(02-13-2012 11:40 PM)levydl Wrote:  

(02-13-2012 09:49 PM)Overrated Wrote:  Are you sure he interviewed Cronin? The quotes I read sounded like what Cronin said after the game.

He said on Mo Egger's show that he did. Said he spent like a week or 10 days in Cincy. He interviewed Yancy's high school coach and Frease's mom for crying out loud. I imagine if Frease slapped Davis' wife, someone would have told him, and if not then I don't see how that makes the article biased.

Yancy's coach is an x alum, who admitted in the article he tried to steer Yancy away from UC. He also threw Yancy under the bus with his Yancy just being Yancy comments. The majority of the piece centered on Bobinski, Gate's HS coach, Larkin, and Frease's mom. I did not read any comments from UC's side, with the exception of one comment from Mick. Mick's comments were a set up for Larkin's unsolicited reamrk towards Mick. I was shocked to hear the writer indicate the story was just about this one punch and not the entire incident. (From Mo's interview) The writer looked at this story through a prism. The writer only wanted one point of view to represent the entire incident. If it's not bias its certainly irresponsible journalism.

(02-14-2012 11:05 AM)bearcatmill Wrote:  Yancy's coach is an x alum, who admitted in the article he tried to steer Yancy away from UC. He also threw Yancy under the bus with his Yancy just being Yancy comments. The majority of the piece centered on Bobinski, Gate's HS coach, Larkin, and Frease's mom. I did not read any comments from UC's side, with the exception of one comment from Mick. Mick's comments were a set up for Larkin's unsolicited reamrk towards Mick. I was shocked to hear the writer indicate the story was just about this one punch and not the entire incident. (From Mo's interview) The writer looked at this story through a prism. The writer only wanted one point of view to represent the entire incident. If it's not bias its certainly irresponsible journalism.

I guess you missed Van Exel and Terry Nelson's comments. And McBride said he tried to steer him away from XU too. He also defends Gates saying he was trying to protect his guys. Who is the biased one againt?

Believe what you want, every media member is biased against UC in favor of XU, even some national guy with no allegiance who didn't know much about either school to begin with. Makes perfect sense.

(02-14-2012 01:43 AM)Overrated Wrote:  I just skimmed the article again, but this is the only quote or mention of something Cronin said that I remember from the piece:

Quote:If it doesn't, there are plenty of people who will get behind the Crosstown Shootout's extinction. And Cronin is leading that crusade. "If it's not a positive, then there should be no game, and there will be no game if I have anything to do with it," the Cincinnati coach says. "And you can quote me on that."

He said something along those lines within 2 days of the game. Maybe he repeated himself, but that is hardly giving UC's side of the story. I don't really consider Yancy's high school coach giving UC's side of the story either considering he is a Xavier alum/fan and said Yancy wasn't a Xavier player or whatever.

I wouldn't call it a hit piece on UC. But I definitely think the angle was slanted towards X. That's what happens when you give so much space to a Xavier players mom who doesn't have any balance at all to her opinion. And I don't blame her. She is Kenny's mom. But less than a minute after the punch he was standing over the UC fan section having to be pulled away while cussing at them. And these are a bunch of old people who looked disgusted. Not people who are fighting back. He is also someone who threw a headbutt at Yancy (Mick has mentioned this publicly since the brawl, the writer omitted it) and behind the scenes he has talked tons of sh*t about how much he dislikes Yancy (I've heard it first person). But we only heard that Yancy hates Kenny, not the other way around.

My word, he said he interviewed Cronin. You think he has a bunch of quotes from UC that he left out so that he could make it slanted towards XU?

And I thought Frease's mom actually had some perspective when she blamed the fight on the culture and wondered why Frease was even in at the end.

This is silly. It doesn't matter what gets written or who writes it, some of you guys will think it's biased against UC. Just know that it sometimes makes you look like paranoid crybabies.

So you think he interviewed Mick and only got one quote (and a quote that came a day or 2 adter the fight at that)? That doesn't make any sense.

(02-14-2012 05:03 PM)Overrated Wrote:  So you think he interviewed Mick and only got one quote (and a quote that came a day or 2 adter the fight at that)? That doesn't make any sense.

I would guess that Cronin didn't have much to say because he didn't want to talk about it. Or does your conspiracy theory that the writer just wanted to make XU look good and UC look bad make more sense?

And I've never seen that quote from Cronin prior to this article. You got a link?

Wasn't there an article a few weeks prior to the game about how the rivalry had cooled??

Anyway, I'd be in favor of moving it downtown. I've been saying that for years. It's big enough to where both schools could give their season ticket holders ticket options every year, and you could also get the X students behind one basket, and the UC students behind the other. There aren't many games like that (Pitt v Duquesne has moved downtown, and I tink it's better). Illinois v Mizzou is the other. That's about it. I think they have the chance to create a somewhat unique environment around the rivalry if they move it downtown.

As far as the rivalry itself, I haven't lived in Cincinnati for several years, but I really don't think it's THAT heated. The players go to each other's open gyms. They play each other in the summer leagues, and in pickup games. If you've been around basketball that fights don't often happen in organized games. I don't want to say they happen all the time in practice or in open gym, but they happen more often than people realize. One of the things that's unique about the rivalry is that of all the open gyms and pick up games the two sides play, this is the one organized game. So, it has meaning to the players, and it has a sort of playground element to it.

The fight shouldn't have happened. No question about that. It was ridiculous. Having said that, the way the media et al (as I now call it) reacted to it was ridiculous as well. It created a large soap box for the media et al to stand on and sound off. People that had no affiliation with either school were chiming in with the intention of hyping up the shock value, as well as taking the opportunity to offer up self-righteous commentary. Ten years ago, this doesn't get nearly as much coverage. Even five years ago, it probably doesn't.

Back in the 1999-2000 season when Xavier upset top ranked Cincinnati, something else happened that night. Memphis and Tennessee got into a big brawl. It was mentioned on sportscenter and during the half time, but that was it. There weren't articles being written about it months later. No one was asking for a pound of flesh. No one was saying the series should be suspended. People were basically allowed to get on with their lives.

Do you know what happened in the Central Connecticut vs Long Island game this year?? There was a huge brawl involving both players and fans after the game. But, the self righteous aren't as attracted to that because the soap box isn't quite as big.

In either 1957 or 1958, Kansas and North Carolina got into a fight during in the NCAA Championship game, that went into triple overtime. No one was even ejected, and it's considered one of the greatest NCAA games ever played.

Duke and UNC got into a huge brawl in the 1960s, as did Mizzou and Kansas (in both football and basketball). The same network that is disgusted by the brawl at the shootout, glorifies those moments as a testament to how big the rivalry is.

Yes, the fight happened. Yes, it was ridiculous. However, it is no more over the top than much of what has happened in the past. In the past, players were allowed to get on with life. In this instance, one of the things that no one mentioned was how the players reached out to each other the day after the fight to make amends. Yeah, the fight was avoidable and stupid, but if you're going to criticize both teams for it, at least MENTION that they made amends.

As far as the fans and institutions not respecting each other, that part of the article is just completely bogus...

When I was at X, I had several friends that went to UC that I worked with at the time. We're still friends. We went to each other's parties, and shared each other's student tickets. There were many UC football and basketball games where I was in UC's student section, people knew I was from Xavier, and no one cared. Same for them when they would come to X games.

I do know some people that currently work, or have previously worked in UC's athletic department. Some of them actually got their master's degrees from X. They don't dislike or disrespect Xavier.

Just about every one that I knew worked at a place where some liked UC and some liked X. The statement about people not getting jobs based on where they went to school is just utterly ridiculous.

Some of the members of UC's board of trustees are X grads.

The two schools get along. The fans get along. I'm not saying it never gets heated during the game, but the notion that the two schools do not like each other and don't associate is just way off. It paints the picture that the two camps are completely segregated, and on the one day out of the year they get together, all hell breaks loose. Sheesh. XU and UC alumns date and marry each other.

So, I think it is a good rivalry. I don't think it is out of control. The players undoubtedly lost control in a less than sixty second incident in this past game, but as a whole, it's a good rivalry that had a bad moment. Everyone ( and by everyone, I mean EVERYONE...many of whom have never even been to Cincinnati) is harping on that as a case that the rivalry is way out of control. Some of these people were talking about how the rivalry was overrated just a few weeks prior.