Tennessee quarterback Kerry Collins led his team on an 11-play, 80-yard drive in the fourth quarter of a 13-10 win over the Baltimore Ravens in Week 5.
Well, I got three out of four games correct, with the lone exception being the Indianapolis-San Diego game. The problem with that is I had the Colts — 23-17 overtime losers — going to the Super Bowl to meet the Carolina Panthers.
I've heard some jokes from several of you this week, and I really do enjoy that. When a writer doesn't hear feedback, he sometimes begins to wonder if he's the only person who read his story.
I would like to hear more from you, the readers, and I always encourage you to write to me with any questions or comments you have about what's going on in sports.
What I would love is to start printing some of those questions and comments, so if you do have something you want to get off your chest, just remember to give your name (first and last, preferably) and the town you live in. And if you do write in, be sure to do it early in the week (Monday would be best) to ensure I can include it with my column.
I anticipate receiving more comments than questions. "Why would I want to ask this dude a question?" you might say. "He picked the Colts to be in the Super Bowl!"
Before I move on to this week's games, just a few little things:
• We don't need a playoff in college football. Utah just went undefeated, and they topped off a perfect season by beating Alabama, the team that was No. 1 for most of the season and had its only loss against the eventual national champion Florida Gators.
I don't think Utah could play with Florida, but they deserve the chance, a chance they would get if we had a playoff system in college football.
• Dallas cut Pacman Jones. That's great, but for everyone who is a fan of the Cowboys, there's a long way to go before this team is fixed.
Terrell Owens and Tony Romo can no longer co-exist. The Boys cannot win — ever — with Wade Phillips as their coach. Phillips said he is going to change, to be tougher on players, beginning next season, but that won't work. You can't coach in the NFL for 31 years and suddenly change who you are.
These Dallas players, almost all of them, have been with Phillips for two years. They will laugh him out of the locker room if he shows up in Valley Ranch as Mr. Tough Guy in 2009.
• The Cowboys had the real Mr. Tough Guy — Mike Singletary — in as one of three finalists for the Dallas job in 2007. Phillips was taken over Singletary, and now Singletary has signed a multi-year deal to coach the San Francisco 49ers after leading the team to a 5-4 record as interim coach after Mike Nolan was fired.
Singletary made an example out of one of the team's best players, tight end Vernon Davis, after Davis picked up a silly personal foul penalty in Singletary's first game as head coach. The Hall of Fame middle linebacker from the Chicago Bears wants to build a team full of high-character players, and I think he'll stay away from bringing big-name stars to his team.
Singletary has a great chance to win with this philosophy.
• The Georgia Bulldogs did not live up to the expectations of their preseason No. 1 ranking. But here's something to keep in mind: the Dawgs won 10 games and finish the year ranked in the top-10, even after losing 19 players to season-ending injuries in 2008. Georgia starters lost 50 games to injuries, and the offensive line woes were so bad that the team had to start a new player at all five positions against Arizona State, one week after a tough battle with South Carolina.
It's amazing that Georgia was able to accomplish what it did.
• For anyone who would take Peyton Manning over Tom Brady, here are a few numbers you might want to look at: Manning is 7-8 in the postseason; he has throw 22 touchdowns and 17 interceptions in those 15 games; he threw three TDs and seven interceptions in "leading" Indianapolis to the Super Bowl in 2006.
Brady won three Super Bowls with receivers named David Patten, Troy Brown, Deion Branch and David Givens. None of them will ever get a sniff at the Hall of Fame.
Manning has Marvin Harrison, who is going to Canton, and Reggie Wayne, who is on a pace that could earn him consideration for the Hall someday. Dallas Clark is a better tight end than any Brady has ever played with.
The proof is in the pudding — Brady is just better.
