Dave's Football Rant.

Good to be back. Why have I not been posting? Three reasons: School, Football, and World of Warcraft. Because school is inherently boring - as evidenced by the glazed look on the faces of my friends when I launch into a diatribe about how heroin is not dangerous - and that I've already made a World of Warcraft post, I've decided to talk about a few major points in football-related current events.


Point 1A: The Philadelphia Eagles are Still Better Than You.

For 4 Reasons. 1) they still have one of the best defenses in the NFL; 2) They have an infinite amount of cap room, while having more star players than most teams in the top 5 of each conference; 3) they're being victimized by the Madden Cover Jinx, the Chunky Soup Curse, and the Superbowl Loser Curse simultaneously. And they still might finish .500; and 4) They had the balls to get rid of their most effective offensive weapon, which leads us to...


Point 1B: Terrell Owens is a moron.

PHILADELPHIA (Dec. 16, 2005) -- Before Terrell Owens was banished from the Philadelphia Eagles, the All-Pro wide receiver told GQ magazine that some of his teammates didn't want him to play in the Super Bowl last February.

"A lot of people, they doubted me," Owens said in the January issue of GQ. "Some of my teammates didn't want to see me come back, but I came back.

Well, Terrell, maybe they didn't doubt your ability as much as they were worried about the potential longterm health problems that could result from you running around in a 60 minute full-contact sport on a BROKEN LEG. But no, I'm sure they wanted to sideline their star receiver so they would have a better chance of losing the superbowl.

The article goes on to say..

Owens told the magazine he felt "used" by the Eagles.

"One of the main reasons they brought me to Philadelphia was to get to the Super Bowl, so it's just like, I feel used all of a sudden," he said. "You all used me to win a lot of games, and then once I got hurt last year before the playoffs, it was, 'Yeah, we really don't need T.O.' "

Owens wonders if the media is out to get him.

Terrell, you're playing in a multi-billion dollar sport. They didn't get that much value from nothing. They're a business. Their franchises are businesses. Of course you're going to feel used. They pay you to play, not for your personality (lucky for you).

Although your paranoid ideas about the media out to get you is fucking hilarious.

"The things that I've done in the past, like celebrate in the end zone, they're making a fanfare out of it now with (Bengals wide receiver) Chad Johnson," Owens said. "With all the celebrations that he's done, they're like congratulating him for it. But if it was me, they'd be like, 'Oh, we don't need this in football, this is not good for football.' Not that Chad is doing something wrong, it's not his fault, but you kind of wonder, do they have it out for me?"

Owens is known for his flamboyant celebrations, including the Sharpie incident and posing on the Cowboys' star at midfield at Texas Stadium.

Chad Johnson's TD celebrations, while just as flamboyant as yours, are more in the vein of celebrating one's own successes and greatness instead of outright disrespect for the opposing team. Running over to the sideline and mock-proposing to a cheerleader is not as blatently disrespectful as running to midfield of the opposing team's stadium and posing arrogantly on the team's logo.

But I thought it was funny. Then again, I'm a jackass.

Owens feels he doesn't get equal treatment from the media.

"I went down to the Houston Astrodome after (Hurricane) Katrina, but nobody made a big deal about it," he said. "But you saw Peyton Manning and his brother, they made a big deal about that. I did it on my own. I didn't do it for publicity."

For someone who supposedly "didn't do it for publicity," you have a serious pre-occupation with the press paying attention to you.

Oh, and by the way, Peyton and Eli Manning are FROM New Orleans. Their childhood home was just destroyed. I'm fairly certain their intentions weren't to steal the spotlight away from you.


Point 2: Your Typical Sports Journalist is a Prick.

An excerpt from the Associated Press with the title,

Tony Dungy's Son Dies of Apparent Suicide

Note that I found the article in the sports section. Not necessarily an unusual event, but since when has a suicide been a sporting event?

Later in that article,

Tony Dungy took the team plane from Indianapolis to Tampa, Fla., where he had coached the Buccaneers from 1996 to 2001.

The Colts (13-1) travel to Seattle for a game Saturday, and team president Bill Polian said assistant head coach Jim Caldwell will take over "for however long Tony will be away, and however long he will be away is entirely up to him."

Okay, an 18-year-old kid just committed suicide, his father's in shambles, and we want to know about his coaching history. Not only that, but his current team's winning record, their travel itinerary, and their next opponent. Because, you know, then you can buy tickets ahead of time so you can go ridicule the man in his sorrow.

I would expect this from NFL.com, but when you're part of the Associated Press, you should show a little more class than that.

Or maybe I'm just reading too far into it...

Two other NFL head coaches lost close family members this season, both in November. Don Parcells, brother of Dallas Cowboys coach Bill Parcells, died of brain cancer in New Jersey at age 62; Steve Belichick, father of New England Patriots' coach Bill Belichick, died at 86.

Or maybe not.

Why do we need this information? So we can settle our office pools on which Coach's family member is going to pass away next? What does this have to do with the kid that just died?

... Who am I kidding, this article might be written by me one day.

Point 3: Dave is a Rookie-Most-Likely-to-Succeed-in-their-first-NFL-Season Guessing God.

Well, for two years running, at least. Ask gugens. I picked Ben Roethlisberger, even before the draft, to be the big kahuna in 2004. Pittsburgh went 15-1 on the season, and Big Ben went perfect as a starter. Eli Manning did terribly until his last 2 games, while Philip Rivers didn't even play.

Defensively, I said Jonathan Vilma or DJ Williams would be the best defensive rookies in 2004. Vilma and Williams both led their teams in tackles, while the former also received the honor of Defensive Rookie of the Year.

This last draft, I predicted Carnell Williams to be the star runningback this season, out of the big 3. He broke rookie rushing records in his first 3 weeks. Ronnie Brown went from terrible to only above average, while Cedric Benson got injured after being benched for the first part of the season and getting injured with a sub-4.0 rushing yard average.

I also chose Shawn Merriman as the best defensive player in the draft. He has 9 sacks to lead all rookies and is neck-and-neck with DeMarcus Ware for the defensive rookie of the year award.

I win.

Point 4: I Watch Far Too Much Football for Someone that Throws like a Girl.

Enough Said.