Rih-tards love shiny objects.

Super Bowl XLVI is now in our collective rear-view mirror and, with it the 2011 NFL Season. Before I get started, I’d like to state the following as tactfully as possible: Eat my ass then cram my baby seed pipe down your throat, Vegas! I called the Giants to win it and you didn’t!

With that out of my system, let us proceed with some thoughts from the game.

It’s hard to explain why, too. Maybe it was the long drives and low score. Maybe it was a lack of devastating turnovers.

My vote goes to sloppy play. There were lots of dropped and fumbled balls, 12 men on the field penalties and a safety on New England’s first offensive play of the game. For two teams that are supposed to want to win, the Giants and Patriots sure seemed like they were getting their rocks off on giving the damn thing away.

I haven't enjoyed a fan-made NFL shirt like this since those Ron Mexico jerseys.

The NFL is an ultra-competitive game where the slightest decrease in performance can take you from Pro Bowler to shit scraped off the coach’s shoe. Which makes it odd that an obviously injured Gronk was (unsuccessfully) thrown to on a handful of key plays. Yes, a healthy Rob Gronkowski is awesome, but you can’t pretend things are the same way they once were just because you want them to be. That’s when real winners make the tough decisions and do what has to be done, like a man who cheats on his wife once she’s lost her looks.

I’m hearing a lot of lazy sportswriters and ESPN talking heads jerking their dicks to all the parallels between this Super Bowl and 2008′s contest. Most of it I’m willing to let slide because you have to fill airtime with something and coming up with actual content is really boring. But to compare Mario Manningham’s catch, the caliber of which you will probably see once every Sunday, to David Tyree’s catch in 2008 is profane and shows no appreciation for nuance. You might as well say The Beatles and Herman’s Hermits were the same thing because both featured British guys with shitty haircuts playing guitars.

Oooh, a middle finger! And from an uppity brown-skin, no less! The country has been robbed of its collective innocence!

Though the headline from Madonna’s halftime show is M.I.A. flipping the bird to millions of people, I don’t think we should forget how ultimately gay the spectacle was. And I don’t mean that in an “I’m a disenfranchised teenager with a very limited vocabulary who calls everything ‘gay’” sort of way. I mean Zac Efron licking semen off the abs of David Beckham by candlelight while Elton John plays the piano and blows in their ears GAY. Why anyone thought a bony old witch lip synching her hits from 25 years ago would be a great idea is beyond me. I’d have been happier with a collection of one-hit wonders performing their hits from yesteryear. Cameo’s “Word Up” cascading into Bel Biv DeVoe’s “Poison” would have brought the house down.

I never got the fuss about Giselse. Sure, I'd stick my dick in, but let's not go crowing like that's some standard of excellence. There have been overripened cantaloupes I'd have fucked if the grocery store were a little emptier.

I’m sick of people referring to Gisele Bundchen as a Brazilian when “Bundchen” is a name so German that any self-respecting Jew would feel a shiver down their spine hearing it. If a Korean named Hong Suk Kim moved to Italy, you probably wouldn’t call them Italian, would you? But because we’re a nation of morons, we hear a name that isn’t John Smith and toss it in the pile of “foreign names that don’t compute” and figure “She’s from Brazil, that makes her ethnically Brazilian!”

Regardless of her national origin, Gisele took a giant, steaming shit in the punch bowl of Patriots’ team camaraderie by shouting at a Giant’s fan who had mocked her husband’s performance that “My husband cannot fucking throw the ball and catch the ball at the same time. I can’t believe they dropped the ball so many times.” Yeah. Thank God the citizens of Boston are famed for being a bunch of level-headed, understanding angels. Otherwise, things might have gotten awkward this off-season.

Not this year.

Not by a long shot.

Here’s what I recall: There was a slutty brown M&M, a fat dog that lost weight, some Italian chick in a FIAT ad I wanted to bang and John Stamos selling Greek yogurt, which sounds like normal yogurt covered in body hair. None of them moved me in any way whatsoever, though some of the people viewing the game with me were clapping and howling like they were watching Pryor in his prime, so maybe my sensibilities aren’t refined enough to appreciate the artistry I was witnessing.

