The 2007-08 National Football League Thread

[booztravlr]

Freeney isn\'t their entire defense either. He plays a huge role but they should still be in the top 5 overall defenses at the end of the year. Their remaining schedule is KC, @ Atl, Jax, @ Bal, @ Oak, Hou, Ten. No real offensive powerhouses there.

[leith]

After lucking out last week, the Chargers still cannot get their shit together.
Thank goodness the rest of our division sucks just as much.
They will probably win the division at like 9-7 because the rest of the division is that bad. Truly amazing how this season is tumbling downhill.

[Wolfman]

19-0: 9 to go[/B]

Who watched tonight\'s game against Buffalo?  It was a thing of pure beauty.  Moss doesn\'t even have to run patterns, he just trots into the end zone, turns around, and there\'s the ball.  Early in the fourth quarter the Patriots had 7 offensive posessions and 8 touchdowns.  They had scored a TD every time they had the ball through 3 quarters and they had a defensive TD.  Astonishing.  The Bills came in over .500 and winners of 4 in a row, this is not a bad team.

The Patriots really are a beautiful team to watch.  It\'s breathtaking how effortless they make it look.  This is football being played at the highest level it ever has in the 110 year history of this great, great sport.  The Patriots take this violent, bone-jarring game and make it elegant, even on defense.  You have to watch this while you have the chance.  Imagine if you could tune in once a week and watch Picasso paint, or Michaelangelo sculpt, or watch John Coltrane play the saxophone, or Martin Luther King speak.  You\'d have to watch that.  Or for a competitive analogy, imagine if you could tune in once a week and watch Picasso paint against your high school art teacher, or watch Bobby Flay cook against your 7th grade home ec teacher, or watch Gary Kasparov play chess against your valedictorian.  

No matter what the discipline, there\'s something moving to the human soul watching the best there has ever been do their work.  This is especially true when you are gifted with the rare opportunity of knowing that what you are watching, right now, is the best there has ever been.  In the particular discipline of football, this opportunity lies before us today in the form of the 2007 New England Patriots.  The sports fan had this opportunity 15 years ago with the 1992 USA Dream Team.  This is the next chance.  Enjoy.

*   *   *
In other news, I will be attending the Pats v. Eagles game next week, as well as the Steelers and Jets games in December, and will report back with full notes for everyone.  This is only going to get hotter...

[leith]

Ha Buffalo did come in over .500 were beaten by the Pats before and are not that good a team.
The Pats have beaten 2 that\'s 2 quality teams in Dallas and Indy.
The rest of their wins have come against the normal dregs of the NFL.

Football being played at the highest level in the history of the sport? OK Calm down.

This team is great I\'ll give you that but they would be eaten alive by the 70\'s Steel Curtain, outsmarted/played by the elegant Niners of the 80\'s and that early 90\'s Dallas team would kill this team. The Patriots are feasting on NFL parity and lack of truly worthy competition.

Don\'t you forget it.

[Wolfman]

Don\'t let your personal disdain for the Pats lead you to foolishness.  First of all, these players are way bigger, way faster, and way better than those teams.  It\'s not even comparable.  They would kill anyone from earlier eras.  Do you even realize that players in the 70s often had other offseason jobs so they could support themselves?  These players today are year-round specialists working 12 months of modern training with personal trainers.  And the amount of information and advanced scouting these guys have and use is so different now.  Those teams you mention wouldn\'t know what to do with the amount of info these guys prepare.  They\'d get all the film and notes and just say "wtf do I do with all of this?"  The tactics Belichick would prepare for those teams would be so foreign to them and beyond their comprehension that they\'d give up.  Even medically, we\'re way way ahead of those days, everyone is in better shape.  Any good team today would kill those teams.  What\'s your next argument...that the current Spurs couldn\'t take the 1950\'s George Mikan Lakers?  Cmon I know you\'re smarter than that last post.  Just say you hate the Patriots, that\'s fine, but don\'t make a fool out of yourself saying a team from 15-40 years ago is better than a comparable team today.  Physically and strategically we\'re on another level of existence now than we were then.  

