Dates and Towns to be announced soon. Let’s get excited anyway.

Football Prognosticator Extraordinaire

Clearly, the tide has turned beyond reason. The dogs are howling at the gates of progress. Men with jowls huddle in boardrooms and ask each other if we are going to get our group of young men to completely humiliate any other group of young men, how will we do it? Who will we choose? Indeed, what talent available expresses the maximum amount of intensity, speed, achievement and personal integrity that our organization prides about most?

Is he a boy of faith? Will he need to be watched? Can he go to bed early and take care of himself well enough to execute insanely difficult physical tasks for us over the course of a large contract? On whom shall we believe?

1. Houston Texans – Jeoffrey Pagan, DL, Alabama

The moribund, hapless Texans would be fools not to fall on Alabama’s Jeoffrey Pagan with warm, open arms. “Come to us! Let not a yard pass beyond thine Pagan arms!” And the world, so longing for happy news from Houston, will say, finally they have found their leader. We will now look forward to seeing them on TV as often as the Vikings, because only a completely crazy person would wear those colors. And we love that. Which, getting back to the Texans, if anyone needs a Pagan to lead them, it’s the Red, White, and Blue Team from Texas. It reminds me of the time I saw a Dodge Durango with a vanity plate that read DURANGO. And hey, I get it, if I could afford a new one of those cars, I’d probably get that license plate too. All I’m saying is, I would have been way more impressed if that guy driving that car had been burning on FIRE as he zipped calmly through traffic, which, again is akin to the effect that Jeoffrey Pagan of Alabama would have on the Houston Texans. Done deal, Mr. Houston GM. I bet you’re like 26 and have no jowls. The hell with you. When Jeoffrey Pagan’s a monster, you owe me a steak.

2. St. Louis Rams – Marqise Lee, WR, Southern California

The Rams are in trouble, my friends. They are knights without a kingdom. Weekly, they run rampant among the doves of the air, looking for space amongst warlocks and thieves, and howled down at from on high are they. “The Rams may move!” They say! Again! The damn Rams! Just counterfeit kings needing a fancy pirate to break them out of the land where they live, which we all know is the XFL. We all know the Rams live in an alternate universe where the XFL survived with the Rams as the Yankees of dystopian football. To make this a viable option, the Rams will lean heavily on the fleetness of Marqise Lee. This warrior will float across goal lines like Nimbus on a Tuesday. Heaven needs no angels like Lee, for they need theirs to go more than 100 yards. However, in the dystopian heaven that is St. Louis, Lee will be Gabriel, and his dance a trumpet solo by Miles in the 80s, shuffling in circles around the goalpost, anon.

3. Jacksonville Jaguars – Blake Bortles, QB, UCF

Would anyone really be against the Jaguars being really good for a few years? I mean, wouldn’t that be a nice change of pace? Come on. Give the Jaguars a great QB and let’s forget about a LOT of other towns we’re a little too bored of hearing about. Like all the freaking ones at the bottom. And it’d be nice if they just showed up the Dolphins for depressing everyone by sucking all the time. Hey, hey magical transformation!

4. Cleveland Browns – Ha Ha Clinton Dix, DL, Alabama

Because “Ha Ha Goes To Cleveland” would be the greatest movie ever.

5. Oakland Raiders – Morgan Moses, (TO BE CONTINUED IN PART TWO!)

Take three years of songwriter’s life and boil it down to one day. Alex Battles’s Album contains the first recordings of ten songs sequenced by the time of day they were recorded. Originally released on June 14, 2011, Alex Battles’s Album became the first of the four albums in the “Manila Folder Boxed Set.” It will be re-released on iTunes, etc. on Tuesday, February 4, 2014.

I will be the MC for the Hank-O-Rama X at Rodeo Bar, on January 1, 2014 on New Year’s Day. Always a great time. See you there.

The Johnny Cash 82nd Birthday Bash returns to the Bell House with two nights of music on Friday, February 28, 2014 and Saturday, March 1, 2014. Both nights will be headlined by Alex Battles & The Whisky Rebellion and feature guest singers and classic films from archivist Clinton McClung.  This event has been a Brooklyn tradition since its inception in 2005.

Alex Battles played his first Johnny Cash tribute show a week after the Man In Black’s death in 2003. In 2004, he started The CasHank Hootenanny Jamboree, a monthly jam dedicated the music of Johnny Cash, Hank Williams, and other four-chord artists. The Johnny Cash Birthday Bash started in 2005 at a bar called Lillie’s on the Red Hook waterfront. From there the party moved to Southpaw in 2006, and finally to the Bell House in 2010.

This show has sold out every year since its inception. Advance tickets are strongly recommended. Fans may purchase individual tickets to Friday or Saturday or limited-edition two night passes for two nights of music. See you at the show!