As we’ve probably all heard by now, the Bears have named Kyle Orton as their starting quarterback for the 2008 season. And while his 12-6 record is nothing to sneeze at, the more important thing is that a guy who drools Jack Daniel’s all over his face is actually leading a team that was in the Super Bowl just two years ago. It’s going to be a great season.

It’s the early odds on team’s chances to make the Super Bowl. What are your team’s chances? Just look below. My team, the Falcons, well, they’re pretty much as long a shot as there is, and at 100-1, I think that’s kind of unfair (this one should be somewhere in the thousands or millions). Pats at 7-2? Chargers at 7-1? I like that action. . .

Arizona Cardinals 50 - 1
Atlanta Falcons 100 - 1
Baltimore Ravens 75 - 1
Buffalo Bills 50 - 1
Carolina Panthers 40 - 1
Chicago Bears 35 - 1
Cincinnati Bengals 60 - 1
Cleveland Browns 25 - 1
Dallas Cowboys 6 - 1
Denver Broncos 50 - 1
Detroit Lions 80 - 1
Green Bay Packers 25 - 1
Houston Texans 60 - 1
Indianapolis Colts 7 - 1
Jacksonville Jaguars 12 - 1
Kansas City Chiefs 100 - 1
Miami Dolphins 100 - 1
Minnesota Vikings 18 - 1
New England Patriots 7 - 2
New Orleans Saints 25 - 1
New York Giants 15 - 1
New York Jets 35 - 1
Oakland Raiders 50 - 1
Philadelphia Eagles 20 - 1
Pittsburgh Steelers 15 - 1
Saint Louis Rams 75 - 1
San Diego Chargers 7 - 1
San Francisco 49ers 80 - 1
Seattle Seahawks 25 - 1
Tampa Bay Buccanneers 40 - 1
Tennessee Titans 40 - 1
Washington Redskins 50 - 1

There’s never enough Madden 09 previews, and with that said, I present you with yet another. As long as these things keep popping out, I’m going ot keep showing them.

It’s sad to see a guy who’s been such a bust and who parties with lots of white girls on his boat while drinking get cut from a team, but that day has unfortunately come. The Chicago Bears, who only play mediocre-to-bad quarterbacks, have decided they’re not going to take that approach at the running back spot.

His weekend DUI charge while in a car in Austin, Texas, has led to his release, however. The Bears placed Benson on waivers Monday, two years before the end of his contract and three years into a disappointing career with the team.

“Cedric displayed a pattern of behavior we will not tolerate,” Bears general manager Jerry Angelo said in a statement. “As I said this past weekend, you have to protect your job. Everyone in this organization is held accountable for their actions. When individual priorities overshadow team goals, we suffer the consequences as a team. Those who fail to understand the importance of ‘team’ will not play for the Chicago Bears.”

This one should really damage the Bears. Benson, after all, has rushed for 1,500 yards over three seasons, or less than what Adrian Peterson did last year with the Vikings.

I posted the original trailer, but this one seems to be the actual gameplay, which is so much more revealing than the closeups that come out at first. Enjoy.

Here’s a look at Madden 09, which features Brett Favre on the cover, which is probably bad for Brett. Before, Madden only ruined a person’s statistics. Now, it’s gonna mess up sonmeone’s fishing trip on a nice Saturday.

When you’re going through high school and college, you’ve always got that friend that’s the designated one to talk to the police. You know, the guy that doesn’t drink and doesn’t smoke and, in short, is sober. My friend looked the part. Ricky Williams doesn’t.

The former/kinda running back who’s been suspended more times than Pacman says he may have been able to help if he was aboard Cedric Benson’s boat the other weekend.

“I think if I had come down, things might have worked out a little bit differently,” Williams, who is entering the final year of his contract with the Dolphins, told the newspaper. “I find I have a calming influence on people I’m around.

“As a high-level athlete, it’s just something that’s ingrained in me. I always think that if I’m there, things would be different. I can’t say how.”

This may be well and true, but that calming influence, it’s called pot, and when you bring it out around police officers, they don’t smoke it, they arrest you. Pretty much, Benson was better off getting his ass beat and pepper sprayed than having Ricky around.

In the daily “He was drunk,” “No I wasn’t,” “Yes you were,” the police are refuting Cedric’s earlier comments that he wasn’t drunk, and say that not only was he drunk, but he was combative.

After Benson said there was absolutely no resistance, the cops say otherwise.

Sgt. Leonard Snyder, who sprayed and arrested Benson, wrote in his report that he believed Benson was intoxicated because he was “combative,” “cocky,” “insulting” and used “profanity,” but at other times was “crying”
and “cooperative.”

Officer, those tears, they weren’t from crying. He was drunk. And you pepper sprayed the shit out of him. That’s what happens.

Cedric Benson is disputing the claim that he resisted arrest, or that he was drunk all together. You’ll remember, Benson was arrested by police when they say he wouldn’t cooperate and take a field sobriety test (which we all know are biased).

According to Cedric, none of it went down like that.

“I was not intoxicated,” Benson told the Chicago Sun-Times. “There was alcohol on the boat and others were enjoying themselves, but I wasn’t drunk.”

“They gave me a field sobriety test, told me to say my ABCs and told me to count from 1 to 4 up and down,” Benson told the Chicago Tribune. “I’m thinking, I passed all the tests, did everything right. Then the officer told me we needed to go to land to take more tests. I politely asked him why we needed to go to land to take more tests when I took every test. Then he sprayed me with mace, on his boat.

“I’m not handcuffed. I’m not under arrest. I’m not threatening him. I’m not pushing him. I’m not touching him. And he sprays me right in my eye.”

Count one through four? ABC’s? Wtf? Seems like an easy sobriety test. Mine was much harder. Unless, of course, you count that I wasn’t maced.

Credric Benson was the fourth overall draft in the 2005 NFL Draft, and he’s since done nothing. He’s finally broken into the headlines, but probably for the wrong reasons; unless, of course, you consider being pepper-sprayed the right reasons.

Benson, who starred at the University of Texas, failed a field sobriety test on his boat, a Lower Colorado River Authority spokesman told the Chicago Tribune.

When police tried to get Benson to take the sobriety test on land, Benson resisted and refused to put on a life jacket, police told the newspaper.

Benson threw a great stiff arm, but the 180 pound officer took him to the ground with a textbook tackle, even causing him to fumble the handle of Hennessy.