Don’t you just love the MANDATORY 14-hour marathon watches? I sure does. But shiiiiiit fahr, is it difficult to remember enough about it all for recap purposes.
Execpt that Denver won, thanks to some remarkably dumb Q4 play from the otherwise career-day-throwing Strawberry Fields. That really was…a game that happened. A 28-7 beating, turned completely around by Charmslinger, UDFA Jaleel McLaughlin, and a defensive scoop and score. Oh, with the dagger provided by Lionel Hutz (from 51) after Chi**** went for it on 4th and 1 inside the Donks’ 20. And failed miserably. 31-28, good guys.
The shame stank lingers, though. The Bearistocrats were just very, very, very committed to losing this fixture.
(above photo h/t Rikki) Surprisingly enough, they didn’t cancel the rest of the slate!
They could have at least gone back in time and cancelled ATL/Duval. Remember when the London game would sometimes bleed into RedZone hour? No worry when Arthur Smith is in the building. They went into half down 17-nil, managed their only score on the opening possession of Q3….and proceeded to play out the string as if in quicksand. London’s beloved Jaguras wisely just went all “don’t fuck up” and took their two FG opportunities to win 23-7. Never in doubt, barely took us to noon EST.
Because The Shield is determined to Make Fetch Happen, JAX will stay in Merry Old England, and face Bills Mafia next week.
That is, the whire hot Bills Mafia, who have been curbstomping all comers since losing the 9/11 game to MILF-Hunter Z. Talk about net shifts – Miami went from +50 last week to -28 in WNY. Net swing of 78 points – that has to be a salary cap era record, right? Anyway, 48-20 was the final, and it could have been worse had Buffalo needed it to be. So much for the showcase game of the day, unless you are a Bills supporter (enjoy it, Rev).
Perhaps the story of the early season was #ThePauls defensive unit, which put opposing offenses in a vice during their 2-1 start. But lo, today they had to turn the quartered backing over to The Picture of Dorian Thompson-Robinson (the talk of the pre-season, and you know how predictive THAT always is). It…did not go well for the home team (3.4 YPA, 3 pickerceptions). They were lucky not to get shut out, and that Lamar! spent most of the 2nd half in cruise control mode. 28-3, Ratbirds.
2023 version of the Philadelphia Iggles? Just plain weird. It’s like there is a glitch in the matrix (no, I have not seen the movie – and will not), though they still flash in spurts, usually AJ Brown and/or Th’Andre Swift. But they also fuck around, play passively (especially on defense), and fail to put teams away. PHI was crap both early and late, allowing Rebecca Malone to complete a long drive (with under 2:00 and just one timeout), with the tying score coming at 0:00.
But yes, TYING – because “Riverboat” Ron chose not to go for two. They won the coin flip, took the ball…and netted 5 total yards. Hurts almost fucked up the winning FG taking a horrid grounding penalty on 2nd down. But they picked up around 10 on 3rd and forever, enabling Jake Elliott to nail a 54-yarder and rob humanity of the possible draw. 34-31, Iggles. Not looking Superb Owl worthy.
Oy, though. They don’t look like Team WKRP. As widely reported, Joe Burrow can hardly walk, let alone move within (or surely not outside of) the pocket. Despite these limitations, Burrow kept his uniform pretty clean in last Monday’s win. Mike Vrabel was far less kind, and blitzed the ever-loving fuck out of him. He’ll (meaning Burrow) be hitting the oxy bottle pretty hard tonight, you’d think. El Tractorcito‘s jump pass TD ended the competitive portion of the game right before HT, with the rest of the “action” just spent grinding Cincy into dust. 27-3, Tits. Pretty much Peak Tits, so long as they punted well (we’ll wait for DonT to weigh in).
As scotchnaut noted early on, Coach Epps has made his coaching bones by almost always making his layups. But maybe Yinzburgh is out of hat-rabbits, or the 500s are simply no longer a layup. Probably both. Anyway, CJ Stroud looked great (again), Uncle Jack rattled by pressure (again) – and then had to leave the game with a knee owie. We’ll see if it’s serious, but I sense that it is. Bollo del Verdad, come on down! Final score – HOU 30, PIT 6. And it very much reflected the balance of play.
Indy looked to go the same way of Pittsburgh, getting shellacked by visiting RRRRRRRRRRRAM IT! But Bill Maher missed multiple, would-be-clinching FGs – and the D finally broke down, allowing three Fat Hump TDs in the 2nd half. Both attempted two pointers also hit, so 23-zip became 23-all. Neither team could take its chances late in regulation, so OT is what we got. Pretty much out of nowhere, Fat Sackford got his shit together and rallied the troops for a game-winning TD drive. Richardson never saw the ball in OT, as Pookie the Rookie finally scored his first NFL touchdown for a 29-23 escape job. Both teams are 2-2, en route to 6-11.
MRSA looked downright sickly on Monday night, but Emo Carr with an arm owie was just the tonic they needed. Don’t ask Baker Mayfield to do too much, and you just might have a winning – or at least competitive – formula. Bucs led from start to finish, usually by 8+ points. Final margin was 26-9, only a slight exaggeration of the gap in quality between these two perplexing squadrons. Mike Evans did his hamstring, though. If he’s out for long, I don’t see much hope – even in a dire NFC South.
Good Lord, those wacky Black Panthers. Thanks to a Dingleberry pick-6 and a 2nd bad pick late in the half, Charlotte’s finest got staked to 10-0 and 13-7 leads. But Brian Flores’ unit (PHRASING) mustered a defensive score of their own in the 2nd half, plus one to Justin Jefferson (who had a really good day despite Dingleberrry throwing a mere 19 forward passes – 12 complete to his teammates – for the game). Bryce Young got to the red zone late, but came up well short. 21-13, Minnesota finally has a win in their ledger.
Only three AGAIN in the late window, but this time without any surprise competitiveness (Hippo wrote at HT, stupidly).
Zeke came to the Metroplex, for a “revenge game” against his former fellow Compersons. Redshirt captured the essence of this fixture, succinctly and perfectly – The Legend of White Mac – Denouement. Grumblelord finally put him down in Q4, mercifully(ish). Enjoy the Bailey Zappe era, all! Dallas gets well, 38-3. Largest margin of defeat in Grumblelord’s head coaching career. Spanning 29 years.
Black Powder and some AI-generated placeholder WR named “Michael Wilson” showed some gumption, cutting an early 21-3 Tomsulas lead all the way down to 21-16. But that just made Santa Clara pay attention, with Purdy Mouth and McCaffrey grinding the Qards into 35-16 dust. Give them credit, Arizona is playing hard for Jonathan Gannon, but they ain’t beating the NFC’s best team in their (library quiet) building.
Words cannot aptly describe how stupid the Clippers are. Facing a green, late round rookie QB (a Rod Favra clone with AOC initials, give us all your memes), they fucked around for no reason. Up 24-7 at the half, they completely checked out. All of a sudden, it’s 24-17 with 4 minutes to play. Coming up a half-yard short on 3rd down, Brandon Staley did the EXACT SAME DUMBASS THING he did late last week. This time, he QB sneaks from his own 34. Herbert the Duck is tall, but not particularly strong. They can’t really do the Philly “rolling tank” play. But sneak they do, and fail. And just like last week, they pay no price for their chucklefuckery (this was a way dumber gamble, I can see the argument against giving the ball back to Cousins/Jefferson), as Asante Samuel picked off AOC to wrap up the win.
UH, or so Samuel thought. A more game-aware fella might have noted 2:30 still on the clock, and the Raiders still having a timeout. That means the most likely/cautious outcome gets Vegas the ball back, with maybe 70 seconds to work a miracle. So…why would Samuel SLIDE DOWN AT HIS OWN 7, with acres of green grass ahead of him? Because Clippers du Merde are a moronic organization, from soup to nuts. Predictably, 2 runs get no yards. Now, you still reckon to run, and burn almost half the remaining clock. Remember – the opponent basically has no QB. Odds of going 60 yards in 70 seconds are quite slim. But no – they not only throw, but also take a DEEP SHOT to the boundary. To Herbert’s credit, he completes it – but fuck a duck, talk about “good result, bad process.” 24-17, Clips back to 2-2 and Raiders ahead of the Donks at 1-3 (on goal differential, hee hee).
Also, Khalil Mack sacked AOC/Favra six motherfucking times. I don’t care how immobile that fat fuck QB is, 6 sacks is impressive work.
That leaves SNF, an awful Chefs at Jest matchup. NBC thanks their lucky ratings stars for the “Swifties” effect. Q-aron (with new/terrible mustache) is also in the house, so I guess nobody has to talk about the actual game. Except Hippo. But this is why y’all pay me the BIG (imaginary) bucks. That said, when it’s 17-nil with 3 and change left in the first QUARTER? What the fuck really is there to say? Was Taylor Swift in Blake Lively’s box, or was Blake Lively in Taylor Swift’s box? YOU make the call!
Unpredictably, Noo Yawk stormed all the way back, tying things at 20 early in Q3. But that was as far as the Jest offense could get. Gangrene’s defense continue to make life very, very difficult for Mahomes (who apparently has never seen a LB drop into coverage in his life), such that KC had to run to get in FG position, then even MOAR to bleed the last 5-6 minutes off the clock. Aaaaaannnnd…one defensive holding call that really set Robert Saleh off. Anyway, Mahomes slid down at the 2 rather than take an extra score (and give the ball back), so 23-20 it ended. Much better game than expected, and maybe Z will live to MILF-hunt another week or two. Hippo’s apologies to Monkey Trev, who had to be looking forward to Week 5.
Found a funny (re: former Abercrombie and Fitch CEO Mike Jeffries):
“He looks like Gary Busey went bobbing for apples in a bucket of bees”
Hey Horatio, still having problems with your neighbors’ cows???
“Two criminal complaints filed last month in the Sundance Circuit Court allege that Patrick Sean Carroll, who is 66 this year, and his son Tucker Kye Carroll, who is 34 this year, funneled 189 heifers and six bulls into a chute and bleach-dyed them to get a neighbor’s attention after three years of having the cattle cross onto their land.
Some of the heifers had penis shapes bleached onto their bodies, according to an evidentiary affidavit written by Crook County Sheriff’s Deputy Alex Jessen.”
https://cowboystatedaily.com/2023/09/28/wyoming-ranchers-accused-of-bleaching-penis-shapes-onto-neighbors-cows/
Outstanding.
The cow issue has been resolved. The State extended the roaming dog law to livestock effective this July. The town decided to enforce that right after another neighbor and I went to a Board meeting and told them they were going to get sued to hell and back when one of those things got hit by a car.
$92 fine, every day, per cow. Fucking guy had them rounded up the next day, which should tell you what kind of an asshat he is.
But man, if only I had a chute, some bleach and some penis-shaped forms to…wait, why did they have penis-shaped forms?
Janis Joplin died in this motel, room 105. You can still stay the night in there.
I’m pretty sure someone has died in most motel rooms
“Lets not talk about the number that died behind Canadian motel dumpsters.”
-S. Naut, Ontario
Yes, but they were nobodies.
Do Bob Crane next!
John Belushi died here. Between here and Janice Joplin’s death site is the Lenny Bruce death site. I drove past it but didn’t take a photo.
Happy Monday all, I keep forgetting I can talk before the night game starts!
What decadence! I went Carney’s anyway!
Bless it all I already ate my lunch and I’m still hungry
Zero traffic on the Sunset Strip:
Hey guys. I have no idea how this stuff finds it’s way onto my feed. But Maria here apparently is Bologna’s answer to Napoli’s Marika.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4_G7HHJ0GE&pp=ygUKbXkgYm9sb2duYQ%3D%3D
I am wincing looking at that boob sunburn. And I’m not sure I would have tried to match my dress color to my skin damage color
WOOOOOO MARIA!!
Regression to the mean is absolutely breaking a lot of Patriots fans lately. It’s kinda funny watching people calling for Belichick to get fired, and for the Krafts to sell the team. Forgetting what the past 20 seasons had. I’m going to the Saints game on sunday. It should be interesting to say the least.
