Charles Woodson is ESPN NFC North Player of the Year
Jan 1, 2010, by Kevin Seifert, ESPN.com
~I assumed this week’s Have at It would fall along party lines, but I was pleasantly surprised. I asked you to name the NFC North’s best player this season, and early on VikesWinItAll defied apparent allegiances and named Green Bay quarterback Aaron Rodgers. That took some courage!
Woodson almost single-handedly won a couple of games this year. How many plays he makes against Kurt Warner in the Wildcard game could be pivotal.
In perusing your comments, I found dominant support for Packers cornerback Charles Woodson and an interesting debate between the merits of Rodgers and Minnesota quarterback Brett Favre.
VikesWinItAll gave the edge to Rodgers because of “the beating he took early in the year.” VikesWinItAll continued: “He does not have an AP type back that is a threat so defenses know they are going to pass which put tremendous pressure on him to perform. His defense was also in flux early in the year adjusting to the 3-4 which did not put Rodgers in good field position often. Favre of course had a great year and is the only reason the Vikes have any kind of shot this post season.”
Rodgers’ and Favre’s passing statistics were close enough to be a wash. So machinemanske supported Rodgers because of the importance of the quarterback position and his 314 rushing yards, which I neglected to include in the original post. That total leads all NFL quarterbacks.
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The Value of Momentum heading into Playoffs
January 1, 2010 by admin
Filed under Uncategorized
Jan 1, 2010, by Kevin Seifert, ESPN.com
~When someone mentions “Big Mo,” I always think of a former baseball slugger. In football, however, it refers to another opaque entity: momentum.
You’re hearing that word bandied about regularly as we approach the NFL playoffs, perhaps in no division more than the NFC North. Our two playoff teams are going in opposite directions, and the debate is on as to whether their late-season performances will impact their postseason run. How much importance should we place on Minnesota’s 1-3 record in December? What does Green Bay’s 3-1 mark over the same stretch indicate?
If you’re talking about the ultimate goal of reaching the Super Bowl, however, recent history gives the Packers a much better chance than the Vikings.
Conventional wisdom suggests teams playing well at the end of the regular season are more likely to experience postseason success. In this ESPN Insider piece, Bill Barnwell of Football Outsiders terms that notion “a crock,” noting examples from both sides of the equation — hot teams that failed in the playoffs (Atlanta, 2008) and cold teams that marched through the postseason (Indianapolis, 2006).
If you’re talking about the ultimate goal of reaching the Super Bowl, however, recent history gives the Packers a much better chance than the Vikings.
I took a somewhat arbitrary look at each of the 18 teams that have reached the nine Super Bowls during this decade, measuring their records in December/January regular-season games. Of that group, 16 had winning records over that time period. The 2006 Colts were
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