For the second week in a row, I must begin with an Eagles rant.  There are three phases of football – offence, defence and special teams – and frankly, the Eagles found ways to screw up in all three (not to mention some spectacularly boneheaded coaching as well).

Offence: On the surface, the stat sheet looks pretty good (Vick throws for over 400 yds and actually plays the whole game).  Look closer and you’ll see only 9 rushes for McCoy – Andy Reid once again falls in love with the passing game and forgets he has a real running game to rely on.   There were drops at key times by Maclin and Jackson (Vick could have thrown for 500+ without the drops).  Maclin had a weak fumble after a large gain late in the 4th quarter (not to mention he was caught from behind by a 290lb defensive end).  When an offence puts up 500+ total yards and only scores 23 points, something is very wrong.

Defence: The secondary (especially the stars at CB) look disinterested in covering anyone (Asomugha missed tackles and got beat on a TD for the 3rd week in a row).  A relatively weak 49ers offence ripped big plays at will on the run, continuing to show a fundamental weakness the Eagles have.  In the past 3 games, the Eagles have had 4th quarter leads and have been outscored 36-0 in that span to lose all 3 games.  Everyone on defence is missing tackles.

Special teams: Two missed field goals by a rookie kicker.  If he makes one of those, the Eagles likely would have pulled out the win.

Coaching: Reid and his staff have always frustrated and baffled me.  Short yardage in the red zone and they’ve got Schmidt and Brown in the backfield and have Herremans lined up as an extra TE (in other words, they take out McCoy, Jackson and Avant for a key goal-to-go play).   Reid and his OC are trying to be the smartest guys in the room with what they cook up.  Here’s an idea, keep your best players on the field and let your $100M quarterback try to find a way to score.

Odds and ends from the other games I watched to take my mind off my 1-3 team:

• The Redskins are out to an early share of the NFC East lead.  Rex Grossman’s prediction of a division title for them doesn’t seem so far fetched now, even if it did make me chuckle back in August.
• The Cardinals-Giants game was surprisingly close and a great one to watch.   The officials made a terrible call in the 4th quarter on a Giants fumble (ruling the runner went down intentionally thereby nullifying the fumble – wrong call, and the next play was the Giants game winning TD)
• Kevin Kolb has become too infatuated with throwing to Fitzgerald.   If he feels pressure, he’ll throw it up for grabs to Fitz.  That cost him an interception on a key drive in this game.  He also forced a 4th and 2 pass into Fitz who was tightly covered – the pass went incomplete and that was it for the Cardinals chances.  On the other side of the field, his TE was wide open, but he never looked there.
• Love the Lions getting to 4-0 with yet another huge comeback win.  Romo gave away this game with interceptions meaning he’s been a hero twice and the goat twice this year.    Cowboys looking like an 8-8 team with the good-Romo bad-Romo quarterbacking this year.
• Is Wes Welker open on every play?   The offensive line of the Patriots gives Brady a ton of time and allows Welker the time to run through inside coverage by safeties and linebackers (and you can’t jam him at the line because he lines up in the slot off the line of scrimmage), but really, take him away and let someone else beat you.
• Jets-Ravens: In a season of completely ridiculous games (comebacks, video game stats), this one takes the cake.  Five returns for TDs including 4 by the defences.  The Jets O-line looked like it would get Sanchez killed.   Lots of chippy stuff between whistles.  A ton of penalties.  Two QBs who couldn’t complete any passes.  After the opening Thursday night Saints-Packers game, this one was the most fun game I’ve watched so far this year even though it was a sloppy mess.

Great slate of week 3 games, but after watching my Eagles on Sunday afternoon, I’m not sure I can think about the rest of the league this week.  Simply put, my Eagles are in a wee bit of trouble.

The 1-2 start is bad enough, but the loss to the Giants was bad across the board – tackling the likes of which would get you cut from your pee wee team; the injury to Vick’s hand making him unlikely to start next week; a linebacking corps that keeps being exposed in the running game.  I could go on and on… getting no pressure on Eli, weak play out of the safeties, poor OL play especially in pass blocking, terrible play from the guys who got the big money in the off-season – Babin, Jenkins and Asomugha, Andy Reid’s game management goofs…. why do I cheer for this team?

