Thoughts on the Grammys

- by Magglio and Jericho

***(Warning: Gratuitous verbal fellatio about to commence.) Love him or hate him, Kanye West is one of the best performers of our generation. He transcends genres with his style and his stage presence. He’s like a badass rock star the way he commands the stage. Watch any other “rapper” perform live and it’s crap (except for Jay-Z, I guess). But Kanye? He owns that stage; he spits lyrics like he’s possessed and though he reminds us non-stop, he is in fact the best there is. And last night with Daft Punk, the pyramid, those glasses and the lit up violins, this performance will go down in history as one of the best ever.

***Four thoughts on Carrie Underwood:
1) Isn’t she the exact person she’s signing about in her song? Doesn’t she have bleached blond hair and is there any way that her skinny ass could take a shot of whiskey?

2) Carrie Underwood and Riahnna are battling for this year’s “we used to be kinda hot but now are so skinny that we look like 12 yr old boys and not in a good way” award.

3) I’m not sure who I feel worse for: the guy in Carrie’s song, who got totally stalked and terrorized by a pyshco or the spaghetti strap on Aretha Franklin’s right shoulder that got totally swallowed by her ham shoulders.

4) Ladies, once again let’s recap the lesson we can all learn from “before he cheats” – blow him. Just blow him. Blow him when he asks, blow him before he asks, it’s not difficult and it’ll make all the difference in the world. Trust me.

***Was anyone else shocked by how big Tina Turner got? Love may not have anything to do with it, but barbeque sauce sure does.

***Amy Winehouse’s performance was so ironic last night you could almost hear Alanis Morrisette talking about a free ride that she just didn’t take. Watching Winehouse seduce the camera, wriggle around like a crack addict and croon about not going to rehab seemed so textbook part of me had to laugh. But damnit, it worked. First, that bitch can sing. Second, she is in fact cracked out and plays the part accordingly And lastly, what the fuck was Cuba Gooding Jr. doing there? And why was he announced as ‘Cooba’ instead of “Cuba”?

***In an effort to boost ratings, NBC just announced a new team will join the cast of The Biggest Loser, couples. Starting next week, Beyonce and Alicia Keyes will be battling other obese contestants for the right to be called the biggest loser. (to which Jericho replied “lay off the sistas!”)

***Ok, I don’t get it. What is the time frame for when music is eligible? Didn’t Amy Winehouse perform at last year’s show and wasn’t her album from like 2006? I remember this happening when Outkast’s Hey Ya! was up for awards for like 3 years running. I think Norah Jones won 2 years in a row for the same song. I think the music industry just kinda makes it up as they go. I’m so confused.

***Ringo Starr can do whatever he wants. I mean, admittedly he was the least talented Beatle, but the man walks on water. What are you supposed to say to him? He’s a Beatle for fuck’s sake. It’s the equivalent when Jerry Rice enters a Super Bowl party or Michael Jordan shows up at a basketball tournament. These guys are about as big as you can get. It’s too bad Yoko and her dumb hat had to be there.

***As far as Alicia Keys goes, remember that episode of Seinfeld when Jerry is dating that chick who is hot or ugly depending on the light? We’re convinced Alicia changes gender in certain lights. In the ‘No One’ video she changes sides more times than Anne Heche. (Insert Jay Leno head bob here)

***At 86 years young, Tina Turner looked like she had the face of a 65-year-old. It’s amazing what plastic surgery can do for people isn’t it? I mean what the fuck was she thinking? Sure, she can’t move her face, it looks like she’s half smiling, half wincing and half farting at all times, but at least there were no wrinkles! I don’t get it.

It's just one of those days...

Hard to put a finger on it really. I think Monica said it best. "It's just one of those days/that a girl goes through/It's just one of those days/when I wanna be all alone." Yeah, I just went there.

