With the win over the Pats yesterday, the Jets celebrated like they won the Super Bowl IN week 2. WTF!?!
Now that we have two weeks in the books, there are some undefeated teams that look for real, and some that seem lucky to have two wins two weeks into the season. Surprisingly we are already down to only 8 teams that haven’t lost, and if the shocker of the weekend doesn’t happen with the 49ers taking down the Saints, it should stay that way. KC, Tampa, and Chicago are all shockers in my book, considering most people didn’t have them penciled in for their 2nd win before their respective bye weeks. Here’s my rankings for the top 8, with New Orleans in last, because the MNF game is still in progress, and they aren’t undefeated yet.
#1 Green Bay – The pack didn’t do anything to make me think that they aren’t a contender to make the Super Bowl this past weekend. By far the best all around team on the list. I think I’ll be picking them all year long no matter what the spread is. Remember that epic Patriots team that put up huge numbers every week like a video game in 2007? This team is looking like them, good all over the field.
#2 Pittsburgh – I’m not sure how they beat Tennessee and Atlanta, oh wait no, I do know why, their defense! They are 100-0 with Polamalu, and his $1M hair in the lineup. He is the X-factor much more than Big Ben is. The Steelers never have more than one down year, so this success is no fluke.
#3 Houston – Their win over the Colts was HUGE for their mentality going into the rest of the year. I picked them the last two years to make the playoffs, and now that I didn’t pick them, they are tearing it up, go figure…
#4 Chicago – There’s noway I thought the Bears would be good this year. Cutler hadn’t shown much of anything since the trade, but it looks like he finally found a couple of guys to throw to, and actually has the best passer rating in the league, no, that stat is not a typo. Enjoy the undefeated season while it last Bears fans, your next opponent is the Packers.
#5 Miami – Brandon Marshall is exactly what they needed. A receiver that teams will have to double team, and maybe open up a couple more running lanes! Their defense is actually better than I expected it to be too. Maybe all those young players are better than advertised. We will see exactly how good this Dolphins team is when they line up against the Jets this weekend.
#6 Tampa Bay – What!?! Freeman is leading the Bucs to a 2-0 start!?! I still can’t believe they curb stomped the Panthers this weekend, but low and behold this is a new Bucs team, and Freeman is much better than I thought well, his non-five interception game against Carolina made him look good. They need to beat a good team before I buy anything they are selling.
#7 Kansas City – Anyone can beat the Browns, but they beat the Chargers, and made them look bad for good portions of that game. They’ve been lacking a direction for years, and it looks like they might have found one on defense and special teams. Does that win you the AFC West? Maybe, but they will need something from the passing game…
#8 New Orleans – They are up 9-0 in the first quarter, but I can’t call that a win, because there’s a ton of time left. The Saints look like they should win if it keeps going the way it has so far though. A win would probably launch them into the top three knocking Houston down a spot, but we will see what kind of fight the Niners have in them for the final three quarters.
The life of an elite NFL feature back is getting shorter and shorter. I don’t mean that they’re dying at a young age, just that a guy can be the man on his team for just a handful of years, and that lifeline seems to be getting shorter. It seems like just a few decades ago, it’d be the same handful of guys racking up 1,000 yard season for years on end. Now a guy is likely to have one or two, and then be replaced by the next young, healthy back. It’s evident this season when you watch guys like Ladanian Tomlinson and Marion Barber no longer getting the bulk of their teams’ carries. It seems like just yesterday guys like these were dominant on the field, and now are relegated to sharing duties with younger guys. In other sports, you could look at league leaders from five years ago and the majority of those guys are still putting up numbers. I took the top ten rushers from 2006, and it looks like all ten of those guys would be lucky to total 1,000 yards combinedthis year…
SHAUN ALEXANDER, SEA. 1,880 yds: 2005 was Alexander’s 5th and final 1000 yard season. He donned the cover of Madden 07, but failed to tally as many yards as he did in 05 over the next three seasons, his last in the NFL. He totaled 1612 yards over his next two years in Seattle, before adding 24 more in 2008 on the Redskins. That was his final season.
