12 Observations from a 14-Year-Old's Club Soccer Game

1. Portable camp chairs are everything.  Some city soccer fields provide aluminum bleachers, but it's never guaranteed.  You can go with the basic Walmart model with four legs and two arms - the cup holders will cost more - or upgrade to the high-end "look at me!" models with pneumatic piston rockers and/or built-in adjustable shade awnings.
2. There's always the one parent who's way too aggressive with the cheering, whether it's arguing with the ref ("Call it both ways!"), criticizing his kid's play ("Come on, move to the ball!"), or demanding cut-throat intensity even if your team is blowing out the opponent ("Keep the pressure up!").
3. You really cannot tell how good a team will be just by looking at them warm up.  Scrawny kids who look like pushovers can be crazy fast and agile, tall girls that look formidable can be clueless on offense.
4. Don't ask us to explain the offsides rule.
5. Soccer weather can be extreme.  We've watched just as many games on freezing cold mornings wrapped in multiple layers as we have on broiling hot summer afternoons with our chairs strategically positioned in the slender shadow of a field light pole.
6. Right or wrong, if a parent can speak Spanish we will assume they know way more about soccer than we do.
7. Thankfully, youth soccer doesn't entertain that ridiculous "extra minutes" nonsense.
8. Good luck parking on tournament days.  If it's not mud fields, it's mud fields with gravel.  The trick is to show up during the "shift change" when the earlier block of games is ending thereby allowing you to stalk the folks shuffling out to their cars carrying armfuls of camp chairs or dragging those game-day wagons.
9. Surprisingly, many of these giant soccer complexes just didn't have enough money in their budgets to create signage.  And so you're creeping along in your car squinting through binoculars like GI Joe on a secret mission trying to read the tiny, faded 8-1/2 x 11 sized metal signs that are cable-tied to the goals facing the wrong direction.  "Is that a 3 or a 4?" "If that's a 6, where the hell is 7?"
10. Parents, stick to your side of the field.  Look for your kids' bench and place your chairs opposite that bench.  And leave a nice 10-yard buffer zone at midfield.  It's not that hard.  We don't want to hear your cheering for your kids or complaining about ours.
11. It's always a weird "Twilight Zone" moment when you realize there's a player on the other team with the same name as your kid.
12. Inevitably, you will believe with absolutely certainty that the refs are making more calls against you than the other team.  Guess what?  The parents on the other side feel exactly the same.

Tweet

Fourteen Observations from a Club Volleyball Tournament

1. There's something overwhelming when you first arrive at a club volleyball tournament in the morning before any games have started.  Dozens of courts - and if you're at a big tournament in a convention center, if could be well over a hundred courts - filled wall to wall with players warming up.  As far as the eye can see, there are balls popping into the air.
2. We regret to inform you that volleyball tournaments are big business.  Playing the games can often feel secondary to the larger goal of separating parents from their money.  There's the fee to get in, of course.  Then there's also the obligatory overpriced tournament sweatshirt (if it's $50, consider yourself lucky).  Then there's also the endless food options - we'd never before heard of an acai bowl until we started going to tournaments - that are of course A) ridiculously overpriced and B) much more appealing than the trail mix, fruit, and salami sticks you packed for your daughter.
3. There's always one player on every team who seems to take it upon herself to always go running after a ball that's sailed off the court.
4. The possible severity of an on-court player injury often feels inversely proportional to the amount of time it takes for a trainer to mosey over to provide aid.  The girl is crying on the court, holding her knee, but you take your time, bro.  No rush.
5. If you don't pay attention, you will get hit with a ball.  Guaranteed.  Most dangerous scenario: you're facing the team as they're warming up with serves coming right at you.
6. The timing of pool play "waves" is a mixed bag.  The morning wave typically starts at 8:00am, which means you have to get up very early to arrive early for warmups... but it also means you're done by 1pm and thus have the rest of the day to do what you want.  On the other hand, an afternoon 3:00pm wave of pool play lets you sleep in, sure, but it can make for a very late evening.  The worst combination, of course, is an afternoon wave (figure you'll back in the hotel by 9:30pm) followed by a morning wave the next day.  Brutal.
7. There's always one player on every team who is the master hair braider.
8. There is an etiquette to spectator seating that, unfortunately, isn't always followed.  Parents of the teams actually playing on the court get first dibs.  Then, after they're settled and only after they're settled, the rest of the seats are available to the general public.  A corollary to this: once your team is finished, get your slow ass up out of those chairs as expeditiously as possible so parents of the next team up can sit down.
9. There's always at least one set of parents who sit far apart from the other parents.  Reasons may vary.
10. Some referees just aren't good.  It had to be said.
11. We still don't understand the "in the net" rule.  But it's okay... you don't need to try and explain it to us.
12. We have learned the hard way that every club team has drama among players, parents, or both.  The only question is what form that drama will take.  It's not "if" but "when."  Usually it involves the emotional monster that is known as Lack of Playing Time.
13. We need a sociologist to study the subculture of dads responsible for recording the team games.  It's an intricate ritual of setting up the spindly tripod, arranging the camera just so, keeping track of the score via some kind of app, delivering encouraging shouts and cheers, and - eventually - taking it all apart again and uploading the footage into a pricey game management system.  Bonus points for those inevitable moments when an errant ball sends the whole thing flying.  Odds are even that any given dad can move fast enough to rescue the tripod before it hits the ground.
14. Here's the deal: while it's nice to play teams from other cities and states, do volleyball families really have to get on a plane (and spend all of that money) to accomplish that?  Cars can drive pretty far and for a lot less money.

Tweet

Observations from a Middle School Volleyball Season

This fall and last fall, the Cheese Fry has spent a number of Thursday evenings sitting on hard plastic bleachers in half-full middle school gymnasiums cheering on the 13-year-old Lil Fry.  Hers is a better-than-average team.  Last season, they got the top seed in the post-season tournament, but then were inexplicably eliminated after failing to close out (they only needed to score one more point!) what seemed to be an easy win.  The outcome of the current season remains unknown - the team may be a little better than they were as a 7th grade team, but so are the other district teams.

Forthwith, some observations made during our trip along the middle school volleyball circuit...

* Some of these gyms look like an NBA stadium what with all of their championship banners hanging from the rafters.

* While we can appreciate the attempt to create excitement and energy by blasting music during timeouts, these schools seem to all use some sort of school athletics streaming services that's supported by ads.  And so during a timeout, rather than get some amped-up top-40 song, you often get the end of a Kroger commercial.  Let's go, team!  Produce is always fresh and always affordable!

