You know who nobody pays much attention to during Super Bowl week? The punters.
Last year, I urged people to Win One For The Punters! This year, as part of my "I Don't Get To Go There But I'm Making The Best Of It" nonstop Super Bowl hype, I'm going to continue to promote the punters, in part by following Green Bay punter Tim Masthay's Twitter feed, and in part by trying to find something... anything... from Steelers' punter Jeremy Kapinos -- who used to be Green Bay's punter last year and who we can therefore expect to be punting with a chip on his shoulder in this game.
The latest updates from Masthay:
From January 29:
thanks everyone! We gotta get it done one more time! Looking forward to heading down to Dallas!
And the one prior to that, from January 11:
Didn't think I'd ever cover the big window in our apartment with a bedspread. But when the wife has lasik surgery that's what you do!
It's all glamour for Masthay, who also used Twitter earlier to get fans to weigh in on what car he should buy.
Meanwhile, Kapinos seems not to have a Twitter feed, but that doesn't mean that Twitter isn't all a-Tweet about him:
@foundinIdaho stopped writing anti-government screeds and oiling his shotguns long enough to respond to a tweet about Kapinos thusly:
It's to our benefit. Mwahahaha. RT @PackersOnReddit: I still can't believe Jeremy Kapinos is playing in the Super Bowl.
Really, @foundinIdaho, you and the Packers are an "our"? Meanwhile, an erstwhile sports writer has given Kapinos a nickname:
@50YardBard Talked to the Kapinator actually. No one around him in the corner of the locker room.
To which the original commentator, @50YardBard, replied:
@APGenaroArmas I imagine the only thing worse than being a punter on an nfl team is being the new punter that nobody knows...
Yeah, but, 50YardBard, Kapinos is at the big game, while you are sitting somewhere in Pennsylvania making jokes about your last trip to the adult bookstore.
I say it's only a moderate scandal because despite an article over the weekend in which residents of Green Bay claimed there's more to the city than the Packers, there's really not. Reading the article reveals that the "more to the city" part boils down to "we've got a vegan coffeehouse" (that'll last about 3 weeks in that city) and nothing more. I've been to Green Bay and there's almost literally nothing there but the Packers. So if the team is negotiating with the city over something, they're going to get it, and face-value tickets aren't going to have any effect on the outcome.
But that made me wonder how much the tickets are really worth, anyway. They were priced at $900 to $1,200 for the ticket alone, and one of the politicians who bought them re-sold them (at face value) to a friend -- so they didn't want to go, possibly because going to the Super Bowl will cost you way more than the $16,000+ reported as the highest-priced face value.
As we all know, going to the game isn't the only cost, though, so I decided to look into just how much it would cost you to go and have a reasonably-priced good time at the Super Bowl this week. This isn't about travel costs -- those are up to you, and I recommend piling into your friend's van and making him pay for gas while you promise to pick up the snacks on the way. That's how Biden travels, after all.
This is about what you do in town and around the game: the refreshments, the souvenirs, the autographs, and more: all the stuff the ticket entitles you to try out.
Here's the FIRST costs I've found: Want to get 1 item autographed by 1 player? The NFLXtra pass will get you into the NFLXtra lounge to do that -- for $45. That same $45 lets you "bypass the lines" that apparently form around "Mike Thomas" of the Jacksonville Jaguars -- one of the players signing autographs at the "Fuel Up To Play 60" minifield.
Whodathunkit!?, a shared enterprise between The Best Of Everything and Nonsportsmanlike Conduct!, celebrates the momentous occasions in life by telling you not what everyone else is talking about, but what you really want to know. Let other people talk about the same old things, year after year -- the commercials, the on-field action, the hype, the crowds, the score... ho, hum... sigh, snore.
If you really want to be the life of the party -- or at least that person who's there but nobody's sure who invited them -- then you need Whodathunkit!?,the only blog post with the guts to look at those areas of major events that nobody else has thought to look at. And thanks to me, you don't have to do the legwork. Just read this post, then memorize it, and be prepared to recite it during the various breaks in the action during the big game. And don't worry: with only 11 actual minutes of football action in any televised football game, there'll be plenty of time to share such bon mots as: 1. Love is in the air at championships: All those stories about how Dallas needs another 10,000 strippers to meet the demand for the Super Bowl? Not only is that story nothing new -- strippers flocked to Tampa before the Super Bowl there, and generally head to any city where the game is held -- but it's just a minor aspect of the overall atmosphere of romance that hovers over football championships. From college players proposing after bowl games to reporters trying to hook up with Tom Brady* during Super Bowl week:
There's just something about a bunch of sweaty men grabbing each other and throwing each other to the ground that screams romance. Right, Ben Roethlisberger?
Right! People in the past have tried to raise money to propose via Super Bowl commercial -- because what better way is there to let your fiancee know exactly where she'll rank in your life in the future? "Honey, I'm glad you said yes. Now shut up, because the second half is starting."
(That guy couldn't get people interested enough to buy time during the game, and had to settle for proposing via a commercial that aired during Veronica Mars. Let's hope the marriage lasted longer than the show.)
Silvia Mena [described in the article as a "Salma Hayek lookalike"], 25, alleges Haynesworth, 28, met her in Miami, romanced her during Super Bowl week, and invited her to his Tennessee home. She claims in the documents that after learning about the pregnancy, Haynesworth promised to "emotionally and financially support Silvia." But, "after making such promises . . . Haynesworth has abandoned the pregnant Sylvia Mena . . . He has refused to provide any emotional or financial support of Silvia Mena or his unborn child."
