Podcast Review - Week 1

Another live review of the Higland Spices podcast!
There was some pushback at the unvarnished truth that I was doling out in the last review and one of my resolutions this year (which, like all of my resolutions, I’m completely failing) is to be more positive so I’ll try to dial down the curmudgeon and be a little more uplifting this week.

00:00 I love the theme song but shouldn’t the podcast have a new theme song, one more in tune with the Highland Spices name? This theme song could play at the end of the podcast, serving as a light at the end of the increasingly cavernous tunnel one has to get through with these pods.

01:10 Eli and Andy are talking about the horror show that was week 1 for Eli, which made me think of “Resident Evil’, which I saw last night. It is the closest a movie has come to the experience of watching someone else play a video game. The first half of the movie is actually quite good and there was one jump scare that made me audibly yelp but as the film goes on, it feels like Zach Cregger and Co. couldn’t really come up with anything new so they leaned more and more on humor with diminishing returns. End of the day, I think the film falls into the Fine But Forgettable bin.

03:48 I voted for Any Win allows a team to rename themselves. But I’m proudly not a “real man’ and think victory points are a great addition to the league. Gender norms are man-made bullshit and we’re better off without them!

06:43 Eli got Brett’s name correct but messed up by saying he “feels terribly” (he said feels terrible-y which is even weirder) which, as anyone who has seen “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang” knows, is not correct.

I highly recommend “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang” as well as Shane Black’s follow-up “The Nice Guys”.

10:23 Shots fired at Bills fans! Eli calling the Davises “lunkheads”.

14:22 Now that we know there was a glitch in the scoring, it’s a little painful listening to the hosts go crazy about the massive points scored by defensive players last week and showing zero curiosity in how these IDP managed to muster said points since it’s not like there were a ton of guys who had multiple sack games.

15:43 When is Eli’s housewarming party or was I not invited?

17:05 Nothing like saying “We gotta keep this going” and then pausing to whine about being called boring last week. And now Eli is making excuses for being boring. “We had to talk about all of the teams” is a weird excuse. More teams means more opportunities for interesting insights or funny takes on each player’s draft performance but no, the Dandyelions couldn’t step up to the challenge!
We’re still only 17 minutes into the podcast and I’m wondering if I should fire up an episode of “Satisfaction” to help pass the time. I feel like I probably don’t need the audio to enjoy that show.

17:59 My initial idea for Rahul’s team name was “Eli is a racist alien clone” (and I should have added sexist after seeing that he just picked up Harrison Butker) but I thought that was a little too much truth for this early in the season. But, yes, I do agree that the name I went with wasn’t a great one. Who can think of anything disparaging about Rahul? I mean, besides his lack of fantasy football acumen but that seemed too on the nose.

And in a rare defense of Player #14, there being no place for John Mayer in fantasy football is exactly why you give someone a bad John Mayer pun as a team name. Every time Mark logs in, he gets that song in his head. Which is rough but not as rough as every time Rahul logs in, he gets the podcast in his head.

Not sure what’s up with the pod but I had to download it; it kept freezing. Or maybe my computer is taking a stand against this “content”.

20:36 The second “Let’s get going” of the pod.

21:00 We’ve had a “libtard” and “doing your own research” already, if anyone was questioning my accusation of the pod taking a turn towards the Right.

22:20 I’m hoping we can get to the third “Let’s get going” soon.

23:13 If Kobayashi was the first guy to employ a strategy, why is it called “The Solomon method”?

26:00 I’m with Andy on not feeling great the morning after the draft. I gagged up hot sauce in the AM. Odd that of all the things I ate/drank that day, the only bit remaining to get puked up was the hot sauce from the wings.

26:55 There it is. “Let’s keep it moving” followed immediately by more defensiveness about the blog’s honest and, quite frankly, objective truth about the week 0 podcast.

28:06 Eli’s gravestone should read “Mid-Tier Boss”.

30:44 Woah Woah Woah! When writing about the Costco exit, Eli uses the words “Currently” and “Yet”?! So for all of his bluster, Eli lets it slip that he is still willing to come back to Costco? For such a good poker player, Eli made a terrible bluff here. And here we thought Eli was a man of principle but it seems like he’s just looking for a handout. SHAME! for using the podcast to further your own grift, Eli!

40:46 Could Nico and his wife make a podcast that spoils this podcast so we can save 80 minutes of our lives?

41:55 Amen to Andy for calling out Eli’s weakening stance against Costco.

53:43 For a guy with so much free time at work, Eli could spend a little of that time editing this podcast down.

BREAKING NEWS! Rahul has finally set his lineup and he is now FAVORED to beat Eli by a mere .7 points. Although I think Eli probably wins this week; Rahul’s team is pretty brutal.

I would also like to point out that while Rahul is dealing with three guys who are out this week, Eli somehow is getting away with having a questionable player in his IR spot.

Hopefully Eli will keep Devaughn Vele on his bench because I’m starting him in another league and don’t want the Dolleman Curse to shut him down.

1:01 Andy was right a few minutes ago when he talked about how the pod was coming in under an hour and he was hoping to not blow it with a meandering roster rant. That being said, I like when we can hear a true Eli rant. You know Eli is in his feelings when he loses the mid-tier boss facade and shows his roots by dropping a “wicked”. And I will actually agree with Eli on one thing - streaming sports have been around a while now and companies pay huge amounts of money for streaming rights; how is it that there are still only like five commercials for every game? And the commercials are usually so cheap that it looks like they could have at least shot a few variations of the ad so we don’t see the exact same thing twelve times a game. But, honestly, this might be as good as it gets; my guess is that soon all of those ads will be AI slop.

1:03 I’m not sure we should call this a “bonus” rant. It’s like calling a late hit on a QB a “bonus” hit. But keeping things positive, I’ll say that Andy has had a bit of a bounceback podcast performance and has at least tried to keep the Commish - who still managed to make a Hall of Fame mention after his crappy first week - a bit in check.

1:04 So wait, Eli spent like 15 minutes discussing his Costco empty gesture and now he’s making us suffer through a “bonus” rant hating on Tesla drivers’ empty gestures? Why does Eli assume that these people only put the bumper sticker on and didn’t also send out some emails to Elon and Co.? In keeping more positive, I think we shouldn’t assume the worst of people.

1:05 Is Eli the Justin Herbert of podcasting?

1:06 Eli is showing his teeth and Andy responds by mansplaining “performative outrage” to him. Bold move! I’m surprised Eli let that go.

1:07 If the full podcast song was saved for the end of the podcast, I’d have something to look forward to right now.

1:10 Like most of my resolutions, I guess I’ll start being positive next week.

The outro song! Way to end on a high note!