Almost Halfway Through Hell

Of the seven quarterbacks the Lions have faced this season six of them have had career best passer ratings against the Lions. Think about that. Six out of the seven quarterbacks the Lions have faced have had the best game of their entire career against the Lions. That is just...I mean, there are no words. Now, you could say that all those quarterbacks are young and/or inexperienced and thus, the fact that they had the best game of their career doesn't mean quite so much as if, say, Peyton Manning did. But, the other side of that coin is that it means that the Lions have been torched by a bunch of young and/or shitty quarterbacks. I can't even imagine what would happen if they played Peyton Manning. Jesus! It would be fucking apocalyptic.

Which is not to say that hasn't already been the case this year, including against the Lions opponent this week, the Bears and Kyle Orton. Now, I love Kyle Orton. He should be commended for being a drunken pussy hound. As I have said before it worked for the best quarterback in Lions history, Bobby Layne, and it worked for Ken Stabler and Joe Namath so why shouldn't it work for Kyle Orton? I can't cheer against him. I just can't. He is everything that I wish the NFL still was. So I am stuck in the unenviable position of cheering either against one of my favorite players or my favorite team. Of course my team will win out in the battle for my heart and mind but I still want Orton to do well. I just want the rest of his team to suck monstrous amounts of cock.

Unfortunately, you and I both know this is unlikely to happen, especially given that we have already seen what can happen when these two teams play one another. The Lions lost 34-7 in their earlier game and really it wasn't even that close. And that game was in Detroit. This one is in Chicago. This will likely get ugly fast, and like last week, the only quotes coming out of Chicago are those same guarded and yet patronizing statements that just make you realize how shitty things really are in Detroit. Brian Urlacher said that the Lions are still an NFL team and have to be treated as such which is just terrific. I mean, the Lions are so bad that other teams are having to remind themselves that the Lions actually have professional football players and not drunken transients who were paid five dollars and a bottle of Night Train to pretend to be football players for a day. Meanwhile, Lovie Smith is out there saying that the Lions are playing their best ball right now which is just hysterical given that they are 0-7. In other words the Lions absolute best is still an eight point loss. Good to know.

In other news you may have heard about the story of Roy Williams going to Mike Furrey's Halloween party as Tatum Bell, complete with a bellhop outfit and underwear with Rudi Johnson's name written on them. Now, everyone else is talking about how hilarious this is, and okay, sure, there is that, but at the same time we are overlooking the fact that none of these fuckers have anything to laugh at. If anything, Tatum Bell got off lucky. He may be an underwear thief, but at least he doesn't have to suffer the indignity of being a Detroit Lion. Then again, neither does Roy Williams so I guess he is entitled to cut loose and party now that he has escaped from Hell. I assume the rest of those assholes went as the scariest monsters of all: themselves.

There is honestly not a lot to look forward to on Sunday. The Lions will likely lose, and there is a very good chance that they will lose badly. And then next week there will be more reports that the Lions are working out quarterbacks like Daunte Culpepper or Tim Rattay or Scott Mitchell or Bobby Layne's bones or Mike Utley's wheelchair and everyone will wonder who the quaterback of the future will be. Some are still clinging to the hope that it will be frat boy Drew Stanton who is the one man who could make me wistful for that Bible thumping dick Jon Kitna. I pray to God that is not the case, and apparently the Lions agree with me since, although he is the number two quarterback on the roster right now Stanton is apparently not getting any reps except for on the scout team in practice. Of course this means that if Orlovsky gets hurt that shit will get hilarious. But the point is that regardless of who plays the rest of the season it doesn't mean shit for the future, because come next year the Lions are going to have new coaches, a new quarterback, and really, a whole new team. So this Sunday doesn't really matter. Except that it does because it always does, and when you see your team colors you find yourself rooting for them even if they are being worn by a bunch of drunken bums. It doesn't matter, and sadly that's the theme for this season in more ways than one. It doesn't matter.

This doesn't help my opinion that California should be disallowed NFL franchises

I'm suffering through an awful case of the flu, so I'm struggling to come up with interesting things to say about the New York Giants. I will, shortly, but in the meanwhile I've decided to help out my brothers in San Diego by posting the most important fan video on youtube.



We need more of this, and less of the coach firing and kicker icing and Tom Brady murdering that has been going on in this 2008 season. For the good of the nation.

Neither Warm Nor Fuzzy, Singletary's Niners

Nolan, several Niners players say, lost the team last season, which began with high expectations following a 7-9 campaign in ‘06. Midway through a year in which San Francisco would lose eight consecutive games and finish 5-11, Nolan gave a speech to the team on the Monday after a defeat in which he announced an end to his lenient ways. It soon became known derisively in the locker room as the “Warm and Fuzzy” speech.

“He got up there and said, ‘I’m done with the warm and fuzzies,’ ” recalled one player who witnessed the talk. “He said, ‘I’ve made it too warm and fuzzy around here for too long. No more (expletive) warm and fuzzy.’ It was comical. He was up there ranting and raving and clearly trying to be something he wasn’t.”

Added another Niners player: “It was a total front. I had a comeback waiting for him if he ever said it again: ‘It’s real warm and fuzzy on the sidelines, (expletive).’ ”

Fuck yeah!

I'd imagine good 'ol Mike Nolan patting VD (the most appropriate of initials right now) on the ass after that personal foul penalty while telling him to go gettem next time.

We got a bye week this week and it's at the right time after such an embarrasing loss. Watching a fullback with neon green shoes race past your defense for two 40+ yard touchdown receptions and JTO trying to become the best NY Giants-era Kurt Warner he can be can AGAINST THE FUCKING SEAHAWKS was like watching yourself get cockblocked at a bar by a morbidly obese eunuch; you probably weren't getting the number anyways but jesus christ you couldn't imagine it was because of that guy.

That's what makes the press conference afterwards much more satisfying. Singletary said on Monday that there were some cancers on the team (*cough* Jonas Jennings maybe?) and they needed to be fixed before it multiplies and the bye week can't come at a more perfect time to fix this situation. To be last place in the most mediocre division in the history of pro football is absolutely horrid, but at least that press conference spread some optimism for Niner fans that are practically the living dead when thinking about this team right now.

Another good thing about axeing Nolan is that we don't have to see that godawful nickel sub-package that he loved so much that he blamed his players for not executing properly. I don't know if Martz got butthurt for losing the interim coach race, but him and Singletary's philosophies seem to be at opposing ends of the spectrum. Martz masturbates to 4WR go routes while the other Mike stated he wants a tougher offense. I'd be more inclined with Martz if we had a Hall of Fame o-line and a bunch of Torry Holts on the roster, which I think he thinks we have considering the playcalling I've seen all year. The other Mike has stated he wants a tougher offense in place, so we'll see how that turns out.

We might be 2-6, but I don't think we'll see that cancer spreading under Singletary's watch.

A New Hope

After last weeks let down against a beatable Redskins team I began my withdrawl from reality. I went to the the library and checked out two books about teams that existed before I was born- "The Best Game Ever" about the 1958 NFL title game between the Colts and the Giants and "1964" which told the story of Cleveland's last ever sports championship. I can recommend these books to others like me, the people who live in the past. Not even their own past but someones else's. Their are no championships in my history, only wings made of chicken and disappointments made of Franks hot sauce with a side of celery and self-loathing. The utter crushing realization that the Browns had dug themselves into a hole so deep that they were out of the playoff picture had reduced me to a Cleveland Howard Hughes. I stayed in the shadows, a freak hunted by winning franchises. In my fever bed Jim Brown paid me visit and as I dialed 911 to have him arrested for breaking and entering he told me to never give up, that no matter what happened a chicken wing always had a bit of meat on it. "Keep gnawing" he said as he was led away in handcuffs. And gnaw I did.

I don't know exactly how the Browns won last Sunday as I'm pretty sure the Jaguars scored more points than Cleveland but these details are meaningless. What matters is that the orange and brown are back in the playoff picture with 4 out of the next 5 games at home with no sign of Butch Davis on the sidelines.

Drunken Retardation and the Detroit Lions

For a while on Sunday the Lions managed to run in a straight line without shitting their pants, thus going above and beyond what I said they would do in my preview of the game. Of course, they didn't run particularly fast or well and while they didn't shit themselves they definitely had a turtle head poking out the whole time just waiting to drop. And drop it did. When Santana Moss housed a punt to put the Redskins up 23-10 a few different things happened. Most Lions fans groaned, I laughed deliriously, like a loon, and my poor retarded kid, the Detroit Lions, finally let loose with the explosive diarrhea that we all just knew was waiting to come out, spun around, fell down and began crying.

