So you guys are probably wondering, and rightfully so, what exactly is Automatic First Down? Well, Automatic First Down or AFD, for those if you that enjoy acronyms, is a new weekly column here on Sports Two about our favorite game. Football. No, this isn’t your run of the mill football column. This isn’t going to tell you who won last week’s game or how many yards Peyton Manning threw for. You can find that out yourself, you don’t need me telling you. If you do need me to tell you then you are wearing the wrong undergarments. A diaper would be more appropriate. I’m just kidding, but I pride my self on delivering content that won’t be found anywhere else. This was a lesson I learned at a young age. You see I had a job writing for this golf magazine. Instead of writing about my personal experiences on the green I chose to write about Ángel Cabrera’s US Open win. It was a disaster. It turned out that the editor thought I copied it from somewhere. I didn’t. But there is only that much to write about one persons golf win. And most of that was already taken by big news agencies. So it looked like I had just copied and pasted. Anyone can write the news (they’re called tabloids) but it takes a real journalist to deliver that news in his own way. Enter me. This new column will be published every weekend either Friday or Saturday. It would be great if you all could check it out and I will be very strict to myself on getting it to you in time. If I miss a week please feel free to come to my house, break down the door and haul away my TV so I can’t watch football anymore. You see I can’t live without watching football so it will never come to a faceless James Bond drop-kicking my plasma.Ten Yards 1. Terrelle Pyror will be good in the NFL. Maybe it’s the Buckeye in my writing right now but I see him as a good player. Maybe not as a quarterback but as an NFL player he will excel. Sure, he has hurdles in front of him. But who doesn’t? Everyone has hurdles in life but the people that overcome them are champions. Or track runners. And since Pyror doesn’t run track that means he is a champion. He might have hit the self-destruct button when he went to Oakland. The Raiders aren’t exactly known as a factory to build young players. More like a place to crush dreams. In the last ten years only two first picks by the Raiders have blossomed into stars. Those two players are Nnamdi Asomugha and Darren McFadden. One of them finally got fed up and left to a real Super Bowl contender. The other wasn’t played in his rookie season despite being praised by the media as the most complete Raider rookie. Another player from the Raider factory to kill dreams is now considered as the biggest draft bust of all time. His name is JaMarcus Russell. As for his game? It sucks. How’d the Raiders screw that one up? He was great in Baton Rouge and as soon as he hit Oakland. BUST. Of course the Raiders did do one thing good in that draft selecting Zach Miller. But he too left the not so promising fields in Oakland. That being said I believe Terrelle Pyror will be able to buck that trend and perform well. He is no stranger to adversity. Heck, he played in the tainted era of college football in a program that is spelled Ohio State Football*. While him and fellow rookie Cam Newton have different views on tattoos they are roughly the same player and everyone jumped out of their seats handing Newton a Heisman and a couple million dollars. Pyror got squat. Truthfully he was a better quarterback. He had three good seasons while Cam Newton had one great season. Pyror did not get much glory at Ohio State. Of course since he was a quarterback for a national football team on par with the NFL he got glory. But not a lot of it. In High School though he was the greatest thing since sliced bread. These up’s and down’s in life will make Pyror work hard in the NFL and finally succeed. But if he can’t there are thirty-one other teams! 2. The Buccaneers will be good, er elite, this year. Yeah, I said it. Someone had to. Josh Freeman might be my favorite quarterback in the NFL after Tom Terrific. He’s young and dedicated and heavily underrated. But he won’t be throwing to a fan in the stands. He has a young speedy receiver in Mike Williams who basically throws the ball to himself. Then they have a young, fast, powerful back in LeGarrette Blount. Him having another 1,000 yard season is inevitable and will complement the passing game perfectly. Did you notice a trend? All the players I mentioned are young and can only go up from here. The Bucs can only go up from here. DeQuan Bowers and Adrian Clayborn will infuse energy into the defense that will propel them into being an efficient unit. The whole world expects Tampa Bay to regress after an amazing 2010 season. Well then I’m from another planet. Raheem Morris has finally got this crew in 2002 form, they have a trusty leader and expect the Bucs to have their swagger back in 2011. 