30 Day Countdown: Day 13 - Which Fictional Character Would We Want Suited Up?

Before we start today’s (belated) countdown question, I have a quick pitch for all y’all -

The UWDP content that you love is generated by our writers and editors and, believe it or not, there was a time in each of our lives when we had the literacy level of a slightly above-average turnip. (The exception to that rule is Chris who, I have reason to believe, was born a fully-functioning SB Nation editor.) For some of the old farts, that was centuries ago. For others (cough, me), that time was much more recent.

I hear you all now - "What?! Gabey, there’s no way you’ve ever not been super talented at analyzing information and articulating your thoughts so elegantly in word form! Plus you’re so humble!"

Gosh, thanks guys, but as it turns out that’s not true. I did in fact have a handful of weirdly great English teachers in high school who were instrumental in me learning how to write good (and do other stuff good, too).

One of those teachers is Babs. Babs is an all-around cool person who just happens to work in a profession wherein her whole day revolves around teenagers, who we can all agree are easily the worst demographic. So the fact that her students all leave that class way better than they had been in just about every way and thinking she’s a total badass? Anyone who can do that is in the top .0001% of people-with-crazy-skills-that-I’ll-never-have.

Anyways, as if that weren’t enough, she’ll also soon be spending three days participating in the Tour de Pink, a fundraising bike ride to raise money for kicking cancer’s stupid face in.

And you guessed it - I’m about to politely ask you (yes, you) to consider donating to this super-ultra-mega-worthy cause. If we got $1 for every page view on this thing, we’d raise over $1,000 in less than 24 hours. Personally I think that’s pretty rad.

Yes it’s a cliche, but there really isn’t any amount too small, even if it’s just a penny. Unless it’s a Canadian penny, because those things are useless.

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Okay, now on to Day 13 of The Best F#@&ing Countdown Ever. (Seriously, why hasn’t that title caught on yet?)

Remember that one time Sayler warned you about upcoming fluff pieces? And then that other time I validated his warnings about upcoming fluff pieces? Yeah, well that’s about to happen again.

See, Chris assigned Day 13 to me as "Streaks to Fall?" but, since, among others, The Streak That Shall Not Be Named and the potential of it being broken has been discussed ad nauseam the entire off-season, I felt that a) we probably wouldn’t be bringing anything new to the discussion and b) I would rather bash my head in with an ice axe.

And really, the answer to that question is simple: good teams win games. The end.

Since I answered that question with such ease, the rest of today will be dedicated to (remember that fluff piece warning?) something else...

Which fictional character would you most want playing for the Dawgs?

A) Mr. Robinson - Saturday Night Live

I’m not sure if Mr. Robinson would make a very good player, but what about as a coach? He does seem to think out of the box — a valuable trait in a coordinator. For every "Fire Smith!" heard this last year, put a nickel into the New OC Rainy Day Fund and in a heartbeat we’ll have enough cash for Coach Rob. Plus he’d probably be the only one to top Mike Leach in the category of "Coaches Saying Things That We Definitely Weren’t Expecting."

B) Voldemort - Harry Potter

He seems like he would kill it, right? Given the inherent violence of football you would think a mega-powerful dark lord would be a natural. I can imagine the punditry now: "makes all the throws," "he’s a passionate competitor," "what happened to his nose?"

But if you really stop to think about it, Voldy’s kind of a little turd. Consider that he elected to tear his soul into seven pieces in order to attain immortality instead of trusting his God-given mega-powerful dark lord talents. Now that I’ve said that out loud, he sounds eerily similar to Tom Brady. So talented... Such a little diva... Though if this were Neuheisel’s team he’d fit right in.

C) The Channel 4 News Team - Anchorman

Technically this is cheating on account of they’re-not-one-person, but let’s suspend disbelief here (if you didn’t already do away with that paragraphs ago).

Since I trust you all watched the above clip with the intense focus rivaled only by a cocaine-powered recruiting assistant breaking down a 2019 OT’s game film, surely you noticed some of these guys’ key traits. For one, they have the chemistry required to be one heck of a unit. Since Ron Burgundy has the prototypical height and build of an NFL-ready quarterback, let’s assume they’ll be offense.

Now take a look at how that bunch delivers hits. If those four aren’t phased by taking a lead pipe et al. to the face, getting slammed by a safety should be a piece of cake.

D) Elizabeth Jennings - The Americans

A KGB officer trained in taking down people twice her size? For the same reason that Petersen likes former wrestlers, I could see this working out.

A photo posted by The Americans (@theamericansfx) on Aug 8, 2016 at 11:40am PDT

To those of you unfamiliar, Jennings hits like a bad bitch and comes with the added bonus of having all sorts of espionage techniques at the ready. Thus, she could go all Bill Belichick on opposing teams minus the whole "getting caught" part. Between being the human equivalent of a rabid wolverine and being able to steal intelligence about opponents’ playbooks, perhaps she could finally bring the player-manager concept over to this side of the Atlantic.

E) Jack Bauer

Need I elaborate?

F) Matt Saracen

An underdog hero who comes from a broken household where he selflessly takes care of his grandma and rises from nothing to become the star quarterback of a football-obsessed small town in Texas?

Meh, who needs one of those?

The Verdict

Elizabeth Jennings

Of course we can all agree that it comes down to her and Jack Bauer. Who is this Saracen kid anyway?

What gives Jennings the edge is a few things. Besides the fact that she’s basically a professional cheater (not unlike my grandma at Uno), she also brings the mental A game that Bauer simply cannot compete with. After all, being a Russian spy in America takes some serious brainpower that involves more than just beating the ever-loving crap out of people. And keeping that cover for 20 years means she’s all the more able.

Plus she’s shorter and a woman, which means a lower center of gravity. We all know how that works out for Myles Gaskin. (Hint: Really well.)

For anybody who stuck through this whole thing, I’m quite sorry.

Next one, I swear, will be a real life non-fluff piece article. Though I can’t promise the same from Sayler — that guy will do anything to get away with crap like this.

But until then: Do good things, don’t do bad things, and bow down to Washington.