welcome, guest nfl columnist.

i bring you john lorenz.

Word on the street is that the widespread readership of this blog isn't quite down with the NFL... in fact, any form of American Football seems to take a back seat to basketball, both professional and amateur, as well as MLB and minor league baseball. (On a side note, shouldn't there be a blog dedicated to the comings of goings of the D-league? This True Hoop Blog entry says yes. While I'm pimping blogs, have you checked out Straight Cash Homey yet? Possibly the funniest sports related site around. Alright, close parentheses.) Well, today friends, I am here to convince that yes, you should care about the NFL playoffs - and anybody that says college football is better than pros, I present this year's putrid bowl season as exhibit A why your assumptions are false. I completely forgot that they hadn't yet played the national championship game. Do I care that OSU and LSU played for it tonight? Maybe... kinda... I mean, they both lost, didn't they? And it was a week after New Year's Day. It was kind of hard to maintain any kind of enthusiasm. Then again, I'm not from the O-H-I-O...

So, why should you care about the NFL Playoffs? I tend to be rather prolix when I try to do such an analysis, so I'll just present a nutshell of why each game is going to be awesome.

And as is the custom with this particular blog, I introduce blog entry proper with lyrics from a random song... I'm going with "Sons and Daughters" by The Decemberists:

These currents pull us 'cross the border
Steady your boats
Arms to shoulder
'till tides are pulled
Hold our grounds
Making this cold harbor now home

NFC
Dallas v. NYG
This game is entitled, "Eli Manning now has more playoff wins than Tony Romo." Is Tony Romo still the holder for field goals? I haven't been paying attention but probably not. The alternate title is, "I can watch the game on a 42 inch HD Plasma screen and there will be shots of Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders." Anyone want to come over?

A fun subplot is that you can turn this into a drinking game. Just take a drink every time one of following happens:
Jessica Simpson is on camera or is mentioned
Tony Romo runs around like a chicken without a head
Anytime you could vaguely picture Wade Phillips as Santa Claus in the Macy's Thanksgiving day parade
Shot of Tom Coughlin in a state of utter confusion and/or disgust after an official's call or a poor play
Roy Williams makes a horsecollar tackle
You have to chug if TO yells at either Romo or Phillips for an extended period of time. (This one use to be a weekly drinking game in and of itself, but TO has behaved pretty well and I have some catching up to do.)

Green Bay v. Seattle
Do you really need more incentive than "We want the ball and we're going to score!"? I say no, but how can you not be entertained by a matchup between the oldest and and the baldest QB in the league?

AFC
Indianapolis v. San Diego
Really, they should just skip the semi-final round games and let Indy play New England. I say you could turn this one into a drinking for by taking a swig every time Phillip Rivers looks totally overmatched, but I would only advise doing that under a doctor's supervision. But Indianapolis is kind of a weak 14-2 to me (if such a thing exists) and San Diego has LT and a stout D. Oh yeah, I totally forgot the revelation of last years super bowl that God is rooting for the Colts. What does that count for? Well, they did have to play against Rex Grossman in the Super Bowl last year... you decide...

New England v. Jacksonville
I'm going to take a more serious tone on this one. Everyone wants the Jags to win... not only that, football minds everywhere have deluded themselves into thinking they will win. But they're just being populist - everyone hates the Patriots, right? They cheated. They're the Yankees of the NFL. I'm not from Boston, so what do I care?

I'll tell you why I care.

They are freakin' good.

The Yankees they are not. They don't spend the most. Bill Russell era Celtics may be a better comparison - people take pay cuts to play for New England. They do not spend the most.

Did they cheat in the first game? Probably. But they went 16-0! They demolished teams! They broke records! This is Tiger Woods winning makers by 10+ strokes. This Roger Federer winning Wimbledon without dropping a set. Perhaps it's even Federer or Woods winning a calendar year grand slam - I don't know... but we're probably not going to see it again. You've got to root for it to happen. If nothing else, you've got to root for them to win it all so that there will never be another Brady v. Manning debate again. It's not allowed - it's forbidden from this day hence.

Frankly, the unjust venom spewed towards the Patriots is displaced secret hatred of the Red Sox. There's a resentment about Boston being good at every sport (although to be fair, Boston used to suck at a lot... now just hockey....) but we're unwilling to take it out on the Red Sox because they beat the Yankees. But Red Soxs fans are everywhere and it drives the rest of us crazy - but we can't hate them because, well, wasn't Johnny Damon's beard saga of 2004 awesome?

I'm going to close with this:
The most exhilarating thing to watch in sports in the past year has been Tom Brady winding up to make a 60 yard throw. You already know who he's passing it to. You can follow the parabolic arc before it ever manifests and results in the hands of the most talented wide receiver the game has known. You can bitter that they are better than your team if you like, but if you do, you're missing quite a show.