Looks run in the family.

Now that he has two ring’s to his brother’s one, some people are beginning to whisper that Eli Manning is possibly a better quarterback than his brother Peyton. I’m going to take the occasion to make a point that I feel is very important: Accolades and talent seldom go hand in hand. Permit me to elaborate.

In this country, there is a belief in the “American Dream.” That, if you work hard and keep trying, eventually, good things will happen to you. And I’m not going to deride the notion, because working hard and plugging away are indeed important. But so much of our fate – far more than anyone can admit while maintaining their sanity – is due to dumb luck. If Madonna had one single bomb early in her career, she’d be touring county fairs with Cyndi Lauper, not performing the halftime show backed by a writhing army of hairless homosexuals.

While Peyton and Eli are both gifted individuals, one of them has reaped the benefit of landing on a team with excellent coaching and talented teammates while the other has had to do every last goddamn thing on the field for himself. Accolades should never be used heavily as a criteria for determining talent. Trent Dilfer has more rings than Dan Marino, and Los Del Rio has had more number one singles than the Ramones. Don’t forget that.

The Super Bowl. The one day of the year I hate the NFL. Do you know what the Super Bowl means to a dedicated football fan? Mourning the death of another season as you explain how many points a field goal is worth for the fifth time to a bunch of Philistines who are only watching for the commercials. What should be an act of beautiful purity is reduced to a carnival spectacle, like losing your virginity to a hooker while your father insists on watching.

Depressed as I am by the season’s looming conclusion, I will put on my game face and write a final NFL article because I’m mommy’s brave wittle soldier like that. Here are the three pillars that I believe Sunday’s contest between the New York Giants and New England Patriots will hinge upon, followed by a prediction of the game’s outcome.

Rob Gronkowski as seen in a photo he publicly Tweeted to Kate Upton. Again, you have to love this guy.

The inarticulate embodiment of all Polish joke punchlines, Rob Gronkowski has become the engine of the Patriot’s offense. Yes, Wes Welker and Aaron Hernandez are also critical, and Tom Brady is the gas which fuels the fire, but most people this year have a sense of “Where Gronk goes, so go the Patriots.” That’s troubling because an ankle injury sustained against the Ravens could prove to seriously limit Rob’s explosiveness on the field. Whether or not Gronk will be able to secure some V to heal himself in time for the game is Sunday’s biggest question.

'I'm Tom Brady, the prettiest quarterback in all the land. Let's hope I don't trip over my lengthy penis or my sleeping supermodel wife before Sunday, because then I might hurt myself. Except I'm Tom Brady, so I'd just break my fall on a pile of gold coins like Scrooge McDuck because nothing bad has ever happened to me.'

While I hate the Patriots because I’m a Redskins fan (which makes any team that wins my mortal enemy), I’m saying the following objectively: Tom Brady has become jumpy in the pocket in recent years. Not “chuck-the-ball-at-the-first-sign-of-pass-rush-then-shit-yourself-and-curl-into-the-fetal-position-like-a-frightened-bear-cub” level scared, but he can get rattled. This is critical to Sunday’s game because some of New York’s greatest strengths are blitzing and a general gift for quarterback disruption.

Tom Brady is going to have to weather some blistering attacks during the Patriots’ first few drives. If he can stand up, the game will be quite winnable for him and his team. If he doesn’t, the Giants will smell that blood in the water. And that will put the whole game in jeopardy.

Many people calling the game for New York are doing so based upon the assumption that the Giants’ receiving core is going to prove too much for New England’s lackluster secondary to contain. While there isn’t much you can point to that disputes this idea, I will say New England’s defense has done markedly better in the postseason, so I don’t think this is quite the gimme that people are viewing it as.

