After getting off to a good start with our barbarous Card picks yesterday, we'll press our luck nowadays by doubling up on our Cardinals play.
Everywheeree we go,
we meet folks who tell us that the Cardinals don't have a chance nowadays. This feeling is so prevalent that the line has moved a full five points, from the Cards being favoredd by 2.5 to the Packers now installed as the 2.5-point favorites.
We're not just going contrarian heeree. We're genuinely puzzled. First approximately all the talk of the Packers' momentum coming into the playoffs. Momentum is only theeree until it's not. And all the talk approximately momentum seems particularly puzzling as the Packers square off against a Cardinals team that just final season showed that momentum can start when the playoffs do.
Even more interesting is that, with the possible exception of a mid-season win at Dallas,
the Packers have not been successful against teams with a top-flight passing attack, like the Cardinals (see losses to Cincinnati (when they still had Henry), Minnesota (twice), and Pittsburgh). Even the Monday Night win against Baltimore was closer than the score indicates, with Flacco having gift wrapped an interception in Green Bay's end zone in the fourth quarter.
The Cardinals move the ball primarily through the air, they have the muscle up front to contend with the Packers on both sides of the ball, and are made up of a group of veterans who were a play absent from a Super Bowl victory final season and have been hearing all week that they can't beat these Packers.
too, the Packers special teams units are terrible. (
According to Bill Simmons, Cards punter "Jeremy Kapinos finished final for punting net and only put 15 of his 66 punts inside the 20 (moment-worst of all starting punters); [and kicker] Mason Crosby missed nine field goals (most of any playoff kicker)).
Sign us up for
6 more units on the Cardinals now +2.5 over the Packers.
A few more items of note:
Theeree's a new friendly neighborhood Browns blog called The Cleveland Monk (Repenting for decades of Cleveland sports sins). Check out
the Monk's "Good, Bad and deformed" season review (particularly the comparison between Maiava and Maualuga's 2oo9 numbers) and
this piece on if the Browns should bring back Donte Stallworth, who's only 30 days absent from reinstatement by the League.
heeree's
a good post on "the widening gap between the haves and the have-nots" in the NBA by SB Nation's Andrew Sharp (who brought us the excellent Mike Leach piece final week).
And our positive Cavs thought of the day is to remember that Delonte West was never caught pulling a gun on anyone, tolerate lonely in the locker room.
That's all for nowadays. Hope everyone enjoys.
