Category: Uncategorized

When There is Nothing to Play For

Play to win anyhow. Peter King writes about a meaningless game from fifteen years ago.

Fifteen years ago this week, on Dec. 29, 2007, the 15-0 New England Patriots traveled to New Jersey to try to finish an undefeated season against the New York Giants, who, in a playoff sense, had nothing to play for. They were locked in as the fifth seed in the NFC playoffs, due to play at Tampa Bay in the first round of the playoffs, win or lose in Week 17.

It’s one of the best regular-season games I’ve covered as a football writer, which is paradoxical. Why was a game with two teams locked into their playoff positions so good? The Patriots had clinched home-field advantage through the AFC playoffs entering that night, yet played like it was a playoff game because of the potential for an undefeated season. The Giants, after beating Buffalo the previous weekend, also had nothing to play for.

Tom Coughlin doesn’t play meaningless games, however. I’m glad to see the Giants’ coach that day has written a book now, A Giant Win (written with Greg Hanlon, Grand Central Publishing) to commemorate that championship season for the franchise—with special attention paid to the Saturday night game on the final weekend of that regular season.

Coughlin on the game, and on his decision to play his full team against the Patriots:

“As soon as we won the previous week, you know how this goes because it’s scripted somewhere for the writers. ‘OK, coach, you gonna play your starters against New England?’ It started right away. I listened to that a little bit. I thought to myself, ‘We are the New York Giants. We are the flagship team of the National Football League. We are red, white and blue. I am not going to allow that future historians would look back upon this game, where the Giants would play the Patriots, the Patriots having a chance to have an undefeated season, and the New York Giants do not put their best foot forward. We are going to play our starters. We are going to play to win.’

“When I told our team that on Monday, they rallied. They wanted to play against the 15-0 New England Patriots. If you remember, we’re leading in the fourth quarter. We got the lead. It’s one of those games where, they beat us, but when we walked off, we knew we could play with them.”

In the eyes of many, it was a 35-38 Giants’ victory over New England. Coaches hate moral victories, but this was one for the Giants. It was also memorable for New England, of course, finishing a perfect 16-0 regular season by beating back a gallant bid for a big upset by a heavy underdog. I remember Tom Brady and Randy Moss in the New England locker room post-game. They couldn’t stop smiling. Brady was downright giddy.

He wouldn’t be giddy five weeks later, but that’s another story. When I spoke to Coughlin recently about the game, it was a pre-dawn memory the next day that stood out.

“I gotta tell you one more story because this is what will be most meaningful,” he said. “It was a great performance. I’m really proud of my team. That’s a team that’s 16-0, we know we can play with them. All that stuff. Next morning at 5 o’clock I come into my office and I see the red light’s on the phone. A voicemail. I pick up the phone and it’s John Madden. He’s saying, ‘Tom, I just wanted to call. Because I want you to know that is the greatest thing that’s happened to the NFL in the last 10 years.’ He said, ‘This is the National Football League—we don’t NOT play our players. We owe a responsibility to our fans to perform every day. That’s what you did. I’m just so proud to be a part of that. I’m so proud of what you’ve accomplished and what your team has accomplished.’ He said, ‘I’m very emotional right now. But I want you to know how I felt.’ I played it for my team in our next team meeting. It was moving. Very moving.”

The two teams met in the Super Bowl. The Giants beat the previously 18-0 Patriots, 17-14.

This historical anecdote is a useful reminder that excellence has its roots in effort. And success isn’t just luck combined with talent, it’s also a consequence of positive philosophy.

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Merry Christmas

A very Merry Christmas to everyone from Arkhaven, Castalia House, Infogalactic, Unauthorized, and, of course, Booster Patrol.

  • Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas
  • The Most Wonderful Time of the Year
  • Holly, Jolly Christmas
  • The Ninth Day of Christmas, Boosted
  • What Child is This
  • I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas
  • O Holy Night
  • I’ll Be Home For Christmas
  • White Christmas
  • Silent Night
  • Let It Snow
  • Hallelujah
  • All I Want for Christmas

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On the Cold Snap

The smartest man in the world says it is the result of US government weather modification:

A Few Choice Words on the Geoengineered “Polar Vortex”

I live on a ranch smack in the middle of the US Heartland. There are 3000 people or so in this entire county. We’re a hundred miles from the nearest airport able to handle commercial jetliners. Yet last week, just prior to the “polar vortex”, the sky over our property was a fluffy white tic tac toe game played by what appeared to be large jet tankers belching out ugly non-dissipating contrails which were smudged and smeared by the wind into expansive blotches that blotted out the sun. This has been going on ever since we moved here nearly 20 years ago.

There is no way to explain this in terms of normal air traffic generating the usual vapor-laden jet contrails. The “contrails” do not look or behave like water vapor or ice crystals, and there is no reason that we should ever see more than a single jet airliner overhead, maybe two at rush hour (the usual number on a clear day is 0). I’ve checked the airline schedules, and there’s simply no way. The government is once again trying to kill us, and you’d better believe that this record “cold snap” is taking quite a death toll.

This farmhouse presently feels like an icy tomb. The warmest spot in the house registers 50 degrees. We have animals here about which we’re very, very worried. Animals are tough, but notoriously susceptible to attempts by humans to kill them. This is such an attempt, and it is being made without our permission or approval. Whoever is responsible for this has no right to be doing it.

This sounds far-fetched, to be sure. But if we’ve learned one thing about “conspiracy theory” since the CIA invented the term to discredit observers who doubted the official story about the JFK assassination, it’s that the conspiracy theorists are much more likely to be correct than the apologists for the mainstream narrative.

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A Vibrant Christmas

Online shopping was a blow, but it was something the malls of America might have been able to survive if it were not for the dissemination of vibrancy throughout suburban America:

A shooting inside the Nordstrom department store at the Mall of America on Friday night left a 19-year-old man dead, according to Bloomington Police Chief Booker Hodges.

Hodges said during a late-night news conference that the shooting involved an altercation between two groups of young men and that the individuals involved fled the scene immediately after the shooting, which occurred about 7:50 p.m. on the eve of Christmas weekend.

A Bloomington officer who was nearby heard the shots and arrived to find the victim on the ground, Hodges said. “We had 16 officers working today in the mall. Sixteen cops,” Hodges said. “And they still decide to do this. I’m at a loss.”

I used to love going to Rosedale, Southdale, and occasionally, the Galleria, at Christmastime. From the time I was a little boy, they were vast and magical Winter Wonderlands, where children could roam freely and window-shop. I used to wander alone from one end of the mall to the other, with particular attention paid to B. Daltons and Games by James. I still remember being 11 years old and walking back through the parking lot at Rosedale to our Oldmobile station wagon with my father, who was carrying what seemed at the time to be a very large package.

When I asked him what it was, he said “the best Christmas present you’ll ever get”. I can’t say he was wrong, because it was a Mattel Intellivision, and with the possible exception of an Apple //e with two disk drives, it was the device that I loved most throughout the course of my life. From that year on, I’d happily be abandoned in Sears when my mother was shopping, playing Utopia or Sea Battle in the little electronics section.

When I started working at Dayton’s at the age of 15, I began seeing Christmas from the other side, from the retailer’s perspective, and it was every bit as magical. Dayton’s was one of the anchor department stores at all the Dales, and it was always exciting when the Christmas decorations would start going up the day after Thanksgiving. The sights, the lights, and the smells, taken in sum, were nothing but pure and unadulterated joy.

Christmastime in Minneapolis, 1963

This sense of communal magic and wonder is one of the many things that vibrancy has cost America. Perhaps it wasn’t important, perhaps it wasn’t a significant part of the Christmas season, but I loved it as a child and it grieves me to know that it is part of the world that we have lost.

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12 Hours of Midnight’s War

Hours Left: 12

% of Goal: 260.4 percent

% of Stretch Goal 2: 86.8 percent

Backers: 474

You can back the campaign here if you are so inclined.

