“Hilariously, Roid Rage has to tell you why the Patriots will win the Super Bowl.  For a devout Buffalo Bills fan (is there any other kind?) that must be the most painful experience since the Music City Miracle”

That’s me quoting Ginger King.  And while it’s true that I had to get 7 or 8 Genny Lights deep before even powering up the laptop, at least I’m not delusion.  I’m mean, the Falcon’s beating the Patriots in the Super Bowl?!  Only if Jacoby Brissett is playing (is that dude even still in the league, or is he bagging groceries in the Midwest somewhere?!) [Editor’s note: despite being activated from IR for the playoff run, Brissett will likely be a healthy scratch for the Super Bowl.  But he’ll still get one of those big ass Super Bowl rings after the Pats dismantle the Dirty Birds!]  Thanks for the note editor, I couldn’t have said it better myself.

The argument for the Falcons is laughable.  The hot young quarterback—that’s never played in a Super Bowl—leading a “high-powered” offense against (future HOF coach) Bill Belichick and (future HOF QB) Tom Brady?  What could possible go wrong?  Do you know who doesn’t care that the Falcons have the reigning MVP on their team?  Or that the rest of the league has had a hard time stopping their offense?  Or that Julio Jones seems to be a cyborg dressed in a football jersey?  That’s right, this guy…..

Can his Canton bust please be wearing a hoodie

Guess how Bill is going to crack Matt Ryan?…..Pressure.  Guess what his plan will be for taking Julio out of the gameplan?….double coverage, bracket coverage, bump-and-run with safety help.  Guess where they are going to catch the Falcons underprepared?….special teams.

While the Falcons have built themselves an awesome football team, it’s the exact OPPOSITE of the kind of team that gives the Patriots fits.  If there is a “blue-print” to beating the Patriots, what is it?  The ’08 Giants and ’16 Broncos should come to mind?  No, you don’t need a Manning under center….or a miraculously stupid catch (or two)…..Those teams had dominate defensive lines that could generate consist pressure (up the middle) with 4-guys, while dropping 7 into coverage.  The Falcons can’t do that.  If anything, their defensive line, especially up the middle, is a liability.  To generate pressure they’ll be forced to send a blitzer.  And blitzing Brady is like playing with fire, you’re bound to get burned Napalmed. The guy doesn’t miss a beat.  He checks every play at the line, aligns the blocking assignments and never misses a hot read.   It’s not like they are going to throw something at him he hasn’t seen (which is exactly what BB will do to Matty Ice btw).  Oh, Dan Quinn’s defense.  Yeah, played against that…..in a Super Bowl none the less….oh, and won that game.  Yawn.

This guy

Trust me, I want Brady to get clobbered and throw an interception on EVERY pass attempt.  That’s what I root for when they play against the Bills….or the Dolphins….or the Jaguars for crying out loud.  But it just doesn’t happen.  The guy is averaging 335 yards and 2.5 TDs in the postseason this year.  He wakes up (next to a supermodel) and pisses excellence.  True, he only eats baby seal liver on a bed of Kale and goes for blood palette therapy like you or I go to the barbershop, but such is the life a rockstar.  As much as it pains me to say it, he is the greatest quarterback of all time.  Don’t take my word for it; all of these boners lined up on media row to say the same thing this week.  You could argue the Texans (easily) and maybe even the Steelers have a better defense than the Falcons.  Those teams didn’t have any answers for TB12 and company, so how exactly are the Falcons going to slow down them down? Not gonna happen.

No Gronk?  No problem!  Brady will spread the ball all over the field, exploiting match-ups and throwing his guys open.  Seriously, Brady can take any other teams third WR and turn him into a star.  Hello Wes Welker Chris Hogan.  Edelman seemingly can’t be covered within 5 yards of the line of scrimmage.  It’s death by a 1,000 paper cuts when you play the Patriots.  If they need 6-yards for a first down they get 8.  3^rd-and-1: QB-sneak for 2 yards.  First-and-goal, here comes the battering ram LeGarrett Blount.  Wait until they get Dion Lewis matched-up against a linebacker.  Think Brady won’t exploit that?

Not catching passes from EJ Manuel sure has its upside

I do like what the Falcons have going on the offensive side of the ball.  Matt Ryan is peaking at the right time.  He isn’t necessarily locking onto Julio (which is exactly what I’d be doing), and spreading the ball around.  They’ve done a nice job bringing in complimentary pieces to bolster their attack, mainly Mohammad Sanu.  Perhaps there best way to attack the Patriots is their one-two punch of Devonta Freeman and Tevin Coleman.  Both are excellent receivers out of the backfield and both possess game-breaking speed.  New England’s linebackers struggle in pass coverage.

New England’s defense does give up chunk plays; and have long been regarded as a bend-but-don’t-break defense.  But they are so well coached that they always seem to be in the right place at the right time.  They always seem to punch the ball loose just before the runner’s knee hits the ground.  Or get their hands up just in time to deflect a ball for an interception.   Julio will have to work for everything he gets in this game.  He’s such a physically dominate player he could go off despite New England’s efforts to shut him down.

At the end of the day [narrative alert] this is a legacy cementing game for BB and TB12.  A win here…..better yet, a beatdown here…. and they’ve both blasted the GOAT conversation out of the water.  You know Tom wants to force Goodell to hand him that Super Bowl MVP trophy (and shitty Nissan truck that he’ll give to Jackie Slater for making a key tackle on punt coverage).  And there is a little part of me (okay, all of me and the entire Bills Mafia) that wanst Brady to give Goodell the ultimate FU and retire!  Yeah, that’ll show him Tom!  I mean, Brady and his agent  are forming their own league.  Said league would draw a much bigger audience if they had the greatest quarterback in the world running the show.  Just thinking out loud here!

GOATCITY

So get your popcorn, chili, nachos, smoked wings, 18-layer bean dip and whatever other goodness you’re going to cram into you face ready, because it’s SUPER BOWL SUNDAY BABY!!!

New England 24, Atlanta 18

***(Yes, hammer the under!)***

Pittsburgh @ New England (-6), Sunday, 6:40 pm

The Playoffs are back!!  Hot damn!  Those Divisional Games were awesome.  Aaron Rodgers moved from ‘Elite’ to ‘Legendary’ status with one throw.  Seriously.  Moving to his left, throws a 37 yard rope along the sidelines to a sliding/kneeling Jared Cook.  Nice catch too…but that throw!

The Steelers-Chiefs game was compelling in its own right; what with the touchdown, made-two-point-conversion-called-back-due-to-holding followed by a failed two-point conversion in the last two minutes.  Good stuff.  But the highlight came about 7 minutes after the game, when Antonio Brown (genius) decided to Facebook Live the Steelers lock room.  Thanks for this gem AB:

It’s mostly just AB running his hands through his hair, flashing the “call me” sign and showing teammates bragging, dancing, swearing, undressing and just goofing around.  15 of the 17 minutes basically goes like this….”God is good man….we at fucking 42k…..bang bang bang….we live…God is the greatest”…Oh, and Antonio thought it’d be a great idea (which it was) to keep the video rolling during coach Tomlins postgame address.  You know, the one where he calls the Patriots a bunch of assholes (more on that in a bit) among other things.  But the best part is Tomlin literally telling the guys to “keep a low profile….be cool on social media” and “keep your mouth shut”.  At one point LeVeon Bell turns to Brown and snickers something about keeping it cool on social media.  Brown is unfazed, continuing to stream away.  It’s ridiculous and glorious at the same time.  Social media is going to be a torn in the NFLs side for a long time to come.

Tomlin, Brown and the Steelers went to work on damage control.  But honestly, the comments were pretty harmless and much ado about nothing.  Seriously, how can that be considered “bulletin board material?”  The Patriots are assholes!!  I know it, you know it, hell even they know it. Tom Brady is a giant asshole, but he’s just following the lead of his lying, cheating asshole coach.  But it starts at the top; Bob Kraft is a walking, talking live-action asshole.  Come to think of it, the city of Boston is filled with only assholes.

And you thought that foul smell was from all the beans they eat!

With all that said, on to the game!

What a matchup.  Two prolific offenses.  Two HOF quarterbacks.  Two dynamic running backs.  Two bend-but-don’t-break defenses.  While everyone is expecting a shootout between the Packers-Falcons, this one certainly could go down that road.

The matchup to watch

This game will be a rematch of Week 7….sort of.  The Patriots won, 27-16 in convincing fashion.  Much has been made this week that Belichick used Malcolm Brown to shadow, and contain Antonio Brown (57.4 passer rating when thrown to, 0 TD, 1 INT ….@NFLReasearch).  I’m going to go ahead and take that game- and those stats- with a giant Himalayan rock crystal of salt for one reason: Ben Roethlisberger didn’t play.  Landry Jones was on the other end of those AB throws.  And Brown still finish the game with 7 REC for 106 YDS.  More impressive however was the Patriots containment of LeVeon Bell, whom only average 3.9 yards per carry.  Bell did most of this damage through the air (as a result of playing from behind), adding 10 REC for 68 YDS.  Meanwhile, Tom Brady was his ever efficient self, going 19/26 for 222 YDS and 2 TDS.  LeGarrette Blount carried the mail with 27 carries for 127 YDS and 2 TDS.

Like I said, the Steelers were without Big Ben.  And the Patriots had Gronk in that game.  Week 7 was a long time ago.

12 to 11, all day

The Patriots have had an easy playoff run so far: bye week and a cakewalk past the Texans.  On the other hand, the Steelers faced a feisty Miami team and a tough Kansas City team in hostile territory.  The Patriots are going to try to wear the Steelers defense away with their intermediate passing attack that features Julian Edelman and a healthy Dion Lewis.  I’d be shocked if Edelmen doesn’t catch 10 balls this week.  Blount could be in for another heavy usage game if the Patriots can build an early lead.

The Steelers do have weapons galore on offense, so they should be able to keep it within striking distance.  But they aren’t going to beat the Patriots by settling for FGs like they did against the Chiefs.  I’d expect Tomlin to be aggressive all day, particularly in the redzone.

We’ve been crowning the Patriots the AFC Champs for 3 weeks now (it makes us nauseous too).  It seems like a forgone conclusion.  Bettors agree, pushing the line to NE -6.  I think it’ll be much closer than that and I won’t be shocked if Pittsburgh wins this game outright!

Pittsburgh 25, New England 27

Who ya got?