Week 1: Finally!

I'm so excited for football, not even the steaming turd of a lineup given us in the Northeast could dampen my spirits on Sunday.

I guess things really started on Thursday, and I don't know what horrified me more: Pittsburgh stealing a game Tennessee should have won, or Cris Collinsworth's attempt to have Troy Polamalu's baby during the first half, only to be thwarted by Polamalu's knee injury.

Back to Sunday, we kicked things off with the 3rd straight year where the Texans' big jump to a playoff team turns into the Texans taking a giant dump on the field. As disappointed as Houston should be in its defense for letting Mark Sanchez look like a 7-year veteran, their offense is what really stood out to me. Ever since Houston traded for Matt Schaub, the book on Schaub has been, excellent skills, bad bone structure. Having selected him on 2 different fantasy squads, I was understandably nervous when he sprained his ankle in the 3rd preseason game. But when I heard he'd play in game 1, I figured the proverbial bullet had been dodged. He should have taken the day off, he was horrid. Now his coach admits he wasn't close to 100%. Yuck.

The other early game? Philly at Carolina. Now, the last time we all saw Jake Delhomme, he was being Arizona's MVP in Carolina's home playoff loss with 5INTs and a fumble lost. Jake's first drive: 7+ minutes and a touchdown. The rest of the first half? 4 INTs and a fumble lost. If there was such a thing as anti-fantasy football, Jake Delhomme would be the #1 overall draft pick. If he doesn't get benched, Steve Smith is going to knock out 12 of his teeth by week 5 at the latest. Luckily Carolina didn't give him an extension this offseason. Oops. As for Philly, the game was great...except for McNabb fracturing a rib. (One of those teams I have Schaub on? McNabb's my other QB...should have gotten that fantasy insurance.) The crazy thing? Jeff Garcia was available...and he chose Philly over Carolina. Chose to be a backup who maybe gets 3-4 games over the chance to be a starter by week 4? Interesting choice by Jeff.

Of course, this mess of 2 games was almost made up for by the 1 minute we got of the Denver-Cincinatti game, featuring the incredible defelction touchdown pass "to" Stokeley, followed by Gus Johnson's on-air climax. Gotta love Gus.

The Giants-Redskins game was a lot like last year's Giants-Redskins opener, with the slight change where Washington looked like an NFL team instead of a high school team, but still not really a threat to beat the Giants. The fake field goal with the punter running it in for the TD was exciting though.

Of course I didn't get to see it, but my Seahawks took advantage of playing one of the worst teams in the league (Rams), overcoming one of the sloppiest first quarters I've ever watched on NFL Gamecast to blank the Rams 28-0. Seattle was helped by St. Louis' inability to do anything on offense, a missed chip shot field goal by hero-turned-traitor Josh Brown, and a blocked field goal returned for a TD that was called back (wait for it) because the Rams had 12 men on the field.

Finally we got the best game of our day, Chicago vs Green Bay. In this game, we got the answer to the Jay Cutler question. No, he cannot manage the game and fit in to the defense and strong running game that exists on the Bears. Instead, the Bears will win or lose based on where and when Cutler feels like chucking the ball. Last night, that was frequently across his body into 3-4 Packer defenders. As you can imagine, bad things happened (4 INTs, a career high for Jay). Despite all this, Chicago was ahead with 2 minutes to go, thanks to the worst performance by a right tackle since the pudgy uncoordinated kind in Little Giants. But the 3rd and 1 playcall that led to a 60+ yard TD pass for the win? Outstanding call, and outstanding throw by Rodgers. If he goes on to have a good NFL career, he'll look back on that night as when he finally threw off the yoke of Brett Favre.

Now excuse me while I try and figure out why Buffalo isn't down by 21 points already.