Week 7 Wrap, Week 8 Picks, Plus NBA Notes
San Francisco at Houston
My Pick: Houston 23, San Francisco 17
Final Score: Houston 24, San Francisco 21
I don't know what it is about these Texans. I'm not even making fun of them when I say that, each week, whatever game they're playing is inevitably the league's most forgettable game of the week. It's actually a little bit unnerving.
In any case, this game featured an appearance from The Forgotten Alex Smith, who threw three touchdown passes to The Forgotten Vernon Davis and probably won back the starting QB job for the 49ers. Which is interesting, if only because, before this season began, the major challenge I identified for the 49ers in the Mike Singletary regime was for Singletary to give himself permission to turn the team over to a Blue-Chip Golden Boy quarterback-type over the competitive-but-hopeless Cagey Journeyman type. Shaun Hill was the competitive-but-hopeless Cagey Journeyman type; Alex Smith is the Blue-Chip Golden Boy type (only slightly modified by the fact that he's apparently got the hands of a small girl). Whether this means anything at all is, of course, yet to be determined.
Green Bay at Cleveland
My Pick: Green Bay 26, Cleveland 13
Final Score: Green Bay 31, Cleveland 3
Can I just ask: what the hell happened to the competitive game in the NFL? How can there be so many teams that lack even that bare modicum of professionalism, pride, and dignity that enables them to merely compete at home? No one expected the Browns to win this game, but damn, couldn't they have competed? A majority of this past Sunday's games were over before halftime, and that's just a shite state of affairs. The quality of the average NFL game is in the toilet right now.
San Diego at Kansas City
My Pick: San Diego 23, Kansas City 21
Final Score: San Diego 37, Kansas City 7
I mean, there were two AFC teams that lost by four touchdowns at home this past week. Four touchdowns!
Indianapolis at St. Louis
My Pick: Indianapolis 34, St. Louis 17
Final Score: Indianapolis 42, St. Louis 6
Not to be outdone, the Rams went out and lost by five touchdowns. At home. Lest anyone mistake them for professionals.
Minnesota at Pittsburgh
My Pick: Pittsburgh 20, Minnesota 17
Final Score: Pittsburgh 27, Minnesota 17
This game had a kind of inevitability hanging over it that was either giddily awesome (if you were rooting for the Steelers) or miserably depressing (if you have no balls). At no point did I have even a shred of doubt that the following things would happen: 1) Brett Favre would murder the Vikings; 2) there would be a special teams touchdown in the game; 3) the Steelers would win. Check, check, check. As an added bonus, this game featured two of the most pathetic "tackling" efforts you will ever see in your life, both of which were good for big-time laughs if you didn't have an intense rooting interest in either team. The first was Favre's hilarious duck-and-cover routine on the long return of his fumble: he halfheartedly gave chase for a few yards or so, and then as soon as a blocker got near him, he folded into a ball so small he probably smelled his own ass and flopped onto the ground like he'd heard gunshots. And really, the funniest part of it was that, prior to his air-raid-siren drill routine, he was probably a half a second away from having a shot at making the tackle that would have prevented the touchdown. That Brett Favre: it's all reckless joy with him! He's like a kid out there! A kid with pants full of his own shit!
The second comic "tackling" routine was Steelers kicker Jeff Reed's turbo-whiff on Percy Harvin's kickoff-return TD on the very next play. It wasn't quite as gut-bustingly funny as Favre's "Oh God, I've been shot!" move, but Reed's couldn't have done less to prevent Harvin from blowing past him without actually blocking some of his own teammates. It was a finely executed don't-mind-me from a guy who's had a pretty wretched season and who certainly won't benefit from looking like an out-of-place ballerina on tape this week. If the Steelers had lost the game, Reed might be looking for a job today.
In any case, this game was entertaining as all hell.
New England at Tampa Bay
My Pick: New England 38, Tampa Bay 14
Final Score: New England 35, Tampa Bay 7
Boy, I'm sure glad I backed away from that Tampa Bay pick. Holy crap. This was a first-degree ass-blasting.
New York Jets at Oakland
My Pick: New York 16, Oakland 13
Final Score: New York 38, Oakland 0
At home! The Raiders got shut out and lost by more than five touchdowns, at home! The NFL flat-out sucks this season.
So, JaMarcus Russell finally got the hook he so richly deserved this past Sunday, after two more killer interceptions and a ghastly fumble. As you might have imagined, the sight of Bruce Gradkowski trotting onto the field did little to galvanize the Raiders - and the miserable fact that his average completion went for less than ten yards similarly failed to inspire. The studded-leather-wearing nitwits jammed into Oakland's worst-in-the-NFL stadium declined to hang themselves, which is really the only sensible thing for them to do at this point. Oh well. Nothing changes. This NFL season makes Schindler's List seem like a rip-roaring roller coaster of a good time.
Buffalo at Carolina
My Pick: Carolina 27, Buffalo 21
Final Score: Buffalo 20, Carolina 9
Jake Delhomme took the hatchet out of his team's skull, polished it, and then smashed it right back in there in this game. I'm no doctor, but I'm pretty sure the patient's not going to make it. If anyone can offer any conclusive evidence that this game actually occurred, that person should be summarily shot.
Chicago at Cincinnati
My Pick: Cincinnati 24, Chicago 20
Final Score: Cincinnati 45, Chicago 10
Well, I was wrong when I predicted that Jay Cutler would throw two interceptions and one of them would go back for a touchdown in this game, but to make it up to me, he went ahead and threw a third interception and fumbled twice for good measure. Meanwhile, Marvin Lewis uncorked the "Thanks for releasing Cedric Benson!" game-plan on the Bears, using Benson as a sledgehammer to bash the Bears over the head an astonishing-in-this-pass-happy-day-and-age thirty-seven times on Sunday, for a total of 189 yards and a touchdown. Matt Forte continued his one-man campaign to prove the asininity of fantasy football by tearing off 49 total yards and zero touchdowns. (Too heavy on the sarcasm? Probably.)
Atlanta at Dallas
My Pick: Atlanta 27, Dallas 24
Final Score: Dallas 37, Atlanta 21
The Cowboys looked outstanding, the Falcons looked depressingly low-wattage, Matt Ryan reminded all of us to put our "Matt Ryan for God!" bumper-stickers back in the drawer for a while, and Joe Buck wailed and sobbed like a baby for all but the final six minutes of Sunday night's Yankees-Angels broadcast at the heartbreak of not being able to do the play-by-play for Tony Romo's best performance in three years. But seriously, the Cowboys were fantastic in this game, although it sickens me to acknowledge it. And yet, the thing I remember most about this entire game is wondering to myself at several junctures whether FOX Sports has some kind of contract deal with the Cowboys where they're not allowed to have anyone broadcast a Cowboys game who doesn't agree up front to be a total homer for the Cowboys throughout the entire afternoon. Seriously. I thought I was catching a break when I realized that Buck wasn't doing the game, until Thom Whatever did everything short of painting a blue star on his face to make it clear what he thinks of impartiality. Here's what it sounded like when Ryan threw a touchdown to Roddy White at the end of Atlanta's outstanding opening drive:
Troy Aikman: "Blah blah blah blah, that's exactly right, blah blah blah, Romo Romo Romo."
[ball is snapped]
Thom Whatever: [stony silence]
[Ryan throws to White in front corner of endzone, touchdown]
Thom Whatever: "Touchdown, Falcons."
Aikman: [clearly crestfallen] "Blah blah blah blah, that's exactly right."
Whatever: "Blah blah blah, outflanked Newman, blah blah blah."
And here's what it sounded like when Tony Romo scrambled for a half-dozen yards in the third quarter:
Thom Whatever: "ROMO! TAKES OFF! FIRST DOWN DALLAS!"
Actually, in retrospect, I'm surprised he could yell like that with Jerry Jones's balls in his mouth.
New Orleans at Miami
My Pick: Miami 24, New Orleans 23
Final Score: New Orleans 46, Miami 34
Damn. Damn damn damn. For a long stretch of Sunday afternoon, it sure looked like I had nailed my Upset Special right in the teeth.
