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This past Sunday, ESPN aired an outstanding in-depth piece on Outside the Lines about how high school football has helped heal some of the pain that will be forever felt in Joplin, Mo. This is the town that was devastated by an F5 tornado in May and lost over 160 of its residents.

Joplin High School was essentially wiped off the map by the storm. Students are now attending classes at a nearby mall. But the school’s football field, which was off-campus, remained mostly intact and allowed for players to practice and eventually play football there. The story was narrated by the Joplin Eagles’ head coach and members of the team. They all said that it was their goal to have football bring some stability back to their tattered community.

Over time, sporting events have been shown to be incredible emotional boosts for those who have endured a significant misfortune in their lives. After the 9/11 terrorist attacks in New York, playing football and baseball helped bring people together, especially when the New York Mets hosted the first baseball game in the state following that horrific day. When Hurricane Katrina turned New Orleans upside-down in 2005, football fans rallied around the New Orleans Saints – a team that was experiencing success for the first time in years. Quarterback Drew Brees seemed to be someone everyone looked up to at the time, and Brees has gained a reputation for helping others in the New Orleans community.

The fact that sports can unite a group of people in need of some good news is an interesting concept. It just goes to show how fun and exciting athletics can be. Whether it’s the play on the field, the mascot dancing to a song blaring on the loudspeakers, the cheerleaders throwing each other in the air or any other entertaining element of a game, it is a time when everyone in a community can gather in one place and have a great time. It also gives people a place to go and temporarily forget about some of the stresses of life that we all experience. For those in Joplin, these stresses have reached terribly high levels over the last few months. That is why they are so glad to have something to cheer about now.

Mid-October means we are in the thick of the college football season. At this point, it is starting to become clear who the frontrunners in most conferences will be come December.

However, for the first time in a long time, the state of Florida may not be a factor in these races whatsoever.

On October 9, the Associated Press released its weekly poll of the top 25 teams in the nation. After a streak of 472 consecutive polls, there was no team from the Sunshine State included in this elite group. This marks the state’s first absence in such rankings since 1982. And there are a few more schools in Florida playing in the FBS (formerly Division I-A level) than there were back then.

There is one glaring reason that could explain why this streak came to an end. The BCS programs at FSU, UF, Miami and USF all have head coaches in either their first or second year. In the meantime, the programs at UCF, FAU and FIU certainly aren’t making much of a case to pick up their big brothers’ slack.

But as St. Petersburg Times columnist John Romano points out in a piece on this subject, Florida is a hotbed of high school football players, many of whom have starred on national championship teams at the college level and on Super Bowl teams in the NFL. In fact, the state has produced 10 national titles in college football. Clearly, even to this day, the athletes are there.

The challenge then becomes attracting top players to these schools. It is much easier for an athlete to pick a school that has a well-established, successful coaching staff in place. It is less tempting to play in a program surrounded by uncertainty due to the newness of its coaches.

So, as college football enthusiasts living in Florida, where do things go from here?

The answer is hurry up and wait. Fans will have to be patient for another two, three, maybe five years before they see the Sunshine State’s teams consistently ranked among the top programs nationally. In addition, these new coaches will either prove themselves by winning conference championships or will be forced out due to a lack of progress. Because of the pressure to succeed at these tradition-rich schools, time is not on the side of these coaches.

It was the night of Wednesday, September 28, 2011. It was an important night, at least in my eyes. That night, the Tampa Bay Rays were playing the New York Yankees at Tropicana Field. It was the final game of the regular season for both teams. But it was far more important for the Rays as its result would determine the team’s future. If they won and Boston lost, the Rays would claim the American League wild card and a postseason berth. If they lost and Boston won, their season was over. A similar result in their game and Boston’s game meant a one-game playoff the following day to determine the wild card winner since the two teams had the same record.

Just a few innings into the game, the Rays trailed by what seemed like an insurmountable lead. It was 7-0 after Rays starter David Price struggled to one of the worst outings of his career. Meantime, the Red Sox had grabbed a 3-2 lead in Baltimore and were in the middle of a rain delay.

For some reason, I kept the Rays game on TV in the background. At the very least, I wanted to see how their season would end, thinking this would be the final day of it. At that point, I was glad I had turned down a friend’s offer to go since it was getting worse and worse.

Then something started happening in the eighth inning. The Rays started putting men on base. They started scoring some runs – just a few – to make the scoreboard operator do something. But when Evan Longoria stepped up to the plate and belted a pitch to left field, I knew the Rays were not done. You could just feel something special after listening to TV broadcaster Dewayne Staats call the three-run homer, which made it 7-6. Tampa Bay was a run away from tying the game after only collecting a pair of hits in the first seven innings.

Then came the ninth inning. Dan Johnson, who had struggled just to stay in the majors all season long, was at the plate for the Rays with two outs and no one on base. He was a strike away from ending what appeared to be an amazing comeback if he had swung and missed the next pitch. But he didn’t. He made solid contact and hit a ball that barely got over the right field wall to tie the game at seven. How in the world was this happening?

