DID THE FBI JUST BLOW UP COLLEGE BASKETBALL

Yesterdays arrests of four college basketball coaches by the FBI have sent shockwaves through the NCAA and its member schools. And from all indications this is just the beginning.  In their announcement the federal prosecutor and F.B.I. stated very clearly that “we have you playbook,” and we are coming for you. 

 

The four coaches, Chuck Person from Auburn, LaMont Evans from Oklahoma State, “Book” Richardson from Arizona and USC’s Tony Bland have all been implicated by the FBI of using money supplied by shoe company Adidas to steer prominent high school recruits toward specific universities, and sports agents.

In addition the Louisville Men’s Basketball program has been implicated in receiving payments of approximately $100,000 which was funneled to the family of recruit Brian Bowen who committed to Louisville early this summer.  In the FBI Statement they indicated that they have phone records to support the alleged criminal behavior by the Louisville staff.

Rick Pitino couldn't talk or deny his way out of the latest allegations

This is but the latest and probably most serious allegations against Louisville Head Coach Rick Pitino who has left a trail of NCAA violations at every school he has been at. This is more than NCAA Violations, this is a criminal investigation being conducted by the FBI and all of those involved could be looking a significant jail time.

Pitino ranks up there with disgraced coach Dave Bliss as being one of the most disreputable people in sports. In 2010 he was involved in a federal extortion investigation involving Karen Syphers who served time in prison after attempting to get money from the coach in exchange for keeping quiet.

Then in 2015 members of his staff was basically running a whore house for prospective recruits. And now this federal fraud investigation is probably the final nail in Pitino’s coffin.  Over the years including the 2015 whore house investigation and again yesterday when the latest allegations came to the surface, Pitino claimed he didn’t know and is shocked by the information.  It's your program and if you didn't know, you should have. Your statements and plausible denial just don't hold water.

When you look at everything that is going on under the banner of the NCAA, it appears that the organization has lost total control of its so called member institutions. Recent NCAA investigation at marquee programs like North Carolina, Syracuse and again at Louisville which takes years to complete makes the entire NCAA irrelevant. In short the FBI is doing something the NCAA either refused to do or couldn’t do.  When you get right down to the brass tacks, the NCAA is not capable of managing the vast expanse that is college athletics.

What came out yesterday is just the tip of the iceberg. There will be more schools named and there will be more high profile coaches not only lose their job but become the subjects of criminal investigations.

Louisville announced that Pitino has been placed on unpaid administrative leave which is probably a politically correct way of saying he will be fired in the very near future. Which leave me to ask what about Sean Miller at Arizona, or Bruce Pearl at Auburn, Andy Enfield at USC and Mike Boynton at Oklahoma State, how well are they sleeping at night and how safe are their jobs.

Is this FBI Criminal Investigation a good thing? I think so. This is more about losing scholarships, tournament bans or probations.  This is about significant jail time for the corrupt individuals. Did the  FBI just blow up College Basketball? I think so and I am not at all convinced that it is a bad thing.  The corruption that goes on at major programs needs to be exposed and dealt with, which is again something the NCAA couldn’t or more likely wouldn’t do.

THE TOMBSTONE TOURIST VISITS: BELLEFONTAINE CEMETERY

I first visited St. Louis in March of 2010 hen I was on the way to the NCAA Basketball Tournament in Oklahoma City. In 2013 my NCAA Tournament Vacation took me to Kansas City and I once again stopped in St. Louis.  When I first started researching things to see and do in St. Louis, the first thing that I wanted to do was visit the famous Gateway Arch, and many of the downtown attractions. But also high on my list was a visit to some of the area's historic cemeteries, including St. Peter's, Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery, Calvary and Bellefontaine.

During my 2010 visit I spent the better part of an entire day visiting Bellefontaine and Calvary Cemeteries. These two cemeteries are located on Florissant Avenue, north of downtown St. Louis.shortly after  The surrounding area is not the best and I was a little apprehensive as I got closer to the the cemetery.

Bellefontaine Cemetery is a very large cemetery consisting of more than 300-acres and is the final resting place of close to 100,000 people. The cemetery was founded in 1849 and some of the first burials were a result of the area's worst cholera epidemic. In the years that followed some of our nations most notable citizens were buried here.

I arrived at Bellefontaine Cemetery shortly after 9 a.m. and stopped at the office where I picked up a driving tour map and a small booklet that details the history of many of the historic figures that are buried here.

