What the Titan's Record Should Be

I know I've neglected to comment on my own favorite team's performance this season... The Titans... However, I am often frustrated by either my inability to watch the games here in NYC.... or to watch the Titans get robbed... or for our receivers to drop Young's passes... okay there's a lot that hurts the heart...

I know "almost" doesn't count, especially in a sport like football, but I have to argue that the Titan's record doesn't even come close to reflecting their true game performances. Let's review!

Official Record: 6 wins, 5 losses

5 Losses Include:

• 20-22 to Indy
• 10-13 to Tampa
• 13-28 to Jacksonville
• 20-34 to Denver
• 35-6 to Cinncy

But really, the Titans outplayed the Colts in Week 2 and should have won that game. The Tampa game was also close and I really don't consider that a true loss. We were not outplayed.

I will concede the division game to jacksonville was lost the second time around (but that's just what statistically is going to happen with you play the same team so frequently) and Denver and obviously tonight the Bengals.

But that should really put us at....

8 Wins, 3 Losses

I know I'm living in dream world, but don't worry, it's only Vince's second year and we're still pulling things together. Imagine if we had Pacman this year! Our defense would be unstoppable. Next time save the dollar bills for tipping the pizza delivery guy.

Reason #5367 Why I'm Not a Jets Fan

Aside for the butt-conquering, back-riding from the Cowboys Thursday... this is virtually the same atmosphere and impression of Jets Fan I had 15 years back when I first attended a Jets Game...

I'm not sure why its taken the NYTimes this long to catch on, but . Read it and puke. I did.

At Jets Game, a Halftime Ritual of Harassment
By DAVID PICKER
November 20, 2007
At some of Giants Stadium’s pedestrian ramps, obscenity-laced chants and demands that women expose their breasts have become a staple during halftime at Jets home
games. Read More>

Packers Gobble Up Detroit


While most Americans spent last Thursday in a gluttonous state of food stupor, d'em Meat Packers captured the Lions like they were trapped Turkeys. Although the final score was 37-26, it was a slaughter for all intensive purposes.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Giants Conquored By Vikings

Unfortunately I'm not talking about a chapter out of a history book or fairy tale. Eli is far from the Prince or Valiant Knight who could lead the troops to victory... instead, this disaster is tonight's Sunday reminds us this young, overshadowed Manning boy is more like the Ashley Simpsons of the world... oh dear that was way harsh. I don't mean it Eli. You're not that bad, but good lord son, today's performance is just as embarassing to watch as Ashley's 'singing' on SNL.

And Adrian Peterson didn't even play.

4 interceptions, three for TDs. Sigh.

Turnovers, punt returns, kick off returns, safetys... As wise Santa Belichick said in last week's press conference.. these are like "bonus points". Statistically as a coach you can't count on them, however every time bonus points are on the board, it puts you that much further behind...

Snap out of it Gmen! Get rocking! You're still number one spot for the wild card, but don't let that slip away!

Too Close for Comfort

Whoa Patriots... Hott darn AJ Feeley... 23 point spread? Not so much.

Mister Hester Snuffs Mr. Sauerbrun

With 11 return receptions in 27 games. Utterly Unbelievable. That's all he does and he does it incredibly. Touches the ball, what? Ten times a game at best? And two out of every five game he does, he puts 6 more points on the board? Talk about clutch.

Last year, six return tds in one season shattered the NFL record, yet already this year he's had five... with five more weeks to go... At this rate, a mathematical person would propose that he'll return two more!

But that's assuming the next five teams the Bears play use Mr. Sauerbrun's mentally... What was the quote? Oh yes:

“We’re not going to kick away from him,” Sauerbrun told The Denver Post. “We
respect him and he’s the best, but we have guys on our coverage teams that are
paid to make big tackles.”

While I respect Sauerbrun's attempt to keep football a more true sport than baseball (cough intentional walks cough cough), there is something to be said for strategy in this human game of chess.

Well after 1 punt return AND 1 kick-off return, Sauerbrun had to eat his words... and the ball... almost literally. The one time he tries to punt it away from Hester it gets blocked and returned for a TD... be damned if you do, be damned if you don't.

Either way Sauerburn looks ridiculous. Sawwy.

If it wasn't for Hester today, I don't think the Bears would have been able to go to OT in order to get that W. Anyway, someone should put a compilation of all of Hester's returns and put it on YouTube. I don't have time.

In the meantime, check out the NFL.com highlights.

PS. NFL.com, let me embed your videos! wahh!

Perfect Stranger, Perfectly Horrible

Hallie Berry... how did you ever win an Academy Award? Overacting her role... Bruce Willis' execution of such a bland character, 'Harrison Hill', failed to save or add to this film. While most of the time I was occupied with trying to figure out what other movies Giovanni Ribisi was in (I decided Boiler Room was the most memorable one)... the producers/director/movie makers were busy trying to make various characters "suspicious".

The movie was so bad, I actually thought that there was the possibility that these clearly "suspicious" characters would probably be the actual killers. Everything else was being overkilled, that's for sure.

