Yet Another Reason to Like Teddy Roosevelt

He saved football.

The Super Bowl

My co-workers around noon, when joy and optimism still ruled the Mon Valley

Well, the big game came and went and sadly, the Steelers simply don't get to be champions of the Universe this year. It's a shame honestly. It was a very special season to say the least. Not only did the Steelers overcome the hurdle of playing without their star quarterback for the first four games (not to mention an unseemly amount of confusion about who our replacement quarterback would actually be), but on a personal level, it was a pretty significant season. as well. This was the first season that the Girlfriend really got interested in football.

That pretty lady right there.

It was an interesting thing for us. Not only to maintain a relationship from thousands of miles apart, but to also maintain a shared fandom.

Probably the funniest feature of this season would be IMing the Girlfriend during the game. Usually, she would have to resort to watching it online. As a result, situations would emerge where I was often typing in joy after a gorgeous catch or punishing tackle seconds before she got the chance to see it. It irritated her because it ruined some of the suspense but I like to think it gave her the chance to experience watching football...With psychic, future-telling powers! Or something.

Poor Clyde. Even his Olde English tastes like hard work.

Also on a personal level, I have to note that we got KILLED, KILLED, KILLED at work yesterday! We had to face down an endless, mad horde of football fans. The store was instantly filled the moment we opened the door. People had been camped out in the parking lot for at least 1/2 an hour before we started doing business and people kept coming to the door half an hour after we closed. It was simply unending.

We managed to plow through it though but after that amount of work, I think that the least we deserved was a win.

Sadly it wasn't in the cards. And now it's a gray, Mudville-sort-of-day in Pittsburgh. There's a pretty good rundown of the local reaction here. Yeah. Open weeping. Might be a bit much but hey, we love our Steelers!

Next year....

Programming Note

Today, is the Super Bowl people. Not just any Super Bowl either mind you. Today is the day my beloved Steelers take on the vile and degenerate Packers for the big win.

Normally, I would be moved to write a bit more about this. For that matter, I'm sure that there are matters of lesser import occurring around the world (Egypt? Ho hum....Yawn) that deserve my attention as well.

However, due to matters beyond my control, I have to work for a chunk of the day. Pretty much right up until the game starts at which point I need to do some cooking. So, probably no posting beyond this today.

To tide you over, here are movie titles that got lost in translation. And here is a movie that translates well:

KURZSCHLUSS from Xaver Xylophon on Vimeo.

Crap. Gotta go get some eggs. Enjoy the game!

Franco's Italian Army

No, not that Franco. The non-fascist one.

Because It Bears Repeating

Ahem. The Steelers are going to their...What is it? 8th Super Bowl?

So I'm posting this again. Old season, old video. But still, I think that it exemplifies the pure, glorious ugliness of proper, smashmouth, Steelers football.

Football

Are you guys watching the Steelers take it to the Jets? Wow.

Football

I was going to save this video for Sunday but I really, really like it. It also pivots nicely off my recent post concerning violence and football.

Love the James Harrison bit around 1:18 by the way. The man is a monster.

Football and Violence

Let's face it: I'm really going to only have two more football games to talk about so I might as well get it out of my system now.

After the Super Bowl, I'll probably stare at my tv and wonder why I even bother to own such a thing...

The biggest change this year (more so than even the changes to overtime in the play offs), has been the crackdown on vicious hits. The arguments in favor of this crackdown are compelling, humanitarian even. Nobody wants a crippled, brain damaged or even dead athlete lying on a field.

However, in the rush to control risks in an enormously risky game, the very essence of football is threatened. There is a very reason why football is played by extremely large gentleman (got into an argument the other day as to whether Aaron Smith at 6-5, 300 pounds is small or not): The astonishing grace of a receiver diving for an impossible catch or a running back pirouetting through a wave of defenders towards a glimpse of blue sky is meaningless without an utterly crushing and aggressive defense. Remove that and you have nothing more than a game of catch. With cheerleaders.

People with this name have no choice but to cover sports or become astronauts.

Buzz Bissinger:

But it’s the mano a mano combat of a fast defensive line against a behemoth offensive line that is the turn-on. It’s the blitz of a safety speeding out of nowhere to crumple the quarterback. It’s the running back breaking tackle after tackle by defenders who truly want to punish and knock him out. It is no longer mandatory in the NFL to wear thigh pads or hip pads, and some players don’t because they want to be as fast as possible. The lack of protection can also obviously lead to injury, which indicates the NFL’s need to preserve the mass destruction.

I realized over the weekend how much I actually relish the speeding blur of the game and the possibility on every play of a hellacious hit. I realized how much I liked the clear derangement of the defensive backs, human sacrifices for a bone-splitting tackle. Every player in the NFL knows the possible risks down the road, whether it is Alzheimer’s or the well-known realities of crippling arthritis and being able to walk only with a cane. I venture that not one of these well-paid performers has any regret about his chosen profession. I also venture that the vast majority would like helmet-to-helmet hits reinstated, because until this season they were a part of the game. There is a sickness in football, but one that has to do with its overemphasis in academic settings, high school kids as gods and college players in college only to play. And football is hardly the only sport that is guilty.

