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The Definitive 2009 NFL Preview continues…..if you didn’t read the first part, it's here.
AFC South:
The Texans will finally win the AFC South if Gary Kubiak and Kyle (product of neo-American meritocracy) Shanahan don’t completely fuck up the offensive play calling at crucial times like they did last year. But that’s too much to ask and so the Titans will win the division again. The Titans are always tough, they looked pretty good last night against the Steelers, but they will miss Jim Schwartz and Haynesworth in the long run---they already missed Schwartz’s defensive mind in the fourth quarter against the Steelers. So the Titans will not be as dominating in that division as they were last year. The Texans will benefit from this small Titan dropoff, will finish second in the division and contend for a wild card berth.
The Colts will have a hard time getting 8 wins this season. If Joseph Addai and Donald Brown play out of their minds, maybe the Colts will win more than 8. But even then I doubt it, unless the Colts sprout a defense all of a sudden. Even if they have a couple of miraculous wins like they did last year I don’t see them getting past 9&7.
The Jaguar players pretty much quit on their coach last year and I have no idea about their team this year, but I’m guessing they are still chopping wood so I’m conveniently assigning them a losing season.
AFC West:
The Chargers will win this division easily--- unlike last year when they should have won easily but scraped out an 8-8 division-winning season.
The Raiders will be much better than people expect and they’ll finish second. Of course, that ain’t saying much in that division.
I would have picked the Chargers as a mortal lock for the Superbowl title this year except for the fact that they are led by Norv Turner. I will state, however, that their FUQIT Quotient at key positions is so high that even Norv may not be able to hold them back this year. FUQIT Quotient (Frustration of Uniquely Qualified Individual Talent) is (something I just invented and) a measure of the Talent of a brilliant player multiplied by the Frustration the player feels in not having been rewarded with a Superbowl title for that talent. Rivers is a kickass QB who is steaming over the fact that fellow classmates Roethlisberger (two titles) and Mr. Mediocrity Eli Manning (one title) are ahead in the bling-bling game. Also, the scuttlebutt from San Diego is that Rivers is an intensely devout man who prides himself on not swearing. A frustrated pro athlete who does not swear…this has got to be the biggest case of emotional blue balls ever, right? The guy is a ticking time bomb, I tell ya. Anyway, LaDainian Tomlinson is good enough to kick Emmitt Smith into the footnotes of history but the lack of playoff success frustrates him to tears---plus his career window is closing fast. Shawne Merriman’s roid rage is so frustrated at not even meriting a FUQIT Quotient yet that he is allegedly choking his girlfriend in his spare time. So anyhoo, you get the picture --- I would not be the least surprised if the Chargers win the Superbowl. I will, also, only be mildly surprised if they end up at 8-8 again (of course, in that division 8-8 could win it again and then they could still go on to win the Superbowl….so…..yeah……).
NFC East:
The Eagles will win the NFC East easily if Andy Reid doesn’t fuck up the play calling at crucial times like he did last year. But that’s a tall order, especially with the distraction of the ‘wildcat’ possibilities with Vick now. The bottom line is that anything that reduces Westbrook’s touches also reduces the Eagles’ chances of winning...so I have a bad feeling about this season for the Iggles…
The Giants are loaded on defense and have a great run game but I don’t favor them to win the division because they are led by Eli (product of neo-American meritocracy) Manning. Plus, by cutting David Tyree at the same time that they made the mediocre-piece-of-crap-Manning the highest paid QB in football they have SURELY pissed off the karma police enough to ensure them losing seasons for the rest of Eli’s career, haven’t they? I know, I know, but I can hope, can’t I?
The Redskins have upgraded on defense. Plus I think it is the first time in QB Jason Campbell’s career that the poor guy gets to run the same offense for a second consecutive year. So you’d think they’d be serious contenders. But I don’t know…Portis said, during the last election, that Obama was surely the better candidate for the nation but he wasn’t sure he’d vote for him as he was worried his taxes may go up. Now that kind of stupidity, especially in DC, has got to invoke some seriously bad karma…..
The Cowboys will be, as always, very entertaining. They have the talent to win but I have the sneaking feeling that Jerry Jones’ tight face will be feeling a bit tighter at many times this season. I can’t wait for the first Cowboy receiver to drop a pass because he was too focused on the ginormous HD screen, right over the field in the new stadium, as opposed to the freaking football. Also, I really, really, hope that in every Cowboy home game the visiting punter hits the screen a couple of times….for any visiting team it is only a couple of do-overs but by the end of the season the Cowboy special teams would have had like a few dozen extra special team do-overs and that has got to be great for the health of the Cowboys, hasn’t it? All the Cowboys on IR can can rest secure in the knowledge that Jerry Jones did a smidge more than the bare-minimum requirement and therefore the screen was technically legal…..I’m looking for some seriously good times here….
Getting back to the issue of the NFC East, this is too tough to call. Screw it, I’m calling that no team wins the NFC East this year. I’ll say that they’ll all finish 8-8 with identical conference records and some lame tie-breaker will send the least-loser to the playoffs. And that will likely be the Eagles, and furthermore, they could go on to ride this playoff berth all the way to the Superbowl. I had to write that to avoid getting hate mail from Comrade PhysioProf.
The remainder of the The Definitive 2009 NFL Preview will hopefully follow sometime late tomorrow. Be sure to tune in.
My sponsors just wet their pants---I mean, breaking up a single episode into two was commercial enuff, but three installments...that’s some serious enterprise at work right there…
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2 comments:
I guess I may need to put up the annoying word verification gizmo to keep out spam.
The Eagles will win the NFC East easily if Andy Reid doesn’t fuck up the play calling at crucial times like he did last year. But that’s a tall order, especially with the distraction of the ‘wildcat’ possibilities with Vick now.
I agree that Reid needs to sack the fuck up on the red zone play-calling, but I totally disagree with your analysis of the Vick influence. Reid's problem in the red zone has always been that he doesn't trust McNabb with options/etc, and has always grossly overfavored running it between the tackles. With Vick on the field (or even on the sideline), I hope Reid will mix it up more, and put the ball in the hands of McNabb and/or Vick in the red zone, and not just run three and out between the tackles.
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