2021 NFL Predictions Sure to Go Wrong

No drawn out intro this time.

I gotta keep this project going, right?  

Right.  Mark the tape.

1. Montez Sweat and Chase Young will be the #1 pass rush duo in the NFL. I had actually forgotten this fact, but the Washington Football Team are reigning NFC East champions.  Their defense under Ron Rivera will keep improving this year as Sweat and Young emerge as the premiere pass rush duo in the entire league, leading everyone else in sack totals for the season.  Defensive Coordinator Jack Del Rio knows how to maximize rushing the passer since he's coached the likes of Elvis Dumervil and Von Miller during their best days in Denver together.  Sweat and Young will become even better than that pair since Sweat is 25 years old and Young is only 22.  

2. The Pittsburgh Steelers will go first to worst in the AFC North.  It's always fun to pick a team going worst to first in a division since the NFL sees faster turnarounds than any other sports league.  It's not often when a team goes the other direction, but that's what will happen with the Steelers this year.  They still have playmakers on both sides of the ball, but I do not like their offensive line at all.  More than that though is the rest of the division is either on the rise or close to peaking.  Joe Burrow will show why he was the #1 overall pick last year with his young receivers while the Browns and Ravens fight it out for the division title.  The Steelers will be left at the bottom of the division and have to figure out what their future at QB will look like.

It's going to be a long, dark season for the Steelers and their fans this year.

3. Matthew Stafford will throw for his most yards and touchdowns since 2011.  Matthew Stafford will have a career renaissance now that he's on the Rams.  In 2011 he set career highs for himself by throwing for just over 5000 yards and 41 TDs.  His passing yards have mostly declined every year since then (with a couple small upticks here and there), and he hasn't thrown for more than 32 TDs in a season since.  He'll be a great late-round grab for fantasy players on his new team.  And he'll have a whole lot more to celebrate than just personal career stats (more on that later).

4. The Tampa Bay Buccanneers will be the only team in the NFC South to finish over .500.  This is just as much about how much better the Bucs are than their divisional rivals as it is who their opponents are this season.  The NFC South will face the AFC East and NFC East divisions this year, both of which are filled with teams better than the Saints, Panthers, and Falcons.  The Saints are arguably the best of those three teams, but still will take a huge step backwards without Drew Brees at QB.

5. Derrick Henry will be the first running back to lead the NFL in rushing yards for three straight years since Emmitt Smith from 1991 to 1993.  Not so bold, really.  Next.

6. Josh Allen will be the league MVP.  Allen took agiant leap forward last year, improving his completion percentage, passing yards, and total touchdowns from the year prior.  The Bills got all the way to the AFC title game with him under center, and he'll keep rocketing up the points to put himself toe to toe with Patrick Mahomes as the best QB in the AFC (which is somewhat painful for me to say as a Ravens fan).  It'll be bittersweet for Bills fans though, because....

7. The Los Angeles Rams will defeat the Buffalo Bills in Super Bowl 56.  The Rams came oh so close to winning a championship a couple years ago but couldn't get anything going against the Patriots offensively.  Matthew Stafford will finally get a taste of not only winning a playoff game, but he'll be hoisting the Lombardi trophy as Super Bowl MVP.  Meanwhile, Bills fans will be left hoping this game isn't the start of a repeat of the early 90s when they got to the big game for four straight years and came up short every time.

2021 MLB Predictions Sure to Go Wrong

The world is starting to get back to normal, albeit very slowly.  I actually didn't expect the NFL season to be played in full, and it sure looks like the MLB season will not only begin on time but fans will be allowed into stadiums now.  We're still a very long way away from being totally back to normal, but at least there's a light at the end of the tunnel.  So unlike this time last year, there's a point to making my normal preseason predictions.

1. The Toronto Blue Jays will win the American League East. The last time the Blue Jays won the division, they were a surprise team that came largely out of nowhere.  While they made the playoffs last year as a Wild Card, they will take a major jump forward and steal the division away from the Rays and Yankees.  They added George Springer and Marcus Semien to their already stacked lineup, and Nate Pearson will join their rotation at some point once he recovers from his groin injury.  

The Yankees have a bear in Gerrit Cole, but their lineup is extremely unbalanced.  DJ Lemehieu and Gleyber Torres are certainly reliable, but Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton are injured far too often to count on them.  And is Gary Sanchez really expected to still be the primary catcher?

As for the Rays, they were a stunning team to go all the way to the World Series against the Dodgers.  However in years past they play way over their heads one season and quickly return to Earth the following season.  They'll still be good, but not good enough to win the division again.

2. The St. Louis Cardinals will finish with the best record in the National League.  I still don't know how the Cardinals acquired Nolan Arenado without having to give up any prospect of significance.  Adding him to their lineup makes them the best team in the NL Central by a fairly wide margin; only the Brewers avoided dismantling their roster over the off-season.  Both the Cardinals and Brewers will beat up the other three teams in the Central, and the Cardinals will win enough games head to head against Milwaukee that they'll finish with over 100 wins this year.

3. The Philadelphia Phillies will finish last in the NL East.  It's already been an ugly, ugly year for Philly sports fans, considering everything the Eagles have dealt with in the last three months.  Baseball will bring them no relief, with the Phillies finishing dead last in their division.  They just don't have the talent to keep up with the rest of the division, especially the Braves and Mets.  Consider the following:

• Their rotation after Aaron Nola and Zack Wheeler is projected as Zach Elfin, Matt Moore, and Chase Anderson.  That's just....ugh.
• Their bullpen consists of Hector Neris, Jose Alvarado, Tony Watson, Connor Brogdon, and Brandon Kintzler.  Of this bunch, only Alvarado had an ERA under 4.00 last year.  And they signed Archie Bradley to be their new closer.
• Bryce Harper, Zack Wheeler, Andrew McCutchen, Jean Segura, Didi Gregorius, Aaron Nola, and JT Realmuto will make nearly $120 million combined this year.  McCutchen, Segura, and Gregorius are all over 30 years old and will show their age this year.  It's a lot of money wasted for a team that had tanked several years ago with the expectations of competing now.

5. Zac Gallen and Lucas Giolito will be the Cy Young winners. Gallen hasn't pitched more than 80 innings in a season thus far, but he will quickly emerge among the best pitchers in the NL.  I thought about picking Jack Flaherty for NL Cy Young, and while I still expect a big year from him Gallen will still have the superior season.

Speaking of young pitchers emerging among the league's elite, the same can be said about Giolito.  The White Sox are ready to be a true contender now that their young core players are established major leaguers, and Giolito will headline their rotation.

6. Ronald Acuna will have a 40/40 season. Acuna came only 3 stolen bases shy of having a 40/40 season in 2019, and he's only going to keep getting better.  He and Fernando Tatis, Jr, are two of the most exciting players in baseball, and they will have an MVP race for the ages this year.  Tatis will come up just a little short this year, because....

7. Ronald Acuna and Vlad Guerrero Jr will be league MVPs. Acuna will edge out Tatis for NL MVP for the reason discussed above.  Meanwhile in the AL, Vlad Guerrero, Jr, will break out and show why he was the former #1 overall prospect in baseball with an 80-grade hit tool.  Plus it's no fun to keep picking Mike Trout for AL MVP.

8. The San Diego Padres will defeat the Chicago White Sox in the World Series.  Even though Fernando Tatis, Jr, will miss out on winning league MVP, it won't matter since he will hoist up a World Series trophy in October.  It'll be a series filled with some of the best young talent the league has to offer, starting with Tatis and including Manny Machado, Yoan Moncada, Eloy Jimenez, and Luis Robert.  If this isn't enough to be a huge ratings win for MLB, then nothing will.

2020 NFL Predictions Sure to Go Wrong

It dawned on me over the weekend that we have only a few days to go until the NFL season starts.  I've barely given football any thought at all since I'm used to watching preseason games, but eliminating them thanks to COVID-19 has me left with an "out of sight, out of mind" feeling.  I don't think anyone can really know what to expect given what we've seen in the other major sports, but since the season kicks off a week from Thursday, here goes.....

1. We are in for some bad football for the first month of the season.  I have no doubt that players across the league are in shape, but there's a huge difference between being in shape and being in football shape.  The preseason normally gets players there, but since they've been limited to practices this month we are probably bound to see plenty of slopping mistakes and missed tackles for the first few weeks.

On top of that, all the undrafted free agents who normally use the preseason to fight to make the final rosters won't have that option.  Coaches will only have practices on tape to evaluate who should stay and who should go.  That's not even close to being enough to properly evaluate everyone.  The overall quality of play on the field across the league will be shoddy at best.

2. Kyler Murray and Josh Allen will be the next young QBs to take a huge leap forward.  Two years ago Patrick Mahomes set the world on fire.  Last year it was Lamar Jackson.  Murray and Allen will be neck and neck in carrying that torch in 2020.  Both QBs had very middling stats across the board in 2019; in fact, Allen had finished dead last among starting QBs in completion percentage.  However, Murray will now have DeAndre Hopkins and Allen has Stephon Diggs to help them stretch the field.  Their dynamic play will be exciting to watch for fans of both teams, though Buffalo has a better chance at reaching the postseason than Arizona does.

3. The New York Giants will be that sub-.500 team from last year who comes out of nowhere.  Much of this prediction depends on just how good QB Daniel Jones will play now that he's the Week 1 starter under center.  Just how well he plays depends on what new head coach Joe Judge and OC Jason Garrett can do with him, but there is a lot of talent on both sides of the ball.  Jones has a stud RB in Saquon Barkley and two quality WR in Golden Tate and Darius Slayton.  

Meanwhile the defense looks to be a whole lot better than it has been the last couple years.  Dexter Lawrence, the Giants' first round pick in 2019, has a full season to play alongside Leonard Williams on their defensive line.  They also added Kyler Fackrell at DE for pass rush who knows DC Patrick Graham's system.  

