Man, it's been some time since I updated this bad boy. But we are now in football season, four weeks in as a matter of fact, so I think it's a good time to reset what's been going on. 20 points for all you football fans to ponder on after four weeks...and keep in mind I'm going to stick mainly to what's going on on the field.
The one thing I will say about the off-field stuff is that the NFL and college football for the most part are fortunate that the leagues and the games sell themselves otherwise there would be an even bigger problem. That said...away we go.
20. Never count out a Steeler football team, ever. People left them for dead after that awful performance against Baltimore but Steeler pride more often than not shines through. They proved that on Sunday night by demolishing a pretty solid Carolina Panther football team.
19. Saints got their first win of the year against a hapless Minnesota squad without Peterson. If there is ever a team that could come from 0-2 to make the playoffs, it's a team led by Drew Brees. Watch for more huge numbers for Drew against Dallas, which he does routinely.
18. The Redskins offense is a different offense when Kirk Cousins is in the game. It's too bad because I really liked RGIII coming out of college, but it's obvious Wash is a better football team with Cousins manning the snaps. They're not great still, but better with Cousins behind center.
17. The Cowboys offensive line is the best offensive line they've had in quite some time. On my way to doing something on Friday morning, I was listening to Mike and Mike and I think they said the Cowboys had three first round offensive line picks in their rotation. That is helping their offense be what it is right now. They can't stop anyone but they can score a lot of points.
16. Buffalo comes back to Earth. Unlike Chicago (sorry, they have Cutler and he'll never sniff that trophy) and Miami, San Diego is a legitimate Super Bowl contender and they smacked around Buffalo pretty good.
15. The Patriots are 2-1 but it's obvious Brady isn't what he used to be. They just barely scratched by Oakland and now they have to go to Kansas City on a Monday night, then play a really good Cincinnati squad six days later. Tough stretch.
14. Speaking of Kansas City, big win at Miami (where they rarely win in the first place) to keep them from 0-3. They play New England at home next Monday, then go to the Niners and San Diego. If they can somehow get to 3-3 after those first six, they have some winnable games after that.
13. Hoke has got to go at Michigan. Did anyone see how empty that stadium was in the fourth quarter with Michigan down 26-10?
12. Auburn beat K-State by six, but barely squeezed by. A win is a win, but K-State is going to be kicking themselves for the rest of the season after losing that one the way they did. Oh and as someone from a Nebraska family I don't want to hear that the flyover states can't compete with the great and mighty SEC. That is complete bollocks.
In the last year, Missouri won the SEC East (yes you read that right), Oklahoma beat Alabama in the Sugar Bowl and Tennessee about a week ago, Nebraska beat Georgia in its bowl game and K-State took Auburn (for the record, my national title pick) to the wire.
11. Alabama gets 645 yards on Florida. Yaaaaaaaay. Florida is a lame squad this year and Muschamp will likely be gone following the season so excuse me if I'm not impressed yet...Bama hasn't even played a ranked team yet. A&M, Mississippi State, LSU, Auburn have all beat at least one ranked team and three of those four teams won true road games. The best team Bama played was West Virginia who isn't ranked and only lost to them by 10...and Oklahoma by the way scored more points against WVU (on the road too) than Bama did.
10. Ryan Fitzpatrick is still not a very good NFL quarterback and for those Texans fans who say that he's anything more than decent...well, you can have your opinion and I'll disagree with it. They're going to be better than they look this year, but no playoffs.
9. If anyone has a panic button in San Francisco, now might be a really good time to hit it. That Ferrari they are running around with is 1-2 and got lapped in the second half each of the last two weeks. By the way, the Niners are getting outscored by a cumulative 52-3 in the second half of their games this year. Oh, and Arizona's for real. That's a physical, nasty, vicious football team.
8. I guess you can try and clean up a program as much as you can, but you can never really take the chippiness out of the Miami Hurricanes. Nice win for the Huskers, game that looked a little bit like old-school power football. Oh and that roughing the passer call on Nebraska was horrendous in that game. I know about the new roughing the passer rules in college, but if you watched the play the Miami player blocked our guy into the quarterback and the hit wasn't even below the knees.
7. Cal was up 31-13 at Arizona starting the fourth quarter but somehow manages to lose 49-45 on the last play of the game on a Hail Mary. How in the world does that happen?
6. Ravens kicked a game winning field goal to squeak by the Browns, but I like where the Browns are headed. They beat a New Orleans team that's pretty good and have been competitive in all of their first three games.
5. Sad weekend for LSU fans as they got upset by Mississippi State; first win in Baton Rouge for State since 1991. LSU's offense without Mettenberger is in a bad way this year.
4. Arkansas vs A&M is this week's most intriguing matchup. A&M started out as a double digit favorite but that line is now 8.5 points from what I see. Who's going to control the tempo...A&M's high powered, turbo charged attack or the Hogs rushing attack which ground Tech into the dust?
3. Very quickly regarding Winston...I find it as sort of weird that he got suspended, yet he was still on the sidelines. I'm not going to read anything into it more than that, I'm just saying, like Kirk Herbstreit mentioned on twitter, that it's just bizarre.
2. On another note, I think that game Saturday was FSU's best chance to lose. Now that they survived that game without Jameis, they should run the table easily to the four team playoff.
1. Denver may have lost to Seattle, but I think they showed well and it seems to me they are more equipped to beat the Seahawks than they were back in January. I remember saying right here back in January that Seattle was better because they could run the ball and they could play defense much better than Denver could. There is no longer a significant gap in those two areas. Seattle isn't going to be able to push Denver around anymore and I think when the playoffs start this year, Denver will be in much better position to win a title than they were last season. Remember, they're playing all the NFC West this year, so when the playoffs start, they will be mentally tougher than a year ago.
Bonus thoughts: The Kansas City Royals might make the MLB playoffs for the first time in 29 years, but it will be in spite of Ned Yost not because of him. There's a reason Milwaukee fired him in the middle of a pennant race when he was there...I'm looking forward to the Ryder Cup this weekend, but we are probably going to get hammered...Regardless of what happens with the Astros in the last week of the season, this season is significant progress...69 wins with still the possibility of avoiding 90 losses....The Rockets should have fired McHale after they lost to Portland in the playoffs. Keeping him will be a big mistake...And as far as a World Series prediction, Dodgers over Halos in 5.
Until next time...
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