When I wrote, “It’s the quiet ones you need to worry about,” I meant Marvin Harrison: O.G.
I’m smaht!
My favorite part of this Daily News headline is that the News is supposed to be the “smarter” of the two NYC tabloids. Your a genious!
Little Fluffy Tight Ends?
I feel kinda bad that I stopped paying attention to Hurricane Ike once it took New Orleans and environs off its itinerary. Sure, the people of Houston and its environs have plenty to worry about, but hey.
In fact, Ike’s change of path may have an added benefit! In addition to an election season where we have our first sorta black presidential candidate and our second female vice presidential candidate, Ike may have revealed to us the first out gay player in the NFL!
The Houston Texans, concerned about the timing of Ike’s landfall, have pushed their home game against the Ravens from Sunday afternoon to Monday evening and rescheduled practices to allow players and office staff to take care of their families. But buried in the middle of the article is this paragraph:
Texans tight end Owen Daniels said the hurricane isn’t a distraction and is a bit intrigued at the prospect of going through one. He has a degree in atmospheric and oceanic sciences and hopes to be a television weatherman one day.
Far be it from me to stereotype an entire profession, but I think it’s pretty clear that all television weathermen are gay. (Don’t believe me?) Every single one of them. (Especially him.) I’m not sure why that is, but it adds some color to the local news, I guess.
Now, I may be wrong; maybe Mr. Daniels wasn’t speaking in lightly veiled code about his sexual preferences. Still, I hope he embraces this role in bridging the hypermacho NFL and the hypergay weathercasting worlds.
(And I hope that Houston doesn’t get pasted too badly by the storm. Good luck!)
Maybe his brother can suit up!
I’m kinda astonished that the NFL season starts tomorrow night. I figure I’ll order up some pizza on the way home from Amy’s train and watch the Giants begin their defense of the champi —
— oh, who am I kidding? The Giants could go 3-13 this year and I won’t care! They beat the Patriots in the Superbowl and derailed The Perfect Season!
Anyway, I was just clicking around on ESPN.com and noticed that Baltimore’s starting QB Kyle Boller last year is gone for the season. I wondered who’s going to start for new head coach John Harbaugh, and I read the following sentence:
Boller entered the preseason competing for the starting job with Troy Smith and top draft pick Joe Flacco, who ultimately won the job because of Boller’s injury and Smith’s lengthy battle with infected tonsils.
So that means that Baltimore is starting a QB because one of his competitors wrecked his shoulder and the other got tonsilitis.
I know this team won a Superbowl with Trent Dilfer at QB (beating the Giants), but I have a feeling the Ravens fans will be covering their eyes and saying, “Nevermore!” a week or two into the season.
Look at the tail on Haley’s Comet!
This is a family blog, so I’m not going to quote my favorite passage from this NYPost review of Boys Will be Boys, Jeff Pearlman’s history of the Dallas Cowboys of the early ’90s. But you really need to read it, regardless of whether you like football. Trust me; you’ll laugh in shock when you get to That Paragraph.
License to Ill
Both the Giants and the Jets are planning to sell “Personal Seat Licenses” (PSLs) to gouge season ticket holders pay for construction of their new shared stadium. This morning’s Newark Star-Ledger has an article on the subject, and it makes one of the most bone-headed statements I’ve read about PSLs.
The cost of building stadiums — along with cities’ increasing reluctance to commit tax dollars to sports projects — has made such fees necessary at new venues, according to sports finance experts. The $1.6 billion stadium being built next to the current Giants Stadium is expected to open in mid-2010. These fees would help fund the construction.
The Giants and Jets are sharing the costs of what is expected to be the most expensive stadium built. The state is paying an estimated $300 million for infrastructure improvements at the Meadowlands, as well as other costs related to the new venue.
The Giants’ seat licenses are expected to bring in $300 million to $400 million, team co-owner John Mara said in June. If the Jets were to match that with their take from the PSLs, the cost of the stadium construction would have been cut in half.
That’s right! The cost of the stadium will be cut in half by PSLs! A $1.6 billion stadium — the most expensive ever, the article notes — will only cost half as much! PSLs are magic!
Actually, the cost of building the $1.6 billion stadium is $1.6 billion, you morons. It’s just a question of whose $1.6 billion is going to pay for it. And thanks to PSLs, it looks like loyal season ticket buyers are going to be on the hook for half of it!
At least the Star-Ledger’s economic idiocy isn’t as bad as the NY Daily News’ attempt at making PSLs look like they’re a favor to the fans:
The Jets and Giants are discussing a plan that would give the owners of personal seat licenses (PSLs) first dibs on concert tickets and other non-football events in the new $1.6 billion stadium, Jets owner Woody Johnson revealed Saturday.
Johnson, confirming the Jets will announce their PSL pricing plan later this month, said it may include a system for Jets and Giants PSL owners to “alternate events as they come along during the year — concerts, a tractor pull, whatever we have.”
That certainly would make PSLs more appealing for those apprehensive about shelling out thousands of dollars.
Really? If a ticket-holder comes up with thousands of dollars to help finance your football stadium, you’ll also give him first crack at tickets for a tractor pull? Awesome! Where do I sign up?
I guess it’s too much to expect the local sports sections, which rely on access to these teams, to offer anything but the party line.
Sign Language
I was in the running for this job, but the competition was cutthroat. BWAH-HA-HAH!
John Clayton: pumping irony
Pacman Jones was “partially reinstated” by the NFL today, after getting suspended for being in or around a shooting a strip club that he may’ve caused by “making it rain,” (read: tossing wads of money in the air). For a full reinstatement, he’ll need to be on his somebody else’s best behavior through September 1. But that’s okay, reports ESPN’s John Clayton, because he has a new set of friends who can help him hew to the straight and narrow:
Since being traded to the Cowboys, Jones has tried to surround himself with a better support group. He’s befriended former Cowboys Michael Irvin and Deion Sanders.
That’s right. Michael “No contest to felony cocaine possession” Irvin and Deion “Michael Vick had a passion for dogfighting” Sanders.
They should just trade him to the Bengals already.
It’s the quiet ones you need to worry about
I’ve always loved Marvin Harrison for great performances and his lack of showboating, but how awesome would it be if he turned out to be the most badass mo’fo’ in the NFL? Amy thinks it’d be like that SNL skit about Neil Diamond.
Unrequired Reading: April 18, 2008
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