82-0 and NFL week 2!

I just got off of the phone with my brother Jordan and discussed not only the Brady injury but also Week 1 in general, and ended up agreeing that with the Pats a normal team again, the Colts and Bolts looking subpar on Sunday and the Jags offence in shreds, that suddenly the AFC is a free for all. The Bills, Jets, Steelers and dare I say it, my Broncos look like they could take their divisions and possibly go deep into the playoffs. The NFC is not as wide open and is pretty much what we thought with two differences: The Lions and Rams were as bad as either of us had seen in a long time. I mean the Rams offence was 2001 Dallas Cowboys bad (remember that dynamic 1-2 punch of Quincy Carter and Clint Stoerner at QB?) and the Lions just got run over as if the Falcons truck was being driven by Billy Joel. But at least they didn’t lose 82-0 in a women’s Olympic Hockey Qualifying game.

Yes, you read that right. Slovakia 82, Bulgaria 0. 139-0 in shots. Somehow, 57 of those shots did not find their way into the back of the net. Bulgaria, never the hotbed of hockey in either gender, kept the score tied for a few seconds in the first period but after the first goal went in the floodgates opened and before the period was over it was 31-0. 51 more goals followed and when it was finally and mercifully over it was an 82-0 win for the Slovaks. This prompts more than a few questions into the SportsOne’s head, but more on that in a minute. With the win, Slovakia qualified for the Olympic Qualification Tournament, which is kind of like a second job interview. You pleased the sweet thirty-something red head woman, now you have to impress the “man hating 45 year old recently divorced and now taking her job way too seriously because it’s all she has” Junior Executive. In other words, not so fast you Slovaks. The mighty Japanese as well as Team Kazakhstan are waiting for you in the second round.

As I said, a few issues go on in my head,

1. Why 82? Why not try for 100? It’s only 18 more goals, or 25% more than where you’re at. I mean, if Gretzky can get nine goals in two games for 50 in 39, certainly this team could’ve reached 100. 82 is nice, but 100 is three digits, that is something that would’ve been talked about for years. Perhaps at or around 60-0 the players started hot dogging it and trying insane passing plays and tic tac toe plays with the notion that “You know what? We’re F---ing Slovakia! Try and take the puck. You no get this!!” Yeah, that’s gotta be why 100 escaped them. (Could you imagine if you were on the Slovak team and did not get a goal in this game? Would they ever let you live that down? It would be like being the guy who cast Rosie O’Donnell in Exit to Eden…shudders) Oh well, next time.

2. How come the game continued at all? I don’t mean for a minute that this game should’ve been stopped. What I mean is, at what point do all 12 women on the ice just concede the fact that it’s 40-0, Bulgaria’s not coming back, let’s just all sit on the blue line and chat and wait out the clock. Sure, the dozen or so fans will end up

paying to watch a foodless picnic (assuming they actually were charged in the first place!), but who cares? Did Slovakia really need those extra 42 goals? I know they faced stiff goal differential competition from Latvia (who only beat Bulgaria 39-0) but still. On the other hand, who among us wouldn’t want an extra 42 goals? I know I wouldn’t mind if my team had 42 extra goals thrown their way at some point. Still should’ve reached 100.

3. There are two things I want from this game. One: I want video of the entire game. All 82 goals. I want Pierre McGuire to discuss every goal and break them down as to who botched the coverage in the defensive end, why the player was open and what could’ve been done to stop it. And I want him to do it in his “the arena is going bonkers and I have to shout louder than I normally shout” voice. Two: I want a written transcript of the 1^st intermission pep talk of the Bulgarian Coach. I really hope it went something like the SNL skit where Will Forte introduces his players to the theme from “Casino Royale” in order to get them pumped up to mount a great comeback (possibly the funniest 4 minutes on the show this decade). Do you think the backup goalie started period two? “Uh, look Katelin we’re gonna try Jukka in net this time ok? Nothing personal.” Also, the coach needs to go on the record like Ozzie Guillen and just call out every one of his players. Drop some F-bombs in there, call them all bitches or something. Get his team motivated!

4. What it must have been like (assuming there was a crowd there) to be a Bulgarian supporter, only to have half sloshed Slovaks sitting in front of you, and then every 44 seconds turning around to give it to you because your team got scored on again. How this didn’t turn into a melee like that Simpsons episode where Bart and Lisa’s team tie and the crowd just starts trashing the arena. There HAD to have been at least one spectator fight in this game. Which leads to my fifth ponder.

