Joe Kusek needs to shut up

bozbobcat · Post by **bozbobcat** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 3:44 pm

I read the Billings Gazette's Joe Kusek's article for his thumbs up/thumbs down for the year 2005. The only thing he happened to mention about the Bobcats was this. Here's the link to the whole article for those who are interested. http://www.billingsgazette.com/index.ph ... review.inc

Thumbs down, Montana State and Montana men's basketball. Yes, we've beat this issue like a rented mule, but both are still ducking Montana State-Billings. The Bobcats have made it clear they will not play the Yellowjackets. But I would hope that UM head coach Larry Krystkowiak would have enough confidence in himself and his program to give MSU-B at least one opportunity.

This one wasn't very complimentary either.

Thumbs down, out of control fans. College football fans are already bemoaning the fact that quarterbacks Travis Lulay (Montana State) and Tyler Emmert (Carroll College) might not play in the NFL. Who said they were going? They were great quarterbacks at their respective levels. Leave it at that.

What does everybody think of this? I wish Kusek would quit pissing and moaning about how the Cats (and Griz) never play MSU-B. It would be suicide to play MSU-B as they put up 100 or more points quite often and they've beaten D-I teams on the road in the past. It might have been Oregon State in 1996 that learned the hard way.

Anyway, this is just a thought to consider and discuss. There's not much else going on here today.

Post by **SonomaCat** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 3:55 pm

I've always personally been underwhelmed by Kusek's general knowledge of sports, so I don't really get too excited either way about his opinions. He's come up with some truly bizarre theories in the past, so nothing surprises me.

He should be beating a mule over why Eastern is D-II as opposed to D-I or NAIA (and what impact being D-II has on their ability to schedule a non-silly slate of games each season), but that might require some hard questions asked of people within Billings.

And as for his fans comment ... where is he coming up with that? We ARE the out of control fans in the state (along with egriz) and even we haven't seen anyone complaining about Lulay or Emmert not getting a shot yet (we'll certainly wait until after they don't get a shot to complain about it, and join the Dave D. chorus whose voices are long since sore). Did a guy at the bagel shop in Billings say something like that, and now he is extrapolating that across the state? It's one thing for us to be sanctimonious know-it-alls that fight straw man arguments on bulletin boards, but it just doesn't seem nearly as cool when he does it.

GavinDonos · Post by **GavinDonos** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 3:59 pm

bozbobcat wrote:I read the Billings Gazette's Joe Kusek's article for his thumbs up/thumbs down for the year 2005. The only thing he happened to mention about the Bobcats was this. Here's the link to the whole article for those who are interested. http://www.billingsgazette.com/index.ph ... review.inc

Thumbs down, Montana State and Montana men's basketball. Yes, we've beat this issue like a rented mule, but both are still ducking Montana State-Billings. The Bobcats have made it clear they will not play the Yellowjackets. But I would hope that UM head coach Larry Krystkowiak would have enough confidence in himself and his program to give MSU-B at least one opportunity.
This one wasn't very complimentary either.
Thumbs down, out of control fans. College football fans are already bemoaning the fact that quarterbacks Travis Lulay (Montana State) and Tyler Emmert (Carroll College) might not play in the NFL. Who said they were going? They were great quarterbacks at their respective levels. Leave it at that.
What does everybody think of this? I wish Kusek would quit pissing and moaning about how the Cats (and Griz) never play MSU-B. It would be suicide to play MSU-B as they put up 100 or more points quite often and they've beaten D-I teams on the road in the past. It might have been Oregon State in 1996 that learned the hard way.

Anyway, this is just a thought to consider and discuss. There's not much else going on here today.

That MSUB gripe is the same every year. While I do get tired of him bitching about it, I must admit that UM and MSU sure do act like weenies when it comes to taking on the Yellowjackets. MSUB would be more than happy to head up to the Brick or Dahlberg to play a game.

raincat · Post by **raincat** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 4:09 pm

Let's just play M-SUB and get it over with! Heck, after our football team got beaten by Humbolt State led by a former Bobcat running back I can take anything. Besides, we'd probably kick their yellow butts!

Cat Pride · Post by **Cat Pride** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 4:10 pm

If JoeK aint talking about rodeo, he hasnt a clue. Ignore him people, get a life JoeK.

Cat Pride · Post by **Cat Pride** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 4:11 pm

raincat wrote:Let's just play M-SUB and get it over with! Heck, after our football team got beaten by Humbolt State led by a former Bobcat running back I can take anything. Besides, we'd probably kick their yellow butts!

I vote for playing them the year after Durham leaves. We will kick their yellow butts then!

Grizcat · Post by **Grizcat** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 4:21 pm

Glad to see so many share the same view of Kusek. I can't find much of anything in his column worth anything. A waste of ink.

