Week 11 Re-Crap

I really don't have any juice for this recap.

This is going to be a slim week, blog-wise. I farted away Tuesday because my car needed two new tires and I had a whole ass-load of responsibilities I'd been putting off for a while. The really sad, pathetic part is I was busy and active and didn't have time to do a week 11 recap on Tuesday because I wasn't at work. And the even more sad, pathetic part is I still pissed a significant part of the day away playing Madden.

Anyway, here's my uninformed recap of week 11. These will be pretty slim, and for that I apologize. That won't be the norm going forward, I swear.

But the truth is, I'm not very enthusiastic about the NFL today or this week. Obviously, the Redskins lost a big game, and that's part of it. But another big part is, frankly, the way the sports media reports the NFL. Really. The Jets put up a really good win in New England and Brett Favre played about his best ball of the season. I'm honestly impressed by their performance. But to hear the national media tell it, it was all Brett Favre, he worked his "magic", Brett Favre carried the Jets to a win. It's not true! At least part of the reason the Jets won the game was New England's hair-brained and overdue-for-maximum-exposure offense.

Well, wait, before we get into that, let's put it in the recap.

New York Jets over New England, 34-21
My Pick: New England over New York Jets, 21-17
Hey, great win for the Jets. They're looking like strong playoff contenders.

Now, as I was saying: the Patriots ran more offensive plays (79-75), had more yards (511-375), more first downs (26-23), and fewer punts (5-4). How, then, did they manage to lose time of possession by 11 minutes? By running that goddamn stat-padding Wes Welker no-huddle bullshit. I hate that crap. Matt Cassel racks up 400 yards passing, Welker gets to set NFL records for receptions, and really all they're doing is putting an unnecessary burden on their defense. New England's old, slow defense was stuck on the field for almost 40 minutes of night-time football in very cold weather. Really, the Patriots were bound to lose.

And honestly, that's all I have to say about that. I don't really like or care about either of these teams at all. At this point, I'm almost rooting for the Jets to go to the Super Bowl just so the Packers can get a higher draft pick for Brett Favre.

Denver over Atlanta, 24-20
My Pick: Atlanta over Denver, 30-24
And again, this one is being spun like it was Jay Cutler leading the Broncos to victory. Yes, Jay Cutler had a nice game. Nothing special, but okay. On the other hand, in Atlanta, somehow Denver's defense held Atlanta to only 20 points despite giving up 250 yards passing, 114 rushing yards, and losing the time of possession battle by 6 minutes. Denver's defense did the job here, Cutler was just a guy who didn't cost his team the game. Is this what has become of "elite" quarterbacks? Go on the road, throw for 216 yards and a score in an upset, and suddenly YOU led your team to victory? Gimme a break.

And if you're a Falcons fan, you're probably quite upset about this loss. You should be. Atlanta is a way, way better team than Denver, and with the way the Falcons have been playing at home, this one should have been a blowout. The Falcons gave up important room in the NFC South and dropped into the thick of the wild-card chase. It's a disappointment. There were bound to be some. Now they need a bounce-back win in week 12 against . . . (hold on, I'm looking) . . . oooohhhhhh, Carolina. At least it's in Atlanta. And what a statement game it could be!

Tampa Bay over Minnesota, 19-13
My Pick: Tampa Bay over Minnesota, 17-13
Minnesota only ran 52 plays in the entire game. They didn't have the ball long enough or do nearly enough with it to establish, really, a damn thing. Frankly, I'm not sure either team did enough to win this game. To take it a step further, I'm not even entirely sure this game actually took place.

New York Giants over Baltimore, 30-10
My Pick: New York Giants over Baltimore, 17-13
Yowza. The Ravens got absolutely flattened Sunday afternoon. They had absolutely no business being on that field. And if anybody thinks the Giants aren't the best team in the NFL, well, that's ridiculous. They're at least two times better than the Titans on offense, and the defenses are right there. I'd take the Giants in any stadium in any city, and I'd give 'em six points.

As for the Ravens, after this kind of ass-whupping, the most important thing is that guys don't start panicking. They were good enough to beat most teams handily before week 11, and they'll still be right there in week 12 if they just stick to the format. The worst thing that could happen to the Ravens would be to start second-guessing themselves. They've got a strong defense and a capable enough offense. The Giants are much better than them, that much is obvious, especially up I-95 in New Jersey, but then the Giants are much better than almost every team in the NFL.

Miami over Oakland, 17-15
My Pick: Miami over Oakland, 31-6
The Raiders scored their first touchdown in 13 years on Sunday, on a 9,000 yard punt return in the fourth quarter. They were perilously close to winning.

Let's be honest, here: did anyone anywhere watch this game?

New Orleans over Kansas City, 30-20
My Pick: New Orleans over Kansas City, 34-27
This was the first road win of the season for the New Orleans Saints. Read that again. Why have we been so hard on the Cardinals for their road woes, when this pansy ass team hasn't won but one road game all goddamn season, and it was a poorly played piece of crap over Kansas City? The Saints suck.

And it looks like Tyler Thigpen came back down to earth just in time for a bunch of morons to start him on their fantasy teams. Nice.

Carolina over Detroit, 31-22
My Pick: Carolina over Detroit, 27-10
How does a team commit only one penalty and dominate time of possession by almost 9 minutes without winning? Maybe by giving up 264 rushing yards on only 30 carries? Holy hell, the Detroit Lions might actually go winless in 2008.

As for Carolina, hey, they found a way to win. That's what matters. It was closer than it should have been, but they did the job at home. Good for them.

Philadelphia and Cincinnati, 13-13
My Pick: Philadelphia over Cincinnati, 41-17
What the fuck. What do you say about this train wreck? I honestly don't know who I'm more disappointed in. The friggin' Eagles are the most dependable piece of shit team in the world. For fuck's sake, if this team even had their helmets on sideways they would have won this game with a double-digit margin. What the hell has happened to the Eagles offense? Donovan McNabb looks like straight up garbage these days. Brian Westbrook is the diminutive Adrian Peterson: at any moment, he could break out. We're waiting for it. We know he's supposed to be dangerous, but it seems like only once or twice a season this guy actually makes a difference in a football game. 13 points? In Cincinnati? What a bunch of bullshit. With as much talent as the Eagles have on offense, they have to stand in their own way to come up with only 13 points against such a dismal defense.

And as for Cincinnati, God almighty. Two drives into Eagles territory in overtime. Two chances to win the game. When your quarterback is sacked 8 times, when you rush for only 56 yards, when the only reason you're in the game at all is because the opponent's Pro Bowl quarterback is imploding left and right, your goddamn veteran kicker really effing needs to connect on that field goal. You don't have a game gift-wrapped like that and squander it away. Look at the Rams in Washington a few weeks ago: outplayed left and right, but a few turnovers and just a few opportunities, and they found a way. Even the Rams can find a way. Not the Bengals, I guess.

Green Bay over Chicago, 37-3
My Pick: Green Bay over Chicago, 23-16
Holy hell, what a pounding. Good teams do not lose by 34 points to division foes. Not ever.

Sorry, Chicago, but you've got a pretender on your hands. A gutsy pretender, a troublesome pretender that could spoil a lot of playoff hopes down the stretch, but a pretender all the same. The Bears got obliterated in Green Bay. Any ranked D-1 college football team could have stepped in for the Bears and you might not have noticed.

As for Green Bay, is it too much to ask, when you put up 37 points, maybe your quarterback puts up some ungodly numbers? Christ, when the Jets score 14 points, somehow Brett Favre manages to come away with 4 touchdowns. Matt Cassel put up 400 yards and another 60 on the ground in a 20 point effort. The Packers score 37 and I get a measly 227 yards and 2 scores from Rodgers. Thanks a lot, asshole.

Indianapolis over Houston, 33-27
My Pick: Indianapolis over Houston, 34-27
Pretty close, right? One friggin' point.

And maybe it's not the media that's pissing me off. There's a poll on one of the major NFL sites that asks which 6-4 AFC team is best. The options: Indy, Miami, New England, Baltimore, Denver. The way I see it, this is a pretty close race. I'd probably pick New England, although Indy's resume is pretty nice. It turns out Indy won the poll. My problem, here, was that the Broncos came in second place. The Broncos? The horrible Broncos? The biggest pretender above .500 in the AFC? The best team in the NFL's worst ever division? The Broncos, with the NFL's fourth worst defense, no backfield, a turnover prone quarterback, and horrible team chemistry? Better than the plucky and always competitive Dolphins? Better than the sharp, always professional, well-coached, well-rounded Patriots? Better than a Ravens team with a top-5 defense and 3rd-ranked rushing offense? No fucking way.

What does this have to do with the Indy-Houston game? Nothing, I guess. But I'd rather talk about it than the game. I don't know what happened in this contest, even though I had a whopping 3 players on my fantasy team playing in the game.

San Francisco over St. Louis, 35-16
My Pick: San Francisco over St. Louis, 24-20
A totally meaningless game. I don't care who played well and who didn't.

Arizona over Seattle, 26-20
My Pick: Arizona over Seattle, 27-24
What little steam I had is running out fast. I have nothing to say about this game. In fact, I'll be back later to talk about the last four games. I'm totally out of juice.

Tennessee over Jacksonville, 24-14
My Pick: Jacksonville over Tennessee, 21-20
I'm back now, and I still have no juice.

This will be the last time I pick against the Titans during the regular season. I can't believe I've done it for two weeks in a row now. They don't have much left on their schedule, so with far less fanfare and general gayness from the national sports media, the Tennessee Titans are closing in on an improbable undefeated season. They really could do it. And all of a sudden, the dirty feeling we all got from the contemptible undefeated regular season of the 2007 Patriots would be washed away. We'd feel totally differently about the achievement if a team like this Titans group pulled it off, and for that reason, I'm very much hoping they will.

And I've probably just doomed them to lose next week. Ah well.

Pittsburgh over San Diego, 11-10
My Pick: Pittsburgh over San Diego, 28-23
I'm a lot like the San Diego Chargers, in that I no longer care whether or not they win or lose.

As for that debacle at the end of the game, it was some bullshit. I have a hard time figuring out where the forward pass was supposed to have taken place, too. It doesn't look to me like either of those laterals went forward, and I can't imagine how the refs ended up blowing it. In fact, I'd be willing to wager you could take a random handful of Steelers fans between the ages of 18-40, put striped uniforms on 'em, send 'em out there at the end of that game, and they would have gotten that call right. For as badly as Ed Hochuli blew that fumble call earlier in the season, this was so much more discouraging. Hochuli made a split-second call, got it wrong, and there was no possible recourse. In the case of these morons, they got the call right, then went out of their way to go back and get it wrong.

Now here's an interesting thing: the closing line for that game was Pittsburgh by 4.5. Before that last second touchdown, the Steelers were up one. After the play, when no flag was thrown, the refs went back and called a penalty that absolutely did not take place, then put the penalty in the wrong part of the timeline of the play, then screwed up the ruling about whether or not the penalty should have had any impact on the result of the play even if declined. So the margin went back to 1 instead of 7 or 8, thereby keeping the score within the spread.

I'm just saying.

Dallas over Washington, 14-10
My Pick: Washington over Dallas, 26-24
Yes, the Redskins lost.

Yes, the offensive line was bad in protection.

I fucking refuse to do the panic thing. I refuse. I swear to God, I'm not getting sucked into the bullshit.

I just went back and watched the highlights of that game on NFL.com, and I really did my best to watch them like another NFL fan from another NFL city might watch them, wanting to know what happened in the game Sunday night. Here's what I saw:

I saw a hard-hitting, sharp, professional Washington defense punishing Dallas ball-carriers left and right. That's a good thing.

I saw a unit that has been pretty under the radar this season come up with some big hits and two interceptions on one of the NFL's "elite" quarterbacks. That's a good thing.

I saw a rookie safety stay around the ball and generally impress the shit out of me. Good.

I saw Redskins corners thumping guys around the line of scrimmage and in the secondary. Good.

I saw an injured tailback race through Dallas' defense on fourth and one, setting up an early score. Good.

I saw a sharp, professional, accurate quarterback complete over 70% of his passes. Good.

I saw a good, solid, sharp team with a potentially great defense give themselves a chance to win.

On the other side of the ball, I saw a focused, desperate Cowboys team bringing as much heat as they could on any passing down, and doing a damn good job of disrupting the pocket and the timing of Washington's passing game.

