"NFL Football is Back!" 2011 Season Thread

[Al B. Sure!]

I'm glad John Elway isn't back-tracking from his endorsement of Tebow after the Patriots game despite two ugly losses since.

After the first four-turnover game of his career at Buffalo on Christmas Eve, Tebow looked timid last Sunday against Kansas City, unwilling to throw in tight spaces. Afterward, he looked shaken over his 6-for-22 passing performance that produced a season-low 60 yards in Denver's 7-3 loss.

"The key thing for (Tebow) is to go out, put everything behind him, go through his progressions and pull the trigger," Elway told the newspaper.

"When you get into these playoff situations, he's a good enough athlete, you know what, to pull the trigger. He's obviously upset with last week. He's already got an edge to him, so he's ready to go. I like seeing the edge. Oh, yeah. I actually love it. I have full confidence he'll bounce back and have a good week."

Tebow on Wednesday agreed that he needs to be more aggressive but emphasized he wants to be smart with his throws.

"Sometimes I think I do need to be more aggressive in certain routes and throws," he said. "I think especially the more you get into tighter games, playoff games you've got be aggressive ... you've got to be smart, but also be aggressive and pull the trigger at times and that's something that we'll have to do."

Tebow's still going to have to have a good game this weekend. A good showing and/or a win and he'll probably have the 2012 starting job locked. A struggle and the Broncos will probably look elsewhere.

Still nice to see Elway has warmed up to him.

[Demonbinder]

So someone tell Sloww he doesn't need to start a poll thread about what the Colts will do because 1) this is Chicago Bears civilization site and 2) there's this thread for such discussion, not to mention an entire thread already devoted to Peyton Manning/Andrew Luck.

As to your #1 point - If you don't like it, leave it!!

[Al B. Sure!]

As to your #1 point - If you don't like it, leave it!!

It's the inactivity that bothers me. No one wants to discuss ****. Probably because we don't have enough representatives from different fanbases so there's no heated discussion.

And it's crazy because we had a HUGE season finale between Sloww's and my favorite teams but bah... my Giants face Imran's Falcons in the playoffs but he hasn't posted any smack... sucks.

We need some umpf around here.

[Koyaanisqatsi]

It's the inactivity that bothers me. No one wants to discuss ****. Probably because we don't have enough representatives from different fanbases so there's no heated discussion.

There are, potentially, other explanations for this.

You know. Potentially.

[SlowwHand]

So someone tell Sloww he doesn't need to start a poll thread about what the Colts will do because 1) this is Chicago Bears civilization site and 2) there's this thread for such discussion, not to mention an entire thread already devoted to Peyton Manning/Andrew Luck.

Why doesn't someone tell Al to mind his own ****ing business?

[-Jrabbit]

It's the inactivity that bothers me. No one wants to discuss ****. Probably because we don't have enough representatives from different fanbases so there's no heated discussion.

And it's crazy because we had a HUGE season finale between Sloww's and my favorite teams but bah... my Giants face Imran's Falcons in the playoffs but he hasn't posted any smack... sucks.

We need some umpf around here.

A sports sub-forum on a slowly fading website dedicated to a single computer game franchise... not exactly a place where one should expect a lot of spirited discussion. The fact is that there is very little fandom-based smack talk here. Hell, there's not even much fantasy smack. A lot of our more interesting sports posters (Jaguar, Zopperoni, and snoopy369 come to mind) just don't seem to have time to do anything more than draft and run their teams.

With Ben gone, you're our only real sports troll, Alby. It's a huge responsibility.

[Al B. Sure!]

With Ben gone, you're our only real sports troll, Alby. It's a huge responsibility.

I know

[Al B. Sure!]

For ****s and giggles, Deadspin did a "Race Bowl" in Madden with a team of white all-stars vs. Black all-stars CPU simulated.

http://deadspin.com/5873045/we-simulated-the-nfl-white-vs-black-race-bowl-on-madden-so-you-dont-have-to

Highlight video included there so Sloww can cream his pants at an Aaron Rodgers-led all-white Dallas Cowboys beating the all-Black Raiders.

[Al B. Sure!]

Nice touch that they had them play at the very neutral (and American Indian-inspired) site of Arrowhead.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Imy Giants face Imran's Falcons in the playoffs but he hasn't posted any smack... sucks.

Smack talk is for children. So I'm not surprised you'd relish it.

[SlowwHand]

Do you never shut up, Al?

[Boris Godunov]

We're all Tebow fans this weekend.

[Tuberski]

I think you'd find that many Patriots fans, including their head coach, would much prefer a league where it's legal to play defense. That said, they've taken advantage of the environment they've been given.

By not playing defense?

ACK!

[-Jrabbit]

Well, that's certainly one way to get the ball back...

[Koyaanisqatsi]

By not playing defense?

ACK!

I was thinking more about emphasizing the offense, but that explanation kind of fits the data this year. If the rules are set up to favor high scoring passing offenses, then obviously stopping the pass becomes very difficult. So what else can you do? You can shift the focus away from yardage and toward forcing turnovers. It's much less reliable than a consistently tough defense, but playing tough defense is itself inconsistent now given the rules. If you focus on turnovers then you only need to get one play where there's no flags thrown and it completely ends the drive. Turnovers have always been a good predictor of success, and if you look at the teams on top this year they have all been good at forcing turnovers. They give up yards hand over fist, but they're still getting turnovers and stops in the red zone (where passing defense is easier anyway because of the compressed field).

Tubes, you're a genius! You've explained the 2011 bad-defenses-rule problem that has all the talking heads mystified!