Friday Foolin'

Jackpot, count it, etc.

(clip courtesy of YouTube)
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Friday FunStuff: It's No "Press Hop," But...

...you do, in fact, play to win the game.

(clip courtesy of Deadspin)
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Thursday ThumbTubes: From the Vault

I'd love to sit here and wax poetic about the reasons why it'd be awesome for the Chiefs to get a win on Sunday, but I'm gonna leave all that time and effort to the more professional sports bloggers. Instead, post-hop, some classic StubTube action. Be safe out there.

Some vintage Iron Mike:

"Spinal"



"Pussy"



What's up, Big Herm?



Two coaches, spanning a decade now, have not been able to get their guys to play to win the game at InVesCo Field and Mile High Stadium. Will Todd Haley be any different?

Of course, Coach Doogie has a different version of that mantra...



Do you need a reason to re-post the AI Practice Press Hop?



Of course you don't.

Let's go, Chiefs. Let's go win.
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Monday Mayhem: Brain Candy

Quite the week, HoGnation. Quite the week. Hot mitt in hand, I've taken the miniature lid off of my simmering (redacted) and peered into the stewed contents. I can neither sort them in any focus-related way, nor can I list them in any order of importance. I can offer feeble attempts at commentary, however, and I'll do just that after the jump. There won't be any shocking details or hints of genius; those are beyond my capacity. There will, however, be many misused words, typos, and inconsistencies in the form of idiocy and white supremacy. Those, I'm told, are my four tays.

As Cecil reported last night, the Denver Broncos have in fact acquired their man. The more-professional, and also more-dying sports journalists have put together a "story" full of facts and other nonsense, mostly painted with full-of-potential brushstrokes, and that's fine with me. There are, however, speculations that Pat Bowlen doesn't like to make these kinds of big hires, and in all honesty, who wouldn't admit that the selection process, even once it's complete, isn't stressful and nerve wracking. Granted, there's got to be a part of you that's pumped if you feel like you've pulled the trigger at precisely the right time.

And Bowlen may've done just that. He's got a young guy that's been around football his entire life, and, in his half dozen years with Robert Craft's organization, he's witnessed a ton of winning. A ton. There's also the angle that Denver was ahead of the game, or got to the best candidate first. And there's also a fresh blood/not-a-retread slant that will, at very least, instill a healthy sense of optimism throughout the organization. For your best examples of how this could go, one could look, if one was so inclined, to Al Davis' club. Not, of course, as a model of how to do things, but as historical references to signing super-young guys to run the show. Some feel that Jon Gruden is still, championship and all, an overrated coach. I think he's pretty good. The other side of that coin is Lane Kiffin. I'm not sure what folks really think about the kid; I think he got the rug pulled out far too early. Either way, the hire is an exciting one, one that, in my opinion, is better than getting a dude who's had the position elsewhere but been without success.

Championships are, of course, the ultimate Litmus, but I'm eager to see how Mos' Dan fares in this troubled division, and I'm also fascinated to see what kind of time he gets to get his prints on the operation and run with it. That is, I'll certainly be comparing it to the Herm Edwards regime in Kansas City, but only in aspects that are fair. Will he keep a standard mix of veterans on the roster? Gut things and go young? Will he finish 2009 above .500, then drop to four losses, and then to two? Well, I never really thought that was possible. Not in the modern-day NFL. I'm also a guy that's been wrong before. I've also been real damn wrong, and most recently, wronger than rufie-inspired sodomy, like I was with Edwards' '08 "effort." I mean, draw the comparison to your job or mine, and we're canned before Halloween. But you know, another tale, another time.

Seriously though, there are a few things that every new head coach must stomach when he slides into the new pair of snakeskins, and based solely on non-requests, here are the three that Denver Broncos Head Coach Josh McDaniels must suffer through before tabbing his mile-high slate a clean one.

