We’ve already shared a gallery of depressing pictures from Thursday’s Browns/Steelers game and an even more depressing set about their fans, so it’s no surprise that game’s head-to-softer-head collision that concussed Browns quarterback Colt McCoy would lead somewhere depressing, no matter what side you’re on — the league has decided to celebrate James Harrison’s fifth illegal hit against a quarterback in the past three seasons by making him the first player suspended for helmet-to-helmet since the rule’s emphasis.

“We’re disappointed, we’re disappointed for James,” Steelers coach Mike Tomlin said Monday. “Because we know, quite frankly, how hard he’s worked to play within the rules. He’s worked extremely hard to adjust his game. Unfortunately, the incident did happen, it was a penalty, we have to be accountable for that. He has to be accountable for that.”

The suspension is effective immediately, but Harrison has requested an expedited hearing and they’ve set a date for his appeal. Oh, and in case you wonder how he feels about the whole thing:

I guess rolling on the floor would’ve been seen as insincere.

If you missed the hit, you can check out the video below.

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For all intents and purposes, Cleveland’s 14-3 loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers wasn’t that big of a deal.

It was a defensive struggle. The Browns went into the game 4-8 against the 9-3 Steelers, so dropping a game on the road by only 11 points is pretty good. That’s sorta the running theme of being a Cleveland sports fan, you have to watch the Indians do well through June and finish the season clinging to second place in the worst division in baseball going “hey, this isn’t so bad!” Or the alternative, “CLEVELAND HAS WASTED THE LAST 20 YEARS OF MY LIFE, GO CLEVELAND.”

Because I’m not a Lead Football Analyst I can’t provide any insights you wouldn’t catch watching guys talk over a game, but what I can do is show you ten photos from the game and cut to the heart of the situation, bypassing photo service captions like “#18 makes a tackle on December 8, 2011″ with easier to handle captions like “look at this football team suck a f**king dick, you guys”.

So, enjoy that.

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Now that the NFL is back in full swing, Pittsburgh Steelers linebacker James Harrison has, as expected, increased his PR efforts in regard to his recent interview with Men’s Journal, a magazine that I once had in my bathroom because I received four free issues.

In the interview, Harrison called Goodell “stupid” and a “devil” among other things, regarding Harrison being fined more for his brutal hits last season than other hard-hitting defenders. And despite the fact that those words were printed in a magazine and all over the Internet, Harrison still expects us to believe that he didn’t mean them like that. Now he’s apologizing to Goodell, despite not actually talking to Goodell in person, and we should believe that he’s sorry, because why not? Oh I know why – because he’s full of sh*t.

“The interview that I did and the comments that I made about Roger Goodell were inappropriate, at the least,” Harrison said. “They were way out of line, and I was speaking out of anger and frustration at the time. Any comments that I made that offended anyone, I apologize.” (Via ESPN)

Hold on, I have Goodell’s response right here: *fart noise*

As for the comments he made about Ben Roethlisberger not being as good as Peyton Manning for what he’s paid, and Rashard Mendenhall being a fumble machine, those were taken out of context.

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… which is pretty good, if you ask me.

Sports

John Wall Returns to North Carolina Pro-Am, Makes Julius Hodge Famous - I used to know what John Wall was famous for, but all I can see when I hear his name is that terrible, terrible pitch. I will think of O.J. Simpson as a Heisman Trophy-winning football star before I’ll picture John Wall as anything other than Mariah Carey in a Nationals hat. [Smoking Section]

The ‘Pitcher Name’ Phenomenon - Jon Bois uses irrefutable Sporcle-centric data to substantiate his theory that pitchers can be born with a “pitcher name”. It’s interesting and worth a look, even if it’s as scientifically valid as the other thing I learned on Sporcle, which is 99% of people know “Lion King” by only like 52% have heard of “Dumbo”. SMDH [SBN]

Watch Some Dude Get Schooled By a Woman in MMA Exhibition - It’s always fun to watch a woman beat up a man, for some reason. It’s one of the unexpected quirks of the women’s lib movement. If I ever run into a white woman with cornrows I am crossing the goddamn street. [Cage Potato]

James Harrison Comments On His Comments - Kissing Suzy Kolber handles the delicate James Harrison situation in a much more eloquent way than we did. And I had to come up with a new headline, because the real one has gay slurs and sacrilege. [KSK]

With Leather

Brooklyn Decker and the 2011 ESPYs - We talk a lot about Kate Upton on this network of websites, but don’t sleep on her 24-year old Old Lady equivalent. I think showing up in an Adam Sandler comedy aged Decker by about twenty years in our minds. You know Upton’s going to show up as Luis Guzman’s girlfriend or something dumb in one of those things. [With Leather]

The ‘Roger Clemens Mistrial’ Dugout - Sometimes I give these things esoteric headlines and nobody reads them, because the most important part of blogging is putting buzzwords in your title. I should’ve called it ROGER CLEMENS LIAR CHEATS JUSTICE SYSTEM RAPES INTEGRITY. Or “Fat Guy Cheats At Baseball, Life”. [The Dugout]

