Last season, the Jets beat the Bengals badly twice in two weeks, once when the Bengals weren’t trying and once in the playoffs when the Bengals were barely trying. This time around, it’s not quite as important, what with Cincy being more like the Cincy of old this season. The main manufactured drama of the week has been Darrelle Revis calling Terrell Owens a slouch, which is something that Revis seems to do with a receiver every other week.
And I wouldn’t blame anyone for skipping the live broadcast and waiting it out for Saturday when NFL Network is rebroadcasting the game sans its horrible announcing team and using audio from 15 miked-up players and coaches instead. Ooh, that means a steady stream of Rex Ryan commentary. It’s like a bonus episode of Hard Knocks. Sign me up.
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.
An aged and desperate Terrell Owens has been signed by the Bengals to a one-year deal to replace the gimpy Antonio Bryant. Owens, a noted suicidal troublemaker with a penchant for roster insurrection, joins Adam “formerly Pacman” Jones, Cedric Benson, Matt Jones, Rey Maualuga, Tank Johnson and Chad Ochocinco to form the first-ever reality show about getting DUIs while doing cocaine in the back seat with underage girls who are holding your weapons cache and getting into a fight with your bodyguard. Also: making it rain Sun Chips. I think that covers all the bases of requisite jokes.
Sorry, I know this announcement is supposed to be more fun. Like, WOW, how can all these volatile components exist together without an orgy of orgies? But I don’t know. It’s set up like Dinner For Schmucks, in that there’s just such a purposeful overabundance of things that are really supposed to be funny that it renders everything banal and sad. Which is sorta fitting for Cincinnati.
So, there is talk of “Dancing with the Stars” in the sports blogosphere, and it’s louder than usual since the coming installment will feature an NFL star from the present, rather than a creaky Hall of Famer. Not to mention Erin Andrews, ice skating gold medalist Evan Lysacek, subject of masturbation Nicole Scherzinger, and some guy who supposedly “walked on the moon.” Yeah, like that happened.
Chad Ochocinco wants to change his name to another clunky foreign translation of “Eight Five”. This time it’s Japanese, making it “Hachi Go” which sounds too much like Hibachi for Maj not to murder Chad in a defense of Gilbert Arenas’ honor. OchoHachiCincoGo also responded to the $30,000 fine for the poncho and sombrero he wore on the sidelines last week by saying he was going to blow the horn of Vikings mascot and Drew’s bear of choice, Ragnar, on Sunday. Also, he wants to punch Shawne Merriman in the mouth, but that will have to wait for next week.
Chad’s antics are temporarily overshadowing a pretty huge game. A few weeks ago, it seemed inevitable that the Vikings would have the second seed in the NFC sewn up. A loss here leaves them only a game up on Arizona, which owns the tiebreaker after dominating the Vikes last week. The Bengals, meanwhile, want to keep pace with San Diego in their hunt for the AFC second seed. The two teams play next week in what will likely decide whether it’s Marmalard or true Bengals hero J.T. O’Sullivan who gets the first round bye.
Also, it’s possible it could be a Super Bowl preview. Which makes us wonder what stunt Chad would pull if Cincy makes it to the Super Bowl in Miami? Remember that he’s from Dade County, so he would likely want to put on a show for the kith and kin. Since he’s turning Japanese, seppuku would be fitting if the Bengals come up short. Or, alternatively, he could get one of those comfort women Japanese guys like so much if they prevail.
The Eagles and Cowboys meet with NFC East primacy on the line. Just weeks ago, the Iggles lost to the Raiders and the Cowboys had to squeak by the Chiefs. Now suddenly, they’re teams of consequence once more. It’s key for Dallas to build as large a division lead as possible before December sets in and they lose all their games in spectacular fashion. After signs had indicated he would play, Brian Westbrook will instead sit out for a second straight week. Tony Romo, meanwhile, will have to make sure that he stops playing favorites with Miles Austin. C’mon, Tony – just because he’s actually capable of getting open and can communicate with you in your mystical smialect (that’s a dialect for smiles, duh) doesn’t mean you have to ignore Roy Williams.
As we wait for kickoff, here are a few of the standout moments from the first two Sunday timeslots.
1. Via reader Michael from Charlotte come the greatest (and by greatest, we mean the only non-nauseating) split team jersey taxidermy in the history of anything ever.
2. BUCS WIN! BUCS WIN! CREAMSICLE SHERBET BUCCO BRUCE GAYCATION CELEBRATION! But, hey, since when do the Buccaneers have enough greats for a ring of honor? Shouldn’t it be a carpet sample of honor?
3. Tom Brady acts like a dick for no reason? GET OUT!
4. Tiny Darren is never too small to get blowed up rull good.
5. Via Deadspin – Ocho brought a few singles onto the field in Cincy at the beginning of the 4th quarter against Baltimore, playfully pretending to pay off the refs while they reviewed a sideline catch that he made (it was overturned). Or was he giving the Baltimore secondary some walking around money before half of them get cut after the season? NO, HE WAS DEFINITELY PAYING OFF THE REFS! GET ‘EM, RAVENS CONSPIRACY THEORISTS!
I don’t think there’s ever been another team in history that’s generated more buzz with a win over the Texans than the Jets have this week. And with that newfound swagger they’ve decided to poke the bear as much as possible in advance of their Kris Jenkins dubbed “Super Bowl” against the Pats. Metal Gear Rex did his best Lane Kiffin impression and Kerry Rhodes pulled a near-Anthony Smith. There were even pointless Twitter fights involving Rodney Harrison, who someone needs to remind is no longer on the active roster.
Can Rex’s dirty chimichanga play well enough for the J-E-S-T to pull one out? Or will the Pats receivers decide not to drop seven passes this week and run away with it? Either way, Rex is at Scores by 5 p.m.
What Chad said. Except, you know, without the terrorist attacks and national emergency and march to war. Rest in peace, King of Pop.
After the jump, Jackson’s Super Bowl halftime performance.
(Full disclosure: Ochocinco later recanted. I guess some people are still a little touchy about 9/11. But whatever, imagine if Bettie Page and Elvis died on the same day. As sad as the attack on Pearl Harbor, right? Hello?)
Elisha Manning was all set to get empaneled onto a jury, but his questionnaire revealed a deep-seated bias against people who have stolen antiques. And older brothers. Also, the article reports it was unknown which case Eli was asked to sit in on, though we all know he only showed up to demand that his Plax be set free and allowed to return to his team.
Warren Sapp has pinned Tony Romo’s late season failings on trips to the golf course. See, this would have been more convincing had he said Romo wants to lose early just so he can get back to the course earlier than usual, rather than it being a distraction during the season. Also if Sapp had any sort of reputation for being a workout warrior himself during his career, that might’ve bolstered his argument ever so slightly.
Rudy Huxtable Ocho Cinco? Make what you will of MediaTakeOut.com’s report that the Bengals headcase wide receiver is engaged to Cosby Show alum Keisha Knight Pulliam.
![[avatar]](http://p.uproxxcdn.com/global/images/default-avatar.jpg){kind=avatar}
