Bob Lobel: Using Sports as a Distraction

By Bob Lobel (@boblobel)

This would have been a terrific old-time Patriots win to be enjoyed by all north of Hartford, but the French Connection held the world's attention, and still will long after the Patriots move onto the next arena. 

On the game, I'll be short but sweet. There was only one time while watching that I thought the Patriots would win: When Gostkowski's final kick did not veer off the road at the last 10 feet. 

That’s when I knew they would win that very entertaining mid season game. The game was a perfect example of what sports should be- a diversion from the bad stuff. 

NFL Week 10 Primer (With Picks): Halfway Done

Can Arizona wrangle Russell Wilson and the Seahawks to seize control of the NFC West?

  By Jeremy Conlin (@jeremy_conlin) and Joe Parello (@HerewegoJoe)

At some point last Sunday, the NFL season officially hit the halfway mark. Every team has played at least eight games. Some have played nine.

The cream is starting to rise to the top, at least in the AFC. The Patriots, Bengals, and Broncos, based on their current records and the strength of their divisions, have all but wrapped up playoff berths, barring an epic, near-unprecedented collapse. (Football Outsiders lists all three as having a better than 90 percent chance of winning their divisions).

Indianapolis seems to remain the favorite in the South, if only by default, and a handful of other teams - New York, Buffalo, Miami, Pittsburgh, Oakland - will be left to duke it out for two Wild Card spots. You could try to talk yourself into Baltimore, Houston, or Kansas City, but you'd be very stupid.

The NFC is murkier. The only team with a real stranglehold on their division is Carolina, but really only because Atlanta has stumbled of late, and their 5-0 start may have been a mirage. The East and the West are both totally up for grabs, and the NFC North suddenly finds itself with a tie atop the division between Green Bay and Minnesota. The Packers are still the favorites (and a Week 17 head-to-head at Lambeau Field with the Vikings tilts the scales even more), but Minnesota's easy schedule should continue to benefit them.

Don't expect much separation to occur this weekend - only two games feature teams competing for (potentially) the same playoff spot, and one of them occurred Thursday night. As for the other one, it's one of our games of the week.

Game(s) of The Week

New England at New York Giants (4:25 p.m. Sunday, CBS)

New England is obviously the class of the AFC East, and probably the favorite to take the conference crown. The Giants are certainly in the mix in the NFC East, and have proven time and again that, once in the playoffs, they're capable of making inexplicable runs to the Lombardi trophy. These aren't your slightly-older-brother's Giants' teams - there isn't much of a pass rush, and they don't throw deep. Their success stems from short timing routes to quick, shifty receivers.

Kind of like, you know, the Patriots.

Joe & Daphne's Preview: The NFC East

Us working hard on these NFL previews.

By Joe Parello (@HerewegoJoe) and Daphne Parello (@DaphnePup)

Monday we took an in-depth look at the AFC East, and today we turn our sights to the NFC East where Dallas, Philadelphia and New York all have legitimate playoff hopes, but also questions to answer in the early days of training camp.

The division is still the home of reigning rushing champion DeMarco Murray, but the 1,800-yard rusher has taken his talents from Big D to Philly, where offensive guru Chip Kelly has had one of the most interesting off-seasons in recent memory. The Giants are also in a period of transition, as they welcome back Victor Cruz to play next to instant star Odell Beckham Jr. at receiver, and bring in former Patriots running back Shane Vereen to make life even easier for Eli Manning.

One thing that hasn't changed: Robert Griffin III and Jay Gruden are still paired and probably hating each other. How will this confrontational relationship between quarterback and coach work out for Washington this season? If you know the recent history of this franchise, I think you can guess.

Without further ado, here are our thoughts on the NFC East.

Long And Suite Preview: The NFC East

The Cheerleaders might be the only appealing part of Dallas' season in 2014.

By Jeremy Conlin (@jeremy_conlin) and Joe Parello (@HerewegoJoe)

The NFC East. All the prestige. None of the results.

The failures of the blue bloods of the NFC North can at least be explained by injuries - Aaron Rodgers, the entire Chicago defense - the NFC East doesn't really have an excuse. They were just bad.

The Cowboys continued their annual tradition of entering Week 17 with an opportunity to win their division. But for the third straight year, against the third different opponent in three years, the Cowboys lost, awarding their opponent the NFC East title. So if you believe in destiny, the Redskins will be the 2014 NFC East champions - they're the ones with the fortune of playing the Cowboys (at home) in Week 17.

Has it Been 10 Years Already? The 2004 NFL Draft Revisited

Yeah, it's definitely been 10 years. Look how skinny Roethlisberger (right) is. Eli (left) looks about the same.

By Joe Parello (@HerewegoJoe)

Actually, it's been 10 years and one day since the first round of the 2004 draft, and what a first round it was.

The 2004 edition of the draft is memorable for a few reasons, not the least of which is it being the first draft to feature two quarterbacks that would go on to win multiple Super Bowls as starters.

That's right, not even the legendary quarterback class of 1983, featuring Hall of Famers John Elway, Dan Marino and Jim Kelly can match this group. The 2004 draft was also the quickest draft to ever produce two Super Bowl winning quarterbacks, only taking four years to do so, and it was the obviously the same two guys.

March Mascot Melee™: Round One of the NFL Bracket

Steely McBeam is just the worst.

By Joe Parello  @HerewegoJoe

We got our mascot tournament going yesterday with the top mascots from the MLB and the NBA.

Today, we bust out the big guns and tackle the hardest hitting mascots in the National Football League. Check out our bracket below.

The Top-10 Super Bowls in NFL History

For historic plays and dramatic finishes, Super Bowl XLIII is tough to beat, but is it No. 1 on our list?

By Joe Parello  @HerewegoJoe

By now you're surely ready for Super Bowl Sunday, and what should be a fantastic game between Denver and Seattle.

Like we mentioned earlier this week, Sunday's game will be a Super Bowl like no other, but that doesn't necessarily mean it will be remembered as one of the best in league history.

So, which games are the 10 best Super Bowls ever? Are they the games with the most history on the line? The ones with the most drama? The ones featuring the most legendary players?

Well, they are all of those things and more. Check out our slideshow below for my Top-10, and click on the picture in each slide if you want highlights from that game.

Why Your Favorite NFC Team Will Make the Super Bowl Next Year

Now that they've re-signed their apathetic, humorously smoking quarterback, the Bears are THIS CLOSE to the Super Bowl.

By Joe Parello (@HerewegoJoe) and Jeremy Conlin (jeremy_conlin)

Yesterday we told you how every team in the AFC can make the Super Bowl.

For realz. Joe even came up with an elaborate Tebow-Vick two-quarterback system for the Jaguars, and had Johnny Manziel leading a perennial bottom-dweller to Super Sunday.

Jeremy, on the other hand, thought the Raiders were in such bad shape, that coming up with a fictional scenario where they made the Super Bowl was not something he was prepared to do.

You can check out that article here. Now, join us once again as we brighten your day and let you know why you're favorite NFC team is TOTALLY making the Super Bowl next year.

NFL Week 12 Primer - The Home Stretch

Tom Brady and Peyton Manning square off yet again this week.

By Jeremy Conlin (@jeremy_conlin) and Joe Parello (@HerewegoJoe)

By the time Week 12 rolls around, the playoff picture usually becomes clearer. Not this year. The 2013 NFL playoff picture (or is it the 2014 NFL playoff picture because the playoffs will occur in 2014? This crap always confuses me - it's really the biggest upside baseball has, that the season is contained within one year) is murky and only getting murkier. 

Somehow, in Week 12, there are only two teams in each conference that seem 100% safe in reaching the playoffs - the 9-1 Broncos and 9-1 Chiefs in the AFC, and the 10-1 Seahawks and 9-2 Saints in the NFC. You'd think that the first-place Patriots in the AFC East would have separated from the pack by now, but if they lose to Denver Sunday night, and the Jets pick up a road win over the struggling Ravens (not out of the question), the Jets would suddenly be just a game back of the Patriots. The 7-3 Colts atop the AFC South have to travel to play the suddenly-frisky Cardinals on the road, and still have road games against Cincinnati and Kansas City.

And don't even get me started on the AFC Wild Card. One of the NFC West teams will grab the 5th seed (and will probably be 13-3 or 14-2 in the process). The other? Really, just roll a die. The Jets and Dolphins "lead" the way at 5-5, and then after that it's like Oprah's favorite things.

