Peyton Manning

Peyton Manning Takes a Break from Shooting Commericals, Takes Down the Texans

Still the Same: John Royal on the Houston Texans

John Royal’s Friends’ Top Twenty Sports Moments of 2007, Part One

Jason Friedman’s NFL Playoff Preview: Hillary Clinton is to the New England Patriots as Chuck Norris is to Jessica Simpson

Random Thoughts from a Stupendous Sunday of Sports

Top Ten Sports Moments of 2008

10. Danica Patrick won the Indy Japan 300 to become the first woman to win a major (NASCAR, Indy, Formula One) auto race. 9. Atlanta Braves pitcher Tom Glavine won his 300th game, then retired at the end of the season, to just about cement his selection into the Baseball Hall of Fame in five ye ... More >>

John Royal's NFL Power Rankings

10. Danica Patrick won the Indy Japan 300 to become the first woman to win a major (NASCAR, Indy, Formula One) auto race. 9. Atlanta Braves pitcher Tom Glavine won his 300th game, then retired at the end of the season, to just about cement his selection into the Baseball Hall of Fame in five ye ... More >>

Texans-Colts: Houston Needs to Go to Finishing School

10. Danica Patrick won the Indy Japan 300 to become the first woman to win a major (NASCAR, Indy, Formula One) auto race. 9. Atlanta Braves pitcher Tom Glavine won his 300th game, then retired at the end of the season, to just about cement his selection into the Baseball Hall of Fame in five ye ... More >>

Gary Kubiak’s Top Ten Excuses for Losing to the Colts

10. Danica Patrick won the Indy Japan 300 to become the first woman to win a major (NASCAR, Indy, Formula One) auto race. 9. Atlanta Braves pitcher Tom Glavine won his 300th game, then retired at the end of the season, to just about cement his selection into the Baseball Hall of Fame in five ye ... More >>

Idol Beat: The Final 36, Group 3

Peyton Manning flow - I just go, no huddle: Michael Becker/ Fox Lil Rounds* Hey, Von, Alex, Scott, Taylor, Kendall? You thought you were trying to advance into the Top 12 tonight, didn't you? But you were wrong: in reality, you were just opening for Lil Rounds. * Kara, do everyone a favor ... More >>

Top Ten Sports Moments of 2008

10. Danica Patrick won the Indy Japan 300 to become the first woman to win a major (NASCAR, Indy, Formula One) auto race. 9. Atlanta Braves pitcher Tom Glavine won his 300th game, then retired at the end of the season, to just about cement his selection into the Baseball Hall of Fame in five ye ... More >>

Hope for the Houston Texans?

Gary Kubiak and team search for their first winning season

Mail Call

Sports Columnist Smackdown

Time to Grow Up

No more excuses for the Houston Texans

Boobs, Balls and Beer

Check out what's brewing for Super Sunday

Experts Ask The Pressing Question Tonight: Are You Ready For Some Football?

​The NFL season opens tonight. We've already given you our astute and accurate take on the Houston Texans. (9-7, if you must know.) But what about the rest of the league? Do you actually want to sit through all the games, or learn what will happen in the next few grafs?We thought so.So here is how ... More >>

Fire Down Below

Not a great idea to slap a woman on the butt, even at the laid-back Firehouse Saloon.

Texans Find Yet Another Way To Turn Breakthrough Into Heartbreak

​Before 2004, I remember laughing at Red Sox fans and the Curse of the Bambino. I rolled my eyes while Cubs fans whined about a goat. I remember being baffled that grown men and women could seriously believe or discuss outside forces having an impact on what occurs in the field of play.Then I met ... More >>

Game Time: Defining Texans Coach Gary Kubiak

​"When a defining moment comes along, you define the moment... or the moment defines you." -- Roy McAvoyCertainly, I'm not asking Gary Kubiak to make like the source of the above quote and take multiple 3-wood shots over a water hazard to post a 12 on the last hole of the U.S. Open, or even do o ... More >>

All I Want For Christmas Is A Football Coach

​Dear Santa Claus:I haven't asked much from you in the past few years. So since I've tried to be a good person, I'm hoping that you'll do me a solid and fulfill my wishes this Christmas. Especially since I'm not asking for Ashley Judd, like in the past, but since I'm asking for something that w ... More >>

The Triple Option: 2-For-2 Against Disinterested Bowl Teams

Photo by John RoyalThe not-so-filled stands at the Texas Bowl.​The Texas Bowl and the Armed Forces Bowl featured two teams in Houston and Missouri who felt they should have been playing in better games going up against two teams who employing the triple-option run offense.The Cougars have had trou ... More >>

Announcements That Are Almost As Startling As Mark McGwire's Steroid Confession

​Former St. Louis Cardinal Mark McGwire gave a statement today to the Associated Press admitting he used performance-enhancing drugs during baseball's steroid era.The sports world is reeling from the confession, which came completely out of the blue. It is, of course, absolutely shocking; in fact, ... More >>

Game Time: Come! Watch The Amazing Vince Young Water Down Matt Schaub's Pro Bowl Bid!

