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Football Meteorology, Conference Championship Week
Authored by Jeff Risdon - 19th January, 2007 - 8:08 pm
With John Herrera standing to his right dressed in black and appearing not unlike an undertaker, Lane Kiffin sat down at the podium for Sunday's postgame news conference.
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A 3-1 forecast last weekend left me 7-1 for the playoffs, but the two games this weekend are both real difficult to predict. Before the predictions, though, I need to weigh in on a couple of other NFL stories of the past couple of weeks.
Nick Saban leaving the Dolphins for Alabama:
I know a lot of people who know Nick Saban pretty well, and to a man they all tell me he realized he never should have left LSU for Wayne Huizenga’s money. His repeated denials about interest in the job were a cry for public displays of affection and respect from the Dolphins, an attempt to further stroke his own massive ego. But the Dolphin family realized he’s not that great of a coach and left him to eat his own words, and I’m proud of them for that. If I were a player being recruited, I wouldn’t let Saban say one word to me, and I hope that goes for the vast majority of kids he’s going to deceive and hustle into going to Alabama.
Two things stand out to me in the story of Vick getting caught with a faux water bottle with pot residue in the airport.
1. Why on earth is the highest-paid NFL player flying a crappy, cattle-call airline like AirTran? I know they are one of two airlines that flies to the 4-gate Newport News Airport (Vick’s hometown airport), but when you make that kind of money, charter a flight. Could you imagine sitting next to Vick, arguing over which of you gets the window seat and which has to wedge himself next to the fat guy spilling over the aisle seat?
2. This gives the Falcons a golden opportunity to change the direction of the franchise.
They’ve already got a new head coach. They have Matt Schaub, a restricted free agent who is far more accurate than Vick and will be starting somewhere in 2008 or sooner. They have a lot of money and high draft picks tied up at the WR position. For all the great things Vick can do, the things he cannot do on the field totally hamstring most NFL-style offenses. It’s a bold move to be sure. The market for Vick is driven way down by this situation, his Dirty Bird salute to the kids, and how the Falcons have collapsed two seasons in a row in no small part because Vick hasn’t progressed. Much like the 76ers dealing the iconic Allen Iverson, it’s time for both Vick and the Falcons to move on and start anew.
And now the games…
New Orleans at Chicago:
I’m having a war inside my head on this game. If the Bears come out with confidence on offense, stay patient, and don’t make stupid mistakes or turnovers, I really don’t see any way they can’t win. I’ve been a frequent critic of their defense lately, but they are a different animal at home and they do have lots of experience in important games in the cold. I like the matchup of the Bears LBs against the Saints RBs, so long as the Bears DL can hold the point of attack. The RB combo of Thomas Jones and Cedric Benson appears to finally be working well too.
But I also strongly believe the Saints offense has the ability to run right past the Bears. When Drew Brees has time to survey and throw, he’s going to beat you, and the Bears get almost no pass rush outside of Mark Anderson, who is so inept against the run he only plays about 35% of the snaps. The Saints have great speed and size at WR and run lots of field-stretching patterns, which keeps the LBs and safeties deeper, thus opening up running lanes for Deuce McAlister. The Saints D doesn’t get a lot of credit, but they actually allowed only 5 more TDs than the vaunted Bears defense did all season. They will give up the big play, but you don’t see them surrender a lot of 10-play, 85 yards drives. That means their potent offense will get lots of chances. And I’ll take their offense over the wildly inconsistent Rex Grossman in a shootout.
One road team has won on conference title weekend every year since 1996, and that trend will continue in Chicago. New Orleans 27, Chicago 24. Though I also have a forecast model where the Bears come out and annihilate the Saints 30-13.
New England at Indianapolis:
The Colts are the one team I didn’t expect to be here, and they’ve done it by surviving two pretty lousy outings by Peyton Manning. But this time, Peyton will have to be on top of his game. The Chiefs and the Ravens both lacked the ability to repeatedly throw the ball and win via the passing offense, and the Colts exploited that by devoting all hands on deck to shoring up their putrid run defense. The Patriots not only have the ability to win by throwing the ball, that’s actually when they do most of their damage. New England has beaten better Colts teams than this one in the playoffs before, and though this is perhaps the weakest Patriots team of the dynasty to have made it this far, they’re still coached by a master schemer and have the best big-game QB of the 2000s leading them. Meanwhile, I’m still waiting for Peyton Manning to play well in a big game, something I’ve not seen from his days at Tennessee to his myriad playoff flameouts in the NFL. The Colts got his far thanks to an overachieving defense getting lucky draws, but that luck runs out here. Peyton will have to win this game for the Colts, and until he’s actually done so, I refuse to believe he can. The Patriots 3-4 scheme, experience, and versatile talent make it that much harder for him. Patriots 33, Colts 26.
