Tag Team: Bob and Kristin and Steve on the NFL Playoffs

Bob says: In hopes of keeping with the updated theme of your blog, I wanted to do my best this week to tie my picks to what I now refer to as the “sports and Tivo” box, since sports is the only programming I still watch live. I may be a little late to the scene in terms of people on the Internet commenting on The Jersey Shore. (Do you like that, by the way? I capitalized Internet, and I know you love your AP Style.) However, I have been onboard with this show since Day 1, and it is arguably my favorite show on TV right now (although that’s not saying much, since most programming is in repeats until next month and The Real World is just awful).

Many people seem to enjoy Jersey Shore the same way people enjoy slowing down to gawk at a car accident on the highway—they are interested in a morbid kind of way to see the carnage and wreckage that is on display. People are shocked that eight young Americans could be so self-absorbed and stupid, and seem fascinated by the so-called “Guido” culture the same way they might be interested in headshrinkers. Most of these people seem to take comfort that the cast of The Jersey Shore is some kind of aberration, which is enjoyable to watch but doesn’t represent anything more about America as a whole.

Well, I’m here to tell those people that they are wrong but that doesn’t mean they can’t enjoy the show anyway. First, with regards to the “Guido” culture, I attended the University of Rhode Island along with many of your readers. The culture is real, and we could see it in person at that school. Fully one-fifth of out-of-state students at URI come from New Jersey, where many students would have made it through the first round of auditions for The Jersey Shore, and let’s not forget that Pauly D from the show is actually a Rhode Island native. This culture is real, so let’s not act like numerous Italian-American organizations have and pretend it does not. The “Guido” culture is not a slur against Italians — in fact, the only link it has to Italians is that the culture seeks to emulate the glorified concept of slick gangsters that has been perpetrated by Hollywood, which includes many movies about the Mafia, particularly Goodfellas and The Sopranos.

The movie that is more emblematic of the culture, however, is Scarface - the movie poster of which decorates the wall of every wannabe Guido, including the Jersey Shore house — but that movie isn’t even about Italians. Although Al Pacino is Italian-American and played one of the most prominent film roles about an Italian-American, he played a Cuban in Scarface. It is ridiculous to pretend this subculture doesn’t exist, and one has to be almost as self-absorbed as The Jersey Shore cast to pretend that “Guido” culture is explicitly tied to Italian-Americans at this point. Perhaps many young Italian-Americans aspire to be “Guidos,” it is no longer a term that people use to refer to Italian-Americans as a whole. The Jersey Shore may be the best thing to ever happen to Italian-Americans, as a matter of fact, because the moniker “Guido” — which is also an ethnic slur — may become less attached with think very real subculture. Instead, in the future “Guido” culture may be referred to as the Jersey Shore culture.

Secondly, let’s not pretend, America, that the cast of the show is an unrepresentative group of ignoramuses. We all saw the clips from Sarah Palin rallies during the 2008 elections. Even before then, when people started rejecting candidates for being too intellectual or urbane and deciding they would decide their votes on whom they would “rather have a beer with,” many Americans have actually begun to pride themselves in being unsophisticated and slightly ignorant. There is nothing wrong with that, per se. I reject the notion that most people should have to have a college degree before they get a job, and people shouldn’t have to feel that brie is a necessary food to have on-hand for parties. However, let’s not pretend that the cast of The Jersey Shore is somehow unrepresentative of the population of a country where only 62 percent of Americans believe Barack Obama was born in this country and 40 percent of Americans did not read a single book over the course of a year.

But I came here to praise The Jersey Shore, not to bury it. There are many reasons to love this show. For one, those of us who think that we are somehow more sophisticated than the cast of the show can use it as a release valve where we allow ourselves some time to live vicariously through their unsophisticated but fun lives. Think of it as dessert for the brain. Another reason to love the show is that it represents a natural progression in performance art — the melodrama has been around for centuries and reality television shows for the most part are just the newest, unscripted incarnation of that. Let’s remember that the premise of this “reality” show is that eight young Americans can live for a month working at a T-shirt store a few times a week but party almost every night, drink unlimited amounts of alcohol, and live in a seaside house. The show is fun to watch, so let’s embrace that instead of pretend we are somehow too good for the show.

