Usually I copy/paste a previous recap before I start writing so that all of my formatting stays intact. Lookie what I found here from Week 4:
Several obscenities later, I have reached a zen-like state where I no
longer expect my team to do great things this season. It's okay,
really. The way the NFC South is playing, there's still a silly chance
that the Saints can take the division, but it no longer concerns me.
Clearly, it's someone else's year, so I can enjoy the little wins here
and there and work on picking a B-Team in January.
Yep, pretty much sums it up. You know what would be hilarious though? The Saints winning the division at 7 - 9 and the Seahawks having to travel to New Orleans for the Wild Card round. Oh I like that. Make it happen, Drew Brees! Anyway, onto lots of other things on a pretty exciting NFL week and 5 Bold Predictions for the Second Half of the Season:
Week 7: The Good Stuff
Extra Special Teams in St. Louis - There were a few interesting upsets this week, but none more exciting than the St. Louis Rams playing with house money against the Seahawks. It was genuinely a team effort with Austin Davis making clutch plays with minimal mistakes, Tre Mason making a name for himself on the ground, and the Rams defense holding Marshawn Lynch to just 50 rushing yards. Those performances were huge, but St. Louis was the stuff of legends on special teams. This
trick punt return play was spectacular - the kind of thing that seems like it could only ever really work out in the movies. And
then, the Rams pulled off a gutsy fake punt pass from their own 20 in the fourth quarter to seal the victory. They won't be world-beaters this year, but this has been a surprisingly fun team to watch all season, and I'm glad they finally got more than a moral victory after a 5-week slump.
Golden Tate, Third Down Monster - In my zen state, I can say without dry-heaving that the Lions' Golden Tate was a sight to behold on Sunday. Seriously, Megatron who? In fantasy talk, Tate racked up 150 yards and a big-time TD in the fourth quarter, but in intangible terms, he was just clutch all around when Detroit needed him most. He had three crucial catches on third-and-long including said highlight reel touchdown and also drew a few PIs for good measure. Every time it looked like the Lions were falling out of reach, Tate just found a way to make it work. It almost made that whole Fail Mary thing seem plausible after all.
Here Come the Ravens - Watching Baltimore falter in the early go this season in the wake of Ray Rice's departure, I was convinced they'd be lucky to get to 8 - 8 again this year. Now they're a game and a half ahead of the pack and trouncing the teams they should be beating, and they've found a running back by committee scheme that makes Joe Flacco better. If I'm being fair, the Ravens have looked rough against the only two good teams they've played this year (Bengals and Colts), but luckily for them, the schedule looks luxurious from here on out with the Titans, Saints, Jaguars, Texans and Browns still left. Don't be surprised if they sneak ahead of some of the bigger names in the AFC by the time January rolls around, especially as they continue to improve week after week on offense.
Peyton Manning, Ageless Cyborg - And finally on the good stuff, that Peyton Manning guy. I try to avoid stating the obvious on this blog, mainly because it's hard to make it worth your time. I feel like I'd end up being like Chris Farley's SNL reporter with lots of "Hey remember how Peyton Manning is the top scoring quarterback of all time? That was awesome." But it'd be silly not to tip a hat to Manning for overtaking Brett Favre's all-time pass TD record on Sunday night, especially since No. 18 looks like he could play another 3 years or so and put this one out of any other human being's reach. These Broncos look like an even better version of the team that was historically dominant last year, which ought to be bad news for just about everyone else in January.
Nailed It! My Best Week 7 Prediction - Well heck. This didn't exactly turn out to be the slaughter it could have been, but at least I warned you that Rex Ryan's squad would give it their all against the Patriots on Thursday, even if they still ended up on the losing side:
- Hand it to Rex Ryan, no matter how bad the Jets look year-to-year, he
usually seems to get the best out of this team when they’re playing the
Patriots. Still, this looks to be just about as big of an uphill battle
as any New York has played under his tenure. The secondary is looking
mighty porous just as Tom Terrific is reclaiming that moniker, and
Geno’s Jets just aren’t primed to win a shootout.
Week 7: The Bad Stuff
An Implosion of Sadness - Oh good Cleveland Browns, we hardly knew ye. After weeks of solid wins and respectable losses, the bad Browns just Browned their Brownsiest Brown losing in an ugly fashion to the winless Jaguars on Sunday. Sure, Cleveland came into the game with new challenges, namely with reshuffling on the offensive line due to center Alex Mack's season ending leg injury. That doesn't bode well for a team that has been as successful on the ground as the Browns have been this year. But asking Brian Hoyer to throw the ball 40 times will never be this team's recipe for success, especially when you're only trailing by 4 to start the fourth quarter. It's remarkable that rookie Blake Bortles could get away with 3 interceptions and still help beat this team handily. Poor Browns.
