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1) Five reasons why I'm confident the Patriots are going to march into Mile High and leave the Broncos gasping for air:
• Richard Seymour didn't play in the season's previous meeting, a 28-20 Denver victory, and you, me, and all-time playoff sacks leader Willie McGinest know how much of an impact Seymour's presence has on the rest of the defense. He commands the attention of the offense - he simply cannot be blocked one-on-one - which eases the burden on those around him. It is not a coincidence that McGinest and Rosey Colvin have raised hell like LT and Carl Banks since Seymour's return from a knee injury.
• Rookie Ellis Hobbs has emerged as a top-flight cornerback. Frankly, even if he were merely a Poteat-caliber corner, he'd be an upgrade on the departed Duane Starks, the charbroiled goat of the early season loss. Not to get all analytical and Jaworski on you, but man, that guy sucked.
• Tedy Bruschi is back, and barring setback to his injured calf during practice this week, is as damn near as good as ever. I trust that no further explanation of that man's importance is necessary.
• Despite receiving repeated shocks from Mike Shanahan's handy tranquilizer gun every time he throws an interception, Jake Plummer is still Jake Plummer, a gambler at heart, and we're betting he's incapable of countering a Bill Belichick scheme twice in the same season without coughing up a couple crucial turnovers. Have we mentioned that the Patriots' defense is healthy this time around?
• The cool cat in the No. 12 road jersey. After the Jacksonville game, we were pretty much thinking what Peter King wrote in his Monday Morning Quarterback column:
"So I'm leaving Gillette Stadium early Sunday morning, thinking, God, Tom Brady was pretty blah tonight. I get back to my hotel, open up the stat sheet and see: 15-of-27, 201 yards, three touchdowns, no picks, 116.4 rating. Then I think: That's when you know a guy's going to Canton -- he plays blah (for him) and his numbers are Player of the Week worthy."
Brady, as I'm sure you know, is 10-0 in the playoffs. That first blemish in the loss column has to come sometime, I suppose. It just won't be this week.
2) Apparently, the people of Denver are spending less time focusing on this game and more time feeding their collective facial hair fetish. Not that the fate of Jake Plummer's John Holmes Tribute 'Stache isn't a worthy cause, of course.
3) Despite my belief that Troy Polamalu is the most overrated defender in the NFL - his awesome mane and knack for the occasional knockout blow distract all those experts who voted him All-Pro from noticing that he's just about Starks-esque in coverage - I am convinced that the Steelers will be coming to New England for a rematch of last season's AFC Championship Game next weekend. The Steelers will grind it out with the rejuvenated Bus on offense and keep Peyton and Co. off the field, and defensively, they'll inflict enough pain on Marvin Harrison and the rest of the lightweight, contact-averse receivers that they'll again shrink when the season hangs in the balance. The pick: Pittsburgh, 21-17. Oh, yeah - the Pats win, too, 28-17.
4) Words we never thought we'd write: Monty Beisel has become a useful part of the Patriots' defense. While we slashed Beisel along with everyone else during his - and there's no kinder way of saying this - brutal stint as Tedy Bruschi's stand-in, we always understood why Scott Pioli and Belichick liked him enough sign him away from the Chiefs in the offseason. Beisel has tremendous speed and a motor that never stalls. Unfortunately, that speed and desire often led to him overrunning a play, leaving the defense susceptible to cutback runners such as Tatum Bell, and that's in the off chance he was in the right position to begin with. But to his credit, he's continued to work hard, learn and gain comfort in the Patriots system, and against Jacksonville Saturday night, he made a couple of point-of-attack plays that even Bruschi would be proud of. I'm not saying I won't be queasy if he's on the field in place of Bruschi Saturday night. But I'm not saying he wouldn't come through, either.
5) And while I'm confessing my past sportswriting sins regarding current Patriots, I might as well admit that I wrote a column sometime in the 2002 season demanding that Belichick release Kevin Faulk. Yeah, that Kevin Faulk . . . the one who has become a steady, invaluable and underrated stalwart in the Patriots' passing game, a player whom every team in the NFL would be pleased to have. (Conveniently, I was unable to find any trace of the ridiculous article on Google.) If I recall, the venom toward Faulk flowed through my keyboard after he dropped a lateraled screen pass against Green Bay, then failed to pick up the ball as the Packers took it in for a touchdown on the way to an easy win. At the time, the play epitomized what was wrong with the Pats - indifference, namely - and it was not the first instance of the then-fumble-prone Faulk making a boneheaded play at the most inopportune time. Needless to say, it would have been foolish to dump such a versatile and intelligent player, one who, in retrospect, just needed time to grow. Faulk has matured and improved at his job since then. Come to think of it, I hope I have too.
