Patriots Backup QB Danny Etling Taking Reps at Wide Receiver Now

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We’ve obviously seen this with the Patriots before as Julian Edelman was a QB at Kent State before becoming arguably Tom Brady’s best wide receiver ever. The Patriots love to move guys around the field whether its Edelman at WR, Cordarrelle Patterson at RB, or Troy Brown at defensive back so this isn’t necessarily a surprise. What is startling though is how BARREN the Patriots receiver group currently is that Belichick is resorting to second year QBs to help fill the gap.

This could just be a way to get an athlete on the field more or it could be Etling’s last shot at making the team. With Hoyer entrenched as Brady’s backup, I highly doubt the Patriots will carry four quarterbacks on the roster after drafting Jarett Stidham in the fourth round this year. Although the last time they did that it worked out pretty well when TB12 was QB4. If nothing else, we know Etling has some WHEELS.

‪Nike Just Unveiled the Official Home Whites of Side Chicks Everywhere

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I literally did a double take when I saw this on the Gram last night and had to check that it was actually from Nike and not some meme account. I don’t know why, but a hoodie that says FREAK on it is just laugh out loud funny to me. I fully expect this to become the home white kit for side chicks everywhere. I understand that Nike is referring to Giannis Antetokounmpo, but I’m sorry this is a hoodie for chicks proudly walking to the T at 7 am with disheveled hair and makeup running down their face. Might as well be a choker.

It’s the Opening Day of Training Camp! Here are Some Lowkey Patriots to Keep an Eye on This Summer

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As I sit here on the opening day of Patriots Training Camp 2019 (!!!), it’s really hard to decide exactly which of the many storylines surrounding the team right now is the most important:

  1. Is Julian Edelman’s thumb really OK? And what does it mean for the team’s still undefined receiving corps?
  2. Is Isaiah Wynn truly healed up? If so, is he actually ready to be Brady’s No. 1 protector?
  3. Is Sony Michel even reliable? Or is rookie Damien Harris going to come in and steal the show?
  4. Who is going to play tight end? And what the hell is a “Matt LaCosse”?
  5. How will the team fare after losing pretty much 99 percent of its coaching staff from last season? (OH, and our de facto GM also doesn’t want to be here anymore either. Let’s not forget about that.)
  6. And, of course, there’s also the never-ending Josh Gordon saga…

But, as with any team around the league, many of the major preseason worries and concerns will be addressed over the next couple of weeks, and per usual Belichick & Co. will find a way to ensure they don’t become major problems. Also, there’s already a smorgasbord of articles out there addressing each of the things I’ve mentioned above, and it’s all speculation at this point anyway.

So instead, ya boy Mattes is here to point out some under-the-radar guys who I’m really keeping my eye on at camp this summer. While most of them won’t be starters, a couple of them are players who have a chance to still make a major impact and serve as a key cog in a well-oiled 53-man machine. There are also others who might not be guaranteed a spot on the team as of yet but do have the chance to surprise some people this summer.

Chase Winovich – DE/OLB

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Our faithful 300s readers already know that I have been absolutely gushing about Winovich ever since he was drafted back in April. In fact, I wrote an entire feature article right after the draft dedicated solely to just how awesome this guy is. (Seriously, he is a gem as both a player and an individual.)

Though the team did go out and bring in Michael Bennett to replace Trey Flowers this offseason, Winovich’s ability to step in right away and produce is going to be vital. Even with Flowers last season, the team was pretty mediocre (to outright “bad” at times) in terms of their pass-rush. And on Sunday, we received the news that Deatrich Wise – who was my breakout candidate last preseason before suffering what became a nagging, season-long ankle injury – will start camp on the PUP list. While Wise could be ready to go by the start of the season, it’s certainly not very encouraging news, and the issue will likely still affect him early on in 2019.

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I still believe in you, D! But you gotta actually stay on that gridiron first.