Marvin Lewis' Everything - Rinse and repeat for the Bengals' offense this weekend facing one of the worst run defenses in the league. Similar to my Peyton comment above, I can't do much to state the obvious in an interesting way here - Cincy got blanked, apparently because Andy Dalton thought it was January. So I'll focus on coach Marvin Lewis instead for a totally different reason. With regard to linebacker Vontaze Burfict's recent head injury, Lewis was quoted as saying
this:
"I coached defenses and linebackers for a long time and concussions
didn't linger. Now we have found that because of the media and things
they seem to linger longer. There's a lot of attention paid to it. I
don't know why they linger longer. I don't remember them lingering like
they do now." My head just exploded, probably because of the media and things. It's no secret that most players would do almost anything to stay on the field if they aren't hobbling, and attitudes like these from professional football coaches in the year 2014 are frightening. For shame Marvin Lewis. Why don't you hang out with Jay Cutler's unvaccinated kids while you're at it?
Saturday Night in Tallahassee - Okay, okay, I know this is a total sidebar to my usual NFL scope of work, but as disappointed as I was in how the Saints game ended Sunday, Notre Dame's loss to Florida State ended in the most gut-wrenching way possible and I don't even follow the Irish. But full disclosure, I could not possibly hate Florida State's athletic program more - surprising, I know! If you didn't catch the game, Notre Dame had a chance to score the go ahead touchdown with seconds remaining in the fourth quarter. They did so on an outside pass from Everett Golson to Corey Robinson. But then the refs threw a flag for offensive pass interference, erasing the score and pushing back the Irish to Hail Mary territory. I'll preface this by saying it was technically the right call, so if the rest of this infuriates you, skip to the next section. But I got three problems with this kind of call that make Jameis Winston's "got away with it again" smile and that incessant tomahawk chop even worse from my vantage point: 1) Offensive pass interference is almost never called, and the referees did so, ahem, very selectively in this game; 2) In watching the replay, it's a stretch to say that this instance would have made any difference in allowing the defender to get to Robinson in the first place since he was on a different route 10 feet away; and 3) So outside of some egregious offense, it seems more than a little sketchy to me that the refs would decide the outcome of the game on something like this. FSU, I hope the SEC West devours you alive in a couple months.
Shanked It! My Worst Week 7 Prediction - Goodness gracious. This level of confidence led to two fantasy busts for me in Jordan Cameron and Isaiah Crowell this weekend. On a related note, my bench has been absolutely fantastic lately. Stupid Browns.
- Poor, poor Jaguars. Playing the Cleveland Browns used to be a source of
hope that you wouldn’t go 0 - 16. Not this year’s Browns.
Week 7 Feature: 5 Bold Predictions for the Second Half of the Season
Peyton Manning Will Nab Another MVP - Just how bold is this prediction? Probably not the boldest, but so far most of the MVP talk this season has been about DeMarco Murray, J.J. Watt and Philip Rivers. Even if all three of those players keep it up, they could split the "not Manning" vote with Murray in the lead, but here's why I think Manning will edge them out: 1) the Broncos have the clearest path to a top seed (and the best record) in their conference; 2) they look just as good as last year; and 3) he's is due to break many a career passing record yet this season.
The Bears Will Miss the Playoffs - I'm not that concerned about the Bears' recent locker room fray since those kinds of things happen all the time. What I am concerned about for Chicago is that the Detroit Lions continue to win and have a very manageable schedule coming up. The NFC East figures to grab the other wild card spot unless the NFC West surges ahead. The Bears are banged up on defense and making mistakes far too consistently on offense to stay in the games they should be winning right now.
The Saints Will Make the Playoffs at 8 - 8 or Worse - Confession: I put the Panthers in here and deleted them a couple times. I do think it will come down to these two teams with the Buccaneers being even more terrible and the Falcons starting an entirely different offensive line than they had in July. If the Saints do it, it'll be because everyone else continues to be even worse - as currently indicated by point differential - and because they have six home games left on the schedule.
The Raiders Will Finish Last at 1 - 15 This Year
- Sure Derek Carr continues to look like a silver lining in the Black Hole, but I just don't see any team out there as awful as Oakland today. The rest of the season doesn't bode well for a rebound either with the Raiders facing 2013 playoff teams seven times over the next ten weeks. Their best shot at that one win will be visiting the reeling Browns this week or hosting Buffalo in Week 16.
Only One NFC West Team Will Make the Playoffs - The 49ers and Seahawks have looked like a given in January for the past couple of years and were heavy favorites starting 2014, but I think that all changes this year. For one, they'll have to catch up to the surprisingly good Arizona Cardinals first, who could be at least two games ahead after this week. For another thing, these three candidates have nine divisional games left this season, which spells cannibalization on the win/loss front. Get the popcorn ready for a wild December finish.
