I’m starting things off with a bit of a ramble. Please read anyway. If nothing else, it’s something to do while you torrent fancy Scandinavian pornography.
Growing up in the vast wilderness of Manitoba (vast!), I only had one team as a regional birthright: The Winnipeg Jets. My parents never watched sports, so there were no clubs/players/mythologies passed down to me that I would be expected to carry on as a family tradition. I had a luxury that a lot of fans have never experienced, the opportunity to handpick my favourite teams. And of course I fucked it up.
I picked “my” NFL team when I was a snot-nosed Elementary School punk. If I remember correctly it was one year removed from when I was forced to undergo a psychological evaluation at the request of the Midland School Division for writing a story about a robot that raped women. (Yes, that actually happened.) The team I chose was the San Francisco 49ers. This was because: 1) At the time, they were a perennial Super Bowl contender. 2) My pal Dustin Hooker liked them. 3) Steve Young and Jerry Rice seem like they wouldn’t beat me up if I asked them to come over and play the Star Trek: The Next Generation VCR board game.
I’ve only managed to really get two positive things from my Niner fandom. The 1994 edition of the club and a conversation I had with Oliver Stone about said 1994 club. Other than that, it’s been a daisy chain of misery and ridiculous personnel decisions. I’m not entirely sure what my emotional engagement with the club is at this point. There was a time when I pinned my hopes on a quarterback unicorn named Tim Rattay. Now I don’t have any San Francisco unicorns I can believe in. (This shitty analogy may be overlapping with last night’s episode of Glee. My apologies.) The Niners are a club I think about more than I believe in. I chose the club for shitball reasons and I never really managed to put together a proper connection outside that initial spark. In short, I chose wrong.
My relationship with the 49ers is a superficial one. I never got around to having a real emotional connection with the team (although I faked it at times) and that’s why our relationship doesn’t work. I can handle a team of perpetual losers (Go Jets Go!), but what’s the point of rooting for a team of winners or losers if you don’t have a proper bond with them? I’ve decided to divorce from my 49ers fandom and find a team that’s right for me. Fair warning, I’ll probably be wearing sweatpants a bit more during the transition period.
Jay Cutler Has A Heart (It’s Just That His Heart Throws Interceptions): Jay Cutler has been mocked for not having any heart. I’ve always felt that’s unfair. Heart’s an overrated attribute. Just ask Ma-Ti from Captain Planet. Jay Cutler’s issue is that he makes terrible decisions in marginally-to-fairly important games. Watching the Packers/Bears game on Fox’s “America’s Game Of The Week So Listen To Joe Buck Or Submit To Waterboarding” broadcast was mostly an exercise in seeing Cutler throw ugly passes and making bad decisions to compensate for a malfunctioning run game. The good thing is that Cutler seems like a bit of a dick so you don’t have to feel bad about watching him getting into some hot passing disaster action.
But How Will Kenny Britt’s Injury Impact His Doing Crazy Shit In The Offseason Career?: For the second year in a row, Matt Hasselbeck is somehow the second best quarterback in his division This seems insane. Who’s starting at quarterback for Indianapolis right now? A refrigerator box with the word “fundamentals” written in Sharpie?
Drafted For Public Speaking Purposes: I don’t really care for the CFL (I was bullied by a Rouge as a child), but I love TSN’s commitment to following around a player after a touchdown. They don’t just follow him for a bit on the bench, they seem to keep the camera on the player for a needlessly long period of time. Normally the player looks into the camera and gives a soundbite (“All day baby!” “Hi Mom and Dad!” “Does the Arena League have a dental plan?”) and then the camera just stays on the guy. Sometimes the player keeps talking, but most of the time the player gives a series of uncomfortable glances and tries to psychically force the cameraman to leave him alone. It’s incredibly uncomfortable and cringey and I want it in the NFL right away.
Arbitrary Commercial Talk (Present): All the commercials for The Keg do nothing to dissuade my assertion that they should just rename themselves “See, Dad’s Doing Fine Since The Divorce Bar & Grill”.
Arbitrary Commercial Talk (Past): Blogs are a forum for crackpots. I’m going to take advantage of that. I’ve always had an irrational hatred for the Buck A Day “Do You Really Want A Clone” ads. I hesitate to call kids cunty, but the ad was just these cunty kids shouting “No!” over top of a terrible Madison Avenue parody. Why would you use a dickscab knockoff version of a song to demonstrate how “clones” are bad? Are you saying the song’s garbage and the computer you’re offering is the opposite of your campaign? Fuck you Buck A Day. I hope everyone that conceived that ad gets flesh eating disease. Preferably face first.
Week 4 Game To Watch With Your Eyeballs And/Or Listen To With Your Earpowers: Broncos at Packers. When the Broncos played the Packers in Super Bowl XXXII, it gave John Lithgow an opportunity to yell all Lithgowy after the game. I will be watching the game with the faint hope that it could happen again.
Week 4 Game Not To Watch With Your Eyeballs And/Or Listen To With Your Earpowers: Vikings at Chiefs. One of these teams will exit with their first win, but not with their dignity. Wait, these teams could possibly tie. Let me revamp the original comment: this game will happen and you will not watch it. Feel free to blind yourself if this game is the CKCK game. (But if you do that you’ll be missing out on those charmingly half-assed Houston Pizza commercials.)
Mexican Aristocrats Take Priority In My Life: I’ll be skipping the Sunday night game this weekend to watch WWE’s Hell In A Cell. Feel free to talk about Alberto Del Rio’s excellent use of arrogant hand gestures in the comments.
Dan MacRae doesn’t mind if you want to use the comments to talk about Ring Of Honor instead. Feel free to harass him on Twitter