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Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Tom Hammond's Grotesque, Ill-Formed Clone to Join Tom Hammond in NBC Booth

Hot on the heels of today's announcement that Pat Haden will be leaving NBC to take the position of athletic director at the University of Southern California, rumors have been rampant about who will join his inimitable broadcast partner Tom Hammond in the booth for Notre Dame football games this fall. In an eerie pre-dawn press conference at a hastily-constructed dais in front of Notre Dame's Radiation Laboratory, NBC and a team of unintroduced heavily-armed men in lab coats put an end to the speculation by officially announcing that Tom Hammond will be joined in the booth by a gnarled, misshapen clone of Tom Hammond that has been living in the subterranean tunnels below Notre Dame's campus since a team of unscrupulous scientists created him from a scraping of skin cells from the broadcaster's cheek five years ago.


Know ye know what gods feel like!


2-Hammond-beta, as the repulsive affront to God and nature is known, brings decades of genetically-inherited experience to the booth, although he has not seen any broadcasting action, nor the unrelenting burn of natural sunlight on his limpid skin, since being wrenched from the carbide incubator that served as his unholy womb during the cloning process.

"Unfortunately, there hasn't been a place for Nega-Hammond in the NBC Sports family until now," commented NBC Sports chairman Dick Ebersol from the safety of a reinforced bullet-proof lucite box several dozen yards away from the chained-down clone. "And although we are sad to lose the talents of a fine broadcaster like [Haden], we are happy that it provided an opening for us to return our beloved semi-reptilian hellspawn back to the fold."

According to one university source who was very, very adamant about not providing his name, Nega-Hammond was initially created to solve a pernicious rodent infestation in the subterranean tunnels, a task which he proved to be exceptionally adept at. Too adept, in fact, as the indigenous brown rat population in Northwest Indiana took a precipitous drop in the first 18 months of the clone's horrid existence, and leading biologists in the region say that an intact specimen of rattus norvegicus has not been seen in the region since the winter of 2007. It was at that point that Nega-Hammond's handlers lost contact with him, prompting many close to the project to openly wonder what the gnarled underbeing has been doing, and particularly what he had been subsisting on for food, since then. "The answer to that question," one highly-placed source in the administration was quoted as saying, "is beyond the reach of where nightmares tread," and then crossed himself vigorously.


The only known image of Nega-Hammond in existence. The camera was eaten shortly afterwards.


Despite going off the grid since that cold winter of 2007, Nega-Hammond was spotted by some ice skaters at the on-campus rink at the Joyce Athletic center, who complained of an eerie, croaky voice doing play-by-play of their figure skating routines coming from one of the vents in the floor. The problem was resolved without incident after maintenance crews pumped the vents with pesticide spray overnight.

Not surprisingly, the revelation of covert organ- and monster-harvesting cloneries on campus has sparked controversy on the campus of the Catholic university, as the Church strongly opposes the practice of human cloning.

"Tom Hammond is an affront to God and abomination upon this world. Our faith is crystal clear about that, and we are shocked and repulsed by his presence," commented the director of campus affairs, Rev. Ted Moynihan, CSC. When asked if meeting with Hammond's clone had made him rethink his position on the subject, Moynihan replied, "Tom Hammond's what?"

Monday, December 21, 2009

Stuffing the Passer - O Touchdown Tree

As we conclude our broadcast year of 2009, we'd like to step back for a second and remind you of the reason for the season. We proudly present to you the Stuffing the Passer Players' Christmas Special (joined already in progress) and it's thrilling conclusion where muppet Golden Tate gives a stirring speech reminding us that the true meaning of Christmas is not trees, or presents, or YouTube videos, but touchdowns. Sweet, wonderful touchdowns.

God bless us, all of us.



On a related note, irishoutsider and I are happy and relieved to wrap up our production schedule for 2009, and are nothing but amazed by the positive feedback we've received from this project. We're going to take a few weeks off to rest and celebrate the Winter-Solstice-Gift-Exchange and Arbitrary-Gregorian-Calendar-Renumeration season, then get to work on a special offseason project that we'll share more details on later. Basically, we want to extend our appreciation to those of you who have indulged our weird fantasy and humiliated themselves by yelling "BACKUP pirate hat!" in socially unacceptable situations. Hopefully by the end(ish) of January, we'll have a little somethin' somethin' that we think you'll enjoy. Happy holidays everyone!


And lo, they were afraid, because he was made of many, many touchdowns!

Monday, December 14, 2009

Stuffing the Passer - Coach Kelly Gets Grilled

After a long dark nightmare of a coaching search, Notre Dame has finally found its man in Brian Kelly (and, also, apparently, a thirteen year-old to design a website for him). However, before he takes over the reins, he has to face his toughest critics in muppet Golden Tate and Jimmy Clausen and answer some pressing questions. We think he fared quite well.


Tough questions, but fair.

Tuesday, December 08, 2009

Stuffing the Passer - Jimmy and Golden's Last Press Conference

A bittersweet moment this week as the Golden Tate and Jimmy Clausen eras came to an end at Notre Dame, as both lads announced they will be heading to the NFL. To make sure that the event had all the gravitas that it deserved, the boys spent a lot of time worrying about the backdrop behind them and taking extra time to make sure it was just right.

The final result (shown on your right) was nice, but I kind of liked the earlier attempts as well. It's a whole process, though, this creativity thing. Sometimes the best ideas are the ones that don't make the cut. Perhaps those other backgrounds will make like the director's cut of their press conference footage.


I don't know, something a little more, like, manly...


Also, if you're interested in downloading those backgrounds for, like, your Christmas cards this year, they can be found here:

[ 1 ] [ 2 ] [ 3 ] [ 4 ] [ 5 ]

Monday, November 30, 2009

Stuffing the Passer - Everyone's Free (To Score Touchdowns)

Well, folks, there you have it. Five years into the Charlie Weis experiment, athletic director Jack Swarbrick pulled the plug on the strangely bipolar but largely ignominious experiment. Feelings are mixed at the House Rock Built critter lab. We were all really rooting for Charlie to pull it together and bring us back to the glory days of perpetually dancing shirtless in a meadow for no damn reason at all, but reality can be a merciless wench that snaps as back to attention about the fragile state of Notre Dame football.

Le sigh. We'll miss that little fuzzy goofball. He gave us some good times, some heartburn, and probably kicked irishoutsider up to the top of the liver transplat list, but it's always been interesting. His tireless recruiting and unending advocacy for the return of Notre Dame football to national prominence was sorely needed, and hopefully some top-flight coach can succeed and make sure that Charlie's blood, sweat and tears weren't shed in vain.

On a more House Rock Built-esque note, we noticed that ESPN cut away from the press conference before we got to hear from the man of the hour himself. We think that's unfair, and so we tracked down the footage of Charlie Weis giving his valedictory speech to the Fired Coaches Class of 2009. Because everyone's free (to score touchdowns).


We're all free to score touchdowns. Do what we want, live the way we want. And score touchdowns.


UPDATE: Had to fix a few gremlins in the soundtrack to the video. The new version sounds much better.

Monday, November 23, 2009

Stuffing the Passer - A Serious Coach

After another tough loss, Muppet Charlie Weis seeks out some help and advice from the wisest man on campus. Unfortunately, things don't work out as planned. He's in a very serious mess.


I've tried to be a serious coach.

Monday, November 16, 2009

Stuffing the Passer - Wann-stache'd

The Gang wants to get ready for next week's game against the University of UCONN, but first we have to clear the air about that event that happened last week in Pittsburgh. We've got this big hunk of populist bile in our throat that we need to clear out, and it's pretty clear the gang is starting to unravel at the seams as well.

It even looks like Muppet Charlie Weis might have pulled a Bill O'Reilly-esque freakout. I guess that explains the guys in suits standing behind him at the last press conference.

Don't worry, Irish fans, though things might seem bleak now, you can always count on us to whistle past the graveyard with the fury of an, ahm, thousand-piece orchestra... thing. You know what I mean. Stiff upper lip, lads. The puppets are your friends.

