The NFL is already the best game in town. In a thousand ways, football is a superior sport, and pro football is an especially superior product. Clearly it is America’s game in every respect. And the final chapter of the NFL’s 2011 season was a microcosm of all that is great about the league and the game. What a weekend!
Three teams were playing under interim head coaches on Sunday -- Jacksonville, Miami, and Kansas City -- and all three of them won. Moreover, two of those unlikely winners beat teams that were playing for their playoff lives.
The Patriots spotted the Bills what seemed like an insurmountable lead, only to come roaring back and prove that for them it was very surmountable, indeed.
The Jets completely choked away their playoff opportunity, losing by 2 in Miami. Do you remember Richard Nixon’s infamous line: “I am not a crook”? Now we can add to it Rex Ryan’s postgame insistence: “I am not a loser.”
And it was a rough day for the Ryan boys all the way around. Rob gets a ton of attention -- more than Jason Garrett, the TV and radio talk guys always say -- yet his reputation is greater than his accomplishments. The Cowboys went down in flames, while the Giants managed to get the job done in the end one more time. Is there any other coach who moves so frequently within in a single season from hot-seat to hero as Tom Coughlin?
The lackluster Bucs practically hand-delivered Raheem Morris’ pink slip. The Falcons and Saints both demonstrated tremendous firepower. And the Colts’ locked up the first pick in the 2012 NFL Draft, guaranteeing that the Manning-vs.-Luck debate will dominate the conversation throughout the month of March.
And then there was the Lions’ visit to Green Bay.
The Packers had nothing to play for, which was evidenced by McCarthy’s choice to hold back several key starters, including especially Aaron Rodgers. And, in the early going, the Packers looked like a team with nothing to play for: boy, what an ugly start!
Since perfection was no longer a possibility, I wouldn’t have minded a loss. But a humiliation, an embarrassment -- that would have been bad news going into the playoffs. And that is what it looked like we were giving birth to throughout the early minutes of the first quarter.
In the end, though, Matt Flynn’s epic performance made everyone forget about the ugliness and failure with which the game began.
Of course, a 6-TD, 400+ yard day should have more of a sense of triumph. The way last Sunday’s game unfolded, though, it was no so much triumph as relief. The Lions played us nearly point-for-point. And while Bobby Brady Stafford didn’t put up 6 TD passes, he threw for over 500 yards. Defensively, the game was a real debacle.
But then, as I’ve watched a few college bowl games this past week, it seems that defense is going out of style all around. Perhaps next Monday’s BCS National Championship game will be a refreshing change of pace, in this regard. Perhaps LSU or Alabama will prove that defense still wins championships.
Let’s hope that’s not necessarily true in the NFL, though. In an almost unbelievable bit of who’d-have-guessed symmetry, the top seed in the NFC (Green Bay) and the top seed in the AFC (New England) are, statistically, the worst and next-to-worst defenses in the NFL. Crazy stuff. Will explosive offense continue to compensate for pathetic defense all the way to the Super Bowl…?
Well, more about that as we look ahead at the playoff match-ups in the next post.
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