Weekend Review

WHO WAS AWESOME

1. Matt Garza. And David Price. And BJ Upton. And Evan Longoria. And Willy Aybar. And all the Rays. Awesome bounce back from that crushing loss in game five to come back and win in seven to head to the series to lose to the Phillies. How insanely good was Garza? And Price, shutting the door in the 8th and 9th, despite not even being a relief pitcher and not even being in the majors until September? This team is loaded, and this will most definitely not be their last playoff appearance. Delmon Young better get his shit together.

2. Gopher Football. Congrats to the Gophers on getting themselves ranked in the top 25 (#25 to be exact) and 24th in the BCS rankings. Certainly a great step up from last season, no doubt. With the schedule they have remaining they have a chance to end up going 11-1, it shouldn’t be expected, but it is within the realm of possibility. Would that be enough to get to a BCS bowl? A lot would have to happen with the teams above them, but I don’t think it’s out of the question. In any case, they should end up at a top tier bowl, probably against an SEC team where they’ll get crushed, but it wouldn’t be an embarrassment to anyone. This season has already exceeded most people’s wildest expectations for this team. I’d love to make a smartass comment here, but I just can’t. I’m pretty happy over here.

3. Tennessee Titans. Now 6-0 and basically making it look easy. Yes, I said they wouldn’t be very good this year, but that was with Vince Young at quarterback. Once you get Kerry Collins involved, all bets are off. He’s nothing special, but he does a pretty good job of taking care of the ball and keeping them in the game (exactly what Young doesn't do) so that top shelf defense and solid running game can beat down a team. Chris Johnson looks very AP-like so far and can break one at any time, and FatDale just keeps running into people and falling down until they get so tired and worn out from having 300 pounds bouncing into them over and over again they can barely stand. Note: his 80 yard TD run doesn’t mean he’s good, it just means Kansas City is really THAT bad.

4. Texas Longhorns. Damn dude, those are a couple of very impressive back-to-back wins by the Longhorns, following up last week’s win against Oklahoma with a 56-31 stomping of #11 Missouri in a game that wasn’t even that close. Texas QB Colt McCoy has jumped to the lead of the Heisman race, going 29-32 for 337 yards and 2 TDs (with 2 more rushing). Read that again. 29 for 32. Those are video game numbers. Texas still has a ways to go, with games against Texas Tech, Kansas, and Oklahoma State still to go, but they’ve certainly staked their claim as the best team in college football.

5. Mewelde Moore. I've written before that Mewelde is better than Reggie Bush, and once again I've been proven correct. The Steelers have finally given him the chance to be a feature back he deserves thanks to a few injuries and he's rewarded them big time. Yesterday he rushed 20 times for 120 yards and 2 TDs with another touchdown receiving. Reggie Bush? 9 carries for 55 yards and no touchdowns, and is so bad at scoring TDs that they gave the ball to some white guy named Mike Karney to score their one yard TD. "But what about receiving?" you say. "He's so valuable in the passing game" you say. Really? 1 catch for 5 yards. Mewelde had five catches. And a TD. The previous week, Mewelde went 17 carries for 99 yards, while bush was 14 carries for 27 yards. Case closed.


WHO SUCKED

1. BYU. Yes, this happened on Thursday but whatever, it still counts and it helps strengthen my belief in the DWG Jinx, since I highlighted BYU and their easy road to a BCS Bowl a couple of weeks ago. Of course, they went out on Thursday and got beat by TCU, and got beat badly at that, 32-7 ending their something like one hundred game winning streak. Cougars QB Max Hall threw two picks and was sacked seven times (sacked only once previously this season) as BYU rushed for a total of 23 yards while giving up 410 total yards to the Horned Frogs. Yeah, that’ll do it.

2. Football in the state of Michigan. Wow, where to begin? The Lions didn’t bother to show up until the second half, falling behind 21-0 to the Texans before making a game of it and losing in the end 28-21. They are on an almost inevitable course towards 0-16, and I see no possible way to break it – except maybe against the Vikings in week 14. The Spartans have a great opportunity to show they are a quality team going up against the Buckeyes, and lay a complete egg, getting rolled 45-7, taking their season from “potentially special” to “who the hell cares.” And the Wolverines, whose entire program is basically in the crapper right now, have a huge chance to score a quality upset win against Penn State after going up 17-7 in the second quarter. Then Penn State scored the next 39 POINTS to end up winning 46-17, not only getting a victory but covering a spread that looked completely safe with two minutes remaining in the second quarter. Good thing they at least have the Pistons. And Red Wings I guess. I think they’re good.

