No One Wants To Be In The Big 12 Anymore

The Big 12 is the least appropriately named conference in college football, since it only has 10 teams (the Big 10 ironically has 12 teams, just switch names already damn it). Well that number is about to go down to nine, since Texas A&M is taking its toys and going home:

Texas A&M dealt a blow to the Big 12 Conference on Wednesday, saying it plans to leave by July 2012 if it is accepted by the SEC or another league.

The move, which had been expected, may set off another round of conference realignment in college sports. The Aggies have made it clear they want to join the 12-member Southeastern Conference and the Big 12 said again after the announcement that it will move swiftly to find at least one replacement for the Aggies.

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“We are seeking to generate greater visibility nationwide for Texas A&M and our championship-caliber student-athletes, as well as secure the necessary and stable financial resources to support our athletic and academic programs,” Loftin said in a statement. “This is a 100-year decision that we have addressed carefully and methodically. Texas A&M is an extraordinary institution, and we look forward to what the future may hold for Aggies worldwide.”

It’s too bad that the SEC doesn’t really seem to care all that much about adding Texas A&M. A&M is like a middle child who is average in every way, but believe that if they just got out of the shadow of their older, more highly regarded sibling (Texas), everyone would like them. Marcia, Marcia, Marcia, etc.

Texas, blamed by some for running off Nebraska with its deal with ESPN to set up its own Longhorns Network, said it remains committed to the Big 12 with its storied rivalry with Texas A&M clearly in jeopardy

“As we stated last summer, we are strong supporters and members of the Big 12 conference,” Texas athletic director DeLoss Dodds said. “Recent events have not altered our confidence in the league. A Big 12 committee is in place to look at all options, shaping the future of the conference so it will continue to be one of the top leagues in the country.”

Obviously, Texas could care less about any of this because they’re going to make a buttload of money on the Longhorn network regardless if the Big 12 collapses. I kinda wonder why they simply don’t leave the conference and become independent a la Notre Dame, preserving all of their traditional rivalries without completely pissing on all of the other schools in the conference. My guess, it’s because they’re Texas and they’re assh*les

No One Will Be Shutting Charlie Sheen Up

When Charlie Sheen went bat sh*t last spring, it provided endless easy comedy for the likes of yours truly. Then it got old. But now, it’s been long enough that whatever asinine rants that Sheen spews next might be funny again (strange how comedy works isn’t it?). Which is why it’s good news that there will be no gag order during his firing arbitration with Chuck Lorre and Warner Brothers. Prepare for some truth missiles!

Charlie Sheen’s legal battle over his firing from Two and a Half Men might end up a little more public than Warner Bros. andChuck Lorre would have liked.

The Hollywood Reporter has learned that the arbitrator overseeing the $100 million legal proceeding between Sheen, Men co-creator Lorre and Warners has denied a request for a broad gag order in the case. The media still won’t be invited to attend the arbitration, and confidential details relating to facts deemed “sensitive and proprietary” will remain private, but the parties and the lawyers will be free to discuss the case with the press as it chugs along toward a resolution.

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The ruling is a mixed bag of sorts for Sheen. He has shown a keen interest in discussing the Warners/Lorre litigation in many media outlets, so the ruling will give him more freedom in that regard. But the judge’s order will likely prevent him or his team from talking about the most sensitive financial details or potentially embarassing personal facts about Lorre.

Warners and Lorre also must be disappointed. They moved the case to arbitration in part to avoid the public spectacle that a trial involving one of Hollywood’s most famous and volatile figures would entail. Sheen is now free to talk about the case as he promotes his upcoming Comedy Central roast and his planned comeback sitcom Anger Management.

I asked Charlie Sheen for a comment (because he’ll do an interview with anyone these days), but he just tried to cast a spell on me with his warlock powers. I think he might have been high, he seems like the kind of guy who might do drugs.

Gregg Easterbrook Thinks Vince Young is the Future

Derp

When we last left ESPN’s resident Christian theologizer, Gregg Easterbrook, he was conclusively proving that the Bills are cheap because they cut crappy players like Trent Edwards, that Al Gore hopes that the world ends in 2012, and that no one reality checks anything, including his own columns.

So what idiocy will Greggggg spew this week? Well, there’s stuff about how practicing is bad, complaining about the Catwoman uniform, and a full NFC preview. Follow the carnage after the jump:

He Really Needed to Get Back to the Island

I never watched Lost mostly because I don’t feel the need to show how “cool” and “intelligent” I am to anyone who will listen, but also because Lost sucked (wanna fight about it?). On top of it all, Matthew Fox always struck me as kind of a douche. Well I have to say it’s always nice to be proven right:

Matthew Fox was arrested early Monday morning, Aug. 29, after allegedly punching a woman in the chest and stomach.

According to a police report obtained byThe Hollywood Reporter, the actor is accused of attempted to hitch a ride to his hotel aboard a private party bus. The driver, a 29-year-old female, blocked the entrance and informed Fox that he could not board, as the bus had been rented out.

Fox then allegedly punched the driver in the chest and stomach, before receiving a blow to the mouth in return. The woman suspected she may have broken her hand and would be seeking medical attention if needed.

To be fair, it was Cleveland so he probably thought the driver was a dude… When asked for further comment, Fox mumbled something about smoke monsters and time travel (man, Lost was stupid).

