Sunday, January 19, 2014

Championship Sunday

"Part of what makes these two contests so tantalizing is that they are so different. In the AFC, obviously, you have the Brady vs. Manning angle, but how about the fact that the last Denver quarterback to host a conference championship game was Jake Plummer -- or that his Broncos were facing the sixth-seeded Steelers?"

"Yes, the AFC title tilt is a true clash of titans -- but then, so is the NFC Championship Game, for that matter. The two best defensive units in the league are part of the story, as are Colin Kaepernick and Russell Wilson, clearly new-breed leaders who represent the NFL of 2020. Throw in the fact that the 49ers and Seahawks are divisional rivals, that Seattle is the toughest place to play and that San Francisco is arguably the premier road team in the league, and ... well, you get the point."

NFL.COM (go Pats)

53 comments:

Shouting Thomas said...

No rooting interest, but I will enjoy the games.

Manning and Brady are both old style drop back passers who never run.

Kaepernick and Wilson are new style spread offense guys who bring a lot of elements of the college game to the pros. They run on purpose.

So, no matter who wins, the Super Bowl will be a match of the old style versus the new.

ricpic said...

After Brady wins, to go on being a TOTAL winner he'll have to trade in that Bunchen gal for a new model before that kraut face of hers starts to age, well...like kraut faces do. I mean the figger she'll likely keep for quite awhile but does Tom Terrific really wanna wake up next to a grizzled veteran of the Eastern Front?

Third Coast said...

And there will be a cumulative one hour and nine minutes of official timeouts so the refs can review plays and sponsors can squeeze in more pickup and beer commercials.

Unknown said...

Brady and his wife look like brother and sister. Bonus, they act like spoiled children.
I'm cheerleading for the cool adult in the room.

Pay.
Ton.

Titus said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Shouting Thomas said...

@Third Coast

That's why you have a remote control.

NBA games on other channels.

Third Coast said...

Thomas, I was a huge NFL fan before the NFL was cool. My avatar is an old photo of the entire Detroit Lions defensive line about to plant Bart Starr into the turf of the now demolished Briggs Stadium. Due to an accumulation of issues I have with the NFL as currently constituted, I've slowly lost interest. Really haven't been a steady watcher since Barry Sanders retired. And I haven't watched more than 5 minutes of an NBA game since the Detroit Bad Boys.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

#Obamaism of the day.

“I would not let my son play pro football,” he said. “But, I mean, you wrote a lot about boxing, right? We’re sort of in the same realm.”

Michael Haz said...

Today's picks:

Broncos and Seahawks win.

And the Seahawks will win the Super Bowl.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Its funny watching the taped delayed match where #1 Serena Williams lost to 14 seed Ana Ivanovic.

Funny because, after Williams won the first set, you hear them, the announcers, kind of writing off the challenger.

It's on ESPN2 right now.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

My picks are the opposite of Hazman.

Pats and San Francisco win.

Pats winning it all.

Shouting Thomas said...

I say Denver wins it all!

I'm a big Peyton Manning fan.

virgil xenophon said...

Being a Saints fan I should root for the team (one of the few) that beat them, right? Or should I be a hater? Actually I'm a hater because, when you get right down to it the Seahawks' success is predicated on referee intimidation. By this I mean their defensive secondary uses the old former Georgetown BB coach John Thompson's formula. Thompsons teams on defense saw ALL FIVE--on EVERY SECOND when on defense--pushing, shoving, hacking, holding, tripping, elbowing--you name it--their opponents, totally throwing their offense out of sync. When refs were asked why they didn't call the fouls they replied: "Are you kidding me? If I called every foul we'd be doing nothing but walking up & down the court shooting free-throws and the games would last till midnight and I'd get booed out of the gym and never be hired to referee a game again." Soooo, banditry paid off and only the most obvious, egregious fouls were called, giving a tremendous advantage to Thompson's teams.

So too it is with the Seahawks. While granting that their secondary is super talented, the icing on the cake is that on top of their talent everyone of them commits a penalty (holding, shoving receivers , etc.) on every play simply DARING (ala Thompson) the refs to call them all.

