MMBSD: Playoffs and Bowls Oh My!

Well a 2 score+ bowl games and Wild Card weekend is in the books. That's a lot of football. Luckily the couch was up to handling myself, the otter and a case of bud. So what did we learn?

NFL
Surprise - Of all the playoff games this year the one that surprised me the most was Arizona's win over Atlanta. Yes in hindsight we should have considered rookie QB and team that went too far too fast but Arizona had struggled against anyone not in the NFC West (3-7) and certainly anyone with a rushing attack. Arizona showed a toughness that Wisenhunt had last seen in the Steel City in crushing turner and battering Ryan. Not going to say the Cardinals will go any further but a playoff home win in Arizona? First time for everything...

Unsaid Stories - A lot could be said about the San Diego v. Indy game (reffing, Manning v. Rivers, Manning v. 3-4 Ds, Rivera taking over the D, etc, etc) but one of the unsaid stories is depth. San Diego last year lost the leagues best running back backup (Turner) and nearly immediately lost Tomlinson. Yet Sproles not only held his own but was the star. It truly is an impressive feat for San Diego's draft acumen to have such depth on the team. With a half strength Addai Indy's rushing game just never seemed to show and that as much as anything killed the Colts

College Bowl Games
Outside of Charity Hodges (who does I believe sideline NASCAR reporting or something) I still can't figure out why they have sideline reporters. Its like you could have a magic eight ball of trite coach sayings instead of those painful halftime interviews.

Bowl games are odd entities as I've mentioned and as such gleaming truths from then might be near excercises in futility but a few storylines and truisms seem to be leaking out. While the Midwest conferences (MAC/Big 10) have barely escaped a zero win I would just chalk it up to the structural and inevitable collapse of that entire region than to anything serious like bad coaching.

The West via the Pac 10 and MWC were appeared to be under-rated while the Big 12s superiority (most notably Texas Tech's, Ok State's and Mizzou's stinkers) seems to be over-rated. While glorified exhibitions these games are important for recruiting and pre-season rankings (which are far more important for determining the national championship and big bowls than is typically acknowledged) .

Anyway predictions for the final BCS bowls
Texas 34 OSU 17

Florida 40 Oklahoma 21