NFL discloses that Force is to be reckoned with in decision to bring back refs

In a stunning announcement,Commissioner Roger Goodell revealed the real truth behind the pressure to get the NFL referees back working.  Fittingly, the Green Bay Packers were the ones to apply pressure on the league to make a deal happen, following their controversial last second loss this past Monday night to Seattle.  The play that won the game for the Seahawks caused a major outcry throughout the nation, as an embarrassingly poor call on the hail mary touchdown to Golden Tate gave Seattle the win.

Since last year's loss to the Giants in the playoffs, promient Green Bay players, including Aaron Rodgers, Clay Matthews, and Jarrett Bush have blamed defeats on "beating ourselves," giving no credit to Giants or 49ers for their victories.  However, the true nature of how the Packers beat themselves has been hushed until now by the league and ties in to the NFL's rush to get a deal done in the referee lockout.

In an exclusive interview yesterday, Rodgers explained the process of their discovery.  "We first got a hint that Force manipulation was involved after the 49ers game to start the season.  After talking with teammates in the locker room, we realized that there were large gaps of the game where our minds went suddenly blank, coincidentally before big plays by the Niners."  Rodgers was concerned enough by this that he finally reviewed film from the Giants game in last year's playoffs and saw significant lapses in concentration by his receievers.  "Jermichael and Greg would never drop balls like that in such clutch situations if there was not something else going on.  The only explanation is that the Giants have a Sith Lord on their bench who was manipulating our thoughts to give the Giants the edge.   Even the best efforts of the referees to even the playing field in that game wasn't enough to counteract the Force.  I will never underestimate it again. Personally, I suspect Coughlin.  He looks like Palpatine."

Jets' coach Rex Ryan.  Of Hutt descent?

On further investigation of the game tape from the opening game against the Niners, Jarrett Bush has also saw evidence of mind tricks.  "Everyone in the league knows that I am one of the top cornerbacks.  There is no way those chump receivers of Frisco could get the better of me without that voodoo religion.  Both of those Harbaughs are clearly creatures of the Dark Side...I never seen such rage channeled to winning football games."  As an aside, the seeming success of head coaches who are either angry, fat or both may be explained by this theory.  Anger, as is well known, is a passion that fuels the power of the dark side of the Force;  therefore it raises suspicion about force sensitivity in any successful coach who often displays this emotion.  As far as fat coaches go, it is also known that Hutts, the species of nefarious underworld bosses from Nar Hutta, are resistant to Jedi mind tricks and therefore are not easy prey to the force sensitive coaches.  It may be no coincidence that quarterbacks yell "Hutt" before the ball is snapped.

Artist's rendition of inner lining of Packer helmets.

Any resemblance to tin foil is coincidental

The Packers started taking steps to defend against further thought invasion.  In the game against the Seahawks, they managed to contract with an outside bounty hunting supply company to get ysalamiri skins to line the inside of their helmets.  Ysalamiri are creatures from the planet Myrkir which can create Force neutral bubbles.  "I haven't felt that kind of mental clarity in ages," said Clay Matthews, who though he only had 3 assisted tackles in the game, was still a disruptive force for the Pack on defense.  "The problem was that we didn't account for the refs."


Ah, yes, the infamous replacement referees.  Anyone who saw the final play of Monday night's game is still dumbfounded at how many things went wrong with the call.  From the obvious fact that M.D. Jennings intercepted the pass to the inexplicable lack of a conference among the officials to make sure that the call was correct, the Charlie Foxtrot of that play is mind-blowing.  However, the recent revelation about Force mind control may offer an explanation.

"Mental conditioning to resist Force manipulation is a major part of our off-season training," says Jeff Triplett, a veteran NFL referee who was a contributor to the negotiations for a new CBA.  "We have even got to the point where we can tell when a team is trying to use it and we throw in calls to try to even things up."  This explains the past bias that Triplett has been accused of showing against certain teams like the Giants in the past.  "I mean, you can pretty much call holding or pass interference on every play anyway...if teams try to gain some advantage by mind manipulation, then we need to set things straight.  It is part of our job, isn't it?"

