TOP OF THE WEEK:

Memo to Bay News 9: It’s okay to give the predicted high for the next day during your top and bottom of the hour afternoon weather forecasts. This is not the Manhattan Project we’re talking about – no need to keep it a secret. That being said, Bay News 9 is becoming old, tired and predictable. We realize that a 24-hour news operation must repeat things but they need to change it up a bit with more meaningful features. Watched several similar services in various markets (all smaller) in the last few weeks and their overall look was far superior to what we get here. Another welcome change would be distancing themselves a bit from the ultra-liberal St. Pete Times. Oh, and did we mention the Soviets are probably not watching, so it’s okay to include the next day’s high temp?

AROUND THE BAY:

1. It didn’t take long for Pinellas sheriff Bob Gualtieri to moonwalk away from his support of Sen. Jeff Brandes’ medical pot bill. Funny, in doing so, he used the very phraseology that appeared here last week concerning medical pot – the devil is in the details. And again, stay tuned!

2. Weather item. The weekend of January 24-25, the west coast got blasted by rain, high winds - really nasty weather. Watching NBC News, you saw this blob of red and yellow off Tampa Bay but no mention of that. The story of course was that the weather system was headed for the I-95 corridor a few days later – oh the humanity!

3. Now the fun begins as Hillsborough County’s dysfunctional school board attempts to find a replacement for Florida’s superintendent of the year.

4. It was a relatively quiet year at Gasparilla with only about two dozen arrests reported as opposed to literally hundreds a few years back. Four of the arrests were for battery – on police officers. Dude, if you’re going to commit battery, pick your battles a little better.

5. You’ve lived in Pinellas County a long time if you remember the “name act” for the grand opening of J.M. Fields on Missouri Avenue was rock/country star Conway Twitty. For our younger readers, J. M. Fields was . . . oh forget it; we’d have to get into W.T. Grant, Woolco, JByron and a bunch of others.

THE DIAMOND, THE MEDIA AND OTHER STUFF:

6. This question isn’t original – saw it somewhere on the web. Nonetheless, your three favorite movie themes are? Put us down for The Magnificent Seven along with The Sand Pebbles (And We Were Lovers) and Hawaii (I Am Hawaii). And yours?

7. Sorry, we can’t help ourselves in following up this week’s lead article with the great George Carlin’s Cold War era bit “The Hippy Dippy Weatherman” where he pronounced “Radar is showing a band of showers, however it is also showing a fleet of Russian ICBMs heading our way, so I wouldn’t sweat the showers”. Classic!

8. Factoid: As Saturday Night Live closes in on forty years on the air, do you remember that the above quoted George Carlin was its first guest host?

9. Best college basketball game of the year had to be last week’s heavyweight battle between the Virginia Cavaliers and Duke Blue Devils. The games of the last two weeks indicate just how deep and balanced the talent is in the ACC this year. But can any of those teams beat Kentucky?

10. It took way too long, but it’s good to see Jerome “The Bus” Bettis and Tim Brown getting an invite to Canton. Tony Dungy should be there too. His time is coming.

IN CLOSING:

So is he the greatest quarterback of all time? With four Super Bowl rings and six total appearances, it’s hard to argue against Tom Brady. There are a couple pre-Super Bowl era QBs who might rate consideration – Otto Graham and Johnny Unitas both of whom seemed to win championships every year although the road to the championship didn’t involve as many grueling postseason games as this era. Then there are two other guys who have four rings should they care to wear them – Joe Montana and Terry Bradshaw. For some reason Montana seems to get more credit than Bradshaw – Pittsburgh’s killer defense might have something to do with that, but then ultimately, it was New England’s defense that won the day last weekend. The debate on who’s the greatest will continue to rage but there aren’t many arguments against Brady – love him or hate him.