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49. Man-Ape
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48. Mangog
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8. Dracula
40. Kirigi
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56. Ravenous
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24. Sin
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Preseason Countdown:
21. Michigan Wolverines
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30. Dark Beast
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14. Chaos King
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19. Surtur
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6. The Leader
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27. Daken
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11. Obadiah Stane/Iron Monger
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22. Mysterio
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Matchup notes: It hurts my heart to have to throw Dirk Anger as a sacrificial lamb to Bullseye, but Nextwave is perhaps the greatest forgotten comedy book in the history of comics.
You will never find a better compare and contrast of the kind of villian from different eras than the Daken/Enforcers matchup. The Enforcers, a lean, mean band of cowboy-themed gangster flunkies from early Spider-Man and Daredevil stories were almost too cheesy for the 60's. Daken to me represents the worst of modern comics. What if we created a villian and gave him his own ongoing book before he ever was actually popular? Then, what if virtually the entire book was just reading Daken's thoughts as he poetically rambles on about what it would mean if he did this or that, and was very mysterious all the time like something epic was planned but yu weren't supposed to know what? What if after three years of stories, nothing had happened yet and it was becoming clear that the book exists solely to soak up some of the extra popularity of Wolverine? What if the book included random, somewhat disturbing, bisexual moments on a regular basis that had no real point or meaning?
Preseason Countdown continues with:
22. Arizona State
No, this team wasn't even bowl eligble last year, but they seem to have finally figured out their offense, after a few years of playing QB carosoul. The Sun Devils return almost everyone from a year ago from a very, very competative team and that should be enough to win what looks like a really bad PAC-12 south.
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Matchup Analysis: If you aren't familiar with Ghost, shame on you, you should have been reading Thunderbolts the last three years. Tiger Shark is Namor foe.
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Matchup analysis: Blastaar is best known for being the second best villian from the negative zone but has been very involved in recent cosmic crossovers. Fitzroy killed Professor X to kick of the Age of Apocalypse and hasn't done much else in comics.
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Unitentionally, we ended up with Galactus facing off against his long lost, and short lived son. Interesting, but I'd surprised if this is close regardless.
Pre-season countdown
23. Texas
Short analysis, last season was a fluke and there is too much talent on this team to not be back in the top 25 again this season.
NFL Free Agent analysis: Ochocinco and Haynesworth to Patriots, and the Dolphins trade for Reggie Bush instead of Bradshaw or Marion Barber. Summary: FML, the Fins will never compete in this damn division again.
Grand Theft Auto: Vice City.
Currently sitting at 55% complete, found all 100 hidden packages today, and true to form somehow ended up with only 99 of them. Now I have to decide whether to stop playing or actually go back to all 100 spots and see which one I missed.
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53. Ord
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60. Shinobi Shaw
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36. Mr. Negative
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61. Shriek
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Preseason Countdown Continues with.......
24. Tulsa
I honestly don't think I'll take the time to write about these teams until I reach the top fifteen. You can read about the Golden Hurricane here, if you care too.
The more important college football note of the day is the revealed outlawing of Boise State's blue jerseys at home games in Mountain West conference plays. For years, opposing players have complained that the Broncos are practically invisible in those jerseys against the smurf turf, which to me sounds like a lot of excuse-making for taking an ass-whooping at Bronco stadium.
I'd like to point out that regardless of jerseys, every player on the field should take note of where opposing players are before the play starts. Bronco jerseys still have big white numbers on the front, orange trim, and visible skin under the helmet and likely in other places as well. If you got blindsided by an "invisible" bronoco, maybe because you didn't take the time to see where the opposing player was at before the ball was snapped and deserve to have you clock cleaned. The only time I think of this excuse as viable is on special teams plays where players are seperated by great lengths of field and often van't be seen until they are already moving 20 miles per hour but that is the case for any team and unless you think special team alone are responsible for the large number of 50+ point victories over the past few years, I think the rule is ridiculous.
The NFL had a busy day of agreeing to potential deals and trades that can't be finalized until Friday. I found a handful of deals particularly interesting.
- Deangelo Williams resigns with the Carolina Panthers: This is interesting because the Panthers have spent a lot of money now on resigning players that were on the leagues worst team from a season ago. You Cam Newton will get a big deal to tie a good chunk of any remaining salary space so Carolina seems to think a rookie QB and the names from last year will turn the ship around. I personally would have gone after a cornerback or a linebacker.
- Donovan McNabb to the Vikings: This is just huge for Minnesota and with seemingly no QB deals to add for Wahington on the horizon and today's "big get" of Donte Stallworth at WR could mean a 32nd ranked passing offense for the Redskins this year.
- The New York Jets re-signed Santonio Holmes: I heard the rumor that the Jets were almost right at the salary cap when the new CBA was passed, but today they signed Santonio for 50 mill and they are also negotiating with Braylon Edwards, Nmadi Asomogha, and Randy Moss. Do cap rules not apply to New York teams?
- The glass man to be displayed behind center for the Tennessee Titans for, oh, five games or so this year, probably next. Seattle fans don't like what they at QB now but don't seem to broken up about the loss either.
- No signing in Miami yet but Kyle Orton, Ahmad Bradshaw, and Marion Barber all rumored to be potential fish before the week is out. Even better, this likely means that Ricky Williams can go bother someone else for a few years before dying of an overdose or something.