* We've gotten to see a number of gymnasium wall murals (some pretty good, others... less so) depicting school mascots, usually "breaking" through the gym's wall and looking extremely angry and fierce.  A photo compilation of these murals is desperately needed.

* Paper tickets are oh, so 20th century.  Now it's all about buying tickets online and showing your phone app at the door to a disinterested mom and/or student.

* There's always a bored police officer lingering by the gym door.

* We'd love to know why kids going to buy concessions prefer to sprint full speed from their seat to the exit doors.  It's not just little kids - a lot of the middle schoolers do it too.  Is it to avoid blocking everyone's view?  Is it to hear the loud clomps of their sneakers on the hardwood?

* Theater students have nothing on the over-the-top antics the two student line judges - with their big orange flags - perform to keep themselves entertained.

* One mental game we like to play is trying to figure out which parents belong to which player on the court.  It's always a small victory when we piece it together through subtle clues (i.e. seeing an adult hug a player offers no challenge - that's too easy and obvious).  We're like Columbo secretly eyeing the people around us, looking for little gestures and phrases.  But there remain many open cases: some adults we see at every game we cannot pair up with any of the players.

* It's always a thrill when we get to throw a ball back in.  Like we're briefly part of the action.

* A good drinking game would be to do a shot whenever someone who's not paying attention gets accidentally boinked in the head by a ball during the pre-game warmups.

* Between the shrill voices of 13-year-old girls and the terrible, echoing acoustics of gyms, it's not always easy to understand sideline cheers.  Of those we can understand, this one is the best: when the opponent hits the ball out of bounds, Lil Fry's team shouts "O! U! T! Out! See ya!"  With a little snarky goodbye salute on the last two words.  Teenaged genius.

* The most common phrase you'll hear in the stands - asked by children to their parents, of course - is "You have any money?"  Middle school athletic concessions stands have more variety than your local movie theater.

* Unofficial tally - the most popular concession items are ballpark nachos with the hot cheese sauce, popcorn (just the Orville Redenbacher microwave bags), and ring pops that turn your lips and tongue blue.

* You'll note there's always one girl way better than everyone else on a team.  Good things happen around her.  Likewise, there's one girl on every team who clearly is in over her head.  You cringe when the ball comes her way.

* Promoting sportsmanship is a good thing, of course, but the traditional line of girls at the net slapping five after the game with a monotone "Good game... Good game... Good game..." reminds us of the David Spade flight attendant sketch on Saturday Night Live where the phony cheer of "Buh bye!" really meant "Get lost."

* If you get through an evening without the scoreboard operator making an error, it was a good day.

* What's true for your college and professional sports fandom is also true for middle school: few things are more frustrating than watching "your" team lose through self-inflicted mistakes and unforced errors.  It's understandable when the other team is better.  That you can accept.  But when it's clear the teams are more or less evenly matched and your team is floundering hopelessly, that is infuriating.

One last observation - every middle school volleyball game will attract at least one spectator from these nine categories:

1. The mom who shouts and cheers at an inappropriately loud volume ("Get your ball back!")

2. While Loud Mom is trying to help in her own way, the dad counterpart who shouts and cheers at an inappropriately loud volume has more of an impatient edge ("Get your head in the game!")

3. A variation of Loud Dad is the obnoxious dad who likes to whistle really loud - this guy is usually sitting near you for maximum audio impact

4. The mom who offer encouragements by name to every single player who touches the ball like she's calling the game for Fox ("Good serve, Emma!" "Nice set, Olivia!" "What a hit, Lucy!")

5. The stoic, Vulcan-like dad who just sits there, facing forward like a wooden carving no matter what happens

6.  The dad secretly watching an ESPN game on his iPhone

7. The two moms who know all of the good gossip about the school team, the school team players, the school coaches, the last practice, and also (bonus!) what's going with the school players' individual club teams - and rest assured that each will also happily address for each other any knowledge gaps so they each end the conversation armed with new juicy intel

8. Bored younger siblings who are either running wild (sprinting to the concession stand, as mentioned) or slumped in the stands playing on a device in a far dark corner of the bleachers

9. The spectators who sit behind you and deliver an unending, podcast-style conversation and commentary about anything and everything other than the actual game everyone's paid good money to watch

Tweet

Eight quick notes on HBO's "Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty"

1. Many pundits - including Kareem Abdul-Jabbar - complained loud and long about the ridiculous, exaggerated vibe of the show.  To us, that was a feature, not a bug.  The show works as a fable, a larger-than-life fictionalized spin on true events that were already a little ridiculous.  HBO and the producers just gave the whole thing a little nudge into crazy.  It's practically satire in some ways.  No reasonable person should ever consider this thing a documentary.  At this point, in fact, we have Google or Wikipedia open on our phone anytime we watch a movie or TV show that's supposedly based on a true story.  An instant fact check is often essential.
2. That said, it is curious that the show made Jerry West such a wild-eyed maniac.
3. John C. Reilly was born to play Jerry Buss.  Phenomenal.  We always remember Buss as the old-timer covered in locker room champagne with Shaq and Kobe during the 2000-2002 three-peat title run.  The depiction of him here as a creepy ladies man horndog - which, apparently, does have truth to it - was rather shocking.
4. On paper, a shaggy, montage visual style seeking to create a late 70s/early 80s vibe would seem like a pretty obvious choice.  Lots of movies use different film stocks and styles and jump cuts to create a period mood.  Yadda yadda yadda.  But there was something different about this.  The grainy film stock with 8mm-style sprocket holes, the glitchy TV video images, it all came together beautifully.  Along with the wardrobe and the set design, "Winning Time" may not be 1980 accurate, but it feels 1980 accurate.
5. Was Larry Bird really that surly and angry?  Dude.  Bonus points for using a beer car to catch the tobacco spit.
6. Fun fact: so it turns out HBO didn't want to call the show "Showtime" - which was what the Lakers of the 80s called themselves and what the book was titled on which the show is based - because of the competing Showtime pay-TV service.  HBO's Showtime.  Sort of be like Showtime's HBO, we suppose.
7. Aside from Reilly, the actors who played Magic Johnson and Kareem (Quincy Isaiah and Solomon Hughes) walk that line between perfectly evoking the real person without ever lapsing into an cringey impersonation.  Like much of the show, they feel exactly right.
8. All of that tedious business with the Buss family and the dying matriarch Sally Field seemed very important to the producers, but for us it paled in comparison to the layered drama and intrigue of the players and coaches trying to make this whole thing work.

