So I'm sitting at home today thinking when something hits me in my skull in regards to ranting about all things sports. Given how much ESPN I consume on the average, why not take at least three topics that are ranted on [in some instances as blindly as can be] and do it my way. I'm gonna do this tonight, then starting next week, every Saturday [since I need to do more writing over the course of the weekend and what not] thereafter. So after sitting at home and tossing things back and forth in my head the three topics I'm going to get all "Grimey" on are as follows...

- Nicocchio Going To 'Bama
- The Not So Mighty Quinn
- When Being Overrated Is Too Much and Nonachieving Isn't Enough.

So alright, I'm partially taking this from my dawg Stephen A. Smith, but I digress. Before I get into that, allow me to very quickly touch on the NFC picture or the Jigsaw Puzzle For Retards that is sadly, the NFC. Let me first state that growing up as a little Grimey Guy in Jersey, the NFC was the Alpha and Omega of the NFL. If you ever told me that the AFC would rise to Mt. Fuji-esque levels and the NFC would sink lower than the combined stocks of Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson amongst real Blacks, I would've laughed in your face. But alas, this has happened. I was all but ready to go all rantalicious on these two games, but why bother? All four teams while being fatally flawed in their own, sadly unique ways are as mediocrity and this year's top two NFC teams would have it, all capable of booking trips to Miami for February 4th. So, here are my picks:

New York over Philly
Dallas over Seattle

I'm sorry, but the Madden Curse will rear its true form [Titans fans can see where I'm going with this] and Shaun Alexander will make one costly, unconventionalish error that dooms this team. On top of that, I had no clue their secondary was as patchwork as a quilt. Dallas will pick these boys apart through the air.

As for NY over Philly, let me be clear about something. Two things actually. One, this is quasi-personal for me as someone I used to know has royally pissed me off and I'd love to see her team crash and burn horribly. I actually miss laughing at these clowns, I really do and secondly, by no means is a win good enough to save Coughlin's job in NY or is it enough to get me to not go back home armed to the teeth to force his resignation Tony Soprano style. Only ONE thing can save it and stop me and that's a Vince Lombardi trophy. Alright, onto the Grimey Three.

The Not So Mighty Quinn And What ND Really Stands For...

Well, last night saw the Quitting Irish go down yet again, leading me to think a few things. First, this particular BCS spot could've gone to a more deserving team that would've put up even half of a fight more than what the No Dice Quitting Irish did against LSU.

Now please, spare me the whole 'it was practically a home game for LSU' crap. Maybe if No Dice would've won at least one game against a school that wasn't Cupcake University, A Non Football Playing Academy or what have you [read: against a team with two pair between their legs] maybe ND would have had a better draw.

But anyhow, what makes me laugh isn't the fact that for this decade long extension that they gave Charlie Weis he's yet to win a game against an actual university that plays football while a black guy who did exactly what Weis did in his first year got zilch other than a pink slip once things turned south. I'm beyond that.

What makes me laugh is how the Not So Mighty Quinn, whose softer than the toilet paper in my bathroom whenever the game becomes big time, is being hailed as the #1 pick in this April's draft. What's got me plitting my sides in absolute and I mean flat out laughter is that earlier this week or last week, he put in a word to the Browns for them to draft him with their 3rd or 4th pick.

Yeah, like they really need another 1st round pick wasted on a overrated, nonachieving, sure to disappear on your team and most likely to turn into Rick Mirer 2.0 since the Browns have five invisible men as their OL.

As I sat down listening to ATH this evening, I thought to myself, these dumbasses are probably going to do it just on general stupidity alone. I mean, I'm anti-playoffs in college football, and the multitude of great games this bowl season has more than justified it. However, there are a few things about the BCS that I'd tweak considerably, such as the one rule where by virtue of name only, No Dice University gets an automatic BCS bid if it wins 10 games. The only legitimate games they played this year against actual opposition [Michigan, USC, LSU] they were BLOWN OUT in all three games. Can someone justify to me how a school with 9 straight bowl losses deserves a BCS bid over a school like Arkansas or Wisconsin? Please, I'm dying to hear this.

Niccochio's Rolling, Tide Won't.

Just when I think this man can't get any dumber with the moves he makes, he makes one even dumber than the last. First, he left about as cushy a job as you'll find in the SEC with the Bayou Bengals to coach the all but paraplegic Dolphins, which haven't been spit since the 70s. Got full control of that team and made them even worse than they were when he took over. So after about two weeks of telling the world that he had no interest in the job at Alabama that damn near everyone within the college ranks wouldn't go near with someone else's body to boot, Niccochio does the predictable 180 and walks north of the Florida border to Alabama.

