First Week of December

Well, as the first round of games wind down this week, I catching the end of Atlanta/Minn and Ten/NY. I am happy that the Pack has pulled off another victory at home, following two weeks of supersticious losses against the Vikings and Bucs. I really believe that Favre just believes he cannot win certain games and then proceeds to complete the self-fulfilling profecy.

As I said to my friend, GoneFishin, earlier today, this is the weekend for teams to start their final push if they want to make it into the playoffs. And that's what the two overtime games are about.

From the PickEm pool, these are actually important to me because the guys ahead of me have chosen different victors. So, as I'm making the quick post here, I'm looking for Atlanta and the Titans to pull of some victories.

Week 10: The Return of the Orange Blazer

It’s the 500th presentation of Monday Night Football and Jerry Rice, scoring his 200th touchdown, and the Oakland Raiders are devastating the Denver Broncos.

I’ve hated the Broncos since 1995 when we were forced to watch American Football on the Denver affiliate stations in El Salvador. No matter what, you had to see the kick-off for the Bronco’s game. Even when, it was the final play of a two point game and Green Bay was kicking from 42 yards against the Vikings, if it was time for Denver to play they took you away in time for that damned kick-off. The number of close early games I missed because of Denver’s dedication to their football team was enough to turn me off of the team forever.

Of course, beating my Packers in the Superbowl a few years back doesn’t help.

Now, add to that, some red neck, expatriate idiot that used to frequent the Club yelling at his Broncos every single time they made a play, and you’ve turned me away from the team for life, no matter how nice John Elway’s smile was. I wish I could remember this Gringo’s name because he was a case. He thought he was a God because he was paying his poor girlfriends way through med-school and that of course gave him the right to treat her however he pleased. He refused to make any attempt to pronounce the Spanish place names correctly; I remember he always called from “Cincinnati” (actually the town of Sonsonate) to ask what the score was in the game if he had to miss it. The best was when the other guys at the bar sold him drink after drink of premium “brandy” which he raved about for days. The drink was actually a combination of whatever cheap liquors had been lying around at the bottom of their bottles for years, mixed together and sold off to this guy as payback.

While I’m at it, I might as well relay another story of a character I was forced to watch football with. This young guy came in one day, drinking coke or something. It’s always a bad sign when I guy drinks soda pop when he’s watching American Football at a bar. On his first day in the club he grabbed the control and watched his game, graciously turning back to the Packers game to allow me to catch the score. Finally, when it was obvious the game he was watching was a blow-out, we managed to get the control back. My point here is that when you are in the Club, there is a seniority that you have to respect. I respected it in my early years there, and every other good member respected it, but this guy was one of those people you just wanted to punch as soon as you saw him.

Of course, it doesn’t help that he started dating the girl I was after back then. But alas, Karma had its way in the end. Everybody figured out that this guy was a jerk, the girl ended up being completely self-centered, and he ran up tons of drinks on her tab that she wound up having to pay for.

With the personal rant over, I should get back to the Football.

It is a shame that Tampa Bay, Green Bay, and New Orleans are all in the NFC because it would be great to see two of these teams play in the Superbowl. The Pack just walked all over the Lions yesterday, perhaps not a big feat on its own, but they are dominating the standings this season. Sure they don’t look so hot some days, but the team has stepped up to make the big plays when it counts. Every player has come into the game to help Favre get the job done. That’s the sign of a leader.

Before I get to the British Club standings, I’ve got to say that while I was never a fan of Dennis Miller, watching John Madden has been even worse. I mean every fifteen minutes, I’m on the verge of throwing something at the television set in the hopes that the psychic effect will actually reach Denver and make him realise what an idiot he sounds like. This is not just tonight—this goes way back to the New England game when he wanted to name 22 MVPs and couldn’t make up his freaking mind, to his geography lesson in Philadelphia. It is pretty sad when somebody like Madden is commentating the biggest sports event of the week.

Okay, ladies and gentleman as the game winds down I’d like to give you the standings of the British Club Second Annual Weekly Pickem Tournament. It really is close midway through the season and could be anybody’s game.