3. The Patriots will not win the Super Bowl. If I were Marty McFly I would tell you who will win. Sadly, I’m not. But I can tell you that the Pats will not be dancing on their rival’s field in January. As a fan of New England it pains me to say this but they are still under the curse. Like the Beast in Beauty and the Beast they will never be able to return to their old form. No matter what. The curse all began a few days before the Super Bowl against the Giants. The New York Times broke the story of Spygate just days before the epic culmination of the NFL season. In the days leading up to the Super Bowl many other news organizations such as the Boston Herald and ESPN caught on and since then the story blew up. The story is history. The Patriots were fined for videotaping New York Jets' defensive coaches' signals during a September 9, 2007 game from a sideline location, an act deemed by NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell to be in violation of league rules. They were never forgiven for this act. The Patriots lost the Super Bowl and have never won a playoff game since. That streak will continue this year. Sorry but karma’s a b*@&%h! 4. The Dolphins will be god-awful this year. Surprise? Not by much. While many have the Dolphins finishing in third in the AFC East they will slip much farther then that. The Bills are better then the Dolphins. Just ask the Dolphins quarterback. Oh wait, that’s right, they don’t have a quarterback! Fine then ask their every down running back. They don’t have one of those either? Oh shucks. How can a football team compete if they don’t have two very important skill players? They can’t. I have the ‘Phins going 2-14, their only two wins coming against the likes of Washington and Buffalo. They play New England and the Jets twice, San Diego, Dallas, Philadelphia, the Giants and the Chiefs. They also have some games that could go either way such as battles versus the Browns, Broncos and the Raiders. But they don’t have the personal to compete in a loaded AFC East. So if you want to keep a Miami Dolphin out of your yard just put up goal posts! 5. Madden dropped this week! I would have to say it’s the second best football game of the year considering FIFA hasn’t come out yet. But College Football 12 was much better. That being said I am a loyal Madden fan and will continue to fail tests thanks to the genius power of John Madden. But Madden promised to not rest on the fact that has a monopoly over what it does and to actually deliver. Did they deliver? In a word, yes. But there could have been changes to help make the game better. They tried to upgrade this year and features such as Free-Agency Bidding, Cuts and the Stadiums will bring a McDonalds smile on any gamers face. But the commentary, the scouting system and the plays don’t exactly hit the mark. It wasn’t great but it wasn’t terrible either. It is about the same that we have come to expect from the illustrious franchise but I know that I will be playing it for hours on end. 6. The Seahawks will win the NFC West. But they will have competition! Yes while the punching bag of the NFL may be a Napoleon compared to Shaq, the four teams will have competition in themselves. The Cardinals have the new dynamic duo of Kevin Kolb and Larry Fitzgerald but they will have competition from a couple misplaced Vikings- Travaris Jackson and Sidney Rice. When Rice is 100 percent he is one of the best wide receivers in the league and he knows the ins and outs of his quarterback, which should make for an interesting offense. They also keep their old offensive coordinator. Jackson should be in good shape, trade Marshawn Lynch for Adrian Peterson, Zach Miller for Visanthe Shiancoe and Jackson has his old team back. While the Rams will be improved this year does anybody see Sam Bradford making the playoffs? Sure he will have Mike Sims-Walker but learning a new offensive coordinator in a shortened period of time is very hard to do for a young quarterback. Age is slowly creeping up on Stephen Jackson and while his numbers have not taken a hit yet they will. As for the 49ers Jim Harbaugh comes into a situation completely different then Stanford. He doesn’t have Andrew Luck but instead Alex Smith. Things like this take a while, maybe next year for the 49ers. But not this year, this year is the Year of the Seahawks. 