Bear witness to the champions

The Packers are going to the Super Bowl and the Bears are not. The first Packers-Bears postseason matchup since the Roosevelt (Franklin) administration ended with more drama than expected, but the better team won the game, plain and simple. This is not a slight at the Bears - they have a good (but not great) team that is going to remain that way until they get a quality receiver or two.

A word to Jay Cutler's NFL colleagues who felt behooved to call upon their years of medical training and experience to pass social media judgement on his injury: Blow it out your rectal orifice. I don't particularly care for Cutler, but he's the best qb they've had since...Harbaugh? Vince Evans? Erik Kramer? Bobby Douglass? Sid Luckman? (O.K., its not exactly a distinguished list.) An immobile Jay Cutler was not going to bring home the Halas trophy. Unfortunately for the Bears, neither was Todd Collins at any level of mobility.

Another point in this rather improbable defense of Jay Cutler is the Bears relative lack of receiving options. It is a testament to the Bears as a team that they advanced to the NFC Championship Game with the likes of Earl Bennett, Johnny Knox and Devin Hester at wide receiver. Greg Olsen is a capable TE, but it's not rocket science to toss some double coverage his way and challenge the other guys to beat you.

I was puzzled by the Bears not using Hester more on WR screens, bubble screens or out of the backfield. He's a devastating "in space" runner, but Mr. Martz seemed to content to leave that club in the bag. It's not like the Packer's LB's and DB's outside Sam Shields are heralded as speed burners.

As for the contest, the Packers D made up for a subpar Aaron Rodgers performance and James Starks provided effective run support. Troubling signs for the Packers were the Charles Woodson/Nick Collins "After you," "No, after you," "No, after you, I insist" tackling routine on Earl Bennett's touchdown catch late in game, and a stunningly effective hurry-up offense orchestrated by Caleb Hanie. (The Bears' 3rd string quarterback, a.k.a the second coming of Peter Tom Willis.)

The Packers are peaking at the perfect time with some improbable players. Sam Shields, who I predicted on this very blog would not make the opening day roster and possibly get cut at halftime of a preseason game, is now arguably the heir apparent to Charles Woodson. Woodson is gradually doing the Rod Woodson career-twilight position shuffle with alarming effectiveness - in fact, a new position name is needed to account for his whereabouts in the nickel and dime packages. Current favorites are "Delta-back" and "Omega-back", using the actual greek letters in text media. Howard "All You Can Eat" Green dined his way out of New York and into the Packers defensive line rotation, and Erik Walden continues to make play after play after being very unemployed just month or so ago.

A key to watch in the Super Bowl will be the play of AJ Hawk. If Hawk is making plays ahead of his position (as opposed to dragging Rashard Mendenhall down from behind) this indicates the other members of the front seven are doing their job. Hawk is a good-but-not-great linebacker who can be very effective when he doesn't have to create for himself. If the D-line can create some disruption up front, Hawk is in a position to make plays. The rest is up to him.

Another matchup to watch is BJ "The Freezer" Raji and the Pittsburgh interior lineman. With All-Pro C Maurkice Pouncey questionable for the game, the burden falls on Raji and his crew to get push up front. An All-Pro center also can make the adjacent guards look very good - it will be interesting to see how Ramon Foster and Chris Kemoeatu perform if Pouncey can't go.

Other bold predictions for the Super Bowl: The Packers will have a pivotal positive special teams play, John Kuhn will get stoned on a 4th and short, and Jerry Jones will try and fail to seem happy to be there. The over/under for cheesehead shots is 14, and the late Myron Cope will get mentioned at least twice.

Be sure to weigh on the new position name for Charles Woodson - Deltaback or Omegaback (Animal House similarity purely coincidental).

Go Packers!

Diamond In the Rough

Okay, full disclosure.  It wasn't a very good football weekend for me.  Granted, the Packers did win - in spectacular fashion mind you - and I'm grateful for that.  But, in this house, the Playoffs are more than a single game.  And the results of the other three left a bad taste in my mouth.