1 white man 87
2 coconetsuperstar 85
2 TheBunny 85
4 SPURSMASOCHIST 84
5 Dinosaur Bob 83
5 swanhorts 83
7 TheScribe 82
7 Cheesehead Chick 82
9 Tributary Trudeau 81
10 I SUK!!! U ROOL!!!! 78
11 GONE FISHIN' 77
12 Canadian Kevin 62

I’d also like to send out a warm “Get Well” message from all the guys at the British Club of El Salvador and ScribeCentral.com to Canadian Kevin who had some health problems recently but is, thankfully, recovering nicely. His low score is not because he doesn’t know football as he finished in second place last year, but has unfortunately had to miss a couple of weeks.

Best of luck Kevin.

The “Ex” Patriot

Week 5, Weekend of the QB

Some amazing performances from the Quarterbacks this week with Rich Gannon proving he still has a lot of juice and Brett Favre looking more rested than he has all season. If you like points on the board and long touchdown passes straight out of "Any Given Sunday", last weekend was for you.

Beginning what will hopefully be the new format of the weekly notes, both The Scribe and Gone Fishin' share thoughts about their favorite teams this week. Do you have a team that you love? Send us a sample paragraph, and if it is not too insulting to the Packers or the Ravens, we might ad you in as a weekly contributer.

40 000 Yards for Brett

Another great Monday Night for Brett and the Pack. The first touchdown happened so fast I missed it. I saw the punt from Chicago, went to the bathroom and came back wondering why the ads were taking so long. By the time we got back to the game, Green Bay was already up by a touchdown. My personal fears about Green Bay looking tired these past couple of weeks seem to have been put to rest tonight. They really are representative of the hard-working blue collar fans that support them.

I also stand by my pick of the season as the New Orleans Saints scored yet another victory.

And who would have thought the Rams would be this year's Panthers? Okay, last year at this time New England were losing badly, but the Rams are pretty beat up.

The Scribe

CRAVEN RAVENS

THIS PAST WEEKEND BALTIMORE’S NEW QB, CHRIS REDMAN AND RAY LEWIS PUT IT TOGETHER FOR ANOTHER WIN. THEY SEEM TO HAVE THE STEAM IN THE 1ST HALF BUT THE 2ND HALF IS A BIT OF A STRUGGLE. BUT THE POINT IS, “IT DON’T HAVE TO BE PRETTY TO GETTA A WIN”. JEMAL LEWIS, CHRIS MCALLISTER, TOM HEAP AND MICHAEL STOKELY DID THE THINGS THEY HAD TO DO TO WIN. SO RIGHT NOW I AM CRAVEN MY RAVENS AND MAYBE, JUST MAYBE THEY CAN GET SOME GAMES TOGETHER AND EXCITE US IN BOTH HALVES. RAY LEWIS WITHOUT A DOUBT IS THE GREATEST IN THE GAME TODAY AT HIS POSISTION; AND FOR THE REST OF THE TEAM, THEY’RE YOUNG, QUICK LEARNERS AND IN MY BOOK ON THE ROAD ARE A SOLID YOUNG FOOTBALL TEAM. BY THE WAY FOR THOSE WHO MAY BE BIT SUPERSTITIOUS, CHRIS RED MAN WAS BORN ON THE 7TH DAY OF THE 7TH MONTH IN THE YEAR OF OUR LORD, 1977, AND IT IS ONLY FITTING HIS NUMBER IS “7” TOO.

GONE FISHN’

Week 4, Parity in the NFL

With The Scribe being too busy to watch more than one football game during this upset weekend, ScribeCentral.com's Vince has graciously offered to step in.

BALTIMORE WITHOUT A DOUBT FOR ME WAS THE GAME OF THE WEEK. NOT BECAUSE THEY ARE MY TEAM, BUT BECAUSE IT KEPT ME JUMPING OUT OF MY SEAT THROUGHOUT THE FIRST HALF. THEY HAVE BEEN DESTROYED WITH SALARY CAPS AND HAVE A BUNCH OF NEW KIDS. DENVER JUST COULD NOT PUT ANYTHING TOGETHER.THE FIRST HALF. THE 108 YARD RUNBACK BY MCALLISTER WAS THE KICKER. CHRIS REDMAN IN ONLY HIS THIRD NFL FOOTBALL START WAS ACCURATE AND HIS RECEIVER HEAP WAS THERE TO CATCH EM’. THE SECOND HALF WAS NOT MUCH TO WATCH, BUT THE END RESULT WAS A WIN. GOOD JOB BALTIMORE, HOPE YOU CAN DO IT AGAINST CLEVELAND.