Boots of the ground!
Skoal in the Hair!
Done
“Boots of the Ground: The Jim Tomsula Story”
It is a stunningly beautiful day in L.A. today and there’s no traffic.
Yeah, today’s awesome. Gonna get hot this week for some stupid reason.
Pink’s Hot Dogs on La Brea
11 AM 10/2/23 (right now)
I drove past and it was absolutely empty. In almost 30 years in L.A., a lot of it working in actual Hollywood, this is only the second time I’ve ever been here (first time was almost 30 years ago). It’s not bad.
It was a spur of the moment stop. I was actually looking at a nearby billboard for Carney’s Hot Dogs on the Strip and was thinking about going there. I haven’t been there this century either.
I rarely come into Hollywood anymore yet traffic is really light. Is it a holiday?
I’ve sat in that exact same table!!
I have trouble keeping track of all the holidays, too. Christmas and Thanksgiving should really be enough.
Don’t you go speaking ill of any nonsense that results in a paid day off! I may be unemployed, but I still won’t tolerate that blasphemy!
People should just be allowed to have floating “fuck it, I am reading with my cat and turning phone off” days, to use whenever.
They do, they’re called “personal days”.
Traffic was SUPER light this morning and as I stare out my window in DTLA, I see traffic is still light.
No idea why.
Same here. Super easy drive to work. All of last week was friendly too.
I figured it was all of Newsome’s librul gestapo tactics driving the god fearin Murricans out of the state to someplace where there isn’t a war on freedom.
Well done Hippo.
/sometimes he cracks me up
Derek Carr really digging Jimmy Butler’s new look.
I uh,,,humbly request abstaining from a “20 Questions” here…
It’s a Media Day thing. He does it so that his official team photograph (that will get used many times throughout the year) features a fun hairstyle like this. Last year it was dreads.
Going with the Karen look I see.
HE WOULD LIKE TO SPEAK TO THE MANAGER RIGHT NOW
Nawt quite up to Lil Nas X standard (he is the reason I have hope for GenZ) but still diggin it
I understand that I am a very, very weird humanoid. But sanity check me here – am I correct in my belief that clients deciding to start TEXTING you instead of the equally easy (but preservable as attorney/client communication) e-mail…is a MASSIVE FUCKING violation of the social contract??
Consult your closest law-talkin’-guy.
You mean the bathroom mirror? Nah, all that guy would do is encourage him to open up the medicine cabinet and see what kind of prizes are waiting within.
You’re NOT WRONG! – Other H., Apex, NC
https://youtu.be/SHWrmIzgB5A?si=Wky8xDgB0f07QQS4
They swear to God this song is somehow NOT about being on the beak.
I love that despite the airplane wifi not loading this, I knoe exactly which song is posted here. And I’ve seen it live!
I’ve received multiple texts for business. The difference for me is that I have a business phone the company pays for.
If they are not giving you a work phone, you shouldn’t be doing work on your phone.
My work phone is a tad bit austere
Starting to do so, no issue, but continuing to do so after you’ve told them why it’s a bad idea, total red flag
It should be a no no but no longer is. At my last company, text proliferated, both internally and with clients and suppliers. I hate it but it became the norm.
I worked in a studio where the spectrum VFX supervisor would text me . . . He was sitting in the same suite ten feet away from me, in easy speaking range. I would reply on post-it notes that I would tape to his monitor while he was sitting there.
thanks Alton
Who the fuck is Alton?
Alton Brown, he used to only draw/reply on postits and take pictures of the notes to post on the tweeter.
I see. Very well then.
Not as weird as never having seen The Matrix.
I only ever saw a pirated pre-release of the Matrix, and I’ve quite happily never seen Titanic
Titanic? Worth seeing for the effects. The story is hot garbage.
Yeah what part of “for the record” don’t they understand?
Oldest is a university professor. You should see some of the “correspondence” she gets from our finest young minds.
My best friend from undergrad recently went back to NC State as an engineering professor. She is almost intimidatingly smart, but her shared “shock and awe” at the laxity of the student generation is 100% on point.
