Eight is Enough: The Hater's Guide to the Postseason

If, like myself, you find yourself confronted with an NFL postseason without a rooting interest and unmoved by Don Cheadle soliloquies, you must draw from the well of that most powerful of human emotions. Ok, well, lust probably won't do here. But the second most powerful, hate, will serve as a fine proxy. This is the first in a series of posts filled with bile, spleen, vitriol and all-around nastiness toward all the teams involved with the sordid roundelay we know as the NFL Playoffs.

NFC 6th seed -- New York Futbol Giants (8-8)

The advent of free agency coupled with the league's expansion to 32 franchises brought with it the expectation that talent would become diffuse and there would parity throughout the NFL. And while this has more or less come to pass, it is positively staggering how so high a percentage of the league's fucktasters ended up on one team. It's just teeming with shitheads, this Giants squad: Eli Manning, Jeremy Shockey, Michael Strahan, Plaxico Burress, Tiki Barber by virtue of the NFL thinking I care that he's transitioning to a career as an annoying announcer. They don't even need Lavar. They've found a secure place in my heart (mine is to hate, not love, as I understand is its common usage) and that's why they win at football nearly half the time.

I will say that with the awe-inspiring game winning streak they rode into the playoffs, it's hard to take this seventh 8-8 playoff team since 1988 lightly. Knowing they would make the playoffs following their resounding 14-10 victory over the Texans on Nov. 5, they made the sagacious decision to take the next eight weeks off. Tom Coughlin, impressed by the bumptious, bastard genius of Brian Billick, stripped his offensive coordinator of play-calling duties with a week left in the season, handing them to wundercoordinator Kevin Gilbride, a decision no team has ever regretted.

Okay, we're all aware of a few Manning family shortcomings come January, but with the weapons Eli has to wield come next week in the Link, he's bound to at least...blame one of them when they lose. Top receiver Plaxico Burress in his last four playoff games has seven catches for 117 yards and a touchdown. That's, like, one great performance there. I mean, if you average it out, it's not so good, but, uh, just shut up for a second you fucking nerd.

One thing that has long bothered me about this team is the G-Men nickname, not only because it gives Berman the opportunity to show his O-face on air every week. Now, I watched The Good Shepherd and for the life of me, I couldn't figure out who was supposed to be Wellington Mara. William Hurt, Robert DeNiro. Matt Damon, Alec Baldwin, they all seemed to be concerned with intelligence gathering and shoving people out of planes from 20,000 feet. They really glossed over the whole football franchise ownership aspect. Damn liberal Hollywood.

This post didn't end strongly, you say? How apropos for this team.