The conclusion of the The Definitive 2009 NFL Preview:
NFC WATB… er…North:
The NFC North. Scion of the legendary NFC Central. The Black and Blue division. The Norse division. Home of legends such as the Purple People Eaters, the Monsters of the Midway, the Frozen Tundra of Lambeau Field. The division that doubtless inspired the voice of Jon Facenda to greater depth and timbre. Of course, now with the addition of Cutler and Favre it has turned into the NFC Whiny-ass-titty-baby division.
Green Bay is now the chic pick to win it all this year. I hope they do really well but, to borrow a phrase from Chris Collinsworth, I am not so sure. Their defense has to prove a lot of things this year and the offense still has to produce like it did last year. Minnesota is better on defense and Adrian Peterson alone makes them a potentially dominant force on offense. I think Minnesota wins this division even if Favre’s arm falls off after 10 games like it did last year. Green Bay should earn a wild card spot. BTW, Detroit will be much better than they were last year---I think Jim Schwartz could have them winning very soon, possibly as early as next year.
NFC South:
Both New Orleans and Atlanta look great but both have suspect defenses. I say Atlanta wins this division based on their better ground game and New Orleans earns a wild card berth.
NFC West:
Seattle is the chic pick to win the NFC West. They won’t. They’ll suck, as they deserve to, being led by the vocal conservative shithead Hasselbeck. About a month into the season, Ol’ Hassle-back will throw out his spine again during one of his weekly ritualistic orgies with Glen Beck, Rush Limbaugh and Bill O’Reilly. The 49ers will win that division, and it may not be close. Those of you who are yelling, “ B-B-But the Cardinals…!!!”, pipe down. Arizona was the worst team to make the playoffs last year---then they caught lightning in a bottle when they found a running game and Kurt Warner stumbled upon this pop report that Viagra can improve athletic performance as well. Defense and rushing win championships, and I don’t see Arizona having a sufficient supply of either, especially the latter. They do have ex-Steeler Whisenhunt as head coach, and they still have LFitzgerald and Boldin, so they won’t completely suck---just enough to not make the playoffs, methinks.
The Definitive 2009 NFL Preview continues…..if you didn’t read the first part, it's here.
AFC South:
The Texans will finally win the AFC South if Gary Kubiak and Kyle (product of neo-American meritocracy) Shanahan don’t completely fuck up the offensive play calling at crucial times like they did last year. But that’s too much to ask and so the Titans will win the division again. The Titans are always tough, they looked pretty good last night against the Steelers, but they will miss Jim Schwartz and Haynesworth in the long run---they already missed Schwartz’s defensive mind in the fourth quarter against the Steelers. So the Titans will not be as dominating in that division as they were last year. The Texans will benefit from this small Titan dropoff, will finish second in the division and contend for a wild card berth.
The Colts will have a hard time getting 8 wins this season. If Joseph Addai and Donald Brown play out of their minds, maybe the Colts will win more than 8. But even then I doubt it, unless the Colts sprout a defense all of a sudden. Even if they have a couple of miraculous wins like they did last year I don’t see them getting past 9&7.
The Jaguar players pretty much quit on their coach last year and I have no idea about their team this year, but I’m guessing they are still chopping wood so I’m conveniently assigning them a losing season.
AFC West:
The Chargers will win this division easily--- unlike last year when they should have won easily but scraped out an 8-8 division-winning season.
The Raiders will be much better than people expect and they’ll finish second. Of course, that ain’t saying much in that division.
I would have picked the Chargers as a mortal lock for the Superbowl title this year except for the fact that they are led by Norv Turner. I will state, however, that their FUQIT Quotient at key positions is so high that even Norv may not be able to hold them back this year. FUQIT Quotient (Frustration of Uniquely Qualified Individual Talent) is (something I just invented and) a measure of the Talent of a brilliant player multiplied by the Frustration the player feels in not having been rewarded with a Superbowl title for that talent. Rivers is a kickass QB who is steaming over the fact that fellow classmates Roethlisberger (two titles) and Mr. Mediocrity Eli Manning (one title) are ahead in the bling-bling game. Also, the scuttlebutt from San Diego is that Rivers is an intensely devout man who prides himself on not swearing. A frustrated pro athlete who does not swear…this has got to be the biggest case of emotional blue balls ever, right? The guy is a ticking time bomb, I tell ya. Anyway, LaDainian Tomlinson is good enough to kick Emmitt Smith into the footnotes of history but the lack of playoff success frustrates him to tears---plus his career window is closing fast. Shawne Merriman’s roid rage is so frustrated at not even meriting a FUQIT Quotient yet that he is allegedly choking his girlfriend in his spare time. So anyhoo, you get the picture --- I would not be the least surprised if the Chargers win the Superbowl. I will, also, only be mildly surprised if they end up at 8-8 again (of course, in that division 8-8 could win it again and then they could still go on to win the Superbowl….so…..yeah……).
