Bottoms Up!

A fan's guide to the team you've always been wise to ignore:

Do you guys have any history? The Eagles have never won the Super Bowl. What's on the line historically here? Who is considered the greatest (post-Chicago) Cardinal of all time? Is there anyone particularly beloved who might do the coin flip to a raucous crowd?

As mentioned before, the Cardinals' history is a endless succession of dreadful, irrelevant seasons, both in Arizona and in St. Louis. But, for the sake of discussion, considering everyone else other than me who grew up or lives near St. Louis moved on from the Buzzsaw years ago, let's stick with the last two decades in Arizona.

The most popular player is, without question, Pat Tillman, but he's sadly not making any guest appearances. (There's a statue of him outside the stadium.) The only other post-St. Louis Cardinal to make the Pink Taco's Ring of Fame is Aeneas Williams; it wouldn't surprise me to see him make an appearance Sunday. As you might suspect, he had only one winning season in a decade at Sun Devil Stadium.

But history, as a team? Losing, losing, losing, with few fans around to witness it. With the Buzzsaw's win over Carolina, there is now only one team in the NFL that has never reached its conference's championship game in the Super Bowl era: The Houston Texans. (Even the Lions have made one, back in the 1991-92 season.)

Which is one of the reasons I'll be rooting for the Cardinals this weekend, despite the fact that they put one of the coolest examples of sportsfan superstition ever in jeopardy. Thankfully, cooler... hips?... prevailed. I also think it's cool that the Cardinals' new stadium is called the "Pink Taco" by fans who still rue the day an innocent chain of Mexican restaurants was denied their constitutional right to name a stadium after their corporation. Beats the hell out of "M&T Bank Stadium" and "McAfee Coliseum," to say nothing of "Enron Field."

Now I understand that scene in Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay! It was a Panther fans' gameday party! If you don't know what I'm talking about, check out this report which, confirming all "the end of the world is nigh" predictions, actually exists. I haven't seen such a fine example of journalistic professionalism since yesterday!