Let's Try to Understand some of the Football that happened Last Weekend
In the NFL Preview, each team has a 2-page spread - a pattern I hope to see the Sports Illustrated Baseball Preview return to in the future. There's an article about each team, a profile on the coach, a "Spotlight" on a particular player, and of course the Projected Lineup. Some might say it's useless to look at pre-season rankings this late in the year, since various changes throughout the year will cause most of them to be out-of-date or inaccurate. But they are useful to see how the teams and the players got to where they are now (the playoffs) from where they were then (potential teams, only existing within the pages of a magazine).
I have the pages marked for 4 teams: the Baltimore Ravens, the New England Patriots, and the aforementioned Giants and Niners. These 4 teams will all play next week, and 2 of those 4 will go to the Super Bowl, or so I'm led to believe. This is a pretty important cultural event, the Super Bowl, if for no other reason than the commercials. And Sports Illustrated is a magazine whose predictions are fun to make a story out of. So let's take a look at the men who SI's writers think were likely to factor into the teams that could play in the big game.
New England Patriots
Projected Finish: 1st in AFC EAST
Actual Finish: Same
Spotlight on: Chad Ochocinco, one of the team's three starting Wide Recievers. Now he sat out most of last game, after compiling just 276 yards the whole season. The top-performing player on Tom Brady's offense last week was TE Rob Gronkowski with 145 yards - SI describes him as "highly skilled". The article mostly features the new defense surrounding powerhouse NT Vince Wilfork (who incidentally had 1.5 sacks in their trouncing of the Denver Broncos).
Projected Finish: 2nd in AFC NORTH
Actual Finish: T-1st in AFC NORTH
Spotlight on: Anquan Boldin. The team's top Wide Receiver was expected to gel better with QB Joe Flacco (pictured (in the magazine, as well as above)) after spending a year playing together. Well, he earned 887 yards this year... after 839 the year before. Not sure if it's working out how they planned, but he's still the team's #1 WR - he had a team-high 79 yards in last week's win over the Houston Texans. I have no idea what stats to use to judge Quarterbacks, but pro-football-reference has him at an 80.9 Passer Rating, a drop from 93.6 the previous year...
New York Giants
Projected Finish: 3rd in NFC EAST
Actual Finish: 1st in NFC EAST
Spotlight on: Jonathan Goff, the would-have-been-4th year Linebacker, had he not missed the whole season with a knee injury.
WR Hackeem Nicks gets the picture in the article. He's supposed to "hold together New York's untested receiving corps" - all signs point to success, as he trailed rookie Victor Cruz in total yards, but still hit the 1,000 mark himself. However it has been Nicks's turn to shine in the playoffs, combining for 280 yards and 4 touchdowns in the Giants' two postseason games.
San Francisco 49ers
Projected Finish: 4th in NFC WEST
Actual Finish: 1st in NFC WEST
Spotlight on: Aldon Smith, a Linebacker who in 2011 somehow ended up with 14.0 sacks in just 16 games... The clear focus of the article was on Jim Harbaugh, their new Coach, recently departed from Stanford (and the brother of Ravens coach, John Harbaugh. There's a chance for the brothers to meet in the Superbowl, if things turn out right.
I'll certainly be pulling for that eventuality as I watch the games next week. Maybe at that point I will also know enough about the teams in question to actually make some meaningful observations about the Big Game.
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