Week 12 picks

By Jeff

All hail Tim Tebow. Who needs to complete more than 50 percent of their passes to win in this league? Well, every one but Tebow.

What the hell is going on in the NFL the past four weeks? Why is Tebow succeeding? He takes what seems like eternity to wind up and deliver a ball. Even Byron Leftwich thinks he takes too much time winding up.

I would be a lot closer to .500 if this Tebow thing wasn't happening. That's like three picks I thought were locks only to be smited by Tebow.

Whatever. The miss of last week was taking Buffalo (+2.5) against Miami. And now Fred Jackson is done for the season. It's safe to say the Buffalo Bills 180 has become a 360, as they are back to sucking big time.

I went 6-7-1 last week and am 65-70-7 for the season. But there is still hope. I am off to a 3-0 this week. Wooooo!

Arizona (+2.5) over ST. LOUIS - NFC West games are so friggin boring.

NEW YORK JETS (-9.5) over Buffalo - See above.

CINCINNATI (-7) over Cleveland - Andy Dalton has to be so excited not to be facing the Pittsburgh Steelers or Baltimore Ravens this week. Having A.J. Green back helps too.

Houston (-6) over JACKSONVILLE - Let the Matt Leinart Era begin anew!

Carolina (-3.5) over INDIANAPOLIS - I'm not sure any player on the Colts cares anymore and are just going through the motions for the rest of the season. Has anyone seen Reggie Wayne, Dallas Clark, Austin Collie or Pierre Garcon recently? Their families are worried.

Tampa Bay (+3.5) over TENNESSEE - Only because one of my fantasy teams is on the decline and I need Josh Freeman to be the man he was last season if I want to defend my title.

ATLANTA (-9.5) over Minnesota - Vikings quarterback Christian Ponder has been playing OK, but he hasn't had to play a game without the safety net that is Adrian Peterson before. He is in for a long day. Clearly I don't have much faith in Toby Gerhart.

OAKLAND (-3) over Chicago - Unless the Raiders decide to punt to Devin Hester in the middle of the field every time.

SEATTE (-3) over Washington - Marshawn Lynch might be one of the ugliest men alive, but you have to respect how hard he has been running this season for a very bad team. He could have easily packed it in and tried to save his body a little bit, but he keeps breaking tackles and playing tough.

New England (-3) over PHILADELPHIA - Maybe the two most annoying fan bases in the league. There are no winners here. Only losers, as one of these fan bases will be happy and we'll have to hear endless excuses from the loser's fan base.

SAN DIEGO (-5.5) over Denver - Clearly I'm going to hell for picking against the chosen one.

Pittsburgh (-10.5) over KANSAS CITY - You only need to know two words in regards to this game; Tyler Palko.

NEW ORLEANS (-7.5) over New York Giants - This is just a guess as I have no idea what Giants team will show up. Ever.

Starship - We Built This City (Worst song in the history of music?)

Thanksgiving picks

By Jeff

Sorry I am a little late. Had a really fun drive last night (sigh).

Green Bay (-4.5) over DETROIT

Miami (+7) over DALLAS

BALTIMORE (-3.5) over San Francisco

Fantasy Addiction

I have a severe addiction. I get angry for no tangible reason, I have mood swings that rival any princess from My Super Sweet Sixteen and just recently, I have started staying up at night thinking about my addiction. I am addicted to fantasy football. I have a problem.

