The Road to Tampa:
The NFC West champs beat Atlanta (+66 scoring diff.) to earn the franchise’s first home playoff victory in 60 years. Experts wrote off the win to rookie-QB-on-the-road-itis and said Atlanta didn’t really have a good defense, anyways. Next, the Cardinals went to Carolina (+85 scoring diff.) and pounced on the Panthers, breaking Jake Delhomme’s career in the process. This victory was also written off to Delhomme’s poor performance and again, Carolina didn’t really have that good a defense. The Cardinals hosted the Eagles (+127 scoring diff.) for the NFC Championship. The game was over in the second quarter, but the refs muffed a kickoff call that would have given the Cardinals the ball inside the Eagles 30 with a 21-6 lead. Sure, the Eagles made a miraculous comeback to take the lead, but the Cardinals closed the deal at the end of the game. This game was written off to the Eagles not covering Larry Fitzgerald and a 4th down non-PI call on incidental contact. The bottom line is, the Cardinals have beaten three good teams to get to the Super Bowl…and they will beat the Steelers.

How it goes down:

Steelers on offense: Hines Ward will be playing, if at all, with a brace on his knee. The Steelers offensive line is made up of turnstiles and there are rumors this week that Big Ben’s back is aching. The Cardinals defense has already contained three better running backs than Willie Parker (Michael Turner, DeAngelo Williams, Brian Westbrook) this post season. Rodgers-Cromartie and Aaron Francisco can cover Santonio Holmes, while Rod Hood blankets a gimpy Ward. Clancy Pedergast (remember that name if your team needs a new head coach in a couple years) will concoct a scheme that contains Willie “Sometimes I am Fast” Parker and puts Big Ben on his back. Byron Leftwich, anyone?

Cardinals on offense: This is going to be tough for the Cardinals offense. Todd Haley, Arizona’s offensive coordinator, is hotter than steam and could be headed to Kansa City after this game to coach the Chiefs. He will have the offense ready for the pressure the Steelers will bring. Remember when everyone said stopping Larry Fitzgerald is the key to shutting down the Cardinals offense? Remember when Anquan Boldin went all T.O. during the NFC Championship? Anquan Boldin will get the ball a lot in the first quarter on Sunday. I would not be surprised to see him run, catch and throw the ball all in the first 15 minutes – prop bet? When the Steelers have to honor Boldin over the middle and Larry Fitzgerald deep, Edgerrin James will get some cheap yards running delays and draw plays. Kurt Warner’s quick release will keep him upright long enough to find the open receiver. Last, but not least, Ike Taylor cannot cover Larry Fitzgerald.

Prediction
Oh, NO! If the Cardinals win the Super Bowl, the NFL regular season no longer means anything! The non-Best regular season teams aren’t supposed to win so many championships! Woe is me! It’s the apocalypse!
The Reality is that if the Cardinals win, it means its sports. In sports anything can happen, that’s why we love sports. “Sports! Sports! Sports! Sports! Sports! Sports! Sports! Sports! Sports! Sports! Sports! Bart gets to ride upfront because he’s good at sports.” The Arizona Cardinals’ strength on offense (passing game) is the Steelers defense’s weakness (not really a weakness, but not as awesome as the rush defense). The Cardinals can basically abandon the weakest part of their offense (running game) early and force the Steelers’ offense to beat them.

Super Bowl Champion Arizona Cardinals. Get used to it.

Arizona 24 – Pittsburgh 17

RT is 5-0 against the spread in the playoffs so I would listen to him

It could not have been much easier for the Steelers in the playoffs. They did not have to play the Colts or the Titans and both of their games were at home. Unlike their road to victory in Super Bowl XL, which required three straight road games, the Steelers barely had to break a sweat this time around. The only real news to speak of was the injury to Super Bowl XL MVP Hines Ward but he is still going to play on Sunday. The Steelers playoff run has been nothing short of a walk in the park but on Sunday they will face their toughest test.

Nope.

As I embark on my last AFC playoff preview, I would like to give you a few thoughts before I pad my 4-0 record.

* How come nobody is talking about how Jake Delhomme single-handedly OJ’d the Panther’s season!? He just turned in the worst single performance in playoff history and somehow he gets a free pass. I don’t get it.

* We are about to enter a new era of great quarterbacks. Matt Ryan, Joe Flacco, Matt Stafford, Sam Bradford and Brady Quinn have the collective potential to bring back respectability to the quarterback position.

* I want to thank the Steelers defense for mailing in the last 5 minutes of last week’s game to ruin my prediction of a blowout. Thanks guys.

