NFL -- Second Quarter Update

Although we're technically not quite through the halfway point for many of the teams in the NFL due to bye weeks, I figure we are close enough for me to get my thoughts about the state of the league down "on paper" here now. Of course a lot has gone on as usual in the No Fun League, but here are some of my thoughts that maybe go just beyond the normal stuff you'll hear about and read about at all the usual sites.

Lions wideout Calvin Johnson has the same pompous streak in him as the Eagles' DeSean Jackson. This is pomp and circumstance drives these guys to be among the best performers and the greatest deliverers of big plays at their positions. But it is also the same pomp and circumstance that leads Calvin Johnson to repeatedly "pull a DeSean" and taunt the opposing team on many of his big touchdown plays. Calvin, if you keep stopping at the 1-yard line and waiting for your opponents to nearly tag you before taking it into the paint, you're eventually going to blow a big score in a huge spot. Just ask DeSean how that feels, and how his coach reacts when it happens.

Tim Tebow sucks. This was already obvious, but I just don't understand what his supporters are looking at after this most recent effort in Week 8. You can give the guy credit for last week's sick comeback win over the hapless Dolphins, but to do so you have to flat ignore the fact that Tebow was 4 for 14 for 40 total yards passing through 56 minutes of that game, and the needed an unbelievable fumble by Dolphins qb Matt Moore to even have a chance to come back like they did. Against the single worst team in the NFL. You may love God, you may love the Florida Gators, but you can't do shiat to change the fact that Tim Tebow is an abject waste of space behind center. After Week 8's 18-for-39 performance for 172 yards, one touchdown, one pick-6, and a fumble leading to a score as well, plus 7 sacks, we're now looking at a guy whose accuracy (47% thus far this year) is among the worst you'll ever see of any player allowed to start in this league. I know it looked a couple of weeks ago like John Fox had no choice but to give Tebow the rest of the 2011 regular season to prove himself one way or the other, but this guy is so foul at the quarterback position that I just don't see how Fox can feel secure in his own job if he keeps putting Tebow out there much longer.

And speaking of dicksuckitty quarterbacks, how the hell is nobody even talking about how awful Kevin Kolb has been so far this year for the Cardinals? After being traded to the Cardinals by the Eagles in the 2010-2011 offseason in exchange for cornerback Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie plus a 2nd-round pick in 2012, and heading to a team with former NFL best wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald perennially highly productive tight end Todd Heap among his targets, Kolb has put up a paltry 57% completion percentage so far in 2011, to go along with 7 touchdowns, 7 interceptions, and five fumbles to boot. So far Kolb has done more to justify a benching than he has to explain why he was worth even a single late-round draft pick, let alone a 2nd-rounder plus an established NFL player. And pretty soon people aren't going to be able to ignore it any longer -- and I don't care how white Kolb's skin is.

Jacksonville Jaguars rookie quarterback Blaine Gabbert is also probably worth mentioning while we're on the topic of hapless hurlers in the NFL. I know he is a rookie so I don't want to write his ass off after just six games, but in addition to perhaps the league's worst mullet, Gabbert has posted a 69-for-143 throw record for a putrid completion percentage of 48% -- including two games this month with an under 40% figure -- with just four touchdowns and two picks for a qb rating of 69.4. And believe me, if you've actually sat and watched him play over his six real chances so far this year, Gabbert hasn't even been close to that good. This league is full of quarterbacks who were flat-out hideous in their rookie seasons but who ended up being great NFL stars, but even most of those qbs were more productive than this right from the getgo, so there might be some cause for concern here.

The Cincinnati Bungles might actually be not-horrible this year! After this weekend's blowout of the shitty Seahawks, the Bungles are 3-1 on the road, and the GM made the best move in the past decade-plus for this franchise by duping the crap out of the Raiders into getting a 1st- and a 2nd-round draft pick in exchange for interception machine Carson Palmer earlier this month. The Bungles certainly do not hold a candle to the class teams in the AFC this year, but at 5-2 as we near the halfway point of the season, it may be time to stop discussing this team like we have every other year of the past, what? 15? 20?

The San Francisco 49ers are 6-1, despite ranking in 31st place out of 32 teams in passing, and despite giving up passing yards to opposing quarterbacks more readily or worse than three-quarters of the teams in the league today. What's the 49ers' secret? Fabulous coaching from rookie head coach Jim Harbaugh, playing in without a doubt the worst division of my entire lifetime, and, most of all, controlling the run on both sides of the ball. Rejuvenated back Frank Gore headlines the NFL's 6th-best rushing attack through seven games here in 2011, and meanwhile the team is allowing the 2nd-fewest rush yards per game at just under 75 yards on the ground. Like the Bungles in the AFC, the Niners have no prayer whatsoever of holding up against the truly great teams in the NFC -- in particular with a guy like Alex Smith taking the snaps -- but Harbaugh has done in half a season what many (myself included) expected former coach Mike Singletary to do but could not even approach doing in a couple of seasons at the helm in San Fran.

