Jared W. Smith

I’ve struggled to come up with a good 2007 post that’s reasonably concise and has some brevity (the number one thing Twitter has taught me in my month or so of using it). A ton happened this year — most of it was good, but there were always speedbumps along the way. I’m really proud of my continued progress in getting on my own two feet this year, and am really looking forward to taking off like a rocket in 2008.

A couple months ago, when I began doing some renovations on jaredwsmith.com (which continue, in a big way, in case you haven’t noticed), I created a “Best Of” category with the intent that I would start tagging posts that really stood out to me or others to keep tabs on what people liked best for a compilation later on. The category laid dormant for months.

Then, earlier today, I caught a post at Patrick’s Place, where he ran down his best posts of 2007 by month…and bam. Inspiration. While I don’t think I can locate a post for every month of the year that stands out (my blogging comes and goes in cycles — some months, particularly high-impact school months, are almost dead with very pithy posts while others have a cornucopia of novels to choose from), I have located quite a few that I thought were special in some way, whether for comedy, historical impact, or other judgement calls that come with the power of having your name on a Web site.

And so, the category finally got some love, and The Best of JaredWSmith.com, Volume I was born, complete with Van Halen ripoff artwork. In the future, the category will receive posts before and beyond 2007′s postings — and I’ll try and do a better job of categorizing them by date as well — but in the meantime, enjoy. And Happy New Year. :)

I forgot to get to this before 2007 actually came, but here we go nonetheless with my nonexistent magic 8 ball. I seem to have a good track record with magic 8 balls — the last question I asked one was “will I have a girlfriend within a month” — I ended up dating the girl I was with that night for two and a half years. So there you go. Take that — and these predictions — with as many grains of salt as needed.

Football

• I can easily foresee a Saints-Chargers Super Bowl, but don’t count out the Eagles and the Ravens either.
• I predict that Rex Grossman will be pretty unpredictable in his second playoff start.
• I predict that the AFC representative in the Super Bowl will pound the NFC equivalent. It may as well be the ’60s again — the AFC and NFC are two totally different leagues right now.
• Jim Mora Jr. gets one more chance in Atlanta, but with a total shakeup of his staff. Tom Coughlin is outta there. Dan Henning is fired in Carolina, and Keyshawn Johnson will retire. Cam Cameron, the Chargers’ offensive coordinator, will leave for a head coaching job. Bill Cowher will retire for a year and Tim Whisenhunt will assume the controls of the Steelers. Jared Smith will not be considered for any potential coaching vacancies.

Baseball

• The Padres will finish third in the NL West, behind Arizona and San Francisco. San Fran’s acquisitions in the offseason make a fairly decent team much more competitive. The Big Unit will face revival in the heat of the desert, out of the heat of the New York lights, and will win about 15 games for a young and scrappy D-Backs squad. The Padres will struggle with Termel Sledge leading off, Peavy will have an arm injury (with his delivery, it’s inevitable), and the Padres at the end of the day will still have no idea how to win in Petco. The Dodgers and the Rockies will fight it out for the NL West cellar, as the Dodgers bled players this offseason and the Rockies still play in Coors Field.
• I see Mike Hampton being a pleasant surprise at #5 for the Braves. Additionally, their young hitting will continue to improve. Are they a match for the Mets? Probably not, but as long as Bobby Cox is the Braves’ manager, they have a fighting chance to make the playoffs and bow out early every year.
• Brian Cashman’s approach to youth with the Yankees will deliver yet another division title in the Bronx. A-Rod will bounce back, and their rotation will be fine. Daisuke Matuszaka will prove to be a $100 million flameout in Beantown — a Red Sox version of Hideki Irabu. This was an extremely bold move that I’m not sure the hype will let pan out.
• The Royals will pay $44 million for .500 baseball from Gil Meche.

Politics

• 2007: Year of the Hearing. Need I say more?
• The United States will begin drawing down in Iraq by the end of the year. (We can be optimistic, right?)
• Ted Stevens will continue to preach on about tubes and trucks as Net Neutrality takes center stage again in 2007.

Jared’s Personal Aspirations

• I’ll meet several fun females in 2007, and promptly scare them away with a pseudo-Freudian slip about local forecast music or overly-eager joysticks, thus contributing to continued bachelorhood through a large portion of the New Year.
• I may finally finish the entire jaredwsmith.com conglomerate. Maybe.
• My TV studio project, which I am going to firmly commit myself to, will take off in the summer with plenty of free time and a bit more disposable income.
• I can see some positive expansion in my Web properties in 2007, with a bit more aggressiveness in the Web sector for a change.

This will be a fun read at this time in 2008…haha.