Keith Olbermann named the Flyers’ social media person his Worst Person in the Sports World last night for their unfriend your Rangers fan friends campaign (which I thought was delightfully endearing*). He also implied that you cawnt matt reid dis:

“Very much a waste of time. Flyers fans, on Facebook? Don’t you have to be able to read to use Facebook?!”

I laughed. Olbermann grew up in New York and is presumably very much a Rangers fan. Nothing wrong with a friendly swipe at the opposition. You may deposit your faux outrage here_________.

*It also led me to discover that I, too, am a fan of the Rangers on Facebook. I think I “liked” them to get updates sometime around the Winter Classic. That, or I am the sports world’s greatest sleeper cell and was planted here in 2009, waiting for this exact moment with which to strike. LONG LIVE MESSIER!. LET’S GO RANGERS! POTVIN SUCKS! SAM ROSEN FOR LIFE!

The Flyers have signed 2012 third round draft pick defenseman Shayne Gostisbehere (I’m never going to be able to spell that, so Ghost it is) to an entry-level contract. Ghost, who is 20, was the MVP of the Frozen Four, which was played in Philadelphia this weekend. He led his Union team to their first ever National Championship, scoring one goal and two assists in the championship game.

Ghost, an offensive defenseman, will play the final few games this season with the Phantoms.

I’ve watched him play exactly zero times, but hardcore OBs seem to be pretty excited about him. So now I am excited, too… mostly because the Flyers have a guy called Ghost. Our t-shirt printer is just shaking his damn head right now at the thought of making Casper-inspired shirts. Boooooooooooooooooooo.

UPDATE: Ghost will also be among the Flyers’ Black Aces (minor leaguers who practice – and in some cases play – with team during playoffs). He won’t be eligible to play in a game, though, since his contract doesn’t kick in until next season. But still… now we have a Black Ace named Ghost. Yes. I’m giddy.

Few deals to throw your way. And yes, some of these do give CB a slight commission for bringing them to your attention:

T-shirts

G and Coots shirts. If you order both shirts (or any two regularly priced shirts), you can save $5 through the end of day today using code EATINGCROW at checkout.

Shop now.

Uber

Our friends at Uber are still offering a $20 ride credit to CB readers. That should cover a medium distance trip within the city. They’re basically giving you a free ride to try out their service. All you got to do to get the credit is click here and signup by entering the most basic of basic information. Put crossingbroad in for the promotional code (for most of you it should already be entered). That’s it. You get $20 to go wherever you please.

Get your $20 here

Masters watch party

Dan over at Philly Phaithful is hosting a Masters watch party on Sunday at their massive showroom. As you can see, food, beer, a cigar coupon, and a 16-foot HD screen.

Grab a ticket here

Flyers playoff tickets

You can still get first round – Divisional Semfinals, ugh – tickets for $78. But act quickly, because they will go up once the opponent and start times are known.

Flyers playoff tickets at Crossing Broad Tickets

Amazon

You probably shop at Amazon anyway. So if you do, just use our link and we’ll get a small commission for the sale.

Shop at Amazon

SB Nation as great piece about how college football players get paid in the South– in cash. An excerpt:

There might not be a FDIC-insured savings account at a local bank branch, but there is always a pool from which money can be accessed quickly. A majority of fundraising occurs in the offseason, when coaches visit alumni and booster clubs throughout their schools’ regions.

“The coach or coaches come in, say their piece, bullshit with the folks and take pictures and then they’re in the car and headed back home. When they leave, we start talking. What we figure out then is what we need to put together in that area [of the state] for anyone we’re trying to land from that area. That’s when the hat gets passed.”

The actual money is never collected in a single area, but a collective of shadow boosters keeps an unwritten counter on how much each of them can contribute in cash at any given moment for three major purposes:

1) Large single sums to be paid out in order to convince a recruit to sign with the school.

2) Maintenance payments to current players, delivered in an ongoing basis.

3) Cash owed by an out-of-area shadow booster to a bag man living in the college town. Sometimes a player whose sponsor lives back at home needs money immediately, so a local bag man not assigned to that player will pay the player, with a marker going to his booster back home.

The small business fuels America. Cash that doesn’t have to be accounted for exists in any variety of ways. Sell a pair of lower bowl tickets to a guy you know from church? Cash. Sell a bass boat on Craigslist? Cash. Run or own a restaurant? Cash. Work in agriculture? Lots of cash.

“We all do different things. Finding liquid capital is not a problem for any of us. If it was, we wouldn’t be doing this.”

Interestingly, a bag man says that it’s not the super rich who give money to the athletes – they’ve already been contacted by the school for above-board donations – rather it’s the people with $10k-$15k to burn who bankroll players. Which begs the question: How much of a loser do you have to be to use your disposable income to self-fund your favorite college football team? Sell the boat… and then buy a bigger boat, idiot.

You can read the full thing here.

via Daring Fireball

This is why I’m the best blogger in the city. I mean, I hate to gloat, but I absolutely called the meth lab in Horsham the other night. There’s just no other way to put it.

