Sport

I find myself going "oh my god shut up, Romo" at least six times a game. He's just annoying and he didn't use to be. His issues were evident during the Bengals-Bills game. His preferred guy wasn't playing well, but he couldn't STFU about great he is. Collinsworth does this too. If a guy is a good player you don't have to spend the entire broadcast GUSHING about him. Just be normal. 

You know who's great? Greg Olsen. His call of the Cowboys disastrous last possession against San Francisco is what every analyst should be. He's my new number one guy. 

8 minutes ago, PaleVermilion81 said:

 

I get it. Your team lost. That sucks. But wow that was not a phantom call. 

 

 

My mistake. The initial TV view only showed the batted pass and I missed this clip. Still, that was the least impactful because the Bengals stopped them three plays later anyway. I think my other points stand. 

Also, I need to be clear, officials aren't the only reason the Bengals lost. They had plenty of chances to go take it and didn't. It's just lame when it feels like the field isn't level. 

12 minutes ago, See Red said:

The NFL has a huge officiating problem but this seems like people just looking for something to be upset about because the team they wanted to win didn't.

On the intentional grounding, Burrow threw the ball straight to the ground seven yards away from the nearest eligible receiver to avoid a sack.  Seven yards!  He threw the ball seven yards from a player that was 11 yards away from him.  That's intentional grounding.

 

 

Come on, nobody genuinely believes that isn't intentional grounding even by the loose interpretation the league uses for what's a realistic chance of completion. 

 

The third down play was blown dead by an official running onto the field waving his hands above his head before/during the play. By rule the play didn't happen and wouldn't have happened even if the Chiefs had converted.

Genuinely baffling to me that these plays are being held up as examples of the Bengals getting screwed.

Even the "missed holds" on that last play people are talking about would've been ticky tack calls.  The rulebook specifically addresses holding that occurs when a defender does a rip technique and that it should not be called.

Again, Mahomes did the same thing - no call. Chris Jones hands to the face on that play - no call. Missed two blocks in the back on the Chiefs punt return. Phantom defensive holding that gave the Chiefs a first down on their third down do-over, which didn't end up mattering much because the Bengals forced a punt on the next set of downs, but still. A lot had to go wrong for the Ossai play to matter. The entire gripe is they put the flags away for one team, but kept throwing them on the other. I don't think that's an unreasonable stance. 

5 hours ago, See Red said:

I was cheering for Cincy but I didnt think the officiating was that bad.  Regarding the third down play, they showed a replay of one official clearly running onto the field calling the play dead right after the ball was snapped and before Mahomes attempted the pass because the clock was running after an incomplete pass on the previous play.  There is no legitimate argument that the play should have counted when you have an official running onto the field waving his hands above his head in the middle of it.  It wasn't handled well but the primary issue was the official saying to start the clock on his signal.  The intentional grounding was very much intentional grounding.  It wasn't in the direction nor the vicinity of the RB.  The late hit is a penalty every single time.  I do remember a weak PI call against the Bengals, though. 

 

It was par for the course as far as NFL officials goes. Nothing that egregious imo. 

I don't agree. Close enough to Perine to not be called most of the time - Burrow's been doing that all year without a flag. Then Mahomes does the exact same thing the next possession and they didn't get a flag. Either call it the same or don't call it. Also they missed Chris Jones hands to the face on Burrow's intentional grounding. The way you handle the extra third down botch is you don't flag a non-existent defensive holding on the do-over third down play to give them a whole new set of downs. A little make-good there for the Bengals would've been the just course of action. And you call the blocks in the back on the punt return that gave KC an extra 20 yards. 

Not saying it was rigged because I'm not an idiot. It's simply Hanlon's Razor in action. The Chiefs got some help in the second half that the Bengals didn't and all I'm saying is that's a bummer of an outcome. 

that. That fourth quarter was an officiating joke. Worst officiated game I’ve seen since Super Bowl XL. I liked the part when they gave the Chiefs a fifth down and then had the balls to throw a defensive holding flag on it. If you’re gonna get :censored:ed by the officials it might as well be in a new and creative way. 
 

That wasn’t on the level and everyone here knows it. The out of bounds play was a penalty for sure, but the curious part is where the entire chiefs oline got to zip tie our defensive line in the same play. Also, they missed a rulebook block in the back on the last punt return, but I guess the Bengals should’ve won by two scores so I’m not allowed to be mad, right? 
 

Eagles by three touchdowns. 

17 hours ago, infrared41 said:

 

My reaction will more likely be "who?" because I stopped following MLB about 4 years ago.  Advanced stats may improve your chances of winning or whatever stupid bull- they're supposed to do, but they have sucked every bit of enjoyment out of watching a game.

 

This is what I think of when I see "where actual value in baseball comes from"...

 

• Left handed hitters constantly grounding out to right field
• Strike outs and more strikeouts. And then some more strike outs
• Walks
• Home runs and not much else
• More guys hitting .210 than .280, but hey, their OBP+WAR x Velocity Angle + (y) = Exit velocity x Spin means they might accidentally make contact and accidentally hit a home run so screw the guy who consistently puts the ball in play. Three true outcomes or die, bitches!
• Pitchers who are trying to throw the ball as hard as they can instead of actually, you know, pitching
• A sport where players like Tony Gwynn and Rod Carew would have never made the big leagues
• A sport where a guy like Dave Kingman would now be a superstar

Baseball went from being fun to being like watching a spreadsheet take place in a stadium and you can keep it. I'm not wasting 4 and a half hours of my time watching a game of Microsoft Office Baseball.

I agree with all of this. I watched fewer than 20 games last year, which would've amazed 2012 me. That was mostly because our Silver Spoon dumbass owner dared me not to watch, but still I wasn't really tuning into any other games around the league. I've tried to get into Ohtani and some other star players and for whatever reason I just don't care anymore.

I think the worst thing about baseball right now is so many of the teams aren't doing all they can to win. You have teams in contention who are selling trade pieces at the deadline, actively not trying to make the playoffs. That's a huge problem. Imagine if the Ravens, Steelers, and Browns had done nothing to improve this offseason in order to win a very winnable division. That's the NL Central right now! 4 teams are going to just give it to the Cardinals. 

I felt a little bit melancholy when Rolen news came out because it reminded me of the last time the Reds mattered as a civic institution here. Now they feel like an outdated business that you can't believe people still use. Like Jai Alai or a travel agency or something. 

15 hours ago, ManillaToad said:

 

"Who cares?" is a great mentality to have when putting together a Hall of Fame

 

it's my mentality because none of this is serious business. It's just sports. 

18 hours ago, BBTV said:

And if you don't think that playing in Philadelphia or New York or Boston is harder than playing in St. Louis or Cincinnati, I just don't know what to tell you.

The extent to which it matters is WAY overblown. Especially by you. I don't know where you got this idea that a guy good enough to make the hall of fame would only able to do it because he didn't have to play in a pressure cooker market, but it's really dumb. I don't know where you got this perception that cities outside of the Northeast are cultureless tumbelweed farms. None of these cities are Cousinfukk, Arkansas, they still have to deal with fan backlash, annoying media questions, and the pressure of performing because the difference between millions and the minors is like 3 hits a week. Also their opponents are the same major leaguers they'd see if they played in New York or Boston. The game's hard everywhere even if you're not being harrassed by 45,000 BBTVs every night. 

1 minute ago, infrared41 said:

 

All due respect, I take WAR almost as seriously as I took Tank's annual suicide threats. That aside, my point was that Williams and Rolen are essentially the same player. And neither of them are Hall of Famers.

Rolen is a fringe guy that I could've gone either way on and I always tend to lean towards just putting the fringe guys in because who cares. Matt Williams is a no, though. He was also probably on the juice, which I don't personally care about, but if you're not even a fringe guy and you were on the juice then no. 

Rolen is just the start and I want to caution you guys so you're ready for it - The voting bloc for the hall of fame is changing and along with it is thinking about where actual value in baseball comes from. Also Harold Baines and Jerry Reinsdorf lowered the line forever.  There's going to be a lot more guys in the next two decades who get in who your initial reaction will be "THAT GUY'S NOT A HALL OF FAMER".  Just get ready for that. 

8 minutes ago, infrared41 said:

 

 

And he was pretty good throughout his career, but players need to be more than pretty good to be in the HOF.  Ask Matt Williams.

 

Matt Williams 46 WAR doesn't match Rolen's 70. 

2 hours ago, BBTV said:

I don’t think it’s a “hall of stats”. He couldn’t handle bright lights (not that the lights were too bright in those days) and could only thrive in anonymity.

First of all, he was pretty good in his Phillies years so "he couldn't thrive in the "bright" lights" isn't even true. Second, he didn't go to Nunavut - He played before way more people in his St. Louis years than he did in his Philadelphia days when the Vet was an empty hole so LOL at "anonymity". The game's hard everywhere. You act like athletes have never struggled with fans or media anywhere else besides Philadelphia. I don't know how to convince you that you're not special.

2 hours ago, BBTV said:

His contributions to the one championship team were minimal,

 

He was pretty good in the 06 WS, but also it's baseball where a guy could go 5 for 5 with 5 home runs and his team can lose. You can't hold only one ring against him. 

