New Orleans Saints - Titans Ever On

Wild Card Round Preview (The NFL on REO)

It’s playoff time! Here is your preview for the Wild Card Round – picks included.

Tennessee at Kansas City

by Michael Lytle

The Tennessee Titans are big underdogs in the Wild Card match up with the Kansas City Chiefs.

This is not surprising. The Titans are without their starting running back, they have played poorly on offense for most of the season, and they are short on playoff experience. The Chiefs, on the other hand, have an explosive offense, a very successful head coach, and are playing at home. Even as a Titans fan I admit that it makes sense that the Chiefs are a 9 point favorite.

Two Tales of One City (The NFL on REO)

Updated Power Rankings a look at sports in Nashville. (1,505 words)

Power Rankings

I got some help this week for the NFL Power Rankings from fellow REO contributors Gowdy Cannon and Mike Lytle. I asked them to rank their top 15 teams. We then assigned a point value to each team based on where they were ranked and then added those points together to get the final product – The NFL on REO Top Ten. (Example for the ranking: A 1st place vote receives 15 points, a 2nd place vote receives 14 points, and a 15th place vote receives 1 point.) I’ve listed the total point value for each team so you can see how this all came together. For the tie-breakers, I listed the rationale for why one team was placed above the other.

1. New England – 45

Back when the Patriots were 2-2 with what was by far the last place team in defensive points given up, it looked like the rest of the league may have had a prayer of not having to deal with this constant playoff juggernaut this year. It was a testimony to how incredible the offense is that they were 2-2 since most teams would have been 0-4 giving up 38 points every week.

Who Watches the Watchmen? (The NFL on REO)

Catches, media incompetence, and bad wins. We cover it all this week. (1,687 words)

In Watchmen, the genre-defining masterpiece by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons, there is a slogan that can be seen throughout the graphic novel, spray-painted on walls, “Who watches the Watchmen?” It’s a message about keeping those in power accountable and if that is even possible. While the things I examine this week are much less important in the grand scheme, I believe they belong in the conversation. It’s too often that we find incompetence or worse coming from those that are in a place of power in the sports’ world – whether it be the leagues, the teams, or the media that covers it all. So here is my attempt to watch the watchmen.

The NFL on REO: Old Faces, New Places

Week One wrap up and more! (1,299 words)

Week 1

Week one is in the books.

Contrary to popular opinion, we don’t really learn much after one week of play in the NFL. It is going to take a lot more to convince me that the New England Patriots are as bad as they looked on Thursday night against the Kansas City Chiefs. Similarly, it will take a lot to convince me that the Los Angeles Rams are as good as they looked against the hapless Indianapolis Colts.

Game one is never the strongest indicator of future performance. You just have to look at the two years Ken Whisenhunt coached the Tennessee Titans. If you only saw game one in those two years, you would have thought the Titans were a juggernaut of a team. Unfortunately for fans of the team, those two games were far and away the highlights of each season.

The NFL on REO: Game Time!

The Regular Season is here! We rank all 16 games and we give our staff predictions for the Tennessee Titans’ record. (947 words)

It’s game time baby!

The NFL season kicks off tomorrow with the defending Super Bowl champions, the New England Patriots, facing off against the Kansas City Chiefs. I am so excited, even if this first game includes my most hated team in the history of all sports – the Patriots. It’s real NFL football for the first time in over half a year! What is better than that?

To commemorate this momentous occasion, here is my interest level for each game this week. We’ll start at the bottom.