She’s wearing red this time

I’ve decided to write this post since the mention of Maria Sharapova will likely quadruple our visitors.  I hope you 3 enjoy it! I feel like fashion is more a part of women’s tennis than well, the tennis.  Case in point, Bethanie Mattek who thankfully lost in the first round thereby only subjecting us to this monstrosity once.

Kiran Chetry: Giving us the news we care about.

I should preface this post by saying that in general I don’t watch CNN very often, but I do play around on the internet and watch random clips that happen to come my way.  More and more often one journalist seems to be behind these clips; that journalist Kiran Chetry.  In case you were as unaware as I cnn.com states that:

Chetry joined CNN in February 2007 and immediately began anchoring various CNN programs including American Morning, Anderson Cooper 360º, Paula Zahn Now and CNN Newsroom. Previously, Chetry was the anchor of Fox & Friends First and Fox & Friends Weekend for the Fox News Channel. She has covered major breaking news stories including reports from the field during the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the Columbia Space Shuttle disaster, the invasion of Baghdad and Hurricane Katrina.

While Chetry may have been covered many of the most important American news stories of the last ten years, a quick google reveals that what really made her famous.  Chetry has clawed her way to the top of the broadcasting totem pole, by not being afraid to do what it takes to get there and by covering any story at all.  She will have an awkward interview with a spelling bee champion, call co-workers from the bathtub, jump on a pogo-stick in high heels and a short skirt, hit the street with an ugly dog, talk to a pedophile, get pied by a clown,  perpetuate French stereotypes, talk down to Hillbillies about Politics, watch Panda pornography, sit on Santa’s lap and flirt with him, and sleep on the street.  Oh yeah she’s also pretty hot and not afraid to dress up as as a sexy video game character for Halloween.

At what point have I cheered sufficiently?

I was just cruising Greg Oden’s Blog which you really should check out if you have three or four free minutes, and I came across one of the best things that I’ve seen in a while. I don’t know how this clip slipped past me for so long, but it shows the people of beautiful Portland Oregon getting far too excited for something that everyone in the sporting world knew was going to happen. I mean come on, was the fact that they drafted a prospect that scouts are calling a once in a generation talent really surprising? It’s not so much that people cheered it’s how long they cheered for and how much jumping around there was. The video lasts almost a minute and it doesn’t look like the crowd is anywhere near settling down when it ends. I suppose that we’ve all been there but while watching the video I could only thing about if I were there how uncomfortable I would be and how all I would be thinking is: “How much longer to I have to jump up and down with my hands in the air?”

If for no other reason, watch it for Chabal.

It’s official, August is the most boring month on the calender.  Having already given up on baseball as a professional sport due to its unfair treatment of everyone who is not a Red Sock or Yankee, I have been concentrating my efforts on getting as pumped up as possible for the upcoming NFL season.  Even this is starting to wear on me as I’ve been inundated with news of some fellow who enjoys fighting dogs in his spare time more so than actual previews of the upcoming season.  Despite this, I am chomping at the bit to see the Bengals dominate the league, along with the rest of my fantasy roster, leading me to the glory and infamy I so deserve.  Since I’ve been playing club Rugby all summer, I’ve also decided to take an interest in the World Cup of Rugby starting September 7th.  I was just informed that it’s the 4th most watched sporting event in the world behind the World Cup of Soccer and the Olympic Games ( I too thought more people watched Dancing with the Stars than the Winter Olympics, Who knew?).  I would be surprised to find out that more than a handful of Americans other than their 30 man roster and Miss Teen South Carolina have even heard of the game which means that countries like England, Australia, New Zealand and France will be literally shutting down to watch their home sides.  I think this kind of obsessive fandom is greater than any in our domestic professional leagues.  The drinking and rioting that go along with it mean that it can only be undertaken every four years for everyones safety.  Speaking of safety, the other reason I wanted to wrote this post was to have an excuse to show you this clip of Sebastian Chabal.  He plays for France, which is the site of the tournament and is clearly a deranged individual.  If anyone could take down Kimbo Slice, I’d put my money on this guy, and not just because he looks like the white version of him.

I’m pretty sure he broke that guys jaw when he headbutted him.  Also, I’m going to make two predictions:  Canada will make it to the knockout round and France will ride homefield advantage to victory.

Nope Sorry.

Ever since I moved to Miami I’ve been making a inordinate amount of long distance calls. It probably has something to do with the fact that I refuse to speak to the 85% of the population of Miami that is functionally retarded. Regardless I tend to make a lot of calls to Canada and other cities up in the North East. To save my phone bill I’ve been using skype, and it’s $29.99 per/ year unlimited outcall plan. The problem with this of course is that I am unable to get in calls on my skype phone, and so what usually happens is that I have people call me on my mobile and then depending on whether or not I can get to a phone I either call them back on skype, or I just take the charge on my cell. It’s a pretty simple system but apparently there is a new way for me to consolidate.

Enter the Plantroics Calisto Pro. This one device will take my cellphone, landline, and skype calls while single handedly ruining my sex life. I mean look at this late-term design abortion. It is possibly the ugliest phone I’ve ever seen and at just this side of three hundred dollars you’d expect that it would at least look good enough to get you laid. While I would never be so shallow as to not sleep with someone because of their phone, we are living in a material world and most of the women I sleep with are material girls whores who just might might not get loose in the pants if I’m carrying this phone. The device itself is pretty cool, though I’m still confused about how it can take calls from a landline while mobile (doesn’t the landline then become a cell). Also I’m not sure if I would be able to trust the brand name, Plantronics, because it sounds like the type of name that they would put on The Flintstones, one which just close enough to a real brand that you recognize it but far enough away that they can’t be sued.

I’ll admit that I may not be the target market for this item but I probably could be and I’m sure that there are thousands dozens of young people out there who use three different phones and would be will to join them all together if a product came out that looked cool and functioned well. The shame is that it’s almost a sure thing that someone in the near future will make a phone that does all of the exact same things but it will look good, and a load of people will buy it. Too bad Plantronics, too bad.

Subway Series.

I really wish that I could think of something funny to say about this picture… but I can’t.  I feel like my lack of humor may have something to do with the 25 imported Vietnamese beers I swilled last night.

A.L. East: Fucking the Jays since ’95

What was I thinking?  For the second season in a row, I actually thought the Blue Jays might finish ahead of either Boston or New York in the A.L. East.  After being swept by the A’s we sit 12.5 games behind the Yankee’s and 7.5 behind the Sox.  In other words, we’re fucked.  Ever since the Jays won back to back World Series’ in ’92 and ’93, we have been pretty fucked every year.  I decided to delve into the past to see just what has been going on since those triumphant times.  What I found was very interesting. 

In 93, the Jays finished as World Champions for the second straight season and the Montreal Expo’s were just 3 games shy of winning the pennant in the N.L. East.  Is it a coincidence that Major League Baseball decided to realign the divisions and change the playoff format the very next year?  I think not.  I think they were worried we were trying to steal “America’s Game.”  The divisions were set, and the Expo’s dominated in ’94. This just happened to be the strike shortened season.  Very convenient.  The Expo’s never really recovered after this disappointment and eventually relocated where?  That’s right, Washington D.C., the heart of the great beast. 

The Wildcard has been awarded for 12 years now, and how many times do you think it has gone to an A.L. East team?  8.  That’s twice as many as any other division in baseball.  In fact, last season was the first time a team in the A.L. Central has ever gotten it.  It was also the first time the Jays have finished in the top two in the division since the new system was put in place.  This division is clearly the hardest in baseball.  It’s dominated by the two most storied and historic franchises in the American League.  It’s not bad enough that we have to compete with them, we also have to play them about 50 times a year.  We get to play the Devil Ray’s and Oriole’s the same amount which should even it out but never does.  On that note, can you imagine being a Devil Ray’s fan?  Holy shit, what a lost cause.

