I am Cookie Monster

I have a weakness. It is either because I'm fat, I lack willpower, or I have a tapeworm. My problem is that it is absolutely impossible for me to not eat any type of food that is put out for everyone to "share" at work. This morning, one of the ladies that worked here brought fresh baked chocolate chip cookies. The fucking things were still warm. It really wasn't even a fair. I've been at "work" for about four hours now, and have eaten 4 cookies, which is somewhere in the neighborhood of 25% of the total available cookies. Mathematically, there was about one cookie per person, however, at least a quarter of the employees are women on "diets", so they probably won't eat any. There are still like 2 cookies left. My main competition for those last two cookies is one of my bosses, who has had at least 4 today himself. I may just have to slit his throat when nobody is looking, for those last, delicious, cookies.

Color Blind

I'm going to start out by saying two things. 1) This could potentially be a bad idea to write about. 2) I don't think this makes me racist, and I'm going to go ahead and assume that more than 50% of the 4 people that read this blog have thought these two exact things.

Last night, I was watching the #19 St. Mary's-#13 Gonzaga game (until I fell asleep at halftime). I swear that I've seen St. Mary's play at least 3 times in the past two years, and was pretty sure I knew what Australian sophomore PG Patty Mills looked like. I guess I hadn't paid that much attention, because last night I realized that he wasn't white. I guess I must have just assumed he was white for various reasons. 1) He's Aussie, 2) His name is Patty Mills, 3) He plays for St. Mary's, 4) He is a three point gunner, 5) I guess I've never seen a picture of him. Either way, I was surprised to find this out. This is like the reverse of Bill Simmons's "Reggie Cleveland All-Stars".

If you hadn't seen the game between #2 Duke and #13 Wake Forest on Wednesday night, and I told you that a guy that hailed from Cheyenne, Wyoming hit the game winning shot, your brain would've almost automatically assumed the same thing I thought about Patty Mills. Instead of the name/school/position/nationality assuming skin color, it was his home town. This isn't to single out Wyoming in particular. It could've been Montana, Idaho, North Dakota, South Dakota, Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont or Green Bay, Wisconsin and I would've guessed the same thing.

I'm not sure of my point other than it is interesting what one's brain imagines a person looks like based on stereotypes.

IN OTHER NEWS:

Does anyone REALLY fucking believe that fucking Italian citizens can't tell the fucking difference between Pizza Hut Lasagna and real Italian Lasagna? Fucking fuck. I absolutely refuse to ever think about eating that shit based on principal. I guess real Italian pasta is served out of a fucking tin foil pan. I GUESS I can buy that some dipshit New Yorker's could concievably believe it, although definitely not people that have been to a fancy Italian restaurant. Someone that lives in Green Bay could think that, because alot of people here feel that Olive Garden is the standard against which all Italian food should be judged. I'm going to go out on a limb though, and say that Pizza Hut falls somewhere between Chef Boyardee and Olive Garden. I just don't get it. The claims are ludicrous. Now they are claiming people can't tell the difference between their greasy ass delivery pizza and gourmet Italian pizza, which is miles beyond stupid. The commercials that Pizza Hut is throwing onto the American public are somewhere in the range of diet pill commercials in terms of believability. I bet Italians would be even more pissed that Pizza Hut gathered a bunch of people to pretend they couldn't tell the difference between fake pasta and real shit. I don't know why this pisses me off so much.

Reason #17 Why I hate Joe Krabbenhoft

Really Joe? What the fuck were you thinking man? This pick is perfectly legal until he turns his elbow into the Purdue guy. I say he should get suspended for it...


OMG THIS IDEA CAME FROM WWW.JSONLINE.COM, NOT ME, THE ONLY REASON I THINK KRABBENHOFT SHOULD BE SUSPENDED FOR THIS IS BECAUSE I HATE HIS GUTS

One More Thing

Did anyone else catch the story about Brian Butch and his "pro" basketball career? He's playing China, scores 22 in his first game, is a nationwide hero, then is held to 3 in his second game and is FIRED!?!?!?!? That is a fan-fucking-tastic story. Brent Musberger and Steve Lavin are one of the top three broadcast partners on the planet. Along with Gus Johnson and anyone and Bill Raftery and anyone.

Classic

I think I've finally figured it out. Bob Sanders must be an assistant coach for the Badgers. That is the only logical explanation for why the Badgers have begun to remind me so much of the Green Bay Packers in that they are incapable of holding a lead late, or winning a close game.

Like last year when the Packers were the best 6-10 team in the NFL. The Badgers are the best 12-8 team in the NCAA. They could be 18-2 right now if they won every close game they played.

I think the part that bothers me the most was THAT was the shot that Bo Ryan called a timeout to get? A left handed floater, in traffic, from a freshman? If you are going to have someone drive to the basket, why not just let Trevon Hughes finish what it appeared like he was going to do before Ryan called the time out? It sure looked like he was breaking his man down off the dribble. I'll take my chances with the 7th year junior taking that shot all day. But if you are calling the time out, couldn't there have been a play drawn up for Nankivil, who out of the blue turned into Brian Butch and was 5-5 on threes? Or Landry, who has a pretty decent mid-range? I don't have a problem with Taylor taking the shot necessarily. I thought he did a really good job running the offense, and has some explosiveness and athleticism that nobody else on Wisconsin has. He was probably a little too eager in the last minute or so on the trigger, and that is probably because he hasn't played many crunch time minutes. My big problem was the lack of a playcall, and the horrible shot selection.

I still think we'll be OK. Need to finish up 7-3, which is doable.

CU is a mere 11 game winning streak away from a possible at large as well after the win last night.

What a Dick.

State of Basketball

After two brutal losses yesterday, and the nearing of midseason for UW and Creighton, I think it is a good time to take stock in where they are as teams, and what their postseason prospects look like.

UW
Record: 12-7 (3-4) 8th in Big Ten
RPI: 23
BBall State Ranking: 45
Best Wins: @ Virginia Tech, @ Michigan
Worst Losses: @Iowa, Minnesota
Outlook: The Badgers are in about as a good shape as is possible considering they have lost 4 straight for the first time in 11 years, and are in 8th place in their conference. RPI wise, they are in good shape because their losses have mostly been losses to tough teams (UConn, Texas, Marquette, Purdue, Illinois). Of course, we haven't beaten anyone all that good either. And we've done nothing in the last two weeks to lead me to believe we are going to magically turn this slide around either.
What they need to do:
1) Finish 7-4 in the Big Ten.
2)Win three out of the five between: Purdue, Illinois, Ohio St at home, @Michigan St., @ Minnesota.
3) Get to the semifinals of Big Ten Tourney.
That would get them to about 20-12, which should get them an at-large.
What will happen:
Badgers go 8-3 the rest of the way, and get in.

Creighton
Record: 15-6 (5-4) 4th in the Missouri Valley Conference
RPI: 59
BBall State Ranking: 66
Best Wins: New Mexico, Dayton, DePaul, @ St. Joe's, @ Bradley, @ Evansville
Worst Losses: @Arkasas Little-Rock, UNI, Drake, @Wichita St.
Outlook: The Jays have been maddeningly disappointing this season. Probably the most talented team in the Valley, but super inconsistent. Also, they get dominated on the boards, and if they don't hit their shots, they are fucked. The Valley has been a bloodbath for everyone this year, and they still have a shot at winning the conference, but more likely than not, it will be a one bid league.
What they need to do:
1) Win out in the Valley (9 straight), to finish 14-4
2) Also win the Bracket Buster game
3) Get to Arch Madness title game to finish 27-7 overall.
4) Pray
If they manage to rattle off 12 straight, they have a shot at an at-large bid.
What will happen:
CU finishes 21-10 (11-7), but wins Arch Madness for the Auto bid.