Behind Bennett and Wise, there is not much else, at least not in terms of guys who can really get after the quarterback. This will likely be Derek Rivers’s last chance to prove that he’s not a bust, and John Simon is a nice rotational piece but certainly nothing to write home about. Keionta Davis has potential but has yet to prove himself; in truth, he probably needs a standout camp performance to even make the team. And while Lawrence Guy and Mike Pennel are a pretty solid interior combo, it’s clear that the team’s depth in terms of edge guys is pretty lackluster.

Winovich honestly has the ability to become the second- or third-best pass-rusher on this team right away behind Bennett and Kyle Van Noy (and maybe Jamie Collins, too). Not only do his insane combine numbers and college track record back that claim up, but he’s also got the attitude and drive to make it happen as well. This kid is going to be real fun to watch for years to come. Trust me.

Ja’Whuan Bentley – LB
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Bentley started off with a bang as a rookie last summer, standing out pretty much right away in the preseason and quickly earning a big-time role on defense early on in 2018. That is, before he tore his bicep in Week 3 against Detroit, forcing him to miss the remainder of the season. It was a pretty deflating outcome to what was a white-hot start to his career.

Seriously, though, Bentley received starter-level playing time before the injury, as he was in on 64 percent of the defensive snaps through the first three games before going down. Very rarely has a defensive rookie ever received so much trust from Belichick so quickly, and there’s no reason to expect he won’t be given the chance to grab hold of a big role once again in 2019.

Though both Van Noy and Dont’a Hightower are still here and the team brought back Jamie Collins, who has apparently looked fantastic so far, Bentley will still be asked to serve as a big, run-stuffing force in the middle. He even held his own in coverage last season, allowing only two-of-four targets against him to be completed, with an interception to boot. There’s no doubt that he’s earned the respect of Bill and the rest of the staff, which is not surprising considering that he was a three-time captain during his time at Purdue.

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Bentley was easily the heart and soul of the Boilermakers during his college days.

Bentley could be the next coming of Jerod Mayo – who also just so happens to be the man coaching Bentley and the rest of the linebackers this year. Hmmm…

Dontrelle Inman – WR

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Honestly, Inman shouldn’t even be eligible for this list considering he’s a five-year vet with over 150 career catches. Still, the dude is being slept on hard by the vast majority of beat writers in the area, and I just do not understand it.

Look, I know that Jules is still the team’s No. 1. Unless the thumb injury turns out to be something more serious, nothing is going to change that. N’Keal Harry, the team’s first-round pick this year, is also going to get every chance to become the No. 2. There’s also the potential for Josh Gordon to come back, and Phillip Dorsett is still here as well. And young guys like free-agent signing Maurice Harris and second-year man Braxton Berrios are getting their tires pumped as potential options, too. But I truly believe that Inman has the chance to become one of Brady’s favorite weapons by season’s end, and that is not hyperbole.

I already said as much in my piece breaking down the team’s wide receiver depth before the start of OTAs, but ICYMI here’s a little quick-hitter on the 30-year-old journeyman:

Inman is another big-bodied guy (6’3″, 205 pounds) who has bounced around a few teams the past couple of seasons (Chargers, Bears, Colts), and I’m not really sure why. In 2016, he put up 810 yards on 58 catches while playing with Philip Rivers. The Chargers even placed a second-round tender on him the following offseason when he was set to become a restricted free agent. And in just four starts with the Colts last year (nine games played overall), he hauled in three touchdowns with 28 catches on only 39 targets.

Again, I have no idea why he’s shuffled around the NFL as much as he has in recent years, but this is actually a really good signing. Inman could honestly surprise a lot of people this year playing with the G.O.A.T.

Especially with Gronk no longer being a part of this team (for now??), Inman’s profile and skill set could be huge for the team’s offense. Yes, there is the chance he loses out in the positional battle, and there are some out there who think he’s no guarantee to even make the roster. (And I’ll eat a huge crow pie if he’s back on the unemployment line come late August.) However, I really believe in Inman, and I think you should, too.

Obi Melifonwu – S
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Melifonwu is one of those uber-athletic but still super raw players with oodles of potential and a long way to go. The fact that he was a second-round pick by the Raiders just two years ago demonstrates the type of talent he possesses; the fact that he’s already on his second team after being drafted only two years ago shows that he’s also far from a sure thing. Still, Belichick thought highly enough of the 25-year-old to sign him to a two-year deal last November, shortly after being released by Oakland.

