The best seat in the house is the view from the couch

Week 17 Recap

Week 17 Recap

n I don’t think I could possibly feel worse about a winning (9-7) week picking football games. Sure, I finished the season with a respectable 135-112-9 record, but this was just a bad week. Let’s recap, shall we?

o Personally, I’d like to take this opportunity to thank Lovie Smith for completely screwing me and thousands of other gamblers with his late announcement of Kyle Orton as starting QB. I fully expected Orton to be in the game at some point, just not for all four quarters. My “break even” bets for the week both involved Chicago covering the (+5.5) line. Naturally, Chicago was the only pick I had wrong in both bets.

o Also, could I suggest that someone really needed to alert Herm Edwards that he could have had the third pick in the draft by losing yesterday. Seriously, why were the Jets even trying to compete? Laurence Mulroney would have been a solid running-back to replace Curtis Martin. Sure, he might still be available at the #5 slot, but I’d feel a whole lot better with a guaranteed shot at getting him rather than only a nice pick to trade with.

o As for the Ravens… well, it’s nice to see that the first time I decide to put money on Kyle Boller’s shoulders, he completely blows up. I Think I’m just going to set up a “No Kyle’s allowed” rule when it comes to making all bets.

o And finally… I’m just happy to finally have the answer to “who backs up Matt Hasslebeck”. The answer? Seneca Wallace. Wish I’d known that sooner…

n So Dom Capers, Mike Martz, Mike Sherman, Mike Tice, and Jim Haslett are all out, with Dick Vermeil and possibly Bill Parcells retiring. Quite a first day of the off-season in the NFL…

n Personally, I think only Tice & Haslett will have trouble finding jobs on an NFL sideline immediately. Tice will probably end up in the studio for a year or so, while Haslett has a pretty sweet buyout clause in his contract (1/2 of his $3.3M yearly salary if he doesn’t get another coaching job), so I’d be surprised if he didn’t take a couple years off to recover from this disaster of a run in New Orleans. Capers will probably go back to being an assistant for while, while Martz & Sherman will most likely end up as head coaches almost immediately.

n As for the draft… If Houston does anything with this #1 pick other than trade it away, GM Charlie Casserly should be fired on the spot. Houston doesn’t need a running back. They don’t (really) need a quarter back. What they do need is help at just about every other position on the field. Sure, Reggie Bush would be a big draw, and will probably (though not guaranteed) be a major NFL star for the next 8-10 years. But the price for a #1 overall pick is step, not only in dollars and salary cap numbers, but in the fact that you can only improve one spot on your roster. The best thing that Houston could do with this pick would be to ship it to the Jets for their first and fourth rounder, and maybe John Abraham before he walks. Houston has the cap space to pay Abraham (and vastly improve their defensive line), plus the additional picks would still yield plenty of quality to fill in other holes.

Alright, you’ve asked for it, so here are Big D’s official playoff predictions, as well as my pre-season predictions so that we can all have a good hearty laugh…

AFC

Hey, maybe this predicting stuff isn’t so hard after all… I’ll take four out of six, with two even in the right places… I’m not making any points-based picks until the lines settle down on Thursday, but as for straight wins… here’s how I see it shaking out:

Round 1: New England over Jacksonville, Pittsburgh over Cincy

Cincy is in full “just happy to be here mode”. Jacksonville looks like they’ll be stuck with either a young, unproven QB, or one coming off of a serious ankle injury. Not a good time to be heading to Foxboro…

Round 2: Denver over Pittsburgh, New England over Indy

Denver/Pittsburgh will be one hell of a tough game. And I’ve learned my lesson about never picking against Belichick and Brady in the playoffs. They’re 9-0 together for a reason.

Round 3: New England over Denver

See above…

NFC

It really says something for the wonderful world of parity in the NFL (or maybe for the low level of competition in the NFC) that 5 of the 6 teams in the conference playoffs are new from last year, with only Seattle returning to defend their claim from last year’s playoffs. The AFC returns 4 teams, with the two newcomers both falling just short of a wild-card berth last season. I guess the NFC really does just suck after all…

Round 1: Washington over Tampa Bay, New York over Carolina

Sorry, I just don’t trust essentially a rookie QB in the playoffs. And the Giants don’t lose at home.

Round 2: Seattle over Washington, Chicago over New York

Nice run for Joe Gibbs. Not getting past Seattle though… And New York just doesn’t win on the road. Which begs the question – just how important was that 9^th home game this year?

Round 3: Seattle over Chicago

If Chicago can somehow luck out and get anyone other than the Seahawks, and therefore get a home game for the NFC title, they’ll be Super Bowl bound. Otherwise, Lovie Smith will be coaching in the Pro Bowl.

Lata.

posted by Big D @ 3:30 PM