Let’s Define A “Truck”

According to dictionary.com a truck is defined as “any of various wheeled frames used for transporting heavy objects.”

Job well done. A great post if I do say so myself.

No, just kidding, this post is not about  a lorry -as the Brits call it- but instead it’s about the word “truck” as a verb, and more specifically the meaning it has acquired with football connotation. Most people know this term, but for those of you that don’t it is in reference to when a player (usually in possession of the ball) flattens or “runs over” his opponent – like a truck.

This is not an example of somebody getting trucked

Friday 5 – Our Football Teams

For those of you that haven’t been counting down for nearly six months, football season officially starts in less than five weeks with the first games of the college season being on Thursday, September 2. This means I thought it would be a good time for us to evaluate our personal desires for how we would (realistically) like our respective teams to fare this season. Bryan and I are both Tennessee Vols fans, he’s a Missouri Tigers fan, I’m an Indianapolis Colts fan and he’s a St. Louis Rams fan. So for our Friday 5 I’ll put up the schedule for each game, how many wins we expect/hope that team to get and at then end for the final part, to complete the ‘5’ in Friday 5 I will put up a total. I will also plan on putting up some sort of weekly chart or graph or both or something to provide something to look at for the progressions our teams our making towards the goals that we are setting for them. Let’s get started:

Friday 5 – Favorite Highlights

This is going to be short because I have a lot I need to do but figured this would be a good way to start my day. I’m simply putting up my five favorite football highlights. This isn’t including anything that has personal, emotional or any other sort of biased attachment or they would simply be plays from the Colts Super Bowl XLI win, the win during that year’s AFC Championship game, Peyton Manning throwing his 49th TD in 2004, the Vols 1998 National Championship and one of my favorites from Peyton at Tennessee. But alas, none of those will be included. These are just highlights that I love to watch over and over simply because of how awesome they are as football plays, not because they had any sort of meaning (to me or anyone) or influence over a game or season. This was hard to narrow down to five so there are a ton of honorable mentions, but I’m sure all those will come up in the comments. Let’s get started:

Early 2010 NFL Predictions

This isn’t going to be in depth. That will come later. I am planning on doing an in depth preview of each of the eight divisions and that will be when I offer my analysis and thoughts behind my predictions. This is simply me taking a brief (very brief) look at each division, keeping in mind what they did in the draft, what they’ve done this offseason, and all the knowledge of each team that I have accumulated over the years as well as my gut instinct about each one. I won’t be providing anything for this other than simply listing the final standings for each division, the playoff seedings and the winner of each playoff game. Most of which I will be deciding as I go. So without further ado…

What does your team need to do to make the playoffs?

This post will be similar to all of the other posts I have done on this very topic. The only difference for this one is that I will have four categories (AI, COD, HAC, AO) instead of six. But I will still be laying out for each team what they need to do to make the playoffs, clinch their division, get a first-round bye, and/or get the #1 seed in their conference. First let’s layout what the NFL playoffs would look like if the season ended right now.

What does your team need to do to make the playoffs?

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THIS POST IS OUT OF DATE! CLICK HERE FOR THE UPDATED VERSION!

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This post will be similar to the posts I did last week. I will be laying out for each team what they need to do to make the playoffs, clinch their division, get a first-round bye, and/or get the #1 seed in their conference. First let’s layout what the NFL playoffs would look like if the season ended right now.

In the AFC the seeding would be as follows: 1. Indianapolis Colts, 2. San Diego Charger, 3. New England Patriots , 4. Cincinnati Bengals, 5. Baltimore Ravens, 6. Denver Broncos… so the Bengals and Pats flipped and the Ravens jumped both the Jags and the Broncos, knocking the Broncos down to the 6 seed and the Jags out all together.

In the NFC: 1. New Orleans Saints, 2. Minnesota Vikings, 3. Philadelphia Eagles, 4. Arizona Cardinals, 5. Green Bay Packers, 6. Dallas Cowboys. Absolutely nothing has changed here.

