By Jason
    February 7th, 2006 at 1:03 am

Immediately after watching what had to be the worst Super Bowl in the history of the universe (well, not immediately, but, you get the idea), I get a frantic message from my buddy Murph who is now, more than ever, convinced that the NFL fixes games. At the time, I laughed it off. There's no way the NFL would fix games right? I mean, even the Lions won some games, and if EVER there was a team that played like it was their intent to throw a season, it was them, right? (We can all agree that Matt Millen hates Detroit and it's fans at this point, can't we? Seriously. What more does someone have to do to merit getting fired? You're reading it here first. At some point next season, Millen is going to run naked onto Ford Field's…uhm…field, screaming obscenities, wreaking of cheap Scotch, and flipping the bird to the crowd consisting of all two hundred people who keep going to the games JUST for this very moment, with, "Why won't you let me leave this damn city!?!" written in black marker across his wrinkled naked body. Talk about high comedy. I might buy the NFL package JUST to tivo every Lions game. Ok, where were we? Oh yeah, G-d had the Steelers at 12-1.) The more I thought about it, the more it all made perfect sense. Not only did the NFL fix the season, it did so because it HAD to! After last night's debacle, it all came full circle; G-d took the Steelers at 12-1. Don't believe me? Here's just SOME of the things that had to happen in order for the Steelers to not only win the Super Bowl, but also cover that suspect 4 point spread in the process:

1. You can't even talk about any other team having a legitimate chance of making the Super Bowl out of the AFC until you some how knock off what was quickly becoming one of the greatest NFL dynasties ever. At the start of the season, was there any reason to think the Patriots wouldn't win the Super Bowl? Of course not! Then it happened. The injury bug didn't just hit the Patriots, it did so in a way that had Dustin Hoffman gitty as a schoolgirl with the possibility of a new storyline for the sequel to Outbreak. (I don't think there's actually one in the works, but, considering the move into relative obscurity Hoffman's career has taken, I wouldn't be surprised. I know. I'll get off the Hoffman rant. I just can't let it go. I won't. Live with it. I do.) Not only did Corey Dillon, seemingly overnight, turn into Irving Spikes (without the jail time), almost the entire defense saw time on the injury report. These things don't just happen! Especially not the Patriots! What's more, they STILL made the playoffs!! That's when it happened; in Denver no less. Tom Brady, the same QB that was 1,423-0 in the playoffs, suddenly throws 18 picks, completes 1 pass that went for an 18-yard loss, and, as Bill Simmons would say, played almost the entire game with the "Manning face" comprising almost every facial expression that he made. You're telling me there weren't greater forces at work? If G-d, him/herself wasn't stirring the pot, how else would Jake Plummer suddenly win a playoff game? There was more at work here. There had to be. That's the only explanation.
Continue reading The Chosen Team, Dustin Hoffman, A Seductive Sheep, and Other Random Offerings……