NFL Wild Card Weekend: Saturday Predictions

I promise this won't become a sports blog! That just is a lot of what's on my mind at the moment, and you don't get the luxury of choosing what I write on.

All four wildcard games already happened this season, and this is the first of three that happened last week. (Sunday's AFC game happened much earlier, and while everyone talks about Wes Welker's injury being a potential difference-maker this weekend, he was injured for the first BAL-NE matchup this year, too.)

In any event, it's pretty tempting to make predictions about a playoff game based on the regular season matchup. I'm reluctant to do that too much not because "playoff football" is fundamentally different (apparently, it's all about defense and pounding the rock, which has comically little to do with how the playoffs actually have worked for the last ten years or so) but:

1. Because judging off a single regular season game (even if it's with the same opponent) is working with a hilariously small sample size; if the game was decided by a single score, then the difference literally could have been a receiver being a half-step slow in making his cut, and I'm uncomfortable suggesting that that's enough for me. Better to judge off a season of work (adjusted for garbage time possessions that aren't representative of a team's play) or off the five games against opponents most like the relevant opponent, or something.
2. Because even if a single regular season game were a large enough sample size to make claims about the outcome of a playoff game, it's difficult to parse out which observations about that regular season game have predictive power and which are noise.

So I'll refer to a regular season matchup when it seems to provide good context or particularly bad context. Season-long, cumulative analysis I'll leave to the experts (or perhaps I'll do some of it myself when it gets down to the conference championships).

NYJ @ CIN, 4:30pm ET

Things to ignore from the regular season matchup:

1. CIN lining up in a really ineffective 46. Football Outsiders' take on this wrinkle is that it was intended to give NYJ something extra to think about, and won't be used much this week; there are all kinds of levels on which this could operate (including "let's run ineffective plays out of this formation this week so that NYJ thinks it's just meant to distract them in gameplanning for next week") but the upshot is that the few 46 plays we saw won't be a big part of this week's game, whether they're suddenly effective or still ineffective. (Even if CIN decides to try it, the first person I'd pick to make on-the-fly adjustments against a 46 is noted son of Buddy Ryan Rex Ryan.)
2. Carson Palmer's disappearing act. Ever since his injury in the wild card round of the 2005 season playoffs against Pittsburgh, Carson Palmer hasn't had a consistently successful season. Last season, he played four mediocre games (all against playoff teams, but still); the season before, he would bracket 95+ quarterback rating games against great pass defenses between 60- games against terrible pass defenses. Carson Palmer, everybody. Palmer looked genuinely bewildered last weekend, and his stat line showed it. But with another week to scout the Jets, look for Palmer to regress to the mean this week. If he can stand to spread the ball around, then the Jets are vulnerable, particularly when they bring pressure.
3. Chad Ochocinco dropping passes. Chad's going to be Carson Palmer's first target (because what's his alternative, Laveranues Coles? Jerome Simpson?). And Chad isn't going to have a hundred yard day, or a two touchdown day, or a reason to look particularly cocky at the end of the day, because Revis really does blanket him effectively. But I think the two passes that bounced off his fingers were an artifact of small sample size, not a sign that he's going downhill.

Things to pay a lot of attention to:

1. Brad Smith running option plays out of the pistol. It's clear by now that Brad Smith is much more than a good punt returner; he has downfield vision beyond his years. Given that the passing game just isn't a major option today (the CIN corners are too good and Sanchez too green and in too cold an environment), Brad Smith is their big-play threat.
2. Thomas Jones isn't the same; he wasn't too effective last weekend. Well, maybe he is the same, and the stats just don't show it: Jones has put up some gaudy YPC this year (4.2 overall, but buoyed by a lot of long runs; Football Outsiders only gives him a 44% success rate, which is good for thirty-eighth in the league) but was stopped by CIN last week (27 carries netted only 78 yards). Jones didn't manage a long run all game, and it didn't look like he was too close to it. It looks like the loss of Ray Maualuga hasn't stopped CIN on run defense; it also looked like their secondary was helping out on the run very effectively.
3. CIN needs to start running the ball effectively. With some injuries on defense, it can't stand to get tired, particularly when the NYJ attack doesn't play to their remaining strength (their cornerbacks). An offense that can run the ball fifty-eight times is not their friend (nor is their own offense, which, discounting two rushes, one by Johnson and one by Scott, for twenty-two yards apiece, managed sixteen carries for twenty-eight yards). Granted, let's just count first-half carries for the Jets: that's still thirty-four carries. Uh. CIN is going to need to run the ball effectively if Carson Palmer's going to have one of his good games; they're also going to need to run the ball effectively if NYJ is ever going to get off the field.

If you couldn't tell, I'm picking the Jets today, though I hardly expect the 37-0 lashing of last weekend. I'd pick something more conservative like 21-10. (No reason to expect the same number of Brad Smith home runs or Ochocinco drops.)

PHI @ DAL, 8:00pm ET

This game is inherently a bit harder for me, in no small part because I don't watch the NFC as frequently and because I hate the Cowboys.

Things to ignore from the regular season matchups:

1. DeSean Jackson is going to play. One element that helped the Cowboys win last Sunday was the absence of DeSean Jackson, the Eagles' deep threat. One element that helped them win in their first matchup was his lackluster performance in Week 9. That likely won't happen again; over the course of this season the Eagles have come to realize that their passing game is DeSean Jackson, Brent Celek, and a bunch of screens.
2. Tony Romo. This season has dedicated a lot of time to Tony Romo and what a gosh-darned disappointment he's been. I don't really know why this is; I guess he's a gosh-darned disappointment to someone. But here's the problem: he wasn't as bad as people were making him out to be early in the season, and he's not as new and improved as people are making him out to be now. He's still a distinctly second-tier passer whose strength is fast, short plays and hot reads. Get him in third and long, and he falls apart. This is the Tony Romo we've always known, and that's okay. Whatever inferences we try to draw about his quarterback play from any regular season games are going to be colored too much by biases one way or another (is he reborn? is he a joke?) to reach a productive conclusion.

Things to pay a lot of attention to:

1. Celek isn't going to be too effective. Ball and Sensabaugh have done a fair job of limiting him over the top in the past two games; his production has come against Ken Hamlin, a third-stringer who probably will get less playing time today. And they haven't done it via big plays; they've done it with tight, consistent coverage.
2. The Eagles' offensive line. The talk of the town around draft day this past year was the Eagles' new line: they were all under thirty and signed through 2014, 2013, 2013, 2015, 2014. It was going to be a bright new year, with McNabb able to stay in the pocket, no longer having to extend the play with his ever-older legs. This is decreasingly true: Jamaal Jackson is short an ACL, and Stacy Andrews isn't recovering from his own any too quickly. The line is full of holes, and the Cowboys managed four sacks in both matchups. The difference is that in the second game, the Cowboys got three of those sacks from defensive linemen. If they can do that again this game, if they can get pressure without having to bring men on a blitz, then they'll be able to sit back against McNabb and wait until he makes mistakes. I'm no McNabb detractor; in fact, I think he's a pretty smart quarterback: and for that reason, he's doubly hurt when the defense can get pressure on him without making itself vulnerable.

I wish I didn't have to say it, but I'll take the Cowboys, albeit in a close one: let's say 24-21.