The Best Show You May Not Be Watching: The League

I've been pretty overwhelmed by the amount of good television at my disposal lately, and I've slowly been trying to expand my horizons to new shows in order to find a new favorite. I am up to season three of Lost, although admittedly losing interest already; season six of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, which is lacking something, however still makes me laugh in a bizarre, 'I'm probably going to hell' sort of way; season seven of The Office, which is one of my favorite shows of all time; and one other show which may be the best show you are not currently watching: The League.

When I turned on the season premiere of The League, back in October of 2009, I only knew a little bit about what I was getting involved in. I was already aware of the terribly wonderful YouTube stylings of Jon Lajoie, so I understood the type of humor that was to come. It was far better than I could have ever though.

The League is an improvisational, comedic sitcom on FX about a group of friends and their Fantasy Football league. Sounds like a basic concept, right?
Well, the genius is that the characters are deeply rooted in the types of people we actually see in our very own Fantasy Football leagues: Pete is the recently divorced, three time champ and more than likely the only normal one; Kevin, the league commissioner whose wife knows more about football than he does; Ruxin, who will do anything it takes to do well, even if it means throwing his friends under the boss; Andre, a rich plastic surgeon who is reigning champ in season one despite not knowing nearly enough about football and the brunt of all the jokes; and Taco, played by the lovable Jon Lajoie, who doesn't care or try to care about football or the league, yet has won it at least once. He's also the younger brother of Kevin.

After watching episode one, it was clear this show had everything it needed to make a great comedy (ie: inappropriate songs sung to kids about sex). The creators gave the characters free reign to experiment, and that’s where this show soars. You never know how far over the line they are going to go, and to me that is what makes certain comedies stand out from others (ie: season three of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia).

Season two of The League premiered two weeks ago, and without wasting any time the producers included real NFL players into the script. Chad Ochocinco makes a guest appearance at The League’s fantasy draft after Andre invites him. Now that the creators of the show have seen how far they can go on FX, which is pretty lenient with a lot of material, sky’s the limit. It’s especially exciting to see actual NFL players in certain episodes now (episode three is due to feature Cleveland Browns WR, Josh Cribbs). A new character added to The League this season was Rafi, or el cunado, Ruxin’s incredibly vile brother-in-law. I was a bit iffy on his character in the season premier, however in episode two he erased all doubt with a hilarious performance.

If you are a fan of football or good comedies, or simply looking to try a new show, The League is for you. It’s filled with hilarious characters with a unique plot and an improvisational license to make us laugh for days on end. Stop slacking and tune in to The League on Thursday nights at 10:30 PM EST.

SHU Volleyball defeats Louisville, Osmun becomes all time kills leader

The women’s volleyball team split two matches this past weekend as they opened their Big East schedule on the road against the top two teams in the 2010 Big East preseason coaches’ poll, Cincinnati and Louisville.

After rallying from behind in the first two sets to force extra points (26-24, 27-25) on Friday, the Pirates dropped their third set (25-17) in defeat to the nationally ranked Cincinnati Bearcats. Cincinnati’s Big East preseason Player of the Year, Stephanie Niemer, finished with 20 kills and 10 digs to lead her team.
The Pirates were paced by senior Sarah Osmun who finished with 17 kills and 10 digs. Junior Meghan Matusiak tallied eight kills and 12 digs of her own, while freshman Alyssa Warren added 14 digs.

On Sunday, the Pirates stunned Louisville in five sets (25-20, 25-21, 19-25, 17-25, 15-13) with the help of senior Sarah Osmun, who finished the day with a game high 21 kills and 3 digs en route to becoming Seton Hall’s all time career leader in kills with 1,384. The record breaking kill took place with her first kill in the fifth set.

Junior Meghan Matusiak notched 14 kills, 11 digs, and four aces while sophomore Hannah Hugeback added 13 kills and 11 digs. The team effort was supported by a game high 47 assists for sophomore Olivia Trudeau and a game high 13 digs for Alyssa Warren.

