American Sports Thread

[heganboy]

Exhibition from Newton. Cards dont have a single part of their game firing well tonight. It is a rout at this point.
Wade Phillips will have a better tool kit against this offensive unit.

[Syferus]

People thought this would be too tight to call before it started. Clearly the best team in the NFL this year. Hopefully they prove it in two weeks.

[heganboy]

People thought this would be too tight to call before it started. Clearly the best team in the NFL this year. Hopefully they prove it in two weeks.

Are you saying panthers or broncos? Im assuming Panthers?

Sadly Warner doing his team a massive disservice at this point

[Syferus]

People thought this would be too tight to call before it started. Clearly the best team in the NFL this year. Hopefully they prove it in two weeks.

Are you saying panthers or broncos? Im assuming Panthers?

Sadly Warner doing his team a massive disservice at this point

Panthers. I don't know how you could say Denver are the best team in the NFL. Carolina will be delighted the Pats lost today but it won't matter if they can't take care of business.

[heganboy]

They say defence wins championships...

Turns out "they" are wrong, top offence vs top defence should be a cracker.

[gallsman]

They say defence wins championships...

Turns out "they" are wrong, top offence vs top defence should be a cracker.

Two years ago, turned out that "they" were very much right, and massively so.

[AZOffaly]

Very disappointing, but Carolina clearly the better team. I was afraid that the Cardinals would lose on both lines, and while David Johnson had a very respectable running night (watch for him in fantasy next year) Palmer was twitchy and uncomfortable in passing downs all night. That really shouldn't happen when you have a viable running game, as play actions should buy you time. Palmer just wasn't good enough last night.

The nightmare start, again, obviously hurt them, but I thought they were getting back into it when Johnson scored, and then they forced the punt. Peterson made an arse of that, and the Panthers scored from the following drive. That was the dagger I think. If they could have started at half way and got a field goal even, to make it 17-10, they were right back in it, but 24-7 is a huge swing in those circumstances. I don't think it would have mattered, the Panthers were just stronger, and it has been a great year for these Cards, but I'm sad for Larry Fitz. It's hard to get back to this stage in the NFL, so who knows what happens next year. I'd have loved to see him get a Superbowl.

Best of luck to the Panthers, Newton has been a revelation this year. He looks like an NFL QB when he stays tall in the pocket and throws lasers. Yes he makes mistakes, but his game has improved so much from last year it's unreal. That is not an elite receiving corps he has either. If he was in Arizona, the Cardinals win that game.

[gallsman]

Panthers did indeed look absolutely superb. Was very impressed with Ginn's hustle getting back to make that tackle!

[AZOffaly]

Another reason I'm sad the Cardinals lost is there was a great story there if they had made it. One of their assistant coaches Tom Pratt, is 79 years of age. He coached in Superbowl 1 when he was with the Kansas City Chiefs, and had a chance to coach in Superbowl 50. That would have been some stat.

[heganboy]

They say defence wins championships...

Turns out "they" are wrong, top offence vs top defence should be a cracker.

Two years ago, turned out that "they" were very much right, and massively so.

Statto:
http://freakonomics.com/2012/01/20/does-defense-really-win-championships/

[AZOffaly]

I would say that, generally speaking, Superbowl calibre teams tend to be well put together on both sides of the ball, so it's not surprising that they'd have good offenses and defenses. Like everyone is saying this is Denver D v Carolina and Cam, but The Panthers D is good too with Keuchly, Davis and norman, not to mention the Line play.

Perhaps it is more accurate to say 'You don't win championships without Defense'. You obviously need to score points too, but if you can't stop anybody, and your opponent has a decent defense, then sooner or later you are going to run out of road. Of course if you have a great defense, and can't score, your road would be shorter still. That said, I can remember a couple of teams who had stellar Defenses, the 85 Bears and the Ravens in 2001 who really carried their offense to titles. I can't really remember an offense doing that on it's own. Maybe the Rams, but even their defense was able to make stops when it had to.

So you need both to win, but you're more likely to have a shot with a lockdown defense and poor offense, than super offense and crap defense.

[AZOffaly]

My maxim is 'You can't win without a good offensive line, and a good 4 man pass rush'

[Minder]

Couple of surprising (to me anyway) stats about the Patriots, they haven't won a playoff road game since 2006 & they have now lost 4 of their last 5 AFC Championship games.

They probably haven't played too many road playoff games either if they have been #1 seed.

[AZOffaly]

That really was a strange mistake for NE to make in not closing out v Miami. Probably not an exaggeration to say that had a huge bearing on Sunday.

[Minder]

That really was a strange mistake for NE to make in not closing out v Miami. Probably not an exaggeration to say that had a huge bearing on Sunday.

Yeah I think the crowd had an effect on them able to get to the QB, the NE OL were continually late off the ball when it was snapped.