In light of these revelations, it is clear why Commissioner Goodell and the NFL were swayed to come to a quick deal.  Clearly the mental fortitude needed to resist mind tricks can't be developed over the course of a few weeks.  "While we were targeting getting a deal done quickly anyway, we realized the true value of keeping the tried and true referees in place.  The replacement officials could call the games just as well as the real ones, we are certain of that, but they just would need more time to develop the iron will needed to keep the Sith out of their heads.  We also appreciate the gravity of that experience and were happy to cave into..I mean, find a common ground with them in a new collective bargaining agreement.  As far as the mind tampering, that has been in the game at least since the days of Vince Lombardi.  I don't think we have reason to enact any legislation against it now.  However, we may bring it up at a future owners meeting."  When further questioned about the possible widespread use of performance-enhancing drugs in the NFL, Goodell was heard to mutter "these aren't the roids you're looking for," and ended his press conference.

With order once again restored to the NFL galaxy, we can now look forward to operations as usual for the rest of the season.  Already, with the real refs back in their accustomed position, there were no surprises in the Ravens-Browns game (yes, Weeden really is that bad right now) on Thursday night.  Hopefully, even descent into that wretched hive of scum and villainy known as the Linc will not be enough to keep the officials from calling the Giants-Eagles game in an equitable manner.

Disclaimer:  As usual, the above report is purely fictional, a product of the delusions of the author in an attempt to entertain himself.

NFL Week 3 Observations

Admittedly and regrettably, today had less than nine hours of football due mainly to schoolwork. However, I have still seen enough for a decent set of observations, especially since it is highly doubtful I will be able to do so for the next two weeks due to the Chagim. Today, I watched most of Cowboys-Buccaneers, as well as Eagles-Cardinals and am in the process of watching Patriots-Ravens.
-I will lead off with a general Fantasy announcement: It really, really screws up rooting priorities. While I always root for the Giants regardless of fantasy, and against the Eagles and Cowboys, I am in a very interesting position regarding the current Sunday Night game. I am simultaneously rooting for Brandon Lloyd, Rob Gronkowski, and the Ravens Defense, while rooting against Stevan Ridley in one league but for him in another. Oy. What this means is that I need the Patriots to pass a lot, but only to score if it is Gronk or Lloyd. Very twisted scenario there. Tomorrow night I get to root for Aaron Rodgers, Cedric Benson, and Randall Cobb, but against Jordy Nelson and Mason Crosby. The Packers will hopefully score in very precise, helpful manners. Sigh...
- Now, to get everything else in in a hopefully chronological manner. I believe that the Giants broke the Buccaneers. Whatever made them tick for the first week and a half has clearly been shattered by the awesome that is the Giants. Hopefully, they can rebound to beat the Redskins next week.
- Speaking of which, RGIII is legit. However, and I say this having only watched replays and seeing the box score, it seems like the Skins are starting to have issues with giving up long plays. The first one to AJ Green was a trick play, but it was something like three long touchdowns on the day. That is bad. Jest bad.
- Back on to the Bucs game, it seems Schiano still isn't cowed by all the media pressure, and finished an awful loss to the Cowboys by attacking the kneel down twice in a row. While I appreciate your wanting to win the game, not giving up, etc., this is not college, and you should be man enough to learn not to do that. Just take the loss like a man. Really, nobody will think any worse of you. If Tampa does that next week as well, it will be a Chazaka, and they will then have to do it every game, whether they win or not. Maybe it will curse them and they won't win until Schiano is gone. I am making this up, but he really should stop, even if just from a player safety standpoint.
- Three overtime games today, and apparently epic finishes to a bunch of other ones. And I was on Dallas-Tampa... Detroit is a concern now, what with Stafford hurting his shoulder for like the 70th time in 4 seasons. Shaun Hill shall rise again! Bright spot for them, though- at least they had a 100 yard back for the first time in a bit. They may be 2-1, but the Jest still suck, and got really super lucky with Carpenter having a total off-day.
- Zona! Dominant win over Philly, who is about as good as everyone thinks they are, except the Eagles themselves. Thankfully, it wasn't the Browns nor were the rep refs screwing the ravens this week, so Philly finally got its first loss, though its third deserved one. I hate them. Truly disgusting franchise. Kudos to Zona for tenderizing Vick, who has something like 11 turnovers already. And many more! Giants get them next week. Hopefully, both teams will play as they are (Giants dominantly win), but in a division all bets are off. Not that I will be able to watch. Succot. Will go rewind on it if they win. Which they should.
- Incidentally, do not pick anyone in a division game if you are playing in a survival league. I know a guy who picked Indy this week. They were coming off an evidently good win, and were playing Jacksonville, but no. Don't pick in a division game. Maybe if it is like Niners-Rams, but I still wouldn't.
- Also, there is a statistic somewhere out there I would really like to see. Are replacement refs overturning a higher percentage of calls on coaches challenges this season than the regular refs usually do? Twice during Dallas-Tampa, Romo fumbled, both of which were only called so after Schiano challenged. However, on both of them, while watching the instant replay, I declared that neither were fumbles. While I rarely complain about a Dallas turnover, I did not think that either were fumbles, and I am inclined to stand by that. There was another overturned call in Cardinals-Eagles, something to do with a two yard catch on third down that wasn't questionable on the refs part, but rather on Wisenhunt's. He was totally right about it not being a catch, but was it worth it for the two yards? That is why he is coaching and I am not. Finally, an Anquan Boldin catch was overturned and ruled a first down, even after the commentators clearly explained why it wasn't. They could well have been wrong, but still. I have yet to see a call upheld this season, at least as far as I can remember. Are these rep refs so intimidated/scared that they are overturning everything on grounds that the coaches must know better or wouldn't challenge? Maybe they just want to be cool. At any rate, a stat I would really like to see. These rep refs really suck and I am so ready to see them go.
- The Ravens kicker is Justin Tucker. That's just annoying. Does he think he is a better #91 on the Giants than Justin Tuck? If so, he should just challenge him to a test of Justin Tuck-ness. My money is on Justin Tuckest, however. He has definitely got what it takes.
Think that's all I got. I will see all four of you who read this in three weeks, in NFL week 6. Meantime, enjoy your viewing.

