EXTREME KORN REPORT: CONSUMER ALERT!!!!!!!!1!1!

Jersey: awesome, color coordinated Zubaz: EXTREME.

ZUBAZ!!!!! ZUBAZ!!!!!

THEY'RE BACK! The most EXTREME pants you can slip your legs into (unless Levi's makes a pair of jeans out of TERIYAKI BEEF JERKY covered in FLAME DECALS) are back from the 80s!

Now I'm sure you're all with me, but I've been writing letters to Zubaz literally each and every day since they went off the market DEMANDING they start up production again. Well, apparently my letters weren't ALL returned to sender, because the Zubaz machine is back in gear. TITS.

My bad for not including more KORN news in this EKR, but we'll be on the scene when (IT'S ONLY A MATTER OF TIME) Zubaz makes a pair in ORANGE and PURPLE and sends the first pair to MISTER KORN.

Get your ZUBAZ here! Tell them you want a new variety in ORANGE AND PURPLE! WHOOOO!!!

PURNELL CALLS ON HIS POSSE

The following is an email sent out to the entire student body a la Coach Purnell:

Dear Students,

I want to thank you for your great support that you've provided our basketball team this year. As you know, at this point in the season, each game becomes more and more important as we fight for seeding in the ACC and NCAA Tournament. This Wednesday we face the biggest game of the year up to this point as we play Miami at 7:30pm in Littlejohn Coliseum. It is pivotal for us to have a great crowd! We have such a great home court advantage when Littlejohn is full and as you know this begins with the students. You have been great all year long and we need you for two more games!

Let's make Littlejohn louder than ever as your Tigers take on a very good Miami basketball team. Don't forget to wear Orange and I look forward to seeing you on Wednesday Night at 7:30pm.

Go Tigers!
Oliver Purnell


Side Note: Have you ever noticed that Cliff Hammonds looks exactly like Mike Epps

I wonder if OP and Cliff have similarly styled arguments in practice.

BASEBALL RETURNS

The Tigers are at it again, and things are looking bright after the first day of NCAA Baseball play . The Tigers, ranked as high as 13th in some polls, and as low as 23rd by Baseball America, are looking forward to another good season, and maybe a return to the CWS. The polls are split on who in the ACC will be contenders but you can definitely expect North Carolina, Miami and FSU , among others, to be tough this year. As usual, the chickens in Columbia are ranked higher than Clemson and will soon start the smack talking, though this is the one sport they usually fare well in.

After having their season opener against Mercer canceled due to inclement weather (or the threat of it) Friday evening, the Tigers played a double header on Saturday in a great start for the Tigers in 2008. The first game went to the Tigers in a 12-5 showing where returning starter Doug Hogan went 3/4 with a two run homer in the game. Starter Ryan Hinson got the win, going for 5 innings in good form, allowing just 2 runs off of 5 hits, and 3 walks while striking out 4. In other good news, Stan Widmann, who was drafted by the Oakland A's in the 39^th round has returned to form after sitting out most of the 2007 season with an injury. He singled to bring in Clemson's first run of the season.

In Game 2 returning starter and former outfielder DJ Mitchell had a very shaky start but got the win, going 5 innings and allowing 3 runs on 3 hits and 3 walks while striking out 4. Clemson scored 6 runs in the first three innings and cruised to a 6-5 victory with closer Matt Vaughn picking up his first save of the year. Perhaps the biggest story of the day is freshman Chris Epps, a right fielder from Stone Mountain GA ( Dunwoody HS). Epps went 3/3 with 2 runs and 1 RBI in game 1, and 2/4 with a two run homer in the 3rd inning of game two. That put him 5/7 on the day.  Definitely a bright spot on the roster, if you ask me.

Look forward to more weekly updates on the baseball scene each Sunday.

