Eat My Sports: Cav It All

As we reach the literal worst part of the sports calendar, I have to reach for things to write about. This year, it’s the NBA trade deadline which actually ended up being one of the more entertaining days in the NBA in recent memory.

This past summer, reigning NBA Finals’ losers, the Cleveland Cavaliers, re-shaped their roster by trading away a 25-year-old superstar in Kyrie Irving, away for Isaiah Thomas’ bum hip and scrap metal. They also decided that it would be a great idea to bring in Dwayne Wade, who hasn’t been useful in about five years, Derrick Rose, who hasn’t been useful since before Obama’s re-election and some other moves that really don’t make any sense. Continue reading Eat My Sports: Cav It All

Eat My Sports: Super Bowl LII Running Diary Edition

Welcome back Eat My Readers! Of course, you all know the outcome of Super Bowl LII by now. Nick Foles Face and the Eagles thwarted the dynastic Patriots 41-33, Philadelphia has all but burned to the ground under police-supervised white privilege, and Bryan McBournie is using the pages of his TB12 method book to soak up his tears before the Pats go on another run next year.

In my attempt at further hacking Bill Simmons’ career, I realized it’s been a while since we’ve done a running diary (almost eight years, actually). So, as the Super Bowl unfolded and Philly was about to be turned into carnage, here are exchanges between McBournie and I during the Super Bowl: Continue reading Eat My Sports: Super Bowl LII Running Diary Edition

Eat My Sports: One more time, for the last time

As many of you know, The Guys (mainly Bryan McBournie and myself) are avid Boston Red Sox fans, and today marked the final opening day for one David Arias Ortiz. Of course, being the big, round, mound of trotting around, Ortiz blasted off a home run to kick off his final season.

If the Sox season goes down the toilet, the focus of this season will turn into what the 2014 campaign for Derek Jeter did, and just be one farewell celebration after another. And for my money, as my all-time favorite member of the Sox, no one deserves it more.

Especially, because even at 39, he’s going out at the top of his game.

Ever since his arrival in Boston in 2003, Ortiz has easily been the most likeable member of the team (his flare for postseason dramatics helped) which is why it’s going to be so tough to see him go, since he can still play. Continue reading Eat My Sports: One more time, for the last time

Eat My Sports: The Juice Is Not Loose, But He’s Back For 10 Episodes

Roughly 21 years ago, if you were able to have conscious thought at that point, on October 2nd, 1995 you were hovering around a television waiting to hear the verdict of the O.J. Simpson trial. What was incredible was that every conceivable bit of evidence pointed to a guilty verdict for Simpson, but the defense poked so many holes in the credibility of the LAPD, that Simpson was found not guilty and let go.

As horrible as the brutal murders were, somehow the whole thing blew up into a media spectacle that made Simpson the must see TV event on a daily basis. It made compelling television in 1994 and 1995, 21 years later it’s still got everyone’s attention.

Last year FX assembled an all-star cast for “The People v. O.J. Simpson,” nabbing Cuba Gooding Jr., John Travolta, David Schwimmer, Nathan Lane and Courtney B. Vance to headline a 10-part series going behind the scenes of what most of America has known about the case. Is some of it embellished? Of course. Is some of it deviating away from what really happened? Probably. But what has come across, at least through the first six episodes has been arguably the best acting on television, and a story stranger than fiction. Continue reading Eat My Sports: The Juice Is Not Loose, But He’s Back For 10 Episodes

Eat My Sports: The narrative isn’t done

Like many of you, I thought I had written my last column on Peyton Manning last month after the Broncos dispensed the Carolina Panthers to win Super Bowl 50. That’s how it was supposed to end, Manning wins his second title and rides off into the sunset, yet here we are now having reports leak that Manning may want to give it another go.

While it is annoying that the story doesn’t end, I can honestly see why Manning would want to come back, I do understand that he won’t want people’s final memories of him playing were of him limping to the finish. Continue reading Eat My Sports: The narrative isn’t done

Eat My Sports: NBA What if?

Now that we are in the post-All-Star Game portion of the NBA schedule, there are really only a couple of storylines left: the Warriors’ chase of the Bulls for the best regular season win total of all-time, and the Kobe Bryant farewell tour. There’s plenty of time left for us to talk about the Warriors this year, so I’m going to give Bryant his due and give him the spotlight for one column.

