2013 All-Armchair Linebacker Team (numbers 23 through 33)

Look, I don’t feel like writing this shit today. So here’s what we’ll do. Go buy yourself a twenty bag and roll up two big blunts. Then start smoking the first one. I’m going to tell you some music stuff to look up on youtube for these players on the All-ACLB team, one rap-type shit and one rock-type shit for each…

#23: Arian Foster (RB, Houston Texans) – Maybe the most metaphysical fucker in the NFL. Look up Wise Intelligent’s “Illuminati” video. Yeah I could probably put links but fuck it, I want you to wormhole yourself here. As for rock, I guess it would have to be kinda wacky, and might as well represent Texas, so look you up some Roky Erickson. Old Roky with 13th Floor Elevators is cool, but maybe you’ll get the Roky documentary there too, which would be nice.

#24: Marshawn Lynch (RB, Seattle Seahawks) – Beast Mode, from the Bay Area. Fuck rock on this one, just put “classic E-40” in the googlebox, but somewhere in there mix in “Life is Too Short” by Too Short, for clarity.

#25: Richard Sherman (CB, Seattle Seahawks) – Intelligent shit-talking, aka the NFL embodiment of back-packer rap and nerd metal, and abusing Adderall. Might seem like a Danny Brown choice, but I think Danny Brown wallows in the darkness too easily. Go for the official video for “Pineal Gland” by Ab-Soul, and see if “Book of Soul” is there while you’re at it. As for rock, early Mastodon, definitely.

#26: Atari Bigby (S, San Diego Chargers) – Simply here because of his name, as I hate all Chargers, forever. But San Diego is at the border with Mexico and we probably could use a break. Scope you out some cumbia rebajada as done by Sonidero Duenez, which is like the screwed and chopped music done in Monterrey in the late ‘60s. You’ll be glad you did. Or maybe you won’t because you’re an uptight bitch who didn’t actually get high at the beginning of this article like I told you. In that case, your lack of enjoyment is due to your own not following the goddamn formula laid out for you. So fuck you.

#27: Rashean Mathis (CB, Jacksonville Jaguars) – Florida mini-dreads means Gunplay. Look up that “The Hard Way” song, as that’ll get you hyped the fuck up again. A good rock match for this is Pentagram’s “Forever My Queen”. I mean, they don’t really match but when it’s cold outside and you are high and it’s nearly a full moon and you want to get your crazed mind of a Charles Simic lunatic snowflake on, Gunplay and Pentagram are a good combo, both in terms of music as well as actual things you are utilizing for leisure.

#28: Tom Zbikowski (S, Indianapolis Colts) – Haha, I don’t even know why I included him. Probably to be contrarian towards Adrian Peterson, whose bug eyes freak me out. Whiteboy safety returning punts in white people Colts uniforms pure Indiana style is funny. Do you have Audacity for mixing tracks? You should get Audacity, and put some Scott Biram on there first, maybe “Reefer Load” or 18-Wheeler Fever” but then mix the sound on that one down to about 33%. Then put “Kush Clouds” by Freddie Gibbs over top, or fuck that, put “G.I. Pride” by Gibbs, going more old school (as old school as Gangsta Gibbs can get) and put that over top the Biram, so that then you can play it and it is Freddie Gibbs but with Scott Biram blurring up the background. There, you have Indiana drug music. You’re welcome.

#29: Earl Thomas (S, Seattle Seahawks) – Why are there so many fucking Seahawks on this thing? What the fuck man? I hate the Seahawks. Oh well, go listen to “Drop” by Earl Sweatshirt, and then Steve Earle’s version of “Mr. Mudd & Mr. Gold”. Actually that Steve Earle song is dope as fuck; it’s why I have a Jack of Diamonds tattooed on my dick. Jack of Diamonds is a hard card to play.

#30: LaRon Landry (S, New York Jets) – Haha, LaRon. No rap, no rock, just R&B music late at night doing push-ups by yourself. But you are already high, right? Okay, go get OG Ron C’s chopped not slopped version of Frank Ocean’s Channel Orange called Channel Purple. By the time you get through “Pyramids” and “Pink Matter” you ought to be halfway done on that second joint, and wishing you had dipped it in embalming fluid first.

#31: Cortland Finnegan (CB, St. Louis Rams) – Pure shit-talker. Pure Shit Talker. Listen to three Action Bronson songs (make one of them “Barry Horowitz” though), and then “The Black Mass” by Pagan Altar just to cleanse your aural palette and you’re almost done here.

