House of Eratosthenes

Pretty good. Required viewing for those who think these guys are overpaid…wonder if that’s why they made it. The three o’clock guy impresses me the most.

Hat tip: Sister Toldjah.

I’m calling that fake. Very cool, but fake. I just don’t buy it.
- Andy | 01/30/2009 @ 11:07
They’re all impressive as hell!
- pdwalker | 01/30/2009 @ 11:44
It’s as real as what their advertising for…fantasy football. The most idiotic concept EVER.
- tim | 01/30/2009 @ 13:11
With some of these, it’s sufficiently difficult to envision how they could be faked, Occam’s Razor seems to favor them being real. I dunno. If they’re taking me for a ride, I’m willing to admit it and my hat’s off to ’em.
- mkfreeberg | 01/30/2009 @ 13:27
And I am not saying this to be a punk, but in my opinion Morgan, even if all of those tricks are real, not a single one of them qualifies these guys for anything approaching the millions per year that they get paid. I mean, so you throw a football all good and stuff, is that worth 47 gajillion dollars over three years, even if you break both of your legs?. Uh, no.

And I like sports.

I dunno, maybe you agree with me on this, and I just missed your sarcasm.
- Andy | 01/30/2009 @ 13:29
Well, regarding how much they’re paid — it’s my opinion that people spend way too much time being fixated on football. However, once people are paying the level of attention to it that I don’t think they should be paying, it’s not that difficult to justify the outlandish salaries. The salary is derivative of the attention, and therefore the outlandishness lies in the attention.

Now as far as the attention paid goes, I find it a little tough to criticize there too, at least, when people take the time and effort to actually play football rather than just watch it (I’ll concede that usually doesn’t happen). Because Americans ARE fat. We have an obesity epidemic, and a low-pain-threshold epidemic, and a lack-of-fresh-air epidemic and a piss-all-over-rugged-masculinity epidemic. I still don’t entirely approve of football — the spectator sport, or the participant sport — as an antidote for these, but dammit it’s better than nothing-at-all.

And since you’re a regular reader you already know my thoughts about third-parties dictating financial transactions between private parties, on matters such as contracting, bonuses or salaried compensation. If you can make an honest sale to someone who knows something about what he’s buying, and in so doing make more in a minute than I can in ten years — more power to ya. Even if I disapprove personally of the purchase, I think that’s what America is all about, and I hope later on you find a way to make even MORE. Anyone who doesn’t have that attitude, in my book, isn’t really an American. Even if (ahem, cough cough) He got elected President a couple months ago.
- mkfreeberg | 01/30/2009 @ 14:52
“The salary is derivative of the attention, and therefore the outlandishness lies in the attention.”

I’ll buy that (ha, ha). I do like me some sports, and watch football regularly (even when my team isn’t playing), but 5 minutes of Sportscenter on ESPN is enough to know that the attention paid is every bit as outlandish as you say.

It’s easy to make the short trip from fanaticism to ticket/apparel sales to team revenues to the enormous salaries, and I can’t argue with the system in that regard. Makes perfect sense, and as you said, more power to ’em. Doesn’t stop the ol’ common sense meter from whistling and popping at the thought of people with half my brains and practical abilities making millions to have recess, though. I know practice is hard, the fitness/diet regimen is strict and takes dedication, but in a strictly “paid for what you do” sort of way, you simply cannot play any recreational game hard enough to EARN that kind of money.

No idea why I decided to wake up today and be so obstinate about this.
- Andy | 01/30/2009 @ 15:13
Oh, I think you can remind yourself just by catching a glimpse of what some of these muscleheads are pulling in. We don’t disagree here at all, m’friend.

The irony is — once you really think on it, it’s actually tougher to lower a wrecking ball on the situation when you consider the luck that’s involved in getting a job like that, than when you ponder the dedication and skill. I mean, who wants to live in an America where we “spread the wealth around” from lucky people, as opposed to skilled & dedicated people. In a way, that would be even worse. That would be just like being hauled down to the dark and dirty basement of the casino any freakin’ time you win something from the craps table, so that nobody’s left with two good kneecaps except the chronic and constant losers.

See, I think America has historically been a unique land of winners, because historically America uniquely tolerates winning. It takes balls to tolerate winning when the other fellow is the one who’s doing it. And a lot of other countries don’t have those kinds of balls. Literally. You go over there and use the word “football,” they think you’re talking about something involving goalies, short pants and round white balls as opposed to pointy pigskin ones. They confiscate guns, make horrible cucumber sandwiches, drive on the wrong side of the roads, and have the nastiest of mangled words to use for any among their countrymen who’ve ever done something extraordinarily creative, successful and great. Gah. I am so hoping we don’t turn into that. If American football is going to be the one cultural icon that stops it from happening, that’s enough to turn me into a fan, outrageous salaries and all.
- mkfreeberg | 01/30/2009 @ 16:26
The video IS a fake. But it’s cool, none the less. Not with so the National-Frickin’-Football League. Real football… the sport, not the bid’niz… is played on Saturdays. And Friday nights. If “they” abolished the NFL tomorrow I’d shed nary a tear. But I WOULD laugh a lot.

One of my minor hot-buttons in life is the wildly successful nature of the NFL and the relative obscurity of the NHL. But that’s just me. And Andy, too, I’d reckon.
- Buck | 01/30/2009 @ 19:25

Leave a Reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Recent

Items of Interest

Monthly Archives

What They Say

Links

Football TricksFriday, January 30th, 2009

Football Tricks
Friday, January 30th, 2009