2013 Offseason Update, Week 6

Wes Welker was introduced as a member of the Denver Broncos this week.
Photo credit to ESPN.

As I promised last week, I will continue my weekly updates even as I continue to be counted on to cover Maryland basketball for ACC Battles. Speaking of which, if you are an ACC fan, be sure to check out the site.

The biggest news of this past week was of course free agency, so that’s my focus today.

Major Additions

The biggest names among free agent signings this past week were the wide receivers. Peyton Manning already has two young receivers who are beginning to make their mark on the league, but now he has a seasoned veteran already used to playing with one of the all-time greats as the Broncos signed Wes Welker.

Greg Jennings felt “wanted” in Minnesota, so the Vikings signed their former division rival and the Patriots, to replace Welker, signed former Ram Danny Amendola.

Steven Jackson considered retirement, but found a home in Atlanta. The Falcons still have Jacquizz Rodgers, so they will share the load which should definitely help Jackson last a few more years in the league.

Former Lion Cliff Avril landed in Seattle as they want to bolster their defensive front and the Vikings found some potential competition for Christian Ponder by signing Matt Cassel, who was released by the Chiefs after Kansas City got Alex Smith.

Reports came out last night that Jake Long, who was considering returning to Miami, decided to accept a deal from St. Louis, which Sam Bradford must be ecstatic about.

Trying to Get it Right

The Dolphins and Browns have not been particularly competitive in my lifetime. I became aware of sports as Dan Marino’s career wound down and they have only had a couple of decent seasons since. The Browns just haven’t been good since Baltimore took their original team.

Both teams are trying to get it right and have been big players in free agency so far.

The Dolphins added Mike Wallace to complement Brian Hartline and give Ryan Tannehill a much needed second option. A bigger emphasis has been placed on defense so far. Dannell Ellerbe and Philip Wheeler were added to their linebacker corps and they brought back safety Chris Clemons. Expect them to continue to play their hand.

The Browns made several nice additions, but none better than on their defensive front. End Paul Kruger and Tackle Desmond Bryant were signed on the first day of free agency as Cleveland appears to be building around the defensive line. I’d like to see them emphasize the offense, but maybe they’re going about this as a multi-year project, which isn’t a bad idea when you’re as bad as the Browns.

High Profile Trades

Last week it was Chiefs acquisition of Alex Smith via trade with San Francisco. The NFC West again worked some deals this week. Anquan Boldin was likely going to be released by Baltimore. Instead, San Francisco managed to convince the Ravens to give him up for a sixth round pick as the 49ers did some nice thrift shopping.

Seattle preceded that move by trading for Percy Harvin. The Seahawks are going to be dangerous this year and these two teams are making it even harder for St. Louis and Arizona to have any chances of digging their way out of the abyss.

Fax Fiasco

The Broncos were seething, Elvis Dumervil was seething, and Dumervil’s agent was looking for anywhere to pass blame until he was fired just hours after huge mistake caused Dumervil to land in free agency.

Elvis Dumervil has just signed a contract to stay with Denver when suddenly it all came undone. Apparently the fax with his signed contract did not reach the Denver offices until minutes after the 4 p.m. deadline, causing Dumervil to become a free agent. This is a huge loss from a Denver defense already in need of some patchwork. This is a big step back that will be difficult to fully recover from this offseason.

If I’m missing anything important, or if you just want to hear my thoughts on any other offseason news from the past week, feel free to contact me via my blog’s Facebook page or my Twitter account, @cpuffnfl.

AFC Championship Afterword: Patriots vs Ravens

Another year, another case of Bradying. Brady made some atypical poor decisions
late in the game and was as much to blame as anyone else for their loss.
Photo credit to The Boston Globe.

For a while, neither team really deserved to win this game. The Ravens weren’t playing all that well in the first half and the Patriots, Wes Welker in particular, couldn’t catch to save their lives.

Joe Flacco improved to 8 touchdowns and no interceptions this postseason with another solid outing. He had a few poor throws, but every quarterback does so you won’t see me hassling him over this game. I can’t really think of many, if any, instances where his receivers had to bail him out. He made good throws, they made good grabs, and by the end of the game, the Ravens were clearly the better team.

As I was previewing this game, I talked about a lot of stuff on my radio show, but I focused on previous stats when I previewed the game on my blog. I brought up that Joe Flacco always seems to show up against the Patriots, that there is only one team he plays better against. Low and behold, he had a pretty terrific game yesterday.

