NFC West Preview: Over/Under Predictions for All Four Teams

Sheepless In Seattle and Other Goofy Titles

By: MaChez, TSZ Expert

A lot of hype going into the season is surrounding the NFC West after Russell Wilson completely outplayed his draft spot and height and Colin Kaepernick did 55% of the work to get the 49ers to the Superbowl.  The christening of these two as some of the best quarterbacks in the league after just one (or half of a) year starting for two stacked teams is surprising to me (see Cam Newton, Year 2) and I’m curious to see if they maintain their status.  The Rams and Cardinals are somewhat in re-building mode with the Rams at the tail-end of it and the Cardinals completely changing things up to create for an interesting year out West (and in St. Louis).

San Francisco 49ers - Over/Under 10.5 wins

2012: 11-4-1, 1^st in the NFC West, 2nd in the NFC

Finally we get to the 49ers, the favorites out of the NFC to win the Super Bowl.  Last year’s runner up, the 49ers come in to this season with high expectations and should be extremely dangerous.  Basically the only negative thing coming from San Francisco this off-season was Colin Kaepernick’s lack of understanding of the term “face of the franchise.”  I mean, other than the obvious reasons, wouldn’t it be strange if Bill Gates decided to wear this unitard to the beach and tell everyone “it’s just swag, it ain’t never hurt nobody.”

  

Fortunately Kaepernick’s football talent is ahead of his maturity and his grammatical knowledge regarding the use triple negatives in sentences, and he’s one of the least likely second year quarterbacks to regress this year.  However, with last year WR1 Michael Crabtree out for the season with a torn Achilles, Mario Manningham recovering from a torn ACL, Randy Moss in the broadcast booth, last year’s first round pick A.J. Jenkins traded to the Chiefs due to underperformance, and Vernon Davis a rare target of Kaep’s, the bulk of the load will fall on the shoulders of new arrival Anquan Boldin.  Luckily for him, the O-Line is strong and allows Frank Gore, LaMichael James, and Kaepernick to run the ball well.

On defense, Star ILB Patrick Willis anchors the unit and had them as the #2 defense last year according to Football Outsiders.  The entire front seven is scary with DE Justin Smith the beauty to OLB Aldon Smith’s beast, NaVorro Bowman next to Willis at ILB, and former fifth-pick-overall, Glenn Dorsey coming over from the Chiefs to play nose tackle.  The secondary isn’t as scary, but with the drafting of safety Eric Reid and signing of former shutdown corner Nnamdi Asomugha they shouldn’t be an issue.

Looking at the schedule, the 49ers don’t have it too bad. Unlike the Seahawks, they get most of their tougher matchups at home (GB, IND, HOU, ATL) and most of their easier games on the road (TEN, JAC, WAS, TB).  Only two of the games are on the East Coast and only the Tampa Bay game is at 10am.  The JAC game is at 10am also, but it’s in London and c’mon, it’s Jacksonville.  Even giving Tampa Bay that one game, it’s hard to find surefire losses for the 49ers.  The Week 1 matchup against the Packers could be the most important game of the season, likely determining home field in the playoffs and possibly the NFC championship game.  I see the 49ers going 12-4 and recommend taking the OVER 11 Wins.

St. Louis Rams - Over/Under 7 Wins

2012: 7-8-1, 3^rd in the NFC West

Like a Starburst, St. Louis was the contradiction of the NFL last year.  Although they finished with a sub-.500 record and in third place in the NFC West, they did hold the best division record at 4-1-1, including never losing to San Francisco.  The team looks to be moving in the right direction after one of the best drafts of the off-season.

