Green Bay proved no match for Atlanta, losing 44-21.
On the surface, the NFC Championship game loomed as a battle between two powerful offences and a pair of fairly mediocre defences.
Digging deeper and it became apparent that Atlanta and Green Bay was a match between an almost historic offence against an historic quarterback and an average defence against something turning into a trainwreck.
If Green Bay was going to stand any chance in the Georgia Dome, it was going to require another miracle effort from Rodgers and having produced countless miracle efforts down the stretch and into the playoffs, the magic couldn’t have lasted forever.
Rodgers was fine yesterday, he just wasn’t incredible and against a Falcons powerhouse, Green Bay looked overmatched and out of their depth, bringing back memories from the first half of this season and the 2015 season, where without hall of fame play from Rodgers, the Packers drifted around the edges of the playoffs.
Outside of the quarterback position, Green Bay are an incomplete team, severely lacking the talent on defence to be a true Super Bowl contender. For the fifth time in six years, the Packers reached the divisional round or further without reaching the Super Bowl. This clearly suggests they have major deficiencies which show up every January.
Top of that list is clearly Green Bay’s defence and defensive coordinator Dom Capers was in the gun again yesterday from fans and pundits. Capers has overseen the Packers defence since 2009 and every year it seems to battle.
In fairness to Capers for the NFC title game, the secondary was already ravaged by injury and the loss of Micah Hyde, an important utility piece who played multiple positions in the secondary, was the final nail in coffin. There was already no Sam Shields.
Ladarius Gunter, an undrafted free agent in his rookie season, was already playing a larger role than previously envisioned and above his current ability. Man-on-man coverage against Julio Jones was always going to be a slaughter and Jones’ 180-yards and two-touchdowns failed to invalidate any predictions.
Outside of the hospital ward secondary, Green Bay’s front seven is aging and lacks any playmakers. Their pass rush failed to put any indent on Atlanta’s offensive machine, Clay Matthews has been non-existent all playoffs and Julius Peppers is reaching the end of the road.
It wasn’t a fair fight and the Falcons had their way all game, marching up and down the field via a variety of receiving threats and the combination of Devonta Freeman and Tevin Coleman in the backfield.
Atlanta displayed a truly great offence reaching peak performance and pre-game assumptions that Green Bay were a match proved to be unfounded.
Mason Crosby’s missed field goal on their opening drive was an ominous start and an Aaron Ripkowski fumble in the redzone on the next drive meant alarm bells were ringing, the Packers did not have the capability to reel in a two-score deficit, not against this Falcons team and by half time the game was over.
With Green Bay forced to play catch-up, it highlighted issues on offence that were simply masked in their playoff run by number 12. Their running game was non-existent and a one-dimensional offence took away any mystery, allowing the Falcons to zero-in on the passing game.
Eddie Lacy will return from injury next season, however his inconsistencies throughout his career brings in to question the level of improvement they can expect from Lacy over Ty Montgomery and Christine Michael.
Focusing on the passing game, Rodgers is constantly lauded for his ability to make any receiver great, which while a compliment for the QB, questions the ability of each receivers. Without Jordy Nelson last season, the Packers offence lacked speed and the ability to separate and these issues still remain. Rodgers ability to throw receivers open is unparalleled but it’s not sustainable. Those wild improvised plays are incredible, but Green Bay need to operate in a standard offence.
For all of Rodgers’ greatness, the era in Green Bay still only has one Super Bowl and a litany of heartbreak playoff losses. Their defence has been a constant battle throughout this entire period and the 2016 effort shows it still requires some extensive remodelling.
Surviving off ridiculousness from Aaron Rodgers is fun and exciting, but it cannot create legitimate playoff runs. He needs help, right now, while the magic is still there.
Houston were shutout in New England in the regular season, a repeat of that is on the cards.
If there was one upside from a fairly mediocre wildcard weekend, aside from Aaron Rodgers’ domination and a second week of “Boatgate”, it was that only eight of the best teams remain, setting up a mouth-watering (or as Ray Lewis likes to say, “mouth got water”) divisional round featuring three dream match-ups.
