NFL Predictions - Week 15

In My Humble Opinion
41

Lessee here (I’m checking the standings on ESPN.com right now)…Washington now has no chance of winning the division, and they have to win both remaining games just to have a chance at a wildcard. Since Tampa Bay, St. Louis, and Detroit already beat them, Detroit also has to lose both its remaining games…one of which is against the Bears at home. This is the situation a $100 million team with high hopes at the beginning of a season is in.

It’s mind-blowing. If they do nothing else but beat up the Cardinals (a game which, going by the stats, they should have won by about 200) and manage ONE FIELD GOAL against the Giants in the second game, they’re 9-5 and in the driver’s seat. The Redskins, simply put, have become a team that seemingly does the worst possible thing at the worst possible time.

As for the Jaguars “sudden but too late surge”, remember that their wins have come over weak opposition, including the almost automatic victories over Cleveand and Cincinnati. The only playoff team they’ve beaten is Tennessee. The Steelers have had an extremely up-and-down year and also look to just miss the playoffs. Essentially, though, the AFC Central is one big logjam. I’ll be looking forward to two years from now when realignment finally arrives.

Minnesota fans can now start worrying, Eagles and Ravens fans finally have something to celebrate, Cowboys fans can take a little solace in the lost season, and Rams fans…well, pray real hard and hope the Saints defense runs into a sudden slump.

LFO - Sorry, man. You actually did good, but with the race to tight the Vikings loss is really going to cost you. Still, gotta admire someone willing to put it all on the line. Don’t give up, don’t ever…you know.

Gazoo - 10-4 pending Monday night. Pretty impressive for someone coming off a losing week, and great calls on the Rams and Saints. Too bad about the Dolphins pick, and this was one they probably should have won. Just that kind of a season, huh?

42

Sorry, that’s LNO, not LFO. I’ll get it right next week, I promise…

43

Yeah, you certainly had the call on Fiedler. 4 freakin’ INT’s??!!

A couple of notes:

-Do we really need it pointed out that Warner rubs his hand on his own ass before every snap?

-In the Bears/Patriots game, when the officials knocked the final 10 seconds off the clock for a illegal formation in the final two minutes, shouldn’t the play have been whistled dead at the time of the snap (when there were 15 ticks left)? That would have left 5 seconds for the Patriots to try one Hail Mary.

-What’s up with all the “end arounds” and faking the “end around”? Just about every time Green Bay ran the ball they did the fake “end around.” Dallas scored twice on “end arounds.”

-Next week begins football bliss. Games on Saturday, Sundat and Monday!!!

44

We wuz robbed :smiley:

I can’t believe it, clean slate 0-4

45

I think you were in fact robbed. It looked to me like the Saints fumbled out of the endzone. It should have been a touchback for the Niners. But, you may want to let Mariucci know that (a)he can’t challenge a play in the final two minutes, no matter how much he waves his little red flag; and (2)he’s lucky he wasn’t penalized for being out on the field.

46

Gazoo – What’s up with all the end arounds and faked end arounds? About five or six weeks ago (if that), the Vikings scored on a faked end around with Robert Smith up the middle. Every week, we’ve seen more and more teams use it. I wonder if a team can patent a play … imagine the penalty. “Offensive patent infringement - fifteen yards - repeat first down.”

I think I’ve got 82 points out of a possible 120 this week, which isn’t all that bad. However, I’ve now slipped to second place, with two weeks to go … first place is about $300, second is about $200, and third a measly $100. Cash is cash, I suppose, but I also want to be able to rub it in the face of some coworkers who derided my football-picking abilities. Now I decide whether I want to go with the safe picks and hope I regain the lead, or to gamble it all …

Sigh. I KNEW I should have gone with the Rams, I knew it I knew it I knew it … I also think that the Vikes and Rams didn’t really play yesterday, but rather just put in the tape of last year’s playoff game with some CGI enhancements. You know, to make Jeff George look black, and about 50 lbs bigger. Other than that, it was the same game.

47

Now this is the Rams team I’ve been waiting to see all year! Only problem though, it’s a little late in the season. We’ve lost the home field advantage (almost surely going to the Vikes), but we’ll still go to the playoffs if we win the next 2 games. Can the Rams beat the Vikes on the road?

48

No, because when the Rams come to the Metrodome, I’ll be secluded in the upper deck with a scope and a high-powered rifle …

Just to shoot the ball out of Warner’s hand, that is. I’m not that bloodthirsty …

49

Sure, just get a missed field goal by Gary Anderson. That’s how the Falcons did it!!!

50

Metrodome SCHMETRODOME!!

I’ll bet even though the odds are heavily stacked in your favor now because we won the first one. The usual split forecasts a Viking win but this is the Mike Sherman era and he is almost as bad at clock management as Denny Green so who knows what will happen.

Whatcha want to bet??

51

Gazoo, I was thinking the same thing Re: the Bears-Patriots game conclusion. I think the reasoning is this. The penalty was Illegal motion, which doesn’t stop the play since it cannot technically occur until the ball is snapped. Had the referee chosen to call a false start on the receiver then the play would not have occured and the time would have been reset to 16 seconds, and had the time run off.

The way I saw it there were 3 possible penalties that could have been called.

  1. Illegal Motion since the player was moving towards the line of scrimmage, not parallel to it.
  2. False Start since he moved towards the line of scrimage.
  3. Illegal Formation, not enough men on the line of scrimmage since he was the end man and was still moving in an attempt to get to the line.

Illegal Motion and Illegal Formation both do not stop the clock, and ergo would result in the 10 second run off ending the game. They don’t stop the clock because the snap of the ball is a necessary condition for the infraction to take place, i.e. a player can be off the line, or in motion towards it at any time before the snap without penalty. An official never stops a play at the snap, only before the snap. This leaves False Start as the other possibility which would have generated a stoppage of play, and as a result time for one play. The question now is whats the difference between a false start and illegal motion, the rules digest only differentiates in that a false start is defined as a sudden movement towards the line which may simulate a snap. I guess in the officials judgement the player wasn’t moving as if it were a snap.

Probably could have gone either way, but the officals were cold and didn’t want to chase a hail mary down the field, as a Bears fan I’ll take it.

PS. Matthews hits 15 straight completions? BYU, you can keep Crowton, thankyouverymuch.

52

I didn’t see anything about the Bears/Patriots game last night, mostly because the “fastestthreeminutesinsports” highlights that Chris Berman did during halftime of the Heidi Bowl rematch showed a clip of William “Refrigerator” Perry scoring a TD in that Super Bowl game.

It was pretty funny, but it would’ve been nicer to see a controversial ending, like they did with the Saints/49ers game.

Ahh well, at least they showed one of McNabb’s TD passes in the Eagles victory. :slight_smile:

53

Yeah, I went and checked the official gamebook. The call was “illegal formation,” so I guess they got it right this time.

54

Really, the box scores on NFL.com called it “Illegal Motion” specifically. Not that it makes a damn bit of difference.