Week 10 — 15 Nov 2004
From: Jeff To: mnf@fat.doobie.com
Subject: It's Monday...
...and what happened to the NFC?
This week, the playoff situation got much, much cloudier. The bad teams continued to play poorly... and some of the good teams did too.
The AFC Summary:
I'll start with the Jets. I've been writing about the Jets as a playoff team since week four (which was the first week that I mentioned the playoffs at all). Alas, they lost their second game in a row yesterday, to the Baltimore Ravens in overtime. The Jets are now 6-3, and have put an AFC Wild Card up for grabs.
Pittsburgh and New England have pretty much wrapped up the North and East divisions, and are more or less undisputed as the top two NFL teams. Both teams have 8-1 records, and either can beat Philly.
The AFC South is a tie between Indianapolis and Jacksonville, both at 6-3. At the moment, Indy wins the tiebreaker, and with upcoming games against Chicago, Detroit, Tennessee and Houston, (the last two of which are week teams in the same division, which will help a lot in a tiebreaker situation). Speaking of Houston, they've now lost two in a row, falling to 4-5, and essentially out of playoff consideration.
The AFC West is a tie between Denver and San Diego, with Denver wining the tiebreaker. These two teams play each other on December 5th, and the winner of that game will probably win the division.
Thanks the the Jets self destructing, There are now 6 teams that are very much in the running for two AFC wild cards: Jets, Baltimore, Indianapolis, Jacksonville, Denver and San Diego.
The NFC Summary:
The Eagles and the Falcons have all but wrapped up the NFC East and South. The Eagles are a far better team than the Falcons, and either could see it's season go up in smoke with a single injury to a critical player.
In the NFC North, the Packers beat the Vikings this week, which means that they're both 5-4, and thus, tied for the lead in a division with two 5-4 teams and two 4-5 teams. The Vikings momentum is working against them, they've lost three in a row. The Packers, on the other hand, have won four in a row. Overall, the Packers have slightly harder schedule in front of them than fo the Vikings... but at this point, it's still too close to call. (and don't completely discount the 4-5 Lions and Bears)
Over in the NFC West, we've also got a tie between two 5-4 teams, Seattle and St. Louis. They played each other this week (St. Louis won comfortably), and that game may end up determining the division winner in a tiebreaker. The Cardinals are 4-5, so they're potentially in the running, if both of the leaders lose most of the rest of their games.
To me, that sounds about as likely as, well, about as likely as the Arizona Cardinals making the playoffs :)
And then there's the wild card picture. As it turns out, the wild cards are probably going to be won by a team that's 5-4 today. That includes Seattle, St. Louis, Green Bay, Minnesota, and the NY Giants.
Does anyone think it's strange that more than half of the likely playoff-bound NFC teams are struggling to stay above .500? Do any of them have a chance against any of the AFC teams?
Before I get to tonights game, there's something else important that happened this week in the NFL: some of the contracts for the 2006 through 2011 seasons got signed. Most news about this involved the size of the deal. NFL football is now a bigger money maker than Baseball, Basketball, NASCAR, Hockey and Soccer combined.
As expected, CBS will continue to air AFC games (and inter-conference games where the AFC team is at home). Fox will continue to air NFC games, and they'll each get two Super Bowls.
ESPN will eventully re-sign their Sunday night contract, and rumors abound that they're negotiating to have additional Thursday night games starting in 2006.
DirecTV suprised everyone by renewing their EXCLUSIVE contract on the Sunday Ticket package (it was assumed that DirecTV would continue to offer it, but would let the exclusivity lapse, so that digital cable, and possibly dish network subscribers would be able to get ST). This cost DTV a bundle, and you can expect them to pass it on to their subscribers (probably even the ones that don't get the package).
In the fine print, you'll also find that DirecTV will be allowed to show Sunday Ticket content to its subscribers via broadband technology.
But that's not the interesting part.
First... notice the lack of ABC. It's unlikely that ABC will drop the Monday night game (and if they did, NBC or Fox would snap it up in a heartbeat), but the fact that the Monday contract isn't signed yet, does mean that it's in play.
and the really interesting part has to do with the scheduling of Monday night games for the second half of the season. Starting in the '06/07 season, the NFL will be able to SWAP certain games between Monday night and Sunday afternoon. There are a set of rules and ways for the different networks to veto the moves, but ultimately, this means that there won't be anymore meaningless Monday night games between terribly mismatched teams.
And that's a plus for anyone who prefers their football in prime time
But I digress... how about tonight's game?
Tonight, we've got an interesting one, that hopefully will turn out to be an exciting one too. Tonight, the 7-1 Philadelphia Eagles go to the FieldTurf-encrusted surface of Texas Stadium to take on the rather mediocre 3-5 Dallas Cowboys in front of 65,675 fans full of Busch and Lone Star.
Texans, not known for their creativity, can also be counted on to provide a "T.O. (still) has B.O." banner somewhere in the stadium, and a cameraman is sure to find it.
So, why is this game interesting? If it were 2006, would ABC have swapped it? The game is interesting for a couple of reasons: First... the Eagles and the Falcons are fighting with each other to be the top ranked team in the NFC. Right now, the Falcons are 7-2. If the Eagles lose tonight, they'll be tied with the Falcons. A win tonight leaves them alone at the top of the NFC.
And then there's the Cowboys. There's something unique about this team, playing at home, on Monday night. Don't get me wrong... Dallas Sucks. But let's just say that even teams that suck can win sometimes (especially this week), and I think that Dallas wants this win enough to at least keep the game interesting.
And then there's the T.O. factor. He's allowed to be larger than life as long as he keeps catching footballs and scoring points. Except that he hasn't been doing that the last two weeks. I expect to hear him blaming his quarterback before too long. Wake up Philadelphia... the honeymoon's over. T.O. is just another overpaid brat playing a boys game, trying unsuccessfully to be amusing, and collecting yellow hankies, fifteen yards at a time.
That's not the game that your coach tought you to play all those years ago, Mr. Owens. The game is bigger than anyone who plays it, and at the end of the day, the game always wins.
As for ABC and swapping this game for another one (say the Packers/Vikings game from Sunday afternoon), forget it. The Dallas Cowboys have a strong National following. Every town has Cowboy fans, and ABC wants to show advertising to all of them.
The Line:
The Eagles are favored by 7. The Over/Under is 43.
Last week, the Smart Money lost, because a douchebag quarterback failed to cover the spread. It is now 4-6, and hopes to recover soon. This week, the Smart Money is on the over, and would be on Dallas if the spread were 8 or more.
The Bar:
A favorite from seasons past, and one of the few places in town with HDTV... but one we haven't gone to yet this year.
Greens Sports Bar 2239 Polk Street (@Union) Steps from the 19 Polk bus. One block from the 47, 49 and 76 (Van Ness busses). Two blocks from the Powell/Hyde Cable Car.
Kickoff is at 6:00 See you there?
P.S. Matt Green sends this from our mellow neighbors up north: http://sask.cbc.ca/regionalnews/caches/riders_mccallum041115.html