THIS GUY MOVED TO CLEVELAND TO ROOT FOR THE BROWNS. Seriously, that’s almost too sad to fabricate, but no. Eric Barr, formerly of East Hartford, CT, left his job, family and friends to move TO Cleveland. He has no furniture, and apparently, no common sense. And we haven’t even gotten to the part where Barr had driven 566 miles to see Browns home games. EVERY home game. For the last three years.
And that was in a 1992 Nissan Sentra with a top speed of 54 mph.
Barr knows nobody in Cleveland. He inherited his love of the Browns from his father. He had never lived in Cleveland, either. His favorite thing about Cleveland? “You can buy beer on Sundays!” Oh, Eric. You and Cleveland were made for each other. H/T Upstate Underdog
The hottest topic in the world of quarterbacks is the argument between the screw top and corks. While the traditional demands and can only conceive of a cork closure, there is in undeniable groundswell in favor of the screw top. With a screw cap, a defensive lineman can avoid the problem of cork taint. Screw tops are less expensive than natural or plastic corks. Plus they can be removed without any special equipment. In the future, the avid Delhomme consumer should expect a further proliferation of screw tops.
It’s that time of year when we make bad predictions about the upcoming season and bad jokes, all in the same post. Next up: the AFC North, the festering den of iniquity that is home to murderers, rapists, abusers, drunk drivers, drunk kickers, drug addicts, tardwit reality show wide receivers and worst of all, the Cleveland Browns.
It was then that the Beagle Boys kniferaped Magica De Spell and dropped her from the back of a moving truck.
Key Additions: Anquan Boldin, Donte Stallworth, Walt Harris, Shayne Graham, Marc Bulger
Key Departures: Kelley Washington, Samari Rolle, Adam Terry
Known Miscreants: Ray Lewis (murder snitching on friends to plea bargain down to obstruction of justice charge), Donte Stallworth (reigning Death Race 2000 champion), Fabian Washington (domestic assault), Terrell Suggs (woman bleaching), Willis McGahee (Antonio Cromartie syndrome)
Five Fast Facts About The Ravens:
- Sergio Kindle’s fall and resulting injury earlier in training camp was blamed on his narcolepsy. Ravens fans were aware that referees could induce that in people.
- The enduring lesson of Donte Stallworth’s vehicular homicide: if you act halfway remorseful, the public and the media will completely forgive you. Or, in the case of Leonard Little, you can not give a shit and the public and the media will mostly ignore it.
- WERE YOU AWARE?: Of the 19 active quarterbacks with more than one start in the playoffs, Joe Flacco has by far the worst postseason passer rating (in five starts, he has 1 TD and 6 INTs for a rating of 46.5). The next highest is Mark Brunell (11 appearances, 66.3 rating) who still has a rating nearly 20 point higher. Also ahead on the list: Rex Grossman, Michael Vick, Chad Pennington and Ravens back-up Marc Bulger (so that’s why they got him). BUT HEY JOE COOL IS THE PIZZA HUT OF MARYLAND SPOKESBROW FOR THE SECOND YEAR RUNNING!
- Ray Rice’s father was killed by a drive-by shooting when the running back was only a year old. His uncle helped to raise him until he was killed by a drunk driver in 1998. Man, Ray Rice must have such great admiration for his teammates.
- Haloti Ngata gave Terrence Cody the nickname “cheeseburger” during training camp. As they say, you are what you eat 39 of in any given sitting.
Over/Under For 2010: 10 wins
Verdict: OVER
Their secondary isn’t good even when it’s healthy, and it’s definitely not healthy right now. Nevertheless, the Ravens are pretty stacked everywhere else. Granted, Joe Flacco can’t play for shit in big games, but then that won’t come into play until they reach the playoffs, which shouldn’t be much of a problem for the Ratbirds this year. Though it is amusing that, after losing close games last year because of a lack of clutch kicking, that they would consider Shayne “The Ginger Nate Kaeding” Graham a possible answer.
CINCINNATI BENGALS
Key Additions: Terrell Owens, Pacman Jones, Mike Nugent, Antonio Bryant, Matt Jones
Key Departures: Laveranues Coles, Shayne Graham
Known Miscreants: Pacman Jones (womb raiding), Matt Jones (being a cocaine cowboy, Rey Maualuga (DUI with underage girls in the car – the best kind!), Cedric Benson (waitress assault), Tank Johnson (munitions hoarding)
Five Fast Facts About The Bengals:
- Experts say the emergence of Bernard Scott is expected provide some relief to Cedric Benson’s huge share of carries this season. No word on how much of Benson’s arrest commitments he’ll be taking on.
