Better To Be Silent...

Just curious, but what the hell is R.L. White thinking?

For those who are unenlightened, R.L. White is the president of the Atlanta chapter of the N.A.A.C.P...and, in this scribe's mind, further evidence of how far this once-proud organization has fallen.

I mean, from W.E.B. DuBois to this?

White, speaking to reporters in the wake of Michael Vick's admission of guilt, made a series of statements in defense of Vick that demand a breathalyzer, at the very least.

For example: "...(W)e should join hands as a team, and recognize the fact that Mr. Vick is human. Humans make mistake (sic), but we maintain that he is a redeemable human."

A mistake?

Locking your keys in your car is a mistake.

Fumbling the football is a mistake.

Believing the Republicans will win the next presidential election is a mistake.

Planning, executing, and operating a dog-fighting operation for five years is not a mistake.

This was on purpose.

This was not a one-time incident, but a lifestyle that Vick would still be living had he not been discovered by authorities.

That bears repeating.

Michael Vick was killing dogs on his property as recently as April. That is not the evidence of a man who suddenly realizes the horrible direction that his life has taken, a man who truly repents in the biblical sense of the word, a man who turns away from his iniquity to take up a life completely different from the one he was leading.

That is the evidence of a man who was happy doing what he was doing, and who would still be doing it if he hadn't been caught.

But then, I shouldn't be surprised that the N.A.A.C.P. got it so horribly wrong. After all, their track record in the last 30 years hasn't exactly kept Dr. King's dream alive.

But it gets better.

Continuing their theme of victimization where there are no victims, White did his level best to portray Vick (!!) as the victim in all this.

"There are those who took exception to our characterization of “piling on,” or even later, uh, I used the term, uh, “lynching” of his, uh, personality by those who cried the loudest."

See, we might take exception to the term "lynching" because Michael Vick was not the one who got lynched figuratively, but was the one who did the lynching, literally, and he has admitted it.

That's the unalterable truth that even the blindfolded leaders of the N.A.A.C.P. just don't get: this is no longer the witch-hunt they've been looking for, nor is it the "techno-lynching" of the black male in the new millenium, nor has anyone fabricated any evidence or created charges out of whole cloth simply to bring him down. Michael Vick admitted that he fought dogs, killed dogs, and profited from the same.

Who is the victim here? The man who has admitted to a crime, or the dogs that he brutally killed?

But that's not the worst of it. White goes on to make the kind of statement that questions his grip on reality.

"The way he is being persecuted, he wouldn’t have been persecuted that much if he had killed somebody."

What the blue hell is he talking about?

Is he actually suggesting that Vick would have caught less flack if he'd killed someone?

I'd like to know what planet he was on when every media outlet known to man was covering the Ray Lewis fiasco, and Ray-Ray wasn't even the trigger man.

Better yet, he must have completely forgotten the firestorm that surrounded the Rae Carruth case, and Carruth failed in his attempt to kill his girlfriend and their unborn child.

Or maybe he's still a member of the O.J. Simpson fan club.

You'll remember O.J...the double murderer.

Was he sleeping through that entire year of 24-hour coverage and endless debate in print and electronic media?

Does he really believe that Vick would have gotten less attention than O.J. did, and Vick was the highest-paid player in the NFL at the NFL's most glamorous position?


My goodness, the only way Vick could have gotten more attention is if he'd murdered human beings the same way that he killed dogs.

Perhaps one of the best things about Vick's going to prison is that it will finally stop people from publicly making asses of themselves...

...and if it will shut up knuckleheads like R.L. White, I'll drive him to the prison myself.

Today.

Couldn't Have Said It Better Myself

Following are lengthy quotes from sports writers that I respect and admire, opining about Michael Vick in the wake of his confession of guilt. Because I couldn't have said it better, I'll let them speak for themselves.

"Folks, this wasn't a bad decision made in a night club under the influence of Grey Goose. This "mistake" was a lifestyle that unfolded over a period of years. It's something that Vick likely would still be doing if his property in Virginia hadn't been searched by authorities in late April." Mike Florio, ProFootballTalk.com, Aug. 21, 2007

"It's the newest cautionary American tale: Football icon flips American dream on its head. It's so totally overwhelming and wildly extreme it's difficult to know where to begin. Vick is alleged to have not just run a dogfighting ring, which by itself is illegal and heinous, but to have tortured and killed dogs with his bare hands, lied to the man who's paying him $105 million about his involvement and lied to the NFL commissioner's face about his involvement. You wonder what Vick was thinking as the federal government knocked him out in what amounts to less than one round. Could the feds have had a more solid case against him? The dog-killing is such a showstopper, most folks don't even realize the feds could have nailed him for gambling as well." Michael Wilbon, Washington Post, Aug. 21, 2007

"Lying to the commissioner's face can't help Vick's chances of playing in the league again. He lied to Goodell. He lied to Arthur Blank, the Atlanta Falcons owner who thought Vick was revolutionizing the quarterback position three years ago and gave him a $130 million contract. He lied to fans throughout the nation who were captivated by his skills, lied to his mother after promising her last month that he would clear his ''good name,'' lied to the people of Atlanta who used to worship him but watched him flip an obscene gesture at them last year. Worst of all, he lied to himself." Jay Mariotti, Chicago Sun-Times, Aug. 21, 2007

"So let’s go ahead and redefine “keeping it real,” shall we?

We might as well, now that Michael Vick kept it real stupid and probably is headed to a federal penitentiary, the vacation destination of choice for men who believe criminal behavior and a lack of education are cultural benchmarks...

The Atlanta Falcons and owner Arthur Blank introduced and ushered Michael Vick into a brand-new world, a world that required Vick to carry himself in a more mainstream manner, a world of wealth, privilege, responsibility and the appearance of ethics and morality.

It’s a world all starting quarterbacks are asked to join. The position is the most prestigious in sports.

Vick wanted to do things his way. He wanted to customize the position in terms of style of play and off-field demeanor. He wanted to keep it real by keeping his feet in the seedy world he once knew and the new world that demanded a squeakier image.

The worlds don’t mix.

Michael Vick should not have abandoned his boyz from the hood, the gentlemen who predictably and quickly accepted plea agreements and squealed on Vick. He should’ve demonstrated the courage to demand that they join him on his new journey. He should’ve forced them to abandon him." Jason Whitlock, Kansas City Star, Aug. 21, 2007 (emphasis mine)

"So deep is the disappointment in how this once charmed tale turned ugly that the Falcons general manager at the time of Vick's drafting, Harold Richardson, won't discuss any facet of the rise and fall. Not even the best part of the story, because Richardson knows how it ends. In the road-building business now, he steers clear of potholes.

Dan Reeves, the Falcons coach at the time, said, "There was a lot of excitement about (drafting Vick). He was one of the most exciting players I'd seen on film, and I was extremely excited about bringing that kind of talent to Atlanta."

If this is the day to begin the writing of Vick's legacy in Atlanta, then you go back to the spring of 2001 where all that promise was born. At the same time, according to the federal indictment outlining charges against Vick, beneath the giddiness there was Bad Newz brewing.

"...in or about May 2001, (Tony) Taylor identified the property at 1915 Moonlight Road, Smithfield, Va. as being a suitable location for housing and training pit bulls for fighting."

Right away, Vick was marked for financial greatness. The 20-year-old who had grown up in the Ridley Circle housing project in Newport News, Va., signed the richest NFL rookie contract to date, with a $3 million signing bonus up front. Money enough to make any dream come true; money that could elevate a family for generations.

"...on or about June 29, 2001, Vick paid approximately $34,000 for the purchase of property located at 1915 Moonlight Road...From this point forward, the defendants used this property as the main staging area for housing and training pit bulls in the dog fighting venture and hosting dog fights."

In the context of where Vick was at the time, these passages from the indictment become all the more unsettling. They lay the rails of an unseen parallel track that Vick traveled even while building his name and his fortune. And rather than answer any great questions about his fall, they only make it all the more incomprehensible." Steve Hummer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Aug. 21, 2007

"There will be all this speculation about what kind of football future Vick has now that he has pleaded guilty to these federal dogfighting charges, involving conspiracy and interstate commerce and all the rest of it, charges that can get you five years in prison but will probably get Vick just one. There will be all this speculation about what kind of player he might be after doing time. But for as long as he is in jail, Vick ought to think about what kind of person he wants to be when he gets out, whether he finds another team that wants him or not. He ought to wonder what kind of person got involved in something as terrible as dogfighting, however much he was involved, ask himself what kind of athlete thinks that is some kind of acceptable sport.

He sure ought to think about what kind of friends he had or thought he had, ones to whom he always said he had to be so loyal. This case isn't about race, even though there are people who want it to be. It is about values and judgment and skewed definitions of friendship, and accountability. If it isn't some kind of alarm sounding throughout sports, where a lot of guys, white and black and Hispanic, aren't taking a closer look at all those around them, it ought to be.

You can talk about the irony of the public, a public that loves the violence of pro football, finding a different kind of violence shameful and unacceptable. You know there are athletes who have committed other crimes, been behind the wheels of cars when people died, been accused of rape, and never have seen the inside of a jail cell the way Vick will. And yet what Vick and Quanis Phillips and Purnell Peace and Tony Taylor are accused of, will plead guilty to - including the execution of "underperforming" dogs - is the behavior of bums. Sometimes you still go to jail for that." Mike Lupica, New York Daily News, Aug. 21, 2007

"In sports, it's good to be original. The first to dunk. The first to throw a knuckleball. The only time you don't want to be original is when it comes to bad behavior.

Michael Vick is finding this out. Using drugs? Sexual assault? DUI? Waving a gun? As pathetic as it seems, those offenses no longer shock in the privileged world of professional sports.

But dogfighting? Betting on it? Hanging the weak dogs? Drowning them in buckets? We have not seen that before. Vick, in being accused of such crimes, has invented his own category. Not good. He is out there on his own more than he ever was as a quarterback scrambling from defensive linemen.

And the government now has him by the knees. All that is left is how hard the judge knocks him over. Vick will plead guilty to heinous charges -- despite once claiming a trial would clear his name.

In these ways, Vick is an original.

And he is done." Mitch Albom, Detroit Free-Press, Aug. 21, 2007

All that matters now is the settling up.

Vick's Cloudy Future

So there I am, reading Sports Illustrated online, when I run into yet another Michael Vick article that misses the point entirely.

This one, by George Dohrmann, tries to complete the Shylock’s Bargain that is Vick’s current situation: figure out some way to get Vick back onto a football field anytime in the future.

One will sooner cut a pound of flesh from his own body without spilling a drop of blood before that happens.

The amazingly large point that Dohrmann and others are missing is this: Michael Vick is simply not a good quarterback.

No one doubts his amazing array of physical gifts. That has never been in question. What we have yet to see from the NFL’s most highly paid soon-to-be convict is consistency with those gifts. It is not merely enough that Vick can throw a football into the teeth of a gale force wind and through a steel filing cabinet…across his body…but can he go through his reads and hit the open man?

History says that he’s a worse passer than Joey Harrington. That by itself should get him cut, because Harrington has never been anything but abysmal for his entire career.

And that is how we must judge Vick: as a quarterback. Not as a freak of nature athlete, but as a quarterback. As a quarterback, Vick couldn’t lead a hungry offensive lineman to the buffet. (This, by the way, is why we should never consider the number of Pro Bowls attended when considering someone’s Hall of Fame credentials, because the Pro Bowl vote is not based on merit, but on popularity. The fact that Vick has been elected three (!!) times in his career speaks largely to his highlight-reel popularity and not to his ability to lead his team any further than the, er, doghouse…)

As a quarterback, Vick has never managed the game well. He has never out-thought his opponents, the way a Donovan McNabb or a Warren Moon did. He has never learned the judicious use of his legs, the way a Steve Young or a Roger Staubach did. He has never taken a strong arm and learned deftness of touch, the way a Brett Favre or even a Randall Cunningham did. And in the crunch, when it’s time to get dressed in a phone booth, he has never been larger than the moment, the way a Joe Montana, a John Elway, or a Tom Brady was.

Dorhmann, like so many others recently, doesn’t even address Vick’s obvious failings at QB, choosing rather to focus on the murkiness of Vick’s future. He tosses Kobe Bryant’s name into the mix, and rather unfairly, because Bryant was never convicted of rape in a court of law or in the court of public opinion. We just never thought Bryant was guilty of being anything more than a cad who would cheat on his wife. Dohrmann also runs Leonard Little back up the flagpole, and rather unfairly, because Little did his time and the law says he owes nothing more. If Dohrmann’s sense of justice is not satisfied by the outcome, he should talk to his local congressman to see about getting the law changed, but whining about Little’s penalty after the fact isn’t going to bring that poor woman back, nor will throwing Little into an oubliette to serve more time.

Dohrmann gives us these examples as though they have anything to do with Vick and his situation. “Fans will take it all in and decide that Michael Vick deserves to play again…” He couldn’t be more wrong. Fans took in all of the Rae Carruth fiasco, too. If Carruth gets paroled tomorrow, runs a 3.9 40, vertically leaps 55 inches, and catches everything from a JUGS gun blindfolded, no GM this side of hell signs him to as much as the practice squad because 1) Carruth is nuclear waste and 2) nobody DESERVES to play professional football.

No matter what Dohrmann may think, Vick doesn’t DESERVE to play football. Playing in the NFL is a privilege, and not a right. And as much as Vick has become nuclear waste like Carruth, the truth is that he just wasn’t cutting it as a quarterback.

Let Vick plead out. Let him do a year at Club Fed. The problem for him is this: he’d likely be suspended by the league for at least a year after his prison stint…but to be suspended, he’d have to be under contract to an NFL team.

After all this, what team is willing to take the public relations hit to gamble on a career 53% passer who won’t play a down for them until 2010 at the earliest?

We Break From Our Regularly-Scheduled Programming...

...to bring you this non-sports-related update:

DO NOT, under ANY circumstances, view the film called "D-War."

I repeat, DO NOT, under ANY circumstances, view the film called "D-War."

As this has been a blog dedicated almost entirely to sports, that should give my warning extra weight. That is how strongly I feel about this film.

Ho.

Lee.

Crap.

For those of you who know me personally, you'll remember that I'm a man with well-defined and somewhat questionable tastes in films in general. I tend to like films that are usually characterized by excessive violence, monsters, magic, futuristic weapons, mindless chase scenes, meaningless dialogue, gore of all sorts, and not much in the way of plot development. For example, as I write this, I'm watching Arnold Schwarzenegger's "Commando," which will never be mistaken for "North By Northwest," but which has its place in the action genre. "Commando" is unapologetically bad, but in a fun, wink-at-the-audience kind of way.