He ultimately only appeared in just two games for the Pats last season, recording a measly three tackles. To be fair, though, Melifonwu was also less than a year removed from hip surgery at the time of the signing. In fact, because of the same injury, he never even really had a chance to get on the field for the Raiders before getting cut at the beginning of his second season in the league. Belichick obviously wasn’t going to throw him into the fire right away, especially with the team already having such a loaded secondary.

Still, this was a guy who had 118 tackles and four picks as a senior at UConn, and he could have a chance to earn a spot in the rotation behind Devin McCourty, Pat Chung, and Duron Harmon this season. But it is certainly going to be an uphill battle. The biggest roadblocks for Melifonwu are Nate Ebner and free-agent signing Terrence Brooks, both of whom are special-teams standouts and thus probably already have a leg up on Melifonwu in terms of making the roster. The Pats also traded up to select Joejuan Williams in the second round in April. And though Williams is being listed as a cornerback by many, he also profiles as a CB/S hybrid, much in the mold of Melifonwu.

But there’s no doubt that Melinfonwu’s ceiling as an overall player is significant, and the former Huskies star could potentially turn heads this summer if he’s finally healthy once again.

And just a few more quick ones:

Braxton Berrios, Maurice Harris, and Jakobi Meyers – WR: Rather than doing an individual write-up on each of them, they will instead be grouped as one trio battling amongst themselves for the final one or two spots on the receiving depth chart. Berrios is the one who has been receiving the most attention from those close to the team, and Harris showed some serious flashes down in Washington last year. Meyers is another one whose name has been tossed around in certain circles as well.  I do expect one or two of these three to make the roster and provide the team with some much-needed security (and long-term hope) at what is currently an entirely unsettled position.

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Some are already pegging Berrios as the next big thing. 

Keion Crossen – CB: Here’s someone who was quietly decent last season. While he did not ascend to the same heights as fellow 2018 rookie corner J.C. Jackson, he did appear in 11 games and played on over 20 percent of the defensive snaps in each of the final two regular-season contests. Though he really didn’t show up on the stat sheet, there were a few plays where you might remember hearing his name called. Cornerback is actually one of the only positions where the Patriots have some serious young talent that they can build upon for years to come. Crossen should be one of those guys.

Jakob Johnson – TE/FB: This is really more about pure intrigue and wishful thinking than anything else. To be honest, I don’t think the 6’5″, 285-pound German spectacle has a snowball’s chance of making the roster, but at least the monster of a man can’t be entirely ignored. Especially with the dearth of options the team has at tight end – even after yesterday’s signing of Lance Kendricks (mehhh) – it’s not like he doesn’t have the opportunity to prove himself. Regardless, he’ll be a fun guy to monitor all summer long. (Here’s a quick write-up from Red on the big fella after the team initially signed him back in April.)

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This guy is a complete wild card but a beast nonetheless.

Regardless of what happens with any of these guys, though, all that matters is that football is back, baby! Let the fun begin.

Marc Savard Joins the Enemies

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Really, Savvy? Really. One of the more underrated members of Bruins Twitter has now jumped ship and is a member of the Stanley Cup Champion St. Louis Blues. Savard would openly root for the Bruins during playoff games, and seemed to be invested in how the team did despite the ugly ending to his career.

Seriously, though good for him. It was a long, dark road to recovery for Marc Savard and I’m happy to see him back in the NHL.

Would love to be a fly on the wall though when he speaks to fellow Blues assistant coach “Brave” Steve Ott for the first time though.

Jalen Ramsey Arrives at Camp in an Armored Truck

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ESPN – Looking for a raise, Jacksonville Jaguars defensive back Jalen Ramsey showed up at training camp in an armored bank truck Wednesday.

At least he showed up. Defensive end Yannick Ngakoue did not report to the team facility with the rest of his teammates because he wants a new contract, a league source told ESPN’s Adam Schefter.