CASINO NIGHT RECAP:
They gave us $5,000 each in fake money. Only blackjack and poker. At one point I was up to $64,000 playing blackjack, but got bored and lost it all in 2 hands. It would be pretty tits to ever have enough money to play as recklessly as I did with the fake money. I'm far to conservative to ever to this, so I will never get rich, or lose $64,000 in 30 seconds in real life.

Non-Football Weekend

It really, really sucks that there is no football on this weekend. I guess I will just have to live with what is actually on today. There is Wisconsin at #21 Illinois on ESPN. There is Creighton hosting Drake via stick figures going to back and forth on the computer screen. UW will lose by at least 10. CU should win, but they have been so Jekyll and Hyde this year, it wouldn't surprise me if they lost.

Tonight, we have my wife's "holiday party" (yeah, it is almost February). It is going to suck balls. This will be our third one at this company, and the last two are awful. The people are boring. The booze are not provided. It is being held at the place where we had our wedding reception, The Riverside Ballroom in Green Bay. For those who were there, you remember that their all you can eat chicken dinner is prepared in heaven and flown down on a chariot made of chocolate and feathers, and driven my seventy brown eyed virgins. In other words, it is really good. Of course, her stupid fucking company is not having the chicken dinner. They are having some other fancy ass food. I'm sure it will be fine, but it is not chicken dinner. The one change this year is that they are having one of those gay, corporate "casino nights". I'm not really sure what it entails, but I'm guessing they have some table games set up, and they give you some fake chips, and you must win some prize for having alot of chips. As I'm hoping to end this night as quickly as possible, I plan to take all my chips, go to the roulette wheel, and put everything on black. If I lose, great, if I win, great. I don't give a shit.

RANDOM RENTAL MOVIE REVIEW:

I can to the decision that I am finally going to get Netflix. We don't rent all that many movies, but last night we decided to head over to Blockbuster and get a couple. We rented 2 Blu-Rays and it was more than $10 for 2 fucking nights. You've gotta be kidding me. Meanwhile, as long as you don't care if you only have one movie at a time (which, to be honest, is plenty at my house since I don't really have time to watch anyway) it is only $8.99/mo, PLUS you can watch a bunch of shit online for no extra charge.

Last night we rented "Step Brothers" and "Righteous Kill". I had heard good things about Step Brothers, even though it looked fucking retarded. I'll probably watch it again to make sure, but right now I will give it 3 1/2 stars. But if it is anything like most Will Ferrell movies, you have to watch it like 3 times to appreciate it. I didn't get to "Righteous Kill" yet, but it looked OK. It was about 20 years too late to get DiNero and Pacino together, but whatever.

Vegas, baby?

OK, I'm back.

A rather uneventful trip in terms of Vegas excitement, but a successful trip nonetheless. I'd like to do a clever and witty rundown of events, but I'm simply too lazy.

Overall, I won around $300. I won about $600 the first night, which is always great getting ahead right away. Worm dominated the first night, winning around $1500. I went out to vegas with $1300 and returned with $1000.

Fuck you Juice and your prediction of me lying around in Vegas like a sack of shit. Granted, I have done that on more than one (or two) occasions, but not this time. I made it to about 5am the first night. As I opened my eyes at around 11am I did not have a headache and thought all was good. Well, all wasn't good. Three of the four of us (Worm got back around 9am and didn't join us) wondered over to OSheas for food. All I could eat was half of my Subway five dollar foot long. That is a bad sign. We stopped in at the Mirage sports book only to find out the Mirage now makes you place bets to get drinks. Fucking gay. That was the main reason I loved their sports book so much. As long as you were sitting there you got drinks. Now you need to either bet on a horse race to get a drink ticket or, get this, bet $250 on a single sporting event. 250 FUCKING DOLLARS. If you need a drink ticket that bad and you lose the bet, that better be the best drink you've ever had. Anyways, I was really put off by this development because the Mirage sports book is awesome to watch a game at and I was really looking forward to watching the conference championship games there on Sunday. We decided to find a new venue.

Getting to the point, we made it back to the room where I proceeded to upchuck. I could have preserved a lot of energy by simply throwing my sub into the toilet.

We made our way to three casinos I had never been to - Palms, Rio and Gold Coast. At the Rio we made a great discovery. They're sports book doesn't require you to make a bet to get a drink. This was a big relief. We spent the entire day there on Sunday. I was absolutely certain the Eagles were gonna win, so I lost that bet. On a side note we got word from Schmock he wanted to place a bet on the Cards. Somewhere in the correspondence with Schmock confusion took hold. Worm thought Schmock wanted $40 on the Eagles. So when we got a "u bet!!!" text from Schmock after a Cardinal touchdown we knew something was wrong.

The second game provided me with one of my all time favorite sports betting Vegas moments. My top moment ever was the double reverse flea flicker Steelers vs Bengals the game Palmer hurt his knee a couple playoffs ago. This year, the Palamalulululululu pick for a TD was AWESOME!!! I bet a hundy on the game and came away victorious. But since I bet a hundy on the first game the championship games were a push. But still a great time. Nothing is better than a full day at a sports book.

A lot of funny shit happened (Worm doesn't snore, he makes creepy sexual noises instead) but most were of the "you had to be there" type. I was out and about all three days, so Juice's prediction was wrong. I also won money, debunking another Juice prediction.

Fuck Juice. Fuck him right in the butt.

I have 50 bucks on the Super Bowl right now. I have the Steelers (-7) and the over (47). I also placed about $200 on some future bets (Stanley Cup, Daytona 500, NBA Championship, World Series).

Time for Juice to figure out a date. I will not take part in planning another trip but I'll try to make it.

T.V. Bukkake

I'm not going to sit here and lie to you and pretend like I didin't skip watching the Badgers lose last night. I'm not proud of it, but there are certain occasions where you have to miss out on one of the 70-ish collegiate basketball games that my preferred teams play a year, in order to spend other quality time with your television. Last night was one of those nights. True, I had to suffer through American Idol. But there is always something pretty funny that happened, like last night when the really hot formerly signed singer chick told her "story" about how she moved out to L.A. by herself at age 16 to pursue a singing career, which was promptly followed by me making 30 straight minutes of adult entertainment jokes, and me saying "not in my eye" a whole bunch of times, which is great.

But after American Idol was the two hour season premier of the best show on television (at least in the top 3) "Lost". Fucking love that shit. I am convinced that when the entire series is done, I still won't know anything. This is Season 5, and I have no fucking clue what anything that has happened in the last 4 years had to do with anything. But enough crazy shit happens to keep you coming back every week. Charles Widmore is an evil ass dude. (not as evil as Lance Armstrong). Tune in next week as a fucking dinosaur eats Hurley, and Ben reveals he is actually a llama.

I would also be remiss if I forgot to talk about "24". You know a show is going pretty well when an hour seems far too short to get a fix. I have no idea how that FBI chick is going to manage to escape being shot, thrown in a ditch, covered in plastic and buried alive. If it was Jack Bauer, I wouldn't bat an eyelash, but if this chica gets out, they may be laying the groundwork for a spinoff where she is the new Bauer. She has already done some highly illegal/reckless shit to either get information, or track down a lead. And in an age without CTU, the FBI considers what she has done "torture". Not that I think a show with her as the main character would be any good.

