"Good Character Guys"

I made a snotty aside to this in my SB post, ("God hates Chicago"), but overt religiosity by athletes/coaches has always bugged me. First, I suspect that the whole point-to-the-sky thing is a less overt version of the sack dance. Yet another way of saying "look at me." Poster child for this was always Cris Carter, who was by most accounts a complete prick during his playing days. So, color me cynical when I suggest that his 'thanks-to-God' schtick was just that*. Second, there's the sheer ridiculousness and arrogance of suggesting that God cares about a football game. I'm reminded of the Chris Rock bit where, imitating a losing boxer interviewed after the fight, he says "I was doing fine, until Jesus came down and busted me in my ribs." Third, what are we really talking about here? Tony Dungy, such a great guy. Except when he isn't (via Dwil):

Virtually every article about Colts coach Tony Dungy praises him as a devoted family man of deep religious values. But Dungy’s values do not extend to tolerance for gays, which is why he will be the honored guest for Indiana’s leading anti-gay political organization.

For all the hagiography about the Colts "doing it the right way" that we've heard in the last few days, you wouldn't suspect such open bigotry. Even understanding that prop sports in general and the NFL in particular are not especially welcoming to non-heterosexuals, this is surprising and disappointing. Though upon reflection, I shouldn't be either surprised or disappointed. I'm in no position to offer a lecture or to pontificate about why Dungy has any special responsibility to gay people. But am I off base in wondering why this is both ok and not a bigger story, nationally? Instead of focusing on such trivia as a candy bar ad, why are we not talking about this great guy, Tony Dungy, being honored by a group who's main purpose seems to be to deny rights to their fellow citizens?

Which leads me question what we mean by having a team full of "good character guys." Peyton Manning just might be an asshole, but he's a "good talker," so he gets a pass. Allen Iverson shows real erudition at times, but he's surly at others and vaguely scary, so he's a "bad character guy." How do we know enough about any of these guys to say? It would be different if we had personal knowledge. I've interacted with a few pro athletes, enough to say that he's a good guy, and by proxy, so is he; Randy Moss is in fact a jackass. But beyond that, what the hell do I know? And why should I base my opinion of them on their ability to conjugate a verb or not have tattoos?


*I'm not doubting that Carter was and is a very religious man, giving his recovery from substance abuse. However, I doubt very much that he is praising God, instead inviting you to praise or at least notice Carter.

XLI Plus - Minus

Plus: Billy Joel, with a huge upset, gives the win to the under on the "1:45 National Anthem" prop bet. Geezeman clocked it at 1:36.

Minus: Billy Joel is really the best that they could do? Was John Mellencamp unavailable due to rerecording the remix of "This is Our Country" for the next round of stupid truck spots?

Plus: A Super Bowl being played in football weather. I agree with MY, Edmonton next year.

Plus: Devin Hester. Gone.

Minus: Everything else the Bears did with the ball.

Plus: Rock-Paper-Scissors (ok, who out there was with me in asking "who throws f'in paper? You p****!"), the BlockBuster Mouse, the New Fist Bump and Connectile Dysfunction.

Minus: Every other ad. Seriously, if the top ten Super Bowl adds includes not one but two movie trailers (including one for this obvious dog, though I laughed and laughed at the T.Rex at the end of the spot for this one: "I have a large head and small arms", it seemed to say. How it longs for a grapefruit), you have problems. Also, I'm all for making fun of K.Fed rapping, but if the commercial is 80% K.Fed rapping...then I just watched 40 seconds of K.Fed rapping. This time does not get credited back to my account because it was presented in ironic fashion. The Go Daddy ad was also very disappointing. If you are going for the prurient, go for the prurient. Tastefully done, my ass...

Plus: Prince. I liked it, damnit.

Minus: Shannon Sharpe plagiarizing the late, great, Robin Harris at half time, acting like it was the height of wit.

Plus: Mmmmm...Steak.

Minus: Large dog trying to steal my steak.

Minus: Jim Nantz as the Official Budweiser Authority on Black History XLI (I'm sure they sold naming rights for this). A tradition unlike any other! Black History and Augusta National, I see no problem here at all. The tiebreaker being Billy Packer...gah...)

Minus: According to Irsay and Tony Dungy, god hates Chicago.


Overall: Giant "meh."

Just to Sum Up

Bad, Bad, BAD sports day for Pooh.

I should have known it wouldn't end well after getting up too damn early for this gut-punch. Then Tyge snarfs the fresh pumpkin bread (leaving little pumpkin boogers in his beard for moster of the day, and then...ugh and ugh...

Called It (Part the Reverse)

Immediately after poor interference call on NE (don't you have to touch the receiver for it to be interference?*), Steph (who is inexplicably rooting for the Colts. This might not work out, pops...) says "well, you guys will win it anyway."

