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Story about markets, entrepreneurship, economic development, and the best and worst of humanity. Less of Space Marines nuking aliens, though conflicts do arise.
Descriptions of how things work may ultimately be oversimplified, or even wrong. If there are any interesting concepts I under-explain, I will try to link to more outside reading, though a knowledge of economics will not be required to understand the plot of the story.
There are references to some events and people in Galactic Economics, but I tried to write this story in a way so that you won't have to read it to understand this one. And I wouldn't mind if you went and read it at all!
The Story So Far:
Humanity entered the galaxy with the discovery of FTL. They began to make contact with the galactic community, based on trading ships operated by aliens of thousands of different species. Soon, they realized that the aliens had forgotten to invent some rather important concepts that humans have taken for granted.
Currency. Banking. Economy.
Without money, aliens had extremely hobbled trading networks that relied on barter. They slowly accumulated wealth and technology over generations of inheritance. Despite these inheritances, quality of life for the average alien was prehistoric by human standards due to lack of consumer goods.
As humans expanded, they started running into the Ribbiths, the first species to discover FTL, who had been oppressing the traders of the galaxy with a protection racket. They had leveraged their first mover advantage into a permanent monopoly on violence, until the rising humans quickly put an end to that.
Humans introduce themselves to their neighborhood, bringing their lean, mean economic machine into the stars, but they run into some unintended consequences:
Not all development is equal. Not all transitions are smooth.
At Gakrek, humans showed their tremendous capability for goodwill and altruism with shiploads of food aid and relief for a planet suffering from widespread planetary famine. And at Bohor Orbital, the aliens showed that the values humans held dear were not unique or unteachable.
With the establishment of the Galactic Union, the galaxy entered an age of rapid modernization, a gold rush of unimaginable scale. And as with every revolution, as the saying goes: there are winners and there are…
Gophor, Gakrek
Enrico woke up to the sun shining in on his face, from the high window of the small brick room he was boarding in. He pulled out his phone from his cargo pants pockets and checked the time. It was six and-
Has it really been four years?
From a middle-class family in Italy, he had moved to Chicago before First Contact. The stories of people getting rich off the aliens triggered an early mid-life crisis for him at the young age of 30. He said goodbye to his parents and friends and sold all his belongings. Then he hopped a ride on board a trader spacecraft with a bought cargo full of dry foods and durable consumer goods to the first destination they would go to: Gakrek.
He struck a deal with a spaceport security guard to look after his goods while he hiked all over Gakrek, looking for new experiences and meeting new folks. He introduced his race to many Gaks who had never even seen any aliens before.
And right when he thought he had figured the planet out, the famine struck.
Millions of Gaks starved to death every day. Watching them waste away, there was nothing Enrico could do other than open up his warehouse of food to feed them, as he took one day at a time himself as well.
When the Red Cross arrived, he joined up and became one of tens of thousands of people handing out supplies to the hungry aliens.
And when they left three years later, he decided to stay. It was a booming economy. He could feel the electricity in the air when the local Gaks chattered excitedly about new plows, new irrigation, and the new credits that had flooded their planet.
The past few months, he had been crashing at the place of one of his friends from back in the pre-famine days, a young security guard by the name of Grob and his wife. As he entered their dining room…
"Good morning Grood," he intoned in his terrible Gak pronunciation. He was getting better at it every day, but his mouth just refuses to make the right sounds sometimes.
Grob's wife, a teacher at a local school, giggled and also made an attempt at cultural exchange, "gnooood moooorning reecoooo". They both agreed that she was much better at English than he was at Gak.
"You're making rice for breakfast?" He asked as he turned on his translator, not smelling much from her stove.
"Yes!" She nodded enthusiastically as she glanced at her simmering pot.
Enrico wasn't a fan of the way she made rice. For some reason, the Gaks loved to eat rice at the consistency of oatmeal, which reminded him of how some Asian cultures cooked it for breakfast. His personal theory was that wet rice requires less actual rice but was just as filling, even though it contained fewer calories. This must appeal to the Gaks who were used to dealing with a constant shortage of food.
It was better than nothing.
"Anything you need me to get at the spaceport later?" Enrico asked out of habit.
Grood shook her head. She didn't need much. School wasn't in season. Like many Gak teachers, she only taught a class for three months out of the year: the three months during winter when nobody had anything to do. The rest of the time, she stayed home and tended to the house.
Without modern household conveniences, hers was a full-time job.
Grob woke up. It was a good sleep. He could see the sun from his window.
Pulling on a t-shirt, he made his way into the dining room where Enrico was making the table and serving the rice. "Good morning Enrico", he didn't even bother with English. Enrico had a translator anyway, so Grob wasn't sure why he even tried to learn Gak. Just one of the many weird things that the human did.
"Hey Grob," Enrico glanced up, squinting at his t-shirt, "ah it's the Falcons winning Super Bowl 51 today eh?"
Like many humans, Enrico always teased him about his cheap Earth-made t-shirts, but he loved how comfortable and colorful they were. Enrico had tried to explain what football was to Grob once, but the concept of deliberately expending thousands of calories of energy just to advance 120 yards in one direction repeatedly… It was simply too alien for Gakrek right now.
As he does every day, Enrico browsed the now massive selection of goods at the Gophor Spaceport market. All the vendors moved to using credits a while ago, and he could pay for things by transferring over money from his bank account back on Earth.
There were several farm goods vendors, who had by far the largest booths with multiple cargo shipping containers they'd "appropriated" from the Earth relief effort. Enrico found it amusing how much stuff the volunteers of Earth left behind as worthless junk were now being used or sold on the market as premium items. A few of the food vendors had moved into what was previously the large briefing tent for relief workers to keep their produce out of the sun.
There were now also small electronics vendors selling Earth compatible batteries and gadgets. These were mostly for the few humans who opted to stay on Gakrek, though a few of the farmers were beginning to invest in some agricultural use items imported from Earth. Enrico had bought a FTL Internet adaptor from one of them, but it was still expensive to use.
Ma Bell charged by the minute, even with the abundance of human telecom infrastructure in Gakrek space. Some things don't change.
Enrico entered the food tents. There was a vendor selling potatoes, one peddling Earth chicken, and to his surprise, there was a merchant loading up what looked like a Coca-Cola syrup cartridge into a soda machine. Enrico watched him start filling cheap plastic bags with the mixed sugary drink and placing them on the table for sale.
Bagged soda, what a world!
"Hey Enrico!" It was Ghili, one of Gordorker's adopted daughters, who had set up a little stand next to the Cola vendor. "Over here!"
"How are you doing Ghili? And are you here alone?" Enrico asked, curious if Gordorker was at the market too. He made his acquaintance with the middle-aged Gak farmer a while back when he started selling his wheat crops at the spaceport.
"Yes! And I'm good! Dad lets me come make trades by myself now," Ghili beamed proudly, and then looking a little shy, "do you want to buy some bread?"
How could he say no to her? "Ok, how much?"
"2.99 GC for a loaf of white and 5.99 for a loaf of whole wheat!" Ghili recited automatically. She had learned to read and write numbers from a human Red Cross volunteer, and when she was old enough, Gordorker immediately put her to work as a merchant for his food products. After all, doing work for the family was the entire point of raising so many children in the first place.
"Six bucks for a loaf!" Enrico feigned outrage, "I can pay for a ride to Earth, get a big load of bread, and come back for less money!"
"Maybe, but they won't be freshly baked like these are." Enrico was skeptical; Ghili's trek to the spaceport must be at least half a day. He played along, sighing dramatically and wagging his finger at her, "ok, fine, I'll have two. But you better give me your two biggest loaves!"
She swiped his card, he typed in his code, and the transaction went through. "Say Ghili, where did you learn to make bread? You ever been to Earth?"
"N…no. Gromor, my brother, has! He works at a mine and one time, he sent me back a book of how to make all kinds of Earth food," Ghili said. Then looking a little disappointed, "though we can't make most of them here because we don't have the right spices and ingredients."
"Oh, that's too bad," Enrico said. Then he added, "though I can introduce you to one of my trader friends who may be able to import some of them if enough people here want the-"
"Really?" She asked, her face lighting up very hopefully, "please! There's so many things I want: cinnamon, garlic, ginger, sesame, nutmeg…"
As he was typing a message to N'har, a trader from Yis'Meh, on the spaceport Wi-Fi requesting the items Ghili wanted, Enrico looked up at all the vendors. Suddenly, he was struck by a thought. Something was missing here.
They had plenty of goods. Food, items, wares. Goods. Raw goods. Manufactured goods. In some ways, Gophor Spaceport had so much more variety of goods on sale than even many of the spaceports on Earth. But there was one thing missing. Something nagged at the back of his head.
As he finished typing and started browsing on his phone, he saw some advertisements on social media and realized what it was.
Services.
Hundreds, if not thousands, of traders now flood in and out of Gophor every day. It was a busy spaceport. At midday, some of them would take a break, go over to the food vendors, and buy some fruit or even cooked chicken for lunch. That was where they chatted with other vendors about the latest news in the business.
Despite the massive number of customers that passed by the spaceport every day, there was not a single restaurant in sight.
In underdeveloped countries where the majority of people were poor, this would make a lot of sense. Most of the poor can't afford to eat out; even in developed countries, it was somewhat of a drain on the middle class's finances to eat at restaurants too often.
But the beings who frequented Gophor Spaceport weren't poor. Not at all. They're the wealthiest individuals in the galaxy.
When the currency revolution swept across the galaxy, most creatures got richer. From being barely sustainable feeding his own family, farmers like Gordorker would start being able to comfortably feed thousands of people soon. Crafts-beings were starting to assembly line their process and a smattering of mass-produced low tech alien consumer goods were starting to appear on the galactic markets. The factories of Earth moved fast, but there were only so many of them that could be built, and the galaxy had thousands of planets.
Traders' wealth exploded exponentially. By virtue of starting out richer, they had even better access to capital than the poor and destitute on Gakrek. Many of them were even becoming millionaires now, and many knew that the famous Zikzik probably would have eventually ended up a billionaire if he hadn't tragically died on Bohor Orbital.
Most traders spent most of their money on two things: their spaceships, and Earth. And they were mostly buying their spaceships and parts from Earth too.
Earth became obscenely wealthy from this massive inflow of capital, but this was not a factor holding back growth on other planets. After all, whether people ate out more or less often or consumed some quality of life services… It just doesn't have that big an effect on other decisions like buying a new car or house or yacht or spaceship. Maybe a little for some, but not that much.
Traders started finding themselves having plenty of disposable income to burn, and not enough places to spend it on.
Chicago, Earth
Rey Crawley was a low-level manager at the McDonald's corporate HQ in Chicago. She supervised a team of engineers who made websites for the company's promotions and special events. It wasn't terrible work, and she was paid very well. But she was finding it harder to get out of bed to go to work every morning.
Rey had started out as a promising shift manager at a local McDonald's store at 16, which is surprisingly… totally legal. She graduated to managing the entire restaurant at 22 when the owners caught the previous manager skimming money off the top. She turned the failing franchise around in a short two years, and they sent her to McDonald's HQ's famous Hamburger University.
There she got a degree in "Hamburgerology". Surprisingly, it wasn't a total waste of time. They taught her business development, management skills (some of which she already knew by intuition), supply chains, leadership…etc all that jazz. It was a prestigious place of learning, with a lower acceptance rate than Harvard, and it was supposed to put her on track to owning her own restaurant one day. This was when things fell apart. Or rather the economy did.
With stiff competition popping up everywhere else in the restaurant industry in the early 21st century, there just weren't that many places that wanted a new fast food restaurant. She couldn't find a bank that was willing to loan her the money to get started. Without a place to go, and with a fairly niche education, she ended up just applying to work at the corporate office.
It wasn't bad at all. She was earning a cushy six-figure salary and saving up cash while still dreaming the business owner dream.
A few years later, she noticed a social media post from a high school friend, featuring pictures of flora and fauna from a different planet.

Rey: Long time no talk Enrico, how's it going out there in the galaxy?
Enrico: Great! I love Gakrek. You ever been?
Rey: I wish! I haven't even been to space…
Enrico: Ah so what do you do now?
Rey: Manager at McDs HQ
Enrico: Wow! I heard that pays a lot!
Rey: Yeah… it's not bad. A bit boring though haha!
Enrico: Hey, I've got a question about that actually…

After a lengthy night of conversation, Rey quit her job the next week. She converted her savings into GC at the local branch office, and bought a translator and some gadgets. Then, she hitchhiked onto the next ride to Gakrek out of Chicago O'Hare Spaceport.
If you wrote a book about globalization and the American way of life in the 20th century, McDonald's would be its own chapter. It popularized the assembly line method of preparing food, mostly invented the drive-through restaurant, and it has a long and fascinating history around its iconic branding, American soft power, and its major role in the obesity epidemic.
One crucial thing to note about the modern McDonald's though, is that many experts, even those at the company, will tell you that it is NOT a restaurant company. Its main business is not to sell milkshakes, delicious fries, or even burgers.
It is a real estate management company, one where they tell their tenants precisely how they're allowed to pay rent.
(They do run a few of their restaurants, but those make less than a fifth of their money actually selling food. And they would really prefer that number to be less than five percent.)
This is how their franchising model works: if you're a prospective owner of a McDonald's franchise, they train you, sell you some signs and menus, and get you hooked up with their global supply chain. And then they tell you, "good luck and remember to pay rent on time."
Unless you make their brand look bad or break a few rules, they don't really care that much about what happens in your store. The most important thing for them is that you stay in business and pay them between 5% to 30% of your revenue.
That's why the quality of service and environment of every one of its franchises can seem so different, and yet the food almost always tastes the same. The coffee and burgers come from the same supply chain, but the management and ownership of each store may vary wildly.
Collecting from franchise owners instead of selling food somewhat shields the $50 billion real estate company from fluctuations in local economies. No matter how much labor pricing changes or how much the price of chicken goes up or down, they get their rent payments and franchising fees.
When humanity first reached out into the stars, the prices of shipping goods were high, and building a multi-planetary supply chain was a fool's dream. But then, credits got introduced, orbital outposts got built, standard pricing systems optimized the inefficiencies out of the galactic economy, and the major trade barrier known as the Trader Guild got the boot. Suddenly, the idea of having an offworld franchise became much more feasible.
And with a huge abundance of grown human food courtesy of the famine relief, as well as capital from the vitalized economy, the clown in red, white, and yellow was looking at several offworld planets as test sites for its plans of galactic domination.
Gophor Spaceport, A Week Later
As the hatches opened, the warmth of the Gakrek atmosphere hit Rey like a sack of moldy potatoes. That's what it smelled like too.
She thanked the Bhak trader who gave her a ride, swiped her card in his trading Terminal, and tipped him a generous 250 GC for the ride. Then without looking back at his shocked expression, Rey buckled the straps on her backpack and walked off the ramp towards her destination: the only other human she could see.
"Enrico! Haven't seen you in a while! How's Gakrek been treating you?" Rey shouted at him as they came in for a short hug.
"Great," he replied, smiling, "a lot better now that's for sure."
"Oh yeah? I saw about the famine thing on the news," she shuddered, not ever having experienced actual hunger herself, "must have been real bad."
"Yeah, yeah, it was," Enrico said, and then added quietly, "some people here don't like to talk about it."
"Gotcha," Rey said solemnly. "So… show me around?"
About an hour later, Rey and Enrico found themselves a spot around the edge of the market, where they sat down at an abandoned parking lot in use during the spacelift. They took out their tablets, and started planning the future.
"Since you came here, I assume you think this could work," Enrico started to question.
"Yup, I've heard that the higher ups have been talking about something like this for years," Rey said, getting excited. "And there's always been one thing or another stopping them, but the big thing has always been shipping cost."
"Right."
"But costs have been decreasing for years. Even if it isn't profitable today, it will be soon," she concluded, "so we gotta start now for when it is."
"Got it. Alright, heheh, so I actually have no idea how to run a company or a restaurant-," Enrico said nervously.
"Yup. You'd have no idea where to even start. That's why I'm here," said Rey very matter-of-factly, "what I need for you to do is to help me with the supply chain."
"Supply chain?" he sputtered, "But I have no idea how that works either!" Before he came to Gakrek, he was a development chef for a large pizza chain that had a less than popular reception in Chicago, which had its own pizza culture. The most management experience he'd ever had was making sure that he didn't run out of beer in his fridge at home.
"Don't you? When you showed me around the spaceport, you told me which trader brought in the syrup for the soda machine. You pointed out that the chicken farmer was a growing business that didn't have many chickens. You know who the honest crafts workers are and which ones might try to get one over on you. You're on a first name basis with the daughter of the biggest farmer around, and Enrico," Rey said seriously, continuing without taking a breath. "We're staying at the house of the guy who enforces the laws here! One of the biggest problems chains have expanding into Third World countries at home is having to pay all the right bribes to the right people, and you said his wife loves you? Bruh."
"Oh."
"Yeah, don't get a big head or anything," she smirked. "But did you think I was gonna get on a spaceship without knowing the kind of person who I was going into business with?"
Their talk segued into the finance discussion they had started online: Rey had enough savings from her work as a corporate manager to get started and to get people interested. She was the one who wanted to own the place, so there wasn't much dispute there.
Enrico just wanted to get into the ground floor of a new business. He knew this would help the people he'd grown to like, and it would be an exciting new adventure with a business his Gak friends have never seen before.
Their interests aligned.
At the end of the day, Enrico found Grob to drive them home.
He was chatting with another security guard, which their translators caught from far away. "… and since they both wanted the last cargo container, they shared it, but Gromula keeps taking the wares on his side… ah hey Enrico", Grob was saying as he came into view. "Ready to go home?"
"Yeah sure, and this here's the friend I was talking about. Grob, this is Rey. Rey, Grob."
After introductions, Grob drove with them sitting in the back of the truck while complaining about his work. The vendors were petty and got into catfights all the time. The traders threw their trash everywhere and never cleaned up after themselves. The spaceport doesn't pay them enough.
Judging from Enrico's amused expression across from her, Rey surmised it was a pretty average day for Grob.
"Grooooooood," Grob yelled into the open door, "we have another visitor from outer space!"
"Welcome to our homes!" Grood had known that Rey was coming for a week now, and she had spent it cleaning and preparing everything. She showed Rey around her makeshift kitchen attached to the dining room. She noticed it was just a plastic fold out table from the Red Cross and several plastic stackable chairs placed next to it.
Grood then pointed to their guest room and shrugged, "we don't have that much room, only one for guests and one for us, so you will have to share with Enrico." Then Grood made a big theatrical wink as if she had some unique insight into the nature of their friendship.
Rey had expected to have to share rooms, but blushed at the comment anyway, "that's not a problem. I brought my own sleeping bag," and as she pulled out items from her camping bag, said "and I've got something for you, Grood."
"For me?" Grood actually squealed.
It was a portable sewing machine kit that took double-A batteries. "I heard they haven't started importing these yet-" and the rest of what she was about to say was muffled by Grood giving her a joyful teddy bear hug.
Wife of the guy who they'd normally have to pay bribes to and all.
While Rey and Enrico were sleeping in the house of Grob and Grood, a major geopolitical shift was happening a mere few hundred light years away.
Of all the species, the Zakabarans were some of the slowest to adapt to humanity's introduction of credits and economic reforms to the galaxy.
The Zakabarans were an old species. Like many other such species, they had achieved space travel countless generations before, and they were able to colonize and exploit the resources of other planets in their system. When they discovered raw resources on an outer system planet with a liveable atmosphere, they sent ships, machinery, and people there.
Over time, Zakabara Second developed a population of almost a billion and a distinct economy from the homeworld. Without arable soil, they could not cultivate crops. They had to import them all from Prime, which they exchanged for the raw materials they mined and the output from their growing processed goods manufacturing sector. This was not a problem; after all, Prime traded food to everywhere else.
When humans and their money came, Zakabara had been the center of food exports for centuries. When cheap Earth fruits that were higher in nutrition and lower in cost hit the galactic market, farmers lost the most in the food export business.
Doing what most other planets did, Zakabara Prime started to industrialize. Agricultural abundance was no longer the path to prosperity, so they diversified. They put their highest skilled laborers to work in factories, developing and creating new engines, new ships, and even weapons in some cases. Their farmers abandoned farms, and they started to work in large factories manufacturing low cost, low tech goods for newly formed corporations.
After all that happened, despite how poor the entire galaxy started out, it still had thousands of planets, full of billions of thinking, working, and productive beings. The aliens were catching on.
Unlike what other species did, Zakabara started heavily restricting what could be imported into their spaceports. Food was, of course, banned. What Zakabarans would eat, they would grow themselves.
On the other hand, Zakabara Second was also undergoing changes. As a colony, the people of Second traded mostly with their cousins on Prime, and were mostly unaffected by the money revolution at first. When cheap Earth food flooded the galactic markets, Prime farmers' were forced to sell their food below cost (in credits) to Second.
However, as the Prime food export industry collapsed, they started to grow less food, and the cost of Zakabaran food in their colony went back to normal.
Normal was way above galactic average.
To make things worse, with the mass development of Prime's industrial sectors, the price of goods dropped in the system. They were no longer as willing to buy from Second.
In direct contradiction to the policies dictated by the centralized government on Prime, Second started directly trading with the outside galaxy and with Earth.
This made some people on the homeworld very, very unhappy.
These new developments did not go unnoticed at a quiet government building at Langley, Earth.
This was a relatively short chapter because of the previous series synopsis taking up the character count. But I think it starts with a good setup for the upcoming challenges and conflicts I'm planning.
There are several good sources on the operations and management system of McDonald's: The Founder is a decent biographical drama starring Michael Keaton; it's on Netflix. Or you can read Ray Kroc's autobiography "Grinding It Out", which is basically the same story but spotlessly sanitized from his point of view. Or, as this story claims, most economic textbooks written about globalization in the 20th century have explored its many innovations in business culture and model.
RoyalRoad
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Great Day for BB despite stick dipping.

I have been a long time blackberry follower and have followed the autonomous vehicle market closely here is my speculation on what is happening.
Blackberry announces monumentous venture with Motional and the stock tips 4%. Crazy! Recap: Amazon recognizes the cloud computing company that has best security will have dominant position in autonomous vehicle market. Partners up with BlackBerry/QNX to form IVY. Amazon/ BB Announce IVY will collect vehicle data and share it with automobile manufacturers (OEMs) at no cost to the OEM. They're only play (assuming they are still companies that are trying to make money) Is what they're not saying. They wanted to be the platform for all cars so they can provide V2V and V2X communication. This will not be a one-time licensing fee this will be a streaming fee.
Look at the history of personal computers. The first wave was the desktop that also evolved into the laptop. Apple and Microsoft dominated. The mobile computer was the next wave where BlackBerry got in early but did not keep up with innovation. Eventually Apple and Google dominated that market. It included cell phones and tablets. The third wave will be automobiles or more specifically autonomous vehicles. Remember, cell phone started with a mobile device used to make phone calls. It morphed into a mobile computer with one of its funtions (minor functions, if you're below 30) being telephone calls. The automobile in the future will be as morphed from cars today as smartphones are from flip phones. It will be a self-driving, infotainment, navigation, communication, security system. Every company: Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Apple, Baidu, Tesla, recognize this and wants a piece of that pie. The ability to bill automobile owners monthly for streaming service similar to having Wi-Fi at home or in the office. Similar to paying for monthly mobile service.
Amazon struck first and not unlike a pickup basketball game chose the best player on the court - Blackberry. Amazon is a 1.6 trillion dollar company while BB was a $6 billion company. Amazon could have easily bought BB instead of joint venture on IVY. That is perplexing, It is tantamount to Warren Buffett asking me to do a deal with him. It is almost beneath Amazon to do joint ventures with companies that are valued at one half of one percent of their market share. So really what give? If BlackBerry has something it wants buy the whole company!
The explanation is simple. If Amazon made a play to buy BlackBerry they would have to submit a tender offer. They would be showing their cards. All the big boys would understand Amazon is trying to monopolize the best security to corner the autonomous vehicle market. There would be a bidding war by its Titan competitors. Apple, Microsoft, Tesla, or Google could have all countered with their own offers. No matter how committed Amazon was to buy BB there is no guarantee they would have come away victorious from a bidding war. Rather, they chose to enter a secret long-term contract with BlackBerry, airtight and with exclusivity.
Immediately Microsoft recognized what Amazon was up to and acted quickly to do a similar joint venture with Cruise/GM. Apple immediately tried to partner with Hyundai. Hyundai so flattered and obviously horny for Apple did not consider or ignored their previous commitment to QNX and BB. Yet, the deal fell apart because Hyundai was already committed to BB. Motional is a conglomerate owned by Hyundai and Kia that has developed autonomous driving for Lyft. Apple wanted to be the provider of V2V and V2X for Apple cars, Motional was already committed to BB/QNX and hence Amazon.
To be cont......
My apologies The day job just got in the way.
I've had some really good feedback and solid questions regarding my narrative.
Let me first explain why BlackBerry is so coveted. It's not it's AI. It's its cybersecurity. I mean through the BlackBerry phone craze, Pres Obama's phone, Even until today BB is supreme in secure connectivity. It may be the only company that has all US government certifications and has multiple national contracts. So picture a world where all cars are communicating with other cars through a cloud There are no human drivers. Now picture a North Korean or Russian hack of the system. Total shutdown of all commuter traffic paralyzing the whole country. That's the less scary thought. All cars are to accelerate to max and purposeful head on collisions, that's a nightmare terrorist scenario!
It's only a matter of time before a car commercial touts their luxury design and security.

