Indianapolis is My Home

03
Feb

Cheaters Never Win, Winners Never Cheat

Author: Jason Bean, Category: Indianapolis Colts, News, Sports

A huge congratulations to Eli Manning and the New York Giants. What a season. What a comeback. What a Super Bowl.

Thank you for beating the Patriots and ruining their perfect season.

I’ve got to say this, there will probably be some smack talk in the Manning household for awhile. It’s a good thing that Peyton won last year, can you imagine the grief Eli would have been giving Peyton if he’d won his first?

Good job guys! What a season!

30
Jan

Indiana Pacers Desperate for Audience

Author: Jason Bean, Category: Conseco Fieldhouse, Indiana Pacers, News

I was just reading an article in the IBJ about the Indiana Pacer’s being in an ugly situation for attendance and revenue for the first time in well over a decade. It’s so serious that the NBA Commissioner, David Stern, is even keeping an eye on the situation. Rumor is they’ll even be asking the city for help.

But Pacers home attendance is a crippling financial factor. Sports business experts said a decline of the magnitude the Pacers are experiencing this year could cost the team $7 million to $9 million in ticket revenue alone. Lost parking, concession and other ancillary revenue that results from fewer fans’ attending games could easily put the loss in the eight-figure range.

Here’s an idea. Cut the crap!

When Chris Rock comes to town and jokes about not hanging out with the Pacers because they could "get you shot" would be hilarious if it weren’t so true!

I went to a game early in the season and tried to give them some benefit of the doubt, but less than a month later Jamaal Tinsley is involved in another downtown Indy shootout.

I’ve got to think the best move the team could make is some zero tolerance for about the next 5 years at least. I’m not sure if it could actually be accomplished, but I’d dump any player on the team that’s been involved in any court other than the one with goals and basketballs. I’ll bet they could garner some more fan support from 3rd string, hard-working college graduates than some of the players on the team now.

IBJ Source: What’s Pacers’ next play? Team falls into last place in NBA home attendance; league wants ’ship righted’

21
Jan

Woo hooo!!! Dungy’s Back for Another Season

Author: Jason Bean, Category: Indianapolis Colts, News, Sports

Good news today. Tony Dungy has decided he will come back for another season with the Indianapolis Colts. I believe that I should start preparing now for the fact that he’s probably not going to be here another year.

What a history and success he’s had with the Colts and in his coaching career as it is:

Dungy is 127-65 in 12 seasons as a head coach, finishing his six-year career in Tampa Bay as the franchise’s winningest coach. He is the only Colts coach to get double-digit victory totals and earn playoff berths in six straight seasons. He led the Buccaneers to the NFC championship game in 1999 and has been to the AFC championship game twice with the Colts, following the 2003 and 2006 seasons.

In 2007, the Colts became the first team in league history to win at least 12 games in five consecutive years, and Indy has won five straight AFC South titles. Dungy also has been an assistant coach with Minnesota, Kansas City and Pittsburgh and spent three seasons in the late ’70s playing for the Steelers and San Francisco 49ers.

Colts head coach Dungy will return for the 2008 season

20
Jan

Is Dungy Done?

Author: Jason Bean, Category: Indianapolis Colts, Indy Pro Athletes, News, People, RCA Dome, Sports

This is not happy news to even hint at but we’re all waiting to hear from Tony Dungy on Monday if he’ll be back for another season with the team. Irsay has already announced that upon his decision to leave, assistant coach Jim Cardwell will become head coach on Dungy’s departure.

We were talking this past week about the possibility of Dungy retiring from the Colts again. I can understand his desire to move on and focus on other things. The thoughts we all shared though was that his position as head coach of an NFL team that’s doing very well affords him the ability to make even more changes in the community for the good don’t you think?

I don’t think it bodes well that his kids have already enrolled in schools in the Tampa area. I’ll bet he could walk right back in the door of the Bucs and get a head coaching job back.

Sad day. Sad, sad day.

Photo Credit

15
Jan

Over for the Colts - Here’s to Next Year

Author: Jason Bean, Category: Indianapolis Colts, Indy Pro Athletes, News, Sports

I’m sad, but not too shocked. Let down, but not surprised. I’m amazed that our defense barely showed up for the game. We just didn’t play well at all. I don’t want to say we didn’t prepare, I’m sure Tony and Peyton wouldn’t let that happen, but we sure didn’t show up for yesterday’s game.

The San Diego Charger’s two star players LaDanian Tomlinson and Philip Rivers were both out for the 4th quarter and they still beat us. We let them march it down the field and score a touchdown.

I will say I think Norv Turner is a big cry-baby. He marched out onto the field on almost every call that went against his team. I will give him credit, the one he had a right to be upset about was the pass interference call with Reggie Wayne in the second half I believe. Didn’t see anything on that one.

If we’ve won the game I was going to try and get a movement going for thousands of Indianapolis Colts fans to mail Norv a box a Kleenex. Can’t really do that since we’re the losers.

Anthony Gonzalez had an amazing play tight-roping the sideline to run down for a touchdown. Great job!

I’m stuck between a rock and hard place now, it’s going to be good football hopefully. I really like Brett Farve, but I’m rooting big time for Eli Manning to have a good showing. I really like LaDaniana Tomlinson, but Philip Rivers appears to be a big jerk. I can’t stand the Patriots, but they’ve got a great team working together now and Belichick is a cheating but brilliant coach. I’d love to see the Patriots go down, but I’d also give serious credit to them if they can pull out everything and win it all. After all, if that were the case the last team to beat them will still have been the Indianapolis Colts in the 2007 AFC Championship Game.

