My buddy Steve has a cat named Fat Brutus. He found Fat Brutus as a stray kitten, and raised him to his current state of exaggerated fatness. Fat Brutus lives for Steve. I’m not a cat person, but in my experience they don’t usually wait at the door for their owners. Fat Brutus does. He jumps into Steve’s lap whenever Steve sits down. He begs for attention. The whole shebang. This sounds like a nightmare for me, mainly because I hate and am allergic to cats, but for Steve it’s a good experience, I guess. Anyway, when it came time for Fat Brutus to get neutered, Steve made the mistake of dropping him off. After the procedure, as Steve explains it, Fat Brutus “wouldn’t talk” to him for weeks. This is to say the cat started treating him like it treated everyone else. Fat Brutus snubbed him, walked out of the room when Steve entered, and generally acted like, well, a regular rude cat. For three weeks this went on, and Steve, rather attached to Fat Brutus, had determined that the cat no longer liked him and was devastated. Fat Brutus was over Steve. It was tragic. Eventually the cat came around, but during the snub period, Steve was heartbroken. I’ve never seen Steve cry. He’s a big dude; a former college football player, firefighter and all-state high school wrestler. But when imagining him witness his relationship with Fat Brutus crumble I can see him wailing like an overgrown infant.
Fat Brutus is rollin' in dat gwap! (cat pictured not actually Fat Brutus...but Fat Brutus IS rollin' in dat gwap)
I’ve recently had a discussion with The Real KC, my reader liaison. He reads all of my stories, and acts as an intermediary between myself and my millions of dedicated followers who for some mysterious reason refuse to comment on my stories. Here is a transcript of our text message exchange last night:
After finding out that Nate Dunlevy over at 18to88.com was shutting down his Web site after this year:
LukeNukem: Heard your boy was closing shop on 18to88…pussy
The Real KC: Nah, he is just teaming up with Coltzilla and ColtsInsider so there is only one Colts blog. Also, apparently it’s much harder to run a daily blog when you have a job in the USA rather than volunteer work in Argentina.
LN: Whatevs. I got two jobs, two kids, a wife who hates football and zero readers and I still keep on the grind.
TRKC: Yeah, but all your articles are basically the same thing: “I’m better than the experts, my fantasy team did blah blah blah…” DZ [Dunlevy] has to write something I’ll read.
LN: Doesn’t take any less time. My sh*t’s heavily researched. And it’s not easy finding Trogdor and Silent Bob references and working them into the articles. I never got the Colts blog craze anyway. Most of those clowns were only popular bc the Colts were good. As soon as its en vogue to commit heinous libel against fantasy experts I’ll be a star.
TRKC: You should have automated that sh*t by now: 1 Paragraph: “I’m better than [Matthew Berry].” 1 Paragraph: “Panda is a punk.” 1 Paragraph: “Stupid man crush.” 1 Paragraph: “Recounting drunken shenanigans.” 1 Paragraph: “I actually can’t win in fantasy football.” 1 Paragraph: “Just here to show hotties.” 1 Paragraph: “Random number generator.” BANG! You’re automated out of a job.
LN: Dammit! I knew I should’ve invested in a Web guy. Well, you at least have to admit that’s better than what they give you. It’s funnier, has more swearing and boobies.
TRKC: What? Are you saying @Redbraham doesn’t have any actual Web skills? (editor’s note: he doesn’t) That’s hard to believe. Boobies are better for sure. But your navel gazing “I’m better” columns could do with an edit…
LN: That’s only a recent development spawned by my inferiority complex. Usually my nut grafs are either about the Colts (too depressing) or drinking (too predictable). Maybe I’ll talk about movies or something. Also, the point was more that ANYBODY could do it better than Berry et. al, not just me.
So my articles need an edit, do they? Straight from the horse’s mouth. I feel like Steve must have when Fat Brutus started shunning him. My loyal followers, of which there must be near-uncountable numbers, no longer like me. So how do I fix this? I’ll tell you.
I’m going to prove, once and for all, that anyone can do this stuff, by letting my wife do the start/sit recommendations this week. I’ll still give you viable, half-assedly-researched position rankings interspersed throughout the column, but Mrs. Nukem will be specifically advising you on who you should start/sit this week.
A little background on my wife. I love her, respect her, and she’s great at a lot of things. When it comes to being a human being, she puts me to shame. I’m lucky to have her. But, football knowledge is not one of those things in which she excels. When a game comes on her eyes sort of glaze over. When we go to games together, after punts she asks questions like “Wait, why does the other team have the ball now?” She’s unfortunately stereotypically ignorant and disinterested in the game as a whole, though she thankfully pretends to be, at least when we go to the games. That’s okay. I d0n’t know the first thing about some of her interests, whatever they might be (yeah, husband of the year, I know).
So I asked her several start/sit questions. She was familiar with a few of the players involved, and I treated it as I would any other start/sit column, essentially only asking her to analyze players about whom you may be somewhat torn. Here is what she came up with:
Quarterbacks
Ben Roethlisberger @ KAN: “I’d sit him because I think he’s some kinda woman hater or something. Didn’t he assault somebody?”
Mark Sanchez vs. BUF: “He’s hot, he’s single and he’s all about family and charity. Start him. I saw him on the Today Show. That’s where I get all of my sports information.”
Tim Tebow @ SDG: “Oh yeah, good Christian boy. I’d start him.”
Matt Leinart @ JAC: “These pictures [obtained from Google image search] seem to depict him fraternizing with known pornographers. I’d sit him.”
Eli Manning @ NOR: “No question. Start him. There’s gotta be a Manning playing somewhere.”
Wide Receivers
Denarius Moore vs. CHI: “His braids make me nervous. I don’t really have a good explanation. But I’d sit him just to be safe. Does that make me sound like a racist?”
Reggie Wayne vs. CAR: “He’s totally my boyfriend. Start him.”
Pierre Garcon vs. CAR: “[Here she makes some awkward French laugh sound] and whatever the word for ‘start’ is in French.”
Plaxico Burress vs. BUF: “Sit. Shooting yourself in the leg is reason enough. I’m not blaming him, but…”
Running backs
Kevin Smith vs. GNB: “Start him. I went to high school with a guy named Kevin Smith…or was it Kevin Johnson? I don’t remember. Maybe it was Kevin Smith.”
Reggie Bush @ DAL: “I’m thinking sit him. Because if he has his helmet off I can see his cute smile more. Because he’s kind of a hottie.” (She was then asked, “you do realize that us benching him in fantasy has nothing to do with whether or not he plays in the real game, right?” She did not).
Willis McGahee @ SDG: “McGay-WHO?”
Daniel Thomas @ DAL: “Are they in or out of water? Is it on the dolphin’s turf, or the cowboy’s turf? Start him. Cowboys are a bunch of smug jerks” (she’s actually spot on with that last bit…the Cowboys are a bunch of smug jerks. However, it was initially unclear whether she was talking about the Dallas
Cowboys, or cowboys in general).
Tight Ends
Benjamin Watson @ CIN: “Start him. Elementary, my dear.”
Dustin Keller vs. BUF: “I guess sit him because I think I’ve been saying ‘start them’ too much.”
There you have it, folks. Probably the best start/sit advice you’ll ever read.
