Man Trip: Sports Edition/ Prospect Watch

12:26am– Sacrificed any alcohol intake at Wrigley Field to make sure we got back to the hotel safely/in a timely manner but still managed to get lost. Oops.

9:21am– Put on my Packers shirt. This is the moment I officially caved to “peer” pressure and by peer, I mean an entire city of green and yellow.

1:13pm– It’s always good while on your way to the stadium, the tickets are randomly brought up and the person in charge of said tickets says “Oh Shit!”

1:31pm– Back on the road…. with the tickets.

2:04pm– Parked, shot-gunned a beer and already hit a car while playing parking lot football causing dirty looks from the car’s owner (who doesn’t know that is a chance you take parking at a football game and regardless, a football to the quarter panel is not gonna make that 1980’s Chevy Impala look any worse). 

5:07pm– Saints fans singing “When the Saints come marching in,” prompted my buddy, Chris, to sing “When Marshawn Lynch comes marching in.” All Saints fans immediately shut up (think that run has haunted Saints fans all off season).

6:13pm– I might be in the minority on this but I really can’t think of anything I would care less about watching than Lady Antebellum perform while A-Rodg and Drew Brees are warming up.

7:52pm– Stsrt of 2nd quarter (left as written). A little buzz going. Mad I took the under (teased the under up to 53 1/2. With 28 points scored in the 1st quarter our ticket is already being ripped up).

9:34pm-The look on the face of every Packers fan is suddenly priceless. Pretty much the whole game was smiles until late in the 4th when Drew Brees and company got the ball back with time left on the clock and a chance to tie the game. Imagine 70,000+ just witnessing a puppy being punched in the face (no puppies were actually punched in the face).

11:39pm– Had to say good-bye to “The Grizzly” (Ford Ranger with a grizzly license plate and multiple grizzly stickers on back of truck) who managed to cut us off on the way to the stadium, preceded to park next to us and by the end of the night was inviting us ice fishing (Green Bay was full of nice, respectful, polite people. the exact opposite of Las Vegas).

-So much happened before, during and after the game. So much I can’t put into words. Needless to say, I hope the 2011 NFL season is full of games like that night.

And with week 1 in the books, I must not forget week 2 of the college season. Here are some quick notes on my prospects to watch:

Matt Barkley (QB, USC): Barkley went 20 of 32 for 264 yards while throwing 1 TD and 1 INT.  It was nice to see his yards per attempt go up to 8.3 this week (6.8 in week 1) in a 23-14 win against Utah.

Trent Richardson(RB,’Bama): In a tough match up against Penn State. Richardson earned every bit of his 111 yards on 26 carries. It took him some time to get going and in the early stages of the game had some Reggie Bush syndrome ( def: juking laterally, not just hitting the hole). He was also in the game quite a bit on obvious passing downs, even split out wide some resulting in 4 receptions for 19 yards.

Justin Blackmon (WR, OK State): Blackmon now has 14 straight games with at least 100 receiving yards (NCAA Record). He did so on 12 receptions for 128 yards and 2 TDs last Thursday against Arizona. He also wasn’t afraid to block, most evident by a 42 yard run in which Blackmon’s block led the way early in the 1st quarter.

Zach Brown (LB, UNC): For the 2nd straight week Brown recorded 6 tackles, 1 sack.

Cliff Harris (CB, Oregon): Harris returned from suspension but did not return a kick or a punt and only recorded 1 tackle.