It’s my favorite season of the year…football season!! So I have some thoughts on the college game as well as way too early first impressions about the NFL.
Is it my imagination or has the NFL had an above average amount of serious, season ending injuries thus far?? I have no numbers to back up the supposition and am far too indolent to do the needed research, but 
that is my notion. Maybe it is because I have had 4 players from my dynasty fantasy league (RBs Jamaal Charles, Mikel Leshoure, & Ryan Williams plus kicker Nate Kaeding) suffer that fate, which has all but killed my chances in that league.
Teams that are better than I thought: Washington Redskins – maybe I underrated QB Rex Grossman a bit. Buffalo Bills – QB Ryan Fitzpatrick was underrated by e-v-e-r-y-o-n-e.
I assume the Miami Dolphins will still draft a quarterback in 2012, but so far Chad Henne hasn’t been all that bad.
Kudos to rookie QB Cam Newton, whose NFL viability some (including yours truly) have questioned. Even though the Carolina Panthers are 0-2 Newton has thrown for a ton of yards and looked very much like he can hang with the big boys. Sure he’s made the normal rookie mistakes, and 
those errors may have even cost his team victories, but that’s not necessarily unexpected when a young quarterback is thrown into the deep end and told to swim. The bottom line is that that Newton looks like he belongs and might become scary good if a decent team is ever built around him.
I detest the New England Patriots, but I have to give the devil its due…that is one heck of an offense. There isn’t a top tier receiver or running back on the roster but somehow Tom Brady still puts up Dan Marino-esque numbers. And when have we ever seen a team with two tight ends that are such lethal weapons??
Teams that haven’t lived up to expectations: St. Louis Rams – I may have had their breakthrough predicted a year or two too early. Philadelphia Eagles – they certainly haven’t looked like a Dream Team.
More kudos to the Detroit Lions, who are making believers out of those who hadn’t already jumped on the bandwagon. This is a team that went 
winless just three years ago and now might actually contend for a playoff spot. They’ve done it the right way, by building around a talented franchise quarterback and concentrating on constructing what one day soon might be a wicked awesome defense. Did I just say “wicked awesome”?? Yes, I did.
Early leaders in the Andrew Luck sweepstakes: Minnesota Vikings, Seattle Seahawks, Miami Dolphins, and…something I never thought I’d say…the Indianapolis Colts. How wild would it be if the Colts are in a position to grab Luck just as the storied career of Peyton Manning winds down to its inevitable conclusion??
I don’t even know what to say about the mess that is college football and all its conference realignment/expansion wackiness. The first thing to come to mind is “Go to Hell” to Pitt & Syracuse for leaving the Big East hanging, the SEC & ACC for having no respect at all for my WV Mountaineers, and the “leadership” in the Big East who have stood around with their thumbs up their asses watching it all happen. But beyond my own personal biases I am just sad to see such a wonderful on-the-field product fragmented by a bunch of suits with dollar signs in their eyes and no reverence for the one thing that elevates college football head & shoulders above every other sport…tradition. Do I want to see a “rivalry” between Cincinnati and Kansas St.?? No, not really. 
Does it make any sense for Texas A&M to abandon annual battles with Texas, Oklahoma, and Texas Tech to play Vanderbilt or Kentucky?? Not at all. Look, I’m not dumb…I understand the business part of all this. I realize that these suits are looking mainly at population and television markets. But I am just a guy whose lone enjoyment in the dank & dreary chill of autumn is to spend my weekends watching hours & hours of football. I want that football to be competitive, entertaining, and meaningful in that unspoken yet understood way in which we know that Michigan-Ohio St., USC-Notre Dame, The Backyard Brawl, The Border War, The Red River Rivalry, The Battle for Paul Bunyan’s Axe, The Iron Bowl, The World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party, and Bedlam are significant just because they are. The fact that these annual rituals are being imploded by a bunch of pointy headed bean counters that probably don’t know a Horned Frog from a Hoosier or the difference between a Golden Flash and a Golden Hurricane should embarrass the hell out of the ineffective and neutered people that supposedly run the NCAA.
