4th Annual Icness Awards + Post Your Own!

[Rooster]

http://football.realgm.com/src_encroach ... ss_awards/

Check 'em out. A good read.

NOTE: Icness, when the Cowboys were 9-5, you said on this forum that they looked headed for the playoffs. I disagreed vehemently, stating that they'd lose to Baltimore and Philly an that 9-7 wouldn't cut it. I don't think you can claim too much credit for predicting 9-7 and no playoffs after that whole thing.

Here are the guys I would've picked.

Most Unheralded MVP Candidate: Ray Lewis - linchpin and leader of a defence that stays scary as time goes by... he should've won it at least once by now too, especially in 2000
Best Story of the Year: every single AFC playoff team except Tennessee entering red-hot
Best Coaching Job: Jeff Fisher, despite the late-season mediocrity
Most Fortuitous Injury: Vince Young, no argument there
Best In-Season Rebound: Peyton Manning
Most Overlooked Streak: Houston has never made the playoffs, and their 8-8 mark this year was a franchise best.
Most Unfortunate Scapegoat for a Crappy Season: Eric Mangini, if that season could be called crappy - otherwise, Rod Marinelli
Best In-Season Example of Perseverance: this is basically the same as the rebound to me
Best Color Commentary: Cris Collinsworth
Worst Luck: Everyone in the NFC East as well as Baltimore and Pittsburgh, having to play each other so many times
Best Example of Why You Don't Deal with the Devil: trading all that for Roy Williams when your team already has Owens, Crayton and Witten
Second-Best Example: I don't know, but I sure don't think a Pennington-led Jets team goes 12-4. I suppose the Packers' treatment of Favre gets this?
Most Overlooked Catastrophic Injury: Can't remember them all. The NFL is a graveyard.
Best Predictions By Me: Jets at 9-7, Panthers at 12-4, both on the dot (in-season, it'd have to be the 11-1 Giants and 8-4 Cowboys to both win one more game max)
Worst Predictions By Me: Jaguars winning the division... yeah, you can look away now
Most Valuable Player on a Crappy Team: I agree with Shaun Rogers, but I still think Harrison deserves the award over him
Most Overrated Player: the entire quarterback position, c/o Joe Flacco
Most Entertaining Game: The twisted jerk in me says the Eagles' Week 17 obliteration of the Cowboys, but for fans of both teams, both Steelers/Ravens games are up there
Biggest "What the Hell?" Game: Redskins/Bengals... way to piss away playoff hopes
Most Heart-Warming Moment: Who am I kidding? I can't think of anything that tops the Matt Bryant thing.
Most Valuable Player: James Harrison, Pittsburgh.
Defensive Player of the Year: Give the man both, or give this to Haynesworth to spread around the love.
Offensive Rookie: I agree with Matt Ryan, but I have to mention Chris Johnson as a second who'd be first most years.
Defensive Rookie: I have a difficult time keeping the defensive rookies straight so sure.
Executive of the Year: Anyone who can orchestrate that Titans turnaround gets it from me.
Most Improved Player: DeAngelo Williams, yup.
Best Off-season Acquisition: Jared Allen in Minnesota, edging out Michael Turner in Atlanta.
And Three fearless predictions for the offseason: -The Eagles core will stay together, especially if the team goes deep in the playoffs.
-San Francisco will win the NFC West. (Yeah, that's next season, but it's fearless.)
-Bill Cowher will not return to coaching next season, or to any team in any capacity.

[Icness]

http://football.realgm.com/src_encroachment/144/20081230/the_4th_annual_icness_awards/

Check 'em out. A good read.

NOTE: Icness, when the Cowboys were 9-5, you said on this forum that they looked headed for the playoffs. I disagreed vehemently, stating that they'd lose to Baltimore and Philly an that 9-7 wouldn't cut it. I don't think you can claim too much credit for predicting 9-7 and no playoffs after that whole thing.

Thanks for tooting my horn bro.

And I did say in that thread that I wasn't sure the Cowboys would win another game. Not as strong as your statement, but I definitively picked them to get bombed by Baltimore.

I just wish even one of the 412 different Cowboys fans who sent me flaming emails (I have them in thier own folder) for predicting the absolute truth about their team would man up and admit I was right. Just one. But they're too much like their team--a group of mouthy, spineless front-runners with little positive character.

[studcrackers]

stop bragging about every little thing you get right and they might

[Manhattan Project]

Most Unheralded MVP Candidate: Andre Johnson
He really means that much to the Texans.

Best Story of the Year: Tie. Dolphins and Falcons.
How can you argue against either one?

