Week 10 Recap

A few quick-hit notes before we cut into the recap:

1. Tom Jackson was on fire on ESPN Radio's Sunday pregame show! First, he talked about how Pittsburgh's offensive line isn't as bad as you think, as evidenced by how they protected Byron Leftwich in the second half against Washington. He pointed out that Ben Roethlisberger holds onto the ball far too long not just waiting for a guy to get open, but waiting for a guy to get open 20 yards down field or longer. When Leftwich was in the game, he was almost never hit and the Steelers moved the ball better than they had all night. Now, that's not to say Leftwich would be an improvement over Roethlisberger (but it is to think it loudly), but maybe Big Ben could learn something from watching tape of Leftwich. Roethlisberger was scattershot and on his ass, Leftwich was upright and accurate. Some teams do a great job of taking away the deep ball, and Washington is one of those teams. Coming into the game, it's hard to believe Pittsburgh wouldn't have tried to adjust the play of the quarterback to have success. I think Roethlisberger's just wired that way.
Jackson's second point was about the Bills and Trent Edwards. Edwards has been very solid this season, but in their losses, he's turned the ball over too much and in the worst possible times of the game. Nobody's suggesting Edwards is a choke artist or anything, but the fact is, the way Turk Schoenert calls plays in Buffalo, the pass is designed to set up the run. When Edwards is way off, as he's been a few times this season, it allows teams to stack up the box against Marshawn Lynch. Lynch is a talented runner, but he ain't no Adrian Peterson.
And the third and final great point he made was about New England, and I was wondering if anybody in the national media was going to point this out: Rodney Harrison might be a leader and a big hitter and a smart player and all the rest, but New England's defense is a hundred times faster now that he's out. I mean, they still have a slow defense, but it helps having at least a single secondary player who can run around back there, and now that lead-footed Harrison is on the shelf, there's actually a little bit of speed on New England's defense.

Now, my own point:

When the Redskins first picked up DeAngelo Hall, I liked the move. You might have noticed from my post earlier in the week. First of all, Hall may be a brash personality, but "bad" DeAngelo was only really a turd in two pretty bad circumstances: when the Falcons brought in Bobby Petrino (an asshole if ever there was one), and in Oakland, which is like a black hole. There's hope yet that he may not be such a bad guy. Fred Smoot was a real cock in college and a full-blown disaster in Minnesota. Guys change. Reputations are sometimes bogus.
Second, the Redskins have been banged up in the secondary all season. This move gave them depth, and quality depth at that.
Third, Hall would be playing close to home, which is probably a good thing, although why, I can't say.
Fourth, the Redskins are a humble, hard-working defense built mostly out of steady veterans and a few no-name impact youngsters. The whole vibe of the team, top to bottom, is professional, humble, quiet, and hard-working. In other words, exactly the kind of environment to bring a loudmouth like DeAngelo Hall down to earth.
Fifth, the cost of bringing this guy on for a year is next to squat. Less than half a million bucks.
Sixth, it's now all of a sudden a contract year for Hall, which means he needs to look great, act great, fit in, suck up, get to practice early, leave late, and never be seen without his playbook. Guys almost always play better in contract years, and this is like a contract half-year after a disasterous stint in Oakland, better known as Football Hell.

Then, to make room on the roster, the Redskins cut Leigh Torrance.

Now, I hope Vinny Cerrato's head explodes in the middle of his midday radio show. Cutting Torrance for Hall makes zero sense. Torrance is a good special teamer. He knows the system. He's more quiet, he's much cheaper, and he's only 2 years older than Hall. Malcolm Kelly could have very easily gone on IR. Justin Tryon could have been cut from the practice squad, and they could have sent Rob Jackson back down to the practice squad to make room for Hall, especially now that Jason Taylor is back healthy. Any number of roster moves could have been made that A) kept a semi-valuable part of the defense intact, B) kept a very valuable part of the special teams intact, C) actually improved the depth in the secondary, where the Redskins have been hurting, D) kept a defender who is familiar with the defense, and E) didn't cost the Redskins a young, fairly competent player who actually sees the field on Sunday.

So now I'm angry about this move. This reeks of Dan Snyder and Vinny Cerrato getting big eyes over a big name free agent.

And now, the recap. Let's dig right in:

Broncos over Browns, 34-30
My Pick: Browns over Broncos, 22-17
Yeesh. Choke job.

Brady Quinn outplayed Jay Cutler. C'mon, if you watched the game and know football, it's obvious. Cutler had 447 yards on the night. He got a miracle catch from Nate Jackson on a chicken-shit Brett Favre ball that should have been picked off. He got a miracle run from Daniel Graham on a crossing route, when apparently nobody on Cleveland had any interest in tackling him. Most importantly, he got a miraculously terrible defensive play on a 93-yard catch and run by Eddie Royal, when the defensive back not only took his eyes off the ball, not only tried to make a blind play on the ball, not only failed to address the receiver in any way, but actually tried to pull a Superman routine and fly through the air. When you miss on that kind of play, you don't just embarrass yourself. You embarrass your nation.

Quinn, on the other hand, did not make a single bad decision on the night. He was accurate, he was sharp, he was poised. Unlike Derek Anderson, he protected the football. No, the funny thing about Cleveland's offense in this game was actually the play of Kellen Winslow Jr. Look, I can look at a stat line and tell you he had a big night. Here's the thing, though: Winslow killed a second half drive with a blatant offensive pass interference penalty. He killed another second half drive by fumbling a ball. Then he killed a potential game-winning drive by letting a catchable ball shoot right between his hands. It's rare as hell that a receiver manages to cancel out 10 catches, 111 yards, and 2 scores by shooting his team in the foot multiple times. Winslow pulled it off.

Still, Cleveland would have won the game if anybody on their defense could cover, catch, or tackle for shit. And it's a shame, because Cleveland's defense looked a lot better this season until Thursday night. And you've got to figure now the only thing keeping Romeo Crennel in Cleveland is his young quarterback, which makes the benching of Derek Anderson in a short week about the smartest move Crennel has made in an otherwise embarrassing failure of a stint with the team. Think about it: if Cleveland loses this game like this with Anderson on the field and Quinn on the sidelines, why wouldn't the Browns dump Crennel in what is mighty close to a bye week after this game? But the fact that they just got a positive performance from the kid probably keeps Crennel around through the end of the season, right?

Right?

Atlanta over New Orleans, 34-20
My Pick: Atlanta over New Orleans, 29-28
Well, say this for New Orleans: they were pretty decisive about ending their season early. Last season, the Saints might have pulled this one off or made it really close, then lingered for a bit. Now, at least, we know where they stand: they're OUT. DONE.

As for Atlanta, I'm honestly afraid of this team at home. Matt Ryan's quarterback rating at home this season is over 120. The Falcons score an average of 32 points a game in Atlanta. Halfway through the season, they're a legitimately scary home team, and they've got two more consecutive road games after this one. There's every chance . . . every chance the Falcons will be 8-3 headed into a week 13 trip to San Diego. Holy shit, I can't believe I just typed that.

Atlanta's front four was all over Drew Brees Sunday afternoon. Brees might be one accurate sumbitch when he's in rhythm, but under pressure, he plays like a turd. Forget the 422 meaningless yards and the 2 touchdowns, one of which was a desperation heave in the final seconds; Brees was garbage, completing barely over 50% of his nearly 60 pass attempts. His three picks were ugly. He was under seige, and he folded. Matt Ryan, on the other hand, completed 16 of 23 attempts for about 250 yards and 2 scores. He didn't turn the ball over, he spread his passes around, and frankly, he looked like the veteran of the two.

Where do the Saints go from here? It bums me out that they have the Chiefs in Kansas City up next. The Chiefs are determined to lose every game left on their schedule, which means the Saints'll probably roll 'em pretty good. Then we'll have to pretend to take New Orleans seriously for another week. I don't have the energy for that. I can't root for the Chiefs, but I don't any longer think I can root for the Saints, not until their games are totally meaningless. We're almost there, but not yet.

Tennessee over Chicago, 21-14
My Pick: Chicago over Tennessee, 17-16
Well, I was wrong, but it turns out I don't feel so stupid about it. Chicago did a hell of a job bottling up Tennessee's ground game. They didn't count on Kerry Collins stepping up and putting the Titans on his shoulders, but sometimes you pick your poison and live with the consequences. Pretty much every opponent this season is going to try to make Kerry Collins beat them. How many times will he be able to deliver? Well, at least once.

Tennessee still managed to dominate time of possession, with a 7 minute advantage despite only 21 rushing yards. You know you're a tough-ass football team when you can rush for only 21 yards and have 8 penalties on the road and still win time of possession and your ninth consecutive regular season game. The two most impressive things about this Titans team, in my opinion, are the way they pass-protect and their stinginess with the football. They just don't turn the ball over ever. It's remarkable.

Chicago didn't really do anything wrong to lose this game. They just ran up against a superior team. In this case, I really think it's that simple. They turned the ball over one time, had only 3 penalties, outrushed their opponent by a significant margin, and played pretty effing great defense. I suppose this game came down to three things: 1. Chicago only converted 3 of 14 third down opportunities. It's hard to win games when you can't sustain drives, and Chicago struggled mightily to make the key plays that keep an offense on the field. 2. That one turnover? Yeah, a bad ball from Rex Grossman inside his own territory that gave Tennessee possession at the 25 yard line. Chicago had the lead at the time, but not for long. 3. Tennessee made the big special teams play of the day, a blocked fourth quarter field goal.

Sometimes, that's how it goes. The Titans are as solid and well-coached as any team in football, they'll make those kinds of plays. You've gotta love this team.

Jacksonville over Detroit, 38-14
My Pick: Jacksonville over Detroit, 24-20
I spent a few minutes clicking through stats, replays, summaries, whatever I could find to try to muster up the energy to bang out a recap of this one, but you know what? I don't care about it at all. Detroit sucks. Jacksonville sucks, but they still know what to do against roadkill. That's it! I don't want to get bogged down in a recap of this game, otherwise I'll be too depressed to give adequate thought to everything after it. That's it!

Baltimore over Houston, 41-13
My Pick: Houston over Baltimore, 20-16
It would be easy to roll this whole thing up, hang it around Sage Rosenfels' neck, and call it a day.

So we're going to do that very thing!

Remember how, in my pick of this game, I mentioned that Sage Rosenfels isn't such a steep drop-off from Matt Schaub, that he might make some mistakes, but ultimately he can run the Houston offense successfully? Okay, forget all that. Sage Rosenfels is a friggin' turd. He played like hammered dog-shit out there. Of course, Baltimore's defense is one hell of an obstacle, but damn. Those two throws that turned into picks by Ray Lewis were about as piss-poor as your likely to see at any level of football ever. Who the hell was he throwing to? The Haloti Ngata pick . . . well, Ngata is a monster and he made an incredible play, but still, Rosenfels hit him in the hands. Chris McAlister walked right into a pick. Rosenfels was turrible. Turr-i-bull.

Joe Flacco, on the other hand, did his own little Matt Ryan impression out there. He was friggin' stellar. And again, this guy throws a beautiful, beautiful deep ball. In fact, from the TV angle, Flacco looks as comfortable and athletic as any quarterback in football when he takes a deep drop. I'm no NFL scout, but to me Flacco's whole drop-release motion is about as fluid as any I've seen, and he's got a cannon. Right now, Baltimore's only asking him to take care of the ball and hit the occasional bomb off playaction, but someday down the line, Flacco might be one prolific passer.

