Sunday, September 30, 2012

What to Watch, Week 4

Darrelle Revis-most likely out for season
Good morning, all! I hope everyone's having a great weekend. Let's review some of the games of the day:

In the morning, I'll probably be watching is the 49ers/NY Jets game. The Niners are coming off a loss and both teams have a 2-1 record. The Jets recently lost Darrelle Revis, one of the best defensive players in the league with a season ending injury (torn ACL) last week. Let's also see if Jets QB Mark Sanchez can concentrate now that he's dating Eva Longoria.

The Atlanta Falcons/Carolina Panthers game should be fun to watch. Atlanta is undefeated going into week four and many critics think they might be the best team in the league. Over on the Panthers side, QB Cam Newton is always a great player. This should be an exciting game.

The Buffalo Bills/New England game should be interesting. Tom Brady and his Patriots have a losing record (1-2) going into week four and they really need a win to get back on track.

Darren McFadden
In the afternoon, whilst we attempt to put up Halloween decorations at the Alexander household, we'll probably also catch the Oakland Raiders/Denver Broncos matchup. These two teams have always had an intense rivalry and those games are always a lot of fun. Trash-talking and what not. Plus, we'll get to watch Peyton Manning and see if he can get a win. Also watch for Raiders running back, Darren McFadden.

Also, pay attention to the New Orleans Saints/Green Bay Packers game. These two teams have fantastic quarterbacks, Drew Brees and Aaron Rodgers, and both teams also have losing records. Saints are 0-3 and the Packers are 1-2. This is sort of a "must win" situation for both teams. They are gonna come out fighting! And of course we remember what happened with the Packers last week when they got robbed of a win by the replacement refs. Not to worry this week as the "real" refs are back in action. I'm sure they won't make any bad calls. ;)

The night game should be a great one. The NY Giants and Philadelphia Eagles have an NFC East rivalry. Those games typically tend to be exciting. Eli Manning vs. Michael Vick.

And there you have it!! Enjoy the last day of the weekend!

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

The call heard round the world...

Interception! Touchdown! Wait...huh?
So unless you've been living under a rock, you've heard about this. During the Monday night game between the Seattle Seahawks and the Green Bay Packers, the replacement referees made a ton of questionable calls, culminating in what will now go down in history as one of the worst calls in the NFL. Seahawk's wide reciever Golden Tate shoved a defensive player out of the way and jumped up to grab the ball thrown into the endzone by Seattle's QB, Russell Wilson. As he was doing this, Packer's safety, M. D. Jennings also jumped up to grab the ball.
To me, it looked like Jennings held the ball close to his chest and then they

Monday, September 24, 2012

Monday morning recap-Week 3

Heyward-Bey's teammates praying
Good morning, everyone. How was your weekend? Mine was long. My 1-year old is the absolute best...until night falls. Then these four massive teeth that are trying to come in take over and make her a screaming lunatic about every 40 minutes. All. Night. Long. O.M.G. And of course she's also growing so she'll wake up again at 5am starving. And screaming, of course. What kills me is that my 4-year old sleeps through the entire thing! I swear a bomb could go off and she'd sleep through it. Anybody else dealing with this? I feel your pain!

Anyway, I digress. We did have football on all day here yesterday and I managed to get the gist of what happened on the field, so let's review:

The Kansas City Chiefs beat the New Orleans Saints, making the Saints record 0-3. Chiefs player Jamaal Charles is doing amazingly well. The Saints, however, have been plagued by a

Sunday, September 23, 2012

"The World's Greatest Garlic Bread"

The Original Smokehouse Garlic Bread
...or at least MY version of it. This is a recipe I've adapted from a favorite restaurant from my childhood years growing up in beautiful downtown Burbank, California. We always used to go to the SmokeHouse, which opened in 1946 and is right near Warner Brothers, NBC, Disney and Universal Studios. Back in my grandpa's heydey when he ran the music department at Disney (and let's not forget grandma who was an animator!), it was a place for big company dinners and lots of old-school-hollywood bashes. Quoting from their website, "...the SmokeHouse is a favorite hangout for actors,

Friday, September 21, 2012

The Linebackers: Super Stalkers

Alright, it's finally time for me to finish my definitions of the defensive positions! As most of you know, across the top of this blog there are tabs that explain the rules, the field, some phrases and some of the positions.

We've discussed the offensive positions: the Quarterback, Tight End, Running Backs and the Wide Receivers. On the defense, we've covered the Defensive Linemen. Today, we're gonna learn about the Linebackers, or as I've conveniently named them, the "Super stalkers."

First, a little review is in order. Remember back, if you will, to when we were discussing the

Monday, September 17, 2012

Recap //// Week 2

Oooooh, cake!!!
Hi! How was everyone's weekend? Here at the Alexander household we celebrated our youngest daughter's first birthday. Happy Birthday, Sasha! I couldn't resist this picture...She went straight for her cake, face first. We actually got to watch a decent amount of football, too. AND I recreated the "World's Greatest Garlic Bread" from the famous "Smokehouse" restaurant in Burbank, CA. More on that later...

Here are some highlights of the weekend's games:

Philadelphia Eagles: Had 9 turnovers in first 2 games...both of which they managed to win by one point! Apparently this hasn't happened since 1983. Ask a dude, "So, do you think the Eagles winning these two games is just a fluke?" or "Do you think Vick can fix his interception problem?"

Biggest upset of the week: New England Patriots lost to the Arizona Cardinals. What to say to a dude, "So, what was with the Patriots this weekend?"

The New Orleans Saints lost again, making their record 0-2.

Our Hard Knocks Miami Dolphins won their first game! Reggie Bush and Ryan Tannehill looked great against the Oakland Raiders.

Andrew Luck and his Colts did much better this week, beating the Minnesota Vikings 23-20.

The Cincinnati Bengals beat out cross town rivals the Cleveland Browns but the Browns running back, rookie Trent Richardson, had a breakout game.

The San Francisco 49ers are playing great and beat the Detroit Lions, 27-19.

Monday night game:
Peyton Manning and his Broncos looked bad tonight against the Atlanta Falcons. He threw a bunch of interceptions and just couldn't recover.

Until next time!

Saturday, September 15, 2012

Mark and Eva, sitting in a tree...

The happy couple
K-I-S-S-I-N-G! That's right, folks. Eva Longoria has snagged yet another professional athlete, this one 12 years her junior. Longoria, 37,  recently confirmed on Extra that she is dating Mark Sanchez, 25, quarterback of the New York Jets.

The two have been spotted shopping together and dining at Donald Trump's exclusive golf club in New Jersey. Longoria is the ex-wife of basketball star Tony Parker, 30, and was recently linked to 25 year old Spanish singer Eduardo Cruz.

She's kinda like the senior guys in "Dazed and Confused." She keeps getting older and her guys just stay the same age. You go, Eva! 

Thursday, September 13, 2012

"Pick 6" or "Taint"--you decide

I'd love to use these middle-of-the-week blogs to explain things that were unclear (at least to me!) during the games. I don't know about you, but when I watch football, the commentators talk about things as if you've already taken 50 classes in the sport and now you're in the advanced class. Wrong! Let's back it up a little, fellas. I am positive that this is one of the reasons why women feel left out on game day. It's like a secret club. If you guys ever have any questions or need anything explained in a more "female-friendly" way, please add a comment or send me an email!

So this weekend when I was watching some after-game interviews, the term "Pick 6" was mentioned. Huh? Like Lotto? Is there a bonus round? Apparently not.

What it means is this: When the quarterback throws the ball and is caught by a member of the opposing team (an interception), the slang term is called a "pick," a shortened form of "picked off." Who knew? 

And why the "6," you ask? Well, in this case, if that same interception is returned for a touchdown, they get 6 points. Duh. So, let's say Tom Brady (Patriots) throws the ball and it's caught (intercepted) by Randy Moss (on the 49ers) and he then turns and runs it into the endzone for a 49er touchdown, it would be considered a "Pick 6." And there you have it.

What I find really hilarious is that in the official Wikipedia definition there is this amazing quote:

ESPN columnist Bill Simmons suggested the abbreviation "TAINT" (Touchdown AfterINTerception), but this largely failed to catch on, possibly because of other slang meanings of "taint."

Bahahahahahahhaaaaa! Can you imagine? Hey there, Bill, didja see that TAINT? That was incredible!

I don't think so.


Monday, September 10, 2012

Monday morning recap-Week 1

R & S--Aw, aren't they cute??
Hello everyone! Whew, this is the latest that my Monday morning recap will be published, I promise. I recently got back from Orange County and San Diego for a final summer trip for 10 days. We drove home last night in about 7 hours, finally arriving at around 1:30am. Luckily, both girls are in school/daycare for the day so I was actually able to say to Mike, "So will you watch SportsCenter with
me this morning? I recorded it...I really need to see some highlights!" I don't know who was more shocked, him or me. I have to say, I think after four years of writing this blog I'm actually kind of getting it!

First off, I want to give two shout-outs: One to my UCLA Bruins after not only the football team but the Men's Soccer team, the Women's Soccer team, the Women's Volleyball team and the Men's Water Polo team ALL won their games this weekend. Go Bruins!!

Second, I've gotta give a shout to my dear friends Rebecca and Sean, who's wedding celebration we attended in San Diego this weekend. What a fabulous time. Good friends, good times. Congrats guys!!

RG3
Ok, so let's get down to the games and goings on of the weekend. Remember our rookie players that we learned about last week? Let's see how they did.