Calvin Johnson did make a play to bring the Lions back to within one score and while they tried on defense those poor bastards couldn't make a play when it counted. Jason Campbell looked like he could have thrown for a million yards if he wanted to. Every time the Redskins threw the ball down the field they were successful and I was left with the distinct impression that Raven was right in his analysis of his team. Jim Zorn is not a particularly good coach and his game management both from a play calling perspective and a time management one were suspect. More plays down the field to Santana Moss would have broken the Lions back long before they actually did and the last drive at the end of the first half was absolutely atrocious. The Redskins continually fucked up and putzed around, eating a lot of time off the clock but the Lions bailed them out again and again by allowing big plays when all they needed was one measly stop to head into the locker room with a 10-3 lead. The Redskins managed a field goal, cutting the lead to 10-6, which did its part by zapping all the life out of Ford Field, but also should have left Redskins fans upset that they couldn't manage a touchdown which the Lions were determined to gift wrap for them. But, this is about the Lions and not the Redskins and so I will let that go. And instead, I will focus on the immediate ennui which set in once that field goal sailed through the uprights.

The Lions stink. That much is obvious, and you should all know by now that such a statement is almost criminal in how little it does to actually describe the futility going on here. Despite all this, they caught a sleepwalking Redskins team and got out to a 10-3 lead. But because of how depressingly putrid the Lions really are any lead is going to come with an inherent sense of fragility. It is like hanging out with your horrible drunk of a friend at a party. Even though he hasn't had anything to drink yet and everyone is having a good time you know it is only a matter of time before someone hands him a beer or a bottle of Jack and when the night ends with him pissing in a house plant or the fish tank or drunkenly groping your other friend's girlfriend, leading to a bunch of drama that nobody wants or needs, you're not gonna remember that for a couple of hours he was on his best behavior. No, you'll remember the black eye he mysteriously acquired at some point in the night and the vomit he left in the backseat of your car and you'll know and understand all too well that it is his nature and any hope that may creep up on you is just a false hope. It is evil, it is cruel, and it will happen every goddamn time.

And sure enough, when the third quarter started the Lions took their first sip of the devil's brew and by the end of the quarter they were getting loud and aggressive, threatening to fight random people and smashing bottles and putting out their cigarettes in the carpet. And then Santana Moss returned that punt, the Lions pissed in the closet and started grabbing random asses. After that, it was over. It just was, and even though the Lions tried to play it straight, said that they were cool and that they were going to maintain, it became obvious that the party was over and the Lions just had to get the fuck out of there before someone got hurt. But still, somehow they managed to walk the line between just drunkenly stupid and full on disaster, getting the ball back with enough time to move down the field. And again, somehow they managed to barely function, moving in fits and starts but when Calvin Johnson was smacked down short of the marker on fourth down by London Fletcher, the Lions finally shit their pants, began bellowing incoherently and had to be dragged out of there so they could sleep it off and live to disappoint us all again another day.

Sadly, there is no rehab for what the Lions are going through. Maybe the best thing is to just let them stay at the party and get the shit kicked out of them over and over again. That might be the only way they learn that they are too fucking miserable to be around. Let them get completely cleaned out and start over again at zero. Look, in my last two posts I have compared the Lions to a retard and the worst kind of drunk. I don't know what else to say. I mean, that shit speaks pretty clearly for itself. I just want to go back to the days when the Lions would get a few drinks in them but could still control themselves. They were fun to hang out with back then. Sure, by the end of the night they would usually do or say something stupid but it was easy to laugh it off because fuck it, we've all been there. But now, shit's just out of hand. My loveable old friend is now just a drunken retard.

My Advice: Start Drinking Heavily

HA! Like any of us ever stopped. The Raiders showed yet again why they are incapable of beating decent teams on the road. Meltdowns in the secondary, shit QB and O-Line play, repetitive play calling on offense, all of these things made an appearance on Sunday as they laid down for nearly as offensively anemic Baltimore Ravens. Tom Cable showed exactly why he'll be back to coaching offensive linemen next year. He has no clue what the hell he's doing on the sideline, which really isn't his fault. The players could seemingly give a shit less if they win or lose at this point, which is what happens when you dump your coach early in the season. It is becoming more and more apparent that a season that was originally being billed as one where the right steps were being taken is instead going to end up as yet another lost season with no improvement made. The win over the Jets last week, while still a win, was more an inditement of the current state of the Jets than it was a sign of things taking a turn for the better here in Raiderland. On Sunday any momentum that may have been gleaned from the Jets game was promptly pissed away before halftime. JaMarcus Russell looked like utter shit in the first half as the Raiders promptly fell behind and had to rely on him to make plays. The running game has taken a huge step backwards the last few weeks. This team simply cannot move the ball. A recent study shows that 100% of teams who score more points than their opponent at the end of the 4th quarter go on to win the game. Someone may want to pass that info along to Greg Knapp, Al Davis or whoever the hell is calling the plays nowadays. The much maligned Javon Walker followed up his best performance so far this season with his typical 2 catch bullshit. Justin Fargas continued to play like shit. Johnnie Lee Higgins, owner of the Raiders longest play from scrimmage this season, continues to be misused and under utilized. Ashley Lelie did his usual one catch and done act. The defense managed to generate zero sacks and only 1 turnover. But hey, at least they were only penalized twice! The final results were 234 net yards of offense and a dismal 10 points. This team needs to be blown the fuck up starting now. Cut the underachieving Javon Walker. Cut whinny ass Ronald Curry. Cut the inept left side duo of Kwame Harris and Robert Gallery. Fire Greg Knapp. Fire Rob Ryan. Hire a general manager. All of the things A NORMAL FRANCHISE would do under the same circumstances. Sadly, none of these things will happen and the Raiders will be hard pressed to win another game this year, leading to another high draft pick who will accomplish nothing. Wash/Rinse/Repeat.

Fever Dreams and Pants Shitting

I think I'm getting sick. My throat hurts and when I woke up today I had that dehydrated vaguely hung over feeling, but it hasn't gone away all day. I'm not what I would call sick yet but the signs are definitely there and by Sunday I may feel like complete shit. Which is fine because the sicker I am the less I will give a shit about what the Lions do and if it gets really bad I am hoping that I will just be able to chalk it up to a fever dream. If anybody tries to talk to me about the game I will just nod politely all while thinking to myself that I need to get the fuck out of there. I mean, a fever dream is not something to be shared and if some asshole saw what I saw then that either means that I have to face the horrifying thought that it actually happened or that son of a bitch is a wizard and I'm not real fond of either scenario since each would probably end with me projectile vomiting. Fucking wizards.

Look, I know that Raven says that he doesn't really trust the Redskins and he wants them to score some fucking points before halftime, but I can assure him that this is the game when his boys will break out. So far, Jason Campbell has been good for the Redskins and if you go through the early part of the schedule you will see that just about everyone who has played quarterback against the Lions this year has put up Hall of Fame numbers. They have all been like that asshole who only plays Madden on rookie because he wants to put up ridiculous stats built from 1 play 87 yard drives. That is what the Lions are now, the rookie level in Madden. So, yeah, Jason Campbell by himself is probably enough to eviscerate the Lions but then you throw in Clinton Portis who is running all over fools and the outcome of Sunday's game becomes painfully clear.

Offensively the Lions have one player who is any good. Calvin Johnson may be the Christ child but he is still young and he is still all alone and the Redskins know all this. I expect him to be harassed and beaten until he finally just says fuck it and punches Dan Orlovsky after another failed play. Meanwhile, my man Lennie Small is being pulled yet again in favor of Gosder Cherilus which is just mean. The man is a retard, it is just cruel to keep allowing him the opportunity to run and play one week only to shove him back in his cage the next. Have some class Rod Marinelli. Come on.

Look, the Redskins are going to beat the Lions. Everyone knows this. Which makes Washington's desperate attempts to avoid giving the Lions anything to build off of that much funnier. The Redskins' players and coaches have all been bending over backward in order to compliment the Lions and every time Chris Cooley or Jim Zorn mention how hard they play and how they don't quit it is impossible not to picture the Lions as the retarded kids who get stickers and ribbons just for trying to play. Sure they look ridiculous and they are at least as likely to shit themselves, take their clothes off during the middle of a game or run away crying as they are to do anything right, but they are trying damn it, and everyone will clap for them and cheer them on and yell and scream when they manage to run in the right direction. This is what it has come to, the Lions opponents just pity them at this point and are patting them on the backs and saying "Awww, atta boy, here's a popsicle. Go have fun now!" It is as if the entire team has become a 53 man roster made up entirely of Lennie Smalls, and as much as you know I love my boy Lennie, this is not something I'm all that proud of. But it is what it is, there is nothing I can do about it and so on Sunday, whether I am watching the game with a clear head or whether I am watching through the haze of a fever, I will still be rooting for my big dumb retard of a kid, hoping against hope that maybe this time will be different. But deep down, I just know he's gonna shit his pants again.

