2022-3 NFL Pro Football (Pls, no other sports - thx!)

I think I'll make my picks for the next round, just for the hell of it. :cool:

Jaguars/Chiefs: Chiefs, that's a given, Jaguars' win was a fluke.
Giants/Eagles: Hurts is a-hurtin' with a bad shoulder. One good hit and that's going to do it for him. Jones looked pretty good against the Vikings, so I'm going with the Giants.
Bengals/Bills: This is that matchup I was hoping for after their game a couple weeks ago was cancelled after Damar Hamlin's near-death injury. I'm taking the Bills, but it should be a good game.
Cowboys/49ers: Hmmm... I wasn't a 49ers fan with Garoppolo at the helm, but Brock Purdy looked purdy good against the Seahawks. Of course, Dak Prescott looked pretty good, too, against Tom Brady and the Bucs, but what was the deal with their kicker? I'm going to have to think about this one, but I think I'm going with the niners.
 
What We Learned in the NFL’s Wild-Card Round
NYTimes Jan. 15, 2023
Teams don’t suddenly turn into champions when the postseason begins. If anything, the even matchups and heightened stakes force opponents to rely more heavily on what they’ve done best all year since there’s little room for experimentation.

Bengals 24, Ravens 17: The Ravens played their hearts out. Defensively, they had Joe Burrow’s number. Baltimore’s well-designed pressure schemes and chippy play over the middle made it difficult for Burrow and the Bengals’ passing offense to ever get in a groove. It wasn’t enough, though. Ravens QB Tyler Huntley, who mostly played a respectable match, squandered the game early in the fourth quarter. After leading an 80-yard drive, Huntley reached for the end zone on a QB sneak. But instead of going low, he went high – and was stopped short by about a yard. Worse, the ball was jarred loose right into the hands of Bengals defensive end Sam Hubbard, who ran it back 98 yards for a touchdown to break a 17-17 tie. It ultimately sealed the Ravens’ fate, and the Bengals will go to Buffalo to meet the Bills.

Giants 31, Vikings 24: Both Daniel Jones and Kirk Cousins had a field day in the short area, peppering each other’s defenses with throws designed for yards after the catch. The Giants’ receivers were just a smidgen better at evading their opponents and picking up extra yardage, and that was the difference. Minnesota’s receivers struggled to squeeze out extra yardage, and chunk plays after the catch were tough to come by.

Per the NFL’s Next Gen Stats, the Giants played a season-high 65 percent of their snaps from split-safety coverages. The Giants struggled to affect Cousins directly — he wasn’t sacked and didn’t throw any interceptions — but they took away the wide-open explosive passes he is used to finding with his receivers. It’s hard to imagine the Giants have the juice to go any further in the playoffs versus the Eagles. But stealing a postseason win in a “rebuilding” year with a first-year head coach is a huge success in itself.

Bills 34, Dolphins 31: After a 17-0 start, the Bills collapsed for about a quarter and a half. Josh Allen’s big plays cut both ways. One of the league’s most prominent big-play makers, Allen had the most volatile game of his season in Sunday’s 34-31 win over the Dolphins. The deep throws and extended plays that buoyed an otherwise hapless Buffalo offense were the same plays that led to turnovers and disjointed drives. It was a game that highlighted both Allen’s singular ability to affect a game and also how dangerous his decision making can be for the Bills.

That’s been a scary way for the Bills to play this season, with their three losses each featuring Allen turnovers. Allen finished Sunday’s game with 16 interceptions and 22 giveaways this season, including the playoffs. That’s tops in the league, according to NFL Research.

Perhaps Allen wouldn’t be tempted to gamble if the Bills had a more consistent running game, and if the team regularly threw more in the short area and chipped away at drives. But Buffalo has banked on Allen’s unique eye and talent for doing the improbable. And on Sunday, a Skylar Thompson-led Dolphins team couldn’t make the Bills pay. Buffalo may not be so lucky against the rest of a loaded AFC playoff pool.

Jaguars 31, Chargers 30: It’s hard to play two more different halves of football than the Jacksonville Jaguars did. QB Trevor Lawrence’s playoff debut opened in terrible fashion, with the second-year Jaguars QB throwing four interceptions on the first six drives. That meltdown gave the Chargers a 27-0 first-half lead. Each interception was worse than the last, on throws that ranged from unlucky to wishy-washy to flat-out horrible. Somehow those mistakes — plus a muffed punt return — weren’t enough to put away the Jaguars.

Coach Doug Pederson dug deeper into his bag of tricks. TE Evan Engram took center stage in the Jaguars’ rally to victory, racing across the shallow part of the field over and over again. Lawrence found him repeatedly on short throws that reaped 10- and 15-yard chunks. When the Chargers finally made an effort to stop it, it opened up the vertical game for Lawrence.

Behind 30-28, the Jaguars put together a Q4 drive. With fourth-and-1 at the Chargers’ 40-yard line and 1:28 remaining, HC Pederson called an old-school T formation: three players in a horizontal row behind the QB. RB Travis Etienne got the ball on an outside rush to the right, and sped 25 yards for a first down at the 16-yard line. A game-winning FG sends them on to meet the formidable KC Chiefs.

