- You may not remember Matt Lepsis, even if you’re a pretty avid fan of the National Football League. But Lepsis was an offensive lineman who played several seasons for the Denver Broncos and was actually a very good player for his entire career, part of a Broncos’ offensive line that was perennially among the NFL’s best. However, Lepsis abruptly retired from the league after last season and enrolled in the Dallas Theological Seminary, a drastic turn in a life that, as it turns out, was spiraling out of control. Now that he has his life back on track, Lepsis has admitted to playing the first six games of the 2007 season, his last in the NFL, while high. Yes, the Rocky Mountain high wasn’t the only one dude was experiencing, but he managed to get away with it. Lepsis didn’t specify which drug or drugs he was using, only that he played those six games under the influence. After the season, he was so heavily burdened by his drug habit and trying to rif himself of it that he walked away from the final two years of his contract with the Broncos, a deal that was to have paid him $9 million. Clearly, he felt that living the NFL lifestyle was contributing to, if not creating, his problems and that getting away from all of that was worth much more than $9 million. Honestly, as much as we would all like to believe that stories like this are one of a kind and that Lepsis is some sort of unique case, it’s not true. Maybe the league doesn’t have a cocaine epidemic like it did decades ago, but there are absolutely guys who use illegal drugs and you’d be a fool to believe that none of them have ever taken the field while under the influence. Lepsis did so and if he hadn’t told us about it, I doubt anyone would have ever known, so how can you say that he’s the only one. Regardless, I’m glad he was able to make the tough decision to walk away from the game and possibly save his life in the process…..
- Damn. I wanted to be the first one to file a lawsuit against CBS on account of Two and a Half Men, but sadly, Warner Bros. TV has beaten me to it. There are two reasons for this, the first being that my reason for wanting to sue is that the show absolutely blows and is an affront to everything that’s good about TV. It is, after all, a half-hour sitcom, and the only one of those that hasn’t totally blown for as long as sitcoms have existed is Seinfeld and to quote a famous politician, “Two and a Half Men, you’re no Seinfeld.” However, suing on this basis is something that, at present, the law doesn’t allow. The second reason is that Warner Bros. is a major corporation, has crap loads of money and lawyers and can actually afford to file a lawsuit. Oh, and their suit has an actual legal basis, so that helps. For those reasons and many more, Warner Bros. has filed a $49 million lawsuit against CBS, claiming the network has refused to reimburse the studio in production fees and costs since the sitcom became a hit (and yes, “hit” is a relative and subjective term in this case).
Warner Bros. claims in its suit that its licensing agreement with CBS entitles the studio to recoup costs incurred during the show’s first four seasons, known as a "deficit recoupment," once the show has proven to be a success. After the first four seasons, the deal was renegotiated and for seasons five and six, it declares a "modest increase" in fees. "CBS has reaped the benefits of the tremendous success of Two and a Half Men but wants to deny Warner Bros. the right to its agreed-upon share," the Warner whined in the suit. As quick aside, how infuriating is it when two ginormous corporate titans brawl over seemingly inconsequential amounts of money and act like they aren’t both filthy rich? But back the point at hand before I get too upset, the suit claims that CBS agreed to pay a $750,000 per episode license fee during the first four years. Unfortunately, crappy shows aren’t always cheap to produce and the average cost per episode for those first four seasons was $1.22 million per clunker. Putting on our math hats, we can calculate that Warner Bros.’ deficit over four seasons id…..$61.1 million. As you might expect, CBS is giving a big legal middle finger to Warner at this point, so we’ll have to wait and see how this one shakes out….