AT FIRST WHEN FLIPPING THROUGH THE CHANNELS I THOUGHT I WAS WATCHING THE END OF THE BASEBALL SEASON. WITH LITTLE SCORING GONE ON, THEY PLAYED THE WAY PITTSBURGH SO OFTEN DOES. KEEPING YOU ALL IN A GUESSING GAME, BUT THEY PUT ENOUGH POINTS UP TO WIN THE GAME. I USED HATE PITTSBURGH, BUT LATELY I HAVE COME REALIZE WHAT AN INSTITUTION THEY REALLY ARE. THE ONLY BAD THING I GUESS IS THEY SHARE THE DIVISION WITH MY RAVENS.

OAKLAND, HOLY HELL WHAT BUNCH OF POINTS. THEY REMINDED ME A LOT OF THE OLD RAIDERS AND THE MADDEN DAYS. TOUGH HITTING, GOOD PASSING, AND LOTS OF SCORING. HERE IS A TEAM THAT COULD POSSIBLY GO ALL THE WAY. GRUDEN, YOU SHOULD HAVE HUNG AROUND 1 MORE YEAR. YOU CAN ALWAYS GET THE MONEY, BUT YOU BAILED OUT TOO SOON. WELL LIKE THEM THERE CANADIANS SAY, TOO BAD EH?

BUFFALO, HERE IS A GOOD SOLID TEAM. BLEDSOE IS A GREAT QB, AND HE SHOWED HIS STUFF IN OT. I BELIEVE THEY SAID IT IS THEIR 3RD GAME THIS SEASON TH AT WENT INTO OT. THAT TO ME IS SURE SIGN OF A DETERMINED WINNING TEAM AND REMINDS OF THE OLD JACK KEMP AND OJ (KILLER) DAYS; THEY WERE ALWAYS AN IMPRESSIVE TEAM. THEY HAVE HAD SOME GREAT YEARS IN THE 90’S, BUT NEVER QUITE PULLED IT OFF. LIKE THE RAIDERS, THEY WILL SURELY BE CONTENDER THIS YEAR.

THREE CHEERS FOR WEEK 4 IN THE NFL AND 4 CHEERS FOR THE RAVENS AND RAY LEWIS.

--Vince

And here are the up to date results of the Second Annual British Club Football PickEm on Yahoo!

1. swanhorts 38
2. coconetsuperstar 37
3. Dinosaur Bob 36
4. Canadian Kevin 35
4. Hong Kong Bunny 35
6. I Rool!!! U SUK!!!! 34
6. SPURSMASOCHIST 34
6. white man 34
9. Tributary Trudeau 33
10. GONE FISHIN' 32
10. TheScribe 32
10. Cheesehead Chick 32
13. americono 17

Monday Night--What Happened to the Rams?

It's early Tuesday morning boys and girls, but I just have to ask before I go to bed.

What the hell is up with Kurt (Four Interceptions) Warner and the 0-3 Rams? Good job for Gruden and the boys though.

I'll be back with my weekly update on Tuesday.

NFL WEEK 2 or "When Refs do the Breaststroke"

Well, ladies and gentlemen, this has been a miserable weekend for your friendly neighbourhood Scribe and my standing in the 2nd Annual British Club Pickem Pool. I sat through yesterday’s games horrified each time I turned to the DirecTV scoreboard as it seemed all the teams I had picked to win were behind or in serious trouble. Okay, granted I chose Detroit to beat the Panthers, a silly decision in the hope against hope that the Rock City boys could finally win a game. Please don’t think I’m a total loser as I honestly felt that Atlanta was not going to blow a last minute field goal to throw their game and Brett Favre was not going to score his first loss against New Orleans. And, come on, let’s be honest. Apart from you people from Texas out there, who really thought that the Cowboys were going to beat the ex-Oilers?

