Ben Roethlisberger: HI BATCH!

Charlie Batch: Hey Ben.

Ben Roethlisberger: YOU KNOW TODAY IS FIVE-O DE MAY-O?

Charlie Batch: Yeah, you’re right. I guess it is.

Ben Roethlisberger: THAT MEAN WE GOTTA GET TOE UP FROM FLO’ UP

Charlie Batch: What now?

Ben Roethlisberger: DRUNK. MESSICAN-STYLE.

Charlie Batch: I dunno, man. I’m getting up there in years. My partying days are a little behind me, I think. Jeff Reed’s probably already at the bar though.

Ben Roethlisberger: BOOOOOOOO

Charlie Batch: Sorry, man.

Ben Roethlisberger: BOOOOOOOO

Charlie Batch: Look, man, I told you I was sorry.

Ben Roethlisberger: I WUZ SAYIN’ BOOOOOO-ATCH.

Charlie Batch: Gotcha… What do you have planned?

Ben Roethlisberger: THE BEN GOT THIS HERE LUNCHA LIBRE MASK. I THINK LUNCHA LIBRE MEAN FREE LUNCH, SO I WEAR MASK, I GET FREE GRUB ON. THEN START DRINK.

Charlie Batch: Uh, you might be confused. I think lucha libre is a type of wrestling.

Ben Roethlisberger: THE BEN HAVE TO WRESTLE FOR LUNCH?

Charlie Batch: Looks that way.

Ben Roethlisberger: THE BEN MUST BECOME BEN MYSERTIO JR., LEGENDARY WRESTLER OF SECRET!

Charlie Batch: But you just told me your identity.

Ben Roethlisberger: HARF HARF HARF. MUST FIND WAY TO THROW YOU OFF TRAIL

[Later]

Ben Roethlisberger: HI DIESEL

Brett Keisel: What’s up?

Ben Roethlisberger: CALLING IN FAVOR

Brett Keisel: But I don’t owe you a favor.

Ben Roethlisberger: THAT’S WHY I CALLS IT IN

Brett Keisel: Um, okay. What do you want?

Ben Roethlisberger: HOW WOULD THE BRETT LIKE TO BE THE BEN? I MAKES IT WORTH YOUR WHILE

[Later, during team drills]

Ben Mysterio Jr.: ONE SIDE, ONE SIDE, JABRONI.

Ben Mysterio Jr.: I, BEN MYSTERIO JR., ON THIS DAY, FIVE-O DE MAY-O, EXTEND OPEN CHALLENGE FOR FREE LUNCH TO ANY WHO DARE ACCEPT. WHO WILL STEP FORWARD TO TAKE ON LEGENDARY WRESTLER OF SECRET?

Brett Keisel: And, uh, I’m just, I mean, I IZ THE BEN, HANGING OUT OVER HERE AND NOT WHERE BEN MYSTERIO JR. IS AT. PEW PEW PEW, ETC.

Frank Summers: Free lunch sounds good. I’ll take that fight.

Ben Mysterio Jr.: A ROOKIE TANK HAS STEPPED INTO THE OCTAGON

Frank Summers: What Octagon? Where’s the Octagon?

Ben Mysterio Jr.: ROOKIE TANK HAS STEPPED INTO BATTLE ZONE WITH LOOSELY DEFINED BOUNDARIES

Teammates: FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT

[Summers lunges at Mysterio, attempts to throw him down, but Ben shakes free of his grasp]

Frank Summers: Damn. This dude’s actually pretty tough to bring down.

[Mysterio scrambles around the field, occasionally breaking free of Summers' tackles. Summers eventually becomes fatigued and doubles over, and Ben pins him with his foot]

Ben Mysterio Jr.: I IZ TRIUMPH! NOW PREPARE TO BE SHOCKED WITH SURPRISE AS BEN MYSTERIO JR. SHOWS SELF [takes off mask] TO BE BEN ROETHLISBERGER

[Teammates feign surprise]

Ben Roethlisberger: NOW WHERE IS FREE LUNCH?

Mike Tomlin: At the mess hall, like every day.

Ben Roethlisberger: ALLLLLLL RRRRRIIIIIGGGGHHHHTTTTT! [Skips away gleefully]

Public address: Now boarding United Airlines Flight 1274 to San Diego at Gate B32. Now boarding Flight 1274 at Gate B32.

Ticket agent: Please pay attention to the assigned section on your ticket. We’ll begin by seating first and executive classes. Please have your boarding passes ready.

Mhmm. Okay. Thank you. Enjoy your flight.

Mhmm. Okay. Thank you. Enjoy your flight.

And you sir?

[Luggage flies open]

Philip Rivers: Ya betta ask somebodddddaaaayyyyyy

Where’s the section for throbbing pulsar QBs who throw fewer picks than Golden Boy Brady? All that dirty, awful sex outside the bonds of marriage done clouded his mind with sin. The mind should be clouded with unreleased sexual energy, dammit!

