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Preseason's no-brainer picks didn't pan out
In a calamitous half-season for so-called football experts, you've made us look like, dare I say, economists.
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But at least one economist — Paul Krugman — saw the global economic crisis coming. Who had Denver four games better than Tennessee at midseason? Nobody.
Who thought the Giants would find themselves in third place less than a month after opening 5-0? Nobody. (Least of all my buddy Nick who is at risk of a personal economic crisis if he doesn't get off his beloved Big Blue.)
Week after week the NFL has been hazing those of us who like to pretend we know a little about tackle football.
What in the name of Mike Sims-Walker is going on here? (Besides a raft of nobodies becoming fantasy studs.)
So let's mark the passing of Week 9 — the approximate midpoint of the 17-week regular season — with nine iron-clad, super safe proclamations for 2009 that have blown up in our faces.
1. The Bengals, as ever, will be the Bungles.
Anyone who watched "Hard Knocks" had to reach this conclusion.
First-round pick Andre Smith held out, then promptly broke his foot upon reporting to camp. Cincinnati was so strapped on the offensive line that they were converting defensive linemen to offense late in training camp.
Rookie tight end Chase Coffman was rising up the depth chart even though he often looked overwhelmed by the NFL game. Why? First- and second-stringers Reggie Kelly and Ben Utecht both suffered season-ending injuries.
Chad Ochocinco was his yappy self, bragging that he was back even as HBO was cutting together a preseason drops montage that would have made Terrell Owens flinch.
When the Bengals found a miraculous way to lose a home game to (what-we-thought-was-lowly) Denver in Week 1 it seemed safe to assume they were on their way to another four-win season.
And then?
The Bengals ripped off six wins in seven games, making the preseason football cognoscenti look dimmer with each successive victory. Included in those half-dozen wins was a victory over the defending champion Steelers, two beatdowns of the Ravens and a 45-10 annihilation of the Bears.
The only people the Bengals have blown out worse than the Bears are the prognosticators.
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| Josh McDaniels appears to have learned from Bill Belichick, right down to the hoodie. (Doug Pensinger / Getty Images) |
2. Josh McDaniels has made a mess of things in Denver.
We nailed this one.
The consensus was as fast and ruthless as it was wrong. It went like this. 1) Jay Cutler was the one player on the Broncos McDaniels could not alienate. 2) Kyle Orton was a huge downgrade from Cutler. 3) McDaniels will be the latest Bill Belichick disciple to fail spectacularly.
Oh-for-three.
The Broncos are 6-2, atop the AFC West and Jay Cutler is second in the NFL with 12 picks. McDaniels is the favorite to win Coach of the Year.
Just as we predicted.
3. Brett Favre will not look good in purple.
There may not have been unanimity among the pundits on this one, but no one was predicting what has transpired. Anybody who tells you they saw this coming is lying. (Including Brett Favre.)
The 40-year-old Favre led the NFL in interceptions last year and his clock had obviously struck midnight down the stretch for the Jets. When he finally arrived in Minnesota he supposedly created a "schism" in the locker room.
How do you go from schism to Kumbaya in three short months? You lead your team to a 7-1 record with a 106 QB rating (second in the NFL) and the lowest interception rate in the league. That's right, the guy who led the league in tossing picks (22) last season has thrown only three in 256 attempts.
Simply put, Brett Favre is having the best season of his career. Raise your hand if you saw that coming. Turns out the guy looks every bit as good in purple as Prince.
4. The Colts will slide back to earth.
Is there any surer sign that a team's long reign among the NFL elite is about to end than the departure of the still relatively young, super-successful head coach?
When Tony Dungy decided it was time to turn over the reins to assistant Jim Caldwell it could only mean one thing: the Colts' decline phase was under way. Place your bets accordingly.
Whoops.
On Sunday, against all logic, Caldwell became the first coach since 1930 (Potsy Clark) to start his rookie season 8-0.
