Top 5 NFL Observations from Week 12

Yes, I will grant you, this is pretty heavy on the Patriots-Broncos game.  Rightfully so, in my opinion.

Let’s get started. (First: Rams fans, I gave you all a quick six-minute podcast on the win over the Bears)

1. You’ll have to excuse me if I’m not quite in love with the Carolina Panthers like everyone other NFL talking head seems to be.  The Panthers record cannot be argued.  Their 8-3 mark is impressive.  But they’re just 2-2 against above-.500 teams so far this season and Cam Newton, while entertaining, sports just one game where he threw for over 250 yards.  On Sunday in a win over lowly Miami, he was o-for-7 on passes traveling over 15 yards .  Going to need more there before I fall in love.

2. This is the best celebration photo of the year in the NFL.  Maybe any sport.

3. I am a Peyton Manning fan, so it does hurt me to say that cold weather has always affected Manning.  But, thank goodness my boy won that one Super Bowl.  If he hadn’t, he’d still be getting burned at the stake by the talking heads worse than he already is for being a guy who just can’t get past Brady and coughs up 24-0 leads to the Golden Boy.  There’s some of that anyway, but could you imagine if he never won a Super Bowl? (By the way, here’s some bonus Patriots-Broncos stuff that I thought was important)

4. We saw a great game in 20-degree weather in Foxboro on Sunday Night Football, elements and all.  Are you still going to blindly agree with those that think the a cold-weather Super Bowl is going to be terrible?  Because what I saw on Sunday Night in the freezing cold and wind would be just fine by me on the first Sunday in February.

5. Tony Romo.  I know, I know… “do it in the playoffs.”  But, with me, I felt like he’s always had it, and I don’t have a dog in the fight.  Yes, this is one of those “eye tests” things.  He throws with touch, he extends plays, he throws lots of touchdowns, he takes chances, he fails and he recovers.  I’m a fan.  On Sunday, he was on his rival’s home field and for the second Cowboys win in a row, he orchestrated a game-winning drive in the 4th quarter.  In fact, Romo now has 11 game-winning drives under his belt in the 4th quarter.  That leads the NFL.  Oh, and he’s got a career passer rating of 93.1 in the final two minutes of the game for his career.  He hasn’t done it in the playoffs yet, but he needs to start being mentioned with other great quarterbacks when it comes to how well they play under pressure in the regular season.

[Photo credit: star-telegram.com, twitter.com/PaulPabst]