The Life Pursuit, 2005 Repeated and a Vicious Beatdown of the Miami Dolphins: An AFC Preview
It has been a rough week. Chaos has reigned and the weather is warming. It is time to move on, like The Great Bear. Bears tend not to move into quality hotels with 24-hour room service and high grade club sandwiches but they understand the importance of moving on. They don’t hang around until the seeds have been sewn and the bridges burnt.
So after Toots farewells Canberra in front of 25,000 raving league fans, I will flee The Capital like a bandit in the night. The weather is warm and Canberra has lost its charm. Without icy mornings and rugby league, Canberra is the same as a thousand other cities. So early Sunday morning, after an evening of drinking and depravity, I will hit the airport and won’t return to Canberra until next winter. Unless, of course, the Raiders get a home final or an election is called. Both would have me on the next flight back to The Capital.
But for now, it’s farewell Canberra.
And I’ll be going alone. My latest assistant, Amy, has been run out of town by a wild bunch of short haired lesbians. She got mixed up in some kinky gigs and that is tough to deal with, particularly when the filing hasn’t been that great and she sure as hell wouldn’t know what a decent orange is. When spikey haired females with eyebrow piercings named Ricky come banging at five in the morning, yelling about love and domination, reason suggests it is time to cut yourself off completely from the scene.
So Amy is gone and best of luck with the lesbians was all I could say.
And me, I’m off to San Fran to catch some training camp action before the NFL season kicks off. I’ll walk the hallowed streets of Haight Ashbury like great men and wiseheads of the caliber of Dr Thompson and Mr Kerouac and Steve Young have, drinking whiskey and talking Niners until it is time to shoot and hit the NRL finals.
But before I jet out of here, some thoughts on the NFL. The AFC Preview…
The East
Despite proclamations from above, the AFC East will not change in any noticeable way this season. The Pats remain a solid team and the Dolphins are shockingly overrated. The Jets and Bills remain without hope. Ignore the so-called experts who wish to lead you up the garden path and indoctrinate you with thoughts to the contrary. Beat them with a heavy stick if you can find one.
The Pats will win the division with ease, in all probability being the only team from the East to finish with a winning record. Despite the loss of clutch kicker Adam Vinateri and legendary linebacker Willie McGinest, the Pats enter 2006 with a Tom Brady led offense and a defense that, at this stage anyway, is workable and healthy. With the best coach in the NFL and a soft schedule that should see six wins off the bat against divisional rivals plus home games against Chicago, Detroit and Houston, the Patriots are set to win another divisional title and make another playoff run that can still end in Super Bowl glory. Eleven wins would not be unexpected.
The Dolphins are a stand-out second but will not threaten in 2006. Many pundits and Dolphin fans see new QB acquisition Daunte Culpepper as The Second Coming, the new Marino. But that is far from the case. He is a crock coming back from a serious injury and a start to the season that would have seen most coaches drop him for Alex Smith. Combined with the loss of star running back Ricky Williams and a questionable defense, it is hard to see the Dolphins threatening this season.
The rest of the East is a hodge-podge of grasping hope and bitterness, in both a meteorological and football-related sense. The Bills and the Jets are no hope to finish with winning records, so never mind the playoffs. If either side wins six games it will be a big year. Neither have the personnel, the coaching or the intangibles to turn the misery of 2005 around. The Bills have nothing but a few aging stars in defense that will be required to relive days gone by if the Bills are to win a few games. And the Jets, well, they are re-building their offensive line and no side wins without a sold O-line. To make matters worse for the Jets, it appears as if star running back Curtis Martin may retire without strapping a boot this season. The one advantage these sides have, come the depths of December, is a significant home field advantage that many warm weather sides struggle to overcome.
The North
Without doubt, the best division in football. The Steelers, who are on their way to another Super Bowl. The Bengals, who will improve on their fine 2005 effort. The Ravens, solid and mean. And poor old Cleveland, the dog-gone Browns who will give their all.
The Steelers are the team to beat in 2006. What was a late season fairytale last season is now an expectation. On paper, they are The Balls. And in practice, they will get the job done. The reason: the Steelers are winners. Big Ben is a winner. Coach Cowher is a winner. The Steelers are winners. With the most fearsome front seven in football, an all-pro offensive line, an elusive runner, some good receivers and the mighty Ben Roethlisberger throwing, it is hard to see the Steelers losing too many games this year. They look set for a 13-3, 12-4 year with a more than reasonable schedule. And when they hit the playoffs, they will take last year and build on it. The Steelers will be there deep into January.
The Bengals are the big threat to the Steelers in the AFC North. Carson Palmer, for all the mean spirited word beatings I gave him last year, is a good QB verging on greatness. When he went down, so did the hopes of Bengal Nation. He was that important. And he will be again this season. With a great running game and an all star receiver in Chad Johnson, the Bengals have the most balanced offense in football. The big worry for the Bengals, aside from Palmer’s fitness, is their D. The Bengals need to stop leaking points. They did acquire Sam Adams to reach this end and should be more effective without the ball. Overall, the Bengals are a side capable of hitting the championship game.