Tweet

Observations from a Minor League Baseball Game

The Cheese Fry family recently visited a local Double-A baseball park to watch a game.  It's been well over two years - if not more - since our last visit, and while the kids grumbled and whined about going ("Three hours long?!") there were conversations on the way home about where to sit on the next visit.  The consensus seemed to be the outfield grass, which is fine with us - it's half as expensive as the infield seats.

* It's not a baseball game unless you eat a steamed hot dog ($5) wrapped up in that paper foil sheet and slathered in enough room temperature mustard to make your fingers yellow.

* All baseball games require multiple discussions of how long it will take sun to move behind the upper deck and give you the sweet relief of shadow.

* Our row was completely empty, at least 20 seats curving out to the right in our section, but we had one guy sitting right next to us.  Why?  Also: who attends a baseball game all alone?

* We don't what that mascot was supposed to be.  Sort of a giant beaver, but also orange and yellow and shaggy like a Muppet.  Whatever it was, it wore a number 2 jersey.

* There's a low-key ritual involved with baseball field preparations that can be soothing to witness.  Raking the infield, drawing the chalk lines, hosing down the infield dirt, placing the bases.  It's a ballpark reset. What's happened before doesn't matter.  What's important is now.  What happens next.  On the diamond tonight, which is being freshly assembled and cleaned and groomed just for us, anything is possible.  Anything can happen.

* We still don't fully understand the difference between the OBP and the batting average.

* At any sporting event, people-watching of course can be just as engaging at what's happening on the field.  While we secretly judged the bad tattoos, the inappropriately dressed teen girls, and the couples who didn't look like they belonged together, the winner on that evening surely went to the two old timers sitting right behind us who didn't shut up for seven innings.  Their loud running commentary most notably included a discussion of Lee Harvey Oswald's rifle and shooting skill.  They also had comments about a player named Luken.  "Why not just drop the N and go by Luke?"

* Honorable mention to the huge group one section over.  This was the boisterous relatives and friends of one of the visiting team players, all of whom cheered and shouted whenever he was on the field.  (To his credit, he hit a lead off double.)

* An post-game fireworks show allowed us to sit on the outfield grass.  Thick grass, but clipped very short.  Scratchy, not soft.  And yet, not as flawless as it might look from a distance.  We saw some divots and bald spots.

* Another baseball game essential food item: the bag of salted peanuts ($3.50).  Nowhere else can you make that big of a mess on the floor and then just walk away with a shrug.

* Scoreboards have come a long way in our lifetime.  Gone are the crude message boards made up of incandescent light bulb grids.  Now it's all gigantic flatscreen TVs.  We particularly marveled at a real-time update of the opposing pitcher's ERA as he gave up several runs in the middle of the game.

* Not a fan of the row of urinals without privacy barriers, people.

* Whoever ran the sound board was earning their paycheck.  An endless, wall to wall string of audio drops, music cues, and sound effects.  Is that person following a rigid script or just selecting on the fly what to play and when to play it?  Bonus points for the "Price Is Right" loser cue after a strikeout.

* Stadium was maybe half full, so the half-hearted attempt to start the Wave fizzled quickly.

* We often daydream about what sort of song we'd want played for us if we were a player walking up to the plate.  In those 10 seconds, how would you define yourself?  You could go the obvious route and play something hard and heavy like AC/DC.  Or you could go goofy, maybe play "Mmmbop" or "Margaritaville."  Or you could go instrumental and maybe pick the "Game of Thrones" theme or that Alan Parsons Project song "Sirius" that the Chicago Bulls made famous.  We'd probably end up picking some cheesy 80s song like "Your Love" by the Outfield.  The Outfield.  Get it?  Baseball?

Tweet

On the Enduring Mediocrity of the Dallas Cowboys

On January 28, 1996, your Dallas Cowboys beat the Pittsburgh Steelers 27-17 in Super Bowl XXX.  Since that day, this so-called "America's Team" of missed opportunities, lost seasons, and unearned hype has never advanced past the Divisional round of the NFL playoffs.  Not once.

There are 31 other teams in the NFL, many of whom since January 1996 have experienced considerable (and consistent) post-season success while all the while the Cowboys shuffled along on reputation alone, often entering seasons with high Super Bowl expectations - often pushed by the snake-oil salesmanship of Jerry Jones, the only General Manager in the NFL who will never be fired by his Owner boss no matter how crappy his team performs - that fans foolishly fell for time and time again. We're like Charlie Brown goaded by Jerry-as-Lucy into kicking that ball just one more time, hearing assurances that this time it's going to be different, only to have it yanked away yet again.  The Dallas Cowboys have languished under a variety of head coach misfires: no-name, clueless folks like Chan Gailey and Dave Campo; supposed geniuses who consistently showed a lack of necessary fire and grit like Jason Garrett and Wade Phillips; and one Hall of Fame coach in Bill Parcells who did the best with what he had but (understandably) finally just gave up.  Some of those seasons were disasters, a few were surprisingly successful, but all ended with playoff flameouts and ultimately squandered the talents of Pro Bowl players like Tony Romo, DeMarco Murray, Jason Witten, Dez Bryant, and Demarcus Ware.

On the eve of what we hope will be the unceremonious ejection of Jason Garrett, who should have been fired years ago, let's look at the other teams that have found ways since 1996 to string together wins and devise game plans good enough to beat other good teams consistently enough to advance in the playoffs and contend for Super Bowl titles.

Let's first remember the teams who have won the Super Bowl and hoisted the shiny Lombardi Trophy. Since January 1996...

The Baltimore Ravens have won two Super Bowls*
The Denver Broncos have won three (and lost one) Super Bowls
The Green Bay Packers have won two Super Bowls*
The Indianapolis Colts have won one (and lost one) Super Bowl
The Los Angeles Rams have won one (and lost two) Super Bowls
The New Orleans Saints have won one Super Bowl*
The New England Patriots - as we all know - have won six (and lost three) Super Bowls*
The New York Giants have won two (and lost one) Super Bowls
The Philadelphia Eagles have won one (and lost one) Super Bowls*
The Pittsburgh Steelers have won two (and lost one) Super Bowls
The Seattle Seahawks have won one (and lost two) Super Bowls*
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have won one Super Bowl

Wow.  That's a long list (parity!) with zero mention of Dallas.  These twelve teams out of 32 represents 38% of all NFL teams.

Now let's look at the teams that made it to the Super Bowl (which means they won their conference) since 1996 but didn't win...