6) It's going to be fascinating to see how the Jets' pursuit of defensive coordinator Eric Mangini plays out. Mangini, 34 and with one season as a coordinator on his resume, seems like an obvious head coaching candidate . . . in 2008. From what I've seen and how Bill Belichick interacts with him, I'm hard-pressed to believe he's ready to take over an NFL team on his own, even if that NFL was team previously run by the comically inept Herman Edwards. I suspect the Jets' interest has as much to do with his link to the lamented former HC-of-the-NYJ-For-A-Day and the perceived damage it might do to the Patriots as it does with any strong belief in his particular coaching talents. Yet if Mangini turns down the Jets - and by all accounts he is their first choice - does that mean Belichick has promised that he'd someday be his successor here in New England? More to the point, just when might that "someday" be? Because when it comes to the length of Belichick's tenure here in New England, anything less than forever would be a disappointment.
7) Let's see. Andre' Davis is a speeding bullet as a gunner on the special teams, averages over 20 yards a catch as the Pats' designated deep threat, made perhaps the play of the Jags game with his heads-up recovery of Ben Watson's fumble, and has the beep-beep! speed to pull a Rick Upchurch every time he returns a kick. Yup, I'd say Bethel Johnson's days as a Patriot are just about numbered.
8) It's worth recalling, in the aftermath of Seattle's Shaun Alexander running away with the NFL MVP award, that the former Alabama star very likely would have been the Patriots' No. 1 pick in 2000 had they not had to give the choice to the Jets as compensation for Belichick. While the thought of Alexander as a Patriot is intriguing - hmmm, he is a free agent, isn't he? - I can't imagine there's anyone in New England who wouldn't much rather have Belichick. It just goes to prove yet again that a game-changing coach is worth more than a game-changing player. (And with that in mind, I still say the Chiefs' swap of a fourth-rounder to New York for the rights to hire coach Herm Edwards is a damn steal for the J-E-T-S. On the NFL level, he's Pete Carroll with a slightly better tan.)
9) Remember before you mock him, people: Chuck Norris invented the Internet, and with one roundhouse kick, he and his almighty beard can take it away.
10) As for today's Completely Random football card:
Everyone always makes such a big deal about Jerry West being the model for the NBA logo. Ask me, the Broncos' decision to pay homage to Shannon Sharpe by putting his face on their helmet is a far greater tribute.
(Cool thing is, you substitute "John Elway" for "Shannon Sharpe," and this lame-o joke still works. Give those men a sugar cube!)
There's too much negativity on Hole Punch Sports sometimes. Dirk Nowitzki chokes this, only your brother reads that...so without further adieu, I give you Denver's ten greatest athletes of my lifetime. I decided against pretending I know how good Frank Tripucka was. (For the record, I was born in 1982.)
10. Rod Smith. Smith drops too many passes and was never as popular as running mate Ed McCaffrey, but he gets the edge here on longevity and consistency. He's had at least one thousand yards receiving in eight of the last nine seasons. And despite his sometimes-faulty hands, Smith has made plenty of big catches, my favorite being his 80-yard touchdown in Super Bowl XXXIII.
Plus, just about everyone considers Jerry Rice the best receiver of all time, but Smith even beat him out for a roster spot one year. True story!
9. Todd Helton. Helton has had the misfortune of playing on some truly awful teams. He's both a fantastic fielder and amazing slugger, and he's always been a hard-nosed player. While he hasn't avoided steroid rumors, everyone knows he's clean.
His batting stats speak to historic greatness: the excellent Baseball-Reference says he's ninth all-time in on-base percentage and seventh all-time in slugging percentage. However, and I hate saying this, he's got to be, at least partly, a Coors Field creation. While his slugging percentage falls behind only Ruth, Williams, Gehrig, Pujols, Bonds, and Foxx, he doesn't even hold the franchise's career mark-that goes to Larry Walker, who hit for slightly more power when he was in Denver.
8. Joe Sakic. Sakic probably deserves a higher spot on this list due to his steady play in Colorado over the last decade-plus. I don't want to be a jerk today, but the Avalanche captain was ineffective in too many playoff series. Than again, he also won the Conn Smythe Trophy as playoff MVP for Denver's first major pro sports championship. A great player, but easily the least fun to watch of anyone on this list.
7. Alex English. English was the NBA's leading scorer in the 1980s, which is the kind of number that makes people hate statistics. (He won just one scoring title.) But English brought offensive firepower to the Nuggets' only sustained run of competitiveness since I've been around. He's also a Hall of Famer.
