CubColtPacer

My house just went crazy! The Colts have lost the toss in every single playoff game, so we all wanted to lose it again-We lost the toss!!!! :D

The Bears definitely have more of a support there than the Colts do, if that be because they have more true fans there or they have people cheering for the underdog, I don't know.

Both these teams look pretty focused.

If Harper's 75% the Colts are lucky. I'd test him if I was Turner... I'm not sure I'd let Harper start-I'd rather just have him as the nickel corner for this game if he's not completely healthy.

No it won't. The Bears are a team that runs it to throw it, while the Colts are a team that throws it to run it. So, the weather will affect the Colts moreso then the Bears. The Bears have no problem with running the ball all game, considering that is their strength. True, but the Colts have been much better at just standing up and running it down an opponents throats lately. The wind won't affect the Colts passing game much-they simply don't go deep all that much. I see the wind as being a pretty neutral factor right now.

He was the QB coach-he's still officially listed as that, but really he's simply the top assistant to the team at this point.

I certainly hope not, and I hope my opinion doesn't change tomorrow.:D

I think that's a pretty safe bet. While Indy is worse on kickoffs then punts, punt returners stats are inflated against the Colts because Hunter typically kicks it about 60 yards in the air, which give the returners a little room to run. I hope he kicks it higher and shorter-but that strategy will have to be seen.

We weren't the best defense in the conference though, were we? Yeah, you were. 3rd best in the NFL, first in the NFC (Baltimore and New England were ahead of you in scoring defense overall).

The refs sure didn't put the whistles away at halftime. This is excessive. This reminds me of the two games at the beginning of the season (the preseason NIT games)-one touch and its a foul.

Whistles on every possession is really bogging down the Indiana-Iowa game on both sides. It's 37-37 at halftime. Silly watch: Iowa crowd starts chanting Airball, Airball after the IU player is short on his attempt from 3/4 court as time expires in the half :D

I agree that there are things beyond a GM's control. But, some of those things that are now beyond the GM's control are things that could have been within the control of the GM prior to lapses in judgment. For example, last year Greg Maddux was traded for Cesar Izturis. I'm sorry, but if that's the best the Dodgers have to offer for Maddux, I'd have let Maddux finish the season as a Cub. Just how valuable was Izturis to the Dodgers? They already had Kent and Furcal in the middle infield, and had already traded for Julio Lugo. Izturis was bench fodder. Hendry didn't play hardball. He caved like an umbrella in a wind storm. A complete nitpick-the Dodgers didn't trade for Lugo until right after the Izturis deal was done, and they were starting him everyday after he came back from his inury. So at the time of that deal, he was a starter for him, although struggling mightily trying to come back from the major surgery.

Even as you pointed out though-two of those Super Bowl games games, the defenses were practically the same-all it took was one garbage time drive in the regular season in one game, and only 2 out of the last 4 best defenses would have won the Super Bowl. Second, even though you posted the QB rankings for the losers, you didn't for the winners. I bet that the best QB won at least one of those games, and possibly a second. Third, the Bears have bad trend lines themselves. Common opponents favors the Colts, the overall AFC record against the NFC, and the fact that AFC playoff teams were a combined 21-3 against the NFC this year (I'm pretty sure of this stat, but it is second-hand). Fourth, the Colts playoff defense is different then the regular season-with Bob Sanders in there, it's like it's a completely different squad taking the field then before. Fifth, the Colts have been breaking trend lines all year. No team has finished the year as poorly as the Colts did and come back to go to the Superbowl. No team has made the Superbowl with as bad of a run defense ranking as the Colts. They took out Baltimore, and improved the dismal record of dome teams outside. Tom Brady was 12-1 as a playoff starter, and 10-0 inside a dome-the Colts broke those two trend lines as well. The Super Bowl won't be nearly as hard of a trend line as trends the Colts have faced previously. With that said, this should be a great game. The Bears have a great squad, and 1 or 2 big plays should make the difference. I'm confident enough in my squad to think they will make the plays, but the Bears are more than capable of making them as well.

I'm not sure, but it's a good problem to have. The team has left no depth behind players like Prior and Miller for years (with Wood being Miller now), and now that they have depth, the question becomes what happens if everyone is healthy. I hope the result though of that question is that whoever is pitching worse, Miller or Marquis, gets sent to the bullpen and becomes the long man.

I'm curious what the Wisconsin stats look like (Packers) and what the southern states look like (Saints). Wisconsin: 67/34 (some rounding issues there) colts Louisiana and Mississippi are both about 80/20 colts Looks like there's bitter Saints face too That's not necessarily the case-there are a great amount of Manning fans in that area too (which always skews polls like that) because of his growing up in NO-with the connections to Peyton and Archie, they'd vote for the Colts even if they hadn't just lost to the Bears.

Many of the people in the media that I've heard pick the Colts actually are saying that they think the Colts are a better overall team right now. For example, I heard both John Elway and Chris Simms say this on the Dan Patrick show. Well personally I think the Bears D is better than the Colts, the Colts O is better than the Bears, the Bears special teams overall is better than the Colts special teams. That to me would constitute the Bears being a better overall team. It's hard to say. The Colts are something like a 9 on offense, a 6 on defense, and a 7 on special teams. The Bears are a 6 on offense, an 8 on defense, and a 9 on special teams-the Bears numbers add up to more, but the 3 units are not equal, nor are they always needed to be strong. For example, the Colts don't need such a good punt or kick returner because their offense is so good-they don't need a guy like Hester to score TD's, they just need a player who won't fumble. A player like Hester who scores more often and fumbles more often may actually hurt the Colts overall as a team even though he is obviously better than anything the Colts have to offer. The Colts defense is designed to play with a lead-the better the offense does, the more valuable the defense is. It really is hard to isolate one unit from another like that because teams usually build their units to feed off of what their best unit does.

That's what I was about to just come here and post :D

At the same time, he puts the Bears at 28 points, so it's not the Bears offense that he thinks will struggle in the game on Sunday.

I thought the Colts won the AFC :-k Might as well be "The Bears .v. the World, since EVERYBODY---outside of Chicago and the fanbase of the Bears---has given the Bears NO SHOT at beting the Colts. Except for the 2 of 6 people on CBS sportsline, the guy on espn.com, Mike Greenberg, 3 of the 4 people on Cold Pizza... yup you got it, nobody thinks the Bears are gonna win. I sincerely doubt that the nation will be in mourning either-just because most of the nation may be picking the Colts doesn't mean there won't be plenty of people rooting for the Bears on Sunday.

Strange they would set up a parade for the losing team. :wink: I don't dare say that directly yet, no matter how I feel :D

Chicago has announced that they will be holding a ticker-tape parade on Tuesday afternoon.

Eli Holman took the floor last night for his high school for the first time in a long time (the IU recruit who was shot a couple weeks ago)-he had 27 points, 12 rebounds, and 9 blocked shots in his first game back.

Don't worry though-3 of 4 people on Cold Pizza picked you, you're fine :D

I realize that. But how did he make more of a difference in the SF game than the Detroit game? The stats are very similar (including the score). Unless you're talking about the second Detroit game... I was talking about the first one-that game is right on the border. The only reason I gave it to him is that 17 of the 24 points in the first half came on drives that started on the Chicago 30 or worse. The TO's helped Detroit not score, but it didn't put the offense right in position to score, and Grossman led them down the field 3 times in the first half to help make the game a blowout.

I'm not saying he's awful overall and should be benched! I'm saying that for most of the Saints game, Grossman was awful-that's it. Although I do think that if you did that, the only games where Grossman really needed to play well and did were the Detroit, Seattle, Giants, Rams, and Tampa Bay. Why leave out Buffalo and SF? Well, the SF game, they gave the Bears the ball on the SF 15, the SF 41, and the SF 13, and the SF 24-and that was just barely to the first part of the second quarter. I don't think any quarterback could have lost that game with the way the Chicago defense and special teams were playing. The Buffalo game wasn't quite as bad, but the Bears still started at the 50 or better 4 times in the first half. That, combined with the Bears shutting Buffalo out till a late meaningless TD, meant that it was the defense who won the game, not really anything the offense did. Maybe he couldn't have lost it, but he could have had the same kind of game that he did with the Saints where you've told us all that he was "awful" in the first half. If he could be awful there, I don't think you can discount when he plays well in a similar game. (Admittedly, it wasn't the NFC championship, but the early turnover scenario was similar.) Well, the question wasn't which games he played well in, but rather the ones he made a "huge difference in winning". Grossman certainly played well in both of those games, that is for certain. Sorry for the confusion.