NFL WEEK 1

[mauchow]

Originally Posted by EagleFan

I think it was a bad interpretation of the rule but his arm was not under the ball when he hit the ground.

His arm was under the ball all the way to the ground... then his arm rolled around and that's when the ball fell out.

[EagleFan]

Actually, looking it up and I can only find references to this rule being about the "toe tap" out of bounds catch. It was an even worse interpretation of the rule in that case. That is even worse than a blown call, a call in which the ref didn't understand the rule. Kind of like looking at a replay to see if the receiver had both feet in the endzone instead of looking to see if the ball actually crossed the line on a play in the middle of the field (is this the same crew? ).

[remper]

The Raiders defense will keep them in a lot of games this year. However, their offense, Russell in particular, will do just enough to lose them the close games. How do they expect a linebacker to throw accurately?

[Pumpy Tudors]

I stopped watching the game at halftime because I'm going to bed soon. About the Oakland TD reversal, until I actually find the rule myself, I think the reversal was a good one. Then again, I also eat paste.

[remper]

Russell just found his strength. Lead blocker.

[RainMaker]

The Raiders don't look that bad. McFadden actually looks pretty solid and Bush is a good power back. Couple things that don't make sense:

Why don't they use Russell more on scrambles and rollouts where he can use his mobility?

Why don't they run more screens and flat passes instead of going downfield all the time?

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

Why don't they run more screens and flat passes instead of going downfield all the time?

Because Al Davis wants to throw the ball down the field like it's 1980.

[DataKing]

Originally Posted by Atocep

Because Al Davis wants to throw the ball down the field like it's 1980.

At least they stopped the "nothing but 7 step drops" thing that nearly got Andrew Walter killed a couple years back.

[DeToxRox]

This might be the worst played regular season NFL game I have ever seen, and this is coming from a Lions fan.

[Karlifornia]

Nice throw from Russell...Higgins just got blowd up

[Crapshoot]

Ouch. Poor guy. No "hard hitting" football bullshit; that is going to get someone killed.

[Jas_lov]

Wow.

[Radii]

whoa... two great throws out of nowhere for russell

[DeToxRox]

Great work by Chargers D there.

[Lathum]

SERIOUSLY cHARGERS?

[Karlifornia]

Holy shit what a borderline insane call to go for it, but it paid off!

[TroyF]

Forget the taping the Patriots do, what do they do to opposing teams brains when they play them? It seems like teams get a serious case of the stupids everytime they play the Patriots. I remember the Broncos on Monday night a few years ago. The Colts fumbling inside the 20 without being hit. It's incredible.

What is also incredible is how they take advantage of it every single time. You get stupid, you get burned when you play the Patriots. Every single time.

As for this second game, I'm in shock. Not so much that the Raiders look OK. With Seymour playing well and motivated, they kind of remind me of the Vikings of last year with a slightly worse running game. They have a solid D, good running backs, good TE and a horrific QB.

What shocks me is how bad the Chargers look. Leaving WR open all over the field. (as I type this they just got torched on a 4th and 15). They aren't getting any pressure on Russell at all, even when they bring five. They can't get any kind of running game going. They can't block. This is a team with Super Bowl aspirations and they are starting the season like they've already been annoited champions.

Looking on the 4th and 15 play on replay, it's stunning. Horrible pass rush. Horrible coverage. I really thought they'd be better this year.

[Crapshoot]

Only the Raiders could lose after a play like that.

[DeToxRox]

Only the Raiders would go into prevent against a team down to OL who they have abused all day.

[TroyF]

Originally Posted by Crapshoot

Only the Raiders could lose after a play like that.

Bengals fans are crying at that statement.

By the way, the Chargers are using the Madden '10 exploit of moving up the field now. Nothing but shallow crossing routes, throws to the running backs in the flat and quick passes to the slot receivers.

The Raiders need the patch to come out before they finish this drive off.

[Jas_lov]

San Diego will just keep throwing that drop off pass- Oakland LBs playing too deep.

[TroyF]

Why isn't Tomlinson in there? Because he's sucked tonight. That's why.

[Crapshoot]

Oh, Raiders LOL.

