Bleacher Report - Articles by sam briggs

2009 NFL Playoffs

sam briggs — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 17:49:29 -0500

The new year is on the horizon and that can mean only one thing.

NFL Playoffs.

That's right, the playoffs are back, and it should be a pretty good one. Granted some good teams were left out, but this is a very talented group of teams and should be a good month of football.

Wild card Weekend

Miami(3) vs Baltimore(6)

This match up intrigues me more than most of the others. Despite the fact that Baltimore handily defeated the Fins early this season, I think this game is going to be determined less by X's and O's and more by some other factors on the field. The Dolphins have a bunch of momentum coming into this game and they have one of the feelgood stories of the year playing in Chad Pennington. Besides, rookie QBs historically don't have great playoff performances. I like Flacco a lot, but I'm gonna have to take the Fins in low scoring game

Miami 17, Baltimore 7

Indianapolis(5) at San Diego(4)

First of all, let me start out by saying how ridiculous it is that an 8-8 team will be the HOME team against a 12-4 team in the Playoffs. It's ridiculous an 8-8 team got in over an 11-5 team, and this needs to be fixed. Sorry, had to get that out of my system, but now let me get back to the game. San Diego has had Indy's number for the last few years and their D has always had its way with Manning. I expect for that to continue and I think that San Diego's offense will continue to thrive against this Indy D.

San Diego 41, Indianapolis 37

Atlanta(5) at Arizona(4)

I know early I talked about how rookie QBs usually don't play well in their first playoff experience, but this game is against Arizona, and Matt Ryan will have no problem with them. Atlanta will use a a balanced attack of Matt Ryan to Roddy White, and then have Turner and Norwood run right by them.

Atlanta 38, Arizona 14

Philadelphia(6) at Minnesota(3)

This is a hard one to pick because both teams have been playing well lately in my opinion. If Minnesota hadn't have fumbled the game away against Atlanta, I'm sure a lot of people would have a much rosier view of the team. Jackson isn't a very consistent QB but he has been playing much better lately. But their opponent has been much hotter. Philly is riding into this game after absolutely demolishing the Cowboys. Another interesting fact is the Eagles have beaten the Giants, Falcons, Cardinals, and Steelers. They went 4-2 against teams that are in the playoffs. That is a very good record, and i Think that the Eagles will win this one. They will lose if they call 75% pass plays though.

Eagles 31, Vikings 10

Divisional Round

Philadelphia(6) at New York(3)

This is a game that the Eagles are going to show up ready for and that will be the difference right there. The Giants have really started to play worse later in the season and I think the bye week is going to mess them up. Philly is gonna come out and play them like they did in the week 14 and the defending Super Bowl Champs are gonna be going home early this year.

Eagles 24, Giants 13

Carolina(2) vs Atlanta(5)

This is where the dream story of the Atlanta Falcons is going to end. Carolina just has too much for the Falcons. The defense will dominate Matt Ryan and force him into just enough mistakes to give them the game. Carolina will also dominate the time of possession battle with the duo of Smash and Dash. It will be a one-sided affair and it will set up an oh so familiar NFC championship game.

Carolina 27, Atlanta 10

Pittsburgh(2) vs Miami(3)

Miami has had a wonderful season but that wildcat formation will not play out well against the number 1 defense in the league. The Steelers will be able to contain Ronnie Brown and Ricky Williams unlike some other defenses they have played this year. Miami has not seen a D like this yet, and they will not win this game on momentum alone. The Steelers are a lot better than the Ravens, and they have an experienced QB, barring that Big Ben will actually play. If Roethlisberger doesn't play, they don't win. Leftwich is good, but there is a reason he is a back-up.

Steelers 20, Miami 9

San Diego(4) at Tennessee(1)

San Diego will be coming into this game on a 5 game win steak, and they'll make it 6 with a win over Tennessee. I know everyone is still talking about LenDale White stomping on the Terrible Towel; well that won't come back to bite White in the butt, because they won't even get a rematch against the Steelers. I like the match-up of Rivers vs the Titans D, and I don't believe that Titans are good enough on offense to keep up with Rivers' high-paced squad. The Chhhhhhhargers advance to the AFC Championship again.

