I, Shane › Shane Adams’ personal weblog

Herm Edwards’ is not a good coach. I’ve said it since last December…he should not be the Chiefs coach. His theory on the game is antiquated and frankly, just doesn’t work.

His strategy is based upon having a good enough defense to keep the team in games, but the problem is that the way that he and Mike Solari call plays, the Chiefs have to have the league’s #1 defense, which at last check was 13.2 points allowed per game by the Pittsburgh Steelers. That’s right…that’s the ONLY scenario that works for the Chiefs, who are averaging a 3rd-from-last in the league 14.9 points per game on offense.

Herm and Carl Peterson continue to find washed-up kickers to blame for the Chiefs’ problems, but they never look in a mirror and think to themselves, “Maybe I’m the one doing something wrong.” I’ll give props to Mike Solari who at least took some of the blame this week for the abysmal offensive performance. I’ve got good money that says that he was put up to that by Edwards and Peterson, who cannot take blame themselves.

Herm Edwards is a mediocre coach at best.  He has taken teams built by other coaches to the playoffs, but his regular season record speaks for itself - 52 wins, 55 losses. When you play to win games by 3 points, that’s what your record will be. And when you hire a coach that believes you can go to the playoffs winning games by 3 points, the General Manager should be held responsible for breaking the streak of home sellouts at 147 games, which probably will happen before the end of the season.

Clark Hunt needs to do what his dad couldn’t - fire Carl Peterson. Shake things up. If Chiefs ownership was really committed to winning instead of making money, they would have done it 10 years ago (3 years after his initial “5-year plan”). Loyalty is good to an extent, but when it loyalty is more important than on-the-field success, there’s a problem. Here’s hoping the Chiefs fix that problem. And soon.

In 2006, I read 25 books. Those books ranged from the first 6 books in the Harry Potter series to excellent nonfiction tomes like The Tipping Point to books about my industry like Designing With Web Standards.

I enjoyed most of the books, but I haven’t read nearly as many this year. I don’t know what it’s been, but I’ve still read plenty…I just haven’t posted many reviews. I read several books when we were in Europe and never got around to reviewing any of them officially.

• Skinny Dip by Carl Hiassen
• Blink by Malcolm Gladwell
• Textpattern Solutions by Kevin Potts, Nathan Smith, etc.
• Songbook by Nick Hornby
• The Polysyllabic Spree by Nick Hornby
• others that for some reason I can’t think of

I just finished reading Stormie Omartian’s book, The Power of the Praying Husband. Omartian has written several The Power of a Praying… books and Alli really loved The Power of the Praying Wife. It’s taken me quite a while to get through it completely, but I really thought it was a great read.

As someone who has a strong belief in the power of prayer, I really liked how Omartian wrote 20 different chapters about things to pray about for the most important woman in my life. There’s stuff in there that I would never really think of, but after reading through it, it made a lot of sense. Alli and I have started giving these two books to new married couples and I would highly recommend them to any married person. I really thought the book was great. Wherever you might be in your life, I think there’s a Power of Praying… book for you.

Thank you all for your comments on the Complete This Sentence project. I thought the comments were all awesome. There were some that I wish I could have fit into the allotted space, but couldn’t, particularly this one:

Shane…eats lightning and craps thunder.

If you have other ideas, please feel free to leave them in the comments. For now, if you’d like to see what made the cut, just refresh the page and watch the top. Some that I chose were actually variations on suggestions to make them either more accurate or funnier. Or they were edited so they’d fit. Others were ones that I thought of along the way.

Thanks again for your participation. And now, back to your regularly scheduled program…

Don’t forget…you can participate in the design of this website by contributing your pithy quote to completing this sentence:

Shane…

To see examples, just refresh the main page and watch the top banner to see what I’m talking about. There have been some great submissions so far. Keep them coming by commenting on this post.

I’ll be taking submissions a couple more days and then look to my site to see any new banners in the rotation. Thanks for your participation!

