NFL Playoff Picks
My annual attempt to pick the NFL playoffs straight up, here goes nothing:
Wildcard Round:
Houston over Cincinnati
Pittsburgh over Denver
New Orleans over Detroit
NY Giants over Atlanta
Divisional Round
New England over Pittsburgh
Baltimore over Houston
New Orleans over San Francisco
Green Bay over NY Giants
Championship Round
Baltimore over New England
Green Bay over New Orleans
Super Bowl
Green Bay over Baltimore
Conference Realignment
With all the conference realignment moves over the last year and speculation of more over the last couple days, I wanted to offer up my take on it. Instead of much larger conferences, I’m in favor of much, much smaller conferences that are more like divisions and then turn scheduling over to the NCAA. Conferences are kind of an archaic concept nowadays anyway for the larger sports. They were designed to ease scheduling and reduce travel by creating regional conferences. But since the amount of money earned has grown and most teams have their own plane or can afford to charter one now, it isn’t as big of a deal. I think you keep your conferences for all sports except football and basketball. For football and basketball, you have a small 4 team division that includes all the nearby schools, particularly any rivals or teams that you want to play every year. (One example would be Texas, Oklahoma, Texas Tech, and Texas A&M, another would be California, USC, UCLA, and Stanford, still another is Alabama, Auburn, Arkansas, and LSU) Then, every year, your schedule includes 1 game with each of the schools in your division and 1 additional permanent opponent to cover any rivalries not included in the divisions. For example, let’s say Michigan and Ohio State end up in different divisions, then they become each others additional permanent opponent. That’s 4 of your 12 games. Also, everyone is going to start off the season with a cupcake. I know, it ruins the excitement of week 1. There are a grand total of like 10 games to get excited about in any opening week of the season and those will be gone now, but hey, that’s it for the cupcakes. One cupcake in week 1 to get everyone some practice in new schemes or new coaches, whatever and some live hitting and game action for all the freshman and then we move on so you don’t have Alabama playing Georgia Southern in week 9. The other 7 games on your schedule will be scheduled by the NCAA and will be based on your recent onfield performance, similar to the way the NFL does it. I’m thinking 60% based on last years schedule, 30% on two years ago, 10% on three years ago. So the better you are, the tougher your schedule is. The worse you are, your schedule gets easier as you go on. That way, everyone has a balanced schedule, no talk of Boise State playing an easier schedule than the SEC, etc. With this in place, you don’t need some elaborate 8 or 16 team playoff to declare a champion that takes forever to decide on the field and requires fans to travel all around and causes more controversy. We then have a simple 4 team playoff, with the schedules more even, that’s all that’s needed and it can take the place of the conference championship games. You have round 1 two weeks after the season, and the championship game will be 3 weeks after that. You can still keep all the bowl games too (although I’d change that to require 7 wins instead of 6, 6-6 just isn’t worthy of a bowl in my opinion). I know many fans don’t understand the importance of keeping the bowls, but the bowls matter to the players and the smaller schools. It’s good publicity for them and it helps out in recruiting. The players enjoy going to and playing in the bowls, it’s somewhere different and special to play and turns the spotlight onto them and their program, so you have to keep them. I think smaller is better though in “conferences”, not larger.
NFL Playoffs
Every year I try to pick the winner of every NFL playoff game straight up prior to the playoffs starting, I’ve been within 2 games in the past, but that is as close as I’ve gotten. It’s such a crapshoot most years anyway, but one of these years I’m going to be perfect. Also I’ll say this, if the NFL playoffs are a crapshoot and the best team doesn’t always win, then why do people always claim that the best team would win a college football playoff? So the best team would win every year in college but not in the pro’s? On to the picks:
Wild Card Weeked (and the hardest weekend to pick):
NY Jets over Indianapolis – Close game, I think the Jets are overrated but that Indy team isn’t that great either.
Baltimore over Kansas City – Tough game to pick, I just like the Ravens playoff experience and coaches better.
New Orleans over Seattle – Not even close.
Green Bay over Philadelphia – I’ll take Aaron Rodgers over Mike Vick, even on the road. He’s been there before and the Packers played better down the stretch, which I look heavily at.
Divisional Weekend:
Pittsburgh over the Jets – Better team, better coaches, more playoff experience, home field.
New England over Baltimore – See above, all the same reasons plus revenge for last season’s playoff massacre.
New Orleans over Atlanta – Think the loss a couple weeks ago to NO took a lot out of Falcons, better coaches on NO sideline.
Green Bay over Chicago – Yes, I know the Bears beat them in the regular season, this is the playoffs. These teams are familiar with each other and GNB is healthy now.
Conference Champsionships:
New England over Pittsburgh – Matchup favors NE and Pitt hasn’t been playing as well lately as they did earlier in season.
New Orleans over Green Bay – Even without Chris Ivory and Pierre Thomas, their running game is still better than Green Bay’s and I think the lack of ability to run and dependency on Rodgers finally catches up to the Pack.
Super Bowl:
New England over New Orleans – Hard to believe a couple weeks ago that I’d be picking NE here as I still don’t entirely like their front 7 on defense at all, but it’s manageable and I think in a shootout they can pull through.
2010 Preseason All-American Team
1st Team
QB Case Keenum, Houston
QB Ryan Mallett, Arkansas
RB Jacquizz Rodgers, Oregon State
RB Demarco Murray, Oklahoma
WR A.J. Green, Georgia
WR Julio Jones, Alabama
WR Micheal Floyd, Notre Dame
TE Kyle Randolph, Notre Dame
G Justin Boren, Ohio State
G Stefen Wisniewski, Penn State
T Anthony Castonzo, Boston College
T Marcus Cannon, TCU
C Kristopher O’Dowd, USC
KR Titus Young, Boise St
K Alex Henery, Nebraska
DE Robert Quinn, UNC
DT Marvin Austin, UNC
DT Jurrell Casey, USC
DE Cameron Heyward, Ohio St
LB Greg Jones, Michigan St
LB Alex Wujciak, Maryland
LB Bruce Carter, UNC
CB Patrick Peterson, LSU
CB Prince Amukamara, Nebraska
CB Brandon Harris, Miami
S DeAndre McDaniel, Clemson
S Mark Barron, Alabama
PR Jeremy Kerley, TCU
P Ryan Donahue, Iowa
2nd Team
QB Terrelle Pryor, Ohio St
RB Dion Lewis, Pittsburgh
RB Mark Ingram, Alabama
WR Ryan Broyles, Oklahoma
WR DeAndre Brown, Southern Miss
TE DJ Williams, Arkansas
G Rodney Hudson, Florida State
G Thomas Claiborne, Boston College
T Clint Boling, Georgia
T Gabe Carimi, Wisconsin
C Zane Taylor, Utah
KR Torrey Smith, Maryland
K Kai Forbath, UCLA
DE Adrian Clayborn, Iowa
DT Jared Crick, Nebraska
DT Jerrell Powe, Mississippi
DE Marcell Dareus, Alabama
LB Akeem Ayer, UCLA
LB Von Miller, Texas A&M
CB Kendrik Burney, UNC
CB Curtis Brown, Texas
S Rahim Moore, UCLA
S Deunta Williams, UNC
PR Ryan Broyles, Oklahoma
P Drew Butler, Georgia
Super Bowl Preview
Well, my playoff picks were beyond subpar this year. Not sure how I missed that so badly, and how we had so few good games. Anyway, without further ado, my annual Super Bowl preview.
Offense and Quarterbacks:
We have an amazing matchup of quarterbacks this year. Both quarterbacks have the ability to read defenses and make adjustments well enough that we should have plenty of offense to watch.
As far as key players on offense go, I have to give the Saints the edge. Not that the Colts don’t have manageable receivers (Peyton Manning can make anyone look good), but I give the Saints an edge on their explosiveness. They have the ability to go all the way on any reception and open field tackling by the Colts defense will be key in keeping them in check. I also feel like the Saints running backs fit better into their offensive game plan than the Colts do as Addai is more of a power back stuck in a spread offense and they lack that Pierre Thomas/Reggie Bush receiving threat out of the backfield.
From a pure quarterback standpoint though, I give the edge to Peyton over Drew because of his experience. The quarterback position is so important in the Super Bowl and should be weighted accordingly. I give the Colts the overall offensive edge.
Defense and Turnovers:
Both defenses face a huge challenge this week, especially the Colts who will be without Dwight Freeney. Dwight is a big loss and he could pressure Drew and hopefully force him to make a mistake or two. But it could be worse, they could have had losses in their secondary. Net-net, the defenses are about a wash. I have been able to find a few stats though that indicate an edge for the Saints. First of all, the Colts are ranked 30th in the league stopping opponents on 3rd or 4th down and 31st in forcing 3 and outs. This will give the Saints offense more opportunities and possibilities for big plays. Also, that could raise the time of possession for the Saints and lead to a more tired Colts defense that might make mistakes late in the game. The other things is turnovers. A turnover at the right time will change the course of the game. Just ask the Cardinals last year. The Saints are 2nd overall in forcing turnovers and the Colts are 18th. Based on those two stats, I’ll give the edge to the Saints.
Coaches:
Jim Caldwell and Sean Payton. Payton has more NFL experience and comes from the Bill Parcells/Ray Rhodes coaching tree. Caldwell was a mediocre college coach until he came under the Dungy tree in the NFL. Caldwell is also in his first season as a head coach. I prefer Payton here as a pure coach, but Caldwell has a coach on the field in Manning. Still I give the edge to the Saints here.
