My Favorite New Picture

Hey Michael Phelps, Let’s Party!

Everyone does it.  Well, I didn’t.

I never thought I would be able to say that I could do anything that Michael Phelps could not, but today I realize that I can do something that he can never do.  I can say that I have never done drugs.  He, obviously, cannot.

I have made some mistakes I my life.  I remember drinking a few times when I was in high school.  I remember driving recklessly on some occasions, and regrettably I remember doing both on a couple of occasions.  I remember bullying one kid a little, and I regret that also, but for the most part I was a good kid.

I had lots of friends, and tons of acquaintances.  As a result, during my junior and senior years I was invited to several parties.  At these, there would always be alcohol, and occasionally the stakes were higher.

I remember one night several of my friends did something pretty stupid.  There were five of us.  We had just purchased food at the local Taco Bell, and we were about to get into the car to leave when a car full of hot girls pulled up and started to talk to us.  No lie.  It was like a scene out of Porky’s or something.  They were leaning and yelling out of the windows of the car, “Hey, do you guys want to go to a party?”  As God is my witness, it happened just like that.  Of course, if we had taken just a moment to analyze the situation, we would have noticed that: 1) no of us were the studs of our high school (though we were not horribly disfigured), 2) these girls were really nice looking, 3) and they looked a little older than us.  No, we did not consider any of this, because we were 16 year old boys full of hormones.

So, we hopped in the car and followed them.  We drove to an apartment out by Lewisville Lake, and followed them into it.  Several things were instantly apparent.  First, this was no sorority bash.  All of the girls had boyfriends there, and the boyfriends did look older than us.  Second, we were not prepared for a party in any way.  We had no alcohol of any kind, and the partiers were not offering any.  And third, these people were doing a lot more than drinking.  There were several couples engaging in what was sure to become sex at some point, and the smell of pot was in the air.  I was confused at first, not knowing what to do, then a girl offered me a pill.  It was ecstasy.  I was not prepared, but since I had decided long before that I did not want to ever do drugs, I was able to fall back on my default answer, “No thanks.”  A friend and I sat with our backs near the door for a while watching what was going on and feeling uncomfortable.  Finally I suggested that we leave which we did.  Honestly, these kinds of stupid decisions are how people end up in 55 gallon barrels at the bottom of a lake.  We had no idea where these girls were taking us or what would happen when we got there.

On another occasion, I went to a party with some friends at a house where a member of the quasi-successful local area band ESFM (the Electric Sheep Farming Method- no lie) had the house to himself (no parents) for the weekend.  This time I was in a place where I knew all of the people, and they liked me.  I had brought some alcohol, and was drunk before long.

There were about two dozen people at the party, and after a while, I noticed that they were all taking turns stepping out into the backyard.  They were smoking pot, and after a few minutes, one of my friends asked me if I wanted some.  This was my big opportunity, and it was the situation where most kids fall.  I was with friends, and they were having a good time.  All I had to do was say, ‘yes,’ but I was faced with my own reasons that I had determined long before that day.  I knew that some things could limit you and your future possibilities in life, and pot was one of those things.  Since I did not know exactly what I wanted to be in life, I reasoned that I shouldn’t do anything that would limit my possibilities.  So, I said, “No, that’s OK.”

I was expecting a scene out of Reefer Madness or some after school special to unfold in which they all surrounded me and ritualistically ostracized me from the group while baiting me into taking the drugs at the same time.  It did not happen.  In fact, they were extremely nice about it.  Honestly, at the time I believed that they were actually going outside to smoke for my benefit.  In retrospect, it seems more likely that they did not want pot smell to permeate the house for the parents of the guy who lived there to smell when they returned.  I stayed at the party and enjoyed myself with my friend late into the evening.

These little victories were important in a teen ager’s battle not to partake in what everyone else was doing, and they made me feel good about myself, and stronger if I should have had to face the same thing again.  I thought that I was the only one, but I still have a friend that I met about a year later who also says that he never did drugs, and I’m sure that he had opportunities (being in a band well into his late twenties).

This brings me to the Michael Phelps situation.  It’s a real shame.  Here we had a young man that could have been the poster-boy for clean, positive, American achievement, and he lost it all when he put his mouth on a bong like everyone else at the party was doing.  It can’t be undone, and the pictures can’t be unseen.  In so many ways, Michael Phelps proved how different and stronger he was that the average human being.  His discipline can probably be only matched by a few people in the world.  However, he knew what the consequences of smoking pot were for him.  His handlers had warned him over and over, but he chose to do so anyway.  He chose to be just like everyone else, average.  And now, his incredible Olympic legacy will forever be tainted by a picture of him with dumb-face toking on a bong.  Sad.