2 hours ago, BBTV said:

and he’s irrelevant to the “story of the game”. 
 

he also answered a reporter who asked if he could tell the fans more about himself “if you want to get to know me, I’ve got some bad news”. 

 

What does that have to do with anything?

2 hours ago, BBTV said:

 

if you emphasize stats then sure. And if that’s your measurement for what a HOFer is then that’s your opinion and that’s fine.  I feel differently. But the toothpaste is long out of the tube. 

You feel differently than almost every voter. How else would you measure what a HOFer is? Their Q score? 

8 minutes ago, Unocal said:

 

He needs to be better when it matters most. He never has been and never will be.

 

I think BUF and DAL need to swap QB's. They need a change of scenery

Where do you come up with this stuff? This is Baylessian. 

If Josh Allen's defense hangs on for 13 more seconds I firmly believe he and the Bills would've won the Super Bowl last year. He was perfect in the playoffs last year and lost for reasons fully outside of his control. He was also injured this season. 

1 hour ago, BBTV said:

Scott Rolen: “"You don't think about this," Rolen said on MLB Network. "You think about trying to do the best you can, play for your team and play the game as best you can, and there's such a long road. I never thought that the Hall of Fame was going to be the answer."

 

Also Scott Rolen: “waaah, fans are mean, the team is bad, I’m not playing here so you need to trade me, waaaaah”. 
 

GD coddled baby that had to go to the softest place in the world to play because he had such thin skin. Screw him.  Scott Rolen is, and always has been, a coward. Cool, he won a WS. Lame selection based strictly on stats and not impact. 

You're going to make me say nice things about the Cardinals? Not cool. Stats are what we have to go off of. I'll ignore all the Philly Feelings grudge holding from over two decades ago because that's, frankly, a really silly thing to still be going on about. I'll just say he's got the 9th highest WAR by a third baseman ever, 8 gold gloves, 7 all stars games, RotY, key contributor on all those undeniably good Cardinals teams, played on a half dozen division championship teams*, and was on a couple World Series teams. To say he was not impactful is just incorrect. 

*including two for the Reds and winning the division with the Reds should count twice because look at us now. 

Scott Rolen is the only player to get into the Hall of Fame this year. No complaints from me. Todd Helton missed by 11 votes. 

Eagles

Bengals 

Sorry, guys, but I love that Coyotes alternate. The cactus on the pants is something I would've done in the concepts board when I was 14. 

Also, I'm watching Blue Jackets-Flames right now. First time seeing the Flames nu-blasty uniforms. Again, sorry, but I love these. I think I'm getting soft and less critical  in my old age. 

23 minutes ago, Unocal said:

 

The Bengals do not have better coaching. Are we sure Zac Taylor is the reason they win these games?

Are you sure he's not? He's comparing the Bills to the Bengals and I don't know after yesterday how you can say the Bengals don't have better coaching than the Bills. They went to the Super Bowl last year, they're one game away from going back again, and he calls the plays - You can't say Zac Taylor isn't one of the reasons they're winning these games. Also, coaching includes Lou Anarumo, who held the Bills to 10 points yesterday. 

23 minutes ago, Unocal said:

I thought Harbaugh outcoached him last week save for the fumble.

Harbaugh's a good coach, though, and had the benefit of an extra game to prepare for the wildcard game. Due to the coinflip scenario, the Bengals didn't have that luxury and lost their starting right guard as a result. The Bengals were effectively asked to win their wildcard game twice, which is a really tough request for any team, let alone against a familiar opponent, let alone one who's already a bad matchup for the Bengals. The Ravens might be the best defense the Bengals see in the postseason. I wouldn't try to take any lessons from that game that had a lot of weird circumstances. 

15 hours ago, DG_ThenNowForever said:

 

The Bills are 2-2 against the Chiefs in their last four. Unfortunately, those two losses are in the playoffs.

 

The Bengals leapfrogged the Bills in the AFC hierarchy for sure. If last year was a fluke, this year they showed they're for real. Better coaching. Better big game players. Better scheming.

 

Today sucked.

I know how you feel and I wish the Bengals hadn't been the team to eliminate the Bills.

Don't take this personally as a Bills fan, but my frustration this offseason was that the Bengals were treated like a fluke while the Bills got all the benefits of the doubt. It's not your guys' fault, but they were the trendy pick of so many pundits. All of the NFL Network Sunday show people picked the Bills, for instance, which is just bad television. 

I really can't believe how not close it was and I'm really glad it didn't come down to a terrible call or something. I felt all week like if the Bengals were going to win they'd have to win by multiple scores so Roger couldn't manipulate a replay review to get his neutral site conference championship test*. By the way, that was a touchdown catch and that was a fumble.

*I'm on Team: That's a hideously bad idea and I hope it never happens.

3 hours ago, ManillaToad said:

Cincy swooping in and stealing Buffalo's thunder as the team to rival the Chiefs in the AFC is pretty funny

It’s very funny because the nfl coverage sphere seemed to anoint the Bills as the Chiefs primary threat because they lost a close game to the Chiefs, ignoring that the Bengals beat those same Chiefs twice. It almost felt like from my point of view the Bills got more respect for losing to KC than the Bengals did for beating them. 

1 hour ago, the admiral said:

Which extreme was she: physically abused as a child, or coddled beyond belief? Both roads take white women to the same shoe-chucking place.

Only child. Coddled beyond belief. Her parents thought she was perfect, took it personally when the world did not bend to her will, never heard the word “no”, etc. Also, this was 2009 so the shoe was the extra heavy platform style. You could’ve used that thing as a hammer. 

On 1/20/2023 at 2:12 PM, FiddySicks said:

The Dana White thing makes me feel a little weird. It’s NEVER ok to smack a woman, but I find that being preceded by the feeling that it’s never ok to smack anyone like that. Real move on his part, but I don’t exactly have a ton of sympathy for her, either.

 

This might be getting a little personal, but I had an ex who got pretty abusive like that toward the end, and she felt kind of emboldened knowing that I wasn’t going to do anything about it for a multitude of different reasons. Pretty quickly I realized that the only thing I could do was to leave. I’m a lot better off for it and am with someone now who’s the polar opposite of her, but I’m not going to lie and say there wasn’t some trauma I’ve dealt with because of it. 
 

Hitting women is just about the most vile answer you can come up with, but I really do wish we had a better way of confronting abuse from all ends. 

My college girlfriend used to hit me in the chest with a closed fist along with the occasional slap in the face because she knew I wouldn't do anything in response. She also threw a high heel shoe at the back of my head when I wasn't looking. Her anger management and conflict resolution skills were insane, like she thought the point of having a boyfriend was someone you boss around and get into public arguments with. The smallest thing would set her off and when I started dating my now wife the first time I went to her with a request I was sheepish like "hey do you mind if I go to X with X?" It was almost like I had PTSD and she, like a normal person, said something like "yeah I don't care. Why are you asking me?" I remember thinking oh so this is how it's supposed to be. 

I like the guy running around the arena floor like it's an accomplishment that he knocked out a guy who was CHECKS NOTES just standing there and let him hit him as hard as he could. You're a real strong tough guy. I find UFC pretty yucky, but at least the participants have an opportunity to fight back and there's strategy involved. What's the sport in hitting someone who is just standing there? 

Just go to a batting cage or hit golf balls at a driving range. 

4 minutes ago, infrared41 said:

 

You're going to be in the unfamiliar position of celebrating back to back AFC Championships in 8 days. You heard it here first.

 

I'm very nervous about the offensive line injuries, but I hope you're right. 

Just now, DG_ThenNowForever said:

 

Didn't we think that when Mahomes had scrambled eggs for brains that one game?

Remind me when that was.

I just think the Chiefs are the third best team in the AFC and I don't think much of their defense. Nobody remind me of this when they win the AFCCG in 8 days. 

I obviously could be wrong, but, especially with Mahomes' injury, if feels like the winner of Bengals-Bills is going to the Super Bowl. 

38 minutes ago, Rockstar Matt said:

 

Is he a Steelers fan? I was under the impression he's a Vikings fan. He's openly talked about his love for the Vikings before. I did find a recent YT video from 2021 on NFL on NBC's official account where Florio is talking about how he became a Vikings fan in the 70's as a kid. 

I think he's both. He's from Wheeling, West Virginia and went to Carneggie Mellon and has a severe case of Steelers Brain. In any case, :censored: that guy. 

3 minutes ago, FiddySicks said:

For as much “whining” as their might be, seeing the Chiefs get to and or win another Super Bowl would still be an infinitely better prospect than basically half of those Patriots Super Bowls were. I’m annoyed and bored of the Chiefs already, but I find them to be so much more enjoyable than any of that Pats stuff was. 

The late Brady era of the patriots were absolutely joyless, plodding, boring, and made football a chore. At least the Chiefs occasionally do cool stuff. 

So they just gave Mahomes an orange peel and a couple Tylenol, right? 

2 minutes ago, Red Comet said:

I understand that being unbiased is ultimately impossible but at least maintaining the illusion that someone is fair isn’t. Hell, it isn’t even that hard but this hack fails at it.

 

 

I give old players and coaches a pass for semi- rooting for their old teams on those shows, but just a guy who's just a fan? Nah it's really fu***ng not cool. He's the only person I've seen on that show who's ever done anything like that that I can remember.