Chargers 38, Titans 17

Championship Weekend

Philadelphia(6) at Carolina(2)

Well this game sure brings back memories. It is a rematch of the '03 and '04 NFC Championship games. Each team won one of them, but both ended up losing in the Superbowl to the Pats. But this year it will be two very hot teams and I believe that Carolina will be heading to the Superbowl. The Panthers have a good defense, a solid two back system, and a decent game managing QB. The Eagles are a very good team, but they don't have enough to get past this excellent Panthers team.

Panthers 44, Eagles 27

San Diego(4) at Pittsburgh(2)

Pittsburgh is better fitted for this game than the Chargers. It is a January game in Pittsburgh, and those are the kind of games that the Steelers pride themselves on. The Chargers have been dependen't on Rivers arm during this season, with a little help from Sproles. Sproles is gonna be ineffective against a defense that is a run stopping machine, and LT won't be much better. I'm no weather man but I'm guessing it is going to be cold, maybe some snow, and that is not Philip Rivers kind of weather. Pitt wins an old fashion defensive shootout.

Steelers 10, San Diego 3

Superbowl Sunday!

Carolina vs Pittsburgh

Carolina's and Pittsburgh's offenses match up about evenly, but the old saying "Defense wins Championships" will be the deciding factor. Pittsburgh's D is statistically the best in the league and they're one of the scariest to see in person. Like I have been saying, Pittsburgh's Defense is dominate against the run, and that is what has been carrying Carolina. If Pittsburgh can continue doing what they do best, they will be the first team to reach 6 Super Bowl Championships ever.

Steelers 27, Panthers 17

New England Patriots Are Through to the Playoffs!

sam briggs — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 15:59:07 -0500

Breaking news out of Miami! The Miami Dolphins have decided out of the goodness of their hearts that they are going to donate one of their wins to the Winless Detroit Lions. By doing this they have given Detroit their first win of the season and they have also put the Patriots through to the playoffs.

The Miami Dolphins had won the AFC East with their win over the Jets, finishing with an 11-5 record, and won the tiebreaker over New England with a better conference record. But at 11:30 tonight the Miami Dolphins Head Coach, Tony Sporano, decided that it would be nice to give Detroit one of their wins.

When they did this they went from 11-5 to 10-6, and the Lions went from 0-16 to 1-15. When Sparano approached commissioner Godell with this situation, the commissioner was very unsure at first but he soon gave in.

"It was a hard decision and I had to look deep in the rule book, but I finally came across the ruling, and I decided to let Transaction proceed," Commissioner Godell said moments ago.

Dan Orvlosky, The Lions QB, said that he was very grateful that Miami would do such a thing. Orvlosky talked about the horrible season and expressed interest in coming to Miami. The Dolphins were not that nice though.

Rod Marinelli was also very grateful. "This move was very nice of Sparano, and might have just saved my job. I think this is exactly the spark we need going into the playoffs." After one reporter told him that The Lions were not going to the playoffs, Marinelli resigned.

The one player that is the saddest about this decision isn't even on the Dolphins team. Travis Fisher of the Lions had vowed that if they won he would walk all the way home. Well they might have not beaten Green Bay but they do have a win so his teammates decided to make him stay true to his word.

"I was trying to talk my way out of it, I even told them about my concussion last week, and bout' how I was thinking straight and all, but they wouldn't listen to me and they sent me hiking," said Fisher.

Back to the earlier mention about how the Patriots are now in the playoffs. Patriots players were extremely happy. Bill Belichick even got in on the smiles and laughter of the team. The Patriots now are preparing for their game against Baltimore later this week.

BCS: My Perspective On The System So Many Hate

sam briggs — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 06:35:37 -0500

Probably the most controversial system in sports at the moment. Sure it has a lot of setbacks, no playoffs, teams feeling left out and no respect for the non-BCS programs, but it also has its advantages, most exciting regular season in all of sports, and huge bowl games.

I see a change the need for a change in the system though because the negatives heavily outweigh the positives.

Let's start with the biggest negative of the BCS system, teams that clearly should have a chance to fight for a national championship get left out in the rain.

For all of the people that say, "hey, well, they should have played better in the regular season," that's not a very good argument. First of all, if teams are afraid of losing one game during the season, than that makes teams schedule the easier teams, instead of taking chances against the higher-tier teams. That right helps destroy the notion that without the BCS, the regular season wont be as exciting.