In other news:

It's time for DFIG's annual fantasy baseball league to begin. It'll be conducted under the same rules as last year and hosted by Fantasy on Yahoo! Sports, as usual and the league will be open to all of our readers. We request that everyone name their team based on the name by which you post on the site so we can keep track of everyone. We also request that if you're not going to keep up with your team please don't bother registering one. We had several teams last year that ended up not playing past week 2, which resulted in nearly a third of all games for everyone else being easy wins, which really sucked when it got to the end of the year. The preliminary date for the live online draft is March 9th at 2pm, so try to get your teams in before then.  We'll start play and draft when we get enough teams. The draft date and time is up for suggestions as well since we can change it. Sign up now with the following info:
League ID: 122123
Password: HDDVD

In still other news, the HDDVD format has officially lost the war to BluRay (damn you Sony). While I'm happy that I refrained from buying an HD DVD player before its demise, I'm sad that this format war was not in the end decided by the porn industry. They've lost their hold on it...

One quick recommendation though, is Penn and Teller's BullShit. It's a show they've been producing on Showtime for the last 5 years. I recently downloaded the fifth season and it is absolutely awesome. That is, if you like to see every popular myth and hippie/liberal cause debunked with very convincing evidence. They have departed from magic in this show and showcase their atheistic, libertarian points of view while attacking some of the most crackpot causes in America with humor and cynicism. This season the targets ranged from Wal-Mart, the ADA , Nuclear Regulation, and my favorite episode: Breast Hysteria, where they argue that women should be allowed to walk around topless wherever men are. I'm not a libertarian, but these guys are great. Check them out. Here's part of an episode they did on PETA, brilliant.

FORMER TIGERS LAND IN NEW ALL-AMERICAN FOOTBALL LEAGUE

This year's new spring football league (competing with the Arena League) just had their draft recently and some of our guys made it. Nathan Bennett (T) and Roman Fry (G) landed with the Alabama team, Tennessee got Woody Dantzler (QB), William Henry (T), and Reggie Merriweather (RB), and lastly Kevin Youngblood (WR) gets to play on Ford Field for the Michigan team.

This is the first spring league for football that I can actually see garnering some attention as it's kinda set up as a minor league system for the NFL. The basic premise is that all players have to be college graduates. Each team will just be called Team Alabama, Team Texas, etc. The corresponding teams will play in major college or professional venues in their respective states (Team Tennessee plays in Neyland, Team Michigan plays at Ford Field in Detroit). Lastly, teams will feature players that played for in state colleges with some non-regional players on the roster. Plans for an Indiana team out of Purdue and a North Carolina team out of Raleigh are in the works for 2009 if the league doesn't fold. I hope they don't try to lump us in with North Carolina cause I can't stand that they did that with the Carolina Panthers.

NEWS & NOTES

- Clemson's Athletic Department, always with its finger firmly off the pulse of the student body, is now acting to curb fun at Clemson baseball games. In an email sent to Clemson's Student Body President Josh Bell, John Seketa requests help curbing "organizations that set up a tent, cook-out [sic], play flip-cup, etc... and never come inside to watch the game." He mentions that students "leave the facility like a tornado zone" and that their actions are contrary to the family atmosphere desired at Clemson's sporting events. I agree that Clemson's family atmosphere at sporting events is a signature aspect of our university and should be preserved. However I would also point out that Clemson is a university, and college students need a fun and loose atmosphere in which to enjoy sporting games as well. This is just my (Chili's) opinion, but college baseball is boring as hell most of the time. Sitting around and drinking and screaming horrid things at the outfielders is a time honored tradition at Clemson and shouldn't be changed in any way. However if the outfield screamers are indeed leaving behind garbage they ought to be reprimanded in some way. I just know Clemson well enough to know that they'll eliminate students drinking at baseball games before they urge them to throw their trash away. Something about using a bazooka when a flyswatter would do...

- Coincidentally, on Sunday night IPTAY launched their new campaign to raise $10 million campaign to expand the baseball stadium and help fund smaller sports. The budget will put new seats and stands beyond the outfield fences and beside the batting cages.

- Sticking with baseball, you Charleston area Tigers should attend the February 27th matchup of Clemson and College of Charleston at Patriot's Point. The game is at 5 PM and you can pick up tickets here.

- The Men's basketball lost to FSU in Tallahassee tonight by a score of 64-55. This drops
Clemson to a 19-7 overall and 7-5 in ACC play. KC Rivers, Cliff Hammonds, and Trevor Booker were the only double digit scorers. Check out the box score.