Je me rende

Shocking the world, the French have decided to close down their embassies and schools this Friday, due to the cartoons published in Charlie Hebdo this past week.  Fear of reprisals from Muslims over the offensive pictures of Mohammed prompts the upcoming closures, which will mark the 4000th time since Waterloo that the French have publicly surrendered. 

Even the clear attempt to defray Mohammedan wrath by simultaneously publishing offensive images of Jews in the same series of cartoons was not enough to allay French fears, since they were nowhere near as offensive as routine publications within the Arab world.  Ali "Hu" Akhbar, a resident of Vaulx-en-Valin, described the Jewish images as "...really nothing.  Such amateur efforts at caricaturing the Zionist pigs are frankly a further insult to the Prophet." 

French government officials immediately denied involvement in the publication of the cartoons and denounced them, questioning the wisdom of intentionally inflaming the already inflamed practitioners of radical Islam, following the now infamous YouTube video of last week.  However, they did timidly defend the right of the magazine to exercise such stupidity, citing the national French motto "liberté, égalité, fraternité."

Hopes are high that this incident will blow over without serious consequence.  In honor of the milestone achievement, the French have decided to follow the example of the Swiss Army Knife, by releasing a commemorative corkscrew, pictured below.

Disclaimer:  The above, as usual, should not be taken seriously by anyone, but is meant as a deranged satire, mostly to entertain the author.

   

 

RGIII to be Limited to 35 Quarters this Season

Redskins sources have recently announced that rookie sensation Robert Griffin III (RGIII) is to be limited in terms of how many quarters he is allowed to play this season. Says GM Bruce Allen: "We feel that Robert is a valuable piece of our football team, a standout on the roster, and one of our most exciting and electrifying players overall, particularly because he is a rookie of such high caliber and surrounded by so much hype. As such, we at the Washington Redskins organization feel that for the greater long term success of our franchise, we should limit Robert to 35 quarters, so that he doesn't overwork himself or risk potential season ending injury. We have been discussing this issue since we drafted him, and while we recognize that the fans will not be happy with this decision, we can only hope that they can recognize that we do this with only the best interests of Robert, the Redskins, and even the fans at heart".
Evidently inspired by the Washington Nationals brilliant plan of ending ace pitcher Stephen Strasburg's season after roughly 160 innings, the Redskins have taken to heart the underlying message. If you want your exciting young stars to have long, healthy careers, your best move as a franchise is to keep their playing time down during their first few seasons. As perennially lambasted owner Daniel Snyder puts it, "we firmly believe that the Nationals have the right of it, to bench Strasburg just before the late season playoff stretch. Our goal of 35 quarters, a number we collectively decided upon for Robert, is to keep him active long enough to give the fans hope for the playoffs, but not long enough to actually ensure any postseason victories".
While the organization may truly have RGIII's long term health issues at heart, fans are understandably upset. Hear it from them:

"WHAT THE F**K SNYDER!!! WE FINALLY HAVE A GOOD QB AND YOU DECIDE TO BENCH HIM. THIS IS WHY WE F**KING SUCK. SCREW YOU FOR ALWAYS GIVING US HOPE AND NEVER FOLLOWING THROUGH. I HOPE YOU BURN IN HELL!!!
                                                                                                                 - SkinsGirl21

"The Washington Redskins organization is without a doubt one of the worst run football clubs in America. The sheer fact that they would ever consider something as blatantly backwards as benching your star rookie just in time for playoffs says all I need to know about them: Under Mr. Snyder, they never have, and never will be true winners"
                                                                                                                  -Matt B.
"Lolz skinz always suk will never win nething rg3 done GO BOYZ!!! rOmo always wins never benched Best team evr"
                                                                                                                  -Cletus 

Of course, despite the rampant fan outrage against the organization, they will, of course stand firm in their decision. Fantasy players beware, and get ready to dump Griffin as of week 10, because he will not be playing. It appears that this is now a ritual of passing in Washington sports, as first Strasburg and now Griffin are being shut down while healthy purely in the name of long term health. The Washington Capitals have already announced that they are currently planning on following suit with their first round picks for the next several years. If this strategy pans out, who knows? We may see this spread beyond our nation's capital, and become a true American sports tradition.
Griffin himself could not be reached for comment as of yet, but it is generally understood that he fully respects the Redskin's decision and will not complain when he is shut down nine games into the season. Redskins sources say that backup Rex Grossman is "psyched" to get the chance to lead the Skins to the playoffs later this year. Washington fans, beware.
      

NFL week 1 observations (Sunday only)

