NFL -- Wildcard Weekend Picks

In a very strange twist of events, for the first time in as long as I can remember, it looks like all four of the lower-seeded teams in this weekend's Wilcard Round games in the NFL have a good argument that they are actually the better team in their respective matchups. I mean, obviously the defending Superbowl champion Saints are far better than the embarrassing 7-9 Seahawks, who will host the Saints on Saturday due to the NFL's playoff seeding system that puts all division winners ahead of all wildcard teams right off the bat. That same system also has the 11-5 Jets travelling to the 10-6 Colts on Saturday afternoon, although that is at least a much closer matchup where you could easily see either team finding a way to win. And in the Sunday games, it's the 12-4 Ravens visiting the 10-6 Chiefs in the early game in another matchup of a far better record travelling to a far worse record team due to the NFL's divisional structure. And then Sunday's late game is what most are viewing as the best game of the weekend, a matchup of the 10-6 Packers visiting the 10-6 Eagles, but when the two teams played heads-up in Week 1, the Packers bested the Eagles in Philadelphia, albeit with Kevin Kolb at quarterback in what seems like it was about 10,000 years ago. I'm not sure I can ever recall a situation where all four of the road teams have a good argument to actually be the superior teams, and in particular where three of the four matchups feature a team with a better record on the season going on the road to play at a team with a worse seasonal record, doubly in particular in this case with two of the matchups being a road team visiting a home team with at least two fewer wins on the year.

All that said, the Vegas lines on these games are adjusted accordingly to take into account all of the above, and the end result is four games which are all pretty much hard to pick. With that in mind, I'm going to deviate from what I did during the regular season and just force myself to make picks for all four games, and see what happens. Whether I will really bet these lines in real life remains to be seen, but unlike my regular season predictions where I pretty much only posted picks on the games I had good confidence in, I'm planning to go ahead and just make my guess for each playoff game from here on out and see how I do.

For starters, I like the Saints over the Seahawks, even giving the 11 points Vegas has come up with for the line between one of the league's hottest teams and defending league champion and a truly bad sub-.500 divisional winner. In looking at Seattle's schedule, if you throw out Carolina and Arizona -- perhaps the league's two worst overall teams -- Seattle's total scores over its last 8 games have been, in order of most recent to least recent: 16, 15, 18, 21, 24, 19, 7, 3. The 21 and 24 both came in blowout losses as it is, and included a fair amount of trash time late in the game where those last points were not defended by the opponents with nearly the ferocity that the Seahawks are sure to run into this weekend in the Saints who are defending their Superbowl title. And, the 'Hawks are either looking at Charlie Whitehurst again at qb this weekend, or a beat-up Matt Hasselbeck at something like 70%. Basically, I'm thinking the Seahawks are going to score mid-teens in this one (unless the Saints run up 40), and the Saints should be able to pile on some serious points with their offense. New Orleans already scored 34 points at home against the Seahawks when they played in mid-season, and the Saints have put at least 30 on the board in 6 of their last 8 games to boot. This one looks to me to be a low-30s to mid-teens affair, which means the 11 points is not likely to be enough to cover the massive chasm in skill between these two squads. Especially with Seattle's average margin of defeat this season sitting at over 21 points, I'll take the champs and lay the points here, albeit a huge line for a road favorite in the playoffs.

In the second game on Saturday, it's the Colts favored by 3 points at home against the Jets, which is also a rematch of last year's AFC Championship. Only, this year, both teams seem a little worse than they were last year, and it seems to me that whoever wins this game is going down hardcore next week, regardless of which team wins and which team they play in the conference semis. That said, something tells me that Rex Ryan and the Jets will find a way to defend well enough against the Colts' incredibly one-dimensional offense, as Indy is the #1 passing team in the league but the #29 rushing squad. They're going to be an easy game plan in relative terms for what is still a strong defense in New York, and even the return of Joseph Addai a few weeks ago is likely to do a whole lot to remedy this big imbalance. In addition, the Jets' Mark Sanchez has had an inconsistent year, having particular trouble against aggressive, talented defenses, but the Colts just don't have one. They are 13th against the pass on the season, and 25th against the run. This means the pressure will likely be off of Sanchise to make things happen with his arm, and when he needs to make a play, the Colts have just not had a great time this year coming up with the big stops on any kind of a consistent basis. In all, I think this is a close game, but with the Jets getting 3 points on top of a favorable matchup, I think New York is where the value lies for this one.