- The Charleston Post & Courier has a great article on Cliff Hammonds, one of the most underrated players in the league. Not only is he rising to the top of the scrappy Tigers lineup, he's an academic star to boot. He's majoring in pyschology and the most difficult and time consuming of all majors at Clemson: architecture. He's doing all this while having a wife and child. Oh, and he got a 4.0 last semester. People this great at everything sometimes just make you feel like crap.



WHAT REALLY GRINDS OUR GEARS!



Chili:
Ashley Judd. Okay, she doesn't anger me, but the sports coverage of her does. WE GET IT, she's a Kentucky fan. We needn't be reminded of this every time she's at a game. Oh, look, there's Ashley Judd watching... SEC Basketball. I guess she's a better actress than I thought she was because she's managing to look vaguely interested in a basketball game involving Mississippi State. Come to think of it, she's a lot like her favorite basketball team. You know, in the 90s they were great and got a lot of attention, but they've made some poor career choices (Billy Gillespie, every lame thriller she's ever been in) and are generally irrelevant in 2008 and now when people think of them it's just sort of "meh."

Don't send me any more damned Facebook application requests. I don't want to be a zombie, or a pirate, or a ninja. I don't want to play Oregon Trail with you, either.
People who reminisce about the Oregon Trail deserve a good cockpunch. "Hey, remember when you'd like... ford a river and.. uh... your oxen would die? Man, that was awesome." No, no the fuck it wasn't.

I'm not going to rant about all the Ohioans in Charleston, I'm really not. It's a free country, move where you want. Some of my best friends are Ohioans. That being said, nobody here cares about your team. We know you love the Buckeyes. Good for you. In Charleston you're generally a Clemson or a Sakerlina fan. It's not that we don't believe all your yarns about how awesome OSU is, or that we don't respect your long winning history, we just don't care. Not at all. Not. One. Bit. And if I see you trotting down the street wearing a Buckeye jersey and a nut necklace I might laugh and point. Don't take it personally.

Willy Mac:

Pretty much everything Chili said with the addition of this: If I pay a car wash place almost 30 bucks to clean my car, then DO YOUR DAMN JOB. Please take the time to actually wipe down the inside and vacuum. Now, I realize that not many USC fans probably read this site, so please pass the message along for me when you see them. Also, enjoy the following hilarity of some guy that broke into a liquor store, then became trapped. I can't tell if he was already drunk, but I'm guessing he was.

HELLO?

Is it me you're looking for?

UNC BASKETBALL PREVIEW

Clemson (17-5, 5-3 ACC) @ #5 North Carolina (22-2, 6-2 ACC). Saturday, February 10th, 6:30 PM, Fox Sports Net, XM Radio Channel 190, WCCPFM 104.9 in the upstate (Live feed).

Line: North Carolina -8.5


The more you know: UNC has never lost to Clemson at home, going 52-0.

Preview:

Right now, the Clemson Basketball team is well into rollercoaster mode as it has already seen it is fair share of extreme highs and lows just… and we’re only midway through the in conference schedule. One thing is certain and that is UNC is an extremely good team. So good in fact that the regular season championship as well as the ACC Tournament championship will probably come down to either Duke or the Tarheels. On the other hand, Clemson has shown flashes of brilliance and hope as well as terrible form and lack of concentration.

Tyler Hansborough's senior page in his high school yearbook. And yes, from as much as I can tell, he was being serious about it.

The keys to victory will be to do two things they’ve had relative trouble doing all season: make their free throws and not fall prey to the stab and pass offense. All season teams have driven the ball inside only to hit a man wide open on the arch. UNC can shoot the lights out from that range and it’s extremely important for us to not leave them uncovered. Also, for as long as I can remember Clemson Basketball has been known for their poor free throw shooting percentage. That’s one of the key points that Clemson has to address before they can actually expect to consistently beat teams as good as UNC. The time we faced UNC was at Littlejohn earlier this season and we dominated most of the game. A big factor in that game was the fact that the Tigers were able to play patiently and Trevor Brooker was able to be aggressive with Tyler Hansborough and get him off his game. The Dean Smith Center can be a very hostile environment so the Tigers have to act quickly and make smart decisions and keep the Tarheel crowd a non-factor. You can fully expect the Tarheels to show up in their usual cookie-cutter national contender form, let’s just hope the Tigers show up like they did back on January sixth.

