Denis Leary – You’re An Asshole

As punishment for his purchase of ESPN’s Insider, Bagels not only gets to read the stupidity of John Hollinger, but he gets a monthly reminder of his purchase with the ever terrible “ESPN The Magazine”. I’m not a subscriber and don’t really care to read the thing at all. Bagels’ underwhelming description of the magazine has made me pretty comfortable with this choice. I’ve found his now-and-then comments to be sufficient enough to lead me to believe “The Magazine” would be better served as a weed plate than anything worth using as a means for avoiding eye contact with the homeless people on the train ride home.

Today, much to my frustration, Bagels has brought it to my attention that ESPN is releasing an “America’s Most Dominant Sports City” issue. A collection of articles devoted to the Cawk Suckas from New England. We’ve grown to accept these types of things from ESPN. This is a network that told us the Red Sox were a lock to win the AL Pennant and that the worst case scenario for the 2010-2011 Boston Celtics was a game 7 loss in the Finals.

What made me exceptionally upset is that an article titled “New York Sucks” is written by self proclaimed asshole, Denis Leary. That freckled f-ck head has made his living for the past seven years on a New York centric show. I guess it never occurred to Denis that he could have opted to make the show in New England and easily insert his drunk, womanizing character there. But then again, he may have realized that making the show NYC themed would allow him to take advantage of 9/11 for an easy plot line. He may have also realized that we have enough red headed, asshole, “tough guys”, with shitty accents on the big screen and that there may not be any room for that on the small screen.

Save Your 10 Bucks and Stay Away From These Teams

It's tourney time. The brackets aren't out yet but I know some teams I already don't like and you shouldn't be fooled by. Of course, because I wrote this, one of these teams will be in the Final Four. Either way, feel free to share any other teams you hate in this tournament.

Florida - We'll start with their star player sporting a Justin Bieber haircut. Even if the team was great, they would still end up in the "Hate Column". I refuse to pick a team that has a dude that looks like a total douche bag with a bad haircut to do anything positive. Florida has almost always been soft aside from the years when Noah gave that team some character. Last year resulted in a first round elimination in the tournament...this year may be a second round knock out, plenty of time for Mr. Parsons, get a haircut.

UNC - They're an athletic team that can score in bunches. They've matured a great deal throughout the season. They're well coached. So what is there not to like? From a practical standpoint, they don’t defend the perimeter well. Tournament teams have to defend the perimeter. That’s because every tournament winner needs to beat at least one good perimeter team. UNC also seems to start games slow, forcing that explosive offense to crawl back into games can wear any team out. I definitely see them getting out of week one…but I’m not so sure about week 2.

Kentucky - I hate the slimey snake in the grass named Coach Calipari. I hate Kentucky; a team that plays in an arena named after a racist and built on exploiting young black athletes. My personal issues with this program aside, they don’t have any depth, they don’t have any experience, and Calipari finds awesome ways to get beat in big tournament games.

West Virginia - I hate Bob Huggins and his stupid track suits. Most major programs have issues graduating players these days with the NCAA acting like a development league. However, Bob takes it to another level graduating almost zero percent of his players. This certainly shows in his team’s play as they sometimes look like a squad with a zero basket ball IQ. I can see this team as a primed for a first round upset.

Notre Dame - They’re a great shooting team with a ton of experience. They struggled with full court pressure against Louisville and they rely on Hansbrough’s and their three point shooting to win games. You can’t shoot the lights out of a building every night and they seem to struggle against teams with athletes, something this tournament has a ton of.

UConn - Kemba Walker is a gritty, prime time player that plays without fear. (Tired of the clichés yet? Well here come some more). He’s undersized, his team relies a bit much on him to score, and he just played 5 games in 5 nights. Unless the boy has a God Shamgod type of run in the tourney, I don’t see this team getting all that far. Seeding and location will determine how far they go.

BYU - Primed to get beat. Ferdette is a great college player. No denying it. But this team relies on him for all of their scoring. Someone in this tournament will figure out that you defend that guy, and let a different Mormon try to beat you.

Side Note - Sometime before the Tourney starts I will try and pick an upset or two and share the teams I think are worth investing 10 bucks in your office pool on.