Dear Baltimore Ravens; thank you so very, very much for granting us the possibility of a seventh, Pittsburgh Steelers Super Bowl victory.  Thank you for reminding us, yet again, that you guys haven't had a dependable offense since... well... ever.  I understand that the sixth-seeded Jets upset the first-seeded Patriots and the sixth-seeded Packers crushed the first-seeded Falcons, and the 7-9 Seahawks defeated the 11-5 New Orleans Saints last week, but seriously, if there was a bigger playoff meltdown this season, I didn't see it.  Baltimore went into halftime up 21-7.  Against a Ray Lewis defense a 14-point lead should have been insurmountable.  But before you rip into said old, tired defense, consider this.  Ray Rice has made a living hanging on to the football.  This year alone, 404 touches without a fumble.  Saturday night he softly coughs up the ball on a dump-off at the Baltimore 23 yard-line just after the start of the third quarter.  Give Ben Roethlisberger a chance just three yards outside the red zone and he's going to hurt you with it.  Then Joe Flacco floats a pass into a two deep safety zone, over the head of Todd Heap and into the hands of Ryan Clark, which he then returned to the 25.  Three plays later the Steelers were in the endzone again.  Then Flacco fumbled the snap, leading to another Pittsburgh recovery and field goal to take the lead.  Then it got really bad.  In all his years in Arizona, Anquan Boldin was known as the guy who made ridiculous catches in traffic.  The guy has had his jaw broken going up to make a catch and still hung onto the football for crying out loud!  Yet Saturday night, in a position to retake the lead, Flacco hit a diving Boldin in the chest with a pass he could have caught in his sleep for a touchdown - and he dropped it.  Finally, on 4th & 18 with 30 seconds remaining in the game, Flacco hits T.J. Houshmanzadeh in the hands on the Pittsburgh 35 to extend the drive and give the Ravens a chance to tie the game - and he dropped it.  The guy who spent the past eight weeks complaining about how he wasn't getting the ball enough, dropped said ball when it mattered the most.  Pittsburgh didn't win that game.  Baltimore gave it away.  On a silver platter.  Trimmed in gold leaf.


Then there was Seattle.  I know, I know, they weren't supposed to be there anyway, and I'm not surprised that they lost.  What surprised me was the manner in which they did so.  Last weekend the Seahawks defeated the defending champion New Orleans Saints in spectacular fashion, capped of by the most impressive offensive touchdown run anyone has made since the retirement of Barry Sanders.  Marshawn Lynch pinballed his way for 67 yards, breaking eight (or nine) tackles (depending on what one counts as a tackle), and throwing aside Saints Super Bowl hero Tracy Porter like a loaf of moldy bread on his way to the endzone.  The crowd went so berserk that the Pacific Northwest Seismic Network registered an earthquake beneath Qwest Field.  Over-the-hill and balding Matt Hasselbeck threw for over 300 yards and four touchdowns on his way to victory.  Fast forward eight days, and those same receivers that caught four touchdowns couldn't catch a cold against the Bears.  It was as if every single Seahawk wearing an eligible number had also laced up a pair of boxing gloves.  Offense, defense, didn't matter.  Nobody wanted the ball.  I stopped counting Seattle's dropped passes after they hit double digits.  I stopped watching after they punted away their first nine possessions.  Oh, and how in the world do you not cover Greg Olsen deep down the middle of the field?  Lawyer Milloy has played in this league for the last 35 hundred years, he should know better than to get beaten by a 250-pound tight end on a go-route up the seam!