Ramsey said after June’s mandatory minicamp practice that his agent told him the Jaguars will not give him a contract extension in 2019. Roughly an hour later, Ramsey joked on social media that he’s going to “ask for so much money, they have to put me on lay-away.”

Us sports fans are sort of blatant contradiction. Lots of folks try to at least say out loud that at least 95% of their interest in sports lies in the games themselves. In their teams and wins and losses. In successes and failures.

They/we try and say that the rest of what goes into sports – the drama between players and coaches, contract disputes, off the field tomfoolery, doesn’t peak our interest. If it’s not the product on the field/ice/court it is of noooo concern to us. No sir.

At the same time, we all know that is a lie.  We discuss amongst ourselves ad nauseum all that drama and gossip as if we just started season 1 of “Gossip Girl” and are trying to figure out the true identity of this mysterious scribe. It is the worst kept secret in fandom.

One of the specific items of interest of late concerns NFL players and their handling of dissatisfaction with their contracts. Arguably the league’s best Running Back, Le’Veon Bell, sat out all of last season losing an entire years pay, rather than play for the Steelers who he decided were not compensating nor treating him fairly. Before that season began, NO ONE would have believed you had you said Bell would forego the whole year to make his point. But he did.

So now it’s pure exhilaration watching contract disputes because the guy might show up or he may just take paddle boarding lessons in San Diego for a year. Who the fuck knows?

Which brings us to our headline. Jalen Ramsay, never one for the subtle or understated, showed up to training camp in an armored car. He quite literally showed his team that he wants them to “back the Brinks truck up” as a sign of his value. What. A. Move. It’s one thing to hold out, like his teammate Yannick Ngakoue. It’s another to tweet. Another to give interviews. But to roll up ready to get ripped off by Affleck, Renner, and the boys is a different play altogether.

Now obviously it is a massive question whether or not this pays off (GET IT!?) for Jalen Ramsey. Does forgoing a respectable luxury car, sports car, limo, or any other normative means of transportation in favor of hopping out of the back of an armored car drive the point home enough? Does it make Jaguars execs look at Ramsey and say, “you know what, he’s right. Pay him,”? I don’t know. Sure am glad I don’t have to make that decision though.

The rest of this preseason should be chock full of contract and roster drama. We’ll all find it fun, even when we pretend we’d rather talk about the 2-0 pitchers duel the Red Sox just put us through in 95 degree heat. We’ll all even know better.

Maybe that’s just it.

 

-Joey B.

How I Became a Diehard European Soccer Fan

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As a Boston sports fan, I’ve been a bit spoiled over the last two decades. I’ve seen my teams win 11 championships in 17 years (I’m not a Celtics fan, that one doesn’t count.) We’ve been in the championship round 16 times. We’ve been in the Conference Championship round 21 times. Yeah, it’s been pretty sweet.

But, there is a downside to all this success.

*This is the part where if you’re not from Boston you might want to skip a few lines.*

I just can’t get myself up for regular season games anymore. It just doesn’t have the juice. Yeah, I’ll “watch” the Red Sox or the Bruins in the regular season. (Patriots are different because of the nature of the NFL.) But usually, it’s on an iPad on mute, while the majority of my attention is devoted to a TV show or movie or some funny internet video. I know the storylines surrounding my teams during the regular season, and I still root for them and everything, but the days of me having my main focus on them during some mid-June game against the Texas Rangers or a late-December game against the Calgary Flames are over.

As a result, there’s been a void in my sports life. I have seen all my teams win a championship, and while winning subsequent championships are awesome, nothing quite compares to that time you see your team win their first championship. Everything changes after that. It’s not life or death anymore. Yeah, it really sucks when the Bruins put up an absolute stinker in Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final. and it did sting for a few days. But that was nothing compared to blowing a 3-0 series lead vs. the Flyers in 2010. That was real heartache.

So I found myself missing that feeling while watching sports. I needed a new journey for a championship. A new team that hadn’t won anything before. 

Enter Tottenham Hotspur.