D-War is the kind of bad that all involved in its coming to fruition should be taken out and publicly caned as an example to all children everywhere: "This is what happens to you when you make a film that deserves to be shown in Dante's Eighth Circle of Hell."

Ho.

Lee.

Crap.

Where to begin?

Lacking a clearer narrative to follow, and desperately trying to save you 90 minutes that could be better spent sticking straight pins into your pupils, I'll begin at the beginning.

This "film" makes a classic fantasy film mistake: too much exposition at the beginning. We meet a young white dude in the beginning of the movie, who immediately (and I mean immediately) has an expository flashback to meeting a strange old white dude in an antique shop when he was a kid, where a strange old box opened up to him. The strange old white dude tells the young white dude that he has been chosen to save the world...which I was pretty sure would be my job when I was 11, except that my Dad had to be a jerk and make me wash dishes...but I digress...We are told, in yet ANOTHER expository flashback, about some spurious Korean legend involving dragons coming to Earth every 500 years, and of course one of them is EEEE-ville. And, of course, some poor human sod is supposed to make some sort of CHOICE which will save the universe or destroy the planet.

See, for a guy like me, you don't have to explain why dragons are here...just get them suckers on screen and let 'em start tearing stuff up! For most people who will actually pay to go see a dragon movie, we've already bought into the whole idea that dragons will be featured somewhat logically in the film. Don't waste our time trying to convince us about what we're already there to see...bring on the reptiles!

(This, by the way, is what makes Disney's "Dragonslayer" the undisputed finest dragon film ever made, bar none, accept no substitutes. We didn't bother explaining how the damn dragon got there or waste any time with spurious prophecies...nope, we got right down to fire-breathing action...but I digress.)

So anyway, this utterly useless exposition takes place in Korea about 500 years ago, which gives the filmmaker the excuse to turn the movie into a really bad Wuxiu martial arts rip-off...I mean, "somebody should go to prison" bad...like if Ed Wood or Uwe Boll were to make "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" bad...complete with an old man from the Pai Mei school of old oriental dudes that can kick massive amounts of arse, young dudes that can do that corkscrew air spin to avoid a sword thrust (when merely stepping back could do the same thing...but I'm digressing again, dang it), and bad guys in scary, black armor that looked like something Peter Jackson laughed at and dismissed while designing "Lord Of The Rings."

(By the way, can we just round up all filmmakers who wish to make a fantasy and ask them to do the following? I get the whole armor thingy. All of us do. You want to make sure that we understand that they are the bad guys. Right. Got it. Here's a hint: TRY PUTTING THEM INTO ARMOR THAT'S A DIFFERENT COLOR. Must every EEEEE-ville army in existence wear black? What, is there some kind of group-rate discount for EEEEE-ville armies if they buy black, scary armor in bulk? GAAAAAAAH!!!)

Okay, I'm all better now...mostly.

So, you have this EEEEE-ville black, scary dragon with his EEEEE-ville black armored henchman, leading and EEEEE-ville black armored army that is supported by EEEEE-ville black LOTR design-reject monsters...who are carrying multi-rocket RPGs.

I sh*t thee not.

Multi-rocket RPGs.

500 years ago.

In Korea.

Where we know, of course, from all military history, that the multi-rocket RPG was invented...

I mean, for crap's sake, you go to the trouble of introducing large, menacing, and possibly carnivorous dinosaur-like creatures into your fantasy film...is it too much to ask that they actually EAT PEOPLE? What the stinking hell does a 20-ton carnivore need with a shoulder-mounted, multi-rocket RPG?!

See, this is where Spielberg got it right with Jurassic Park 1-through-inevitable sequels: the dinosaurs saw the long pig, ate the long pig, and liked the long pig. When that T-Rex ate that slimy lawyer in the first movie, Spielberg had our money for as many J-Park movies as he cared to make, because he gave us what we wanted to see: big dinosaurs eating small people.

You ready for this? Here's where the movie gets bad.

The Pai Mei stunt double trains up the Liu Kang stunt double so that the Liu Kang stunt double can protect the Lucy Liu stunt double, who is supposed to make that CHOICE between the good (and heretofore unseen) dragon, and the EEEEE-ville black scary dragon. The EEEEE-ville henchman in the scary black armor leads his EEEEE-ville army to the innocent and idyllic Korean village and proceeds to bomb it back to the Stone Age...which is most certainly the best way to make sure the EEEEE-ville scary black dragon gets the girl it wants, by blowing up the entire village without stopping to consider that the girl might be inside one of the buildings catching the Scorched Earth Special...

...only for the Liu Kang stunt double to decide that he didn't want the girl to make that CHOICE, because his love for her was clearly more important than THE FATE OF THE ENTIRE WORLD...so they eloped, chased by the EEEEE-ville black scary dragon, until they both jump off a cliff and into the ocean, where they DIE...

...which brings us back to the present, where we discover that the young white dude is actually the Liu Kang stunt double, only like reincarnated into a young American white dude (I gotta look this one up...is coming back to life as a young white American a reward or a punishment? Apparently, a Korean dying and being reincarnated as a Korean is just too much to ask of an audience in a dragon movie...er...), and he's supposed to save some young white chick, who is...you guessed it...the reincarnation of the Lucy Liu stunt double (see the digression in this paragraph).

(In a delicious sort of irony, as I write this rant, I'm watching Ah-nold single-handedly destroy the entire army of San Culo En Fuego...or whatever the Espanyol Estereotype of the Era was...)

Right about the time that this young white dude figures out that he's the savior of the world, the young white chick starts getting pursued by the giant, scary black dragon...which looks like a hooded cobra on whatever swole Barry Bonds up...and then the movie takes a turn that only the benighted director of "Gymkata" could appreciate: this scary black dragon magically shows up wherever this young white chick is, waits until she has exited whatever domicile she happens to be holed up in, and then wrecks said domicile in search of the girl that ain't ten feet from it as she runs away. Of course, through a plot device too stupid to mention, she gets hooked up with the young white dude, and we repeat this nonsense ad nauseam, with the following caveat: whenever the scary black dragon is about to discover its prey, we get the cheesiest of Deux Ex Machina deliverances imaginable...including that the strange old white dude is now some sort of shapeshifter (!!) who just becomes different people who help these two knuckleheads out whilst they run around what's left of L.A.

See, the young white dude is convinced that things will be different this time...all this with a scary black dragon showing up in his rear view mirror every five minutes or so, but yeah, I can see where it's different...er...

Meaningless Stereotyped Character #1: the young white dude has a young black friend who literally says "Oh, HELL naw!!" at least a hundred times in the movie.

Meaningless Stereotyped Character #2: Of course, you can't have scary black dragons wreaking havoc in Los Angeles without some predictably black-suited government agents wondering how to stop said scary black dragon. Even worse, the leading black suit decides that the best solution to the whole scary black dragon problem is to kill the girl that the dragon is chasing...because that's what our government agents want to do...rightly prosecute high profile black quarterbacks for dog-fighting and rightly kill white chicks that are running from EEEEE-ville black scary dragons...it's a black thang, you wouldn't understand...

