Hockey, Wrestling and Me

Recently on the chlforums site, a Bucks fan went off on a rant about Brian Benway – the “Voice” of the Laredo Bucks.  The fan called Benway “Gay Pee Wee” [as in Pee Wee Herman] and talked about how his play-by-play sucked and how Laredo needed a new media guy.  [Here, why don't you just go look at the thread yourself?]

Anyway, I decided to chime in on this subject because I too find Benway to be pretty annoying and un-professional.  I can’t stand to listen to the guy on the radio and I’ve stopped reading his blog a long time ago.  For a professional broadcaster and public relations rep, he can’t speak or write for shit.  Now, I wouldn’t personally insult him like the Laredo fan, but I don’t think he’s fit for his job. That’s my opinion.

Then I brought up wrestling.

You see, Benway is a huge wrestling fan.  He has mentioned it numerous times in his blog and I’ve heard him talk about it during his broadcasts [hey, sometimes CHL TV leaves me no choice but to listen to him].  I think it’s pretty immature for a grown man to be a wrestling fan.  It’s entertainment for tweens and teens, not adults with jobs.  I also think that this immaturity shines through in what he does on-the-job for the Bucks.

Well, Rich Bocchini, the broadcaster and media guy for the Killer Bees, read those comments and felt the need to come to Benway’s defense.  let me quote him directly here:

As far as Benway being a WWE fan, what does that have to do with anything? I am a big fan of pro wrestling. I’m not embarrassed about it one bit and neither should Benway be. I watch it and often read the autobiographies wrestlers have written. I also read a lot of political books. During the course of the season, I find watching and reading about wrestling a fun, mindless escape from the day-to-day grind. Now, maybe some people expect that play-by-play guys just go home and watch more hockey. Sometimes I do. But I get tired of it. I love the game, just like I love steak. But if I worked at Morton’s Steakhouse I doubt I’d want to go home and eat a ribeye every night (OK, maybe I would).

According to the posts about Benway, somehow being a ‘rasslin fan equals being immature. Really? How is it any different than going home and watching Lost, or American Idol or Ghost Hunters? Yes, it’s “fake” (by the way, try telling a wrestler what they do is “fake”) and  it’s silly, but it’s fun. I think some of the stuff they do is pretty amazing (check out this move) and to be honest, they can incur some pretty serious injuries.

Ok, Rich, since I can’t comment on the Killer Bee site directly, I’ll respond here and send you a link.

I don’t consider that you broadcast/media guys eat, breathe and live hockey.  It’s ok that you don’t.  My point is that you are professional men, fully grown.  What appeal can wrestling possibly hold for you?  Let’s forget about the fact that it’s fake for a minute.  Lots of things are fake, TV shows, movies, books, etc. Why do I hold wrestling in such low regard in comparison?

Well, you brought up Lost, which is actually my favorite show on TV right now.  I like the story and the scientific/philosophical/metaphysical ideas it brings up.  So you are saying that being a fan of wrestling is no different than being a fan of Lost.  Sorry, but I whole-heartedly disagree -except for one instance where you might be right; maybe this exception will help you understand where I’m coming from:

There is a particular group of Lost fans who call themselves “shippers,” because they support a particular relationSHIP on the the show.  You have your Jaters who want Jack and Kate together.  Then you have your Skaters who want Sawyer and Kate.  There are other factions, but you get the idea.  These factions spend a lot of time back and forth in discussion forums arguing about which ‘ship is the best, which characters have the best chemistry, which characters made love, etc, etc, ad nauseum.  These are not teenagers, for the most part.  These are mostly women in their 20′s and 30′s. To me this behavior is not to far from that of wrestling fans; very immature.

Lost is a story and a damn good one at that.  It’s filled with thought-provoking ideas, great dialogue and superb acting.  However,  I have no rooting interest in the show other than the fact that I like it and want to see it continue.  When Jack and Kate kiss on the show, I don’t get all excited and squeal.  When something major happens plotwise, I don’t stand up and yell and cheer and scream.  Wrestling fans and ‘Shippers do all of this.  They create a rooting interest.   They forget that they are being told a story.  I think this is extremely immature behavior.

Now, if you can watch wrestling merely as a mindless entertainment, then fine.  Even I can admit to admiring some of the moves they pull off and certainly there is some element of danger.  If you like that then, “To each their own,” right?  But if you: stand up and boo when the “heels” enter the ring, cheer like crazy when the “faces” show up, yell and high-five with every body slam and piledriver, pay $49.95 to watch the various PPV, pay ridiculous sums for ringside seats, walk around in t-shirts with your favorite wrestler, inject your everyday conversations with wrestling anecdotes, talk about wrestling on-air and in your blogs, etc.  then I say you are immature.  Sorry, but that’s what I think.

