NFL Week 12 Musings

Week 12 went almost according to how it was scripted, with a couple of not-so-shocking differences, which means that most Confidence Pools had high-scoring teams across the board. This has been the norm, rather than the exception this year. The one area that I did see a radical change in was the amount of low-scoring games. It seems that the defenses have finally caught up with the offenses and are now causing more punts and field goals instead of touchdowns. Of course, the Giants would beg to differ with that assessment. I am sure that the reason for the high-scoring games earlier this year was due to the lack of conditioning due to the lock out, the lack of practice by the defense and the inability to disguise their coverages and the reliance on the passing game; almost across the board. When teams like Cleveland, Carolina and Tennessee are airing it out far more often than running the ball, you know change is a-foot. However, success in the NFL comes from mixing the play-calling up and controlling the clock. Those items, coupled with the weather getting bad, will force teams to rely more on the running game, which tends to bring the scoring down and field goals come faster than TDs. There were 12 field goals on Thanksgiving alone and another 48 on Sunday. There were some very happy fantasy owners who received far more points than expected from their last draft pick. A few other items of note from this past week:

• DeSean Jackson needs a new financial advisor because getting benched for your play (or lack of) is not the key to a huge payday
• Calling a reverse-side screen with a little-used QB in the Red Zone is the type of play that should remind people that Mike Martz is far from an offensive genius
• Stevie Johnson made fun of Plaxico shooting himself in the leg once. He makes fun of Stevie Johnson numerous times per game by dropping critical passes
• It seems like Jon Gruden had a personal mission on MNF to make sure that Eli Manning was praised as often as Drew Brees, if not more, but he went overboard. He was almost courting him. I think he needed to be toweled off after the telecast.
• Fame is fleeting. Kevin Smith became the toast of Detroit when pulled off of the shelf after missing two years with injuries and putting a career game together, then gets hurt early the next game.
• Fame may never come. Matt Leinart gets yet another chance to showcase any talent he may have and gets knocked out for the year before the half is over.
• The coaching carousel is firing away; see ya Larry Coyer, see ya Jack Del Rio, better not hang Christmas lights just yet, Andy Reid
• The Patriots are 3-TD favorites over Indy. DAMN, that is a lot of points. The oddsmakers went overboard three years ago and started jumping the Patriots' lines over 20 points....they did not cover any of those games.

Speaking of lines for this week's games, the Saints continue their aerial assault and bomb the Lions. The Niners shut St. Louis out, Cleveland covers against Baltimore and more than half the games go Under again, with Houston and Atlanta being a real snoozer.

Week 10 Weirdness

It was strange that all teams played in week 10 yet some teams still had a Bye left. It was the result of some odd agreement having to do with the lockout and a schedule change that would allow for weeks 10-11 to be scheduled as such if any of the games, including pre-season, were cancelled. However, that oddness was quickly forgotten after the teams hit the playing field. San Diego started this weird week off by continuing its recent run of poor play by letting division rival Oakland, and only true challenge to the division crown, come into its house and run roughshod over the Chargers. This result irked many Survivor participants. Of course, many of those people turned grief into glee when Philly continued to show its dreamy colors and lost at home to the lowly Cardinals. In the end, the league's most dominant team continued to flex its muscles with an absolute domination of the Vikings. The Packers were the only predictable team in week 10.

Of course, you could cite the Colts and their predictability, but, truthfully, against Jacksonville, you couldn’t ink in that result in advance, especially if you knew the Jags' passing line for the game; 251 total yards. Sadly, the Colts’ stats line was even worse; 212 total yards. Combined, they produced as much offense as Devin Hester did for the Bears. How amazing is this guy (no answer needed)?! Returning to the week's stories of disbelief, how does Denver complete TWO passes and win? Come on, KC, you held a team to two completions at home and lost! So much for that brief run at mediocrity. When is the 2012 draft? As bad as the Colts-Jags game and Chiefs-Broncos games were, the Rams-Browns may have been even worse to witness. The local TV affiliates in these cities have to be in tears. No one wants to watch these games.

Of the teams that are doing good, you will notice that they have found a reason to be successful and they execute it regularly. For Green Bay, it simply means taking the field. For the Bears, it took a paradigm shift to bring success...or at least it took some common sense. Run your offense through the legs of Matt Forte and not the arm of Jay Cutler and you'll be successful. A moderately successful defense and passing game, balanced with a strong running game, leads to success. The Cowboys learned this to be true as soon as they found a solid running back (that stays healthy) and tied their fortunes to his thighs. As much as Rex Ryan thinks he can out-think Bill Belichick, he can't and needs to stick with Shonn Green and LT to bring them wins.

Heck, just look at how Houston has bought into that formula this year and they have been dominant, even though their best defensive player and wide receiver have been hurt. Now that QB Matt Schaub is out for the year, one does have to wonder if that city's football team is cursed. Just look at how close the Oilers came to The Big Game on multiple occasions in the past only to be turned away.

Good thing I stayed away from posting any NFL predictions last week since the picks I posted on the MFSPicks.com site sucked (college was top-notch though). I like Buffalo to right the ship this week, though wait to bet it as the line is moving in Buffalo’s favor (making me wonder if I am the only one who likes the Bills). Miami currently has the least impressive two-game winning streak in recent memory. It is just a step above Denver’s…due to the Broncos squeaking one out against Miami via Divine Intervention. Speaking of Denver, the Jets will beat the Broncos so badly that they’ll be saying Rosaries for months. I am shocked to see the Packers’ line at a mere two TDs. It may have been 14 points the year Tampa won the Super Bowl. Come on! Tampa never has played well in the cold or in Lambeau or when being so completely outclasses in talent. If you can play an alternate betting line and get Green Bay anywhere under 28 ½, bet it…..same goes for New England on Monday night.

2011 NFL Mid-season report

The first half of the NFL season went as expected. The league is top-heavy and there are a few surprises. Below is our mid-year status report, though a handful of teams still have their Bye left so they have played 9 games. Though the league is a pass first and often league, which yields lots of points, the Jaguars have yet to break into triple-digits, having scored 98 points in 8 games. On the flip side of that, the Packers have scored 275 points in 8 games. None of the teams in the AFC West have scored more than they have given up.

The most-surprising game of the year was St. Louis dominating New Orleans. Even without the Saints crushing of the Colts the prior week, we are not used to seeing the Saints get man-handled on turf, especially when the opponent has a journeyman back-up at QB. The Game of the Year thus far had to be the Pittsburgh-Baltimore game last Sunday night. That game had everything mixed in. There are plenty of top contests still left, including the Jets and the Pats this week, but it is hard to imagine a more exciting regular season game.

East	Current	Bill	Ron		East	Current	Bill	Ron
New England	5	12	10		NY Giants	6	9	7
NY Jets	5	10	11		Dallas	4	9	9
Buffalo	5	6	5		Wash	3	5	8
Miami	1	6	8		Philly	3	11	9
North					North
Baltimore	6	12	11		GB	8	12	10
Pittsburgh	6	12	9		Detroit	6	7	8
Cincy	6	4	3		Chicago	5	8	7
Cleveland	3	5	8		Minny	2	7	9
South					South
Houston	6	10	10		NO	6	11	9
Tenn	4	6	7		Atlanta	5	11	11
Jax	2	5	4		TB	4	8	7
Indy	0	9	7		Carolina	2	3	5
West					West
San Diego	4	12	11		SF	7	8	9
Oakland	4	7	8		Arizona	2	7	7
KC	4	6	5		Seattle	2	5	6
Denver	3	7	6		St. Louis	1	8	8

Obvious Awards:

Most surprising team: Cincinnati (runner-up: San Francisco)
Most disappointing team: Philadelphia (runner-up: San Diego….again)
League MVP: Aaron Rodgers (no reason to mention another name)
League LVP: Michael Vick (runner-up: Philip Rivers)
Fantasy MVP: Fred Jackson
Fantasy LVP: Chris Johnson

Predictions:

1st place team to miss playoffs: New York Giants (one easy game left)
1st Packers loss: Thanksgiving Day at Detroit
Super Bowl Winner: Baltimore (sticking with them all the way)
Bottom-dweller to fear: Carolina (they have multiple aspiring playoff teams to damage in second half)
"Luck"-y winner: The Colts have two shots to beat Jax. If Miami doesn't beat Washington this weekend, they won't win another game. I say the Colts have worst record when the dust settles.

Where's Your Messiah, nooooow?

OK, you know what’s coming next. I, like every other sports columnist, would love to refrain from chuckling at the Broncos, their “fans” and Tim Tebow, but that is asking the impossible. While other players’ failures receive little press, Tebow is a powder keg. Although he is a great humanitarian and extremely humble, he did himself no favors while playing his role in this ongoing drama. As Kyle Orton was unfairly being hung out to dry, Tebow made no effort to back his teammate. I do not know Orton personally, but I can’t imagine that he is evil enough for Tebow to wish him ill will. Tebow could have stemmed the tide and saved some face by backing Orton and his coach, John Fox, by stating the organization is putting their best players on the field in an effort to win games. Even if he doesn’t believe it, it would appear that he cares about the team more than himself. Had he done that, he possibly may have stifled some of the fans calling his number. It wouldn’t have done anything to the idiots buying billboard space but it would have helped his perception in the eyes of countless others who have now grown tired of all the hub-bub. We now relish the backlash, even if much of it is caused by the hype of those who fervently follow him and have started “Tebowing“. These are the true targets of the mockery aimed at Tebow. But, since they are nameless and faceless, the poison-tipped ink arrows all point towards Tebow. I still don’t understand why Denver traded for Brady Quinn. Maybe they plan on using him soon to get the Irish bashers going as well.

Speaking of mockery, that word is barely effective enough when discussing Kim Kardashian’s treatment of marriage. Poor Kris Humphries. He embodies the punchline of a joke that everyone saw coming as soon as the joke started. KK simply used Kris’ ill-directed attempt at happiness to bolster her reality ratings. For the life of me, I have no idea why anyone really cares for anything she does other than to make home movies but I definitely saw this divorce coming. What it must mean is that a new season of her loser show must be filming and they were fresh out of ideas on how to keep her loser viewers engaged (hee-hee). Come on, people. Why do some of you make celebrities out of no-talent hacks? It amazes me even more to see these non-talents successfully drag even less interesting personalities, like sisters and parents, into the limelight as well. At least Humphries’ sport isn’t bothering me. The NBA can stay away permanently for all I care.

OK, so that foresight was as obvious as watching the commercials for that new animated series, Allen Gregory, and knowing it would suck. I personally don’t think Jonah Hill is funny, but his show makes Bob’s Burgers look like the early years of The Simpsons. The best part of the first show is that it is over and Fox will quit incessantly airing the same annoying snippets of the show on commercial breaks during games. Soon enough, it won’t be airing any snippets of the show. Live sporting events is the only TV I will watch without recording using my DVR so I can fast-forward over the commercials, leaving advertisers little time to make an impression on me. Too bad most of them make poor ones.

When it comes to foresight, I did say a few weeks ago that St, Louis had the talent to get off the snide much sooner than Indy or Miami. Of course, I would never have forecast that to be against the Saints. That was a downright shocker (getting back to football). Last weekend was an odd weekend overall as many big favorites were losing out of the gate. Most of those teams did right the ship eventually. The perceived “good” teams that did not should come back with a vengeance this week. Expect Dallas to whoop up on Seattle, the Saints to destroy the Bucs and for the Patriots to make up for a poor showing at Pittsburgh by hanging over 50 on the porous G-Men D. I think you will see an upset in Buffalo with the Jets winning and I would not be surprised to see Miami go into Arrowhead and come out with a victory since the Chiefs will manage to take them lightly after ripping off 4 straight wins.