Pocket Change – The Weekend in Football – Turkey Day Edition

If there’s anything we should have learned by now, it’s the unpredictability of the football season.  Week after week this year we’ve been shown that there is no such thing as a “sure thing”, as if we needed a reminder.

As more and more teams fall by the side in the NCAA ranks, more and NFL teams are keeping themselves afloat in the race for the playoffs.  This truly is one of the most memorable football seasons ever.  Only time will tell if it continues but at this point it seems a certainty that the grand finale won’t disappoint.

• Oklahoma State falls to Iowa State, Oregon falls to USC, and in the most mind-bending loss of the weekend, Clemson falls to North Carolina State.  The path to the championship game that was open for these teams has just slammed shut.  While they all are still in line for a big bowl appearance, the brass ring is now out of reach.  Too bad, because any of the three – Oklahoma State, Oregon, or Clemson – would have posed a great challenge to any defense.  They still can, only now it’s going to be in the “less-important” bowl games.
• Like a phoenix rising from the ashes, the Denver Broncos appear to be returning from the dead.  With a disappointing 1-4 start, the Broncos switched to Tim Tebow at quarterback and utter chaos has ensued.  There hasn’t been that much electricity on the Mile High Gridiron since Mr. Elway walked off into the sunset.  Say what you will, Tebow might not be the greatest passer (that much is certain) but every other part of his game says “winner”.  Somehow he has the ability to find a way at the end to pull out a victory.  Truly inspiring.
• So are we all ready to concede that Peyton Manning might mean more to his team than any other player in the league at the moment?  Most of us saw this coming from a mile away, but it’s still hard to fathom the Colts without a win this deep into the season.  I mean, without Peyton it was assumed that the Colts would struggle but O-FER?  Not even the most negative prognosticators were thinking that.
• Thanksgiving week.  For my money one of the best weeks of the YEAR.  Especially for football.  Also, the ONLY week I think that should include Thursday games.  I love my game, that’s obvious.  I just don’t care for Thursday games.  The reason the Thursday games on Thanksgiving week were so special was because it was ONCE a season, not two months worth.  When the games are spread out over four days it kind of dilutes the excitement of following them all on Sunday (and Monday night!).  Hopefully this doesn’t get any worse and spread to Wednesday or Friday or any other weeknight.  This kind of thing already messed up New Year’s Day bowl games, and the college football week in general.  Football isn’t like other sports that need every day of the week to play it’s games.  It’s one game a week.  Leave it on the traditional game days.

We’re about to head into the home-stretch of the season.  So many teams are jockeying for position that we’re sure to be in for a photo finish.  Hopefully the injuries will cease because that’s no way to determine a champ.  Attrition always plays a role, but I’d like to see the teams have more to say than the training room.

Next week – which teams will suffer the post Thanksgiving Tryptophan slumber?  We shall see…