Sean Salisbury at XLI, John Clayton's MySpace Page, Franco on Tomlin, Cowher Family Tree, Favre Wants Moss, Stupid Comic Covers

FOOTBALL:

There's no tailgating at the Super Bowl this year. See, it's a good thing the Steelers didn't make it after all.

Sean Salisbury, big pimpin' at XLI

Another sign of the apolcalypse: John Clayton has a MySpace page.

In between interviews to push his Hines Ward and JoePa donuts, Franco Harris gives us his thoughts on the Mike Tomlin hire.

Here's an illustration of the Bill Cowher Coaching Family Tree. That Cowher name must go far on an assistant's resume.

Minnesota's Pioneer Press asked their readers which coach will be more successful - Brad Childress or Mike Tomlin. The response was overwhelming.

Brett Favre wants the Packers to trade for Randy Moss. Please make this happen.

Charger Terrence Kiel, he of the codeine shipments, gets caught draining the dragon in public

The NFL goes to the Oscars

BASEBALL:

The New York Yankees just can't quit Bernie Williams

RANDOM FUN STUFF:

Cold outside? Try on a Willy Warmer

A follow up to yesterday's comic book covers link, here's a gallery of "stupid" comic covers

The Official Sports Media Memorabilia Price Guide

That short post about the Trenni Kusnierek autographed photo on eBay sure caused a lot of buzz. She's generating Erin Andrews-like levels of traffic today. So I thought I would further investigate the subculture of sports media collectibles and create a handy price guide for those who collect these items.

Rick Reilly

The item: 2005 Playoff Prestige Fans of the Game card

The asking price: $1.95

Value analysis: Needs to write more bleeding-heart pieces on the back pages of SI if he wants this price to rise

Dan Patrick

The item: 2006 Upper Deck Sweet Spot Autograph

The asking price: $50

Value analysis: There's only 50 of these to go around, so you Patrick fans should act FAST!

Sean Salisbury

The item: Autographed USC 8x10

The asking price: $14.99

Value analysis: At least he's not exposing himself in this picture...unlike others floating around

Keith Olbermann

The item: 2003 Bowman Autographed card

The asking price: $79.95

Value analysis: Comes with an official Topps hologram. You know, as a security measure against all the people forging Keith Olbermann's autograph.

Stuart Scott

The item: Autographed 8x10 Photo

The asking price: $14.99

Value analysis: Currently priced $14.99 too high.

Dick Vitale

The item: Autographed Bobblehead

The asking price: $85

Value analysis: At least it doesn't talk, which I assume would considerably hurt the value.

Chris Berman

The item: Framed and matted advertisement

The asking price: $8.99

Value analysis: A visual reminder of every sports fan's fantasy

Barry Melrose

The item: Autographed hockey puck

The asking price: $28.28

Value analysis: Would be higher if hockey was ever recognized by American networks

Mike Golic

The item: Autographed Eagles 8x10

The asking price: $15

Value analysis: Should surge in value when he announces the Arena Bowl with life partner Mike Greenberg

Harold Reynolds

The item: Autographed Baseball

The asking price: $30

Value analysis: Dismissal over an alleged hug hampers the long-term investment potential

Jay Bilas

The item: Autographed Floor Board

The asking price: $19.95

Value analysis: This should sum up my thoughts on the sports memorabilia industry: a piece of wood signed by Jay Bilas is valued at $20.

Michelle Tafoya

The item: Head on a stick

The asking price: $15

Value analysis: Maybe it's just me, but I don't see much of a return down the road on a collectible of a sideline reporter.

Match the Bengal to the Crime, NFL Playoffs, Pitt RPI, $50 Million for KFed

NFL:

ESPN gives us an interactive "Match the Bengal to the Crime" game. I have a better idea, which the Bengals could use for their website. It's called "match the ESPN employee to their firing/suspension". You could have Sean Salisbury, Harold Reynolds, Michael Irvin...

