Everyone has his or her (I knew our feminist exec editor would add that second pronoun, so I thought I’d save her the trouble) fantasy. Mine has almost always consisted of some amalgamation of Michael Jackson videos, horse racing, golf with my father and witnessing any Tiger Woods defeat. And although during Thanksgiving I lost more than $200 at the race track, didn’t have the chance to play golf with my dad and ate it on the dance floor mid-spin move, I can assure you Tiger lost. And he didn’t even pull out a golf club.

No, this time the club wielder was his unbelievably gorgeous wife Elin. I mean, this women stops traffic and is the sole inspiration for the Rolling Stones’ “Start Me Up.” Apparently the egomaniacal Tiger wanted more from an already perfect life. So he decided to have an affair with some bimbo, and he got caught.

Three hilarious things ensured. First, El Tigre called the girl and asked for her to remove his name from her phone book. Now, where the hell is the logic there? If Elin already has her number, what does Elin care if the mistress has Tiger’s? Tiger must think if she doesn’t have his number they never had a three-year-long wild and passionate affair. Wouldn’t that be convenient. Even Bill Clinton thinks that’s a bad one.

Second, he was chased from his house by an enraged Elin with a golf club; she put a beat down on Tiger worse than the 2000’s put the beat down on David Duval’s career. His Escalade was destroyed, and the media melee began.

Third, he declined to play in his own tournament that benefits charity because a doctor told him not to. Are you serious, Tiger? You won the U.S. Open on one freaking leg. Your ACL was more broken then than your integrity is now. Your pain threshold is high. Apparently, your maturity level is low.

I don’t know if I agree with all the negative media coverage. It is not our business, and if they cover the bad, then they should cover all the good you do as well. Like when you donate millions to charity. But in the end, these stories sell. And I have a bone to pick with you, my man. Like not signing my autograph at East Lake. Revenge is sweet, Tiger. Revenge is sweet.

Now, it isn’t every day that soccer appears in OnFire. Frankly, along with hockey, we care about it as much as Carrot Top apparently cares about his career and reputation. But in this particular instance, we had to take a little jab.

Last weekend, Wigan Athletic, a Barclays Premier League team, got shellacked by Tottonham Hotspur 9-1. Hotspur’s nine goals are the most in one game. Decidedly embarrassed, the Athletic — or unathletic in this case — have decided to refund all of the proceeds from the game and give their fans their money back.

Why anyone would pay to see a team that could lose that badly is beyond our level of comprehension. (Similar to the way we have no idea how the Detroit sports landscape still exists, but that’s another story.)

Anyway, it’s commendable that the team has made this gesture and we hope that fans repay it with continued support.

We give the Athletic two weeks to start playing better before we revoke that statement.

2. Walmart shouldn’t offer deals on white linens anymore

OK, so hatred exists in the world, especially in sports. Sometimes it’s funny and sometime’s it’s not. Note: everything in this column is an example of the former. Anyway, a few hood-lums decided to resurrect the dumbest tradition in this country — no, it’s not the Detroit Lions playing on Thanksgiving Day — donning of the white robes of the Ku Klux Klan.

A few individuals — clowns — decided to march on a library spewing hateful slurs because Ole Miss refuses to play the song “From Dixie With Love” anymore. Apparently, the South will not rise again as they had hoped, but they do not want to wake up to the reality.

Fortunately,the protesters were vehemently booed off stage after about 10 minutes. But that doesn’t mean that Ole Miss is doing everything right. They are in a state that ranks last in education. In fact, to help prove this point, when protesters were told the KKK was at the library, they promptly asked “what the hell is that” and continued drinking.

Bam, got you, state of Mississippi.

3. Is Dick Vitale writing blurbs for TV Guide?

In perhaps one of the most groundbreaking pieces of evidence to surface that proves the Duke conspiracy, TV Guide, when providing information about last weekend’s Celtic-Magic game, gave us this: “J.J. Redick and the Magic visit ex-Duke teammate Shelden Williams and the Celtics in a 2009 Eastern Conference semifinals rematch.”

Redick doesn’t start and Williams is the second lowest paid player on the team. In no way does the description accurately reflect the key points of this game, nor does it excite anyone outside the cess pool of pretentiousness that is Duke University. That description is so boring, even Robert Byrd, the 92-year-old senator from West Virginia who has fallen asleep during many a debate, called in and claimed that he thought it was a little too much.

