Sports

Weekly What

Tim Tebow is a Jet

There’s so many angles to this. The most entertaining aspect of the trade, which can’t be touched on enough, is that Antonio Cromartie and Tebow will be interacting. I have a dream of a buddy-cop movie involving Tebow and Cromartie. Remember, this is the same guy who can barely name all of his children. He has nine kids with eight different women, and they live in six different states. To be fair, that’d be hard for anyone to name. Cromartie already came out and said that he didn’t want Tebow on the team. To quote Cromartie, “We don’t need Tebow. We sell out every home game let him go to Jacksonville Tampa or Miami. Our wildcat offense can b ran by Kerley or Joe McKnight we straight.” Awesome. For the record Antonio, you are not straight.
Tebow, on the other hand, is an unashamed vigin. He’s a small slice of holiness living in a locker room that has prison-like qualities. From Rex Ryan racking up world records for swear words in a pregame speech, to an overall failure of any type of leadership, Tebow in New York will provide the NY media with more content than a certain Asian point guard. If only the Jets would re-sign Plaxico. I can dream.

Sean Payton got wrecked

Whoa. Did everyone see Roger Goodell’s giant muscles? He flexed them all over the Saints and made sure that New Orleans has yet another story about overcoming adversity for the next three years. The punishment fit the crime. Well, the punishment fit the idea of the crime. Depending on whether or not you actually believe that a bounty system resulted in more violent play from New Orleans, the one-year ban of Sean Payton from coaching may or may not seem too harsh. The whole concept of having a bounty system, and then keeping the program after being caught once, is just asking to be massacred by the NFL.   It seems odd that the league came down this hard on New Orleans, but Bill Belichick can cheat to win Super Bowls and just lose draft picks. Life’s funny.

I can continue not caring about college basketball.

The Final Four is in full swing, with Louisville, Kentucky, Kansas, and Ohio State making it to New Orleans. It’s just not that exciting. It never actually is. In a sport where the brightest stars play one year, and then leave for the NBA, who cares? I care about Texas Tech basketball, but it’s a messy relationship full of missed phone calls and skipped dates. I love Tech basketball but I’m not in love with Tech basketball. That could also be because Tech is horrible.
Quick, name 10 college basketball players who don’t A) play for the school you went to or root for, B) are the star of the rival school of your school, or C) go by the name Anthony Davis and have the most exciting unibrow in years.  I think I could do it, but not before watching seven NCAA tournament games. The regular season of college basketball is meaningless, and the tournament is marred by 7th-grade officiating and clanked shots. If I want to watch bad basketball, I’ll take high school. The officiating is the same and the kids care more.
Again, Tech being terrible is probably 94% of the reason I don’t care.

Sports

Weekly What

I’ve been having trouble coming up with hundreds of words about one topic, so I decided to do what all lazy writers do, and simply touch briefly on multiple topics. In my defense, a ton of stories broke last week so this isn’t all about taking shortcuts. It’s just 95% about taking shortcuts.

Dwight Howard opted in

The best center in the league didn’t really solve anyone’s problems when he decided to stay in Orlando until 2013. With the trade deadline looming, Howard opted in on his player option and will not become a free agent for another year. That solves Orlando’s problems for about three months, and then sends them right back to square one. Most people have criticized Howard’s indecisiveness, with multiple reports contradicting each other regarding Howard’s future. In Dwight’s defense, I honestly believe the guy was really just struggling with the decision. This wasn’t a case of LeBron leading everyone on for attention while he always knew where he would end up. If you don’t think LeBron knew he was going to Miami in the middle of the Cavs’ season in 2010, you’re gullible. Dwight is different. He has an honest interest in trying not to hurt Orlando. It’s all got the very nervous feel of a messy 8th-grade breakup. Dwight’s trying to ease into the whole process so that Orlando won’t scribble all over his locker in permanent marker and make cootie-catchers with him dying the only option on every tab. Howard won’t be there after next season, but I think he’ll let Orlando know about it early enough for the Magic to avoid claiming they were blindsided. But when an organization has no qualms about trading for Gilbert Arenas’ contract after he signed that humongous mistake of an extension, it’s hard to blame Dwight for anything short of bringing a gun to the locker room. Wait a second. Something about that sounded familiar.

Peyton Manning is a Bronco

Wow. Denver got the biggest “Get out of jail free” card in the history of the NFL. Sorry. Sometimes I forget I’m only 22. It was definitely a “Get out of jail free” card, though. Without Manning, Denver was about to sink the fate of the next 5-10 years of their franchise into Tim Tebow. The same Tebow who can’t complete 47% of his passes. The same Tebow who has to have the entire offense tailor-made to fit his style or his entire career is blown. The same Tebow who can make people shout at the top of their lungs in an argument over a guy who has only played 23 games in the NFL. It’s crazy.
I have no opinion of Tebow as a person. I assume he’s a pretty good guy, and I don’t really find him that obnoxious. If he wants to witness every time he gets a microphone, nobody should tell him to quit. Quit giving him the microphone if you don’t want to hear it. But as a quarterback, he’s a novelty that will someday ride the bench while coming in for a few novelty plays once or twice a game. Manning immediately makes Denver better. I had doubts about his neck and I still do. Three different teams cleared him in a physical, so that’s got to mean something. Manning was the only living, breathing quarterback who could let Elway jettison Tebow out of town, while simultaneously keeping the orange and blue faithful from jumping off a bridge. I see Tebow getting 2-3 more shots as a starting job in the NFL, eventually landing as a backup in Jacksonville while some poor soul has to start ahead of him. I see Denver winning the division and making a serious playoff run this year. Demaryius Thomas is for real.

