Double Coverage: Week 4 (A Guide to Games and NYC Sports Bars)
Welcome back to 'Double Coverage.' We hit this pipe -- ILLEGAL REFERENCE -- on the semi-regular Thursday basis to discuss three or four key games in the NFL that upcoming weekend and sports bars you can watch them at within the subway-based hell that is New York City. We kid (about which part?). But no, really. NFL Week 4 has arrived. That's 1/4 of the season! Where is the time going? (One-half of the authors of this, Ted, will be 30 in a month.) WHAT IS GOING ON HERE? Here's what: these four games.
Baltimore Ravens vs. Pittsburgh Steelers:
This Steelers team is absolutely terrifying. They're 3-0, right? Let's look at what they've done: beat the Falcons (who then beat the Saints, and now everyone is on their jock), held Chris Johnson to about 50 yards, and completely exposed the Bucs for the fraud they are. You know how they've done this? With DENNIS DIXON and CHARLIE BATCH. This is a 13-3 team when Big Ben comes back. Here's a really odd thing to wrap your head around: the two PA teams in the NFL, Steelers and Eagles, are both QB'ed by guys that have had serious, life-altering, falls from grace -- and yet both are considered football studs. Whoa. Double standards abound in this world. Steelers' spot? Ship of Fools is a good one.
Here's the deal with the Ravens: they're very good. This game actually could be the AFC Championship in four months. Here's the OTHER deal with the Ravens: in the last 40 years, there are two major factors that have made average people often equate the NFL with war. The first factor is how NFL Films shoots the league. The second factor is seeing Ray Lewis on a field. Will this dude ever slow down? They like the Ravens at Wharf.
Denver Broncos vs. Tennessee Titans:
OK. We understand the Broncos have won two Super Bowls, appeared in four-five others, and represent a cool American city. But how the hell is this team always in big-time, nationally-broadcast games? Their current version is meh. The Titans should truck them, but of course, weird stuff happens all the time in the NFL (and, frankly, in life). Have you really thought about Chris Johnson as a being? Last week he runs right into Keith Bulluck -- Johnson is a RUNNING BACK and Bulluck is a LINEBACKER, and the difference in weight is about 30 pounds -- and Bulluck just falls the heck over. BOOM. Chris Johnson is a freak of nature. You take that strength and add the fact that not a single fool could catch him in the open field, and ... whoa. Broncos people go to Butterfield 8 sometimes; if you go there, be sure to make the "Mad Men" joke (essentially, associate the bar with prostitution). You can thank us later! Titans' fans do it up at Croxley Ales; Ted really wishes he had read the site more closely last week, because he's not a very big Giants' person and would have like to be at a bar with the name "Ales" in the title to see that debacle last weekend.
Washington Redskins vs. Philadelphia Eagles:
Let's say that you broke up with a girl after a pretty successful relationship, and about a year later, you had to essentially go to war in front of a stadium of all her friends and family. Take that possible life spec, multiply it out by about 10,000, and that's Donovan McNabb's place in the world right now. Bonus for him: Michael Vick has been OUTPLAYING McNabb so far this year. (Cue pompous sportswriter: "But fundamentally, can we root for Vick in today's society?") If you want to support McNabb 250 miles north of D.C., go to Van Diemen's. Our friend who runs this site and his cousin once apparently closed that bar down and neither of them has any fundamental recollection that it happened. In short, it was a good night. Red Sky, which I once went to after a week in Spain (literally, I had been off the plane for 12 hours or less), is also a Skins place. I then went there for a work-related event and the place has an entirely different social context now. You an Eagles fan? TELL ME WHERE DESEAN JACKSON AND JEREMY MACLIN WENT TO COLLEGE, SON!!! Whoa, that got heated. To be with -- pun alert -- "birds of a feather," go to Wogie's.
New England Patriots vs. Miami Dolphins:
Wanna hear a joke about Miami? What's the only reason Miami would get to host two prime-time football games on back-to-back weekends? Answer: it's the only damn way anyone would go! HAHA. HaHa! Dang yo, I am amusing. Easiest thing to know about the AFC East: it's a three-team race because the Bills are absolute trash. I'm fairly sure Alabama could take 'em out back behind the woodshed. This game could help one of these teams break apart, because it's likely the Jets will truck the Bills on Sunday. Pats' fans? We like Hairy Monk. The mood there should be interesting because for the first time in years, the Sox won't be entering the playoffs come Monday. You can get in some legit bar dialogues with Beantown heads. Dolphins' fans? They go to Third and Long. My girlfriend is moving in this weekend (i.e. with me) and she's from Miami, but probably couldn't name two people on the Dolphins ... so do I go to Third and Long? Perhaps I still do. It's near work. I could burn some time there.
We'll be back with Week 5, well, next week. Looks like the big dog will be MNF -- Vikings vs. Jets. Too bad Mangini ain't around.
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