Name: GreekHouse
Hometown: Minneapolis, MN (although I was actually born in Fargo, ND)
Town I Currently Live In: Ames, IA
Profession: Math PhD Student
Bats: R
Throws: R
Positions: 1B,3B,DH
Greatest Career Achievement in Baseball/Softball/T-ball: When I was in college, I was nicknamed "The One Man Home Run Derby". When the fence was up on the women's softball field, I homered in over half of my at-bats. Once they took it down, my number of home runs decreased dramatically and my number of triples increased dramatically.
Hobbies: Watching sports, playing sports, playing poker, walking/running, lifting, math, movies, video games
What are you known for around the WGOM? I'm the guy who can't tell the difference between a sporting event and a math problem.
If you could have a nice, polite dinner with any 3 people - dead or alive - who and why? Leonhard Euler, Paul Erdos, and Julius Caesar. Euler and Erdos are two of the most prolific mathematicians who ever lived and I would like to get a chance to meet them and try to figure out how their minds worked. When I was an undergrad, I went on a study abroad program that was started by Erdos. Unfortunately, he had passed away a few years beforehand, otherwise I would have gotten a chance to meet him. As for Caesar, I think he lived one of the most interesting lives that any human has ever lived.
If you could pick any 3 people - again, dead or alive - to go out and party who and why? Tom Cruise, Jon Stewart, and Jesus. Just being in the presence of those three guys, I'm pretty sure every woman in the room would want to come over and talk with us and I could get the 4th hottest one.
Sports Allegiances: T'Wolves, Twins, and to a lesser extent the Vikings
Favorite Books: Harry Potter, Moneyball, Fooled by Randomness, Basketball on Paper, Various poker books
Favorite Music: Tool, KOOOOOOOOOOOOORN, Thonley, Big Wreck, Metallica, Dream Theater, Stone Sour, Slipknot, The Used, other hard rock/metal
Favorite Baseball Movie: Baseketball
Favorite Non-baseball Movie: The Big Lebowski
Favorite Food & Drink: Pizza and Lo-carb Monster
Favorite TV Show(s): Most HBO shows, The Office, The Simpsons, Futurama, 24 (although the last season sucked)
Favorite Twins Player, historically: I think most Minnesota baseball fans of my generation would be lying if they said anyone other than Pucket
Favorite Twins Player, currently: Justin Morneau
Best Twins Memories: I have great memories of the Twins 2 World Series when I was a kid. Of all the games I've been to, I'd say that Santana's 17K game is my favorite. The energy in the crowd that day was electric and is something I will never forget.
Favorite Sport to Play: Basketball, Slow Pitch Softball (with fences of course)
Favorite Sport to Watch: Baseball and Basketball are pretty close to a tie
If I could live anywhere in the world, I’d live in: I seem to be pretty happy wherever I go. I've lived in towns as small as Northfield and cities as big as Budapest and was happy in both places. Mostly, it seems to matter who the people are around me. If I had to pick one place though, I'd probably go with Las Vegas.
If I was commissioner for a day, I’d: Hug it out with Barry Bonds.
If I had Terry Ryan’s job for a day, I’d: teach Gardenhire how to use the bullpen correctly. Also, I'd challenge Tyner to a home run derby.
Favorite Ballpark: Sadly, the only major league park I've been to is the dome. I had plans to go out to SoCal this summer when the Twins were playing the Angels, but it didn't work out.
Favorite blogs: SBG is obviously the best--especially now that that GreekHouse guy is writing there. Aaron Gleeman is pretty much the only other blog I read regularly these days, although I've recently been introduced to Fire Joe Morgan and find it hilarious.
What area of math is your PhD work in? I do combinatorics and graph theory. I also have an interesting in probability and statistics, which has originated from my love of sports and gambling. For the first time since high school I'm taking a stats course this term, although I've done plenty of independent study in that area. My advisor does a lot of research with random graphs, which seems to be a good fit for me.
What would the outcome be of the "GH vs. Tyny HR Derby"? I'd like to think that my bat could back up my mouth in this case. Unlike Tyner, I am capable of hitting a baseball more than 400 feet, although I would imagine he can make solid contact a lot more consistently than me. I think it would be an entertaining affair for anyone who knows me, but pretty boring for anyone else. In the end, I will come out with a 2-0 victory.
How did the Cyclones lose to the Kent State Golden Flashes? Guh. I have no idea. It seems like every time I watch a football game of a team whose school I attend, they just end up embarrassing themselves. When I was at Minnesota, I only watched a handful of Gopher games, but everything I watched was just a humiliating loss (losing a 28
point lead in the 4th quarter against Michigan, failing to punt the ball against Wisconsin when we basically needed to get the punt off to win the game). Last year was terrible for the Cyclones and they lost every game I saw. So to answer your question, I'm just gonna say that they're in rebuilding mode.
