The Quarterback Enigma (Or Other Some Such Lofty Title as is Deserving of a Ball-chucker)

That's one old QB.
Photo by Daniel Garcia Peris.

What an elusive role, the linchpin of not only a team and playing style, but a whole organization. Who would the Colts be without Peyton Manning? Hell, who would Indianapolis be without the Mr. Rocket-Arm? A bunch of fucking yokels who would have Jim Harbaugh acting as back-up and mentor to Ryan Leaf, and if that doesn't sound like a pro-football nightmare then I don't know what does. (By the way, that tandem did get an NFL chance with the Chargers, resulting in a predictable one win season (Don't worry Niners fans, Harbaugh went 8-8 the year before so he's not the pathetic douchefart)).

But it's not even the top tier of quarterbacks that I care that much about, not until one of them is on the Skins. It is rather, the unknown, what some would call the intangible element to quarterbacking that I enjoy, not the super-powered receiver-tracking arms of the top tier of 4K throwers, but rather the abilities to rush an opening, to know when to throw away a ball and when to take a hit, to inspire and inform teammates, that I enjoy.

However, this is not the main ingredient to a successful quarterback, rather what a successful quarterback needs to win the Superbowl, so in my time as a fan of the Redskins and a close observer of the 49ers and Raiders, I seen plenty of interest but no payoff. What the hell? Why can't these bastions of potential and intangible glory live up to their elevated statuses as Future Gods of the Game? Because that is not how the NFL works, in fact, the NFL is about work itself, work is required by every position but most of all the QB who must act as the brain of an offense, being able to recognize and dispatch defensive ploys immediately while making plays. This takes a very developed mind that has been honed over years for the split second decisions that such a position requires on the professional level. I mean, Jeff Garcia was the last good QB the Nners had and he didn't make it to the league until he was twenty-nine, putting in a good amount of time in the CFL before he became a 4k thirty-and-ten kind of guy.

A blurry and useless Alex Smith, as usual.
Photo by Dinur Blum.

Also, unfortunately, contract size is not directly relative to playing skill, a faux pas committed upon by the Redskins with nearly every damn quarterback that rolls through the town of continual quarterback controversy. Dan Snyder can't keep his hands in his pockets long enough to let a single QB develop with a single Offensive Coordination (a la Jason Campbell) and if he does get someone with some appreciable skill that skill is denigrated by both the giant contract said player received and the inherent pressure that comes with such a contract (a la Mark Brunell). Then you have the guys that consistently over perform in the preseason, just enough to waste about half or more of the regular season during which they habitually under perform (look at Alex Smith for the Niners, Rex Grossman for the Bears and Skins). Then you have the out-and-out failures, peoples whose stars were so bright but could not stand out due to injury or plain stupidity (the Raiders have most of these sad stories, take a look at Jamarcus Russell, Daunte Culpepper, Kerry Collins, the list is fucking endless).

While the position itself is layered, complex, and difficult to ascribe to any particular style of winning, this is what makes it interesting. Sure, sports today are becoming offensive clusterfucks with no tackles and no returns, but one can see why through the daily drama and intrigue that surrounds a position as enigmatic as that of the quarterback.

P.S.: I got so wrapped up in Bay Area QB history I forgot to mention the reason why I started writing this post: John Beck is the projected starting QB for the Redskins this season. Uh.... whaaaaaaaaa?

Bad Calls

These are...
Photo by Robin Kanouse.

It wasn't going to be long before this blog touched on perhaps what is the bane of my existence: referees. There is so much to be said about the notorious act of the bad call, both in example and solution, that it seems misplaced to focus on it too intently. Fuckwits are simply that and do not merit too much consideration, unfortunately so many of them seem to find their way into the refereeing and/or umpiring occupation (maybe there should be an additional category for umpires, say, asshats as opposed to fuckwits).

Alien-People Sex

On June 4th... GERBIL PEOPLE!
Photo by Martin Rodriguez.

I choose such a ridiculous title for today's observations in a sort of smart-ass backlash to their subject, observations concerning the so-called "sci-fi-horror-thriller" splice. With such a ballsy amalgamation of genres you would think some obscure yet relevant, varied yet honed film would be produced, especially when you got the potential of an Adrien Brody lead. But, throw in some other no-names, a screenplay by the same guy that wrote Cube (a good flick, but nothing more than a classier Canadian Saw), and a bit too many screenings of the Species quadrilogy, and this smorgasborg of fuck-all is what you get.

The Wonders of the World

The Smithsonian Castle, a nice slice of the epicness of the area surrounding it.
Photo by Andinarvaez.