Anyone with any experience with her skills of prestidigitation knows that one could safely shut the TV off. So it always was, so it shall always be.

This leaves me in a positiong similar to last year's NCAA hoops final, where I'm forced to pick between the lesser of two massively annoying teams.



I won't be booing, I'll be yelling "Moooo-vers"



* All the bitching I'm going to do, I'll leave the rest to others...

Called It (Part Deux)

Quoth the Geezeman: "You know, Asanti Samuel has turned himself into a heck of a cornerback."

Ensuing play = Peyton Manning face...

Called It

Congrats Chicago Bears. I guess. The Extreme Large Fruit Vessel XLI will be much less interesting with them instead of the Saints, both in terms of the actual game, and the stories leading up to it. I admit to a certain degree of fatigue about hearing about the wonderfulness of the Saints' players and how they Rebuilt that City on Rock and Roll (note that Joe Buck gave Reggie Bush a completely free pass on his outrageous taunt-front flip-and-dance routine on his TD. I have no problem with any of that, but imagine Buck's reaction if it had been, say, The Randy Moss doing those things...), but the Saints are also a more interesting Football qua Football team, I think.

In any event, all that is merely a long-winded windup (like I do), for me noting that Sean Payton made a huge tactical error that likely cost them the game, and I called it at the time. Consider, Uncle Mo has been standing on the Saints sideline since before half-time, Rex Grossman was making Eli Manning look composed, and the field conditions were miserable. Why the hell would you kick a 48 yard FG? Just pin them inside the 20, stop them again, and so on. As it was, Figgie predicitably missed (is it ever a good sign when your kickoff guy comes on to try a long FG instead of the regular kicker. Does this ever work out well?) Saints get the ball inside the 5. They panic, take a safety, and the only time the Bears look in trouble from then on was when Rex almost got picked by Uncle Mo switching sidelines in the middle of the next drive.

And all of this was so obvious at the time, I was expecting Simba's assistant coach for common sense to stop the madness, but it never happened.

Go Pats...

Worlds Colliding

Sometime, somewhere, I posted my top five press-conference meltdowns of all time. I can't seem to locate it at the present time, but I'm fairly certain it included Bob Knight and/or The Tuna losing it, John Cheney trying to choke John Calipari, Herm Edwards "playing to win the game." It was a while ago, so Denny Green was not yet "who we thought he was." But the top two, well, come on:



I could die happy. (H/t Skeets)

And as a bonus, Outkast vs. Charlie Brown:



(h/t Yogo)

Compare and Contrast

Without looking at the headers, which of these is actually Easterbrook, and which is parody? No points for answering "it is the real Easterbrook and a parody, your mother, your sister, your mother, your sister...." *SLAP*

Sorry about that...

Anyway, best bit of the parody?:

80% Of This Column Was Written Using Autotext! DirecTV has a monopoly! There is "dark matter" in the universe! CEO's who fly private planes are fucking assholes! Coaches only make decisions that will make them look good! No one touched the running back on that run! He shouldn't get any credit! My son Spenser is very advanced and will ruin the curve for your unintelligent child!

(HT joeo in the Unfogged Mineshaft)

Things I Know Are True

1. I was wrong, wrong, wrong about Vince Young. Good on you, son. Though I can safely say that I was 100% right about Eli Manning. Though Eli is not helped by his coaching being the biggest jackass this side of Bobby Huggins.

2. Ohio State. Give the points. Michigan. Give the points. Whoever is playing Notre Dame. Give the points and then some.

3. To quote myself on Wire #49:

Not to get all Bethlehem Shoals here, but 49 completely validated the agony any fan of the show has come to expect, dread, and crave in equal measures. In previous seasons, they've managed to spread out the heartbreak - this year, they dumped it on us all at once. In a way, it was a relief, because my expectations being what they were, I felt a great deal of foreboding as to what precise terrible things were about to happen.

Is there any way that Child Services lets Bunny take Namond in? Is the world only big enough for one of Michael and Bodie? How does the rug get pulled out from under Daniels?

4. Someone find me the YouTube of Carmelo going all Dr. J from this weekend...

5. I just got caught up on the first 3 shows of "DayBreak" this weekend. Surprisingly strong. Plus it has Jayne, playing, well, a guy just like Jayne. Good times.

Gregg Easterbrook: Making Sense (almost)

My favorite new show of the season is Friday Night Lights - (Heroes, Studio 60, Shark and The Nine all have their moments, but suffer from certain flaws. KF Monkey covered Heroes overly-portentious dialogue pretty well; Studio 60 is, surprisingly for Sorkin, unsubtle; Shark is an unabashedly terrible show made watchable by James Woods; I think I think The Nine will become less interesting the further in time the characters move away from the opening bank heist.) And I don't think I'm the only one.