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raised your hand put it back down…liar. Out of over 6 million individuals who entered ESPN’s Bracket Challenge only 2…TWO out of over 6 MILLION…got it exactly right. I’m a big underdog guy, so I love seeing Butler and VCU involved at the finish line. My only regret is that they’ll be playing each other in a semifinal game, eliminating the opportunity for both to prove themselves one last time on the big stage against power conference teams.
error when they said the team shouldn’t have been selected in the first place. Sorry fellas…wrong 
answer. I love ESPN, but they employ some of the biggest assclowns alive as prognosticators and “experts”. Try something: Take a weekday sometime (which I realize is difficult for those that work a traditional 9-5) and watch all the ESPN shows…Mike & Mike, First Take, Around the Horn, Pardon the Interruption, etc. You begin to notice a pattern. More than occasionally they all ponder the same topics with the same angle, making it obvious that there is some sort of agenda in Bristol. The powers-that-be are well aware of just how much stroke they possess in the sports world, and are not afraid to steer public sentiment in a particular direction. As far as the VCU issue goes, I would have much more respect for Dickie V., Bilas, and others if they would just say “You know what…I was wrong and I am sorry. The Rams have proven they belong.” 
honest), but I did happen to catch one of Baylor’s NCAA Tournament games and saw an interview with 6ft8 sophomore Brittney Griner. Let me just say this…that’s a MAN baby!! I think there needs to be some sort of investigation. She’s got an Adam’s apple and a deeper voice than that cracked out homeless radio announcer from the mean streets of Columbus, OH that was famous for about 5 minutes a couple months back. 
black players “Uncle Toms”. Now I am about as white as they come, but I know that calling 
excitement or anticipation for Opening Day. I have written about it elsewhere here, but the Pirates’ ineptitude combined with a steady stream of steroid/cheating scandals and the annual foregone conclusion that there are only a handful of teams that stand a chance at post-season glory have numbed me to the magic of The National Pastime. I am honestly looking forward to The Masters and WrestleMania more than the start of the baseball season.
movement either way for a couple of weeks. I am still hopeful that all will be resolved and that the 2011 season will not be affected, but there is a little less hope than a few weeks ago. It still seems kind of silly from a fan perspective, although I am sure both the players and the owners perceive their particular beefs to be quite important.
choice to being surpassed by a couple of guys just at his own position. Conversely QB Cam Newton has gone from a major question mark to very much in the conversation for being the #1 overall. And these guys haven’t played a game since early January!! For pete’s sake what has changed so dramatically?? Maybe nothing has changed and too many people are getting paid far too much money to spend way too much time picking apart something that isn’t really that complicated. As far as that top pick goes, the Carolina Panthers are crazy if they don’t trade it, and even crazier if they take a QB since they just drafted one last year (Jimmy Clausen from Notre Dame). I’m not a Notre Dame fan at all, and the history of Irish quarterbacks has been pretty suspect over the past couple of decades (Brady Quinn, Ron Powlus, Rick Mirer), but Clausen should be given more than just one year to prove his worth. The only potential out I see is if Carolina trades Clausen to a team with a veteran QB, allowing him to learn for a year or two without the pressure of being The Man, while Newton or Missouri’s Blaine Gabbert end up with a Panthers team that also scores an extra draft pick or two in the trade. 
congratulatory message to QB Aaron Rodgers. Who cares?? Favre doesn’t owe Rodgers a damn thing, and if 
he did call him what he really should say is “Don’t get too cocky son. As good as your stats were the fact is the only reason you got to hold The Lombardi Trophy is because the Steelers gave the game away.” As much as I love ESPN, I think that sometimes they struggle to come up with topics for their plethora of shows (Mike & Mike, First Take, Around the Horn, Pardon the Interruption, et al). The Favre/Rodgers discussion has temporarily replaced the old “did Team A win the game or did Team B lose it” as the biggest time waster on “The Family of Networks”. 
This has nothing to do with sports, but Bryce in Minnesota needs to freakin’ get over the crappy pizza he received from Domino’s and the CEO of the pizza giant needs to stop apologizing. Maybe if his parents would have named him something other than Bryce he’d be more of a man than to take a stupid photo of a pizza and send it to the company. 
brother Darrell. After the race I changed the channel and spent the rest of a lazy Sunday doing God knows what. I never gave a second thought to the wreck because I’d seen dozens…alot of them involving Earnhardt himself…that were so much worse. A couple of hours later I was surfing The Internet and saw a giant headline on ESPN.com that I believe just said “EARNHARDT DEAD”. I was stunned. I had been a meandering Nascar fan as far back as the early 80’s when I cheered for “The King” Richard Petty. After Petty’s retirement in 1992 I had to find a new favorite driver and by then, for a variety of reasons, I had gone through a personal metamorphosis that made the hardscrabble, rapacious, anti-hero persona that enveloped Earnhardt appealing. His death hit me surprisingly hard, and I was taken aback at how sad I became. Ten years later and thoughts of that day still feel like a punch to the gut. I am sure there are fans out there much more invested in the Nascar product than I that were affected even more deeply. So as we mark this significant anniversary I’ll just say that I am glad that much good, i.e. more extensive safety regulations that have undoubtedly saved countless lives, resulted from Dale Earnhardt’s death, but I miss his unique contribution to the sport and more importantly I miss what stock car racing used to be, a rough & tumble thrill ride with rich personality and an unrefined yet colorful edge, instead of the tedious corporate exercise in banality it has become.
dominated their opponent in the conference title game before letting up a little and allowing the final score to become closer than it should have been. Team B went 10-6, did not win their division, has the #5 ranked defense, barely won the conference championship game against an opponent forced to use a 3rd string quarterback, and has a grand total of two players who have played in a Super Bowl. Would it surprise any knowledgeable fan that Team B is favored to win the game?? It sure as hell shocked me. 
Bay?? How about the New York Jets?? The Baltimore Ravens?? No, no, and no. But you know what those three teams have in common?? None of them are representing the AFC in the Super Bowl…the Pittsburgh Steelers are. And NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell can’t stand it. Neither can ESPN or Fox because they don’t want to alienate the female or metrosexual demographic by saying positive things about Ben Roethisberger. The solution has been a hard sell in which fans have been duped into believing that the Green Bay Packers are some sort of combination of the 1985 Chicago Bears and the 1972 Miami Dolphins with a little of the St. Louis Rams’ Greatest Show on Turf thrown in for good measure. Sadly it is a storyline that many are eating up. At first I was even a little concerned. The Steelers’ defensive backfield has needed an upgrade for years and it seems plausible that a pass oriented team could torch their average at best cornerbacks. On top of that their starting center will not play in the game leaving a backup to deal with Green Bay’s huge nose tackle. These things had me worried. But then I woke up.
defeated the Packers 37-36 in a shootout that likely made Vince Lombardi and Chuck Noll roll over in their graves (except for the fact that Coach Noll isn’t dead yet). But take a closer look. First of all, Pittsburgh was up 24-14 going into the 4th quarter before Green Bay exploded for 22 points. Secondly, Pittsburgh’s best player, safety Troy Polamalu did not play in that game. A safety isn’t normally much of a difference maker, but over the past two years the Steelers have won 80% of the games Polamalu has participated while losing 60% of the games in which he was on the sideline. Also, Green Bay will not have the services of tight end Jermichael Finley in the Super Bowl. Finley, who has been out for most of this season with a knee injury, had 9 receptions for 74 yards and a touchdown in that game. A real effort has been made this week to put Packers’ QB Aaron Rodgers on the same lofty pedestal as Tom Brady and Peyton Manning, but the truth is that Big Ben outgunned Rodgers in that previous head to head tilt. I’ve even seen Rodgers referred to as “a football god”, which made me want to concurrently laugh and puke. Two weeks ago I really liked the Green Bay Packers, but I’ll be darned if all this unwarranted praise isn’t tempting me to loathe them on a Patriots/Cowboys/Ravens level.
for 100 yards, but I do look for time of possession to be important. I think there will be atleast 3 turnovers by the loser, with one of those being a Pick 6 for the defense. I believe special teams and field position will play a key role, but field goals won’t be a deciding factor. Aaron Rodgers is a very good quarterback but these media types need to get up off their knees and quit fellatiating him because President Obama is getting jealous. I am not at all excited about the halftime show featuring The Black-eyed Peas, but am hopeful that Christina Aguilera will do a nice job with the national anthem. Ample cleavage would be a bonus. I am sure there will be some amusing commercials but most of them will range from forgettable to horrendous, although I am excited to see the trailers for 
The Manofesto 
