My Preseason Predictions:
1.Washington Redskins (11-5)
2.New York Giants (9-7)
3.Philadelphia Eagles (8-8)
4.Dallas Cowboys (6-10)
Actual Standings:
1.Philadelphia Eagles (10-6)
2.Dallas Cowboys (8-8)
3.New York Giants (7-9)
4.Washington Redskins (3-13)
Dallas Cowboys: The Dallas Cowboys honestly are just comical. One of the few safe bets in such an unpredictable league is that every year that the Cowboys are going to come close to clinching a playoff spot then blow it in the final week of the season and this season was no exception. The fallman in 2013 that continued this unprecedented streak of mediocrity was the defense. It didn't matter if it was rushing or passing, the Cowboys defense couldn't stop it. The two leaders of the defense, DeMarcus Ware and Sean Lee, spent the season in a state of injury-related flux. Ware missed minimal time but played much of the season injured limiting his explosive presence as a pass-rusher finishing the year with a career-low 6 sacks. Lee was great when he was on-the-field, but missed 5 games during the year and when he was out, this already poor defense became the absolute worst in the league. Lee's absence exposed the vulnerability of the Cowboys secondary and also left a huge gap in the rushing defense as none of the other Cowboys linebackers are even close to as good of a tackler as Lee. The defensive play this year showed that Rob Ryan's coaching wasn't the problem in 2012, it was the overall lack of talent. With their horrible defensive play, The play of the offense is what kept them in the playoff hunt this year. Save for his typical December incompetence, Tony Romo had one of the best seasons of his career. He limited his mistakes this season throwing only 10 INT's and kept the Cowboys in a lot of games over the duration of the season that he wouldn't have in the past. Romo's year was especially impressive since everyone one of his receivers (save for Dez Bryant) had a disappointing season. Jason Witten wasn't quite the safety belt he's been in years past, Miles Austin was limited by injuries and rookie Terrance Williams started off very strong, but finished the season with a huge whimper. I'm a huge detractor of Romo, but I really can't give him that much grief for this season because he was great for much of the year. The Cowboys also managed to get a nice balance going this year thanks to a strong season from running back DeMarco Murray. Murray ran for 1,000 yards for the first time in his career and only missed 2 games, which is pretty impressive for the oft-injured Murray. The Cowboys are consistently subpar and as long as Jerry Jones is in charge of the team, I believe it's going to remain that way.
New York Giants: The Giants were unable to bounceback from the disappointment of 2012 and ended up having an even-worse 2013. The Giants underwhelming season is almost solely on the incompetence of the offensive unit. The offensive line, rushing game and the play of Eli Manning were an absolute mess this year. Manning made a ton of mistakes throwing a league-high 27 INT's and really could not shake the problem all season long. Manning's mistakes limited his deeply talented receiving corps that includes the likes of Victor Cruz, Hakeem Nicks, Rueben Randle and Brandon Myers to underwhelming seasons If you're throwing that many INT's, you aren't going to win games, no matter how much talent is on your roster. Manning's poor play was made worse by a running game that couldn't take flight. David Wilson did not live up to the hype in the slightest with abysmal numbers in his 1st season as a starter and when Wilson went down with a neck injury, veteran burnouts Peyton Hillis and Brandon Jacobs didn't do much to stop the bleeding (Jacobs's 100+ yard performance against the league-worst Bears run defense was a fluke that anyone with functional legs could've accomplished.) Even solid power back Andre Brown stumbled to end the season after a great initial return from injury in Week 10. Manning and the running game are the popular answers for the biggest problem with the 2013 Giants, but I honestly think the offensive line was their biggest issue. The combination of injuries to guard Chris Snee and center David Baas and poor play of veterans David Diehl, Will Beatty and rookie Justin Pugh led to an offensive line that just couldn't get the job done. Manning was getting frequently hurried forcing him to throw balls and they weren't opening very many holes for the rushing game, which really hindered the offense's ability to make plays. The Giants got a lot of flack for their poor offense, but no one really gave them any credit for their pretty tough defense. Their defense was 10th against the pass and 14th against the rush this year. Inside linebacker Jon Beason made a huge impact after coming over in a trade with the Panthers in mid-October, the allegedly-declining defensive end Justin Tuck quietly got 11 sacks and the secondary led by an All-Pro caliber season from safety Antrell Rolle was vastly improved. The Giants have veteran coaching great Tom Coughlin and ample talent on their roster , they just need a solid offensive line to help Manning regain his confidence and open up some holes for their running backs if they want to live up to their enormous potential.
