Rejected Voiceover Dialogue for Diet Pepsi NFL Spots

If someone doesn't get TO a Diet Pepsi right now, TO just might kill TO's self. TO is totally serious. And you all will miss TO when he's gone, yes you will...

(Peyton Manning approaches line of scrimmage, waving hands) I just *hate* my flabby forearms! And my ass has gotten *sooooo* big! That's it, I'm switching to Diet Pepsi!

(Ray Lewis enters stadium, doing his Spasmodic Dance Routine) You do not drink Diet Pepsi, you rent it! Let me take a piss or I'm a gonna kill someone!

(Drew Bledsoe on sidelines) You know what goes good with Diet Pepsi? Burgers. Mmmm, burgers...

(Jerry Porter on sidelines) Man, can you believe the Diet Pepsi guy didn't show up today, and he still got paid? What up with that?

(Eli Manning after interception) I told Dad, I just wanted to deliver Diet Pepsi. But no, he *made* me play football...

(Martin Grammatica after hitting field goal) Yes! Yes! Yes! Meesa Get Diet Pepsi Now! And Scary Man Coach With Titties Does Not Beat Me! Meesa Happy Happy Happy!

Crown His Ass

Item:

Dennis Green, Unemployed Coach, refuses interview with the Oakland Raiders, on the grounds that Al Davis knows him well enough already.

Fact:

Dennis Green's last 4 years in the NFL: 5-10, 6-10, 5-11, 5-11.

Conclusion:

HE IS WHAT WE THOUGHT HE WAS!

Update -- Raiders to hire James Lofton. Guess they knew enough about Dennis Green.

(Hat tip: Philvis)

Fight, Fight, Fight

We know this goes against one of the rules we set down way back in FFT Post #1, but our marketing people had a talk with our editorial people. So here comes the tits.

But not just any tits. We're still on the record as saying that the standard issue cheerleading squad is either

1) an asexual exhibition of painfully trebly music combined with boring or life-threatening gymnastics, or

2) Three vitally important ingredients -- clothing, lubricant, and a pole -- away from Entertainment that's still wildly out of place in daylight and/or public.

So. In any event, it's not going far enough to entertain me, Rabid Sports Fan, despite my hetero-ness.

And why is that? Because there is no conflict. There is no sense of Us vs. Them. There is no home-field advantage, no tension, no drama, no strategy. They're going to shake their breasts and asses to music, and then they're going to stop.

Which is where the Genius comes in. Mad Genius, really.

Why not have a section of the cheerleading squad go rogue, and reveal themselves in the colors of the other team?

Hijinks would ensue. The virtuous cheerleaders (inevitably more blonde, but in the event of fairness and political correctness, I'd argue for a multi-cultural approach for both groups) could then prevail in the kind of entertainment that has packed 'em in at wrestling arenas all over the world.

And then, of course, the spanking. (Both at home and at the stadium.)

Just remember, when you see the Raiderettes clotheslining each other next year to get people in the seats to watch another awful team, where you read this first.

And send me the check, please.

Your Performance Review in a C-Webb World

Dear Employer,

I think we both know this isn't working out.

It isn't, of course, my fault -- I give 110% and excrete nothing but fragrantly inoffensive materials -- but you've surrounded me with lesser beings. (I love them all, of course, in the same way that you love a bushel of puppies, but they’ve got ringworm and mange.)

They sap my will to live, and prevent me from being the employee you thought I was during the hiring process. Sorry about that.

It would be a shame for me to waste my time trying to raise this place up. After all, I'm not getting any younger, and you guys clearly aren't going anywhere this year. Or next, so long as I'm around.

So here's what we should do. You pay me 95% of what you were going to pay me. I'll go, and say nothing bad about you, for at least a good week and a half, in public.

Then, I'll sign with a competitor for a lot less than what you're paying me, and give them the full effort that I was unable to give to you. It's a win-win situation. (Not a win-win-win situation, but hey.)

Do we have a deal?

I really don't think that level of laughter is called for. Very unprofessional. I'm so going to send out resumes now.

And don't touch my stapler!

Spasmodic Dance Squad

From the Associated Press today...

(Chargers defensive end Shawn) Merriman, nicknamed "Lights Out," did a spasmodic dance to celebrate each of his NFL-high 17 sacks. Chargers quarterback Philip Rivers said he saw some Patriots pointing to the scoreboard, mimicking the dance and stomping on the Chargers' logo at midfield.

"I think what got LT, and I was right there, was just a little of the taunting," Rivers said, according to the San Diego Union-Tribune. "Hey, celebrate -- we'd have been sprinting on the field, too, I guarantee you. But it was a little finger-pointing and I don't know where it came from."

OK, where to start with this...

1) Of course the Patriots are classless scum. They beat the Eagles, after all. And they're from Boston, home of the Celtics, as well as the Derek Lowe Red Sox that ended my A's year when Eric Freaking Byrnes and Miggy Freaking Tejada forgot to touch home plate. It's in the drinking water. (Along with the bitterness I feel for having so many of my teams go down at the hands of these guys. You employ Danny Ainge the player, you deserve Danny Ainge the GM.)

You think that teams that have won this thing are going to behave any better than those that didn't? Dream on. (And by the way, for the record, post-game trash talk is not taunting, it's gloating. I respect the in-game stuff a lot more than the post-game. Have the stones to call your shot.)

Having said that, any Patriots fan that thinks this is just part of the Vast Media Conspiracy to make Peyton Manning look more sympathetic... may be right. I think I speak for a lot of America when I say this next week's match-up leaves me with no good outcome to root for.

2) "Spasmodic dance", AP? Kudos. I think I've got my team name for next year's fantasy team right there. Either that or L'il Sean Salisbury.

3) And the big one, however, is taunting. Few things in the National Football League (extra points to anyone who starts talking about the National Baseball League on air, especially if they can use the word Baseball once every ten seconds) then the matter of Taunting. Let's see, we employ people to try to kill each other, we celebrate the most violent moments, we denigrate players that don't react well to the physicality... but don't you DARE TAUNT them. That's just not nice!

You might wound their feelings, contribute to low self-esteem, or create a culture of people who... who... who... TALK TRASH! (I'm sorry, I'm a little overcome right now with Thoughts of The Children. Please, discuss amongst yourselves.)

I talk trash in my fantasy league. I do it because it amuses me, and because it helps to remind me that it's a freakin' *game* that I shouldn't be taking too seriously.

I suspect those motivations are common, along with the fun of watching some Too Serious Person having smoke pour out of their ears when you dish some out. (A shame, but most of the folks I play with no longer take it personally.)

There's a phrase for people who take trash talk with thin skins. It rhymes with Crybabies Who Are In The Express Lane To Beatdown City.

So Mr. Rivers, if you don't want them doing Shawn Merriman's dance, audible out of the bad 2nd and 4 pass calls by giving the ball to the MVP. Mr. Tomlinson, if you don't want them dancing on your logo, commit a false start penalty when your idiot coach wants to go for it on 4th and 11 in the first half. And if it really offends you that it happened, use it as the motivation you’ll need to get the #1 seed again next year.

And when you play that game, try to do it with a coach that wears a headset on the sidelines, and doesn't work playoff games with both hands wrapped around his throat.

P.S. Andy Reid, for the record, coaches playoff games with a thumb up his ass. He puts it there with two minutes left in every half. We’ve learned to live with it, because it’s less painful than the foot he puts in the Skins, ‘Boys and Giants’ asses just about every year…