In other comics-related news, we’re looking for individuals in European countries to assist The Legend in building a database all of his works published in those countries over the last 20 years. We have someone for the UK, but we’d ideally have one in every country. If you’re willing and able to contact your domestic publishers, email me with LEGEND in the subject.

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The 10th and 11th Days of Christmas, Boosted

Now, I don’t want to psychologically scar anyone or retrospectively ruin anyone’s childhood, but I do have to pose the question: who tells “scary ghost stories” at Christmas? I mean, I suppose A Christmas Carol might technically qualify, but isn’t that more of a summer campfire activity than a Christmas tradition?

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24 Hours of Midnight’s War

Days Left: 1

% of Goal: 238.9 percent

% of Stretch Goal 2: 79.6 percent

Backers: 432

There are 24 hours left to become an original backer of Midnight’s War. And in the meantime, Arktoons rolls on, relentless and remorseless.

HYPERGAMOUSE Episode 96: Outrageous

THE SWORD OF GOD Episode 39: The Witch Test

THE SIDEWINDERS Episode 10: A Losing Fight

SHADE Episode 69: Grand Finale

CHUCK DIXON PRESENTS: COMEDY Episode 74: Christmas at Greyfriars

BOB Episode 97: Pharma Christmas

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The Evil of this World

It is remarkable to see how the patterns of history play out again and again. Even though more than 1,600 years separate us from St. Augustine’s time, the same behaviors appear every time evil gains the ascendancy.

OF THE KIND OF HAPPINESS AND LIFE TRULY DELIGHTED IN BY THOSE WHO INVEIGH AGAINST THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION.

But the worshippers and admirers of these gods delight in imitating their scandalous iniquities, and are nowise concerned that the republic be less depraved and licentious. Only let it remain undefeated, they say, only let it flourish and abound in resources; let it be glorious by its victories, or still better, secure in peace; and what matters it to us? This is our concern, that every man be able to increase his wealth so as to supply his daily prodigalities, and so that the powerful may subject the weak for their own purposes. Let the poor court the rich for a living, and that under their protection they may enjoy a sluggish tranquillity; and let the rich abuse the poor as their dependants, to minister to their pride. Let the people applaud not those who protect their interests, but those who provide them with pleasure. Let no severe duty be commanded, no impurity forbidden. Let kings estimate their prosperity, not by the righteousness, but by the servility of their subjects. Let the provinces stand loyal to the kings, not as moral guides, but as lords of their possessions and purveyors of their pleasures; not with a hearty reverence, but a crooked and servile fear. Let the laws take cognizance rather of the injury done to another man’s property, than of that done to one’s own person. If a man be a nuisance to his neighbour, or injure his property, family, or person, let him be actionable; but in his own affairs let everyone with impunity do what he will in company with his own family, and with those who willingly join him. Let there be a plentiful supply of public prostitutes for every one who wishes to use them, but specially for those who are too poor to keep one for their private use. Let there be erected houses of the largest and most ornate description: in these let there be provided the most sumptuous banquets, where every one who pleases may, by day or night, play, drink, vomit, dissipate. Let there be everywhere heard the rustling of dancers, the loud, immodest laughter of the theatre; let a succession of the most cruel and the most voluptuous pleasures maintain a perpetual excitement. If such happiness is distasteful to any, let him be branded as a public enemy; and if any attempt to modify or put an end to it let him be silenced, banished, put an end to. Let these be reckoned the true gods, who procure for the people this condition of things, and preserve it when once possessed. Let them be worshipped as they wish; let them demand whatever games they please, from or with their own worshippers; only let them secure that such felicity be not imperilled by foe, plague, or disaster of any kind.

St. Augustine, City of God, Book II, Chapter 20

A society that prioritizes economic growth, where hedonism is celebrated and consent is the highest morality. A society in which those who see the danger and instability inherent in the society are silenced, banished, and cancelled. A society in which those who provide pleasure are celebrated, and where the powerful may do as they like without fear of recourse or consequence. A corrupt society whose rulers hate Christianity.

Sounds familiar these days, doesn’t it.

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