BUSCH MAUSOLEUM: As a young man Adolphus Busch  delivered supplies to local breweries and met and married the daughter of Eberhardt Anheuser. After the Civil War Adolphus joined his father-in-law in the brewery business.  Together the two grew their locally brewery into Anheuser-Busch, which is today the world's largest brewery company, featuring 12-brewery's in the United States and is also one of the worlds largest theme park operators.

SAMUEL HAWKEN: In the early 1800's, brothers Jacob and Samuel Hawken opened a gun shop in St. Louis. Their Hawken Rifle quickly became a favorite of the the mountain men, replacing the Kentucky Long Rifle. Jacob died in 1849 and Samuel continued the business until the late 1850's when he sold his business to J. P. Gemmer who continued the tradition until 1915 when the shop finally closed.  Samuel Hawken died on May 9, 2884 at the age of 92.

GENERAL STERLING PRICE: General Price was a veteran of the Mexican War and governor of Missouri from 1853 to 1857. He originally tried to keep Missouri in the Union but later joined the Confederacy and rose to the rank of Major General. When it became apparent that the South would lose the war, Price and a few of his loyal followers fled to Mexico to serve in the army of Emperor Maximilian.  He returned to St. Louis late in life and died here on September 29, 1867.  Evidently the actor John Wayne was fond of General Price as Rock Hudson's Character in the Movie "The Undefeated" was loosely based on the Civil War life of General Price.  Finally Rooster Cogburn's Cat in the the John Wayne Movie "True Grit" was named - General Sterling Price.

GENERAL WILLIAM CLARK: General Clark along with Meriwether Lewis led the expedition that explored the upper Louisiana Territory all the way to the Pacific ocean.  Lewis and Clark, lead the Corp of Discovery on the expedition that departed St. Louis in 1804 and returned in 1806. Following their return, Lewis was either murdered or committed suicide while traveling on the Natchez Trace south of Columbia, Tennessee. General Clark Married Julia Hancock in 1808. In addition to caring for his own family General Clark cared for the children of Sacagawea after she died in 1812. He also later served as Governor of the Missouri  Territory for 7-years, and when Missouri became a state, he ran for Governor of the State but lost the election. After loosing the election Clark continued his work in Indian Affairs and was respected for his ethical and fair treatment of Native Americans. William Clark remained in St. Louis and died here on September 1, 1838.  General Clark

THOMAS HART BENTON: When Missouri became a state in 1821, Benton became it's first United States Senator. He was a defender of the Union and lobbied for Missouri to remain loyal to the Union during the Civil War. Benton was also a staunch supporter of expansion and was responsible for the eastern portions of the Missouri Pacific Railroad starting in St. Louis, resulting in the City becoming the  industrial and business center of the Midwest. Benton also was featured in a notorious part of local history when he and lawyer Charles Lucas fought a duel on Bloody Island in the Mississippi River. Lucas was wounded but survived the first duel, but was mortally wounded during the second one.  Senator Thomas Hart Benton died on April 10, 1858, in Washington, D. C.






I spent more than 4-hours touring Bellefontaine during my 2010 Visit and returned in 2013 and spend another 3-hours here. Once again, Bellefontaine is a very large and historic cemetery and the management embraces their history. Throughout the cemetery, visitors will see different colored line painted down the center of the road. These colors of the lines represent the different tours available, one tour highlights a Civil War Tours that takes you to notable graves of Civil War figures. Another tour is basically the historical tour which is the longest tour and highlights many of the historical figures that are buried here.

Whether you are pushed for time or have all day to spend in the Cemetery, I encourage you to stop at the office and pickup a driving tour map. It will help and enlighten as you make you way around Historic Bellefontaine Cemetery.

Here is a short Video highlighting my two visits to Bellefontaine Cemetery.

THE TOMBSTONE TOURIST VISITS - CROWN HILL MEMORIAL PARK

CROWN HILL CHAPEL

In March of 2013, while on the way to the NCAA Basketball Tournament in Kansas City, I stopped off in Indianapolis and spent some time at Crown Hill Memorial Park.  At over 500- acres, Crown Hill is Indiana's largest cemetery and the third largest non-government cemetery in the United States.  Before arriving I downloaded and print a cemetery map, but it was still very difficult to located particular graves. There are three United States Vice Presidents resting at Crown Hill, but I was able to locate on the grave of Charles Fairbanks, who served as Vice President under Teddy Roosevelt.