A tip of the hat to @rgspiegel for the headline, check out his blog

Go See This Movie! (When It Comes Out)

I know it looks like a mugshot, but this is how he shows up to job interviews

I hadn’t heard of Gangster Squad, until today, and although the title makes it sound more like a Filipino cop drama than a Hollywood one (where are the bullet puns?? no colon?) I now want to see it more than any movie ever. Deadline has reported that Nick Nolte has joined the cast as a police chief (is the character an alcoholic? cause that’s all Nolte can play) facing off against Sean Penn. Also there is apparently an elite police task force (the Gangster Squad) comprised of Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, Mireille Enos (?) and Anthony Mackie (The Hurt Locker). That’s you idea of a hardcore police squad? Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone? Are they going to cute the bad guys to death. I guess it’s feasible, if Emma Stone questioned me, I’d confess, she is after all, all the way beautiful…

Weekend Recap: This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things

Here is your weekend recap, late as promised. On a further programming note, I’ll try to bang out one more post this evening, but the Gregg Easterbrook FJM’ing won’t be up until late tomorrow evening as I have a family obligation during the day.

Hurricane Irene hit the east coast this weekend and even though it barely rained in my area, it was enough to keep people from seeing movies, making this the second slowest weekend of the year so far, after Super Bowl weekend, of course.

The Help continued to lead the pack, earning, $14.5MM bring its cumulative gross to $96.8MM, proving that white peoples’ self-esteem isn’t going anywhere. Columbiana came in second, earning $10.5MM, which I assume has more to do with Zoe Saldana’s fine body than things like writing and realism. I think we’re past the point of pretending that people care about quality.

Our Idiot Brother, the one movie out this weekend that I actually wanted to see, came in fifth, bringing in only $7MM, which sucks. By most accounts, Idiot Brother was a well made if slightly cheesy film. It had a likable star and screened well at Cannes. By my standards, it’s exactly the type of comedy that Hollywood should be making more of, rather than churning out Seltzer and Friedberg Scary Movie re-hashings. Alas, the poor performance at the box office means that even less smart, earnest, comedies will be made. This is why we can’t have nice things, America, we don’t appreciate them.

Programming Note

I had planned to move today, but due to Hurricane Irene, will likely be unable to do so until Monday. I will try to get a weekend recap done Monday night after moving, but I can’t promise anything. Sorry folks.

Weekend Preview: Nothing Doing

Oh, Paul Rudd, you're my favorite

I’m moving today, so your weekend preview is coming early. Just accept it.

Movies

Our Idiot Brother: Paul Rudd is a lovable buffoon who teaches his family a lesson about seeing the good in others. Or something along those lines.

Rotten Tomatoes: 69%

Uninformed Commentary: I realize that is fodder for middle-class liberal intellectuals, but let us have our things, okay? The monster truck crowd gets 15 movies a summer, we deserve at least one. All you Sevendust listening jackanapes got Fast 5, Transformers 3, Conan the Barbarian, and to a lesser extent The Green Latern, Thor, Captain America, and  X-Men First Class. All we got is The Help and half of us found it insulting. Also, I bet Zooey Deschanel’s farts smell like rainbows.

Jerry Richardson Wants You Damn Kids to Get Off His Lawn

Jerry Richardson is the owner of the Carolina Panthers. He is also a 500-year old douche who doesn’t like all this newfangled nonsense that the kids are doing these days:

In a recent interview on “The Charlie Rose Show” on PBS, the 75-year-old Richardson recounted a conversation he had with the the 22-year-old Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback on April 4 in which he asked Newton if he had any tattoos or piercings.

When Newton replied “No sir, I don’t have any,” Richardson told Rose he told the quarterback: “Good. We want to keep it that way.”

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The April 4 meeting came just weeks after the team had signed tight end Jeremy Shockey, who has several tattoos.

“I’m not a choirboy. I’ve never said I was. And I don’t want a roster of 53 choirboys,” he told the newspaper in April. “I told Jeremy Shockey, ‘Don’t change your personality. It’ll be good for the team. I could do without the tattoos, though.”

In “The Charlie Rose Show” interview, Richardson also said that Newton said he was thinking about growing out his hair. Richardson said he responded, “I think you have a very nice haircut.”

When Charlie Rose told Richardson he sounded like Vince Lombardi, the Panthers owner responded: “I think I sound reasonable.”

When I asked Jerry Richardson for further comment, he told me to pull up my pants and turn off my hippity hop music.

Also, can Charlie Rose fellate the people he interviews any more? Jerry Richardson is the face of ownership greed, not the greatest coach in the sport’s history.

Here’s an Idea, Just Don’t Make It

Fox really, really, wants to make a Wolverine sequel for some reason. The problem is that no one else seems in much of a hurry.

The studio says it never officially has given the sequel a production state date. Fox was looking at a Fall 2011 start date for the Christopher McQuarrie script for Wolverine 2 starring Hugh Jackman and directed by James Mangold. But now that may push back to Spring 2012.

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But we’re also hearing that the start date will wait until after Jackman finishes making Les Miserables. There’s no question that 20th Century Fox wants the pic badly and has been trying to get its sequel to the X-Men spinoff The Wolverine rolling for quite awhile now. In June it landeddirector Mangold after Darren Aronofsky bowed out in March, ending one of the most competitive contests among Hollywood helmers for a major studio film. That set up the studio thinking that it could begin production in the fall.

Wait people were competing to direct a Wolverine sequel? This looked mildly interesting for about a second when Aronofsky was going to direct, but then he realized it was a Wolverine sequel and decided to bow out. Mangold has a decent resume, including Walk the Line; Girl, Interrupted; and a personal favorite of mine, Cop Land. He’s also directed Knight and Day; and Kate and Leopold. The problem is, no matter how good the director is, there is almost no chance that the script for this will be any good, so why bother? Have you people learned nothing from last weekend?