Bear's Dream Come True

Now we have two years of watching him slowly eat himself to death! Seriously though, not a terrible deal for the Brewers, and it buys them some time to ship him off if they feel like it. Alot better than the $12 mil they had on the table before last year. Instead of costing them $36 mil, he will have cost us $18.67 mil. Not too shabby.

Surrender to the DARK SIDE!!!!

I was unaware that Lance Armstrong was actually Emperor Palpatine the entire time. How am I supposed to sleep after seeing this picture?

Fatty Tumor

I was just listening to this discussion on the radio on the way to work, and it occurred to me that everyone has forgotten about this. Prince Fielder is headed to arbitration with the Brewers, which is his right as a baseball player, and is expected to "aim high" and ask for like $8 mil per year. Everyone thinks that is a shitload of money, and it is, especially for a player with the limitations that Prince has. But I completely forgot that Fielder and his "genius" agent Scott Boras turned down a 5 year, $60 million dollar contract last year. Which, if you don't have a calculator handy, is TWELVE million per year.

Basically, what Prince is saying is "Fuck you Milwaukee and all of your fans. Fuck you for putting all the time and effort into developing me and trying to prevent me from eating myself to death by the age of 25. Fuck you for taking the chance on me despite my obvious limitations. Fuck all you fans for buying my jerseys, and spending money on tickets, and cheering for me. Fuck the fact that we have a young nucleus of players that just made the playoffs for the first time in 26 years. I am willing to take FOUR MILLION LESS this year, and probably next (unless I hit like 65 HRs, which isn't going to happen) to play out the string to get to free agency, to make MAYBE the same amount as you offered me last year, because I fucking hate being appreciated in Milwaukee that much."

Prince Fielder can eat a dick. I was at least a little on the fence about him, throughout Bear's relentless bashing of him last year. But this shit kind of offends me. So he's officially dead to me.

Dear god...

I was going to post this as a comment to Juice's post about Capers being hired, but then it got too long so I said fuck it.

It's official, we're going 3-4.

Where is Kampman going to play? He's too small for a DL in a 3-4 and he's not quick/agile enough to cover anyone as a LB, so he'd basically be a permanent down rusher LB or what I like to call a 4-3. I shouldn't rag on Kampman too much, this isn't his fault and he's surprised me before, maybe he beefs up, adds 20 pounds and becomes this monster O lineman clog that the 3-4 really requires to excel.

What about our linebackers? I think the middle will be fine with Barnett and *gag me as I dare to say this because I was his biggest critic last year* AJ Hawk. So then what are we left with? A DE/LB hybrid on the outside like Kampman or, dare I even hint at it, Peppers? Maybe say fuck Hawk and toss Poppinga in the weak middle side and the leave Hawk somewhere on the outside? We need at least one of those two outside linebackers to be a legitimate pass rush threat, that's just the way the 3-4 works, flexible, variable but constantly generating pressure.

So if we don't get Peppers, which I'm probably 95% certain that we won't, and if we then move Kampman to that DE/LB hybrid spot I see two problems. First of all, Kampman might be able to line up on which ever side he wants to, but in the end he's probably never going to be a threat to have any coverage responsibilities, I just don't see him as capable of doing it. That being said it should be pretty easy for an offensive line to figure out where that "flexible and variable" pressure is going to be coming from.

The second problem I see is if we lose Kampman from the D-line, who is going to be our D-linemen then? I think Pickett will be fine where he's at in the middle, but 3-4 DE's are typically a little beefier, we almost want a scheme where its a 5-2 with the 3 D-linemen being close to DT size and we want them to eat up 5 offensive blockers so the two random blitzers out of our LBing corp can slice in untouched. Obviously this is best case scenario and not something that always happens. We have Jenkins, Jolly, Thompson and Montgomery left to fill in the two outside spots in the D-Line, two are bigger DT type sizes, pushing "310" as the program might say and the other two are your typical DE around 270.

It should be noted that I'm listing these issues at as "problems", they might not actually end up being problems, just conflicts I'm forseeing in the future.

Another issue I see is with our secondary, 3-4's typically rely on more zone coverage looks in the secondary and we all saw how well Al Harris has handled zone in the past. Now that's just Al, and I think they might adopt a more, put Al on an island with his bump and run. Of course we've seen him get torched against good WR's very easily with this philosophy as well. And let's face it, we're not switching to the 3-4 because we can't beat the bad teams, for the most part we can do that, it's because the good teams have too many answers to what we are trying to accomplish.

This post started off a lot more negatively but as I went through the roster I saw we still have some holes in certain positions, but not the 5 or 6 I had worked out in my head while starting to type.

The First "Dom"ino?

So word is that the Pack has finally hired someone to be defensive coordinator, and that someone is Dom Capers. I'm satisfied with that selection. Statistics say he was the best choice all along, and he is definitely a proven commodity as a defensive coordinator. It is unknown whether he will run a 3-4, 4-3, hybrid 3-4/4-3 or a 2-2-7 (the only defense the Packers have the personnel to run). But I think what makes me the most excited is that with the hiring of a coach that could run a 3-4, could come the signing of a freak of an athlete named Julius Peppers, who wants to play in a 3-4. Capers gives the Packers the scheme, to go along with the piles of money lying around that they have to sign him. History does not suggest Ted Thompson will actually pull the trigger on this. But at this point, Green Bay has to be the favorite, don't they? All of this assumes Carolina doesn't give Peppers the middle finger and franchise him. However, Carolina supposedly has to choose between Peppers and all-world left tackle Jordan Gross (one will be a free agent). So if they franchise Peppers, I say we sign Gross.

The moral of this whole story is that Dom Capers is the first piece to the puzzle that is going to lead to a Super Bowl title next year.

Worthless, Uninformed and Biased Thoughts

-It is snowing like fucking crazy, and one of my asshole neighbors is outside shoveling it, as it piles up behind him.

-The Jays are currently down 11-3 to Witchita St., who isn't very good.

-Went to dinner last night and I see one of my neighbors, she says hi, then a dude who I think is her husband is walking behind her and I say hi, and he looks at me like I'm retarded. Turns out it was my neighbor's twin brother.

-I built a shelf in the basement today. I give it a week before it falls over.

-I wish I could hire Gus Johnson to announce my bedroom performance. How much do you think he charges for 30 seconds?

-Wow. The UCLA cheerleaders are hot.

-I bet Sports Bottle is being a bitch and is hung over and not drinking right now. Worm is sleeping. Spensley is blacked out drunk, and is either wandering around by himself, or is in jail.

-I signed Kobe as a free agent on NBA 2k9 to the Bucks.

-Kinda surprised Chucky got shitcanned in Tampa. The Glazer family better watch the fuck out. Chucky never dies!

-Clemson starts out 17-0 every year, then goes 2-13 the rest of the year and goes to the NIT.

TV REVIEWS:

-24: rad. The biggest problem I am having is with Jenine Garraffalo (and I'm quite sure I didn't spell it right, but I don't give a fuck). I can't take her seriously. She is a terrible actress. When is President David Palmer coming back from the dead? He is about the only one that hasn't. He is the biggest badass is TV presidential history.