- Here’s a steadfast standard to live by in life: no matter what your job is, if someone points a gun at you at any point during your work day, consider that day of work over and go home - well, unless you are a police officer or a soldier. In those jobs, getting guns pointed at you is part of the gig. Otherwise, if some psycho points a gun of any size and caliber in your face, it’s day over. That’s why I’m more than a little disappointed in an unidentified 65-year-old delivery man in Spartanburg, South Carolina. Dude was robbed in the middle of his shift, yet continued to drop off pizzas last Monday. The delivery man said he was dropping off a pizza at a residence when he was approached by a who demanded money. When the delivery man said he would not give the robber the money, the masked man pulled a gun and was then given $15 by the delivery man. But as I said, this tool (the delivery guy, not the robber) went on delivering pies. And why did he do so? Well, in part the reason seems to be that when this guy was robbed at gunpoint by a man wearing a bandana over his fact, his first call was to his manager at the Domino’s Pizza where he works. The manager, showing loads of sensitivity and class, told him to finish his deliveries before returning to the store. Worse still, the delivery guy listened to those idiotic instructions, finished his deliveries and then he went to the Spartanburg sheriff's office to report the robbery. Now, police are out looking for the robber but so far, they have no leads. In the meantime, how’s about arresting the manager for being an insensitive, un-caring, thick-headed ass? This senior citizen has a gun pointed in his face and you don’t tell him to call it a night and go home? Like I said, if anyone points a gun in my face at any point in the day, I’m done working. See ya later, I’m going home. So props to this old dude, I guess, for being tough enough to hang in there, but also a wag of the finger to him for not having the testicular fortitude to tell his boss to take a hike……
- I have several reactions to the news that the Detroit Lions fired coach Rod Marinelli on Monday, a day after the team became the first in NFL history to finish with an 0-16 record. The first is that even though Marinelli is a stand-up guy and a solid, character-first individual, I wouldn’t trade that 0-16 season for anything, even if it meant a dude like Marinelli keeping his job. Second, I think the Lions should be ashamed of themselves, firing a coach who was able to keep his team focused on being un-focused for an entire season, guiding them to perfection the way he did. Yes, Marinelli was gallant in defeat, admitting that he knew the axe was about to drop. "You can't go 0-16 and expect to keep your job," Marinelli said at a news conference. Why not, Rod? You got your team to do something that no team has ever done and probably no team ever will again. You were handed terrible players and a mismatched roster by an inept front office, and you kept those guys performing just the way any rational person would have expected them to. You got them to play to their strengths, or more specifically, their lack thereof. But if you really want to heap the blame on Marinelli, you might start with the fact that he had a disturbing tendency toward nepotism, which is generally not a good idea in pro sports. Hiring one’s family members tends not to work out well if for no other reason than the fact that it’s extremely unlikely that multiple members of one family are going to be good pro coaches, just as a general rule. So the fact that Marinelli's son-in-law, Joe Barry, was the team’s defensive coordinator, and assistant offensive line coach Mike Barry, Joe’s father, were on staff probably didn’t help matters. However, the Lions won't have that problem going forward, as both Barry’s were canned alongside Marinelli. Continuing the coaching carnage, secondary coach Jimmy Lake was also fired, as was defensive line coach Joe Cullen. Somehow, offensive coordinator Jim Colletto managed to survive, although he was demoted to offensive line coach. My last thought in the Marinelli firing is that former Lions GM Matt Millen deserves the bulk of the blame for the team’s awful season, as he put the roster together. After all, the players are the bulk of the reason any team wins or loses. Coming into this year, the Lions were 24-72 in Millen’s tenure. He was fired mid-season, having hired three coaches in his reign and having seen none of them work out. So if you’re looking to dish out credit for the worst season in NFL history, start with Millen and don’t be so quick to point to Marinelli……
- Wow. Stunning news here: a study has found that teens who take virginity pledges are just as likely to have sex as teens who don't make such promises. Furthermore, teens who make such pledges are less likely to practice safe sex to prevent disease or pregnancy. "Previous studies found that pledgers were more likely to delay having sex than non-pledgers," said study author Janet E. Rosenbaum, a post doctoral fellow at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. "I used the same data as previous studies but a different statistical method." So what you’re saying to me is that a bunch of horny teenagers, people who change their minds more often than they text message their friends, don’t stick to a non-binding verbal pledge they make? Jeez, what revelation do you have for me next, that water is wet? That fire is hot? I appreciate that Rosenbaum took the time to compare those who had taken a virginity pledge with similar teens who hadn't taken a pledge, but this should surprise exactly no one. "Virginity pledgers and similar non-pledgers don't differ in the rates of sex or any sexual behavior," Rosenbaum said. "Strikingly, pledgers are less likely than similar non-pledgers to use condoms and also less likely to use any form of birth control." For her study, Rosenbaum collected data on 934 high school students who had never had sex or had taken a virginity pledge. and matched students who had taken a virginity pledge with those who hadn't. Five years down the road, she followed up with her subjects and found that those who had taken a pledge did not differ from teens who hadn't taken a pledge in rates of premarital sex or sexually transmitted diseases. Again, I’m flabbergasted. What, teenagers lie? They make promises they don’t keep? They do things like take purity pledges to pacify their parents or because friends are doing it, then don’t live up to those pledges? Never does it cease to amaze me how many “researchers” can score big grant money to research things that are so blatantly obvious……..
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