TDL’s Sports, Wrestling, & Otherwise

After 12 books following Drizzt and his friends, two new characters finally get a spin-off to their own series. Artemis Entreri and Jarlaxle, two guys who have been a thorn in Drizzt’s side on and off for all the other books finally get their chance to be fleshed out. Servant of the Shard doubles as the third book in the Paths of Darkness arc and the first book in The Sellswords trilogy. This seems like it was the general idea of the Paths of Darkness — give the more interesting characters their own books and see what sticks.

Artemis and Jarlaxle stuck.

The basic plot of the book deals with Jarlaxle’s plan to expand the reach of his mercenary guild — Bregan D’aerthe — to the surface world. As the surface dwellers aren’t usually interested in dealing with drow (with their whole reputation for treachery and murdering their business associates) Jarlaxle drafted Entreri to be his front in Calimshan and Morik the Rogue to be his front in Luskan. With these two guys in place, Jarlaxle sets in to motion plans to take over the thieves’ guild in both towns using these guys as figureheads. As there is plenty of profit and power in the position the two humans don’t really protest that much.

That plot kind of takes a back-seat to the secondary plot — the gentle guiding of Artemis Entreri from evil assassin to semi-honorable hero. While Salvatore still makes it a point to duck whatever it is that set Entreri down the path of evil early on in his life (but he does drop some hints — specifically Entreri’s blinding hatred of religion and priests) he starts to finally give the reader’s some hints. You start to get the sense that Entreri and Jarlaxle are homerun characters. Oddly, it’s likely that neither of them were created to be so. Entreri was created to be the human, evil version of Drizzt. Jarlaxle was created to explain what happens to drow who have no house. The lack of backstory has done nothing but make them more interesting as Salvatore starts to flesh them out. What you learn by the end of this book is that Drizzt and Entreri aren’t really all that different at the end of the day. Their motivations really aren’t all that different. Drizzt doesn’t kill for money, but he does kill people who have wronged others. Entreri does the same — he just earns a profit doing so.

Ironically, through all the trials and tribulations all the characters in this pocket of of Faerun have gone through because of the Crystal Shard, it’s one of the evil guys who eventually takes up the quest to have it destroyed. That kind of fills in as the third plot line in this book. How two bad guys sort out Crenshinibon between the two of them and its final fate.

I can only assume that the second and third books of the trilogy deal with more of the backstory of these two very interesting characters. But I’d consider this one the second consecutive home run by an author that I started to get a little burned out on.

Strong recommendation.

I’d like to take this space to congratulate the Ms. L Superstars on their epic 6-0 run to start the season. However, sadly, it came to an end this week as a perfect storm of events turned this week’s highly anticipated match-up of the 1st place, 6-0 Superstars against the 2nd place, not quite as talented 5-1 “Random Team From Some Accountant” into a 45-point blowout. Our heroes now share a 6-1, 2-game division lead from the rest of the pack, but have to settle in to second place since they lost the head-to-head tiebreak. As for the perfect storm:

- I could try to blame Chicago’s defense for giving up 41 points, but with two touchdowns, 4 interceptions, and some other shenanigans — they came up with 19 points.

- The Giants decided to unleash Brandon Jacobs at the goal line this week for the first time running up two touchdowns and then entirely skipped Derrick Ward (my bye week selection) and go right to Ahmad Bradshaw to get the garbage time work.

- Jason Campbell was stymied by the 22-person pass coverage the Browns dropped on the Giants last week and could not throw any passes to Santana Moss from my bench. Conversely, Matt Cassel chose this week to remember that he was allowed to throw the ball to Randy Moss for touchdowns. My Moss did not fare so well.

- The Panthers completely shut down Reggie Bush holding him to five points while Kevin Smith took enough time off of writing movies to rush for 12 points.

- We will remember this week, JMos…. you had the game well in hand at the end of Sunday’s games and just used Randy Moss to insult us and run up the score. This sleight will not go unpunished.

- Reggie Bush is now gone for 2-4 weeks and I have to pick up a defense AND a kicker this week to replace Robbie Gould and the Bears Defense. Awesome.

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W/W - Titans -7 over Chiefs, 34-10, Titans cover: Can I count this as a correct selection of a Titans game or is it just fish-in-a-barrel easy? Probably can’t count it but I’ll take what I can get.

W/W - Bills over Chargers, 23-14, Bills win: When I heard that a power outage delayed the beginning of this game, I was really, really hoping it was one of the Rogers Center games. BTW: I look forward to the Bills ending their season by returning to a surface that everyone has decided is awful for football. Nothing says “injury” like playing football on concrete covered by thin carpeting! I will also assume that the irony of a Chargers game being delayed by a power failure has been noted and file for posterity.

W/W - Steelers -6.5 over Bengals, 38-10, Steelers cover. Didn’t see one highlight of this game but it looks like it’s just about what everyone expected.

L/L - Ravens +3 over Dolphins, 27-13, Dolphins cover: Well… I guess I should have stopped one short where I told myself that the Dolphins were due for a letdown even if the Ravens suck on the road.

L/L - Rams +10.5 over Cowboys, 34-14, Dallas covers: Bahahaha, totally worth it. A new fast receiver toy isn’t going to help when it’s the defense, stupid. Bahahahahahaha.

W/W - Bears -3 over Vikings, 48-41, Bears cover: I guess Adrian Peterson can finally pop for one of those fantasy games that owners drafted him for and the team STILL gets outscored — it’s over, Johnny.

L/L - Panthers -3 over Saints, 30-7, Saints outright: I have no idea how to pick either of these teams, but this was one of the four events required in the perfect storm to end my undefeated season at 6-0. Reggie Bush with 1 point? Really? A**hole.

W/W - Giants -11 over Niners, 29-17, Giants cover: If anything, this game goes down in the annals of “games gamblers had in the bag before garbage time craziness changed the outcome”. JT O’Sullivan fumbled the ball through the end zone for a safety with 5 minutes left in the game. The 2 points covered the spread and, depending on whether you got the over/under between 45 and 47, kicked over or pushed the over/under. Unbelievable.

W/L - Texans -8 over Lions, 28-21, Texans cover: Took a shot on this spread. 8 points suck. Fortunately for the Lions they move one step closer to picking the wrong quarterback in the draft.

L/L - Raiders +3 over Jets, 16-13, Jets cover: And right there, written for all to see, the reason I don’t bet games anymore.

L/L - Packers -1 over Colts, 34-14, Colts outright: Twice!!

W/L - Redskins -8.5 over Browns, 14-11, Redskins cover: Expected a little more of a “let-down” in the let-down game, but the Browns defenses ability to play 9 guys on the line and 12 guys in coverage apparently stymied the Redskins, too.

W/W - Bucs -6.5 over Seahawks, 20-10, Bucs cover: Bucs! Rays! Sunday night was party night in Tampa!!

W/W - Patriots -4.5 over Broncos, 41-7, Patriots cover: It’s this kind of game that makes this season ridiculously hard to predict.

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Little better on the straight up picks this week. Really need to hit a good 12 win spread week to get myself back in to the standings.

Standings

5 points - Jets -3 over Raiders - L
4 points - Colts +1 over Packers - L
3 points - Cowboys -10.5 over Rams - L
2 points - Bucs -6.5 over Seahawks - W
1 point - Giants -11 over Niners - W

Straight Up: 9-5 (51-51)
Spread: 7-7 (50-50-2)
Point Pool: 3/15 (51/105 - .485)