A hateful tactic which obviously works on spineless refs, giving Seattle an unwarranted, unfair edge. I blame the NFL big kids for not instructing the refs to call a halt to all of this, but they won't for the same reason the NCAA didn't in Thompsons case.

AllenS said...

I'll watch, but I can't think of a team that's playing who I would root for.

Third Coast said...

How can one root against Colin Kaepernick's "...tattoos, the big arms, the whole deal..." as noted by that famous football prognosticator, Nancy Pelosi.

Rabel said...

More from the source of Lem's quote at 12:00:

“At this point, there’s a little bit of caveat emptor,” he went on. “These guys, they know what they’re doing. They know what they’re buying into. It is no longer a secret. It’s sort of the feeling I have about smokers, you know?”

That's shockingly conservative thinking from the Big O. There may be hope for this guy yet.

Nah.

As to football, two close games.

The QB who handles the pressure will win the NFC. Probably Wilson.

The evil Patriots will try their best to lie, cheat and steal the AFC behind Satan's spawn, Tom Brady, but the Golden Child Manning will lead his mighty men to victory and glory. Maybe.

Go long, Peyton. Go long.

Trooper York said...

Peyton is a loser and he will lose the big game again. His one title was a fluke.

You will have to wait until Eli is in the Big Game next season to see a Manning win in a Super Bowl.

Michael Haz said...

I'm trying to be like Peyton Manning today. For example, my wife was going to bring me a bowl of potato chips, but I changed my mind and wanted Fritos.

I called the signal "Omaha! Omaha! Omaha! Corn meal 12 on 3! Hut! Hut! Hut!" She went into Fritos formation, ran a down and in, brought the bowl right to where I expected it would be.

Upside down, over my head with a grinding motion.

Icepick said...

Pay.
Ton.


You mean the guy that, in order to amuse his father, dropped his pants and shoved his ass in a woman trainer's face? And had to pay her a big undisclosed settlement to settle the harassment claim? That mature adult in the room?

It's amazing how many people love big shots who intentionally abuse the little people for their own amusement.

Icepick said...

And the Seahawks will win the Super Bowl.

I hope so. Seattle is the last franchise left that I can stomach.

Icepick said...

Thompsons teams on defense saw ALL FIVE--on EVERY SECOND when on defense--pushing, shoving, hacking, holding, tripping, elbowing--you name it--their opponents, totally throwing their offense out of sync.

Virgil, you mean playing like the secondaries in the 1970s were legally allowed to play? LOL

Icepick said...

I called the signal "Omaha! Omaha! Omaha! Corn meal 12 on 3! Hut! Hut! Hut!" She went into Fritos formation, ran a down and in, brought the bowl right to where I expected it would be.

Nicely done, sir, nicely done.

Upside down, over my head with a grinding motion.

You've usually got to pay extra for that.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

That ball was catchable.

Unknown said...

Icepick - shove it, lover.

Icepick said...

You're rooting for the "Do you know who I am" child of privilege, April. The fact that you are hero worshiping him based off a well-orchestrated marketing scheme isn't on me.

Unknown said...

I'm rooting for John Kerry?
wow who knew?
I like Payton. It's not hero worship, for crying out loud. This is football game. A game. I'm a Denverite. What the hell do you expect?
You think I'm going to root for the Pates here?

Icepick said...

No, you're rooting for Ted Kennedy.

You wand to root for Denver, fine. Every team has scumbags, that's football.

But don't tell me Payton is a great guy when he and his father have made a point in the past of humiliating people just because their last name is Manning, and the other person didn't matter. That is pure scumbag.

Titus said...

I love all the cities representing.

Unknown said...

Thanks for you permission, Icepik. And thanks also for calling me a scumbag.

Unknown said...

Yay Titus.. He brings the love.

Chip Ahoy said...

I watched SuperBowl with a bunch of blokes. The whole time the producers interjected a "whoosh" sound for every little thing, every number shown accompanied by "whoosh.' Each stat whoosh. And lots of stats. Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh all the way through the whole game.

So naturally I picked up on that.