Also, a description like that is similar to describing a movie such as “Pulp Fiction” by saying, “John Travolta provides a spellbinding performance as an anxious husband when two gangsters ask for towels to clean a little blood from their hands.”

Umm, yeah that misses the point too. Let’s leave the writing up to more qualified people, TV Guide.

For months now, we here at OnFire have cried over The Rock’s decision to call himself by some god-awful nickname “Dwayne Johnson.” Apparently that nickname works well for movies like “Race to Witch Mountain,” which could clealry not support a dude named “The Rock.” The reason this is relevant is we have at OnFire have supported the WWE like wealthy indie kids support thrift stores. It’s real and we have taken enough criticism in the past for defending the legitimacy of the sport. Clearly, these guys are athletes engaging in the purest form of athletic endeavor that one can. Why cynics deny this is beyond us.

Each and every day these wrestlers combine high-flying athletic stunts with chair-bashing and unbelievable entertainment. So they say things like, “I’ll lay the smack down on your roody poo candy ass” or their signature stars perform “the pedigree.” It doesn’t distract from the real, raw emotional hate these wrestlers have for each other and are able to only show for two hours each week without ever seeming to have worked anything out on the side. It’s cool, we understand. And so does The Daily Telegraph, an Australian newspaper that sent a photo journalist to cover the Ric Flair-Hulk Hogan press conference in anticipation for their next brawl.

After a fight broke out at the event, the newspaper wrote, “Wrestler Hulk Hogan has been badly injured after a violent bloody brawl broke out at The Hulkamania promotional press conference at Star City today … [t]he press conference veered violently out of control today as Hogan and ring rival Ric Flair let their animosity break into a full-scale bloody brawl … Media were stunned as Hogan’s head began bleeding profusely and confusion broke out when the veteran wrestling star was unable to get to his feet.” Seriously, and we thought only FOX News spouted falsehoods and called them legit. We were wrong.

The only thing more crazy about this is the fact that Ric Flair and Hulk Hogan can still draw an audience. They are a combined 250 years old and haven’t had definitive muscle tone since before Australia was recognized as a country. Or continent. Whatever, who knows that anyway? 2. 60 percent of the time, it works every time Researchers from Indian University and Ball State University have done some research on college basketball referees. They concluded that essentially they suck. Their study focused in the certain facts such as if their is a great discrepency in foul calls, it is very likely that the next foul will be called in the team with fewer fouls against them. Now, it makes sense that Indiana would perform this study. Ever since Bobby Knight aka the greatest coach ever was fired from IU, the team has been gasping for air. Yes, we know about the Mike “Knight” Davis final game, but that hardly counts. They will do anything to prove it isn’t IU itself that sucks, but the officials. Althoug that logic could apply to the banking crisis — the regulators slept at the wheel while thousands of people stole billions of dollars — it doesn’t work here. In fact, in the age of Gladwell, 85 percent of time time, you can prove 30 percent of your hunches. Could we stop with such mindless research and focus on things that are important. Or at least actually improving your basketball team.

2. The Invisible Hand

For all of the heat that NBA, MLB, and NFL officials take, rarely do they ever make mistakes as egregious as the one made in Wednesday’s World Cup qualifying match between France and Ireland. Tied at 1-1 in extra time, France went on the attack with a late scoring opportunity that was clearly offside, but not spotted by the linesman.  Then just seconds later, star French striker Thierry Henry knocked the ball out of the air with his hand before crossing to a teammate who scored the game winning goal.  As result, Ireland was robbed of a trip to South Africa in 2010.  Americans have long mocked soccer in part because of its tolerance of dives and the frequent occurrence of referee bribery.  The sports’ trend of poor officiating incidents such as this one is just one of many reasons why soccer continues to be a laughingstock in the U.S.

Recently, the Michelle Wie Dynasty tied the Shun Dynasty as the most short-lived one in history. Wie, now 20, was hyped as a 10-year-old kid after she became the youngest player to qualify for the Women’s U.S. Amateur Public Links Championship. Within a few years, she set records for the youngest player to make the cut in an LPGA event and the U.S. Open. Girl had game, and she decided to next tee it up against the men.

