A tale of two ... weeks

 So remember this time last week, when folks in Chicago were saying "Daaang, these boys are gooood," and folks in Indianapolis were saying "Daaang, these boys are baaaad"?

We thought we were SO SMART. We thought, one game into a season that lasts until judgment trump, that Da Bearz were gonna go through the NFC North like poop through a goose. And we thought the AFC South was gonna go through the Colts like ... well, the same.

See what happened yesterday?

The Bears lost at home to the Minnesota Vikings, 9-3, and Caleb Williams popped a hammy. Seven days after turning the end zone into a campground -- Fifty-nine points! Are you KIDDING me? -- they couldn't find the end zone with search planes and a GPS. Six City became the Forbidden City. It was the starship Enterprise with its shields up.

 And that was before Williams went down like a shot on a scramble. Which didn't happen until there were, what, six minutes or so to play?

So they went roughly 54 of the 60 minutes with their star quarterback pulling the trigger, and instead of 59 points, they generated one lousy field goal. How does that happen?

"Because the Vikings are really, really good?" you're saying now.

Come on. They beat the Bears with Carson Wentz, for pity's sake. Try again.

"Well, it was raining and all," you're saying.

In other words, it was Bear Weather. Try again.

"Weeell ..."

Well, nothing. This was a football team that looked like the king of the world a week ago looking like Dennis the Peasant from "Monty Python and the Holy Grail." From the Lady of the Lake holding aloft Excalibur to a watery tart throwing swords in seven short days.

(If you don't get the latter, look up the Dennis the Peasant scene online. It's my favorite.)

Anyway, the whole business should remind us that in the NFL, it's always Not For Long, as Jerry Glanville used to say. Fifty-nine points one week become one lonely field goal the next. One week you're the windshield; one week you're the bug.

And speaking of bugs ...

Here's another example of the NFL's capriciousness: Your Indianapolis Colts.

Who last week got so smooshed by the windshield -- i.e., the visiting Baltimore Ravens -- the home fans were booing them before the first quarter was over. The offense was "meh," putting up 23 points and 251 yards. The defense looked like Larry, Curley, Moe ) and eight other guys who couldn't tackle Lamar Jackson.

Final score: Ravens 41, Colts 23. The ugly details: Lamar 'n' them racked 506 total yards and almost eight yards per play. The equally ugly conclusion: Eight-and-nine, here we come again.

Exactly one week later, I turned on my TV and saw DeForrest Buckner sacking Patrick Mahomes.

"What th-?" I said, along with most of America.

"What th-?",, indeed. The same team that was so odiferous in Lucas Oil Stadium last week was in Arrowhead, giving Chiefs Kingdom all it wanted. The Horsies didn't win, of course -- come on, that would have been too much even for the NFL -- but it took overtime for Mahomes and the Chiefs to finally put them away, 33-30.

"Does this mean the Colts are NOT looking at another 8-9 season?" you're saying now.

No, it doesn't mean that at all. After all, the same names -- Chris Ballard and Shane Steichen -- are still at the top, even though Colts owner Carlie Irsay-Gordon has put them on double secret probation. There are still 15 games for them to start breaking stuff again.

"But is it possible they could make the playoffs for the first time since 2020?" you're saying.

Sure, it's possible. It was also possible Dr. Jack Miller the Racing Dentist could have won the Indianapolis 500 back in the day. But probable?

Well. After last week and this week in Chicago and Indy, I'd say all bets are off on that one. And on pretty much every other one, too. 

In the meantime ...

Let's see what happens this week. 

And the week after that.

And all the weeks after that.

Fight night!

 Hardly anyone was watching, one presumes, but the best fight of the night Saturday did not happen in the octagon or a boxing ring or even on various football fields in various college towns across America.

No, it happened in Bristol, Tenn. Where NASCAR ran the annual Bristol night race while America was watching Ole Miss beat LSU and Notre Dame tool up on Michigan State.

 What happened was Carson Hocevar and Ryan Blaney were going around and around, and then Hocevar either got under Blaney or Blaney came down on Hocevar (opinions vary). At which point Hocevar turned Ryan into the wall with the classic Bristol Tap on his left rear quarter panel.

Not long thereafter Blaney came after Hocevar in the pits, and they threw down. Well, Hocevar did, anyway. 

Seriously, check this out. That's some straight-up Mike Tyson/Joe Frazier stuff right there.