She was like “could you IMAGINE ever e-mailing a professor and leading off with “Hey,”
Verily, I could not.
“Hey Asshole, how’s about an A on that assignment?”
Yeah she gets that a lot. Even got a “hey Prof” from a grad student. She “yo failed” him back. Teaching languages BTW…
The lady sitting next to me on this flight is literally twiddling her thumbs, I’ve never seen it before to this extent. It’s weirdly distracting to see twiddling out of the corner of your eye while reading
Olivia Manning has all kinds of techniques she’s happy to share to get someone to stop fidgeting. With the caveat that a few of them are “not CPS-approved.”
It’s an ADD thing, especially when you’re doing nothing with nothing to divert your attention.
She’s since ceased and has arms crossed, has been watching a movie the whole time though. Great manicure, so she doesn’t pick at her fingernails, so not sure it’s ADD
Evolution of a fan.
It’s not that this is the first time I’ve wanted to see Travis Kelce’s leg shattered into multiple pieces to the point that they literally have to clean up the bone fragments and ligament shreds off the turf with a wet-dry vac, but the addition of the Swifties makes me really really want to see that. More than ever before, which was already kind of a lot.
I’m both amused and disturbed that you’re including the vacuum type in your Kelce snuff fantasy
Did the Dr. Mrs. (Ret) help with that?
She did not, though I’m confident that she’d approve.
I bought one of those “space age, you’ll never need another razor!” single-blade dealies. That razor makes my face feel like it’s on a movie. Last week, it was There Will Be Blood. This morning, Reservoir Dogs, the “Stuck in the Middle with You” scene.
If you reach “Carrie at the Prom” status, seek medical help immediately.
I need like a Nerf version of a razor for my shaky hands. Never gonna try one of those single straight blade ones
I’m with you. Don’t need to up the degree of difficulty when it comes to shaving.
What I miss is that old-timey hard-core menthol shaving cream, where it makes your face numb.
“That sounds awful. I’d be happy to take it off your hands and, uh, properly dispose of it for you.” – scotchnaut
.
Meanwhile, the Raiders are living up to my every expectation for them this season!
In other news, there are eight more pool play games remaining in the Rugby World Cup. I think Wales and France have clinched spots in the quarterfinals, and it would take blatant match-fixing by Ireland and Scotland to keep South Africa out. But a lot of other stuff is still in play. Ireland-Scotland (Saturday 10 a.m.) and Argentina-Japan (Sunday 2 a.m.) are the two upcoming games to get excited about next weekend.
England and Wales have clinched, if France loses to Italy there’s a good chance they don’t make the quarterfinal.
Ah, that’s right; for some reason I had it in my head that New Zealand and Italy were the ones playing against each other. But France losing to Italy is definitely a pretty big “if”.
EDIT: I see why I thought that – I got France’s situation mixed up with England’s.
My rugby knowledge can be fit inside a thimble, but one of my few tenets is that Italy is never, ever any sort of threat to a serious participant?
I actually haven’t seen them play, but you’re probably right. I would expect them to hold their own at auto racing, fencing, and garrotting though
They’re not terrible but there tend not to be all that many truly *shocking* results in rugby. Italy advancing would be about an 8 on the shock-o-meter.
(it would be nice to have a BOLTMAN graphic for that)
hips thrust enthusiastically
It’s a bit more probable with Dupont out after Namibia broke his jaw, but that’s more likely to hinder them in later rounds rather than against Italy
You would really like rugby though, we can take you through a game at some point if you want. It’s clear how closely related it is to american football, to the point that you have to touch down a try giving birth to the term touchdown even though we don’t require that anymore. Also interesting from a player safety POV, since the rules actually allow them to play full-contact with fewer injuries of lesser severity, although there’s still a lot of toughness required
I saw my little sister play intramurals (at NC State) once, she is 5’11” and likes violence (ie, had two older brothers and played football with us). She was whatever the outside runner position is, and she made one of the touched downs where I got to see the “set ball in end zone and smack palm down.”
