What's up, Special Ed?
The biggest thing in the NFL this week was ESPN’s tom-foolery with Odell and Lil’ Wayne. This interview aired before the games on Sunday. Good timing for ESPN, since now that the Yankees are out of the playoffs this bullshit has been the talk of the town all week. Of course Wayne has a new album out so he’s trying to get as much media exposure as possible right now. And if there’s one thing the NFL knows it’s marketing. Odell probably saw this as a win-win for his own personal branding efforts as well: getting on TV with a famous rapper should have been a slam dunk for the NEW NFL’s prototype marketable young super-star.
The only problem is Lil' Wayne isn’t actually cool anymore. He’s 36 years old, has never appeared in an NBA Celebrity All-Star Game, and hasn’t released an album since Odell was a sophomore at LSU. Much like the NFL itself, Lil' Wayne is desperately trying to stay relevant, feebly fighting against the inexorable march of history.
The Ringer’s Justin Charity recently wrote about the “commercially exiled rapper” and his harrowing journey toward releasing his 12th studio album. But then asks bluntly - “will anyone care when he does?” We think some people will care. Old people. Yesterday, relevant former-Giant Michael Strahan spoke to The New York Post about Odell and Weezy:
“I’m not cool enough to hang with Lil Wayne. I’m not that cool, man. Lil Wayne would have lost his cool before he’d hang out with me. They would have taken the ‘Lil’ off his name and just called him Wayne if he’d have hung out with me.’’
See, maybe when Strahan was in the league, in like 2005, he might not have been cool enough to hang out with Lil’ Wayne. But now? We’d say Strahan is exactly cool enough to hang out with Wayne in 2018. Possibly too cool.
Old people can’t get enough of this stuff. First thing Monday we got Eli’s trademarked corny-dad comment:
Which no one should care about at all. But of course Wayne, who’s the same age as Eli, took the comments quite personally and issued this emotional riposte:
“And here you’re talking about you don’t watch Lil Wayne much ... I don’t care what you watch, what you listen to, nothing like that … Why you gotta do me like that, man?”
Also on this video, Wayne gets GANGSTA on 50-year-old Daily News reporter Frank Isola:
“I rock with you. I actually like you, when you come on TV, I like your heavy New York, Italian whatever accent, I like the way you do your thing … but you mentioned my name, my name came out your mouth this time. When that happens, I’m going to fire back at you… Keep my name out your mouth.”
SHOTS FIRED!!! SOOWOOOO!!!
Wayne also suggested that Eli should be listening to "Lil' Wayne music" before games. If so, we’d suggest he go back to The Block Is Hot era. We just gave Carter V a listen and we are decidedly NOT fired up (2 stars). Graham Gano was probably listening to 6ix9ine before he boomed that 63 yarder on Sunday. But seriously: Jesus Christ, Wayne. You don’t need to respond to Eli Fucking Manning, have some self-respect.
Folks, this is the NFL trying to be cool. And it’s the corniest thing ever. Do you think Future and The Migos said no? Or does Odell not even have their numbers? You can’t really blame him, though. See, most NFL players don’t know what’s cool because they spend all their free time either in the hospital or trying to memorize a 3,000 page playbook. They don’t “go out” a lot.
NBA regular season starts next week and we CAN’T WAIT!!!!!!
WEEK 5 HALL OF SHAME!!!!!!
¡Que Lastima! - The only Hall of Shame inductee this week is ¡Que Lastima! We’ve already shamed this team in detail twice in the last three weeks, so there’s really no need to belabor our arguments about how nobody should start Dolphins, or how fat Derrick Henry is. He knows.
AMERICAS GAME OF THE WEEK Prediction Record: 4-2
GENTRIFIERS vs. TEAM MEH!!!!!! Two of the league’s hottest teams will test their mettle in Week Six!!!!!!
Both Gentrifiers and Team Meh sit at 4-1 thanks to exceptional Fantasy Defense. Team Meh is 2nd in points allowed, holding their opponents to only 106 points per game. They are also currently 2nd in points scored, BUT their roster is depleted this week with Michael Thomas on bye and Adrian Peterson banged up. He’ll likely turn to Chris Godwin who has a nice match-up at Atlanta, and Corey Clement who’s looking like a shaky replacement RB2 in a committee situation.
Gentrifiers has the #4 Fantasy Defense, allowing 112 points per game, 7 points below the league average. We feel like this could be a big week for Fay but there are a lot of question marks, and things need to break just right:
• Deshaun Watson travels to Buffalo, and we have no clue if that’s a good match-up or not. In the first two weeks, the Bills allowed 23 fantasy points each to Rivers and Flacco. Since then they’ve held Cousins, Rodgers, and Mariota to 6, 11, and 1 point respectively, so… • Antonio Brown is having a weird week which could lead to a big game for Juju, cancelling out much of Team Meh’s Roethlisberger points from a potential shoot-out in Cincinnatti. • The biggest key to the game will be the health of Cook, Cooks and Devonta Freeman. If Fay can plug one of those guys in at the flex he’ll be in business. But if Powell starts then they’ll really need to lean on that Fantasy D, as they may not score more than their average 112 points allowed.
Our guess is Brandin Cooks plays, James White has a big game and Gentrifiers has one of their highest scoring weeks of the year.
GENTRIFIERS – 119.01 TEAM MEH – 117.76
SPECIAL ED MATCHUPS:
GOLDEN RICHARDS vs JEFFERY’S TEAM We don’t think New Guy Jeffery has it in him to make TWO (2!!) moves to replace Ingram and Tate. A Free Win would make a nice little belated b-day gift for Paul. GOLDEN RICHARDS WINS!!!!!!
IN SAQUON WE TRUST vs RANDALL CUMMINGHAM With bye weeks and injuries setting in, this Cummingham team is looking very thin. We don’t think Corey Davis is gonna work out as a starter for them. What they need to do is find a team with like 2 or 3 pretty-good WRs that he can swap Diggs for. He could probably get a couple of John Brown/Tyler Boyd/Tyler Lockett-level guys for Diggs. THE COMMISH WINS!!!!!!
DEFENDYOURMOVES.COM vs ¡QUE LASTIMA! Our team is in bye week heck playing without our favorite WR and RB. A nice bounce-back opportunity for ¡QL! Hopefully we can both avoid the Hall of Shame. ¡QUE LASTIMA! WINS!!!!!!
UPSET SPECIAL: POLK HIGH PANTHERS vs EAT A SNICKERS BITCH This is an absolute smash spot for Matt. The Patriots play The Chiefs at home in what should be the week’s highest scoring game. KC defense is dead last in yards allowed to QBs (360 yards per game) and TEs (90 ypg). Also, AJ Green is at home against The Steelers, the #2 best match-up for WRs (216 ypg). PHP gets a much needed W and returns to relevancy with a big-BIG score!
Kudos to Doug for being the first team to change their name this year. That’s a great way to shake thing up for your squad when nobody’ll trade an RB for Amari Cooper. POLK HIGH PANTHERS WINS!!!!!!
HAVE A GREAT WEEK EVERYBODY!!!!!!
