ironwasp

1 – Maintaining excellence in the NFL is a brutally difficult business. Ask Sean Payton and Drew Brees. A year ago their Saints team rode the crest of an emotional wave all the way to the NFC Championship, and looked as if it was building something good in the Big Easy. But three weeks into the season the Saints are winless and will be grateful for a bye week that at the very least will help them avoid another notch in the loss column. The defence is weak, while the offensive line is going to get Drew Brees killed if it doesn’t get its act together soon. Now Deuce is gone too. The Saints’ plight throws more glory on teams like the Pats and the Colts who sustain excellence year in and year out.

2 – Kev Cadle, the larger than life (and larger than a house) character who presents NFL in the UK has a favourite phrase: Coaching’s important. “You have to have talent, but coaching’s important” he said during the Chargers loss to the Pats in week two. With every week that passes Chargers fans must wonder why this simple rule seemed lost on GM AJ Smith who carelessly managed to lose his three senior coaches in the off-season. There’s no lack of talent on the Chargers, but at the moment it is lacking direction, and unless Norv Turner and his greenhorn staff find it soon, a season of profound disappointment looms large.

3 – Here’s another reason why 16-0 is difficult. For about a quarter and a half on Sunday, the Patriots took their eye off the ball against the patently mismatched Bills, as a result of which they found themselves facing their first scoreboard deficit of the young season. Against a better team the deficit could have been bigger and the task of hauling themselves back into the game exponentially more difficult. To win 16 games you need to be right at the top of your game for a minimum of 48 quarters, and probably as many as 56. That’s demanding in this league. It’s ridiculous in fact. Seriously, is there anything else?

4 – Greatness is not achieved over a handful of seasons, it is painstakingly assembled over a dozen years, and requires a constant evolution by the individual concerned. So hats off to Brett Favre who is showing this season that there’s more than one way to skin a cat, leaving the gun-slinging of his glorious early years behind in favour a conservatism better suited to his team and his declining physical abilities. In a weak conference, the Pack are contenders.

5 – The NFL is right to give quarterbacks as much protection as it can without undermining the reality that football is a brutal game played by big, tough men. As JP Losman’s injury showed, the passer is in a uniquely vulnerable position when he has his front leg planted and acting as pivot for his throwing action. Vince Wilfork hit him neither hard nor maliciously but the potential consequences could have been even more serious and Losman can probably count himself lucky that he’s got away with a sprain rather than a Carson Palmer type injury.

6 – While on the subject of player safety, it might also be worth having a look at the way players throw themselves into tackles that have effectively already finished when the ball carrier is either on the ground or as near as dammit. There are multiple instances of this on view in every game, every week, where the last defender’s action has no material impact on the play but could end up having serious consequences for others involved, usually guys on his own team. I wince every time I see this happen, and while I appreciate a rule change here would be difficult, it is worth examining. Football is a dangerous enough sport without recklessness of this kind.

7 – Roger Goodell is in serious danger of becoming a camp parody of himself. The latest directive to teams regarding cheerleaders distracting visiting teams during the warm-up is a serious danger sign. It tells me that this is a man who wants to micro-manage every last aspect of the game, and believes he can control everything and everybody. Get over yourself, Roger. This practice is either utterly harmless or total nonsense, I can’t decide which, and it doesn't matter. There must be more important things to focus on.

8 – I’ve seen some strange things on a sports field in my team – rugby teams wearing pink, some wearing bow ties, soccer teams having to change out of grey uniforms at half time because the players couldn’t see one another property – but the Eagles psychedelic haze of a throwback uniform takes the prize for the worst kit ever seen on a sports field. I love teams wearing the throwback gear from time to time – the 49ers looked great on opening day – but please, that proud franchise must have something better to offer from its history than that.

9 – Is Brady-to-Moss not one of the greatest things you’ve ever seen on a football field?

10 – A word of praise for a Manning. I know, I know, but bear with me. Eli of that line has had to put up with a lot of crap since he joined the Giants, and a lot of that falls squarely on his own shoulders. A lot of it – having to put up with the NY media, fans, Tiki etc is not. And although he still looks as if he’d prefer to be performing a vasectomy on himself with a rusty spoon rather than playing football, he has strung three decent performances together on the bounce this season on a team that isn’t playing well. Maybe he will make it there.

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WTE

Peter King is probably still pissed at the Commisioner's Office because Mike Lynch was the first to properly report BB's punishment while King was still saying a suspension is likely.

Peter King hates it when someone beats him to a story, especially a regional sports broadcaster.

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psychoPat

O ho !
Stirrings of mutiny in the lynch mob, eh?

Krugman

You're right,Ironwasp,I do like your "ten things" list better than PK's....its a good read.

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In Belichick we trust....
"Crush your enemies,see them driven before you,hear the lamentation of the women." Arnold Schwartzenegger doing his BB impression.

patchick

Flashback to the preseason...
http://msn.foxsports.com/nfl/story/7071478

"Seven years from now, executives around the league will probably clamor to hire Sean Payton or Eric Mangini types.

Dungy's corporate management techniques made "maverick" coaches like Jerry Glanville and Buddy Ryan look like snake-oil salesmen, hastening their extinction. Mangini and Payton, with their guest speakers and offbeat motivational tactics, are moving football coaching even further into Fortune 500 territory....

We have a feeling that one or both of these guys will reach the top five (coaches list) in a year or two."

A few scant weeks of the season, the boardroom boys are a combined 1-5 and Mike Tomlin is being lionized as the Next Big Thing in coaching with his revolutionary focus hard work, discipline and attention to detail.

patsox23

It sounds a little bit like a couple of the posters here think that this IS Peter King's work. My understanding is that it's ironwasp's version of King's "Things I think I Think" column, but that it's ironwasp's own theories. Helluvajob on that, by the way. Interesting takes.

ironwasp

Yes, sorry. I had the idea of doing this sort of thing last week when turning to the usual suspects in the media was a chore because of the constant harping on videogate. I enjoyed doing it last so week so decided to do it again, and so these are my own thoughts rather than Peter King's. I guess I didn't make it too clear.

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Bella*chick

They're much better than Peter King's.

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PatsWickedPissah

Stuff like this makes the site worth reading instead of "Look At Me...I got banned from XYZ" tripe or endless personal viewpoint topic starters on the video issue ad nauseum.

1. I had similar thoughts of the difficulty of sustained excellence while watching the Saints debacle. It also shows how easily a fine tuned balanced team can self-destruct when a few things (e.g. OL play) go awry. That being said, the Tits look good this year.

2. Charger fans were oblivious and whistling in the dark off season when thoughtful observers pointed out the risks and problems of wholesale coaching changes.

7. The NFL cheerleader memo, not the video incident, pushed me over the edge regarding Goodell. Reminds me too much of corporate puke CEOs I reported to who were really disconnected from daily reality and were prone to ludicrous disfunctional policy memos.

11. I admit to being surprized at the total meltdown of LT as a 'leader'. The guy is the antithethis of a good leader with his public dejected and morose behaviour. That must really rally his team...NOT.

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BelichickFan

The sustained excellence is the overlooked greatness of this team (and the Colts too, I have to admit). This will be 7 years in which we've made the playoffs in 6 and still been 9-7 in the one non playoff year. Even with 2002 this will be 5 straight playoff teams and no end in sight.