Week 18: The Drinking Game

Nacho: After the smoke had cleared and the charred rubble had been picked through, the Arizona Cardinals and Philadelphia Iggles emerged victorious in the Wild Card Weekend of the National Football League. The AFC also played games, but I'm gonna go ahead and assume you know about that.

So how do the SportsBrethren feel about this rematch of drunk proportions? As the New Zealanders say, It's Business Time.

I think it bodes well for the Cats that they barely eked out a victory at home against the Cards earlier this year. Up until the fourth quarter there wasn't one iota of certainty about how the game would play out. Boldin was back and scary, but Edge James was really a non-factor in the game. That is not so much the case anymore. Edge and Boldin are finding reserves of talent heretofore dormant to the public eye. The Panthers match up a heck of a lot better with Arizona than they do Minny or Philly, so I'm glad for that aspect, but Kurt Warner's Faustian destiny still seems a few years off.

If the game this upcoming Saturday is anything like the depressing-then-inspiring, come-from-behind victory of yore I'll be pleased. The best we can hope for is everybody in the media starts hyping the Cards, so ESPN, FOX, and Blogosphere have at it.

The Cards did some monumental things this season. Won a home playoff game. Won their division. These are things they should be proud of. And use to build momentum next season.

For the record, Leitch never paid up on the beer he owes me, so I've upped the ante to a pony keg. Who knows if he'll be man enough to take me up on it; at this point I'd imagine he's playing with House Money. I am truly glad he got to see a playoff game in the Melted Hershey Kiss, but playtime's over.

Brethren may or may not get around to posting his thoughts on the weekend, somewhere after...


Nacho cont'd: In the meantime, lets bask in the memories.

Brethren: I celebrated my 24th birthday yesterday by drinking several pint-sized Pabst Blue Ribbon cans with good friends at a bar whilst watching the Sunday NFL. In a lot of ways, it was not unlike, oh, every other Sunday this fall/winter.

But you know what I've come to learn now that I'm in my mid-twenties? I gotta ap'reciate what I got in life, especially what I got from 2008: two damn good football teams. No matter what happens this week, I am going to be watching two epic games that I will be heavily invested in.

First, on Thursday night, the Florida Gators play for their second national championship in three years (and third in my lifetime). Now, I've already explained my perfectly legal pro and college football allegiances round these parts, so I don't want to hear anything about that. Now, granted, I haven't written about Baby Rhino and the Gators much this year (at all?), but that doesn't mean Urban Meyer's tour de force hasn't been on my mind. At this point, you'd be a silly, silly man to doubt Tim Tebow and the horde of fleet-footed receiver/tailbacks he has at his disposal. It has been good to be a Florida Gator this year, and I expect nothing but perfection come Thursday.

But whether or not the Gators bring home the crystal ball, I know that football will continue to matter come Saturday night. Football will not be out of my life. When Charlotte plays host to the first home playoff game since a night game against the Cowgirls in 2003, football will still be running through my veins. It's not always that when college football bowl season ends, and ends in epic fashion, that I've got something to look forward to. This year, this football season, I do.

Go Gators.

Then bring on the Buzzsaw.