FAN: Hitler or Saddam

So here we go again.... another NFL week acting like the Colts and Patriots are the only two teams playing. I get really sick of it. Manning is on the cover of SI so Peter King can suck from his teet. Picking who I want to win this game is easy, the Pats. Should the Steelers make the AFC Championship game and it's not a home game which is a very likely scenario, I'd much rather play at New England than go to the sissy, sterile, noise added dome. As for actually rooting for the Pats to win, ain't gonna happen. I hesitate to even watch the game because the idiot announcers are already in a thesaurus this morning frantically scribbling down other words for awesome, phenominal, perfect, elite, gay ......etc.

Hey Colts, Here Ya Go

Well, Benny served up today's game on a silver platter. There is no other way to describe it. Without those two picks, and a lucky ass tip (two for that matter) the Colts may not have been in the end zone all day. The defense has to be really frustrated. They easily played well enough to win. Even though my team lost, I have to say, the most troubling thing about today for me was seeing Boomer Esiason for the first time in a long time. I'm trying to watch less and less panel shows and updates and I've been doing OK so far this year. I've added a lot of free hours (well, not really) to my Sundays by only watching a little of the Football Night in America show. I didn't even watch it tonight. However, when I turned on the HiDef to watch the Stillers, I turned it on a few minutes early and Boomer looked as if he swallowed a small child earlier today. His face is so bloated! What the heck? His head looked like a pumpkin for Christ's sake. I hope he's healthy and I'm not making fun of a medical condition. I guess that's what old age does to you. He looks like shit.

Genius Mashup

Thanks Still A South for one of the most creative mashups I've seen in a while. This one goes out to Cousin Boomer and Cowboy fans across the country....er, world, I guess...or at least Germany.

History Repeats

Amazing how other playoff games this week ended with some of the same conditions as the Steelers faced last week. The Chargers had to give up the ball after running while fighting for a first down to end the game. With less than 2 minutes to go, they punted to the second best offense in the league from their own endzone. Dude punted the ball 66 yards! 66! Sixty-Frickin-Sicks! That's what we needed from Danny Boy last week and we didn't get it. Oh, it doesn't hurt that their defense then STOPPED the other team from scoring as well. The Giants also had to give up the ball with more than a FG lead with less than 2 minutes to play. They also chose to run on all 3 plays if memory serves me correctly. Their defense was also able to hold the Cowboys off. Ho Hum. I guess out of the teams that are left, I'd most like to see Green Bay win...problem is - I don't think they're the best team left.

Did You Hear?

In case you didn't hear (that was dripping with sarcasm) the Colts are playing the Patriots this week. Blah Blah Blah. I'm so freaking sick and tired about hearing about these two teams and seeing Peyton & Tom's faces all over the promos. Every armchair quarterback is saying the winner of this game will win the Super Bowl. Give me a break. They very well may, but it's still the first week of November. Who on Earth would have picked the Steelers to win the Super Bowl in 2005 the week after Halloween? Isn't the team clicking on all eight cylinders at the end of the season the team that usually wins it all? Let's at least wait until the week after Thanksgiving before we start this kind of talk. Every stinking show about football and every pregame show thinks we care who they think will win the Super Bowl. Freaking Peter King started an MVP Watch sidebar in his weekly column several weeks ago...like week 3 or something. Ridiculous. Can we let the season unfold without all the idiots picking teams to win the Bowl already? Every year somebody gets smoked in the playoffs that isn't supposed to. Weren't the Colts supposed to destroy the Steelers in 2005? The Steelers physically manhandled them and made them look bad in doing it. "That's why they play the game" and "On any given Sunday" are two huge quotes concerning the NFL. Now, if you want to watch two teams bash each other's skulls in this week instead of watching the air attacks in the other game - watch the game that myself, Still A Dog & Still A South will be at. Watch The Pittsburgh Steelers try to extend their lead in the AFC North against the hated Baltimore Ravens. Let the talking heads talk and let those two teams listen to their own press clippings. Let their heads swell. Here we come, right under the radar. Watch out.

Tale Of Two Cities

The three pictures with a sprinkling of fans were taken off the Colts website showing pictures of their celebration parade. Their own website sites about 40,000 fans attended. The three pictures full of yellow are off of the Steelers website from the Super Bowl XL parade last year. There are about 10 references on Google estimating the crowd to be over 250,000 people as the entire city shut down. I'm not sure what my point is other to say when Manning thanked the crowd for being the best fans in the league, he didn't do nearly as much homework researching that as he did the Bear's defense. Also, from every account I read and from the noise levels at the game and listening to the announcers - the crowd was about 70-30 Bears fans. I'm not ragging on the Colts, I'm just using them as a yardstick to see how football crazy Pittsburgh really is. Still A Dad taped the parade and mailed it to me last year and I have to say - from every angle I saw and from every aerial shot - that parade was jam packed more than 10 people deep every step of the way. Thanks to Still A South for sending this in. The Steeler's website has video of the parade as well if you've never seen it. I linked to some video highlites last March that a friend of a friend took.