Moving to the early game on Sunday, the AFC West champion Chiefs are getting three points at home against the Ravens, and even though I have been behind the Ravens as a dark horse Superbowl candidate all season long, I think this one could be a tougher matchup for Baltimore than most people seem to think. Yes the Chiefs haven't been good for several years before this one, but this is a deceptively good team, with the NFL's #1 rushing attack, a wideout with 1170 yards and 15 touchdowns, and a quarterback who threw 27 touchdowns to just 7 interceptions on the season. Although the Chiefs' defense is pretty much average at best, the Ravens don't exactly feature the type of offensive onslaught that is likely to give KC trouble, and the Chiefs have perhaps the single best home-field advantage in the NFL, losing in KC only in the last game of the season this year after the Chiefs had already clinched their first divisional crown since early in the last decade. Although I have a definite worry that the Chiefs faced only two playoff teams in 16 games all season long (one of them being 7-9 Seattle!), the Ravens no longer have the incredible team defense that they did a decade ago. I could see the Ravens squeaking one out in KC for sure, but on balance with the Chiefs having a lot going for them in this game and that incredible home field advantage, I think taking KC plus 3 points is the value pick here.

And then we come to the toughest game of the weekend to pick, both from a spread standpoint and for me from a personal standpoint as well, being a lifelong Philly fan. The Eagles are favored by 3 points at home against Aaron Rodgers and the Green Bay Packers, who sneaked into the playoffs with a Week 17 win over the Bears to knock the Giants and Bucanneers out of postseason contention. In the Packers' favor, Aaron Rodgers is pretty much the class of the NFC as far as quarterbacks go, and the team has a solid defense as well to boot. Andy Reid's amazing postseason ineptitude is another big plus that simply cannot be overlooked from Green Bay's perspective, as his in-game management is basically as bad as any coach in the league today. On the Eagles' side of the ledger, though: the game is in Philly, and the Packers were just 3-5 on the road this season, with one of those road wins over the Kevin Kolb-led Eagles way back in Week 1 -- a totally different team -- and another against the hapless Vikings back in Week 11. This is simply not a good road team, who managed to lose during the season at the likes of Washington and Detroit in the second half. The Packers are also another of these totally one-dimensional teams like the Colts, with the Pack ranking as the league's 5th-most prolific passing team but just the 24th-best running squad. And let's not forget that Packers' head coach Mike McCarthy is almost equally poor at game management as Andy Reid, so it's not like there should be a big advantage either way there. This one is so hard to pick, because the Pack's total give-up on the running game is going to make things much easier to game-plan for Andy Reid, and Reid does know how to win a game in the early rounds of the playoffs, and in this case he's facing a team that has not played well at all on the road overall on the year. But the Packers should benefit from the general beat-up nature of Mike Vick at this point in the season, and the game plan that the Giants twice put together as well as the Vikings most recently in showing how to take Vick out of his comfort zone pretty easily. I could go back and forth on this one all day, so in the end I think you have to take the points and go with the Packers, who could easily win the game outright, but could even lose a close one and still get you the winning pick for the game.

So in all, I'm laying the big points on the road in the one totally lopsided matchup on Saturday, but otherwise I am taking the points and the road team in the close matchups at Indy and at Philly, and am again taking the dog and the points at home with the Chiefs. Other than the Saints - Seahawks, this may be the best set of Wildcard Round matchups in recent memory in the NFL.

Quick Hits

OK so Superbowl XLIV is over, and the New Orleans Saints nabbed their first ever league crown, removing another team from the list of franchises that have still never won the trophy, making more room for my Eagles on that ignominious roster of historical ineptitude. For most guys -- including me -- the superbowl is always bittersweet, because while it is a great, exciting game in most cases, once it is over, well, there's a void.

A serious void. If for some reason you still play fantasy football, and especially if you obsess over it like I once did back when it was cool, then that void is even larger. Sometimes it can seem unthinkable that you won't be watching any more football on tv until late in the summer. That's six looooooong months of no football, and the prospect can be a bit daunting to be sure.

