Thursday, September 08, 2005
King Kaufman makes some nice points in his annual NFL predictions column-- or, at least, some points that sound good to me in my regularly scheduled state of wishful thinking: "Just as the NFC East comes down to "Can anyone catch Philadelphia?" the AFC East is a matter of "Can anyone catch New England." Only in the AFC East, there are actually some candidates.
"The Bills went 9-7 last year despite a 1-5 start. They went into the final game of the season on a six-game win streak during which they simply abused people, beating the Seattle Seahawks by 29 points on the road, pounding the St. Louis Rams by 20, the Browns by 30, the San Francisco 49ers by 34.
"They outscored opponents 228-89 during the streak. Those foes ranged from mediocre to astonishingly bad, but I don't care if you're playing the Little Sisters of Charity, 38-15 is a pretty impressive average score.
"All the Bills had to do was beat Pittsburgh in their last game to make the playoffs. The Steelers were 14-1, but they rested their first string. The Bills lost, and stayed home.
"The Buffalos bring back their powerful defense, maybe the best in football, and powerful runner Willis McGahee. The big difference is at quarterback, where Drew Bledsoe has been replaced by J.P. Losman, a second-year man out of Tulane.
"It's rare for a young quarterback to step right in and succeed, but Losman is a good athlete with a strong arm, and he's in the right situation to be the exception, on a running team with a strong defense. Just ask Ben Roethlisberger. If he can keep his mistakes to a minimum and manage the ball-control attack, the Bills will be a playoff team."
Amen, King. Preach it, brother! The Jets will always be the Jets, and Miami has Ricky "Rastaman Vibration" Williams coming out of the backfield. Somebody is going to come in second in this division, and I can see this team beating up on some non-division opponents (Tampa Bay? Oakland? C'mon, they gotta be able to take Kerry Collins apart. October 2 against the Rupert Mundys?) I can see ten wins, I think, and that ought to do it. Plus they are taking the field against Houston in the old school helmets. That's some powerful mojo right there, isn't it?
"The Bills went 9-7 last year despite a 1-5 start. They went into the final game of the season on a six-game win streak during which they simply abused people, beating the Seattle Seahawks by 29 points on the road, pounding the St. Louis Rams by 20, the Browns by 30, the San Francisco 49ers by 34.
"They outscored opponents 228-89 during the streak. Those foes ranged from mediocre to astonishingly bad, but I don't care if you're playing the Little Sisters of Charity, 38-15 is a pretty impressive average score.
"All the Bills had to do was beat Pittsburgh in their last game to make the playoffs. The Steelers were 14-1, but they rested their first string. The Bills lost, and stayed home.
"The Buffalos bring back their powerful defense, maybe the best in football, and powerful runner Willis McGahee. The big difference is at quarterback, where Drew Bledsoe has been replaced by J.P. Losman, a second-year man out of Tulane.
"It's rare for a young quarterback to step right in and succeed, but Losman is a good athlete with a strong arm, and he's in the right situation to be the exception, on a running team with a strong defense. Just ask Ben Roethlisberger. If he can keep his mistakes to a minimum and manage the ball-control attack, the Bills will be a playoff team."
Amen, King. Preach it, brother! The Jets will always be the Jets, and Miami has Ricky "Rastaman Vibration" Williams coming out of the backfield. Somebody is going to come in second in this division, and I can see this team beating up on some non-division opponents (Tampa Bay? Oakland? C'mon, they gotta be able to take Kerry Collins apart. October 2 against the Rupert Mundys?) I can see ten wins, I think, and that ought to do it. Plus they are taking the field against Houston in the old school helmets. That's some powerful mojo right there, isn't it?