5. At what point do the Bulgarian girls lose it and start deliberately trying to take out the Slovak players. There isn’t any body checking in women’s hockey, which makes sense if you think about it. (This is what they need to do in women’s basketball, impose a simple rule change which makes it a tiny bit different than the mens game to make it more compelling to watch. Install eight foot nets instead of the standard ten footers. All of a sudden you go from having a game consisting of nothing but jump shots to a game in which the possibility of a crazy dunk might take place! Ok, I’m getting way too excited talking about women’s basketball. I’m sorry) Somewhere in the second period of a 48-0 ass kicking you’d think the Bulgarians would just go crazy, like the Canadians and Soviets did during the 1987 World Juniors. Imagine 44 female hockey players just punching each other’s lights out at centre ice. Ok, it sounds better than it probably is.

6. What do the girls who didn’t make the Bulgarian team think now? They’re either thinking “Haha Suck it!” (Much like everyone here who isn’t a New England Patriots supporter) or, “I need to practice and get on this team next time around, I want to be the one to spoil an 82-0 shutout!” (Actually, Bulgaria somehow lost to Croatia 30-1, which boggles the mind as to how this team actually got a goal. It had to have gone in off the goalie, or a defencewoman, or maybe in an unprecedented trash talk moment, the Croatian coach bellowed “Oh yeah? Well my team of power plant workers can crush your team of shepherds daughters even if we spot you a GOAL!” to which they did, and then of course the wheels fell off the bus.)

Now that that’s out of the way, onto Week 2!

Saints (+1) vs SKINS

Washington looked awful on Thursday night. New Orleans looked good against the Bucs on Sunday, so naturally Vegas has the Skins favoured right? It doesn’t matter that Washington is having their first home game this weekend, they have huge issues all over the field. Even though the Saints just lost Colston for a month, Reggie Bush looked like Roger Craig in Tecmo Bowl on Sunday. He could run, catch, break tackles. He was the one man power team they thought they were getting when they drafted him two years ago. New Orleans will be okay,

especially against Jim Zorn and the Skins. Take the Saints on the road.

VIKINGS (+2) vs Colts

Indy is so overrated this week its laughable. This team got crushed by a Bears team that most of us thought was over the hill on defence (Urlacher still has that “I’m gonna beat up you and your dad” look to him) and completely inept on offence (Kyle Orton still isn’t much). The Vikings meanwhile went into a crazy Green Bay and almost crept out with a win. Much like Doc Halladay getting shelled for hits against the White Sox at the moment, I don’t know what to make of this Indy team. Is Harrison done? Will Dallas Clark be ready for week 2? Can a center REALLY be that valuable in football? Am I out of questions to ask for this game? No? Ok, yes.

Titans (+1) vs BENGALS

This is the third straight game I’m taking the underdog. Why? Because this is the third straight game in which the wrong team is favoured. Cincy looked awful on Sunday. Carson Palmer looked like the second coming of Akili Smith. TJ Houshmanzadeh was garbage for my fantasy points (4??) and Marvin Lewis looks like he might be fired before OUR Thanksgiving. The Titans meanwhile have handed the reigns over to Kerry Collins, who is actually a decent QB. Sure, he’s as mobile as a zamboni but still a step up from all of a sudden crazy Vince Young (there’s a total breakdown coming here, one day he’s just gonna go Ryan Leaf on us and start swearing and yelling at every person with a camera around).

LIONS (+3) vs Packers

I picked against the Pack last week, and although Aaron Rogers played OK, I still want to see how he does on the road before I officially put him in the “Possible Steve Young” category. For now he stays in “Brian Griese” territory. The Lions meanwhile, got spanked by the Falcons and will want to make amends for that. Plus these teams have split the last 7 played in Detroit with the Pack winning the last two, time for the Lions to tame Rogers.

RAMS (+9) vs Giants

Nine points at home vs the Giants? Yes, the Rams were horrible in week one. The guy I was playing against had McNabb as his QB and was killing me heading into the second half of the early games so yes friends, the Rams stink. I don’t care what anyone says, the Giants are not good enough to go anywhere this season and win by double digits. They won’t lose the game, they just won’t win by 10. On a side bar, it’s fun having the Rams to kick around the league again. We nearly lost Cincy and now they’re back too! We missed you guys!

CHIEFS (-3) vs Raiders

I would puke if this was the only game my TV provider was showing me.

PANTHERS (-3) vs Bears

Based on what we saw last week, this should be a decent game. Based on what we care about both teams, this will be watched by very few people. I don’t think I’ve ever met a Carolina Panthers fan. I know some Bears fans, and they’re waiting to see if last weeks win was a total fluke. I think it was. Panthers go to 2-0.

JAGUARS (-5.5) vs Bills

With Brady done, this is a big game for Buffalo. A win on the road in Jax will have them thinking they can not only hang with the big boys but possibly win the division come December. Jacksonville’s running game was obsolete against Tennessee in week one. They need to get some long drives to keep the Bills offence (Really??) off the field. I think they do, this one is close throughout but Jax scores a TD late to make it 20-10 and covers. Just a hunch.