The Cowboys are still the class of the NFC East, but the Eagles look far too shaky to keep pace and Washington is mired in football hell for reasons everyone already knows.  The Giants could be a whole lot better than most people think.

4. The Atlanta Falcons will be forced to have a fire sale by the trade deadline and Dan Quinn will (finally) be fired.  The Falcons had peaked a few years ago when they had reached the Super Bowl against the Patriots, and then....well, you know the rest.  Now they are mired in salary cap hell, and the bottom will finally fall out underneath them this season.  Over the first eight weeks of the season, their opponents include Seattle; Dallas; Chicago; Green Bay; Carolina (twice); Minnesota; and Detroit.  Things could get ugly very quickly for them and the season could spiral out of control.  

While moving contracts like Julio Jones or Jake Matthews would be next to impossible, they could look to trade guys like Alex Mack, Deion Jones, or Ricardo Allen.

5. Joe Burrow will be the first quarterback taken #1 overall to win his NFL debut since 2010.  There have been five other QBs taken #1 overall in the last decade to start Week 1 of their rookie season, and they've either lost or tied (Sam Bradford; Cam Newton; Andrew Luck; Jameis Winston; Kyler Murray).  It would be fun if Burrow faced off against another first round QB drafted this year in Justin Herbert, but the Chargers are going with Tyrod Taylor under center to start the season.  However, Bengals fans will have something to genuinely get excited about when Burrow takes the field for the first time with a win.

6. It's the final swan song for Ben Roethlisberger.  Ben has hinted at retirement in the past; this year all his injuries will finally catch up to him.  Frankly, I'd be impressed if he's able to walk around comfortably in his post-NFL career days considering his various injuries.  Something will happen to him this season (not that I root for a player to sustain an injury), and it'll be enough that Ben will have to hang up his cleats for good.

7. The Baltimore Ravens will defeat the the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in Super Bowl 55. Chalk, chalk, chalk.  How monumentally boring of a Super Bowl prediction.  Conversely, how fun will this game be, too.  The Bucs had loaded up for this season, starting by signing Tom Brady and bringing Rob Gronkowski out of retirement.  On the flip side, the Ravens are a team stacked with young talent led by Lamar Jackson.  The youth will win out over the vets, and Lamar will continue the trend started by Patrick Mahomes last year of a league MVP winning the Super Bowl in his third season (and live up to the promise he had made the night he was drafted by the Ravens).

2019 NFL Predictions Sure to Go Wrong

And here we are, only 24 hours away from the start of the 2019 NFL season.  I still find enjoyment from writing these predictions, regardless of whether anyone out there in cyberspace even reads these things.  I promise to make no mention of Antonio Brown anywhere here because I refuse to give in to that circus (I don't even watch Hard Knocks for the same reason).

I find it amazing that I even tend to get one or two predictions right every year, which I have to believe is pretty close to what most talking heads on TV networks get right as well.

1. The Baltimore Ravens will be the first team since the 2009 Panthers with two 1000-yard rushers.  The Ravens had reinvented their offense last year when Lamar Jackson took over at QB from an injured Joe Flacco.  They had run the ball down opposing defenses' throats and only hit a wall when they had faced the Chargers for the second time in three weeks in the playoffs.  The Ravens added Mark Ingram in free agency and drafted Justice Hill, both of whom expect will be among league leaders in rushing yards in 2019.  This is the first time in years when Ravens fans have good reason to be excited about the team's offense.

2. The Kansas City Chiefs will miss the playoffs.  This prediction looks bona fide crazy at face value.  The Chiefs had gone all the way to the AFC Championship Game last year and took the eventual Super Bowl champion Patriots to overtime.  If not for Dee Ford lining up offsides, the Chiefs would have won that game and history would be quite different.  All that brings me to my point: this Chiefs team is bound for regression this year.  Their defense is still really, really bad, and losing Kareem Hunt (albeit for very justifiable reasons) will have heavy impacts on their offense.

Every year, there are one or two teams who had made the playoffs the previous season but stumbled the following year.  The Ravens went from 10-6 and reaching the Divisional Round of the playoffs following the 2014 season to 5-11 in 2015.  In 2016 the Packers went from NFC North champions to finishing 7-9 and out of the playoffs in 2017.  In 2017 the Jaguars went 10-6 and went to the AFC Championship Game but finished 5-11 last year.  I could keep going on, but I think I made my point.  And it's not just the Chiefs who struggle this year after making a deep playoff run last year because....

3. The Seattle Seahawks will be the only team in the NFC West to finish over .500.  Yes, this includes the NFC Champion Rams who still look as loaded as they did in 2018.  The Super Bowl Hangover is real, folks.  History has shown time and again that the team who loses the Super Bowl stumbles the following season.  There is no logical reason for it, really.  It just is.

And there is really no need to explain the 49ers nor Cardinals here either.

4. The Dallas Cowboys will be the first team in the NFC East to repeat as division champs since the 2003/2004 Eagles. This is more about the Eagles just not quite having enough to supplant the Cowboys this year.  I expect Jerry Jones will blink at some point and sign Ezekiel Elliot to the kind of deal Elliott desires so he will play the entire season.  And just like the NFC West, there is no need to say anything about the Giants or Redskins.

5. Alex Mattison will finish with more yards and touchdowns than Dalvin Cook.  Cook looked like a future superstar running back early in his rookie season two years ago, but a torn ACL brought his career to a screeching halt.  He didn't show much more last year, though it could at least be partially explained by his return from injury.  I still like Mattison to emerge as the Vikings' every down RB long term.

6. The Chicago Bears will start the season 5-0.  The Bears will show that last year's upstart team was not a fluke.  Their first five games are by no means a cakewalk (vs Packers; @ Denver; @ Redskins; vs Vikings; @ Raiders) but they are all winnable games.  They'll need those wins too, considering their schedule post-Week 6 bye includes the Saints, Chargers, Rams, and Cowboys.  In fact, with a second half schedule like that the Bears almost need to start the season 5-0 in order to have a shot at the playoffs again.

7. Ezekiel Elliott will be the league MVP.  This prediction was screwed up because my original call would have been Andrew Luck, and he....well....you know.  Elliott turned into my plan B, but even he was a dicey choice until earlier this morning, and Cowboys fans can all sleep much easier at night now heading into the season.  I expect Zeke will have a slow start since he wasn't with the team throughout the preseason, but by Week 3 he'll be all systems go and won't look back.

8. It's the final swan song for Drew Brees.  It's quite shocking that Brees has never won a league MVP during his career to date.  I thought about taking him in light of Luck's retirement, and while Brees will have another typical season (and quietly, as he always seems to do), Zeke will be an even bigger difference maker for Dallas.  However, even though Brees will close out his final year in the NFL without a league MVP to his resume, it won't matter because....

9. The New Orleans Saints will defeat the Los Angeles Chargers in Super Bowl 54.  John Elway.  Ray Lewis.  Jerome Bettis.  Peyton Manning.  They all walked off the field as Super Bowl champions, and Drew Brees will join them.  The Saints defense typically starts out seasons shaky, but they turn things up by mid year, and that will carry them through January.

Meanwhile, the Chargers are primed for a disastrous start to the season with Derwin James on IR and Melvin Gordon nowhere to be found.  At least they can expect James to be back by mid-season, but Gordon is a major wild card.  Despite those (very justified) questions, Philip Rivers will still put his team on his back and put the team in the best position to finally win a championship.  They'll just come up a little short.

2019 MLB Predictions Sure to Go Wrong

This is, in fact, still a thing.  I have no idea who reads or cares about these predictions, but they're still fun to write after

*looks up blog history, gasps*

six years (!!!!!) of writing them.  Who cares about being right?  It's still fun.

1. No division champion in the NL will repeat in 2019.  Both the NL East and Central are incredibly deep this year.  The Braves and Brewers have done remarkably little over the winter to improve their clubs from last year, leaving the door open for their rivals to close the gap.  The Phillies made all kinds of moves, bringing in Jean Segura, Andrew McCutchen, and - oh yeah! - Bryce Harper.  The Nationals added Patrick Corbin.  The Mets brought in Robinson Cano and Edwin Diaz.  While the Braves still have an incredible amount of young talent, they don't have enough to keep pace with their primary rivals.

Meanwhile, the Reds and Cardinals made numerous moves of their own to catch the Brewers.  I looked at the Reds late last season and felt if they had added to their starting pitching, they'd compete for the division in 2019.  Then they added Alex Wood, Tanner Roark, and Sonny Gray.  In what looks like a total slug fest, I actually like the Reds' chances at coming out on top based on their amazing lineup.

Then there's the NL West.  The Dodgers have owned that division for years and really never had much competition until last year when the Rockies made things interesting late.  I really like the Rockies to take the division outright this year with German Marquez and Kyle Freeland anchoring their rotation.  The Dodgers are getting old really fast and news broke today that neither Clayton Kershaw nor Walker Buehler will be ready for Opening Day.  They had plenty of windfall in their favor the last two years, but those were their best chances to win a title.

2. Aaron Judge will break the MLB record for most home runs during the first three years of a player's career.  Judge only needs 32 home runs to break this record, so it's less of a prediction than an inevitability.  He'll shatter the record currently held by Albert Pujols.

3. The Astros will be the first time in MLB history to win at least 100 games in three consecutive seasons.  It's fairly difficult to fathom, but no team has ever won 300 or more games in a three year span.  It's happened a couple times in back-to-back seasons, but the Astros will be the first to accomplish it for the third straight time.  They're just too stacked on offense, defense, and pitching.

4. The Diamondbacks will score the fewest runs in baseball this year.  I really didn't do this intentionally, but I've actually got a history of predicting which team will score the most or fewest runs in a season (here and here).  The Diamondbacks traded away Paul Goldschmidt and lost AJ Pollock in free agency, and only brought in Adam Jones as a replacement.  Calling that a barren lineup would be extremely polite.  The Marlins might give them a run for their proverbial money in offensive ineptitude, but at least Lewis Brinson and Brian Anderson have some upside for Miami.  There isn't anyone with real upside in Arizona at the moment.

5.  The Nationals' offense will be better without Bryce Harper than it ever was with him.  On the flip side of offensive firepower, the Nationals will score runs a plenty this season.  They'll have Juan Soto all year long, paired with Anthony Rendon, Trea Turner, and their top prospect Victor Robles.  They also have one of the better rotations in all of baseball now that they had added Patrick Corbin.  They won't miss Harper one bit, despite him playing for a divisional rival now.

6.  The Indians' starting pitching will be undone by their outfield.  I had to look up who was listed on the Indians' outfield depth chart because I had no earthly idea who was on there.  Even though there are a few days left to finalize rosters, the Indians currently have names such as Jordan Luplow, Leonys Martin, Greg Allen, Jake Bauers, and Tyler Naquin.  I had never heard of Luplow or Allen; I'm sure they're perfectly nice guys who must have done some good stuff to impress Terry Francona, but I can't figure out what he could possibly have seen in either of them.  All this leads me to suspect there will be some atrocious outfield defense for the Indians this year.  Their starting pitching is normally among the best in baseball, but it could be completely undermined by the guys tracking down fly balls in the outfield. 

7. Eugenio Suarez and Mike Trout will be the league MVPs.  Suarez has taken off the last two years, becoming a premiere bat in the middle of a loaded Cincinnati lineup.  He'll become even more of a household name this year by holding off other heavy hitters like Nolan Arenado, Manny Machado, Anthony Rendon, and Kris Bryant (and that's just among 3B in the NL).  The Reds are a team I really like heading into the season, even in what looks like an incredibly competitive NL Central.

And then there's Mike Trout.  Yawn.  Honestly, what could I possibly say about him that hasn't already been said thousands of times already?  Is there a stat that doesn't show him to be one of the greatest players of all time in the sport?  If there is, I have yet to find it. 

8.  Aaron Nola and Gerrit Cole will win the Cy Young Awards.  Nola came close to winning the Cy Young last year, finishing third in the voting.  The Phillies rewarded him with a four-year contract extension, and Nola will capitalize on that by taking the next step to becoming a true ace in a division filled with incredible starting pitching.

Meanwhile, Cole is in a contract year and will cash in big time as he approaches free agency.  He'll make the Astros have to push extra hard to keep him around the way they have locked up Jose Altuve, Alex Bregman, and Justin Verlander.  Trouble is, they can't sign everyone on their team, so he could price himself out of Houston.  But that's okay because.....

9. The Houston Astros will defeat the Washington Nationals in the World Series.  Astroball is no joke.  I know this because a) I read the book as any Orioles fan should, and more importantly b) the Astros have already won a World Series using these tactics.  They're just too good of a team.

The Nationals would be a bit of a surprise team since they have yet to get past the NLDS, but there's no denying how successful they've been in building their team.  Like I said earlier, I think they are a more complete team across the board even without Bryce Harper.  Almost more importantly though, they will resurrect a stat that I had discovered last year that I felt doesn't get enough attention across baseball: For the period of 2001-2017, the World Series had featured at least one team every year who did not make the playoffs the previous season.  The Brewers came extremely close to keeping the streak alive in 2018 but fell short in Game 7 of the NLCS.  Washington will bring that trend back in 2019.

2018 NFL Predictions Sure to Go Wrong

You'd think that a guy who is less than two months away from tying the knot would have better things to do than make sports predictions.

You'd be wrong.  Priorities and such.

I only got one prediction right last year, that being Carson Palmer would call it quits.  I got relatively close with the Jets having arguably the worst offense in the NFL, though the Browns said, "Oh no, allow us," and took over from there.

Since I'm not one to break tradition, here goes for the 9th - yes, 9th - straight year.

1. The Los Angeles Chargers will win the AFC West.  I'm still getting used to referring to the Chargers as being from Los Angeles.  Geography issues aside, it's easy to forget how close they came to winning the division last year despite starting the season 0-4. I don't expect them to start so slowly this year, with four of their first six games being very winnable.  The only question is how packed will the StubHub Center be when the Chargers win the AFC West for first time since 2009.

2. Carson Wentz will struggle in his return from a torn ACL. There are just too many examples of quarterbacks whose first season back after tearing an ACL is below average at best.  See Brady, Tom; Flacco, Joe; Palmer, Carson; and Griffin III, Robert.  Griffin is pretty much a worst case scenario though since he hasn't played effectively since his rookie season in 2012.  It's worth pointing out that the rest of those QBs did eventually recover (especially Brady), but their first seasons back were mostly about working through the cobwebs and getting comfortable with taking a hit again.  Wentz was on his way to being league MVP last year before tearing his ACL, so he'll have to wait till at least 2019 before playing at an elite level again.

2(a). Ditto for DeShaun Watson. See above.

3. The San Francisco 49ers will be get one of the two Wild Cards in the NFC.  The 49ers went 5-0 in their final five games of last season, largely because they got their first real QB since Colin Kaepernick's brief dominance in 2012.  They also have a head coach and GM who are on the same page for what feels like the first time in over a decade.  The NFL always has s couple upstart teams who take significant leaps forward from the previous season.  The Cardinals and Seahawks are both going to be bad teams this year, so the 49ers have a great opportunity right in front of them.

4. The Cleveland Browns will give up at least 70 points in their first two games of the season.  There's literally nowhere to go but up for the Browns after an 0-16 season last year.  While they'll win a few games at least - which will feel like a Super Bowl championship for fans of the Factory of Sadness - they won't look so hot in their first two games of the season. They open at home versus the Steelers, and then they head to New Orleans in Week 2.  That's two powerhouse offenses in the first two weeks, each of whom can put up at least 35 points on the Browns defense. 

5. Eric Decker will catch at least 80 passes for the Patriots.  The Patriots have this super weird and unique talent for turning white guys into productive wide receivers (I'm looking at you, Danny Amendola and Julian Edelman).  It's worth pointing out that Decker has been very productive over the course of his career; he caught anywhere from 74 to 87 passes during his peak years of 2012-2015.  He had only played in three games in 2016, and then bounced back a bit last year in Tennessee.  In New England, he'll resurface as a favorite target for Tom Brady.

6. Stefon Diggs will be a top-5 wide receiver in the entire league.  While we're talking wide receivers, Diggs had a breakout year last year for the Vikings and was the hero of the wild Divisional Round playoff game versus the Saints.  This production came with Case Keenum playing at QB in 15 games, no less.  Now that the Vikings have Kirk Cousins as their permanent QB, Diggs will be among the league leaders in both receiving yards and touchdowns.

7. The Buffalo Bills will score the fewest points in the league.  Meanwhile, on the other end of the offensive spectrum, the Bills are starting their franchise over.  They drafted the guy they hope to be their primary QB long term in Josh Allen who will have the likes of Kelvin Benjamin, Andre Holmes, Corey Coleman, Zay Jones, and Jeremy Curley for his receivers.

Ugh.

LeSean McCoy is still their primary running back, but he's 30 years old now.  He may still be productive despite his age, but the elephant in the room is whether he'll be suspended for his ex-girlfriend accusing him of breaking into her home.  He's an X factor for now, but opposing offenses could stuff him in the box since the wide receivers leave little to defend.

8. Kirk Cousins will be the league MVP.  Getting back to more positive predictions, Kirk Cousins will really get an opportunity to show off what he can do with real talent around him like Dalvin Cook and the aforementioned Stefon Diggs.  The Vikings will be one of the big dogs in the NFC again and will look to avenge the egg they had laid in last year's NFC Championship Game.  They'll make the playoffs again, but they'll come up short yet again because....

9. The Los Angeles Rams will defeat the Pittsburgh Steelers in Super Bowl 53.  This matchup sounds like it comes from the 1970s.  Fans of classic smash-mouth style football will salivate over a pair of teams like these, with stars like Todd Gurley, Aaron Donald, Brandin Cooks, Jared Goff, Cooper Kupp, Michael Brockers, Dominique Easley, Ndamukong Suh, and Marcus Peters taking the stage.

And that's just the Rams.

Add in Ben Roethlisberger, Antonio Brown, David DeCastro, Joe Haden, Cameron Heyward, Juju Smith-Shuster, and Stephon Tuitt, and this game has all the makings of one of the great Super Bowls of all time. 

Sean McVay will wind up having the last laugh and vault himself among the top coaches in the NFL as the Rams take home the Lombardi trophy in only their second season back in LA.

2018 MLB Season Predictions Sure to Go Wrong

I'm neck deep in my annual March Madness marathon, so I'm using the opportunity to make my season predictions for Major League Baseball this season.  It's been the most bizarre offseason for baseball across the board that I can recall, and at this writing free agent SP Alex Cobb still hasn't signed a deal.  Regardless, it's time to make my predictions that will look absurd a month into the season, if not sooner.

1. The Minnesota Twins will win the AL Central.  I realize that I had made this same prediction two years ago.  I had jumped the gun on the Twins big time since they were one of the worst teams in baseball that year.  Now they are coming off a Wild Card berth and they've added Lance Lynn and Jake Odorizzi to their rotation.  Those two additions will make any rotation better, and their starting pitching will be even better for a reason that I'll get into later.

The Indians are still the big dogs in the AL Central, but I expect them to fall backwards a little this year. The baseball gods doth giveth as they did the last two years for Cleveland, and now they shall taketh away a little (albeit not by much, since the rest of the division is very weak).

2. Shohei Ohtani will make more starts as a pitcher than he will as an OF/DH for the Angels.  My logic here is two-fold: First, The Angels have a crowded outfield as it is led by perennial MVP candidate Mike Trout, expensive new arrival Justin Upton, and Kole Calhoun.  Albert Pujols will be their DH at least most of the time, so that doesn't leave much room for Ohtani's bat. Secondly, the Angels will need him to pitch regularly anyway since the rest of their rotation includes Garrett Richards, Andrew Heaney, Parker Bridwell, Tyler Skaggs, and Matt Shoemarker, all of whom have dealt with various injuries during their respective careers. Ohtani will get his fair share of at bats during the course of the season, but he will be far more valuable as a pitcher.

3. The Atlanta Braves will finish over .500 for the first time since 2013.  The Braves are still at least a year away from competing in the NL East, but considering how bad the Marlins will be and how bad the Mets could be, the Braves will benefit from beating up on some bad teams.  The Phillies could be in a similar position for the same reason.

4. Tommy Pham will be a top-10 center fielder in baseball.  Pham came out of nowhere last year with a slash line of .306/.411/.520 over 128 games.  He just turned 30, so he's fairly old for a guy entering his 5th season but only now expected to play every day.  He will be a sleeper wonder this year for the Cardinals who now have one of the better outfields in all of baseball.

5. Nolan Arenado will compete for the Triple Crown.  Last year, Arenado finished third in the NL in HRs, second in RBI, and eighth in batting average.  With Giancarlo Stanton now in the AL, Arenado has a great opportunity to lead the NL in all three categories.  Even if he comes up short in average, he is primed for career bests across the board.

6. The Tampa Bay Rays will score the fewest runs in baseball.  It's really shocking to see how the two Florida teams dismantled themselves during the offseason.  Six of the the Rays' top seven home run hitters from last year are no longer with the team, whether by trade or free agency.  They lost over 140 home runs from those departures, so how they expect to score any runs is beyond me.  They will be a really hard team to watch offensively this year.

7. Nolan Arenado and Jose Ramirez will be the league MVPs.  Arenado will be the NL MVP for the reason I had outlined above, especially if he does win the Triple Crown.  Ramirez was a late candidate for the AL MVP last year as the Indians went on their 22-game winning streak, and that momentum will carry over into this season.  He still has plenty of upside for himself, offensively and defensively.

8. Chase Anderson and Jose Berrios will be the Cy Young winners.  Anderson would have finished 4th in the NL in both ERA and WHIP last year, had he pitched enough innings.  He and Zach Davies form a very underrated 1-2 punch in the Brewers' rotation and will lead the team to a postseason berth with the beefed up offense behind them.  Anderson's primary challenge will be whether he can keep his 2017 HR/FB rate and increasing his strikeout totals.

Berrios is only entering his second year as a full time starter, but he's the Twins' best pitcher.  He will emerge as the Twins' #1 guy over the course of the season as they narrowly edge out the Indians for the AL Central title.

9. The Chicago Cubs will defeat the New York Yankees in the World Series.  I doubt there is a bigger chalk pick for the World Series than this choice, but I just don't see anyone topping the Cubs in the NL or anyone beating out the Yankees in the AL.  The Astros are reigning champs, but there is a reason why no one has repeated as champions since the 1999/2000 Yankees (though in fairness, the Giants won 3 championships over the course of 5 years, and that is arguably more impressive).  

2017 NFL Predictions Sure to Go Wrong

It's that time of the year again, kids.  Yes, it is time for me to make some crazy sports predictions for the fun of it, and then look back on these in a couple months to laugh at them.  Nothing else needed to introduce things, so let's get right to it.

1. The Tennessee Titans will win the AFC South.  The Titans took arguably the best wide receiver in the draft this past April in Corey Davis (I don't like any wide receiver named Mike Williams and I'm only half-joking when I say that) to give Marcus Mariota a deep receiving threat.  Their offense top to bottom is stacked,and their defense ain't too shabby either. The Texans are the prohibitive favorite in the division, but they have decided to start Tom Savage over DeShaun Watson at quarterback to start the season.  Watson could still get the job later, but the Titans are still the more balanced team overall.  Besides, some division winner has to be a little bit of a shocker anyway.

2. The New York Jets will score the fewest points per game since the 2012 Kansas City Chiefs (13.2).  It's no secret that the Jets have one of the worst rosters top to bottom in the NFL.  Their training camp has been filled with blunders like QB Christian Hackenberg not being able to break a huddle properly.  Now they are going with Josh McCown at quarterback for their first game of the regular season.  Bottom line is, this team is a mess and they are not going to score many points at all from their lack of playmakers.  They don't have much of a long term direction either, so Jets fans will have to suffer through the season and keep reading about top college talent they could look towards drafting come April 2018.

3. Odell Beckham, Jr will break Randy Moss's single season TD record.  If this prediction sounds a little familiar, it's because it is.  Normally I draft my season's predictions on their own, but I do sometimes look over my previous predictions to compare and contrast.  I was actually surprised when I had discovered I said this same thing about Demaryius Thomas three years ago, but I figured what the heck?  Beckham is a more electric player to watch than Thomas, capable of some incredible acrobatic feats on the field.  Eli Manning will once again have a ton of fun throwing to his #1 target this year.

4. Dalvin Cook will break Gale Sayers' rookie total TD record (22).  Cook has a dual-threat capability as a running back for the Vikings since he's a pass-catching threat in addition to being an every down back.  It won't take him long to become one of the most-discussed rookie players in the NFL this season, and he will almost certainly be quickly compared to Adrian Peterson.

5. Martavis Bryant will lead the Steelers in receiving touchdowns.  Bryant is still waiting on being officially reinstated to the Steelers by the league office, but if he finally plays a full season he and Antonio Brown will make up the top receiving corps in the NFL.  Assuming he has stopped smoking marijuana completely, Bryant will quickly become one of the top wide receivers in the AFC.  Antonio Brown will still be a playmaker, but even he doesn't have the physique that Bryant has.

6. The Atlanta Falcons will finish under .500 this season.  The Falcons, on paper, should still have a solid season despite blowing a 28-3 lead in the Super Bowl this past season.  Their key players on both sides of the ball are all still around, and the only notable coaching change was Offensive Coordinator Kyle Shanahan leaving to coach the 49ers (which is a pretty big deal, in my opinion).  This prediction is one of those gut feelings that isn't based on anything terribly logical, but there's a reason why no Super Bowl loser returned the following season to play for a championship the following year since the 1992 Buffalo Bills.  Fortune will not favor the Falcons in 2017.

7. It's the final swan song for Carson Palmer.  The writing is on the wall.  Palmer's injury history has been piling up over the last 4 years or so, including a torn ACL, a concussion, a finger dislocation, and a shoulder injury.  He came close to retiring last year, instead opting to come back for another year.  However, I foresee yet another unfortunate injury that forces him to miss at least part of the season and ultimately leads to the end of his career.  The Cardinals will look towards April's draft to find their quarterback of the future.

8. The Oakland Raiders will lead the league in scoring this season.  Raiders QB Derek Carr had a breakout season last year, and his career will continue on its upswing in 2017.  Amari Cooper has developed into a strong #1 receiver, but there is a question as to what the Raiders can expect with Marshawn Lynch at 31 years old.  Still, this team will be scoring points in bunches all year long.  There's a reason why many see them as the #2 team in the AFC.  In fact, speaking of the aforementioned Carr....

9.  Derek Carr will be the league MVP.  I don't think I need to really say much more, except that Carr will show NFL fans he's fine after breaking his leg late last season.  He could have had a chance at the league MVP last year had he not been injured, but he'll make up for that in 2017.

10.  The Seattle Seahawks will defeat the New England Patriots in Super Bowl 52.  Okay, I'm going somewhat chalk-ish with this pick.  I don't normally like doing that, but there just isn't any team in the AFC who has a realistic chance at dethroning the Patriots.  The NFC is more leveled, though the Seahawks stand out from the bunch.  They'll get their revenge for bumbling the end of Super Bowl 49 against these same Patriots.

MLB 2017 Predictions Sure to Go Wrong

Once again, baseball season is upon us, which means I throw myself into the wood chipper in the name of making predictions.  One of my best friends enjoys reading my predictions, and last year he loved bringing up my prediction of the Twins winning the AL Central as being one of the worst of all time (and it was well-deserved, too).  I knew by late April last year I would wear egg on my face on that one.

So naturally, I'm heading back to the well for another round of predictions that will make me look silly in retrospect.

1. Five shortstops will have 20/20 seasons.  Specifically, I mean Xander Bogaerts, Francisco Lindor, Carlos Correa, Jonathan Villar, and Tim Anderson.  The last time we even had one shortstop with a 20/20 season was Ian Desmond in 2014, so this kind of offensive performance from the position hasn't been seen in quite some time.  The best part of this group is that they are all still very young with tons of upside, so they will only continue to get better in future years.

2. Cody Sedlock and/or Keegan Akin will make their ML-debuts with the Baltimore Orioles this season.  Chris Tillman has me very worried as an Orioles fan for this season.  As of this writing he is expected to miss the first month of the season, and the Orioles are crossing their fingers over him pitching effectively at all this season.

So even if Tillman were fully healthy, I would still expect at least one of Sedlock or Akin to make his debut this year (mostly because Kevin Gausman made his debut the year after he was drafted by the Orioles as well).  However, given the huge question marks surrounding the back end of the Orioles' rotation for at least the start of the season, there is almost no question in my mind at least one of their top two pitching prospects will be called up by August.

