NFL: 2011 Divisional Round

So I went 0-4 in wildcard picking. I'm not prepared to panic yet - I did start 0-4 last year as well, and ended up with a winning record (6-5). I did go 1-3 against the spread.

The wildcard weekend was two coinflip games (GB/PHI and NY/IND) and two classic "85%" games. The 85% games are when 85% of the public picks the same team to win - in this case New Orleans and Baltimore. Can't say anything about the coinflip games; I just plain got those wrong (Thanks Jim Caldwell for that timeout! Thanks Vick for that interception! Jeez). But I did smell something funny in those 85% games and just picked the wrong one.

That's my excuse anyway. Let's look at the divisional round:

Ravens at Steelers (Pitt by 3)

Everyone's talking about how this game will end with one team winning by three points exactly. I don't think so. Just a hunch, but I'm thinking Pittsburgh by 6. I didn't feel too good about the Ravens in that KC game - KC just imploded. Flacco started to get rattled, which he has a tendency to do. The X-Factor, in my mind, is Ed Reed. Will he be distracted by his missing brother, or will it become one of those crazy games we hear about years later (like the game Favre played after his dad died?).

I'm thinking Pittsburgh 20, Baltimore 14.

Jets at Patriots (Patriots by 8.5)

The Patriots totally have that icy silence right now. They're totally just letting Rex Ryan (and Cromartie, etc) stick their foots (heh) in their mouths. Here's one thing I know: you can beat Tom Brady in close games. But you can't play a close game if Brady stone cold hates you.

Patriots 35, Jets 10.

Packers at Atlanta (Atlanta by 2)

An insulting line to Atlanta. Green Bay didn't play a magnificent game last week, but it was still pretty high profile, because it was against Michael Vick. I'm sticking with Atlanta - home team advantage.

Atlanta 23, Packers 17.

Seahawks at Chicago (Chicago by 10)

Too many weird things about this game. Let's look:

1. Seattle and the "nobody believed in us" factor.
2. Chicago hasn't scored a touchdown since December 26th.
3. Chicago is undoubtedly the luckiest number 2 seed ever.
4. Seattle knows they can beat Chicago at Chicago.
5. Chicago wants a bit of revenge.
6. Jay Cutler has never played in a playoff game, college or pro.
7. Two weeks in a row Seattle being double digit underdogs plays into Pete Carroll's coaching style.
8. Chicago was perhaps the one team that least needed a bye to rest.
9. Seattle has become the single greatest crappy "What If" team in recent history. Think of all the questions you can ask - could Seattle be 10 point underdogs throughout the rest of the playoffs? What if they won everything despite the opposing teams being favored by a total of 45 points? What if it's Seattle vs New England (Carroll homecoming)? Seattle vs Pittsburgh (Refpocalypse)? What if...?
10. I dreamt that Chicago would win by two points.

So bottom line, I have no idea. I do believe that either this game or the NE/NY game will be close, so I'm sticking with this one to be the close game. And who am I to argue with dreams? I'll take Chicago.

Chicago 14, Seattle 12. That seems like the most likely two point victory, right? Unless we're talking Chicago 30, Seattle 28. Either way.

Devotions

I'm leading devotions today for the broadcasting team - a team that I don't really know. I've been experimenting over the last few days with stories, trying to see what is worth talking about... Well, I'm out of time to experiment, so I have what I'm going with. I'm going to share it with you, my blog readers, first - as an exclusive to you, and also as final practice of what I'm going to say. So... Onwards? Upwards. I don't know.

(I intend to open with the story of my mom's death)

There's a psychological model called the 5 Stages of Grief. Most people are familiar with it, but just in case you aren't, here are the 5 stages:

1. Denial - This can't be happening.
2. Anger - I hate that this is happening.
3. Bargaining - I will do anything to prevent this.
4. Depression - This is inevitable and crushing.
5. Acceptance - It's going to be okay.

Most psychologists accept that these are varying and indeterminate stages. Not everyone goes through in a strict order of 1 - 5. Some people skip around. Some people move through the stages cyclically. Psychologists also don't believe that there is a certain time frame for each stage. People spend different amounts at each stage, and how long they are in any one stage is determined solely by them.

I'm starting to believe that this model is not just helpful for grief, or at least the narrow definition of grief that it's usually applied with. Perhaps a more appropriate title would be the 5 stages of change? After all, grief is fundamentally a change in the world around us, right? We grieve because the change is irreversible and hurts us specifically.

Here's an recent example from my own life of a change I grieved, and how I worked through the stages:

At work, we recently changed the software that we use for scheduling. This turned out to be much more frustrating than we originally envisioned - partially because we at the Nursing Center did not envision or desire a change of software. We went through (in sequential order, actually) the 5 stages of change/grief:

1. We spent a lot of time just ignoring the request to switch to a new and confusing system. Since there was no real urgency to the request to switch, and no one shut down our old method, we just continued to use it and hoped noone would notice us.
2. When eventually we were noticed, we were told to switch to the new system. This made us rather angry - we didn't ask for a new system, and no one asked us for our input about the system. As regular users, this didn't really sit right with us.
3. After a bit, we cooled down and started thinking about how we could use (or not use) the system. We spent about a month emailing with people in charge of the switchover, trying to 'negotiate' how much we would be forced to use. What if we just switched over two of our half dozen calendars? What if we just made a note on the new software to call us to use the old software? What if...
4. Most of our what if's fell to the ground, and we moved into the new system, still upset about the ordeal. The next two months I spent comparing the new system to the old system; thinking of how great and easy the old way was, and how much I wished we could go back. All I could see of the new system was the flaws and the ways it came short of our old software.
5. Only recently have I started to see the ways in which the new software is useful, and stopped wishing to go back to the old software. I don't have a specific reason why - time heals all, I guess. Or perhaps it just from me playing around with the old software again and getting frustrated by it's limitations. Either way, I'm now at the acceptance portion of using the software.

So the 5 stages of grief can be used practically in our work place lives. It helps us to recognize areas of change where we're struggling, areas that we're grieving a loss (or change) in our lives.

I also believe that the 5 stages of grief is biblical, with a twist. I see it in the structure of the most grief-stricken book in the Bible - the book of Lamentations.

Lamentations is in the Old Testament, a small book nestled between Jeremiah and Ezekiel. It's only five chapters long, and the only book in the Bible consisting solely of Laments - sad songs. It was written about the fall of Jerusalem in 586BC. It's also a poetic book - the first 4 chapters are acrostics, each line starting with the next letter of the Hebrew alphabet.

And, interestingly, it's structure almost exactly fits the 5 stages of grief. Chapter by chapter even.

Chapter 1 is outlined in my study bible as "Jerusalem's Misery and Desolation." Here are a few key phrases:

• how deserted lies the city, once so full of people (v1)
• she who was a queen among the provinces (v1)
• all the splendor has departed her(v6)
• Jerusalem remembers all the treasures that were hers (v7)

The author seems focussed on what Jerusalem was, painting a comparison of what it is now. In some senses, the author is living in the past, living in denial. He (or she) can't avoid praising the Jerusalem that was, as if the act of praise will bring Jerusalem back.

Chapter 2 is called "The Lords anger against his People." That seems pretty self explanatory, but just in case it's not clear that this is the Lord's wrath, 5 of the first 6 verses all make explicit reference to wrath or anger. The first 3rd of the chapter is a description of the Lord's anger, and the second 2/3rds are the results.

Case in point - the first verse in the chapter: "How the Lord has covered the daughter of Zion with the cloud of his anger; he has hurled down the splendor of Israel from heaven to earth; he has not remembered his footstool in the day of his anger."

Chapter 3 is the "Basis for Consolation." The author makes a plea for the Lord to save him - verses 49-50 are a classic "if I do this, Lord will you do that?" prayer, the sort we make all the time. "Please let me be on time and I will read my bible every day for the rest of my life!" "Please let this be okay, and I will serve you." When I was in high school, I swore to God that if he provided me with a date to my freshman homecoming dance, I would read 3 chapters of the Bible every day. I forgot, and then spend the day before the dance frantically trying to read a month's worth of 3 chapters a day (90 chapters). That didn't really work so well, and I went single (that year).

Verses 49-50: "My eyes will flow unceasingly without relief, until the Lord looks down from heaven and sees."

Chapter 4 is the depression chapter... which starts out with this verse: "How the gold has lost its luster; the fine gold become dull!"

That seems pretty depressing.

And it all culminates at the end of Chapter 5 with this verse (19): "You, O Lord, reign forever. Your throne endures from generation to generation."

So that's the book of Lamentations in five minutes. Or less. Maybe more. I'm pretty bad at clocking myself. I think the most interesting parallel to the 5 stages of grief is the final stage - acceptance. Acceptance doesn't come from a false sense of "it will be okay," or a denial of what happened. What happened hurt, and that still matters.

Acceptance comes from the idea that despite how much it hurts, God is still good. Praising Him is still worthy. When we can come back around to praising God, even in the midst of pain and hurt, is when we can know we are healing (not healed) and that we are coming to terms with our grief; that we are learning acceptance.