TIKI BARBER, NYG. 1860 yds: Barber totaled 6 1000 yd seasons over a span of 7 years, and though you could argue he retired still in his prime, it was clear that Barber’s days were numbered, which probably prompted his retirement somewhat. Barber’s last season was 2006, but he knew Brandon Jacobs was the back of the team’s future.
I know, I know, this video is a few months old. I seem to find myself going back to it every few weeks though, and the reason I brought it back out, is because this weekend I’m heading to a wedding for one of my college buddies. I’m going to see two of my good college friends there that just became fathers. I figured it was only right to post this video of how gangster dad’s are these days, and use it as a dedication to my homies and their new seeds. Hopefully this music video takes you into the weekend with a good laugh if you haven’t already seen it.
No, I’m not talking about my favorite EA basketball video game, NBA Street. I’m talking about skateboarding! I work for Quiksilver at their headquarters in Huntington Beach California if you didn’t know. Naturally I’m plugged into the action sports industry happenings. This year, Rob Dyrdek’s dream came to fruition with the new Street League, and I really wasn’t sure how it would play out when I first heard about it. He pulled together DC Shoes (a company owned by Quiksilver) and Monster to sponsor his skateboarding Street League. Growing up I was much more into snowboarding, skateboarding, wakeboarding, and eventually surfing to a lesser extent over the ball and stick sports, but the appeal went away when my free time dwindled. I was never a huge fan of how you couldn’t really declare a winner or call someone “the best” for any of these sports since it’s subjective to whose style you like, but Rob created a league that comes very close to finding a true winner. I do watch some of the X-games, but only for the good events, like the street skate, and find myself more into the contests they show on FuelTV than the X-games ones. To this day, I have so much respect for the pounding that these guys take just to get this good. In my opinion skateboarding is by far the hardest of the action sports to learn, and is probably why I love watching the street skating contests. This contest series really does embody all that is street skating. Last night the first leg of the Street League competition was aired on ESPN, and after watching it, I knew I had to write why you should be watching it too. Skateboarding is probably the most popular non ball and stick sport, and Rob Dyrdek is taking it to a whole new level showcasing the best of the best.
Even if you don't like skateboarding, you had to love Rob & Big when they were on MTV!
Rob’s vision was like nothing we’ve seen from the skateboarding world. He threw out the old style/formats for contests where you can go where ever you want on the street course to make a run that suits your abilities, and instead he made it so the skaters would have seven trick attempts for a specified obstacle in the skate park. Dyrdek basically threw out the whole timed run type of contest, which already made it a better platform for a skating event, since nobody is timed when they are street skating, unless a security guard calls the cops. Last night they had four obstacles set up where each skater was given seven tries to do tricks on that obstacle. This brings out some strategy within the contest. If you go for a big trick and don’t land it, you get zero points. If you do an “easy” trick, you don’t get that many points, but it’s much better than bailing. Nyjah Huston ended up winning the event, and I was happy for the 15 year old. He has a silky smooth style that makes everything look effortless. Plus being from Norcal (Davis), always made me root for him a little more or maybe I just get mesmerized by the flowing dreadlocks. If you don’t know who I’m talking about you can check out clips of him ripping hard here and here. Anyways, this contest came down to the wire, and Nyjah laid it on the line throwing down HUGE tricks that the judges rewarded him with high scores to take over first place, and ultimately winning the contest for him. He had a habit of finishing second in nearly every contest I’ve watched him in, so it was great to see him get his first win, and the $150K check to go along with it.
Nyjah throwing down a switch noseslide.
The genius part of this whole league is how Rob made it have the feel of ball and stick sports game. Each trick is scored live before the next guy goes, so you can see the names jumping up and down the leader board with the real time scoring after each contestant goes, so the scoring looks kinda like a basketball game where you can’t win on the first couple obstacles, but you can definitely lose if you fall too much. What makes it feel like a sporting event? The simple fact that all these contest are going to be held in arenas in front of a crowd oohing and ahhhing over the tricks. Supposedly nearly all of them have been sold out. It’s a big step up from the X-games in terms of declaring a true winner, and I think it will help the sport grow/conform for the viewers. It might not ever be as big as the major sports, but it could give the NHL a run for their money!
