You Guys Read the Internet?

Me too! I even have a blog: [URL NOT FOUND]

You follow professional sports? Me too! I happen to have a preference for Boston-based teams, including (but not limited to) the football squad that recently got their (gorgeous) teeth kicked in by one from New Jersey! (No, not that one--the one with the head coach who mistakenly thinks that he can bury his self-loathing under a pile of fried foods, narcissism and sexual perversion.)

According to the internet, the New [LOCATION PERSISTENTLY UNDEFINED] Jets are the best foot-based sports team ever now and they will never, ever, lose again.

For real! It's on the internet!

Pilgrims' Progress (Where the Buffalo Fumble)

If you're a fan of any NFL team other than the New England Patriots, you probably hate Tom Brady because he's handsome and has led his team to more Super Bowl victories than he has yours. As a Patriots fan, I happen to like Tom Brady because he has led my once-maligned team to three Super Bowl victories (so far) and is handsome.

If you're a fan of any NFL team other than the New England Patriots, you were probably pleased with the Patriots' performance through the first three-and-two-thirds quarters of their opening game Monday night--Brady's first regular-season contest since suffering a season-ending injury in the first quarter of the previous year's opener: the offense's timing was off, the defense seemed to constantly be a step behind their opponents and Brady himself appeared skittish; hence, the Buffalo Bills were leading the Patriots 24-13 with 5:32 left in the game. As a Patriots fan, I was not pleased with their performance through the first three-and-two-thirds quarters of their opening game Monday night, as a result of which they were trailing the Buffalo freaking Bills by two scores with five-and-a-half minutes left in the game.

If you're a fan of any NFL team other than the New England Patriots, you probably weren't particularly concerned when Brady connected with Ben Watson in the end zone: after the Patriots missed the two-point conversion, they were still down by a touchdown and the Bills were getting the ball back with 2:06 left. As a Patriots fan, I was deeply concerned after they failed to score the aforementioned attempted two points, to the point where I had to struggle against the urge to contemplate the possibility that letting Matt Cassel go had been a bad idea.

During the ensuing kickoff return, Buffalo's Leodis McKelvin (to be known for the next week, at least, as "Scott Norwood") inexplicably ran forward out of the end zone instead of just taking a knee, got slugged into fumbling and Patriots' placekicker Stephen Gostkoswki (to be known for the next week, at least, as "Stephen Gostkowski Of All People") ended up recovering the ball at the Bills' 31-yard line. If you're a fan of any NFL team other than the New England Patriots, this was the moment where your mood began to turn sour. As a Patriots fan, this was the moment where my mood began to head in the opposite direction. Both of our instincts were correct, because we knew for sure that the game was destined to end in a ridiculous, come-from-behind victory for the Patriots.

Which it did.

Rather than bicker about the outcome of the game itself, I think we should come together in celebration of our shared ability to have accurately predicted it (at a certain point). Hooray for all of us!

Black Saturday

Damn you, National Football League. Damn you to hell.

As a New England Patriots fan, it was painful enough for me when my 11-5 team was inconceivably cockblocked from the playoffs by the busted-ass megalomaniacal quarterback of their division rival. The fact that the 8-8 San Diego Chargers--ever-so-fortunate to exist in a division that is the NFL equivalent of "Introductory Tambourine for Disabled Squirrels"--did make the postseason was salt in the wound. Conceive of that wound being located on your genitals and your genitals being on fire, then you might have an idea of how I felt about the comically-undeserving Chargers facing the despised-Manning-based and despised-in-general Indianapolis Colts in the AFC Wild Card round on Saturday.

Who could I possibly root for? Nobody, that's who. I wanted both teams to lose. Unfortunately, such an outcome is not allowed by the current NFL regulations.

Once the Chargers-Colts game went into overtime, I made the Sophie's Choice to root for Indianapolis. In keeping with my fan-karma this season, San Diego wasted no time in their march to victory.

An 8-8 team has reached the second round of the playoffs, while the 11-5 New England Patriots didn't make it past the regular season. I might not be very good at math, but I sure as hell know injustice when I see it.

Damn you, National Football League. Damn you to hell.

(And, I guess...go Buzzsaw.)

Tom Brady Reads This Blog

Apparently daunted by Metroville's challenge to redeem last year's Super Bowl loss, New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady opted on Sunday to cut his season short--more specifically, to less than one quarter of one game.

You're welcome, Matt Cassel.

Super Bowl XLII Replaced With Faulty Tecmo Bowl Cartridge

The more times Tom Brady got sacked yesterday--courtesy of an offensive line that appeared to be made of ectoplasm--or threw passes that vanished into thin air, the more suspicious I became.

But it wasn't until the fourth quarter, when flailing nincompoop Eli Manning closed his eyes and hurled his umpteenth hopeless prayer of the game and the ball ended up magically stuck to the side of David Tyree's helmet, did I know for certain that the world was witnessing a complete work of fiction.