Vice President Charles Fairbanks

Fairbanks was elected as the 26th Vice President in 1904 and was the first vice president to serve an entire 4-year term without be called upon to case any tie-breaking votes as President of the Senate. Fairbanks also was an opponent of President Roosevelt's "Square Deal" and did not perform any significant role in the Administration and chose not to seek reelection. After leaving office in 1909, he returned to Indianapolis where he practiced law until he fell victim to ill-health. Charles Fairbanks died at his home on June 4, 1918

President Benjamin Harrison

Probably the most famous grave in Crown Hill is that of Benjamin Harrison, who served as the 23rd President of the United State. Harrison served as President from 1889-1893. He was the grandson of President William Henry Harrison and the great-grandson of Benjamin Harrison V, who signed the Declaration of Independence and succeeded Thomas Jefferson as Governor of Virginia. Following his term as president, he returned to his home in Indianapolis where he died on March 13, 1901 at the age of 67.

Robert Irsay

Just a short distance from the rave of President Harrison is the grave of Robert Irsay, who was the owner of Baltimore and Indianapolis Colts.  Irsay remains the most hated man in Baltimore because of his decision to move the Colts from Baltimore to Indianapolis. During the early morning hours of March 29, 1984, Irsay loaded of the teams property into 15 Mayflower Moving Vans and left Baltimore for Indianapolis. The City of Baltimore never forgot and to this day many residents curse his memory.

James Whitcomb Riley

At the top of the hill above the Irsay grave is probably the largest grave monument in the Cemetery, which marks the grave of James Whitcomb Riley, who is best known as the creator of "Little Orphan Annie."  Riley's grave is located at the highest point in Crown Hill and afford visitors a grand view of the Indianapolis skyline.

Cannonball Baker

I actually stumbled on the grave of  Erwin "Cannonball" Baker while looking for the grave of gangster John Dillinger.  "Cannonball" Baker made 143 separate cross-country motorcycle speed runs across the United States and set a number of record including riding coast to coast in 1914 on an Indian Motorcycle in 11-days. His cross country runs are thought to have totaled more the 550,000 miles. "Cannonball Baker" died of a heart attack on May 10, 1960 at the age of 78.

My final stop in Crown Hill Cemetery was at the grave of John Herbert Dillinger.  Located in Section 44, the Dillinger grave is probably one of the most visited graves in the cemetery.  John Dillinger was one of the most well known of the depression era gangsters, that included the likes of Bonnie and Clyde, "Pretty Boy" Floyd and "Machine Gun" Kelly. During the years of the Great Depression The Dillinger Gang was accused of robbing 24-banks and he was known to have escaped jail twice. Throughout his criminal career, Dillinger was never convicted of murder.

John Dillinger

John Dillinger's career came to a violent end on July 22, 1934 when he and his escort Ana Sage (the famed lady in red) attended a movie at the Biograph in Chicago. Unknown to Dillinger, Sage had tipped off the FBI that she and Dillinger would be attending the movie. The two were seen entering the theater at about 8:30 p.m. and FBI Agents lead by Melvin Purvis waited outside for the gangster and his escort to exit.

Ignoring commands to surrender, Dillinger chose to shoot it out with the agents and died of gun shot wounds in a nearby alley.  Dillinger's body was taken to the Cook County Morgue and put on public display.  As many as 15,000 people are believed to have viewed the gangsters body.  John Dillinger was eventually buried here in Crown Hill Cemetery.  His gravestone has been replaced several times because vandals and souvenirs hunters.

Over all I spent about two and a half hours and managed to visit only a few of the more notable graves. If I am ever back in Indianapolis I plan to return to Crown Hill but for now I must move on.
Here is a short video that  I shot during my visit to Crown Hill Memorial Park.

DOIN' A LITTLE ----STEPPIN' OUT

Every year during the first weekend in August the Town of Blacksburg, Virginia host "STEPPIN' OUT. A large and well attended street festival that features artists and craftsmen from the immediate area and from surrounding states.  Also set up around town are three separate stages that features anything from classical music,and cloggers, to bluegrass and folk music.

I spent a very enjoyable few hours walking around downtown. I was impressed with the talent of the artist and craftsmen who were displaying and selling their ware up and down Main Street.  There were a number of food trucks and food vendors which I really enjoyed and is where I spent most of my money.

Parking is limited in the immediate area around the festival, but plenty of free parking was available in the Chicken Hill Parking Lot across from Lane Stadium.  Blacksburg Transit provided free shuttle bus transportation from the parking lot to the festival site. Buses were schedule to run every 15 minutes, but in mid-afternoon the bus broke down and a large number of passenger were left stranded for about an hour.

I was one of those passengers so I chose to walk up the Huckleberry Trail to the Parking Lot. The weather was in the mid to upper 70 with lot humidity and a light breeze, so it really didn't bother me to walk.

Here are a few photos from the day along with a short video.

ON THE ROAD TO.....RETIREMENT-PART 1

I don't usually post a lot of personal stuff here but, I am going to make an exception as I get closer to the BIG R.....Retirement. Over the years when some one would ask me "When are you going to retire?" my reply had always been, "The First!" Which always brought the followup question, "Oh, the first of the Year," to which I always replied, "No, The first time they piss me off."  Well, it finally happened and a few weeks ago, they pissed me off enough for me to finally pull the trigger and start the process.

I have been employed by the State of Virginia for the past 43-years, in fact this is the only job I have ever had. But, without going into the politics of working for the government, the last few years have been challenging and it finally dawn on me, "You don't have to do this anymore." So a few weeks ago I started looking into actually retiring.

One of the best benefits of working for the State is it's leave package. If you treat your leave like an extension of your pay check and carefully manage your leave, a seasoned employee only has to work about 8 months of the year. The problem is when you finally decide to retire the the state will only pay you for a small portion of your unused leave. So the first thing I did (after picking an actual retirement date) was to calculate my leave and figure out how much leave I have to take so that I can get paid for the max while not loosing any.

The one thing that I found is that my agency's personnel office (if you want to be politically correct - human resources office) is really little help in helping figure out my current leave balances and no help at all in calculating my future leave balances. So my own calculations show that I will have about 70-days of discretionary leave that I will have to take by the end of the year.  Figuring that each month will require an average of 20-days leave, I will have a little over 3-months of leave to take. So with that being said, I will basically stop working about the middle of September.

My next thing was to sit down and do a monthly budget. Listed my bill, and other monthly expenses. For the last year I have kept a pretty detailed log and have a pretty good idea of what I will cost me to live month to month.  Some of the expenses will go down, like gas to and from work, and eating out. Some may go up like, groceries.  So I have a good idea what it will cost me to live month to month and have found that I should have a good bit of money left over for discretionary spending, and hopefully may be able to continue to save a little each month.

So now that I have set an actual retirement day - January 1, 2018 and an actual leave date - September 15, 2017, it was time to looking in to the dreaded paper work.  I first started the process by looking on line at the Virginia Retirement System (VRS) website and downloaded the Retirement Handbook.  This is a must for anyone who is considering retiring from the state in the next year or so. It is full of information and I found it very helpful.

My next step was initiating a call to my agency's personnel office and setting an appointment for an initial review. From where I live in southwest Virginia to my agency's personnel office in Richmond it is a good 4-hour drive. I have to say that this was a total waste of time.  The person I initially set the appointment with and was scheduled to meet with wasn't working and I had to meet with another person who did little else but print off the necessary forms. She could not even get logged into the correct website to calculate my financial numbers. The entire meeting took about 20-minutes. So 4-hours up and 4-hours back for a 20-minute meeting. Waste of time. I ended calling the VRS office direct and found that they are very helpful and provide a bunch of information that my personnel office didn't. The VRS Representative also was able to correct some of the "Mis-Information" that my personnel office had given me.  Moral of the story, while you may have to deal with your personnel office for some things, I have found that it is better to go to VRS for accurate information.

Some people will disagree with my next statement but after meeting with my financial and tax people, I have decided to start drawing my social security as soon as I can. After considerable thought, there are a couple of reasons that I have chosen to take early social security.  First and foremost, is it is never ever a good idea to allow the government to manage your money. So I am going to get my money that the government has been holding for me and run with it.  The second reason is by drawing social security I will be able to leave my investments alone and they hopefully will continue to grow. I anticipate that with my monthly retirement and social security check I will be able to live comfortable while allow my investment to grow. The initial plan is to use my state retirement and social security for my monthly bill and still have enough left over for monthly discretionary spending and using my investments for emergencies and travel.

The next big benchmark that is coming up will be actually filing the retirement papers and applying for social security, and that will come in the middle of September. The VRS will not accept applications for retirement no more than 120-days in advance of the actual retirement date. Applications for VRS retirement must be files 60-days in advance and they advise 90-days is ideal.

Since I have made the decision to retire, another question that I am often ask is, "What are you going to do."  My answer is more often than not, "Nothing."  But the truth of the matter is, I plan on traveling. I have even thought about sell out and becoming a full time RV'er, but have basically talked myself out of that for a couple of reasons.  First, while I like the idea of waking up in different places, the constant setting up and tearing down does not appeal to me.  Second, I have watched a number of YouTube Videos from full time RV'ers and the one thing that they all have in common is that you are driving your house and there is always something breaking.  Most full timer's are really quite handy at fixing thing themselves but the truth of the matter is I am not that handy and if it requires much more than changing a light bulb, I am totally lost.

So, I have decided to keep a sticks and bricks home, whether it be at my current location or at another site we will have to just wait and see.  But I do plan on traveling, some times it will be just a day trip, others it will be a weekend excursion, and yet another time it may be a week or so it will just depend on my mood.  I do plan on taking a couple of extended trips each year. One in the spring of the year around the time of the NCAA Basketball Tournament and another in the late summer or fall of the year.

Over the years I have have kept a rather detailed travel journal and I have also kept track of my expenses. In 2015 I managed to take a 9-day trip to the the Baseball Hall of Fame and the Hudson Valley of New York. During that trip my average daily expenses was $107.00. Of course my biggest daily expense was lodging, followed gas and food.

In 2013, I attended the NCAA Basketball Tournament in Kansas City, Missouri. This trip took about 17-days and again I kept a very detailed travel journal and expense log. My average daily expenses was $97.00 per day. This included lodging, food, gas and tours.

A lot of people tell me that is very low considering hotels and food should be my biggest expense, and I am a able to minimize or some time eliminate some of the bigger expenses like food, and lodging.

I am a big fan of rewards programs especially hotels and gas stations.  Currently I am a member of the Choice Hotels reward program which features Comfort Inn, Sleep Inn and Quality Inns.  I really like Choice Hotel's programs as it seems like I can accumulate enough point for free nights quicker especially during the early spring and late fall when they often offer double points or stay two nights and get a free night.  Plus accumulated points don't expire.

While Choice Hotel are my number 1 hotel chain when traveling I am also a member of the Holiday Inn rewards program.  While Choice is usually cheaper than many of the competing brands, I have found that Holiday Inn are by and large more customer service friendly and the rooms and common areas are nicer.  I am usually able to keep my lodging expenses down by using my rewards points for either free or reduced stays at Choice Hotels and Holiday Inn's Nationwide.

Another way that I reduce my expenses, is in my daily food budget.  Most of the hotels I stay at feature a complimentary breakfast.  I always take advantage of this breakfast before hitting the road. For lunch, it usually hit up fast food (I know it's not healthy) but a lot of the time I opt for subway, or eating the lunch at a place that is recommended by the locals.  For supper, it usually a nice sit down chain restaurant or again a local recommended place.

Also another way that I minimize food expense is I start buying gift card a few weeks before I depart. I usually by them at Kroger's where I get double, triple, and even 4-times the fuel point which serves to reduce my fuel cost when I am on the road.

So you ask what is on the horizon. Well, first up is submitting social security and VRS Retirement applications in September.  Then in October my sister and I are off to Washington D. C. for my birthday.  She has never been to our Nations Capitol so it is going to be an awesome adventure.

Then in November I am planning on taking a short Amtrak Trip just to see how I like traveling by rail. Everybody I have talked too tell me you will either love it or you will hate it.  Where am I going, well I haven't decided yet, I am looking at either Charleston, South Carolina, or Savannah, Georgia. If it doesn't happen in November I am looking at somewhere in Florida in December.

January 1, 2018 will be my official retirement date and somewhere along the way, I will be getting a new car. Yes, Hannah Honda (my 2010 Honda Insight) has almost 180,000 miles and it is going to be time to trade her in before I hit the road for my first big retirement Adventure in March of 2018.

Yes, my first big road trip will be in March 2018. Right now, I am planning on a Texas vacation where I want to attend the 2018 NCAA Basketball Tournament at the American Airlines Center in Dallas.  I won't know for sure until I am able to purchase ticket in Mid-October, but right now I plan on hitting the road the first of March and spending the better part of a month piddlin' around Texas.

So that's the plan for the next few months as I make my way down the road to retirement.