6. Shannon Sharpe. Elway's most reliable target for most of the 90's, Sharpe was a rare tight end who actually had wide receiver skills. Sharpe demanded double-teams, though that says more about the team's receivers before the emergence of Smith and McCaffrey than it does about his skills.
Yes, Sharpe should be ranked lower for leaving for Baltimore-after all, do you see Dikemebe Mutombo on this list?-but the Broncos were underpaying him for years, so I can't hold a grudge. Besides, I can forgive anyone with his trash-talking skills.
5. Peter Forsberg. It's not fair to knock Sakic for disappearing in playoff series when Forsberg had trouble even staying on the ice. That said, he combined speed, grace, skill and power in a package that actually made hockey fun. He gets extra credit for his clutch play and toughness.
4. Larry Walker. He fought injuries his whole career and, like Helton, benefited from Coors Field. So what? Walker was the most versatile and entertaining baseballer I've seen. His 1997 MVP season might have been the most complete year ever for a Denver athlete. He was second in the league batting average, hitting .366. He led the league with 49 homers and finished third in doubles. He also led the NL in on-base, slugging, and, obviously, OPS.
That said, he was even more exciting on the basepaths (33 stolen bases) and in the outfield, where he notched a dozen assists. Nothing pleased me more than when runners tested his arm.
Actually, one thing did. I remember Walker being beaned late in a close game once (Reds or Pirates or some other meaningless game), then walking towards the mound talking trash but not actually charging. I usually don't like that, but on an ensuing groundball he went way off the basepath to knock over an infielder and break up the double play, and I'm pretty sure the Rockies ended up winning thanks to that play. Like Forsberg, he wasn't always in the lineup, but he was Michael Jackson-bad.
3. Terrell Davis. Yes, he only had four good years, but three of those were solid gold. Besides, before Davis, who'd ever heard of a clutch running back? Seven straight playoff games of at least 100 yards fueled both Super Bowl runs, and, including the loss to Jacksonville in the 1997 playoffs, Davis averaged 142.5 yards per playoff game for his career.
He won Super Bowl XXXII MVP with a record-tying three rushing touchdowns (even though he missed most of a quarter) and took home the regular-season MVP the next year. I don't really care if T.D. makes the Hall of Fame, because in his prime, he was better than almost all the runners already enshrined.
And oh yeah, he was a sixth-round draft pick who fought off an abusive childhood and miserable college experience to become, briefly, the NFL's best player. What a stud.
2. Patrick Roy. If he'd been in Denver his whole career, he'd probably deserve the top spot on this list. (Not that I'd give it to him.) Roy holds two amazing NHL records: career wins and playoff MVPs won. Like baseball's Walter Johnson, he wasn't the best player ever in his sport, but he was the greatest at the most important position.
I loved the two Stanley Cup rings plugging his ears comment, but my favorite Roy moment came in the 2001 playoffs. He'd had a terrible game in the opener. For some reason I was driving my boss' car across town (I think to sell his Avs tickets, actually), and some local sports radio morons were saying that Roy was still motivated, but he was simply no longer capable of greatness. I couldn't believe the absurdity of it...and Roy went on to lead the Avs to their second Cup and capture his third playoff MVP.
1. John Elway. Touchdown passes are great for guys like Dan Marino, but Elway held the meaningful records for the position: most wins (like Roy), most fourth-quarter comebacks, and started in the most Super Bowls.
But with Elway, it was all about the moments. Who can forget the Drive? Or when he caught the touchdown pass from Steve Sewell?
What set Elway apart was his constant striving for greatness. Just like he was best at the end of games, Elway saved his best moments for the end of his career. Remember when his wild-card team knocked off the home-field Chiefs to get to the AFC Championship game? And when he hit Sharpe on that third-and-six in Pittsburgh to keep the drive alive and the Steelers offense off the field? How about when he ran the bootleg and became the oldest player ever to score in a Super Bowl? Or his dive late in the game that gave the Broncos the emotional edge to knock off the Packers?
How about when he threw for 400 yards the next season against Kansas City, hitting Sharpe for the winning touchdown, to run the team's record to 13-0 and tying the then-NFL mark with eighteen consecutive wins? Or what about the only time he faced Marino in the playoffs which-typical of both players-was his only win over Marino in three tries? (I recall the Dolphins spent a thousand-something on a special heater to keep Marino's helmet warm on the sidelines during that game...what a woman.) Do you remember how he got off to a terrible start in the first half of that incredibly windy AFC Championship game against the Jets, then hit Eddie Mac with a 47-yard pass in the second half to spark Denver's first touchdown drive? And then, in his last game, remember how Elway won MVP with 336 yards passing and, for good measure, broke his own record as the oldest player to score in a Super Bowl?
In short, John Elway is the greatest hero in the history of mankind.
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