Ain't All Sunshine and Super Bowls for Steelers Fans! (Part I)

On Sunday, most of you are able to catch your team wherever you are throughout your afternoon. 

Maybe your livingroom’s 55-inch screen is staring back at you and your pizza, wings and beer.  Perhaps that wall-mounted manspace tube is dwarving your laptop monitor that displays your web browser, complete with multi-tasking tabs for a live league scoreboard and each fantasy league in which you participate.  Maybe the local bar or restaurant offers half of their screens for your orange and brown, half for the unimportant rest of the league.  If you're in the car, maybe ittle preset button #6 on the console looks forward to the Sabbath, when it’s finally HIS turn to be pressed, bringing your radio dial to 97.5 WONE or the Buzzard’s 100.7, or one of the many Clowns-carrying AM frequencies.

For you less-than-diehards, Jim Donovan can keep your lawnmower, trash cans, air compressor and half-empty paint cans company with that old radio, now relegated to the garage shelving because time and its pesky technological advances have rendered it a relic, its dial forever tuned to 1590 WAKR.  Between the noisemaking of whatever it is you’re doing out there, your ear perks from time to time with Donovan’s upper register “Touchdown!”   Maybe you encounter his play-by-play throughout much of your errand-running as local hardware stores or grocers take an elevator or muzak break for Sunday football. 

Or, if you’re like me, you sometimes have family and friend obligations on Sunday afternoon.  To make sure your family knows you don’t actually suffer from Autumnal Agoraphobia, you figure you might want to oblige the invitations from time to time.  And that works out just fine, because what fall cookout have you ever been to that doesn’t have the game on somewhere?

Ahh, but here lies the difference between you and me.  Your game, via the countless options listed above, is available everywhere.  My game?  Not so much. 

I must bookmark certain websites to refer back to when my car’s radio decides that, for whatever peculiar reason, it isn’t going to find the same scratchy channel with which it found Bill Hillgrove (listen to Myron Cope [RIP] in the background!) last week. 

I must create a chart of the season’s schedule for the Browns and Steelers, highlighting which Steelers games I will have to find some other way to watch because the Browns play at the same time, and NFL broadcasting regulations require that no other game be shown against the local team’s telecast (read the rules here).  Thankfully, because of the large, local Steelers following, the black and gold are on local TV at least a few times a season for primetime telecasts, the Browns’ bye week, when Cleveland plays during the opposite Sunday afternoon timeslot, and the Browns/Steelers matchups themselves.

I must find the rest of the games via DirecTV’s NFL Sunday Ticket, a revolution in sports broadcasting with which I have a love/hate relationship (a topic for another day).  Someday, I’ll be a subscriber myself.  Until my basement is finished and I have a proper manspace in which to spend my Sundays, I must continue to freeload off of my friends’ subscriptions or find a restaurant or bar with The Ticket.  I’m not saying this is difficult, as many local establishments promise two or more Steelers TVs every week.  It’s because of the large, local Pittsburgh following that I am able to rarely miss a game…

…until Sundays like this one.  The family and friends obligation.  What to do when faced with a 2:00PM party?  The Browns are hosting Tennessee at 1PM, so there will be no local Steelers broadcast for their simultaneous game at Houston.  It wouldn’t matter anyway, as the party at which I’ll be celebrating the second birthday of a dear friend’s daughter, is full of Browns fans.  Compassionate Steelers fan Uncle Mike even found it within himself to buy the little one a Browns cheerleader’s uniform (never mind that the team, in one of its few similarities to the Steelers, has no cheerleaders). 

So, I face a dilemma. 

• Not SEE a down, but find a better Android app (I welcome any suggestions!) than the overrated Yahoo Live Scores that is currently on my phone?    

• Find a watering hole within minutes of the party’s location so that I can see as many minutes as possible before hitting the party?

• A combination of the two?

• Miss the whole thing and head to my traditional Sunday spot—my friend’s couch with the Steelers game on one screen and the RedZone channel on another?  (This option should also include “and sleep on the couch for a week?”)

What to do, what to do?

Mike’s Picks for Week 4 (a terrible 6-8 last week against the spread):

Detroit @ Dallas (-1): The Cowboys ran all over Washington last week…until it really mattered, when Tashard Choice couldn’t get a yard on consecutive carries and they settled for a six-field goal win.  Lions win here because their offense is far better.
New Orleans @ Jacksonville (+7): Saints offense is way too much for most of the league, Jags included. 
San Francisco @ Philadelphia (-7.5): I’m afraid to call it an upset special for the Niners, but Michael Vick finds something else to whine about as well as another exaggerated injury that forces him to miss the Niners comeback to at least cover.
Washington @ St. Louis (+2): There must be a lot of Bears fans in Las Vegas.  How else would you explain a Grossman-led Skins team and all of their offense this year giving only two points to one of the most banged up, disappointing teams of the young season?  Skins by a mile.
Tennessee @ Cleveland (pick’em): Hard to tell if either of these teams are for real.  Titans, only because Chris Johnson has to have a big game some time this season. 
Buffalo @ Cincinnati (+3): Bills move to 4-0, but still not to the top of the power rankings with a big win.
Minnesota @ Kansas City (+1.5): Matchup of mediocrity.  Arrowhead gets rocking (and so do my fantasy teams) with Dexter McCluster.
Carolina @ Chicago (-6.5): The Bears lick their Packer-wounds and continue Cam Newton’s return to earth, barely beating the spread. 
Pittsburgh @ Houston (-3.5): Shootout of the week is decided by just how bad the Steeler O-line performs.  Pittsburgh covers and hopefully wins.
Atlanta @ Seattle (+4.5): Falcons need a win desperately and Seattle needs Andrew Luck desperately. Atlanta by a lot.
NYGiants @ Arizona (+1.5): This is another stupidly low spread.  Arizona just lost to SEATTLE.  Go with the only Manning playing this season.
Miami @ San Diego (-7): Philip Rivers, the most overhyped quarterback in recent memory, gets it done.  I’d call a push but that’s quite a guarantee.  Go with the Chargers.
Denver @ Green Bay (-12): Denver is horrid.  Pack by at least 14. 
New England @ Oakland (+4.5): Patriots are peeved.  I would never bet against Belichick, much less an angry Belichick, though this one will be decided by not much more than the 4.5 because McFadden is running over everyone and New England’s defense isn’t stopping anyone.
NYJets @ Baltimore (-3.5): A tie would be really sweet.  I hate to see either of these teams win a game, so I refuse to pick one!
Indianapolis @ Tampa Bay (-10): Second consecutive week the Colts are 10 point dogs in a primetime matchup.  They’ll cover this one too, but lose.