On the NFC side of the playoff bracket, you could mix up the four remaining combatants in any combination and only get great games. Seattle didn’t really exceed expectations in their 26-6 win over Detroit, however at least they are peaking and the hint of a dangerous running game led by Thomas Rawls and a defence which is still formidable suggests they will at least make it tough for Atlanta.
Green Bay travelling to Jerryworld would be a suitable NFC Championship game with Rodgers’ playing at an all-time level and looming as a serious roadblock for the 13-3 Cowboys team that would definitely have preferred a meeting with New York, despite the fact that the Giants swept their division rivals in the regular season.
Kansas City hosting a white-hot Pittsburgh looms to be an intriguing matchup as Le’Veon Bell looks to follow up his impressive playoff debut, this time against a fiercer defensive unit in front of an opposing and raucous crowd at Arrowhead Stadium.
So three of the best possible match-ups fill this weekend, a good way to move on from the previous weekend of one-sided romps which included an overmatched Connor Cook, Matt Moore recovering from a concussion in the space of a few minutes and Odell Beckham putting a hole in a Lambeau Field locker room wall, his lone highlight after a poor game.
The one tiny issue with the second round of the playoffs is the obvious fact that there are four games this weekend. The fourth game of course features the Houston Texans, a team which to their credit did what they had to do and eliminated the Raiders behind a solid defensive showing and surprisingly competent quarterback play from Brock Osweiler.
Despite this, the Texans are really the only team that doesn’t belong in the final eight. They lucked out against the Raiders, with Derek Carr on the sidelines, watching on TV on the other side of the US. So well done for getting this far, but realistically they would have been the easy beats for whoever was lucky enough to host them and who gets that privilege on Sunday? Why who else but the New England Patriots.
It’s amazing how the universe decides each year, how can we make it even easier for Bill Belichick and Tom Brady? They already have an uncompetitive division in which they’ve ruled for almost the entire 21st century, they already have the smartest coach in the league who despite being superior already, makes it his mission each and every week to embarrass the slew of mediocre coaches in the league. And they already have one of the best quarterbacks of all time, who has the means to access the best care and recovery methods to ensure he can play at a top level until he’s 65.
No, it’s not enough letting them sleepwalk through the regular season into a division title and usually a bye week, let’s make their playoff path as simple as possible. The Patriots go into Sunday’s game as almost unbackable favourites, it’s a mere certainly that they won’t only win, they’ll destroy Houston for another divisional round blowout.
Just look at the recent history of who New England has faced for a trip to the AFC Championship game. Last year they met a Chiefs team which was overmatched offensively to keep up with Patriots and even threw in some insane Andy Reid clock management, winning by a touchdown in game which was never that close. In the 2013 season, they waxed Indianapolis 43-22 after the Colts had come off a shootout with the Chiefs. In 2012 they faced their first meeting with Houston and won by 13, and in 2011 they were able to enjoy a match-up with Denver, led by Tim Tebow, right after the magic had disappeared, crushing the Broncos 45-10.
It makes sense though that in 2016 the Pats would get an “Advance straight to go” into the Championship game. After surviving the horrors of “Deflategate” in the opening month of the season, New England have had a ridiculously easy schedule for a Super Bowl contender and the added benefit of key injuries in the AFC making it even more of a cakewalk.
The Pats faced only four-playoff teams in the regular season for a total of five games and even that doesn’t tell the true story. Two of those games were divisional games against the Miami, the second of which coming against Matt Moore. They faced Houston, who as stated above, shouldn’t be in the playoffs at this point and even faced the Steelers with back-up Landry Jones as quarterback.
Their playoff path was made much easier once Carr went down, meaning they would avoid having to face both Kansas City and Pittsburgh in the playoffs and heck, even with Ryan Tannehill going down it meant their final game against the Dolphins, which netted them the top seed, became a non-event.
