First Grab Bag of 2025: Round up of 49ers, NFL, Warriors, Giants, College football updates, plus cyborg cockroaches??? Oh, and there is a doughnut crisis happening! Happy New Year!
- Colby Michaels
- Jan 16
- 6 min read
We're back! After some much-needed time off, and to prepare myself for the gathering of evil to pledge allegiance to kiss the "precious" ring to Sauron at Mordor (formerly known as the White House), this month, I needed some "me time" to prepare for "Survive 2025". Dearies, it's already off to a rocky start.
Before we dig into the sportsball, i'm sad to report the donut industry has been hit with troubles! First Krispy Creme was hacked, causing order mayhem, and I just recently read that Dunkin' Donuts is suffering a donut shortage at their manufacturing plants- i shall just mention the words "donuts" and "manufacturing plants" really should not be used in the came sentence; perhaps conveyer belt problems? I could live with that.
Now that the real world dark news is out of the way, time to catch up on the sports stuff!
For this post, it's gonna have a bullet-point feel, lest my fingers fall off, or y'all start dozing off without your donuts and coffee! Here we go:
Cal Bears: Yes, they did get one of the smaller bowl games, the "LA Bowl" , and played UNLV (Las Vegas). Before the game though, Cal's star quarterback, Fernando Mendoza decided to enter the transfer portal, and is now the Indiana Hoosiers starting QB for 2025. Quick rant on the transfer portal: The portal should NOT be open till after the last football game is played! I hate the transfer portal, because if you buy tickets to see a game with your favorite player/s, he may not be in that game! GRRR! Anyhoo, without Mendoza, Cal lost to those Vegas Rebels, 24-13. Good news for Cal, is that thru that same portal, they were able to sign a potential 5-star QB whose name has too many consonants for me to type out at this time; Once he actually plays for Cal, I shall learn to spell his name correctly. So for one last time, One last look at Fernando, as I, and many Cal fans will miss his athleticism and great personality:
Oh, the College Football Championship game coming up this Monday will end up with the heavily favored Ohio State Buckeyes against the the Fighting Irish of Notre Dame. Bullet points.
Golden State Warriors: Well, they started the season hot, but in the last few weeks, due to injuries (Jonathan Kuminga, for example, out for at least a month with an ankle injury), the team has slid into a range of bad vs mediocrity. As of this writing, they are below .500, and things have gotten so bad, that Steph Curry had to dispel rumors that he wants to be traded! Trade deadline for the NBA is February 6th, so things could get interesting in the Golden State locker room!
NFL: Well, the New England Patriots wasted no time waiting for Black Monday once their season ended Sunday, they fired their head coach hours after their last game of the regular season- Damn! Other teams that gave the ax on Black Monday and the following days were: The Las Vegas Raiders, the Jacksonville Jaguars, and after five years , Mike McCarthy is out as the Dallas Cowboys coach (about two years too late!). The NY Jets also have a coaching vacancy open as well. Oh, and the Tennessee Titans, for having the worst record, are scheduled to pick first in the NFL draft. As for the wild card playoffs, all the home and favorite teams won. A quirk about "home teams"; due to the the massive fires that were/are devastating to Los Angeles, the NFL moved the home team Rams game against Minnesota to Arizona, where the Arizona Cardinals loaned out their planes and practice field for the Rams players, family and staff....classy move by the Cardinals organization. Oh, the Rams, with the help of NINE sacks, whooped the Vikings, and will move on to the NFC divisional round.
San Francisco 49ers: Good news, based on the 49ers record (6-11), they will pick 11th in the 2025 draft. That's it for the good news, as this team was cursed the moment LB Dre Greenlaw ruptured his Achilles tendon while running out to play on the field late in the Super Bowl game early 2024. The injury bug took out a lot of our star players during the course of the season; 18 players in total spent some or most of the time injured. The 49ers also had off-field drama with contract signings, a player getting shot in an attempted robbery in downtown San Francisco, and on-field drama with a player refusing to play in a game (career ending move in the NFL), and basically mediocre play of both defense and offense, and especially special teams. Run defense, without Greenlaw (who is a free agent, but we want to keep him), was abysmal, the offense without key offensive weapons (was down to the 5th running back on the roster at one point, due to injuries) never fully clicked, and special teams, on punt and kickoff returns- yikes- not to mention our kicker, after returning from ....wait for it...injury to his kicking foot, was well, awful. So my immediate fixes once the season ended were to fire the special teams coach (that unit gave up a 55 point differential, worst in the NFL), and the Niners canned him! Next up was to fire the defensive coordinator (Head Coach Kyle Shanahan calls the offensive plays)....and he also got shown the door! The Niners have interviewed their former defensive coordinator, Robert Saleh, and Niner Nation so hopes he does return!! Quarterback Brock Purdy, after finishing the last year of his 1 million dollar per season rookie contract, is expected to get PAID, so there is a chance one of our star players may get traded to free up money for Purdy's new contract. I'll end this 49ers post-season autopsy with a couple of bright notes: Some of the defensive rookies showed promise, WR Juaun Jennings proved he is an elite wide receiver (I always knew he was good!), and rookie wide receiver Ricky Pearsall, he being the one who got shot before the season started, showed in the later games that he has the talent to be in NFL. And for that, he gets an eye candy pic!
SF Giants: To shore up their starting pitching, and add some veteran experience, the Giants and Buster Posey signed a one-year deal with Justin Verlander, who was quite the dominant pitcher in previous seasons. The Giants also extended one-year contracts to reliever Camilo Duval, first baseman Lamonte Wade Jr, and one of the Rogers twins, I thing the submariner one, (it is) who also just became a brand new father last week. Spring training just a couple of months away!
Formula One: The fastest motorsport season doesn't start for a couple of months ( I am jonsing!), but a bit of news came out that Franco Colopinto, who filled in for the Williams Racing team, has signed on as a reserve driver for Alpine! Also of note, former Mercedes driver and recent Sauber driver Valterri Bottas has agreed to become a reserve driver for his "home team", Mercedes. Both teams making these signings just in case one of their two primary drivers falters during the 2025 season.
Both the Golf and Tennis seasons have started, I rarely mention the golf unless it's a major tourney, same with tennis, but the Australian Open (first of the Big Four), has started, and next post I will denote which ranked players were upset/knocked out before the final.
Betcha thought I was gonna end with some Carlos Alcaraz visual- I've decided I'm going to randomly choose pics of athletes from the Paris Olympics, as I have a slew of unused ones. I choose this one because of what the caption says! :)
Oddities: Almost forgot to post about another sign that humanity is on the way out! I do love the good intentions of this story, but seriously, ya know once they figure out they have strength in numbers, the human/cyborg cockroach war is inevitable!
Oh, and a Heal Well to my friend Jason, who contrary to gossip, does have a heart, and that ticker needs work done- so sending positive thoughts and break a heel in the OR!
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