- Pacman say hey da HughesNet bitch stop paradin yo fine azz round my TV. You older, but not too old that Pacman don slip it in dat USB slot. That stand for pUSsyBitch. Pacman not carin if that don make sense. YOU NO STOP HE SHINE.
- The anemic quarterbacking done by J.T. O’Sullivan in the ante-season will not be a blot on his escutcheon. If anything, coaches appreciate his efforts to ease pressure on Good Sir Palmer that his station could be imperiled by a son of Eyre.
- Bengals fans two years ago bought up billboards threatening to “protest” the team until Mike Brown hired a GM that wasn’t himself. Brown responded by… doing nothing. Of course, the team started winning anyway, so the fairweather Cincy folk forgot all about it. Which is pretty much how all fan protests go.
- Let’s hope Maurice Purify isn’t taking his last name as a life mission, or he has quite a task ahead of him with the Bengals.
Over/Under For 2010: 7.5 wins
Verdict: OVER
The Bengals played like dogshit down the stretch in 2009, mostly as a result of a inability to pass the ball. To resolve that issue, they did the usual Bengal thing and picked up a bunch of inexpensive retreads that no one else wanted: T.O., Matt Jones and Antonio Bryant. T.O. should be a decent improvement over Laveranues Coles, who was generally useless last season. First-round pick Jermaine Gresham has looked pretty good in preseason, so maybe he’ll be a good receiving option at tight end this year. Nevertheless, the pass blocking is still horrid and the team still has f*cknuts Bob Bratkowski calling plays. And Carson Palmer has shown that he isn’t good enough to compensate for those for those deficiencies. Again, the defense and the running game will have to carry this team, except now they play with a 1st place schedule and the Bengals will be hard-pressed to sweep both the Ravens and Steelers again this season. They won’t finish under .500, but they’re not going back to the playoffs either.
CLEVELAND BROWNS
Sensing the obvious, the Browns didn’t even bother to print Jake Delhomme jerseys. Ever resourceful Cleveland fans adapt. via.
Key Additions: Jake Delhomme, Bobby Engram, Benjamin Watson, Seneca Wallace, Scott Fujita, Sheldon Brown, Colt McCoy
Known Miscreants: Shaun Rogers (airline firearm supply), Brandon McDonald (future T.O. rapist), Colt McCoy (too wholesome), Joe Thomas (fishing without a license)
Five Fast Facts About The Browns:
- Shaun Rogers tried to rehab his image after bringing a loaded gun onto an airplane by ratting out a drunk driver to the police. Mario Reyes appreciates the timing, asshole.
- As referenced above, corner Brandon McDonald threatened over Twitter that he and the Browns secondary are going to “run a train” on Terrell Owens. Usually not a fan of prison rape, T.O.’s talks with his Bengals teammates have convinced him otherwise.
- DAWWWWWWWWW WHERE’D STEVE SMITH GO?
- Joshua Cribbs spent his wife’s birthday at a Playboy Golf event, then took her to Roscoe’s House of Chicken and Waffles for dinner. This automatically puts him in the top 4 percentile of NFL player husbands.
- In a recent interview with GQ, Scott Fujita referred to former teammate Garrett Hartley as a “fat punk kicker.” Asked for a response, Hartley said he refused to lower himself to those Jap tactics.
Over/Under For 2010: 5.5 wins
Verdict: UNDER
I was briefly tempted to be generous and give them the over, but then I peeked at Cleveland’s schedule. After two winnable games against the Bucs and Chiefs, they have to run this seven-game gauntlet: @Ravens, Bengals, Falcons, @Steelers (this will most likely be the game Roethlisberger returns), Saints, Patriots, Jets. I seriously doubt that the Browns are going to win any of those games, meaning Cleveland will likely be 2-7 or 1-8 after nine games. Most likely, that means it’s “let’s give Colt McCoy a shot” time, with a trip to Miami, and rematches with the Bengals, Ravens and Steelers remaining. So yeah, sorry, no six wins for you guys.
