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SEA: 23

SF: 22

Kaepernick is not quite as good as Wilson.

  NE: 29

                DEN: 26 (O.T.)

…however, ask me in another half hour, and I might say “Denver by 14” instead.  I went back and forth trying to figure this game out.  But it’s one of the most difficult matchups I can remember.

On the one hand, Denver is exactly the kind of powerful but wildly unbalanced offense that almost always collapses in the playoffs.  It’s not that Manning “chokes” as people always say; it’s just that his teams are usually one-dimensional passing attacks, and when they meet someone who can stop that, they lose.

New England, meanwhile, seems to have finally done what I’ve been saying they should do these past few seasons, and developed a running game.  This is good–for a time, they were the one-dimensional passing team that was always collapsing in the postseason.

The only difficulty is that almost all of their first-stringers on defense, and their top receiving weapon, are injured.  Soon or later, this seems bound to catch up to them.  Thanks to the salary cap, teams just can’t build up depth.  But then again, no one would’ve said they could get even this far with so many injuries, and yet here they are.  So why not take down one of the best offenses in NFL history while they’re at it?

Then, of course, there is the meeting earlier in the season between the two teams. Normally, that would give some indication of what to expect.  But somehow, I doubt New England will spot Denver a 24-point lead again by fumbling three times.  But if they do, I don’t think their offense, sans Gronkowski, can come back.

It could be a shootout.  It could be a defensive struggle.  It could be a blowout by either side.  All I know is it figures to be pretty entertaining.

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Ok, this really is getting ridiculous.  I thought Tebow was an odd signing for New England.  He doesn’t really fit their system.  But, when a team is as loaded as they are, they can afford to experiment.

But what if there were a team that had signed a running quarterback, and was all geared up to run a read-option offense, but he was injured for week one?  And their backup was also injured for the rest of the season? And they were in a position where they were being forced to start an undrafted free-agent?

Wouldn’t it be worth it to give a quarterback with a playoff win and a 75.3 career rating a try?

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It’s that time of the year again! My predictions were uneven last year–I was totally right about Atlanta and Arizona, but was woefully wrong about Chicago and Denver.

Atlanta

They are becoming

Just what the Colts used to be.

Will choke yet again.

Arizona

Larry Fitzgerald

Should be traded for linemen.

Would be a win/win.

Baltimore

The defending champs

Will not make the postseason.

Third in division.

Buffalo

Rebuilding again.

Manuel looks like poor man’s

Kind of Tim Tebow.

Carolina

The Anti-Niners:

Demonstrating the option

Won’t work in the pros.

Chicago

Will Cutler breakthrough?

Can there really be offense

In Windy City?

Cincinnati

Will get past Houston;

And in all the excitement

Will get to New York.

Cleveland

They seem to have been

Re-rebuilding ever since

1999.

Dallas

Changes make them good.

Win their division, first round

And lose in Green Bay.

Denver

Their last playoff loss

Looked just like Manning’s Colts teams.

Will regress this year.

Detroit

Arizona East:

One Hall of Fame receiver,

And just nothing else.

Green Bay

Need to have balance;

But having the best QB

Makes up for a lot.

Houston

It’s make or break time.

Schaub should declare he’s “elite”;

It seems to work well.

Indianapolis

Well, now, that was quick.

They’re right back where they belong:

Can they win big one?

Jacksonville

They’re gonna be bad.

Like, really, really awful.

As in, not too good.

Kansas City

Might surprise people.

But not nearly enough to

Surpass the Broncos.

Miami

Are getting better,

But they are a year away

From winning the East.

Minnesota

This will be the year

Peterson will disappoint.

Can Ponder step up?

New England

In spite of it all

They will still field a good team.

Also, Tim Tebow.

New Orleans

More insane offense,

But will the defense improve

Or still let them down?

 New York Jets

You heard it here first:

They will somehow make playoffs

And save Rex’s job.

New York Giants

Can take one more year

Before they shape up and win.

Third Championship.

Oakland

They are still lost in

A giant black hole in West.

Where will they finish?

Philadelphia

Kelly’s new offense

Will be a flop in this league.

Won’t win more than five.

Pittsburgh

Will compete again,

With infusion of talent.

And sweep Baltimore.

San Diego

This will be last year

Rivers plays for them, and then

They’ll draft new QB.

San Francisco

They look amazing.

They will live up to their hype

And will win it all.

Seattle

Won’t live up to hype,

Sophomore slump for Wilson

And get passed by Rams.

St. Louis

Will take second place

In the division, but the

Offense will struggle.