 "Ford built tough, and BlackBerry safe" "Volvo crash tested and hack proof, safety is always our priority"

One of the most important selling features is car autonomous communication safety. Let's face it once you can't drive your own car how many other options really matter? I know I would only choose an OEM with a BB secure OS.
I listened to the podcast where the ACS executive and the BlackBerry QNX exec answered questions about their joint venture. Amazon guy said the word "safety" in almost every sentence. Meanwhile it's not theoretical BlackBerry already is the platform for the autonomous driving software behind XPeng and recently also signed Canoo (spelling?).
There's no question as to what Amazon was after. Now go look at the timeline December 1st Blackberry announces joint venture with Amazon. Two or three weeks later GM announces joint venture with Cruz. Two more weeks and we're hearing rumors from the Hyundai side about their talks to build an Apple car. Apple does not confirm and Hyundai restates that they do not have an agreement but are talking towards one. Meanwhile, Apple is desperate to team up with a partner so they don't lose out on the autonomous market. I don't know how that's going to end. I'm curious if they're looking at Chinese automakers like BYD, Cherry, Geely.. then recently Ford and Google got together to announce that Google would be the infotainment center in Ford vehicles. Everybody's pairing up for the big dance. The prettiest girl in the room was BlackBerry and she had the most suitors.
Other data that leads me to my conclusions are Blackberry has recently filed a slew of patents related to V2V and V2X technology. In press conference releases BB refers to revenue "stream" from Amazon joint venture. Not just revenue or just fees. Stream indicates continuous collections like they had with their blackberry messenger service.
Okay why did Hyundai and Apple not consummate their joint venture? I think this is exactly related to the Motional-BB announcement we saw today. Motional and blackberry already an agreement to develop autonomous vehicles. Along comes Apple and flirts with Hyundai in co-developing autonomous vehicles. Hyundai, overly excited, leaks the news and happily sees their stock pop 20%. BlackBerry here's the news and is pretty surprised and pissed. BB violently objects waving their signed joint agreement. Apple investigates and discovers that the BB /QNX- Motional agreement leaves no room for Apple to develop anything with Hyundai (Motional corporate parent) that will not violate Hyundai's commitment to QNX and hence their nemesis Amazon. Apple terminates the courtship.
Imagine it's 1957 and the hot girl you're going steady with is being hit on by the handsome captain of the football team. You first use a few choice words and chase him off. Next you insist she start wearing your letter sweater So everybody knows she's spoken for.(No, I'm not that old, I just watch fair amount of TV). Blackberry insisted on formalizing their announcement with Motional lest any more unwanted suitors showed up. That is why I surmise the BB- Motional announcement was made today.
Why I think BB dropped today. The WSB frenzy is coming to an end. There are many retail investors and even hedge funds that bought put options on BB when the price was in the twenties. Exercising those options means the right to sell BB. Further there are plenty of retail investors caught holding the bag. They are Looking at the stock price before WSB and figuring the base price and how much above it their stock is at. For GameStop and AMC The price should be $2. That's where it was and would have stayed without WSB promotion.
For BB the price organically grew from $6 in late November to $14 in early January. This doubling in the stock price happened before WSB started touting it. This was secondary to Amazon announcement, Facebook settlement, a slew of positive press releases and articles on BB's future. The uneducated investor looks at the stock price and sees that blackberry climb from $6 naturally that's where it must be reverting to. Yes there are silly investors dumping BlackBerry at $13 thinking that It is headed back $6.
As far as the good news on Motional. There will be a stock increase and positive reaction tomorrow or the next day. bad news always has an immediate effect to drive the stock down but good news sometimes takes a while to set in.

[International Cricket] How a new style of bowling caused a major diplomatic rift between England and Australia

You may recognise me from my English Football series. I am still working on this, but a mix of being busy IRL and writer's block have precluded a new instalment. I hope to get the drama juices flowing with another sporting mishap and another football instalment up at some point this week
For now, we take a trip back to the 1930s and discuss the England cricket team's controversial 'Bodyline Tour' of Australia
Background
It is often something of a national joke that the British are excellent inventors but poor innovators. They often invent a new concept before being promptly overtaken by the rest of the world in it. The Industrial Revolution and the computer as we know it both owe their origins to the British, but Britain was the first major economy to suffer post-industrial decline, and there has never been a major British computing giant in the vein of Microsoft.
Sport is no different. British national teams dominate none of the three classic team sports codified and spread across the world during the 19th and early 20th centuries.
When an Australian cricket team toured England in 1882 and inflicted a shock defeat against England at the Oval in London, a satirical obituary printed in the papers mourned the 'death of English cricket' and that the ashes would be cremated and taken to Australia. This is the genesis of international cricket's second most intense rivalry and the reason that full Test series between England and Australia are known as 'The Ashes'.
After the First World War Australia ran rampant in international cricket. From 1918 to 1925, England mustered just one win out of fifteen tests over three five-test tours against Australia. Things picked up a little after 1925 and the passing of a 'golden generation' of Australian crickets while England saw an uptick in talent, but one man would change all that and tip the balance back in Australia's favour.
Enter the GOAT
If you were forming a team of the best 11 cricketers of all time covering all positions, to include Sir Don Bradman would be a no-brainer. Generally considered the greatest batsman of all time with a career batting average of 99.94 runs (for reference, the best batsmen in contemporary Test cricket would average about 60-65) and quite possibly the greatest Australian sportsman to ever represent his country in any sport, the Don absolutely changed things.
Australia toured England in 1930 and were widely expected to get a drubbing from England owing to their side's inexperience compared to the increasingly ascendant English side.
This isn't what happened.
In the Third Test at Headingley in Leeds Don scored 309 runs in a single day, a feat unsurpassed to this day. Also unsurpassed is his record of 974 runs over a standard five-Test series.
At the Fourth Test at the Oval in London English players and commentators noticed that Don struggled to play against 'bouncers', fast balls pitched short in order to bounce fairly high towards the batsman. I'll give a rundown of bowling mechanics later, but suffice it to say that this information would become critical later.
Australia surprised all by winning the series 2-1 and the shy and self-effacing Don was suddenly thrust into the limelight of an adoring Australian public. Don also thrust himself into the attentions of those in England who sought to avenge the defeat by winning the next English tour of Australia.
Enter Douglas Jardine
The cricket administrator 'Plum' Warner had noticed Don's struggles against aggressive fast bowling at the Oval, and he rapidly put himself to work planning on how to neutralise Don Bradman when England toured Australia in 1932-3, for surely only then could the Ashes be reclaimed.
He saw to Douglas Jardine being appointed captain of the England side in 1931 as a prelude to the tour. Jardine was amenable to Warner's plans and strongly disliked Australians. In the 1928-9 tour he received a good amount of 'banter' from Australian supporters owing to his haughty demeanour and habit of playing while wearing his Oxford University cap, the latter was hardly rare at the time amongst those entitled to one, but Jardine wore one while fielding which was a little strange. He also fielded out on the boundary, near the spectators, and proved an awkward outfielder which further encouraged mockery from Australian supporters. Rather than shrug it off or endear himself to the home crowd by giving a little back, he tended to draw in on himself and criticise what he saw as uneducated and lower class Australians.
A Plan Assembles
Jardine arranged to meet the two fast bowlers from Nottinghamshire (English professional cricket was and is organised on counties) Harold Larwood and William Voce. Nottinghamshire had been a dominant side in the late 1920s with their fast bowling, and Jardine saw in them a solution to his Don problem.
Remembering Don's discomfort against high-pitching balls at the Oval in 1930 and believing Don Bradman to be physically lacking in courage and inclined to shirk against aggressive bowling, Jardine asked the two men if they could repeat this style of bowling and do so accurately. They believed they could, and after a trial in the domestic competitions yielded mixed results, the England team departed for Australia in late 1932 eager to reclaim the Ashes with their secret weapon.
The Mechanics of Bodyline
I'll very briefly try and explain what we mean by 'Bodyline'. Essentially in cricket the bowler typically tries to hit three wooden stumps (called the wicket) with his delivery. The batsman generally faces the bowler side-on and stands slightly to one side of the wicket, meaning that a ball aimed at the wicket is generally unlikely to hit the batsman. When we talk about pitch we talk about how the bowler makes the ball bounce. A cricket delivery nearly always involves the ball bouncing at some point between the bowler and the wicket. The earlier (or shorter) that the ball bounces, the higher it will be when it comes to the batsman. This is an important part of cricketing strategy as different bowling styles suit different circumstances and pitches.
Jardine essentially asked Larwood and Voce to bowl leg-side (that is at the side of the wicket the batsman stands on) and pitch it short, meaning the balls comes directly at the batsman and at an intimidatingly high angle.
The batsman's reflex move, if he does not duck, is to use his bat as a shield and try and push the ball away, this puts it straight towards fielders on his leg-side who will be close.
On this diagram you may notice the 'Slips'. They are close-in fielders used when bowling aggressively for close catches. The slips are shown here on the 'off' side, opposite the batsman, but in 1932 they could line up like this directly behind the batsman's leg in order to take catches from the strokes he makes to defend himself from high balls.
A final major factor is the pitch. Australian pitches have more 'bounce' than English ones owing to generally being drier, making a tactic reliant on short-pitching to generate high balls more extreme in Australia than England.
Arrival in Australia
Jardine came to Australia with a score to settle, claiming from the off he had not come 6,000 miles to 'make friends'. The Australian press had noted his selection of an unprecedented four fast bowlers as being an obvious retort to Don Bradman's genius with the bat, and such comments did little to defuse what was already becoming a contentious tour.
In the matches before the main Test series against Australia against various Australian sides such as New South Wales England dabbled a little with Bodyline bowling but did not seriously employ it. It was enough to indicate the direction that Jardine had gone with his tactical choices and initially a substantial section of the Australian cricketing world accepted that England had merely adopted long-standing theories around fast bowling which had been common enough in the English domestic game.
The Early Tests
Don Bradman didn't play in the first test in Sydney. He was embroiled in a dispute with the Australian cricketing authorities about his writing a newspaper column, although Jardine appeared convinced that he had simply bottled it or had a mental breakdown.
The First Test was a comfortable win for England as Jardine's methods bore fruit. Larwood took ten wickets and a strong English batting performance saw England win essentially with an innings to spare.
Nonetheless, the early seeds of the forthcoming shitstorm were apparent. One of Jardine's fast bowlers, Gubby Allen, accepted using aggressive fielding positions but refused to bowl directly at Australian batsmen. An Indian princeling, the Nawab of Pataudi, on the English side (who would later go onto captain the Indian team, making him one of few Test cricketers to represent two countries) refused to field in an aggressive position on the batsman's leg side, to which Jardine remarked that 'His Highness is a conscientious objector' and largely removed him from the side for the rest of the series. Australian cricket remained split, with many still seeing Bodyline as a sharp but lawful practise.
The Second Test in Melbourne saw Don return. True to form, he scored a century, while a disastrous English batting performance granted the match to Australia. Jardine, a batsman, in particular had a bad game. Normally icy and virtually emotionless on the pitch, he did a 'war dance' when Don was surprisingly bowled out early in the first innings, showing perhaps his sheer desire to 'get one over' on the Australians.
Adelaide
England would win the Third Test in Adelaide, but at the cost of potentially ending the tour and causing a huge rift.
On the second day a Larwood ball hit the Australian captain, Bill Woodfull. The English fielders crowding around the batsman's position gathered around Woodfull to check on him, while Jardine called out 'well bowled, Harold!' in earshot of a now-irate Australian crowd. 'Sledging', the practise of playing mind-games against a batsman, was nothing new in cricket, and Jardine apparently intended to unnerve Don, who was the non-facing batsman and so stood near to him, but he succeeded only in appalling Woodfull and the Australian supporters.
Woodfull for his part gained respect for not retaliating during this game and acting perhaps more magnanimously towards the English players than most people would.
But it gets worse.
Later that day, 'Plum' Warner went to the Australian dressing room to visit Woodfull and apologise in person. Warner had sought to make Jardine captain, but he had likely underestimated Jardine's single-minded desire to defeat Australia by any means. Woodfull's reply to Warner was leaked to the press, to the fury of all involved and his quote would go down in cricketing history

I don't want to see you, Mr Warner. There are two teams out there. One is trying to play cricket and the other is not

Warner tried to tell Jardine about this, who appeared unrepentant.
Could it get even worse?
Absolutely.
The following day another Larwood ball struck an Australian player. Bert Oldfield was knocked unconscious and suffered a fractured skull in an era where cricket helmets were unheard of but the ball was the same wood and leather as today. The ball which struck Oldfield was a misplaced 'bouncer' rather than a true bodyline ball, but it became symbolic of the highly aggressive bowling which Larwood was rapidly gaining notoriety for.
You can see Oldfield falling to the right in this picture
Diplomacy
Things escalated, as at the end of the fourth day the Australian cricket authorities warned their English counterparts of the diplomatic damage being done to the otherwise close relationships between Britain and Australia, which was self-governing in nearly all respects but not quite wholly independent. Their telegram directly accused the English team of unsportsmanlike behaviour contrary to the spirit of cricket.
After a reply from England, the Australian authorities requested that the series continue but that 'bodyline' bowling would be considered by the authorities afterwards. The English authorities now seemed those most inclined to end the series, stating they would only play if the Australians retracted the 'unsportsmanlike' accusation.
At this point, the actual governments got involved.
Neither the British nor Australian governments wished to see relations damaged over cricket and both sought to defuse the situation. Eventually the Australian cricket authorities retracted the accusation but only after the Prime Minister of Australia intervened, as he did not wish to risk a public boycott of Australian goods in Britain for an economy still heavily reliant on the British export market.
The Series Winds Down
Bill Voce missed the Fourth Test in Brisbane and his replacement with a spin-bowler (ie a style of bowling by definition incapable of 'bodyline') indicated a shift away from the pure dedication to this approach. Larwood was now the only bowler still committed to bodyline bowling, but he appeared to dip in form after the earlier tests and was less effective.
England won this match and the final Test in Sydney, but without resorting to the methods employed in the earlier games.
Legacy
Relations between Britain and Australia did weaken, with some anecdotal evidence of reduced trade and antipathy towards Britons in Australia and Australians in Britain existing during the mid-1930s.
Bodyline became more widely used for a brief period after the tour in England as Larwood and Voce continued to ply their trade at home. The method saw heavy employment by both sides when a team from the West Indies toured England in 1933, and it did turn English opinion against it. In the words of Wisden, the main cricketing publisher

Most of those watching it for the first time must have come to the conclusion that, while strictly within the law, it was not nice.

