indy will be out of the picture this weekend.

the steelers and ravens having losing records kind of surprised me. the chargers part did not.
also, just for fun i looked into the records of a few other teams:
the pats were 2-4 against playoff teams
the cowboys went 2-6
eagles went 4-3
i empathize with pats fans for them being left out with a 11-5 record, but i don’t buy that they were one of the best teams in the nfl with a 2-4 record (like some of my pats friends have been saying).
also, the cowboys and eagles records were interesting to me because i think it shows that the eagles are for real (and rightfully in the playoffs) and the cowboys were pretenders.

Folks,

You can say what you want but regardless of who wins the AFC and/or The Super Bowl this year, the Titans are still a young franchise looking to make it’s mark on football history. To the contrary, the “Top NFL teams” described in the below link have established their extended excellence over at least a ten year period. In the case of the Steelers and the Packers, the excellence (and at times dominance) goes back much further. Anyone who’s that unaware of NFL history might want to Google things like “Steel Curtain” or “Vince Lombardi”. If you’re up for an enjoyable road trip I strongly suggest the Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio. I’m sure it might come as a surprise to some of you but you’ll see quite a bit more Cowboy, Packer, Giant, Steeler, or (Baltmore) Colt stuff than Titan memorabilia. I don’t know if you’ve ever been there but the Steelers even have a place in the Smithsonian Institute’s collection. Since many of you out there are probably Tennessee residents and UT fans let me ask you this:

Could you ever in your wildest imagination picture Peyton Manning stomping a Terrible Towel if/when the Colts beat the Steelers in a playoff game?

Of course not, because though he did play (and play very well) for the Volunteers he’s clearly not a classless redneck from Tennessee. If you guys really want to see the Titans establish the tradition and respect belonging to the Packers, Steelers, Giants, etc you might want to listen to some of Jeff Foxworthy’s monologues and encourage your players to raise the bar on their behavior above that level. Also note the below comment about the Vegas bettors liking the Steelers. Wonder why?

Have a good new year and don’t get too torqued up about this stuff or you’ll find yourself playing right into Foxworthy’s image. :)

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LAS VEGAS — Las Vegas sports books favor the New York Giants over the 11 other teams in the NFL playoffs to win the Super Bowl, giving 2-to-1 odds on the NFC’s No. 1 seed to repeat as champions. The Tennessee Titans are the favorite among AFC teams to win a title at 4-1, closely followed by the Pittsburgh Steelers at 9-2.

“Baltimore and Indianapolis can get there almost as easy as Tennessee,” Seba said. “They have to do it on the road, but as we saw last year with the Giants, it can be done.”

Jay Kornegay, executive director of the race and sports book at the Las Vegas Hilton, said there is essentially no difference between the Titans and Steelers, though the Hilton has the Titans slightly behind the Steelers because of Pittsburgh’s popularity among bettors.

“The way we see it, it’s a crap shoot,” he said. “It’s going to make for an interesting playoff. I wouldn’t be surprised if we don’t see either of the one or two seeds from both conferences in the Super Bowl.”

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Top NFL teams over the last 10 years
  
http://www.boston.com/sports/football/patriots/graphics/09_04_08_patriots_excellence/

NFL Statistics
  

2008 – Week 17
 
League Leaders – Offense

Total Offense (YPG) Complete List

1. New Orleans Saints 410.7
2. Denver Broncos 395.8
3. Houston Texans 382.1
4. Arizona Cardinals 365.8
5. New England Patriots 365.4

Passing (YPG) Complete List

1. New Orleans Saints 311.1
2. Arizona Cardinals 292.1
3. Denver Broncos 279.4
4. Houston Texans 266.7
5. Indianapolis Colts 255.9

Rushing (YPG) Complete List

1. New York Giants 157.4
2. Atlanta Falcons 152.7
3. Carolina Panthers 152.3
4. Baltimore Ravens 148.5
5. Minnesota Vikings 145.8

League Leaders – Defense

Total Defense (YPG) Complete List

1. Pittsburgh Steelers 237.2
2. Baltimore Ravens 261.1
3. Philadelphia Eagles 274.3
4. Washington Redskins 288.8
5. New York Giants 292.0

Passing (YPG) Complete List

1. Pittsburgh Steelers 156.9
2. Baltimore Ravens 179.7
3. Philadelphia Eagles 182.1
4. Tampa Bay Buccaneers 187.3
5. Dallas Cowboys 187.7

Rushing (YPG) Complete List
  
1. Minnesota Vikings 76.9
2. Pittsburgh Steelers 80.2
3. Baltimore Ravens 81.4
4. Philadelphia Eagles 92.2
5. Chicago Bears 93.5