3. The Chicago White Sox will be one of the most improved teams in baseball over last year.  When a team finally pulls a trigger and trades away their premiere player in order to rebuild, it typically takes a couple years for the team to regroup with young talent.  The White Sox traded Chris Sale to Boston back in December, and they may still trade Jose Quintana, too.  Despite making deals with their top trade targets, their young talent - starting with the aforementioned Tim Anderson - will give White Sox fans plenty to be excited about this season.  I don't expect them to quite make the playoffs, a la the 2012 Orioles or 2015 Astros, but they will show they are ahead of schedule in competing in the AL Central.

4. The New York Mets will be one of the biggest disappointing teams from last season.  Just as there are teams who make surprise surges, there are teams who fall backwards.  The Mets have arguably the best rotation in all of baseball, but their offense is soft and their defense is even softer (especially their outfield.....yuck).  They just don't have enough pitching to keep themselves in contention with the Nationals in the NL East, and the Marlins will be on their heels because....

5. Christian Yelich will top 30 home runs for the first time in his career.  Yelich broke out last year, and his power will really show off this year for the Marlins.  Miami has collectively one of the better outfields in baseball, and Yelich will become one of the best overall young outfielders in baseball.

6. The Houston Astros will score the most runs in baseball this season.  The Red Sox and Cubs both have incredibly potent offenses to name a couple examples, but the Astros will outscore them both this season.  Additions to their lineup like Josh Reddick and ageless-wonder Carlos Beltran will add some serious pop, coupled with their young infield stars in Carlos Correa and Jose Altuve.  Their primary issue is their starting pitching, and Dallas Keuchel alone can't carry their rotation, even if he does return to his 2015 form.

7. Anthony Rizzo and Francisco Lindor will win the league MVPs. Rizzo has consistently been one of the most productive first basemen in baseball over the last few years. He was one of the leading MVP candidates last year if not for his teammate Kris Bryant winning it.  Bryant will hav another amazing year this year, but it will be Rizzo's turn in the limelight.

Meanwhile, I already said Lindor will have a 20/20 year at shortstop, but his offensive output will be superior to the likes of Bogaerts and Correa in the AL. His Gold Glove-caliber defense will be the deciding factor, making him one of the most exciting players in all of baseball to watch.

8. Madison Bumgarner and Marcus Stroman will win the Cy Young Awards.  Maybe it's just me, but Bumgarner somehow flies under the radar among the list of great pitchers in the NL.  Most names on that list include the likes of Kershaw, Syndergaard, Arrieta, Lester, and Scherzer, and yet Bumgarner is left as one of those "Oh yeah, I forgot about him" guys.  He will have his year in 2017.

As for Stroman, I see the Blue Jays taking a fairly big step backward without Edgar Encarnacion in their lineup and Jose Bautista steadily declining.  Regardless, Stroman will have a huge year of his own and keep Toronto in the hunt for the playoffs.

9. The Cleveland Indians will defeat the San Francisco Giants in the World Series.  The Indians came oh so close to pulling off one of the greatest upsets in World Series history last year.  Unfortunately, the Cubs would not be denied ending their drought of championships.  Cleveland fans will finally get to celebrate after having to wait for another year.  Adding Edgar Encarnacion will add major power in the middle of their lineup, and their starting pitching will be one of the best in the AL once again.

NFL 2016 Predictions Sure to Go Wrong

Few people can consistently make bad predictions year to year like I can, and that includes the talking heads on TV networks like ESPN and NFL Network.  I think I set a new low for myself last year, getting only one prediction correct of the ten I had made.  I suppose I could spin that and say I have to rebound since there's just about nowhere to go but up.....right?

Let's see what 2016 may have in store for us, if my crystal ball has anything to say about it.

1. The Oakland Raiders will win the AFC West.  The AFC West is entirely up for grabs this season following Peyton Manning's retirement.  The Broncos have a roulette wheel of options at quarterback since Brock Osweiler left for Houston, while the Chargers still have yet to sign their top draft pick Joey Bosa, and the Chiefs have the Andy Reid Factor alive and well.  Meanwhile, over the last couple seasons the Raiders have quietly stockpiled some superior young talent between Derek Carr, Amari Cooper, Khalil Mack, DJ Hayden, and Mychal Rivera.  They also added former Ravens OL Kelechi Osemele to anchor their left tackle spot.  Suffice to say, they're fairly loaded on both sides of the ball and play in a division that isn't nearly as top heavy as it's been the last couple years.  They have a real chance at winning double-digit games this year and take the division title.

2. Ezekiel Elliot will break the NFL rookie RB record for rushing yards.  The Cowboys' offense has the chance to be very special this season.  Their offensive line is still the best in football, and they've added a special breed of athlete at running back in the draft this past May.  Ezekiel Elliot will break Eric Dickerson's previous record of 1,808 rushing yards set in 1983.  I don't think he'll necessarily shatter the record or anything, but he has the talent to beat Dickerson's season.  The Cowboys have the dynamic offense needed to win the NFC East again, though Tony Romo's health is becoming a bigger and bigger question with each passing season.  Speaking of top offenses....

3. The Baltimore Ravens will have a top-5 offense in the league this season.  Up is down, back is front, black is white, right is left, and top is bottom.  The Ravens have had some good offenses in their history, and Joe Flacco's best season was two years ago when Gary Kubiak had called the plays.  For the first time in team history, the Ravens will finish with a top-5 offense because of the talent surrounding Flacco on offense.  Steve Smith is a fairly large question of just how effective he'll be coming off his torn Achilles last year, but adding Mike Wallace and finally having Breshad Perriman on the field will form one of the best group of receivers in football along with their tight ends.  If anything, the bigger questions for the team will be how well their defense plays, which is unfamiliar territory for the Ravens.  While we're talking teams with surprise elite units....

4. The Jacksonville Jaguars will finish with a top-5 defense in the league this season.  The Jaguars' offense took a huge step forward last year with their young receivers led by Allen Robinson and Allen Hurns.  Their defense will take a similar step forward this year since they had added Malik Jackson in free agency, and they'll finally see Dante Fowler take the field after he had torn his ACL in minicamp last year.  They also landed two of the top defensive prospects in this year's draft in Jalen Ramsey and Myles Jack.  Gus Bradley's job as head coach is somewhat under the gun this year, but the AFC South is another division up for grabs.  The Jaguars will be one of the most balanced teams in the NFL in 2016, and they're my pick for AFC South champions.

5. The Seattle Seahawks will miss the postseason for the first time since 2011.  The law of averages says that for every upstart team like the Raiders and Jaguars, another perennial quality team has to take a step backwards.  The Seahawks will be that version this year, following losing guys like Marshawn Lynch to retirement and OL Russell Okung to free agency.  They won't fall off a proverbial cliff, but the Cardinals are one of the elite teams in the NFL, and the Rams look like another team who will take a big step forward this year.

6. The New England Patriots will go undefeated for the rest of the regular season after Tom Brady returns from his suspension.  This is one of the rare predictions where I genuinely hope I'm wrong.  However, Tom Brady is going to play with a chip on his shoulder the size of all New England when he takes the field after serving his suspension.  He will want to flip a proverbial middle finger at the league office and Roger Goodell in every game he plays and tear through every opposing defense he faces.  Jimmy Garappolo will be serviceable enough at quarterback for the first four games, but the Patriots will lose at least one or two of those games.  I don't want to see it happen, but Brady will shred every secondary and lead the Patriots to yet another divisional title and playoff berth.

7. It's the final swan song for Adrian Peterson.  Peterson was one of most special offensive talents to play on a football field in an entire generation.  He's a rare type of running back who still played at an incredible level at 30 years old last year (though that was the end result of extremely unique circumstances).  Father Time will set in on him by the end of the season, and he will have to hang up his cleats for good.

8. Carson Palmer will be the league MVP.  Palmer has enjoyed the best years of his career to date during his time in Arizona, and his career will set new personal heights in 2016.  The Cardinals are both the best and most complete team in the NFC, and Palmer will lead them to the Promised Land because.....

9. The Arizona Cardinals will defeat the Pittsburgh Steelers in Super Bowl 51.  The Cardinals will get some revenge after losing a rather heart-breaking game in Super Bowl 43 to the Steelers.  I will hate seeing Pittsburgh getting that far through the playoffs to the point of literally seeing red.  However, the Steelers will miss out once again on getting their seventh Super Bowl title, and Arizona will hoist the Lombardi trophy for the first time in franchise history.

MLB 2016 Predictions Sure to Go Wrong

Apparently I only write sports predictions on my blog now.  Oh well, such is life.

I did such a great job last year - and by "great job," I mean "piss awful" - that I'm keeping things going for another round.  I suppose I'm just someone who enjoys setting himself up for failure later.

I have to say, over the last couple years I've grown to become more and more of a baseball guy over football.  There are a lot of reasons for this, and probably too complicated for this post.  Still, there are few things more exciting in the sports world than Opening Day for baseball.  I got two new Orioles jerseys in the mail a couple weeks ago, and I absolutely cannot wait to wear them to OPACY.

With all that said, let's get down to business.

1. The Twins will win the AL Central. This is one of those head-scratching picks that don't make any real rational sense.  The Twins finished near the bottom of the AL in hits, batting average and on-base percentage in 2015.  Their pitching wasn't that much better either, considering they were very middle-of-the-road in team ERA, earned runs, and strikeouts.  Somehow this team won 83 games, despite very mediocre (at best) performances across the board.  We're going to finally see what Byron Buxton is like after what has felt like an eternity of him being one of the top prospects in all of baseball.  He is the X factor in the AL Central this year, and could be what the Twins need to win a tight race over the defending World Series champion Royals.

2. Manny Machado will be baseball's first 30/30 player since 2012. Manny had his breakout season last year, showing a taste of the power and speed he's capable of.  Since the Orioles lack a true leadoff hitter, he's likely to hit either first or second in the lineup again this season.  He won't be able to knock in 100+ runs, but he'll still finish well over 30 HRs and be the Orioles' primary stolen base threat once he gets on base.

3. The Dodgers will miss the postseason entirely. The Dodgers' payroll is projected to be a hair under $230 million this season.  Let's take a look at where that money is going, shall we?

Clayton Kershaw: $32 million
Adrian Gonzalez: $21 million
Andre Ethier: $18 million

(Okay, nothing too weird there)

Yasiel Sierra: $7 million
Kenta Maeda: $17.4 million
Chase Utley: $7 million

(Maeda is an unknown, but those other two seem overpriced)

Carl Crawford: $21 million
Brett Anderson: $15.8 million (QO)
Brandon McCarthy: $11 million

(WHAT ON GOD'S GREEN EARTH IS GOING ON HERE????)

See what I mean?  Anderson is going to miss 3-5 months with back surgery, so that's a great way for a team to flush nearly $16 million down the toilet.  If I'm a Dodgers fan, I'm going to be excited having the single best pitcher in the game take the mound every 5 days.  But is there really that much to be excited about besides Kershaw?  Corey Seager is an early candidate for Rookie of the Year, and it's always fun to watch young talent develop in front of fans' eyes.  Aside from that though, this is a team that costs $230 million?  At least when the Yankees were spending money like crazy circa 2005/2006, they had All Stars at every position on the field.  The Dodgers don't have anything close to that kind of lineup.

Once you factor the Giants and Diamondbacks into the equation, the Dodgers look less and less like a playoff team.  They are going to be one of the major disappointments of 2016.

4. The Nationals will sink even further in the NL East.  Speaking of huge disappointments, the Nationals were arguably the biggest one last year with the fifth highest payroll, but they barely finished over .500 by season's end and didn't make the playoffs.  The locker room was a circus between Matt Williams' incompetence running the team and the drama between Jonathan Papelbon and Bryce Harper.  Exit Williams and enter Dusty Baker, but the Nationals are looking weaker overall since they lost more than they had added in the offseason.  Jordan Zimmermann and Ian Desmond left via free agency, and they didn't do much at all to replace either of them (unless you want to count Bronson Arroyo and Daniel Murphy).  Do the math, and the Nationals won't even finish in second place in the NL East this year.

5. Jon Lester and Jake Arrieta will be the first pair of teammates with 20+ wins since 2002. So much has been said and written elsewhere about how stacked the Cubs are this year that I won't bother directly repeating that jargon.  What I will say is that Jake Arrieta will not flame out after winning the NL Cy Young last year, and Jon Lester won't get so much of the tough luck he got in his first year in Chicago.  Lester's overall stats last year were pretty solid except for his win/loss record, but he'll win a lot more games this year than he did previously with a much stronger lineup putting runs on the board much more consistently for him this year.

6. Mike Trout will not finish in the top three voting for AL MVP for the first time in his career.  This is not to say that Trout will have a down year, even by his standards.  It's more about the kind of talent who will be competing against him, namely Manny Machado, reigning MVP Josh Donaldson, and my personal pick for league MVP (see below).  Trout is still premiere talent and he won't slow down, but others will step up more.

7. The Red Sox will only be marginally better than they were in 2015. I couldn't believe the number of people who, this time last year, expected the Red Sox to bounce back after a terrible 2014 and compete for the division.  My buddy and I agreed they'd be terrible in 2015, particularly because of how awful their starting rotation looked.  This time, he and I disagree on what the Red Sox will be like in 2016.  He thinks they'll be a whole lot better this time around, but I don't think they'll be that much better.  Four of the five pitchers in the rotation are still the equivalent of batting practice, and the combination of Pablo Sandoval and Hanley Ramirez playing the hot corners of the infield on defense has the potential to be the comedy event of the year.  Don't expect much more from the Red Sox beyond what they did last year.

8. Chris Archer and Jacob de Grom will be this year's Cy Young Award winners. Tampa has successfully developed one quality starting pitcher after another for nearly a decade now, and Archer is one of their latest examples.  He's finished near the top in the AL in categories such as strikeouts, ERA,and WHIP over the last couple years, and he will continue ascending to the top of premiere pitchers in all of baseball this year.  There will be other guys in the mix, including Chris Sale, David Price, Sonny Gray, and Cole Hamels, but Archer will come out on top.

As for de Grom, the Mets will have to give him a hefty raise next year once he is eligible for arbitration.  They might even have to find out his asking price for a long term contract extension, since he will be even more expensive after he wins the Cy Young this year.  The Mets have the best kind of problem since their entire rotation consists of guys who would be either a #1 or #2 across the league.  Still, it's in their best interest to keep de Grom if they can help it.

9. Carlos Correa and Paul Goldschmidt will be this year's MVPs. Correa is the most exciting player to enter the league since Mike Trout - which sounds like he's the most exciting player to enter the league since last week, but Trout is about to enter his fifth season, if you can believe it.  His career will really take off this year, as he leads the Astros to an AL West title (and a lot more beyond that, if you cheated and read further down below already).  It's very rare for a second-year player to win the MVP, but Dustin Pedtoia did it in 2008, and Trout nearly did it in 2013.  Correa will be the latest prodigy to take over the league.

Meanwhile, Paul Goldschmidt has finished in second place in MVP voting in the NL in two of the last three seasons.  It's worth noting a rather odd trend in his career so far where his stats dip in even-numbered years, while he blows up in odd-numbered ones.  His offensive performance will be more consistent this year, and Goldschmidt will lead the Diamondbacks to the playoffs.

10. The Giants will defeat the Astros in the World Series. I'm honestly not sure if I'm taking chalk or not by picking the Giants to win the World Series this year.  On one hand, the Giants have won the World Series in 2010, 2012, and 2014, so the obvious trend would be to take them this year.  However, most baseball talking heads and beat writers have been hyping up the Cubs this year, between all the young talent they've got and the big free agent signings of Jason Heyward and Ben Zobrist.  The writers have largely acknowledged the Giants' trend, but then they promptly jump onto the Cubs' bandwagon.  So is taking the Giants to win it all again going with chalk or not?

Meanwhile, the AL is more wide open than AT&T Stadium in Dallas with its retractable roof opened up.  There are probably at least 10 teams who could reach the World Series, and I really wouldn't be all that surprised.  I suppose I'm largely taking the Astros based on them having the reigning Cy Young winner in the AL and their young phenom will be the league MVP this year.  It's still a fairly arbitrary pick, but in a fairly evenly matched league, why not the Astros?

NFL 2015 Week 8 Snap Judgments

....or, "The Week Where the Football Injury Gods Let Their Fury Upon the League."

This weekend was brutal, and there's no getting around it.  The Seahawks' Ricardo Lockette took a massive blow during a punt and fell immediately to the ground.  He was immobilized and taken off the field by stretcher (though he did give a thumbs up to everyone on the way out, so he could be okay).  Le'Veon Bell's knee bent almost literally backwards and his MCL was shredded.  Half the Chargers went down with various injuries against the Ravens yesterday.  We might have seen the last of Steve Smith as well, as he tore his Achilles tendon in his left ankle.  His career didn't deserve to end like that, and as both a Ravens fan and football fan I hope he returns for one last round next year.  But none of those injuries are what I want to discuss in some detail here.

I want to talk about Reggie Bush.

Reggie Bush fielded a punt in the first quarter against the Rams, and eventually ran out of bounds.  The Rams play in a dome, and they have cement flooring on the outside surrounding the actual field.  Football cleats aren't designed to run on cement, so Bush slipped and fell, immediately grabbing his left knee.  He tore his ACL on the way down, and ended his season.

Why would anyone put cement flooring around a football field?  Did no one think this could happen?  Playing football on astro turf is bad enough, considering the litany of serious injuries that have happened over the years.  This is worse, considering someone should have seen this coming and could have taken measures to avoid it.

Then again, it's worth pointing out that even playing football on natural grass is hazardous, considering that two weeks ago Justin Tucker slipped and fell while attempting a field goal kick.  Fortunately he wasn't hurt on the play, but Levi's Stadium is pretty terrible to play on.

Oh, and that's where Super Bowl 50 will be played in February, too.  Awesome.

1. On a more positive note, the MVPs of the Week were Eli Manning and Drew Brees.  Manning and Brees played a game of "Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better," combining for 13 touchdown passes and only 1 interception (the one pick was a pass from Brees that bounced off Willie Snead and landed in Jermaine McBride's hands, which he ran back for a touchdown).  Brees tied the NFL record for touchdown passes in a game, and Manning did everything in his power to keep the Giants neck and neck, until the very end when Kai Forbath kicked the game-winning field goal as time expired.  That's an offensive showcase.

2. On the flip side of that coin, the Giants' and Saints' defensive backs are the combined Goats of the Week.  When two teams combine for over 100 points in a football game - however often that happens - the defensive secondaries aren't doing their jobs.  I'd hate to be in either team's film room in reviewing the tape this week, though at least the Giants managed to capitalize on a deflected pass to run it back for another score.  Still, this is one game tape both Steve Spagnuolo and Rob Ryan will want to burn.

3. Dean Pees will keep his job for another two weeks.  Had the Ravens lost to the Chargers, the last slack John Harbaugh would have been able to give his defensive coordinator would have been used up.  There was no doubt in my mind that with the Ravens' bye week coming up, Harbaugh would have had no choice but to fire Pees this morning.  The Ravens win bought Pees at least two more weeks, and since they don't have to leave home until after Thanksgiving they have a chance to win some football games.  My armchair GM self still thinks Pees needs to go since he's obsessed with having his defensive backs play at least 10 yards off the line of scrimmage all the time.  The Ravens will have to win at least two of their next three games for Pees to keep his job for a while.

