A few weeks back I was at Gooseberry with Woody. There were other people there like kids and wives or whatever, but they’re not part of the story, so they don’t matter. Woody and I were sitting in our beach chairs and he turns to me and goes, “Tonight, I’m gonna put the kids to bed, open a beer, turn on the wrestling PPV, and put together the Toppa Invite.” I then sprinted full speed toward the ocean and jumped into the water, in an attempt to suppress my massive boner with cold seawater.

Toppa league is back! And this year, we’re getting JACKED! Well, I have the perfect aperitif for the first #PowerRanks of the year, and for the NFL SZN in general. Let me briefly paint you a picture. The year is 2006. ESPN is still the powerhouse of sports TV and they are not filming SportsCenter in a giant spaceship. Boomer and Teej are hosting NFL Countdown for like, the 38th season in a row. And they have a little weekly segment that they call, JACKED UP:

Oh hell yeah! I forgot my own birthday just watching that video.

By the way, I know everyone loves to complain about the pussification of the NFL, but 3 or 4 of those hits don’t look like they’d be illegal today. Maybe they throw the flag on #5 for defenseless receiver, and maybe that QB hit gets flagged. But, mostly, those are pretty clean tackles. Form tackles. Fully wrapped. Hit em between the numbers. That said, Number 1 is very much illegal today. 100% defenseless receiver. I’m not even sure it was legal back then. Ray Lewis (of course!) just hits him in the head with his forearm.

In a moment of perfect corporate synergy between ESPN and the NFL, this segment was removed and never talked about again. Just like all the concussions caused in that video! (TELL DE TROOF!) It was then replaced with the lame “C’MON MAN” which subjected us to Mike Ditka trying to make jokes for 10 years.

On to this year’s Toppa Invite PowerRankings, ranking just how jacked each member of the James M. Toppa Sr. Memorial Fantasy Football League is.

2019 Toppa Invite #PowerRanks

12.

The over/under on pull ups from this picture is 1. And the under is a heavy, heavy favorite.

11.

Sorry, but anytime you look like you’re gonna jump in the pool with your shirt on, you’re pretty low on the “Jacked Scale.” Brendo’s not that guy, but that was definitely the first thing I thought when I saw this picture. Maybe I’m an asshole (note: I’m probably definitely an asshole).

Swimming with your shirt on is the least athletic looking thing in the world. Which is ironic, because it is ridiculously difficult to swim with your shirt on. The fabric goes everywhere. It’s like a straight jacket.

Kids these days have no idea how real the struggle was. Nowadays they have their rash guards and waterproof sun shirts. They have shirts that are COOL to swim in. Sure, they have their cyberbullying, but they will never know the wrath of having 20 kids at the pool judge you for being fat with your shirt off, but also making fun of you for swimming with a shirt on.

10.

See? Maybe if I had one of those fancy SPF shirts like all them kids nowadays, I’d not have been burnt to a crisp after 14 minutes in the sun. I’m pretty sure I reapplied at least 6 times that day. I hate all you fuckers that basically don’t put any sunscreen on, and apparently, just: tan. I really hope you get skin cancer. Like, really. I hope you have to spend thousands and thousands of dollars on cancer treatment and still die early. It’s not fair. The other night, I got a sunburn watching Our Planet on Netflix (those desert scenes are rough).

9.

Dad Bod

8.

I honestly had a tough time coming up for anything here, so here’s 8 minutes of chair shots to the head!!

Holy fucking shit!!! None of these people are still alive, right??

7.

Damn. PWood was a swole little kid. He was probably taking 5th graders lunch money while he was in kindergarten. 

I have to say, Woody is a pretty good older brother. Like, he might not be great. Maybe right after Mama Wood took this picture, he pushed PWood’s face into the mud. But all I’m saying is, that if my brother was in charge of sending out pictures of me yearly to my friends…. Jesus Christ would it be embarrassing. “Toppa Draft 6 is gonna be SICK. Just like RhysNice getting sick all over himself after drinking too much.” “We proudly invite you to Toppa Draft, unlike these girls who never invited RhysNice back to their place (somehow has pictures of girls turning me down at parties and pastes them into Toppa Invite)”

My relationship with my brother is… complicated.

