Sunday posts

1:00-Second batch of games about to start up. Carolina-Minnesota is the only game still close. Minnesota has the ball in a tie game with 2 minutes to go. New Orleans scored two quick TD's to put Green Bay away. Giants just got within three points.

12:43-The focus of the talking heads this next week will be on how bad Miami looked, but Buffalo may have a surprising defense. They're young and fast, and they gave New England a ton of problems in the first half last week.

Minnesota and Green Bay have tied up their games. Cleveland's got it down to ten. I'm going to be pissed if they hang around and cover. I would love if Oakland could get a cheap TD to cover though. That's a problem with picking favorites with double-digit spreads. If a good team doesn't run up the score to pad stats, ala Peyton Manning and Indianapolis, a shitty team can hang around in a game that isn't at all close and get a cheap cover at the end, something that is just infuriating.

I'm really interested to see if Rex Grossman is for real against a solid team. If he's even above-average, then the Bears are an elite team with that defense. It's too bad that he is such an injury caveat. At least they have Griese this year, instead of drunken Kyle Orton.

12:19-Scratch Andrew Walters semi-competency. Oakland might not score an offensive touchdown this year. They just gave up a safety to go down 15. Their defense is actually looking pretty good, but their offense redefines ineptitude. The only question remaining is who's after Walter, Tui or Jeff George?

I'm not sold on Baltimore's defense. They're going to have to stop a real NFL offense before I'm a believer.

Carolina's really struggling to move the ball without Steve Smith. DeShaun Foster still sucks.

Tampa's going to bench Chris Simms soon. He looks terrible. Ron Mexico and Warrick Dunn are both over 100 yards.

11:54-I missed this, but apparently Aaron Brooks is injured, and Oakland has brought in Andrew Walters, who looks semi-competent. I don't think I'm quite ready for the Aaron Brooks era to end. That crashing noise you just heard was the Miami Dolphins Superbowl bandwagon careening off a cliff. They're down 13-0 to Buffalo, late third quarter. That's the quickest bandwagon calamity since Arizona's of last year. Philly is now up 24-7 on the Giants. I feel sorry for the Giants. They've got a good team, but a killer schedule. Detroit's scored finally. I don't think Atlanta even needs to throw the ball. They just just go to a Wing-T and get it over with. Last thoughts: I think something terrible happened on the Vikings sex cruise last year, something unspeakably horrible. That's the only way to explain the quarterback formerly known as Daunte Culpepper. This is just sad. When do the calls for Joey Harrington start?

11:43-Philly adds a field goal, New Orleans a TD, Baltimore a TD, all games to the half.

11:24-Early games all nearing halftime. Atlanta, Chicago, Cincy, and Indy up by double digits. Green Bay up six, Buffalo up three, Carolina up four, Philly by a touchdown, and Baltimore up six and driving. Chicago looks really fucking good, but I think they may also be a difficult team to read because of their schedule/division.

10:32-The Green Bay-New Orleans game feels like one of those games where Brett Favre goes for about 350 yards and 3 TD's, and leaves the field to a standing ovation, followed by a week of Madden, Joe Buck, Peter King, Joe Thiesmann, et al., fellating him in word, both verbal and written, saying how he still has something left in the tank, how Green Bay might be a sleeper in the NFC North with him at the helm, etc., to then have Favre come out next week and throw 3 horrid interceptions across his body into triple coverage. In fact, I know this will happen, and I plan on enjoying it. Why? Because I'm not a good person. In other news, it looks like Ron Mexico might run for about 200 yards on Tampa. I like when talking heads say that Tampa will be able to contain Vick because they have in the past, as if roster turnover and the effects of aging are non-existent in the NFL.

10:21-Indy leads Houston 14-0 with 8:17 to go in the first quarter. At their current pace, Indy should win about 115-0. I think this might actually happen. Green Bay's up 10-0 already, Giants up 7-0 with Philly in the red zone, and Chicago and Cincinnati are both up 7-0 and driving.