How can we be sure that these are really the best 24 skaters there? Well, it’s by invite only, and there’s no way any of the top skaters would turn down the invitation to compete. There’s $1.2M in prize money, and $150K up for grabs at each venue. They also throw $5K to the skater with the best trick (highest scored trick of the night), so even if someone isn’t doing all that well, they can go for huge tricks that have a high failure rate to win that backup prize. If you missed the contest last night, don’t worry, they are going to show all three of the contests on ESPN. As an added bonus Rob and Steve Berra are doing the commentating which is much better than listening to Tony Hawk during the play by play during the X-games.
I’m still not sure what the purpose of making Reggie Bush give back his Heisman is. It just reminds me of when the sucky kid doesn’t get picked on the playground, so he throws a fit and takes his ball home. Perhaps Bush received illegal benefits, but did it really give him an advantage on the field? He would’ve won that Heisman wherever he played, and probably by a more lopsided vote, since he surely split some votes with teammate Matt Leinart. Mack Brown thinks Vince Young should get the award. Are we sure his decision to go to Texas was all on the up and up? Sure, he’s from Houston, so why wouldn’t he go play for Texas? But then again, why not A&M, or Houston, or LSU? Reggie Bush was from San Diego, who’s to say he wouldn’t have ended up at USC anyway? Look, I can name quite a few college athletes who received illegal benefits, and some didn’t even go on to a professional career in their respective sports. The point is, the NCAA can keep targeting USC all they want, e.g. Bush, OJ Mayo, but clearly this goes on at every university in the country. I wonder how long until they cry foul on Demar Derozan. It’s common knowledge he went to SC because they let his buddy Lil Romeo tag along. This whole mess has got me thinking about other players who went to a certain university, where there’s no way there wasn’t foul play. I know they don’t have Heismans per se, but you get the idea. Let’s start pointing some fingers…..
JAMARCUS RUSSELL, LSU: I know it’s not too far fetched for a kid from Alabama to choose LSU, but we all know what kind of guy Russell is, there’s no way he didn’t go play for the highest bidder. Why would he choose LSU over other SEC schools like Alabama, Ole Miss, Georgia, or Tennessee? Les Miles and the boosters surely offered him the iciest #2 platinum chain of all the competition.
Week one didn’t go bad, but it didn’t go all that well either. I went a less than impressive (2-3-1), while By kept it mediocre with a 2-2 start. Now that we’ve seen a whole week of football action, we are experts and shouldn’t miss another pick for the rest of the year, right!?! I’m still shocked that By called that Texans game. I actually could see the Colts winning the next nine games without anyone noticing. I don’t buy TMQ’s argument that this is Armageddon because the Texans won, but do agree it would be hilarious if Houston ended up playing in the Super Bowl in Jerry Jones billion dollar stadium. Anyways, this should be another fun week, and I’m excited to win the money back that I lost in week one, so here are our picks for week 2!
