‘Sup? Welcome back to
the Chode Picks, for what I’m pretty sure is the fourth week of the NFL
season. It’s currently Thursday night,
because I felt obligated to get an earlier start on the Picks than last week,
and because it was one of those nights where I got tired of studying and said
to myself “You know what? Fuck it. I’m gonna go get drunk in my sauna”. Yes, I have a sauna in my basement. And a pool table. Don’t ask me why, because I still live on
campus. It makes no sense. But I guess that’s one of the few perks of
being a medical student; the further you get from undergrad campus, the nicer
the houses are, and the cheaper the rent is.
Of course, it follows that you’re miles away from any of the fun bars
(the ones packed with drunk twenty year olds), but that’s the price you (not
you actually, but third person you) pay.
But enough about my old, boring life.
I’ll get to more of that later.
Time to kickoff the Chode Picks with the premier matchup of the
week. The date that I circled on the
calendar when the schedule first came out, because it was crucial to our
championship aspirations. The one that
Wisconsin has been waiting for all season…
GREEN BAY PACKERS (1-2) vs BYE WEEK (0-0)
What, did you think I was talking about the Ohio State
game? Don’t be silly. This is it.
The week that determines our fate in the 2013 NFL season. Simply put, we cannot afford to go down 1-3
against Detroit next week, so we need absolutely need this extra time off to
get healthy. Come week four, one of two
things is going to happen. Either Morgan
Burnett, Casey Hayward and Clay Matthews will get healthy enough to help us
stomp the Lions and get back into NFC North contention, or they’ll stay
sidelined and watch as we fall out of the playoff race. It might seem a bit dramatic, but it’s
true. That’s just how much parity exists
in the NFL. Truth be told, the Vikings
are already out of it with three losses and Christian Plunger at
quarterback. And I don’t know who Green
Bay’s team physician is, but I swear when I get there, I’ll do everything
humanly possible to keep us in winning shape.
In the immortal words of Joe LaBuda, “we’ll leave no stone uncovered”. Hey, speaking of Joe…
GREEN BAY by DEFAULT
MENOMONIE INDIANS (5-0) at RICE LAKE WARRIORS (3-2)
Yeah, we’re going there.
It’s been a few years since I’ve paid attention to my old high school
football team, but they’ve earned a mention in the Chode Picks with their
performance at the halfway point of the season.
Check out the final scores of their first five games:
Menomonie 42 Tomah 0
Menomonie 42 Tomah 0
Menomonie 23 Merrill
0
Menomonie 36 Chippewa
Falls 0
Menomonie 21 Eau
Claire Memorial 0
Menomonie 38 River
Falls 0
That’s right. My alma
mater has played five full games, 300 minutes of football, without giving up a
single damn point. Perhaps more
impressively, they haven’t missed a single extra point all season (for those of
you not from my hometown, an extra point is to Menomonie Football as a Hail
Mary is to Wisconsin Football: we always get fucked over). But that’s not what matters. The point is, I couldn’t tell you the name of
a single player on this team, but for the first time in six years, I’m going to
be paying attention to a high school football team. Don’t let me down, you seventeen year-old
freaks.
MENOMONIE 21 RICE
LAKE 0
Okay, fine. I’ll
write about the Badger game now.
WISCONSIN BADGERS (3-1*) at OHIO STATE BUCKEYES (4-0)
I’ve been trying all week to think of a way to spin this one
for UW. Maybe our kickass run game can
keep it up against Urban Meyer’s super-talented defense. Maybe our front seven can keep Braxton Miller
in check like they did last year in Camp Randall. Maybe we can count on Kyle French to make a
clutch field goal or two. Maybe this
week Joel Stave will be able to hit a wide-open receiver after a play-action
fake. And if all of those things happen,
unfortunately I still see us losing a close game in Columbus. The truth is, our secondary is just too damn
inexperienced to hold up against Ohio State’s vicious passing attack. Coming into this year, everyone knew that our
pass defense would be our Achilles heel, and it’s been blatantly obvious over
the past two weeks. Despite stellar play
from Dezmen Southward and Peniel Jean, we’ve gotten torched through the air by
Purdue and that fucking team from Tempe that will not be mentioned by
name. It almost makes me miss Marcus
Cromartie and Devin Smith (just kidding.