4. Mediocrity is taking over across the league.  Through 8 weeks, the AFC has only 5 teams who are over .500.  The NFC isn't much better with only 6 teams above .500.  While that's still nearly enough to cover the teams in the playoffs, the NFC East-leading Giants are 4-4, and the AFC South-leading Colts are 3-4, pending their game tonight in Carolina.  It's possible that things can change in the second half of the season, but if there's this wide of a separation a month from now, the final four weeks of the season will lose a little drama.  The good teams will still be good (possibly great), but the bad teams will be that much worse.  There may not be multiple teams fighting for Wild Cards and/or division titles since teams like the Jets and Raiders have clearly distanced themselves from the rest of the AFC.  There's an awful lot of football to play between now and December so things can change radically, but realistically I don't see much chance of any sleepers lying in waiting in either conference.

5. We may need to redefine what the MVP is.  Tom Brady is unquestionably the front runner for the league MVP at this point, and he's head and shoulders above everyone else.  Consider for a moment other names such as Cam Newton, Philip Rivers, and even Tony Romo.  The Panthers are 7-0 going into tonight's game against Indianapolis, and Newton is almost literally single-handedly winning them games.  Few people outside Charlotte can name anyone catching the ball there aside from Greg Olsen, and as I had discussed before, Newton is winning games despite very pedestrian stats.  His overall value to Carolina cannot be overstated.

Likewise for Philip Rivers.  Sure, the Chargers are terrible, and they are losing player after player to injury.  Just like Newton, Rivers is keeping them in every game.  If not for him at quarterback, they wouldn't even have their two wins on the season, and they'd be blown out every week.  The entire franchise wouldn't even get more than a footnote of recognition on television and in the media without him.  That's true value.

Lastly, there's Tony Romo.  Romo hasn't played since Week 2 when he had broken his clavicle against the Eagles, a game the Cowboys won.  They have gone 0-5 without him under center, and there's little doubt the Cowboys wouldn't have won at least two of those games had Romo been playing.  His situation is the most unique of these three players since we're talking about his value while being absent versus actually on the field, but it's hard to deny what he means to the Cowboys.

6. Gary Kubiak's system can work in Denver, after all.  For what felt like the first time this season, the Broncos won a football game because the offense finally complemented the defense.  Peyton Manning had a fairly pedestrian night, but the running game finally got going.  C.J. Anderson and Ronnie Hillman combined for three rushing touchdowns on the night, which gave the defense more than enough cushion to rough up Aaron Rodgers.  All season long, it didn't look like Kubiak could make the Broncos' offense fit into his style, but he made the most of the bye week to prepare for the Packers.  Denver can still compete for one of the top two seeds in the AFC for the playoffs if their running game continues to thrive and adjust for Manning's lack of arm strength.

NFL 2015 Week 7 Snap Judgments

As boring an opening as this will be, Tom Brady was something special yesterday.  The Patriots hosted their divisional rival Jets on Sunday, and for a while the score showed the Jets had a shot at winning the game.  Then reality set in, and the Patriots took over in the 4th quarter.  Brady's stats for the game were pretty standard for him - 34-of-54 for 355 yards, 2 touchdowns, and no picks - but he was also the Patriots' leading rusher on the day (4 carries for 15 yards, which otherwise would be pretty laughable if that was any team's leading rushing number).  The Patriots went into the game knowing they wouldn't be able to run the ball on the Jets, so they didn't really bother with it.  Instead, Brady dropped back to pass on 90.9% of the Patriots' offensive plays, but that's not even the most mind-blowing stat of that game.  In the last 10 years, Brady is 4-0 when he drops back to pass at least 80% of the time in a game.  The rest of the league?  3-109.

Is there any question as to who is this week's MVP?

1. The Dolphins are a radically different team under Dan Campbell.  Once is a fluke, but twice is a trend.  The Dolphins blew out the Titans last week 38-10, and jumped out to a 41-0 lead over Houston yesterday before the Texans put up some garbage points and made the final 44-26.  Ryan Tannehill might have been the MVP of the Week had it not been for Brady.  Incidentally, the Dolphins play Thursday night in New England, so Campbell's new hard-ass attitude will get its real first test after the last two opponents rolled over on Miami.

2. The Goat of the Week is Ryan Mallet.  When the Texans had acquired Mallet from New England a couple years ago, I thought they had their long term quarterback of the future.  Shows how little I know about football.  In Mallet's tenure so far with Houston, Mallet missed a practice during training camp after he lost the starting QB job to Brian Hoyer; news later came out that Mallet had missed the practice because he claimed he had overslept.  This past weekend, Mallet missed the team flight to Miami and had to fly commercial on his own, claiming he was stuck in traffic along the way.  Houston would have been blown out by Miami even if Mallet had taken the field, but his unprofessional attitude has been showing itself pretty heavily.  For a guy who spent his first three years in the league in New England and studying under Tom Brady and Bill Belichick, you'd think he would conduct himself more maturely.  Then again, Belichick might have seen some warning signs in Mallet during those years, which was why they had no problem shipping him off to Houston.

3. The Raiders are a whole lot better than most anyone thought.  Well, maybe everyone except Jack Del Rio.  They are certainly not the laughing stock they've been for well over a decade.  Derek Carr is a quality quarterback.  Rookie Amari Cooper is a stud wide receiver in the making.  Their offensive line can adequately protect Carr and even make a block when necessary.  They may not win the AFC West this year since Denver has a pretty solid stranglehold, but they're a whole lot closer to competing for the division title than anyone could have guessed going into this season.

4. Rex Ryan just doesn't qualify as a head coach in the NFL. Oh, he's an excellent defensive mind, but the Jets offense was terrible under his coaching, and the Bills offense is equally inept.  The Bills even have much better playmakers than anyon Ryan had in New York in LeSean McCoy and Sammy Watkins, though Watkins has battled injury this season and has missed three games.  The point here is that Ryan is a coach who is much better suited as a coordinator and not a head coach, similar to Wade Phillips, Norv Turner, and Romeo Crennel.  Ryan just hasn't yet figured that fact out for himself yet.

5. I wasn't as wrong as I thought I was about the Giants.  For the first couple weeks of the season, the Giants looked like one of the worst teams in the league, unable to protect 4th quarter leads.  They are now 4-1 in their last 5 games, and made Matt Cassel a turnover machine on Sunday.  Their defense is pretty terrible, but their offense can put enough points on the board that they can compete with most teams in the league.  Nobody in the NFC East is going to win more than 10 games this season, but the Giants have enough that they could be the last NFC East team standing in January.

6. Don't crown the Seahawks as officially back yet.  The Seahawks did beat up a hapless 49ers team Thursday night (how did that same 49ers team beat the Ravens again?), but Russell Wilson was still sacked five times and he threw two interceptions on the night.  Wilson has been sacked 31 times already this season, and he's within striking distance of the single season record set by David Carr in 2002 (76).  Marshawn Lynch is still the most important player on that offense, so if he can still run the ball effectively the Seahawks will be in the mix for the playoffs, but Russell Wilson is taking way too many hits on his dropbacks.

7. The Steelers are primed to go on a major win streak.  Ben Roethlisberger could return for the Steelers next game, a showdown against the unbeaten Bengals in Pittsburgh. If he plays, get ready for a big win streak for the Steelers.  Four of their next five games are at home, with their bye week and a road game in Seattle in that stretch.  It's very possible they could win all five games, leading into their second game versus Cincinnati on the road.  They managed to tread water without Ben the last four games, which is really all they had needed.  They had just better hope Ben doesn't re-injure himself the rest of the season.

NFL 2015 Week 6 Snap Judgments

or, "The Week Where Football Officially Became a Chore."

I'm going to start off with a fan rant here.  I normally try to stay fairly objective as I write these posts, but this time I'm going to be very subjective for a moment.

The Baltimore Ravens are an insufferable team to watch play football.

I honestly can't remember the last time watching the Ravens play was such a frustrating experience.  All weekend long, I had zero expectations that they'd have a chance at winning in San Francisco, and the season would be completely lost by game's end.  True to form, the Ravens were never really competitive at any point in the game, even at the very end when they had the ball with no timeouts left and Flacco tried leading them down for a game-winning score.

They look lethargic.  They look unmotivated.  They look sloppy.  They lack any heart or fire to their game, except for Steve Smith, Sr.  In fact, Smith is the only true leader left on the team, and everyone else is merely going through the motions.  The season can't end fast enough for them.

I feel worst for Smith since he had announced this season would be his last in the NFL.  I had every expectation that the Ravens would mount a playoff run to try getting Smith a championship so he could pull an John Elway/Jerome Bettis/Ray Lewis, and retire a champion.  Sadly, that is not meant to be.  I suppose it's possible that the Ravens may try convincing him to return in 2016 and not let this lost season be his last in the league, but there's no way to know whether he'd be willing to change his mind and try one more time next year.

Still, the inarguable fact is that the Ravens are a bad football team.  They are one of the biggest disappointments this season in football, and there is a legitimate argument that the Ravens are the single worst team in the NFL right now.  Their schedule the rest of the season doesn't get much easier either, with maybe five winnable games left on their schedule.

At least one or two people on the coaching staff have to face a firing squad, and Defensive Coordinator Dean Pees has to be the first man in line.  Defensive Backs Coach Chris Hewitt is close behind him, as well.  If the Ravens don't win at least one of their two remaining two games before their bye week, both men could be unemployed.

1. I'm still not fully buying into the Bengals.  The Bengals are 4th in the league in both scoring and in point differential.  They're also 6-0 for the first time since 1988 in franchise history.  Andy Dalton is playing like a league MVP candidate; he's tied for second in touchdown passes and is second only to Tom Brady in QB rating.  They will even likely be prohibitive favorites in at least their next three games.  Despite all those resounding positives, I am still waiting for the shoe to drop for them.  It may not happen until the postseason, but I still don't see Andy Dalton playing mistake-free in the clutch.  There's too much evidence to the contrary.  And realistically, does anyone think they could go into New England and beat Tom Brady in his own building in January?