Despite this critical acclaim, the show has struggled for ratings out of the block, so TMQ says "save FNL":

Here are the good aspects of "Friday Night Lights." First, brilliant cinematography. Many television shows claim to offer theatrical-quality film values; "Friday Night Lights" actually does. NBC has spent a ton of money on "Friday Night Lights," a reported $2.6 million per episode -- perhaps too much for the long-term survival of the series. In Hollywood, production money often disappears into Ferraris for the director and presidential suites for the cast; "Friday Night Lights" producers are getting their money's worth onto the screen. The episodes have many outdoor scenes, which are more expensive than studio-filmed scenes; lots of crowd scenes; lots of gritty depictions of school corridors, parking lots, restaurants, gas stations and other standbys of daily life. (The greater the number of scenes, the more expensive an hour of television is to produce; many contemporary TV dramas have too many scene shifts, but that's a separate issue.) Next, the acting is first rate. Third, the situations and characters presented are as close to real life as television can come. Yes, the cast is better looking than any representative sample of actual people, and 25-year-olds play 17-year-olds. But there's no over-glamorized action, no preposterous subplots. Surely "Friday Night Lights" would have stood a better ratings chance had the show been some "Gilmore Girls"-esque teen inanity [Pooh: Seriously Greg, Gilmore Girls is your best shot at 'teen inanity?' Afraid to take a shot at The OC because it's on Fox? Tsk tsk]. Instead "Friday Night Lights" challenges viewers with material that isn't flashy or pumped up.

Now to the not-so-good aspects. The pilot episode not only was a total downer -- it ended with the character you thought would be the series focus being paralyzed for life -- but gave viewers the impression the show held small-town life and prep football in disdain. The pilot was heavy on subliminals suggesting the producers thought the sort of people who play or care about high school football are rubes or have warped values. That view might be defensible as an artistic choice, but my informal survey of friends who love football culture and who watched the pilot was unanimous on this point: Everyone one of them said that if "Friday Night Lights" was going to be about bashing football, they weren't going to watch. It turns out the show does not think small-town America or people who care about high school sports are weird; subsequent episodes have been sympathetic to the characters and to the town depicted. But as the saying goes, you never get a second chance to make a first impression. Having the pilot be depressing, then end with a character paralyzed and everyone sobbing, was the sort of touch effete Manhattan critics love, but viewers don't -- who wants to watch more of that? The "Friday Night Lights" pilot was a disaster in terms of stating the show's case for its audience. This show would have been better served to start with the second episode, whose concluding image -- the coach and his petrified backup quarterback standing alone on the field of an empty stadium late at night with all the game lights on -- was haunting.

Okay, so Easterbrook can't help being a populist anti-snob, no shock there. I'm not an effete Manhattan critic, and I loved those aspects of the pilot, features not bugs as they say. However, I think he's quite probably right from a viewership standpoint - the reason that all sports movies are the same is that the 'scrappy underdog making good in the big game' thing resonates. Even if you know it's coming.

And FNL turns that paradigm on its head a little - there have been legit "chill scenes" in every episode thus far (the hail mary in the pilot, the one-on-one under the lights and "eyes wide open" scenes in episode two, and the conclusion to the 'standard training montage' in last week's episode). But the show never ends on these high points, as if to say, after the game ends their is still life to live. Last week's was a particular gutshot sort of moment - bringing in the hired gun QB right after the team building solidarity of the previous day's midnight practice. Perhaps appreciating these reversals do make me a Manhattan elite, but whatever.

In any event, watch the show, it's worth your while to get caught up.

Update: Easterbrook can't help himself from being a tool in some aspects - see Yglesias, who disses so I don't have to...

Pooh's Views of Early Fall TV: The Good

So far the new shows I've decided to watch have been a bit underwhelming We've seen the debuts of several new shows, and I've taken a gander at several of them: Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip; Smith; Shark; Six Degrees and SHeroes. By and large, meh. Today I'll talk about the ones which I have liked so far, later, I'll get into the bad and the unoriginal.

1. "Heroes" - okay, so they are so obviously going for the X-Men storyline to appeal to the immense fanboi base. So what? I'm something of a fanboi myself, so it works for me. Plus, they've made several good choices - only one of the players introduced thus far has the Supermannish whiny-guy thing going, and they have made some very interesting choices not just for powers but for who has them. I particularly liked the inclusion of the Japanese salaryman, as well as the flying brothers.

