Old guy

There is a Cafe Provencal in Kirkwood, I have not gone in years since a bad experience there but they used to be reasonably good.

Doctor B, having lived in the Boston area for 24 years with fairly frequent flights to NYC and DC, I completely agree that what you get for a set amount of money in either of those cities is much less than what you get in STL for the same amount of money. This is particularly true if you include the cost of parking your car and the cost (oftentimes in tolls) to just get where you are going.

What I am sure about is that Billi Ken does not have a valid conceptual idea about overall school finances and limitations to financing some areas instead of others. The fact that private donations are financing improved locker rooms for the basketball team and infield, locker rooms and batting cages for baseball are indications that at least some donors are responding directly to SLU's athletic department appeals. This is good. The fact that the University is favoring academics overall is something Athletics has to live with. Yes, a lot of money is apparently being spent on the medical area, but they also hope to markedly increase the number of research grants the medical area receives. Honestly I do not want to put you down for talking about optimism and ambition surrounding an athletic program, but I must point out that a good amount optimism and ambition does exist in SLU about the basketball program and other athletic programs as well. It is also true that the development financing the school provides is still being directed elsewhere. Again, it is good that the Athletic program is able to approach donors and get funding of their own for specific purposes. The real answer to your question about the leaders at SLU is that they have already decided how and to what extent they will finance the various areas of the University for the next cycle. In short they have taken a path of austerity with specific areas being basically maintained at specific levels (which may be a very low level judging by Doctor B's post above), other areas being heavlily cut down or eliminated altogether, and just a few areas receiving additional development funds. Obtaining participation of outside funding sources for specific projects probably has a lot to do with how the funds are being apportioned. Athletics is not one of the areas receiving additional development funds but apparently they are allowed to hustle for funds on their own, at least for specific projects. I really cannot comment upon the specific details that Doctor B is referring to in his post above, except to mention that the pain is evident in at least some of the areas and programs of the University. To Dr. B specifically: it appears that you and the surrounding staff are being asked to do the work of several people for the same or a lower salary. This is tough and believe me I have lived through situations like the one you describe. All I can say is that keeping your feelings and anger bottled inside while you explore alternative paths may be the way to go. Just saying. All the best of luck as you decide what to do.

Yes and no, SLU's budget is not well funded and they have had to lay off employees and terminate programs. The departure of Biondi left behind a divided group of donors some of which appear to have withdrawn support. Given the financial issues faced by the school, a difficult set of choices have apparently been made favoring the academic side of the school. Their aim appears to be the improvement of the academic side of the university. I have to assume the current athletic programs are doing fine as is without extensive new facilities. You may not like this choice, and the kid that goes to interview at Creighton will probably stay there, and that will just have to be too bad.

Ask Beidschield (Not sure of the name's spelling, he was a much better player than Zeke) how well his plans and transfers worked out for him

Too many transfers will not get him into the NBA that is for sure

I am sorry to see Zeke transferring to a JUCO program, hope it works out for him.

I do not have enough personal knowledge of Chris May or of most of the people he interacts with to make an opinion as to how good or bad he is in dealing with his job. I do know however that people in positions like his have to make some difficult decisions and deal with limited budgets. I also know that anyone making decisions of any kind will offend or upset other people who do not like the decision made. This is inevitable. Therefore the issue of how good May is at doing his job is something that really cannot be judged by how some people have reacted to his decisions. Sometimes developing a fair amount of opposition is a sign of a job well done, after all, you cannot make an omelet without breaking some eggs.

There are a number of physiological reasons why athletes habituated to high altitude living can play better at those high altitudes than athletes who live closer to sea level. The higher the altitude the thinner the air becomes, the thinner the air is the less oxygen it carries. Denver air is breathable without oxygen supplementation but being able to breathe and carry on with normal activities does not mean you can engage is strenuous exercise at that altitude and perform like you are accustomed to perform. People that live at high altitude adapt and can perform better than the sea level dwellers because their own bodies respond to the high altitude by making additional hemoglobin and red cells so that their lungs can extract more oxygen form the thinner air, and carry more oxygen to the body than people habituated to life at sea level can do. At the time of the Summer Olympics in Mexico City some years ago a number of teams trained for months in Mexico City itself in an attempt to force habituation to the high altitude in their athletes. Personally, I remember getting very short of breath during a meeting I attended many years ago in Reno, NV. No, I was not playing basketball or anything like it but the hotel was pretty high in the mountains and my body was plainly not getting enough oxygen to tolerate much exertion at all. Oh, and I have been to Jackson Hole and the National Parks in Wyoming, also Aspen and Denver CO many times and never got short of breath there.

