Niners/Giants

I'll qualify my comment by saying 3 of the 4 teams are playing good defense now.

Overall the Giants may be so so on that side of the ball but they are playing well now. My point was to say that you still need to play D if you want to have a shot at the Super Bowl.

Also, I'm betting Rivera and company will be watching the tape of the Saint/49ers game. The 49ers looked good against Brees.

 

The Giants were worse than so-so. They were pretty bad on defense this season, ranking only slightly ahead of the Panthers. Really, you can make it through the playoffs and win the Super Bowl in any number of ways. There's no one formula that you must conform to. Honestly the biggest connection between the teams who advanced is that they forced turnovers. The Panthers didn't seem to do that much in 2011, and it would help a lot if they could in 2012. Meanwhile the offense needs to do a better job taking care of the ball as well.

 

G men defense is pretty good when they're healthy. Not sure they were at full strength earlier in the year.

 

Until the playoffs they didn't have one game all season allowing less than 14 points, and they gave up 34+ four times.

 

the Giants definitely have weaknesses. They were fortunate to be able play with a lead for the entire 2nd half against the Packers. It's back to 0-0 again against the 49ers. If it goes the other way, a few things might pop up that were not issues against the Packers: (i) the home crowed will have a much greater impact if the Giants arent able to get any demoralizing big plays like they did in Green Bay, (ii) their run defense could get exposed since San Fran actually emphasizes the run, (iii) therefore, the play action game could be very effective for getting the 49ers some big plays of their own, & (iv) the motivational prowess of Jim Harbaugh is tough to ignore.

The Giants certainly have some good mojo on their side, there's no doubting that, either. The 49er defense have already seen this offense once, but the G-men are more potent now with all 3 receivers, 2 TE's, & both backs all healthy and well engrained in the offense. Should be a great game.

 

This should be an interesting game. I'll take the under. Both SF and the Giants have proved that you need more than flying dogs catching frisbees to win a Super Bowl (Thank God there are still D Linemen strong enough to break through the holding that O Linemen are allowed by the NFL and some corners/safeties fast enough to bring it on the blitz)

 

The league is undeniably more offensive based now, but you can still dominate the turnover ratio like SF and make a run.

I do think fans are going to get tired of seeing records broken every few years.

 

They need to dump the illegal contact rule, or at least make the threshold higher for what constitutes a penalty.

 

game could go either way... if turnovers aren't factor like they were in both their games last week

Giants - Pats... and it's a payback game

 

Between that and the ambiguous defenseless receiver rule, I don't know how you're supposed to coach DB's now.