Buckeyes Drop to No. 8 in Newest College Football Playoff Poll
November 24, 2015Ohio State can still make the College Football Playoff
November 25, 2015Happy Wednesday, Blawg Pound. Just when you thought you’d seen it all with the Browns, eh?
A refresher in case you were stuck under an F-150 yesterday: Johnny Manziel spent some portion of the bye week in Texas, where he was apparently photographed and filmed partying. Mike Pettine, in a very dad-like way, said he was “disappointed” in Manziel’s behavior and that he would need some time to make a decision as to who would be the starting quarterback against the Baltimore Ravens on Monday Night Football. Apparently a few hours was all he needed, as the team announced — reportedly with the backing of owner Jimmy Haslam and GM Ray Farmer; don’t those names warm your heart with confidence? — that Manziel had been demoted to third-string QB. 36-year-old Josh McCown will be back in the starting lineup, with Austin Davis taking over the No. 2 spot.
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.
Oh man.
What the hell.
This team, I’ll tell you what.
I get why Pettine benched Johnny. I don’t think I fully support it. It seems rather arbitrary that this was the straw the broke the camel’s back, but as Mos Def might say, there were a million other straws underneath it. But I get it. Johnny didn’t commit a crime, as far as we know, but it seems being an NFL quarterback is increasingly like running for office. The problem isn’t so much that he was out cavorting — or maybe it is; knowing more than a couple addicts and being one myself, I’m not comfortable speculating on substance-related issues — but the appearance and perception. The NFL has long been and is becoming more corporate. No position is subject to greater scrutiny than QB1.
The whole thing reminds me quite a bit of the plight of Randall “Pink” Floyd from Dazed and Confused. The summer before his senior season at Lee High School (near Austin, Texas, of all places), his coaches give him and the team a pledge sheet to sign. It reads: “I voluntarily agree to not indulge in any alcohol, drugs, or engage in any other illegal activity that may in any way jeopardize the years of hard work we as a team have committed to our goal of a championship season in ’76.”
If Pettine explicitly laid out certain guidelines for Manziel before the bye week, and Manziel did not abide by said guidelines, then I don’t take much issue with the benching. If the expectations weren’t made clear I have a little trouble with it, but my bellyaching ain’t gonna change a thing. The worst part for me is that the Browns look so bad, so incompetent, and so embarrassing. Actually, that’s not the worst part. The worst part is that it feels like we’ve been down such a road before.
I’ve found it awful hard to get too worked up about the Browns this year. This latest mess hasn’t made me mad or sad or even that frustrated. I’m growing more and more numb to their blunders, and that numbness is growing more and more familiar. You might even say I’m…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7EpSirtf_E
I understand, however, that folks will have stronger opinions on the matter than I do. That’s fine. Other folks will have strong opinions that are incompatible with those first opinions. That’s fine, too. It’s fine to disagree. It’s fine to not like something, and to leave it at that. It seems that disagreements of opinion often turn into attacks on character, or it at least feels that way. I struggle with it myself. I find myself getting mad at people for holding a different opinion or visa versa. It’s not a good quality.
It was a pleasant surprise then, when a remark on a wrestling podcast offered some perspective. On a recent episode of the Cheap Heat podcast, hosts David Shoemaker and Peter Rosenberg were discussing a particularly controversial angle in which a wrestler’s (Charlotte, daughter of Ric Flair) brother, who died of a drug overdose, was referenced on screen, and derogatorily so. It was part of the storyline, with a heel (Paige) hitting an emotional low blow in order to give their conflict some teeth. Word later came out that the idea had not been cleared or even run by Ric Flair, who is as celebrated a wrestler as any. The question became if it was in poor taste or completely out of bounds.1
After some discussion of the matter, Shoemaker said the following, which I think pertains to a great many situations outside of wrestling.
It’s okay to not like something and have that be the end of your feeling about it. You can not like a storyline and it doesn’t necessarily equate to a bigger problem with WWE. You can disagree with something that President Obama’s done and not think he’s the worst president in the history of mankind. It’s okay not to like an episode of whatever your favorite show is and not think oh, this show’s going into the crapper. Not liking something is totally fine, and sometimes that’s just the end of it.
It reminds me of the old David Letterman bit, “Is This Anything?” Some things just aren’t anything, at least not anything worth getting worked up about. (Except the Browns, of course. I think they exist just to remind us to get worked up from time to time.)
Lastly, Wright Thompson went to Paris shortly after last week’s terrorist attacks and wrote about it. It’s intense. It’s frightening. It’s heartening. It’s sad (except for the odd moments when it’s funny). More than anything, it’s powerful.
An excerpt:
THIS IS THE FIRST TIME terrorists have attacked the gates of a stadium during a game. Amazing as that sounds, it’s true. All these years, it’s been a worst-case scenario. Stadiums are soft, rich targets. A minor league baseball game seats as many American casualties as the entire Normandy invasion, and a small basketball arena holds all the Marines killed on Iwo Jima. The biggest football stadiums hold two Gettysburgs. Thousands of people sit side by side, riding public trains and eating in nearby restaurants, on Avenue Jules Rimet in Paris or River Avenue in the Bronx, with no way for authorities to make them secure. The only thing between a pleasant day and Mad Max is a social contract and faith in each other’s humanity. Live sports work because people believe they are safe, and in Paris, that belief came under attack.
Happy Thanksgiving, all. May your weekend be long and your plates be filled. All the best.
