Steve Breaston wants to be a Facebook poet laureate, and I got to admit he’s not bad. Under the pen name S.Phantom (aka William Esteban aka Benito Stevenson aka Stevie Phantom), he’s been writing some pretty eloquent Facebook notes – weird concept in the age of Sarah Palin’s Facebook notes, I know – on his official page: Steven Breaston 15 ((The official page of S.Phantom)). The most recent, a really sweet ode to his grandmother. Hope he doesn’t mind a re-post here:
In junior high there was a woman I used to kick it with,I would give her Hershey kisses and she would give me kisses,so I close my eyes and try to envision it because I’m missing it…no sound,even though they say a thousand words come from images,I don’t know about that,but I can tell you a thousand tears do exist from these mental movie clips,cause I reminisce when she would sit without throwing fits, so many surgeries she could of quit and said I’m done with it,she never did and as a kid I learned what being unselfish is,and I’ll never know what being helpless is,the reason when I hear “give me sugar” I pucker up my lips,wishing it was for your kiss and that you were here for this,but I guess you are cause in my mind you’ve always been apart of it,that’s thoughtless… cause grandma you always been the heart of it,and it’s because of you I can’t part ways with it…so I’ll continue to write….grandma,I miss you, goodnight. -S.William Breaston aka S.Phantom-
Last week in an interview with The Arizona Republic, Breaston claimed he was a writer, and it appears he intends to back it up. Just like I’m hoping he intends to back up the hype from Week 1, and get in the end zone sometime soon.
For the risk averse amongst us in the Fantasy Football community, here’s a tool guaranteed to make your head spin when selecting who to start; from NFL.com and Bloomberg: “Decision Maker” (cost: $8)
It allows you to input players and will tell you who to play. Of course, they have to complicate things by giving you both the Best Play and the Upside Play.
Bloomberg Sports Decision Maker – while driven by extremely detailed, fact-based, historical calculations – is very quick and simple to use. It provides fantasy players with the key answers they need to make their choices each week. The players are ranked by a system using complex analysis and formulas update based on recent performance and other factors such as the opposing defense that week and the weather forecast at that week’s venue. Decision Maker also has a unique technology-driven Risk/Reward Index, analyzing consistency of the scrutinized NFL players and pointing to long shot opportunities for players whose performance tends to be most unpredictable.
The guy I’m playing in our league this week posted this to the message board today, disclosing that his brother-in-law is one of the developers. He got my eight bucks, and I informed him that if I lose to him, I’m coming after his whole family.
As it would happen, I have a tough decision to make this week – who to start at second RB: Fred Taylor, Matt Forte or Marian Barber. So I put it to the test.
I’ll admit, even after I drafted Steve Breaston in Fantasy this year, I didn’t really care about what Breaston had to say, . Then last week, to everyone’s surprise he went off for 132 yards in the Cards season opener – awarding me a serviceable 13 fantasy points. Now I’m ready to listen.
He likes to always (or at least a lot) eat McDonald’s for his pre-game meal, he prefers sausage-egg mcmuffins and double cheeseburger meals
He’s part of a non-NFLPA sanctioned gang called the “Backpack Boys” made up of himself Adrian Wilson. Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie and Mike Adams
He follows the code, “You’ve gotta dance with the girl that took you to the prom.” (citing Mike Adams)
Breaston also fancies himself a writer. I look forward to him bringing long-form back on Steven Breaston 15 ((The official page of S.Phantom)) on Facebook. Maybe pen something like “A Possession Wideout’s Guide to the Extra Value Menu” by S.Breaston.
Highly serviceable NFL tight end Brent Celek recently hosted a contest for people to design his Twitter background, and someone with highly serviceable MS paint skills won.
I put in an inquiry to @BrentCelek to see who the winner is. Let’s see if I get a response.
Celek is also giving away spots in his Fantasy Football league this year. According to NFLTouchdown.com, 11 of his Facebook fans will get to play Fantasy with Celek this year.
On Saturday, Celek started a contest on his Facebook page where he will pick 11 fans to participate in a fantasy football league with him–but there’s a catch. Instead of picking fans at random, the former Cincinnati Bearcat decided to make it more interesting by having his fans perform tasks to earn a spot in the league.