In 1935 the laws of cricket changed. It was now forbidden to directly bowl at a batsman, and the umpire had discretion to forbid it on the pitch. A later law in 1957 altered fielding arrangements (banning more than two fielders being in the quadrant behind the batsman on his leg side) which effectively prevented pure bodyline from happening.
That being said, the concept of intimidatory high-pitched bowling has remained. There are limits on how many balls can be bowled in this way, but it isn't banned. In the era of mandatory helmets in the professional game and the proliferation of other protective equipment against fast bowlers it is a part of modern cricket to an extent which would doubtless shock both the English and Australians of 1932-3.
Bodyline didn't stop Don Bradman. He was a young man in 1932 and his greatest career highlights were ahead of him as he attained truly unbeatable batting averages for Australia. Following a hiatus in the Second World War, he captained Australia on a triumphant 'Invincible' tour of England in 1948.
What of Jardine, Larwood, and Voce? Larwood and Voce remain heroes for Nottinghamshire cricket, having a stand named after them at Trent Bridge in Nottingham, a major ground which generally sees an Ashes Test when Australia tours England.
Bill Voce and Harold Larwood did not have their reputations unduly damaged by bodyline. They were both working class players from Nottinghamshire (Larwood an ex-miner, and Voce from a mining town), then a major coal mining county in the Midlands, in contrast to Jardine's more elite background. It became generally accepted they had merely done Jardine's bidding. Bill Voce had a largely unremarkable career after 1933 and had never committed as strongly to bodyline as Larwood had.
Larwood was largely unrepentant. He had been the most prominent of the bodyliners and had cold relations with Don Bradman. As an old man he claimed he never bowled at a batsman's head, but he would sometimes aim for the chest or legs.
Ironically Larwood moved to Australia after the Second World War, joining thousands of Britons who benefited from subsidised emigration to Australia. He received a warm welcome from both Australian cricket and the public, although his broad Nottinghamshire drawl caused some issues in understanding apparently. He occasionally received abuse when the topic came up in the media, but generally lived quietly in Australia with a few slightly cantankerous media appearances in the 1970s to criticise the proliferation of protective equipment for batsmen and to criticise the then-England star all-rounder Sir Ian Botham. When he received a medal for lifetime service to cricket in 1993, an Australian newspaper expressed the class angle quite bluntly.

At last the ruling classes honour the man who carried the can for their savage arrogance

Jardine for many is the villain of this piece. He represents an elite and classist attitude towards the more egalitarian Australians, whom he nursed a strong distaste for. As above, Australian opinion would later forgive working class English players who bowled bodyline, but such forgiveness did not come to Jardine. Nonetheless, he was a complex figure who above all had a desire to win which went beyond the norms of sporting decency in his time. He left cricket in 1935, disillusioned with negative press and the phasing out of bodyline. The English cricket establishment was all too happy to blame the scandal on him, and his name has gone down in cricketing infamy, deservedly or not.

[1/18/2021] Monday's Off Topic Free Talk Thread

Hunter or Huntress Chapter 58: Negotiations

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It would appear the Writing gun has managed to hit the pages with another chapter for you guys. I know some of you have been waiting eagerly, so let's give thanks to TwoFlower68 for helping get this ready and jump right on in.
Sapphire
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Chapter 58: Negotiations
Where were they? Sapphire had rounded the corner with Herron to find an empty Grand hall and a quick check confirmed they weren't in the greeting hall either. She walked up to the edge as confidently as she could manage, peering down. There they were, three dragons and more than a dozen dragonettes, all standing opposite Nunuk with the others all lined up behind her in rank and file.
She trotted back to where Tom was hiding inside.
“They’re down below, stay here we will come get you, or all come up here, okay? So stay out of sight just for now.”
“I’ll go hide” Tom replied in an annoyed tone. She felt almost like kids trying to trick the adults, but if anyone knew how to hide it was Tom. Even if he had once again been made as unstealthy as possible and he didn’t seem thrilled by the prospect.
Sapphire and Herron walked out onto the platform looking as stately as they could manage before dropping off the ledge taking to the wing circling down to where the others were discussing.
Sapphire hadn’t seen a dragon of the royal guard since she was in the capitol 5 years ago and this was no young recruit like Jarix. It was in fact a huge red dragon, heavy-set, barrel-chested multiple scars, and even some fairly nasty-looking old injuries. It had spines missing and a cracked and broken left horn to boot.
It was wearing more armor than she had ever seen on a dragon and it was beautifully decorated. If that was enchanted armor it was likely worth more than the keep. On its back, over its haunches, was mounted a single light ballista as well, pointed rearward. She had heard of the practice for use against a chasing target.
His escorts were also all royal-guard both male and female. They were clad in various kinds of armor and all held different weapons, in fact, they seemed like a rather varied bunch. Looking at the shoulder markings though. It couldn't be… What was a full squad of veterans doing here!? That was insanity.
And that dragon. Sapphire had never seen a dragon look old before, nor did this one. But it was covered in scarring and the closer she looked the more she found. He had to be a veteran of countless battles and possibly centuries of service!
She wasn’t sure if she was excited to meet them or sour at the fact they had rejected her way back when. She was definitely scared of why they were here though. If they were about to defend the killing of a traitor against someone who could bring an escort of royal guard veterans out here, this might be a very bad day.
The residents of the keep were lined up behind Nunuk standing at attention. Even the kids were there, all crowded around Apuma, who was actually standing with his back straight for once.
She touched down alongside Herron with as much grace as she could manage, walking to join the line beside Jackalope.
“I see tardiness is another quality of your subjects, Bizmati” The lead robed figure spat out with evident distaste. “You didn’t even have a welcoming committee and then you proceed to come dropping in willy nilly. Disgraceful.”
“And terrible manners one found in yours. Not to mention bad memory” Nunuk retorded unfazed.
“And what do you mean by that, might I ask?”
“You failed to roll out your flag. How were we supposed to welcome strangers?”
“Perhaps your scouts are about as useless as yourself. We arrived under flag as per protocol.” the robed figures replied lifting her snout and looking to the side.
Jackalope leaned over to whisper to Sapphire ”Like hell they did.”
“Anyway your inadequacies aside. Do you expect me to believe that my cousin Dashu, who has served as a trained member of the citizen’s militia, member of the Free trader’s and long-serving escort of said traders betrayed all of his oaths and aided a DARK KNIGHT in entering your keep?” Long-serving my arse Sapphire thought to herself. From what Vulzan said he had been with them for a few years and the guy hadn’t even turned thirty yet.
Sapphire studied the robed figure as best she could, it would appear to be a woman even if she was a little on the small side, but her temper betrayed the truth. She wasn’t wearing any weapons, at least not openly. Her robes were fine white silk with silver and blue trimmings bearing embroidered symbols Sapphire didn't recognize. Her horns had silver plating hammered over them at the tips with gold chain and jewelry hanging from them. She looked stinking rich.
“As I stated he was originally deceived into thinking he was dealing with more common scum and villainy. Only following the first battle did he become aware darklings were involved. Following that encounter, threats, and promises of revenge should he not do as ordered, combined with his weak spine, made him cooperate.”
“Preposterous! He...”
“During his trial, he stated he feared for the safety of his family. Judging by the escort you brought along perhaps he was even dumber than we thought. Or are you in fact incapable of defending your family?” Nunuk was clearly not taking shit from anyone today. Sapphire did wonder whether that was a smart move in this situation though.
“A trial held where his defender was the one he was supposed to have betrayed. That is no trial, Bizmati, that is a travesty!”
“It’s hard to find impartial parties when you betrayed everyone within a day's flight.” Nunuk retorted in a forced calm.
“Then why would you proceed with such a trial. Have you no concept of fairness in law!?” The woman gave no such courtesy, it was perfectly clear she was absolutely furious.
“We had everything we needed to condemn him. He confessed to his crimes, we found evidence he had been communicating with the enemy, and it explained the enemies actions perfectly.”
“What is this evidence you speak of? I want to see it immediately and how did you manage to make him confess? He had no reason to give you a confession!”
Nunuk snapped her fingers and Rachuck came up with the earrings and the helmet of the Litch plate.
“This is a set of enchanted earrings that allow for communication. My husband tested them himself, they are not cursed and are indeed still functional. Here is the helmet of the knight in question and his sword. The sword is indeed cursed, so please be careful.” Nunuk was trying to sound cordial, Sapphire though could hear the contempt clear as day.
The lead armored figure came up to take the helmet. She was a little shorter than Jackalope, but still an imposing figure. Her armor was silver trimmed with three golden bands on her shoulders marking her as a colonel.
Sapphire leaned over to Jackalope “What in the god’s will is a colonel doing out here?”
Jackalope just shrugged “How the fuck should I know. I didn't even know she was a colonel”
“I must say fighting off an attack of this size after they breached your gates is quite a feat, not to mention you only took a single casualty. How did you manage such a thing?” Her voice was calm but inquisitive. The colonel pointed to Vulzan and Tyborg “From their account you have a very powerful warrior amongst your number. Where is he?”
“Tom is currently waiting for us to make our proper acquaintance. He is not of our kind, so we thought it best to avoid any misunderstandings.” Nunuk Replied in a much more respectful tone bowing her head slightly.
“You're hiding the means to attack us! The arrogance of such an action!” A male robed figure shouted out.
The colonel just sighed. “Lady Bizmati would you mind getting him down here so all parties may have peace of mind” Well at least the colonel didn't seem like an angry arsehole. In fact, she sounded a bit annoyed if anything. That likely meant she was here under orders rather than of her free will. That was honestly even scarier to Sapphire.
“Jackalope would you mind?” Nunuk went, turning back to them.
“Yes, ma’am, right away” Jarix did seem to take an interest in that as his head turned to follow Jacky as she departed.
“He can’t even fly? What sort of man is he?” The angry woman spat out.
“No he can’t and to address the earlier screaming, Tom is a dangerous fighter, but I hardly think he’s capable of downing a truly legendary dragon and a squad of veterans like what you seemed to think necessary to bring to visit a frontier keep.” Nunuk sounded more than a bit condescending, it was a good point though. This was a terrible waste of veteran warriors that could surely have been put to better use elsewhere and did she know the dragon?
