I want my 63 Billion-Billion DOLLARS!

You may remember Jonathan Lee Riches the White Suge Knight (pictured left) from lawsuits such as Riches vs. Snitches, Batman and Identity Robbin, Holding My Life Hostage and Fraud in Sports.

But it’s not the lawsuits against the Snitches, Skittles, Guantanamo Bay, LeBron et. al., or even Barry Bonds that has made Mr. Riches our almost-friend. It was when he first burst (busted? Bust?) onto the scene for his lawsuit against Michael Vick entitled “Theft and Abuse of my Animals.”

Chances are, Mr. Riches will never rightfully be compensated the $63 billion-billion he’s requested. He’ll never get his dogs back, convince the Supreme Court that Michael Vick has Iranian missiles, or have his credit restored from the Doggie Warehouse account Ookie opened under his name.

Mr. Riches, on behalf of society, I wish I could make everyone stop physically hurting your feelings and dashing your hopes. Your hopes are the hopes of a nation, no, the hopes of a civilization. Or I could at least pony up the missing fees that keep getting your complaints bounced by Judges who don’t serve Justice.

For it’s not the system who’s wronged Mr. Riches, it’s not even the 3 thousand-thousand defendants who have refused to feed you in jail, bench pressed you to impress ballpark buddies, forced you to eat live rats and roll around in kitty litter for punishment, and, of course, repeatedly subjected you to microwave testing. It’s society for ignoring this man at the center of a vast conspiracy to illegally use his name for shirts, Mr. Riches Hats, and Jonathan Lee Riches Bibles.

But, Mr. Riches, don’t fret. There is an ultimate justice that we all face. All things eventually work out.

In the case of Mr. Riches, there is but one suitable outcome.

By now, the news that Michael Vick has agreed to plead guilty on several federal charges that include jail time is, well, not news, since everyone knows it. He also didn’t commit any white-collar crime, and therefore won’t be getting conjugal visits. Michael Vick is going to federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison.

If there is kharmatic justice, then that federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison must be FCI Williamsburg. Yes, the same FCI Williamsburg where Michael Vick was supposed to deliver $63 billion-billion backed by gold and silver to Mr. Riches.

The FCI Williamsburg where Mr. Riches is paying his debt to society.

Mr. Riches may never get to face his accuser in court. But if our system is not broken, Mr. Riches will get to face his accuser in the yard.

So get ready Michael, because now you too are going to be locked in the same holes where you microwave tested on Mr. Riches. Ezekiel 25:27. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. Mr. Riches is our brother, and you shall feel that vengeance.

That $63 billion-billion is going to be taken out of your ass one nickel at a time (figuratively) at FCI Williamsburg. Enjoy Michael.

For More on Mr. Riches, see Jonathan Lee Riches Central.

Sociologial Experiment

INNNNNNNNN West Philadelphia, Born and Raised
On the playground is where I spent most of my days

If you are:
1. Able to read those two lines without singing the entire theme to The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

and

2. Between the ages of 18-34

Please drop me an email at iconogrill@aol.com , because I'm pretty sure you aren't American. Much like Pigman in PCU where he was trying to prove his Caine-Hackman theory, this is my greatest thesis. I don't think I'll get any emails.

*does little hop-step like Will after he got out of the cab*

Blog Keeping

Just doing a little house keeping here on the old internet.

First, I’ve learned how to use this RSS. I now no longer visit any sites, I let Google do it for me and then let me know if they’ve been lazy asses or steadily pumping away the words.

This has led to two developments.

1. I have an RSS Feed. That way, you don’t have to keep typing in this address to find out if my lazy ass has been typing away (Note: This is post 4 in the last 24 hours, with one or two more on the way - a random college football observation post, and a complete analysis of the latest legal genius to hit the US court system.). I don’t have any friggin’ clue what it is, but if you have an RSS machine, then you can figure out how to add me.

2. I have more sites that I’m able to look at and read, and thusly will be adding more sites to the sidebar, they include:

www.EverydayshouldbeSaturday.com
www.loserswithsocks.com
www.dawgsports.com
http://thesportingorange.blogspot.com
www.rockytoptalk.com

I find it hard to believe that there’s a better Georgia Site than the one posted, which might just be the best written of the college blogs that I’ve read. T. Kyle King has him one of those lawyer names, and a habit of being wordy, but even when reading way too much about Georgia, I don’t feel like I’ve had my time ripped from me.

If you have a good blog that I’d enjoy - keeping in mind I hate pretty much everything - drop me a note. I need something that challenges the conventional wisdom and actually spurns me into looking at a topic in a different way.