I have to apologize for my extended absence, I had some pressing family matters to attend to which were quite nice but meant a week of dealing with the hellhole that is traveling in the modern United States. While I was making this trip due to very important family commitments, it also happened to coincide with my birthday, a coincidence that I was going to take full advantage of.

Habitual Failure Pt. 2: Fuck, Jamarcus Russell

Ah, it's been a bit of time since I've been able to write about this subject, examining the fuckhole that is Ryan Leaf's life really took it out of me. However, there are sports douches to be berated, so I must return to my ever noble profession of emotionally decapitating these bastards. On we go, then.

Jamarcus Russell, with standard glazed look of stupidity.
Photo by Brit.

If you are an observant reader, you might have noticed the (perhaps misplaced?) punctuation between Fuck and Jamarcus (and the only thing that gets in between those two concepts is usually just Jamarcus' fat ass). This simple comma denotes much more than its banality implies. I would say simply Fuck Jamarcus Russell, but that really wouldn't depict the great deal of hope I had for him at the beginning of his career. My family's from Louisiana, so, that gave me an excuse to root for them (and you need everyone you can get in the fuckfest that is Bowl season), and I saw a bunch of L-State's games, but the notable one in my mind, of course, being the '07 Sugar Bowl. He was a beast with a Manning-esque laser rocket cannon of an arm, before draft day I could already see him chucking 60 yard bombs to drag the Oakland Raiders out of a Davis-fueled coma.

Brad Neely: This Guy is Funny as Fuck!

Brad Neely, in front of a mysterious plant.
Photo by bobafred.

There are many things from my days in middle school I would gladly leave behind: the pre-jock bullies, the straight up primadonnas, the hellish social atmosphere, the inability to do anything except sit inside and play video games (...maybe that wasn't so bad), and just the general depressing douchebaggery inherent in all middle-schoolers. However, there was one gleaming moment of cultural production that just sings to me from that time in my life, like some fucked up nine-year-old parakeet, singing to me "Wizard People! WIZARD PEOPLE!"

For those of you unfortunate enough to not know the instant nostalgic ramifications of this phrase, let me enlighten you. "Wizard People, Dear Reader!" was a shortly popular but intensely hilarious comedic romp through the land of spoof and parody, taking a much more comfortable viewpoint with the Harry Potter mythos than perhaps most were comfortable with. Created by web-comic artiste Brad Neely in 2004, this comedic masterpiece is simply Neely's narration, on two discs, which are played in sync with the film "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone", using the base plot movements but completely changing the characters and their actions into ideas so much more worthy than some piddling JK Rowling book about emotional preteen wizards.

Hellraiser: The Engineer

Horror and hedonist hallmark Clive Barker published his novella entitled "The Hellbound Heart" in November of 1986 as a part of the masterful horror anthology Night Visions. However, this work was far too prolific to be confined to the pages of a mere anthology, spawning itself into a horror franchise so absolutely in touch with the darkest parts of human suffering and eroticism that is takes a sort of magnanimous position to all other horror which precedes and follows it.

The Cenobites, on what is just a lovely VHS
cover. Photo by Jesper Wiking.

What I am speaking of with this perhaps wordy introduction is the well-known film series Hellraiser, the first of which was directed by Barker, the rest of which passed through the hands of numerous B to Z list directors. However, even when the production of the sequels was questionable, the pure power of the base story has provided each subsequent film with the ever seductive intonation of the first, the deep fulfillment promised by a world of pure torture. The characters of the Cenobites, the primary hellish force facing the protagonists of these films, and their General of Sadomasochism, horror all-star Pinhead, are creatures which touch the very base fabric of what human fright is based on, as well as the deeper and more mysterious points of human desire. A sadomasochistic feeling envelopes each film in a particular way, though always intriguing, bringing to question the viewers comfortableness with such "sights" as the ritual skinning of man, the penetration of chain into flesh, the sundering of man into a quivering beast of ecstatic pain.

Habitual Failure Pt.1: Fuck Ryan Leaf

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I'm Locking Out The Lockouts

Alright, I'm gonna try to keep this post short, as I admittedly do not know much about the labors lockouts pending in the NBA and NFL, but I feel they worth some form of discussion. I mean, hell, I can barely manage the payroll for my simulation Nationals team: it's halfway through the season and I am somehow twenty million in debt to the District of Columbia already (Jake Peavy is fucking expensive, man).

This man is a completely impotent leader.
I can't be funny about how much I hate
David Stern. Photo by Eric Richardson.

My interest can merely just not stay tacked to such a meaningless issue, meaningless in that it is a bunch of fucking-absurdly-rich people arguing for more control and revenue from a bunch of more-fucking-absurdly-rich people. That might sound uneducated, sure, but sports is about putting balls into goals, reaching the endzone, or any other of the various signs of physical and technical dominance that rile us up and make us proud to be fans. Sports is not about having the entire construction of teams altered to fit markets, punishing an area not for its lack of love for a team, but for its lack of something as basic as population.