On the contrary, the opposite is true. If the league enables teams to take some more shots at the better opponents. Imagine a season where we see match ups like, USC-Florida, Ohio State-Alabama, or Oklahoma-Florida. Those three match ups right there are enough for me.

Also lets look at a team that can talk about being left out in the rain. Texas has had a great season, and have only lost one game.

That one game was to a Top Ten team, Texas Tech. But they wont be playing in the big game come January, even though they beat one of the teams that will be playing in it, Oklahoma.

That's right, Texas beat Oklahoma, 45-35, at the Cotton Bowl, and they both have the same record, but Oklahoma will most likely be playing for the National Championship while Texas will have to settle for another BCS Bowl game.

Another team that will be left out of the picture is the USC Trojans. The Trojans are being punished for not having a good enough offense though.

Just because the Trojans cant put 60 on the board in five straight games, they can't play for a National Championship. They do, however, possess the best defense in the Nation. That's right, I said the best defense in the nation.

That is another problem with the BCS, they reward teams for having prolific offenses, but if you have a brick wall defence then they just kind of look through it. The other big problem is that the BCS just doesn't like non-BCS teams.

Sure, Utah might not have played the best teams, but they won all of their games, and deserve a chance to play for the National Championship. Same goes for Boise State. Both of those teams should have a chance in a playoff scenario to fight for a Championship.

In my mind the Playoffs would be set up something like this. 16 team format, 11 automatic bids for the 11 Conference Champions. Some of teams that got bids might not be very worthy, but it still gives everyone a chance, and it gives the better teams easier games in the first round, which would mean doing good in the regular season would still be important.

The other five spots would go to the top five non-Conference Champion teams in the AP Poll. That still might cause controversy, but it would be much better than what we have at the moment.

Patriots Depth at RB Keeps the Offense a Runnin

sam briggs — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 15:11:32 -0500

This year is just a bit different from the offensive explosion we saw coming out of the Northeast last year. First off, the almighty Tom Brady is not on the field, and to add to the strain, Laurence Maroney is also on IR. The Patriots' passing game has been decent, but the reason for that is the running back core.

Even without Laurence Maroney, New England has a very modest group of RB's. Sammy Morris, Kevin Faulk, and BenJarvus Green-Ellis are those three special players. Morris has been riddled with injuries throughout the seasons, but when he has been in, he has shown great.

BenJarvus Green-Ellis is only a rookie, but when the Pats have given him playing time, he has played great. He has really shown some of that power that the other two backs lack. He has the ability to help convert those short distance situations that the Pats had trouble with (San Diego game, goal line stand). Then there is Kevin Faulk.

Faulk is a long time Patriot, one of the few players left from the 90's. Faulk has been a huge part in the three Super Bowl runs that the Pats had. He is also having a big role in this season, where he has become a key component on the 2008 Patriots' offense. He is primarily a third down back, but he can do so much more. He is a RB, WR, kick returner, punt returner, and sometimes even QB (ha-ha).

But in all seriousness, Kevin Faulk can run the ball out of the shotgun very effectively, and he is just as effective when coming out of the backfield, either getting open or drawing multiple defenders towards him. He also has showed up in key moments in close games.

In the San Fran game, he caught the game winning TD in the end zone. Most recently during the Steelers game, I believe that Faulk was one of the few players that actually showed up ready to play. As I watched Moss drop a perfect pass 30 yards down field with no one within 10 yards of him, the next play Faulk leaped up high in the air with defenders about to nail him, and he made the dangerous reach up catch.

If the Pats are going to make the playoffs, everyone needs to keep playing hard, but they need to include Kevin in more plays, because he is the playmaker of that team at the moment (little weird saying that about a team with Randy Moss on it).

There is also the issue of what to do with Maroney. He is signed through 2010 to play with the Patriots. Should the team keep him though? Sure he has played good, only when he has played though. He has been bugged with a reoccurring shoulder injury. Does the talent outweigh the injury risk? This is the question we are left to ponder. If you would have to ask me, I would say that unless he goes through the '09 season injury free, he'll be gone. You never know in the NFL though, especially with the Hoodie.