Week 3

Last week's picks: 3-9-3
Overall: 20-19-6

Yikes, that was an ugly week for picks. I didn't realize I had done that bad until I was tallying it up. Ah well, gotta love NFL parity.

I'm going to have to get back to studying for a couple months again, so my posting will go back to being sporadic at best. My goal is to at least get my picks up each week.

Just a couple comments on the Niners game...I'm going to just get the obvious out of the way first: they got absolutely hosed by the refs in 3 critical situations that I can think of right now

1. The "incomplete" pass to Davis that would have put them inside the 15
2. The phantom holding call by Clements that gave the Steelers 1st down on 2nd and long, leading to their TD drive.
3. Not calling intentional grounding on Roethlisburger, leaving them in field goal range late in the game.

Having said that, it's no excuse for losing, and I'm glad Nolan recognizes this. The offense continued to be putrid, and the defense played okay, although for the second straight game the corners often played 10+ yards off of the WRs, leaving them wide open. I don't know if this is a common practice in the NFL, but it makes no sense to this fan.

I am getting very frustrated with Hostler. While his play calling is slowly getting more creative on the passing end of things, every single time Gore's number is called, it's between the tackles...and even the bonehead announcers could recognize that this was a bad idea considering the Steelers' front 3. You have to switch up your playcalling during a game, otherwise Gore won't end up with 600 yards on the season. It is horribly frustrating to watch them not use their tools properly, and it is particularly disappointing to see Smith regress to pre-2006 form. He seemed to be so comfortable in Norv Turner's system, and losing him has really, really set Smith back. After Turner gets fired at the end of this season, I'd do everything in my power to get him back in the play-calling booth if I was in the 49ers front office.

On a brighter note, the Giants decided to play spoiler, and have almost knocked the Padres out of the Wild Card lead. Way to go, guys.