But beware, don’t have a Florida blog, and then make 38 posts about the Yankees between anything football related. That just pisses me off, since I’ve already always got more than 100 new items in my reader.

NOTE: I chose the title so that I could put up a picture of a chick in a maid outfit, but a google image search left me with far too many choices of scrupulous intention to click

Maddening Plaguirism

So Rick Reilly bitched earlier this year to Gelf Magazine, complaining that his intellectual property is jacked by ESPN more than a house owned by a baskeball player in Chicago. He said that, “[he’s] flat-out handed them five or six Emmys.”

See, he put in all the the effort in coming up with these ideas. Everyone is always looking for a new angle, and well ESPN took Reilly’s angle and didn’t link back to him.

(Now they could have saved a ton of hassle by just having a real-journalist roll on the side of the page. Then Rick and ESPN could be RSS BFF. Well, ‘cept for that douche Simmons, real journalists hate him, too. But that’s a tangent.)

Rick, beware though, Ethan Albright is going to (long) snap your damn neck. You stole his idea. You took his angle, and didn’t mention him.

Actually, it’s Juan Turlington’s angle from The Phat Phree where he wrote a profanity filled tirade on lowly rated Madden players funnier than any of your imaginary conversations with golf gods, draft picks or cheerleaders. There was more humanity in Albrights plea for Madden’s acceptance than in any of your tear jerkers that serve as an allegory to an Aesop fable.

Juan is flat-out handing you another National Sports Writer of the Year award.

With Madden gaining main-stream acceptance more and more each year, with every player thinking his rating is too low, with every reference to Tecmo Bo Jackson, you decided that people who had ignored video games thus far needed you to show the human side of the PS3.

I’m shocked you didn’t make this about NCAA 08, then you could have talked about how these were just amateur athletes trying to get an education who were being subjected to quantification by some computer dorks in the Valley. Could have tugged at the ol’ heartstrings.

You ripped off Turlington. You went and talked to several crapily-rated players and presented it as an original idea.

You shouldn’t be throwing rocks when you live in a glass house. You need to save those rocks for Courtney Brown, the player you asked about being the least aware in the game, to eat for breakfast.

Or perhaps save them for your readers, who you appearantly give a 12 to in awareness for thinking this is another original Riff of Reilly.

My copyrighted name has been used illegally in many ladies room stalls

You may remember my ripping of PETA for using the Michael Vick thing to make money by pushing shirts? (If not, it’s like 3 posts ago, just scroll, lazy-ass.) I’m not sure if this is the same thing, but I know that I expect a process server any day.

Among the many accusations of one Jonathan Lee Riches was that Michael Vick was using his copyrighted name to make T-Shirts. Fuck it, I did.

FRONT
BACK

Now you too can make a statement about Michael Vick, with your own. They’re not for sale, per say, but I could make available to you your very own Jonathan Lee Riches shirt for 63 Billion-billion dollars reimbursement of my cost and effort.

The interesting thing about the shirt though, is that it’s a rather ambiguous statement. I have heard from people who consider it a statement of support for Michael Vick with it’s outlandish accusations. Then others think it’s just dog-piling. I say it’s just a hilarious reminder of a modern day Socrates.

This shirt stemming from some comments of Matt Vasgersian reminded me that I had been meaning for a while to make a post about the shirt.

Buy them before you physically hurt my feelings and dash my hopes any more.

UPDATE: I’m not prone to expletives, but HOLY SHIT! Remember when Ziggy went back to the complaint window to talk about the New Yorker ripping him off? Well, Mr. Riches is back at the prison law library. He’s now suing Barry Bonds, Bud Selig and Hank Aarons corked bat for 42 million-million, and 83 billion-billion from LeBron, Tony Montana, et al. This place is Jonathan Lee Riches The White Suge Knight central.



More On This as it Develops

If 3 is good enough for Dale, it's good enough for me

In April, my instant reaction to the Cowboys sending Cleveland the rights to waste a draft pick on Brady Quinn was, “Wow, McFadden first, Manningham 32nd.”

But now in retrospect, I ask myself, do I really want the first overall pick? Seems that it just doesn’t work out for the teams lately who sit atop the draft board. I’m not really talking about the talent level of the guys who have been first picks, but the headache they bring. Finding the right guy performance-wise is just as important at 3 or 6 as it is at 1.

The guys who have been taken at the top of the last couple drafts have brought with them a sense of entitlement. One that’s seemed to grow ever since Daddy was able to dictate what team took the Manning Family version of Jeb Bush. Now, the number one picks all think they are John Elway with a baseball career to pursue.

Jamarcus Russell threw the ball 80 yards and led LSU to several narrow defeats before Al Davis said he’s the guy. Now Russell sits at home presumably getting fat while waiting for the fat check.

His ego has to be a big part of why he’s waiting for an extra million guaranteed. He IS that damn good, remember he was the number one overall pick.

Reggie Bush wasn’t. He wanted too much money. He wanted a house for his parents. He wanted 63 billion-billion dollars to sign. So he fell. Vince Young did, too.

Instead, Houston found the guy happy to be the top pick and take top-ish pick money, Mario Williams.

Next April, the Cowboys could be facing a similar situation with the Cleveland pick. They take someone who starts to buy the crap that’s spoon-fed to him for four months, and then he’s at home. Or they pass on him because of that same ingested feces.

PR disaster either way.

But at third? He’s too busy trying to find Ashy Larry’s cigarette hookup for his family, because he’s RICH. The third pick is too damn happy he didn’t play the role of Brady Quinn to have Daddy coming out moaning and whining.

The third pick won the lottery, but lost it too because he wasn’t good enough, wasn’t smart enough, and ahh hell, I was just going there for a gratuitous Vince-Young-is-dumb joke.

So c’mon Cleveland. Suck. Just don’t suck the most. Take the McFadden decision out of Jerry’s hands.

An unproductive day at work

...leads to a very productive day on the ol' blog.

The New York Daily News put Barry Bonds on Trial.

Now, after getting all semantical on this bitch a few minutes ago, I decided to put Barry on trial. But I'm not talented enough to summon 12 baseball greats, just George Mitchell.

Transcript Follows.

Bonds: You want answers?
Mitchell: I think I'm entitled.
Bonds: You want answers?
Mitchell: I want the truth.
Bonds: You can't handle the truth.

Son, we play a game that has records, and those records are beaten by men with bats. Who's gonna do it? You? You, Bob Costas? I have a greater responsibility to this game than you could possibly imagine. You weep for Hank Aaron, and you curse BALCO. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know. That these homers, while tainted, made history. And my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, made the rich richer, kept ESPN on the air and helped keep this game in the forefront of the public conscious despite every other option.

You don't want the truth because deep down in places that you don't blog about, you want me in the batters box, you need me in that batters box. We use words like gate receipts, ratings, merchandise. We use these words as the backbone of a career spent entertaining someone. You use them as a criticism. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who cashes in on and capitalizes under the blanket of the very entertainment that I provide, and then questions the manner in which I provide it. I would rather you just said thank you, and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a bat, and take a swing. Either way, I don't give a damn what you think you are entitled to.
Mitchell: Did you take the cream and clear?
Bonds: I played the game the way...
Mitchell: DID YOU TAKE THE CREAM AND CLEAR?
Bonds: YOU'RE GODDAMN RIGHT I DID!

So yeah, NY Daily News, what I do want is for you to stand there in that faggoty white uniform and with your Harvard mouth extend Bonds some fucking courtesy.

Parody is much more difficult. That's why Weird Al Rules.

Sadaharu Oh, wait

Humans are filled with inadequacies. Constantly worried that we might not be enough of this, or too much of that. We also HATE how inadequate we feel.

That's part of why we like to tear people down. We build them up, and then knock them off the pedestal we've placed them on. It's jealousy and it's OK. I sit here today and tell you I am not and never was a great baseball player. I know people who are better husbands than I, better employees, better people. But I've got excuses for every one.

People who put baseball players on pedestals - the people who enabled Barry Bonds to do whatever it is he's done - they are the ones who let their inadequacies take over. Those who shred Barry to take him OFF the pedestal. We impart moral answers to questions we've never been asked.

People do it because they need to "defend baseball," because they need to defend Hank Aaron." BECAUSE BARRY DID IT THE WRONG WAY!

I understand the need to make Barry not so great. To make it seem like he's no better than you or I.

The most inane of these arguments is the Sadaharu Oh is the real home run king because of his 868* professional homers.

While he's no doubt great, don't sit there and tell me that they are THE record. His 868* are no more THE record than Clint Dolezel is the touchdown king because of his 800+ in the Arena League. Hey, it's PROFESSIONAL FOOTBALL. Rationalize away.

That doesn't matter. You're going to gerrymander records to suit your desires, but if we're changing the definition of professional to suit your argument, then you need to get the facts right. Barry is not 112 homers from Oh. Barry is 82 92 91 homers from Oh**. He hit 13 with Prince William in 1985 and another 7 in 1986 with the Hawaii Islanders.

* 868 were accomplished against lesser competition. Any league where Tuffy Rhodes is a star is not the equal of MLB. (see how I worked an asterisk into the post?)

**Not very good at math either, I guess. That or typing. Don't remember which.