Get the fuck out:

1. Chris Webber

2. Tony Romo and Jessica Simpson

3. Boston Sports

4. Johnny Bananas

5. Randy Jackson...Can you dig it?

Come on in, the water's great:

1. Christina Aguilera and her gigantic MILF tits

2. Monta Ellis

3. Frances Bean Cobain

4. Brian McNamee saving needles and vials of Clemens' blood...for a rainy day. 

5. Joe Crede

Five predictions for Vegas this weekend:

1. I blow all my money waiting for the 2 to hit in Roulette

2. The strippers are more interested in my wife than with me

3. AFC beats the NFC by at least 10 

2. Stanford covers against Oregon State at home Saturday

2. Jags have 15-1 odds to win it all next season. Interesting.

A&M's Plan to Fix The Nation

With the election season in full swing, we’ve been inundated with pundits, policies, but more than anything, politics as usual. Sure there have been some great ideas, some interesting debate, but will any of these proposed changes really have the kind of effect our country desperately needs? Obviously the jury is still out on this one, but after watching about 150,000 hours of CNN the last few months, we put our heads together and came up with 5 innovative, yet highly controversial ways to fix our nation. Without further ado:

1. Election Half Day

Look, here’s a conspiracy that I will believe until proven otherwise. The major political parties do not want you to vote. The lower the voter turn out the easier an election is to predict and control. Opening up an election to new voters creates all kinds of unforeseen variables (which is actually why the Republicans are terrified of Obama right now.) You know what? Fuck this. Under this new rule, employees are allowed to take a ½ day on Election Day as long as they bring their voting receipt with them to verify that they did in fact vote and didn’t just watch Saved By The Bell. Organizations with the highest percentage of voters (not total number, but percentage of staff) will be given a special tax break at the end of the year, known as the “Voter Exemption.”

2. Candidate Transparency

Debates, political ads and ultimately elections are mostly won based on the policies of the candidates, how well defined their policies are and how well they present them. Here’s the catch though, policies really don’t mean shit at this stage. We get way too wrapped up in ideas forgetting that our political system includes several other branches of government. Obama’s health care plan sure does sound great at this stage, but it’ll go through 15,000 revisions and still has to pass through both houses. With that said, I think we focus way too much on policy and not enough on personality. Therefore, from this point on favorite movies, CDs, wide receivers, snacks, travel destinations, pastas, wine, brand of socks will be just as important as a probably doomed health care plan. There’s absolutely no way to predict what will happen during a presidential term, we need to get to know these people better so that we can trust that they’ll act the right way when the shit hits the fan. Have you seen the “My Pet Goat” clip? Pretty terrifying, huh? I’m pretty sure that didn’t have anything to do with his national defense plan when he was running. In real life you form opinions on people based on their first concert, whether or not they like Leno or Letterman, whether or not they love or hate cilantro (ever notice how there’s no middle ground with cilantro), why should a president be any different?

3. Third Party Advisors

OK, I realize #2 is a crazy idea and that elections will always be decided by policies. With that said, what do you do when two candidates are so close on certain issues you can’t tell them or their plans apart? For that I propose the “Common Sense Calculator” (CCS) a third party organization that will examine every single claim made by a candidate and will report on the validity, overall effects and cost. For example, if Clinton says that Obama supported X & Y as a Senator and always voted no on A & B, the CCS will investigate and release a full report. If Clinton or Obama’s healthcare plans sound too similar, than the CCS will release a very easy to read and understand report highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of both without offering a verdict or an opinion of any kind. We are overwhelmed by pundits and talking heads during an election campaign, let’s have a no-nonsense approach to sorting these very important details out.

4. The Fat Tax

Take a look at these stats:

- Obesity costs the federal government $170 billion annually
-Workdays lost related to obesity: 39.3 million
-Physician office visits related to obesity: 62.7 million
-Restricted activity days related to obesity: 239.0 million
-Bed-days related to obesity: 89.5 million

Amazing, huh? So let’s do something about it. Starting in January of ’09, the government will create the Body Mass Index (BMI) Bureau (BMB), similar to the census bureau except the BMB will travel door to door and take every single Americans’ BMI, if the BMI is over a certain number than that person has to pay a Fat Tax. The government will issue you a BMI number and send you an official tax doc (like a W-2) that has to be filed along with your regular tax return. Your BMI will be taken once a year and whatever the number is at the time of your test, that’ll be your number for the rest of the year and you’ll have to pay the according tax (which will be prorated per income). Not only will the creation of the BMB create jobs, but the BMB will be entirely funded by the Fat Tax and whatever is left over can be used to build low-cost, government-funded and ran health clubs throughout the nation.