Predicted Final Score: Redskins 34, Lions 10, Number of Pants Shit 7

Now Let's Score Some Fucking Points

Okay, I can't complain. The Skins are 5-2. They have started to win games they would've lost the previous 10 years of my life. But every game goes down to some bullshit at the end. No game this year has been decided by double digit points. So my request to you, Redskins, overlords of my autumnal emotions, is to start fucking running some points up. Get some ballhawking going on defense. Fuck this close shit. I want the game over by halftime so I can not drink slowly out of worry, but drink heavily out of delirium. I know pounding out the running game is great and smashmouth football, which I love to see, but let's take that smashmouth metaphor too far like I'm a shitty writer in a newspaper alt-weekly. If you are smashmouthing motherfuckers, you do not want it to go the bell of the final round, because wacky shit might happen, and you lose. Happens all the time. If you are going to smashmouth, stomp the motherfucker out of commission completely after smashing them in the mouth. When you let people get back up, they are pissed from their bloody lip, and will gladly accept lucky shortcuts to get over on your ass. So start stomping on some motherfuckers. Run back some interceptions for TDs. I know Jason Campbell hasn't thrown an interception in 17,000 pass attempts or some shit, but fuck it man, throw it downfield. I mean, we have Chris Cooley (who is a better Jeremy Shockey than Shockey) and Santana Moss (who is an older Santana Moss than Moss)... we ought to be able to punch the shit inside the end zone. And throw some sort of stimulant in that oxygen tank Clinton Portis is sucking on after every three plays. I got no gripes with C.P. because Riggins used to do the same thing... actually, Riggins never really busted open too many long runs, and those fast fleet-footed fuckers tend to fumble. So do your thing Portis. You are the black John Riggins, and if you want to wear #44 from here on, you're probably the only person I'd ever be comfortable with that happening.
We play the Lions this weekend, but I am broke, and self-employed, so most likely I'll be painting a neurosurgeons wrought iron (not a sexual euphemism, though it does sound like one) on Sunday, listening to the game on the AM radio I have that has fallen from at least 40 feet in the air twice and survived. I paid ten dollars for it one time in Indiana so me and my boy Boogie Brown could listen to DJ Screw tapes in our shitty hotel room. It might rain though, which means I'll stay home, get drunk, and watch the game on the TV. And you motherfuckers better have it wrapped up by halftime. Fuck all this slow 1st quarter bullshit. You are shaving years off my life, and I am the perfect demographic of upwardly mobile white dude who would conceivably buy a bunch of useless shit with Redskins on it in ten years. The longer it takes you to win, the more you fuck yourselves.

The Cleveland Browns make me nervous and I can't relax

Wow, looking at my incoherent post two days ago should be a warning to all those who think that writing on a tear stained keyboard after drinking a bottle of wine and eight beers is a good idea.

Now the news from Brownstown is that Kellen Winslow has been suspended for next weeks game against the Jaguars for his comments after the Washington loss. The Browns tried to coverup his staph infection by not disclosing his illness and it spun out of control until sad sacks (myself included) decided to makeup their own diagnosis. Everything from veneral disease to breast cancer was bandied about until Winlsow decided enough was enough and told the truth. Staph infection has haunted the Browns for several years and it effectively ended the career of LeCharles Bentley and may end Joe Jureviscious' season. Winslow has had it twice now and several other players have suffered from it as well. I don't know why this keeps happening but the team decided that it was better to say nothing because it obviously makes them look bad, like they're not doing anything to prevent this. So the GM, Phil Savage, said nothing and allowed everyone else to draw their own conclusions. Phil Savage should've come out and told the truth and said exactly what was going on and what the Browns were doing about it. Instead it led to a suspended player. I seriously hope the Browns figure this staph infection problem out, but what can I do? I am one man with only innuendo and wine at my disposal.

Back to the offense, Derek Anderson is too inconsistent as a starter and still can't throw the short pass, the bread and butter of every NFL QB- there's a reason why the Browns run the ball in the redzone and it's because they don't want Anderson throwing interceptions. Taking two different drives to score once from inside the 5 yard line last week was unacceptable when a simple play action pass would have sufficed. If the coaches still don't have confidence in Anderson then it's time for a change. Bizarrely and despite the conservative redzone play calling, Jamal Lewis and Jerome Harrison were under utilized again. They should spread the defense and then run the ball. What's the point of a two tight-end offense at midfield with 9 defensive players crowding the ball? What kind of yards do you think this is going to produce? Who are they they trying to fool?!? This isn't the Oklahoma wishbone vs Iowa State in 1979.

Braylon Edwards is a whole story unto himself and mentally ill. He needs help. He's fine in the endzone but get him out in the open field and he's a basketcase without the basket. Is it agoraphobia? There are only questions and no answers. The coaches are back painting numbers on the nose of the ball and making him announce them as he catches in practice. They're at their wits end a week after he had a career defining game! Can you imagine?

The defense, which I rarely talk about, is this nail biting, bend don't break undersized constantly injury riddled squad that only the mother of a bed ridden Tim Couch could love. They give hope and hernias to all who believe. 14 points against the Redskins at Washington let alone 14 points versus the Giants is all a Clevelander can ask. D'Qwell Jackson, a starting middle linebacker, is 3'11" and 130lbs! But seriously folks, he's out-weighed by everyone on the opposing team except for the quarterback and the wide receivers. Not to mention the Browns rely on a rookie 7th round draft pick out of St. Augustine to rush the passer. The offense is not worthy of such a game crew.

I can argue that the win against the Giants was the biggest victory since the Browns came back from their move to Baltimore but it means nothing if everybody from the general manager to the offensive coordinator to the number one receiver continues to self destruct.

I think they call this feeling "happiness"

General contentment with your team's performance really inhibits the writing process. (I know, poor me!) After Sunday's game against the Chargers, I am feeling pretty good about the Bills' chances this season. I've decided our walloping at the hands of that ancient quarterback and his Cardinals two weeks ago is entirely attributable to the fact that Trent Edwards got killed on the third play. But he has been reborn and redeemed the city of Buffalo through his unflashy precision and calm stoner demeanor. This team is just kind of...nice and unobjectionable. What the hell am I supposed to say about them?

I am sort of digging the no-name vibe on defense--Kawika Mitchell and Marcus Stroud have been playing really well, but so have Paul Posluszny, Ryan Denney and Copeland Bryan. Who? Exactly. Two of those dudes are second-stringers to the first-string no-name players that got hurt. At some point during the game Sunday, one of the announcers speculated that the Chargers may have been taken by surprise slightly because rather than preparing to play the Bills they got distracted by PACKING to travel to London. This is a little ego-bruising but I've decided that it works to the Bills' advantage if opposing teams find picking out clothes more challenging than the prospect of playing against us. Especially when the Bills play at home: we lull them into a false sense of security by not having any name players and then they get to our house and we cut the power and just generally confuse the shit out of them. By the end of the game, you could have knocked Philip Rivers over with a feather: Kawika Mitchell basically did, and the ball came out, too.

This approach of enveloping your opponents in a disorienting mist is probably not going to work as well in the upcoming divisional stretch of the Bills' schedule. Luckily, we play in the AFC East. I refuse to be intimidated by the Patriots' victory last night because they were playing against a team with no defense and 83 turnovers, and seriously, if we can't beat the Dolphins and the Jets...well, I'll have a lot more to write about on this blog. (Okay, I'm actually terrified of the Patriots because Bill Belichick has chunks of guys like Dick Jauron in his stool, but this fear is irrational and I'm counting on this being the year Belichick crashes to earth.) It really feels like tempting fate to even think this kind of optimism, but whatever. Neurotic second-guessing has gotten Bills fans nowhere; the time has come for some triumphalism.

Help Us Calvin Johnson, You're Our Only Hope

I will be honest with you right from the start here. I missed the majority of Sunday's game because my dad called me up and wanted to take me out for a late lunch for my birthday. So, I hung out with the old man for a few hours and basically ignored the fact that there was any football going on at all. And I was fine with this. Of course, I got back home just in time to see the Texans go up 28-10 on the Lions and it is my understanding that the game started out like most of the others have this year, with the Lions spotting the other team three scores before realizing that they were actually in the stadium and not still sitting around jacking off in their hotel rooms. Perhaps I should have hung out with my dad a while longer.