2. The MVP of the Week is Cam Newton.  How in the world are the Panthers 5-0?  In one of the most surprising wins of the weekend, the Panthers went into Seattle and beat up the Seahawks in their own building.  The Panthers lost their top receiver Kelvin Benjamin in the preseason to a torn ACL, leaving their tight end Greg Olsen as Cam Newton's number one target.  He has nearly twice as many receptions as Carolina's #2 receiver, Ted Ginn, Jr (!!!).  Newton's numbers thus far are very pedestrian: 55.4% completion, #26 in passing yards, tied for 13th in touchdown passes, and #33 in passer rating.  However, he's had to make up for a dearth in quality wide receivers and he's led the Panthers to a very improbable win this weekend.  There is a legitimate question as to just how good the Panthers are though, and two of their next three games are against Indianapolis and Green Bay, which could bring them back to Earth a bit.  They do also have two games against Atlanta in December, so the NFC South is far from decided.

3. So much for understanding just what is a catch now.  The Lions finally won a game this weekend after some really tough luck that didn't go their way in Seattle a couple weeks ago, but the big play in the game was late in the first half when Golden Tate really didn't catch a touchdown.  How this play was not ruled a tipped ball interception is beyond me, and I'm merely a lowly fan.  The officials are contradicting themselves week in and week out now as to what is and is not a catch.  These inconsistencies have already affected playoff games (see: Bryant, Dez), and sooner or later it will happen in the Super Bowl if the league office doesn't do something to clarify the super vague phrase "process of the catch."

4. Peyton Manning is pretty hard to watch now.  An undefeated team rarely has as many important questions as the Broncos do this year.  Their defense is the predominant reason why they're 6-0 right now, and they had to go to overtime against Cleveland in order to pull out the victory.  Manning is playing with less strength each week, and he's being picked off more and more easily along the way.  His passer rating is the lowest since his rookie season, He's on pace currently for a 19 TD/27 INT season, which would easily be the worst season of his career.  The 2000 Ravens were able to win a Super Bowl with an elite defense and sufficient enough quarterback play from Trent Dilfer that didn't result in many costly turnovers.  The Broncos can't win a Super Bowl with their elite defense because Manning is making costly turnovers every game.  They may still win the AFC West since they have a healthy lead, but they aren't the powerhouse team they've been with Manning the last 3 years.

5. The Patriots are pretty close to being unstoppable.  Yawn.  Forget finding a game where they wouldn't be a prohibitive favorite to win this season; find me one they even have a realistic chance of losing.  The best three options - and all three are stretches to the extreme - are at the Giants, at Denver, and at the Jets.  I'm never one to say something like, "Looks like it'll be Team X vs Team Y in the Super Bowl this year," but I just don't realistically see anyone taking them down, even in the AFC playoffs.  I just hope we are spared having to watch them hoist another Lombardi Trophy in February.  Imagine how awkward that would be for a moment.

6. The Goat of the Week is Mike Vick.  This has to be the first time that a Goat of the Week is a guy on a team who won, but Vick never could play well filling in for the injured Ben Roethlisberger.  Despite his terrible performance through three games, the Steelers have gone 2-1 with their only loss coming against the Ravens and lacking a semi-quality kicker to seal that victory.  Vick was finally pulled in the second half after throwing for merely 6 yards (!!!!) for Landry Jones.  The Steelers' offense was much improved with Jones under center, and Martavis Bryant had a massive first game back following his suspension.  Things will get better for Pittsburgh going forward since there is a chance Roethlisberger could return in the next week or two.

7. Chris Ivory and Brandon Marshall have made the Jets an entirely different team.  There's little room to argue that any player on a new team has had a greater impact than Brandon Marshall.  The Jets have not had a true #1 receiver since Keyshawn Johnson, but they have one now in Marshall.  He's made defenses adjust to the passing game, which has only led to great things for Chris Ivory in the running game.  Marshall went on record calling Chris Ivory the best running back in the NFL, and while my opinion would lean towards Le'Veon Bell, no one in their right mind could undersell what Ivory and Marshall have collectively done to the Jets offense.  The insanity involving Geno Smith and IK Enemkpali during training camp is a distant memory now.

NFL 2015 Week 4 Snap Judgments

....or, "The Week Where We Actually Start Figuring Out Who's Good And Who's Not."

The NFL season is pretty murky for the first month or so, and that's nothing new.  Some teams start out super hot but flame out eventually, and others hit stumbling blocks for the first couple weeks before getting their collective act together.  We still have six unbeaten teams left - New England, Cincinnati, Denver, Green Bay, Carolina, and Atlanta - but we can't expect all of them to still be in the mix come December.

I was dead wrong on New England.  I thought Brady's suspension would have been upheld, and the Patriots would be forced to go with Jimmy Garoppolo for their first four games.  If there's some kind of blue ribbon for making dumb predictions, I deserve every bit of mockery that comes with it.  The Patriots have steamrolled their competition thus far, and Brady is playing at a level even surpassing his record-setting season in 2007.  I looked at their schedule for the rest of the season, and I don't see a game where they even have a chance at losing until Week 12 when they travel to Denver (and they could still be a prohibitive favorite to win that game).

Denver is an enigma.  Their offensive line is below average at best, and Peyton Manning hasn't played well in Gary Kubiak's offense.  Despite their struggles, they're still winning football games, while Kansas City and San Diego have both struggled in the first month.  Oakland looks a heck of a lot better than anyone could have expected after four weeks, but they aren't about to overtake the Broncos in the division.

The NFC South was a putrid division last year, with Carolina being the team that was the least awful (talk about a backhanded compliment).  Cam Newton is throwing the football to Ted Ginn, Jr, and a bunch of guys nobody has ever heard of.  If you put a gun to my head and asked me to name anyone on their defense besides Luke Kuechly, I'd freeze, though Josh Norman is quickly making a name for himself at CB.  Meanwhile, Atlanta has soundly beaten three of the four teams in the NFC East, and their defeat of Houston yesterday was way more one-sided than the final score would indicate.  Devonta Freeman is giving head coach Dan Quinn a great problem to have by playing so well, he should be the starter when Tevin Coleman returns from his rib injury.  Quinn is even a super early candidate for Coach of the Year in how quickly he's improved the Falcons.

But it's not all coming up roses for everyone because....

1. There are some surprise bad teams in the NFL, too.  The Eagles, Colts, Ravens, Chiefs, and Dolphins each have one win apiece, and at least three of those teams were picked by many to be playoff teams.  Of those five, the Dolphins and Eagles are arguably the worst of the bunch, though the Ravens aren't that far behind them.  Chris Ivory ran circles around the Dolphins defense all day, and that includes Ndamukong Suh, who was supposed to anchor their defensive line.  The loss could cost Joe Philbin his job, and we should find out within the next 24 hours or so whether he's been given a pink slip.  Meanwhile, the Eagles quite possibly have the worst offensive unit in the NFL, with an offensive line who provides zero protection for both passing and running plays.  Their defense isn't doing them any favors either, though being on the field for over 41 minutes will wear anyone out.  However, they have the benefit of playing in a bad division, so they actually still have a chance to win it if they can finish 8-8.

2. The 49ers defense is every bit as bad as expected.  I don't get to toot my horn very often at all, but one of my season predictions was that the 49ers' defense would give up the most points in the league this year.  Right now, they're in 3rd place in that category, but they aren't far off the pace.  The Bears and Chiefs are currently tied for first at 125 points, and Tampa is second with 117 points.  The 49ers do have the worst point differential in the league at the moment, at -62.  Even though the Lions are winless, San Francisco is still arguably the worst team in the NFC.

3. The MVP of the Week is Devonta Freeman.  As mentioned above, Freeman is giving Falcons head coach Dan Quinn a great problem to have when Tevin Coleman comes back.  He's scored 6 touchdowns in his last two games, and the trio of QB Matt Ryan, Freeman, and WR Julio Jones is the best tandem of offensive skill positions in the league right now.  If there's a weakness on their team, I have yet to find it.

4. The Goat of the Week is Josh Scobee.  Scobee missed two field goal attempts Thursday night in the 4th quarter for the Steelers in a game where they could have buried the Ravens for the season.  Instead, the Ravens won the game in overtime and kept their season alive.  Scobee has already been released, and the Steelers are now on their fourth kicker for the season.  Special teams can make or break a team, and the Steelers are Exhibit A.

5. Tramon Williams was a close runner up for Goat of the Week.  The Browns made a huge comeback against the Chargers, tying the game up late in the 4th quarter.  With only seconds to go, the Chargers lined up for a game-winning field goal attempt, which Josh Lambo kicked wide right.  Most other games would head to overtime, except Tramon Williams was off sides on the play, which meant the Chargers got a re-kick.  Lambo made it, the Chargers won the game, and Tramon Williams made a typical Browns finish to a close game.

6. When was the last time the league had so many young, impact wide receivers?  Amari Cooper, Mike Evans, Odell Beckham, Jr, A.J. Green, and Sammy Watkins, just to start.  I can't remember a time when the league had so many good to great young wide receivers all playing at the same time.  Green is just starting to reach his prime, and he signed a long-term extension to stay in Cincinnati a few weeks ago.  I realize this is very arbitrary, but in the first round of the NFL draft between 2003 and 2005, a total of 16 wide receivers were drafted in the first round, and of those, only 3 went on to have successful careers in the NFL: Andre Johnson, Larry Fitzgerald, and Roddy White.  The league's efforts to protect wide receivers from serious injury may play a role in that, but no one can deny the kind of raw talent this group of guys has.