Baltimore Ravens v. Pittsburgh Steelers (-6)

#6 Baltimore Ravens

OFFENSE: The Ravens looked terrible on offense last week. The coaches looked scared out of their mind every time Joe Flacco dropped back to pass. The fear was completely unjustified as Flacco did what he has done all season which is manage the game and make a few big plays. I would say he played with significantly more confidence than Kerry Collins. Beyond Flacco, the running game was pathetic. The offensive line was dominated and the numbers proved it. McGahee had only 32 yards rushing and McClain had an abysmal 12 yards on 12 carries. No running lanes = No victory for the Ravens this week.

DEFENSE: There is only one thing that needs to be said about the defensive effort from the Ravens last week. If Ed Reed doesn’t pull a “one-game suspension” worthy dirty play on Chris Johnson in the first-half, the Titans win the game by 10 points and the Steelers are playing on the road this week.

#2 Pittsburgh Steelers

OFFENSE: The Steelers offense starts and stops with the run game. Willie Parker ran all over the Chargers (as predicted here) and the Steelers won the game going away. The run game will again be the key this week as Ben Roethlisberger cannot be trusted to win the game against a defense like the Ravens. He gave us a B game last week and he will need his “A” game if Parkers is stuck at the line of scrimmage all game. Of course, the unsung hero of the Steeler’s win over the Chargers was the offensive line which gave Big Ben all the time he needed and gave Parker the running lanes he needed.

NFL Playoff thoughts

Baltimore v. Tennessee
Sure, Baltimore has a great defense, but Tennessee gave that game away. Let's do a quarter by quarter breakdown of all the Titans breakdowns.
1Q: After looking good holding Baltimore to two three and outs the Titans score first and hold the Ravens to a 3rd and 18. Then defensive offsides on Vanden Bosch pushes it to 3rd and 13. No biggie, except on the next play it looks like Chris Hope is supposed to have the deep third coverage, but is late getting over and gives up the 48 yard touchdown.
2Q: Tennessee has another nice drive into Baltimore territory, but it stalls when a screen to Bo Scaife is sniffed out by Raven safety Leonhard for a five yard loss to make it 4th and 8 at the Baltimore 30. Because of the wind conditions Jeff Fisher elects to go for it and Collins fumbles the snap. 4th and 8 isn't close to guaranteed against the Ravens, but you have to give yourself a chance. The next Titans possession starts at their own one yard line and they move the ball all the way to the Baltimore 32 and face a 3rd and 8. The Ravens blitz and Collins throws up a duck that is easily intercepted. Collins is a seasoned veteran, but looked like the rookie all game when the Ravens bring more than four pass rushers. The Titans hold the Ravens to three and out and get the ball back and in seven plays are already inside the Raven 22 yard line with 36 seconds before halftime. LenDale White earns five hard yards, but doesn't protect the ball when he's in a wash of defenders and the ball pops loose and Baltimore recovers.
3Q: Both teams are playing great defense after the half, each team forcing three punts. The Titans get to the 28 yard line on one drive, but the Ravens challenge a third down catch by Scaife and the ruling is reversed forcing a 51 yard FG attempt instead of a 46 yard try. Bironas misses to the left. 51 yard FGs are not gimmes in any sense, but you have to make those in the playoffs if you want to move on.
4Q: After the Ravens take the lead with a FG, the Titans put together a ten play drive and Collins completes a pass to Alge Crumpler on 2nd and 9 from the Baltimore 13. Crumpler gains seven before he's hit and the ball goes flying forwards, recovered at the one by Baltimore. Again, the contact was coming, but the ball wasn't protected. The Titans hold the Ravens on the next drive and comeback and tie the game with a FG afterwards. When Baltimore gets the ball back, they face a 3rd and 2 on their own 32 yard line when the now infamous play clock reaches zero and no flag is thrown. The amount of leeway that NFL fans are used to allows for a split second after the play clock reaches zero to get a play off, but this was almost a full second.

The Ravens earned the victory, but Tennessee did more than enough to help them out. Both fumbles had more to do with carelessness than with defensive pressure. Joe Flacco the rookie had more pocket presence than 15+ year veteran Kerry Collins. Tennessee lost its best offensive player, Chris Johnson, for the entire second half because of an ankle injury and they got burned by an officiating blunder. What lesson can be learned from this? Don't let your team peak too early in the season. Tennessee was the last unbeaten team this year and then fell off a little, even though they ended with the best record in the NFL. They didn't "play" in week 17 and then they looked sloppy after the bye week.

