Rob Moore's Round 1 Playoff Picks

Moore Rants

Playoff Predictions

AFC Wild Card Round

Indianapolis v. San Diego
I’ve got the Colts beating the Chargers in this game. While the Chargers are winners of four straight and every game that they have played in the last month has been essentially a playoff game, the Colts are winners of a league leading nine straight games which included an impressive win over the Pittsburgh Steelers. In this game I feel like Indy is really just the better team across the board and frankly we all know that San Diego is lucky to even be in the playoffs. If it weren’t for the fact that the Broncos choked harder than Nick Anderson at the free throw line in the 1995 NBA Finals, San Diego wouldn’t even be in the playoffs. But, the fact still remains that the Chargers made it so we have to give this game some analysis:

While I could sit and talk about the Chargers offense for a while and how great a season Phillip Rivers has had and the fact that Landanian Tomilinson looked really good against Denver last Sunday night, I think the real key to this game lies in the Chargers porous pass defense. The Chargers ranked second to last in pass defense this year and they desperately miss the pass rushing abilities of Sean Merriman. That looks to be a recipe for disaster when going against the league MVP and picture of consistency, Peyton Manning in the first round. That combined with the Colts sixth ranked pass defense that will get after Phillip Rivers all day should be enough to put the Colts in the second round of the Playoffs.

Baltimore v. Miami
The Miami Dolphins are one of this years best stories with a turn around that brought them from 1-15 to 11-5. This will be a great game and what I think will be the most competitive game of the weekend. Two tough defenses going against strong running games with serviceable quarterback play (with the edge at QB going to the Phins). You’ve got Joey Porter on one side of the ball and Ray Lewis on the other. There will be a lot of trash talking, chest pounding, and hard hitting in this game. As my high school football coach said, “Throw your cds and dvds out the window fellas, this is gonna be a game to remember.” (sorry I couldn’t resist that one, and yes I’m still to this day as confused as to what that meant as you are right now). But anyway, I digress. Cutting to the chase, I’m going with the Ravens in this one and here is why:

I think the Ravens have the stronger of the two defenses, and I think the Ravens defense is built to stop an offense just like the Dolphins. (i.e. hard nose run game with short ball control passing attack). Just a quick look at the stars on both defenses shows an edge in favor of the Ravens. While the Dolphins had Joey Porter who had a defensive MVP type season, Ed Reed’s league leading nine interceptions was only one part of the Ravens impressive defense. The Ravens still line up with Ray Lewis and Terrell Suggs in their front seven, both of whom are having a great year and will bring a ton of pressure at Chad Pennington. Furthermore, this Ravens D should be able to stuff the power running game of the Dolphins which only amassed 71 yards rushing in their first meeting this season (the Phins have come a long way since then, but one thing that we know from that day is that the wildcat formation does not work against the Ravens). Furthermore given Pennington’s weak arm the Ravens will be able to crowd the line of scrimmage and commit to stopping the run and eliminating yards after the catch which should put an end to a lot of the Dolphins long drives.

With all of that said, I think this is one of those games that will boil down to turnovers, field position and special teams. And factoring in these elements I give the nod to the Ravens because I see them being able to force some turnovers from Dolphins offense by getting pressure on Pennington and forcing him into some bad throws (Pennington’s suspect arm strength will haunt him against a swarming defense like the Ravens which needs the threat of the long ball to back them up and create space for the shorter passing game). So I’m going with the Ravens, but don’t sleep, although Flacco has the stronger arm, he is still a rookie and it’s always possible he could revert back to his early season form and turn the ball over and then we may be looking at the Phins advancing to round two. But don’t count on it because I think Flacco has put those days behind him.

NFC Wild Card Round

Atlanta v. Arizona
I’m going to go with the Falcons in this one. Although the Cardinals won their final game against the Seahawks last week, they have backed into the playoffs for the most part while the Falcons have finished strong winning their last three. I’m going to go with the Falcons for these reasons: the pass rush, the strength of the NFC South v. the weakness of the NFC West, and finally the running game. The Falcons win all of these battles by a large margin and that should ultimately tip the scales.

For starters, the Falcons have employed a very physical brand of football under first year head coach Mike Smith and that has led to a great pass rush with 34 total sacks ranking them 11th in the league (John Abraham is leading the team with 16.5 sacks). And as we know, the Achilles heel of Kurt Warner is his inability to escape the pocket and his propensity to take too many sacks and fumble the ball once he is hit. This is ultimately what led to his demise in NY and in STL. Look for the Falcons under Mike Smith to bring the funk early and often. (noted here is that the Falcons have struggled in yards given up to opposing passing defenses which may hurt them against the pass happy Cards, but if they can force turnovers, i.e. fumbles from Kurt Warner they should still come out victorious).

The second factor that I’m pointing to is the strength of the conferences that these two teams played in. The Falcons played high intensity football all season long in the NFC South where every team was at or above .500 making every conference game like a playoff game. That means that this game against Arizona will not be anything that rookie quarterback Matt Ryan is startled by. Arizona on the other hand has coasted all season long playing in a division where at 9-7 they were the only team to finish above .500. Finishing 6-0 in their division means that they only beat three non-divisional opponents, only two of which finished over .500 (Miami early in the season and a mid-season victory over Dallas).

Philadelphia v. Minnesota
Here we have another team that is lucky to be here in the Vikings (Giants benched their starters in the second half and the Bears folded in their final game) and a Philadelphia Eagles team that is surging at the right time. In short I think the Eagles pass rush overwhelms the inexperienced and turnover prone Tavaris Jackson. Adrian Peterson will have his moments at some points during this game but overall the Eagles defense is getting after it right now and an offense that struggles to score points as much the Vikes won’t be able to handle what the Eagles bring in the form of defense. And as the Eagles offense has been doing of late, they will do enough to compliment the defense and advance to the second round.