Super Bowl Bye Weekend Links

Two weeks, that's what Coach Tomlin and Cheese-whiz get to implement their plans as it's the Steelers vs. Pittsburgh-West a week from Sunday, and here's some links to get you through a slower sports weekend, since I don't think the NHL All Star Game will be all that exciting without Sid the Kid...


-Well, Kurt Warner's wife finally looks like the wife of a quarterback...

-Are the Steelers the greatest franchise ever??? I say yes, but let's hear what ESPN"s Flem File has to say about it.

-Does 43=75? Find out during the Super Bowl 43 commericals.


For those of you headed to Tampa for the completion of the 6-pack...

-The St. Pete Times newspaper provides a calendar of events for the upcoming week, including the necessities for the guys. (2nd link NSFW)

-A list of Steelers bars in Tampa and the surrounding area, and more discussion on things to do during Super Bowl week. (courtesy Steelernation.com blog)


I could go on and on about the Steelers but let's give love to another Black and Gold team (one that Mr. Bice loves like they're his own child), the Pittsburgh Pirates...

-They teased us with talks of Pedro.

-And also, believe that Sleeves=Championships.

-Thanks to Pat that runs the Where Have You Gone, Andy Van Slyke? blog, we can cruelly be reminded of all the Buccos losing seasons since 1992, in his intermittent recaps.
(1993-1999 here) (2000-present here).

MONEY WELL SPENT - AFC CHAMP TICKET

I recently attended the AFC Champ. game in Pittsburgh to watch the Steelers take on the Ravens. Before this game even kicked off, I was already anticipating a war so to speak. I can say this much, I was not let down on that and from what I have been reading I don't think others were either. This was one of the hardest hitting, most physical games I have ever witness ever in sports history. I know Bones wrote about this earlier and I want to say i agree with him about people talking about the game was to physical and this superbowl match up is terrible.

Let me start by saying the game of football was meant to be physical. Scoop, Skip and the rest of you emo clowns I got some questions for you. Why do they were pads in the NFL? I also thought you were suppose to tackle the opposing player in order to stop them from scoring. Why do they where helmets on the field? Oh wait, I have one more for you, why are these atheletes always in the weight room constantly lifting and staying in tip -top shape? Don't worry you overpaid ESPN shitty reporters, I'll answer them for you. The game of football if we have forgotten is a contact sport. A game that involves hitting your opponent to the point where they either want to run out of bounds or avoid you. The sport has instilled this into players since midget football to run over your opponent and hit them as hard as you can LEGALLY. So if you want no contact Skip, Scoop, and the rest of you emo clowns, then pick up a a golf club and go suck Tiger Woods off some more about his come back to his sport.

I think you can ask either one of those teams that played this weekend if they think the game of football is to physical and if it needs to be addressed. I am sure your going to get the same answer or maybe you won't get an answer maybe they give your dumbass a chuckle and pull a Drew Rosenhouse and say ," Next question!"

Moving on to what I think will be a high rated superbowl due to the fact that the Steelers have such a large following and everyone seems to be interested in this new found identity that the Cardinals have found in the payoffs. There are tons of PA connections, storylines and a spider web of stories that tangle these two teams together. I haven't even got into the storylines of the game. Like how do the Steelers plan to stop Fitz and Co.? Will they be able to get pressure on Warner. How will the Steelers offense react to what seems to be a defense flying to the ball all of a sudden? Big Ben hasn't made any mistakes in the playoffs yet. I don't know about you,but that makes me nervous, just little bit, we all know Ben is good for a few of those. Will it happen in the superbowl or has Ben turned over a new leaf?

I could really go on and on, but no need to because if you watch football and follow it just a little bit then you will see this match up is one that was not even thought of in the beginning of the year and carries many interesting storylines. I also am tired of hearing about the Romo's , Manning's, and Brady's of the NFL. Who cares they aren't going to the Superbowl unless it s for some new sweat your balls of gatorade commercial. It 's gets annoying seeing these big headline teams always facing off in the Superbowl. So congrats Arizona and Pittsburgh or throwing a big fuck you to the NFL and the rest of the media who wants to see Dallas. Indy, New England, and New York's in the Superbowl.

I have to thank Bones and his latest blog post with that emo clowns article for my motivation to write this. Good points by you Bones.

GO STEELERS!!

What I liked/didn't like: AFC Title Game

Well, after a day of celebrating the Steeler's seventh trip to the Super Bowl, I'm here with some musings about yesterday's bloodbath (yes, that's being generous).

