So, one round in the books, and the best weekend of football to come. Four great games are in store this week. I can see any of the four NFC teams winning, and the dichotomy between the Chargers and Colts and Jets and Ravens is interesting, in a new school vs old school twist. Either way, I would be remiss to pass over a chance to award and scold those who made wild card weekend a combination of football from 1975 (34 yds? WTF? Running? "This is NOT what I signed up FOR!!!") and two 10 year olds playing Madden on rookie level in that last game. Here are some quick awards for round one.
Player of the Week - Kurt Warner, QB Arizona
This stat line is really as good as it gets: 29-33 376 5 tds. Those are the numbers of a first-ballot hall of famer. Sure, the Packers defense was moving around like drunks at time square, but numbers are numbers. Warner is now 9-3 in the playoffs, with six three-hundred yard games. He now ranks fourth all-time in TDs in the playoffs, and is eighth in yards. Those numbers are the stuff of real legends (unlike the next guy, a fake legend). I really hope he doesn't retire, as it really is a joy to watch Kurt Warner play in the playoffs. Watching Kurt Warner fling the ball around is something that needs to be cherished every time it happens, as every single team he cocks his arm back, might be one less tick in that career clock falling through.
Goat of the Week - Tom Brady, QB
If you thought that the Warner section was a bunch of sugary prose, it was. Fear not, this section will not be. Tom Brady was so bad, Gisele reportedly started the affair with DiCaprio after the first interception, and was pregnant by the third. Brady was horrible. The media's coddling of him is amazing, as no one, but the soothesayer of the times Dieon Sanders, was man enough to openly criticise him. He's not hurt, as he was 23-26 three weeks ago, with the same reported Rib Injury. No, he just stunk. He was complete shit. He threw the ball 42 times, and gained only 154 yards? I could do that, by just throwing one yard quicks to Moss. He was sacked three times and turned the ball over 4 times, at home no less. Manning has only played that bad a playoff game once, and that was on the road as a prohibitive underdog in a snowstorm. Brady's first interception was high-school level bad. Carson Palmer went 18-36 with no TDs, and Shayne Graham missed two field goals that any competent Pop Warner kicker hits, and neither of them win 'Goat of the Week'. Talk about an upset.
Surprise Player of the Week - Dustin Keller, TE Jets
I was going to go with Early Doucet, for stepping in for Boldin and putting up two tds, but Keller deserves this in every conceivable way. Really, here is a guy who was such a dissapointment in the regular season that people just completely forgot about his primary existence, letting him off the hook for doing jack for 17 weeks. Keller was invisible. Maybe he doesn't like Mexicans, who knows. Where was this Dustin Keller all year. He was absolutely Benjamin Watson-y. It was completely inexplicable that he suddenly turned into neo-Kellen Winslow (the senior, not the thug "warrior" junior) and turned that playoff game around. He was finally the TE that so many (me) thought he would be when we (I) picked him early in my fantasy draft. Screw you, Keller, for stringing the fantasy world along. But congrats for Manning up and balling out in round one.
Dissapointing Player of the Week - DeSean Jackson, WR Eagles
Where were you? Maybe you aren't all your crack-self thought you were. You crowned your ass, and know that we (I) are not letting you off the hook. He evidently tweeted multiple times how he would run all over the Cowboys, instead he bended over. He opened it up, and took multiple jabs from all of the Cowboys players. Honestly, the performance by the whole Eagles was reprihensible, but for someone that talks as much shit as DeSean does, that was an awfully silent performance. The Eagles are one of the classier teams (note: not classier fan-bases) in the NFL, and that was truly un-Eagle like behavior.
Team Performance of the Week - Arizona Cardinals Offense
There is nothing harder than protecting a lead while still playing to score. I think the Cardinals perfected such a quandary. That was vintage Warner. That was the Greatest Show on Turf. What classifies something to be like the "Greatest Show on Turf" is when the offense is so effective that it just looks effortless, like the receivers are always running free, the ball is always there. That is how the Rams used to do it, and how the Saints did it early in '09. The Packers looked like they had to work for those yards, that great-catches had to be made. Not so for the Cards. It was easy, it was on. Here was their drive-by-drive results: TD, TD, FG, PUNT, TD, TD, TD, PUNT, TD, MISS FG, TD. That was offense at its very best. No turnovers, no negative plays. Just yard after yard and point after point.