Granted, she missed the cut in those men’s events by more shots than it would take a man the size of young, fat Jack Nicklaus to get drunk, but that’s beside the point. She was the “It Girl” — sans the short curly hair of the endearing (not really, she was gross) Clara Bow. Some guy named Arnold Palmer said she’d have as much influence on the women’s game as Tiger Woods does on the men’s. We’d argue Tiger has more influence on the ladies.

And throughout her teens, Wie struggled to make it on tour. Perhaps a $10 million contract, millions of people expecting things and the limelight got to her.

But the phoenix rose, and in a big way. The Big Wiesy dominated at the Solheim Cup (the women’s version of the Ryder Cup). She won three points for the victorious U.S. team and this past weekend, Ms. Wie won her first title, the aptly-named Lorena Ochoa Invitational. We say “aptly” because it is named after the best player in women’s golf two years after Wie withdrew from then-No. 1 Annika Sorenstam’s tournament because she was not going to break 88. For those of you who don’t, a pro not breaking 88 is like a vice presidential candidate not being able to state more than one Supreme Court case on national television — pretty embarrassing. (Let’s just hope that same woman doesn’t do the equivalent of win a tournament though.)

Anyway, congratulations to Michelle Wie. You are now only 626 years shy of tying the Three Sovereign and Five Empires reign from prehistory. Take your vitamins.

2. What ever happened to the three “Rs”?

You gotta love those academics. Nothing is too mundane, too off-the-wall or too obvious for them to turn into research. We now present Exhibit A.

A recent Ohio State study showed that fans with exceedingly low expectations of their teams enjoy the games much more. Well, duh. We didn’t need a team of researchers to tell us this, just the ticket-sale data from the past 80 years at Wrigley. In case you haven’t noticed, the phrase “lovable loser” is thrown around to describe just this “phenomenon.”

Apparently, the study continues, winning is more exciting if you don’t think your team is going to win in the first place. Again, this makes perfect sense, and a cursory glance at our social lives would let us know that. For example, we’re always thrilled when we get the girl — often because we’re not expecting to move past the “Hey, my name is X” stage. If girls were throwing themselves at us on a daily basis, well, the whole thing would lose some of its excitement.

Thank you, Ohio State researchers, for these absolutely mind-blowing and astounding findings. Don’t you dare come out of your ivory towers until you give us more information just like this — even if it means missing an unexpected win from your team.

3. Going against the grain

While 95 percent of the sports commentators across the country are on their high horse criticizing Bill Belichick for his decision to “go for it” on fourth down of the Patriots-Colts game, we would like to take this time to defend him. You have one of the best quarterbacks in football on your side, and maybe the best one waiting on the sidelines — why not try to keep him off the field? How many times do we see a team not stop an offense all day long, then play conservatively with a lead in the final minutes, only to hand the ball back to the same offense with a chance for a game-winning drive? Aren’t the Patriots’ chances of making the “fourth and two” pretty high there? Either way, we’re impressed the Belichick went with his gut instead of being afraid of the media’s second guess. Bill, we salute you.

In this issue of OnFire, we will pay tribute to the wonderful television shows and characters so often found on the prime television of VH1. In this first segment, we will revisit our very favorite current sexcapade romp between Brooke “No guy has ever paid this much attention to me” Hundley and Steve “What was I thinking” Phillips.

Just to refresh your memory, Phillips decided to cheat on his incredibly hot wife to fool around with a young ESPN intern. It blew up in his face. In case you haven’t seen her, we’ll save you the description. But it would be similar to his wife sleeping with Mo Vaughn. Yes, it’s that bad.

Hundley appeared on “Good Morning America” a few days ago to tell her side of the story, explain how hurt she has been and drag out her 15 minutes of fame Can you say “book deal?” If you need a ghostwriter, I can pinch hit. I won’t even charge you for your services.

We hadn’t been following this story for a while, but apparently the late night comedians had been having their — comedic — way with her. Similar to us, thank you very much.

Anyway, in her interview, she referenced a Jay Leno bit that put her over the edge. So, instead of just zooming past what made her so upset, as she was crying, ABC decided to show the entire clip that disturbed her.