“A frontier keep that had possibly fallen to corruption and one can never be too careful. You never know what might be hiding out here.” Had Jackalope still been there Sapphire would have expected her to call the robed woman a coward. And what did she mean fallen to corruption?
“I assure you we're very much still here and doing just fine. There have been no attacks since Vulzan's departure.” Apuma tried, sounding as diplomatic as he could manage. Head bowed low.
“You expect that to reassure me, if you had already fallen, darklings wouldn’t need to knock now would they?” The sheer arrogance of that insult. To insinuate they had fallen to corruption while standing in front of her, Sapphire felt her fist clench up involuntarily.
“Are you accusing me and my keep of being lacking in purity? Sapphire met the unicorn Kalestine not even two weeks ago, as did Tom in fact, and a further three of my number. Do you think the great Kalestine would not have done something if we had turned?” Nunuk stated with a fair amount of malice in her voice.
That sparked a discussion on who had just insulted the will of a unicorn with those statements, which carried on for a bit till the colonel seemingly got tired of listening to it.
“Not to interrupt the shouting match but was this you Lady Bizmati?” The colonel held up the helmet showing the dent where Tom’s revolver had bounced off.
“No that was Tom’s doing, he was the one who downed the cursed creature in the end,” Nunuk replied. The colonel turning back to inspect the damage with a curious look on her face.
“Speaking of the devil” Vulzan went, in a clearly forced optimistic tone, looking up at Jackalope coming into land.
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Right, so he had been left in an empty keep once again dressed up like a drag queen knight, except now he was without his boots too and his feet needed a bath. He had found a window slit that overlocked the proceedings below and they appeared to still be discussing. He sighed looking down at himself, he looked like a clown and he was supposed to meet some, apparently, very important people.
Perhaps he had some time to make a few final adjustments. Well first of his cape. Sapphire had wanted it plain white, but he had a better idea. They did use their blood to dye things so by his deductions, he should be using red anyway.
One quick memory challenge later he was draped in one of the oldest flags still in service complete with gold embroidered Danish royal insignia because fuck procedure. He looked more like a rich football fan in his eyes but there was no way they could complain about this, and more importantly, he didn't look like a human pretending to be a dragonette.
A quick sprint down to his stuff and some digging yielded his old rank tabs and insignia. With the pauldrons it couldn’t go on the sleeves, so the vest would do. It wasn’t like proper procedure mattered anyway, wearing these again was technically illegal. He slapped them on. If these were military people it might help a bit.
He pondered switching out his tiara thing for his battered helmet. Shiva had managed to straighten everything out, but the paint was still chipped and cracked though. He elected to keep the tiara and the jewelry. Surely it was there for a reason following the debacle of getting it.
As he looked through his things he cursed his already cold feet. He had even had his boots modified so they would be more appropriate. He had a pair of sandals with him though, those might do. As he was going to put them on he heard Jackalope shout out from above.
“Where the fuck are you hiding, come on the bitch wants to see you.” Okay, that wasn’t entirely how Tom had expected to have their guests described.
He got on the sandals in a hurry and made his way up the stairs again. “Coming”
He made it up the stairs to see Jackalope pacing back and forth.
“Why did you hide in the basement and what is that?” She went pointing at him.
“Me” he replied, spreading his arms out.
“Funny. Heads up the lead lady in the robes is a bitch and likely out to get us, so be nice. Oh and the one in armor is a colonel so don’t insult her please.”
“So don’t call her a bitch?” he asked. Jackalope just did the finger guns at him like he had shown her, looking down a bit annoyed at the still bandaged left hand. Swearing a bit under her breath before looking up.
“You’ll make a diplomat yet, now come on.”
They took off running over the edge circling down to the procession below. Tom didn’t have the best feeling about this. He was fairly sure this was the first time he had heard of possibly important diplomatic talks being carried out by a dude in sandals wearing a flag as a cape. He made a mental note to add this to the list of stupid ideas.
Jackalope swung into land and he got off, hitting the ground running. Smooth he thought to himself. He was getting better at this, when he remembered the ride was over at least. He trotted over to join the line beside Jackalope and Sapphire.
Sapphire had a sort of pained expression looking at him before turning back to face their oposition. There was a fair amount of gawking from every new face all staring at him. He had sort of expected that, the one Jackalope thought was a bitch appeared unfazed though as she went to speak Nunuk beat her to it.
“Thank you, Tom. Now since you ordered us all out here shall we get on with it?” The robed lady looked very annoyed at being talked over, as she replied.
“Well, your little keep is hardly spacious so we thought we would spare you the embarrassment of running out of chairs.” The robed woman spat. “But let’s ‘get on with it’, gods how uncivilized.”
Right then, bitch first class identified. What kind of a comment was that? It wasn’t even true, they could all have been seated in the grand hall, even if it might be a little tight and not counting the dragons of course.
This was who he had been dressed up to impress? First impressions weren't his strong suit, but she was truly terrible. Nunuk and the bitch, had engaged in what was best described as verbal warfare for several minutes. The keep’s dragonettes and himself growing more and more irritated by the moment just looking on in silence.
The one in the fancy armor just stood there, seemingly more interested in Tom and the others than the two arguing. The subject appeared to be that Dashu’s trial hadn't been good enough for the bitch and she didn’t believe the judgment was correct. The fact they had evidence and witnesses in both Vulzan, Tyborg, and Archeon. Didn’t seem to faze her. She also claimed he would never have confessed to such a crime since he had been instructed to never do so.
That comment drew the attention of the one in the fancy armor. “Did you tell him that or is this a general thing in your family lady Flaxen?”
“It’s common sense that if accused of a crime you shouldn’t confess before a trial.” The bitch replied as if even a child should know that. The colonel just huffed, looking back to Tom. “He would never have done such a thing.”
“He was persuaded to do so,” Nunuk replied.
“You tortured my sweet cousin!?”
“I tortured a traitor” Nunuk continued “Colonel Hashaw, what is the proper procedure for obtaining information from captured enemy combatants?”
“Extract the required information by any means necessary of course.” She replied drawing an evil grin.
“My cousin was no traitor and he was most definitely no enemy combatant.”
“He infiltrated my keep, under the guise of a friend and misused our trust to let the enemy in our door. He was second only to the knight himself in terms of damage done to my keep.”
“He would do no such thing!”
“You said so already, you pompous prick! Yet he fucking did now, didn’t he!?” Jackalope finally snapped. The bitch looked like she had just been smacked in the face as she took a step back, hand on her chest in shock.
“How dare you speak to your betters like that huntress! Have you no clue who I am!?” Tom wasn’t sure if the fury in her voice was more show or if he should be ready on the draw, but the woman appeared to be spitting with anger at this point.
Shiva managed to shut Jackalope's mouth before the reply came, which judging by her expression would not have improved the situation.
“Hashaw, would you take the word of such undisciplined savages over that of a city warden?” The colonel turned to the by now nearly manic looking woman.
“Colonel Hashaw... And I believe your judgment may be impaired at the moment. I require that you calm down before I’m willing to join this discussion” Tom knew military folk dealing with bulslhit when he saw it, though that was a rather impressive display of self-control.
“You!…” The woman looked almost like she was going to strike the armored woman for a second raising her hand. The armored one just stared her down raising an eye ridge. In the end, she thought better of it.
“Now then” The armored woman started turning away from the bitch.“ I believe proper introductions are in order now that we are all here. The remaining ones aren’t going to be joining us correct?”
“Correct, they aren’t expected back for a while yet” Nunuk clarified in a much more respectful tone.
“Very good. I am Colonel Hashaw, that fine gentleman behind me is Baron and that lot is his crew.” Tom nearly let out a snicker at that one. He looked about at the dragonettes of the keep who were all staring like they had seen a ghost or something.
“We have been in charge of overseeing the training of young Jarix here, who has managed to meet or exceed all expectations placed upon him and as such has recently joined the ranks of the royal guard proper.” Hashaw looked around for a bit with a satisfied smirk. Tom guessed she was reveling in their expressions. He just tried not to smile too much. The Red Baron, seriously. What were the fucking odds?.
“As you are likely well aware, Archeon has requested his son’s first deployment is to your keep. Following the recent escalations in hostilities in the area, we have elected to consider that request. However, following accusations of criminal behavior, it was decided the truth should be known before the request could be granted.” Hostilities in the area… was it not just them or were they the area?
“Did I forget anything, old boy?” She went, turning back to look at the large red dragon.
“I think that about covers it,” The dragon answered in a deep calm rumbling tone. He sounded even rougher than Archeon and kinda raspy too, almost like he was a smoker. It sort of made sense in a weird way, being a fire-breather and all. Tom wondered whether lightning or fire would be rougher on the throat.
“Very good, Lady Nunuke, I will require any evidence in your possession, as well as all eyewitness accounts to be given under oath. A thorough inspection of your keep would also be appreciated.” Hashaw continued.
Oh shit, Tom thought at that last one.
“Of course, do you require lodging for your crew and... passengers?” Nunuk responded.
“Let the kid and his father take the greeting hall. They might not be seeing each other again for a while. If you have a few extra tents I wouldn’t mind though” Hashaw looking to the bitch for a split second.
“I will have what we got sent down for you.”
“Excellent that can wait though. Lady Flaxen I strongly recommend you take a rest before we return to deliberations. This part does not concern you.” The furious woman looked like she was going to launch into another tirade before backing off with a huff, walking over to Baron with her companions in tow.
“You.” She went pointing to Tom, walking over to him “We need to have a talk. Jarix, come on over boy, you wouldn’t shut up about this guy all the way here. Even if he looks ridiculous and was possibly involved in a terrible accident at some point,” She looked at him with a pained if not very genuine expression. ”ouch. And Vulzan You said he was very modest?” She gestured at Tom. Her voice was somewhere around sarcasm and laughing at a bad joke.
You’ve got to be kidding me’ Tom thought to himself. All that to impress an angry bitch and a soldier that doesn't care.
__________________________________________________________________________________
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So the incoming threat has been revealed. Was it obvious, or did you expect something else on the horizon? I know you mostly found out last chapter, what was in store, but do let me know down below what you thought. As always any and all feedback is much appreciated.
Until next time have an awesome day.

