NFL Conference Finals...

[TazaD]

May as well start a thread... ...they are going to be 2 very good games, now that the pretenders are out of the way ;) Initial thought is under 41 @ Denver. Jake "I have come to clean z pool" Pummer did his usual job of controlling the game, and came up with a couple of huge plays down the stretch when he needed to, but I have to agree that he was far from comfortable in the pocket when under attack. He's much more comfortable when he gets to roll out, but NE realised a bit too late...I'm sure Pittsburgh will use a weak side LB to contain (ala Vick) rather than rush at the QB or RB. 27 points, but the first TD was a terrible interference call...the 1 yard run after the INT return and a 3 play 15 yard TD. 25/90 rushing yards wasn't too bad, but you'd think the Steelers would be able to match that defensive effort. As for the Steelers, they came out throwing against (imo) a very poor defensive team and got a quick 14 on the board, but still only ended with 21....although they did go pretty conservative with the lead in the second half I guess. But, you'd have to say that Denver are far superior defensively to Indi, and they still allow just 12 ppg at home. The pressure they put on Manning defensively was fantastic...Denver might try to avoid that by using a lot of screens and dump off passes, but it's going to be tough for either team to get anything long downfield. (A decent price for over 4.5 sacks might be worth a look too) How do you go passed Carolina? 29 points, 123 yards rushing and Delhomme 24/33 for 319 and 3 TD's against a Chicago defense who had been dominating all season! I said last week that I didn't think Seattle could top 20 against a decent defense...Carolina's pass D is almost identical to Washington's, but their run D is significantly better! (Although, allowing Chicago 20 is a worry....as the following trend will show ;)...) play against any playoff team that won last week (a playoff game), but allowed 21 or more pts in that win. This angle is 17-4-1 ats (80.9%) playing against that team since 1995, including 1-0 last year after indy lost to new england after beating Denver 49-24..... play against carolina.... play againstany team that is on the road for at least 3 consecutive weeks. Record: 23-8 (74%) If opponent is .800 or better the record moves to 7-1 including a win this weekend with seattle. both seattle and denver are .800 or better. Still, the Panthers bucked a pretty big trend last week, so no reason to start doubting them now. Panthers +4 looks like the right play to me.

[TazaD]

Re: NFL Conference Finals... No interest this week? :\ Come on folks...let's say we put Denver down to a fluke, and move on with things, eh? ;) :lol Still liking the under in both games...probably more-so in Seattle...hoping for a 44, but 43.5 looks nice if need be....but more on that a bit later. Plummer under 20.5 completions Just going with the %'s in this one... In 17 games, he has completed over 20 passes in just 3 games; 22/48 in wk. 1...a loss @ Miami. 23/37 in wk. 2...v. San Diego. 22/35 in wk. 8...v. Philli. All have worst %'s allowed and more pass yards allowed than Pittsburgh. The Steelers have allowed 21+ in 6 of 18 games...(but one of those was an OT game, which was 19/32 in reg.), so really 5 of 18... 22/38 @ Indi last week (15th in pass attempts...7th in completions) 25/41 @ Cinci 2 weeks back (12th in attempts...4th in completions) 22/38 v. Cinci again 25/44 v. Balt (surprisingly 8th in attempts and 10th in completions!) 31/41 v. NE (not surprisingly!...7th and 6th) Denver are 25th in attempts and 24th in completions (17.4 per game) Pittsburgh allow 19.7 per game, but as you can see, if we take out the games which they played teams in the top 10 for completions (Tenn (18/27 and SD (20/35) count in that category aswell)...they av. just 17.0 per game allowed. I think Pittsburgh will continue to bring a tonne of pressure this week as it was so successful for them last week, so expect some sacks and hurried throws.