Drew Magary’s Thursday Afternoon NFL Dick Joke Jamboroo runs every Thursday at Defector during the NFL season. Got something you wanna contribute? Email the Roo. You can also read Drew over at SFGATE, and buy Drew’s books while you’re at it.
You might have heard there’s an election coming soon. Given that this is The Most Important Election Of Our Lifetimes, No. 536, the campaign industrial complex has rested a 1,000-pound boulder atop the SPAM button in an attempt to curry favor with you, the voter. This is why I, a Marylander, am bombarded with campaign ads/flyers/robocalls 48 hours a day, including TV ads for Senate candidates in states nowhere near mine, Ohio and Texas in particular. It’s also why Donald Trump has used taxpayer money to buy up national airtime for an ad that features him walking menacingly toward the camera, like you’re about to be his next victim. Thank you, Mister President!
You’ll notice that much of this long-distance haranguing is being waged by the Republican Party, almost certainly because their current polling nationwide is abysmal. If those numbers hold—although you and I know better than to trust polls—the GOP stands on the brink of losing both houses of Congress, plus a number of crucial state elections. That’s why they’re flooding the airwaves with a steady stream of dogshit. These are tactics of desperation.
All of this is somewhat heartening to me, the screechy liberal. The idea of President Fuckhead finally getting a firm check on his power is enough to make me almost kinda sorta think things here in the U.S. can actually get better. But if this blue wave materializes—I am in no way predicting that will happen, please do not tell people that I predicted anything—I already know that the path to progress will be impeded by the same coterie of gutless motherfuckers I’ve been having to deal with as long as I’ve been a registered voter.
When asked if impeachment was a top priority, Jeffries said “of course not” during an appearance on “Fox News Sunday.” “I’ve made clear from the very beginning that our top priority is going to be to drive down the high cost of living.”
That’s Democratic House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. A few years ago, he took the scepter from retired pushover Nancy Pelosi as standard bearer for Democrats in the House. But as you can see from the passage up above, he has been carefully molded in Pelosi’s image, perhaps with her help. Jason Zengerle profiled Jeffries for The New Yorker five months ago, and that story has stuck with me. Every time I am told what a big deal this election is, and what a blue wave could accomplish, I remember the copy from that story, which made me want to eat my own teeth:
Standing beneath a sea-grape tree, his suit jacket buttoned and a wireless lavalier microphone attached to his lapel, Jeffries looked into an aide’s iPhone and said, “Fuck Donald Trump!”
Almost immediately, Jeffries began to waver. He instructed staffers back in Washington to bleep the word “fuck.”
According to Zengerle, Jeffries’s staffers talked the congressman out of censoring himself. Good job by them. But the idea that this spineless jackass hesitated to publicly say, “Fuck Donald Trump” is all you need to know. Jeffries is one of the chief gatekeepers in the Democratic Party and, like his predecessors, he loves bringing a spork to a gunfight. His counterpart in the Senate, the dreaded Chuck Schumer, is even more brazenly pathetic.
Schumer is the senator who took more donations from private equity than any other. He's the guy whose asshole kid is a lobbyist for Amazon. He's the frog that continually insists the water he’s sitting in isn’t coming to a boil. Schumer has presided over every catastrophic decision Democrats have made in the Trump era, and is one of the primary reasons that Trump has won the presidency. Twice. This man is a fucking loser. He’s paid to be a loser, and he’s only interested in sharing leadership duties with fellow genteel scum like Jeffries: people hard-wired to let Republicans get the best of them time and time again.
I am so fucking sick of these chumps. I’m sick of every victory notched by the Democrats being a fleeting one. Right now, Donald Trump is an historically unpopular president, and he has made the party he rules over equally despised. During Trump's second term in office, he has destroyed this nation’s preventive healthcare infrastructure, wiped out entire fields of scientific research, unleashed a fascist police force on American cities, started an insane war, murdered dozens of people in cold blood, desecrated the national park system, fucked up the Reflecting Pool, and literally torn down the White House itself. Every oval that Americans fill in on the D side of a ballot this fall is them saying “Fuck Donald Trump” as loudly and clearly as possible. And Hakeem Jeffries wants to check his swing if he dares to utter it himself? Sit on a gavel, you fucking clown.
