Monday Morning Quarterback
I admire and respect Tony Dungy, but there is a legitimate reason to question his coaching ability at playoff time. The Colts were not ready for Sunday’s game against the Steelers. They had the best record in the NFL this year and a week off to prepare for this past weekend’s Divisional Playoffs and were just not ready. They were flat on offense, lacking intensity on defense and got their heads handed to them.
Peyton Manning too will continue to wear the goat horns. “Can’t win the big one” has followed him since his college days and will hang around his neck until he gets off the snide and wins a Super Bowl. His post-game blaming of his offensive line was unprofessional too. When they lost in Week 14 to San Diego, breaking a 13-0 run, every other team studied those game films and figured out that the Colts can’t handle defensive pressure up front, so that’s exactly what Pittsburgh gave them. For all of his audiblizing at the line, Manning couldn’t pick up on their blitzes and neither could his offensive line.
I had long thought the Chicago Bears run this year was a bit overrated. I questioned their schedule and their offense and Sunday, my questions were answered. A team that boasted about their defensive abilities and had the audacity to question Carolina’s record and the abilities of Steve Smith, gave up 434 yards of total offense and got burned by Smith for 218 yards and two touchdowns, the first on just the second play of the game.
Carolina has shown no fear of any of their opponents thus far and brought their A-game to two consecutive road wins in New York and Chicago. There is an intensity to their game unmatched by any of the other teams in the playoffs. I’m not making my Super Bowl prediction just yet, but I’ll be interested to see how they do next week against Seattle.
Denver is showing similar signs of unpredictability. They can hurt you on offense and defense, as they did to New England Saturday, forcing turnovers and mistakes that were uncharacteristic for the Patriots. They’ll need to do that again next week against the Steelers, who have shown they can take a team out of their game plan as well.
Seattle is a team I didn’t get to see much of this year, except for their win over the Giants (in a game the G-men should have won). They showed they were more than Shaun Alexander on offense, in their win over the Redskins, but it was the Redskins they were beating up on Saturday. Washington again failed to get their offense on track, making Seattle’s defense look exceptional. I’m not sure if that will be enough against Carolina however.
I went 3-1 in this week's predictions, 5-3 overall. I’ll make my Conference Championship round picks later in the week.
Posted by bernie at January 16, 2006 11:38 AMBernie, I agree with you overall. As for Dungy, the mitigating circumstances of his son's suicide I'm convinced played a role. He's faltered in the past in the playoffs, but this time I think he had a substantive excuse and explanation. As for Manning the Older, you know, I'm glad you called him out. Pittsburgh figured out how to throw off his game and he couldn't recover. But think about this: had Van der Jagt made that damned field goal, we might have had a different outcome. Pittsburgh was pretty sloppy too. Overall Indianapolis looked flat, they didn't seem to know how to mix up the running and passing games as they'd done, which might have helped Manning a bit more, and Pittsburgh appeared to want it more.
As for Chicago, I knew they were going to have problems with their offense (because they basically have had none all season), but it was great to watch Carolina shred their vaunted defense. It was as if they also weren't prepared for what they were going to encounter and thought tough talk and their rep would be enough. It wasn't! (The odd thing was that yesterday, when the local TV stations were interviewing some of the defensive players, they were sounding a bit hesitant and cautious...I think they knew the jig was up.)
Happy MLK Jr. Day!
Posted by: jstheater at January 16, 2006 2:38 PMI'm not so ready to let Dungy off the hook. The Colts went flat in week 14, when they lost their first game, and they never recovered. That was before his son's death. Week 15 they lost again, 16 and they struggled to eek out a victory. They had a week off in between that game and Sunday. There has been ample time to regroup and prepare and they didn't.
And, Dungy had a losing playoff record in Tampa Bay and he has a losing playoff record now in Indianapolis. He's a good regular season head coach and nothing more.
Posted by: Bernie at January 16, 2006 4:01 PMcan't wait to see your predictions for this sunday's championships games.
should be two interestin' matchups!
Posted by: dizyaboy at January 18, 2006 10:36 PM