Super Bowl XLIII Ads Reviewed

 

Every year, I watch the Super Bowl, as much for the commercials, as for the game.  And, every year a couple of my friends and I get together after the game, and discuss our opinions of the commercials that were shown that year.  This year, I decided to bring these opinions to my blog, and so I have written a list of my favorite and least favorite commercials for the year.

I will try to stay away from commercials that are not new (though I am a big DVR watcher, and it is very possible that I would have simply missed a commercial up to this point), and I will ignore commercials that do not try to be ‘Super Bowl quality’ commercials.  I also will ignore the car commercials for the most part.  To make either list (good or bad), I have to feel like the people who made the commercial were trying, and not just buying time to run the same old commercials for the same old campaign that they always do.

Let’s face it, when it comes to Super Bowl commercials, it’s all about the humor.  Most of the great Super Bowl commercials over the years have had some comedy element to them.  Sometimes there may be one that has good CG that makes it stand out, but CG is so good today that we have become used to it to the point that we just expect it.

Top 5:

5. The Carlos Boozer commercial for Overstock.com where he shows the difference between ‘bling’ and an Olympic gold medal was poignant.

4. The Pepsi Max ‘I’m Good!’ commercial was funny and had a nice use of visual humor; something that is easily abused in a commercial.

3. The Conan O’Brien Bud Light commercial where he does a freaky commercial that is only supposed to be seen in Finland was hilarious.

2. The Pepsi MacGruber/Pepsuber commercial with Will Forte was brilliant.  I loved it.

1. The Bridgestone commercial with Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head was brilliant. 

Bottom 5:

5. The obtuse Cheetos commercial with Chester, the pigeons, and the irritating lady on the cell phone was too weird, and the timing was off.

4. The 3D Sobe commercial with the dancing football players was terrible.  They must have spent all of their money on the effect.

3. All three (1, 2, 3) of the boorish, tiresome Budweiser Clydesdale commercials

2. Both, but especially the second of the two Go Daddy commercials with Danika Patrick

1. The horrible Teleflora commercial where the flowers in the box insult the lady reminded me of a horrid Jared Jewelry commercial.  It will be my worst of the Super Bowl simply because of the awful message.  They should be ashamed.

See all the Super Bowl ads here.

Before the Game:

Hit- When I saw the E-Trade commercial with the little kid, I thought, “Not these tired ads again.”  However, by the end of it, I thought it was pretty funny.  I’m sure all of the golfers will be calling each other “Shankapotumus” for the next few months.

Hit- The Samsung commercial where the guy loved the Cowboys so much that he became an usher so that he could sneak out of church an listen to the game was funny also.

Miss- The commercial with Lebron James daydreaming that he was a Cleveland Brown was a good idea but sort of fizzled.

Hit- The McDonalds Charities commercial where the girl gave the pennies out her loafers was nice.

First Quarter:

Hit- The Bud Light commercial where the guy was thrown out the window for suggesting that they could save money by not buying Bud Light for every meeting was sort of funny.

Hit- The Audi commercial that showed car chases moving through the decades was clever.

Hit- The Bob Dylan/Hip Hop commercial for Pepsi was clever and nostalgic.

Miss- The Doritos ‘Snow Globe’ commercial tried to be funny, but it was just bad.

Hit- The Conan O’Brien Bud Light commercial where he does a freaky commercial that is only supposed to be seen in Finland was hilarious.

Hit- The Bridgestone commercial with Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head was brilliant.  It was easily my favorite commercial of the first quarter.

Miss- The Castrol Edge commercial featuring a guy who had a group of monkeys become devoted to him after he used the product was weird and unfunny.

Second Quarter:

Miss- The Doritos commercial which had a guy who suddenly had powers that were associated with crunching a Doritos’ chip was better than the first one, but still nothing to write home about.

Miss- The Go Daddy commercial with a showering Danika Patrick was the same old tired thing from them.  They need a new idea.  Guys, Danika was already in Sports Illustrated.  I saw the pics.  They were OK.

Hit- The Pepsi Max ‘I’m Good!’ commercial was funny and had a nice use of visual humor; something that is easily abused in a commercial.

