I’m still a bit pessimistic about their chances at beating the Jets, but it’s pretty simple for them — if they win they’re AFC East champs and in the playoffs, if they don’t, they’re most likely left out in the cold. After last year’s 1-15 disaster, I honestly couldn’t have wished for anything better than this. I’m proud of them either way and it’s been a very fun year of watching them play.

The one apparent downer to my fruitful football weekend, which began on Thursday, is that my fantasy football team has a very precarious 15 point lead over one of the worst teams in the league, with that team still having Winslow, Randle El, and Lindel to play. He also has the Cards D going right now while all I have is 2nd string Mewelde Moore. If I lose this game, it was be heartbreaking given the competition and the fact that I got home 1 minute too late and was stuck with BenJavus Green-Ellis who I was going to bench in favor of either Ted Ginn Jr or Lance Moore (15 and 16 points respectively) if Sammy Morris was cleared to play, which he was. I ended up with 0 points in that slot instead of at least 15. The late work day on Thursday just might cost me a victory that I was favored to win by 51 points. Sad Christmas if that happens.

Most of his tirade about Kiffin in yesterday’s press conference didn’t make any sense at all and he often contradicted himself in the same damn sentence. He physically handed him the letter, but then says he FedEx’d it? What the fuck, dude? Make up your Mr. Burns-esque ancient damaged mind. He’s clearly the problem with the Oakland Raiders and the team will continue to be one of the laughingstocks of the entire league until he finally dies. However, that will probably never happen, as he’ll likely still be running the Raiders into the ground 500 years from now while he’s nothing but a talking head like in Futurama.

My hope is that Kiffin ends up coaching the Kansas City Chiefs next year and starts beating the crap out of the Raiders every year just like Shanahan and the Denver Broncos. It would be completely befitting and proof that there is indeed a God out there.

That said, the offensive play calling was absolutely atrocious. The team might have a chance to compete in the ACC this year but only because the conference is horrific right now. They will never compete on a national level with Patrix Nix calling the plays and running the offense. He sucked at GT and he’s been atrocious at UM. I’m a Randy Shannon fan but he screwed up mightily by keeping this guy around.

Then there’s the Dolphins. The post-game announcers kept on talking about how the team showed a lot of promise and that Pennington showed leadership in driving them down the field and putting them in position for a come from behind victory. Umm, why should I be happy with that? The team lost six games last year by three points or less. What good did that do? They lost this one by six. Why should I be happy with the fact that Pennington had four shots from inside the 20 to WIN the game and couldn’t complete a pass? Sure, I believe he was a good pickup and I believe the team is on the right path for success but I’m not going to be happy until they actually start winning these types of games. And that goes for both the Dolphins and the Hurricanes.

The Detroit series will be a beast, particularly because of Boston’s road woes. However, I have faith in my boys and am hoping that they might just match up better against Detroit than they did against Atlanta or Cleveland — meaning that while Detroit is by far a better overall team than the Hawks or Cavs, they don’t have any scorers in the vein of a Lebron or Joe Johnson that really gave Boston problems. Nevertheless, I’m both nervous and excited. It should be a fun and hard fought series that will hopefully end with the C’s in the NBA Finals.

Speaking of fantastic, I’m even more thrilled by the fact that the Flyers finished off the Canadians last night putting them into the Eastern Conference Finals of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. They finished 22-48-12 last season, which was dead last in the NHL with only 56 points, so making it this far has been a fun, albeit stressful, ride. I can’t wait to see them take on Crosby, Malkin and the Pens (assuming they don’t collapse against the Rangers).

The Flyers, as per form, got a 2-0 lead only to blow it and make things interesting before finally coming out on top. The finish is all that matters in the end, but if I start getting gray hairs or have a stroke the blame is going to be put on them. I’m really hoping they can close it out this weekend. My fingers are crossed and a blade isn’t coming anywhere near my playoff “beard” (if you can call the long scraggly hairs hanging under my chin a beard).

The C’s did exactly what they did in the first two home games — blow out the Hawks — so now it’s time to see if they can pull things together in Atlanta’s raucous arena to finally close out this series on Friday. I don’t want to see it go to a game 7 in either series, because I’m not sure if my heart could take it.

Yet, because of mental lapses and lackluster effort once things seemed “in the bag”, the series with the Caps is going to game 7 in Washington tomorrow night. We might still be able to pull this out because home ice seems to matter very little in the NHL, but it shouldn’t have had to come down to this. We’ve let this series slip away, plain and simple. Then again, this inconsistency has plagued this team all year so it shouldn’t surprise me. I was just hoping it was a case of them just needing the motivation of something like being in the playoffs to get them playing at the top of their game. But, I guess I was wrong.

The players we got in return for Bedard look fairly dope. Adam Jones looks like he could be a stud with his mix of power and speed. Plus, we’ve been in serious need of a good hitting OF. George Sherrill will hopefully be able to fill in the closer role for injured Chris Ray. Then you have Chris Tillman and Tony Butler who at 19 and 20 years of age were considered two of the top pitchers in Seattle’s farm system. The 5th guy we got is Kam Mickolio, who may or may not be that great, but is a menacing 6′9″ and 245 lbs.

The long-term outlook of this trade is phenomenal and it was what the club needed to do. Just like trading away Miggy. That said, it still saddens me a bit. Bedard was starting to become my favorite Oriole. I haven’t really had one since Ripken retired and Mussina left. Maybe Adam Jones or one of the other kids will step up and fill that void, you never know. I just hope we can once again contend in our division some day, it’s been forever since we last made the playoffs.

Yet, nobody suspects him? Sure, he hasn’t failed any drug tests…but the NFL cannot and does not test for HGH. They do piss tests and HGH can’t be tested for in urine. If he was doing it, he could do so with very little risk of getting caught. Hell, he could even be doing it legally given his age and the fact that the NFL allows players to use HGH if medically prescribed. I even read an article back in May that said 5% of the players in the NFL are allowed to use it.

Nevertheless the media keeps covering his season with blinders on much like they did with baseball during the beginning of the steroid era when it was so blatantly obvious that everyone was juicing yet nobody talked about it. It’s just not him, either. I’ve read tons of articles this year talking about older players doing better than ever. ESPN.com has had articles about a renaissance of old receivers playing well past their prime, same with the 30+ crowd of RB’s. Is everyone blind or am I just too cynical?

Despite the rant, the truth is that I don’t care whether or not athletes of any sport uses HGH or steroids. If it turns out Brett is really on it, I wouldn’t think any less of him. The fact that he’s playing amazingly well is a good thing because he’s one of the most exciting players to watch in football or any other sport. I’d love for him to be doing it if it keeps him around and playing at a high level into his 40s.

I just wish Shaun Alexander would’ve had the foresight to do it this year, because if he did maybe my fantasy football team wouldn’t have sucked so much. This is the 3rd straight year I’ve had to take solace in the fact that I “won” the loser’s bracket of the playoffs. That’s just as worthless as the award I got for being the sexiest kid in fat camp when I was a 12.

Furthermore, this venom isn’t only directed to the Big Ten but extends to all of the historical national powerhouses such as the Notre Dame’s, OU’s, UT’s, USC’s, and Alabama’s of the world. What bugs me about these football programs and the Big Ten is that they often get overrated because of their history. Instead of just judging things on the here and now, the media puts too much weight on what’s happened over the past 100 years. That just doesn’t make any sense to me.

For instance, if you ever have a Big Ten team like Michigan or Ohio State sitting at 11-1, they will generally be considered superior and ranked higher than a Big East team like West Virginia at 11-1. It wouldn’t matter what each team’s strength of schedule and it wouldn’t matter how strong each conference was in that particular year. Because of the legacy of those schools and the history and perceived strength of the Big Ten, the majority of the sports media and pollsters would automatically put the Big Ten school ahead of the Big East school.

That’s bull shit and just not fair. The bowl records over the past seven years show that most of the conferences are fairly equal except for the SEC, which appears to be a step above the rest. The Big Ten was the clear worst when it came to winning percentage, as it’s been 9 games under .500 in bowl games over the past seven years.

However, I do NOT believe it’s the worst conference. I think the poor showing doesn’t mean the conference sucks as much as it’s always overrated year-in and year-out causing them to play in games that they shouldn’t be playing in. The same holds true for a school like Notre Dame. The Irish have had a horrible bowl record over the past decade and the main reason is that they get into bowls that they shouldn’t because they’re usually overrated and they’re such a big national draw that bowls will take them over much more deserving teams. It irks me and is the main reason I hate the Big Ten and teams like Notre Dame.

For one, Big Tuna is the type that gets bored easily. He takes over teams, makes them winners and then bails, whether or not they actually make it to the promise land. His past four coaching tenures have been for four, three, and four years respectively with not a single Super Bowl to show for it. If the Dolphins don’t turn around quickly, will that make him more eager to stay and complete the job or will it just make him want to go back to his cozy ESPN gig?

On the plus side, the dude’s a proven winner. I think he’s been somewhat overrated as a head coach because of his career record with and without Belichick being substantially better with, but every team he’s gone to improved after he got there. That’s definitely a good quality for someone taking over control of my dismal Dolphins.

That said, too much credit might be given to him for turning things around. The Pats went from 2-14 to 5-11 with him. The Jets 1-15 to 9-7. The Cowboys 5-11 to 10-6. Improvements, sure, but I could see teams making improvements like that without any changes other than better luck and less injuries. He could have the magic touch, but it’s entirely possible he’s just taken over jobs from really crappy coaches where there was nowhere to go but up.

But, hey, while I have my doubts, I can’t seem to keep in the excitement I’ve been feeling since these reports started coming in. The big guy knows football, knows what it takes to get to the Super Bowl and is destined for the Hall of Fame. I hope he accepts the offer, takes full control over the team, and does whatever he needs to do to return the Dolphins back to prominence.

It’s no surprise for me. In fact, I have been saying for the past five years or so that I suspected Clemens of being on steroids or HGH. But, nooooo, not Clemens! He just got fat in his old age. He’s just a good ole boy from Texas who probably ate a lot of beef. No way he’s a cheating piece of shit like Barry Bonds! Ummm, yeah, right. It looks like he may have cheated, as well!

The simple fact is that with baseball players you are dealing with individuals that are HIGHLY competitive. They were in a sport that did NOT test for steroids at the time and did NOT ban it at the time. They were also in a sport where your on-field performance equated to more money in your pocket. More home runs equated to big pay checks. More strikeouts and more wins equated to big pay raises.

It would not surprise me at all if Jose Canseco’s assertion that 80% of players during that era took steroids was completely accurate. I think it would be completely ignorant on anyone’s behalf if they were to adamantly argue against that at this point. It could’ve been anyone. It even could have been your favorite player, who may never have seen a jump in his stats or a change in his physique. It’s completely plausible.

What should be done about it? I just say we should concentrate on the future. There’s no way of telling exactly who did it in the past. Singling out Barry Bonds was stupid before and is even more now. Singling out any of the 80 or so names expected to be released, such as Roger Clemens, would be just as idiotic. You can’t say Clemens shouldn’t be in the Hall, but then let someone else from this era in just because they were never officially “caught”. It sucks for those that didn’t use drugs and did things fair and clean, but there’s no getting around it. It’s sad and may be unfair, but everyone from this era should be assumed guilty.

The crowd was loud, the stadium was rocking and it was just fun cheering on the home team even though I couldn’t really give a shit about either team or any players (Roenick, who I love, wasn’t playing). There’s just something about watching hockey live that makes my nipples hard, and it’s not just because the temp is fairly low in the arena.

Plus, once the game was clearly out of hand, you could just sense that fights were coming. The Wild were getting chippy and you just knew something was going to happen…and it did! We got two fights and I fucking loved it! The first was good, but the second was honestly sub par. You probably see better fights at a women’s hockey game than that one.

Oh, and I must mention that sporting events are overflowing with beautiful babes in attendance. It’s just crazy how many hot, anal sex-worthy, butt-slapping, hair pulling, quality lovely ladies were at the two Sharks games I’ve seen this year. They were also out in full force at the Sacramento Kings basketball game I had floor seats for a short while ago (I’ll post about this later). It’s insane. There’s nothing better than a chick that gets all enthusiastic while watching a sporting event. I love it.