Mark’s Musings – March 12, 2014

Mark Fortune

Buckeyes – wow. Aaron Craft left it all on the floor Sunday in a key win over Michigan State for the men from Columbus. Now it’s on to face Purdue in the Big 10 tournament. You did know that Craft broke the all-time steals record for the Big 10 yesterday right? The record was set in 1986 by Illinois’ Bruce Douglas. Craft broke it by four and it now stands at 328. There are certainly scoring records and rebounding records and assist records – but steals? How does someone do that? Hustle. And this kid is one great hustler. I would like to see his dad smile a bit more from the stands but I am sure he is rightly proud of Aaron’s efforts on the court and more importantly, in the classroom.

Speaking of classrooms, Ohio State athletics and another great Buckeye – Craig Krenzel is speaking at River View High School this Saturday morning. Krenzel has a degree in molecular genetics and graduated from The Ohio State University with a 3.75 GPA. In molecular genetics. I don’t even know what that is! Krenzel will be speaking at River View High School this Saturday morning – March 15 – at an All Pro Dads Breakfast. The doors will open at 7:20 a.m. with father-children games starting at approximately 8 a.m. Tickets can be purchased at any local elementary school.

This little issue in the Ukraine has the potential to blow up into a big time fracas. The key question to answer right now is this – does Russia plan to turn the Crimea Peninsula back over to Ukraine anytime soon? According to one website, there are 5 key issues centering on this ordeal. This is one of the bigger ones – the Eastern Ukraine and the Crimean peninsula on the northern coast of the Black Sea have more of a cultural connection to Russia. Eastern residents speak Russian interchangeably with Ukrainian, and their political ideals more closely align with Russia. Western Ukraine residents more clearly identify with Eastern Europe.

One of the more economically potent factors is that a majority of Russian gas exports to Europe pass through Ukraine. There are others and you can google as well as me but this gives you a clearer picture. And yes, it does matter what happens in Russia and the rest of the world for that matter – to us Americans. The world is so connected technologically and economically speaking those little ripples can soon become big waves. Hopefully, this will not become a Tsunami.

One of the larger issues – as if the above two are not large enough – is that Ukraine is not a full member of NATO – thus the U.S. and European NATO alliance countries are not obligated to come to their defense. And since Russia has veto power on the U.N. Security Council it is doubtful that anything will be done by the U.N. Big surprise there.

Let’s move to NASCAR – where Dale Earnhardt Jr. leads in the point’s race. He leads Brad Keselowski by one point. Jr. has three top five finishes in this young season. Baseball and spring – soon.

Category: Mark's Musings