As desperate as Republicans are to hold onto power, the Democratic establishment is even more rattled. An oil slick like Schumer sees his GOP chums on the other side of the aisle get marginalized by an interloper (Trump), and now fears a similar interloper on his side doing likewise. The Schumers of the DNC fear the likes of Zohran Mamdani and AOC (even as she's gone about sanding down her politics over the last eight years) far more than they fear Trump. So if they wrest control of Congress a month from now, their priority won’t be to reform a brazenly corrupt Supreme Court, or to punish Trump and his many accomplices for their endless crimes, or to finally cut off aid to Israel, or even to force an end to that shitty war in Iran. All they’ll do is sit on their candy asses and wait around for the next election. Then they’ll tell you the best way, the most responsible way, to express your anger at their indifference is to continue voting for them.
They’ll probably lose that 2028 election. You know why? Because they don’t CARE if they lose. They never have, and even Donald Trump’s ongoing looting of this nation isn’t going to compel them to start. This is what happens when a two-party system becomes too big to fail. Reach the penthouse of the Democratic Party and you’ll never go hungry again. Even if you lose an election, you’ll just end up with a better paying job working for the same machine. So I don’t have to wonder why Schumer has managed to endure, despite gladly acting as a doormat for our most evil public officials. As that fucker sees it, being a chump is his job. He’s certainly not interested in making things better for you and me. If Democrats like him wielded power on behalf of regular people for once, they'd be expected to continue doing so, and that would be bad for both their bank accounts and their minimal work ethic. As such, here I find myself again having to vote blue all the way down the ballot, again hoping that it will yield tangible results when everything tell me otherwise.
As you might expect, my patience for this vicious cycle is wearing thin. I turned 50 this week. I’ve always known that this stupid country would still have an endless amount of work to do after I died. But I’m at the point now where I’d just like to see the faintest shred of evidence that America is willing to do that work before I kick off. I’d like to see a Democrat with real juice start by asking for the moon instead of asking for table scraps. I’d like the lawmakers I vote for to act on urgent matters before I go out onto the street and protest, to no avail, for the umpteenth time. I’d like to see all Nazis chased back into the closet. And I’d like the Trumpists to be treated and prosecuted like the pigs that they are. I’m running out of time, and I can only go so long living like this, enduring the same old shit every election cycle until the idea of hope sounds like a joke. I’d like to have faith in something other than my fucking dog.
But that faith is going to be hard to come by, even if Democrats take Republicans to the woodshed a few weeks from now. The battle won’t be won that day. It’ll only be beginning. I’m so tired, Chuck and Hakeem. Gimme something to work with, or else I’ll be daydreaming about pissing on your graves, too.
The Games
All games in the Jamboroo are evaluated for sheer watchability on a scale of 1 to 5 Throwgasms.
Five Throwgasms
Bills at Rams: Are you ready to have the announcers refer to this game as a “potential Super Bowl matchup”? I bet you are. It’s the closest Bills fans can get these days to experiencing an actual Super Bowl appearance!
49ers at Seahawks
Four Throwgasms
Raiders at Patriots: We have a 14-year-old son, and I know the boy is mine because his favorite thing in the world is getting our house all to himself. Not so he can raid the liquor cabinet or watch dirty movies to his heart’s content. No, this boy just wants to cook. Literally. With no one else around, the boy can have our kitchen all to himself so he can steam his own dumplings, bake his own cookies, or whip up his own batch of curry noodles. All without anyone getting in his way or complaining that he’s using too many pots and pans. This boy understands what is best in life.
Three Throwgasms
Bears at Packers: As I am now 50, I have earned the right to dispense cranky old-man takes as I see fit. Here is one: NFL players, please wear your fucking mouth guards. I see players like Caleb Williams (out this week) always doing the Steph Curry thing with their mouth guard, chewing on it instead of wearing it, both before and after the snap. Are you guys out of your fucking minds? What, are you afraid that wearing a mouth guard will somehow slow you down out there? It’s just a mouth guard, man! Wear that shit! You need all the tooth and brain protection you can get! Take it from a guy who has brain damage: You don’t want this. You’re gonna get it anyway, but do what you can in the interim to mitigate it.
