After watching Jake Delhomme shit the bed against the Eagles in Week 1 this year, I fully expected the Carolina Panthers to have a very long and very ugly season. So I tuned out and focused on my Steelers, who then proceeded to shit the bed twice against the Bengals — which was no fun to watch, but didn’t make me think Pittsburgh’s playoff hopes were anywhere close to being dashed like the Panthers’ playoff dreams. Hey, the Steelers won a Super Bowl as a six-seed. Just get ‘em in the door, right?

Regarding the Panthers, however, there was one thing that I didn’t count on — the NFC’s extraordinary ability to suck.

Yes, even at 4-5, the Carolina Panthers are only one game behind all the Wild Card contenders in the NFC, and they fought their way into that position by running the ball, playing good defense, and generally ignoring Steve Smith’s incessant bitching that he’s not getting the ball enough.

What, exactly, does Smith expect? When your biggest liability is your overpaid quarterback and your top two running backs are gaining 4.98 yards a carry, you run the damn ball. Is Smith volunteering to line up in the backfield? The man has proven incapable of enjoying success when his numbers are down — although really, that just makes him a typical wide receiver, doesn’t it?

Either way, the Panthers have inexplicably found their way into the playoff race, and they can pull one step closer to being a contender — at least, as much as any mediocre team can be a contender in a conference that the Saints and Vikings are utterly dominating — with a win tonight over the Miami Dolphins. (8:00 PM, NFL Network) I’m not sure even the most ardent Panthers fans could have predicted that this scenario, especially with Thomas Davis and Jordan Gross out of the lineup with major injuries.

Meanwhile, the great irony of this game is that Dan Henning, who was fired by the Panthers for being the most boring play caller ever, is now being hailed as a creative genius for building the Wildcat formation in Miami. Where was that creativity when you were in Charlotte, Dan? Oh, right, you didn’t have Ronnie Brown… wait, you won’t have Ronnie Brown tonight, either. I guess you’ll have to put something together with Ricky Williams and Pat White. How many fascinating and innovative ways can run the ball off-tackle tonight, Dan? Show us that sparkling offensive creativity now, Dan.

Of course, all this mockery of Dan Henning — which, to be honest, is fun — becomes worthless if Jake starts tossing pick sixes again like they’re going out of style. Let’s just hope this Panthers team builds off that win against Atlanta last Sunday and does all the right things tonight. I suspect the NFL Network is thinking the same thing. The last thing they want to be known for is showing spectacular quarterback implosions every week.

I suggested that DeShaun Foster was better off taking a knee after getting that first down, rather that running into the end zone, because then the Saints never would have gotten the ball, and the Panthers could have run out the clock with a 4-point lead. As you might expect, the FanHouse commenters thought mockery was the proper response to that idea, in part because the Panthers still won the game.

Three years later, Maurice Jones-Drew takes a knee at the 1-yard line for the Jacksonville Jaguars, setting up a game winning 21-yard field goal and preventing the New York Jets from getting the ball back. It was a riskier move, because the Jags were trailing by a point with 1:48 left, but Jones-Drew seems to be attracting universal praise for making a smart strategic play.

The point here is that you don’t give your opponent the opportunity to score if you don’t have to. This is why Bill Belichick really went for it on 4th down on his own 28-yard line against the Colts. Converting meant Peyton Manning would not get the ball, and the Pats could run out the clock. Punting meant Manning was all but guaranteed to get the ball and engineer a game-winning drive. Plus, Belichick put his faith in his best player — Tom Brady — to get the job done.

We shouldn’t criticize Belichick for choosing to go for it. We should, however, get on his case about the play he chose to call. Honestly, the coaches couldn’t have picked something better than that?

