Green Bay Goes Farve and…D-oh!

I find it interesting that FanYard users are predicting a 6-point victory for Green Bay over Washington. Here’s why: the Packers are a young team, minus Driver and Favre and a few others. They started off 4-0 and got very confident. Over-confident, in fact, and their confidence became a detriment about halfway through that game last Sunday night against the Bears. And it was not just the young ‘uns who got cocky; Favre did too when the Pack went up 20-10 and looked very in charge. You could see it tangibly happening to Favre on the field, and the lead-up to his game-killing interception was one of the highlights of my football watching. Not because he screwed up, but because the little things that led up to it usually slip by me.

This time, however, as soon as he rolled out of the pocket to the right on that play, I got a bad feeling for the game. From his body language, it was obvious that he once again thought he could do anything. Brett Favre used to be able to run to his right, look back across the field, cock his arm and accurately throw off his wrong foot to the left. He can’t now, and I was standing up steps before he threw the ball, yelling, “Don’t do it, Brett!! Don’t throw that baaa-lll…it will be…”

Boom. Interception.

It took a few years after Mike Holmgren’s departure for Brett to come to grips with his declining skills and to understand that he is still a master of the basics. Up until Green Bay’s last game, he had been playing excellent, basic football. I am not sold that it will not take at least one more mistake-filled game for Brett to understand fully that if he and the team play that way – the I-can-do-anything-because-I-am-Brett way – this team is going to sink, and fast.

The rest of the team could very well be telling themselves, too, that they had that game won, and should have held on to be Five-And-Oh, instead of Farve and…d-oh! And that will, I imagine, lead to a fewmore mistakes this week against the Skins.

The Pack still might win this game, if only because Washington could be a little cocky themselves, but I have a hard time seeing either team win by more then a field goal.

As a side note, the only thing worse than the Packers’ performance in that second half, was the awful announcing by Jabba the Hut…er, I mean, John Madden.

I am a Yankees Fan and I Don’t Care

This is a story for Babes (Who) Love Baseball:

It is true. I am a Yankees fan, and I’ll tell you why this fact does not make me an agent of Satan. (I know you all don’t think this way, but it makes me feel better to say it).

I grew up on the Eastern Coast. Not the East Coast that anyone west of Michigan might call East, but the real east. The East that borders on the Atlantic Ocean, for real. Anyway, there I was subjected to a constant dose of the Yankees, Red Sox, Blue Jays…and Montreal Expos.

So, at the age of…I dunno…really young, I decided that I was an Expos fan. I think now that the reason was because I was chastised – even as a small, unsportsmandeveloped child – for cheering for any of the other teams my non-cable small town recieved coverage of. Much of the population of the town was pretty evenly divided between the Yankees, Red Sox, Blue Jays and the rest, who covered the Mets and Orioles.

There were, if I remember correctly, three Expos fans. But they were French and no one paid them any attention; they felt like they were still in Canada and it worked out well for everyone.

Anyhoo, I became an Expos fan because I like to be the rebel; the loner; the one your momma…Oh, never mind.

Alright, I’ll tell you: in the 1981 NLCS, the Expos were playing the LA Dodgers in the NLCS and were up 1-0 in the ninth inning in the fifth and deciding game. The manager of the Expos was Jim Fanning, and he decided to take out pitcher Jay Burris and replace him in the bottom of the ninth with Game Three winner and Expos favorite Steve Rogers. As we all know, Steve Rogers is the alter ego of one of my childhood-best-loved comic book heroes, Captain America.

OK, I thought he was the Bionic Man, too, but that was Steve Austin.

Rogers had two out and one on base with two outs in the bottom of the ninth. Last man at bat was Rick Monday, who went to a full count…

Now, imagine being a small child with all your hopes and dreams for what you even then knew was a franchise destined for financial failure unless miracles were to occur, and then watching as Rick Monday hit a two-run, game-winning home run to beat your team.

You got it. I hated the Dodgers.

Oh. my. god.

In my mind, the Yankees had come back from three games down to beat my hated Dodgers. I just looked it up and, in fact…well…there, my friends, is a perfect example of why perception is reality. Wow! The Dodgers really did win the World Series that year; not the Yankees. Color me flabbergasted.

Still doesn’t change anything. Anything I gained as a young fan was lost the year they cancelled the World Series and I was supposed to have been able to watch the Expos play the Yankees. Now, the Expos are gone and I am still a Yankees fan. And now I don’t care if they win or lose.

Like most MLB fans, I suspect. Really. But I am still watching the playoffs!

Now, give me NFL!