PETA Thinks Vick Is Just Average

Remember when you were in the dating game and you would go out of your way to learn more about your prospective date's interests and research them/it so you'd make a good impression?

Most you just answered no, and seemingly ex NFL Quarterback and dogfight Godfather Michael Vick doesn't know what I am referring to either.

In a reported attempt to win PETA's endorsement to return to the NFL, Vick took a PETA generated test on empathy and was prepared enough to shine with a C on it.

Hold up.......PETA's endorsement to return to the NFL?

Supposedly, PETA has lobbied the NFL and is bamboozling them with an Obi Wan jedi mind trick, including being quoted as saying:

"Commissioner Goodell knows that he has an obligation to the league and to millions of fans, including children... to make sure Michael Vick is mentally capable of remorse before he can touch, let alone wear, an NFL uniform again."

This quote is much more powerful when you imagine a minimally clad woman in a cage with red paint on her reciting it while waving her paw, er... hand over the fake horizon in front of her in a confident manner.

This issue was important enough to Vick's handlers (or dollar sucking hangers on) to prepare him so he could get an impressive "C". Where would that type of effort landed one of Vick's dogs? Don't even think about it.

Before you pajama clad Frappers with low impulse filters throw red paint on your monitor and then find some way to blame it on me, let me just disclose that I love animals and have a house full of them. They get treated better than I do and I am also keenly aware that if a fire broke out and the Bent family had a choice to make, the animals would have nothing to worry about while yours truly would be in trouble.

But I am not ashamed to simply say that I also love me some McNuggets, and refuse to feel bad about it. Especially when there's plenty of dipping sauce available.

Check out the bizarre test and futile attempt by Vick to make the the grade.

Sports Douche of the Week

This week's award goes hands down to Anquan Boldin.  At the end of the Arizona Cardinals biggest victory in franchise history, Boldin was so upset that he wasn't in on the final 14 plays of the game that he refused to celebrate with his teammates and was reportedly seen leaving early via the back door.  That's right: Boldin was so butt-hurt that he wasn't used at the end of the game in which his team won the freakin' NFC Championship that he passed on slapping five with his teammates and drinking some bubbly.     

This of course is just the culmination of a rocky season with Boldin, who started the season saying that he would never re-sign with the Cardinals after they failed to sign an extention with him.  And in consistent fashion, Boldin will try to keep these weeks leading up to the Super Bowl all about him and not about upsetting the Steelers in Super Bowl XLIII.    

A New NFL Legacy is Born

Regardless of what happens in the Super Bowl two weeks from now, by getting the Cardinals there, Kurt Warner has earned himself one of the most unique NFL legacies ever.

Most of you readers of the Sports Frappe are pretty knowledgeable, so I won't go through his entire story here. You know he came out of nowhere in 1999 as an undrafted, 28 year old third string quarterback to lead the hapless Rams franchise to two Super Bowl appearances and one championship.

You also know that before this season, he was considered washed up for at least the previous four years. He wasn't even supposed to be the starter of the Cardinals, and yet today we can say he has taken one of the NFL's worst franchises to their first ever Super Bowl.

The NFL world never gave him a chance to begin with, and then was quick to count him out when his career hit its first bump. Who else has risen to the top twice, in both of these circumstances? Through it all, by most accounts, he has remained a family man true to his convictions. He has thanked God for each victory, even jokingly apologizing for it yesterday.

I honestly don't think we've seen a football player like him, and I doubt we will again.

It's interesting to contrast Warner's new legacy with the declining legacy of Brett Favre. I don't want to pile on Favre at this point - he has taken a lot of abuse lately. Years from now, we will mostly remember Favre for his MVPs and gun slinger mentality, and selectively forget his recent Jets incarnation.

But for now, the fact is that he has damaged his own legacy. He put the team that loved him - the Packers - in an incredibly difficult position by renouncing his retirement. The trade to the Jets looked like a great match. The problem is that Favre acted the same way with the Jets that he did with the Packers - like an aloof old-timer who was somewhat above the rest of the team. This didn't cause any problem with the Packers because Favre was the face of the franchise who outdated anyone and everyone who walked into that locker room. But with a new team, that doesn't work, and Favre should have realized that before he requested a trade.

So as the season closed, we saw a fading Favre who looked old and broken - and worst of all, as the season ended with no playoffs, his teammates ripped him.

Other than being MVPs, Warner and Favre have little in common, and their legacies will show that to be true.

It's Rickey Time

Rickey Henderson will be entering into the baseball Hall of Fame this year, and since I grew up idolizing the man (I wanted to be like Rickey so badly that after I read his autobiography in the 4th grade, I stole third when my coach gave me the red light because that was what Rickey would do), I thought I'd go ahead and write Rickey Henderson's acceptance speech for him. Here it is:

"Thank you. Thank you. When Rickey Henderson heard that Rickey Henderson had be elected to the Hall of Fame, Rickey Henderson said, 'Well of course Rickey Henderson was voted into the Hall of Fame.' Rickey Henderson just can't believe that 28 writers didn't vote for Rickey Henderson. If Rickey Henderson could vote, even Rickey Henderson would have voted for Rickey Henderson. Rickey Henderson is the greatest offensive threat in the history of baseball. So Rickey Henderson thought Rickey Henderson would share some stories about Rickey Henderson today, but Rickey Henderson has already heard them all, so Rickey Henderson thought Rickey Henderson should ask one simple question. If Rickey Henderson signs with a team next season, because everyone knows Rickey Henderson can still out steal any leadoff hitter in the game right now, will Rickey Henderson still be in the Hall of Fame or will Rickey Henderson have to be put on probational status? Someone call Rickey Henderson with that answer because Rickey Henderson wants to know.

That's pretty much all Rickey Henderson has to say about Rickey Henderson. Thank you. And, oh yeah, Rickey Henderson is the greatest of all time."

My hat goes off to Rickey. I'm still pulling for a franchise to sign him this next season so that he can finish off his 300 homers. That may sound ridiculous given that he is now 50 years old, but if anyone could do it, I'd put my money on Rickey.

New GM, Same Old (Sorry) Team

After an abysmal 2-14 season, the Kansas City Chiefs are ready to embrace anyone who can let them focus on next year. The first major step for the franchise was booting Carl Peterson out of the office of general manager and hinting that Herm Edwards would not have a job next season. The next move was to hire a new GM and get this off season underway. Well, Kansas City, your long awaited savior has come, and his name is Scott Pioli.

For those who are unfamiliar, Scott Pioli was the vice president of player personnel for the Patriots in 2002 and has 3 Super Bowl Championships to his name. That's two more than the entire Chiefs franchise. And now he's leaving his friend Bill Belichick to take on the challenge of one of the worst teams in the NFL who has plenty of upside. With the 3rd overall pick in the draft and 32 million dollars under the cap, Pioli can't complain about his hands being tied.

But while Kansas City celebrates this hiring (Jack Harry, an NBC Sports commentator for the Kansas City affiliate, ludicrously said it sounds like the best thing that the Chiefs have had for at least 40 years), it's going to take a lot more than a GM with an impressive resume to bring the Chiefs out of this funk. No matter what Pioli decides to do with the head coach position, we're looking at at least a four year struggle before the Chiefs win a playoff game. Until then, fans are just going to have to enjoy their newly renovated stadium and their beloved off seasons which are always brighter than the actual season.

By the way, you know your franchise is in a sorry state when the Arizona Cardinals have won more playoff games in the last 38 years than your team. A new GM certainly doesn't miraculously turn that around.

Goodbye, Tony Dungy

Tony Dungy announced his retirement from coaching today. Most will remember him as a class act - except for this blogger. I will remember him as the coach who seemed to take pleasure in wrapping up an early playoff spot, and then blatantly forfeiting his team's remaining games. To me, this act was more disrespectful to the game than any form of cheating - I think it was bad for the NFL, bad for the fans, and on the whole, bad for the Indianapolis Colts. Many will miss you Dungy, I will not.

My Love For the BCS System

I was just about to write a beautifully crafted blog about why I love BCS, but Will Forte from Saturday Night Live beat me to it.  So instead of writing something new, I'll just pass him the mic.

One More Vote for Utah

In my previous post, I stated that I won't think of any one team as the national champion; but if pressed to cast a vote, my vote goes to Utah.

Don't misrepresent me - I am not usually on the bandwagon of the non-BCS conference schools. Some guys are always arguing for the trendy non-BCS school of the year. This is really the first time I've found myself in this position - but Utah really does deserve the national championship.

I came to this realization while watching (and partially sleeping through) last night's game. It was sloppy, and not at all what I had hoped it would be - which was simply a great college football game. It's hard to blame the schools for this part, they're lay-off is way over the top.

Utah, on the other hand, drubbed Alabama. They looked dominant against a team that looked dominant against most of the SEC (save Florida, I know, I know). Now, looking back on the bowl season, they beat teams in the regular season who won significant bowl match ups (TCU and Oregon State).

As for Florida and Tim Tebow, congratulations, you have earned all the accolades you are receiving. I only hope Tebow gives us one more year before going pro, please don't leave us the way Vince Young did.

But as for my vote, it goes to Utah.

Even playoffs could not have saved this season

Looking back at this season of college football, with the BCS championship game still to play, I have one point I would like to make: Not even an 8 team playoff could have solved the dilemma that this season posed. There were just too many deserving teams.

If we consider our recent bowl games as the first round of playoffs, let's see who would be remaining for the next round: USC, Utah, Texas, Virginia Tech, and oh yeah, those two teams still playing: Florida and Oklahoma.

So in this hypothetical playoff scenario we're working with, we've got 6 (or 5 after Thursday night) teams remaining. In BCS games, we eliminated Penn State, Ohio State (no surprise), Cincinnati, and Alabama. But we also got lucky here, because Boise State and Texas Tech, who were well deserving of hypothetical playoff berths, were eliminated by opponents we didn't consider so deserving (TCU and Ole Miss).

That's at least twelve teams all originally deserving shots at the title. Let's face it, there is no way the NCAA will ever consider a four round playoff bracket. Any playoff fix that they do offer us will be a patchwork fix - teams will be left out that deserve to be there.

But let's remember, the last two seasons have been especially unique. Usually, there is at least one team that clearly deserves to be in the national title game, with the rest of the NCAA arguing over the chance to play them. The last two years, both teams have arrived to the championship with plenty of naysayers, plenty of teams with a valid argument that they deserve to be there instead.

So as I watch Thursday night's game, I'm just going to enjoy what oughta be a great college football game. One team will claim to be the national champion at the end, but as far as I'm concerned, this season didn't really have a champion, and I'm okay with that.

On the practical side, I'm starting to warm up to the new trendy playoff plan, the "bowls plus one" idea. The idea is to move all of the traditional BCS bowls back to New Year's Day or earlier, and only after they are completed, use the BCS standings to declare the two contenders in the championship game to take place January 8th. Many have complained that bowl games should not be incorporated into any playoff plan because it ruins the whole point of a bowl game - but I think this "plus one" idea is okay because it treats the bowls as more of a potential qualifier instead of an actual playoff round. Most importantly, the bowl games will weed out the pretenders from the contenders (this season's examples: Texas Tech, Alabama, any team from the Big Ten). And we'll get a real idea of how strong a conference is before we choose the championship match up. For instance, this entire season, the Pac 10 was thought of as one of the weaker BCS conferences, but they went 5-0 in bowl games, mostly against teams ranked higher than them.

It isn't really a solution, but it's better than what we got, and it does a pretty good job at saving the historical tradition of the New Year's bowl games.