This was originally going to be a picture of Jerry Springer to go with the 'Final Thoughts' title, but the faces of old people are wrinkly reminders of our own inevitable demise, so stare at these instead.

I could be missing something here (mostly because I’m fucking stupid), but I don’t think this game is going to be particularly close. With a healthy Gronkowski in the lineup, I could see New England having the weaponry to score in spite of New York’s disruption and keep things tight. Sadly, that lovable Polack’s ankle gimping out might have doomed him and his team.

Bill Belichick’s mastery of making something out of nothing shits on MacGyver’s, and he could easily pluck some player out of his ass that’s been quiet all year to be a Super Bowl hero, but if New York is able to ring up the touchdowns as easily as I think they will, and if the G-Men can get to Tom Brady like Schillinger would a prag, this affair will get ugly quickly. I’m going Giants 37-Patriots 27.

For a league that fields the finest sports product known to the face of the Earth, the NFL (if you were expecting me to say anything other than the NFL, please drink bleach until you feel a boo boo in your tummy) sure shits the tub when it comes to selecting Super Bowl halftime entertainment. This year’s choice of that dessicated bruja Madonna continues a baffling trend of boring, geriatric ghouls being picked to entertain the world on America’s biggest stage. Without proper entertainment, halftime has been reduced to a break for men to take a excruciating, constipated, queso-dip-dump while their girlfriends flick their cuteness bean to the Puppy Bowl.

Enough is enough. The Super Bowl deserves entertainment worthy of its greatness. Here are a few ideas I had that would keep our morbidly obese American asses glued to the sofa.

Any takers for Slayer?

Maybe all that’s needed to fix halftime is a small tweak of the artists selected. After all, in recent years, I must admit to thoroughly enjoying the performances of both Bruce Springsteen and Prince. Here are a few other musicians that I believe have enough presence to handle the Super Bowl with ease.

Metallica-They haven’t been relevant since 1994 and Lars Ulrich will someday share a bunk with Hitler in the afterlife, but you’re a goddamn liar if dispute that the opening chords of “Enter Sandman” wouldn’t throw the house into a frenzy.

Garth Brooks-Yes. I like – nay, love – Garth Brooks. (That sound you just heard was every shred of the edgy persona I’ve spent years cultivating being flushed down the toilet.) Say what you will about the man or country music in general, but he knows how to entertain. How else do you explain this video?

Jay-Z and Kanye West-I suppose this wouldn’t play in Middle America, but you know what? Fuck the Heartland. Unless you need an abortion clinic blown up or the appeal of Hee Haw explained, that shithole can contribute nothing to your life.

According to Google, these are Victoria's Secret models. I wouldn't know. I'm an adult. I mastubate to porn, not a bunch of skinny bitches who have the presumptuous audacity to assume that I'd choose looking at them over naked ANYONE because they have high cheekbones.

I don’t get the appeal of the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show. The women involved are beautiful but not sexy. (The difference between beautiful and sexy is a face you want to take home to mom versus a face you want to spray with more white stuff than a runway that’s about to take a crash landing.)

Still, judging by Twitter traffic, people seem to love the yearly VSFS, so why not hold it during the Super Bowl? Seems like a great piece of synergy, and it’s a more innocent way for Junior to learn about the contours of the female form than the Katie Kox cuckold porn he found on your hard drive.

It’s time we embrace the fact that America is the Roman Empire with Wi-Fi. And one of the best aspects of Rome was the Colosseum, which spillethed over with rivers of gladiatorial blood. (And affordable booze. You hear that, FedEx Field?) While the government probably wouldn’t permit humans maiming each other in combat (thanks, Obama), animals beating each other to a pulp sounds like it’d be incredibly fascinating, ASPCA be damned. Here are some matches I’ve dreamt up, in no particular order:

-A pack of wolves versus a pride of lions
-A rhino versus an elephant with a machete stapled to its trunk
-A polar bear versus a seal with a bomb inside it
-A tuna-smeared gorilla versus 100 cats

I could keep going (no I couldn’t), but I feel those duels are a good place to start.

Have a Super Bowl halftime show idea of your own? Tell me in the comments. That way the site won’t look like some 1996 Geocities ghost town.

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It's an easy joke in light of Billy Cundiff shanking his kick, but it had to be made. And, now, the article can move forward. (Click the photo if you don't get the reference. Then, kill yourself.)

Both of the weekend’s championship round games were grueling affairs decided by three-point margins and heartbreaking errors. That the cities of Baltimore and San Francisco weren’t reduced to flaming rubble afterward is testament to either the restraint of the fans or the stopping power of rubber bullets. Now onto the “analysis”.

LaQuan Williams reacting to Cundiff's miss. This expression says 'I may not punch you on the plane, but, the moment your back is turned, I'm shoving your toothbrush up my asshole.'

It’s been a while since I witnessed a loss as painful as that which the Ravens suffered on Sunday to the Patriots. Billy Cundiff’s kick was tragic and will go down in the annals of all-time awfulness alongside Scott Norwood‘s Super Bowl botch. (That was enough alliteration to last the site a month or two.) Lee Evans also let his team down spectacularly in the game’s waning moments. (PS-Lee, given how much heat he’s taken off you, even Jesus would recommend you let Billy place his penis inside your wife’s vagina.)

What sticks with me the most, though, is how for so much of the game, it seemed like the Ravens were in control. Tom Brady was having one of those rare outings where he looked mortal and beatable. In fact, after that second, spectacular interception by the Ravens, most people though to themselves, “Wow, what a backbreaker. That seals it!” And then, you realized that Baltimore was actually down by three. And that there were only a few minutes left. And that the Ravens’ offense requires tons of time to do its thing. With every postseason loss they suffer, the more it seems like the Ravens will forever be one of those teams that contends but never gets over the hump. It’s almost like they’re karmically snakebitten. But we all know there’s no cause for that to be the case.

'Oooh, I am just SO upset with myself right now! If I could kick my own fanny, I would!' (Yes, you were to imagine that being said in the most effeminate voice possible.)

I was so drained by the Ravens-Patriots contest that it wasn’t until the 4th quarter of the Giants-49ers game that I realized, “Damn, I’m witnessing another tight one.” And, just like the earlier match-up, this one also had its goat-Kyle Williams, who took over punt return duties for the injured Ted Ginn and ended up fumbling twice. The man is now being Tweeted multiple death threats a minute. Let that be a lesson to any of you who offer to do anything for a sick coworker.

As for the Giants, they are getting better by the game. Victor Cruz is playing like the top receiver in the league, and the Giants managed to get him without using a draft pick, at that (fuckers). Eli is looking every bit as good as Peyton, which fails to compute in my circuitry. If he wins a second Super Bowl before his older brother, I might start buying in the 2012 armageddon talk, after all.

My Super Bowl pick shall be forthcoming next week.

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Well, I guess we know who to call in case of a Joe Flacco biopic.

“Win, and you’re in.”

“Once you go black, you’ll never go back.”

A lot of clichés get bandied about during the championship week of the NFL Playoffs. Maybe it’s because, as the breadth of the teams left narrows, it gets harder and harder for writers to find words to put on a page. Luckily, that’s never been a problem for me, both because I’m that damn good and due to the fact that this website is my own, meaning I could up and leave right this second to go chase a butterfly if it had particularly interesting wings.

Here are my picks for this weekend’s games, complete with my usual in-depth analysis that might as well consist of me picking teams based upon the prettiness of their uniforms.

Look, I get it, 'Ravens' has some historical significance with Edgar Allan Poe and all. I just wan't to float 'Baltimore Omar Littles' out there as a possible, far more intimdating alternative.

I don’t think there has been a harder game to call this postseason than the Ravens-Patriots contest. Every time I want to pick the Patriots, I remember that, as good as they’ve looked, they haven’t beat a single team with a winning record this year. And that says a lot. Put me on a T-Ball field and I’m going to look like Albert Pujols.

On the other hand, Baltimore seems like a total crapshoot because they are so streaky. There are days that its offense, lead by quarterback Ben Stiller, puts up great numbers and the team totally dominates the clock with Ray Rice’s running and a defense that looks ready to play Ike to any team’s Tina…and then there are the days where Joe Flacco goes three and out so many times that you might think that he derives sexual satisfaction from it.

After much deliberation (20 seconds of thought while on the john this morning) I’m calling the Patriots for the following reasons: The Ravens’ defense, while solid, isn’t that 2000 squad. Sorry, citizens of Baltimore, but they aren’t, and no amount of jeering me with your herpetic, sore-filled mouths is going to change that. They’re going to give up 28 points, minimum, to Prettysmile McHandsomepenis. And, though the Pats’ defense sucks, Cam Cameron’s plays date back to a time of leather helmets and smoking in the locker room at halftime. Belichick will be able to figure out a way to disrupt the Ravens O enough for a win, regardless of how shitty his personnel may be.

Being based in San Francisco, it still shocks me that the 49ers have female cheerleaders. You'd figure a bunch of glistening Latinos in Cocksox might be more in order.

There is no way that the Patriots-Ravens game will be half as thrilling as this one. The Giants are on a Hell of a tear, with Eli Manning proving that you can have a face like Sling Blade but an arm like Joe Montana. Opposing him will be Alex Smith, who’s shown that, in spite of almost a decade of underachievement, there might be some potential buried in that dung heap after all. (Can you tell I identify with him?)

While the Giants have done great work, I see the 49ers walking away with this one. They’re a more complete team with a defense that’s far more likely to get them turnovers. Not to mention that the 49ers won the regular season match-up when their running was putrid and now Frank Gore is all better, or at least as good as someone’s going to get after he’s had morbidly obese men in body armor crushing him for five months. If the Giants pull it off, it’ll be because Eli and Victor Cruz continued to develop their Riggs and Murtaugh-esque bond while Alex Smith shit the bed and did what everyone deep down expected him to do even after last week’s outstanding performance.

I’ll write about the results on Tuesday. If I go 0-for-2, please leave comments so horrible that they would bring shame to both of our families.

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Hey, Hitler Baby, your daddy is a loser. Can you say 'loser'? Of course you can. BECAUSE IT'S IN YOUR BLOOD.

This close. This close. I was this close to getting to brag that I correctly called the outcome of all four of this weekend’s playoff games. Moron or not, I love getting to wave a triumph erection around the place like a pirate would his cutlass. Alas, it was not to be, as the Saints’ gambit of turning the ball over every third play to lull the 49ers into a false sense of security didn’t pan out the way they intended. Guess you can’t win ‘em all. Here are my thoughts from each of the four games.

Brees, you do as good a job concealing your hair loss as you do holding on to the ball.

Either this game was decided by bad luck, or the 49ers really do hit the living shit out of people harder than anyone else in the NFL. I don’t know which is a more-plausible explanation for why the Saints simply couldn’t keep their hands on the ball. As much as I like the 49ers, I’m not sure if you can count on Alex Smith having a day like that again, much less the defense getting him the ball that many times. He reminds me of Rachael Leigh Cook in She’s All That. For the entire movie, she kinda looks like crap, only to clean up nicely for the prom. Then, the movie ends. Well, after six ugly seasons (and a much-improved 2011 campaign) I worry the New Orleans game was Alex Smith’s prom and he probably isn’t having a game like that again anytime soon. (Disclaimer-This analogy only holds water if there isn’t some straight-to-video sequel titled She’s Still All That which I’m unaware of.)

Tom Brady, the original Bieber.

The weekend’s dullest game by a long shot. I have nothing against Football Jesus, but his performance made the Patriots‘ defense look like the goddamn ’85 Bears. There just isn’t much to say here. I had the game off by halftime and spent the rest of the night watching Casino. I’ve seen the film a hundred times, and yet its outcome was still less predictable than that piece of shit game’s was.