Fast-forward to extra innings when the Rays were batting in the 12^th inning. The game was still knotted at seven. In Baltimore, the Orioles were threatening to tie the game against Boston closer Jonathan Papelbon. Before I could flip over to ESPN from Sun Sports, the O’s had tied it at three. Then, somehow, some way, Robert Andino drove in the winning run with former Rays leftfielder Carl Crawford diving to make a play but coming up short.

Since Baltimore had taken care of business and knocked off the Red Sox, the Rays were on the verge of history. In mere minutes after the other game had ended, Evan Longoria launched a pitch to left field and, somehow, some way, it left the yard and landed in the blue outfield seats, sending the Rays to an improbable comeback in their game and a trip to the playoffs that nobody could have ever imagined. If only I had been there.

I may be young, but I can’t imagine ever witnessing such dramatics in sports for the rest of my life. I also got to share the moment with my brother on the phone. He had called me no more than 30 seconds before Longoria’s game-winning blast to find out if I was watching. Fortunately I was. He had taken a nap when it was 7-0 and later awakened to see a tied ballgame. We both screamed and laughed when it was all said and done, finding it hard to believe what we had seen occur. A team with one of the lowest payrolls was in the playoffs. A team with one of the highest was not.

Timing is everything in life, and it was totally proven on this night.

Finding character in current and former athletes and coaches can oftentimes be a tough task. With the frequent news of athletes getting arrested for a variety of crimes, it has to make you wonder why Americans support certain players with long rap sheets.

The University of South Florida football team won perhaps the biggest game in school history by beating Notre Dame this past weekend. Skip Holtz returned to his roots in South Bend, Ind. where both he and his father, Lou, coached to capture a tremendous victory for the Bulls and for Holtz personally.

This past week, I had the opportunity to attend the 2011 AEJMC conference in St. Louis. Basically these conferences are a gathering of journalists, professors, and others who have some kind of footprint in the journalism and mass communication world. The main reason I attended was to present a research paper I did with a professor over the past year. The paper is called “Why your grandpa is on Facebook: A Survey of Uses and Gratifications of Facebook by Older Adults.” In simple terms, this study looked at why people over age 45 use Facebook. The main two reasons were for entertainment purposes (to play games) and for social interests (viewing others’ profiles).

No, that splash sound you just heard isn’t a 250-pound man leaping into a swimming pool. It’s the sound of several Tampa Bay Rays rookies making a splash this season.

Last night, I was flipping through TV channels and came across an episode of “20/20” on ABC. In terms of journalism, this is one of the best shows on television, along with “Dateline” on NBC and CBS’ long-running “60 Minutes.”

This particular broadcast focused on the subject of progeria, an extremely rare disease that affects children. It involves rapid aging and most kids who are diagnosed with it rarely live to see their teenage years. Barbara Walters did an outstanding job of telling the stories of three young girls with progeria and how the disease has affected their families. She interviewed the girls, their parents, and a few doctors. One striking statistic that stood out is that there are only 16 documented cases of the disease in the United States. Even though it is clearly a condition most people don’t have to deal with, Walters and her producers made it seem important to the viewer.

Can you miagine being in the shoes of a child with progeria? Or a parent with this child? It is hard to even fathom how they must feel knowing their fate is closer than that of their parents. Their health is practically in greater jeopardy than that of most elderly people. One mother commented that she wakes up every day “wondering if this will be the day” she loses her daughter. Just think how difficult it would be having a child in this situation.

Watching this broadcast was somewhat disturbing, but it made me appreciate life more than ever. There are individuals living among us who are in more difficult positions than we will ever be ourselves. To me, these people should be rewarded. I’ve never really bought into the mindset that everyone should live life to the fullest and take risks, probably because I’m a little more cautious than most people. But now I can understand why people feel this way. Life is a precious thing that we should all, at the very least, cherish.

Have you ever paid attention to hotel pillows when traveling? If so, you probably know where this blog post is going.

I have had the opportunity to travel both around the country and internationally. Along the way, I’ve stayed in numerous hotels and motels. There is one thing that the pillows at these homes away from home all seem to have in common. They are lumpy and lame. Right as you plop your head on them, they sink in, almost as if they aren’t even there and your head is propped on the actual bed.

I know it’s kind of an inconsequential complaint, but don’t people want to be comfortable when staying at a hotel? I sure do. Sleeping in a bed other than the one at home is tough enough. Even the higher-end places that charge a fortune and have fancy rooms with all the amenities imaginable still fail to provide comfort for your head. Using these pillows is basically like sleeping on the floor.

I know I can’t be too crazy if there is a Facebook group called “I hate hotel pillows,” can I? I have to believe that this complaint is more prevalent than some may think. The next time I stay at a hotel, I think I will bring a big sign with lyrics similar to those of the holiday tune that goes, “All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth.” It will read, “All I want in my room is a firm pillow.”