• I did call it correctly with the Florida Gators. Here's how I said the 2008 college football season would play out in a column I wrote nearly two months ago:
"Florida's done losing. I've been saying this for a month now. The Gators' 56-6 destruction of South Carolina is just another sign of what's to come. The Gamecocks were ranked 25th and had the nation's No. 5 defense (No. 1 in the SEC) coming into Saturday's game. Quarterback Tim Tebow's emotional post-game speech after a 31-30 loss to Ole' Miss lit a fire underneath the Gators that has not stopped burning since.
Unbeaten Alabama has not played the same since going up 31-0 on Georgia in the first half over a month ago. Florida will beat the Crimson Tide in the SEC Title game, and Urban Meyer will confound whichever Big 12 coach he stands across the sideline from in the national championship game.
No team in the nation has the combination of explosive offense, stifling defense and dynamic special teams play that the Gators possess. It’s ironic that Florida’s only loss came due to a missed extra point against the Runnin’ Rebels."
The Big 12 defenses made the Big 12 offenses look better than they really were all season. The mismatches that Oklahoma’s offense was used to exploiting were simply not there against the Gators.
• A quick baseball note thrown in here. An amazing statistic I read on new Yankees acquisition Mark Teixeira this week.
One reason Teixeira was so coveted was because he is a true switch hitter, with equal power and ability to hit for average from both sides of the plate.
Guess what Teixeira's lifetime slugging percentage is while hitting left-handed? It's .541. How about the right side: It's .541. How is that for consistency from both sides.
Now, for this weekend's games:
Arizona at Carolina
Sometimes, getting to the Super Bowl involves a little good fortune. That's what the Carolina Panthers get this week, as they get to face the Arizona Cardinals while the top-seeded Giants battle NFC East foe Philadelphia.
Arizona (10-7) won its division and Philly (11-6) finished behind the Giants and were the conference's final wild-card team.
This game is by far the easiest of the four to pick for the following reasons: At the time of the Panthers' 27-23 win over the Cardinals in Week 8, Carolina had not hit its stride. DeAngelo Williams was not playing at the level he is at now, and Carolina was just a much different team.
Cardinals wide receiver Anquan Boldin is a big question mark for this game with a hamstring injury. Boldin is one of the most physical receivers in football, and he and Larry Fitzgerald compliment one another so well as the league's best 1-2 receiving tandem. Arizona quarterback Kurt Warner will suffer without Boldin in the lineup, and the Panthers will be able to turn a lot more attention toward Fitzgerald.
The Cardinals defense did a great job in bottling up Michael Turner, the NFL's second-leading rusher, last week. The problem for the Cardinals this week is that the Panthers' line is better than the Falcons, and they can most likely force the Cards to commit extra defenders to the box.
When you do that, Steve Smith is going to kill you. The Panthers are so much better at establishing the run and hurting you with big plays from Smith (in either order) than they were when these teams first met.
Pick your poison, Arizona.
Panthers 38, Cardinals 17
Philadelphia at
New York
The two teams won on each other's home fields this season. The Giants went 1-3 down the stretch while the Eagles were 3-1.
Those trends would lead some to believe that the Eagles will be in Charlotte for next week's NFC Championship game, but I'm not one of them. Part of the problem the Giants were having was with injuries, especially to running back Brandon Jacobs.
Jacobs is rested and should be healthy now. During last year's run to the Super Bowl, Eli Manning played flawlessly at quarterback, never once turning the ball over. I believe that this is the Eli Manning that teams are going to see, most of the time, from now on.
The Giants also had lots of players step up in the playoffs last year who didn't do much of anything in the regular season. Look for guys like Mario Manningham or Ahmad Bradshaw to have an important impact on this game.
The thing that scares me about the Eagles is that they were in a tough game last week with Minnesota until very late. Viking quarterback Tavaris Washington played very poorly — I predicted he would cost his team the game — and just a halfway decent performance by the man under center would have Minnesota in the Meadowlands to meet the Giants this weekend.
I said last week that Jackson is no Donovan McNabb. Well, Eli Manning is no Tavaris Jackson, and he will lead the Giants past their bitter division rival and into the championship game for a second straight year.
