Tuesday, January 30, 2007

Super Bowl Preview: Welcome to McDowell’s

After the smashing success during last year’s Super Bowl preview of the discovery that Mike Holmgren is indeed Col. Mustard, I thought I’d try to replicate the same kind of formula. You see, for the longest time, I’ve really believed that Lovie Smith is actually Mr. Cleo McDowell, owner of McDowell’s restaurant in Coming to America (or the military guy from Die Hard 2 who pretends to be a good guy, but actually is a bad guy. If you hadn’t seen Die Hard 2 yet, I apologize).

For those who need a little refresher, McDowell is the one that gave a priceless quote in Coming to America: “Look... me and the McDonald's people got this little misunderstanding. See, they're McDonald's... I'm McDowell's. They got the Golden Arches, mine is the Golden Arcs. They got the Big Mac, I got the Big Mick. We both got two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles and onions, but their buns have sesame seeds. My buns have no seeds.”

Similar to Mr. McDowell, Lovie Smith/Coach McDowell has tried to re-create the Bears in a similar fashion to the 1985 Bears. The 1985 Bears had one of the best defenses ever. So what does Coach McDowell do? He helps create one of the best defenses in the NFL in 2006, but with a deficient and injury-riddled secondary (it’s like losing the sesame seeds). The 1985 Bears had a hall-of-fame RB on their roster. So what does Coach McDowell do? He uses two RBs, which together almost equaled what Walter Payton did in 1985. The 1985 Bears had a white QB, drafted in the 1st round, who was in his 4th year, with a 1-syllable name of “Jim.” So what does Coach McDowell do? He gets a white QB, drafted in the 1st round, who is in his 4th year but calls him “Rex,” which just happens to also be a 1-syllable name!

This blatant copying by Coach McDowell of the 1985 Bears just makes my stomach turn, and I’m not even from Chicago. I even sent a photographer over to some of the Bears practices, and then sent the pictures to Buddy Ryan and Refrigerator Perry, just to prove that Coach McDowell is copying them!

The only problem is, Coach McDowell has been unable to get much of a consistency on offense or from his QB. It must be pointed out, as CBS/Fox did in their stats two weeks ago, that Rex Grossman has the 2nd-most amount of games this season where he achieved a passer rating mark of over 100, but he also has the most amount of games this season below the passer rating mark of 40. Rex is very reliant on the homerun play, and there really is no explanation for how he can be so terrible one week, and so proficient in other weeks. It’s like trying to open a McDonald’s, and you don’t know on any day if you will have any French Fries available. I mean, sometimes the customers are happy eating just hamburgers, but eventually, you need to be certain that French Fries will be available in addition to the hamburgers. What if the hamburger doesn’t fill up the customer? You can’t always rely on customers getting “special” desserts to fill them up! In addition, some customers only will be satisfied by eating French Fries!

Ultimately, Rex is someone not to be trusted, which really makes McDowell’s a restaurant that you can’t rely on. Consumers don’t ever know if they will be getting French Fries with their meals. So, it really is inevitable that I have to pick the Colts to win this game.

In my football preview for this year, I actually picked the Colts over the Giants, in a sick, twisted Manning Brother Bowl. So, while I continually refused to believe in the Colts during the playoffs (I picked against them every week), my intuition back in August proved to be superior. And it’s this same intuition from August that I will follow at this point. Of course it’s possible that Coach McDowell and the Bears serve up enough defense/hamburgers to not even need to worry about the inconsistent availability of any offense/French Fries. Or maybe the special treat of a special team touchdown from Hester will save the Bears. Look, for the Bears to succeed, not only do they need to create turnovers, but they also have to deal with the roller coaster ride that is Rex Grossman. Take a look at what happened this season, each week, with a turnover ratio:

Week 1.....+2..... beat Packers by 26 (Grossman = 1 TO)
Week 2.....+2..... beat Lions by 27 (Grossman = 0 TO)
Week 3..... 0...... beat Vikings by 3 (Grossman = 2 TO)
Week 4.....+2..... beat Seahawks by 31 (Grossman = 0 TO)
Week 5.....+4..... beat Bills by 33 (Grossman = 0 TO)
Week 6.....-4..... beat Cardinals by 1 (Grossman = 6 TO)
Week 8.....+5..... beat 49ers by 31 (Grossman = 0 TO)
Week 9.....-4..... lost to Dolphins by 18 (Grossman = 4 TO)
Week 10....0..... beat Giants by 18 (Grossman = 1 TO)
Week 11....+2..... beat Jets by 10 (Grossman = 0 TO)
Week 12....+1..... lost to Patriots by 4 (Grossman = 4 TO)
Week 13....0...... beat Vikings by 10 (Grossman = 3 TO)
Week 14....+1.... beat Rams by 15 (Grossman = 0 TO)
Week 15....+1.... beat Tampa by 3 (Grossman = 0 TO)
Week 16....+1.... beat Lions by 5 (Grossman = 0 TO)
Week 17....-5.... lost to Packers by 19 (Grossman = 4 TO)
Divisional rd.... -1... beat Seahawks by 3 (Grossman = 1 TO)
NFC Champ.... +4... beat Saints by 25 (Grossman = 0 TO)

Which means by my unofficial count, Grossman makes 1.44 TO per game. Ultimately, the Bears defense then needs to create (probably) at least 3 turnovers for Coach McDowell to win, and the odds are that they will not get it. I don’t believe that the Colts will turn it over that many times, in fact, the odds are that they won’t, because 3 turnovers is A LOT. Furthermore, since when does a copycat ever become #1 in anything? Coach McDowell has a large mountain to climb.

Suddenly, if you thought you saw a lot of Peyton Manning commercials in 2006, just wait until 2007 plays out! Peyton’s going to be pitching everything from cars, to microwave dinners, to male enhancement products!

Pick: Indy 27, Chicago 20

Last week: 0-2 (I have no idea what I’m doing, and actually, it’s my 2nd straight year of going 0-2 on the Final 4 weekend)
Playoffs: 4-6 (even worse than terrible).

No comments: