Its time for the rubber to meet the road here in Glendale Arizona. The Packers just lost 3 weeks ago 38-8 to the Cardinals in this building so what has changed? They went on to lose to the Vikings who took the NFC North from them 20-13 in Lambeau. The saving grace is last week’s wildcard win over Washington.
Last week saw a rebirth of the running game as Eddie Lacy and James Starks combined for 100 yards and 2 touchdowns. This helped settle a schizophrenic Rodgers down who started the game being sacked for a safety and throwing off his back foot. He found his rhythm in the 2nd half. Can he repeat that against Arizona?
The Packers come into this game with the NFL’s #6 passing defense. If you look at the stats, Palmer only threw for 265 yards 2 TDs and 1 interception. Pedestrian numbers until you remember Aaron Rodgers was bludgeoned for 8 sacks and 4 turnovers. Palmer, an MVP candidate, can do this without a short field. He threw for 4,671 yards and 35 touchdowns comes in this game hot. With Larry Fitzgerald (109 rec/ 1215 yds /9 Tds) John Brown ( 65 rec / 1003 yds /7 Tds) and Michael Floyd (52 rec / 849 yds / 6 Tds) they are averaging 28 points per game at home.
If the Cardinals rushing attack stays productive, the Cardinals should repeat their week 16 performance and wins today 40-17.
How can we top that Cincinnati Bengal v Pittsburgh Steelers for drama? You have to love the NFL playoffs and its time to get into day 2 with both NFC games on the same day.
First game up is the Washington Redskins hosting the Green Bay Packers in the nation’s capital. All year long you’ve heard The Chancellor of Football state the Packers are a flawed football team. They have gone 4-6 down the stretch and have the NFL’s 23rd ranked offense. Twenty third?? Not only that, the supposed great Aaron Rodgers and the Packers passing game ranks 25th. No team has won with more smoke and mirrors than Green Bay.
What this game will turn on is Kirk Cousins and the 11th ranked passing attack facing the 6th best passing attack of Green Bay. The reason the Packers rank so high against the pass is they have been run on all year…ranking 21st. Also the fact they have gone 6-2 at home and won 5 of their last 6, the Redskins will win 31-17 sacking Rodgers 5 times.
As for the Seattle Seahawks vs Minnesota Vikings it is nostalgic to have this game outside. Teddy Bridgewater will make it to the divisional round…next year. Today in below zero weather is not the time to develop your downfield passing. Seattle gave up 125 yards to the Vikings in week 13. Too many match-ups Seattle won on the line of scrimmage. The Seahawks will win this 27-13. It will be closer than the last time due to the cold.
There you have it…thanks for reading and please share the article.
When you talk about the Bengals when the season began, everyone would scoff “wait til’ the playoffs.” That held true for the team and certainly Andy Dalton. Now here we are again and Dalton has his thumb in a cast. The Bengals have to place their hope on back-up AJ McCarron.
Almost 10 years to the day that Kimo Von Oelhoffen knocked Carson Palmer out of the 2006 wildcard, again they get to face a back-up in the playoffs. Ironically Pittsburgh knocked out Dalton late in the regular season. Now they are missing DeAngelo Williams who injured his ankle in the season finale.
Can AJ McCarron throw caution to the wind and look long for AJ Green (86 rec. 1,297 yds 10 TDs). Pittsburgh’s defense is 21st overall and 30th against the pass. In previous playoff games Dalton played way too cautious. They need to run solid between the 20s with Giovani Bernard and Jeremy Hill and take their shots for touchdowns when they get in close. No Dalton playoff checkdowns. McCarron needs to be daring.
One of the NFL’s most electrifying players.
The shifting point is the loss of DeAngelo Williams. He had more than adequately replaced LeVeon Bell with 997 yards rushing and 11 touchdowns. The full dimension Steeler offense that streaked down the stretch now has questions. Can RB Fitzgerald Toussaint (who?) keep the Bengal defense honest? Cincinnati’s defense is 7th against the run and 20th against the pass.