Like a lot of people, I'm a little tired of the New York Jets.  (Let's be honest, if this team played in Minnesota nobody would ever talk about them.)  More specifically, Rex Ryan.  Some people like that he steps up to the microphone every single week and says something ridiculous.  I happen to believe that people who routinely say ridiculous things probably happen to think ridiculous things as well.  But, for the second week in a row, Ryan's players have played big enough to back up his big mouth.  For the second week in a row, the Jets defense made a Super Bowl MVP quarterback look like a freshman started at Notre Dame.  And let's give credit where credit is due.  There has never been a better NFL cornerback than Darrelle Revis.  Never.  That includes the Hall-of-Fame-bound Deion Sanders.  Deion Branch might as well have been wearing a green and white inflatable bubble around him Sunday night.  Over the last two weeks, two Hall-of-Fame quarterbacks with four Super Bowl victories between them have thrown a grand total of two passes to receivers covered by Revis.  Two.  Out of 75 attempts.  One for one yard and the other incomplete.  Wow.  I guess when you have eight linebackers/defensive backs that only have to cover half the football field, it's going to be next to impossible to move the ball.  Tom Brady and Peyton Manning found that out the hard way.


I was more than a little surprised at how unprepared New England seemed for New York's coverage scheme.  They had the Indianapolis tape.  What exactly had they been watching for two weeks?


Finally, what to say about Green Bay?  Honestly, prior to Saturday night's performance, I expected a tight, defensive struggle, and wouldn't have been surprised had Atlanta come out on top.  And once the Packers went down 14-7 on the Eric Weems kick return I figured I was in for a long night.  But something happened between my first and second slices of pizza.  Green Bay hit on drives on 92 and 80-yards for touchdowns, then stunned Matt Ryan with a pick-six as time expired in the half.  Thirty minutes, two touchdowns and two field goals later it was all over.  In case that doesn't impress you, the Packers could have left their punter back in Wisconsin.  They didn't need him.  Not once.


I know I've said this before, but I think it's worth repeating.  I'm not sure the first round bye actually helps teams in the playoffs.  Last season being the exception that proves the rule (both number one seeds met in the Super Bowl), good teams more often than not seem to suffer from the loss of momentum caused by the week off.  I know coaches believe it gives players time to rest and recover, and additional time to study their opponents, but two weeks of preparation didn't help the Patriots or the Steelers, and it certainly didn't help the Falcons.  It seems as thought, at least going into the playoffs, getting on a roll matters more than getting healthy.


As for predictions for next week, I have none.  Every attempt I've made at calling a playoff game this season has ended poorly.  I will say that with Seattle and Baltimore out I have only one chip left on the table.  So its Green Bay or bust from this point on.  Stock up on snacks for Sunday.

Walk on the Wild Card Side

No, I will not give Mark Sanchez credit for the Jets' win, because the Colts lost that game. Couldn't get a first down, left too much time on the clock, couldn't stop the Jets from getting a field goal. Whatever. It was a ridiculously boring game. (I suppose I should cut Sanchez some slack; it's not him I hate, it's his coach and his fans. But it all seems to bleed together.)

Instead, let's talk about Marshawn Lynch, Seattle Seahawks' running back. For some reason I could never understand, Marshawn, affectionately known in this house as "The Ugliest Man in Football," was traded to Seattle by the Buffalo Bills for two bags of chips earlier this year. I've always admired how hard he works, and how when he's on the field, he always runs at full capacity. It was nice to see him play for a team I really like (sorry, Buffalo. It's not you, it's me).

A little background: The Seahawks won their division with a 7-9 record. It's the first time in history a team has won a division and gone to the playoffs with a losing record. Sort of an ignominious achievement.

But even though they were 11-point underdogs at home (against the 11-5 wild card Saints), the Seahawks not only took the early lead, but took it big. At the end of the third quarter, the Seahawks were up 34 to 20 against the champion Saints. But then the Saints started coming back. The famous 12th Man crowd was silent, all emotion sucked out of them. The Seahawks defense looked exhausted and lax. The Saints looked calm and collected. Mark and I were watching with a mixture of excitement and horror (we like the Saints, and we like the Seahawks...it was very stressful for us). The Saints were one possession away from the lead, and, in all likelihood, the win.