I started this morning hating the Blue Jays for not living up to my expectations.  They were even teasing me late, getting hot after the break, including their pitching which was totally unexpected.  I was considering adopting a new team to root for that would actually have a shot.  Instead, I think I’m just going to hate Major League Baseball.  They let us slow witted Canadians have a couple rings and then pulled the rug right out from under us.  I’m vowing to hate baseball from now on, or at least until the beginning of next season when the NHL, NBA, and NFL are all gone and I’ll have no fantasy sports to play. 

CFL to NFL: We want some of your trash, but we can’t take it all.

A report came out today in the Canadian press citing that Michael Vick will not be able to play in the CFL once he is suspended by the NFL.  My initial response to this article was “Duuuhhhh he’ll be in jail,” but once I whipped the sleep from my eyes, shook the remnants of my hangover off, and figured out who the girl that was sleeping my bed was I finished the article and realized that it was reporting about after he got out of jail.  Apparently: 

A rule approved by the CFL in the off-season bars clubs from signing players who are under suspension in the NFL. The rule was adopted in response to the Toronto Argonauts’ signing last season of running back Ricky Williams, who was serving a one-year suspension for drug use.

Who knew?

     In a completely unrelated story that equally as few people care about, recently cut Detroit Lions first round pick bust Charles Rogers may soon be making a trip up north.  Apparently there is a bevy of teams foaming at the mouth for this once in a generation talent (Three year NFL totals: 15 GP, 36 Rec, 440 yrd, 4TD).  No less than three teams are interested in the services of Rogers who plans to follow in the footsteps of players such as Lawrence Phillips, Robert Edwards, Andre Rison, and unsuccessfully use the CFL as a way to get back into the NFL.  Rogers was the second overall pick in 2003 ahead fantasy draft regulars Andre Johnson, Willis McGahee, Larry Johnson, and Super Bowl choke artist Rex Grossman.  That’s just about all of the CFL news I can handle for now.

August 17th: The worst day of the year.

August 16th is my birthday. I love August 16th. I’m not one of those people that pretends that they hate they hate their birthday. I love the attention that I get, I love the cake, and I love the drinking.

August 17th on the other hand I hate. On the day after your birthday it’s like people are fed up with you, often they go out of their way to be rude and if you say anything about it they just mention that they ate cake with you the day before. It’s only 11:30 but I am well on route to having one of the worst August 17th’s ever. I woke up on my kitchen floor fully dressed (including shoes) already late for work. I came to two conclusions very quickly. Conclusion 1) I’m painfully hungover and sore from spending the night sleeping on Mexican tile. Conclusion 2) today is going to suck. I shower and head off to work, thinking I’ll just make one quick stop to pick up an egg and cheese on my way. I stop and somehow stuck in a line at the bagel store behind 4 cops. I realize that I am really hungover, look like a bag of shit and if the cops wanted to there a good shot that they could arrest me on a DUI so I try to pull myself together. I can’t. I am next in line when it strikes me… I am going to puke. Midway through saying “everything bagel egg and cheese with a water” I have to run to the bathroom and kiss porcelain. The worst part about the whole experience someone else has peed in the toilet and not flushed. I’m literally blowing my now fully digested birthday dinner into someone else’s piss. I’ve hit a new low. Now is the part of the story where I should let everyone know that I am a violent heaver… I make sounds. When I come out of the bathroom everyone everyone in the store knows that I’ve been puking and is staring at me, the kid with 8 fingers working behind the counter looks at me and asks if I’m alright… I reply with something along the lines of I’m a lot better than whoever has to clean up that bathroom and I leave with my egg sandwich and orange juice. On my way into the office I get an email from my boss asking if I have any plans of coming in to the office. I let him know that I’m almost there. When I arrive he lets me know that my behavior is unacceptable and than he piles on work for me to do… He’s very disappointed. Instead of doing the work that I am given I am writing a blog post so it is now a foregone conclusion that when the work isn’t completed I will get another stern talking to.

