Andi And Josh Find Love

TigerBlog knew Andi was going to pick Josh over Nick.

So did anyone with a brain. Well, except for Nick himself, who didn't quite take it graciously.

TigerBlog refers, of course, to the season finale of "The Bachelorette," which aired last night. Depending on your point of view, the show is either breezy, soap opera-ish entertainment, another sign of the collapse of American culture and society or something in the middle.

TigerBlog has little tolerance for most reality television, especially the ones that are merely showcases for increasingly abhorrent behavior, the ones that make people rich and famous for doing things that not that long ago would have resulted in some parental scolding and admonishment, not to mention major societal disapproval.

Today? Whatever it takes to be famous, right? Celebrity at all costs, right?

There are some shows that fall under the "reality" genre that are pretty good. "The Amazing Race," for instance, is a fun show with a pretty good premise - contestants in groups of two go all over the world facing various obstacles and challenges, and the first one to the final finish line wins.

TB saw a little of "Dancing With The Stars" and admired the actual talent and hard work it took to be successful at that. The same is true with "American Idol." He's watched almost none of the other shows were contestants have to sing or dance, but he assumes the same thing applies to them.

Make no mistake. If TB never saw another minute of any of these shows, he'd be fine. Give him Turner Classic Movies, repeats of some of his favorite old shows or a handful of current dramas and he'll be just fine.

As for "The Bachelor" or "The Bachelorette," these are somewhere in the middle. They're not exactly shows that require actual talent, but they're also not shows that make TB want to break his television and weep for the future of America.

Yeah, TB does sort of believe that love should be found and cultivated in private between the two people doing the falling, rather than on a television show with cameras everywhere. Can they really get to know each other when they're constantly worrying about how they look for TV or getting another sound check or all of that, all with ubiquitous cameras (and people holding them)?

And yeah, the idea that one man or woman is definitely going to fall in love with a random stranger from a group of 24 or however many start out is a little far-fetched. But hey, it's a popular show and hey, 50% of marriages fall apart anyway, so who's to say Andi and Josh won't make it simply because they met on a TV show.

As for last night's season finale, it was obvious early on that Josh was the one. TigerBlog only saw two brief moments of the show this season. The first was when the guy from Iowa got dumped because he was from Iowa and then he gushed tears, only to have some random woman from the audience come onto the show and ask him out. TB suggest that that was staged.

The second was a bit of last night's finale. Nick had no chance, even if he didn't think that way. Sorry Nick. To quote "On the Waterfront," "kid this ain't your night."

As an aside, TB would rather watch "On the Waterfront" for the 1,000th time than most anything else.

Anyway, it came to be that Josh was the winner, he and Andi are going to get married and Nick came in second and was fairly bitter about it. And, TB supposes, America is no worse off because of it.

Josh was once the 48th player selected in the Major League Draft, by the Brewers, though he never made it to the Majors. His brother Aaron was the quarterback for the University of Georgia the last few years, and he was drafted by the Chiefs this past spring.

TigerBlog always thought Murray was a pretty good quarterback, and TB thinks Murray has a good chance to make the Chiefs, who currently have four quarterbacks listed on the roster, including starter Alex Smith and backups Chase Daniel and Tyler Bray.

As for the Chiefs, TB is much more interested in the defensive line, where Princeton alum Mike Catapano is heading into his second year with the team.

MotherBlog always hated three NFL teams - the Cowboys, the Raiders and the Chiefs. TB could never figure out why she lumped the Chiefs in with the other two, but TB has always sort of liked Kansas City. And now they have Catapano, a Princeton player, on top of that.

Catapano made the team last year as a seventh-round draft choice, and he had four tackles and one sack as a rookie, when he played mostly on special teams. There's a great picture of Catapano on his bio page on the Chiefs' website.

TigerBlog figures Catapano has a pretty good chance not only to make the team again but also to have an expanded role on the defense.

Joining Catapano in an NFL training camp this year is Caraun Reid, who was the 158th pick of the most recent NFL draft. That breaks down to being the fifth round pick of the Lions.

Reid is a defensive tackle on a team with two of the best defensive tackles in the league. Still, Reid has a great chance to make the team as well. For starters, when a team has that much money invested in two defensive tackles, it needs to have inexpensive depth.

Here is what it says about Reid on the Lions' website:
Reid will learn from two of the League’s most dominant duos in DT Nick Fairley and DT Ndamukong Suh in 2014, and is expected to provide key depth to the defensive line unit as a whole.

As it is the last week of July, NFL training camps are in full swing. The first preseason game is the Hall of Fame Game this coming Sunday, when the Bills take on the Giants.

TB will be back to rooting for the Giants, who were awful last year. Still, with their two recent Super Bowl wins and four total, TB can't complain about anything for the next few years.

So he'll be fine with some other teams if they do well. Like the Chiefs and Lions.

Just not Dallas.

Or worse, the Eagles.

At least Dallas is coached by a Princeton guy.