Here are some other interesting football stories you might have missed:

• UNC serves up its most fortunate illegal forward pass since 1895. [WRAL FANKind]
• Dan Marino inadvertently shares his true feelings about the Wildcat formation. [Awful Announcing]
• Chicago Bears fans are sore losers, even when they win. [FanHouse]
• Allen Iverson as a Philadelphia… Eagle? Right. [The Sporting Blog]
• Japan calls on South Africa to ban the vuvuzela. Yeah, good luck with that, fellas. [The Guardian]
• Katy Perry launches new line of West Ham United lingerie. Now we know what Michelle Obama is getting for Christmas. [The Guardian]
• Belated congratulations to the Raleigh Venom, champions of Division II USA Women’s Rugby. [WRAL FANKind]

What better way to start the week than with an old guy flippin’ the bird?

Yes, Tennessee Titans owner Bud Adams was clearly enjoying his team’s win over Buffalo yesterday, so much so that he proudly stood up, pointed at the Bills, and gave them the finger — two fingers, from the looks of it. Oh, and he did that in a luxury box with NFL commissioner Roger Goodell looking on.

I suspect Bud’s fine won’t be quite as big as Chad Ochocinco’s fine for that one-dollar bribery stunt. I also suspect Bud will gladly pay up. After all, what’s the point of having money if you can’t have a little fun spending it?

UPDATE (6:00 PM): Wow, I was way off on the size of the fine. Ol’ Bud was fined $250,000 by the NFL today.

(Spotted on Shutdown Corner.)

First off, designer Ken Carbone spent Fast Company’s time telling people that NFL helmets offended his sensibilities as a designer. So he decided to make new ones — a concept that has “Oh, hell…” written all over it. First, he made a new helmet for the Washington Redskins:

For the Washington Redskins I tried a design direction that might be considered more politically correct in most circles by removing the Native American portrait, emphasizing the feather motif from the headdress and using it more dynamically on the helmet.

Except, of course, that the end result looks less like an Native American feather headdress and more like your typical Halloween peacock outfit.

Hey, there’s an idea. Let’s just stop calling them the Redskins all together and make them the Washington Fightin’ Peacocks. Then all the cheerleaders can dress just like that, but in maroon and gold. (We should have Vinny Cerrato go recommend this to Daniel Snyder immediately, just to prove how bulletproof Vinny’s job seems to be.)

Then there’s Carbone’s design for the New England Patriots

America! Fuck yeah!

While Carbone derides helmets for being ugly, though, some researchers have decided that helmets are actually hurting players more than helping them. Their ingenious solution? Take the helmets off. And who’s suggesting this? Australians. Of course!

One of the strongest arguments for banning helmets comes from the Australian Football League. While it’s a similarly rough game, the AFL never added any of the body armor Americans wear. When comparing AFL research studies and official NFL injury reports, AFL players appear to get hurt more often on the whole with things like shoulder injuries and tweaked knees. But when it comes to head injuries, the helmeted NFL players are about 25% more likely to sustain one.

Unless Barry Hall is playing, of course.

Andrew McIntosh, a researcher at Australia’s University of New South Wales who analyzed videotape, says there may be a greater prevalence of head injuries in the American game because the players hit each other with forces up to 100% greater. “If they didn’t have helmets on, they wouldn’t do that,” he says. “They know they’d injure themselves.”

What would be the end result of American football without helmets? Do I need to bring up 1908 again? Most NFL players aren’t going to suddenly stop leading with their heads right away — not until a few people die from on-field cranial fractures. When that happens, nobody will give the game time to slow down and look more like old-fashioned rugby. No. They’ll go right back to wearing helmets, and they’ll do so because the risk of slow, long-term brain damage seems better than the risk of instantly having their gray matter see the light of day.

More importantly, though, removing the helmet from American football takes away from what the game really is — modern gladiatorial combat without the swords. It’s a violent game for violent tastes, and it’s what the American people have chosen for the last century or so. They’re not going to quit just because a few jocks get their brains scrambled over time.

Maybe football helmets are ugly, then, for more than just design reasons, but it’ll be a long, long time before anyone decides to get rid of them. In the meantime… hey, Steelers v. Bengals. WHO YA GOT!?

As I sat here getting ready to watch my Pittsburgh Steelers in another big Monday Night Football game, I watched Ron Jaworski give a bit of his usual solid game analysis. As you can see from this video, David Anderson of the Houston Texans has seen some of Jaws’ analysis as well — quite a bit of it, from the sound of things.

