On Monday Night Football, the Seattle Seahawks easily defeated the New Orleans Saints, 34-7 in Seattle. With the way the Seahawks defense was playing, this game was pretty much over by the end of the first quarter. Michael Bennett picked up a fumble by New Orleans quarterback Drew Brees, and returned it 22 yards for Seattle’s first touchdown, to give them a 10-0 lead, in the middle of the first quarter. On their next possession, the Seahawks drove 73 yards for another touchdown, this time on a 2-yard pass to Zach Miller from quarterback Russell Wilson, and it was all over but the crying early.
This game was billed as the biggest game on Monday Night Football this year, because Seattle and New Orleans had the 2 best records in the National Football Conference (NFC). But just like after the highly touted week 2 divisional game, where the Seahawks delivered a 29-3 beating to the San Francisco 49ers, the Saints went home with their tail between their legs. Seattle outgained New Orleans 429-188 in total yards. Brees only threw for 178 yards on 38 passes, that’s less than 4 yards per pass attempted. On the other hand, Wilson threw for 310 yards on 22 of 30 passing, over 10 yards per passing attempt, and 3 touchdowns.
Now the Seahawks have a 2-game lead over the entire NFC, and a tie-breaker over the closest teams in the standings (Saints and Carolina Panthers), with 4 games remaining in the regular season. This doesn’t bode well for the rest of the conference. Not only will Seattle get a first round bye, but they will be at home for the rest of the National Football League (NFL) playoffs, until Super Bowl XLVIII in New Jersey on February 2nd, if they make it that far. Seattle is a brutal place for visiting teams to play, with all the noise that the fans make at Century Link Field. Their fans (the 12th man) registered the loudest sound level ever for a football crowd last night, at 137.6 decibels. The Seahawks look to be a heavy favorite to represent the NFC in the Super Bowl.
In the American Football Conference (AFC) the Denver Broncos currently are the top seed, after beating their division rival Kansas City Chiefs for the 2nd time in 3 weeks, by a score of 35-28 on Sunday. However, the New England Patriots are just one game behind the Broncos, and own the tie-breaker, because they beat the Broncos last week in that 34-31 overtime thriller. I think the Broncos will win end the season as the top seed in the AFC, because their remaining schedule is so easy the rest of the way. The Patriots should receive the other first round bye as the 2nd seed.
However, this is early in December, and being the best team now, doesn’t mean you will be the best team in the playoffs. Injuries can hurt your team, and a team with a mediocre record now can get hot, and keep winning all the way through the Super Bowl, like the Baltimore Ravens did last year, and other teams have done in recent years.
So if your team still has a shot at making the playoffs, don’t give up on them. They just might surprise you with a great run in December and January, and maybe even in the Super Bowl. Home field advantage used to be huge a few decades ago, but not anymore. We’ll see how this all shakes out in the coming months.
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Sports With Frank Thomas