Both the Ravens and the Browns will improve but due to their tough divisional match-ups, will struggle to go .500. The Ravens are better off with McNair throwing and the Browns have tightened up their defense but neither will threaten the playoffs. Expect both to be competitive but expect both to struggle come November.
The South
Indy will dominate, the Jags will chase hard and the Texans and Titans will fight hard to avoid last place. The same old script will play itself out again in the South with little room for ad-libbing, particularly the ending. No other division in the NFL has such a vast disparagement in terms of talent. The endless stream of stars in Indianapolis to the trickles of capability in Houston. Watching the AFC South this season will be like watching an old man chase a spider with his slipper….you know he isn’t going to catch it but for some strange perverted and humorous reason, you can’t help but watch.
The Colts, Super Bowl favourites again, will treat their divisional rivals with contempt. Peyton Manning is still the best regular season QB in the NFL and he has two of the best receivers to hurl too in Marvin Harrison and Reggie Wayne, as well as an offensive line which more than holds its own. What has hurt the Colts significantly is the loss of Edgerrin James to Arizona. James understood Indy’s complex no-huddle offense and was one of the best pass blockers in the game. Indy also have a brutal schedule that includes the NY Giants, the Pats, Denver and Dallas on the road and Washington and Cincy at home. Saying that, the Colts are a good, well rounded side who can be counted on for at least ten wins this season. But it will be the same old story come playoff time. On that front, you can sign my name in the mud and come and see me in February.
The Jags will again be solid and should easily account for divisional rivals Houston and Tennessee to knock up four wins. The Jags do nothing spectacularly but do everything well and are a hope, though not my pick, of grabbing a wild card spot. Expect nothing brilliant from the Jags but they can be counted on to always put in. Consistency is their signature and as a punter, that is all you can ask for.
The Texans and the Titans will both be appalling and neither will win more than six games. The Texans still have no offensive line, a questionable QB and the specter of Reggie Bush hovering above them like a permanent reminder of their stupidity and mismanagement. And the Titans have a worse QB (seeing that they refuse to play Vince Young), a horrible schedule and a defense with more holes than a leaking showerhead. Both sides will be fighting it out hard for potentially the top draft pick.
The West
This division, more than any other in the NFL, will be won and lost on the shoulders of three quarterbacks and their ability to handle The Big Time. The fate of the AFC West and the respective playoff hopes of the three contenders from there is in the meat glove hands of Jake “The Snake” Plummer, Phillip Rivers and Trent Green. Not one of them inspire you with confidence so I thank the Lord I wasn’t bestowed with one of these outfits when he who allocates sporting teams dished out the goods.
Plummer, for the wonderful season he had last season, returned to the Plummer of old come playoff time and enters this season with a lot more pressure on him than in 2005. The Snake has never shown any great propensity to handle pressure in the past, so there is no reason to expect him to now. Rivers is having his first year as a starter and there are significant question marks over his mechanics, so that has the potential to derail the Chargers charge. And Trent Green. Trent Green is just the dour QB who can make a pass but has never lived up to expectations and has never been able to set the Chiefs alight.
To my eye, the Broncos are still the team to beat in the West. Shanahan runs a system that Plummer can handle and if he can’t, the Great Mountain Hope, Jay Cutler, will step up and toss the ball. The Broncos have a great defensive unit, a solid running game and some fine special teams specialists. The Broncos should be hosting playoff games again. But with the Snake tossing the ‘skin, this is as far as I can ride the Bronco train in 2006.
The two threats, the Chargers and the Chiefs, both have rosters capable of upsetting Denver. And one should take a wild card playoff spot. The Chargers are the team that will, to my eye. I’m not sold on Phillip Rivers yet but they do have the best running back in football and a much more manageable schedule than last season. The Chargers will win a lot more than they lose in 2006 and should be seeing January action. And if Rivers is all he has been touted to be, a Super Bowl run is not out of the question. Without doubt, the smokies of the AFC.
The Chiefs just seem to be lacking the X-factor. They are a team used to mediocrity, defeat and kicks to the balls. They will be competitive…and so they should be with Green at QB, Larry Johnson running the ball and Tony Gonzalez at tight end. They are capable and can win the division but they can also go 6-10. They are a punters nightmare. So, for mine, watch them early and then decide. I have them 8-8, another season that will crush the hopes of Chiefs fans just a little bit more.
As an aside, Oakland are the team that don’t matter in the West. They are awful and hardly deserve mention. They cannot possibly win six games. Terrible quarterback. Ill disciplined. Fragile defensively. I will say nothing more about the Raiders other than one final lament on the once proud organisation. What was once tough and mean and glorious is now meek, whiney and accepting of mediocrity. Times, they’ve changed. The sadness and horror of it all.
So, there it is. Written in stone for the world and more to see. Layed out like a loudmouth punk. The Steelers to win the AFC. The Bengals and the Pats, the big threats. The Colts, Chargers and Broncos to fill the playoff gaps.
And the Miami Dolphins will be well and truly beaten by then.
That is how it is.