(The two are shown in the picture alongside the heading for this section.)
Whatever your situation, just remember that Super Bowl parties are public events, and nobody likes PDAs:
Especially when they get in the way of the chips. 2. "A strange game. The only winning move is not to play."Joshua/WOPR said that about tic-tac-toe/global thermonuclear war, and his primitive, straight-forward, not-yet-capable-of-winning-at-Jeopardy! computer brain was clearly wrong: You win in tic-tac-toe by taking a corner move first, and you win at global thermonuclear war by letting that one city way over on the left go and focusing on the two cities closest to you. (This lesson brought to you by the arcade version of Missile Command.)
But WOPR could have been talking about Super Bowl ads. With airtime going for upwards of whatever figure the media wants to make up today, it can be increasingly hard to justify blowing the annual ad budget on a 30-second commercial that, by now, must include each of the required elements of a Super Bowl ad:
(a) Cats (b) Women in tight t-shirts. (c) Betty White, at least until she dies. (d) A twist ending (e) More women in tight t-shirts. (f) A cameo appearance from some reality show star you won't recognize. (g) A Master Lock.
Seriously. Take a drink each time you see an ad featuring at least one of those things. If it features more than one, down your whole drink. If it features all of them, take Chad up on his dare to send a friend request to that hot girl you both knew in 11th grade, but do it while your wife is out of the room.
You know what's cheaper than airing an ad during the Super Bowl? Not airing one at all, and having the entire world run it for you in the week leading up to the game. That's the tactic taken by PETA and other groups in the past few years: Create an ad that's so provocative that the networks don't dare show it... during the Super Bowl. Instead, they'll show it on their news programs and talk shows, and it'll get front page treatment on HuffPo, Slate, and everywhere else people surf.
The banned Super Bowl strategy dates back to 2005, when Internet registry firm GoDaddy.com had its commercial yanked after running in only one of the two spots the advertiser had bought. That ad ended up generating some 2,700 news articles and blog posts, according to GoDaddy. It is, in many ways, the “1984” of the banned Super Bowl ad genre.
The following year GoDaddy.com's commercial was rejected 11 times. In 2008, it actually advertised during the game, promoting its previously rejected ad starring Danica Patrick. "It worked like a charm," reflects Bob Parsons, chief executive officer of GoDaddy.
The approach has spawned imitators, most notably infidelity dating site AshleyMadison. Unsurprisingly, this year Fox nixed AshleyMadison's ad, which features a porn actress and centers on workplace affairs. But the $120,000, in-house-produced video is a hit on YouTube, where it has 450,000 views and directs viewers to the AshleyMadison site for the “X-rated version.”There’s little doubt that a banned Super Bowl spot can lead to a short-term pop in attention and consideration. AshleyMadison two years ago had a Super Bowl spot rejected by NBC. The spot, which cost $200,000, garnered over 1 million views on YouTube and attention from Larry King and others. Noel Biderman, CEO of AshleyMadison parent company Avid Life Media, said the buzz surrounding the rejected ad resulted in 100,000 new members—a $2 cost per acquisition, far below the $100 maximum it sets.
(Source.) This year's hot banned ad? Jesus Hates Obama:
An ad that, according to the article, was designed to be banned during the Super Bowl.
Most ads that get banned are knocked off the list for being too sexy. One, though, was rejected apparently for being in incredibly poor taste:
Sometimes I don't know why the rest of the world doesn't just come and punch us all in the throat.
3. Whether you'll have any money to buy the stuff in the ads depends on who wins the game... and not just because you bet February's mortgage payment on Green Bay. Stupid! They'll never cover the spread!
The "Super Bowl Indicator" is a longtime superstition that holds that if an "Old NFL" team wins the game, the market will go up the following year, while if an "Old AFL" team wins, the market is going to drop faster than Charlie Sheen's pants around porn stars.
[I made that joke hoping that this blog entry will be banned by the Super Bowl, and that it will then make me rich.]
Or, that's what one site says. That site -- Snopes.com -- claims that the predictor is 80% accurate (give or take a couple of percentages) but muddies up the water by noting that some "Old AFL" teams aren't exactly "Old AFL" teams; the Steelers, for example, were in the NFL before there was an AFL, and the Packers have always been an NFL team.
Which poses problems because the predictor would work only if you phrased it the right way -- kind of like a Magic 8-Ball, or the Congressional Budget Office. If, for example, you say The market will go up provided that an old-NFL team wins, then this year you're guaranteed to get the market going up, as both the Steelers and Packers are NFL teams through and through. But if you were to say the market goes down when an old-NFL team loses, then we're in for another 12 months, at least, of financial troubles, and probably looking at President Palin.
And neither of those formulations can work when the game pits a team that wasn't part of the old NFL or AFL, period. When Carolina or Tampa Bay make the Super Bowl, the Super Bowl Indicator has troubles working. And what can the Powers That Be make of the Baltimore Ravens? This article claims that Baltimore counts as an "old NFL" team because they used to be Cleveland -- but the NFL, remember, awarded NEW Cleveland all the old Cleveland records. So is Baltimore really Old NFL?
