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#2 Texas

Offense: They return basically everybody besides Quan Cosby. Namely Jordan "Van Wilder" Shipley, every running back, pretty much the whole line, and a certain mouth-breathing hillbilly Heisman candidate.

Defense: They lost Orakpo to the League, but bring back College's best drunk driver (I can't wait for jokes like, 'Sergio Kindle ran through those blockers like he does through living room walls'). Texas also brings back the whole defensive backfield, led by the pride of Orange, Deon Beasley.

Special Teams: Ryan Bailey is in fact involved in a Kicker Kontroversy over who will start. With another senior. Get. A. Fucking. Life.

Texas had a legit argument to be in the Championship game last year. However, Texas Tech being the douchebags they are, instead of putting up a fight in Norman, they buried their own faces in shit and let the Sooners stomp them in the nuts all the way to Florida. Whatever, I always enjoy seeing the Horns beat tOSU, especially since it involved a Quan swan song.

The question marks last year pretty much all revolved around the defensive backfield (would've beaten Tech if it wasn't for some late miscues) and the offensive line. They were both filled with underclass superheroes that were prone to the mistakes of youth. They're a year wiser, and a year more athletic. Unfortunately, ALL FOUR TIGHT ENDS have been injured. ALL FOUR. For real? How do you kill an entire position? That's less of a question mark and more of a missing chapter in the playbook. In regards to losing Orakpo, I'm all sorts of jacked to see freshman Alex Okafor get some reps. Dude is a tad weak (because he's 18), but he's got the body type of a Julius Peppers. Texas doesn't rebuild, we reload.

The Horns know the grind of the season. It's the same shit as it always is. Run through some cake like Wyoming, UTEP, and [insert Louisiana college not named LSU]. Then they enter the gauntlet that is the Big XII South. The big games are the same as always. OSU, TT, OU, and the Thanksgiving brother's war.

Analysis is thus: Texas is preseason ranked #2. Anything less than a championship game appearance is below par. Tebow and Florida have the hardware already, and Colt and the Horns need to hit that blue and orange target, or the season is a failure. Thems the breaks.

I Bet This Conversation Would Have More Flavor If An Encyclopedia Salesman Interjected Politely

Journal of a Cubs Fan: A Tale of Despair

A journal was discovered in the wreckage of a large building on the north side of Chicago. While officials do not claim that it has anything to do with the destruction of the building, or that the journal exists at all (seriously, if you call them right now, I bet they deny everything), the scrawl in these pages prove otherwise.

Oct. 4, 2008: Oh boy! Oh boy! The Cubs aren’t out of it yet! Sure, we’re down by two games in a best-of-three situation. But by golly, we’ve got destiny on our side! We couldn’t lose again and be left out of the World Series conversation. We’ve been too good all year long! We’ve got the most All-Stars on our squad, and we’re all healthy! There’s no way we can be denied this year, not in this century! And I mean, c’mon! We’ve got destiny on our side, by golly. Destiny!

Oct. 5: There is no God.

Oct. 6: Okay, okay, so maybe it’s not that bad. I mean it’s only a game right? So if it’s only a game, why haven’t I slept in 32 hours? And why do I find myself eating Hagen-Daas and watching the Lifetime Channel far too frequently? Or is it not frequently enough?...Where’s the model glue?

Oct. 8: This has been a rough couple of days. It seems my abounding optimism has left me with little credibility and even fewer prospects for friends. I had what I thought was a “running joke” with my boss – a Cardinals Fan - about whether or not the Cubs were going to beat the Dodgers. I was pretty cocky, so I said he could fire me if we lost. Anyway, I haven’t heard back from anyone on Monster.com.

I hate my life. And I’m out of glue.

Oct. 11: So my girlfriend left me. She said I was too “mopey.” Whatever, I don’t have to take a shower if I don’t want to.

Oct. 12: The Cubs have been forever tarnished by some sort of malevolent destiny, which has thusly tarnished my very soul. My therapist said that to me. After she said that I tried to bicycle kick her in the chest.

I awoke in a hospital bed days later, with my jaw wired shut. Apparently, my therapist was a highly-trained ultimate fighter, or so I was told as I immediately blacked-out after the first sight of my own blood.

The nurses at the hospital got my beloved baseball team all wrong. Albert Pujols came to tell me to keep my chin up. Then he signed my cast. It’s a full body cast, so I can’t wash it off, or do anything about it.

I think a nurse wrote “KICK ME” on the cast. The nurse or Pujols. Wait. I think Pujols was my nurse. Or my doctor.