God help us all.


We'll do it live!

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Stuffing the Passer - The Coach Who Stares At Goats

Sitting in the gorgeous sunshine of a beautiful fall day in South Bend, irishoutsider and I were struck by how ruinous a gaggle of red zone turnovers can be to what would otherwise have been a downright lovely day spent outside. Naturally, the mind reels trying to rationalize a loss to the University of Navy in what was supposed to be a season where the Irish contended for a BCS bowl, but thankfully we found a safe haven of movie parodies to fall back onto to make sense of the events of this weekend.

Perhaps it's low-hanging fruit and only tangentially topical, but the mind just naturally clicks on this association when trying to make sense of Charlie Weis repeatedly running afoul of the mighty goats from the Naval Academy.


Location: Redacted

Wednesday, November 04, 2009

Stuffing the Passer - The Gang Sings a Sea Shanty

Some games are harder to get motivated for than others. Sure, anyone can get fired up for the game against USC or Michigan, but it takes some special maneuvering by the coaching staff to get the squad amped up for a game against Navy. It's important to do so, though, since it was a mere two years ago that the Midshipmen snuck up on a lackadaisical Irish and broke a 43-year losing streak in hearbreaking fashion.

The good news is that Muppet Charlie Weis has a secret weapon for Navy game preparedness. What better way to prepare for your enemy than by using his greatest asset against him? I'm talking, of course, of the power of sea shanties.


Huh, that usually works. Sharpley... a little help?

Thursday, October 29, 2009

The House Rock Built Wishes You a Happy Halloween

Hey kids! Hope everyone is priming up for a fun holiday weekend, and bracing themselves for the spooky reality that Notre Dame will be playing a 1-6 team in San Antonio for no reason at all.

At any rate, the fellas want to send their best in video form, so here you go.


Oh... that's nice.... too. I guess.

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Stuffing the Passer - The Road to San Antonio

A cupcake game in a neutral site stadium that promises to be 90% Notre Dame fans. What could possibly go wrong?

Well, I'm glad you asked. It looks like muppet Golden Tate might have some problems joining the team in San Antonio after a surprising encounter with airport security during his flight to San Antonio. Sure, it's difficult to pack for a vacation at this time of year, but there's a couple things you need to make sure you don't have in your bag before you show up at the airport... like plutonium. I'm just sayin'.


We don't go anywhere without the wildcat!


Oh, and as a heads-up, we've filmed a special Halloween episode where our fuzzy friends wish our beloved readers fine tidings for the holidays. Keep an eye out, it will be up later this week.

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Stuffing the Passer - Here Comes The Hurt

So... that happened. Sigh. I know what you're all thinking, that I'm just going to freak out, but that just goes to show you have no clue how deeply jaded and cynical we've all become. With years of hard work, irishoutsider and I have found a way to find something grimly amusing about every sidelong blow that fate sees fit to deal us.

Of course, the same does not apply to our fuzzy athletes and coach. Needless to say, the suffering they have experienced in the aftermath of this hearbreaking loss has been indescribable... Indescribable, that is, until now, where we find the one and only proper way to describe it: with a novelty cake and a video montage:


And the Academy Award for best offscreen cockfight goes to...


Breaking the fourth wall for a moment, we're going all Hollywood with Stuffing the Passer this week. This week's show featured High-Definition footage, brand new editing software, a new, more robust embedding site, and a big time Hollywood Budget of $12.46 (which we fully expect to get reimbursed for, once we figure out who in the world we can mail our expense report to.) Oh, also lots of dwarves from Indonesia who may or may not be here legally and may or may not be receiving any compensation at all for their laborious and incredibly dangerous puppet wrangling work. Hope you enjoy it! A lot of good people died so you could.

NB: Hi-Def version is encoding now. Should be up by afternoon. Once it finishes, I'll swap it out.

Update: It's up. Although I can't tell much of a difference. Is there a better high-quality video embedding site?