Adam over at Pitch Right has announced that he’s hanging up his cleats keyboard and taking what we can only hope is an extended break rather than a permanent departure from the blogging world. Adam was very supportive of this site from the beginning, and many of you only found it thanks to a link on Pitch Right. It’s our loss. Make sure to stop over and thank him for his work. Hope you jump back into the game soon, Adam. Thanks for your support.

Your blog choices are expanding pretty much by the minute. If you’re a Navy fan, you know Pete Medhurst. He is the Voice of Navy Lacrosse, the television voice of Navy football for CSTV, host of Navy’s CSTV All-Access, and the co-host of the Navy football Tailgate Show before each game. He knows what he’s talking about, whether it’s Navy sports or the sporting world in general. He’s as entertaining as he is enlightening, and now he’s blogging. Bookmark this: http://peteonsports.blogspot.com/. Try not to forget about me.

EDIT: Man, is this great timing or what?

I’ve received a few e-mails asking about my take on the whole Rutgers fan story. On the remote chance that you haven’t heard, there have been several reports from the game of off-color chants directed towards Navy players and coming from Rutgers fans, the student section in particular. I think it’s unfortunate, but it probably wouldn’t matter what team was playing in Piscataway that night. I don’t feel like Navy was singled out. This isn’t the first time that a few Rutgers fans have been mixed up in controversy. This incident has gained more widespread attention, though, because many people hold service academies in particularly high regard. Rutgers officials have issued apologies to their Naval Academy couterparts. With that, I feel the issue is more or less closed.

I didn’t write about it because I don’t take it personally as a Navy fan. Like I said, I’m pretty sure that the subsection of Rutgers students starting these chants would do so regardless of what team was visiting that night. I don’t see this as an “insult to the Naval Academy” issue as much as I see it as an issue for Rutgers to decide what kind of image it wants to project to the rest of the world. I’m sure it is true that things like this happen at games across the country. However, that doesn’t make it right. It can be stopped if a school’s administration really wants it to. It might happen at several schools, but not every school. Rutgers will have to decide the side with which it would like to be counted. I know which side’s schools I’d want Navy to be associated with on the gridiron.

The chanting isn’t nearly as offensive as Schiano padding Ray Rice’s stats by leaving his starters in and running for a TD on 4th down with 2 minutes left and the game already determined. I hope the team remembers that next year in Annapolis.

According to most college football players, anyway, in Sports Illustrated’s poll.

At least my mom thinks I’m handsome.

Here in the South, a “bird dog” is just another name for a Pointer. Pointers are a hunter’s best friend; dogs that track game birds and point at them so the hunter can find them. Like those hunters employing their trusty canines, the Naval Academy had a nationwide system of “pointers” in the 1950s and 60s led by the legendary “Rip” Miller. Instead of game fowl, though, these scouts looked for athletic talent. Scouts would identify high school athletes and alert Navy coaches, who could then begin the process of recruiting them. The similarity to the relationship between the hunter and his dog earned this scouting network the nickname, “Birddogs.” The Birddogs were once labeled by Time Magazine as “perhaps the most extensive recruiting service in college football. ”

Over time, as information became more readily available and college football became less of a regional affair and more of a national one, “Birddogs” became obsolete. Players can now mail their own highlight tapes to coaches, and they do it to schools across the country. While civilian talent scouting might be a thing of the past, the spirit of the Birddog as a far-flung advocate for Navy athletics remains, and is the inspiration behind this blog.

Or maybe it’s just to heckle from the balcony. It’s what the internet does best!

So there you have it. Hopefully a couple more “Birddogs” will catch on and have some fun with this. Happy reading!