Meanwile, remember scary henchman in black scary armor? He shows up just like the Michael Ironside character from Highlander 2: The Quickening - just materializes out of thin frickin' air, and (get this) right in the strange old dude's antique shop...where he proceeds to zap various pieces of old Korean antiques and turn them into his...you guessed it...scary black armored army and LOTR reject monsters, complete with UPDATED multi-rocket RPGs. (Of course, no one thought to ask why they all showed up in the strange old white dude's antique shop in the first damn place...I mean, didn't he think that they might show up one day? Didn't it occur to him that he oughtta burn those scrolls so that they couldn't just show up in the middle of his business? GAAAH) They go on a classic EEEEE-ville army rampage, blowing up whatever was left of Los Angeles after "Volcano" and "Day After Tomorrow," where they are met by the same inept helicopter pilots and infantrymen that were in Ferris Bueller's Godzilla, all bad flying and bad shooting...

This stuff goes on for much too long, when we get this: the young white dude and the young white chick decide to break for Mexico, because, as we all know, there are anti-dragon laws in place, right there on the books next to the drug-smuggling laws and the immigration laws...when they get caught by the EEEEE-ville army, and the young white dude passes out...

...where we wake up on some set left over from one of the Mortal Kombat flicks, waaaaay out in the middle of frickin' nowhere. The young white dude is tied up, the young white chick is stretched out on an altar, the EEEEE-ville army with the vegetarian semi-dinosaurs is all lined up in parade formation, the scary black dragon shows up...and then the young white dude screams the young white chick's name.

"SAAAAAA-RAAAAAA!!!!!"

At which point the medallion (!!) that the young white dude had been wearing around his neck and which, coinci-friggin-dentally, had never been explained at any point in the movie simply lights up and annhilates the ENTIRE EEEEE-villle army and monsters in one big ol' Led Zeppelin laser-light show. One minute they're there, the next they're exiled to CG hell.

Now loose, the young white dude picks up a sword and advances on the EEEEE-ville henchman.

You're probably thinking we're going to see him predictably recreate all that bad wire-fu of the early part of the flick. I was thinking that. Everyone in the theater was thinking that.

But NOOOOOO...the EEEEE-ville henchman beats the sugar-coated crap out of the young white dude, moves in for the coup de grace, accidentally touches that dang medallion, and melts away like the Wicked Witch of the West.

You're probably thinking that this young white dude has figured out that he is wearing an industrial-strength can of Whoopass around his neck, and that he'll then tun to put some on the scary black dragon. I was thinking that. Everyone in the theater was thinking that.

But NOOOOOO...out of literally NOWHERE, here comes the GOOD dragon.

WHAT?

NOW you're probably thinking that the good dragon beats the bad dragon in some desperately-needed dragon-on-dragon violence...but NOOOOOO, the bad dragon choke-slams the good dragon to death, all "teeth buried in throat" style.

At which the young white chick, uh, raises her hand, makes some magic 8 ball appear in the sky, waves it around, and throws it at the beaten good dragon.

Then she dies.

No crap, she dies.

Then the good dragon gets up...and changes form...and becomes that weird-looking whiskery dragon from the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, complete with arms that the other dragon ain't got...at which point it finally delivers the butt-whuppin' the evil black dragon has so richly deserved.

Then (!!) the parade dragon turns to the young white dude...and the dead young white chick manifests The Force and appears to him, all glowing and white, with Yoda and Hayden Christensen behind her, saying that she'll always love him and they'll be together forever...then she disappears, the dragon flies away, the young white dude is left standing all alone on the Mortal Kombat back lot...

...and up come the credits.

And the Korean audience applauded.

I, meanwhile, have taken on the thankless duty of trying to warn everyone that I care about to avoid this movie at all costs. There is no amount of alcohol that will excuse its excesses, no amount of hallucinogens that will forgive the sins of the plot, and no excuse for ever seeing this movie.

Ever.

In fact, there is no amount of money that could be paid to you to force you to sit through this atrocity.

If you HAVE to watch a bad movie, get some beers and laugh your way through "Plan 9 From Outer Space."

DO NOT watch this film.

We now return you to the Michael Vick investigation, already in progress...

Taking Issue With Michael Silver

Okay, so the guy is Yahoo! Sports newly-minted sports writer...wonderful.

Now if only he'd keep his opinions to himself, unless he's going to offer something genuinely meaningful to the conversation.

To wit, I give you his initial offering, posted on Yahoo!'s NFL News page on August 13. He wastes the better part of a couple thousand words recycling the same bleeding-heart Michael Vick apologies that the Worldwide Fearless Leader has tried to ram down our throats for the last two months.

Basically, he gives us the "What about this? argument, the "It's not as bad as..." argument, and the "He's not the only one..." argument, none of which come close to making his point.

He begins with his "What about this?" argument by attempting to draw a parallel between Peyton Manning hunting in the offseason and Michael Vick fighting dogs in the offseason. This was his first mistake. For all of his trying to paint Bambi into Manning's sights, hunting just doesn't carry the same cachet that dogfighting carries. Hunting is not only legal, but socially accepted around the world. Yes, there are some rather vocal opponents of hunting in the U.S., but they make up a rather loud and annoying minority. Most folks don't care or don't mind if a man hunts legally in his private time.

Silver then moves to the "It's not as bad as..." argument, by citing the misadventures of St. Louis Rams defensive end Leonard Little. If there's a difference here, it's that Little committed a crime that most of us could easily have committed: he drove drunk, caused an accident, and inadvertently killed a woman. Vick, on the other hand, cold-bloodedly and quite soberly planned and executed a gambling operation for over five years that involved the wholesale abuse, torture, and slaughter of animals, all for profit. One act does not excuse the other.

Finally, he goes to the "He's not the only one..." argument, by sharing comments from New Orleans Saints running back Deuce McAllister. McAllister essentially backs up Silver's contention that dogfighting is widespread in the NFL and that we should not make such a big deal out of it since so many people do it.

Well, by that logic, we ought to excuse pederasty, drug dealing, and wife-beating because, after all, so many people do it.

Then Silver has the nerve to castigate us for enabling Roger Goodell and the NFL to "rush to judgment."

Actually, it's quite simple: the public finds dog-fighting abhorrent. The NFL and its players make their living at the largess of the public. The advertisers who associate themselves and their products with the NFL do so at the largess of the public. The networks who broadcast those games and use them to promote their prime-time schedules do so at the largess of the public. Therefore, if the public finds dog-fighting abhorrent, the public is not likely to spend its hard-earned cash at NFL events, nor with the sponsors associated with the NFL, nor with the networks associated with the NFL.

And Silver thinks that this is a bad thing. He really thinks that Peyton Manning's legal and honorable hunting is the same as electrocuting a dog that failed to test well, or that Leonard Little's single conviction somehow outweighs five years of intentional perfidy, or that a lot of people might do it somehow excuses it.

Dude, it's simple. Most of us think dog-fighting is sick, and that the people involved in it are sick. Think about it: no person hides the fact that he's going to go hunting. He tells his wife, he brings his kids, he goes with friends, he brags about it at work, and if his prize is big enough, he gets his picture in the local newspaper.

When's the last time you opened up the Local Interest section of your newspaper and saw a guy proudly sitting with his rape stand?

Evolution Of The Game(s)

Somewhat lost amidst the hoopla surrounding Barry Bonds inexorable pursuit of baseball's Holy Grail was that perennial nice guy Tom Glavine won his 300th game as a starting pitcher.

I say somewhat, because for a reality-deprived sports maniac like myself, Glavine's achievement has been properly noted, if in most quarters with some sepia-toned sadness, as though we were seeing the last pandas die without successfully mating.

