I will admit, I was cheering for the underdog Cards who shocked me and a lot of people by taking a 23-20 lead by just over 2 minutes to play in the 4th quarter of the Super Bowl.  Then Ben Roethlisberger showed his mettle, and toughness and led his team down the field with little resistance. Soon, they were knocking on the TD door. And, Santonio Holmes, the wide receiver, pushed the door in with a brilliant catch on the sidelines for the late score. 

This game turned out to be a shoot-out.  Kurt Warner was terrific throwing for 377 yards against the top-rated defense in the league. His precision passes were pretty to look at. What was beautiful to watch was Larry Fitzgerald gathering in the ball from Warner while he was in stride and seamlessly moving upfield and outraced two defenders for the Cards' score that must have sent the fans in Phoenix beserk.  But the game wasn't over yet.  The Pittsburgh QB had life and fight in him as well. He was able to avoid defenders all night and he looked for somebody open. More often than not, he found his man.  Hines Ward saw limited action because of a banged up knee but Santonio Holmes took over and won the MVP with some great catches. 

Continue reading "Steelers score last and prevail 27-23 in Super Bowl"

Just read that the Chicago Bears have been mentioned in trade rumors to move Linebacker and probable Hall of Famer Brian Urlacher to the Arizona Cardinals and in return, get rights to Anquan Boldin, one of the top receivers in NFL.

This would be a shock to the Bears system of building a top-rated defense.  However, with Urlacher, the Bears were not a top-rated defensive unit.  They made some nice plays and had a few goal-line stands but teams moved the ball on them either on the ground, or in the air. You would have to say that rushing D is stronger that passing D. 

Boldin is a 1000+ yards receiver and would force teams to develop schemes to counter-act the passing attack.  Currently, the Bears don't have a receiver that forces teams to "cover" their receivers. Having Boldin would be a big improvement.  Getting another wideout to balance the passing attack would be the next logical step.  If the Bears had Bernard Berrian and Boldin, they would be much better positioned.  But the Bears let Berrian get away and he burned them in a key game vs. the Vikes this past season.

Continue reading "Boldin to Bears for Urlacher May Be Worth It"