Left Field

Come join me over at my chalkboard, would you? Let me spike my hair up and gain 125 pounds and somehow get a nightly FOX News program on which I'm liable to cry at any moment. OK. Good. I am now in full conspiracy theorist mode.
Friends, why don't I let you in on a little secret, all right? The Pittsburgh Steelers will win the Super Bowl on Sunday. They might not win big or even have more points on the board when the clock runs out, but the Steelers will be named champions of the Super Bowl. Why? Um, I think it's pretty obvious. There exists a vast conspiracy to ensure that the Steelers win Super Bowls. Everybody is in on it, especially the referees. This thing goes all the way to the top baby, and you've got blinders on if you can't see it.

The NFL Playoffs (can anyone still say “playoffs” without employing Jim Mora's wild-ass inflection? I can't) have produced the two teams that will play in the Super Bowl down in Dallas. Remember back in the day when we'd power through the conference championships and the following weekend head full-steam into the Super Bowl?

You feel that? It's not a winter chill. That's the sensation of disappointment – deep, burning, painful disappointment – flooding through the fields, mountains, rivers and city streets of Oregon. The Ducks didn't win the BCS Championship and thus the vast conspiracy to keep the Coaches Trophy in the hands of SEC teams and their swollen-bellied boosters remains intact. But barely.

If you're a football fan from Seattle, Tacoma, Spokane, Sedro Wooley or, actually, anywhere in the states of Washington, Oregon, Idaho or Alaska that constitute the Seahawk Nation*, you stood in front of your television on Sunday night and realized that the miserable season you'd endured with your Seattle Seahawks wasn't over. In fact, you celebrated the team's NFC West championship. Which means they're in the playoffs. And get to play a home game. With a 7-9 record.

1. I'm Lebron, Bitches!
“Dear people of Earth, I am Lebron James and you're all going to stop what you're doing in the middle of summer and endure an anticlimactic hour of television in which I'll disappoint a bunch of kids.

Guess what, kids? If you don't watch all the college football bowl games during the Christmas week/weekend, Santa knows, because he has an exclusive deal with ESPN that allows him to look back at you through your television set. And if Santa finds out you skipped, say, the Little Caesars Bowl because you thought it was something your cousin dreamed up when he was super high, he'll make sure you get nothing for Christmas. You'll also be forced to watch nothing but NASCAR until next year. Sorry. Them's the rules.
In the hopes of keeping you from enduring a Santa-enforced year of motor sports, (The guy can be a dick sometimes. Especially when he's been drinking, which is pretty much every night since the elves unionized over the summer.) here are some pointers to bring you up to speed on all the bowl games you better be watching this weekend.

If you've been as bored by this NFL season as I have, this past Sunday just may have been more entertaining than the first 14 weeks of the season combined. First, the collective disappointment in the Vikings' season and/or the functionality of Brett Farve's key body parts became so massive on Sunday morning that their home stadium was all like, “fuck this, I give up,” and collapsed.

I gave thanks for many a sports blessing this past week, including the continuing mediocrity of the Miami Heat and the shanked Boise State field goals that once again made the world safe for big-money college football programs, but that's not what I'm most thankful for this year. Rather, I'm most thankful that there is something called American Ninja Warrior and that this is an actual televised athletic competition, not just the desired profession of second-grade boys everywhere.

Last week, the Blazers announced that Greg Oden would undergo yet another microfracture surgery in an attempt to repair his left knee – the same knee that kept him out for most of last season – and will miss the remainder of the 2010-2011 campaign. With frustrated fans beginning to make Sam Bowie comparisons and all but giving up on the friendly giant, I figured I'd go straight to the source for a comment. And that's why I'll now provide you with an open letter from Greg Oden's knee.

It's almost two in the morning on Tuesday and what do you think I'm doing? Sleeping? Nope. First of all, how would I be writing this if I were sleeping? Jeez, get your head in the game, pal. No, I'm watching college basketball on live television between two teams about which I could care less. Did you know they have a Central Michigan University now?