Rumor from Bizarro World

A trade rumor that just started circulating:

Philadelphia television station WPVI is reporting that there is a trade in the works that would send disgruntled wideout Terrell Owens, who had 1,200 yards and 14 touchdowns for the Eagles last season, to Oakland in exchange for Jerry Porter and possibly a draft pick. Porter caught 64 balls for 998 yards and nine touchdowns in 2004.

Read the story here and here. I can just barely imagine this happening, but it seems far to Madden-esque to be true.

UPDATE: Sal Palantonio says it's not happening.

Down Memory Lane

Just a little trip down memory lane as we head towards the 2005 fantasy football season.

Cass City Monkies 2004 Results
Season
1. Go Deep!!! 11-4 2178.15 W-3*
2. Soon 2 be the leader 9-6 2050.45 W-8*
3. BimSkalaBimmin' 9-6 1978.75 L-3*
4. Turf Smack 8-7 1999.10 W-1*
5. DTownThunderCats 8-7 1887.30 L-2
6. The Tecmos 7-8 2134.25 W-2
7. The Living Legend 7-8 2064.85 L-1
8. Bone Collectors 1-14 1574.70 L-3
* = made playoffs

Playoffs
1. Go Deep!!!
2. Soon 2 be the leader
3. BimSkalaBimmin'
4. Turf Smack
5. The Tecmos
6. Bone Collectors
7. The Living Legend
8. DTownThunderCats

Go Deep!!!= Barrigar, Soon 2 be the leader= Fritz, BimSkalaBimmin'= Andy, Turf Smack= Haag, The Tecmos= Adam, Bone Collectors= Matt, The Living Legend= Bader, DTownThunderCats= Kid Loe.

Cass City Monkies 2003 Results
Anyone remember the standings, or at least who the champion was? That year it was Forearm Shiver, Gruesome Gamecocks, Dirty Construction Workers, Calm Like A Bomb, Kung Fu Death Monkies, etc. Matt and Darin were at the bottom, and I know neither I or Andy won.

Cass City Monkies 2002 Results
Season
1. Bader
2. Fritz
3. Barrigar
4. Haag
5. Stack
6. Ross
7. Andy
8. Labar

Playoffs
1. Barrigar

That's all the info I have. Add whatever you can remember. Or don't.

Bye Weeks

Useful info when drafting:

Week 3: Detroit, Washington, Baltimore, Houston
Week 4: Chicago, Cleveland, Miami, Pittsburgh
Week 5: Kansas City, Oakland, Minnesota, NY Giants
Week 6: Green Bay, Philadelphia, Arizona, San Francisco
Week 7: New England, Tampa Bay, Carolina, Jacksonville
Week 8: Atlanta, Indianapolis, NY Jets, Seattle
Week 9: Buffalo, Dallas, Denver, St. Louis
Week 10: Cincinnati, Tennessee, New Orleans, San Diego

Top 150

Excited for fantasy football? Obviously not, as only 3 people have signed up so far. But, when you are, you may want to check out ESPN's Top 150 for the season. It's supposed to be Insider content only, so don't know how long it will be up. Here's a taste:

1. LaDainian Tomlinson
2. Shaun Alexander
3. Peyton Manning
4. Priest Holmes
5. Randy Moss
6. Edgerrin James
7. Willis McGahee
8. Deuce McAllister
9. Corey Dillon
10. Jamal Lewis

Who has the best WRs?

According to The Sporting News, the Rams. The Lions come in second. See for yourself here.

A Quote...

from Len Pasquarelli's Tip Sheet on ESPN.com:

"The Jim Jones-type Kool-Aid that he is offering players, the essential ingredient in that Kool-Aid is that he can get them a new deal. Jim Jones Kool-Aid often leads to mass deaths and destruction. People that are drinking the Kool-Aid can expect the normal consequences to follow. (But) right now, the players are buying the stuff by the gallon." – former agent David Ware, who over the last year lost a half-dozen clients to Drew Rosenhaus, one of the NFL's highest-profile agents.

NFL Roundup

Ricky Williams is going to apply for reinstatement. Apparently, now that he's a holistic healer or somesuch, he doesn't need the pot. He does, however, need the money, as he was unable to pay the $8.6 million a judge ordered him to repay the Dolphins. So he's planning to lace up the cleats again. Wonder how his teammates will react when he shows up again?

Not really news, but this bit from an article by SI's Dr. Z intrigued me:

Did the idea of a double-QB offense at Atlanta, featuring Michael Vick lined up in a shotgun, alongside another QB or maybe spread out, or something, ever cross my mind?

OK, I'll need room for this one (although I could swear I wrote about it a couple of years ago). One night I had a dream ... honest, this came to me in a dream. The dream was that the Falcons came out in an old-fashioned single-wing. It was probably keyed by something Vince Lombardi once told me. I had asked him what would happen if a team all of a sudden sprung a single-wing. He said, "It would embarrass the hell out of us."

In my dream, I lined up Vick at the run-pass tailback spot. T.J. Duckett was my spinning fullback. Warrick Dunn was the wingback, and Brian Kozlowski, normally the second tight end, was the blocking back. I just couldn't shake the vision. Finally I called Dan Reeves, who was the Falcons' coach at the time. Of all the loony calls he's ever gotten, this must have ranked right up there. Anyway, I laid it all out for him, ending with Duckett as the old Michigan-style spinning fullback.

"What's a spinning fullback?" Reeves said, and I realized that I was either real old or just dopier than usual. The idea never got any further, but I still think something like that would light up the sky.

I've become rather fascinated by the single wing and similar offenses. I've read that some high schools have had some major successes with it. I wouldn't want to install it as the only option for a team, but it might an interesting change of pace. Especially if you had a guy with skills like Vick.

Kickoff!

It has begun. The fantasy football league is up at Yahoo. The League ID# is 7276 and the Password is monkie, as usual. That's all the info you need to get in. Sign up and check out the settings and let me know about anything you'd like clarified, changed, etc. They're the same as last year, with the exception that tackles are worth 1 pt instead of .5 and assists are worth .5 instead of .25. The draft is at the best time I could get; there weren't any other good options unless you want to draft much earlier. Draft order is yet to be determined, feel free to share any ideas.

Fantasizing

No sooner do I say that fantasy football season is around the corner than does a bunch of content pop up. You can check out a 14-round, 12-team "experts" draft here. The first pick was L.T. A bunch of Yahoo! fantasy writers also have their "High Fives", their top 5 picks in various categories posted here. Just enough to whet your appetite.

Holy Horsepower, Batman!

Want to see the new Batmobile in action? Check out this link. Also, a pic for those who haven't seen:

Tiger Trade

The Tigers traded RP Ugueth Urbina and SS Ramon Martinez to the Phillies for 2B/3B Placido Polanco today. I knew that the Tigers were likely to move Urbina, but I haven't followed baseball closely enough to comment on whether or not it's a good trade. I guess I'll trust Dombrowski. It also means Joe will have another Tiger to pick-up for his fantasy team.

Heads-Up

Yahoo! says that sign-up for fantasy football will happen sometime in June. So, before that happens, if anyone wants to make any comments or suggestions, please do. Draft type, draft time, number of players, positions, point values, waiver time, and especially playoff scheduling would all be good candidates for input. You can see the choice of settings here and the front page is here. The season kicks off September 8th.

Jumping Ship

ESPN is getting off the USS BCS, withdrawing its name from the Coaches' Poll. A remark from ESPN:

"Coaches have the perfect right to conduct their voting the way they see fit," said Vince Doria, ESPN's vice president and director of news. "We just feel, in our best interests here, we couldn't reconcile having our name on the poll and being able to cover any controversy that might arise."

Weak? I think so. It's hard to believe that ESPN is really worried about controversy. You'd think they'd welcome it. It's not like people blamed them when the poll got wacky the end of last year. Looks more like they're jumping on the anti-BCS bandwagon. Maybe it has something to do with the BCS signing a deal with Fox?

Playing Favorites

The NFL has just released sales figures for player jerseys from the past fiscal year. The top ten:

1. Randy Moss
2. Michael Vick
3. Tom Brady
4. Donovan McNabb
5. Ben Roethlisberger
6. LaDainian Tomlinson
7. Byron Leftwich
8. Carnell Williams
9. Jeremy Shockey
10. Tiki Barber

Tiki? I guess there's no accounting for taste. Number one draft pick Alex Smith was 12th. The Eagles had the highest team sales.