Ranking Sunday's games by watchability

I seem to remember someone doing this a few years back and really enjoying it, so I thought I'd give it a shot with the condensed schedule leaving so many games on the schedule each night. I'm ranking each game in three categories: competitiveness, importance, and style points/storylines (which includes star power, the style of basketball, and any intriguing stories to watch). I'll include a survey at the end where you can predict the winners of each game!
Let me know if this is something you'd like to see again!
10) Milwaukee Bucks (1-1) vs. New York Knicks (0-2) at 7:30 pm EST
Where to Watch: League Pass
Spread: Milwaukee -11
Last Meeting: January 14th, 2020. RJ Barrett drained five threes and Bobby Portis scored 20 off the bench, but the Bucks dominated the Knicks at Fiserv Forum 128-102. The two teams combined for a whopping 79 points in the third quarter.
The Bucks have won their last five meetings with the Knicks, with the last New York win coming in an overtime thriller at the Garden in December of 2018.
Competitiveness: A championship contender that dismantled the Warriors by 40 facing the Knicks on the tail end of a back-to-back. Not much else to say here. 1.5/10
Importance: This game is essentially a scheduled win for the Bucks, and a chance for the Knicks to test their young guys and let them grow up a little. Unfortunate that Obi Toppin will be on the sidelines for this one. 2/10
Style Points: The high-flying Bucks offense has been off to another hot start, topping the 120 point mark in both of their games. The Knicks' young guns have shown promise and made so flashy plays, but they also turn the ball over a lot. Neither team tends to foul a lot or shoot a ton of free throws, which will help game flow.
Some might keep an eye on Giannis' free throw shooting, but the real story to watch is RJ Barrett's three point accuracy. He lit it up from distance against Indiana, but struggled mightily against Philly. Can he take a step forward in that department this season?
Bonus points for the MSG crew calling this game. 6/10
Overall Rating: 3/10
9) Brooklyn Nets (2-0) vs. Charlotte Hornets (0-2) at 7:00 pm EST
Where to Watch: NBA TV
Spread: Brooklyn -7.5
Last Meeting: February 22nd, 2020. The Nets used a third quarter explosion to turn a comfortable win into a rout as they won 115-86. Luwawu-Cabarrot led the team in scoring with 21, while Garrett Temple of all people snagged eleven boards.
Competitiveness: The Nets have steamrolled over their competition so far, blowing out the Warriors and Celtics by 20+ points. The Hornets have struggled with two losses to non-contenders, and come into this game on the wrong end of a back-to-back. 1.5/10
Importance: A contending Nets team cannot afford to drop games like this one, especially in the early part of the season when there are so many eyeballs on KD and Kyrie. The Hornets could really use a positive performance to get their season headed in the right direction. 4/10
Style Points: The Nets have stars all over the court and have looked like a juggernaut early this season, making them one of the most intriguing teams to watch, and a fun one too, as they've played fast and made lots of threes. Charlotte ranked last in pace of play last season but seems to be trying to pick things up. You'll get the Charlotte crew for this game on NBA TV, and they call a fun game.
Terry Rozier and Gordon Hayward are two guys to pay attention to- Rozier dropped 42 on a Cavs team that sucks at defending point guards. Is he headed for a breakout season? Hayward was shut down by the Thunder last night and will look to get things going. Plus LaMelo Ball! 8/10
Overall: 4.4/10
8) Golden State Warriors (0-2) vs. Chicago Bulls (0-2) at 8:00 pm EST
Where to Watch: League Pass
Spread: Golden State -2.5
Last Meeting: December 6th, 2019. Glenn Robinson III made the go-ahead layup with a minute left and a very different looking Warriors team beat the Bulls 100-98 in Chicago. Denzel Valentine was ejected in the third quarter for yelling at the Warriors' bench.
Competitiveness: The Warriors have been blown out by two great teams so far. The Bulls have been blown out by two mediocre teams and just played a deflating contest against the Pacers last night. 4.5/10
Importance: Both teams could really use their first win of the season. The Warriors cannot afford to lose to teams like the Bulls if they're going to contend for the playoffs. This probably still figures as a matchup of two non-contenders, though. 5.5/10
Style Points: The Bulls have lots of exciting young players, but they seem turnover-prone and have struggled to score. Neither team has been able to stop literally anyone on defense so far (lol thanks Golden State for taking Wiggins), so there's a chance this turns into one of those ridiculous shootouts where both teams top 70 in the first half.
Patrick Williams looked good in his first game against the Hawks, but the Pacers were able to shut him down. Watching him adjust to the breakneck pace of games and the new level of competition will be interesting. The Warriors will need to find other sources of offense besides Curry and Wiseman, and this game is a perfect chance for them to do so. Definitely opt for the Chicago broadcast if you tune in. 4.5/10
Overall: 4.8/10
** 7)Philadelphia 76ers (2-0) vs. Cleveland Cavaliers (2-0) at 7:30 pm EST**
Where to Watch: League Pass
Spread: Philadelphia -6
Last Meeting: February 26th, 2020. The Sixers had to play most of the game without their two best players as Joel Embiid left in the first quarter with a sprained shoulder. The Cavs, then the worst team in the East, led the entire way and won 108-94.
Competitiveness: The Cavs look like a much better team this year as Sexton has another year under his belt and they have Drummond underneath. There's a long way to go to challenge the Sixers, though, and they played an exhausting two-overtime trench war with the Pistons last night while Philly coasted to an easy win over the Knicks. 5/10
Importance: Definitely a litmus test game for the Cavs- can they hang with Philly and prove that they can be that dangerous team no one wants to face in the east play-in tournament? The 76ers might be looking past this game as they have a big clash with Tampa Bay coming up on Tuesday. 4/10
Style Points: This game gives us two matchups between stars. Joel Embiid has been on a mission to start this season, following up his 29/14 against Washington with a 27/10 against the Knicks. His matchup with Andre Drummond will be one to watch. At point guard, Simmons-Sexton could be an even more exciting face-off. The Cavs have played a more fun style of basketball this season, using Sexton to ignite a high pressure defense that stole a win in Detroit. That double-overtime win might prove costly tonight, though, when they run out of gas against a deeper and more talented Sixers team. Bonus points for the Cavs having that really fun color guy, I guess. 6.75/10
Overall: 5.25/10
6) Minnesota Timberwolves (2-0) vs. Los Angeles Lakers (1-1) at 10:00 pm EST
Where to watch: NBA TV
Spread: Los Angeles -11
Last Meeting: December 8th, 2019. AD dropped half a hundred and LeBron put up 32 and thirteen assists as the Lakers won a 142-125 slugfest. The Wolves hung around and trailed by only seven after three quarters before LA pulled away.
Competitiveness: The Wolves are off to a surprising 2-0 start, including an impressive win in Utah last night. Most would write this off as a scheduled loss, though, with a back-to-back against the defending champs and KAT getting dinged up at the end of the Jazz game. Still, it will be interesting to see how this new-look Wolves team trades punches with AD and Bron in the first half. 6/10
Importance: The Lakers seem to finally be settling into the new season after a disappointing showing on opening night, and will be looking for another statement win. Some Wolves fans have speculated that they will rest KAT after his injury scare tonight. I'd expect him to play, but no one in Minnesota thinks they will win this game. 3/10
Style Points: Anthony Edwards going up against two of the best in the game? DLo back in LA? Upstarts against the defending champs? Top notch storylines for this game, where the first half will be a good litmus test for Minnesota, before fatigue probably sets in for guys like Edwards and Culver and the game gets pretty ugly.
Minnesota's defense looks much improved this season, and their explosive bench can keep this game fun. And you know what you're getting with the Lakers' stars. Unfortunately the NBA TV rights to this game mean most fans will get the LA crew and miss out on the top notch Fox Sports North announcers. 8/10
Overall: 5.6/10
5) San Antonio Spurs (2-0) vs. New Orleans Pelicans (1-1) at 7:00 pm EST
Where to Watch: League Pass
Spread: New Orleans -5
Last Meeting: August 9th, 2020. The Spurs and Pels faced off for a high-scoring showdown in the bubble that saw the two teams combined for 77 fourth quarter points. JJ Redick went off and hit eight threes and Zion chipped in 25, but the rest of their teammates shit the bed and the Spurs won 122-113.
Competitiveness: The Spurs are off to a fast start, most recently squeaking out an impressive win over the Raptors last night. The Pelicans have produced mixed results, but beat Tampa by a more impressive margin and have an extra day of rest. Expect a close one early, with New Orleans having a sizeable edge late. 6.5/10
Importance: Both teams figure to be in the hunt for the final playoff spots and will see each other plenty this season as they are both in the same division. I doubt the Spurs would sweat this B2B loss too much, though. 7/10
Style Points: Zion put up a highlight-worthy 32 and 14 on Christmas Day against the Heat, and the Pels look like a new team on defense, making them one of the most interesting squads to watch this year. Ingram, Redick, Hart, and Lonzo can combine for an offensive explosion at any time. The Spurs can play kind of a bland style sometimes, especially with 35 year old LaMarcus Aldridge playing on a back-to-back. Dejounte Murray, who just posted his first career triple double and looks much improved this season, will be an interesting to player to watch today. This one feels like it could be a snooze-fest or a barn-burner, with nothing in between. 6.75/10
Overall: 6.7/10
4) Boston Celtics (1-1) vs. Indiana Pacers (2-0) at 8:00 pm EST
Where to Watch: League Pass
Spread: Boston -2.5
Last Meeting: Tuesday March 10th, 2020. The Celtics were the last team the Pacers faced before Miss Rona stepped in and put a stop to the basketball for awhile. Marcus Smart made the go-ahead layup to rescue Boston in the final minute after they blew a 19 point lead, and they held on to win 114-111. Sabonis posted a 28-9-8 night for Indiana.
Competitiveness: The Celtics have the rest advantage, as they got the night off to lick their wounds after a Christmas Night Stomping at the hands of KD and Kyrie, while the Pacers had to take the floor last night and beat up on the Bulls. The Pacers figure to be in the middle of the playoff pack, while the Celtics would like to challenge the Bucks and Nets at the top, and this game will be a huge early measuring stick for both teams. The Pacers will have home floor, which makes this anyone's game. 8/10
Importance: It's never too early to have a big game for playoff seeding! The Celtics will be anxious to prove that their opening game win against Milwaukee was no fluke, while the Pacers need to show us that they can beat someone better than the Knicks and Bulls. 7.5/10
Style Points: This is where this game kind of falls short. Tatum, Kemba, Sabonis, Brown, and others all provide lots of star power, but aren't the big names featured elsewhere on this list, and both teams tend to play slower, more defensive-oriented basketball. The Celtics' thumping at the hands of the Nets is more of a story for Brooklyn than for Boston, and Indiana has maybe been the playoff team that jumped off the page less than anyone else so far. Add in a game that's only broadcast locally and that overlaps with every other game but two and this game takes a bump in a packed Sunday night slate.
Still, this should be a very good game between two playoff teams, and a fun one to tune in for down the stretch if the Pacers keep it close. 5.5/10
Overall: 7/10
T-2) Orlando Magic (2-0) vs. Washington Wizards (0-2) at 7:00 pm EST
Where to Watch: League Pass
Spread: Washington -1.5
Last Meeting: Last night! The Magic and Wizards squared off for their first of back-to-back games, which was an exciting back-and-forth contest. The Magic had the edge on the glass for much of the game, which only intensified late as they pulled away and the Wizards started pressing and taking bad shots. Beal went off for 39 points while Westbrook posted a triple-double, proving that they can in fact play together just fine.
Competitiveness: Last night's game was a see-sawing battle for most of the evening. Orlando looks like the better team and one of the more improved squads in the East, if their win against Miami is any indication. Still, beating a team on their home floor twice in a row is extraordinarily difficult, and the Wizards get to regroup and see if they can fix their rebounding woes against the same team. Expect another entertaining toss-up!9/10
Importance: Both teams are in roughly the same boat: improved squads who will likely find themselves sitting on the edge of the Eastern Conference playoff field. They won't see each other again in the first half of the season, and to pick up a quick two games on their competition would be an enormous boost for Orlando. 7.5/10
Style Points: The Wizards have been playing a fun new style with Russ and Bradley Beal sharing the load on offense, and early speculation about how the pair will get along on the court has been promising. The Magic get the job done with comparatively little star power, but Vucevic has always been one of the more underrated players in the league and deserves some recognition. Terrence Ross and Davis Bertans will be other players to keep an eye on- Ross has been extremely hot offensively in his first two games, while Bertans is a streaky shooter who can be the key to Washington winning or losing.
Perhaps the most interesting storyline, though, is the back-to-back baseball-style two game series. College leagues are trying this out across the country and we've seen in leagues like the MAAC, Mountain West, and others how hard it is for superior teams to beat the same team on consecutive nights. We've also gotten a glimpse of this in the NBA preseason. This time, the teams are very evenly matched. How will the Wizards adjust tonight? What effect will the wonky scheduling have? 8/10
Overall: 8.2/10
T-2) Dallas Mavericks (0-2) vs. Los Angeles Clippers (2-0) at 3:30 pm EST
Where to Watch: NBA TV
Spread: Los Angeles -5
Last Meeting: August 30th, 2020. The Clippers knocked the Mavs out of the first round of the playoffs, winning Game 6 after the game was moved back due to the player strike. Doncic dropped 38 and Dorian Finney-Smith chipped in 16, but only one other Dallas played cracked double digits. L.A. moved on to the next round where they cruised through the first four games against the Nuggets and...oh wait hahahahahahahahahaha.
Competitiveness: The Mavs need to get their shit together. They posted a close opening night loss against the Suns and then got their doors kicked in by the Lakers... neither of those are alarming results, but they're not the mark of a playoff team. The Clippers are angry at the way last season ended, ready to take it out on the league, and they've looked like a juggernaut with Nic Batum in their lineup, putting up convincing wins over the other top two teams in the West. Doncic can keep any game close, but he needs his teammates to carry some of the load, and the Clippers are still the clear favourites here. 6.5/10
Importance: Dallas needs to show that they can beat playoff teams, as their schedule for the next few weeks doesn't get any easier after tonight. They'll face the Heat, Rockets, Magic, Nuggets, and Pelicans. They'll have to figure out who their second and third best scoring options are in the process. Both teams will be looking for a statement win on a national stage- they're the only teams playing in the afternoon tomorrow and get a national broadcast on NBA TV. 8/10
Style Points: Kawhi... Luka... PG13.... could you really get any more star power? The Mavs looking for revenge on the team that knocked them out of the playoffs by beating them in a Sunday Showcase game (albeit on NBA TV) in their house provides a great story to go along with the stars. The Clippers have been red hot from three point range to start the season, and a Mavs defense that allowed 138 points to the Lakers will probably provide plenty of opportunities for more fireworks. If not for the potential of a lopsided final score, this would be the #1 game of the day. Tune into this instead of football on a relatively light NFL day. 10/10
Overall: 8.2/10
1) Phoenix Suns (1-1) vs. Sacramento Kings (2-0) at 9:00 pm EST
Where to Watch: League Pass
Spread: Phoenix -3.5
Last Meeting: Last night! Sacramento jumped out to a 15-2 lead, but the Suns almost immediately cut that in half, and tied the game early in the third quarter. The teams traded baskets for much of the second half, with DeAaron Fox and Buddy Hield carrying the offensive load for the Kings, who held on to win thanks to some timely offensive rebounding from Richaun Holmes.
Competitiveness: Aside from the early flurry from the Kings, these teams were as evenly matched as they come, trading punches for the entire second half. The Suns probably won't shoot 11-44 from three point range again tonight, and the Kings will probably take better care of the basketball. Regardless, we're in for a fascinating rematch of two Western Conference playoff hopefuls. 10/10
Importance: Both the Suns and the Kings are exciting young teams with opportunities to improve on last season, and both figure to end up in that 7-10 seed range in the Western Conference. These two teams won't see each other again in the first half of the season, and the Suns cannot afford to drop back-to-back contests against one of their competitors for the last couple of playoff spots. The Kings, meanwhile, were largely overlooked by fans and writers heading into the season and look poised to outperform expectations. Going 3-0 to start the season would do a lot to quiet the doubters. Regardless, this two game series will likely end up mattering down the road. 8/10
Style Points: The Suns were the talk of the NBA Bubble in August and have continued turning heads with their opening night win against the Mavs. Chris Paul's presence at point guard allows them to run a better offense than "just let Devin Booker chuck as many threes as he wants and hope Ayton rebounds enough to let us eke out a close win". They're still a fun, up-tempo team that shoots lots of threes, and finally play some good defense if that's your thing too. Sacramento announced themselves as a team not to be slept on with their opening night win against the Nuggets (thanks Will Barton), and the trend continued last night. They've attempted the fewest threes of any team through two games this year, and their game plan of Fox driving and everyone crashing the glass gives us an intriguing contrast of styles.
Like I mentioned for the Wizards game, the baseball-style series also presents us with interesting questions to answer in this game (how will the Suns adjust on the glass? can the Kings beat the same team twice in a row?), and a nerve-wracking two games between two teams who are very close in talent level and playoff hopes. Perhaps most importantly, Phoenix's broadcast is the only one on League Pass so far that has figured out their on-court audio and actually sounds normal. Keep that one in mind! 8/10
Overall: 8.7/10
I also made a Google Form where you can pick all the winners of today's games... I'll link that below. Thought it would be cool to see how Reddit does predicting the winners. I'll close the form at 3:30 when the Mavs and Clips tip off. I'll try to pare this down length-wise if and when I do this again. Thanks for reading!
Pick the winners here!