In the last 5 minutes, the movie redeemed itself slightly with a decent twist ending... Something that in a well-acted movie you might have guessed, but the rate everything else was going made you assume the ending would be equally obvious.

C+ rating at best.

Simulating a Snap!

Injuries + Peyton "Prettyboy" Manning + imperfect conditions = Colts loss.

The colts are a talented, strong team. But the San Diego defense wrecked Peyton tonight. Wow, if you didn't watch the game, I recommend you check out highlights on EPSN or NFL.com. Even so, i don't think anything can re-create the nail-biting excitement of this game.

Peyton's numbers were horrendous with five picks... ok, make that six (just happened in a hail mary but that's not really count)... and Vinatieri missed two field goal - including the game-winning field goal (only 25 yarder ish). Most clutch kicker of all time my-ass... no matter how indisputed by NFL analysts

Just when I thought the Colts had made their come-back, everything goes wrong for Indy.

Including a 'first down' being called back for a 'better placement' (i think that was a poor call personally) and a "simulating a snap" call. I actually looked up the rule for simulating a snap and it's really a 5-yard penalty if more than one player moves at the same time before the snap.

Home field advantage definitely helped San Diego, while Phillip Rivers did not. And I was underimpressed by LTD's performance. What happened dude?

Well that's the SNF update... WATCH THE HIGHLIGHTS!

'Til MNF....

J-Lo Prego? No Ways!

I think she's making it up. She's totally lying to cover-up her weight gain.




What? You don't agree?

Priceless "Prep Talk" Peyton Campaign

One of the great intersections of my life is the football marketing programs. It brings my work and pleasure together. Of course I love what I do so the equation has pretty obvious results.

This week's commercial featuring a "pep talk" from Peyton drove consumers to priceless.com/preptalk.

Failures:
With no disrespect intended for the online marketers at Mastercard, if you're going to spend the money on the commercial, you could at least spend a little bit of budget for some search engine keywords on Google.

First I tried typing in the url and I got "page not found". So maybe it was priceless.com/peptalkS (plural) or maybe i just totally remembered the url incorrectly. Either way, I considered typing in a direct url my user-error.

So I moved onto the omniscient Google. I typed in "priceless prep talk" and what I was looking for did not come up. In fact, no advertising even came up for those keywords. I tried three more sets of keywords and still nada.

I had to resort to a generic "priceless mastercard" search and got priceless.com homepage.

Successes:
Well at least on the homepage I found exactly what I was looking for. From there my experience was great.

This customized (i got to type in my name to hear Peyton cover his mouth and say "Sarah") experience had cute clips of the charming QB giving me advice. Very well and smoothly done. No quirks. I sent to a friend easily. I had a great time. And if my name wasn't there, there were some awesome options like "Mr. Man" or "Babe".

Definitely recommend everyone attempt to find the campaign. But I won't make it easy for you. You should experience the mistakes of MasterCard yourself.

Can Someone Remind Miami & Buffalo That This is Football? Not Baseball.

3-2. That's the score that scrolled on the bottom of my screen on CBS. Three to two. I thought... why are they reporting baseball scores? Then after squinting, I realized it was the Miami-Buffalo score.

Although I've yet to see "highlights" from the game, I can't imagine it was very pretty.

Rams Go Marching In

What they say might actually be true... it could be harder to go 0-16 than 16-0... On one hand, who'd though the St. Louis Rams would go this far without winning... but I was really starting to think it was possible... But finally the streak is broken.

This early afternoon, the Rams beat the Saints.

Awww, how pathetic for the Saints to lose to a team like the Rams.

However, thank GOODNESS my mom did not listen to Stevers and I and pick the Saints over the Rams. She was right to consider the fact that St. Louis is coming off their rested bye week and the truth about Drew Brees.

How awesome would this season be if the two extreme records were broken. I'd love to see the Pat's go undefeated... and heck, who cares if the Dolphins go unchampioned. It's already an embarassing season and maybe we'd get some great coach rants Playoffs? PLAYOFFS?

Sorry all you fins fans. I mean no offense.

Baltimore Ravens (3/32)

November 2007

Matchup: Baltimore Ravens (w) vs. Philadelphia Eagles

Setting: 

• EndZone seats, 5th row back

Game Highlights: 

• McNabb benched for the first time
• Crazy guy behind us

Trip Memory: 

• tight parking spot! Very specific associated with the tickets

Award: most detailed parking assignment

American Gangster ... They ARE who we Thought They Were

Last night stevers and I went to a late night rainy showing of American Gangster featuring Denzel and Mr. Crowe. We had debated for a while whether to see the Lions/Lambs Tom Cruise movie or the American Gangster. Ultimately our decision was made based on the times available for each and we saw the latter.



This morning i sit here with the voice of Denny Green running through my head 'THEY ARE WHO WE THOUGHT THEY WERE'... and the Coors Light Commercial isn't even on. But that's pretty much what I felt about the movie. I expected it to be a good movie (it was) and I expected the actors to play their roles as they did. The plot was to be expected and overall it was a good movie. I never cried, I never gaspes. I did grimmace a few times from the violence but ... I don't think you need to crown'em.