SBM Exclusive: The Worst Teams Of All Time

Here’s another feature from Sports Blog Movement. One of the things we love to do in sports is celebrate success, but in order to truly appreciate greatness, we must look at the other side of the coin.  This series, aptly enough called the Worst Teams of All Time, is dedicated to some of the worst teams in the history of sports.  Some were just truly bad, and some became bad at the wrong time.  Either way, all of them exemplify the opposite of greatness. Some had laughable regular seasons, and some had strong ones, only to die in the post-season. In any event, sit back and enjoy a good laugh or a good cry and celebrate the teams that were woeful so you can better appreciate the teams that weren’t.

Part 41: The Michigan Wolverines in the 1985 NCAA Tournament

Part 40:  The 1992 Seattle Seahawks

Part 39: The 1976 Montreal Expos

Part 38: The 2013 Winnipeg Blue Bombers

Part 37: The 1982-83 Houston Rockets

Part 36: The 1992-93 Ottawa Senators

Part 35: The 2002 Saudi Arabian World Cup Soccer Team

Part 34:  The 1989 Dallas Cowboys

Part 33: The 1998 Winnipeg Blue Bombers

Part 32: The 1982 Pittsburgh Pirates

Part 31: The 1986-87 Los Angeles Clippers

Part 30: The 1977-78 Minnesota North Stars

Part 29: The 1998 U.S. World Cup Soccer Team

Part 28: The 1996 New York Jets

Part 27:  The 2007 Toronto Argonauts

Part 26: The 1982 Minnesota Twins

Part 25: The 2007-08 Miami Heat

Part 24: The 1984-85 Toronto Maple Leafs

Part 23: The 1994 Greek World Cup Soccer Team

Part 22: The 2004 San Francisco 49ers

Part 21: The 1985 Calgary Stampeders

Part 2o: The 1987 Cleveland Indians

Part 19: The 2000-01 Chicago Bulls

Part 18: The 2000-01 New York Islanders   

Part 17: The 2001 XFL Birmingham Thunderbolts

Part 16: The 1990 United Arab Emirates World Cup Soccer Team

Part 15: The 1980 New Orleans Saints

Part 14: The 2003 Hamilton Tiger-Cats

Part 13: The 1998 Florida Marlins

Part 12: The 2009-2010 New Jersey Nets

Part 11: The 1989-90 Quebec Nordiques

Part 1o: The 1986 Canada World Cup Soccer Team

Part 9: The 1976 Tampa Bat Buccaneers

Part 8: The 2003 Detroit Tigers

Part 7: The 1992-93 Dallas Mavericks

Part 6: The 1980-81 Winnipeg Jets

Part 5: The 1982 El Salvador World Cup Soccer Team

Part 4: The 2008 Detroit Lions

Part 3: The 1993 New York Mets

Part 2: The 1982-83 Cleveland Cavaliers

Part 1: The 1974-75 Washington Capitals

Stay tuned, there’s more to come…

SBM Exclusive – The Deep Six: Why the Richard Sherman Postgame Interview Is Being Blown Out of Proportion‏‏‏‏

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By now we’ve probably already seen all of the clips of Richard Sherman’s postgame interview with FOX sideline correspondent Erin Andrews after breaking up a pass and causing an interception in the final minutes of the NFC Championship game. If you’ve been living under a rock and you haven’t caught it, here’s the clip that everyone is talking about:

So there it is. You can make your own judgment on whether or not it was out of line, but the sporting media as well as all of the social networking sites have already told you how to feel based on how we expect athletes to act. I am going to use an unpopular take here and tell you that I don’t think any of this is a big deal. So I’m going Deep Six plus bonus points on this one and I am going to give you several reasons why this is not a big deal.

What We Learned From the NFL Divisional Round and What It Means For the Conference Championships

By J-Dub and Meehan

It’s no secret the NFL is king in America, and nothing proves it quite like Conference Championship Sunday.  It’s like this:  If you live in the Eastern Time Zone like J-Dub, the games are on at 3 and 6:30 p.m.  If you live in the Central Time Zone like Meehan, they air at 2 and 5:30.  What that means is that the NFL basically doesn’t give a fuck about you eating dinner.  They know no matter what your usual schedule is, you’re going to break it, and you’re going to do so with a bigger smile on your face than a lonely guy who just got mailed a Viagra sample and a free weekend of Cinemax.