The Arizona Cardinals lost one Super Bowl
The Atlanta Falcons lost two Super Bowls
The Carolina Panthers lost two Super Bowls
The Chicago Bears lost one Super Bowl
The Oakland Raiders lost one Super Bowl
The San Francisco 49ers lost one Super Bowl*
The Tennessee Titans lost one Super Bowl*

Now if you add the 12 winners with these 7 losers, you end up with 19 NFL teams that got all the way through the playoffs to appear in a Super Bowl.  Nineteen teams that each had a chance at football glory.  Now we're up to 60% of all of the 32 teams.  

Still no Dallas Cowboys.

Okay, so let's look at the teams that - since 1996 - got to their conference title game but lost.  These are the franchises that were just one win away (or, even worse, one play away) from the Super Bowl.

The Jacksonville Jaguars lost the 2017 AFC title game
The Kansas City Chiefs lost the 2018 AFC title game*
The Minnesota Vikings lost the 2017 NFC title game*
The New York Jets lost the 2010 AFC title game

At this point we are up to 23 NFL teams that - since 1996 - have all advanced to at least their conference title game, if not the Super Bowl.  That's 72% of the NFL.  Still no Cowboys.  At this point, the law of averages should give the Cowboys help, but chance has nothing on poor decision-making of the Cowboy front office.

In fact, at this point in this study all we're left with is a collection of consistently going-nowhere NFL franchises that since 1996 either lost in the Wild Card round or in the Divisional round.  These teams never got close to the conference title games, much less the Super Bowl.  It is amid these dead-end teams that we finally find the supposedly proud, legendary, fierce Dallas Cowboys.

Below is a rundown of when these teams most recently made a playoff appearances.

The Buffalo Bills lost a Wild Card game in 2017*
The Cincinnati Bengals lost a Wild Card game in 2015
The Cleveland Browns lost a Wild Card game in 2002
The Dallas Cowboys lost a Divisional game in 2018
The Detroit Lions lost a Wild Card game in 2016
The Houston Texans lost a Wild Card game in 2018*
The Los Angeles Chargers lost a Divisional game in 2018
The Miami Dolphins lost a Wild Card game in 2016
The Washington Redskins lost a Wild Card game in 2015

What unwelcome company.  But this is where Cowboys fans find themselves.

Do we think a new coach will help change the fortunes of the Dallas Cowboys?  We hope so, but we doubt it.  It's more than just the curious game day intransigence of Garrett - it's the culture of the organization, which means it's the culture of Jones and the way he makes decisions based on PR rather than Xs and Os (he pushed hard to draft Johnny Manziel in the first round!), the way he undermines his coaches at every turn (always with the postgame interviews! why?) thereby spoiling discipline, the way he spends more time on big picture NFL and Cowboy strategies that he can't possibly focus on the day-to-day needs of the club, the way he so hypes and spins the Cowboys that players can't help but develop big egos and baseless entitlement, the way he stubbornly clings to bad ideas and decisions at the risk of admitting his own errors.  Anyone who tunes into Dallas sports radio can see the problems.  Until Jerry is gone, the Cowboys will not succeed.

* These teams - unlike the Dallas Cowboys - made the 2019-20 playoffs so their place in this list could change.

Tweet

Confessions of a Youth Volleyball Parent

* The more we watch volleyball, the less we understand the rules.  Just when we have it all figured out (you can only score if you're serving, you see), something happens on the court that completely baffles us.  We've now more or less given up and just crinkle our face to make it look like we understand everything and are carefully considering all levels of strategy and execution.  You think they're buying it?
* The worst is when the ball rolls to our feet and we have no choice but to put it back in play.  But who's serve is it now? We weren't paying that close attention. Well, we were paying attention but now with the pressure of everyone looking over to see where the ball went we can't remember who served last.  Does the ball go back to that team... or this team?  Invariably, we choose wrong and toss the ball to the wrong side, only to suffer the humiliation of an 8-year-old girl correcting our mistake and sending the ball where it actually belongs.
* Some of the other volleyball moms aren't drinking water from their fancy big plastic tumbler, if you know what we mean.  This isn't speculation. This has been verified.
* As exhilarating as it can be to watch your kid's team run up the score on a hapless opponent, it's just as disheartening to have your kid be a member of that hapless team getting steamrolled by a superior opponent.  We've experienced both ends of that particular scoreboard spectrum, once during the same two-hour period.
* Here are the six kinds of players you'll find on a youth volleyball team:
1 The kid who's afraid to touch the ball with anything approaching intent, so the player ducks away from an incoming ball, serves with a wet-fish half-ass swing that barely makes it to the net, and otherwise cringes the entire time they're out there.
2. The kid who might as well be on the junior varsity team now, making sophisticated digs and spikes and launching untouchable, rocket serves over the net.  How is that little kid already that good?  Sometimes they're even the shortest kid on the team.
3. The kid that's completely inconsistent, making MVP moves one moment, then flailing around cluelessly the next.  You never know what you're going to get.
4. The coach's kid.  Sometimes they're pretty good, but mostly they're not.
5. The hapless kid that tries so hard every time but just can't make anything happen.  They're returning one ball straight up into the rafters, shanking another into the face of the scorekeeper, or swinging with all of their might and completely missing (the ball never got within five feet of them).  They're trying, but it's a disaster every time.
6. The kid who's out there doing anything but paying attention.  This player is dancing and laughing or craning their neck around to look at the scoreboard or chatting with the player next to them or staring at the floor.  What they're not doing is staying focused and watching the ball.  This is probably your kid, FYI.
* You don't hit the volleyball with your hands.  You hit the volleyball on the flat part of your forearms.  We didn't know this.  That is apparently called by some "the platform."
* This whole youth sports thing isn't a cute little bit of recreation, people.  It's an industry.  The facility we use is packed with as many as ten games going on at once.  It's a cacophony of whistles, tennis shoe squeaks, ball thuds, and parental cheers.  And if everyone's paying as much as we're paying, that place is essentially a suburban Fort Knox.
* It's always fun when your kid's team is down by a point or two with the clocking winding down and there's zero urgency or hustle from anyone to try and get in a few more plays to get the go-ahead score before time expires.  In the final seconds, it's like everyone purposely goes into foot-shuffling underwater slow-motion when it comes time to reset and toss the ball back to the server.
* It can be very hard to maintain a positive, encouraging attitude when the ball drops straight down equidistance between three players on your kid's team and no one moves an arm or a foot even one inch to try and return it.  This happens multiple times during a game.
* We think that snack counter popcorn just came out of the popper.  How can it already taste so stale?
* To say we get tired of yelling "Rotate!" at games would be an understatement.
* As mentioned, we don't know much about volleyball, but even we have determined that at this level, teams live and die on the ability to serve a ball over the net.  There's just not a lot of returning.  But then you have these kids serving the ball by tossing it up and palm smacking it like they're Misty May at the Olympics (rather than underhand hit it out of your left hand).  If we weren't so lazy, we'd keep track of how many palm-hits actually go over the net and stay in bounds.  If it's more than 15% we'd be shocked.  But a majority of the kids do it that way regardless.
* We understand that in the world of youth sports, coaching usually comes down to whichever parent has been sufficiently guilted into volunteering.  It's the luck of the draw as to whether your $115 (and ten weeks of your life) will be spent with a coach that will patiently and competently teach skills or a coach that has no idea what they're doing and doesn't seem inclined to learn.  
* But if you're not going to volunteer, you really have no room to complain.  Ms. Cheese Fry didn't volunteer to coach this summer because she didn't think she'd do a good job.  Only now, seeing the coach we ended up with, does she truly know what it means to "not do a good job."  We're calling it a teachable moment.
* Maybe adults should end their workday by lining up and slapping hands with their coworkers with a mumbled "good game."  Would the world be a better place?
* Move your feet and get in front of the ball!

Tweet

A patchwork of NFL fanatics

For once, Facebook isn't a useless timesuck.  A Sean Taylor used the website recently to analyze users' NFL team favorites and develop a map of NFL allegiances during the regular season (we duly note the kingdom of the Cowboys in the south - only the Broncos can boast a similarly large geographic area), then compared that map to some of the playoff rounds as teams started dropping out.

Tweet

There's always next season

As the season ends with a shameful fizzle for the Dallas Cowboys right on schedule, we decided to take stock of our own lackluster performance on the gridiron.  We've been a member of one fantasy football league for 14 seasons now.  We've never gone to the post-season, never even sniffed a championship.

Our cumulative record over these 14 season is 78-112-6, which works out to be a winning percentage of .397.  Pretty good for a batter, horrible for a team sport.  We lose more than we win.  In fact, we almost lose two out of every three times we play.

And there isn't an obvious learning curve, either.  Our worst record was 3-11, which we understandably put up in our first season when fantasy football was new to us.  But then the posted that same 3-11 record in our 8th season.  Our best season was our 11th, when we went 8-6.  We've won 7 games only four times in 14 seasons (our 3rd, 9th, 12th, and 14th).  Although maybe we are doing a little better.  In the last four seasons, we've never won less than six games.

All of this obsession over a completely ridiculous waste of time that ruins Sundays more than makes Sundays enjoyable gives us a special affinity for this NFL spot that returns every winter:



In a previous post, we looked at the seven stages of fantasy football.

Tweet

"Stay tuned for Monday Night Soccer..."

As much as we love football, growing statistical evidence about the negative impact the sport has on some athletes' brains has given us pause. Would we allow a son to play the game in high school? Probably, but maybe not. As a born-and-bred North Texan with a devotion to the Dallas Cowboys embedded in our DNA, the fact that we would even consider saying "no" perhaps says a lot about the future of football in general and the NFL in particular.

Grantland.com recently took this a step further and tried to imagine how football might wither in the U.S. and become a second-class sport like boxing. On one hand, this is crazy talk. On the other hand, it certainly seems possible.

Tweet

Observations from an NFL stadium

The Cheese Fry was in attendance at the Christmas Eve game at Cowboys Stadium in which the Cowboys again prove that they're just good enough to disappoint their fans time and again.

* If you think getting to the game two hours before kickoff is "early," about 10,000 other fans think so, too.

* People sometimes joke that their Sunday religion is the NFL. If so, then the steel and glass monstrosity that is Cowboys Stadium is surely their church. It is enormous.

* 16 ounces of beer is $8.50. We will admit, however, that it was ice cold.

* It's hard to not watch the infamous 60-yards-long HD screen as if you're still in your living room. You have force yourself to watch the action down on the actual field.

* You don't have to have a screw loose to go to a game in face paint, but it probably helps, don't you think? Especially for those who go shirtless and apply face paint to their pasty white pudgy torsos.

* The video packages displayed on the in-stadium screens are incredibly sophisticated and polished. And remarkably effective in stirring emotion. They play you like a cheap violin. You will laugh... here. You will get fired up... here.

* We're glad we brought binoculars. All the better to see Tony Romo huddle up with Steven McGee on the sideline to try and figure just what in the hell is wrong with the Dallas offense.

* We have new respect for the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders. The most we usually ever see of them involves mugging for the Fox Sports cameras as the games go to commercial, but at the stadium, they're working hard between quarters and during TV timeouts. The halftime routine was easily ten minutes of choreography.

* Nachos are $9. And it's the exact same kind of nachos you'd pay $4 for at your local cineplex.

* Not many things more miserable than watching your team flail and stumble while the opposing team racks up yards and touchdowns. Well, there is one thing more miserable: having the opposing team's fans cheer and holler. Who knew there were any actual Eagles fans outside of Pennsylvania?

* In person, NFL game day is like a one-day, PG-13-rated house party. Wall to wall people, loud music, crazy clothes, lots of food and alcohol. Plus Santa Claus.

* If there's a way to honor the military, the NFL will do so. Not passing judgment on the questionable pandering that hasn't ebbed since 2001, just making an observation.

* Some of the players in pre-game stretching exercises look like they could perform with Cirque de Soleil the way they contort and bend.

* Plastic bucket of slightly stale popcorn is $10. But you get to keep the souvenir bucket.

* There's always one or two jackasses who won't take off their hat for the national anthem. What is their malfunction?

* It's such a big operation that the stadium has something of an in-house TV show going on, with a host setting up videoclips, interviewing guests, and announcing promotions. All of it coming to you live from the concourse.

* Looking at all of the corporate signage, the mind reels in thinking how much Jerry Jones is paid for the privilege. Dr Pepper, AT&T, Miller Lite, Ford. The list goes on and on.

* Are we old or is the stadium audio turned up about two notches too loud?

* We hate not sitting on the aisle. There's no graceful way to shuffle down the row without getting intimate with the people you're passing.

* Bottle of water is $5. Bargain of the day.

* You surely can't find a more enjoyable way to drop $200 or so, spend an entire day standing in line in the cold, then sitting in a hard plastic seat, all to watch your team get dropped like a JV squad.