So for those of you, I will start with some parting thoughts today as Superbowl XLV has officially come and gone. With a day or two to think things over and let things crystallize in my mind, it is clear to me now that both head coaches really puckered up like they were drinking pure lemon juice in the first half of that superbowl. I already mentioned how unforgivably hideous Sean Payton's play-calling was on 3rd and 4th and goal from the 1-yard line late in the first half. To call two straight running plays just off tackle there with all the offensive weapons on that team is simply unthinkable, and Payton showed that he was not ready for prime time at that point in the game, a mistake which he soon corrected with the onsides kick to start the second half of the big game. But Colts head coach Peyton Manning Jim Caldwell also made a very similar error just after that huge goal-line stop by his Colts, opting to run three consecutive running plays after a quick first down, basically right up the middle, none of which worked even remotely well. To not attempt to mount a real drive there at a point when all the momentum was going the Colts' way, was just inexcusable, and as is often the case, this mistake really hurt the Colts as it led to the Saints getting the field goal right back that they gave up by opting to go for it and then running a horrible play on 4th and goal from the 1, and it completely switched the momentum that to that point was all weighing in favor of the Saints.

In the second half, as I mentioned Sean Payton really deserves a lot of credit for the ballsy onsides kick call, which obviously would make him the goat of the superbowl if the Saints don't pull that play off. But it was a brilliant play and one which was executed flawlessly by the Saints, and I give Payton a lot of credit for deciding during halftime to stop being a pussy and start trying to find a way to go and win the game. As I mentioned previously I think the kind of reckless playcalling that Payton exhibited a few times yesterday is probably above the level I would think of as optimum risk-taking -- I mean think about it. Honestly, do you think Bill Parcells would have opened the 2nd half in that spot with an onsides kick? Bill Bellichik, yes, sure he would have. But he's never won shit when he hasn't been proven cheating on every single play. Andy Reid would have done the onsides kick there too. But, well, he's Andy Reid and his record in big games is beyond laughable. But would Parcells? Bill Cowher? No, I don't think they would have, not in that particular spot. Because if you miss this roughly 50% chance of getting the ball back, your team is more or less finished in the superbowl given the way things were going. I'm not so sure I want my coach deciding with 30 minutes of football left in the biggest game in franchise history that he's going to willingly take a 50-50 gamble that will result in surely losing the game if he's wrong, and may or may not lead to victory if he is right and his play works. But I do give Payton credit for coming out and trying to grab the win instead of waiting around, and especially for his team obviously being more than ready to run that play to perfection.

I also give Sean Payton a lot of credit for what the Saints did defensively to confuse Peyton Manning. Now sure, nobody actually ever confuses Peyton -- you can just watch him at the line for a few plays to see that he always knows what's going down better than anyone else on the field for the most part -- but the Saints did as good a job as anybody in holding Manning and the Colts to just 17 total points on offense. They moved the ball well and outgained the Saints by around a hundred yards in the game, but despite that, Peyton never really seemed to get into that rhythm where he is a few steps ahead of the defense and can basically isolate the coverage mismatches and throw quick-strike bombs to penetrate the weaknesses. The Saints deserve a lot of credit for the way that they kept changing up their defenses, encouraging the Colts to run the ball early in the game and then taking away the run in the second half once the Saints got ahead on the scoreboard. The Saints not only changed their looks but they actively rotated different defensive packagesm, alternating between a 3-4, a 4-3, the nickel and various other formations which clearly helped to keep Peyton Manning off of his best game. The Saints rarely showed their full blitz package prior to Manning hiking the ball, and the result again was that Peyton was never really able to get on a roll and just pick apart the defense like he usually has been so adept at doing. Kudos to the Saints on defense, and to Drew Brees on offense, in what was truly an amazing run. Like I said yesterday, it's very rare that we get a true #1 vs #2 matchup, in football or in any sport really for that matter, and this one did not disappoint.