And what about Tom Brady? I mentioned that he has played well enough against the Ravens but that he has below average numbers in Conference Championship games. He completed 53% of his passes, threw one touchdown and two interceptions, though to his credit the first one wasn’t entirely his fault.

New England’s predictable passing attack haunted them badly. When your quarterback is Tom Brady and your entire receiving corps only averages about 11 yards per catch, that’s a sign of a pretty conservative passing attack.

The Patriots run this offense often, but when they play good teams they usually switch it up more, it’s what it takes for them to get ‘over the hump’ to beat the NFL’s better teams. They didn’t do so yesterday and I feel it’s a big part of why they lost by two touchdowns.

Wes Welker had eight receptions despite having more drops than I could keep track of, so he is still Tom Brady’s favorite target at receiver. However, when you have as many bad drops as he had yesterday, you can expect plenty of questions about his future with the team.

Baltimore advances to their franchise’s second Super Bowl and the fourth appearance for the city. The Ravens won their last Super Bowl matchup against the Giants in January 2001. The Colts went 1-1 before moving their franchise to Indianapolis.

Check back with my blog daily over the next two weeks, especially next week when the focus will be fully on Super Bowl XLVII. For updates on when new blog posts are published, ‘like’ my page on Facebook and follow me on Twitter @cpuffnfl.

Super Bowl XLVI Recap

Wow. Is it too much to say that the sequel was better than the original?

Yeah, that’s what I thought. That might be a little bit of a stretch, but it was pretty darn close.

I won’t try to hide that I am very happy the Giants won. But I am even happier that the game was so close. I have my ties to specific teams, but I am first and foremost an NFL fan. I will be excited for the Super Bowl if my least favorite teams from each conference are in it (sorry, Eagles in the NFC and Raiders and Patriots in the AFC) as occurred in Super Bowl XXXIX. I was just as excited for that Super Bowl as I was yesterday and as I was during the Colts’ two recent Super Bowl appearances.

I can now say with much certainty that my Super Bowl predictions simply do not apply to the Giants. Of the three Super Bowls involving the Giants since I began making my predictions, those same three are the only ones I have predicted incorrectly. Nothing can be said for the Patriots, however, as they have won in every prediction game I have played since 2000 and are now 3-2 in the real deal over that span.

This is the second consecutive (and I believe second overall) year that I have correctly predicted the winning team’s score. Notice that doesn’t say winning score. I predicted the Patriots would win with 35 points, but I predicted the Giants to score 21, which they did. Last year I predicted a 31-30 Packers win and they went on to beat the Steelers 31-25.

Eli Manning, who won Super Bowl MVP honors for the second time, played exceptionally well. Tom Brady played very well, too, though I cannot bring myself to place blame entirely on the receivers for those late drops. Though Welker “makes that catch 100 times out of 100” (thank you Cris Collinsworth), there is no arguing that the pass was a bit high and made for a difficult attempted catch by Wes. Likewise, the 3rd down pass to Branch on the next play was thrown way late and gave the Giants secondary a chance to close in and force Branch into a position where the ball could only glance off his gloves.

Mario Manningham’s catch was sensational. It was a catch I have seen tens of other receivers make in much less important games, but the throw by Manning was unreal and Manningham played it beyond perfectly.

New York’s defensive line deserves a lot of credit. The Patriots got to Manning a fair amount early, but the Giants put the pressure on Brady when it mattered most, when they absolutely has to prevent him to coming through in the clutch.

The only play from this game that might outshine Manningham’s catch 25 years down the road was Bradshaw’s bizarre score with just under a minute left. I said before the play that Manning should just down the ball between the hash marks, though I was more concerned with a fumble than a touchdown. Either way, my dreaded expectation almost came to life, but Gronkowski just missed a diving effort at a tipped pass in the end zone with no time on the clock.

So again I ask, better than the original? I would never claim that, but I will say that they are too close to separate. NFL.com ranks XLII and XLVI #2 and #3 all-time, respectively. I would put them at a tie in the #2 spot, but that is one man’s opinion, and they make good points for theirs as well. You can read their take here: Super Bowl XLVI definitely ranks in top three

Thank you to everyone for reading all season. I will be writing about what some teams need to do over the offseason, but I will not be posting separately for each team this year. Instead I will just make a few points about each team’s offseason needs, in my opinion, and separate posts by division.

Let me know if there is anything I could do next season to make my posts more interesting. I love having people read my blog, but want them to feel like they are getting something out of it, too.

I hope everyone enjoyed the 2011-12 NFL season as much as I did and I look forward to the offseason and what next fall brings.