And, sure, lots of people think Hocevar is is a punk-ass b**** and Blaney's a solid citizen who was raised right, which means the good guy didn't win this time. However ...

However, Blaney's been around the barn a few times, and that includes Bristol. So he should know as well as anyone that what happened Saturday night wasn't a particularly glaring bit of villainy. It was just Bristol.

The Bristol Tap? Shoot, Dale Earnhardt pulled that stunt a million times. Ditto countless others. You squeeze 43 cars into that small a space, people are gonna run into each other, sometimes deliberately and sometimes not.

Hocevar swears it was the latter. The proper response to that is "Sure, Jan."

(Gratuitous "Brady Bunch" reference)

And Blaney?

He just caught the wrong end of it this time. In more ways than one.

Hotty Toddy ...

 ... and all that jazz.

Final score from Oxford, Miss., where The Grove broiled under a merciless September sun until it gave way to hectic, sweaty night: Ole Miss 32, Lane Kiffin 24.

Wait, did I say "Lane Kiffin"?

I meant LSU, of course. Although you might have been forgiven for thinking otherwise.

You might have been forgiven because The Return of the Prodigal Son (known in some quarters around Oxford as "The Return of the Prodigal S***head") was the storyline to Ole Miss-LSU, whose rich history of football enmity became merely garnish for the main course this time around. This time it was all about LSU coach Lane Kiffin, last seen winging away from Oxford on an LSU charter, trailing less-than-good wishes behind him.

It wasn't that Kiffin grabbed for the cash. Lots of coaches do that (hello, Brian Kelly, who fled Notre Dame for LSU under similar circumstances). It's that he strung Ole Miss along, then high-tailed it for Baton Rouge while acting like the injured party because Ole Miss wouldn't let him stay and coach the Rebels in their bowl game. 

This was cheeky even for Kiffin, a notoriously cheeky sort. And this was on top of the fact he poached several of Ole Miss players on his way out the door, and took most of his Ole Miss staff with him.

So this really was brother-vs.-brother Saturday night, a familiar theme in the heart of the old Confederacy. And what happened?

An endless rain of boos. A few catcalls, vulgar and otherwise. A guy waving a facsimile corn dog with Kiffin's face on it.

And one hell of a football game.

Ole Miss jetted out to leads of 17-0 and 24-7, and then here came LSU. Tied it at 24, finally, in the fourth quarter -- after which the splendid Trinidad Chambliss ran and passed the Rebels right back down the field, scoring the winning touchdown on a 14-yard dash to the pylon with 6:14 to play.

So was it over? Heck, no it wasn't over.

LSU's equally splendid Sam Leavitt immediately ran and passed his guys 69 yards the other way, and there the Tigers were, camped on the Ole Miss 6-yard line. But Leavitt couldn't close the deal, missing tight end Zach Grace at the goal line on third down and bouncing a fourth-down pass off the helmet of Ole Miss defensive end Kam Franklin.

The football settled obediently in the hand of defensive back Jaylon Braxton in the end zone, and the thing was done.

Ole Miss 32. LSU 24.

Trinidad Chambliss, surely the biggest man on the Ole Miss campus now since William Faulkner, was 33-of-48 passing for 363 yards and two scores. Sam Leavitt threw for 158 yards and once score and ran for 63 yards and another. And Lane Kiffin, gracious in defeat, professed to be glad the whole ordeal was over.

"I'm sure I'll be criticized for saying that (Editor's note: He wasn't), but, yeah, I am," Kiffin said in the postgame. "I was thinking that all week, especially today, and I would have said that in a win or a loss ... It was just really a lot of emotions of gratefulness for this place and the six years. It went well beyond football."

It did. And then sweltering night fell, and the lights came up, and, blessedly, football was all that was left.

Today in live sacrifices

 Today your Kent State Golden Flashes make the cross-state trip to Columbus, O., and one can only hope they didn't check the scores from last night first. You want to have your mind right when you're the Christian and the lions are waiting.

Which is to say, didja see what happened out in Eugene, Ore., last night?

The Portland State Vikings, in the Christian role, got swallowed whole by the Oregon Ducks, who portrayed the Lions.

The final score was Ducks/Lions 84, Vikings/Christians (now there's an interesting juxtaposition) 0. And raise your hand if you didn't see that coming. 

See, Oregon was coming off that shocking upset at unranked Oklahoma State, which dropped the Ducks from No. 6 to No. 21 in the polls. Portland State likely thought "Uh-oh" when it saw that. This is because Oregon is still Oregon, and Portland State is ... well, not. And not only that, but now Oregon was undoubtedly a pissed-off Oregon.

This could not have filled the Portlands with confidence, given that they're a humble Big Sky Conference school who were an equally-humble 1-11 last season. In fact, if it weren't an insult to their competitive spirit, you can imagine the following exchange after last week:

Coach: OK, men, big challenge next week against Oregon, which you know of course just lost to unranked Oklahoma State. Who's ready for a pissed-off Oregon team?

Players: Uhhhh ...

Coach: Oh, come on! This is what anyone with a competitive spirit lives for!

Players: Uhhhh ...

One Brave Soul Among The Players: Coach, can't we just call in sick?

Anyway, they came, they saw, they were eaten, the Portlands. And now Kent State's got to be wondering if a similar gruesome fate awaits it.

Just like Oregon last week, after all, the Ohio State Buckeyes suffered a galling defeat last week. The top-ranked Buckeyes had the No. 4 Texas Longhorns 'Horn-swoggled, leading 23-3 after three quarters and looking much the better team. And then ...

And then the Buckeyes ran out of gas, or something, and Arch Manning and the Longhorns zoomed past them like Dale Earnhardt lapping a back-marker. After lollygagging (or mostly just gagging) for three quarters, they outscored the Buckeyes 21-0 in the fourth to pull out a crushing 24-23 win.

"What th-?" every Ohio State fan said, when they were done throwing snacks at their 100-inch TV screens.

And now?

Now Kent State, a humble Mid-American Conference school that was a humble 5-7 last season, gets the no-longer-No.-1 Buckeyes, who likely spent most of this week figuratively throwing snacks at their own TV screens. Kent State is 1-1, having beaten Wofford after getting rolled 57-0 by South Carolina. And South Carolina isn't Ohio State.

Especially not a pissed-off Ohio State.

Someone light a candle for the Golden Flashes. Compassion demands it.

Game of the week

 Tomorrow night Ole Miss welcomes LSU for their traditional Saturday Night Lights  throwdown, and apparently the only question is the choice of weapons. Will the Tigers and Rebels choose broadswords, battle axes or pistols at 20 paces?

This on account of there likely will be an Extreme Venom Alert, on account of LSU's head coach and incorrigible asshat Lane Kiffin was coaching Ole Miss a year ago. Then LSU threw a pile of green at him to jump ship, and Lane-o did, with unbecoming haste. Took a few Ole Miss players with him, too, just to twist the knife.

And speaking of twisting the knife .. Kiffin being Kiffin, after he fled Oxford he couldn't resist flapping his gums about how it was harder to recruit black players to Ole Miss because blacks didn't feel as welcome there.

Never let it be said Ol' Motormouth has trouble locating someone's hot button.

Ole Miss, of course, was where they used to greet football visitors with a forest of Confederate battle flags and full-throated renditions of "Dixie." It's also where the student body practically started Civil War The Sequel because a black student -- James Meredith, perhaps you remember the name -- wanted to enroll there.

All of that was a long time ago, of course, and a few things have changed at Ole Miss since. The majority of the football players are black now, including star quarterback Trinidad Chambliss.  The student body, 100 percent white back in the James Meredith days, is roughly 13 percent black. And the Confederate flags, blessedly, are long gone.

But race is still a sensitive subject in Oxford and surrounding precincts. So it was an on-target cheap shot from Kiffin, not to say some impressive ingratitude from a guy Ole Miss paid $9 million last year to coach its football team.

Anyway, Kiffin comes back to Vaught-Hemingway Stadium tomorrow night, and an ancient rivalry likely will be even more rivalry-er than usual. In fact Ole Miss is calling in extra mounted police to keep the hooliganism to a minimum.

Game of the week for sure in college football. Don't forget the snacks.

Gotcha-ed

 Look, I should know better. OK? I should.

I should know better than to cruise social media certain weeks. I know the level of idiocy, always flirting with the red line, will reach critical mass then. And I know it will frost my cookies, even though I acknowledge frosting the public's cookies is the overarching purpose of social media.

It exists to mine outrage, almost all of it phony. To annoy. To make you splutter, "Why, that's the stupidest thing I ever heard!"

Which is what a lot of social media cruisers spluttered when they saw what a couple of  fools named Jason Whitlock and Laura Ingraham had to say about sideline reporter Holly Rowe after Texas coach Steven Sarkisian blew her off in the wake of the Longhorns' win over Ohio State.