WHAT I LIKED

1. The physicality of the game. In my 15-20 years of tangible football memories, I haven't seen a game as physical. Right from the opening kickoff, when Carey Davis blew up that guy from the Ravens, I knew this was going to be ugly.

Unfortunately, some emo/whiny people that make a lot more money than I do don't see it that way. Check out this crap heap. This is Scoop Jackson/Jemele Hill/Skip Bayless/any other hack level of crap. I'm betting this diaphragm gets paid to stir shit up because no one could possibly be that stupid.

The comments are equally as funny because it was discovered that he was a hardcore Philly fan (sounds like some sour grapes to me) and there's like 300 posts telling him how much he sucks.

Boo-hoo, if you don't like the physicality of football, go watch curling or soccer. Nice emo/hipster glasses too dude, go cry yourself to sleep while listening to that shit-sucker Dave Matthews.

2. Ben Roethlisberger. What else can you say? The running game was neutralized, against a vicious defense and constantly under pressure he kept making plays. His most important statistic: ZERO turnovers.

I'm just waiting for Ben to get his due. One Super Bowl won and he just took his team to another. I don't know how many quarterbacks teams would rather have right now. Brady, Peyton Manning and maybe Drew Brees.

And for the love of God, could we quit with all the Tony Romo hype. Hell, he even fails getting into the shower as well as on the field.

3. Troy Polamalu. Again, what else can you say about this guy that hasn't already been said? Came up with big tackles and made the big interception return to seal up the game.

WHAT I DIDN'T LIKE

1. Limas Sweed. This guy could have gone down as one of the biggest goats in franchise history. Dropping a sure touchdown pass, then a mystery injury that took away the last time out. I know rookie receivers usually struggle and by no means am I giving up. But it just seems that his head is so far up his ass, he can look out his mouth. However, his hit on Corey Ivy sort of made up for it.

LINUS or LIMAS. Which one would you rather have?

(sorry the pics are fucked up, what we use to write these isn't conducive to pictures, hence why I don't use that many)

2. Clock management. With the ball in field goal range and no timeouts, why in the blue hell would you throw it across the middle? Why the hell didn't Moore try to get out of bounds? Those three points could have been real critical.

3. Shotgun formation and passing on third and 1. Before the San Diego game, I listed this as one of my concerns. Still can't/don't have the faith to convert third and shorts with the ground games. It hasn't bit them in the ass yet, so can't really say much else.

4. The offensive line. I know this is whipping a dead horse but still. If you see yellow on the field pre-snap you can assume nine times out of ten that #74 is responsible. Starks getting caught flat-footed and letting Terrell "Bounty Hunter" Suggs have a nice shot on Ben.

5. The announcing. For god's sake, Nantz and Simms bring nothing to the broadcast. They are boring, dry and don't give any insight. Joe Buck is horrible as well. He's about as excited calling game as I was when Bice bought me the Friends gift pack the one year for Christmas. His cohort Troy "State the Obvious" Aikman doesn't help either. Can you tell he's had about 15 concussions? Me either (being facetious).

Christ, I'd rather listen to the Communist Manifesto read by Keith Olbermann.

Could go on a rant about how much McCarver sucks but this isn't the time nor the place. Deadspin dug up this handy dandy little invention that can solve all your shitty announcing problems.

6. The officiating. I was under the assumption that the playoff crews were the best. But when you assume you make an ass out of you and me. To start, the Santonio Holmes catch and touchdown that was reversed. It looked like he caught it, had his hand under the ball and it came out when it hit the ground. Last time I checked, I didn't think the ground could cause a fumble....guess not.

The pass interference call on McFadden that practically handed the Ravens their first touchdown was particularly sketchy. I could've sworn I saw Jared Gaither hold James Harrison god knows how many times and Ben took some late hits. I guess since he's big he can take them and the flags don't need to be thrown.

The pass interference call on Taylor was legitimate. If you have your back to the ball and touch the receiver, they will call it every time. Hell, that roughing the punter call on Baltimore was terrible. Mitch Berger did an acting job that Hollywood Hogan would be proud of....while I'm on the topic....

7. Mitch Berger. Could that punt have possibly been any worse? I could have kicked the ball better after downing a 12 pack. Seriously, between him and Ernster earlier in the season, I haven't seen such terrible punting. At least Sepulveda will be back next season.

On a final note, my take on the hit on McGahee.