I didn’t so much laugh as say, “Damn, that’s pretty good.” Your mileage may vary.

(Spotted on Awful Announcing.)

Even if you do dismiss the idea, though, you cannot dismiss that quite a few of these Tuskers will get NFL jobs come December. And at the top of that list? Tuskers quarterback Brooks Bollinger.

Yes, Jets fans, that Brooks Bollinger. He of the mediocre passer rating (74.6) and completion percentage (58.6%) in six sideline-heavy NFL seasons, who made many of you pray for the quick and complete recovery of Chad Pennington’s shoulder. In case you hadn’t noticed, the UFL is making Brooks Bollinger look like Brooks Manning. In three games, Bollinger has completed 62 of 88 passes for 767 yards, 9 TDs and 1 INT. That’s good for a passer rating of… wait for it… 126.4.

Remind you of anyone?

Remember when ol’ Tommy Maddox ran roughshod over the fly-by-night XFL and walked away with a big fat MVP trophy — this after four years of unfulfilled promise (and a 67.8 passer rating) in the big show? Remember when Steelers fans were practically overjoyed to see Maddox replace Kordell Stewart and, for about half a season, actually look good doing it?

My friends, this tale is about to be re-told. If the Tuskers go undefeated and Bollinger walks away with an MVP trophy, someone will offer him a NFL job. There are certainly enough NFL teams in desperate need of competent quarterbacks. The Raiders could use one. So could the Titans, Browns, Bucs and… oh, yeah, the Panthers.

Seriously, Matt Moore better hope this UFL lasts more than one season, because that’s the only way he’s ever going to prove he can be a starting quarterback. If he can’t win a start over Jake Delhomme and his 0.3 touchdown-to-interception ratio — zero point three, people — then he needs to get the hell out of Charlotte. You can’t tell me Matt Moore, who went 2-1 as an NFL starter when John Fox finally gave him the ball two years ago, wouldn’t be thrilled to swap places with Brooks Bollinger at some point in the next 12 months — or the next 12 days, for that matter.

Bollinger won’t be the only UFL player who comes out of this with an NFL job, but he’ll definitely be the most visible, and if this stint gives him the confidence to do the job at the NFL level, that will be a nice boost for this startup league. He should enjoy it while it lasts, though, because this will likely be the last time his passer rating hits triple-digits.

And I think I speak for most Premier League fans when I say, “Bloody ‘ell, he’s still at Pompey?”

The Numa Numa guy? Really, Michigan State? Was Rick Astley not available? Could you not get a Keyboard Cat to play you off?

Then again, maybe Keyboard Cat was wearing an Iowa sweatshirt that day…

(Spotted on The Sporting Blog.)

Y’know, in most cases, I don’t like to see a player from my favorite team getting blown up like this, but let’s be real. Hits like this one that Adrian Peterson delivers on William Gay are a big reason why people watch the NFL.

On the other hand, Peterson was compared to Earl Campbell here, and hits like this are a big reason why Campbell can’t walk anymore. Playing American football often requires sacrificing  your future quality of life. How much do you love this game?

(Spotted on Shutdown Corner.)

A few weeks ago, I found myself in a sports bar in Philadelphia, which was filled with people in Phillies jerseys who gathered to watch the Raiders upset the Eagles and kvetch about Andy Reid together. At some point in the game, this happened:

You never see those lazy gulls in Melbourne get involved in a footy match, but this pigeon? Yeah, he’s ready to go. And it would have been just a fun little aside — until Justin Fargas spoke up and said that the pigeon was the reincarnation of Marquis Cooper, the Raiders linebacker who died in a boating accident last March.

So how does a little piece of Marquis Cooper end up in pigeon in Oakland? Let’s examine this a bit further, beginning with the notion that, as the old saying goes, you are what you eat.

Marquis Cooper was lost at sea and presumed dead after suffering from hypothermia in the waters off the Gulf Coast of Florida. So we can suppose that his body sank to the bottom of the Gulf, where he was likely eaten by some fish. So those fish carried little bits of Marquis with them.

Perhaps those fish then came closer to the shore, where some pigeons (Mine! Mine! Mine!) occasionally go diving into the water for dinner. So one of those pigeons nabbed a fish that had dined on Marquis Cooper’s brain cells and took it back to its nest, where it fed its babies. That little bit of Marquis Cooper — the one that understood where it needed to be on punt returns, probably — was then infused into the being of one of those baby pigeons.

And when that baby spread its wings and learned to fly, it just knew where it had to be. So it began the long, arduous cross-country trip to Oakland — making plenty of new friends along the way, of course — where it could rejoin its teammates and play outside contain against the Eagles. After all, an eagle tried to attack our hero pigeon somewhere over Colorado, so he’s no fan of eagles. No fan at all.

This amazing tale has inspired me to come up with my own plan for reincarnation. When I die, harvest whatever working organs you need from me, then take what’s left of my carcass, drop it in the dirt, and plant an apple tree on my ass. Then, after that tree has fed off my remaining bits and started appling, invite everyone to come eat those apples. Eventually, some young couple who partook of those apples will get it on one night, and nine months later, voila! I’m back! Hand me my Terrible Towel, mom! The Steelers are playing!

Yes, it all makes perfect sense — until you realize, of course, that NFL players are more likely to suffer from dementia as a result of brain injuries than most of the general population. NFL players also seem to end up bankrupt more often than not. So maybe, just maybe, I shouldn’t take at face value the ideas of someone who plays a game that is likely to leave him broke and stupid.

Oh, well. It sounded like a good idea.

In soccer, clubs loan players to other clubs all the time, usually because those players are young prospects on the end of the bench that need some experience. So big club A and small club B have a chat, and small club B gets to put said prospect in their starting lineup for a set period of time. Villarreal loaned Jozy Altidore out to Hull City for this season. (Of course, why Phil Brown isn’t playing the young man remains a mystery to me.)

We need this policy in the NFL, and the first deal should be for the Pittsburgh Steelers to loan Limas Sweed to the New York Jets.

Why? Because apparently, the New York Jets actually teach their receivers how to catch the ball.

Seriously, you saw Braylon Edwards out there in Miami last night, right? It took him all of one game to go from being Ol’ Iron Hands in Cleveland to making one clutch catch after another in a Jets uniform. That performance must have had every Browns player thinking to himself, “Damn, who can I punch to get the hell out of this town?”

So how did Braylon Edwards suddenly become clutch? Was he suddenly free of staph? Does Mark Sanchez put some special mojo on the ball that Brady Quinn and Derek Anderson don’t? I doubt it. Clearly, Edwards got coached up in a few days in New York, and that might have been better coaching than he had gotten in several years in Cleveland.

What a shame that the Steelers can’t loan Limas Sweed out to the Jets to figure this out. Clearly, Ben Roethlisberger throws a decent ball. He’s neck-in-neck with Peyton Manning for the league lead in completion percentage. There must be some reason why can’t Sweed catch his passes. He wouldn’t have been a 2nd-round draft pick if he couldn’t catch, right?

Maybe this will be the purpose of the UFL in the long run. Maybe the Steelers will be able to loan Sweed out to the California Redwoods one day and let Dennis Green coach him up. Until then, though, we have to settle for watching the Jets work miracles, while we hope Hines Ward and Santonio Holmes don’t pick up an injuries — because, y’know, they can catch a football. That’s why the Steelers pay them.

Plus, this popped up on the UFL’s Twitter feed:

Y’know, it’s almost as if someone other than Different Dave and Jeff actually reads this blog. Interesting. Perhaps I mention here that the league standings tab on the front page needs updating, too…

Imagine my surprise, then, when I went to the UFL web site and discovered they were showing the Versus feed online for free. That page is still up, too, with an on-demand replay of last night’s broadcast. That’s a quality move by the league.

On the other hand, they probably could have done a better job publicizing it as it was happening. They have a Twitter account like everyone else — myself included, of course — but they didn’t use it to say, “Hey, DirecTV subscribers, missing Versus? Watch Locos v. Redwoods live on UFL.com RIGHT NOW!” There’s no hint of such a message in their Twitter feed. That might have helped a little. (Apparently, it did show up on FanHouse, which is now billing itself as an “Official UFL Digital Partner,” but I don’t check there as often as I check Twitter.)

You know what else could help? A nice little game recap.

This is all the info that the UFL web site has about the game — a final score. No summary, no statistics, no highlight reel. No hint that J.P. Losman got off to a slow start, then recovered to lead Vegas from a two-touchdown deficit to victory, or that Locos kicker Graham Gano went 3-for-3 in field goal attempts, including a 53-yarder, which led to other players paying for his drinks at Tabu afterward*. Nope. Just the score.

That needs to change in a hurry. Fans of the gridiron game like numbers, and those numbers need to be up on the page. The NFL’s web site is loaded with stats, as is the CFL’s web site. So why am I getting more info about the game from FanHouse and the Las Vegas Review-Journal than I am from UFL-football.com?

These are problems that need to be addressed quickly — in no small part because the quality of play on the field isn’t so terrible. It might be damning the league with faint praise to say I saw a higher level of play from the Locos and Redwoods last night than I did from the Redskins and Buccaneers last Sunday, but there you go. These are guys with NFL experience getting coached up by guys who have coached games in January. They knew what they were doing out there. I wish I could say the same for the folks who designed the UFL’s web site.

* – May not have actually happened, but likely would have been awesome.

Yeah, me neither. I tried to get myself excited about the new United Football League, telling myself that this might be the only football league operating in 2011 — and this could still happen, given the current state of NFL labor negotiations — and that they have some decent coaches running the show here, so hey, maybe we should pay attention.

Then I saw some of the names on the rosters: Brooks Bollinger, Ingle Martin, Tatum Bell, LaBrandon Toefield, Taye Biddle, Bobby Sippio, etc. You’ll forgive me if I’m not quite gung ho on the level of talent on display here.

The fact that DirecTV and Versus are still squabbling doesn’t help matters, either. What’s that? I have to go find a sports bar that has Versus in order to watch that big quarterback duel between J.P. Losman and Mike McMahon?

These are just a few reasons why I’ve shut down The Star and Clam and redirected what little traffic that site had back here for the time being. That domain is available to pretty much anyone who wants to buy me a Jozy Altidore Hull City jersey. If I were getting paid to care, it might be different, but I’m not. Sorry.

Besides, if I really want to watch low-quality American football this year, I could always turn on the NFL. As my pal Bomani Jones pointed out on Monday, the NFL just isn’t that good this year. Look at teams like the Rams, the Chiefs, the Browns, the Buccaneers, the Panthers and the Titans, all of whom are winless and hopeless. Then there are teams like the Raiders, Cowboys, Redskins, who continue to play terrible football while their owners rake in the dough. The Steelers’ 4th-quarter play this season has been atrocious. Hell, the Denver Broncos are the worst 4-0 team I’ve ever seen.

On top of that, the number of truly compelling storylines in the NFL this season seems awfully small. It’s little wonder that ESPN shouted Favrity Favre Favre Favre to the high heavens on Monday night. What else is there to talk about? The fact that Tony Romo sucks? The contempt that Daniel Snyder has for Redskins fans? The lack of attendance in Jacksonville? The whimpering return of Ron Mexico? The Jets’ sudden fascination with jealous receivers who can’t catch? The possibility of a work stoppage in two years?

It’s no wonder the NFL media is so obsessed with Twitter. It’s a welcome distraction from the complete lack of positive NFL stories this year — unless you can find something positive in Favre’s latest comeback (no) or the possibility of a Manning v. Manning Super Bowl. (maybe)

And yet it’s still more compelling than watching Simeon Rice and Dexter Jackson try to relive their glory days in a startup minor league.

I wish you well, UFL, but if you’re looking for me, I’ll be getting up early on Halloween to watch the North London Derby on ESPN2. Good luck with the whole Versus thing, too.

YA BETTA ASK SOMEBODAAAAAAAYYYYYYYY!!!

(Flickr photo from tomrichnc. If you have no clue what I’m talking about, look here.)

