So Here's What's Going On.

I need to, first, apologize.

It's been about ten days since I last updated this thing, and, considering the Big One is upon us again, that's, well, pretty awful.

The truth is, I'm not sure where this site is going. People aren't quite sure how to react to it. I've gotten every criticism to "tl;dr" to "too analytical" and every praise from "nice poetry" to "syndicate this $#%&."

The truth is, I'm not sure how much time I even have to figure out where Second and One is going, if anywhere. I have been working between 9 and 12 hours per day for the last three weeks. This isn't likely to change any time soon. I haven't read much about football for more than five minutes, and haven't read anything longer than about five sentences. I don't know who's been hired, fired; what's contested, who got arrested - I couldn't put together a coherent post if someone handed me a template, and even then it would probably end up coming out like the Patriots' eventually ill-fated playbook: flying in every direction, with no way to stop it.

So, I'm going to say for now that Second and One is going to take a vacation, and a pretty long one at that. As far as I can foresee, this is the end of regular updating. I'm fading off into the swirling vortex of the Internet. I'm tired. I'm stressed out. I don't really care who wins the Super Bowl, to be perfectly honest. Feel free to unfollow if you really want. There will probably be sporadic updates here and there as I feel like it - I'm just posting this message so I don't have to feel guilty in the early hours of the morning about not posting.

Thanks to everyone who reads.

And have a good and safe time this weekend, no matter who you're rooting for.

MC

This is not a good week.

First, I have to apologize for the sore lack of updating around here. I seem to have completely forgotten that this blog exists, neglecting it in a corner just days after Second and One's second anniversary. I'm so busy now: in addition to having to do chemistry, I have to teach it as well.

Truth be told, the NFC Championship game, as respectably as it ended for both teams, doesn't make me feel very good. Not because the Bears lost to a good team, but because of how much anti-Bears invective has been swirling around. Not just now, but all season long. Who cares of they honked out in the preseason? Who cares how sloppily they played at times? They still beat some tough rivals and lost by only seven in the NFC Championship game, and I think the hate needs to stop at the door of the postseason, especially for a team that got further than the Patriots. So, time for me to put this into pictorial form, lest I go into a Long, Persecuted Bears Fan rant. Inspired by a similar game for the Indianapolis Colts, it's...Bears Hate Bingo!

Nonetheless, despite the disappointing outcome, it was nice to see that the Bears aren't total toast at the QB position, and it was nice to see Brian Urlacher and Matt Forte absolutely play their hearts out. Thanks for the memories, Bears. It was a long, nauseatingly up-and-down but wildly pleasant season with an anticlimactic whimper of an ending.

Even after that, I still love you guys; I always will.

An Ode to The Wild Cards, Part One

Ten points up, the game was boring

The Saints played like noone was there

But the Who Dats caved to Carlson's scoring

And looked as if they tackled air

The Saints' backfield, so far eroded

The line false-started from the noise

I think Sean Payton's head exploded

As joyous Carroll praised his boys

A breakout run, poor kick onside

Some lousy calls to twist the knife

Upon this hurl-inducing ride

Both teams were clinging for their life

New Orleans eventually lost the battle

At thirty-six to forty-one

At eight and nine now comes Seattle

Ready to spoil Atlanta's run

In the AFC, the hate was breeding

Tempers surging, flames-a-fanning;

The Colts were trying to stop the bleeding

And Ryan wished to knock off Manning

Ol' Rex shouted, Sanchez tried,

LT had some epic runs

But Peyton would not be denied,

And it appeared as if the Colts had won

The home crowed cheered, the field goal boomed

V, for victory, and Vinatieri

But fifty ominous seconds loomed

(And would you trust Indy's secondary?)

And so the clock announced the hour

But premature celebration begets

Collapses of the highest power

And victoriously emerged the Jets

Yet fortune favors strong, not meek;

Both winners shall be nixed next week.

I'm pretty busy, but Part II will come later.

Bowl Games!!!

Wow. What an absolutely abysmal performance by the Big Ten Et Al. today. Wisconsin showed poor clock management, Penn State threw a backbreaking interception and handed the contest to Florida. Northwestern rallied too late. Michigan schools were outscored 101-21 in bowl games. None looked worse than MSU. #9 showed up wanting a pound of Nick Saban's flesh. They also showed up with the Bears' O-line from the Giants game, the Texans' secondary, the defensive front from Denver, a QB lofting passes about like a second-grade girl whose primary interest is her Barbies, and an overall air of frustrated, "why-is-the-tight-end-fifty-yards-downfield"- desperation.

(My boyfriend and I wrote this description together.)

Happy New Year!!

Happy 2011! I hope everyone's enjoying the college bowls and the last week of NFL before the playoffs. I thought I'd do something different this year, and remember 2010 in the form of some funny football quotes. Without further ado: Second and One's Funniest Football Quotes of 2010, collected from around the Internet (and one from real life).

