De-thawed corpse and Mr. Magoo-sports mogul Mike Brown is not the most beloved owner in the NFL, which is really saying something right now. But he still has fans in Pittsburgh, Baltimore, and even Cleveland, who have benefited from his leadership of the Bengals for years. In January, interception machine quarterback Carson Palmer put his crib on the market, changed his cell phone number, deleted his four square twitter app, and changed his facebook status to “available.” Mike Brown responded to all these clear signs of Palmer’s desire to move on by threatening to deprive the field hands of their supper, giving them each forty lashes, and then after soiling himself, he muttered something about controlling “the rebellion.” Mike Brown can’t quit you Carson, so come on home!
“We don’t plan to trade Carson,” Brown said Monday at the NFL Spring Meeting. “He’s important to us. He’s a very fine player, and we do want him to come back. If he chooses not to, he’d retire. And we would go with Andy Dalton, the younger player we drafted, who’s a good prospect.
“Ideally, we’d have both of them. That’d be the best way to go forward. If we don’t have Carson, we’ll go with Andy.”
Ideally, Mike Brown would be removed from being the owner, like some other Cincinnati sports executives. Make no mistake, Mike Brown will burn this village in order to save it, Bengals fans. Start printing Super bowl tickets Cincinnati (downs scotch bottle, collapses in small pile of empty pill bottles and vomit).
There’s no need to go into the abuse Jay Cutler took during and after the Bears’ loss to the Packers in the NFC Championship game. He was getting it from all sides. Current and former players, commentators, journalists, fans and half-ass bloggers (including yours truly) were killing him for not playing the second half. People even tried to get on him about walking up the stairs while going to dinner Sunday evening. Won’t someone please think about the children!
There were plenty of questions about Cutler this whole season even as he lead them to the NFC Championship game. The questions weren’t so much about his durability or heart. He took a beating all season especially against the Giants who sacked him 10 times in the same game. Todd Collins was forced to come in for him and was promptly injured. Nice to see him reprise his role on Sunday by not wasting any time getting injured again.
The doubts surrounding him were more about his abilities. He threw the most interceptions in the league last season and had a tendency to throw ridiculous ones this season although he managed to not repeat his feat from 2009.
You can put T.O. and Michael Strahan among those who don’t think much of Cutler’s skills. Check this video from last week’s episode of the T.Ocho. show. They wasted no words slaughtering him (which is stunning).
“Least favorite”. “Color blind”. “…Slinging the ball around like free loaves of bread in the ‘hood.” Tell us how you really feel. Fantasy owners must have the same
Usually when I write this post, it takes me awhile to find worthwhile headlines to make pithy little jokes about. This week: nothing but gold. I’m not even going to waste time. Let’s just get right to it: Read the rest of this entry
The return of football season brings back to focus a lot of things, but most notably, the blustery sportscaster. For some odd reason, FOOTBALL may only be announced in LOUD VOICES by GUYS who speak in run-on sentences while GRUNTING. While I love football, I’m not sure I can take another season of Chris Berman gesticulating his way through a stream of highlights or Jon Gruden speaking in coach talk for an entire season. There’s got to be someone better. Nevermind.
And one other thing: Berman, I don’t normally like you, but for one reason or another, the moustache looks oddly right. Bonus points for helping kill an emerging hipster trend. On to this very special football-only edition of headlines:
It’s pretty easy to get obsessed with the MLB Trading Deadline, but as I get older I find myself getting tired of being jerked around. In my mind, I’m able to live with certain guys no longer being on their previous team as long as I have proper time to visualize it. For example, it was tough for me to accept Roy Oswalt in anything but an Astros uniform, but when I thought he’d land with the Cardinals, I started to make peace with it. When he was traded to the Phillies, that messed up the entire part of my brain dedicated to processing Roy Oswalt’s existence in my feeble mind. It’s a rather small existence, but still… Since there is a new Adam Dunn trade rumor just about every couple of hours, that part of me is in utter disarray. I don’t know how I’ll contemplate him in a Tigers or White Sox uniform. That wouldn’t look right. What if he stays in Washington? Will I still view him as a National or does part of me think of him as a rental from the Reds? I don’t know. That one may take some time. But I do know this: it’s time to do some headlines:
Roy Oswalt waived his no-trade clause in order to complete a trade sending him to the Philadelphia Phillies.
Not a bad consolation prize for basically giving Cliff Lee away this past winter. In the past year, the Phillies have traded for three of the best pitchers in baseball (combined career record: 402-222) without giving up their best prospect. Ifthe Yankees had done this, we’d have to hold an intervention for ESPN.com story commenters. Either way, Team Roy should form a pretty good 1-2 punch as the Phils try to get back to the World Series.
Bengals coach Marvin Lewis must be a glutton for punishment. Here are his starting wide receivers, or as I like to call it, the “Depth Chart of Crazy”:
Chad Ochocinco: Twitter-addicted egomaniac who legally changed his name to “eight-five” in Spanish. Budding reality TV star, possibly insane.
Terrell Owens: Egomaniacal cry baby who throws quarterbacks under the bus like temper tantrums: regularly. Budding reality tv star, probably insane.
Antonio Bryant: Labeled as a “bad character” guy dating back to his college days at Pitt, he repeatedly gets into fights with his coaches, probably because of his ego, which usually leads to him having to find a new team (or because he fails a drug test). Maybe insane.
See a trend here? Sidenote: Marvin’s starting running back is Cedric Benson… So good luck with all that…
I don’t know what took the Orioles so long, but Showalter is probably the best hire the Orioles could have made. He has a solid track record of getting his players to play disciplined baseball. Granted, he usually gets fired after three or four
There's a part of me that forgot this ever happened.
seasons because his players grow to hate him, but with 32 wins through July, the O’s aren’t really in a place to call the shots. One O’s fan reaction: “Did Showalter count how many times ‘major league worst’ can appear in one article about the Orioles before he took the position?” Needless to say, Buck will have his work cut out for him. First suggestion: hire this man! You can never have too many “Bucks.”
The rumor circulating was that the writer misidentified himself to Team LeBron. Silly ESPN, how dare they report something unflattering about a basketball player. Best leave that to those scalawags at Deadspin! And how come Bill Simmons wasn’t writing this piece? He knows more about Vegas and the NBA than anyone! Oh wait, it was because he was busy hopping off the Red Sox bandwagon to write a “This Third Place Boston Red Sox Team Doesn’t Entertain Me” article for the front page of sonsofsamhorn.com espn.com.
Orlando “El Duque” Hernandez made his minor league debut for the Washington Nationals’ Rookie League affiliate.
Duque is one of my favorite players of all time. He tells people he’s 44 years old but it’s probably closer to 46. Despite his World Series rings and career earnings over $34M, he’s still holding on to the dream. Or he’s broke. I hope it’s not the latter. Either way, I’ll be pulling for him.
That’s it for me. If you need me, I’ll be on a gigantic boat, resting my shoulder, preparing for one last summer push into the MLB playoff races and the start of football. Gotta make some room in my brain:
De-thawed corpse and Mr. Magoo-sports mogul Mike Brown is not the most beloved owner in the NFL, which is really saying something right now. But he still has fans in Pittsburgh, Baltimore, and even Cleveland, who have benefited from his leadership of the Bengals for years. In January, 