What a roller coaster opening week for me. I hit the ground running like a Chris Johnson breakaway, after my prediction of the Texans upsetting the Colts came true. I began imagining myself hoisting up the “I Told You So” trophy after that one. Unfortunately that image shattered immediately, as the Houston/Indy game didn’t equate to the biggest upset of the day. The biggest upset of the day went to me. Because I was so damn upset at my 49ers! What a waste of one and a half hours of a beautiful Sunday afternoon. As you can guess, I stopped watching midway through. Anyway, to brighten up my mediocre week, let me just say, “How about ‘dem Cowboys, huh!?” I wanted to stay away from the Jets/Ravens game, but ultimately couldn’t resist. I originally wanted to take KC over SD, but couldn’t pull the trigger on another significant upset. Lesson learned, always go with the gut. But like Chappy said, we learned everything I needed to know about all the teams after the first week, and ala Vernon Davis, I predict we win on all of our picks the rest of the way! Continue reading
With about three weeks left there are a TON of good looking rookies in the NL. For awhile I thought it was Jaime Garcia, then Buster Posey took a slight lead, then Gaby Sanchez, and now Jason Heyward is remaking his case for the ROY award with a hot streak. What I’ve found most interesting about the NL ROY race is that guys like Mike Stanton have 20 homers, Tyler Colvin has 19 homers, Ike Davis has 18 homers, Neil Walker has a .306 average, John Axeford has 21 saves, Stephen Strasberg was insanely good for a bit, and none of these guys are going to be considered for the award. It’s has been an insane year for the youth in the NL, and will probably be just like the NL West race coming down to who has the best final weeks of the season. I’m going to take a look at the top five candidates, and try to figure out which one is the best choice. I’m already leaning towards Heyward during his resurgence, and being in the big leagues all year helps his case. Gaby Sanchez is so underrated that I feel like I should almost just pick him for shock value, but I just can’t do it. Here’s my thoughts on the top five candidates in no particular order. I heavily weighted one thing in my list, and that was the word YEAR, as in playing a complete season. Continue reading
The Rangers have gotten a ton of play on the MLB network over the past month or so. I can’t remember seeing more of their games on TV at any point in my life. They’ve earned those televised games, as they are the clearly the class of the AL West, and playing as good as any team in the league right now. They usually fade during July and August when their home field turns into a launching pad, but not this year. I was hoping for an implosion from them, so maybe the A’s would be able to sneak into the playoffs, but that’s like hoping for the Raiders to show up in back to back games. Once again, I’m starting to wonder if the A’s are cursed. Not because of the numerous injuries they suffered for a third straight year, but because we let Ron Washington go. I’d much rather have Washington as the manger over Geren, but Beane was very pro Geren, so we’re stuck with the schlep. Until A’s fortunes change, I think we are still under The Curse of the Wash. Normally I’d root against the AL West winner if it wasn’t the A’s, but I found myself pulling for the Rangers to succeed this postseason.
The Rangers sweep over the Yankees showed us exactly what they’ve been doing well all year long. Come from behind to win. They came back to win two of the three games, and even made one of those comebacks while Rivera was on the mound. That kind of win can’t be understated when it comes playoff time, and just knowing that they have already beaten up the most dominant closer of all time is a feather in the cap. They also had their ace (Cliff Lee) back on the hill to close out the sweep. It was his first start in two weeks. He showed how healthy he was shutting the Yankees down for 8 innings giving up only one run. It’s only the second time all season the Yankees got swept! What made this even more impressive was that they didn’t need their MVP candidate Josh Hamilton, who is still out with a bruised up ribcage. There’s no rush to get Hamilton back, since they do have a commanding lead in the West (8 ½ games). Now that the Yankees and Rays starting to come back to earth a little, does this give the Twins and Rangers an edge? I’d probably put both of them above the TB and NY on power rankings if I made them right this moment. I’m already envisioning an ALCS matchup between Minnesota and Texas. Maybe that’s a little presumptuous, but if Morneau and Hamilton come back healthy, who’s to say that these two teams are the favorites to make it to the ALCS?
Another thing I’ve noticed about this Rangers team is their swagger factor. It’s crazy how together these guys are. Early in the season after they took out the Angels in the opener of a series in June, right after the final out of the game was recorded Ian Kinsler was out there yelling for them to “get off our field”, as the Angels were heading to the showers. At the time I thought Kinsler was just being the dickhead he is, but now months later I think it was a statement of things to come. It was like they finally believed in themselves before anyone else did, and knew they weren’t going to have a collapse when the weather got hot. They were no longer going to be a pushover and would play every game hard, just the way Wash would’ve played. They were paying attention to more details than they used to, even doing the small ball stuff that wins games utilizing their speed in Bobon and Andrus. We will see if they can continue their good play through the last 19 games. I don’t see any reason for them to slow down since they don’t have the division locked up yet, but they are in as good of a position possible for a solid postseason run, and can let guys like Josh Hamilton and Cliff Lee take some extra rest if it’s needed. I’m glad my prediction of who would win the AL West is working out thus far!