*****************************

I’ve always enjoyed watching soccer. But I was one of those “once every four years” type of fans. I’d watch every United States Mens National Team match in the World Cup and would love watching the best players in the world, even if I only recognized Messi, Ronaldo and a handful of other players. But once the World Cup was over, my attention would move elsewhere and I would barely give soccer a second thought.

That changed in the summer of 2018, when the Americans didn’t qualify for the World Cup. With no rooting interest, I was able to really just enjoy the entire tournament more. Really focus on the top teams and players. I wondered to myself why I don’t watch this more, why not pick a team to root for.

So that’s what I did.

After the World Cup was over, me and my buddy were both equally amped about soccer and needed more of it in our lives. So we set on a quest to pick a team to root for.

We knew we were going to pick an English Premier League team. That league was generally regarded as one of the best leagues in the world, and it would provide us the opportunity to watch the majority of our team’s games on a basic cable plan.

I also knew I wasn’t going to pick a team that was already really, really good. Manchester City had just won the EPL title last year, so they were out. Manchester United would basically be like rooting for the Yankees, no thanks. Chelsea? Arsenal? Nothing really drew me there. And again, those were all teams with a storied history of winning.

I won’t lie, I had a natural inclination to want to pick Liverpool. They are owned by the same owners as the Red Sox, so that could be a natural partnership. They have a long domestic championship drought. Liverpool is the home of the Beatles, the best musical group who has ever lived. They had a recognizable player that even a casual fan knew in Mo Salah. I even had a Liverpool flag as a child from a trip my dad took. All the signs were there.

But the more I thought about it, becoming a Liverpool fan made no sense to me.

First, John Henry and Tom Werner annoy me. So out of touch with what the basic fan wants. Why would I voluntarily choose to root for a team owned by them? They were just coming off a Champions League final and had won a European championship in 2005. Yeah, they have that long wait for a domestic championship, but it just felt too EASY to be a Liverpool fan. They were one of the favorites to win the EPL. I wanted it to be hard, I wanted a championship to mean something.

So we turned our attention to North London. I was vaguely familiar with Tottenham before, but all I knew of them was that they were a good, not great team who always had a knack for choking in the big games. It sounded like pre-2004 Red Sox to me. I was also familiar with their star player Harry Kane. He had just won the Golden Boot in the World Cup and led England to the semifinals.

Their kits weren’t ugly. They were playing Champions League football next season. They were building a new stadium and had a ton of young players to build around. They were a team on the rise who was poised to continue getting better and better in the next few years. It also didn’t hurt that they were located in London, so it could be an ideal place to combine a vacation and a game.

So we went with them. I wasn’t sure how long my Spurs fandom would last, and figured it might just be a fad that would dwindle eventually.

Instead, they took me on one of the most incredible single-season sports roller coasters that I’ve ever experienced.

*****

The best thing about soccer is the morning games. 7:30 AM is the perfect time to hold a sporting event. You’re able to get up at a decent hour, sit on the couch and watch your team play, and still have the rest of the day to do everything else you need to do. Waking up every Saturday or Sunday morning to watch Spurs play became something I eagerly looked forward to every week.

They got off to a hot start, going 15-4 in the EPL’s first half of the season, and I quickly started to become familiar with all the players on the team. Harry Kane was the star and you could tell right away. He had the most scoring chances, and scored the most goals. An obvious leader. There was Dele Alli who could seemingly nutmeg (which I quickly learned was dribbling the ball through your opponent’s legs) defenders once or twice a game. There was the poise and brilliance of midfielder Christian Eriksen on set pieces.  Moussa Sissoko was basically like watching a bull in a china shop. Danny Rose was the Brad Marchand getting under every opponent’s skin. Jan Vertonghen and Toby Alderweireld were the Belgian rocks on defense.

But my favorite player became Heung-Min Son, a South Korean national. He always seemed to show up in the big matches, including this incredible goal against Chelsea early in the season.

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He also played with the biggest smile on his face and seemed to just enjoy being out on the pitch every day. I mean look at this adorable boy.


As soon as I knew every player’s quirks and weaknesses, I knew I was hooked. My yelling at Kieran Trippier letting attacker after attacker waltz right by him reminded me of how I used to scream at Dennis Wideman or Joe Carlo or Kyle McLaren. Backup striker Fernando Llorente’s inability to do anything positive was infuriating. I genuinely cared about this team.

Watching the EPL during the weekend mornings was great, but I found myself more drawn to the Champions League. The Champions League was my chance to watch the biggest players in the world, and to see how my Spurs matched up against them. They were drawn in a group with Barcelona (Messi!, Suarez!), and Inter Milan (I had heard of them!) so I was immediately hyped to see how they matched up against the best in soccer. 

Their Champions League campaign started horribly. They let up two goals in the last 5 minutes to lose to Inter, then lost to Messi and Barca, before drawing some Dutch team I had never even heard of. They basically had to be flawless in the last three games of the group stage to even have a chance to move on to the knockout stage. All the blogs and Twitter follows I started reading over the last few months all said the same thing, this was “Spursy”, which you can find so elegantly defined here in Urban Dictionary. “To consistently and inevitably fail to live up to expectations.” This is why I told myself I became a Spurs fan. I knew there would be lows.

But then a funny thing happened. Spurs started pulling some magic out of their ass. After letting up an opening goal to the Dutch team, Kane scored two goals in the last twelve minutes for a miraculous win. Then Eriksen scored in the 80th minute to beat Inter. They got some help along the way, and all they basically needed to do was draw Barca and get some help to move on.

They let up a ridiculous goal in the opening seven minutes, but Spurs kept coming and coming before this from Brazilian striker Lucas Moura



I jumped off of my couch, something I hadn’t done in the middle of December since god knows when.

I then became obsessed. I woke up early one morning just to watch on my iPad who they would be drawn with in the Round of 16 (think NBA lottery). I was stoked to see it was Borussia Dortmund, a top German team who featured the next American star in Christian Pulisic, but a beatable team. Spurs dominated the first leg 3-0 while Kane was out with an injury. I spent the next two weeks until the next leg constantly watching highlights of the victory, before they finished them off.

They got a poor draw in the quarterfinals. Manchester City, who led the Premier League and was the favorites at the time to win the Champions League. I figured this would be the end of the run. City was just such a deep team. Fortunately, City thought the same thing, and came out with a conservative approach. Still, when Harry Kane suffered a brutal injury halfway through the first leg, I figured they were cooked. Until my guy Sonny came to the rescue.

So up 1-0 heading into the final leg on the road without Kane, still didn’t feel confident. I had been trained that my team wasn’t good enough. What unfolded in that second leg, was one of the craziest sporting events I’ve ever witnessed.



Just watch those highlights. They are must watch if you haven’t seen them. Four goals in the first 11 minutes! In soccer! There isn’t supposed to be scoring in soccer! It went back and forth, there was controversy, heartbreak, overturned goals, edge on your seat tension. It was incredible. I swear it’s one of the most phenomenal sporting events I’d ever seen. European soccer analysts were debating whether it was one of the best matches EVER. I’d been a soccer fan for nine months and I’ve already seen my team win one of the best matches of ALL-TIME. Was my Boston fandom spreading across the pond?

We got Ajax, a scrappy Dutch team, in the semifinals. The first leg at home sucked. Out-played and fortunate to only be down 1-0. They then let up two goals in the first half of the second leg. They had run out of gas. Still, the semifinals of the Champions League is the furthest they had ever gone, and they are taking steps toward the future.. but then wait a minute, no…



THEY DID IT AGAIN. That’s two completely emotional, unbelievable victories in about a three-week span. I will put this game up against any other sport-watching experience during my sport fandom as well. Well maybe not 28-3. But this was close! Back from the dead! Onto the final. Just jaw-dropping. How did I become so lucky?

It was around this time I started thinking about the Lippa Quadruple. The Red Sox and Patriots had already won titles in the last six months. The Bruins were on their Stanley Cup run, and Spurs were in the Champions League Final. If all four of my favorite teams (yes, by this point I cared about Spurs just as much the other three teams), won championships in the SAME YEAR, where do I go from here? I think I’d have to retire from sports fandom? I don’t think it could get much higher.

