Celebrating the Holidays with Madonna 1/27

As Madonna said back in 1982 “If you took a Holiday, took some time to celebrate, just one day out of life, it would be, it would be so nice!” Well I took more than one day to celebrate the holidays, but it was definitely nice. Now that I’m rested and relaxed, it’s time to get back into it. Here are a couple thoughts on some topics I’ve been following:

USC/OKLAHOMA – Well it didn’t turn out to be quite the game everyone expected (ie, me), as USC destroyed them. I really thought Peterson would have a huge day, but the Trojan defense shut him down forcing White to throw and then it was turnover city.

Leinert Returns – Good for him, I hope it works out. Yes he’s turning down a ton of money, but hopefully no injuries occur and he comes back next year and has a monster year. With all the defections of high school athletes to the pros, and players leaving school after a couple years, it’s always nice to see someone having fun and enjoying himself in college. The pro’s will be there when he graduates.

NFL – Well I predicted a while back New England would make it back there, and they’ve looked dominate so far in the playoffs. Can Philly stop them? I don’t think so. Then again this is why they play the games, you never know what’s going to happen on any given Sunday. McNabb will have to have an error free game for Philly to have a chance. Their defense will have to cause turnovers and create opportunities because if the Patriots start putting points on the board, McNabb will be forced to sit back in the pocket and start looking downfield, and that’s when New England will start causing turnovers. With Owens doubtful (and certainly not at 100% if he does play), and Philly now missing their starting Tight End Chad Lewis, Westbrook will have to have a monster game coming out of the backfield. Next week I’ll give my predicted outcome and score of the game.

PreGame Shows – After spending the last month watching a lot of NFL pregame shows, I rank them in this order 1) ESPN 2) FOX 3) CBS. With CBS, I always seem to get bored with Nantz, Marino, Deion and Boomer. I don’t know why, it just seems to drag on. The only reason to watch is to follow the conflicts between Marino and Esiason…… I like the people at FOX. Brown, Bradshaw, Long and Johnson. They all seem to get along, are knowledgeable and have quality information they’re passing along. It also doesn’t hurt that I like Jillian Barberie and her cleavage, tattoo’s and navel (like her? No I LOVE HER!). ESPN to me is the gold standard. I admit I love Berman with his nicknames and humor. I like listening to someone who’s enjoying himself, and after all this time, he certainly seems to be doing that. Jackson, Young and “The Playmaker” have a good mix of knowledge, interesting interviews and camaraderie. After not really seeing Steve Young for awhile, I was shocked to see him looking so old. At first I thought it was John McEnroe up there. Next week though, I think he colored his hair, because suddenly all the grey was gone!

Tennis – Yup, the Australian open is going on, and I know everyone out there are huge tennis fans……… I was never a big Serena Williams fan, but now since she’s been knocked down a couple notches in the last year or so, I’m pulling for her in this tournament. As I write this, she just knocked out Sharapova (HATE HER), and will be facing Davenport in the finals. I’ll say 6-4, 6-3 for Williams. On the men’s side, I’m going to say Marat Safin takes out Roddick in the finals 7-6, 4-6, 6-4, 6-4….. Safin is a player who has all the skills and if healthy can beat anyone (as he did by knocking out Federer yesterday). Roddick I think is overrated.


Jamal Lewis Starts Serving His Jail Sentence – I hate things like this… If it was you or I who admitted to setting up a drug deal, we’d get more than 4 months in jail and we’d have no say in when we serve it. The cuffs would be slapped on then and we’d be hauled off to jail. I can just imagine me saying “uh, judge, I have a couple houses in escrow that are closing in the next few months, can we just postpone my jail time to my off season when I’m not busy?”. That would go over real well…. How do athletes/celebrities get breaks like this? Is it because they have money and can hire “better” attorneys? Please one of my lawyer friends out there give me an answer to this as it always drives me crazy…… Old Jamal should be out of jail just in time for spring training to start, causing him not to miss any games (or money).


Well that’s it for now. I possibly have a couple of upcoming interviews so be on the lookout for that. Also I’ll be back next week with my Super Bowl prediction…


Aloha,

Bill