(P.S. I’m not a complete asshole, of course there will be exemptions if people have medical conditions or are genetically predisposed. But something has to be done here; obesity is an epidemic and not only costs our country billions, but greatly affects our standing in the world. While other nations starve, 57% of Americans are overweight, we have to fix this and I think the government has to get involved.)

5. No Weird Cloning Shit

At no time may a candidate create a female clone of himself, marry that clone and then storm around the country touting his family values and denouncing gay rights whenever he has the chance. This is unacceptable.

A picture may be worth a thousand words, but this one only needs four “don’t let it escape.”

5 Apples, 4 Moustaches

Apple

Brangelina. Bennifer. Even Billary Clinton. You know what? The Giants’ Matt Cain and Tim Lincecum need a nickname too. I’m thinking Lin-ce-cain. Or, Cain-ce-cum. On second thought maybe just Cain and Cum. Nope. That doesn’t work either. Back to the drawing board.

 

Moustache

Here’s the deal. If you’re a bartender with great tits it doesn’t mean you can try to rip people off. Saturday night, I had a few drinks, I stumbled to the bar, ordered a drink and handed the bartender a 20. She giggled, took my 20 and put it in the cash register…then went to the next person. I waited for her to return. She finally came back, giggled and handed me 50 cents. Again, I waited. She came back for a third time and said (in a voice that sounded like a chipmunk) ‘whoops, you gave me a 20, not a 5, right?’ Bitch. Good luck with those tits. It’s all you’ve got.

 

Apple

I love the new strategy for the Britney campaign. Make her the victim! Blame it all on Sam Lufti. Make it seem as though he’s been the culprit behind the months and months of her bat shit crazy rampage. The public loves a good victim story, right? I can see the outcome already…three months of psychiatric rehab. Then, she gets her kids back. Then, a heart-to-heart with Barbara Walters during May sweeps. Schedule the comeback tour. She becomes the new face of Maybeline (maybe she’s born with it?) and in 30 years she’s headlining at Cesar’s Palace in a sing-along/poetry reading event titled ‘An evening with Britney.’ I can’t wait.

 

Moustache

We posted a few rules, guidelines, and friendly get-to-know-yas on the right. It’s under a header titled ‘We are Apples and Moustaches.’ When you read the title, please read it like you’re Matthew McConaughey in ‘We are Marshall.’ Thank you.

 

Apple

I’ve been working out to Kanye West’s album Graduation for far too long now and I have a problem with it. There are directly contradicting statements from Kanye that throw me off every time I hear them. On the song ‘Stronger’, Kanye says ‘Now that that don’t kill me, can only make me stronger.’ Fantastic motivation right? Perfect for working out. Then, three songs later on ‘Can’t tell me nothing’ Kanye directly contradicts himself by saying he takes it easy…‘Cause when you try hard that’s when you die hard.’ Now how the fuck am I supposed to get ‘stronger’ but not ‘try hard’. What the fuck Kanye? Explain yourself.

 

Moustache

I’m not a big Peyton Manning fan, never have been. But on Sunday I was so impressed with him and frankly I liked him more than I ever have before. When TV cameras kept switching to his booth and showed how into the game he was, it was really cool. He was supporting his little brother, wanting him to succeed. And he let Eli have his moment. He didn’t come down onto the field to congratulate him and you’ll be hard pressed to find a quote from him about the game. Sure, Peyton is a gigantic scrotum but for the first time in a long time, I didn’t hate him.

 

Apple

Crank up the rumor mill. How nice would Roy Williams or Chad Johnson look in a Niners jersey next season? Not sure who’d be throwing him the ball but one of those guys could really jump start our offense. At most they would cost us a 2^nd round pick. My two cents? Draft a defensive lineman then trade the 2^nd round pick for one of these dudes.

 

Moustache

A general rule of thumb is we never post pictures of dudes with their shirts off. Especially d-bags like Leonardo DiCaprio. But needless to say, this one had to be posted. Ladies and gentlemen, Bar Refaeli.

Apple

Lastly, today is national signing day for preps to college. Fingers crossed Washington can find some stud receivers to compliment Jake Locker next season. Locker for Heisman in 2008.

Jericho’s Application to be an NFL Writer

After spending the last few years reading everything there is to be read about the NFL on the Internet, Jericho has a pretty good grasp of how these writers write and what their editors think that readers want. To that end, he wrote the following article to officially audition for an NFL writing job. Look out Len Pasquarelli, Peter King, Pete Prisco and all the weird looking fucks that write for NFL.com, Jericho’s coming!


The Coaching Carousel: A Plea for Continuity

Round and round it goes,
Where it stops
Nobody knows.

- Old English Nursery Rhyme

Call it shortsightedness, call it lack of foresight, call it an inability to look into the future, or, if you must and are so inclined, call it narrow-minded forward outlook. Whichever synonym you use, there is a plague plaguing the National Football League.

Continuity. Or rather, incontinuity.

Webster’s defines continuity as “the state or quality of being continuous,” from the latin, “continuitas” meaning “a progressive flow all emanating from the whole.” Although, you have to wonder if football owners are using the same dictionary.

In no place is this better epitomized than in Oakland. If San Francisco is “the city by the bay,” then Oakland is “the city of no way,” as in “there’s no way we’re keeping a coach longer than two years because our owner keeps firing everybody.”

In Al Davis’ dictionary, maybe continuity is defined as demanding the resignation of your “savior” one year into his tenure. Perhaps, after the word, the pronunciation and the word type, the definition of continuity reads: bring back a coach you mistakenly fired and his motel-running offensive coordinator and give them just enough rope to hang themselves. And, I would wager to guess, when flipping through the “C”s in his dictionary, wandering past the “Ci”s and the “Cl”s, eventually and haphazardly finding himself in the “Cont”s he stumbles across a word defined as thus: fire a coach a year removed from the Super Bowl.

Now, I should note, that this is in no way a knock on Al Davis the man, this is a knock on Al Davis the decision maker. For we can be sure, there isn’t a person alive who loves football more than Al Davis. If football were a baby, Al Davis would lactate and feed that baby. If football were a homeless man on the street carrying multiple shopping bags and screaming incoherently about socialism, Al Davis would buy that man a soup. If football were an old, senile owner who keeps messing up the chemistry of his team by demanding to stay in charge of all operations and personnel decisions, than Al Davis would be that man. Because football is Al Davis. And Al Davis is football.

What a gift it is to be in his presence. To be in the box with him. To see his drool, so dedicated and passionate, slither down his chin onto his windbreaker. To see his teeth, yellowed and broken by years of bad cigarettes and worse offenses, open for a bite of pudding as his trembling hand, elegant and grand like a wide receiver running a deep post, misses his mouth completely, slamming the spoon into the side of his benevolent face. We are all enriched by Al Davis’ passion and purpose. We are all students of the game. His game.

However, all reverence aside, the proud old ship that was the Raiders has taken on more water than an upturned cup in a mid-December drizzle. But be sure, this rain is not made of water this rain is raining incompetence. And the incompetence starts with the revolving door, the ejector seat, the darned if you do, but pretty much darned anyway situation that is the Raider’s head coaching job.

At first, the hiring of Lane Kiffin seemed inspired. A masterstroke. The young, intrepid genius united with the wise sage of the hash marks. However, as the two egos started to clash, the decision started to be questioned. Suddenly, the brilliant move seemed forced, awkward, unnatural, like a black guy wearing Birkenstocks. The young upstart looks like he’s on his way out after one year.

Art Shell was supposed to be a return to Raider greatness. A reminder of a bygone era of Super Bowls, Pro Bowls, and stained glass bowls filled with victory. It was not the case. Art Shell’s offense proved to be as listless and as unmovable as Art Shell’s face. A rumor started steaming through Raider Nation that Al Davis was so upset at the performance of his team that he crapped himself and forgot who he was for over an hour. A symptom of age? Maybe. A symptom of incontinuity? Probably. Art was shown the door after one year.

Bill Callahan and Norv Turner did not fare better. Callahan was the heir apparent to a great team, a veteran team, a tenacious team, an Al Davis team. But his awkward demeanor, and “the bullies took my lunch money and now I have no lunch money!” style of coaching did not bode well with Raider faithful. Norv Turner was the wrong man at the wrong time for the wrong team, known as an offensive genius, Norv quickly turned a proud, talented team to the kind of gooey mush that Al Davis is spoon-fed approximately 90 minutes before bed time.

