Most of the time, Super Bowl ads are either cute, funny, sexy, over the top, or a combination of the above. Rarely do they preach any particular social awareness message – in fact, in the past oftentimes when advocacy groups have tried to place such ads during the Super Bowl they’ve been shot down by the network airing the SB.
Realized late last night that I had not started an open thread for this past weekend’s NFL wildcard playoff games. I’ll remedy that this weekend with an open thread for the next round.
The Panthers host the Saints here at home on a very wintry-like day here, at least in terms of the temperatures. It’s 32 degrees currently, but it feels about ten degrees colder.
In light of Colts coach Jim Caldwell’s decision to bench Peyton Manning and a few other key starters in the third quarter of yesterday’s Jets/Colts game, a decision that many would argue directly led to the Colts’ first loss of the season, sports pundits and average Joe sports fans are debating as to whether or not the decision was the right one or wrong one to make. I can see both sides of the argument; on one hand, you’ve already locked in home field advantage for the playoffs and you want to protect your star starters from injury in the last couple of games of the regular season, but on the other hand, you are desirous of maintaining your undefeated season all the way until the end. I’d give the edge to the playoffs argument, as freak accidents happen all the time in the NFL – and the last thing you want to happen is to have any of your starters injured seriously enough that they can’t join the team on the field for the playoffs.
After last week’s impressive home victory against the Vikings, the Panthers have the potential to play spoiler role again today as they take on the NY Giants on the Giants’ turf in NJ. This could the last Giants’ game that will be played at Giants Stadium unless the Giants win today and thus keep their playoff hopes alive.
With hopes for making the playoffs a distant memory, the 5-8 Panthers’ season is all but over. Tonight, they hope to play the role of spoiler here at home as they take on the 11-2 Vikings, who can clinch the NFC North with a win. Once again, Matt Moore will start as QB for the Cats in place of the ‘injured’ Jake Delhomme. The weather here? Much different than it was on Friday, when we had a wintry mix of slush, sleet, freezing rain, and bitterly cold winds. It’s cold tonight, but there’s not a drop of the frozen stuff in sight.