3. Minnesota Vikings. Good lord, what the hell was that? One of the worst offensive teams ever (outside of AP of course) manages to somehow miraculously score 41 points and they lose? I know their special teams is brutal, so it’s not surprising they gave away some free points, but what about the defense? I thought this year’s version of the Vikings’ defense was supposed to be a cross between the 86 Bears and the 2000 Ravens? It sure didn’t bother the Bears and Neck Beard, who threw for 286 and two TDs. To be honest, it felt like a whole lot more than that. There was never a point where the Vikings defense looked like they even had a prayer of stopping the Bears. At least they have a bye coming up next week to try to figure out what the hell is wrong.

4. Dustin Pedroia’s nickname. I recently learned that Boston fans call him “Destroyah.” Like, if you were unfortunately born in Boston and have that retarded ingrained inability to enunciate, and you tried to say Destroyer instead of saying it like a normal human person you would say it so it rhymed with Pedroia. Horrible. Worst nickname since Steve Esselink started going by “Sunshine.”

5. Indiana Jones. Yeah, we rented that new movie about the Crystal Skulls and all. I gotta tell ya, I can’t believe they waited twenty years and THIS is the script they came up with. Brutal. Not so much the script, but the idea was brutal. The really frustrating thing is that it felt like an Indiana Jones movie. The action, the archaeology, the music, everything was like Indiana never left, except for the god damn retarded faggy plot. I think what happened was Lucas and Spielberg got some guy and said, “You make this movie for us but here is your plot and you can’t deviate and here are some plot points that go with it that you have to hit.” And that guy took the crap they gave him and did a phenomenal job. But it’s still crap. Although that fictional guy who I made up just there deserves an oscar or emmy or whichever one goes for movies.

Wait....What?

Hey everybody! I'm in Grand Rapids, Michigan and it's totally awesome. And by totally awesome, I mean it sucks. Yet another place I have to travel too that is not very fun at all. The good news: I'm drunk! Yeah for me.

You know what's not a sucky place to visit - Indiana. Specifically South Bend. I hear it's awesome, and they have a kick ass football team that once had a little piece of crap guy named Rudi with the biggest heart ever and made a really boring movie out of his story and probably made stuff up to make it touch the pure of heart. If I was a kickass receiver, I would totally go there.

Wait, what? The mighty Irish are only 1-7? How can that be?

Well, they must still be pretty awesome, since the best player in the history of Minnesota prep football (other than Joe Mauer, who was also awesome at everything he ever tried) Michael Floyd has committed to the IRish. I haven't read this yet, but I'm going to assume paging jim shikenjanski guy has much more lucid thoughts on the subject.

I just don't understand why, if you were going to a shitty shitass team, you wouldn't go to your hometown team. I bet it's that god damned Metrodome.

Seriously, why not go to Florida, Michigan, or Ohio State - his other finalists based on the zero minutes of research I've done. They win stuff. Or lose to Appalachian State. Hey, I'm in Michigan! Up yours Carr! Way to not know how to coach.

Also, Roy Williams should get his ass kicked too. That guy is far too inconsistent to make my fantasy team win all the time single handedly.

Speaking of fantasy football, those of you who think that I'm some sort of fraud for starting FatDale White this week should really probably go to hell. This is why you people never win money. If you really need a running back, and a super fat, horrible running back who gets most of his yards by falling down has the guy he's splitting carries with get hurt and you know he's going to get 25 carries, you should really start him. Even if he's one of the two worst running backs in football right now. It's really just common sense and you should all be embarrassed by your complete inability to understand simple concepts.

I will guarantee that I will never, ever have Reggie Bush on my fantasy team. The only way it would ever happen is never. Actually, there are two ways it could happen:

1) They move him to wide receiver.
2) We start giving points for kick/punt returns, and the Saints use him in the only role where he'll ever excel.

I mean really. The guy is known as a shifty, good runner in space. So we can't expect him to be a grind it out, feature back unless you're the Saints or JC. But you'd think, well, he probably breaks a long one now and again, since he's so good at that kind of thing. Well, in a full year and half, his longest career rush is 22 yards. 22 YARDS. I can't even write that big enough. 22 yards. I'm sorry, he had a 25 yarder in the playoffs last year. But he's so good.

Mewelde Moore's career long is 33 yards. Moore has had 254 carries. Bush has had 241. Yet Moore's career long is 50% longer than Bush's. I believe Snacks, and me, since I posted, has once again been proven correct, he's really just a poor man's Mewelde Moore.