If I were Baltimore's center, you'd have to pay me extra to bend over in front of a dude sporting that moustache.

Shocker, the boring-as-shit Ravens managed to host a boring-as-shit playoff game. Baltimore’s offense is abominable and looks all the worse compared to their outstanding defense and special teams. It reminds me of those old Bugs Bunny (I’d hit it) cartoons where a woman with a slamming figure would wear a veil to cover a ghastly gorgon face. The tits are Baltimore’s defense, the ass its special teams, and the face is Joe Flacco‘s offense. Beating by a touchdown a Texans team decimated by injury doesn’t bode well for Ray Lewis and his accomplices next weekend.

Rodgers, I love ya, but the madness had to stop.

The game of the weekend. Not only because of the fascinating way it played out, but because I watched it from the comfort of Whole Foods. Yes, you heard me, Whole Foods. The one closest to me has a titanic faux-bar area with dozens of massive TVs and food so cheap that it’s a wonder I didn’t leave the place clutching a colostomy bag. As for the game, well, I hate to say I called it, but I did. Green Bay just hasn’t been the same since their defeat in Kansas City last month. That loss was like hearing your really sexy girlfriend fart for the first time. You want to pretend it can go back to the way things were before, but the damage is irreparable.

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Happy New Year, Papa's Basement fans!

Yes, I’m back. And doing what I do best, I might add: Verbally jerking off to the best two weekends of the year, the Wild Card round and Divisional round of the NFL playoffs. Listen to me discuss last weekend’s games, give my picks for this weekend’s games, and hear the story of how I got hustled out of $10 during the Giants-Falcons game by a goddamned flipper baby.

Papa’s Basement 1-13-12 (Left-click this link or press the “play” button at the bottom of the post to listen to this episode immediately. To download this episode, right-click this link and select “Save Link/Target As.” iTunes users can download Papa’s Basement by clicking here.)

'How does he do it, Smithers?'
'He's a love machine, sir.'

Last week’s moronic picks went two and two, right in the middle of that big, fat, simpleton part of the bell curve. I would have been 3-1, but Tim Tebow drank an extra amount of baptized baby blood or did whatever it is he draws power from. Not that I’m complaining. Seeing the Steelers ousted in that fashion left me engorged for days. Which made my niece’s preschool graduation extremely awkward, but that’s another article for another day.

Let’s see if I can improve upon last week’s mark. If I don’t, I promise to apologize to you in the only manner acceptable.

'Frank Gore' is the manliest name ever. My street name could be 'Johnny Twelve-Inches' and I'd still prefer being called Frank Gore.

If this game were in the Superdome, I wouldn’t waste your time and would simply write the words “New Orleans Saints” and be done with it. But it ain’t, so I can’t. New Orleans isn’t the same team on the road offensively, not to mention the 49ers are just about the best defense in the league. So this becomes the age-old question of who prevails when it’s a juggernaut offense versus a shut-’em-down defense. My vote is with New Orleans. Alex Smith is mediocre and will be unable to equal the 21 points that I assume New Orleans’ offense will, at minimum, put up. Also, I know a lot of 49ers fans and really want them to be pissed and miserable. That didn’t affect my decision, but I would have used it in the event of a tie.

Maybe I'd also believe in God if I had a body like that. (A body like that PRESSED AGAINST MY LIPS.) What!? Five alarm gay fire! And I'm sure the intonation in those words didn't translate whatsoever online and now everyone thinks I less-than-three cock. Great.

Even Tim Tebow’s staunchest detractors can’t deny the fact that the guy is exhilarating to watch when he’s good. It’s like witnessing a coma patient suddenly snap awake and start reciting pi to the thousandth digit. Do I think the Broncos have a shot this week? Sadly, no. Take what I said about the New Orleans-49ers match-up in the previous paragraph, then ratchet down the 49ers’ power level a few notches and you have my take on both teams in this contest. While I do think that the Patriots’ horrible defense will be punished at some point this season, it’ll take an offense better than Denver’s to do it. Plus, that scumbag Bill Belichick is an expert at psychological warfare. I bet he’s teaching his players to scream “Allahu Akbar” after making a good play just to mess with Tebow.

'THIS HOW YOU STAB A BITCH!'

I’m crowning this one the “I-Don’t-Give-a-Shit Bowl.” Believe me, I want to care about the Ravens. I live close to Baltimore and I goddamn hate the Steelers, but…they’re just so fucking boring to watch. As for the Texans, I feel I should like them because their fans probably hate the Cowboys as much as I do, but again, they’re a Texas football team, so it’s guilt by association.

As for the game itself, these two teams mirror each other extensively. Strong defenses and running games combined with quarterbacks that have their moments, both good and bad. When in doubt, pick the home team, so Ravens it is. Yep, you’ve discovered the level of insight I’m bringing to this article. No, you’ll never get back the time you’ve spent reading it thus far.

Motherfuck do I hate the two “actors” playing a couple in that commercial. Especially the guy. I wonder how many aspiring starlets have blown him because he’s asked, “Recognize this?,” done the belt move, then pointed at his crotch. The world is a cesspool.

For some reason, everyone’s cooled on Green Bay recently. I can only assume it’s due to the Kansas City loss which derailed their bid for a perfect season. Look, even those of us known for consistent quality have our ignoble moments. You don’t think that Leo DiCaprio’s stuck his cock into a fat slimeheap a few times? The man’s balled Bar Refaeli and Blake Lively. His two is your ten. But, sometimes, it’s any port in a storm.

The Giants are capable of disrupting any offense. They definitively proved that back in Super Bowl XLII. What’s more, Made-in-Taiwan Peyton is slowly proving himself to be the Solid Snake of the two brothers, and the Giants have been a surprise offensive threat for most of the season. You know what? Screw it, I’m picking the Giants. Just so I’ll have something to crow about if they do win. And because this has to stop.

I’ll address my results Tuesday.

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'Please let me be the top photo of a Papa's Basement article. Please?'

Result of the picks I made here: Two of four.

I’m not going to lie to you: For the first three NFL playoff games of the Wild Card Round, I felt a bit of a fool for extolling the greatness of football throughout my previous article (in which I picked the weekend’s games). Not that any of the match-ups were unwatchable, mind you. But by the early fourth quarter (at the latest), they all lacked drama.

And then, He came and showed us the way.

If Chaucer had witnessed the end of Sunday night’s amazing Denver Broncos-Pittsburgh Steelers contest, I believe he’d have eloquently summarized it thus: “Holy fucking shit, didst thou just goddamn see that? Unmotherfuckingbelievable.” Yes, Tim Tebow, the man whose magic I thought had thoroughly waned at this point, ended the shortest overtime in NFL history on its first play with a 20-yard dart to Demaryius Thomas that, through the powers that you may assume someone named Demaryius to have (cough, fast feet, cough), became an 80-yard touchdown. I don’t believe in much regarding the supernatural, but every time I see Tim Tebow win, it makes me consider pulling the Slayer poster off my wall (despite the fact that ladies love it).

A little something for the gals, as well as my gay readers. All three of them.

The resurrection of Tim Tebow (I bet I’m the only person who comes up with that line!) wasn’t the weekend’s only story, though. Here are a few of my thoughts on everything else I witnessed during the 16 hours watching football that I could have spent volunteering at a soup kitchen or battered women’s shelter:

-Andy Dalton looks like an evil ventriloquist dummy come to life.

-Marvin Lewis’ discretion with throwing the challenge flag makes Andy Reid look like Sun Tzu by comparison. Both of the plays he pissed away his challenges on were ridiculously bad choices that weren’t even close. They’re flags, not magic beans.

-Drew Brees is so good in the Superdome that it can almost get boring. We get it, you see the playing field through Terminator vision. Please don’t decide that mankind is a threat to you.

Haha, visibly-erect man-teet.

