Am I Too Old To Love Pro Wrestling?

As I have stated before, I still watch and enjoy pro wrestling. There was a few years that I got out of it, but thanks to Zack Ryder's YouTube show, I really got dedicated to watching Raw every Monday night and watching Smackdown when I remembered. A lot of people think this is sad and pathetic, but trust me, we have not gotten to the sad and pathetic part yet.

So I was watching the Royal Rumble last night, and although it didn't have the greatest matches top to bottom, two matches stood out with the CM Punk/Dolph Ziggler title match, and, of course, the Royal Rumble match.

In the Royal Rumble match, it came down to Sheamus and Chris Jericho. Before the match, I predicted that Sheamus would win the Rumble (worst brag ever?), but Jericho is one of my all-time favorite wrestlers. I have read not one, but both of his books. My brain was with Sheamus since I love being right, but I was definitely more rooting for Jericho, because I feel more of a personal connection to Jericho. Throughout the end of the match, I was on the edge of my seat as each guy was nearly eliminated about a half dozen times. In the end, Sheamus eliminated Jericho and will go on to headline WrestleMania. Good for Sheamus.

Before I go any further, I would just like to say that I know wrestling is all predetermined. I choose to not use the word fake, because wrestlers pull off some pretty legit moves. But yeah, I get it; it's not a real sporting event; it's sports entertainment.

Now the Punk/Ziggler match stood out, because I am a huge Dolph Ziggler fan. I think he's hilarious, and I think he's an extremely entertaining wrestler. Twitter has helped me like him even more as we both have an affinity towards Archer as well as a preference for empty stomach cardio. I thought he would beat Punk, and more importantly, I thought he deserved to beat Punk. The same thing that makes me think my favorite sports teams should win guided me in determining that Dolph Ziggler deserves to win. Even though they put on the best match of the night, I was a disappointed when CM Punk retained his title. I didn't realize it at the time, but after the show was over, I had to ask myself the tough question. At 27 years old, am I too old to be cheering for pro wrestlers?

I was forced to do some self-reflection, and I realized something. Pro wrestling is awesome. I want to remain passionate about for as long as possible. I know it's predetermined, but so are movies and television. Think about how awesome it is to watch something that you love and to just get lost in the storyline. Good movies and television shows aren't that common, so think about how much fun it is when you can get lost in something like that. I get to experience that every Monday night, and I love it. Don't feel sorry for me, because if you don't have anything that you can immerse yourself into and care about, honestly, I feel sorry for you.

I am 27 years old and proud to be a pro wrestling fan. Deal with it.

Moneyball 2 Is Going To Be Awesome

As I am sure a lot of you know, Moneyball got six Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, Best Actor (Brad Pitt), and Best Supporting Actor (Jonah Hill). Was it worthy of these nominations? That’s debatable, but certainly not in my mind as somehow the Academy overlooked the contributions of everyone involved in Fast Five.

Moneyball was a solid movie, but it is going to pale in comparison to Moneyball 2. Michael Lewis has not written that book, but the story started to unfold a couple days ago with one innocent tweet.

JoseCanseco Jose Canseco 

 

Billy is probably as good looking as brad pitt
Oh, yes, this is starting off better than I could have hoped. Way to butter him up, Jose. Now, let's follow it up with something casual.

JoseCanseco Jose Canseco 

 

I am going to play this year
Excellent. Let the world know of your intentions. Now it's time to go for the kill.

JoseCanseco Jose Canseco 

 

Billy beane call me would love to dh for you just give me a tryout that's all I ask
YES! Billy Beane and I both know that aging slugger/former steroid user/reality TV star is the newest market inefficiency in baseball. Some scouts overrate players who look good in jeans. Have you seen Jose Canseco move lately? He can probably barely put on jeans. Does that matter? Hell no! We're talking about the man who led the Yuma Scorpions in Home Runs last year...with 8. Get this man signed immediately.

JoseCanseco Jose Canseco 

 

Baseball hates bill James but the Boston red sox hired him .that's from the movie money ball .baseball hates me maybe they can hire me
This may be the most underrated tweet in the history of Twitter. Its simplicity is what makes it so beautiful. Jose Canseco is nearly 50 years old, but looking at this tweet, you would guess the age of the Tweeter to be somewhere between 5-7. It sounds like he is doing show-and-tell for his Kindergarten class, and he is explaining how this one guy overcame odds, so I will also overcome odds, and it will be great. It’s also sad, because everyone just wants to push this kid out of the way, because the kid coming up next brought in his pet turtle.