The Washington Redskins are absolute shit. You had to know this even after the team started the season 2-0, but my god, is there honestly any worse franchise in all of football today? I mean, this team has only made the playoffs three times since 1993. Holy shit, just think about that. In contrast, the division rival Eagles have appeared in the postseason 9 out of the last 11 seasons, the Cowboys have been there in 11 of the past 20 seasons, and the Giants have been in the postseason in 8 of the last 16 years. In the Redskins' last three games, runningback Ryan Torain has led the team in rushing with an unbelievable 22 yards in Week 6, and now 14 yards in the team's Week 8 crushing at the hands of the Buffalo Bills. 14 yards as your leading rusher, and it's not even an outlier? Is that stat even serious? Meanwhile, current starting quarterback John Beck is just the latest in an amazingly long line of consecutively shitty qbs, following up on Rex Grossman, a worthlessly old Donovan McNabb, Jason Campbell, Todd Collins, Mark Brunell, Patrick Ramsey, Tim Hasselbeck, Shane Matthews, Danny Wuerffel, Tony Banks and Jeff George, which is every hurler to start a game for the Skins since the 2001 season. This team is going nowhere fast and at this point has once again assumed their rightful position at the bottom of the NFC East, a place Daniel Snyder must be getting very used to since taking over the team in 1999 as his team has recorded only two finishes better than 3rd place in the division since 2000.

Staying in the NFC East for a moment, Eli Manning is quietly having a pretty solid season for the Giants, following up on his worst season as a starter in 2010 for the Giants with an efficient and productive effort consisting of a very respectable 63% completion percentage and 1778 yards over 7 games so far this year. Very importantly, Manning has cut down on his 25 interceptions from 2010, tossing up only 5 INTs thus far through 7 games in 2011 to go along with 11 touchdowns. Although the Giants are sitting pretty right now at 5-2 with a full 2-game lead in the NFC East, we're about to learn just how much Manning has cleaned up his act since 2010 as the team's schedule is about to get a lot tougher, with its next six games featuring matchups at 6-2 New England, at 6-1 San Francisco, vs. an upstart Eagles team, at 6-2 New Orleans, vs. the 8-0 Packers, and then at the currently 3-4 but always tough divisional rival Cowboys. Given that the Giants have not played consistently well so far in 2011, it's a safe bet that the NFC East will look a lot different a month and a half from now than it does today nearing the midway point.

Watching Tony Romo lead the Cowboys on two long drives only once the game had become 34-0 with 11 minutes to go on Sunday night against the Eagles reminded me just how much this guy loves to pad his stats with worthless yards and touchdowns late in games. For a guy with lifetime 4th-quarter stats as "good" as Romo's, he has got to be one of the least clutch players in the NFL today, very possibly the literal worst, and this is a trend that looks to me only to be getting worse here in 2011. And my god, will somebody please find someone for the Cowboys to stick at center who knows how to snap a ball to the quarterback, at least a little bit? I can say with confidence that I've never seen during my lifetime anyone consistently make shitty snaps for such a simple play, and retain his job week in and week out.

Which brings me to my beloved Eagles. The Eagles took a big step towards pushing for the NFL East crown this year after their horrid 1-4 start to the 2011 regular season, with Sunday night's absolute blowout defeat of the hated Dallas Cowboys at home in every single aspect of the game lifting the Eagles to 3-4 and a tie for second place in the East through nearly half of the 2011 regular season. With the Packers, Niners and Saints looking like near-locks to win their respective divisions, and with the Bears, Lions, Buccaneers and Falcons all ahead of the Eagles (plus the Cowboys still tied) through Week 8 of the year, the Eagles are likely going to need to win the East to have any real shot of playing in the postseason this year, but this week's win over the Cowboys combined with the Redskins' loss at Buffalo this week positions the Eagles at 3-4 within striking distance of the Giants, with a bunch of winnable games coming up in the second half of the schedule, including games at home against the Bears, Cardinals and Redskins, and road matchups with the Giants, Seattle and Miami, in a division where 9 wins might just be able to take it in a tiebreaker. Star runningback LeSean McCoy just better learn how to hold the ball, though, as he is bound to lose some game-crushing fumbles in the near future if he doesn't stop cupping the ball loosely against his right wrist while nearly fully extending his arm while running for 100+ yards in almost every game.

2011 NFL Post-Season Predictions

Finally this past weekend I had time to put the finishing touches on this post, which for the record was written over the couple of weeks leading up to the start of the 2011 NFL regular season. And what a wild Week 1 it was, which will quickly become apparent when you see some of my picks for the postseason this year in the NFL.

NFC East: Eagles
NFC North: Packers
NFC South: Saints
NFC West: Cardinals

NFC Wildcard: Cowboys, Bears

NFC Almost's: Falcons, Lions, Rams

AFC East: Cheatriots
AFC North: Steelers
AFC South: Texans
AFC West: Chargers

AFC Wildcard: Jets, Ravens

AFC Almost's: Chiefs

So, that is a total of four new playoff teams I am predicting in 2011, two in the NFC (Cardinals and Cowboys, replacing the Seahawks and the Falcons), and two in the AFC (Texans and Chargers, replacing the Colts and the Chiefs). Four out of twelve ain't bad, but over the recent past that's still not as much annual turnover as the NFL has seen in its slate of post-season participants, so there are likely some more surprises to come this year. I just think the Seahawks have fallen behind both the Rams and the Cardinals given the moves of this past offseason, and for some reason I decided to hitch my prediction this offseason to Tony Romo, the greatest step-down-in-the-clutch artist in the NFL today, over Matty "Ice" Ryan. Pure. Genius. And in the AFC, I am expecting the Chiefs to impress again this year but they are going to have trouble winning their division again due to a much harder schedule and not being overlooked by their opponents this year, while the Colts are in my mind finished without Peyton Manning at the helm.