St. Louis Named Top City In Which to Find a Hot Baseball Girlfriend - This has been backed up by my good friend (and Anarchy Championship Wrestling Heavyweight Champion) Davey Vega as well as Dugout commenting stalwart Donut King. What else are they gonna do, cheer for the Blues? [With Leather]

Punte Interviews Urijah Faber and Jon “Bones” Jones - Our Man Zerkle visited the set of the Kenny Powers K-SWISS commercials and interviewed every awesome person there, except for the little one in the mask who fake fights that I would’ve been most interested in. [With Leather]

Not Sports

Annie and Britta are Naked and Spanking Each Other - I’m not sure how else to share this with you. Some photographer convinced Alison Brie and Gillian Jacobs that this would be a good idea, and I mean I guess it is, but jeez. It’s one step away from Terry Richardson making the Gossip Girl cast french kiss soft serve. In a related story, Annie is still hotter than Britta by like forty-thousand miles. [Warming Glow]

First Look: Colin Farrell in Total Recall Remake - The original Total Recall is one of my girlfriend’s favorite movies, so I’m including this here. She once sent her Mom a text message that said “get your ass to Mars”. [Film Drunk]

No Emmy Nomination For Ron Swanson, The Internet Reacts - Nick Offerman’s face is more expressive and a better actor than the cast of “Glee” and at least 4 of those 6 people nominated from “Modern Family”. I still think awards are stupid, But they’d be less stupid if they went to the right people. [Uproxx]

Superbook - I mentioned this yesterday, but am including a formal link to it today. Here’s a thing I wrote a few years ago about my favorite religious Japanese cartoon from the 80s, featuring nudity, blasphemous robots and too many anime references for you to handle. [Progressive Boink]

According to Drew Brees, the NFL Lockout is almost over. According to Chad Ochocinco, it’s far from over. Either way, while the NFLPA* and team owners met into the late hours last night, James Harrison’s big mouth continues to be the top NFL news because that’s all we’ve got. Well, except for Hines Ward’s DUI, and he must be absolutely loving Harrison right now.

Harrison recently sat down for an interview with Paul Solotaroff of Men’s Journal, which I once read on an airplane, and he sounded off about everything from his hatred of Roger Goodell to his problems with his own teammates. And if you haven’t already read the article, Harrison really sounded off. Most notably, he called out Ben Roethlisberger for some mistakes in the Super Bowl and pointed out that he’s not Peyton Manning, he labeled Rashard Mendenhall as a “fumble machine”, he said that Houston Texans linebacker Brian Cushing is “juiced out of his mind”, and he called Roger Goodell many things, including (allegedly) a f*ggot. Harrison also defended his reputation, most notably as a thug, but… hey, did I mention that banner pic is the lead image from the article?

And with all of that on paper, published and available on magazine racks, Harrison claims he was misquoted and Solotaroff, the guy who says he has notebooks full of other quotes and hours of digital interviews, agrees.

“We talked about 11 o’clock yesterday morning,” Solotaroff said on Thursday. “Look, James is the guy who’s got to live with Ben for the next three years. . . . So as I told James, ‘Listen, whatever you’ve got to say to mend fences is perfectly fine with me.’” (Via Pro Football Talk)

That’s the quote that really should stop the story. Solotaroff is an admittedly big fan of Harrison, which moves this article from “insightful interview” to “sloppy knob polish” and renders it irrelevant, as far as journalistic integrity. Essentially, Solotaroff told Harrison that he can say whatever he wants and he’ll manipulate and fix it after the fact. As I learned in one of the few journalism classes I stayed awake during, that’s not kosher.

But what is relevant is that Harrison has a big mouth and he said a bunch of things that he can’t take back. Cushing has since said he would pray for Harrison, whatever that means, and it has been reported that Roethlisberger and Mendenhall will take Harrison at his word (translated: they’ll share some “What the f*ck”s in private). Goodell, though, is a different story. While he has his hands full trying to make sure that Harrison and the rest of the players have a job this season, I can’t imagine that he’s going to look to favorably upon a guy that he has never looked favorably upon.

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James Harrison was one of three defensive players fined by the NFL yesterday for what the league deemed to be…dangerous. Apparently, football isn’t dangerous anymore, as long as players are making dangerous hits. Harrison was fined $75,000 for two hits against Cleveland Browns receivers Mohamed Massaquoi and Joshua Cribbs. Harrison’s reaction to the punishment was, shall we say, unique to pro football.

“I’m going to sit down and have a serious conversation with my coach (Mike Tomlin) tomorrow and see if I can actually play by NFL rules and still be effective,” said Harrison on Tuesday as a guest on Fox Sports Radio’s “Into The Night with Tony Bruno”, according to NFL.com. “If not, I may have to give up playing football.”

After a meeting with Tomlin on Wednesday morning, Harrison was cleared from practice and meetings for the day. –FanHouse.

It seems insane to me that the NFL would start pulling money out of players’ pockets for doing their jobs, and nobody captured that sentiment better than ESPN’s Mark Schlereth, whose five-star rant against the NFL’s hypocritical stance on big hits was solid gold. Who would have thought of a man named “Stink” would have been the voice of reason here?