Consider, Predict, and Enjoy the Show! By Kevin Lange Forecast? Bitter with a chance of that lovely setting in a snow globe clanking around in a dryer. There initially was chatter that Goodell would consider bumping the dang game to Saturday, the day before scheduled. (New Jersey was a horrible idea on the league’s part.) But let’s not talk about what anyone short of Mother Nature can’t control. This year’s Super Bowl is about the Denver Broncos and the Seattle Seahawks. Let’s spew the contents of what exactly this matchup entails. Kicking off with a Bird’s-eye view of the Seahawks’ perspective, it’s very much evident that, despite the world’s inability to ever know what the Seahawks are truly feeling at this point, anyone could presume, at the very least, that their ears are still ringing. Two weeks removed from the NFC Championship game in Seattle’s CenturyLink Field—named probably for all the ears that ring for centuries after attending a game there—decorated with the notorious army of human-vuvuzela fans, the flock of Seahawks are soaring on a plane of honorary reputation as the hard-nosed (or, uh, hard-beaked), smash-mouth (and loud-mouth), in-your-face team from as far Northwest as one can go, as they now soar on another plane, literally, to the bitter tundra as far Northeast as one can go. On their mental plane and actual plane, it’s safe to say their spirits are running high. That whole punchy label is pretty ironic, really. Their Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer—their humbled, young leader in quarterback Russell Wilson—happens to reflect the polar opposite demeanor to that of his strutting, vicious team, which collectively hauls the city of Seattle in a sleigh to East Rutherford, New Jersey this week. Wilson, only in his second year, has disgruntled all teams’ GMs that passed up on him in the 2012 NFL Draft, as well as those 74 (74!) players that stood up before him that day two years ago. Despite early growth spurts, the most captivating question leading up to the big game is, on the biggest stage, the brightest limelight, how Wilson will keep pace with a been-there-done-that, 37-year old Peyton Manning, who happens to be coming off the greatest individual season in NFL history. Though no predictions are safe in a game like the Super Bowl, the presumption that Wilson will be a diamond—in the sense that he won’t crack under pressure—is supported solely on one, simple number: 27. This is the Denver Broncos’ rank in the entire league against the pass. They’ve allowed an average of 254 pass yards a game, a stat Wilson has great potential of surpassing if given enough attempts. But he doesn’t need to for this Seahawks team to win games, for they’ve won enough from digging up sod all season—halfback Marshawn Lynch having carried them through drives down the lawn on his shoulders alone. He’s shoved, rammed, and high-stepped his way to his reputation as the fiercest, most productive goal line halfback in the world; his league-leading 12 rushing touchdowns this season speak enough to that. And then, contrastingly, there are the teammates who never feel their production sells their reputation enough, and so speak to every magnitude of their athletic ability. In this instance, yes, the famous or infamous (or both) Seattle safety, Richard Sherman. “I’m the best corner in the game!” Sherman yelped dryly, though completely drenched in sweat and exhausted competitiveness after his season-saving deflection in the end zone to preserve the NFC Championship. “When you try me with a sorry receiver like [Michael] Crabtree, that’s the result you’re gonna get!” Success never instills confidence in Sherman; he brings it with his success. Truly, it’s one of those very necessary problems to have, especially heading into the biggest game of one’s life. On a side note, not to impede on Sherman as a human outside of his ego as an athlete, ESPN Seahawks reporter Terry Blount’s evidence should be acknowledged, saying it best with: “An athlete can come across as Santa Claus when the camera lights are on but be closer to the Grinch when no cameras are around. Sherman is the opposite side of that equation.” He sort of is the Grinch when he needs to be for Russell “Rudolph” and the gang when he steals footballs for the gift of winning. Though viewed from the outside as portraying an over-the-top persona, Sherman’s fiery will-to-win assertiveness has reflected upon the Seahawks squad as a whole. Their defense is ranked first against the pass and fourth against the run, making them, overall, the best defense in the NFL which, frankly, will be facing the best offense in the NFL. This Broncos’ offensive show has shown all season to be much like that of the 2010 Green Bay Packers title-winning team. The broad plethora of young, speedy receivers. The pass-heavy approach and the willingness to march down the field with safe, short to medium-range throws to perfect routes, which result in miles after the catch. Those timely hand-offs to a mix of two or three interchanging runners in the backfield. Oh, and that heady quarterback that knows when to take control of a play-swapping audible. Those characteristics beat a Steelers curtain of punishing safeties and corners, from Troy Polamalu to Ike Taylor. That shiny curtain is very much reflective of the Seahawks’ Earl Thomas, Sherman, and many others this year. That approach can pick apart great pass-coverage teams, particularly this rope-tough Seattle defense. Seattle can hurt a team when the opposing quarterback likes to try his luck deep, or when the opposing coach hopes to try to win a game through the trust of his running backs. Much can be said in those regards for just about every team on their schedule this season. And then you look at a team like the Indianapolis Colts, who possess almost identical offensive characteristics to that of Denver’s and, as a result, ended up handing Seattle one of their only three losses, along with the most points they’ve allowed all year. In any way attempting to predict what could happen in the biggest annual tossup every February, at least this evidence seems supportive enough to say Manning will scorch the best defense in football, and there truly is no other way to uncorked champagne for Denver. Referring back to that number ’27,’ that horrid rank Denver’s defense has casting dark over their heads, much must be said about their vast improvement. In a late-season comeback from an 11-game absence due to a foot injury, 35-year old Broncos cornerback Champ Bailey has made the world of a difference to a consistently improving defense. Remember, this is a guy who, in his prime, was by far the “best corner in the game,” as Sherman now dubs himself as. In three of the last four games, Bailey and his comrades have held Schaub, Pryor, and Rivers (all inconsistent but proven starters) to yardage totals of only 176, 207, and 217. And in an AFC Championship game against New England, being forced to face a top-three quarterback of all-time in Tom Brady and a complementary halfback in LeGarrette Blount, who was coming off back-to-back monstrous games of 189 and 166 yards and six touchdowns combined, what’d Denver do? Their front linemen and pursuing linebackers, who actually have been tremendous all year, stuffed Blount for an average of 1.2 yards a carry and six total yards, along with only a combined 64 yards among all New England backfield players. If they can give the punishment they gave to the 250-pound workhorse that is LeGarrette Blount, they should feel mightily confident about squaring off with Seattle’s 215-pound Marshawn Lynch, who has been nursing his knee on the sideline of practices all week. In stopping the beast, Lynch, who’s been “digging up sod” all year, they’ll be gladly inviting Seattle’s offensive coordinator to force the issue throwing the ball with that two-year arm of inexperience against, again, a very much improved cohesion of Broncos safeties and corners. All in all, the side stories of players’ media-dragging egos and headline magnets preparing for the game of their lives is all great to hear, read, and tweet about, and this column has certainly dove into that enough. But being serious about the game itself, I end with this: Considering the momentum of each team, who’s primed, who’s hurt, who’s more proven, and who’s flunked in games testing the same subject as they certainly will be tested on February 2nd at a blusterous MetLife Stadium, anyone hoping to make any money best consider what this column has to say.
Posted on: Sat, 25 Jan 2014 22:03:47 +0000
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