Necessary Roughness, Week 10: Congrats to the Vikings!
GODDAMIT! I actually have a day off in Toronto and I whip out my computer to write this column only to find a whole bottle of Listerine has leaked all over it, leaving a big discolored smear across the screen. No big deal, it’s only a brand new laptop, now a craptop. You’d think a dude with as much road experience as me would know better than to store a $2,000 machine on which I do 80% of my work in the same bag as my leaky toilet case. But at least I got to watch football yesterday!
Congrats to the Minnesota Vikings for claiming their first victory of the season in the continental U.S.A. with an amazing goal-line stand against my beloved ‘Skins on Thursday night. We were playing in Cincinnati that night and had the game in the dressing room. I got to watch the first half of the game and it really seemed like the ‘Skins had the game in hand. I hit the stage and tried to perform with the intensity I knew my boys were playing the game with, then ran back to the dressing room only to behold in horror that we were losing. For a minute it looked like RG III might just put the game into OT, but those Vikes stepped up and stuffed the ‘Skins’ four attempts to get into the end zone. Great fucking game! Heartbreaking, yes… but still a great game.
Sunday dawned with a strong signal on the satellite and us parked up in Grand Rapids. I decided to watch the Bears vs. the Lions at the classic venue of Soldier Field (please tell me it’s still called Soldier Field and they haven’t changed the name to the Tostada AT&T Corporate Whore Bowl) for one of the longest running rivalries in the history of the league. And I was not disappointed. It was a bitter and bruising slug-fest where Chicago QB Jay Cutler, after a strong start, was in obvious pain for most of the second half and was finally taken out in the third quarter for Josh McCown. But that combo of Matthew Stafford, Reggie Bush, and Megatron is tough to beat. It came down to a furious two-minute drill from the Bears, who pulled within two points with a touchdown toss to the always amazing Brandon Marshall. A roughing the passer call gave the Bears an extra shot at the two-point conversion… but the Lions’ Nick Fairley sniffed it out perfectly and stuffed Matt Forte in the back field for a five-yard loss, then proceeded to do the fat-man-happy-dance down the length of the field, followed by the entire Lions defensive unit as the city of Chicago took a collective barf. Perched atop the NFC North, and without Aaron Rodgers to worry about, the Detroit Lions are looking good.
The third and final game I watched was the Niners vs. the Carolina Panthers, a massive defensive struggle in which Colin Kaepernick was sacked a career-high six times. Both teams were coming off win streaks but only the Panthers would continue theirs, prevailing 10-9 in a game that was a lot more exciting than the score. That was about as much time as I had for football, although I did notice the Saints crushed the Cowboys, 49-17. That made me happy.
This will be the last column from the road as this tour is done on Sunday in D.C. So before I spend my whole day off on NFL.com, I am going to turn it over to my legions of wanna-be sports reporters. Keep those comments coming, and I am gonna try and get this ass home in one piece!
