Dave’s Football Blog

You know the Super Bowl hype gets to be just too damn much when email from the horoscopes department lands in your inbox:

Dave… Have some Super Bowl news that I thought your readers, especially Bears fans (and bookies) would find of interest. According to our experts, the “stars” will align for the Chicago Bears and they will defeat the Colts to emerge the victors of Super Bowl XLI. In addition, there’s specific predictions for several key players, including Rex Grossman and Lovie Smith. Below, please find the link to the feature. Let me know what you think.

Here’s the feature, by the way, and since you asked, here’s what I think — if you actually spend any amount of money placing bets based on the information in that feature, you deserve to lose every penny. Seriously, you’d be better off contributing to a fund to buy me a hooker for after the game…

Actually, no, I’d be better off. Either way, though, you’d still be broke.

Since my attempt at biting satire was met with mass indifference yesterday, I have decided to flip the script and bring you lighthearted whimsy — in the form of Bear vs. Colt, a silly little video series in which fake mascots square off in random situations.

The insipid genius of the opening song lured me in…

I have to admit, though, that anyone who has seen the “Fur and Loathing” episode of CSI — like I have, unfortunately — is going to look at this all wrong. The moment these two start yiffing, I’m outta here.

On the other hand, that Bear totally 0wnz0rs the Colt in DDR…

What, his baby-eating wasn’t enough to convince you? Well, here’s more proof that Rex Grossman is THE WORST EVAR!!!!!

I mean, just look at the shoddy copy editing and fact checking job he did for this article about CBS’ HD plans at the XLI…

To be sure, the scope of CBS’ Super Bowl production in Miami on Feb. 4 is typically immense—evidenced by multiple production trucks provided by vendors NEP, Coreplex and New Century Productions with sophisticated replay, graphics and audio units. But there won’t be anything radically new for the matchup between the Indianapolis Colts and New Orleans Saints—just a lot of state-of-the-art equipment, all in one place.

Nice one, Rex. You’re so bad that you don’t even want to admit your own team actually won the NFC. What’s more, you didn’t even pay attention to the AFC Playoffs at all, did you?

This year, CBS will deploy the latest super-slow-motion technology. That includes three ultra-high-frame-rate cameras capable of capturing hundreds of frames per second: two NAC Image Technology units that shoot at 300 frames per second and a Phantom camera that can capture 2,000 frames per second, manufactured by Vision Research Inc.

Such “overcranking” by the camera allows a slo-mo replay that can document a player’s motion in pain-staking detail. It was good to have in CBS’ playoff coverage, used to replay a critical third-down catch in the Colts’ divisional win over the San Diego Chargers.

Really? Those were the Colts in San Diego? Who knew Peyton Manning and Tony Dungy were such masters of disguise?

So there you have it. All the errors in that article were all Rex Grossman’s fault. He’s THE WORST EVARRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!

(Article spotted on Engadget HD.)

For all you people arguing that Rex Grossman is not the worst Super Bowl QB EVAR, here’s a photo that was taken after room service came to his hotel room last night…

Y’know, you wouldn’t think a guy who grew up in Indiana, went to college in Florida and now lives in Chicago would ever develop a taste for California Cheeseburgers, but there it is. There’s your proof. Sexy Rexy is not just the worst QB, but the worst human being EVAR — worse than all these Bears fans combined, and certainly worse than all those people who were too stupid to realize Jonathan Swift was freaking satire…

Several Miami hotel workers died to bring you this information. I hope you appreciate that.

If you’re going to be a shameless opportunist in the 21st century, you only need three things: a little internet savvy, and very large breasts…

Meet Sarah Spain, just an ordinary Chicago girl who loves her Bears, right? She loved ‘em enough to rewrite the Super Bowl Shuffle — an idea that got picked up quickly by our friends at Kissing Suzy Kolber. It seemed innocent enough, right?

Oh, no. Sarah Spain couldn’t stop there, especially with all the boys starting to drool over her cleavage-bearing Myspace photos. She took it one step further and auctioned herself off on eBay. Yes, you could actually give this chick money to take her to the Super Bowl. Of course, you had to have the tickets in hand already, and those probably cost you tens of thousands of dollars, but hey, it’s the Super Bowl, and she has D-cups, and since when did logic ever apply to the Internet, anyway?