In this game Ben Roethlisberger is going to be the difference. He challenged Martavis Bryant (50 rec. 765 yds and 6 TDs) and we’ll see how he responds. With 2 Super Bowl rings and a 3rd appearance, Roethlisberger’s mettle is what you can hang your hat on. Bryant needs to come up big because the Bengals will be paying most of their attention on MVP candidate Antonio Brown. With 136 rec. 1,834 yards and 10 touchdowns, he has to be the focal point of the Bengals coverage schemes.
In the end… you have to go with Big Ben and that passing game in a 27-24 game. It will be close but the Steelers will win.
The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2015 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
Madison Square Garden can seat 20,000 people for a concert. This blog was viewed about 69,000 times in 2015. If it were a concert at Madison Square Garden, it would take about 3 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.
Reggie White, Mike Holmgren, and Brett Favre brought the term “Titletown” back to Green Bay when they beat New England 35-21 in Super Bowl XXXI. It was fun to actually have a champion Packer team in my lifetime because it had a great feel to just say it. The championship had been gone from the land of Lombardi for 29 years.
One of the strongest teams of the 1990s and maybe the strongest team in Packer history. This team had absolutely no holes and overcame injuries to receivers Robert Brooks, and Antonio Freeman (playing the latter half with a plate in his arm). With Brett Favre throwing a conference record 39 TDs. They wound up becoming the first team since the ’72 Dolphins to score the most points (456) while allowing the fewest (210). Although they were 13-3 with Brett Favre coming of age, they needed that signature game which would show the league they were going to win it all. In came the perennially strong San Francisco 49ers for the divisional playoff.
The NFC Championship was fitting in that it pitted the Packers (NFL’s richest tradition) against the NFC’s newest team in the Carolina Panthers.
I’m normally an underdog guy, but not this time. Especially after watching the 1995 Packers get jobbed with a ton of bad calls in the Championship game in Dallas. Talk about a twelfth man…damn! That game left you feeling like the best team didn’t win but set the course for this team to dominate 1996 from start to finish.
Possibly the first true champion of the free agent era. Reggie White (Eagles), DE Sean Jones (Oilers), FS Eugene Robinson (Seahawks), Mike Prior (Colts), TE Keith Jackson (Dolphins), WR Andre Rison, and KR Desmond Howard (Jacksonville) gave the Packers a veteran group that added to the team’s sense of urgency. Not bad for an organization that was used arguing against free agency. It was expressed the Packers wouldn’t attract black players if true free agency came to the NFL. Once they nabbed Reggie White, the rest was history.
Now let’s be honest, this team should have gone back to back but Holmgren over-coached against the Broncos in Super Bowl XXXII in 1997. Dorsey Levens was ripping off 13 yd runs repeatedly in the first quarter and Holmgren took the ball out of his hands. Which fed right into the blitzing Broncos and the Pack was having a problem picking them up which forced the fumble and interception that forced Green Bay to play catch-up. Further taking the ball out of Dorsey Levens hands….of course that’s just my opinion I could be wrong.
The 1996 Green Bay Packers were a meteor that you could see coming from a year away. A game New England Patriots team tried to stop them and narrowed the score to 27-21 when Desmond Howard brought the house down with a 99 yard return. Game…set…match 35-21 and the Lombardi Trophy returned to Green Bay.
If you look at the difference between the ’96 champion team and the ’97 squad, the difference was Antonio Freeman couldn’t break games open as Howard could. Desmond set the NFL record with 875 punt return yards alone. A quick vignette on how dominant he was coming down the stretch:
The Super Bowl XXXI Championship Trophy in The Packers Hall of Fame visited by The Chancellor Alumni Weekend 2017.
This article is dedicated to the memories of Fritz Shurmur, Reggie White, Wayne Simmons, Pete Rozelle, & Vince Lombardi.
Three yards short… just 3 yards short of the 1994 AFC Championship. That loss to the San Diego Chargers haunted the Pittsburgh Steelers for nearly a full year. They had fought to unseat the Bills and Oilers in an AFC ruled by open offenses during the early 90s. In 1994 with each foe not making the playoffs, Pittsburgh would coast to Super Bowl XXIX, right?? After all Greg Lloyd, Kevin Greene, Levon Kirkland, Rod Woodson and the rest of the Blitzburgh defense would be back intact.
LOL Uh huh that’s exactly what everyone thought when on a rainy, gray, dreary, ominous day in Three Rivers Stadium, the Steelers welcomed the San Diego Chargers in what was going to be a Steelers coronation and they’d be off to win that elusive “one for the thumb”, fifth Super Bowl title. However trailing late in the 4th quarter 13-10, on a 3rd and short, Stan Humphries play faked and went up top for Tony Martin for a 43yd touchdown with a few minutes to go in the game.
The Steelers weren’t known for their passing offense or good at a two minute drill. Frantically the Steelers raced down field when they were caught 3 yards away from the goal line facing a 4th down. The season rested on one play… Neil O’Donnell threw for Barry Foster yet Dennis Gibson knocked the ball down to preserve a 17-13 upset. Prozac prescriptions skyrocketed in western Pennsylvania.
So the mantra going into the ’95 season was to get those “3 more yards”. It was emblazoned on banners, t-shirts, terrible towels, you name it. They were determined not to be denied again.
In the offseason the Steelers said goodbye to free agent TE Eric Green and farewell to Barry Foster. Foster who had led the AFC with 1,690yds rushing in 1992 was the heart of the offense since Coach Bill Cowher had come to the Steel City. Yet unlike when the team lost Hardy Nickerson and Thomas Everett in recent years, Green and Foster represented the offenses identity and personality. So when they lost their most decorated player, cornerback Rod Woodson in week one, staggered to a 3-4 start, it looked like 1995 would become a lost season.
Enter Kordell Stewart. The mid-round draftee QB from Colorado made famous for his hail mary pass that beat Michigan in 1994, was languishing on the Steelers bench. Several receivers were injured and he was pressed into duty as a receiver in practice where he proved to be more athletic than the regular receivers. Stewart electrified in practice. Cowher started to insert Stewart into the lineup in several packages and a now wide open Steelers offense was born.
The big play along with 3, 4, and 5 receiver sets were run with regularity, for the first time. Teams did not have any film to study they’re new approach nor ANY film to recognize where or how they would use Stewart.
With this new weapon, “Slash” helped the Steelers break their predictable play calling and a bolder offense went from scoring 21 to 27 points per game. They went on an 8 game winning streak and for 6 straight games scored in the last two minutes before the half. Stewart scored 4 of those touchdowns. They took the momentum into the half with them in the process. Retooled with new enthusiasm the ’95 Steelers screamed into the playoffs.
Yet make no mistake about it… this team was still identified by it’s defense which ranked 3rd in the NFL. Led by one of the decade’s best quartet of linebackers, Greg Lloyd (6 1/2 sacks, 6 forced fumbles/ 3ints) & future Hall of Famer Kevin Greene (9 sacks /2 forced fumbles) led the pass rush along with DE Ray Seals. ILB Levon Kirkland (88 tackes 2 ff) and Joel Steed suffocated inside rushing attacks and former SS Carnell Lake joined Greene and Lloyd in the Pro Bowl. This unit was 2nd against the run, 3rd overall whicle sacking QBs 42 times forcing 18 fumbles and pirated 22 enemy passes.
