Green and white.

Those are the only colors.

But I bet you knew that already.

What you may not know is why this particular website has sprung into being.  This site is the result of five Spartan fans coming together in an attempt to establish an on-line gathering place for serious discussion of Michigan State athletics (full disclosure: football and men's basketball will occupy the overwhelming majority of our attention).

What do we mean by "serious"?  Well, here's what we DON'T mean:

• Devoid of humor.
• Exclusively statistical in nature.

What we will strive to do is foster a conversation about how the boys in green and white are performing on the field/court.  What's driving their success?  What's caused them to stumble?  In some cases, the answer may be "heart" or "a lack of focus."  But in other cases, the answer may be something more like "well-designed offensive set plays against the 2-3 zone" or "poor pass protection against defensive line stunting."

We take this stuff seriously.  We also take being Spartans very seriously.  This will, we hope, also be a place for MSU fans to talk about the memories, traditions, emotions, and pride that go along with bleeding green and white.

To accomplish all this, an all-star cast of writers has been gathered from the corners of the Spartan blogosphere.  Allow us to introduce ourselves.  (Warning: This may start to feel a bit like an AA meeting.)

• KJ:  AKA Kyle, the author of this post.  I'm the former proprietor of the Spartans Weblog.  I earned a couple degrees from MSU in 1997 and 2000.  I like running, photography, microbrews, making scatterplots in Microsoft Excel, and taking long walks from the parking ramp next to the Computer Center to the Breslin Center.  Football's OK, but I'm a basketball guy at heart.  My Spartan is Goran Suton.  I own enough MSU shirts to go two weeks without wearing the same one twice.
• Ground Zero East Lansing (hereby abbreviated as G0EL):  What's up, I'm Pete.  I have a degree from MSU in Biochemistry.  However, after a year of applying to med school, I decided to go back to MSU and get a degree in Chemical Engineering . . . as an undergrad again.  Yes, this means I will be starting my 7th and final year of undergrad next year; yes, I know lots of people go to school for that long; and yes, I know they're called doctors.  I realized I could make it in the blog game after I called into EDSBS live a couple times and managed to hold my own with Orson and PB.  Thus, I started the Ground Zero East Lansing blog in the summer of 2008 as an outlet for my MSU football related thoughts, because there weren't a lot of MSU blogs out there, and to prove that engineers could write.   After I took an unannounced hiatus from blogging, KJ found me and asked me to join up. I also like microbrews (Fat Tire FTW, it breaks my heart it isn't in Michigan), and my Spartan is Keshawn Martin. 
• patrick d walters: My name is Patrick Walters, and I have elected to post under my real name, sans capital letters or proper punctuation because this is the Internet. I was once a weekly columnist for most things Spartans sports, and have been writing about Spartans athletics in one way or another for almost seven years as of site launch. George Perles' son once mocked my response time in replying to an e-mail he wrote, so you _know_ I'm legit.
• LVS . . . 's real name is Ben, and I used that name while a member of the Spartans Weblog commentariat.  (LVS is short for Lakeview Spartan, an old message board handle.)  I graduated from MSU in '05, and I'm currently a law student in Chicago.  My favorite things include 5AM departures for East Lansing on Saturdays in the fall, tailgating behind Giltner Hall, Greg Jones, M&M cookies from Quality Dairy, and, of course, the Riviera Cafe.
• Steve Hendershot: First of all, a confession for KJ's dedicated fans: I only have a vague idea what "eFG" is. And I live in Chicago, far enough from East Lansing that I was starved for fanship until KJ's blog and the BTN changed my life. But I think the current and near-future editions of the Spartan football and basketball programs have a shot to re-set the standard for greatness at MSU, and I'm excited to write about it.
  

Now you know why we're here.  Hopefully, you'll decide to join us in this endeavor.  Have a look around.  The digs are pretty swanky.