I was too disappointed to post something yesterday, plus my computer crapped out with some Trojan virus on Friday. I’m the one to blame for that since I didn’t ever buy one of those virus protectors…. Anyways, now that I’m a little bit more calm and collected, and at work with a working computer, I can actually assess what happened to the bay area teams. This was supposed to be the year of hope for both franchises, since their divisions suck, and they both made solid offseason moves, but in week one, they were huge disappointments having everyone in the bay saying nothing has changed. Neither team was in their game at the end of the half, which was very disturbing to see both of them give up on both sides of the ball when the game was out of hand. Usually you like to get a couple positives going for the next game during garbage time, but there wasn’t even much of that to draw any hope from. A grade of an F- for both of these franchises to start the season. Actually, I’ll give them an incomplete to start the year since they didn’t even finish all their assignments for week 1.
The Raiders had everything going for them coming into the game, even their “Taking it to them” t-shirts they wore all of training camp. The temperature was mild (77 degrees), and it was surprisingly un-humid in Tennessee. If it was humid, I can only imagine what the score could’ve been. The Raiders had a chance to pull within 14 at the end of the half, and chose to only be down by twenty after kicking a field goal instead. With the ball at the 15, and a yard to go on fourth down we really needed a touchdown. Cable’s fat ass called in the kicking unit, and it felt like we were mailing it in before the half. If we really wanted to be in this game, we don’t go for a field goal when the offense is struggling, and actually has the ball in the redzone for once. Three points wasn’t going give us that boost of confidence we needed going into the locker room. I would’ve been much happier seeing them go for it, and not get the first down, even if that meant we scored zero points on that possession. The most worrisome part of the day was easily the o-line. We couldn’t figure out the no name Tennessee defense. They knocked Campbell down every time he dropped back, and made me hesitantly think, maybe Jamarcus wasn’t completely the problem. Campbell’s line looked familiar for Raiders starting QB’s over the past few years two fumbles, one pick, and one garbage time TD. I might finally be jumping on the fire Cable bandwagon. He seems to have the respect of the players, but what the hell is wrong with our o-line. Isn’t that your specialty Tom!?! If you can’t get your team to be good at what you are supposed to be good at (former o-line coach), then how are you helping this team improve!?! He already gave up the offensive play calling to Hue Jackson, so shouldn’t he be more responsible for other things like coaching the offensive line. The one silver lining is that they played a Tennessee team that is supposed to be pretty good, and a team that was on fire to end last season. If they can’t show up against the Rams, I’m going to be very worried about this team. There was one part of the game that I found entertaining, the Titans mascot ate a cheerleader!
The 49ers had an even worse day than the Raiders. They couldn’t even get a touchdown, and looked terrible in every facet of the game against a team that both By and I predicted to having a good shot at that #1 pick next year in our Doin Lines picks. Coach Singletary thought it was a good “wake up” call for the team, and hopefully he’s right for their sake. If losing to the Seahawks isn’t a wake up call, then I don’t know what this team expects to do this year. Maybe their players were partying in the Castro District a little too much over the offseason and that made them soft, or maybe Vernon Davis is taking to curling more than football… Ok, ok, Vernon was one of the few guys that played well. Seattle played off their 12th man, and somehow looked like the 2007 Seahawks that were perennial playoff contenders. They do have a great home crowd, but the 49ers should’ve made this one at least a little close. It’s sad that they can’t even pin this all on Alex Smith, because every part of their game plan was executed poorly. The scariest part for the Niners is that this isn’t a good team, and preseason this was one of the games I had inked in a W. At least the Raiders got beat down by someone that has playoff aspirations. It’s only one game, but both of these teams have a lot to work on before they are considered anything near a playoff caliber team.
Many thought that the team that Jerry Coangelo & Coach K built and brought to Istanbul was a Silver medal team at best, but I begged to differ. I was never worried, not for one moment that Team USA would fail to bring home the Gold. And on the first NFL Sunday of the season, I celebrate basketball, and what our country accomplished against a good Turkey team.
