- The Airborne Toxic Event, an L.A. indie-rock quintet, plays at 6:30 at the Murray Theater, 4916 S. State St., Murray. Tickets are $10, at the door.

- If the weather clears up, the Salt Lake Bees will begin their pursuit of the Pacific Coast League title with their season-opener against the Reno Aces, starting at 6:35 p.m. at the newly renamed Spring Mobile Ballpark (pictured), 77 W. 1300 South, Salt Lake City. Tickets, from $7.50 to $22.50, available at the Bees' website or at the ballpark. UPDATE: Tonight's game is rained out.

- The Oscar-nominated documentary "The Garden," about efforts to save a community garden in south-central L.A. from developers, will screen at 7 at the City Library auditorium, 210 E. 400 South, Salt Lake City. Director Scott Hamilton Kennedy will take questions after the movie. Free.

- Miami funk/soul band The Lee Boys plays at 8 at The State Room, 638 S. State St., Salt Lake City. Tickets are $25, at The State Room's website or at the door.

- English pop duo The Ting Tings - whose "That's Not My Name" was a No. 1 hit in the UK - perform at In the Venue, 579 W. 200 South, Salt Lake City. (This is a venue change, as the group was originally scheduled to play at the Urban Lounge - so now the under-21s can go, too.) Doors open at 9. Tickets are $15, at SmithsTix and 24Tix.

Labels: sports, Tonight's schedule

I have to feel for the kids at The Daily Universe, the student paper at Brigham Young University.

As The Salt Lake Tribune reported, Monday's edition of The Daily Universe featured what editorial manager Rich Evans called "the worst possible mistake" - a photo of leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, with a caption that referred to the group as "the Quorum of the Twelve Apostates."

(Glossary for the non-religious: An apostate is someone who speaks against the doctrines of a church - and, in LDS circles, is about the nastiest thing you can call a good upstanding Mormon.)

The Universe staff tried to retrieve the 18,500 copies printed, and reprinted a corrected version. They also issued an apology to church leaders, and explained that the error was due to the paper's spell-checking software substituting "apostate" for a misspelled version of "apostle. (Lesson to young journalists: Spell-check doesn't fix everything.)

Lest the Tribune be accused of, as scripture says, noting the mote in its neighbor's eye while ignoring the log in its own, I'll note that such blundering happens at every paper. A week ago, a Tribune story about a speech by LDS Church President Thomas Monson carried a headline that called him Gordon Monson - who happens to be one of the Trib's sports columnists.

I will leave it to theologians to debate which is worse: To be called an apostate or to be called a sportswriter.

Labels: Brigham Young University, journalism, LDS, sports

Fans of Brigham Young University know Gifford Nielsen as the Cougars' star quarterback in the mid-'70s, leading BYU to the WAC title in '76 and '77 and earning a place in the College Football Hall of Fame.

Nielsen was drafted by the NFL's Houston Oilers, where he played six seasons - first as a back-up to Dan Pastorini and Ken Stabler, then as a starter alongside Archie Manning and Oliver Luck.

For the last 25 years, since leaving the NFL, Nielsen has been sportscaster and sports director at Houston's CBS affiliate KHOU.

Today is Nielsen's his last day at KHOU. He announced his retirement on Monday's newscast, and the station posted a tribute page to "Giff."

Labels: Brigham Young University, sports

In my Vulture column, in today's dead-tree Tribune, I join the chorus of voices - alongside the Tribune's editorial board - decrying the rigged roulette wheel that is the Bowl Championship Series that determines the so-called "national champion" in college football.

It is a system organized by the big college conferences - the SEC, Big 10, Big 12, Pac-10, ACC and Big East - to prop up their schools at the expense of smaller conferences without the clout or money to join the good-ol'-boys club. It is a system that slights an undefeated team, like the University of Utah Utes, because it doesn't get the media spotlight from the East Coast sports establishment. And it is a system that props up antiquated bowl games, to line the pockets of old men in blazers.

If our president were selected by the BCS system, the media pundits would have put Hillary Clinton against Mitt Romney in the general election - no matter how many primaries and caucuses Barack Obama or John McCain had won.

Or, for another analogy, Dan Shanoff of SportingNews.com compares the BCS to the Oscars: "What is the 'Best Picture' in any given year? Like college football, there is a lot of debate -- and it's not like there is a tournament to pit them against each other. ... But we have the Oscars, which is/was the standard. But then the foreign press wanted to have their influence, so they created the Golden Globes. Then the actors wanted a say, so they created the SAGs. And each regional film critics' association created their own."

Meanwhile, The Washington Post's esteemed sportswriter John Feinstein is urging AP sports writers who vote in the post-season poll to engage in a form of civil disobedience: To vote for the Utes for No. 1.

After touting the Utes' undefeated record and the weakness in some of the BCS conferences, Feinstein expresses the main reason to vote for Utah:

The reason to vote for Utah is simple: This is the one and only way you can stand up to the BCS bullies -- the university presidents, commissioners, athletic directors and the TV networks who enable them -- and, to renew a catch phrase, just say no. Say no to this horrible, hypocritical, feed-the-big-boys system. Say no to the idea that fair competition doesn't matter. Say no to all the hype surrounding the power conferences and power teams. To co-opt yet another catch phrase, say yes to change.

Labels: sports, University of Utah

So, once again an undefeated, nationally ranked team is knocking on the door of the good-ol'-boys that determine college football's championship - and, again, the door is kept shut.

The 12-0 University of Utah's Utes - ranked No. 6 in the current BCS standings - will get to play one of the big-league teams in a major bowl game. (Probably the Sugar Bowl or the Fiesta Bowl, according to the Salt Lake Tribune's Lya Wodraska.) But a chance to play for the championship? Not gonna happen.

The insanity of this system - propped up by the big-money conferences for their own benefit, using polls and computers determine who's on top instead of actions on the field - has gone on too long. Heck, even President-Elect Barack Obama has weighed in on it, and now members of Congress are raising a stink.

An eight-team playoff is the only fair way to determine a champion. Then we can argue about which eight teams make the cut.

Labels: Barack Obama, sports, University of Utah