Tuesday, July 27, 2010

Rayshawn Parker is upset! OH NO!

A while back, the monster known as Adrian Clayborn gave a quote to the Des Moines Register that some Cyclones have taken offense to. Clayborn, being the best defensive end in the country, and Adam Rittenberg's #1 Player in the Big Ten has earned the right to say a few things. His quote is, "we're the only team in the state, as far as I know." Now, I can see how some people in Ames take offense to this, but anyone who disagrees should remember that Iowa State has not scored a single touchdown against the Iowa defense since Clayborn first stepped onto the field. When you dominate someone that badly, you earn the right to talk a little trash. What really makes me laugh, is his counterpart on the Cyclones, DE Rayshawn Parker says that ""It upset me. It's like a slap in the face." To be fair to Parker, his head is probably still ringing from the shot he took as a freshman at Kinnick, so almost everything feels like a slap in the face. If you don't remember, it's a video I really like, and can be found in this article.

I am really looking forward to Parker and his teammates trying to do anything but get blown out of the water this year when the come to Kinnick in September. My preliminary line is Iowa -16.5, but things may change depending on loltastically bad the Cyclones perform against Northern Illinois the week before.

C.J. Fiedorowicz

I'm taking credit for everything good Iowa's amazing new tight end recruit does at Iowa.

After an hour or so sitting outside the gate at Kinnick before the Minnesota game, the security people inside start talking to me. They needed to test that the ticket scanners had been updated from basketball the night before, so they let my friend and I get our tickets scanned and head into the stadium early. We slide over to the security entrance behind the drum line, and get to zoom on through early so that we are in the front row by the time people come out of the tunnel to get seats. A short while later recruits come out, and my friend and I, knowing C.J. is visiting for this game, start a chant for him, ask him to come to Iowa, and generally show him the love that only Hawkeye football players get at Iowa. He's an amazing talent at TE, and will likely follow in the tradition of other Iowa TE's to succeed in the NFL. As you probably know, Iowa pitched their second straight shutout vs Minnesota in a 12-0 win, but you may not know that in the coming week, Fiedorowicz would change his plans and would attend Iowa instead of Illinois, largely based on this game. In announcing his decision (article) he gave the following quote:

"I'm set, no more looking around. Last weekend, I was talking to Iowa fans and they knew all about me. You could tell they care about their football over there."

For the next 4 years, C.J. is going to be my guy, and I will be just a little bit happier knowing that I did my part to make the Hawkeyes a better football team.