Yesterday's games produced some interesting results, to say the least. For starters, can we all agree that Denver and Cincy are officially for real? Can we agree that the Jags are the most up and down team in the league? Can we agree that Matt Hasselback is pretty darn important to the Seahawks? Can we agree it's a great day to be Josh McDaniels? The usual shoutouts to road winners go to the Vikes, Browns(how bad are the Bills after a promising start?), Steelers, Cowboys(ok, they only get a half shoutout after squeezing out an OT win against KC), Atlanta and Colts. The Browns and Bills staged one of the worst games in years. Browns QB Derek Anderson, who replace Brady Quinn last week, was a stunning 2-17 for 22 whole yards, with an INT. Somehow, that was a winning effort. And Redskins fans think our offense sucks. The Browns did manage to run the ball for 171 yards. Close on these teams' heels for ineptitude were the Raiders, who got blasted 44-7 in NY. Someone explain to me again why I passed on this game. Did you have a bad day recently? Be glad you're not JaMarcus Russell. He lost three fumbles, was sacked six times and was a whopping 8-13 passing for 64 yards. Of course, those numbers look like Peyton Manning compared to the Browns. As odd as those two games were, the prize for weirdest game has to go to Jacksonville-Seattle. The Jags had put up consecutive 30 point games, and figured to be able to run the ball on the Seahwks. They produced 38 yards on 15 carries. That's not going to get it done for the Colts and certainly not for the Jags. End result was an embarrassing 41-0 whipping. this is the kind of game that gets coaches fired. Pittsburg got by the Lions 28-20. The Lions may have begun to pull themselves out of the muck of really terrible teams. Now they are knocking on the door of being mediocre, a huge improvement for them. The Steelers are not impressing me all that much, but a win's a win. So much for the underachcievers. Two teams that really took care of business, on the road no less, were Atlanta and Cincinnati. Both faced tough foes. The Falcons made good use of their bye week and had a plan to exploit Sf's slow secondary. Wake up call for the Niners, as they got blown out 45-10. Carson Palmer has a history of playing well in Baltimore and he produced again, leading the suddenly respectable Bengals to a 17-14 win. The Ravens, who looked like a potential Super Bowl team a couple of weeks ago, now have a two game losing streak. On to my picks. I tired to be selective this week and it paid off with a 3-0 tally. I thought the Vikes had too much for St. L and they did, covering easily with a 38-10 road win. I liked Philly giving double digits at home to TB and they did what an elite team should do at home, winning easily and covering, 33-14. I thought the matchup of Tennessee's weak pass defense and Indy's best in the league pass offense would have only one result, and that's the way it turned out,m with Indy easily covering at 31-9. Officially panic time in Tennessee. Those results bring me to 11-5 against the spread this year.
Tenn needs to draft a REAL QB. That could certainly be accomplished if they end up like 3-13 or worse...which seems like a very likely scenario at this point.
VIKINGS to 5 & 0................ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y56FJY2z0Ho&feature=related VIKES have the Ravens at the Metrodome next week....that will be a good test!
For those who hate showboating and want to see a real dumbass play. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8k3sA0_29DQ
Wow, great highlight vid, thanks. I didn't realize the Rams turned it over 3 times in the red zone. If they turned those into TDs, could have been an interesting game. Jared Allen is a beast.
Desean Jackson is the king of the early touchdown celebration, he has done it twice in his career, how fucking stupid do you have to be to do this twice when you are a pro player, he is lucky he is good cause if he wasnt he would be gone already if Andy Reid saw the first one as well. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pH1H13nl01M
How great was that MNF game between Miami and the Jets? At its best the pro game is all about matchups and schemes. We saw that last night between two teams with great coordinators on both sides of the ball. The Jets are a blitz team. Get in third and long and you are in trouble. Miami is turning into a run-first team. It was the first team to run the wildcat. Last night they used the wildcat extremely effectively to negate the Jets blitz package. They had a 15 play drive that ran over 8 minutes off the clock, with the majority of it being wildcat. The key is they take the QB out of the game, none of that splitting him out wide silliness. Then they run two TEs and four RBs, with Ronnie Brown taking a direct snap. Most of the time, they run it into the line, but the defense has to respect the outside run. Someone out there has to be wondering if a wildcat/spread offense run by Tim Tebow would be effective in the NFL. Tebow is not an NFL QB by my estimation, but he is tough and can pass better than a RB. I was surprised that Jason Taylor got most of the defensive snaps at LB for the Dolphins. He was so done last year, it was embarrassing. He was a total nonfactor last night. Of course, so was Joey Porter, playing the other outside backer position. I have to question how good miami can be with Taylor playing. Great HOF career, but he was getting dominated by TE's last night. I never want to hear any more excuses about how long it takes a receiver to get in synch with a QB or learn an offense. Braylon Edwards has been on the Jets for a week, and he was awesome last night, scoring one TD and setting up two others. I thought that trade was an outright steal, and it sure looked that way last night.
