When is pro football like a lesbian porno movie? When it's Week 17, the playoffs are on the line and, as Akeem in Coming to America would say, the Giants of New York will take on the Eagles of Philadelphia and, in the end, the Giants hope to triumph by kicking an oblong ball made of pigskin through a big H.
And if the kicking game fails the G-Men, it's gonna be just like Coach Calhoun said in Grease: "We're gonna yank 'em ... tear 'em... rrrrip 'em ... We're gonna take 'em and roll 'em around, and rip 'em up to pieces ... and then we're gonna slaughter 'em!"
Fuck yeah, coach. And if we have to win the game on account of Jim Fassel's genius, we will. But let's be careful in throwing around that kind of adulation. As NFL commentator Joe Theismann says, "Nobody in the game of football should be called a genius. A genius is somebody like Norman Einstein."
Let's not get ahead of ourselves here, though. The Giants need to take it one step at a time Saturday, as did the great George Rogers, the former Saints running back, who once said, "I want to rush for 1,000 or 1,500 yards, whichever comes first."
But some athletes really do know what they're talking about. Take former St. Louis Cardinals pitcher Joaquin Andujar, who once said, "There is one word in America that says it all, and that word is, 'You never know.'"
How right he was. You never know. You just never know.
One guy who did know was pre-three-peat Shaquille O'Neal who clearly knew more than his detractors when he said, "I've won everywhere but college and the pros."
But what this game all boils down to is revenge. Revenge for 1989, when I sat in freezing cold Giants Stadium and watched Eagles QB Randall Cunningham, buried in his own territory, "pooch" punt on third down for 91 yards, wrenching my heart with each rotation of the ball in the luckiest damn play I have ever seen in the history of sports.
Randall, I have not forgotten. We're gonna get you, sons of bitches.
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Will the Giants make the playoffs? It doesn't really matter because no 5 or 6 seed has ever made it to the Super Bowl. The playoff format is too difficult for them, forcing the lower seeds to play three road playoff games. In this case, the Giants have to beat the Eagles, then likely the Packers at Lambeau (where they never lose, 8-0 at home this year), then the Eagles again, then the Buccaneers. It's just not gonna happen.
Posted by Joe DiGiovanni at December 27, 2002 7:19 AM