Best Coaching Job: Tony Sparano
1-15 to 11-5. I dont care if Parcells.

Most Fortuitous Injury: Vince Young.
No one fits it better.

Best In-Season Rebound: Ryan Grant
Started off real slow, then picked it up.

Most Overlooked Streak: Ed Reed, two interceptions in the past two games.
I had no better answer, but Ed Reed is that damn amazing.

Most Unfortunate Scapegoat for a Crappy Season: Eric Mangini
He needed to go, but coordinators needed to go as well.

Worst Luck: Lions
Bronco's were unlucky with the injuries, but it cant topple 0-16.

Best Example of Why You Don't Deal with the Devil: Brett Favre
Completely changed the Jets from a running team to a passing team in one hour.

Second-Best Example: Jerry Jones
Adding Pacman and Williams only increased the hype.

Most Overlooked Catastrophic Injury: Earnest Graham
Bucs season swooned when he got injured.

Most Overrated Player: Joseph Addai
MIA for his career, not really missed.

Most Entertaining Game: Falcons-Bears
Matt Ryan for the win.

Biggest "What the Hell?" Game: Jets vs Raiders

Most Heart-Warming Moment: Matt Bryant
Nothing comes close.

Most Valuable Player: Peyton Manning
Defensive Player of the Year: Demarcus Ware
Offensive Rookie: Matt Ryan
Defensive Rookie: Jerrod Mayo
Executive of the Year: Bill Parcells
Most Improved Player: DeAngelo Williams
Best Off-season Acquisition: Jonathan Vilma

[deeney0]

These are so much more fun than traditional awards.


Most Unheralded MVP Candidate: Homer vote for Pat Williams. Take a look at the Vikings’ D with and without him, it’s very telling. Non-homer vote? Matt Ryan. He’s not exactly unheralded, but I don’t expect him to finish in the top 4 in voting. Where would the Falcons be without him? About where they were last year.

Best Story of the Year: Three nominees, all AFC-East. 1) Miami moves the hyphen, 1-15 to 11-5 2) Tom Brady out for the year on week 1 3) Pats first team in almost a quarter century to miss the playoffs at 11-5. Honorable Mention: Drew Brees comes oh so close to breaking Dan Marino’s yardage record.

Best Coaching Job: Jeff Fisher. I don’t care how surprising Miami and Atlanta were, anyone who said the Titans would finish atop the AFC at the start of the season would have been ridiculed incessantly. And that he did it in spite of the early season drama surrounding Vince Young? He gets a good portion of this vote just for the Pittsburg game, a game that virtually everyone picked the Steelers in despite it being in Tennessee.

Most Fortuitous Injury: Vince Young, see above.

Best In-Season Rebound: Peyton Manning. Other than the 4th quarter of the Vikings game, he had a pedestrian first third of the season. His performance the rest of the season has moved him to the favorite for MVP.

Most Overlooked Streak: Pat Williams, 75 straight games played, ended week 16. For someone of that size, I think it’s incredible. Brett Favre wouldn’t have made it 16 games if he had that much momentum every time he hit the ground.

Most Unfortunate Scapegoat for a Crappy Season: Eric Mangini. It wasn’t even a crappy season. 9-7 exceeded my expectations by 2 wins, minimum.

Best In-Season Example of Perseverance: I’ll echo Icness’s comments about Tarvaris Jackson and add an addendum; before the season. TJax’s infant daughter had to undergo multiple surgeries to install a pacemaker. There is little doubt this distraction affected his play weeks 1 and 2. Definitely adds a layer to the story.

Best Color Commentary: I was disappointed across the board with commentary this season. FOX crews seemed especially crappy this season, but maybe that’s just because I watch NFC more.

Worst Luck: If this was the start of karma catching up with Tom Brady, he’s got a long way to go. He should avoid walking near construction sites.

Best Example of Why You Don't Deal with the Devil: Flip a coin, Dallas or Oakland.

Second-Best Example: I’ll just add a bit to what Icness said – not only would the Jets have won the AFC East with Pennington, they would have won it with Kellen Clemens. And they’d have had about the same chances with Erik Ainge as with Brett Favre.

Most Overlooked Catastrophic Injury: I may be jumping to conclusions, but there’s a possibility that Matt Hasselback may never play another game. Even if that’s not the case, it seemed like his injury was a footnote at best this year.

Best Predictions By Me: I knew the Pack was a sub-500 team. I called a Manning vs. Manning Super Bowl, which is looking more and more likely by the hour.

Worst Predictions By Me: I thought the Browns were going to vie for the AFC title. I had no idea that Miami and Atlanta would rebound so quickly, though I’m not alone there.