He still looks like an ostrich.

But I'm thinking about this now, and I'm saying to myself, "Baltimore's defense is quite nearly as ferocious as Pittsburgh's. Baltimore's offensive line is superior. Baltimore's backfield is healthier. Pittsburgh might have the better receiving corps, but right now (only), Flacco is doing a better job of playing within the mold of quarterback on a run-first offense with a strong defense." All of a sudden, I'm convinced Baltimore is a better overall football team than Pittsburgh. If Flacco plays like this (15 of 23 for 185 and 2 scores, 111 straight pass attempts without a turnover) the rest of the way, Baltimore is the better team. Now, he's a rookie, and he's bound to have some rookie outings the rest of the way, but he's shown the ability to protect the ball, hit some big plays, and keep his team in the game, and frankly, Ben Roethlisberger has been a turnover machine.

I'm just saying. Keep an eye on it. Pittsburgh is not so invincible. Baltimore could win the North.

Miami over Seattle, 21-19
My Pick: Miami ove rSeattle, 21-13
I made a big stink over the 2-point spread, and look at this shit. 2 friggin' points. If I were a betting man, I'd have almost been screwed. Almost.

So this was the best possible effort from Seattle. They traveled as far as possible to play a fairly warm AFC team still in the hunt, and they came within 2 points in a 1pm East Coast game. That moral victory might be as close as they come to the word "victory" the whole rest of the season.

As for Miami, hey, a win is a win. Ricky Williams had himself a nice game. The Wildcat was on fiyah(!) again today, which was nice to see. Miami's on a nice little run here, and watch out for those Dolphins: they've got two more consecutive home games coming up, and they've got seven straight possible wins left on their schedule. Oakland, New England at home, St. Louis, the Bills in Buffalo (not as tough as we thought), San Francisco at home, Kansas City, and then a week 17 match-up with the Jets in New Jersey that could be for a playoff spot. Miami could win anywhere from 4 to 7 of those games. 9-7 would be a disappointment for this Dolphins team. What an unbelievable story they've been.

Can you believe this shit? Already in this post I've talked about Atlanta heading into week 13 at 8-3, Baltimore winning the AFC South, and Miami being a disappointment at 9-7. Just for the record, those three teams finished a combined 10-38 last season. You could say this has been a strange season.

Minnesota over Green Bay, 28-27
My Pick: Green Bay over Minnesota, 27-17
Something just hit me about this game: no matter who won, it would be impossible to say either team earned it. This was about as frustrating a football game as you're likely to ever see.

Minnesota, for crying out loud, these fucks can't stay out of their own way. Gus Frerotte was fucking terrible. He and Sage Rosenfels should get together and buy each other a few drinks. What an incredibly terrible performance by a veteran quarterback. And consider this two-minute sequence from the third quarter: Minnesota takes over possession at their 45 yard line leading 21-10 with about 5:30 left on the clock. Gus Frerotte drops back and fires a short pass directly into the arms of a Green Bay defender, who races through and around the Vikings for a 59-yard score. Minnesota gets the ball back 14 seconds later, loses 18 yards in 2 plays, punts on fourth and eight, and Green Bay's Will Blackmon returns it 65 yards for another score. Green Bay goes into the fourth quarter leading 24-21.

Minnesota is just an awful, awful football team. In an absolute must-win division home game, the Vikings committed 7 penalties, turned the ball over 3 times, and gave up their NFL record sixth special teams touchdown of the season. How in the hell did they win this game?

His name is Adrian Peterson, and when we make a point of mentioning the possibility of him going nuts against any given opponent, this is exactly what we're talking about. On the decisive drive of the game, the Vikings ran the following plays: Adrian Peterson run left for 4 yards. Adrian Peterson run left for 5 yards. Frerotte pass to Wade for 5 yards. Adrian Peterson run left for 2 yards. Pass to Adrian Peterson for 16 yards. Pass to Adrian Peterson for 8 yards. Adrian Peterson run right for 29 yards, touchdown. That score decided the game. One player on Minnesota's offense had their head screwed on correctly on Sunday, and they're thanking their lucky stars it also happened to be their best player, the pissed-off rhinoceros wearing number 28. For 33 touches and 225 total yards, this kid piled his team's whole season on his back and carried it around. On the winning scoring drive, the Vikings called his number on 6 of 7 plays.

As for Green Bay, I guess they're the one middling sub-.5oo team I'll refuse to write off for another week. What the fuck. Aaron Rodgers was bad, but he was under an insane amount of pressure in the pocket. Minnesota's defense was pretty fucking dialed in, come to think of it. Green Bay had nothing in the following departments: slowing down Minnesota's ground game, and converting anything on offense. Green Bay's defense just couldn't get off the field, and they ended up facing down Adrian Peterson in Minnesota for 36 minutes. There might be two or three defenses in football that could contain Peterson for 36 minutes, and the Packers don't have one of them.

Adrian Peterson single-handedly kept this game from being a total farce. The total points might trick you into thinking this was a good game. It had it's moments, but there was only one player on either team worth watching. The rest was total garbage.

New England over Buffalo, 20-10
My Pick: New England over Buffalo, 23-17
I wish I had more to say about this. I feel like I should write an extended eulogy for the 2008 Buffalo Bills, but I've got nothing. New England was clearly the better team, and what was truly appalling was the lack of enthusiasm or energy from Buffalo. They came out flat, sleep-walked through the better part of this game, and got drilled. Now they're 0-3 in the AFC East, 5-4 overall, losers of 4 of 5, and all but out of the running for the playoffs. Record-wise, they might still be in it, but how in the hell do you recover from this kind of collapse?

Why go on? You know what happened. But do you care? Nope, neither do I.

New York Jets over St. Louis, 47-3
My Pick: New York Jets over St. Louis, 29-20
Ouch. What an embarrassment.

And other than that, I don't care at all about this game.

Carolina over Oakland, 17-6
My Pick: Carolina over Oakland, 35-6
I guess you get to play that poorly on the road and win, so long as you do it in Oakland. Holy hell. I had a hard time figuring out which team was which out there. I'm not sure Jake Delhomme should be allowed to collect a paycheck this week after that stink-bomb.

7 of 27? I mean, what the fuck happened out there? Was he throwing with his left arm or something? 7 of 27? 4 picks? Those are Horacio Grey numbers! The headline of this recap on NFL.com says "Panthers get road win vs. Raiders". Has the word "get" every implied anything as foul or ill-gotten as this win? I'll never look at the word "get" the same after this. If I'm Andrew Walter, I'm sending a case of something expensive to Jake Delhomme this week. Who even remembers how bad Walter played after watching Delhomme stumble out there?

Remember that scene in Rookie of the Year, the one near the beginning where the idiot main character fucks up his little league game by committing a series of errors on a ball hit to center field before accidentally throwing it over the outfield wall? That was Jake Delhomme. Was his helmet actually on backwards? I mean, I know we use that saying all the time when guys play like dogshit, but now I'm really wondering! 7 of 27? I'd like to make a joke about somebody out of left field being able to outperform Delhomme, but I'm struggling to think of anybody I know who actually couldn't complete better than 7 of 27 throws against Oakland's defense. Jesus, is DeAngelo Hall really that bad? Take him out of Oakland's defense, and all of a sudden otherwise competent quarterbacks complete only 7 of 27 pass attempts. If that's the case, I'm driving out to Ashburn today with a sledgehammer. No way Hall takes the field for the Redskins this season. No way.

Man, what a friggin' dog this game was. Nobody deserved to watch this crap. Oakland residents are luckier than a mother this game was blacked out in the local market.

Indianapolis over Pittsburgh, 24-20
My Pick: Pittsburgh over Indianapolis, 23-20
I was almost exactly right about the final score, except the teams were backwards, which means I was almost exactly wrong.

Indy, man, for all the shit that's gone wrong for them in 2008, they sure have had some incredible luck in a few of their wins. How about a tipped ball that finds Reggie Wayne for a 65 yard score? I mean, I hate to piss all over their parade here, but they seriously lucked into another win. They played poorly on offense from start to finish, hit a couple of timely plays, got incredibly lucky on a few others, and somehow managed to sneak off with a win. Good for them, I suppose.

As for Pittsburgh, I imagine there are a lot of folks wondering why Byron Leftwich didn't play Sunday afternoon. I can't be the only one. Roethlisberger didn't look right. I'll give him this: he seemed to have picked up on Leftwich's success in completing short passes and taking pressure off the offensive line, but his full-tilt tendency reared its ugly head in a few bad, bad moments. That end-of-the-first-half interception was a friggin' disaster, it let Indianapolis off the mat and the ensuing touchdown gave the Colts all the momentum headed into halftime. Twice in the game Ben forced balls in his own territory, and the Colts turned both interceptions into touchdowns. I'm not saying Ben Roethlisberger is killing the Steelers, but I am typing it. Ben Roethlisberger is killing the Steelers.

And though Peyton Manning wasn't great, he didn't turn the ball over and he found the endzone. When his defense gave him a short field, he took advantage. That was a gutsy road win for the Colts. They get to linger for another week, and if you take the group of wild-card contenders right now, you've got to like Indy's chances. Down the stretch, I'd feel more comfortable with my money on them than on Brett Favre's Jets, the plummeting Bills, the upstart Dolphins, or the rookie-led Ravens. There's a good chance the Colts will not make the playoffs, but among the teams competing with them, they look like one of the safer picks because of their pedigree and experience.

San Diego over Kansas City, 20-19
My Pick: San Diego over Kansas City, 31-20
I sat in a booth at Thai Towne for a good 5 minutes with absolutely nothing in the world to say about anything. It could have even been longer; it's possible I blacked out for a period. I'm still not sure I know exactly what to say about what happened in San Diego Sunday night. Even thinking about it makes me feel nauseated.

It's not supposed to be like this. Coaches can't aggressively torpedo their teams like this and keep their jobs. And to be sure we're on the same page here, I should say I have rarely seen a coach cost his team a game the way Herm Edwards did on Sunday. I've said so much about the guy already, I'm pretty much out. But where in the past Herm was just a terrible gameday coach and an embarrassment, this time he's actually crossed the line into actively working for the opposition to hurt his own team. What he did on Sunday should be called a crime.

The first two-point conversion attempt was an accident. Kansas City failed to execute a simple extra point kick and wound up screwed. The second one was just an incredibly fucking retarded call by Edwards. Jesus Christ. I shouldn't even have to explain this. On the road, with a chance to deliver a death blow to a struggling Chargers team, playing them remarkably close throughout, struggling from behind late, scoring a miracle touchdown. Kick the goddamn extra point, take the momentum, put 'em away in overtime, for crying out loud. The Chiefs are a fucking 1-win team! They had a victory in their grasp! Anything can happen in overtime! Give yourself a goddamn chance! This isn't like Mike Shanahan rolling the dice in week 2 after a gift from the referees. The season was young, Shanahan was looking for a statement, and he has a very talented core of offensive players to work with. There's reason to trust his players in that scenario: they'd been lighting up San Diego's defense all night, and he had a tried-and-true play in his hip pocket for that exact scenario. Kansas City . . . oh fuck it. It was a retarded call by a horrifyingly bad coach, a guy who deserves to be fired so bad, and not just from this job, but from a cannon into the sun. There's guts and then there's stupidity: if you watched any portion of this game, you knew there was a 0.0% chance the Chiefs would convert that 2-pointer. The only person in America who didn't seem to know that in advance was Herm Edwards.