-Atlanta’s loss was the worst of the weekend, and Mike Smith’s play-calling rivaled Marvin Lewis’ challenge flag-throwing. Twice on 4th-and-1, he opted for predictable, gut-it-up-the-middle crap, which only works if you have the ogres on the offensive line to make it happen. Obviously, Atlanta didn’t. Way to know your personnel, ass.

-This.

My moronic Divisional Round picks to come Friday.

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Haha, fuck you, Cooper.

I love NFL football. Out of all the sports on the face of the Earth that man watches in lieu of engaging in meaningful activity with his wife and/or children, professional football is the only one that captivates me. Baseball is boring as piss. Basketball has approximately 12 meaningful games a year. And hockey is filled with pagan viking last names, meaning that, as a Christian, I can’t partake. That leaves football, which is fine by me.

The only catch is, I’m an idiot when it comes to the sport. Given how many games I’ve watched, my lack of of comprehension is astounding. It’s like telling you I’ve seen The Sixth Sense hundreds of times yet never realized Bruce Willis was a ghost (spoiler alert). With that confession out of the way, I’m still going to pick this weekend’s playoff games because, hey, for me, it’s win-win. If I’m wrong, well, I told you I was a moron, which absolves me of all guilt. If I’m correct, I look like some Rainman-esque idiot savant). Here are the games in the order they’ll be occurring.

Brian Cushing looks mad that one of his gigantic, steroid-fueled pimples popped.

I’ve always had a soft spot for the Bengals because, as a kid, I thought they had the coolest helmets ever. As a Redskins fan, my team had a stoic-looking Indian making an expression like he’d just learned the rest of his tribe had been murdered by paleface, and here’s Cincinnati sporting a design that looked fit for the interior of a street pimp’s Cadillac.

Let’s go with an upset out of the gate: I’m taking Cincinnati over Houston by a field goal. The Texans are going through quarterbacks like Spinal Tap does drummers and Andy Dalton and A.J. Green are both growing by leaps and bounds. I think this is the game where it finally shows. Besides, any football team from Texas can lick my scrot.

These post-game hugs always look so forced. I imagine the players hissing 'Fuck you' 'No, fuck YOU' at each other through smiles.

This is the easiest game of the weekend to call, and I predict New Orleans will bury Detroit. Which is sad, because, as a Skins fan, I always felt guilty about ending the Lions’ season that year Mike Utley‘s shitty vertebrae disintegrated, screwing Barry Sanders out of ever getting a ring. (Ironically, I’d now snap a baby’s back like a glow stick to see the Burgundy and Gold hoist the Lombardi, but that’s neither here nor there.) Is there a chance that Ndamukong Suh’s presence makes this game closer than the previous match was? Sure. But don’t hold your breath.

Eli Manning, either doing the Thriller dance or pantomiming a gay velociraptor.

The Giants are going to win this one, and I’ll tell you the reason: The Atlanta Falcons are the John Papageorgious of the NFL. Translation: They have all the talent in the world and, when things don’t matter, they look amazing. It’s just that, when any sort of performance is actually required, they will most assuredly disappoint you. (Also, that “all the talent in the world” description applies much more to the Falcons of 2010. This year’s squad has been decidedly lackluster by comparison. So, yeah, they’re doomed.) New York is always one of those squads that, in spite of what they did during their first 16, you’d rather not face when your season is on the line. They’ll pull this one out.

I'm rooting for anyone that's stood next to tits like this.

This might be second-easiest game of the week, because I think the Steelers also fit that bill of “team you fucking hate to see when it’s one-and-done time.” The shine of He-Who-Died-For-Our-First-Downs seems to have tarnished a lot in the last month and, in spite of Ben Roethlisberger having a crippy ankle this week, I still see Pittsburgh winning because their defense will make Denver’s offense look as inept as a squad playing the Harlem Globetrotters. What will it mean if the Broncos lose? Only that Tim Tebow didn’t pray hard enough. Shame on him.

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