For the record, I’ve never been a huge Bryant supporter. His antics and attitude while Shaquille O’Neal literally dragged him to his first three titles was just downright nauseating. Then, when the whole Colorado rape accusations came out, it made Bryant easily one of the most deplorable and unlikeable figures in all of sports. Somehow, in the decade-plus since, him having the 81-point game, getting within one title of Michael Jordan and him becoming almost an ambassador for a former generation have seemingly erased what a class act jerk Bryant was from when he entered the league basically through 2008.

The Bryant farewell tour is reminiscent of the Derek Jeter lovefest of 2014. Iconic player, iconic franchise that is being shoved in our face. But what people forget is how close Bryant came to not being a lifetime Laker, and more than likely not getting the rings that put him within striking distance of Jordan. Continue reading Eat My Sports: NBA What if?

Eat My Sports: So, how about that NBA trade deadline?

Like many of you, the NFL season is the highlight of my year in sports. The beginning of the season also runs about the same time as the MLB postseason, so that’s really about as good as it gets. Then, after the NFL calendar runs it’s course, we end up here in the sports dead zone. The holidays are done as you’ve finally assessed the damage after Valentine’s Day reared it’s ugly head six weeks after Christmas and you are either training your liver for St. Patrick’s Day, or finally cleansing your body of everything you’ve managed to d as o to it since Thanksgiving.

This leaves me with not a lot to talk about as I don’t care about the NHL and the NBA still has well over four months to go. But what the hell, let’s talk about the impending trade deadline anyways! Continue reading Eat My Sports: So, how about that NBA trade deadline?

Eat My Sports: Super Bowl overreaction!

Welcome, folks to the end of the 2015 NFL season and Super Bowl L 50. Right about now you are either hating on Cam Newton, praising Peyton Manning as the greatest quarterback of all-time or on your way to Red Lobster, any way you cut it, everybody is right and everybody is wrong.

So, in honor of overreaction week in the NFL where the Broncos are the greatest team ever, Newton is a cry baby and the combo of Coldplay/Bruno Mars/Beyoncé is the greatest musical combo since Aerosmith/Britney Spears/Nelly/N’Sync, here are some quick hits:

PEYTON MANNING IS THE GREATEST OF ALL-TIME, SERIOUSLY HE IS LIKE THE FREAKING BEATLES OF QUARTERBACKS!!!
Let me be the first to say that there is now enough on both sides of the argument to support Manning as the greatest QB who ever lived and to make cases for other people, and honestly it all depends on the prism in which you view his career through. If you want to make the case for him, he’s a two-time Super Bowl champion, third all-time in postseason wins, all-time leader in yards and touchdowns and holds the single-season records for yards and touchdowns (a record he’s claimed twice). If that’s not enough to make a claim, I don’t know what is. Continue reading Eat My Sports: Super Bowl overreaction!

Eat My Sports: Cardinals and Pats, Super Bowl Champs!

Not every football fan is a Neanderthal, meathead screaming at their television because they like seeing people get their brains bashed in. Unfortunately, sometimes, the average football gets lumped into a pool of people that is considered by and large, uneducated and spends way too much of their time, money and energy on a team or sport that really never gives anything back. This generalization is given to them by the few that make the rest of us who simply enjoy the sport look very, very bad.

Unless you live underneath a rock, you know by now that the Denver Broncos and Carolina Panthers are squaring off in Super Bowl 50. I repeat the DENVER BRONCOS and CAROLINA PANTHERS ARE PLAYING. Unfortunately, there are some recently tattooed Arizona Cardinal and New England Patriot fans that will have a lifetime reminder that their team did not, in fact, win the 50th Super Bowl. Continue reading Eat My Sports: Cardinals and Pats, Super Bowl Champs!

Eat My Sports: What in God’s name just happened?

Like many of you, I watched the NFL Wild Card Playoffs this weekend. Also, like many of you, I am still trying to process what in the hell happened in the Pittsburgh/Cincinnati and Seattle/Minnesota matchups.

As a Steeler fan, after Landry Jones’ interception with under two minutes to go, I gave up. I generally know when the possibility of a miracle can happen, this was not one of those situations, until I heard “AND THE BENGALS HAVE FUMBLED THE BALL!” Ok, I had a glimmer of hope, but let’s face it, Jones or Ben Roethlisberger with a bum shoulder still had a longshot to win the game.

Then Vontaze Burfect and Adam “Make It Rain” Jones pulled two of the most Cincinnati moves you’ll ever see. Burfect targeting the head of Antonio Brown on a pass that put the Steelers in field goal range then the ensuing on field scuffle that had Jones shove a ref gave the Steelers a chip shot field goal to win the game after choking away a 15-0 fourth quarter lead. Continue reading Eat My Sports: What in God’s name just happened?