Monday, October 02, 2006

Random Thoughts from the Weekend

I haven't written for a few days due to A) my C drive crashing and having to re-install Windows, B) general busy-ness and C) being out of town in Columbus for my final shoulder check up and Iowa game (basketball was played).

I've missed a lot, let's review:

1. Terrell Owens. Does it make me a bad person that I don't care? I really don't. I kinda feel bad for the guy, but you know what my first thought was? "Well, I guess I'm not watching ESPN at all today". Seriously, I heard this news and I was preemptively sick of ESPN's coverage. I had the radio on during the day and the two Cleveland talk shows were just awful. Kenny Roda (who I normally don't mind) was speculating that maybe Owens was gay. Awesome. And Mike Trivisonno? His take on the whole thing was that Terrell Owens was a piece of shit. Triv was totally blown away by Owens not liking his quarterback in Philly, Donovan McNab. Why was Trivisano hung up on this you ask? Because both men are black and he couldn't grasp that a black reciever couldn't like a black QB.

2. I agree with the boys at Deadspin on the whole Owens mess:

Is Kim Etheredge the worst publicist of all time, or is she merely a decent human being? And, perhaps more pressing: Is it possible that she's the former because she's the latter?

Let's take a look again at the facts that we know from the police report, which, no matter how many people try to tell you otherwise, has absolutely no reason to lie. (Unless, of course, it's an O.J.-style frame job to convince the world that Owens is suicidal. Hey, it's Texas, it's possible.)

Etheredge, Owens' personal publicist, found him last night disoriented and/or overdosing on medication. She told police that he said he was "depressed" and that a prescription for 40 pain bills had been filled earlier that week. Before this exact incident, Owens had taken five pain pills. Etheredge now realized they were all gone, and she watched Owens put two pills in his mouth, which she tried to extract. The police, witnessing the empty bottle, asked him if he had taken them. He said "yes." He was asked if he was trying to harm himself. He said "yes."

3. Sometimes I really, really hate ESPN. Sometimes ESPN will set itself on a story or narrative and just goes overboard. They'll beat a story to death. They're really the only sports network out there, so when they get to choose what a lot of the big stories are. Like Terrell Owens. The past few year this has been an overload. They'll hammer the same story time after time, to the point where the viewer (or at least Ben Cox, blogger) are sick to death of it. Really, another Barry Bonds leak? Terrell Owens may have missed practice, let's go to Ed Werder. There's a ton of pro and college teams out there, I would love some more indepth coverage of those teams, not Barry Bonds, Terrell Owens and Jerome Bettis hailing from Detroit.

4. It happened again with this past week's Monday Night Game in New Orleans. The entire pre-game and broadcast was full of sportscasters proclaiming how wonderful this is to be back in New Orleans and how wonderful the Superdome is. "This is more than just a football game, we're watching history" Really? History? Sure, it's a national broadcast from a city that was devastated. But please, just because the Superdome is up and running doesn't mean that things are back to normal in New Orleans. I know that they tried to mention things still weren't perfect, but I feel like that got drowned out in the whole "MNF in New Orleans, we're back, baby!" narrative. Part of me feels gravely cynical that the football stadium is one of the first things 'fixed' in New Orleans (and I know that a convention center like the Superdome can draw in revenue and people). But there are so many things still wrong there, still not fixed and seeing a 3 hour love fest for the NFL returning just irked me a bit. It came off as a little too self congratulatory for my tastes.

5. Ohio State looked damn good during Saturday night's win over Iowa.

6. I think one of the key sequences in the game happened at the very beginning. Iowa recieved the ball to start the game and OSU made them go 3 and out. OSU promptly marched the ball down field to score the games first touchdown. Iowa's fan were so pumped up and excited for this game, if Ohio State came out flat, they could've been in for a long night. The 3 and out followed by the TD set the tone for the night and sobered up some of the Iowa fans real quick.

7. The defense is full of big play guys. These guys force a lot of turnovers and can get to the QB very well. However, they still had a bit of trouble with the run (but I don't think that will be much of a problem until the Michigan game). Gholston is huge, he tackled a dude with one arm!

8. Have you heard that Anthony Gonzalez sleeps in a tent? And just breaking: I hear Craig Krenzel was a molecular genetics major.

9. Smith's yards weren't that spectacular, only 186, but he did have 4 TDs. His TD-INT ratio is 12/2. That's pretty good.

10. Seriously, how can OSU not be the unanimous number 1 team? There's one guy in the coaches poll who is gave a number one vote to Auburn and the AP poll has Aurbun getting a vote and West Viriginia getting two. Really? #4 West Virginia? They've played Marshall, Eastern Washington, Maryland and at freaking East Carolina. #3 USC? They've played at Arkansas, #19 Nebraska, at Arizona and at Washington State. And #2 Auburn? They've played Washington State, at Mississippi State, #6 LSU, Buffalo and at South Carolina. How can any of these teams receive number one votes? Ohio State played Northern Illinois (who has the Heisman candidate?), at #2 Texas, Cinncinati, #24 Penn State and at #13 Iowa. Ohio State has played 3 top 25 teams, two of them on the road (and at night!) and beaten them all by a pretty good margin. But West Virginia trashing East Carolina shows someone out there that they deserve that number 1 vote.

11. And just becuase it cracks me up,#7 Texas has played: North Texas, #1 Ohio State, at Rice, Iowa State and Sam Houston State. Now that is a schedule. And Lou Holtz went on ESPN and said if OSU played Texas now, Texas would win. Apparently, playing cupcake teams is a great way to prepare yourself for the #1 ranked team in the nation. Who knew?