So far, two contestants–Charles Alexander and Derek Diep–are the first two winners to join Celek in his fantasy league. While Alexander earned a spot by being the first fan to respond to one of Brent’s wall posts, Diep clinched the second spot by being the first to send in a picture of himself wearing Celek’s jersey in front of a stop sign.
Wonder how the NFL’s resident tight end social media expert Chris Cooley feels about Celek trying to take a shot at the title?
The annual American Century Tahoe Celebrity Golf tournament took place over the weekend in Lake Tahoe. It’s always a character driven event. Posted some quick photos of the newly kempt, but no less ridiculous Jared Allen, the ever increasingly sinister Michael Jordan, and others below.
Golf Digest’s senior travel editor Matt Ginella (I want your job) posted a good write-up on the event – check out Lance Armstrong’s mom, stuck in a bunker.
In lieu of being able to be Ginella, I’ll be trying my hand at the game American Century has posted on WGT.com that allows you to play the back nine at Edgewood Tahoe. One lucky winner is going to win a trip to the 2011 tournament. I’m still trying to get my swing down, good thing this game is nicely addictive.
Get the flash player here: http://www.adobe.com/flashplayer
On Saturday, state and local officials raided booths at the [St. Mary's County farmer's] market in Charlotte Hall, Md. and came away with $88,413 worth of merchandise with counterfeit trademarks, authorities said.
Authorities said they hauled away clothing with fake logos from the National Football League, Major League Baseball and National Basketball Association.
There were counterfeit Coach, Gucci and Louis Vuitton purses, too.
St. Mary’s Sheriff’s officials said seven suspects were identified and prosecutors are reviewing the case.
When I first read this, I was confused (probably because I’m terrible at thievery). If it’s all counterfeit, why is the lot worth $80 Grand? Well, as my source @asilentflute asserts: “must have been a sh*tload.”
When I was growing up, lawn darts was the preferred leisure sports activity at most family events. Those 12-inch spears were a Hayes family institution. I think they took that game off the market, yeah? At some point during my childhood we moved from lawn darts to volleyball, with like 14 to a side.
With my friends, I spent many an afternoon perfecting the art of “hitting the chair” (strike-zone) while pitching a beyond inordinate amount of innings of whiffleball. I’m talking from the age of seven through college, 1991 through…actually, one of my buddies is trying to bring weekly whiffleball back, which I told him I’m in for.
Recently, I’ve also taken a liking to lasso golf (often called ladder golf or polish golf).
Barely competitive, barely athletic akin to sport sports are the best. John Madden and I have an understanding about this. Madden just held his 12th annual charity bocce tournament: the Madden-Mariucci Battle of the Bay Charity Bocce Tournament. Madden, Steve Mariucci, George Seifert, and presumably a bunch of other members of the Tommy Bahama Weekenders club were all in-attendance – starting to understand why I went with the pic of the anonymous Raider cheerleader?
People seen a little tense about Maurkice Pouncey. I don’t want to talk about Maurkice. I want to talk about Trent Williams. He may sound like a character from a movie co-starring Andrew McCarthy and Jami Gertz. He’s actually the 6′ 5”, 315-lb O-lineman taken by the Redskins with the fourth pick in last night’s draft. And since anyone who tells you that they know how anyone picked last night is going to pan out is lying, and since Williams was the only guy picked to give M.C. Taskmaster a big old hug when his name was called at the podium, let’s call Williams the feel good story of the first round.
Who knows if this guy is going to be any good. What we have learned about Trent in the last 24-hours: 1.) His nickname is Silverback and 2.) He has, to quote his close confidant and fellow draftee, Gerald McCoy, wrist game.
McCoy, who went #3, one pick ahead of Williams, was keeping track of the draft board’s wrist game throughout the night. He also posted what Joe Haden and himself were sporting at Radio City last night on TwitPic.
Back to Williams. They don’t just let anyone be known as Silverback. He’s probably going to be really good.
