Colt/Saints Win- Manning vs Brees

Yesterday we witnessed a great playoff game and a a great quarterback. First the great game. The Saints and Vikings went back and forth for sixty minutes and then resolved that was not enough and took us to overtime. They then decided that all the calls that were at least debatable and that the possibility of this being Brett Favre's " last game" was not enough controversy, thus the team that got the ball first in overtime won the game. Before we look at all those issues lets talk about the game. The Saints Drew Brees was very solid. The Saints defense was opportunistic. The game, to me, however, seemed to be more about what the Vikings did and did not do. The Vikings fumbled the ball, late in the first half a Favre handoff in the red zone got away, the Saints recovered. Brett Favre returned to the recent playoff Brett Favre and threw picks that were a result of his forgetting he cannot make those throws in big games and come out unscathed. This game was captivating. It was not exactly well played.

We will now hear this week about the inequities in the sudden death overtime system. When watching a game like this it is almost impossible to think that there might not need to be a fairer way. However, statistics seem to show that the system as it is devised works. I recently was told by Colin Cowherd in his debate about this issue that 52 percent of teams who win the coin toss win the game. That is a very minute percentage for those that have an advantage that is seen to be so large. In a game such as this it is magnified but it was not as if the Vikings did not have a chance to stop them. Fourth down would seem to have been a good time to do so. When your team loses a game like the Vikings did the rule seems unfair, any objective analysis will later determine that sudden death works.

In the AFC game the J E T S Jets won the first 25 minutes of the game leading 17 to 6 and bringing the believers to their feet. However this just gave a precept for Peyton Manning again to prove that he is currently the greatest quarterback in the game. While there are a few quarterbacks that are very good consistently, Drew Brees being one of them, Peyton Manning is the best in the game, and perhaps the best there has ever been. Watching the game yesterday what I notice more and more of Manning is watching him come to the line early in the play clock and change the play based on the defensive set. He is the best I have seen at this.

One last point when watching Tom Brady this year I noticed several times at the end of the game that Brady does a disappearing act. Brady,especially after a loss, does not have anything to say to opposing quarterbacks,coaches or players. Tom is up the tunnel like Giselle has the limo running. In the big picture this is not a huge issue but when Lebron James failed to congratulate Orlando last year it was an issue. The contrast between Favre, Manning, etc and Tom Brady at the end of the games is significant. In our house examples of sportsmanship are pointed out. Tom is invisible in these cases.