​For better or worse, the Texans are still at a stage in their history where they are experiencing some "exciting but for most teams not really extraordinary" things for the first time. This will happen when the first four years of your eight-year existence were spent being constructed by Char ... More >>

Is Anyone Rooting For The Colts In The Super Bowl?

​Now that the NFL is down to two teams, the big question remains -- who the hell is going to be rooting for Indianapolis?Let's examine the options.The cities.On the one hand, you have a town (not a city) full of pasty Midwesterners, a burg that only has an NFL team because the owner of one of the ... More >>

Game Time: Brett Favre Melting Down....Right On Cue

​We are inundated by so much marketing hype in this day and age. Between internet pop-up advertisements, electronic billboards, late-night infomercials, not to mention all of the traditional marketing avenues, we are promised so many things by so many people, yet rarely does it happen where you ... More >>

Pop Rocks: Quick Hits

​We're going to mix it up a bit on Pop Rocks today. Usually, I stick with one subject for the entire piece because I'd rather not depend too heavily on snarky line-item entries. But let's face it; sometimes there's just too much going on in the world of pop culture for me to focus on just one top ... More >>

Game Time: ESPN, For The Sake Of High Comedy, Do Whatever It Takes To Keep Chris Berman

In the end, all we want from any medium of entertainment is to be moved emotionally in one direction or another. Whether that emotion is joy, anger, or sadness, as long as it's removing us from the boredom of our everyday lives in some way, then it is serving a purpose.The late Jim Valvano put it ... More >>

Texans Schedule Out, And More Rides On Kubiak Than Ever Before

​The season remains nearly five months away, but with Tuesday night's much-celebrated release of the 2010 NFL schedule, the gameplanning for Peyton Manning among the Texans' brain trust can and should officially begin. Sure, this week's draft is the more pressing matter. Yes, there are still ... More >>

World Cup: 25 Things An Outsider Learned

What? No "Heil Shitler" headline?​With the U.S. soccer team defeat to Ghana on Saturday, I thought I would note some things I noted from the World Cup this year.1. From my readings on the internet and twitter, it appeared that the U.S. soccer team was coached by Gary Kubiak. The team had bad fi ... More >>

Our Year

Will Texans make it to playoffs?

Texans-Cowboys: Five Things To Watch (Actual Football Analysis)

And the prediction is.....​The Texans are 60 minutes from reaching their highest point in franchise history.For a team with as short a history as the Texans, it's easy to be overly dramatic and lose perspective. Yet on this particular Sunday, the game truly is that important.A win over the ... More >>

Texans' Bye Brings Unofficial Start To AFC Bubble Watch

Will the Texans take "moops" for an answer?​For the first time in seven weeks, a football Sunday passed and the Texans' secondary wasn't torched by an opposing quarterback. Of course, that sadly meant it was the Texans' bye week.A week from tonight, Peyton Manning will look to repeat his 400-yard ... More >>

Texans-Colts: You Come At The King, You Best Not Miss

The Texans failed to heed sage advice​"You come at the king, you best not miss." -- Omar Little, The Wire That line works. Whether you're trying to riddle the most feared gangster in the drug neighborhood with bullets or whether you're attempting to sweep the season series from the best quarter ... More >>

Kenny Chesney's Real Life Lessons For The Boys Of Fall

​Rocks Off found out last week that country singer Kenny Chesney is offering free DVD copies of his high school football documentary The Boys of Fall to any schools or coaches who might be interested. If you want to buy it, it's only available at Walmart. From the email: In the documentary, C ... More >>

Countdown To NFL Lockout 2011 (Obama Speaks!)

Obama's punting on this one​"If we can make the kind of progress that you needed to make to have a further extension, that's where we'd be looking." -- Jeff Pash, lead negotiator on behalf of the NFL owners ...and that's exactly what happened. On the heels of a 24-hour extension of the curre ... More >>

The New Normal

The Texans start operating like a bona fide NFL team.