“It’s only week 3” is a fair comeback as Eagles nation typically panics early in the season, but there were a couple of things that showed during the Giants game that are particularly worrisome:

• The offence spent the entire game looking like it was trying to prevent Vick from getting hurt rather than trying to make plays.  Yes, Vick is injury prone.  Yes he suffered a concussion last week and was cleared to play.  But Sunday looked like a team trying not to lose a QB for the year rather than trying to win a game.  Ironically, that approach ended up with Vick hurting his hand.
• Nnamdi Asomugha got burned big time on two TDs.  It takes a defence time to gel, but a cover corner needs to be able to cover.  He doesn’t look comfortable yet.   I’m hopeful this turns around, but his early performances aren’t encouraging.
• Although the run blocking of the O-line looks pretty solid (and I’m very thankful that Andy Reid has remembered that running the ball is permissible in today’s game), the pass blocking is horrible.   This continues a trend of the past couple of years for the Eagles.  There’s a reason the best QBs in the league look so good – it’s because no one is hitting them every play.  According to ESPN, Vick is under duress on 30% of his pass attempts (worst in the league; league average of 19%).
• Andy Reid is taking a lot of heat in the Philly media for his decision to go for it on 4th and 1 from mid field up 2 in the 4th quarter.  I’m ok with the decision, but he’s got to have a better play call.  A slow developing run against an athletic DL is a lousy call.
• The play calling in short yardage was brutal.  In goal-to-go situations, they called a couple of tentative QB sneaks and a full back trap.  You’ve got the most athletic QB and WRs in the league – maybe try something creative – a roll-out, a play-action pass.  I can’t believe I’m actually complaining about the Eagles running the ball too much.

Life goes on, so time for some short snappers on the other games:

• The Bills and Lions at 3-0 after massive comebacks that put a smile on my face.   Love that the Bills are doing it with a QB from Harvard.
• The NFC West is really bad.  The Arizona-Seattle game should have been played to relegate one of those teams out of the league.  The 49ers won a 13-8 game in Cincinnati that petty criminals in that area should have been forced to watch as part of their debt to society.  Saint Louis got to 0-3 by losing by 30 at home.  That whole division should decline their playoff spot this year for the good of the game.
• The Oakland-Jets game was the worst officiated game this year.  Made up and phantom calls all over the place and a roughing the passer call that is way out in front for the worst call of the year.
• How is Tennessee 2-1 with their star running back not having run for 100 yards through 3 games?  
• Mike Martz (offensive coordinator of the Bears) is going to get his QB killed this year.  How he keeps calling slow developing pass plays with a decimated offensive line is beyond me.  His QBs have been sacked 40+ times in each of the past 10 years yet he’s still employed… amazing!

Snacks were really good this week.  We made two salsas based on recipes from Rick Bayless and his amazing cookbook “Authentic Mexican” (on the left is a chipotle-based salsa, on the right is a salsa verde – both made with fresh tomatillos from the Halifax Seaport Market):

There are weeks during the football season where I’m not sure if I’m more excited about the games or the food.  Looking at the week 2 schedule before Sunday, there weren’t many exciting match-ups (as result of the possible work stoppage, week 2 was designed without any divisional games to allow a possible delay to the start of the season with some scheduling magic) so I was leaning heavily to the snacks carrying the day:

1. Homemade fresh soft pretzels (http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/New-York-Pretzels-109221) with grainy mustard.  These freeze really well and the recipe makes enough for 8 pretzels. 

2. Big Monkey Kettle Corn from the Halifax Seaport Market

3. Philadelphia cheesesteaks (“wit wiz” in Philly-speak).  The key to doing this at home is to freeze the hunk of meat, then partially defrost it.  This makes it much easier to slice really thin.

The snacks were delicious and the football was better than expected.  Here’s what I saw during a pretty solid afternoon and evening of football:

1. Steelers bounce back – The 24-0 score flattered Seattle (if that’s possible).  Never at any time did this game feel in doubt.  Like last week, I wouldn’t read too much into the game as Seattle is cover-your-eyes bad.  That being said, there were a number of positives: some of the top defensive players had solid games – Polamalu was around the ball most of the afternoon and Harrison became visible as the game went on.  

2. Eagles – The loss to the Falcons drops them to 1-1.  It was a sloppy, yet exciting game to watch.   Turnovers, penalties, and the injury to Vick made this compelling television.  It was a typical Eagles loss – get behind early, launch a ferocious comeback, then lose because you can’t stop anyone late.

• The good: Some excellent d-line play (Cole was dominant all night vs the run and the pass); the left side of the o-line did a reasonable job of run blocking all night (especially Peters at LT); McCoy is a real superstar and showed great elusiveness; Kafka coming in to replace Vick and showing some poise in a tough spot; Maclin’s 13 receptions for 170+ yards.
• The bad: Turnovers (especially Vick continuing to not protect the ball – for all of the highlight reel runs and deep passes, if he doesn’t improve this, it’ll be the limiting factor for the Eagles success this year), the run defence surrendering huge chunks of yardage at points early and late in the game
• The ugly: Reid electing not to challenge a play ruled as a catch (it wasn’t, and he actually got an apology from NBC who was covering the game since they didn’t show a replay quick enough on their broadcast for the coaching staff to see) then watching the Falcons score 2 plays later, Maclin’s drop on 4th down with the Eagles driving for a potential game winning TD, Vick’s injury and what it might mean over the next few games.

3. It’s a 16 game season – Most times, you’re never as good (or bad) as your week 1 performance would lead you to believe.  The Bears dominated the Falcons, then get beat pretty handily by the Saints.  The Ravens demolish the Steelers, then get completely run over by a Tennessee team that looked awful in week 1 against the Jags.   On any given Sunday….

4. Head shots – It’s good to see the league finally taking a stand and throwing penalty flags for hits to the head.   That’s a good first step.  The proper next step?  Deal with repeat offenders and blatant hits to the head that could be avoided.  Dunta Robinson of Atlanta is a repeat offender, twice delivering vicious blows to Eagles receivers – last year to Jackson, and this past week to Maclin.  It’s time for a suspension for this kind of behaviour.

5. From the “I could have told you this was going to happen file” – Jags starting QB McCown goes 6/19 with 4 INTs against the Jets and his tenure as the team’s starter is already in question.    In a year where their division is wide open for the taking, they entrust the team to this guy (and his unproven rookie backup) over David Garrard?   Looks like they made a purely financial decision to save about $8M thinking if they lose, they may as well lose cheaply. 

6. Tony Romo take 2 – He was dreadful late in last week’s game.  This week he plays through a fractured rib (or 2) to lead a 10 point comeback and an OT win.  The deep pass on the first play of OT was vintage Romo: an exceptional play action fake and an on point deep pass.  The 49ers defence  were all looking in the backfield and got fooled on the play.  Romo is up there with the best play action ball fakes of any QB in the league.

7. “You play to win the game” – It won’t show up in a box score, but I love the Patriots philosophy on offence.  Up 6 points with less than 12:00 left in the 4th quarter, they elect not to punt and go for it on 4th and 4 at mid field.  They didn’t make it and the announcers denounced the strategy (Side note on this: Has Phil Simms ever thought an aggressive play call was the right decision?  He calls a lot of Patriots games given he’s CBS’s top analyst and the Patriots play in the CBS marquee game many weeks. Week after week, when the Patriots make a bold call, he “tsk tsks” and says if it were up to him, he’d send out the punting unit…. and that’s why he’s talking about football and others are coaching football)  It’s easy to criticize a decision that doesn’t work out, but the overall philosophy is the one more teams should take – going for the win rather than playing not to lose.   The odds favour you (interesting reads on studies here and here) and if I had Tom Brady, I’d rather see him on the field with the ball than my defence (especially the Pats defence – more on that below).