28y/o making $95,000 in consulting in the Washington DC metro area

Sorry I was scheduled to post yesterday but it was a crazy day.
Background: I just got married and live in a apartment with my husband.
Growing up I didn’t know much about money, my parents emphasized that you never know if someone has money (wealth) or is living beyond their means. My mom was really strict when it came to me working because she thought it would interfere with my school work. I was never allowed to have a job in high school and even early in college. I got a summer job later in college when I had to work. I would babysit in high school though and saved around half the checks I received. I had about $2000 saved up before entering college.
Income progression:
First job (2015): $20/hr temp for a year although I earned more because I could work OT. Probably made around $43k that year, temp job ended and most of us got laid off.
Second job (2016): $39k I was really eager to get back to work and settled for the first job I got, this was a government job and I literally hated it. I quit after a year.
Time off and third job (2017-2019): I took some time off of my last job to figure out what I wanted to do with life and contemplated picking up and moving to a brand new city. I was living a really reckless life at this point as well and was trying to find balance. I finally landed a job doing tech consulting at $45k, I was good at my job and got a promotion and raise to $52k after a year, but I was still severely underpaid. In early 2019 I started interviewing with other companies.
Fourth job (2019-present): I switched companies and got hired on at $80k. I like company and the resources it provides. Over the last two years I’ve been promoted and received some annual raises taking me to $93k currently (my currently salary break down will be from last paycheck which was pre-raise and still has my husband on my health insurance)
section one: assets and debt
Inheritance: I have a pretty hefty windfall, over a couple mil is all I will say. I try not to use it and act like it’s not there but it did afford me to pay for finishing college and a car amongst some other things.
Retirement: total: $92k
20k in a Roth IRA, $12k in a traditional IRA, $52k combined in current and rolled over traditional 401k, $5k in HSA, and $4k in my brokerage. My first couple of jobs did not offer retirement options (temp) so I was late to start saving. Wish I did earlier!
HYSA: $25k, saving for a house
Equity: nada
Credit Card balance: $1,000
Section two: income
9-5 job in consulting: 93k
Side hustle: anywhere from $200-500 a month, I’d prefer not to indulge any details about this.
section three: Monthly expenses
My last direct deposit paycheck: $4,025.33
Rent/utilities/HOA/cell: my husband is my landlord and I’m on his cell plan, I pay him anywhere from $1,000 to $1,200 a month depending on other outstanding bills we have
IRA: I average $500 a month, I just got married so I’m switching from Roth to traditional due to our increase in income
Groceries: I average about $400 a month between weekly produced deliveries and buying from the store. I buy all groceries for my husband and I and he usually pays when we dine out.
Eating out: $50 for the occasional lunch
Car insurance: $116
Domestic partner health insurance: $550, I paid extra for my husband (we weren’t married yet but literally just got married last month) to be on my health insurance. He is on his companies in the new year and I haven’t gotten paid yet but I’m excited for the extra money!!!
HSA: $300
Traditional 401k: $890
Health insurance for myself:$160
Amazon prime: $12.99
Spotify: $9.99
Various workout subscriptions: $200, I’m still going to in class workouts around 5 times a week, it keeps me sane and on track
Day one:
8 am: It’s the Tuesday after Christmas and one of the best work weeks because everyone is still off for the holidays! I sign on to my computer and make some green tea to start the day followed by a bowl of cereal.
3pm: Since it’s a slow day for work i am able to dedicate my afternoon to making some Bolognese sauce, I forgot how labor intensive it was! I go to the Italian store to get some 00 flour to try to make homemade pasta and some wine while I’m there, $19.98. I fail miserably. I don’t think I let the dough sit long enough and didn’t roll it thin enough. Good thing I have some store bought pappardelle.
7 pm: My husband, J and I have the bolognese with a side salad, yum!! We clean up and start watching a new show a friend recommended (Your honor). 10pm: Naturally I fall asleep on the couch and then zombie sleep walk into the bedroom.
daily total:$19.98
Day two:
8 am: I ended up not sleeping well last night. J woke up ahead of me and made sausage and eggs. I don’t like eggs so I just have sausage and make a smoothie. I do a little work but it’s still slow.
1 pm: I post up with my laptop and my bed and see that there is a new season of 90 day fiancé...A guilty pleasure of mine. I manage to catch up on the existing episodes then I browse the subreddit to catch up on the shit talk and opinions. I do a training in the background during all of this as well.
5pm: I start to get dressed and head to a workout class. I have a side hustle after this but don’t really want to divulge. Just an FYI I stay masked up during both of these occasions and distanced.
10pm: I get and reheat some bolognese for a late dinner and off to bed.
daily total: $0
Day 3: 9:30 am: It’s New Year’s Eve, but it doesn’t feel like it. I took today off of work. I get up lazily and J and I make breakfast. He makes the bacon and eggs and I make the smoothie. We don’t really have plans due to covid but decided to meet up with some neighborhoods while the ball drops and have a glass of champagne outside (distanced) later that night.
3 pm: I remember I’m having my cousin over tomorrow for a late Christmas celebration so I run out to Safeway to get some food for it, as well as some items to make drinks that night, $79.59. I decide my drink for the night is going to be a blackberry fizz and I’m excited to use some new bar tools we have. I get home and put the groceries away and then J and I clean our place. I’m always amazed at how much of my fucking hair gets everywhere! We have steak, sweet potatoes and a salad for dinner.
8 pm: J and I start drinking and FaceTime some friends. I did pretty well with the blackberry fizz.
11:50 pm: we head outside and meet our neighbors and toast with some champagne. It’s too fucking cold and we head in after 20 mins or so. We continue watching the NYE show, FaceTime a couple more friends and then I pass out around 2 am.
daily total:$79.59
Day 4: 10 am: I wake up and am not hungover! We make breakfast with some biscuits this time. I clean up from breakfast and the remnants of the night before. J and I park our butts on the couch and stay there for a couple of hours watching TV.
2 pm: I get up and start to cook dinner just to realize I forgot something...ugh. I run out to HT to pick up some shallots and a couple other things, $19.97
3:00 pm: I get home and am ready to cook. I start with the braised short rib and while I’m browning them my apartment is getting really smoky and the smoke alarm keeps going off...J takes the batteries out. I put the short ribs in the oven to really cook and start on the sides. First, the mushroom risotto. I get the risotto prepared and even enjoy the wine I used to cook it. Lastly I season the vegetables I’m roasting (potatoes, parsnips and carrots).
6:00 pm: My cousin shows up and we all exchange late Christmas gifts. Managed to score a gift card to crate and barrel 😍.
7 pm: Dinner is finally ready and I serve my creation and it’s received well. We have tea after dinner and chat. Around 9 they head out and we clean up.
10 pm: I do my skincare routine, just switched to a new retinol (dr lancer) and it is scorching my skin so I only do it a couple times a week. J and I snuggle in bed and watch some it’s always sunny.
daily total: $19.97
Day 5:
*I want to preface this by saying I made some poor dietary choices this day and if stomach stuff weirds you out, just skip this day.
9:30 am: I got some great sleep and wake up to get ready for A workout class. I head to class and get a good workout in.
12 pm: I have some time to kill before I get my hair done so I stop by this place In old town to eat. I get Mac n cheese and a cherry coke $9.99, since it’s covid and there is no indoor dining I eat in my car and then walk around the shops on king st. I hop back in my car and head to the salon to get my hair done.
2pm: I get some highlights and a cut and it turns out really well (I already had a deposit down, the remaining including tip was $160.)
4:00 pm: I head back home and change since I’m still in workout clothes. I snack on some pumpkin seeds and wait for J to get home. It’s pretty nice out this day so we decide to go somewhere for outdoor dining and drinks. I get an optimal wit and loaded tots and chicken tenders, $32.20.
8:30 pm: It’s nice to be outside but we start getting cold and head home. It’s about a 8-10 minute drive home and about 4 minutes in my stomach starts hurting and about 2 minutes later I’m realizing this is an emergency. In recent years, my window between feeling the urge and having to go has shrunken, not sure if this is aging or possibly IBS. We get to be about a minute away and I tell J to pull up and let me out. I get out and literally run to the closest bathroom on the ground level. I didn’t make it. I text j to bring me clothes and clean myself up and throw away my clothes.
10:30 pm: I go upstairs and take a shower and then cry and head to bed.
daily total: $202.19 and my dignity
Day 5: 10 am:It’s Sunday, which is a nice lazy day for us. I eat some oats for breakfast and kiwi on the side for a guy friendly meal.
1pm: J posts up on the couch to watch football. I alternate between reading and going down a rabbit hole of sustainable beauty products, over the course of a couple hours I debate buying a composter for our place as well as new moisturizer. I decide I probably should just use what I still have.
6 pm: I reheat the leftover short rib and risotto and make a salad to go with it for dinner. I have a glass of red wine as well.
8 pm: we head to bed and watch Soul, I loved it!!!
daily total: $0
Day 6:
9 am: I wake up a little late and log on to my computer. Meanwhile I have skyr with raspberries for breakfast. I have a couple meetings and listen to a podcast in the background, (hidden brain.)
1:30 pm: I make some chicken pesto for lunch and do a training for work.
5:00 pm: I get ready and head to a HIIT class. I’m late and the class literally kills me. I haven’t done much cardio recently and I’m out of shape. My chest feels heavy for the rest of the night.
6:30 pm: I come home and J and I make steak with sweet potatoes and parsnips plus some rice.
8:30 pm: I’m practically falling asleep on the couch. I wake up around 9 and make myself some magnesium tea and head to bed. J and I watch some shameless and now I can’t fall asleep! I play on my phone and toss and turn, I’m not sure if I actually ever fell asleep.
Day 7:
7:00 am: since I didn’t sleep I cancel my workout class for the morning and get charged $10.00. I try to sleep for another 2 hours.
9:30 Am: I finally get moving and make some toast for breakfast. I send some emails and have a meeting. I still see bolognese in my fridge, I freeze it for some future lasagna.
4:00 pm: there is no food in our fridge so I go out to the grocery store. On the way I stop for gas, $15.27. I don’t know why but I never get a full tank. I make it to HT, I hate buying anything more than what can fit in a basket but I fill that baby to the brim and can barely carry it, $49.54.
5:15 pm: I’m home and start making dinner. I make some butter chicken from the honeysuckle cookbook and add in some mushrooms. I make some brown rice to serve with.
6:30 pm: we eat dinner. It’s good the first night but probably better the 2nd night because the sauce thickens a little more. I pack up the leftovers and do the dishes.
8:00 pm: I take a shower and try on some new bras I bought on Black Friday that just arrived. They’re super cute and comfy (bought from negative underwear). I do my skin routine and make some chamomile tea with honey.
9:30 pm: I got a new manduka yoga mat for Christmas and bust it out for some yoga/meditation before bed. I join j in bed and we start watching some stupid Adam Sandler movie, it was so terrible I fell asleep 15 mins in.
daily total: $74.79
Overview: Compared to other weeks in December, this one was on the lower side. I was finished paying for presents and am trying to save more money now. Yesterday I ended up buying new pants and booties as well as ordering Chinese for lunch. The DC area is crazy right now and we were under curfew...so we’ll probably be laying low. Stay safe y’all.
weekly total: $396.52

Failing To Find Friendships On This Subreddit READ THIS

Intro:
Today I'm going to focus on signs of whether to move on, leave, and overall indicate if your reddit friendship is heading in a positive direction. Along with some mistakes commonly made and some methods to start the conversation.
Messaging Someone:
You found someone you want to message, great! So there are three ways that are appropriate approaches ^{(if you have any other that work extremely well put it in the comments of this post})
Before we get to that I want to say when deciding to message someone or not HAVE CONFIDENCE!!!! I hate it when I look at a post and I see people commenting saying "blah blah blah hmu" HAVE SOME DAMN CONFIDENCE AND INITIATE THE CONVERSATION!! I get that when you do this your trying to be polite and not trying to be a creep but it just does not work.
Mindset: When you message these people I want you to treat it like an elevator pitch. There are some redditors getting hundreds of messages and comments when they make a post. KEEP THAT IN MIND! Here are some ways you can message someone:

Asking a Question: Not a small talk question like "how are u" make it specific to the post. At the same time keep in mind some people may be asking the same questions so try to be unique with them