JoseCanseco Jose Canseco 

Fenway 350 lifetime batting average 1 hr per every 9 at bats .I am ready to play for Boston give me a tryout
Then Jose got to thinking. If Boston hired Bill James, maybe they will hire Jose Canseco. What is Moneyball about? Stats, so Jose Canseco shows off his inner-sabermatrician, and drops home runs per at bat in a specific ballpark. Is Jose hinting that the new market inefficiency might be nerds? Look how well Ivy League graduate Sam Fuld did last year…for the first two months of the season. Another benefit is that Jose showed off his Scott Boras side to create a BIDDING WAR. How high will they go?

JoseCanseco Jose Canseco 

I guess murderers and child molestors get more chances than I do
Don’t worry, Jose. Your time will come. You are a better man than James Early Ray and Jerry Sandusky combined…wait a minute, that combination would just create a racist, molesting murderer, so yes, you are totally better than that combination. Please, Oakland or Boston, make this happen. If the World Series Ring isn’t sweet enough, how does hundreds of millions of dollars in movie revenue sound? Plus, I’ve already got a great tagline.

“He’s not a murderer, he’s not a rapist, he’s Jose Canseco, and he’s finally getting a second chance…Moneyball 2.”

My only question is: Great idea or greatest idea ever?

I’m going with the latter.

A Man's Guide To "The Nutcracker"

Since I am a man of great substance and culture, I went to the ballet over the weekend. Now many out there may call me a Nancy Boy for this action, but, um...shit, I was really hoping to have a comeback for that. Anyway, going to the ballet is a good way to impress a lady, so it's maybe, kind of, somewhat justifiable. 

I sat there intently as I actually learned many things from "The Nutcracker." It would be a disservice to the world if I kept these things to myself, so today, I would like to share my thoughts so that other men will know what they are in store for when going to "The Nutcracker." 

My only experience with ballet up to this point was the Saved By The Bell where the guys filled in at the last second so they wouldn't have to cancel things. Obviously, like all things SBTB, hilarity ensued. Screech dressed up like a giant bird, but everybody else was in leotards. Because of this, I assumed everyone would be in identical leotards throughout every ballet. Looking back, I realize this was not my most sophisticated thought, but this is what happens when your only point of reference is SBTB. I also can't stop time by saying "Timeout" which is another thing I found out the hard way. So although there are some leotards, there's a lot more variety than that.

Now onto the actual ballet. The first thing that will piss you off at the ballet (at least this performance) was that the ballerinas were mouthing words but not saying anything. If you are going to mouth things, you might as well just say it, because we have the technology for people to be heard. Either do a better job of acting, or just say that you want to punch your sister in the throat. 

The plot starts with a party where all these greedy kids want presents. They don't get presents for a while, until a magician comes along. The reason I believe he is a magician is that he wore a cape with lining on the inside that looked like a quilt. He didn't do any magic, but he did give presents from a giant treasure chest. Not only did his presents suck (half of them were just giant candy canes), but he only gave presents to like 40% of the kids. What an asshole.

Finally, he gives this girl a Nutcracker. Yep, that is another shitty present, but she's excited, so maybe she has some form of mental retardation. Immediately, two other kids break the thing. It gets fixed really poorly by The Magician, and then without explanation, it shows up again, and it's back to normal. 

The girl then dances around rat children for a while for no apparent reason. Then she puts her nutcracker in a magic shed, and he turns into a human-sized nutcracker, which is goddamned terrifying. Seriously, imagine this thing as a human coming at you:

Fuck that. There is no toy in the world that looks more like a rapist than this one. So I'm thinking this thing needs to be killed, and luckily there is a Rat King out there who is pulling this girl in because I think he wants to eat her for strength. I'm still rooting for the Rat King, because he kind of reminds me of Master Splinter, and I will cheer for anything that will kill this life-sized Nutcracker. Rat King and Nuts (my nickname for Nutcracker) get in a sword fight and Rat King basically owns him. Nuts plays dead like a total bitch, and when Rat King turns his back, he stabs him in the back. So now the rat children who I assume to be a lot like the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles have nobody to teach them ways to kill Nuts, so they mourn and disappear forever.

Afterwards, Nuts turns into a regular human, and they dance around a lot until intermission.

A lot of things happened before intermission, which is good, because very little, and I mean practically nothing happens plot-wise in the second half of this. It's really just a bunch of dancing in the second half. I couldn't even make up a coherent plotline from the dancing, because it looked like someone with ADD decided to have a dance party, but no theme for the dance party, so people just take turns showing off their moves.