Discuss that amongst yourselves. I'm going to go watch all those banned super bowl ads. I've got a hankering for some shirtless Mickey Rooney. BONUS WHODATHUNKIT!?: More eerie than the idea that the Super Bowl might affect the market is the idea that television show writers might affect the Super Bowl -- or have the ability to almost predict the future.
Certain TV shows and movies have at times hinted at a future we can only (at the time) imagine -- such as Smart Guy predicting a Saints-Colts Super Bowl:
54-3? Smart Guy wasn't really good on how football games work, was he? That wasn't the only time pop culture accurately predicted the participants of a Super Bowl. I Am Legend forecast the Giants-Patriots* matchup by predicting (in a news crawl early in the movie) that the Giants would lose to the Patriots* for the second time in a season; since the teams are in different conferences, the only way they could play twice in one season is to meet in the Super Bowl.
Super Bowl predictions by pop culture tend to be close but no cigar -- no matter how far back they go or what the pedigree. Consider this prediction, by Nostradamus:
Four dawns past the inverted name of the beast shall arise a four eyed heir to the throne, name unpronounced, in favor of the god, the child.Twin brothers in celestial dispute, Mars at its zenith, shall defend the stronghold.The great son of apostle Peter lie in tandem with the 22nd man of the serpent, reign upon the battlefields as the Taylor waits patiently for his cloth.The Bear, Lion, Eagle, shall no longer be welcome, victory blood green to purple, the spoils of war earned.
Buy one of these great books: Or buy THREE, because if you buy any three of these, and email me proof of purchase at thetroublewithroy[at]yahoo.com, I'll send you the other two, free.
A shape-shifting demon torments children while their parents stand by. A widower haunted by the ghost of his wife tries to understand her requests. A baby stolen from his mother by gargoyles returns, full of hatred for the life he's led. A family of children raised by grave-robbing corpse stealers tries to discover a way out. An elderly man possesses the power of life and death in his retirement. These stories present images and people who will haunt your thoughts for a long time after you read them.
In Just Exactly How Life Looks you'll be introduced to unforgettable people living remarkable lives. Cowboys wander in a timeless desert. Scientists meet in secret to plot a new way to get attention, and money, from people. A man and his would-be lover try to find lions on safari, and more. The people and places in this book spring to life fully-formed and full of anxiety and imagination. They worry about the time they have had and the time they have left. They bury their loved ones and look for new friends. They talk and laugh and hope and cry and die, while their friends and family and enemies and Gods watch them, seeing, in their faces and actions and fears, a portrait of just exactly how life looks.
Claudius wanted to be the first man to reach the stars... and maybe he was. In a stunning psychological horror work, "Eclipse" unfolds slowly, beginning with Claudius drifting through space after something has gone wrong with his mission. As he stares at the only thing he can see, a tiny rock off in space, he mulls the events that led him here, reflecting on his childhood and the mission-turned-into-murder. Or did things go bad? As "Eclipse" unfolds, the reader is treated to a twisting, constantly changing landscape created by Claudius' own mind, as version after version of what-might-have-happened pile on. One thing is clear, though: Something has gone wrong, and Claudius may never reach the stars. Or will he?
Why will paying attention to Paris Hilton destroy the universe? How can one number be better than the other? Are saber teeth really necessary for a good movie monster? Would Hollywood as we know it exist if not for Jennifer Aniston's hair? These questions and more are asked, and answered, in the only book that dares to explain how jellybeans are related to the apocalpyse. Essays on pop culture, things that are The Best, and life show a provocative, and hilarious, way of looking at the world.
Life, only funnier: Here's the book you've been waiting for, assuming you've been waiting for a book about a guy who spends his time trying to prove velociraptors didn't exist, who teaches his kids to gamble and helps them with their homework by wondering what would happen if you cut a superhero in half, whose own wife said he would get a crocodile for a babysitter, who finds squid chili romantic, and who generally makes the most -- or the least? - -of his life.
That's really the best you could do, OJ Mayo? "A gas station energy drink"? Maybe there's a Mad Steroider going around injecting discount energy drinks with illegal performance enhancing drugs... just for kicks? Probably: that's why I stick with the Slushee. (TM).
I'm talking about OJ Mayo's 10-game suspension after testing positive for performance enhancing drugs; rather than go with the time-honored Family Circus "Not Me" ghost as the culprit, OJ Mayo took out our nation's proud 7-11 cashiers. Asked about the test results, Mayo blamed an (unnamed) energy drink he got at an (unnamed) local gas station:
"It was bad judgment on my behalf because I maybe should have gotten it checked out by Drew (Graham, the team's athletic trainer)," Mayo said in response to accusations that he'd taken the illegal substance mindfully. "It's not like I went to a GNC and got some kind of Muscle Armor or something. Or ordered some supplement off the Internet or anything...A local gas station got me hemmed up. I've definitely got to make better decisions. I admit to my mistake, and it's something I've got to deal with."
Now, as if to remind people that they should be talking about him, Packers QB Aaron Rodgers has shoved his way into the controversy, edging aside the other participants like they were so many cancer survivors in pink hats. From the USA Today report:
This time it's a comment — not a tweet — that's created another rift as the Green Bay Packers prepare for the Super Bowl. ...
The most recent hurt feelings in Green Bay began when Aaron Rodgers was asked during a five-minute media availability Saturday if he feels for his teammates on injured reserve because they can't take part in the run-up to the game next Sunday.
