10. The Design Change. Wow, the blog sure looks different with all of the pinks, sparkles and unicorns, doesn't it? This in no way reflects some deeper truth about myself. It's just fun!
9. The usual nose grind. How could anyone possibly notice this small moment in the calendar, when there are *so many* sports going on right now that will make us all go weak in the knees? Dammit, between the NCAAs, NBA, NHL and MLB, I can barely remember to wipe. What's wrong with all of these other bloggers to notice anything from outside of the arena?
8. Linky regret. Crap, we forgot all about this quasi-holiday, but luckily, these six other blogs didn't, so go click. Next year, we'll have our act together, and then, you shall know the force of our wackiness!
7. Life Change. The blogger is moving! Or getting a sex change. Or taking up religion, or maybe, and this is really good, *all three at once*. Is your mind blown? 6. Grumpus. A sniff-tastic piece that not only tells the reader that the blog is about Such Foolishness, but that if you like that sort of thing, you are Wrong. (Note: this entry and post is in no way like that. Really.)
5. Scoops. Despite the fact that this blog is always about analysis and breaks no news of its own, I've got the grist on an incredible new story, complete with a Photoshop-riffic image. Take it as true!
4. Guest Writer. Do you find it suspicious in any way that a new writer is on the blog today, and that he or she writes in a highly affected way, perhaps with an overstated dialect? I know I don't.
3. Sidd Finch. Sure, the SI piece ran 24 years ago and wasn't really all that funny, author George Plimpton is dead and no one really read the follow-up book. But, um, woo. How about it?
2. Dork Harder. Nothing quite says April Fool like a highly detailed, trying too hard piece that sells the benefit of a new statistic with a wacky acronym. If you are very lucky, eggheads will take it seriously and run with it. LOOGY, anyone? 1. The Death Notice. Goodbye, cruel indifferent world that doesn't give me the traffic or ad revenue that I so justly deserve. I'm out of here, and the blog is going to lay fallow and collect dust while I do not, under any circumstance, check the page every few hours so that I can eavesdrop on my eulogy.
And just to prove my point, here's a gratuitous insult to show you how I'm really burning the bridge behind me. Take that!
In the next 11 days, I'll be drafting three fantasy baseball teams, with the first event happening in two days. That's the head to head league that's mostly comprised of co-workers and ex co-workers (you have to love this economy, you really do), and it's the first time I've been in it. The trash talk is pretty rife, which is intriguing given that no one's even made a pick yet, and I barely know most of the people I'm competing against.
Next Monday, I'll draft another head to head league, against a bunch of folks who I've been playing against, off and on, for most of the decade. Last year, due to my schedule, I opted out, and while I'm not completely thrilled with the idea of being three leagues (it's officially one too many, unless the leagues in question vary dramatically in scope, like having an AL-only and an NL-only set-up)... well, it'll be nice to play against some of these guys again. Assuming, of course, that I actually do well. If my team stinks, it'll be nothing but misery.
And finally, there's the keeper / auction league that I commish and host, which will happen on Saturday the 28th.
Now, which league do you think has dominated my thoughts?
Yup. The keeper league. And it's not even close.
It is just, simply, a superior product. Instead of working over the same old rankings that you see everywhere, having no real emotional attachment to any particular player, I'm agonizing over whether I should keep the guys that I have on my roster. Sure, they frequently disappointed me, and the market *should* value them less this year, in case I want to try to get them back again... but hell, I kept them all year for a reason, didn't I?
And it's not just me. The league has been live with rule changes, trades and trade requests, planning and preparations for what to do with the room. I've gotten e-mails from owners who haven't been very active, wondering what I think the auction will be like this year, in terms of values. Everyone is angling for low priced protectable players, stud starting pitchers, and just about everything in between.
Oh, and the actual draft prep is also dramatically more interesting. Several MLB teams are actively planning to keep some top prospects down at the start of the year, so that the "clock" on their service time doesn't start too early. In a normal league, this more or less takes them out of the running; the disadvantage in a shallow bench head to head league is just too strong to hold on a rookie who will only be up for a portion of the season, especially in a league with daily moves.
