Best team name: New Orleans Saints

The team was named on All Saints Day and the infamous “When the Saints Go Marchin’ In” make this team name a winner. Add in a French fleur de lis and you have the total package: It’s local, it’s relevant to the city’s history and it’s unique.

Best team name that came from a legend: Buffalo Bills

There aren’t any buffalo roaming the plains of Buffalo, but Buffalo Bill’s legend is well known. And while the team bears no semblance to the Wild West or the 4,280 buffalo William F. Cody claims to have killed, the name works even though the buffalo on their logo should probably have its eyes X’ed out.

Worst team name: New York Jets

Yes, Madison Avenue has cooked up some of the most creative things we’ve  witnessed in advertising. And while the Jets and Namath are legendary, when it comes to New York creativity they clearly outsourced this gig to Jersey. The Jets were named because it sounds like the Mets and they’re close to LaGuardia airport. No, they don’t make planes in New York. No, it’s not considered the birthplace of flight.

Worst team name submitted by fans that was chosen for another reason: San Diego Chargers

Did you know that the Chargers were named by a resident of Hollywood? It’s true, and he won a vacation for submitting the winning entry. This would be enough to earn a pass (or a huge “win” if social media had been around back then) but we’ve also found that the Chargers name stuck because the team had a horsie on their stationery and the team owner was the founder of the Carte Blanche card. Get it? You can charge your credit card! Hilarious! Marketing! Win! Or not.

What do you think? Which team name is your least favorite?

Source: Football Happenings

At any rate, grinding out every game for last year’s posts was tedious, to say the least. And after seeing the final regular season BCS standings before the bowl season even begins, I’m ready to pick every game right now.

Here’s no surprise, especially to those down South: The SEC will win every single game it plays. Notre Dame will have their mud shoots literally stomped in by Bama, LSU will decapitate an opponent on a kick return, Florida will score a billion points while allowing negative thirty billion and A&M’s Johnny Football will be christened as New Jesus.

And when I say the SEC will win, it’s not just in the bowl season — I’m talking about all time, forever, in every game it plays. In the event that a SEC school takes a break from beating up on a glorified high school team the week before their final SEC game and schedules another SEC school, the little known NCAA “reverse academic rule” comes into effect whereby their higher ranking academic school, Vanderbilt, will be forced to lose the game by forfeit — not because they didn’t field a team that Saturday, but because they’ll be busy taking all of the final exams for SEC bottom feeder schools like Mississippi State and Ole Miss. Vandy, by default, will then be allowed to play in the “NCAA (cough cough, laugh laugh) Title Game” against whichever felons from Ohio State that aren’t incarcerated in January, with the Commodores undoubtedly skipping their way into the end zone through rival conference’s “top defenses” — whilst reciting sonnets from Shakespeare and Pandya theorem.

Given this inevitable outcome, the SEC is going to make such short work of next year’s college football “schedules” that EA Sports will be forced to put the entire SEC on the cover of the 2015 NCAA Football game. Eventually the NCAA will be forced to do something unheard of in college sports: Split the SEC off into its own NFL D-League. In this new format, every player will be paid slightly more than they already pocket from team boosters while automatically being drafted from 1-253 into the NFL. Other NCAA players will be forced to play for the London Sillynannies in Europe, where Tom Brady will make his triumphant return (he did attend That [pussy] School Up North, after all) to England and lead the Sillynannies to a European Kittens and Girly Things Bowl championship. His team will be awarded matching pink lederhosen, pinky rings and castrations.

Eventually, with the second rate NFL players out of the way, every SEC player will dominate in the “New NFL” and break every record ever held throughout all time: a 50,000-yard rusher, 99-yard field goal records and team defenses that allow negative points will all force the NFL to burn the NFL Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio and move it to Buloxi, Mississippi. There, Southerners will take annual pilgrimages to pray at the feet New Jesus and curse at all of the Blue States for even messin’ with their game.

Could the NCAA change their rules to stop God Nick Saban from forcing players to enroll a semester late, only to redshirt them so they’re closer to 23 years of age when they hit the field than 18 year old kids as “Freshmen”? Sure, but we don’t live in a world where an unchecked governing body like the NCAA could put a stop to this… right?

You might be thinking “Well, isn’t this whole scenario just a LITTLE overboard?” — and the answer is “YOU CAN’T SPELL ‘SECEDESCREW YOU’ WITHOUT ‘S-E-C’.”

My wife: “I do.”

Me: “What that the group of fat guys from Tennessee?”

My wife: “No, you’re thinking of someone else.”

Me: “But we watched them on YouTube that one time. Remember?”

My wife: “No.”

[clicks over to YouTube, checks Search History only to find that I disabled it]

Fail.

The spot that has already been well leaked and spread via social media has been Matthew Broderick’s mysterious Ferris Bueller spot. The 10-second teaser clip was released on the web before the weekend and spread quickly.

Since most of the Dads here on EOT are children of the 80s-90s, we wanted to share with you what is a great spot for Honda’s CR-V. Broderick plays himself in true Bueller fashion. Well done and not overdone. Enjoy

We're licking more than our wounds this New Year's

That New Year’s hangover couldn’t be any stronger after going 2-3 on our New Year’s Eve picks, but we’re not going to let that deter us from winning the battle. Even with those losses, we’re still an astounding 15-7-1 going into today. Here’s what you need to know to come out ahead on your day off.

TicketCity 
Houston (-7) vs. Penn State
Jan. 2, Noon (ESPNU/ESPN3)

As Jeff Foxworthy said, You might be playing in a shitty bowl game when you find yourself being molested in a shower in Texas”. Ok, he never said that, but this home game for the Cougars is about as close to justice as we’ll see this month against a Penn State team that will struggle to stop the U of H offense. That said, Houston has literally had zero tough games this year except for their conference title game, where they were exposed. Take the seven points and go with the fifth ranked PSU defense.

Outback
Michigan State (+3) vs. Georgia
Jan. 2, 1 PM (CBS)

EOT Bowl picks: All the muscle, none of the ball shrinkage

We’re just over halfway through Bowl season and in case you’ve been following along, I’ve been tearing it up on these bowl predictions going 12-4-1 over the first 17 games against the spread. Much like my boy @bigguyd rolling running down hill, once this train gets moving it ain’t stoppin’. That said, here are the next few days worth of games to keep your winnings rolling into the New Year.

Hyundai Sun
Georgia Tech (-2.5) vs. Utah
Dec. 31, 2 PM ET (CBS)

Little Caesars Bowl
Western Michigan vs. Purdue (-2.5)
Dec. 27, 4:30 p.m. ET (ESPN)

Detroit’s own Pizza Man, aka Red Wings and Tigers owner Mike Ilitch, has picked up the sponsorship of the now defunct Motor City Bowl which features a decent Western Michigan Bronco team against the Big Eleven Twelve Ten Purdue Boilermakers. While it may seem like a homer pick, it’s difficult to take a team that barely beat Middle Tennessee State and lost to Rice early on in the season. The Broncos are ranked 9th in the nation in passing, which means they’ll be spreading the cheese through the air against a doughy Purdue defense giving up 26 points per game. Take the two and a half breadsticks and get free delivery of another EOT bowl prediction.

Belk
Louisville vs. NC State (-1.5)
Dec. 27, 8 p.m. ET (ESPN)

Four letter bowl game? 1. Four 2. Word 3. Prediction: 4. Louisville. (h/t @extraface)

Military Bowl Presented By Northrop Grumman
Toledo vs. Air Force (+3)
Dec. 28, 4:30 p.m. ET (ESPN)

What happens when a Rocket takes on the Air Force? We’re not 100% sure, but looking at each team’s schedules it’s hard to pick against an offense that can flat out score in the Toledo Rockets. The only problem is, the game’s being played outdoors in Washington, D.C., which doesn’t bode well for the pass-happy Rockets. Look for Air Force to keep it close playing in the swamp by controlling the clock. Take the 3 points and cheer on the fly boys!

