September 10, 2007
So yeah, football season's underway again.
Good news: Sirius broadcasts every NFL game played. Bad news: But not online -- I'd have to sit in my car for three hours.
Good news: Sports bars. Bad news: I'd still be watching the Browns.
The 34-7 drubbing they took (I tuned out when it was 17-0 in the first quarter) was made worse only by the semi-literate Steelers announcers they picked up. I'll grant that the Cleveland broadcasters aren't superstars of any kind, but at least they speak English.
I'll have to check SportsCenter tonight to see footage of the most broken play I've ever heard of. Of seven officials, five threw penalty flags on a botched punt. The referee began his call with, "there were four fouls on the play, on the offense." Hockey games have penalty calls shorter than that.
Since you can only get penalized once per play in football, they wound up tacking a 10-yard holding penalty onto a 5-yard punt, so on that fourth down the Browns basically walked five yards backwards and knelt.
I think that was the high point.
In the interest of not boring all of you to tears, I'm going to lay off on sports-stuff unless something notable happens. So this'll probably be it for me for this year.
Edit, 12 Sep 7:14 PM: Oh look, they made TMQ with their bungling.
Sour Quarter of the Week: On the Browns' first possession, they lost 3 yards, then boomed a 15-yard punt -- and there were three penalties against Cleveland during the punt. Pittsburgh took over on the Browns' 22 and immediately scored. The Browns' second possession ended with an interception. The Browns' third possession ended with a punt on fourth-and-20. The Browns' fourth possession ended with a fumble.
Something tells me this won't be the last time this year. And TMQ missed the fourth call, illegal man downfield.