Who are you?

Since I was bored and wanted to avoid working on homework, that bit about Rosenhaus got me thinking. He sees himself as a superhero, but which one? The Punisher, Dr. Doom, or maybe Mr. Fantastic? Hmm. Then I got thinking, who would I be? So here it is: Which superhero best describes you, or anyone else in one of our fantasy leagues? Need help? Check out Marvel or DC Comics.

Welcome back, Chuck!

Charles Rogers has been cleared to practice without restrictions. Goodbye red jersey, hello contact. My first NFL prediction of the year: Chuck will NOT break his collar bone this year and will play at least 10 games.

Superheroes

For Drew Rosenhaus:

Speaking of hatable...

...there's an article on ESPN.com about slimeball agent Drew Rosenhaus. Everyone's familiar with him, he's a fast-talker with a gigantic ego. The tactics of some of his clients have drawn the ire of guys like Brett Favre and Donovan F. McNabb. Another agent's view of him:

"He's Colonel Kurtz stepping off his boat in Heart of Darkness. He's become megalomaniacal, consumed by greed."

But would you believe he's a... comic fan!?!

They occupy an entire wall of his upstairs bedroom: Spiderman, Batman, The Incredible Hulk, etc. Thousands of Marvel Comics are stacked neatly in his closet.

Like him or hate him, Drew does work his butt off. If it makes you feel better though, he apparently has no life to go with all that money and ego:

Rosenhaus averages four or five hours of sleep per night. He says he works seven days a week and never takes vacations. Even when he's in the shower, he parks his two cell phones within easy reach. He concedes he doesn't have much of a personal life.

Interesting reading.

Love & Hate

Congratulations to the Pistons for beating the Heat, advancing to the NBA Finals, and proving my pessimism wrong. Love from the Freep here and the Detroit News here. Of course, there are haters. Like Marc Stein on ESPN.com here. Hater might be a tad strong, but we all know the national media hates Detroit (especially the hateable Dan LeBatard, but everyone hates him, so who cares?), so you can expect to see a lot of praise for the Spurs and little for the Pistons over the next couple of days. Of course, the Spurs are the best TEAM they've played so far and deserve much of the praise they get, but there's a lot of sports reporters who would have preferred Spurs-Heat. Oh well, I guess we'll have to settle for a Finals where something like REAL basketball might be played.

The Revolution will be, uh... small?

Those of you less video game inclined (and by "you", I mean the hypothetical readers) may have missed the announcement about Nintendo's next-gen system, the Revolution. Here are some pics:



Yes, it's about the size of 3 DVD cases stacked together. You can check out the official specs and other images here.

The most interesting thing about the Revolution is that it will be backwards compatible and allow you to download old school games. Yes, NES games, like the ROMs on your computer. And they'll be free, the ones from Nintendo anyway. There's a list of Nintendo's offerings here, my favorites:

NES
Duck Hunt, Excitebike, Final Fantasy, Kung Fu, Metroid, Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!!, Super Mario Bros., Super Mario Bros. 2, Super Mario Bros. 2: The Lost Levels, Super Mario Bros. 3, The Legend of Zelda.

Super NES
Donkey Kong Country, Super Mario Kart, Super Mario World.

Nintendo 64
Excitebike 64, Goldeneye 007, Mario Kart 64, Perfect Dark, Star Wars Episode I: Racer, Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire, Super Mario 64, The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.

Yes, I'm on a list kick.

Military Humor

Ran across this today and found it amusing: The 213 Things Skippy Is No Longer Allowed To Do In The US Army. My favorites:

1. Not allowed to watch Southpark when I'm supposed to be working.

8. Not allowed to add pictures of officers I don't like to War Criminal posters.

20. Must not taunt the French any more.

22. Must never call an SAS a "Wanker".

25. Never confuse a Dutch soldier for a French one.

29. The Irish MPs are not after "Me frosted lucky charms".

33. Not allowed to chew gum at formation, unless I brought enough for everybody.

34. (Next day) Not allowed to chew gum at formation even if I *did* bring enough for everybody.