Also interesting this year in the NFL is that the NFC has finally caught up and seemingly passed their AFC counterparts after several years of AFC superiority. This year the Colts were awesome, but the Saints were better start to finish. And I think most people would agree after the playoffs that the Vikings were the next best team in the NFL as well. The Chargers looked good, the Jets had their moments, but the bottom line is that the best teams in football no longer reside in the AFC. If recent history is any guide, this could be the start of a long period of NFC success, as the conferences have tended to run in cycles of 10-15 years in duration with one conference having the clear advantage over the other.

It's also worth mentioning that, at least in my view, the superbowl loss has real significance in the career of Peyton Manning. I myself proclaimed that with the win in this year's superbowl, Peyton would already be well on his way to being the greatest quarterback who ever lived. Well, Peyton didn't win on Sunday, and I am revoking my statement as a result. The bottom line is, Peyton's number are sickeningly great, and his performance on the field is even so much greater than just what his number show, but in the end -- for quarterbacks more than almost anyone else in sports -- champions equate with all-time greatness. You simply need to have multiple superbowl titles to be considered one of the all-time greats in my book. It doesn't mean you have to win four or five superbowls -- too much of that is tied up in what specific team you happen to be drafted for and at what specific time -- but one is not enough to be grouped alongside the Montanas, the Elways, the Aikmans et al. By losing on Sunday, Peyton still has work to do all over again in order to ascend to "elite of the elite" status in the eyes of most knowledgeable football fans. Peyton's numbers by the time he is done with this league are going to speak for themselves as to how great he really is, and his one superbowl is enough to cement him a top-10 spot already for sure. But he can call all the plays at the line of scrimmage all he wants -- there are still other quarterbacks out there who did less playcalling and audibling at the line, but who had more overall success than Peyton in playing the position the way they know best. So Peyton's still going to have to win a second title to get the historical credit we all know he deserves in the eyes of many a football fan after losing his bid for a second superbowl title in Miami this past weekend.

Before closing the book on the 2009-2010 NFL season and commencing the huge wait until next season ramps up, I figured it's never too early to start thinking about next year already in the sports books. Courtesy of our personal information-disclosing friends at Bodog, I present to you, in alphabetical order, the hot-off-the-presses futures odds to win the 2011 championship in Superbowl XLV:

Arizona Cardinals - 35/1
Atlanta Falcons - 30/1
Baltimore Ravens - 20/1
Buffalo Bills - 100/1
Carolina Panthers - 40/1
Chicago Bears - 35/1
Cincinnati Bengals - 30/1
Cleveland Browns - 100/1
Dallas Cowboys - 12/1
Denver Broncos - 50/1
Detroit Lions - 100/1
Green Bay Packers - 12/1
Houston Texans - 35/1
Indianapolis Colts - 13/2
Jacksonville Jaguars - 50/1
Kansas City Chiefs - 100/1
Miami Dolphins - 45/1
Minnesota Vikings - 12/1
New England Patriots - 10/1
New Orleans Saints - 10/1
New York Giants - 20/1
New York Jets - 25/1
Oakland Raiders - 100/1
Philadelphia Eagles - 16/1
Pittsburgh Steelers - 11/1
San Diego Chargers - 8/1
San Francisco 49ers - 45/1
Seattle Seahawks - 45/1
St.Louis Rams - 100/1
Tampa Bay Buccaneers - 100/1
Tennessee Titans - 25/1
Washington Redskins - 50/1

Looking at the above list, a couple of names jump out at me as potentially representing some decent value. The Steelers are 11-1, and we all know that they have the personnel on both offense and defense to get back to the big game. I don't think the Eagles have the personnel to make it there, but the Jets at 25-1 are also worth a look given that we know they will have the defense again, and they managed to make their way to the conference finals this season already. The Minnesota Favres are at 12-1 right now, placing them in a three-way tie for sixth-highest on the board, but I imagine that as soon as Brett Favre makes official his obvious desire to return next season, that number probably climbs up to 10-1 or 19-2, so there may be an opportunity to get in early on that one before Favre makes his decision official. The Denver Broncos at 50-1 are also intriguing, only because the team was 6-0 and looking unstoppable a few months ago, and those are some long odds that could really pay off a small fortune if you have a hundy to drop on a few teams in advance of the 2010 NFL season commencing late this coming summer.

Now, enough about football, bring on the pause and some time to focus on March Madness as we roll into the home stretch in conference play in the NCAAs. And, of course, some time to focus on Lost! I watched last week's episode again on Monday evening, and I have to say without reservations that that was one cool episode. They've given us some solid more information that we never had before, introduced us to a new group of characters at a final station on the island heretofore never seen, and they've given some solid clues as to what makes certain people on the island immortal. As someone who was generally underwhelemed by the silly over-complexity of Season 5, the first episode of Season 6 seemed like it harkened back to the old days of this show, which is a welcome change to me to say the least. I realized yesterday while at the gym that I am genuinely looking forward to Lost tonight -- have been for several days, really -- for the first time in almost two years. I mean, I really can't go even 15 minutes without thinking about Jacob, the Japanese guy, and what's going to happen next. With just one episode this year, Lost has already grabbed me totally back in, which is a very good sign I think heading into the series conclusion just 15 episodes from now. Some people have heard tonight's episode is going to be crazy, and some have heard the really crazy one is next week's, but suffice it to say that Lost is really back with a vengeance, and is captivating its viewers like it hasn't for many of us in a long, long time. And nobody is happier about that fact than me.

Superbowl Redux and NFL Recap (Costanza FTW Again!)

Yep, George Costanza did it for me again. I thought the Colts would win. I thought it was pretty obvious in fact that Peyton Manning was going to lead his team to victory and cement his legacy as perhaps the single greatest all-around quarterback in NFL history. Even at 5 points I thought there was room in that line for the greatness of Peyton to win and cover. By halftime, according to Tony Dungy, who apparently is no better a picker of NFL games than he is a head coach.

Anyways, I was so sure the Colts would win and cover the 5 point spread, that I went ahead and picked the Saints using the Costanza opposite method that lifted me to 2-0 last week after a dismal 6-23 stretch prior to recognizing the strengths of the Costanza system. And look what happened. 3-0 to end the season, which I guess makes the rest of my NFL pick performance during 2009-2010 a tiny bit better. In the end I had a great first three-quarters of the season, followed by as bad of a final quarter as is humanly possible. Recognizing that I could do nothing but pick losers, I made the switch to Costanza for the conference championships and then the Superbowl, and I won 'em all. I had a fun time picking the games on the blog this year and will plan to do it again next year, but next time I resolve to rely less on what the "experts" like Tony Dungy say and more on what I myself believe will happen.

Moving on to the game itself, it was a pretty good superbowl that was competitive until late in the 4th quarter. My first thought it basically that the best team won. In fact, this was the first time in a long time that we have had pretty much the undisputed two best teams in the NFL meeting up to crown the season's champion. It was the Saints, the clear winners from the NFC after they bested the Minnesota Favres in both the regular season and in the postseason, against the Colts, clearly the only great team in the AFC this year. This was the matchup that had been fixing to go off all year, pitting the 13-0 Saints before their late-season slide against the 14-0 Colts before they pulled their starters and lost a couple of games. In fact, the Colts not only had the best quarterback in the league but they did not lose a single game all season long in which they actually played their starters enough to be really trying to win. I don't remember that ever happening before since the undefeated Dolphins team in 1972, excluding of course teams that were later found to be cheating on every single goddam play during the season in question. So this was the great matchup to decide who would be the champion from among the clear best team in each conference during this season.

And like I said, the best team won. Peyton Manning and the Colts looked good on offense. Peyton threw for well over 300 yards and they ran for just a hair under a buck on the ground as well. The Colts moved the ball enough to win the game. They just did not capitalize well enough when they needed to. The Saints did a great job of taking away the big-play, quick-strike capability that we saw Manning and the Colts unleash several times on national tv this season, and the result was that the Colts just couldn't get it into the end zone enough times to win.

And I'll tell you something else about this superbowl -- not only did the best team win, but the best quarterback won on Sunday as well. Manning's body of work is obviously head and shoulders above Drew Brees right now -- nobody sane would argue that -- but on Sunday it was clear that MVP Drew Brees was the better player. Peyton finished the day 31 of 45 for 333 yards, 1 touchdown and 1 costly interception at the end of the game (final qb rating of 88.8). Drew Brees, on the other hand, was simply amazing, throwing for a hyper-efficient 32 of 39 for 288 yards, two touchdowns, and most importantly zero picks on the day. Brees' final qb rating in his first superbowl? 114.5. Absolutely stellar.