Tampa Bay

Revis Island moved,

And that alone gives them hope.

Can’t beat Atlanta.

Tennessee

They will crash and burn;

And have to start rebuilding.

Enjoy Fitzpatrick.

Washington

If Griffin’s healthy

They could be great, but if not

They won’t fall apart.

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Chuck Norris has written an article about how great Tim Tebow is.  I hate to say it, but beneath all the hyperbole and cliches about “clutchness”, he has something of a point, even if he has a much higher opinion of Tebow than I do.  I don’t think he’ll ever be a really great player, but he deserves more of a chance than he’s getting.  I wish Buffalo had signed him and spent their first round pick on a defensive player instead.

I really can’t figure out the weird reluctance by teams to take Tebow.  It’s not that Tebow doesn’t have his flaws, but rather that teams are willing to gamble so much more to get potentially so much less.  E.J. Manuel may end up being the next J.P. Losman, whereas Tebow at least has won a playoff game, which is more than can be said for Rob Johnson, whom Buffalo once anointed their starter for no apparent reason, or Ryan Fitzpatrick, or any of the other placeholders they’ve had these past thirteen years.

It’s not just Buffalo, though; nobody wants Tebow.  If teams were generally very conservative, this might make sense, but they aren’t.  They gamble on worse odds all the time. Heck, Geno Smith, who signaled the end for Tebow time in New York, has “bust” written all over him in giant, neon green letters.   (B! U! S! T! Bust! Bust! Bust!)

People keep passing this off by saying “well, teams don’t want the attention he brings.” Of course they do!  They’re pro football teams! The reason they exist is to get attention, and thus money.  “Well, Tebow has this zealous fan base, led by people like Chuck Norris,” you say.  Yeah, he does.  So what? All pro football teams aim to fill their stadia with zealous fanbases each week, and it doesn’t seem to bother them then.

Tebow’s fans say he’s being discriminated against due to his religion.  Seems unlikely.  Most football players are Christians.  Kurt Warner was an outspoken Christian, like Tebow, and teams were quite willing to give him a chance, even when his play was very inconsistent.

So, we come inevitably back to his bad mechanics.  Well, no one can deny his throwing motion is terrible.  But, even so, the Pittsburgh defense could not stop him in a playoff game.    It may be bad, but it was good enough to win that day.

Can Tebow be a championship-winning quarterback?  No; it’s very unlikely, unless he travels back in time and signs with the ’85 Bears.  But can he get a team into the playoffs?  Yes–he already has done it once. Can he make a team relevant again?  Yes, even if he plays poorly, he will still attract attention.  That’s why perennially bad teams, like Buffalo, Cleveland and, as Norris mentioned, Jacksonville would be wise to get him.

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I see  that Electronic Arts has gotten the exclusive rights to Star Wars video games.  I remember another thing EA got exclusive rights to, and that didn’t work out so great…  but we’ll see.

I’m not saying this is necessarily bad news–for one thing, if I understand correctly, EA can still publish games that other developers make. To my mind, it could be good or bad.

I’ve been thinking about the Mass Effect series again, and how weirdly uneven it was for a trilogy that was supposedly mapped out in advance.  The first Mass Effect had a very interesting story, but the gameplay was a little wonky, at least to people like me who aren’t really familiar with RPG mechanics.  Combat in ME1 feels very awkward.

Then Mass Effect 2 streamlined the combat, making it much more like the popular Gears of War series.  The hardcore RPG people may disagree, but I think this made for a superior game, even if they had to mess with some established background information of the setting to make it work.  ME 2 is still my favorite in the series, even though parts of the story don’t make sense.  And I think it’s interesting that EA acquired BioWare between ME1 and 2, and in the latter, the game suddenly became much more  accessible to the average gamer.

But then you have Mass Effect 3, which had many well-known problems with its infamously unsatisfying ending.  BioWare insists that they had total creative control, so you can’t blame EA for the ending.  (Then again, the Illusive Man insisted he had control of the Reapers, too…) But in addition to all the in-game problems, it was criticized for forcing players to buy a bunch of additional stuff in order to get the “full” ending.  Again, it’s just interesting to me that there was no comparable marketing scheme for, say, BioWare’s Knights of the Old Republic (2003) or Jade Empire (2005) or even the first Mass Effect (2007).

So, I think we have a pretty good roadmap already for what is going to happen to a beloved science-fiction franchise whose video games department is now being run by EA.  But wait!  There’s more!

