BRING ON FOOTBALL!!!

Since moving to Mesa in May of this year I’ve spent most of my time adapting to the new lifestyle, making friends with my neighbors, driving Whinnie and enjoying the greater Phoenix metro area. My focus has not been as dialed in on College and the NFL Football as in years past because of the protest nonsense last season. Hopefully the NFL gets a handle on it this year. Given that, I'm excited about the upcoming season, if they get it cleaned up. 

I'm also pumped up for the NFL Fantasy Football season. I’m into the 16 consecutive year of the league I host on Yahoo. I haven't won the darn thing since 2009, maybe this is my year.

The Denver Broncos and the Wyoming Cowboys is and will always be my 2 favorite football teams but this season I’ll be keeping my eyes on the Arizona Cardinals and especially the Buffalo Bills and the development of Josh Allen.

Allen was sacked 5 times in the Bengals preseason game.

Allen was sacked 5 times in the Bills 3^rd preseason game against the Bengals. I watched the highlights and it was clear that Allen was not getting rid of the ball fast enough and the speed of game and the Bengals D was overwhelming him. The Bills OL wasn’t doing a great job either. I worry that like many Rookie QB’s Allen will get put through the meatgrinder early, get hurt and lose his confidence. Like no other Wyoming Cowboys Alumni ever, Allen has the potential to be a superstar if he’s brought along slowly. Once he develops the game between his ears he’ll be unstoppable with his physical skill set. If… he can survive the beatings he’s likely to face early in his career.

It was disappointing to see the Wyoming Cowboys D just totally collapsed in the 2^nd half of their home opener against Washington State last Saturday. The Corners and Safeties for the Cowboys have been the worst part of their team for years. They can’t cover and are very poor tacklers. There was plenty of blame to go around for the loss but until the Cowboys can play D for 4 quarters they could be in for long year in Laramie.

Red-shirt freshman QB Tyler Vander Waal couldn’t elevate his game either. He had less than 100 yards passing. Again, the Cowboys O in the second half was a total train wreck but I hope he picks up his game soon. He’s a tall kid at 6-4 and a light 210 pounds but he's no Carson Wentz or Josh Allen just yet, that’s clear.

 

Cardinals uni I bought David for Xmas in 1980.

As for the Cardinals, which has been my favorite NFC since their days in St. Louis in the early 70’s, I hope their team makes advances too. My kid Brother David, also a Cardinals fan, called me the day the NFL schedule was released in April and told me he wanted to come to Phoenix to watch the Broncos/Cardinals game on Oct. 18^th. So, I look forward to seeing that game with him, but I’ll have to root for my Broncos even though I’m an official Arizonian now.

Since I’m only a 6 ½ hours from Albuquerque my other football adventure this season will be to travel to watch the Cowboys/Lobos game on Nov. 24^th.

So… bring on football and end the protests! GO BRONCOS! GO WYOMING COWBOYS! GO CARDINALS!

On the Disabled List for the Jaguars Game

I didn’t get to see the Broncos game because it wasn’t nationally televised this weekend. I had planned to go to a Sports Bar in Astoria Sunday and watch it but I got my butt kicked so bad by a cold over the weekend and put myself on the disabled list. I couldn’t drag myself out of the house. Now, I really regret having such a knee jerk reaction to the Tim Tebow trade 2 years ago and cancelling my NFL Sunday Ticket. I’d had it since 1998. Next summer my contract with Dish runs out and I’ll drop it and go back to DirecTV. I’m still not over my mad the way the Tebow situation was handled but missing any game just is totally unacceptable.

It doesn’t sound like I missed much of a game though. The Broncos predictable won but from what I saw from the highlights the Jags gave them some trouble in the 1^st half. I knew the crazy point spread was going to motivate them. Even though the Jags have been down this season you had to believe their pride if nothing else was on the line and that they would give the Broncos a challenge.

I’m sure Peyton Manning and the whole team couldn’t help thinking about the matchup against the Colts this weekend in Indianapolis, I know I was. But after watching the Colts horrible performance against a lousy Chargers team last night now I wonder if the Jags probably gave the Broncos a better game than the Colts will.

I’m looking forward to seeing how Von Miller plays. Since now he knows he’ll be suspended for a year if he screws up again, I think he’ll be more than highly motivated to redeem himself to the team this week.

I’d say the same for Manning, if you take away the Cowboys once in a franchise offensive performance against him he’s breezed through these first 6 games. I still believe it’ll be a win but it will be a stressful game for him. Andrew Luck will be feeling it too but since the expectation is the Broncos will run them off the field he may rise up and surprise them. I doubt it though; the Colts D has some injuries to key players so it’ll be a football miracle if they hang with Manning and company.

I have to give some kudos to Knowshon Moreno again this week. If he continues to play as well as he has for the remainder of the season, he has to be considered for the NFL Comeback Player of Year award. Whoever that player was that couldn’t break a single tackle or get the tough yards up the middle is dead and in his place a warrior has emerged. We all know he can catch a pass but this power running surge he’s been on this season is unbelievable. My hat is off to you Knowshon.

The Cowboys have had the Bronze Boot in Laramie the last 4 years.

It’ll be an exciting weekend of football; the Wyoming Cowboys will be playing Colorado State in the Border War for the Bronze Boot in Laramie Saturday. Currently the Cowboys are place in 1^st place in the Mountain Division of the Mountain West Conference and 1 game up on Boise State. The Rams are the only rival left in the conference. They’ve been playing against each other since 1899 with CSU holding the series lead with 55 wins to the Cowboys 44 with 5 ties.  

Starting with CSU each game from here to the end of the season will be a considerable test to see if they’re worthy of getting a respectable postseason bowl seeding. CSU, then San Jose State, then they play Fresno State Nov. 9th.  If they pull out wins against CSU then SJSU then the match up against Fresno becomes a very significant game. FSU is currently leading the West Division in the Mountain West Conference with a 5-0 record. If they can get a win against them then the biggest game of the season becomes the Boise State game the following week.

The Cowboys have one of best running and passing QB’s in the nation in Brett Smith and he should be a leading All-America candidate in 2013. Smith is a Junior this year and through 6 games he has a total of 2,247 yards of total offense and 18 TD’s. Since starting as a true freshman at UW he has a career total of 8,691 yards of total offense, with a total of 81 TD’s, 62 through the air and 19 on the ground. He’s an amazing athlete and one of the best QB’s I’ve ever seen play at UW. He also runs the hurry up offense as well as any QB in college football today.

Unfortunately for Smith he doesn’t play on the Cowboys Defense. They’ve given up a lot of points and yards this season, especially late in the 4^th quarter of games. My hope is they can play the bend not break type opportunist Defense they’ll need to for the them to achieve a successful record the rest of the way.

It’s so difficult for me take the Cowboys games one at a time like I do with the Broncos. Their program has been in a painfully long slum and they are so due for some success and meanful bowl game.

GO BRONCOS! GO COWBOYS!!