Dudes Rock
I went to a party with some of my friends this past weekend. My wife asked me how it went as she wasn’t able to go. I said I had a great time. She asked me for the tea on folks. She always gives me the tea with her friends after she hangs out. It’s always juicy and fun. It also sounds exhausting to go hang out with a friend and discuss relationship drama and feelings for hours. When she asked me what I talked about, I had to sit back for a second, and realized that I spent most of the party talking with two other guy friends just remembering cool dudes in Elden Ring (These were not my sports fan friends). I had a great time. Remembering dudes is a certified Grade-A Dude pastime. If you hang out with friends and don’t spent at least 20% of that time remembering dudes in some capacity, you need new friends. This is why sports is such a great bonding interest for so many people: it makes dude remembering a pivotal part of the experience.
Anyone who makes a comment must include, in that comment, a dude that you remember, and a specific thing you remember about that dude. I went with mid-2000’s wide receivers for the comic strip, but feel free to branch out. I remember TJ Houshmandzadeh. We used to call him TJ Who’s Your Momma. He was the cool guy who played next to Chad Johnson/Ochocinco on those fun Bengals teams. I wonder if he ever went to the strip clubs with Pacman Jones. Damn, remember Pacman Jones? What a mess that guy was.
From my personal experience, the talking about random stuff eventually devolves into reminicing about old times. Eventually once you’re nearing the end of your box of alcoholic fizz (New Zealand has a bad drinking problem), you hit the real emotions. That’s where things only don’t get too serious because you’re far too drunk for the real emotions and feelings to result in anything real.
Also as a Kiwi who discovered the sport in the aughts, I pent years thinking that kickers were hot shit. Watching Mike Vanderjagt kick 55 yarders to win the game had to be the most important guy on the field accoring to my pre-teen brain who grew up on rugby.
Trung Canidate, Madden ’04 MVP for the Redskins, dude was a beast with breakaway speed to beat anyone as long as a stiff wind didn’t injure him. Totally unintentional that I managed the video game and sports dude crossover here by the way.
Terry Kirby, man. On a heavily pass-flavoured team like the Marino-era Dolphins, I loved that guy. Especially fond of him playing for the football equivalent of the cycle – catching, rushing, passing and returning for a touchdown – with not one but TWO teams, us and the 49ers.
Plus he has a way better passer rating than Marino or Young – 4 of 6 for 85 yards, 3 TDs and no picks tops out at 149.3.
Anyone remember when SATAN played hockey?!
Specifically, Miroslav Satan (Pronounced “Suh-TAN”), a player for the Buffalo Sabres in the late 1990s. He was one of their players featured in one of the Wayne Gretzky’s 3D Hockey games, but didn’t have a portrait associated with him. Nintendo Power pointed out this fact, since it looked like they had two typical hockey players and then ‘SATAN’ on their team owing to the names all being in ALL CAPS.
(My memory wasn’t as good as I thought. I initially described him as “a role player for…”, but looking him up now, evidently he was on several teams over a 15-year NHL career and led the Sabres in scoring six times! Some “role player”, huh?)
Wasn’t that when Buffalo used a red & black goat skull as their logo? SATAN fits perfectly
Just in case you want to feel old, Satan’s son, Miroslav Jr., just got drafted by Washington.
I also remember his Yahoo Player ID was 666.
Kiirrrrbbyyyy Puckett!
Dang it, you took mine!
Rod Gardner was underrated. Same with Amani Toomer.
Also, Andre Rison is a Hall of Famer.
I love that you mentioned Rod Gardner because I’m a huge fan of The Amazing Race and he was just on the show with his wife
And speaking of passcatchers who went on The Amazing Race with their wives, Marcus Pollard.
A little new school but Ryan Matthews – drafted by the Chargers to replace LT and man was he mid. Liked him in Madden 11 tho
Whatever happened to Plaxico Burress? I mean, AFTER he shot himself, accidentally.
He went to jail for 2 years and then played for the Jets for like a season. He has a podcast/radio thing now with two other former players
I went on a work related tour of the since closed medium security NYS correctional facility where Plax had been sent to. At the time he was on the Jets, so my supervisor (a Jets fan) wanted to look inside the cell Plax had been in and ended up getting himself locked inside. Since the prison was closed they had to go all the way down to the first floor to find the button to release him.
Another aughts (well late 90s/early 00s) celebrity that had been in that facility was Ja Rule. While there he became good friends and was taken under the wing of Dennis Koslowski (the former CEO of MCI) and Alan Hevesi (the former NYS Comptroller). The three inmates bonded over a love of basketball, and the two older financially oriented men encouraged Ja Rule to get a business degree and straighten out the finances that landed him there. This absolutely neededs to become a movie or a least a middling Netflix doc.
I don’t remember much of the 90’s lions, but I really got into my fandom with them in the early aughts while watching with dad. Sure we sucked, but they were my team and by god I’m gonna root for them. I watched every game of that 0-16 season. Turns out when that’s your intro and you don’t jump ship (like a reasonable person), it creates a lifelong love lol.
Anyways, I remember Cory Schlesinger (had to look up how to spell his name lol). Dude came to my school as a kid and it just blew me away cause he seemed like a giant compared to our teachers. I just remember him being a really nice dude to us and that memory has stuck around for quite a long time.
Gary Barnidge, former TE who had a breakout season on the Browns in 2015 but didn’t really do much else of note… until he competed on The Amazing Race with DeAngelo Williams, they were really entertaining to watch
Also remember Austin Collie? I certainly do, because whenever he comes up on the NFL subreddit, someone will inevitably post that comic you made of Peyton Manning “putting him down” by throwing him a hospital pass.
How about Samkon Gado. Dude lit it up for the Packers in ’05, and otherwise awful season for cheeseheads, gets traded, and disappears. Dude is a medical doctor now, trying to build a hospital in Africa (I’m like 90% sure he’s Nigerian but I don’t feel like verififying that rn). Hell of a dude.
I remember the Texans picking up Samkon Gado from Green Bay (they traded another dude RB for him, Vernand Morency), where he joined a motley crew of castoffs in the backfield: never-to-play-again Domanick Williams (Davis), the world’s oldest 20-something Ron Dayne, Virginia Cavalier legend (and one-and-done) Wali Lundy, and was-he-even-a-real-dude Chris Taylor.
Somehow that Texans team went 6-10 with the corpse of David Carr under center.
Perfect opportunity bring up BenJarvus Green Ellis. I only remember him being on the Patriots at any point because of his unusually long name, but I also remember him being one of the few kind of terrible running backs to use when he was on the Bengals in Madden 25 (the anniversary version on 360/PS3, not this year). Painfully slow and couldn’t maneuver the field like basically every other half-decent back in that game.
The actual career fact about him that’s a fun trivia question for weirdos is the fact that he didn’t record a single fumble of any kind for the first 4 seasons of his career. Wasn’t until late in Year 5 that he dropped his first, but he was off the Patriots by then so I don’t care. Also worth mentioning that he never had a single rush go over 50 yards. His career longest reception of 53 yards is actually longer than his career longest rush of 48 yards which is funny because I don’t think he was ever much of a receiving back.
aw yes, The Law Firm!
‘Member Jason Sehorn!? I ‘member!
‘Member when his pants almost fell down? I ‘member!
https://youtu.be/upwEyQmHW8A?si=eLcTJvriUS5YvbVR&t=49
A former co-worker and buddy of mine used to argue endlessly about the abilities of Jason Sehorn versus Phillip Buchanan… and neither one of us was a fan of the teams either guy played for. I only see him very occasionally these days, once every couple years maybe, and he STILL brings this up. So it goes…
I’m biased as a Jints fan, and I saw a lot more of Sehorn, but I’d have to go with him. He made ridiculous plays like this one regularly, he won the NFL iron man competition three years in a row… Buchanan is no slouch, but I’d take Sehorn any day.
https://youtu.be/Bm2x4LF8spc?si=qR5lbt0109_xYP0D
Was married to Angie Harmon for a while. I remember this every time Rizzoli and Isles is on.