-FNL: pretty good first episode. I was positive that Lila was a senior last year, but I guess 25 year old seniors are plausible. I guess it is also plausible that Buddy Garrity is trying to get a fucking HD jumbotron built at a high school field in bum-fuck Texas. Or that a high school freshman could possibly be better than a high school senior, who was last year's starter. Best line of the week: "You are a rebound guy from Jesus."

-The Office: great as usual. Line of the week: "Guys fight over me all the time. Usually it is over who gets to hold the camcorder."

BOOK REVIEW:

-"Men With Balls" by Drew Magery. Pretty funny book. Written as a handbook to prospective pro athletes. I would recommend it.

-I am starting to read "Downtown Owl" by Chuck Klosterman. This is his first fiction book. His other ones are spectacular.

CHAMPIONSHIP GAME PICKS:

Last Week: 1-3

Playoffs: 4-4

Season: 132-125-7

This Week: Ariz (+3 1/2), Pit (-6)

Packer's D-Coordinator Search

I just read this on JSOnline and was sort of astounded. Not that I was ever crazy about the idea of Jim Haslett running my defense, but now I am far less so. I wish someone with more time than me would do a similar comparison with the other remaining candidates.



My prediction: McCarthy is waiting on someone who is a coach on one of the remaining four teams.

For some reason this cracked me up...

"Woods posted a short statement on his Web site to say he would speak at "We Are One," a concert and celebration that will be broadcast live on HBO and feature entertainers such as Beyonce, U2, Stevie Wonder and Garth Brooks, along with appearances by Denzel Washington and Martin Luther King III."

Ok, I'll give you Bono. I understand he is very liberal and part of alot of alot of movements (like my bowel movement).

But Garth fucking Brooks?

Why don't we just get Hank Williams Jr.

Anybody know if Mark Furhman is available?

Witch's Titty

It is frigid as fuck outside right now. -17 degrees (not counting the wind chill). I realize that 90% of the people reading this (at least) are dealing with similar problems. It is getting to the point where my vehicle is being adversely affected even after it has been driven for 30 minutes. You want to know what else is cold? The fucking Wisconsin Badgers. That shit last night was an abomination on so many levels. The blueprint to beat Bucky was laid out last night: 1) use a trapping, full court press, 2) make circus shots for 15 straight minutes, 3) force the Badgers to shoot under 25%. Do all that and you can beat the Badgers in Madison. I really, really like Bo Ryan, and kills me to say what I'm about to say. I think he SUCKS at adjusting during the game. He relys on his "system", and thinks that if the Badgers just look down and run their swing, that eventually the other team will get frustrated and make mistakes. And it usually works. It worked for most of the game last night too. But sometimes you have to adjust your game a bit. Like when the other team is trapping your point guard full court. I'm no coach, but I've watched/played enough basketball to understand that the way to break a press is not to let your point guard get trapped 25 feet from mid court, and have the other 4 guys stand underneath the basket waiting for him to dribble by and start the offense. Fucking pass the ball before you get trapped, if they over pursue, beat them deep, it isn't fucking rocket science. We were able to break a press in 6th grade, with the worst team on planet earth. Fuck! That wasn't the only reason they lost. The other was that once they broke a press, their inability to not have every layup/dunk blocked in the last 5 minutes (at least 5 of them). Or when they could run offense, passing it around for 30 seconds, and then have Hughes try a driving layup through 4 defenders, or a contested 3. On top of that, the Goophs were possessed on offense, making every backwards layup they threw up, and every 3 they needed to make in the last minute. It was really a perfectly shitty storm, but that press break is not excusable. Minnesota is far more talented, but Wisconsin is a better "team". If UW doesn't figure this kind of stuff out, Michigan St. will win by 40 if they trap. This is the kind of loss that could completely destroy thier season, when they look back two months from now and are 5-10 in the Big Ten.

Wow, that was a long paragraph.

Friday Night Lights is BACK tonight!

Cool and Not Cool

I am starting a bi-annual post (or however often I feel like doing it) entitled "Cool" and "Not Cool" to recap current events.

Cool

- showing up half-naked for a singing audition to ensure that you will make it to the next round

Not Cool

- acting like you're hot shit and popping off to the new hot judge

Cool

- Creighton winning in OT last night in what was likely a very exciting, intense game

Not Cool

- not listening to the game so you can spend some "quality" time with your wife to catch up on American idol (ALso Not Cool are Creighton's 4 losses on the year, 3 by a combined total of 5 points)

Cool

- taking second place in the OJSFA and winning 100 bones

Not Cool

- having the league manager (who won 3 times as much money I may add) hold your funds hostage so he can earn interest income off of them

Cool

- winning 0ver 150 clams in fake sports league after only paying 60 for entry fees

Not Cool

- using your winnings to buy your wife an IPOD (but I love her so I'm going to)

Cool

- The University of North Dakota Fighting Sioux sweeping the UM Golden Gophers in college hockey

Not Cool

- Acting like you understand and follow hockey, just so you can say you root for your home state team (where I was born, not where I live now)

Cool

- only having like 3 appointments all week (and getting paid the same)

Not Cool

- only having like 3 appointments all week (and not generating any cash for "The Firm")

Cool

- Tim Tebow helping out with things around the world

Not Cool

- Announcers proclaiming that he is the second coming of mine and Sport's Bottles Christ

That's all for now. Feel free to expand (as I'm sure you all will).

Sports Illustrated Preview

Good god. I realize Barack Obama plays hoops. But, Jesus Christ, do I have to hear about it ALL THE TIME? Don't worry, I won't enter into a long political diatribe, partly due to the fact I don't typically discuss politics and partly because of the strong liberal current running through this blog, but the media circle jerk over Obama is never ending. He hasn't done anything yet. Save the nut busting at least until he's in office.

As you all should be well aware, I depart for Las Vegas in just over 24 hours. This means I will be betting heavily (my 'heavily', not degenerate gambler 'heavily') on the AFC/NFC Championship games. Probably around $50/game on assorted over/unders, prop bets and money line bets. I haven't decided how I'm going with the Ravens/Steelers. But I'm excited about that game. I'm definitely betting on the Eagles. I think they're gonna win by at least 17 and I heard the line is maybe 2.5. Really? Also, I hear there's a UFC event in London this weekend. I am not a UFC fan in the sense that I know next to nothing about it. I'm pretty big into boxing but never got into the MMA craze.

I cannot put into words how much I hate the long dreadlock look. It looks fucking ridiculous and we'll see two of the worst on Sunday - Larry Fitzgerald and Troy Palomoulululululululu.

SI Players NBA Poll - I'm gonna let you guys try to answer this, and don't cheat. The question posed to NBA players was, "Which NBA player would you least like to mess with?" The top answer received 46%. Second place got 17%. Those were the only two with double digit percentages. Can you guess the two? #1 is pretty obvious.

About fucking time Jim Rice made it into the Hall of Fame. And, while I'm on the subject, my all time favorite athlete also made it in, Rickey Henderson, because Rickey Henderson is the greatest Rickey Henderson and he's more Rickey Henderson than any other Rickey Henderson. Truthfully, though, he was my idol. I was a leadoff base stealer through high school and I wore #24.

Dan Patrick interviews Utah head coach Kyle Whittingham. Kudos to Whittingham for voting the Utes #1. They have a legitimate claim. It always works well for the BCS when teams like Utah go undefeated but get smoked in whatever bowl they play. This year it didn't happen. Anything that fucks the BCS makes me happy.