10. "Unless that's Frank Caliendo doing Brett Favre, his wife is probably going to make off with half of his crap." - Brian, our stockroom attendant, on Brett Favre's voice mails to Jenn Sterger.

9. "[Lance Briggs is] Vick's Vaporizer." -Tim Souers of Cubby Blue on Bears vs Eagles.

8. "[MSU TE] Charlie Gantt could have moonwalked those final 10 yards and still scored untouched." - Awful Announcing's Brady Green, responding to Lou Holtz's assumption that Notre Dame had MSU's infamous "Little Giants" play - which gave Mark Dantonio a heart attack - "well defended."

7. "The Book of Revelation predicts that a beast with seven heads and 10 horns, four horsemen on colored horses and a Houston series win over Indianapolis will be the signs of the approaching Last Judgment." - Gregg Easterbrook, on the Colts' real clunker of a season opener.

6. "Topeka, Kansas has high schools of both Trojan, (Topeka High) and Seaman Academy. Therefore every year we have to suffer through headlines in the Capitol Journal of "Seaman Breaks Through Trojan Defense." It's like they think it's some kind of inside joke." - Random message board commentator on the world's worst sports team nicknames.

5. "Somewhere over the Dwayne Bowe" - Chris "Boomer" Berman, on a touchdown by KC WR Dwayne Bowe.

4. "I think this guy's a neo-Nazi." - Glenn Beck, upon seeing a picture of Brian Urlacher.

3. "Ranked 32nd against the pass after last week's epic collapse against the Jets, they should call the Texans' defensive backfield Room Service Breakfast -- five pieces of really expensive toast." - David Fleming, re: Houston's terrible secondary.

2. "No, I want to say f*** you. And I mean that in the most professional way." Denver WR Brandon Lloyd, upon asking if the newly-minted Pro Bowler had any messages for previous teams who let him go.

1. "Must've been Bill Belichick running the video camera." Fantasy CPR, on foot-fetish videos involving Jets coach Rex Ryan's wife, Michelle.

More to come later.

A Thriller in the Chiller!

Also known as "MC and Dad's Annual Bears-Related Heart Attack." 

I will never stop saying this. It happens every year. I come home for Christmas, plop myself in our den/TV room wearing all sorts of Bears gear (this year, a brand new Bears hoodie that I got as a Christmas gift over my Devin Hester jersey), and the game we watch damn near kills us. Sometimes, it gets so bad, that I think my mom and sister leave the house/move to a distant part of it intentionally so that they don't need to hear my dad and I going utterly ballistic for three hours.

Ok. So here's what was so logic-defying about this game. We've got the #8 defense in the league (Bears) meeting the #5 defense in the league (Jets). Put these two teams out in extreme cold and snow and make them play on turf that's probably worse than frosted kitty litter. And what do you get?

A 38-34 shootout, of course! I thought it would be a Bears blowout when the Bears scored 10 points easily. Then I thought it would be a Jets blowout when the Jets scored 24 in the second quarter and the Bears looked like they couldn't remember if they put their underwear on backwards or not. The Bears went into the locker room down by seven. And then came the third quarter, a scoring frenzy of positively epic proportions in which the Bears staged a furious comeback and Jay Cutler threw three touchdowns in like, eight minutes and positively hung the Jets' secondary out to dry. 

It was like they took uppers at halftime, or entered a barbarian-esque berserker phase, or sold their souls, or borrowed the Scoring Machine from the University of Oregon or maybe the Saints. It was like watching someone who is really good at Madden 11 beat someone who is abysmal at the same game. I've never seen anything quite like it. The Bears' offense under Mike Martz has been struggling to find an identity all year as Martz has been experimenting with the playbook (sometimes with disastrous results), but I like the recent incarnations, in which the Bears' prime goal is to score in a manner as quickly and precisely as possible. Cutler was great, Knox was sensational, Hester was magical, Forte was tough as nails, Olsen threw some tremendous blocks, and the O-line even held pretty well. 

The Bears have now scored 78 points in two games in which the defenses ran circles around themselves trying to contain Cutler and Crew. Had Robbie Gould not missed his field goal, it would've been the first time the Bears have posted back-to-back 40-pointers since 1948. I call this the "Bat-out-of-Hell" offense. Here's a picture of what the Bears' offense looked like yesterday.

All we need now are a couple of 5'9" receivers and for Lovie Smith to cut the sleeves off his sweatshirts. Source: Getty images, Mike Zarrilli.

By contrast, here's a picture of what the Bears' defense looked like yesterday for most of the game.

Where "you" equals "giving up a gerjillion yards against the slant by playing ten yards off the ball. 

Until the end, of course. The fourth quarter was one of those quarters that was such a nail-biter that I nearly chewed off the first digits of several fingers. I'll skip past a couple of the intermediaries and cut to the positively stunning conclusion. Mark Sanchez had the ball with about a buck left on the clock, no timeouts, and the Bears jumped offsides. He found what he thought was a wide-open Santonio Holmes streaking down the sidelines, but at the last minute, Chicago safety Chris Harris flew in front of him to make the game-icing interception. 