Well, those dreams came crashing quickly. Of course we were facing Liverpool, and they capitalized on an early penalty and pretty much put a stranglehold on the final. After such an incredible Champions League run, the final was a complete dud of a game, even for neutral observers. It was brutal, they’d gone this far only to put in a terrible performance. This was an experience I’d feel again just two weeks later.

I still couldn’t get enough Spurs though. I found myself reading British newspapers, trying to figure out what their offseason moves would be. Who’s coming, who’s going? Speculating on who they could get, and how they would get them. I was diehard.

Sunday morning, I woke up to watch the Spurs first preseason game. Pre-season! No chance you’ll see me watching Red Sox or Patriots or Bruins pre-season games. But I wanted to see how our new signing, Tanguy Ndombele, fit in (spoiler: he looked great) and just be able to watch the team again. Oh, and Harry Kane scored one of the most remarkable goals you’ll ever see.

That preseason goal gave me more joy than anything our floundering baseball team has provided this season.

So here we are, the Red Sox stink and are a lifeless team, the Patriots season doesn’t start until the AFC Championship game, and it’s a long nine months before the annual Bruins-Leafs first round playoff series. But the biggest thing circled on my sporting calendar right now is Aug. 10.

Spurs opening day. 

N’Keal Harry Was Not Happy One Iota Regarding the Patriots Rookie Head Shaving Ritual

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Arizonasports.com – It appears former Arizona State Sun Devils wide receiver N’Keal Harry is not aware of some of his potential rookie duties coming soon in the NFL.

While joining “Fair Game with Kristine Leahy” on Fox Sports 1, Harry was asked by Leahy which bad haircut he would rather have.

Harry was perplexed by the oddity of the question coming out of nowhere, which left Leahy compelled to make sure he knew of the New England Patriots’ tradition of giving rookies terrible haircuts.

Crushed. Devastated. Inconsolable beyond belief. Those are just a words and phrases to describe N’Keal Harry’s face in the screenshot from this interview. He looks like a friend-zoned kid who took the girl he’s secretly had a deep, profound crush on to the prom “as friends” only to have to watch her dance with someone else, possibly with some roaming hands involved.

I myself, like a couple of other folks here at The 300s, take my hair seriously. It’s a part of how I present myself. But I see Harry as someone who truly sees it as part of his identity. And now at the hands of Dont’a Hightower, Julian Edelman, Patrick Chung or otherwise ruthlessly mischievous veteran, his identity may just be male pattern baldness or whatever the inverse of a high top fade is. Someone might just yell out “GIVE HIM THE HAIRCUT VERSION OF THE UPSIDE DOWN” and leave it to the pro football player/amateur barber to interpret.

I for one enjoy me a little hazing as long as it doesn’t cross the line into assault, which this doesn’t. For these guys their lives now need to be about the team and football, not their hair, which is what this ritual represents in a way. So my advice to a man such as N’Keal Harry is to, in a way, cherish the atrocities about to be committed to your luscious locks, as only a very select people ever achieve the greatness necessary to earn it.

And then there are some people like Rex Burkhead who are genetically predisposed to avoid it altogether. That probably sucks worse.

-Joey B.

Good Humor Has Unofficially Put Me in Charge of Bringing Back Bubble Play

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There are few things I love more than America, Baseball, and Ice Cream. My family sure, but to be honest it’s kind of close. There’s nothing better than sitting at a game in the midst of summer, watching your favorite team take down a rival while you soak up the sun and snack on a delicious frozen treat. Years back, there existed something that encompassed all three of the key components I named above. I’m talking about Good Humor’s Bubble Play. 

I’ll pause to let you reflect as your taste buds take you back to a time of euphoric delights, a staple of the youth of every millennial child from sea to shining sea.

Bubble Play was the perfect summer treat, straight from the ice cream truck circling your neighborhood after you just got done running through the sprinkler. Unfortunately, it’s been years since it’s been available and the world was never the same. Some say the current political climate is due to the lack of Bubble Play, but that’s neither here nor there. 