I have been playing fantasy football for over 15 years - my first team consisted entirely of Miami Dolphins, I was a homer, but the game was simple and I could just root for my favorite team and my fantasy team in one easy stroke. Fast forward to yesterday, where I sat down at a bar with my friends to watch the Dolphins vs Bills game. My friend, a rabid Bills fan, remembered that I had Fred Jackson, the Bills starting running back on my fantasy team, and I noted that I would be okay with him scoring against my own Miami Dolphins. I have now accepted that part of my universe revolves around a fictional team (The White Devil, named after what NFL players think of the commissioner, Roger Goodell) and that I can root against my lifelong favorite team as long as overpaid members of my fictional team inflict the damage.
I am not entirely addicted to fantasy, although perhaps this is a sentiment that would set me back in my 12 step process. I am (only) in two leagues, which compared to some friends is downright frugal. I only bet $50 combined between the two leagues, and in one league I already made my money back this year. So theoretically, I will only lose $20 this year - or in Sweet Sixteen terms, the price per minute of renting an elephant. Financially and league commitment wise I probably only invest an hour or so a week, not including Sundays.
Which brings us back to yesterday. Yesterday, my girlfriend and I met up with another couple (the bills fan and his girlfriend) and later on two more of my friends came. There were six of us and 3 of us played fantasy football, although not in the same league. This way, there was some understanding of the irrational lapses when one player drops a ball or doesn’t even get to touch the ball. We arrived 30 minutes before kick off of the early games and left as the whistle blew on the late games. Total hours spent at the bar: 6:30. My girlfriend, a pretty big football fan, was beyond bored by the 2nd quarter of the afternoon games, the other couple left halfway through the first game, and thus there were only 3 of us remotely interested in the TVs. This is my Sunday, every Sunday.
The lethargic feeling that comes from sitting stagnant all day, refreshing your phone every minute and forcing your eyes from one TV to the next, is overwhelming. After a day at the bar, I fight the urge not to binge eat myself to death. Somehow binge eating seems to make up for the fact that I did nothing all day long, like eating that extra slice of pizza will trick my brain into saying, “Hey, at least you ate 6 slices of pizza today.” On a day like yesterday, it wasn’t my own self hatred to draw attention to my addiction. It was the looks on my friends faces.
Example 1: The Bills fan was repeatedly surprised about how much I knew about the Bills roster. I noted that I only spend about an hour per week on Fantasy Football, but that does not include the weekly routine of reading MMQB, TMQ, Grantland and every single Miami Dolphins article I can get my hands on. If you count those and the amount of hours that my TV is stuck on ESPN, perhaps the hours per week multiplies to 10. My friend was nearly incredulous that I would know that his team’s back up center got injured last week, and that’s why the Bills mishandled several snaps. This was an early indicator yesterday.
Example 2: As I was watching the Chargers/Bears game I had 3 players involved in the game - Bears’ Matt Forte and Jay Cutler and Chargers’ WR Vincent Brown. My friends were all cheering for the Bears with no higher purpose, they just LIKED the Bears. Meanwhile, I was rooting for Jay Cutler and Matt Forte to score. On an early touchdown opportunity Matt Forte, arguably a top 5 running back in the league, was nowhere to be found on 5 straight plays. Here lies the problem - not only did I rage when his backup got the TD after fumbling on the previous play, I had to explain to my friends why I was so upset. (My given reason was that I had both the Bears’ running and passing options for an offensive TD - I was almost guaranteed to get points somehow). The fact that I even had to explain this to compensate for my actions shows that maybe I’m too wrapped up in football. As the game progressed it only got worse, I yelled at the TV when the Chargers’ QB didn’t even bother to look at my open receiver, I got down and prayed for the first time since high school that Matt Forte would score (he didn’t) and it was then that I saw the looks of horror in my friend’s face. He looked at me as if I had lost my mind, my response was to tell him he didn’t understand because he doesn’t play.
Example 3: The culmination of this weekend and my awakening was my actual fantasy matchup. It’s one thing to get mad at players and condescend the TV as if it were a human, as if your words could change anything, but to get mad at a fictional game, that’s legitimately insane. In my main league, I had reeled off 7 wins to start the season, my team looked great. I proceeded to lose the next 3 games - including one week by one point. This might have been slowly building. So as I look to stop my losing streak and clinch a playoff spot, I play a team that scored a measly 58 points the week before (if I had played him last week, I would’ve won). I will not win this week. The team that could only muster 58 last week will double that this week. To make matters worse the team that I lost to last week, only managed 59 points this week (I would’ve have beaten him this week). This is part of the game of fantasy football, you get different matchups and sometimes you get lucky and sometimes you don’t. My immediate reaction to this unfairness was to spend an inordinate amount of time going over the leagues records this year to see who would beat who each week. In fact, writing this entire paragraph, trying to justify my fantasy record is crazy. If you lose in fantasy, move on. Now, I have lost my mind.
After watching ¼ of the night game last night, I realized I needed to stop checking scores and thinking of scenarios that I needed to happen to make a win possible. We turned off the game and watched Elf. I checked the scores after Elf and realized I would not be winning thanks to an amazing game from a 3rd string WR for the opposing team (sense the hatred here?). This drove me crazy, I couldn’t fall asleep for hours and when I woke up I realized that this was way too much effort over an intangible fantasy game. Fantasy Football is a celebration of two great things - men beating each other savagely and men getting together to celebrate men beating each other savagely. Yesterday, I enjoyed neither. I painstakingly sat through 6 hours of games, only to leave disappointed (even though my Miami Dolphins won for the third week in a row) and then complained externally(and perhaps more so, internally) about how those games would reflect on my fantasy team. When the joy in those two things are gone, it’s time to move on. Perhaps now, I can finally save up my money and time for the more important things in life, like renting an elephant.