And annoyed the living shit out of everybody in two minutes flat.

But I didn't stop because the teevee didn't stop. It kept going whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, f'k'ne whoosh every three seconds so I did too.

Within a few minutes everybody paying attention to the game considered my sound intrusive, and all at once stopped dead and looked menacingly straight at me and the tele is still going whoosh so I stood there and said, "Fuck you whoosh. You're annoyed whoosh with me? You're beginning to whoosh sense how annoyed I whoosh am. I DEMAND whoosh you be annoyed as I."

Come to think of it, I just might have put my finger on what went wrong.



Chip Ahoy said...

When you are at the stadium watching a game in person do you have earbuds in listening to someone explaining things?

Then it would make sense to have the sound on and allow all kind of extra whoosh sound intrusion and other nonsense.

o.t. I just realized sitting here, I pulled a bottle of liqueur of some sort for this and that all cooking mostly from another room but do not return them. Instead set on a table half way out of laziness. The bottles are rarely touched. But now they're collected outside their cabinet and I look like some kind of confused lush or a practicing bartender.

Chip Ahoy said...

You know why Haz can so breezily predict a Seahawks win? Well, no comparison, actually, it's like the Seahawks are in a whole different league.

Unknown said...

I went to a Bronco game in the 1980's. Skybox, baby! (keep in mind this was the old stadium, but we thought we were fancy pants. The tickets were a gift.)

We beat the Chargers one million to zero in the heavy snow. Blizzard. Along in the skybox were my dad, me, and my best friend's husband. He did all the shoveling. I remember foggy glass.

That experience has spoiled me and I cannot imagine sitting in the stands. I'm a delicate scumbag princess.
I do on occasion go to CU games, but the noise is too much for me. I suffer terrible tinnitus.
Not to be confused with Titus.

Chip - I have no idea what you are referring to with the whoooosh. I'm going now to test it.

Michael Haz said...

Ahahahahaha!

Michael Haz said...

Every time Denver scores, an angel smokes some weed.

Unknown said...

Dude!

Chip Ahoy said...

Thank you for explaining this post, by the way. I just now tuned in, just now turned on the sound and clicked around. I heard somebody hoot and that caused me to look and see the Broncos just kicked bee ewe double tea, that's BUTT in case you can't read.

Chip Ahoy said...

The whoosh was for the SuperBowl a few years back. The last one I was allowed to watch with other people.

Rabel said...

My condolences to the Lemster.

Group hug?

Unknown said...

@ Rabel The evil Patriots will try their best to lie, cheat and steal the AFC behind Satan's spawn, Tom Brady, but the Golden Child Manning will lead his mighty men to victory and glory.

Wow. You're good.

deborah said...

It wasn't a whoosh so much as a 'row' (rhymes with cow), and the stat they were talking about would enlarge. The sound was to represent the speed of the stat enlarging. It was incredibly annoying.

ndspinelli said...

Trooper is a one trick pony. NYC doesn't even have a football team. The only NY team are the Bills. If Peyton wins the Super Bowl he'll be the FIRST QB to ever win w/ 2 different teams. His brother has been lucky to have great talent and defense to hide his dull/normal intelligence and average skills.

ndspinelli said...

Haz, I spent a night in Omaha this week. That was the lead story on the local news.

Michael Haz said...

Do you suppose Brady's wife yells Omaha! at the height of their love making?

Unknown said...

LOL Haz. I think she yells Hurry hurry hurry!

Unknown said...

@Deborah - yes, I think I remember that.

Unknown said...

Drudge has it:
Pot Bowl!

Michael Haz said...

Regardless of which team wins the Super Bowl, the fans will sing Weed Are The Champions.

XRay said...

I watched the game in its entirety, due to a San Francisco resident nephew visiting. What a travesty from the old days, coach and players, both teams. Plays called and execution of same, weak. More a three ring circus than an organized sporting event.

And then, after it was over, that 'interview' with #24, a summation of why I rarely watch the sport anymore.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Thanks Rabel

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Hazman prediction is half way through completion.

Icepick said...

April, your state is full of damned dirty hippies, so that's hardly surprising.