If anything else goes wrong I’ll write it up in the comment section. If not I’ll probably pretend to be conscious at my desk for the next 8 or 9 hours.

A view from the top.

As mentioned below this Sunday was much better than any religious holiday could ever be; we had our fantasy draft.  Fluffy mentioned that I was back in Canada for the weekend.  I had to go to a wedding and while that was the premise of the trip, the real reason I followed through was for this draft.  There is little better than drinking beer, eating pizza and attempting to verbally defecate all over the psyche of some of your best friends.

I’ve had almost a week to let it sink in and the confidence that I have in my team is through the roof.  I should warn everyone though that this doesn’t mean anything, when it comes to fantasy my confidence always seems to be through the roof.  Last year at this time I considered myself a Championship lock and I finished in a disheartening sixth place.  Generally I do well in fantasy sports and this sixth was the worst finish I can remember having in any league (aside from the time someone convinced me to try fantasy nascar).  I should also note that while this confidence does approach cockiness, I feel that it is acceptable if for no other reason than because I spend far more time than is healthy following all things sports (racing doesn’t count as a sport) and because I obsess about my players as if they were my own children, albeit children I can get rid of if a better kid comes along.

I guess I’ll explain how the draft went for me now:  My keepers this year were Frank Gore and Stephen Jackson.  I was able to get both of these players because one guy stupidly dropped Gore early in the season because of bye week trouble.  With these two workhorses holding down the front end of my team I figured that I needed to go after two stud receivers in the first two rounds of the draft.  I was really hoping to get Marvin Harrison but he was taken early and I ended up landing Tory Holt in the first round, in the second round I was shocked to find out that Reggie Wayne had somehow (because of Honest Abe: see below) slipped  back to me.  The reason for this slip became clear in the next round, since our league has 12 teams and we start 2 quarterbacks, top QBs tend to go quickly.  In the next two rounds I tried to salvage what was left of the quarterback crop and ended up with the mediocre Tony Romo, and the potentially franchise killing Jason Campbell.  Jason Campbell was my “Joey Galloway”, I tried to defend the pick but I’m not sure if it is possible.  I imagine that he’ll be serviceable but I probably could have gotten him five rounds later and I realized this because when I drafted him the room went silent until someone coming over the speaker phone said “Is he a tight end?”  I rebounded well from this blunder taking Adrian Peterson, Chis Chambers, Jerious Norwood, and Gregg Jennings over the next 5 rounds.   I think that this really makes up the core of a great team.  The last half of the draft had me filling up my bench with, Rex Grossman, Jason Witten, Brady Quinn, Carolina Defense, Ronald Curry and the Patriots kicker.

Like I said, I think that my team looks pretty strong and I’ve got a bunch of high upside players that may end up doing a lot.  Clearly the two weakest links on my team are the two Jason’s (Witten and Campbell) I think that if they can have semi-decent seasons you may hear back from me in a few months letting you know that I have won the KFC trophy seen below (yes in fact we are losers).

Here are some of the other highlights of the draft:

Tingles selecting Chicago defense as a keeper.  Then selecting a team full of journeymen and backups that would have been good in 2000 including: Hines Ward, Terry Glenn, Jamal Lewis, Ashlie Lelie, Lamont Jordan, Marty Booker, and Damon Huard.

Dilbert taking Tony Gonzalez- ahead of Antonio Gates, because he assumed Gates was a keeper so he didn’t even look to see if he was on the board.

Chippy taking Marques Colston, Eli Manning, and Joe Horn with his first three picks after taking the full two and a half minutes each time.  Needless to say Chippy was unprepared and had a lot of Joey Galloway moments at the front end of the draft.

Life long Bills fan Honest Abe taking JP Losman in the second round because he was afraid “someone would take him just to screw with me.”