For weeks now, Missouri fans have been discussing the upcoming “Beast Mode” Jerseys that Nike is putting out. With the jersey comes an advertisement. Here it is the text of it…It’s the Tiger Football program Mantra as created by Nike.

THIS T-SHIRT SYAS MORE THAN “BEAST MODE.” IT SAYS WELCOME TO THE TRUMAN SHOW. IT SAYS WE ORGANIZE A MILITIA TO PROTECT OUR HOME. IT SAYS WHO LET THE TIGERS OUT? AND THERE AIN’T NO ONE GOING TO PUT THEM BACK IN. IT SAYS LET’S TAKE THE WAR DRUM AND TEAR DOWN THE GOALPOST AND CARR THEM BACK TO HARPO’S, EVEN IF WE’RE PLAYING IN KANSAS CITY. IT SAYS, “HERE TWEETIE, TWEETIE BIRD, THE BIG BAD TIGER IS STARVING.” IT SAYS THAT THIS GAME, THIS TEAM, THIS GIANT “M” ON THE HILL MEANS MORE TO ME THAN ANYTHING ELSE. IT SAYS MIZ-ZOU OR SOMETHING CLOSE TO THAT DEPENDING ON WHOM WE’RE PLAYING.

Real Clear Sports is one of my favorite sports news Web sites. It collects a lot of different opinions and by 3 p.m., it has collected the best sports enterprise and features in the country. However, in its latest Top 10 list, Real Clear Sports calls the Telephone Trophy that Missouri and Iowa St. play for every year the sixth best college football trophy. Seriously?

Missouri plays Iowa St. on Saturday in Columbia. I’m sure the Tigers are talking about taking home the telephone trophy all week.

2.

I will get a lot of crap from my friend Shawn Garrison for this but college basketball before March is probably my least favorite sport to watch of the Big Four. The game has no flow and it takes two hours to play a 40-minute game. The refs decide how the game is played, who gets the majority of the calls and dictate the game. It drives me nuts how inconsistent basketball referees are so I just don’t like watch it. I would rather watch the NBA than college basketball unless the game is played in March.

Football is my favorite but it is only played four months of the year.

3.

My favorite new Web site I discovered this week is multimedia shooter. Obviously, I’m in the multimedia journalism generation that is going to take everything from the print newspaper to digital readers or the internet. I can’t wait until the digital readers become cheap enough. Imagine the flash graphics that you could present on a reader like that. You can entirely change how a story is told and how people consume the news.

4.

One day after Bill Belichick goes against tradition and goes for it on fourth down, people are still pissed off. I don’t understand why people aren’t okay with him trying to win the game on one play. On offense, Belichick has the best quarterback of the decade, the best wide receiver, the best slot receiver and a great offensive line.

Advanced NFL Stats breaks down why statistically it was the best move. Honestly, does anyone think that the Pats defense was going to stop Peyton Manning at home with over two minutes and a timeout?

5.

NorthJersey.com is reporting former Missouri basketball player Keon Lawrence was arrested for driving under the influence on Monday night. Lawrence transfered away from the Tiger basketball program before last season to be closer to his family and citing differences with head coach Mike Anderson.

Lawrence was driving with a suspended license and had two traffic warrants out for his arrest. The accident occured just before 3 a.m. early Monday morning. Lawrence was driving the wrong way down an express-lane traffic way.

Lawrence averaged 11.0 points, 3.3 rebounds and 2.4 assists his sophomore season at Missouri before transferring to Seton Hall.

The Yankees won the World Series. Yawn. My sports-writing idol Joe Posnanski shares his thoughts on the Yankees. I agree with Posnanski. How else did the 2006 Cardinals win the World Series? That’s the same team that almost blew a 10 game lead in September.

2.

Who doesn’t hate those “FreeCreditReport.com” commercials? If someone made an inflatable punching bag with that annoying guy’s face on it, I would punch it every morning for every time I’ve had to listen to that commercial. It’s horrible.  The US Government doesn’t like those commercials either.

3.

The Onion and Comedy Central are teaming up to make a pilot TV show that would spoof sports coverage.

This isn’t an original concept. Blogs have been bashing ESPN for years. Consumers have been bashing ESPN for years. I haven’t watched ESPN SportsCenter religiously since I was 10 years old. The problem is that if you’re a sports fan, you have to consume ESPN. Fox Sports Net deals only with local sports and has its 30 minute highlight show some nights but I can never figure out what time it actually is on. VS. only has hockey and college football. Oh and bull riding if you’re into that kind of thing.

Comcast might spend a bajillion dollars to buy NBC. Could Comcast attempt to enter the national sports market by beefing up Versus? There is a market for straight reported news on everything not just what ESPN owns broadcast rights to. I’m so sick of ESPN sounding like a sports talk radio show instead of a news outlet. Why are talking heads the new way to deliver information? See MSNBC, Fox News, CNN..ect.

4.

Joke of the Day: Two Musicians’ in a major symphonic orchestra were discussing who they thought the LEAST talented musician in the band was. One of them said; that’s easy. See that guy standing in the back? Well, we just put two sticks in his hands and we call him a Drummer. The other responded; well, if we take one stick away, we call him a Conductor!

5.

Finally, a shout-out to my brother who did this video a couple years ago when he was in high school.

300 Mighty Ducks

TONIGHT WE DINE IN HELL.

ESPN’s 30 for 30 series has been great. Tonight, it featured a documentary on the death of No. 2 overall pick Len Bias. I’m a documentary junkie. Every year, Columbia hosts the True/False Film Festival. That’s what got me hooked on watching documentaries. I like true stories. I like documentaries, non-fiction books and good narrative journalism. I’ll leave the fiction stuff to the sci-fi junkies.

2.

I failed my first test in college. A big fat 48 on an economics exam. To be fair, everyone did horrible on the test. Somehow, I developed a love of markets and how they work from that class while everyone else cursed the teacher so much that she almost cried in class one day. That’s why this article on savings interests me. I also can’t wait to be able to afford the new book Too Big to Fail by Andrew Ross Sorkin.

3.

This guy claims that Google is ending the world as we know it. At least that’s what he says in his new book. He was featured on C-SPAN’s Q&A this week. While flipping channels bored with the World Series, I stopped to watch what he had to say. The book is a biography of the company Google. But the most interesting thing he had to say was how Google has crippled traditional media. I can’t disagree with him. It’s up to traditional media to learn how to make money off its content instead of giving it away for free after so many years online.

4.

I love spending my Saturday’s relaxing on the couch watching college football. At the same time, I hate college football. It’s long been known that the BCS system is unfair but John Feinstein takes the BCS out to the woodshed and brings it back into the house crying.  At this point, is it any secret that teams like Boise State, TCU and Utah can hang with the big boys when they have their best years?

5.

Artist Video

1.

Jon Stewart can make everyone look stupid. But when it’s Fox News, it’s just a little too easy.

2.

I had a great time at the 2009 Associated Press Managing Editors conference in St. Louis last week. Check out the coverage our team from the University of Missouri did at apme2009.com.  The most interesting presentation given was by Detroit Free-Press managing editor Paul Anger about the Detroit Plan which saved the Free-Press and limited home delivery to three days a week. I think this is the future of journalism with only one or two printed editions which house entertainment features, watchdog journalism, food sections and good story telling. All of the breaking news will be done on the Web site.

3.

I don’t know why but I really don’t care about baseball right now. Yes, the World Series is going on but I’ve only watched two or three innings of the World Series. Maybe it’s because I covered 40 or so baseball games this spring but I doubt it. Major League Baseball just doesn’t entertain me anymore.  It might have something to do with hating Tim McCarver and Joe Buck.

4.

Californication might be the most raunchy show on television.  That being said I love the writing on the show. It’s funny, original and the story lines generally don’t suck. Every episode there are priceless random moments that make me rewind the DVR every time.

5.

If you’re ever having a bad day, just watch this.