The chill bros at Shutdown Corner reminded us earlier this week that this was the week the NFL was promoting the fight against breast cancer, and to do that, our pal Eeyore will be wearing these pink shoes on Sunday. We’ll also see pink gloves and towels, coaches in pink shirts, and probably some pink Gatorade, too. They’re doing this for you, ladies, because like me, they don’t want to see anything bad happen to that awesome rack of yours.

Franck Ribery approves of the use of these shoes…

Of course, Cutler and Ribery are sending very different messages with their pink shoes. Cutler’s shoes are telling the world, “Breast cancer is a terrible thing, and you ladies should have your lovely breasts checked out regularly. By a doctor, I mean. Yeah, a doctor.”

I suspect ol’ Franck cares just as much about breasts, but that’s not what his shoes are saying here. Those shoes say, “I’m ugly as sin and I wear pink boots, and you’ll still love me, because I’m that good.” It’s a message of courage and self-esteem. I think that’s also a worthwhile message. Wouldn’t you agree?

And see this?

Anyone? Just me? Okay, just checking.

James Harrison can do this…

…and he’s considered awesome.

Meanwhile, Craig Bellamy can do this…

Bellamy & Garrido – More amazing video clips are a click away

…and he faces an inquiry from the FA?

Okay, perhaps Bellamy didn’t need to get involved there, but still, this rule really needs to change. You want to curb pitch invasions, FA? Stop giving yellow cards and suspensions for players who go after these idiots. Nobody would run out of the Kop at Anfield if they knew that Jamie Carragher was allowed a free shot at him.

Better yet, make it Stevie G. The pitch invader might be able to outrun Carragher at this stage.

(Bellamy vid spotted on EPL Talk.)

The Carolina Panthers signed Jake Delhomme to a 5-year, $42.5 million deal last April, three months after he threw six, count ‘em, six interceptions in a home playoff loss to the Arizona Cardinals. But hey, the Panthers went 12-4 and won the NFC South, right? Surely that tank job against the Cardinals was merely a blip, right? Right?

Uh, no.

To be fair, I turned the game off midway through the 2nd quarter, after the first two interceptions and the sack, fumble and Eagles touchdown. I was faced with a choice: head out to a beach filled with attractive women in bikinis who wanted to dance with me, or stay in and watch Delhomme continue to shit the bed. Gee, let me think about tha–*click*.

Because I knew. When Bad Jake shows up, he’s there for the whole day, and after nine picks in two big games, it’s starting to feel like he’s here to stay. Panthers fans sure think so. Did you hear all the cheers for the Eagles rising above the boo birds in Bank of America stadium? Even money says those Philly fans bought their tickets from Panthers season ticket holders who gave up after Jake got that contract.

Those Panthers fans knew like I knew. This has all the earmarks of a long and ugly season in Charlotte. Six picks in a playoff game is a stench that stays, and when Delhomme stole all that money from John Fox and Marty Hurney, we knew it wasn’t going away — especially when, after yesterday’s suckfest, the Panthers chose to stick with Jake. He didn’t just steal the money. He made the victims thank him for mugging them.

What are the options? Josh McCown clearly wasn’t the answer, and now he’s out with a knee injury. Plus, nobody seems to have any confidence in Matt Moore, despite the fact that Moore has a better winning percentage as an NFL starter than anyone named McCown ever. At least one blog was quick to point out that Jeff Garcia is available, and Carolina could use McCown’s injury to justify that signing, even if Garcia has that Vinny Testaverde old-car smell about him.

At this stage, though, Garcia sure looks like a beach full of hotties when compared to another afternoon of Bad Jake. All I know is if I ever have to negotiate a big money contract, I want Delhomme’s agent on my team. He’ll just walk in with a big-ass pistol and shout, “Stick ‘em up!”, and I’ll get what I want.

UPDATE: Adam Schefter just tweeted that Josh McCown was put on injured reserve. Jeff Garcia’s phone will ring in 3, 2, 1…

UPDATE 2: Looks like Garcia’s phone rang already. He’s an Eagle again.