WeedKillinCat · Post by **WeedKillinCat** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 7:02 pm

I've been really disappointed with the Gazette's coverage of the Big Sky especially the Cats and the other team. I usually go to the Tribunes or Comicals websites to get good info on the Cats.

bozbobcat · Post by **bozbobcat** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 7:13 pm

I think the poor Gazette sports coverage of the Cats and Griz comes from the fact that Kusek is the editor. The Comical and the Tribune are better. I think Kusek is also relatively pro-Grizzly. I hate to admit it, but the sports section was better when Fritz Neighbor was there. He was a Grizzly, but he was at least better than Kusek.

whitetrashgriz · Post by **whitetrashgriz** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 9:19 pm

bozbobcat wrote:I think the poor Gazette sports coverage of the Cats and Griz comes from the fact that Kusek is the editor. The Comical and the Tribune are better. I think Kusek is also relatively pro-Grizzly. I hate to admit it, but the sports section was better when Fritz Neighbor was there. He was a Grizzly, but he was at least better than Kusek.

what these small schools and their supporters dont get, is that the bigger squads have absolutly nothing to gain by playing these games. if msu-b really thinks that msu and um don't play them because they are afraid, they sare mistaken! but a fluke loss, a 10, 15, or 20 point win all equal bad things for the bigger school. here's my advice to all the smaller schools. and by smaller, i mean highscool c opposed to aa, naia opposed to 1-aa, and 1-aa to 1-a. if you want a shot, and you want to be considered "the best", then win. win win win win! i don't mean a few winning seasons. i mean, back to back to back undefeated seasons. do you think that if a division 2 team won the national championship 5 years in a row, that conferences wouldn't look at them? i don't care how good you are, until you become a legit "powerhouse", then i don't want to hear whining about how you're not getting a shot at the bigger schools. and for the record, i have no idea, what is msu-b's record anyway? it'd better be flawless for this talk to even start!

CARDIAC_CATS · Post by **CARDIAC_CATS** » Thu Dec 29, 2005 9:06 am

Kusek is so predictable I don't even get a rise out of his articles anymore

He is pretty much an idiot. Pretty sad journalism if all you can write about is how MSU is dissing MSU-B every year.

BelgradeBobcat · Post by **BelgradeBobcat** » Thu Dec 29, 2005 9:33 am

Playing MSU-B would be like playing a D-2 wishbone team in football. It's an offensive system we never see so it doesn't accomplish anything to play a "practice" game against a team that runs a different system.

MSU-B plays that run and gun style which is completely out of vogue in the Big Sky and most of the rest of D-1.

Remember when Tech came into the Fieldhouse and ran that Princeton offense (something they didn't normally do) and put a huge scare into the Cats? Tech wasn't back for about 15 years.

That's my theory anyway.

Cat Grad · Post by **Cat Grad** » Thu Dec 29, 2005 10:11 am

It's apparent Kusek has contributed to the declining sales of the Gazette in an area experiencing fairly decent growth while the Comical's sales are skyrocketing; Welsh has done a great job identifying with his readers and what they want to read about while Kusek appears to be taking the Gazette toward a regional paper strictly in and around Billings. Even though it bothers me still that Welsch won't bow to the Great Bobcat gods (yet), his coverage of all things in and around Bozo has greatly improved my opinion of his ability to plan--I'd suspect he'll eventually expand the subscription base toward other "regional" papers tradional areas. Wish I could get the Comical delivered same day when I get stuck in the Flathead over the weekends

iaafan · Post by **iaafan** » Thu Dec 29, 2005 12:05 pm

bozbobcat wrote:I think the poor Gazette sports coverage of the Cats and Griz comes from the fact that Kusek is the editor. The Comical and the Tribune are better. I think Kusek is also relatively pro-Grizzly. I hate to admit it, but the sports section was better when Fritz Neighbor was there. He was a Grizzly, but he was at least better than Kusek.

Kusek isn't the sports editor. It's a guy named Zimmer(?), according to their web site. Kusek is down as a sports/rodeo writer.

Cat Pride · Post by **Cat Pride** » Thu Dec 29, 2005 12:28 pm

iaafan wrote:Kusek is down as a sports/rodeo writer.

And he should limit his opinions to rodeo related topics. I wonder if he used to be a rodeo clown and took too many knocks to the nogin. Stick to what you know best Joe.

AZCAT21 · Post by **AZCAT21** » Thu Dec 29, 2005 4:54 pm

The only reason why MSU and MSU-B don't play is because smaller division schools play at the largers home gym. Obviously it would be insane for the cats to go there because like we all know no team goes in there and beats them. Simply because every road team is playing against 7-8. The refs are all from Billings!! Have MSUB come to MSU and we will see what happens.

CARDIAC_CATS · Post by **CARDIAC_CATS** » Thu Dec 29, 2005 4:59 pm

AZCAT21 wrote:The only reason why MSU and MSU-B don't play is because smaller division schools play at the largers home gym. Obviously it would be insane for the cats to go there because like we all know no team goes in there and beats them. Simply because every road team is playing against 7-8. The refs are all from Billings!! Have MSUB come to MSU and we will see what happens.

Exactly! I won't even go watch MSU-B play in Billings here as it is a total homer job every time. I think it is disrespetful to the other teams/players/coaches that bring their teams into Billings to play.

CatFamily · Post by **CatFamily** » Thu Dec 29, 2005 5:57 pm

Amen on the situation at MSU-Billings home games. It is my understanding that teams coming into Billings now bring one official with them to work with two Billings officials. I have inside info also that some staff people were to the point of being so embarrassed by the homer job that they wouldn't wear any shirts with MSU-B logos during a game. Sad... verh sad....

Joe Kusek needs to shut up

Joe Kusek needs to shut up

Re: Joe Kusek needs to shut up