NFL Review: Playoffs Week 2

What is going on people? Its time for that NFL Review, Playoffs Week 2.

You need some music and I was searching for some Mars Volta and CKY, but came across some Rage Against the Machine. I loved these guys in high school and college. I liked the earlier material like Freedom and the song below. Enjoy:



Before I review the games, some general NFL thoughts:

-Tony Dungy retiring from coaching is getting a little too much “the game will not be the same without him” talk, dare I say Tebow-esqe. Look, the guy was a very good coach, I think he underachieved with the Colts, overachieved with the Bucs and is right in between. Is he a Hall of Fame coach? No. Very good coach in this era? Absolutely.

I get that he’s Black, won a Super Bowl, a very religious man and if I met the man I would probably like him. But don’t give me this talk about this being a sad day. Dude did his job, wants to move on to another phase in his life, that’s it.

I think this is a prime example of “White Guilt,” which is something that I seriously need to touch on in another post, being portrayed in sports media. It seems like the sports journalist speak in hyperbole about Dungy because he is Black and probably want to make it look like they REALLY loved the guy and not be labeled as racist.

All of the accomplishments that Dungy had in his coaching career are nice but if he was White, he wouldn’t be receiving as much media coverage, especially on the positive end. My theory isn’t perfect but there is some truth to it.

-The overtime rules are just fine the way that they are. As I always say, life isn’t fair so sports shouldn’t be an exception. You lose the coin toss, play defense, which is half of the game, get the ball back and score. Peter King and all of these sympathetic whiners for players in the game need to fall back. If the Giants lost a playoff game in overtime without getting possession of the ball, I wouldn’t be mad at all.

OK, I want to do something a little different this week. I’m going to list each playoff team and state in a few sentences how you should feel as a fan at this moment. Just remember, its only a game and you have to move on.

Atlanta Falcons: Pleasantly optimistic. This time last year, you were still recovering from Bobby Petrino pulling an ultimate dick move and leaving for Arkansas, your franchise quarterback decided that operating an illegal dog fighting ring was a pleasant way to spend some off-time, your already sensitive racially charged fan base was ready to reject anything you did. Now, you have Matt Ryan, an excellent coach in Mike Smith, an all-pro runner in Michael Turner, a decent defense and you’re going to win the division next year easily because Tampa is not good, New Orleans can’t find defense and Carolina, oh, I will get to those Panthers.

Miami Dolphins: Optimistically resolute. You won one game last year and now you’re division champions, only in the NFL. You still have to make a long-term decision on Pennington but you have Chad Henne being groomed right now, which is a good thing. Parcells is staying, which is an excellent thing. The Wildcat formation has been fun to watch and you ran into the wrong team at the wrong time in the playoffs.

Indianapolis Colts: Mildly disgruntled. I hit on this earlier with my Dungy thoughts but I think that this team has underachieved in the past 10 years. There were several times where they should have been a Super Bowl team and didn’t deliver. You can blame Manning, blame Dungy, the defense, injuries, age and several other things. So as a Colts fan, you should be disgruntled a little about this, but you have to temper it because you have also witnessed an average of 10 wins a season for a long time. No one does this, not even the Patriots.

Minnesota Vikings: Pissed at management. You have the best running back in football. You have a top-five defense when healthy. You play in a dome. How this team doesn’t have at least 11 wins is inconceivable. Oh, I know how. Tavaris Jackson is not a good quarterback. You can spin it to say that he’s young, he’s inexperienced, he hasn’t been coached right. In the end, he’s not good. When you have one of the worst game managers I’ve ever seen as your head coach as well, that can’t help things. Brad Childress should have been fired yesterday. Seeing them try to execute a two-minute drill is so terrible, its enjoyable. Watch the final regular season game against the Giants for my point. They ran the clock down to SET UP a 50+ field goal to win the game, the division and ultimately their place in the playoffs. Never seen that before in my football viewing life.

Carolina Panthers: Mystified. How are you supposed to react when your quarterback plays that type of game? I don’t like blaming one person for a team’s misfortunes because it takes a whole team to win or lose a game, but Jake Delhomme cost them the game against the Cardinals. If they don’t change the quarterback, they won’t make the playoffs next season. If they get a veteran or even a decent young guy like a Joe Flacco, then they can win the NFC next season. Its really that simple.

San Diego Chargers: Cautiously Worried. You’re not going to ever win the Super Bowl, that’s a given. Those days are over. You have to seriously consider signing Darren Sproles long-term and parting ways with Tomlinson. I’m not saying that you do it, but you have to think about it. I actually think that lower expectations for this team may be a good thing for next year. They no longer have the fictional title of “most talented team in football.” That mantle goes to the Cowboys and we’ve seen how that turns out. Similar to Carolina in a way, they’re going to win the division again next season because the Broncos are transitioning, the Chiefs are rebuilding with Pioli and the Raiders are well, the Raiders.

I save the last two for teams that I follow on a daily and semi-daily basis:

New York Giants: Disappointed. Lets do this bullet-point style:

-I underestimated how valuable Burress would have been in this contest. I like many other fans applauded the Giants for suspending Plaxico for the rest of the season for his antics off the field, but he was sorely missed on the field. That’s why GM Jerry Reese was open to the possibility of Burress returning to the season next season, which I agree with. If you cut him, he will count against your cap. You may as well use him. It doesn’t help when one of the leaders on the team that can keep Plaxico in check, linebacker Antonio Pierce, was out with him on the night of the infamous leg shooting. No one else on the team steps up to Plaxico and knocks him down. Major problem.

-Manning didn’t have a good game, it happens.

-I was more mad at the play calling during the game. Jacobs got his rushing yards but they’re were far to many perimeter plays. They also were predictable when they were going to run the ball.

-In the end, the Eagles played the better game and deserved the win. I can’t get really mad about that. Plus, the Giants won the Super Bowl last year and to steal from the Sports Guy, I’m in Year One of my Five-Year Grace Period. All is still good in Giants land for me.

Tennessee Titans: Incredibly pissed. If you’re a Titans fan, you should be very, very mad at your team right now. You’re the better team than Baltimore and your mistakes cost you the game. Too many turnovers in the red zone. Missing field goals was bad. Baltimore only had two or three big passes the entire game and you still lost.

I also don’t want to hear about how the missed delay of game penalty cost you the game. It didn’t. All of the reasons mentioned above lost you the game. Chris Johnson getting hurt was bad as well.

Early Predictions for the Conference title games:

Philadelphia at Arizona: I have no idea about who wins this contest but I will be cheering hard for the Cardinals because first, it’s a good story and when your team is out of the running, you just want a nice story. Second, the day I openly cheer for the Eagles to win a game, especially a playoff one will be the last day I roam this earth. F*ck the Eagles! Who wins it, go with the Cardinals at home, why not?

Baltimore at Pittsburgh: Good game, no really major pull towards either team. I’ve never minded the Steelers over the years, the Ravens I’ve had beef with from time to time. Plus, the Ravens are boring accept for Ed Reed and Ray Lewis, at times.

Give me Pittsburgh by a decent margin. Baltimore isn’t as good as advertised.

That’s all from me, gotta get some sleep after sitting through the Benjamin Button movie. I’ll hit on that tomorrow.