It looked like a blast to play, I just could make no sense of it. My brain has these weird blind spots like that. Foreign languages are another.
It does take a bit to get used to the flow, especially when used to the whole forward pass thing. It may help to think of it as one of those desperate last NFL plays where there’s a ton of laterals to keep the play alive, because that’s almost exactly what’s happening with the exception that tackles don’t end the play, but are almost a sort of really inefficient lateral a lot of the time since the person being tackled can release the ball backwards in such a way as to get it to a nearby teammate
Oh, and Fiji is also probably in, they just need a single point from their match against Portugal, and as I observed yesterday the Portuguese rugby team is pretty rubbish
Yeah, Fiji’s definitely in very good shape.
It’s a good thing I don’t have Sunday Ticket anymore. It seems like a waste of money if your team is just going to suck out loud. Why would you want to watch your team shit the bed and pay for the privilege?
Or if your team is going to run headfirst into the buzzsaw known as THE NARRATIVE.
Or both, of course.
Because I HATE MYSELF that’s why, Mister Man!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGfLFmlU8zo&ab_channel=mikepolkjunior
This is old, but relevant as ever.
AFC South gentrification update: still seedy, but now with cool hang out spots
Surly Duff growls his appreciation
Ryan Stonehouse: two punts, one inside the 20 (✔️), one inside the 10 (😁). He’s dependable, and K Nick Folk too.
It’s all about the O-line. That’s the Tits Test for Suckcess.
On a scale of Belichick to Eli Manning with a juice box, how happy do you think Chase Claypool was after the Bears gave away the game yesterday?
Tennessee just released the blueprint for beating the Calfless Joe Burrow-led Bengals: Press the receivers, Strong Zone on Intermediate Routes, Send Everyone Not On Pass Defense to the ballcarrier.
Burrow can’t throw deep, so the defense can play closer to the line of scrimmage and defend the Line to Gain. He still has the accuracy so you can’t Jailbreak Blitz every play, but he doesn’t have the mobility to extend the play, and he can’t pick up 5-10 yards if the defense leaves an empty space in the middle of the field committing to the pass rush or routes.
Its not a lack of ability or panicking. You can see Burrow trying to do what he always does; he just can’t do it right now. The sooner the Bengals can figure out, the better chance they’ll have to salvage the season and maybe have a more-mobile Burrow available in December.
The AFC North is going to be a gauntlet. Browns are averagely-average. Steelers are still trying to figure it out. Ravens are the only team with a chance to run away with the division, but not quite there yet.
11 wins may be enough. McCarron may get you there. Perhaps even Browning with this offense. But not Burrow. Not at the moment.
Seems like a no-brainer that resting Burrow until he heals and maybe losing a handful of games with a backup before he can come back would be far better than delaying his recovery and risking him doing a RG3 while still losing games because he can barely limp. I don’t understand how the AMA lets any NFL medical staff keep their licenses.
No brainer and Cincinnati go together like hippo and opiates
I very much enjoyed the first bit of real football I was able to watch this season!
The Bearsenscheisse continued, I met a few nice Bills fans and one horrible Bills fan who I wish I could have punched in the face. In addition to stealing my seat, she also kept loudly complaining that Red Zone wasn’t only showing the Bills game at the end of the early game window when there were multiple close games.
The seat stealing thing actually kind of worked out for me though, since some very nice Vikings fans offered me a seat with them. The NFC North really is the friendliest division, we talked about Birdmurderdome, Urlachers new career selling baldness cures, and how funny it is that the Bears are building a bigger stadium when they can’t actually fill Soldier except for Packers games, so they’re basically just making room for more Cheeseheads.
The Commies might actually be a pretty good team next year, if they’re able to overcome the Snyderstench and retain players. The offense held up to the Iggles far better than expected, and if the game wasn’t such a ‘learning moment’ for their rookie CB the defense would have been pretty damn effective.
And Congrats on the Donks win! It may only be against the Bears, but in a week where Fields managed to be cromulent for much of the game that’s still worth something
I regret that I have but one +1 to give this, just for Bearsenscheisee alone.
*Bearsenscheisse, because fuck your editing desires