Miss- The Pedigree ‘Maybe you should get a dog was a good try, but a miss.

Miss- It’s time to put the Clydesdales out to pasture.  I just don’t care about them, or the fact that they can fetch.  Not funny.

Miss- Budweiser has a history of staying with a commercial idea until everyone hates it (see the fogs, lizards and the Bud Bowl– I just threw up in my mouth).  The commercial where the Clydesdale follows the white horse that he is in love with was worse than the first one.  It’s time to send this commercial to the glue factory.

Miss- The Gatorade “G” commercial gets an ‘A’ for star power and an ‘F’ for delivery and presentation.  I’ll bet it cost them a mint.

Hit- The cars.com where a guy named David Abernathy is a child prodigy but needs help buying a car was clever.

Hit- The E-Trade commercial featuring the two babies, one of which was singing, “Take These Broken Wings” was a good one.  I did not like these commercials in years past, but they seem to have stepped it up this year.

Miss- The Bud Light Drinkability commercial where the guy used the telestrator was not funny at all.

Miss- I don’t know how you can incorporate Death into a commercial and end up with an unfunny product, but H&R Block was able to do so.

Miss- The horrible Teleflora commercial where the flowers in the box insult the lady reminded me of a horrid Jared Jewelry commercial.  It will be my worst of the Super Bowl simply because of the awful message.  They should be ashamed.

Miss- The obtuse Cheetos commercial with Chester, the pigeons, and the irritating lady on the cell phone was too weird, and the timing was off.

Halftime:

Incomplete- The 3D Monsters vs. Aliens commercial looked good, but I did not have the 3d glasses, so it looked a little fuzzy.  Pixar is always great, though.

Miss- The 3D Sobe commercial with the dancing football players was terrible.  They must have spent all of their money on the effect.

Honorable mention- The Heroes commercial with John Elway was kind of funny.  I’m sure it would have been better if I had watched the show.

Miss- I just do not care about the Toyota Tundra or the commercials that they choose to run for it.

Miss- The Priceline commercial with Shatner as Cyrano De Bergerac was not bad, but the premise is too tired for the Super Bowl.

Hit- The Carlos Boozer commercial for Overstock.com where he shows the difference between ‘bling’ and an Olympic gold medal was poignant.

Hit- The ‘Milosh wants to play for…’ commercial for American Airlines made me smile.

Third Quarter:

Miss- I don’t even know what Coke was trying to do with this commercial, but obviously they spent a lot of money again this year animating a failure.

Miss- The Bridgestone commercial where the tires are stolen off the moon rover was not funny.

Hit- The mob-styled commercial for Denny’s where the guy is contemplating the fate of a rat while the waitress finishes putting a smiley face on his pancakes was surprisingly funny.

Miss- Unfortunately, Monster.com proved that comic timing can be so off, that even a guy sitting under the ass of a moose can fail to be funny.

Miss- Apparently, the only cure for the Budweiser Clydesdale commercials is the cure that is used for most horse ailments, a twelve gauge.  The Scottish one was just as tiring as the rest.

Hit- I found the 60 second Career Builder commercial to be funny, but I expected more since they had this much time to work with.

Hit- I still do not understand why Coke keeps making the Pixar-style commercials that seem to have little purpose.  That all being said, I liked the one with the insects in the third quarter of the game.

Miss- I don’t care that Kellogg’s is rebuilding fields.

Hit- The Usama Young NFL commercial was enjoyable.

Hit- I hate the Jack commercials for Jack in the Box, so I got giddy when I saw Jack’s cracked head on the pavement in front of a bus.  I thought the lines from the lacky talking on the phone were funny too.  If this is Jack in the Box’s way of getting rid of Jack, this may end up as my favorite commercial ever.  However, if this is just the start of a ‘save Jack’ campaign, I may not live through it.  I will reserve judgment.

Fourth Quarter

Hit- I generally hate the Coke Zero commercials, but this modern take on the old Mean Joe Green commercial with Polamalu was funny, except for the Coke Zero guys which, as usual, were a whip.

Hit- The Cash for Gold commercial, though funny, was a little uncomfortable with the references to all of the bankrupt celebrities.  It seemed like they were taking advantage a little.

Miss- I care even less about GE and their ‘eco-savings’ than I did about Kellogg’s building fields.

Hit- The Hulu commercial with Alec Baldwin was a little weird, but they get an ‘A’ for getting their message out and explaining their product.