NFC East:
The Eagles will win the NFC East easily if Andy Reid doesn’t fuck up the play calling at crucial times like he did last year. But that’s a tall order, especially with the distraction of the ‘wildcat’ possibilities with Vick now. The bottom line is that anything that reduces Westbrook’s touches also reduces the Eagles’ chances of winning...so I have a bad feeling about this season for the Iggles…
The Giants are loaded on defense and have a great run game but I don’t favor them to win the division because they are led by Eli (product of neo-American meritocracy) Manning. Plus, by cutting David Tyree at the same time that they made the mediocre-piece-of-crap-Manning the highest paid QB in football they have SURELY pissed off the karma police enough to ensure them losing seasons for the rest of Eli’s career, haven’t they? I know, I know, but I can hope, can’t I?
The Redskins have upgraded on defense. Plus I think it is the first time in QB Jason Campbell’s career that the poor guy gets to run the same offense for a second consecutive year. So you’d think they’d be serious contenders. But I don’t know…Portis said, during the last election, that Obama was surely the better candidate for the nation but he wasn’t sure he’d vote for him as he was worried his taxes may go up. Now that kind of stupidity, especially in DC, has got to invoke some seriously bad karma…..
The Cowboys will be, as always, very entertaining. They have the talent to win but I have the sneaking feeling that Jerry Jones’ tight face will be feeling a bit tighter at many times this season. I can’t wait for the first Cowboy receiver to drop a pass because he was too focused on the ginormous HD screen, right over the field in the new stadium, as opposed to the freaking football. Also, I really, really, hope that in every Cowboy home game the visiting punter hits the screen a couple of times….for any visiting team it is only a couple of do-overs but by the end of the season the Cowboy special teams would have had like a few dozen extra special team do-overs and that has got to be great for the health of the Cowboys, hasn’t it? All the Cowboys on IR can can rest secure in the knowledge that Jerry Jones did a smidge more than the bare-minimum requirement and therefore the screen was technically legal…..I’m looking for some seriously good times here….
Getting back to the issue of the NFC East, this is too tough to call. Screw it, I’m calling that no team wins the NFC East this year. I’ll say that they’ll all finish 8-8 with identical conference records and some lame tie-breaker will send the least-loser to the playoffs. And that will likely be the Eagles, and furthermore, they could go on to ride this playoff berth all the way to the Superbowl. I had to write that to avoid getting hate mail from Comrade PhysioProf.
The remainder of the The Definitive 2009 NFL Preview will hopefully follow sometime late tomorrow. Be sure to tune in.
My sponsors just wet their pants---I mean, breaking up a single episode into two was commercial enuff, but three installments...that’s some serious enterprise at work right there…
If it weren't for him, the Steelers would be losing by 2 TDs right now.
Troy "I just got bumped by the receiver but I'm gonna reach up with my left hand, while falling, and intercept that pass anyway" Polamalu.
Fuckin' Ayyyyyy!
HALFTIME UPDATE: There have been some horrible calls in this game, surprisingly against the home team. The fucking Titans may have knocked out Polamalu---I have always admired Jeff Fisher teams but the "receiver pulling Polamalu down by his hair that was called a penalty on Polamalu" play may be changing my mind. All that having been said, I have a disturbing stat---Steelers 10 rushes, 12 yards. All other things aside, this cannot bode well. The defense can only do so much. If you cannot control the ball, you cannot win consistently. Steeler left tackle #78 was so freaking bad in this half that I actually looked up who he was---Max Starks. Max, if this is what you're bringing this year, email me. I will abandon all hope.
