The Belly Check

Sorry about the delay in getting the football picks out.... but The World Series, Halloween, All Saints Day, Hurricane Noel, Duxbury vs. Barnstable MIAA Tournament Field Hockey, the Cranberry Harvest and The Cape Cod Today Blogger Summit were a lot of capital letter Events to be jamming into one week. It's also a lot of work being pretty and popular in high schools these days, so gimme some slack, eh?

The big story right now is 80 New England taking on 8-0 Indianapolis. Indy won the last Super Bowl, while we've won 3 of the last 5. Both teams command dominant passing attacks, and both have fine young running backs.

They have their differences as well. Indy plays in a dome, while we seem to revel in blizzards. Indy seems like a bunch of solid citezens, led and perhps defined by the aw-shucks non-threatening Midwest earnestness of their talented QB, Peyton Manning. New England cheats, takes steroids, and runs up the score. Our QB is firing seed all over Hollywood, at one point needing to upgrade from Bridget Moynihan, or however you spell that. He's dirty and filthy and covered in fleas, and takes his women by the twos and threes.

OK, scratch most of that last part. The Tomcat is a good looking guy with a lot of money.

What's important is that both teams are 8-0. Someone isn't going to be undefeated in 12 hours. Either the big bad bully Patriots will be humbled, or the Super Bowl champs will get slapped up like a mouthy kid by the team that they thought they had surpassed.

Or maybe not. Maybe Belichick blows the game on purpose.

I've seen him do it before, most notably in a Halloween loss to Pittsburgh a few years ago. You only notice it because the team is normally so well prepared... but they roll out on that particular day and put forth a rotten, listless effort. Sometimes they lose 30-0, 21-0... always ugly.

You wonder how they could look so unprepared when playing someone who they figure to be meeting in the playoffs.... but it makes sense when you look at Bill throwing a game here and there.

Consider...

- It's very difficult to beat a team twice in a season. Pitiful Miami 21-0'd us last year in one of our two meetings.

- If you beat someone, you expose their weakness... and your strengths. The other coaches will have time to analyze said strengths and weaknesses, which in itself becomes a strength and a weakness.

- Eventually, even a broken clock will be right... like last year's AFC title game. It's nice to know when that's going to happen.

- A guy like Tony Dungy needed a few cracks at us before beating us... but beat us his team did. They became an obstacle we had to surpass. I'm sure Nantucket Bill has spent some time thinking about how to rectify that error. Why show that hand now?

- In the same vein..  if Indy were to come out full speed today... you'd get a good look at their A game. If you come out and just run all the wrong plays for the situation all day, he sees nothing of your A game plan. You give him THAT particular game plan in January.

- If the key Patriots are clued in, you can even avoid injury. Brady can throw it away if anyone gets near him. Moss doesn't have to fight through coverage. You can sub the defenders a lot, so they don't get all banged up... let Joe Nobody from Special Teams jar his spine all day.

- If they aren't clued in and are done in by intentionally shoddy play-calling, it serves to humble some players who have been coasting along fairly easily all season. Sometimes you need a pat on the back, and sometimes you need a kick in the ass.

That's my theory, and I see it coming to fruition today. Expect a lot of 1940's style simplified running plays. The pass patterns will be all sideline routes, and the guy will run out of bounds before allowing himself to get gang-tackled. Don't be surprised to see a lot of big plays happen against our 2nd-string defenders. They may even yank Brady early, and may take a load off Maroney as well.

If you see Heath Evans with 10+ carries today, know that he fix is in.

That's how I see today going down today. Come plyoff time, weplay seriously and beat them by 17 points. But for now...

Colts 28, Pats 13

New York Jets 27, Washington 17... You don't take a fisting like we gave Washington and just walk away unscathed... they'll be limping this weak.

San Francisco 20, Atlanta 19... When both teams suck, bet the illogical tangent now and then. San Fran has better dining. I choose them.

Arizona 30, Tampa Bay 21.... Arizona is rising, Tampa Bay is falling. I loved Tampa's orange uniforms, but the burgundy/pewter thing is nice too. they should switch 'em up a lot, to confuse the other teams.

Kansas City 20, Green Bay 17... Kansas City isn't that good, but they've had 2 weeks to prepare for this game.

Cincy 31, Buffalo 28.... Bet the over.

San Diego 38, Minnesota 17... Minnesota contacted me to QB the rest of the season for them, but I was committed to Duxbury High school field hockey through December 2007.

Denver 20, Detroit 14.... Part of the curse of being Detroit Lions fans is the inexplicable good start that keeps the moron GM in power for 5 more years.

Carolina 24, Tennesse 10... The punter will probably move the ball thru the air better than Vince Young will.

New Orleans 27, Jacksonville 21.... A good article about New Jack City... What's That Smell? Jacksonville (washingtonpost.com)

Seattle 28, Cleveland 17.... This doesn't relate to the game... but don't you get the impression that the guy who ran back with the news of the Battle Of Marathon ran at a more hectic pace than that dude who croaked yesterday? I wonder what sort of time that guy finished with...

Houston 17,  Oakland 10 .... Houston has the longer losing streak, but the Raiders beat the Fins in the tiebreaker.

Dallas 20, Philly 19.... The NFL feels the same way I do about Belichick blowing games. That's the only reason I can see why they'd put an exposed weakling like Dallas and Phree Phalling Philly on national TV over the two unbeaten teams who have won 4 of the last 5 Super Bowls.

Pittsburgh 17, Baltimore 14.... A good smashmouth game to fall asleep to.

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