Championship Sunday

Seattle and Pittsburgh! Just sounds weird. At the beginning of the year I thought these were two teams bound to take drastic drops from 2004. Instead, they'll be playing for it all in two weeks. It's nice to see Bill Cowher finally return to the Super Bowl. I really hope that he's finally able to win it all. Same for Jerome Bettis. He's probably the greatest pure power back of all time. He had enough speed to break some longer runs in his prime, but this man rose to the top 10 all-time NFL rushers simply by finding a hole, lowering his head and refusing to stop pumping his legs. He's not the type of back you'd ever build a team around. You have to have a good offensive line for him to be effective and somebody else to play on 3rd down and obvious
passing situations. Still, he has had one hell of a career.

It's amazing that Cowher has been so successful running pretty much the same D his entire time in Pittsburgh. You'd think that offensive coaches across the NFL would all know how to beat it by now. I'm sure they have their hunches. But despite losing great minds such as Dom Capers and Dick LeBeau and so many great players, they just keep reloading that system.
Then there's the offense. Except for a couple years with Mike Mularkey as offensive coordinator, Cowher has done a great job building a powerful running game year after year. They've also had their fair share of above average receivers. Now he finally has the QB that won't blow it for him. I have to give Rothliesberger lots of credit. He's constantly putting up great passer ratings every game. The few games I've watched him in Pittsburgh, it seems like he always finds the open guy. I assumed his rookie year was a bit of a fluke. This kid is the real deal. I remember watching him play Iowa when he was at Miami (OH). He shredded some pretty good defenses. High percentage play after high percentage play. It's going to be tough for the Seahawks to rattle him like they did Carolina.

I think that's the big difference for this Steelers team. I kept waiting for them to find a way to blow it like they seemingly had so many times before. I was waiting for it to turn into the 2 Colts games. The 1995 AFC Champ that came down to a bobbled Hail Mary pass in the endzone and last weeks game that came down to a terribly shanked Vanderjagt field goal. Plummer played like Neil O'Donnell, Kordell Stewart and Rothliesberger though, and kept Denver out of it with some terrible throws. Rothliesberger, on the other hand, just kept making plays against a highly regarded Broncos D.

I was pretty skeptical about that D. Visions of them being torched by the Colts the last two years made it hard for me to believe they'd be able to stop anybody when it mattered. Sure, they beat the Pats. I should say they outscored the Pats. They were given gifts by the ref's and Tom Brady. I'd be shocked if the Broncos make it back to the playoffs next year. They played it safe with Plummer, but it's very difficult to win a Super Bowl doing that. I don't think Plummer has it in him to be so cautious again, and the overloading of former Browns will finally come back to descimate their D. The running game will be there. With Shannahan it will always be there. Next year, the AFC West belongs to the Chargers or the Chiefs. I've always rooted against the Chiefs, but it'll be especially hard to do so with Herman Edwards there. I love to root for anybody that's a whipping boy for the press, especially New York's, LA's, SF's, and Boston's.

Alright, enough about the AFC. The NFC Champ just made last week's Bears loss so much more difficult to swallow. If only the Bears had been able to put that kind of pressure on Delhomme again. If only Tillman hadn't fallen down on the second play of the game and then let Steve Smith grab hold of the ball two series later. If only the Bears had run more against the Panthers. So many if's. I thought the Bears were just beaten by a better team last week. Now, it's clear that the coaches did a poor job of preparation. They could have beaten the Panthers. They definitely could have beaten the Seahawks. I would have loved a rematch against the Steelers. Oh well, just repeat the Chicago slogan. "Vote early and often." Oops, not that one. "If they pull a knife, we pull a gun. If they put one of ours in the hospital, we put one of theirs in the morgue. It's the Chicago way." Not that one either. "Wait till next year." That's it.

Anyways, I hadn't seen Seattle since they lost to St. Louis in the playoffs last year. I had a hard time buying into how good they'd be. They looked great. I thought that they'd let Steve Smith beat them after seeing the numbers Santanna Moss put up last week. They came up with the perfect game plan. They found a way to constantly put pressure on Delhomme and took Smith out. Now it helps that Carolina was down to their 4th string RB in the 1st qt. Still, they just overran the Panthers OL. I had no idea that D was so quick. They'll take their lumps from a bigger, better Pitt OL in the Super Bowl, but they'll keep their team in the game. If the offense looks just as good in two weeks, they may not have to do much to do so.

Hasselbeck had plenty of time to pass and a plethora of options to go to. Shaun Alexander seemingly had a huge hole to blow through every time. If their OL made such big holes every game, I have an even harder time accepting Alexander's MVP. He's a fantastic runner, no doubt. It's just that Tom Brady carried a Pats team with no running game and a banged up D for about 3/4 of a season against a difficult schedule. As much as I hate to say this, the man lived up to all the words the press writes about their golden boy in the NFL. It's really shocking to see him not win the award. But Alexander did break the TD record. I don't know much about comparing football stats, but that still seems insignificant to what Brady did.

Still, the Seahawks made believers out of me. It may just have been one of those Any Given Sunday situations where everything went right. They jumped out to the big lead thanks to 2 Delhomme INT's and the crowd was probably one of the loudest I have ever heard. The D was all over the place and the OL really set up Hasselbeck and Alexander for success. I'm not quite ready to put money on the Steelers yet, but I'm definitely leaning that way. I can't imagine there being a big spread on this one, but I have a feeling the difference coming down to which team is the 'dog.