Known Miscreants: Ben Roethlisberger (alleged bathroom bad touch), Jeff Reed (bathroom bad touch on towel dispenser), James Harrison (domestic assault)
Five Fast Facts About The Steelers:
- Threatened by the arrival of Flozell Adams, Hines Ward has been forced to slash the prices on his cheap shots.
- Dennis Dixon would be getting a chance to start during Ben Roethlisberger’s suspension, but instead the team is purposefully stifling his development because they don’t want to risk him showing up the quarterback that they tried to trade before the draft. Luckily, I am first person to formulate this not-at-all retarded theory for why Byron Leftwich will likely start Week 1.
/checks PFT
SHIT!!!!!!!
- Mike Wallace has some large vaginas to fill with the departure of Santonio Holmes.
- Even if it’s a year late, Troy Polamalu appreciates that the Madden Curse has finally caught up with Larry Fitzgerald.
- Despite the fact that he was injured months ago and will miss the entire 2010 season, Limas Sweed will still find a way to cost the Steelers a win this year. Mark my words.
Over/Under For 2010: 9 wins
Verdict: PUSH
After the offseason that just transpired, there’s absolutely no outcome to this season that would surprise me. On one hand, the Steelers tend to do better when expectations aren’t astronomically high, and they have Troy Polamalu, Aaron Smith and Bryant McFadden (starting in place of shitty ass Purple Jesus-stompee William Gay) back on what should be a damn good defense. On the other hand, their most talented receiver was traded away for nothing (DON’T SLEEP ON MIKE WALLACE MOTHERFUCKAS!), they have goddamn slow-footed cheap-shotting penalty magnet Flozell Adams starting at right tackle and who knows how Roethlisberger is going to respond once he’s reinstated. With all that in mind, I’ll keep the homerism at bay and keep it at a push.
This would probably pass for hilarious in the Antarctic Circle; but seriously, if a couple of penguins can realize what a bad decision it was for the Cleveland Browns to sign Jake Delhomme, why couldn’t they? To be fair, when most of a typical day involves standing around in the snowy elements, that leaves a lot of time to think about other things. Like going out and buying a Ford Taurus, for example.
The Browns are hanging with the Ravens through the first quarter, even if that isn’t likely to continue. Making Bawlmer burn their entire complement of first half timeouts in eight minutes will probably be the top Cleveland accomplishment of the evening, not that the Ravens will really need them. Mike Tirico did sneak in a Bert Flacco reference, however, which can’t begin to atone for Gruden dubbing (before even kickoff, mind you) Jarret Johnson “The Anvil,” Terrell Suggs “Clubber Lang” and Ray Lewis “The Master of Disaster” but then with this booth you take anything worthwhile you can get.
UPDATE: Upon further review, I suppose Tirico is saying “Birk-Flacco”. That’s what I get for thinking anyone in this booth could say something halfway interesting.
Welcome to the Friday Five, our unimaginitively-named Friday afternoon post where we provide you with five things the KSK staff is looking forward to this coming weekend. It was a tough week of empty balloon watching and SkiFree reminiscing, but we made it through intact. And these next two days are our reward. Why, there are actually good games this weekend. A showdown of unbeaten teams! A face-off between the faggy purple-clad franchises! Stacy Andrews-Tom Cable punching spree! And so much more!
This week, what we’re looking looking forward to most is…
It’s that time of year again, when we’re so devoid of content that, rather than spending time gushing over Jeff George’s Uncle Rico-esque comeback tape, we run through our predictably inaccurate prognostications for the upcoming year, division by division. Up next, it’s the AFC North, where you’re either running over pedestrians while drunk, getting slapped with rape allegations, ratting out your friends to escape murder charges, or playing for the Bengals and doing all of the above.
See, I don’t engage in “serial domestic violence,” I beat me some women—
if you don’t see the difference now, brother, you never will.
Tonight Jim Brown will appear on HBO’s “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel”. Among other topics, the greatest running back to ever play the game will address his dissatisfaction with the current generation of athletes’ failure to follow the examples set by him and others of from his era. We had hoped to get a preview of what this legend had to say, but obviously, Mr. Brown would never talk to someone associated with this site. But let’s pretend that he did… Read the rest of this entry »
We’re two days removed from Donte’ Stallworth’s apostrophe-deficient plea deal with the state of Florida that saw the Cleveland Browns wide receiver cop to manslaughter in exchange for serving a whopping 30 days in jail. Personally, I’ve spent more time in jail on tours, visiting friends, and shooting my new adult film, Cops And Cradle Robbers 7, available at finer adult video stores near you.
Some of you are comparing Stallworth’s sentence to that of Michael Vick, who was sentenced to 23 months in federal court for orchestrating an interstate dogfighting ring which, while grotesquely inhumane, makes a lot more sense than anything the UFL has ever done. But let’s get a grip and do the math. Thirty days is pretty fair, when you consider the surrounding factors involved, and compare those factors to Vick’s proceedings:
The case against Stallworth was not a slam-dunk. Stallworth blew a 0.126 at the scene, minutes after he ran over Mario Reyes with his Bentley on March 14th, but wasn’t charged with DUI manslaughter until April. Why?
The big issue centered around a wrinkle in Florida’s DUI laws referred to as “causation,” meaning that if the drunk driver is involved in a crash, that driver is not necessarily responsible if the other party contributed to that crash. Like if I have get drunk and have sex with your mom, but she pays for the hotel room; I can’t be held responsible, unless of course your dad is bigger than I am (fat chance).
This applies to the case since Mario Reyes was jaywalking when Stallworth hit him. Reyes’ illegal action–petty as it is–could have potentially absolved Stallworth. There also would have been difficulty provinig that Stallworth was impaired, since he was able to honk and flash his lights. The prosecution might have had a better case if Stallworth was texting behind the wheel while sober.
And there’s probably a going-over-the-middle joke here that, due to time constraints, I’ll leave to the fine commenters of this site.
Conversely, the case against Vick was damn near iron clad. Several of Vick’s friends flipped and testified against him. Significant physical evidence, including 70 dogs, were seized. Investigators were confident that they could prove that Michael Vick was the de facto CEO of an interstate dogfighting operation that involved gambling, drugs, and the violations of both state and federal laws. It’s also worth nothing here that Virgina has suspended all charges against Vick, because they’re just mighty swell folks.
Stallworth made good with the Reyes family. I don’t know what happened here, but this is my best guess: A contrite Stallworth met with the family, apologized from the bottom of his heart, and pulled out his checkbook. He then gave Mario Reyes’ surviving wife and daughter more money than either of them had ever seen in their entire lives, enough to put that 15-year-old daughter through college. Enough for the widow to live “comfortably,” if such a term could even be used here.
The Reyes’ family’s wishes to get the proceedings over with may have stemmed from the settlement. The prosecution admitted that this was a factor in hurrying the proceedings, a factor that certainly worked in the favor of Stallworth and his legal team. No word on whether Vick and the survivors of the 70 dogs seized are cool.
Stallworth’s illegal action was not premeditated, and happened in less time than it took you to read this sentence.I hate using the word “accident” in general, but the fault stemmed from ann instantaneous lapse in awareness. Is that worth sending a guy to jail for years of his life? Is that fair? Vick, on the other hand, delivered the Bad Newz for six years. Oh, but he didn’t kill nobody and didn’t rape nobody. Whatever.
Legal proceedings aren’t as cut and dried as our society would like to pretend they are, and that’s a good thing. Alleged criminals don’t just walk up to a judge with their offense written on an index card and receive a cookie-cutter punishment like some sort of Value Meal of Justice.
The state’s burden of proof is one of the cornerstones of liberty in a republic. It doesn’t make the death of Mario Reyes forgivable, or any less tragic. It doesn’t diminish the value of the 59-year-old man that woke up every day to provide for his family. Stallworth had his day in court. So did Vick. But it wasn’t just random chance or some obliviousness to humanity that Stallworth’s day turn out a lot better.
THIS GUY MOVED TO CLEVELAND TO ROOT FOR THE BROWNS. Seriously, that’s almost too sad to fabricate, but no. Eric Barr, formerly of East Hartford, CT, left his job, family and friends to move TO Cleveland. He has no furniture, and apparently, no common sense. And we haven’t even gotten to the part where Barr had driven 566 miles to see Browns home games. EVERY home game. For the last three years. 
This would probably pass for hilarious in the Antarctic Circle; but seriously, if a couple of penguins can realize what a bad decision it was for the Cleveland Browns to sign Jake Delhomme, why couldn’t they? To be fair, when most of a typical day involves standing around in the snowy elements, that leaves a lot of time to think about other things. Like going out and buying a Ford Taurus, for example. 
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