Giants 24, Eagles 20
Baltimore at Tennessee
Tennessee beat Baltimore 13-10 in Week 5. Titans quarterback Kerry Collins led an 11-play, 80-yard drive that provided the winning touchdown, and Tennessee outscored Baltimore 10-0 in the fourth quarter to improve to 5-0.
This is a case of one team that has clearly improved since that time, and that team is the Baltimore Ravens. Most football teams talk about wanting their offense to get into a groove, get hot or get rolling; well, that is what folks in Baltimore are accustomed to seeing their defense do, and this defense is at the top of its game right now.
All-pro safety Ed Reed is leading the way. The 30-year-old is playing arguably the best football of his career while intercepting 10 passes in the last seven games — that streak includes three straight two-interception games.
Reed may be the most dangerous defensive player in the history of pro football once he gets his hands on a turnover. The position of safety really cannot be played any better than Reed has played it in the last two months.
Rookie quarterback Joe Flacco threw for two interceptions in the first game against Baltimore, and his second pick came with the Ravens attempting to drive and either tie or win the game in the last two minutes. Flacco is a far better QB than he was in the fifth week of the season, and he is trying to become the only rookie quarterback in NFL history to start 2-0 in the playoffs.
Another big problem for Tennessee this weekend could be injuries. The Titans' top two defensive linemen, Albert Haynesworth and Kyle Vanden Bosch, are supposed to play but are banged up. Center Kevin Mawae has already been ruled out, and that could hurt Tennessee's ability to establish the run with LenDale White and Chris Johnson, and to keep a clean pocket for Collins to throw from.
Ravens 17, Titans 13
San Diego at Pittsburgh
Just like with the other AFC Divisional round matchup, this game features one of the top seeds in Pittsburgh, a bye team, and they beat a wild-card team, San Diego, earlier in the regular season.
The Steelers got a 32-yard field goal from Jeff Reed to beat San Diego 11-10 in Week 11; it is the only game in NFL history to end with 11-10 as the final score.
Ben Roethlisberger was great at managing the game against the Chargers in Week 11. He did not throw a touchdown pass, but completed 31-of-41 passes for over 300 yards and no turnovers. Phillip Rivers, on the other hand, had one of his worst days of the season against the league's top defense, throwing for 164 yards, no TDs and two interceptions.
I see this game just like I do the AFC's other game. The lower-seeded team, the team that will be on the road, the team that lost to its opponent in the regular season, is much better than they were at the time the teams last met.
San Diego fell to 4-6 with the loss to Pittsburgh, and the Chargers would go to 4-8 before hitting rock bottom and getting things turned around. Winners of five straight games, the Chargers are now the hottest team in the postseason field in terms of consecutive wins.
Pony-sized running back Darren Sproles gained over 300 all-purpose yards and had the game-winning touchdown run in San Diego's win over Indianapolis last week. Sproles will likely start in this game, as LaDainian Tomlinson is doubtful with a torn tendon in his groin.
The Chargers will be fine there. If Sproles struggles against a more physical Pittsburgh defense, Michael Bennett can be called upon. Also, don't be surprised to see the Chargers line rookie fullback Jacob Hester up at tailback and give him a few carries. He is an extremely tough runner who always came up with the yards that LSU had to have during its run to a national championship two years ago.
The biggest key to this game is Ben Roethlisberger and the Pittsburgh offensive line. Roethlisberger was sacked 46 times this season an suffered a fairly serious concussion in the last game of the regular season. San Diego was successful in getting pressure in Peyton Manning's face throughout the second half last week, and, if they can do it to Manning's Colts, then I'm betting Roethlisberger is going to discover a lot of unwanted company with him in the backfield this weekend.
Chargers 20, Steelers 13
Michael Gilliland is sports editor of The Laurinburg Exchange. Write to him at mgilliland@laurinburgexchange.com
Post a Comment