         The Evolution of Sam Bradford

Former first-pick-overall, quarterback Sam Bradford enters his fourth season - officially becoming the face of the franchise after God finally answered running back Steven Jackson’s career long prayer to leave St. Louis for a contender.  Fortunately, Bradford will finally have someone to throw to now that they drafted Tavon Austin and his WVU teammate Stedman Bradley and signed ex-Tennessee tight end Jared Cook.  The #1 and #2 WRs from last year are still around, but Austin instantly skyrockets the level of talent at receiver and should be crazy good.  With another former-first-pick-overall in OT Jake Long added in the off-season to protect Bradford‘s blindside, he will have no excuses if he doesn’t play up to expectations this year. 

On the other side of the ball, Jake’s brother-from-another-great-great-great…grand-mother, Chris Long, anchors one of the best defensive lines in the league (second against the run, third against the pass according to Football Outsiders). Cortland Finnegan and Janoris Jenkins make up one of the best cornerback tandems in the league but unfortunately for the Rams their safeties are terrible. A decent line backing corps lead by the new #1 bald, white linebacker James Laurinaitis, will help shore things up back there and the whole defensive group should again pose difficulties for the division.

Looking at the Rams schedule, they obviously don’t have it too easy being in the NFC West, but that didn’t hamper them last year and I think they’ll be able to manage at least three wins from their division rivals again this year.  The line is set at seven wins so they’ll need to find four more outside the division.  Games against Jacksonville, Carolina, Tennessee, and Tampa Bay sound like good places to get them.  Other than that, they do have three playoff contenders from 2012 plus the Bears, Cowboys and Saints on the schedule but I don’t see them having any issues hitting the over.  The defense is loaded, Fisher’s a good coach, and Bradford should have a big year now that he finally has weapons.  I actually see them going 10-6 as the surprise #2 team in the division and recommend taking the OVER 7 Wins.

By: MaChez, TSZ Expert

Seattle Seahawks - Over/Under 10.5 Wins

2012: 11-5*, 2^nd in the NFC West, 5^th in the NFC

Seattle was a pleasant surprise last year when they went 11-5* after two straight 7-9 seasons.  Rookie QB Russell Wilson was also a surprise, first stealing the starting job from Matt Flynn and then becoming the first QB in NFL history to throw a game-winning interception in only his third NFL start.  Even though he has talent, it will be a battle living up to the expectations for this season.

Although his offensive line is pretty average, with the exception of LT Russel Okong, Wilson helps with his legs and has Marshawn Lynch consistently going beast mode behind him to keep defenses honest.  Also helping Wilson out (eventually) is new arrival Percy Harvin who GM John Schneider traded for in the off-season on the way to his goal of collecting all of Brett Favre’s 2009 receiving corps.  They aren‘t trading cards, John…  Wilson will still have to rely on Sidney Rice and Golden Tate like last year for the first half of the season while Harvin recovers from a hip injury.  Not a bad player to have in your back pocket for a late-season playoff run.

On defense the Seahawks are oversaturated with talent.  A prime example of this is standout second-year DE Bruce Irvin being moved to a made-up DE/LB role just to keep him on the field (when the league allows him there) with the arrival of ex-Lion DE Cliff Avril to the Seahawks‘ talented D-Line.  Cornerback Antoine Winfield also left the NFC North for Seattle and gives them three of the top ten CBs with Richard Sherman and Brandon Browner at 1 and 2.  Even at linebacker they’re set with one of last year’s top defensive rookies in Bobby Wagner. 

So, they’re Super Bowl bound, right? Wrong. I know I’m in the minority here, but I don’t see the Seahawks doing so well this year.  First of all - their schedule.  Yes, the Seahawks have the best home-field advantage in the league and should do well there this year with TEN, TB, JAC, MIN and NO at home.  However, they are also one of the worst away teams and will be without the 12^th Man for most of their tough match-ups with CAR, HOU, IND, ATL, and NYG on the road. To make matters worse, all five of those games are at 10am PST when Seattle is significantly worse (1-3 in 2012 with losses to MIA, DET, and STL) and four are on the east coast where they have lost eight of nine 10am games since 2008.  Even with CAR to start the season, I wouldn’t be shocked by an 0-5 non-division road record.