8. Early favourite for worst team of the year: Kansas City.  Wow.  So bad.

9. Troubling trends that have been covered up so far: 

• Green Bay’s secondary and pass defence – bad vs Saints, really bad vs the Panthers, but they’re 2-0. 
• Carolina’s play calling – Cam Newton has thrown for 400+ yards in his first two games as a pro, but the Carolina coaches need to mix up the play calling if they want to actually win games.  It’s like they have a shiny new toy and forget they have a pretty reasonable run blocking O-line and running backs.
• New England’s overall defence – At some point in a season, you need to make a few defensive stands to win a game.  This may never come back to bite them as Tom Brady, the receivers and their O-line are just humming along, but Miami and San Diego both have put up crazy offensive numbers that were overshadowed by what Brady did. 

10. I live with a football savant – I’ve got to give props to Jodi on her picking skills.  In her office pool, she’s way out in front after correctly picking a bunch of tricky to call games this week (Cleveland over Indy on the road, Buffalo over Oakland, Atlanta over Philly, Tampa over Minnesota on the road, Denver over Cincy).  Heading into Monday night, the only game she got wrong this week was Tennessee over Baltimore, but as a Steelers fan, she didn’t seem too upset about that one.

It’s good to have football back and week 1 provided exceptionally compelling games.  Here’s what I watched and the snacks (and a few recipes) that accompanied the games.

Games watched intently: Eagles-Rams, Steelers-Ravens, Redskins-Giants, Chargers-Vikings, Packers-Saints, Jets-Cowboys, Patriots-Dolphins

Snacks:

• Thursday night game – Chicken nachos (bell peppers, onions, jalapenos) with homemade guacamole
• Cheese and rosemary breadsticks: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/giada-de-laurentiis/cheese-and-rosemary-breadsticks-recipe/index.html
• Mixed vegetables with homemade chipotle dip
• Nacho dip – family secret recipe (sorry!)
• Picaroon’s Yippee IPA (Thursday night – http://www.picaroons.ca/yippee.asp) and Garrison Tall Ship Amber ale (Sunday)

The key to week 1 of every NFL season is to not overreact to everything you see.  It takes at least a few weeks to see trends, but saying that, here’s what I saw from week 1.

Eagles – I’ll always take 1-0 after week 1.  Vick looked at his athletic best, the offensive line didn’t look as bad as expected after a shaky start and the defence was spectacular in an understated way.  My favourite thing watching the defence was the pressure generated by the front 4 without needing to blitz.  I only counted 6 or 7 blitzes all game, and the 4 sacks the Eagles had all came from only a 4 man rush.  The Eagles look like they’ll struggle against the run this year, but that’s a problem to worry about another day.

Steelers – Let’s just say it was an unhappy household after the Steelers got drilled 35-7.  They looked old, slow and disinterested.  I didn’t see anything positive all game.  I’m not reading more into this than it being a one game beat down.  My bet is they take out their frustrations on Seattle at home next week.

O-lines: The guys in the trenches never get any credit.  Loved Baltimore’s LT McKinnie’s work in their run game.   Green Bay’s centre Wells was a beast against the Saints’ D-lineman in their run game.   Tom Brady owes many of his 500+ yards of passing to being able to stand in the pocket without fear of contact.  The Pats pass blocking was outstanding for most of their game.

Redskins defence – Last year the Redskins new coach, Mike Shanahan, blew up what was the previous year a top 5 NFL defence.  After adjusting defensive schemes to fit his philosophy (oh, the arrogance), his team’s defence tanked to be one of the worst in the league.   Against the Giants in week 1, the defence was flying to the ball, looked faster than last year, and generally created havoc.  If the Redskins get the defensive side of the ball right this year, they’ll contend for a wild card.

Tony Romo – Week one showed (again!) that this guy cannot be considered among the elite QBs in the league.  For 3 quarters, he looks like a hall-of-famer, then when the game is on the line, he chokes.  Against the Jets, he threw an inexcusable interception, fumbled in the red-zone and came apart at the seams in the 4th quarter like he usually does.  His ball security is terrible and legendary.  He’s the rich man’s Rex Grossman – a train wreck always waiting to happen.

Special teams and return games – This is an area where the shortened off-season was noticeable.  In week 1, if a team had speed and elusiveness in the kickoff or punt return game, you saw it – a combined 8 TDs on punt/kick returns and many, many more long returns.  The lack of practice time has special teams coverage behind in preparation.   I expect this will tighten up in the coming weeks.

Buffalo Bills uniforms and helmets – Completely love them.  If you squinted your eyes during their unexpected domination of Kansas City, you may have thought you were watching the glory days Bills. 

Brian Billick as TV analyst – He was the commentator in the booth during my Eagles game.  He’s pretty solid as a studio guy for taped segments, but is among the worst live analysts.  He gets names wrong, doesn’t see obvious parts of plays and generally gets in my way of enjoying a telecast.  Every time he calls a game I’m watching I want to unplug the centre speaker from my home theatre setup and listen to the game with crowd noise only.

Passing offence – Week 1 saw the highest passing yardage of any week in NFL history.  Even rookie Cam Newton threw for 400+ yards.   At this point in the season, receivers have the advantage as at least they know where there should be going at the snap – the defensive reactions are literally a step behind right now.

Peyton Manning is the undisputed MVP of the league – When you completely design an offence around the once-in-a-lifetime skills of one person, you get what happened to the Colts when he can’t play.  The entire Colts offence is based on Manning putting everyone in the perfect spot pre-snap to take advantage of the defence then running the play with the utmost precision.  All of the talking heads on TV make you think the Colts run a complex offence – they don’t.  They have something like 6 runs and 8-10 base pass plays.  Manning is smart enough to audible to the best play against the defence.  Their pass routes are precise and Manning is deadly accurate in putting the ball in exactly the right spot on each play.  Kerry Collins (or any other QB available to be picked up) can’t do any of those things – it’s going to be a long season in Indy.

Disappointment of the week: My television provider (Eastlink) didn’t carry the NFL RedZone channel in week 1, and even worse, tweeted out that it was on channel 440 (it wasn’t there or anywhere) then didn’t respond to multiple tweets from a number of football fanatics asking where they were hiding it.  It better show up next week.  I don’t know if I can manage flipping channels on 2 TVs for 6 hours next week.

This is my favourite time of the year.  As a life-long student, September always signifies change, opportunity and new beginnings.  This is really my new year.  Plans are made and dreams take flight on cool fall breezes. 

A big part of my love for the fall is the return of NFL football.   I’m a complete junkie.  Every Sunday at 2pm, you’ll find me on my sofa in front of 2 televisions (guilty admission: I hook up our second TV in the living room so I can follow more than one game at a time) for the start of about 11 hours of football.   The sport has hooked me for a couple of reasons:

1.  The team I follow (the Philadelphia Eagles) typically comes tantalizingly close to being a championship team, only to break my heart in spectacularly creative new ways each year.  Oddly, this makes me come back for more abuse each season.

2. Each week of the season is crucial.  With only 16 games, each one could be the game that puts your team over the top or kills your championship dreams. Week by week, you never have any idea what is going to happen.

Predictions are a fool’s game for football fans.  Each year as the season approaches, I’ll make a bunch of bold predictions that only Jodi will hear sitting next to me while I disagree with football pundits on TV.   This year,  I’m going to put my thoughts on the season down in writing so I can later brag about what I got right, and so I can have some good laughs when February rolls around and I see that most of my predictions are dead wrong. 

With only a few days to the start of the season and with my Eagles’ Super Bowl dreams wildly alive, here’s what I see for the 2011/12 NFL season:

1. My Eagles aren’t going to win the Super Bowl.   I’ve been a sports fan my whole life.  My Montreal Expos – departed.  My Quebec Nordiques – gone (and won a championship the first season in their new home).  I feel doomed to never cheer for a winning team.  The only thing in question is the manner in which they break my heart this year (more on that later)

2. Jodi’s Steelers – She’ll have household bragging rights (again).  I see the Steelers winning the AFC North with minimal competition this year.  The Steelers make it back to the AFC Championship game for the second year in a row.

