Pigskin Pigsplosion Week 5 NFL Preview: Christian Ponder Tries to End the Thursday Night Blowouts
The Pigskin Pigsplosion plugs along for another week. Ryan took the lead this last week, which means he gets to write 1,000 words about things like his love for charcuterie plates. You’ve been warned.
Last Week
Ryan: 9-4
Jason: 6-7
Stephen: 5-8
Overall
Ryan: 35-25-1
Jason: 32-28-1
Stephen: 30-30-1
Minnesota @ Green Bay (-9.5)
Ryan: I know the Packers appeared to put all their offensive struggles to rest in last week’s thrashing of the Bears, but there will still be some times where they struggle to move the ball. As I mentioned in what ended up being a pretty prophetic piece last week (for reasons other than this one), Rodgers is working with a less formidable arsenal of weapons than he had in the past.
Jordy Nelson and Randall Cobb combined for 17 catches for 221 yards and four touchdowns last week; everybody else combined for 81 yards on five receptions. That distribution can work some weeks — especially if Eddie Lacy ever gets humming — but it’s not sustainable over the long haul, and won’t work against teams like Seattle.
This is a roundabout way of saying that the Packers miss Greg Jennings (who has been kind of annoying since he left), probably more-so than anybody else they’ve lost in recent years. His stats from last year — 68 catches for 804 yards and four touchdowns — don’t really pop out at you, but those balls were being thrown by Christian Ponder and Matt Cassel. Jennings had six catches for 58 yards and a touchdown last week, and would be super nice to have around in Green Bay if the sides had been able to agree on the money. Oh well.
Packers keep humming this week.
Jason: Will we get our first close Thursday night game? Maybe . . . if the Packers can keep up with Christian Ponder. (Gulps, bites the bullet.) Vikings? [Note: I am not reporting that Christian Ponder is starting, only trying to make jokes and guessing that it is likely that they play it safe with Bridgewater’s ankle injury on a short week on the road, though the team did just activate Chandler Harnish, which is an indication that it might be Ponder.]
Stephen: So Lisk thinks we’ll have a close Thursday night game. That’s cute. PACKERS
Chicago @ Carolina (-3)
Ryan: In the last section, I mentioned the long piece I wrote on the Packers last week. I had to research it and think about it, and it took me a good bit of time to create. This week, I pulled a quote from Aaron Rodgers’ radio show joking that his pre-snap smoking signals are a tribute to Jay Cutler. That post took me about 20 minutes, and has done about 26 times as much traffic as the one that was difficult and (hopefully) thoughtful. So it goes. Bears.
Jason: I feel the same way about the cost/benefit of the time I put into my picks sometimes. Bears.
Stephen: Yeah. Trying hard is for suckers. Smokin’ Jay will tell you that. PANTHERS
Cleveland @ Tennessee (-1.5)
Jason: It’s too bad this one didn’t come along later in the season, so it could be flexed to primetime. Browns.
Stephen: Or at least to 4pm. Goodell forbid we ever have an even mix of early and late games. TITANS
Ryan: I know our colleague Ty Duffy had a dreadful experience with the Apple geniuses recently, but mine last week was about as good as could be expected. My MacBook was dying after three years of hard service, and when I took it in it was two days past warranty. They could’ve been dicks about it, but they replaced my hard drive for free. Obviously it’s not ideal to lose all my data and whatnot — and I could’ve backed it up if I really wanted to bother — but at least I didn’t have to drop about a grand on a new computer yet. Browns.
St. Louis @ Philadelphia (-7)
Stephen: So this is a game, huh? The Rams and the Eagles. Classic showdown. You’ve got the Eagles. And the Rams. Good old fashioned football. Chip Kelly versus… Jeff Fisher? Jeff Fisher is still coaching the Rams? Can he not get a job in television? What went wrong in his life that he’s been coaching the Rams for three seasons now? That sucks. EAGLES
Ryan: Philadelphia’s MO is that they beat up on bad teams. Chip Kelly slightly misquoted Mike Tyson’s “everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth” line earlier this week, and it sounded like he’s going to have his team ready for that crap team slaughter ACTION on Sunday. Eagles.