Rodgers made a point of saying that when he spent time on injured reserve in 2006, he stayed in Green Bay to finish the season instead of returning home to California...."I'll say this, I was on IR back in 2006 and I chose to stick around and finish out the season with my guys and be here every game. Some of those guys didn't...We love them, we care about them, we don't wish injury on anybody, but this is a group of guys that's really come together and it's been great to work with the guys we've brought in midseason, some of them, and the young guys....Some of the guys who were injured, they still are part of this team, but some of them didn't choose to stick around."
He managed to get all that in... in five minutes. Given five minutes with the media, The Anointed One opted to use a good portion of it to rip on some of his future teammates.
What's confusing is, if he felt that way, why did he intervene with McCarthy to get the photo moved? And don't give me that he was being a team leader: if he felt it was important that the team recognize those guys on IR, then he would not have (presumably) felt it was important to insult the guys on IR for not sticking with the team.
That quote is from Bill Maher, who's breaking it to the public that the NFL is socialized sports (And that collective gasp! you just heard might drown out the sound of monocles falling from the jowls of NFL owners.)
On his HuffPo column, Maher has a hilarious-- and true-- expose of how socialism made the NFL America's Most Popular Sport:
the NFL runs itself in a way that would fit nicely on Glenn Beck's chalkboard - they literally share the wealth, through salary caps and revenue sharing - TV is their biggest source of revenue, and they put all of it in a big commie pot and split it 32 ways. Because they don't want anyone to fall too far behind. That's why the team that wins the Super Bowl picks last in the next draft. Or what the Republicans would call "punishing success."
What do Republicans favor, according to Maher? Baseball, and it's protect-the-wealthy system:
Baseball, on the other hand, is exactly like the Republicans, and I don't just mean it's incredibly boring. I mean their economic theory is every man for himself. The small market Pittsburgh Steelers go to the Super Bowl more than anybody - but the Pittsburgh Pirates? Levi Johnston has sperm that will not grow up and live long enough to see the Pirates in a World Series. Their payroll is about $40 million, and the Yankees is $206 million. They have about as much chance at getting in the playoffs as a poor black teenager from Newark has of becoming the CEO of Halliburton. That's why people stop going to Pirate games in May, because if you're not in the game, you become indifferent to the fate of the game, and maybe even get bitter - that's what's happening to the middle class in America. It's also how Marie Antoinette lost her head.
Maher's absolutely right -- both about socialism being built into many American institutions (a point I made about a year ago, here) and about baseball being boring.
One point he missed is how much the NFL really is mirroring American society -- just as the public's right to health care is being attacked as socialism by rich people protecting richer people (see: GOP, Tea Parties), the NFL's current revenue sharing system is being attacked by the owners, with the likely result being that people's "right" to football will be taken away, too.
What's really alarming is that if you threaten to take away reforms that make it mandatory for insurance companies to cover pre-existing conditions so that people don't die of treatable health conditions because nobody will cover them, nobody bothers listening and we go elect Senators who think sunspots cause global warming.
But take away the NFL season, and people will get outraged in a way that makes Cairo look like your grandma's last book club gathering.
I was getting worried there... by my count, it was six consecutive weeks of smart coaching moves by Packers Head Coach Mike "Mike" McCarthy, and I was concerned that he might be able to keep it together long enough to get the Packers title number 4 and finally get Brett Favre's monkey off his back.
(" Brett Favre's monkey" is just a euphemism. Calm down, Jen Sterger.) I need worry no more, though: Even though it's the off-week, "Mike" is settling into his old routine of ensuring that his team won't be mentally prepared, this time through the novel tactic of calling some of his players whiners (and by extension, blaming the active players who helped the whiners.)
After Jermichael Finley and Nick Barnett moaned about getting a free trip to Dallas for no reason but being shut out of the team picture, notable Packers Aaron Rodgers and Charles Woodson visited Coach "Mike" and asked him to reconsider, and reconsider he did: The picture was moved to Friday rather than Tuesday.
All's well that ends well, right? Right -- unless you want to make sure that your team continues to be distracted, in which case you have to pick a fight with the injured players:
Green Bay Packers coach Mike McCarthy isn't thrilled with the way a couple of his injured players chose to express their disappointment about potentially being left out of the Super Bowl team photo, saying they made a "poor decision" when they complained about it in public.Still, the coach says it's no big deal for the team to take the photo late next week so those players can be included."If that's the biggest issue that we have in our preparation, we are going to have a hell of a week," McCarthy said Thursday. "So it's not that big of a deal."
(Source.) McCarthy says he checked with Ted Thompson, who told him they could take the picture anytime, so he moved it to Friday ... and then criticized the players, anyway.
To help you keep track: McCarthy could have picked any day, including after the injured players came down, for the picture. He chose to exclude them, then only included them after it made national news and the two best players on his team complained about it, after which he caved in but made a point to say how easy it was to switch it, and what babies the players are for crying about it in the first place.
I hadn't even gotten around to putting up a post about Lions LB Zack Follett calling Matt Stafford a china doll, and now, before I could put up something about how he's right and what that means for the Lions, he's gone and taken it back and blamed the whole thing on Satan. Which at least proves he's a clearer-headed thinker than Bills WR Steve Johnson. (If you're going to blame someone for screwing up your sports career, at least don't pick the person who can deny you entry to paradise. Am I right? Of course I'm right.)