3. Playoff teams from 2011 that won’t get back to the playoffs this season:

• Seattle – got lucky last year, won’t happen 2 years in a row
• Chicago – their defence looks old and overrated, their OL is brutal, they have a QB who I don’t trust and I still don’t know how they won 13 games last year
• Indianapolis – even if Manning is healthy, they made some head scratching personnel choices: when you sign Ernie Simms as a key part of your linebacking core, you’re got issues
• Kansas City – they got lucky during a down year in their division last year, lightning doesn’t strike twice in a row

4. Teams that missed the playoffs in 2010 who make it this year:

• Detroit – ferocious DL and under-rated linebackers and DBs, an emerging QB who if he stays healthy is going to impress
• Arizona – they play in a terrible division and although everyone is on the Rams to win the NFC West, I like the pairing of Kolb-Fitzgerald to put up lots of points this year.
• Tennessee – I think they have one of the best O-lines in the league, they can run the ball and have a veteran presence at QB.  They pull the upset and take the AFC South
• San Diego – everyone is on their bandwagon and I am too, plus they play in a bad division

5. A few assorted player and team predictions:

• Tim Tebow doesn’t see a snap this year for the Broncos.  He won’t be back with them next year. The Broncos wasted an entire year’s draft last year – the Tebow pick was just the most visible of a bunch of bad selections.
• Iron man streaks for Eli and Peyton Manning both come to an end this year
• Brett Favre makes a November comeback for some team with playoff hopes that lost its starting QB to injury for the season
• Baltimore’s defence takes a big step back this year.  Ray Lewis gets exposed as a very aging LB.  They miss the playoffs.
• In the first 4 weeks of the season, someone gets a precedent setting 4 game suspension for targeting an opponent’s head.  The NFL finally takes a real stand on head injuries.
• Ben Roethlisberger has a monster season for Pittsburgh.  He was good before he even realized what practice was.  Look out this year.
• The Cincinnati Bengals end up dead last in the league in offensive production and tops in the league in defensive production and play some of the lowest scoring football ever seen.
• Colt McCoy starts to look like a franchise QB for Cleveland.
• The once proud Oakland Raiders will have one of the top running games in the league, but without the ability to stop anyone on defence, they end up with 4 or 5 wins.
• Julius Peppers (Chicago) becomes invisible this year after a monster year last year

6. Division predictions:

AFC East: Patriots, Jets, Bills, Dolphins

AFC North: Steelers, Ravens, Browns, Bengals

AFC South: Titans, Texans, Colts, Jags

AFC West: Chargers, Chiefs, Broncos, Raiders

NFC East: EAGLES, Cowboys, Redskins, Giants

NFC North: Packers, Lions, Vikings, Bears

NFC South: Falcons, Saints, Bucs, Panthers

NFC West: Cardinals, Rams, 49ers, Seahawks

So given I’m taking Philly to win their division, it begs the question – how will they break my heart in the playoffs?  I see a close playoff match up with New Orleans.  Game tied at 24 late in the 4th quarter.   Andy Reid will have used all three time-outs early in the 3rd quarter due to his lackluster game management.  Drew Brees throws a ball over the middle, the ball pops up in the air and is ruled to have fallen to the ground incomplete.  A quick TV replay shows Eagles middle linebacker Casey Matthews clearly catching the pass for an interception, but without any timeouts left, the Eagles can’t challenge the ruling on the field.  Four plays later, Brees completes a last second pass to the end zone for a 31-24 win.  If you think I’m exaggerating, ask any Eagles fan what will cost us a trip to the Super Bowl this year and I bet more than half will bring up Andy Reid’s game management as a likely cause.

I think I’m ready for some football, but maybe not as much as the guy on the right…