In an auction/keeper league, they are all very much in play, and in a myriad number of ways. Do you name them early, in the hopes that you can suck out big money from the market from an owner that just has to have the hot young things? Or do you hold and hold and hold on them, hoping that you can draft them late, when the money's out of the market and you are more likely to get them for the super-low price that could mean a protectable player for years and years to come?
I know the drawback of a keeper and auction league; time on draft day. I'm fully expecting this to take up my entire day, and that's not even counting all of the prep work in advance of the event. But dammit, if you're going to commit to a massive timesuck -- and there is nothing more time-consuming in fantasy than baseball, which is why so many football guys consider taking a team to be an act of utter masochism -- then you owe it to yourself to experience the full red blood variety.
And no, we don't have any spots open, but if you want, email and get on the waiting list.
Jon Papelbon, like many in Red Sox Nation, just can't stop talking about ManRam, and compares him to cancer. Now, this is where the media fails me, really. What kind of cancer, Paps? Breast, which makes you use funny pink bats? Ass or dick cancer, like what so many people wished on you when you did your spasmodic dance routines? Heroic Jon Lester Cancer? Details, man, details. (And yes, the sound you heard was the Bad Tooth squealing with delight that another 5,000 words on what the Paps-Manny Feud Means, and what would happen if, heavens to all heavens, they actually met as adversaries on the field of combat. I feel faint.)
The real jersey purchase of our times: making your own. Screw you, jersey price gougers. Note also the Very Male Way of referring to sewing as DIY. Balls malesy DIY, oi oi oi!
Did you have NBA Trade Deadline Fever? I know I did, having spent most of the last 72 hours in a cocaine-fueled tizzy while digging into the contract details of every player in the Association, then moving them all around in ways that only my fantastic mind could comprehend. After that work was done, I then went on to a lot of NBA blogs and posted my latest research, just to see how much groundswell I could get. How else could you explain rumors like:
> Shaquille O'Neal to the Cavs, because he worked so well for the Suns in their stretch drive last year, and the Cavs are completely convinced that they need to blow up the team, considering how gosh-darn awful they've looked as the best team in the East this year
> Vince Carter to Toronto, just to teach him a valuable lesson about being a piece of crap
> Kirk Hinrich to a team that's convinced that oft-injured and unathletic point guards always age well (surprisingly, Hinrich is still a Bull)
> Stephon Marbury to the Celtics, because the Celtics always get a guy for pennies on the dollar, and the Knicks want nothing more than to put him in the same division and on a playoff team, for all that he's done for them
> Raptors sending Chris Bosh to the Bulls, because you want to move a guy to a franchise that, if they offered their entire team for him, still doesn't have enough
> My left nut for my right one, just to give both a fresh start
What actually happened? Squadouche, as Norm Chad might say, and I'm probably impugning the good name of nothing by associating it with Larry Hughes and Rafer Alston (but probably not Brad Miller). By the end of the afternoon, the Lemur had already pivoted to the Tiger Comeback, having sensed that the biggest annual non-story, behind only Dog Show Coverage and the ESPYs for sheer Public Naked Pud Pulling, had faded.
Why do the Association's fans and writers fall for this every year? Maybe it's just that it's February and we're all out of other things to write about. Maybe it's because the writers are all hopeless nerds who would rather play Fake GM than Real Fan.
Or maybe -- and this is the stunning thing, the unthinkable thing, the dare not speak its name thing -- the Association's front offices are actually, you know, a little bit smart about their jobs.
Trades in the NBA, unless they are absolute theft (see Gasol to the Lakers and Garnett to the Celtics), are rarely a great way to improve your lineup. That's because trades are almost always about the salary cap, rather than the on-court product, and because it takes a long time -- years, really -- for players to truly adapt their games to each other and be successful, especially on the defensive end. Most mid-season trades are just shuffling chairs on the Titanic; by the time you've played 50 games, barring injury, you are what you are. Unlike baseball, a bubble team does not go to the Finals with the right move; unlike football, trades actually exist.
Anyway, now that that's over, it's time to... watch the games? Hell no. Let's write some more about the 2010 free agent class!
For the first time in, well, forever, I went big early and liked my draft, or did until I realized post-draft that Arenas and Ginobili were both out for a long time. I'm doomed.
Drafting fourth in a 12-team serpentine draft...
1st - Amare Stoudemire 2nd - Tim Duncan 3rd - Andre Iguodala 4th - Hedo Turkoglu 5th - Devin Harris 6th - Jermaine O'Neal 7th - Andre Miller 8th - Gilbert Arenas 9th - O.J. Mayo 10th - Manu Ginobili 11th - Mickael Pietrus 12th - Hakim Warrick
We start nine, in a 8-category roto league. If this is the year Jermaine O'Neal cares, I really like my bigs; if not, I'm boned. Same thing, of course, goes for the star hurt guys, but at least I'll be rooting hard for the Sixers again this year. I think we'll contend. My favorite pick is Mayo in the 9th; I think he'll contend for Rookie of the Year, and it's not like he won't get monster minutes for the Grizzlies.
Anyway, we now return you to the parts of the blog you might care about...
My starting fantasy football teams, for the record.
H2H 14-team Yahoo League (Work league)
QB Drew Brees, Kurt Warner RB Marion Barber, Earnest Graham, Steve Slaton, Andre Hall, Lamont Jordan WR Greg Jennings, Jerricho Cotchery, Anthony Gonzalez, Derrick Mason TE Heath Miller, Ben Utecht DEF Green Bay, Philly PK David Akers
Points 12-team Auction League (Private)
QB Tom Brady, Kurt Warner RB Ryan Grant, Thomas Jones, Slaton, Kenny Watson WR Torry Holt, Anquan Boldin, Cotchery, Gonzalez, Justin Gage TE Jeremy Shockey, Heath Miller DEF Indianapolis PK Adam Vinatieri
H2H 14-team Yahoo League (Friends)
QB Tony Romo RB Barber, Graham, Slaton, Chris Perry, Tim Hightower WR Jennings, Gonzalez, Nate Burleson, DeSean Jackson, Robert Mecham TE Dallas Clark DEF Tennessee, Carolina PK Matt Prater
The last draft was rough, in that I got poached at least a half dozen times early and late. The teams don't really vary all that much, in that if Slaton and Gonzalez tank, I'm boned in three leagues, and Barber, Graham and Jennings could take me down in two. I'm also a little embarrassed that I didn't play QB Roulette in any league, but I just hate doing that, even if it does work out fairly often.
Anyway, those are the picks; mock at your leisure.
Your list is here, and boy, the research on this one took me.... seconds. Gambling ain't pretty, folks.
(And yes, there is the very real possibility that I'm just trying to intimidate the other players in my league into thinking that they haven't done enough to compete with you, and that they need to spend the rest of their time before the draft getting into the same kind of over-analyzing paralysis. It's time for Big Evil.)
You are about to experience a Nerdgasm. (Hey, I told you this week was the Bullshit Factory. At least I'm giving you different stuff than the rest of the blogosphere, in my continuing doomed effort to avoid Titty Blogging.)
Earlier this week at the Carnival, I took a potshot at Joss Whedon, the truly great writer-director-et cetera of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel and Firefly. I'm an unabashed fan of the man, because he (a) writes great dialogue, (b) lives in the barely lapsed nerd section of science fiction that's right in my wheelhouse, (c) casts smart and funny women that are flat-out fantastic. Even the biggest meatheads would like to ride Charisma Carpenter, Sarah Michelle Geller, Amy Acker, Julie Benz, Gina Torres and Summer Glau... and I'm just scratching the surface, really. So there's something for the whole family.
Anyway, Whedom has spent the last several years not making more stuff, thanks to pointless sideshows with the "Wonder Woman" movie, his lingering heartbreak over not being able to make a lot more of Firefly, and I don't know what else, because I don't stalk the man. However, he appears to be back on the rails with the following Web phenomenon, "Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog." It's a musical -- no, wait, stop, come back -- from the point of view of a would-be supervillain as he battles a two-fisted hero and his professional ambitions versus his love for a kind-hearted woman.
It's completely great, and you can see it for free... but only for a limited time. Click on the banner to go to the site, where Whedon is hosting the free episodes this week only. His Mad Plan is to have fans evangelize this, then make a DVD that we'll all buy / rent / give. After that, I think we're supposed to show up at conventions dressed as the characters, which isn't as bad of a deal as you think, because you might get to say this phrase, "The Hammer Is My Penis."
Anyway, go, watch, you'll like or you don't have my tastes, at which point I get to impugn your worth as a human being. I'll be here when you get back.
If you own Josh Hamilton or Rich Harden, now is the time to trade them. (I hear Hamilton hits lots of home runs in a pointless exhibition yesterday, and we all know what that did for Bobby Abreu.)
And speaking as a Harden owner, I'm not going to, mostly because I hate trading, and as an A's fan, I'm not sure how to live in a world where the sudden and tragic loss of Harden doesn't ruin my season. Where would we be without Tradition?
Some consider it the coolest show ever on TV. Now, AMC is bringing back "The Prisoner," a 1960s cult classic that originally starred Patrick McGoohan as "Number Six." In its new incarnation, slated for 2009, Jim Caviezel and Ian McKellen co-star in the network's reinterpretation of the series. AMC is co-producing a six-part miniseries with British broadcasters ITV and Granada. Caviezel will play the title role of "Number Six" and Oscar nominee Ian McKellen will play "Number Two."
And yes, I am dreaming, as always, of my own Lotus Super Seven...
Since it's mid-June, and fantasy sports leagues start earlier every year (it's getting as bad as retailers with Christmas and other holidays -- watch your circulars for back to school, which will probably happen right after the Fourth of July), league sign-ups are starting now. I'm no different, and this year, I'm starting my own league.
Which leads me to following strong annoyance point... if we're going to the trouble of drafting defenses, why don't we care whether they win or lose the game?
In the Yahoo pre-sets, which is the dominant format, you can adjust for points for blocked kicks. Safetys. Get points for a botched running play by the QB where he's tackled, or runs out of bounds, for a one yard loss that's called a sack. But whether or not the defense manages the game to do what football teams are constructed to do -- win? Nope. Not at all.
(A similar grievance happens with quarterbacks who rack up 300 yards and 2 touchdowns in garbage time against scrubs, after their own backbreaking turnovers caused the game to be long out of reach. I call this the Aaron Brooks Effect, after the worst real-life and best geek-life QB in roto sports history. Brooks was on the champion roster in my total redraft league for three or four years straight, because the man was born to deliver points that meant nothing in reality, but everything to us. You could, if you had the balls, spend nothing at QB and load up on the other positions, and routinely fight the guy with Peyton Manning to a draw on touchdown passes to Joe Horn that changed the final score from 28-10 to 28-17. In his honor, I will now back this column up for ten yards under no real pressure, and throw my point backwards like a special needs child that's not getting milk before nap time. There's a good long pointless parenthetical digression. Brooksie would be proud.)
Anyhow, my fellow nerdlings, how many times has this happened to you? You select a defense on a good team. They contain the opposition and build up a lead -- maybe even with sacks and a turnover or two. Their offense then puts the game out of reach. And then, whether through an obvious letdown, a fluke play, or the game management mode that kicks in for every team once the magic "well, we can't get a shutout" play happens... and by the final gun, you are looking at 14 to 21 meaningless points against prevent, including ones where the offense has totally screwed you with a red zone turnover, or auto points from point after touchdowns on defense or special teams. It's the worst way to lose.
Meanwhile, the guy over in the corner who picked up the freaking Bengals has outpointed you, because while they are a terrible, terrible defense, they score more because they gamble constantly. So they've given up more points and lost, but had a pick and lateral play that got them in the end zone. In the immortal words of Derrick Coleman, whoop de damn do.
Now, if we're able to give the defense some points -- not a ton, mind you, just say, five to cover for the letdown touchdowns that happen in the 14 to 20 points range -- well, I don't see what that hurts. Maybe it makes the defenses a little more important in drafting, or adds an amount of extra (but fairly cool) complexity in the waiver wire strategy of adding and dropping defenses by match-up. Maybe, and this is the best thing of all, it makes all of us nerdlings not stick out like sci-fi conventioneers in Wookie costumes at the sports bar, since we'll be cheering and groaning over the outcome of the game. That'd be nice.
