With Ohio State losing to Michigan State in the Big Ten title
game, Auburn will play Florida State for the national title. It is just as
well, since Ohio State doesn’t have a legitimate passing game to compete
against FSU. Michigan State suddenly jumped to number four in the BCS, somewhat
belatedly. Interestingly, the Spartans’ only loss was 17-13 to a ranked Notre
Dame team; we will discover in this bowl season if the Big Ten was actually “down”
or dangerously under-rated. As for the SEC championship game, won by Auburn by
the ridiculous score of 59-42, one wonders if Auburn will bring any defense to
the national title game. If not, it will be Florida State exposing the
over-rated SEC.
In the NFL, Matt Flynn and his Green Bay Packer teammates threw
a monkey wrench into the idea that Aaron Rodgers will be “shutdown” for the
rest of the season. With the Packers beating the Atlanta Falcons and the
Detroit Lions losing to Philadelphia, the reality is that if Packers win their
final three games (against Dallas, Pittsburgh and Chicago) and Lions stumble against
either the Baltimore Ravens or New York Giants, the Packers win the NFC North. Of
course, that is if Rodgers is healthy enough to play. Flynn is an accurate
passer and knows the offense, but his arm strength continues to be an issue; on
the 46-yard pass play in the third quarter, Jordy Nelson had two steps on a
defender, but Flynn’s underthrown pass caused him to slow down and turn back
toward the ball when he easily could have run it in for touchdown. The Packers
end-up settling for a short field goal on that drive.
The New York Jets actually beat a team at home that is worse
than they are, the Oakland Raiders, 37-27. Geno Smith started “impressively”—completing
9 of 13 for 141 yards midway into the second quarter; for the next two and one-half
quarters he was just 7 of 12 for 78 yards. Perhaps it is not surprising that
against a team that is ranked 31st in the NFL in opponent pass completion
percentage and intercepted only seven passes in 12 games, Smith can still fool
a lot of people. However, once reality kicked-in, Smith was really only his
usual marginal-to-insignificant self; his now 20 interceptions ties Mark
Sanchez’s worst season with three games to play. Interestingly, the Jets’ owner
still thinks that the team is going in the “right direction.” Next up: On the
road against Carolina’s Geno-unfriendly defense.
Matt Prater kicked an NFL record 64-yard field goal in the
rarified air of Mile High Stadium. Two previous 63-yarders were also kicked in
Denver. Tom Dempsey’s record-setter in normal atmospheric settings is still more
legitimate, since it shattered the previous record, dumbfounded friend and foe
alike, was the work of the now rare “conventional” kicker (not “soccer-style”)
and his kicking foot was literally little more than a stub, with a special shoe
molded around it. In the meantime, a “slow” start against an inferior team
allowed Peyton Manning to pad his stats. In seven games in which the Broncos
have blown out their opponent by 15 points or more, Manning is averaging 359.4 passing
yards per game, and 3.7 touchdown passes—compared to 334.3 and 3.2 in games
that were “competitive.”
In the blizzard in Philadelphia, LeSean McCoy ran for 219 of
the Eagles 299 yards rushing to defeat the Lions and help keep the Packers’
division hopes alive. One thing I noted about this game was that Nick Foles
targeted his racist “great friend” Riley Cooper 9 times out of 21; Cooper only
caught 3 of those passes, while the rest of the team caught 8. Maybe the
Oklahoma boy can’t play in the snow.
I’m not a Seattle Seahawks fan, but I did want them to beat
San Francisco, instead of losing on a field goal in the final minute. Colin
Kaepernick is one of the most over-rated quarterbacks in the league, and his 67.5
quarterback rating proved it again. Kaepernick is a middling talent whose “athleticism”
masks his limitations, and he has been fortunate to be on a well-coached team
with one of the better defenses in the league. He won’t be fooling many opposing
defenses again this postseason.
The Indianapolis Colts continue to be an enigma, their
defense blitzed for the third time in five games, losing 42-28 to Cincinnati. With
Reggie Wayne on injured reserve, Andrew Luck’s top receivers are fellow
second-year players T.Y. Hilton and Coby Fleener. While former Alabama teammate
Eddie Lacy has had a fine rookie campaign in Green Bay, Trent Richardson has
been a horrible acquisition for the Colts, who sorely miss Ahmad Bradshaw—who at
least showed some semblance of providing an adequate rushing threat before he
was lost with a neck injury in the third week. Why ESPN continues trumpet
Richardson despite the fact that he has rushed for less than 30 yards a game on
a 2.8 YPC average is a mystery.
And finally, as I mentioned before, all is not well with the
Washington Redskins. Robert Griffin III and coach Mike Shanahan are not on the
same page, and the reason for this is that RG3 is owner Daniel Snyder’s “pet”—suggesting
that Shanahan has little control over him. Since his injury last season, RG3
has been reduced to what we should have expected him to be: Another overblown
product of a college offensive system (a “hybrid” of the “zone read” and “spread”
offense) that does not require the quarterback to be able to read defenses, but
quickly find the first open receiver—or failing that, run. If RG3 can’t run,
then you are stuck. Shanahan supposedly saw the handwriting on the wall at the
end of last season, but decided to stick it out for another season. Regardless
who the coach of the Redskins will be next season, that person will still be
stuck with another failed Snyder “blockbuster” acquisition/brain cramp.
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