Bolo Ties, Creepy Moms, and Struggle Faces: Playoffs Round Two

Over the past week, I have seen more “Put the ‘Wild’ in Wild Card” headlines than I ever wanted to. This made me realize, sportswriters aren’t all that creative. Website to website, article to article, you see the same headlines about the same subjects. It’s quite disheartening, really. However, I had reason to rejoice whilst cruising the interwebs this week because of two journalists who refused to fit within the social norm.

Exhibit A, the front page of the Kansas City Star. Many a reporter was writing about the Colts’ comeback victory over the Chiefs on Saturday, but none did it as boldly as this Kansas City publication. The headline “Horse (Bleep)” captures not only the fact that the Colts mascot is a horse (albeit a baby horse), but also what many Kansas City fans were probably screaming as they watched their team blow a 38-10 lead. Take in all of its glory:

Our second shining example analyzes my beloved Patriots. As they are set to host the Colts in a divisional round face off tonight, you can imagine that plenty has been written about them over the past seven days. So what was so intriguing about this article? It’s analysis of New England’s injury struggles? A fresh new take on Tom Brady’s leadership of a less talented team? Actually, it was not even close to those run-of-the-mill options. No, our friends at The Count simply asked, how many times has Bill Belicheck smiled in press conferences this year? This is the kind of hard-hitting reporting that I live for, people! Spoiler alert: Bill didn’t even manage one smile per game this season. Enjoy:

Now, I would be remiss if I didn’t take some time to mention the magic that was the 2014 BCS National Championship. In case you didn’t know, it was the last BCS Championship ever due to the NCAA adopting a playoff format next season, and boy did it go out with a bang. Now, I could tell you about how it seemed that the SEC would again dominate and capture its eighth title in a row, or how Jameis Winston earned every bit of his Heisman trophy while engineering the second-largest BCS comeback ever. Heck, I could even tell you about me being on a farm on Monday, running back and forth to the “bathroom” to check the game I was bootlegging on a borrowed laptop with a shoddy wi-fi connection. However, the real story on Monday was the official struggle face of 2014.

If you watched sports and used the internet this past year, you’re probably familiar with the term “struggle face”. This phenomenon occurs when a coach or player is losing or has just lost a game, and some genius snaps a picture of their frustration manifesting in their facial expression. There were many great struggle faces in 2013, but this  Auburn player gave us the Holy Grail on Monday night. The best part about this particular photo is that I instantly began to see it all over my Twitter timeline with captions like “When you ask for barbeque sauce at McDonald’s and they ask for 25 cents”. I myself couldn’t resist joining in the fun, and soon I had posted the picture at least eight times in a row. Here are some of my favorite captions, straight from my very own Twitter feed:

·         When somebody steals your tweet

·         When they tell you the check you were expecting Friday won’t come until Monday

·         When you find out the son you been paying for for 18 years…ain’t yours

·         When McDonald’s won’t sell you a hash brown at 10:31

Okay, I’m not sure if I’m doing you a favor with this next one or if I’m going to scar you for life. Last Sunday, while Andy Dalton was being Andy Dalton and throwing interceptions to the Charger’s defense, Old Spice sprung a blitzkrieg on us all. I was watching the game with about 10 other friends, and nobody was quite sure what to say after we saw this commercial. Old Spice has gradually become bolder and more outlandish with their commercials, doings things like turning Terry Crews’ muscles into instruments and trapping Wes Welker in a snow globe, but this takes the cake. It not only takes the cake, it baked the cake in the first place and never even considered bringing it to the party. In what was apparently an attempt to convey the sentiments of mothers whose sons are getting attention from ladies because of wearing Old Spice, we were treated to (or unfairly subjected to) “Mom Song”. 

Immediately after the commercial, my friend Liam counted seven consecutive tweets on his timeline about the affair. “Mom Song” inspired responses like:

·         Old Spice commercial wtf?

·         Wtf was that Old Spice?

·         Eww Old Spice commercial creepy af

·         Old Spice commercial…

·         That Old Spice commercial was the creepiest thing I’ve ever seen

There’s really nothing else to say about that. I guess I should talk about football, right? Well the Chargers, Colts, Saints, and 49ers all advanced into the Divisional Round of the playoffs. Here’s a one-sentence recap of each Wild-Card game to get you caught up to speed:

Ø  Chargers vs. Bengals: Andy Dalton feels really bad for the poor defensive players who never get to catch any passes

Ø  Saints vs. Eagles: LeSean McCoy was really hoping to be running in the snow

Ø  Chiefs vs. Colts: Kansas City thought the game was already over at halftime because of the NFL’s secret mercy rule

Ø  Packers vs. 49ers: Freezing or not, somebody should really be covering Vernon Davis

So now the Colts will travel to New England, the Saints will travel to Seattle, the Niners are heading to Carolina, and the Chargers will return to Denver, which means I was 2-2 for my picks last week. If you’d like to know how I think the rest of the playoffs will turn out, just refer back to my brackets in our Playoff Blowouts. Being from San Diego, I have to address one of the biggest developing stories in these playoffs, which happens to come out of my hometown.

Let’s start with this image:

Apparently, the San Diego Chargers are undefeated on the road when Philip Rivers wears a bolo tie. This trend continued when the Bolts downed the Bengals on Sunday, prompting the entire city to jump on the fad (as well as the Chargers bandwagon). Now the real phenomenon down here is the fact that San Diego fans are severely non-committal when it comes to any sport, especially football. All season long they berate the Chargers players and coaches, but now that they’ve returned to the postseason, suddenly everyone is a die-hard fan. It’s very interesting to watch. However, every team has at least a few true fans, and one of them (my buddy Alan) passed this article along to me earlier this week. As the kids say these days, Bolt Up!

Today the Saints are headed into Seattle to take on the Seahawks. Last time that happened in the post-season, Marshawn Lynch did some less-than-king things to the New Orleans defense. In remembrance of that day, enjoy this video. WARNING: there is an abundance of profanity in that video, so click at your own risk. It is one of the most hilarious things I’ve ever seen in my life, though. Unfortunately, the NFL has blocked the video from Youtube, so forgive the bad quality. 

Well, friends, our time together has yet again come to an end. The Saints and Seahawks matchup has just begun, so go enjoy the savagery as I’ll be doing all day. Go Patriots!