Miss- GE, I just don’t care about your wind energy.

Hit- The Pepsi MacGruber/Pepsuber commercial with Will Forte was brilliant.  I loved it.

Miss- Someone needs to tell the Bud Light Lime people that the whole ‘walking around and having an effect on the world around me because of the product I am wearing or have with me’ has been done many times before, and recently, and better.

Miss- I thought the first Danika Go Daddy commercial was bad, but this one was terrible.

Jim Rice Polutes the Baseball Hall of Fame

Anyone from outside of the Northeast who likes baseball will eventually get beaten down by the Eastern media bias.  I had some feeling of this growing up, but really had it drilled home with Ken Burns’ Baseball.  You would have thought that there were only three teams in baseball as Burns waited until the last hour of the program to acknowledge the existence of any great player outside of Boston or New York.  I actually think I saw the great Nolan Ryan’s face flash past the screen in a montage, but I was not sure.

The problem is two fold.  Great players from teams outside of the Northeast have to be that much greater to even be considered for the Hall of Fame.  While it seems like Players for that Yankees and Red Sox simply have to be good for a long period, and be likable to make it into the Hall of Fame (see Wade Boggs). 

Today, we are told that Jim Rice will be in the Hall of Fame.  I don’t have any problem with a person saying that Jim Rice was a very good baseball player, but he does not deserve to be in the Hall of Fame.  Put him in your team’s Ring of Honor if you wan to, but not in the Hall of Fame.

He did not reach any of the ‘benchmarks’.  He did not have 3000 hit.   He did not even have 2500 hits (2452).  He did not have 500 home runs (382).  There is no justification for his inclusion, and it cheapens the Hall of Fame.

I looked at a few other players in comparison.  Reuben Sierra and Al Oliver are two Texas Rangers who have never sniffed the Hall of Fame, and rightly so.  Oliver had a 303 batting average, 2743 hits, 219 home runs, and 1326 RBIs in 18 seasons.  Sierra had a 268 average, 1322 RBIs, 2152 hits and 306 home runs in 20 seasons (he played less than 50 games in 11 of these).  These players are not as good as Jim Rice, but they compare with him, and the point is that they obviously do not belong in the Hall of Fame.

Ricky Henderson obviously does belong in the Hall of Fame.  He hit a benchmark with his 3055 hits while compiling the most stolen bases in history.  That’s it.  He’s in the Hall because he did what it took to get there.  Unfortunately, players like the great Ted Williams and Carl Yastrzemski will now have to have their names spoken in the same breath with Jim Rice.  Am I the only one that sees the wrongness of this?

New Nicknames for some of the Cowboys

Yesterday, I watched as once again, it was proved that it is more important to have heart than talent.  It was the poorest showing by a Cowboy team in the biggest game that I can remember.  The worst part is that this team is indeed very talented, and this year, the NFL is as wide open as I ever remember it.

As I sat watching the game (if you want to call it that), I cam up with some nicknames that I thought might be appropriate for several of the players that graced the Cowboy’s roster this year.  Enjoy:

Tony Romo– “Intentional Grounding Gump“-  There is so much to consider with this guy.  He can not seem to hit the broad side of a barn, and when ever teams keep him in the pocket, he has no idea what he should do.  The whole ‘golly-gee’ bit was cute at first, but he needs to realize that he is now a $60,000,000 quarterback on the biggest team in sports.  I really wonder about how bright he really is.  I keep expecting him to tell Adrea Kramer that ‘life is like a box of chocolates.’

T.O.- “Big Mouth”–  Shut up and catch the ball every now and then.

Roy Williams- “Big Nothing”- And, that’s exactly what the Cowboys got for their trade with the Lions.

Flozell Adams- “Big Early”- No one commits as many illegal motion penalties as the big guy.

Jason Witten- “Little Early”- No one, that is, except for our starting tight end.

Andre Gurode- “Surprise!”- He has the uncanny ability to surprise defenses as well as his own quarterback with his ill-timed snaps.  And, if Romo looks ready, he’ll just snap it right over his head.

Nick Folk- “90 Degrees”- Possesses the strange quality of being able to kick the ball at a right angle.  This is not so bad for Cowboy fans though, because in this case the opposing team only gets to start on the 40 yard line.

Sam Paulescu- “Minus 20”-  This name refers to the 20 yards that the Cowboys give up in field position because this guy is punting instead of Matt McBriar.