In fact, the numbers indicate that Drew Brees flat outperformed Peyton Manning not just on Sunday, but in the entire post-season. In fact in fact, the numbers indicate that Drew Brees was -- for the second straight year, to be honest -- the best quarterback in the NFL all season long in 2009-2010. Just look at this. In the 2009-2010 post-season, each of the Colts and the Saints played three games. Over those three games, Peyton Manning went 2-1, throwing 87 for 128 passes for a 68% completion rate. In the three playoff games, Peyton had 6 touchdowns and 2 interceptions, including the late pick to Tracy Porter in Superbowl XLIV. His average qb rating over the three playoff games this year was a lofty 100. Impressive numbers by any measure.

But now take a look at Drew Brees's postseason. Brees finished the playoffs 3-0, a game better than Manning, on 72-102 passing for a completion percentage of 70.5%, also higher than Manning's already impressive 67% clip. And in the Saints' three post-season games -- all wins for his team, again -- Brees threw 8 touchdowns (two more than Manning), and zero picks. Yep, that's right, 8 touchdowns and no picks in the three biggest games of Drew Brees' career and life, all in succession. Even Brees's average quarterback rating over the three wins bests Peyton Manning's triple-digit score, coming in at an incredible 115.5 over the post-season on his way to his city's first-ever Superbowl and his own personal Superbowl MVP honors.

As I mentioned, even over the entire regular season this year, Brees's performance compares very favorably with Manning's. Peyton finished with 4500 yards, 33 touchdowns and 16 picks in 2009, for a qb rating of 99.9, while Brees finished the year with 4388 yards, 34 touchdowns, 11 picks and a qb rating of 109.6. Both sets of numbers are really, really strong, but in direct comparison between the two, it's not close. And nor are the 2010 playoff numbers.

Oh, and while I'm at it, let's just look reallllly quick at the 2008-2009 regular season numbers as well. Peyton Manning: 4002 yards, 27 touchdowns, 12 picks, qb rating of 95.0. Drew Brees in 2008: 5069 yards (!!), 34 touchdowns, 17 picks, qb rating of 96.2.

Drew Brees is the best quarterback in the NFL today. Hands down, after Sunday night.

I also wanted to mention the performance of the biggest Payton in the superbowl this year, Sean Payton. His handling of the 4th down play late in the second quarter wasn't just bad. It was legendary. I mean, Andy Reid musta had pangs of jealousy watching Payton pucker his anus up just like big Andy would have in that big a game. I was already writing the post here in my head about how Sean Payton stepped down in a huge spot and basically pulled an Andy Reid on the country. Going for it on 4th down in that spot was probably the wrong decision -- the game was so close at the time, the 3 points instead of 0 could have made a big difference with the way the game was going -- but I wouldn't kill the guy for deciding to go for it there given the percentages and where they were on the field even if they missed. But running it up the middle just off the right tackle on 3rd and then again on 4th down? With Drew Brees, the undisputed best quarterback in the NFL two years running now? With Meachem, and Shockey, and Thomas, and Reggie Bush, etc etc etc? And the best you can do is go for it instead of taking the guaranteed 3 points in a close game against a very powerful foe who already has the lead on you, and then run it up the middle again and again and get stopped every time. That is just pathetic.

One of the things that helps me to be successful long-term at poker is that I don't get caught up in results-oriented thinking. Ever. In this case, the Saints missed the first down and failed to score at all in a spot where it is obvious to me that they really needed to get something out of their drive. Those that point out that the Saints ended up getting a field goal before half anyways miss the point of course, since again it's not so much the decision to go for it -- probably the wrong one as I discussed above, but not clearly wrong -- but that decision combined with the play that was chosen that make it such a horrible, horrible move by Payton. His ass tightened up in a tough spot and he made a horrendous, hideous call, and I don't care how the play ended up. It was a brashly wrong decision at a key time for his team, and he let them down badly.

