It’s been a while, since I could… hold my head up high

Well it’s been a while since I updated this last.  The title has nothing to do with anything, I just thought of that song when I started this post.  It’s kind of weird because there are really no sports to write about except for SU basketball, which just sucks right now, so there’s absolutely no point.  So this will be more of a random post, since sports is obviously way too big in my life that I can’t find anything else to write about.  I used to have a link spy on here, not to see who checks it, but just to see if anyone at all reads this or gets the link from my AIM profile… maybe I’ll stick a counter on here or something because the link spy is too shady and seems kind of stalkerish, actually.

This semester has been fun though, met some cool new friends that I’ve never met before in my 3 and a half years here.  That’s the thing about college… you’re going to school with so many people for so long, and you don’t know most of them.  But I also can’t believe that I’ll be graduating in a couple months.  Very strange… that is if I pass this class that I should be studying for at this moment.

I was thinking about maybe starting a collaborative blog with people’s stories about everyday life that can be actually pretty funny.  I don’t consider myself a smart person by any means, and I do stupid things all the time which I could write about… and then things like being very strange things happen to me as well, almost on a daily basis.  I seem to be always caught in complete awkward moments, such as the time(s) I was shoulder banged (you can ask, I probably won’t say).  All I can say is that my shoulders must be completely irresistable to some, and I would have to agree.  The point being, there’s plenty that people can write about, so if you want to contribute, let me know… I can make a blog and it may or may not be funny to read.  If it were my straight up “comedy,” it would just be retarded, so we need other people to contribute.  MVP and I were thinking about creating a sports podcast (and/or The Sporting Dudes blog) again as well, as we had one and it worked out pretty well, but we just forgot/didn’t have the time to continue it.  So let me know about all this.  And yes, I mean you.  If you are reading this, you are probably 1 out of 4 at max.  So let me know what YOU think about it, hahaha.

Check out Beer Grylls and his adventure at Chuck’s and picking up girls in Syracuse: http://youtube.com/watch?v=RfagNJTAmVw

On a whiffle note, Whalen’s Warriors are coming back stronger than ever this year, with a couple new additions as well… one of which is a so-called “power hitting second baseman” and another may play shortstop and has a “better ass than Derek Jeter.”  Both will hopefully be huge additions and aid in bringing down that “never was” team we all know as the Legion.  Hopefully they will actually come through and play… unlike our past signings.  Though we will probably need a bigger roster so get at the GM or owner (Wil/Whale) and put in a good word for yourself.

Well, there’s nothing else for me to write, and wow, this was random…

Perfect Commercials

Saw a great commercial from Nike.  It’s perfect.

New York Giants – 2007 Super Bowl Champions

Honestly, I don’t even know where to begin with this post… I can’t start to explain how amazing it is to me that the Giants actually got it done this year and won the Super Bowl. There’s really no way, but I guess I will try.

Well, as I said in a previous post on this blog, I predicted the Giants to go 6-10 this year. I honestly did not think that Brandon Jacobs could replace Tiki Barber as well as he did (along with help from the Giants 7th rounder and last pick Ahmad Bradshaw). Eli really did not impress me in the preseason, and I figured Shockey and Burress would take over Tiki’s role in complaining about Coughlin, who I saw as a complete lame duck coach, leaving after this year or being fired in the middle of the season. I felt that losing Ernie Accorsi really didn’t help the Giants, who I felt did not make any really important offseason moves, considering his best was a linebacker from the Chiefs, Kawika Mitchell. I knew he was their leading tackler but the Chiefs, who are pathetic, didn’t seem to want him there, so why did the Giants? I did feel that the defense as a whole would be a good unit and would keep the Giants in games, but I really did not think that the offense would put up enough points in the NFC East to keep the Giants in playoff contention. While thinking all of this, I did stay optimistic and hoped that I was very, very wrong.

And today, I could not be happier to be able to say that I was very, very wrong.

This year was filled with ups and downs for the Giants, who were one of the most streaky teams in football this year. Although, injuries played a major part in this, considering at secondary positions, the Giants started 9 different players throughout the year, and brought on guys from the practice squad, one of which actually played and made a difference in the playoffs. Even through the injuries and everything else, they were able to do one thing for almost the entire season… win football games on the road. Including Super Bowl XLII, the Giants won 11 straight road games, which was an NFL record at 8. Obviously you have to win your games at home, which was actually quite difficult for the Giants this year, for reasons unknown… although Giants Stadium is a tough place to play when the terrible winds factor into the game. But even so, they could not seem to win at home, but beat almost everyone in their path as the visiting team. I guess when you are a 5th seed wild card team, it’s a perfect setup for playoff contention.

The thing that really stuck out to me in the playoffs was the fact that the Giants lost 4 out of their 6 losses this year to 3 of the teams that they would later beat in the NFC Divisional Playoff, the NFC Conference Championship, and the Super Bowl Championship. That is simply amazing, as they were able to regroup from the 4 losses, and the coaches were able to put together a great game plan to make sure that the same mistakes were not made when it counted. NFL analysts on the major networks as well as ESPN didn’t seem to bring this up at all (at least I never heard about it), although the reason was probably because the playoffs this year completely revolved around the Patriots, and rightfully so. But the fact that the Giants were able to make some changes and come back and beat all of these teams when it counted was just simply perfect. The total record of the teams that the Giants faced was 54-13, with the Bucs alone being 9-7, so the caliber of the teams that the Giants played against was huge.

The only thing that I am very sick of hearing is that the Patriots choked. They did not choke, they were outplayed. The defenses in this game took over and did a great job in stopping the offenses, especially the Giants… considering the Patriots offense was one of the best of all time. The Patriots team as a whole was definitely one of the best of all time, although it might not be thought of in that manner anymore because of the Super Bowl loss. But on paper, the team is amazing, and during the season, they were the most dominating team that I have ever seen. They had a bunch of scandals, and they deserved the criticism, as they brought them on themselves (“Spygate” and steroid/human growth hormone usage). Bill Belichick is a sore loser for sure, and isn’t much of a better winner. He ran up the scores claiming that he was allowing the opposing teams to have a chance to stop his offense, which is a completely load of garbage. These actions angered me as much as the rest of the NFL fans that disagree with this practice. But all that being said, you can’t take away their amazing regular season. They are the best team that I have ever seen, which makes it all the better that the Giants were “undefeated killers” once again (most notably/recently the Vikings and the Broncos) and ended their pursuit of perfection.

While I was watching the playoff games, someone made a comment about being a Giants fan, just because the games were so close. They said that they could never be a Giants fan because of the way that they always find a way to lose a game that they have in hand, or the fact that they almost give their fans a heart attack every time they take the field. I actually agreed at the time that it was hard to be a fan, but it’s really like that for any team that doesn’t consistently win. The thing is, it’s not hard to be a Giants fan. Sure, our team gives up so many points, will completely demolish a team one week and then be blown out by a lesser team in the next week at home. Yes, our team seems to let opponents stomp all over them at times, and are usually one of the most inconsistent teams in the NFL, year after year. And we can’t forget the stupid plays that Shockey makes that cost the Giants 15 yards and an automatic first down on 4th and 15, or the fact that the quarterbacks never seem to have any awareness about blitzing defenders and fumble the ball so much while in the red zone. But you know what? This team seemed to go out every week and try their hardest to win the game. That alone makes it extremely easy to take a liking to this team, at least to us as fans. This year, you could see it, they generally cared about winning games, and showed their anguish when they lost. They seemed to actually feel the same way as the fans watching the game, as many of us pour our money (and lots of it), time, heart and soul into this team, and we appreciate it when the players do the same for us. This was completely evident in watching this team play against the New England Patriots in Week 17… they played their best, and it wasn’t good enough. They admitted that it wasn’t good enough, and they came out and showed us that they could improve even more. After 17 long years of waiting, we were ready for this huge task. I said all along throughout the playoffs that the Giants matched up best with the Patriots because of the defensive schemes that they used all year. I also said in Week 2 that the Giants would beat the undefeated Patriots and end their pursuit of perfection. I obviously meant in Week 17, and I was almost right. When a friend suggested that I still had a chance to be right, and maybe I just got the date wrong… I believed, just like every other Giant fan. That’s what being a fan is all about, and when they finally win, it’s completely worth it all.

It’s not hard to like this underdog of a team; a team that nobody thought would do anything in the playoffs, and some didn’t even think the deserved to be there. Some thought of the NFC as a terrible conference, and that nobody had a shot against the godly Patriots. Well, these people were proved wrong. The New York Giants maybe were not the most talented team in the NFL, the NFC, or even the NFC East. But that really doesn’t matter, because they were the best team when the season was on the line. And out of 31 teams, there is only one champion of the National Football League, one team that is considered to be the #1 team in the league. In 2007, that is the New York Giants, and nobody can take that away.

And I can honestly say that this was by far the best moment of my life as a sports fan. I remember the Giants winning when I was 5 years old, and I remember going crazy, but it still wasn’t the same, as I couldn’t appreciate it in the same way, and there was not as much on the line for the opposing team. Having your team finally win it all after 17 years of continuous hope will do that to you.

To the 31 NFL teams, and especially the Patriots… Michael Strahan put it best… the Giants stomped you out.

Chris Berman Explodes

Someone leaked this video from ABC’s Monday Night Football some years back… this makes Berman look like a complete idiot (NSFW).