The Steelers are 4-6! The Ravens are 4-6! The Browns are 4-6! The Titans are 4-6! The Chargers are 4-6! The Raiders are 4-6! EVERYBODY IS FOUR AND SIIIIIIXXXXX!!!!

NFL Week 8 Primer - How To Pick Games Without Watching Them

Only Peyton Manning has thrown more TD passes than Dallas scapegoat Tony Romo this year.

 By Jeremy Conlin (@jeremy_conlin) and Joe Parello (@HerewegoJoe)

Joe's wedding this past weekend threw a large (but quite lovely) monkey wrench into football viewing this week. I drove south from Mt. Washington and arrived home just in time to see my beloved Patriots lose in embarrassing fashion. I was too thoroughly exhausted to watch any late afternoon games (although I hear Joe's Steelers came up with a win), and I barely managed to sit on the couch with a glazed look on my face as Indianapolis upset Denver.

For this reason, we didn't have our usual "Good, Bad, and Ugly" recap on Tuesday morning - it's hard for us to talk about things that happened over the weekend if we didn't see any of those things happen. So this week's picks will be interesting. How will we handicap games when we basically have no idea about how these teams performed in their last game? We'll just make it up and hope we're on the right track. Ironically, this is basically what we do even when we HAVE watched football all weekend. Let's see if it makes any difference.

NFL Week 6 Primer - The Worst Teams and Worst Games (With Picks)

Much has been made of the Jaguars' terrible start, but there's been a lot of "Manning Face" going on in New York.

 By Jeremy Conlin (@jeremy_conlin) and Joe Parello (@HerewegoJoe)

Five weeks of games starts to give us a pretty good sample size to work with. This is not to say that we know everything we will ever need to know after five weeks, simply because every week we'll have a more reliable sample size than the week before, but five weeks is still pretty good.

It's good enough that we can start to talk about how good (and how bad) certain teams REALLY are. And through five weeks, the Jaguars are REALLY bad. The phrase "historically bad" gets thrown about a lot (in this space included), but, as it turns out, they really are historically bad. The nifty metric SRS (Simple Rating System - an easy amalgam of scoring margin and strength of schedule) scores the Jaguars as a -18.4. That's the worst score in the league since the 1976 Tampa Bay "Yucks," who scored at -19.7.

Weekend Football Roundup - The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

Plenty of QBs put up huge numbers this weekend, but perhaps nobody scored a bigger win than Andrew Luck in Indy's come-from-behind victory over Seattle.

 By Jeremy Conlin (@jeremy_conlin) and Joe Parello (@HerewegoJoe)

Every Tuesday during football season, editors Jeremy and Joe will bring you the good, the bad and the ugly from the college and pro football weekend that was.

The Good

Quarterbacks in Losing Efforts

Among quarterbacks not named Peyton Manning, there's a strong argument to be made that the three best performances from quarterbacks in Week 5 came from losing teams. Manning's counterpart, the tragic figure of Tony Romo, threw for over 500 yards at an obscene clip of 14.1 yards per attempt. He added five touchdown passes (and one ill-timed interception that was more bad luck than bad football) and some of the most precise throws seen all season. Joining Romo among the losers was Jay Cutler (24-33, 358 yards, 2 TDs, 128.1 Passer Rating), who out-dueled his more-acclaimed opponent in Drew Brees (29-35, 288 yards, 2 TDs, 120.0 Rating), and Matt Ryan, who had an exemplary performance on Monday night, completing 36 of 45 passes for 319 yards and two scores, including a late touchdown drive that included two 4th-down conversions to take a 28-27 lead that was eventually squandered by a porous Atlanta defense.

-JC

Weekend Football Roundup - The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

Peyton Manning: Still good at football.

 By Jeremy Conlin (@jeremy_conlin) and Joe Parello (@HerewegoJoe) 

Every Tuesday during football season, editors Jeremy and Joe will bring you the good, the bad and the ugly from the college and pro football weekend that was. 

The Good

Carolina's Front Seven

It's hard to say how much they had to do with the absolute dismantling of the Giants that took place Sunday afternoon, considering this is the third straight week in which the Giants have appeared to be firing bullets into their own cleats, but in any event, the Panthers' defensive front dominated this game from start to finish.