I’ll give him credit, sometimes Jeremy Shockey does use Facebook to make a meaningful and positive connection with his fans, and I’m sure his 60,000+ Facebook followers appreciate the effort. Of course, other times he uses Facebook to:
A.) Speak in code (“Cngrts to mickelson.. good 1st tourny back for tiger”)
B.) Play with young girls hearts
Here’s that wall post from Friday that’s both stirring up conversation and embarrassing videos alike:
Ok LADIES heres the contest.. Post a video on the “just fans” section of my fbk fan page explaining why u deserve to have me take u on a date 1 nite this offseason… Contest ends sun night 4/18 at 8pm est… Lets have fun w this so be creative but just be careful its not too inappropriate where fbk deletes it!! good luck!!!
So far, of those 60,000 fans but three ladies have taken him up on this and posted videos. Two are almost unwatchable. The third is :18 seconds of a woman snowboarding in a bikini. She never actually defines herself as a contest entry. She might just be crazy.
By this time next week, the first week of NFL playoff match-ups will be abundantly clear, and the media landscape will be lousy with speculation – prediction: an unnecessary amount of people picking Philly or Dallas to make a dark horse Superbowl run. As it stands right now, 10 of 12 teams are at their very least in, with two spots in the AFC no less than wide open. Of those 10 teams, seven are playing games in the last week of the season that have some sort of playoff implications. Even so, after the Colts conceded victory vs. the Jets on Sunday, one can’t help but wonder who of the teams that are in regardless plan to rest their starters in the final contest of the regular season.
As I see it, you can eliminate three teams from that debate instantaneously, and a few others fairly quickly. The top seeds in their respective conferences, New Orleans and Indy, each backed their way into resting their starters in Week 17. And San Diego didn’t have to earn it – and they did beating up on Tennessee – but with a firm hold on the #2 seed they’ll sit their first string too.
The obvious candidates to play their starters this Sunday are Philly and Dallas, who meet to decide who takes the NFC East title. It’s just as much of a no-brainer for Minnesota and Arizona to put their starters out there. Minnesota needs to win to stay eligible for a bye. If a few things fall into place (MIN loss, PHI loss), Arizona can play their way to a bye to the following week.
That leaves three teams to consider – New England, Cincinnati and Green Bay. All three of these teams are playing a game on Sunday that affects the playoff picture, just not necessarily in a huge way personally. None of these teams have a chance at a bye, and Green Bay has no chance to get higher than a fifth seed. For New England and Cincy, on the surface it’s really only a question of rest – beneath the surface it’s a question of how bad do we not want to go into Indy in the divisional round?
Here’s the brief on GB, NE and the Queen City’s match-up on Sunday, and the context of each. Hit the poll at the bottom on who you think most needs to rest their starters on Sunday:
New England
vs. Houston
Implications:
Houston needs to win to get in. And realistically, they need so much help that the round-the league scoreboard will garner as much attention as Tom Brady and Randy Moss. The third seed in the AFC is New England’s to relinquish with a loss and a Cincinnati win. However, at this point it’s hard to wish for a second-round jaunt to the left coast to face San Diego over a rematch with Indy, who’ll be dusting off considerably for that divisional game.
I say sit the A-team at half time, Bill – who, ever the contrarian, called a QB dive with Brady twice on the final drive vs. Jacksonville on Sunday, up 35-7 in the fourth.
Cincinnati
vs. Jets
Implications:
Jets win, and their in. And with the Jets playing at home and the master of their own destiny, Cincy can count on getting the Jets’ best punch in the mouth. Still, if the Bengals knock out the Jets and a few other chips fall their way (NE loss, BAL win), they could be set-up to take on Baltimore in the first round, who they swept in the division during the regular season. Sounds complicated, but really it’s really as simple as living by the out-of-town scoreboard – if at any point New England wraps up Houston and that third seed is, pull Palmer.
Green Bay
vs. Arizona
Implications:
Arizona wins, and Minnesota and Philly lose, the defending NFC champs all of a sudden earned a week off, which is great for them, but does it really do anything for Green Bay? Rodgers and crew are looking at the 5th or 6th seed regardless of what happens on Sunday. But somehow, other than New Orleans, they’ve managed to have the least to play for this week. And, it’s almost a sure thing, that no matter where they’ve got to go in the first round, they’ll face a third or fourth seed that either played their way or got themselves beaten down into that position. May not hurt to be the rested team in that scenario.
…
My smart money prediction: Green Bay conducts business as usual, and plays the starters, New England and Cincinnati pull the first string at half time.
Vote for the team you most think should rest their starters this week in the poll below.
