This week, the NFL’s postseason tournament gets underway – every game has a certain amount of intrigue, and we should see a healthy mix of defensive struggles and pass-wacky shootouts – but, with the possible exception of the Saints, every team playing this weekend has a large flaw and none is likely to make the Super Bowl. However, let’s look at each matchup and try to figure out who will win, starting with Saturday’s games.
Cincinnati Bengals (9-7) at Houston Texans (10-6): I feel really bad for the Texans and their fans – they get their first playoff appearance in team history, and after 10 games they appeared to be primed to finish 12-4 or 13-3 and secure a bye week. Then QB Matt Schaub went down for the season, his backup Matt Leinart followed suit the next week, and the Texans’ offense never scored more than 22 points the rest of the season. The team comes into the playoffs on a 3-game losing streak, with a rookie 3rd-string QB leading them, with their top WR less than 100%, and with two of their top defenders also gone for the season. However, their early success got them a game against another deeply flawed team, the Bengals – a team the Texans beat only four weeks ago on the road.
Even with all the injuries, the Texans have continued to play solid defense – they finished second overall in yards allowed (only 285 per game), third against the pass and fourth against the run. This does not bode well for the Bengals offense – among playoff teams, only the Steelers and Broncos scored less this season than Cincy, and they were held under 300 yards by Houston last month. Indeed, the Texans turned the ball over four times in that game and yet still won by rolling up over 400 yards of total offense! Speaking of offense, Tyler Yates threw for 300 yards against the Bengals, his best game as a pro – he doesn’t need to repeat that, but he DOES need to limit turnovers and be efficient. The Texans will get 120-150 yards rushing as usual, but Yates needs to make the Bengals pay when they load up to stop Arian Foster’s rushing attack.
Cincinnati is a very average team, both offensively and defensively – they scored about 20 points per game, they allowed about 18, gaining and allowing about 320 yards per game. They were adept at getting sacks, and that’s something they will have to continue if they are to beat Houston. Their running game was average at best, and not likely to be effective against the Texans’ stiff run defense. Rookie AJ Green is a tremendous wideout, but I expect the Texans to base their game plan around stopping him and forcing QB Andy Dalton to throw elsewhere.
I know a lot of folks are picking the Bengals in this game, and I think it will be extremely close – but in the end, you have two teams with rookie QBs, each has a great wideout, and both teams want to run the ball a lot. In situations like this I side with the best defense, and that belongs to Houston. Cincy couldn’t win this game at home last month even with four turnovers by Houston – seems to me to be a long shot that they’d win on the road now. HOUSTON by 5.
Detroit Lions (10-6) at New Orleans Saints(13-3): What a contrast between the two Saturday games – I fully expect a low-scoring slugfest in the early game, but in this game the winner might need 40 or even 50 points. Looking at Detroit first, two things jump out at me: First, until last week I had no clue how amazing Matthew Stafford’s season has been – he ended up with over 5000 yards and 41 TDs!! That’s one of the best seasons in NFL history, but it will always be overshadowed by Brees and Rodgers’ 2011 seasons. Many years Stafford would get significant MVP consideration, and frankly given Detroit’s numerous other flaws, I think one could argue that Stafford was more valuable to the Lions than Rodgers or Brees were to their teams. In any case, Stafford is CLEARLY the key to the Lions on offense,, as their running game is mediocre at best and his backups are awful – if he gets hurt (and I bring it up because he has an injury history), Detroit has no chance in this game.
The other thing one quickly notices when studying Detroit is that they beat up on bad teams but have trouble with good teams – the Lions went 9-1 against non-playoff teams, but 1-5 vs. playoff teams – and the one win was against a poor Denver squad. More to the point, they lost at New Orleans a month ago by 14 points, and were down 24-7 at halftime – to have any chance in this game, they MUST start stronger. Detroit won four games with late comebacks, but getting down 10+ points to this Saints team will likely be too much to overcome. Detroit’s defense is not good, either against the run (allowed five yards per carry) or against the pass (3800 yards allowed) – they kept only four teams all season under 20, and allowed a total of 387 points – only Denver allowed more among playoff teams (I’m sensing a pattern regarding the Broncos, more on them below). In short, Detroit is EXTREMELY unlikely to hold New Orleans under 30 points, so all of the pressure is on their offense.
For the Saints, Brees had a season for the ages – over 5200 yards and 71% completion percentage, both new NFL records. Everyone knows about their passing, but the Saints also ranked sixth in the league with over 2100 yards rushing, and they averaged 4.9 yards per rush. The Saints went 5-1 against playoff teams, they went 8-0 at home, and they scored 40+ points six times (five at home). Aside from a 40-33 win over the Texans (the only game all season that Houston allowed 30+ points), New Orleans won every home game by at least 10 points and won five of those games by 17 or more. In short, at home New Orleans was the most dominant team in football, making the challenge for the Lions even more daunting.
There are some chinks in the armor – despite playing indoors, New Orleans managed to lose to the Rams, arguably the worst team in football. They allowed over 4100 passing yards against and only intercepted nine passes – but I think that’s partially explained by teams having to constantly play from behind against the Saints. They also allowed five yards per rush just like Detroit, but I don’t think the Lions have the running game to take advantage of that.
To win this game the Lions have to force turnovers, hope that Brees is not on his ‘A’ game and hope Stafford can play as well this week as he did last week – I think it’s a bit too much to ask. The Lions are on the rise, but I think the 2011 ride ends in the Big Easy…SAINTS by at least 10 points.
Atlanta Falcons (10-6) at New York Giants(9-7) : I’m going to start with a shocker of a stat – the Giants, traditionally a run-first team, finished DEAD LAST in the league in rushing yardage – and it was no fluke, as they averaged only 3.5 yards per carry. More than ever, their offense was all about Eli Manning – Eli threw for almost 5,000 yards despite having no running game to support him, and led the team to the playoffs despite a porous defense that allowed 400 points – Eli seems more and more like Peyton every day, doesn’t he? The other big story on offense was WR Victor Cruz, who came out of nowhere to set a new franchise record for yardage.
Defensively, the Giants give up a lot of yards both through the air (255 per game, fourth worst in the league) and on the ground (121 YPG, 19th). New York was outscored on the season, and the defense’s only real positives were sacks (48, tied for third) and turnovers (they forced 31). Forcing turnovers is not a repeatable skill, but the Giants will need to force a few this week to get by a solid Falcons team.
Atlanta’s defense was sixth best against the run, but 20th against the pass. Some of that might be inflated due to playing Brees and Newton twice, as well as Rodgers and Stafford, but the simple fact is that the Falcons are much more vulnerable through the air than on the ground – which plays right into what the Giants offense has become this season.
Offensively, Matt Ryan had a better season than you might have thought – he threw for 4100 yards and completed 61% of his passes, along with 29TDs – numbers quite similar to Eli. Atlanta also struggled more running the ball this season, as their 1800+ yards ranked them only 11th in the league, but I look for them to have some success on the ground against a soft Giant run defense. The Giants’ secondary is wracked with injuries, and they will struggle to cover Roddy White and Julio Jones – look for big days from both receivers.
This should be a fairly high-scoring game, Manning tends to come up big in moments like these but the team around him just isn’t very good. If the Falcons can protect Ryan from the pass rush, I think he will light up the Giants’ secondary and lead the Falcons to a win on the road. FALCONS by seven.
Pittsburgh Steelers (12-4) at Denver Broncos(8-8): Tebowmania has been talked about to death, so I’m not going to hit on that topic much – suffice it to say, if Denver has to throw it more than 20 times in this game or they are in serious trouble. They have the worst pass offense in the NFL and they are facing the best pass defense – yes, the Steelers allowed only 171 passing yards per game, by far the best in the league. On the other hand, the Broncos easily led the league in rushing attempts and yards, and Pittsburgh was unusually vulnerable to the run – they finished eighth in rushing yards against, but allowed four yards per carry, a very high total for them.
Denver’s game plan will stay the same as ever. They will look to run a lot, grind the clock and shorten the game, hopefully giving Tebow a shot to pull it out at the end. Given his inaccuracy and the stellar job done by the Steeler corners this season, I cannot imagine Tebow having much success through the air – the key matchup will be Pittsburgh’s run defense vs. Tebow and McGahee running the ball.
Offensively, the Steelers have moved the ball but have really struggled to score, especially lately – they scored 17 points or less in seven games, and scored more than 30 only three times. A team with this many weapons should be more efficient, and it’s on Ben Roethlisberger and offensive coordinator Bruce Arians to make that happen this week. Against the Broncos, they cannot settle for field goals, they must find a way to punch it in. The Steelers were an effective rushing team this season, averaging 4.4 yards per carry, but it remains to be seen how much the loss of Rashard Mendenhall will affect them. I say it won’t affect them much at all. I was not impressed with Mendenhall this season and thought that Redman ran the ball with a lot more ferocity most weeks. Denver’s defense was average against both the run and the pass, so there should be opportunities for the Steelers to move the ball.
This game is pretty simple – Denver is going to try to run the ball 50 times for 200 yards and have a 10-7 game in the 4th quarter. Pittsburgh is going to try to have a balanced attack, finish drives, and win the turnover battle. I cannot recall a one-dimensional rushing team ever beating a Dick LeBeau defense – if the Broncos are going to win, Tebow will have to play a lot better than he has the last three weeks. I think it will be closer than many expect – I don’t have much faith in Arians and the offense right now – but I also cannot see Denver scoring more than about 13 points, and the Steelers will get more than that. Call it STEELERS by SIX, with the real test coming next week.
Dave Glass can be reached at buggyracer@verizon.net.
