ONE WORD
Begin.
August 30, 2007
CALL AMNESTY: RECE DAVIS IS NOT A FREE MAN
Rece Davis is cozying up with his invisible sun right now, looking like something that the cat brought in, trapped at gunpoint for what will be (as of posting) hour 20 of the ESPN 25 hour marathon preview of college football.
While we appreciate the WWL’s enthusiasm for the great game of college football, Rece Davis doesn’t deserve this. Even as Norby Williamson held Davis’ infant son off camera over a pit of live piranhas, Davis made this quip last night around 9:15 p.m.
Mark May: June Jones has coached at the highest levels of football.
Davis: He’s coached in the SEC?
See? It’s that kind of blatant cheekery, along with Davis’ barely concealed glee for the game, that makes Rece awesome. And now they’ve had him at bazooka point for the better part of an entire day, making him watch some things you were better off missing at 3:30 in the morning. Like what, you say?
1:45 a.m. EST Mark May drops pants and does the whirlybird in front of the camera while singing “The Pitt Victory Song.” Lou Holtz giggles, then pronounces the exercise as “disguthting.”
2:27 a.m. Bruce Feldman of ESPN Magazine benches 325 sixteen times in a row. The feat’s made more impressive by the 325 pounds being a sleeping Chris Berman stuffed to the gills with buffalo wings and Ovaltine he ate straight from the can in the ESPN cafeteria.
4:42 a.m. Davis weeps uncontrollably at the mention of Bear Bryant’s name. Can only be coaxed back on air by May speaking to Davis as the dead Alabama coach addressing him from heaven through his earpiece.
7:38 a.m. May is now doing entire show from offstage, talking to Davis as Bear Bryant from the production room. Occasionally gets Davis to drop and give him twenty during commercial breaks and run through pieces of scenery in “blocking drills.”
1:14 p.m. Davis conducts entire interview with Greg Schiano as Beaker from the Muppets. Questions included “MEE MEE MEEEE MEEE MEE, MEE ME MEE MEEE?” “Coach Bryant” insists through the earpiece that he get his ass in the game, to which Davis loudly says “Yassir!” to on air to no one in particular.
As of our last check, he looked to be in decent shape–a bit drawn, yes, but seemingly kept in line by “Coach Bryant.” No man deserves this, though. We implore ESPN to let Davis’ children out of the Death Machine and give the man some rest. With four months of football left, he’s gonna need “Coach Bryant” in his ear all year at this rate.
FIVE HOURS
Trying…to…keep…pants…on…and…stay…off…ceiling…
Five hours to kickoff. We’re…we’re…WE CAN SING! LISTEN!!!
There is no baby crawling on the ceiling. There is no baby crawling on the ceiling. There is no baby crawling on the ceiling. There is no baby crawling on the ceiling. There is no baby crawling on the ceiling. There is no baby crawling on the ceiling. There is no baby crawling on the ceiling. There is no baby crawling on the ceiling. There is no baby crawling on the ceiling. There is no baby crawling on the ceiling. There is no baby crawling on the ceiling…
WEEK 1 VIEWER’S GUIDE: ALL UR REMOTEZ BELONGZ TO ESPN
To bring you an even more maniacal posting pace throughout the season, we’re bringing on new correspondent Hannibal Montegna, who will be publishing tracts on a number of subjects throughout the season. You may know his earlier work writing under several pseudonyms of note and infamy. Enjoy.
In 2004, Swarthmore professor Barry Schwartz published The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less, arguing that “offering more choice is not benign,†as generally accepted by the almighty market, but rather that more choices are “a major source of stress, uncertainty, anxiety – even misery†that in large part accounts for troubling lows in Americans’ reported happiness levels over the last thirty years. We were once like goldfish, he argues, content with the possibilities within our meager bowls, blissfully unaware of its restrictions. But as so many constraints continue to be removed – the bowl is being broken – individuals are left gasping in the free world, frozen in a tyrannical trial of endless choice.
alt=”" />Choice: the silent killer.
Professor Schwartz is not a football fan. If he were, the Dark Age of limited choices – one game per week, at the discretion of a single network, as likely to be North Carolina-Wake Forest on any given week as USC-Notre Daeme – would be a dead idea, buried in the remote-less past, where it belongs. We demand games! All day! And every night of the week! Some choices can’t be wrong, and a paralyzing dilemma between “football†and “more football†is one of those choices. You live in privileged times; give thanks.
Just so you have no excuses:
Thursday Night Blowouts
8 p.m. • LSU at Mississippi State ESPN
How long you last with this one is a true measure of your dedication. By turning it on, you’re conceding to a deep need in your soul for the game; under normal circumstances, no one would watch the modest ambitions of hyped-up, hopeful, hard-working, maroon-clad gnomes trampled underfoot by a careless Goliath’s boot. And make no mistake: if Mississippi State’s defense keeps it mildly interesting (in this case, that means “within two touchdownsâ€) through halftime or a turnover/lazy punt coverage bug afflicts the Tigers, it will be an achievement. The trampling will ensue. With this knowledge, then, those who flip to the Leader at the start of the game are open, unrepentent addicts. Those who stay are heroes. Watch for: Amid a torrent of grassroots emotion, the precise moment when Mississippi State’s distant but surging fantasies are crushed. Also: parents in the stands. Hi mom!
Hors d’oeuvre: Tulsa at UL-Monroe (ESPN2)
The first Bowl Subdivision kickoff of the season is actually in Monroe, an hour before foot meets ball in Starkville, if you’re interested in ceremony, inauguration, etc. and don’t have a happy hour in your general vicinity, you poor rural soul. (more…)
SABAN: NEXT FRIDAY…IS HAWAIIAN SHIRT DAY
Separated at birth? Thanks to reader Thor for the submission proving that Saban may, in fact, be character actor Gary Cole. Meaning that Saban was superb in Talladega Nights last year, and once appeared as “Alan McClafferty” on an episode of Moonlighting, and all but guarantees that a movie will be at least moderately awesome.
All that and a 325 page defensive playbook? Alabama, you got more of a bargain than you’ll ever know, friends.
(Note: We’re also stressing the tensile comic strength of Office Space references here, yes. But for science’s sake, we’re willing to take that chance.)
Step one: Saban unadorned.
Step two: Saban, accessorized:
(more…)
CURIOUS INDEX, 8/30/07
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 Orgy? Did I say orgy? Ohio State’s former president Karen A. Holbrook may have “exaggerated” when she referred to OSU fans’ behavior at games as being like a “drunken orgy.” Holbrook made the remarks during a taped interview, whose really spicy bits are excerpted below: “When you win a game, you riot. When you lose a game, you riot. When spring comes, you riot. African-American Heritage Festival weekend, you riot,” Holbrook said on the tape. “They think it’s fun to flip cars, to really have absolute drunken orgies. … I don’t want to be at a place that has this kind of culture as a norm.” How would a reasonable, sensible OSU fan respond? By saying what others say: that this isn’t the norm, that they mayhem is mild and strictly that of frisky youngsters enjoying a festive fall weekend. How would Subcommandante Wayne respond? Quote: “Fuck you, ladybitch.” Tressel has been too entranced by the magical voice of Celine Dion to respond. Pinky, shminky. Erik Ainge has a broken pinky finger (that’s a medical term, y’alls) but will start versus California on Saturday night anyway, according to Phil Fulmer, who remains very, very fat. Tennessee fans making the cross-continental trip may also enjoy the sight of hippies behind oddly permanent-looking fencing, designed to “protect” the protesters living in trees behind the stadium from…from Tennessee fans, we guess. Remember, Berkeley police: crossbows may be stored in carry-on baggage. Fencing won’t protect them from that. It has holes in it. Mormonz r weerd! When football and Mormonism meet, mockery ensues! We’d rail about how anti-Mormonism is the last acceptable prejudice in this country, but frankly we can’t care: they don’t like profanity, caffeine, premarital sex, or alcohol, four things that gave us immense joy in life. Oh, except for anti-Spaniardism, right? Because those assholes blew up the Maine, and we will not rest until both Cuba and the Philippines are subdued! Never forget! The most productive running back in the country toils in obscurity in Chadron, Nebraska, and stands just 699 yards shy of breaking the all-time NCAA record. He’s white, too–DUH DUH DAAAAAHHHHH!!!! (music of shocking surprise.)  Oh, god, Vince, wait ’til we get on the field, ok?Burritos again, Vince? Vince Young knew how to lighten things up in the huddle, according to Limas Sweed. He’d do things like fart in the huddle. I was young, so I guess he could see in our eyes that maybe he needed to loosen things up.” A legend in so many ways, that man.
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