Tweet

Don't let the Dodger Stadium door hit you

Dodger fans rejoiced when news emerged last week that shamelessly stubborn slimeball Frank McCourt finally saw the writing on the wall (e.g. that Bud Selig would never, ever let him keep the team and, in fact, wished he could find a DeLorean to go back in time and prevent himself from ever allowing McCourt to come within 1000 feet of the team, much less buy it with what was essentially a maxed-out Visa credit card). McCourt, you see, agreed to sell the team.

Good things (if you don't count Game 6, also known as the Ninth Inning We Don't Talk About) happened to the Texas Rangers with new ownership. Maybe the Dodgers are in for some sunnier times as well.

Mike Scioscia's Tragic Illness catalogs the many crimes and misdeeds of Frank and his blowsy wannabe-Real Housewife of Beverly Hills wife Jamie. They came to Los Angeles wanting to be loved and respected power players, they leave hated and reviled and listed among the city's most infamous figures.

Nicely played, losers.

Tweet

Seven stages of fantasy football

1. Shock and disbelief – Did you really just waste a pick on Alex Smith? What the hell is the matter with you? You shouldn’t have been drinking during the draft.

2. Denial – Don’t worry, you can still win the championship with two backup running backs and a 40-year-old receiver. It’s not that bad. It only looks bad on paper.

3. Anger – The one week you finally start the surging Detroit defense and they give up 85 points? Someone must pay and pay dearly. Maybe throwing the remote control out the kitchen window will help... no, turns out that doesn’t help. And now you can’t change the channel and you’re stuck watching Raiders-Chiefs on channel 752.

4. Bargaining – Okay, if Matt Hasselbeck throws for 300 yards and Marion Barber scores five TDs, you’re still in this. Miracles can happen, right? Right? You can always find that super-sleeper on waiver wires, the one scrub player that’s already been picked up and dropped by five other teams. But it’ll be different with you. You can make it work.

5. Guilt – You’ve wasted seven weekends of your life rooting for those go-nowhere New York Giants and all you have is a 2-6 record to show for it. "What does the outside look like on Sundays, daddy?" "Leave me alone, kid, Eli’s finally in the red zone."

6. Depression – Who are you kidding? All you know about football you learned from “Friday Night Lights” and Madden videogames. You couldn’t tell a Cover-2 from a Skinny Post if you had a gun to your pathetic head. You’re useless. No wonder you drafted Alex Smith and started a 40-year-old receiver.

7. Acceptance – There’s always next year.

Full disclosure: this was created for a private fantasy football league (go Anthrax Avalanche!), but we thought our few loyal readers might also enjoy it.

Tweet

Fox Sports was smarter than all of us

Our new favorite website, Bill Simmons' Grantland, offers a long overdue celebration of the "Fox box," the always-on sports score. How did we ever live without it?

Thanks, Fox. In return, please don't hack our cell phones.

Tweet

Dallas 105, Miami 95

* Our condolences to the NBA and to ABC for this ending in six games instead of seven. Have to make that extra dozen millions somewhere else.

* Guess that Miami Heat dynasty will have to wait a year. Sorry, Big Three.

* As much as we love to hate LeBron James - and we certainly do - there's a small little piece of us that does feel bad for him. If he thought the second-guessing and criticism was bad these last few days, he ain't seen nothing yet. Let the Miami finger-pointing begin.

* We do like Heat coach Erik Spoelstra. We just wonder where he'll be coaching next year. Someone may need to be the scapegoat. And in the NBA, that's never the players.

* Is it us or did the use of the phrase "give credit to" suddenly spike in usage by the TNT and ABC-ESPN commentators?

* We will happily take some credit for this championship. We wore the same smelly Dallas Cowboys T-shirt for all three of the Maverick's clinching victories. Should we wash it or store it for the fall NFL season? A tough decision.

* The way Dwyane Wade spells his first name really bugs us. There, we said it.

* One sportswriter noted: the Mavericks were playing like a team that wanted to win the title, while the Heat were playing like a team that thought they deserved it. We concur.

* Memo from the Washington Redskins to the Miami Heat: you can't just get a title by opening up the checkbook. You still have to play all of the games.

* It's not that LeBron James chose to sign with the Heat. He's a free agent and has every right to take full advantage. Whatever. But the smug, arrogant manner in which he did so was absolutely insufferable and proves how tone-deaf he truly is when it comes to basketball fans. Not only was the forum he used (a live ESPN primetime special) unbelievably self-serving and asinine, even the words he used were just oh-so-cocky ("I'm going to take my talents..."). He sometimes seems like a guy more interested in developing his brand than in hardening his basketball resolve.

* We'll be brutally honest here: we still only partially understand what a pick-and-roll is.

* The poetry is undeniable in comparing the 2006 Maverick collapse with the 2011 Heat collapse. Revenge is a dish best served cold. And closing out a series in Game 6 is indeed cold.

* This would seem to end Dallas' Curse of the Crease.

* Has LeBron always insisted on chewing on his mouthpiece like that? Yuck.

* Rick Carlisle does look like Jim Carrey. Sorry.

* For Dirk Nowitski, this is surely a much sweeter victory than it would have been had he moved elsewhere to win his first title. A sports columnist somewhere noted that LeBron would probably have to win three rings in Miami to get the same feeling of satisfaction and accomplishment as he would have gotten by scraping and fighting to win just one in Cleveland. In an era of wheel-and-deal trades and mercenary free agency, there remains something noble about sticking with the same team and working hard, overcoming adversity, swallowing losses, and learning from your mistakes. Even if no one does it anymore.

* We attended Mavericks games back in the 80s at musty Reunion Arena and cheered for such names as Rolando Blackman, Mark Aguirre, and white guy Brad Davis. Just saying.

* Class act, Mark Cuban, allowing first Maverick owner Don Carter to be involved in the trophy ceremony.

* Be curious to learn more about the truth behind those NBA Cares spots, as in, which players truly give their time and energy to charities when the film cameras aren't rolling?

* Odds remain good that tomorrow morning's ESPN Radio Colin Cowherd show will still focus mostly on "What's wrong with LeBron?" rather than "How 'bout them Mavericks?" We smell a lot of excuse-making from media pundits to try and explain how Goliath just got the snot kicked out of him by David.

* There's something robotic about competitive athletes. In watching Nowitski monotone his way through another interview tonight, we started to realize that all cold-blooded players demonstrate this same lack of emotion. It's like putting Spock into your lineup. They can be charismatic, sure. But Kobe, Jordan, Tim Duncan - there's just something humorless about them. They exist to win. The end.

* If you don't live in Miami and were still rooting for the Heat, we want to know why.

