LOL jl (and hang onto that action HF).
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I watched JB's tropical update this morning and I'll give you what I got from the discussion. He sees a center somewhere between Cancun and Cozumel. He disagrees with almost all the models. UKMET/GFS rush it off into Mexico. The European moves it north to the UT coast. His problem wtih the European is that he believes the high over the western caribbean will pulse west then back east and there won't be a mechanism for 90L to keep moving west. He likes the idea of something in the south central Gulf vs. something near Mexico/Texas. They he offered divergent forecast problems and just said that this is a situation that the Gulf Coast should be on alert for. He hasn't come out and said "major hurricane threat" but you can see that he's leaning that way utilizing the assumption that it doesn't just head off into Mexico. He thinks it sits in the BOC/Southern Gulf for 4 or 5 days south of the NE flow and cranks. He drew a parallel to Opal but hasn't suggested this will be an Opal. Of note, his hurricane intensity/landfall forecast still needs a hit in the Al/MS and SFL zones to score a coup de'grace for him.
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My take now makes sense to me. Much of the energy will in fact be moving in on FL south of Tampa. It's just that the system as a whole will not be.
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For the SIO SOI Star Wars crew, the SOI remains negative for the 11th day. Flattening/zonal flow should follow the 15 day lag period begun 9/19/03. That means amplification should be more or less busted by Sunday or Monday with the set of tropical problems that goes along with it.

Steve