Leg Day and Free Movies for Ansah

You know how you feel when you're not doing something you're supposed to be doing, and then you finally do it? Feels good, right? Well that was me today. I don't skip leg day, but I definitely have been avoiding squats for quite a while. I've always been intimidated by squats. Guys wear the weight belt, so you think there's a risk of throwing your back out. I've always had the impression that squats have a high degree of technical difficulty, so I avoided them or used the machine.

Several months ago I bought a weight bench with sturdier supports for the bar, in part to make it easier to load weights on by myself and in part so I could do squats. But, I'm a chicken sometimes. The bench wasn't positioned right to do squats, I'd need to take the weight down, move it, adjust the bar rests, etc. Finally I decided to face my fears (really more of a concern than a fear, but nobody says "face my concerns") and do these squats. It was awesome, and I'm not going back.

First of all, doing squats on the machine (the only way I'd ever done them) uses maybe half the muscles that you would use with the bar. When I was in HS I could do sets of 10 with 350 lbs to around 500 lbs. The strongest guy in our school set the squat max record (with the bar) at 450 lbs. He weighed 275 lbs, was an all-state offensive lineman and would've been all-state defensive lineman too, but they could only vote for him once. You get the picture, this guy was a beast. That should give you an idea of the difference between the machine and the bar. Bar = WAY harder. Anyway, I'm searching for some explosiveness for basketball and the upcoming soccer tournament, and squats are on the menu. I'll have to figure out how to do box jumps with my limited resources...

The Lions signed all their draft picks, so that's out of the way. Ziggy Ansah got a sweet deal just from carrying out a dare at the NFL Draft by wearing 3-D glasses. IMAX is seeing dollar signs. Word is the Lions are taking a look at Josh Cribbs to fill the role of kick returner. Yes. Please. Cribbs has some health concerns, but he's a game-changer on both punts and kick offs. And he could come in as a spread-the-field WR too. How about some highlights?

MLB's umpires are screwing up big time. First, the league had to issue an apology for Angel Hernandez's crew blowing a HR non-call, first on the field and then on replay. Hernandez has a pretty long history of being a jerk (seriously? Throwing out Mongo McMichael while singing Take Me Out to the Ball Game?"). He's got a quick trigger, and he's handling this situation pretty poorly. He also calls one of the worst strike zones in baseball, so it's a wonder he even has a job. This blown call cost Oakland the game.

The other incident took place in the Angels-Astros game. It didn't cost anybody the game (Angels won 6-5), but it was another example of guys whose job it is to know the rules not knowing the rules. What happened was this - the Astros brought a guy out to pitch, he started throwing warm ups & the manager ran out and sent him back to the 'pen so another guy could pitch. The problem is that when a guy comes out of the bullpen, he has to pitch to at least one batter unless he's injured, and this guy wasn't injured. Whoops. Back to basics.

Wings fight for their playoff lives tonight. I don't think they can win a Stanley Cup this year, but I'm not ready for them to be done for the playoffs and these younger guys are fun.