Hey there, With Leather reader, were you one of the lucky, forthright individuals who thought a hologram-embedded band could be scientifically proven to enhance balance, flexibility and strength because Shaq and Drew Brees and some tennis players said so? Did your brain trick you into thinking someone would sell super-human strength for only $29.99? Do you play those Nigel West Dickens missions in Red Dead Redemption and think, “hey, this guy’s onto something”? Then you’ll love this quote from TMZ, which you probably already read:

Power Balance — the company that allegedly duped athletes into believing its bracelets could provide super-human strength — is about to take a $57 million dollar hit in a lawsuit filed by people who called BS on the product … TMZ has learned.

Now, sources with direct knowledge of the situation tell TMZ … the company has reached a settlement worth $57.4 million, intended to compensate all those who were misled into buying the product.

And it gets worse for PB — we’re told the company will be declaring bankruptcy and plans to fold up shop altogether.

You can order a Power Balance Bracelet today via Amazon for $2.60, a 91% discount. And hey, just because there’s no scientific evidence to back it up and the phrase “holograms which are embedded with frequencies” is meaningless doesn’t mean those 33 five-star reviews are invalid. Right? Uh, right? Sh*t, now what am I gonna tell my friend at the mall kiosk?

Everything’s a placebo, though, isn’t it? Eventually we’re going to find out we don’t even need food, we’ve just convinced ourselves that we’ll starve to death if we don’t have it. If I can’t trust a Shaq-endorsed mega bracelet, what can I trust?

Last night’s 2011 NFL season debut between the Green Bay Packers and the New Orleans Saints was about as perfect as a game gets. It was a shootout between the last two Super Bowl champions, displaying two of the greatest – if not the greatest – quarterbacks in the NFL, and it went right down to the wire, with Green Bay ultimately prevailing 42-34. It was a gambler’s dream, so long as you’re the type of gambler who didn’t bet on the Saints. If you stuck to the over/under, you’re probably a happy person today.

But I have a few quick thoughts before we get to the recap of the stuff that really mattered:

- On what planet do you choose to run the ball when you’re on the 1-yard line with zero seconds on the clock after you’ve just been handed the ultimate Christmas Day pass interference penalty? And I’m not asking this because I have Jimmy Graham and that clouds my logic.

- Is Aaron Rodgers going to be so awesome this season that fantasy owners will have to worry about him playing less time toward the end of the season after the Packers wrap up the NFC North with ease? Yes.

- The Packers and Saints are probably the two fan bases that I hate the least in professional sports while having absolutely no allegiance to either team. I imagine Lambeau may have been the nicest place on Earth last night.

And that’s really all I’ve got because I’m just so content with last night’s game from a fan perspective. So let’s hit the recap in pictures, shall we?

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With the NFL Lockout behind us like an angry Aryan inmate, most of us have begun our annual preparations for our fantasy football drafts. That is, unless you’re in one of those leagues that already drafted because your commissioner is an impatient d*ckhead, who probably has a wife he only married because she was pregnant, so he needs anything he can get to distract him from reality. If that’s your case, then I’m sorry but this won’t help you.

In all honesty, this probably won’t help most people. So what is this then? It’s my own hastily organized fantasy football position rankings, based on biased logic, gut feelings, and many years of fantasy football angst. All this week and next, I’ll be breaking down each position by telling you which players are the best of their class, will give you the best value in later rounds, will cause you to have fits of rage and disgust, and will help you look smart in front of your friends when you draft them. Now, keep in mind – I’m not an expert. I’m not even a guy who knows stuff. I’m just a dude who makes an occasional funny joke and has vague opinions.

But I’ve won a few leagues over the years and let’s face it – we all live for this sh*t. And we want to read every possible ranking and mock draft that we possibly can before we sit down with our notebooks, laptops, magazines and all-around utter hopelessness. For most of us, it’s validation. For the rest of us, it’s just a way to make worthless games fun. Either way, welcome to my first installment of Burnsy’s Bad Advice: Ranking Your Fantasy Football Quarterbacks. And yes, I’ve based my choices entirely on female celebrities. Because why wouldn’t I?

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Yesterday, Minnesota Vikings punter Chris Kluwe was seemingly the first NFL player to respond to allegations that Peyton Manning, Drew Brees, Vincent Jackson and Logan Mankins were seeking special treatment (a la Reggie White in 1993) through their antitrust lawsuit with 6 other players. Manning and Brees reportedly wanted to be exempt from the franchise tag for the rest of their careers while Jackson and Mankins wanted to either be outright free agents or receive $10 million each for their troubles of last season. And as you can see from the Drew Brees Tweet above, it may not be true.

Boston Globe reporter Greg Bedard also Tweeted a few hours prior to Brees that the four “douchebags”, as Kluwe so wonderfully put it, had backed off of their special demands. But as Pro Football Talk pointed out last night, the reason for the special treatment claims is a whole lot simpler than we should have even thought.

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Heading into the weekend, there was a good feeling in the sports world that the NFL Lockout was so close to lifting and that we wouldn’t have anything to worry about. Expectations were so high that the World Wide Leader was reporting that teams could have been negotiating with and signing undrafted free agents and their own free agents as early as yesterday, while others even believed that the lockout could be completely over by the end of this week, thus sparking the greatest, most bombastic free agency period in professional sports history. Turns out that was all a big bunch of poop. You can thank Peyton Manning, Drew Brees, Vincent Jackson and Logan Mankins for that.

For starters, Jackson and Mankins, who both sat out for most of last season due to failed contract negotiations, have their own specific demands:

Yahoo! Sports has learned through multiple sources that the agents for wide receiver Vincent Jackson(notes) and guard Logan Mankins(notes) have requested that their players either become unrestricted free agents when the lockout is over or that they receive $10 million each as part of the settlement. (Yahoo!)

Manning and Brees, though, want to make sure that they can never be given the franchise tag. Manning just received the Colts’ tag in February before the lockout began and Brees would most likely receive the Saints’ tag after this season when he becomes a free agent.

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The NFL and its players agreed to extend their collective bargaining agreement by 24 hours yesterday, making midnight tonight the new zero hour for the football apocalypse. NFL kommisar Roger Goodell has been whining for months about what a bad deal this had been for the owners, but I guess it’s still good enough to extend by a day. But El Roge will have more to complain about soon if the league’s most famous players decide to sue the league.

If the NFLPA eventually decertifies and enters antitrust litigation with the NFL, it will form ranks behind arguably its three premier field generals.

According to multiple outlets, including NFL Network and ESPN, QBs Tom Brady, Drew Brees and Peyton Manning would be the union’s lead plaintiffs in any kind of antitrust suit.

–Game On!

People will sit on pins and needles for the rest of the day, but here’s what will happen: Jeff Pash will drop a taco and it’ll be the third lead story on ESPN. Then there might be another extension so talks can break down during the weekend when fewer people are paying attention. Maybe it won’t happen exactly like that, but we will have a lockout. What’s a lockout? Think about Indonesian kids making Nikes for 12 hours a day. It’s almost the opposite of that.