Jason: The Eagles’ offensive line kind of stinks right now, with Kelce out. Can Robert Quinn turn onto his 2013 form and dominate, along with Michael Brockers and Aaron Donald? Rams.
Atlanta @ NY Giants (-4.5)
Stephen: Don’t know if you heard, but Larry Donnell owns Larry Donnell in fantasy football and didn’t play Larry Donnell! He played Vernon Davis. What exactly is Larry Donnell doing during the week that he can’t pay enough attention to the injury reports to know that he should have used another tight end last week? Preparing to catch three touchdowns in an actual football game you say? I guess that’s an acceptable excuse. GIANTS
Ryan: Hadn’t heard that. Was that published on the internet somewhere? Falcons.
Jason: He probably only picked himself up after reading the Waiver Wire posts, though. Falcons.
Tampa Bay @ New Orleans (-10.5)
Jason: New Orleans just got embarrassed on the road in primetime. The Bucs are playing their third straight road game, and saved face with an upset at Pittsburgh after getting embarrassed in primetime. I have a feeling that the Saints are going to take out some frustration in this one. Saints.
Stephen: Are the Bucs good enough to be embarrassed? I mean, the Saints have won a Super Bowl. The Bucs are from Florida. Embarrassment does not factor in for the Bucs. BUCS
Ryan: There is some stat that says the Saints are really good at home. Saints.
Houston @ Dallas (-4)
Stephen: Two Texas teams. Two teams from Texas. Alliteration. All Romo needed was an all-pro running back to make him awesome again. COWBOYS
Ryan: Allow me to throw my hat into the “JJ Watt should be MVP so far” ring. Texans.
Jason: Watt is incredible, no doubt. I think we should just go ahead and save and “Watt crushes Romo” in drafts and just have Shamburger load the GIF when it happens. Texans.
Buffalo @ Detroit (-7.5)
Jason: Who would have thought that the guy whose college team got much better when he left would not pan out in the NFL? When Orton is an upgrade (which I think he is), that’s not good. Bills.
Stephen: Sammy Watkins breakout week #2 should be fun. BILLS
Ryan: Y’all clearly aren’t onto the pattern that the Lions tear shit up in September and October then, afterwards, not so much. Lions.
Baltimore @ Indianapolis (-3.5)
Ryan: The Ray Rice fiasco was all-encompassing for months, and I think people are sleeping on the Ravens a little bit because of it. Baltimore’s outgained their opponents every week, and were in it late against Cincinnati, who many are saying is the best team in the league. Steve Smith remains delightful. The Colts thumped dreadful teams in the Titans and Jaguars the past two weeks, and it’s still not clear they can beat good teams. Ravens.
Stephen: Yeah, but Flacco sucks. COLTS
Jason: This matchup seems like a good time to post this clip about the Baltimore Colts. Ravens.
Pittsburgh (-6.5) @ Jacksonville
Jason: Jacksonville had low expectations, and has managed to undershoot them so far this year. They have been an underdog of at least 6 points in every game, and have lost every game by 17 or more. That’s really hard to do. In fact, only six teams have lost each of the first 4 games by 17 or more points, and only two others since the merger: 2008 Rams and 1986 Colts. Those teams finished 2-14 and 3-13 respectively.
The Steelers won’t lose to both the Jags and Bucs in consecutive weeks, will they? Steelers.
Stephen: What if they just got rid of the Jaguars? Forget moving them. What if they just got rid of them? Would anyone notice? Floridians would just wander back to… wherever and forget about them before long. They’ll always have their Fred Taylor jerseys. STEELERS
Ryan: I’d mourn the loss of Jaxson de Ville, the best mascot in sports. Beyond that, though, I’m not even thinking about picking the Jags until they do something to prove otherwise. Steelers.