They made her the bad guy, is what they did. 

Whitlock, a former sportswriter transformed by some inner furies into a raging make-me-a-sandwich misogynist, said Rowe was trying to "destroy the patriarchy" and "invade male spaces."  This of course was news to those of us who just thought she was a veteran (and well-respected) reporter doing her job. 

But then, Whitlock used to be a semi-respected reporter, too. Now he's just another insecure male ranting in the online wilds about how all these damn women are ruining America for, you know, men.

And Ingraham, Fox harpy extraordinaire?

You know what you're gonna get from her, too. And so, right on cue, she sided with Arch Manning after the little goof laughed about all the AI memes featuring Rowe and Sarkisian -- particularly the one where Sarkisinian knocks her flat with a backhand slap.

"Have y'all seen that?" the little goof said to reporters this week. "That's a good one. Of him slapping Holly Rowe? It's hilarious."

(The worst part about that? Some of the reporters laughed, too. Oh, yeah, tee-hee, ha-ha, someone AI-ed a video of a woman getting slapped, that's a real knee slapper. Not one of those reporters, apparently, had either the good sense or common decency to say, "Hey, Arch, that's not funny." But then there's no accounting for how some folks were raised.)

Anyway, a day or so later the little goof apologized. I'm guessing this was preceded by a stern phone call from Papa Manning -- Cooper, Peyton's and Eli's brother -- reminding Arch that there was an accounting for how he was raised, and by God you're gonna apologize, mister, and I mean RIGHT NOW.

Ingraham, of course, thought Arch had nothing to apologize for, to get back to the no-accounting-for-how-some-folks-were-raised thing. In fact she blamed Rowe for somehow "extracting" the apology from the poor lad -- which was so ridiculous that, sure enough, it made me splutter "Why, that's the stupidest thing I ever heard!"

And now here I am, writing about it, giving these fools more oxygen -- which of course is exactly what they were after. Gotcha, Blob Boy.

I should know better. I really should.

Stupid geography

The world was too ridiculous to even bother to live in.

-- Jack Crabb, "Little Big Man"

Boy howdy there, Mr. Crabb. You sure hit that one on the noggin.

The world is too ridiculous to live in these days, and it's getting ridiculous-er by the day. We got us basketball players (Kyrie Irving) who think the Earth is flat, and football players (Aaron Rodgers) who think America's pre-eminent epidemiologist is Josef Mengele. And we got us hysterical (or cynical) politicians who tell us Commies and Muslims are trying to take over America and make us all buy crappy Soviet-era cars and pray to Mohammed five times a day.

And that's not even mentioning the senile old fart in the White House, who picks fights with Canada, of all people, and shut down the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts because he refused to renovate it unless they stuck his name on it, too.

Also, he says he'll pay us all $5,000 if the Republicans win in November. Which sure sounds to me like bribing folks to vote Republican, but what do I know.

Oh, yes: And he likes renaming stuff he can't really rename.

Which brings us today's Stupid Geography Trick, which is the Cleveland city council voting to rename a large swatch of Lake Erie the Gulf of Cleveland. Now, apparently this was all very tongue-in-cheek, a splendid trolling of El Presidente by the council. Sort of like, "You know how absurd it is to rename international bodies of water you have no authority to rename? Watch THIS."

In any case, it's yet more fodder for the Blob's seventh-grade-boy sense of humor ...

Q: What did the part of Lake Erie designated for renaming say when it found out?

A: "The Gulf of CLEVELAND?? Aw, HELL, no!"

I got a million of 'em, I tell ya.

Here's another one: If Lake Ontario is Lake America now, and part of Lake Erie is the Gulf of Cleveland, what's our next geographical snatch-and-grab? The senile old fart already has his eye on both Niagara Falls, or so the story goes. And if we can steal Canada's falls for our own, the sky (soon to be renamed "The American Sky") would seem to be the limit.

President Trump: I hereby sign an executive order to rename the Canadian Yukon the "AmeriKon."

President Trump again: I hereby sign an executive order to rename Greenland "Ours," and Iceland "Ours, Too," and Venezuela "You Damn Right It's Ours."

Also President Trump: And from now on, Nova Scotia, whatever that is, will be known as BOSSA Nova Scotia here in the U.S. And the "Montreal Canadiens" will be called the "Montreal Boom Shakalakas" because "Canadiens" sounds French, and really woke, besides.

A million of 'em, I'm tellin' ya. A million of 'em.