Today begins a recurring feature chronicling the people who, through their idiocy, underachievement, overachievement, or due to my general taste, I blame for the multitude of failings in my personal life. Congratulations, Sidney Rice, I blame you. Today.

It was about, what, five or six years ago now, that I saw you profiled in a pre-season college football magazine as one of the “best” WR’s that Steve Spurrier ever had on one of his pass-happy teams. Being mildly fascinated by South Carolina, a devotee of Spurrier, and a fan of tall athletic WRs with strong hip swivel, I immediately fell in love.

You naturally, spent a career at “USC” stumbling through the growing pains of a Spurrier offense that still hasn’t hit its stride and generally being mediocre.

I understand it isn’t all your fault that Spurrier isn’t what he once was, and that he has insisted upon a revolving door at QB featuring a variety of mistake prone autistic children, frisbee tossing golden retrievers, and a 6 ft. tall version of the plastic punter/kicker/thrower from the electronic football games.

The “realists” among us will point out your multiple record setting games, 8 straight games with a TD, and SEC records. Sure, you broke Sterling Sharpe’s records, but who really gives a shit when you don’t single handedly deliver wins in games that I bet on you?

That’s why I only partially blame you for the several hundred dollars I’ve lost gambling on South Carolina teams during your tenure. I fell in love with the potential this duo showed and was burned, over and over, and over and over. That is at least partially on me.

But then we have your NFL career. Your pathetic, disappointing, completely shitty NFL career. I drafted you with one of my last two picks in your rookie season. You had, what, three catches for –30 yards over the course of the season? I chalked that up to jitters.

There you were again the next year, picking up some hype in NFL mags and blogs as a potential breakout candidate and it all came rushing back to me, the USC days, the potential, the desire to get in on a good thing before anyone else. So you made the roster again, as an early season pickup, and again you failed me miserably.

Thinking I’d finally learned my lesson, I took a pass on your sorry ass this season in favor of another perennial favorite of mine, Jerricho Cotchery. I figured that Cotchery, free from the tyranny of Favre, and you, a disappointing shell of the supposed superstar you were now under the yolk of Favre, was a better bet than yourself.

Ah, and here we are. I rotate something named Malcolm Floyd and whatever scrap I picked off the waiver wire this week in my 3rd WR spot while you amass the best season of your career and about 100 yards a week. Meanwhile, Cotchery ends up on the same team with the fleeting potential of Braylon Edwards, who also happens to be on my team, and those two assholes fight to the death over the 4 passes the Sanchize manages to throw on target in any given week.

So, yeah, a big FU to you Sidney Rice. You never won the Heisman like I bet on, you never made me look a genius, and now your making my mortal enemy Brett Favre look like Peyton fucking Manning. Bullshit. I blame you for this.