Oct. 14: Oh hey, it looks like the White Sox might win a- nope. No, they lost too. Way to go, Chicago. Hang on, I’m going to go throw up off the top of a nearby cliff and think about trying to catch back up with it before it hits the ground.

Oct. 15: So one of the top people interested in buying the Cubs is something called a Mark Cuban. I hear he’s very involved with his team, the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks, and he is a very excitable personality. Maybe this is the sign I’m looking for…

Oct. 16: So I just met Mark Cuban on the sidewalk, and I’ve never had to actively restrain myself from lethally striking another human being. Every time Cuban smiled when he was talking to me, I felt the soul of an orphaned kitty cat die a grizzly death.

I’m out of glue again, but Cuban made himself useful and bought me a big bag of meth. So I’ve got that going for me, which is nice.

Oct. 18: I have no idea how to smoke meth. Up yours, Mark Cuban. You knew I wouldn’t know how to handle this crap. I’m pretty sure this isn’t even meth. I think it might be fiberglass insulation. Guess it’s back to the glue, anyway.

Nov. 1: I saw Kerry Wood on the sidewalk. I ran up to him and asked for his autograph. He said he was too injured. I was inconsolable.

Nov. 12: I’ve stared at a wall for eleven days now. My beard smells like a dirty pet store. My retro Cubs shirt looks like someone used it to dam up a mudslide, only instead of mud, it was poop.

Nov. 14: I ran into my old girlfriend. She was with that no-talent hack, Alfonso Soriano. Apparently his game is much better than his…well, game. I want to punch myself hard enough to either knock teeth out or throw up. Or both.

Nov. 17: It’s my sister’s birthday. I’d call her, but I know it doesn’t matter. She’s 20 years old, 81 years since a World Series; it’s all the same.

Nov. 23: I tried to give a defense for why being a Cubs fan makes sense. Why it’s noble to root for a team that has never and will never win. I broke down halfway through, which was weird because I was talking to a dumpster, so I shouldn’t have gotten so upset.

Nov. 27: Well, what do you think I’m thankful for. I’m thankful we were swept so I wouldn’t have to endure even more heartache at the loss of a National League Championship. I’m pretty sure that I would’ve suffered a major cardiac arrest at that time. And not the Baconator-induced kind of cardiac arrest, but the Lover’s Lament type of heart failure.

Either way, there’s a part of me that is dead inside.

But I gotta say, these sweatpants are holding up pretty well. Hanes Her Way? Definitely one of the better purchases I’ve made.

Nov. 28: I lost my sweatpants. I think Lou Pinella stole them to add to his track suit.

Dec. 1: If one more fake Santa Clause asks me what I want for Christmas, I’m going to punch them until my arms bleed. I already told the real Santa last year I wanted a Championship. I’m finding his apparent absence odd.

Dec. 12: Kerry Wood is getting traded to the Cleveland Indigenous Native Americans. My beard reaches to my nips, and frankly the smell that I have generated over the past few weeks of despair are enough to warrant that my other “roommates” pick up my cardboard “house” and throw it in the river.

Dec. 13: It’s a Saturday. I hate Saturday’s now. I’m going to burn down this building. 1060 W. Addison. Nothing here worth too much I don’t think.

Hey, is that a goat?

No, You Don't Understand!

Seriously, y'all, it was nothing.

If you think about it, it was like that wrestling thing I did. All in good fun, you know? I didn't get arrested for messing around then, and I didn't get arrested this time, right? All jokes, man.

Huh? You sayin' the police got involved? Nah, it wasn't like that. We was just up there chillin' wid Ludacris, and people start talking about how Pacman Jones is a wildman. I'm like, nah, I'm not him, I'm ADAM Jones.

And they keep on, like, 'yeah, it was you in that strip club in Atlanta.' I just said, "no, that was Pacman." And they say "wasn't it you in that hotel, and then the club in Nashville, and then in the bar in Murfreesboro, and then in the strip club in Vegas?" I say Pacman. But they keep tryin' me. So finally, I'm like alright, I'll do a Pacman imitation, which is weird, because I'm Adam. But I'm an entertainer, and I'm paid to give people what they want, I hit my boy Tommy upside the head wid a bottle of Moet, just like Luda would've done (sorry, bruh).

Then people start wildin' out, saying, "Pacman's drunk again! Pacman's fighting people!"

That's not how it went. I'm Adam. I'm good and reformed, just ask Deion.

And remember, since the police didn't arrest me, I get to still play football.