[Karlifornia]

Did anyone expect any different of a finish?

[Crapshoot]

That defense had more holes than Swiss Cheese. Just some brutal play-calling.

[Izulde]

what better sproles run or russell pass

[Jas_lov]

Plenty of time left to return a squib kick to midfield and then throw a Jamarcus bomb.

[Karlifornia]

LOL. In my fantasy league, the biggest shit talker was losing 99-98...until that San Diego INT on the hail mary. He wins 101-99

[DataKing]

If Gates doesn't get tackled at the 1-yard line in the first half, I lose my fantasy game by 1 pt. Thank you Oakland.

[RainMaker]

Originally Posted by TroyF

Why isn't Tomlinson in there? Because he's sucked tonight. That's why.

He had 13 carries for 55 yards (4.2 average). Much better than Sproles rushing the ball.

So is LT a backup now or what's going on?

[TroyF]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

He had 13 carries for 55 yards (4.2 average). Much better than Sproles rushing the ball.

So is LT a backup now or what's going on?

He didn't have a great deal of explosiveness. A few nice runs, a bunch of 2 yard jaunts where he didn't make anyone miss.

Sproles is the guy in the two minute offense.

I may have been hard on LT, but he just doesn't look like the LT of old to me and didn't impress me at all tonight.

[JediKooter]

Way to go with more uninspired play calling Norv Turner! 3rd and long...run. Surprise, surprise.

[Danny]

What awful playcalling at the end of the game. Not the player's fault. I am so disappointed. They played so hard and I haven't been this into a Raiders game in 6 years. I woke my wife up several times throughout the game with my yelling and other than watching sports I never yell.

[BishopMVP]

Originally Posted by molson

It's at the point now where I get nervous every time there's a sack - I wait for the flag.

Well, we all know Vince Wilfork is a dirty player. I loved Gruden - aka someone who will actually criticize the officials over that. But really, all game he and Jaws did a fantastic job - it'll be worth listening to MNF games now.

Pats defense is really awful. That's why I wasn't as fired up about the Seymour trade as others. They have to air it out more than they did tonight.

I disagree (on the latter part). We ended with 441 yards and were easily outgaining them even before the 2 comeback drives. We were down because of a missed FG, a phenomenal pick 6 and 2 missed 4th and shorts. You could see on a number of plays Brady was checking down (and Moss was running shorter routes) because the Bills defense was sending 2-deep every play. Plus, the ball-control short passing game is what we've used for a couple years now to hide out poor defense. For how bad it looked, we only gave up 277 yards and will slot in around 12th in yards allowed after week 1 mostly because we held the ball for so long and ran so many more plays.

Originally Posted by RainMaker

If the Pats had recovered that fumble by Jackson on the last play, I lose my fantasy game. Wondering how that's recorded in the stats.

I lost pretty brutally this week. Had Drew Brees and most the rest of my team did solid, so I had the 2nd most points, but my opponent had AP and the Eagles defense, so he ended up #1. The kicker is I was down 10 heading into tonight with Gostkowski going. 1st he misses from 41, then once I'm back to within 3 at the end the Pats miss the 2-pt conversion (which would have brought us to within 3 and a likely FG to tie), miss the 2nd 2-pt conversion (which would have put us up 3 and made a Buffalo FG send it to OT where we could have won on a Gostkowski FG and my win) and he somehow miraculously recovered the kickoff fumble, so I only ended up losing by 1 and would have won if we scored those TD's earlier and kicked the XP's. FML.

Originally Posted by RainMaker

Is it me or are virtually all the AFL uniforms much better than the current ones?

Certainly not the referees. Who ever decided that was a good color - I wanted to mess up the contrast on my TV just so they'd stop hurting my eyes.

[whomario]

anybody got a before/after stat for Brady completion percentage for like after the 1st or 2nd quarter ? I only saw the first half (time difference, 3 am at that point over here) As far as i can recall he started out pretty shaky/sloppy with a ton of missed passes (relatively speaking) only to end up 39-53 in the end for 378 yards. Not a bad return all in all, the ending obviously icing on the cake
What happened to the ground game though ? They started pretty good, the end of game numbers look pretty bad compared with what i saw ?