Learning to Grieve

My mom died January 10th 2008, three years ago today.

It's one of those things you don't really get over; something you can't ever quite put behind you.

There are moments of pure grief involved. I think of the last three years of my life - in many ways the best three years of my life, and think about how my mom never got to see those. She never got to hear me talk about my final months in Charleston; she never watched me pursue Jess; she never got to watch my wedding; she never really had a chance to see me grow up and be a man (in my humble opinion, of course).

But then there are moments of pure anger as well. Because it was her decisions that ultimately prevented her from seeing any of those moments. My mom was an alcoholic, and when she was brought to the hospital with a sudden onset of jaundice, it was discovered that she had lost her liver to cirrhosis. Worse - she had known that there was something wrong for sometime and had kept it hidden from everyone else. The lack of medical follow-through meant that when she was finally forced to go to the hospital, she had also lost the function of her kidneys.

Even at this point, she didn't want to stop drinking.

So it's a strange thing to look back and remember. Because I may have moments of grief, but sometimes they flow into anger, and vice versa.

The one thing I've noticed about losing my mom is that stories about her mean so much more now. At Christmas, I shared a story about my favorite Christmas memory at an office party, and I was surprised to find that the point of the story was just the look on my mom's face for one Christmas. It's a story that I probably would never have remember or thought twice of if my mom was still here.

I've wanted to write down my experiences of that two week period three years ago for some time. It's an amazing story the more I look back on it - not amazing in a good way, mind you. I lived in Charleston; went on vacation to Michigan; and came back motherless two weeks later. It happened that quick.

I've written some of those experiences down, but not all of them. I remember struggling to pretend to be strong for my family and for my dad; I remember anger at some of the ways family members responded; I remember the fumbling terror the morning where my dad called into the bedroom I was sleeping in that we needed to go to the Hospice center right there and I remember the numbing sensation that covered my entire self the moment I realized that it could only mean one thing.

But it's not all terrible memories. I also remember being overwhelmed with the grace and kindness of my friends. I remember crying on the phone with several of my friends, and friends crying on the phone with me. I remember the cavalry showing up and taking me out to dinner. I remember the morning she died driving to Cornerstone and just being with a friend who had no idea what had even happened and how that was exactly what I needed.

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a few things about what I think this year is going to be about - a few of my resolutions. I think this is an important part of this year too, learning to face and confront this grief. I don't think it's a coincidence that I've recently developed a friendship with a man who lost his mom a few years ago. I don't think it's a coincidence that I'm wanting to write more and that this is one of the larger projects I've considered writing.

I'm not entirely sure where this is going, but I do know where it's been. I think even stepping out and writing this post could be a first step - a first step to healing; a first step to growth; a first step towards learning to grieve.

Fill in the ______: The First Kiss

I'm supposed to lead a 30-45 minute devotional next week for a group of people I don't really know. I led a devotion for them last year, and told some funny stories about India (straight out of Ashram) and then connected them. I'd like to do something this year, but I don't want to talk about India again.

I have three funny stories that don't come from India. I'm going to tell them on the blog over the next couple of days, and I'd like you to tell me:

• What elements interested you?
• What elements bored you?
• What meaning do you see behind the story?
  
• Can you draw any lessons / parallels from the story?
• Any advice on telling the story?

Today's story is "The First Kiss."

I moved across the country for a girl once. Not the long ways across, but from the south side to the north side anyway. This girls name was Jess, and I had fallen hard for her in college. After college, I moved away to pursue an internship at a church. We kept in contact throughout the years, and once my mom died, we began to tentatively explore the idea of being in a real relationship together.

I immediately packed everything I owned and moved back to Michigan. Well, not immediately, but that was how it felt. I left a great house full of great friends and a good job. With very little cash (and right after Hurricane Ike drove gas prices to 5 dollars a gallon) and no firm place to live, I drove north.

All of the housing and job stuff worked out (as it always does if you're patient), and I started seeing Jess on a regular basis. Well, I saw her once. We started dating on a Tuesday, and she invited me over to meet her parents on a Sunday.

We ate dinner with her parents and played some card games. Afterwards, I walked Jess to her car.

"I think we should break up."

I was stunned. We had been dating 5 days and I was pretty sure I hadn't screwed anything up yet.

Jess started explaining, without really looking at me, how she had talked to her sister and didn't feel like we were meant for each other. She said she wasn't sure that she wanted to date me, and wasn't sure if I was her Prince Charming.

She said I wasn't the man she fell asleep dreaming about.

