Currently HBO for the Memorial Day Weekend is showing Kevin Bacon In "Taking Chance", a true story about a Marine who volunteers to be the private escort for the journey home of a KIA one Chance Phelps. If you have never seen this movie, I highly suggest that you spend the time to watch this film and it will undoubtedly put into perspective that a soldier Killed In Action affects just more than a family. This will undoubtedly put a modern war in perspective for those of you who have never served, but it will also show you that when one of our men or women have fallen they are not a number, they are and should be treated with the utmost respect for their ultimate sacrifice! I promise in the end you'll have a whole new appreciation for what it is we reap from our men and woman of the Armed Forces, both living and deceased!

On a scale of 1-10 this movie is a 12!!!
 

The Duke lacrosse players may never get a formal apology from their accuser or Revs' King and Sharpton, but they will take comfort knowing that skank douche bag has had a run-in with the law and this time she isn't the victim, she's the defendant!! It would seem this time around no Reverend's will be coming to her defense, imagine that.

RALEIGH, N.C. — The woman who falsely accused three Duke lacrosse players of raping her was charged Monday with murder in the death of her boyfriend.

Crystal Mangum was indicted on a charge of first-degree murder and two counts of larceny. She has been in jail since April 3, when police charged her with assault in the stabbing 46-year-old Reginald Daye. He died after nearly two weeks at a hospital.

An attorney for Mangum and officials in the district attorney's office did not immediately return calls seeking comment.

Mangum falsely accused the lacrosse players of raping her at a 2006 party at which she was hired to perform as a stripper. The case heightened long-standing tensions in Durham about race, class and the privileged status of college athletes.

Prosecutors declined to press charges for the false accusations, but Mangum's bizarre legal troubles have continued.

Last year, she was convicted on misdemeanor charges after setting a fire that nearly torched her home with her three children inside. In a videotaped police interrogation, she told officers she set got into a confrontation with her boyfriend at the time — not Daye — and burned his clothes, smashed his car windshield and threatened to stab him.

Friends said Mangum has never recovered from the stigma brought by the lacrosse case and has been involved in a string of questionable relationships in an attempt to provide stability for her children. Vincent Clark, a friend who co-authored Mangum's self-published memoir, said he hopes people don't rush to judgment — echoing one of the oft-cited lessons of the lacrosse case itself.

Clark said Mangum realizes she has mental health problems.

"I'm sad for her. I hope people realize how difficult it is being her," Clark said.

When Daye's nephew talked to a 911 dispatcher after the stabbing, he referenced the notoriety Mangum still carries.

"It's Crystal Mangum. THE Crystal Mangum," said the nephew, whose name was removed from a publicly-released version of the emergency call. "I told him she was trouble from the damn beginning."

Happy New Year Gabitants!

Looking back, 2010 was a great year for YouGabSports. We outlasted our former stomping grounds at TSN, we acquired many quality members, and our raw numbers were tremendously better than the year before.

But that’s yesterday, and the way we look at it, we have a bright future to look forward to. Part of that has to do equally with the people we have here already as it does with the people still to discover us. Another part of that are the improvements that will likely continue to come in the New Year, both from ourselves and our service company, Spruz.

As you’ve no doubt already seen, we’ve already begun to usher in the New Year by doing some minor housekeeping on the front page. I’ve cleaned up the columns to make them more reader friendly, as well as added a section for the Top Gabbers under the Featured Blogger. We’re a sports site, so a little competition is a healthy thing right? Don't worry though, anything you publish will still appear on the front page, just under the header of "Latest Blog Entries - All Topics."

Those are just a couple of the changes we will work on in the upcoming year.

Another one we’d like to tackle right out of the gate will be to rework the YouGab logo and header. This has always been a moving target for us and I’ll fully admit that my limited artistic ability stretched to get us there. Still, we’ve carried that logo for the better part of a year now and there is a growing opinion that we need to freshen it up a bit.

