Go Steelers.
Kinda swamped the next two days, so hopefully Tim can pick up the slack till Wednesday.
*** Update ***
A decisive Steelers win.
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[…] From the comments: […]
Come for the politics, stay for the snark.
Baby steps, because the Republican Party is full of angry babies.
This must be what justice looks like, not vengeful, just peaceful exuberance.
The Supreme Court cannot be allowed to become the ultimate, unaccountable arbiter of everything.
Consistently wrong since 2002
Republicans don’t lie to be believed, they lie to be repeated.
When you’re a Republican, they let you do it.
I did not have this on my fuck 2025 bingo card.
Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.
Every decision we make has lots of baggage with it, known or unknown.
Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.
If you still can’t see these things even now, maybe politics isn’t your forte and you should stop writing about it.
Petty moves from a petty man.
GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.
They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!
I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.
You come for women, you’re gonna get your ass kicked.
I would try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.
One lie, alone, tears the fabric of reality.
You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.
Our messy unity will be our strength.
Trump’s cabinet: like a magic 8 ball that only gives wrong answers.
Fight for a just cause, love your fellow man, live a good life.
Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?
We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.
Far North
That is why I can’t stand instant replay. How in the fuck do you call that an incomplete pass. The 9ers got jobbed. Get rid of instant replay. I don’t care if they give an INT to Pittsburgh. That would have been the wrong call too but at least it would have been made on the fiels.
zzyzx
I don’t understand how that INT was turned into an incomplete pass.
I chose the Steelers this week in my suicide pool so I’m with you this week.
zzyzx
I don’t think it could have been a reception because the receiver only took one step. Since he hadn’t made the football move, he would have had to keep reception through hitting the ground.
Far North
No intentional grounding on Rothlisbugrer? WTF. OK, the officiating is getting to me and it’s ruining the game. I need to switch to the history channel or go outside for some fresh air.
zzyzx
You definitely have a case with the grounding call.
Far North
zz,
It looked like possesion to me. He didn’t have it long but it looked long enough.
Sometimes it gets to the point where I focus too much on the officiating and I can’t enjoy the game. That’s what has happened today. On Pitts second touchdown drive, there was that crappy holding call on Nate Clements. Then again, maybe if SF tackled a little better it wouldn’t matter.
Tim F.
Short punt baby. Good thing since SF’s punter has an inhuman leg.
zzyzx
The holding call was legit. The defender had jersey and a lot of it.
Think of the catch as an out of bounds play. The rule is that you have to get both feet down and maintain possession all the way through landing. It’s a weird rule that only applies before both feet are down and a move is made. If it had been a few steps later, it’s a completion.
zzyzx
Having said all that, that’s just how I understand the rule. I could be wrong.
Far North
SF doesn’t have the offense to be a top notch team. Defense looks good for the most part but as a team SF isn’t good enough to overcome a bad call or two. Somewhere these bad calls even out, just not today.
And damn, Rothlisberger is tough to bring down. We should have had a couple more sacks.
Far North
Tim – Good point on the punter. He was our bright spot today. If I had a game ball to give, Andy Lee would get it.
Zifnab25
That’s completely freak’n ridiculous. If we’d had cameras this good on the field in the 50s, on one would think twice about using them to rule on balls. I’d much rather see a dozen refs reviewing the play a dozen times than one bad call ruin a football game. You end up with a lot fewer disgruntled fans and confused bystanders when you can just bring up the video, see exactly what happened, and make a good call based on sound rules. The coach usually has to throw a TO to get a review anyway, so its no skin off anyone’s nose.
That said, the Texans ran a close game against the Colts today, and even though they lost I couldn’t be happier. If someone had told me the ’06 Texans came within six points of Manning, I’d call him a liar. But if we could have given Schaub a solid drive with that ball, we could easily have seen a 3-0 season for Houston.
Far North
Zifnab,
What’s ridiculous is disrupting the game to have an official put his head under a blanket and come out and announce a ruling that defies logic. Then you end up with a lot more disgruntled fans and confused bystanders because all the official had to do “was just bring up the video, see exactly what happened, and make a good call based on sound rules”.
I’ve hated instant replay ever since the Tuck game in Boston. Replay disrupts the flow of the game. There are still too many replay rulings that are un-fricken-believable.