Also, what are you talking about with the schedule?  Um, leith, hello, they\'re playing the toughest schedule in the league.  Their opp. record is 48-40, and 46-24 outside two games against the Jets and Dolphins.  Nobody else is playing a schedule like that.  They\'ve beaten the next 2 best teams already, Dallas and Indy, both on the road.  Coming into the season they had the #3 toughest strength of schedule. Proof  They\'re going to end up playing 4 out of 5 of this year\'s AFC playoff teams, having already took down the Chargers and Browns and Colts, and will take down Steelers, and they took down the best NFC team.  There\'s being foolish in opinion (first paragraph) and then there\'s just not knowing the facts (this paragraph).  You want a Mulligan yet?  

I mean, are you even listening to anyone?  Former players, the exact same players you are talking about, are lining up saying this is the best there\'s ever been.  Former coaches too.  Not to mention the analysts everywhere.  But to heck with analysts, there are unsolicited comments from former players and coaches coming out almost every day saying this is the best ever.  Michael Irvin from those 90s Cowboys and Terry Bradshaw of the 70s Steelers have both said this is the best team they\'ve ever seen!!!  Don Shula who coached the only undefeated team...John Madden who won a championship as a coach and has been around the game longer than anyone...they\'re all lining up and saying what I\'m saying.  And we\'re supposed to listen to leith duvall say all these other teams are better when the actual players and coaches from those teams are saying they\'ve never seen anything like this?  Oof, leith, get with it.

P.S.  You don\'t think the Chargers are a quality opponent? rotfl rotfl  Sorry chip.

[leith]

Ha Nevermind that Shula also said their record would be tainted because they cheated. Forgot to mention that huh?

As for your argument that the players are bigger etc. I understand that but teams like the Niners beat you without having a huge line.
Bill Walsh would run circles around the Pats gameplan.
As for the other analysts you forget they work for TV stations DUH! They need to say this is the best team ever so people will tune in to watch it. You can\'t see this? The NFL is filled with crappy games every Sunday due to the wonderful advent of Parity. Anytime a team starts to look good they start with this. Hell Indy went 10-0 a couple years ago and everyone was on their bandwagon.
Oh and you still listen to what John Madden says. Oh OK.
As for the Chargers not being a quality opponent, yeah I don\'t they are a 5-5 team that is not quality and
as for coming into the season with a #3 schedule PFFFT That schedule only shows the strength that is supposed to be there, obviously the Pats have not actually played a #3 schedule this year. They have not beaten anyone other than Indy and Dallas it does not matter that the rest of their opponents  were supposed to be good.

[tyzack]

Patriots uber alles.

I am now cheering for two things:
1.) A complete shut-out
2.) 60+ in a game.

They can do it.

Also, Shula\'s thing about spygate doesn\'t really hold. That happened within the first quater of the first game of the year. If you took away the points the Pats got that quater, they still would have won.

[Wolfman]

Leith, again, get your facts straight.  Shula took it all back and said that if the Pats run it they will be the best ever  And Bill Walsh?  rotfl Everyday tactics from today like the zone blitz and cover 2 hadn\'t even been invented in the 80s.  The Pats would run one zone blitz and Walsh would call timeout and say "WTF was that?!"  The 80\'s 49ers playing this team would be like General Custer showing up to Little Big Horn with his band of musketeers to find an army equipped with AK47s, tanks, and laser-guided missles being launched by fighter jets.  

Your strength of schedule tangent is so silly its appalling.  Just stop.  They\'re playing the toughest schedule in the league and nearly every other elite team.  With most teams being equal this year, I\'d love to see you squirm your way to explaining what a tough schedule would be.  Actually, no I wouldn\'t.  I enjoyed the part where you buried your own team too.  

I will not continue to discuss football with someone who doesn\'t know their facts.  All I can say is that I pity you, leith.  It\'s your loss and your loss only that you can\'t appreciate the beauty before you.  The rest of us have something spectacular to enjoy.  If you had attended the I Have A Dream speech, your response would be, "Meh, FDR was better."  Sad.

[Yoda]

Not everyone has to enjoy and appreciate the Pats run this year.  As a Jets fan, there\'s nothing that I would rather see than the Pats lose and ruin their perfect season.  I don\'t need to bring up arguments on who is a better team throughout history.  I just want them to lose, plain and simple.

[booztravlr]

Also, what are you talking about with the schedule? Um, leith, hello, they\'re playing the toughest schedule in the league. Their opp. record is 48-40,

Actually, it\'s not.

Chargers 57-42
Colts 55-43
Cowboys 49-51
Patriots 48-52
Packers 46-53

[Titans and Broncos still play tonight, which explains why the sum of wins/losses doesn\'t equal 100 for all teams.]

I\'m not doing it for all 32 teams. I just picked the top 4 and the Chargers for examples. Sadly, I still think the AFC East is better than the AFC West, NFC South and NFC West. Those divisions are just pathetic.

W/L By Division

AFC East 17-23
AFC North 20-20
AFC South 26-13
AFC West 15-24

NFC East 26-14
NFC North 23-17
NFC South 17-23
NFC West 15-25

The AFC South and NFC East are the only divisions without a team below .500.

[leith]

Ahh so Wolf can\'t even get his facts straight. Figures.

[skalnbyc]

The 80\'s 49ers playing this team would be like General Custer showing up to Little Big Horn with his band of musketeers to find an army equipped with AK47s, tanks, and laser-guided missles being launched by fighter jets.

Post of the day?

[Wolfman]

That\'s one version of it booz, but I prefer to use an adjusted strength of schedule that doesn\'t include your own games...i.e. the Patriot\'s schedule isn\'t ten games worse because they went 10-0 vs. their opponents, or the Dolphins\' strength of schedule doesn\'t become ten games tougher because they handed out ten wins to their opponents.  And the pure number isn\'t the only factor in toughest schedule, i.e. nobody else has won on the road at the Colts and Cowboys.   Whether they played the toughest schedule or the 4th toughest, it\'s no matter, it\'s brutal either way and leith is just trying to irk me because he\'s fed up at his own team.

Anyways, I stopped in to comment on Belichick\'s radio show today.  Interesting stuff.  He gave up way more than normal.  He mentioned how they\'re running plays where the receivers have no routes.  They get in formation, 3 or 4 wide, and the receivers pick their own route based on who\'s lined up on them and where they are, then signal the route in to Brady while he\'s under center.  Sometimes one receiver might be on this program (usually Moss), sometimes more than one might be.  They line up first with no routes to survey the matchups then the receivers each call their own play.  Or sometimes they don\'t send in a play at all and totally wing it mid-play based on what the defense gives, and Brady finds them.  You need a highly, highly advanced set of players and coaches to pull off abstract offensive concepts like this.  This is really cool stuff.

[booztravlr]

I see what you\'re saying. There are many different ways to interpret strength of schedule. I\'m not trying to say the Patriots schedule isn\'t one of the hardest either. Like you said they are the only team to beat the Cowboys and Colts on the road, which is very impressive. It\'s just their weak divisional schedule really weighs them down where as the Colts divisional schedule makes it one of the harder ones out there. Tomato. Tomahtoe.

Is it too early to throw out some playoff predictions?

The Bills, with their fairly easy schedule the remainder of the year, could squeeze in as the second Wild Card team. The Browns are in the same category too. Above them it\'s the Titans and Jaguars who both have slightly harder remaining schedules but have some room for error. I think the Chiefs will knock off the Chargers and Broncos in the coming weeks to finish 9-7 and win the West.

Patriots, Colts, Steelers, Chiefs, Jaguars, Browns

The Giants have a nice cushion as the Wild Card leader and the Lions are the only other Wild Card team above .500. The Redskins and Eagles have hard remaining schedules which will make it difficult to gain any ground on the Lions. The Panthers and Saints blew their chances early in the season. I think the Cardinals will take over the NFC West and knock the Seahawks down to the second Wild Card spot or out of the playoffs entirely.

Cowboys, Packers, Buccaneers, Cardinals, Giants, Lions

[Wolfman]

^^^^^^^^^^ Proud owner of Minnesota defense in fantasy!  3 INT TD\'s so far!  If Eli\'s name weren\'t "Manning", he\'d be out of the league by now.  

Off to Foxboro.  Full report tomorrow morning.  Stay tuned!