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Filed under: Arizona Cardinals, Chicago Bears, Chargers, Colts, Eagles, Panthers, Redskins, Saints, Vikings, NFL Media Watch, NFL Quarterbacks, NFL Predictions, NFL Podcast

The Wildcast is NFL FanHouse’s podcast formation. It’s like the Wildcat, but better.

There was really zero way that Snyder and I could avoid discussing the Colts sitting their starters and losing the perfect season, while setting the Jets up to backdoor the playoffs. I’m sorry — it’s beat into the ground, but there wasn’t anything we could do. Fortunately for you, we have interesting points that haven’t been made publicly yet. So there’s that.

There’s also a discussion on what coaches find themselves on the hot seat, our typical MVP talk as well as an assorted amount of goodness throughout the (surprisingly) lengthy Wildcast for this week. Hop on down and take a listen, kids.

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Filed under: NFL Awards, NFL Analysis

On Sunday night and Monday morning, 50 media members will vote for MVP and other NFL awards in a ballot conducted by the Associated Press and recognized as official by the NFL.

Finally.

The expanded media and fans who interact on social media began speculating and asking who the league’s MVP would be last spring, when offseason workouts began. Or maybe it just seems like that. And the chatter changes every week — Peyton Manning’s stock is holding steady, especially since Curtis Painter showed last week how valuable Manning is to the Colts; Drew Brees and Brett Favre are dropping as their teams lose and Philip Rivers‘ stock is on the rise.

It also seems like Manning has been the MVP every year. Not true. It’s only been three times, tied with Favre for the most — and in one of those seasons, they were co-MVPs, Peyton with Steve McNair in 2003; Brett with Barry Sanders in 1997. But like the Heisman Trophy winner, the MVP is usually a quarterback — six of the nine times this decade, a stretch broken by Marshall Faulk in 2000, Shaun Alexander in 2005 and LaDainian Tomlinson in 2006.

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Filed under: Broncos, NFL Playoffs, NFL Analysis

Nobody this time of year gets tired of talking NFL playoff scenarios, even if they do make you a little dizzy. But as the convolutions and possibilities pile up on each other, people invariably start looking for questions that make it all simpler. Questions like, “Well, what if everybody loses?”

In the case of the remaining seven contenders for the two AFC wild card spots, such a scenario (while not, technically, possible since the Dolphins and Steelers are playing each other) would favor the Denver Broncos — the lone team among those seven remaining contenders that can lose its game Sunday and still make the playoffs. Here’s how it works:

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Filed under: Bengals, Jets

FLORHAM PARK, N.J. — In what may have been the greatest midweek opposing player conference call in NFL history, Bengals receiver Chad Ochocinco on Wednesday dazzled the New York Jets media with 20 minutes of playoff-caliber trash talk. Known for elaborate post-touchdown celebrations, Ochocinco says he’ll don a Bengals fire helmet, climb on the goal post and shush the home crowd ala “Fireman Ed” if he scores Sunday night against the Jets. He also said his one-on-one matchup with Pro Bowl cornerback Darrelle Revis is going to be “better than Pacquiao-Mayweather,” and indicated somewhat strongly that he thinks he can win it.

“Darrelle Revis couldn’t cover me in a brown paper bag on the corner of a Manhattan street in a phone booth,” Ochocinco said. ” And I love him. I call him ‘Master-Lock.’ Master-Lock Revis has locked up a lot of great receivers this year. But not this week.”

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Filed under: Bengals

The Cincinnati Bengals are 10-5 and have already clinched the AFC North. And they’ve done it without having a single player who’s among the conference elite at his position.

At least, they don’t have any players among the conference elite if you trust the Pro Bowl voters, who didn’t pick a single Bengal on this year’s AFC squad.

To me, the biggest Bengals snub comes at cornerback, where Cincinnati’s Johnathan Joseph is more deserving than Denver’s Champ Bailey, who made it this year more on reputation than on 2009 accomplishments. I would have chosen the Bengals’ other cornerback, Leon Hall, over Bailey as well.

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Filed under: Raiders

Looking back on the 2009 NFL season, Oakland Raiders coach Tom Cable thinks he had a pretty good team. At least, at every position other than quarterback.

During his press conference on Monday, Cable was reflecting on how the 2009 season has gone. And when he was asked specifically about the lousy play of quarterback JaMarcus Russell — and whether he thinks the Raiders would be a playoff team if they could have gotten average production out of their quarterback — Cable said he thinks it’s obvious that Russell was the one keeping the team out of the postseason.

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Filed under: Super Bowl

And now, from the people who brought you Michael Jackson surrounded by 3,500 children and Janet Jackson’s right breast, we have the most controversial Super Bowl halftime performer of all.

Pete the Pervert.

That would be Pete Townshend of The Who, unless child advocacy groups have their way. They’re raising a stink over the NFL giving the world’s biggest stage to an ex-registered sex offender.

“Inviting Townshend to play is a blatant disregard to the values of American families and a slap in the face to victims of child sexual abuse,” proclaims the release from Child Abuse Watch.

Actually, the advocacy groups are slapping the face of American values. In a fanatical quest to promote their cause they’re willing to trash fairness and common sense.

Yikes, I just cringed while writing that. I mean, who besides Roman Polanski doesn’t want to prevent child abuse?

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Filed under: Jets, NFL Analysis

FLORHAM PARK, N.J. — The amazing thing about the Jets isn’t that they’re still alive and will make the playoffs if they beat the Bengals on Sunday night. The amazing thing is that they didn’t lock up their playoff spot weeks ago.

The Jets lead the NFL in total team defense (263.7 yards allowed per game) and in team rushing offense (166.6 yards per game). And if it sounds unusual for a team to do both, that’s because it is. Only one team in the past 21 years and only seven teams since the 1970 merger have led the NFL in both total defense and rushing offense in the same year. A couple of them rank among the greatest teams in history. So for the Jets to be leading the league in both categories through 15 games and be just 8-7 … well, that has to be a surprise, right?

“When you look at the way we’ve figured out ways to lose games, we probably should be four or five games above .500,” Jets coach Rex Ryan said Monday when I asked him that very question. “But those stats, you don’t luck into those stats. That’s usually the blueprint for success in the National Football League — You’ve got to play great defense and you’ve got to be able to run the football this time of year. I think that’s what makes us a dangerous football team right now if we can win this game and head into the postseason.”

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Filed under: Vikings, NFC North, NFL Injuries

One of the things fans respect about pro athletes is their unwillingness to resort to excuses. Even when an excuse is obvious, most athletes will avoid it like the plague and blame themselves for not getting the job done.

In the case of veteran Minnesota Vikings cornerback Antoine Winfield, his return from a foot injury surely hasn’t gone as planned. He has morphed from a shutdown cornerback to a guy who looks tentative in man coverage and doesn’t have the closing speed he had before his injury.

To his credit, however, Winfield isn’t pointing the finger at his foot for his recent troubles. At least, that’s not what he wants you to think he’s doing.

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Filed under: Arizona Cardinals, Bengals, Cowboys, Eagles, Jets, Packers, Patriots, Texans, NFL Playoffs, NFL Analysis

For weeks, it’s sat there on the schedule as an obvious quirky possibility. The Cardinals host the Packers on Sunday in Week 17 of the regular season, and the most likely playoff scenarios lead to a rematch of those same two teams the following week in the first round of the playoffs. Same two teams, two weeks in a row. It’s odd, but it happens sometimes.

What’s really bizarre is that, if things break the right way this Sunday, all four first-round playoff games could be rematches of Week 17 regular-season games. The four first-round games could conceivably be Cardinals-Packers, Eagles-Cowboys, Bengals-Jets and Patriots-Texans, all of which are Week 17 matchups. That, we can say with confidence, has never happened before. But here’s what has to take place Sunday to bring this weirdness about:

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