A neat look at the amount of ads from for last week's Chiefs/Colts game. Or as I remember it, commercials with a bit of football sprinkled in.

Bill Simmons takes a look at the NFL playoffs, and surprisingly, picks the Patriots to beat the Chargers.

COLLEGE HOOPS:

Pitt ranks 4th in the college basketball RPI, with a strength-of-schedule of 10.

Seth Davis says the Panthers will be 74-67 winners over Georgetown tomorrow. By the way, this is an ESPN GameDay event, so plan your day accordingly.

Penn State WR Jordan Norwood decides he wants to try his hand at hoops as well. If only they had a basketball team.

RANDOM FUN STUFF:

December finals: Wii: 604,200 units sold. Playstation 3: 490,700. Xbox 360: 1.1 million.

Ebay buys StubHub for $310 million. Did they wait for the auction to end, or just use a "buy it now"?

Kevin Federline gives his divorce settlement demands: $50 million dollars. But only if he can play for the L.A. Galaxy.

Here's the trailer for Will Ferrell's new movie Blades of Glory, as well as the trailer for Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer

Sean Salisbury's Pictures, Accorsi Out, Garcia & DeCesare, Sonic in Pittsburgh

NFL:

What's with jocks and taking pictures of their weiners on cell phones? First, we had Jeff Reed. Now, we have ex-NFL QB and much-maligned ESPN talking head Sean Salisbury taking pictures of his junk! Since Sean is the moral compass of the NFL, always telling us why we should hate Terrell Owens, would this be acceptable if Owens did it?

Who cleans up after Hurricane Accorsi in New York? Why call him Hurricane Accorsi? Could it be a trade of what turned out to be Philip Rivers, Shawne Merriman, Nate Kaeding, and Roman Oben in exchange for one Elisha Manning? Here's some additional fun facts about this trade, courtesy of Wikipedia:
-Philip Rivers, Nate Kaeding and Shawne Merriman have all made the 2007 Pro Bowl. Manning still has yet to make a Pro Bowl in the NFL.
-The Chargers will also consider the third round compensation pick from the NFL in the 2007 draft for releasing Drew Brees as being inextricably linked with the Manning trade.
-Nate Kaeding, over three years from 2004 to 2006, has a higher field goal percentage than Giants kicker Jay Feely
-Rivers has a higher career QB Rating than Manning
-Shawne Merriman was the 2005 Defensive Rookie of the Year and led the league in sacks in 2006, despite serving a 4 game suspension after testing positive for steroids.

Yes, Jeff Garcia is still dating former Playmate of the Year Carmella Decesare. In fact, they're getting married. And Garcia's Dad is the Best Man. Seriously.

NHL:

Video of possibly the worst gaffe in NHL history: Dallas' Patrik Stefan misses an empty-net goal, then Edmonton's Ales Hemsky scores a game-tying goal with two seconds in the game.

COLLEGE FOOTBALL:

See, a playoff system isn't needed after all! Of course, I found this on the official BCS website. But why would they not be objective with that argument?

Wondering who to call to complain about the lack of the non-needed playoff system? Yahoo Sports says to blame Big 10 Commissioner Jim Delany.

RANDOM FUN STUFF:

Finally! Harley King is bringing 10 Sonic drive-ins to Western PA.

2007 might be the warmest year ever. Ironically, I write this on the eve of our first semi-snowfall of the winter.

That Beatles butcher cover album finally sold on eBay. The hammer price? $28,763.

Here's a nice story to start the morning: a French prisoner "probably" ate parts of his cellmate.

Let Me Ruin Benchwarmers for You

I don't mean to go Bill Simmons on you, but I decided to treat the Mondesi's House faithful to a movie review. Actually, it's more a warning, bordering on a Public Service Announcement.