How to fix the Raiders? If anyone had that answer, there’s a good chance that Al Davis would ask them to repeat it several times with his hand cupped over his ear before screaming, “Starbucks! Photograph! Indiana Jones stole my dishwasher! Indiana Jones stole my washdisher!” There is a proud tradition in Oakland and a proud man who is proud of that tradition. Maybe coaching continuity isn’t the end all be all, and it might not be a step in the right direction, but at least it’s a step, something that Al Davis hasn’t taken unassisted for years.

Something needs to be done. And quickly.

Round and round it goes,
Where it stops
Nobody knows.

This is one ride, I, for one, can’t wait to get off.

And soon.

Because after soon comes later, and later may be too late.

Super

First off, and to state the obvious, what a great Super Bowl, from start to finish a well-played, well-coached game. The kind of game that you completely forget about the pre-game hype, the individual stories, the cities, the money you bet on the Pats and the over (fuck!), and just watch and enjoy.

A few observations / questions about the big game:

1) Tom Brady is a lot more hurt than anyone let on.

He couldn’t throw the ball more than 15 yards, his 5 and 7 step drops looked clumsy, awkward and slow, and he overthrew an open receiver 4-5 times, a sign that his arm was trying to overcompensate for his legs.

2) In the third quarter, Belichick decided to go for it on 4th and 13 rather than attempt a 50 yard field goal. The Pats didn’t get the first down and ended up losing by three.

I was stunned by this decision, it wasn’t wet or windy, the kicker isn’t hurt, points are a premium, why wouldn’t you try and kick the FG? If he misses the Giants get the ball on the 39, if you don’t get the first down they get the ball on the 32 – what’s the difference? 7 yards? Their offense hadn’t done anything, why worry about 7 yards? I did some research this morning and discovered that kickers make 50 yard field goals 36% of the time. Offenses convert 4th and over ten yards 14% of the time. How does Belichick, a guy who knows everything and anything about the game not kick that field goal?

(P.S. I made those stats up)

3) Who is more embarrassed by the Giants’ win this morning, Tiki Barber or Jeremy Shockey?

Tiki was the face of franchise for years, he retires, calls out Eli in the press and then the team wins the Super Bowl. Shockey has been Eli’s favorite target for years, so much so in fact, that Eli has admitted that he often makes mistakes trying to force the ball into Shockey’s hands. Shockey breaks his leg and the Giants get hot, really hot. Eli plays the best football of his life and the Giants win the Super Bowl. I think you have to vote Tiki here, especially because he called Eli out while making cookies shaped like Dr. Phil’s head on Good Morning America, but Shockey should sting a little this morning.

(Also, why was Shockey in a box boozing with his buddies rather than on the sidelines cheering on his teammates? Who made that decision? No matter what the answer is, how stupid does this make Shockey look? If he asked to be in the booth, he’s a prick. If the team asked him to be in the booth, so as not to be a distraction, he’s a prick. Have you ever seen this before? One of the team’s best players gets hurt and rather than stand on the sideline and chart plays, tell Eli what he sees, it’s better for the team for him to be in a booth with guys named Anchor and Steel Toe? How can the announcers not mention this?)

4) What exactly was Belichick’s defense scheme for this game?

They barely put pressure on Eli, they didn’t press the receivers at the line, they didn’t overload the run or cut off the underneath passing lanes, they didn’t take away Plax (the whole “take away the best player” thing); what was the plan? When you watch the Pats play you can almost always tell what their scheme is, I had no idea throughout this game, which surprised me a little. And that’s not to say that their D played poorly, they played well but they couldn’t come up with a stop in the final minute.

5) I’d give the commercials a B-

Overall, pretty disappointing this year, nothing really stood out, I think I laughed twice. Boooooring.

6) What’s more surprising that Tom Brady lost or that Eli Manning won?

Ultimately, you have to say Brady losing. Everything fell into place for Eli this year, the defense played out of their minds, Jacobs and Plax established themselves as top 10 players, Steve Spagnoulo earned himself a head coaching job. Brady’s hurt but I think this team peaked too early, all of the “one game at a time” rah rah shit, fell short in the playoffs and Eli was the beneficiary.