#32: Jacquizz Rogers (RB, Atlanta Falcons) – Haha, what a funny name. Makes me think of Jacuzzi rooms in the hotel, getting ass back in the day. Oh man, to rent the Jacuzzi room at the Comfort Inn for the weekend, getting fucked up as shit, those were good times. Oddly enough I find my sexual stamina is more long-lasting now that I don’t drink alcohol. I get in this weird mode where I’m dialed in and start having this weird brain sweat thing going on and I literally can just do it forever, focused on my 3rd eye. I’m interested in the changes in the brain chemistry during sex, and what drives men to want to ejaculate in order to release those dopamines, because with the philosophy of Chinaman old crazy dudes who just have sex with no orgasm gaining Qi force, there’s something to it. I can feel it in my own life; I have found this to be true. I’d like to know the chemical causes of this. How do we increase those pre-orgasm chemistries naturally without getting the release of orgasmic dopamine, and how does that stimulate Qi? No songs this time, sorry, we were thinking instead. Maybe watch five minutes of a Sun-Ra documentary while you think about it.

#33: Jewel Hampton (RB, San Francisco 49ers) – Don’t even know who this dude is but his name is Jewel Hampton. You can just keep watching the Sun-Ra documentary. It’ll be good for you.

2013 All-Armchair Linebacker Team (numbers 2 through 22)

In case you missed yesterday’s first part to this 2013 All-Armchair Linebacker team, well then you’re fucked. You’ll never catch up at this point. Anyways, today we go through numbers 12 to 22. These are the higher-profile QBs where one number was not enough, or misfit kickers or punters, or WRs who at first barely make a football team as a special teams guy with a second-hand number in training camp, but then it sticks. These are also the early 20s numbers, star numbers for players better than an under-20 number would warrant, but need to be first in line on the regular, non-pussy specialist dude roster. So let’s get to it…

#12: Tom Brady (QB, New England Patriots) – You know what? A really strange thing happened to me after that Patriots/Ravens game the other day, as I had been rooting against Belichick/Brady like anybody else with any human decency. But then there was Ray Lewis trying to take off his shoulder pads with 2 minutes left in the game so he could show off his stupid fucking Jesus shirt, and somebody is like, “No no no no” to him because you know, the game’s not over. So he lurks around, then gets himself unstrapped really quickly after the game so he can very melodramatically crouch down in the center of the field and gibber-pray some bullshit, with no teammates around at all, surrounded by media cameras, with his stupid tank top message on. And I realized, here I was rooting against Tom Brady this whole time, thinking he was a total douchebag, when in actuality the real total douche of the NFL was on the other side, in the form of Ray Lewis. All too often the Ray Lewis opinion is either, “He’s great” or “He stabbed people so I am uncomfortable with him.” Neither of these really address the issue of what a melodramatic queen type he truly is, and how he’s easily – EASILY – the biggest douchebag in the NFL. Why do I say all this as I talk about Tom Brady on the All-ACLB team? Because it’s my way of explaining that yes Tom Brady is handsome by magazine advertisement standards, and yes he is rich, and yes he has won three Super Bowls already. And yes, he was George Bush’s guest a bunch of times. But how is he really that bad? Like what are the genuine displays of outright douchery he has committed lately. Now I understand this might just mean he has excellent handlers and PR people, but still, being handled properly and relating to the public well is not necessarily a horrible thing, now is it?

#13: T.Y. Hilton (WR, Indianapolis Colts) – Mostly I like him because his name sounds like an actor on one of those WB network urban sitcoms. Sometimes I can’t sleep and I am sitting around late doing nothing naked on the couch high on hydrocodone, and I end up watching those shows – like Sisters or Meet the Pains (or whatever) where that one dude wears the most garish clothes possible. I’m not even sure most white people know these things exist. But also, racial composition is not scientific at all, and actually a political tool, so ultimately it doesn’t matter if white people know it exists, because “white people” themselves don’t truly exist, at least not scientifically.

#14: Zoltan Mesko (P, New England Patriots) – If you are named Zoltan, you will be on the All ACLB team. That’s been the new rule ever since Mack Strong retired.

#15: Tim Tebow (QB, New York Jets) – The whole Sanchez/Rex Ryan thing I wrote about yesterday is even more bizarre when you add in Tim Tebow to the whole thing. I know locker room codes are not broken, and the NFL is very strict in enforcing its kayfabe policies of not revealing bullshit to the rubes/marks at large (meaning you and me), but man, I bet the story beneath the  underbelly of the 2012 New York Jets is quite an amazing story.

#16: Josh Cribbs (WR, Cleveland Browns) – Gangsta Cribbs, who did not have the same explosion as return specialist this year, nor was he utilized as much in the wildcat formation being the Browns have Brandon Weeden now. But Gangsta Cribbs is Gangsta Cribbs, and he always came with the fury. For me, Cribbs is the perfect example of how the NFL exploits people, as he was the only thing worth seeing in a Browns uniform for a number of years, and they never gave him the money he wanted, even when he held out, and now his value has gone down so he couldn’t get it if they wanted to give it to him, and he’ll be out of the league in a couple of years, having generated millions, and made thousands. I know you heartless fuckers raised on the machine emotions of the Lords of Capital always go, “Whoa man, these guys get paid a lot of money to play this game… If they are broken, crippled, and impoverished in five  years, it’s not my problem.” One should not revel in the ignorance of others, and one should definitely not pretend to themselves that by continuously supporting an exploitative business that preys on the environmentally conditioned ignorance of others, that they are not part of the problem.