The Cowboys paid for Brandon Carr

Yeah, they definitely paid the 25-year old corner too much money. But what were their other options? Every comparable corner on the market was going to end up with fairly similar deals and the Cowboys had to get one. 5-year/$50 million isn’t that bad for a young guy who can cover top receivers. As long as he laces up his cleats he can play better than Newman last year. I haven’t given up on Mike Jenkins. I’m not even close. If Jenkins can get it together again (I think he will), the Cowboys will be significantly better in week 1 than they were in week 17 last year. My favorite part about this signing is Alan Ball can go back to being a safety. I love Alan Ball. I’m not sure why. He wasn’t very good at safety anyway, but he was serviceable. When all the corners went down, and it became obvious that no help was coming, Ball played a ton of snaps at corner. He was terrible, but he tried dammit. God bless you Alan. Oh, and Abram Elam is horrendous. I had as many interceptions and as many passes deflected as Elam. That’s not a joke.

The Mavericks won a couple of basketball games

Without their starting center, starting small forward, and back-up point guard, Dallas took out San Antonio, Denver on the road, and two absolutely horrific teams in Charlotte and Washington. Through all of this, Roddy has looked like he’s a professional basketball player, and Wright is quickly becoming one of the most important guys on the floor. Every time I want to write them off, I ask myself a simple question – “Who the $*#@ is going to stop Dirk in the playoffs?” I have no answer. He’s looked incredible in the last four games, and Oklahoma City has no matchup for him. The Lakers have no matchup for him. San Antonio has no matchup for him. I’m starting to believe, again, they can make it back to the Western Conference Finals so the Heat can run over them. Dream big, Mavs.

Sports

NCAA Rule Changes

What’s more exciting than a 99-yard kickoff return for a touchdown? That’s easy! 17 touchbacks in one game.

Not only has the NCAA made the same adjustment to the kickoff distance that the NFL has, they’ve taken it a step further. While the NFL moved kickoffs from the 30-yard line to the 35-yard line and left touchbacks at the 20, the NCAA decided teams needed even more incentive to take a knee. The rules committee decided that touchbacks will be moved to the 25-yard line instead of the 20-yard line.

There are tons of people wandering aimlessly around the internet who are screaming about how these new rule changes take away “kickoff return guys.” While Devin Hester is an absolute freak, let’s call “kickoff return guys” what they really are: fast receivers who aren’t very good at playing receiver. The days of teams trotting around with poor-man’s Ted Ginn Jr’s hogging roster spots are over.

Another rule change the committee decided on is that when a player loses a helmet during a play, he’ll be treated the same way an injured player is treated. He must stop his participation in the current play, and sit out the next play. First of all, how the Hell are you going to stop a helmet-less player from continuing to try to make a play? I feel like there’s some variation of this rule that’s already in place. It’s a fun thought that helmet-less defenders won’t tackle running backs and receivers, but what are the officials really going to do? You can’t call a penalty on a corner who has his helmet pop off and tackles somebody.  Can you?

The second part of that rule change is the forced sidelining of a player who lost his helmet. Is this supposed to be more incentive for players to use their chin straps? I’m confused. If a player takes a helmet to his exposed skull he’ll probably take the next play off voluntarily. And unconsciously.  If a lineman just got his helmet shoved off at the line of scrimmage and he puts it back on, why are you taking him out of the game?

One more fun nugget from the rule committee’s deliberations. When a team is receiving a punt, players on that team are not allowed to jump over blockers. They may jump between them, or straight up. But any players attempting to block a punt better think twice before LeBron-ing a blocker and knocking the punt out of the air. That’s a penalty. This penalty is supposed to stop special teams players from bull-rushing the “shield” formation that has become popular. We’ve all seen that one guy break the original line of scrimmage and then dive head first into the three guys waiting on him. Normally they’re 5 yards in front of the punter so the rusher is just glory hunting. Or making sure all the coaches notice his effort on film. I’ve got an idea for lineman blocking on special teams. When the ball is snapped just link arms, smile, and chill out. It’s like a big, fun game of Red Rover.

The most upsetting part about these rule changes for me is the touchbacks, but not because I think football is losing its manliness. I’m upset because, in most games, there are at least two or three segments in games where a kickoff is the only thing you’ll see in between commercial breaks. It’s the most obnoxious series of events in television.

You just got done seeing fourteen beer commercials and Blake Griffin driving a Kia, and you’re finally ready for some football. The camera cuts to that shot behind the kicker, he smashes the ball deep, it’s fielded by the poor man’s Ted Ginn Jr, and then he bravely takes off into a murderous field of third string players before having his head taken off by someone you’ve never head of. BOOM. Blake Griffin’s driving a Kia again and you’re waiting another five minutes for football. I hate that segment. ABC should warn me when those segments are coming so I can at least have a stress-free trip to the bathroom.

The only solace I  took in those times was knowing that I almost witnessed a murder. Now? I’ve got nothing but touchbacks.