So hopefully we can move on past Deflategate when the Pats lead 35-7 in the third quarter and Osweiler is being roasted on Twitter and recognise how easy the Pats have it every year.
Here are the four games, while I’ll go and be sick.
Seattle @ Atlanta (-5)
The 2012 divisional round epic played out between the Falcons and the Seahawks has quietly been forgotten as truly memorable playoff classic. Russell Wilson sat on the verge of being a playoff hero in his rookie year, leading the visitors in a two-minute drill, with Marshawn Lynch scoring a touchdown with just 25 seconds to go. Matt Ryan quickly answered and moved the home team into field goal range in 17 seconds, where Matt Bryant did the rest, claiming victory for Atlanta. The teams don’t seem as evenly matched this time around with the Falcons having a superior offence to last time and Seattle a defence closer to average.
The Falcons are going to put up at least 30-points, they have done that in almost every game this season, so can the Seahawks match that? Their hope comes at the line of scrimmage, where in Week 6, Seattle overpowered the Falcons offensive line and put consistent pressure on Ryan. They also limited Devonta Freeman and Tevin Coleman to 50-rushing yards on 17 carries. However, Ryan still threw for 335-yards and three touchdowns and that was in Seattle’s building.
Apart from Vic Beasley, the Seahawks won’t face a ferocious pass rush, so they will be able to keep Wilson upright, however they simply don’t have the weapons and are not playing well enough to top Atlanta.
Houston @ New England (-15)
See above, this will be a whitewash. A fun game to play while watching the Texans get blown out will be to count the number of JJ Watt sideline shots. The reported number last Sunday was 16, he’ll try to top that this week.
Green Bay (+4.5) @ Dallas
For the second playoff weekend, the Packers look set to be in the juiciest match-up of the four-game slate. If it lives up to expectation, their meeting with the Cowboys will be a good one. Rodgers and the Green Bay offence overcame a slow start at Lambeau and turned on the jets in a second half demolition of the Giants.
The star QB has returned to peak performance about a year-and-a-half of more mediocre form. A quick sidenote on that, there’s a lot of revisionist history going on regarding Rodgers and his struggles in the first half of the season, it’s almost as if it never happened because he’s playing so well now. There’s nothing wrong with criticising a player and an offence when they’re not performing, even if it is Green Bay and Aaron Rodgers.
For Dallas, they watched the Packers obliterate a Giants defence which is far superior to their own. The positive is their offence can work to control the clock and limit Green Bay possessions and Rodgers’ time on the field. The wildcard is Dak Prescott’s first playoff game, will he be nervous? Will he miss some throws early? And will he turn the ball over?
This is going to be tight and for all of Green Bay’s good work on this winning run, the Cowboys regular season dominance can’t be discounted or forgotten. Jerry Jones will be looking extra smug in his luxury box at the end of this one. #Dezcaughtit
Pittsburgh @ Kansas City (-1.5)
The closest match-up and the toughest game to call sets up an epic in Kansas City. Pittsburgh didn’t do their chances any harm in Miami seeing as that game was over midway through the first quarter. The Dolphins may have made it interesting on the scoreboard, but the Steelers were always a couple of gears above their opponents.
The unveiling of Bell, Antonio Brown and Ben Roethlisberger as a trio on offence did not fail to disappoint. Bell smoked Miami for two touchdowns, Brown did the same and Roethlisberger completed his first 12 passes. The only lowlight was an injury to Big Ben which left him in a moonboot, however knowing his history; the moonboot was probably more for affect than anything.
Kansas City are at a level above Miami and it’s hard to see a scenario of the Chiefs getting blown away early. This is a big game for the Chiefs, it’s time they capitalised on two-seasons of regular season consistency and went deep into the playoffs. Their defence is comparable to last season where they fell at this hurdle; however the addition of Tyreek Hill on offence is the real wildcard. They’ve lacked a spark on offence in past seasons; however the rookie sensation can open up the field for Alex Smith, who has a patchy playoff record (2-3). Get it done Kansas City.
Jay Ajayi rushed for over 200-yards and two-scores against Pittsburgh in Week 6.An up-and-down regular season, marred by lower TV ratings, a lack of power teams and patchy quarterback play is now over and we’ve reached the playoffs where most would have hoped 12, at least competent teams would have escaped the mire to provide some entertaining games in January.
That hasn’t quite happened, in fact not only did few fresh contenders emerge down the stretch, but Super Bowl calibre teams have become weaker, with injuries ravaging most of the AFC. It’s created a situation where the six playoff teams in the conference provide us with a quarterback list of Tom Brady, Alex Smith & Ben Roethlisberger (tick) and Connor Cook, Brock Osweiler and Matt More (cross).
From this motley crew of quarterbacks, it’s created two things, 1. A clear path for the Patriots to waltz into another Super Bowl and 2. A fairly lacklustre wildcard weekend slate.
It seems fitting that in this season so many teams would get knocked with major injuries or have lost all form by the time we entered the playoffs.
Houston have no business being division champions or playing in the postseason, Oakland’s hope died with Derek Carr’s broken leg, Detroit’s incredible run of early season luck appears to be over and Moore has replaced the injured Ryan Tannehill, weakening an already pedestrian offence. Throw in a Seattle team which hasn’t produced the form required to contend and it’s a mix of also-rans filling up half of the playoff spots.
There is some good news, Green Bay has backed up Aaron Rodgers’ proclamation from late November that they would run the table and are on a six-game winning streak. Atlanta’s offence is fully fit and absolutely firing, Kansas City look stronger than last year and New England & Dallas have emerged as legitimate number one seeds in any season, not just the weakened 2016 campaign.
The Houston, Oakland barnstormer to open the postseason looms as a non-event as we look forward to a far from memorable quarterback battle between a first-time starter and guy who was benched as recently as Week 15, after floundering as the Texans’ starting QB. Still, it’s not like this game will come without precedence and will even follow a recent tradition of stinkers on wildcard weekend. Here’s a short list of similarly lampooned games, like Cook vs Osweiler.
2015 season – Kansas City 30-0 Houston Texans
As bad as Osweiler has been this year, he has a very low bar to reach if he wants to top Houston’s previous playoff disaster. Who could forget the way the Texans were embarrassed in their own buildinf as the Chiefs broke a 23-year playoff win drought. Knile Davis kicked off the beatdown with a return touchdown on the opening kickoff and Brian Hoyer was sent running for the border after throwing four-interceptions.
2014 season – Arizona 16-27 Carolina
If Connor Cook debuting in a playoff game is a shock, then so was the Cardinals’ third string quarterback Ryan Lindley starting in Carolina two years ago. The career back up struggled throwing for just 82-yards and committing two turnovers as Arizona produced an historically bad offensive performance, picking up just eight first downs and gaining 78-net yards on offensive, a playoff record in futility. This all coming against a Carolina team which had finished 7-8-1, surging to win the putrid NFC South.
2012 season – Cincinnati 13-19 Houston
After so many one-and-done playoffs losses for the Bengals, it’s a little hard to remember Andy Dalton’s second attempt at ending Cincy’s playoff drought. Houston were the beneficiaries of a struggling Dalton who threw for just 127-yards, completing less than 50% of his passes.
2011 season – Cincinnati 10-21 Houston
Dalton’s first playoff effort was just as tough as he threw three interceptions and saw his team run over in Houston. The highlight of the game was JJ Watt’s 29-yard pick six and the rough outing was a taste of things to come for the Bengals in the playoffs.
So, as you ponder not waking up on Sunday morning for the AFC playoff clash, remember you’ve seen this all before. And now that we’re here, let’s preview the four games.
Oakland @ Houston (-3.5)
If someone had told you three weeks ago that the Raiders and Texans would meet in the wildcard round and the starting quarterbacks would be Cook and Osweiler, what would be more surprising? The fact that Oakland had lost their MVP calibre quarterback and had replaced him with a debutant, or that Osweiler would somehow start another game for the Texans? It’s a tough call, but certainly once Tom Savage took over for the AFC South champs to rescue victory from the jaws of defeat against Jacksonville, it would have been safe to assume Osweiler was done, at least for this season.