“I had a good feeling about beating Louisville,” said coach Kris Zeiter, “and the win says a lot about the resiliency of my team. Most coaches go into a weekend like that and know they probably won’t win either game, but we did, and that’s great.”

Seton Hall took the first two sets in quick fashion. In the first, Louisville could never recover from an early deficit and did not come within three points of the Pirates all set. In the second, the two teams matched up evenly, keeping the lead extremely close the entire way. It was only after a 5-2 run capped off with an Olivia Trudeau kill that Seton Hall put them away.

After Louisville rallied back to win the next two sets, the Pirates made quick work of the Cardinals by pulling away after a 13 all tie. Louisville could not recover, once again, and the Pirates pulled off the upset.

Osmun, a senior from Crystal Lake, Illinois, did not have much to say about the kills record. Rather than focusing on the personal record itself, she praised her teammates for helping her reach the new record together.

“Volleyball is such a team sport,” said Osmun, “so if anything I think it just shows a lot about the teams I’ve played on and how much work we’ve done together as a team.”

Zeiter, who is in his fifth year as women’s volleyball coach, also understands that volleyball is the quintessential team sport.

“In basketball you can do things on your own with the ball,” said Zeiter, “but in volleyball, you can’t do anything unless you get a good setup, and Sarah understands that. She’s very modest and laid back.”

According to Zeiter, it was clear from the beginning that Osmun was going to be something great for the women’s volleyball program.

“I told her when I recruited her that if she came to Seton Hall, she could help us do some special things,” Zeiter said. “We beat Cincinnati for the first time ever in her freshman year, made the playoffs for the first time, and now we’ve beaten Louisville for the first time ever.”

As for Osmun, her mantra is quite simple.

“Win. Just keep getting better,” Osmun said. “Beating Louisville shows how much we really want to win. The rank of the team doesn’t matter, as long as you give the effort.”

The Seton Hall women’s volleyball team hosts West Virginia on Oct. 2, before welcoming Pittsburgh to Walsh Gymnasium on Oct. 3.

Why Felix Hernandez should win the Cy Young Award, even though he probably won't

I'm not the type for corny metaphors, but to make this interesting, let’s pretend that the Cy Young Award race is like climbing a mountain. Mount Everest, to be specific. Each year, pitchers begin to climb the mountain. Some fall off rather early, while others hang around for awhile. A select few, maybe four or five at most, climb more efficiently than all of the others. Now keeping in mind that only one of these pitchers can win the award despite all of their impressive resumes, or in this case all of their impressive climbing, these four or five pitchers must wait at the top of the peak for some kind of mountain dwelling committee to decide their fate. That's the Baseball Writers of America, for those of you who I have now confused.

This year, there are a number of pitchers who have the resumes to win the award. In fact, there are even two or three relievers who are in serious contention to finish in the top 10 in voting. However, one man will probably barely make the cut when in actuality he probably deserves to win the award outright. This man is Felix Hernandez.

They call him King Felix, the man who wears the brim of his hat down so low that you can barely tell if he has eyes. Hitters are scared of him. Pitchers admire him. His repertoire of pitches includes a fastball that can reach 100 mph, and devastating breaking pitches. And he’s only 24 years old. In just six years of Major League service, he has managed to become one of the most feared pitchers in the game. So why isn’t he going win the Cy Young Award, or even finish in the top 5?

Wins.

As a diehard baseball fan and a student of the game, nothing angers me more at the statistic ‘Wins.’ It is an incredibly simple stat to understand, and yet so troublesome, especially in a situation like the one I am writing about.

Hernandez, as of today, has an earned run average of 2.38 and a WHIP of 1.10, and his 200 strikeouts are tied for an American League best. He has pitched 211.1 innings and given up only 14 home runs, both which are league bests, as well as posting an impressive .222 batting average against. So why is CC Sabathia the favorite to win the Cy Young Award?

CC Sabathia has 19 wins. Felix Hernandez has 10.

