Denver:
Once again, Denver's defense is unbelieveable! The second half adjustments are remarkable. For the past three years, our halftime adjustments were worthless. In fact, most of the time, we allowed teams back into the games in the second halves. Those days are gone. Denver now makes appropriate halftime adjustments and has shut everyone out in the second half of games. No one has scored on Denver in the second half except for the Cincy Bengals in week one with 20 seconds left. Five and Oh! Wow!
Kyle Orton looked freakin awesome! I mean really awesome! The glove is gone and his throwing hand is on fire! He threw 330 yards and two TDs. Not only that, but he was on target, and was zinging and zipping balls into WRs. Eddie Royal was blanketted by the DB and Orton could squeeze it in to him, like Cutler was doing last year! (some of those should have been pass interference penalties) He did this time and time again. He led a 90 yard scoring drive and a 98 yard scoring drive. Can you say, "The Drive?" Orton could throw over 70 yards coming out of high school, so we see know his arm strength and accuracy on display! Now that he has a real coaching staff and QB coach, watch out! I've been telling people here in Chicago for the past few years that Orton was a good quaterback and is not the problem. They are finally agreeing with me!
This team is very special! Josh McDaniels has brought accountability, leadership, emotion, attitude, and pride! Gone are the days of complacency and disorder! He showed his enthusiasm and energy after the game in the stadium thanking the fans and pumping his fists! GOOSE BUMPS! CHILLS! Wow!
The "Wild Horses" formation was something new. It's not exactly the "Wild Cat" that Miami has been using but it sorta is. Orton lines up as a WR and Moreno as the QB. Orton can return to QB position after reading the defense. It's not that brilliant, just no one else has tried that. It was a nice way to surprise NEs defense. It kept them honest and simple. It worked. And we drove all the way downfield. In most Wild Cat situation two running backs are in the backfield and the defense knows it's some sort of run play. With Orton having the option of coming back under center, suddenly the defense no longer "knows" that it has to be a run play. It can be a downfield pass too! Miami let's Ronnie Brown throw ever once in a while, but it's not that same as having your regular QB still on the field. It's brilliant in that regard.
McDaniels said he is going to do somethings that the "NFL has never seen before", I am excited and waitng to see what that is. I think we have seen some of it with the Wild Horses and the other part is the reliance on the "Magic Three" (the three Tight End formation). HoosierTeacher has written on this extesively on my football website. Check out his awesome write up! Can't wait to see what else McDaniels does.
Denver could go undefeated this year! I've been saying this since preseason when I saw our third and fourth string defense hold Arizona's first team offense to zero points through 3 quarters. And scoreless by the end of the game. (If you care for preseason). We held Cincy's explosive offense to a measly 7 points. We beat the Number One offense in Dallas, and shut the Patriots out in the second half! Did you catch that? No score for New England at all in the second half! Wow!
We still play KC two more times, SD twice, Oak once more, Philly, Indy, Pitt and the NYG. Not easy by any means, but doable. Only two teams have ever gone undefeated, so we will see what happenes. Odds are against us. But I am very optimistic. I love analyzing football and am a student of the game. This team has all the players, the schemes, the coaches, as well as the emotional capital to go undefeated. We will see if it happens.
Monday Night Football:
I love the new Monday night crew! John Gruden brings an amazing energy to this crew and you can feel it! It's palpable! He's a great complement to Ron Jaworski, who was already awesome enough! Loving this crew!
Sunday Night Crew:
Much better with Collinsworth. Got tired of Madden. Glad he is gone. He should not be a hall of famer! What'd he do?
Indy:
Manning is amazing once again! 5-0. Wow! Is it possible that neither Indy nor Denver lose and are both undefeated when they meet later this year? That'd be crazy! It's also wishful. The way to beat Indy is to run your big backs against their smaller, faster defense and just wear them out. Tennesee had success when running with LenDale White, but not Johnson. They should have stuck with LenDale. They should stick to LenDale all the time, he wears people down.
Miami:
What a fun team and fun offense to watch! What a awesome Monday night game. Henne versus Sanchez? Big Ten versus USC? Wow! It was a boring game until the fourth quarter when a go ahead touchdown was cored five times (NFL record?). Five teams a touchdown was scored for the lead and the win. Sanchez and Henne were playing lights out and were on target. I have never seen a game between to young quarterbacks like this.
I love Miami's Wild Hog/Wild Cat/Single Wing/Veer offense. This is the most exciting offense to watch. They practice this every day. They work on it. They care about it. It is their bread and butter, not a gimmick. Most teams run a gimmick version of this. They run their single wing/wild cat offense looking to run first. Similar to Urban Meyer's schemes. Run first. Having studied and written extensively on Urban Meyer's spread option offense (read my article), this closely resembles it. They don't pass much out of this attack, but Ronnie did it once to Fasano, and it worked brilliantly. And he is left handed, and rolled out to the left. The Jets defense was shocked and stunned. Then they threw in Pat White, who used to run a spread offense at West Virginia with Rich Rodriguez. They aren't sure how they are going to use this yet, but they are finding ways to use him. Meyer's studied Rich Rodriguez's system.
Why run the Wild Cat? It's a numbers game. Read my article above. Urban Meyer, Rich Rod, Linehan, and Walker figured it out and perfected. Rich Rod loved passing out of the spread. Meyer loves running. It's all about numbers! With two running backs in the backfield you are playing 10 on 11 football. A quarterback in the backfield drops the number of offensive players to only 9. The QB can't block nor distract, he just hands off to the running back. Why waste a player and waste a step? Let their be two amazing athletes in the backfield that can be used to either block, or distract defensive players, or run the ball (or pass?).
The problem with the way Miami is running it, is that defenses know that there will be no downfield passing threats. Unless Henne comes back into the game. Denver is running it with Orton still having the option to come back under center. With Pat White, now Miami can pass downfield AND run the spread read option running attack. Brilliant! And they will win games as well as chew up clock. They can still win their division!
Looks like Miami has learned a lot from Gainesville.
Ravens:
Ray Lewis, Shut Up! Stop complaining about referee calls. Ray Lewis cost his team the game. So did Suggs. Cincy was down and out. They were going to lose. Two penalties on the Ravens defense kept them alie, and they came back to win. Ray Lewis loves to complain about the referees. Shut up and play! I have never seen a bigger whiner! Cry baby? The Ravens need to stop blaming others for their misfortunes. Just own up and shut up! Play the damn game. I hope Cincy wins that division. I have an inert dislike for the Steelers and Ravens. Ray Lewis, what a clown!
Cowboys:
If their receivers could actually catch, they'd be ok. Wow! I ahave never seen more dropped balls. They finally discovered Miles Austin. Feed this guy the ball.
Raiders, Browns, Bills, Rams:
Still can't decide which one is the worst. At least Cleveland won.
Jaguars:
How did they get skunked by the Seahawks? Wow!
Bengals:
Are they "for real" now? 4-1 and winning their division. One bad Roy Williams play away from being undefeated! If only Williams would have played his position, instead of coming down and trying to lay out the WR. What a clown!