              Not on the road, they can't

Secondly, the only thing not making this a 2011-Eagles-esque Dream Team is Vince Young not being around to name it that.  The hype is sky high and along with a lot of big ego, questionable character guys from last year (look at all the suspensions), they also brought in talented veterans who desperately took less than they deserved on short term deals to win a Super Bowl.  With positions now over-filling with talent and three 2012 playoff teams in their first five games, how will all these superstars react if they go 2-3 or 1-4 to start the season and don’t think they’re getting used correctly or playing enough?  What’s that quote about too many cooks in one kitchen?  I’m guessing it’s not one of Wilson and Pete Carroll’s little sayings, but there is such a thing as too many shepherds. I’m using my “one crazy pick” card:  I see Seattle going 9-7 this year, good for 3^rd in the division, and recommend taking the Under 10.5 Wins.


Arizona Cardinals

2012: 5-11, 4^th in the NFC West 

After a strong start to 2012, the Cardinals completely tanked it the rest of the season leading to the ousting of the coaching staff and basically half their starters.  New GM Steve Keim was busy filling during the holes during the off-season and new head coach Bruce Arians will have plenty of work to do pulling it all together in one of the NFL’s strongest divisions. 

Ever since Kurt Warner left, the Cardinals have been rotating through a list of ex-Phoenix University quarterbacks.  After seeing what Andy Dalton is doing in Cincy, they finally decided to acquire Carson Palmer, although part of that uptrade (upgrade/trade…) required Palmer to promise not to read how many sacks his new O-Line gave up last year (58!) and to please give up certain sponsors. The Cardinals used their seventh overall pick on  highly talented guard, Jonathan Cooper to fix it, but he broke his leg on Saturday leaving the job of improving the line to Winston Justice, Levi Brown, and Bobbie Massie. 

Keim was also aggressive in fixing the running back position after Beanie Wells left the team and Ryan Williams keeps injuring himself. He brought in ex-Pittsburgh Steeler Rashard Mendenhall and picked up two RBs in the draft - Stepfan Taylor and Andre Ellington.  When he’s not handing it off to his mediocre running backs, Palmer will obviously be throwing to Larry Fitzgerald who gives him his best threat since Ochocinco.  Behind him are slot receiver Andre Roberts, tight end Rob “zero career TDs” Housler, and 2012 first-rounder Michael Floyd, who should have a big year under Palmer.

On the other side of the ball, things were blown up even more.  Their two starting safeties are gone so the team drafted honey badger Tyran Mathieu to help replace them.  He could easily be defensive rookie of the year if he continues to stay out of trouble. Big, captilized IF. The two starting ILBs are gone too but the Cardinals brass signed Karlos Dansby, John Abraham, and fourth-rounder Alex Okafor to compete with the leftovers from last year, including the talented Daryl Washington who may or may not be in jail the entire season.

At cornerback, they have their star player Patrick Peterson and not much else to speak of.  With him set to also line up at WR, RB, QB, and Coach this year I can already hear the ESPN debates about the injury he suffers as a decoy on offense… Fortunately, Arizona has Calais Campbell and Darnell Docket returning from injury on the D-Line and they should slow things down for the rest of the questionable secondary.

The Cardinals are going to have a lot of work to do this year with a new coaching staff and tons of new players. On top of that, their schedule is very hard for a below average team.  There are pretty much only four “easy” games and even those are hard to call.  After that there are a bunch of toss-ups (STLx2, DET, PHI) and more tough match-ups (SEAx2, SFx2, NO, ATL, HOU, IND). They seem to be moving in the right direction and I’d love to pick them as a surprise team this year, but with their schedule, the amount of turnover on the team, the shaky secondary, and the quality of teams in their division, I’ll save that for another team.  I see them finishing with a 6-10 record but with the line set pretty low at 5.5 wins I recommend betting the Over 5.5 Wins.