Indeed, if you look up any collection of articles discussing Glavine's feat, most of them bemoan the dearth of future 300 game winners...as though this were a bad thing.

Friends, did I miss something?

I thought that we taught our children that individual accomplishments are secondary to team goals.

I thought that winning the game was the whole goal of teamwork.

For all of our carping about the lack of 300 game winners on the horizon, for all of our complaining about not seeing iron men log 300 innings or more in a season, let's remember something: great teams are still winning over 100 games in a baseball season.

And all this without staffs littered with 20 game winners (surely the next pitching species on the endangered list).

It's gotten so bad that there's a new faux-stat in vogue: the quality start. To get a quality start, a pitcher must go at least seven innings...this, despite the rule that says a pitcher gets credit for the game if he completes five innings.

Again, it's nice if a pitcher is good enough to put up a body of work deserving of the Hall of Fame, but I'd guess that Jack Morris will take some solace in his World Series ring from 1991 whenever his 254 career victories leave him out of baseball's Valhalla.

Seriously, if 300-game pitchers go the way of the sabre-tooth tiger, I say so long, hasta la vista, and good night.

There are lots of reasons for the lack of 300-game winners on the horizon, all of them valid, and none of them Tony LaRussa's fault.

First off, there are all of 23 men who have won 300 or more games as a starting pitcher in the entire history of baseball.

23.

That's it.

Period.

So, before we all start crying about the sudden lack of 300-game winners, let's talk about the paucity of 300-game winners in respect to a few other baseball hallmarks.

There are 27 men who have 3000 or more hits.

There are 22 men who have 500 or more home runs.

There are 14 men with 3000 or more strikeouts.

Yes, I will admit that the offensive numbers are more likely to change in the short term, but not by much. For example, the 3000 hit club is not likely to grow by another 10 men in the next 5 years, nor is the 500 home run club.

So, again, there are only a handful of men in baseball who have been good enough for long enough to win 300 games as a starting pitcher. This tells me that we should not bemoan the lack of the achievement, but rather celebrate the singularity of the achievement. These few men defied age and, more importantly, younger hitters to get their wins. Before we bury them, let's praise them.

Second, if there are a lack of 300-game winners, it might be due to the fact that managers might have more options available to them.

Let's go back to 1904. If you lived in the Big Apple back then, you might have cheered for the New York Highlanders (who became the Yankees). That team went 92-59. Starting pitcher Jack Chesbro, usually appearing on two days rest, went 41-12 while appearing in 55 games. In plain terms, the man won a third of his team's games by himself. And I'll bet the rent that his manager, Clark Griffith, would have run Chesbro out to the hill 100 times if he could have.

Not impressed? Let's get a little closer to films with color and sound.

In 1968, Bob Gibson went 22-9.

Not impressed? He had 28 complete games. (Do the math, bunky: he was the pitcher of record in 31 games, and he finished 28 of them. Talk about a pitcher who could have sued for non-support...)

Still not impressed? He had 13 shutouts. That's 13 times that his team only had to score one single run to win. (For the record, he won four games that season by the score of 1-0.)

And for you roto-stat-freaks, he posted a 1.12 ERA, and a 0.853 WHIP.

He appeared in 34 of his team's 162 games.

And if it were up to Red Schoendienst, he'd have appeared in 90 games that season.

In other words, if there's a lack of 300 game winners, it might be because there's an abundance of live arms in the bullpen.

Managers keep their jobs (or lose them) based on their won-lost percentage. Therefore, it's in a manager's best interest to field the best possible lineup out of 25 players, in order to win games. Back in the old days, when arms like Gibson's were rare, you ran him out to the mound every 4 days, only because you couldn't run him out there every 3 days...and, to be frank, because you knew that the guy replacing him might not have been fit to lace Gibby's cleats.

Nowadays, it just makes sense to shorten games.

One, it keeps your starter fresher for longer. If a guy doesn't have to log 350 innings, he's likely to be a lot more effective during a white-hot pennant race than the guy who gets overused.

Two, when you shorten games, it makes it harder for batters to adjust. Just about the time that a good hitter has timed a good pitcher and gotten a feel for that pitcher's rhythm, you pull that pitcher and replace him with a fresh junkballer out of the bullpen. Now the batter has to start all over again, but this time it's late in the game and his team is down a run or two, which means that he might be pressing against a pitcher that he hasn't seen all day.

Better yet, when the game gets late, you can situationally pitch to hitters, doing thw whole lefty/righty thing until the game is in the books.

In other words, managers are managing games like they were the seventh game of the World Series.

Remember a few years ago, when Randy Johnson came out of the bullpen in Game 7 to help seal the victory for his team?

That happens every night in the bigs, and we're too spoiled to notice it.

Finally, it may be that pitchers aren't willing to extend themselves like they used to.

After all, when Gibby was chunkin' for the Redbirds, he was literally putting food on his table for his children. Nowadays, Carl Pavano can suck so bad that he'd mess up Stephen Hawking's math and his family would still never have to taste Spam forever.

In other words, when modern, multi-millionaire pitchers get to the sixth or seventh and they have the lead or are tied, and the welfare of their children doesn't depend upon their pitching a shutout into the eighth or ninth, they are much more likely to give the ball to skip and let the bullpen sort it out.

This is NOT to say that they are lazy, only that priorities have changed. In the old days, starting pitchers scoffed at the bullpen, largely because the bullpen was only there in case the starter broke something beyond immediate repair. Nowadays, modern pitchers love their 'pens, because those guys who get Holds and Saves also preserve Wins for the teams.

And, ultimately, that's what matters most.

But I don't believe we've seen our last 300-game winner.

In fact, all a guy has to do is win 15 games a year for 20 years. Raise the number of wins per season, and lower the number of seasons needed to get there.

In other words, there are pitchers out there right now, doing their due diligence, winning 15-18 games a season, that will be on the doorstep of 300 before we know it.

And I can prove it.

Give me a fastball pitcher with a nasty change-up and modern bullpen tactics, and I can give you a 300-game winner by 2027.

Unless you give me C.C. Sabathia, Roy Halladay, and Johan Santana right now...heh heh heh...

For The Record, Part 2

This is the second of 2 articles pondering the significance of Barry Bonds breaking the all-time home run record.

A most amazing thing happened after Barry Bonds broke Hank Aaron's home run record.

Aaron himself appeared on video to congratulate Bonds for the achievement.

Aaron, who had steadfastly refused to say anything positive or negative about Bonds as the latter approached the Holy Grail of baseball records, recorded nothing less than an eloquent and dignified congratulatory speech that really put the capper on the occasion.

Never mind that Aaron never should have had to go through this indignity in the first place.

This act by Aaron highlights his character and his generation.

You see, Aaron came up in an era in which black folks didn't air each other's dirty laundry in public, because that just ain't what people did.

Aaron came up in an era in which black folks believed that decent character would eventually win out, despite the evils being perpetrated against them. It didn't matter if another black man was less than perfect. In that era, all black men were united against a common foe: white society.

We cannot make too little of this. Laws existed that restricted a black man's freedoms, even his pleasures. Laws existed that restricted a black man's movements and ability to earn. And those were the ones that were on the books.

Other laws existed regarding such improprieties like a black man cutting his eyes at a white woman, or offering impertinence to a white person, that were paid for in blood after dark.

As a joke of the era went, one black man would ask another, "How you doin'?"

The other would reply, "White folks still in the lead..."

At which both would laugh, or grunt, or not in sympathy.

