The 2008 NFL Playoffs

[Deacon]

Well, NY vs NE. Wow.

I guess even a blind squirrel finds an acorn every once in a while.

[Kyros]

WOO! I had multiple heart attacks during that game, but somehow Big Blue came through.

[The Cid]

And the constant battle for Center of the American Sports world continues between eastern Massachusetts and the Tri-State Area.

Eli Manning in the Super Bowl. Guess Satan will make a deal with just about anyone nowadays.

[ampersand]

Eli played very well, although I didn't understand why were they still using both running backs. Bradshaw was clearly the better runner and perhaps should have used him more often. I was right about everything happening in the NFC game except for the final score. Farve had too many interceptions. But it was a really good and competitive game.

As for the AFC game, San Diego had to score at least one touchdown, and just couldn't. Brady threw what, two or three INTs and San Diego couldn't convert them into touchdowns. That really hurt them in the second half when NE had about a two to one edge in time of possession. That's not going to work against New England.

Somehow someway, some Boston or NYC or National sports columnists will compare this Super Bowl to the Red Sox and Yankees rivalry. And I really want to tell them to shut up. Edit (again): Cid, think you could remind them that this doesn't have to always refer back to baseball?

Edit: Kansas City fans are wincing again, as Tynes was their starting kicker and then cut after one very bad game he had at the start of the season.

[Blaze]

I gotta say, the whole game, it just felt like Green Bay was fighting to keep up, rather than fighting to win. I don't know that it's true when you look at the scope of the season, but when you look at that single game, the better team won. As did the better QB.

[Deacon]

You may be the first to assert that Eli Manning is a better QB than Brett Favre.

[Blaze]

For that game.

[mikehendo]

For the record, that sucked and my foot warmers never actually warmed up, I took them out of my shoes after the game and they were frozen solid .

It was a very bad game, but Favre can hardly take all the credit. His recievers were rarely open, and the Packers never established the running game.

Hats off to the Giants, Jacobs and Bradshaw are something special, they tore the Packers D-line apart. I'm not sure how far i will go to say that Eli has fnally arrived because all that he did was fail to throw a pick. His play was far from the level thathe was expected to play at out of college. he might make it into the upper echelons of quarterbacks but it won't be this year.

I guess all those special warming benches that the Giants had may have been the right thing to do after all, and I hope that during the off season the Packers get at leats one ofthe new high-tech benches for thier sideline at the very least.

It sucks that the season is over, but I am still hopign that Favre comes back again. After all, the Packers lost the NFC Championship game the year before they won the Superbowl. And heck, at least this wasnd 4th and 26..


So, who does that leave? Well, I hope I am not rushing on this by calling the Superbowl for the Patriots, the last major challenge they had in the Packers is now gone. There is always next year, and next year the Packers are going all the way!

[The Cid]

I don't think this makes Eli an elite quarterback, but again he's rising up the list for these games. Detractors of his cited his performance in big games as a reason for being anti-Eli, and I was one of those. Credit where it's due: in today's NFL, home of the West Coast Offense, a good portion of quarterbacking revolves around simply not screwing up. Eli Manning didn't win yesterday's game, but he did not screw it up. Just like credit is due to Brad Johnson and Trent Dilfer helping their teams win Super Bowls by not screwing up, credit is due Eli for his performance yesterday.

I still say Brandon Jacobs is going to be one of the best running backs in the league for a long time. Bradshaw had the better day on Sunday, but Jacobs is a human battering ram. Still, I was very surprised at how poorly the Packers played on Sunday. They had every opportunity to win that game, even despite their horrible second half. Football this year has left me frustrated in general regarding the level of play. (THESE are the best players in the world?) This NFC Championship, however, takes the cake.

Also, the Patriots have now won a string of like...seven horribly ugly football games in a row. I know, since Brady arrived in Foxboro that's kinda been the norm (winning ugly), but maybe I put unfair expectations on what is being called the Best Team Ever by many.* I honestly wanted to see them just blow the Chargers away. Credit to the Pats for winning without any real presence from Randy Moss, who reminds us that he's never hit a woman with anything smaller than the grill of his car. Credit to the Chargers for not forfeiting the game when Tomlinson got hurt...I guess. They looked terrible. How do you get inside the Red Zone four times and kick four field goals? Seriously, that's unacceptable!

*Scratch that. I DEFINITELY put unfair expectations on the Pats since they started coming close to going undefeated. More on this in Fuggle's sports-related poll.

[ampersand]

Mike: Actually according to Fox's Pam Oliver during the game, those heated benches on the Giant's side didn't work at all, and apparently it didn't work throughout the entire game. Not even the heat blowers were working.

Cid: Agree, four FG in the red zone when your team is needing a touchdown is really bad. If they just had one touchdown, I think it would have completely changed the complexion of this game.

And somewhere in NYC, Rich Eisen is celebrating because now NFL Networks can show that Week 17 game over and over again.

[The Cid]

A whole bunch of reasons why this Boston v. New York stuff is going to get old:

-Because we've already lent the Red Sox-Yankee analogy to Patriots-Colts. Too many times.
-If you're going to draw a Red Sox-Yankee analogy, you can't forget that in this situation the New England team is playing the role of the Yankees. You've got your old, respected yet quiet and brooding coach (Belicheck as Joe Torre); your smug, pretty-boy, do-no-wrong quarterback (Brady as Derek Jeter); your problematic megatalent having a resurgent season (Randy Moss as Roger Clemens/Gary Sheffield/David Justice); and a crew of guys who by themselves aren't much but combine to be something nearly unstoppable. As a Red Sox fan, I'm familiar with both sides of that rivalry, and in no way do the Patriots resemble the Boston Red Sox.
-Foxboro is not Boston. New Jersey is not New York. There is no professional football team within the city limits of Boston, MA or New York, NY.
-The Patriots' regular season rivals are the Colts and Dolphins. Not the Jets or Giants (though there's not much love lost there, the Jets hate the Dolphins and Giants more).
-The game is being played in Arizona.
-Tom Brady is reportedly a Yankee fan. ...That doesn't have much to do with this discussion, but I mention it a lot because it bothers me.
-Neither New York, New Jersey or Massachusetts is much of a football hotbed. Seriously. I lived for quite a while in Pennsylvania, where people take football seriously. High school football stadiums there are bigger than college football stadiums here. In fact, the only college football teams in either area worth watching are Boston College--sometimes--and Rutgers--sometimes.
-Because aside from Yankees/Red Sox and Knicks/Celtics, there's not really as much bad blood as you'd think between Boston and New York sports teams. Red Sox fans and Met fans often identify with each other, the Bruins and Rangers were in the Original Six, and the Giants are considered our local NFC team up here.
-Because the New York Football Giants already have three or four of the best rivalries in football (with Philly, Chicago and Washington, maybe Green Bay as well), and the Patriots don't really have any major rivalries.
-Because the Super Bowl doesn't really need hype.

[ampersand]

I've heard a lot in the local radio yakking about how there's no tailgating at the Super Bowl and how there's this petition trying to urge the NFL to reconsider their stand. Maybe it's just me, but I agree with the NFL. Not because of their excuses they've put up or that they want to have as much space as possible to put up their NFL Experience zone and charge them "appropriately" for this experience, but because these people are whining over one game that they can't go and tailgate like they did last week at their conference's championship game. It's really much ado about nothing.

(Really, like about 99% of events nowadays, you're almost always better off watching the game at home --- preferably on a high-definition television screen --- than you are actually being in attendance at the game. Hockey maybe the lone exception.)

[The Cid]

I might throw baseball in there too amp, but then again I live not far from one of the best two spots on planet Earth to watch a ballgame. (Fenway Park--pretty much any seat--is pretty awesome. Spot #2 is the outfield bleacher at Wrigley Field, but this is a football thread so I'll get back to the task at hand.)

On tailgating: If people are going to travel all the way out to Arizona for the Super Bowl, spend all that money on a ticket, not to mention hotel and air accommodations, they should be allowed to tailgate. Ever been to one of these things? Tailgating is a ritual for many, something that has to come with the game. Now on the biggest game of the year, suddenly they can't do it anymore?

You're right that it's a stupid little thing to get hung up on, but people are going to the Super Bowl to have fun--shouldn't they be allowed to have as much fun as possible?

[mikehendo]

A football game seems to lose some of its importance without tailgating allowed. As The Cid said, it is a ritual that many partake in. I would like to add to his long list of expenses possibly outrageous price of parking.

Then again maybe the NFL thinks that most people at the Superbowl will be high level company execs who really have no interest in tailgating. Either way, not allowing tailgating was is was a bad decision.

Not that I really care because I am no longer going. If the Packers were in it though, I would be pissed.

[The Cid]

I would like to add to his long list of expenses possibly outrageous price of parking.

You, sir, just hit one of my biggest nerves re: the NFL.

Think about your average NFL stadium. With few exceptions (Soldier Field, Seahawks Stadium, Candlestick and the Superdome come to mind), these are not in big cities. New England plays in Foxboro, MA (population: The New England Patriots), both New York teams play in East Rutherford, NJ (population: The New York Giants, Jets, and both New Jersey professional teams--for now), places like Green Bay and Buffalo are already kind of isolated. The Eagles play in Philly, but there's really nothing but other sports venues in their neighborhood. So my question is this: why charge for parking as if parking were scarce?

The Super Bowl is being held in Glendale, AZ. Know what, besides University of Phoenix Stadium, is in Glendale? NOTHING! They could turn the whole town, and the town next to it, into parking lots and nobody would know the difference! You know parking is going to cost a fortune, but why?

With the exceptions of those stadiums that ARE in the midst of cities (did I miss any up there?), I don't understand why you need to pay to park near any other NFL stadium.