As much as I would have liked to see the Jayhawks get it done against the Tigers on Saturday night, I have to give props to Missouri (you’ll never hear me do this about basketball)…they are a talented team and they certainly did what they needed to do to win.

Still, you can’t help but wonder what the Jayhawks will be like next year with all that youth back. Another year in the system will give Todd Reesing the confidence to not look at the sidelines 5 times before snapping the ball. It just looked like Missouri was more mature and confident going into the game and Chase Daniel really impressed me as a quarterback.

I was glad that KU fought back in the fourth quarter. It’s too bad those missed field goals came back to bite them.

I actually will be looking forward to this game next year (as I’m sure many fans will as well) and I hope this rivalry continues to be relevant long into the future.

OK, so I’m working on some tweaks for my site, one being that the header will be rotating different pithy quotes. I am asking you, dear reader, to help finish this sentence: 

Shane… 

That’s it.

It can’t be too long (see above for examples…refresh the page to see random ones…there are 4 right now) and it must make sense. Put your ideas in the comments and I’ll use the best ideas. Here are some examples:

• Shane… likes cheeseburgers.
• Shane… is my hero. 
• Shane… writes valid XHTML and CSS.

You get the idea. Gimme your best shot. 

I wanted to wish all of you a happy thanksgiving. I know many of you will be off today and traveling.

Alli has been posting regularly over the past month about what she is thankful for every day. Last year, I took the opportunity to do the same thing, but I listed one thing each day. It was a wonderful exercise and I enjoyed it a lot. This year, I haven’t managed to post everyday like I did, but I am by no means any less thankful.

Just want to share some of what I’m thankful for today:

• I’m thankful first and foremost for my lovely wife Alli who makes my life complete. Plus, she started my fan club.
• I’m thankful for my loving and understanding parents who set a terrific example. 
• I’m thankful to have a brother who is my best friend outside of my wife. 
• I’m thankful for Alli’s family, who have accepted and loved me as a son and brother.
• I’m thankful for Kelly and Ireland, the newest members of our family. Love you guys!
• I’m thankful for my wonderful dog, even if he constantly licks and chews his feet.
• I’m thankful for a great group of friends that I’ve grown up with and acquired along the way.
• I’m thankful to have a home that I love being in and a great job.
• I’m thankful for the cool fall weather and the evening dusting of snow.
• I’m thankful for having teams to root for in the fall - Rock Chalk and Go Chiefs! 
• I’m thankful that Alli and I got to take a dream trip to Paris and Italy this summer.
• I’m thankful to have a great church family that I enjoy worshipping with every Sunday.
• I’m thankful for the thorns in my life that remind me through tears the colors of God’s rainbow are more brilliant.

Happy Thanksgiving.
Love, Shane

I was always suspect of Priest Holmes’ motives in attempting to comeback to the Chiefs this year. I thought the timing seemed weird…with Larry holding out…it just seemed like a stab at the limelight before fading away.

Now that Priest will be retiring because of a second neck injury, I can’t help but think that I was wrong to doubt him. And the really unfortunate thing is that I really wanted him to do well as the starter. Larry Johnson’s preening, crybaby nature was certainly off-putting, particularly for a guy who has averaged barely 3.5 yards per carry this season.

The return of Priest Holmes was like a breath of fresh air to the people of Kansas City. As doubtful as we were, Priest showed that he was for real - maybe not what he once was, but he put it out there and did his best to try and help the team. I salute him for that. Priest was one of the unlikeliest of heroes for this city - a guy who came out of obscurity and transformed himself into one of the league’s premiere running backs.

A few months back, Elizabeth Merrill wrote a great piece for ESPN that tried to get to the heart of Priest Holmes psyche and still left us wondering. I suppose that now we will continue to wonder what might have been had a ‘roided-up Shawne Merriman not hurt Holmes 2+ years ago in the first place. For now, we can tip our hats and say thanks to a guy who will go down as one of the best running backs in Chiefs history.

Thanks, Priest. We’ll miss you.

I made this badge for bloggers who root for the only real school playing in the so-called Border War this weekend. Feel free to put it on your site if you are a Jayhawk.