This post has nothing to do with Barack Obama. But Daily Kos is a political site, so there you have it.
Ndamukong Suh is the best defensive tackle in the NFL, hands down. The
numbers don't lie. In his five seasons, he has more sacks and more disrupted pass plays than anyone else at the position. Furthermore, he has done so despite facing a double-team on almost every play, something that makes his teammates' jobs that much easier. There's one other thing. He's the
dirtiest player in the league.
On Thanksgiving 2011, Suh stomped (literally stomped) on the arm of an opponent who was lying prone on the turf after a play had ended, and received a two game suspension. The NFL has fined Suh on six other occasions for violent hits (two of which occurred in preseason games), including $100,000 for blocking an opponent at the knees, and $30,000 for a deliberate kick to the groin. Dirtiest player in the league.
Mr. Suh is in trouble after last week's game, during which he, again, stepped on the limb of an opponent who lay on the ground (it's worth noting that one of Suh's teammates missed that game after having been suspended for stomping on an opponent a week earlier). Initially, the NFL suspended Suh for one game, i.e., the playoff game this coming Sunday in Dallas between the Cowboys and Suh's Detroit Lions. Then Suh appealed and won. His suspension was reduced to a $70,000 fine and he will play in Dallas.
Full Disclosure: I'm a lifelong Cowboys fan. I still get riled up thinking about the bogus pass interference penalty called on Benny Barnes after Lynn Swann ran into him (!) in Super Bowl XIII (the call was so bad that the NFL changed the rules on pass interference before the subsequent season, adding the so-called incidental contact rule). I've been on a football-induced roller coaster ride fiercer than that of any other Tuesday afternoon through Wednesday morning I can remember, thanks to the Suh suspension and subsequent un-suspension. For the record, Suh deserved to be suspended, even for a playoff game. His history of deliberate, violent acts against defenseless opponents, including ones committed outside the bounds of an ongoing play, more than justify such a punishment. Oh well.
The Lions' top-ranked run defense, anchored by Suh, will have to stop the league's second-ranked running attack, led by the NFL's leading rusher—Dallas's DeMarco Murray—and an offensive line with three Pro Bowlers. Without Suh, and with his fellow defensive tackle Nick Fairley almost certainly out as well thanks to an injury suffered in week 8, Murray & Co. would likely have been able to dominate on the ground. Now, the game becomes a lot tougher for Dallas.
Head below the fold for predictions on this game and others.
Nevertheless, Detroit looked dysfunctional at times on offense and defense—even against a hobbled Aaron Rodgers—last week in Green Bay, and had trouble eking out wins against sub-.500 opponents in the previous two weeks. Dallas, on the other hand, has won six of seven games, including their last four—in which they scored the most points in the league, an absurd 42 more than the team with the second most.
The Lions will put eight men in the box to try and stop the run. When they do, the league's top-rated passer in Tony Romo will find Dez Bryant, Jason Witten, and their mates open downfield. The Cowboys defense isn't great (and has a couple of injuries to solid contributors as well), but it is playing better of late and is good enough to stop an erratic, Matthew Stafford-led passing attack and a Detroit running game that, despite having won 11 times and thus having mostly played with a lead in the second half of games, gained fewer yards than all but four other NFL teams this season. This is—both in terms of matchup and newsworthiness—the most interesting game of the week.
Prediction: Dallas 31, Detroit 21
To stay within the NFC, we have only the second sub-.500 playoff team in league history, the 7-8-1 Carolina Panthers, hosting the 11-5 Arizona Cardinals. Easy call, right? Wrong. The Panthers have won four in a row, and finally have their most important weapon, quarterback Cam Newton, fully recovered from offseason ankle surgery (he was also in a serious car accident that caused him to miss a game only three weeks ago, but Newton has looked good in the two games since). Arizona has lost two in a row and four out of six. They are also starting their third-string quarterback, and lost their top rusher, Andre Ellington, to a season-ending injury in week 13. Carolina's defense is coming on as well, giving up an average of just under 11 points per game the past four weeks—admittedly against some weak opponents. Neither team is great, but right now, Carolina at home is the better bet.
Carolina 20, Arizona 17
In the AFC we've got a terrific matchup of NFC North rivals. There are few teams that hate each other more than the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Baltimore Ravens. The Steelers, the division champs, are the hosts, but the Football Outsiders' (way too complicated to begin explaining, but impressive) final team rankings actually put Baltimore as the better squad. Both are playing well, and if anything Pittsburgh was hotter in December, but the likely loss of their superb all-around running back Le'Veon Bell is a significant blow, made worse by their having released backup LaGarrette Blount (now back with his 2013 team, the New England Patriots). The Ravens have the better defense, and they know how to win on the road in the playoffs, having done so twice in January 2013 on the way to a Super Bowl victory. They'll do so again.
Baltimore 34, Pittsburgh 27
The other AFC game features the Indianapolis Colts hosting the Cincinnati Bengals. The Bengals are a tough team to figure. They did beat the Denver Broncos two weeks ago, an impressive win. But the Bengals also lost twice in the past four weeks to Pittsburgh, losses made worse by the fact that a win in either game would have made them, not the Steelers, the NFC North champions. The Colts have won five out of their last six—the only loss was in Dallas, a game the Cowboys had to have and which the Colts had little incentive to win. Plus, this is a quarterback league, especially in the playoffs, and Indy's Andrew Luck is simply a better quarterback than Cincy's Andy Dalton. In the playoffs, Dalton is 0-3, and has thrown one touchdown compared to six interceptions. Luck hasn't been stellar in the playoffs either, but Dalton needs to prove he can win a postseason game before I'll actually pick him to do so.
Indianapolis 30, Cincinnati 13