But what if I told you, we had a chance to restore our summers to former greatness?

Good Humor has proposed to me that I come up with a plan to revive Bubble Play.

The only thing that millennials are better at than making great social media campaigns is reviving products of yesteryear. So I ask you, please use the hashtag #BringBackBubblePlay and show Good Humor just how much you love and miss Bubble Play, and maybe, just maybe, we can save the summers yet to come.

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New British Prime Minister Boris Johnson Has a 100 Trucking Rating

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I probably watch more cable news than any of the other writers here at The 300s but I don’t follow European politics too closely, so I don’t know much about this new British Prime Minister. All I know is that I am intrigued by a world leader whose Trucking Rating would be higher than most NFL running backs.

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The fact that the new Prime Minister of the United Kingdom isn’t afraid to bulldoze an elementary schooler in a pick-up game is impressive. World leaders take note: Boris plays to win the game. He’s an OG member of the not-messing-around crew.

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I respect the hell out of Boris’s hustle. I’m the guy who runs out ground balls in adult softball leagues. (Maybe that’s why my brother-in-law’s team didn’t invite me back?) As a guy who has younger brothers, and as someone who worked as a summer camp counselor back in the day, I don’t believe in letting little kids win. What does that teach them? Make them earn it!

I once Dikembe Mutombo’d a kid in a pick-up basketball game. He cried. I felt bad.  But then he learned a very valuable lesson. The next time I went for a rebound in the corner I jammed my pinkie finger so bad my hand hurt for three weeks.  The lesson learned? Karma.

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I never blocked a kid again, and that kid learned the value of the pump fake.

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Only time will tell how well Boris’s playground experience prepared him for the world stage.

Amanda Knox is Having a Moon-Themed Wedding and She Wants You to Pay For It

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Yahoo – In the universe of wacky wedding planning, Amanda Knox’s betrothal to poet Christopher Robinson surely is in a galaxy all its own. The couple have set up a crowdfunding wedding registry site to raise $10,000 to help pay for their moonscape matrimony.

Knox posted a video of Robinson’s elaborate space-themed proposal on YouTube last year, so clearly the wedding theme was established then.

I know this is a cliched way to dive into a blog but….I don’t even know where to begin.

If you’re too young, dumb, or oblivious to know who Amanda Knox is, I’ll lay it out briefly. In 2007, Amanda Knox was an American college student studying abroad in Perugia, Italy. Then her British roommate was was brutally murder and Knox, her Italian boyfriend, and a sort of nomadic-type, burglar-by-trade guy they sort of knew were all interchangeably charged. They all were convicted and sentence to between 20 and 30 years. Problem was that Knox and the boyfriend’s case had more holes than Iraqi Navy. They served about two years before, after a a second “appeal” trial they were acquitted and released. They put her, kind of laughably as the US was never going to send her back to Italy, back on trial in 2013 but was acqitted again. A couple years ago Netflix put out  a documentary on the whole ordeal. This is an important thing to note as I made two conclusions:

1.) They had very little on her and she 90% didn’t do it
2.) At the same time she is a weeeeeeeeeeeeird bird so maybe she did.

Basically you come away feeling like despite the fact that criminal justice system-wise she should have never been convicted, holy fuck there is something up with this girl.

So a few years later, a few years in which she has stayed out of the public eye because she lives in Lewinsky-esque infamy, she has now resurfaced throwing a space wedding. She is marrying a poet and throwing a space wedding complete with a “moonscape” and  blaring of “Intergalactic” by the Beastie Boys. And they want to crowdsource the whole thing.

I honestly don’t know what to even do with this much material. You’d think if you were a formerly convicted murder marrying a poet after years underground you might do things a little more subtly. Then again, you might think someone crowdsourcing their wedding might not lead off with, “Let’s face it, we don’t need anymore stuff.” But like I said, homicidal or not the girl is tapped.

But far be it from me to be a hater. if you’d like to donate for LEDs, cosmic centerpieces, or like the like feel free. Just do yourself a favor and watch the doc before you know who you’re buying fake light sabers for.