Not pictured: The people in this family who matter

Kommissar Goodell and the rest of the NFL Politburo know that, and that’s why they schedule these games making sure that 80% of the U.S. population has to choose between football and feeding themselves. Do you think it is a coincidence that one of the league’s biggest stars spends his time hawking those tomato-sauce herpes discs Papa John’s flings?  Face it, the people who think that shit is good pizza are…well…the people who think that shit is good pizza.

What the 2014 NFC Championship Game Means to Both Cities

The Seattle Seahawks and the San Francisco 49ers  have made it to the NFC Championship Game, this is the third match-up of the current seasn between these two teams. This means that arguably the two best teams in the NFL are facing off against each other two see who plays the winner of the Patriots/Broncos game in the Super Bowl.

Now both fan bases are at each others throats in the build up to this Sunday’s match-up. Between the two fan bases, the trash talk has been ratcheted up to a degree that is a slightly above insane. As a result, the internet — mainly social media — has become extremely difficult to navigate for those who don’t want to see internet tough guys yelling at each other.

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What We Learned From Week 17 of the 2013 NFL Season: The Play-Off Preview Edition

By J-Dub and Meehan

As we promised in last week’s What We Learned piece, it is time for us here at Sports Blog Movement to breakdown this play-off season, because like we always say, there’s a ton of stuff you need to know that the usual suspects in the sports media will miss while they are busy lapping Peyton Manning’s spooge off a locker-room floor. Having said that, let’s break this down by conference.

AFC:

The Actual Conference Play-Off Power Rankings:

This has nothing to do with the seeding of the tournament; this has everything to do with who is playing the best football right now.

What We Learned From Week 11 of the 2013 NFL Season

By J-Dub and Meehan

Up until now, we’ve been consulting our medical expert Dr. Kelly Brackett for his prognoses on NFL teams. But now that we are clearly in the homestretch, it’s time to shift our focus from the survivors and the casualties to an analysis of the survival of the fittest. That means we change our expert as well; rather than looking for overall health, this becomes an exercise in actuarials…or to make it sound less insurance-like..it’s time to look at the odds of each possible contender making the play-offs.  For that, we have invited legendary movie odds-maker Sam “Ace” Rothstein for his thoughts.

AFC:

1) Indianapolis Colts (7-3)

Remaining Games:

• @Arizona
• Tennessee
• @Cincinnati
• Houston
• @Kansas City
• Jacksonville

Odds of Making Play-offs:

Metaphysical certainty. Steal as much money as you can get your hands on, then bet twice that much that Indianapolis will be in the play-offs.

Key Facts:

With six games to go, the Colts have a three-game lead in the AFC South over their closest competitor, and they just beat them on the road with a dramatic comeback victory.The Colts will make the playoffs because no one else in the AFC South will step up and challenge them.  The Titans are in second place, and the other two teams might as well be Terri Schiavo two days after they yanked her feeding tube.  They’ve already beaten Seattle, San Francisco, and the Broncos, and by the time they get to the Kansas City Chiefs, both teams could be just resting up for January.

What We Learned From Week Four of the 2013 NFL Season

by J-Dub and Meehan

Yet another week has passed in the sportsgasm that is the NFL season, and that means it is time for us to tell you some things you need to know without the self-serving spin those assbags at ESPN will never give you. We know this because if you think you can get real football information from guys like Chris Mortenson and Adam Schefter, you probably also don’t know that every menu item at Denny’s is 40% Soylent Green.

Mmmmmmmmm…Denny’s!

1) The reports of the demise of the San Francisco 49ers might have been a bit premature.

For the entire week leading up to Thursday night, all we heard about was how Colin Kaepernick is not really a good quarterback and how the 49er defense can’t stop anybody with out Aldon Smith.  Yeah, about that…funny, but somehow we stopped hearing that shit come Friday morning.