And those 13 wins don’t mean diddly right now. The other teams you mentioned could care less how many the Titans have won so far and/or if they were one of the 13. It’s a one game season each week and it’s win this week or you’re done. The Titans are definitely playing well this year but we’re yet to see if they have what it takes to stand up to the playoff pressure. It’s true that all of us are looking hardest at “this year”, but during the 1st quarter of the Colts/Chargers game they anounced that Indianapolis had now made the playoffs 9 of the last 10 years. That’s the kind of “extended excellence” that was spoken of in a previous post. Being a Tennessee resident I hope your guys can make a good showing but post game towel stomping, touchdown towel waving, and other forms of undisciplined/amateurish behavior aren’t going to gain you the respect you so greatly desire. At this point I’m going with the “Why don’t we just wait and see what happens on the field?” call. But I strongly suggest that you and your Titan fan friends visit Canton, Ohio some day and see if you might gain a greater appreciation for all the years that pro football (NFL, AFL, etc) was played before anyone ever dreamed of bringing a team to Nashville.

One final note:

Listening to some of the towel talk coming out of Nashville, it honestly seems to me that Titan fans & players were jealous of the horde of Steeler fans that invaded your stadium the other week with towels in hand. Perhaps this could be a good learning opportunity for the Titans franchise – if they could consistently field a championship caliber team they might be able to sell enough tickets to fill their own stadium and keep all those opposing team fans out.

Here is all I have to say about the Steelers in the upcoming playoff game.

That offensive line is going to be the end of that team this year. The defense may be a steel curtain, but that o-line is a wet paper bag!

I think that the Steelers are one and done this year my friend.

My prediction. Ravens over Dolphins today and next week Titans/Ravens (bring them on I want to whoop them again) and Chargers/Steelers.

Sets up a nice rematch from last years playoffs for the Titans by hosting the Chargers in the AFC Title game.

Well I was gonna “Go Away” but you guys are so fun to talk to that I can’t resist.
 
Per the comment about “you lose to the really good teams” I’m sure everyone knows by now that an 8-8 team that commits several devastating turnovers can still beat a 12-4 team with an MVP quarterback if they suck it up and make the big plays when the money’s on the line. It’s the playoffs baby. Except for home field advantage the rest of the season is history.
 
As far as Super Bowl rings and eras, do you suppose most Titans would care which era the rings came from if they just had any?
 
And as far as “No one cares about the Steelers” I’ll bet you a can of Skoal Wintergreen and 2 dip cups that, outside of this blog, the Steelers have thousands (probably hundreds of thousands!) more fans worldwide than the Titans. Do you remember looking around the stadium that Sunday and seeing towels, towels, and more towels and thinking “What the …. This is OUR house”?
 
Mr mbftitan – I don’t think the “wet paper bag” is a totally accurate description, but you are certainly correct in this assessment. Thankfully the Chargers may not have the pass rush that some teams do. The defense has covered a multitude of Ben’s sins this year but if the turn-it-over Ben shows up next weekend there will be trouble in Steel City. However if I-can-still-work-the-magic Ben shows up things could be great, especially with LT riding the bike all evening. Yes I know that other smallish Charger guy can run fast but if Troy P and/or Harrison get a few direct hits on him he might melt. By the way, your predictions on matchups were very accurate. But Flacco has matured a lot since you played the Ravens earlier and their D is “almost” as strong as the Curtain. You better get all those home boys stompin’ more than towels because they’re gonna need to be flat out crazy mean to take it to Baltimore.
 
Another wild card for the Steelers is whether or not Ben will even be able to play. Rumor has it that he’ll come into the stadium riding a Harley with no helmet, lay the bike down on the turf hitting his head on the goal post in the process, then jump up and throw 3 touchdown passes in the 1st half. But then again we could see Leftwich right from the start.
 
Is “gramsey” a shortened form of grandmother? Most grandmothers I know are nicer and offer cookies to people they’re visiting with.
 
Where’s that army guy?

…obviously trying to say that they have experience (winning) in the playoffs and the Titans just don’t. You can say whatever you want about how that doesn’t matter now and all that bullshit, but it does matter. Nobody gives a damn if the Steelers, Titans, or even the Ravens won important games in the regular season. BUT, if you have a team that has successfully won PLAYOFF GAMES (on the road) and won super bowls, I believe you have a significant advantage in a PLAYOFF GAME over a team that doesn’t.

To Titans Fans: I don’t even understand why you guys are acting like you are going to play each other already. The Titans beat a “young” Flacco by 3 measly points. Don’t get me wrong I’m not trying to take that away from you guys or even lessen the accomplishment, BUT to act like your gonna walk all over that same team that now has an “experienced” Flacco doesn’t make any sense.

To Steeler Fans: Your team still has to beat the smokin’ hot Chargers before you even think about the AFC Championship game as well.

THIS IS THE PLAYOFFS. ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN

NFL Defensive Player of the Year -—- James Harrison of the Pittsburgh Steelers
2nd Place -————————————————— Andre Ware of disco era dynasty Dallas Cowboys
3rd Place -—————————————————- Ed Reed of the Baltimore Ravens
Tougher Than Terry Cloth award -—— K Bullock & J Kearse of the Tennessee Titans

FYI I got to this site by googling “Terrible Towel” and/or “Keith Bullock”. I never saw anything that indicated it was a “closed” site for FANS of a specific team or that a “grandmother” owned this house. I do know that if this house belonged to either of my grandmas there would be cookies rather than daggers on the table. And I agree with the person who made the observation that an early season win over the Ravens doesn’t in any way guarantee success over them this weekend. If you Titan guys are so confident about your team and/or yourselves, why do you continue to get so emotional instead of just having a friendly discussion? In doing so you really just set yourselves up for more kidding. So just chill. if your team beats the Ravens this weekend (and avoids the sideshow "antics") they will certainly gain the respect of many including myself, but respect generally has to be earned and isn’t given away lightly. And to whoever made the comment, I personally wouldn’t call the Chargers “smokin hot”. I do believe they won four in a row to rally into the playoffs, but Indy had won 8 in a row and they’ll be watching the rest of the playoffs on TV. Anybody have any definitive info on the status of LT and/or Big Ben for the upcoming game?

Tennessee Folks,

I just found this link to a recent (August 2008) espn.com rating of NFL teams fan base. Pursuant to this discussion, I found it interesting that the Steelers ranked numero uno in fan base while your team ranked down a ways. I don’t have time to line up all the stuff (I don’t understand why cut & paste doesn’t work better here) but the factors are as interesting as the text itself. Travel and Hate are two items that might be particularly pertinent to this discussion. Regardless of who you root for, this article is insightful. But I’ll warn you right now, if you’re a towel hater you’ll be ticked off when the see the picture at the top of the article and some might also be offended that another disco era team ranked 2nd.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/preview08/columns/story?id=3530077

St. LDF Travel Loyal Hate TG CF TOTAL
1 … 1……. 2 ……..1……..1 …. 2 … 2 ….10
 
1. Steelers
Consecutive sellouts: 299 | Season-ticket waiting list: More than six years

No team is as woven into the fabric of a city. The organization’s stability has a lot to do with it, as generations of Steelers fans relate to the tradition of ownership (Rooneys), smashmouth football, quality head coaches (league-low three since 1969) and success (five Super Bowl titles). The season-ticket waiting list is extremely long and the consecutive sellout streak of 299 games, including playoffs, is unbelievable.

St. LDF Travel Loyal Hate TG CF TOTAL
3 … 2 …… 4 ……. 3 …… 3 ….. 2 ..2 ….19
 
18. Titans
Consecutive sellouts: 72 | Season-ticket waiting list: 28,000

Titans fans have lived off reputation for some time. When their building opened in 1999 as Adelphia Coliseum, it was incredibly loud and could throw an unfamiliar visitor off. It’s been quite some time, however, since the volume was a real factor. Fans were also spoiled by early success — the team went to the Super Bowl in its first season as the Titans and had the best record in the following regular season. In SEC country, the tailgating is hard-core. But there are empty seats at LP Field when things aren’t going well and ticket holders in the club sections generally spend too much time inside.

Good morning,

I told you, I was looking for some additional info on Bulluck and the towel incident and wound up here. I don’t normally take a lot of time to blog because it tends to be time consuming and can become a negative experience. I was born and raised in Central Pa in the early fifties. I was primarily a baseball fan (Pittsburgh Pirates) growing up but got really interested in the Steelers as a college student and young adult during the Bradshaw, Joe Greene, Curtain era. I moved to Tennessee during that time period and have lived here ever since. I’m not really looking to cause trouble, just enjoying an invigorating conversation with some fellow Tennesseans. But you guys do seem to take this fan stuff very seriously and it probably makes it easier to stir up “trouble” with a few words. To me the bottom line is:

Tennessee is an up and coming franchise and may make a multi year run at extended success. But it’s just not yet a vintage (pre disco era) NFL team like the Packers, Giants, Cowboys, Steelers, etc, nor is it yet a “new era” proven team like New England, Indianapolis, or San Diego. Hopefully continued success will come over time. But you’d better eat some gun powder and get ready for those Ravens. That’s a “real man’s” football team.

