Frito-Lay Sucks

I've been mad at Doritos for years, after they stopped making the delicious Sour Cream and Onion Doritos. I briefly got over it when they came out with Cool Ranch Doritos, which were just as good. Until they stopped actually putting any cool ranch flavor on the chips. I can't remember the last time I ate any Cool Ranch Doritos that tasted any different than unflavored tortilla chips. They also stopped making the 3D Doritos, which were great, and inexplicably seemed not to have much more flavor on them than their two dimensional counterparts, but somehow tasted like they did. So I've managed to just stay away from Doritos, so I don't have to be annoyed with them. That is, until the other day, when I was hungry and saw new Spicy Sweet Chili Doritos in the vending machine. These were very good, but when I went to get more yesterday, they were gone. So I figured I would just pick some up from the grocery store. But I've since been to three different stores and couldn't find them. Having a product that people want doesn't seem very valuable if it isn't available anywhere. So I'm now back to being annoyed with Doritos.

Also, I went to doritos.com to see if maybe this was a limited time flavor or something, and it looks like they're trying to turn it into some sort of hip social networking site or something. I couldn't see anywhere to get actual information about their products. I don't who's running the Doritos department at Frito-Lay, but I don't think they're very bright.

And speaking of good snacks that I can't find anywhere, someone brought in some great Crispy Mint M&Ms to work, but I looked for those everywhere too and can't find them either.

And just because I'm too lazy to make another post, let me just use this space to tell Arlen Specter to shut the fuck up. No one gives a shit what you think about the NFL, and it's not any of your business anyway. And even if it was, you've got far more important things that you could be spending your time and energy on.

NFL 2008

The NFL season can never get here fast enough, so it's always nice to have some off season activity. Today the schedule came out. It looks like the Cowboys are on national TV six times. Of course, I wish it were 16, of course, but I think six is pretty good. Also, none of their games will be called by Bryant Gumbel this season, so that's great.

And the draft is coming up soon as well.

Dallas postmortem

Anytime you travel to see a sporting event, you run the risk of your team losing. We've been pretty lucky. We drove to Dallas in 1992 and saw the Cowboys beat the Redskins on their way to the Super Bowl. We saw them again in 1992 in Atlanta when they clinched the division and Deion threw a bench on the sidelines. And, although it was only a day trip, I count the 1993 FSU-Florida game in Gainesville, because that's a hard place to go and leave a loser. The forces of good won all of these games. But our luck ran out yesterday. Let's break the trip down.


The Game - Disappointing is too tame. It was crushing, all the more so because it was there for the taking. The Giants played well, but were certainly beatable. I'll sound like a bitter fan here, but the story of the game was Cowboy mistakes. The Giants made few to none, and the Cowboys made several costly ones. 11 penalties to the Giants' 3, including the drive-extending offsides on the first possession, followed shortly by 3 Cowboys missing an easy tackle on Toomer, who scored the first touchdown. Dropped passes, crucial penalties and poor execution in general plagued the Cowboys the whole game.

But even after all that, the defense made a couple of good stops and we had the ball with nearly 2 minutes and 50 yards to go. One thing this team has been really good at is responding under pressure. But they looked terrible on the last drive. No spikes, an awful draw to Barber with under a minute left and 1 timeout. And then the timeout was wasted when the sideline official blew the call and kept the clock running after Witten got out of bounds.

I'm not reading any post-game analysis, because who wants to relive that nightmare? But I would hope that all the talking heads have shut up about Romo and his December slump now (although I'm sure they haven't). Romo played well, made a couple of bad plays but also a few good ones and didn't turn the ball over (the last desperation play doesn't count), pretty much what Eli did on the other side (and you know he's getting sloppy BJ's from everyone now). I really think it showed that we didn't have a credible deep threat. Owens was healthy enough to play, but he was clearly not playing at his level from most of the year.

Soon enough, I'll turn to next year and realize we're still contenders and ought to be for a few years more. That's a nice change from the last 10 years, when any joy in the success we did have was tempered by the knowledge that it was mostly a fluke. But for now I'll have to content myself with the thought that the Giants will go to Lambeau and be exposed for the gutty but overachieving team that they are.


Texas Stadium - For a stadium built in the middle of nowhere, the parking is really shitty. No park-n-rides or stadium shuttles anywhere. All the parking is miles from the stadium and costs a fortune. And all the lots are designed so that there are massive, unmanned bottlenecks when people try to leave. Extremely poorly done. I really hope that they think about these things as they're building the new stadium. Jackonville's parking is far better, even more so considering that the stadium is built downtown. I can park a mile from the stadium for $5. Yesterday we parked at least 3 miles out and had to pay $25.

Texas Stadium was finished in 1971 and you can see the age, but also the innovation. There's no club like in more modern stadia, but there are skyboxes everywhere. You can see how it was state-of-the art 35 years ago. But it's certainly showing its age now. Rust and wear everywhere, and horribly designed bathrooms. The men's room had a line that probably had 100 people in it. All you need for the men is a 20' long trough. Why build a place with 6 urinals per bathroom? While Texas Stadium is a a mecca for Cowboys fans everywhere, it's definitely time for an upgrade.

The hometown fans - I hate to be critical of my fellow fans, but fuck, these hometown fans need to learn how to be a good home crowd. Mainly the noise level. When the other team has the ball, especially in a big game like this, you have to make noise - constant, deafening noise (we did our part). The acoustics are certainly ok. But while it was always far noisier on Giants' possessions, it never approached the frenzy it should have except for a few 3rd downs and goal-line plays. It was far, far noisier at the FSU-Alabama game we went to this year, and the stadium here isn't really designed to hold it in. For all that the Cowboy haters love to accuse us non-Texan Cowboys fans of being bandwagoners, I think the non-native fans are probably better than the home fans in our level of passion.

Overall - I don't regret going, and I'm sure we'll do it again, but I'm not going to lie and say it was all good. It was fun getting away. We love to travel and we love to fly, so that was fun. But the loss turned what would have been a spectacular trip into an ok trip. As I said before, that's the risk you take.

Hey, that's our island from the air! We live near the airport and have planes fly by the house all the time. But we've never been able to see our neighborhood from the air for various reasons. Not to mention it's a lot harder to identify landmarks from the air than you might think.

It's NOT hard to beat a team three times in one season.

Anytime a team is playing a division rival that they swept during the season in the playoffs, as the Cowboys are this week, we always hear the tired argument that it's so hard to beat a team three times in one season as the hope for the team that's lost the first two. However, it's just not true. The team trying to sweep is 11-6, and 9-3 when they're at home. The worst part of this argument is that it's normally made by people on TV who have access to enough information to realize that it's not true.

Sweet Jags of Mine

The sports talk show I listen to in the morning put together a cover of "Sweet Caroline" called "Sweet Jags of Mine". The production values are a little ummm... rough, but it's fun. Dan Hicken, who also wrote the lyrics, sings with full-throated abandon and his enthusiasm makes up for the fact that he really can't sing. The Tony in the background is Tony Boselli. The song is about the upcoming Jags-Pats game so it has a short shelf life. Other "hits" include "Grady" (about DL Grady Jackson), to the tune of "Lady", "Tebow", to the tune of "Hey Jude", "Reggi-lution" to the tune of "Revolution" (about WR Reggie Williams), and "Jack and By-ron", to "Jack and Diane" of course. Oh and "Honolulu" to the tune of "Kokomo", I think, lobbying for Fred Taylor to go to the Pro Bowl. He's got a knack for these.

I'm not a Jaguars fan, as anyone who reads this blog knows, but I am this weekend. It's the duty of all red-blooded NFL fans to oppose the evil empire up in Foxboro.

Make sure you turn the volume down before playing.

We're going to the playoffs!

Yes, next Sunday, January 13, Michelline and I will be at Texas Stadium to watch the Cowboys trying to make their way to the NFC championship game. It was a spur of the moment thing. We found that Stubhub had a lot of tickets available for a reasonable price (and we didn't get screwed by the seller this time, the package is already shipping via FedEx). That along with a couple of $300 airline vouchers we picked up in February after volunteering to be bumped meant this would be a relatively inexpensive trip.

This will only be our fourth non-exhibition Cowboys game and our first ever visit to a playoff game. Not to mention our second game at Texas Stadium. The first game was the season opener in 1992 against Washington. The atmosphere was incredible. The Redskins were defending champs, but the Cowboys were coming off an 11-5 season and everyone knew they were on the way up. The big thing I remember is Kelvin Martin's TD on a punt return and Issiac Holt blocking a punt for a safety. And it was really loud. I'm very interested to see what the atmosphere is like for a playoff game.

I know that the Cowboys can win the game, whether they're playing the Redskins, Giants or Buccaneers, but I am a little concerned after their lackluster finish. Barely escaped in Detroit, laid an egg at home against the Eagles, and, although the game was meaningless, the first team played horribly against the Redskins in the first half last week. But the good thing is that we're going by ourselves. The only Dallas loss I witnessed in person came last year in Jacksonville in the Jags season opener. I figure that was because John was with us. Now we're getting back to our 1992 roots, and the luck should be with us.

The media are stupid

Warning - Cowboy fan introspection and wankery follow. If you don't like it, too bad.

The Cowboys are 5-1 and barring key injuries or some other catastrophe, appear to be headed for the playoffs for sure, and have as good a shot as any at the division title and home field. None of that changed yesterday. Looking at it practically, I'm sure the team is unhappy with the loss, but realize that it was only a couple of plays from being a different game. But, damn it, I like to listen to sports radio and read sports websites, and from that selfish perspective, the final score yesterday has ruined this week for me.

I've only listened to about 10 minutes of radio this morning, and I've already heard it expressed that between the Buffalo game and the "blowout" yesterday, maybe the Cowboys aren't as good as advertised. That's what a lot of the media are going to take out of the game yesterday. Not that the Cowboys came back from a 14-0 deficit to take the lead in the third quarter, but that the Patriots ran us off the field. Yes, a 21 point victory is a blowout, but what kind? Not the kind where the Patriots came in and never looked back. The game wasn't over until the Patriots kicked a FG to go up 14 with about 4 minutes left.