Now, we will admit that Leno takes an incredibly cheap — albeit hilarious — shot at Hundley, but it did not need to be shown. The girl was crying. How much do we need to exploit people in our society to gain attention for our network? (See any Vh1 television show, we guess for the answer.)

At the end of the day, Hundley is a home wrecker, Phillips an absolute moron who is now jobless and Phillips’ wife a hot single MILF. Come to think of it, this didn’t turn out so bad after all. If Phillips’ wife ever decides to do reality television, perhaps I may need to sign up.

2. Chance at Love

Mike Tyson has never done anything that didn’t shock, upset or surprise anyone after it was reported. The unbelievable boxer-turned rapist-turned-ear biter-turned disgrace has fallen harder and further than the stock market since 2007.

Yet, his struggles have left us so numb to any ridiculous story that this most recent story doesn’t phase us.

Pulling his best Jay Dangle impression, Tyson pulled a citizens arrest on an Los Angeles photographer in the middle of the LA airport.

Now, this wouldn’t sound so bad if it wasn’t because Tyson accused the photographer of hitting him.

Are you serious? What citizen in their right mind — not a Tyson-like brain, a normal brain — would ever strike another human being of that size? Didn’t that guy see “The Hangover?” Yeah, he’s fierce.

The photographer accused Tyson of hitting him first and also threw out a citizens arrest. Uh oh, we hope the cops can figure this chaotic scene out.

Tyson may be in violation of his probation for drug use. We say, let him go. We mean, is putting him behind bars really going to heal him? Is he even at a point where normal methods of recuperation can solve his obviously ridiculous craziness. That’s like saying someone can actually shut Rush Limbaugh up.

It just isn’t going to happen. And we hope not because Tyson needs money and will definitely wind up with a TV deal soon. Only one station would air it.

3. A Surreal Scene

So, when you are a star Division-I SEC athlete, life is pretty good. You’re like the celebs on “Surreal Life:” well-known, but not yet that big where people truly care about you.

Well, upset that they had not yet reached that next level of fame, Nu’Keese Richardson, Janzen Jackson and Michael Edward decided to rob a convenience store. Unfortunately, they wore their Tennessee gear in the middle of Tennessee. Talk about the perfect crime. And these guys really have what it takes to go pro?
They used pellet guns as props and a Prius as a getaway car. Nothing says scary, manly theft like those two things.

In the end, they stole no money. So stupid, just like the “Surreal Life.”

Welcome to the first-ever Michael Jackson themed OnFire! Every headline is not only the title of one of his songs, but also my reaction to the story following it. Let’s begin with an obvious one.

What is it with people I like and weird skin issues? First there was Michael and his vitiligo that shocked the world more than his moonwalk. What was more shocking was see a white guy — him— dance like that later on. And now, another of my favorites, Sammy Sosa, who appears on my personal Mt. Rushmore of misfit idols — along with Michael, Rush Limbaugh and Mick Foley — has apparently undergone some weird skin rehab.

Let’s just say whoever worked on his skin was either A) way coked out of his mind or B) decided to he would like to have a legitimate reason to say one the greatest catch lines of all time — Steve Urkel’s “Did I do that?”

Sosa, a native of the Dominican Republic, has always had a darker skin tone. Recent pictures of him make him appear as white as PC guy and as scary as the “South Park” incarnation of Michael Jackson. In fact, the only thing scarier about Sosa was his ability to crush a fastball — something else that was medically caused (cough, cough).

Why did he decide to go through a rejuvenation process for his skin? Perhaps too much sun over the years harmed it and he wanted to look good for his upcoming tryout for “Dancing with the Stars.” HD television has changed the game.

Regardless of the reason, Sosa looks like a fool — and I thought only a curveball in the dirt could do to him.
2. Speechless

Continuing with our Michael Jackson theme of this column with creepy, weird and strange activity, the above headline is straight from one of his better tracks off Invincible and also appropriately describes this next story.

Twenty-two-year-old Anthony Avalos had a nice high school basketball career but never managed to land an NCAA scholarship. So, at 22, he decided to re-enroll in high school — after already attaining a degree — to play some more hoops. He forged his birth certificate, enrolled as a junior and started to play some ball.

Beyond fooling the entire administration, he also fooled a 17-year-old co-ed who took a liking to the new young stud. He was like that cool new transfer kid who managed to scoop all the girls because he was new.