#17: Austin Collie (WR, Indianapolis Colts) – I like to call him Mr. Concussion. This dude sneezes and he’s got neurocognitive specialists giving him tests on the sideline. I have to admit I’m a little bummed there’s already been three Colts on this team. I kinda hate the Colts. Still though, it’s pretty hard to resist the chance to make an Austin Collie concussion joke.

#18: Randall Cobb (WR, Green Bay Packers) – I run a fantastical league where return yards on special teams scores points, so that period this year when the Packers had no RB, and Cobb was the only receiver who could catch passes, and he was also their return man, it was a glorious period. Thus, he is now here. Because of fake football games with nerds using math.

#19: John Skelton (QB, Arizona Cardinals) – Is there anything more perfectly misfitted than a cast-off Cardinals QB named Skelton wearing the #19? I mean, Harry Crews or Cormac McCarthy couldn’t have dreamed up something like that. So sad and so real.

#20: Ed Reed (S, Baltimore Ravens) – Ed Reed is the greatest. You can tell by looking into his sad ancient hobo hermit poet eyes. It really just drives home what a douche Ray Lewis is when you look over and Ed Reed is just being totally chill about everything, always.

#21: Charles Woodson (S, Green Bay Packers) – Similar things – though not quite as strongly – can be said for Charles Woodson. He is a rock, and keeps fighting around injuries galore, although he’s already made the downgrade from CB to safety, so there’s not much further into the grey areas of active NFL rosters he can really go. But we love Charles Woodson at Armchair Linebacker, as he was always the superior Woodson (fuck you Rod, and I guess Darren as well, though I don’t think other than that one Super Bowl game where Neil O’Donnell was paid to lose it by the Mafia anybody really thought Darren Woodson was good).

#22: Jerron McMillian (CB, Green Bay Packers) – Makes the team simply because he is the only NFL player active with my last name, spelled as I spell it, which is a rare spelling only utilized by true Super Destructors. I am of course of the metaphysical variety of Super Destructor, and the last name is pronounced “MACK-mill-in” because the extra a in the last syllable shoots into the first syllable because I am motherfucking magical like that, and more powerful than the painful conventions of the English language. I am New Writing, in human form.

2013 All-Armchair Linebacker Team (numbers 1 through 11)

Let me make this clear – this is the 2013 All-Armchair Linebacker team of people. I am not sure where Neil is, as he has not been at the ACLB Clubhouse the past couple weeks, after I gave him some cursed turtlehead knife from a Portuguese bruxa. We usually try to meet every other week in Louisville, Kentucky, at a studio space our immense profits from Armchair Linebacker allows us to rent in the downtown arts district, where we chat about our editorial direction. Neil hasn’t showed up the past three times though. Whatever. Thus, he’s not helping with this.

Also I think picking teams based on position alone is for assholes. If you want to read some bullshit like that, go google Peter King and get your asshole reading done elsewhere. This list is done by numbers, one player per number, so our team has 99 players and like 10 kickers. Fuck you if that’s a problem.

Our first listing goes from 1 through 11 – the primadonnas of the NFL – kicking specialists and sheltered QBs and the occasional weirdo WR with a super low number (though none made our All-ACLB team in these numbers). These are the little twerps of our football team, thus they have little twerp numbers, and are the guys most likely to be good at really complicated five-part sudoku puzzles. Or backgammon. Man, is there any game more asshole-y than backgammon? Anyways, here’s the 2013 All-ACLB team, Part 1 of 9…

#1: Pat McAfee (P, Indianapolis Colts) – Don’t know shit about this guy, like at all, and I hate the Colts, but I can’t help but imagine weird ass drunken rich guy Jim Irsay is somehow friends with that weird ass drug-addled rich dude who started the actual McAfee virus software that was in Central America doing brain drugs and killing some other dude and being a nutball, so I sort of imagine Pat McAfee is probably about as good as 142 other punters on this earth (as they are all about the same after the best five), but because his uncle is the crazy software guy, and that guy used to go on hash/16-year-old boy indulgence vacations with Irsay a few years back, Irsay got him to be his punter.

#2: Kai Forbath (K, Washington Redskins) – California kid called Kai who kicks with a shoe three-sizes too small… not normally what I’d be proud of, but he’s the first good kicker the Redskins have had in 20 years, even though half the guys who used to kick for the Redskins all kick elsewhere now. Naturally easy nickname of “Cobra” Kai as well.

