Another weekend in the books with a lot to talk about. The Cards—well, they were in Cincinnati for a football game, the Cats took out the Warhawks 36-13, and Slick Rick brought his boys out for the Red-White scrimmage. First, the football Cardinals.

It’s just getting ugly. The Cardinals were completely outclassed at nearly every position by Cincinnati, and I’m including the ‘Nati’s back-up quarterback in that assessment. I am not going to address the head coaching situation regarding coach Steve Kragthorpe again, but you can read my thoughts here in last week’s article. Louisville is now 2-5 and 0-3 in Big East play, and have two winnable games left on the schedule, Arkansas State and Syracuse. The Red Wolves come into the ‘Ville this Saturday and Syracuse two weeks later.

Anyone who watched the 41-10 beat down the ‘Nati put on Louisville knows the story. Cincinnati gashed Louisville pretty much at will and Louisville was powerless to stop them. However, I did find two positives coming out of the game. The first was the play of running back Darius Ashley.

Ashley, a redshirt freshman from the ‘Nati, has been bothered by a shoulder injury this year, but on Saturday he showed his ability that people from the football program have been raving about since he stepped on campus. While he finished with an okay 67 yards, Ashley averaged over five yards a carry and showed his immense ability. There are definitely signs of a high quality backfield with Ashley and Vic Anderson, along with Bilal Powell.

Such a polite looking young man

The other positive coming out the game, at least as far as I’m concerned, was the comment made by coach Steve Kragthorpe after the game in which he stated he was trying to not pull redshirts off true freshmen, despite the lack of depth and injuries to the defensive backfield. That statement was highly encouraging because if there was ever a situation in which pulling redshirts was necessary, it is now.

By my count, Louisville has five true freshmen, listed as either safety or defensive back, that would be eligible to play and probably could help out in the secondary. If you play them for the final five games of this season, which looks to be lost, then their freshman season is a waste. For example, former Louisville coach John L. Smith completely wasted Elvis Dumervil’s freshman year for EIGHT plays. If that does not occur, then Elvis Dumervil is on the 2006 Louisville squad.

My point is this, Louisville has a problem with depth and preserving redshirts is a way to build depth. Coach Steve Kragthorpe is doing the right thing by trying to avoid burning redshirts. It is an encouraging sign because Kragthorpe’s job status is obviously in question and for his immediate benefit he probably should burn a few of those redshirts, but it is not the right thing for the long term success of the program. So I applaud him for that, but if he turns around a burns several of them at some point this year, then it will be a bad thing for the Louisville program and I reserve the right to take back my statement of applause.

In Lexington, the Cats played a solid first half of football against the Warhawks of Louisiana-Monroe, but then seemed to mail it in for the second half. It almost seems like we can say this after every single game; Randall Cobb is a big time player. As far as I’m concerned, go ahead and mark him down as first team All-SEC. All the man did on Saturday night was rush for 41 yards on 3 carries with a touchdown, catch 4 passes for 27 yards, throw 2 passes for 46 yards, and a 73 yard punt return for a touchdown. He’s Kentucky’s best player, period and he should be in the discussion for the best player in the SEC.

Big time playmaker is Randall Cobb

 As for the rest of the game, I’m sure most Kentucky fans would have preferred to see a better second half. In my mind, Kentucky won the game and there were no season ending injuries, so the game should be considered a success. I know Micah Johnson has a MCL issue, but coach Rich Brooks, once again proving his dominance in the hilariousness field, says it’s not a “major, major”.

The Cats are now 4-3 and have a somewhat decent Mississippi State squad coming into Commonwealth on Saturday. I think this is a huge game. Mississippi State feels like they got robbed by the officials against Florida on a questionable fumble no-call and will most likely be coming into Lexington fired up. Mississippi State’s first year coach Dan Mullen has done a good job and looks like he could have that program rolling in a few years. I think Kentucky is better than the Bulldogs, but Miss State has shown the ability to play with Florida and they should have beaten LSU so the Cats need to be on their game.

On Sunday night, Slick Rick unveiled his 2009-2010 basketball squad for the Red-White scrimmage. Over 10,000 fans came out to the Hall of Freedom to see this team play an intrasquad scrimmage with maximum offense and minimal defense. I take no stock in these contests, but I’ll pass along a few thoughts from the Slickster himself as to how he felt about the performance.

- felt freshman Rakeem Buckles, nicknamed Rock, had the best performance of the night and has a ton of potential
- loves this team offensively, feels this team will be special when the defense catches up to the offense
- loves the effort from this team
- Jared Swopshire will start at the four spot, but Rakeem Buckles will see time

The basketball Cards take the floor for their first exhibition game against NAIA power Georgetown (Ky) on Wednesday night. After the two exhibition games, there will much more substance to talk about. Time for the quick hits:

-The St. Louis Cardinals, or as I refer to them, the Whiny B*tches from Missouri, have hired Mark McGwire as their new hitting coach. My initial response was uncontrollable laughter. But after thinking about it, it’s just stupid.

Big Mac is back in MLB

-Are we entering an unprecedented era in NFL football? I don’t want to jinx it, but there are some fantasically awful squads currently. My evidence is the Browns (1-6), Bucs (0-7), Raiders (2-5), Chiefs (1-6), and Rams (0-7); simply wretched. Oh, and the Bills, Panthers, and Redskins aren’t too strong either. By my math, that makes eight squads that are terrible, which constitutes 25% of the NFL.

-On a positive note, the Cincinnati Bengals are now 5-2 on the year and flat out embarrassed the Chicago Bears on Sunday 45-10. Obviously, there’s no need to get too hyped over a single win, even though I acknowledge it was a huge win, but the Bengals have beaten some good squads this year. With Carson Palmer, Cedric Benson, Chad JOHNSON, and co., we knew there was always potential on offense. However, the Who Deys have a defense this year that appears legit, and they look to be a real threat.