I love that Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers are going to headline the Superbowl this year...maybe one year, the Superbowl headliner will be billed as the players. I have been to some Superbowls with great halftime shows like Paul McCartney. I have been to some Superbowls with LOUSY halftime shows, Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake and all the other people they tried to cram in that year. I was in New Orleans when U2 perfomed at the first SB after 9-11.....indescribable. I think Tom Petty might be a little under-rated. The guy is a hit factory. I always try and get people talking about who is under-rated and who is over-rated.
Here is my list of both.
UNDER-RATED:
Pete Townsend (not The Who...just Townsend). Steve Miller The James Gang Sadly, these days...The Beatles. Keaton Simons Prince
OVER-RATED
Bob Dylan (Springsteen writes just as well, and actually performs his heart out. Fleetwood Mac...maybe the worst band ever. The Eagles. Chicago Jackson Brown Joni Mitchell Lou Reed Patti SMith THE MOST OVER-RATED BAND EVER---THE GRATEFUL DEAD. many of you are losing your minds right now....lets discuss.
My son had a karate class today. It's pretty impressive to watch a five
year old do half moons and run through his blocks while screaming,
"KIYA!" Hi sensei is a phenomenal teacher. A very patient guy named
Mr. Davis who to my son's amazement, lets the kids hit him in the
stomach with no pads. (I don't think the kids realize that they are
only five). I was watching my son get his yellow belt last week and
thought to myself that I better start taking some self defense classes. I have
since started taking Krav Maga. It is Israeli self defense and it is
the best workout I have had since high school wrestling. I don't really
think I need to get a black belt in self defense or have any real
particular zeal for the art form...I just dont want to ever get beat up
in front of my son. Especially now that he is on pace to be a black belt
by junior high. I dont want my son to ever have to cover my back at a
strip club brawl.
Imagine getting beat up in front of your child! What if that is his
first real big memory? How would you disipline him after he saw that
beat down? The boy would be around 12 years old and you would tell him,
"HEY! Clean your room or I am going to whup your but!". The kid just
looks at you and says, "Oh, TODAY you're a man?!!?"
"Remember when I was 6 and you got beat down like a punk by the
neighbors kid?!"
Okay...I think the Japanese are programming sports just to help me write.
I am in Oahu and have been religiously watching Japanese foot volleyball. Last night, right as foot volleyball was winding down, I saw my new favorite sport.
HAND SOCCER! Japanese guys running around with a little yellow ball, slightly smaller than a volleyball.
They pass the ball back and forth through the gym and eventually throw it as hard as possible at a goal slightly larger than a lacrosse net. We need more of these bizzaro sports in the states. Foot volleyball, hand soccer? What's next?
Truly, what is next from our wonderful Japanese friends? Head volleyballs like seals? Basketball with bowling balls? I think it is worth staying in Hawaii for an extra week just to soak up seven more days of Japanese sports on television.
I have moved from the island of Kauai to the island of Oahu. What a difference a 20-minute flight makes. For one thing, there are markets on Oahu, and people, and people in markets. I have seen more people in the last 24 hours than I had seen in the previous eight days in Princeville, Kauai. I have also seen a lot of Japanese television. If anyone thinks that American sports are interesting, I suggest catching a few rounds of foot volleyball on Japanese television. That wasn't a typo...FOOT VOLLEYBALL!!!
You have never seen anything so amazing. It comes on Honolulu public access television around midnight. From what I can gather, the rules are the same as regular, boring, international volleyball. The only glaring exception being that instead of digging and spiking with their hands, the players are spiking and digging with their feet. Sounds cool, right? It gets better. One guy on each team gets to hit the volleyball with his face! HOLY CHRISTMAS. Is that a job one aspires to when beginning a career in foot volleyball? Is it a punishment?
I kid you not when I tell you I watched a solid two hours of foot volleyball two nights in a row. The announcers were speaking Japanese and the subtitles were in Korean, so I have to assume what I was watching was what I thought it was. AMAZING! One Japanese guy serves the ball over a waist-high net with his foot. It looks like a pooch punt in football. On the other side of the tennis-like net, a different Japanese guy kicks the ball straight up in the air to set the next guy up, who sets the next guy up for the spike (or the kill). The kill shot looks like a lethal Kung Fu kick and the man who performs it flops onto the ground and screams bloody murder.
Just like in American volleyball, the kill shot has to be dug out and sent back into the sky. Japanese guys are flailing all over the gym sticking their feet out and stretching out their toes...anything to keep the foot volleyball from touching the wood floor. Sometimes, one poor #### lets the foot volleyball ricochet off his face to save it. That man should be MVP of every single foot volleyball match.
One of the teams called a timeout. All of the foot volleyball players gathered in a little circle and (I guess) spoke strategy for a few minutes. I noticed that on both teams, there were a couple of guys wearing glasses. I prayed that they would have a turn at stopping the ball with their faces. That is a real man. Have a karate-kicked foot volleyball bounce off your orbital socket at 70 mph, shattering your glasses all over the gymnasium floor, then get back to me about how hard it is to hit a major-league fastball.
As far as sports go, foot volleyball is pretty much all that's happening on local television here. Foot volleyball and the Mercedes-Benz Championship. Golf is HUGE in Hawaii. I don't get it -- 99% of the people here are rushing to get on the sand, the other 1% are trying to avoid it. To all the golfers out here, I have a suggestion. The next time your ball lands in a sand trap, grab a lava flow and a towel and just lay down in the sand with it. Take a nap. Enjoy yourself...get rested up for a long night of watching foot volleyball. If I find out where in the hell they play foot volleyball, I am totally going. Without my glasses.
Don Imus is being sued by one of the Rutgers chicks?
WTF??? Is this where we have come as a society?
You can now sue people because they HURT YOUR FEELINGS!!
I am going to sue everyone.
There is a barber shop on Fairfax here in Los Angeles called "Oh My Nappy Head!" They hurt my feelings. I am going to sue the owners of that salon. I want free hair extensions for life!
Now that we have one NBA referee pleading guilty to fixing games . . . let's get the rest of them to walk into Superior Court to plead guilty to RUINING games. Handcheck foul?
I have decided to start a blog. I am not really sure what this will all entail but I am giving it a shot.
I currently write a column for FOXSports.com (I am not listed on the roster of writers, but if I was, I would be listed between Eric Moneypenny and Warren Moon). My column, or article as some might say has been a very interesting experience. I have always loved to write.
In high school, I needed two math tutors to keep my D average from dipping to an F in algebra. Writing on the other hand was always enjoyable and easy to me. Until now.
Suddenly, whatever I write seems to not only not be some people's cup of tea but it actually seems to ENRAGE them. I encourage you to look at any of the articles I have written . . . you will need to type my name into the search engine.
Only two of my four articles are listed but pick one of them. . . . now read the comments.
(Editor's note: Since Jay apparently helped himself to a big 'ol glassa grouchy juice this morning, here are links to his previous masterpieces. There's this one, and this one, and this one . . . oh, and this one too. There. Happy now? Great. Take it away, Jay.)
AH! The Comments! For some reason, what I write makes people seeth with anger. What started as a wonderful dream job for me has become a curious experiment in human relations. I wrote a column about being the new guy, and listed some of my likes and dislikes, and the majority of the 300 comments told me that I am a has been, useless, never funny, pathetic excuse of a writer. "An E Lister" as one blogger put it. I am currently reading comment after comment about how sad it is that FOXSports.com had to hire an out-of-work, has-been comedian to write for them.
I would like to take this moment to publicly remind all of my readers that I can be seen every Friday at 8 p.m. on CBS on the television show The Ghost Whisperer. That is, Friday nights . . . on television .. . as in NOT OUT OF WORK.
I also tour constantly across the United States of America doing stand up comedy. For all of you bloggers that post such gems as "Jay Mohr has never been funny and has always sucked" I would encourage you to call your local Improv and ask them to sift through their receipts. . . .Try to find which show in FIFTEEN YEARS of headlining was there a seat available.
Finally, for all of you that post comments such as, "FOXSports.com will let any clown write a column!" let me assure you: YOU ARE RIGHT!!!!
Many of you are "bloggers." That means you write for the internet. I have been to many of your blogs and I would like to emphatically state that wiithout question THEY ALL SUCK. I find it hilarious that someone would read my column and then post, "jay mohr ####, he cant write and he isn't funny . . . never was funny." The I notice the tiny emblem next to your screen name that indicates that you write a blog. I go to your masterpiece and read, "Michael Vick should fry for what he did." that's it . . . that's all one "blogger" wrote.
Another clown that keeps riding me has a blog about the "sweet science." YAWN!
If all of you out-of-work writers -- by that I mean WITHOUT CONTRACT with FOXSports.com -- want to continue to slam me and tell everyone what a zero I am in my message margin, I encourage you to do so. The more you type and the more people respond to what you wrote, the more my new bosses look impressively at the numbers and say to each other, "Jay Mohr's column is getting a lot of traffic!"
This is my new blog. I am going to criticize your blog from my blog.
The internet is the world's largest bathroom stall. People can write whatever they want without being held accountable. Just scrawl something negative and angry and walk out of the toilet. Well, that is fine with me. Keep writing me hate mail and continue "blogging" away. I will be reading and laughing . . . AT you.