Never did he have anything cool to say or do, he just was the “new guy.” He would then proceed to swoop in, using this goodwill, and take all of the top girl prospects. Then, he’d talk about it in front of you until you burst and made a scene in the middle of the student lounge, leaving in a violent uproar and causing yourself a huge embarrassment. Damn you, Thor Steinhovden!

Eventually, the school caught onto the misspelling on his “birth certificate” and realized that Avalos wasn’t the age he claimed. Now, he has been charged with sexual misconduct — he took his fantasy a little too far. Always happens that way.

But look on the bright side, Anthony. To get an NCAA scholarship nowadays, you need to break almost every eligibility rule, so you’re cool, man.

Imagine being the son of Pepsi’s CEO at Emory University, an Oklahoma fan at Oklahoma State or Paris Hilton at a Motel Six. Wouldn’t you feel slightly out of place? Well, apparently these awkward feelings also apply to your footwear choices.

University of Central Florida’s most famous benchwarmer, Marcus Jordan — you may have heard of his father Michael — refuses to wear the Adidas shoe that the rest of his teammates are contractually obliged to wear. He chooses — you guessed it — the Jordan brand.

What kind of ridiculous message does this send? It’s like Michelle falling off the horse in the final episode of “Full House.” Come on, you were already bigger than Uncle Jesse and Uncle Joey combined — do you really have to be the center story in the finale? Once again, we see that the lucky sperm club is the only one to belong to.

2. Take it off?

Here at OnFire HQ, we have a few ways to promote staff bonding. There are the classic trust falls, some giggly truth-or-dare sessions and, of course, the occasional strip editing session — you drop an item of clothing for every misused semicolon or ellipsis. 

Now, to most people, this probably sounds like a pretty preposterous idea. But members of the Tampa Bay Lightning apparently wouldn’t bat an eye.

On Tuesday night, the team stayed after practice for a little friendly — borderline too friendly, perhaps — competition. Members faced off for a series of shoot-outs and every time the puck didn’t make it into the net, they had to toss some clothing to the sidelines. None of the guys took it all off, but we still find the whole event a little odd. Don’t these dudes see enough — you know, enough — of each other in the locker room? If the Lightning takes home the Stanley Cup, we’ll suspend all our judgment. In the meantime, boys, please allow us to recommend some trust falls.

In chronological order, the Tennessee Titans have assailed all
previous notions that they might be: 1) Super Bowl contenders, 2) playoff
contenders, 3) a .500 team, 4) a team that could feasibly lose to Notre
Dame.

On Sunday, in a titanic 59-0 loss to the New England Patriots, Vince
Young and Kerry Collins combined for two total passes completed for a
whopping negative 7 yards, with two interceptions and three fumbles. In
short: the two quarterbacks graciously passed to as many Patriots players
as Titans players.

The Pats slaughtered the Titans. Destroyed them. Beat them like a
dead horse. Made them look like those NFL Europe teams you like
to dominate by a score of 100-0 in Madden 2010.

The Tennessee Titans, who sported white-and-powder-blue throwback
jerseys to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the AFL, looked nothing
like the team that won that league’s first championship. The team looked
awful, amateurish, Lions-esque. Patriots players cheered on Tom
Brady, who threw an NFL-record five touchdown passes in one quarter,
boasting that he was back to true form. As we all know, running up
the score and embarrassing teams suits Brady well. At least it did in
2007 when the Pats when undefeated and won the — oh, wait, never mind
(David Tyree!).

Indeed, the score-until-the-opposing-team-cries mentality is back
for the Patriots. Says Coach Bill Belichick: “I know the score got out
of hand, but we were just trying to run our offense.”

“Got out of hand” might describe a college frat party, Bill. I think
the phrase you’re looking for here is “made Steve McNair turn in his
grave.”

But there is good news for the Titans! The season will be over in
10 games! The Titans this year are sad. Pathetic. Downright pitiful. You
have to wonder how a team could go from so good to so bad in one year.
Is Albert Haynesworth really that valuable?

Seriously. Detroit Lions wins this season: 1. Titans wins: well, you get
it.

