Charlotte Pats Fan
In the Starting Line-Up
- Joined
- Oct 13, 2007
- Messages
- 3,904
- Reaction score
- 1,622
Registered Members experience this forum ad and noise-free.
CLICK HERE to Register for a free account and login for a smoother ad-free experience. It's easy, and only takes a few moments.Just getting it out of the way early
Wait, so they actually picked the Giants, or you're predicting they willl pick the Giants?
So 9 of 10 of the ESPN crew picked the Pats (I saw Berman on ESPN this morning pick the Pats 35 - 20).Hoge picked the Giants officially:
http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/features/talent
You know what I find most amusing about so many people picking the Giants, that no one is really talking about?
Almost NOBODY picked the Chargers to beat the Patriots, and I think we can all agree they were a better team in every conceivable way than the Giants, even banged up. I guess it just comes down to people not wanting the Super Bowl to be devoid of drama.
Beautiful. C'mon...anyone surprised? Ditka and especially Hoge are big freaking bildos. Hoge couldn't pick his nose if someone inserted his finger in it for him.
So 9 of 10 of the ESPN crew picked the Pats (I saw Berman on ESPN this morning pick the Pats 35 - 20).
Haven't seen a thread, but Inside the NFL went this way:
Chris Carter, Pats by 32 - 20
Dan Marino, Pats by 31 - 17
Chris Collinsworth, Pats by 41 - 14
Bob Costas, Giants 27 - 24, but he said someone had to pick the Giants. Collinsworth studies a lot of film, in fact, this week's show had a piece showing him in his basement looking at film. I like his opinion as much as anyone's. Only caveat is that he picked the Pats to blow out the Colts in the regular season game this year.
Is it Sunday yet?
Well, Hodge went 16-2 on the Patriots this year. Of the ESPN analysts, he also had the second best record for picks, behind Schlereth.
I love Hoge's reason the best. He feels that the Giants will win because every team this year that has played the Pats tougher the second time around. He is passing this off that teams figure out the Pats in the first game and play them far tougher in the second. There are a few things wrong with his arguement:
Didn't the Bills lose 56-10 the second time around after losing 38-7 the first time?
Weren't the Dolphins down 28-0 at halftime against the Pats the second meeting and lose the game 28-7 primarily because the Pats abandoned a true gameplan in the second half just to try to air it out to get Brady and Moss the TDs records in the Pats home game? Didn't the Pats win both games by 21 points (the first game the Pats won 49-28)? Doesn't the fact the Pats blew the Dolphins out in both meetings mean that the Dolphins really didn't figure out how to play the Pats all that much tougher?
Didn't the Pats and Jets meet in a Noreaster the second time around after meeting in a perfect weather game the first time?
Didn't the Chargers play so badly at the beginning of the season that they went 5-5 in the first ten games only to win the next eight games straight including beating the Colts twice? Weren't the team that played the Pats the first time very different than the team that made it into the playoffs?
I think Hoge basically manufactured his reason. He used faulty
I get that we are fans, but there are an awful lot of excuses in there to deny what actually is a true fact: Of the 4 opponents the Patriots played twice this year, they didn't play as well in the second matchup three times.
I'm not saying this means will lose, or that there aren't answers for this. But it's not ridiculous that a commentator would point to the fact.
To be fair, almost all of them picked the Pats every week. Why wouldn't you? I was pretty sure Hoge picked Dallas, Indy, and Pitt, but I could be wrong.
IIRC, Jaws was the only who picked them every week in that spot.