I'm The Rabbi, editor of On The Sportslines, welcome to your Week 11 Football Recap.
OK, I know you're sick of it, and I am too. So here my friends is the last definitive word on the Patriots 4th and 2-gate you've been hearing all week in their loss to the Colts. Was the decision stupid? Of course it was! No team in it's right mind would go for it unless they had the cockiness of Bill Bellicheck. But PLEASE remember two things:

1. That drive was doomed from the beginning when Bill had to take a timeout so NE wouldn't be called for too many men on the field. Seriously Bill, couldn't you have been more careful or had just taken the penalty so you had the timeout in your back pocket?

2. New England called timeout before the 4th and 2 play and Indy called timeout to make sure they kept the 2 minute warning. I think Indy outsmarted New England more than New England outsmarted themselves on that final drive.

Now the numbers said that New England had a better chance of going for it than they did in punting. All I got to say is this...ARE THEY NUTS? Since when did numbers mean the world in football. We all saw how World Series manager Joe Girardi got killed for that in the ALCS in baseball cause he took out a hot reliever for a better matchup. Maybe the media wants to see the good in the dumb decision Old billy made. Which leads us to this....

TEN THINGS THAT HAPPENED THIS WEEKEND IN FOOTBALL- THE GOOD/BAD EDITION...OR IS IT THE BAD/GOOD EDITION?

1. Good: Playoff games for all BCS Conferences.

For those who like playoffs, listen up. By virtue of their 44-41 OT win against Arizona Saturday night, Oregon will now host Oregon St a week from Thursday with a Rose Bowl bid on the line to the winner. Add that to what we will see December 5th when Pitt hosts Cincinnatti for a BCS auto bid plus what the Big 10 had 9 days ago when Ohio St and Iowa played for the Rose Bowl. Yup, all 6 BCS conferences, one way or another have conference title games this year. The bad: the Big 10, Pac 10, and Big East couldn't get their "title" games sponsored. Oh well.

2. Bad: Possible blowouts in 2 conference title games.

In the ACC, Georgia Tech will face Clemson. Tech hasn't lost a single game since they lost in September at Miami. Clemson hasn't lost in their last 6. In the Big 12, Texas will be an overwhelming favorite versus Nebraska. 7 out of 9 times this decade the Big 12 title game has been decided by 2 TD's or more, with the favorite winning all but once (good for Texas). However the good is that both the Huskers and the Tigers have nothing to lose, so expect them to go down...with a fight. Good: As for that "other" Title game in the SEC, we will preview that on its own next week, along with a requiem for Mr. Charlie Weis.

3. Good: San Diego looks like a Super Bowl team.

Since losing week 6 to Denver, the San Diego Chargers looked like a much different team. 5 straight has brought them up to 7-3 after a 32-3 win yesterday over Denver, and now this team is in a great position to get the 2 seed in conference. Ladanian Tomlinson is not dead yet, with another TD yesterday (and how bout fullback Mike Tolbert getting 50+ yards of his own!), Phillip Rivers is one of the steadiest QBs in the league, and all of a sudden the competiton of the Chargers (mainly Denver) has folded like a cheap suit. Bad: Norv will be very paranoid on when the collapse will actually come.

4. Bad: The Cleveland Browns blow a 3 TD lead, go to 1-8.

All thanks to the efforts of one Matthew Stafford of the Detroit Lions...oh and a big time pass interference call late. Stafford threw for 5 TD's and 422 yards, and thanks to that 5th and final- untimed- last play of the game, the Lions have 2 more wins than their fans expected in 2009. Oh and Stafford has had what is a typical rookie season, 4 games with QB ratings over 74, and 4 games with a QB rating under 60. Good: Cause of what happened at the end, people actually realize the two teams played yesterday.

5. Good: The New York Jets know what type of rookie they have.

Answer: a bad one when he's good he's real good, when he's bad he's real bad. Yesterday's 31-14 loss against the Patriots can go up there with his loss against the Bills for worst game by Mark Sanchez in his 10 game career. He went 8-21 for 136 yards, and esentially gave the Patriots 17 points because of his turnover (the 3rd time you can say he was the most major part in a loss this year, the New Orleans game in Week 4 the other). Mark needs to keep the turnovers down, he's up to 16 now, or an average of other an INT and a half per game. Bad: Especially for Jets fans, Kellen Clemens may get one more start as a Jet QB if this keeps up.

6. Bad: Jay Cutler. Oy.

The Bears starting QB's INT number is 18, with just one that gave the game to the Philadelphia Eagles the win last night 24-20. But it's not just that. Just look at Jay Cutler's numbers: 24-43, 171 yards. Not only is Jay Cutler's not accurate, he's scared and more off than ever. Three times in last night's game, he missed wide open WR's for TD's. I honestly think both Cutler and Sanchez are more harm than good right now and would honestly both deserve a benching. The Eagles played solid, but not 100%, and it still was enough. Good: Next year's #1 dra...oh. Um, the chance that they can still make....help me out here?

7. Good: The Giants are off the schnide.

And you can thank Eli Manning for every bit of it. He passed for 391 yards, through 2 TDs to his primary red zone target Kevin Boss, and had 4 WR's with over 60 yards recieving. In the 34-31 OT win over the Falcons, Eli looked as sharp as he ever did. Take away the 3 game stretch in October (NO-ARI-PHI), and Eli has done a lot to cover his teams non existent running game (only 88 yards, and now Brandon Jacobs is injured) this season. Bad: the defense gave up a 2 TD lead late against a soild passing team. Not good when you have a stretch at DEN and hosting DAL and PHI up. The defense can't do this again.

8. Bad: The Cowboys and the #7 go together well.

That's for the number of points they've scored in the last 2 weeks. However, this time it was good enough for a 7-6 win over the Redskins. While the fact that Tony Romo got it together in the 4th, this time the lack of a rushing game for Washington was as important here. It allowed the Skin offense to be too predictable, and let Romo develop throughout the game. You know what they say, a win is a win is a win. Good: 7 also equals the number of wins for Dallas AND they host the 3 win Raiders next week. Wait, 3 win Raiders? More on that in a moment.

9. Good: Everything is even keel in the AFC North.

That's cause the Steelers and Bengals both lost yesterday. In the 20-17 loss to Oakland for the Bengals The 4th quarter issues for Cincy (giving up 10 points in the quarter and a late fumble in the game) combined with Jamarcuss Russell not screwing it up for Oakland (cant do it when you're on the bench, thank you Bruce Gradkowski), were the difference. Pittsburgh just was in a dogfight in their 30-27 OT loss (see post below for more, courtesy of Mr. Jay Kaplan), morely cause they were down from the get go thanks to the EIGHTH GAME IN A ROW where Pitt let up a special teams TD. Not winning you many games there. Bad: Chances for a 2 seed (thanks to San Diego and Wild Card (thanks to 6-4 Jacksonville) less certain after yesterday.

10. Bad: The Colts Were ugly yesterday.

Let's just get this out of the way now: Good: THEY WON! The Colts 17-15 win over the Ravens yesterday shows that winning ugly is not a bad thing at all. 2 INT's, 1 Fumble? No problem! Not when the competiton was playing down (since the bye the Ravens offense has gone back into a sort of shell). And the defense was playing up (playing the same bend but not break D we've seen for a while now), Along with the Saints wining yesterday,we now enter post Thanksgiving with TWO 10-0 teams, when at this time last season we had none. The toughest challenges might be in the way for both next week, with the Saints hosting that last 16-0 team, the Pats, and the Colts going on the road to play a team they almost lost to at home, the Texans.

See you next sunday night, and happy Turkey Day to all!