Can we expect an encore to popular "Sharks vs. Pirhanas"? There is still a part 4 in the works. I've been pretty busy with the start of school and just haven't had the time to put it together yet. When I get a good idea like that one, I tend to ramble on for pages about it, so breaking my posts up into different parts seems to work for me. I have a few other good ideas in my head right now. I can't guarantee anything as popular as SVP (I've been overwhelmed with the response it has gotten), but these ideas will give more insight into the way I think about sports, which should be interesting to a lot of people here.
Check out the map! It's after the jump.
Maybe you could let Tyner hit from second base to make things more even.
Finally, the Nation procures a right-handed power hitter.
so, I noticed that you did not mention Numb3rs among your TV favorites. Does that make you throw up a little in your mouth?
What's wrong with Numb3rs?! Sure, Mr. Universe (oops, wrong role) can somehow write a graphical UI to display complex data analysis from disparent databases in only ½ hour, but besides that, there's actually some intelligence being shown.
ooooh, I thought that guy looked familiar. I just didn't recognize him without his fembot.
I've only seen the show a few times and I thought it was ok. One of the episodes I saw guest starred Bill Nye as an expert in Sabermetrics. If every show had Bill Nye and talked about baseball, perhaps I'd watch it more often.
Would it be reasonable to assume that you are affiliated with a fraternity, and if so, which one?
I get that a lot, but nope I wasn't in a frat. There's no good story behind the name, a few of my friends were just randomly distributing nicknames and they decided to call me "House" because I was big and solid like a house. I thought it was sort of lame and recommended that they prepend "Greek" to it and it stuck.
I want to thank GH for taking up my offer to write here at SBG Nation. I contacted him about a year ago and thought that maybe he'd want to write about the T-Wolves, but at the time he was too busy. Then, out of the blue this summer, he contacted me and said he wanted to do a little writing on the Twins. The results have been a fine addition to The Nation. Thank you, sir! We love your work.
I also appreciate the opportunity to write here. It gives me a chance to share all the bizarro ideas that are floating around in my head. I've been overwhelmed with the positive response I've gotten so far.
Nothing wrong with presenting bizarro ideas to The Nation here; whether agreed with or not, it stimulates great conversation.
One of the books I listed above is "Fooled by Randomness". It takes a great deep look at randomness and how it affects our lives in ways we may take for granted. I plan to do an in depth post on it some time. A lot of the concepts in the book are things that I had somewhat figured out already (largely due to my poker playing career). These concepts have led me to a very non-standard world view and understanding them is key to understanding the way my mind works.
Moss is intrigued...
Moss enjoys GH's contributions, too -- FWIW.
How do you like Iowa State? I spent a lot of time there when I was in college. With the combo of engineering and agriculture, it is a very male campus.
Sounds like NDSU. When I was there, there were eight or nine thousand students, with 2000+ in agriculture and well over 2000 in eng/architecture. I usually knew every girl in my class -- they were the same two girls in every one of my classes.
I've got a school motto for you:
NDSU - Like Iowa State but with a better football team.
I don't know what the male/female ration is here. It's pretty male dominated in the math department, but I see a lot of hot women just walking around campus. I like the school a lot and I've gotten the opportunity to teach my own course every term since I've been here (including summer). It's been a great experience and a lot of fun.
Dream Theater, GH? Wow, someone with a (bordering) prog rock liking. Have you tried Transatlantic, maybe? Or Porcupine Tree?
Back in late high school and throughout most of college I listened to a lot of prog rock. Dream Theater was basically my favorite band from 1996-2001. I've gone away from it a bit lately, but still consider Dream Theater as one of my favorite bands. I can still listen to their stuff that I've heard hundreds of times and it's still amazing.
I like Transatlantic quite a bit also. I'm not familiar with Porcupine Tree...maybe I'll check them out!
Porcupine Tree started out as a lark, and early stuff is reminiscent of early Floyd, but they're as close to a latter day prog band as you can get. I think In Absentia is their most consistent CD to me, but they have a great few tracks on each of their works.
Liquid Tension Project is also good, as is Spock's Beard. I think they all may share members from Dream Theater.
Dinner with Erdos and Euler?
You'd end up with like 8 papers to write!
Following up on that...
I spent a summer at the Univerity of Idaho as an undergrad, studying Ramsey Theory, which is sort of combinatorical if I remember right. You ever get into any of that?
Simple Ramsey Theory:
y0 + x1y1 + x2y2 + x3y3 + ... + xnyn <= z
y's and z are given. What set of x's is this true for?
x was usually in an integer set like {0,1,2,3,4} or {-1,0,1}.
Crap, I really thought I could remember it better than that. That was an awful description.
There's a professor here who does a lot of stuff with Ramsey theory and Ramsey numbers. I haven't done any of it yet (although I don't know exactly what I'll end up studying).
The research I did over the summer had to do with regular graphs and vertex identifying codes.
Sytem Of A Down - nu metal, or not? Are you a fan?