I'm not typically one for making detailed post-season predictions for later rounds here without even knowing who is playing who, who is injured, etc. But I will say that I think the Cheatriots look once again to be the class of the AFC if they stay healthy and are likely to show up in the superbowl again this year, while the picture in the NFC is a bit murkier, between the Eagles and the Packers. I'll take the Packers over the Cheatriots in the superbowl in a repeat for Green Bay. Since, just like the Red Sox over the Dirty Decade in Boston, the Cheatriots have never won a damn thing since they haven't been allowed to cheat.

NFL Is Back and Just Like Before

Although I still have not posted my completed set of predictions for this year's twelve NFL playoff teams -- that should definitely be done within the next day or two -- I just had to mention a couple of things I noticed from the Week 1 games. It's amazing really, how much the more things change, the more they stay the same in a lot of ways, and the beginning to the 2011 NFL regular season so far rang very similar in a lot of ways to what we saw in 2010 in corresponding situations.

For starters, the Saints-Packers game last Thursday to start the 2011 NFL regular season, if that was not a continuation of 2010, I don't know what is -- in particular for Aaron Rodgers and the Packers offense. But both quarterbacks and both offenses, really -- Rodgers went an extremely efficient 27 for 35 for 312 yards, 3 touchdowns and no picks, and Saints qb Drew Brees chipped in at 32 for 49 for 419 yards, also with 3 touchdowns and no interceptions. If those two teams had played at the end of the 2010 regular season, we probably would have seen the exact same thing, with more or less the exact same outcome. But when Aaron Rodgers and Drew Brees battle it out to a 132.1 and 112.5 qb rating, respectively, I'm definitely getting shades of last year all over again.

I should also mention along these same lines that that entire Cowboys / Jets game last night was like one big massive glitch in the matrix deja vu. I mean, the Jets pretty much got outplayed from start to finish. The Jets defense simply could not come up with the big play when they needed it through 58 minutes in the field, and they allowed the opposing offense to move the ball enough to grab and maintain a fairly comfortable lead. Jets qb Mark Sanchez made a couple of crucial mistakes and led the team on a couple of inept drives in huge spots, including late in the 4th quarter when the game should have been by all rights over. But then suddenly it's a ridiculously bad play leading to a touchdown runback for the Jets' defense late in the game, and then the opposition completely collapses again on offense in an unthinkable, Brett Favreian moment for Tony Romo. Even that pick by Romo, over to the sidelines, in the final minute of a game, with the game tied so that the only thing Romo cannot do is throw an interception, haven't we seen that exact thing not all that long ago our of the exact same quarterback in Romo, in that exact same, tie-game-final-minutes-drive spot? I definitely remember it, I think against the Giants a couple of seasons ago on a national game. So the Jets pull out a victory after sucking it up pretty much on both sides of the ball for 98% of the game, and Tony Romo steps down hugely and ridiculously in the biggest moment of the game. Sound familiar?

The Bears were another team that basically picked right up here in 2001 where they left off in 2010. As I wrote about last week, if there was ever a team with low expectations after making the NFC Championship game the year before, and basically losing nobody of real significance in the offseason, it is this year's Chicago Bears. And yet, despite once again being picked against by basically everybody this week with the Falcons coming to town -- just like we saw everyone doing last year whenever the Bears played in a big game, over and over again -- Jay Cutler did the same thing he did over and over again in 2010 that led his team to the conference finals in the first place -- he played great. Just as I felt watching Atlanta get drubbed out of the postseason at home by the Packers in the first round of the playoffs last year, it was clear right from the getgo that the Falcons were outmatched this weekend, and just like last year, it was Brain Urlacher and the Bears' ferocious defense making the big plays to make sure the team held on for the big victory.

Even the Eagles basically showed up in St. Louis for the start of the 2011 regular season the same way they played through most of 2010. Philadelphia fell behind early after the defense gave up a gaping hole and a nearly 50-yard run on the very first defensive play from scrimmage on the season -- with the big play being a constant problem for the Eagles; defense all through 2010 including especially in the postseason against the Packers -- but then the Eagles turned it on and basically blew out the Rams from then on. Michael Vick threw for 187 yards with two touchdowns and no interceptions -- recall Vick's amazing touchdown to interception ratio in 2010 -- and Vick chipped in with 98 yards rushing as well on the day, joining with 122 yards on the ground and two total touchdowns from runningback LeSean McCoy, and 6 catches for 102 yards and a score from star wideout DeSean Jackson to create a three-headed onslaught on offense that no team could withstand.

And speaking of the Eagles, then there was Donovan McNabb, the aging, too-old-for-the-league veteran. D-Mac's line on the day with his new team in Minnesota? 7 for 15, for 39 yards, one touchdown and one pick, for a passer rating of 47.9. And this guy was behind center for every offensive snap for his team on the day, which mustered a total output of 28 yards in the air. 28 yards passing, with McNabb at the helm all the way through. This is like Washington from 2010 all over again for Donny Mac, isn't it? Only this time, we might need to rename the JaMarcus Russell award if things don't pick up in what could be a looong year for McNabb and the Vikings.

Of course, there were a few areas where things were completely different from 2010 as well, including the bitter blowout of the colts at the hands of the Oilers, and the Bills absolutely schmeistering Todd Haley and the Kansas City Chiefs. I was also surprisingly impressed by Rex Grossman and the Redskins, who took it to the New York Giants and called into question just how good the men in blue will be in the NFC East during 2011, what is likely to be head coach Tom Coughlin's last season in charge in the Big Apple. But for me, it was more the similarities than the differences that stood out about the Week 1 action this year as compared to my recent memories of a lot of these teams and a lot of the players making the big plays for them.

Winners and Losers

The NFL packed another powerful punch in Week 2, with several big winners and several big losers emerging from what we saw all Sunday long across the world's best professional sports league bar none.

The Big Winners:

Rex Ryan. The automated phone call to 55,000 Jets season ticket holders during the week, encouraging them to come out and support the team as hard as they can and hinting at expected victory for the first time against the Cheatriots in New York since 2000. Keeping his rookie quarterback totally in the game and not requiring him to do too much. Holding the Cheats to just 9 points in his first time coaching against Bill Belichik. In fact, giving up just 9 and 7 points in his first two games as head coach. Watch out for the Jets in the biggest sports media market in the world.

Jay Cutler. Cutler didn't exactly play great against the Steelers' vaunted defense, but he sure saved himself a whole world of heartache by throwing the fourth-quarter td pass to Johnny Knox to secure a win this week and stop himself from starting off 0-2 in Chicago. Although Cutler only threw for 236 yards on the day, it was enough to win against a very stingy defense, and more importantly, his line included two tds and no picks, a huge improvement from the 77 interceptions he threw against the Packers at Lambeau last week. Cutler has been redeemed for now, and his Bears are right back in the hunt for the hotly-contested NFC North.

Eli Manning. Say what you want about the guy, but Eli is getting better every single week, and he is downright proficient at leading a 4th-quarter offense. And how 'bout that 360-turnaround play and then accurate throw in the fourth quarter of Sunday night's game against the Cowboys? That was Favre-esque, and by that I mean the athletic, youthful version of Favre we used to see with the Packers several decades ago. Eli's Giants are off to a 2-0 start in the NFC East, and put a serious damper on the opening of the Cowboys' opulent new stadium in Dallas. And special kudos also go out to new Giants starting wideout Mario Manningham, who now has 13 receptions for 208 yards and two touchdowns through his first two games as a starter in New York, helping to fill the void left by the self-shooting Plaxico Burress.

Drew Brees. Wow. Nine touchdowns in two games this year, after easily outperforming all other NFL quarterbacks in 2008 as well in completing 65% of his passes for 34 touchdowns and 5069 yards last season. The Saints are averaging 46.5 points per game to start the season, and with the Panthers playing like dog poop, it looks like the Saints will be talking playoffs (cue the Jim Mora "Playoffs?!" soundbite here) soon enough coming out of the NFC South.

The Losers:

TO. Even with the Bills winning their game this weekend to move to 1-1, TO is quickly picking up right where he left off last year as far as his season being defined more by two blatant drops so far in his first two games than by any actual highlights he's been coming up with. Yeah he scored his first touchdown this weekend, but have you seen his stats so far on the season? We're 1/8 of the way through NFL 2009 already, and TO is at 5 catches for 98 yards and 1 score. Not good. Nor is it good that TO was seen angrily yelling at the fans on the sidelines after his touchdown this weekend, nor suggesting after last week's loss that his quarterback "needs to throw the ball downfield" more. Uh huh, Terrell. Just catch the damn ball.

Tony Romo. 13 of 29 for 127 yards on national tv on Sunday night to open the Cowboys' new gem of a stadium? One touchdown but three picks, all of which led to touchdowns for the Giants on the night? Granted one of the interceptions was a flukey off-the-shoe tip catch by Giants rookie Bruce Johnson, but still, Romo looked like crap on Sunday night, there's just no other way to say it. And how tired are we all getting of having to look at Wade Phillips' obviously confused, beaten-down mug on the sidelines 85 times a game for the Cowboys? Thank god that guy'll be long gone a year from now. Hope everyone likes the idea of Mike Shanahan or Bill Cowher's scowl on those sidelines, because that's what we other NFC East fans will be seeing a lot of starting in 2010.

