Ten Things And a Wedding:
Before I amaze you with stories about about my newly wedded son and Me!Me!Me! I’ll amaze you with a few Things from a game I sorta-watched on my phone while walking the sidewalks of New York.
The Bengals Verge Season is pleasantly apace. Maybe even apace-r than I thought it would be after five games. Burrow back from mental and physical knee scarring? D-line productive? Check. O-line hanging in there? Tentatively.
Zac Taylor’s Culture Club? Thriving.
The difference between being a pleasant surprise and a national story line is one missed field goal on Sunday against the Packers. That said. . .
The chances of Burrow staying healthy an entire season playing the way he does are about zero in a million. Taylor has done a decent job calling plays and bringing balance to the offense, but if Burrow doesn’t rein in his fondness for running around, well, Brandon Allen can hand the ball to Joe Mixon, too.
That said, how could you not love Burrow’s reaction to taking a shot to the throat? Bombing Green Bay with Ja’Marr Chase is about as solid as a comeback as you’ll see.
What is a throat contusion? Beyond the obvious, I mean. Seen it on the injury list? Ever miss a day of 3rd grade with a headache, runny nose and a throat bruise? Me, neither.
Really no need for the 57-yard FG try. I love Taylor’s aggressiveness, but too often he walks the ledge between daring and reckless.
People have talked about the need for a Statement Game, which is the sort of thing people talk about when they want to sound smart. Would a mini-upset of the Packers have signaled Cincinnati’s arrival? Why? This isn’t 1966. Verge, people. Verge.
The NFL changes week to week for its first 12 weeks. Things don’t begin to shake out until the last quarter of the regular season. We’re a long way from that. Cleveland is supposed to a good defense. The Browns allowed 47 to the LA Rams Sunday. The Ravens needed a miracle Monday night to rally at home against Eh Indianapolis. Ben Roethlisberger was a little less done on Sunday at Denver than he’d been in the previous month. And so on.
Statements? Ask me in a few months.
Now, then. . .
SAY GOODBYE TO ARCHIE BUNKER. . . Jon Gruden is the stereotypical NFL coach. At least he used to be. Struttin’, swearin’ pseudo-tough guy. Problem for Chucky is, this isn’t 1965. You can’t be swaggerin’ around your life anymore. Coach Cro Magnon isn’t a “man’s man.’’ He’s an unemployed would-be badass who once won a Super Bowl with Tony Dungy’s players.
The bigger point is, every owner in the league knew what kind of guy Gruden was, yet he still managed to find good work for high pay. Ten years, $100 mil in ’18, the balance of which will be voided.
The NFL will tell us of its dedication to being a soldier in its very own cultural revolution – look at us, pretending to care about the social issues of the day! – but as MLewis used to say, “I see better than I hear.’’
"I have resigned as head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders. Said Gruden in a statement, presumably written in crayon. “I love the Raiders and do not want to be a distraction. Thank you to all the players, coaches, staff, and fans of Raider Nation. I’m sorry, I never meant to hurt anyone.’’
Oh, the sincerity. As I read it, I cried moon tears.
Since then, Gruden has said to ESPN "I'm ashamed I insulted (players union chief) De Smith. I never had a racial thought when I used it, I'm embarrassed by what's out there. I certainly never meant for it to sound that bad." "I'm ashamed I insulted De Smith. I never had a racial thought when I used it," Gruden told ESPN. "I'm embarrassed by what's out there. I certainly never meant for it to sound that bad."
Thanks for insulting our intelligence with that nugget. Seeya around.
BASEBALL NEVER LOOKED BETTER than it did in Boston last night. The raucous crowd, the Rays near-magnificent rally, the home runs and the small ball. The Red Sox win 6-5 on a couple singles, a sac bunt and a sac fly. SABR savants, take note.
IT’S UP TO YOU. . . My son Kelly got married at a bar in Brooklyn on Saturday. It was good, unless you hate fun. Sitting in folding chairs on the sidewalk, enjoying adult beverages as my 35-year-old progeny left his single life was a pretty good way to spend an autumn afternoon. And not once was the 10-minute ceremony interrupted by an emergency vehicle, trash truck, police siren, street band, street sweeper, protest, argument, SWAT team, jackhammer or mentally unstable canine.
In between the Event, we ate lots of food. Greek food, Italian, Thai and several hundred bagels. (Not those rolls we call bagels around here. Real bagels, the kind Marx makes in Blue Ash.)
We rented the first floor of a 4-story walkup in Cobble Hill, which is to Brooklyn what Terrace Park is to Cincinnati. It was as quiet as any suburb here.
We took a ferry to Governor’s Island, so pleasant it almost seemed we weren’t in NYC. We did a touristy on/off bus tour of Manhattan that included the 9-11 memorial/monument that was breathtaking in its somber simplicity.
We were amazed at the walkable access to every kind of eat and drink known to man. And at the cleanliness of the streets we accessibly walked. We weren’t delighted with the parking situation. If you go to NY, don’t take your minivan.
That said, NY is the ultimate Love It, Wouldn’t Wanna Live There scene. Nobody speaks to you there. They don’t even make eye contact. I imagine all the walking could get old. For me, it was all a little much. My idea of homestead heaven is a cabin in the woods with Hulu, Netflix, ESPN and a pizza place nearby. Not where I gotta wait 15 minutes to get a cup of coffee.
It was all incidental to my kid getting married to the woman he has known for close to 15 years, in a city they’ve grown to love almost as much as each other. There aren’t many truly significant days in our lives, events that bring us to realize why we’re here in our cabin in the woods or sipping Brooklyn Lager on the sidewalk. This was one of them.
Cheers.
TUNE O’ THE DAY. . . I wrote a column about the pending nuptials last week. For inspiration, I went back and watched parts of Father of the Bride. The gender was different this time. The stirring of the emotion was not.
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