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by whomario

anybody got a before/after stat for Brady completion percentage for like after the 1st or 2nd quarter ? I only saw the first half (time difference, 3 am at that point over here) As far as i can recall he started out pretty shaky/sloppy with a ton of missed passes (relatively speaking) only to end up 39-53 in the end for 378 yards.

From the pbp, looks like he was 4/9 for 29 yds and 1 sack in the first quarter.
So 35/44 for 349 afterwards.

[Logan]

That Murphy call was right by the way. One angle showed it much better, but they never went back to it. Just another poor job by the whole broadcast.

[Galaxy]

Originally Posted by miami_fan

Good thing Dick Jauron is such a nice guy. If this were another head coach, he would not be on the flight to Buffalo.


EDIT: "he" being the kick returner.

Nah, Ralph Wilson will just give him another contract extentsion.

[wade moore]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

From the pbp, looks like he was 4/9 for 29 yds and 1 sack in the first quarter.
So 35/44 for 349 afterwards.

JiMGA siting..

Did you read through the whole thread from last night and see the discussion about Mike and Mike ratings?

[gstelmack]

Originally Posted by TroyF

By the way, the Chargers are using the Madden '10 exploit of moving up the field now. Nothing but shallow crossing routes, throws to the running backs in the flat and quick passes to the slot receivers.

The Raiders need the patch to come out before they finish this drive off.

You're stealing my material. I already pointed out that the first Trent Edwards TD was a clear cheese since he hit the TE in the flat who took it in for the score

But to your earlier point, yeah I don't know why teams will make that key mistake against the Pats. McKelvin just downs it in the endzone, they run out the clock, or at least eat up all the Pats' timeouts. Or once he does decide to run it out, slide when the Pats get near you, don't go for the extra yards.

Compare that to Brandon Stokely's play yesterday at the end of the Denver game where he ran along the endzone to burn an extra 7 seconds (about 1 play) off the clock before scoring. Two extremes on the spectrum.

The Bills played a great game aside from that one mistake, and even then nearly pulled it out with their own miracle drive until the sack killed their chances.

[gstelmack]

Originally Posted by whomario

anybody got a before/after stat for Brady completion percentage for like after the 1st or 2nd quarter ? I only saw the first half (time difference, 3 am at that point over here) As far as i can recall he started out pretty shaky/sloppy with a ton of missed passes (relatively speaking) only to end up 39-53 in the end for 378 yards. Not a bad return all in all, the ending obviously icing on the cake
What happened to the ground game though ? They started pretty good, the end of game numbers look pretty bad compared with what i saw ?

Early on Brady was not in synch with the receivers. Moss and Welker both dropped early passes, and Brady and Welker had a mixup on another incompletion where Welker basically just turned at the line of scrimmage and Brady through it downfield a hair expecting him to run forward a bit. He was also tentative on his knee; Jaworski was pointing out how he wasn't really planting the front foot and driving off it early but was late.

As for the running game, Buffalo did a real good job stuffing it with their interior line. There were some good runs early, but also some early blowups. Buffalo was playing very disciplined defense. What's funny is they were basically playing New Englad defense circa 2001-2004: bend-don't-break and stay disciplined. New England moved the ball early, but Buffalo stiffened when they had to and did not let them score. NED missed a pair of early 4th-and-short conversions for example that they usually pick up in their sleep.

[Samdari]

Originally Posted by miami_fan

Good thing Dick Jauron is such a nice guy. If this were another head coach, he would not be on the flight to Buffalo.


EDIT: "he" being the kick returner.

You do realize he'sone of the best players on the Bills, right?

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by wade moore

Did you read through the whole thread from last night and see the discussion about Mike and Mike ratings?

Must have missed it.

edit to add: Okay, found it I think.

No, I can't think of a single market I've ever seen where they lead in any demographic, but it's tough to blame them on that one since the format rarely reaches the upper echelons anyway. They are sometimes the highest rated sports talk show in the morning in some markets and off the top of my head they might be the most listened to morning sports talk nationally.

