TT: Are You Ready For Some Football??

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Yep, it is that time of year again; football season is upon us. Not to mention that we are about to enter the stretch drive in MLB and the long summer break is over in F1. It has been a long week, starting with the IG Report release and ending with services for the Lion, Ted Kennedy. So, take yer shoes off, have a cocktail and let’s have some fun.

NFL: Well, here comes another season, and it looks to be a doozy. Seriously, so many teams have got people back, have added key parts, and gained exciting rookies through the draft; there is simply a lot of excitement all across the league. The following are some random highlights as I see them at this early and somewhat unclear vantage point. Let us start off with the team I predict will win the Super Bowl, and that would be the:

New England Patriots: This pains me a little because of the natural inter-blog rivalry. And hey, my local professional football team was actually in the Super Bowl more recently than the Pats. No matter. Listen, the Pats were 11-5 last year with no Tom Brady all season, no Roidney Harrison and a rushing attack led by Sammy Morris. Oh yeah, and they sported a quarterback that had not started a game since high school. Harrison is gone, but they now have the closest thing to Joe Montana as far as cool (and with a better arm) I have ever seen back in the saddle and raring to go, and they have added Fred Taylor, a back that can still run wild if you don’t run him down with overwork. And I still love the Law Firm. The defense looks healthier too. Oh yeah, and that Bill Belichick guy. and someone named Moss, Randy. The Pats are not the sexy darlings of the moment, but they don’t care. They are the best coached team in the league and they have Brady back. Look out.

Some quick hits on the rest of the AFC: I wonder how the Fish will make use of Pat White; I think the kid is a winner. The Bills have TO, but I just don’t see them going anywhere. The Jets are a tough call. They really could be pretty tough if they run (love rookie pick up Shonn Greene, getting him and Read more →

Pre-Season Trash Talk: SpyGate, the Twitter Edition!

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I’ve been meaning to put up a Friday trash talk for some time. I tried to convince bmaz to do it. But ever since his man Brett Fav-ruh said no to the Vikes, bmaz has been pouting. And while I hope that Fav-ruh un-retires around mid-season, so bmaz will get out of his funk, on the off-chance that the Kitties are on a resurgance this year, I’m happy that Fav-ruh declined to move back to the neighborhood.

And then I was going to write to note the passing of Jim Johnson. He will be missed. 

I thought about doing a pool–enter your guess and win a hubcap!!–about whether and where Mike Vick might try to mend his ways. I’m surprised, frankly, that Al Davis hasn’t picked him up–they might enjoy each others’ company.

But what finally signaled that it’s time to start trashing again is the latest spying scandal in football: players Tweeting during pre-season. The big scandal, of course, is that the pre-season favorite, the San Diego Super Chargers, are feeding their players "nasty food." A secret it cost Antonio Cromartie $2500 to spill.

Cromartie said he was pulled out of a meeting by Twitter cop/head coach Norv Turner and notified that he was being fined. Cromartie also was a given a letter that spelled out the fine.

The fourth-year pro had a good laugh over the matter, but said he’s going to be more careful. Still, he’s not going to stop tweeting.

He also thinks the fine is a bit excessive.

"But other than that, I mean, I ain’t going to take back what I said," Cromartie said after practice Tuesday afternoon. "I said what I had to say. But at the end of the day, I mean, I got fined for talking about nutrition and that. I can’t really say too much else.

"I just thought it was harmless. It was just me talking about the food and stuff. I took it as a joke. But other people took it as a different kind of way."

Cromartie thinks the mole occupies an office somewhere in the team’s executive suite.

Between Cromartie’s leaking of important secrets and Shawne Merriman’s insightful tweets (his most recent as of this posting? "Wow"), I figure this is just enough distraction to keep the Bolts out of the Super Bowl (leaving room for the resurgent Pats). 

Let me just Read more →

NFL Entry Draft Trash Talk

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Alright you mopes. There you were buggering up EW’s nice threads, demanding to talk football. Can’t blame ya there. The Motor City Kitties have a new QB, and a good one I think. And now the NY Jets Jets Jets do too, having traded up in order to go full Sanchez.

Trash it up and keep Marcy’s nice substantive threads clean will ya? Thank y’all.

Pat Tillman's Super Bowl

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When the Arizona Cardinals take the field tomorrow, the most famous Cardinal will not be with them. 