Troy Polamalu is out 3-6 weeks with an MCL sprain.

Watch your back, man.

Sincerely,
All Arizona Cardinals fans and fantasy owners everywhere.

For all my talk about being a soccer convert and an aficionado of Aussie Rules, the gridiron game is still the game I grew up watching and loving, and the highest level of American football kicks off tonight, with my Pittsburgh Steelers beginning their title defense against the Tennessee Titans. And yes, my ass will be planted in my sofa, watching every minute of it, for it is football, and I must watch.

Looking for a game preview? My buddy J.J. Cooper has one here. Looking for a full weekend preview? Big Daddy Drew’s got his infamous Jambaroo here. Go check them out. The NFL has returned, and it remains glorious. This is the game America built. Soak it in, folks.

I’ve written before about the possibility of NFL owners locking out players in 2011, and after reading this FanHouse piece about the ongoing frustrations of NFL Players Association chief DeMaurice Smith, I’m just about convinced that a year without the NFL is inevitable.

Basically, Smith wants to see the owners’ audited financial statements, so that the NFLPA can start negotiating on the next collective bargaining agreement. Roger Goodell and the owners are refusing, claiming Smith’s request is a “distraction” that’s preventing them from negotiations. Smith countered, “We’re still waiting for a proposal.”

Meanwhile, the owners have hired Bob Batterman, the lawyer who engineered the NHL lockout in 2004.

Here’s the thing. The bottom line is the bottom line for NFL owners. The NFL’s TV contracts pay out in 2011 regardless of whether a season is played or not. (And how tightly did the networks hold their noses when they agreed to that clause? I would have done more haggling than an Islamabad street market before signing off on that.) And since owners are wealthy old men who didn’t get their wealth by doing things that made them less money… well, you can see what’s coming.

The real question here, though, is what the owners’ hope to accomplish in the long term by ditching the 2011 season. They won’t engender any good will among their customers — especially those who forked over thousands for “Personal Seat Licenses” before even buying season tickets. Fans are fans, however, and they keep coming back for the spectacle. They came back after the infamous scab games in 1987. They’ll be back in 2012.

What about the TV networks? Certainly they won’t be too eager to hand the NFL billions again after a lockout, right? Well, the networks have their own troubles. Ad sales are down across the board, and traditional TV networks are fighting to stay relevant. So if that money isn’t going to be there anyway, the owners might as well take what they can get now. The league is still powerful enough that it can get a good deal from someone down the road.

So that puts the NFLPA in a bind. The owners are digging in and preparing to shut down in two years. Where do the players go? The UFL? Assuming that league even survives long enough to hold a 2011 season, the money ain’t there yet.

So this looks like a clear-cut case of the rich old bastards looking to break the union and slash players’ salaries at all costs, collateral damage be damned — and from the looks of things, the owners have most of the leverage, because this is the NFL, and it’s too big to fail.

None of this matters tomorrow night, of course. Tomorrow night, the 2009 season will begin, the fans will fill the stands and tune in and watch and cheer and tailgate and drink and all that, because it’s football, and we crave the spectacle of that like nothing else.

Enjoy it while it lasts, America. The gridiron apocalypse is two years away, and it makes me glad I’ve come to appreciate other football codes. The Association game will get me through 2011 okay. So will the AFL Finals Series, and possibly the Rugby World Cup, too. How about you?

But who says NFL football is the type of football Bolt wants to play?

Given his size and speed, Bolt could probably spring offside traps all day, and his body wouldn’t take nearly the same kind of pounding it would suffer in the NFL. Plus, as this video shows, he favors his left foot, which could come in handy. The only question mark would be his ball-handling skills. If his first touch is weak and he can’t find the net, he might as well be a really fast Ameobi.

It’s probably going too far to suggest Bolt is following a trend here, but it makes you think about what’s really more glamorous: being a striker in Spain, or being a punt return specialist in America. After all, if you do a Google image search of Devin Hester, how many photos of his face do you see?

(Video spotted on 101 Great Goals.)

Memo to NFL media types: there are 32 teams in the National Football League, each with 53 players on the roster. That makes for a total of 1,696 players.