(Also, isn’t the entire Brady v. Manning distinction summed up by the fact that Eli still had his pads on when he received the MVP? What a dildo. Super Bowl champ, Super Bowl MVP, hero of a city, all those are true, but he’s still a fucking dildo.)

7) How obnoxious will the Sport Guy’s column be?

On a scale of 1 to 10, I’ll go ahead and give this a 12. Here’s a preview:

After the game, I just wanted to be alone. I didn’t want to talk to my friends or even my Dad, I didn’t want to see the press conferences or Belichick grumble through his first “I just lost a Super Bowl and I can’t f*cking believe it” interview. And that was the most difficult thing to deal with. This season had been about togetherness. That was the greatest part about this team, they brought people together, old friends, new friends, friends of friends, they were like a real world MySpace page. You called people, you emailed people, you ran into people and just nodded at each other because everyone knew that something was happening. When Brady’s last pass fell dead to the ground, kind of like Tony Montana falling into the fountain at the end of Scarface, it wasn’t just the end of the game, it was the end of a family.

And that’s why I wanted to be alone with this one. I took my dog for a walk around the block and before I knew it I was downtown, wandering through a busy street, lights and sounds, but everything seemed oddly quiet, as if the city itself could feel it. I bumped into a homeless man, a guy my wife and I refer to as “Salty Charlie,” because he looks like a Charles in Charge era Scott Baio and always screams racial slurs at people that don’t match their race. I love Salty Charlie. Anyway, I bump into him and after we got through the yelling part, he put his arm around me and said, “son, you’ve got to kill it if you ever want to dream again.” And he was right.

And I slept a dreamless night.

Fuck 'em both

Hey. Guess what? The Super Bowl is Sunday. No, really. Enough of the bullshit hype and the “other Manning’ articles. Let’s settle this shit on the field. Truth be told, we could give a shit who wins. Those coastist fucks back East never care when we’re in a major event so why should we when it’s them. (that sentence made sense in my head.) In a perfect world, both teams would lose. In a perfect world, cameras would catch Giselle giving a squeezer to Gene Upshaw during the 3^rd quarter. In a perfect world I’m sitting on a tropical island right now being served drinks by a baboon wearing a toga and laughing about how my millions of Google shares just split again. But it’s not a perfect world. Which means one of those teams is going to win. Shit.

Top 5 reasons why we hope the Patriots lose:

1. Because we won’t have to see Bill Belichick smile. Which is both creepy and awkward.

2. Because it means Mike Vrabel probably didn’t score a touchdown, Tedy Bruschi won’t be joined on the field by his bimbo wife and Randy Moss won’t get a Super Bowl ring.

3. Because as handsome as he is, we just can’t take anymore Tom Brady. It’s true. You’ve had your moment Tom it’s time to ride off into the sunset. We want Montana’s 4 Super Bowl rings to stay alone at the top. (we don’t count Terry Bradshaw after his partial nudity in the movie ‘Failure to Launch.)

4. Because Matt Cassel has thrown only 38 passes in college and the NFL…COMBINED! He hasn’t earned a ring.

5. Because they let go of Bethel Johnson last season. And I always thought the announcers were saying Beppo Johnson instead of Bethel Johnson. How much cooler is the name Beppo Johnson?

Top 5 reasons we hope the Giants lose:

1. Because it means the gap in Michael Strahan’s teeth won't be all over TV, magazines and radio. Yeah, radio too.

2. Because it means we won't have to hear Chris Berman say ‘The New York Football Giants’ over and over and over again.

3. Because Plaxico’s a whiner, Eli has a labia minora and the no-talent Jason Seahorn is the luckiest guy on the face of the earth. What’s that? Sehorn’s not on the team anymore. Ah, who cares? Fuck him anyways.

4. Because nobody remembers who lost the Super Bowl…think about it…who lost 3 years ago? Exactly. Fuck the Giants. I hope you forget them too.

5. Because it looks like this Johan Santana deal is going to go through. Isn’t that enough for New Yorkers to be excited about this weekend? Do they need much else?

Prediction:
Giants - 27
Patriots - 24

Go Niners!