Quote of the Week

I've always loved watching football at every level, but I pretty much hate football culture. Ultimately, football culture is a big part of the reason I chose never to play football growing up, opting instead for the equally weird but much less self-congratulatory culture of baseball. I've always rolled my eyes at the idiotic insistence of football players on drawing war analogies (it's only cool when George Carlin does it), the incessant chest-thumping and celebrating by players and coaches alike, and the general taking-oneself-too-seriously attitude of all those in the game.

And then, of course, there are the commentators--the gratuitious "this guy" usage of Jon Gruden, the grammatically disastrous repetition of "than what" from Troy Aikman, and whatever the hell Merril Hoge is talking about.

But most of all, I think what drives me crazy about football culture... is the fact that they can't stop saying the word "football". Football players make football plays in football games. Gotta take care of the football. We need to do a better job of running the football. Guys, we get it. The name of your game is football. But can we just call your ball a "ball", like everyone else does?

I guess not. This weekend, Ravens head coach John Harbaugh may have set a new record, explaining his team's terrible loss to the Seahawks by saying the word "football" nine times in 30 seconds. Not an easy task. Take it away, John...

This week's QUOTE OF THE WEEK 

"You play better football, you win football games like that. And that goes to all of us, that's what we have to do, we have to coach better, we have to play better, and we'll win those three football games. But, you know, we've won some other football games that people didn't expect us to win, against some really good football teams. So, tie the psychology together on that for me, you know? But I don't have time to be looking at that, we're going back to football. And we'll study the football as a football team, we'll have our answers in-house, we'll have our answers that will be football-related answers, and we'll come out and we'll play on Sunday."
                        - Ravens head coach John Harbaugh
  
Yes, and remind me again what it is that you'll be playing on Sunday? My memory is bad, you'll have to help me out here... oh, that's right. Football.