ROOKIES:
Remember RGIII on the Washington Redskins? Well, folks, he killed it. A+. He has lived up to, if not surpassed all of the hype. Everyone at your office will be talking about how great he was on Sunday against the New Orleans Saints. He became the first player in NFL history to have 300 passing yards, 2 touchdowns and 0 interceptions in the 1st game of his career. Amazeballs. This guy is a beast. You will definitely hear more about him in the weeks to come! Congrats! You may now keep all of your sponsors.
Andrew Luck

ANDREW LUCK is the also hyped, 1st round draft pick for the Colts who replaced Peyton Manning. He did...meh. We'll give him a B-/C+. This isn't college, honey. Look at me sounding so harsh. He had 3 sacks, 3 interceptions and 3 fumbles during his first game. Not so "Luck-y." Jay Cutler and his Chicago Bears killed them 41-21. I wonder if the Colts are kicking themselves this morning for dumping Manning considering he looked fantastic and led his new team, the Denver Broncos, to a win over the Steelers 31-19. This is after he was out all of last year after having 4 neck surgeries. He also became only the third person in the NFL to get 400 touchdowns in his career on Sunday. Apparently this is a lot.

Tannehill
And then there's our poor, poor RYAN TANNEHILL that we've grown to love from Hard Knocks (HBO) on the Miami Dolphins. He gets a D. Even though I love him and his hot wife. Tannehill threw 3 interceptions in less than six minutes in the 2nd quarter. This is bad. On SportsCenter, they said he had problems with "staring down the receivers," meaning that most QBs sort of look at other receivers when the ball is snapped and then at the last second look and throw the ball to the intended receiver. You know, like a fake-out. Apparently Tannehill was just staring at who he was gonna throw the ball to. As you can tell, this makes it easy for the defense to just go chase after that guy. Sigh.

Another rookie who did even worse than Tannehill was BRANDON WEEDON on the Cleveland Browns. He gets an F. I've gotta ask my girl Jenn over at Sports Stole My Man if everyone in Cleveland is crying today. They played Michael Vick (who looked almost as bad!) on the Philadelphia Eagles. BOTH Weedon and Vick threw 4 interceptions and generally just looked terrible. Vick eked out the win for the Eagles 17-16.

In other news, our own SF 49ers looked great with back-from-retirement Randy Moss. They beat the Green Bay Packers 30-22.

Tom Brady with busted nose
The NY Jets scored an impressive 48 points over the Buffalo Bills, the most ever in franchise history for a season opener. Bill's Fred Jackson had a cringe-inducing knee injury that may keep him out for 3-4 weeks. You may remember that Tim Tebow got traded to the Jets...he played a little bit, but Mark Sanchez was in for the majority of the game.

Oh yeah, and Tom Brady busted his pretty nose! Apparently it's not broken, but if you look on the replay, this guys shin literally goes right into the open spot on his helmet and slams him in the face. Ouch. Whatever, he's still hot. I bet Giselle is pissed.

There are two Monday night games tonight (a little excessive, I know). The Cincinnati Bengals take on the Baltimore Ravens at 7pm ET and the San Diego Chargers take on the Oakland Raiders at 10:15pm ET.

Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Rookies-Who to watch this season

As football season draws near (Weds, Sept 5th) we've gotta start learning who's playing. Since there are hundreds and hundreds of players that guys seem to have all memorized (including all those pesky stats, numbers and positions), my suggestion is that we just jump in and get going. We'll start slowly, I promise.

Pay attention to these four rookies, right out of college that are gonna try their hardest to live up to the media hype that surrounds them.

Andrew Luck
ANDREW LUCK: 
#12-Quarterback 
Indianapolis Colts
You've probably heard of this guy. He was the #1 draft pick this year. Although he was eligible for the draft last year, he elected to stay at school and finish his degree at Stanford. He's basically replacing Peyton Manning who was out for most of the season last year.
He has a ridiculous amount of awards and has broken many records and is probably the most hyped player of the

Monday, September 3, 2012

All in the name of Research

You all have to appreciate this scenario. I'm in Orange County visiting my mom and step dad. I went to BJ's to try and get some work done. They have no wifi. Errrg. I circle around the endless mini-malls until I get a signal--Tapas and Beer. Score! Beer and work on a Sunday. When I walk in, there is a live fantasy draft going on...another score! I set up my laptop and order a beer. When the draft is over, they all go sit outside to talk and smoke. I wonder, "Should I try and infiltrate this group? I bet I could get some great 'lil nuggets of information. Hmmmmm. I'll down my liquid courage and just go sit outside." So I do. And before you know it, I'm handing out business cards and laughing and talking with a great group of guys (and girls!). It was all very informative and fun--thank you Jeremy, Tyler, Brett, Megan and all of the others! I hope you guys enjoy!
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