Back in my app developing days, I made a contact for “Houshmandzadeh T. Roethlisberger” so I could see if the display broke on giant names.
Nick Reed. You remember Nick Reed? Of course you don’t. He played a single season for the awful 2009 Seahawks where he had an amazing fumble recovery for a touchdown in a 41-0 pasting of the Jaguars and then left football to become a pilot in the Air Force.
Moose sighting in the wild. Love to see it.
I got two Packers LBs.
Desmond Bishop. Tore it up for about a year and a half. Looked great. Couldn’t stop getting hurt.
Nick Perry. Thought he would be the next great Packers LB. He was fine, but never quite got there. Always liked him though. Got a jersey and everything.
Morlon Greenwood! Competent linebacker in the 2000s for Miami and Houston, he also had a go as a rapper that didn’t quite live up to his football career. The Texans’ glib radio play-by-play voice, Marc “Rock’nRoll!” Vandermeer, once did a cringeworthy rendition of one of Greenwoods raps (complete with a miserable attempt at Greenwood’s Jamaican accent), a clip of which was regularly played as a gag on Houston sports radio for a good 5 years.
My friends and I like to reminense over Bret Swain almost making the winning catch in the 2011 NFCCG for the 49ers. Swaiiiin!
Doug Baldwin
Santana Moss
Stevie Johnson
Tim Dwight
Robert Meachem
Johnny Knox
The Other Steve Smith
Pierre Garcon man. He and DeSean Jackson had the Washington Football Organization offense looking really scary for that one year.
Chris Simms playing through a ruptured spleen.
The guy was a punching bag for online pundits when he was at Texas. He’s a punching bag for online pundits now that he’s… well, a pundit. But man, toughest motherfucker in football that day.
I remember Ray Lewis delivering the hit that ruptured that spleen!
Matt Asiata lost me my place in a fantasy playoff. Dude NEVER played and for some reason my opponent started him. I thought they were throwing in the towel. Dude randomly scored 3 TDs and bounced me.
Terrence Newman also came to the Vikings at the end of his career. Most of us figured maybe he’d be a good depth piece, but homeboy KILLED it for like 3 years at one of the hardest positions for older players to succeed in.
Dude! Kickers. As a college fan (Texas) we’ve put a couple of great ones in the league. Phil Dawson being a legend who quietly stayed an ace through all those years in Cleveland. Dicker the Kicker. And of course, actual legend Justin Tucker. And then there’s that Aussie punter who was actually MVP of a bowl game for consistently turning Missouri’s defensive wins into losses, the Seahawks’ Michael Dickson.
Mike Mamula, AKA the “Workout Warrior”. Although not the first, but maybe the most biggest known, mid-level-prospect who shot up draft boards because of his Combine and Workout performances. The Eagles drafted him #7 overall. He was a *decent* player, not worthy of that high of a pick, but also certainly not what I’d label a true “bust” (which, to me, is someone who is drafted very high and then just completely flames out in no time flat).
I always felt bad for him because of the amount of heat he got from the Philly fans and media, because it wasn’t his fault the Eagles brain-trust at the time was stupid enough to draft him that high.
Anyone remember Aaron Rodgers brother Jordan Rodgers? He was an undrafted free agent for the Jags in 2013 and then played on practice and preseason squads for the Bucs and Dolphins before playing for the BC Lions in the CFL. However, he quit that team in April 2015 after attending their mini-camp. Then he went on to be in The Bachelorette with JoJo Fletcher and they got engaged and married on May 14th, 2022. They also hosted a show called “Cash Pad” in July 2019 and they were scheduled to host a show known has “The Big D”, which was set to premiere on July 7, 2022, but it got cancelled on June 16th, 2022, three weeks before it was scheduled to premiere.
Peerless Price, who got a shoutout in an SI column by Steve Rushin (who was probably younger then than I am now, yikes) about football player names he thought were especially memorable.
I remember Chris Kluwe. As a LGBT football fan, I credit him a lot with me getting into the sport when I was getting into my teenage years, despite not even being a Minnesota fan at all. I remember his Hall of Fame protest, which I still agree that punters have basically no representation (Landeta should be in the hall at minimum), hell, I even bought his book. Yet, despite everything, I feel like the league completely moved on from him by this point. Even the kneeling controversy is old news at this point and mostly remembered for how silly it was; a punter self destructing his career to speak out in favor of gay marriage just seems quiant now. Like a trivia fact over how quixotic it ended up being. Like everyone just collectively moved on from that story quickly, to the point where we have Nassib openly playing to significantly less controversy than Kluwe’s letter generated.
Unrelated, but I can’t help but notice you made a small goof in this comic. Your wife’s pants just change colors halfway through the comic and I just thought that was kind of amusing.
Hey, I have his book too, I just pulled it out the other day to read the open letter again because I couldn’t remember one of the beautifully profane statements in it.
The pants aren’t the only thing changing color, which I take to imply that conversation ran long enough that the sun had time to set, changing the color of the whole room.
And to keep with today’s theme let’s remember the time the Bills sent out a season tickets flier featuring Brian Moorman punting out his own endzone in a game the Bills lost to the Browns.
I remember Leroy Hoard. He was that guy to get you the score or first down in short yardage situations back in the 90’s. He supposedly said, “If you need one yard, I’ll get you three yards. If you need five yards, I’ll get you three yards.”
I’m an Otis Smith man. One of those veteran guys that Bill Belichick added to fill out the early 00’s Patriots roster who was solid but not spectacular. Ok in coverage, but an excellent tackler at cornerback. My best memory was when they did recorded player introductions, and he just introduced himself as “O – T – I – S”
Antone Smith had such a strange career, quick glance at the stats he averaged 8.6 yards per attempt and 14 yds per reception but only had 60 touches in his career. I remember in 2013/14 for Atlanta he was an absolute homerun threat the 3 plays he got a game before getting injured. Always mention him in the “can’t teach game speed” conversations I have with the dudes.
Remember Jarryd Hayne? Every Australian on the internet was frothing that he was going to come in and dominate football. Show Americans what a REAL athlete looks like. Then his only meaningful play was muffing a kick return. Lol, good times.
Mike Minter, stud cornerback for the panthers who then went on to coach football at my alma mater for several years
Remember Dwayne Haskins? Josh Rozen? Just me? Ok
I remember Josh Rosen’s entire draft status was built off Kevin Sumlin not knowing how to hold a 4 td lead in a game where the Aggies rushed for 250 yards in the first half. A&M’s entire second half offense was quick pass, quick pass, quick pass, punt, elapsed game time 30 seconds. I was losing my fucking mind.
I always thought Sebastian Janikowski and Wayne Chrebet were underrated players.
Andy Russell, man…slowest 93 yard fumble recovery touchdown ever
Willie McGinest and his Quarter Pounder commercial.
Dude remember Brent Celek? He’d constantly catch a pass for like 7 yds and then drag a db for another 5. Oh! And there was that time he hurdled Ed Reed.
I know he might not count because he’s not retired but like what the hell happened to juju smith schuster. Like he was pretty good his rookie year, EXPLODED his sophomore year with like 1500 yards and the. Kind of fell off the face if the earth after signing with the chiefs and then the patriots when he only had 260 yards receiving and I never hear anything about him
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2. Ryan Fitzpatrick/magic/tragic (and by extension Arden Key). In the 2020 game against the Las Vegas Raiders, Arden Key grabbed his facemask, blinding him as he threw the ball. The pass was completed, sending the Phins into Sanders’s range. Phins won that game. Tragic caught COVID and missed the Bills game, in which the Phins were rekt 26–56, eliminating them in an AFC that had the best record since 2008. Arden Key was cut. Patrick became a TEAM player and caught a Brood X cicada in his beard. Then he was badly injured early in the season (prolly week 1). Then he retired.
