Carolina not so LUCKy

By Dan Rodgers

Stanford QB Andrew Luck has declared that he will be returning to school for his senior season. This decision is said not to change after Luck learned that his coach, Jim Harbaugh, signed a contract to be the head coach of the San Francisco 49ers.

Harbaugh signed a five year deal on Friday, worth approximately $25 million. It was speculated, especially by me, that he would choose San Fran because of the proximity to Stanford.

Back to Luck, who was said by many to be the consensus No. 1 overall pick of the 2011 NFL Draft. The Carolina Panthers have that pick and it was widely speculated that they wanted to take Luck even though they drafted Jimmy Clawful in the second round of last year's draft.

Carolina will now have to completely rethink their draft strategy because the other QBs available (Mallet, Newton, Locker, etc) aren't considered to be No. 1 status.

I respect Luck for his decision while other people have been ripping him a new one for it. One guy called in on 105.7 The Fan and said he would tell his son to go pro and get the money while he could.

I guess I understand why it would make sense to go pro. If Luck tears his ACL his draft stock will plummet. However, even a bad season could hurt him since he is already the consensus No. 1 pick there is nowhere to go but down. However, you have to respect a kid who knows he will probably be the first overall pick and is staying in school even though his coach has already left as well.

Good luck Luck...

Rodgers That

Black Monday...or not?

By Dan Rodgers

For those of you who are not accustomed to NFL terminologies or sayings, one being: Black Monday.

Black Monday refers to the Monday following week 17 of the NFL season. This is because on that Monday, the most coaching-related firings take place around the NFL.

However, there has been less firings than usual this past Monday. Many people believe this is partly due to the lack of Collective Bargaining Agreement set up for the future. Owners are not prepared to fire a coach and pay a new one if there won't be football next season. That doesn't mean coaches haven't been fired though!

Wade Phillips, Brad Childress, Mike Singletary and Josh McDaniels were among the coaches fired during the season. Tom Cable joined them on Black Monday.

Some surprises were the coaches that weren't fired. Gary Kubiak and Tony Sparano were two coaches who were expected to lose their jobs but haven't so far. Jim Harbaugh is one of the top candidates for some of the openings, but Minnesota and Dallas have already announced the decision to stick with their interim coaches.

We could see a few more firings depending on how the CBA situation plays out during the offseason.

Rodgers That

NFL history made, good or bad?

By Dan Rodgers

The Sunday night football game was left open so that the NFL could put whatever game they wanted there based on how important it was. Well, the game that was moved was the St. Louis Rams @ Seattle Seahawks. The winner of the game would win the division and the loser would go home.

To my surprise, Seattle played fairly well and their defense came to life. The Rams couldn't do much on offense, even though it didn't look like they even tried. It wasn't an offensive explosion or anything, but the game was still exciting because of what it meant.

Many people were rooting for St. Louis because if they had won the game they would have finished 8-8. However, because Seattle won the game, they finished the season 7-9 and won the division. This is the first time in NFL history that a sub-.500 team has made the playoffs. Twice before an 8-8 team won their division.

Due to this, talk has emerged regarding reorganizing the divisions (this would never happen); there has also been talks about where the Wild Card games are played. There are discussions about allowing whichever team has a better record host the game. I would definitely not be opposed to that.

Saints @ Seahawks 4:30 Sat. NBC
Jets @ Colts 8:00 Sat. NBC

Ravens @ Chiefs 1:00 Sun. CBS
Packers @ Eagles 4:30 Sun. Fox

Rodgers That

Week 17 leaves much to desire

By Dan Rodgers

I am sitting on my couch watching NFL Redzone right now. If you don't know about it then you are probably not a football fan.

They are showing the Bengals @ Ravens because the Cincy is inside the five with 16 seconds left, and an incomplete pass puts them at fourth down and two yards to go.

Palmer makes a terrible throw to a an open receiver and the Ravens take over on downs. They knee the ball, win game number 12 and leave a lot of question marks as they head into Wild Card Weekend.

The Jets played their backups for almost the entire game against Buffalo, with the only thing that could change would be moving up to the fifth seed if Pittsburgh lost and Baltimore won. That didn't happen so the Jets will stick with the sixth seed.

Talking about the Steelers, they destroyed the Brownies 41-9 in Cleveland. The win clinched them the two seed and a first-round bye.

The Falcons win over Carolina clinched them home-field advantage throughout the playoffs, even though they would have earned it anyway because of the Saints loss to Tampa Bay. The Bucs keep their playoff hopes alive with the win. It was just about the only interesting thing to happen during the early games. They now need the Giants and Packers to lose to earn the six seed. If either win, the Bucs are eliminated.

It should be an interested set of late games. I think the Pack will take care of business against the Bears and clinch a playoff spot, but I also think the G-Men will beat the Skins to atleast keep the Pack looking over their shoulder during the game.

The other important factor is the Colts/Titans game. If Indy wins, they move up to the three seed and play the Jets in the first round. If they lose and Jacksonville wins, the Jags win the division and four seed. If the Jags lose and the Colts lose, the Colts get the four seed and host the Ravens. WOW, that's a lot to take and I'm ready to watch it all go down.

Rodgers That

Winter Classic proves worth

By Dan Rodgers

This 2011 Winter Classic is proving to be a great game. The Washington Capitals currently lead the Pittsburgh Penguins 2-1 halfway through the final period of play.

I'm watching with a friend of mine who is a big Caps fan. His dad had tickets to the game, which is being played at Heinz Field, but decided to sell them and watch from home. As a season ticket holder he was given the opportunity to buy them, he did so for $250 per ticket for two seats. He sold the two seats for $700 total only because someone sent him a nice email asking for them as a gift for someone, so he was nice enough to lower the price from $1,000 to $700.

The place is sold out and it's incredible to think that the place is sold out and the tickets are that expensive. There are just over 65,000 seats and imagine how much money was exchanged for all of those seats. Jeez, crazy to think about.

Note: Fehr puts in his second goal of the game on a breakaway with eight minutes left in the game. Caps 3 Pens 1

The game has been fast-paced and hard-hitting. I'm not a huge hockey fan but this is the kind of game someone like me needs to watch to get more into the sport.

Game over, Caps win 3-1.

This is completely unrelated to this post, but it is awesome yet kind of inappropriate. I would be surprised if this guy didn't get fined or punished in some way. If he was on a good team he definitely would be.



Hope you enjoyed it, I certainly did because he came after a Dolphins loss.

Rodgers That

Happy New Year!

By Dan Rodgers

I hope everyone had a nice time celebrating the new year. I want everyone not reading this to know that I have recognized my slacking off. One of my many resolutions for 2011 is to pick up the slack.

I am planning, pending extenuating circumstances, to write a minimum of three (3) posts per week about whatever the hell I want pertaining to sports. I want to write more articles about random things and not only one's that pertain to games.

I am also working on buying hosting for the domain I purchased.

Enjoy week 17 tomorrow.

Rodgers That