On Tuesday night, Ms. CB and I had a meeting with the pastor who will marry us. The meeting went from about 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. On the way home we were hungry. We decided to get takeout from Tonelli’s, a local pizza pub here in Horsham. Real good stuff. Our food wasn’t ready when we got to the window (they have a window!), so we were instructed to pull forward into a spot and wait as they would bring us out our food. We waited for about 10 minutes, facing westward on 611. We talked about marriage, keeping my ego in check, the SNL baby skit from last week and, prophetically, the Days Inn across the street, which we’ve lived near for almost two years.

Convo, starting with me:

Who stays at that Days Inn?

What? What do you mean who stays there? People traveling. Business people, I guess.

I mean, sure, there’s the business park around the corner, but besides that, who comes to the Days Inn in Horsham? 

Maybe people from the military base used to stay there.

I’m sure if they were in the military, they stayed on base.

Oh.

We should stay there one night. Have a little getaway. Bow-chick…

No.

Seriously though, it’s a shady place. Like I bet you bad stuff happens there. Prostitution. Gotta be drugs. I bet you people sell drugs there.

Stop. I’m sure people don’t…

No for real. Who comes to the Days Inn on 611 in Horsham? It’s a drug hotel. I’m telling you, bad stuff happens there. Look at that guy walking in and pushing the cart with a weird limp. It’s shady. 

Is our food here yet?

No joke– that was pretty much our conversation. I remember it, vividly.

Fast forward less than 72 hours… and basically Jesse Pinkman is on the loose. From Montgomery Media:

Police and K-9 units were still searching the area around the Days Inn Hotel in Horsham around 4 p.m. today, April 4, after responding to a report of a meth lab allegedly discovered in a room at the hotel. Horsham police had gone to the hotel to serve a warrant on a man, identified by police as Gary Long, who was staying in the room with the suspected meth lab at the hotel and managed to escape, police said.

The meth lab was allegedly discovered at a Days Inn Hotel in Horsham around 2 p.m. April 4, according to a Breaking News Network alert.

Horsham Lt. Jon Clark said at the scene police were at the hotel at 245 Easton Road to serve a Bucks County warrant he believed was for a theft charge on Long. They thought they would just go in, get him and bring him out, Clark said, but when officers went to serve the warrant, Long, who was staying in room 333 since approximately Monday, slid a window open and jumped from a third-floor window onto a mulch pile as a detective entered the room, he said. The man believed to be Long then ran off and was now the subject of a manhunt, he said.

Nailed it.

Just for proof, I recorded my conversation with Ms. CB when she came home from work today, because I’m that type of guy:

This is why you read, folks. This is why you read. Come for the instincts, stay for the gang breakdowns.

WOW. THE SHOE FITS! THE SHOE FITS! CINDERELLA DANCES TONIGHT! THE 3 SEED, RHEA HUGHES, KNOCKED OFF BY THE 14, PAUL JOLOVITZ (!!!).

Rhea became the first victim of what I am calling the top seed detractors issue. The higher seeds have a target on their backs. People want to see the underdogs win. The higher the seed, the more well known you are, the more likely you are to have detractors and haters. Thus far, the heavy favorites have weathered this storm, but Rhea has become the first to fall to an unlikely lower seed– a 14 seed! It’s MADNESS, baby!

Your Day 3 results and updated bracket:

WIP Region

Jolovitz’s crazy shocker upset sets up a Round 2 match with Anthony Gargano. Jolly and Cuz are two WIP veterans. Jolly is riding high and pitchy, but will he be able to carry the momentum over to beat Gargano? We’ll see.

97.5 Region

Both Harry Mayes and Nick Kayal held off stiff competition from Tim McManus and Matt Lombardo. Neither trailed, but these games were close. Perhaps a chink in the armor for the 3 and 6 seeds? Something has to give in Round 2. It’s been all chalk in the 97.5 Region.

TV Region

Neli Hartmann and Derrick Gunn just beat up on the competition. The TV Region has been full of blowouts. Lots of big names establishing their dominance early. Eventually those titans will collide. Today, TV Region favorite John Clark goes against the 15, Colleen Wolfe.

Writers Region

Ryan Lawrence fought off an onslaught of words and douche from David Murphy. Survive and advance, baby. Tim McManus was able to hold on against a feisty Eliot Shorr-Parks. Tim led big early, but a late surge from Eliot made the finally result closer than it really was. Eliot’s a young team, expect him to be right back next year with a much higher seed.

You can view the full bracket here.

On to Day 4 matchups– the 7-10, 2-15 games.

WIP Region

97.5 Region

TV Region

Writers Region

Vote after the jump. Continue Reading…

Joshua Harris is worth $2.9 billion and, according to an article in the Wall Street Journal, was among the highest paid private equity executives in 2013. He makes $100k in salary, but took home more than $275 million. And that’s not including what he earned from selling some of his Apollo shares:

Mr. Harris, 49, collected at total of $396.7 million in 2013, according to securities filings. That includes about $222.5 million in dividends, $53.2 million in payouts on his investments in Apollo’s funds and about $121 million from selling shares in the firm, securities filings show.

All that money and he can’t afford a decent pair of pants*:

I have this theory that Harris bought the Sixers and Devils just so he could earn street cred with his billionaire friends. You can attach a value to many things in life, but you can’t put a price on hugging Allen Iverson on national TV. No, sir. Stephen Schwarzman ain’t doing that shit.

*Actually, those hideous cargo pants probably cost about $800. Which makes me a sad.

via (@chrismayCBS3)