3. Carl Nassib, first openly LGBT+ NFL player while in the league. On week 1 of 2021 against the Ravens on the very first MNF of the season, he forced a fumble to stop the Ravens’ pair of runningbacks. Raiders’ offense 1upped the favor with the game winning touchdown.
4. Sam Howell. Who? He did not exist until week 18 of the 2022 season, in which he became the first quarterback to win on his very first start since Patrick Mahomes in 2017. In a shocking beating of the goofy Cowboys. Then he evaporated from the know.
5. Zamboni Driver (I forgot his name). He had to step up as emergency goalie for the Carolina Hurricanes to defeat the Toronto Maple Cowboys. LOL, make beliefs. He was in his 40s (!) when he debuted.
6. Warren Sapp, for other reasons. He appeared in a Hungry Man ad where he SCHWEPT EVERY SINGLE TV DINNER BOX INTO HIS FRICKIN KART. YEAH! AS IF HE DOESN’T GO FOR A MORE HANDS-ON AND TRADITIONAL MEAL LOOOOOOOOL.
7. Terry Tate. Was office linebacker. Would tackle anyone who does anything egregious. “BREAK WAS OVER FIFTEEN MINUTES AGO, BITCH!” A shoes company (possibly Reebok) actually did these advertisements but did not advertise their products. LOL. Ad breaks are for advertising, not extra entertainment. Remember that. It was awesome. They developed a MUTHERFORCKING SINEMAATTCI JUNIVURRSEE 4 DER KARAKTER. While funny, they unintentionally promoted “Violence is the answer”.
8. L. McGowan. Never made it out of Baylor. Around 400 lbs. tight end who caught a touchdown and was forgotten.
9. Daniel Jones. I know him cause the old turf monster GOT HIM!!!!! Lol he let loser Philly (who finished 4–11–1 dat season) win from that.
10. Sam Darnold, who caught mononucleosis and turned into a meme. He sees ghosts, and now does Zach Wilson after a 4 interception debut (he was asksd whether he saw ghosts after the 2021 loss to the Patriots).
11. Dontari Poe. DL who weighed over 300 lbs. and threw a touchdown for the Chiefs. Heaviest player to throw a touchdown. I remember him ‘cause of the Chiefs and the Ravens (cus Ravens remind me of Edgar Allan Poe).
Isn’t Michael Sam the first openly gay player in the NFL?
Michael Sam never played a snap in the regular season.
Tommy Waddle walking off to the wrong sideline with a small backyard’s worth of grass wedged in his facemask.
Remember Shaun Smith? The defensive lineman who kept grabbing other player’s nards at the bottom of the pile and getting called out for it until they basically blackballed him from the league (pun very much intended)
Remember Bert Jones? One of the best qbs in the 70’s, cut down prematurely by injuries. And Roger Carr, his favorite receiver.
Yes I’m frikkin’ old.
Didn’t the bus, plaxico, and ike taylor just retire? Their kids all just committed to notre dame.
https://x.com/elijahburress/status/1802726373103915135
IT’S NOT A TOOMER!
shifting to baseball here, but I always liked Coco Crisp, at least as silly names for players go… Milton Bradley was another player with an amusing name, at least until you saw his attitude
Remembering some Broncos guys: Philip Lindsay, Danny Trevathan, Emmanuel Sanders, Simon Fletcher, Ricky Nattiel, Knowshon Moreno (AKA Knowshow), Jake Butt, Andy Janovich.
Captain Chaos, aka Chris Cooley. He was a stud.
Remember Peyton Hillis? Absolutely crushed it at runningback for the Browns for one season and ended up on the cover of Madden. Then faded into oblivion. Talk about a one-hit wonder.