And then somehow, Sean Payton goes into the locker room, knowing in his heart of hearts that he had just made a horrendous coaching blunder that was going to be talked about for weeks on the airwaves, on ESPN, at water coolers, etc., and this guy somehow has the testicular fortitude to come out to open the second half and risk giving the potent Colts offense a short field by attempting on onsides kick to open the half. And I'll be damned if it didn't work. The Colts weren't even thinking of considering such a move, they were taken completely by surprise, the Saints executed it perfectly, and they got the ball back. This clearly swung all the momentum in the game in the opposite direction towards the Saints, and by the time they punched it in a few plays later the entire game had taken on a different feel, one I am sure the players on both teams were well aware of. This onsides kick decision was another dubious one by Payton, as if it does not work, Payton has just compounded his national embarrassment from the first half with a mega blunder that gives Peyton Manning only half the field or less to get back into the end zone and make it a two-touchdown game. You won't hear hardly anyone say this today, again because so many people in the world of poker and in the world at large are results-oriented, but Payton has got to have some massive brass gondalas to make that kind of a dubious call in that spot. He clearly put his team at risk of falling far behind an offensive powerhouse due to his own stupidity, but in this case you have to give him and his team credit for pulling that play off, I'm sure practicing it hard all week long, and getting it done there. But Payton, who coached a very good game otherwise, definitely has me wondering after those two big calls that were each highly dubious ones in their own right, and even worse when combined together over just three or four minutes of game time in the biggest game of the year and the biggest game his team's franchise had ever played in.

I mean, can you imagine what people would be saying about Sean Payton today if that onsides kick didn't work?

Big, huge, brass balls I tells ya.

It's also pretty amazing isn't it that the same guy who intercepted Brett Favre to end the last-minute threat against the Favres last week is also the one who intercepted Peyton Manning in the superbowl with under four minutes to go in a 7-point game? That kind of karma is hard to come by around these parts. Truly amazing, I seriously hope Tracy Porter got one hell of a hummer from somebody last night.

But more than anything else, what I really, really hope is that all these clowns can find a way through the current labor issues that are leading all parties to claim now that a lockout by the owners before the start of the 2011 NFL season is all but a certainty. Letting things get off-track with the NFL at the heights at which it is currently perched would be a massive donkoff by the league's owners and players that would make Sean Payton's playcalling in the second quarter on 4th and 1 look like the second coming of Vince Lombardi.

Superbowl

So here it is: the moment of truth.

Do I go with who I feel pretty confident is going to win the big game on Sunday? The team that seemed destined to win it all right from the getgo this season? The team that has won every single game all year long, regular season and postseason, when they actually attempted to win the game?

Or do I go with the opposite?

You may recall, after a dismal end of the regular season and early playoffs in picking these games, for the conference championship round I decided to do something drastic, opting to go Costanza on your asses by taking the opposite of what my gut was telling me for each game. So, since it was clear to me that the Colts were favored by too much against the Jets, I picked the Colts. And won. And it was equally clear to me that the Saints were going to cover the 3.5 point spread at home against the Minnesota Favres who had fallen dramatically at the end of the season. So there I went with the Vikes. And won.

2-0 after weeks and weeks of 2-3 and 1-4 performances?

I just don't see how I can forsake it now.

So with that, I present to you the hammerplayer pick for Superbowl 44:

New Orleans Saints +5 vs. the Indianapolis Colts. I don't know how else to pick it. My gut tells me that the Colts are the better team here. They played better in the regular season. They played better in the playoffs. After a slow start the Colts handily beat their conference championship opponents in the Jets, while the Saints got outgained badly and had to rely on 6 turnovers from the Favres including a final-seconds interception from near field goal range just to snatch a 3-point victory from Minnesota. Drew Brees is good, but Peyton Manning is better. And the Colts have experience on their side as well, with much of this team having been in the superbowl a few years ago as well. It all points towards the Colts, and the 5-point line is I think very beatable by this high-scoring Colts offense, especially considering how porous the Saints defense looked last week against a less potent offense than the Colts' this weekend.

So go with the Saints, and take the points. 2-0 going the Costanza, as compared to 6-23 in my final six weeks picking games the real way. I'll stick with the opposite. Go Saints!