The highlight of the second half was this dude who kept almost hitting wrestling moves on his lady dance partner. He nearly nailed her with a piledriver, but chose not to. Then he had her up for the torture rack, but decided against it. Finally, as he went off stage, he had her up for a Razor's Edge, so I'll just assume that he put her through a table with that one, but it was too gruesome for the children in the audience to watch.

And then anywhere from one to eight people take turns dancing, and the crowd applauds everything. It's absolutely outrageous. If this were a basketball game, they would applaud every time someone dribbled without turning the ball over. Ballet crowds are extremely easy to please. 

And really, that's all that happened in the second half. Lots of dancing. Eventually, our nightmare ends when Nuts turns back into his original nutcracking form, and the ballerinas proceed to bow for a good five minutes. 

Although I would not recommend "The Nutcracker" to other men, I will say that the ballet and I have two things in common. We can be completely ridiculous, and chicks dig us. 

Now please stop calling me a Nancy Boy.

-Joe

P.S. To masculine up this post, here is a picture from @Si_Vault of Hulk Hogan and Mr. T:

I'm not sure what's most ridiculous: The weight belts? Hulk's socks? Mr. T's shoes? I'd probably go with the weight belts. That look definitely needs to come back.

The Ultimate Fighter Finale Preview

I really haven't written anything about Mixed Martial Arts in quite a while, but I was inspired by the recent season of The Ultimate Fighter, so I figured I would share my thoughts with the world. Let's go over the Ultimate Fighter finals as well as the coaches fight.

Bantamweight Final: John Dodson vs. T.J. Dillashaw
Not gonna lie, I'm horribly biased in my prediction for this fight. Dodson was one of my main coaches when I trained at Jackson's, and not only is he an awesome coach to have, he's also just a really good guy. Although the conditioning we did on Thursdays sometimes bordered on cruel and unusual punishment, it definitely helped me get in, by far, the best shape of my life.

As for real analysis of the fight, Dodson has most of the advantages. I don't think Dillashaw wants to stand with him for very long periods of time, so he is going to try to take the fight to the ground. From what I have seen, and because of his size advantage, Dillashaw is probably the better wrestler, but Dodson is incredibly hard to take down, and as people have seen on The Ultimate Fighter, he is even tougher to keep down.

I think the fight is going to end up a lot like the Johnny Bedford fight in the final episode. I think Dillashaw will get a takedown; I think Dodson will get up, and I think Dodson will TKO him in the second round.

Dodson by TKO - Second Round

Featherweight Final: Diego Brando vs. Dennis Bermudez
I am less biased in this one, but admittedly, still biased. Diego also trains at Jackson's, and if you saw the show, it's a pretty accurate portrayal of him. He's a real nice guy for the most part, but if you get on his bad side, he will destroy you. I only had a few interactions with him, and luckily, always remained on his good side.

In the fight, I really have trouble seeing Bermudez win this in any way. His only hope is to take Diego down and pull a lay and pray for three rounds. Not only is it going to be difficult to do, but Brandao has really good jiu-jitsu, so even on the ground, he could finish the fight. I don't think Bermudez gets it there, and this fight ends like all of Diego's other fights, first round knockout.

Brandao by KO - First Round

Michael Bisping vs. Jason "Mayhem" Miller
No bias in this fight. Miller has always been solid, but he has never shown any elite skills. Bisping also isn't a guy with a lot of "wow" factor in his game, but he's really good everywhere. Although I dislike Bisping, I think he probably wins this fight, although I will definitely be rooting for Mayhem, because I'm American.

Bisping by Decision

-Joe

P.S. The Post Script has slowly turned into an advertisement for the Twitter handle of @si_vault, but when they post awesome things like a picture of Michael Jackson and Bo Jackson throwing a football together, it's really tough to not share it with the world.

That's just...perfect.

Jose Canseco Is Celebrity Boxing Again

As the totally unofficial blog of Jose Canseco, I feel like I need to address the fact that Jose Canseco is getting back in the boxing ring for the first time since his switcheroo boxing controversy, and this time it's going to include MORE Jose Canseco (since last time it included zero Jose Canseco). 

Now, honestly, Jose Canseco's celebrity boxing doesn't interest me all that much. I have known about it for weeks (although he did get a new opponent a few days ago), but it didn't really seem noteworthy to me. But the major sports blogs have been covering it, so I figured I should add a little bit to the conversation.

In his past fighting efforts, Jose has has mixed results, and that mixture has been mostly losses and draws, so I don't think he's quite ready to challenge a Klitschko. But this time, he's got a fight against noneother than Lenny Dykstra. Fomer MLB player, turned financial genius, turned financial idiot, turned awful Dad who wasted his son's signing bonus, turned criminal. As Stone Cold Steve Austin would say, "OH, HELL YEAH!"