7. The Colts will not make the playoffs. Yes for the first time in nine years the Indianapolis horseshoes will be watching footballs rite of passage from the couch. Sure, the Jaguars and Titans don’t pose quite a threat in the AFC South but the Texans are lunar opposites. Every year Houston is a darling preseason pick and every year they crumble under the Texas heat. I’m not going to be quick to say that this is the year for Houston but all the pieces are there like pawns in Gary Kubiak’s hand. Matt Schaub, Andre Johnson and Arian Foster are the best quarterback, receiver, and running back triplet in the NFL right now. Also, the Texans boosted their defense by signing more then capable coordinator in Wade Phillips and nabbed cornerback Johnathan Joseph to help a weak secondary. Echoing Smash Mouth “I’m a believer.” Meanwhile, things don’t look to good in Indy. This team is flawed, heavily flawed. But it didn’t matter when a healthy Peyton Manning was sitting behind center calling audibles like a teenage girl on a new cell phone. But now that he isn’t at one hundred percent the Colts will relay on the supporting cast to step up. Cricket…Cricket… come on the Colts must have some supporting cast. OK, they don’t. Joseph Addai is old in running back years and has never been the same since 2007. Age is not only banging on the Colts receiving corps’ door, it’s inviting itself in and having a cup of coffee. Peyton Manning makes these guys look good. Curtis Painter, who is too unproven, and Kerry Collins, who is on life support, makes these guys look human. And don’t even get me started on the defense! The team is in two words: washed-up. If a blue-faced horse tells you the Colts will get the wild card to ride into the playoffs then that’s as wack as the Lonely Island. There is no doubt that the two AFC wild cards will be either the Jets/Patriots or the Steelers/Ravens. Basically the teams that come in second in the AFC East and North will grab the wild card slot. Even the team that comes in second in the AFC West (Chargers or Chiefs) could grab the spot. But not the Colts. Their time is up. 8. I liked watching preseason football games. Now don’t get me wrong. I love the regular season much, much more but the preseason games were actually pretty watchable. From the first quarter which watched like an actual regular season game until the fourth quarter that watched like a high school game these exhibition matches were highly entertaining. It was almost like talking a time travel to the different levels of football. The first and second quarters were the NFL in which most of the starters played. After halftime the third quarter felt like watching a college match, as most of the players were rookies or second year players. And finally we would get to high school football with completely unknown players trying to make a name for themselves. In the regular season most fans and I know every single player. We know who is on the line and who just got a sack. But in the preseason games I felt like a little kid with apple pie when Seattle quarterback Josh Portis would race into my memory. I felt like a scout when I saw an undrafted player play like he was Joe Montana’s heir or when I first round player throws the ball like the offspring of Ryan Leaf and JaMarcus Russell. While regular season games mean something these games bring fun back into the No Fun League. 9. Carson Palmer will never get out of Cincinnati. He deserves to. But he won’t. All because of a guy named Mike Brown. The Bengals owner refuses to let the 31 year old go as he has four more seasons on his contract. Now this is just plain wrong, Palmer has been one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL for the past three or four years. He is willing to walk away from tens of millions of dollars just so he doesn’t have to play for the Bengals. Someone please do something to release Palmer from the grasps of Brown. He will get money or players for Carson if he trades him away. Right now Carson is slowly dying in Ohio when he could be playing for a team that doesn’t hate him. The funny part is that Brown let wide receiver Chad Ochocinco go to New England. Ochocinco promptly tweeted “God is great. This is heaven” about the move. Now I feel happy for the guy but shouldn’t Palmer get the same treatment? Not according to Brown. That is why Carson Palmer will be stuck in Cincinnati like an overweight tourist is stuck in quicksand. 10. I love this video and you will too. Nicknamed “The Ball” it captures, perfectly, what football means to everyone. This game is the most rewarding one in the world and I love when advertisements go beyond their product to give us a great piece of art. If I were teaching a class on American Culture I would start out the lecture with this video. Everyone from every different race, gender, and age was touched by football and the video captured what it meant to them. From the joys of parenthood, to the wonders of childhood, to the freedom in the workplace, to the great feeling of a big game, to the love of a family gift and the dedication of practice this film had it all. All the different emotions it made me feel are indescribable so I would strongly suggest checking it out. The song they got hit it right on the mark so you betcha I’m going to Google Josh Ritter right now! [video=youtube;qWugWaEIlrk]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qWugWaEIlrk&feature=channel_video_title[/video] Until next week keep drafting football fans!