Even despite a depleted secondary, the Giants were held to just 90 net passing yards (thanks to seven sacks of Eli Manning) and at no point in the game did it appear that the Giants were capable of moving the ball. Their only "positive" play was a seventeen yard would-be touchdown run by David Wilson that only occurred because Will Beatty bear-hugged the defender in front of him, and the only reason they had the ball in that position was because their defense forced a turnover. Carolina's front seven spent more time in New York's backfield than they did on the other side of the line of scrimmage. Considering they also did it Week 1 against Seattle (who beat up San Francisco's front last week) makes me think it's not a coincidence.

-JC

Miami/Kansas City 

Seriously, they're both 3-0. Go ahead, you can look it up, I'll wait.

The Official NFL Week 2 Primer (With Picks)

Russell Wilson hopes to put Seattle at the top of the NFC West with a win over San Francisco. (Flickr)

By Jeremy Conlin (@jeremy_conlin) and Joe Parello (@HerewegoJoe)

Welcome to Overreaction Weekend.

Everyone went into the season with pre-conceived notions, and many of them were trashed in Week 1. Both of us feel it - we were both under .500 by a good clip in our Week 1 picks. Week 2 is a balancing act - you have to really weigh how much one game really matters, and even beyond that, you have to weigh both sides of the coin. For instance - a lot of people picked the Colts to regress, and a lot of people expected Oakland to be one of the worst teams in the league. So when the Raiders cover a 10-point spread against Indianapolis (and almost win the game outright), does that mean the "Colts Regression" camp was right, or does it mean the "Oakland Sucks" camp was wrong? Or is it both? Or is it neither, and the game was just a fluke? It's only one week, so nobody knows for sure.

In other words, let the overreactions begin.

Weekend Football Roundup - The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

There are already a few NCAA coaches on the hot seat. Lane Kiffin might be one of them.

By Jeremy Conlin (@jeremy_conlin) and Joe Parello (@HerewegoJoe)

Every Tuesday during football season, editors Jeremy and Joe will bring you the good, the bad and the ugly from the college and pro football weekend that was.

The Good

Peyton Manning

He threw for seven touchdowns and zero interceptions. That is all.

-JP

Chip Kelly, LeSean McCoy, Michael Vick, DeSean Jackson, Brent Celek, and Everything Else Involving Philadelphia's First Half Offense

After seeing one game, I think it's safe to say that Chip Kelly is the best coach in NFL History. Any objections? No? Okay good.

Long and Suite Preview: The NFC East

Will RGIII be healthy enough to deliver more memorable moments in 2013?

By Jeremy Conlin (@jeremy_conlin) and Joe Parello (@HerewegoJoe)

Unlike the AFC East and its year-to-year domination by the New England Patriots, the NFC East is arguably the most volatile division in the league. In fact, the last four years have seen a different division winner each time (Washington in 2012, New York in 2011, Philadelphia in 2010, and Dallas in 2009). Every team has occupied every spot in the standings over the last four years except one - the Giants have never finished last.

At first glance, it would seem like the Giants have had a disproportionate amount of success in comparison to the rest of the division, and considering their 2012 Super Bowl win, that may actually be the case. But it's important to remember that the Giants have two seasons of missing the playoffs entirely sandwiching that Super Bowl year.

In other words, it's up for grabs.

2013: A Draft Mockery

By Joe Parello  @HerewegoJoe

I'm not going to lie, as much as I love the NFL Draft, I like mock drafts even more.

Not that the first round of the draft isn't captivating television. In fact, it is probably far too interesting considering that it isn't even an actual sporting event. But still, the draft moves at a snail's pace, and the only thing that can keep your attention is when somebody falls down the board like a rock.

Aaron Rodgers comes to mind, and I guess it's probably even more fun when the guy who falls is going to suck, like Brady Quinn. Either way, unless there's a huge compelling trade that swaps a ton of picks and significant players, there isn't much to do between picks other than talk about who is losing money and stare at Mel Kiper's hair.

Well, sit idly by no more, because I bring you 2013: A Draft Mockery, complete with free falling players, fake dead girlfriends and mocking descriptions of team needs.

Most of them aren't that clever.