Tuesday Night Week 10 Recap.

Week 10 Predictions Heads up: 7-7

Never Count out Peyton Manning

Week 10 Predictions against the Spread: 5-9

Record so far: 70-57

Every week things are supposed to become a bit clearer, but this year nothing is really clear except we don’t know much. 3 of the teams I would have put in my top 5 lost last week, the Ravens and Steelers losing tough games to other elite teams while the Giants lost to the Cowboys. I don’t know if Jason Garrett has really inspired the Cowboys or if this is one of those fluky new coach one week of excitement type wins. Normally a win against the Browns doesn’t impress anyone, but Cleveland is playing everyone tough this year so for New York to go in there and steal one in overtime was impressive to me. When I think of the top of the league 6 teams jump to my mind, Falcons, Eagles, Giants, Pats, Steelers, and the Jets. I don't know the exact order but if the 2 super bowl finalists don't come from the those 6 teams you can color me surprised. Well unless its the Colts because here at Screen and Roll out we never count out Peyton Manning. 

Michael Vick turned on God Mode

I don’t know if I’ve ever seen anything more insane than what Vick did to the Redskins on Monday night football, the closest I’ve probably seen was when Adrian Peterson broke the all time rushing record and Bo Jackson in pretty much any Tecmo Bowl. The first play of the game he throws one of the most beautiful deep passes you’ll ever see to Desean Jackson that travels 60 yards in the air before landing perfectly in Jackson's outstretched arms for 6. It would be one thing if he just put on a passing clinic, but he did it all in a way that only a player of Michael Vicks speed, agility, and overall explosiveness could. He ran for 80 yards on 8 carries most of them the “darting away from a defender at the last second to demoralize a defense variety”. The only bad thing about this game was that it was a blowout which means we were treated to blowout commentary by the Monday night football crew, and when  a crew doesn’t have a good game to talk about they typically drone on about everything and anything which takes away from some of the awesomeness of the performance. The fact that this all happened on the night Donovan Mcnabb christened his new 78 million dollar contract had to be especially stinging to the Redskins and especially rewarding for Vick, because if Mcnabb is worth 78 million over 5 years how much am I worth at 5 years younger and better than he has ever been?

Tom Brady doesn’t like the Steelers

Pure Precision

In another QB tour de force performance Tom Brady put an absolute clinic on in Pennsylvania dissecting the Steelers every which way while being about as pumped as I’d seen him in a while. Part of me wanted to believe he was just pumped because it was a big game, except he’s played in more playoff games and super bowls than most people have seen so he knows big games. Then after seeing him spike that ball after his QB sneak I thought he might dislocate his shoulder. I don’t think I’ve seen Tom Tremendous try to stick it to a team this bad since………..the Steelers during the Patriots date with regular season perfection. Except this time there was no trash talk by a mediocre safety coming into the game it was just a matchup of AFC powerhouses trying to establish a pecking order, and the Patriots made it clear however the pecking order stacks up they’re on top of the Steelers.  350 yards, 3 touchdowns, and a 117.4 QB rating which doesn’t do his performance justice. The first touchdown pass to Rob Gronkowski couldn’t have been throwing a millisecond later or an inch in another direction it was like it teleported off his hand onto Gronkowski's fingertips, truly a masterful performance by one of the game’s best.

Have the Falcons been the best team all along?

The Atlanta Falcons beat the Ravens on Thursday night in probably the best and most exciting game of the week. Matt Ryan lived up to the Matty Ice moniker making a tremendous sideline throw with the game on the line in the 2 minute drill before sealing it with a touchdown to Roddy White. In last week’s preview I picked the Ravens in part because I didn’t believe Roddy White would be himself on an injured knee well count my suspicions as invalid because he was absolutely spectacular as he did what he wanted against a Ravens secondary that had been surprisingly stout up to that point. The fact that their passing offense was that effective when they’re normally solid run game was nowhere to be found makes it even more impressive. Michael Turner who was coming off consecutive hundred yard games was held to a mere 39 yards and they had less than 60 rushing yards total. On the defensive side of the ball the Falcons rely on the pressure generated by sack master John Abraham who is two sacks of the league lead with 8 this year. The Falcons only two losses this year have been at Pittsburgh and at Philadelphia both of whom seem like elite teams in the league. However if the Falcons keep playing the way they’re playing they may not have to travel until they make a road trip to Dallas in February. 

Week 10 preview. Thursday Edition

The Weekly previews are going to be coming out a little earlier now because of Thursday night football. So enjoy a little weekly preview action Thursday as opposed to our normal Friday affair. 

Baltimore @ Atlanta

Pick EM

How this game goes to me depends on the health of Roddy White, it comes out this morning that he’ll probably play but how well he plays will determine how the Falcons do. Without him putting forth something comparable to his normal effort I don’t see how the Falcons can beat a really balanced Ravens team, however with him putting up his regular Roddy White numbers I think Matt Ryan extends his ridiculous home record to 18-1. Roddy White could either have a soft tissue bruise or a bone bruise, a bone bruise obviously being the more serious of the two, I honestly just don’t like betting on guys with knee injuries who aren’t Kobe Bryant so I’ve got the Ravens going into the Georgia Dome and heating up Matty Ice.

Ravens 24

Falcons 20

Detroit @ Buffalo

Buffalo -3

A battle of two teams that don’t quite know how to win yet. The Bills were up by 5 in the 4^th quarter before eventually giving the game away because of their inability to hold on to the ball. The Lions loss was even more inexcusable as they were up by 10 on the Jets in the 4^th quarter with a few minutes left. They had a 3^rd down with the Jets having no timeouts and instead of running the ball and taking 40+ seconds off the clock they pass and get an incompletion. This would be partially excusable if their franchise Matthew Stafford was in the game, because you want to show confidence in your young players, however he wasn’t. Decisions like that make me think the Bills will finally get off the schnide this week even with no Stafford.

Bills 23

Lions 19

Minnesota @ Chicago

Minnesota -1

Has Brett Favre finally turned the corner? Did anybody expect 446 yards to be his career high? That completely blew me away, as long and storied as Favre’s career has been I would have expected him to have thrown for 500 yards at least a few times but apparently he’s never even crossed the 450 mark.  The Bears barely beat the Bills with Jay Cutler throwing no interceptions and the Bills turning the ball over 3 times. I have to say they can’t count on luck so good against a Vikings team still fighting for a playoff wildcard berth. Brett Favre strings two wins together for the first time this year.

Vikings 27

Bears 17

NY Jets @ Cleveland

Jets - 3

Fun Fact. Rex Ryan has multiple wigs always at the ready

 In his press conference this week Rex Ryan put on a blonde wig and put a pillow under his shirt to become his brother Rob who’s the defensive coordinator for the Browns. Rob is looking a lot better than Rex would have you think as the Browns are coming off 2 straight wins over the Saints and the Pats lead primarily by Rob Ryan’s defense. The Jets just scrapped out a win against the Lions in a game they had no business winning without the Lions absolutely handing it to them. I think the Browns don’t hand the Jets anything except the upset loss they should have gotten last week.

Browns 17

Jets 13

Cincinnati @ Indianapolis

Indianapolis -7.5

The Bengals showed some life at the end of their loss to the Steelers last week the question to me is whether that was too little too late. I don’t think they have much shoot at the playoffs at anymore so I wonder whether guys like T.O. and Chad Ochocinco can be counted on to still play as hard as they have been, or in Chad’s case complain as much as he has been. Who would have thought T.O. would be the better receiver of the two of these guys be a mile, as much attention as Chad draws he still just isn’t getting it done. Sure T.O. doesn’t have coverage rolling to his side but he soon will the way Chad isn’t producing and I doubt that will slow him as much as it’s slowed Mr. Ochocinco. The Colts just couldn’t stop Michael Vick although nobody has been able to this year so there’s no shame in that, there would be some shame in losing to the Bengals at home, but they won’t do that.

Colts 31

Bengals 23

Houston @ Jacksonville

Jacksonville – 1.5

Looking at this game I don’t really know what to say. The last time the Jaguars played a pass defense as bad as the Texans David Garrard threw 4 touchdown passes, rushed for one more, and then cured world hunger.  The Texans just got obliterated by the angriest QB around Phillip Rivers to the tune of 293 and 4 touchdowns while he was throwing to junior college rec team. Houston is just a middle of the road team now and on the road I don’t think they’re good enough to beat another mediocre team in the Jaguars.

Jaguars 24

Houston 20

Tennessee @ Miami

Tennessee – 2

Randy Moss= Dolphin destroyer

Apparently somebody on the Ravens spit on Channing Crowder which has him rightfully very upset. The NFL is investigating this but we all know nothing is going to come of it because nothing can be proven. I highly doubt Crowder would make something up, and I have a feeling the Ravens don’t feel bad about it especially with all the trash they talked after the game. I tell that story because that’s the only interesting thing I can that comes to my mind when I see the Dolphins. The Titans on the other hand premiere Randy Moss this week against a secondary he obliterated many times during his Patriot days, after watching him lay an absolute egg against said Patriots my confidence in Moss is shaken. However the Titans don’t need him to be anything more than a decoy to beat the Dolphins.

Titans 17

Dolphins 12

Carolina @ Tampa Bay

Tampa Bay -7

Raheem Morris should probably refrain from calling his team the best in the NFC after that horrendous end of game goal line call he made against the Falcons last week. The Panthers just got spanked by the Saints 34-3 last week and I don’t think things are going to get much better this week. Josh Freeman has been pretty good, but even better have been his two rookie receivers.  Arrelious Benn and the other Mike Williams have been revelations for the Bucs combined with the excellent special team’s play of Michael Spurlock have made this Bucs team a serious playoff threat. The Panthers on the other hand are now down not just DeAngelo Williams, but Jonathan Stewart and Tyrell Sutton. So the Panthers are going to be going on the road with Mike Goodson at starting running back and Jimmy Clausen. Yeah Bucs win big

Bucs 27

Panthers 10

Kansas City @ Denver

Kansas City – 1.5

After a disappointing loss in Oakland Kansas City looks to rebound against a poor Broncos team. Last week the Chiefs had an opportunity to create some distance between them and the rest of the AFC West however with the loss now all of the teams in the AFC West are within 1 ½ games of each other. Looking at Denver I don’t know how many weeks Josh McDaniel has left if the Broncos continue to play the way they have, combine that with his trade of Peyton Hillis for Brady Quinn which is looking even worse and worse by the day for the Broncos. As good as Dwayne Bowe can look he still has huge problems with drops dropping what would have been a game sealing catch against the Raiders last week. The once place the Chiefs do struggle is in the passing game and that’s the one place where the Broncos excel. I think the Broncos spring an upset and keep McDaniel’s job safe for another week.

Broncos 24

Chiefs 20

Seattle @ Arizona

Arizona -3.5

After a promising start to the year the Seahawks have lost the past two games by a combined score of 10-74. I think the Seahawks might have seen enough of Charlie Whitehurst to realize he’s not the QB of the future or even the present. Luckily for Seahawk fans they’ll get everyone’s favorite bald QB back against the Cardinals who sport a solid 2-1 home record with their only loss being a very close 35-38 loss to a good Bucs team. Derek Anderson is pretty bad but he’s NFL bad, he belongs in the league except as a backup QB. However against a Seahawks team that can’t stop anybody running or passing I think the Cardinals finally have an explosive day at home.

Cardinals 31

Seahawks 24

Dallas @ NY Giants

Composite drawing of every Cowboys fan

NY Giants -14

Seriously I don’t know if they could make a line high enough for me to not bet on the Giants in this game. The Giants won their last game 41-7 while the Cowboys lost their last game 45-7. I do think the firing of Wade Phillips will make some difference with the Cowboys, but the fact remains they’re just an awful awful team.

Giants 34

Cowboys 14

St. Louis @ San Francisco

San Francisco -6

Frisco finally got their second win of the year over an even more inept Broncos team in England. As  much as Roger Goodell wants to expand the league giving them games like 49’ers vs. Broncos won’t have them begging for more NFL action. St. Louis’ last game was a tough last second loss to the Bucs, but now they’ve had a bye week to get Steven Jackson healthy or at least healthier which should be huge against the 49’ers. However Troy Smith did inject some life into the niners like I thought he would and I think this is the beginning of his run to get them back into the NFC West division race.

49ers 20

Rams 17

New England @ Pittsburgh

Steelers -5

It seemed like a classic trap game for the Pats last week and it was as the Browns demolished them by 20 points on the road. Pittsburgh barely held off a more than game Cincinnati team stopping a last second drive on the goal line to hold on to a slim victory. Both of these teams are trying to stake their claim as the best in the AFC and possibly the league. Big Ben will be without his starting left tackle Max Starks not just for this game but for the rest of the season as was placed on IR. Big Ben is probably  one of the few QB’s who could take a blow like that and still manage to be as good if not better, Roethlisberger has the best QB rating after contact in the NFL and he’ll have plenty of opportunities to improve starting this week against the Pats. Looking at this Steelers team I think while they may not be as tough running the football as we give them credit for their tough enough to pound a Pats team that struggles against the run.

Steelers 24

Pats 20

Philadelphia @ Washington

Philadelphia -3

Vick vs. Mcnabb II this time it’s for blood. The last time these two teams faced off against each other Michael Vick was knocked early in the game with a rib injury that allowed the Redskins to come away with the victory. I don’t think the skins will be as lucky this week with Vick not missing a beat last week dismantling the Colts I think he’ll want revenge on the team that knocked him out these past weeks. Looking at Washington it’s a team in disarray, people talk about the coaching issues in Minnesota but their seem to be just as many in Washington and when your starting QB and your head coach don’t trust each other it spells doom for your franchise. I think the Redskins get 4 full quarters of the Michael Vick experience.

Eagles 31

Redskins 23