We Have A New Addition to the Double A Baseball Ridiculous Name Hall of Fame – Introducing The Amarillo Sod Poodles!

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The Padres’ new Double-A Affiliate in Amarillo, Texas, on Tuesday announced that “Sod Poodles” had won its “Name the Team” contest. The other finalists were the Boot Scooters, Bronc Busters, Jerky and Long Haulers.

Double A Baseball has officially gone off the rails and I LOVE it. First we were given the Hartford Yardgoats. What’s a yardgoat you may ask? Hell if I know. Then we were blessed with the Binghamton Rumble Ponies, home of the best quarterback in baseball, Tim Tebow. And now ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Amarillo Sod Poodles. I guess it’s just a really fancy way of saying prairie dog? And look at that logo! That thing screams machismo. My credit cards are already maxed out, but one little Sod Poddle snapback isn’t going to land me in debtors jail.

Game of Thrones Officially Premieres in April, Now I Can Plan My Rewatch

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First off, every news outlet reporting that Game of Thrones has an “official release date” can kick rocks. Fake News like you read about. April is not a date, April is a month. HBO could have just told me Thrones is returning in Q1 and I’d have the same amount of information.

BUT it is exciting to know that Thrones won’t be getting pushed back to summer, which I was worried about since they’re essentially filming 6 movies. It also needed to premiere before May to be eligible for next years Emmys technically, so I’m sure that was a strong incentive.

Now its time to fire up the annual rewatch. This show has so many characters, storylines, and subtleties that you’re missing a ton if you’re relying on your memory from a single viewing. Hell, if you don’t read the books you’re out of the loop as HBO just punts on details that help clarify a lot of things. I’ve read 1.5 of the books and it’s helped immensely. But rewatching a show of this magnitude is DAUNTING.

7 seasons of Thrones is a goddamn commitment, but I’m ready to take this challenge head on. I’m just trying to avoid what happened last year. I did not allot for enough time to comfortably rewatch all 6 seasons before the premiere so I was watching like 2 episodes a night the week of the season premiere. You don’t know stress until you’re trying to cram like 3,600 minutes of Thrones into a month.

Now for anyone that wants to join me on this journey I did the math (accurately I think?) on just how long this will take. So with Thanksgiving and Christmas and New Years coming up most of us will be shutting it down at work anyways, so heres what you’ll need to breeze through every single Game of Thrones episode ahead of the final season.

  • 7 seasons
  • 73 episodes
  • Avg 60 minutes each
  • 4,380 minutes total
  • 4.5 months
  • 138 days until April 1st

Since we don’t know the exact premiere date we’ll just use April 1st as a placeholder to be safe. This breakdown gives you 138 days to burn through 73 episodes, which if you wanted to start today you would need to watch one episode every 1.8 days in order to catch up in time. May it serve you well.

The 300s Bloggers’ Lois Einhorn Edition Fantasy Football Round Up – Week 10

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Farewell, sweet prince.

Just like that our favorite underdog has been jettisoned from the ranks of professional football. Needless to say, Nathan Peterman had possibly the worst series of spot starts in the history of the game, if not in the history of sports. Poor guy just could not get out of his own way. He’d flash some semblance of ability one play and then on the next one hit a DB in the chest for a pick 6. Fucking brutal to watch.

So with his run in Buffalo finally over, I see a full-scale Lois Einhorn situation developing here. Peterman will masquerade as some sort of female public figure in a long-con scheme aimed at extracting revenge against the world that so openly mocked and derided him. It’s coming people.

So how’d we all do this?

Red

We had a goddamn barn burner this week. Down 37 points heading into Monday Night Football I completely checked out and went to play some beer league softball like all athletes past their prime do. Matt Breida had the game of his life with two TDs and 26 pts and Sterling Shepherd chipped in with 10 of his own. So I was down by less than 5 with a minute to go with the 49ers driving. All I needed was Breida breaking a screen for a big gain or maybe punching it in from the 1! So. Much. Hype. Andddd Breida wasn’t even on the field for the final drive.


Mattes

You know when things get so bad it’s almost comical? Check this shit out.

My 1-8 team was taking on the team that is *now* in first place. After a pretty solid, 130-plus-point performance across the board, I was up comfortably heading into Sunday night with two guys left to play – Amari Cooper for me and Zach Ertz for him. Ertz then goes off for the greatest game of his life – in a game his team still loses, mind you – and I lose by 0.78. ZERO-POINT-SEVEN-FUCKING-EIGHT. Sure, my season’s already over, but it would’ve been cool to see my abortion of a team take down one of the best in the league. But again, it’s just not my year.

AND THEN – in the league that actually matters – I got unreal performances from DJ and Aaron Jones (I told you guys to grab him two weeks ago!), but the Buffalo Bills decided to somehow actually be good at football this week, and the Jets defense got me -7. NEGATIVE SEVEN. It all came down to Monday night: I was leading by 13, and all he had left was San Fran’s kicker. And guess how many points San Fran’s kicker got? Did you say 13??!! GOOD FOR YOU! I TIED and am now hanging on by a pube to a chance at the playoffs. (OH, and that last field goal Gould had was EXACTLY 30 yards; were it just one yard shorter, I would’ve won.)

I don’t know what I did to piss off the fantasy gods this year, but COME ON, MAN.

Joey B

I won a Goddam UGLY one but I won all the same. Another two excellent performances from James Conner and Michael Thomas allowed me to squeak by equally anemic opponent 91-84, and no, we didn’t forget to sit someone on a bye, etc.

Papa G

Lost in 2 out of 3 leagues this week. It’s getting down to the wire as i’m a borderline playoff team in all my leagues now. Fournette returning has seriously helped though and my bench is becoming useful again, not just a sea of RBs on IR. I’m going to need Aaron Rodgers to step it up though as i’m not getting the production I would have liked from him. I guess we’ll see how this plays out.

Side note: fuck the Jets. Bills Mafia for life.

Big Z

The Z-Men made it four wins in a row in Week 10 with a one-point victory, and led the league in points for the third straight week. You never want to lose with the second-highest points total for the week. That’s when furniture gets broken.

Christian McCaffrey led the way for my squad again this week with 31 points, but Eric Ebron was my MVP. He was game-time decision Sunday. I left him in and he rewarded me with three touchdowns. George Kittle was my closer, and his 83 yards Monday night was just enough to get me the one-point win.

Not a bad turnaround! Just hoping not to peak too soon. Again.

 

Remembering Stan Lee

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Tributes to Stan Lee have been pouring in from all over the place and it’s not hard to understand why. I’m not much of a comic book guy, but by all accounts Lee was a creative genius, a legend in his own time, and an all around great guy.

Red covered that in his post yesterday, but I still wanted to share some of his best cameos from outside the Marvel Universe. Again, I’m not much of a comic book guy, but these are some of the cameos that clued me in to the legend of Stan Lee.

Jared Goff Audibles into Romance With Next Level Peacocking

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Goff using @halleberry as an audible in the #Seahawks #Rams game is incredible 😂

(SOUND ON)pic.twitter.com/IPo5I7Qf65

Everybody knows the famous audible calls like Peyton Mannings “Omaha,” which got old around the time it started. Rams coach Sean McVay actually has a well known flair for absurd audible names.

Big Ben busted out the Dilly Dilly call before Bud Light dumped a billion dollars into creating an entire mythological universe around the catchphrase.

DILLY DILLY! Phenomenal audible from Big Ben and the #Steelers #NFL #TNF #ThursdayNightFootball #Titans #TENvsPIT #ColorRush pic.twitter.com/Pt3ywAUfaa

— The 300s (@The300sBoston) November 17, 2017

And then there was the completely out of left field reference to milk products in the Patriots Texans game in September.

“Cold Dairy” may be the weirdest audible I’ve ever heard. #Patriots #Texans #HOUvsNE

🥛 🥛 🥛 🥛 🥛 🥛

— The 300s (@The300sBoston) September 9, 2018

But for Jared Goff to shoot his shot while playing on national TV for the Los Angeles Rams, just a stone’s throw away from Hollywood, is next level peacocking. The Pickup Artist himself would be proud.

AND IT WORKED! Halle Berry is smitten already

 

Hold up. @JaredGoff16 @RamsNFL – What is a “Halle Berry”?? 🤔😂 https://t.co/nQyaWHQRrn

— Halle Berry (@halleberry) November 11, 2018

Jared Goff played it cooler than the other side of the pillow too.

It’s my favorite play ever https://t.co/YLWi7c3DNE

— Jared Goff (@JaredGoff16) November 12, 2018

This guy might not know which way the sun rises and sets, but goddamnit he knows what women want.

What the Hell is Going on With the Celtics Right Now?

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Image result for celtics loss

No, but really, though. What the hell?

After Sunday night’s 100-94 loss to the Portland Trail Blazers, the Celts are set to return home this week after a rough 1-4 road trip – which could have easily been 0-5 were it not for a furious fourth-quarter comeback which forced overtime against the two-win, atrocious Phoenix Suns. (Yeah, we struggled to beat the effing Suns!)

The Celts now currently sit sixth in the East, at 7-6, tied with the Charlotte Hornets and five games behind the 12-1 Raptors.

Yeah, I know it’s still early in the year, but again: what the literal hell?

For starters, after giving up just 99.5 points per game through the first eight games of the year, the Green gave up just about 110 points per contest over the past five games. Sure, this stat could be slightly skewed by last week’s OT game in Phoenix, but the team still allowed 115 points to the Nuggets last Monday and 123 to the Jazz on Friday night, both in regulation. As of Monday morning, they’re still somehow first in the NBA in defensive rating, but this past week really wasn’t so hot on that front.

Offensively, the team continues to struggle, although there have been slight improvements. Kyrie looks like he’s starting to get hot; after putting the team on his back with 39 points – 18 of which came in the fourth quarter and OT – against the Suns, he missed Friday night’s game against the Jazz due to his grandfather’s funeral. However, he averaged a solid 27.3 points per contest in the other games he played on the trip, and he’s now shooting over 40 percent from three on the year.

Image result for kyrie irving

Kyrie’s been cooking lately.

Jayson Tatum has looked good the past two games as well. Although he somehow only mustered up four points in Phoenix last Thursday, he’s shot exactly 50 percent in each of the past two games with totals of 21 and 27 points, respectively. The 300s favorite Marcus Morris continues to be a force off the bench as well, currently sitting third on the team in scoring in just 25 minutes of action each night. And finally, even though he’s not racking up the points, Marcus Smart has been a great facilitator all year long and is second on the team to Kyrie this year in assists.

Image result for marcus smart

Yeah, Marcus. I see you dropping dimes out there.

Otherwise, though, there’s not really anything to hang your hat on. The Celtics rank only ahead of the Magic, Hawks, and Suns in terms of offensive rating. Again, I know we’ve only seen the team play 13-of-82 games at this point, which is a paltry 16 percent of the regular season action the C’s will take part in this year. A lot can still change, and I’m not saying to hit the panic button.

BUT MAYBE we’re starting to see signs of trouble, those that aren’t found on the stat sheet, which could be a slight cause for concern.

Earlier last week, there were rumblings that Terry Rozier was unhappy with his bench role after being one of the team’s studs (at times) in the playoffs last year. Rozier downplayed the rumors on Thursday, but he didn’t necessarily deny them outright (h/t ESPN):

“I go from starting in the playoffs to coming off the bench. … I’m pretty sure it’s not easy for nobody. But I’m not complaining. And, if you know me, I would never be the one to complain about it. I would never go to the media or bring out the unhappy thing. Like I said, people that know me know I wouldn’t do that. I’ve never been a selfish type of person, selfish player. You can tell the way I play I’m all about team.”

He said he wouldn’t “complain” or “go to the media” about it, but that certainly does not constitute a denial of the rumor itself. Not in the slightest. I’m not saying I blame him either, as he could probably start for most teams throughout the league, but this is definitely a situation to monitor.

Image result for terry rozier

“Scary Terry” might soon become “Salty Terry” if the rumors are true.

And as much as I love Kyrie, the guy’s definitely a bit of a wild card. After rifling the ball into the stands after the game in Denver because some kid roasted him for almost 50 points that night – a move which I made sure to call him out for last week – he comes out with this comment after the team’s latest loss to Portland:

Really, man? So, having you – a former champion and THREE-time NBA Finals participant – Al Horford, and Gordon Hayward won’t cut it? You can’t express to them just what it takes to win a title, or at the very least get to an NBA Final – which, again, is something you’ve done yourself on multiple occasions?

For a guy who supposedly left Cleveland to be THE GUY, it doesn’t always seem as though Kyrie relishes the role. And while I’m not in the locker room and don’t want to just project, Horford and Hayward don’t really seem like big rah-rah-type leaders either.

So while it’s definitely too early to begin worrying about hard numbers and stats, it may not be too early to start monitoring the air in the locker room. As with any NBA roster loaded with talent, there comes a point where the “team-first” mentality can start to wane, for different reasons, after everyone gets a little taste of success.

I’m not jumping ship guys, and you shouldn’t either. But, Brad, it’s time to get ya boys in check now before it’s too late.

RIP Stan Lee

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TMZ – Stan Lee, the man who co-created Marvel Comics, has died … Stan’s daughter tells TMZ. We’re told an ambulance rushed to Lee’s Hollywood Hills home early Monday morning and he was rushed to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. We’re told that’s where he died. Lee had suffered several illnesses over the last year or so — he had a bout of pneumonia and vision issues.

Stan started Marvel with Jack Kirby in 1961 with The Fantastic Four. He went on to create Spider-Man, Black Panther, The Incredible Hulk, X-Men, Iron Man and The Avengers. Stan made cameo appearances in all of the Marvel movies.

Wow, what a sad and sobering headline to write. He was 95-years-old so he lived a long and incredibly successful life, but still a sad thing to see. Stan Lee made comic books cool. Fact, not opinion. Sure Kevin Feige deserves a ton of credit for nailing the formula for making a good superhero movie, but it was all based on Stan Lee’s work. Even before all the blockbusters, there were the 90s cartoons like Spider-Man the Animated Series.

But just think about the creative juices you need to have in your brain to create Spider-Man, the Hulk, Black Panther, the Fantastic Four, Iron Man, and the freaking X-Men! The guy was a genius and a lot of his comics touched on some pretty sensitive subjects way ahead of their time. While the underlying message of X-Men has become abundantly clear over the past couple of films, at its core this was a story that tackled civil rights and how they were granted to some types of people, but not others. Whether that was mutants, gay people, transgender, African Americans etc. – it was a pretty radical thing to write about when the X-Men were first created in 1963.

So Stan Lee was a wildly successful guy who created some of the most iconic characters and intellectual property of all time. The only sad part is that Disney just bought FOX and all its Marvel character rights, which is why we’ve only recently started to see crossovers like Spider-Man finally joining the Avengers. So unfortunately Stan Lee won’t get to see all his kids playing on screen together. I’m not sure what Marvel will do to honor the godfather of comic books, but after having a cameo appearance in every single Marvel movie, I’m sure it’ll be something special.

Is Kyrie Irving Courting Carmelo Anthony?

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Reports came out over the weekend that the Houston Rockets are about to part ways with Carmelo Anthony after just 12 games. Then we get this vague quote from Kyrie Irving alluding to the Celtics needing a 15 year vet (like Carmelo) to help out? Kyrie, lets not mess up a good thing here. Sure the Celtics are currently tanking on a roadtrip of their own losing 4 of their last 5, but for a team that puts a premium on defense, moving the ball, and everyone being multi-faceted, adding a 33-year-old iso guy is not the solution.

I remember we all had delusions of grandeur when there were rumors of a Rajon Rondo-Carmelo-Kevin Love Big Three. And I was all in on that. Mostly because I was an impatient fan looking for anything to jump start a post KG/Pierce/Allen Celtics team that had fallen on hard times.

Thats why I’m not a GM.

Danny Ainge instead opted to play the long game and put this team in arguably the most enviable position in the NBA with the current collection of players and draft capital.

So I’m not saying I’ve never wanted Carmelo, but just look at recent history and you’ll see this is not a guy the Celtics want to add. If he were a through and through 3 point guy, then I could see adding the veteran, similar to how the Heat brought on Ray Allen in 2012 just to drain wide open corner threes. But Melo is a career 34% shooter from three. That would be good enough for 168th in the NBA this season.

While it is tempting to add another elite ball handler, shooter, playmaker — this isn’t 2010. This isn’t the “I’m Coming Home” Knicks Melo. This is 2018 Melo who has averaged 22.4, 16.3, and 13.4 points per game the past 3 seasons on 3 different teams. Thats not a coincidence.

Hoodie Melo though? Give me Hoodie Melo and we can talk…

Former High School Phenom and Celtics Player Sebastian Telfair is Dropping an Album

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Former high school phenom and street ball legend Sebastian Telfair was on the Breakfast Club this morning and I was wondering why he was on the radio regailing tales of his NBA heyday. Apparently he’s dropping an album, which I’ll get to in a bit, but first I have to dive back into my long dormant obsession of one Sebastian Telfair. On the Breakfast Club Telfair even briefly touched on his time with the Boston Celtics. I’m paraphrasing here, but basically what he said was:

“Even the young guys was acting like old guys, like if that guy drives a Cadillac instead of a Bentley I’m not setting a screen for him.”

Telfair played on the worst Celtics team of my life as a fan: the 2006-07 squad that went 24-58 under Doc Rivers. Woof. That was the year Paul Pierce missed a bunch of time due to a foot injury and only appeared in 47 games. What I totally forgot though was just how young Telfair was when he joined the Celtics. In case you were wondering he averaged 6.1 points and 2.8 assists per game in his one year with the C’s. He was still only 21-years-old though and it was just his third year in the league! So its not like he was this total project of a player, which probably helped his value as he was later part of the earth shattering Kevin Garnett trade package just a few months later.

Now who was it that Telfair could be referring to? That Celtics team had a TON of young guys that were on a terrible team so I can imagine how toxic that environment was. Lets take a look at the young guys on that team. Since it was Telfair’s third year in the league, lets take a look at guys who had three years or less of NBA experience when he joined the team. Tony Allen, Ryan Gomes, Gerald Green, Al Jefferson, Kevinn Pinkney (?), Leon Powe, Allan Ray (not Ray Allen), Rajon Rondo, and Delonte West. Holy shit what a cast of characters. I don’t remember the last time I actually looked at the 2006-07 roster (why would anyone?), but I forgot how many “mercurial” players were on that team. I can totally picture Delonte West and Rajon Rondo hating on Telfair for no other reason than the publicity and fanfare he got for being good in high school. And thats before we even get to Kendrick Perkins, who is a favorite player of many Celtics fans, but is also known for being a complete prick too. My money is on Rondo and Perkins just icing Telfair out and straight up bullying him like Mean Girls.

Now it’s probably because I saw Telfair’s documentary Through the Fire when I was like 16 that I have such an affinity for the one time superstar in waiting.

Plus a closing credits song that bangs so hard its on my iPod (iPhone?) to this day.

He was one of the first high school basketball players to go straight to the pros not named Kobe, Garnett or LeBron. Jay-Z even spit a verse about the fucking guy on Dead Presidents.

Let me live out my dreams, until my heart give out
Devour cream, you know exactly what this is about
Fuck y’all mean, handlin’ since a teen
Like LeBron or Sebastian, high school graduates
Straight to the league, I ain’t waitin’ for my knee to blow
Yesterday I was needin’ this dough

Telfair was on the cover of magazines,

His high school games were on ESPN, he had the aforementioned documentary, HOV and Derek Jeter even went to watch him play. In a high school gym.

This was the real life Jesus Shuttlesworth as we all watched a 17-year-old kid decide what he wanted to do with his life. He ultimately ended up spurning the honorable Rick Pitino at Louisville to turn pro instead, going 13th overall to the Trailblazers.

After parts of 11 seasons in the NBA where he averaged 7.4 points and 3.5 rebounds over his career, Telfair went over to China just like his cousin Stephon Marbury and not surprisingly lit it up for a couple years. Now? Now we get mixtape Sebastian as Telfair is apparently dropping an album. Athletes releasing music almost always ends poorly, unless you’re Cole Beasley of course.

But we’ve buried the lede long enough. All athletes want to be rappers and all rappers want to be athletes, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t gonna give Sebastian Telfair’s debut album a listen. I literally could not find any mention of it on the internet though, which is not a great sign. But I was able to track it down after I finally landed on Telfair’s own Twitter page. So without further ado…