Beating North Carolina would be about as awesome as this video. Random, but enjoy.

2008 FOOTBALL SCHEDULE RELEASED

From the Clemson Athletic Department

Aug. 30  - #Alabama
Sept. 6  - THE CITADEL
Sept. 13 - NC STATE
Sept. 20 - SC STATE
Sept. 27 - MARYLAND
Oct. 9   - ^at Wake Forest
Oct. 18  - GEORGIA TECH
Nov. 1   - at Boston College
Nov. 8   - at Florida State
Nov. 15  - DUKE
Nov. 22  - at Virginia
Nov. 29  - SOUTH CAROLINA

Season Ticket Information: 1-800-CLEMSON
# - at Georgia Dome, Atlanta, GA
^ - Thursday evening game on ESPN

PIMP MY COACH

Tommy Bowden shows up in style to a recent IPTAY meeting. I like the stadium pants and the orange boat shoes, just maybe not together. Link to source article.

THURSDAY NEWS AND VIRGINIA PREVIEW

NEWS

- The spring game for football has been tentatively set for April 12th. Wonder how Willy Korn's "shoulder injury" is healing up?

- The baseball season is set to begin on February 22nd at home with a weekend series against Mercer in Doug Kingsmore. 4PM Friday, 2 PM Saturday, and 1PM Sunday. Check out the remainder of the schedule here.

- The basketball team destroyed Boston College last Saturday, 78-56. Five Tigers scored in double figures and saw a strong defensive performance from Clemson's younger players including Terrence Oglesby, David Potter, and Raymond Sykes. Last year there were times that I worried we made a mistake recruiting the latter two but they have really turned it around. The stat column didn't show it for that game but they played with a lot of emotion and intensity. Box Score.

- CJ Spiller posted a national best time of 6.58 in the 60 m dash last Saturday at the Carolina Classic. He also beat out a few professional times in the 60m and it's the schools fourth fastest time for the 60m.

- Cliff Hammonds was named to the ESPN All-District Team. He is a senior with a 3.2 GPA. Impressive, but what's even more impressive is that he's a double major in architecture and psychology. Congratulations Cliff. But seriously, the only career I could see a former college athlete with superb grades and those two majors winding up as would be a Ghostbuster.

- The State has an interesting article about Clemson's recruiting of Jamie Harper and how the high school star almost changed his mind.

PREVIEW

Clemson (16-5, 4-3 ACC) @ Virginia (11-9, 1-6 ACC). Thursday, February 7th, 7:00 PM, ESPN2 HD, XM Radio Channel 190, WCCPFM 104.9 in the upstate (Live feed).

Line: Clemson -3

The more you know: Clemson is 63.5% as a team on the year for free throws, but have gone 24/30 in the past two games. The Tigers also lost to UVA last year in Littlejohn in terrible fashion. Shitting the bed in the final minutes of the game, they allowed the Cavaliers to score 15 unanswered points and beat them.

Our take:

Willy Mac: At first glance I thought that this could be a great opportunity for a hiccup game but UVA really has been that bad this year. Granted that they've nearly beaten some good teams in the final seconds, they've also lost to some decent at best teams like Seton Hall and absolutely go pounded by Xavier. I think if we play smart and just make some of our free throws we should be fine and come away with a win. Considering injuries and players being banged up, we're playing some really good ball right now sub the loss to Miami. I just hope the refs actually call a clean game and not one like they did against Boston College and Wake Forest with all the holding and arm push-offs.

OP is tired of the no-calls for holding as mentioned briefly Monday night in his show.

Chili: Forthcoming.

ELECTION '08

Some candidates offer you a formation. We offer you a play. What others may malign as a gimmick and possibly dangerous for exposed receivers we present to you as a daring change of pace that will keep the defense on its toes. The fresh influx of talent at skill positions and a new crop of linemen aching for the zone just begs for SCREEN FOOTBALL. If set up correctly it is a perfect breakout play. Don't believe the detractors. Running the ball every play is so 1980s. Welcome to the FUTURE.

The future.

The future.

Paid for by Mad Scientist Labs, LLC. Remember running is lame, screens are shiny and new and fun. You do love shiny things, don't you?

ELECTION '08

James Davis... ...CJ Spiller... ...Andre Ellington... ...Jamie Harper... names like these, in times like these, require decisive action. We need a formation we can trust. Would you trust your players' careers to some new-fangled "screen?" Ask Jacoby Ford what he thinks about that. The choice is simple. Stable. Old-school. Reliable.

Wishbone. For Clemson. For America.

It was good enough for Danny, it's good enough for me.




Paid for by Friends of Danny PAC. Remember, screens are for queers and Madden players.

CLEMSON FINALLY FINISHES THE JOB

UNBELIEVABLE. According to ESPN, Clemson's recruiting class is ranked second in the nation behind Miami. Florida, Alabama, and Georgia round out the rest of the top five. So far our buddy Jeff Merritt was correct with his predictions of getting two out of three of the final major recruits in Jamie Harper and Antoine McClain. Jerrell Harris made the expected choice and went to Alabama. Surprisingly, we stole Under Armour All-American Tight End Dwayne Allen from Georgia. This is definitely one of the best recruiting classes Clemson has put together during the post-Ford era and unfortunately for you Bowden haters, you have to give it up to Tommy and his staff. In all we have 10 recruits that are in the ESPN 150. Also seven recruits are ranked in the top five of their respective positions. This looks to be a great haul for us. Check out the complete signings a la ESPN.

Jamie Harper: Cookie cutter running back from the smash mouth mold.

HITLER IS A GAMECOCK FAN

This video has been floating around Tigernet and Rivals lately, and it comes from The Chicken Curse. Pretty damned hilarious, hopefully we'll see some more from them soon.

"I was going to sell them at Bojangles and make a fortune."

NOM NOM NOMINATED

Checking out Every Day Should Be Saturday as I tend to do compulsively, I noticed that we were nominated for Best ACC Blog in the 2008 College Football Blog awards. We think that's cool, and we thank our buddy Andrew Reed and anyone else who nominated us.

NATIONAL SIGNING DAY PREVIEW

Wednesday is national signing day for high school football players, the day when the dust settles on fierce recruiting battles and recruits sign on the dotted line. Not long ago, this was about the only day the average college football fan paid great attention to the ranking and recruitment of high school athletes. Now, with sites like Rivals.com and Scout.com making a business out of reporting the day by day changes of impressionable teenagers, recruiting has been pushed into the mainstream of college football fandom. Check out Bruce Feldman's book Meat Market for more lamentations over the business of recruiting.

Because every post should have a picture. And because it's fucking awesome.

Personally, I honestly could care less about the day to day decisions these recruits are making. Just from following along with Tigernet I've heard about kids who are "100% committed, but could change [his] mind later." This is the sort of 100% commitment that Pamela Anderson has thrown into her marriages. Most of these kids will change their mind time and time again, and Rivals is betting on you hanging on their every whim for a subscription fee. What I'm getting at with this whole rant is that I put little value in the pre-signing day shenanigans and find the hard news once the names are signed and LOIs faxed far more pertinent.

So far, 23 players have committed to Clemson. Rivals and Scout rank the haul so far at 14th nationally. ESPN ranks them at 4th in the country. Interestingly, last year ESPN had the Gamecocks' recruiting class in the top 5, to the outright derision of the most vocal Tigers. This year the shoe is on the other foot and it is curious to see many Tigers bragging about ESPN's take on our class. Regardless of who ranks the class, the Tigers are looking great right now.


Jeff Merritt supplies us with his take on how Signing Day will boil down for the Tigers:

Will this be a Great Signing Day, or the Greatest Signing Day??

The 2007-2008 recruiting season is about to come to a close this Wednesday, February 6^th. While many schools have finished up with all their prospects or ran out of scholarships, the Clemson Tigers are in it with 3 top players who plan to announce their choices on National Signing Day, Jamie Harper RB, Jacksonville, FL, Antoine McCain, Anniston, AL, and Jerrell Harris, Gadsden, AL. It should be noted that Clemson already has a #4 ranked class by ESPN, (of course #10-12 is more realistic by other outlets, we’re just gonna go with #4… yea, I like that better.) It should be no surprise that the MAN, the Legend, Dabo Swinney is the recruiter of record for each other these top out-of state prospects.