The return of Golf Plus!!! I entered the fantasy golf league that Bear posted. Didn't have a great first week but I'm just warming up.

54% of America's top 100 golf teachers say Tiger will be better when he comes back, which I hear could be for the Accenture Match Play next month.

SI predicts Steelers 20-Ravens 13. Pretty high scoring in my opinion. I'll go Steelers 17 - Ravens 6. For the other game they have Eagles 24 - Cardinals 19. That's horseshit. I have Eagles 31 - Cardinals 13.

WOW, Jake Delhomme laid a monster egg. That's the stuff the end of careers are made of.

Oh no....... The only person the media loves more than Obama right now is????????????? You guessed it, Superman Tim TEBOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I do think it's pretty sweet he's coming back. Reminds me of another big white guy from another sport on a certain college basketball team that came back for his senior year.

SI's 2009 College Football top 10 is already out. Florida #1, Texas #2 and so on.

Focus - D-Wade. He's pretty fucking good. Leads the NBA in scoring. He averages almost 3 steals and 1.5 blocks per game. Impressive.

Apparently Illinois is the most surprising college basketball team team in the nation's most surprising conference. Fuck Illinois and fuck the Big Ten. I hope North Carolina goes through the Big Ten's best again to get to the NCAA Championship game like they did in 2005. Speaking of UNC, I was completely caught off guard by how much "undefeated season" talk was going on prior to them losing to BC. And now they've lost twice. I'm not the least bit concerned. They'll end up with a #1 seed.

Other thoughts -

I completely agree with Juice's assessment of the Dungy situation. It's very comparable to when someone famous dies. That person is ALWAYS the greatest person who ever lived. I know nothing about Dungy other than what I hear on SportsCenter. But who knows if maybe he whacks it to kiddie porn and kills baby seals? I'm not saying he does, but none of us actually know.

I'm not afraid to admit the new season of 24 has sucked me right back in. Tell me you don't want to bend that chick FBI agent over. Holy fuck she's hot. Being a member of the law enforcement community makes that show hard to watch sometimes. The scene where the dirty FBI agent is checking the basement for that sniper is ridiculous. A single person would NEVER NEVER NEVER be allowed to search for a fucking SNIPER by himself on a floor of a large building. So that part was extremely frustrating. But, luckily for me, I'm able to ignore most of that stuff in this show.

I really don't care too much for the Trevor Hoffman signing. Not that I think it's a bad signing. But, like I said before, I just don't think he's gonna make that much of a difference. I hope I'm wrong.

I heard a sports talk radio dude say Corey Hart faded down the stretch last year. I thought that was funny because he's wrong. Corey Hart faded before the stretch. He was completely irrelevant in the 2nd half of the season.

I listen to most Bucks games on the radio (the radio announcers are fantastic, by the way) but last night I saw them on tv for one of the only times so far this year. Tell me, does Michael Redd look a little fat? Joe Alexander looked pretty good, except the incredibly ugly last second 3 to tie. I hear the Bucks may be auditioning him for some sort of trade to the Grizzlies? I don't know what that's about.

Juice, have you picked a Vegas date yet? I hope the wife's permission is still in effect.

Tony Dungy: (Random Superlative)!

So now that the media fawning over Tony Dungy (aka the black Tim Tebow) is mostly finished, I thought I would take a shot at commenting on the commenting. Tony Dungy was a pretty good coach. He took a team with a hall of fame quarterback in the Colts, and a team with at least two hall of fame defensive players on it in the Bucs, and won a whole mess of regular season games. He also won a Super Bowl, which is not something alot of coaches can say, and he went to the playoffs like 10 years in a row, which I guess is a record. Dungy also seems to be a nice enough guy, respectful, mild mannered, all that. Finally, he was the first black coach to win a Super Bowl. He is a borderline hall of famer, but probably not a shoo-in like everyone makes him out to be. And that is one of the places that all of this fawning got a little out of control, and it always happens. Person A retires, media ignores every negative thing that every happened, therefore person A is the greatest person, and greatest player/coach ever.

As I said, Dungy has a legitimate claim to the HOF. But to give him a free pass is to ignore alot of his team's postseason failings.

The other thing I have a problem with is the talk about how Dungy is the greatest person on the face of the earth. Dungy is a man of god (allegedly), does charity work, says the right things, etc. But the general public doesn't know Tony Dungy, just as we didn't know Michael Vick, or O.J. Simpson (he didn't do anything), or Marvin Harrison (allegedly). So I don't know how it is automatically assumed that Dungy has no flaws because he goes to church and does some charity. You may remember, I believe during his Super Bowl run, that Tony was speaking on behalf of an anti-gay group. Yet you never hear this brought up in connection with how great of a person he is, yet in 2009, I'm pretty sure that hating gay people (Jesus says its wrong!) doesn't fall under the definition of "great person". I'm just saying that we don't know anything about Tony Dungy. He may very well be a great person. But he might be electrocuting dogs in h is spare time too. So lets relax on the greatest coach/greatest person of all time stuff.

Vegas?

So yesterday, the wife and I were discussing my blackjack dominance and somehow the prospect of me getting permission to go to Vegas with the Sports Bottle on the next of his 8 yearly trips came up. I am happy to report that I have been granted "soft" permission to go. I say "soft" meaning that the timing would have to be right, etc. But this is definitely a move in the right direction. As far as I am concerned I am going. So start planning your next trip now. I can't go before June 1st (no vacation until then) for sure, and not between Jan 1st and April 15th (work restrictions), so there are pretty much no good times to go, but keep me posted either way. I can smell the Spearmint Rhino calling my name.

Best of Times/Worst of Times

I just wanted to follow up that fucking spectacular Tebow post, with a few thoughts about the greatest human being on the planet. This shit is getting to proportions that we haven't seen since a certain former Green Bay Packers quarterback. I hear the following comments by Thom Brenneman on the game Thursday night (not word for word exact). Referred to Tebow as "The unquestioned greatest leader in college football today." Said, "Tim Tebow is just a fantastic human being. If you get 20 minutes to spend with Tim Tebow, your life will never be the same."/Puked in my mouth.

Random NFL picks:

Last week: 3-1

Ten (-3), Car (-9 1/2), NYG (-4), Pit (-6)

I'm actually going to get to watch!

On one hand, P.J. Hill is a retard for going into the NFL. On the other hand I am ecstatic that he is leaving so he can stop poaching unwarranted carries from John Clay and Zach Brown (along with whatever terrific freshman running back is incoming). He has been getting carries based only on his performance as a freshman, which leads me to another shocking discovery. HE IS ONLY A JUNIOR?????? Holy fucking shit. Next year, we are naming the all-guys we feel like have been in college football for at least ten years team, the P.J. Hill All-Stars. I mean, he played alongside Ron Dayne in the Rose Bowl in 1999 didn't he? Anyway, he is slow, injury prone and fat, will be about a 7th round pick, and be bagging groceries next year.

Finally, the wife and I went to local Native American gambling establishment last night with my wife's sister and her husband. The wife and I bellied up to the $5 blackjack tables with $25 each. My sister in-law and husband were too intimidated and "didn't know how to play". (????) I haven't been to the casino in GB since I was 18 and they changed the age to 21 about a month later. I think what struck me the most was that it smelled of cigarettes worse than any place I've ever been in my life, and everyone there was old, poor or Asian. Strange experience. Anyway, I turned my $25 into $60 in about an hour. Cash money.

