The Barrister

Ah the bye week. The time to appreciate a break from the often frustrating squad we've been saddled with for these many years, to watch football with few rooting interests, and to perhaps forget about football altogether when life takes precedence as it so often does, whether in big ways or small. 

This week was certainly no different. 

But now that we're back to thinking about this underachieving and tragically coached Bills team, as it matches up against a hilariously superior Houston Texans squad, it's tough to find much of anything to be positive about. Perhaps the only real reason to be excited about this game is as a welcome opportunity to step away from the enormous and ongoing impact of a crazy as shit storm. Seems a good enough reason to me.

Scizz is taking a much needed break after his hell-ish week, and I'm luckily drunk enough to think I can fill his shoes, having sucked down a few Buffalo Lagers.  Those lagers, unsurprisingly, assisting me in my belief that the Bills actually have a shot to win this game, or - put more accurately - my willingness to at least latch onto the infinitesimally small shot the Bills' actually have to win and cheer with a detached relationship with rational thought.  

I would describe this as the "beers equal delightful sports fantasyland" paradigm.  It's a working title.

Moving on to our feature presentation...

The Barrister, feat. Scizz, Outlander and the Apologist

Shawne Merriman. No longer a Buffalo Bill.

Coming off a long and tiring weekend of prep for the birth of my child, I was considering penning a piece on fatherhood and sports and my anxiety level and my fear of becoming a shell of my former self once the sleep deprivation hits. I may still get into that at some point before or soon after Baby Barrister makes his way into the world, but not today.

Ripping on a has-been/maybe-never-would-have-been-without-the-juice and the similarly has-been/maybe-never-would-have-been-without-the-Juice-or-Jimbo team that employed him is way more fun. See what I did there? It’s only Monday and I’m already bringing the awesome.

Science made Merriman a great player. And science probably should have told One Bills Drive that Merriman couldn’t be a great player after being robbed of his special sauce and the behemoth abilities it brought him. Steroids help with recovery time, avoiding injuries, getting unreasonably huge. Without them, Merriman showed himself to be incapable of keeping up with the game. His “Lights Out” dances seem delightfully quaint now, like a high school player celebrating his dominance against a ten year old kid half his size. You didn’t earn it, Shawne, and you couldn’t hack it when the playing field was leveled. The Bills, for their part, look not just a little bit like they're wiping a $3 million egg off their face. Ugh.