Most Valuable Player on a Crappy Team: Anquan Boldin. Yes, I know the Cardinals are a playoff team, but they are also unquestionably a crappy ream. He’s not happy in Zona (who would be?), but rather than be a prima dona about it, he came in and caught 89 passes for over 1000 yards and 11 touchdowns.

Most Overrated Player: Aaron Rogers. The Packers might have been a .500 team with Brett Favre this year, and that’s saying something. On any other team, in any other situation, Rogers might have been benched. Instead, because of some misplaced notion of legacy, he’s going to be given at least another free year. Here is a prediction for the next few years: Aaron Rogers will never lead the Pack to more wins than they got this year.

Most Entertaining Game: 11-10. I was entertained that whole game.

Biggest "What the Hell?" Game: Ed Hochuli, week 2.

Most Heart-Warming Moment: Atlanta clinches a playoff birth.

\Most Valuable Player: Peyton Manning by default. Everyone else in the running effed up.

Defensive Player of the Year: Albert Haynesworth or Pat Williams

Offensive Rookie: Matt Ryan, no question

Defensive Rookie: I don’t have a better answer right now than Jerrod Mayo, though I wish I did. Not a knock against him, but no other names come to mind.

Executive of the Year: Whoever is in charge in Atlanta.

Most Improved Player: Philip Rivers was never this good, was he? San Diego made the playoffs despite LT being essentially a non-factor.

Best Off-season Acquisition: Jared Allen by the Vikings

[Basketball Jesus]

Most Unheralded MVP Candidate: New York Giants offensive line – A little-known rule is MVP voting is that you can vote for an entire unit as MVP. That said, has any unit been more instrumental to their team’s success than the Giants’ offensive line? They’ve blocked for two of the top 5 rushers in the league, berthing holes as wide as a school bus on many occasions, and allowed only 28 sacks despite Eli Manning’s occasional dalliances and being in a pass-rush heavy division.

Best Story of the Year: The 2008 rookie class – This might be the best rookie season since 1983…and you know what happened to most of those guys.

Best Coaching Job: Mike Singletary – usually when somebody’s name interim coach, they go in fully knowing that the Sword of Damocles is dangling over their head and that, at best, they’re merely keeping the seat warm for the next offseason hire. Ownership and management don’t want you doing anything more than just showing up and earning your pay. They certainly don’t want you rocking the boat. What did Singletary do? He smashed the boat to splinters. Singletary comes in, kicks all kinds of ass, isn’t afraid to call out some of the bigger personalities on the team, provides some of the best quotes this side of Herm Edwards, and leads the Niners to a respectable finish, earning the respect of the clubhouse and, more importantly, ownership. Given all the sexy names currently not coaching (Cowher et al.), chances were the Niners were planning to look elsewhere this offseason but Singletary made that team his own in such remarkably short fashion that it would have been ludicrous to hire anybody else.

Most Fortuitous Injury: fortuitous (adj.) Happening by accident or chance. – Brandon Marshall’s preseason injury where he slipped on a McDonald’s wrapper and put his hand through a TV.

Best In-Season Rebound: Deangelo Williams – Yeah, a great deal of credit goes to the offensive line’s switch from a zone- to a power-blocking scheme which in turn is more beneficial for a player like Williams, but his progress over the second half of the season was amazing in of itself. After battling with Stewart for carries early on, Williams separated himself by being more decisive in his cuts and using his bulk to finish off runs.

Most Overlooked Streak: The Seahawks have not drafted a homegrown Pro Bowl offensive player (i.e made the Pro Bowl with the Seahawks) since Steve Hutchinson in 2001. On the defensive side, they’ve only drafted two (Lofa Tatupu , Marcus Trufant) in that timeframe.

Most Unfortunate Scapegoat for a Crappy Season: Eric Mangini – While choosing Clemens over Pennington (thus enabling the team to get Favre) was an obvious misstep, Mangini did the best he could after inheriting a team of moldy veterans and turning around the defenses.

Best In-Season Example of Perseverance: Bill Belichick – stuck by Matt Cassel despite some high-profile meltdowns and in the middle of a hotly-contested division.

Best Color Commentary: Ron Jaworski – Jaws offers the best combination of ex-player insight and legitimate analysis.

Worst Luck: New Orleans Saints – Just when they start playing top-notch football again, so does everybody else in their division.

