This week's Monday Morning Hangover was pieced together while shaking off the effects of several oversized bottles of
Imperial Pilsner from
Chef Morimoto and
Rogue Brewery. What's an imperial pilsner? Well, it's just like an ordinary golden pilsner.
Except different. It's jam-packed with hops, making it more bitter than your ex-wife, and has nearly 9 percent alcohol, twice the ordinary beer, which makes it easy to erase the lying, unfaithful, untrustable tramp's evil cackle from your memory.
We're also struggling to overcome the end of the Pigskin High Holidays and the start of the football doldrums. Last weekend, we were blessed with some 18 straight hours of football for four straight days, followed by three straight nights of great college bowl games. We got just four football games this weekend and now, sadly, there are just seven games left on the football lover's 2005-06 calendar.
The Parity's Over
Parity may have been a buzzword around the NFL for the past decade, but as we showed last season,
the parity is over – especially in the AFC.
As if further proof was needed, simply take a look at the AFC's final four: Denver, Indy, New England and Pittsburgh.
If this list of teams has a familiar ring to it, there's a good reason. These four teams have utterly dominated the conference, not to mention the NFL, for more than a decade. If the NFL is hoping to make each season a league-wide, 32-team run for the roses, it's failing to rein in the AFC's top studs.
In fact, when the AFC title game rolls around in two weeks, it will feature two of these four teams for the sixth time in 11 years. Here's a look at their past meetings:
1995 – Pittsburgh 20, Indy 16
1997 – Denver 24, Pittsburgh 21
2001 – New England 24, Pittsburgh 17
2003 – New England 24, Indy 14
2004 – New England 41, Pittsburgh 27
2005 – TBD
At least one of these four teams has played for the AFC championship nine times in the past 12 seasons and 10 times in the past 15 seasons.
You have to go all the way back to the 1990 season to find a list of AFC playoff teams that did not include at least one of these four teams. How long ago was 1990? Consider these Cold, Hard Football Facts:
- John Elway was just halfway through is 16-year Hall of Fame career with Denver.
- Indy was in the final year of the Ron Meyer Era and Jeff George was its gunslinging rookie quarterback.
- Chuck Noll was getting ready to come back and lead Pittsburgh for one more season.
- An inglorious history in New England officially bottomed out with a 1-15 campaign under Rod Rust.
- Buffalo ruled the AFC and was making the first of its four straight Super Bowl appearances.
Denver, Indy, New England and Pittsburgh have sparked a resurgence for the AFC after the NFL had been dominated by the NFC for 13 straight years. Remember, NFC teams won every Super Bowl from the 1984 to 1996 seasons, but they have picked up just two more Lombardi Trophies since then.
The AFC began to show signs of life in 1995. Pittsburgh earned a hard-fought, last-second victory in the AFC title game over Indianapolis that season before falling to Dallas in Super Bowl XXX.
New England represented the AFC in the Super Bowl in 1996, falling to Green Bay.
Denver officially put the AFC back on the map with back-to-back Super Bowl victories in 1997 and 1998. New England, of course, took up the AFC cause after that, winning Super Bowls in 2001, 2003 and 2004.
And now, in 2005, the AFC Super Bowl participant, whoever it may be, is likely to be a heavy favorite to give the AFC its seventh championship in the last nine seasons.
AFC fans can thank Denver, Indy, New England and Pittsburgh for their ability to trump the league and its quest for parity.
There are no worlds left to conquer
With its win over Jacksonville Saturday, New England now owns every team winning streak in the history of the NFL.
- Most consecutive regular-season wins (18 games)
- Most consecutive overall wins (21)
- Most consecutive postseason wins (10)
The hatchet man swings again
New England has set all three of those records over the past 16 months. The funny thing is that folks like
Boston Globe hatchet man Ron Borges believe that Bill Belichick is not the best coach in the league.
Borges went on ESPN Radio Boston on Friday afternoon and admitted to host Michael Felger that he has a grudge against Belichick. Felger wiped the floor with Borges during the exchange, highlighting the axe man's many errors over the years. When pressed, Borges said he doesn't like Belichick because he knows something about the coach that other people do not. He then refused to divulge this juicy bit of inside information.
Borges came across as if he were alleging some sort of professional or personal impropriety by the coach.
Of course, the truth is that Borges is full of shit and was making something up to bolster his
ruined reputation (the site
BostonSportsMedia.com has done a lot on this topic). After all, what kind of reporter has some juicy gossip on a leading sports figure,
admits he has this information and then refuses to report on it?
Dontcha think his editors are interested? Football fans certainly want to know what skeletons may lie in the coach's closet. If Borges is such a good reporter, maybe he should let the world in on his little secret. Otherwise, the only impropriety is Borges making up something on the air about a figure who he admits to not liking.
'Dogs are wild
For the second year in a row, three road teams won on wildcard weekend. Five of those winners were road underdogs.
Power players
Here's how the AFC's power teams stack up over the past five seasons (2001-05).
|
|
Regular Season |
Postseason |
Overall |
|
New England |
58-22 (.725) |
10-0 (1.000) |
68-22 (.756) |
|
Pittsburgh |
55-24-1 (.696) |
4-3 (.571) |
59-27-1 (.686) |
|
Indy |
54-26 (.675) |
3-3 (.500) |
57-29 (.663) |
|
Denver |
50-30 (.625) |
0-2 (.000) |
50-32 (.610) |
Pittsburgh chases its Cower Era demons
Pittsburgh finally erased a pair of the demons that haunted the team in
the Bill Cowher Era. With their 31-17 win at Cincinnati, the Cowher Era Steelers:
- Won their first ever road playoff game (1-3)
- Won their first ever playoff game against a division-winning team that had a record of 11-5 or better (the Bengals were 11-5)
Pittsburgh (11-5) still has some hurdles to overcome as it walks into Indy (14-2) on Sunday:
- The Cowher Era Steelers are 0-5 in the postseason when facing teams with a better regular-season record.
- They've never bested a team that had a record of 12-4 or better.
To put that in perspective, New England last season beat three straight teams in the playoffs with records of 12-4 or better (Indy, 12-4; Pittsburgh, 15-1; Philly, 13-3).
... but can they win with the pass?
Ben Roethlisberger was extremely efficient in the win over Cincinnati, as evidenced by his three TD passes and near-perfect 148.7 passer rating. But with just 19 passing attempts, and the team's 34 rushes for 144 yards, the Steelers have still yet to prove they can
win in the postseason on a day when their running game stalls.
It may not matter against Indy, either. The Colts have certainly been the better team this season, but they surrendered 4.4 yards per rush attempt in 2005. Only four teams were worse: Buffalo (4.5), Houston (4.6), Atlanta (4.7) and St. Louis (4.7).
Pittsburgh averaged 4.0 yards per carry this year, 12th in the NFL.