Arizona at New York Giants
My Pick: New York 31, Arizona 21
Final Score: Arizona 24, New York 17
Yikes. Something's not right with the Giants right now. The Cardinals were just pouring through New York's offensive line in this game.
Philadelphia at Washington
My Pick: Philadelphia 27, Washington 10
Final Score: Philadelphia 27, Washington 17
Right up until the Skins' meaningless final touchdown, I had this one pegged.
I have to say, I wholeheartedly agree with Michael Wilbon (a rarity for me) in this column when he says that the Redskins seem dispirited and need a break. When we talk about football players and effort, fans tend to break things down into two extreme categories: players either give good effort, or they've quit. It's entirely possible the Redskins have quit - hell, what do I know? - but I think it's more likely that they're all just miserably depressed and need some time off to recharge their batteries. Their effort against the Eagles wasn't terrible - especially at the beginning of the game, when they seemed admirably fired-up for a team that has been a national punchline for two months - and the defensive players generally fought their asses off throughout the game. But the guys on the offense, holy crap: once things started going south, their body language tanked at an alarming rate, and by the end, guys like Jason Campbell, Santana Moss, and Antwaan Randle-El legitimately looked like they were close to tears.
I talked to my wife during the early stages of the game about how miserable it must be to play or coach for the Redskins these days. No matter what, there is no escape: the next game will come around, and their inadequacy will be shown, and booed, and mercilessly dissected, in front of tens of thousands of live fans and millions more around the world. For all of those fans, what the Redskins do for a living is little more than a pastime, an intensely-loved entertainment, and we think nothing (I, in particular, think nothing) of ripping a player or coach (or front-office type) to absolute shreds for their performance. But for these guys, it's a career - and, more so than any of the careers that we fans have out here in the regular day-to-day world, pro sports is a career where job-security is virtually nonexistent. Imagine if your chosen field was one in which no more than one in a thousand applicants had any chance of making a living, and 80% of everyone who actually got a job in the field got fired within two years and never made it back into the field, despite having trained for the job with lunatic single-mindedness since they were about six years old. Imagine working a job where, if you studied and trained and pushed yourself to the absolute limit of your mental and physical exertion during virtually all of your waking hours - in the case of head coaches, often 18 hours a day or more - you would still be extremely lucky to last more than five years in your career before having to find an entirely new one. And now imagine that, despite all that pressure, and work, and stress, you knew that you were about to walk into your next project meeting on Thursday afternoon utterly unprepared and certain to embarrass yourself. And then imagine knowing that when you walked into your next project meeting, on Thursday, there would be 85,000 people in the room, staring at you, prepared to - eager to - mercilessly boo and jeer every mistake you made. While your boss watched from behind a glass wall and took notes. How do you think you'd feel on Wednesday night? Or after you made that first mistake in the meeting? I don't know about you, but I'm pretty sure I'd shit a gallon of blood and toss myself out the window.
I know, I know: cry me a river, these guys make millions of dollars playing a children's game on television for a living. But these were the things that were on my mind as I watched Jason Campbell try to maintain his game-face on Monday night, or when Randle-El let that punt bonk off his face-mask for a turnover immediately after an impressive stop by Washington's defense got the crowd back into the game, or Zorn when his week of humiliation and emasculation and being the butt of jokes on national television didn't lead to any kind of redemption but instead to more failure. I could imagine what I would feel if I'd been Zorn at the end of last night's game: "Is it possible that it's actually going to get worse? If it gets worse, how will I not fall apart?" I could imagine what I'd be thinking and feeling if I were Randle-El: "Oh God, I have to walk back over to the sideline, I have to see the looks on everybody's faces, all those people who've been calling for someone else to return punts for the past two seasons, I have to exist out here in the middle of this field where there's nowhere to hide and I have absolutely no excuse for what just happened." I don't want to exaggerate, but I'd be fucking praying for death if I'd been Randle-El in that situation. I'd barf my heart out. If I make a dumb mistake at my job, everybody maintains the facade of polite professionalism, courteously not calling undue attention to my mistake, and certainly not ripping me to shreds for it in front of a bunch of people. When Randle-El makes a mistake at his job, 85,000 people boo at the top of their lungs, call for his job, call him a fucking loser, tell him he sucks at the thing to which he has devoted his professional life and for which he has sacrificed his health: the sound is like thunder, like an oncoming train. When I imagine what hell might be like, the only major differences are: it's the Middle Ages, my clothes are saturated with wet sand, and everyone is British.
And so, instead of leaping out of my seat and ranting about Randle-El's ineptitude, I just felt really fucking sorry for him. I felt really sorry for all of them. At this point, the issue of whether or not These Guys should be on This Team in This Configuration, coached by These Coaches, is mostly irrelevant, isn't it? I mean, they're here, it's not possible to replace them right now, and they have no choice but to try to do their jobs under these circumstances. Believe it or not, they're going through something infinitely worse than the experience of being a fan of a crummy, ineptly-run, go-nowhere team. And, unlike us, they can't change the channel, make other plans, escape at all. If I were in a similar situation, it's impossible to imagine not crying myself to sleep every single night.
So the Redskins need a break. From a purely football-performance-based standpoint, they may not deserve one, but from a human standpoint, they absolutely do. Here's hoping Jim Zorn (and the powers-that-be) outright banish them all from Redskins Park for the entirety of the bye week; here's hoping that someone explicitly says to those of them (Campbell, London Fletcher, Moss, etc.) who might otherwise sneak in for a workout that they will be locked out of the complex and are being instructed to get away from football and try to enjoy life a little bit, that this is non-negotiable. If you see any of those unhappily crummy football players out in public in the next week, leave them alone. Don't offer encouragement, don't ask them what's wrong with the team, don't ask for an autograph. Let's let these guys be anonymous for a while. The same goes for the Rams, the Raiders, the Chiefs, the Buccaneers, the Lions, the Titans, the Browns, the Bills, and Jake Delhomme. There are times, I think, when it's worse to be famous.
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Week 8 Picks
Houston at Buffalo
Here's a question: if, instead of having these two teams actually play this game, the NFL hired ninjas to shoot 60,000 Buffalo season ticket-holders with tranquilizer darts that would knock them out cold for three hours on Sunday afternoon, would anybody notice any difference, other than that those Buffalo residents would save a bunch of money they'd otherwise have spent attending the game? I say no. They could decide the outcome of this game by coin-flip and no one would miss a thing.
The Pick: Something like Houston 24, Buffalo 20
Cleveland at Chicago
Odds the Bears are going to lose to both of the NFL's orange-clad Ohio teams in consecutive weeks? Slim.
The Pick: Something like Chicago 34, Cleveland 6
Seattle at Dallas
Have the Seahawks had any games this season? What's their deal? How's Cortez Kennedy doing?
The Pick: Something like Dallas 38, Seattle 10
St. Louis at Detroit
You know what would be both bitterly ironic and gut-bustingly hilarious?
The Pick: Something like Detroit 0, St. Louis 0
San Francisco at Indianapolis
I'm happy for Alex Smith and I think he gives the 49ers a real spark on offense, but I also think they're just not all that good whenever Frank Gore's not running wild. The Colts, on the other hand, are probably the NFL's best team right now. Actually, there's no "probably" about it.
The Pick: Something like Indianapolis 28, San Francisco 17
Miami at New York Jets
Interesting game. The Dolphins seemed like they were turning things around after their crappy start, and in general they probably are, but last week's second-half bed-crapping at home against the Saints really put their backs up against the wall, playoffs-wise. The Jets, on the other hand, sure seemed like they were screaming back to earth before they annihilated the Raiders last weekend. I get the sense both of these teams are at critical, crossroads-type places right now. I'm going to pick the Dolphins for an Upset Special, just because I feel like the Jets lost their best offensive weapon when Leon Washington went down for the season, and I give second-year Tony Sparano a slight edge over first-year Rex Ryan. We'll see.
The Pick: Something like Miami 20, New York 17
New York Giants at Philadelphia
I don't know anymore with these two teams. The Eagles put up 27 points in their solid whipping of the Redskins last week, but at the end of the game, it was hard to remember where the points came from, and other than two big plays, it didn't seem like their offense did much of anything. For that matter, their defense didn't exactly light the joint up either, considering the friggin' Rams held a much-healthier version of this Redskins team to 7 points, and the friggin' Chiefs held a substantially-healthier version of this Redskins team to 6 points, and the friggin' Lions held a much-healthier version of this Redskins team to 14 points, and writing that sentence made me want to yank my own eyeballs out of their sockets and squish them between my fingers.
As for the Giants, I think we're coming to an understanding of the Eli Manning-Tom Coughlin Giants, and it's this: there are going to be stretches of each season in which they look like an unstoppable, dominant, overwhelming force, and there are going to be stretches of each season in which they look like tentative, discombobulated, low-wattage stiffs. The question is: how long will each stretch be, and how will they be distributed? In their Super Bowl season, they had one ugly-bum stage in the first two weeks, and then another one in November and December; their world-beater stages included the second half of September and all of October, and then the playoffs. Last season, their world-beater stage was the first 13 weeks of the season; their ugly-bum stage started in Week 14 and got them bounced out of the playoffs in the divisional round. This season, they had a world-beater stage that began in Week 1 and continued through Week 5; they had an ugly-bum stage that began in Week 6 and consumed Week 7 as well. Is it over yet? Are we really going to see the Manning-Coughlin Giants drop three straight games?
Um, the answer there is "no." Giants win.
The Pick: Something like New York 31, Philadelphia 28
Denver at Baltimore
The Broncos are still the NFL's big wild-card, and the reason is this: for as admirably as they've performed through their first six games, for as clear as it is that they're vastly better than they were last season, and for as great as it is to have a scrappy out-of-nowhere contender in the NFL this season, it's also dead-certain that the Broncos are going to come back to earth a bit at some point. They're a good team, but they're not an elite team, and they're going to lose a few games on their way to winning the AFC West and sending Norv Turner into the ranks of the unemployed. So each week that the Broncos remain undefeated, the tension grows: is this the week they start their return to earth? It has to happen eventually, as sure as the sunrise. Is it this week? Can I pick against an undefeated team?
I don't feel good about it, but I'm picking the Ravens here, if only because a fourth consecutive loss will send them into full-blown crisis mode, where people will start murmuring about John Harbaugh and Cam Cameron and Joe Flacco, and I just have a hard time imagining that. The Broncos, on the other hand, have virtually no pressure on them, since no one outside of maybe Josh McDaniels's home even briefly entertained the notion they'd be 6-0 at this point, and I can imagine them dropping a road game against a still-perfectly-decent Ravens team without anyone getting too worked up by it.
The Pick: Something like Baltimore 20, Denver 16
Jacksonville at Tennessee
Yeesh. This game is a dog. The only thing keeping people from spending more time talking about how underwhelming the NFC East has been this season is the utter collapse of the AFC South. It's not even in the upper half of NFL divisions anymore.
The Pick: Something like Jacksonville 17, Tennessee 16
Oakland at San Diego
Here's what's funny: if the Raiders were to pull the upset here, they'd have the same record as the Chargers at the midway point of the season. When you think about the relative talent-levels of these two teams - or, at least, the relative name-recognition, pay-scale, and media-hype of their players... well, it kinda shines a pretty ugly light on Norv Turner, doesn't it?
But that's a lunatic fantasy. No way the Raiders win this game. We're officially in the part of the season where the Chargers beat a series of tin cans by gaudy margins and everybody goes, "Here come the Chargers!" Well, they're not coming. They stink. They'll be fortunate to grab a wild-card. But everyone's going to make a big deal out of them the whole way.
But that's a lunatic fantasy. No way the Raiders win this game. We're officially in the part of the season where the Chargers beat a series of tin cans by gaudy margins and everybody goes, "Here come the Chargers!" Well, they're not coming. They stink. They'll be fortunate to grab a wild-card. But everyone's going to make a big deal out of them the whole way.
The Pick: Something like San Diego 41, Oakland 7
Carolina at Arizona
Two of the league's what-the-hell? teams. Cardinals win, Delhomme throws at least one awful interception, and John Fox finally pulls his plug this week.