But the results of the weekend suggested that the Lions weekly training routine is one of “rock and roll all night and party every day”. I’m also beginning to think that the Titans should seriously consider changing their name to “Whom Gods Destroyed” or at least to Sisyphus. Every time it looks like they’ve got that rock back to the top of the mountain, they’re forced to let it roll back down to the bottom, inevitably suffering injuries in the process.

As well, New Orleans seems to have finally recovered from the plague of Ricky Williams and, as I said last week, is playing football like a Super Bowl contender. The move appears to have worked well for everyone as Williams is finally starting to live up to the potential he was supposed to have demonstrated three years ago. As for Indianapolis, Peyton’s the guy responsible for Tony Dungy being the coach this year so he better hope that his team can get it together before the second half next week in their contest with the Texans. Even a close game with the expansion team would be highly embarrassing.

Following from my Texan comments last week, fans got to see a little more of what the team’s potential, or lack thereof, might be as they suffered a devastating loss to San Diego who have been fully juiced for these first two weeks. Here’s to hoping they will continue with their Duracell performances and not slip into the weak Radio Shack nickel based rechargables they became last year. You remember the ones that you bought for twenty bucks to power your Walkman back in the eighties, the ones that wouldn’t last long enough to play an entire album after a couple of months?

Despite the press raving about Bledsoe’s great performance and Moss’ magic in the Bill’s second Overtime game in as many weeks, I couldn’t help but feel this game was like watching the XFL of a few years back, four and a half quarters of incompetence, interspersed with a few moments of brilliance. How many times is a kicker allowed to miss the extra point in a game before his team mates start kicking him? And then, Hollis’ makes a brilliant fifty four yard thriller of a field goal to take a game, that should have been lost, into overtime; this was, of course, followed by his equally dismal forty four yard attempt in overtime. If Drew and the boys had been playing the Gators yesterday, the game would have been lost. The Bills should spend the week thanking whatever deities they worship that the Vikings were the team with just a little bit more desire to lose.

I opened tonight’s rant telling you about my own dismal performance in yesterday’s picks and rather than embarrass myself further by telling you what other silly teams I picked, I’m going to thank my own personal deity that I am not a Ram or a Steeler tonight and send out congratulations to those who deserve it.

Good job on Canadian Kevin for being the high scorer of the week with eleven points forcing a tie with the WhiteMan and last year’s late comer SwanHorts. For those of you new to the British Club PickEm, SwanHorts has spent the last ten months vowing to finish this season at number one. Other ten point earners this week were “I Rool” and the ever vocal Tributary Trudeau who, contrary to popular belief, did not post the one hundredth message on the chat board. Thank God, The Scribe managed to not finish in last place even while only scoring six points over the weekend. Out of respect to CheeseHead Chick, we will not reveal who scored the least amount of points, at four.

Well, ladies and gentlemen, it looks like the Redskins will not be making a Monday Night New York Jets style comeback and that the most interesting thing about the game is some incident which cleared the Eagles from their bench and brought some firefighters out onto the field. It appears that police used pepper spray to break up a fight in the stands and the poor Philadelphia players wound up getting some of it. Man, if they’re upset at a little pepper spray, they should try playing real Football in Latin America. Anybody else who’s had a urine ball burst on their head knows what I’m talking about.

Football movie to watch this week: Remember the Titans

NFL Week 1 WORKING OVERTIME

Some of the biggest trades this season happened in the broadcast studios with Chris Collinsworth moving on to game analysis and tonight’s Monday Night game featuring John Madden. If anybody knows Dennis Miller, tell him he’ll always have a home here at ScribeCentral.com, although he should be warned that the people at this site actually have enough pseudo-intellectual knowledge to call his bluffs and obscure references.