The thing is, I generally love the 2-point call, down one late in a game. I love a coach going for the win. I can't fully explain why I felt overwhelmingly differently about this call when cameras showed Herm holding up 2 fingers after Tony Gonzalez made his miracle touchdown catch. This didn't feel like going for the win, it felt like going for the loss. There was no way in hell the Chiefs were going to get the conversion, from the moment Herm raised two fingers. They'd stolen momentum by scoring the late touchdown, but it was a miracle catch. Watch it again.

I fucking hate the Chiefs, I hate the Chargers, I hate the AFC West. I almost hate the NFL for being affiliated with these assholes.

New York Giants over Philadelphia, 36-31
My Pick: New York Giants over Philadelphia, 24-21
Time of possession, folks. 40 minutes of possession for the Giants, in Philadelphia. In the wise words of John McCain, "that, my friends, is domination."

And really, what a game! This game had intrigue from all angles. Brandon Jacobs took it upon himself to make it a lot more interesting by fumbling the ball on an absurd end-of-run hurdle attempt, and then put the ball on the turf a second time, late in the game, at the goalline, only a millisecond or so after crossing into the endzone. I love this guy, he's a monster, but he needs to secure the damn ball a little better. Then Eli did his part by tossing the ball mere milliseconds before crossing the line of scrimmage, leading to frustrating minutes of confusion about the rule regarding how much of a quarterback must be at or behind the line of scrimmage when the ball is released. So the Giants did their part. They dominated the game, but in the interests of entertaining primetime television, they really went above and beyond in providing an interesting game.

The Eagles, hey, they're entertainers too! How about Donovan McNabb, folks, is this guy something or what? Why not take a late delay of game penalty, that'll spice things up!

Okay, seriously, this was a hell of a game. The Eagles, despite having the ball for only 20 minutes of game time, had a chance down the stretch. Brian Westbrook might not have had a great game (or really, any game at all), but it's hard to criticize Andy Reid for putting the ball in the hands of his All-World tailback on the clinching 4th and 1 play. It didn't work, so he'll eat shit for it, and the Eagles have had major troubles converting short-yardage chances all season, but again, Westbrook is one of the best tailbacks in football, and he only needed a yard.

One thing must be said of both teams: they went after it. On Philadelphia's final meaningful defensive play of the night, Brian Dawkins obliterated Derrick Ward in the backfield and caused a fumble. On New York's final meaningful defensive play of the night, Danny Clark, Antonio Pierce, and Chase Blackburn charged upfield like it was the first play of the game, blew up Philly's blocking in the backfield, and stuffed Brian Westbrook a yard and a half short of the first down marker. New York chewed Philly's defense to bits, especially upfront, churning out 220+ rushing yards and only allowing a single sack on the night, and the Giants dominated time of possession and won the game because of it, but both teams came to play and neither team let up for a minute. Even the aforementioned Donovan McNabb scrambled for a key first down deep in New York territory late in the game and then fired a beautiful ball on the go to Kevin Curtis on fourth down.

So both teams played well. It must be said, then, once and for all, that the Giants are much better than the Eagles. Both teams played well, both as close to full strength as can be expected 10 weeks into an NFL season, in Philadelphia, but New York still doubled 'em up in rushing yards and time of possession and still won the game. In fact, it really shouldn't have been as close as the final score.

They don't get any easier for either team from here on, either. New York has a red-hot Ravens team up next, then they go to Arizona, then to Washington. Those are three tough wins, and if the Giants drop two of them, they could be right back in the thick of the NFC East. The Eagles are facing an uphill battle, and not just for the division any longer. With Carolina, Tampa, and Atlanta all above them in the NFC, not to mention Washington today and potentially Dallas down the stretch, they need another run here. They can forget about the division, of course, but they're pretty clearly talented enough to be a playoff team. They just put three straight wins together before Sunday night, they need to find a way to get back on the horse and do it again.

Arizona over San Francisco, 29-24
My Pick: Arizona over San Francisco, 34-13
Mike Singletary's influence over San Francisco's overall effort and their offensive gameplan was significant, and the 49ers played about as well as they have all season. Arizona is not an easy place to play for away teams, but the 49ers were in good position to win this game down the stretch.

But here's the thing: San Francisco turned the ball over 3 times, committed 10 penalties, and seemed to be clueless in key situations regarding clock management and playcalling. Singletary is a new head coach, and sometimes clock management can be tricky for new coaches who don't spend a lot of time playing Madden in the off-season. The 49ers ran the ball well and played pretty solid defense, on the one hand. On the other hand, they ran the ball to Michael Robinson from the 2 yard line with 4 seconds on the clock and lost 25 of the final 45 seconds on the clock trying to get the right personnel on the field for a quarterback spike. Ultimately, those two plays were the difference between a fantastic division road win and a gut-wrenching, demoralizing loss. I think Singletary will probably find his way, and I think this game will be remembered more for the positive ways Singletary influenced the gameplay of the 49ers than the way his team struggled to put their helmets on correctly down the stretch. That probably won't make it any easier for San Francisco's players this week.

As for Arizona, boy, that shiny new running game they unveiled last Sunday sure disappeared in a hurry in week 10, didn't it? It's a good thing A) Kurt Warner was pretty damn close to perfect passing the ball, B) Frank Gore was lightly grazed while stumbling to the turf inside the five yard line with less than a minute left, and C) Arizona's defense came up with a huge push on that ill-fated Michael Robinson plunge on the final play. Arizona escaped with a victory Monday night. It was an entertaining, illuminating game, and Arizona barely escaped with their reputation intact.

And now, some rankings:

Contenders

1. New York Giants (2)
That's right. They friggin' owned the Eagles in Philadelphia Sunday night. You can't tell me they aren't better than Tennessee. If you can pull the "Tennessee is undefeated" card, I can pull the "the Giants are Super Bowl Champs" card. So there.

2. Tennessee Titans (1)
The didn't do anything to lose the top spot, except maybe look like garbage in their running game. New York jumped up and took it from 'em.

Everyone Else

3. Carolina Panthers (3)
Played about as poorly on offense as you can, but still found a way. They could have dropped, but nobody jumped up high enough to take this spot.

4. New England Patriots (6)
Flattening the Bills and jumping to the front of the AFC's only deep division is enough to bump you into the top 5 in my book.

5. Washinton Redskins (5)
Didn't play, didn't move.

6. Pittsburgh Steelers (4)
Dropped a home game to the Colts behind an ugly game from a clearly banged up Ben Roethlisberger.

7. Atlanta Falcons (8)
That was some ass-whupping they laid on the Saints in Atlanta on Sunday. This is a serious playoff contender.

8. Philadelphia Eagles (7)
They had a chance down the stretch against the Giants in Philly, but the tale of that game is told in the numbers: 20 minutes of offense and virtually no running game did them in.

9. Baltimore Ravens (10)
I'd bump them up higher, but over who? They stomped the shit out of Houston on Sunday, and I think they're still improving.

10. Chicago Bears (9)
The Bears put up a fight against the Titans, but they didn't have much going offensively and didn't have an answer for Kerry Collins, of all people.

11. Arizona Cardinals (11)
That was their diciest home performance of the season, and they very nearly tossed out all the good will they'd generated through the first half of the season. Still, a division win is a division win.

12. Green Bay Packers (12)
Yes, they lost, but they played the Vikings very close in Minnesota and nobody behind them jumped up at all.

13. Miami Dolphins (17)
It was a narrow home win over a lousy Seattle team, but everyone around them took a dive and they look like playoff contenders.

14. Tampa Bay Buccaneers (14)
Didn't play, didn't move.

15. Indianapolis Colts (18)
Hey, any time you go into Pittsburgh and come out with a win, you've done something impressive.

16. New York Jets (19)
Absolutely throttled the hapless Rams in one of the ugliest, most brutal violations ever committed to film.

17. Minnesota Vikings (20)
It wasn't pretty, but the crucial division win put them above .500 and kept hope alive for a playoff run.

The Dregs

18. Buffalo Bills (13)
I could move them lower, even. 3 straight losses, all in the AFC East, and it's adios, Bills.

19. Houston Texans (15)
Just looked like poached rat crap in a humiliating blowout at home. Sage Rosenfels is quickly becoming either an adjective or a verb, or maybe both.

20. New Orleans Saints (16)
Put up zero fight in their most important game of the season. They're totally done.

21. Denver Broncos (21)
That win did nothing to convince me they're anything but a bunch of clowns.

22. Jacksonville Jaguars (22)
Meh. Killing the Lions is hardly an accomplishment.

23. San Diego Chargers (23)
And we'd all like to thank the goddamn Kansas City Chiefs for letting this atrocity hang around for another week.

24. Cleveland Browns (24)
Brady Quinn was a nice improvement. Too bad the rest of the team is crap, and now they're accusing each other of quitting. Nice.

25. Kansas City Chiefs (25)
Played well enough to win, coached poorly enough to lose.

26. Dallas Cowboys (26)
Is this excessively low? Probably. But after putting them here last week, I can't really move them if they didn't play, can I?

27. San Francisco 49ers (29)
Played almost well enough to win in a very hostile environment. That's worth something.

28. Seattle Seahawks (28)
I'll give them a little credit for traveling all that way for a 1pm game against a good team and still mustering up a competitive effort.

29. St. Louis Rams (27)
Wow. That was just awful.

30. Cincinnati Bengals (30)
Didn't play, right? Or did they? At any rate, they didn't move, apparently.

101. Detroit Lions (31)
So incredibly bad. The odds of them going winless in 2008 are getting very strong.

201. Oakland Raiders (32)
Lost by 11 points to a team whose quarterback actually played with his helmet on backwards, at home, and the only thing surprising about it was that they only lost by 11.

Week 11 picks should be up tomorrow afternoon. Peace!

NFL Stuff

A few NFL items:

1. Jack Del Rio is losing his grip in Jacksonville. The wheels are off.

First, the Jaguars are a big disappointment this season. Even before they went on their bye week, they were a huge disappointment. Then, coming out of the bye week, they got dumped at home by the Browns before losing on the road to the winless Bengals. Basically, they're out of playoff contention altogether. So they're a huge disappointment.

Now this shit: Del Rio thought it would be a good idea to hold a team meeting with his players, insist upon their silence, and then call out individual players in front of their teammates and subject them to criticism without an opportunity to defend or explain themselves. Somewhere along the way, he ripped into perhaps the best player left on his defense, veteran Mike Peterson, about showboating after a sack late in a losing effort. Peterson defended himself, it turned into a shouting match, Del Rio kicked him out of the meeting and then banned him from practice for two days.

First of all, as a practice of leadership, I don't think it's ever a good idea to insist upon certain types of behavior from those interacting with you. Like, for instance, telling someone they're not allowed to respond to something you say to them. It's one thing to make such a demand of your children. "Stand there, shut up, and listen to what I have to say." Generally speaking, it's not ideal, and if you're making that statement, even to your kids, it means they did something wrong, which in a roundabout way means something else you tried to get through to them didn't quite make it.

But we're not talking about kids, here. We're talking about grown men, and in Peterson's case, a veteran, a team captain, a stand-up, hardworking guy who has probably earned the right to not be treated like a child in front of his teammates.

And another thing: I like accountability, but efforts towards accountability are ultimately undermined if the messenger lacks credibility. Now, I'm not saying Del Rio lacks credibility in Jacksonville's locker-room, but I know there isn't a person in Jacksonville's football organization who can be absolved of responsibility for the Jaguars sucking, especially not Del Rio. The idea of him standing in front of a room of guys and specifically calling out individuals for their role in another loss is . . . well, unappetizing, for one thing. I'd have a hard time keeping my mouth shut. Did he call himself out for allowing the offense to get so far away from establishing the run this season? I'd guess not. I'd guess this was a big, fat, disgusting case of Jack Del Rio blaming his players for the state of the team, embarrassing them, making them scapegoats, and I'd bet Mike Peterson was grossed out long before Del Rio called his name.

And the thing is, even if Peterson weren't a veteran and a team leader, it's never, never a good sign when a coach and player have a heated exchange in a formal meeting. Generally speaking, it means a coach has lost the locker-room. Frankly, I'm surprised he had it this long.

2. The NFL is getting way, way, way carried away with the disciplinary action for hits on quarterbacks. This Justin Tuck fine is ridiculous. Someone please explain to me what he did wrong on this hit on Brooks Bollinger. Seriously, this shit is getting out of hand. What the hell are defensive players supposed to do? The only way to not put that hit on Bollinger would be to go out of your way to avoid actually hitting him at all. I fucking hate this kind of thing. Why don't they just put red jerseys on quarterbacks and just disallow contact?

Look, I hate injuries to franchise quarterbacks as much as anybody. I'm not interested in NFL seasons going by with a third of the league's quarterbacks on the shelf any given week. But this kind of hit, the kind Tuck put on Bollinger, is not at all the kind of hit that generally leads to injury. It was a clean hit: his helmet made contact well below Bollinger's head, he wrapped up, drove him backwards, and then seemed to let go of him right before they landed. I'd like to hear from the NFL what they'd have a defensive lineman do differently if he's running in on a quarterback with a chance to tackle him before he gets rid of the ball. Push him over? Grab him around the waist?

I'm getting disgusted even thinking about this.

3. I love, love, love, love, love, love, LOVE the acquisition of DeAngelo Hall in Washington. I do. I need to get out in front of the local media on this one. I love this move.

First of all, it doesn't cost Washington much at all. They're paying a prorated portion of his $1 million salary for the rest of the season. Second of all, this solves the problem of the Redskins having frequent injuries in the secondary. Third, Hall has some ability. Mostly, though, I like this move because Hall is from this area, played college ball at Virginia Tech, and is going to a veteran team with high expectations, a strong work ethic, and a lot of very serious veteran leadership on his side of the ball. Hall has been a bad guy in his time in the NFL, in that he's got a big mouth and tends to be a me! me! me! sort of personality. Well, there's just no room for that kind of crap on this team. He's got 7 regular season games to try to prove he can fit in and be a team guy on a veteran team. He knows it. If he plays the part, he could land himself another decent contract after the season. If not, hey, it's just seven games, they can deactivate his ass and send him home.

And it keeps him from going to another NFC contender, where he'll be faced with roughly the same equation: shape up, fly straight, work hard, try to rebuild the reputation, earn a contract in the off-season. Either way, any good, well-coached team would get something positive from him for 7 or 8 games. The only possible better case scenario would have had him landing in Dallas like a base into a vat of acid, killing everyone involved in a massive explosion of gore.

I think Carlos Rogers is a few picks away from being a Pro Bowl corner. Shawn Springs is as good a cover corner as there is in the NFC when healthy. Fred Smoot is a chemistry guy, a fan favorite, and a capable nickel corner. Leigh Torrance has turned into a fine special teamer and a regular contributor on defense. The Redskins are deep in the secondary. But injuries have been a problem, and you just can't have too many capable cover guys with good hands available. If nothing else, he can step in and challenge somebody in practice. I love this move. Love it. It costs the Skins almost nothing, and they made the decision the right way, involving veterans like London Fletcher in the discussion. Great great great.

That's all, y'all.

Week 10 Picks

I don't know how they do it, but week in and week out, the NFL makes it hard for me to just pick a heavy slate of home teams and be done with it. Again, in week 10, there's a handful of road teams who I just like better and just are better than their opponent. I managed to sneak by with a 9-5 record in week 9, but this heavy reliance on road teams is giving me heartburn.

Here we go!

Denver @ Cleveland
The Line: Cleveland by 3
Cleveland's not much of a team. Denver's definitely not much of a team. Denver doesn't travel well and they have no defense. Cleveland has a new quarterback making his first NFL start. Toss up?

Bold prediction here: Brady Quinn is going to look awesome on Sunday. Not just because Denver's defense is atrocious, either. He's playing at home in his home state, he's a sharp kid, he's got a lot of talent around him, and the Browns aren't going to put him in a lot of bad situations. Frankly, I think he's going to be an improvement over Derek Anderson for the rest of the season.

As for Denver, I don't know what to make of this team or it's chances to win. I just know I can't pick them on the road. At this point, I'd be reluctant to pick them at home. They burned me in week 9 when my confidence on them was already critically low. Would it shock me to death if they pulled off a win here, looked great on offense, put up some big numbers? Not really. I just can't pick it that way.
Browns over Broncos, 22-17

New Orleans @ Atlanta
The Line: Atlanta by 1
As John McCain might say, "This, my friends, is a great match-up".

New Orleans has had two weeks to prepare for this, they deserved it, and I think they needed it. They deserved it because they had the London "home game" atrocity. They needed it because Atlanta is hotter than hell right now and a monster at home. I'm having a very hard time imagining how this game will go down.

This much is certain: New Orleans is desperately in need of this victory. They've done a lot of farting around at the bottom of the NFC South and the middle of the NFC, but they're supposed to make a move here. They've dropped two killer division games already, they can't at all afford to drop a game below .500 by losing their third straight division game. Not this late in the season. You could call it a desperation game for the Saints. I expect them to come out blazing.

And here's a good test for the young Falcons. They're about to get a tough challenge at home by a veteran division foe. That's a hurdle. They've also got an opportunity to dig a rusty blade into the belly of a wounded opponent, and that's another hurdle for a wannabe contender. They can either step down on New Orleans' throat or they can let 'em off the mat. I don't know about anybody else, but I'm ready to be done with the Saints in 2008. They're 0-3 on the road, they've got the worst defense by far in their division, and they've pooped away a series of winnable games already this season, to say nothing of the brutal bludgeoning they took from the Panthers in Carolina. Cast 'em out, I say. Here's hoping the Falcons take care of business. Either way, it should be fun. I've gotta say, I'm kinda loving the NFC South this season (except those friggin' Bucs).
Falcons over Saints, 29-28

Tennessee @ Chicago
The Line: Tennessee by 3
Truth be told, I kinda love this match-up. I'm not sure where exactly Chicago is supposed to find any offense, and I'm not exactly sure how they're supposed to avoid turning the ball over, but I'm fascinated to find out.

Just like last week, I'm giving a tough NFC North team a chance against the big bad Titans. Tennessee is so sharp, so professional, so tough, it's hard to imagine a banged up Bears team with Rex Grossman under center holding them off. Still, I have a feeling Chicago had trouble with Detroit because they were looking ahead at this one. I think they're a lot better than we saw in week 9, and I think, if nothing else, they won't lie down for a minute. If we've learned nothing else about Lovie Smith's Chicago Bears in the last few seasons, we've at least learned his teams fight like hell. The good news here is the Titans are almost the exact same team; toughness takes them a long way and what they lack in offensive explosiveness, they make up for with dominating defense and scrappy play-making.

I'm going to go way out on a limb here and take the home dog, even with Rex Grossman under center. There's a high, high probability I'll feel desperately stupid about this pick come Sunday night, but for now, I think the match-up is within maybe 7 points to begin with, and I like Chicago's homefield advantage. I especially like Chicago's homefield advantage in the second of back-to-back home games, this one against the stronger of the two opponents. Chicago's fighting for something this season, maybe even the division, so I expect a hell of a battle.
Bears over Titans, 17-16

Jacksonville @ Detroit
The Line: Jacksonville by 6.5
I'm not sure why Jacksonville, losers of two straight against abysmal AFC South bottom-dwellers, is favored to win by nearly a touchdown in any road game against any team not from Oakland. I mean, Detroit's garbage, but they aren't Oakland. We may be whores, but we ain't horses.

After all, didn't Jacksonville just lose to a winless Bengals team in Cincinnati?

I have a feeling this would be the end of someone's tenure in Jacksonville if the Jaguars were to lose this game. Maybe not Jack Del Rio, but someone. You don't come out of your bye and lose three straight to teams with a combined 2-19 record without putting a noose around somebody's neck. Anybody. Anybody! Maybe that threat alone is enough to push Jacksonville to victory. God knows it won't take much against this friggin' Lions disaster.

On the other hand, Detroit is the last team in the NFL without a win, and they've been better in each of their past three games. Calvin Johnson is a real difference maker. One interesting variable here will be whether or not Detroit turns over the starting quarterback position right away to Daunte Culpepper. On the one hand, Culpepper should absolutely be starting for the Lions, I'm just not sure it should happen this quickly. Culpepper can be turnover prone even at his best, I'm not sure it's a good idea to stick him back there behind that awful offensive line with only a limited understanding of the offense. Detroit has no running game, no defense, and a bad offensive line. You couldn't sell me on the idea of putting a turnover-prone quarterback with less than a full week in the NFL this season under center against just about anybody. Jacksonville's defense may not be what it was, but . . . well . . . they ain't exactly horses either, now are they?

I don't know. It's hard for me to pick Detroit. Jacksonville isn't exactly setting my heart a-flutter, but I have a hard time picking them to lose three straight, too. I guess I'm going with the road team. At least they're favored.
Jaguars over Lions, 24-20

Baltimore @ Houston
The Line: Baltimore by 1
That's an interesting line to me. On neutral territory, I'd pick Houston, even with Sage Rosenfels under center. First of all, Rosenfels isn't much of a step down from Matt Schaub in terms of moving the ball and scoring points. He turns the ball over and made some incredibly stupid, embarrassing plays earlier this season, but he can get the engine going, too. In Baltimore, I'd definitely like the Ravens in a 1 pm game; Houston's doing the dreaded west-to-east, and they're not great away from home. In Houston, however, I don't know, I have a hard time reasoning this one. Baltimore's pass defense isn't terrible, but their secondary (especially the corners) isn't special and Houston's passing attack is formidable. I also like the way Houston plays at home and the home crowd has proven to be pretty enthusiastic. Baltimore by 1? Really?

No, I don't see it that way. I see Flacco under pressure when he passes, I see Houston moving the ball in the air, and I see this one being close enough that the home field advantage ends up providing the edge. Gimme Houston.
Texans over Ravens, 20-16

Seattle @ Miami
The Line: Miami by 2
Again, by 2? Really? Seattle can't actually travel farther than this and still be in the United States, doesn't Vegas realize that? This is a 1pm game, Seattle is literally traveling as far as they possible can to play inside the country, and Miami is only giving 2 points? Seattle gets thumped at home in week 9, Miami dumps the Broncos in Denver, and the following week Seattle is supposed to hang around and make it close a million miles from home? What?! Has the whole world gone crazy?

No, no way Seattle musters up much here. Miami is tough, man, and even if their offense doesn't do much, no fucking way Seattle musters up an attack. Miami's defense is going to make lunch meat out of those groggy sons-of-bitches.
Dolphins over Seahawks, 21-13

Green Bay @ Minnesota
The Line: Minnesota by 2
A big time division match-up here in the North. This is the season for one of these two teams. Minnesota has already played a couple of "this is our season, boys" games already in 2008. Green Bay was within a coin flip of not really needing this to even be a "this is our season" type game, but such is the nature of things.

When these two teams met earlier in the season, in Aaron Rodgers' first game as the starting quarterback, in Green Bay, the Packers squeezed by the Vikings late, ultimately winning by 5. The other thing: Tarvaris Jackson was under center for the Vikings. Now, lately Gus Frerotte hasn't been a whole lot better than what they were getting from Jackson, except that, in typical Frerotte fashion, he's been hitting on a good number of deep balls. That explosive side of Minnesota's offense could be a concern for Green Bay.

And this is the second straight road game for the Packers, never a good sign. Ruh-roh . . .

But, BUT, the Packers are about as healthy as they've been all season, and they put up a pretty impressive defensive performance of their own in week 9 against the Titans. So here's the thing: I think Aaron Rodgers' progression in Green Bay's offense is more significant than Gus Frerotte's play under center for the Vikings. I also think Green Bay is more talented on offense and just as good on defense (when fully healthy). I think the homefield means a lot for Minnesota.

On a neutral site, I'd definitely pick the Packers. By how much? Maybe a touchdown. So how much is the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome worth to the Vikings? Well, whatever it's worth in any other game, it's almost certainly worth more in a division game against the hated Packers. So far, Minnesota has one good home win this season, a 20-10 job over Carolina. Other than that, it was a discouraging 3-point choke job loss to the Colts, a discouraging 2-point bullshit win over the Lions, and a herky-jerky performance in a 7-point win over the Texans. Hmmmmmm . . .

Okay, plus, I want Green Bay to win.

Shoot.

Well, gotta go with my gut. Here's hoping it's my gut!
Packers over Vikings, 27-17

Buffalo @ New England
The Line: New England by 3.5
Two things I'm sure of: 1. the Bills are shitting themselves; 2. the Patriots know it.

This one, too, is the whole season for one of these teams, but in this case, only one. If the Bills lose, they're done. Not because they can't make a season out of it, not because it's impossible for them to struggle back, win the remainder of their division schedule, and take a playoff berth in the sluggish AFC. But I can't expect them to recover from this kind of mid season groin kick. A 4-0 start that became 5-4 with 3 straight division losses, that's hideous. And I do think they'll lose. In fact, at this point, I'll be hugely impressed and very surprised if they do win.

On the other hand, though, it's not exactly like the Patriots have been blowing anybody's hair back. There's virtually nothing to be afraid of on this Patriots roster. Now that their behind the scenes advantages have been neutralized, it couldn't be more plain how few on the field advantages they actually have. Matt Cassel is up and down, the running game is inconsistent at best, and their defense is still old and slow. Buffalo could win this game. But just like the chances of them reversing the direction of their season if they lose, it'll be a long shot for them to go into New England and get a win, even against this Patriots team. I can't pick it that way. I will be rooting for the Bills, I still like the Bills, I just no longer believe in 'em.
Patriots over Bills, 23-17

St. Louis @ New York Jets
The Line: New York Jets by 8
I friggin' hate the Jets. I will be rooting very, very hard for the Rams.

I don't know how they can pull it off. Actually, wait, I know exactly how. They just need to put consistent pressure on Brett Favre and play their secondary as far from the line of scrimmage as possible. Favre gets so frustrated and goes scattershot so badly when teams hit him consistently and take away the big play. He's been trying to self-destruct for weeks now, he badly wants to self-destruct. St. Louis might actually benefit from getting away from home for a week. They took a bad booing at home in week 9.

New York's run defense has been consistently strong all season, so we'll have to see if Steven Jackson can make any headway in there. It'll also be interesting to see if St. Louis can get another big play or two from their younger receivers.

Okay, I'm dragging this out. You don't care about this game, I don't either.
Jets over Rams, 29-20

Carolina @ Oakland
The Line: Carolina by 9
Oakland can't possibly play worse than they played against the Falcons, right? Except, ummm, uh oh, the Panthers are better defensively than the Falcons, they've had two weeks to prepare, and, ummmm, the Raiders can't have even an ounce of confidence in anything they want to do anymore.

Oakland had -2 yards of total offense by halftime against the Falcons. I'm not kidding, here, Oakland could very easily finish this game with negative yardage. I'm picking a huge, huge blowout. Oakland might be the first team ever in any sport to fire two coaches in 10 games.
Panthers over Raiders, 35-6

Indianapolis @ Pittsburgh
The Line: Pittsburgh by 3.5
Those poor Colts, they're in no position to string something together. On the other hand, they did it to themselves, didn't they? They opened the season with a slew of winnable games, and one after another they crapped the opportunities away. Now they need a big upset in Pittsburgh to avoid falling right back to the edge of the abyss. By the by, that 3.5 line is teetering in the middle of a sea-saw right now. If Ben Roethlisberger is healthy, it will move one way. If he can't play, it will move the other. Officially, that line is based on the lack of knowledge about his status.

The Colts are the only team this season that really did anything noteworthy against Baltimore's feisty 3-4. That was in Indianapolis, but it's about the only goddamn hope in hell they have in this one. That and maybe the fact that Pittsburgh just played two tough as shit NFC East opponents and those poor bastards are probably exhausted. By the way, now that I think about it, wasn't that the biggest regular season win in Mike Tomlin's career as a head coach? Last season, the Steelers were doo-doo on the road against tough competition. This season, they dumped two NFC East games. In a must win contest, on the road against a very competent Redskins team, in spite of an injury to their franchise, Super Bowl winning quarterback, they pulled away in the second half and stayed dominant in their division. That was a huge fuckin' win for them!

Hey, anyway, maybe they're drained. It's the only hope for the sad-sack Colts. If they have a run in them at all, it starts here. They got a big ugly home win in week 9, now they're going to the belly of the beast to (hopefully) upset a (hopefully) tired, (hopefully) banged up Steelers team. The chances are thin.
Steelers over Colts, 23-20

Kansas City @ San Diego
The Line: San Diego by 15
Fucking goddamn Chargers. 15 points? You mean to tell me a 3-5 team gets 15 points over a division rival that just played a second straight highly competitive game? Holy crap, what the hell do I know about anything.

Know what? Just for the sheer fuck of it, I'm picking the horrid, horrendous Chiefs (no I'm not). Know why? Because a man has to believe in something, okay (yes, it's called reason)? A man has to take a stand sometimes (no he doesn't), a man has to say "I know what's right, and I'm standing for it" (bullshit).

I'm (not) picking the Chiefs because they're (not) goddamn honest to goodness fighters. They have (probably not) seen this line, and they're (probably not) insulted by it. As (wo)men, it burns them to be underestimated (or estimated at all, for that matter). The Chiefs are ready to make a statement (of surrender), and I'm (not) going to stand there beside them (not in a million years). I've had enough of this shit (there's truth there), and I'm not (not) going to take it anymore!
Ch(argers)iefs over Ch(iefs)argers, 31-20

New York Giants @ Philadelphia
The Line: Philly by . . . .wh-wh-what? Wait, wait, stop everything.

Giants: 7-1. NFL's 5th best Offense and 2nd best Rush Offense. NFL's 3rd best Defense and 2nd against the Pass. Reigning Super Bowl Champions. In 2007, the Giants went 2-0 against the Eagles, held Donovan McNabb to 317 total passing yards, 1 touchdown, 3 fumbles, and sacked him a disgusting 15 times.

Philly: 5-3. Already lost 2 NFC East games, including a home game to Washington. 3 of 5 wins came against NFC West. In 2007, the Giants went 2-0 against the Eagles, held Donovan McNabb to 317 total passing yards, 1 touchdown, 3 fumbles, and sacked him a disgusting 15 times.

Okay, so, let's get back to that line, because clearly something was off there. Now that we've cleared all that up . . .

The Line: New York by . . . . wait . . . you're serious! Ummmm, wow! Am I missing something? Really? You saw the bit about the 15 sacks, right? 15 sacks, man. You know that was in 2 games right? Not 5 games, 2 games. Hmmm. Hey, you're the boss.

The Line: (deep breath) Philly (yes, Philly) by 3

Nope. Giants win! Giants win! Giants win!

Actually, I do give Philly a chance in hell here. They're healthy and explosive, and they could very well turn the tables and sack the holy shit-balls out of Eli Manning. Still, New York's the better team and I'm takin' 'em.
Giants over Eagles, 24-21

San Francisco @ Arizona
The Line: Arizona by 9.5
This should be a one-sided obliteration. I am kinda interested to see what antics we might see from Mike Singletary in this one, though. I'm having two animated sitcom flashbacks here, so hang with me:

Remember the softball championships episode of the Simpsons? Remember when Mr. Burns stupidly took Darryl Strawberry out of the game because he wanted the right/lefty match-up with the game on the line, and he put Homer in instead? He goes through this prolongued explanation of all the potential signals from the third base coach, and Homer totally zones out. Then, later, Homer looks over at Burns on the third base line and Burns is spazzing out, wiggling his hips, jamming his finger up his nose, sticking his tongue out, in an absurd attempt to signal something to Homer in the batters box.

Anyway, this is a wierd stretch, but for some reason, I now picture Mike Singletary this way on the sidelines of 49ers games. He's so desperate to make an impression, he's pulling his pants down, sticking his tongue out, dancing on his toes, pulling ugly faces, only his players are totally zoned and tuning him out. Point is, you save the dramatic shit for after you've built up some credibility in your position. In much the same way that Mr. Burns was ineffectually trying to get complex ideas into Homer's brain after stupidly pulling his best player from the game for questionable reasoning at best, Mike Singletary is trying to get his team to accept a different quarterback and respond to him pulling his pants down after he yanks the only guy on the team who might be remembered for giving a shit in that game. Anyway, I know it was a reach, but it's what came to me.

That, and this:

In Futurama, when Leela gets to play for the New New York Mets as a publicity stunt because she's got one eye and has an uncanny knack for beaning the shit out of opposing batters, her coach benches her because he actually cares about winning a game. When they get to the last inning of the last game and the clown (literally, a clown) playing second base fucks up a routine ground ball by throwing a pie in the face of the first baseman, he needs someone to get the final out. In the end, he throws Leela in there because, even though she's garbage, he's out of other options and clutching at straws. And though Leela pitches better than she's ever pitched before, on her third (yes, third) pitch of the game she gives up the game winning grand slam.

Shaun Hill, you're Leela. Mike Singletary, you're the coach. J. T. O'Sullivan, you're the clown.

Cardinals win! Cardinals win! Cardinals win!
Cardinals over 49ers, 34-13

No Skins this week. I probably won't pay a whole lot of attention, which is a good thing. I could use a week away from football. Though it's been fun, this has been a stressful football season so far.

Week 9 Recap

Keeping track of these games Sunday afternoon felt like punishment. It was an ugly day, and I'm having a harder and harder time keeping this optimism going about the 2008 season.