I did see Calvin Johnson turn in a huge play in the fourth quarter though to put the Lions within striking distance. The Lions were stuck at their own goal line and Johnson, with his 4.3 speed flew by the dipshit covering him and hauled in a pass and ran the rest of the way for a ridiculously long touchdown. It was one of those plays resulting from pure talent and it was one of those plays that superstars make when they need to. It was not a play made because of a brilliant scheme or because of a defensive lapse, like so many of those types of plays often are, but it was a play made simply because Calvin Johnson was better than anyone else on the football field. It made me smile and gave me a small bit of hope for the future. Now, we just have to make sure that Calvin stays happy and gets the ball as much as possible. I don't give a fuck if they have to start doing goofy ass shit like lining him up at quarterback and taking a direct snap or using ridiculous double reverses or whatever the fuck they have to do, they need to just give him the ball and let him go make plays. He is the only thing they have going for them and I really, really don't want to see him turn into Roy Williams and just say fuck this shit and quit trying. There have already been signs of this early in the season and the Lions have to do whatever they can to make sure it doesn't mushroom into something ugly and, well, to be honest, Lionesque. The coaches should be forced to draw straws each week to see who has to blow him every day after practice. Fuck, buy him some whores and let them lounge around his locker all week. I don't care. Just keep him happy.

The thing that had me most excited in the football world on Sunday though had nothing to do with the Lions - at least not directly anyway. The Cowboys were fucking abused by the Rams of all teams and not only does that mean that it looks like my hopes that we will see Jerry Jones drunkenly pistol whipping Wade Phillips - pantsless of course - will come true, it means that there's a decent chance that the first round pick the Lions acquired from the Cowboys in the Roy Williams trade will be better than any of us thought. Perhaps if the Cowboys continue to implode and the season does end with Terrell Owns sashaying across his front lawn wearing Tony Romo's skin as a coat, the Lions might actually end up with two high draft picks, and maybe, just maybe, with Matt Millen dead and buried, someone with competence might actually make something of this unexpected boon. I know, I know, it is asking a lot, but it is all I have as a Lions fan and so I will put all my eggs in this admittedly rickety basket. Also on the plus side, Roy Williams didn't do shit against the Rams and I suspect that I will be watching the Cowboys the rest of the season and praying for their demise even more fervently than I normally do. I am sorry Cox, this is what my season has come to.

WE AM BEARZARRO

WE AM BEARZARRO, PERFECT IMPERFECT DUPLICATE OF CHICAGO BEARS!

CHICAGO BEARS TERRIBLE AT SCORING, WE AM SCORED 48 POINTS! LEAD LEAGUE IN POINTS OF SCORE!

CHICAGO BEARS ALWAYS AM KNOWN FOR RUNNING GAME AND DEFENSE, WE AM AVERAGING 3.6 YARDS PER CARRY AND MAKE VIKINGS LOOKING LIKE OFFENSIVE JUGGERNAUT! FANS VERY HAPPY! FANS BOO IN APPRECIATION! HA HA!

BEAR MIKE BROWN ALWAYS AM OUT FOR SEASON. BEARZARRO MIKE BROWN NEVER HURT! ON FIELD FOREVER AND EVER! PRETTY IMPERFECT, HUH?

-----

A win is a win, I suppose.

Nothing I Saw Today Was Winning Football

The Browns did the exact opposite of what they did against the Giants last Monday night and jammed up the middle of their offense. I kept track for some reason in the first half and it went like this: Pass, Run, Pass, Punt.

It sickened me like no other Browns' play calling has in a long time . Why the Browns rely on the slant pattern time and time again is a mystery. Derek Anderson has tried to throw that slant for the past two years and it has worked maybe 30% of the time. When you need a first down that's not good enough.

Still, the Browns had a chance at the end, and moving the ball another 10 or so yards would've put them into makeable field goal range. Instead they threw it long- unlike earlier in the game where it was all double tightends, I-formations, short passes and three & outs it was throw it deep because heaven forbid we have to go into overtime:
The Browns kicked a 54 yard field to try to tie it up and it missed.

Nothing I saw today was winning football.

Derek Anderson- the Cleveland Browns started two drives in the first half at the Redskins' 45 and could not get a first down either time.

Not surprisingly Jerome Harrison was a non factor in this game and I swear I never heard his name called until the second half. I don't understand.

Derek Anderson has had one good game this year out of 6. The Browns drafted Quinn for a reason. It is time.

Derek Anderson was 14 out of 37 today.

Hello darkness, my old friend

I've got that old feeling again. That old familiar feeling you get when you watch a cockroach try to make his way up a wet bathroom wall. The way you know that no matter how high he climbs, he'll always hit that one slippery spot and fall back to the start. And he keeps trying and trying. But soon, the hot water will hit him. Soon he will be dead. Soon, he will be down the drain, and it becomes time to wait for the process to repeat with a more promising - yet still utterly doomed - cockroach. And all you can do is watch and laugh at the hopelessness of it all. I live in a shitty little apartment with nasty neighbors, so I see this a lot. Somehow, it's rather appropriate in the context of Chicago Bears football.

But hey, I found a way to actually be positive for at least a few minutes here. On the offensive plus side, Kyle Orton is still playing like a goddamn hero, even with a shitty gang of wide receivers, his best one (Brandon Lloyd, of all the damn people) spraining a knee, and no running game as of late, due to a 2007-esque collapse of the offensive line. His rugged manliness and quarterback unshittiness have been a breath of fresh air, in the wake of all those years with what's-his-name looking like a 15 year old date rapist and throwing the damn ball into the air with no intended target, and crushing my spirit over and over again costing me my one chance to see the Bears win a Super Bowl while I'm young enough to not be shitting in a bag, GRRRAAARGH FUCK YOU FOREVER REX GROSSMAN I'LL KILL YOU I'LL STAB YOUR FAMILY IN THE FUCKING FACE YOU DICK-EATING DOG. Uh. Yeah, I guess it's time to get negative again.

The biggest problem on the side that's supposed to have the ball and move around with it is the aforementioned offensive line run-blocking meltdown, which has left former superstar-in-the-making Matt Forte producing about the same as what the no-headed monster of Cedric Benson and Adrian Peterson did last year. The thing here is, the Bears went like thirty-seven years without paying any real attention to the line in the draft, (I guess ol' Jerry is still smarting from the Marc Colombo thing. By the way, how many games has he started for the Cowboys now? 38 and counting. Nice move, fucko.) and have instead relied on other teams' scrap-heap veterans and the vain hopes that someone will find a magical amulet somewhere in the bowels of Soldier field that will make Olin Kreutz and John Tait revert to being 26 years old, in which state they shall remain for all eternity. This is made all the more hilarious by the recent news that Terrence Metcalf, a worthless meat-sack who's been with the team six years without ever cracking the starting lineup for reasons other than someone else's injury, Terrence Metcalf, a lineman who could not block and oncoming snail if you shot him in the head and threw him down on top of it, Terrence Fucking Metcalf, a man who must have taken Matt Millen's blackmail photos of William Clay Ford and photoshopped Virginia McCaskey over them as his only means of staying on this team for so goddamn long... Is on steroids. You mean, he needed to be artificially enhanced to not play as well as Roberto fucking Garza? He had to be on the gas to give people fond memories of Tom Myslinski and Todd Burger? Wow. Holy fucking... Wow. But hey, Chris Williams is practicing in pads now and should be back soon. As long as he can play about three positions at once and excel at all of them, we're money.

But the defense. Oh, the defense. Shit. The Bears could very well go into tomorrow's game missing both starting cornerbacks, two of their backup corners, AND their backup corner/safety/nickel back, Danieal Manning. It begins. Same as every one of the last few years, the defensive guys are dropping like flies, (that rhymed) and we got torched by a rookie QB last week as a result. Also, after handing out all those bigass contracts, they've barely gotten a damn thing back in return. Sure, Lance Briggs might be having his best year, but next to him, Brian Urlacher is having one of his worst, as invisible as he was for most of last year, except without back injuries to fall back on as an excuse this time. Another big deal signeee, Alex Brown is the same as he ever was, which is to say that he'll have one good game that makes people say "oh my god, Alex Brown is Pro Bowl bound, seriously, this guy is FOR REAL," and then goes missing for a six-game stretch. Worst of all has been Tommie Harris. In one year, this guy went from seeming model citizen and absolute killer of a destroyer on the field to just being some asshole taking up roster space. He's missing practices, showing up late for shit, getting suspended by the team, and having babies with mommas that he's not supposed to be having babies with. Also, his only real meaningful contribution to the team has been one recovered fumble that he immediately fumbled back to the Falcons, handing them a first down. I guess they should have known better than to give a gant contract to a guy who hasn't finished a season in two years, but this is the Bears we're talking about. They gave new deals to Rex Grossman AND Terrence Metcalf. They are fucking retarded.