Their strength, and frankly the reason they're still on the air would be my guess is the TV show, which pulled surprisingly good numbers (relative to the network) at very little additional cost. They were a great bargain buy for men for several years & I assume are still fairly solid for at least a minor role in a media buy.

[boberot]

* takes off Bills jersey *
* falls on sword *

Being a Bills fan = being Charlie Brown running toward that football thinking "this is the one!"

I honestly don't mind McKelvin taking the kickoff out of the endzone, even though the "hands" team was in. He obviously had a ton of real estate to work with. The clock was at 2:06, so the objective is to burn those six seconds and take it to the 2 minute warning. Coach has to tell him [he should know already] -- wrap it up with two hands like a fullback and as soon as somebody brushes up against you, go down like a brick shithouse.

There was a certain macabre certainty about the outcome of this game. Why the fuck do I root for this team . . . .

[wade moore]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Must have missed it.

edit to add: Okay, found it I think.

No, I can't think of a single market I've ever seen where they lead in any demographic, but it's tough to blame them on that one since the format rarely reaches the upper echelons anyway. They are sometimes the highest rated sports talk show in the morning in some markets and off the top of my head they might be the most listened to morning sports talk nationally.

Their strength, and frankly the reason they're still on the air would be my guess is the TV show, which pulled surprisingly good numbers (relative to the network) at very little additional cost. They were a great bargain buy for men for several years & I assume are still fairly solid for at least a minor role in a media buy.

That's pretty much what I figured you'd say. I mean, they may have the most bulk numbers, but I imagine they probably have the most markets as well because of being the national ESPN show. Seems to me that in a given market they are generally thoroughly "ok" and they get big numbers nationally because of sheer quantity.

Again - none of this means that they're actually good.

[Fidatelo]

Those announcers for the second game made me turn off the TV and go to bed before the end of the first quarter. I hope they are never on my TV again. Terrible. The PBP Mike (Greenberg?) was actually worse than Bryant Gumbel, which I did not think was possible.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by wade moore

Again - none of this means that they're actually good.

I think they're probably suffering from exposure too. The first couple of years I watched them fairly frequently in the mornings, at least for a segment or two. Now? Good grief, I can't remember the last time I bothered. Somewhere along the way the show jumped the shark for me, specifically with regard to how silly they can get with their promotions.

[stevew]

even though the Chargers were down late, I knew the raiders would find a way to blow this game. And the fact that the long developing post route actually worked for the Raiders is funny. I'm sure they'll get Russell blowed up by a defender before that play works again.

[bhlloy]

As usual coaching for the Raiders cost them the game. On offense, they had 5-6 yards every single time they ran the ball up the middle. Often on first down, then it would be two inaccurate Russell incompletions and a punt. On defense they were great all game, and then went into a crazy prevent scheme where their LB were 12-15 yards downfield on every play and Rivers just picked them apart. Why you would ever do that against a QB who doesn't have a really big arm and a team that has zero deep threats is completely beyond me. But it's the Raiders.

Russell missed on 8-10 throws that an NFL QB just has to make. The difference between him and Gradkowski was pretty sad considering, it's Bruce Gradkowski. I can't imagine what on earth made them give up on Garcia, unless this is just a development year for Russell. Heyward-Bey looks like everyone said Heyward-Bey would look like, good speed, gets open and can't catch shit.

Chargers defense is horrible. D-line was being pushed back 5 yards on every run play, pass rush is poor, linebackers can't cover anybody, the secondary is soft and I'm not even going to go into what the hell happened on the last TD.
I dread to think what a really good team is going to put up. Could be in the bottom five in rushing and passing this year.

[RendeR]

Originally Posted by Fidatelo

Those announcers for the second game made me turn off the TV and go to bed before the end of the first quarter. I hope they are never on my TV again. Terrible. The PBP Mike (Greenberg?) was actually worse than Bryant Gumbel, which I did not think was possible.

I liked Golic and Young, but my God Greenberg's voice just makes me want to stab myself in the head with a long sharp knife.

Its not that he's bad at it, but his tone and inflection just sound like a some whiny girl trying to fit in with her guy friends.