Eli will find Manningham over and over....                         ...while the Jets D will smother the Ravens run   Unattributed Photo by AP                                                     Photo by  Nick Laham - Getty

I have to admit to being somewhat confused this Friday.  What’s interesting?  Certainly not the upcoming Giants and Jets games on Sunday.  The G-Men will most likely romp  while the Jets play another Jeff Fisher version of an NFL team, the Titans, all defense (but not this year so much) and absolutely no passing game.

The G-Men go against the Tampa Bay Bucs, who have shown nothing in the way of pass defense in their first two games, so Eli should just eat them up whenever he gets the notion.  Now that they’ve found Mario Manningham, things should go very smoothly.  He and Steve Smith are among the leaders in the NFC receiving categories and they may approach stratospheric numbers after this week.  The Bucs toughened their run defense while absolutely killing their historically tough cover-2 pass defense.

The Jets play the Titans from Tennessee and, although the Titans played Houston very tough in their last game, they still managed to lose, even with an unbelievable performance from their fleet running back, Chris Johnson. 

The Titans also lost to Pittsburgh 13-10 in the opener, and, well, they may put up a good fight against Ryan’s warriors but I get the feeling that they’ll manage to lose again, but not before they bore us all to death.  The Jets will smother the run and then pick-off Kerry Collins ad infinitum.

The Mets are dead.  And have been dead, lo these many months of this sorriest of sorry baseball seasons.  I refuse to even discuss Beltran and Reyes and Delgado and Maine and Wright’s power slump.  I mean, really, how excited can I get about Jeff Francoeur and Angel Pagan?  Oh, and Luis Castillo too. And K-Rod and Santana, I guess.  Let’s face it, the Mets are in purgatory.

The Yanks face the Red Sox with a five game lead in the loss column, so a lot of the potential drama was drained from this series last week when the Bombers held on to take two of three from the Angels.  I had been looking forward to the Angels kicking their butts, but it just didn’t happen.  The Yanks pitchers held on in those last two games to make it clear that this isn’t the Yankees of the last few years.

Of course, Joba goes in the Yanks opener and that will undoubtedly have some tongues wagging again, no matter how he does.  If he wins against Lester, the story will be his inconsistency.  If he loses, it’ll be about his stupid innings-limit (again). Really, the Yanks may have bought the pennant (again), but the general management stinks (again), and the broadcast team is laughable (again).

The NJ Nets are in the news but not in any good way.  What a surprise, huh?  They sold the team to a Russian nickel and financial magnate whose only other claim to fame is his way with the ladies.  And David Stern loves the deal.  How nice for him.  How sad for the locals.

The poor Knicks haven’t been in the news at all and that situation is an upgrade over where they’ve been the last few years.  They did sign David Lee for about 8.5 million  and that move bodes well for this year, I suppose.  All signs though point to another year of holding steady until they can pick up a top free agent in 2010.

I almost never watch hockey so I won’t bore you any comments in that direction.

Given these circumstances, to me there are only a couple of things that could capture my attention.  One is the remarkable comeback of the Twins and the other, strangely enough for a Mets fan, is the almost unreal performance of the Braves under a soon-retiring Bobby Cox.

The Braves could very well steal the wildcard from the Rockies.  They play the hapless Washington Nationals in 7 of their last 10 games.  The Rockies have a much harder schedule, playing the Central Division-leading Cards, then the hard-hitting Brewers and then the Western Division-leading Dodgers.  If the Braves go 8 and 2 while the Rocks can manage only 4 and 5, a distinct possibility, they’ll wind up in a flat-out tie for the NL wildcard. 

The SF Giants are still there, of course, and the Marlins have been hanging around, but the hottest team is the Braves, and the niftiest schedule imaginable plays right into their hands.  How cool it would be for Atlanta to once again rise to baseball prominence under a beloved but retiring manager?  For a city buried in water after a 21-inch pounding of rain, I can think of nothing better; it does my heart good.

And then there’s the upcoming NFL blackouts.  What a shame !  Detroit is dying and now they won’t even get to watch their Lions play on Sunday.  The same goes for Jacksonville and maybe even some other lower-profile NFL entities but my heart really goes out to Detroit.

A friend pointed out that fans will still see other games on cable but that’s really not making me feel better if I’m a Lions fan.  With something approaching 40% unemployment in Motor City, another hit below the belt is not what’s needed.  While it’s nice that the Tigers are probably making the playoffs, chances are they’ll be buried in the first round.

So, not being a Yanks fan, and as I foresee Jets and Giants easy wins,  I guess I’ll just have to immerse myself in my fantasy team this weekend.  That team is at least exciting, with Drew Brees leading the exciting Saints and Marques Colston too.  But this will be one of those nail-biter weeks, as my opponent’s got the Baltimore defense and Tony Gonzalez, who keeps getting better and better.

But who really knows in football?  The G-Men surely didn’t impress vs. the run against the Boyz and the Bucs have shown they can run the ball with Cadillac and former Giant Derrick Ward.  And maybe the Titans will surprise us all.


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