So I figure if I am going to contribute to a blog, the least I can do is discuss one of my favorite subjects: the NFL. The beauty of Sundays is that you can wake up late, eat, and then watch six straight hours of football (barring OT) before it stops. You then have approximately one hour before the final three hours that come with the night game. To me, since I have to eat dinner during the second game as per dining hall time restrictions (dinner over at 7), I appear to have this one hour window from roughly 7:30 to 8:30 which appears to be very good for blogging my reflections on the early day games (and Thursday night game - Wednesday this week). This will likely be one of those things I do only until I reach a Sunday where I have to actually work, but since I am not there yet, I can say with no certainty that I would like this to be a weekly thing, for the next 21 weeks or so. Sorry I'm not covering the Sunday night and Monday night games, but alas, that is how my schedule apparently works out.
Today I watched (on my laptop- thefirstrow.eu- don't download any of their stuff, ignore all the popups, and the videos should come on on their own) Redskins- Saints and Packers- 49ers. Nothing that likely wasn't on your local FOX doubleheader. At any rate, some observations and thoughts:
- Are the Skins actually good, or do the Saints just suck, what with all the suspensions and bounties and no head coach and all? My take is that to some degree both are true. These Skins would NOT have beaten last year's Saints, though this year's Saints would still destroy last year's Skins. Seems kind of obvious there.
- Is Goodell planning on paying every team to intentionally injure the Saint's record i.e. beat them? I feel like it would be his distorted form of justice. Beat the Saints, get $5 million more in cap space!
- Brandon Weeden pretty clearly sucks, at least insofar as I can judge a rookie who has only ever played one game. However unfair that assessment may be, particularly in light of the fact that he was up against Philly's well designed coordinated assembled thought out overhyped defense, I still think he performed below average, and I wonder how long it will take before Shurmer brings in his backup, likely some 5 year old from Saskatchewan who is supposed to look good in college in 15 years. Never to early...
- On that note, can the entire league please come to terms with the fact that Vick is simply not a QB on an NFL level? 4 picks, one for a TD against Cleveland? Really? They may not be as bad as everyone thinks (might be worse actually), but 4 picks against any team is inexcusable, unless you are Eli Manning, in which case they are likely your receiver's fault (come on, that one is true often enough. And I am totally biased)
- For some reason, likely that it was pirated European TV, all the in-break commentary and commercials for the Packers- 49ers game was in British (I still got the Buck/Aikman play by play and commentary). I have no objection to that whatsoever, just an interesting side note. The part that threw me off though was when they aired their Super Bowl predictions: Ravens vs. Eagles, with the Bills as a dark horse. First of all, what is the deal with putting a dark horse in there? Will the Ravens make it or the Bills? You can't choose 2 teams to make it and 1 to maybe make it. Predictions don't work like that. I don't even need to get in to the fact that the Ravens are by far too trendy a pick to ever make it, the Eagles are an overrated bunch of wanna-be's who always think they are great but never are, and the Bills? The Bills? The Buffalo Bills? These same Bills that got blown out earlier today by the NY Jest? I will grant that they are adorable in their suckiness, but really?
- Packer's defense finally reached the point where the offense can no longer keep the pack in the game, at least not aginst a legit D, which the Niners clearly have. Kudos to them for winning the matchup of the last two NFC teams to lose to the Giants in the playoffs.
- Either the Bucs are better than everyone thought, or the Panthers are way worse. I am inclined to think they both suck. At least they are next on the Giants schedule. God, Carolina looked awful, based mainly on the box score, as I was not watching the game.
- John Skelton got injured. Does anyone care? Oh, wait, we have this guy Kolb who we gave up a second round draft pick, our top CB, and a $60 million contract for. Maybe he can play. Hmm...
- Finally, as every announcing booth has mentioned ad nauseum today, these replacements throw way too many flags. And  Mario Williams is right. They kind of suck. Let's end this lockout please.
Nothing more to really add here, except that I really hope both Peyton Manning and Willis McGahee can manage to score fewer than 24 points more than the Ravens defense on Monday. One can always hope. Nothing like Fantasy to screw up all your rooting priorities.
Enjoy tonight's game, since I highly doubt anyone will really care at all about tomorrow's (especially with who ESPN has announcing them. Ick)

Ve ri tas

This morning I have been thinking about the recent cheating scandal at Harvard University, where approximately half of a class of 250 students are suspected of cheating on a take home examination.  The initial reports declined to mention the name of the course, but in an opinion article printed in the Washington Post this morning (apparently on the website since 8/31), Professor Howard Gardner revealed that the cheating occurred in "Introduction to Congress."  I was surprised by this for a few reasons:

1)  Why anything involving cheating and Congress is worthy of news.
2)  How precocious the students at Harvard must be if they are learning how to cheat so early on in a class about Congress.  In most colleges that doesn't begin until the 200 level course.
3)  Why anyone is shocked that a large percentage of people would refrain from such a temptation on a take home exam.

The first two thoughts haven't really occupied much of my time, but I was considering the third point during my commute to work.  The fact is, as is pointed out in the editorial, our society values success over honesty.  Flaunting laws and/or ethics is viewed by far too many people as a worthwhile price to pay to attain a goal.  Unfortunately, teaching our children otherwise is difficult when they are so often surrounded by public figures who succeed by doing just that.  As an example, I remember having a long discussion with one of my kids over why insider trading is wrong.  One only needs to look as far as our leaders to recognize how pervasive is this contempt for ethics.  From my own lowly vantage point, it seems that running the country in the best interest of the country comes as a secondary goal to running the country in the best interests of the leaders who are in office.  My wife is a strong supporter of limiting public office seats to one term (of whatever length that may be), and I find myself agreeing with her.  If our leaders spent less time worrying about retaining their positions of power, then they might actually make decisions that benefit the nation first.  It may be a bit naive of me to think that, but it could not be worse than the way our current system seems to be heading.  The only problem with this is finding enough of those people in power who would support such legislation.  Catch 22 anyone?