Arizona @ Carolina
The surest bet around had to be Carolina -9.5 at home against the a Cardinal team that was 0-5 on the east coast this season and 2-22 in it's last twenty four games played in the eastern time zone who was missing a key cog in the offensive attack, Anquan Boldin. Carolina even came out and scored rather easily on the first drive in five plays. Unfortunately, the Panthers could not cover Larry Fitzgerald and Jake Delhomme might have had the worst playoff quarterback performance of all time. It was extra ironic for Delhomme because on Sunday NFL Countdown on ESPN, I think it was Bob Holtzman said Delhomme came into the game as third all time in playoff QB rating after Joe Montana and somebody else. Later on the same show Cris Carter repeated the stat, but didn't give Holtzman(or whoever said it originally) credit like he had come up with it himself. Delhomme had six(!) turnovers including five INTs. Delhomme had a playoff passer rating of approximately 104.5 before this game and it dropped over twenty points after this game to 83.3.

Philadelphia @ NY Giants
This game was all about the Eagles defensive line. The Giants defense played great as well, holding Westbrook to 36 yards on 18 carries and only two catches for ten yards, but the Ealges and Broderick Bunkley in particular won this game for Philly. It was windy at the Meadowlands and John Carney, who missed only two 40+ yard FGs all year, missed two in this game. The windy conditions and the Giants power run game led Tom Coughlin to go for it on fourth ans short three times, but the Giants only converted the once in the first quarter. Not counting the intentional grounding by McNabb in his own endzone for a safety, neither team had a sack this game. Two great defenses, both teams like to blitz and both are in the top ten in number of sacks this season had zero this game. The Giants had zero sacks against the Eagles in three games this year. Clap it up for the Eagles offensive line.

San Diego @ Pittsburgh
Every team that scored first this weekend ended up losing. Three of the four teams scored touchdowns first. San Diego connects on a long bomb to DUI Jackson and then force a Pittsburgh punt. After giving the ball to Darren Sproles three times the Chargers give the ball to last week's MVP, punter Mike Scifres. Unfortunately, the Charger punt coverage was hideous, with four men bunched on the left side of the field and the five others spread too far apart on the the other side of the field. Naanee had a chance to push Holmes out of bounds, but instead dove at his ankles like a punter/kicker/quarterback and Hollmes hurdled him easily. The key to this game was San Diego's inability to get pressure on Roethlisberger and the Steeler offensive line to protect Big Ben. Only one sack for the Chargers, by the safety Weddle, while the Steelers got four sacks from Woodley, Harrison and Keisel, all DL/LBs.

Sharks
Despite some people panicking because the Sharks aren't leading the other NHL teams by 10+ points, they beat the Oilers and Canucks on back to back nights on the road. Now the Sharks have four home games spread out over the next week before the All Star break.

Warriors
I hate this team. Not because they are losing and will continue to lose. It's because the team is symbolic of what the Warriors were just three short season ago and the previous decade before that, irrelevant with no hope for the future. Ellis is unhappy. Maggette sucks. He can get to the line, but he can't pass, at all. Bellinelli looks promising. Randolph looks promising. Wright looked promising before separating his shoulder. Will any of them flourish with the Warriors? Most likely not because Robert Rowell and Nellie mucked everything up when their egos got in the way. Warriors basketball, it's a great time out.

Baltimore Ravens v. Tennessee Titans (-3)

#6 Baltimore Ravens

OFFENSE: It is no surprise that the defense continues to be the straw that stirs the drink for the Ravens but the offense continues to do a good job of not losing the game. Flacco was less than impressive in the win against the Dolphins but who cares? The most important stat for him is interceptions, as in zero. Little else is required of him in order for the Ravens to be in the game. Of course, he is afforded this luxury because the running game is hitting on all cylinders. McClain and McGahee were not exactly overwhelming against the Dolphins but they did run with passion that kept the Dolphins on their heels. The offense will need to be a little more dynamic than they were against the Dolphins if they expect to beat the Titans.

DEFENSE: The defense is playing as well as any defense I have seen in recent years (including the Bears of 2006). The Ravens have been very impressive in December especially against the Steelers on Dec. 14^th (and they lost that game!) You cannot talk about the defense without talking about Ed Reed. It is really amazing what happens when you put an undersized wide receiver with a chip on his shoulder at free safety. There are football coaches around the country who would love to have Ed Reed talk to their wide receivers about the joys (and glory) of playing on defense. Reed is a difference maker and he plays at his highest level in tight games.

