New Years NFL Blog: The Best Stories of 2007
Since today is the last day of 2007, the Super Bowl log has decided to do something that most other blogs and news websites will be doing today: a yearly retrospective! Don’t get too excited. Hopefully this will be as painless as possible. Besides, there is no Monday Night Football game this week, so the Super Bowl Blog needs to do something drastic to get you football fans excited for buying some playoff tickets while we’re in the void. Here goes:
There were plenty of bad NFL stories that dominated the headlines all year long, so let’s get them out of the way. We all know about the off-the-field troubles of the following athletes: Michael Vick, Pacman Jones, O.J. Simpson, and Tank Johnson. Plus there was Spygate. But what were the good stories? Well, the Patriots just completed the first perfect regular season in decades, Brett Farve is having one of the best years of his career, well into his golden years, and Kevin Everett has had a miraculous recovery after a horrific injury. But the story of the year for 2007 is going to have to be… The Colts winning the Super Bowl. This IS the Super Bowl Blog, mind you.
We look forward to another great year at getting you all the inside info in the NFL world. Happy New Years, everybody out there in the Blogosphere! And remember to get your NFL tickets at StubHub.com.
NFL Preview: Last Week of the Regular Season
It was a short week here at the Super Bowl Blog, so you’ll have to bear with us. The bloggers were all home for the holidays, all settled in for long winter naps, so we were unable to give you the kind of NFL news you guys deserve. To attempt to make up for it, we’re offering you a quick-hit attack for the upcoming games this weekend. The first one, the one that will take up the rest of this paragraph, is the Saturday game: Patriots vs. Giants. The Giants are no pushover, and indeed, they will be one of the toughest teams that the Patiots face all season. Plus, there is the added pressure of a New York-Boston game. The Pats have regular season perfection on the line, so will they play the starters all the way through, or let them sit and risk the game?
On Sunday a few of the best games to get tickets to include the Detroit-Green Bay game. This NFL North battle will be more intense than the lopsided point spread predicts. Another good game to see live or to watch on TV would be Buffalo-Philadelphia. The loser gets a losing record on the year, the winner gets to .500. Probably this blog’s favorite two games are going to be between potential playoff matches on Sunday evening, Dallas vs. Washington and Tennessee vs. Indianapolis.
To get NFL tickets, go to StubHub.com.
To Play or Not to Play?
With the last week of NFL football just a few days away, the NFL teams that have already wrapped up a spot in the postseason must attempt to determine how much, if at all, they would like to play their starting players. The question is as old as time. Do you risk losing ground, even losing a whole game, just to keep your top players healthy for the playoffs? Do your fans demand that you play your hardest on every down of every game, or do they understand the game within the game? The question is similar for teams who are eliminated and thinking about next season. Should you try out second and third stringers in the final game to test them, or try to go out with a bang, a win to keep fans warm all throughout the offseason?
Every team in the NFL will have to attempt to answer these tough questions. For some, the answer will be easy. For others, like the New England Patriots, the answer will be hard. There are plenty of comments about what the Patriots should do at CBSsportsline.com. As you probably know the Pats are going for an undefeated season, but they have to worry about keeping some of their star players fresh for the postseason. Will they play Brady all game, or take him out in the second half even if the Pats are losing?
To get NFL tickets go to StubHub.com.
Ranking the Patriots’ Accomplishment Before they Actually Accomplish It
ESPN has a feature that will give you the chance to rank the various “amazing” accomplishments of professional and college sports teams throughout history. If you submit your list, you’ll get to see the way the rest of the Sports Nation poll takers ranked the greatest accomplishments of each team. There are several problems with this. First off, the ’07 Patriots have done nothing yet. They haven’t gone undefeated this season, let alone won a single playoff game. The Super Bowl Blog wishes that ESPN would quit teasing and just ask the Patriots to elope.
You’ll probably not be surprised to see how high the Pats are on the list. It’s the equivalent of ranking Hillary Clinton as the sixth best president of all time… assuming that she’s able to wrap up the Democratic nomination, overcome Nader or another alternative candidate on the left, beat whoever the Republicans run despite her “high-negatives” and the inevitable election stealing that will go on, then see this nation through the bankruptcy that looms just around the corner. Basically, you’re getting a little ahead of yourselves, ESPN and New England fans.
To get NFL tickets, go to StubHub.com.
Bill Parcells to Miami?
The latest and greatest from the rumor mill at the Super Bowl Blog is that Bill Parcels, the famously authoritarian pro football coach, has decided to join the Miami Dolphins organization. Don’t get your hopes up too high Fish fans, the Big Tuna is set to be the vise president of football operations. What that job entails is anybody’s guess, however, having Parcells around has usually led to successful football so you’ve got to be happy to hear this news if you are a sports fan in Southern Florida. The Miami Dolphins aren’t having the greatest of years, so some shakeups are due. This is probably going to be the first big move that the Dolphins make. Expect more to come.
News coming from the Bay Area is that fan favorite and all-around great guy Bryant Young has decided that he will retire after this season. Young is a defensive lineman who has played his whole career with the 49ers. He is beloved by anyone who has ever coached him or played with him. 49ers fans will get to see him suit up for the last time this upcoming weekend when the Niners play the Buccaneers. Hope you have your tickets to the game so that you can say thank you to Young for a career well done.
To get NFL tickets, go to StubHub.com.