Jamie Harper RB 6’ 0” 220lbs. 4.4

Harper is the biggest fish of them all. This running back is so special that he was worth two offers- meaning his teammate Daniel Andrews’s first offers were from Miami, Florida and Clemson; the three main contenders for his services. Jamie is considered by some to be the #1 running back in the state of Florida, giving Clemson a chance to pluck the top ball carrier 2 out of the last 3 years from the sunshine state. Things look good for the tigers here, as multiple sources have reported that Clemson is his leader, and the fact that Daniel Andrews, his best friend, not just teammate, best friend who got offered in order to be a package deal with him, is already committed to the Orange and White. Another strong indication is that a few months ago, a top RB from New York tried to set up an official in order to commit…. Clemson had to deliver him the news that they would not be accepting his commitment and would be ending their recruitment. Why would we do that unless we had someone already silently committed? Harper’s press conference is set for 12:20pm. Offers include – UF, Miami, FSU, UGA, Illinois, and Clemson among others.

Antoine McClain OT 6’6” 317lbs

This is where things might get interesting. McClain hails offers from Alabama, Auburn, Clemson, LSU, Florida, Tennessee, and UGA. Antoine made his official visit to Clemson for the weekend of the Clemson Football team banquet, and was blown away. So much that it was believed that Clemson was in second place to Auburn for his services. Recently, Auburn’s class has filled up and has stopped recruiting McClain, putting the Tigers from the Upstate in the drivers’ seat. Don’t be surprised if the # 13 ranked Offensive tackle according to Rivals.com announces for Clemson at his press conference scheduled for 10:30 am.

Jerrell Harris LB 6’2 220lbs 4.5

Harris reminds me a lot of the linebacker Clemson lost out on a few years back, Geno Hayes who went on to absolutely star at LB for FSU – too bad there was no offense. He is the prospect that highlights the title of this piece. Regardless if Clemson lands this unbelievable playmaker that has offers from Southern Cal …(enough said), the Tiger will have a great signing day. Now if by some slight chance Jerrell shocks everyone and leaves the state of Alabama for Clemson, with the possibility of landing Harper and McClain, this could be the greatest signing day in Clemson history. But the chances of getting all three kids to leave state and head to the foothills of South Carolina seem pretty slim.

Put me down for “great”. Prediction - Harper and McClain choose the tigers while Harris rolls with the tide.

Willy Mac reacts to losing out on the big recruit.

BRIEF SATURDAY NEWS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

NEWS

- The Tiger baseball team is ranked 23rd in the Baseball America Poll and 16th in the Sports Weekly Coaches Poll. God, February 22nd can't get here fast enough. This should be a good year of baseball after last years semi let down. What I'm not looking forward to is the effect skipping all those classes to go drink beer in the outfield is going to have on my grades. How many times have you parked in Lot 5 and just said "Screw it, it's too nice out to waste today inside in some boring class," then wandered over to Doug Kingsmore Stadium?

- The basketball team is well into the patented "Clemson Rollercoaster Mode" as they have gone 3-4 since the semester started back. A brief injuries run down: Trevor Booker is questionable to start; Stitt is out for at least two weeks; Mays is still banged up but will play. Today's Boston College game is sold out and if you're a student at Clemson I strongly encourage you to put your ass in seat at Littlejohn for that one. WCCP FM will be broadcasting the game for free. Check out that link for their internet broadcast. Clemson has boosted their free throw percentage to 63% overall with a 75% (15-20) at the Miami game. Let's hope this is an upward trend. Also, we face Boston College guard (I think?) Tyrese Rice who has a 22 point average per game.

A depleted Tiger basketball team faces a tough challenge in BC's Tyrese Rice

RECOMMENDATION

Moe Joe Coffee Company - Run by a former Clemson football player and graduate, Moe Joe is the only true local coffee place out of a handful that have popped up in Clemson. You've got the national Starbuck's, that crap store in Bilo that I can't even pronounce, Spill the Beans which started in Greenville, and Jittery Joes, a UGA based company. I can vouch that it's some of the better coffee in town. Oh yeah, the fact that they have great food and, oh yeah, my favorite, a good selection of premium cigars. Just do me a favor and buy local because not only is it a quality product but I'm just sick and tired of seeing national chains come into Clemson and force local businesses into closing down.