That’s where each of you will come in. While I will no doubt try to work out a new design myself, Kevin, Steve, and I thought it would be interesting to see what each of you envision. We’re hoping that a few of you will take a shot at creating a design and submitting it to us. I’m sure there are multiple users in our little niche group that have experience using Photoshop or any other graphic design programs available. We’ll then put all designs to a vote and put the winner at the top of the page, with full credit going to the designer.

Here are just the basic guidelines we want to work with:

-         The color scheme must feature the Red and Blue that we currently use, or as close an approximation as possible.

-         We’d like to avoid anything loud and gaudy. We want to draw attention to the site, but not blind the users right off the bat.

-         If you have an interesting take on something, go for it. We don’t want to limit your imagination.

-         Email the file to use as either a JPG or PNG (preferred) to yougabsports@live.com .

That’s it. We want you to have fun with it and we hope as many of you take part as possible.

Welcome everyone to YouGabSports. The backbone for this site is the ability to say what you want, when you want and have adult conversations with adults. No playground antics.

Here are a few simple instructions to let you enjoy the Gab and all that it has to offer.

Set up your profile. After signing up for the Gab there are many options to customize your profile. Add elements such as A Blog, Groups, Text Box, Music Player, Friend Map, Comment Box, Recent Activities, Images, Friends, Personal Info. Click on Add Element to put these onto your profile. Once there you can move them to where you want and highlight what matters to you most. You will also be able to add a profile picture. How fun!!!

Do you see Friends that you want to add? Simply go to their profile and under their picture will be an Add Friend link. Click that and another box will open for you to add a comment and send a friend invite to them. If they have a comment box on their page, you can leave them a message directly on their profile.

Want to post a Blog? From your Profile go to Add Element, find Your Blogs. (should be the one at the top right of the Elements) and click Add Element. This will then open a box for you to Title your blog, give you the option to show a number of past blogs on your page, and Who can see them. Once you are happy with the settings, click Add Element and you will see it on your profile.

Once you have your blog set up and are ready to drop your first post at the Gab, you will see there are MANY options for you after opening the Blog Editor. Photos, Videos, Links, and so on... If you are not sure what something does on the Editor, hover your mouse over the icon and it will give you the name of that icon. Be sure to click that little SAVE button at the bottom to post your blog.

And now an important message regarding Blogs. We offer many categories to post your blogs to in regards to subject matter. Listed below are all the categories that are at the Gab. Some are directly associated with our daily feature writers and others are for general use.

Daily Blog 2.0
FEATURED
Humor
MLB
NBA
NCAA
NFL
NHL
Racing
User Showcase

PLEASE... Do Not Use the Daily Blog 2.0 or FEATURED category if you are not one of the daily featured bloggers.

If you have a generic post, please use User Showcase. This will put your post in with the others. If you have a sport specific post, please use that category. This will allow you to go directly to that sports posts and read only those 'sport-specific' blogs.

We have only ONE RULE... PLEASE... No profanity in the TITLE of your blog. You are free to drop all the F-Bombs you want in the body of your blog, but please refrain from use of  questionable language in the title. Past blogs have been picked up for use by other outside sources for re-posting and we would love for that to continue. However, if a blog has profanity in it, I am sure the Chicago Sun-Times won't be using it any time soon.

...And last but not least, if you have any questions, issues, comments, concerns, ideas, recipes, or hunting tips... Do not hesitate to send an email to the powers that be. On the left side of the Home Page is the Contact Us email. yougabsports@live.com Someone should be able to answer your question or point you in the right direction with in 24 hours. If you have a technical question or site-related issue, please email us. Be sure to add this to your email contacts so that any future information blasts from us don't get lost in your spam filter.

Don't forget... We have INSTANT MESSAGING!!! That's right. As you can see on the bottom, our friends at Skysa has messaging available for you to chat with other Gabbers online. Go ahead... Give it a try!!!

Thank you for joining YouGabSports.

Steve, Kevin, and Kyle.