BUCS (-7) vs Falcons

Remember that scene in Dazed and Confused, at the beer bash near the end, where Mike wants to fight Clint and spends the whole party thinking his best course of action is to just get in the first good punch, play defence and wait for the rest of the people to break it up? That’s what the Falcons did. They spent their entire preseason waiting for that one good punch against Detroit and got it, and now they have nothing left because they’re not going to surprise anyone anymore. Clint kicked Mike’s ass. The Bucs do the same at home. (On a side note, I just wikipedia’d the movie and O’Bannion’s first name is Fred! Who knew??)

49ers (+7????????) vs SEAHAWKS

Ok let me get this straight. The ‘Hawks get dumped in Buffalo, I mean clobbered (think Mike Tyson vs any of those white boxers he faced in the mid 80s) and are STILL giving a touchdown at home? San Francisco granted is not very good, but Seattle’s QB has a herniated disc in his back and missing their top FOUR receivers! San Fran won’t win the game, but I can’t see Seattle being a TD favourite. Not with the shape of their team.

TEXANS (-4.5) vs Ravens

This has sucker game written all over it. The Ravens just played like their 2000 team against the Bengals and the Texans just played like the Texans against the Steelers. So naturally the Ravens should win this game right? The fact remains, neither of these teams are very good. Flacco (who hands down wins the “Ackward White Guy Runner of the Year” award for 2008) played alright in his first game, but he had the crowd behind him and the most dysfunctional team in recent memory playing on the other side of the line of scrimmage. I think Mario Williams introduces Flacco to NFL football this weekend and goes crazy, like 4 sacks. Also while I’m thinking about it, isn’t the NFL obligated to make Cincy the team featured on its Hard Knocks TV show next season? I mean this could become the greatest reality show of all time. It’d be like Survior meets Big Brother meets The Two Coreys meets 7 Lives Exposed! We could follow the team through the practices, to the hotel, to the strip club etc. It would be amazing! Let’s get a letter going, HBO needs to take this into consideration!

Dolphins (+6) vs CARDINALS

I admit, I didn’t watch much of the NYJ/Mia game last week because of the Bucs/Saints thriller going on in New Orleans. I also didn’t watch the Arz/SF game because it was Arz/SF. As much as I think the Cardinals will win this game, I think it’ll be a tight one, maybe 13-9 for Arizona. Hopefully they have Edgerrin James and Ricky Williams together at halftime for an exciting round of “Did you ever in a million years think your career would turn into this?”

Patriots (+1.5) vs JETS

It’s amazing what a few days can do. Monday afternoon, myself much like everybody I talked to thought the Pats were done. No Brady = no wins. Well, they won’t win 14 games anymore, but they’re still the Pats and Belichick is still the best coach of the last 10 years. I’m not saying that Matt Cassell will deliver .650 with 3TD’s, but the system has always worked and they’re not exactly going up against a great team on Sunday. The Favre show was nice this weekend, but the Jets still won because of a ridiculous pass that under no circumstances should’ve been caught. That’s why Brett Favre is who he is though. For him it’s a TD, for Jake Plummer it’s an INT and TD the other way. Still think the Pats can overcome for this week. Did the Jets go out and sign Morten Anderson to a 3 game contract yet?

BRONCOS (+1.5) vs Chargers

This is a huge game because a win gives the Broncos not only a huge confidence boost but also a two game lead on a team who just lost their best defensive player to an injury for the rest of the season. The Chargers did not impress last week. They didn’t deserve to win the game anyway, but they still should’ve won it the way they came back in the 4^th quarter. The Broncos DID impress, but it’s hard to say whether that was because they’re actually good or the Raiders just look like a farm team. (Seriously how has Al Davis NOT shot anyone by now.) I’m taking the Broncos to squeak by, although LT didn’t look good last week and will be looking to run rampant all over the Broncos defensive line. Hmm decisions, decisions.

Steelers (-6) vs BROWNS

I know, I know. Just last week I proclaimed Cleveland ready to take the AFC North away from Pittsburgh. I didn’t count on two things: One, Cleveland’s defence being VERY bad. Dallas pwned them last week, and even though the ‘Boys have one of the better offences in the league, I didn’t think the Browns would let them dictate the way they did. Two: With the Patriots all of a sudden an ordinary team again, and with the Colts and Chargers losing last week, the Steelers have the chance to be the best team in the AFC now, and Sunday night will be their coming out party. Parker is licking his chops at this Browns defence. He finally remembered how to score TD’s last week and should get at least one more this weekend. GO TRAMPOLINE BEAR!!!

09/15

COWBOYS (-7) vs Eagles

Dallas is good; “1993 Dallas” good. Philly is OK; “1993 Philly” OK. Take the ‘Boys here. I’m tired of writing.

Last week: 10-6-0

Season: 10-6-0