6.

I assume JeffWho went total Hulkamania on these shirts immediately after this picture was taken. Or he made a sudden movement and they ripped down the back. Or JeffWho got his head stuck while trying to take them off, then needed help of like 3 other people to pull it over his head. Any of these three classic 90s movie scenarios would be acceptable for me.

5.

Felt Cute. Definitely won’t delete later. You should use this for all your social media profile pics from now on. Facebook. Instagram. LinkedIn. “Who’s that guy? He’s hired!”

4.

Lookin’ good! Feelin’ Good! And you know why he’s feelin’ good? Because that smile on Vegas’ face is totally a “I’m peeing in the water right now, and no one can tell” face. Well, I can tell. And I… 100% approve. I pee in the ocean EVERY TIME in it. Doesn’t matter if I just went. It’s like Pavlov’s Ocean. Why do they even have bathrooms at the beach?

3.

That Keto Diet has been paying off for Micho! I’d make fun of him for drinking those White Claws, but man! You can’t argue with the results. I’d say the dude is pretty jacked. Also, those Pordagees sure do tan. One afternoon on a boat in the sun and look how dark he got! Glad he put proper skin protection on his face though.

Proper footwear though? Not so much. Who flies down to Miami with just Timberlands? I’m so confused by this. The outfit worn by all the dudes in this picture is like when you walk out the door on a fall day, and it’s like, 59 degrees out and you haven’t experienced a chill in the air for 4 months, so you overcompensate and put on jeans and a long sleeve shirt and maybe even a light jacket, but then around 2pm the sun comes out and blasts the entire earth in sunlight and the temperature goes up to, like 75, and it turns into a totally gorgeous day but you can’t enjoy it because you’re stuck carrying around your jacket and your long sleeve shirt and your legs are all itchy because you’re wearing pants and your sweating. That’s basically what’s going on here.

EXCEPT. They’re all millionaires and willingly chose to get on a boat. You’re telling me they couldn’t all pull over their Bentleys on the way to the boat and pop into a surf shop and grab some Panama Jack shorts and some flip flops?? Instead they got on a boat… in Timbs?

2.

Woody clearly wanted to show this picture off, and then built the rest of the invite around it. Maybe this was because I ranked him dead-last last year. He was determined to find the picture that made him look the most jacked and get PowerRanked #1 going into the SZN. Too bad he didn’t account for…

1.

Dude, Buckets is never NOT gonna be the most jacked person in Toppa League. Look at those lats. I don’t even know where lats are, but their fucking huge. Their bigger than my biceps. Lats on lats. Look at the height on Jaymo. He’s got to be 15, 20 feet in the air. And that kid is a tank! I swear, after I opened Toppa Invite, BoomBoom looked at it and laughed at all the pictures but then went, “Who’s THAT?!?”

Close your eyes and listen closely. Do you hear it? That’s the sound of 12 BINGO balls rolling around and around. Only to be chosen and put back into the spinner and then roll around and around again.

Keep your eyes closed. Let your other senses come alive.

Do you smell that? That’s the smell of steak tips going on the grill PROMPTLY at 4pm.

And can you taste the vegetables? Their fresh from Braman Street Farms. There here to help the meat and cheese along its natural way in your digestive tract.

Oh, and can you feel it? The cool breeze blowing from East Lot? No longer will 12 dudes be packed in a tiny attic. You needn’t worry about falling out the window desperately trying to open it to let in some fresh air. We’ll be in the fresh air, my friends.

Are your eyes still closed? But you can see it, right? I see it too. It’s Timmy putting Tyler Locket on the board 3 rounds too early.

It’s like fucking hours away at this point. Several hours. Many hours. Okay, like a lot of hours. But still. It’s hours away. I won’t lose my job if I just don’t go today and tomorrow and start drinking in Woody’s driveway right?