The Colts have won in every conceivable fashion. They've won squeakers (two points over the Jags, three over the Texans and four over the Niners and Dolphins) and they've won blowouts (31-10 over the Cardinals, 31-9 over the Titans and 42-6 over the Rams). They won a game in which they had the ball for less than 15 minutes. They've won when Peyton Manning has thrown three or more TD passes (3-0) and when he's thrown one or zero (3-0).
Indy was supposed to be ripe for the taking this season with the Texans as the new trendy pick in the AFC South. But instead the Colts have a four-game lead in the division and, with 17 straight victories dating back to last season, they have their sights set on the Patriots' all-time record of 21 straight wins.
Some decline phase.
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| Antonio Pierce and the Giants have faded to also-ran status. (Jared Wickerham / Getty Images) |
5. The Giants are the beasts of the East.
The Cinderella Super Bowl champs in 2007 were even better in 2008, going 12-4 before an upset home loss to the Eagles in the playoffs. Tom Coughlin's team came into this season looking loaded for another title run.
Through five weeks the G-Men not only confirmed that they were the best team in the NFC East, they looked like the absolute class of the NFL, dominant on both sides of the ball.
But following a 44-7 embarrassment of the Raiders, linebacker Antonio Pierce felt obliged to dash a little salt in the wounds of the vanquished Silver and Black, equating their lack of intensity to a scrimmage.
The karma Gods have struck back with a vengeance. Even the Raiders have won more games in the last month than the Giants. Over the course of their four-game losing streak the Giants have allowed 133 points, none more devastating than the seven they surrendered to Philip Rivers and the Chargers at the end on Sunday in the Meadowlands.
If the playoffs started this week, the Giants would be on the outside looking in. And their next four games are against teams with a combined 22-10 record.
It's astonishing how quickly the Giants have gone from beasts in the NFC East to bronze medalists.
6. The Niners are for real.
After the Niners won four of their last five games down the stretch last season it was clear Mike Singletary had changed the culture in San Francisco. The Niners were a team that came into 2009 expecting to win.
And win they did. San Francisco won three of its first four games, its only loss coming on the Brett Favre-to-Greg Lewis Play of the Year.
With the Cardinals off to a slow start, the NFC West was San Fran's for the taking. But a funny thing happened on the way to the division title. Everyone's favorite sleeper fell asleep.
The Niners got destroyed at home by Atlanta, 45-10, in Week 5, then lost successive one-score games to Houston, Indy and Tennessee.
They are now 3-5 and two games behind Arizona. For real.
7. Remember the Titans.
Sure, they lost Albert Haynesworth. But they also led the NFL in regular-season victories in 2008 with 13. And as long as Jeff Fisher is the coach in Tennessee you know that his team will always give maximum effort.
Uh ...
Say that again. Fifty-nine? To nothing? Hold on, let me read that back to you: 59-0. That's a five and a nine on one side. And a zero on the other. Wow.
The Titans may have bounced back with wins the last two weeks, but to paraphrase Al Pacino at the end of "The Insider," what was broken in Week 6 in New England doesn't go back together.
Forget the Titans already.
8. Turner the Burner is burned out.
The word spread through roto drafts: Don't take Michael Turner with that third pick. The guy had 376 carries last year, and 370 carries was supposedly the stress point beyond which not even Castrol could save a running back's motor.
The prevailing wisdom held that Turner would take a statistical step backward this season as the offensive load shifted to Matt Ryan. So how's the prevailing wisdom doing?
After rushing for 1,699 yards and 17 touchdowns in 2008, Turner is on pace for 1,440 yards and 20 touchdowns this season. And, if anything, the guy who was supposed to be a burn-out risk is getting better as the year goes on. He has 317 yards rushing and three touchdowns in his last two games.
9. Darrius Heyward-Bey was taken way too high.
Bless the Oakland Raiders. At least we got one thing right this year.
Through eight games Heyward-Bey has five catches for 74 yards. At this rate he'll finish the fifth and final season of his contract with 50 career catches, 11 fewer than the Giants' Steve Smith has so far this season. Smith is making $460,000 this year and slated to make $550,000 next year. Heyward-Bey is guaranteed $23.5M from the Raiders.
Suddenly I don't feel so stupid.
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