So have a heart, Yahoo Honks. Give us defensive wins as a point option, and do it in time for this year's leagues, so that I don't have to keep it by hand. You'll strike a small blow for making fantasy football more closely resemble what it really is -- gambling on the outcome of NFL games. (Shhh....)
I'm going to clean up some loose ends that have been rattling around in my pending post file. Which means that it's time for all of you to put up with my esoteric leanings. (Hey, I gave you an Alyssa Milano image below. If I don't cockblock you here with some London Review of Books-inspired work, I lose all cred as a wildly unpopular sports blogger.)
"Public facts" is a concept that economists and financial analysts use to determine the veracity of a market. If everyone knows something (say, for instance, the raising or lowering of an interest rate), it's a public fact. If the rate will be changed but only a portion of the market knows, that's a private fact. Markets depend on the swift dissemination of public facts, because if you don't have them, you've got a rigged game, and you won't get fresh money or investors.
Here's another point from reading too many esoteric book reviews... when you think about life among the ancient Greeks, assuming you ever think of such things, you probably think that they are relatively tolerant of gays, given that there's been any number of pieces of art that depict such things.
But when you dig into how people actually lived back there, it really wasn't that way. Sure, among military and aristocratic elites, such things were tolerated, but for the most part, the orientation was regarded the same way that it was throughout most of the ancient world -- with suspicion or derision, because, dammit, when life expectancies and infant mortality is what it was back then, you need all the spawn you can get.
So a false perception of reality is maintained due to the existence of noteworthy art: the pots have survived more than the writing, so voila, Greek Love means what it means.
Now, how does this roll back into sports, since that's what I do? It's all relevant to MLB, this year, this moment.
The public facts about steroid and HGH use among players is still far from known, and not just from the obvious aspects of 500 foot home runs and the track records of various MVPs, Cy Young winners and the whole rogues gallery of users.
We don't know, for instance, how many older players were kept in the game, or had their prime years extended, from the use of the junk. We also do not know, and will never know, how many players are now hitting a hard wall that the needle and pills might have prevented, at least for a little while longer.
But since MLB isn't a traditional market, the failure of public facts has not been a detriment to financial interest. (Compare and contrast this to, say, what's happening with home values right now. Or, better yet, don't, because if you are like me and bought in before the market went south, it'll just make you very, very sad.)
Now, to the Greeks. When you hear people talk about parity, it's almost always in disgust; it means a confederacy of mediocres, with the era being little-known, nor long-remembered. Especially in baseball, people talk about the Yankee Dynasties or the Braves always winning the NL East as being meaningful and memorable... but when you look at the attendance figures, the numbers don't back it up. People like to watch teams that are actually competitive, and more competitive teams equals more stadiums that have filled seats. The existence of the art -- be it pottery or pennant -- does not reflect the reality of what it was like to be there.
Oh, and this also makes fans of MLB+ franchises complete perverts that shouldn't be allowed to marry, and a threat to our traditional values. And that's a Public Fact.
Today, my family celebrated my upcoming birthday (it's Tuesday, and I turn neatly older than every professional athlete, thanks for asking).
Because the Shooter Wife and Mom are cooler than your Wife and Mom, I'm getting the new PS3 and Grand Theft Auto 4, which means that the site will more or less cease operations in another ten days, as I get my thug on. (I keed. But seriously, guest authors welcome.)
Meanwhile in my fantasy league, my previously resurgent team started June with...
1) David Ortiz getting an MRI
2) Nick Blackburn taking a shot off the face from Bobby Abreu (both of them on my team), knocking him out a game where he was up 3-1 and 2 outs from locking down a win
3) BJ Ryan, JJ Putz and Trevor Hoffman all having save opportunities... and all getting the snot beaten out of them
4) Falling from second to third and losing three points in ratios (hard to do in a roto league with nearly 500 innings in the books)
It's a long season. And tonight, that's not really a comfort.
Tonight in New York, the Shooter Wife and I were in the studio audience for the Colbert Report taping. Here's All You Need To Know.
