Welcome back to the Jimmy G blog on the team990.com
As promised, in today’s post I will answer reader’s emails but before doing so I will make my predictions for Week 8.
Patriots over Redskins: this is the first time that three time Super Bowl winning coaches have gone head to head. To beat the Patriots the Skins need to (a)run the ball effectively (b)win the turnover battle (c)keep the score close and then (d)make the proper coaching decisions at the important moments . If you’ve been reading my blog, you know how I feel about (d) as regards
Browns over Rams:
Titans over Raiders; the Raiders are 2-4, having blown three 4th quarter leads. Their ship has sailed. The Titans are a legitimate playoff contender. To move from contender status to playoff participant, the Titans have to beat teams like the Raiders.
Bears over Lions: This is the separation game in the playoff standings. If the Lions win, they are 5-2 with a 2 game lead on the Bears, three with the tiebreaker (Lions have already beaten
Bills over Jets: Dick Jauron did everything humanly possible to give away last Sunday’s game against the Ravens, but won anyway. I just don’t see the Jets being a winning team until they change quarterbacks or until Chad Pennington regains his arm strength. My favorite line thus far goes to ESPN's Keshawn Johnson: "The girl who delivers my newspaper has a better arm than Chad Pennington"
Giants over
Bucs over Jags: the Jags have one less day to prepare after playing on Monday. Having seen Quinn Gray play, I would imagine the play calling for the Jags will be one dimensionally tilted towards the run. The Bucs however, need this game just as badly, and unlike the Jags, they can depend on their QB should they fall behind.
Broncos over Packers: even with a week off, I still expect Brett Favre to throw four picks any game now.
In other games: Colts over
Now onto the emails sent from team990.com readers.
From Derek Pearson: “Hey Jimmy, just read your blog for the first time. Why are you ripping Tarvaris Jackson for? He’s a young quarterback. What do you expect? Give the kid time before you blast him.”
Thank you the email Derek. I expect that with more experience and good coaching Tarvaris Jackson will prove to be an effective NFL quarterback. With a rebuilding team I would recommend Tarvaris stay in the lineup. The Vikings are not a rebuilding team however. They have a solid running game, and they are very good at stopping the run. They can win right now, especially in the weak NFC if they just get decent production from the QB position.
Head Coach Brad Childress has to look at the situation selfishly: if he stays with
From Greg Phendler: “Can anybody beat my Patriots? If they win the Super Bowl will they be the best team ever? Keep up the good work”.
Greg, thanks for the nice comment. What makes the NFL so beautiful is that on any given Sunday anybody can beat anybody.
The Patriots were 14-2 in both 2003 and 2004. Among their losses: in ’03 they lost to the 5-11 Redskins and in ’04 they lost to the 4-12 Dolphins. True, Randy Moss was not a Patriot back then but you get the idea.For the Patriots to be the considered among the best teams ever they have to, like you alluded to, win the Super Bowl. In my lifetime the best teams I have seen are the ’89 49ers and the ’98 Broncos. I’d have to do some statistical studies after the Super Bowl to calculate how good the Patriots are in comparison (assuming of course, that the Patriots win)
From Ragesh Patel: “You keep mentioning statistics and winning football games. Can you explain which stats I should be looking at?
Ragesh, in the coming weeks I will be writing about this subject in greater detail.
For a statistic to be considered relevant it had to have a direct correlation to winning.
Here are the stats I always look at: yards per pass play, yards per pass attempt, turnover differential, rushing yards and rushing attempts differential.
From Matthew Da Silva: “Hey there Jimmy, decided to take a little time off from the midterm shenanigans and drop into your NFL blog., It’s definitely looking good as expected, but I got one topic: NFL coming to canada? Now I’m gonna leave the CFL aside, would an NFL expansion to the great white north be say...as smart as an NHL expansion to the southern states? If you also have some added insights not covered by this queston, please elaborate.
While I think the NFL coming to
NFL owners, while they care about dollars like everyone else, are different from NHL owners in two crucial areas: they do extensive research and they have better cash flow.
The NHL owners expanded for one reason: easy money. New owners pay up front, the old owners collect quick. Since the NHL doesn’t have the same revenue streams as the NFL I can hardly blame them. It is difficult to turn down free money.
Unfortunately the NHL owners didn't care that by expanding their product they'd be diluting their talent base. The NHL owners also didn't care that fans in the South (
The NFL is much smarter and wealthier. The owners don't need the expansion money (although they would love easy money like the NHL owners) The NFL knows its market. The NFL does its research.
In terms of expansion, I do not think the NFL is looking at
I do believe that the NFL will schedule as many as TEN international REGULAR SEASON games each season, perhaps 3 on opening day, in places such as Toronto, Mexico, the Orient, Europe and maybe even South America because it is in the same time zone.
All these international games would allow the NFL to maintain its huge presence without risking over saturation.
That is it for me. I’ll be posting my analysis of Week 8 on Monday afternoon as opposed to my usual early Monday morning.
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