The Football Fan's Manifesto Part 6

With so little exposure to the players that will be carrying the team throughout the regular season, every iota of playing time in the preseason must be overexamined and treated as though it's indicative of the entire year to come. Did the starting quarterback go 5-for-5 with a touchdown in his only drive? f.u.c.k YEAH! EMM VEE PEE! SUPER BOWL YEAR, BAY-BEE! Did the starting running back average under four yards a carry in his two touches? Wonder how he feels about a severed pig's head in his mailbox? Similarly, the preseason can be a minefield for spiking the fantasy football value of some minor-role players, who end up racking up insane numbers against third-string defenses, only to return to being regular old Kevin Jones in the regular season. Don't be fooled by these preseason stalwarts.

The presence of irrelevant players is no reason to stop caring about the outcome of the game, either. Just because your team was ahead 1310 when the starters got pulled doesn't mean victory has been attained. Do you want them to finish with a losing record in the preseason? That's just the kind of weak momentum that can carry over into the regular season, dooming what would have surely been a memorable t.i.tle run. Yes. That's more like it. Scream your lungs out at the spa.r.s.ely filled stadium. You've already started to care about these meaningless second-half scrubs, haven't you? So begins the descent into the fan madness.

After each contest, be sure to call in to local radio shows to express your overzealous observations of these pointless affairs. It may not seem so, but coaches regularly tune in to these programs before making important roster moves and playbook alternations. Generally they only heed the loudest, most deranged testimonials, so keep that in mind if you get on the air.

ARTICLE IX.

Taking Fandom to Unhealthy Levels-Then a Little Further

IX.1: Fandom on the Intarwebz!!11!

Finding that your manic pleas for the fullback to get a few more touches per game have fallen on deaf ears? You've tried writing four-page profanity-laced screeds to the local newspaper columnist. You've kidnapped the pets of the area sports radio call-in show. You've yelled vehemently at anyone on the street wearing your team's colors. You've run cars off the road bearing a team logo b.u.mper sticker, then proceeded to berate and frighten the driver as he reaches for a cell phone to call the cops. In a final fit of pique, you even stood outside the team's headquarters dressed in animal pelts with a bullhorn and poorly edited signage. What's a monomaniacal true football fan to do?

Lucky for you, you live in the age of the Internet, which was created primarily to give people with singular obsessions and foot fetishes a venue in which their vices can fester and grow larger from finding other like-minded and like-perverted freaks, most of whom have the spelling ability of Terry Bradshaw. Utilizing this wondrous medium, you can air your views on any and all subjects, no matter how ill-informed and laden with obscure Simpsons Simpsons references your commentary, to an audience of potentially dozens. From now on, no one will be able to ignore your calls to bench the starting quarterback after Week 2 or trade for a star receiver, even though the team has neither the trade collateral nor the cap room. That's the beauty of it. Anything goes! Even the asinine. Even gratuitous pictures of cheerleaders. Especially gratuitous pictures of cheerleaders! references your commentary, to an audience of potentially dozens. From now on, no one will be able to ignore your calls to bench the starting quarterback after Week 2 or trade for a star receiver, even though the team has neither the trade collateral nor the cap room. That's the beauty of it. Anything goes! Even the asinine. Even gratuitous pictures of cheerleaders. Especially gratuitous pictures of cheerleaders!

Despite what clueless old dips.h.i.+ts like Michael Wilbon will tell you, the Internet is not a monolithic ent.i.ty. There are, in fact, a very large swath of worthless places for you to visit online while being unproductive at work.

Mainstream Media Sites The MSM presence online is largely composed of reprinted content that originally appeared in your daily newspaper, weekly newsmagazine, or up-to-the-second cable news network broadcast, most of which is just rewritten a.s.sociated Press stories. The material typically strives to be balanced and dispa.s.sionate, though it favors the East Coast, liberal values, Disney's financial interests, sc.r.a.ppy (white) players, and athletes who don't reflexively hate reporters. Because its sports coverage depends greatly on the privileged access to athletes and league officials that media professionals can't afford to lose, the MSM tone is by nature antiseptic and inoffensive, and therefore painfully, painfully boring.

In terms of utility to the modern fan, these are good places to get immediate news alerts, scores, the recap of a game you already saw the highlights from seven hours ago, injury reports, and canned quotes from stars. Keenly sensing their own obsolescence, many MSM outlets have tried to incorporate elements of new media, such as blogs and comment sections (which are mysteriously closed for some more high-profile writers), into their sites. However, as these features are subject to the same standards of decency as their parent companies-no swearing, no overt misogyny, no trash-talk, no threatening statements-they are of little use to actual fans.

Message Boards Message boards are visually Spartan and aggressively unedited forums where groups of anonymous mouth-breathers bandy petty insults, usually in a tone marked by misanthropy, profanity, and casual racism (though not in the excusably clever way sports satirists employ these ills to hilarious effect). All this putative discussion is done in the context of discussing a subject in the news. Message board commenters are of the opinion that the Internet peaked with the advent of the Drudge Report's siren GIFs.

As a rule, the t.i.tular subject in any message board thread is discussed rationally for an average duration of two or three comments, at which point it veers wildly off course as someone's mom is compared to Hitler and chaos breaks out in a flurry of LOLspeak and run-on insults. Of course, the first casualties of any Internet flame war are proper syntax and the ability to make moderate use of capital letters. JUST LIKE THIS! DOESN'T IT MAKE MY WORDS SEEM STENTORIAN AND DIM-WITTED AT THE SAME TIME? Someone will spell "b.i.t.c.h" with a percentage sign. Don't be alarmed. That's just sort of how it goes on messages boards.

Though the level of discourse contained within message boards hovers somewhere around "s.h.i.+t you'll hear in a mall Lids store," these forums offer the closest approximation of the drunken trash-talking that goes on during tailgating most Sundays. The difference being that, while it's an often innocent and amusing way of provoking knife fights in the parking lot, it's suddenly unbelievably dorky when you do it on the Net.

Blogs Though MSM writers continue to propagate the thread-bare, wildly inaccurate stereotype that bloggers are unemployed losers sitting in their parents' bas.e.m.e.nts p.i.s.sing away their pathetic lives spreading unsubstantiated rumors about public figures, most bloggers actually work in their parents' living room, thus granting themselves easier access to the kitchen and its mult.i.tudes of Supreme Pizza Hot Pockets and Shasta Cola. Successful blogs, by and large, combine the qualities of mainstream media sites and message boards in a crude, tantalizing admixture that requires of their authors shrewd news judgment, a lapidary wit, a taste for vulgarity, and deep cache of Erin Andrews pictures.

Unlike message boards, with their armies of subliterate posters, blogs are typically written by an individual or a small group of authors who are for the most part capable of stringing together complete sentences, if not always coherent thoughts. The writing style is often lazily referred to as snarky, though it has yet to be proven that the fictional snark created by Lewis Carroll ever wrote for a Gawker site. Often, authors of blogs have at least some minor background in writing (composing fake Craigslist ads does count as writing experience), a boring office job, a boring spouse, and lofty career goals they would strive toward if only they weren't spending the time blogging.

Blogs can be many different things, all of them as frightening to Bob Costas as the ghastly practice of gambling on sports. The route a blog can go is entirely up to the author. It can be something as basic and innocent as a personal diary (of s.e.x), a journal of someone's vacation (s.e.x cruise), or even quick ruminations on topics of the day (s.e.x advice). Accordingly, they can be broadly thematic, narrowly focused, or just a collection of images of awkward-looking people with superimposed LOLCats-inspired captions. With eleventy million blogs forming every hour, you have to do something to be distinctive and build a readers.h.i.+p. That way, you feel like people are tuning in for your views, when really they want to jerk it to the Keeley Hazell photo you posted. Either way, the delusion is intoxicating.

An important lesson to remember when trying to establish yourself in the blogosphere is to befriend your fellow bloggers. They can a.s.sist with driving traffic to your site, promoting your blog, helping you refine your voice, and offering interesting content to steal. Remember, though, that if you comment on a news story or a viral video you have to credit whichever blog had it first, even if the subject is a news story posted on ESPN.com that a million people will read whether or not blogs write about it. It's an incredibly lame practice, but you must abide by this item of blog decorum or an disturbing lifelike effigy of you will be burned in Second Life Second Life.

Once you're ready to begin, you can use any number of free blogging programs to get up and running. Try to give it a clever name, preferably something that pokes fun at Travis Henry's penchant for unprotected s.e.x (at press time, he's sired eleven kids by ten different woman). Or, failing that, something randomly vulgar. Might I recommend Cris Collinsworth's Appalling Girth?

If your soul-crus.h.i.+ng, non-football-related job places you in an organization run by humorless tighta.s.ses, like, say, the Was.h.i.+ngton Post Was.h.i.+ngton Post, you will need to adopt a blogging pseudonym, lest your boss Google your real name, discover your ramblings, and take issue with the post where you called Mark Sanchez a c.o.c.kharvester seven hundred times in three paragraphs. But what should you call yourself in the blogosphere? There are no ironclad rules, though this is the rare case where something homerific like bearsfn6832 probably won't hack it. (Unless you're a woman, then feel free to call yourself something perfectly insipid like Diamondbacks Chick. Sure, it's a lazy name, but it sends an unmistakable message to the preponderence of single men in the blogosphere that you are receptive to their awkward overtures.) People respect something funny and eye-catching. Or at least an Arrested Development Arrested Development reference. Failing that, just be extraordinarily crude and cruel. To bloggers, they're the same thing! reference. Failing that, just be extraordinarily crude and cruel. To bloggers, they're the same thing!

If you stick with the blogging game long enough, eventually advertisers will offer you piddling sums to place banner ads that cover half the top page of your blog. And you'll take it without thinking twice. Because that sum, however miniscule, represents money you made being a fan. And though that amount is far outstripped by the value of the hundreds of hours you spent blogging when you could have been trying to get your masters, it offers a handy excuse to loved ones who allege your blogging is useless. "No," you'll say, shoving into their faces the $112 check that represents three months of revenue from the site. "This be a cash-flow machine, motherf.u.c.ker."

IX.2: Heed the Officially Licensed Section on NFL Apparel and Merchandise To fully live the football dream, you must make yourself a walking billboard for your team by covering yourself and your meager possessions in branded gear. Whether that means team b.u.mper stickers dotting your car, sporting teamware head-to-toe, or team-colored tackling dummies in your yard, no one will ever mistake you for a person of rounded interests. Or, worse still, a follower of a rival team.

NFL teams have succeeded in merchandizing every conceivable consumer product on the market, and even a few of the basic elements of the universe. If you look at the periodic table, you'll notice that the G G in the in the Ga Ga representing gallium is really the Packers' logo. Be advised to keep it away from the Bears' logo in cerium. representing gallium is really the Packers' logo. Be advised to keep it away from the Bears' logo in cerium.

This army of products is mostly stocked with items lacking in even the most tenuous relation to the sport itself. In most cases, they come in the form of regular household objects like, say, vacuum cleaner bags, a GPS machine, or an inhaler. Naturally, it's your duty as a fan to fill your home to the point of overflow with these team-themed gadgets. If the team alters its logo or color scheme, unload half of it. Gotta stay current with some of your possessions. The rest maintains your vintage credentials. Sure, usually such changes are a transparent attempt by the team to churn up some quick revenue, but are you really going to deny them that? Without the cash influx, they might not be able to stay compet.i.tive! They'll be forced to sign second-tier free agents. Your team might even end up with Gus Frerotte!

If you follow the trademark rules of the NFL, only officially licensed goods are approved for purchase, but no one without a luxury box has the dispensable income to invest in that much overpriced love. Fortunately, all manner of chintzy c.r.a.p (sorry, beautiful and imaginative c.r.a.p) with your team's logo on it can be found at craft fairs, yard sales, or from shady merchants outside the stadium on gameday. Just because it was made with without a trademark hologram sticker doesn't mean it wasn't made with love.

For the handyman, the fun doesn't stop. In 2006, Home Depot and Glidden began offering a line of team paints that exactly matched the colors of every franchise in the league. Now you can rest easy knowing that the color of your walls and the pants of a bunch of dudes you cheer on once a week are in perfect aesthetic harmony. Now, if you could only find team hair dye to match that of the starting quarterback, you'd be all set. Just kidding. That would be deeply unsettling. I mean, except when you you do it. do it.

Your house, your person, your pets: It's all a blank, beautiful canvas stretching out before you, begging to be splayed over with merch. Look at the options before you for personal adornment: hats, wacky gla.s.ses, earrings, watches, s.h.i.+rts, jerseys, wristbands, helmets, foam fingers, hoodies, Mardi Gras beads, socks, sweatpants, belt buckles, f.a.n.n.y packs, concealable bludgeons for beating people with f.a.n.n.y packs, wigs, condoms, prescription soles, hearing aids, license-plate frames, gangsta grills, c.o.c.k rings, nipple clamps, creepy contact lenses, home pregnancy tests, and ties for your dad. The possibilities are only constrained by your imagination. And the extent to which you have access to drugs potent enough to make you buy this much stuff.

Of all the fan accessories out there, Fatheads are an especially curious case. They are life-size stickers of players that are intended to be placed on your wall. Now, I understand player adulation as well as the next fan, but having a realistic likeness of a guy on your wall, regardless of how great a player he is, is about a step away of having a blow-up doll of him. You might as well go the whole hog at that point.

NFL teams are helpful in that they enjoy shaping your consuming habits for you. Enterprising retailers can enter into sponsors.h.i.+p agreements with teams to have themselves designated the official something or other of an NFL team. For example, Harris Teeter is the official grocery store of the Was.h.i.+ngton Redskins and the Carolina Panthers (two-timers!). That way, if you're a Redskins or a Panthers fan and you purchase your frozen pizzas or toilet paper from another store, it's like you're aiding and abetting the enemy. I hope that TP you got chafes your a.s.shole, traitor.

If all that's not enough, there are always credit card companies that offer team-themed cards with predatory interest rates. Yes, indeed: the reputation of sports fans is that of being so blindly devoted that they'll enter into any deal, no matter how inane, so long as the team's logo appears somewhere on the object of their fleecing.

But it's not always about the league exploiting your poor fiscal decisions. On occasion, you can make good on the poor economic straits of players themselves. On more than a few occasions, players from Super Bowlwinning teams of the distant past will auction off their champions.h.i.+p rings on eBay. Last year, Larry Brown sold off one of his three rings he won with the Cowboys. A fan who leans toward the aristocratic could parade one of these around, not only affirming his fan cred, but the weaknesses of the player pension system. Double score!

The most contentious debate in apparel etiquette centers on the th.o.r.n.y issue of jersey wear. This rift, if left unresolved, threatens to tear all of fandom asunder. The majority of people attending games find the jersey a perfectly acceptable expression of fandom. However, a rogue band of contrarians insist that the notion of wearing jerseys, replica or authentic, is ridiculous on its face. "What, you think if the team is a man down they're gonna call you down from the stands?" they chide. Hey, it could happen!

What these tight-a.s.sed prigs of the pigskin don't understand is that jerseys are a vital, if, yes, somewhat silly way for fans to connect with the game they'll never be a part of. Because football pants are otherworldly ugly and helmets obscure vision (though they're helpful when bottles are being thrown at you by Jets fans), the jersey is the most sensible part of the uniform to wear in a casual setting. So scorn away, you aloof bunch of judgmental taintstabbers. You're the type of people who take all the fun out of life, like nosy cops and neighbors who can't take a little celebratory gunfire after a win.

Customized name jerseys, however, are another matter entirely. People who wear personalized NFL jerseys with their own last name on the back are an affront to G.o.d and deserve to die in a landslide. Your own name only serves to remind other fans how tragically distant you are from the action. If you are going to customize the name on a jersey, at least have the decency to do it in a way that amuses other people. Unfortunately, the NFL does you no favors in this regard, as the league keeps an extensive list of banned words that can't be put on a jersey ordered from NFL Shop. When it was revealed years back that former dogfight impresario and quarterback Michael Vick went by the pseudonym Ron Mexico when dealing with a woman who later alleged that he infected her with herpes, fans tried to order customized number 7 Falcons jerseys, but were immediately rejected. Because the league is full of humorless t.i.tblisters.

Another frequently spotted abomination is the fan who wears a jersey of a player who is no longer with the team. The only instances when this is acceptable are if said player is a retired star or the player is a longtime fan favorite (at least seven years of service!) with your team who has only left to play out his final few unproductive seasons on a non-contending team. Otherwise, you might as well be proclaiming yourself a fair-weather fan who hasn't shown interest in rooting for the team in years. You don't want to be left out when fellow fans are pa.s.sing out shots, after all.

IX.3: Dress Your Pet, Because They Can't Tell You It's Lame If you had to identify which sports fan base is the most likely to have its followers dress up pets in ridiculous themed outfits, you'd probably guess NASCAR fans. But NFL fans wouldn't be that far off. Yes, obsession over football is indeed a virulent pathology, one that carries over to everything within sight, animal or car b.u.mper. And there's nothing a pet-owning sports fan loves more than annoying and possibly terrifying their dearest animal companions by forcibly covering the poor beast in a hand-sewn Giants sweater.

The sad fact remains that thirty-one NFL teams prohibit the admission of any non-seeing-eye animal to their stadium. St. Louis' policy, however, remains open to goats, though in recent years it has been limited to those with a doc.u.mented living arrangement with a human. That means, mostly likely, your Vietnamese potbelly pig is staying at home during the big game. Which is a shame, because they'd probably totally get a kick out of an environment where the people are the ones acting like braying animals.

Clothing isn't the be-all, end-all of pet humiliation, however. There's still the matter of naming the poor b.u.g.g.e.rs. Mainstream society, misguided though it may be, frowns on bestowing upon your human children sports-related names, ruling out the possibility of a Dolphin4Life or Patsfan 1 for them. You'll just have to settle with giving them some boring mundane moniker like Joshua or a weird spelling of Jeremy (Jerheme Urban being the offspring of one such couple).

Pets, on the other hand: You can go bats.h.i.+t crazy with them. h.e.l.l, that's the point. Call the thing Purrless Price, Biletnikoff the Dog, or Lil' Rocky Bleier if you're so inclined. Whatever charges your phone.

Not all pets are created equal. Each demands its own specifically discomfiting costume or theme forced upon it.

Fish-Fish add a cool, almost sensual presence to any room. Some people even consider them seductive. And in spite of what you've been led to believe, fish are surprisingly good companions. However, fish, it should be said, make horrible football fans. You can't dress them in anything! You can't color the water in the tank to correspond with the team's or you'll kill the little scaled s.h.i.+ts. The best you can do is get a little decorative scuba man with the team's logo on it. That's it. f.u.c.k fish. They're not team players.Ferret/Lizard/Spider/Ant Farm-Who owns these? They're the pets of contrarians and contrarians have no place in football. They should belong on the writing staff of Slate, which coincidentally has no business writing about the NFL. But that doesn't stop them from churning out mind-curdling pieces on why the loss of the force-out rule is actually good for receivers. In other words, screw these pets.Snake-Giving the mice you feed them the name of the next opposing quarterback the team faces is a nice touch.Turtle-The lesson of Entourage Entourage, other than that it became unwatchable after its second season, is that turtles love rare sneakers, ornately designed Yankees hats, and unkempt goatees. This makes them sympathetic to baseball douches and therefore unsuitable to football fandom.Horse-If you're wealthy enough to own a horse, you can probably buy a team. Make sure to save a luxury suite for me, you rich a.s.shole.Dog-Well, for starters, you should probably eschew starving them, beating them, and breeding them to fight one another to the death. Glad we had this talk, Michael Vick from the year 2006.Cat-The NFL is a league that generally appeals more to dog owners than to insular cat people, though that won't stand in the way of crazy cat ladies, who will collect enough cats to fill a fifty-three-feline roster of her own, replete with uniforms.Bird-Taking into consideration the fact that birds aren't particular fearsome, there sure are a lot of teams named after them. That bird better be something imposing, like a falcon or other predatory bird, and that falconer's glove better be in team colors. Unless you like the Falcons, then it's kind of self-explanatory.Monkey-Echoing the point from the previous item, somehow there are five G.o.dd.a.m.n lame-a.s.s bird teams in the NFL and yet not a one named for a monkey. Knotty racial connotations might have something to do with it, but that doesn't stop the Redskins from hanging around. You and your monkey should protest the league office. If the project doesn't work out, he can still bring you beers. Just make sure he doesn't open them first. You don't wanna know what surprises he'll have waiting for you.

IX.4: The Mystery of Trash-Talking Fandom, at least in the ideal, consists of more than simply showing up every week to the stadium, to the bar, or to the couch blanketed in team apparel and getting s.h.i.+tfaced. No, with great intoxication comes great belligerence. You've got to put that animosity to good use. But because swinging an awl to an opposing fan's faceplate is an arrestable offense in most states, you've got to do your damage with your words. Nasty blunt instruments of locution that devastate an enemy fan's will to live, or at least invokes his will to chuck a brick at you. Eliciting either response means you've gotten under his skin.

Trash-talk, like any martial art, must be executed with extreme discipline and well-honed precision. Solely screaming, "f.u.c.k YOU, COWGIRLS FAN, YOU'RE A f.u.c.kIN' LOOOOOOOSER! I HOPE TONY h.o.m.o BREAKS HIS HURT PINKIE OFF IN YOUR b.u.t.tHOLE!" accomplishes nothing but to reflect poorly on you. Except that Romo line. That one was all right. Effectively unnerving comments go past the generic and get at something personal. And because fans don't care much for their own lives, that means you must mine the personal lives of the players for caustic remarks.

Calling Plaxico Burress "Plexiglas" inflicts little damage when compared to riffing on the reports of numerous police calls to his home regarding domestic abuse. Perhaps a better subst.i.tute is "Smacksaho Her-a.s.s?" Preferably said while aiming gun-fingers at your thigh. Everyone who's seen an Eagles game knows Andy Reid is a free-floating planetary ma.s.s that draws McRibs into his gravitational field. But he's also a horribly inept parent. Be sure to identify any Eagles fans being arrested on game-day as either Garrett or Britt. Santonio Holmes got busted for marijuana possession, but he also exhibited his p.e.n.i.s on the Internet. Commence cheers for the Santonio Dong Rodeo whenever you see a Steelers fan sporting his jersey. Marshawn Lynch boasts of his Beast Mode persona when in front of a microphone, but behind the wheel of a car he is a hit-and-run-machine. Therefore, running down Bills fans doubles as social commentary.

Because so much of trash-talking is based on how teams are faring at the point of their contest, their head-to-head histories, the rap sheets of their players, and how b.u.mpkin-like their fan bases are, it's impossible to predict how any one team should approach verbally tearing down another. The best way to zero in on what riles the enemy is to listen to them, observe their fan message boards to find out what they dislike about their own team. Then hammer on them like Larry Fitzgerald on the mother of his children.

Before proceeding with reckless invective, there are several incontrovertible laws of the smack of which to be aware.

IX.4. A THE LAWS OF TRASH-TALKING.

1. To every perceived slight to a team there is an equal, or more likely excessive, countervailing blow. Essentially, this falls squarely under the "don't start no s.h.i.+t won't be no s.h.i.+t" principle. Let not a foul word about another's team escape your lips lest you be prepared for things to get out of hand. Beer bottles, for instance. They get out of people's hands in a hurry. Essentially, this falls squarely under the "don't start no s.h.i.+t won't be no s.h.i.+t" principle. Let not a foul word about another's team escape your lips lest you be prepared for things to get out of hand. Beer bottles, for instance. They get out of people's hands in a hurry.

2. A fan who pleas for civility or tries to rat out a trash-talker to security is to be counted among the snitches. And, as the saying goes, they are to receive st.i.tches. Anyone who attends an NFL game expecting a polite, deferential atmosphere is, at best, mistaken, and, at worst, developmentally disabled. Have a thick skin or stay home. And don't try to hide behind your kids, saying you expected it was an atmosphere friendly to their virgin ears. Horses.h.i.+t. Don't try to impose your rigid morals on football fans. I'm sure there's something great on ABC Family right now if you can't take it. And, as the saying goes, they are to receive st.i.tches. Anyone who attends an NFL game expecting a polite, deferential atmosphere is, at best, mistaken, and, at worst, developmentally disabled. Have a thick skin or stay home. And don't try to hide behind your kids, saying you expected it was an atmosphere friendly to their virgin ears. Horses.h.i.+t. Don't try to impose your rigid morals on football fans. I'm sure there's something great on ABC Family right now if you can't take it.

3. When in doubt, always resort to the number of champions.h.i.+ps your team has won. (Unless your team has won fewer t.i.tles than your enemy's, in which case resort to childish name-calling.) (Unless your team has won fewer t.i.tles than your enemy's, in which case resort to childish name-calling.) 4. When your team is impossibly ahead, the world of trash-talking is your oyster. Here's where the playbook really opens up. The morally righteous will tell you there are such things as bad winners. And they're right. That's the winner who doesn't bathe in his opponent's misery like a pig in s.h.i.+t. Rub your nipples whilst taunting the losers. Let them know you're really getting into it. Here's where the playbook really opens up. The morally righteous will tell you there are such things as bad winners. And they're right. That's the winner who doesn't bathe in his opponent's misery like a pig in s.h.i.+t. Rub your nipples whilst taunting the losers. Let them know you're really getting into it.

5. When your team is ahead, but the outcome is still in doubt, be ever mindful of the forces of karma. The mood is good, no doubt, if still a little uneasy. The last thing you want to do is start shooting your mouth off so much that you jinx the team. Then you'll not only have gloating enemy fans to listen to but the scornful eyes of friendly forces. Remind the opposition of the scoreboard, but don't act like it's a done deal. Someone might make a clever GIF image of you pointing smugly to the camera like Jeremy Shockey, just before failure descends. The last thing you want to do is start shooting your mouth off so much that you jinx the team. Then you'll not only have gloating enemy fans to listen to but the scornful eyes of friendly forces. Remind the opposition of the scoreboard, but don't act like it's a done deal. Someone might make a clever GIF image of you pointing smugly to the camera like Jeremy Shockey, just before failure descends.

6. Should the game be tied, allow your concentrated hate to be the difference-maker. Anxiety runs highest when things are tightly contested. This is when the team needs you most in the verbal war that doesn't affect the action on the field. Scream rivulets of obscenities that would make the hair of the worst Tourette's case stand on end. For reference, check out Chris Berman cutting room floor footage on YouTube. Anxiety runs highest when things are tightly contested. This is when the team needs you most in the verbal war that doesn't affect the action on the field. Scream rivulets of obscenities that would make the hair of the worst Tourette's case stand on end. For reference, check out Chris Berman cutting room floor footage on YouTube.

7. Your team is trailing, but there is still hope. Okay, there isn't. But that's no excuse to show fear. Panic is setting in, which means hurling insults out of reflex as a survival technique. The barbs may be a bit scattered by the sense of worry, and more than a few may be directed at the refs, but you must keep your wits about you and not let the opponent see your fear. Even if you want to p.i.s.s yourself. Panic is setting in, which means hurling insults out of reflex as a survival technique. The barbs may be a bit scattered by the sense of worry, and more than a few may be directed at the refs, but you must keep your wits about you and not let the opponent see your fear. Even if you want to p.i.s.s yourself.

8. Your team is getting the skin kicked off the kernels of corn in their s.h.i.+t. Time to hide your face. Welp, you be f.u.c.ked. Now's when you have to sit and stew in your juices. While getting mocked, lick your wounds and direct all of your white-hot rage at the coaches and players of your own team. Whatever you do, don't get blubbery and emotional. You'll never live it down. Welp, you be f.u.c.ked. Now's when you have to sit and stew in your juices. While getting mocked, lick your wounds and direct all of your white-hot rage at the coaches and players of your own team. Whatever you do, don't get blubbery and emotional. You'll never live it down.

9. Respect those who have met unintentionally tragic ends. Otherwise known as the Heath Ledger rule. That means no jokes about Sean Taylor's death, lest you find yourself getting clotheslined and dragged from the back of a pickup truck in the FedEx Field parking lot. On the other hand, jokes about Ben Roethlisberger's near-fatal motorcycle accident are fair game, because it was danger he brought upon himself by being dumb enough to ride a motorcycle without a helmet. Also, and this is critical, he survived. Not to mention that he's been spotted palling around with Carson Daly. That's more than a venial sin. Otherwise known as the Heath Ledger rule. That means no jokes about Sean Taylor's death, lest you find yourself getting clotheslined and dragged from the back of a pickup truck in the FedEx Field parking lot. On the other hand, jokes about Ben Roethlisberger's near-fatal motorcycle accident are fair game, because it was danger he brought upon himself by being dumb enough to ride a motorcycle without a helmet. Also, and this is critical, he survived. Not to mention that he's been spotted palling around with Carson Daly. That's more than a venial sin.

10. Steer clear of extremely derogatory epithets. If you aren't brave enough to say it when surrounded by a group of said folks, don't say it at all. If you aren't brave enough to say it when surrounded by a group of said folks, don't say it at all.

11. Never speak ill of Joey Porter. THAT'S DISRESPECT! He has ways of knowing, even if you do it in private. And he never forgets. And he will visit any affront to his person tenfold upon your head. With his dogs. He might bite you himself. Scratch that, he will. Fix that mouth good. And then you'll need a rabies shot. They hurt too. He has ways of knowing, even if you do it in private. And he never forgets. And he will visit any affront to his person tenfold upon your head. With his dogs. He might bite you himself. Scratch that, he will. Fix that mouth good. And then you'll need a rabies shot. They hurt too.

IX.5 "Can You Please Sign My Newborn?": Autograph Hunting Try not to be alarmed at the news that athletes do not much care for you. In fact, they're plenty freaked out with obsessive fans and have personal security prepared to deal with you. Yes, the glorified idols of sport upon whom you lavish your near-heroin-addiction affection have better things to do than to curry your favor. They have commercials to film for the latest edgy iteration of Gatorade. If it's Peyton Manning, he has a spot to film for every consumer product known to man.

Indeed, NFL players have nothing but disdain to show when you find them in the public sphere. Usually, when this happens at all, it's at one of the many Cheesecake Factories, Best Buys, Olive Gardens, or paintball courses that dot the suburban hinterlands surrounding the city they play in. Because most famous athletes live the secluded lifestyle you would expect of any obscenely wealthy individual, yet have tastes that adhere to your average fifteen-year-old male.

But surely there must be a way to get them to warm up to you and give you a measly signature? Outside of getting bilked at autograph shows, these are your best bets.

Be their server at the Cheesecake Factory. Slip them what appears to be a copy of the bill. After the player foolishly commits his John Hanc.o.c.k to the piece of sc.r.a.p paper, kindly turn in the uniform you stole from the nineteen-year-old you trussed up outside the restaurant and beam the smile that only comes via the sense of pride from a job well done. Slip them what appears to be a copy of the bill. After the player foolishly commits his John Hanc.o.c.k to the piece of sc.r.a.p paper, kindly turn in the uniform you stole from the nineteen-year-old you trussed up outside the restaurant and beam the smile that only comes via the sense of pride from a job well done.Lay a sob story on them. Because nothing works on a ball of kinetic energy like a good play on the sympathies. Actually, the player will likely cave to your demands to avoid the blubbering you're subjecting them to. Either way, success! Because nothing works on a ball of kinetic energy like a good play on the sympathies. Actually, the player will likely cave to your demands to avoid the blubbering you're subjecting them to. Either way, success!Tell them autographs are part of a video game. There's nothing outside the playing field that athletes respect quite like the gaming world. Get them to think it will advance the cause of their online There's nothing outside the playing field that athletes respect quite like the gaming world. Get them to think it will advance the cause of their online Call of Duty Call of Duty profile and players will sign your week-worn drawers, if need be. profile and players will sign your week-worn drawers, if need be.Berate them horribly. As NFL coaches have evinced for decades, football players respond to nothing like infantilizing techniques that rob them of their basic humanity. Now you can turn the denial of their worth to your gain. As NFL coaches have evinced for decades, football players respond to nothing like infantilizing techniques that rob them of their basic humanity. Now you can turn the denial of their worth to your gain.Get a hot girl to do it for you. If there's a tactic no NFL player can elude, it's that of the impossibly attractive female decoy. Sure, it's expected, but hot girls tend to get what they want from athletic mental midgets. And book-writing mental midgets, if memory serves. If there's a tactic no NFL player can elude, it's that of the impossibly attractive female decoy. Sure, it's expected, but hot girls tend to get what they want from athletic mental midgets. And book-writing mental midgets, if memory serves.

IX.6 Pester G.o.d to Intercede on Your Team's Behalf Priggish religious types like to chide football fans by saying that praying to G.o.d to beseech Him to make their favorite team win is a disgusting perversion of faith. "G.o.d has much more important things to deal with," they cry. "He doesn't concern Himself with who wins a measly old football game!" Disregard their sanctimony. Those people are probably all Lions fans who long ago swore allegiance to a dark master in hopes of getting even one win. In fact, no single act works better for increasing your team's chances of victory than groveling to the Man Upstairs. But, mind you, only if it's done properly. G.o.d is a stickler for details, because apparently He is in them.

Once you're ready to get started, douse yourself with a bit of holy water. If that's in short supply, beer is a fine subst.i.tute. Just make sure it's not a s.h.i.+tty brand, like any of the ones that advertise on NFL broadcasts. Anyway, be sure when praying to face the direction of your team's stadium. Muslim readers may refuse to do this because they are supposed to be facing Mecca, which may explain why NFL teams with a large Muslim fan base do not win very often.

His G.o.dliness gets roughly forty-three million requests from sports fans each day, though half of those are from baseball fans asking Him to cut short their miserable lives. Still, that leaves a very high volume of pleas for intercession on behalf of real sports teams. How He ultimately decides on whom to favor is anyone's guess, though I have an inside source (lots of angels are habitual snitches) who says it boils down to the sheer number of quality pleas he gets from each side. G.o.d is very democratic like that. So whenever your team loses a critical game and you didn't get down on your knees and cancel out a rival fan's prayer, you're directly responsible for your team's failure on the field. And you're going to h.e.l.l. And believe me, it's worse than it sounds because every other demon is a Steelers fan. Which kind of makes it like earth.

At the same time, G.o.d doesn't like to be bothered by the same people every single week, so you might want to s.p.a.ce out the number of requests throughout the season. Saving them up for a playoff run isn't a bad idea. Above all else, you must exercise restraint. Beg the big guy enough and you're gonna find yourself on the Do Not Bless list.

In a pinch and finding G.o.d to be unresponsive to your recent begging, take it up with Satan. He does have a much better return-on-request rate. Unfortunately his price tag is a bit steeper-it's usually your soul, and probably carrying out an evil task like a bridge-bombing of some sort, meaning you can only go to him once every so often (unless you're a fellow collector of souls like Al Davis). So you might want to save him for a Super Bowl or a conference champions.h.i.+p game or something else important. You wouldn't believe how many Giants fans' souls he got before Super Bowl XLII. How else do you think they won that game? Sure, Satan loves the Patriots, but he's a guy who puts business first.

IX.7 Fortifying Your Conversations with the Power of Football Cliches Getting a proper handle on the culture of football requires you to inject a number of phrases Romanowski-like into everyday conversation, as though dropping a mention of the Wildcat Formation into a discussion of health care reform were a perfectly normal thing. Besides supplementing the usual bouquet of expletives, these sayings help pad out your otherwise flabby speech with the added muscular oomph of sport talk. That doesn't mean you need to belabor the terminology of X Xs and O Os, telling your friends to run slant and go routes to find the bathroom and asking your girl for some better weak-side penetration. Well, maybe give that last one some thought.

Granted, these sayings are entirely devoid of meaning, but they're a staple of football discourse. Employing them incessantly makes you sound knowing, even when what you actually know about the game could fit on the top of an end-zone pylon. As with everything, it's all about pulling off the act. As a bonus, you'll find these phrases to be very versatile in their usage, applying to situations outside the obvious football context, which only serves to further decrease the time you'll have to spend conversing coherently with others, the bane of any intense gridiron fan.

In some cases, they are familiar toss-off expressions used by players, coaches, and team executives; in others, they're the redundancies and hollow prattle often employed by television announcers. Feel free to borrow liberally from either school of NFL parlance; it will let others know that you are a fan of varied tastes. A pigskin polyglot, if you will.

"At the end of the day..."

How It Is Used: A preface to any statement of fact that you feel could benefit from an empty sense of gravity. A preface to any statement of fact that you feel could benefit from an empty sense of gravity.

It's a useless and meaningless saying, but you won't find a player or coach in the NFL who doesn't toss this one out after every thought in need of verbal underscoring. For example: "Yes, we just lost by five touchdowns at home. We had some plays that didn't go our way, but, at the end of the day, we're still the same fifty-three guys who have to go out there each week."

Use Outside of Football: "Look, I know I drove us to financial ruin, cheated on mom, got her brother arrested and her sister killed, lost the house in a poker game, and sold you kids into slavery, but, "Look, I know I drove us to financial ruin, cheated on mom, got her brother arrested and her sister killed, lost the house in a poker game, and sold you kids into slavery, but, at the end of the day at the end of the day, we're still a family."

"It is what it is"

How It Is Used: A blanket statement of resignation; an unhelpful way of answering someone asking for specifics. A blanket statement of resignation; an unhelpful way of answering someone asking for specifics.

Reporter: "Today you surrendered eight plays of 20 or more yards. The opposition had more than 300 yards rus.h.i.+ng by the end of the third quarter. Then their backups scored another three touchdowns on you. How would you describe the play of the defense today?"Athlete: "It is what it is."

Use Outside of Football: Nosy person: "You're squatting in a closed Domino's Pizza storefront, subsisting on the cheese from discarded pizza boxes, and selling your blood for smokes? Really? Is this what you're planning to do with yourself? You call this living?"You: "It is what it is."

"Taking it one week at a time"

How It Is Used: A response to any request for speculation in regard to the outcome of future events. A response to any request for speculation in regard to the outcome of future events.

The NFL is an environment in which the entire landscape of the league can change on a week-to-week basis and the slightest boasting gets inflated into bulletin board material. With this in mind, players and coaches don't enjoy engaging in hypothetical discussions. You should do the same.

Use Outside of Football: Overbearing parents inquiring, "When're you getting a job?" Easy: "Lay off, 'rents, I just graduated and Overbearing parents inquiring, "When're you getting a job?" Easy: "Lay off, 'rents, I just graduated and I'm taking life one week at a time I'm taking life one week at a time. Who knows what tomorrow will bring." The girlfriend carps: "When are you going to settle down and marry me?" Your winning rejoinder: "You can't live your life that way. When it happens, it happens. Gotta live your life one week at a time Gotta live your life one week at a time." Before long, you'll see how far speaking fatalistically can get you and just how easy it is to make Ramen noodles (very easy!). At least Bill Belichick will find you relatable.

"Football move"

How It Is Used: A term with a meaning impossible to pin down, which doesn't stop referees and announcers from using it constantly when detailing a ruling on a fumble, interception, or incomplete pa.s.s. A term with a meaning impossible to pin down, which doesn't stop referees and announcers from using it constantly when detailing a ruling on a fumble, interception, or incomplete pa.s.s.

After catching a pa.s.s, a receiver or a defender is required to make what is commonly referred to as a "football move" before he is considered to have possession of the ball. If the player loses control of the ball prior to making this "football move," the pa.s.s is considered incomplete. However, the exact definition of this term is cryptic at best. Conceivably one could stand in place after catching the ball for an hour, drop it, and have the play considered an incomplete pa.s.s. What actions then meet the requirements of a football move? A certain amount of steps taken after the catch? Or is it more a matter of type than degree? Perhaps there's an especially football suggestive motion that a player has to perform? Maybe striking the Heisman pose.

Use Outside of Football: That said, allow uncertainty to work to your advantage when employing this bit of gridiron legalese. If someone calls dibs on something, take it anyway and note that they neglected to make a football move with said item. While they try to make sense of the bulls.h.i.+t you just fed them, you'll have at least a few seconds head start toward the door. That said, allow uncertainty to work to your advantage when employing this bit of gridiron legalese. If someone calls dibs on something, take it anyway and note that they neglected to make a football move with said item. While they try to make sense of the bulls.h.i.+t you just fed them, you'll have at least a few seconds head start toward the door.

"To throw someone under the bus"

How It Is Used: To malign a teammate's or a coworker's poor performance in public. To malign a teammate's or a coworker's poor performance in public.

In the esprit-de-corps-fueled world of the NFL, loyalty is treasured above all, unless, of course, you're a superstar. Then anything goes. It is therefore considered very bad form to single out a teammate's performance for blame, no matter how glaringly obvious it may be to everyone involved.