With Leather has the latest news and a video that I tried to watch, but it was loaded on Vimeo and even with my new higher-speed connection I can't get the stupid thing to play, so screw you, Vimeo and Zack Follett: if you want to watch the video, click that link. If you want to read a snippet of what With Leather said before going on to what I think about it all, keep going:
[Follett] used Vimeo to make a response to his comment [about Stafford being a china doll], and it’s very worth watching as he stumbles through a bunch of stuff about Christianity and how Lucifer hates Matthew Stafford’s tinfoil shoulder so much....Follett goes on to say it’s an example of the battle between good and evil. Satan, failing to get him to succumb to lust, tempted him to lash back at his critics. “I’m like, ‘Satan, that’s all you got? That’s all you got, bro?’ ” Follett says.
If I can put on my Literal Glasses for a second, calling Satan a “bro” is probably the worst way possible to show that you’re a fervent Christian. You are literally (do I get points for using it correctly?) calling him your brother, and I’m no religion expert, but that’s not what you’re supposed to do.
The thing is, Follett's right. Stafford's missed 19 games in 2 seasons -- or more than half. I can recall the Milwaukee Brewers investing a lot of time and money in their often-hurt pitcher Ben Sheets, who was supposed to be phenomenal but to my recollection would break into tiny pieces everytime he pitched more than three consecutive balls. I don't think he ever went a season without going on IR.
Once a guy's been on IR for multiple weeks twice, he's done. He's too injured or too injury prone, and you're better off cutting ties and moving on. Stafford's shown some promise, but I'd bet anything he's never going to finish a season without missing 3+ games. Is that who the Lions want to base their future on? Even if Stafford's the best QB in the league -- he's not -- if he's only there 50% of the time, he's not worth it.
Last year, the Arizona Cardinals took issue with it during the Packers’ victory in the regular-season finale, when Rodgers scored on a 1-yard run. Even though Rodgers had done the move several times earlier in the season, the Cardinals were annoyed by it enough to splice video of the celebration into their Saturday night film study, showing the move over and over and over again for motivation in advance of their NFC Wild Card game against the Packers the next day.
After beating the Packers, 51-45, and winning in overtime when Karlos Dansby returned a Rodgers fumble for a touchdown, the Cardinals mimicked the move after the decisive score and crowed about how the silly move motivated them.
“Now Aaron Rodgers can go home and practice putting his little belt on and stuff, and go and shovel some snow out of their driveway,” outspoken defensive tackle Darnell Dockett said.
There seems to be something about pretend moves that particularly offends NFL players and commentators. Joe Buck still has the vapors over this:
But in any event, I can now suggest that in addition to the other moves I mentioned previously, Rodgers could perhaps mimic a DJ scratching on turntables -- one hand to an imaginary headset and one on an old-school LP.
I say that because Rodgers helped found a music label, "Suspended Sunrise Recording, LLC."
General manager Ted Thompson and coach Mike McCarthy traded Favre to the Jets last Aug. 6 because they felt Rodgers was ready to rock and roll.Little did they know the 25-year-old and buddy Ryan Zachary would start an alternative rock label, Suspended Sunrise Recordings.
The duo signed an Atlanta group called "Joy in Tomorrow."Rodgers is a self-taught guitarist whose playlist runs from Pearl Jam vocalist Eddie Vedder to Ryan Adams to country music.
"I'm definitely into singer/songwriters, a Jack Johnson, Ben Harper, Pete Murray," Rodgers said. "We came up with the name Suspended Sunrise because when you think of a sunrise, it's suspended in air, suspended in time. It's a cool image because it represents the beginning of a new day. Anything can happen."Sounds reminiscent of his hopes for his other band, the 2009 Packers, determined to rebound from 6-10 disappointment.
Rodgers wants to grow his new venture similar to how he's blossomed as a leader, distinct from Favre in how Rodgers invites teammates to his home weekly to foster team chemistry."Aaron came up with the Suspended Sunrise name and that new beginning is especially true after what he had to persevere through," Zachary, 25 said.
(Source.) That article notes that Rodgers plays guitar -- and he played on and produced this:
Not my kind of music, exactly, but not bad. (That comes perilously close to saying something nice about A-Rodg, so I'd better watch myself.)
Here's something I like a little better: One of his label's bands, "The Almost," with the song Monster, Monster:
It's got kind of a My Chemical Romance feel to it. Not bad.
The label's website -- which needs some work-- also says that Poema's album "Sing It Now" will be released on their label:
I like that one better. And here's Fair, "Disappearing World,"
(And, I know, record execs don't exactly go to clubs and mix tunes, making my celebration not-quite-right, but I didn't want to suggest that A-Rodg mimic riding in a limousine and sleeping with Mariah Carey, as that might draw a penalty for taunting.)
I mentioned this to Sweetie and she said "He's still an ass. I don't care if he owns a record label. He can own 20." Then she went off on a tear about how when we're rich, we're going to help people a lot and give money to charities, which I guess means that I won't, when I'm rich, be running a record label.