Also, what took you to Budapest? (My maternal grandfather's family came from Hungary early last century, so I'm curious to know the reasons whenever I find out people have visited th' homeland.)
I'm guessing the Erdos study abroad thing.
Yes, BSM. It's pretty much the only study abroad program where you get to study math.
D'oh.
I have no words to describe the sound of System of a Down.
Is that a good thing or a bad thing?
Im thinking its a bad thing
I like SOAD
I tend to like bands that have a very unique sound and SOAD definitely is that. I like some of their stuff, but sometimes their music just seems like it's weird for the sake of being weird.
A gnarly fusion of Armenian folk sensibilities and high-test metal?
Thirty years before System Of A Down, there was Focus.
thats a great song!
I like that song.
You know, Focus does a lot of really great music, although most everyone only knows Hocus Pocus.
One of my favorites has always been Sylvia, and Focus 2 (Moving Waves) is another fave. Hamburger Concerto is another one that gets a nod.
Hanging out with Tom Cruise, listening to Korn while sipping Lo-carb Monster - where do I sign up?
Man, I used to dig Korn a bunch for a about a year there... 1996, but then my preferences really changed. (House, Jungle, Trip Hop, Acid Jazz by 1997)
I recently read a review of their new album, it said it sucks. Not sure how much I can separate "Korn Sucks" from the actual review. How does it stack up to the first three albums (which is all I know)?
Korn?
He was great on Iron Chef
more Korn.
Korn is all over the place. It was also the last name of a guy who went deep into the WSOP main event last year. With a name like that, I had to cheer for him.
KOOOOOOOOOOOOOORN!!!
KORN is the call letters of one of the Mitchell, SD radio stations. Corn Palace, you know.
See you on the other side was pretty crappy. I'm more a fan of their older stuff.
I'll agree that their older stuff is better. Remember that episode of South Park? Good times!
thats a very underrrated movie
Funny - I just made a South Park comment above before reading this... This was (and still is) a great movie for those of us still amused by dick and fart jokes. Except that kissing scene... That was just a bit on the disturbing side...
I think the best part of that movie is the narrative on sports at the beginning.
http://www.spscriptorium.com/Treats/BBscript.htm
My favorite movie by those guys is definitely Orgazmo though. It's about a Mormon who becomes a porn star. I always tell people it's based on a true story.
Orgazmo is great too!
...failing to punt the ball against Wisconsin when we basically needed to get the punt off to win the game...
Needed to get the punt off, OR RUN IT OUT OF THE BACK OF THE END ZONE!! That's coaching at it's crappiest.
(Moss, however, is amused by the ineptitude of the Gophers football program.)
I do combinatorics
Ever play around with Douady rabbits, Julia sets, Mandelbrots and the like? Cool stuff.
Fractals tend to fall into the area of analysis. Fractals are cool, but analysis sucks.
Analysis really, really, really sucks.
Greek House: “Well, since I got to pick where we are eating tonite, I figgered George is in Fridley would be perfect, you know, a Greek House?â€
Waitress (to Caesar): "I suppose you would like a Caesar salad? With Caesar dressing?"
Caesar: “As a rule, what is out of sight disturbs men's minds more seriously than what they see. In my case, madam, it’s your bosom. Heh.â€
(From th' kitchen: "Hiyo!!!")
Waitress (F’ing Romans!!. Writes down: Corned-beef hash. Spit in. To Euler): "And what would you like?"
Euler: “Madam, I have come from a country where people are hanged if they talk.†(Laughs at his own joke). “Seriously, tho, I’ll have a plate of peas, lined up in a geometrical series such that N is an even, perfect number. N is even, hence it can be written in the form,…†(starts to scribble furiously… Waitress writes down: steak done well, with mushrooms).
Greek House: “So Paul, what is your Erdös number?â€
Erdös: “Um, yeah. Zero, I guess… Can we switch from these cloth napkins to paper? And bring a pen. Miss, what’s your name? I’ll make this next problem a joint paper with your name on it as well.â€
Waitress: “Lena.â€
Erdös: “Perfect. Erdös-Lena problem 357 – a $175 dollar problem. You might even get this one, Euler…â€
Euler: “Vass!?â€
Caesar: “Good yuks, Erdös. +10 boyo!â€
This crew shouldn't have any trouble splitting the check.
Caesar would use his sword to split the check.
Euler would use the limit to an infinte series.
Erdös: "I'll just pay for it with these 2 hondos."
Waitress: "Oh, Mr. Erdös, I'll never spend these in honor of you!"
Erdös: "In that case, can I write you a check?" (true story)
+25% gratuity. Lena's hot.
I'd hit it.
lol...awesome work NBB!
Nice to see Baseketball on the movie list.
Say, GH, do you know a math grad student last name Hilgemann?
Yes, I know Mike Hilgemann. He has the same birthday as me!
Cool. I grew up with the kid. He lived a mile from my house (rural) and our parents are still best of friends to this day.