First -- and keep in mind he has no choice in these matters -- he has got to completely destroy his first draft. Oh, no. I don't mean hit the thing out of the park. I mean destroy it. Literally. Like, he should draft all CU Buffaloes, or only Division II guys. He could Shanahananigan up the joint and take a bunch of defensive guys that blow, or have unwieldy egos, or a history of weapons charges, or hell -- all of the above. He should probably squander at least one pick via trading up or down in the process, too. For good measure.

Second, whether it's in the off-season, during camp, in the pre-season, or regular season, he has got to facilitate the consummation of the unsexiest, most fucktastic bromance of all time: the Cutlerfucker-Marmalard bukkake. It shall be the best-of-the-West, wearing-only-a-vest-while-fantasizing-of-Ryan Seacrest mutual masturbation phenomenon. The kicker, of course, is their must be footage. McDaniels can put it on the StubTubes. Cecil and Old No. 7 can watch it, rate it, and then vomit while worrying about the "partial" that it gave them, and then you know what? We can put this vial (Editor's Note: Betta' ax somebody.) of bad blood behind us all.

Finally. The most important thing that Shanny's replacement must accomplish is a Chiefs victory at InVesCo. Not in the last season of his reign. Not after Seven's daughter gets her driver license. Now. As in, 2009. It's gotta be legit, though. No throwing the game. No SpyGate Junior factor. A win. Just one. Why? Because eight years is e-fucking-nough, don't you think? Come on!

And then, once those teensy headaches are done and out of the way, he can get to workin' for the shield and keeping that torch of sustained excellence -- fire bans notwithstanding -- burning bright for the Centennial State.

Now then. There are the matters of a) What the crap is the status with the Chiefs' GM non-hiring, b) Tony Dungy stepping down in Indy, and c) Mike Tomlin tearing down the Great Wall of Bloachery, but frankly, this has exhausted me, and I need a nap. I do, however, have to get dinner ready for the missus, and so for now...
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Football. Nothing More, Nothing Less

I'll get to the various jersey-swaps taking place in Major League baseball soon enough, I think there's ample time between now and spring. For now, let's slog in the December mud of the NFL.

RBBAWB You've heard of Running Back By Committee. Your first-place club in the AFC West is currently employing the time-tested Running Back By Available Warm Body approach. We'll see how that pans out. I was contacted Wednesday by RB Coach Bobby Turner about a tryout, but we could not come to an agreement. The Broncos refused to pull No. 44 out of retirement for me (what the fuck has Floyd Little done lately?), they wouldn't guarantee me a roster spot and their signing bonus was pitiful. OK, I am somewhat of a prima donna, but this prima donna runs a 5.9 40 and hits the hole like an ornery moth. Their loss.

In my stead, Denver has promoted Cory Boyd from the practice squad to team up with Tatum Bell, P.J. Pope and possibly Selvin Young. That is one imposing quartet, a veritable Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Selvin's once again promising that he'll see some action, but let's just say that I'm not holding my breath. He seems a little, ahem, dainty these days.

It's been exactly one month since Bell was signed, and I doubt my opinion could have changed more in that span. Last month I was less than thrilled about the addition of the suitcase-swindling, always-underachieving tailback. At this moment, after Peyton Hillis became the fifth(!) Bronco RB this season to head to IR, I'm suddenly on board the Tatum-Train.

Fun fact about Tatum Bell, courtesy of Mr. Fun Fact himself, Jim Armstrong: We've all heard that Bell was selling cell phones at the mall when the Broncos called him in, but Armstrong revealed that it was the Aurora Mall. I don't mean to go all snobby on my Front Range shopping centers, but to say the Aurora Mall is sort of past its prime is to say that Mike Shanahan sort of likes cigarettes and tanning beds. I just assumed that Tatum was slingin' Crackberries at Park Meadow, Flatiron, maybe Cherry Creek. No wonder he couldn't afford to buy his old jersey number back from Jack Williams.