Puddinman’s Health Care Reform: Personal Responsibility

I’ve been blogging about Health Care for awhile and I was in the middle of talking about Overutilization. Rest assured that I will return to that topic soon enough. But I recently hit upon what I think is the MOST important point that we are all overlooking: Personal Responsibility. Every American needs to take responsibility for themselves. This is vitally important in every facet of our lives, but none more so than Health Care.

Ask yourself this:  How much do you save per year to pay for your future Health Care needs, whether you have insurance or not?  If you are like most Americans, the answer is probably $0.  Now, how much do you spend per year on luxuries like coffee, movies, alcohol, drugs, cigarettes, books, sporting events, etc.?  Americans have this funny habit of spending all their income on what basically amounts to bullshit and then turning around and complaining when they don’t have money for the things they need.  What’s worse, they turn to the government to provide them things they aren’t prioritizing.

All I’m saying is that if you want Health Care, then you need to prioritize it.

CHL Rankings

As some of you may be aware, I have devised my own “power ranking” algorithms to help me analyze several professional sports for the purposes of sports betting.  I only bet when I have an edge and this algorithm helps me get that edge. The algorithm uses key stats from each sport to help me identify arbitrage opportunities to take advantage of.  I’ve been moderately successful with this on my trips to Vegas, but not enough to make me want to quit my day job.  Surprisingly enough, the sports betting market is VERY efficient in Las Vegas so there isn’t much arbitrage to be had.  I’m still tweaking the formulas all the time.  Maybe when I get it just right, I’ll publish a book.

Anyway, I have applied this in the past to create Puddinman’s Aggregate Ranking Algorithm™ for the CHL.  Last year, I got it to be a pretty damn accurate predictor of the outcome of games.  Too bad there isn’t a market for betting on CHL games!  (Yes, I have used it for NHL betting and it has been pretty successful.)  Just to give you an idea of how good the system is, let’s look at last year. At mid-season of the 2008-2009 CHL season, my Algorithm gave me this as the top 10 Power Ranking:

1. Texas
2. Colorado
3. Laredo
4. Mississippi
5. Odessa
6. RGV
7. OKC
8. Bossier-Shrievport
9. Rocky Mountain
10. New Mexico

I’d say, given how the rest of the season and playoffs played out, that was pretty damn accurate.  The only thing it didn’t forsee was the rise of CC to overtake AZ and NM, but that can be ascribed to the coaching change in CC among other things which my formulas don’t really account for (I can’t see the future, dammit, or read the players minds!).  So, inspired by my friend, BucksFanAddict at chlforums.com, I decided to apply the Algorithm to this years budding season.  Here’s what we have so far:

2009-2010 CHL Power Rankings as of 11/3/09

1. Odessa
2. Amarillo
3. Colorado
4. Allen
5. Laredo
6. Corpus Christi
7. Texas
8. Arizona
9. Rapid City
10. Tulsa

Now, understand that I would never use these rankings as the sole determinant of my betting decisions at this point in the season; the sample size is way too small with the average games played of only 6 games.  There are also several other factors I consider before making a bet that can’t really be plugged into a formula, such as rivalries, roster moves, injuries, last-5-game stats etc.  For example, with David Nimmo injured, I would drop Amarillo a few notches.  But I think this is a pretty dang fair analysis of the performance of the teams up to this point in the season.

So what say you?  Do you like it or do you think I’m full of shit?

Hello! Let’s catch up a bit . . .

Hey!  Sorry it’s been so long since I’ve posted, but I’ve been busy.  Real busy.

Anyway,  I’m tweaking a few posts about Health Care, CHL Hockey and some general rants.  The next few days should be pretty busy on this blog and hopefully I can keep up that level.

As some of you may be aware, CHL hockey is in full swing and it’s been a mixed bag for the RGV Killer Bees.  They started off abysmally, losing their first two games, but have managed to bounce back and win 3 of their last four games to get back to .500.  I’m excited about the scoring potential they have, but the defense  is one big area they need to tighten up -and quickly.   They are currently giving up 4 GA per game and you can’t win if you keep giving up in the defensive zone.  Surprisingly, goaltending seems to be a problem area, but I think that may be more a result of all the wide-open looks the D gives opposing teams.  I have full faith that Coach Brooks will correct this issue soon.

As far as the Health Care debate, things have gotten worse.  The Democrats seem intent on getting the “public option” into legislation.  If you read my article on Overutilization, hopefully you have an idea why that is a terrible idea.  The two government programs in existence (Medicare and Medicaid) are rife with Overutilization, Fraud and Abuse.  The bottom line is that the government has no business being in the Health Care business.  Wait, scratch that . . . the real bottom line is that every American has to take personal responsibility for themselves.  I’ll get into this more in depth in another post.