Best Example of Why You Don't Deal with the Devil: The Lane Kiffin – Al Davis fiasco

Second-Best Example: Brett Favre from Week 12 to Week 16 - 2 TD/9 INT

Most Overlooked Catastrophic Injury: Champ Bailey – Without him the Broncos couldn’t stop anybody from throwing on them, which then forced Cutler and the rest of the offense into shootouts, when they were better equipped at clock-management style offense. Even when Bailey returned, he looked less than 100%. With a healthy Bailey, the Broncos would probably still be playing.

Best Predictions By Me: Brett Favre is no longer even a league-average QB and will cost the Jets a playoff spot.

Worst Predictions By Me: Matt Ryan = Kyle Boller

Most Valuable Player on a Crappy Team: Calvin Johnson – If you can amass over 1,300 yards and 12 TD as the only legitimate receiving option when you have misfit toys like Dan Orlovsky, Daunte Culpepper and the Drew sisters throwing you the ball, chances are you’re something special.

Most Overrated Player: Kurt Warner. Is an explanation necessary?

Most Entertaining Game: Week 11, Jets 34 @ Patriots 31 – just a classic battle between two fierce rivals that ended in classic OT fashion.

Biggest "What the Hell?" Game: Week 7, Dallas 14 @ St. Louis 31 – Never mind how lopsided the score was, Dallas played even worse. Just a humiliating game.

Most Heart-Warming Moment: Matt Bryant

Most Valuable Player: Demarcus Ware

Defensive Player of the Year: Demarcus Ware, no question about it.

Offensive Rookie: Matt Ryan

Defensive Rookie: Jerod Mayo

Executive of the Year: Bill Parcells

Most Improved Player: Samson Satele – went from being a scrub center to an All-Pro seemingly overnight.

Best Off-season Acquisition: Chad Pennington

And Three fearless predictions for the offseason: 1. Matt Cassel signs with the Jets or Chiefs 2. TJ Houshmandzadeh ends up with the Raiders 3. Mike Shanahan replaces Norv Turner in San Diego after the Chargers pull a one-and-done in the playoffs.

[deeney0]

Most Overrated Player: Kurt Warner. Is an explanation necessary?

Yeah, I think an explanation is necessary. There are huge problems with the Cardinals, no question, but it's not in the passing game.

[Da Schwab]

Most Unheralded MVP Candidate: I'll go the route of BBJ, but pick a different unit and take the Falcons O-Line. Clearing the way for an unproven Michael Turner and a rookie QB, who many thought would flounder, really impressed me. Plus, I wasn't going to pick the Giants O-Line because of the homer thing.

Best Story of the Year: Rookie coaches guiding their teams to the postseason. Tony Sparano, John Harbaugh and Mike Smith did the nearly unthinkable.

Best Coaching Job: Tony Sparano. Talk about the Tuna all you want, but Sparano did more with less than I've ever seen. There isn't one star on that team (unless you talk to Peezy), and he used unorthodox play-calling (wildcat/hog) and simple fundamentals, in a crazy concoction that worked to perfection. I don't think anyone on the planet thought that the Dolphins would even contend for a Wild Card berth, let alone a division title.

Most Fortuitous Injury: Its easy to say Tom Brady, but that Brandon Marshall injury is just f*cking outrageous.

Best In-Season Rebound: Can I just say the Chargers? The three consecutive close losses to Pittsburgh, Indy and Atlanta could've made the Bolts just hang 'em up and mail it in the rest of the year, but they kept going.

Most Overlooked Streak: Can't think of one off the top of my head, and I'm too lazy to research.

Most Unfortunate Scapegoat for a Crappy Season: Its definitely Mangini. The fact that he lost his job due to a signing that his FO had to pull the trigger on is just wrong.

Best In-Season Example of Perseverance: Rod Marinelli. Why you ask? Because what other coach would stand by their squad and not pop a few blood vessels, while watching their team play as pathetically as the Lions did?

Best Color Commentary: Me. Because all I do is talk when I play Madden.

Worst Luck: The Seahawks. Just ugly.

Best Example of Why You Don't Deal with the Devil: Jon Kitna and his 10 win predictions. Don't write checks your team's collective ass can't cash.

Second-Best Example: Brett Favre is definitely the remedy for the Jets.

Most Overlooked Catastrophic Injury: I'm with BBJ on the Champ Bailey injury, too. He was on my fantasy squad (which is really a bad move), and I saw how much the Broncos suffered. To see how much he is actually feared, and then see how much opposing teams exploited the Denver secondary.

Best Predictions By Me: Looking back on the prediction thread, I got the Steelers dead on.

Worst Predictions By Me: Da Bears. They didn't make the playoffs, but they were 1000x better than I thought they would be.

Most Valuable Player on a Crappy Team: Patrick Willis. The 49ers weren't nearly as crappy with Singletary at the helm, but this has to be a good combo: HOF linebacker coaching a kid who is the best young defensive talent in football.

Most Overrated Player: Kurt Warner. There's a consensus here.

Most Entertaining Game: Week 16. Giants def. Panthers in OT. OK, that's my homer pick.

Biggest "What the Hell?" Game: The tie. Donovan F. McNabb's crowning moment.

Most Heart-Warming Moment: Matt Bryant's story is another consensus, but Warrick Dunn confronting his mother's killer is another great story.

Most Valuable Player: Demarcus Ware [/raisesfisttoBBJ]

Defensive Player of the Year: Demarcus Ware

Offensive Rookie: Matt Ryan

Defensive Rookie: Brandon Flowers

Executive of the Year: Bill Parcells

Most Improved Player: Antonio Bryant

Best Off-season Acquisition: Michael Turner, duh.

And Three fearless predictions for the offseason:

1. The Giants make a big play for TJ Cantspellhislastname to be Plax's replacement.
2. LJ pulls a TO to wherever he gets shipped to.
3. The Broncos bring Shanahan back.

[treiz]

Most Unheralded MVP Candidate: I have a few picks for this award:
1)Calvin Johnson - still managed to produce 1000+ yards and 10 TDs with the horrible team that the Lions is and the QBs hes had to go through.
2)Andre Johnson - Just incredible performance this season carrying the Texans O on his back, especially the game against Miami.
3)Nnamdi Asomugha - Just damn near untouchable this season, I think he had a better year than Champ in 06.

Although I do like the Ray Lewis pick

Best Story of the Year: the success of the rookie coaches, especially Singletary, he actually got the 49ers to fight for him.

Best Coaching Job: Tom Coughlin, still managed home-field advantage despite losing Strahan and Umenyiora

Most Fortuitous Injury: Vince Young, can we actually call him a bust now?

Best In-Season Rebound: Peyton Manning

Most Overlooked Streak: Chargers late season run and Jets' collapse

Most Unfortunate Scapegoat for a Crappy Season: Eric Mangini, this season was Favre's fault

Best In-Season Example of Perseverance: Tarvaris Jackson, after being benched, got an opportunity after Frerotte becomes injured and has since had the 2nd best QB rating behing Peyton Manning in that span.

Best Color Commentary: Cris Collinsworth, this guy is a genius

Worst Luck: New England Patriots and the Seattle Seahawks

Best Example of Why You Don't Deal with the Devil: Al Davis being Al Davis

Second-Best Example:Pennington goes to Miami = 12-4.

Most Overlooked Catastrophic Injury: I guess I'm going with Tony Romo, if he stayed healthy, they probably would've won those games Brad Johnson lost.

Best Predictions By Me: Jets at 9-7 even with Favre, Arizona and Houston going 8-8

Worst Predictions By Me: Lions actually being good, 49ers being 9-7 and winning their division

Most Valuable Player on a Crappy Team: Shaun Rogers or Nnamdi Asomugha

Most Overrated Player: I agree with Kurt Warner

Most Entertaining Game: Jets fan in me says the 34-31 win over the Patriots, that game had everything. But I'd agree with both of the Pittsburgh-Baltimore games. And the funniest one being Dallas-Philly in week 17.

Biggest "What the Hell?" Game: Oakland/Jets - Janikowski kicking a f****** 57-yarder to win in OT

Most Heart-Warming Moment: Matt Bryant, no questions asked

Most Valuable Player: Peyton Manning - carrying his team like he did without a running game, this guy is unstoppable and is going to won his 2nd Superbowl.

Defensive Player of the Year: James Harrison

Offensive Rookie: Matt Ryan

Defensive Rookie: Gotta be Jerod Mayo

Executive of the Year: Parcells or the Titans GM

Most Improved Player: DeAngelo Williams, or Darrelle Revis

Best Off-season Acquisition: Michael Turner and to be fair Alan Faneca was a great acquisition for us.

And Three fearless predictions for the offseason:
-Jets get a rookie head coach and draft a rookie QB (god I hope not)
-Parcells leaving Miami to go to Cleveland
-Larry Johnson becomes the worst off-season acquisition by any team that gets him

[Cliff Levingston]

Cliff Levingston couldn't agree more with Brian Urlacher as the most overrated player in the NFL. People actually think he's a good player, although while he's not bad, he's thoroughly average. Here are his numbers this year:

Tackles: 93 (down from 123 last year, which was down from 141 the year before)
Solo tackles: 79
Tackles for loss: 10
Sacks: 0
Passes defended: 10
INTs: 2

[A.J.]