Clearly, they didn’t need Aldon Smith to beat the sorry-ass Rams, and it’s even more clearly a good thing that Smith’s liver is getting a little “me” time anyway.

As far as the offense was concerned, the lesson learned here was that Colin Kaepernick is not the entire 49er offense. Anquan Boldin rolled through the Ram secondary like a Vicodin through Amy Winehouse, but the real difference was Kaepernick’s ability to rely on Frank Gore, who racked up a rushing average of 7.65 yards per carry.  See, the dirty little secret nobody who keeps talking about “read-option quarterbacks” wants to admit is is that the entire “read-option” concept only works when there’s a running back that keeps defenses worried about the threat of the run. Russell Wilson has Marshawn Lynch, Michael Vick has LeSean McCoy, and Colin Kaepernick has Frank Gore.

What We Learned From Week One of the 2013 NFL Season

By J-Dub and Ryan Meehan

Without any further fanfare, let’s just get to the stuff week one of the NFL season showed us.

1) Peyton Manning’s performance hid the fact the Broncos’ defense sucks.

If Thursday night taught us anything, it’s that the Broncos are indeed going to struggle on the defensive side of the ball.  By “struggle,” we’re talking something akin to a turtle on its back getting gang-raped by a group of Hell’s Angels all to an all Kenny G soundtrack. If you consider all of the mistakes that Baltimore made offensively, the fact that Denver gave up 27 points is pretty pathetic.  Ray Rice is a pretty solid “yards after contact” guy, but against the Ponies defense, he got more second chances than Robert Downey Jr.

Not to mention, we aren’t even counting the mistake made on the interception return that by all that is right in the football universe should have resulted in yet another Broncos’ touchdown. This is where Danny Trevathan had a “Honey Badger meets DeSean Jackson” level brain-fart. After making the pick, and cruising to what should have been the “pick-six” part of this, he inexplicably released the ball before he crossed the goal line in a momentary lapse of judgment reminiscent of a young DeSean Jackson.  As you would hope, Denver defensive coordinator Jack Del Rio ripped Trevathan’s ass open like he was Edward Norton in the prison shower scene in American History X, because Denver can’t expect Grandpa Manning to chuck 7 touchdowns every week.   

Besides, expecting Fetushead Manning to bail you out on a weekly basis is a reasonably solid plan in the regular season, it’s going to kill Denver in the play-offs.  Given the past history, Manning will get you a shit-load of wins between September and  December, but in January he becomes as dependable as a nine dollar cell phone. The problem is that after Thursday, Bronco Nation is “all in” on that phone you wouldn’t trust your grandmother’s life with; they now expect that every time the elder Manning brother steps onto the field, he is going to throw more successful scoring passes than a 1970’s Warren Beatty with a sugar bowl full of coke.  This will prove to be like expecting Wendy’s employee to give a lecture on nuclear fission in between the time it takes after you’ve consumed an entire a double Baconator combo meal with extra cheese and mayonnaise and when you regain consciousness staring up at the paramedics.

A championship-level NFL defense is supposed to dominate opposing offenses like the Red Army rolled through Prague in 1968.  Without Von Miller until week 7, and with no real replacement for Elvis Dumervil, the Bronco idea of defense is a bit like Saddam Hussein promising the “Mother of all Battles” while rolling out to meet the U.S. Marine Corps with a half-dozen Buick LeSabres.  To keep the military analogies going, the Ravens played the role of France as they let der grüppenfuhrer  Manning goose-step down the Champs-Elyseés while they were busy worrying about how to properly stomp the wine grapes.

But not everybody is going to lay down for the Blitzkrieg like Baltimore did.  To win in January, eventually this Bronco defense is going to have to show it can stop somebody.

Sports Blog Movement NFL Preview: NFC West

Welcome back friends! It’s time to take a look at the NFC West.

Two years ago, this was easily the worst division in football. If you don’t recall, the Seattle Seahawks won the NFC West in 2011 with a whopping 7-9 record. Oh how things have changed. Nowadays, the West features two of the best teams in the NFL. Even the bad teams in the division aren’t all that bad. The Rams are on the rise and the Cardinals finally have a functional (albeit washed-up) Quarterback. There won’t be any 13+ win teams here, simply because each divisional match-up will be a god damn blood bath. You won’t be seeing any (6-0) divisional records in the NFC West. Meaning that this division will be fun to watch.