Over on ESPN today, writer David Fleming hints at (but doesn't come right out and say) the provocative thesis that the more criminal a team is, the better it will do at football. Examining the Steelers' background all the way back to the 70s, Fleming notes that the team's history has been marked by:
1. A lengthy background of employing players who also doubled as shotgun-toting, high-speed-chase having, allegedly-steroid using suicidal/homicidal sociopaths (a/k/a "The Steel Curtain")
and
2. The public generally not caring about all that stuff and thinking the Steelers are good guys after all.
Fleming notes that the Steelers have had 13 players arrested since they were last in a Super Bowl; the (relatively) clean Packers have had only five arrests in that time. He doesn't say what the arrests were for, so I did some investigation on my own and found:
Pittsburgh player arrests include public urination, a tantrum in a restroom, possession of marijuana, hitting a girlfriend, breaking down a girlfriend's door, running a prostitution ring,
Green Bay player arrests, meanwhile, were for things like possession of cocaine, battery, possession of firearms (that's practically a requirement under today's GOP) and assaulting an officer.
The article is worth reading, if only to see how far the Steelers have raised their moral high-ground; the same family that once bailed out a player who took a shotgun onto the highway and began shooting out people's tires now cuts players like Santonio Holmes for dumping a drink on a woman's head.
Also worth reading is something that Fleming only links to: The NFL Arrests Database, a searchable table compiled by the San Diego Union Tribune. You can sort by team, position, and other factors (that's where I got the specifics of the charges, above.) It's hard to get stats off of the list -- it's slow to manipulate and there's no totals -- but it's fun to page through and look at the stuff NFL players do off the field.
I didn't yet have time to see which team had the fewest arrests during the timespan on the table -- or to check to see whether more arrests correlates with more winning. But hopefully, someday soon?
(The quote for the title of this post comes from the article, but is attributed to Chad Millman, another ESPN writer.)
Getting to the Super Bowl has allowed Clay Matthews to finally achieve a lifelong dream.
No, not of getting to the Super Bowl. Of landing an endorsement deal for his hair.
Matthews, who earlier this week reminded America that he's in the market for helping market hair products, got his wish granted when Suave hired him to be its spokesmodel for a reformulated version of the shampoo, one aimed at men.
And by "expert," I mean my 19-year-old, who is currently a business student at MATC (she's planning on opening a bakery someday), and who goes by the name "Middle" on these blogs.
Middle hurt her knee a couple years ago trying out for the basketball team, and as I listened to person after person accuse Cutler of faking, or say he wasn't faking, I decided to consult with Middle, via this exchange of text messages which were definitely not sent while I was driving home from work yesterday:
Me: Didn't you tear your MCL?
Middle: ACL & MCL.
Me: Could you have played quarterback after you hurt it?
Middle: Not at all.
Me: Why not?
Middle: Cuz it hurt.
Me: Could you have run, if you didn't mind the pain? Or walk up stairs?
Middle: Stairs, yes. Run, no.
And that settles that: Jay Cutler's torn MCL (assuming it's torn for real, but why would the Bears' medical staff lie for him?) clearly was enough to keep him from finishing the NFC championship; if a 19-year-old future baker couldn't have QB'd the Bears, why would we expect Cutler to do it?
In all seriousness, the only reason people are down on Cutler is because he was behind, and not playing well, when he pulled himself/was pulled from the game. If Cutler had been playing well, but was behind, nobody would be criticizing him -- especially not Maurice Jones-Drew, who's really not somebody who should be talking about playing through pain. If Cutler had been playing badly, but the Bears had been leading, nobody would criticize him, either.
It's the combination of being behind/playing badly that leads people to assume Cutler didn't want to go back out and play -- people assuming that Cutler just didn't want to be blamed for the loss or his bad play and so he blamed it on an injury. I suspect that's the truth because that's what I thought.
I watched the game with Middle and The Boy and Oldest, and when I saw that Cutler wasn't going back in, I said "I wonder if he pulled himself out because he's playing so badly." I was serious, too -- and I won't claim I was just joking, like Mo-Jo. And I wouldn't have thought that if Cutler had been, say, 15 for 17 with two touchdowns at that point. And I'm pretty sure nobody else would've thought that, either.
So it's not really a question of whether Cutler should, or should not, have gone back out to play. It's more a question of why we all assume he'd just decided to take off in the most important game of his career; so far as I know, Cutler's had plenty of bad games, but hasn't always pulled himself out of them (for any reason) before this. And I know Cutler's missed games due to injury, but nobody accused him, then, of deciding to just quit on his team.
So why now? Is it because the game was so important? Is that why everyone says (as Mike Ditka did) that they would've played until dragged off the field?
Because think about this: if the game is so important, shouldn't Cutler have decided not to play with an injury that might make him less effective than his backup? Isn't that the real question, Trent Dilfer and Jones-Drew and you others? Whether he thought he could play well enough to help the team? Anyone can drag themselves onto the field and toss the ball around -- but team players don't engage in self-aggrandizing behavior, staying in the game when they're clearly not as effective as they could be. So the people who are shouting "They'd have to drag me off the field" not only are liars, but also might be hurting their team if they put themselves through that.
Consider Aaron Rodgers. (Here's the promised gratuitous attack!) I pointed out to The Boy, during the game, that The Anointed & Bearded One wasn't throwing all that accurately following his touchdown scramble during which he was knocked out of bounds. And it turns out I was right; Rodgers' shoulder was injured on the play.
Now look at the record. On the first drive, Rodgers completed passes of 22, 26, 22, and 6 yards before the run-in. On the next drive, Rodgers completed a short pass before throwing 3 incompletions. Rodgers completed a 21-yard pass on the drive after that, and didn't throw again that drive.
