George, my dog

George has a new love for blue! I swear he begged me to put it on.

Apology from Dennis

I apologize for the harsh comment I sent you CC, but it is bad being a Cleveland fan sometimes with all the bullshit we have to deal with. So, when I mistakenly took your comment as a bash of our city and organization, hopefully you can understand why I thought this way. I'm a diehard fan and we have been through so many losses, and heart breaks that it gets real frustrating. So I apologize again to you Chris and to Redskin fans, I respect your play, and would love to have you in Cleveland, but everyone here gets sensitive when it comes to our Browns because of our history of bad luck. Thanks again man. It was a mistake and obviously a misunderstanding because the comment was made clear the first time.

Take care.

Dennis

P.S. That was not me who posted those things above about you still being a douchebag. Thanks.

We posted the first email from Dennis and felt like it would be good to post his second.

Dear Dennis

Hey Cooley,

Your a f***ing douchebag.  How you gonna talk shit about Cleveland like that?  I hope we do trade for your ass just so I can boo you during home games.  Grow up and be a professional.  You never know we're your gonna end up this is the NFL so talking shit about a city you might end up in is kind of idiotic.  I used to have a good impression of you and be a fan.  Now I see what a faggot primodonna you are.  Peace hom0.

Dennis - FROM CLEVELAND

Dennis, 

I'm glad that I have a chance to respond to you, as well as the many other outraged Cleveland fans that have commented on this site.  I was nothing short of amazed when the comments to the trade rumor post soared past the 200 mark, but embarrassed for multiple Browns fans with their outrageous remarks. Dennis, you and many others accused me of talking shit about the Browns.  The comment that I made was "I would be pissed if I got my ass shipped to Cleveland."  Now if I would have made one negative statement about the Browns organization, the players, the team, or even the city I would have agreed with you. I clearly did not.

Dennis, by your brilliant writing style and obvious intelligence I should be surprised that you took my comment out of context, but I guess you just never know.  So for you I will clarify, really all I was saying was that I do not want to leave DC.  Any team or city could have been interchanged and I would have made the same statement.  "I would be pissed to go to San Diego, Baltimore, or even New England." Nothing wrong with any of their teams, fans, or cities, I'm just happy where I am.   Your, wait, (you're) kinda idiotic.

Oh! I almost forgot.  John Elway wanted me to ask you how it felt almost getting to the Super Bowl?  That must have been awesome!

Regards,

Chris

To everyone else who commented on the fantastic comments.  First class, all the way!  I had no clear opinion what amazing fans you guys were, but now I have a definite jealousy of anyone wearing that beautiful orange helmet.  Gooooo Browns!

Thanks Extreme Skins

John Elway Day

I caught two passes from Elway today!

Cooley Brackets

March madness is upon us and Chris and I have decided to do a little bracket challenge. Of course Chris thinks he is some wise analyst when it comes to making the picks. He even printed out expert brackets to cheat off. I on the other hand went with the "just pick 'em" method. The only college teams I have followed all year were North Carolina, Maryland, and Utah State. So I feel like my odds aren't that great, but who really knows? Here is what Chris has to say followed by a picture of his bracket. After that, my justifications and my bracket.

CHRIS: Nothing on television is better for me than the first two days of bracket watching greatness. The best part being that I know absolutely nothing about college basketball or really basketball on any level. Well I guess I know a couple things. One, I'm awesome at shooting 3's and two, I will dominate Tanner in our head to head bracket challenge. I know I have a couple crazy scenarios, but if I'm going to win it might as well be in a landslide. To be honest, I nearly picked Utah State all the way, it took a lot of self discipline to stick with Memphis. For some reason I feel good about Syracuse, again I don't know anything, but they did look good in the Big East tournament and that's good enough for me. Hope everyone had as much fun watching ESPN and making as many educated first round decisions as I did.

It's laughable to think that I could lose to Tanner. I'm 100% confident. Wawawow.

TANNER: The great thing about my bracket is the fact that I have 2 Big East teams and 2 ACC teams fighting for their shot at the title. Sorry Rob Lunn, but I have your Huskies losing to N.C. in the title game. I feel good about this pick and after seeing the President's bracket today, I feel that I am in good company. Prepare to lose Christy...I mean Chris

Trade?