With the $72 million QB back in command of the offence, he actually walks into a decent situation as the Houston playoff narrative has been turned on its head. As the playoffs approached and the Texans loomed as a possible AFC South division champion, contenders for the fifth seed would have been licking their lips at the possibility of a very winnable playoff game. Now it’s the Texans who must sense a massive opportunity.
The Raiders look like a broken team which has succumbed to the fact that without Carr at quarterback, they simply cannot contend in the AFC. Cook faces a baptism of fire against a Texans defence which is strong all around and even better at home. After all that has happened, Osweiler may lead Houston to a playoff victory, good work NFL.
Detroit @ Seattle (-8)
At some point the Lions were going to have to pay for their incredible run of good karma and the final three-weeks of the regular season suggest their 9-4 wasn’t a true indication of the quality of this team. Their offence was stifled against the Giants, they were outmatched by a Dallas offence and simply couldn’t keep up with Green Bay and Aaron Rodgers at the top of his game.
The bright spot for Detroit is their wildcard opponents seem at least one level beneath those three NFC playoff teams and despite winning another NFC West crown, look to be a shadow of their former selves and just don’t seem to pose a threat in the NFC title race. Even with the return of Michael Bennett, the loss of Earl Thomas has been massive and while it’s clearly hurt them in the regular season already, they will truly feel the absence of Marshawn Lynch in January as their running game crawls behind a poor offensive line.
Even with their weaknesses, Seattle look to have the firepower to at least last one more week. Detroit’s own lack of a running game will mean Matt Stafford will need to be on fire and with a suspect middle finger still plaguing the QB, the Clink can celebrate another playoff win.
Miami @ Pittsburgh (-10.5)
Pre season expectations of a dominant Steelers offence haven’t been met by Mike Tomlin’s team and they’ve instead been plagued by inconsistency. Aside from their absolute stinkbomb against Philadelphia, the Steelers’ Week 6 thrashing at the hands of Miami was one of their worst performances of the season. Although unlike the wildcard game this was a road game, the Dolphins ran all over the Steelers D, with Jay Ajayi celebrating his breakout game with 204-rushing yards and two touchdowns.
Pittsburgh also battled away with an injured Roethlisberger who missed a series in the second quarter with a leg injury which came on an interception, completely swinging momentum. A hobbled Big Ben hurting their offence, it was the dominance Miami had over the Steelers’ D which was the biggest surprise.
However, it does look like you can’t take too much from that game. For the first time in a while, Pittsburgh’s offence is fully loaded in January and with Miami battling defensive injuries, particularly in the secondary, this looms as a blowout if Pittsburgh can click. Ajayi will be the key for Miami, they’ll need to lean on his rushing and control possession to stand any chance as they too head into their first postseason since 2008 with a backup quarterback.
New York Giants (+5) @ Green Bay
If there is one game to look forward to on wildcard weekend, it’s this one. A genuine battle between a high-flying offence and dominant defence looms at a frozen Lambeau Field. A fun subplot running through the season has been the thought of the Trilogy taking place in the Super Bowl as the Giants and Patriots both surged into the postseason. A fun omen would be if New York could repeat a feat they achieved in both Super Bowl years by beating the Packers in Green Bay.
Thankfully for Green Bay, Rodgers has returned to not being human and put on a masterclass in Detroit to steal the NFC North title and propel the Packers into another playoff run. Jordy Nelson is a top-five wide receiver again and Davante Adams has made a quantum leap. Their defence is still suspect, however outside of Odell Beckham, the Giants offence has been awful with Eli Manning being the main culprit.
Despite all that, the Giants defence is legit, their off-season overhaul has exceeded expectations and they have the ability on all three lines of defence to match Rodgers and company. It’s going to be Part III and Eli is coming for the Evil Empire once again.
