Football Round Up

Great game between Packers and Niners.  Kaepernick and Boldin played awesome, making tons of huge plays.  Makes me a bit nervous that we couldn't run the ball, but I imagine the Packers were scheming to stop the run, which is one of the reasons we three for 400 plus yards.

I noticed the Chiefs look to be adopting the personality of the Niners under Alex Smith.  28-2 game against Jacksonville.  Smith was routinely said to be a benefactor of a strong Niners defense.  I haven't looked at the stats, but I'd be willing to be the Niners let in a whole lot fewer points with Smith at QB than Kaepernick.  Why would that happen?  A couple reasons:

1.  Smith tends to play ball-control offense, running, short passes, etc.  Not a lot of big plays, but not a lot of turnovers or plays for losses.  His offense tends to hold onto the ball longer and then the defense doesn't have to play as much.  They are fresher and the other team has fewer opportunities to score.  You also don't give the other team good field position.

2.  Kaepernick plays bigger.  Big plays put points on the board, but give the ball right back to the opponent.  He turns it over more (that was the most impressive part of yesterdays game - no turnovers). We also get bigger leads, which causes the other team to become more aggressive offensively.  The flip side, is we are able to come from behind.

No real huge surprises yesterday.  Looks like Pittsburgh might finally be running out of steam.  Tampa got screwed on that call to put the Jets in field goal range at the end of the game.  The Giants demonstrated that running backs are still important.