1. Seattle Seahawks (12-4)

Additions: WR Percy Harvin (MIN), RB Christine Michael (Draft), QB Tarvaris Jackson (BUF), QB Lady Quinn (KC), DE Cliff Avril (DET), Antoine Winifield (MIN)

Losses: QB Matt Flynn, RB/KR Leon Washington

Offensively, Russel Wilson has plenty to work with. Even with the injury to Percy Harvin; the remaining receivers Sidney Rice, Zach Miller and Golden Tate are still dangerous targets. Beast-Mode will continue to do his thang and the Offensive Line will continue to be dominant (They gave up the 5th least amount of QB hits last season).

PED’s or not, the Seahawks defense is easily in the top-5. The addition of Cliff Avril will help make up for the injured Chris Clemons at Defensive End. The Linebacker core is solid. K.J. Wright and Bobby Wagner combined for almost 250 tackles last season. The defensive backfield is THE best in the league. Kam Chancellor and Richard Sherman are All-pro caliber. Earl Thomas is just about to enter his prime at 24 years old. Brandon Browner is solid on the corner. Not to mention, Antoine Winifield is set to play the Nickle back. I don’t know of another defensive backfield with more physicality. The Seahawks are poised to make a run deep into the playoffs. I think it’s fair to say that if they can survive their own division, this team is a lock for an NFC Championship appearance.

2. San Francisco 49ers (11-5)

Additions: WR Anquan Boldin (BAL), RB Marcus Lattimore (Draft), QB Colt McCoy (CLE)

Losses: QB Alex Smith, WR Ted Ginn Jr.

Fresh off a Super Bowl loss, the 49ers look slightly worse off than they did at the beginning of last season. Two things are going to happen offensively: First, Colin Kaepernick will struggle to move the ball through the air due to his lack of weapons. He still has Vernon Davis and the addition of Anquan Boldin will help, but only a little. The loss of Michael Crabtree for the foreseeable future will put this offense in a huge hole. The second thing that will happen offensively is that teams will adjust to the Read-Option offense that made the 49er’s offense so successful last season. Defenses always adjust. Just as they did with the Wildcat offense, defenses will be on a mission to discover a way to shut down the Pistol. It will be up to Colin Kaepernick to adjust to the adjustment, so to speak. When defenses take away Kaepernick’s ability to run, how will he respond? That is the single biggest question facing the 49ers this season.

On the other side of the ball, the 49ers won’t have to change much. Their front seven is the best in football, bar none. Everyone knows about the great linebackers in Aldon Smith, NaVorro Bowman and Patrick Willis. However, the real key to that defense is a guy that no one talks about. I’m my opinion, he’s the best 3-4 defensive end in the league. I’m talking of course, about Justin Smith. He doesn’t show up on the stat sheet but Smith’s unique ability to occupy blockers is crucial to that defense. He’s the biggest reason that Aldon Smith got freed up enough to record 19.5 sacks last season. In fact, Aldon Smith recorded his 19.5 sacks in the first 13 games of the season. With three games to go, Justin Smith went down with an injury. Sure enough, Aldon Smith’s sack totals in the final three games were 0.0, 0.0 and 0.0.

Okay Jon Gruden, enough Justin Smith boners. The 49ers will struggle a bit in the beginning of the season until Michael Crabtree returns. Once #15 gets back into the line-up, the 49ers should be in position to fight for a wildcard berth. 

3. St. Louis Rams (8-8)

Additions: WR Tavon Austin (Draft), RB Zac Stacy (Draft), T Jake Long (MIA), TE Jarred Cook (TEN), OLB Alec Ogletree (Draft)

Losses: RB Steven Jackson, WR Danny Amendola

The Rams are going to beat a lot of good teams this year. They’re not a great team yet, but they’re a dangerous. I equate them to Northwestern in the Big10. The “Cardiac Cats” always seems to sneak up on ranked teams like Michigan or Wisconsin and take them down to the wire or even beat them. We saw it last year when they went (1-0-1) against the eventual NFC Champion 49ers. This team could go 10-6 easily if they were in another division.

