As you guys may or may not know, in addition to my work as a studio host for NFL Fantasy LIVE I bang out a column every week. And as part of that column I always ask Twitter to hit me with questions I can tackle for my mailbag.
Normally it's of the "Should I start Player X or Player Y" variety but every now and again I get some gems. Recently, one of those gems hit my Twitter feed and the tweet was so good, I took it out of the mailbag and gave it its own column.
It's a pretty basic question:
Let me just say I've now made this my official ringtone and spent a solid hour re-watching old '90s episodes of "X-Men: The Animated Series".
I also spent about seven hours thinking about who was who and then dedicated the following 9,239 words to this very important subject matter.
Molly Qerim
So then I thought maybe Psylocke mostly because of the dark hair. But that wasn't quite right because in real life Molls is actually super, super nice and Betsy Braddock was a quiet and reserved assassin type.
I settled on Rogue minus the southern accent; incredibly sweet but also fierce. A warrior who would actually crack on her male counterparts and deliver solid one-liners.
Adam Rank
Again the lazy comparison would be to say The Joker. But as much as I love one of the greatest comic villains of all time, let's be real here. The Clown Prince of Crime wasn't too terribly nuanced as a character.
If you guys couldn't tell, Rank is kind of all over the place. Soft spoken at times, he is also the guy that is literally jumping around the studios screaming out nonsense like "DUVALLLLLLLLL" or of course "THAT HELPS NO ONE!"
So again because Marvel > DC I'm going with Deadpool, who I think is one of the more underrated characters in the "X-Men" universe. Although full disclosure here, I'm a sucker for any and all of the sword-wielding characters both in comics and in video games.
Is he a hero? A villain? Eh, who knows? But what we do know is that he's a pretty independent thinker with a funky sense of humor. Wait, am I talking about Deadpool or Rank?... Exactly...
(note: after refusing to reveal to Rank who I pegged him as, he said quote, "I better not be some Marvel character, or I swear to Great Caesar's Ghost..." he didn't finish his sentence. The percentage chance I get narded just went up significantly.)
Michael Fabiano
But the more I thought about it, I was kind of waffling between Lex Luthor and Apocalypse with me, of course, leaning a bit more toward the Marvel side of the equation.
I like Apocalypse mostly because he was kind of the godfather of all mutants and Fabs is one of the godfathers of fantasy football television personalities. The only problem is that 'Poc hardly ever talks and when he does, it's done in half riddles with the weight of about 10,000 crushed souls.
Being that Fabs is MUCH more personable, on this I will tip the cap to DC and go with Lex Luthor as played by Gene Hackman. A smart, witty dude that isn't necessarily Superman but will go tit for tat with any challenger.
Marcas Grant
He's also an extremely laid back guy, definitely the most chill of all the dudes on the show. And it's this combination of depth of knowledge and zen-like attitude that led me to think Bruce Banner.
We don't know whether the mild-mannered side of The Hulk is quite that savvy with pop culture references but I do know that Marcas will sometimes Hulk up and get a little rage-y if you argue with him too long about USC, fantasy stats or fashionable socks. Plus, trolls beware: Grant has been known to Hulk smash a few haters every now and again.
Elliot Harrison
Always a favorite among our female viewers, Harrison even rocks the Remy-LeBeau-esque five o'clock shadow at all times. I mean honestly, Elliot IS Gambit minus the French-Quarters' accent and the deck of energized cards.
Personality-wise the two share that same silky charm and wit. Harrison takes Gambit in the karaoke department though, especially if a good Michael McDonald tune comes on.
Matt "Money" Smith
Matt's wickedly sarcastic sense of humor and semi-hidden genius instead led me to think of the man who constructed the Iron Man suit: Anthony Edward Stark.
Matt is a guy that I've said is 100 percent for sure wasting his talents by talking about sports. A lot of guys in this business have good memories. Some even have near-photographic memory. But there is a huge difference between good recall and genius, in that highly-intelligent people know how to apply that information to create and project forward. That's Matt. He's a borderline genius and he's using those considerable powers to make off-color jokes about sports and athletes…Never mind, that's actually pretty awesome.
Akbar Gbajabiamila
Here's the skinny; Akbar is a genuinely nice guy. Like, a super, super nice dude. He sits around with a bunch of nerds arguing about whether Arizona's wide-receiver fantasy-points-against projections are accurate or not and whether or not that makes DeSean Jackson a WR1 or WR2.
We're talking about a mountain of a man and a former NFL player arguing numbers and semantics with a bunch of guys who have zero experience in the pro game. Listen, I've met a lot of athletes and I can tell you without a doubt that almost every single one would flip over a table in a meeting before taking flak about numbers and projections from a bunch of ham-and-eggers. Akbar does it with a huge smile and a great attitude.
It was that humbleness that reminded me Piotr Rasputin, who in the comics was loathe to use his physical size as a means of intimidation even though lesser men with similar size could easily do just that.
James Koh
Then from a character standpoint, old Hank McCoy was a well-educated man who largely contributed with his intelligence. I especially thought it was a nice match in that Beast was an essential part of the "X-Men" but never the star. Crucial but complementary. I've always felt my role with the show has been to help everyone else shine as much as possible and in the process fill in gaps whenever possible with smart, well thought out bits of knowledge. I'd like to think I'm doing okay in that role, and if not, at least know that is what I'm striving for!
Well that was fun but I've got to get out of here... episodes of "X-Men: The Animated Series" aren't going to watch themselves.