Eagles at Jaguars (London): I have all of my “The Eagles might leave Sirianni in London!” jokes locked and loaded for Sunday morning. No stealing them! They’re gold!
Ravens at Falcons
Two Throwgasms
Giants at Commanders: You might have noticed that the Commanders have gone back to their original uniform design, back when they had the bad name. That color scheme still has some old baggage to go with it, but it’s still a much better look than anything the Commanders have beta-tested since ditching it. Since I live in the DMV, I’ve seen more than a few Washington fans walking around wearing some of the merch that came out right after the final name change, and I bet those fans have a truly severe case of buyer’s remorse.
Broncos at Chargers: I thought Omarion Hampton was legit when I watched him play at UNC alongside Drake Maye. Perhaps my scouting eye isn’t as keen as I presume it to be.
Bucs at Cowboys
Colts at Steelers
Vikings at Saints
One Throwgasm
Bengals at Dolphins: We held our Defector annual meeting at the Tropicana in Atlantic City last week, where I performed my annual ritual of losing a modest amount of money inside a casino. I lost $30 in cash at the blackjack table (anytime I went to the ATM to get more cash, it triggered a fraud alert at my bank, and my withdrawal request would get the stiffarm). Then I ambled over to the resort’s sportsbook just to take in the atmosphere. And lemme tell you, the sportsbook at this place was kind of glorious. They had the games playing on HD screens that were as big as the side of a building. I want a TV like that in my basement. I’m sure my wife won’t reject the idea.
Also, Roth offered me a bite of his crab saute, only I thought he was offering me the rest of the dish. You should have seen the look in his eyes when he realized he’d have to seize the dish back from me if he ever wanted another taste of it.
Lions at Cardinals
Texans at Titans
Browns at Jets
This Week On All Ball
Arif and I have decided to rate every game on the schedule using the Throwgasm model. Did my ratings in this week’s episode perfectly correlate to the rating I assigned each game in the above section? I hope so. At least one enterprising commenter down below will be on my ass if not. I say that out of respect, not irritation. Sometimes I need to be held in check.
Pregame Song That Makes Me Wanna Run Through A Goddamn Brick Wall
“Nation,” by Home Front! Are we all ready for some Canadian hardcore?! Reader Nick is!
The Hard Times had a list of songs they’re listening to recently, and included this pretty obscure Canadian band called Home Front, that I am now addicted to. They perfectly described it as “industrial synth-pop, dance-punk with a little bit of hardcore punk mixed in.” That was a shot straight up my alley, thought you might like it too.
I do. Sounds like Oi! music, only without the neo-Nazism. That was reassuring.
Get In Shape With Dr. Cam Skattebo, A.S.U.!
“Everyone gets on my boy Jameis for licking his fingers, but did you know that the human finger is covered in more than a dozen bacteria, all of which can help promote gut health? When you eat a W, you’re also eating vital nutrients! That’s why I lick my fingers and my toes at least four times a day, and so can you!”
Fire This Asshole!
Is there anything more exciting than a coach losing his job? All year long, we’ll keep track of which coaches will almost certainly get fired at year’s end or sooner. And now, your potential 2026 chopping block:
Jim Harbaugh*
Aaron Glenn*
Nick Sirianni
Matt LaFleur
Shane Steichen
Todd Bowles*
Dan Quinn*
Robert Saleh
Mike McCarthy
Zac Taylor
DeMeco Ryans
(*potential midseason firing)
Packers fans REALLY want Matt LaFleur to stay on this list until he finally gets the axe. From reader Mark:
I humbly submit that The Flower should be added to the Fire This Asshole list. He has wilted. No amount of ThirstToks by ladies that like his angry daddy sideline schtick (yeah it's a thing) can save him. The savings in hair gel alone would be phenomenal.
