About Me:
The Right Honorable Sir Dr. ObliQ, PhD, Esquire is a multi-thousandaire businessmann, pimp, player, hustler, rapper, pundit, advisor, & owner of the One-Eyed Trouser Snakes in the CSFL.
He is most well known for being "Player Coach to the Stars", advisi
About Me:
The Right Honorable Sir Dr. ObliQ, PhD, Esquire is a multi-thousandaire businessmann, pimp, player, hustler, rapper, pundit, advisor, & owner of the One-Eyed Trouser Snakes in the CSFL.
He is most well known for being "Player Coach to the Stars", advisi
About Me:
The Right Honorable Sir Dr. ObliQ, PhD, Esquire is a multi-thousandaire businessmann, pimp, player, hustler, rapper, pundit, advisor, & owner of the One-Eyed Trouser Snakes in the CSFL.
He is most well known for being "Player Coach to the Stars", advisi
I'm really not going to be cheering for anyone. I can say one thing though. It would be a bigger letdown for the Pats to lose than it would be an upset for the Giants to win. The fact that the G-Men are in the big game lets you know that they have a chance to win and should be there. However, everyone, myself included, has expected the Pats to win the Super Bowl ever since the Randy Moss trade. To go 18-0 thru the regular season and playoffs just to lose the one game that absolutely matters most will be considered the biggest choke job in NFL history.
I've never seen a team before with their legacy on such a big pendulum as this year's Pats. Win the Super Bowl, and you're aguably the best single season team to ever play the game. Ahead of the '85 Bears (who lost one game during the season only to shut out their first two playoff opponents and obliterate the Pats in Super Bowl XX 46-10), the '72 Dolphins (17-0), and the '84 49ers (15-1 reg season, SB champs). Lose the Super Bowl, and you don't go down as the best single season team ever, you go down as the best single season team ever NOT to win a Super Bowl (the 1998 Minnesota Vikings know how that feels).
There will always be a "but" when talking about this team if they lose. People will say "the 2007 Patriots were great BUT they didn't win the big one". Greatest team ever discussions do not have a "but" in them. Only sound arguments for the team. The only thing people remember about those great Buffalo Bills teams of the early 90's is the fact that they went to the big game four straight times and lost. Now they're a footnote, and so will the Pats be if they lose.
The Giants are just happy to be here. If they lose, there will be no huge letdown. The NY fans will praise them, and are already praising them. Almost no one outside their locker room expects them to win, so the Giants have absolutely nothing to lose. The Pats have everything to lose...
Thursday, November 29, 2007, 09:32 AM EST
[Shawn Taylor]
I was listening to Stephen A. Smith of ESPN radio this morning and he had this to say about the death of Shawn Taylor:
"...a lot of black people have been writing about how people don't want to hear this stuff in regards to Shawn Taylor's past. I respect that, and I understand where people are coming from. They talk about this was a burglary and it was a tragedy, and all of that stuff- - fine. And then you've got people in the media saying 'let's not make this the same old story'. There's a problem there. You know what the problem is? This is eerily similar to some of the things that have been happening, and the fact of the matter is that it is only happening to black athletes. I'm a black man. You think I like coming on the airwaves talking about there's a common denominator someplace along the line? A Darrent Williams? A Brian Potter? You look at this situation with Shawn Taylor, and you hear and see a lot of stuff going on, but it's not happening to white athletes. People need to think about that. And I'm not going to be hypocritical and come over the airwaves and act like it's not an issue. And there's not some common denominator somewhere. Because there is.
As much as I'd love to sit here and look White America in the face and say 'don't jump to conclusions', well dammit how many times am I on the airwaves talking about 'if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it ain't a mongoose'? I don't want to hear Black America talking about not putting race into the equation. Black athletes are falling by the wayside. Wasn't no white athlete who went into a strip club in Las Vegas and said 'I'm gonna make it rain', and it ended up with someone getting shot and paralyzed. Wasn't some white athlete, who's sitting there and threw away a $130 million contract to win- - thousands- - betting on dog fighting. Revealing and exposing themself as arguably the worse math student in the history in America. That wasn't a white athlete that did those things. It was black athletes. And if I'm gonna sit here and point the finger at White America for jumping to conclusions or stigmatizing people in Black America, what level of validity am I gonna have if I'm not exercising 20/20 vision and tell Black America what is happening to us? It may have nothing to do with Shawn Taylor, but it kinda looks like it. I can't knock White America for noticing that. Because I notice it. White America ain't the problem here, it's us. And we have to deal with it... and we can't ignore it."
For a long time in the NFL, there was an unwritten rule that a team, to be successful, had to have one workhorse running back, and the other guy(s) gets in the game in spot duty, or if the starter gets hurt. That rule has fallen to the wayside as teams are starting to incorporate a two-back system playing to players' strengths. The Bears did it last year, so did the Superbowl Champion Colts, the Vikings also do it. When Priest Holmes was healthy a few years ago, it even worked for them with him and Larry Johnson.
So why is it, that in a new NFL era, are NFL coaches too stubborn to move to a two QB system when it is obvious that they have two decent QBs with differing strengths? I don't have a lot of precedence to speak of in this instance, primarily because with the exception of the Arizona Cardinals (before Leinhart got hurt), no team dares to utilize more than one quarterback, and by the time most teams go to their backups, the starter has already irreparably lost the game for them.
Here is what I propose, at least for the Chicago Bears: try to rotate Griese and Grossman, and call plays to their strengths; it will also open up the running game. Griese is perceived as a more cerebral quarterback, more accurate on the short throw while not making a whole lot of mistakes, who, however, won't win too many games with his arm (with the exception of the Philly game), but won't lose them either. Grossman, on the other hand, is the swashbuckling gunslinger, not afraid to take a chance or a gamble, known to single handedly win games with the deep ball, but, on more often than desired, has been known to lose games with that same arm.
Why not get the best of both worlds while at the same time keep opposing defenses on their heels and both of the Bears' quarterback sharp?
The answer: old school football traditional mumbo jumbo.
If you were to create a quarterback on a computer (that wasn't Tom Brady or Peyton Manning), you would get an almost perfect quarterback if you were to combine the strengths of Brian Griese and Rex Grossman; a calculating game manager with a laser, rocket arm.
The Bears have that perfect quarterback, his name is Rex Griese.
As I sit and reminisce about the days of old when MJ and Pip used to embarrass their opponents, one question comes to mind: What shooting guard/small forward combo has even come close to playing at the level of Jordan/Pippen since the horrible and premature dismantling of the Unstoppa-Bulls in 1998? The only answer that comes to mind is- NONE!
That is what the new Bulls are looking at if Paxon decides to grow a set of balls and pull a trigger on the Kobe Bryant deal. As currently constituted, the Bulls aren't a championship team. Yeah, they might be good enough to make it to the Eastern Conference Finals to play the revamped Celtics, but keep in mind that even if they made the Finals, they would have to play a Western Conference team to win the championship.
The Bulls organization and fans need to get over their infatuation with Ben Gordon. He is a very talented ball player, but if he is part of the price required to bring in the closest player in skill to His Airness since his exile to Washington, then so be it.
The longer the Lakers wait to pull the trigger on Bryant, the less they are going to get for him. The Lakers need to get rid of the malcontent Bryant more than the Bulls need to trade for him, and that is a negotiation piece in itself for Paxon.
The Bulls need to take a hard line and offer the Lakers a square deal for Bryant. Ben Gordon, Tyrus Thomas, and a future 1st round draft pick for Bryant. Both Gordon and Thomas were top 4 picks in their respective drafts and getting a 1st round pick as well basically gives the Lakers three 1st round picks for Kobe. That is fair enough for a player who will eventually opt out of his deal and the Lakers then get nothing.
Could you imagine what it would be like for Deng to have a big, offensive and defensive minded shooting guard to share the floor with him? I've seen this movie before, and it ended in Utah in 1998 with six championship banners...
Let's see if Paxon has the testicular fortitude to make this happen like that shot he made against Phoenix in '93.
Thursday, September 6, 2007, 02:26 PM EST
[General]
Ahhhh! Its been a long seven months, and football season is finally upon us. The baseball pennant race is great, but it just started heating up and that lull between the end of basketball season and the beginning of football season is almost too much to bear.
Dont believe me? Then why was I watching Japanese league American football when it was on ESPN? Watching five-foot-nine inch tall quarterback Hiraguchi Hachitachi pass to five-foot-eight inch tall wideout Hiro Nakamura is almost laughable now that I think about it, but like a jones'n crackhead down to his last five bucks, sometimes you gotta take what you can get, and thats what I could get at the time.
If you live through a famine long enough, eventually there is gonna be a feast, and starting with Thursday night's Colts vs. Saints game, there is more than an abundance of hopes, dreams, and optimism to go around. Everyones Fantasy Football team is 0-0. Everyones favorite NFL team also is now 0-0. You ask Raiders fans, and their team is going to the Super Bowl. You ask Texans fans, and they'll tell you anything can happen, and to look out for that Schaub kid.
Until reality comes crashing down on the heads of fans from about 28 football teams, and you start to hear the good old "wait til next year".
But now is not the time for that. Now is a time for celebration. It is a time for sugar-plum fantasies and lollipop dreams for everyone. So plop in front of your big screen, crack open a beer and remember, "hey, anything can happen!". Cheers!!