Fox, by the way, is in one of the toughest spots of any coach in the NFL right now, vis-a-vis his quarterback. Jim Zorn in Washington has the luxury of knowing that his team's ownership wanted to get rid of Jason Campbell in the first place, so he can bench him or yank him around or do whatever the hell he wants to do without worrying about rubbing any of the powers-that-be the wrong way. Tom Cable in Oakland knows that his owner is a demented old vampire, so there's no real correlation between what Cable does and how the owner is likely to react. Raheem Morris in Tampa Bay knows he only has to keep Josh Freeman on the shelf until after the Bucs eke out their first win, and then he can unwrap the new toy and give himself an easy excuse for fielding a sucky team down the stretch. Jeff Fisher's under pressure to play Vince Young, but c'mon, he's Jeff Fisher, and there's zero chance he's going to lose his job unless he strangles a cheerleader to death in the middle of a game. Eric Mangini and Steve Spagnuolo are under virtually no pressure, since everybody knew they were inheriting toxic situations; Jim Schwartz gets a free pass because of the goodwill he merited by coaching the Lions to their first win in two years, and because his prized rookie is injured.
Fox, on the other hand, is the coach of a team that won its division at 12-4 last season, and the front office just gave his quarterback a huge contract extension this past offseason. If he benches Delhomme, he's basically pissing the team owner's money directly down the drain, at the same time that his underperforming team is tanking a season that began with major playoff expectations. He's screwed: even if, against all odds, either A.J. Feeley, Josh McCown, or Matt Moore could be the answer to Carolina's problems, he makes his bosses look bad by pulling the plug on the guy they just implicitly endorsed with a huge contract extension, and the Panthers won't be improving on last season's 12-4 record even if such a move worked. If he sticks with Delhomme to appease the front office and the Panthers don't magically rebound, the fans will finally write him off and, in this bad economy, with season-ticket renewals under constant threat, and after the offseason weirdness with Jerry Richardson firing his sons and whatnot, the team's front office will be under unbearable pressure to regenerate interest in the team (and deflect criticism of its own performance) by making a coaching change.
Long story short (too late!): John Fox is fucked, and the John Fox era is coming to an end in Carolina.
The Pick: Something like Arizona 28, Carolina 16
Fox, by the way, is in one of the toughest spots of any coach in the NFL right now, vis-a-vis his quarterback. Jim Zorn in Washington has the luxury of knowing that his team's ownership wanted to get rid of Jason Campbell in the first place, so he can bench him or yank him around or do whatever the hell he wants to do without worrying about rubbing any of the powers-that-be the wrong way. Tom Cable in Oakland knows that his owner is a demented old vampire, so there's no real correlation between what Cable does and how the owner is likely to react. Raheem Morris in Tampa Bay knows he only has to keep Josh Freeman on the shelf until after the Bucs eke out their first win, and then he can unwrap the new toy and give himself an easy excuse for fielding a sucky team down the stretch. Jeff Fisher's under pressure to play Vince Young, but c'mon, he's Jeff Fisher, and there's zero chance he's going to lose his job unless he strangles a cheerleader to death in the middle of a game. Eric Mangini and Steve Spagnuolo are under virtually no pressure, since everybody knew they were inheriting toxic situations; Jim Schwartz gets a free pass because of the goodwill he merited by coaching the Lions to their first win in two years, and because his prized rookie is injured.
Fox, on the other hand, is the coach of a team that won its division at 12-4 last season, and the front office just gave his quarterback a huge contract extension this past offseason. If he benches Delhomme, he's basically pissing the team owner's money directly down the drain, at the same time that his underperforming team is tanking a season that began with major playoff expectations. He's screwed: even if, against all odds, either A.J. Feeley, Josh McCown, or Matt Moore could be the answer to Carolina's problems, he makes his bosses look bad by pulling the plug on the guy they just implicitly endorsed with a huge contract extension, and the Panthers won't be improving on last season's 12-4 record even if such a move worked. If he sticks with Delhomme to appease the front office and the Panthers don't magically rebound, the fans will finally write him off and, in this bad economy, with season-ticket renewals under constant threat, and after the offseason weirdness with Jerry Richardson firing his sons and whatnot, the team's front office will be under unbearable pressure to regenerate interest in the team (and deflect criticism of its own performance) by making a coaching change.
Long story short (too late!): John Fox is fucked, and the John Fox era is coming to an end in Carolina.
The Pick: Something like Arizona 28, Carolina 16
Minnesota at Green Bay
It'll be interesting to see how this one goes. At this point, any scenario is on the table, just because I'm not sure we've ever seen circumstances quite like this in an NFL game before: an iconic all-time-great quarterback returning to the town that absolutely idolized him, as the face of that team's most hated divisional rival, with both teams in the running for the division championship. Could Brett Favre rip his old team to shreds as a personal vendetta against Ted Thompson and Mike McCarthy for refusing to welcome him back after his brief retirement? Absolutely. Could McCarthy and Aaron Rodgers flat-out destroy the Vikings to vindicate themselves and claim ownership of Green Bay's loyalty? No question. Could Favre get rattled by the emotion of taking the field in Lambeau wearing another team's colors, throw a couple of early picks, and beg out of the game with a baloney injury? Certainly. Could Adrian Peterson make all of the Favre-related intrigue irrelevant by rushing for 250 yards and 4 TDs? You bet. The only thing that's certain in this game is that it's going to be fantastic drama.
The Vikings are coming off their first loss, to one of the league's most physically-punishing teams. The Packers are coming off their most impressive win, over one of the league's most atrocious train-wrecks. I'm picking the Packers, and not just because I'll be rooting for them: teams tend to do poorly the week after they face the Steelers - thanks to the beating they typically receive - and by all reports, it's going to be cold as hell, rainy and/or snowy, and flat-out miserable in Green Bay on Sunday evening. Not the kind of weather in which a 40-year-old guy who got knocked around like a rag-doll seven days ago is likely to thrive.
The Pick: Something like Green Bay 23, Minnesota 20
The Vikings are coming off their first loss, to one of the league's most physically-punishing teams. The Packers are coming off their most impressive win, over one of the league's most atrocious train-wrecks. I'm picking the Packers, and not just because I'll be rooting for them: teams tend to do poorly the week after they face the Steelers - thanks to the beating they typically receive - and by all reports, it's going to be cold as hell, rainy and/or snowy, and flat-out miserable in Green Bay on Sunday evening. Not the kind of weather in which a 40-year-old guy who got knocked around like a rag-doll seven days ago is likely to thrive.
The Pick: Something like Green Bay 23, Minnesota 20
Atlanta at New Orleans
Does anyone else feel like it's anticlimactic to have this game on Monday night after what ought to be an epic Vikings-Packers game on Sunday? Nothing against the Falcons and Saints, they're both good teams, but an NFC South matchup in a dome doesn't have quite the same dramatic oomph as a snowy outdoor game between two of the fiercest rivals in the NFL, with Brett Favre playing in Lambeau Field as the quarterback of the Vikings. Oh well.
The Pick: Something like New Orleans 44, Atlanta 27
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NBA Notes!
1) Gilbert Arenas and I have always had a contentious relationship. That is to say: I, for my part, think he's a fantastic talent but have my doubts about his ability to be the centerpiece of a legitimate contender; for his part, he has no idea who I am and couldn't possibly care even one little bit about what I think of him. With that out of the way, I thought he was outstanding against the Mavericks in the Wizards' season-opener on Tuesday night. In fact, leaving out a small smattering of ill-advised 20-foot pull-up jumpers (I feel about the 20-foot pull-up jumper roughly the same way Ahab felt about Moby Dick), it may have been my favorite Gilbert Arenas performance ever. He was driving-and-dishing, he was running the offense with a good tempo and plenty of focus, he was picking his spots smartly, he was rebounding, he was even hustling on defense - and he did it all without any of the annoying self-consciousness that has always marred Gilbert's performances in the past. By all appearances, he wasn't trying to prove anything, just trying to play well and win the game. He reminded me more than a little bit of Chris Paul circa 2007, before he became dour and joyless last season playing for a miserable team.
Actually, the guy whose performance kinda bothered me was Caron Butler, who I generally love. Too much one-on-one crap at the offensive end, self-consciously trying to stick it to Shawn Marion on television. I'm sure it was an aberration: it'll take him and Arenas a while to sort out who's going to be the leader of this Wizards team, and there might be bumpy nights along the way.
Randy Foye was outstanding; Andray Blatche was fantastic (the trick now is to be even a little bit consistent); the team moved the ball wonderfully well when Fabricio Oberto and/or Mike Miller were on the court; Brendan Haywood was his usual physical, hard-working, clumsy self; as I feared, the new roster left no quality minutes for JaVale McGee - although, pleasantly, it left no minutes for Nick Young either.
2) In other NBA action, it will surprise absolutely no one that the Cavaliers are exactly the same team with Shaquille O'Neal that they were without him: slow-footed and unathletic in the front-court, lacking a long, athletic wing man who can take some pressure off Lebron at both ends (this is why it's still just mind-bogglingly ridiculous that they didn't throw a ton of money at Trevor Ariza this past offseason), and needing Lebron to throw himself at the rim in every crunch-time possession to have any chance of keeping pace with an opponent who can score points. When they have Shaq and Zydrunas Ilgauskas on the court at the same time, they're atrocious at defending big men who can step out and shoot, which makes them mincemeat against the Celtics, who handed them their lunch on Tuesday night. I think the Cavaliers are worse this season than they were last season, and there's just no excuse for that.
The Celtics, on the other hand, look fantastic. Which just makes me sick.
3) Am I excited about the Nuggets game tonight? You betcha.
The Pick: Something like New Orleans 44, Atlanta 27
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NBA Notes!
1) Gilbert Arenas and I have always had a contentious relationship. That is to say: I, for my part, think he's a fantastic talent but have my doubts about his ability to be the centerpiece of a legitimate contender; for his part, he has no idea who I am and couldn't possibly care even one little bit about what I think of him. With that out of the way, I thought he was outstanding against the Mavericks in the Wizards' season-opener on Tuesday night. In fact, leaving out a small smattering of ill-advised 20-foot pull-up jumpers (I feel about the 20-foot pull-up jumper roughly the same way Ahab felt about Moby Dick), it may have been my favorite Gilbert Arenas performance ever. He was driving-and-dishing, he was running the offense with a good tempo and plenty of focus, he was picking his spots smartly, he was rebounding, he was even hustling on defense - and he did it all without any of the annoying self-consciousness that has always marred Gilbert's performances in the past. By all appearances, he wasn't trying to prove anything, just trying to play well and win the game. He reminded me more than a little bit of Chris Paul circa 2007, before he became dour and joyless last season playing for a miserable team.
Actually, the guy whose performance kinda bothered me was Caron Butler, who I generally love. Too much one-on-one crap at the offensive end, self-consciously trying to stick it to Shawn Marion on television. I'm sure it was an aberration: it'll take him and Arenas a while to sort out who's going to be the leader of this Wizards team, and there might be bumpy nights along the way.
Randy Foye was outstanding; Andray Blatche was fantastic (the trick now is to be even a little bit consistent); the team moved the ball wonderfully well when Fabricio Oberto and/or Mike Miller were on the court; Brendan Haywood was his usual physical, hard-working, clumsy self; as I feared, the new roster left no quality minutes for JaVale McGee - although, pleasantly, it left no minutes for Nick Young either.
2) In other NBA action, it will surprise absolutely no one that the Cavaliers are exactly the same team with Shaquille O'Neal that they were without him: slow-footed and unathletic in the front-court, lacking a long, athletic wing man who can take some pressure off Lebron at both ends (this is why it's still just mind-bogglingly ridiculous that they didn't throw a ton of money at Trevor Ariza this past offseason), and needing Lebron to throw himself at the rim in every crunch-time possession to have any chance of keeping pace with an opponent who can score points. When they have Shaq and Zydrunas Ilgauskas on the court at the same time, they're atrocious at defending big men who can step out and shoot, which makes them mincemeat against the Celtics, who handed them their lunch on Tuesday night. I think the Cavaliers are worse this season than they were last season, and there's just no excuse for that.
The Celtics, on the other hand, look fantastic. Which just makes me sick.
3) Am I excited about the Nuggets game tonight? You betcha.
posted by chutneeamerica at 10:30 AM
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