Firstly, I need to address an issue that has gotten completely out of hand ---- that of sportscasters conferring honorifics upon themselves. The ESPN assholes, in particular, hand out titles like so much Halloween candy---Professor so-and-so, or Doctor Whatshisface, or Dean of college football etc. People work really hard to earn and retain these titles in real life, so I think it is an affront to the academic community that a bunch of yahoos yakking subjectively about sports can hand these titles out to themselves. Well, screw that. Two can play that game. So this Definitive 2009 NFL Preview is brought to you by 15-time SuperBowl champion and Unanimous-First-Ballot-Hall-of-Famer Anonymoustache. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, ‘Doctor’ Lou.
I didn’t think the football commentators’ booth could get any more annoying till I caught a few minutes of Jon Gruden on MNF last week. To think that I used to consider him a smart guy…….the fucker poached Dungy’s Superbowl in Tampa, hasn’t done shit since and his commentary explains a lot about why. I mean, do we really need him to be staring into the camera with his “I’ve been trying to pinch off this particularly obstinate loaf for 20 minutes now” grimace and proclaim, “Brett Favre creates jobs!”. Do we need this? Really? I mean, REALLY? Gruden reminds me of an old adage that says “It is better to be silent and be thought of a fool than to open your mouth and leave no doubt”. Of course, he is the genius who drafted Chris (product of neo-American meritocracy) Simms, so the signs were there a while ago. He makes me long for the drunken-frat-boy-schtick of Theismann, Mike Patrick and the other fucker, and they were really really annoying (I’ll tell you what…..Let me tell ya something…..I’m tellin ya…..You know what? I’ll tell ya…….I’m gonna tell ya something right now…..).
From what I have seen, I think Chris Collinsworth is considerably overrated and he’s certainly no freaking Madden. Let me explain that to you in Collinsworth-speak: I’m not so sure that Chris is not still the pedestrian hack that I originally thought him to be before he got all these rave reviews from the powers that be in broadcasting. When you consider that, it makes you think again. But then again, that could be because he is just really good at kissing broadcast exec ass, but there is no clear evidence either way so it’s gonna be tough to make that call, you know? I’m not sure that in the end we needed to review this at all; we could have just stuck with the call on the field which was that Chris is considerably overrated.
Al Michaels: Chris, that analysis was uuuuuuge….this game is so exciting I’m having trouble breathing….do you believe in spiracles???.....welcome back to Sunndeeeee nite footbooaall……
OK, here’s the Freaking Definitive NFL 2009 preview:
AFC East:
The Patriots will win. The Jets will be pretty good and will make the playoffs---the standard for rookie QBs, and the teams led by them, has been raised last year by Ryan + Falcons and Flacco + Ravens. RookQB teams now expect to win, and the Jets are solid on both sides of the ball. Plus, head coach Rex (product of neo-American meritocracy) Ryan seems to have his dad’s renegade, bounty-laying, ass-kicking and name-taking redass and that alone could be good for a couple of wins. I am excited by the prospect that the Jets will do really well and then have a minor meltdown in a game that might prompt Ryan to coldcock one of his fellow coaches. Too obscure?
AFC North:
This will be brutal at the top again. Baltimore and Pittsburgh are mirror teams: Tough defense, solid running game, good young QBs and some serious mutual respect+hatred. Much as my heart wants Pittsburgh to win, I have to give the edge to the Ravens this year. I think they will be a bit hungrier and the Steelers may be a bit more relaxed. Plus, Ray Lewis’ window is closing fast and I’ll bet he’d love to stand on the sidelines at the superbowl one more time with a lead and watch his offensive buddies slowly kill the clock….I mean, watch as they slowly bleed the game to an end…..I mean, when a guy has killer instinct you gotta give it to him, y’know? What, too soon? So anyway, I say Baltimore wins the division and Pittsburgh makes the playoffs as a wild card.
The rest of the preview will have to wait till tomorrow or the day after. Be sure to tune in.
In the business, we call this a ‘tease’. My sponsors are agog with excitement.
I haven't done a FSC post in a while. I also realize that in my previous posts on this theme I have been very sexist by not ridiculing fortunate daughters as well (though, in my defense, there are far fewer fortunate daughters than sons; women get a raw deal there too).
Anyway, I can put off writing another FSC post for a while after reading Glenn Greenwald's awesome column "It's time to embrace American royalty". It's gonna be hard to top that.
Enjoy!
(Thanks for the tip, G-man)
PS: Bikemonkey pointed out that I omitted to include the official FSC soundtrack (which he had so appropriately suggested a while ago).
So here goes.....one of my favorite songs from one of my favorite bands, and the inimitable pipes of John Fogerty.........enjoy!