Game Conditions:
Both teams play their home games in a dome, so if weather is a factor, then it will be for both teams. They are also both passing offenses and can be affected by the possible rainy forecast in the same manner, although I’d rather have Donald Brown and Joseph Addai in the rain than Reggie Bush and Pierre Thomas.
The Super Bowl is different too because the game is slower (longer commercial breaks and more game stoppages) and without the experience of managing a slower game, offenses can get out of sync from all the delays. Since Indianapolis has been here recently, they may handle it better.
Other Factors:
Another factor that could come into play is the “happy to be here” symptom. The Saints have never been to a Super Bowl. That could play out in one of two ways. It could be a motivating factor to finish the job and increase their level of play. Or, they could be contempt that they’ve reached their goal and not play up the challenge. We’ve all seen it play out either way. I don’t see the Saints being contempt but they could get caught up in the whole playing for the entire city of New Orleans pressure and trying to hard to win that it hampers their play. The whole Hurricane Katrina, we need to win for this city, card could be too much for them to carry. The Colts want to win a Super Bowl, but the entire city of Indianapolis isn’t at stake, their minds are not going to be as heavy and most of the players have been there before so they will play more relaxed and handle the pressure of the game better. Advantage Colts.
Overall Prediction:
Halftime Score – 14-17 Saints
Final score – 35-31 Colts
NFL Playoff Picks
Every year I try to go undefeated with my playoff picks (straight up, not against the spread) and the closest I’ve been is within 1 game. Here are my picks for this year:
Wild Card Round
NY Jets at Cincinnati Bengals – Bengals
Baltimore Ravens at New England Patriots – Patriots
GB Packers at Arizona Cardinals – Packers
Philadelphia Eagles at Dallas Cowboys – Cowboys
Divisional Round
Cincinnati Bengals at Indy Colts – Colts
NE Patriots at SD Chargers – Chargers
Cowboys at Vikings - Vikings
Packers at Saints – Packers
Conference Championship
Packers at Vikings – Packers
Chargers at Colts – Colts
Super Bowl
Colts vs Packers – Colts
The Thursday prior to the Super Bowl, I’ll post my lengthy, detailed Super Bowl preview.
Bowl Pick Change
With all the Urban Meyer developments, I would like revise my Sugar Bowl pick. I initially picked Florida to win by 7. I still think that they will win, but 7 wouldn’t cover the spread. With the Urban Meyer drama, I now think they will easily cover the spread and win by more like 21.
Quick Hits
What an amazing day in sports we had yesterday. Bobby Bowden retires, Charlie Weis gets canned (along with Al Groh – which I predicted in the ACC Preview this year), Tiger Woods is human afterall, and that’s not including any actual sports that did or did not take place. It’s hard to tell that any did take place because I don’t really see any headlines on ESPN indicating that they did. That’s right, none of the top 10 top headlines concern actual games or matchups. Just about who’s retired, fired, traded, arrested and injured. What a day. Just a couple quick thoughts:
-I don’t really care much about the Tiger Woods deal. I will say that his driving has never been his forte. That tree and hydrant just jumped right out there just like the rough seems to. I’m sure he now realizes how much worse it is to shank an SUV into a tree than a 5 wood into one.
-I think Bobby and FSU are making the right choice even though it’s tough. They are falling behind to Florida and Miami quickly, and although I don’t think Jimbo Fisher is the right man for the job, something needed to be done. Recruits and players need to know who the coach is going to be down the road before they commit. Florida is going to lose a lot of talent on defense next year and Tebow, so they need to capitolize on that opportunity and stabilitity at the head coaching position is a step in the right direction.
-That said, I think this just proves how disasterous the coach-in-waiting scenario can be. I’m very much against the coach-in-waiting clauses and think you will see more and more of them play out with excess drama, wasted millions, and at the expense of the players. I understand succession planning in the workplace and see it’s value, but the circumstances are completely different with football. Recruiting, media, and publicity of the whole thing make it a much more fragile proposition. One can only ponder how many more transitions will have to implode before administrations begin to see it as the bad idea that it is.
-I enjoyed this article by Drew Sharp that appeared in last weeks USA Today. He indicates very pointedly that like GM and the rest of the American auto industry, ND and Michigan need to re-invent themselves before they become completely irrelevant. Turns out, selling cars is more than just brand name, and winning football games is too. Brand name doesn’t last forever, you have to constantly update your image, brand, and business to keep up with the times. GM didn’t do that, neither have ND and Michigan. They need to turn things around soon, irrelavance is standing at the and it’s knocking.
Quick Hits
-I think the suspension on Brandon Spikes for eye-gouging is a joke. Missing one half against the worst team in your conference is not a suspension, it’s a mockery. My biggest problem with the whole thing though is the people who disagree with the suspension and say that eye gouging is just football. It happens. No, that’s incorrect, eye gouging is not football and its not part of the game. It’s part of UFC, but it’s not part of football.
