A relentless throughout each episode of The Distraction is that I at all times really feel like I must apologize for one thing afterward, and, as a common rule, the higher the episode, the extra particular and gratuitous that apology turns into. A few of that is simply me and my agonies, and the way I course of the nice private {and professional} luck of getting to do that type of factor as a part of my work. Generally it is as a result of I really feel like there’s an excessive amount of soccer discuss in a podcast that’s, in my thoughts, about sandwiches. But when that is the worst factor I can provide you with after listening to myself discuss for an hour, we have most likely performed OK.
So I’m glad to report that I do not actually have a lot past that the place this episode is worried. We talked to Ray concerning the NFL playoffs, and particularly the takeaways and scattered pleasures of what was largely a reasonably grim Tremendous Wild Card Weekend, for an hour, and I assume my primary remorse is that we did not speak about it for longer. As a lot enjoyable as it may be to speak about different stuff, and up to now we have run the gamut from “books we have learn some and even most of” to the aforementioned sandwiches, there’s a time when one merely has to Get Prepared For Some Soccer.
And that point, truthfully, is that this upcoming weekend and the one after that, and never a lot the one we spent most of this episode speaking about. But when a lot of Tremendous Wild Card Weekend was about bidding more and more impatient goodbyes to groups that appeared extraordinarily able to go residence and had for a while, there’s nonetheless pleasure to be present in kicking across the variously checked-out and unprepared and heinously malfunctioning groups within the accursed Dolphins/Eagles/Cowboys tranche of blue-chip groups that received waxed. There was additionally one actually good recreation, and we talked concerning the Lions with all of the warily delighted respect they deserve.
Astute listeners will detect the primary stirrings of Ray’s (certified) protection of Mike McCarthy, which has since grow to be an excellent publish on this very web site. Drew stated some good issues concerning the Packers and their teaching workers with out even seeming that upset about it, which may’t have been straightforward for him. We tried to determine what coaches do, for possibly the a centesimal time within the present’s historical past, though I am unsure we received a lot nearer than we have been up to now. Even much less astute listeners will discover that each one of us agree on the identities of every convention’s apparent closing bosses, though we every introduced our personal distinctive mixture of herbs and spices to our makes an attempt to rationalize any final result however the (inevitable, truthfully fairly cool-sounding) Ravens-49ers Tremendous Bowl.
The soccer goes to get higher from right here, and because the lesser groups wash out and the expertise will get extra concentrated we’ll certainly speak about all this once more. Whereas we’ll proceed to combine in different stuff—and I used to be very happy that this week’s Funbag query gave me a possibility to share a thought that has tantalized and tormented me, the brief model of which is “Ennio Morricone podcast theme”—we can even be remaining in a state of heightened readiness for some soccer.
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