Bucs blackout spares bay area a bloodbath. The Steeler faithful showed up by the bus-load. The Bucs delivered a pant-load. I was there. I saw the terrible horrible awful towels. Raymond James handed out towels of their own to Buc fans in an attempt to counter the black and gold dominated atmosphere. White towels. In minutes they became white flags. Nice going, boys. You let Pittsburgh run a (Charlie) Batch in your face (yes, you read that correctly). Through sweaty bleary eyes glazed over by over-priced beer and defeat, Buc nation saw their darkest fears realized. Play a real good team? Get beat real good. Imagine if Big Ben was in the game. I mean, besides locking up your daughters and a run on mace at the Wal-Mart, imagine the final score. You like that? Wait, there's more. Now imagine Bengal quarterback, Carson Palmer watching film of the Bucs secondary getting torched by a 4th string nobody. And TO and Ocho-Cinco sitting behind him sharing popcorn and giggling like Beavis and Butthead. Do you see it? Enjoy the bye-week, Raheem. The good news? The last time Pittsburgh beat us at home, we won the Super Bowl that year. So um, you know. There's that. Plus, we don't have to see that loud towel-twirling beefy bunch in our backyard again until 2018. Think of it. Three years after Back to the Future 2 and one year before Bladerunner. Note to science geeks: Flying cars. You're really dropping the ball on that, poindexter. Get on it. They're super cool and you won't see panhandlers; at least until some bleeding heart invents jetpack-stamps.
Meanwhile across the bay, pitcher James Shields didn't want to leave the football crowd out of the Rays playoff berth celebration. So he gave up a three-run homer in the 6th against the Mariners to put off the champagne popping another night so we could all enjoy it, together. Wasn't that nice of him?
Bulls get a scare against the Western Kentucky Red Blobs Hilltoppers 24-12 (Not-so-fun fact: WKU lost to Kentucky 63-28, who lost to Florida 48-14). For Chissakes, boys. When the coach is heard to proclaim that there's no such thing as an ugly win, you can be fairly certain it's a post-game sound byte after an ugly win. Be thankful they have another tune-up with Florida Atlantic Saturday before Syracuse (not awful) and the one-two punch of a West Virginia-Cincinnati road trip. Concerned? We should be. And that's no bull (sorry). Hopefully the Skip Holtz honeymoon doesn't suffer a late-season choke, both in or out of the locker room. BAM!
Burton for president. After about the 3rd or 4th touchdown, the ESPN U commentators stopped calling him Tyler. Freshman backup qb-receiver Trey Burton scored six, six wonderful touchdowns (cue Count's laugh) in a 48-14 win over Kentucky. Sure, it's Kentucky. But that's what you're supposed to do to bad teams. Just ask Tennessee or Texas if they would like to trade places. Go ahead, ask. I'll wait. Well? Fine, I'll do it. They said, yes.
Okay, boys. Ready-set-Bama.
Quicker Hits: FSU finally beats Wake Forest like, well Wake Forest 31-zip; After firing their coach, Tampa Bay Rowdies lose again to Minne-zzzzzzzzzzzzz; Defensive tackle and unconscionable asshole Albert Haynesworth said that just because the Redskins paid him $32 million doesn't mean they can treat him like a slave (you can to me, Skins!); Finally, Tony Dungy was heard to have given the New York Yankees a pep talk. Jesus, Tony (Please note the comma between those two words. I cannot stress that point enough).