-So, let me get this straight, everyone complained for an entire week leading up to the USC-Oregon game that the computers were wrong to have USC ranked as the worst of the 1 loss teams and all the pollsters were correct by having them ranked as the best of the 1 loss teams. Then, USC gets blown out by Oregon and everyone shuts up. Apparantly, the BCS computers were right after all. Just wish we could get all the talking heads to apologize to the computers and admit that the computers were right and they were wrong. The talking heads only succeeded in planting seeds of doubt about the computers in heads of masses, even though they were clearly wrong
Best Team in NC, Dez Bryant, and Early BCS thoughts
First of all, I never thought I’d write this. But right now, currently, Duke is the best football team in the state of North Carolina. I know, shocking. I’m shocked. Wake not only got creamed by Clemson two weeks ago, but lost last week to Navy. Duke is talking about which bowl game they will go to. NC State somehow managed to upset Pitt, but has looked anemic otherwise. All the while, Duke talks about how Thadeus Lewis is the second coming of Wallace Wade. North Carolina can’t even hold onto a 21 point lead late against a mediocre Florida State team. If they didn’t get bailed out by the officials against UConn, they’d have a losing record right now and their only wins would be against non-BCS opponents. Meanwhile, at Duke, they’ve postponed talk of basketball season until at least November! November! Normally, they switch from football talk to basketball talk up in Durham in August. With Elon’s big win over Chattanooga last weekend, I think the second best team might be Elon. Unbelieveable. Hopefully Duke will upset overrated Georgia Tech in a few weeks and we can put this “left out of the BCS” talk to rest for the Yellow Jackets. Which leads me to my next thoughts…
It’s still too early too talk about who is getting ‘left out’ of the BCS and who the two teams that should be playing in the title game are. Too early. Way too much football to be played. I’ve heard people actually say that if all 7 teams went undefeated how unfair it would be to particular teams, etc. Like 7 teams are actually going to go undefeated! Not happening. Two of them play each other. How are they both going to be undefeated after that game? The most teams I can ever remember being undefeated at the end of the season is 3. So, the likelihood of 7 teams ending up without a loss is slim to none. USC will lose at least one more game so everyone can stop talking about how the computer polls rank them so low. The computers understand that the Washington loss was a bad loss and the USC defense has looked weaker and weaker as the weeks go by. And just because the humans despise the Big 10 and think that the best team in the Big 10 doesn’t deserve consideration and ranks Iowa poorly, that doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t be ranked highly in the BCS by the computers. The computers realize that all Iowa has done is win, that they have beat more teams with winning records than any other team country. Even though they have scraped by a few times, so has Florida, so has Alabama, so has Texas. Ohio State’s misfortunes in BCS title games is Iowa’s biggest enemy right now. Our biggest problem with the BCS is going to be the shear amount of one loss teams. Some of the numbers I look at when evaluating teams are turnovers, points per game (both scored and given up) and yards per point. According to one of my power polls that uses these stats, Cincinnati is the best team in the country. And yet, everyone discounts them as second class citizens. I’m not saying they should be the number one team, I’m just saying that statistically, there is no reason for people to dismiss them, especially as easily as they do. There will probably be 7 or 8 or those. I think the amount of 1 loss teams are going to be the biggest issue come season end. But hear this, I think the current BCS rankings are fine, I have no issue with how any team came out in the rankings except that maybe USC is ranked a spot or two above where they should be.
No one should ever try to understand the NCAA. Never. It will cause your head to explode. Want to know why people have brain anurizms? It’s becaue they are pondering NCAA rulings. The most recent one that bewilders me is Dez Bryant. I work at a law firm. I understand that lying is normally just as bad as committing the crime. In e-discovery there is term called spoliation. Spoliation basically means that once litigation has begun, deleting or losing data, either on accident or on purpose, then the missing data is considered to be incriminating, even if it wasn’t. You could simply be cleaning up your mp3 collection and blow up the entire case. So, I understand that what Bryant did was wrong and the severity of it. However, suspending him for not just the rest of this year, but into next season too is absurd. I hate it when they try to make statements when a case like this one is high profile and in the media. We don’t need a statement case just beacuse it’s being covered by the media more. Dez was apologetic and fessed up. All indications is that he’s a good kid that got nervous and made a mistake. Why not make a statement with someone who isn’t. It’ll make it to mainstream media if you do. I guess it just seems unfair to me that Bryant is effectively missing all of this season and parts of next season for jogging with a former NFL player who is not an agent and then Oregon is allowed to bring LaGarrett Blount back after 7 games when he sucker punched an opposing player on national TV on opening night of the season when everyone was watching. And Blount has a history of getting in trouble. He’s the one that should be told to never play college football again.
Next Page »