potomac NFL Preview.  If you’ve missed any of the preceding weeks’ previews, you can find them at the links below:

 -- NFC East

 -- AFC East

 -- NFC North

 -- AFC North

This week, we’re looking at the mighty NFC South, home to last year’s conference champs and the champs from the year before last, too.  This conference also hosts some of the most exciting and intriguing quarterbacks in the entire League.

5 Things on a Friday: A Day in New York City

Different format this week.  Sally and I took the girls to Midtown West for a day of sightseeing.  I think this was technically a part of Hell's Kitchen, so Hannah kept telling us to stay on the lookout for Daredevil.

I reminded her that Matt Murdock is a lawyer by day.

I had sushi tacos with fries and a beer yesterday for lunch.
Part of why I love New York.

There's a giant AT-AT in the Disney store in Times Square.  Who knew?

NFL Preview: NFC North

Hello and welcome to the third installment of the joint NFL season preview that I’m doing with my friend and classmate Joe from A Hoosier on the Potomac.  This week, we’re previewing the NFC North.  Previous installments are archived below:

• NFC East
• AFC East

Swimming: Dieting Sucks, But...

Alright, so yeah.  I'm on a diet.  And it sucks.

I had a physical this week, and not to get all medically over-sharing on you, but I have a little heart problem.  I've also been putting on weight slowly but inexorably over the course of the last few years.  The heart problem isn't a big deal, exactly, but is something that we've been watching pretty closely since about 2010.  I have a slight mitral prolapse, and on top of that, there's also a minor blockage across the primary electrical conduction path in my heart, and it throws my heart's rhythm a bit.

In simple terms: my EKG looks a little wonky.

Or, as my doctor put it on Tuesday: "It's benign because you're controlling it with exercise.  As long as you keep working out, you'll probably be okay."

5 Things on a Friday: Farewell My Bluefish

Happy Friday, everyone.  The forecast this week is for sun with a chance of Nuclear Winter.

Enjoy!

NFL Preview: NFC East

Happy Monday everyone, and welcome to a new idea on the blog, the 1st Annual NFL Preview series.  My friend and West Point classmate Joe writes a sports blog called A Hoosier on the Potomac, and in course of trying to drum up traffic some traffic on both of our sites, we hit on the idea of doing a shared NFL football preview, and here we are.  We’ll preview the various division in the NFL over the course of the next eight weeks or so, alternating weeks by way of sharing—and hopefully growing—our mutual audience.  You can play along at home by either commenting on social media to tell us how crazy/insightful/wrongheaded we are or by sharing these previews with your friends at work, school, home, church, or even down at your local watering hole.  Bonus points if your church is also your local watering hole.

I’m up first with a preview of the old “Black and Blue” division, the NFC East.  

Final Thoughts: 2017 Swim Across the Sound

The 2017 Swim Across the Sound was yesterday, and while it was a nice day out on the water, I have to admit that it was also a tough day with a lot of hard swimming.  I'm more sore than I was when I did this event two years ago, despite the fact that I've been swimming much more this summer than I had been prior to the 2015 event.  I wasn't expecting that.

Team Snappers.  From left to right: Me, Dillon, Tom, AnnaCaroline, Jill, & Jess.

What can you do?  In the words of the late, great Yogi Berra, "Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, and sometimes it rains."  We had all of that yesterday, including some rain.  At least we got the event off.  For awhile there, it looked like they were going to have to cancel it altogether.

5 Things on a Friday: the Dark Lords of Sport

Happy Friday, folks.  I hope everyone out there in Internet Land is having a day.

I'm reusing this one.  Hope you don't mind.

Let's get it on!