One did not throw another black man under the bus in Aaron's era, not when there was a common enemy more than willing to throw both the accused and the accuser under the bus together.

So Aaron did what he'd grown up doing: he forgave another man.

When Aaron endured death threats and insults of the vilest kind, when FBI protection had to be afforded to his daughter, when he had to be escorted by an armed policeman as he approached Babe Ruth's mark, he forgave.

He could have spoken out like so many black athletes of that time did...but they were younger, weren't they? They weren't riding buses in the Jim Crow South of the 1950s. Those athletes were children in the 60s when Malcolm X was assassinated; to them, the battle had always been fought that way. For Aaron, for the generation prior to that, the battle had been won by being the better man.

That bears repeating: the battle had been won by being the better man.

Aaron has publicly and privately spoken about carrying on the example that Jackie Robinson set, professionally and personally.

When the obviously chemically-enhanced Barry Bonds broke his record, he could have reviled, just as Robinson could have reviled when the Phillies gave him the kind of insults that might have made a modern hood rat "catch a case."

Instead, as he'd done throughout his career, throughout his life, Henry Aaron chose to take the higher road.

In doing so, he forever provided a poignant reminder of the gulf of character that exists between himself and the eternally-tainted Bonds.

And, quoting the very first words out of his mouth when he finally broke Babe Ruth's record,

"Thank God it's over."

For The Record, Part 1

This is the first of two articles reflecting on Barry Bonds' becoming baseball's all-time home run king.

I saw the dinger.

THE dinger.

Number 756.

Any way you say it, the number demands a certain respect.

And yet, I find myself feeling weird right now.

Not ambivalent, but weird.

There's just something wrong when such a colossal indignity is committed publicly and nothing is done about it.

While something may yet be done is really immaterial. After all, no matter what the NCAA and the Big Ten may say about Michigan's tainted records with the Fab Five, we all saw freshmen play in the NCAA Championship Game. All the money that any boosters might have given them didn't make them better players, only richer. We saw them. They existed. Their deeds occurred in real life. We have chosen to ignore their deeds because of off-court malfeasance, but that's really it, isn't it?

We choose to ignore what really happened.

In other words, we're trying to edit reality.

Barry Bonds, most certainly chemically-enhanced, really hit his 756th career home run.

I will not recount the evidence against him, mountainous though it is.

All I can say is that, whatever we may choose to do with his record, it is now finally his, now and forever.

Any future discussion of home run kings will inevitably have to mention him, because, love him or hate him, he still had to face major league pitching and hit the baseball out of the yard 756 times, more than anyone else.

An asterisk only tempts us to alter reality, just like the asterisk that haunted Roger Maris to his death. The fact is that Maris hit more home runs than Babe Ruth in a season, number of games be damned. Maris didn't make the schedule, any more than Ruth did. Maris actually stood in and hit 61 home runs in a single season, more than any man before him and any man up to the benighted Mark McGwire.

When that asterisk was finally removed, we admitted what we already knew all along: Maris had really done what we had all seen him do.

Just as Pete Rose has done what we have all seen him do, some 4256 times. Rose's eligibility for the National Baseball Hall of Fame really doesn't matter, because the record he posted is unlikely to ever be broken. We can make him persona non grata at official baseball events, we can keep him from ever darkening the Hall's door, but his presence looms over the Hall because his record stands.

He actually hit a baseball safely 4256 times. There's only one other guy that has as many as 4000 career hits, and only one other guy after him that has as many as 3700 career hits.

This is where we are with Barry Bonds. We can choose not to put his records in the books, just like we do for Sadaharu Oh and Josh Gibson. In Gibson's case, we choose not to acknowledge his records because the white, er, right people didn't see them...never mind ample eyewitness testimony to the contrary. In Oh's case, his were only hit in Japan...as though hitting 800+ home runs in Japan is somehow easier than hitting 714 against competition that didn't include black pitchers.

I mean, it's too late for any recriminations now. It's too late to take anything back.

What? Are we going to go back through every one of Barry Bonds' home runs and magically erase them from the box score? Are we going to change the scores of the games in which those home runs occurred?

Let's not forget that all of those home runs did not occur in a vacuum, but within the context of a major league baseball season, which usually ends with a champion, absent Bud Selig's thumb-fingered interference. Bonds' teams haven't always been as bad as the current edition. What do we do to some deserving team that got cheated out of a victory because of a Bonds blast?

Send them roses? Offer an apology? Do some fantasy league crap and retroactively award them the playoff spot they didn't get because Bonds was hitting out of his mind for a chemically-enhanced season or two?

No, these 756 home runs really happened, because baseball let them happen.

And baseball let them happen because we let baseball let them happen.

Had we stood up and been counted, had we spoken with our wallets instead of our handwritten signs, this might have been averted.

Instead, we supported this charade. The more he hit, the more of us came to the yard and bought his jersey and signed up for the baseball package on our local cable providers and bought products advertised on baseball broadcasts...and Major League Baseball took note.

So they gave him a pass.

Instead of keeping him from the pinnacle of baseball records, they paved the way for him. Baseball drug its heels at ever investigating steroids, despite growing evidence that the drug was everywhere, then appointed a toothless investigator with no subpoena power to "look into the matter."

All that was a sham. All that was for our benefit.

Baseball only gave us what we wanted...then, and now.

Then, we wanted commercials that said "Chicks dig the long ball."

Now, we'll want asterisks...or expunged records...or some other equally faux punishment for things that really happened.

Barry Bonds has really hit 756 home runs.

This ain't the Matrix. We can't alter reality.

He really did it.

And it is our fault.

Reading Between The Lines

Some quotes tell you everything you really need to know...

“He doesn’t always finish the routes out the way you want and he’s not always the first guy in line to listen, but he has always produced,” 49ers VP of Player Personnel Scott McCloughan, referring to Darrell Jackson (Jason Cole of Yahoo! Sports).

Translation: He’s a dog.

It’s never a good thing when the guy who traded for you is crapping all over your practice habits, especially after a career that, while somewhat productive, has also done its Vaudevillian best to leave the audience wanting more. Count on Jackson continuing to break the hearts of Niner fans and fantasy football freaks again this season.

“It may be a coin flip before the game to decide. However, they are both going to play in the game,” Cleveland Browns head coach Romeo Crennel, when asked whether Derek Anderson or Charlie Frye would start against KC this weekend (Tom Coyne, AP).

Translation: Both of these guys are only keeping the chair warm for the bonus baby until he gets signed, and then the kid is on the field as soon as he knows more than three plays.

How much lovelier can life get in Cleveland? They get a mammoth tackle in the three-hole during the draft, and then God smiles on them and lets Brady Quinn free-fall faster than Janet’s boob during her “wardrobe malfunction.” His agent doesn’t seem to understand that Quinn, drafted at #22 overall, just ain’t gonna get #3 chedda because, well, he was drafted at #22 overall. There’s a reason guys fall in the draft: it’s called a serious lack of faith. Between Joe Thomas and the 22-hole, 18 teams (in particular, the QB-starved Dolphins at #9) felt like there were other guys on the board that either fit perceived needs better or would be better pros. Nowhere was Quinn’s talent more thoroughly evaluated than on Draft Day, which looked like it was scripted by the Jigsaw Killer for Quinn’s benefit. Sure, Quinn still looks like a better option than either Frye or Anderson, but he’d really better be the second coming of Otto Graham after all this.