The Tennessee Titans. The last team to lose a game in 2008 has now started off 2009 at 0-2, thanks to not enough offense and a very poor defensive showing giving up 420 yards against the Houston Texans this weekend. This week's beneficiary was Texans quarterback Matt Schaub, who followed up his awful performance against the Jets in week 1 with a 359-yard, four-touchdown outburst against the defending AFC South champions this Sunday. Also spoiled in the loss was the Titan's Chris Johnson's sick-ass effort, scoring on touchdown runs of 91 and 57 yards on the day in addition to catching a td pass of 69 yards. Now that right there is a fantasy football players' dream, especially the super dumb leagues that award extra points for touchdowns of more than 50 yards.

Special Category: The Loser Winners:

The Washington Redskins. A 9-7 "win", if you can even call it that, over the hapless St. Louis Rams this weekend doesn't even begin to describe the ineptitude shown by both teams at Fedex Field on Sunday afternoon. Skins qb Jason Campbell did throw for 245 yards in the win, but obviously no td passes as four 60-yard drives for the Skins stalled out at or before the red zone without the team notching a single touchdown against a Rams squad who has won only twice in their last 18 games. Daniel Snyder continues his reign of terror in Washington, DC, bringing in an endless parade of overpriced superstars and ineffective coaches to the nation's capital and absolutely wasting his time yet again this year in the NFC East.

And then there are the Raiders, and more specifically, quarterback Jamarcus Russel against the Chiefs in Kansas City. Russell went 7 for 24 for 109 yards on a thoroughly miserable day in the pocket, and yet somehow that was enough to win the game! In fact, this entire game was a total and utter mismatch, with the Chiefs amassing 409 total yards to the Raiders' paltry 166, earning 25 first downs to the Raiders' 11, and holding the ball for nearly 39 minutes to the Raiders' 21, but yet none of this could stop Jamarcus Russel from becoming the second quarterback in more than twelve years to complete less than 30 percent of his passes with a minimum of 20 attempts but still win an NFL game. It's hard to imagine an uglier win than this one, or an uglier franchise than the Oakland Raiders.

And the Biggest Loser of All award goes to:

NBC. What on earth are these guys doing with their Sunday Night Football coverage? This is Dick Ebersol's big plan to keep NBC relevant to the football scene in the U.S.? Faith Hill copying Hank Williams with a ghey pre-recorded song just prior to the coverage of the kickoff? Repeatedly showing the letters "SNF" to promote their own Sunday Night Football brand, also clearly copied directly from the long-standing MNF Monday Night Football moniker? And then, somehow, forbidding the studio commentators from referring to "NBC" at all during the opening segment and at halftime, instead insisting on repeated references to "Football Night in America". Football Night in America? On a day that is chock full from dawn to dusk with NFL football games, Sunday night is now going to be known across the nation and the globe as "Football Night in America"? Keep dreaming, NBC. And keep dreaming that your tagline "I've been waiting all day for Sunday night" will speak to a single viewer of your games, who once again have just spent an entire fucking day watching nothing but NFL football games! Why on earth would any of us be waiting all day for Sunday night? It's one thing to just blindly copy Monday Night Football like a bunch of plagiaristic lemmings, but for crying out loud, use your brains at least a teensy little bit and change the things that don't make any sense whatsoever when applied to Sunday Night Football instead of Monday night. On Mondays, depending on the matchup, I and I'm sure many of you out there do in fact look forward all day to the Monday night game. But on Sunday? I'm surprised they didn't just call their Sunday night broadcast "Monday Night Football" and not change that either when they stole it from ABC. What an absolute joke, top to bottom on NBC's coverage of the Sunday night games.

And NBC, I have a newsflash for you: Keith Olberman and Dan Patrick were really, really cool co-anchors on SportsCenter back in the day. But that was literally 18 years ago now. Today, Keith Olberman is widely regarded as one of the biggest assholes on network tv, so partisan and biased in his unprofessional "reporting" that he had to be kicked off of covering all political events on MSNBC, and NBC viewers don't want to see him anywhere on the network, including on Sunday night football games instead of the refuse pile where his stale ass belongs. And Dan Patrick is, well, old. In 1992 when Patrick used to bust out with "the Whiff" on a strikeout in baseball and "en fuego" to describe Michael Jordan's latest run, it was really new, cool and refreshing. Now Patrick's shtick is just old, and boring. Seriously -- really, really boring. And then to go along with the tired Keith Olberman and Dan Patrick routine, you bring in Tony Dungy and some other guy I've never heard of or seen before to liven things up? I've got some more news for you, NBC. Tony Dungy may be a very nice man, he may have endured a very sad situation with his son. He may have somehow underperformed and got overrated for that underperformance for years as a coach in Tampa Bay and then in Indianapolis. And, he may even have somehow hitched his wagon to Mike Vick this year and yet still, somehow, come away from it all squeaky-clean as ever. And of course Dungy may be a deeply religious man. But, unfortunately for NBC, none of this does anything to make Dungy even remotely interesting as a football commentator. He is just terrible, and the team put together by NBC for the Sunday night coverage is without a doubt the worst of any network, any game, covering football games on television in my entire lifetime. There, I said it.

Your World Champion Philadelphia Phillies' magic number is 6 baybeeee. Bring it on.