Additionally, they are aiming more for Darknight era Batman, rather than Adam West. I'll take dark and mysterious over campy pretty much any day. One downside is I'm not convinced that either female lead is up to carrying the show. Well, I'm convinced that Ali Larter isn't, and I don't recognize the girl playing the cheerleader, so I'm, at best, skeptical. A further negative is that they appear to have picked the Most Annoying. Voice. Ever. to do the "previously on 'Heroes'" bit: B+

(However, Kung Fu Monkey has a good point about the dialogue, which is at times...pretentiously portentious:

he first episode was laden with the particular disease of non-genre guys writing genre: "Behoooold. I bring you superheroes WITHOUT CAPES! What brave new world of fiction is this? And look, there's even a plotline using a series of pictures as a narrative device. They are called, in the underground, 'co-mic book-es.'"

Indeed.)

2. "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip" - Profoundly disappointing pilot episode. Not saying it was bad, but compare it to the pilot for "West Wing." Maybe for those who never watched "Sports Night", the show might seem original, but I feel like Sorkin is covering old ground with 30 minutes more per week to use. Matt Perry and Brad Whitford seem to have a nice reparte, but I'm concerned that they are not distinct enough from each other either in appearance or personna. I could be proven wrong, but who wants to watch "Smart and Smarter?" I did enjoy the opening teaser (and especially enjoyed the dig at the Media for all reporting the "Network" aspect of it, as if it was an original observation.)

Lest I seem too negative, I thought the second and third episodes were better - a lot will ride on Sarah Paulson, who didn't have much to do in the pilot, but has certainly been growing on me. She'll always be compared to Allison Janney's C.J. Cregg. High bar there. Additionally, I don't feel like we 'know' any of the characters besides Matt & Danny so far - what is D.L. Hughley supposed to be doing? (And after ignoring the 15-year old looking groupie in almost perfunctory fashion, what odds on their being a shocking twist regarding alternate sexuality?) Is Nate Corddry (of "Daily Show" moderate fame) playing Topher Grace playing Jimmy Fallon? Will Danny Concannon, er Tim Busfield ever stop inducing "hey it's C.J.'s hubby! What the hell happened to his beard?" reactions. I know, I know, it's early, but my expectations were pegged insanely high.

But despite all my complaints, it's Aaron freaking Sorkin writing the dialogue, and Matt Perry and Brad Whitford can still in fact bring it: B

(Slate disagrees with my last point, writing the show off as an excercise in "I'm Aaron Sorkin_bitch!, and you're not")

3. "Friday Night Lights" - There was not a single original element in the pilot episode. Isn’t there a rule against a director of a film (Peter Berg) turning around and directing a TV show of the same title? It’s supposed to work the other way, right? (See Miami Vice, Firefly/Serenity, etc…) To my recollection, Altman had nothing to do with MASH the series, for an example of a movie being made into a show.

So, let's see, take the basic plot line of "Varsity Blues," remove the MTV-related goofiness. Mix in the hyperkinetic, shaky camera work from "The Shield," and in the soundtrack from "Any Given Sunday" because it works well for football. Add insanely violent football action, plus the Standard Miracle Comeback ("SMC"). (Simmons has a point:

I can't stomach another climactic game scene in which the home team recovers an onside kick, runs the next play for 20 yards, then, on the final play, the QB throws a 50-yard pass that his WR catches on the opposing 30 and takes off for the winning TD. Not even the CFL has 140-yard football fields. Come on. This isn't rocket science.

I know, didn't occur to me at the time either, but yeah.)

All that said, it was still amazingly well done for network TV, and fully watchable. Even knowing what was going to happen the SMC still had chill potential. Even if the throw should have gone 30 yards out the back of the endzone unless Deer-in-headlights backup QB guy took at 23-step drop before throwing...The trash-talking rapper/preacher running back was surprisingly effective as well - in his prayer following the game, his cadence reminded me uncannily of that of my former college roomie who's now a pastor.

The challenge now is to make the show interesting and believable across a whole season. How many SMC's can we really believe in? And will the show be able to maintain the almost painful earnestness, or will it be reduced to what Tall Guy predicted: "The OC" in pads? B-

I am most intrigued by "The Nine" - after the disappointing premiere of "Lost" (by adding more and more stuff to the island, they are in danger of neutering the essential "Lost"-ness of the whole deserted island thing. More on this one next week, I promise). The pilot teased, and now we really want to know "What happened inside the bank?" Unfortunately, I'm guessing from the previews of the second episode that it is going to be told, in a piecemeal, flashback manner. The premise is "Lost" inverted. And I'm not sure that's a good thing - the backstories make the island happening more interesting, I'm not sure how much I'll care about What Happened After to the Nine until I know What Happened Before. Of course, I could be wrong, and it could be pure marketing genius, as the show will demand repeated viewings once the whole thing plays out, spurring DVD sales, etc...but I'll stay with it for a time, at least. Grade: Incomplete