The difference here is that Sabathia pitches for the New York Yankees, whereas Hernandez pitches for the Seattle Mariners. There is a fundamental difference. Let’s compare the numbers:



Hernandez has more strikeouts, less walks, a lower ERA, a lower WHIP, a lower batting average against, and has pitched more innings; but because Sabathia has 9 more wins, he is going to trump Hernandez when it comes time to vote. That is completely ridiculous. Sabathia’s team averages 5.8 runs of support in his starts, where Hernandez’s team scores an average of 3.1 runs per game. That is a staggering difference, and it certainly is not Felix Hernandez’s fault.

The Cy Young Award is an award that is given to the best pitcher in each given year. For some reason, an emphasis is placed on the pitchers who have high win totals or pitch for teams with better records. A win total does not mean a pitcher pitched well in all of those games. Sometimes a pitcher can have an awful game and still pick up a win. It is a statistic based solely on chance. When it comes to debating Cy Young Awards or any kind of award or merit for pitchers, wins are the last statistic I look at (if I even look at them at all).

What about Felix’s team? Just how awful are they? Well, here are the run totals for the Mariners in Hernandez’s 10 losses: 1, 3, 0, 1, 1, 2, 2, 1, 0, 0, 1. 12 runs in 10 games? That is absolutely horrendous. There isn’t a pitcher in the game today, or anyone who has ever pitched in history, that can survive with run production like that. King Felix has had his share of bad luck as well. On May 13th, early in the season, Hernandez gave up one run on five hits in a seven inning performance, demonstrating incredible control and dominance. The Mariners’ bullpen allowed the Orioles to score five runs after Hernandez was pulled from the game, and went on to lose the game 6-5. That’s Felix Hernandez’s fault though. Right?

How about on July 21st, when the Mariners hosted the Chicago White Sox? Felix Hernandez pitches eight innings of masterpiece baseball, giving up no earned runs and only allowing two hits. He struck out eight White Sox batters and left the game with a 0-0 tie. The Mariners won the game in extra innings, 2-1. Felix gets the no decision. His fault again, I’m sure.

This is not me trying to say CC Sabathia does not deserve the award, because statistically he is having a fantastic year. However, Felix Hernandez is having an even better year in every important facet of the game which is why he truly deserves to have his name engraved on the plaque. The award has never and should never be linked to team success and/or personal win accumulation. It should be based solely on how effectively a pitcher has pitched, using other vital and much more important statistics.

Let’s just hope the Baseball Writers of America put Felix Hernandez on top of Mount Everest, because that is exactly where he belongs.

movie review: confessions of a dangerous mind

" Confessions of a Dangerous Mind "
'Some things are better left top secret.'
Directed by George Clooney
Released: January 24th, 2003

For the second time in as many films, I decided to watch a movie that has been on my queue for ages. Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, based on the unauthorized autobiography of the same name, tells the supposedly true story of Chuck Barris, producer and sometimes host of many hit television game shows of the 60's and 70's, specifically The Dating Game, The Newlywed Game, and The Gong Show. The movie focuses on Barris' claims that he was not only a television producer, but a top secret contract killer for the Central Intelligence Agency.

Chuck Barris, played by the perfectly cast Sam Rockwell, is one of the most well known television faces of the 60's and 70's, having created one of the most successful early game shows on television, The Dating Game. It was a simple concept for a game: take a pretty girl, have her asks questions to three guys she cannot see, and then pick one at the end to go on a date with. His idea was laughed at by ABC, but in the end NBC took a chance and won. After The Dating Game moved to primetime television, Barris scored again with the creation of The Newlywed game, which forced newlywed couples to answer 8 questions about one another for a washer/dryer prize package. The film itself also focuses on the supposed secret life Barris led as a hitman for the CIA, where he claims to have personally killed 33 people. Although the CIA denies these claims, Barris holds his autobiography as the complete truth.

Sam Rockwell dazzles as Chuck Barris in a film that contains one of the best casts I have ever seen. Drew Barrymore stars as Barris' future wife, Penny Pacino; George Clooney, who also directed the film, plays CIA agent Jim Byrd; Julia Roberts as sexy, seductive CIA agent Patricia Watson; and Maggie Gyllenhaal as Barris' coworker on the set of American Bandstand. Matt Damon and Brad Pitt also have hilarious cameos as contestants on The Dating Game who lose to a chubby, mustache sporting man. Rockwell stole the show in such a convincing way, you'd think he might actually be Chuck Barris playing himself.