You can have all the new rules you want, and all the behavior modification you want, but potentially serious injuries will still be common. Both of the hits that led to concussions Sunday were clean. It was terrible when it looked as if Carlson might have snapped his spinal cord. Mercifully, that did not occur. But in the immediate aftermath, Fox showed the replay of what happened over and over. It was like watching a terrible car wreck. But we like wrecks. Except for the righteous few, we are all rubberneckers.

Perverse Incentives, Football Edition

Steeler players talk about how the new league rules regarding helmet to helmet contact actually encourage players to make more damaging tackles.

Several Steelers said that knees will be more at risk for ballcarriers because defenders will avoid going high on them.

"Guys are going to fear getting a big fine," said Woodley, "and they're going to start going for guys' knees, and that's going to be a serious problem once guys start getting their knees blown out and mess up the way they walk the rest of their lives.

Again, are there solutions to this? Perhaps you could say that a tackle has to be an actual tackle: that a player must be brought to the ground in the arms of another in order to end play. That might limit these massive collisions by limiting their effectiveness.

This Can't Possibly be Accurate

The Daily Beast ranks cities by their football fans.

Pittsburgh is 20?!?!?!?!!??!

That can't possibly be correct. It's impossible. I mean, we're ranked below the Redskins for crying out loud!

Football Post Mortem

Sort of surprising for me but I really did find myself feeling awfully ambivalent about the Steelers game. To begin with, a win against the utterly hapless Browns is pretty much preordained from on high.

More significantly, I just found that I couldn't get into watching our passing game. I don't know if it's because it just wasn't that interesting or if I really just can't stand Roethlisberger. Dunno. I'm a pretty serious fan and this is one of the first times I can remember watching a Steelers game and thinking "Touchdown. Meh."

Quick Thoughts on the Steelers Game

Still feeling pretty crummy watching the thug and cad Roethlisberger play. Not much I can do about it though. Almost felt like cheering that interception he threw in the first drive.

Our defense still looks magnificent though. The Browns can't protect their quarterback from us. I wouldn't be surprised if we force them to take him out.

Mendenhall also looks set to have a 100+ day. All is well with the universe.

Football!

Steelers gonna thump the lowly Browns.

Expect some of this:



Kick off!

Football Post Mortem

Baltimore managed to squeak out a win against the Steelers. Evil is victorious and the skies have fallen.

Quick thoughts....

An absolutely stunning goal line defense at the end of the game by the Steelers. I want to say things like: Stout! Resolute! Indomitable! And other things best said by Victorian Englishmen.

Not too pleased with our offense in that game. Anyone else get the sense that following his stellar performance last week, Batch was going to Wallace a bit too much on the long throws? Wallace is a monster but it felt like Batch was looking for a home run every time he went for a pass.

I am begining to wonder about Jeff Reed. I think he's a baby and it's affecting his performance.

All in all, gotta say that I'm pretty happy right now. 4-0 would have been lovely but considering the circumstances (Quarterback whack-a-mole), I'm happy to take 3-1.

Oh my! I've just learned that Joe Flacco tortures dogs, is mean to babies and wants to steal your car.

That Blog Ate My Dog, Football Edition

Going to be light blogging today because of an outbreak of football.

And what football! My beloved Steelers, whose mere sweat is like the tears of joyous children, are hosting the foul and rightly hated Ravens.

Oh, how we hate the Ravens. We hate them so much.

So quick stuff....

Upcoming Supreme Court cases. Quick takeaways....

The marquee case on the docket so far is a suit brought by the father of a fallen Marine against a small Kansas church whose members protested at his son’s funeral. The case, to be argued Wednesday, is freighted with rage on both sides.

Oh, the loving Christians of the Westoboro Baptist Church. Such nice, nice, nice people. Except for their batshit evil qualities. Have to side with them on this one....Mostly. Protest is important. Particularly when it's as fringe as these dingbats are. The right to speech is ultra important.

That said, aren't cemeteries generally privately owned? I may be right, may be wrong, but in that event, I can certainly understand why a cemetery would have a valid reason to disallow protest. After all, cemeteries are in the business of providing funerals. These protests specifically interfere with that.

Man, what's going on with our pass defense?

In a second major First Amendment case, Schwarzenegger v. Entertainment Merchants Association, No. 08-1448, the court will decide whether states may restrict the sale of violent video games to minors. The lower courts in the case and many courts considering similar questions have uniformly said no.

Video games should be placed under higher regulations than any other art form why? What now?

Polamalu is a monster, what what?

The first question is presented in Skinner v. Switzer, No. 09-9000, an appeal from Hank Skinner, an inmate in Texas who is seeking access to DNA evidence that he says could prove his innocence. In March, the court granted a stay of execution less than an hour before Mr. Skinner was to be put to death in the murder of his girlfriend and her two sons.

One of the prosecutions arguments is that Skinner waited too long to attempt to present this evidence. Soooo.....The state is going to kill someone because they missed a deadline? Personally, I'm generally opposed to the death penalty. Because frankly, I have serious reservations about the competency of the government to handle it.

That said....Really, if you allow the government to mete out the ultimate penalty, shouldn't it be a requirement that a higher level of proof be required? Should there really be squabbling over deadlines if possibly exculpatory evidence is available?

Enough.

Football time.