This is the third-biggest playoff comeback in NFL history. It was also the first playoff game in which a team won with five more turnovers than its opponent.

49ers 41, Seahawks 23: Seattle stayed with the Niners for almost three quarters, even having the lead 17-16 going into halftime. Then in Q3, Seattle safety Johnathan Abrams tackled Deebo Samuel and appeared to deliberately twist Samuel's left ankle, which had already kept the star WR out for the past three games with a strain. Tempers immediately flared and the refs quickly stepped in to break up a potential fight.

The incident appeared to light a fire under the Niners, who promptly drove for a TD which began a 25-0 run for SF. The 49ers scored on four straight drives in the second half, giving San Francisco a lead that allowed its pass rush to tee off on Seahawks QB Geno Smith (25 of 35 passing for 253 yards, three sacks). Rookie QB Brock Purdy threw for 332 yards and three touchdowns. Deebo Samuel added a 74-yard touchdown catch, and Christian McCaffery had 119 yards rushing on 15 carries. Seattle scored an additional TD in garbage time, after SF took most of their starters out during the last five minutes. The Niners will meet the Cowboys in Santa Clara at Levi Stadium.

Cowboys 31, Buccaneers 14: QB Dak Prescott erased playoff demons with five touchdowns, while Tom Brady played one of the worst playoff games of his 23-year career in what may be his last game in Tampa. For all their bombast and hype, the Cowboys have been dismal in the playoffs for the past quarter century, winning only three games and failing to advance past the divisional round. But Monday’s game was lopsided from the start as Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott completed passes to an array of receivers, and running back Tony Pollard sliced through Tampa Bay’s defense for 77 yards on 15 carries.

The only Cowboy who had a bad game was Brett Maher, the Cowboys kicker, who missed four extra-point attempts, an NFL playoff record. The game came to a somber stop with under three minutes remaining when Tampa Bay receiver Russell Gage lay on the field after a hit that appeared to jolt his neck. Players from both teams knelt as medical personnel attended to Gage in a moment eerily reminiscent of the collapse of Bills safety Damar Hamlin earlier this month. Gage was carted off to a hospital with a concussion and a neck injury, but was moving his fingers, Buccaneers Coach Todd Bowles said.
 

Update:
Remarkable as Damar Hamlin’s recovery has been, the Bills safety still faces a lengthy rehabilitation some three weeks after going into cardiac arrest and needing to be resuscitated on the field during a game, his marketing representative told the AP.

Hamlin's longtime friend and business partner, Jordon Rooney, released a statement to ESPN on Thursday night 19Jan2023: "Despite being out of the hospital, Damar still has a lengthy recovery. Damar still requires oxygen and is having his heart monitored regularly. He has visited with the team a few times but he still gets winded very easily.

"He's upbeat and positive and ready to continue to overcome this."
 
Update:
Remarkable as Damar Hamlin’s recovery has been, the Bills safety still faces a lengthy rehabilitation some three weeks after going into cardiac arrest and needing to be resuscitated on the field during a game, his marketing representative told the AP.

Hamlin's longtime friend and business partner, Jordon Rooney, released a statement to ESPN on Thursday night 19Jan2023: "Despite being out of the hospital, Damar still has a lengthy recovery. Damar still requires oxygen and is having his heart monitored regularly. He has visited with the team a few times but he still gets winded very easily.

"He's upbeat and positive and ready to continue to overcome this."
I wonder if he'll be at the game this weekend, which is a rematch of the game he was playing in when he had his heart attack — Bills vs. Bengals.
 
We're seeing a new generation of young quarterbacks in these playoff games.
Joe Burrow is 26
Josh Allen is 26
Brock Purdy is 23
Jalen Hurts is 24
Trevor Lawrence is 23
Patrick Mahomes is 27
Daniel Jones is 25
Justin Herbert is 24

... and the Broncos paid $242 million dollars for washed up 34 y/o Russel Wilson! :ROFLMAO:
 
I haven't been a Buffalo Bills fan in yrs not surprised they lost yesterday. The Bengals outplayed them even when the snow was flying at the stadium in Orchard Park{south of Buffalo} The Bills has been #1 sports story in our local paper,Buffalo News 'overhyping' each game enough already!
 
We're seeing a new generation of young quarterbacks in these playoff games.
Joe Burrow is 26
Josh Allen is 26
Brock Purdy is 23
Jalen Hurts is 24
Trevor Lawrence is 23
Patrick Mahomes is 27
Daniel Jones is 25
Justin Herbert is 24

... and the Broncos paid $242 million dollars for washed up 34 y/o Russel Wilson! :ROFLMAO:

And then there's the 230 million that the Cleveland Browns paid DeShaun Watson ... what a disaster.
 
I think it's official...Snyder sells Commanders to Harris group...THIS IS BIG NEWS....yipeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee...no more Danny and his minions fouling up things....let's kick it off...GO COMMANDERS!!
 
I'm ready for football season to begin, again. At least the NFL Network rebroadcasts a lot of the previous games, so that satisfies my desire to watch the games.....GO CHIEFS!!
 

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