Honestly, this match probably won't be entertaining on the face of it, but it does still have entertainment potential. If Jose can obliterate Dykstra, expect hilariously arrogant tweets about it. At the same time, a loss could produce much more hilarious sad tweets from Jose. Jose's sad tweets are comedy gold.

So even though I love Jose Canseco, I'm not so much rooting for him as much as I'm rooting for one of these guys to get their asses kicked. Jose's tweets have been yawn-inducing lately as the best thing he has posted has been a picture of dogs together.

So come on Jose. Stop censoring yourself, and have an impactful fight this weekend. Twitter needs you.

-Joe

P.S. And here is a slideshow during the time that Joe Mauer and Justin Morneau lived together.

The Only Problem With Natural Light

I have always known that nobody is perfect, but now it seems that nothing in this world is perfect. The closest thing to perfection, without a doubt, is Natrual Light. It goes down like water, it's cheap, it screams party, and it is always reliable to get you drunk, but never wasted.

Unfortunately, that first point is actually a flaw. Before all you beer snobs think that a beer with little taste is a bad thing, it's not, so you can shove your fancy beers up your ass and hope your bidet can clean things out for you. With that being said, Natural Light may be a little too close to water.

See, I'm a man in my mid-late twenties (I refuse to classify 27 as late 20s, although 28 means it's probably time for a nursing home...until I turn 28, and then 28 will be young again), so when I drink all day and all night, it leads to hangovers. The best thing for a hangover is chocolate milk, trust me on that, but if I'm not in the mood for that, I like to replenish myself with the classic cure of water.

Alcohol, which Natural Light contains, is a poison, and my body recognizes that. My body has a short-term memory, so it never tries to tell me to stop while I am poisoning it, but if I try to repoison it, my body tries to reject that. So, what I have learned is that water is extremely hard to drink after a Natty Light hangover due to the fact that my body thinks I am repoisoning it. I am trying to help my body, but my body makes water, which has no flavor, taste bad to my mind. My body can literally not tell the difference between water and Natural Light. This is not fun, because the rehydration process is not easy without water, so my hangovers last much longer than they did in my youthful days. As an advocate for Natural Light, it was depressing to discover its incorrectable flaw.

So, that leads us to this very difficult question. Am I done drinking Natural Light?

The answer...

Fuck no. I'm just done drinking water when I'm hungover. A person can die without water, but a person has no reason to live without Natural Light.

-Joe

P.S. I'm not sure what the most shocking thing is in this article about Hawkeyes Cornerback B.J. Lowery. That his name is Fernando, or that B.J. stands for Boots Junior. Although, I would like to now think that every B.J. is referring to Boots Junior. I remember Hawkeye and Chicago Bulls legend, Boots Junior Armstrong, and you see that chick over there in the corner, I wouldn't mind if she gave me a Boots Junior.

Al Davis Was More Inspirational Than Steve Jobs

I learned something very interesting this past week. It seems like half the people I know had some sort of personal relationship with Steve Jobs. This was amazing, because I wouldn't think that a billionaire would have that many friends in common with me, but apparently I was wrong. All over Twitter, Facebook, and even Black Planet, people mourned the loss of Steve Jobs. I, unlike most of the people I know, did not have a personal relationship with Steve Jobs. I'm pretty sure that he started Apple, but I have never felt the urge to thank him for that. I thanked him with my money when I bought my one Apple product, an iPod Nano. I am happy with this purchase as we have spent nearly two years ago, and it works almost all the time despite me repeatedly dropping it over these past two years. It's obviously bad that he died, and especially since he died at a younger age than the average American, but outside of the two minutes I have spent writing this paragraph, it has had no real effect on my life.

On the other hand, I was saddened to see a true legend die when Oakland Raiders Owner, Al Davis, passed away. I had no personal relationship with Al Davis, but this man should be an inspiration to everyone. Was Al Davis a good person? Honestly, no, and I don't think that Al Davis would ever consider himself a "good" person, but that doesn't mean he wasn't an amazing person.

Al Davis was a snake, and he'd be the first person to tell you that. He would do anything to win, and that is why he was so successful. This weekend, people were listing his accomplishments of being a coach, commissioner, owner, and a whole lot of other things, but I don't think most people took the time to realize what that actually meant. Al Davis was not a self-made man, he was a self-made icon, and there is zero chance of anybody pulling off what he was able to do in professional football.