Naturally, the sports blogosphere went into overtime with this story. With Leather picked it up and kept running with it. KSK followed suit. Then the FanHouse got a hold of it. Hey, any excuse to post a picture of a cute girl who loves her some football, right?

Well, guess what? The story got so much blog exposure that somebody who could actually do something finally gave her what she wanted. The Axe body spray people hooked Sarah up with four tickets, and now she’s giving one of them away to one lucky (and presumably male) fan. Oh, and she’ll be appearing on the last hurrah of Sports Bloggers Live, too.

In fact, I’m pretty sure we can expect this bombshell to show up in a lot of places in Miami. After that, we can probably expect a photo shoot in either Maxim or FHM. And would you look at that? She’s a comedic actress, too. That bit part on Scrubs is just around the corner, isn’t it? Or maybe she’ll just keep taking matters into her own hands and start her own video podcast. Hey, look, a hot chick talking about sports, and she’s kinda funny, too! That should get Adam Curry throwing Podshow money at her faster than you can say, “Soccergirl Incorporated.”

We may talk big and blustery about how the blogosphere is changing the sports media landscape and giving untapped talent a new voice, but Sarah Spain knows what most sports bloggers like me really are — just a bunch of horny, lonely guys looking for new wank material. And when a hot, busty girl next door in a Bears jersey shows up to give us some… hell, we’ll all just line up to be used, won’t we?

Congratulations, Sarah. Your “crazy little plan” worked. Now you get to be famous and fabulous, while we get to keep toiling away at our little blogs, drawing a few hundred regular readers (if we’re lucky) and continued scorn from Bristol. I’d ask you not to forget about the little guys who helped you begin your quest for fame, but I’m pretty sure you already have.

And you thought this would be a weekend without football, didn’t you?

While millions around the world await Super Bowl Sunday, hundreds — nay, maybe even a thousand on the other side of the world watched the American Football Team of Korea upset the Australians, 22-13, and become the final team to qualify for the 2007 American Football World Cup. Clearly, the Australian team has struggled since Eric Mangini returned to America.

So the field is set for this year’s World Cup competition:

1.) Japan (Host and Defending Champion)
2.) Sweden (European Champion)
3.) USA (American Qualifier)
4.) Germany (European Qualifier)
5.) France (European Qualifier)
6.) Korea (Asia/Oceania Qualifier)

Team USA qualified by default. Nobody else from any other country in North or South America fielded a team. My guess is that they all turned chicken.

On the other hand, just where is Team USA? An organization called USA Football is supposed to be organizing the team, but there’s zero information about that team on their web site. Are they still competing? Is John Mackovic still in charge, as was reported back in September? I think a few emails are in order. I’ll let you know if I get any response…

So I came down with a cold on Wednesday, and I’ve spent the last day and a half snoozing on the sofa, fighting to breathe through both nostrils at once, and drowning my innards in chicken soup, apple juice and Gatorade. At some point yesterday afternoon, I thought this cold was escaping through my ass. Seriously, it almost smelled like I ate a whole loaf of zucchini bread in here…

I know, I know, you didn’t come here to read that. Don’t worry. I’ll have more fun Super Bowl stuff for you once I get over this. In the meantime, I highly recommend checking out the work of Michael David Smith over at the NFL FanHouse. He seems to be finding lots of fun stuff before anyone else. Our friends at the KSK Gay Mafia are also killing it, as usual…

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m now going to doze off to the dulcet tones of Harry Kalas. Come back tomorrow.

(Photo spotted on Deadspin.)

Remember a few months ago when I actually apologized for going to Champps to watch the Steelers-Raiders game? Before that game, the Steelers were winless when I went to Champps to watch them play, and I thought that would change that particular week. Instead, Ben Roethlisberger threw 4 interceptions, and the Steelers lost.

Of course, the fact that I was at Champps to watch that game had nothing to do with the outcome — not nearly as much as the fact that Big Ben suffered a concussion the previous Sunday in Atlanta. At the time, though, I actually had the nerve to think that my presence in a particular bar somehow impacted the outcome of this game. This is an example of magical thinking — the idea that wishing good or harm on a person will actually impact that person in the way you intend. For example, if you believe that eating chicken every day will make you the best hitter in baseball or that Barbaro would be dead right now if it weren’t for the affirmations of Dee Mirich, that’s magical thinking.

Just in time for the Super Bowl, the Old Gray Lady has a big story about the psychology of magical thinking and why we still use it against all reason. It’s interesting stuff, and it might convince you that putting that kielbasa on your head every time the Bears are in the red zone is just general stupidity…

If the tendency to think magically were no more than self-defeating superstition, then over the pitiless history of human evolution it should have all but disappeared in intellectually mature adults.

Yet in a series of experiments published last summer, psychologists at Princeton and Harvard showed how easy it was to elicit magical thinking in well-educated young adults. In one instance, the researchers had participants watch a blindfolded person play an arcade basketball game, and visualize success for the player. The game, unknown to the subjects, was rigged: the shooter could see through the blindfold, had practiced extensively and made most of the shots.

On questionnaires, the spectators said later that they had probably had some role in the shooter’s success. A comparison group of participants, who had been instructed to visualize the player lifting dumbbells, was far less likely to claim such credit.

In another experiment, the researchers demonstrated that young men and women instructed on how to use a voodoo doll suspected that they might have put a curse on a study partner who feigned a headache. And they found, similarly, that devoted fans who watched the 2005 Super Bowl felt somewhat responsible for the outcome, whether their team won or lost. Millions in Chicago and Indianapolis are currently trying to channel the winning magic.

(Spotted on Boing Boing.)

Tired of hearing “This Is Our Country” 20 times during commercial breaks of NFL games? So is John Mellencamp. He spoke out yesterday about the ads, and he claims that in order to get that song heard, he didn’t have a choice but to put it in a commercial.

“People say I sold out,” John Mellencamp said, explaining his decision to license a song for a Chevrolet commercial. “No, I got sold out. Sometime during the ’90s record companies made the decision that us guys who had been around for a long time and had sold millions of records and were household names just weren’t as interesting as girls in stretch dresses.”

Mr. Mellencamp, whose 21st album, “Freedom’s Road,” arrives in stores tomorrow, had long expressed objections to the use of pop songs in advertising. But he said a turning point for him came last year, after he heard “Highway Companion,” the latest album by his contemporary Tom Petty. He liked it and thought the single “Saving Grace” would be a hit, but then never heard the song on the radio or saw it on the video channels. Fearing a similar fate for his own music, Mr. Mellencamp said he decided to accept Chevrolet’s offer to use “Our Country,” which he had been performing live for a few years and appears on the new album, as the theme for its Silverado truck.

“The bottom line is, I’m a songwriter, and I want people to hear my songs,” he said. “I’m not saying it’s right. I’m not suggesting it for anybody else. This is just what I did this time to reinvent myself and stay in business. Sometimes I get sad about it really. I still don’t think that people should sell their songs for advertising.”

Given the kind of shit I’ve seen the RIAA pull over the last decade or so, I’d say Mellencamp just went from Sunday nuisance to sympathetic figure in one fell swoop. That is effective marketing. What a shame that nobody at his label — or any major label, for that matter — knows anything about that. No, they just know lawsuits and paranoia. Come to think of it, they would get along splendidly with Al Davis.

(Spotted on NFL FanHouse. Photo courtesy of Idolator.)

Say, did you hear that Bill Parcells retired? You have? Okay, did you hear that Tony Dungy and Lovie Smith are really good friends? Yeah? You know that Jerome Bettis is from Detroit, right? Okay, we’re good.

So while I’m recovering from a bad case of Wii elbow — and I played the hell out of that thing yesterday — I leave you with this Ron Mexico video that’s been making the rounds in the blogosphere lately. You’ve probably seen it already, but it’s still damn funny, and it shows why he would be such a good fit for the Raiders…

By the way, this blog and that video are viewable on the Opera-powered Wii web browser, which is kind of awesome.