It was a bold choice on the part of the NFL, and it certainly paid off for Fox in television ratings. However, since the Patriots had worked so hard to stay undefeated through the season, it might have been nice if the league had given them a chance to play in the Super Bowl instead of replacing them with digitally-rendered suckbots.

A Super Bowl Olive Branch

So much has already been said in anticipation of today's historic contest that I am uncharacteristically compelled to refrain from throwing my own thoughts on the pile.

Instead, I will take the high road, and hope only that the Patriots will make Eli Manning violently suffer for his brother's staggeringly undeserved Super Bowl victory last year, regardless of the facts that (1) he had nothing to do with that outcome and (2) he's functionally retarded.

May the best team* win!


[*As long as it isn't the New York Giants, because they're not good.]

'12' Is the Reverse of '21'

...much like not going to the Super Bowl is the opposite of going to the Super Bowl.

Have fun taunting Peyton Manning on the golf course, Philip Rivers.

(P.S. - Hey, Tom Brady? Speaking of the Super Bowl...it would be great if you don't throw as many interceptions in that game as you did on Sunday. It'll be easier to win that way.)

Raise Your Hand If You're Undefeated

(Raise two if you and your teammates broke a few other records in the process.)

Hypocrisy, Thy Name Bears a Similarity to 'Vagina'

One probably would have to have been following sports extremely closely to have even heard the news, but back in the first week of the NFL season, the New England Patriots were caught illegally videotaping the New York Jets' sideline during a game at the Meadowlands. Jets head coach Eric Mangini--a former protege of Patriots head coach Bill Belichick who pretty much owes his entire career to the man, whom he'd already stabbed in the back by taking the job with New York--reported it to the league; as a result, the Patriots were fined $250,000, Belichick was personally fined $500,000, and (now that they've made the playoffs) the team lost a first-round draft pick for next year.

While the Patriots have gone on to be undefeated thus far this season (handily beating the Jets 38-14 in the 'Spygate' game), the scandal has, for many predisposed to be jealous of New England's spectacularity™ and Tom Brady's handsomeness, given fuel to a belief that the franchise's legacy of three Super Bowl victories in six years is tainted, that--should the team go 16-0 (or 19-0, counting the postseason)--the accomplishment should carry an asterisk in the record books. Jets fans--whose team has been something slightly less than perfect since Week 1--have of course been as vocal in this opinion as anyone.

Perhaps they'll quiet down some, now that Newsday is reporting that the Jets were caught illegally videotaping the Patriots' sideline during a game at Gillette Stadium last year.

Whoops!

On Tuesday night, the Jets admitted that such an incident took place last season, and--even better (or worse, if you're a Jets fan)--a team source claims that it was during a playoff game. (Insanely, a Patriots' source is actually disagreeing with that assertion, claiming that it was a regular-season contest.) Perhaps even more telling is the fact that Patriots didn't say a peep about this matter during the investigation into their own misconduct this year...which sort of pokes some holes in the currently popular belief that they are an ethically questionable organization (or at least more of one than any other NFL team).

With the league watching the Patriots like a hawk since Week 1, there can be no question that no impropriety has taken place during New England's quest for a perfect season, currently at 13 weeks and counting. I doubt anyone's been watching the Jets, though...so the question for Eric Mangini is: How can you cheat all the time and still suck that much?

ESPN Might Want To Just Rerun That Last Game Every Monday Night for the Next Few Seasons

ESPN's "Monday Night Football" broadcasts (just as they did when they were shown on ABC) usually turn out to be one of two things: a blowout or a sleep aid...and unless you're a fan of one of the teams involved in a blowout, they're often both. The latest matchup, before it began, appeared to be an exemplary case for more of the same, pitting the seemingly unstoppable New England Patriots, deep into a quest to become the second team in NFL history to go undefeated in a season, against the Baltimore Ravens, well out of the playoff race and losers of their previous five contests.

Lo and behold, the lowly Ravens didn't just "hang in there" against the Pats, they played like the better team for the majority of the game, controlling it on both sides of the ball and putting themselves in an excellent position to pull off an inconceivable upset...until the final minutes, when a freaking cartoon broke loose. Multiple botched chances by the Ravens to win simply by converting late in the fourth quarter...the Patriots getting do-overs on would-be game-losing failed fourth-down attempts--one of which came courtesy of a Baltimore timeout...Tom Brady being his ridiculously calm-under-pressure and handsome self all the way to a review-inducing touchdown with 44 seconds left to play...bizarre penalties from the Ravens that they're going to be kicking themselves about for a while because--even with the yardage it cost them at the start of their final possession--they came three yards short of winning the game on the very last play with a Hail Mary pass (y'know...like in Tecmo Bowl)...it was madness on a level one would not believe if it were scripted. End result? Patriots won, 27-24. And I didn't even mention the part where Ravens head coach Brian Billick blew angry kisses at Patriots safety Rodney Harrison.

