Congratulations to the Carolina Panthers, Baltimore Ravens, Indianapolis Colts, and Dallas Cowboys on moving to the Divisional round of the NFL playoffs.
Further congratulations to the Panthers for finally reaching .500 on the season.
Injuries are an unfortunate part of football. Accepting that, it's still unfortunate that the Ariazona Cardinals, Pittsburgh Steelers, and Cincinnati Bengals teams that made the playoffs weren't the teams that played in the playoffs. It's really no surprise that all three teams lost this weekend. Carson Palmer is the Cardinals starting quarterback. He's been hurt for a while. Drew Stanton is the Cardinals 2nd-string quarterback. He's been hurt for a while as well. The Cardinals looked like one of the best teams in the league when they had their starting quarterback in the lineup. They were playing so well that they were able to hold onto a playoff spot despite some sad play from the most important position. Steelers running back Le'Veon Bell was one of the best players in the league this season. An explosive, dynamic offense revolved around Bell's versatility. The Steelers lost him to a knee injury in the last game of the season. They weren't the same team without him on Saturday. The Bengals haven't shown much in the playoffs recently even with their best players on the field. Still, receiver A.J. Green is their best player and he wasn't on the field Saturday.
Near the end of the Bengals-Colts broadcast, Jim Nantz mentioned that Bengals quarterback Andy Dalton is now 0-4 in playoff starts. They tried to temper that damning stat by saying that he joins Y.A. Tittle as quarterbacks with 0-4 postseason records. They didn't mention that three of Tittle's playoff losses were championship game losses. Tittle led the New York Giants to the NFL title game from 1961-63. They didn't have Wild Card rounds back then. Or Divisional rounds. The NFL only had championships games then unless they had to break a tie.
Colts quarterback Andrew Luck is easily one of the most entertaining quarterbacks in the league. He's just fun to watch.
Silly Tate.
Detroit Lions receiver Golden Tate claims that the first defender never gets him to the ground. That's pure fantasy. I've seen Tate tackled by the first defender. A lot.
The best game of the weekend was the last game of the weekend. The Cowboys took down the Lions 24-20. The other three Wild Card games were two score games. The Lions led most of the game but the Cowboys came back.
Was that Romo's first playoff win? No, it just feels like it was. He won a game in 2009. Then he got stomped by the Minnesota Vikings. Romo actually said something at the post game press conference about how this Lions game was similar to that Vikings game. I'm not sure what that similarity was as the Vikings took the Cowboys apart that day. That loss had pretty much no similarities to this win.
It will be a while before the Lions get over the 4th quarter pass interference call that wasn't. I still vividly remember something like that from about 40 years ago. Cowboys linebacker Anthony Hitchens was initially called for pass interference in his coverage of Lions tight end Brandon Pettigrew. After what seemed like an hour the flag was picked up. First down deep in Cowboys territory became fourth down and a shanked punt. That gave Romo and the Cowboys the opportunity to win. Hitchens didn't turn to play the ball but it's a stretch to say that he interfered with Pettigrew.
The Wild Card games set up these Divisional games next weekend:
Saturday:
Baltimore Ravens at New England Patriots
Carolina Panthers at Seattle Seahawks
Sunday:
Dallas Cowboys at Green Bay Packers
Indianapolis Colts at Denver Broncos
RIP Stuart Scott.
No comments:
Post a Comment