- For what it’s worth, it was hardly the first time pro wrestling has crossed a moral boundary, and I thought it worked like a charm. [↩]
34 Comments
“Comfortably Numb” is exactly how I described my feelings about the Browns on yesterday’s article. (Not saying you stole this from me, Will, just saying it was a fun coincidence). These idiots can no longer surprise me and I’ve mentally moved on to the Cavaliers anyway. The NFL draft will come around next year and, somehow, I will talk myself into their draft picks and talk myself into the team being underrated heading into the season and END OF RECORD, TURN OVER TO SIDE A.
I was with you until you you said you will trick yourself into believing the Browns will be good next year. I am past that phase in my fandom. To me, they are garbage and will always be garbage until they actually produce.
That’s the only way I can get myself to watch them. I can’t watch them when I know that they are horrible. I have to believe they could actually be good or else I just won’t tune in.
That’s the thing about the Browns. Hop. Things can always get worse. There’s no bottom to this barrel.
Benching Manziel took away the only thing of interest for the rest of this season. Everyone will be checking out, including the rest of the team.
Yep. I think I finally reached my limit this year. Living out of state, I have purchased the NFL Sunday Ticket every year just to watch the Browns. I don’t watch any other NFL teams or games. I justified the expense because it’s my team; it’s a connection to my hometown; I didn’t want to miss the off-chance that I might see success – or even the small signs that something good might be on the horizon. This year did it for me. Sunday Ticket is cancelled. I’ll consider it again after consecutive seasons of .500 ball.
Of course, I’ll be 80; but the social security check should just cover the cost. Okay, half the cost.
F**k it Dude, let’s go bowling
I watch because there is only so much yard work I can do.
Same boat. I’ll be switching to watch the local team which just happens to be 10-0.
Come to my house. I’ve got plenty you can do. Or is this about your personal patience and capacity for it? If so, then I don’t want you doing it. You can be 3rd string yard worker, right behind my son, who moves like pond water and has the motivation and work ethic of a large boulder.
Man, don’t know if I could do it. I’m right on the border of Steelers and Eagles country (closer to the latter). It would have to be the Eagles; but I just don’t know if I could count myself with those wearing-jerseys-to-church-on-Sunday-booing-breast-cancer-survivors-pelting-Santa-with-snowballs people. If they went back to kelly green jerseys, maybe.
yeah I tried that one on my Folks one year, know what I got for Christmas? Lopping shears, a bow saw, and a directive to make it so we could “see the dock from the living room”
ahhh…good times
It was especially rough because you live 10 miles from the nearest water.
seriously…crossing the highway would’ve been easier had they not insisted I dress up as the “black ghost” every night
Mowing, edging, raking, trimming, and pruning can only occupy so much time. So, it’s hard to escape the gravitational pull of the Browns.
It’s been 16 years of futility, 2 winning seasons one of which 10-6 wasn’t good enough to make the playoffs. As was stated on WFNY’s podcast everything in this organization has changed over the last 16 yrs except the physical location with essentially the same results. In that time span perennial losers like Arizona and New Orleans have gone/won the SuperBowl, Cinci has had what 10 winning seasons? This year really did it in for me and now we’re heading back in to the offseason with number one priority being finding a QB.
17th verse, same as the first . . .
“there is no pain you are receding … a distant ship , smoke on the horizon … you are only coming through in waves …”
comfortably numb : ONE of the greatest guitar solos ever !
http://media1.break.com/dnet/media/850/920/2920850/31-abide-able-big-lebowski-animated-gifs-image-1.gif
took me a couple reads to figure out if the breast cancer survivors were the booers or booies. I like it either way.
Yeah, it was a flawed attempt at an artful sentence. Those “ing” words were intended to be verbs (within the overall adjective); however, I’m sure both were in the stadium that day.
(For what it’s worth, because it adds to the story, the survivors being booed were men, which clearly contributed to their being booed.)
Don’t have much patience for the “what’s the fuss, it’s legal to drink” justification. Context is everything. Johnny isn’t an easily replaced street FA who only plays special teams and barely impacts the team. He is an admitted substance abuser in whom significant team resources and careers are invested. And he plays the most difficult and important position in sports. Shrugging this off as a non-event is like whining “but it’s legal to make a phone call” when a violent guy violates an agreed no-contact order with his ex-wife. Yes, most people can make that call. Johnny cannot, and he knows it (or why would he defensively say “the footage might be old”?).
It’s not easy to admit that the team we love has screwed up royally, again. But Pettine would not be leading the charge to bench him if he didn’t perceive this as a direct threat to his coaching tenure. If you look at the Johnny timeline of statements and actions and still say this is overblown there’s no objective, rational convo to be had on this subject.
Reducing complicated humorous imagery to decipherable sentences in the time one permits oneself to bang out a WFNY comment is hard. Comedy is easy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GOdAbjebs-g
Boo. You’re better than that. It’s not fair play to say that another person is not objective or rational just because they disagree with your point of view – particularly on a subject so rife with conjecture and subjective perception. I say, boo, sir. BOO.
boo.
My point was that it’s no longer rational to call it subjective.
“You’re better than that.” Boo: to falsely flatter with the insinuation not only that your position stakes the moral high ground, but that I know it.
Cheers. đ
Touche.
Still, if I was European, I’d whistle at that first comment. From the moral high ground.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-H3o8r7JgGY
Uncle, my worthy opponent. I have neither costume nor light saber.
my Browns interest has increased by about 19% via Pettine and the coaches taking this stand. However, that 19% is building upon a negative number.
You are close to those Philly fans, I see.
I’m trying.
I’m very trying.
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