There’s gotta be some sort of football-shaped superstructure for me attached to the plane with shelves of the latest leather bound books on abstainance and items to throw slowly at the wall to ease my animalistic urges.

Agent: I’ll have to check on that.

Rivers: In the meantime, I’ve got a technical question: where can I stow these cumbersome knee braces? If I may, I’d like to keep them lodged in my useless running back’s duodenum. I hope you painstakingly searched his bags for unlawful containers of pussy juice.

[slaps Tomlinson on the back, kicks his suitcase]

90 PERCENT READY!? THAT’S WHAT YOU SAID ALL FUCKING WEEK, YOU SMOLDERING SACK OF GOAT LEAVINGS! MY ACL IS SLICED TO MEXICAN RIBBONS AND I PLAYED THE ENTIRE FUCKING GAME! AND YOU! 90 PERCENT GETS YOU TWO FUCKING CARRIES!? WHAT DOES THAT EXTRA 10 PERCENT GET YOU? ANOTHER BLOCK ON A PASSING DOWN? ANOTHER THREE MINUTES OF ANAL, YOU BASELESS FORNICATOR! MAYBE THE ENERGY IT TAKES TO REMOVE YOUR HELMET WHILE SITTING IN YOUR PUFFY COAT ALL GAME ON THE SIDELINES?! BUT YOU COULDN’T EVEN DO THAT!

Tomlinson: coldcoldcoldcoldcoldcoldcoldcoldcoldcoldcoldcold

Rivers: You know what? I’ve found a new seatmate on the plane!

[Pulls over Michael Turner]

Now let’s see you finish the Sudoku without my help, asshole! Hope they give you extra blankets you can swaddle yourself in when the puzzle turns tough. And if you even try to play my Nintendo DS without asking, I’ll hang you from the wing by your silly facemask and dangle your vagina dry at 40,000 feet.

[Plane cabin]

Rivers: What the fuck, Turner? What’re you doing sitting with Tomlinson? We were supposed to watch Into the Wild together and rethink our life choices!

Turner: I dunno. I was reading the book version and he just flumped down.

Tomlinson: (yawning) Aaaahhh, yeah, Phil. In so much pain, can’t move nowzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Rivers: Coddammit. Now I know I’m gonna get stuck sitting next to Merriman. Just wait ’til the ‘roid tremors start and he tries to pick clean my head with the plastic dinner cutlery again. And he chews so loud, we use it in practice to simulate crowd noise.

If I have to put up with that, I gotta take a piss first.

Flight attendant: No, you must take your seat, sir. We’re initiating take-off procedure. You may go to the bathroom once the pilot has indicated that passengers may move throughout the cabin.

Rivers: YOU ARE BRINGER OF PILLOWS AND DRINKS, NOT THE IMPEDER OF TINKLE TRIPS! You want me to have to wait until we’re in the air? What if the runway is backed up and we have to sit in line for 30 minutes? What, then? I clench my fists for lack of sexual AND bodily waste release? Got something on your airline safety card for that? Huh? With clenched fists and soiled seats? Huh? FUCK YOU

[Walks to bathroom door, opens it, revealing Shawne Merriman]

Merriman: RRRGGRRAARRRR! Finally, mobile rape chamber is complete!

[Pulls in Rivers, slams door shut]

Rivers: NONONONONO I’M CELIBATE! I’M CELIBATE!

AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Matt: Evah notice ha’ cawnfurunce title games ah often bettah than the Sooper Bowl? Is it because a’ the familiarity within tha cawnfurunces? ‘Cass the cowmpetition knows each other sah well? Maybe ‘cass there’s nat two weeks to lose ya mind abaat the game?

Joe Montana: Eh. I don’t know about that. In ‘88, we blew out the Bears in the NFC Title Game then had to come from behind to edge the Bengals in Super Bowl XXIII. In ‘81, the conference title game was classic and the Super Bowl was tight. In ‘84 and ‘89, we won by blowouts in the conference championships, then won by blowouts two weeks later.

Matt: Ha abaat ya just say samthing ta sapport mah fackin aggyament, ’stead a’ making me look like a jerk, Haaaannuh Maaantanah? Lemme tell ya ‘nother thing: Auld Billie Walsh a’ been damn ashamed a’ these eggs flaaarentine ya made today. Taste like ya fried up a lil’ baby Brady meconium and cooked it with ya mah’s discaaarded yeast. Least ya coulda done was addad sahm fresh spinach.

Montana: Real cute. You are free to leave whenever, you know? Been hanging around here, what? Like three, four solid months now? Don’t you have a job or something? A girlfriend? A car getting towed?

Matt: Far as you’re concerned, Maaantanah, my jab is tah hang around this fine estaaablishment and dispense my wry observations on tha game. Ya jab is ta sling that hash and keep tha Irish caaaffees comin’. Says right there on tha windaa “We never close.” Kinda showt yaself in tha dick with that one, huh? Who’s gonna make me go, Ronnie Lott? I dan’t see tha four-fingahed daaarkie hereuh, do ya?