#1 Tennessee Titans

OFFENSE: Similar to the Ravens offense, the Titans offense doesn’t exactly overwhelm with star or fire power (besides Vince Young … never mind). Kerry Collins has done a very good job as the leader this year. He still throws a very good ball and he rarely is the reason a team loses a game. However, he is not the type of guy who will carry the team so the running game will remain paramount to the Titans success. As a result, the Titans will continue to rely on Chris Johnson to get the job done as one of the most impressive rookie running back in recent memory. His “back-up” is LenDale White who is nothing short of one of the biggest head cases in the history of the NFL but credit Jeff Fisher with getting White to play with more passion than many thought possible. The combination of Smash and Dash gives the Titans all the offensive weapons needed to reach the conference finals

DEFENSE: The most important note of this game for the Titans is the return of Albert Haynesworth and Kyle Vanden Bosch. These two anchor an impressive defensive line which will be critical to the success of the Titans in the playoffs. There is no reason not to think the Titans will not continue their upper echelon rush defense in the playoffs. However, the rank near the bottom in the league at defending the pass which could come back to haunt them sooner rather than later.

Ravens v. Titans Matchup

Ravens on offense: The Ravens are going to have a really hard time scoring on the Titans. Flacco is going to be asked to more than he has all season because the Titans will have eight men in the box on most plays and the return of Haynesworth will only make things more difficult. It will be a long day for the Ravens if they cannot establish some kind of passing game to Derrick Mason and Todd Heap early on. Everyone is familiar with the concept of establishing the run to set up the pass – well – look for the Ravens to do the opposite.

Titans on offense: The Titans need to run the ball effectively to win this game. The potential loss of center Kevin Mawae could be huge for the run game and the pass coverage. The Ravens have been running the 3-4 for some time and they have been exceptional stopping the run all year. Chris Johnson has never played this much football in his life. Will he show signs of wear and tear or will the week off have him as good as ever?

Prediction: After the controversial end of the Steelers-Ravens game on Dec. 14, it just seems like the two are destined to play again. While I am very concerned about the play of Joe Flacco, I just think the Ravens defense goes 2001 Super Bowl on Kerry Collins and the Titans and wins the game in a close one.

Baltimore: 17 – Titans: 13

San Diego Chargers v. Pittsburgh Steelers (-6)

#4 San Diego Chargers

OFFENSE: The Chargers offense is very simple. Rivers is good not great and really needs a big performance from his running back in-order to be effective. Since LaDainian Tomlinson is hurt, Darren Sproles will need to have another huge game for the Chargers to have any chance at all. The reality for the Chargers offense is their best player when they have the ball is the punter, Mike Scifres. I fear for them on Sunday.

DEFENSE: Except for a brain fart by Antonio Cromartie, the defense was exceptional last week. The punter gave them numerous advantages but the defense stopped Peyton Manning – not the field position. They will need to duplicate their effort this time around if they have any chance of success.

#2 Pittsburgh Steelers

OFFENSE: The Steelers offense is not exactly overwhelming. They are ranked either in the middle or the bottom of the league in almost every important category. Of course, they have had numerous injuries at running back which has forced Ben Roethlisberger to win games on his own. That’s not exactly the ideal situation for a team that is built to run the ball down your throat then throwing the ball to keep you honest. Everyone seems to be healthy and the week off should really help this team.

DEFENSE: If defense wins championships then the Steelers should win the Super Bowl. They are first in the league in points allowed, yard and passing yards. However, the Steelers really struggled stopping the run … they were second in the league by allowing 80.2 yards per game on the ground. These numbers are impressive on their own but when you take in to account that they had to play the NFC East and played almost every tough team in the AFC – you have to realize this team is THE most dominant defense in the NFL.

Chargers v. Steelers Matchup

Chargers on offense: The Chargers need an all-pro performance from their offensive line in order to score more than 7 points in this game. I really don’t see how the Chargers move the ball any other way.

Steelers on offense: The Steelers will force the run and until it is established. The Chargers job is to keep it from becoming established and force Big Ben to throw the ball to win the game. Besides last week, the Chargers secondary has been dreadful this year against the pass so it could be a blessing in disguise for the Steelers if they have to throw the ball than they would like to.

Prediction: THIS GAME WILL BE A BLOWOUT!!!! While you will hear a thousand analysts tell you how the Chargers have a chance because they are on a roll, please remember that I told you on Monday that this game was the first lock of 2009. The Steelers are rested, motivated and hungry. Too many things have to go right just for the Chargers to score more than 10 points let alone cover a spread of 6 points. Did I mention the game is in Pittsburgh and the forecast is a high of 24 degrees and snow showers!? To be clear, the Steelers will win this game by a lot more than 6 points.

San Diego: 6 – Steelers: 24