Monday Morning Coffee

September 11, 2017

The Dodgers are collapsing faster than the state of Florida.  Oh wait, this must all be a part of Andrew Friedman’s plan right? The Dodgers must be sending a message to all the other teams in the NL, trying to make them overconfident come playoff time.  Those other NL teams must be real overconfident now because the Dodgers’ entire pitching staff looks like a bunch of stiffs.  This has to be the case since Dave Roberts assured us all a few days ago that the Dodgers will win the NL West.  Not even Clayton Kershaw can help the team find the win column, and suddenly the entire team can’t hit.  I’m beginning to think this is the law of averages catching up with the team at the worst time, because they are on the verge of one of the biggest choke jobs in baseball history.  Since Sports Illustrated came out with an issue asking if this is the best team ever on the cover page,  Perhaps the Dodgers would have better luck if Sports Illustrated’s next cover page said “Biggest Choke Job Ever?.  It’s officially time to panic.

Meanwhile, the Angels are still hanging in the AL Wild Card race, but are limping their way toward the finish line.  After avoiding a sweep yesterday against the Mariners, they Halos are just one game out of the final Wild Card spot.  However, Andrew Heaney looks more broken than those couples that win reality dating shows.  Garrett Richards looks like his arm could fall off any moment.  Parker Bridwell has remembered that he’s just Parker Bridwell.  This team has impressed me given how they’ve handled adversity, but since they have nine more games against Houston and Cleveland, I doubt they can make it through that field of land mines to make the postseason.

To the NFL, where the Colts made the Rams look like the 1972 Miami Dolphins yesterday at the Coliseum.  I’ll be far more impressed when the Rams manage to do this against a team that isn’t playing at a college level, which probably won’t be for a few more weeks.  Actually, I’m not even sure that Scott Tolzien played at a college level yesterday.  Of course Jared Goff is going to look like Joe Montana against a crappy defense like that.  The Colts lost by so many points, Chuck Pagano actually forgot who they played, referring to the Rams as the 49ers.  Don’t think the Rams managed to entirely avoid embarrassment for the week though.  The amount of empty seats at the Coliseum made the game look like a University of San Diego football game.  I guess this NFL in LA thing is really working out so far.

Elsewhere around week 1, apparently that judge had Ezekiel Elliott on his fantasy football team.  Elliott and the Cowboys got an easy win against the Giants.  First Hurricane Harvey, then losing to the Jags.  As if Houston hasn’t suffered enough.  Andy Dalton is already in playoff form, throwing four  interceptions in yesterday’s loss to Baltimore.   The NFL should spot the Browns 14 points in every game to make it more fair.  They could have used that yesterday in their loss to the Steelers.  Russell Wilson and his Seahawks got manhandled by the Packers yesterday.  He must have stopped having sex with Ciara again.  The 49ers barely scored more points than the San Francisco Giants yesterday.  Alex Smith is probably going to sit out of next week’s game with arm fatigue after throwing the ball more than 30 yards in the Chiefs win over the Patriots.  The Bills beat the Jets in a game that should have been called “the toilet bowl”.  Great special teams tackle by the Jets on themselves here…..

To college football, where the Trojans finally found what they were missing against Stanford: an elite quarterback.  The Cardinal had won 7 of the last 10 games against the Trojans, but Sam Darnold returned to the elite QB we saw for most of last season, leading USC to a big win.  The Trojan defense is nothing to brag about, but if Ronald Jones is going to run like Reggie Bush, and Sam Darnold is going to play like Matt Leinart, that won’t matter.  Nobody even heard of Deontay Burnett until the Rose Bowl last January, and now he’s the greatest thing since sliced bread.  Darnold’s four TD passes vaulted him back in the Heisman discussion.  The Trojans beat Stanford at their own game, running the ball, and playing a much more physical, ball-control game.  The only thing Stanford did better was drink more chardonnay during the tailgate.  USC should roll in their next two games against Texas and Cal, before facing a tough Washington State team on the road.

It would have been very “UCLA” of the Bruins had they lost Saturday’s game against Hawaii after defeating Texas A&M in dramatic fashion.  Instead, Josh Rosen picked up where he left off by throwing five TD passes, piling up 329 yards like he was playing a video game, and UCLA hammered Hawaii at home.  The Bruins did what they were supposed to do, crushing a team with inferior talent, but they still have plenty of issues.  The defense is banged up, the offensive line provides about as much protection as a broken condom, and they have no running game.  If Rosen can overcome all that and lead the Bruins to an upset road victory or two over the likes of Stanford, Washington, or USC, he definitely deserves to win the Heisman.

As for the rest of college football, nice job by the NCAA to schedule all of last weekend’s great games at the exact same time.  Notre Dame Coach Brian Kelly says that the Irish are really close to being able to compete with any football team in the country.  After losing to Georgia at home, the Irish are 2-11 in their last 13 games against top 15 teams.  They are only a head coach away.  Looks like “The” Ohio State University has “The” worst pass defense in the country, and won’t be in this year’s college football playoff after losing to Oklahoma.  Baker Mayfield was savage putting that flag into the center of the Buckeyes logo after the win.  Here’s the Buckeyes new logo…..

Finally, I feel terrible for Florida, and my thoughts and prayers go out to the families that were impacted by the Hurricane.  However, why don’t these people evacuate sooner? The real problem is the name of the Hurricane.  Nobody is afraid of Hurricane “Irma”.  However, if you gave it an Arab name like Hurricane “Abdullah” or Hurricane “Muhammad”, people would run for the hills.  I also love the fact that these news reporters are practically in a contest with each other for an Emmy award while reporting on the Hurricane.  In fact, it’s getting so competitive we’re practically seeing field reporters blown away on live television, and they seem to be ok with it.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *