It’s time once again for the annual Lowdown Blog Fantasy Hockey Pool. We’ve created our fantasy hockey league over on the TSN/ESPN fantasy website. It’s a public pool so anyone can join. As with last year, if we run out of space in the first pool, we’ll create a second one. It’s a head-to-head league with the winner of each match-up based on winning the most of the nine categories (G, A, +/-, PIM, SOG, STP [Special Teams Points], W, GAA, SV%) in play kinda like the old Yahoo pools we all used to play. Each team has 20 roster spots with nine forwards, four defencemen and two goalies starting each night. Continue reading
Month: September 2011
The Best of My Life Is Average (Part 5)
It’s time for another part in our ongoing series in the best of the interweb that can help you through your day. (Well, the interweb that is outside of The Lowdown Blog.) Once again, I take us back for some more of the best stories of My Life is Average. I like this site because it’s a bit more relatable to everyone’s average lives and some of the stories on the website are the sort of thing that regularly happen to people. That doesn’t mean that these stories aren’t funny. Continue reading
Ten Worst Finishing Moves In The WWE Today
One thing I noticed over that short period where CM Punk made watching today’s WWE tolerable to watch again was that some finishing moves are awful. They either look like they lack punch or look ridiculous in the sense of “how can you pull that off?” I know that a key part of wrestling is for fans to suspend their disbelief like watching a TV show. But like any TV show, there are moments that you can’t suspend your disbelief through. So with that as the criteria, here are the ten worst finishers in today’s WWE. Continue reading
Lowdown BlogCast: September 28, 2011
With the 2011-12 NHL season set to kick-off in a week’s time, we’re back with out annual Lowdown NHL season preview podcast. In this edition of the show, the boys start by picking the top fantasy hockey players for the upcoming seasons, some sleepers for the later rounds and where to draft injured players like Crosby and Kesler who will get you a point per game but might miss a significant portion of the season. The talk then turns to the alleged link between fighting and player deaths and discussion as to whether the connection is there or this is the media trying to make money without substantial evidence. Entertainment is up next as Jackie previews the new fall TV season while getting sidetracked constantly by Steve. When Steve takes over entertainment, he leads the discussion about nude celebrity self-portraits that mysteriously “leak” to the internet. After that, we’re back to hockey as the boys pick their division and conference champions and predict the individual award winners. They also talk in-depth about the playoff chances of the Flyers and Maple Leafs. At the end of the show, things go off-track again as Steve and Jackie talk about who would win in a war between zombies and vampires.
In total it’s a whopping 162 minutes of Lowdown action for you to digest. That’s nearly two-and-three-quarters hours of the classic Lowdown fun and frivolity in one podcast.
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Wednesday Link-Off: In The Game
A quick plug before today’s links: We’re going to have the latest episode of the podcast online today. Since we talk about vampires near the end, it’s only appropriate that we start with Ashley Greene.
The NBA Lockout has wiped out what was supposed to be the preseason and is well on its way to taking out part of the regular season. The biggest fight the league and union will have is over the definition of basketball revenue according to Malcolm Gladwell. (Grantland)
Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi is an absolute legend around Lowdown HQ. Of course, he’s also popular in Italy because he’s the quintessential Italian. (Wall Street Journal)
Ron MacLean got caught at a club while drunk and shirtless? Is the picture real? (Deadspin)
After the jump, Ozzie wants a boat, a new old Twin Peaks game and why Spiderman 3 sucks. Continue reading
Fails of the Week
Every so often, we take a look at the most epic fails from the week that was in the Fails of the Week. This week, we have five pictures and videos that we think are the most epic fails of the week. Continue reading
Worst of Music: Cobra Starship – You Make Me Feel
Normally I do a long lead in before introducing this week’s Worst of Music artist but I really wanted to like these guys. Cobra Starship did the not-at-all related song for Snakes On A Plane called, imaginatively, Snakes On A Plane (Bring It). No, the song didn’t really have anything to do with the movie but it started with the famous Sam Jackson line from the movie so it wasn’t that bad. But what happens when you have Cobra Starship and subtract Samuel L. Motherfucking Jackson? You have this week’s WoM-winning You Make Me Feel. Continue reading
NFL Week 3 Picks
Week 2 was a much better week picking games as I didn’t lose any of my top 5 picks. It would have been nice if reality TV star person Jesse Holley had ran a little harder and dove into the end zone but the Cowboys actually winning that game was a nice and refreshing ending given how that game went. The Cowboys really should have lost the game.
The same thing that happened to the Cowboys pretty much happened to the Bills who managed to pull out a victory at the last minute over the Oakland Raiders. Sadly they didn’t cover the spread and it was just a push but given that that game was 21-3 at half for Oakland, I’ll take the result.
The Steelers, Bucs, and Bengals all cover the spread in games that mostly went the way I expected. The Steelers crushed the Seahawks while the scrappy Bucs managed to pull off the comeback win against a sad little Vikings team. I did expect for Cincinnati to win outright (and they probably should have) but covering the spread is pretty sweet. So far, two weeks into the season I am 4-4-2 for the games I feel best about and a dismal 11-17-4 for all games. On to more crappy picks!
Continue reading
Sunday Link-Off: The Big Show
Last week was a busy week in the world. I started editing a ridiculously long Lowdown podcast. The new TV season started proper (by which I mean shows from networks other than CW started). Pre-season hockey kicked off and the Jets played a sold-out game in Winnipeg. And we were reminded that Poppy Montgomery is still around.
We all know Glee is an awful excuse for a show but have you ever really watched in depth enough to notice the depths of its ridiculousness? Someone watched the whole first season in two days so you don’t have to. (Progressive Boink)
We’ve all heard of the NFL Red Zone channel but not all of us have seen it. Apparently, it’s the greatest thing to happen to football since the invention of the forward pass. Here’s the behind the scenes story of the channel. (New York Times)
I seem to constantly be on a campaign against singers pretending to be social commentators. I do have some allies in my cause. Drew Magary recently wrote a column about how Lady Gaga isn’t really a self-help guru. (Deadspin)
After the jump, Carson Palmer’s new day job, pro wrestling’s newest stars and some special guests on the morning weather forecast. Continue reading
Entertainment Link-Off: Gonna Get Over You
It’s Entertainment Link-Off time since it’s Saturday night! Kicking off this entry is Lily Collins who is starring in the Taylor Lautner actioner Abduction. Sadly the film is critically panned, so perhaps something on the other end of the spectrum is worth seeing… like Moneyball for example!
After the jump, some Elmo related news, Batman likes to beat clowns, Conan O’Brien has a guy moment, an awesome office escape video and two song recommendations to make up for my missing music segment from the upcoming podcast! Continue reading
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