After this verbal explosion, she finally looked at me and said "I would really appreciate it if you said something now."

I stood outside her parents house, in front of Jess's car, and had no idea what the correct response was. At this point, I didn't know if there was a correct response. I cared about Jess more than I cared to admit; and the thought of having moved across the country for this was a more foreign idea than anything I encountered in India. I could feel tears welling up - but I wasn't sure if they were tears of sadness and grief or tears of anger and rage.

"Please say anything," Jess begged.

And so I did.

"Screw it."

And then I kissed her.

WIldcard Picks: 2011

Here are my picks from last year, where I went 0-4 first round...

And here are the rules (copied and compilated from that post) that I pick by:

1. Momentum Matters.
2. One team is overhyped, one team is underhyped.
3. When in doubt, take the home team. But pick at least one road team.
4. Destiny Exists.

5. One team is kryptonite.

I gave up number 4 after last year's much feared Packers/Vikings Favrpocalypse never happened. I'm adding number 5 for me personally - there is consistently one team I pick incorrectly. The most blatant example? The 2007 Giants, who I picked to lose 4 times. So with those rules in mind, let's go to the picks.

New York Jets at Indianapolis Colts

Line: Indianapolis by 2.5

Jets have the ability to be my kryptonite team (they filled that role last year...), but I'm picking against them. They basically backed into the playoffs, losing 3 of their last 5 (and dropping from a potential 1 seed to the 6 seed). Indy's won 4 straight, so all the momentum is on their side. Also, Indy is home. Easy enough.

And the final nail in the coffin? Rex Ryan running his mouth. If there's one player you don't want to give reasons to psych up for a game in the NFL, it's Tom Brady. But if there's two players, Peyton Manning. So I think Indy wins this one. And I'll take them to cover the spread.

Final Score: Indianapolis 24, New York 13.

Baltimore Ravens at Kansas City Chiefs

Line: Baltimore by 3

Unsure. Kansas City might be underhyped, and Baltimore might be overhyped. Kansas City did lose their final game, killing any momentum (and home turf psychological edge). But Baltimore isn't setup to win games big; and a close game benefits the Chiefs running game.

And I do have to take an upset this round, so I'm going to take the Chiefs. Probably folly, but hey, these are my picks. Dang, that sounds so stupid. But I'm doing it. So I'll take the chiefs to win (which means they would by default cover).

It also plays into another theory - go against the grain. If most everyone agrees on something, you can try to get away with it. So I'll stick with it.

Final Score: Kansas City 20, Baltimore 17

New Orleans Saints at Seattle Seahawks

Line: New Orleans by 11

I have my upset special in Kansas City, and I have my road team special in New Orleans. Not often in the playoffs do those come in separate games.

Here's what it comes down to for me: in a game that New Orleans was only half heartedly in, they still gave Tampa a game last week. In a game that Seattle was fully in, they only beat St Louis on the incompetence of the wide receivers of STL. So when New Orleans comes out to play this week, there's no hope for Seattle. New Orleans covers.

Final Score: New Orleans 34, Seattle 9.

Green Bay Packers at Philadelphia Eagles

Line: Philadelphia by 2.5

This is a hard pick because there are two Green Bay Packers teams. There's the team that scores single digit points, and the team that scores 30 points. Team A (Single Digits) has no chance at Philly. Team B (30 points) has a 50/50 shot to outscore Philadelphia. So if we said each team has an equal chance of showing up, Green Bay has a 25% chance to win. I think. Math is hard!

I also think that Green Bay tends to lose to good teams. Their signature wins were over New York Giants (a team in collapse), Chicago (a team with nothing to play for), and the Jets (the game where Sanchez looked remarkably like I think he looks all the time). They couldn't hang with New England or Atlanta, both teams I think would (or will) struggle to handle Vick. So I'll take the Eagles. I'll hedge a bit though and take Green Bay to cover.

Stay tuned next week for the Divisional Round, or whatever the heck it's called.

Fill in the ______: Chopper

I'm supposed to lead a 30-45 minute devotional next week for a group of people I don't really know. I led a devotion for them last year, and told some funny stories about India (straight out of Ashram) and then connected them. I'd like to do something this year, but I don't want to talk about India again.

I have three funny stories that don't come from India. I'm going to tell them on the blog over the next couple of days, and I'd like you to tell me:

• What elements interested you?
• What elements bored you?
• What meaning do you see behind the story?
  
• Can you draw any lessons / parallels from the story?
• Any advice on telling the story?

The first of the three stories is "Chopper."

I lived in Charleston, South Carolina, for about two years, in a house with three other guys. We were all bachelors, which was something about ourselves that we wished to change. Over the course of two years, we hatched many plots to change our bachelorness. We tried creating groups and inviting women - swing dancing, prayer, 80's movies. We hosted bonfires every weekend. We pretended to like "The Notebook." And when none of that worked, we decided to break out the big guns - we were going to get a dog.

Having always been partial to Golden Retrievers, I lobbied for one. It was only then that we realized that dogs are not cheap. A golden retriever could easily run several hundred dollars on the low end! Even getting a dog from the shelter requires about two hundred dollars to pay for vaccinations and spay/neuter. We were desperate yes, but we were also cheap.

And then Steve, my roommate, solved our problems. His coworker was getting married and wanted to get rid of his dog - and he was giving it to us for free! This probably should have been our first clue.

I went with Steve to pick up the dog. I was convinced it was just some sort of mutt, with the lineage of forty different breeds or whatever. I did not expect to show up and find a 120pound pit bull named Chopper.

Okay, so this dog is huge and looks scary. Chopper didn't act scary though. He was nice - he definitely cried when leaving his old owner, and made pathetic mewling sounds.

Once we got Chopper home however, he dropped the act.

I generally like dogs. In fact, I don't think I've ever been scared of a dog before I met Chopper. Playing with Chopper was not recommended. I always enjoyed playing tug of war with a dog, wrestling them for control over a rope or a bone or whatever.

If you made a move torwards Chopper's current toy of choice (bone, shoe, stuffed animal, foodstuffs he had broken into), he would growl. No, scratch that. The frigging T-Rex he kept in his throat would growl. It sounded out of this world terrifying.

We didn't want to leave him in the house when we went to work, because of his propensity to eat the things we cared about. So the first day we left him in the garage, figuring that there wasn't really anything in there he could eat or kill.

I came home from work that day and found Chopper sitting idly on the living room couch. This concerned me, because our couch is not located in our Garage. I went to the garage to see how Chopper could have escaped - perhaps he broke a window or something.

No. Chopper chewed through the inner garage door into the house. Chewed through the door.

Steve and I replaced the door, and vowed to get rid of Chopper before he killed us. We couldn't do anything that night, so the next morning we tied Chopper to a post outside and went to work. Steve tried to contact his coworker to see if he would take Chopper back; this was to no avail. I contacted a few shelters, but none would take an unspayed pit bull. And spaying him brought us back to the fact that we were cheap. Putting him down was also annoyingly expensive.

I returned home that night without any success, only to find Chopper once again on our couch. Being as our couch is also not in our backyard, I was immediately filled with a sense of dread.

Apparently, while we were gone, Chopper broke part of the porch we had attached him to and then chewed through our back door into the house. That's right - Chopper 2, Doors 0.

The next morning, Steve loaded Chopper into his car. I was never really clear what happened to Chopper - Steve said he released him into the wild to destroy trees and eat more wood. I don't think Steve was lying, but I know I lay awake for two weeks, concerned that Chopper was going to go all "Homeward Bound" and chew through our front door in the middle of the night.

NFL: Week 17 and Season Quick Review

Here's where I ended up week 17:

I correctly predicted that the winning teams would be: Atlanta, Lions, Raiders, Patriots, Tampa, Chargers, Packers, Colts, 49ers, Seattle (lock).

I also incorrectly predicted that these teams would win: Browns (upset), Bills, Bengals (upset), Redskins, Jaguars, Eagles. I didn't really state who I was picking in Dallas/Philly, but I meant to take Philly so that's a mark against me...

So the week record was 10-6. Not shabby for week 17. I really thought I was doing much better than I thought; but maybe that's because the only teams I remembered picking were the Browns/Bengals upset teaser and the Bills. Don't take teams that start with B's.

So my overall 2010 regular season:

Picks: 150-104 (59%)

Lock: 12-5 (71%)

Upset: 5-12 (29%)

Not bad. I miscounted somewhere, as there are 256 regular season games, and I only have 254. The two games don't impact my final percentage (I'm still at 59% either way).

Upsets and Locks seem about right for those categories... I did tear up the Lock category, because I started out 1-5. Just goes to show you that the beginning of every season is a crapshoot.

Stay tuned later this week for my "Playoff Rules" column. It will inform you how I make my picks for the postseason, and tell you what those picks are.

Also random factoid I realized last night that I haven't heard anyone announce yet, which may make me a genius ready to be a sportscaster: The wildcard teams are a combined 7 games better than the 3/4 seeds. No wildcard team has a worse record than the team it is playing on the road against.