2. He’s no Mr. Rogers

It wasn’t a beautiful day in the neighborhood for Erick Aybar and the
Los Angeles Angels. During the 10th inning of the ALCS Game 2, Aybar failed to touch second base during a routine double play, giving the Melky Cabrera and the New York Yankees an extra out in a game they would eventually steal (on the grounds of another second
base error).

Umpire Jerry Layne, whose eyesight is clearly impeccable, wouldn’t
cut Aybar the league-wide standard of a “neighborhood” play — i.e.,
where the player’s feet are in the “neighborhood” of second base for a
double play.

While there is no official rule on “neighborhood” plays in the league,
it’s a 99 out of 100 given for players. Like other unspoken rules, such as
not shouting “I enjoy making love to BLT sandwiches” on Emory’s quad,
you just don’t argue with this accepted norm.

In true New York media fashion, the Daily News and Post are
emphatically backing the New York ump Layne. Says Chad Piscaner:
“Aybar and the Angels learned that the ‘neighborhood’ play doesn’t mean
just being in sight of 161st street in the Bronx.”

On the other end of the play were SoCal outlets, blasting Layne for a
bonehead call. Says Halos Heaven: the Angels “once again [fight] the
rain, the cold, the Yankees … and their umpires.”

In all fairness, Layne absolutely made the correct call, but come on.
It’s like a fellow student pointing out to a professor that we’re drunk in economics class. It’s just not cool, man.

After the Halos’ inability to hit with ducks on the pond, they blew it
yet again with an error in the 13th, letting the Yankees take one more
step towards every other team rolling their eyes, bemoaning their own lame
payroll (oh, and letting the Yankees take another ring, too).

This is “beyond” baseball? OK, you know baseball is going to have
a great (read: uneventful) playoffs when the center of the media hurricane
is an ump that made the right call. How’s that for a change in sports
for once?

Now if umps start calling inside strikes on Jeter, we may have a natural
disaster on our hands. Oh well, at least we can dream.

You might remember Bill Romanowski as the all-pro linebacker, four-time Super Bowl champion and the only LB to ever start in five Super Bowls. Or, more likely, you just remember Romanowski as a roided-out nutcase who forced a teammate (TE Marcus Williams) to retire after he confronted Williams after a scrimmage play, ripped off his helmet and crushed his eye socket with a punch.

But apparently there’s more to Romanowski — just read his Twitter page. Last Sunday, Romanowski provided commentary on the games:

“Brett Favre is a true man. Watching the game.”

“Raiders gave up too many plays.”

“I think I need to train McFadden how to be strong.”

Of course, Romanowski would consider himself an expert on what it means to be a “true man.” Because, as everyone knows, being a “true man” involves heavy doses of assault and battery. And one wonders what sort of fitness program he really has in mind for McFadden, considering Romanowski’s own involvement with the federal investigation of BALCO.

Thank God Al Davis likely doesn’t understand Twitter, or Romanowski would be the next head coach of the Raiders. Or, better yet, maybe he would just have Romo and punch-happy current Raiders HC Tom Cable cage-match for the job. It would still be more entertaining than watching JaMarcus Russell struggle to master the forward pass.

2. Mangenius, part deux

If you’re a Jets fan, how do you feel about Eric Mangini right now?

The former Jets head coach tortured Jets fans for three years, alienating the media by holding closed practices, treating his players like children, stubbornly refusing to play anything but a 3-4 defense despite inheriting a team whose franchise building blocks (John Abraham, Jonathan Vilma) were 4-3 players, wasting Vilma’s Jets career and giving him up for nothing and (gasps for breath) sabotaging his own offensive line by driving veteran guard Pete Kendall out of town during his first pre-season, seemingly unable to handle coaching veterans who had actually been around the block and knew how to win without being babysat.

On the other hand, after leaving for Cleveland, Mangini has done more for the Jets in mere months than he did in his entire New York tenure. First, he traded his old team the fifth overall pick (Mark Sanchez) for pennies on the dollar (a late first-rounder, a later pick and three veterans who likely would have been waiver wire fodder in a few months anyway). Then, this week, he fills the Jets’ lone glaring offensive hole by giving them former pro-bowl WR Braylon Edwards for a mediocre receiver — former seventh rounder Chansi Stuckey — another couple late round picks and a special teams player.