This is how areas like Florida get two World Series winning Marlins teams, an appearance at said monumental sports occasion by the Rays, as well as one of the most dynamic groups of basketball players the last few decades has seen. And how does the area reward these amazing accomplishments? THEY STILL DON'T GO TO FUCKING GAMES. These attendance struggles by the MLB are confusing enough, this isn't even the USA's sport any more as much as it is Latin America's, a population certainly prevalent in Florida.

Kool Keith: Kooler Than You

Hip hop is a lot of things these days, but rap, not so much. Producing is where the real groundbreaking is done, hell, the advent of rap came about through the constantly evolving role of the disc jockey. The two roles, rapper and DJ, were not mutually exclusive, but rather worked with each other to create new ways of combining poetry and music. There seems to have been a split somewhere however, and now the two are rarely excelled at in conjunction today, the former if at all.

Fuck it, I'll say rappers suck nowadays, There, it's out in the open at the beginning so I don't have to ease you into the notion of a white guy complaining about rap music, shocking as it is, I know. I don't even really have a problem with the music, hip hop production has been constantly evolving with new sounds and rhythms. And back in the day, sure, there was something crucial to be said in gangsta rap as it evolved out of the early stylings of Stetsasonic and what have you, it's political message being violent and cathartic if a bit ill-wielded. However, this dual progression seems to have been left behind in the good-ole-days of hip hop and rap, as it were, the path of Double Dee and Steinksi influencing such innovative acts as DJ Shadow (such a Bay legend people forget he's form the Bay, but just listen to The Outsider), NWA and Ice T have left us with the poor legacy of Fitty and Eminem. Later, with De La Soul and Tribe we get the feel good rap: music about getting fucked up and fucking bitches in a nice way, or just about how great of a rapper you are. Even later comes the political hip hop, touched on by Tribe and Soul's Afrocentrism but really outplayed by guys like Immortal Technique to the point whiny bitchiness. (Oh and if you want point for genre reference, Kanye West is dance music, nothing more.)

It's either this... Photo by QXZ.

... or this. Well, fuck, not much of a choice. Photo by Dan Figueroa.

True Blood: Uh... What?

True Blood made an impact in my life far before I started watching it. It seemed to spurt up from the veins of society as a cultural phenomenon directly related to the ongoing vampire craze of the time, one that seemed to have reached its peak upon True Blood's beginnings. Hell, True Blood debuted on September 7, 2008 with the oh so infamous Twilight movie premiering two months later in what seemed a clusterfuck of shitty vampire melodramas.

There was hope, however! True Blood's first season got absolutely rave reviews, I mean fuck, it won a Golden Globe and an Emmy! Maybe I was wrong about this whole vampire thing being a smorgasbord of shit and blood. So when an opportunity to explore the show came up at a local science fiction and fantasy conference, I checked it out, got a full first season review and even had some fairly enlightening conversations about how the nature of the show could be related to issues of social justice.

Mission Statement: Shit

There's a lot of shit out there. Good shit. Bad shit. New shit. Old shit. Many would say that society today is filled to the brim with the excesses of an imperial capitalism as it creeps across the globe and even into the most modest of third worlds. Shit.

I love sports. Sports weave a complex fabric between heroic stories of domination and defeat, as well as connecting the worlds of these athletic aces to the common man, becoming a Bildungsroman for an entire society. People pitched on the edge of their seats awaiting outcomes that indicate the emotional investment that an entire association of individuals connected solely by spatial orientation.

Well, that's how it should be anyways. The Dodgers are going to shit because of divorce proceedings.

I love television. Television has become a tapestry that all of society looks on from the loom, its construction the very reflection of our own dreams and ambitions. Not only something as milquetoast as those vague notions, however, but also a vivid imagination that contains within it ever more complex relations between character, situations and genre.

But then again the only shit I have on my DVR is COPS and PTI.

I love music. Music can connect unknowing strangers into bonds of pure joy, lifting listeners into abstract ecstasies that bring about unique forms of mental and physical transformation. Entire cultures have formed and died around not only specific genres, but specific artists. The emotional resonance of music is something that can be found nowhere else.

However, Katy Perry's musical career exists. Shit.

All of this stuff is shit, what some would call the excesses of a far too culturally productive society. I however, take what I consider a much more enlightened look at all this shit. I will sift through it, finding the best and worst the world has to offer in the form of cultural output, be it through whichever media strikes the hot iron of my taste or distaste.

You're all knee-deep in shit too, so you might as well grab a handful and start flingin'.