Championship Week Thoughts

In no particular order:

I loved watching the snow and muck fall in Chicago. It's what the mind conjures up when you think "playoff football". Fast forward to Indy in the sterile dome.......exactly.......football should not be played in a dome.

It always amazes me that whenever the Bears play, if there is a ball on the carpet, a Bear will recover. That's not luck, that's good coaching.

The Patriots secondary is outstanding. I don't think I've ever seen so many passes defensed in a single game - all the same way as well - a big mitt right between the hands of the receivers.

Another thing that is pretty impressive is the fact that Brady is out there whizzing passes to two guys like Caldwell and Gaffney. Remember Marino's receivers after the Marks Brothers? Neither does anybody else. He is out there dueling with Peyton Manning who has a first ballot Hall-Of-Famer in Harrison, Reggie Wayne and an outstanding TE in Dallas Clark. It's almost like a gunfight where one man is armed with a Beretta 9mm and the other has an old board with a rusty nail stuck in it.

Phil Simms can be good, but he can be very bad as well. I could not believe he made the statement he made at the beginning of the game. He was liking the fact that Brady was throwing on first down and said the Patriots didn't want to make the same mistake as KC and the Ravens did....running the ball too much because of Indy's lack of run defense. What?! The Ravens ran the ball with a RB 17 times. Do these guys do their homework at all? Should Joe Schmoe sitting on his couch be able to say "that's bullshit" 3 times during a game when these guys are getting paid tons of money to just talk about football?

The stats they were showing on Manning's regular season prowess (.4 picks per game) vs. his playoff failures (2.4 per game) were amazing. It's almost hard to comprehend. I just remember the Colts killing the Steelers in the regular season last year and then physically being outmatched in the playoff game when they had Peyton on his back the entire game.

I'm happy for Tony Dungy. As an ex-Steeler player and coach and pretty good human being - I'm truly happy for him.

I wish to God Manning's people would talk to him and suggest that perhaps he take it easy on the endorsements. I've already talked about it, but geez it's tough sitting through all those commercials.

How about Eli's reaction to the one TD? Stoic would describe it perfectly - but then again he always looks stoned to me. I wonder if he's really happy for his brother, or secretly wishes it was him?

Drew Brees picked a bad week to have his worst game of the season. I feel bad for him as I genuinely like him as well. Where was Deuce McAllister in this game and why didn't they try to get him off earlier?

At least the Steelers 4 Super Bowls in 6 years won't be matched for at least another 6 years.

Reche Caldwell probably cost his team a trip to the Super Bowl. Now...in true Belichick fashion...will he be back next year? I can see Bill cutting him.

Cut That Meat! Cut That Meat!

Do you remember when Pearl Jam first came out and they had videos for Evenflow, Alive and the superb Jeremy? They were blowing up and Eddie wasn't comfortable with the whole celebrity/fame thing so they kind of went semi-underground by holding back the interviews and not doing any more videos for years. I wish Peyton Manning would sit down and watch an hour of NFL Network. Maybe he too would get sick of seeing his face and hearing his slow drawl. I've never seen something so sickening as all the TV time Peyton, Eli and Archie get. Numerous outlets like to call them cute things like the "First Family of Football" and blah blah blah. Interesting. How many Super Bowl wins do they have between the three of them? Wins? How many Super Bowl appearances do they have between them? Zero. Right. It seems like every other commercial or sideline report last night was focusing on the Sunday night matchup until I had to hear John Madden pontificate on what their mother will be thinking from the stands. I think she'll be thinking - "I think they should have dated more in highschool". I saw one outtake last night on either ESPN or NFL Network where they were all at a table and they were asked to imitate each other. Oh My God...how much more of this CRAP do I have to put up with? And then to hear the cute little story about having a family dinner and Peyton acted like he was taking notes on Eli. Brilliant! My God, the comic talent of that man! Peyton's face is all over the NFL and he seems to be in every commercial on NFL Network. If you're a fan of his, that's just peachy, but if you get off on watching Joey Porter bury him, then it's a problem. I have no issue with him personally. He's a good guy. It was noble to donate time and effort during Katrina. However, I think he should dial back his endorsements and commercials. He is toying around with backlash if you ask me by oversaturating the airwaves with his mug. Archie cracks me up too. How good is it for the game if the undisputed #1 pick holds the team with the first pick hostage every year? Play within the system. You shouldn't get to pick and choose who you want to play for when you're a rookie. I respect Peyton's game and he has plenty of it. Still, the only way to shrug the current tag that he can't win the big game....is to win the big game. Last time I checked....he doesn't play defense and he can't pass block for himself so it might not be this year either.