#3: Russell Wilson (QB, Seattle Seahawks) – Look, I don’t like Russell Wilson, mostly because he sounds and looks like Tiger Woods, and who the fuck likes Tiger Woods? That’s like liking feudalism. But there’s not a lot of great shit going on with the #3 in the NFL right now, and the kid had a good rookie season, so I’ll give him some shine.

#4: Jason Hanson (K, Detroit Lions) – Has been playing since before anybody outside of defense contractors knew what the internet was. Oldest man in football probably, and one day will be forced to retire, thus causing the Lions to lose the one piece that tied together the three times they were almost good as a franchise.

#5: Chris Kluwe (P, Minnesota Vikings) – Very popular amongst the internet for being an internet douche type that likes comic book shit and is okay with gays. Sometimes it is lost on us nowadays that just because you like comic books and are okay with gays, it does not mean you are a cool person. There are plenty of dumbasses who like comic books and are okay with gays. You should stop using the logical fallacy of thinking because somebody is the opposite of something stupid, they are not stupid. Everybody is stupid.

#6: Mark Sanchez (QB, New York Jets) – Oh man, there is so much to say here about Mark Sanchez. First, the butt fumble thing is an amazing work of chaos that we are all so blessed to have happen in the internet age when wacky gifs can live forever (relatively speaking). If that had happened in 1971, which it might have, we wouldn’t know, much less catch many lulz over. But beyond this, the entire Mark Sanchez story is interesting to me, as you have this magazine advertisement handsome kid from SoCal, going into the largest metro market in America, wooing everybody with his good looks – a natural pussymonger if there ever was one, in the Joe Namath tradition. Now usually the professional athlete of this stature takes years to slowly deteriorate and be forced, against his will, to take on a normal man’s life. Except with Sanchez, his lack of successes has caused this to be foisted upon him even earlier. He is essentially the most handsome failure of America, even more handsome but more of a failure than even Matt Leinart before him. And yet there is coach Rex Ryan on Caribbean vacation sporting a shitty tattoo of his wife in a Sanchez jersey. That would be weird under normal circumstances (if such a thing can occur in normal circumstances) but given the fact Ryan’s wife has been outed before as star of homemade foot fetish videos, and Ryan himself an alleged prevert, it all the more remarkable. “Why?” you may ask. Well because through rampant surfing through tumblrs, I can tell you foot fetishists tend to skew towards liking to be humiliated, and there is a strong cross-section of this demographic that also enjoys playing the cuckold, which is a medieval term for “haha, somebody else is fucking your ol’ lady while you watch.” So for Coach Ryan to have his star handsome QB’s jersey on his poorly tattooed wife in a sultry pose, it suggests things very Craigslist No-Strings-Attached folder-like. And of course, that makes perfect sense for the New York Jets, and their degenerate fanbase. Of course now the Sanchez era may be over, and he will just be a high profile back-up somewhere like San Francisco or Carolina or something, but man, it was really the most perfect thing ever while it was rolling along.

#7: Ben Roethlisberger (QB, Pittsburgh Steelers) – Fuck the haters, Big Ben is the best. Giant, halfwit QBs who probably hang out on the Sons of Anarchy set in the off-season will always be the best. Kenny Stabler taught me that.

#8: Adam Podlesh (P, Chicago Bears) – Nothing remarkable about Adam Podlesh, other than he is the Bears player in the #8 jersey, formerly made infamous by Rex Grossman, who is perhaps the worst QB who ever made it to a Super Bowl. Have you ever thought about the fact the only Super Bowl Peyton Manning ever won was against Rex Grossman? Doesn’t seem quite so Hall of Fame-worthy, does it?

#9: Tony Romo (QB, Dallas Cowboys) – There is nothing more perfect than watching Tony Romo fuck up the end of a game and/or season in the haphazard, confused twinkle-eyed ways that only Tony Romo can. For that reason alone, there is no way he would not be on our All-ACLB team, because we are about the beauty of suffering more than probably anything else.

#10: Robert Griffin III (QB, Washington Redskins) – Briefly made the Redskins seem like they might right their immense wrongs, until their immensely wrong ways swallowed RG3 whole and snapped his knee sideways. Every Redskins fan blog should just have an animated gif of RG3’s knee bending sideways in the hardscrabble surface of FedEx Field as its banner, because nothing more perfectly sums up the Dan Snyder era of Redskinsdom than that moment.

#11: Sebastian Janikowski (K, Oakland Raiders) – Throwback kicker in that he is a rudeboy Polock with a beer belly, and yet still awesome as fuck. If you wanted somebody to speak to your corporate sponsors, he’d be the last choice amongst all NFL kickers, but if you wanted somebody to attempt a 65-yard field goal at the end of a meaningless first half of a meaningless week 13 game against the Chiefs, there’s nobody better.