He is there all right.

Reminds me of the anecdote of the Board members of a company that proudly wore jackets with the letters F D A on them. They got the jackets after Steve Jobs broke into one of their board meetings to call them: "F-ck-ng D-ckless As-holes" and then turned around and left the meeting. True story, it is in Jobs biography.

Good for you Billikenbooster, you will find things are more bearable in this board from here on. I did the same long ago.

The point that the home court advantage may by primarily due to officiating and that it is shrinking due to increased standardization of ref calls may well be a correct one. However there is always the wear and tear involved in being on the road and how that impacts players in away games. This factor may or may not have much importance after all, but it is always present and has noting to do with officiating decisions.

Nice interview, like Gordon a lot.

Personally I am looking forward to see French in action.

I really hope Steve is not going to appoint STL Hoops Insider a moderator, if he does he might as well change the name of this board to "Tigerboard East," and change its subject matter to "all things Mizzou."

Like the Wiz says, you need to wait to see a few games (8 he says) before you can make any predictions based on some degree of fact. Until then it is raw speculation. So I will speculate that the bills will win 75% of the games (including Rockhurst), for a 30-10 season. This prediction will be modified after the first 8 games are played.

Moderation starts by using the ignore feature. Getting involved in eternal back and forth insults does not help, getting freaked out about whatever the trolls are saying just shows insecurity which is best to avoid by using the ignore feature. That said, new posters who enter this board to cause fear and spread rumors favoring their own schools agenda should at least be limited in the number of posts they are allowed. That is my opinion, there is no point to allowing threads to get choked full of anti SLU stuff. I think we need both types of actions, limitation of the number of posts allowed to disruptive outside posters bent on posting misinformation, and personal use of the ignore feature by members of this board.

Let's make sure we take his offer and make sure he wears sexy underwear while he is playing the oompa-oompa stuff. He appears to have a small posterior as per the @VCULitos

That is very useful information thank you brianstl

I have been reading a fair amount of speculation as to what our team will be like this coming season, together with doubts about how well they will do in actual play, depth, composition, etc... Issues like lacking a true PG, etc... come floating out frequently. My answer to those concerns is simple, we have a group of players that just do not fit into the standard team compositions we know. This is both a great opportunity and a possible problem. If Ford gets the team integrated in a way that it plays together using the strengths of each player, we will have a winning team that will present unexpected problems for other teams. If Ford does not succeed at doing this, then we will have a problem winning against better integrated teams. I do not think Hines will be getting a significant amount of minutes this year unless we have a disaster in our hands. Whatever happens this coming season is entirely in Ford's hands, we will soon see how well he trains and plays the new team.

Agree completely, the same can be said for the guy that died for selling untaxed cigarettes, it is absurd.

Among the many things that can be truthfully said about Biondi, being an obstacle and obstructing all kinds of things are particularly true. I am very glad the administration wishes to double the research budget, this will allow the University to climb up a number of slots in its academic ranking, something that I think we all support. Good for Pestello and good for SLU, congratulations to the administration.

Agree the case had holes. However the issue of incompetence is real in this case: 1. You do not contest the facts that your own primary witness is testifying. 2. You do not make your arguments based upon facts that are contradicted by your own witnesses testimony. 3. You have the intelligence, which appears lacking in this prosecutor, to stay away from politically charged cases that you cannot or are likely not to win. Competent people choose their battles, this guy has shown he is not capable of doing so. I totally disagree that all high profile cases should be brought to trial. If the aim of the prosecutor is to bring change to the way things are by bringing a high profile case to trial, then he MUST know or be fairly certain he will win the case. You cannot bring change by losing your cases, he should know that is the way things are. I would like to know his name so that we can vote for someone else in any future elections for office. Cheeseman's posts make absolute sense to me, as they should have made to him.

Does anyone know the name of the lead prosecutor in this case? He was frankly incompetent in his presentation of the case to the court. You do not argue with the witnesses and do not present false facts as truth, like the fifth shot, in trial.