Ok. 11-4, folks. I'm generally a pretty big Bears skeptic, but I'm starting to believe in this Martz-Cutler chemistry stuff, and a picture of the two of them now serves as the background of my iPhone. 

And here are a few other observations from yesterday.

Best Way to Get Into the Playoffs: Even though the Jest, erm, Jets lost yesterday, Jacksonville lost in overtime and sent the Jets to the postseason again anyway! They were allegedly cheering in the post-game press-conference when they heard the Jaguars blew it. Ok. I don't understand how the tiebreaker system works. I understand a lot of things about football, but I don't understand this complicated equation involving strength of victory and schedule difficulty and who beat whose division rival. Truth be told, my actual desire to know about how playoff seeding works is on par with the desire to ask Rex Ryan for a foot massage.

Worst Way to Get Knocked Out of The Playoffs: The St. Louis Rams finally pounded any postseason hopes out of utterly dysfunctional San Francisco 49ers. As a result, eccentric coach Mike Singletary was shown the door approximately thirty seconds after the game. A defensive coach with a funny name that I don't remember takes over as interim. So not only do the 49ers look ridiculous in the way they've played, but the brass of the organization looks equally ridiculous in firing the coach in week 15 out of 16. 

Worst Way to Get Literally Knocked Out of the Playoffs: During the Chiefs' stomping of the sleepwalking Titans, Tennessee QB Kerry Collins faced heavy pressure and threw the ball away, where it sailed to the sidelines and hit his own defensive end (William Hayes) in the head and knocked him out of the game with a concussion. (NFL.com) Head coach Jeff Fisher uttered my sentiment exactly, italics mine; "That's kind of how the game went." I kind of want to make a video mashup of the Titans' 2010 miscues and bloopers and dub Yakety Sax over it. I'd bet Colts and Jaguars fans would love it. 

Most Absurd Collapses: Remember when I said that historically, the Chargers are unstoppable in December, and the Cowboys are usually the absolute nadir of suckitude in December? Well, I retract that because they've both been awful this December. Exhibit A: The Chargers, who handed the AFC West title to Kansas City by being torched by the 3-11 Bengals (sans Owens and Ochocinco on top of it), and Exhibit B: the Cowboys, who lost by a single point to Arizona and reportedly made Jerry Jones' head pop like a giant zit.

December Capitalism! Chargers tickets are about $200. From Amazon.com, you can get these Chargers cufflinks for about $50. They look very pretty, but do not give them to your little kids - they're a choking hazard!

To come in the next several days: Second and One's Top Ten hilarious football quotes of 2010.

The Bronze Medal...

I can't believe it. We actually DO have a third-place winner for the Second and One Annual Pre-Bowl Train-Wreck Award. This award, given in mid-to-late December to the college football program that engages in the most unscrupulous activities prior to a bowl appearance, has already occupied its first and second place spots. The third-place spot goes to...

The Ohio State University Buckeyes!

Five Ohio State football players, although not suspended for the upcoming Sugar Bowl, are required to sit out the first five games in 2011 for selling their Big 10 championship rings, jerseys, awards, and miscellaneous tOSU memorabilia, along with accepting "improper benefits". The strangest part of the latter allegations? That the five players, including star QB Terrelle Pryor and four others, traded such goods (and who knows what else) for tattoos at a local tattoo parlor. (ESPN) Pryor insists that he paid for his tattoo(s) fair and square. Fans aren't entirely sure they believe him after it was revealed that even he sold special trinkets given to players as part of a ritual following a defeat of archival Michigan (no doubt twisting the knickers of a few sanctimonious Buckeye purists). As punishment, Pryor et al. are required to pay to charity a sum of money equivalent to that which they received for selling their items.

Join Ohio State's Touchdowns for Tattoos Program!

We give these guys third place because, fundamentally, selling your championship ring isn't really all that bad when compared to the druggies and sex offenders in the first two spots. 

***

There is a great article at Sports Illustrated today about the 32 worst (ie, saddest, gut-punchiest, heart-attackiest) game endings in the history of sports. Everything is covered from boxing to horse-racing. Last Sunday's "Miracle at the New Meadowlands" - in which the Giants blew a 21-point lead at home in seven minutes, failed to anticipate an onside kick, allowed an electrifying kickoff return for the winning touchdown, possibly knocked themselves out of the division title, and then blamed the whole sour mess on the punter - made #8. 

Time for some December Capitalism! Giants tickets? $150. Giants golf balls? $9.95. Getting to see the Giants whacked hard either way? Priceless. 

***

A couple of weeks ago, I went to a tacky Christmas sweater party. My friend John showed up dressed as Santa to distribute candy and small gifts to everyone - it's kind of tradition in my department, where everyone sits in his lap and tells him what they want for Christmas. I told him all I wanted was for the Bears to make the playoffs. And now, if the real Santa may read this in the next 12 hours or so - can we send Da Bears to the Big One?

Merry Christmas everyone.