A New York, New York Super Bowl was Monday’s rage in New York, of course. Stranger things have happened throughout this wacko NFL season that ended with the Giants and Jets grabbing the spotlight for this weekend’s wild-card playoffs.
No NFC team enters the playoffs with a longer winning streak than the modest four games of the Giants. No team enters with a hotter quarterback than the Jets’ Chad Pennington, this year’s edition of New England’s Tom Brady, Baltimore’s Trent Dilfer and St. Louis’ Kurt Warner–the last three Super Bowl winners from nowhere, all backups before their seasons began.
“You can’t play much better than he did,” Green Bay Packers coach Mike Sherman said after watching Pennington pick apart the Pack 42-17 Sunday.
Pennington has the highest passer efficiency rating of all playoff quarterbacks and sounds not the least daunted by the task ahead.
“We’re not complacent about where we are,” Pennington said. “We’re not focused on just winning games. We’re about championships.”
The New York teams haven’t made the playoffs together since 1986.
Teams forced to play the wild-card games traditionally are cannon fodder for the real playoffs that begin Jan. 11-12 with the arrival of Philadelphia, Tampa Bay, Oakland and Tennessee after their coveted bye weeks.
Only three teams without the advantage of playoff byes have won Super Bowls since the wild-card round started in 1978. But two of them were in the last five years–Baltimore in 2000 and Denver in 1997–indicating the serendipitous nature of today’s football.
All four wild-card games are familiar matchups.
– The Indianapolis Colts at the Jets (Saturday, 3:30 p.m.) is the renewal of former AFC East foes and the first game between Jets coach Herman Edwards and his former mentor at Tampa Bay, Tony Dungy. They are the only two African-American coaches in the NFL. It is the first Colts-Jets postseason game since Joe Namath’s famous guarantee in Super Bowl III.
– The Atlanta Falcons at the Green Bay Packers (Saturday, 7 p.m.) is a replay of the season opener won by the Packers 37-34 in overtime. The game marked the coming out party of Michael Vick, the quarterback the Falcons finally found 10 years after prematurely trading Brett Favre to Green Bay. Both the Packers and Falcons are coming off disappointing losses that could shake their confidence.
– The Cleveland Browns at the Pittsburgh Steelers (Sunday, noon) is the 102nd meeting between the two cities but only the second in the postseason. It is the first playoff game for the new expansion Browns. The Browns are the only playoff team whose quarterback was knocked out with an injury during the weekend. Tim Couch broke his right leg and will be replaced by Kelly Holcomb. The Steelers have won five straight over the Browns, but this year’s wins were by three points each, one in overtime.
– The Giants at the San Francisco 49ers (Sunday, 3:30 p.m.) is a replay of the Thursday night NFL season opener won by the 49ers 16-13 in the Meadowlands. The two teams have met six times in playoffs but not since 1993, when the 49ers prevailed 44-3.
Jets comeback: The Jets are the most intriguing entry of the bunch because they have the worst record at 9-7, the biggest chip on their shoulders and the luckiest story to tell.
After a start of 1-4 and 2-5, Edwards got indignant at questions about playing out the season and preparing for next year.
“I wasn’t smart enough to know and the players weren’t dumb enough to listen. It goes to show what perseverance will do,” Edwards said.
They were on the verge of being eliminated on Sunday until the Miami Dolphins blew a 24-13 lead with 4:49 remaining in New England in a collapse that required, the New York Post reported, “every cell of their coach’s (Dave Wannstedt) brain to freeze up.”
It made Pennington look like Namath. After the third-year pro who couldn’t beat out 38-year-old Vinny Testaverde finally got the job at 2-5, he promised the playoffs.
“We’re going to make history,” Pennington predicted.
“It was almost like watching a little kid who has big dreams,” Jets veteran running back Curtis Martin said. “But there was something about Chad. He spoke with so much conviction.
“I think what really helped is we looked at him as that little brother and we wanted to protect him, and that took our game to a whole other level.”
That level dropped precipitously in Champaign in a 20-13 loss to the Bears two weeks ago, a memory erased by the flattening of the Packers.
Pennington was elected the Jets’ MVP before the game, then celebrated with four touchdown passes. Guard Dave Szott was moved to recall playing in Kansas City with Joe Montana in his last years.
More Top Picks Best Drafting Tables For Artists
“Joe got rid of the ball so quickly and he read defenses so quickly and that reminded me of Chad,” Szott said.
In one day, Pennington beat Favre and reminded onlookers of both Namath and Montana, strong stuff for a kid with nine starts, the perfect centerpiece for this postseason.
Driver, Sharper questions: The Packers aren’t ruling out receiver Donald Driver for their playoff game Saturday against the Falcons.
Sherman said an MRI exam Monday confirmed the diagnosis of a bruised and strained right shoulder for Driver, who was injured on a reverse in the second quarter of the Packers’ loss to the Jets.
The offense wasn’t the same without Driver, who caught 70 passes for 1,064 yards and nine touchdowns in his first season as a starter.
The Packers also are hoping to get back Pro Bowl safety Darren Sharper, who missed the Jets game with a sprained right knee. Without Sharper, who finished third in the league with seven interceptions, Green Bay surrendered touchdowns on all six of the Jets’ trips inside the 20-yard line.
Sharper has said he’ll play Saturday, but he still has swelling and is walking with a limp, not a good sign when the task is to chase Vick.
“I can’t honestly say one way or the other at this point,” Sherman said.
Wannstedt aftermath: Wannstedt had explaining to do after his Dolphins blew an 11-point lead with 4:49 left in New England.
He and offensive coordinator Norv Turner were under heavy criticism for not running Ricky Williams to kill the clock, especially after the Patriots had closed to within three points and the Dolphins were pinned deep.
“We needed to make a first down after the kick when the ball was on the 4-yard line,” Wannstedt said. “They had eight guys in the box, and we double checked it this morning and Norv and I reaffirmed it in our minds that the decision that was made was one that gave us the best chance to do that.
“They were in soft coverage and they had three timeouts and the two-minute warning. So the clock was going to get stopped if you handed it off. It wasn’t like we were going to run the clock out on them. The key was to make some plays and try to get some first downs and try to get it out there a little bit so that when we kicked the ball, we could flip the field position on them.”
The Dolphins went three and out and the Patriots tied it after a poor punt.
“What is so disappointing about it is that in games that you win the turnover battle and you rush for over 200 yards and the opponent’s longest play is a 20-yard pass or a pass interference penalty, the question comes to mind, how do you not win that game?” Wannstedt asked.