But then, in the last few minutes, just as the Saints had pulled to within four points, Marshawn Lynch ripped off a glorious 67-yard run, breaking 8 tackles, and LEVELING Tracy Porter on his way to the endzone. The crowd went WILD, and didn't shut up until the game was over. We screamed and danced in the kitchen. The Seahawks pulled off one of the biggest upsets in playoffs history. It might not have been the longest touchdown run ever, but for us, it was nothing short of spectacular. Granted, the Seahawks were in the lead, so Marshawn's run was kind of the icing on the cake, but it was some damn sweet, and unexpected, icing.

12 Hours of Sports

11:00 a.m. on New Year's Day: I am headed to MKE for a 12-hour sports bonanza. A full slate of lesser Big Ten bowls awaited prior to the Grandaddy Of Them All along with the company of my best bud and my brother. The soon-to-be-arrived-at viewing venue happened to serve beer and tasty snacks and featured an HD television every 22.5 degrees of my field of vision. The Ticketcity Bowl was kicking off as I headed over the Chicago Skyway - the 2011 Bowl Season was officially underway.

Some of you may have correctly observed that the bowl season began weeks ago beginning with the New Mexico Bowl, the uDrove Humanitarian Bowl, and the R plus L Carriers New Orleans Bowl (oh, how I wish I was making at least two of those up). While this is technically true, I had enough trouble listening to the Northwestern game without veering into oncoming traffic to even think about feigning interest in the likes of the Little Caesars Bowl.

So back to New Year's Day and Milwaukee's Rock Bottom Brewery. Our first and second pints helped hide the fact that the Big Ten was getting spanked in each and every bowl matchup. (Note to bitter Michigan State Fans: It's time to Shut Up now.) Me and my two 'mates were faced with either bad football or the daunting prospect of actual conversation. We of course discussed movie quotations from Fletch and Support Your Local Sheriff.

The Badger game came on at the appointed hour. The opening drive was promising but only netted Bucky a field goal while TCU countered with a touchdown. The Badgers played just well enough to maintain optimism but just bad enough to allow creeping dread. TCU seemed to know which Badger DB was the least experienced, while U-Dub played away from what worked early on. A gutsy fake punt created false hope, the early missed field goal loomed large. A failed onside kick sealed our fate.

It retrospect, TCU played an excellent game and deserved to win - they were the better team that day. The Badgers were capable of winning the game and were in it until the end, but it still left a bitter taste. Subdued from the Rose Bowl and several additional pints, we headed for the Bradley Center and the Bucks-Mavericks game.

The Bucks were urging people to "Wear Red!" for the game in hopes of parlaying Rose Bowl enthusiasm into a raucous game atmosphere (more on that later). Dallas was without Dirk Nowitzki and Shawn Marion, but we felt little sympathy as the Bucks were short nearly a full squad themselves (for those scoring at home: Brandon Jennings, Michael Redd, Carlos Delfino, Drew Gooden). With cautious optimism we took our Row A seats and awarded salvage rights to the Bucks for this day of athletic competition.

A word on our seats: Row A is a good thing, but not always a great thing. The Bradley Center was built for hockey and is a fantastic hockey venue. For basketball, it is still a fantastic hockey venue, with our euphemistically-named "corner section" seats situated fairly deep off the baseline. We were afforded a unprecedented view, however, of Jason Terry warming up on an exercise bike.

The previously mentioned "Wear Red" campaign yielded mixed results, which is a polite way of saying it blew. To be fair, a number of folks were clad in red, but at no time would you have suspected it was the result of any concerted effort. The game atmosphere was subdued, the in-game entertainment was fair-to-lame. Rose Bowl hangover oozed throughout the building.

Dallas lost Caron Butler to a torn patellar tendon early in the game, but countered with an en fuego JJ Barea and Jason Kidd doing a Jason Kidd impersonation. Milwaukee responded with all 65 inches of Earl Boykins and Ersan Illyasova channeling a circa-1983 Moses Malone. The final buzzer sounded with scoreboard reading Milwaukee 99 Dallas 87.

Our three-block walk to the hotel was accompanied by 30 mph winds in 15 degree weather, but our 12 hours of sports ended on a high note. We are on a four-year winning streak with the Bucks, and an o-fer with the Badgers. Bring on 2012!