Team Lay-Down of the Week - New England Patriots Whole Entire Organization
Worst Home Playoff Defeats of the last 5 years (Points given for missed 2-point conversions as extra-points):
5.) Pittsburgh 31 Cincinnati, 2005 Wild Card
4.) Pittsburgh 34 Denver 17, 2005 AFC Championship
3.) Baltimore 27 Miami 9, 2008 Wild Card
2.) Arizona 33 Carolina 13 - 2008 Divisional Round
1.) Baltimore 34 New England 14 - 2009 Wild Card
That's right. That was the worst home performance of the last five years. This was a team that had never lost a playoff game in that Stadium since Tom Brady was one. This was a team that was 14-3 in the playoffs, and had never lost to the Ravens, ever. That was a team with the best owner, best coach, best QB, best WR, best Stadium and best urinals (all of those are not true, except for one, as told by urinal-ranker.net). They were down 24-0 before the team had 20 yards of offense. Their first four possessions: Fumble, Punt, Interception, Interception. The Ravens first five possessions (the ones sandwiching those four): TD, TD, Punt, TD, FG. Game over. It was that easy to emasculate any "fear" that really was never there since Super Bowl XLII. The dynastic Patriots died that night in Denver in January 2006, when Brady was hammered constantly, but played admirably against immense pressure in a jacked-up Mile High. The post-Dyansty Patriots (the NFL's version of the 2001-2007 high-priced team-less Yankees) died last night. However, unlike the Yankees, Mark Teixeira, CC Sabathia and AJ Burnett are not walking through that Foxboro door. Stick a fork in the Pats. The Brady-Belichick days of winning Super Bowls are done.
Storyline that will be Beat to the Ground This Week - Colts Rested Their Starters
Don't you know that this is the first Colts game in one month? No, you don't. Well it is. Let alone that in the first game the starters played midway through the third quarter, and in Week 17 they played midway through the second. The Colts lack the physicality to fight the Ravens when they are rusty. Of course, Arizona rested everyone including their towel boy (somehow, Larry Fitzgerald's barber was not given the week off), and went on to explode to the tune of 513 yards and 51 points. No, no. Don't you understand the Colts always lose when they rest their starters, except for those two times in 2003 and 2004, where they rested and beat the Broncos a combined 90-34. The Colts will fall down like the Pats in that first quarter becuase they are rusty. Of course, the Pats didn't rest in Week 17 (and lost anyway), and Tom Brady played like utter manure. Rest will kill the Colts.
Storyline that Should be Beat to the Ground - Jets Matchup Well with Chargers
Of course, the main-stream media will disregard actual football when they preview the week ahead. If they did, they would notice that the media's lover-boys, the Chargers who were the odds-on favorite to reach the Super Bowl in 2006 and lost, do not match up well with the Jets at all. On defense, the Jets aren't great against the run. Not to worry, the Chargers are the worst rushing team in the NFL. The Jets are great at stopping the deep ball and blitzing and have a corner who can shut anybody down. That matches up brilliantly against a team that really can only move the ball with the deep ball (something they are incredible at), with only one plus reciever and a QB who struggles when blitzed. Then the Jets are great at running the ball, and the Chargers are porous on run defense this year after losing Jammall "I'm so fat I ate Shawne Merriman's ability" Williams. Honestly, the Jets are a matchup nightmare for the Chargers. How happy am I (btw, so were the Bengals, who were essentially a slightly less-competent version of the Jets, or at least less competent at the kicker position).
Wild Card weekend was merely the appetizer. The entree awaits. Eight good teams, including the league's heretofore four best? Sign me up. Four great crowds, six great QBs, eight great teams, hall-of-famers everywhere? Shackle me down. I will be watching every minute. Thank God NYU only starts next week.