Maybe Tim Tebow isn't such a nice guy after all!

That was a good game last night. Moderately entertaining. I even learned a few worldy things during the game like "there are small children in the Phillipines named after Tim Tebow." After hearing the 439,689 reference to Superman's great mission trips to the Phillipines, I began to ponder. I came up with this horrible thought that what if one of these small children grew up to be an extreme islamic jihadist. ANd the same SOB terrorist attacked our country again. THen, all over the World there would be postings that read "WANTED DEAD OR ALIVE: TIM TEBOW" Aliases include "TIM GURKISTAN, TIM FAHEED, TIM ULEAKAMADEKE AND TIM "The Shiek". Then, people will be like "Isn't that the same name of that overrated quarterback who was the number 1 pick in the 2009 draft and played a few average seasons in the NFL and who had the insanely hot girlfriend with big jugs?"

But, what a nice guy, volunteering his time and all. Did I mention that he took a mission trip to the Phillipines?

Jagz, Pacman, Nolan and Hells Bells

I would be remiss if I didn't discuss a few ridiculous stories that are peculating today.

1) Jeff Jagodzinski getting shit canned at B.C. I'm going to go ahead and ask why everyone is making such a big deal out of this. A few things are obviously true: 1) Jagz knew that he would be fired if he interviewed with the Jets, 2) He did it anyway, 3) He was fired. Everything else is sort of irrelevant. I have heard that he had a clause in his contract stating this very fact. Whether he did or not, this is how the real world works, even though D-I college athletics is about as far from the real world as there is. If I went to interview for another job and my boss found out, I would expect to be a)fired or b) have my boss make my life so miserable that I would quit. I don't fault Jagz for trying to get a better job. Its America. I'm quite certain about 90% of people with jobs are looking for new ones. But to freak out on the employer for firing them is stupid. Admittedly the situation is not really a normal one with a college coach given the regular turnover, but if BC wanted a coach to stay in it for the long haul, they had every right to let him go.

2) Pacman got cut. Good for the Cowboys. What killed me about the story is that I was watching SportsCenter last night when the story broke, and ESPN essentially took credit for being the straw that broke the camel's back. This "new information" regarding the hit that he allegedly ordered in 2007 that was somehow unknown to anyone previously, was going to be reported by ESPN on "Outside the Lines" on Sunday. According to SportsCenter, Jerry Jones first heard of it when ESPN called to ask for a comment and "coincidentally" they cut Pacman like an hour later. Funny how ESPN is willing to take credit for shit like this, that probably didn't have any effect on Jones's decision (I mean really? One tie to an attempted murder was OK, but TWO? Two is where the Cowboys draw the line.), yet when they totally fuck up they refuse to take any blame (No examples to cite).

3) I fully support the hiring of Mike Nolan for D-coordinator. By all accounts he is a spectacular coordinator. Plus he is a snazzy dresser. It isn't official yet, so I'm guessing the rumors/positive reaction is going to be enough to convince Thompson not to hire him. Plus it seems way to high profile for the Pack. But if he gets it, I think he can figure out what the team is really capable of doing, and he won't cram a 3-4 down our throats with a bunch of guys that can't play it. Maybe we could run a 2-1-8?

4)Just got word that the Brewers signed 137 year old Trevor Hoffman and his 48 mph change up. That is a BIG signing. He is the most reliable closer we have had since Coco, and probably Dan Pleasac before that. Now if he could only start 30+ games too, we would be set to go. He has the best entrance music since Rick "Wild Thing" Vaughn.

ESPN's unfathomable love with the ACC

*Note* The opinion of ESPN is in no way, shape or form related to the opinion of Mr. Sports Bottle. I just read his post and it reminded me of what I heard a few days ago.

So I'm just casually watching ESPN while making some food the other day, when sports caster after sports caster starts babbling on about how they can make a really good case for UNC to still be number 1. What the fuck? Really? This is fucking basketball, if you lose, you drop, regardless of who you play, because there are 35 games to make it up later on. They lost to Boston College, who for all intents and purposes has no business being in a game with them. Look at that powder puff schedule that's gotten them to number 24 in the nation. They lost two early games to *cough cough* Saint Louis and an ok Purdue team. But what matters is they haven't lost lately, so they rise in the polls.

The Badgers on the other hand are outside of the top 25 right now with losses to the currently #5, #7 and #15 team in the nation. Other than the UConn game early on those were all really hard fought losses, however we've spread out losses out during the non-conference season and thusly we dropped later on and haven't climbed back into the top 25.

What about Pitt still being undefeated? Yea, they haven't lost and yet just because some dickwads at ESPN think UNC is better on paper, they are totally willing to throw them ahead of an undefeated team. Even though Pitt just clubbed a Georgetown team who had been playing really well lately. Have I ever mentioned that I love the Big East? I was always a huge fan of that conference and it topped my list when Marquette went there in the wake of the, the ACC is trying to make a football super conference(which failed) so we'll make a basketball super conference(which succeeded and left them with a still pretty good football conference), poaching of all the good C-USA teams at the time. The Big East is what the Big Ten wishes it could be.

But anyways, that's just the way the basketball polls work, there are so many more games than football that there is usually a lot of liberty taken with moving teams up and down. Of course what do the polls even really matter other than being a reference point for SoS computations to help determine what bubble teams get in to the PLAYOFFS at the end of the season. College basketball is so much better than college football.

Be Realistic

I have to say I'm surprised I wasn't inundated with text messages when UNC lost the other night. Usually I don't pay attention to my phone when they play until I see the game on my DVR due to the fact I'm usually working when they play. Juice and Schmock have ruined numerous outcomes for me.

Anyways, UNC is gonna lose 4 or 5 games this years. Anyone who really thought they'd go undefeated is retarded. The ACC is way too competitive and when you play a team with someone like Tyrese Rice (who's been at BC longer than Psycho T has been at UNC) anything can happen. The loss was no surprise to me.

I'm a little saddened by my Vikings losing. Seriously, how can anyone root for that team. I had to really force myself and it gave me a headache. But now I'm over it.

The winners of this weekends games will be the teams I'm betting on in Vegas next week. I'm going with Baltimore vs San Diego and Giants vs Carolina.

The 2009 golf season starts this week. I'm a huge golf fan and have been for a long time. I've been in a fantasy golf league out of a restaurant in Madison since about 1994. This is a league where you get a salary cap and then pick 12 guys per year. It starts in March sometime and goes to September. The very first year I did it they paid out the top 3 b/c there was maybe 50 or 60 people. Now they pay out the top 10% b/c there are almost 700 people. It makes golf a lot more fun to watch. Anyways, the first year I finished 4th. Then they paid the top 5 the following year and I finished, you guessed it, 6th. Last year was the first year I finished in the money. If anyone would be interested in this league let me know. It's only 20 bucks. The results are emailed every week.

Random thoughts -

I'm really not excited about the prospect of having Trevor Hoffman. I just don't think he'll make any difference.

I'm continually impressed with Luc Richard Mbah Moute. He's one of those pieces that helps make a good team, too bad the Bucks don't have the other pieces. Michael Redd is simply not the answer to any question for this teams success.

Final Get Together Results!