Photo Source: Lucas Oil

07
Jan

Warm Indianapolis Weather

Author: Jason Bean, Category: Government, Indianapolis Area, News, Weather

Can you believe how warm it is in January? If you’ve lived here very long you probably can, nothing too surprising here for residents of Indianapolis and Indiana.

I was driving in to work today at 7:30am and had my windows down in the beginning of January! It goes both ways though, I remember one year getting a couple of inches of snow in April!

I’m sure we’re not over winter though by any means. Good thing too, my son is eagerly awaiting building another snow fort together after the first good snow this year.

Although I couldn’t really get the information from the website. The photo above appears to be the local offices of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration here in Indianapolis.

Photo Source: NOAA.GOV

07
Jan

Comcast Continues Move to More Open Market

Author: Jason Bean, Category: Areas, Business, Local Media, News

Most of the people in the Indianapolis area are using Comcast for their cable providing company. Insight is another company that’s got some penetration in a variety of areas, but since Comcast recently purchased Insight, it’s all the same now.

I’m getting more and more irritated with the Comcast DVR we’ve been using and if I had the available funds right now I’d dump it and move to the TiVo Series 3 almost immediately.

My wife was particularly ticked last night when her new episode of Desperate Housewives had all the audio recorded except for the actual actors speaking parts.

News in the cable industry may be opening things up a little more for Comcast and other major cable networks to begin working with other hardware devices so you don’t have to rely on a "cable box" to get all the goodies coming through the pipe. You would still pay for the service, just not their provided hardware.

This would allow companies like TiVo and even television sets themselves to use a CableCARD to get all the content off the coaxial directly.

Comcast made this announcement at CES:

An industry initiative, to be renamed "tru2way" after a decade in the works, is expected to allow electronics manufacturers to make TVs and other gear that will work regardless of cable provider. By making devices compatible, the standard also could encourage the development of new services and features that rely on two-way communication over the cable network.

Comcast Corp., the nation’s largest cable provider, will roll out the platform in all its markets by the end of 2008, Chief Executive Brian Roberts said in an interview with The Associated Press ahead of a speech Tuesday at the International Consumer Electronics Show.

Comcast is supposed to be rolling out TiVo powered DVR’s but I’ve yet to hear anything about them being available in the Indianapolis market. I’m waiting for AT&T’s UVerse to be available in my neighborhood, I’ll dump Comcast and try that when it’s an option for me.

Story Source: Comcast: Cable to standardize technology
Image Source: Thomas Hawk

03
Jan

Bad Timing on Indianapolis Headlines

Author: Jason Bean, Category: Areas, Elected Officials, Government, News, People, Politics

Trying to catch up on local news stories and working through my Bloglines reader and saw that the following two stories were right next to each other. I thought that was pretty ironic don’t you think?

• Ballard says crime will be top priority
• Indy police sergeant faces DUI charge

You may want to start looking around the offices there first for things to clean-up.

03
Jan

Hoosiers Among Those in Kenyan Turmoil

Author: Jason Bean, Category: Charities, General, Government, Indianapolis History, News, People, Politics, Volunteers

When news about Kenya arrives via the TV or Internet, I perk up a little more now than in the past. I’ve got a couple of web clients that are either directly located in Kenya or have strong ties to the area. My parents have been in some of the areas that are at the epicenter of these riots and turmoil as well. After college I had the opportunity to live in Nairobi and work for an undetermined amount of time at a local university there.

I came across an article in the IndyStar today that also let me know there are a number of Hoosiers that are also in the midst of the political strife happening right now in that country.

“I took heart in an ER this morning when I no longer needed to step over a body,” wrote Indiana University’s Dr. Joe Mamlin, who works at Moi University School of Medicine in the western Kenyan city of Eldoret, where about 50 people were burned alive Tuesday inside a church where they had sought shelter.

Hopefully things will calm down and everyone can get home safely. Hopefully the people and government of Kenya can get their own arms around this situation and determine the best solution to bring peace back to their country as well.

News Story: Dozens of Hoosiers stuck in Kenya
Photo Credit: Yahoo News

02
Jan

Lilly Bribed Saddam Hussein’s Administration

Author: Jason Bean, Category: Business, Government, News

Lilly should be giving some “Answers That Matter.” to the British pretty soon. It appears they, along with some other major drug manufacturers are being investigated for bribing the administration of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.

The investigation focuses on contracts that companies won with Iraq as part of the Oil-for-Food program, which the United Nations launched in 1996 to soften the impact of economic sanctions placed on Iraq after its 1990 invasion of Kuwait.

The investigation began in February, following a 2005 finding by a U.S. probe that more than 2,200 companies paid nearly $1.8 billion in bribes to win Iraqi contracts, Bloomberg reported.

That just seems to weird to be true. I’ll say that I’m completely ignorant of how the Oil-for-Food program operated though. It seems to me that if 2,200 companies were doing it, there could be some confusion in the law and legal process. Yet, that flies in the face of what our grandmother’s told us by saying “just because everyone’s doing it doesn’t make it right”.

Full Story: Lilly to cooperate with British investigation