Pacman Jones- “Latitude”- He only runs East/West.

Terrence Newman- “Tunnel Vision”-  This refers to Newman’s innate ability to stick to a receiver like glue. watching his eyes intently as the ball sails over his own should and into the receiver’s arms.

Miles Austin- “What The Hell Were You Thinking On That Pitch!”

Feel free to leave any that you might think of.

Does the Constitution Say Anything About Grooming Issues?

There are several reasons that it would be good to go back to the 1950s.  One of these involves grooming issues.  Back then, a man wore his hair short, the only way his barber knew how to cut it.  Of course, there was the occasional ‘greaser,’ but even those guys had nice hair by today’s standards.

It was the 60s and hippies that destroyed hair in America.  The 70s were just an extension of the 60s and in the 80s hairstyles were just a mistake.  It took us until the end of the 1980’s and the introduction of the show “Friends” to finally get a handle on hairstyles once again.

In the last few years, for the most part hairstyles have improved, except in one area, the dreadlock.  Dreadlocks are way out of hand.  This phenomenon seems to have come out of the sports world, and proliferated itself on the heels of the institution of the ‘Emmitt Smith Rule’ in which players were no longer allowed to remove their helmets in the field of play.

Players like Troy Polamalu have started to wear dreadlocks so long that they come out of their helmets and go significantly down their backs.  The problem is that the league did not deal with this issue early on.  There are several reasons for the league to outlaw this nonsense:

1. It’s unsightly.  It just looks bad.
2. It’s not part of the uniform.  In a league where you can be fined for not wearing your socks in the correct manner during a game, It seems to be a little hypocritical to allow a player to wear his hair so long that neither the player’s number nor his name can be seen clearly.
3. It is either dangerous or unfair.  I believe that it is dangerous to tackle these players by the hair (though it could serve as an effective deterrent).  It could easily break a neck, but on the other hand, it is unfair to protect these players against being tackled by their hair as it covers their whole back in some cases.  There was actually a flag thrown for unsportsmanlike conduct in a Cowboys/Steelers game when Polamalu was tackled in this manner after an interception.

Of course, this is all bogus, and the league will have to deal with it eventually.  Now, the player’s union has become involved in support of the players who want ridiculously long hair, and the league has allowed the argument to be changed into a racial issue.  This will make it much harder to deal with.

A similar subject occurred this week when a court allowed a Rastafarian to sue his employer, Jiffy Lube over a new policy that required employees to be clean-shaven.  He is suing on religious grounds.  I do not see how this lawsuit (which was dismissed once already) can be allowed to go forward.  There is no inherent right to dress the way you want to in the workplace.  Many jobs require their employees to wear uniforms, and most county health departments will not allow employees at restaurants to have facial hair.  What happens when a Muslim woman claims that she must wear a head-covering in her job at a bank, for instance?  Or, what if some kooky religion that bans clothing comes along?  Will we then be forced to employee a naked nurse (I actually support this in some cases)?  The implications are huge, and as we all know, in the civil courts in America precedent is everything.  Once Pandora gets out of this box, we are all in trouble.

In closing, Get A Haircut!

NFL Rightly Suspends Players for Doping

I became incensed yesterday when, while listening to the radio, I heard “The Goose,” a local Dallas newspaper reporter known for his own self-assuredness on a radio show with local talk show host Norm Hitzges.  In this weekly segment, Norm had asked about the looming suspensions for the NFL players who had recently tested positive for steroids.  The Goose in his somewhat cocky life persona informed Norm that the six players (running back Deuce McAllister and defensive linemen Charles Grant and Will Smith of New Orleans; defensive linemen Kevin and Pat Williams of Minnesota; and long snapper Bryan Pittman of Houston) would not be suspended until the beginning of next season.

My immediate reaction to this was to day, “What the hell?”  This made absolutely no sense whatsoever to me. 

He continued his argument by saying that to suspend these players at this time (going into the playoff run) would be unfair to other players on teams like Minnesota that would arguably be devastated by any such move.  I immediately thought, “But, they cheated in this season, and their teams benefitted from it.”  Any suspensions should rightfully be handed down in the season in which the cheating (and that is exactly what it is) occurred.  As far as the team goes, if they did not create an atmosphere in their own locker room in which this kind of thing would not be considered, then it is on the team also.

Of course, there is no way to really fix the problem.  All of the teams that had to play early in the season against a strong Minnesota run defense anchored by a couple of cheaters had a tougher time than some teams possibly in their own divisions (or possibly in a race for the playoffs) will have from this point on, and none of that is taken into account when it comes to tie-breakers.

So, when I woke up this morning and discovered that The Goose was once again talking out of his ass, and the commissioner had rightly suspended all of these players for the rest of the season, I felt better.  Good for Goodell.

Things that I am Thankful for

As I edge toward Thanksgiving Holiday, I ask myself what it is that I am actually thankful for.  Daily, it seems that we are being bombarded with news of the bad economy, and being a Republican is nothing like it was a decade ago, but here goes.

I am thankful that I am a Christian.  I may not hold to many of the more fundamentalist (or liberal) views of modern Christian denominations, but I believe that Christ died for my sins, and am thankful that my God is a god of grace who loves me in spite of my many failings.

I am thankful for my family.  I am thankful for my lovely wife and my wonderful little daughter.  Every day is a new adventure when you have a two year old.  My wife and I may be a good pair, but it is the little girl that completes both of us.

I am thankful for the grandparents.  My mom is wonderful with my daughter, and she does everything thing she can to help us through the everyday life situations that sometimes come up.  My in-laws are also great.  This year, there were a couple of times when I had to work some extended hours (once I put in an extra 155 hours in a month).  My mom and my in-laws really came through by coming to stay with us for weeks at a time so that the baby would not have to be in day care for eight hours a day or more.  To top that all off, this summer while I was having to work so many hours, my father-in-law practically put in a bar that I had been planning to do by himself, and it looks as good as a master carpenter could do.

My sister, her husband and my niece who is slightly older than my daughter are also a blessing.  We will not be spending Thanksgiving together this year because we will be at the in-law’s house, and my sister, who would normally be at her in-law’s house, will be staying at home because she is pregnant with what will be my new nephew.  Yeah!

I am thankful that I was born an American in Texas and in the Dallas area.  There is no place I’d rather be.

I am thankful for my education, the fact that I have a good job, and a good boss who appreciates the work that I do, and I am thankful that I have a customer base that, for the most part is easy to work with.

I am thankful that my wife likes some of the programming that I like to watch on television, and that she is willing to sit beside me and act like she likes some of the other programming that I watch.  I am also thankful that I live in the age of the DVR.

I am thankful that I live in an area that has a lot of sports related outlets.  Between, the Cowboys, Rangers, Stars and Mavericks, Dallas covers the sports world well, but it would be nice to see a World Series come through here.  We even have a professional soccer team, FC Dallas.  There are also three professional minor league baseball teams, several universities, and Texas high school football to satiate the sports fan.  And, of course we have the best local sports radio in the country, Sports Radio 1310, the Ticket.

I am thankful that I live in a safe, affordable neighborhood with good schools that my daughter will one day attend.

I am thankful that Texas still does not have a state income tax.

I am thankful that I have a few friends that go back as far a high school, and that I know I can trust at least one of them with pretty much anything.

I am thankful that I will not have to do anything to assist with the cooking of Thanksgiving dinner this year, and I am thankful that my father-in-law finally paid for the local channels to be put on his Dish Network plan so it will not be snowing during all of the football games that I plan to watch this week.

I am thankful that I live in a time, and in a country where I can publish any opinion that I wish to anyone in the world who wishes to read it, for free (thanks, WordPress).  Being a student of history, I know that freedom of speech has been a rarity throughout the history of mankind, and I respect a person’s right to have an opinion even if I do not agree with what the person is saying.

I could go on forever, but suffice it to say, I am thankful.

I’ll bet his lifetime stats are awesome!

This is just funny.  giggle.  It hardly seems fair, though.

Wheels-off Monday Night Football Game

Last night’s Monday Night Football game had some issues.  The problems began before the game even started with Kat Deluna’s atrocious rendition of the National Anthem.  This will go down in history as one of the worst in a long line of terrible renditions of this song.  It was a terrible version filled with growling and runs all over the place.  It was off-key and badly sung in general.  At least she was all into herself instead of the lyrics.  They could have found someone better at the American Idol tryouts.  Thanks to Dallas fans for appropriately booing her sorry ass.

Being on ESPN, we had to put up with the idiot, Tony Kornheiser.  Now that Bryant Gumble is gone, he is, bar none, the worst sports commentator on television.  Last night, as I was frantically and unsuccessfully trying to get “The Ticket” (the Cowboys’ flagship station) to tune in on my radio, I came to the horrible realization that I would rather listen to Brent Musberger.  I never thought I would say that, but sadly it is true.

It is apparent that whatever the ESPN commentators are talking about is much more important than anything else that must be going on, especially the game itself.  At one point Stuart Scott was making some general point about DeSean Jackson after a play where he obviously got hurt.  Since the injury did not do anything to bolster his argument, I guess Scott felt that the injury was not worth mentioning.  Also, it is evident that ESPN is not concerned with providing their audience with a replay even if there is a questionable component to a play.  Thank goodness the refs finally got one right when they reversed the claim that a ball had been tipped (by a phantom, I guess) late in the game.  It was obvious that the ESPN crew was not even watching the game at that point, and it took the refs to point out the play to them.  Thank goodness for Tivo/DVR.  With it, I am able to rewind and review pertinent events of the game on my own, and then fast forward past all of the “blah, blah, blah.  There has to be someone better than this crew out there.  Please find them.

This all being said, the viewers of the game were treated to one of the best Monday Night Football games in history.  What an enjoyable shootout it was.  I make no secret of the fact that I am from the Dallas area, and am a lifelong Dallas fan, and as a result, an Eagles (and Redskins) hater.  This made the game all the better for me.  The rest of the league is lucky that the Cowboys, Eagles and Giants have to play six games against each other this season.  Overall, it was a great game, but it was not perfect on either side of the ball or with the striped shirts.

On this point, I want to say first that I do not consider myself to be a bad fan, one that always complains and finds fault in a game.  There are those guys who would pick apart a victory if their team won 50-0.  I am not like that, but that does not mean that I am blinded by victory either.

One thing that I believe is very hard for players to overcome is a tendency to make bad in-game decisions.  There are those players who perform well, but in certain situations fall apart or make catastrophic mistake.  Usually, this is occurs under pressure.

Monday night’s game had more than its fair share of these moments.  Some times a play simply underscores the fact that a player is a knucklehead in general.  Cowboy fans can thank DeSean Jackson for replacing Leon Lett as the player who made the most boneheaded decision in league history.  Get ready Eagles fans, I’m sure you will have years to enjoy the antics of this idiot if he can survive the Philadelphia media.  There is a great quote from Bull Durham that applies well to this discussion.  Crash Davis says, “Come on, ‘rook, show us that million-dollar arm. ‘Cause I got; oh yeah, I got a good idea about that five-cent head of yours.”

Jackson’s folly overshadowed two other brain-dead plays that had a much greater impact on the game.  Late in the game, Donovan McNabb did his best Lucy Van Pelt impersonation when he stuck the ball out for Brian Westbrook, drew is back, and then stuck it back out again just in time to cause a game-changing fumble.  There is really no good explanation for this play, but he was just matching a equally bad decision made by Romo earlier in the game.

In that instance, Romo went to pitch the ball back to Marion Barber III, and had it slip out of his hands in his own end zone. Romo, instead of kicking the ball out of the end zone for a safety, the appropriate play at the time, picked it up.  This allowed him the opportunity to perform a Romo-like play and simply throw the ball away, as he was outside of the pocket when he got to it.  Instead, however, he picked up the ball, and looked for a moment as if he thought he were Barry Sanders, and was going to run it out of the end zone from eight yards deep himself.  Unfortunately, when he looked up there were four Eagles there ready to fustigate him.  Again, instead of making the good decision, and taking the safety, he decided to try to throw the ball away too late, and handed the Eagles a touchdown.

Look, I like Romo, and think he is one of the most talented quarterbacks in the game of football today.  The problem is that I am beginning to worry about his ‘five cent head.’  Tony has shown a propensity for the bonehead play in his career so far, be it the faulty hold against Seattle, untimely interceptions or his highlight play when he scrambled all over the field for a first down (it was still a bad football decision, though it was very entertaining to watch.).  Many people have compared his ‘gunslinger’ mentality to Brett Favre (I hate these nauseous comparisons.).  We are told that ‘when you have a guy like this, you have to take the bad with the good.’  I don’t get this argument.  I just want the good.  I want a player’s great talent and ability to be bolstered by him smart in-game decisions.  That is what wins championships.  I’m starting to be afraid that when the chips are on the line, in a must-win game, that his ‘gunslinger’ mentality will result in Cowboy fans being shot through the heart.  I truly hope I am wrong.