Anyway, the offense and defense are both half useless, the coaching staff is inept, and Devin Hester is nothing but an average #2 receiver now, and they got a division game coming up against the guy who ran for like 600 yards on five carries against them in one game last year. Happy days are fucking here again.

Neil owns 4 of the last ten posts...

...AKA the Lions blow.

The Death March Continues

The good news is that the Lions are playing the Houston Texans this week and the Texans kind of suck. The bad news is that the Lions are something that goes beyond sucking. Their own brand of awfulness is something that defies description or name. The Texans appear to be an NFL team, not a very good one, but an NFL team nonetheless. The Lions would get abused by a team from the local YMCA. They are bad in a way that almost cannot be comprehended.

To actually analyze the upcoming game between the two teams would be almost meaningless and an exercise in idiotic folly. Instead, I think it's important to really hammer home how miserable the Lions are as a franchise. After Roy Williams was allowed to escape from hell, these were his fellow receivers' thoughts on the deal: “Good for him, though. He hit the jackpot.” That was from Mike Furrey. "We're going to miss the guy, but hey he's moving on to better things." That was from Calvin Johnson. Can't you just feel the excitement for Lions football? For fuck's sake, it almost feels like even the Lions own players feel like Roy Williams got some sort of call up to the big leagues. Even they know their team is an abomination.

Meanwhile, Jon Kitna is telling anyone who will listen that the Lions are a bunch of dishonest fuckers who used his back injury as a way of getting rid of him, which I said was the case all along. I am not sure how to feel about this. On the one hand, the Lions really have acted like a bunch of slimy assholes here. They look like cowards and liars, too feeble and afraid to actually treat their quarterback with any dignity and respect. On the other hand, that quarterback is Jon Kitna and fuck him. I don't really care how they did it, I am just glad that I won't have to watch and attempt to root for such a notorious Bible thumper who bitches and screams at all his teammates and coaches in the middle of games, usually after he does something dumb. He is dead and he will be forgotten and good riddance.

Of course, that leaves the Lions in the less than capable hands of Dan Orlovsky who can't really throw the ball and makes decisions like casually running out of the back of the end zone giving the other team a safety. SOUNDS LIKE A WINNER TO ME. I don't know what to think anymore. We're caught in that weird area right now where the season isn't over with but everyone is just waiting for next year. The only problem is that this season still isn't even halfway through. We've got a long way to go and the whole time we are going to be stuck in this Twilight Zone of apathy and ennui, and we are going to have to try to root for idiots like Orlovsky, guys who are just thrown in there now because there is nobody else there, but who we know probably won't be around for the post-apocalyptic rebuilding of the team. There is no real reason to be invested in any of this nonsense, but I still can't look away. It is odd as this is still my team and these horrible assholes are wearing the colors that I support. Who am I even rooting for here? What am I even rooting for? It certainly isn't tradition or anything so nobly misguided as that. No, I think it's more just a habit, a sense of obligation that I have, like if I am going to continue to care about football I have to actually have a team out there to care about, and really, rooting for any other team now would just be weird and kind of suspect to be honest. No one likes or trusts those dudes who take up their fandom of a particular team when they are into adulthood. No, you ride with the same assholes you were born with. It is just the way it is.

Really, there are only two things I am looking forward to on Sunday. The first is that my man Lennie Small is getting yet another chance at right tackle. If we are going to suck, and we are, then why not give Lennie a chance? Sure, he is dumb, and sure he cannot be trusted around small animals or girls of any sort, and in the end you are just going to have to kill him both for his own dumbass sake and for the sake of everyone else, but for now, it will be good to let him run and play. It's not like it's going to matter. The other thing is that I have Andre Johnson on my fantasy team so at least I will be able to have some sort of hope that somebody on that damn field will be able to get me a win. It is not much, but it is something I will cling to.

Predicted Final Score: Texans: something, Lions: something else, Me: miserable

The Great Purge Begins

The events of Tuesday felt like the first salvo in the Great War to rebuild Lions football(That is, if you don't count Matt Millen's shitcanning, and I am choosing to forget everything about his terrible reign, including his firing, so...).The big news of course is that Roy Williams is safely ensconced in Dallas now where I would like to think that he would drop a million passes the rest of the season and whine and bitch his way into being pistol whipped by a drunk and pantsless Jerry Jones. Why panstless? Why not? But the truth is now that he is out of Detroit good ol' Roy will probably turn into Michael Irvin minus the coke and the whores.

As much as I have berated Roy Williams on this blog over the last couple of months the simple truth is that the Lions are going to be even worse without him. That's okay I guess, since the move was made for the future and with his contract up at the end of the season Roy would be long gone. The three draft picks the Lions got for him will aid in the rebuilding effort, but the first rounder is likely to be a fairly late one unless the Cowboys completely tank and Jerry Jones drunkenly pistol whips Wade Phillips - again pantsless - while Terrell Owens prances around like Buffalo Bill on his front lawn wearing a coat made from the skin of Tony Romo. But that is unlikely to happen, amazing as it would be, and the Lions will probably be on the lookout for yet another contributor with the pick instead of the star that they need. But hey, two first round picks are better than one so I shouldn't complain and a late first rounder is better than watching Roy Williams dance out of town, laughing maniacally while he wears his own coat made from dollar bills pulled from his new gigantic contract with whatever smitten team would have bagged him.

As for this season, he will probably be replaced by some combination of Shaun McDonald and Mike Furrey and while both have been surprisingly and astoundingly productive in the last two seasons, those hyper-productive seasons came in Mike Martz's pass happy system and while playing in the slot. Neither really is cut out for playing on the outside, and I predict that both will struggle in the new role. Adding to their struggles will be the fact that they will have Dan "I'll just run over here, and...oh shit, a safety" Orlovsky throwing to them the rest of the season. Then again, they might end up with frat boy extraordinaire Drew Stanton tossing them the ball, in which case...well, in which case they will still struggle but I can cackle with glee as that asshole Stanton gets splattered all over Ford Field.

Of course, the reason why the quarterback position is in such dire straits is because that other asshole, Jon Kitna, has finally been taken out behind the barn and shot. The Lions are saying it is a back injury and that Kitna just can't go and thus has been put on injured reserve, but as I have said all along this smacks of bullshit, and Kitna's own comments on the situation seem to back this up. According to him, the Lions told him not to fly to Minnesota with the rest of the team, and since then have essentially stopped talking to him even though he claims he doesn't think he needs to be on injured reserve. This of course is the classic "I'll just stop talking to him/her and hopefully he/she gets the hint" breakup strategy and it leaves me with the hope that the Lions, although classless, have dumped Kitna. Unfortunately, in this case they have left their aging old wife for a couple of crackwhores, but hey, it's a start. Also, yes, the him/her, he/she was in reference to my belief that Kitna is in fact a hermaphrodite.

The future in Detroit begins now, and it's going to be ugly as fuck for a while - a long while in all likelihood, but it is something new and it is something different and for now, all we can do as Lions fans is try to ignore all the shit that's been shoveled onto us over the years and pretend that maybe this time shit will be alright. Of course, if you've read anything else that I've written here you know that is a really fucking hard thing to do. But somehow, I found myself thinking about the future earlier today and wondering if maybe, just maybe, things would be different this time. I know, I know, I am the classic battered wife here, but Goddammit he told me he loved me and that it wouldn't happen again! Of course I know that I will just end up disappointed and disgusted once again but a small part of my brain - the same part that thinks I still might end up a billionaire paleontologist as I planned as a child - believes in the impossible. And let's face it, nothing is more impossible than these shitheads somehow turning things around. But if they do, look for me on the cover of Fortune explaining how I made my first billion examining dinosaur bones. I figure the odds of either happening are roughly the same.

Shaun Alexander?

Okay, I haven't written much lately because the Skins were doing good and I didn't want to jinx it. But I knew they would never go 7-1, figuring they were good for a loss, because this team is not used to that role of overdog. I didn't figure it to happen so quickly though. But whatever. That loss didn't bother me too badly because they played good and it was kinda freaky how it went down. What bothered me this week was the Seahawks resurrection in D.C., with former Seahooha RB Shaun Alexander, former Seahooha P Somethingorother Plackenmeier, plus some other S dude, all getting signed up this week. The rookie punter had to go because he was sucking, and hopefully nobody picks him up on waivers, so the Skins can pull a sneaky Jap move and put him on IR since he was waived-injured, and he can have another shot at it next year, training all season long for that second opportunity. But I'm not really down with Shaun Alexander, and not because I think he's some sort of threat to the status quo. Basically, even when Alexander was considered good, he always came across to me as a fucking pussy. And that ended up being his reputation - as soft, and in all likelihood waving a rainbow flag in private. Just saying, that's all. This bothers me not because I'm homophobic but because it follows previous high profile brought-in dude Jason Taylor, who has similar appearances, at least to me.
I am still wavering on this year. I was all into the Zen of Zorn a couple weeks ago, him being the Phil Jackson of the NFL, with his wacky anime hair and offbeat born-again training methods. But I also fear the behind-the-scenes, where Vinny Cerratto and his amazing General Managership of High Profile Mediocrity lurks. Basically, the highlights of this team are all brought in under Joe Gibbs' watch, and ol' Joe was out of touch and couldn't squeeze the most out of them, unless you know, Sean Taylor got killed. But perhaps Zorn is doing things to get the most out of them.
But how long will a good roster last under Cerratto? He picked three receivers in the second round this year, none of which has done shit. Only one (Devin Thomas) has actually played any notable time, costing Santana Moss his lone reception in the Eagles game with a holding penalty. They are acting like Malcolm Kelly is some next level Devin Hester type bullshit, but he's getting his knee drained like twice a week, which is not a good sign for a rookie. That's activities of a 35-year-old O-lineman, not a promising young breakneck speedy WR. And Fred Davis, the ballyhooed TE from USC? I haven't heard shit about him, maybe he's still oversleeping.
I don't know, things might go well. But these pick-ups this week seemed so lazy and obvious. That worries me. I would like to see this team start drafting motherfuckers that perform (I don't think we've drafted a notable offensive or defensive lineman in at least the past half a decade).
I don't know man, I can't really talk shit. We're 4-2, which is about 4 games better than I thought they'd be after that opening game at the Giants. They've been playing some smashmouth football, and Jason Campbell has looked smarter than a motherfucker under center... like goofy hopes of pre-eminent franchise QB type smart, which they haven't really had since... fuck, probably Joe Theismann. Even Doug Williams and Mark Rypien just kinda showed up for a little while then went their separate ways after winning Super Bowls with the Skins.
It just sucks this Shaun Alexander thing. Luckily the only players I really don't like as much as Jason Taylor and Shaun Alexander are all lumped together in the Cowboys now (T.O., Zach Thomas), although I guess the Skins could make a play for Brian Urlacher or Tedy Bruschi and really bum me the fuck out. Still, the O-line is looking tough, and Clinton Portis is being all-man this year thus far. I'm pretty happy to be a fan of a team where an all-time character like him isn't even the greatest character at his position all-time for this team (John Riggins). If nothing else comes from this season than a series of interviews of Portis conducted by Riggins that escalate into nonsense stories trying to one-up each other, then it will be as good as a Lombardi Trophy, so long as somebody sends me a link to an mp3 of said interview.
WORK YOUR WACKY ZEN JIM ZORN! BRAISE THE BROWNS!

Al Davis: A history in photos

I'm doing this half assedly because, honestly, I'm out of words.

A New Hope

On the very first play from scrimmage, after two weeks of intense practice to prepare for the Super Bowl Champs, the Cleveland Browns lined up in an illegal formation. Two plays later Derek Anderson fumbled the snap from center. Then came the 54 false starts and 180 Giant rushing yards. Winslow was on the bench with an undisclosed illness. This is where inveterate homers lose their bets and the Brady Quinn era starts after a sack-happy defense turns Anderson into Tim Couch.

Yet they won 35-14 in the way teams that win football games have won since the 1950's- blocking. Derek Anderson was untouched like only lower caste Indians are untouched. The Cleveland Browns offensive line has finally arrived after their re-birth last season and their injuries in the pre-season this year- Joe Thomas, Eric Steinbach, Hank Fraley, Ryan Tucker and Kevin Shaffer (who's return to the lineup is close- he didn't even play Monday) are the heart and soul and pancreas of this team.

I'm just happy to be 2-3.

Well, That Happened

The Lions only lost by two points to the Vikings, and they probably would have even won the game were it not for a pair of bogus calls late in the game that basically gifted the game to the Vikings. The defense played inspired football for the most part and managed to get almost constant pressure on Gus Frerotte while keeping Adrian Peterson pretty much in check. That said, in a way, this loss was even more depressing than the others. And the reason is because the Lions tried as hard as they could for the first time this year, played balls out football and still ended up losing.

The offense has gone from hilariously inept to terrifyingly worthless. Before, the offense was marked by laziness and general bitchiness, highlighted by the hysterics of Roy Williams every week and the bitch fits thrown by Jon Kitna from the beginning of each game until the bitter end. Well, Kitna was gone this week. No, I mean seriously, the asshole was too much of a worthless dick to even make the one hour plane trip. Now that's some veteran presence there. The official line is that the team was worried that his back couldn't stand the flight, but I call bullshit. Even if that is true, it just means that Kitna is an old pussy who apparently can't even sit in a chair for an hour. So, either he's a gutless dick who has turned his back on his team, or he is a doddering old shit bag whose back is too bad to even get on a plane. Either way, fuck him, he is done. The only problem is that Dan Orlovsky might be the worst quarterback I've seen start in Detroit. And believe me, that is REALLY saying something. Danny boy's most memorable play on Sunday was when he dropped back to pass out of his own end zone and then inexplicably ran too far backwards, out of the end zone, giving the Vikings a safety. Of course, the Lions only lost by two points, so no harm done really.

It was hard to see these guys actually give a shit for seemingly the first time all season only to lose anyway. I think this bodes extremely unwell for the remainder of the season. It took these assholes five games to even get up enough to play at a level befitting professional football players. Now that they have done so and failed it is hard to believe that they will be able to motivate themselves to care at all.

Look, there simply is not a lot to take away from that muddled mess of a game. Were the Lions better? Yes. At least in some ways. Does it really matter? No. This season is a wretched waste. Everyone knows it, including the players and coaches. Sunday was just their attempt to save a little face and feel some pride. Well, they played hard, they did their part, now they can go back to just riding out this shit storm. Some will hope that at the end they still have a job, but the saddest part is I'm sure that many of them will hope that they do get released or traded or outright fired, because the longer they stay in Detroit, the longer they know that their careers will just spiral down the drain like so many others who have found themselves trapped in the cesspool of Lions football.

Even though this year is a known disaster, the sad reality is that we know that next year will probably be just as bad because anyone with a pulse will not want to set foot in Ford Field wearing the Honolulu Blue and Silver. It will be an expansion team without the hope or enthusiasm that surrounds a new franchise. The Fords have owned this team for over 40 years and in that time the Lions have won one playoff game. One. ONE GODDAMMED GAME. And in all that time there has always been a sense that while things were bad they could potentially get better if one or two things happened the right way. That simply doesn't exist this year. We know that a million different things could break the right way and the Lions will still be bad. This is the lowest point in the Lions long, sorry ass history. This is not a low point like the 49ers are in a low point. This is not a low point like the Cowboys were in during the last days of the Tom Landry regime. Those were lows surrounded by highs. This is a low point in a landscape already below sea level. We are so low now that we might as well be digging towards the earth's core. There are some who will take hope away from Sunday's game. Those people are idiots. The only hope we have is that one day we can get back to hoping that if one or two things go right we might be okay. We are not hoping for a Super Bowl win or hell, even a playoff win. We are hoping for a return to mediocrity, for a time when we could at least fool ourselves into believing that we might have a shot at something more. Basically, we are hoping for a return of Wayne Fontes and Scott Mitchell. And really, that is such a damning enough statement that nothing more needs to be said.

Another Day, Another Disaster

The Lions game plan on Sunday against the Vikings is simple: try to run in a straight line without shitting their pants. Of course this is far too much to ask and so by the time we're halfway through the first quarter, I am sure we will all be treated to the sight of a random Lion (my guess is Jeff Backus - well, this week anyway, because, well, why not?)sitting in a pool of his own feces on the thirty yard line, weeping and slobbering all over himself while whoever the shitburger is playing quarterback lies in a broken heap behind him, his arms gnawed off by a celebrating Jared Allen.

The good news this week is that Jon Kitna is apparently out with a sprained vagina. The official explanation is that his back hurts, which just makes him look like the fossilized old pussy he has become. But I suspect this is just some lame ass cover given to him by the coaches who don't want to admit that Kitna has been publicly executed. I mean, come on you fucks, can't you even do this right? If there was one thing that was going to provide any solace to Lions fans the rest of this horrid year it was going to be the ritual dismemberment and public execution and humiliation of each and every one of these assholes. And Kitna is one of the biggest assholes there is, and we aren't even being allowed the satisfaction of knowing that he has been yanked for being too shitty for even the Lions? This is some serious bullshit. He should be forced to wear Rod Marinelli's diaper - after Rod has spent the game wearing it - and run around Ford Field while the fans pelt him with shit - both literally and figuratively.

To say the Lions have struggled defensively this year is an understatement. In fact they are 32nd out of 32 teams in total defense, and if there were 50 teams they would be 50th, if there were 100, they'd be 100th and so on and so on. This week they face Adrian Peterson, who will likely have time during runs to stop for a smoke break and to fuck a groupie or two before the Lions can even think of tackling him. Apparently, I am supposed to be comforted by the fact that Gus Frerotte is starting at QB for the Vikings. But it should be clear by now that the Vikings could line up a retard with polio and pediatric AIDS and no arms and he would still pass for 300 yards and 4 touchdowns.

Meanwhile, on offense, the Lions have already decided to scrap the no huddle they tried against Chicago, which was ineffective because the team failed to grasp that the point of a no huddle is to work at a fast pace, not allowing the defense time to adjust. Instead the Lions just sort of wandered around the field, presumably gossiping and exchanging recipes in between plays. Of course the no huddle was far too complex a system for Rod Marinelli and company to grasp and so it has been left in the dustbin along with anything else that these cretinous assholes are bewildered by, which is pretty much everything. The official reason for the no huddle being killed? Marinelli thinks that the crowd will be too loud for his dumbass players to handle. Of course, he is right, but still, what an enormous pussy.

If the Lions coaches had any guts they would just say fuck it and start doing crazy shit like, I dunno, putting Calvin Johnson in behind center and running the Wild Hog. Of course it would be a disaster, but at least it would be more interesting than the sad little death march they have going on now. I mean, things have gotten so bad that there is a chance that Drew Henson of all people could end up playing quarterback for them in the coming weeks. Why not see if Ryan Leaf is available while you're at it? My only hope is that this is the week when everything finally explodes and Roy Williams chokes Rod Marinelli on the sidelines, causing Marinelli to flip out and have a 'Nam flashback, followed by him randomly attacking various players and referees until he is sedated and carted off the field in one of those Hannibal Lecter masks. A full scale riot may be the only thing that can save this season. I can only hope, and if I am anything it is an optimist.

Predicted Final Score: Are you kidding me? FUCKING MISERY AND PAIN. LOTS AND LOTS OF PAIN. But for you anal retentive types I will do my best to translate that into an actual numerical prediction: Vikings 78, Lions 3, and hopefully a body count of at least 17.

Orton Gets Balls-Deep in Detroit

So smooth.

Well, what do you know. I know it was against Detroit, and if you've spent even a few minutes reading this blog, you know by no that no achievement against them counts, but this Orton fellow is starting to look pretty good lately. I know, he's only had two good games so far, but that's more than a Bear QB usually has, in a row or otherwise, and it's really encouraging when viewed next to how unspectacular his shitty games typically are. Sure, he might run the run the bus into the curb every so often, but you can trust him to not then stomp on the accelerator and send the bus and its 52 other passengers screaming toward a spectacular death that somehow involves running over six boy scouts and obliterating a puppy farm that was unfortunate enough to be located at the bottom of a cliff. You can't say that about a lot of other recent Bear quarterbacks.

And to me, that was the really infuriating thing regarding Kyle Orton's status over the last few years. The guy comes in and wins ten games as a rookie, and sure, he might have done it with training wheels and arm-floaty things on, throwing short passes and relying mainly on Thomas Jones and the defense to do the heavy lifting. But you have to think about it this way: He came in, managed the games, and never really fucked anything up beyond repair. That sounds like nothing to most people, but this is the Chicago Bears we're talking about here. This is team without a franchise quarterback since roughly 1948, who has featured such wretched shitpieces as Mike Phipps, Bob Avellini, Cade McNown, and the unspeakable Rusty Lisch, a man so incompetent that Mike Ditka opted to just put Walter Payton behind center for a game instead. Adjusted for rookie-year struggling, his 2005 performance probably put him in the team's all-time top ten at the position. And I know that in 2006, Rex Grossman was still more or less unproven, therefore still somewhat deserving of the chance that a first-rounder always gets, but Orton never even got considered for the second string spot. And in 2007, when the Grossman experiment finally died its horrible, thrashing death that had begun during the Arizona game the year before, it took injuries to both Grossman and Brian Griese for Orton to get in, and even then, as a third-year player with relatively extensive starting experience and absolutely nothing on the line for a team that had been eliminated from the playoffs by halftime of the first game, they still treated him like the rookie from 2005. They just sent him out to hand the ball off and throw that dink-and-dunk bullshit, seemingly just hoping that he didn't shit his pants or drool so much that it showed up on the TV cameras. And this was after Griese has turned his navy blue jersey almost black with saliva, and Grossman - not satisfied to simply shit his pants - went out there and metaphorically dropped trou and just sprayed brown chunks over all his teammates, several referees, as many as 80,000 fans in attendance, and several important Chicagoland dignitaries. Yet neither of those two ever played with any limitations, save for the unspoken limitations imposed by playing with Cedric Benson, Fred Miller, and Bernard Berrian in the starting lineup. But how did Orton respond? Taking a swig of Jack Daniels, muttering something unintelligible that might have been "fuck all y'all," and dinking and dunking the Bears to their only two-game winning streak of the year, about 14 games too late.

But that was the best part about these last couple weeks: The Bears actually deviated from the plan. They never do that, and that's been one of the main goddamn things wrong with the offense. The Bears "got off the bus running the football," but when that clearly wasn't working, they decided to actually start throwing the ball, unlike last year, when those poor bastards Benson, Peterson, and Wolfe would get plowed into an uncaring offensive line for a long and arduous series of three-and-outs. And when they decided to let Orton throw the ball, they actually let him play as though they felt he belonged in organized football. He wasn't just throwing three-yard slants to tight ends and little dumpoffs to send Matt Forte to his doom. He threw it down the field, to wide receivers, even. And no, I'm not going to jump to conclusions and immediately think that one good game against a decent team and one badass game against a loosely-organized group of people on a football field automatically makes him a goddamn superstar. I jumped to that conclusion with Grossman in '06, and he ended up being the person on this earth that I'd most like to murder for completely stupid reasons. So no, I'm not gonna sit here and say that Kyle Orton is a gunslinger who's just having fun out there or whatever. But it looks like the coaches have enough faith in him now to open up the passing game, the wide receiver corps I figured would be the worst in the league is starting to come together against all odds, (How the hell can Brandon Lloyd actually seem good? What the fuck?) the coaches aren't being quite so suicidally stubborn when it comes to offense, and for the time being at least, opposing teams using eight man fronts on every down regardless of the situation are probably a thing of the past. These are good things, and it's starting to look like a damn offense around here. I'm not gonna say they're a contender or anything, because there are a lot of games and a lot of injuries to come, but this is definitely not turning out to be the Season of Horror that I figured it would be. Now, if only we could find a way to play Detroit every week, we'd really have something going here.

Standing on the shoulders of Giants without getting a personal foul

Cleveland/New York Preview

I predicted at the beginning of the season that the Browns would go 2-2 entering their bye week. My prediction lies in ruins like a torn down goal post on a desolate, wingless planet orbiting a dead, celery husk of a sun. I feel like I've been served ranch dressing instead of bleu cheese by a waiter named Derek Anderson. I felt like that last year around this month when they were 2-3 after losing to the abysmal Oakland Raiders on a missed field goal, the second try of a do-over because it's legal for a head coach in the NFL to call a timeout while the opponent is busy kicking winning field goals. I will never forget it for as long as I live because the Browns would've won the divison outright if they'd beat the Raiders on that fateful afternoon and we could finally have our revenge on the team that was on the winning end of Red Right 88. The sleep of the avenged is all I ask.

I come out of the bye week and look not to Monday night's game but back to the preseason where I witnessed one of the worst football performances of the last 230 years against the same Giants. The score was 30-3 early in the second quarter and half the Clevleand Browns lay dead or dying and I saw a team in shambles. They say there are no second halfs in football but I stand before you as an example of the never say die attitude that has preserved this city through events that would fell lesser greater metropolitan areas. I see it on the faces of the people who deliver my pornography, on the bumper stickers of cars that refuse to use their turn signal and in the stomach of Romeo Crennel.

I See Positives:

Jerome Harrsion was given a chance to run sweeps and catch flat passes in the Bengals game. Yes, the very same Jerome Harrison who lead the PAC-10 in rushing the same year Reggie Bush won the Heisman Trophy was finally given a chance to play. And play he did!

Donte Stallworth is going to start which means a receiver who can catch at least one out of two passes thrown to him. One out of two! 50 percent!!

Ryan Tucker is back on the offensive line where his run blocking is key to the subprime crisis.

36 year old Willie McGinest will be returning. He will be benched in passing situations but no matter because rookie Alex Hall will take his place and rush, rush, rush the passer like a 7th round draft pick out of a historically black college should.

Josh Cribbs should be 100%. His devil-may-care attitude on kick returns is the stuff of legends. And the stuff of touchdowns.

Monocled Prussian guard Eric Steinbach should be be close to 100% as well.

Do you see? I don't think you do.

Awesome Phil Dawson and Dave Zastudil anchor a special teams unit that is profoundly great. They actually recommend that Zastudil is not to be taken if you have high blood pressure such are his side effects on the weak hearted.

The Opponent:

The Giants will live forever in the shadow of the New York Jets and their back to back AFL East ('68 & '69) division championships. A win against the Browns will go far in their pursuit of respectability but they have alot to prove.

The Prediction:

Cleveland 140 NewYork -32

A Year of Immeasurable Pain

- 4. That's how many total yards the Lions had in the first quarter against the Bears. 38-0. That is how much the Lions have been outscored by in the first quarters of games so far. 80-20. That is how much the Lions have been outscored by in the first half this season. 21-0, 21-0, 21-3, 31-0. That is how far behind the Lions have fallen in each game.

Look, sometimes the numbers don't tell the whole story. Sometimes weird shit happens and it's either not as bad as it looks or not as good. Sadly, in this case, it's actually not as good. No, honestly. As bad as those numbers are, the Lions have been even worse than that so far. In each game they've played in thus far they have been completely and utterly dominated, dominated in a way that even I have never seen them be dominated before. And, if I can remind you for a second, these are the FUCKING LIONS WE ARE TALKING ABOUT. For this to be the nadir of this franchise is really saying something. Not even when they started 0-14 in the beginning of the Matt Millen era were they this bad. I mean, this is apocalyptic. It is almost awesome actually. Their ineptitude is almost perfect in its purity. They can't do anything. Not one goddamn thing.

But the scariest thing of all is that every year, as Lions fans, we tell ourselves that it is the bottom. Every game, we think that this is the bottom, that starting next week they can only get better. But it never happens. There are always deeper and darker places for this team to sink. It is almost inconceivable, but they always do. And so even though right now feels like the absolute bottom of the barrel, I have seen enough of the Lions over the years to know that it could, and probably will, get even worse. I have no idea what that would even entail at this point. I don't know, maybe Ford Field could collapse and kill all 65,000 fans dumb enough to still go to the games. Maybe Old Man Ford could wander onto the field, senile and naked, covered in day old applesauce, Ford the Junior chasing him around with a fistful of baby wipes. Maybe Rod Marinelli's diaper would give out and he would leave a shit trail along the sidelines. I just don't know. But on the field it just doesn't seem like it could get any worse. Jon Kitna and Roy Williams are having a contest to see who can throw the most hissy fits during the middle of games. Calvin Johnson has apparently died. Everyone sucks. Everyone. There has not been one bright spot this entire season. Not one.

On Sunday, the Lions made Kyle Orton look like he was going to ride in on a river of King Cobra straight to the Hall of Fame. I will stand by what I said before and I will say that I am happy for Kyle Orton. The league needs more dudes like him and less like Jon Kitna. I will always believe that. But goddamn, the Lions just rolled over and took it. And then you had that mong Rod Marinelli blathering on at halftime that the team believed in what it was trying to do but they just needed to execute better. Someone should have punched that dumb asshole. Are you kidding me? Nothing is working. Nothing. If ever there was a time to be humble, bite the bullet and say you know what guys, we need to change it up, now is that time. But no, Marinelli will stubbornly ride this team of jackasses straight to an 0-16 season and he will be proud that he did it his way. Fuck that. Old man, get the fuck out of here.

During the game, the announcers were talking about how Marinelli spends all his time in practice working with the defensive line, since he is a defensive line coach after all. Well, shit, that just fills me with tons of confidence. While the team goes down the shitter, Marinelli is content to just sit around and play with his little toy defensive line. It's his baby, and everything else can apparently go to hell. Of course, that defensive line has only produced four measly sacks all season, so not only does Rod suck as a head coach, he is also inept as a position coach. This is all just unfathomable. If anyone but Old Man Ford were the owner Rod Marinelli would be stuffed in an oil drum somewhere.

People are just waiting for this season to end. Everyone is confident that there will be a complete overhaul of the team. All the coaches will be murdered or exiled to Siberia or demoted to the mailroom. Jon Kitna will be forced into the priesthood, and Roy Williams will sign somewhere, anywhere, for pennies on the dollar just to get the fuck out of town. Seriously, Roy looks like he is more desperate to escape than Snake Plissken. John Carpenter should follow him around with a camera and put out Escape from Detroit as a documentary. Rudi Johnson is on a one year deal and he will no doubt go somewhere where he can at least feel safe that his underwear won't be stolen. The defense will likely be overhauled again, especially as the new coaches, whoever they are, purge the team of all of Marinelli's ex-Bucs. It is going to be a bloodbath, and when everything is done, this team will look like an expansion team. Only it will be an expansion team that no one has any enthusiasm or patience for. And the saddest part of all of that is that it is by far the only scenario that Lions fans can even stomach. Seriously, we are all just praying that this whole thing gets blown up. We are rooting for a scorched earth. That's how bad it is here. If, somehow, Rod Marinelli is still the coach here next here I swear to God that Lions fans might kill someone. I'm not even joking. They might march on Ford Field and just burn that fucker to the ground with everyone associated with the team locked inside. It will be like when an army rounds up the towns people and locks them in a church or whatever and burns them all alive.

I just don't know what the rest of this season has in store, other than immeasurable pain. This is a team that has flat out quit. That much is obvious. And the dismantling has already begun. Jon Kitna was taken out of the game in the third quarter on Sunday and was presumably taken back to the locker room and euthanized. And it wasn't because anyone had any hope that his backup, Dan Orlovsky, would be any better. Fuck no. We all know that dude sucks. And on his first possession he almost took a safety and then threw a pick six. Kitna's benching was that rare kind not made for the sake of a team, but because we demanded a sacrifice. He was taken out and shot just because we were too disgusted to even look at him anymore. Fuck this team. Maybe Sunday was the bottom. Maybe that is as bad as it's ever going to get. Maybe. But then again, probably not.

exciting weekend

I woke up at around 11 a.m. Saturday morning. Laid around 'til 11:30, got dressed, had to remind my boyfriend three or four times that it was time to get up, typical stuff. Usually, I am not such a stickler that it is time to get up, but this Saturday was Taco Santana Saturday! We met three female friends in Williamsburg to partake in real sodas made with sugar and not corn syrup, and delicious enchiladas and tacos (I had the enchiladas banderas). Really good stuff, and I highly recommend trying it out if you are in the neighborhood.

After we were done eating, we trekked to Little Jerusalem to go to Laurel's loft. While walking down Lorimer street, a Hasid child actually covered his eyes when the four ladies walked by (it's questionable as to whether or not Alex's presence also upset him--I didn't think it would be a good idea to ask the little boy). It is always uncomfortable when that happens, and I feel its mentally unhealthy to make the children hide from the outside world, to be honest, but it's not really any of my business.

When we got to the loft, Laurel presented us all with crazy cocktails, made of tequila, apple cider, blackberry juice, and lemon. Pretty delicious stuff, you should try it! It's supposed to be made with creme de casis instead of blackberry juice, but the proper ingredient was difficult to procure, it seems. After a few drinks, the main event occurred: eye-lash dying! I have an illegal-in-the-US kit from Australia. It didn't show up very much on Theresa and Lauren's (already dark) lashes but really made a big difference on Laurel.

After that was over, Alex and I headed to the city to meet up with our friend Megan, who was in town from D.C., and Moe, who was just laid off and in need of boozing. It becomes a little difficult to remember what happened after that point. Eventually, I found myself at Bushwick Country Club, where some overly chatty NYU kid bought me a tall boy of PBR and I now feel the need to re-evaluate my entire life because I had to type that sentence.

I am telling you this because, despite the fact that it is asinine and mundane, it is far more interesting than a recap of what my Giants did to the Seahawks.