We're Back!

It's been too long friends and readers and other people that search for things online and are randomly taken here. It's mostly our fault and here at Gus Johnson's Whisper, we promise anew to bring you things to read and comment on.

Here's some stuff on our minds:

-The Oregon Ducks getting all punchy at Boise State.

Look, we played sports at a pretty high level for a lot of years. We have argued, seemingly to no one, that teams should not interact after the game ends. We're a big believer in shaking hands before the game. Once the game starts, we are not your friend. Asking a young man to 'shut it off', especially in a sport that requires as much aggression as football, is a much harder task that non-athletic media members realize. Players should shake hands before the game and then retire to separate quarters. We're amazed there aren't more of these incidents in sports. 'WTF do you mean good game? You beat me and now I have to look at you and shake your hand and pretend it isn't eating at my soul?'

We learned our lesson the hard way when, after a regional game as a 14 year old, a 15 year old from Macon, GA punched our mouth after we told him 'great game' (we won 13-2). Pre-game shake people.

-Football is back.

We said football, but really meant absurdly large breasts... no, we meant football. Here's our quick hitting NFL preview so that you won't have to waste the next 26 weeks:

NFC Playoff teams: Giants, Eagles, Carolina, Minnesota, Green Bay, Seattle.

NFC Championship Game: Eagles/Green Bay - Eagles Win (we throw up on repeat)

AFC Playoff teams: New England, Indianapolis, San Diego, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Tennessee

AFC Championship Game: New England/Baltimore - Baltimore Win

Superbowl: Eagles/Ravens - Ravens win and a crisis is averted.

-MLB Pennant Races

The Yankees are running away with the division. Their playoff rotation seems solid (Sabathia, Burnett, and Petite) but there are still some questions. They don't seem to know what to do about a 4th and 5th starter. No one notices because they score 46 runs per game right now but that's not how the playoffs go. Seems to us, the best chance they have to win this year is to make Joba the Hutt a reliever again. We think that's the secret behind the 3 inning performances of late. He turns into a weapon in a series. You can use him for 2-3 innings to get to Riviera. It shortens the game and he can just go out and pitch instead of trying to economize and pace himself. Who knows if that's what they do, but it's what we would do if we actually wanted to win the World Series.

The Angels and Tigers are both a little bit nasty but also flawed right now. Who knows who gets hot? (Cardinals '06 for example)but right now, we'd be nervous both as fans of these squads or as fans opposing them.

Short series with Detroit? It's cold and I have to see Verlander and Jackson twice? You might also get one of those 'rookie with huge sack' outings from Rick Porcello. Then again, you can pitch to most of their bats. Bunch of strikeout guys and spare parts around Miguel Cabrera so their offense is as scary as a Lifetime movie.

The Angels have a complete lineup that wears pitching down. The whole lineup is above .300 and they can all do it against good pitching because they don't muscle up. Their problem? What pitchers scare you? Lackey and Weaver are not the kind of power arms that usually rule the post season. After that? We went 2/2 vs Joe Saunders and hit a line drive so hard, he hurt his neck spinning around (no he didn't).

In the NL, Philly looks old all of a sudden don't they? Rollins isn't the same and Ibanez realized that he is, in fact, Raul Ibanez and stopped the fantasy ruining nonsense. The Dodgers have a different lineup every day and their pitching is kind of breaking down. The Cards look great but that's just it. When was the last time the team that was 'supposed to' won the NL? It's always a wild card team or some forgotten division winner. Go back and look. The Cards are complete but you still see a weakness or 2 in there (bullpen has been a little shaky of late, someone between Ankiel/Duncan/Rasmus/DeRosa has to hit).

Still, the prediction is...

Yankees vs Cardinals - Yanks win. Annoying.

More to come.

Where's the Hype?

Did you even remember that the Superbowl is this week?  Who's having a party?  Are you sure what you're doing yet?  We at Gus Johnson's Whisper feel like we are not alone in this awkward feeling of this boring Superbowl week.  There's no hype.  The best we get are dumb articles by chooches like Peter King where he's all: 'that's not the only connection between these two franchises.  Turns out that Byron Rando, the former equipment manager with the Steelers, was lured away when Ken Wisenhunt took the job in Arizona.  This game means a lot to him.'

Seriously, check it: 

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/writers/peter_king/01/25/walkup/index.html

Weird.  How is that possible?  Oh, you mean in a small league where there is a personnel carousel, a former coach or player could go up against his former team in the Superbowl?  So the league with no imagination that only hires from a selective and exhaustive pool has some overlap?  I don't believe you sir!

Anyway, we feel like this matchup, for the biggest prize in American pro sport, has no buzz.  Let's look at some other matchups for the big prize that had as little (or less) hype.

-Super Bowl XL: This 2006 symphony of boredom featured Pittsburgh beating Seattle in one of the 37 most untight games ever played.  It was like watching 4 estranged brothers play pee-knuckle.  Pittsburgh won but we all lost.

-2002 World Series:

 

Hard to live up to the drama of the 2001 Fall Classic.  So, in a smart move, the 2002 Series went the opposite extreme and no one in the entire world cared at all.  Who played in it?  Can you remember without looking it up?  We could because we're dorks.  San Francisco lost to the Anaheim Angles in 7.  It was actually a good series.  Tens of people on the west coast were riveted.  

1994 World Cup USA vs Brazil in Round 2: The US made it through group play for the first time since John Adams was president.  In 1990, the squad had a great showing when it went 0-3, we didn't qualify for the WC in 1986, before that... we're not talking about before that.  This was huge for US soccer.  Huge.  The game was played on JULY 4th in America!  Somehow, no one cared.  We were so hyped for this and no one else we knew even watched it on tv.  There were like 19 Americans in the stands... which was a nice break from the 30,000 Brazilians.  Even after some punk got a red card for elbowing Tab Ramos' head, it was a boring 1-0 game.  Weird.

1988 Presidential Election: We did a whole thing on this in school.  We were all so excited for this thing to be a nail-biter.  Neck and neck, they traded barbs like slap-boxers at recess.  The night of, we assembled at the home of one of the parents and watched in horror as the tv men calmly explained to us that it was already over and Dukakis was sipping soup broth by 5PM.  We thought it was this epic battle.  It was really close... until they started counting the votes.  426-111 in electoral votes.  Great talk.

-Every boxing match since Mike Tyson lost to Lennox Lewis in 2002: Who is the heavyweaight champ?  How many different boxing organizations are there?  Since the Victorian Freak Show lost to Lewis and had that bizarre post-fight gratefulness episode, boxing has been creeping along on its way to a lonely grave. 

   UFC, no charismatic heavyweights, perceived corruption/chaos with the myriad boxing organizations, and the unwillingness to change the 'pay-per-view' model have all led to boxing's demise.  Championship bouts now get less attention than new episodes of CBS sitcoms.  

-2004 Sugar Bowl: LSU beat Oklahoma.  This game was all awkward because USC should have been in the game and everyone knew it.  It was hyped but every time it was hyped it was like, 'but also USC... so...'.  It was like you have Lucy Pinder at a photoshoot next door to a photoshoot of Keeley Hazel but are only allowed to hype the Lucy Pinder shoot.  Is it not like that?  Whatever.

                                                   

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