NFL 2008 In Review

What a weekend in the NFL. I'm not sure I recall in my lifetime a crazier final week of the NFL season, or one with more do-or-die games for more teams than we saw in the heads-up matchups here in Week 17. It was Chargers - Broncos, winner gets the division, loser goes home. It was Jets - Dolphins battling it out for the right to make the playoffs, with the fate of the New England Cheatriots hanging in the balance as well with that game. The Buccaneers and the Bears each had a win-and-you're-in scenario working for them this weekend, and when they both lost, that turned the late game between the Eagles and Cowboys into yet another do-or-die game for both teams. The Vikings needed to beat the NFC-best New York Giants in order to get themselves into the playoffs (and win the NFC North). This was an absolutely riveting Sunday of football to end the 2008 regular season, and now we can focus on the playoffs and who has the best matchups to make it to the conference championships and eventually to the Superbowl.

First, just a minute about my Eagles. I knew going into the weekend that, if the Eagles somehow found themselves in a win-and-you're-in situation heading into Sunday afternoon's games, then the Cowboys were gonna be in trouble. That's just the Philadelphia mentality. We hate the Cowboys. Ragingly. And after already losing to them in a shootout on Monday night early this season in Dallas, and with the public troubles the team has had in pressure situations, with Tony Romo's clutch performances late in seasons, and with a shot at the playoffs on the line, the Eagles were going to come to play in a big way if they knew making the playoffs was at stake. And somehow, when the opening kickoff happened, that's just the situation the Eagles found themselves in.

And speaking of that for a minute, you do realize that if either the Bears or the Buccaneers had won their Week 17 games, the Eagles were out of the playoffs, right? I mean, first in line were Bucs, playing the hapless Raiders as double-digit favorites. This Raiders team stinks out loud, and everyone knows it. All the Bucs had to do was win and they would claim the 6 seed in the NFC, with Atlanta nailing down the first wildcard after their wildly successful 2008 season. And yet somehow, Jon Gruden's team found a way to lose to Gruden's old team the Raiders, in a game where the Bucs fell behind early, fought their way back but then gave it all up near the end. If you're a Bucs fan this morning, you just feel like absolute crap. And the Bucs loss opened the door for the Chicago Bears, who merely had to beat the Houston Texans in order to sneak into the playoffs themselves after Tampa Bay's alarming loss. And yet, different team, same story. Andre Johnson ran roughshod over that formerly good Bears defense on their way to knocking the Bears out of the playoffs after the referees all but ensured the Bears would stay alive in last week's game against the hated rival Green Bay Packers.

So the Bears and Bucs' losses turned the late Philly-Dallas game into a true do-or-die situation for both teams. The Cowboys already knew if they won, they were in the playoffs. But the Eagles had needed the help of both the Buccaneers and Bears to lose games which seemed highly unlikely for them to lose, and somehow they both did. So each of Philly and Dallas entered their final game of the 2008 regular season knowing that a win gets them a wildcard spot, and a loss sends them packing until next year. And the Eagles came out and absolutely obliterated this lost Dallas team, capping off a late-season collapse that saw Jerry Jones' boys lose 3 of their last 4 games to miss the playoffs. The Eagles went to the locker room at halftime up 27-3, and soon ran that up to 44-3 before the Cowboys got on the board again with their second field goal and only other score of the game. The Eagles's Donovan McNabb threw for two touchdowns and ran in one more, and our defense came to play in a big way, running back two Brian Dawkins-forced fumbles for touchdowns in a game that was never close and which Dallas barely showed up to play for. Marion Barber fumbled one time just a couple of yards from the end zone and with his body already flying out of bounds. Tony Romo turned in another typical Romo pressure performance, going 21 of 39 for 183 yards, no scores and one interception, along another two lost fumbles as the man continues to drop the ball far too easily under anything even remotely resembling pressure. With his performance, Romo significantly added to his reputation as a step-down quarterback in key spots as his December record as a starter dropped to 5-8 overall, despite being a lofty 22-4 in the other months. Unfortunately for Romo, all the big games in sports come at the end of the season, and almost no truly big games occur in the first few months.

And most of all, I look at the coach. Wade Phillips has always been a clown in my book. I mean, I never understood for half a second why Jerry Jones, with this much talent on his team, would hire that bozo instead of bringing in a real coach with a real track record leading a team. But more than that, owner Jerry Jones insisted all week leading up to this game, and even in the locker room after the devastating loss, that he will not make a head coaching change. Why? Why on earth would you want to keep this guy? Word is today that Eric Mangini, just two years removed from being called "ManGenius" and making appearances on The Sopranos, is gone as Jets coach after missing the playoffs in losing 4 of his team's last 5 games. At least the Jets recognize that there is a problem at the top, and also that there is some solid head coaching talent with real head coaching experience out there to be signed at the moment. The big prize of course is Bill Cowher, but I would be happy to hire Marty Schottenheimer after his incredible 15-1 run with the Chargers, which obviously was a significant over-achievement for that team which has basically stunk ever since his departure. But no, the Cowboys don't want Cowher or Schottenheimer, or apparently even heir-in-waiting Jason Garrett as their head coach. They want Wade Phillips, despite the team losing 3 of their last 4 games, and scoring a total of just 51 points throughout those four games, to lead this team into next season? Wade Phillips, whose offense with Tony Romo, Terrell Owens, Jason Witten and Marion Barber got outscored on the season by 60+ points by both the Eagles and the Giants, and whose defense gave up 70 more points than anyone else in the division? The coach who presided over the dissention in the locker room that only got worse as the season went on? What exactly has Phillips done to make Jerry Jones so sure that he has the coaching staff in place to succeed for many years and bring the superbowl back to Dallas?