12. Ohio State had a pretty back breaking September schedule, but it looks like they'll be coasting until Michigan week:
Bowling Green
at Michigan State
Indiana
Minnesota
at Illinois
at Northwestern
That shouldn't be too bad. The only game that is remotely troubling on that list is Michigan State. But right now they don't look like they're in the right frame of mind to beat the Buckeyes.

13. I hope Ohio State gets to face an undefeated Michigan at the end of the season. By that point OSU would have smacked around a ton of weak teams and if Michigan is undefeated then there is no chance of them overlooking the Wolverines.

14. That being said, if Michigan loses, I won't exactly not enjoy it.

15. This will blow your mind.

16. The Browns won a football game, let's not get too crazy.

17. I'm with The Hornless Rhino on this, I'm gonna have a hard time finding what games the Browns should win:
5 Sun, Oct 8 at Carolina


6BYE WEEK
7 Sun, Oct 22 Denver


8 Sun, Oct 29 NY Jets


9 Sun, Nov 5 at San Diego


10 Sun, Nov 12 at Atlanta


11 Sun, Nov 19 Pittsburgh


12 Sun, Nov 26 Cincinnati


13 Sun, Dec 3 Kansas City


14 Thu, Dec 7 at Pittsburgh


15 Sun, Dec 17 at Baltimore


16 Sun, Dec 24 Tampa Bay


17 Sun, Dec 31 at Houston
Um, Denver or the Jets at home should be winnable, but I wouldn't be putting money on the Browns those weeks. The two 'gimmes' on this look like week 16 and 17 with Tampa Bay and Houston. But who knows, at that point we could be into week 5 of the Ken Dorsey era (pssst Frye gets sacked a lot).

18. I seem to say this every week, but if the Browns draft Brady Quinn I'm gonna explode. Seriously, the line still isn't good, and if the Browns can't get Adrian Peterson, draft linmen. Trade down and draft more linemen. Quarterback isn't this teams problem, keeping him upright is.

19. The defense looked a lot better this week, but I sorta feel that's because they faced Oakland. I mean, when Bodden went out that meant Ralph Brown was guarding Randy Moss. Sweet God in Heaven.

20. Frye looked great at times and notsogreat at others. He had 3 TDs, but also 2 INTs. His first INT was a deep ball that he overthrew, but Oakland got it on their own 9. Those interceptions I don't mind, sure it was first down, but it's like a punt and at least they were airing it out.

21. The second INT? Ugh, that was ugly. Frye eluded the sack, ran towards the sideline and heaved the ball across the field (and his body) into the endzone. Every Browns fan watching that play was yelling "No no no no no no #%*@*!!!" Call me an optimist, but at least that's an INT that you can fix easily ("Next time, throw it away Charlie"). That was just a young kid trying to make a play. It wasn't like he couldn't read a defense or something, he was just scrambling and trying to do too much.

22. I hope ESPN devotes as much time to the Roger Clemens steroid saga as they did to Barry Bonds.

23. Have you heard about Florida Congressman Mark Foley (R-Pedophile)? I'm not sure how best to explain this, but here goes: He sent creepy emails and sexually explicit IM's (warning, not safe for lunch) to a 16 year old Congressional Page. But it turns out he's been doing this for a while (2001?) and the House leadership has basically sat on their ass and did nothing. Well done.

24. Seriously, watch Studio 60 tonight. So far the show has been pretty damn good. I can't wait til the show gets on its feet and into a groove (once all the background stories get explained).

25. Last night's Venture Bros. was freaking insane. The Scooby Doo gang had a cameo and it was glorious. If you missed it yesterday, you can watch it for free at Adult Swim Fix.

26. Speaking of cartoons, so far I have not been impressed with the new Simpsons, Family Guy or American Dad. None of them have been any good, but Family Guy has been awful for a little while now (starting with that Tom Brady episode last season). I always enjoyed that Sunday night cartoon block...

27. PC Magazine's Top 99 undiscovered websites.


28. I listened to Norm MacDonald's new album, Ridiculous, and I have to say, I enjoy it. It's a sketch comedy album (most comedy albums now are standup). There are some sketches that work, some that don't. But I recommend it.

29. Cavs stuff:

a) I basically agree with everything Terry Pluto says here. Sure, Z isn't the greatest center out there, but he doesn't suck. He has some old man post moves and a decent jumper, utilize it.

b) I'm still waiting to attempt my virgin story over at Real Cavs Fans. I seem to be looking for, you know, stuff to happen.

c) new floor!

d) I think Shannon Brown will really help the Cavs this year. He'll sure make Cavs fans forget the name Flip Murray!

e) Varejao seems healthy, which is neat

30. I just finished Dune. I've always meant to read this series but I never got around to it until now. Really, really good. It's one of science fiction's classics. It's very political (royal family fueds and such) and almost environmental. I'm plowing through the second book right now. It is awesome.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Did anybody else get the feeling that Randy Moss was majorly half-assing it out there Sunday? The announcers even commented on that.

Moss should have schooled Daven Holly and the scrub brigade. But the Browns corners played him to a draw and did a nice job of breaking up some passes intended for Moss.

I'm glad the Browns won, and I'll take a half-assed effort from Moss any day he's playing the Browns. But honestly, if his pilot light has gone out, he should just retire.

Ben said...

I think he has a hard time motivating himself with Aaron Brooks and Andrew Walter throwing him the ball.

They aren't competitive and I think that if Moss ended up on a good team, he'd be playing his ass off.

Maybe not playing his ass off, but at least trying sometime. The Raiders really suck, and if Moss tries his best maybe they improve to 'kinda suck', a focused Moss could give them an extra win or two, but that might give them a total of... a win or two.

Simmons wrote the other day that he'd trade the pick from Seattle to Oakland for Moss. That'd be nice for Randy.