The Patriots have made a first step in proving that they’re back on the road to the Superbowl tonight with a huge win over the Steelers. It amazed me that so many people, from the guys I chat with at work to the professional analysts, have not had much to say about New England’s chances of making a Superbowl run again this year. In fact, most people I’ve spoken with had the Steeler’s picked to win tonight’s game, but in the end it was the on-again, off-again Cordell Stewart that turned out to be the question mark, and not the young Tom Brady. Brady ended the match as Monday Night Football’s 1st 2002 season player of the game, and Stewart ended with the expectation of journalists asking if the Steeler’s are back to a mediocre season. Even Madden said that the only thing the Steelers have to be grateful for right now is the fact they have landed in a weak division.

My team, the Pack, had a nail-biting session far from looking like the Superbowl hopefuls I expected them to be. However, Brett walked away with another opening day win after four and a half quarters, thanks to the 34 yard field goal by Ryan Longwell. The team has a week to ponder how they let the Falcons get so far in yesterday’s game. In fact, the Falcon’s, with QB Michael Vick looked like playoff contenders, especially considering the division they are in.

Based on Sunday’s game, it looks like the Saints might be the biggest challenge and not Gruden’s Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Brad Johnson was sacked three times and seemed to be on the ground more often than he was standing up, another overtime game which ended with a blunder in the Buc's end zone. Tampa Bay seemed helpless to stop the Saint’s blitz and this is what ultimately lost the game for them, as they couldn’t even get a kick away with a little more than three minutes left in overtime. Tom Tupa gave the ball to the Saints to let the teams finally hit the showers.

Houston was lucky to be playing Dallas on Sunday night to help them earn their first official NFL win. As Dallas seemed to be as far removed from the Superbowl Champions of a decade ago as they have been in recent years, any potential Houston supporters out there really have to wait until next week when they visit San Diego to see what kind of force the team actually is. The Chargers, don’t forget, devastated the Bengals yesterday in a stunning upset victory.

Although, his team didn’t win, ScribeCentral.com’s GONE FISHIN’ still has hope for the Baltimore Ravens this season, “…I WAS SOMEWHAT IMPRESSED WITH THE NEW QB (CHRIS REDMAN) FOR THE TEAM. HE IS A SURE SIGHT BETTER THAN ELVIS GRBAC WAS LAST YEAR. JAMAL LEWIS IS GOING TO BE A FORCE THIS YEAR IF HE CAN STAY HEALTHY, BUT OVERALL I WAS IMPRESSED WITH CHRIS REDMAN, I BELIEVE HE CAN DO THE JOB. SO WATCH OUT FOR THOSE RAVENS, THEY WILL BE A FORCE TO BE DEALT WITH.”

Finally on the British Club Pick’Em board, the week’s high score was 11 picks out of 16. Congrats to Swanhorts and Cheesehead Chick for picking the Patriots to win Monday Night which pushed them out ahead of The Scribe (last year’s overall winner), Hong Kong Bunny, white man, and coconetsuperstar who all wound up with ten points. Dinosaur Bob, Canadian Kevin, and “I Rool” are close behind with nine, and Tributary Trudeau (8), GONE FISHIN’ (8), americono (8), and SPURSMASOCHIST round out the thirteen players this season.

Please send some emails or leave some comments if you have some observations or gripes you’d like to share about these or other games this week.

2002 NFL Season Kicks Off Sept. 5!

The 2002 American Football season is almost here, and this year ScribeCentral.com wishes to follow the games each week with comments and opinions from the ScribeCentral community.

We American Football fans spend hours reading the columns on ESPN, CNN, NFL.com and all think we can do better. We spend countless work breaks standing around and arguing about bad plays and bad calls and finding players, coaches and referees to blame them on. We all love being that Monday morning quarterback or the one to be the first one Tuesday morning to mention what idiotic comment Dennis Miller has made the night before.

Now is your chance to become an active voice in the ScribeCentral Community.

For Thursdays post we are asking for your opinions on:

Last years Playoffs (of course) and where your favorite team went wrong.
Last years champs, The New England Patriots, and your predictions on what will happen with the team and Brady this season.
Who do you feel will be the big winners and losers this season, and why?
And, finally, what's your prediction for Thursday Nights, Giants and 49ers match up?

In addition, ScribeCentral.com is co-hosting the Second Annual British Club of El Salvador Pro Football Pick'Em through Posted by The Scribe at 11:50 PM |Email ScribeCentral.com

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