As promised, here is the conclusion of Juice's Dream NCAA D-I Football Get Together Presented by Cockring Emporium:

Round 2:
Oklahoma 42, OK St. 10
Texas Tech 24, Northwestern 21
Missouri 31, Texas 20
TCU 31, Oregon St. 7
Cincinnati 30, Ole Miss 23
Georgia 38, Virginia Tech 10
Florida 59, BYU 10
Western Michigan 46, Michigan St. 27

Cotton Bowl Quarterfinal:
Oklahoma 67, Texas Tech 64 4OT!!!!

Gator Bowl Quarterfinal:
TCU 47, Mizzou 10

Fiesta Bowl Quarterfinal:
Georgia 35, Cincinnati 28

Citrus Bowl Quarterfinal:
Florida 34, Western Michigan 24

Sugar Bowl Semifinal:
Oklahoma 17, TCU 7

Orange Bowl Semifinal:
Florida 58, Georgia 6

Rose Bowl National Championship:
Oklahoma 30, Florida 24

So, it seems that if they played a real tournament, the resulting championship game would be the same, with Oklahoma winning. So I guess I should go out and put about $10K on the Sooners. This does not however, serve as anything condoning the BCS and the load of shit that it is. See you next year!!!

A mexican pain in the ass

Let me start this post by explaining that it has absolutely nothing to do with sports. Let me also preface it with the note that I got married out in the middle of fucking nowhere and I really appreciate the people who made the trek (THANK YOU MR AND MRS. JUICE. NO THANKS FOR STANDING ME UP SPORTS BOTTLE).

One of my high school friends is getting married this summer. They are having one of those gay "destination weddings" in Cancun. Which sounds cool to the bride and groom, but what they don't realize it is going to cost everybody their fucking tax return (plus more) just to get there. I have never been to Cancun, and I am sure it will be fun, but I am getting fucking old and don't have the drinking stamina and one other minor detail, I'm married now. So, I probably won't be able to enjoy wet t shirt contests or naked chicks at a foam party like I would have in my former life. To make matters worse, my friends tells me I have to stop at Men's Wearhouse to get my tuxedo. I was like "there is a men's wearhouse in Cancun?" His answer "No." So, I have to drag a fucking stupid tuxedo on a plane as a carry on (and get charged for checking my roll along, which I WOULD HAVE used as my carry on). Oh yeah, and don't forget the fact that the wedding is in FUCKING JULY in Mexico. So, it will be a balmy 100 degrees. Don't forget the fact that I could be at home on my lake in my boat soaking up the sun, waterskiing, drinking beer and doing all of this FOR NEXT TO NOTHING. SO thank you assholes who invented the destination wedding.

More notes:

1) Creighton fucking lost at home.
2) Miami exceeded expectations but sucked shit when it mattered (except I think Baltimore is really good)
3) Much to everybody's delight on here, Minnesota will never win a super bowl (0-4 so far!)

...At Least the Vikings Lost

At least the Vikings lost. That is about the most I can say for Sunday. See, on Sunday, I had planned to park my fat ass in front of my large high definition and watch six hours of NFL playoff action. Instead, I found myself listening to the television broadcast from another room as I inhaled paint fumes for ten hours.

Yes, I have managed to find another thing to put on the list of things to do on a Sunday during the NFL season. The partial list is as follows: 1) watch football, 2) follow my fantasy team, 3) read about football, 4) write about football, 5) think about football, 791) go to church, 1,458) snowblow my driveway, 4,298) get kicked in the nuts, 7,810) Paint my fucking bathroom on wild-card Sunday.

We had an issue with mold in the bathroom, I think due to the shitty way the house was constructed. Something needed to be done, and we decided the safest thing would be to murder it with bleach, then prime it with some anti-mold shit, and then paint it. The wife was going to try to do this herself. About 2 hours into priming, she gave up an asked for help. If you've never painted a bathroom, it is a huge ass pain in the ass. There are about 7,000 corners and small ass crevices to go around, so you end up painting half of it with a brush. So that sucked. Then, when we get to the store to buy the paint, we forgot the paint samples that we spent a bunch of time staring at before finally deciding on a color, so we had to wing it. Of course, we get home and it isn't even close to what my wife wanted. So I have to go BACK to get another color. When I get THAT one home, she doesn't like that one either. If all of this wasn't enough, we did a fucking horrendous job, and it looks like total shit. My wife is already contacting professionals to fix it. And I wasted an entire wildcard weekend. Fuck. Me.

OTHER STUFF:

-Good riddance to everyone shitcanned by the Pack.
-Good riddance to UNC at #1 and their undefeated season.
-CU big over UNI tonight.
-I am going to attempt to post the results of the tournament before Thursday's fake championship game.
-The Fiesta Exhibition was a good, but meaningless game
-Utah got screwed

Why Not? My 2009 Predictions

• Sports Bottle goes to Vegas
• Sports Bottle loses money
• Richard comes to Green Bay to watch the draft with the rest of the geeks
• I go too
• We both get drunk
• Richard's dad buys $300 worth of worthless Packer trinkets and bumper stickers
• I will be the 9th overall pick, show up to camp, break my spine on day one, collect around $20 mil in guaranteed money.
• UNC doesn't win the NCAA title
• Neither does Wisconsin
• The Brewers make no further major roster changes
• Finish around .500
• Bucks make the playoffs
• Get swept in first round by Celtics
• Braun flirts with a 40/40 season
• Fielder flirts with 440 lbs.
• Fielder is traded
• Weeks starts about 20 games all season
• Ken Macha doesn't have any daughters for Weeks to have naked pictures of
• Turnbow's ERA will be 8.90 in Texas
• CC will blow out his elbow in May (karma!)
• Pack will sign someone in free agency this year
• Pack will be back in the playoffs next year
• UW will finish 7-5 and miss out on Juice's Dream NCAA D-I Football Get Together presented by Cockring Emporium.
• Ricky doesn't quit OJSFA
• Ricky doesn't quit his bitching.
• I get drunk at Mark's wedding
• I get drunk at Schmock's wedding
• I get drunk at Oktoberfest
• I get drunk at Shit in my eye
• I don't get drunk very many other times

A Great New Year

First and foremost, nothing makes my day more than a random Mrs. Juice quote. Most of them are funny/ridiculous (i.e. Bernie Brewer being a bear or her trying to figure out what Heywood Jablomee means) but I have to say her analogy was right on.

Few 2009 predictions -

1. Packers 4th round draft pick (if they have one) will be much better and more productive than their 9th pick in the draft. They might as well trade the 9th pick for someone's 6th round pick
2. I will make the playoffs in our play for nothing NBA fantasy league but lose in the first round of the playoffs, probably to Schmock.
3. I will continue to enjoy Nascar as driver's begin to drive their personal vehicles.
4. Tiger Woods will not win a major.
5. Tiger Woods' wife will leave him for me.
6. Bucks will win the NBA Championship
7. Just kidding
8. NBA finals will be a rematch of last year. Eastern Conference Final will be great between the Celts and Cavs.
9. Celts repeat
10. Brewers missed their chance and drop back to mediocrity. But I think they'll tease the Wild Card until early September.
11. Badgers lose to Penn St (I'm watching right now).
12. Ricky gets engaged.
13. To Don.

And that's the way the cookie crumbles.