I saw a quarterback shake off a few bad passes to come up with a couple of gutsy throws down the stretch, including a game-winner.

I saw a big offensive line and a hard-running tailback wear down a sturdy defense in the fourth quarter.

In short, I didn't see a bad thing in that game. I don't like the outcome, but c'mon. San Diego put ten up in Pittsburgh. Know what I'm thinking about, relative to San Diego? A) Their offense is better than that, obviously, and B) they have a 4-6 record. With the Redskins, if I were an impartial observer from another team, I guarantee right now I'd be thinking A) well, they're still perfecting this new Zorn offense, B) Dallas' defense played a great game, C) Washington's defense kept 'em in the game and looked friggin' monstrous, and D) hey, they're 6-4, they're still in good shape.

So for today only, I'm an outsider. They're 6-4. The defense is outstanding. It's a new offense. The tailback was banged up. Dallas' defense was great. The Redskins are a good team in good position to finish strong and make the post-season.

That's not to say there aren't some things they could improve upon.

It's important that they find a way to stretch the field, because teams are catching up to the short passing attack. If nothing else, teams have learned they can stack the box against the Redskins to hopefully slow down Clinton Portis, and it won't hurt them too badly when it comes to defending Washington's passing attack.

Pass protection is obviously a big problem. I have a feeling a large part of that could be solved by going back to draw plays, slants, and the occasional screen. I happen to think Washington's play-calling has gotten a bit predictable in the last few weeks, and I think that makes it easier get consistent pressure on Jason Campbell.

Laron Landry needs to be around the line of scrimmage more often. Against the Cowboys, both of Tony Romo's interceptions came when Laron Landry was either threatening to blitz or actually blitzing. On the second one, not only did Carlos Rogers blow up Terrell Owens, but Landry blew up Romo, one of the few hits Romo took on the night. Landy is Washington's most athletic defender, and he has a knack for creating havoc in the backfield when he's around the line of scrimmage. And if it can't be him, slide Chris Horton in there on every passing down. He also has a real knack for creating pressure.

Washington cannot continue having so many three-and-out possessions. The whole deal with Zorn's West Coast Offense is timing and rhythm. There's no way Jason Campbell can get in rhythm as a passer in such short possessions early in the game. The lack of rhythm contributes to the success of the opposing pass-rush; if Campbell has to take an extra half-second to find an open man, it gives the rush that much more time to disrupt him in the pocket, which either leads to sacks, hits, or rushed passes, all of which further disrupt his timing and rhythm. I'd like to see the Redskins come out with some can't-miss type of passes early in the game, like screens, slants, hitches, and play-action bombs. Generally, these have one option, and in the case of screens and slants, they're almost always good for a completion. With the way the Redskins are running the ball, they should be able to generate a few early first downs and get a little rhythm going if they go with the simple stuff early.

I'll be interested to see how they do in Seattle on Sunday. They look about as healthy as they've been in weeks and weeks, and they badly need a win to get back a little confidence. For my part, I'm not so down on the Redskins. I hate the Cowboys, I wish the game had gone differently, but if I'm Joe Dung from Missour-ah, and I only know what I sawon TV, I saw two professional, sharp, hard-hitting teams fight to the death, and the team that was able to convert one big play came away with a much-needed win. It happens.

Cleveland over Buffalo, 29-27
My Pick: Buffalo over Cleveland, 20-17
I'll be honest: I don't really know what happened Monday night. I know Trent Edwards was abysmal. I know Brady Quinn wasn't much better. I know Phil Dawson nailed a 56-yard bomb. I know Leodis McKelvin had a 98-yard touchdown return. I was glad to see Marshawn Lynch finally break out a little bit.

Mostly, it's clear to me neither of these teams is going anywhere this season and that makes this a meaningless Monday night game.


I don't have any rankings or anything like that for this week. I'll be lucky to get my picks out before tonight's game, for crying out loud. I might end up doing some sort of ranking or something later in the week. I remember last year I projected the playoff picture at about this point in the season and ended up getting all but one team correct. Maybe I'll give that another try this season. We'll see. For now, I'm going to get cracking on my week 12 picks. I did go 11-5 this week, and I think I went something like 10-6 last week. Maybe I'll compile my total win-loss record for next week's recap.

Peace!