In the 2nd quarter, Rodgers completed four passes, of 16, 15, 9 and 9 yards. He threw incomplete a few times, and tossed that terrible interception to Urlacher. And so on; Rodgers finished 17 for 30 with a miserable passer rating of 55.4 -- completing only 56% of his passes for no touchdowns, a rating lower than Chicago's Caleb Hanie managed.
Nobody's saying Rodgers should have pulled himself out of the game -- but it seems obvious to me that it should have been considered, given that Rodgers' accuracy looked like it suffered after he took the hit diving into the end zone. But Rodgers stayed in the game, no doubt getting credit for his toughness, and because the Packers won (in spite of Rodgers' play, not because of it), nobody's questioning him.
While in this case many people (like me) jumped on the anti-Cutler bandwagon because we assumed that being behind, and not playing well, gave him motivation to simply quit, the assumption that we made -- that Cutler would quit on the most important game of his career -- was made because we didn't like Cutler in the first place.
Most of people's opinions about someone's actions come from what they think about the person. When Brett Favre has a miserable season and ends up injured and sitting out the final games, people say "He shouldn't have come back," because they didn't want him to -- and when he plays through injuries people like Gregg Easterbrook say he hurts his team by doing so and make ridiculous comments like starting Tarvaris Jackson would be better for the Vikings. Or, put another way, when Favre throws an interception to (effectively) end the Vikings' playoff run last year, people (because they don't like Favre) say that's proof he's no good -- but when Dog Killer Mike Vick thrown an interception to end the Eagles' playoff run this year, people (because they do like Vick) say that just shows what a competitor he is.
And when Jay Cutler, who apparently is not well liked, pulls himself out of the game because he's injured, people don't want to say "Boy, that must have been a tough thing to do, not playing in the biggest game of his career," they say he must be wimping out. But when A-Rodg, who people do like, plays (poorly) through a shoulder injury, we commend him on his toughness and nobody says "He should've sat down if he couldn't throw the ball right."
You'd expect that from fans; fans are idiots. I'd expect more from sportscasters and talk radio hosts and others, but apparently I'm setting my standards a little high.
That is, to be more specific, apparently, expecting sportscasters to not let personal feelings get in the way, and to also analyze whether staying in a game when one is injured is a good idea if the player can't perform at top level, is setting my standards a little high.
I used to read, but then Sweetie gave birth to twins, so for the past four years I've been spending most of my time assembling "Thomas The Tank Engine" sets and trying to remember what literature was like.
But if I did still have time to read, I'd definitely use it to read one of the books listed below, if I hadn't been the one to write them in the first place (so I know how they turn out.)
But you don't know how they end -- so why not buy one of the books below. Or, better yet, buy THREE, because if you buy any three of these, and email me proof of purchase at thetroublewithroy[at]yahoo.com, I'll send you the other two, free.
A shape-shifting demon torments children while their parents stand by. A widower haunted by the ghost of his wife tries to understand her requests. A baby stolen from his mother by gargoyles returns, full of hatred for the life he's led. A family of children raised by grave-robbing corpse stealers tries to discover a way out. An elderly man possesses the power of life and death in his retirement. These stories present images and people who will haunt your thoughts for a long time after you read them.
In Just Exactly How Life Looks you'll be introduced to unforgettable people living remarkable lives. Cowboys wander in a timeless desert. Scientists meet in secret to plot a new way to get attention, and money, from people. A man and his would-be lover try to find lions on safari, and more. The people and places in this book spring to life fully-formed and full of anxiety and imagination. They worry about the time they have had and the time they have left. They bury their loved ones and look for new friends. They talk and laugh and hope and cry and die, while their friends and family and enemies and Gods watch them, seeing, in their faces and actions and fears, a portrait of just exactly how life looks.
Claudius wanted to be the first man to reach the stars... and maybe he was. In a stunning psychological horror work, "Eclipse" unfolds slowly, beginning with Claudius drifting through space after something has gone wrong with his mission. As he stares at the only thing he can see, a tiny rock off in space, he mulls the events that led him here, reflecting on his childhood and the mission-turned-into-murder. Or did things go bad? As "Eclipse" unfolds, the reader is treated to a twisting, constantly changing landscape created by Claudius' own mind, as version after version of what-might-have-happened pile on. One thing is clear, though: Something has gone wrong, and Claudius may never reach the stars. Or will he?
Why will paying attention to Paris Hilton destroy the universe? How can one number be better than the other? Are saber teeth really necessary for a good movie monster? Would Hollywood as we know it exist if not for Jennifer Aniston's hair? These questions and more are asked, and answered, in the only book that dares to explain how jellybeans are related to the apocalpyse. Essays on pop culture, things that are The Best, and life show a provocative, and hilarious, way of looking at the world.
Life, only funnier: Here's the book you've been waiting for, assuming you've been waiting for a book about a guy who spends his time trying to prove velociraptors didn't exist, who teaches his kids to gamble and helps them with their homework by wondering what would happen if you cut a superhero in half, whose own wife said he would get a crocodile for a babysitter, who finds squid chili romantic, and who generally makes the most -- or the least? - -of his life.
Despite not technically doing much to help the team actually get to the playoffs, several Green Bay Packers are upset that they don't get to be included in the group photo the team will take next Tuesday. Yahoo! Sports has the story... and the indignant support their blogger gives to the whiners:
The Green Bay Packers official Super Bowl team picture will be 15 players short.
It was revealed earlier this week that the NFC champions won't be including players on injured reserve in the official photograph, a decision which has left some of those players upset.Nick Barnett and Jermichael Finley, who began the 2010 season as Green's starting inside linebacker and tight end, respectively, expressed their disappointment on Twitter after finding out the news.
I don't blame them. Even if you're one of the IR players who's not as valuable as Finley or Barnett, you still played a role in getting the team to the Super Bowl. There's no "IR" in team. It's ridiculous. Backup offensive lineman Evan Dietrich-Smith began the year in Seattle and signed with Green Bay on New Year's Eve. He gets to be in the team photo while Finley, the most valuable member of the team's offense not named Aaron Rodgers, doesn't?
The Packers say it's important for the players to continue their rehab, and intend to have the IR players there on the sidelines during the game itself, but that's apparently not enough for Barnett, Finley, and others who would like their noncontribution to the big game to be noted for posterity.
For the record, Yahoo! blogger, Barnett was injured in the 4th game, while Finley (who's shown in the picture on this post, "contributing") went down in week 5. While the two played a role in those games, calling Finley "the most valuable member of the team's offense not named Aaron Rodgers" is a bit hyperbolic. That title obviously goes to the long snapper.
Before I get around to posting today's update on who Aaron Rodgers likes or doesn't like -- it never ends, does it? -- I thought I'd provide you with a stirring Packer-related anthem and related Packer-booster mis-reporting.
First, the song: It's "Go Pack Go," by "The 6 Packers,"
... and that's a group name that took me a couple of seconds to figure out -- I tried at first to think of who the six Green Bay Packers would be, before realizing it meant "sixpack," like beer. Don't hold it against me: I don't drink, so I don't get your drinking-culture references as readily.
The ubiquitous Green Bay Packers fight song "Go Pack Go!" has been updated by two members of the platinum-selling band Garbage, and the anthem is getting heavy rotation on local radio.
Calling themselves The 6 Packers, Madison-based Garbage members Butch Vig and Duke Erikson, along with guitar tech Chad Zaemish of Stoughton, put out the new "Go Pack Go" before the NFC Championship Game.
The stadium-ready song features driving, fuzzy guitar riffs by Zaemish, interspersed with DJ scratching by Vig, a prominent music producer. Erikson plays bass on the track and Vig bangs the drums. Zaemish also handles the lead vocals — Garbage lead singer Shirley Manson is absent
The part I bolded is the really inaccurate part; if you go to the page where I found that video for Go Pack Go, you'll see that the song was released at least some time before June 14, 2008, which is when "OCKnightQB" posted that video.
If you like the song, regardless of when the Wisconsin State Journal thinks it was released, you can get a free download of it here.
Commenter "Mike King" took issue with my taking issue with The Anointed (And Now Bearded) One's failure to acknowledge an elderly fan:
why dont you get a life and stop picking through everything that aaron rodgers does. your probably just mad because hes going to the super bowl and had to beat your team to get there. hes signed things for her before so shut up and worry about things that matter
A. The beard he sported in Sunday's game doesn't look stupid... yet. But he's got to keep growing it now for two weeks, so he's going to give Obi Wan (a/k/a The Amish Rifle) a run for his money.
B. He's dating her:
That's Jessica Szohr, who you may know from Piranha 3-D:
Sweetie says she's not very pretty -- Sweetie said that, not me, Mike King -- but I think she kind of grows on you.
First, there's Green Bay's B.J. Raji in what I hope will eventually be called "Teach Me How To Raji":
And then there's THIS, from the Steelers-Jets game:
And while I said they NEED no commentary, they can certainly benefit from some expert commentary, such as this quote from The Superficial about that Roethlisbergerian moment:
Last night, the Pittsburgh Steelers essentially cornered the drunk New York Jets in a club restroom and sort of “blacked out” for a minute. And while the championship game had numerous highlights, including Mark Sanchez wiping a booger on his teammate, nothing stood out more than Rashard Mendenhall celebrating the Steelers’ victory by essentially ambushing Ben Roethlisberger and dry-humping him in the butt. Because that’s exactly what that guy needed. A viral video of mock rape as literally 80% of America filmed their televisions with their phones and uploaded it to YouTube. If there was a list of things Ben Roethlisberger needed to not happen yesterday, I’m pretty sure that was at the top, just below hearing a woman say “no.”
And, as an added bonus -- even though the post-title said "Two best," I've thrown in this you-may-have-missed-it clip of two-time Bridesmaid Mark Sanchez:
Despite the fact that there are many, many things she's not appearing in or at, somehow, it's become news... or at least "news", that Kristin Cavallari won't be appearing at the Bears-Packers game today, despite being in love with Bears QB Jay Cutler.
Kristin, who's best known for being the first of the MTV reality-show stars to not be able to turn shallowness into a sustained career, was interviewed at "The Bank," a nightclub in Las Vegas, and Celebslam has the details on her relationship with the weakest-chinned QB I've ever seen and how she's too busy not being famous to attend the game:
"I want to be there," she said. "I'm bummed that I'm not there and he's not here. Things are really good. I'm just enjoying my personal life and taking a little time away from the public eye, which is why Chicago is great for me. My mom and that whole side of the family is there. And Jay is there. It's nice to be able to hang out with my mom, and, you know, I'm in love and it's been great."
"And Jay is there... and, you know, I'm in love." It sure sounds serious. Maybe we could all help put these two lovebirds together today by pointing out that the "public eye" hasn't been watching Kristen, at all.
