What do YOU do to get through the off-season?

…. for those of us who have the MLB Network, we’ll have baseball on TV fairly often during the offseason, as MLB Network will be covering various winter league games. That’s a first, and it’ll give us a baseball fix when we need it most.

Otherwise, we start the countdown to 2010 Opening Day!

I’m gonna get through it by watching the Hawks and the Bears. Then when spring training rolls around its baseball season again!

I will be watching the Colts until they are eliminated. Then I’ll be on BCB everyday reading through everyone’s posts and comments. I just can’t get enough of the Cubs!!! Maybe we’ll get early trade rumors (which won’t come true) that we will be able to discuss until the season begins next year.

Bears and the Hawkeyes. Just scored tickets for the Iowa homecoming game BTW. But baseball rules all, so I’ll be reading BCB to keep up with the team… and counting down to 2010 ST.

DA BEARS hold me over till then

For University of New Mexico – Lobo Basketball

Under the reigns of Coach Steve Alford. And counting the days till I fly to Mesa for ST.

1) Bears

2) Bulls

3) BCB

football… the Bears, maybe even the Blackhawks this year…

Baseball is done. F1 has three races left. So soccer is my other diversion. UEFA Champions League, Spanish “La Liga,” English Premier League, World Cup Qualifiers and Mexican “Primera.” It’s sporadically amusing, but it’ll do.

The Vikings seem pretty sharp this year too.

And you all will be watching the Hawks along with the Cubs, come April.

(That is, if Christobal Huel is up to the challenge in goal…)

The Bears…just don’t play long enough, unfortunately.

(Well, I get paid to.)

As a Sports Information Director, my winters are occupied traveling to scenic locales like Cedar City, Utah; Tulsa, Okla.; Fargo; Brookings, S.D.; and other towns in The Summit League.

So between that and trying to worm my way into the Winter Meetings this year, I should be fairly busy.

Blackhawks and Bulls will take up my viewing in the off season. Of course I’ll check in here daily for updates.

My husband is a big DePaul fan. He and most of his family went there. He taught some classes and mentors there as well. I used to root for DePaul if he had a game on, but didn’t really care or follow it. Let’s just say I wasn’t even sure most of the time which basket they were supposed to be shooting at. My daughter however just went to Marquette. I’m considering learning basketball now just to start a friendly rivalry with him. I figure since we are paying for Marquette, we should root for them. He’s being stubborn though. I can’t even convince him that it would be OK to root for Marquette as long as they aren’t playing against DePaul. I do think that he will root for Marquette against Notre Dame though. My son agrees with him, so we will have a boys against the girls thing going on. It could be fun.

Bulls games and of course Mizzou’s Fastest 40 Minutes in Basketball will keep me going, of course BCB and constant winter rumors will be just as much fun.

Just be prepared that it can get VERY testy at times. People come out of the woodwork with crazy trade ideas, people don’t visit the site for weeks then post multiple fanposts discussing things that have been discussed in the interim, people are grumpy because they see other teams doing well in the postseason, and then there’s NO NEWS for weeks leading up to Spring Training.

At least we have the probably succession of the Ricketts ownership as an additional diversion this year.

Badgers, Packers, Badgers . . . then it’s spring training time.

Okay, it’s not the NHL. It’s not even the AHL. The Mississippi Riverkings of the Central Hockey League provide an entertaining product to someone who didn’t see a hockey game in person until 1998. I’ll give the Riverkings credit for staying in the Memphis/North Mississippi area since 1992. We’ve had a lot of sports teams come and go during that time.

Hopefully a trip to somewhere warm in the depths of winter. First offseason for me on BCB, will be checking here for all the latest craziness.

Oh, and if the Pack falters, go Bears. Anybody but the Vikings (not due to Favre, just never liked them).

…geez…I don’t know. Probably try and get my iPod over 6,000 songs. (I’m around 5,200 at the moment.) Read some baseball-related books. Think of a few new ways to express my hatred for cold weather. Turn 40 (oh, great).

Hope that the Saints will make a run at it while I’m waiting for baseball season to return. Life also goes on as usual.

Is there anyway to play fantasy baseball in the off-season? I know there are historical fantasy games like Diamond Minds, but it would be pretty cool if some site had a way of recreating the season on a daily basis for fantasy purposes.

Bears, Blackhawks, NU football and a little basketball.

Also have my complete manuscript due to my publisher by December 1st.

Besides that family family and family.

Seven-eight months of baseball can be a grind. Although I’ll check in here from time to time and keep tabs on the hot-stove league.

Otherwise, it’s Blackhawks and college and high school basketball.

From Jan. 1 until April 1 is a lot of fun sports-wise: College football bowl games, college basketball begins to heat up with conference games, high school basketball state tournaments, the NCAA tournament, spring training and Opening Day.

…besides play with, handle, clean, organize – yeah, that’s it – organize his balls…

Oh, and look for a job, rehab a condo so I can rent or sell it, lose 20 lbs, drink wine, smoke the occasional cigar, bake lots of cookies, put on 5 lbs…

Isn’t it kind of nice that it is different to be out of it than to be in it>

… days until Cubs home opener.

I always set dates to focus on getting past, as time markers for getting through the postseason. October you at least have playoff baseball to watch. I always set my first time marker as the Winter Meetings, in early December. And leading up to that, you have the Free Agent signing period to keep you somewhat occupied. After the Winter Meetings, my next time marker is the Cubs Convention in January. Then you have the Super Bowl in early February, and after that, you know you’re a week or two from pitchers and catchers reporting to Arizona.

I follow the Bears very closely, of course, and I’m more of a casual observer when it comes to the Bulls, and the same thing for college football and college basketball. The difference in football and basketball, though, is those are sports I follow when they are in season. Baseball, for me, is 24-7-365. A day never goes by, ever, where I don’t think about the Cubs. I can’t say the same for any other sport or team, even the Bears.