What a weekend.
You have to hand it to the Saints and Colts. When it came down to it, both found a way to win.
The Jets hung in there with the Colts for almost a half but as Manning said, the Colts were trying to figure out how to crack the Jets’ defense.
They did that right before the half and then proceeded to beat the tar out of the Jets in the second half.
Sadly, it comes on one of the better games for rookie Mark Sanchez. One hopes that when he watches tape on the game he spends some time watching Manning as well.
In the end (Edwards stupidity aside) as a Jets fan, this was all more than I expected. Would I have liked a win? Sure. Am I satisfied? I’d be lying if I said yes, 100%.
But it was a great season.
Meanwhile I continue to be impressed by Manning. Beyond him, you look at that team and have to think that as long as Manning is playing, they will always contend.
Collie. Garcon. Clark. Wayne.
They exposed the complete lack of play-makers beyond Darrelle Revis in the Jets secondary. Collie/Garcon flat out embarrassed Dwight Lowery, made him look silly. Rhodes continues to find himself out of position on big plays. Lito Sheppard was a Pro Bowler once, but not this year.
Manning and his guys tore them up.
The Saints better find an answer.
They didn’t have one for Favre, final interception aside.
Also, when a team coughs the ball up five times, you need to take more advantage than the Saints did when the Vikings tried to give the game away.
By Vikings I could just be talking about Adrian Peterson. His three touchdown performance notwithstanding, Peterson’s multiple fumbles were painful.
Yeah, he didn’t lose the majority of them but that was a brutal performance.
I watched Shonn Greene (rookie Jets running back) go from fumble machine to ball—security technician over the course of one season so I know that sort of thing can change.
I don’t know exactly what he did, but someone should find out and let Peterson in on it.
Did it look to you like neither team wanted to go to Miami?
Defensively neither team did all that much. Jared Allen was a non-factor, something I didn’t expect. For large stretches it seemed as if the defenses would just dissappear.
I mean, don’t get me wrong—high scoring games can be fun. A little defense would have been good though.
I’d like to say that this didn’t turn on any one thing—but let’s be honest, there were some terrible penalties called (or in some cases not) and that impacted the game.
I could spend an entire column on the officiating of these playoffs. You guys know how I feel at this point. Mark Sanchez gets hit in the back on a clear late hit. No call. Someone breathes on Favre and flags fly. Pass Interference penalties are terribly inconsistent.
Last night it took half an hour to burn five minutes of overtime—and they still struggled to make the right calls.
In the end though, the Saints made the plays they needed and Favre ended the Vikings’ season with an inexplicable pass play when they were closing on a game winning field goal.
So, you know—business as usual.
Saints/Colts will be talked about a lot the next two weeks (you know, while we’re killing time and pretending the Pro Bowl isn’t a joke) so we’ll back off of that.
For now, congrats to both teams and my condolences to the Jets and Vikings.