Let's just throw out the fact that he's been a success everywhere he's gone in college, including Toledo for just a second. The man lied to one of the nicest owners in all of professional sports in Huzienga, lied to an organization, and basically told the Dolphins in no uncertain terms, "take this job and shove it up your asses, I'm going back to college since I can't fix what I've wrecked beyond all recognition."

Now, as for why the Tide won't roll this upcoming season or any other after that is real simple. LSU, Arkansas, and Auburn for starters and oh yeah, that's just within the SEC West. I haven't even talked about those damn Gators in Gainesville that Urban Legend In The Making is coaching up, or those Gamecocks that the Ole Ball Coach is coaching up in Columbia. Can't forget about Tennessee either.

So while he went from one wreck to another, this is actually going to be worse because, as I paraphrase Rick Pitino here, Shaun Alexander isn't walking through that door anytime soon. I mean, if I'm an 18 year old kid watching this with any common sense at all, how can I take this guy at his word? He said for two straight weeks he wouldn't take the job in Tuscaloosa, now he is. But to put the Larry Brown made cherry on top of this BS made sundae, he punctuated his press conference today by stating this will be his last coaching job. Oh and if your heart was always in college football, WHY IN THE HELL DID YOU LEAVE LSU YOU DAMN MORON?! Another rant for another time though, enjoy getting rolled up and smoked like a joint by Auburn on a yearly basis.

Overrated And Nonachieving

I'm going NBA with this one and the overrated part deals with the Cavs. Yes, I know the Eastern Conference has sunk to NFCish proportions in regards to mediocrity. They've got the Titanic division where it's all but conceivable that a sub .500 team will actually win the damn thing and I guess force Adolf Stern's hand to once again rearrange the playoff seeding to placate the teams that actually finish over the Mendoza Line but are forced to count ping pong balls in Secaucus instead of playing postseason ball.

I live in Akron, so you can only imagine how much I get to hear about any and all things LeBron, hence why I don't watch local news or any of his games on FSN Ohio just to hear two grown men verbally suck off one of the biggest nonachieving, overrated basticos to ever play the game. Just 48 hours ago, this overrated Cavs squad beat the Spurs, my pick to win it all this June. Mind you, this still left the Cavs in second place within the Central but if you asked the average moron err fan here, it makes the Cavs ready for primetime and LeBron taking the Larry O'Brien trophy from Stern in June. Then last night, LBJ's
ridiculous 75 foot bomb from Foxboro aside, they struggle to beat the AAU squad that's posing as the Boston Celtics.

And someone really expects me to believe that this bunch of nonachieving, overrated basticos with Eric Snowball's Chance In Hell of averaging more than 10 PPG running the point can actually win the East, then beat the Best of the West? Yeah right.

Next thing someone's gonna tell me is that Detroit actually fired someone for not doing their job. What? You mean someone from the Lions actually got a pink slip? Oh, it wasn't Matt Millen, never mind. So to show the good people of Detroit that they're firmly committed to mediocrity, they fire not the man who has drafted 3 wide receivers who combined haven't done anything worthwhile and sign a QB who probably is closer to filing for Social Security than he is of leading a team to the playoffs...they fire the first year defensive coordinator who as luck may or may not have it, is black.

Now, I don't really like to make race an issue when it comes to all things in general, but I call BS on this in a major major way. Matt Millen has done nothing other than look smug while ensuring that the Lions hit Enron depths of futility in the NFL. If it weren't for the fact that the Tigers roared out of their near two-decade-long coma last summer to take the AL Central and then lose the worst World Series ever to the Cards, they'd be the worst thing in Michigan right now. Lloyd Carr's a really distant second.

The fact is, despite everything in the book, paperback and every other publication you can think of justifying this man being thrown out of Lions HQ on his ass, he maintains employment despite owning a home in the state of Pennsylvania. Yeah, gets dumber doesn't it?

I've never in my years of living seen a team so bad that its fans stage walkouts to protest the futility they're having to witness. Makes me wonder aloud why Knicks fans haven't caught onto this, but with ticket prices being so damn high there, I guess they're content to just bite the bullet and boo ole Zeke Dummy to their heart's content. As for ole Matt Moron, if it weren't for the fact that the Ford family as a whole or whomever from that sad family owns controlling interest like him so much, he'd be long gone anywhere else.

Hell, even here in Brownstown, he'd have been given his walking papers. But, sometimes nonachieving has its benefits.

Just ask Millen.