“We feel sure that he just has back spasms, but we don’t want to take any chances. There’s no alarm, but we wanted to make sure,” Dallas Cowboys head coach Wade Phillips, on Terrell Owens missing practice (Stephen Hawkins, AP).

Translation: the preseason is meaningless for veterans. When it’s real game time, T.O. will be lined up wide to the right, as he should be.

Anyone remember how much preseason practice Owens missed last season? Anyone remember him riding the stationary bike so much that he even broke out a yellow Tour De Farce jersey mocking how much time he’d logged in the saddle? Anyone else remember the numbers he put up after such a poorly-practiced preseason? They go something like this: 16 games, 85 receptions, 1180 receiving yards, 13 TDs.

“I think that they’re growing together. I think that some of the blitz pick-ups, some of the stunts, as far as the communication and trust in what you see, we’ve still got a ways to go with that,” Arizona Cardinals head coach Ken Whisenhunt, on his maligned O-line (Andrew Bagnato, AP).

Translation: it’s never a good thing when your best offensive lineman is wearing a headset and not a helmet.

I don’t care how much wisdom new O-line coach Russ Grimm passes on to those guys in Arizona, unless he’s suiting up and bringing Joe Jacoby, Mark May, Jeff Bostic, and Raleigh McKenzie with him, the current Cardinals offending line still won’t block anything more than a stiff breeze.

“Coach Herm Edwards said Sunday that (Michael) Bennett ‘has had a pretty good training camp,’” (Rotowire.com).

Translation: Larry Johnson gets paid or the Chefs go for the Herschel Walker Lottery when they trade him.

If you were Herm Edwards and you had perpetually-underwhelming Michael Bennett and rookie Kolby Smith to choose from, you’d give Johnson the rock 800 times if you had that many plays...and you’d be right to do so. Anyone else think Damon Huard is for real, or that Brodie Croyle is going to do anything but stink out loud as a rookie? Carl Peterson wants to play hardball with the franchise, but the truth is that Johnson is Option A and there really is no Option B.

...and I'm OUT like Michael Strahan...

Getting What You Wish For

Some knuckleheads just don't get it.

If the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result every time, then these guys are the ones standing in front of a brick wall with bloody foreheads, gathering themselves for yet another try (that is, after the big, black spots stop swimming into and out of their vision).

Take Rory Sabbatini, PGA Tour professional.

The mere fact that he is a professional golfer at all speaks volumes to his ability. That he earns his living on the PGA circuit is no small matter; even with inflated prize amounts, not everyone is good enough to completely support himself and his family on his clubs alone.

That being said, there are two types of PGA pros: Tiger Woods, and the field.

Period.

Summing up an obscenely bloated career bio, Woods has won 80 times overall as a professional, 58 times on the PGA Tour, with 12 current Major championships to his credit, and all of this before he turned 32 years old.

On top of all that, it's not like he's some ball-striking robot, routinely demolishing fields of accomplished pros with a metronome-like swing.

Woods is the dictionary definition of a competitor.

If he were a pitcher, he'd be Bob Gibson, ear-holing his former teammate, best friend and best man Curt Flood when the latter came to bat for the first time in an enemy uniform, or telling Tim McCarver to get his ass back behind the plate because the only thing he (McCarver) knew about pitching was that he couldn't hit it.

If he were a football player, he'd be Dick Butkus, who was once asked if he'd ever deliberately injured another player, only to respond "no, not deliberately...unless it was like a league game or something..."; Butkus, whose own teammates avoided him on game day.

If he were a basketball player, he'd be just like his friend Mike, who played a bad game against a cypher named LaBradford Smith, with the latter hanging 37 on Jordan. The problem was that Smith started talking it up, as though guys regularly posterized Jordan. It got back to Mike.

The very next game, Jordan hung 40 on Smith by half-time, hounding the kid mercilessly for 24 relentless minutes, talking the entire time.

The last anyone has seen of Smith, he was curled up in a fetal position in the basement of the United Center, weeping and muttering "there go that man again, Momma..."

Like Jordan, Woods takes stuff personally. Like Jordan, Woods holds grudges for a looooong time. Like Jordan, Woods uses anything to his competitive advantage.

Quoting one of my favorite comic books, when Woods enters a tournament, he looks like a shark trailing prawn.

Enter the aforementioned and lamentable Sabbatini. Apparently, he saw something in Woods' game that no one had seen yet. Apparently, this whole Woods thing was "The Empereror's New Clothes" all over again, that there was nothing to this Woods Mystique, and yes, he was going to pay attention to the man behind the curtain.

Round 1 - Sabbatini calls Woods out, saying that he wants to be in a final group with him. Seems that anyone actually going head-to-head with Tiger develops a worse case of the yips than John Daly after an all-nighter at the casino. Seems that Sabbatini thought that all it took was a little testicular fortitude to stand up to this Woods guy and it would all be over, just like when Buster Douglas forever shattered the mystique of Mike Tyson.

The problem is that Douglas caught up with a washed-up bum who was living on a reputation long since repudiated.

Woods, after a career that already has his face on golf's Mount Rushmore, is only now entering what should be his golfing prime.

In Texas, they say that if you mess with the bull, you get the horns. Which leads us to...

Round 2 - Sabbatini is leading (!!) Tiger by one stroke at Wachovia earlier this season, after having called Woods out. The result: Woods wins the tournament, shooting a 69, while The Mouth That Roared faded to a 74.

Round 3 - Not less than a week later, Sabbatini's mouth writes yet another check that his clubs can't cash, saying that Woods looked as "beatable as ever."

This is somewhat like saying that K-2 looks as climbable as ever, or that the Bates Motel looks as hospitable as ever, or that Seal Island during mating season looks as swimmable as ever...I think you get my point.

What the hell is "beatable as ever?"

Apparently, it's the tug on Woods' Nike-endorsed cape.

Round 4 - Sabbatini finds himself leading Woods again (!!) in the final round of the Bridgestone, only to find himself down by 4 after the first six (!!) holes of the final round and by an insurmountable 5 at the turn.

That five shot lead included this ugly sequence: on a par 5, which Woods normally eats for breakfast, he choked, and absolutely public course hacks a drive to the left, then hits a lady in the arm with his second shot. He takes a drop (!!) for his third, hits over the clown and the windmill to reach the green for his fourth, and calmly taps in for par.

Sabbatini, playing with far fewer obstacles and a lot less talent, goes double bogus and hollers at a paying customer for pointing his collapse out.

And all the guy said was, "Hey, Rory. Still think Tiger's beatable?"

As beatable as ever.

Ranting and Raving

Some things you guess, some things you think, and some things you just know.

There is no truth to the rumor that Jean Strahan is selling copies of her pre-nup to the fiancees of NFL rookies...

...although, considering the smackdown she laid on Michael in divorce court (to the tune of $15 million AND the 22-room mansion), it just might be one more wise financial decision for her.

And no, Strahan's holdout has nothing to do with him suddenly going steady with the biggest alimony check in history and needing a lot of money like yesterday...

...really...

There is no truth to the rumor that Falcons GM Rich McKay scourges himself once for every crisply thrown timing route, feathery bomb, and frozen rope that Matt Schaub throws for the Houston Texans...

...because if it was true, he'd look like Jim Caviezel in "The Passion Of The Christ."

I mean, even if Michael Vick had never been accused of anything criminal, what in the name of Mike Ditka would cause him to trade Matt Schaub for what now looks like a mess of pottage? It's not like Vick has ever done anything on the field to warrant such love from the front office.

And I'll hear nothing about him being the first quarterback to gain 1000 rushing yards in a season. First off, that stat is meaningless; over 16 games, that translates to around 65 yards a game...running backs get cut for running that poorly. Second, the quarterback is not supposed to run with the football; he's supposed to distribute the ball to other people.

Third, the only reason he could gain 1000 yards rushing is because he couldn't hit the broad side of a red barn passing.

So, let me get this straight: the Falcons go from a guy in Vick who couldn't throw a beach ball into the ocean (but who could run fast) to a guy in Joey Harrington who couldn't throw a beach ball into the ocean...and Harrington could be timed in the 40 with an egg-timer...

The Chicago Bears would have to have a monumental collapse on the magnitude of the Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald not to return to the playoffs this season.

That ball-hawking defense of theirs will see Tavaris Jackson, Jon Kitna, and the old dude who used to be Brett Favre six times this season...three or four more wins anywhere puts them back into the tournament.

In fact, call me a Bears homer if you want, but this team could easily go 13-3 looking at their ridiculously easy schedule...

...and while I can't fault the schedule-makers for the Bears' sorry division, how on earth didn't the Super Bowl runners-up get a little more meat in their diets this season?

Outside of the guaranteed six victories in their division, the Bears will face the following: San Diego on the road (a loss in spite of Norv Turner's legendary ineptness), Kansas City at home (say it with me: Brodie Croyle...snicker), Dallas at home (pick 'em), Philly on the road (depends on McNabb's knee, but I still like the Bears here), at Oakland (giggle...it won't make a difference whether it's Daunte Culpepper or JaMarcus Russell, one of them will be running for his life for the better part of 60 minutes), at Seattle (pick 'em), Denver at home (if this were a road game, it's a loss for the Bears...but Thanksgiving Day in the Chi? fuggedaboutit), the Giants (thanks for the W, Jean Strahan and Tiki Retirement), at Washington (say it with me: Jason Campbell...snicker), and New Orleans at home...in December...where the Bears stomped a Mississippi mud-hole into the Saints in last season's NFC Title Game.

So, the Bears have, what, six tough games this season? San Diego on the road to open, Dallas at home, Philly on the road, Seattle on the road, Denver at home, and the Saints at home?

Split those six games and you get what I get: 13-3 and a first round bye. Again.

Life is goooood...

Best under-the-radar fantasy running back this season: Travis Henry, Denver.

The Broncos have consistently made chicken salad out of chicken s**t at running back, and Henry ain't chicken s**t.

It sez so right here that Jon Kitna throws 35 TD passes for the Lions this season. Easily. Especially if they get Calvin Johnson signed fairly quickly.

It also sez so right here that Jon Kitna throws 37 INTs for the Lions opponents this season. Easily. I mean, he hasn't stopped being Jon Kitna, right?

Speaking of things being what they are, what on earth are we to make of the situation in San Diego?

I mean, that was the most loaded roster in the AFC last season and they simply could not overcome Marty Schottenheimer...who the hell really believes that Norv friggin' Turner is an improvement?

That team will win in spite of the guy wearing the headset and get blowed up real good in the first round of the playoffs again.

For a guy who is pretty good at what he does, Thomas Jones sure does move around a lot...

If the Texans get anything out of Ahman Green (and early word out of training camp makes that a distinct possibility), they will post their first winning season as a franchise. This is not to say that they will make the playoffs in a distinctly top-loaded AFC, but they will certainly keep some of the riff-raff (read: Jacksonville) out...

Some idiots in Atlanta and elsewhere are of the misguided opinion that the attention Michael Vick has gotten from the feds and the media is driven by race.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

In fact, had it been a white quarterback of Vick's stature, say, Brett Favre or Tom Brady, it would have been blown up even bigger than it already has...

This just in: Tampa Bay stinks. Really stinks.

As in, the last time they stunk this badly, they were called the Suckaneers and had Brucie the Gay Blade on the side of their helmets.

Jon Gruden has a hundred quarterbacks on his roster, and none of them can play.

But that doesn't really matter that much, because there isn't anyone to throw the ball to.

Say, wasn't Aaron Rodgers supposed to be the next something, somewhere?

Seems to me that he and Alex Smith came into the league together as highly-touted quarterbacks.

Smith is progressing nicely. Rodgers, on the other hand, needs to get a refund from whoever he bought his voodoo doll from, because even though Brett Favre utterly stinks, that stinking is done with the first string.

Fantasy alert - stay away from the following running back situations: NY Giants, Washington Redskins, and Dallas Cowboys.

For the Giants, Reuben Droughns is only decent at best, and he's going to get goal-line vultured to death by Brandon Jacobs. Jacobs will score TDs, but that's about all he'll do - he might not have 300 rushing yards all year.

For the 'Skins, signing Ladell Betts (another decent, if unspectacular runner) to a long-term deal says all we need to know about Clinton Portis' health.

And in Big D, one suspects that Marion Barber III would get exposed as badly as Julius Jones has been, if he got as many carries.

Fantasy alert 2 - keep a weather eye on these two RB situations: Carolina and Atlanta. In Carolina, it's only a matter of time before DeAngelo Williams takes DeJob from DeShaun Foster...no later than November, methinks...

And Warrick Dunn picked the worst time in his career to get injured. Jerious Norwood is the genuine article in Atlanta, and will prove it in spades this season. Too bad, because Dunn is the Anti-Vick as far as character off the field.

Down in Arizona, Edgerrin James is telling anyone who will listen that Matt Leinart will be as good as Peyton Manning.

First thing I'm thinking is that Edge must have suffered a heat stroke or something.

I like Chicago and New Orleans to slap each other around for the NFC Title again, and I like the Bears to do most of the slapping again, just like last season.

I really like New England and Indianapolis to disagree about which one of them will represent the AFC in the next Roman Numerals game. And if Randy Moss has a season that approaches anything like his first seven years in the land of Sven & Ole jokes, it'll be a super rematch of two franchises.

And if Chicago has the same guy under center that they had under center last season, New England returns the favor of the '85 Bears beatdown and throttles the current model easily.

(Favorite Sven & Ole joke 1: Sven's walking by Ole's house and sees a sign in the yard that says "Boat for sale." Curious, he goes to the door and is greeted by Ole.

Sven: Say, ya got a sign in yer yard dere dat sez "Boat fer sale."

Ole: Oh, ya.

Sven: But ya don't got no boat dere. Ya got a tractor and a combine out back dere.

Ole: Oh, ya. Dere boat fer sale.)

Speaking of the Land of Lutefisk, the over/under on Adrian Peterson's first and likely last career injury is five games, or whenever he first plays Chicago.

So, uh, take the over, because the unlucky Sooner visits the Monsters on October 14.

Donovan McNabb can be mad about his team drafting John Beck all he wants, but unless he can walk with a LOT less of a limp by Sept. 6, he can be mad about sitting on the bench too.

Quick: name the Raiders starting receivers.

Stumped?

So is Al Davis.

Then again, a lot of things seem to stump Al anymore.

No way LT duplicates what he did last season. No way.

Then again, as receiver Vincent Jackson emerges as a threat alongside Antonio Gates, he won't have to.

Jack Del Rio is saying all the right things, but he really doesn't like either of his options at quarterback...which explains why they didn't take a bigger run at Daunte Culpepper, because Culpepper would have only been more of the same.

...and I'm OUT like Jake Plummer...