The Queens have "Great Fans"

The Viqueens are up against their SECOND "last" chance to sell 3,100 tickets by 3:30 p.m. today or they will be blacked out in Minnesota. This brings me great joy as a fan of the Packers. This is allegedly the EIGHTH time in 2 years they have needed extensions to sell tickets. This is fucking ridiculous. Move this piece of shit franchise to L.A. I don't ever want to hear Viqueen fans mention themselves in the same breath as Packer fans. The Packers have had their season tickets sold out since Lambeau opened more than 40 years ago. And the population base here is probably around 20% of what the Twin Cities are working with. Yeah, I know, the economy sucks, but I guarantee that there could be some sort of plague or act of war or public health warning, and somehow, the Packers would manage to sell all of their tickets about 2 seconds after they found out they were playing. You could tell Green Bay right now that the Packers are playing tomorrow and the tickets would be gone instantly. So don't come in here with your fucking Viking helmets and A-Peter jerseys on you pieces of shit.

Probably some company will show up and buy out the tickets, but you have to ask yourself whether the terrible human beings that live in the "Twin Cities" (or withing 300 miles, but you still tell everyone you live in the "Cities") deserve to watch their team lose tomorrow.

Hindsight is 20/20

Just for fun, let's see how I did....

Correctly picked 2 division champs (Cards and Chargers, although there records were way off).
5 of 12 playoff teams (Cards, Chargers, Eagles, Giants and Colts)
Both Super Bowl teams are still alive... (Eagles and Chargers)
Worst Picks:

Cowboys 11-5 and division champs
Packers 10-6 and division champs
Lions 5-11
Bears 3-13
Seahawks 9-7
Saints 12-4 and division champs
Panthers 8-8
Falcons 4-12 and last place
Dolphins 6-10 and last place
Jags 11-5 and division champs
Titans 7-9 and last place
Browns 11-5 and division champs
Steelers 9-7 no playoffs
Ravens 6-10 and last place

Big Day

First off, my shitty picks.

Last Week: 9-6-1
Season: 128-121-7

Picks:
Arizona (Ev) over Atlanta
Indy (Ev) over SD
Bal (-3.5) over Mia
Phi (-3) over Min

I plan to do nothing (other than take down the Christmas decorations) all day today. Oh, I mean I am going to do nothing other than watch sports. 1 p.m. UW takes on Penn St. (Easy Win). NFL playoffs start at 3:30. And I might try to squeeze in the gigantic early season Valley tilt between Creighton (12-2, 2-0) and Illinois St. (13-0, 2-0) (close win for ISU).

Nothing else to report really. The wife had a good analogy to describe Peyton Manning and how he is probably a better all-time QB than that guy who used to play for the Packers. "Manning is like a baseball player who hits a ton of home runs, but doesn't ever strike out." I think that is kind of true. He really doesn't make any mistakes.


Now you can all wake up and watch football.

Finally Setting In

It just occurred to me that the Packers are not playing this weekend. Or any weekend for about 7 months. And that, sucks. A great sense of sadness has washed over me. At least we aren't Jets fans. But as we set in for a long, cold, snowy-ass winter, and count down the days until we waste the 9th overall pick on a player that has no chance of actually helping us next year, lets take a look at the position grades for the year. Grades are based on actual results v. my expectations going into the year.

QB: We all know what happened in the offseason and the pressure on A-Rodg to perform. Besides sporting awesome facial hair and spouting some pretty great comments, he was a pretty damn good quarterback. And the scary thing is, it is only his first year. Taking all that into consideration, I will give Mr. Rodgers a A-.

RB: Ryan Grant got his 1,000 yds, but averaged 2.7 yds a carry (slight exaggeration). He showed almost none of the burst he had last year. He also had a bunch of excuses (holdout, hammy, dogshit offensive line). B-Jax and Wynn showed flashes. Grade: C-

WR: Greg Jennings is a beast (when he isn't dropping the ball). Driver would start for about 30 other NFL teams. Jordy fuckin' Nelson had a nice rookie year with the chances he was given. Jones was hurt alot. Robert Ferguson wasn't on the team. Ruvell Martin is tall. Overall I though they were pretty great: B+.

TE: Donald Lee was invisible most of the year. Jermichael Finley was allegedly an athletic freak. Tory Humphry was on the field to fill out 11 guys. Not sure if it was not getting open, or not getting thrown to. Grade: D+

FB: Korey Hall and whatever the other guy's name is, are the same exact person. Neither should be given the ball on 4th and goal from the one. I can't really blame THEM for that playcall. Seemed to block well, caught a bunch of swing passes. Haven't yet perfected the William Henderson jump. Grade: B-

O-Line: They didn't run block well. A-Rodg is lucky to be alive. They got a shitload of penalties. They got hurt alot. Grade: D.

D-Line: Kampman was really the only one that showed up. I would guess that Pickett took up some blockers or something, but I bet he had like 3 tackles. The other d-lineman sucked. Grade: F

LB: Not a good year here either. Hawk was either injured, over-matched by the position change or not that good. Barnett was hurt when he wasn't hanging out in Sasquatch costumes at bars two days before a game. Chillar was serviceable at best against the pass, and useless v. run. Poppinga was Mormon. Grade: F

CB: Woodson and Harris are still pretty good. Harris injured a spleen but returned to form. Trammon Williams was really good at times, below average on others, but he is young and will only get better. Will Blackmon is a dime back at best. Jarrett Bush should be shot. Grade: B-

S: Nick Collins was somehow a Pro Bowler, although that was based purely on "stats". Whoever picked that team obviously never watched a game because he gave up as many TDs as he had picks, was invisible at times, and wasn't great against the run. Atari Bigby was mysteriously hurt and seemingly never played, Rouse was below average as a fill in, Woodson was terrible as a safety. Charlie Peprah played Chong to Nick Barnett's Cheech. Grade: C-

Special Teams: Mason Crosby was OK. Derrick Frost was an abomination and an embarrassment to the position of punter. Will Blackmon was a pretty good punt returner. Too many penalties, too many Jarrett Bush sightings. Probably cost us at least 2 games by themselves. Grade: D-.

Coaching: McCarthy got badly outcoached by Brad Childress in a game. Read that again: badly out coached by Mr. fucking McGoo Brad Childress. Failed to adjust when things weren't working. Probably ran it too little. Insisted on handing it to Korey (three carries per year) Hall in crucial situations. Settled for 52 yarder in Minnesota. Team as a whole constantly failed in clutch. Had a lot to do with coaching A-Rodg. Grade: D+.

GM: Everyone has their opinion of Teddy T. I think he made the right call on A-Rodg, but executed it poorly. Made no free agent moves other than Chillar. Made questionable draft day decisions: Jordy fuckin' Nelson? Not a very likable guy. I'm starting to click towards not liking him, but he needs more time (like one more year). I like his general philosophy, but there has to be SOMEONE available that would fit a need in free agency. Grade: D+.

I'm Never Drinking Again...

I pretty much feel like I'm going to die. I just finished driving back from the place I passed out last night, and I nearly had to pull over on the interstate to vomit. Plus, I would say there is a pretty decent chance that I am still drunk. Weird night last night. About 10 p.m. I was sitting on a couch, getting full from drinking much of my Sam Adam's winter variety pack, with a small buzz, trying to stay awake, and seriously considering going home at 12:01. Then they put the baby to bed and started to play some party game thing, which was actually kind of fun. Then we busted out The Andre and it was all downhill from there. I ended up putting down about a bottle and a half of The Andre and was fucking WASTED. Anyway, the whole point of this lame ass story isn't about how drunk I was, it is that I am sick as fuck, and will never drink again. (Until my next excuse).