Early Surprises on Wild Card Weekend (Ravens Open Thread)
Anybody who claims to know what’s going to happen in a playoff football game is either lying or a fool.
Nobody picked the Chargers over the Colts yesterday. Almost nobody picked the Cardinals to beat the Falcons. These were supposed to be no-brainers, right? The Colts game certainly was.
All the more reason to temper the optimism regarding today’s matchup down in Miami. I still think the Ravens will win, but it’s going to be tougher than everyone thinks. Rookie quarterbacks, rookie head coaches, and road teams are historically bad picks in the playoffs. Put all three together and there’s cause for concern.
The other thing to consider: who’s the AFC favorite now? Despite their fifth seed status I think everyone basically assumed that the Colts were the team to beat on the road to Tampa. The way it shakes down now is that the Ravens will go to Tennessee if they win, and the Dolphins will go to Pittsburgh if they win (sending the Chargers to Tennessee).
Feels wide open to me.
Boy that was exciting. For a couple minutes there I was getting worried that Miami was going to just wear down the defense but then Flacco seemed to right the ship. It wasn’t a very impressive offensive showing, but it was a tremendous defensive showing – I’m looking forward to Tennessee for sure.
Also:
Ed Reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeed
Ravens will beat Tennessee.
Guaranteed.
i hope and pray that the ravens are like, 8 point dogs down there. the bigger the spread, the better.
Ravens looked as much like a Super Bowl contender today as anyone — bye week teams included. I’d be worried as hell if I was a Tennessee fan.
Wow. Ed Reed just became my favorite player of all time. Flacco didn’t have his best day, but he did enough. He didn’t have that deer in headlights look that rookies are supposed to have in the playoffs. So that’s good. If he would have connected on 1 or 2 of those long passes that he barely missed to Clayton, this would have been a laugher. And what about that block that Ngata laid on Reed’s return. Unreal.
By the way, still testing the best way to prevent comment spam behind the scenes. Please let me know if you have any troubles commenting.
Good timing on that last post, Neal.
Luckily I saw your comment right away. Still working out the best method, but apparently that one I was just testing isn’t it.
@Big Ben’s Motorcycle – According to Covers.com, the game is opening with us being 3 point dogs. Last year, I would have agreed with you, that it seems like the more the other team was being favored, the better we play. But I don’t think it matters as much this year. Harbaugh seems to have us ready for every game.
Ronnie Brown TD catch…
wowowow
@random dude – i agree – i went back to 2000 for a second.
@Greg – really?
@Greg – i mean, the ronnie brown catch was great but i’ll put it this way – if neal threw me that pass 10 times i bet i’d manage that catch once.
if neal threw me the pass ed reed picked off for the td i might catch it 1 out of 100 times, and return it like he did 0 out of a 1,000,000,000 times.
Ed Reed is a ninja.