The Mondesi's House reader appreciates the marriage of sports and comedy. I'd imagine many of you also read sites like Deadspin, The Mighty MJD, and Sports Pickle, which manage this feat quite well. That being the case, I would also imagine many of you have similar senses of humor to mine. So when I heard of a baseball movie featuring David Spade, Jon Heder, and to a much, much smaller extent, Rob Schneider, I thought it would be good for a few cheap laughs. Among them, they have given us such gems as Tommy Boy, Napoleon Dynamite, Deuce Bigalow, Black Sheep, and one of my TV favorites, The Showbiz Show. So I figured it was worth a shot.

Boy, was I wrong.

Benchwarmers was released on April 7, 2006, trying to coincide with the start of the MLB season. Amazingly, this movie has taken in $62 million worldwide at the box office, according to boxofficemojo.com. Apparently, the marketing must have worked, because people weren't coming to this movie for the script.

I hope you got a boatload of money for this one, Spade

After witnessing a cliched grade-school band of bullies picking on the nerdy son of an eccentric millionaire (played by Jon "Subway..Eat FRESH!" Lovitz), the dorky trio decides to play the bullies for the use of a ballfield. Apparently the "Benchwarmers" were all picked on as a kid, never played, yada, yada, yada.

They only chose Lovitz because Kevin Nealon was unavailable

I wondered how they would strategically set up on defense, being that there were only three of them and nine opponents. Schneider was the pitcher, Spade was the catcher, and Heder manned center. No first baseman. Why? Don't need one! This is the point when this movie morphs from Benchwarmers into the new title of Rob Schneider's Fantasy. Schneider promptly strikes out every single batter, and hits a home run every time he bats. And these were over-the-fence homers. Neither Spade nor Heder can even manage to make contact, yet they still win in a landslide, thanks to the incredible skills of Schneider.

After beating a bunch of grade-schoolers at baseball, Schneider then goes home to his wife, SI Swimsuit model Molly Sims. Yeah, this is becoming more and more of a Schneider fantasy with each passing moment.
Just call her Mrs. Rob Schneider

If that wasn't bad enough, they show more games. And Schneider strikes out every batter and hits a home run every time he is on camera, while Heder and Spade fail to contribute in any way, shape or form. The Schneider slugger angle gets really tiresome after, oh, I don't know...his 35th homer!!

Heder is the Jose Hernandez of the Benchwarmers

This was just a ridiculous premise for a movie. I mean, seriously, who green-lit this? Is Hollywood so bereft of ideas that this was the best they could do? I realize that this movie is meant for kids, but even as a kid, I wouldn't have enjoyed this. And the movie was rated PG-13, with some inappropriate scenes and language for smaller kids, so it looked like they were trying to reach some of the general comedy audience as well.

Spade lacked any of his trademark biting sarcasm. Heder was a Napoleon Dynamite knockoff. Schneider was Nolan Ryan crossed with Babe Ruth in the body of David Eckstein. The movie was a giant product-placement vehicle for Pizza Hut. And to top it all off, we were treated to Dan Patrick, Sean Salisbury, and Bill Romanowski on the big screen. What, were Chris Berman and Neil Everett busy? Of course, Salisbury's character was gay, so as many of you will definitely point out, that didn't require much acting. For the population that contributed to that $62 million take, I hope you asked for a refund on the way out of the theater. This movie had almost as many non-actors onscreen as the Longest Yard remake. If your movie is mentioned in the same breath as a film that cast Michael Irvin, Nelly, and Peter King, that's not a good thing.

Patriots, Brady, Belichick, Favre, Patriots, Brady, Belichick, Favre, Patriots, Brady, Belichick, Favre. Now you don't have to read Peter King's column this year.

So please, please, save the $3.99 rental and 90 minutes of your life and run away from this DVD at your local Blockbuster. It's not as bad as sitting through a Pirate game when Shawn Chacon is starting, but at least that's free. This movie was so bad, I broke my own rules about Pittsburgh-only content on this site in order to warn the masses. If I save one of you from this train wreck, it was worth it.