My money is on Jerry Jones firing Wade Phillips before the Cowboys' 2009 season begins. I don't care what he's been saying over the past week or two.

A few other fun notes with the NFL -- starting with the Dolphins and the Falcons, the two big comeback stories of the year in the league. As I've chatted with a few of you on the girly, I don't know how you tell either of those two coaches that they are not the coach of the year in the NFL. If ever there was a year made for co-coaches of the year, this is it. Atlanta, mired in the embarrassment of the Michael Vick dog-fighting scandal, plucks this kid Matt Ryan out of nowhere and turns him, Michael Turner and Roddy White into stars, going 11-5 and easily making the playoffs after a disastrous 4-12 campaign in 2007. And Miami, winning just one game last season, bringing in new coach Tony Sparano after serving five years as an assistant coach in -- of all places -- Dallas, nabbing a discarded Chad Pennington, rookie wideout Tenn Ginn, Jr., and putting together another 11-win team, and capturing the division title in the AFC East, known to be one of the toughest divisions in football. What stories for the players, the fans and the coaches and ownerships of those two teams this year as the 2008 regular season has come to an end.

And Chad Pennington deserves mention in his own right. After the Jets managed to woo Brett Favre out of retirement in a shotgun marriage of sorts, they immediately cut Pennington, who had led the team for several years in his typical low-profile and yet consistent manner. The Dolphins quickly signed Pennington, their first "real" quarterback in several years, and immediately the move paid huge dividends. Pennington took the helm of an offense that led the league in giving up the fewest turnovers, in fact tying the NFL record for fwest turnovers given up in a season, period. For Pennington to be able to walk in to New York in Week 17 and knock his old team out of the playoffs, while nailing down his own team's division title in that same division in the process, what a story. One interesting stat is that, after Brett Favre threw three more picks (two of them really, really fugly ones) in the Week 17 game against the Dolphins, Favre threw more interceptions in December (8) than Pennington did in every game he started for the Dolphins this season (7). Pennington has always been one of those guys who's not necessarily glamorous about it, doesn't toot his own horn in public much, but who quietly gets the job done every year with roughly 20 touchdowns and usually fewer than 10 picks. He simply does not make the key mistakes that a guy like Tony Romo or Kurt Warner has been known to make over their careers. What a year for Pennington, and what a vindication here in Week 17 for one of the good guys in the NFL.

Lastly, I should mention the Chargers, who did their part by coming out and absolutely smushing the Broncos to capture the AFC West with the lofty record of 8-8. Although coach Norv Turner is a proven boob whose team will simply not be able to stick with the real class of the AFC in the post-season, the Chargers remain a dangerous team with the potential to blow it out on offense. And most of all, despite what can obviously be said about a team that finishes the season 8-8 and yet somehow wins their division, I for one am thrilled to see a team that got megafucked early in the season by redonkulous refereeing getting and fulfilling their chance at vindication and fighting their way into the playoffs despite the earlier uberfucking by the men in the black and white stripes.

So here are your opening futures bets to win the 2008-2009 Superbowl in Tampa, Florida on February 1, 2009:

Arizona Cardinals 40-1
Atlanta Falcons 15-1
Baltimore Ravens 12-1
Carolina Panthers 6.5-1
Indianapolis Colts 5.5-1
Miami Dolphins 28-1
Minnesota Vikings 18-1
New York Giants 2-1
Philadelphia Eagles 40-1
Pittsburgh Steelers 4.25-1
San Diego Chargers 20-1
Tennessee Titans 4-1

I will revisit this topic in future posts for sure, but my initial reactions to the above odds are to first notice that the Cardinals and Eagles are considered the greatest longshots on the board, which is interesting since the Eagles are favored by 3 points to win at Minnesota next weekend. I do think both the Cardinals and Eagles have very little chance of winning it all this year though, so I would probably stay away from the two longest shots on the board for this postseason. Other teams with essentially no chance include the Vikings, the Dolphins and the Chargers, who come in as 18-1, 28-1 and 20-1, respectively, and whom I would also tend to avoid because I just don't think these teams can win it all.

Among the favorites, I would never bet the Giants at a mere 2 to 1, not since the loss of Plaxico has left the Giants looking supremely beatable -- even at home -- during their last three games since suspending Plax for the remainder of the season, and likely the remainder of his time as a New York Giant. 2 to 1 on that bet is wayyyy to thin at this point. I also don't like the Titans at 4-1, who I think are benefiting from their 13-3 regular season record more than their actual chances of winning the superbowl. Obviously they could win it, but, as much respect as I have for their coach Jeff Fisher, I could not pick the Titans over the Steelers (assuming everyone is healthy), and I think even the Colts are likely to give them trouble given the late-season performance by Peyton Manning and crew, nor do I think the Titans would match up well against any of the likely NFC champion teams. 4-1 is not enough for me to take the Titans in this spot. 4.5 to 1 for the Steelers is intriguing, but at this point I would want to wait a week or so to see about the status of Ben Roethlisberger after Sunday's concussion before committing any serious money there. But dam that Pittsburgh defense is a tempting bet to win it all as I sit here right now.

