And, to quote Homer Simpson, what a boy!

Now, that boy turned out to be a girl.  And that comically oversized novelty penis turned out to be Maggie’s umbilical cord.  And I’m not sure where I’m going with this analogy.  But the point is Marshawn was born anew yesterday.  First NFL game EVAIR!  Now, I was busy all day losing to Yellow Fever in our fantasy baseball league.

(Self-absorbed side note:  I hate my life.  The final week of the regular season I lay a total smackdown on Yellow Fever to move from 5th to 4th in the league, ensuring that I STILL face him in the first week of the playoffs.  And, since we do next year’s draft on reverse finish in the regular season of this year, I moved backwards 1 spot in the draft.  And then Yellow Fever bounced me in the first week.  So, basically, since I wasn’t able to catch Ragnarok for the 3rd spot, I did only harm to myself by slaughtering Yellow Fever in the final week of the regular season.  Why even try?)

Looking past unimportant asides, let’s try to focus on what truly is important here.  Marshawn.  And my sad inability to catch the whole game.  I did see a few carries of his and he looked like Marshawn of old.  With a terrible O-Line.  He was able to make 4 yards out of nothing.  Usual never say die style with his endlessly moving legs.  Last I checked he had 8 rushes for like 28 yards, which is not great.

"You aren’t Patrick Chung, are you?" 

But by the end of the game, he had had a very good day.  He apparently had a key first down run.  And he ended up with a touchdown and 90 yards on 19 carries for an average of 4.7.  He had a run of 23 yards for his long.   He also had 2 catches for 9 yards with a long of 14.  So, there musta been a fairly bad play in there somewhere.  Oh well.  His team ended up losing on a last second field goal, apparently.  Rough for all of us.  But especially Avinash.  But especially all of us.

I look forward to seeing Marshawn do more damage in the future.  And trawling YouTube for clips of him running in the pros.  And the Bills making the playoffs, so I can see more games of Marshawn running.  Or, more realistically, me driving all the way out to a game in Buffalo. 

Also, check out this Profile In Heroism about Tedford over at MGoBlue, a popular Michigan blog.  They are like me now.  Lusting after Tedford!  But have they met him and had him virtually hug them?  Maybe, who knows?  I doubt it though.

This is exactly how he looks like up close.  Too bad they don’t have a photo of the small angels who live on his shoulders and play the harp all day.

 GO MARSHAWN!  GO BEARS!  GO NOT EVER LOSING TEDFORD EVAIR!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Edit:  Speaking of Marshawn YouTube clips, check out this backflip. 

Last Saturday was a hugely successful day for the Pac-10, as the league combined to go 7-0, including a couple big-time wins.  Notice, however, that I’m only referring to Saturday, as this avoids lumping in Oregon State’s national-TV face-plant at Cincinnati on Thursday.  However, it seems national pundits are too busy discussing the disaster that is the Michigan football program to really notice what happened between a former Pac-10 contender and a Big East also-ran.

- Nationally, the biggest win of the weekend had to be Oregon’s complete dismantling of Michigan in Ann Arbor.  While this win may or may not turn out to be very impressive in November, depending on whether Michigan can actually win some games this season, right now it’s a big-time performance in front of a national television audience.  Combined with Cal’s victory over Tennessee last weekend, the Pac-10 should really start getting some national love soon.

- However, the most important Pac-10 victory of the weekend probably occurred in Seattle, where Washington proved last week’s bombing of Syracuse was no fluke by ending the nation’s longest winning streak at 14 games, dumping nationally-ranked Boise State 24-10.  I did not see this game; was it even on TV?  Still, with both Oregon and Washington rising, the upcoming Pac-10 season is looking tougher than previously imagined.

- Also in Seattle, Washington State showed no signs of a hangover from their loss at Wisconsin, laying a thorough beat-down on San Diego State, 45-17.  A game that Wazzu should win every time, it’s nice to see that it was done so emphatically.

- ASU spotted Colorado a two-touchdown lead in the 1st quarter before waking up and taking control of the game.  Glad they won, but I was not impressed with ASU during the little of the game I watched.  Erickson will have them back, but we may have been overly-excited by their thumping of San Jose State last week.

- Speaking of unimpressive, Cal held on to beat Colorado State in a classic ‘let-down’ game that was probably best more people didn’t see.  Hey, they got the job done, but if they don’t play with the fire they did against Tennessee, they’re going to lose a Pac-10 game or three.

- Also not impressed this weekend were Bruins Nation, who were nonplussed by a 27-17 victory over BYU, a team I would consider a top-35 team.  The Bruins looked fantastic at times, uninspired at others.  They might win 9-10 games this year, but I think they’ll lose at least 1 game they have absolutely no business losing.

- Finally, Arizona got in the win column with a 45-24 victory over Northern Arizona.  No one is impressed with a victory over a I-AA program, so all I can say is ‘thank god they didn’t lose and embarrass the conference.’  Also, ‘thank god the Pac-10 only plays two I-AA teams this year (OSU hosts Idaho State next week).’

- I don’t want to talk about Oregon State.  They looked awful on Thursday.  The less said the better.

Overall this year, the Pac-10 is 13-3 out-of-conference, including a perfect record at home, the only conference in I-A who can say that (that streak will be severely tested next weekend when Washington hosts Ohio State.  Also, Stanford has a home game.)  A great start, I’d say.

How’d Cal’s non-conference foes fare?:

- Tennessee bounced back with a big victory over Southern Miss.  Watch out next week, as they visit Florida in a game that could really make or break their season.

- Louisiana Tech surprisingly took nationally-ranked Hawai’i to overtime, only to fall 45-44 when their 2-point conversion attempt in OT failed.  They certainly don’t look like the patsy we’re hoping for next week, although it should be noted that Hawai’i plays significantly worse on the road.  While we’re on the subject, how ridiculous is it that this is a conference game?  What the heck is Louisiana Tech doing in the Western Athletic Conference?  Is the Sun Belt full?  I don’t get it.

And the enemies of our enemies (our friends?):

- Notre Dame got creamed again, at least by a respectable opponent this time, falling at Penn State.  Is Notre Dame going to need to beat Stanford over Thanksgiving Weekend to get to bowl eligibility?

- Utah, who plays 3 of our opponents as well, fell 20-12 at home to Air Force.  All they managed offensively was a couple of long field goals and one long pass play.  It appears they’re affected by losing the players injured in last week’s loss at Oregon State, a development that will have a slight negative impact on Cal’s power rating.

- Other teams that play 3 of our opponents include San Jose State (got killed at Fresno State), Idaho (managed to defeat a I-AA team), BYU and San Diego State (discussed above).