It is rumored that there is a possible trade in the works for angry Jay Cutler.  There were a couple different internet possibilities.  The first would be with the Broncos, including Cutler and Scheffler for Campbell and myself.  Another was a three way trade between the Browns and in that scenario Campbell and I would go to Cleveland, Cutler/Scheffler would come here and the Broncos would get Brady Quinn, someone else and draft pick.

Trade talk is a weird wake up at 6:30.  Obviously something was said between teams to cause this internet trading shit storm.  I would be pissed if I got my ass shipped to Cleveland.  But seriously, when the internet is the first news I hear about something this big I would hope it to be speculation.  Really, it could have been a couple owners bullshitting and joking around about guys and someone leaked it.  No big deal.  I would be blown away to hear anything more.  It is nice to read extreme skins posts about not wanting me to go.  Thanks! 

By the way, I do get to hang out with John Elway a little bit this weekend at the Dulles Sports Expo in Chantilly VA.  I'm gonna bring a ball and ask him to smoke one for me.

Ghosts Don't Exist Casting Call Yields Over 200

More than 200 talented SAG and Non-union actors crammed into the Topaz Hotel (link) in Washington, DC Saturday and Sunday, eager for a chance to land a role in 19th + Wilson's first feature film, Ghosts Don't Exist. The film, executive produced by Redskins favorite Chris Cooley, continues to garner the positive attention of prospective cast, crew, and distributors alike. The steady stream of actors this weekend was testament to the interest in this unique psychological thriller.Producers Eric Espejo, Richard Friend, and Aaron Goodmiller—along with casting director Demetrius Parker—carefully observed and filmed auditions virtually nonstop from 10AM to 5PM both days. With their extended team on hand to sign the actors in and keep the auditions on schedule, the group still found themselves faced with a waiting room nearly thirty persons deep throughout the day—a good problem to have when casting. "We had 96 auditions on Saturday alone—which was more than all of our previous (short film) casting calls combined" mused Goodmiller, who started the company in 2001. On Sunday, that number ballooned to 122. "We had a great turnout and are going to have some tough decisions to make," Parker added.

Ironically—and certainly regrettably—the team actually had to turn a few actors away. With the waiting room and lobby still filled to capacity after 3PM, the group realized that they'd have to cut off any additional sign-ins in order to wrap up by 5PM. "The hotel was extremely gracious to allow us to use the space," said Goodmiller, "but we did have to keep our end of the bargain and be out by 5PM." He added, "Some of the auditions were a bit loud; we didn't want to scare the hotel guests. Literally."19W marketing specialist Nancy Yee elaborated. "Unfortunately, one of the inherent risks with the open casting call format is the steady stream of arrivals throughout the day," she explained "We obviously hoped to see every single person who came out. The guys were averaging about 14 auditions per hour, which was about as fast as we could hope for." Nonetheless, those who couldn't make it to the audition in time are encouraged to email headshots and resumes, and to submit their auditions online via YouTube—where the team had already received submissions from as far away as Spain and Sweden, even before the casting call doors were opened.

The producers and everyone at 19th + Wilson sincerely thank everyone who came to the audition, the Topaz Hotel for providing the venue, and the extended team who tirelessly dedicated their entire weekend to this successful event.

My New Boat

Fatpickle: Sheriff Cooley Winners And IMDB Challenge

Thanks to everyone who participated in the "Sheriff Cooley" contest, it was an awesome response and there were a lot of great ideas. One of the coolest things about blogging is the interaction and thoughts that are spurred from each post. For instance, we have learned that taking a picture of your private parts results in about a million hits and late night talk show monologues. Talking derogatory about a rival hockey player results in the steel city breaking bad on you personally, and some of the worst photoshopping I've ever seen. (Some dude actually looked up gay porn for the one picture, how'd he even know where to find it?)

That being said, the "sheriff" posts didn't cause that kind of riot. It did however cause some serious movement on the IMDB Starmeters for those involved. The Starmeter ranks every actor listed on IMDB, based upon the searches for them on the site. Here is the effect that you guys had on the participants of the post in the week that the post came out.

Alex Karras moved from # 7,597(I was surprised he was that high) to #3,203

Chris Cooley moved from #246,368 to #165,712 (surging past Flo, the waitress from Dumb and Dumber)

Tanner Cooley moved from #1,015,929 to #358,918 (surging past Art Monk, who could forget his role in Jerry Maguire, "nice game Rod")

I think we are better than this, so I'm challenging you to go to work on IMDB, searching Alex, Chris, and Tanner and moving them up the Hollywood ladder. Here are the goals I've set for us to reach in the next week (help us baby Jesus, help us Tom Cruise, help us Maxim.com!)

Alex #1899 - 1 spot above Eugene Levy

Chris #29,967 - 1 spot above Brutus "The Barber" Beefcake

Tanner # 69,569 - 1 spot above legendary Sportscaster George Michael (who could forget him in Silence of the Lambs, I sure haven't and I remind him whenever I see him.)

Here are the winners from the contest. You can claim your prize by venturing over to my site http://www.fatpickled.com/, bookmark it to your favorites, then email me.

1st place - And winner of a signed 8x10 of Fatpickle is...Randow who came up with the combination of Pat (from It's Pat) and Gridiron.


2nd place - And winner of a signed 8x10 of Vladimir is...Xstatic4beer who not only has an awesome handle, but also gave us Uncle Buck and Big Wig.

3rd place - And the winner of a signed 8x10 of the man currently over 150,000 spots behind Paula Deen on the Starmeter(in his defense she can do things with a green bean that is heaven) is...Tony Corsini who brought us Spicoli and The Helmet Knocker.

Congrats to all, there was some really good ones and it was a difficult choice.

I'll be back sometime next week to reveal how we did in the IMDB challenge, and to talk about Redskins fans just like you and I (well kind of.)

Cheers and Hail

FWG: The Austrian Night Life

One of my teammates enjoys a smoke, before practice.

I'm not really sure where to start with this post.Maybe the oddity that the buzz at practice wasn't that "Ze Americans are finally in pads, ja??" but rather that "Tonight ve get ze Americans to drink ze beer."

Ze Beer in this case is, would be Austrian Beer. Murauer and Steigl. Maybe I should back up.
All week, our Austrian teammates told us that we were invited to the "Uni-party." I thought maybe I was hearing them wrong, but I didn't know what I Uni-party was. Turns out it was the "University Party." The part to kick off the semester.

I don't know about your collegiate experience, but I'm pretty sure that the higher ups at UConn never turned our student-union over to a beer sponsor, invited in a DJ, set up the place with seizure inducing strobe lights, turned off the no-smoking sign and let everyone from age 14 to 35 in. But, hey...that was just UConn (who knows what the crazies at BYU are up to on a Friday night).
So its finally Friday night, practice lets out, and its time to go. We hop in our car (the worst car in ALL of Austria.

1984 "NEVADA"(yeah, I mean what kind of car would you buy with YOUR signing bonus...)

And we head to a teammates "flat" to have some beers before we head out. I will interject a few points of emphasis here:
1) Austrians take their beer very seriously
2) Never call an Austrian person German.

Continuing...
As the beer starts to flow, one story I was told by a teammate stuck out..
I asked Danielle, "So why American Football...why not soccer for you?"
"It is because, vell...I like to hit somebody....ya. I like to smash them"
"Oh..."
"Ya you can't smash them in soccer, but in football...ahh beautiful, no one gives a fuck, yah!"
(I'd like to argue with him, but this Austrian just gave the Cliff-notes on why everyone should play football instead of soccer)
but then Danielle (a 6'5 185lb receiver) said something even better...
"So, I know NFL Players"
"What?" I said, almost choking on my beer.
"Ya, my girlfriend iz...umm...American-Samoa"
"Okay?"
"And her mom asked me, "Danielle-you play American football" and she vas on ze phone with her coo-zin, so I said "jah, I play American-Football" so she puts me on ze phone viz dis guy. And he said, "Allo! I am in NFL"
So I said, "Oh! Can you get me Patrick Willis's Jersey and Autograph!"
So he said, "Sure"
So I said, "Who is this?"
and He said, "Shawne Merriman"
so I said, "Oh, okay. Make sure ze Willis jersey is a large. Danke!"

He asked Shawne Merriman for a Patrick Willis jersey. Holy shit.

Only in Austria.
Ciao!