Tim P.
I think they have a pretty good replay system in the NCAA; with no refs going under blankets and a dedicated replay official, the calls go much quicker and keep the flow of the game somewhat. Certainly better than the NFL’s at least.
zzyzx
Geez, almost the same exact thing just happened to the Seahawks, only this time it was a pick :/
Far North
We’re stuck with the Giants / Deadskins game up here so I didn’t see it. Did the officials botch another call?
Far North
How could the Chargers think that Norv Turner was the answer as coach? I love it when teams hire a tired old retread. It never works.
Punchy
Cleveland missing that kick cost me a healthy dose of money. Oak’s coach, Kiffin, played that SAME bullshit that was pulled on him last week….the last second TO that makes the kicker kick twice.
Worst fucking rule in the NFL. They MUST abolish this bullshit.
Baghdad Bob Cole
Kinda swamped the next two days, so hopefully Tim can pick up the slack till Wednesday.
Translation:
Hopefully this whole NY Times mess is forgotten by then…
PaulW
It was sheer ego on the part of the general manager, AJ Smith. His wiki entry on hiring Norv Turner (described as the worst coach ever) has been vandalized as of Sept. 23rd 8:25 pm est btw. Smith and Shottenheimer didn’t get along, and the owner sided with Smith. Shotty did have a rep as a weak postseason coach (gee, so did Dungy), but still, going with Norv Turner?! I guess Ray Perkins was unavailable…
The Stranger
John Cole…you ended up looking pretty darned silly over the TNR-Beauchamp fraud.
Ditto with the NYT Moron.org Betrayus ad.
Unhappy Dolphins Fan
Heh – PaulW – Norv Turner was hired because CAM CAMERON was already taken. Sheesh, talk about turrble coachin’..
Andrew
The Stranger. Isn’t that where you sit on your hand until it goes numb?
cleek
… and then you beat off with the numb hand.
awesome!
Andrew
I thought that part was obvious.
D-Chance.
Another Thirtysomething-to-something win for the Cowboys. The 5-0 Cowboys hosting the 5-0 New England Patriots in mid-October… your Super Bowl preview?
Mike
Clearly they were worried about meeting the 49ers in the Super Bowl and decided to preemptively cripple their offense. That part of the plan worked perfectly.
Far North
Wonder if the 9ers can get a hold of Tom Walsh. Winter is the slow season for his his bed and breakfast in Idaho. After going over the offensive game plan, he can whip up ham and cheese omlettes for the O line.
Ninerdave
Well, while my Niners got smoked, the Offense at long last showed up. First half was great.
Weird officiating…
Punchy
Rex Grossman will be run out of town in Chi-town. Deservedly so, of course.
Griese starts all the games from here on out, IMO. Fantasy players take note.
Punchy
Rex Grossman will be run out of town in Chi-town. Deservedly so, of course.
Griese starts all the games from here on out, IMO. Fantasy players take note.
Kevin K.
I think the stranger ended up here because a certain insufferable, over-italicized homunculus from Denver is lobbing huff-huffs at his ex-pal John Cole again.
timb
Protein Wisdom fans are back, with their leering come-ons and admonitions about victories.
Apparently, according to the Jeff, we have won in Iraq. I mean that’s what I took from his important post re: the Moveon/NYT kerfluffle. See, the ad guy at the Times was actually a jihadist (maybe even Jamil Hussein!) and he got together with Scott Beauchamp to give MoveOn a break on their ad.
By Jeff and the brave chickenhawk Bob Owens revealing the story (which has obvious profound national and international repercussions, the US government, headed by a man they never mention or write about (seriously, you could “read” Protein Wisdom for three weeks and get sort of handle regarding whom to cockslap, but you’d never see the name “Bush”), can finally reveal that the IED’s and attacks in Iraq are being set by journalists!
The journalists ARE the insurgents. We’re through the looking glass here, people.
So, the lesson is when you call some place to put an ad and say “I’d like to run on Monday” and the other person says “we’ll see what we can do” and then charges you standby, then you really crossed the wongnut line! They oppose ALL advertising discounts, except those given to Rudy Guliani for whining.
DougJ
Did you guys see that the Wash Post trotted out Stephen Glass’s old editor — Chuck Lane — to trash Rather over the lawsuit and the allegedly fake memos? The piece itself is weirdly shrill and unfunny, almost like Jeff Goldstein had written it:
Here, then, the letter — written by Dan Rather and dated Nov. 31, 2006:
Strange, huh?
Bob In Pacifica
What is this “football move” crap? Ever since they’ve been talking it it’s given an excuse for refs to blow calls. Maybe they want dancing with the stars moves. Davis caught the ball, both, BOTH feet touched the ground. He got smashed, hit the ground, rolled, his elbow hit the turf, and the ball popped out. He was either down or it was an interception. But he was down.
I’m not saying that it would have changed the outcome, the Steelers are one of the best teams in the league and the Niners might be able to win in the worst division in the league. But when Pa Kettle tried to explain the call you could see the shit coming out of his ears.
They should get rid of “football moves.” It’s a load of crap.
Andrew
No, we were watching football.
Tim F.
As John predicted, some morons never seem to understand a single thing that he types.
The Other Steve
Have you guys caught this? Someone over at dKos posted it.
At the Values Voter Debate… otherwise known as the Republican base, everyone was led in song… to the tune of ‘God Bless America’, the lyrics have been changed to ‘God Hates America’. Or maybe it’s just Republicans. Whatever, it’s truly disgusting.
The Other Steve
I don’t understand. If you hate General Betrayus so much, why do you keep talking about it?
The Stranger
Looks like Balloon Juice is 0 for two against Confederate Yankee….and they have been routs.
Zifnab
Much like the Swiftboat Purple Band-aid Brigade, some wingnuts just can’t get enough of hiding behind our military to play partisan sniping games. The “You can’t attack our party operatives because they’re wearing a uniform” game is an old and venerated technique, dating back to Vietnam when the “America hates the troops” myth got started.
It didn’t keep two-war veteran Chuck Hagel from getting smeared as “Senator Betrayus” by the armchair soldiers of the 101st Limbaugh Battalion, but you’ll never see a wingnut mention that. Because IOKIYAR.
pharniel
what does IOKIYAR mean anyway?
The Other Steve
Somebody bring me my fucking Gatorade! I’m back in the game!
Zifnab
Its OK if you are Republican
Also sometimes IOKIARDI (Its OK if a Republican Does it)
chopper
i, for one, always believe in boasts coming from dudes named after masturbation.
Bubblegum Tate
I’m choosing to believe he’s named after the masturbatory technique and not my favorite novel. I’d hate for my favorite novel to be associated with someone so obtuse–it’s still recovering from when Bush pretended to have read it.
Zifnab
What, Bush was referring to the book when he said he got all the way through the Confederate Yankee? Oh, thank god. I can finally start using it again without feeling dirty.
cleek
maybe he’s a really big Billy Joel fan:
You may never understand
How the stranger is inspired
But he isn’t always evil
And he is not always wrong
Though you drown in good intentions
You will never quench the fire
You’ll give in to your desire
When the stranger comes along
F’YEAH!
"Fair and Balanced" Dave
The Steelers have looked pretty impressive in their first three games however the 49ers were the first good team they faced (Cleveland, despite their shootout victory against Cincy last week, is still mediocre at best and the Buffalo Bills may be the weakest team in the NFL).
Next week could be interesting. For one thing, the Arizona Cardinals are much better than they’ve been in quite a while. The played a really strong game against the Ravens in Baltimore. Another factor is that the Cardinals new head and assistant coaches, Ken Wisenhut and Russ Grimm, were both assistant coaches at Pittsburgh (Wisenhut was the offensive coordinator, Russ Grimm was the offensive line coach) and both men were candidates for the Steelers’ head coach job–eventually losing out to Mike Tomlin.
The big question for the Cardinals’ will be who starts at quarterback next week. Leinert has been the team’s starter but the Cards were a totally different team when Kurt Warner came into the game against Baltimore and helped erase a 17 point deficit eventually tying the game with less than 2 minutes to play.
Seth
Just a quibble, but Whis did not lose out to Tomlin. He took the Cards job rather than wait to see if he would be offered the Steelers job. As a Steelers fan, I am glad. I think it was time for an infusion of new blood. So far it looks like it worked.