Farewell Five and Easter Jives

On this Easter Sunday, an era has ended. In case you haven't heard, Donovan McNabb has been traded to the Redskins. My initial thoughts on the trade are as follows. I'm fine with trading McNabb. I doubt the Eagles would resign him after this season, and it would be better to get something from his value while you can. I do not, however, like that they traded him to the Redskins. Why trade him to a team that you play twice a year? For an organization that does a lot of arrogant things, this is just downright stupid.

This of course follows on the heels of trading Sheldon Brown and Chris Gocung for a 4th and 5th rounder, and a linebacker who has started 2 games in 2 years for the Browns. Not to mention the release of several others, including Shawn Andrews, Kevin Curtis, and Brian Westbrook, one of my favorite Eagles who I already touched on. Can you say rebuilding?

One thing that scares me in this trade is the relation between Donovan McNabb and John Elway. Up to this point in their careers, they are eerily similar. Both were said to have not been able to win the big game early in their careers, with a combined 4 Super Bowl losses between the two of them through each of their first 11 seasons. And through the same amount of games, they have similar yards per game and yards per attempt averages as well. In terms of touchdowns to interceptions, McNabb trumps Elway easily in both categories. This is what scares me. John Elway finally won the Super Bowl late in his career, when he was 38 years old in his 15th NFL season. McNabb is through 11 NFL seasons and is 33 years old. Who was Elway's coach in Denver when he finally won, you ask? It was Mike Shanahan. Interestingly enough, the Washington Redskins just got rid of the futile Jim Zorn in favor of an accomplished NFL coach, one with a track record of winning Super Bowls. Who would that be? The aforementioned Mike Shanahan. Look, I know the Redskins are a mess. If it were to ever happen it would take a lot of time. And yeah, I know. It is the Redskins. They tried the dumbest play in the history of the NFL last year. But the connections are there. I really don't want it to happen, but stranger things have happened before. Like Adam Sandler in a serious movie. So never say never.

In final, the McNabb trade is sort of like divorcing your wife, and giving your weird half-brother permission to marry her. You get rid of her, but you still have to see them both twice a year at Christmas and Easter. Talk about awkward.
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While we are on the topic of Easter (What a transition. They should call me Segway Soup) I should tell you about my Easter Sunday with the Sobel's. The plan was to head over to my grandparent's house, and hear some more stories about the man, the myth, the legend himself from Grandpop, and maybe watch Grandmom dunk a little (If you're wondering, Grandpop had to take ESPN off their cable package for this month, just so Grandmom wouldn't get mad at the attention Britney Griner is getting for her achievements this tournament. Grandmom would posterize her, and we all know it). Unfortunately for Grandpop, Jeffrey J. caught wind of the latest blog post and let him have it for giving me all the information that I used. He and Uncle Kevin told me Grandpop's daily itinerary, which goes like this:

Wake up
Check the Soup Kitchen
Nap
Wake up
Read the Inquirer
Nap
Wake up
Check the Soup Kitchen
Eat
Shower
Sleep
Repeat

I'm going to be blunt here. That's probably the bossiest schedule I have ever heard of in my life. Granted he doesn't get out of the house much, except when he goes to Flyers games, but at least he is as loyal a fan as they come (to my blog and to the Flyers).

In other news, Uncle Kevin won the annual "Hit your Egg on the Other Person's Egg and Whoever's Cracks Loses" contest. If that doesn't sound like drama-filled family fun, I don't know what does.
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With Opening Day tomorrow for the Fightin's, I thought it appropriate to relive some of last year's triumphs. While I couldn't find a solid video of J-Roll's walk-off in Game 4 of the NLCS (I was there. Greatest moment of my life? Yes) I could find the Postgame Live Crew's reaction to it. I just wanted to point out that while Barkann and Ricky Bo were, as you can see in the below video, legitimately freaking out, Dutch Daulton barely reacted. It's pretty obvious why. If you aren't familiar with Darren Daulton, he has been said to be a little crazy. In short, he claims to have visited the future. While on postgame live, he said the Phillies would win the National League pennant (interestingly enough, he never said the Phillies would win the World Series, which they obviously didn't). The reason he didn't react? Simple. He already saw it happen.



Always Serving,

Sobel Soup