The S.I. Pro Bowl “Snub Hub”
If you check out the front page of SportsIllustrated.com today you’ll see one of big featured articles titled “Snub Hub.” The Super Bowl Blog thought that this would be a good article to write about, considering that these blogs are brought to you by the website StubHub.com. I wonder if Andrew Perloff thought of that name on his own, or if it was a direct allusion to StubHub? But I digress. You should check out the guys who Perloff thinks deserved to get into the NFL Pro Bowl. He makes some good points, although most of the people on the list will make a lot of other lists about Pro Bowl snubs, so they are fairly obvious.
If you played fantasy football this year, then you probably know which players had breakout performances at their given positions. Who do you think should have been included in the Pro Bowl that wasn’t? The Super Bowl Blog is going to endorse a few snubs this year, including Plaxico Burress, Fred Taylor and Wes Welker. All of these guys had some pretty great seasons, statistically. The trouble is making the case that these players deserved to be in the game more so than the ones that were selected. But that’s the fun of debating the Pro Bowl selections.
To get NFL tickets, go to StubHub.com.
Vikings Beat Bears in Monday Night Football
The NFC North has separated the pretenders from the contenders. The Chicago Bears could not beat the Minnesota Vikings on Monday Night Football last night, creating a playoff picture in the NFC that has the Vikings in control of the Wild Card spot… at least for now. The Bears were the NFC Champions last season, but becoming the team they were last year has been a difficult task in 2007. The 2006 Bears might have been able to come up with enough defensive fortitude to hold onto a first half lead, or be able to score one point in the second half of the game, but it appears that Chicago, for whatever reason, is experiencing a post-Super Bowl slump. If you missed it last night and would like to read up on the game, there’s a good recap at CBSSportsline.com.
As it stands right now, Dallas and Green Bay have both clinched their division titles and a first round bye in the playoffs. Tampa Bay and Seattle have both clinched division titles and thus playoff births. All that still need to be decided are the wild card teams. The New York Giants are 9-5. The next best team is Minnesota at 8-6, and after that is New Orleans and Washington at 7-7, and Carolina is still alive at 6-8. Make sure to get your tickets to the last games of the season.
To get NFL tickets, go to StubHub.com.
Weekend Football Roundup
There’s one more game to be played in the 15th week of the NFL season, the Monday Night Football game between the Bears and the Vikings. However, there’s already been a lot of action to go over, so let’s get right into what you saw this weekend. Hopefully you got tickets to a game and didn’t get to flip around to see all of the action, but let’s give you out there in NFL Blog Land the quick-hit, Cliff Notes version of what you’ll need to know when you meet another person at the water cooler later today.
Saturday football returned to the spotlight, but this time it was a pro game. The 49ers stopped their slide by beating the Cincinnati Bengals. Frank Gore got going after third-stringer Shaun Hill resuscitated the San Fran air attack. The Browns got an ugly win over Buffalo and they can make the playoffs with a win next week. The Cowboys could not find a touchdown as they lost to the Eagles 10-6. One of the most exciting games was the Jags-Steelers, which came down to the final minutes. The Jaguars won 29-22 when Taylor ran in a touchdown. But by far the most important game of the weekend was Miami-Baltimore. The Dolphins avoided going winless this season by beating the Ravens in overtime before their home crowd. There are not many games left before the playoffs, so get your tickets as soon as possible!
To get NFL tickets, go to StubHub.com.
Denver Falls to Houston in Thursday Night Football
The Denver Broncos could not get their offense going last night. The Houston Texans took advantage of Denver’s dismal night of rushing the ball, winning their Thursday Night Football game 31-13. Unlike the Broncos, the Houston Texans used a balanced offensive attack to gain another win, putting them at 7-7 for the season. The Denver-Houston game kicked off Week 14, but there are going to be all kinds of great games this upcoming weekend. Some of the best include San Diego-Detroit, Pittsburgh-Jacksonville and Arizona-New Orleans. The Patriots will face the Jets, looking to wrap up their 14th straight win, and the Miami Dolphins will attempt to get their first win of the year against the Baltimore Ravens.
Every avid reader of the Super Bowl Blog knows what day it is and what that day means to you. Friday is funny news day, of course! So today we’ve prepared for you a nice little reminder that the Patriots are unfairly good at playing football. You ought to check out TheOnion.com for to see a small article titled “Patriots Proud Of Defeating Whoever That Last Team Was.” Those darn Patriots!
To get NFL tickets, go to StubHub.com.
ESPN Goes Deep with the NFL’s QBs
The guys at ESPN are getting a jump on looking back on the 2007 NFL season. Today there is a great special article about the quarterbacks in the NFL. If you check it out there will be a segment about the best up-and-comers, the best old pros, the guys you should trade now and the leaders you need to keep with your team for a long time to come. There’s even a little segment that has a 64-quarterback hypothetical tournament to determine the best there is in the league right now. You probably won’t be surprised to see who wins, but it is interesting nonetheless.
With the season winding down, it is no secret that teams are taking stock of what their situation will be in the future with the game’s most important offensive position. A lot of the time the QB is the face of the franchise, so if that face isn’t one that you’re going to want to look at for a while, you’ve got to start getting a guy like Romo or Cutler. The offseason will be interesting for several teams in the NFL. But that’s a long ways away. The playoffs can change plenty of fates, so right now all we can do is speculate about the future of NFL QBs.
To get NFL tickets, go to StubHub.com.