Tuesday Afternoon Ramblings

February 2, 2010 D.A. Adams Leave a comment

Okay, so I’m going to list my personal all-time favorite players by position. I’m going to limit this to people I’ve actually gotten to see play in my lifetime, so it’s not a comprehensive list. Also, this is my opinion. Here goes:

Kickers/Punters

5) Jan Stenerud, kicker 4) Morten Anderson, kicker 3) Jason Ellam, kicker 2) Gary Anderson, kicker 1) Ray Guy, punter

Returners

5) Billy “White Shoes” Johnson 4) Mel Gray 3) Josh Cribbs 2) Brian Mitchell 1) Eric Metcalf

Special Teams “Aces”

5) Steve Tasker 4) Via Sikahema 3) Hershel Walker 2) Trey Junkin 1) Bill Bates

General Posts

Tuesday Morning Ramblings

February 2, 2010 D.A. Adams Leave a comment

Since the Super Bowl is this week, I thought I’d write a little bit about some of my all-time favorite players.

Terry Bradshaw – Forget about the goofball persona on Fox. Here’s what you need to know about the Blond Bomber: he played in four Super Bowls, and in each one he threw a TD pass in the fourth quarter. He wasn’t always great, but he was the greatest when it mattered the most.

Barry Sanders – Nothing against Emmitt Smith, but if Sanders had run behind that Cowboys line, he would’ve hit 2,000 yards a season. Quite simply, Barry Sanders was the best runner I’ve ever seen carry the football.

John Hannah – I know you’ve never heard of him. He played left guard for the Patriots twenty years before Tom Brady, but he was one of the best lineman to ever play the game. He was one of the first guys to incorporate power-lifting into his training regimen. In his prime, each of his thighs measured 32 inches. The man was a beast.

Joe Greene – Speaking of beasts. No one dominated the trenches like Mean Joe. He was the best DT to play the game.

Mark Bavaro – He played TE for the Giants in the late 80’s / early 90’s. Before he blew out his knee, he was the most dominant TE in the game. The urban legend is that during training camp his rookie season, after a blocking drill, Lawrence Taylor went to Bill Parcells and asked, “Where’d you get this guy?” He played the game the way it’s supposed to be played.

Mike Webster – Personally, my all-time favorite player. Iron Mike played 245 games in the NFL as a center. At one point, he had started 150 consecutive games for the Steelers, and if memory serves, during that stretch, he never missed a single play. The tragic side to that is the fact that he died from complications from repetitive concussions.

Reggie White – The Minister of Defense was the best defensive end I’ve ever seen play. In his prime, he was unblockable. In the Super Bowl with the Packers against the Patriots, there was a point where the Patriots had started driving down the field and looked to be taking control. White on three consecutive plays embarrassed the tackle trying to block him and single-handedly ended the drive. I always thought he should’ve been MVP of the game for that.

Jerry Rice – No one, and I mean no one, played the game better than Jerry Rice. There simply are enough words to describe how dominant he was in his prime. 208 career TD’s. Enough said.

Walter Payton – While Barry Sanders was the best runner and Jerry Rice the best receiver, Walter Payton was the greatest football player to ever strap on pads. He was a great runner, a great receiver, a good passer, and one of the most dominant blockers of his day. Ask a couple of linebackers he picked up on blitzes. Sweetness might have weighed 185 pounds, but he was one of the strongest guys in the league. Jack Youngblood told a story about Payton hitting him with a stiff-arm near the sidelines one time. Youngblood played in the Super Bowl with a broken bone in his leg, so he was a pretty tough man. He said when Payton hit him, he thought he was gonna die. Walter Payton was also one hell of a person, and the world was a better place while he was still alive.

The rest of this week, I’m gonna chronicle my top 5 at each position.

Interviews

Stephen Zimmer Ramblings

January 29, 2010 D.A. Adams 5 Comments

The following is an interview with author, filmmaker, and all-around good person, Stephen Zimmer. He is the author of The Rising Dawn Saga and Fires in Eden series and contributor for Seventh Star Blog.

D. A. Adams: What first got you into storytelling? What was the allure?

STEPHEN ZIMMER: Storytelling has been with me since my mom first read me The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings trilogy aloud, a chapter or so a night, when I was about 7. I’ve always tilted towards fantasy, in the movies and television that I’ve gravitated towards, as well as the books I have been drawn to.

The allure is to immerse myself in fantastical worlds, and to depart Mundania (with a nod to Piers Anthony on that word!). I’ve never thought that the world that we live in is “it”, and loads of mystics and theoretical physicists agree with me on that notion! Fantasy gives me the best chance to explore wild and wonderful worlds in this life, and storytelling provides a medium to craft some of these adventures into something that I can share with others. What are we waiting for? Let’s go!

DA: Outside of literary or film influences, what has shaped your artistic vision more than anything?

ZIMMER: Dreams. Literally. I am fortunate to have very vivid, powerful dreams on a very regular basis, some incredibly life-like. The things that I experience and see in them often inspires me artistically, and really has had an impact on me. I look forward to adventures when I sleep, believe it or not! I’m fascinated by consciousness, and feel that it is a true unexplored frontier!