Offensively, Sam Bradford will have to improve this year. He turned the ball over a little too much last season with 13 INT’s and 4 fumbles and his completion percentage was below average at under 60%. I don’t think the Rams will lose much going from an aging Steven Jackson to a young Daryl Richardson. Richardson averaged 4.8 yards/carry to Jackson’s 4.1 last season and frankly, it was just time to move on. The Rams have a nice little receiving core with Tavon Austin, Austin Pettis, Chris Givens and Brian Quick. The addition of Jake Long should improve an already improving offensive line that went from last in the NFL in sacks given up in 2011 to 14th in 2012.

Defensively, the Rams have solid pieces. Chris Long will be strong off the edge and they have a young linebacking core with the addition of Alec Ogletree who should develop into a serviceable pro. Their two corners are solid. Cortland Finnegan is a fucking asshole but I’d still love to have him on my team. Janoris Jenkins is a stud and will be a Pro-Bowler this year. Keep an eye on rookie Safety T.J. McDonald; he’ll surprise people this year.

This simply isn’t the year for the Rams. Unfortunately, with so much young talent in their division, it doesn’t look like that year is coming anytime soon.

4. Arizona Cardinals (7-9)

Additions: QB Carson Palmer (OAK), G Jonathan Cooper (Draft), RB Rashard Mendenhall (PIT), DE John Abraham (ATL)

Losses: QB John Skelton, QB Kevin Kolb, RB Beanie Wells, WR Early Doucet

It’s possible that I’m being too generous here by giving the Cardinals seven wins. It’s not that I think that Carson Palmer will suddenly turn this team around single-handedly. I do, however think that Larry Fitzgerald is about to go OFF this year. It’s been three years of frustration for Fitz. It’s been three damn years of interchangeable Bumblefuck McShitHead’s throwing him bounce-passes. NO MORE! Now he has a somewhat functional Quarterback and he’s about to ruin your life.

As far as how the rest of the roster is constructed, well, it’s a team. That’s more than the Oakland Raiders can say. It’s not a great team but it’s good enough to win six or seven games. Rashard Mendenhall is WAY past his prime but he’ll get most of the carries unless Ryan Williams can get his head out of his ass. The Receiving core is very top-heavy with Michael Floyd along with the aforementioned Fitzgerald. The Tight ends suck and the offensive line is still shit.

Defensively, the Cards are a little better. The front seven is strong with Darnell Dockett and Karlos Dansby. Patrick Peterson will be a borderline Pro-Bowler this year. The suspension of Daryl Washington for the first four games will hurt their pass rush. Overall, there’s not much to say about this team. They’re certainly not good enough to make a run into the playoffs. Yet their not bad enough for me to make fun of. Just another Arizona Cardinals season for ya’: Perpetual mediocrity.

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I hope you’ve enjoyed my input on our NFL Preview here at Sports Blog Movement. Let’s hope you’re as excited for the start of the season as I am! HUCK IT, CHUCK IT, FOOTBALL!!!!!!

Black (and purple) Monday

I watched my first football game when I was 8. It was Superbowl XIV in January of 1980, Steelers vs. Rams. It was the last of the great Steel Curtain dynasty but was the first in what became a lifelong obsession with football.

Until yesterday.

I made my feelings clear about the game last week, and I had resigned myself to not watching. But I caved. For context, here is my Sunday:

10am- Wake up. I was up till 3am Saturday night playing NHL13, beyond that it’s freaking Sunday. I sleep in.

10- 12:30- Make breakfast, and generally be lazy. I intentionally avoid any channel that might make any reference to the game. But its still there in the back of my head…Why would Ben soft toss that out route? He has to know late in the game the DB is sitting on it…Why can’t someone teach Mendy to use two hands…God Wallace sucks…This team lost to Charlie Batch, CHARLIE BATCH!….8 turnovers…Picked apart by Carson Palmer..

Read the rest here