Malik
(11/2/10)
I am on vacation from
reality right now. At least I'd like to say so. In this
world that I'd like to be in, the Seahawks are winning and I am
subjected to no responsibilities...only Fable 3, Rock Band 3, and
rest. Reality can be a bitch.
The truth of the
matter is that I'm facing a few too many responsibilities right now.
I have a resume I want to dust off and get sent out to potential
employers, I have a broken door bell to fix, a hole that needs fully
fixed in the ceiling of my basement, and a car that needs some
maintenance. In other words, reality and fantasy are way too
separate right now.
Most of all, I'd
love to be riding the high feeling of knowing how good the Seahawks
are. However, the truth of the matter is that Sunday's game
against Oakland may have been the worst Seahawks game I've even
seen. It's one thing to only have single digit points.
It's another to only have single digit points when the opposition
picks up quite a few touch downs and makes one realize that it
wasn't a defensive match. The game was just a sad team, with a
good QB, playing against a real NFL team that seems to be trying to
turn around their bad luck.
Hasselbeck did
play well. I'd even say he did great. Unfortunately,
while a team suffers with no skill at QB, it can suffer even worse
with no skill outside of the QB position. Hasselbeck was under
constant pressure the entire game, but still could get off some
wonderful long passes to receivers without too much coverage on
them. That's when the 'Hawk receivers went to crap in a hurry.
I've never seen so many of Hasselbeck's bombs hit receivers square
in the hands, chest, or face without any receiver actually trying to
maintain possession. If the receivers would have played like
they did in Chicago a few weeks ago, this would have been a flat out
shooting match of a game. Instead, Seattle let a lot of
opportunities slip away and made Hasselbeck look as bad as he
probably is, but not as good as he actually played.
The season isn't
over by any means. When you play in the NFC West, you have
very little to worry about. At least when it comes to a few
loses. Now the Seahawks do need to worry about St. Louis and
Arizona, but that's better than the 49er's have it. Hell,
Seattle is in first, despite playing worse than San Francisco.
Even Buffalo played better this weekend than Seattle did.
I don't know the
solution to the woes that the Seahawks are facing. However, I
do know that the woes never are static. One week Hasselbeck
cannot throw a ball to save his life or gets to antsy in the pocket.
The next week, the defense is not applying any pressure. Then
you have the entire receiving corps falling to rubble for no good
reason. It only gets worse when Okung, who I think must be a
good luck charm for Seattle, out injured. I think this season
has been a weird crap shoot for the entire NFL. In the end, I
think most divisions will not become clear until the dust of week 15
or 16 settles.
Malik |
Malik
(11/4/10)
I think I saw the
equivalent to Sasquatch last night. At least it's up there in
the rarity of seeing Big Foot. I saw a sober (or well
medicated, instead of destructively medicated) Scott Wieland last
night.
I have a list,
unofficially, of bands I think I need to see at least once.
Stone Temple Pilots is definitely a member of that list. In my
younger days, seeing STP was next to impossible. Any time STP
was coming around Seattle, the show was practically guaranteed to be
canceled. I mean the tour would start with Seattle being one
of the last stops. Then a few weeks into the current tour,
Wieland would either end up in rehab or in jail on drug charges.
It was bad enough that buying tickets to see STP was nothing more
than a joke since it was paying money to only get it refunded, with
no interest, a month or so later. Most times it wouldn't even
get that far. The tickets would never reach the date of sale
before the tour was canceled.
I've heard many
recent shows have been pretty bad since it sounds like Wieland has
been performing while in his own state of mind. Still, with
STP coming to Kent (a suburb or Seattle which just got a nice new
small arena in the last couple of years), I had to take the chance
and try to see them, even if the show had a major chance of being
one of great instrumental work featured with some inebriated vocals.
Well, I don't know
what a wasted Wieland sounds like live, but I know what a sober (or
well medicated) Wieland now sounds like. He has not lost a
step, both in his showmanship and in his vocal work. His voice
is still crisp with the same great range you can hear on an STP
album. Without a doubt, when they are on their A game, STP has
to be one of the best concerts I've ever experienced. I'd put
them, in terms of pure awesomeness, right up there with Metallica
(in the long hair days) live. The music is fast and frantic,
the sound is perfect (unless you count any use of a phaser style
pedal in a hockey arena causing a some noise canceling due to
reverb), and the energy is just amazing. It's hard to see STP
last night and think that this band has been around for a couple of
decades. While one show is not indicative of who a band is,
especially with plenty of recent reviews talking about a wasted
front man, what I saw made me think of something like Social
Distortion, with how a band can be around so long but still keep the
energy up and the show going strong.
Malik |