Everyone thinks that this means Star Wars game will become increasingly Call of Duty-like, and you will see a lot of polished but simplistic games.  Pretty much everyone feels that the  Battlefront series or something like it will be making a comeback. And why not?  If EA can make something Star Wars themed that can compete with the highest-grossing game series in history, why wouldn’t they?

This isn’t so bad, really.  Battlefront was a fun game.  It’s just that I think everyone feels EA is just too big, and when a company gets that big, it’s hard for them to function the right way.  They can keep making money off of AAA blockbuster games for a while yet, but they can’t really innovate, because that involves risk. Which means we probably won’t be seeing any deep, philosophical,  Star Wars RPGs like the great Knights of the Old Republic II anytime soon.

But more than that, there are indications that EA is just generally mismanaged.  As Shamus Young says in that article, they are not running their company as well as they might, just from a pure business point of view.  However, I think their model is sustainable for the near-term future.  Star Wars has been popular since the 1970s–people will continue to buy any heavily-hyped game that ties with that franchise for a few more years.  This is where we see the similarity to EA’s NFL license monopoly–the NFL has been popular since the 1960s, and for those who play sports games, it’s the only show in town.

The difference, of course, is that the NFL, while not technically a monopoly is the only widely-watched pro football league in America. Star Wars is not the only major science-fiction franchise. There are still more of those to compete with Star Wars games.

That’s why I think the monopoly on Star Wars has a greater chance of blowing up in EA’s face than their NFL  monopoly–the latter is essentially a monopoly on a near-monopoly, because the NFL controls a huge amount of market share in the market for football.  EA is building off of that. But it’s different with the market for sci-fi games–it’s more of an oligopoly, with just a few competitors: Star Wars, Star Trek, and so on.

If we assume that consumers are indifferent as to which science-fiction franchise’s video games they choose to spend money on, this means there is still an element of competition in the market.  But, of course, not all consumers are not indifferent–they have preferences for franchises.  So, I want Star Wars to have the better video games, among other reasons, to show up the Trekkies. (Not that I dislike Star Trek, but still.) Branding is always very important in oligopolies.

The point is, this arrangement coupled with EA’s past problems with understanding different markets as mentioned in the Shamus Young article linked above and… well, the title of this post says it all.

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To Whom It May Concern:

Well, here we are again. No playoffs, yet again.  Not even a winning record, yet again. Rebuilding, yet again.

I believed in 2010 that you ought to draft Tim Tebow. I also believed you should trade for him last year when Denver was trying to get rid of him.

It’s not like it can get any worse with him on the team, and his value will never be lower than it is right now.  Sure, he can’t throw a ball correctly.  But he has won a postseason game in the last decade, which is way more than can be said for our side.

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[To the tune of the Scottish folk song “Ye Jacobites By Name“.]

Ye Patriots by name, lend an ear, lend an ear,

 Ye Patriots by name, lend an ear,

 Ye Patriots by name,

 Your faults I will proclaim,

 Your gameplan I must blame, you shall hear.

(Chorus: “Ye Patriots by Name”, etc.)

When to Run, and When to Pass, by the chart, by the chart?

 When to Run, and When to Pass, by the chart?

 When to Run, and When to Pass?

Two throws for each run, alas,

 Against the league’s top class falls apart.

(Chorus: “Ye Patriots by Name”, etc.)

What makes defensive ends slow their pace, slow their pace?

 What makes defensive ends slow their pace?

 What makes defensive ends

 Unsure which threat to defend,

 And let your speedy friends out in space?

(Chorus: “Ye Patriots by Name”, etc.)

Then leave some plays un-thrown, and shift gears, and shift gears

 Then leave some plays un-thrown, and shift gears.

 So leave some plays un-thrown,

 Don’t give up on the run,

 And titles you’d have won last two years.

(Chorus: “Ye Patriots by Name”, etc.)

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Well, he’s wrong about a lot of things, actually, but at the moment, I want to address his incorrect claims about football.  Now, his recent column is based on the idea that the game cannot be made concussion free without fundamentally changing the sport.  This is true.  I’ll give him that.

Where he goes wrong is in assuming that this means the talent pool will dry up as parents forbid their children from playing the sport.  It won’t.  It will just make the game less skill based and more strength and speed based.

What’s the first thing kids immediately do when they don’t have to live by their parents rules anymore?  Violate them.  If they can’t play organized football, they’ll play disorganized football.  And ultimately, college and pro football will start recruiting physical freaks of nature like Calvin Johnson and Rob Gronkowski who have little training in the game, but more than enough inherent physical prowess to make up for it.

