"Say, fella, how long will it take to get to El Paso?
"We Memphians are worried about getting to next year's conference tournament in time to see our cagers, see. Our Tigers are the bee's knees to us here, and we're a little sore that we have to travel to Timbuktu to see 'em play.
"I hear we'll see a lot of crazy zoot-suiters out there, too. Hope there aren't any dust-ups that get the flatfeet involved.
"By the way, is the sleeper car full?"
Hello, Memphesians. See, there are these crazy things called airplanes...
Yes, El Paso knows all too well how isolated it is. But the whining from Conference USA basketball's white knight on the banks of the Mississippi when the Sun City was awarded the 2011 C-USA Championship Tournament for basketball is a little too...much.
Especially when Memphis columnists and sports talkers (tune into the Josh Pastner interview about 8:10 in) start listing the reasons why not, one of the biggest being that their city also had a bid; so why wouldn't the conference come back?
This story was taken as gospel that a member of the El Paso coalition presenting the bid to host the tourney used an expletive to describe Memphis' bid, which was then beaten up in the Pastner interview as a reason to be sour.
Two bottom lines to this one.
A) Simple Math: $1 million > $750,000. El Paso's bid was a quarter million bucks better than Memphis'.
B) Conference USA commissioner Britton Banowsky has said they want to spread the wealth when it comes to the conference tourney.
Memphis is yelping that the conference snubbed them because they've hired people to make the school's case for Big East membership.
Maybe, but c'mon, Memphis, you don't need to go any further than Point A above. El Paso did its homework to guarantee that C-USA will make its money.
If there is anti-Memphis bias, it might have a lot to do with C-USA recognizing that, with John Calipari gone, Memphis doesn't walk with quite the same swagger when it comes time to pick teams for the NCAA Tournament.
Before UTEP ended Memphis' C-USA win streak at 64 games, the Tigers' dominance over the rest of the league was sad, but almost understandable. Calipari had taken the program national.
Now, especially after Memphis' fall from grace, a dominant Tigers team is bad for Conference USA. First UTEP, then SMU, then Houston beat Memphis -- the league can't step backward from that accomplishment without giving the impression that it lost traction.
Then the Memphis Commercial-Appeal's Geoff Calkins went and used the anarchy in our sister city as a frame of reference, making the point that Memphians used to murder in their headlines would feel right at home in the Borderland.
He says he's won't insult El Paso for Juarez's problems -- except that he just did.
It is semi-understandable to hear people in other cities talk about the issue as it relates to their feelings of safety. The Oklahoman's Berry Tramel did so during OU's visit to the Sun Bowl.
They don't live here, which makes it oh, so easy to talk negatively about El Paso because of Juarez.
And that's okay. Really.
It just means whoever uses the Juarez thing -- whether it's a full-on slap or off-speed -- renders their argument baseless. They haven't bothered to look under the hood of the issue, so how can their comparisons be taken seriously?
Nonetheless, El Pasoans can shout all they want that their's is America's second-safest big city and point to Memphis' ridiculous murder rate (20.5 per 100,000 people to El Paso's 2.8 in 2008, according to the FBI, in a city of similar size). But when Juarez is news across the globe, it tends to drown out any local noise.
This is, in part, why it is so wonderful that El Paso is getting another opportunity to put its best foot forward. Anytime this city gets a bully pulpit to counterbalance the international headlines -- Preach on, preachers!
By far, though, the loudest complaints have to do with El Paso being a dreary outpost in a faraway land.
Now, I'm not the first to bring up the wonders of air travel; but too many of us assume that our favorite link to the rest of the country, the beloved cattle car of the skies, Southwest Airlines, makes El Paso an easy reach for Tigers' fans.
Alas, SWA does not fly to Memphis!
I know, I was just as surprised. Southwest flies to Lubbock but not to Memphis? Holy peanuts, Batman! How do you get to Buddy Holly without going through Elvis?
But all is not lost, Memphians. Continental has one-stop round-trip flights for $310 next March.
Book early, though. Something tells me the aircraft they use for this route might also be doing some business over farmland along the way, so I'd say seating might be a little tight. Gotta leave room for the pesticide, y'know.
It is pertinent to bring up the whole outpost thing, though, in a different way. Air travel is not easily accomplished for everyone. One of Memphis' draws is its location, which makes it a car trip for a number of C-USA teams and their fans.
Let's be honest, here. This tournament is all about El Paso.
Which means if UTEP loses early, will anyone else bother to show up? Or will this be like the BOK Center in Tulsa this past March -- hearing nothing sneaker squeaks during games?
The tournament is coming here. It will be up to El Paso to recognize its opportunity to put that best foot forward.
calkins is a jackass trying to scare people out of el paso?
Doing a little bit of searching on google and found that memphis is a scary and unethical place
2009 homicides
memphis-147 killings, Memphis had an estimated population of 670100
el paso-10 killings, El Paso metropolitan area had a population of 751296
trying to say memphis has a better team
2009 ncaa record
UTEP 26-7 (15-1)
Memphis 24-10 (13-3)
trying to talk about ethics
memphis 2007-2008(guilty) derrick rose era - 38 forfeit loss season 3 year probation
josh pastner - part of arizona's 2008(guilty) ncaa recruitment violation team
utep has no violations
tim floyd (alleged-has not been proven guilty) OJ Mayo incident
Oh yeah memphis has not won any championships!!! score another win for El Paso
Posted by: Go Miners | May 22, 2010 at 05:13 PM