A week ago I was touting the strength of quarterbacking in the NFL in 2008, and while I may continue to back that up, all the solid quarterbacking in the world can't change the fact that there are only maybe 4 teams in the league that are worth a damn, and maybe only 2 that you might even think about considering great. I'd be okay with only 2 great teams in the NFL, but what I can't handle is the increasingly undeniable fact that the second tier of teams this season is really a bunch of garbage. Seriously, there are 5 good teams: Tennessee, the Giants, Carolina, Washington, and Pittsburgh. Then there's a team or two right on the outside of that group: Atlanta . . . ummm . . . Chicago? Then everyone else is some combination of sloppy, inconsistent, soft, fragile, or poisonous. Honestly, it's starting to gross me out.

And now, the recap:

New York Jets over Buffalo, 26-17
My Pick: Buffalo over New York Jets, 24-20
This was such a bad loss for Buffalo. Not just a home loss, not just a home division loss, not just a home division loss that drops them into third place in the AFC East, but a home division loss that drops them into third place in the AFC East against a Jets team that didn't really play well. In fact, the Jets played poorly. Middling teams don't go on the road, play poorly, and win by 9 points against legitimate contenders. Buffalo is in bad shape.

And here's the thing: Buffalo's healthy! They're as healthy as any team in the NFL! They've got all their offensive linemen, all their skill position guys, their quarterback, and most of their defense. What they don't have, at the moment, is much of a running game, and this is troubling as hell. I like Marshawn Lynch, but for crying out loud, 9 carries for 16 yards? Lynch has been healthy all season, has played in every game, is 12th in the NFL in rushes, and is on pace for fewer than 1,000 yards on the season. What's going on with this guy? Or is it him at all? Lynch has game breaking ability, something stinks in Buffalo's offense. So far this season, he's been a non-factor.

And that raises this point: for all the success Trent Edwards has had passing the ball in 2008, he apparently hasn't discouraged defenses from loading up to stop the run. I read a lot about Turk Schonert's downfield passing game and how it was going to really open up Buffalo's offense, but for whatever reason, Buffalo still looks like a team that struggles to put up points and can't back defenses out of the box. I don't know, 8 weeks in I'm feeling pretty damn pessimistic about the second half for the Bills.

Now, on the other hand, Buffalo's defense continues to look pretty good, and they do have 4 division games left in which to assert themselves. I still think they're the best team in the AFC East, and it's possible they rebound from this and get back on track.

The Jets, on the other hand, continue to be consummate bullshit artists. It was another game in which Brett Favre did everything in his power to get the loss, but the defense wouldn't allow it. He threw a classic Brett Favre "Don't hit me!" interception in the fourth quarter, the kind of chicken-shit turnover he's developed into a signature over the course of his career. Were it not for a pretty damn outstanding day for New York's defense, this would have been another ugly as hell discouraging loss for the Jets.

And truth be told, this game was a dog. I'm not excited about watching either of these two teams again this season.

Chicago over Detroit, 27-23
My Pick: Chicago over Detroit, 28-10
The truth about this game, I suppose, is that Detroit has a little fight in 'em, they actually did come to play, and they actually didn't play so poorly. They're not any good, of course, but I applaud that they actually put up a fight on the road in a division game.

The loss of Kyle Orton hurts. Hopefully it's not a big deal and he won't miss too much time. On the other hand, Rex Grossman wasn't too bad passing the ball and he did make two key plays that ultimately brought Chicago back from 10 points down to win the game. It wasn't a great performance, but it also wasn't vintage Grossman, and that's an encouraging sign. Chicago's season has been too strong to this point to have it derailed by an injury, and unlike at least one team I can think of, Chicago won't use an injury at any position as an excuse to drop meaningful games. They still have Matt Forte, they've still got a strong defense, and they'll continue to fight and execute because that's what they've always done under Lovie Smith.

As for Detroit, this kind of thing happens to bad teams. You botch an extra point early in the game, it comes back to haunt you down the stretch. Instead of needing just a field goal to push this one to overtime where, let's be honest, Grossman was bound to kill the Bears, the Lions found themselves down 4 and needing an unlikely touchdown to avoid dropping to 0-8. A couple things I thought were somewhat encouraging for the Lions: first, Dan Orlovsky still looks like a high-school quarterback when he throws the ball, and he's still the ugliest player on any football field on any Sunday, but he threw some nice balls out there and was competitive. Calvin Johnson continues to look like an animal. Even Detroit's defense wasn't so bad, except that they folded up in the second half and let Forte run wild. I'm not saying they're any good, but I'm no longer certain they're the worst team in football.

And as I predicted, there was no way to, ummm, predict the look of this game. Chicago needed an unlikely comeback to keep from losing at home to a terrible Lions team. These NFC North games are a mystery to me.

Cincinnati over Jacksonville, 21-19
My Pick: Jacksconville over Cincinnati, 20-14
Stick a huge ass fork in the Jaguars. When you lose to the Browns and Bengals in consecutive weeks coming out of your bye, you're garbage.

This team is maddening. As far as I can tell, only one key guy from 2007's 11-5 playoff team is gone: Marcus Stroud. And while I wholeheartedly agree that Stroud is a big-time impact player, there's no way a team drops from strong playoff contender to bottom-half of the league garbage with one player departure. The problem in Jacksonville is coaching, I've never been more sure. Jack Del Rio is a bum, and to make matters worse, they hired a defensive coordinator who does nothing quite as well as he sucks the playmaking right out of even the most talented defenses. Gregg Williams is by all accounts a pretty damn great guy, and I'm not saying he has no business being an NFL defensive coordinator, but hiring him to improve a stout-but-not-especially-ball-hawking defense is like hiring Cuba Gooding Jr. to bring subtlety to a Clint Eastwood picture. Cuba's a good actor and fun to watch, but somebody didn't do their homework on the guy if they thought this was a good idea.

So what you've got in Jacksonville is a mess: an offense that, for whatever reason, doesn't want to lean especially hard on the ground game despite having one of the NFL's best backfields, and a defense that lost their interior plug and brought in a defensive coordinator who removed whatever meager spark existed in Jacksonville's defense. And you'll never get me to understand why a team would call fewer than 20 running plays on the road against a run defense as bad as Cincinnati's. Never. It's like Jacksonville doesn't have a clue. No, it's not like that, it is that.

As for the Bengals, know what? I really love the way this Ryan Fitzpatrick kid plays out there. I'm not kidding. He scrambles. He dives. He executes good play fakes. He even throws a pretty good ball. He's not very sexy, and that'll be a problem because there's no way you're getting Chad Johnson excited about playing with guys who aren't very cool or especially well-respected, but for my money, Fitzpatrick is a baller. If I'm Marvin Lewis and I still have a job in 2009, I'm absolutely opening this competition up at quarterback. I'd bet a million bucks Carson Palmer pulls a Drew Bledsoe and sulks his way out of town. Fitzpatrick may not have Palmer's pedigree, but he competes even when they're down, even when he's taking hits. He pulls the ball down and takes off. To be honest with you, I though Fitzpatrick played as well as any quarterback not named Kurt Warner on Sunday.

And I noticed one other thing: Chad Johnson couldn't keep himself from showing Fitzpatrick up on a deep ball that was thrown maybe a step too far. But did you see what happened next? On the sidelines, Johnson found Fitzpatrick and gave him an apology hug. Now, Chad Johnson is a grade-A prick, one of the most poisonous guys in the NFL, but even he had to recognize the guts the kid was playing with, and he knew it wasn't right to show a guy up who is laying it all out there. That's the thing you'll never get from Carson Palmer: for all his prodigious ability, Palmer is never the kind of guy teammates will feel especially bad about showing up. He's not a leader, he's not especially tough, and he's not the kind of guy who lays it on the line game in and game out. If his teammates are off, he checks out.

Anyway, hey, I'm happy as hell for at least one guy on the Bengals. Great win for him.

Baltimore over Cleveland, 37-27
My Pick: Baltimore over Cleveland ,16-10
I spent a whole pick on Tuesday talking about how this would be an interesting, hard-fought defensive battle, and how we should appreciate it for those qualities. Then these two teams went out and put up a combined 64 points. What the fuck do I know.

I don't have a whole lot to say about this game. Josh Cribbs was outstanding: without his big returns, Cleveland isn't even in this game. They had 8 penalties, 2 turnovers, and solidly lost the time of possession battle. It actually wasn't that close a game, except for Josh Cribbs.

Derek Anderson was solid. Do you realize he threw his first interception since week 4 in this game? That's impressive. Look: I'm not saying Derek Anderson has done enough to keep Brady Quinn on the sidelines. In fact, I picked Brady Quinn up on my fantasy team today. I'll give Anderson this: stat-wise, he probably did as much as he could in the past 4 weeks to make him seem like a potentially interesting free-agent or trade option for teams in need of a quarterback. For instance, in Kansas City. I know Anderson isn't the most accurate passer in, ummm, this room right now, but he's strong in the pocket and throws a good deep ball. Dewayne Bowe excels on the deep stuff. They could do worse.

Ray Rice had a couple of signature stiff arms against Sean Jones, who apprently is expected to play at least 25 yards from the line of scrimmage and make arm tackles. I've got nothing against Sean Jones, but on that long fourth quarter run Rice made mince-meat out of the guy with his left hand. To say he put Jones down would be an understatement: he buried the guy. They had to look for his headstone and dig him up after the play.

And Joe Flacco continues to look like a real pro quarterback. He also looks like an ostrich, but if ostriches can play football, hey, great for them. This was a good road win for the Ravens, and Flacco was very solid. He also throws a beautiful, long deep ball.

The Browns really needed this game. At 3-5, they're pretty much done unless they can string together a lot of wins in a row. They've been playing much better of late, but the 0-3 start was too much for them to overcome.

Tampa Bay over Kansas City, 30-27
My Pick: Tampa Bay over Kansas City, 31-3
I don't really want to take Tampa Bay seriously, and apparently they've got no problem with that. You can't really be taken seriously if you give up 183 rushing yards and need a series of miracles to win against the Kansas City Chiefs.

There's a kind of desperation, especially in sports, that can be kinda beautiful. Late in games, with everything on the line, guys will go full speed even with their guts hanging out of their mouths, dropping limbs left and right. You could also call it determination, and it can be inspiring to watch. Then there's this mess; two full-of-shit teams without a clue in the world, throwing the kitchen sink at each other in what eventually looked just like a poorly played CFL game. No player on either team was able to step up and out-execute anybody, so it became one folly after another, one gimmick after another. The last man standing was a clown squirting water from a flower on his lapel.

Having said that, though, the one gadget play (you know the one) was pretty hilarious. Interesting, too: Saturday morning, my brother and I spent 45 minutes concocting absurd gadget plays in a field by his house, with as many switches behind the line of scrimmage as possible before one of us ran a go route and the other one threw it. It was pretty damn fun, actually. One of our wackier plays went like this: the running back took the ball, headed laterally, pitched the ball to a reversing player, then the quarterback ran a go-route, and the reversing guy chucked a deep ball to him. I think it went something like this: as the runningback, my brother pitched the ball to me on the reverse, only the exchange was screwy so I bobbled the ball and almost lost it. Then I threw an off-balance wobbler down the field, and he ran under it. The funny thing is, right as he stretched to catch the ball, I saw what looked like a tall, lean man in a bright red polo shirt and khakis dart behind a bush. A second or two later, he took off running down the street with what looked like a camcorder in his hands. It was strange, but I didn't think too much of it, until . . .

Turns out, that same exact play showed up in this game, complete with the bobbled exchange, the off-balance throw, the wobbler, and the unlikely completion! I have an idea who that guy was now, though how he thought to travel all the way to Oakton, Virginia for playbook inspiration is still a mystery to me.

Seriously, though, Tampa's defense was poor, their offense was bad, and they needed a long kick-off return touchdown that included one of the worst all-time tackle attempts by the coverage team to even stick around and give themselves a chance to take advantage of Kansas City's ineptitude. Seriously, Jon McGraw, #47 on Kansas City, that was the worst piece of shit attempt at a tackle I've ever seen in an NFL game. Check it out for yourself. I want to know how you run up behind a guy and attempt a tackle without even slowing him down. For the life of me, the physics of this make no sense. McGraw chases him down and dives at him in a straight line from directly behind him, only he seems to miss him altogether. How? How is that done?

That's what happens when you're a bad football team. You race out to a lead, then you let the other team off the mat with a big kick return in which a veteran special teamer totally wiffs on what ought to be the easiest tackle of his career.

As for the Bucs, hey, like I've said before in Redskins recaps, sometimes you win a game you ought to win even when you play poorly. They didn't deserve it, they did nothing to earn it, but there it is.

Minnesota over Houston, 28-21
My Pick: Houston over Minnesota, 31-27
Friggin' protection, man. You can't win road games when you protect like that. Matt Schaub was hit too many times. He tossed a pick and lost one of his two fumbles. Then he hurt his knee. Protection was a major issue for the Texans.

Neither team really stepped up and wowed anybody in this game. Houston showed some second half life, but it was too late. Minnesota ran the ball as well as they have all season, hit a few big plays, and consistently pressured the quarterback. I'm still not afraid of the Vikings.

And just when Matt Schaub was starting to look like a Pro Bowl quarterback, he lays a stinker out there before succumbing to yet another injury. Instead of going to 4-4 and having a legit shot at hanging around in the Wild Card picture, the Texans are probably out of it. Not that Sage Rosenfels is such a bad player, but they're 3-5 and have a series of tough game coming up. One of these teams was going to come out of this game with their heads above water for the time being, and the other one would be sunk. I felt confident it'd end up the other way around, but Houston is about as definitively sunk as it gets, with their starting quarterback down and 2 games below .500.

Still, it looks like the AFC South is sliding, so there's always next year!

Arizona over St. Louis, 34-13
My Pick: Arizona over St. Louis, 34-21
I was sure St. Louis would put up a better fight than this. I definitely didn't expect to see them getting booed pretty angrily by their home crowd. Yikes.

I'll tell you a few things that stood out to me: first, Steven Jackson just can't be counted upon to give a shit 16 times a season. He checked out early in this one, then he officially checked out in the second half. Second, I like Edgerrin James, but Arizona's running game was much more explosive with Tim Hightower and J.J. Arrington in the backfield. Third, Kurt Warner was outstanding. Fourth, time of possession went Arizona's way 38-22. Fifth, though Arizona played extremely well and dominated a division opponent on the road, they still had 10 penalties on the day. I'm not saying that takes much away from what was otherwise a very strong performance, only that 10 penalties on the road against a better team would be a big problem, and it still demonstrates a lack of focus away from home.

Still, good win. I don't have much else to say here.

Let's pause here for radio-station identification:

I started this entry Monday afternoon. As much as I wanted to finish it, I ran out of steam an hour or two later. I wanted to pick it up Tuesday morning, but I ended up finishing House of Leaves instead. That was a whole work-day utterly misused. Good book, though. Then I thought about finishing the week 9 recap Tuesday afternoon, but I was too anxious about the election. The good news is, I'm in such a better mood Wednesday morning, I actually have some energy to pull this puppy together! Seriously, I'll take an ugly Redskins loss in a bad weekend of NFL football any day if I could somehow ensure this kind of elation every four years on the Wednesday after the first Tuesday of November. I'm just sayin'.

But I digress:

Tennessee over Green Bay, 19-16
My Pick: Tennessee over Green Bay, 23-21
A hard-fought slug-fest of a game between two competent teams, and I don't remember either team flinching. Still, the signs are there for Green Bay: on the road against the undefeated Titans, they committed 4 penalties, turned the ball over twice, and their red-zone execution was spotty at best. I believe in the Packers, they look like a good football team to me, maybe one of the top 10 teams in the NFL, but I'm giving them a lot of room here, a lot of room I haven't been willing to give to teams like Buffalo, New Orleans, Indianapolis, Minnesota, Dallas, and Philadelphia. The fact is, at the midway point of the season, the Green Bay Packers are 4-4 overall, 2-2 at home, and tied with the aforementioned Vikings. When I watch the Packers play, I think I'm watching a very good, very dangerous football team, as solid as just about any team in the NFC. But something must be said about their record: Indy is the only team they haven't played disturbingly close this season, and they've lost to the only 4 legitimate playoff contenders on their schedule. Still, at 2-0 in the North and with two straight division contests looming, they've got a chance to pull ahead in the division, and once they get there, I don't see them falling back. Like I said, they look like a very good team to me. I don't want to start treating them like the Saints.

As for Tennessee, hopefully that's as poorly as they'll play offensively in a win this season. Down the stretch, Kerry Collins pulled his shit together enough to hit a few big throws on consecutive drives and put Tennessee in position to kick the winning field goal in overtime. On the other hand, he threw a bad clunker in his own territory in the first half that should have been picked off by either of the three Green Bay guys that had their hands on it before Al Harris decided to throw a tantrum on the field. I'd like to strongly advocate for something that was brought up on ESPNRadio a few days ago: the Titans should very seriously look at installing some packages for Vince Young. First of all, he's healthy. Second of all, he's a winner. Third of all, he's a thousand times better athlete than Kerry Collins. Fourth of all, look at what other teams around the NFL have been able to do with multi-dimentional athletes under center this season! I'm not going to get into whether or not the Titans can coax a lousy 18 of 37 for 180 yards out of Vince Young, because I do think Kerry Collins is the better option in terms of protecting the ball and keeping the receivers in the game, but I feel 100% certain the Titans wouldn't have needed overtime if they'd had a series or two or even a few plays here and there where the threat of Young's running ability had been a factor, especially in some third down situations.

At any rate, it's hard to find a rough patch on Tennessee's schedule from here on. They'll have a tough few games in there, but there's nothing left that should scare them and there's certainly nothing to suggest any kind of prolonged losing streak. They're in great shape!

Miami over Denver, 26-17
My Pick: Denver over Miami, 28-27
I find this whole thing between Joey Porter and Brandon Marshall hilarious. This thing has Brokeback Mountain written all over it. I can't remember a time when two guys targeted each other's manhood so aggressively. Marshall's talking about Porter dancing with his shirt off in clubs . . . that's hot.

One thing, though: in the way that Joey Porter is suggesting that Brandon Marshall is soft, well, he is soft. Sad to say, he really is the kind of receiver who pouts and mopes when he isn't getting the ball. He really is the guy who gets frustrated and volatile, and he really did go to the media after the game and whine like a bitch about coverage schemes and how the other team's receivers were getting the ball more than him. What a friggin' baby. God damn it, I really hate the wide receiver position in the sport of football. What the fuck is it about playing receiver where guys think they can act like spoiled teenage girls and get away with it? Chad Johnson, Steve Smith, Terrell Owens, Randy Moss, Brandon Marshall, Keyshawn Johnson, Plaxico Burress, Roy Williams, Javon Walker, Jerry Porter, etc.: shut the fuck up! Shut up! More than any other position in any other sport on earth, you're just a goddamn tool of the offense. Your production is based on the success of pieces around you more than any other position in sports. You're not worth a damn. As a rule, you're the most overrated player on your team. The only reason anybody gives a damn what you have to say about anything is because networks have to sell advertising slots and clowns make good television. You're being duped into embarrassing yourself and ruining your reputation so ESPN and the NFL Network can convince Miller Lite to buy 30-second spots during Sportscenter and sponsor the Question of the Day. Wake up!

And it's pretty hard to call out Joey Porter when he leads the NFL in sacks and has been a pretty dominant player all season, to say nothing of the fact that his team just owned your team in your house and you made an ass of yourself by bitching and crying to the media.

Apparently there was a game here before there was a gab-fest. I didn't watch it. I've seen the stats and the highlights. I feel confident saying that Jay Cutler might be the most overrated player not named Tony Romo in the entire NFL. Like he's done so many times already in his brief NFL career, Cutler again pulled his best Brett Favre routine by torpedoing his team early and then grotesquely inflating his stats down the stretch. Cutler might have outdone himself in this one, though, this was a tour-de-force: intercepted on his first pass attempt, setting up a Dolphins touchdown; an interception on his sixth pass attempt, which was returned for a touchdown; then, following an astoundin 96-yard kick return by Eddie Royal and a Ryan Torrain carry to put the ball at the 2-yard line, Mike Shanahan totally bails Cutler out by calling two consecutive pass plays to give Cutler exactly the kind of rubbish touchdown that'll make it look like he did anything worth a damn and wasn't pretty much the sole reason his team lost despite a dramatically improved effort from his defense.

Bleh. Enough about this game. I'm thrilled Miami won, thrilled Denver lost.

New York Giants over Dallas Cowboys, 35-14
My Pick: New York Giants over Dallas Cowboys, 25-17
I spent about two minutes last week considering whether or not I should root for Dallas in this game and immediately dismissed the idea. Two reasons: first, I fucking hate the Dallas Cowboys, I hate everything they stand for, and I could never, never stand with their fans. I don't care if aliens attack the earth and wipe out everyone but a group of Dallas Cowboys fans and me, and together we're humanity's last hope for reclaiming the planet and repopulating the human race. In that circumstance, I'm with the aliens. Sorry. No way I'm hunkering down with anybody who can defend Jerry Jones, likes silver pants, gets a boner for Tony Romo, makes excuses for Terrell Owens, and thinks it means anything when they call the Cowboys "America's Team". Give me a laser gun and cut me loose. Death to all humans!

Second, why should I want another team in the NFC East to be in the race? Kick 'em when they're down, I say, hopefully they'll disappear altogether and we can get this thing down to a two horse race. I don't understand this at all, this thinking that it's better if the Cowboys are only a game behind the Redskins heading into the week 11 match-up between the two. No way! As it stands, after this laugher, which we'll get to in a moment, the Giants are well ahead but with some tough games in front of them, including a trip to FedEx Field, but the Cowboys are on their ass and can be knocked completely from the race in week 11 when they visit Washington. After that, there's every opportunity for the Giants to stumble and the Redskins to pick up a few games without the threat of the Cowboys pulling ahead. It's an ideal situation, in my opinion.