I speak, of course, of Corporal Pat Tillman, who left the NFL after 9/11 to serve in the Army Rangers. Tillman was killed by friendly fire in Afghanistan on April 22, 2004. For months after his death, he was used as a propaganda tool to glorify Bush’s failed wars. The exposure of the truth behind Tillman’s death has since turned him into a symbol of the duplicity of the Bush Administration, the fight for the truth, and the futility of the war itself.

Shortly after his death, the Bush Administration (already campaigning for the 04 election) pointed to his sacrifice. Karl Rove waxed, "How does our country continue to produce men and women like this." On May 1, 2004, Bush again focused on Tillman’s sacrifice in a speech at the White House Correspondent’s dinner.

The loss of Army Corporal Pat Tillman last week in Afghanistan brought home the sorrow that comes with every loss, and reminds us of the character of the men and women who serve on our behalf. Friends say that this young man saw the images of September the 11th, and seeing that evil, he felt called to defend America. He set aside a career in athletics and many things the world counts important: wealth and security and the acclaim of the crowds. He chose, instead, the rigors of Ranger training and the fellowship of soldiers and the hard duty in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Corporate [sic*] Tillman asked for no special attention. He was modest because he knew there were many like him, making their own sacrifices. They fill the ranks of the Armed Forces. Every day, somewhere, they do brave and good things without notice. Their courage is usually seen only by their comrades, by those who long to be free, and by the enemy. They’re willing to give up their lives, and when one is lost, a whole world of hopes and possibilities is lost with them.

This evening, we think of the families who grieve, and the families that wait on a loved one’s safe return. We count ourselves lucky that this new generation of Americans is as brave and decent as any before it. (Applause.) Read more →

Super Bowl 43 Trash Talk: The Red & The Black

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This is it baby, the big finale. All the marbles come down to these two: One Red. One Black. One will leave with the Lombardi Trophy in hand, the other with the regret of the world’s biggest runner-up percolating in their gut for the entire off season, maybe for the rest of their lives.

Parting is such sweet sorrow; nevertheless, with this game will come the end of another season of football trash talk here at Emptywheel. Yes, we occasionally whip out a trash talk without football (March Madness and the start of the F1 Circus are certainly possibilities), but it isn’t the same without the pigskin in the air.

What a season it has been, from the tantalizingly close to perfect season by the Pats that came just a few points short to Good Eli and the Gents in Super Bowl 42, the entire complexion of the 2009 season inexorably changed with the loss of Tom Brady in the first few minutes of this year. For eleven games Brett was Favre and all was magical; then it wasn’t. The San Diego team looked like the Clippers for the first twelve games, then they caught lightning and were Chargers on into the playoffs where they again went Norval. When it was all said and done, it was the Stillers and the Cardinals, yes the Arizona freaking Cardinals, left standing. And, thus, here we are.

Who are the Arizona Cardinals’ fans? I’m not quite sure, but I appear to live in the town that houses almost all of what few there are of them. Oh, and even here I have not noticed the whole town being painted red and buildings redecorated in team colors and insignias like it was purple for Barkley and the Suns in 1993 and the Diamondbacks in 2001. Da birdz de rojo get no respect I tell ya. And if all that were not bad enough, now That One is climbing on the dogpile,

Q. The Steelers or Cardinals, sir?

THE PRESIDENT: I have to say, you know, I wish the Cardinals the best. Kurt Warner is a great story and he’s closer to my age than anybody else on the field, but I am a long-time Steelers fan. Mr. Rooney, the owner, was just an extraordinary supporter during the course of the campaign. Franco Harris was campaigning for me in Pittsburgh. So Read more →

Trash Talk – Getaway Week

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The Phoenix Suns once, thrice actually, had a coach named Cotton Fitzsimmons. A wonderful man, and a great coach (10th winningest coach in NBA history actually). Cotton was a diminutive man with outsized character; he may be one of the only men in history that could consistently put Charles Barkley in his place, and it was with such charm that Chuck loved him like a father. Anyway, Cotton had this theory that it was always important to win "getaway games". And Cotton defined getaway games as the last home game before a big road trip or the last game before the playoffs. He always wanted to roll into tough situations on a positive note. Smart man.

Well, this is the last week of the regular season in the National Favre League, and for those teams headed to the playoffs, or trying desperately to get into the playoffs, we got some getaway games. Eli, Coughlin and the Giants showed what it meant last year to play hard on a getaway game in the last week, even when you are already in the playoffs and it won’t affect your seeding. Even though they lost to the Patriots, they played their hearts out and left every ounce on the field. What they gained from that effort propelled them all the way to the Lombardi Trophy. Oh, and don’t miss today’s video, it is some excellent getaway music.

