Lawrence High is known for having excellent teachers that year after year meet and exceed all the standards set by the state. So anytime that one of these teachers is lost by terms not of their own it is very disappointing. It is no secret that the salaries for Lawrence teachers fall way short of salaries for surrounding districts within a 30 mile radius of the same class. This is causing some of Lawrence’s best teachers, some who have been teaching in Lawrence for a really long time, to pack up and go to schools in Olathe, Blue Valley and Shawnee Mission for higher salaries.

When talking with a few other people about this issue to try and draw a comparison of some sort we came up with the baseball farm system example. Since baseball is without a salary cap, every team has a different payroll. This throws off the competitive balance in baseball as it does in teaching. The best example I could come up with for Lawrence High was the Atlanta Braves. The Atlanta Braves have been consistent winners for the past two decades while having a payroll in the bottom half of the league. The Braves develop their players through the draft, scouting and developement to make a winner which is completely opposite from the teams with some of the top payrolls like the New York Yankees.

The Yankees compare to the Blue Valley’s of the world, they can occasionally draft and develop a player for the long run but ussually let the lower payroll teams do it for them and then sign them to huge contracts while they are on the back half of their careers.

I’m sure you can see the point here.

Lawrence is getting young teachers and developing them to win awards and do great things. While they may do just that for the beginning of their careers eventually their contracts run out and they become free agents. While it is disappointing, no blame should be placed on the teachers. They are only doing what is best for them and their careers. The other schools offer them better facilities, higher salaries and the resources to play for a championship (or whatever it is that teachers teach for).

Since I am into sports this was the most natural comparison that I could come up with. If anyone has any other comparisons that they would like to share, write them in the comments below.

Joe-College has offered Lawrence residents with cheaper, humorous KU shirts for many years now and will finally be shuting down.  The blame for this falls no farther than the University of Kansas Athletic Department and Lew Perkins. The discrepancy started approximately four years ago when owner Larry Sinks received a letter from Lew Perkins telling him to close down his store or he would take action.

Even though Sinks doesn’t use any form of a university logo on any of his shirts Perkins felt that the colors, designs, and slogans were disgracing the university. When Sinks refused to close his store Lew Perkins was true to his word and filed a lawsuit against the store.

After a long drawn out process it was ruled that 53 of the shirts infringed upon trademarks and copyright and that Sinks owed more than $500,000 to the university in penalties and legal fees. Eventually causing the shutdown of the business.

The obvious reasons for Perkins to file this claim was that for every Joe-College shirt sold, that was one less official KU shirt sold, and some think he did the right thing, but for most this will put a huge mark on his resume at the university.

Personally, Joe-College was one of my favorite stores downtown, and it won’t be the same without it. Every time I would go in I would come out with a smile on my face from all the clever shirts and slogans. I will never be able to experience that feeling again. I don’t know about the rest of the Joe-College fans out there, but for me every time I see Lew Perkins face flashed on TV during a game I will immediately think of what he did to Joe-College and the city of Lawrence; and next time you are out buying your ugly, overpriced, licensed KU shirt, you probably will too. 

If you have a favorite Joe-College memory or t-shirt let me know down below in the comments.

After an experience earlier this month it really hit me that this would be a long month. It started during the confrence championships, KU was playing their first game against Texas Tech and a group of people were talking about stats and how far they thought KU would get in the tournament when someone in the group said, “This is why I don’t like March, I always feel so left out.” This really hit me deep down. Even though our means of thinking were totally different, we were both feeling the same way.

This person was reffering to their knowledge about basketball and the way they feel when they are watching the game with a group of people who know what is going on. However for me it was completely opposite. I am a huge fan of the game and consider myself knowing a lot about the game, but I was also feeling left out. For my purposes it was a team that was getting left out. 

It is no secret that I am a huge North Carolina fan, and it is also no secret how bad they have played this year. Knowing this you might say things like, “They have been bad all year, you should have known they weren’t going to make the tournament,” or “They won it last year, they can’t be good every year.” Both of these are true, yes I knew they had no shot at making the tournament halfway through January and yes they did win the championship last year, but it is still North Carolina. It is expected to make the tournament every year and when they don’t and you see all the other teams playing it doesn’t feel good and the sadness you thought was over in January when you relize your team is no longer in contention comes back to haunt you. It also doesn’t help seeing Duke in the Final Four.

One thing that I have taken away from all of this though is that North Carolina did recieve an invitation to the NIT and have made it to the Final Four. They will be playing their first game tommorow against Rhode Island on ESPN. While this isn’t the real tournament and I may catch more greif from the NIT bid than I would had they not went anywhere, I am still glad to see them play and improve as they move towards next year’s goal.

Most of you know what intramurals are (because that’s what all the cool kids are doing at LHS right now) but if you don’t and or weren’t at the games last Tuesday night Joe (who plays for the Kansas Indians) put on a show. Being the huge basketball fan that I am one of my favorite things to watch is for a player to take over a game just like Joe did last Tuesday night. There is a certain amount of brilliance that goes on, that just makes me smile every time I see it. Only this time I wasn’t so thrilled.

The most likely reason, because I was on the recieving end of most of his brilliance. This comes as no offense to the Kansas Indians but coming into Tuesday night’s game, I knew exactly who we needed to shut down, Joe Springer. Being the competitor that I am I volunteered to guard him. I was feeling pretty good about this desicion for the first six minutes of the game while Joe was 0-2 and seemed t0 be in a pass first mode and we were up 6-0.

I don’t know what caused him to leave this mode, maybe it was because he figured out what everyone else in the gym already knew, which is that the Kansas Indians go as Joe Springer goes or maybe he was just waiting for us to build a small bit of a lead so when he decided to take over it would look even more brilliant. Either way he did exactly what we expected.

Being the big slow person that I am and always have been I have come to notice that when you are guarding a smaller, quicker, State champion runner like Joe, that you give them a little space on the perimiter so they don’t blow by you for a lay-up every single time. I was feeling pretty confident about this strategy for a short period at the begining of the game when Joe was shooting jumpers and was 0-2 . Joe must have realized I was giving him this room because the next time up the court he gave me a couple of crossovers like he was going to the goal and then hit me right in the face with a step back jumper. I couldn’t have defended it any better, even though he broke me down I still managed to get a hand in his face and contest the shot. It didn’t matter though, it still went down. I knew that if he could make that shot consistantly for the whole game we were in trouble. He did and we were. In fact he put that same move on me three times in a row to bring the game back to 6-6 and I felt like we were playing from behind for the rest of the game. It all happened so fast and before I knew it I look up and we are down by 11. Even though we managed to bring the game within three with 40 seconds left we still went on to lose 46-38, and of those 46 Joe probably had at least 25.

As a player on the opposing team normaly I would be bitter (and I was after we lost), but as a fan of the game when I look back it was a great performance by a good player. So let this be  a warning for any team that crosses paths with the Kansas Indians (I hope we meet again) during the intramural tournament starting Feb. 16 beware of one Joseph Springer III.

Louisiana Street Breakdown is The Budget Online’s latest staff blog designed to give students a voice in matters that they think should be fixed. In addition to giving the readers a chance to express their feelings about whatever their issuses are, I will occasionally be voicing my opinion on issues or problems that I believe should be adjusted.

No one single issue or person is safe from this blog, so if you have an issue with something or someone that you feeled compelled to talk about or have me talk about e-mail me your ideas at bigzach@sunflower.com, and let your voice be heard.