* We do wish ABC would retire that strange NBA Finals montage that opened each game, what with it's chintzy miniature work and goofy video effects that overlap all of that old footage together to make it seem like an NBA Hall of Justice. Much more powerful and evocative are the cool still photos of the star players from each team posing with the trophy and looking alternately introspective and hungry.

* Enjoyable side-effect of NBA playoffs: seeing what kind of insane-but-oddly-fashionable suits the players will be wearing at the press conferences.

* Show of hands: who still thinks Dirk is soft? The defense rests.

* Another villain to loathe on the Heat? One Udonis Haslem. We hate his dumb cornrows as well.

* Thank you, Tyson Chandler. Your impact cannot be overstated.

* If they could go back in time, would the Heat still put on that ridiculous pep rally extravaganza of smoke and lasers and fire before the season started? Way to raise the expectations, fellas.

* This victory proves to sports prognosticators can get it very, very wrong. Almost no one picked the Mavericks to beat the Heat. If you say you did, you're a dirty liar. We didn't even give them much of a chance against the Lakers three weeks ago. (Chronic mistrust is a symptom of being a Mavericks fan who gets burned season after season.) But we're glad they proved them wrong.

Tweet

Live blogging Super Bowl XLV

* Random Super Bowl memory #6: Sitting at the laptop throughout Super Bowl XLV (Packers beat the Steelers) to blog snarky, pithy commentary that no one will read. Next year: Cowboys over Jets, 28-24. See you there.

* This feels right, don't you think? Roethlisberger is a solid two-time Super Bowl winner. He's just not a three-time winner.

* We just hope Brett Favre is watching from his Mississippi compound. The Packers have officially moved on, Mr. Unretirement.

* For the Steelers, one... last... chance... No good!

* Packers now lead by six. The pessimist in us figures this will just set up Roethlisberger to score a touchdown as time expires to win the game by one point and further burnish his image.

* To the geniuses in the stands holding a "You're in Steeler Country" sign. Geographically speaking, you're in Cowboy Country.

* Jennings is wide open. The Cheese Fry could have run that route and got the touchdown.

* The Packers' Jordy Nelson: it was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

* Harbinger of things to come? Steelers fumble the ball away.

* We're calling it now with 19 seconds to go in the third quarter. Steelers will win the game. Packers look completely overmatched.

* Joe Buck and Troy Aikman aren't in the booth. They're in the Command Center.

* Could ESPN's Colin Cowherd be right? His take: Aaron Rodgers is great at executing a first-half game plan, but struggles in the second half when the opponent makes adjustments and a quarterback must do more quick-thinking improvisations. That's what seems to be happening here.

* "Imported from Detroit." Clever. But we'd still never buy a Chrysler, Eminem.

* Harbinger of things to come? Big sack on Big Ben.

* Harbinger of things to come? Steelers get a huge defensive stop. The momentum, as they say, is turning Pittsburgh's way.

* The secret to getting the Cheese Fry to see a "Pirates of the Caribbean" sequel? Give it a running time of less than two hours.

* Wondering which seats the old men from the Visa spot are sitting in. You know, the one where those characters have never yet missed attending a Super Bowl in person.

* Yep. It's a game. 21-17. Wake up, Green Bay.

* Steelers are about to make this a game.

* Ozzy Osbourne probably seems clever and trendy in some Madison Ave. ad agency boardroom, but that's not the same as being clever and trendy in the real world.

* How frustrating it must be to get knocked out of a Super Bowl because of injury.

* Don't say this Super Bowl is coming to you live from Dallas. The taxpayers of the City of Arlington paid a lot of money to Jerry Jones for that stadium. Give them their due.

* Random Super Bowl memory #5: Watching Super Bowl XXXVIII (Patriots beat the Panthers) among a group of retirees on a Caribbean cruise and being one of the few people rooting for New England. Didn't know gray-haired folks could give dirty looks like that.

* We didn't much like "I've Had the Time of My Life" when it was on the radio the first time in 1986. Sorry, we think it's written "(I've Had) The Time of My Life." How pretentious are parentheses in pop songs?

* You may not like the Black Eyed Peas, but at least they're still relevant and making hit songs, and not some creaky relic of classic rock appealing only to the 40+ demo. Which is what the Super Bowl halftime usually delivers.

* To the layman, doesn't it seem like the Black Eyed Peas are really just Will.i.am and Fergie? What do those other two dudes contribute?

* All that hype about Fox Sports' "Sounds of the Game" and it's just a bunch of unintelligible shouting and hollering (with the occasional swear word dumped). Lame.

* You didn't hold 'em, Packers. Now it's 21-10.

* Hold 'em, Packers, hold 'em.

* Are we really so unable to delay gratification (or be alone with our thoughts) for more than 60 seconds that we need the new Chevy Cruze to read our Facebook page to us? This is not a good sign, people. The radio is enough of a distraction while you're piloting several thousand pounds of metal and glass at 50 mph, don't you think? Really, can't you wait to learn that your next-door neighbor had a Coke Zero for lunch?

* Regarding Jennings' touchdown catch, as the coach said to Nick Nolte in North Dallas Forty: "Now that's concentration."

* If the half ends 21-3, the Packers will win the ball game. Print it.

* Harbinger of things to come? Big Ben throws interception number two. Perhaps the K-word is alive and well. Karma. Don't worry, Ben. Losing the game won't affect your ability to pick up coeds in college bars.

* Not sure if the people freezing outside the stadium, having paid money to watch the game on a TV not completely dissimilar from the TV they probably have in their living room, are loyal NFL fans or stupid NFL fans. Or both.

* We don't understand exactly what "Super 8" is about, but we want to go to there.

* Sell it all you want, Marvel and Paramount. But "Thor" looks really, really stupid.

* Maybe the U.S. military should look into applications for Coca-Cola. If it can turn a dragon's fire-breath into fireworks, maybe we should be pouring it on Iran's nuclear reactors.

* Oh yay. Another "Transformers" movie. Just what none of us needed.

* We have "Almost Famous" to thank for giving new life to Elton John's annoying "Tiny Dancer."

* So much for a Super Bowl shutout.

* As we said in college, that there is some sticky D, Packers.

* We're a red-blooded, girlcrazy American male who (somewhat) proudly had a Maxim subscription for many years, but the Go Daddy commercials are always on the wrong side of being skanky and sleazy.

* Something undeniably universal about the panic from accidentally hitting "Reply All" on an e-mail.

* Big Ben's not going to last the full game.

* Claymation Eninem. Brilliant.

* Harbinger of things to come? Packers get a "pick six," a football term that seemed to have suddenly come into vogue this season. Like last year's "bubble screen."

* Kia Optima commercial. Best so far (not counting the movie spots).