Second to last thing, is that I hate the Gay Sox, and I don't wear a XXXL. I can't wait for this Simmons article tomorrow. Here's some calls, Bert:

1) Pedroia (and probably Brady) are God.
2) No mention of the Drew grandslam, which was the biggest at-bat of that series. If you remember, the Sox had just gotten the series back to Boston, loaded the bases against Carmona with no outs, and the first two guys got out. Then Drew comes out, two outs bases laloded, and hits the grand slam. If he gets out, whole different game.
3) Pretends to fear the Rockies, but you can tell by his writing that he "knows" the Sox have this one.
4) Acts like the Manny Ramirez actions were no big deal - I actually agree with this one.
5) Rips on Paul Byrd, even though the poor guy had a gladular problem.
6) Predicts Ortiz has an awesome world series since he had a bad ALCS, convinced one thing is related to the other. HINT: It's not.
7) Finds a way to rip on both the Yankees and the Colts.
8) Includes one completely non-sensical pop culture laden email.
9) Gives way too much credit to Francona, and himself, for "mixing it up" and putting Ellsbury in the lineup. Ellsbury OPS = .583, which ok, was better than Crisp in the series (.333, ouch that's f'ing terrible), but he'll just give credit to "mixing it up."

Last thing, because I'm bored now, I leave you with a top five moment in sitcom history, and if you don't get it, you're not my friend.



Oh, and go Rockies. They're +180, and I'll be hitting that hard. God I hate Boston. Not the city, the city is actually one of my favorites in the world, but the fans. I'd punch them all in the face if I wasn't a little sissy girl.

Also, in case you're curious, Courtney James is currently playing for the Dodge City Legend in teh USBL. I'd love to give you stats, but it will apparently only cost me 29 cents a day. Some of the college awesomeness wasting away in the USBL: Byron Mouton (Maryland), Kyle Cuffe (St. Johns), Jason Wingate (Manhattan), Jermaine Boyette (Weber St), Darryl Dora (Tex Tech), Lazarus Sims (Syracuse, Coack K Allstar), Roy Tarpley (I wish I was kidding), Shaheen Holloway (Seton Hall and McDonald's Allstar game superstar), Jeff Boschee (Kansas), Keith Langford (Kansas), Michael Lee (Kansas), Shawn Kemp (???????????? - Really?)

Turns out, I was looking at a list of all-time rosters, not current. Good enough. Shawn Kemp? Lot of Kansas guys too. Nice team, Snacks. What's your boy Chenowith up to?

As near as I can tell, Courtney James has been bouncing around minor basketball leagues for years. However, when you search for Courtney James on google, here's the first link: Safe for work? Borderline.

A Poor Man's Mewelde Moore?

As I am watching the big kickoff game between the Colts and Saints tonight, it reminded me how overrated Reggie Bush really is. I thought so ever since he was drafted. The guy was great college player, but keep in mind he couldn't even take the starting job from FatDale White.

He was great in space. Great return man, very good receiver guy, excellent with the A+++ rated USC line creating holes even bigger than what Emmitt Smith saw, but he will never be a feature running back.

Honestly, if you were to move him to receiver full-time (and return guy) I see him as another Steve Smith (the Carolina one, not the Giants one).

But if you watched him tonight, as Snacks said when we were at the bar, "He's like a poor man's Mewelde Moore." Harsh? Maybe. Accurate? I'm going to say yes, at least as a RB.

He dances around like Barry Sanders, but there was only one Barry. Put your head down, and get the extra couple of yards, instead of dancing around like freakin' Baryshnikov. This isn't college anymore where you're going against guys who have 1/85th of your talent. These are the best of the best and you can't pull that crap. His longest rush last year was 18 yards. Drew Brees's was 16.

Nine rushes for 29 yard and 2 catches for -3 tonight. And one punt return for 2 yards. And I'm almost positive in his 12 touches so far tonight, I haven't seen him break one tackle or make one guy miss. It's sad really.

Everyone freaked out about the Texans taking Mario Williams over Bush. Maybe they were the smart ones. Vince Young, D'Brickashaw Ferguson, Laurence Maroney, Marcus McNeil, and Maurice Drew (fine, Jones-Drew), all were selected after Bush - and I'd take every single one of them over him.

Also, Brees just got hit by Freeney and fumbled. Guess who was in at RB that play who didn't see that and pick up the block? I'll give you a hint, it wasn't McAllister or Stecker.

Let's look at this Mewelde Moore comparison. Bush longest rush 18, Moore 15. Bush average 3.6 ypc, Moore 5.5. Bush longest reception was 32 yds, Moore's was 50 yards. Bush averaged 8.5 yds per catch, Moore was at 10.2. Bush's longest reception was 74 yards, Moore was 50 - so Bush has him there. Bush averaged 7.7 yards per punt return, with a long of 65 yards. Moore averaged 10.1, with a long of 71. And worst of all, "Captain Elusive" Reggie Bush averaged 8.2 yards after the catch, while Mewelde Moore averaged 10.5. The numbers don't lie folks. Reggie Bush = Poor Man's Mewelde Moore.

I'll just leave you with this:



Also, quick shout out to The Todd: Go Lions!

And FYI, if Bush picks up a cheap TD at the end of the game or cheap yards it doesn't matter so save it.