 

Bridgepoint Education Holiday
California vs. Texas (+3)
Dec. 28, 8 p.m. ET (ESPN)  

What do you get when two teams with losing Conference play face off? Hopefully not a complete stinker. The Longhorns are coming off of a disappointing season that saw them get dethroned in the Big 12 by not just Oklahoma, but a near perfect Oklahoma State team and an RG3-lead Baylor squad, while Cal mucked their way through the Pac 12 losing to the teams you’d expect them to lose to. While it’s clear both teams are in a rebuilding mode after missing out on Bowl games last year, I’m going to give the edge to Texas in this game, if for no other reason than because of Mack Brown and their running game, which is ranked 19th in the country.

 

Champs Sports
Florida State (-3) vs. Notre Dame
Dec. 29, 5:30 p.m. ET (ESPN)  

I'll say a little prayer for ya, fellas, but I'm afraid it's not gonna help!

In a game of “We used to be really good programs”, the ironically named Champs Sports bowl should be a classic. Statistically this is one of the more intriguing early bowl match ups, pitting Brian Kelly’s spread offense against a staunch FSU defense. The game’s being played in Florida, which gives an advantage to the Seminoles, and the Irish essentially lost to every good team they faced this year (sorry MSU). Mix in a near upset by lowly Boston College at home and it makes it tough to pick ND. Look for the Seminole defense to step up big and cover the three point spread.

 

Valero Alamo
Washington vs. Baylor (-9)
Dec. 29, 9 p.m. ET (ESPN)  

The Alamo Bowl lucked out when all-everything Robert Griffin III won the Heisman Trophy. This game should be high scoring as neither defense can’t stop anyone and no one can stop the Baylor offense.  The Texas-based Bears should have a decided home field advantage, so look for a blowout as they’ll put up video game-like numbers and cover the 9 point spread.

 

Bell Helicopter Armed Forces
BYU (-2.5) vs. Tulsa
Dec. 30, Noon  ET (ESPN)  

No one cares. Next! (Ok if you really have to pick one lay the points and take BYU)

 

"RU fuckin' kiddin' me?"

New Era Pinstripe
Rutgers (-1.5) vs. Iowa State
Dec. 30, 3:20 PM ET (ESPN)  

The second annual “Let’s see how much more money we can bilk out of our tri-state area alumni” Bowl is taking place outdoors at Yankee Stadium between Rutgers and ISU. Honestly it would only be more fitting if they played the game at Citi Field, but I digress. Iowa State comes in a 1.5 point underdog and an inability to throw the ball. Conversely, Rutgers ranks twelfth in the nation in points against and can’t run the ball. This should be a craptastic showdown for the ages in the Bronx, where at least a few Iowa State fans will get mugged and/or sell their tickets in exchange for a Knicks game at the Garden. Take the home team giving 1.5 points and expect an early afternoon nap.

 

Franklin American Mortgage Music City
Mississippi State (-7) vs. Wake Forest
Dec. 30, 6:40 PM ET (ESPN)  

Honestly I was shocked to learn that MSU made a bowl game because their SEC record was so bad. Then again, the worst SEC team can beat just about anyone based on the fact that most conferences have been watered down to the point that waterboys are making the team. OK, not really, but the ACC sucks. Based on that alone I have to lay the 7 points and go with MSU.

 

Insight Bowl
Iowa vs. Oklahoma (-13.5)

Dec. 30, 10 PM ET (ESPN)  

In the “Game nobody outside of Oklahoma and Iowa will watch because it’s on too fucking late”, look for Bob Stoopes to mop the floor with an Iowa team that, let’s be honest, hasn’t played well against above average Big Ten talent. The Sooners will be looking to run up the score to show the Sooner faithful that this season was an aberration in his tenure as the OU coach. Oklahoma’s losses came against teams that are tops in the country in passing, which Iowa doesn’t do well. While 13.5 points is a lot to lay down, the Sooners flat out have more talent and will stomp the Hawkeyes.

Naturally, I answered: “*bleep*! and finally finish all of those video games.”