Most Unheralded MVP Candidate: I'll go with Andre Johnson. He means so much for our team and imagine if Schaub played the whole season. He could have had double digit touchdowns.

Best Story of the Year: The Miami Dolphins going from 1-15 to legit playoff team. Congrats to them.

Best Coaching Job: Tony Sparano/Mike Smith. I give both off them the award. Both coaches did a good job. Smith played a rookie season and he made the playoffs in his first year head coaching. Sparano guilded a team that went from 1-15 to the playoffs and he won a division title.

Most Fortuitous Injury: I must say the hit Patrick Willis made on Brad Smith. For a second I thought Smith was gone (and I really mean gone). Good to see he is alright.

Best In-Season Rebound: The Chargers. They started off the season slow, and had no shot of winning the AFC West. Then they go hot at the end while the Broncos struggled and won the division on the last week.

Most Overlooked Streak: Texans winning 4 in a row for the first time in team history.

Most Unfortunate Scapegoat for a Crappy Season: Mangini for me.

Best In-Season Example of Perseverance: Rod Marinelli.

Best Color Commentary: MNF crew and it aint even close.

Worst Luck: Lions. They couldn't even win 1 game.

Best Example of Why You Don't Deal with the Devil: Jon Kitna and his 10 win predictions.
Second-Best Example: Bob McNair saying the it's either playoffs of bust for the Texans.

Most Overlooked Catastrophic Injury: Champ Bailey

Best Predictions By Me: Predicting the Vikings will win the the NFC North

Worst Predictions By Me: The Seahawks winning the NCF West

Most Valuable Player on a Crappy Team: Calvin Johnson. It is not his fault is on a bad team. Imagine if he was on a good team, his numbers would be sick.

Most Overrated Player: Brett Favre. He just doesnt have it anymore.

Most Entertaining Game: Week 16. Giants vs Panthers in week 16.

Biggest "What the Hell?" Game: Texans losing to the freaking Raiders. When we practically own him.

Most Heart-Warming Moment: Matt Bryant and Matt Cassell throwing 4 touchdown passes after his dad died.
Most Valuable Player: Peyton Manning

Defensive Player of the Year: Demarcus Ware

Offensive Rookie: Matt Ryan

Defensive Rookie: Jerrod Mayo

Executive of the Year: Bill Parcells

Most Improved Player: Kevin Walter

Best Off-season Acquisition: Michael "The Burner" Turner

And Three fearless predictions for the offseason:

1. The Giants will trade for Anquan Boldin and let Plax go.
2. The Vikings trade Chester Taylor
3. The Browns will hire Mangini

[Cliff Levingston]

Cliff Levingston will toss out some unique answers:

Most Unheralded MVP Candidate: Matt Ryan. Everyone knows how well he's done this year but it's always compared to the other rookies. He captained the ship of a team Cliff Levingston thought would be dreadful to an 11-5 record. Ryan isn't just "great for a rookie" ... he's already a very good player and a hugely important piece to the Falcons.

Best Story of the Year: The Chargers coming slowly out of the blocks yet still making the playoffs; the only team in history to start 4-8 and make the playoffs, let alone have a home game in the first round. LT looked like crap for most of the season while the defense couldn't stop anyone, yet they improved considerably down the stretch to help out Rivers and a deadly passing game rebound from that 4-8 start.

Best Coaching Job: John Fox. Who thought the Panthers would be this good? You've got to give him a lot of credit for sticking with DeAngelo Williams after he looked so bad last year and early this year.

Most Fortuitous Injury: It was an injury, rather legal trouble and the subsequent release of Cedric Benson that opened the door for Matt Forte to become the feature back in Chicago... and do such a nice job at it. Luckily for Cedric though, an injury to Chris Perry opened the door for him in Cincinnati and he finished the season off with a couple nice games.

Best In-Season Rebound: Donovan McNabb. He played badly enough to get benched and had some turmoils surrounding his comments about the overtime, then all of a sudden the team rebounds and emphatically dispatches the Cowboys en route to a playoff berth.

Most Overlooked Streak: No comment; Cliff Levingston isn't THAT big of a NFL nut.

Most Unfortunate Scapegoat for a Crappy Season: Rod Marinelli. He's a solid coach. Maybe not a great head coach but no one could've won with that team. It's not like the team was dogging it.

Best In-Season Example of Perseverance: The Chicago Bears and Devin Hester. He sucked in the return game all year and rightfully was yanked from kick return duty, but as a receiver, Hester also looked awful early in the year. It wasn't a monumental change or anything, but Hester has improved a lot in the passing game as the season went on and looks like a viable weapon at WR.

