Who’s Got Your Back? We here at RazorbackExpats are no strangers to bar fights; if it’s Saturday night, chances are that we’re in a scrap at the local watering hole. So we took particular interest in this column by the Sporting News’ Spencer Hall (a.k.a. as Oscar Swindle of Every Day Should Be Saturday). In the piece, Hall lists the college mascots you’d want on your side in a bar fight and those you wouldn’t.

Coming in at No. 2 on the list of those you’d want on your side: the Arkansas Razorback. Says Hall: “Razorbacks can weigh upwards of 500 pounds and are stone cold killing machines with knives in their mouths, incredible stamina and a bloodlust a highway killer would call ‘impressive.’ Ragnar, a former Arkansas Razorback mascot, escaped once and killed seven rattlesnakes, a 450-pound domestic hog and a coyote before being captured. You want the Razorback on your side in a fight if only to keep him from being on the other side. Bonus: He has an extremely low center of gravity and can be eaten if killed in combat.”

And who’s no. 1? Mike VI, the LSU Tiger. But as occasional contributor and frequent commenter J Hawg 3 notes in his e-mail alerting us to the piece: “Yeah, baby, but who has The Boot?”

Derek Fisher: Class Act, Part 2. Last week, we mentioned our admiration of Los Angeles Lakers guard and Little Rock native Derek Fisher. Courtesy of Max Brantley’s Arkansas Blog, we came across this moving piece about how Derek has raised awareness of a rare type of eye cancer and a new treatment for the disease. Much as we dislike certain things about the Lakers, this guy makes it impossible to root against them.

December Madness? According to Brandon Marcello of The Slophouse, John Pelphrey is trying to schedule an early-season invitational that would take place next season in Bud Walton. Sounds like a cool idea, although let’s hope it turns out better for the Hogs than did the last regular-season tournament held in Fayetteville: the John Thompson Foundation Challenge Classic, which took place in November 2000.

The Razorbacks, sporting the talents of one Joe Johnson and ranked 15th in the nation, lost to Southern Mississippi in the finals. Perhaps the guys were just distracted by the ongoing Florida recount.

Peering into the Future. In the June 2008 issue of Pravda Hawgs Illustrated, Harry King does his best Nostradamus impersonation and unfurls his game-by-game prediction of the 2008 Razorback football season. The bad news? A 5-7 record. The good news? No humilating bowl loss.

The wins: Western Illinois, Louisiana-Monroe, Kentucky, Ole Miss and Tulsa. The losses: Texas, Alabama, Florida, Auburn, South Carolina, Mississippi State and LSU.

Before you dismiss his prognostications, you should know that King correctly predicted last year’s regular season record (8-4), although, as he’s quick to point out, he erroneously predicted the Hogs to beat Kentucky and lose to LSU.

Do not doubt Harry King. Stronger people than you have - and been destroyed as a result.

One on One. Bobby Petrino recently sat down for a Q&A with ArkansasSports360’s Chris Bahn; to listen to the interview, click here.

The Pride of Little Rock. Please excuse the non-Razorback item, but here’s a nice article on Los Angeles Lakers guard and Little Rock native Derek Fisher. We here at RazorbackExpats can’t think of an athlete that we admire more than Fisher, and we have been known to gab about the following “What If?” scenario: What if he had been a member of those wonderful mid-1990s Razorback teams?

In some ways, it’s not a terribly gripping discussion: After all, the Hogs did win the 1994 title without him. But, we can’t help but wonder if his off-the-charts leadership qualities might have helped combat the sluggish and unfocused play that frequently plagued the 1995 Hogs. Regardless, we would have loved to have seen a backcourt of him and Corey Beck.