Week 5 NFL Notes

AP

Barring incident, I’m 8-4 so far this week.  Not bad, not bad at all.  Had I known JP Losman would be a big factor in the Bills game, I would have been 9-3 cause no way do I believe in that guy.  Oh well, what can you do?  I could go back and edit my picks I guess, would anyone notice?  Well, I won’t, I’m mostly honest.  Only mostly though.

• Farewell San Diego.  I still had faith you, I picked you to go to the Super Bowl in my revised picks, and what do you do?  You lose to Miami.  Miami!  I realize Miami might be better than I’m giving them credit for, but still!  You’re supposed to be San Diego.  LT is a non entity without Lorenzo Neal and Michael Turner.  Rivers doesn’t have enough weapons and the defense is getting gashed.  I’m done with you.
• Carolina continues to be a pain, 34-0 over KC.  I mean, I picked them to win, so kudos to me, but they’re in my teams division and I’d like them to lay an egg or two.  Little help please?  KC is lucky they beat Denver last week, they’d be doing well in the 0fer sweepstakes otherwise.
• The Ofer dream is still alive though, thanks Detroit, Houston, Cincy & the Rams, who can’t lose on their day off (though they might be able to find a way.  Cincy gave it a run against the Boys, who really need some defensive help if they want to do anything in the playoffs.  They may very well be one and done again.  Houston also gave it a run against Indy, but I’ll address that game later.
• The champs are playing like champs yet again.  44-6 over Seattle.  A recent playoff team.  I know, they’re a shell of themselves this year, but wow.  187 total yards for Seattle to 523 for the Giants.  That’s what you call a discrepancy.   Little Eli is having a heck of a year.  I’m happy for him, he’s really out from big brother’s shadow.
• Let’s go from champs to chumps, shall we, and have a little convo about Detroit.  Firstly, they made Kyle Orton look good.  Kyle Orton is a serviceable QB, he is not a 334 yard passer.  They also lost 34-7.  Way to show up, Detroit.  Your first game without Millen and you continue to honor him as you did when he was there.  Sweet of you, really.
• How does Green Bay respond to a heartbreaking loss in Tampa last week?  By suffering another one at home against Atlanta.  Atlanta has a winning record.  I don’t know what to make of the league this year, but that alone should tell you that things are topsy turvy.  Michael Turner had another 100 yard plus rushing day and Matt Ryan had a decent outing again.  GB’s defense needs some work, clearly.
• Tennessee is 5-0 after eeking out a win against Baltimore.  Kerry Collins continues to be the vet you want in the backfield this year, let’s hear it for the old guys, eh?  Tennessee was helped by a roughing penalty that was questionable, but that’s part of the game.  Baltimore is overachieving in my eyes this year, with a rookie QB and an older D.  The AFC is truly a mess.
• The Redskins continue in their quest to make me look like an idiot.  They seem to enjoy doing that to me weekly, so I’m rolling with it.  They went into Philly and walked out with yet another win.  They’re looking more and more like a playoff team with every passing week.  Portis had a big day and Randle El threw a TD.  Philly had a 14-0 lead but the Skins started kicking field goals and chipping away til suddenly they had a lead.  Philly was also stopped again down by the goal line, they just can’t seem to punch it down there.  Gotta work on their play calling.
• Now it’s time to talk about my Bucs.  They lost 16-13 to Denver and I put the blame for that one squarely on the shoulders of John Gruden.  We were going against the 31st ranked defense in the league and fear of turnovers caused us to play small ball all game long.  All Denver had to do was tackle and they did that just fine today.  This team got gashed by KC last week, KC who managed to put up 7 against Carolina today.  That’s just sad.  Cutler had a solid, if unspectacular day, never giving us the turnover we so desperately needed.  I would rather have seen us throw 3 interceptions than play small ball like we did today.
• Speaking of interceptions, Griese got knocked out of the game late in the 3rd quarter and Garcia came in.  He managed to put together one TD drive but we didn’t get the ball back after eschewing the onside kick option with 2 minutes left in the game.  Never saw the ball on offense again.  What was amazing was on the TD drive, Garcia threw a terrible interception but the DE fumbled the ball on the return and we got it back, giving us a new set of downs and setting up the drive.  It’s fun when things like that happen.  Gotta love football.
• I already mentioned it once before, but it bears mentioning again, that I would not have picked the Bills to win had I known JP Losman would be figuring heavily into the game.  Trent Edwards was knocked out with an apparent concussion and in came old JP.  Buffalo had 4 turnovers and lost the game 41-17.  Arizona played well, no turnovers and a lot of yards despite being without Boldin.  I wish I could get a handle on the Cardinals.  Maybe they only win at home?
• New England is back on the winning side after taking care of San Francisco 30-21.  Cassel had 2 picks but threw one pretty TD to Randy Moss.  NE also direct snapped to Kevin Faulk for a TD.  Might be a good idea to keep the ball out of your QB’s hands when he’s not named Brady I guess.
• Lastly I come to the Indy/Houston game.  I saved it for last for a very specific reason.  This week I am unveiling a new weekly award, to the player who manages to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.  This week that player is none other than Sage Rosenfels, my inaugural Douchetard of the Week! The Colts scored 21 points in a 2 minute time span at the end of the game, one of those touchdowns coming off Rosenfels fumble wherein he went flying through the air like, well, a douchetard, when he just needed to slide down, not hop over.  Indy returned that 68 yards to take it 27-24.  Manning then threw another Manning TD and took the lead.  Sage threw another pick to ice the game.  Instead of being 1-3 and pretty much dead in the playoff race, Indy is 2-2 and has new life.  Houston remains winless.  Congrats, Sage, on being the first Douchetard of the Week!

That’s all I have for the day games in the NFL this week.  If anything fascinating happens in the final two, I’ll be back, if not, hope you enjoyed the games.  I’ll be back next week to discuss whatever random happenings occur again.  Titans vs. the Giants in the SB?  Could be!  What a strange year.

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