Playoff Review

Picking the Saturday games I'm 4-0 and I'm 0-4 for the Sunday games. This weekend's games were very boring, at least the 3 that I saw. The one that I missed was the only competitive one. Another tough week for kickers as losing teams missed six field goals.

Week's Most Valuable Player: Sidney Rice
Least Valuable Player: Nate Kaeding
Best Team Performance: New Orleans Saints
Worst Team Performance: Baltimore Ravens
Top Coach: Rex Ryan
Most Disappointing Player: LaDainian Tomlinson

Saints 45, Cardinals 14

The Cardinals scored 51 last week. After their first play against the Saints, they only had one more score the whole game. I don't know what defenses do at practice but I doubt the word "tackle" ever came up for the Arizona team. They were trying to play two-hand-touch against the Saints, and Reggie Bush & Co. were clearly playing a different style. The pathetic attempts of tackling by the Cardinals made this game almost unwatchable. The Saints scored touchdowns (no FGs) on 5 of their first 6 posessions. On the other side, the Saints harrassed Kurt Warner the entire game and he never had much of a chance. He also took one of the biggest shots I've ever seen a quarterback take after an interception. For the record, the team that won the turnover game did win as I expected. Total Saints domination in this one.

Colts 20, Ravens 3
Lots of dumb penalties, dropped passes, interceptions, fumbles, the Ravens were terrible. And then later when the Ravens were down by 17 early in the fourth quarter, every play was a dump-off pass (that was often dropped). Anytime they actually broke through or picked off Manning they dropped the ball. The Colts offense wasn't that good, they averaged less than 2 yards per carry for 25 rushes. But the game totally fell apart for the Ravens before halftime when the Colts scored and then the Ravens went 3-and-out using only like 20 seconds, giving Peyton plenty of time to reach the endzone. And just to make sure, they committed a couple of bad penalties to bring the Colts closer. This was the most boring playoff game I can remember.

Vikings 34, Cowboys 3
This was the most shocking of all the games for me. I was right that it wasn't close but I got it the wrong way. Dallas only had three punts, but they also fumbled twice, threw an interception, and missed a couple field goals. Romo was under pressure all day and was sacked 6 times. Brett had a field day, throwing 4 touchdown passes without a turnover. The most controversial story of this game was inside the 2-minute warning when Minnesota went for it on 4th and 3, already up by 24, and Favre threw a touchdown pass. Keith Brooking needs to shut up and play. I have no problem with the Vikings going for it on 4th down with a big lead. This is the NFL, you are getting paid to make a stop. If you can't stop them, why should they stop for you?

Jets 17, Chargers 14
Unfortunately, I missed this entire game so I had to catch the highlights later. Say what you want, the kicker Nate Kaeding lost this game for the Chargers, missing 3 field goals. I don't know what it is about the Jets, but opposing kickers are 0 for 5 in field goal tries in the playoffs. Darelle Revis was thrown at 4 times with 2 pass deflections, a tackle for a 5 yard loss, and an interception. LaDainian Tomlinson did nothing, signifying the end of his tenure with the Chargers. The Chargers made a controversial call attempting an onside kick before the 2-minute warning but they couldn't stop the Jets ground game anyway. Congratulations to the rookie coach, rookie quarterback, and rookie runningback who led the Jets to the win.