NFL: The Playoffs, “Part Two” // NBA: "Status, Nearly Mid-Season"

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.  .  .   SPORTS NOTEBOOK posts its columns Tuesday and Friday of each week. Ed. & Publ., Marvin Leibstone; Copy & Mng. Ed., Gail Kleiner.

NFL  ---  And now there are eight franchises left, down from 12, as the 2012/13 NFL playoffs continue. The upcoming weekend is about to shave it to four teams per conference, and the next weekend will bring it to two within each conference for elimination toward one per, then it’s the Super Bowl!

Within the NFL’s American Conference, the Baltimore Ravens will challenge the Denver Broncos this Saturday, and the Houston Texans will face the New England Patriots on Sunday.

Inside the National Conference on Saturday, it’s the Green Bay Packers versus the San Francisco 49ers; on Sunday, the Seattle Seahawks facing the Atlanta Falcons.

Except for the Washington Redskins 24-14 loss to the Seahawks on Sunday last, this page predicted the current shape of the playoffs. For reasons that will be discussed in greater detail on this page on Friday, January 11, our AC picks for the coming weekend are Denver over Baltimore, and the Patriots beating the Texans.

NFC, we’re going with Green Bay atop San Francisco, and Atlanta slamming Seattle. This will bring the Broncos against the Patriots for the AFC’s Super Bowl entry, and the Packers vs. the Falcons for the NFC Super Bowl slot.

After? Our pick, “a Denver/Atlanta Super Bowl.”

            BUT, there are “if’s” that could prove us wrong, and they are several.

On a good day, Baltimore quarterback, Joe Flacco, and his receivers, especially Anquan Boldin, are a close matchup vs. Denver’s QB Peyton Manning and receivers Eric Decker and Demaryius Thomas + running back, Knowshon Moreno. Too, about-to-retire Baltimore linebacker, Ray Lewis, is still a formidable asset, and so increased reliance could be placed upon defense squads to keep the better offense from scoring, especially execution of the pass rush that both teams have performed superbly during the regular season---yes, the game could be won by Denver’s linemen Von Miller and Elvis Dumervil keeping Ravens QB Flacco from effective pass completions and decent handoffs, or by Baltimore’s secondary neutralizing the greater share of QB Manning’s pass attempts. Baltimore’s defense that kept the Indianapolis Colts to nine points on Saturday last is sharp evidence of the impenetrability attempts that the Broncos offense will face.

            Though the Texans defeated the Cincinnati Bengals on Saturday without keeping the Bengals from being within victory range, that is, from a possible touchdown and kick reversing the outcome of the game, the Houston franchise still demonstrated enough of the mojo and skills that caused it to be a leading NFL team throughout the regular season, especially within the first eight weeks. Too, the total rushing and passing yards that the Texans and the Patriots accrued during the regular season respectively, is close enough to “equal,” suggesting a match that could go either way. Patriots QB, Tom Brady, has been neutralized in the past by the lightning fast rushes that the Texans defense is capable of; it happened during the regular season in New England’s losses to three other 2012/13 playoff teams, the Ravens, the Seahawks and the 49ers.

            The 49er’s could override the Packers if Packers QB, Aaron Rodgers, and favored wide receiver, James Jones, lose an edge or two in the synchnonicity that allowed the two to be first during the NFL regular season regarding QB/pass receiver connects (13 TD passes achieved), better yet by freezing Rodgers in the pocket often enough to prevent end zone occupation (unlikely). This advises that the 49er’s defense will have to dominate to win, in that the Packers defense is more efficient at stopping the offense that the 49er’s have shown to be capable of. Within that, a 49er’s defense secondary may be able to pull off enough pass disruptions to keep the Packers from scoring big.

            The Falcons could only lose to the Seahawks if the near-perfect offense/defense balance that brought the Atlanta team to a preferred playoff spot recedes greatly. This isn’t likely to happen, yet it’s a turnabout that is possible. During the regular season, the Falcons lost to the less accomplished New Orleans Saints and the near-bottom Carolina Panthers, and a win against the weaker Tampa Bay Buccaneers was by one point, a win vs. the Panthers by only two points. Like the Redskins on Sunday, the Falcons could score early and big in a first quarter, but the resilience and come-back pass and rush improvisations enacted by the Seahawks as the game progressed could be a win factor if the pass protection that the Seahawks QB, Russell Wilson, will need goes into effect against one of the best close-in defenses in the NFL. 

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               NBA   ---   THE gaps between number of games won and lost among NBA franchises holding first place within their respective divisions can vary but they are not wide, for instance, the San Antonio Spurs are leading the NBA Western Conference’s Southwest Division with 27 wins and nine losses, and the Oklahoma City Thunder is leading the NBA Western Conference Northwest Division, 26-7, while the Miami Heat leads the Eastern Conference’s Southeast Division, 23-9, and the New York Knicks the Eastern Conference’s Atlantic Division, 23-10. And , as of Monday there’s been more consistency in number of games won by the six second place teams within the NBA, two of the six with 20 games won, a third with 21, a fourth having 22, the remaining two with 18 and 19 wins respectively. Each of the six is therefore above .500, highest among them the 22-11 Golden State Warriors, at .667, and the 21-10 Memphis Grizzlies, .677.

Sixteen NBA teams are now at or above .500. That’s half of the league, suggesting that as a whole the NBA is still only at the margin of basketball prowess. It also means that by the first week of February, more than half of the NBA regular season will be over, around 40 games per team yet to be played, and probably a dozen of the 32 NBA franchises will have then won half of the usual 50+ games that can guarantee contention for a playoff position as the final month of the season kicks in, and these will probably be the teams that today have 20 or more games won. This implies the possibility of 12 teams, six per conference, vying for a conference crown and playoff eliminations toward the NBA championship game appearance. So, it’ll be as things should be come mid-April. Maybe the NBA isn’t as helter-skelter as it appears on the surface prior to final days of a season.

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