The game will not be destroyed; it will simply morph back into what it used to be in the 1950s and ’60s.  Only with, as Will notes, bigger players.  There will be less strategy and more sheer strength to it.  I suspect the running game will make a great comeback 10-25 years from now in pro football, because it requires less practice and timing and more physical ability.

There is a dark irony to all this, of course: as people keep their kids out of football,  it encourages the sport to rely more on violent play at its uppermost levels to remain popular, as teams become comprised of untrained, unpracticed hitting machines.

Most football players, when asked, say “this is what we signed up for.”  They don’t mind the risk.  Watch players getting themselves pumped up before a game, and you’ll often see them headbutting each other.  It’s not a full-force collision to be sure, but studies show that it’s by repeated, routine hits that the damage is done.  And here the players are, doing it on purpose, voluntarily, to themselves and their teammates.

The bottom line here is that there is only so much you can do to prevent people hurting themselves if they are really hell-bent on it.  (This lesson applies to so many areas in life.)  Of course, I have previously stated my thoughts on the safest, most viable alternative to dangerous sports, but there are some, probably many, players who will accept nothing less than the real thing.

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Football season is upon us!  It’s only pre-season, but still!  Therefore I have prepared some poetry for the occasion.  I wanted to do more haiku since my political ones were pretty popular, and I got the idea to do a football-themed set from Gregg Easterbrook.  Some of them contain an actual prediction, some just make a lousy pun, but all of them contain 5-7-5 syllable goodness!

Atlanta

This will be the year

They win a postseason game.

But only the one.

Arizona

Two great receivers

Never get hands on the ball

If QB’s on ground.

Baltimore

Most boring good team

Will make playoffs, win, then lose.

Wash, rinse and repeat.

Buffalo

Upgraded defense.

But inconsistent passing

Will give the fans “Fitz”.

Carolina

“Cam will change the game”

Maybe so, but then again

We’ve heard that before.

Chicago

Will win division.

And if they can stay healthy

Will reach New Orleans.

Cincinnati
They ought to be good.

Yet, whenever we think that,

They always collapse.

Cleveland

They seem to have been

Re-rebuilding ever since

1999.

Dallas

Poor Dallas Cowboys:

With the biggest screen ever,

And a small window.

Denver

Broadway Joe the Ram

Unitas as a Charger

Condemned to repeat.

Detroit

Don’t blame Megatron;

‘Cover curse’, and their defense,

Put them in cellar.

Green Bay

Defense gets better

But offensive regression

Makes them a fifth seed.

Houston

Just who are these guys?

They lost Mario, but they’ll

Win the Lombardi.

Indianapolis

Well, with any Luck

They will be back into form

Come twenty-fourteen

Jacksonville

They’re gonna be bad.

Like, really, really awful.

As in, not too good.

Kansas City

They might be healthy

This year, and have a good chance

To win Division.

Miami

Major rebuilding.

The last time that they did that

They made the playoffs.

Minnesota

Is it just me who

Believes that “Christian Ponder”

Should be Tebow’s name?

New England

Impressive offense

Figures to run up the score.

Without the “running”.

New Orleans

Team’s united; there’s

No mutiny on bounty.

But still, no Captain.

 New York Jets

Should have signed Owens

And Moss and Ochocinco.

Would be great TV.

New York Giants

They look weak compared

To the Eagles and Cowboys.

Like they did last year.

Oakland

How’ll the West be won?

I don’t know, but it will not

Be by the Raiders.

Philadelphia

Unpredictable

They always surprise people.

Not this year–sixth seed.

Pittsburgh

They tried to Ward off

The ravages of time, but

It’s caught up to them.

San Diego

I think that Turner

Could lose all sixteen games and

Still not get fired.

San Francisco

Will regress a lot

And still win their division

But not NFC.

Seattle

Weird new uniforms

Make them the NFL’s Ducks:

Good, but not elite.

St. Louis

Could surprise some teams,

But Braford’s injury prone.

Can’t beat the Niners.

Tampa Bay

Like the G-Man says:

“Rise and Shine, Mr. Freeman”.

Wrong man in right place.

Tennessee

They appear destined

For second in division

And missing playoffs.

Washington

Griffin next Newton.

Puts up good numbers, but fails

To win seven games.

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This is awesome.  It’s like the sort of thing I would have wanted to do as a kid, except that I would have become frustrated and given up after one section.  But this fan, one Robert J. Hall, saw it through to the end.  There’s an article about him and a photo gallery of his project here.

Now, if only he could build a really good, life-size, moving #2 wide-receiver, we’d be all set this year.  He could use “Mindstorms” to program in the routes to run.  It’d be great.