As a Patriots fan (a real fan, for the record--one who still bears (pun accepted) the emotional scars of winning his third grade class' "Squish the Fish" (re: Dolphins, in the AFC championship) picture-drawing contest only to see his team be humiliated in their first-ever Super Bowl by these jackasses), I'm obviously happy with the outcome. But even if you're one of the rapidly-growing number who hate the still-perfect dominant force from Foxboro, I've got to believe that every football fan--every sports fan, even--is at least a little bit happy to have seen that, in these days of ever-compromised and disappointing professional sports, a game as dramatic and unpredictable as Monday night's can still take place.

(Ravens fans probably aren't feeling that way right now, though. They're probably going to be pissed for a while.)

UPDATE: I have no qualms whatsoever about saying I told you so, ESPN.

Tom Brady--Whereabouts Unknown--Is a Father

The good news is that Bridget Moynahan has given birth to Tom Brady's superbaby. (The bad news for the NWFA is that it's a boy.)

But the just plain curious element of this story is that--at least according to SI.com--at the time the news went public, Papa Brady himself was unaccounted for. It wasn't confirmed whether of not he was with Moynahan in Los Angeles, and he definitely wasn't at the Patriots' practice. While these combined factors might lead one to conclude that Brady was en route from the latter to the former, allow me to suggest a forth possibility as to where Tom might be reached:

Brazil.

Gisele Bündchen estaria Grávida?

Count on it! You can keep your stolen Vince Lombardi Trophy, Gomer. Tom Brady wouldn't be able to carry it anyway, what with his hands being full of the fruit of his can't-miss loins!

Patriots rule!

Colts' Backup QB Seeks to Back Up Peyton Manning in Additional Careers

You would think that with all the time the Indianapolis Colts' backup quarterback Jim Sorgi has to spend on the bench (read: the entire season), he might get a little recreational reading done, and at some point he might have learned the definition of the word "irony". Apparently, though, he has not.

Capitalizing on a comment he made during an interview over Super Bowl weekend where he likened himself to the Maytag repairman ("the guy bored out of my mind waiting for something to do"), on Tuesday Sorgi actually auditioned to play the iconic washer-dryer advertising character [scroll down to the last four paragraphs] as part of a promotional deal with Whirlpool (who owns Maytag).

One can only assume from this news that, in addition to lacking a dictionary, Sorgi does not own a television set. Otherwise, during his three-year tenure in the NFL, he would have seen his on-field superior appearing in just about every commercial ever.

With Peyton Manning completely dominating the field of athlete pitchmen, there's no room for any other starting quarterbacks--never mind his own backup. Jim Sorgi cannot surpass Manning in his third-greatest talent (playing football) or his second (endlessly whoring himself out for money)...but perhaps these facts are just what Sorgi will need to carve out a career for himself in the very realm where Peyton Manning's greatest strength lies: blaming his teammates for his failures. Now that would be ironic.

[Ed. note: Yeah, so I just referenced that last link six posts ago. So what? Tom Brady rules!]

Tom Brady's Sex Season Finished Much Stronger Than His Football One

Now it all makes sense.

When Tom Brady, one of the most clutch quarterbacks in NFL history, was intercepted by Marlin Jackson on what should have been the New England Patriots' game-winning drive in the AFC Championship Game four weeks ago, there was simply no explanation. Tom Brady doesn't fail when the game's on the line. The Patriots don't lose to the Indianapolis Colts. And the finger-pointing crybaby Gomer Pyle certainly doesn't fall ass-backwards into a Super Bowl Ring Giveaway by matching up against the worst quarterback to ever play in the game. But Patriots fans (and, let's be honest, anyone who recognizes the difference between what is fair and right and what is a grotesque affront to football, mankind, and even God) can now take at least a small amount of solace in the fact that there apparently was an excuse for all of these tragedies...

And it was Tom Brady's doggone virility.

How could Brady have been expected to keep his head in the game when he was faced with having to explain to his super-hot girlfriend Gisele Bundchen that his former, less hot but still very attractive (and certainly not deserving of the "aging B-list[er]" title the obviously jealous Boston Herald reporter Laurel J. Sweet assigned to her) girlfriend Bridget Moynahan was 2 months pregnant (now it's 3) with his baby? That's an impending conversation that no man--not even one as handsome and talented as the Patriots' #12--can completely put out of his mind in any situation.

Of course, it's technically unclear as to whether Brady actually knew about the pregnancy four weeks ago...but I refuse to accept the possibility that he couldn't have, because that would leave him with no excuse for the AFC Championship loss. And whether it's on the football field or in the bedroom, I know that in the final seconds, Tom Brady always comes through.