Fish at Jets and Pats at Bison: Let’s be honest, this is all one big game, and it is going to be for all the marbles. If the Dolphins win, they win the East and they are in the playoffs; if they lose and the Bills beat the Pats, the Jets are in. If the Jets win and the Pats win, the Pats are the East champs. Even if the Dolphins win, the Pats can get in as a wildcard if the Ravens lose to Jacksonville. The Jets get in as a wildcard if they win and the Pats beat Buffalo, so long as the Ravens lose. I really, and I mean really, hate to say this, but I think the Dolphins will beat the Jets, the Pats will beat the Bills, and the Ravens, being the home team, will beat the Jags. This, sadly, means that Brett, the Jets and the Pats all go home. Totally sucks, but that is Read more →

Trash Talk – Prime Time Edition

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The penultimate week to the regular season schedule in the National Favre League is upon us and, as many of you have already discovered, the hostess’s team is playing the janitor’s team. Yep, bmaz’s Arizona Cardinals (I don’t really claim the losers, but they are my home team) are visiting Marcy’s gridiron heroes, the Patriots. Apparently there are other games being played too. But, before we get to that….

Did you know that Brett Favre got more votes in Minnesota than Coleman and Franken? Yep, it is true. Has to be true, I saw it on that whiz kid Nate Silver’s site, and the dude has been right on about everything else. Nate says Brett cleaned out teh "Lizard People" too (I guess that means he beat Richard Shelby, Bob Corkass and friends, the "lizard liars"). Okay, so it was for President that Favre beat Coleman and Franken, and it was just a write in, but Brett Favre kicked their ass! Just like he is gonna do to the Seahawks Sunday!

Well, now that we have covered the Minnesota Election Trash, let us get back in our normal groove. By popular request, this week’s musical selection is from The Tubes, a pretty cool two song set (Prime Time and TV Is King) from some German TeeVee show patterned after American Bandstand or something. In their prime, The Tubes were an outrageously good band and put on a wild live show.

And now, for the games.

NATIONAL FAVRE LEAGUE: Well, as previously mentioned, there appears to be an American football contest going on up in New England. And, yes, EW is already beating me and the hapless Cardinals down. Go figure. Listen, first off, I didn’t pick these losers, they came here against my will. I actually participated in an effort to beg Jerry Colangelo, then owner of the Suns (later the Diamondbacks too) to start an expansion team here. But nooooo, the pissant Cardinals wanted a new stadium in St. Louis and was using Phoenix as leverage to get it. The fuckers in St. Louis called their bluff and they freaking moved here. Arrrggghhh! Oh well, they are all mine now. Lucky me. The Patriots, on the other hand, since the turn of the century, have turned into Lombardi’s Packers. They are big, bad, ruthless and good.

The Cards have no running Read more →

Trash Talk – The Axe Starts To Fall Edition

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I’m snakebit. Am driving down the road Saturday afternoon listening to NPR’s Wait, Wait Don’t Tell Me when the first crushing blow occurs. The guest is CIA head honcho Michael Hayden, and the interview is actually superb. Seriously. Then I realize the dude has a great sense of humor; another blow to my world. Now comes the clincher; Hayden is from Pittsburgh and is a lifelong diehard Steelers fan. The host asks him what he thinks of Bill Belichick secretly taping other teams (Hayden is non-plussed by this) and then asks "Well, we know the NSA has secret tapes of everything, surely you must have some of the Patriots’ practices and plays, have you ever thought about covertly sending them to the Steelers"? Hayden quips back "Naw, the Steelers don’t need to cheat to whip the Patriots!" Now, between laughing my ass off and trying to grab my phone to obligatorily call Marcy and prick her with this nugget, I nearly run off the freaking road. Then, in all the inordinate joy of relating this wondrous story to EW, I blow by a photo radar setup. Go figure. Still, it all seems worth it.

Okay, enough hilarity; time to get down to business. Three weeks left in the season, it’s go time baby. There are teams that are going to solidify their hold on a playoff position, and there are teams that are going to start falling victim to the axe. Here’s the rundown:

Steelers at Ravens: Yep, the game of the week is the Chief Spook’s Stillers against the Baltimore Not Colts. Both teams are on strong late season rolls, and they have the top two defenses in the league with Pittsburgh number one and the Ravens number two. Rookie Joe Flacco has been excellent and the Ravens are uncharacteristically scoring a lot of points. Even though the Ravens have Ray Lewis, it is really hard to go against Ben Roethlisberger. But I’m going to. Ravens win at home.