So, Jets fans have reason to be conflicted. At least Browns fans, though, can’t be suffering from the same malady. After doing a redux with the Browns of his opening act with the Jets — cutting loose mouthy but talented veterans, in this case TE Kellen Winslow Jr., and forbidding his players to use cell phones in the locker room — Mangini’s squad is not only winless, but is in the midst of what looks to be an endless quarterback carousel. Which likely could have been solved if Mangini had never traded away that fifth overall pick to begin with. But, hey, then he wouldn’t be the “Mangenius” we all know and love (to hate).

3. The Yankees, on ice

The New York Islanders would very much like to be taken seriously. After drafting megastar John Tavares first overall this summer, signing three goaltenders in free agency to compensate for the zero NHL goalies they had last season and making incremental progress on their new stadium deal, the only non-Yankees sports franchise to ever win four consecutive championships would seem to be clawing their way back to respectability.

Until one realizes that they’re pumping out Nickelback’s “Burn it to the Ground” as their celebratory anthem every time an Islanders player scores a goal during a home game.

It would be impossible, in this limited space, to detail every reason why Nickelback is dreadful and represents the worst aspects of a North American music culture that increasingly stresses uniformity and cliche. Suffice it to say, however, that the hockey gods will be holding this against the Isles for the foreseeable future.

Fantasy football has already taken the world by storm. ESPN devotes hours to covering it; competitors in leagues spend even more time analyzing all the ways to score points. But these fantasy managers don’t care who wins and loses as long as their guys come out on top.

We here at OnFire have been huge Santana “Call me Frantana” Moss fans for a long, long time. Many other owners may refuse to draft him, but we have had much success in our two seasons together. So, for us, yesterday was bittersweet because we, unlike our soulless friends, care about my team. We even babysit their kids.

Santana provided us with more than 30 — yes, 30— points, leading us to an inevitable win against our staunchest rival. Despite his amazing performance, however, his team, The Washington Redskins, lost to the Detroit Lions. Yes, those same Lions who haven’t won a game since December 2007.

Real fast, just to put that into perspective: In the last 22 months, Kurt Warner came back from the dead, Michael Phelps won eight gold medals, we have had two different champions in every major sport and “Saturday Night Live” actually got a little better.

The Redskins have hardly had a stellar year. To begin with, some Native Americans are protesting their team name as an offensive slur. How is it in a world with “Family Guy” that there are still suits like this? Did anyone see the last 45 episodes to air since the Lions last won?

With the loss, the Redskins fall to1-2, but have seemingly lost more than that. It could be argued that to lose on that day to the Lions is the worst NFL performance ever — excluding anything John Madden said as a commentator each and every week.

With the win, the Lions are now1-2, but are far far away from ever becoming a serious contender for anything other than last place in their division. They’re the Rocketmen of the NFL, it’s going to be a long, long time. Perhaps the funniest thing about their situation is that 40,000 fans went to see the game. It was recorded as one of the lowest turnouts in years.

Our question is how in the hell did 40,000 people have nothing better to do than watch such a miserable game? In fact, why did anyone even want to broadcast or cover the event? The game was more meaningless than a column on Division-III basketball. If you broadcast/write about it and no one sees/reads it, did it really happen?

But we digress. Detroit, with a $95 million payroll, finally gave some joy to its city. But we think there are probably much better ways to spend that sum then on a team that is 1-18 in its last 19 games.

Like, maybe buying a few cars. We hear the industry has been kind of soft lately.

2. A personal tale

Many who have ever read anything golf related in these pages is familiar with our disdain for Tiger Woods. Now, we’ll admit, for years much of our hatred was based in observation and secondhand anecdote. But now we have evidence that he’s a total douche bag.

Luckily, we scored some clubhouse entry tickets to East Lake for the Tour Championship. In there, we chatted it up with Stewart Cink, David Toms and had the chance to see our Albus Dumbledore — Phil Mickelson.

But all of the sudden, we were told to evacuate the premises because his holiness — Woods— was coming in. Apparently, his safety would be compromised if a 21-year-old who can’t bench half his weight would be in his vicinity. Fine, we left. But what’s worse is that Woods was the only player not to sign any autographs. Everyone else — except Toms who went inside to watch an amzing LSU game — signed everybody’s request.

Moral of the story, Woods sucks and now we have proof. Great, great day of investigative reporting.