Sunday, January 20, 2013

Football picks - playoffs #3 and more

Have you seen the Bud Light commercials where the fans have to do or wear the same thing every game because it brings them luck?  The slogan is "It's only weird if it doesn't work".  Well, I have made my picks, but in the latter part of the season when I picked the Ravens to win they lost.  While I was cool with that, thrilled even that they lost, I now would like them to beat Tom Brady and the Patriots, because well, I'm not a fan.  And who wouldn't love to see the two Harbaugh brothers fight it out in the Super Bowl, huh?  So I guess I'm saying I don't want to record that game on this blog because....It's only weird if it doesn't work.

San Francisco over Atlanta - I would love for Atlanta to win this game because they haven't been this far in like one hundred years.  I like it (when the Steelers aren't in the thick of things) when new teams go to the party.  I also like that the Steelers are the leading team with six Super Bowl rings.  However, that being said, if the 49ers Colin Kaepernick plays like he did last week, like he doesn't have a thing to lose yet losing is the last thing on his mind, there is no way the Falcons are going to the Super Bowl.  The defense has got to shut down that quarterback.  He can't run and he can't make long Superman passes.  If the Falcons can do that, they just might have a shot.  I just don't think they can.

Ravens and the Patriots - Been there and done this before.  The Ravens have the defense to shut down Brady, but will they come out and do it?  Will Brady be in the zone and play playoff football like only Tom Brady can?  Will the Ravens choke like they did in the latter part of the season?  Will Ray Lewis pump up his team enough to go out there and destroy the Patriots offense?  Oh, my, this should be a good game.  Neither team is my favorite and it kills me that they got this far, but my pick is recorded on my Yahoo account and I'll be watching come Sunday night.

Lance Armstrong - Someone tell me why this man went on Oprah?  What was the point?  Especially if you weren't going to show some tears.  I watched only about twenty minutes of the first day's interview because as Madison said who really knows the truth anymore?  I thought Armstrong came across as a king who was annoyed that his subjects had turned on him and now he was having to sit there and rehash the past and admit his role.  What was the point?  It certainly wasn't guilt.  I didn't see any guilt.  He didn't look like this had been eating away at him for years.  He looked good; fit, trim, athletic and handsome.  Granted I didn't watch the entire interview, but I don't see why he put himself out there.  He never failed a drug test.  He could have just kept silent and there would have always been people that believed him.  He would have avoided tons of lawsuits.  I just don't get it.  In the end he was still the winner because it sounds like everyone was doping.  He just was the king doper.  The situation is so yesterday that I just scratch my head.  It hasn't changed my mind on the whole thing.  I think it a waste of time and money, and I still believe the problem in drugging lies with professional sports, the money, the pressure, the owners, the media, and the fans.

Manti Teo - I'm thinking that Lance Armstrong was the unnamed source who got the ball rolling on this story because boy did it eclipse Lance's interview with Oprah.  By the time that interview was televised no one was watching because they were listening and reading about Manti Teo and his bizarre dead, fake girlfriend who wasn't really dead.  In a nutshell Teo and his family, through various written stories, said that Teo lost his girlfriend to cancer around the same time that his grandmother died.  This was toward the beginning of the football season and the media ran with the story writing all sorts of things about the poor dead girlfriend.  Now it turns out that not only was the girlfriend not dead, but she never really existed in the first place; at last not by the name we all knew.  The questions are did Teo create this story to garner attention for the Heisman?  Did Notre Dame have anything to do with it?  Was it really a hoax, as Notre Dame is now claiming?  Oh, boy!  Oh, boy!

Idiots - The bottom line in both of these situations is how dumb these two guys really are.  Armstrong was so pompous and full of himself that he never believed anyone would turn on him?  He just figured that year after year his friends, colleagues, and family members would just lie as he kept winning, winning, winning collecting more trophies and jerseys and tons of money?  In this day and age of television and social media Teo really believed someone wasn't going to delve into the background of this dead girl, that his friends, colleagues, and family members would just keep quiet as he kept succeeding?  It just blows my mind at how athletes really think they are so much more than anything or anyone else.  Listen guys, people don't keep quiet.  Not even your parents keep things quiet in this day.  You aren't surrounded by people who want you to be king, who will keep mum, and watch as you make millions.  It just doesn't happen.

NFL coaches - The round robin of coaching is still going on in the NFL as teams scramble to hire new coaches, coordinators, and general managers.  Arizona hired the Colts Bruce Arians to be their head coach to replace Arians' former co-worker Ken Whisenhunt, both of whom tried to get the head coaching job in Pittsburgh years ago that went to Mike Tomlin.  College coaches are leaving the young and signing more monetary contracts for the high pressure world of the NFL.  Chip Kelley left the Oregon Ducks to be the Philadelphia Eagles head coach hoping to be the next Jim Harbaugh or Pete Carroll.  But then again he left once before after interviewing with the Browns and then changed his mind.  Heck, even the Jets got a new general manager after everyone else turned them down.  We won't know if any of these new hires are worth anything until next year, but the drama has sure been fun to watch as it all played out. 

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