2-2 and the first playoff weekend is in the books in the NFL. Friday I promised the explanations and excuses for the games I picked wrong and I will admit I thought it would be mea culpa for Phil/GB and Indy/Jets as those seemed like the games with the greatest potential to go either way. Well........who knew that the ghost of the New Orleans Saints circa 1977 would show up and cough up a huge loss to Seattle? Inspired play by the Hawks and a Saint defense that seemed to get stuck in neutral with no passion, intensity or hunger (see Marshawn Lynch TD run for evident) led to one of the biggest upsets in Wild Card history. Good on Pete Carroll and his Birds, they deserved it.
All season long I have been bitching about the Jets winning lucky and arguably it happened again Saturday night. The best game of the four played, Indy did nothing to help their cause, taking bad penalties, ill advised time outs and shoddy play calling that played into the hands of the Jets defense. Mark Sanchez will never be confused with Joe Montana,but he did make the throw when it counted and the Jets played well enough to win.At the final whistle, the scoreboard is the only judge and jury that matter.
Baltimore- ugly win. KC- ugly loss. This thing was painful to watch. I am stretching to try and find something, anything to say about this thing.....not worth the effort, we'll just look forward to the Steelers/Ravens III this weekend.
Finally, the Year of the Vick comes to a crashing halt with a pick in the endzone during a last minute drive. Kudos, major kudos to the Green Bay defense,.Despite the score, it never seemed to me that the outcome was ever in doubt after the half. Philly was banged up and bruised, that much was evident and the pounding continued throughout the afternoon.The sure footed David Akers cost his team 6 points, an early omen to the Eagles that this might not be their afternoon but the Pack played like a team emboldened with a sense of some destiny yesterday, led by an offensive attack that this year has always seemed to find the players to get it done, like the proverbial rabbit in the hat. Yesterday's rabbit? An unheard of rookie named James Starks who banged off 123 yards(Hands up if you had even heard of this guy before yesterday?) in the victory, out gaining all Philadelphia rushers by over 50 yards.
And so...Wild Card Weekend in the books and an entertaining one it was. Let's get ready because the drama only ratchets up this weekend as old rivalries are revisited and new ones possibly created. The promise of another superb weekend of football looms large. In the immortal words of TO: "Get your popcorn ready"
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