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House of Wild Cards: Takeaways from the NFL’s wacky playoff weekend

The Steelers and Ben Roethlisberger will need to rely heavily on Le'Veon Bell. (Image: SteelCityHobbies/Wikimedia Commons.)
Expert
11th January, 2016
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From Adam Jones losing his cool to Blair Walsh and Brian Hoyer losing their minds, it was an ugly, error-stricken, regret-filled first weekend of the NFL playoffs which saw all four wild card teams ‘triumph’.

Here are four takeaways from the chaos.

1. A Cincinnati meltdown
Give the Bengals credit, they had no interest whatsoever in an ‘honourable loss’. They threw honour out the door with the baby and the bathwater on Saturday, losing to the Steelers in the most ignominious way possible.

Losing a game on one personal foul is one thing, but losing it on two consecutive personal fouls is, well, two things. In a playoff game no less.

Vontaze Burfict’s hit on a defenceless Antonio Brown was as dirty as it was mindless. And then, as if he took offence to the possibility of being for once upstaged at mindlessness, Adam ‘Pacman’ Jones ended his team’s season with a ludicrously ill-timed tirade against Steelers assistant coach Joey Porter.

On top of all this, the Bengals fumbled when they were trying to run out the clock, and they allowed Ben Roethlisberger, who couldn’t throw the ball more than ten yards with a busted shoulder, to march down the field. Take a bow Cincinnati, you are and forever will be the kings of being dunces.

2. The Blair Walsh Project
Forget about the end of “Blair Witch”, Blair Walsh and Vikings fans are going to be seeing that hooked left 27-yarder in their nightmares for decades to come. If this had happened to any other team there might be an element of comedy – a Tony Romo in Seattle corollary – to a team’s season ending on a missed chip shot that was six yards closer than an extra point.

But Minnesota has suffered so dearly. From the infamous Gary Anderson miss to the Brett Favre interception that cost the Vikings a trip to the Super Bowl, Minnesota just can’t catch a break. It’s not like the Timberwolves or Twins have eased the pain either.

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Add Sunday’s loss to the pile of emotionally crippling defeats in the Twin Cities. The Vikings had the Seahawks on the ropes, pouring ice water on Russell Wilson’s flames and picking on Kam Chancellor in the secondary. But as is their custom, when they had a chance to turn the knife they slipped and ended up impaling themselves on it. Again.

In perfect Minnesota fashion, their loss was sealed by two grave errors from two of their most reliable players, Adrian Peterson, one of the greatest players in franchise history, and Walsh, their star kicker. Peterson’s fumble and Walsh’s miss ensured that the Vikings’ Super Bowl drought will enter its 47th year. Well, at least you’ve got Karl Anthony Towns, Minnesota.

3. Brian Hoyer puts on his Jake Delhomme costume
There’s something magical about a quarterback having the ultimate meltdown on the biggest stage. It’s like a tragic farce, where the errors outdo themselves in comical magnitude. It’s a crescendo effect, with each mistake making the next one even more inevitable.

That was Brian Hoyer’s life on Saturday, as he gifted the viewing public the biggest quarterback disintegration since Jake Delhomme had the worst birthday in history in January 2009.

There’s something about quarterback confidence where when it goes, it goes straight to hell. A rattled quarterback begins to look no different than you or I out there when he starts to lose it, throwing passes as physically timid as they are mentally incomprehensible. Even with the Chiefs failing to capitalise early, the Texans had no hope of competing with the way Hoyer was playing.

The Chiefs, meanwhile, gifted a virtual bye into the next round, will tackle the Patriots full of confidence. Riding an 11-game winning streak, Kansas City will also take a lot of heart from the 41-14 beat-down they put on the Patriots last season. They match up well against New England, and while Alex Smith and a wounded or absent Jeremy Maclin won’t strike much fear in Patriots fans, the KC defence absolutely will.

4. The panacea of Washington’s defence
When in trouble, head to Washington, Mr. Rodgers. After struggling for the better part of three months, the Green Bay offence came to life on Sunday, gashing Washington on the ground.

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The Packers looked the liveliest they’ve been in a long time, but this game was more about Washington’s raging mediocrity. Kirk Cousins is a nice story, but the reality is that Washington didn’t beat a team with a winning record all season, losing all four of their match-ups by double digits.

Washington did well to win the NFC East, but their triumph was less about them and more about Romo’s injuries, Philadelphia’s meltdown and Tom Coughlin’s year-long struggle with late game senility.

Tempered expectations are always in order after wild card weekend, as we tend to overrate the teams we’ve just seen win. The recent success of the Giants, Ravens and Packers on their Super Bowl marches, which began on wild card weekend have only played into this.

Maybe Green Bay figured something out against Washington, but more likely is that they simply figured out that Washington aren’t very good at football, and they’re about to head to Arizona where they lost by 30 points a fortnight ago.

It’s difficult to separate the truth from the noise on the NFL’s first playoff weekend. Maybe we overrated the Seahawks and underrated the Packers. Perhaps one of the Steelers or Chiefs just took their first step on a journey to the Super Bowl.

We don’t know, and we’ll only know with the clear lenses of retrospect. At the end of it all, there’s only one truth we can extract from this weekend beyond a doubt: the Bengals are really dumb.

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