In keeping with the navel-gazing tradition of blogging, I’ll devote my first post to a study of our own site. I’ve been camping for the last week so tonight was my first look at this site — I’m amazed how much time my pals have been able to waste already on this thing. I’ll join them now.
After one week in existence, Pitt Sports Blather has had about two-dozen posts, on everything from cheerleaders to M. Clarett. Three members have posted (Patrick and Lee, who once mocked bloggers, and Chas, the instigator of the whole thing). (Where’s Shawn?) I got excited when I saw that we had a couple comments from some fool named LionLover, until it became clear that that, too, was Lee, operating under a fake name. We’ve only risked a serious libel suit once, as far as I can tell (I’ll let you figure out which post I’m talking about). Not bad for a blog operated by two lawyers and a journalist.
On the positive side, when you type in “Pitt sports” on Yahoo, we come up third in line (fourth on Google). How the hell can that be the case? Are there that few sites devoted to Pitt? Or is it just that our blog name matches those keywords? Thank God we didn’t go with PittBabble (or BabblePitt), as some of us wanted to do.
And the best Pitt Sports Blather-related development of all: Chas has been neglecting his mother-ship blog, SardonicViews, ever since PSB came online. He used to post three or four times a day; it’s been five days since his last new entry, which of course was about the Cleveland Convention Center.
On the off chance that anyone besides the five of us actually happens across this site, we should fill you in on some of our traditions/sayings.
— “Go Bulls” is a reference to the out-of-nowhere ass-kicking that the University of South Florida gave us a couple years ago. It’s an ironic cheer we tend to use when Pitt does something particularly stupid.
— Hebrew Nationals are the only dogs that make it onto our grill — those who have tried to bring the Ballparks or Oscar Mayers are banned from the parking lot. (I would cleverly link here to the Hebrew National website, if there is one, but I don’t care enough to learn how to do it.)
— Our major contribution to Pitt sports history is that we’re fairly sure we started the tradition of cheering on the guy who retrieves the tee after each kickoff. He’s a heavy guy and he runs his ass off and in recent years most of the stadium has joined us in cheering on his efforts. During one televised game last year, they replayed a slo-mo clip of his dash for glory and the commentators made fun of him. A proud moment.
The other saying and traditions I’m thinking of right now are inappropriate for a Tipper Gore-friendly blog like this one. Any additions, guys?
Screw Arnold. Vote Gary!