Giants at Cowboys: In Dallas, Jerry Jones has finally got the sideshow freak circus he has been angling for all these years. As Condiliar would say, "Who could have imagined?" Yeah, well, they are going to have to take time off from the carnival to play Eli and the Gents, who have a little theater Read more →

Trash Talk II – Waiting For The Sunday Games

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Well, I was going to add this to the main trash talk thread, but you folks gossipped up the joint right nice, so I decided to post it as a Part Deux. This version will be for the NFL Sunday games and some F1 news of significance.

National Favre League: It is another week of mostly unexciting matchups, even though many teams have effectively must win games. The game of the day is pretty easily the ‘Boys at the Stillers. Romo v. Rothlisberger; TO versus Hines Ward. Dallas has regained their swagger since Tony Romeo returned; Pittsburgh has just been gutting it out with tough fundamental football every week. Both teams have issues at running back Marion Barber is very questionable for Dallas and Fast Willie Parker is probable for limited duty for the Steelers. I have been trying to figure out who is going to win this game, and I have no idea. You all will have to tell me what is happening, as, thanks to the pissant worthless Arizona Cardinals, the game will not be shown in Arizona. I guess they are afraid people would watch other teams than them if given the choice; they are right.

The Falcons at Saints looks like a fun tilt too. Drew Brees has been literally ripping it up this year passing. Seriously, Brees is on a pace to break Dan Marino’s single season passing yardage record. But the Saints have been uneven, to say the least, and, at 6-6 need a win to keep their playoff hopes alive. The Dirty Birds are a shocking 8-4 and rookie QB Matt Ryan is playing like a seasoned pro. Since the game is in Nawlins, the Saints should win at home. Except the Dirty Birds have Michael "The Burner" Turner, and that and a conservative Matt Ryan will keep the ball out of Brees’ hands and garner a win.

The Sunday Night game of Redskins at Ravens looks interesting too. Both teams have excellent defenses, but I give the nod to Ray Lewis and the Ravens here. Not to mention the Ravens have Ed Reed, who has rather quietly had a career that is of Hall of Fame quality; the man is just flat out tough nuts, and he always plays. Coach John Harbaugh has rookie QB Joe Flacco on a Read more →

Trash Talk – Recession/Depression Era Edition

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The economic crisis is starting to really intertwine with the sports world in many ways. For instance, CC Sabathia, a stud workhorse and the best pitcher on the MLB free agent market, can only find two teams, the Yanks and Sawz of course, to even talk to him about the contract he wants. The Padres, not long after opening their edifice Petco Field, appear in worse straits than the automakers (attention Mrs. Randiego, you picked a bad time to throw your lot in with the local sports homeboy). The global financial meltdown/crisis is so bad it is even causing grief and thinning of the ranks in the biggest sporting league in the world, Formula One. And, worst of all, talk about yer depression, today we have to deal with those damn dirt thieves, Freepatriot’s Boomer Sooners. Yep, the Sooners and Tigers are goin to Kansas City baby! They got some crazy little women there I’m gonna get me one!

That’s the low down and dirty, let’s get down to the nitty gritty.

NCAA: First up is the SEC Championship from the Georgia Dome in Atlanta. Alabama versus Florida. I wonder if Jim White will be watching this one? Barely in the national polls when the season started, Alabama now sits atop them undefeated and untied. Florida, well everybody knows about the chompin Gators and Tim Tebow. Florida’s offense is the irresistible force to Nick Saban and the Tide’s immovable object defense. But, you know, Florida can play some dee-fence this year too, and there is no way the boys from the Tide pool down there in Richard Shelbyland can score with the Gators. The swamp creatures are gonna roll the Tide flat.

Next up, we have some Tigers versus some dirt farmers in the Big 12 Championship from Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City. This is a rematch of last year’s game where teh Okies rained on Mizzou’s parade big time. From ESPN.com:

By entering this week No. 2 in the BCS rankings, Oklahoma (11-1, 7-1) beat out Texas and Texas Tech for a spot in Saturday’s game and a chance to win a third consecutive Big 12 title game. All three schools finished tied for first in the South Division and the Sooners advanced on the conference’s fifth tiebreaker — BCS rankings.

Oklahoma moved past Texas in those standings, even Read more →

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