DA: Where would you like to be in five years in terms of your career?

ZIMMER: I would like to have a nice timber A-frame high on a mountain close to the mountain where D.A. Adams’ woodland retreat is located, so we can hang out more often, go fishing, discuss the finer points of rock music, etc.!

Seriously, I would like to have the first 4 or 5 titles out in both The Rising Dawn Saga and Fires in Eden series, continuing a year-round appearance schedule. I would also like to have a release or two out in the horror genre, and perhaps some short stories in some quality anthologies, or maybe even a themed collection of short stories that I’ve done.

On the film side of things, I would like to be making modestly budgeted independent features, most hopefully in the fantasy genre. 1 feature a year would be great. Between film and books, I hope to do just well enough that I can make a living just from my endeavors in these areas.

DA: When I was a naïve college student, my friends and I would discuss creating the literary movement of our generation. Now, as small-press and independent writers, you and I are part of a movement away from the New York epicenter. How do you see this movement evolving over the next generation or two?

ZIMMER: It is a brave new world in many respects. The barriers are falling down in some ways, especially with eBooks. However, as with music, it could result in a deluge of releases, and make it a little more difficult to get your work noticed, reviewed, or seen. I take it one day at a time, as there are so many unpredictable factors that have yet to play out fully. Will eBooks really overtake print, or will they co-exist? What effect will piracy have on eBooks? Without bookstores, who is going to be hosting reading clubs, advocating new authors, exposing new authors via readings, etc. in a digital world? The word of mouth that occurs between people at bookstores, browsing the fantasy sections, etc. can’t be underestimated.

Overall, I would have to say that there is going to be an upswing in credibility regarding small press and independent authors, and the accessibility is going to increase in a digital world, but exposure and promotion are going to be very, very difficult if the music and film worlds indicate anything. My heart goes out to talented, seriously-minded independent rock bands that are in an ocean of bands putting out mp3’s everywhere, who have declining options for live clubs, radio, independent music stores etc. It is harder than ever to be heard and talked about, and I hope that it doesn’t become similarly difficult for authors to be read/reviewed/exposed.

DA: What would like your readers to know about you?

ZIMMER: I wish they could see just how immensely dedicated I am to my work and to them. From the time spent writing and researching, to setting up as active of an appearance schedule as possible, so that the folks that enjoy my work can visit with me in person easier, I really value my readers and want to give them the best work and support that I possibly can. They are my friends, as they enable me to do what I love to do. If they commit to reading my series, I must return that commitment 10 fold on my end to give every aspect of being an author a 150% effort, as they deserve nothing less. Without readers, authors are pretty useless!

DA: We’ve discussed in private conversations the financial strain of being a “new” writer. Do feel like this struggle has had a positive or a negative effect on your creativity?

ZIMMER: I have to say that financial strain is mostly not a positive thing, but it does have its uses. Having to pull a late night drive after an event so that you can save on a hotel room is something that I wish I didn’t have to do, for one example of a negative. I wish I could take advantage of every promotional opportunity I encounter. But having thin resources does discipline you and makes you a better planner, I believe. I can see improvement in my planning in just the past couple of years, and am getting more out of the money I allocate out of my pocket to sustain my activities, appearances, etc.

DA: You and I met on the Con-circuit. Do you enjoy Con weekends? If so, what do you find most fascinating about fandom?

ZIMMER: I really do enjoy Con weekends! It’s my kind of crowd for sure! I love everything about it, the atmosphere, the new friends you meet (like you), the unpredictability, the learning (even when you are on a panel, you learn from the audience!), and so much more. I always hate that melancholy feeling that hits at the end of a con, when dealers are breaking their tables down, and attendees are rolling their luggage out. It is really its own world, and it’s a wonderful one. The thing that fascinates me the most is that there is a real sense of community and “we’re in this together” mentality that resonates through fantasy/sci-fi/horror related Cons.

Also, I do not see the provincialism that plagues other writing circles, in other genres. The fantasy/sci-fi/horror writers really do help each other out and pull for each other, at least from what I’ve seen. (and in doing so, they push everyone higher, as JFK said, “a rising tide lifts all ships”)

DA: Any parting thoughts?

ZIMMER: I really encourage people to give small press/independent authors and publishers a chance. Obviously, I’m a little biased, being a small press author myself, but there is a very logical and objective reason as well. The major publishers are shrinking and paring down their rosters, a trend that has resulted in many mid-list authors that are now working with small press outlets. Additionally, as the big publisher’s rosters are smaller and their schedules tighten, they are not as likely to take big chances with releases unless they can really project some success according to an established model. This means that small press is where a lot of the risk-taking and ground-breaking in the genre is truly occurring nowadays. The quality of writing is most certainly there in the small press world, as anyone who has read, to name just a few examples, Jackie Gamber, Lettie Prell, Elizabeth Donald, H. David Blalock, TammyJo Eckart, or D.A. Adams can attest!