Sunday, February 1, 2015

2015 NFL Pickery -- Super Bowl XLIX


Happy Super Bowl Sunday! My improbable playoff pickin' run continued two weeks ago, as I'm an unconscious 8-2 against the spread (and 9-1 straight-up). Joe, meanwhile, remains one HELL of a writer. You can find his work on Tumblr and -- in 140-character form -- on Twitter. Like me, he went 2-0 in last week's games, but in the standings, we're still sending our love down the well (ALL THE WAY DOWN) to him.



Joe: I'm just going to say it: I loved the h*ck out of Deflate-gate. It was wonderful. Two weeks of Boston sports fans being put through the wringer, having to figure out ways to be defensive about the scandal without appearing to take it too seriously. Because those were the twin secret weapons of Deflategate: hilarity and stupidity. Nobody actually thought that deflating the balls (which they probably did) was the actual reason the Patriots beat the Colts two Sundays ago. It would've been way less fun if there were actual victims here. Instead, we had a victimless crime that made the perpetrators look small and petty and foolish and squirrelly. All terrible things! All now applicable to the New England Patriots and, by extension, their fans! Sure 70% of the op-eds were self-serious drivel, and the other 30% were self-righteous bashing of the ones who were taking it seriously. But I didn't tell you to watch SportsCenter every night. That's on you. I just got to sit back and snipe on Twitter and imagine Bill Belichick giving a secret order to execute Action Plan Charlie, which is the code word in the Patriots' organization for delating footballs. The whole thing would have been worth it even if Bill Simmons hadn't written a 180,000-word column on why the Pats are now in FU mode and Cobra Kai and Ewing Theory and click this link to a Jimmy Kimmel segment. But OF COURSE he also did that, and it was great. It's gonna be such a bummer if the Patriots win. Patriots 28, Seahawks 24

Aaron:​ As we all learned from Clint Eastwood's latest fever dream for flyover country, this…is…AMERICA. You're free to root for either team, bet on either team or just watch the game for the camaraderie, commercials and Katy Perry. You're also free to hate either team. Keep in mind, though, that if you hate the Seahawks you're wrong, wrong, WRONG. You hate Richard Sherman for his lack of nationally televised postgame decorum? Please, tell me more. Marshawn Lynch makes BILLIONS, you say. Possibly TRILLIONS. He should be GRATEFUL the press wants to talk to him. Someone should tell him to quit giving non-answers! Yes…yes…go on. The Seahawks fans are NOTHING but a bunch of bandwagoners who only arrived after their team won a world championship. Oh, go find your own pictures of the 2004 Red Sox and 2002 Patriots. YOU GET THE IDEA. Anyways…this spread makes no sense. None. The Seahawks opened as slight favorites, within 24 hours it was a "pick 'em", the Patriots emerged as slight favorites and now it's sliding back towards a "pick 'em". The Seahawks defensive front just might obliterate Tom Brady, 58, once and for all. There's no real answer on the Pats' side for Lynch's systematic manslaughter of run defenses, either. The Seahawks are doing you a FAVOR, America. You're welcome. Seahawks 24, Patriots 20