Best Color Commentary: Jeff Joniak and Tom Thayer on WBBM for Bears games. Cliff Levingston doesn't expect most people to know about these guys but they are simply outstanding.

Worst Luck: Seattle Seahawks. Not only can't Matt Hassellback get healthy, but they lost almost as many receivers to the IR as the Broncos lost running backs.

Best Example of Why You Don't Deal with the Devil: Cliff Levingston will say Jerry Jones, but not because of the Pacman thing... because he gave up 4 good picks, including a first rounder, for Roy Williams who didn't do much at all in Dallas and is just another talented loud mouth to add to the mix.

Most Overlooked Catastrophic Injury: Peyton Hillis. The dude could not be stopped after taking over the starting job, routinely going for 100+ yards and a TD to really balance the Broncos offense. Without him, the Broncos offense became painfully lop-sided (not to mention their D sucks too) and they'll watch the playoffs instead of participating in them partly because of it.

Best Predictions By Me: Didn't really make many, but Cliff Levingston thought the Vikings would own the NFC North and they ended up winning it. Cliff Levingston also steered very clear of all Browns players in fantasy because he didn't think they'd be able to replicate the success from 2007.

Worst Predictions By Me: That Jonathan Stewart would easily take the starting RB job in Carolina, followed by Mendenhall doing the same in Pittsburgh (he was derailed by injury though).

Most Valuable Player on a Crappy Team: Tony Gonzalez. He led all tight ends with 96 catches for 1,058 yards and hauled in 10 TDs. Beyond that, he caught 67 balls for first downs which is more catches than all but 5 tight ends had in total.

Most Overrated Player: Joseph Addai. Not that he's a bad player, but the return of Dominic Rhodes and his success pretty much marginalized Addai and helped prove that it doesn't really matter who lines up behind Peyton so long as Manning is on his game.

Most Entertaining Game: Broncos vs. Chargers in week 2, and the infamous Hochuli forward pass call that cost the Chargers the game.

Biggest "What the Hell?" Game: The Bears beating up on the Colts in their inaugural home game. Everyone knew Peyton missed pretty much all of training camp but the Bears weren't supposed to be a good team coming in, yet they pretty much manhandled the Colts all game. Cliff Levingston vividly remembers Andrea Kramer interviewing Brian Urlacher after the game, and she said something like "what's it feel like to come in here and get a win when NO ONE thought you could." Urlacher just sternly looked at her and said "We thought we could win."

Most Heart-Warming Moment: Matt Bryant, no doubt.

Most Valuable Player: Peyton Manning

Defensive Player of the Year: Albert Haynesworth

Offensive Rookie: Matt Ryan

Defensive Rookie: Jerrod Mayo

Executive of the Year: Bill Parcells

Most Improved Player: DeAngelo Williams

Best Off-season Acquisition: Chad Pennington

[treiz]

Actually let me add Phillip Rivers to the most unheralded MVP candidate for obvious reasons

[Walmart]

Most Unheralded MVP Candidate: There have been some rumblings for James Harrison, but no where near the amount that he deserved as one of the anchors for that Steelers defense.

Best Story of the Year: the surprisingly quick turn around of the Atlanta Falcons following all the Michael Vick and Bobby Petrino turmoil last season

Best Coaching Job: Jeff Fisher

Most Fortuitous Injury: Tom Brady, for Matt Cassel at least who is going to make a fortune in the offseason.

Best In-Season Rebound: San Diego by far

Most Overlooked Streak: Since Week 10 of the 07-08 season, the Lions have gone 1-23 with their last victory being against the Chiefs

Most Unfortunate Scapegoat for a Crappy Season: Eric Mangini by far

Worst Luck: Saints(Tough schedule and division, an unhealthy Deuce McAllister, plus their defensive coordinator interviewing for jobs during the last few weeks of the season)

Best Example of Why You Don't Deal with the Devil: Jerry Jones

Second-Best Example: TO(these two get separate chapters)

Most Overlooked Catastrophic Injury: Shawne Merriman

Most Overrated Player: I agree with Kurt Warner. I'll also say Laveranues Coles and Jeremy Shockey(not on this board, but I've heard enough play by play where they make Shockey a much larger in game factor than he actually is)

Most Entertaining Game: Eagles/Cowboys(first meeting)

Biggest "What the Hell?" Game: Browns/Giants

Most Heart-Warming Moment: During a post show on FOX they showed footage of in the San Francisco lockerroom celebrating their final season game and after a Niners exec gave Singletary the head coaching nod for the next season the place went nuts

Most Valuable Player: Peyton Manning
Defensive Player of the Year: James Harrison
Offensive Rookie: Matt Ryan
Defensive Rookie: Jerrod Mayo
Executive of the Year: Bill Parcells
Most Improved Player: DeAngelo Williams
Best Off-season Acquisition: MIchael Turner

And Three fearless predictions for the offseason:
-Edge goes back to Indy
-Tampa Bay cuts Jeff Garcia
-Plexico Burress ends up in Oakland(LOL)

[Al n' Perk No Layups!]