* "Cowboys and Aliens." One of those genius ideas that seems so obvious, you wonder why you didn't think of it. Plus Olivia Wilde.

* What's with the violent Pepsi Max commercials? Two so far have featured someone getting hit in the head with a can.

* Harbinger of things to come? Packers score first touchdown.

* "Fast Five," huh? Do we need to have seen the last three in order to understand it?

* Hard to believe that not too long ago the networks didn't keep the score in the corner of the screen. Seems like such a no-brainer now. Thanks, Fox Sports.

* Switching a cheeseburger for a bar of soap. Funny, Pepsi Max.

* Thanks to TweetDeck's realtime updates, it's like we're watching the game with Sports Illustrated's uber-columnist Peter King.

* Uh oh. Mendenhall breaks off a big run.

* Random Super Bowl memory #4: The Cheese Fry was only seven when Super Bowl XIII was played (Cowboys lose to the Steelers). While we have only a hazy memory of the game, our strongest memory is the realization that each team got to have its logo painted in one of the end zones.

* There's no way to conclusively study it, but one wonders what role the Madden video game played in elevating the average fan's understanding of the Xs and Os of football. It certainly changed how we look at the game.

* How many times does a ball change hands at the bottom of a pile?

* Harbinger of things to come? Steelers go three and out.

* Random Super Bowl memory #3: Being unable to see Super Bowl XXXIII (Atlanta loses to Denver) because of work-related travel and having to see a small slice of the game at the Salt Lake City airport.

* Mike Tomlin is the same age as the Cheese Fry? Look where he is. Look where we are. May be time to start drinking beer.

* You have to admire Deion Sanders' wardrobe. Look at that shirt.

* Shannon Sharpe was a great player, but he may be one of the most annoying sports commentators working today. Something about the way he over-enunciates drives us crazy. It's like his teeth are too big for his mouth.

* Now the Super Bowl tries to pretend it's as important and significant as world history's greatest and most tragic moments... and even hired Michael Douglas to prove it. Yes yes, the game unites us all, but sometimes the back-patting self-importance gets ridiculous. It's a game, people, that involves a weirdly-shaped leather ball.

* "Heeeeaaaaahhhh... That's so dumb."

* LivingSocial. Funny ad, but we don't get what they're selling.

* "Kung Fu Panda" seems underrated. Way more funny and action-packed than it gets credit for.

* How pathetic that the Cheese Fry and Ms. Cheese Fry are actually having a discussion about whether Christina Aguilera is getting a divorce; A) who cares? and B) how is it that we actually sort of know her personal situation? Thanks, culture of "Access Hollywood" and Us Weekly. Those brain cells can surely be better spent on other, more important questions.

* Random fact: playing a marching snare drum with a tradition grip is no easy feat.

* Mike Tomlin always looks like he should have laser beams coming out of his eyes to better burn your soul to a charred crisp.

* Lea Michele: a future ex-Ms. Cheese Fry.

* Very sad that the Bears didn't get Walter Payton a touchdown in Super Bowl XX. William "Refrigerator" Perry is a bad, 1980s punchline unworthy of carrying Payton's used towel.

* Falcons on the bus. Play 60. Yes!

* Isn't Dr. House always risking his career? Yawn.

* Eagerly anticipating "Battle Los Angeles."

* Jennifer Aniston's agent should get a bonus for finally getting her into a movie that will be a sure-fire hit.

* We're mostly okay with Christina Aguilera, but we're not a fan of those who take the national anthem and twist it into an opera performance full of arpeggio runs and long, look-at-me notes. Reckon she won't be able to resist the temptation.

* At least Sam Elliott lent his gravel baritone to both teams' clip packages and didn't play favorites. He's also selling us trucks today (see below).

* Prediction: Packers 31, Steelers 24.

* We're not sure if we know anyone who still watches "The Simpsons" every week as if it were still 1998.

* We've heard that some people don't like Joe Buck. He may come off a little prudish and nerdy, but he seems solid to us. To us, the best play-by-play guy remains Pay Summerall.

* There's a graduate thesis to be written about the patriotic imagery and tough-guy language used in television ads to sell pickup trucks to American males. We may have to explore this further.

* We don't get NASCAR. And it's probably for the best. How many sports can one person really watch and still get out of the house?

* Random Super Bowl memory #2: Drinking too much to fully remember the Cowboys win over the Bills in Super Bowl XXVIII. So maybe it's not really a memory.

* Clearly, the middle of the Declaration of Independence isn't quite as catchy and poetic as the preamble.

* We hope we get to see the "Play 60" spot with the Atlanta Falcons one last time.

* Not sure why the Super Bowl needs to include a civics lesson. Thanks, Colin Powell, for explaining the importance of the Declaration of Independence.

* Another reason to root against the Steelers: keeping ex-Cowboy Flozell "False Start" Adams from getting a Super Bowl ring.

* "Limitless." Interesting.

* A former girlfriend worked for Taco Bell's media campaign. One of the company's prime customer demographics: college students out late at night who were drunk, looking for a greasy meal. This was accepted as fact.

* We took a tour of Cowboys Stadium. It's bigger than it looks. Impossibly big. You can put the Statue of Liberty on the 50-yard-line and close the roof over her torch.

* As much as we always enjoy the "Fox NFL Sunday" crew, if we had to dump one... it'd have to be Michael Strahan. Howie Long covers the same ground, don't you think?

* Regarding "Drive Angry," does the average viewer really fall for the trick where "reviews" are quoting critics and bloggers from fanboy places like Ain't It Cool News?

* What's the harder phone call to make? Calling NFL commissioner Roger Goddell to break the news about the fire marshal removing thousands of seats? Or calling Jerry Jones?

* We're not sure Ben Roethlisberger will ever completely rehab his image among non-Steeler homers, no matter how many disarming sit-downs he may do with Terry Bradshaw.

* Random Super Bowl memory #1: During the pregame of Super Bowl XXXVII, our viewing party was interrupted by a neighbor who was a full-on, card-carrying member of Raider Nation. This character was decked out in silver and black head to toe. Including the obligatory face paint. He was loud, cocky, and 100% fired up for certain victory, the flames likely kindled by several cases of room-temperature Coors Light. But once the Raiders fell behind, and then lost to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers... uh oh. Raider Neighbor stopped popping into the party. We always wondered how sad he must have been wiping off the face paint, looking in the mirror, listening to his old mix tape of Judas Priest and Dokken, and thinking about what could have been. Especially considering the absurdly perpetual futility of the Raiders ever since.

Tweet