NFL Lines For Week 6 - NFL Football Line Week Six NFL Line 10/18 - 10/19, 2009 Date & Time Favorite Line Underdog Total 10/18 1:00 ET At Washington -6.5 Kansas City 37 10/18 1:00 ET At Cincinnati -4.5 Houston 45 10/18 1:00 ET At Pittsburgh -14 Cleveland 38 10/18 1:00 ET At Minnesota -3 Baltimore 43.5 10/18 1:00 ET At Jacksonville -10 St. Louis 42 10/18 1:00 ET At New Orleans -3 NY Giants 47.5 10/18 1:00 ET Carolina -3.5 At Tampa Bay 39.5 10/18 1:00 ET At Green Bay -13.5 Detroit 48.5 10/18 4:05 ET Philadelphia -14 At Oakland 40.5 10/18 4:05 ET At Seattle -2.5 Arizona 47.5 10/18 4:15 ET At NY Jets -10 Buffalo 37 10/18 4:15 ET At New England -9.5 Tennessee 43.5 10/18 8:20 ET At Atlanta -3 Chicago 46 Monday Night Football Line 10/19 8:35 ET At San Diego -4 Denver 44 Bye Weeks: Dallas, Indianapolis, Miami, San Francisco
Week six. Some interesting matchups this week, including the two best teams in the NFC so far, NY and NO, squaring off. The Ravens visit Minnesota in a good matchup, and SD hosts surprising Denver. To the picks. KC at Washington(-6.5). The Skins have won two games against doormat teams by a combined margin of 5 points. So how do they now rate a 6.5 spread against a KC team that took the Cowboys to OT? The Skins O line is in total disarray, with pro Bowl LT Chris Samuels out, and guys starting who probably would not make most team's rosters. Jim Zorn's job is clearly on the line. Against that, KC is 0-5 and terrible. Wouldn't come near this game. Cleveland at Pittsburg(-14). The Steelers haven't exactly bowled me over this year, but Cleveland is bad. Steelers should roll. Laying the 14 here. Steelers. Baltimore at Minnesota(-3.5). Ravens on two game losing streak, but face a tough test. Ravens have a very good O line, which could negate the Vikes powerful D line, but Ravens need to get back to running the ball. I like the Vikes here, but this one is too tough to call. Avoid. NY Giants at NO(-3). Two premier teams face off. The Giants defense will pose problems Brees and company have not faced thus far. Saints' offense has rolled over everyone however, and their D is vastly improved under coordinator Gregg Williams. Tough call. Avoid. Detroit at GB(-13.5). With its makeshift O line, GB is not an elite team, and Detroit is no longer the team that lost 19 straight games. This spread strikes me as wide, but GB can be explosive. Avoid. Philly(-14) at Oakland. I hate games like this. Philly is playing as well as anyone and has shown the ability to blow out weak teams, at least at home. Oakland is coming apart at the seams. Normally, I would be afraid of traveling to the west coast, but Oakland played in NY this past week, so they are facing travel as well. Have to be disciplined here. This is just too big a spread to take the Iggles on the road, as much as I want to. Avoid. Buffalo at NY Jets(-10). Monday night factor at work here, as Jets lost a tough road game. Buffalo seems to be coming apart however. They lost two starting LBs to injury. Their lack of offensive production is a mystery, but one that is not likely to get solved against the Jets dynamic defense. Give the points here. Jets. Tennessee at NE(-9.5). Hard to believe the Titans were one of the best teams in football last year. NE is not itself either. They should be able to exploit a weak Titans' secondary. Everyone else has. Sooner or later Tennessee puts a game together though. They are not a crap team, even though they have certainly looked like one at times. Avoid. Chicago at Atlanta(-3). This could be a really good matchup. Atlanta coming off a big win in SF. Chicago has quietly put a good string of games together, and it is quickly becoming Jay Cutler's team. The Falcons figure to have too much offense for the Bears, but these Bears can put up some points as well. too tough. Avoid. Denver at SD(-4). Broncos not getting a ton of respect from Vegas here. SD has been one of the more disappointing teams, but they can put points up. Can Denver produce on the road? Too many moving parts here for me. Avoid.
yeah, pretty dumb move i have to admit, though, I dug that rodgers-cromartie high step against houston on sunday 3:40 mark of http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C48AYnobM4A