Enough already

With the NFL Draft less than 24 hours away, I am finally glad that all the time spent blowing smoke will finally be over. No more mach drafts and no more predictions, because history tells us that every draft has done a variation of crazy things.

Raider Nation is sitting on its hands and trying to figure out if Al Davis still has all his marbles to put a winner on the field. He failed with offensive lineman Robert Gallery and he's got a lot of options with the first pick.

I think the 49ers can make the most noise. If they trade up and snag wideout Calvin Johnson, they will have arguably the best collection of offensive talent in the league with Alex Smith at quarterback, Frank Gore at running back and Vernon Davis at tight end.

The team with the most to lose has to be the Lions. They are drafting second and the entire city of Detroit hopes and prays Matt Millen doesn't screw this one up. The smart move for the Lions would be to trade down and get volume for an already weak franchise, but hard telling Millen is thinking about.

Should we punish band members too?

Now that the Appleton North High School saga that saw 34 kids get served up with citations for drinking underage. I'm not immune to underage kids drinking fermented beverages. It's going to happen.

However, here's the rub. Would this party -- that has affected three Lightning sports teams -- be the same if newspapers took band boxscores?

My point simply is this. Since we publicize high school athletes by printing their names and images in newsprint is it fair that other kids -- that should be held to the same higher standard -- aren't included?

Is it fair that band, drama or forensics are able to get plowed after a performance? However, none of this is known. And even if it is, I guarantee you that there is merely a whisper of talk about it, for fear that the high school director would lose his entire winds section.

There is nothing new with North. St. Mary Central had the same problems earlier this winter and 1/3 of Hortonville's football team was caught when I was a junior. This isn't an isolated incident and it surely isn't going to stop anytime.

However, in the meantime, the rules have to remain the same for everyone. Just because they're not athletes doesn't mean they can't break the rules.