I did not know about the MLF TikTok hive. And you know what? I’m not find out any more than what Mark has told me. I don’t need that sort of thing in my life.
Gameday Cookin’ Corner
Reader David has some homemade avocado salsa for that ass.
Drew, here's a recipe that I 100% invented myself for a green dip that is called Green Stuff (very creative!), because it's green. There are just three ingredients, and they are all (you guessed it) green. It's delicious, inexpensive and incredibly easy to make.
Ingredients:
- 2 or 3 lbs of tomatillos (those little green tomatoes that have a husk)
- 3 ripe avocados (three containers of Trader Joe's avocado smash will work as well)
- 1 or 2 jalapeno peppers (depending on how much heat you like)
Instructions:
- Peel the husks off the tomatillos and rinse them under running water at the sink - and toss each one into a large pot as you go. Do the same with the jalapenos.
- Once they're all in the pot, husked and rinsed, fill the pot with enough water that everything is floating. Then cover the pot and put on the stove with the burner set to high.
- Bring to a boil, then lower the heat and let boil for 10-15 minutes until they are turning soft and mushy. Stir a few times and be careful that the pot doesn't overflow when boiling.
- While the tomatillos and jalapenos are boiling, peel the avocados and mash them up in a big bowl.
- When the tomatillos and jalapenos are done boiling, remove the lid and set the pot aside to cool for approx 10 minutes.
- Then pour the whole pot into a colander in the sink and give the whole thing a couple good shakes. This will remove a lot of water and juice from inside the tomatillos not to mention a lot of seeds. It's ok if you still have seeds, you don't want to remove them all.
- Then carefully pour the whole thing into a blender and blend on low for a short time, just 10 or 15 seconds.
- Then pour it into the bowl with the mashed up avocados and stir until it's all combined.
- Voila, you now have a big batch of green stuff!
Serving suggestions:
- You can dip your chip (or veggie) of choice into it right away when it's hot.
- I usually pour the big bowl of green stuff into smaller containers and let them cool, then put some in the fridge and the rest in the freezer. It will keep for up to a week in the fridge and much longer in the freezer.
- You can also make your own nachos with it - just throw chips on a baking sheet with cheese, green stuff, chopped tomatoes, cilantro, etc and heat in the oven at 350 until it's hot all the way through.
I am a salsa verde aficionado, so this recipe is my kinda shit. Tomatillos are the Vikings defense of salsa ingredients. That comparison makes no sense, but I’m gonna roll with it.
Gametime Cheap Beer Of The Week
Two Suns Premium Dry! Remember the dry beer trend? Well, it’s still alive and well Down Under! From James:
“Say hello to Two Suns! "Australian Malt + Wheat, Japanese Precision." Why, you can almost taste the orientalism with every sip. The ads for it on train station billboards had a centaur-like figure with the top of a geisha and the bottom half of a cricketer (attached as a jpeg), which is the perfect encapsulation of what one expects from a coterie of white guys in suits trying to market this. Although, given that Two Suns is an Asahi product, maybe it's actually a problematic appropriation of Australian culture? A lot to think about.”
I won’t lie: I bet that’s a tasty beer, regardless of whom it’s trying to offend.
Gameday Movie Of The Week For Titans Fans
Roofman, which is NOT a Steven Soderbergh film, even though its cast (Channing Tatum, Kirsten Dunst, LaKeith Stanfield) and its logline (escaped con hides inside of a Toys "R" Us by night, while falling in love by day) might suggest otherwise. Your appetite for C-Tates may vary—I have family members who recoil at the mere sight of him—but I was perfectly fine with him in this mild caper. I was NOT fine with how this movie reduced Stanfield to a bit player. He should be a big bright fucking star right now, dammit! The Harder They Fall was an unheralded masterpiece! I won’t hear any opinions to the contrary! Three stars.
Gratuitous Simpsons Quote
“Who are you to demand anything? I run this town. You're just a bunch of low-income nobodies!”
“Uh, election in November. Election in November...”
“What??? Again??? This stupid country.”
Enjoy the games, everyone.
