Well, maybe "confessions" isn't the right word.  But it's a dark tale nonetheless.  Read it and be warned.

     They say you have to hit bottom before you can start the long climb up.  I'm not sure, but I may have found the depth beneath which I can no longer sink.  Maybe my epiphany came from watching the Kotex Panty Liner Why Should I Really Care Bowl between Mississippi State and UCF, a contest that seemed less a football game than a historical re-enactment of a long-forgotten era.  Namely, the time before the forward pass.

Maybe it was during the cavalcade of futility and blandness as the Indianapolis Fighting Sorgis, playing with nothing at stake, nearly held off the playof####esperate Tennessee Titans.  But at some point in this past few days, I had my moment of clarity and realization: I just love watching football - good football, bad football, day games, night games, Central Freaking Michigan against Purdue.  My name is John, and I am an addict.  And I see no need to rise above that.  In fact, I think I'm proud of it.  So I'm going to wallow in the filth of my sporting complacency and enjoy my debased self. 

 Not quite sure how my face got cropped out of this picture, but I was there, and I remain.  And while I'm here, I think it's about time I see a few changes from the rest of you.

     First, let's just end the charade about bowls versus playoffs in college football.  I know all the dumb arguments for bowls, so save it.  The tradition?  Yeah, so is this, but most of us eventually move on from that to this

and eventually, inevitably, to internet porn.  It's the Circle of Life, dammit.  Grow up and get with the program.  The extra burden on our "scholar-athletes" from the couple of extra games involved in a plus-four or plus-eight playoff?  Sorry, but our nation's universities lost their credibility on that one when they allowed a twelfth game, then an exception for a thirteenth for teams playing the Kickoff Classic.  College football players are today's equivalent of Roman gladiators, unpaid endurers of pain for our entertainment.  A select few may earn their freedom in the form of actual paychecks from the NFL one day, but for the rest this is bloodsport and public spectacle, not higher education.  And the argument that it reduces the urgency and meaning of the regular season?  You seriously cannot find me a less meaningful game than Minnesota/Iowa this November.  Ooh, it made the Hawkeyes bowl eligible!  Oops, lost to Western Michigan the next week.  You also cannot tell me that having a playoff at the end of the season is going to make Ohio State hate Michigan or Auburn despise Alabama one iota less.  If the only way to get in is by winning a conference championship, the urgency is still there, with the added bonus of being able to distill all of the tedious my-conference-is-better-than-yours arguments into a couple of games each year.  End the charade.  Playoff.  Now.  TCU and Houston can still play in some erectile-dysfunction-sponsored bowl, while everyone else can figure out who really is the best team.

     Next topic.  We all talk about steroids.  I'm tired of it.  For crying out loud, does Ed Hochuli

get tested?  Don't tell me you don't see some 'roid rage behind some of those penalty calls.  And you have to admit that there is a certain similarity between the near-aneurysmal, veins-bulging, my-chin-can-break-blocks-of-solid-granite photo in the middle and recent Sylvester Stallone.  If you're going to be one-sided about it, why should I care?  And why should I care about steroids in baseball?  I didn't hear a peep out of any of you "purists" when a solid majority of baseball players took advantage of LASIK surgery to improve their vision and, presumably, their batting averages.  I'm sure that since LASIK only involves natural medicinal herbs and Native American healing dances, it doesn't fall into the same category as steroids, right?  Shut up.  Now.  You make all of us dumber and less rational by harping on one while ignoring the other.

     Next: you nerds holding up signs at games with the televising network's name "cleverly" included in some slogan supporting your team.  Not only was it not that clever the first time it was done, not only does it call attention to your undone fly and general lack of a reason for existence ("but I was on TV, dude!"), but it's just plain past its sell-by date.  My own sign:

                              sign-waving crEtins

                                               
                                                    Slurp

                                               
                                              Sal Paolantonio's

                                               
                                                goNads

     We trudge onward.  Excelsior, or something.  How about instant-replay challenges of an "incorrect" ball spot?  How can you pick one arbitrary play to challenge the accuracy of something that is essentially arbitrary on every single play of the game?  Yeah, I'd still be mad if it was my  team that got shafted on an obvious bad spot, but the pretension to micromeasurement is a bit much to take when the aforementioned Hochuli heaves his massive arms into the air to demonstrate, by an inch of space between his muscled fingertips, the exact distance (correct to the nanometer) required for a first down.

     Kill the commercial.  No, I mean it.  I'm all with $8 Beers and the essential evil/unconstitutionality of the touchdown-extra point-commercial-kickoff-commercial sequence, but I think he stops short of the real solution.  Eliminate all commercials not directly related to halftime or timeouts.  Instead, sell advertising space directly on the players' uniforms like soccer teams do.  Oh, the "purists" will squeal.  The sanctity of the uniform, and all that.  Take one look at the Bengals, or any of the various monstrosities sported by the Oregon Ducks.  Tell me you can take those any lower.  No cheating by drinking a lot to get "uniform beer-goggles."  It's time.  Kill the commercial.  You could even stretch the rules elsewhere to accommodate - for instance, Joe Horn's end-zone cell-phone celebration would be allowable if arranged beforehand with Verizon Wireless as an advertising buy.  That, of course, would require Joe getting back into the end zone, but one thing at a time here.

     Can we get some kind of federal oversight over football commentators as well?  Specifically, I'd like to see some kind of system in place to implement proportional penalties for certain mis-uses of the microphone when talking about football.  To wit:

• Using the word "athlete," "athleticism," or any derivative of the terms to describe a defensive/offensive lineman with more than 3 inches' worth of belly clearing his belt
• Any use of the word "genius"
• Trying to coin your own nickname for a player (I'm looking at you, Merrill Hoge)
• Especially if it's a dumb nickname
• Calling any player "underrated"; if you really want to be interesting, insightful, and bold, tell me who's overrated.  And let us see the film footage when the player comes to discuss it with you later.
• Any use of any microphone by Joe Buck will be considered an offense of the highest nature, under penalty of having his mouth surgically sealed, then being stripped naked and tied to a pole while a crowd of steroid-enhanced five-year-olds play testicle pinata with Wiffle-bats (link shamelessly lifted from $8 Beers).

     OK, I think I'm finished.  I think I've made a lot of progress today in accepting my condition, and I hope the rest of you have gained some insight into how you need to re-order your lives and actions to accommodate it.  If you feel compelled to tell me that I need to change anything related to my addiction, I will give any suggestions you offer all attention due them - roughly the same attention I will give anything my wife says about taking out garbage, shoveling snow, cleaning the house, walking the dogs, or anything else during the Tennessee-Wisconsin game.  Thank you, goodnight, and go Volunteers.