One of the most vicious hits I have ever seen. This hit will be picked apart by everyone, was it dirty or was it clean. I, for one, think it was clean. I'm pretty sure there's no rule against helmet to helmet hits on a downfield receiver and Clark led with his shoulder anyways. Now if he was defenseless that would be a different story, he turned and was advancing up field.

I hope McGahee makes a full recovery. He's a Hurricane/Raven (perhaps the lowest form of scum there is) but you wish that on no one. From what I've heard, he's going to make a full recovery. Ray-Ray looked surprisingly perturbed, I didn't expect this because he's seen some dead bodies before.

Well that's enough for now, I'm sure we'll bring you a whole hell of a lot more stuff in the coming weeks leading up to Superbowl 43.

My brother, Jacob, loves the Eagles

Hopefully McNabb gets traded to a team where fans will appreciate him

My brother Jacob loves the Philadelphia Eagles but he often poses as a Steelers fan when they are doing well, which is always. Anyways, he wrote up his take on yesterday's NFC Championship and its not one-sided or biased at all. Enjoy....

I think the philly-zona game was awful. The refs did a terrible game. Donny Mcnabb played terrible. Brian Westbrook played terrible like all postseason. The defense was terrible. But the worst thing of all was when the refs blew the game for philly. It was 4th down and mcnabb threw to kevin curtis and a zona playa pushed curtis and he missed the catch. Turnover. and the refs ignored it. if you look back to the week before during the baltimore tennessee game the play clock went down to zero for like 2 secs and the refs dint call it. during the regular season jay cutler threw a pass and it went behind him but the refs dint call a shouldve been fumble. i think the refs or umps in all sports are terrible. i say fire all of em and rehire some better ones. but thats not up to me. i say philly needs to gett rid of andy reid and donny mcnabb. trade philly and carolinas ( u got them last yr in a trade on draft day ) 1st round draft picks for a top ten draft pick and draft michael crabtree or jeremy maclin. then sign a qb or trade donny mcnabb and kevin kolb for a above average qb. Then make john gruden your head coach. i would say thts just about how my off season would go.

A Tale Of Two Cities

This is one of the most exciting things that can happen to any team or city. That the team you follow, the team you live and die with, has a chance to play for a world championship. It's a great feeling. In Pittsburgh we are very lucky as fans to watch our Steelers head to another Super Bowl. It will be Arizona and Pittsburgh in Super Bowl XLIII.

There is somthing that I want to examine however. Everyone that follows football knows about the history of these two teams. Arizona has had to wait practically their entire lifetime to accomplish anything of this magnitude. Pittsburgh on the other hand was in this exact same boat during the 1974 season when they were pretty much losers their entire existence and headed to their first Super Bowl.

But yesterday somthing just seemed very different about these two teams. Yeah, one is going to their 7th Super Bowl and the other is going to their 1st. But it was just the way these two teams handled themselves. In Arizona confetti was raining down on the Cardinals as they celebrated their first trip to the Super Bowl. I am glad for Arizona. I couldn't imagine not feeling excited if my team was going to it's first championship game ever. I am also glad for Larry Fitzgerald, a former Pitt star and Reggie Wells, who is a former Clarion University player. But the way people were acting and the way they were celebrating kind of made me laugh. In Pittsburgh, it seemed like business as usual. No confetti. Celebration, but not overdoing it. We were acting like we have been there before. Simply put, Arizona was acting like they had won the Super Bowl. Pittsburgh was acting like they were going to the Super Bowl.

I'm not saying that Arizona is destined to lose. Anything can happen in games like these. Think back to last year. Think back to 2001 when New England beat a favored St. Louis team. That's why I don't like to get too cocky. I don't like to jinx things. But i definately looked to me like Pittsburgh realized that they had one more step. Arizona looked like they had already completed it. The two teams are opposites in that sense. Pittsburgh is pretty much the same from their last Super Bowl. Arizona is being lead by Kurt Warner a former MVP of the big game. Arizona just looks a little bit inexperienced I guess.

But regardless it's still exciting. It's special. Arizona will be looking for their 1st championship in their history. Pittsburgh will be looking for their record 6th Super Bowl.

This is gonna be fun. HERE WE GO BABY!!!!

Is it just me....

Kurty wears his mittens in the cold.

Or did some the Eagles, ie: Asante Samuel, look way too happy for having just lost the championship game? Whatever happened to sore losers? Instead I see Eagles laughing and smiling like they just won the fucking thing. I guess that explains while they'll never win a Super Bowl. They're perfectly content coming in 2nd.

Now time for the real game.......