In his directorial debut, George Clooney impressed me with his style. It is evident he's an avid Coen brothers fan seeing as his style is strikingly similar. Using vivid colors, flawless scene changes, and an extremely chiaroscuro type feel in each scene, Clooney creates cinematic eye candy. Screenwriter Charlie Kaufman (Being John Malkovich, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, etc.) has claimed he was disappointed with Clooney's directorial style because he changed a lot of the elements Kaufman had in the original screenplay. Even if this is the case, Kaufman still wrote an incredible script, an absolutely perfect fit for the actors that were cast.

Confessions of a Dangerous Mind is an excellent film which I wholeheartedly recommend. For the first time in awhile, I came into a movie expecting something phenomenal and it was just that and so much more. This is the fifth film I've seen which was written by Charlie Kaufman, and just like the first four, I was positively riveted.

My rating: 9/10
Positives: Sam Rockwell with some of the best acting I've ever seen, fantastically directed, another terrific screenplay by Charlie Kaufman
Negatives: none that I can think of off the top of my head

movie review: sunshine cleaning

" Sunshine Cleaning "

'Life's a messy business.'
Directed by Christine Jeffs
Released: March 27th, 2009

A friend recommended this movie to me several times and I never had the opportunity to really sit down and watch it, but tonight I felt inspired to see a new film and so I did. Heading into the film, the only knowledge I had of this movie was that it is a film produced by the creators of Little Miss Sunshine, which is one of my favorite movies, and that the movie garnered generally positive reviews.

In the very first scene of the movie, a man puts a shotgun cartridge into his coat pocket and enters a hunting store where he asks the man behind the counter for a specific type of shotgun. The man hands him the shotgun and turns around, only to have the customer put the cartridge into the shotgun and commit suicide right there in the hunting shop. After this scene, Mac (Steve Zahn) is introduced as a policeman who discovers that the crew called in to the crime scene to clean the hunting shop makes an astounding $3000. Mac then tells Rose Lorkowski (Amy Adams), with whom he is having a secret affair, that she can make extreme amounts of money by cleaning up crime scenes. Feeling quite despondent about her day job as a house cleaner, Rose decides to become an entrepreneur and take on the crime scene cleanup business. Enlisting the help of her outlandish sister Norah (Emily Blunt), together they learn more than just how to clean up the remnants of the deceased.

The story is about dealing with loss, accepting and understanding it, and learning how we, as human beings, can reach out and help those who have lost. In the film, it is clear that witnessing the suicide of their mother as children has created a helplessness among the sisters. Even their father, Joe (Alan Arkin), struggles to find meaning and purpose in his life as an elder. The concept of the story is brilliant, however I felt as if the movie did not entirely deliver.

I think that what saved this movie from being an ultimate failure was the acting performances. As usual, Alan Arkin used the short time he had on screen to shine. Perhaps it was not as stunning as his Academy Award winning performance in Little Miss Sunshine, but his portrayal of Joe Lorkowski in Sunshine Cleaning was superb in its own right. Jason Spevack, who played Rose's young son Oscar, also deserves a nod for a wonderful performance.

Overall, I think the movie could have been better...but like most movies, when you go in thinking about it too much, you tend to come out disappointed. From now on I think I may just watch movies without really learning any background information at all in order to see if I can grasp the concepts and themes being developed without having outside information. I would recommend this movie to people simply because it is undoubtedly a morbid, feel-good story that will make you question the idea of losing someone very special. In my own opinion, however, I think it wasn't as good as I expected it to be.

As a good friend of mine often says, "no expectations, no disappointments."

My rating: 6.5/10
Positives: Amy Adams, Emily Blunt, Jason Spevack, and Alan Arkin deliver excellent performances
Negatives: Plot develops, but mundanely; not as funny or comical as expected; hugely average film overall