100th Post - Double Duty from Denver

So, I'm in Denver this weekend for a wedding (friends of the wife) and my computer and internet access will be sparse. You're in luck, my 100th post will be a double (kinda triple) dipper. You'll get both the College and Pro picks in one blog! How excited are you!?!?!?

First, let's talk about how the Chiefs managed to beat the Chargers on Monday night. You can give credit to the weather. The rain put a damper on the speed of the Chargers on both sides of the ball. You could give credit to the fans. They showed up big time on Monday and reminded me what it used to be like to be a Chiefs fan. That place was so loud, I felt like I could hear the crowd from 115 miles away. You could say the Chargers didn't show up. They looked like they expected the Chiefs to roll over and die. If you said any of the first three, you'd be right, on some level. But I have a fourth proposal for you... the infusion of new players has changed the culture of losing in the locker room. Let me explain with some stats:

Eric Berry: 6 tackles and great shadowing of Antonio Gates all night
Dexter McCluster: 109 yards and 1 TD on just 6 touches
Javier Arenas: 1 tackle, 2 passes defended, and 119 yards returning
Tony Moeaki: 3 catches for 21 yards and 1 TD (to lead Chiefs receivers)

Now, those are the Chiefs first 4 draft picks from this year and they were prime contributors (not to mention Kendrick Lewis solid performance at safety that got no stats). Why is this important? These guys are part of a group of young talent on the team that doesn't know what it's like to lose. Look at their numbers:

Berry (Tennessee '07-'09): 22-17 in college
McCluster (Mississippi '06-'09): 25-25
Arenas (Alabama '06-'09): 39-15 (1 national championship)
Moeaki (Iowa '05-'09): 40-24
Lewis (Mississippi '06-'09): 25-25
Jamal Charles (Texas '05-'07): 33-6 (1 national championship)
Glenn Dorsey (LSU '04-'07): 43-9 (1 national championship)
Tyson Jackson (LSU '04-'08): 51- 14 (1 national championship)
Derrick Johnson (Texas '01-'04): 44-8

And that's just the beginning. Let's not forget Thomas Jones was in the AFC Championship game last year. Matt Cassel sat on the bench while USC won 2 national championships. Dwayne Bowe was on those same LSU teams as Dorsey and Jackson. The players on this team have won before, the coaching staff needs to keep the locker room positive, and the fans need to believe. I bet at no point on Monday did any of those guys think they were going to lose. That's what they need.

On to the College picks:
Much better than week one. If if wasn't for the upset in the MWC, I would have been alomst perfect.
Georgia over Arkansas... I'd be very careful of the road favorites in the SEC. Just because Georgia already lost, doesn't mean they won't defend home turf against a team that was pretty inconsistent last year.
Connecticut over Temple... great game, should be up-and-down and a preview of two postseason teams... wait, this is football. Nevermind.
Auburn over Clemson... take the Tigers in this one.
Notre Dame over Michigan State... how much do we know about the Irish at this point? Their vulnerable, but I think they've got enough talent to get by here.
Iowa over Arizona... don't sleep on the Wildcats. But they'll be losing sleep over the Hawkeyes defense this weekend.
USC over Minnesota... the Trojans are never afraid to travel to mediocre BCS teams. I'm just waiting for karma to kick Lane Kiffin in the butt.
Nebraska over Washington... it should be closer than most think. We'll find out how ready the Husker offense is for big-time games.
Wisconsin over Arizona State.... what is this Pac-10 versus Big 10 week? The Badgers should roll in this one.
Texas over Texas Tech... the Red Raiders have ONE signature win in the last couple years, Texas has championship pedigree. Who do you think wins this one?
Stanford over Wake Forest... I feel bad that Wake has to travel so far to get beat by so much.

Last Week: 8-2 (44 pts.)
Season: 12-8 (73 pts.)

On to the Pros:
If I had picked with my heart last week, I'd have gone 12-4. But no, I had to be reasonable.
Eagles over Lions... I wish Mike Vick some serious ill will, but you've got to like their chances here against a Stafford-less Lions team.
Falcons over Cardinals... one team barely lost against a good team, the other barely won against a bad team. So which team is the real loser?
Ravens over Bengals... is the Jets offense that bad or is the Ravens defense still that good? For that matter, is the Bengals defense really that bad and their offense that good?
Chiefs over Browns... it's not often the weather and the fans win games for bad teams, but I swear that was a different Chiefs team on the field Monday, they should keep playing hard.
Cowboys over Bears... I'm not sure who looked more disappointing last week, both teams should have easily won and struggled.
Packers over Bills... wow. Do I need to spend more than 15 words on this?
Titans over Steelers... I had a feeling the Steelers would be 3-1 after the first four games, here's the one.
Vikings over Dolphins... winning ugly is Favre's forte. Too bad he's good at losing ugly too.
Buccaneers over Panthers... "upset" special. The Bucs looked like they may be on to something last week, quite impressive.
Seahawks over Broncos... talk about changing my perspective on two teams so drastically in just one game, I was wrong about the NFC West being the 49ers' to lose. It's the Seahawks' to lose now.
Raiders over Rams... speaking of the NFC West, how did the Rams lose that game? The Cardinals looked terrible!
Patriots over Jets... if you can't pick up 10 yards consistently, you don't belong in the league. Even the Chiefs played better on offense than the Jets.
Chargers over Jaguars... The Jags could do some more damage to the AFC West, but I'll bet the Chargers are quite miffed about the result of Monday's game.
Redskins over Texans... here's my real upset special. Call it a let down game or pretend that the Skins are for real, either way, it's happening and there's nothing you can do about it.
Colts over Giants... remember when Manning versus Manning was more exciting on the football field than in Oreo commercials?
Saints over 49ers... wow, again. I'm totally disappointed in how Mike Singletary got out coached last week by a college coach... pretty sad. The Saints may struggle again, but the hardest thing to do in sports is defend a championship.

Last Week: 9-7 (Happily because the Chiefs won, the Cowboys, Broncos and Raiders lost)