How different was this team? In their first playoff win over Buffalo, the Steelers scored the most points ever in a home playoff game winning 40-21. The AFC Championship against the upstart Indianapolis Colts was a slugfest that echoed the 1994 championship in many ways. The most eery was when Harbaugh duplicated the exact same scenario, throwing a late 4th qtr bomb to Floyd Turner to take a 16-13 lead. You want to talk about a hush falling over a stadium, my goodness you would have thought you were at a funeral…lol and we were. After all they had overcome to get back to the championship game and they were in the same position again?? Are you kidding me??
So what had changed?? The season long development of their passing game is what had. Not only were they able to initiate a march, they actually faced the team’s motto during the drive. Facing a 4th and 3 near midfield with their season on the line, O’Donnell hit Andre Hastings to keep the drive alive. “To hell with a tie!”
Nearing field goal range for a game tying kick, this bolder Steeler offense went for it all when O’Donnell found a streaking Ernie Mills down to the 2. They scored a few plays later to take a 20-16 lead. Now it was up to the defense to hold off the Colts who had come from behind many times that season. Harbaugh brought them to within a failed hail mary of pulling off the upset.
So with a collective sigh of relief they were off to Super Bowl XXX. They literally got those three more yards. Although they lost to Dallas, they thoroughly outplayed them from the middle of the second quarter on. They held Dallas to 61 total yards in the second half, fewest ever for a Super Bowl winner.
They were the first to kick an onside kick without being under 5 minutes to go. Something the Saints copied in Super Bowl XLIV. A couple errant interceptions by O’Donnell robbed this team of its rightful place in history as a Super Bowl champion. Yet the magnificence of their effort in trying to achieve their goal was to be celebrated. Tremendous lesson to be learned from these men is a simple one. To achieve what you want, you may have to change how you do things to get there.
A look back at the ’95 AFC Championship Game:
Sigh…. Neil!!! This was the crowning jewel for becoming AFC Champions in 1995. They should have won it all…
Dedicated to the memories of LB Kevin Greene, T Justin Strelzyk, and Offensive Coordinator Ron Erhardt.
Its time for the rubber to meet the road here in Glendale Arizona. The Packers just lost 3 weeks ago 38-8 to the Cardinals in this building so what has changed? They went on to lose to the Vikings who took the NFC North from them 20-13 in Lambeau. The saving grace is last week’s wildcard win over Washington.
The Packers come into this game with the NFL’s #6 passing defense. If you look at the stats, Palmer only threw for 265 yards 2 TDs and 1 interception. Pedestrian numbers until you remember Aaron Rodgers was bludgeoned for 8 sacks and 4 turnovers. Palmer, an MVP candidate, can do this without a short field. He threw for 4,671 yards and 35 touchdowns comes in this game hot. With Larry Fitzgerald (109 rec/ 1215 yds /9 Tds) John Brown ( 65 rec / 1003 yds /7 Tds) and Michael Floyd (52 rec / 849 yds / 6 Tds) they are averaging 28 points per game at home.
One of the strongest teams of the 1990s and maybe the strongest team in Packer history. This team had absolutely no holes and overcame injuries to receivers Robert Brooks, and Antonio Freeman (playing the latter half with a plate in his arm). With Brett Favre throwing a conference record 39 TDs. They wound up becoming the first team since the ’72 Dolphins to score the most points (456) while allowing the fewest (210). Although they were 13-3 with Brett Favre coming of age, they needed that signature game which would show the league they were going to win it all. In came the perennially strong San Francisco 49ers for the divisional playoff.
Possibly the first true champion of the free agent era. Reggie White (Eagles), DE Sean Jones (Oilers), FS Eugene Robinson (Seahawks), Mike Prior (Colts), TE Keith Jackson (Dolphins), WR Andre Rison, and KR Desmond Howard (Jacksonville) gave the Packers a veteran group that added to the team’s sense of urgency. Not bad for an organization that was used arguing against free agency. It was expressed the Packers wouldn’t attract black players if true free agency came to the NFL. Once they nabbed Reggie White, the rest was history.
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