Sweet, Carolina Two teams that have considerably fewer backfield issues than the Broncos are the Tennessee Titans and Denver's Sunday opponent, the Carolina Panthers. Both clubs have really bad-ass RB platoons that hammer defenses all afternoon long. Unfortunately, there is an unwritten rule in sports that really bad-ass RB platoons need really fucking lame nicknames along the lines of "Thunder and Lightning." And sometimes, those nicknames end up in conflict with one another in ways that test the boundaries of reason. I hope all my fellow Prop 8 opponents will allow me to traffic in debunked cultural stereotypes: What you're about to read may be the gayest thing of all time.

Beat writers kind of have it made--free food, lots of free travel, and great free seats at every single game. Then they just write up what they saw in an easy-to-memorize formula with lots of overbaked cliches. Pretty good gig. All jobs, however, have their shitty aspects, and beat writers have two particularly gruesome ones. The first is massive amounts of naked athlete junk, which is a fairly disgusting occupational hazard. The other is the fact that pro athletes are mostly ignorant, illiterate, disrespectful, petty and juvenile. I have no doubt that when Lendale White heard that some other NFL team had the fucking audacity to steal his amazingly original intellectual property, he was genuinely hurt. And that is sad, because Smash and Dash is the kind of thing that 13-year-old boys think is the best (this comes from someone that proudly sported a Three Amigos shirt at 13) but the rest of us should sort of let go.

ANYWAY, my favorite part of that ESPN story was the comments section, where many, many Carolina fans jumped in to defend Smash and Dash as their sacred birthright. They even provided a footnoted timeline and documentation of the lineage of Smash and Dash. There is more scholarly research going into Smash and Dash copyright law than the human genome. And the epicenter of the field is Carolina Growl. Go there at your own risk, the more time I spent the more I wanted to put on a skintight cat suit and lick syrup off of a statue of a Confederate general. I know random message boards are not indicative of entire fanbases, but I feel comfortable in saying that your average Panther fan is a raving nutcase willing to duel over Smash and Dash. I'm pretty sure this controversy has led the Charlotte nightly news all week long, ahead of arrested governors and abducted toddlers.

What, pray tell, does this have to do with the Broncos-Panthers game Sunday? Not a damn thing. I just feel that Panther fans are major-league queers. That is all.

Fantasyland To all of you kicking off your fantasy football playoffs this week, congratulations and kiss my ass. While I hit home runs with my selections of Drew Brees, Anquan Boldin, Chris Johnson (that's "Dash" to you) and Eddie Royal, my downfall came via Steven Jackson, Torry Holt (yes, I picked TWO St. Louis Rams), and Carson Palmer (this league starts 2 QBs, I ended up platooning Frerotte and Orton, please stop laughing).

While my fantasy football management skills have diminished with the ball of marriage and chain of impending fatherhood, I'm still savvy enough to recognize its validity as a pastime. Let's go back to our pal Jim Armstrong, a sportswriter I once enjoyed due to his Palinesque "Joe Sixpack" schtick. Jimmy spoke for the average fan, don'tchaknow? As with most of the initial assessments I make, I was dead wrong about Jim Armstrong, who's the phoniest phony fuck you ever saw.

In his latest "blog" entry, Jimmy gave us this salient morsel concerning the Denver RB mess:

Three words of advice, fantasy-league nation: Don't go there.

Thanks, Jimmy, but I'll take my fantasy tips from someone who actually plays the game. Someone who doesn't look down upon "fantasy-league nation" with disdain and derision. You think that because you have access to the locker room you have some insight for a hobby played by nerds, dorks, and nobodies in their mom's basements? It's all about the numbers, Bubba! Just because you talked about fly-fishing with Ed McCaffrey once doesn't mean you know jack shit about fantasy football. So head on back to the press box, big guy, suck down another sausage with mustard and kraut, and regale us with tales for the common man.

If you want to know what Jim Armstrong thinks of you--you blog-reading, fantasy-playing, born-after-1959 sports fan, you--enjoy this masterpiece from Fire Joe Morgan. FJM retired a month or so ago, and I never even raised a glass to their excellence. Were there any justice in the world, this shitty blog would have shut down and FJM would remain. Sorry, America, you're stuck with us. And Jim Armstrong. Lousy freedom of the press...

What Up Big Herm? This is old news out there in Chief Nation, but I got a pretty big kick out of the rumors that Coach Herman may be the next coach at San Diego State. When asked about it:

"I've got a college team right now that I'm coaching," the embattled leader of the very youthful and 1-10 Kansas City Chiefs said with a laugh. "Next question."

Zing! Also causing consternation in Kansas City is the playing surface at Arrowhead Stadium. Apparently Bob Stoops and Gary Pinkel gave it a big thumbs-down following the Big XII Championship last Saturday, but college coaches (write this down, Herm) are by nature grumpy control freaks. They HATE anything they can't control.

Should Arrowhead just install the Fieldturf? I tend to think this is a rash step, because then you'll have to truck in alfalfa to feed the cheerleaders. ZING!

Real briefly, that last link came courtesy of The Pitch, the KC version of Westword. This publication is on the cutting edge of cock coverage.

The Perfect Season Your mighty Detroit Lions are close, and I did not want to jinx it until the record was in our sights. Expect the full-court HoG press on the Quest for the Impossible Dream soon, but in the meantime tell us your opinion in the Comments. What do you think, football fans? Can Detroit run the table, or will they stumble and win a game? Commenting is fun--you can cuss and make wildly untrue accusations about anyone. Just don't act like a total homo Panthers fan and ramble on about nicknames.

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Tuesday Tidbits: Hints of Hermgasm

This is a little too long, and quite painful on the ears, but somehow, the satire in it makes it worthy of posting:



And this might be the best thing I've ever seen.

(both doo-hickies courtesy of FireHerm.com.)
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All Herman All The Time

Here back about one year ago the guys that write on this site got together. We wanted to start a sports blog, but we had no idea what we'd focus on or anything. In the wake of the historic Colts-Bears Super Bowl and the complete lack of media attention on the race of the two head coaches (similar to the press' egregious oversight of the fact that Jerome Bettis is from Detroit), we thought about calling it the Black Coaches' Blog (or Bloachog for short). Instead you ended up with the House of Georges. Sorry.

While the Bloachog would have examined the black coach in minute and glorious detail, its true purpose would have been to chronicle the wisdom of Herman Edwards every single day. The man is like a father to me, a fountain of verbal kung fu that inspires me to better myself. I ask, actually demand that Bankmeister install Herman on our own little Mount Rushmore of icons on the right side of this page. And by the way, what ever happened to Bear Grylls?

Speaking of beefs I have with our site administrator, Banky did throw this post up over the weekend. Of course he did it while I was drunk and off duty, which is a pretty Jap move if you ask me. No disrespect to the Orientals.

While Bank did inform us that his Chiefs will select with the fifth pick in the upcoming draft, he withheld a key piece of comedic evidence from you the reader. Namely, the reaction of his head coach to the coin toss that gave KC the pick. Feel free to advance past the jump for the daily Hermanism...

After losing a coin toss and dropping to five, Herman tried to explain that five is better than three:

“I didn’t want a chance to flip,” Edwards said. “I wanted to be five. That was a good number for us. Five is good. I just felt all along we were going to be five. I thought Atlanta would win the coin toss.”

Of course you did, Herman. Just for good measure, here's another Hermanism, courtesy of Arrowhead Addict, concerning KC's free agency wish list:

"We might have champagne taste, but we’ve got beer money."

AA rightfully points out that the Chiefs are $20 million under the cap. That's a lot of beer.

We'll try and stay on top of the Herman beat, with no help from our correspondent in Kansas City.

Update: Since I was already mocking our Administrator and attempting to shame him into making site changes, I was about to coerce him into adding this link. Then I went to the site and looked at the counter. Jesus. When I first checked that place out it was around 1.4 million hits. That was two weeks ago. Last week it was at 2.2, today it's 3.4. White people really, really like that place. So check it out, but make sure you do so with the understanding that it's now way too popular and it's no longer edgy or cool.

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