rtunstal

Dr Z of SI.com beleives that miami will when the super bowl all do to DC. This guy is crazy he must be smoking some good stuff.

I mean does he really think that DC is the second comming. He is way overratted, Dr Z needs to have his head Examined. this is the link to it.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/200...eakdown/2.html

Tell me what you think.

Richter

In all fairness, he picks the Panthers, not the Doofins to win the actual big game.

That said, his reasoning is terrible.

rtunstal

Your right im sorry, but still the dolphins in the superbowl! WTF is he crazy.

T-Bone

Dr. Z is one of these guys who make all these outlandish predictions and is never called for it.

I remember when he picked Tampa Bay to go to or win the Super Bowl every year during the Dungey era and when they finally did make it there he had picked another team.

Panthers seem to be a fave with SI also, they are always getting picked pretty high by them also.

shmessy

Not with THAT Offensive Line they won't.

__________________
"They (Patriots) may be the greatest team ever" - Chris Mortenson, January 18, 2005 on espn.com

Pat the Pats Fan

Dr Z while we were in the midst of our 21 game streak, was consistently picking against us. I read his column like I read Rick Reilly's, as comedic prose.

Aqua4Ever04

I bet you that's what a lot of people said when you told them the Patriots would win the Super Bowl 2001. The truth is, the NFL is crazy and anything can happen. That's why it's so popular, it's parity. If I came here one year ago today and said the Bears will win the NFC North and win 12 games, you would call me crazy.

All I'm saying is the NFL is unpredictable, and there will always be something that suprises you each season. I don't call any one crazy for making any certain picks. Unless of course someone picked the 49ers to win the big game this year.

Richter

Parity is a myth, conjured up by the NFL to inflate the notion of competitive balance within the league, and swallowed hook, line and sinker by the media, who help to perpetuate it. When they describe the league as having parity, what's really being conveyed is the idea of a large middle class among the league's teams. The fact is, since the advent of the salary cap and free agency, teams rise and fall at the same rate they always have, with a handful of elite teams remaining successful over long stretches (It just so happens that the rise of said elite teams coincides with the establishment of superior management and coaching regimes). Combine that with another handful of teams saddled with poor ownership parties and management, and what you get is what the NFL has now: Consistent turnover in playoff wildcards, along with one or two division winners a year, all pulled from the same middle tier of teams, sandwiched between two distinct groups, the elite and the incompetent. Note that the elite (and for that matter, the incompetent) tends to stay pretty consistent - The Steelers, Broncos, Patriots, Eagles, and more recently the Panthers and Colts (all teams that draft well) have made up this group for the better part of this decade, and while there will always be occasional hiccup seasons, caused by injuries and short-term attrition, the list doesn't change much - new teams are not welcomed into this group too readily. So sure, you can have the occasional surprise the way the league is structured - you usually see one or two a year - it's a fairly safe bet the aforementioned teams will be there, and picking from the middle class to fill the gaps is at best a crapshoot. And the truth is, aside from the Ravens (bolstered by a once in a decade defense), all the championship teams of recent years have either belonged to this group, or have been creeping onto the fringe of it for some time (Rams, Buccaneers). Those same Chicago Bears you mention (a team in a terrible division, uncoincidentally), who've had two of these "magical" runs as a result of so-called "parity", have flamed out in the playoffs both times. So excuse me when I scoff at predictions that fall outside of this group of elites - there's no precedent for it.

DCPatriot

Dr Z has written that predictions are stupid, and he seems to relish annoying people by proving his point through his own silliness. He does not take it seriously, but, based on his response to readers' reactions to his predictions, he does visit this board:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/200...son/index.html

"Another Ontarian (Is that right? Or is it Ontarioan?), Paul of Brampton, wants to know why the Patriots, with their talent depletion this year, are still rated so highly. The Belichick mystique. The way they can fit personnel to situations. Mind control. Force of habit. Mostly, the fear that if one would be so bold as to pick them, say, 8-8 and out of the playoffs and they end up in the run for the Super Bowl, which has happened, that poor selector would become a laughingstock, his wife's head would be shaved by the townsfolk and his kids pelted with unseemly matter on their way to school."

__________________
"My favorite ring will always be the next one" - Tom Brady