Imagine this scenario - the Cowboys, after that FG, take the ball and drive down to score a TD. Then the Patriots get the ball and run out the clock. Then it's 41-34 and we hear about how the Cowboys played them tough all the way. But essentially, it's the same game - barring a miracle comeback, it was over after the FG. That's why that stupid garbage time TD pissed me off so much.

One last thing about the defense. I'm sure we're going to hear about this all year, but I've watched every game, and I'm not worried about the defense. Sure I'd rather have a great defense, but what we have is good enough. The defense made a couple of key plays yesterday that kept us in it.

Again, the analysis makes no difference to the actual success of the Cowboys. But perception matters to fans, because that's how we experience the game. The analysis and discussion are where a lot of the fun lies. So I guess I'll have to grit my teeth this week, and hope that we take care of Minnesota Sunday so that this week is a distant memory for the media.

Clash of the Titans (or New England at Dallas)

Here it comes, the matchup of two 5-0 teams for just the fifth time in NFL history and the third in the past 84 years. The media's fascination with the drama of the Cowboy's improbable win on Monday is starting to wear off and the hype for the game on Sunday is building. I love the hype. It's really a no lose situation for a fan.

1. They say the Cowboys haven't played anybody. First, you can only play who's on the schedule. Second, just about any NFL team can beat another; it's always hard to win in the NFL. If it's so easy to go 5-0 in the NFL, teams ought to be doing it all the time, right? I remember the last time someone shot a 59 on a PGA course, some pundits complained that it was an easy course. Umm, maybe so, but where were the rest of the 59's? Anyway, the Cowboys schedule hasn't been a gauntlet so far to be sure. But neither has the Patriot's schedule. Here are their opponents with their records -

Cowboys
vs NY Giants 3-2
@ Miami 0-5
@ Chicago 2-3
vs St Louis 0-5
@ Buffalo 1-4
Total 6-19

Patriots
@ NY Jets 1-4
vs San Diego 2-3
vs Buffalo 1-4
@ Cincinnati 1-3
vs Cleveland 2-3
Total 7-17

2. They say the Cowboys have a bad defense. It's true, the defense didn't look great against the Giants. But how are things shaping up overall? Right now, including the Buffalo game, the Cowboys rank 8th in yards per game allowed with 285.4 and 13th in total points allowed with 96. The Patriots definitely have the edge here. They're 2nd in YPG allowed with 251.4 and 6th in total points allowed with 65. But the edge isn't enormous.

3. They say Tony Romo is overrated. No question that some of the praise heaped on him, especially in Monday night's pregame show was overly effusive. But he's got enough experience under his belt for us to make a decent assessment of his talent level. He's pretty damn good. With 15 career starts, he has 4411 yards, 63.2% passes completed, 32 TDs and 21 interceptions (which includes his 5 from Monday) and 94.7 rating. I've watched every snap of every game, and he's had a couple of bad games. But the stretch run where we lost 3 of 4 last year was mainly due to defensive breakdowns. I think there are quite a few NFL teams who would take Tony Romo in a heartbeat right now. As a fan, you get a sense of certain players. I never trusted Bledsoe or Quincy Carter to lead us down the field. Romo feels like a leader to me, a guy who'll shrug off the bad stuff and do what it takes to win. Realistically, the only things I see that can stop him from succeeding going forward will be injuries or some Rick Ankiel-like meltdown.

4. Finally, I heard Chris Mortensen on a radio show this morning. I'm starting not to like him much. He repeated one of the things that's been making the rounds the last couple of days - that Buffalo's coverage scheme confused Romo, and that Belichick would see this and go to town. Buffalo's scheme was pretty good, but at least 3 of those int's were all Romo. Belichick's obviously a great technical coach, but Jason Garrett is no slouch on offense. He also fell back on the old conference disparity saw. He said that looking the Buffalo-Dallas game and the Indy-Tampa Bay games made him think it was a factor. That's just crap. Did he say the same thing when Arizona beat Pittsburgh the week before? Or when Green Bay beat San Diego? It's really too early to tell how this year will go with the conference matchups. Right now, the AFC is 12-10 vs the NFC. The AFC clearly has the top 2 or 2 of the top 3 teams. After that it's a crapshoot. And it really doesn't matter when you're looking at an individual game. I think Mortensen is just lazy.

So, all that said, I'd still pick the Patriots if I leave my heart out of it. They haven't shown any weaknesses so far. I think Dallas' offense is nearly equal to theirs, but they do have a defensive edge. But I don't think it's the foregone conclusion that most of the Pats fans seem to think, and I don't think a blowout is likely. Possible, sure. New Orleans took us to the shed last year, but I don't think they were that much better. Damn, though, I would love to read Simmon's column if the Patriots do lose. (and BTW, did I mention how great NFL.com is lately).