Battle Red Bag 2015, Episode 8: Blunt Force Trauma

Let's not insult one another with excuses for why I have not been posting. Let's just pretend like I explained it in a way that made sense, that you believed me, and that we agreed to move on and never speak of the absence again.

Good talk!

Joe E:

Imagine you are given an empty tube sock and a set of instructions that read, "You have been granted one-time immunity to use this sock, filled with the substance or item of your choosing, to hit one person from each of the following categories in the face as hard as you possibly can: NFL player, NFL coach/GM/owner, non-NFL athlete, actor, SBN blogger, Regis Philbin. You are not allowed to kill the people that you hit; assuming they do not die, however, there will be no civil or criminal liability for your actions."

What do you fill the sock with? Who do you choose from each category?

My first reaction for filling the sock was "wood screws," but I fear I might accidentally cause a fatally if I go that route. So I am going to go with the tried-and-true answer of "nickels." That seems reasonably likely to cause some damage without killing any of the people I pick.

And, honestly, it's the people I'm choosing that make the whole exercise worthwhile, right?

NFL Player: Peyton Manning. Always Peyton Manning. Ol' Fivehead has a cranium that is literally begging for a nickel-filled-sock smashing. Honestly, I could stop here and be happy with the entire endeavor.

NFL Coach/GM/owner: This is a really difficult one to answer, mainly because I can make a case for Gary Kubiak, Rick Smith, Jerry Jones, and a number of other people desperately in need of this treatment. At the end of the day, however, since you included owners--and since digging up Bud Adams' corpse for this purpose seems like a waste--the answer has to be inveterate liar Jim Irsay. I imagine teeing off while screaming, "You're gonna need some pain pills after THIS, you welching jagoff!"

Non-NFL Athlete: Ryan Klesko. F that guy.

Actor: Hmm... the easy answer is someone like Shia Lebeouf, if for no other reason than revenge for what he did to the Indiana Jones franchise. But that's not terribly fulfilling. So I am going to take "actor" to mean anyone who shows up as an actor on IMDB.com, and I'm going to hit Peyton Manning again. SUCK IT, MANNING.

SBN Blogger: Joe, you devious jerk. You did this whole question to hide this particular category, didn't you? I can respect that. (Obviously, the answer is one of the mouthbreathers at Music City Miracles. They're fungible for this purpose.)

Regis Philbin: Regis Philbin.

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Random thing I learned this week: A year on Venus is shorter than a day on Venus. The planet makes its trip around the sun in about 225 earth days, but it takes roughly 243 earth days for Venus to make one complete spin on its axis. On the other end of crazy, Neptune's day is only 16 earth hours, but it takes almost 165 earth years for Neptune to go around the sun once.

***

Weston:

If you were the director of a Face/Off remake, which two actors would you pick to play Sean Archer (John Travolta) and Castor Troy (Nicholas Cage)?

We have to clarify two things before I can answer: 1. I loathe this movie, because it is amazingly stupid on a number of levels. 2. The remake would have to keep John Woo as director, because otherwise I can't pick actors who are the right level of absurd to make the script work.

With those facts in play, my answer is James Franco for Sean Archer and Ashton Kutcher as Castor Troy.

Now, we just need to find a way to write around why, when his face was "removed," Castor Troy still had lips.

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grungedave:

Which current NFL QB would make the best Stormtrooper? (Considering that Stormtroopers are considered to be tall, but also terrible at hitting the target, but not so egregiously bad that they lose their job.)

The obvious answer of former QBs is Donovan McNabb, so no need to address that.

Had you asked me this a month ago, I probably would have gone with Ryan Mallett. However, he has since failed the "not lose your job" prong of your Stormtrooper test. So, I'm leaning toward Blake Bortles and his 56% completion percentage.

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TruTxFan:

With all things being equal, the events in the world are seemingly moving to a tipping point. Does the Texans' season thus far lead to the conclusion that the human race is going to destroy itself in the near future?

That depends. Is Rick Smith going to suddenly be put in charge of ensuring the long-term stability of the human race? Because, in that case, yes.

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Joe E:

Oh, also, add a world leader and a current Texans player to the list.

World Leader: Vladimir Putin. Not for political reasons, but because he seems like the type who would want to prove that he could take it, and it would make for a great story.

Current Texans Player: Brian Hoyer. Because Free Weejay!

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