So, be on the lookout for some rapid-fire updates in the coming days.  As always, I welcome your comments and the opportunity to debate this issues on this blog.  Peace!

Health Care Problem #1: Overutilization Part 1

Overutilization is the single biggest problem with Health Care in America and there are traditionally two sides of it: Doctors and Patients. The overutilization of Health Care on the part of Doctors is the side that gets all the press. We hear all about how Doctors order too many tests or prescribe too many drugs.  However, you rarely hear about Patient overutilization; unnecessary visits, demand for unnecessary drugs, using the ER as primary care, demand for ancillary services, etc.  I’ll talk about both sides in posts to come to try and illustrate just how pervasive the overutilization problem is and how tricky it will be to solve it.  I’m also going to talk about a third side to this problem:  something I call Third-Party providers.  These are the companies and providers that provide Health Care Services to patients other than physician and hospital services, such as Home Health, Durable Medical Equipment providers, pharmaceutical companies and such.  No one ever talks about the problems created by these providers, but I’ll give you my take on where they fit in the overutilization puzzle.

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Doctors

First, let’s tackle the problem with Doctor’s overutilization.  Physician overuse of the medical system stems from 3 main sources: 1)Malpractice suit fears, 2)Patient demand and 3)The current reimbursement scheme.

1)Malpractice Suit Fears

This is the one you hear about the most:  Because of the highly litigious society we live in, Doctors are afraid of being sued.  So, they tend to order more tests to rule-out serious conditions.  No Doctor wants to be sued, only to find out that if he had just ordered that rare blood disease test that costs $1000, he would have been in the clear.  As a result, many Doctors now practice “cover-your-ass” medicine; they don’t want to miss a diagnosis however rare and unlikely it might be.

2)Patient demand

Believe it or not, Patient demand is a big driver in the overuse of medicine.  For example, if a patient comes into the Doctor with cold symptoms, the Doctor is not naturally inclined to write a prescription since antibiotics are not effective against the cold virus and symptomatic care is available over-the-counter; i.e., there’s nothing the Doctor can do except recommend rest, fluids and OTC symptomatic relief.  Most patients are not satisfied with this answer; they didn’t take time off of work and pay the Doctor a copay to hear that they just need to take it easy and take DayQuil!  Chances are, the patient will request an antibiotic and some stronger form of symptomatic relief.  And, in most cases, the Doctor will comply, not wanting to lose a patient.     Now, I’m not excusing the Doctor here; the Doctor knows better.  But I can certainly understand the thinking: “If I don’t give this patient what they want, chances are that someone else will and I risk losing a piece of my income stream.”  Similar scenarios play out regarding lab tests, ancillary services, etc.

3)The current reimbursement scheme

The way Doctor’s are paid has a lot to do with the way they practice medicine.  This is a natural consequence of medicine being a business and the fact that medicine is a very unique kind of business.  First of all, the price that Doctor’s charge for their services is very seldom the amount they actually get paid.  An optimistic estimate would be that Doctors are reimbursed at a rate of about 50% of what they actually charge. Furthermore, Doctors don’t get paid right away for services and sometimes they don’t get paid at all.  Most Doctors consider themselves lucky if they collect 85% of what they are entitled to within 30 days of the service date.  Therefore, on a per visit basis, reimbursement is pretty low.  So, like with any business, the lost revenue needs to be made up somewhere.  Thus, Doctors order tests and add on treatments, sometimes unnecessarily, in an effort to bring the per visit reimbursement up to a level that makes them profitable.

Now please understand:  I’m not trying to say that all Doctors do these things, or that Doctors are evil and I’m also not trying to excuse the overuse of medicine.  All I am saying is that our current medical system sets up situations in which many Doctors feel forced into adding on services in order to make ends meet.

***

So, how do we solve this problem?

1. Tort Reform – Until we rein in out-of-control lawsuit abuse, Doctors will continue to practice CYA medicine.
2. Incentivize Better Standards – Right now, there is too much variation in how Doctors practice.  For example, while one doctor might refuse on principle to give antibiotics for a virus-based illness (as they should!) another will be happy to comply with providing a prescription in order to keep the patient happy.  In other words, the second doctor is incentivized to practice bad medicine because he gets more patients (and thus more money) that way.  If payers started incentivizing Doctors who practice what is called Evidence Based Medicine and penalizing those who refuse to comply, behavior would change in a hurry.

Puddinman’s Health Care Reform: Overview

There can be no doubt that health care in America is a huge mess right now. Something has to be done to reign in costs while at the same time ensuring that more Americans have access to health care. As I’m sure you are aware, our President and Democrat-controlled congress are set to pass legislation that will radically transform the landscape of Health Care. I think this is the biggest mistake we could make. Why? Well, first we have to figure out what the biggest problems with Health Care are.