Now, as for the game, and this gets at why I could never root for the Cowboys under any circumstance, those fuckers wanted no part of this game. I find that offensive as a sports fan, I'm not kidding. There are very, very few teams in the NFL that would even for a moment consider phoning it in against the Super Bowl Champions at the top of their own division, and the Cowboys are one of them. You can't phone this one in if you've got pride, I don't care how many players are injured. This was a shameful embarrassment to football and a shocking indictment of the Dallas Cowboys franchise. The following teams went out and competed their asses off against significantly superior teams despite having jack shit at several key positions: the fucking Bengals, the god-awful Chiefs, and the nauseatingly bad Lions. These teams would trade personnel with the Cowboys any day of the week, ANY DAY, they'd trade standings with them any day, they'd do anything to have a meaningful game on their schedule and a chance to upset a big dog team with something other than pride on the line. The Cowboys, minus one key offensive player, gave up utterly on this game. If it'd been the Redskins, and they'd all but acknowledged during the week that they weren't playing to win, then they'd gone out and shamed themselves with this kind of performance, that'd be it between me and them. Where's the fucking pride? Where's the toughness? Where's the spirit? Isn't there somebody in that organization who loses sleep over losses, grits their teeth, feels sick to their stomach about failing to compete, feels wounded when they get rolled by a division foe, gets angry when someone suggests they lost because of injuries? In my life as a football fan, I cannot remember being more perplexed by a franchise. Oakland may be the most dysfunctional franchise in football, but they've been a pinball for a decade now. Dallas has actual fans, has resources, has expectations, has talent, has a profile. And it's not that they lack the strength of leadership or the culture to keep a few guys from snoozing through a game they were likely to lose anyway, either. Every team struggles with that. The Redskins came out in a huge nationally televised primetime game at home and got rolled, almost certainly because certain guys on the team weren't able to focus in the right way for one reason or another. Hey, it happens. Sometimes a guy or two gets too "up" for a game, sometimes a guy or two comes out flat. In Dallas's case, not a single guy on that team came to compete on Sunday. Not a one of their coaches came to upset New York or make a statement. This team flat quit before Sunday even rolled around, and that's just an embarrassment. Every week I get happier and happier that I'm not a Dallas fan.

As for New York, look, it's obvious they're a good enough team to know what to do when there's blood in the water. Ultimately, that's what separates them from some of the other good teams in football: they don't need the other team to be "up" to get "up" themselves. If their opponent chooses to lie down and lick their wounds, the important thing about the Giants is what they won't do as predators: they won't make it hard for themselves. Out in nature, if a prey animal lies down in the tall grass, the friggin' lion isn't going to spend a lot of time dancing around wagging his tail, trying to engage his meal. He's gonna pounce on the fucker, rip it's throat out, crack it's bones, and start chowing down on it's guts before it even stops breathing. I feel like the Redskins are my pet hound: they want to pounce around 30 yards away, wagging their tail and sticking their butt in the air like it's play time. I respect that, it's cute as all hell. The Giants are a beefy, hungry old timberwolf. They don't bullshit around. There's no play in them. They don't want to convince you to play with them, they want to devour your fuckin' ass, and the Cowboys weren't even a wounded gazelle. They were Bill Murray a third of the way into Groundhog Day; diving in front of buses and walking off tall buildings, hoping for nothing more than a quick ending.

Atlanta over Oakland, 24-0
My Pick: Atlanta over Oakland, 23-18
One other team utterly chickened out on Sunday, and it was the Oakland Raiders. Man, what a sad, sad situation in Oakland. Disarray? Dysfunction? These words don't even scratch the surface of the shit-heap the Raiders franchise has become. What a total, total disaster. They couldn't be in worse shape if they made Sarah Palin their head coach.

Now the Raiders are talking about dumping DeAngelo Hall this week. This is utterly incomprehensible to me. I can't fucking believe it, I don't have words to describe how awful this move is. Al "FUCKING" Davis sent his goddamn talented young coach a letter of resignation to sign this summer because the goddamn guy protested the signing of piece of shit mercenaries like DeAngelo Hall in the off-season, now Davis wants to dump the guy after turning the franchise over to a disasterously terrible head coach. FUUUUUUCK!! How can this man be allowed to continue to run this business? He paid DeAngelo Hall $8 million to play 8 games in 2008, he gave up a second round draft pick for him, he ran a good head coach out of town over him, and now he's going to release him less than a single season after signing him. Words . . . words fall incredibly short of describing my incredulity about the state of this organization. I'm fucking flabbergasted x one million. Shocked x infinity plus infinity. I no longer think there's a solution to this problem short of eradicating the Raiders, Al Davis, his whole family, Oakland, anybody who has ever worn silver pants, all pirates, the entire NFC West, and anyone who remembers liking, playing for, rooting for, or working for the Raiders organization. It's such a disaster, I'm afraid of westerly winds at this point. I don't think I could go to San Francisco without a radiation suit. I'm worried the Redskins will be in the fallout zone and get dusted when they visit the 49ers later this season.

As for Atlanta, hey, that's how you do it. Again, they didn't play with their food, they fucking obliterated the poor bastards. The Falcons are a good goddamn team. They've got lots of good pieces and an extra second round pick for DeAngelo Hall, who (speaking of dusted) just spent the better part of an afternoon getting de-pantsed by his former team. Good God almighty. What is the fucking world coming to?

Philadelphia over Seattle, 26-7
My Pick: Philadelphia over Seattle, 20-14
Donovan McNabb is damn lucky this game wasn't played in Philadelphia. And that's all I have to say about that.

Indianapolis over New England, 18-15
My Pick: Indianapolis over New England, 27-21
I can't honestly tell you anything about this game. It's got to be a bit disconcerting for the Pats that they could only muster 15 points against Indianapolis, but neither team came out of this game in too bad shape. Indy is still hanging around the outskirts of the playoff hunt, while New England is still in solid shape in the AFC East. Both teams bore the shit out of me.

Pittsburgh over Washington, 24-6
My Pick: Washington over Pittsburgh, 27-17
That's some fucking defense they've got over there in Pittsburgh. Jesus effing Christ. They don't give away a damn thing, do they?

A few quick notes about the Redskins before I wrap this mother up:

1. Execution, y'all. The Steelers tried a hideous onsides kick to open the game. The Redskins were only able to turn it into 3 points. Then Ben Roethlisberger turned the ball over in his own territory. The Redskins were only able to turn it into 3 points. Then Roethlisberger chucked a dismal ball right into Carlos Rogers' gut, but he failed to hold on. If the Redskins execute on those three opportunities early in the game, this one's over by halftime. On the other side of the ball, Pittsburgh turns a Jason Campbell interception into a touchdown. They convert a big third down in Washington territory and turn it into a 1-yard quarterback sneak for a touchdown in the second quarter. Execution!
2. Washington's defense pretty clearly and pretty significantly wore down in the second half. That's the first time that's happened all season, but Washington's offense just couldn't stay on the field. A lot of the credit there has to go to Pittsburgh's fantastic, ferocious defense. Still, I would have like to have seen a little more effort go into getting the offense into a rhythm by just getting Jason Campbell some quick, clean looks at easy completions. Throw a few in the flat, throw a couple of quick hitches, even try that receiver screen, just to get some rhythm in the offense, pick up a few first downs, give the defense a blow. Campbell had to spend a bit too much time trying to find open men, and he took a pounding for it. Which leads me to . . .
3. Jon Jansen is a dismally bad pass protector. Holy shit. This is what Jim Zorn was talking about all along. I'll be shocked beyond words is Stephon Heyer doesn't see significant action against Dallas in week 11. Granted, Jansen did good work against Dallas early in the season in the run game, but right now he looks like a big fat target for any pass rush, and that's a problem. He got destroyed by Pittsburgh's outside rush.

And really, that's it. Washington got punched and pushed around at home, it was a disappointment. They've got to be as tired as any team in football, and I think this is a good learning experience for them: you can't allow yourself to be tired against a team as physical as the Steelers. Do whatever you have to do, take the whole week off next time, but you can't be tired like that.

And now, some week 9 NFL Rankings!

Good To Great

1. Tennessee Titans (1)
Another solid win. The offense wasn't much, but it was enough.

2. New York Giants (2)
Maybe the most dominating performance of the week, but not enough to topple the undefeated Titans.

Everyone Else

3. Carolina Panthers (4)
Didn't play, didn't need to. Everyone else near the top came down a bit.

4. Pittsburgh Steelers (7)
You don't go on the road and dominate a very good team without jumping up quite a bit. Still, it looks like their utter lack of pass-protection finally bit them hard this weekend.

5. Washinton Redskins (3)
That was a very, very good Pittsburgh team they lost to, but still; very good teams don't get pushed around like that at home. The bye week should do them a world of good.

6. New England Patriots (5)
A discouraging road loss against their utlimate rivals, but they still look strong in the exposed AFC East.

7. Philadelphia Eagles (9)
That was a damn fine road win a long way from home. With Brian Westbrook healthy, they could be a problem in the NFC.

8. Atlanta Falcons (11)
Went a long way from home and obliterated the weeping-stock Raiders.

9. Chicago Bears (8)
Win a close one at home against the dreadful Lions, drop a spot in the rankings.

10. Baltimore Ravens (14)
A convincing division road win in which their offense played very, very well.

11. Arizona Cardinals (11)
A very well-played road win over a sad-sack division foe proves the Cardinals can at least take care of business in the NFC West.

12. Green Bay Packers (12)
Played their balls off and lost in Tennessee, had some execution problems in the red-zone. Still, I like them in the NFC North now that Kyle Orton is down in Chicago.

13. Buffalo Bills (6)
Losers of two straight division games and now sitting in the middle of their division, facing their toughest division contest yet. The Bills are in trouble.

14. Tampa Bay (13)
Needing several miracles to beat the laughable Kansas City Chiefs cost them a spot. Also, I hate this team.

15. Houston Texans (15)
Hey, losing by a touchdown in Minnesota isn't all that bad, especially when you have to go to your backup quarterback. Let's just leave out the exact order of those events.

16. New Orleans Saints (16)
Didn't play, didn't move.

17. Miami Dolphins (19)
A convincing road win in a place that's supposed to be difficult to travel to earns them a couple spots in the rankings. They look like a dangerous AFC team to me.

18. Indianapolis Colts (21)
A strong defensive effort against a very solid New England Patriots team. Indy is still hanging around.

19. New York Jets (18)
That's right, go on the road, beat the big dogs in your division, drop a spot. You're not fooling me, Jets. You looked like shit on offense and your quarterback is a turnover machine. Am I the only person reminded of the 2007 Chicago Bears?

20. Minnesota Vikings (24)
Hey, that was a convincing win over a very good Houston Texans team in a must win game. I owe them some credit.

21. Denver Broncos (17)
What a garbage team. Bad defense, bad running game, baloney passing attack, bad chemistry, bad coaching, dismal division. Go away, already.

22. Jacksonville Jaguars (20)
And they're done. Forget about the Jaguars.

23. San Diego Chargers (23)
Didn't play, no movement.

24. Cleveland Browns (22)
Hey, they competed. I could drop 'em more. I don't think they're worse than the 24th team in the NFL, alright?

And Here's Where It Gets Both Weird and Tricky

25. Kansas City Chiefs (28)
Two straight well-played, competitive outings. I still think they're garbage, but they can at least make an argument that they're improved garbage.

26. Dallas Cowboys (25)
These motherfuckers should be even lower than this, but I'm not sure it's possible. Only the Raiders save them from being the worst shame in the NFL.

27. St. Louis Rams (26)
Lost to a very good Cardinals team in very convincing fashion. That they failed to put up much of a fight is a bit of a concern.

28. Seattle Seahawks (27)
I'll say this about the Seahawks: they're trying. They haven't stopped playing football. Hey, that's something!

29. San Francisco 49ers (29)
Had their bye in week 9, so I kept 'em where they are.

30. Cincinnati Bengals (32)
Really, this was a toss-up between the Bengals and Lions, and since the Bengals managed a win, they got the nod.

31. Detroit Lions (31)
For a second consecutive week, actually not the worst team in the NFL.

32. ___________ (30)
.


I should have some picks up soon, hopefully this afternoon. Peace!