Why I never faltered in my belief in our team? For one, Coach K is a great, great coach, and aside from the X’s & O’s, he manages egos well. What went on unnoticed during the selection process was the idea of building a “team.” Due to the frenzied free agency that took place this past Summer, it was safe to assume that the top names in basketball would forgo making the trip overseas to play in the FIBA Championships. So Coach K swooped up KD, and basically built a Euro style team around him, with some shooters, hustlers, and speed. Take a look at the team the US presented, and all though there were plenty of All-Stars and franchise cornerstones, they all happily took a back seat to KD and the winning cause. And quite simply put, they became a “team”. Once that was established, KD led the way, Odom held it down, and the cast played their part.
It’s similar to when the US lost in Athens (despite winning a Bronze, we chalk it up as a loss), many threw around the idea of just sending the NBA Champions to the Olympics. At the time, the team would have been the Detroit Pistons, the epitome of a team. There’s no question in my mind that the Pistons would have won Gold that year. Of course, in 2008 the Redeem Team willingly formed to take back what was rightfully ours in Beijing. This time around, we didn’t have the luxury of sending the absolute best players in the planet to Istanbul, so Jerry Coangelo and Coach K basically built the 2004 Detroit Pistons 2.0, bigger and bolder. The team was predicated on defense, and our undersized, scrappy, athletic group of kids shut teams down and suffocated them.
The result, we remain on top of the world in the sport of basketball! USA! USA! USA!
USF athletic director Debra Gore-Mann is resigning to pursue other opportunities. The school said Friday that Gore-Mann’s resignation is effective Sept. 17. Charles Cross, USF’s vice president of business and finance, will assume interim athletic director duties while a national search is conducted to find a replacement. Gore-Mann leaves less than five months after making the high-profile hire of Jennifer Azzi as women’s basketball coach. In June, the NCAA placed USF on probation for two years after more than a dozen athletes spent more than $13,000 in scholarship money to improperly buy textbooks. USF didn’t receive a postseason ban.
Talk about ironty. After all. Debra Gore-Mann is the one who handed head coach Jesse Evans resignation papers.
We always end up being a little slow on getting these predictions up, and with one game in the books it makes all of these predictions so much easier right!?! No, not really… We took a look at the Vegas over under wins and losses for each team and picked if we thought that team would win more or less than that. Skip around to the teams you care about it’s in alphabetical order, if you can’t make it through the whole thing (very understandable).
Arizona Cardinals regular season wins 7 ½
Chappy: Under, even though I think Derek Anderson is going to do better than people think, he still won’t get them to where old man Warner had them.
Dre: Under, no way that offense is the same without Warner and Boldin. Will end up on the wrong side of some low scoring games.
Dyslecix: I’ll take the over, 8 wins in a terrible division is very possible. However, I don’t see them winning 9 games, so this will be close.
Atlanta Falcons regular season wins 8½
Chappy: Over, I really like this Falcons team. Turner didn’t get overworked last year because he was hurt, so he should be good for another 300+ carry season like his first year in Atlanta. Their defense is questionable, but the offense will make up for it.
Dre: Under, division will be tough this year. Even the Saints will struggle to 10 wins, and the Falcons will settle in at 8.
Dyslecix: Under, never been a believer of the Falcons. In a tough division getting to even 8 games might be a feat. Continue reading
I don’t like Matt Barnes. I should. He’s from Sacramento, he’s multiracial, his name’s Matt, and he’s played for the Kings and Warriors. But aside from my sophomore year in high school when we literally rooted for him against our own varsity team in our own gym, I’ve never really cheered for him. Simply put, I’m not a fan.
When I saw the news this morning that Barnes was arrested last night for domestic violence, my gut reaction was “not surprising.” However, after reading some other gut reactions from others online, I had to put assumptions aside and give him the benefit of the doubt. Sure, he’s 6’7″ with a crazy haircut, lots of tattoos and half-black, but that doesn’t automatically make him a wife-beater. Like he tweeted, “9 times out of 10 the man gets arrested.” Ask any police officer, they’ll openly tell you. If the woman has a single mark, whether it be a bloody knuckle from punching the guy or a scraped leg from tripping over the futon while chasing him with a knife (these are both real life examples I’ve heard of), the man is going to jail. Many people scoffed at his text saying he was the victim. They said “sure, a 6’7″ guy was the victim.” Well, being the victim doesn’t mean he lost a fight, it just means he was the one who was attacked. It’s amazing how in the land of ‘guilty until proven innocent,’ domestic violence crimes don’t apply. Matt Barnes will forever be considered a wife beater, while Ben Roethlisberger and Kobe Bryant have never really been considered rapists. You tell me which is worse.
So ultimately, I don’t know if Matt Barnes is innocent here, but let’s put snap judgments aside. He may be a loose cannon on the basketball court, but it doesn’t mean he would put his hands on a woman. If there’s one thing people close to him will vouch for, it’s that he was very close to his mother, who passed away a few years back. I’ve got to believe he was raised better. That’s not to say I’ll be surprised if it turns out he beat the hell out of this girl, but until that day, I think the guy deserves a break. I think we’re more likely to see the charges dropped, and he’ll be riding around Sac in an Indy Car rather than posting up at 651 I Street.
I’ve been impressed with the revival of Entourage this season. For the last couple of seasons, I thought the show was heading downhill, but this year they got Vinny on a drug binge, making bad choices, and dating a porn star. Excellent twist to what was getting to be a repetitive series. Speaking of things reviving themselves, and the true reason for this post, the NFL is bizzniizzzizzaacckk! This means that every team has hope again (including my Raiders and the overly optimistic prediction I made about them making it to the AFC Championship), but this also marks the beginning of gambling season, and the return of Doin Lines! Even if you aren’t betting on spreads, lets face it, there’s plenty of $10 bets thrown down on games amongst friends. I found myself enjoying keeping track of how I did against the spread last year, and ended the season doing surprisingly well considering I was way below .500 for awhile there, and had pondered giving up posting my picks out of sheer embarrassment. My comeback was strong, and ending 49-45-3 on the season, which made me want to see how I could do in my second year of keeping track. At points during the season, I was much more into making these picks correctly than keeping track of my fantasy teams. Not to say that I didn’t care about fantasy, but of all the fantasy seasons, football is the least attractive to me. It’s too much of a crapshoot, and everyone talks endlessly about their “squad”, which is more of a turnoff than a girl with a butterface. Instead of picking ALL of the games, we decided to each pick the top six or so games that we believe are either mortal locks, or very watchable. I did say “we” right!?! Well, this season, By has decided to join me on the adventure of posting picks, so I don’t feel like such an addict doing all these lines by myself! By also had a couple quick thoughts before we get started.
Before I reveal my picks, I must say I’m excited to hear that Entourage is back on the radar in terms of “must see” programs. There was a point in my life where I looked forward to watching Entourage as much as I looked forward to watching a football game on Sunday, but then it slipped. But from what Chappy just wrote, and from what friends have mentioned, Vinny addicted to hard drugs, Sasha Grey, plus the return of Carla Gugino (who is one fine woman) equals the return of Entourage! I have catching up to do …
I really didn’t think I’d get into the FIBA championship this year, but surprisingly I’ve caught at least a little bit of each game. Either when they decided televise them 12 hours after they happened on NBATV, or on ESPN3 when I’m at work, and not so busy. As much as I was unimpressed with the names on the squad we put together, I was very impressed with how well they’ve come together over the past month. If you watched their first game and last game, you’d see a dramatic improvement. They finally looked comfortable together against Angola, and sent them back to their country. I was surprised to find that the U.S. was not the favorite to win the title. I guess not winning the tourney since 1994 is a good reason for them to be ranked lower, but still, shouldn’t the country that invented the game be the favorite even with the rules being much different than the NBA? I’d think so, and even with the B squad they should beat down the competition. Continue reading
#2 Pittsburgh – I’m not sure how they beat Tennessee and Atlanta, oh wait no, I do know why, their defense! They are 100-0 with Polamalu, and his $1M hair in the lineup. He is the X-factor much more than Big Ben is. The Steelers never have more than one down year, so this success is no fluke.
By
cali4dre
chappy81
dyslecix
mceezy
Doin Work 
