Wednesday, November 23, 2016

Russia's F.U. to Japan, Fall Out Boy's pub grab and why athletes lie

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- Ever wish professional athletes could just speak the truth and not have to lie for the sake of keeping up appearances? If they could, then Washington Redskins quarterback Kirk Cousins would not be selling the line of absolute bullsh*t he’s trying to pawn off on the world in the wake of his latest postgame shouting session. Cousins famously yelled, “You like that? You like that!” after a big win last season, one that went a long way toward silencing doubters who wondered whether he was a viable NFL starting quarterback. Yet after last season, when he wanted $20 million per season in a new contract, the Redskins' best offer was $16 million and he’s playing this season under a one-year franchise player tag because the two sides couldn’t agree on a long-term deal. One of those who wouldn’t give him the contract he wanted was general manager Scot McCloughan, who just so happened to be the target for Cousins’ newest rant, one in which he stopped and shouted, “How do you like me now?" at the GM before tussling McCloughan’s hair as he kept running into the tunnel. That came after throwing for 300-plus yards and three touchdowns in a primetime win over the Green Bay Packers and it would seem like the perfect time to get in the face of someone who clearly didn’t believe in you - at least not the way you wanted them to. Yet Cousins insists that there is no underlying motivation for his shouted words. "No, there's nothing," Cousins said. "I was just excited coming off the field with emotion. I would prefer for that to happen with no cameras and no microphones. We're both competitors who want to win desperately and both feeling great in that moment.” It’s a professional response, but one no one is/should be buying………

- Sometimes, morons are difficult to spot in life. This is not one of those times. No, the world can clearly identify William Edwards as swimming in the shallow end of the gene pool given that he a) was leaving a trip club at 2:15 a.m., b) got behind the wheel of his Ford pickup truck while intoxicated, c) drove away with the door ajar and fell out of the truck, d) ran over his own leg and e) crashed into a nearby home, injuring a woman inside. According to the Florida Highway Patrol, Edwards was leaving the Dance Royale Club on Old Cheney Highway early in the morning despite the fact that club security said they had warned Edwards not to drive because he had had too much to drink and in a shocking turn of events, the night went sideways in a hurry. Before he could even make it out of the parking lot, Edwards fell out of the truck, which rolled over his legs, continued traveling across Old Cheney Highway and crashed into a house. A woman audacious enough to be asleep inside her own home at 2:15 a.m. while living within drunk-driving distance of a strip club where lecherous drunks hang out was injured, although fortunately her injuries were not serious enough to necessitate a trip to the hospital. In his final brilliant decision of a regrettable evening, Edwards ran away from the scene of the crash without reporting the crash, but authorities were able to identify and arrest him because he left his driver’s license at the club. Oh, and because he left his truck lodged in the side of a house, so there’s that too. All in all, it’s another on the exhaustive list of reasons not to ever visit a strip club at any point in your life…….

- Thanks for the publicity grab, Fall Out Boy. Because make no mistake, that’s precisely what reissuing two of your early albums next month not long after announcing that your merry band of pop-punksters will be working on new music is and nothing more. Bassist Pete Wentz told the crowd during the band’s set at Reading festival that FOB will be “back with new music,” which is a sobering promise that Reading attendees that they may be subjected to songs like ‘Sugar, We’re Goin Down’ and ‘Dance, Dance’ again. As for those reissues albums, FOB will seek to grab both extra cash and more publicity by re-releasing ‘From Under The Cork Tree’ and ‘Infinity On High,’ with both albums dropping - for a second time - on vinyl next month. The vinyl aspect is nice tip of the cap to hipsters who want to add a mediocre album from a forgettable band to their vinyl collection they use to impress their fellow hipsters at their hipster parties stocked with obscure craft beers, but reissuing a pair of albums from a decade ago isn't really going to generate much of an actual impact. The most recent FOB album, ‘American Beauty/American Psycho,’ was released last year and turned out the usual supply of radio-friendly, teeny-bopper pop-punk anthems for which the band has become famous. Wentz said at Reading that the show would be the last one primarily featuring songs from the new album, after which he made the threat/promise that new material would be on the way soon. But before then, world, enjoy a couple of albums you heard and got tired of 10 years ago……..

- Russia is pushing its incendiary chips to the middle of the table and staking its claim, daring Japan to do a damn thing about it. According to the Russian military, Moscow has deployed new anti-ship missiles on Pacific islands that are controlled by Russia but also claimed by Japan in the process taking time off from trying to (allegedly) rig American presidential elections to stick a massive, communist middle finger in the face of the Far East. The official military mouthpiece of Russia's Pacific Fleet reported that Bal and Bastion missile systems have been stationed on the islands, called the southern Kurils by Russia and the Northern Territories by Japan, in what can only be described as a deliberately provocative move. The long-running dispute over the islands, seized by the Soviet Union at the end of World War II, has remained such a hot-button issue that it has literally prevented the two nations from signing a peace treaty formally ending their wartime hostilities. This move probably won't help matters, but it should make for excellent conversation when Russian President/dictator Vladimir Putin visits Japan next month. Then, Putin can explain why he chose to drop a metaphorical bomb directly on top of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s recent pleas for progress in the territorial dispute……..

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