Playoff Predictions Divisional Round

Will Ed Reed lead his team to victory again? From the AP.

I took my time this week to get my picks in.  Time for heavy thought and deep contemplation of each teams strengths and weaknesses.  I compared rosters and intangibles.  Then I remembered who I was and threw that out the window and decided to just wing it like I usually do.  This week I shan’t be taking all road teams, lesson learned.  Thanks for reminding everyone that you’re a rookie, Matt Ryan, after weeks of fooling the masses.  Thanks to the football gods for having Indy lose the coin flip in OT.  Something really must be done about the overtime system, I get not why the league continues to balk at tinkering with that one.  Oh well, those picks were my bad and I own up to them.  On to the picks!

Baltimore over Tennessee: I’ll be honest, I have no idea how this game is gonna go.  It’s probably going to be one of those 6-3 games and whomever has the ball last will win.  It’ll be a slugfest and a lot of fun to watch if you like defense, as I do.  I’m going to presume that Ed Reed will get at least one interception that helps turn the game, since it appears that he does this weekly these days.  Tenn wasn’t playing their best football down the road and we’ll see if their time off has helped them to right the ship or not.  I’m going with Baltimore because they impressed me last week.  Now watch Flacco remember that he’s a rookie and cost them the game.

Carolina over Arizona: I would LOVE to get this pick wrong.  Arizona rose up and made me pay for picking against them last week, so maybe this week I can inspire them to overcome their road woes to defeat Carolina.  They did play them earlier in the year and jumped out to a big lead on them but then gave up said big lead and lost in a heartbreaker.  These things seem to happen with Carolina for some reason.  You can never say that they’re done in a game and you can’t trust them not to lose one they should win either.  I hate Carolina.  But, as long as they’re smart and keep Delhomme from throwing too many passes they’ll be okay.  He is the one liability they have, the one guy that can foul up and cost them a game when it matters most.  So, Zona, get after him and try to cover Steve Smith and you have a hope and a prayer.  Just a small one though.  Carolina, big.

NY Giants over Philly: This game will be fun to watch, divisional opponents, don’t like each other, tons of history, etc.  And everyone is pointing out that Philly beat the Giants in NY a few weeks ago, which is quite true.  Of course, at the time NY was reeling from the Plaxico “have gun, say hi to the thigh” situation that happened shortly before.  Losing Plax has hurt the Giants, they don’t have a WR that stretches the field the way he did.  But they do have Brandon Jacobs back and healthy, which makes a big difference.  Philly did what they had to against Minny but Minny is not the Giants.  I think it’ll be a close slugfest of a game but that Eli will pull it out over McNabb.

Pittsburgh over San Diego: I’m very torn on this game and I nearly went the other way, but I really like Pittsburgh’s defense more than any other group in this game.  Pitt’s offense is alright, Ben is coming off his concussion and we all know he can throw a stupid ball or five in every single game.  San Diego’s defense is nothing to write home about and their offense is better than they were earlier in the year but Pitt’s D will key on Sproles and challenge Rivers and his receivers to beat them.  Gates is still awesome but banged up as usual and the rest of the WRs have their moment but aren’t worldbeaters.  I prefer Hines Ward to any of them any day.  I think Pitt wins via the turnover.

So that’s what I see happening this week.  We”ll see if we can improve on our 2-2 performance at the very least.  I’ll be back next week but til then, enjoy the games.  Football season is quickly drawing to a close and we’ll all be missing it very soon.