Could you please talk a little more about some of the other 1,693… wait, Plaxico’s suspended.. 1,694 players on those rosters? Please?

Because not only are you making people go completely insane, you’re making me care a little less about the football game I grew up with. It’s gotten to the point where I want to see more stories about Mark Sanchez becoming a rookie starter and Tom Brady being a threat to my PC, just to break the monotony of it all. Or am I just looking in the wrong places?

“Dude, there’s no way you get that spare.”

“What’s that, tubby? You think I can’t get a 7-10 split?”

“You couldn’t get a split if you had the frickin’ banana, brah.”

“You wanna put a few bucks on that?”

“Oh, I’ll do you one better, brah. If you get that spare, I’ll wear a David Carr jersey to the Texans game on Sunday.”

“You still have that David Carr jersey?”

“No, no, even better — a David Carr Panthers jersey. I’ll buy it off eBay and everything.”

“That’s bet, tubby.”

“You got no shot, brah! No shot!”

Sunday:

(Gracias, Stephanie.)

And you know what? I’ll take that. Yes, Ravens fans are bitter because of it, but if the shoe were on the other foot, those same Ravens fans would be laughing their asses off at us today, while Seattle Seahawks fans would be crowing about karmic retribution after Super Bowl XL or something.

So I’ll just ask this question, because I’m genuinely curious — what do Cleveland Browns fans think of this ruling?

Because if I sat in the Dawg Pound and yelled my lungs out for the Browns every year, and I heard Ravens fans complaining that the refs cheated them out of a victory, I think I’d be inclined to tell those Ravens fans to fuck right off, because they stole football from our city for three whole years and won a Super Bowl with what should have been our team. That would pretty much erase any sympathy I might have for that particular franchise.

Then again, if I were a Browns fan, maybe I wouldn’t want the hated Steelers to be the benefactors in this scenario. Maybe that would outweigh my general hatred of the Ravens.

So if there are any Browns fans out there would like to chime in with their thoughts on this call, feel free. I actually find myself rooting for the Browns defense tonight, because I have a 29-point lead in my fantasy league semifinal — more proof that fantasy football makes stranger bedfellows than politics — and the only player my opponent has left is Donovan McNabb. So try to keep him from getting more than 300 yards and 3 TDs tonight, okay? I could use that extra $20.

UPDATE (3:03 PM): As for the Ravens, they took that loss pretty well.

On one hand, it would be sad to see Arena Football disappear, as it has been entertaining in the past, and if nothing else, it gave us Kurt Warner. On the other hand, how many people really paid attention to the AFL when it was in season? I didn’t even go to a Carolina Cobras game when that team was still playing at the RBC Center in Raleigh. Diehard AFL fans have to be as rare as American-born Wigan supporters.

Arena Football is a fun little sideshow, and I’m sure plenty of families enjoyed going to games and trying to catch overthrown passes. But American sports fans have too many other options, and with so many people becoming less willing to spend the cash these days, I have a feeling the 50-yard indoor war might be have just become yet another victim of this craptastic economy. It probably won’t get much in the way of a eulogy, either. It was there, and now it’s gone. Oh, well.

Of course, I didn’t think International Rules would make a comeback, either, so what do I know? 2010 is a long way off.

(H/T: Awful Announcing.)

Second, the gang at World Soccer Daily has let me start blogging on their web site. You can see the early results here. I’m certain this will all end in tears one day, but for now, it’s something to do until I figure out exactly where my blogging future lies…

If this had been, say, Steve Slaton of the Houston Texans and not Joey Walton of Lewiston High School in Idaho, this play would have been challenged by the opposing coach in a heartbeat, and we would have seen about 5 different angles on this cartwheel in slow-motion instant replay, and maybe one of them would have revealed if his elbow had touched grass, thus rendering the play dead at that spot and nullifying one of the niftiest touchdown runs ever.

Thankfully, though, it’s just high school football, and we can celebrate this kid’s kung fu on YouTube. Sick run, Joey. Bravo.

(Spotted on FanHouse.)