Interestingly, though, my goal here was not to rant about The Jersey Shore. Instead, I wanted to use the show as a forum to discuss my playoff football picks. I guess I just needed to let some air out to set the stage. Without further ado, here are my comparisons between the Wildcard Weekend NFL teams and The Jersey Shore cast:

New England Patriots – The Situation: After the first few minutes of the first episode of Jersey Shore, I had good feelings about the Situation. He was confident and had the type of personality that would be terrible to deal with in person but is awesome to see on television. Much like my love for Chuck Bass on Gossip Girl, it is based on the fact that the person is interesting and has a distinct personality, as opposed to being a person with whom I think I would actually get along. The Situation’s performance on the show has been interesting, however. For a person who acts like such a player, he got insanely upset when Sammi Sweetheart chose to hook up with Ronnie instead of him. In addition, despite the fact that the Situation brings home girls almost every time they go out, he never seems to be able to seal the deal. Sometimes it has been bad luck, but honestly I think his game may not be great. I feel the same way about the Patriots—they have had streaks where they have looked good, and they have the potential to make a long run in the playoffs, but they often haven’t been able to finish games and up until now they have been disappointing. Unless they can change things up, expect to be disappointed.

Baltimore Ravens – Ronnie: The Ravens are the hidden juggernaut of the playoffs—a team that lost a lot of close games and, if they come into their element, could perhaps run the table. Ronnie is nothing if not a juggernaut. That guy looks like he could crush most people with his bare hands, and I would be stunned if steroids aren’t in the mix with him. However, as was previously mentioned, the Ravens lost a lot of close games, in part due to their bad defense and propensity to make dumb mistakes in terms of penalties. Ronnie, despite being a juggernaut, has made perhaps the dumbest mistake of the show, and that is breaking his own rule that he stated coming into the show: “Never fall in love at the Jersey Shore.” In doing so, Ronnie has completely rejected the possibility of having random hookups aided by girls wanting to be on camera, and being an interesting character because Sammi and he are so boring together. Similarly, the Ravens could be a juggernaut, but it seems more likely that they’re going to be boring and not really go anywhere.

New York Jets - Angelina: Far and away my least favorite character on the show, and far and away my least favorite team playing this weekend. She was obnoxious because she was a jerk just to be a jerk, ruined interesting television by constantly disrupting things just as they got good, and generally made things no fun. The Jets are a team that inexplicably made it into the playoffs, have an obnoxious coach and a seemingly overrated prettyboy quarterback, and honestly don’t have a compelling angle. Hopefully the Jets run in the playoffs will compare to Angelina’s run on the show.

Cincinnati Bengals – Vinny: Vinny is a loveable but uncompelling character on the show. You are rooting for good things to happen to Vinny because he’s such a nice guy, but he really doesn’t seem to be trying that hard to make good things happen for himself. I don’t think I even need to explicitly draw the parallel to the Bengals.

Dallas Cowboys – Pauly D: A few episodes ago, Pauly D and the Situation brought home two girls, only one of whom they considered attractive. The other one, lovingly called the “grenade,” was for Pauly D to “fall on” so the Situation could hook up with the other girl. In the confessional, both Pauly D and the Situation talked about how Pauly D was going to fall on the grenade, how he should fall on the grenade, and about how much it sucked to fall on the grenade. However, when the show flashed to what was actually going on, all Pauly D was really doing was glaring at the girl and not saying a word. He did not fall on the grenade, unless there was some sort of effort we didn’t see on the tape. Every year, Dallas is supposed to be good, they make it into the playoffs, and they’re scary. Then they get knocked out their first game. Done and done.

Philadelphia Eagles – Snooki: These are both things that are pretty unattractive but it might be nice to see succeed. Snooki is short and not exactly amazing looking, but she seems nice enough and it would be nice to see her take home a guy who isn’t covertly spying on another housemate. The Eagles have THE MOST OBNOXIOUS fans in football so it is hard to root for their success, but at this point you just kind of feel bad for Donovan McNabb, right? Just let them win one Super Bowl and everything will be all right.

