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NFL Pick Review

Well, it’s been a long time since there’s been a post here. In fact it’s been five months since the last post, and six months since the last post that had any meaningful content that wasn’t a funny video or me bragging about GamerFM.

However, since the NFL came to an end a couple weeks ago with the Green Bay Packers  beating the Pittsburgh Steelers in the Super Bowl in Dallas (as well as costing me £15 and a lot of pride in the progress), I thought I’d take a look back at the picks I made in August last year and see how close I came. Whilst I didn’t create a physical bracket for the playoffs this year, my record was not as good as last year’s 9-2 mark, going 5-6. In a pointless comparison, I did get one of the teams right in August for the championship games.

AFC East

Well, turns out you never know what Bill Belichick will do next. After trading Seymour last season and moving Randy Moss at the trade deadline this season, the Patriots are suddenly bursting with young talent, such as Brandon Tate and Patrick Chung, as well as the full emergence of Jerod Mayo as a cornerstone of the defence. That’s not to say that my pick of the Jets was misplaced though, going 11-5 is still no easy feat, considering the schedule. But Miami as a wild card pick?

More after the jump

AFC North

I’m happy to say I got this one near enough spot on, although the extent of the Bengals’ failure was truly shocking. Although I called the Ravens as the winner and the Steelers as the wild card, it was these two teams that ended as the playoff bound teams. No-one and their grandma thought Pittsburgh would do as well as they did when Big Ben was suspended, and I think that stretch alone is why they deserved to win the division. The Browns not coming last as well showed how bad Cincy truly was. That said, I wanted the Vikes to pick Colt McCoy, and he has made a very solid start under GM Mike Holmgren. Look for them to improve vastly.

AFC South

I am officially off the Texans bandwagon. Every year we buy into them, and every year they let us down. The Colts are always a lock, but they regressed this year in terms of record, although they did have a lot of injuries around Manning. Jacksonville did well to get to an 8-8 record, but the fall of the Titans and the longest tenured coach has to be a big shock. One dimensional with Young at the controls they were, but even so, 6-10 is never where you would put them.

AFC West

In some respects, I was probably the most inaccurate in this division. Oakland, whilst still not great, managed to get to an 8-8 record, and then correctly firing their wife-beating head coach. Denver was a big disappointment, especially after drafting the Cult of Tebow. Kansas City – what a shocker, although I think it will be very difficult to repeat this next year. San Diego undoubtably underperformed, but their contract disputes during the season naturally hampered their efforts.

NFC East

Well, considering I based this division on both Romo and Kolb lasting the whole season, this was an interesting one. My call on the Giants was well off as they nearly make it into the playoffs, losing out only on tiebreakers. The Eagles win the division under the shock performances of Dog Killer, and Dallas plummet without their star QB. Washington were undoubtedly a massive disappointment.

NFC North

Even back then, I should have seen that having Favre back as late as he did should have been an issue given the schedule was a lot tougher than the beginning of 2009. The mighty fall from first-to-worst in the North in my mind falls solely at the feet of the poor mismanagement of the QB position, and I will now also accept that I believe T-Jack is not a NFL calibre starter, even at a middling level. With a lot of players contracts running out, it will be difficult to keep all of our key players such as Chad Greenway, Ray Edwards and Sidney Rice and thus difficult to mount an offensive on the title again.

On the flipside, I called that the Packers would be a good team, but to win the Super Bowl? I never had that. I must also say that I was wrong on the Bears, with a division crown and an NFC Championship appearance for the season. I honestly think that if Cutler was not injured, the Bears would have been in the Super Bowl. Detroit met expectations, but I look forward to seeing them improve over the off-season and next year.

NFC South

The Panthers are terrible -  enough said. This division became so strong, so quickly otherwise though – the Bucs proving everyone wrong and coming one game within a playoff appearance, and whilst the top two were easy to pick, I once again got the order wrong as the Falcons win it up.

NFC West

This division was just lol, as evidenced by a 7-9 team going to the playoffs. Arizona were predictably terrible, therefore I gave them way too much credit. On the flipside, San Francisco were the NFC’s Texans, and heavily disappointed, costing Singletary his job. St. Louis actually did well considering many people were saying 4-wins, and Seattle do alright with a serviceable offense and a terrible division.

Well, that’s the long and short of it, below are the comparisons for the seedings.

Prediction	NFC	Actual
NO	1	ATL
MIN	2	CHI
DAL	3	PHI
SF	4	SEA
GB	5	NO
ATL	6	GB
Predicition	AFC	Actual
IND	1	NE
NYJ	2	PIT
BAL	3	IND
SD	4	KC
MIA	5	BAL
HOU	6	NYJ

I’ll look to start with one post a week to revive the blog, and then possibly ramp up production as time moves on.

Until next time, live long and loud everyone.