The other two decent values I see on the board right now are Carolina at 6.5 to 1 -- with the first-round bye and homefield throughout except for the NFC championship game, I expect Carolina to be at New York in a few weeks to battle it out with the Giants for the right to go to Super Bowl XLIII. Of course NY will be favored in that game, but we saw a couple of weeks ago with everything on the line and both teams playing their hardest for the #1 seed in the NFC that Carolina can stick with the post-Plaxico Giants. 6.5 to 1 is decent odds to me for a small bet on a team with a great defense, strong offense and one of the best coaches in the NFL in John Fox. I am also intrigued a little bit by the Falcons at 15 to 1. No, I don't see this team winning any superbowl this year, but they are one of the few teams with big odds that does have the capability to win it in my view. For 15 to 1, I could see dropping $20 or $50 on them for a chance to win some nice coin.

NFL

Man, watching that Cowboys game last night was a thing of beauty, wasn't it? It's not often you get to watch an implosion like that on national tv here in New York, I'll tell you that. I mean, a couple of years ago Eli Manning was doing that sort of thing regularly, throwing incredibly foolish picks very late in tight games in the worst possible spots, but it's been a while now. In fact, come to think of it, many of the biggest step-down-in-the-clutch efforts I've seen lately have come from Tony Romo himself.

Now don't get me wrong -- Tony Romo is obviously a great game-day quarterback. Think about it -- while he was in there for the first half of this season, the Cowboys were talked about as a superbowl team. They were winning almost all of their games, and scoring a ton of points and a whole mess of touchdowns in doing so. Then Romo went down, and with Brad Johnson and some other clown in there as the backups, the team was bad. Far beyond merely bad in fact. They were completely ineffective on offense, and it even made the defense look pretty crappy to tell the truth. Then what, four weeks ago, Romo comes back and the team immediately goes on another winning streak. The guy can move the ball and see the field far better than the average NFL quarterback, and he knows how to make the best of his considerable options on offense down in Dallas.

But that said, Tony Romo is amassing quite a history of stepping down in the clutch. Of course we all remember the flubbed hold of the field goal that ended Dallas's season a couple of years ago, I believe against the Eagles, and of course there was the horrible game replete with a bunch of interceptions that he came up with to end last year for the 'Boys with his girlfriend Jessica Simpson in the stands. And now you can add this past Sunday afternoon to the list. The Cowboys were up 10 with 7 mintues to go against the Pittsburgh Steelers, and the Steelers managed to tie it up with two minutes left after a great punt return and a big drive combined with some stellar defensive stops. With the game tied at 13, Romo comes out to lead his team to victory, only something happened on the way to that game-winning field goal -- he threw a pick to a wide-open Steeler defensive back who ran it in for the game-winning touchdown instead. So sweet.

My Eagles also put a hurtin to the NFC-best New York Giants, but I'm not getting too excited about that one. After the tie with the hapless Bengals, I gave up hopes of the Eagles going anywhere serious this season, but what was interesting to me about the Eagles-Giants game this weekend was how listless the Giants looked on offense. I don't mean to make too big of a deal about it, but I really believe the loss of that idiot Plaxico Burress is a big blow to the Giants' chances of going back-to-back this year. It's not so much that Plax's four touchdowns and 30-some receptions are themselves that huge of a loss to the team's overall production numbers, but rather that his mere presence on the outside or coming across the middle every play is enough to draw double-teams, or at least the noticeable attention, of the opposing defense on mostly every snap of the ball. Now, all that is lost, and the result was an Eagles team that has looked very beatable on defense for most of this season but who on Sunday made the Giants look pretty dam ordinary on their side of the ball.

So I think the loss of Plaxico definitely brings the Giants back to the rest of the field a little bit, but right now I still see them as the favorite to repeat in the NFC. I don't think the Cardinals or anyone in that joke of a division known as the NFC North has the chops to take them on, but I suppose either of the balanced offense/defense attacks in Tampa Bay or Carolina might be able to make some troubles for them in the playoffs, although as I said I still see the Giants as the front-runners in the NFC right now. And on the AFC side, I had been leaning towards the New York Jets until a couple of weeks ago, but now they have been exposed as just what I thought they were at the beginning of the season -- just not a very good team. Right now I don't see how anyone can pick against the Pittsburgh Steelers. Their defense is so stifling, so incredibly awesome, that it's one of those rare situations like the Ravens of some years ago where you almost feel as good about the defense's ability to score points and spark the offense as you do about the offense's. Mike Tomlin has proven to be a very good coach, especially for such a young guy, and right now if I had to pick, I would say we are heading for a Pittsburgh - Giants superbowl matchup early in 2009.