Dear NHL...

You're on notice.

http://post-gazette.com/pg/11324/1191398-61.stm

Go Pens.

Week 11 picks

By Jeff

Another lightning round. Weekend has been full of house hunting. Let me take a few moments to tell you how much realtors suck.

In the past 3 weeks I have looked at 15 houses. Of these 15, I was very excited about three of them and was ready to place offers. When I went to make an offer, I was told that the homes were already under contract, meaning they should not have been active more me to see. Not only was it a waste of time, but it has been soul crushing. Thinking you might have a home only to be bitch-slapped.

I'm done bitching. Well, in regards to houses.

Last week was ugly. I was too late with the Thursday night game, but I went 6-9. I'm 59-63-6 for the season and this week is looking bad as well.

ATLANTA (-6.5) over Tennessee
Buffalo (+2.5) over MIAMI
Cincinnatii (+7) over BALTIMORE
CLEVELAND (-1.5) over Jacksonville
Oakland (+1) over MINNESOTA
DETROIT (-7) over Carolin
GREEN BAY (-13.5) over Tampa Bay
Dallas (-7) over WASHINGTON
SAN FRANCISCO (-10) over Arizona
ST. LOUIS (-3) over Arizona
CHICAGO (-4.5) over San Diego
NEW YORK GIANTS (-6) over Philadelphia
NEW ENGLAND (-15) over Kansas City

Bob Seeger - Against the Wind

Save "Community"!

By Jeff

When you work in a division of Comcast, you pay a lot of attention to ratings of television shows. The past three months I have been following my favorite show, "Community", which is on Thursday at 8 p.m. on NBC. Well, my favorite show is in danger, as it has been since it first aired two years ago.

Granted, the ratings I have been looking at are only in the Philadelphia area, but that is a very big area and the numbers are not pretty. "Community" hovers in the 1.5-1.9 zone. That's not good. In comparison, ABC's "Modern Family" pulls in 9.0-12.0. "Modern Family" is a great show and deserves it's ratings, but then there are terrible shows like ABC's "Revenge". This piece of crap has terrible acting and the storyline is incredibly boring. Yet "Revenge" pulls off ratings in the 4's. What?

"Community" is the smartest comedy on television. The writing and acting is great and almost every episode is a bold move. What I mean by this is they are not common and proven plots. They are mostly original ideas that we haven't seen on television before. When they are not unique, it's because the show copies a previous episode that was very successful and popular.

That has been the only fault with "Community" so far. They had one of the greatest television episodes I've ever seen in Season 1's "Modern Warfare". It was phenomenal. But then they made a two-part episode in Season 2 that was a sequel. It was OK, but it wasn't what the first one was.

They did a similar thing with this past week's episode, as it was a rehash of another one they did in Season 2 (They're on Season 3).

Even with these hiccups, the show is levels above almost everything else on TV, yet it's probably going to be canceled. That is why I am asking you to write to NBC and tell them not to do it. Or at least watch the damn show. You won't regret it.

Queen - Save Me

MLB making smart moves

By Jeff

I'd like to dedicate this space to Major League Baseball for slowly making their way into the 21st century. I'm proud of them.

The cause of this praise is that it was reported yesterday that MLB will work to expand the playoffs one additional wild card team per league, as well as moving the Houston Astros over to the AL and finally have six divisions of five teams. Not like it mattered for the Pittsburgh Pirates, but it never seemed fair that the NL Central had six team, while the AL West had four.

What's even more exciting about this move is that interleague play will become a weekly thing. This is the way it should be. Every other sport has teams from the other conference or league play a few times throughout the year, it's about time baseball made the switch.

Baseball enthusiasts (I'm looking at you, Greg) will probably not like this. Granted, they don't like any changes in baseball.

OK, I'm picking on Greg too much. I'm sure, or at least I hope, there are some changes he would or has supported.

Now if you're a Pirates fan, you get to see the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees more often. If you're just a baseball fan, you get to see more teams and great players in person. You're no longer limited to seeing them once every few years.

Now the big question is whether or not the DH will stay or go with this change. No stories have come out saying one way or another, so one would have to assume the DH will stay as long as an AL team is home.

Baby steps.

David Bowie - Changes