A Moment to Brag

This is probably going to be the final post for the week, both Weller and I are headed to Chattanooga for Thanksgiving, plus there’s not a whole lot going on right now.

All I would like to do is point out that I went a perfect 6/6 while predicting the postseason baseball awards.  It’s rare that I even get kind of close on these things, so when I do this well, I have to point it out.

Don’t worry, it probably won’t happen again.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving, eat lots of turkey and watch lots of football.

Draft Update – Week 11

Well guys, I have terrible news.  The Rams have been replaced.  Matt Stafford’s last-second, one-armed heroics have sent St. Louis crashing from the top spot in the draft.  Still lots of time left here, but I don’t want to be #2 again.  It’s not as fun.  Let’s see the rest of the order.

Click here for last week’s order.

Saturday Happenings

This post is going to touch on a couple things that happened yesterday in the sports world that doesn’t worthy of their their own full post.  We’ll start in college football.

Normally I wouldn’t pay much attention to the Harvard-Yale game, but yesterday was an exception.  Yale had a 10-7 lead with 2:25 left and was facing a 4th and 22 from their own 26 yard line.  That’s when first year head coach Tony Williams made the worst call in the history of organized football.  Yes, worse than Bill Belichick’s decision to lose last week’s game against Colts.  Coach Williams decided to run a fake punt.  Predictably, they did not get the required 22 yards.  Three plays later, Harvard found the end zone for the game winning score.

Williams would take the blame for the horrible idea later saying:

The whole idea was to keep our foot on the pedal, and not play scared. If anyone is looking for somebody to blame, blame this guy right here.

Friday Five and a Half

Don’t ask me what the title means. I’m putting this up.

5. I like this Eric Berry video.

World Cup Field Set

Yesterday was the final day of qualifying for next summer’s World Cup in South Africa.  There were six bids on the line and there were some hotly contested matches.  None were more controversial than the Ireland-France game that ended in overtime after Thierry Henry’s blatant handball that led to William Gallas’ winner.  In fact, it was so blatant that the Prime Minister of Ireland is demanding a replay.  I think that would be the right thing to do, but it’s obviously not going to happen.  France is one of soccer’s cash cows; think of them as a USC or an Ohio State in football, no matter what they do wrong, the NCAA will never punish them. Anyway, France got in by the skin of their teeth.

There was also some tension between Algeria and Egypt in during their clash in Sudan.  The Algerians prevailed 1-0 to qualify for their first World Cup since 1986.  I don’t know the whole story and my internet isn’t working all that well so I can’t look it up, but just know that these two countries have a severe disdain for one another.

Click the link to find out who else will be vying for the championship in the world’s biggest tournament.

Rookie Review #2

I’ve been meaning to do this for a while now but I just never got around to it.  Since there’s only college basketball on ESPN and the hockey on Versus is over…I have nothing to watch.  That means you get a Rookie Review.  Click here to see how your favorite rookies did after their first game in the NFL.

1. Matthew Stafford – QB – Detroit Lions

Stafford is having some growing pains, but that was to be expected after getting taken by the Lions who were winless last year.  He’s averaging 212.7 yards per game and his TD/INT ratio is 6/12 with a QB rating of 59.5.  Not exactly what you want, but I’m giving him extra leeway here.  The Lions have won a game that he started.  That should buy him at least three years.  His stats are actually quite comparable to Eli Manning’s through their first nine games.

Not Actually Post Worthy

I haven’t written anything in a while so this is really just me finding an excuse to remind everyone that I actually am still alive. But here’s a link to ESPN writer, Paul Kuharsky’s mailbag from a few days ago. The first one he responds to was submitted by yours truly so I thought I’d share.

http://espn.go.com/blog/afcsouth/post/_/id/5682/mailbag-whats-on-your-mind

Draft Update – Week 10

I toyed with the idea of giving the Rams half a win for their fantastic performance against the Saints, but I couldn’t.  Now, lets find out if they were able to keep their spot atop the draft order:

Click here to find out how things have changed since last week.

Colts Down the Patriots

Belichick blew it tonight

I was planning on writing another Rookie Review tonight after the Colts-Patriots game, but this was too good to pass up.  I’ll be up front here, I hate the Patriots.  Actually, more specifically, I hate Bill Belichick and I hate Tom Brady.  I don’t hate them as much as Weller does, but they cheated my Rams out of a Super Bowl and I don’t tolerate cheaters.

Anyway, tonight was the annual Manning-Brady Bowl that is usually too hyped up for just two players.  There are 42 other guys on the field.  Let’s give them a bit of credit, too.  Tonight, however, the game didn’t disappoint.  It look like it was going to be the Brady-Moss show through three quarters (try as I might, I just can’t hate Randy Moss.  He’s just so good).  Moss put up 179 yards and 2 TDs against a depleted Colts secondary.  But it wasn’t quite enough…

Friday 5 – Best NFL Pass Rush Duos This Year

It’s a little over half way into the NFL season and so for this week’s Friday 5 I’m looking at the most successful duos in the league at getting to the quarterback. I’m on a trip out in Santa Monica, California so you’ll have to forgive me for making this quick. It’s pretty straight forward: which two players on the same team have combined for the most sacks among the leagues tandems? This may seem like I’m asking which team is the best at getting at the quarterback, and that’s just not the case. It may be similar but it’s certainly not the same. The teams with the most sacks are the Minnesota Vikings (31), Philadelphia Eagles (27), Denver Broncos (26), Pittsburgh Steelers (23), and the Indianapolis Colts and San Diego Chargers (both with 22).

Now let’s look at the top duos: