Fancy Store-Bought Dirt

He got the Welk bit right... though I don't know if Welk ever got to three.

I think Bruce was referring to the "Really Big Shew" part, which is all Sullivan.

PS: You could say placing the play in the wrong quarter was a typo, but I doubt it: no ordinal in 1 through 4 (1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th) has the same suffix, so to accidentally get it wrong you'd have to be typing with your elbows.

Re: Big Ben, I'm not surprised. People go into sports writing because they want to write but aren't smart enough to write anywhere else. There is always a "golden child" and sports people just assume that person or team is the personification of God.

So, until the Patriots fall from grace, every single Patriot player is going to "the best ever." Everyone will imagine that their players have never made a mistake and never lost a game (despite mysteriously finishing the season 14-2).

The Pats will eventually miss the playoffs, another team will take over and *their* players will be the best ever, etc. Unless that team is from New York. New York has the opposite effect, where the rest of the country is never willing to acknowledge any sports acheivement from NYC. The combined effects are why I never bother reading any sports articles at all, beyond game summaries.

I think I have to politely disagree with your premise, in re sportswriters. I think that many sportswriters tend to be people whom would rather report on the joys of human existence rather than its miseries. Chief Justice Warren once famously said "The sports page records people's accomplishments; The front page nothing but
their failures." If I had to make a choice, sports might seem like a good professional decision, but that's just me.

Besides, you're specifically talking about Gregg Easterbrook! The man writes about football as a hobby, he writes about news for a living, and he's pretty well regarding in his primary job.

CDB

"He got the Welk bit right... though I don't know if Welk ever got to three."

That seems right.

I mean, the part about not getting to three.

Corwyn --

I understand you're very distraught about losing out on the honor and privelege of watching Chad Pennington play, leaving Brooks Bollinger, Vinny Testaverde and others to pick up the pieces, but really ... it's only a game.

Besides, the Pats lost Rodney Harrison, Matt Light and Kevin Faulk in their latest cheating of death. Perhaps your boys have a shot!

(And I'm a Giants fan. My needling is solely to pad my own ego, because even if I'm not good enough to write about anything else, I'd rather assault myself with a knitting needle than cover politics with any regularity.)