Friday, July 10, 2009

Top Five Friday

I won't lie to you, I'm incredibly bored. And completely out of ideas - like literally nothing to say about anything. So until I actually come up with something interesting to write about, every Friday I'm going to do what bored and lazy writers the world over do - make lists! The specifics of the list will change but two things will always be constant - it will always contain five items and it will always be about music (yeah yeah I know, sports blog - shut your mouth). This week's list:

Top Five Song Beats
Last week dealt strictly with drum beats - this week, the song as a whole. I'll admit they're fairly similar and probably shouldn't have been posted in back to back weeks. My criteria for this week's category was anything that gets your foot to tapping or your money-maker making money.

5. Summer Love - Justin Timberlake
Say what you will about the man's dubious musical history, but as a solo artist JT gets it done. I will hear no arguments on the matter.



4. Hospital Beds - Cold War Kids
I've said it before and I'll say it again - the human body is biologically unable to stay still during this song.



3. Mo Money, Mo Problems - Notorious B.I.G. feat. Puff Daddy & MA$E
I don't get too many opportunities to write an 'S' as a dollar sign, so I have to take them when they come. And yes, I know this is a sample from a Diana Ross song but Puffy punched it up quite a bit and it's vastly superior. Also, why on earth did they Puffy putt with the pin still in the cup? I'm pretty sure that's a 2-stroke penalty.



2. Train in Vain (Stand by Me) - The Clash
If you don't get up and dance while you're listening to this, during the night Joe Strummer's ghost will let the air out of your car tires.



1. Superstition - Stevie Wonder
This song has so much funk, the Mennen Corporation was called in to clean it up. Wow, that was brutal - please don't let it affect your enjoyment of the song.



Honourable Mention

Crazy in Love - Beyonce
Again, it's a sample - from here - but that seems to be the way it goes. I think this song also gains from the iconic dance Warren Sapp did to honour it. And the official video is the dictionary definition of someone knocking it out of the park.

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Fantasy Football Spreadsheets - Yeah, That's How We Roll

Good news sports nerds, the Sports As Life Fantasy Football guru Trebor is back from hiatus (also known as "having a kid"). Thanks in part to the criminally bad Sports As Life paternity leave policy, Trebor has been hard at work over the past few weeks on a one-man fantasy football draft. Too early for fantasy football you say? Feh! That's precisely the kind of attitude that leads to your consistently terrible fantasy teams. It's never too early to bone up - so let's get to boning...


This is my one man draft. It was done about 3 weeks ago, and then I came back to it and made some notes. This is the first time that I've done this, even though at this point in my life I've never been busier. But after all the winnings last year, I have a standard to uphold. The only research done on my part is checking out NFL.com once a week to see if there's any noteworthy news. I'm sure after digging around about how coaches have changed and formations and how the team drafted the postions would change considerably but it's too early to get into all that information.


(Ed. Note - Click to enlarge)


I would recommend it to any one who takes the fantasy thing seriously. It gives you a chance to go through the players well in advance - instead of a week before saying, what he plays for them now... interesting?? Also you get an idea of and get comfortable with your draft strategy. I purposefully chose Fitz in the 1st round just to see how the rest of the draft would unfold for that team. After doing the draft, I went back to it a couple of weeks later and reviewed it, as well ranked the teams. Everyone's ranking will be different but it gives you chance to see if going with rb/rb the first 2 picks is the best, or maybe just grabbing the best available, or making sure you get a rb along with top 5 wr and qb. You can also see what happens when you reach and grab that high risk/ high reward player.


Friday, July 3, 2009

Top Five Friday

I won't lie to you, I'm incredibly bored. And completely out of ideas - like literally nothing to say about anything. So until I actually come up with something interesting to write about, every Friday I'm going to do what bored and lazy writers the world over do - make lists! The specifics of the list will change but two things will always be constant - it will always contain five items and it will always be about music (yeah yeah I know, sports blog - shut your mouth). This week's list:

Top Five Drum Beats
I love drums - a lot.

5. Born in the USA - Bruce Springsteen
Maybe a surprise choice as it's not a super rigorous beat or anything, but those opening salvos from Max Weinberg are iconic.



4. Nobody Move, Nobody Get Hurt - We Are Scientists
To me, this song sounds like what it must be like to have ADD - frenetic and moving 100 mph at all times.



3. Maps - Yeah Yeah Yeahs
This song is the reason headphones and extremely loud volumes were invented.


2. Jessica Numbers - The New Pornographers
I'm crushed that there's not a better video anywhere on the Internet, because this one just doesn't do it justice. If you've ever seen this band live you know that the intro drums for this song feel like getting repeatedly kicked in the chest with an iron boot - and it... is... awesome.



1. Like Eating Glass - Bloc Party
Honestly, I could have made this top-5 all Bloc Party songs but I think this is the best in terms of drum work. If you ever have a chance to see these guys live, do it. Spare no expense. I had the good fortune to see them recently and you will never, ever see drumming like that again. That skinny Asian kid moves so fast there were several times I thought he was going to achieve lift-off.



Honourable Mentions
BONUS BLOC PARTY!!1!!1!!