No matter how bad our secondary is, I could not be more glad to get rid
of Smith. Giant douchebag). And despite the continued brilliance of James
White, Jared Abbrederis, Chris Borland and backup RB #25, I think we’re losing
this game. Thankfully, I’ll be watching
this game in a cocoon of alcohol-induced bliss on Saturday, which will help
distract me from the fact that we’re headed for the Capital One Bowl.
OHIO STATE by 10
As for the aforementioned state of drunken happiness, you
might be asking yourself “How is that different from any other Badger
gameday?” Well if you must know, this
Saturday is a very special day in my life.
You see, my only brother Evan Quilling is getting married to an amazing
girl in Menomonie that afternoon, and I’m more excited for that than I have
been for any football game since Super Bowl XLV. And since I know he reads the Chode Picks
from time to time, let me be the first to say congratulations, brother. It takes a lot for me to get emotional while
writing the Chode Picks, but you did it.
May you and Robin have nothing but the greatest marriage in the
world. And since you’re lucky enough to
possess half of my DNA, please pass it on to as many children (boys,
preferably) as humanly possible.
Now, with that being said, I fully expect a few of my
friends reading this to crash the reception.
7:30 PM in the Great Hall at UW-Stout.
Tell the doorman that you read the Chode Picks. Dress nice.
Quick sidenote: As
long as we’re on the topic of my family, a couple of years ago after a rough
night of drinking back home, my mother told me “you know Alex, alcoholism runs
in both sides of our family”.
…
That. Explains. A lot.
Damn it. Time for me
to write about more football so I can get rid of the warm, fuzzy feeling the
previous section gave me.
PITTSBURGH STEELERS (0-3) at MINNESOTA VIKINGS (0-3)
In case you’ve been living under a rock for the past week,
this game is being played in London. I
assume it’s part of the NFL’s scheme to make sure football never spreads to
Europe by having two of the worst teams in the league play a game in England
every year. Otherwise, they might be
preparing Viking fans for the inevitable move across the Atlantic when their
stadium deal falls through and the franchise gets relocated to the U.K. Regardless, I’m just gonna go ahead and
assume that some soccer club will give Adrian Peterson a chance to play with real
athletes and he’ll be starring for some Champions League team soon. So I’m picking the Steelers. After all, wins are like trampolines:
Christian Plunker doesn’t have any.
PITTSBURGH by 1
FANTASY FOOTBALL: KIDDIE KIDDIE BANG BANG (3-0) vs LIVIN’
MILE HIGH, GETTING’ DEZZY (1-2)
Yes, that’s my team name this week. Kiddie Kiddie Bang Bang: a tribute to Jerry
Sandusky. No, these jokes never get
old. And to be honest, I changed it as part
of a tribute to my Tuesday night trivia team.
You see, for the past year and a half at Chaser’s Bar and Grille (second
greatest bar in the world behind Tiki Bob’s), we’ve been trying to come up with
a team name that was offensive enough to get us kicked out of the bar. We’ve tried everything; Holocaust jokes, 9/11
jokes, jokes about Trayvon Martin, you name it.
There was no line we hadn’t crossed, until this past Tuesday. So we went all-out and threw down the name
“Shooty Shooty Die Die: a documentary of Sandy Hook Elementary”. Tastless?
Maybe. But so is water, and I
used that joke last week. And to our
chagrin, we didn’t get tossed from the bar.
Just a few distasteful glances from the staff and a promise that
“there’s NO WAY you’re getting any more shots”.
Damn it. You win, Chasers. But don’t think we won’t try again. Also, I’m probably winning again this week in
fantasy. Don’t ask me how.
KIDDIE KIDDIE BANG BANG (lol) by 7
Two more thoughts before I go to sleep
-
You’re damn right I correctly used two
semicolons this week. Let’s see you pull
that off, Radcliffe.
- Chode Out.
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