Philadelphia Eagles: It's official: Chip Kelly's fast-paced, college-style offense translates to the NFL. There was certainly some bumps in the road when the team started off 3-5, but when the team started rolling on their way to a 7-1 record the last 2 months of the season, it was clear that Kelly was onto something special. The most surprising part who was led the team to this success. It was suspected that Michael Vick was going to captain this team with Kelly's run-happy offensive style and Vick's standing as a dual-threat quarterback, he seemed like the clear choice to run the team. While Vick looked alright starting the year off at quarterback, this offense didn't really thrive until Nick Foles took the reigns when Vick went down with an injury. Who would've thought the more traditional pocket-passer would be a better fit for this offense than one of the most explosive running quarterbacks in NFL history? Foles breathed new life into this franchise with his electric play showing incredible patience in the pocket that led to nearly-mistake free football (he threw 27 TD's and 2 INT's in 11 games this year good for the best TD: INT ratio in NFL history.) His arm strength and accuracy was able to make DeSean Jackson elite again, turned Riley Cooper into a legitimate threat and his surprising amount of ability in the rushing game made a wel-rounded force at the quarterback position. Foles certainly was serviceable in 2012 filling-in for Vick, but no one could've expected just how great he would become in 2013. Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie said in early November that the team needed a "franchise quarterback". The following Sunday, Foles went onto tie the NFL single-game touchdown record with 7 TD's, get a perfect passer rating of 158.3 and only 6 incompletions against the Raiders. Safe to say Mr. Lurie found his franchise quarterback and he was already on the roster. Of course, Foles wasn't the only factor in the Eagles high-powered offense this season, the rushing offense was number 1 in the league. LeSean McCoy hasn't looked more dominant in his career thanks to Kelly's system and a healthy offensive line anchored by newly-minted All-Pro tackle Jason Peters and guard Evan Mathis. The offensive line play was a far cry from the horrendous unit that team had in 2012 and deserve a lot of the credit for how well the Eagles ran the ball this year. McCoy hit the next level in 2013 and erased any doubt that he wasn't an elite running back. About the only place the Eagles faltered was in passing defense. Their secondary was stronger than their last-place ranking indicates because they were out there more than any other defense in the league thanks to their big-play offense, but this was still a secondary that had its fair share of problems, primarily in the middle of the field with safeties Patrick Chung and Nate Allen. As long as the magic of Kelly's offense and the play of Foles don't falter moving forward, there's a lot to be excited about in Philadelphia.
Washington Redskins: Moving on from the surprising success of the Eagles to the complete collapse of the Redskins. 2012 was the best year in over a decade for the Redskins: They won the division for the first time since 1999 and made their first playoff appearance since 2007, Robert Griffin III won Offensive Rookie of the Year and looked to be the undisputed franchise quarterback and the team was in full unison with nothing but optimism for the future. Fast forward to 2013: The locker room is in complete disarray, RG3's leadership, attitude and true skills are being questioned and they finish in dead last in the NFC East with a dismal 3-13 record. It was undoubtedly the biggest trainwreck of 2013 and Mike Shananhan was rightfully ousted as coach after the year was over due to his complete lack of control over the locker room situation and inability to get his team to perform on gameday. The 2013 Redskins got killed by Griffin's lack of an offseason. His rehabilitation from the torn ACL he suffered in the playoffs last year kept him from seeing game action until the regular-season opener and that just killed his confidence and put him in a funk that lead to his regression in 2013. You can't expect a 2nd year quarterback to build on a strong rookie year when he spends an entire offseason away from the speed and contact of the game. Griffin's confidence only suffered more because of sketchy offensive line play that allowed him to get his bell rung frequently. I fully expect Griffin to recover from his sophomore slump as he enters this offseason healthy and will have the time to focus on his mechanics instead of just recovering from a major injury. The problems weren't limited to Griffin and the toxic environment of the team, the defense quite simply couldn't make plays or get stops. There were some guys who played excellent (DeAngelo Hall, Ryan Kerrigan, Brian Orakpo), but for the most part this is a unit that struggled all year long. Their interior linebackers are getting old and it showed in the way they got crushed on the run for much of this year and their secondary save for Hall, was wildly incompetent in slowing down the opponents passing game. Amidst all the turmoil, star running back Alfred Morris and wide receiver Pierre Garcon managed to put up great numbers that were overlooked due to how horrible the team was. Morris put up another great year with 1,275 yards and once again finished in the top 5 leading rushers in the league. Despite Griffin's overall struggles, still finished 8th in the league in receiving yards with 1,346. The Redskins have holes in the offensive line and much of the defense, but going into 2014 with a healthy Griffin, a new head coach in Jay Gruden and an elite running back/wide receiver on the roster, there is certainly enough of a reason to maintain hope for the future of this storied but often-troubled franchise.
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