Houston Texans 2011 Preview: The Jinx Is Back, Baby

​Stop me if you've heard this before -- I am very optimistic about the Houston Texans' upcoming season. I know, I know. Crazy, huh? Last year, in this very space, I called for a 10-6 season in 2010 (a logical if not glacially moving projection considering the three previous seasons went 8-8, ... More >>

Texans Preview: The Interactive Season Prediction

​For a larger, interactive version, click here. As noted below, our annual Houston Texans season preview, which includes our annual belief that the team will improve and make the playoffs, is up and on the Web. Our Sean Pendergast was optimistic even before word got out about Peyton Manning' ... More >>

Texans-Colts: Five Things to Watch

No Peyton, no chance.​With Peyton Manning out for Sunday's opener and potentially the entire year after undergoing a second surgery on his neck, the narrative for Houston changes from a statement game to one of trends. That is, there should be no way to actually lose, or for the final score t ... More >>

Football! This Weekend's Best Bets

Odd sare Brian Kelly won't look like this Satruday night​As I get ready to drop some more decidedly mediocre wagering knowledge on all of you this weekend, I have one quick thought to share with you on the opening weekend of the NFL season: This time last season, these were your starting quar ... More >>

Football! This Weekend's Best Bets, A Salute To TV Season Premieres

DWTS = this week's Philly-Giants game?​Television fascinates me. It seems like a new station pops up onto my channel grid every day to the point where I'm actually a little disappointed I haven't been approached by anyone to televise the Sean Network. I mean, doesn't everyone have their own ne ... More >>

Texans-Saints, Etc. -- 4 Winners, 4 Losers

Big winner: James Casey​The easy fall back after Sunday's 40-33 to the New Orleans Saints is to say "Same ol' Texans," and in a way, I understand. Red zone issues, fourth quarter brain farts (23 points allowed), the untimely turnover, same ol' Texans. But I choose to look at the glass half f ... More >>

Football! This Weekend's Best Bets

Tim Tebow, in the act of Tebowing​So I said last weekend that we were in the midst of one of the most dominant, and in turn most predictable streaks in college football. The top ten teams each week were crushing the books to the tune of covering the number about 80 percent of their games. Two ... More >>

Ask A Rapper: Discussing the Six Worse Rap Collaborations Ever

The hip-hop world is a less than sensible place -- lots of times, you're even required to clarify when bad means bad and when bad means good -- so once a week we're going to get with a rapper and ask them to explain things. Something you always wanted to ask a rapper? Email sheaserrano@gmail.com. &# ... More >>

The Peyton Manning Saga -- A Very Special 4 Winners, 4 Losers

Everyone wants The Beard​"Peyton Manning's not going to let (the Colts) draft Andrew Luck." -- Phil Simms "I don't talk to Phil. Phil doesn't talk to me. He did text me after that, saying 'Hey, sorry to drag your name into this.' I wrote back, 'Phil I don't know what you're talking about.' He ... More >>

Top 10 Vintage Things We Miss About Football

​Tear-away jerseys, the XFL and concussion-causing headhunters aren't things we miss about football. We pine for these ten items. 10. Uniforms That Don't Suck This mostly applies to college football, where repeat offenders Oregon were joined by Georgia, Ohio State, Maryland and Syracuse (pi ... More >>

5 Signs You're Dangerously Starting to Think It Just Might Be the Texans' Year

Check yourself before you wreck yourself.​You have tried. You have told yourself you've been down the road before, and each time your hopes and dreams have been cruelly dashed. But you can't help it -- you are, once again, letting yourself become optimistic about the Texans. But this year th ... More >>

Football! A&M-UT, LSU: This Weekend's Best Bets

We would've gotten away with it, if it wasn't for that meddling bodyguard​So yeah, about that "Bully Theory" from last week. Um, well, um....sorry? In case you missed it, I shared a theory of mine last week, and without rehashing the details it all led up to me telling all of you to take Wisc ... More >>

The Really Important Questions to Answer for the Super Bowl

So Tom Brady, is losing the Super Bowl really that bad when you get to go home to Gisele?​So it's Super Bowl week. This game featuring a rematch between the New York Giants and the New England Patriots. There will be a lot of story lines, real and imagined, developed and discussed before and ... More >>

All Retro Everything: This Week In Houston Rap Videos

​Ah, rappers and music videos. Some are vehicles for self-promotion, others are tools used to promote a message, a gaggle of asses or some good ol' wholesome debauchery. In the case of the Houston rap class, music videos are always eye opening glimpses into the future, either telling what a ta ... More >>