Ex: A lot of people put something like "I like video games" in their reddit post.
This person has already been asked "which video games do you play" like 50 times!! A better idea would be asking which video game genre do they like or even asking which of their hobbies listed are they most passionate about and then go from there.
^{People who are in the situation where they have been asked the same question so many damn times it would be a big help if you would tell us a good alternate solution in your opinion}
2) Introducing Yourself: Stating what you like, what your looking for in a friendship, and the fact that you want to be friends with them is a rather personal and up-front way to get the conversation started.
But what do I say after I introduce myself???? Funny enough it is based on their reaction but if they give a one word answer like "k" or "cool lol" then you could start launching off some questions until you find a conversation point. Although with a response like that it could either mean they are disinterested or they are talking to so many people they don't have the time to give a good response.
3) A compliment: NO NO NO this does not mean find a female say she looks hot and wait for results. COMPLIMENT SOMEONE BASED ON SOMETHING THAT THEY CAN CONTROL.
Ex: DO NOT say "girl you thicccer than a bowl of oatmeal"
Rather say "You look great in that photo I like your outfit style" ^{(the more specific you get the better in my opinion}\*******)*
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AM I WATERING A DEAD PLANT?
Odd phrase but it will make sense soon enough
So your messaging someone and just ended your first conversation or maybe you've been talking for a while but how do you know if its going well?
NOTE: WITH EVERYTHING I SAY HERE NOTE IT IS A RED/GREEN FLAG IF IT HAPPENS CONSISTENTLY OVER THE COURSE OF A FEW WEEKS OR EVEN MONTHS
Green Flags:
50/50: You are BOTH initiating conversation. I'm not talking about "well we have had about 10 convos and I initiated 9 of them but they messaged like 1 time" NO I'm talking about a 1 to 1 ratio or something very close to it.
****If you're always the one scheduling, having to reach out or initiate conversation then its not worth it. Your watering a dead plant. And odds are you deserve so much more than to just talk to someone who doesn't even care whether you message them or not. FIND SOMEONE WHO IS WILLING TO MEET YOU HALF WAY
MOIST TEXTING: Get your mind out of gutter lmao let me explain what I mean. Moist Texting is when you're out of that loop of small talk and stuff getting awkward. YOU CAN HAVE A CONVO ABOUT ANYTHING WHETHER IT BE SPORTS, CAREER ENDEAVORS, OR SOMETHING AS IDIOTIC AS IF MR. CLEAN IS ATTRACTIVE OR NOT
****usually replies are hella consistent during moist texting. Your getting replies like every 4-8 mins not every other day or every 5 hours
(THIS IS NOT ME SAYING IF THIS PERSON DOESN'T TEXT YOU BACK IN 5 MINS EVERY TIME THEN DROP THEM)
RED FLAGS:
THEY NEVER MESSAGE YOU FIRST: This is in my opinion the biggest red flag!!!!! Even if they respond to you consistently and you two do stuff all the time a lack of initiation on their part means one simple harsh reality: THEY ONLY RESPOND BECAUSE THEY DON'T HAVE ANYTHING BETTER TO DO. ONCE THEY FIND SOMEONE WHO THEY ARE WILLING TO MEET HALFWAY AND MESSAGE CONSISTENTLY THEN THEY WON'T BE REPLYING TO YOU ANYMORE
(That sounds really dark but please remember the person could also be very busy with their life. Also please remember that if this happens over the course of like a few weeks to a few months then that's where green and red flags should be applied)
I TOOK 5 MINS TO RESPOND BUT IT TAKES YOU 3 DAYS !!!!?????: The title for this section is over dramatic but if you are consistently replying after 3-6 mins and it takes them hours on hours each time that's not the best look (ONCE AGAIN REMEMBER THEY COULD JUST BE A BUSY PERSON).
Now I will admit the reddit chat system is so damn bad so if its strictly on reddit take this red flag with a grain of salt but if its on discord or snapchat or any platform where you can either see they read your message or they are online and it takes them hours/days to respond.....that's rough buddy
Also note that a lot of people will say "don't be dry texter when you message me" but remember it goes both ways. You both have to be moist texters.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MISTAKES THAT YOU ARE MAKING
Alright so lets say every person you message has these red flags. Then the problem might be you. So here are some mistakes that I feel that I've seen others and myself make
SMALL TALK: Now if you have known this person for like 6 months or something then yeah small talk is generally acceptable BUT if you have just started talking YOU NEED TO YEET THAT SMALL TALK BS INTO THE STRATOSPHERE!!!!!!
Nothing kills a convo faster then getting trapped at the grips of what to do next after small talk. Unless you really know this person don't engage in the typical "How r u?" "I'm good hbu?" type of conversations. Yes it is easy and gets you a response because it is easy to reply to but after about four text messages an awkward gap of silence is just waiting to take place.
STOP BEING A PEST: So what if you've had like 5 convos over the course of a week and they haven't initiated anything, what do you do?
Pull back and take like a week or two and just don't conversate because you might be overwhelming someone and they don't want to tell you. Wait a week or two and message again. If they don't respond then that's rough buddy.
BUT WHAT IF THE SAME PATTERN CONTINUES
You keep having convos and you're the only one initiating!!! Well you know that's a red flag and you have two options:
1) STOP TEXTING THEM ALL TOGETHER: You were watering a dead plant. Stop watering it, the damn plant is dead. BUT IF YOU DID THIS YOU CHOSE THE WRONG OPTION (IMO)
2) CALL THEM OUT: IF THERE IS SOMETHING PEOPLE NEVER DO HERE IT IS HONESTY!!! *****NEVER BE AFRAID TO TEXT SOMEONE AND TELL THEM YOU FEEL LIKE THEY AREN'T PUTTING THE SAME ENERGY IN THIS FRIENDSHIP AS YOU ARE
They either won't reply, get mad, or hell maybe even have an actual conversation about feelings. You may not like the results of what happens after you send this but it is going to do so much more for you mentally than just getting sad and either ghosting someone or being ghosted. Go get yourself some closure!!! (Also don't call them out if its only been like 3 days or something ridiculous like that)
YOUR LIKE EVERYONE ELSE: I'm going to make this one short as I said it already put please stray away from asking predictable questions. When people go right be that one person that goes left!!
Ex:
Person 1: "I like to play basketball"
You: "What position do you play" <---- WRONG EVERYONE IS ASKING SOMETHING LIKE THIS
Instead maybe answer with a witty reply
(Bad example but I'm making this up on the fly) You: "I bet you're good enough to beat tom brady in a 1v1"
I KNOW BRADY PLAYS FOOTBALL BUT WHICH MESSAGE DO YOU THINK IS THIS PERSON GOING TO REPLY TO? STATING THEIR POSITION FOR THE 99th time or A MESSAGE THAT CAUGHT THEM OFF GUARD AND STANDS OUT
EXPRESS EMOTIONS: USE THOSE DAMN EXCLAMATION POINTS, QUESTION MARKS AND EMOJIS. They seriously add a whole new depth to the conversation
**********YOUR NOT SCHEDULING: Scheduling something to do with someone is dorky but it is EFFECTIVE! By scheduling I mean get a day and a time that works for both of you guys. This can eliminate something like always asking someone to get online and play and them turning you down because they are busy.
PLEASE USE SCHEDULING ESPECIALLY IF THIS PERSON LIVES IN A DIFFERENT TIME ZONE
But what if we always schedule and they never show up because they forgot?
That's rough buddy and that is a red flag. (If this happens once or twice then don't freak put up if it happens like 6 out of every 7 times then yeah that's a bad thing also if you're the one always scheduling to do something and they never do that is a red flag)
LONG MESSAGES: Often times you are being too wordy. Try condensing your text message to be readable but also short.
\**Rule of thumb: Long meaningful replies to questions but short interesting replies to statements*
FILTERING YOURSELF: When you reply sometimes you think too much and go with a "safe reply" but don't do that because everyone else is going with that "safe reply'!
(This filter thing is not an excuse to go insult or make a pervy comment towards someone)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mentality
I'm going to reiterate some things mentioned earlier but they are that important
Realize some people are getting hundreds of messages and odds are they are only looking for one or two people at max. They may find those people before they even get to your message
Do not build up unreasonable expectations:
If you see that this person likes all the things you like don't go off and make a fantasy in your head where you picture them a certain way and build up an expectation.
Go in with no expectations and take the person for what they are!!!
Accept that 80% of the people you talk to won't develop into the friendship you want or a friendship at all
Be open, honest, and kind to whoever you talk to. Also ask deep question that encourage open ended conversations.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
That's pretty much it PLEASE LEAVE YOUR OWN TIPS AND TRICKS FOR HAVING GOOD CONVOS IN THE COMMENTS.
ALSO PLEASE COMMENT ON HOW TO MAKE A GOOD POST THAT CAN GET PEOPLE TO REPLY. (I'm actually curious to see what you guys come up with)
If you read to this point.....you are a scholar 😎

Dispelling the myth that QBs fail in the NFL based on where they go to school

This was originally written as a comment on a post (I did write it, not saying I stole someone else’s work) and it got enough traction that I think it warranted a post of its own. So any mentions of someone below or a response is referring to someone on that thread.
Disclaimer: I’m not making a claim about Fields or Jones here, just trying to provide context to/dispel a common argument against them.
Ohio State:
2020: Joe Burrow (1.01)- I don’t really think he’s an OSU QB, but someone below mentioned him, and I think it’s at least worth nothing that he was at OSU for 3 years. I consider him a much less OSU QB than I do Hurts as a Bama QB (Burrow threw 39 passes in his time at OSU) and I use Hurts in my Bama analysis, but I think he’s at least worth noting here. Even without him the conclusion still makes sense, and so I won’t talk about him I’m my conclusions below.
2019: Dwayne Haskins (1.15)- This one is bad. Period. There’s no getting around this. However what does this have to do with OSU? Sure he’s not the best player but the reason he flamed out was much more cause of off the field issue that made his middle of the road talent not worth it. If he goes to a different college his off the field issues arnt suddenly fixed are they?
2016: Cardale Jones (4.136)- Comparing Fields to him is simply disingenuous. OSU had a different HC/OC, ran a different scheme, and Jones was rated as somewhere between the 6th and 9th best QB. Jones also had major mechanical concerns and issues with his college accuracy and completion percentage in a scheme based around easy throws and screens.

”He doesn't square his feet, hips and shoulders when throwing from the pocket and too often trusts his arm to do the work his body could be doing for him to generate velocity. Jones' left hip (his back foot) is often turned away from the target and doesn't allow for a full torquing of his core when he throws.” From BR in 2016

2016: Braxton Miller (3.85)- He wasn’t even drafted as a QB.
2011: Terrelle Pryor (3rd round Supplemental draft- This one is a bit tougher. Out of college there was already a significant group of NFL level scouts saying he needed to play WTE to make it work in the NFL. On the other hand there was a group saying he could’ve gone as early as the 1st in the 2011 Draft. Still not the same HC/OC as fields. Again had mechanical issues and if you are already being asked to play a different position that doesn’t bode well for your chances.

”All over the place with his passes, doesn't lead his receivers properly and makes his receivers work for catches...” From SidelineScouting 2011
”For as much experience as Pryor has in a pro-style offense, his accuracy remains an issue. Even when he stays in the pocket, Pryor's footwork negatively impacts his accuracy.” From SB Nation 2011

2007: Troy Smith (5.174)- Again not a highly rated QB prospect. If you win the Heisman in college and still get taken in the 5th doesn’t that say a lot about the type of prospect that you are? Again still not the same HC/OC as Fields. Smith wasn’t even rated as a top 10 QB prospect in his own class. Lemierre’s/Tonsilitis certainly didn’t help but that’s not the reason that he was a bust.
2004: Craig Krenzel (5.148)- Basically everything about Smith applies here. Simply wasn’t a very good NFL prospect. He was taken in the 5th, wasn’t graded very high, and didn’t last long. That happens to 5th rounders all the time.
2002: Steve Bellisari (6.205)- Everything about the previous 2 but even more so. He was grade lower, drafted lower, and was a worse QB.
So to recap OSU QBs this century, we have a 1st rounder, 2 3rd rounders (one taken as a WR, and the other converted there quickly), a 4th rounder, 2 5th rounders, and a 6th rounder.
Does OSU have a track of QB success in the NFL? No. But it’s not as bad as it seems. How many of those guys realistically could’ve hit and been productive NFL players? 2, maybe 3?
Haskins should’ve succeeded, and Pryor should’ve been much better than he was as a 2 way QB, but did have a 1000 yard season as a WR. Smith is the third one. I think he could be a very good QB in today’s league. A guy kind of in the Kyler build in today’s NFL.
Including a guy actually drafted as a WR, the average OSU QB this century has been drafted at pick 109. That’s the early middle of the 4th round. If you see that and think that OSU QBs should just be absolutely lighting up the league, the I don’t know what to tell you. NFL talent evaluators arnt perfect, but they arnt usually that wrong and the draft slots of these guys prove that.
Fields is miles better than any of these guys as a prospect, will go much higher than any of them, and doesn’t even have the same HC or OC as them. How can you compare them at all? Sure, Fields might bust but that wouldn’t be because he went to OSU alone. What’s around him in the NFL would play a huge part in that (and definitely much more that what jersey he wore in college).
Alabama:
2020 Tua Tagovailoa (1.05)- Way too early to make a call on him, but he hasn’t looked like a bust so far. In the games he’s played he has looked like a high end rookie QB. He is what a rookie QB should look like, not Burrow and Herbert. Them both playing insane is making Tua look like a bust which he isn’t. I’m not saying he won’t bust eventually, but you can’t tell me that he has busted yet.
2020 Jalen Hurts (2.53)- Again, way too early to tell on him, but he has looked good when he’s played so far. He wasn’t even drafted to be the starter this year and has still looked good doing it. Hurts played 3 years at Bama and 1 at OU. I don’t know if you call him a Bama QB but I think he fits for the sake of this argument.
2014 AJ McCarron (5.164)- McCarron wasn’t seen as that good of a prospect to put it simply. He had concerns with a lack of arm strength, mobility, and deep ball throwing. Those are all super important traits to have in the NFL.

”Lacks an elite arm strength and velocity on throws downfield. Gets too much air under his deep ball.” From BR in 2014

2011: Greg McElroy (7.208)- McElroy Simply wasn’t a good QB. Not even just a bad prospect. He was ok at bama and put up an average of 2700 yards, 18 TDs, 4 picks on 65% completion. That’s just not that good for a 4th year college player. Just read this scouting report on him and tell me if this seems like an NFL level player to you?

”Passing accuracy is directly tied into consistency. McElroy struggles to consistently place the football out in front of his receivers. His passes are often behind his target forcing them to stop their routes and preventing the chance of additional yardage. McElroy lacks the ability to be an efficient underneath passer as a significant amount of his passes are tip at the line of scrimmage. In the intermediate passing game, McElroy lacks the arm strength to get proper ball placement. His passes are often to high which could be a result of overcompensating for his lack of arm strength. Attacking the defense deep is not going to be an option for McElroy. He struggled to throw an accurate bucket pass often lacking proper touch. “ SB Nation in 2011

That doesn’t even sound like a guy that can start out of high school. I mean to be blunt that sounds like a middle schoolers scouting report.
2006: Brodie Croyle (3.85)- Croyle is probably the only guy on this list that would be considered a bust relative to where he was taken. Sure you don’t expect a 3rd rounder to come and light it up but he didn’t even have a good year the one year he did start more than half the games.
The average draft slot between these guys was pick 103. That’s at the start of the 4th. People expect ’busts’ from that range. Saban has been at Bama since 2007 so this is even a more fair comparison than OSU.
Since Saban has been there he has had 4 starters drafted to the NFL. As long as we are making sweeping generalizations about players simply based on the color of their helmets, I predict that if Donald Trump played QB under Saban, he would have a 50% chance to look good his first year in the league no matter where he was drafted or how he played in college. See how stupid that is?

How can I use sprint sessions to improve my 5k time?

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[Barterverse] Wealth of Planets 1: New Beginnings

Great Day for BB despite stick dipping.

[International Cricket] How a new style of bowling caused a major diplomatic rift between England and Australia

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