Congrats to Mr. & Mrs. Railhead for posting the largest gain this week, doubling up on the G-Men!

Another exciting week in the NFL.

The Giants continue to look scary good.

And the mighty Titans fell to the J-E-T-S who have won 7 of their last 8 and have started everyone thinking about a NY/NY Super Bowl.
I wonder who Springsteen cheers for. And I wonder how Favre?s 39-year
old body is going to feel come February. The oldest quarterback to win
a Super Bowl was John Elway in 1998 at 37 years of age. I don?t know how they do it. I am tired by the time week 13 rolls around just from waking up every Sunday morning and going to the bar to watch the games.

I?m sure the Lions were disappointed not to be the first team to beat the Titans on Thursday!

The Browns would be so much more fun to watch if the announcers called the coach Cromeo.

Can we just replace the AFC West with the top 4 teams from the Big XII??

Can we just put the NBA on hold until 2010 when we know where LeBron will be??

Oakland had scored only 9 offensive touchdowns in the first 11 weeks of the season. Heading into hostile territory, playing at Mile High Stadium, they had not scored an offensive touchdown in a month. Somehow, they were able to score 3 offensive TDs on Sunday and one bonus special teams TD.

McNabb was benched for the first time in his career. I wonder if he
knew that was possible. Sad that Reid wasn?t even the one to tell him.
He left the honors to the QB coach. Nice leadership there, Andy! We?ll
see what happens to the Eagles on Thursday. Evidently McNabb will be
the starter.

Matt Cassel
was the first NE quarterback to throw for back to back 400+ yard games.
He?s making it more and more difficult for the Patriots to overlook him
as a future contributor. And fantasy owners need to stop overlooking
him!!! 51% of owners with Cassel on their roster had him on the bench
on Sunday. According to the internet for computers, there are
30,000,000 people that play fantasy football. If each league has
between 10 and 12 teams, an average of 11 teams, then there are
2,727,272 active leagues. That means that there were 1,390,909 people
are kicking themselves. That?s a lot of red tushies!!!

Speaking of fantasy football, I lost my fantasy game this week. I am
all but eliminated from the playoffs. It was a close game going into Monday Night. I had Aaron Rodgers and the team I was playing had Drew Brees.
Under normal circumstances, I wish some sort of temporary paralysis to
the player that I?m facing. But I just couldn?t do it with Drew. I love
him. Even though he just wiped me out of fantasy football. I still love
him.

Let me tell you why. My dad went to Purdue. My sister and I were
tikes. Or, as I liked to think of it, the shortest co-eds on campus. We
lived in what was called Married Student Housing. As it turns out, the
house that we lived in was situated smack dab in the middle of
Fraternity Row. We had no money. We were so poor, we couldn?t even
afford the trailing ?o? and ?r? and were just called po?. My mom worked
part time in a health food store. The owner took pity on our family.
So, rather than tossing the rotten food in to the garbage, he gave it
to us. We would enhance the rotten food with some delicious meat that
my dad would score from the meat lab. Did you realize that you can feed
a family of 4 for at least a week on one head of rotten cabbage and
some cow tongue? West Lafayette can be a little harsh in the winter. It
wasn?t unusual for our toilets to be frozen over and icicles to appear
on the inside of our windows. I don?t want you to think this is
a sob story. Far from! I consider this to be the best upbringing ever!
My family is awesome and rock solid and we truly enjoy spending time
together. I consider myself to be infinitely thankful for that and for
the way I was raised. (I?m typing this as my family is driving to
Denver to spend Thanksgiving with me, so I?m a wee bit nostalgic).

What does this have to do with Drew Brees?? Oh, yeah. Well even
though we didn?t have 2 pennies to rub together, we had season tickets
to the Purdue Boilermakers football games.
It was there that I fell in love with the game of football. Well, it
was actually there that I first learned the agony of having your dreams
crushed. The Boilermakers had these baton girls that were called Golden Girls. No, Bea Arthur was not out there twirling the baton! The Golden Girls
were these gorgeous creatures that would come out with the band at half
time and possessed such grace and beauty and would absolutely enthrall
me. I wanted to be a Golden Girl
more than anything. After practicing and practicing my little heart
out, my sister crushed my dreams by informing me that only blonde girls
could be Golden Girls. In retrospect, she was probably saving
me from years of pain by slashing my dreams right there. I have the
grace and agility of a drunken 3 legged platypus on an incline.

Anyway, once my hopes and dreams were shattered, I was able to focus on things other than the Golden Girls during the football game. Like the world?s largest drum! Oh, and I started watching the game,
too. And I loved the game. My sister and I had always talked about
going to Purdue for college, but both of us ended up at Texas Tech.
Purdue remains my 2^nd favorite school. And I have loved
following them over the years. I was actually disappointed when Brees
left Texas. (He was undefeated his senior year at Austin Westlake and
beat Abeline Cooper to win the Texas State Championship? interestingly Dominic Rhodes
was on that Abeline Cooper team). As sad as it was to have Texas bred
talent leave the state, I was so happy that he went to Purdue. There,
he and Joe Tiller teamed up. And they introduced the Big Ten and the rest of the country to the spread offense. At Purdue, Brees shattered almost every passing record in the Big Ten.
And he took the Boilermakers to the first Rose Bowl
in over 25 years. And I just loved watching him. He was so poised on
the field. I have always been impressed with how well he handles
pressure.

One thing that I attribute to his incredible poise and precision is
his birthmark. I have a theory that his birthmark actually speaks to
him. His birthmark looks down the field, sizes up the defense, watches
their formations and spots the open man. Upon spotting the receiver,
the birthmark says ?throw the ball, Drew? in this high pitched voice
that is somehow inaudible to any nearby offensive linemen, defenders or
officials. The birthmark also says, ?hand it off, Drew?, ?slide, Drew?,
and ?throw it away to avoid the sack, Drew?. Just for my own added
pleasure, I usually reenact the voice while Drew is making the play.

I wanted to double up on New Orleans
when they faced the Chargers in London. I really liked their matchup
against San Diego. But I just wasn?t sure how the birthmark would
handle jet lag. Also, would the birthmark, while exposed to the English
culture, develop a British accent? I tend to do this. If I am exposed
to a particularly strong accent for a long period of time, I will begin
to mimic it. But I?m not sure if birthmarks have these same tendencies.
I was surprised to find that there is precious little information on
this topic. I asked a dermatologist who is a supposed expert in the
field of birthmarks, but she made it sound like birthmarks don?t have
their own personalities and voices. Whatever! One of my freckles
started yelling that maybe she should go back to school and become a
real doctor, but I left to save him the dignity.

I recently read that Drew?s parents considered having the birthmark
removed when he was a boy. Evidently the doctors convinced his parents
that there was no harm in him keeping it. Can you imagine if he had it
removed?? He certainly wouldn?t be the quarterback he is today.
Doubtful he?d even be in the NFL. Mark Brunell would have started on Monday Night. He probably would have thrown 5 INTs and I would have won my fantasy game. <sigh>

I?m still glad he kept the birthmark. I still enjoy watching him and
his little friend on his face shatter records. Heck, I still love him!

Hope everyone has a great plucking Thanksgiving!

Gobble, gobble!!!

Juicy