[Door flies open]

Philip Rivers: Ya betta ask somebodddaaaaaayyyyyyyy

AH HELP EVERYBODY’S FREAKING OUT THERE’S A LITE BRITE BOMB IN BOSTON!

Ahahaha. Fuck this lame-ass city.

Nice little coffee klatsch we got going on here, chatty Cathys. It’s like the white people equivalent of a barbershop, without the ethnic yukyuks and the low-grade despair. So, what’s going on? Gabbing about the current events of the day? Airing your dim insights confidently about things way beyond your ken? That’s cool. My masturbation technique usually involves yelling at my dick after playoff victories, but to each their own and all that.

[Slaps Matt on back, laughs in his face]

Might be mistaken, but I reckon I heard you spouting a little racism as I was coming in.

Heh. [shakes head] Yankees.

I’M FROM COUSINFUCKING ALABAMA! WE INVENTED THAT SHIT! WE COULD HANG YOUR MEALY-MOUTHED BEHIND-CLOSED-DOORS RACISM FROM A COLD SASSY TREE AND GIVE IT A NEW LAST NAME! WE COULD BURN CROSSES ON YOUR RACISM’S FRONT LAWN! WE COULD MAKE YOUR RACISM SO INSECURE THAT IT WOULD ONLY BE ATTRACTED TO OUR RACISM’S WOMEN AND THEN WE’D KILL YOUR RACISM FOR ACTING ON THAT BRAINWASHING, YOU DUMB FUCKING POTATO-HUMPING MICK!

Matt: Hey, you’re-er-ah that Philip Rivahs, ain’t ya? Ya gawt abaat a queer’s chance in Quincy this weekend against the Pahfect Paytree-uts, shitbawx.

[Rivers smacks Matt across the face with a metal coffee pot then pours the remaining boiling liquid on his collapsed body with laughing maniacally. He lofts in the pot toward the wall. It floats for 30 seconds and falls at his feet.]

Rivers: It’s you I came for, Montana. You’re the original Brady. You, and you alone, hold the keys to helping me beat him.

Montana: I don’t know what you’re talking about. He’s just another in a line of generation defining quarterbacks. Sure, we’ve both seen our share of success, but he’s his own man. I don’t really even know the guy.

Rivers: Oh. Well. Teehee. Guess I’ll be screwing off, then, huh? Joe? Huh? FUCK YOU

TELL ME HOW I CAN SUCCEED WHERE SO MANY OTHERS HAVE FAILED! LET YOUR MIND AND MINE BE AS ONE

Montana: All right. It’s like this: You remember all Joe Cool stuff I was heaped with back in the day? Do you know why that is?

Rivers: ‘Cause you was calmer than a roofied-up girl after an ACC game?

Montana: No. Nonono. I was a dithering disaster. Always a bundle of nerves before every game. Beset with insecurity. But it was the ’80s, so it was socially acceptable in certain circles to wear Garfield and Snoopy shirts. Man, I rode that scene hard. I loved that beagle and I embraced his alter ego, Joe Cool, until it became my own. Almost ate me up in the end. But I drew strength from that Joe Cool shirt.

It’s still seared into my memory to this day. I mean, he had sunglasses on! And a shirt with his name on the front! He was changing the way we thought about a rakish indifference to the opinions of others. Perched on his left leg and leaning to the right; the laws of physics say he should topple over, but he was held upright by the sheer force of his own coolness.

Rivers: WHAT IN THE NAME OF JUMBLY FUCK? You’ve lost it, old-timer. You’ve gone the way of Namath: punchdrunk, fucked in the head and tickled in the balls by dotage and unfortunate endorsements. Snoopy couldn’t sell me Met-Life, how is he supposed to help me win a game?

Montana: That’s just the thing. Every great quarterback has that certain something, seemingly juvenile, that serves as a calming influence. For Starr, it was the Buck Rogers watch. For Staubach, it was his chalice of children’s blood. For Bradshaw, it was the coloring book he never finished reading. Brady has something. I’m sure of it. Finding that is the key to unraveling him.

[stares down over counter]

You’re a fucking Olympic-sized swimming pool of douchejuice, Rivers, doomed to being a footnote in hissy fit history. But I’ve had to deal with this Masshole since he showed up as soon as the Red Sox season was over. And I can’t have Brady joining me in the four title club. Sharing that shit with Bradshaw is bad enough. So you’re all I got, Marmatard.

[Patriots locker room, Sunday]

Brady: Guys! Guys! Where is it? Where’s my buddy? Guys!

Rodney HGHarrison: Your buddy, who? The fuck you going on about, man? It’s game time, baby! WWWOOOOOO! Best get your ass out to the tunnel before I hit you with the lateness.

Brady: But…but…?

…Where?

My Buddy…

[Brady stares panic-striken at his trembling hands]

Brady: Shit!

Shit! Shit! Shit!

I guess you’ll have to do.