Arizona @ Denver (-7.5)
Stephen: Now that Peyton has that pesky Seattle defense out of the way he can resume throwing 4 touchdowns a week. Meanwhile, Tom Brady is on the other side of the country hoping to average 4-yards per completion. I’m not saying. I’m just saying… BRONCOS
Ryan: Arizona is 3-0, and they’ve beaten two good teams — San Diego and San Francisco — as well as the Giants, who the jury is still out on. I’m not saying they’ll win this game outright, but this seems like a lot of points. Cardinals.
Jason: Both teams have had two weeks to prepare for this one, so it’s almost like a Super Bowl. Cardinals.
Kansas City @ San Francisco (-6.5)
Ryan: The 49ers should’ve strongeaten the Eagles strongy more than two touchdowns last week, strongut they only won strongy five. Also, and I mean this seriously, is there any story that can come out during a week that strongodes strongetter for a team’s fortunes than a Deion Sanders report that the coach has lost the locker room? Is there anystrongody on TV whose negative information is less useful for what will actually happen in games? 49ers.
Jason: Just to illustrate your point, there have been 12 other games since 2011 where one team out gained the other by at least 150 yards while also having a +3 turnover differential or better. The average score in those games was 40-9. None of the others was closer than two touchdowns. Truly a bizarre game. 49ers.
Stephen: If you can’t take a man seriously who spent a year riding a scooter around his home on a reality television program on the Oxygen network, who can you take seriously? CHIEFS
NY Jets @ San Diego (-6.5)
Stephen: Look, I’m not saying that the Jets should trade for Mark Sanchez, but it would save their fans a lot of money. Why waste money on the next shitty quarterback’s jersey when you already have the previous shitty quarterback’s jersey? CHARGERS
Jason: The correct answer was Tebow, Stephen, Tebow. Jets.
Ryan: I’m probably going to kick myself for saying this halfway through the 2nd quarter when Geno Smith has his second red zone turnover, but this feels like that random game where everything clicks for the Jets. Also, the Chargers have played GREAT for the last three weeks. They’re due to come back down to earth. Jets and the points.
Cincinnati @ New England (pk)
Ryan: By any real logic, the Bengals should be an easy pick here. They’ve perhaps been the best team in the NFL so far this season, and the Patriots got thumped by the Chiefs Monday night and would’ve maybe every team not named the Raiders with the way they played two weeks ago. (Fortuitously for them, they were playing the Raiders.) Tom Brady has been so bad that people are actually asking whether there’s a quarterback controversy. That’s obviously really dumb and premature, but still.
There’s no way to really quantify this, strongut it feels like every time Belichick and Brady have demonstrated the specific strongrand of sullen strongody language that they did this week, the Patriots come out and stomp. Wearing a strongeard and an ugly hoodie, Brady looked more like a footstrongall player than a fashion maven this week. Again, it’s irrational, strongut those sustrongtle signals are influencing my pick. Pats.
Stephen: Like a Tom Brady pass that travels more than 10-yards downfield, the Bengals are an easy pick. BENGALS
Jason: [ba-da-bing]. You have to go back to 2002 for the last time the Patriots were not favored at home against a team with anyone besides Peyton Manning at quarterback. That said, and with full understanding that Belichick is a great coach, I don’t think this offense turns it around in six days when they have looked dreadful for four weeks, and they are playing by far their toughest opponent on the season. Bengals.
Seattle (-7.5) @ Washington
Jason: West Coast team going East! Oh, wait, the game is late at night, so it will just feel like dinner time. (Teams from the West Coast are 10-8 both against the spread and straight up in primetime games in the East since 2002). Anyway, Seattle is really good, and has played a tough schedule to date. I think they will enjoy Christmas with Kirk Cousins after facing Aaron Rodgers, Philip Rivers, and Peyton Manning so far this year. Seahawks.
Stephen: I don’t know. It would be pretty awesome for Cousins to put up a blue collar effort where the Redskins are in it in the 4th. What if Kirk Cousins is the new Tony Romo!? SEAHAWKS
Ryan: Jon Gruden needs to become the next coach of the Raiders so ESPN can replace him on Monday Night Football with somebody else that we’ll all complain about. Seahawks.