> The Colbert studio is in a relatively unassuming part of Hell's Kitchen, on the western side of Manhattan, near the southern part of Central Park. It's a pretty residential area, and if it weren't for a few awnings with the Colbert markings, you could easily walk right past it.
> Tickets are free, but are pretty murderous to get; I just happened to be on the site a couple of months ago when one lonely day opened up. Go to the site today, and you'll most likely see the tickets reserved for year in advance.
The reason why is simple: there are only 107 seats in the place, and Colbert has about 1.3 million viewers every night. I haven't talked to a friend yet about this who hasn't expressed profound jealousy.
> The line begins forming around 3pm, with conflicting e-mails that tell you to be there early, that your tickets might be revoked if you aren't on line before 5pm, and yada yada yada. We got there around 3:30 with stuff to read, and queued up in a dedicated concrete area, under an awning. It can't be pleasant when the weather's nasty, but yesterday was beautiful, so it was all good.
> Line tidbits... Daily Show guests can't appear on Colbert for two weeks after their appearance. I'm betting that if you are local to the show, getting in via stand-in seats isn't impossible.
> The audience is 90 to 95% slacker kids in their low '20s; it wasn't until we got inside that we saw anyone that looked evern remotely close to our age. The group that was in front of us was obsessed for some reason by the '70s Manfred Mann song, "Blinded By The Light," and kept singing the refrain, but with the word "douche" substituted for "deuce." I think their version works better, really.
> Colbert could easily charge for seats -- there's no one on line that wouldn't have given up a $10 or $20 spot to see the taping, and the income would help them pay junior production people, who are basically young NYC near-homeless -- but the decision is to keep crowd goodwill up as much as possible, for reasons we'll see later. At least two of the kids were chowing down on Americone Dream, the ice cream flavor that Ben and Jerry made for Colbert.
> Around 5:15, security came out to tell the crowd that the taping is a no drugs, no metal, no weapons, no food or beverage kind of place. Over the next half hour, we are led into a holding area that looks like a dingy passport office, or a beaten down post office, where security sends everyone through an airport-style checkdown. The room has a single monitor showing a Colbert DVD, and a restroom for each gender. Not exactly chi chi.
> Security, at this point, asked me to give up the FTT Garment of Greatness that I had brought to the show, in the longshot hope of a Colbert Bump for the site. I give it to a production assistant, who promises he'll put it in Colbert's mailbox. As good as I can hope for, really.
> After another half hour or so of standing around and wondering how long we'd have to wait, the production assistant who took the Garment clued us in on status (rehearsal just ending, seating imminent, bathroom now or never). VIPs are seated first (they have different colored passes), then the regular members of Colbert Nation. (We were seated stage left, in the third row or so; I think you can see us on the wide shot at the start of the show for a second. I'm wearing a red shirt, and the Shooter Wife is wearing a bluish-purple one.)
> The Colbert Studios, while small, are nice; it's pretty cool to be in the room you've seen a million times. It's also kept pretty cool, so if you ever go, prepare.
> After another 10 to 15 minutes of listening to pretty good alternarock, a warm-up comedian came on and did some improv insults of the audience. (Sorry, but my Crackberry was off by then, so no notes for his name.) That's a tough gig, because his time has to be incredibly flexible, and he's punctuating his act with show updates. The guy was a white insult comic with a shaved head; he punctuated insults of wealthy and douchey looking audience members (he also baited some lacrosse players, which made my day) with self-hate. It worked well enough.
> The "toss" is the little quasi-improv aside with Stewart and Colbert at the end of The Daily Show. It's touch and go as to whether it's done or not, and the Daily Show tapes first, a couple of blocks away. When the toss is done, the anchors are actually talking to each other via satellite, just because that's the tech they've got. Tonight, it was expected to happen, but didn't, to the audience's dismay.
> The studio has a permanent chalk outline where Colbert fell and broke his wrist, leading to the Wrist Strong bracelet gimmick that has led to a nice charity boost for the troops.
> Finally, the man himself emerged to take a few questions before the show began. Having been prepared for this from the Five Tool Ninja, who has also been to a show, I got the first question in. I stood to address him, leading Colbert to say, "How polite!" (Well, I'm short, and wanted to make sure to project.) My goal was to see if I could make him geek out. It worked.
"We know you've played Dungeons and Dragons, but Colbert Nation demands to know -- were you a thief, fighter, cleric or magic-user, and what was your alignment?" (I was going to also ask him about his opinion on half-races and half-classes, and didn't really want to use the word demand, but frankly, I was pretty damned nervous, and just happy to get the question out without tripping over my tongue.)
Colbert was clearly tickled by the question, and thought for a few seconds on the answer. "My last character was a Wizard variant from Dragon Magazine, a Witch. Her name was Lulu -- yes, I'm very comfortable with my gender orientation, and she was a 13th level Witch." Here, he threw me a curve. "She died from the breath attack of a black dragon, which is..."
Thinking hard and quickly, as it's been decades for me since I played the game... Red was fire, White was ice, so Black had to be... "Acid?"
"Correct! That's fantastic!" Smiling widely, he waits a beat. "I think I'm having a nerdgasm! Also, that we've alienated the entire audience." He then turned with comic derision to take another question, which was about the Saginaw Spirit. Deferring from hockey, he then talked up his new love of timbersports, rattling off names and tech for a few seconds, then finishing off with "Now, we've alienated everyone that we didn't take care of with the first question."
I can't tell you how happy I was to get the black dragon question right. Made my year, it did.
> Colbert flubbed the open on two different occasions, so if the crowd sounds particulaly overblown on the final film, it was simply because we were rooting hard for him to get it down. (You can also see a little fist pump from him on the first joke as he tries to get through it.) On the subsequent takes, Colbert moved lines around and changed the timing, and once he got past it, he was able to get through the second and third segments without a stop, though the second segment seemed close to wiping out.
> During breaks, Colbert talks to staff, dances around, and sings along to the music like he's the lead singer in a band, with eye contact to the audience as if he's expecting them to know, and sing, the words. (They played REM's "End of the World As We Know It" -- yes, the same tune that we had on the site earlier this week to honor your first place Rays -- and he pointed to the audience to have us yell, "Leonard Bernstein!") He's got the charisma of someone who simply seems to love his job, and that's why the show taping is genuinely fun.
> The interview with Sen. Claire McCaskill was OK, but the best part of it didn't make the air. Before the commercial break, Colbert whirled in his chair, pointed at his guest, and screamed, "You're going down, McCaskill!" As the Senator has clearly seen the show before, she laughed it off.
> All in all, the show was pretty good, and while we were both a bit hoarse from whooping and over laughing (he's funny, but when you are in the room, you're really trying to help him have a great show), it's a pretty good time. (But after acing the Black Dragon Breath Test, what do you expect me to say?)
11. Your man-crush for Vince Young can not be contained
10. Aw, c'mon... everyone else is doing it... it's not fair...
9. You've already got last year's list open -- so how much more time will it take to update it, really?
8. Just can't get enough Microsoft Excel in your life
7. Your Dungeons and Dragons session is off this week (the Dungeon Master is preparing for Pennsic)
6. Determining the proper place to slot Brady Quinn could take weeks
5. You've found yourself watching Arena Football, and want to do something more productive
4. Your free Yahoo league's only available live draft is in late June
3. You want to make sure you've got Larry Johnson on your team before the catastrophic knee injury
2. You are a baseball fan in Chicago
1. You Have No Life
(Bonus: Top justification for writing this post... attracting Google searchers who are doing draft research. Welcome, suckers! See you next time, when you are searching for titty!)
If you want us to link to your blog, ask. If you steal content from FTT, Baby Jesus will cry, and your blog will become nearly as unpopular as this one. If you think we've violated copyright, tell us nicely and we'll probably stop. If you read this, either out loud or just in your own mind, you agree to Not Sue, buy our T-shirts, click on the site ads and spend your every waking hour furthering the Cult of FTT. It's not a nice cult.
10. The Design Change. Wow, the blog sure looks different with all of the pinks, sparkles and unicorns, doesn't it? This in no way reflects some deeper truth about myself. It's just fun!