He started off in coaching, and quickly worked his way up to head coach of the Raiders. Then he became a general manager, and he became so successful that he worked his way into having an ownership stake in the team. He then tricked one of the other owners into giving him the option to buy them out behind the other owner's back, and eventually strong-armed his way into the controlling owner of the team. The other owner tried to sue him, but it was too late, Al Davis was too smart and diabolical to be stopped from owning the Raiders.

I'm obviously giving a very brief description of what happened, but the above paragraph is absolutely baffling to me. Bill Belichick is probably the most powerful coach in the NFL today, and in your wildest imagination, could you imagine him taking the ownership away from Robert Kraft? There is no god damn way that could EVER happen. But Al Davis seriously pulled that off.

I would have loved to have been friends with Al Davis, but I would have shit my pants had I been his enemy. Al Davis was seen as a punchline late in his life as his personnel moves had not been working like they had been in the past, but he created successful teams in the 70s, 80s, 90s, and early 00s. And it's a shame he passed away when he did, because it looks like the Raiders are back on the road to respectability again.

Steve Jobs passing was seen as a much bigger deal, and that's not surprising at all. Apple is a far bigger brand than the Oakland Raiders, and Steve Jobs had far more money than Al Davis. Steve Jobs went into computers and rose to the top, but Al Davis chose the football business while also reaching the top. But know one thing, had Al Davis chosen the computer business, you would still know the name Al Davis, but you would have no clue who Steve Jobs was. Al Davis was committed to excellence, and he lived his life with one simple motto, "Just win, baby."

Now that's an inspiration.

-Joe

P.S. Mexico may be ahead of the US in progressive ideas towards marriage. A two-year marriage license, cut it down to two months, and I might lose my fear of commitment.

Women Law Violation

So my buddy pointed me in the direction of the hashtag Women Law Violation on Twitter like a month ago. I found some amusing tweets, copied them, but couldn't think of anything entertaining at the time to say about the tweets, so they've just been sitting there, ready to be blogged. Well, today is the day that this blog becomes a reality. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you #WomenLawViolation.

drzarbaugh Dean R. Zarbaugh II 
Leaving the kitchen. #womenlawviolation

This is one I used to agree with, but now I vehemently disagree. Have I learned to become a feminist as I have matured? Oh, God no. But I would like to be a kept man, so I need my lady to be out there making that scrilla. Let's face it: I'm far too pretty to work.

inPHamICE Mr. Marcus 

wearing animal print clothes and youre bigger than the animal youre wearing #womenlawviolation

Oh, snap. Mr. Marcus is putting it down on large ladies wearing animal print. About a thousand people wrote this same thing, but I have to disagree again. In fact, if my financials were in order, I might hire a large lady in animal print to stand outside my house so I no longer had to worry about cougar attacks (the animals and the ladies).

stillaCOLEworld you follow, I lead. 

#womenlawviolation refusing to go down, but expecting to receive it.

Wait a sec...guys can do that to girls? Who knew? Must be something desperate guys do.

TheArabPrincess Your Royal Highness 

#WOMENLAWVIOLATION walking around the club barefoot

It may be a women law violation, but it could lead to hilarious results when used in West Coast Dance. Wait a second, this is actually still a very bad idea. My buddies like to break glass more than they like breaking serve. If you see West Coast Dancers at the club, please, keep your shoes on, or you might get lockjaw.

tripstah chris joyner 

@RickeySmiley Not greasing up under the titties #WOMENLAWVIOLATION

I don't even know what this one means, but I promise to never take a girl home until she can assure me that she is greased up under the titties.

bossy_chelle Marchelle Love

#womenlawviolation wearing colored draws with white pants

This is why I don't wear white pants, because I only own exotic underwear. Ladies, if you ever see me in white pants, you may want to throw water on me, because your eyes will get the thrill of a lifetime.

BobbyJComedy Bobby J. 
#WomenLawViolation Telling a Man you got that Wet-Wet but need KY Jelly to get you a jump start!

If I had a dollar for every time a girl told me that she got that wet-wet, I would have zero dollars as I have never heard that phrase before Bobby J's edgy comedy brought it to my attention. It is something that I am going to start asking girls anytime I dance with them at the clubs. I know my dance moves are quite amazing, so I'll be shocked if they don't got that wet-wet, hopefully to the point where they won't even need that KY-Jelly to give them a jumpstart.

-Joe

P.S. Zack Ryder has still got the spot, but Dolph Ziggler is making a hard charge to be the most entertaining wrestler in the WWE. I recommend everyone reads this interview, especially question five where he lets the world know that he's a Natural Light drinker. Natty is like the nWo...it's taking over.