1. Overutilization – In my opinion, this is the biggest problem with federal and state provided healthcare, especially Medicaid. Since care is provided at little to no cost, there is nothing to stop recipients from visiting the doctor for every little sniffle, cough or pain. And just about every one of those visits will result in tests and prescriptions. The problem is that most of these visits are entirely unnecessary. You don’t need a doctor when you have a cold; there’s nothing he/she can do for you! People who have to pay for their own health care don’t visit doctors for colds! When you have to pay a copay or pay for the visit yourself, you tend to care for yourself for minor issues and visit a doctor only when it gets worse.

2. Prioritization – For some reason, Americans don’t prioritize Health Care when it comes to budgeting their income. Americans spend more of their yearly incomes on Entertainment, dining out, alcohol and tobacco than they do on Health Care. Only when something catastrophic happens do we start to think about medical expenses. If we want to be covered in times of need, we have to start thinking about these things before we actually need it.

3. Lawsuits – Health Care costs have risen and much of it has to do with law suit abuse. Doctors often take a Cover Your Ass approach to medicine as a way to defend themselves against the possibility of lawsuits. This results in Overutilization on the doctor’s part; more tests, more hospitalizations and more visits. Until we reform Health Care torts, this isn’t likely to change anytime soon.

4. Fraud and Abuse – A big problem with government provided healthcare is that enforcement of policies is a Herculean task. This results in an increase in fraud and abuse, which raises Health Care costs as well. With private insurance, it’s much less of a problem since it’s in the company’s interest to clamp down on fraud and abuse.

There are other problems, but I think those are the big 4. So what’s the solution. Simply put: Get the government out of the Health Care business and make Americans more responsible for their own Health Care. In posts to come, I’ll go into more detail about each problem and the solution to it.

Cash for Clunkers

So let met get this straight: The federal government owns a piece of the auto industry and now they are distributing money to people to buy cars. So the govt. is both the company and the consumer? How does this make any sense at all from the standpoint of fiscal responsibility?

I say, if a car company fails, let it fail. How does it make any sense to keep pumping money into unviable businesses. If my business fails, is the government going both invest in me and give money to people so they can buy my products? Of course not!

The Beer Summit: WTF?

Am I the only one who thinks this Beer Summit is a stupid, stupid idea? Don’t get me wrong, I have no problem with a few guys sittin’ around drinking beer and talking. Hell, I do it all the time! What I do find problematic is that the President of the United States is endorsing alcohol as the solution to all life’s problems. Does anyone else hear the echoes of Homer Simpson there?

Why couldn’t he just say he was inviting the two parties over to help smooth things over without mentioning beer? Instead, this thing is being called the Beer Summit and prominent members of our government are offering to make the beer run. By putting the focus on the alcohol, the message is getting drowned out.

Look, they can drink all the beer they want to. Let ‘em pull an all-night kegger. That’s not the point and I don’t care if they drink beer. I’m concerned about the federal government’s public endorsement of alcohol as part of the problem solving process.

An Introduction

Hey!  Thanks for stopping by!

I’ve been looking to start a blog for a long time now, I’ve just never gotten around to it.  I’m active in twitter, discussion boards and other sites, but none of those places let me express myself exactly as I want to.  As you can see, I keep my actual identity anonymous on the internet because this allows me to say exactly what’s on my mind without fear of reprisals in the real world.  Of course, for those who know the real me, it won’t be too hard to figure out who I am once I start discussing various issues.  If you figure out who I am, that’s fine- just keep it to yerself!  I’m not fooling myself, though; I fully realize that I might actually only be talking to myself!

Anyhow, I want to use this blog to talk about whatever pops in my head at any given moment.  In real life, I often find myself with a lot to say, but no one to say it to.  Often, I’ll call my local talk radio station and talk to the hosts about things that pique my interest, but they only allow me a few minutes.  I’m active on twitter, but I find that 140 characters is often not enough.  I participate in several discussion boards such as chlforums.com and macrumors.com, but I’m limited to what I talk about there.   Because my business is prominent in the community, anything I say publicly gets associated with that business for better or worse.  Here, I can say whatever the fuck I want to (oh yeah, I cuss sometimes; deal with it) and I don’t have to worry about it disrupting my real life.

So, hopefully, you’ll check back here once in awhile.  The first thing I want to tackle is something near and dear to my heart: Health Care in America.  I have ALOT to say about the current reform movement and I plan on devoting quite a few posts about that.  I’m also psyched about the upcoming CHL hockey season, so I’ll discuss that as well.  Hope to see you here again!