35. Not allowed to sing "High Speed Dirt" by Megadeth during airborne operations. (“See the earth below/Soon to make a crater/Blue sky, black death, I'm off to meet my maker”)

52. Not allowed to yell "Take that Cobra" at the rifle range.

77. The MP checkpoint is not an Imperial Stormtrooper roadblock, so I should not tell them "You don't need to see my identification, these are not the droids you are looking for."

84. Must not use military vehicles to "Squish" things.

87. If the thought of something makes me giggle for longer than 15 seconds, I am to assume that I am not allowed to do it.

101. I am not allowed to mount a bayonet on a crew-served weapon.

102. Rodents are not entitled to burial with full military honors, even if they are "casualties of war".

111. I am not qualified to operate any US, German, Polish, or Russian Armored vehicles.

130. "I’m drunk" is a bad answer to any question posed by my commander.

145. I should not drink three quarts of blue food coloring before a urine test.

146. Nor should I drink three quarts of red food coloring, and scream during the same.

170. Not allowed to "defect" to OPFOR during training missions.

184. When operating a military vehicle I may *not* attempt something "I saw in a cartoon".

191. Our Humvees cannot be assembled into a giant battle-robot.

201. Must not valiantly push officers onto hand grenades to save the squad.

203. "To conquer the earth with an army of flying monkeys" is a bad long term goal to give the re-enlistment NCO.

Peter Gammons...

...talks about a Tiger in his column from yesterday. Dmitri? Nope. Pudge? Wrong. Bonderman maybe? Wrong again. He's talking about Brandon Inge. Here's a short quote: "For all of us who turn to Baseball Prospectus' VORP, he is the second most productive third baseman next to Alex Rodriguez." You can check it out here.

Brownout

The Pistons may very well lose tonight and end their season. If they do, the blame will fall squarely on Larry Brown and his flirtations with other jobs. ESPN.com has done a good job covering this and pretty well sums up what I've been thinking. Check out Adrian Wojnarowski's column here, a quote:

After winning that NBA title a season ago, Brown had a chance to reshape his legacy for the history books. He had a chance to end his career with far more dignity and grace than he had conducted it. But Brown showed once again that he's the most selfish and disingenuous coach the profession has ever spawned. No pupil has ever come closer to Dean Smith's genius on the floor, and gone further from his character off it.

As far as the job with the Cavaliers? Here's Marc Stein's take:

Larry Brown cannot be an effective personnel chief in the NBA. He can't be. He won't be. He sours on players far too quickly to be a level-headed talent evaluator. He is chronically, famously fickle.

No matter what happens, I don't think Larry Brown is going to have many friends in Detroit by the end of the month.

It's Coming

NFL Minicamps are wrapping up and the fantasy football season is fast approaching. So, it's time to start thinking fantasy draft. Well, slightly early maybe, but close enough. In the spirit of sharing, I present the top 25 of Brandon Funston's (of Yahoo!) Top 50. You can check out the rest here.

1. LaDainian Tomlinson, SD, RB
2. Peyton Manning, Ind, QB
3. Shaun Alexander, Sea, RB
4. Edgerrin James, Ind, RB
5. Willis McGahee, Buf, RB
6. Priest Holmes, KC, RB
7. Randy Moss, Oak, WR
8. Daunte Culpepper, Min, QB
9. Corey Dillon, NE, RB
10. Jamal Lewis, Bal, RB
11. Domanick Davis, Hou, RB
12. Deuce McAllister, NO, RB
13. Julius Jones, Dal, RB
14. Tiki Barber, NYG RB
15. Ahman Green, GB, RB
16. Marvin Harrison, Ind, WR
17. Curtis Martin, NYJ, RB
18. Clinton Portis, Was, RB
19. Rudi Johnson, Cin, RB
20. Kevin Jones, Det, RB
21. Terrell Owens, Phi, WR
22. Donovan McNabb, Phi, QB
23. Torry Holt, StL, WR
24. Steven Jackson, StL, RB
25. Tatum Bell, Den, RB

Need a pick me up?

Waking up early got you down? Are you dragging all morning? Just can't seem to wake up? I've got the answer: caffeinated soap! Yes, you read right. Why wait until your coffee to get your caffeine? All they need is a little cross-promotion with Mountain Dew and they'll have a hit on their hands.

E-X-C-I-T-E-M-E-N-T

Don't miss the final rounds of the Scripps National Spelling Bee on ESPN2. Woohoo!