NFL WEEK 3: NFC North & West - 1st Quarter

Let us discuss the professional football like we there is nothing better to do this time at night. I spent three hours listening to one of those sales marketing audiotapes, and those things always leave me feeling like I don’t ever want to make money because the type of things you have to do to become successful following those frameworks always seem so fucking annoying. Not stupid, but annoying, to yourself and to others. Yet there’s always something built in to make that your fault, like you don’t have “business DNA” or “self-hustle” or something. Anyways, I am going to write one of those books by Thanksgiving, but I can’t legitimately push my own other wordsy things and fully sell that sales book manifesto bullshit thing without exposing my real face, so if there’s anyone out there who wants to be the face of my sales manifesto, let me know, we can work out a deal. It’s my scheme, you’ll just be the actor. Kind of like all those dudes on Sunday football shows that act like the shit’s not fixed.
Anyways, in our second week of pretending I know about pro football, I am taking a swing through the NFC North and West divisions, team by team, personal prejudice by personal prejudice, and hoping I can do it all before I die…

#1: GREEN BAY PACKERS (2-0, 4th overall) – The Packers are being mightily hyped as the real deal Holyfield this year, and it’s pretty obvious to see why. Their defense is a motherfucker, and the offense is set up enough behind enough O-linemen who aren’t on injured reserve (which killed them last year) to throw up some points. And if they make the playoffs, football in Green Bay in January, yadda yadda yadda. They should put the fucking Super Bowl in Green Bay. It should have nothing to do with fancy stadiums and hotel rooms and just be given on some sabermetrical scale to whatever team has the best overall finish the previous five years, but you can only get it once every 10 years, and they do it three in advance. THIS WEEK: A Monday night black-n-blue division showdown on the road against the team just below.

#2: CHICAGO BEARS (2-0, 6th overall) – On one hand, it’s easy to be like, “Holy fuck, the Bears are back, ain’t they?” Then on the other hand it’s just as easy to go, “Shit, they in all seriousness actually lost to the Lions already, so fuck them.” I will go with the latter. Of all the emotional I.E.D.s cooking up in locker rooms around the NFL, I think the Jay Cutler/Mike Martz deal in Chicago has the best bet of creating seriously comedic news stories. I mean, far stupider things will happen with T.O. and Chad Ochocinco in Cincinnati, but Cutler/Martz is a pair of self-important white dudes who could explode all over each other after a couple of three or four interception games. Poor Lovie Smith. THIS WEEK: I already told you, they’re hosting the Packers.

#3: SEATTLE SEAHAWKS (1-1, 20th overall) – Pete Carroll’s triumphant return to the NFL was short-lived, as they got beat by old AFC West rival the stupid fucking Broncos. My buddy Loftin is a Seahawks fan, so I will now say the only good thing I can think of about the Seahawks – they are lucky the Texans joined the NFL because now Seattle only has the second ugliest uniforms. THIS WEEK: At home, hosting another former AFC West rival in the San Diego Chargers.

#4: ARIZONA CARDINALS (1-1, 21st overall) – I have the Cardinals defense on one of my two fantasy football teams, and was smart enough to not play them last week against Atlanta. I did not realize I would be that smart. Sad thing is they don’t even really have a quality QB anymore. I would’ve at least just run Matt Leinart out there for the year just to see if he could sink or swim in game conditions. I mean, hell, he’s been sitting around doing sudoku on the sidelines for three years, you might as well. Now they are as fucked as the Cardinals usually are. THIS WEEK: At home, hosting the Oakland Raiders, in a game that I hope I am not forced by local TV to watch.

#5: MINNESOTA VIKINGS (0-2, 23rd overall) – Oh man, the wheels came off the Vikings bandwagon pretty quick this year. The Ol’ Gunslinger is having the media turn on him, and it’s only a matter of a few more weeks – if they keep losing – before the locker room follows suit. Couldn’t have happened to a better guy. You know who else I don’t like? Jared Allen, that’s who. You know another problem I have with the Vikings? How does Adrian Peterson get his jersey numbers all covered in paint or dirt or something like five plays into the game every week? Seriously, that dude has the nastiest numbers in football, but his jersey is still clean, and the numbers aren’t muddy, they’re like covered in paint and shit, like he rubbed against a freshly rolled wall or something. THIS WEEK: They will try again at home, hosting the Detroit Lions. The NFL should make every division play two games at the same time. I think they’re doing that to end the season this year, but it would be tight if that was just standard procedure, so you knew when the Vikings and Lions were playing, that automatically in your brain without you having to verify it knew the Packers and Bears would be playing as well.

#6: SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS (0-2, 26th overall) – Seriously, how bad is the NFC West if the still-expected winner of the division stumbles out the gates 0-2, and is still the favorite? I can imagine, for as awesome as Mike Singletary is, coach Samurai Eyeballs of Hatred’s schtick wearing thin pretty quick if you had to deal with it all the time. It’s like if your dad is like, “Quit that or I’m gonna beat the fuck out of you!” but he never actually beats the fuck out of you, because no matter how bad Mike Singletary is, he can’t literally beat up his players, or he would get fired or sued or both. If you never actually get beat, you eventually learn to think fuck the old man and do whatever you feel like doing, just without him seeing you. THIS WEEK: They give it a third try at winning a game, on the road against the Kansas City Chiefs, for the coveted Joe Montana Legbone trophy.

#7: ST. LOUIS RAMS (0-2, 30th overall) – Looks to be shaping up like another rough year for the Rambos, and yet another high draft pick next year. They host my beloved and emotionally painful to watch Washington Redskins this week, which should be an easy win for the Skins, but probably means the Rams will win, thus fucking up their draft pick for next year. That’s kinda what my Redskins do – they play the roll of spoiler, except they don’t spoil playoff runs, they spoil how high your draft pick ends up being. THIS WEEK: Just told you, didn’t I?

#8: DETROIT LIONS (0-2, 32nd overall) – I have a constantly fluctuating collection of five or six teams that are my second-tier favorite teams underneath the Redskins – teams that I will gladly root for but am not do-or-die-beat-my-children-when-they-lose attached to. The Lions have pretty much throughout my entire life been one of these teams. It is no different nowadays because Calvin Johnson is one of my favorite players. I feel really sad for lifelong Lions fans. It’s like being born with a giant flaccid dick that can never get hard. THIS WEEK: Ndonkakong Suh breaks Brett Favre into pieces in the Metrodome, and cannibal Al Qaeda Somalian kids (there’s lots of African refugees in Minnesota for some reason) feast on his raw flesh. Yet still the Vikings win.