Did you check out that fan rating web site? It’s a set of statistics that really demonstrates what we’ve been talking about. Most of the top teams are the older ones with a storied history.

It makes me feel sort of like a Lord of the Rings character. I didn’t come out of nowhere, I came out of google as a result of researching some behavior of one of your team’s players. And I never felt like I was attacking you, only presenting another (maybe more factual) side of life. If you look up through the posts you’ll see info about the top NFL teams over the past 10 yrs, the leading NFL offensive and defensive teams this year, the NFL strength of schedule rankings for this year, the top defensive players in the NFL this year, a recent ESPN rating of fan support for all NFL teams, etc. All these are pretty unbiased and factual pieces of information. It’s just an opinion, but I believe discussions have a lot more credence if they contain more facts and less subjective “My team’s better than your team” or “My guy’s gonna stomp on your guy” statements. Plus, while you guys seem to be the most happy when you’re all having a big group hug over your favorite team, I already know how great the Steelers are and how good, passionate Steeler fans talk, think, and act so I’m enjoying talking with someone with a different mindset.

You’ll probably get upset again but I’m going to share one more comment about fan/player/franchise demeanor that I believe is relevant. Here’s an email conversation I had today with a Titans season ticket holder that I work with.

—————————————————————————————————————————

Me:

“At lunch I was reading a USA Today article about the upcoming Giants vs Eagles game. Despite being the defending Super Bowl champions, Eli Manning and his fellow players were talking very respectfully about the Eagles’ recent play, capabilities, and the challenges they would face this weekend. I took a moment to contrast that with Mr. Bullock’s response to questions about his recent towel stomping incident: "da’s right, anyone who comes to our house tryin’ to win – we’ gonna stomp ’em out”. I’m sure you can see the difference in approach. Your guys may have a pretty good team this year and they may even beat the Ravens. But if they exude the same attitude as Bullock (does he get his material from Mike Tyson?), one of their main successes will be in further defining all of us in the Volunteer state as a bunch of ghetto rednecks from Tennessee. :)

My co-worker:

“You are a Steeler’s fan aren’t you. To be honest, I thought the towel stomping thing was a little bit low class and uncalled for myself. However, I am a Titans fan and I have to stay faithful. I guess we all have some bad ones in our group. I truly would not have expected that from Bullock as he has always been a good player and I liked him but hate he did that. Hated when Haynesworth done that bad thing as well. However, I can not stand Ray Lewis on the Ravens either as he is some criminal himself. Hey, glad Ben is going to be okay. Steeler’s game was definitely tough. All Bullock did by stomping the towel is add fuel to the fire if we have to play Pittsburgh again.”

——————————————————————————————

Now do you see the difference between the Giants and your guy and/or the difference between much of the conversation (at least with me) on this blog and the response I got from my gracious Titans season ticket holder co-worker?

Well I don’t understand it but a friend of mine told me today that the Steelers are also the favorite pro football team amongst female football fans. Given their blue collar look and home city this sounds a bit odd, but I’m off for a little more googling. See ya.

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/football/2007-09-12-1171345338_x.htm

Jimmy – who really cares?

My apologies to you guys and Mr. Bulluck. My co-worker apparently didn’t know this spelling either so I’ll try to alert her to this oversight so she doesn’t embarrass herself this weekend. I think I originally got his name from a towel article and just cut and paste it into google. If you put in Keith Bullock you will get some hits on Keith Bulluck articles.

If you were a Steelers fan during the 70’s you’d know why we’re not great friends with the Cowboys. I do like the Black & Blue Ravens (because they’re a lot like the Steelers) but they’re also the enemy so I can’t show it too much.

The main reason I’ve posted some “this year” info about the Steelers is that one or more of you spoke about the Steelers being a “disco era” team and that you wanted to talk about “this year”. I don’t know for sure who’s the most dominant team (and you wouldn’t agree anyway) but I do know the Steelers have a lot of current team and individual awards and accomplishments, both on and off the field.

I honestly don’t think you guys will beat Baltimore, but if you do and the Steelers win you better get ready for the invasion of the towel army again. Maybe the stadium staff could develop a type of metal detector that will catch yellow cotton? :)

FYI I did a small bit of research on Bulluck and saw him described as “brash and charismatic”. I’ve seen the brash part but I doubt anyone in Pittsburgh would call him “charismatic”. I also read a little bit about his upbringing. It looks like he’s overcome a lot and tries to share the blessings he’s been given. Some people might define “ghetto redneck” as a guy from the ‘hood who’s now living in Tennessee acting like a redneck. But that’s just speculation.

Have a good day.