Most Unheralded MVP Candidate: Matt Ryan. It's unfortunate that he wasn't given any real shot because he's a rookie, the same way freshmen are stigmatized in the heisman voting.

Best Story of the Year: The Falcons turning it around and making the playoffs. After the castastrophe of last year (QB going to prison, Coach bailing, vets slacking) their performance this year has been stunning.

Best Coaching Job: Mike Smith. The Falcons were an absolute disaster. He was a major part in turning that team around.

Best In-Season Rebound: The Colts. After starting out 3-4 they looked finished, they then proceeded to win their next nine games.

Most Overlooked Streak: The Giants becoming the first team ever to win five straight games against teams with winning records.

Most Unfortunate Scapegoat for a Crappy Season: I'll say Marinelli as well. Same reason as Cliff.

Best In-Season Example of Perseverance: As much as it pains me to say, the Eagles. They were "finished" so many times this year, yet somehow they got into the playoffs.

Best Commentary Team: Troy Aikman and Joe Buck on Fox.

Worst Luck: My fantasy team. Kurt Warner, Matt Schaub, Brandon Jacobs, Brian Westbrook, Chris Johnson, Cadillac Williams, Larry Fitzgerald, Randy Moss, Marques Colston, Braylon Edwards, Jason Witten, Kellen Winslow, Jason Elam and the Giants DST and I lose in the playoffs AGAIN!

Best Example of Why You Don't Deal with the Devil: My fantasy team, clearly some sort of cosmic justice was enacted on me for having that sort of team.

Most Overlooked Catastrophic Injury: Carson Palmer. The Bengals played very well with Palmer in the lineup, taking the Giants to overtime and playing a close game with the Cowboys. With Palmer out of the lineup, the Bengals were awful.

Best Predictions By Me: Giants would be top seed in NFC, Cardinals would win the NFC West, Vikes would win the NFC North, Jets wouldn't make the playoffs, Indy would be the fifth seed in AFC, Eli would have at least twice as many TDs as picks, Domenik Hixon would become a starting WR by the end of the year.

Worst Predictions By Me: Titans would finish last in their division, Jags would win the AFC, Browns would win their division, Steelers would miss the playoffs, Gerris Wilkinson would have a breakout year, Bears would be a bottom five team.

Most Valuable Player on a Crappy Team: Calvin Johnson. I believe he led the league in TD receptions. He also had 1,300 yards. All while playing on an unbelievably horrible team.

Most Overrated Player: Brett Farve, it's not even close. He has a 1:1 TD to INT ratio, single handedly killed his team down the stretch and yet he's in the probowl and the talking heads at ESPN give him daily verbal fellatios. Time to retire Brett.

Most Entertaining Game: Giants vs Panthers in week 16. Battle for the top seed in the NFC. Great game, Giants down early, rallied for a comeback, Panthers with a shot to win but Kasay missed the game winning FG, Giants get the game winning TD in OT, Ward has 215 yds on 15 carries.

Biggest "What the Hell?" Game: The Browns thrashing the Giants on MNF.

Most Heart-Warming Moment: Matt Bryant.

Most Valuable Player: Peyton Manning

Defensive Player of the Year: Albert Haynesworth

Offensive Rookie: Matt Ryan

Defensive Rookie: Jason Jones

Executive of the Year: Jerry Reese. Did another great job this year.

Most Improved Player: DeAngelo Williams

Best Off-season Acquisition: Michael Turner

Three fearless predictions for the offseason:

1. Spagnoulo will stay with the Giants.
2. The Cardinals will sign Derrick Ward.
3. The Texans will make the playoffs next year.

[Rooster]

Most Heart-Warming Moment: During a post show on FOX they showed footage of in the San Francisco lockerroom celebrating their final season game and after a Niners exec gave Singletary the head coaching nod for the next season the place went nuts

I saw this too. It was really uplifting, and gave hope to a franchise that has to be scared of having left its golden age. I think things are turning around there.