Green Bay Packers – Sammi Sweetheart: Much like Ronnie, Sammi Sweetheart entered with a ton of potential but has been disappointing since their relationship started. In addition, the far and away most attractive member of the cast is made much less attractive by the fact that she totally threw The Situation under the bus when she decided to hook up with Ronnie, and then acted like she hadn’t done anything wrong. At some point you have to feel like that is going to bite her in the ass. Green Bay has looked strong all year, but for whatever reason they haven’t been able to put things together. That glaring flaw has been their ability to protect Aaron Rodgers, and you get the feeling that somebody will find a way to exploit that.

Arizona Cardinals - JWoww: The silent killer of the crowd. JWoww, aside from her drama with her boyfriend because she thought it would be a good idea to look at Pauly D’s penis, has been mostly silent throughout the show. However, she still has a strong personality and when she shows up, she shows up big. Case-in-point was last week, where she decided to throw down with some woman at the bar because the woman called her, or Snooki, or both of them (the story was never really clear) fat. The Cardinals have been uninteresting all year, but if that passing game gets going other teams better look out. And they better make sure they don’t call Kurt Warner fat.

Picks:

CINNCINNATI over NY Jets -3
DALLAS over Philadelphia -4
NEW ENGLAND over Baltimore -3.5
Green bay over ARIZONA +1.5

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Kristin says: Okay, so let me first say that I married Bob for a reason, because that was the most entertaining piece of football writing that I have ever read. (Okay, there are more reasons than that, and I don't read that much about football - but hush.)

Reading this made me feel like I was ahead of my time in the complete cotton candy satisfaction I took from watching Newlyweds with Jessica Simpson. Nothing stops the buzzing aching feeling in your brain that comes from reading aloud your Organic Chemistry text book with your roommate like Chicken of the Sea.

Don't laugh, we really did that, and we both got A's. This was one of our many great ideas sophomore year that also included our "no cheese" diet, which resulted in a prompt five-pound weight loss (not worth it) and 2 a.m. dance parties to "99 Red Balloons". In fact, I like to think I introduced Bob to empty calorie television (a.k.a. the Gossip Girl reference he made).

However, I would hate to think my love of coming home from a stressful, intellectually demanding day to mindless girlie drama TV is in any way related to Sarah Palin or anti-intellectualism. I would like to think that you can escape into shows that you would never want to admit to people that your enjoy and not apply the same dumbed-down philosophy to the rest of your life. I don't have the patience to follow Lost - I would rather just read a book than watch smarter television, but I would never ever vote for a Presidential candidate that I thought was less intelligent than myself.

Okay, this is just blather, and it has nothing to do with football or Jersey Shore. But, sadly, I completely agree with Bob's analysis and his picks. I think that Ronnie and JWoww are more interesting than he gives them credit for (he thinks I'm crazy to take Ronnie over The Situation, but Ronnie reminds me of a sweet rhinoceros with better skin), and I feel sick inside picking Dallas in a playoff game, but there are some things you just need to live with. I don't see how Philly bounces back from sheer domination keeping their playbook secret or not. I think that Cinci and Green Bay deserve wins so I'm picking them based on rooting for my Ocho and as part of my Favre revenge. GO PATS!!!!!!!!!

Picks:

Dallas over Philly
GB over Arizona
Cincy over Jets
Pats over Ravens

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Steve says: Well, with all of the love for Jersey Shore going on in this post, it seems like I have to be the one who pisses in the punch bowl - I refuse to watch it. In fact, I daresay that I'm sick of shows like Jersey Shore, which plenty of my friends watch because you don't really have to think at all while you're watching it.

I understand that people need a fast-food equivalent on television every once in a while, but I refuse to lend any more support to tripe like Jersey Shore, which has people who DO NOT HAVE TALENT. These are not functioning human beings; in the real world (as opposed to The Real World), they'd be arrested for being 50 payments behind on child support, or they would have wrecked their 1980s shitmobile with the oversized rims into a telephone pole.

This sort of trainwreck television was mildly amusing to me when it first came on. I'm still a sort-of fan of Paris Hilton, because I think she's much smarter than she leads on, and the same thing goes for Jessica Simpson. Paris is most definitely a slut, but with her and Jessica, there is a sort of playfulness about them that makes me like them. I get the feeling that they have some humility, that they know they're not really that talented, and they're just enjoying the ride.

I don't get this feeling from the typical reality television stars, who all come across as narcissistic assholes. If you're James Cameron, then this is kind of OK, since your talent is so overwhelming. (And Rickey Henderson, don't you ever change either; Steve Greenwell is hoping that Rickey Henderson never changes.) I think the television industry is partly in the shitter because they'd rather focus on shows like Jersey Shore, which sounds to me like an elephant shitting on an abortion clinic.

That being said, I feel compelled to compare playoff teams to something on television, since Bob did it. I will compare them to actual shows:

The New England Patriots = The Sopranos. Long worshiped as a model show and franchise, despite the underhandedness involved at times, but when the end finally comes, it'll probably be a huge disappointment to everyone involved and cause a backlash. The Patriots made the playoffs this year, so the end isn't quite here, but it's looming. I don't see them winning the Super Bowl this year, and things could get worse next year, as Moss (the real key on offense to me after Brady) gets another year older and slower.

The New York Jets = Joey. A show that seemed popular for about three weeks, because its past gave it something to build upon. In the case of Joey, it got the Friends audience for a little bit, until everyone realized that the new show sucked. With the Jets, the bitter taste of the Favre experiment was erradicated with the excitement of Ryan's hiring and some surprising early-season wins.

However, both the show and the team have been found lacking, and I wonder if there has been a worse non-injury starting quarterback in a playoff game than Mark Sanchez. He has a dozen touchdowns and TWENTY interceptions! He's averaging an interception every 18.2 throws. This is worse than JaMarcus Russell (one per 22.36 throws), meaning you could make the argument that the Jets would be better with JaMarcus freakin' Russell as their quarterback. Meanwhile, Kellen Clemens is wondering whether he should throw some more interceptions to get a chance at the starting gig.

The Baltimore Ravens = Punky Brewster. A spunky team that people seem to like, but you just can't take it seriously because of its lead (Flacco and Soleil Moon-Frye). Of course, in five years, when both are all grown-up, you might realize you've made a horrible mistake. (Also, this gives me an excuse to post a picture of her, now that she is all grown-up and hot.)

The Cincinnati Bengals = Hang Time. I resisted bending my rules and going with the obvious movie comparisons like The Mighty Ducks and Little Giants and The Bad News Bears. Instead, I went with the goofy teen basketball drama that was on weird times Saturday morning on NBC, and inexplicably had Dick Butkus coaching at one point. I never regularly watched the show, but I agree with Wikipedia's assessment, which notes the wild changes in the cast even from year to year. Hey, I'm a Bengals fan, but it seems like every year they're dealing with some weird drama, and Carson Palmer has elevated them past "lovable losers" to more of a "goofy competence" sort of club.

The Green Bay Packers = Heroes season one. Everyone raved about both, although nobody really knows about their long-term potential. If the Packers can advance far into the playoffs, then I'd upgrade them to Lost. If they flame out, well, then they continue on the Heroes path.

The Philadelphia Eagles and The Dallas Cowboys = Tyler Perry's House of Payne or The Bill Engvall Show or Blue Collar TV. Both teams have huge constituents of fans that pretty much nobody else likes. This can also apply to the Patriots, except that the Patriots also have bandwagon fans because they've actually won some Super Bowls.

The Arizona Cardinals = Charmed. I've heard so little about the Cardinals that I'm somewhat surprised they actually made the playoffs. In similar fashion, did you know that Charmed ran for eight god damn seasons? That seems like seven too many to me, but hey, what else was the WB going to run? It gave a season of shows to Ellen Cleghorne, so you know anything that remotely had a pulse got a couple years, like The Steve Harvey Show and Sister Sister.

Picks:

Philly over Dallas
GB over Arizona
Cincy over Jets
Pats over Ravens

Sister, Sister is from this blog. Paris is from this blog. Jessica Simpson is from this blog. JWoww and Snooki are both from this site, because I felt dirty just looking for more Jersey Shore photos. And The Situation is from this site.