However, six of the 12 teams I just listed are still in danger of not making the playoffs at all. To determine how much danger they are in and what the other teams in the league need to do and have happen from them to replace one of those teams I will be using the NFL’s official tie-breaking procedures to see who needs to win which games to reach the postseason.  I will be grouping the teams into six categories (AI, COD, HAC, CFH, MML, AO) you’ll see what it all stands for below) to separate them by mathematical probability of making it to the playoffs. Here are the categories:

What does your team need to do to make the playoffs?

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THIS POST IS OUT OF DATE! CLICK HERE FOR THE UPDATED VERSION!

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This post will be similar to the posts I did last year. I will be laying out for each team what they need to do to make the playoffs, clinch their division, get a first-round bye, and/or get the #1 seed in their conference. First let’s layout what the NFL playoffs would look like if the season ended right now.

In the AFC the seeding would be as follows: 1. Indianapolis Colts, 2. San Diego Charger, 3. Cincinnati Bengals, 4. New England Patriots, 5. Denver Broncos, 6. Jacksonville Jaguars.

(NB: I was going to explain how the Jags still have the second wild-card spot but Paul Kuharsky -one of my favorite writers at ESPN.com- beat me to it, so I’ll just link you to that. To view it click here.)

In the NFC: 1. New Orleans Saints, 2. Minnesota Vikings, 3. Philadelphia Eagles, 4. Arizona Cardinals, 5. Green Bay Packers, 6. Dallas Cowboys.

However, nine of the 12 teams I just listed are still in danger of not making the playoffs at all. To determine how much danger they are in and what the other teams in the league need to do and have happen from them to replace one of those teams I will be using the NFL’s official tie-breaking procedures to see who needs to win which games to reach the postseason.  I will be grouping the teams into six categories (AI, COD, HAC, CFH, MML, AO – you’ll see what it all stands for below) to separate them by mathematical probability of making it to the playoffs. Here are the categories:

Friday Five – Young Receiver Tandems

I know that after my last Friday Five being about rookie receivers and now this one being about young receiver tandems you’re going to start thinking that all of my Friday Fives are going to be about young receivers, but I promise they won’t be. I got the idea for this one when I was talking to Bryan earlier this week about if it’s better to have two big receivers (Larry Fitzgerald, Andre Johnson, Terrell Owens, Randy Moss, etc), two small receivers (Steve Smith, the other Steve Smith, DeSean Jackson, Santana Moss, etc), or one of each. Then we thought about the receivers that don’t really fit into either category like Reggie Wayne, Hines Ward or Chad Ochocinco. So this got me thinking about what the best receiver tandems of all time are. Then as my mind started wandering off in this direction I found myself wondering what are some of the best receiving tandems of all time that were two young players.  That is how this list came to be.

Where Might I Find Michael Vick in 2009?

Last year around this time I wrote a post (I’m actually just one week short of it being the exact same date) breaking down each team’s quarterback situation. You can check that out here. This post is going to be similar except it will be to specifically address whether or not each team has a need for Michael Vick and if they do, how much of a need it is. Some teams may need him simply because they need a quarterback, while others might be looking to use him in the Wildcat formation. Just today on ESPN.com’s NFL rumors section they said that the Redskins may be interested in Vick. I’d be interested as to what our commenter, Michael, who is a Redskins fan, thinks about this.

NFL Playoff Predictions – Wild Card

With the playoff seedings set and the first post season game kicking off in about 24 hours, I figured I should get my playoff predictions up. This was a lot harder than it probably should have been. Yes, bias played into these predictions, but not so much that I think they aren’t legit. I was frequently referencing my final power rankings, while also taking into account who’s hot right now and who seems to be putting everything together at the right time. After the wild card round I’ll put up a new set of predictions so that I’ll be able to revise the draft order for my mock drafts. Speaking of mock draft, I’ll try to have a new one up tonight or tomorrow morning. Without further ado, here are the predictions: