Part One of a Nine Part Series in which Sharkey and the Man In Black preview the entire NFL Season, all the way through the Super Bowl.  Today, the guys take a look at the (awful) NFC West.  Since Sharkey claims he knows more about the NFC than the AFC, and MIB follows the AFC more than the NFC, it only makes sense that MIB takes the lead on all NFC Divisions, and Sharkey takes the lead on the AFC.

ManInBlack says:

Ah…what can you say about the worst division in football?  I know that the Cardinals went to the Super Bowl a few years ago, the Seahawks a few years before that (both lost to the Steelers, strangely enough), but come on.  The Cardinals rode Kurt Warner’s arm to the playoffs and even then looked mediocre most of the time with the exception of one playoff run.  Now Warner is gone and the Matt Leinart disaster, er…era, can begin.  I like Tim Hightower to regess and Beanie Wells to take the bulk of the carries, but nothing is going to save the team from the death-spiral that is going to happen in Warner’s absence.  I say Arizona goes 5-11.

The Seahawks, meanwhile, have a bunch of shiny new players from this year’s draft and a brand new scumbag to coach them.  I don’t think Carroll is a good NFL coach; he didn’t impress me in his first runthrough.  He’s better when he can cheat to get better players, which unfortunately gets diverted by the NFL structure of actually paying players.  I hope he falls on  his face, and I kind of expect him to.  I have the Seahawks going 6-10.

The Rams are still awful.  If you think they’re going to improve because they drafted a guy with a reconstructed shoulder, I have bad news for you.  Even if he plays at his peak, Sam Bradford isn’t going to get this team above 5 wins.  As it is, I’m picking  them to be even worse than that.  2-14 sounds about right.

All this leaves is the San Francisco 49ers.  They’re a team on the rise, and have been for a few years.  Of course, when you’re that awful, there’s pretty much no place to go but up.  Regardless, I like Frank Gore, I like Mike Singletary, and I like that they seem to respond to adversity as a team.  I don’t have them doing anything special, but a winning record (barely) will be plenty to win this abortion of a division.  49ers, 9-7.

Sharkey Says:

Hard to disagree with much of anything that the man in black just said.  This is the most bland division in the NFL, and I don’t really care about any of the teams in it.  None of them are good.  If any of these four teams were in any other division, they wouldn’t make the playoffs, guaranteed.  But somebody has to.

That somebody will be the 49ers.  Like MIB, I have them going 9-7 this season.  If they had a better quarterback (say, um, if they had traded for Donovan McNabb), they’d be a 12-win team in this division, and probably find themselves with a first round bye.  Alex Smith?  No thanks.  The team is much improved, and should win the division.  But don’t confuse them for a good team… they’re not.

The former ‘good’ team of this division, the St Louis/Phoenix/Arizona Cardinals, is now a bad team, period.  Matt Leinart is, how did MIB put it?  A disaster.  Antrel Rolle, Karlos Dansby, and Anquan Boldin are all gone.  I just don’t see how this team even comes close to .500 this season.  The good news is Larry Fitzgerald will still be a fantasy force, regardless of his QB.  Everything else about this team is bad news.  Like MIB, I have them at 5-11.

Here’s where MIB and I differ.  He has Seattle going 6-10.  As if!  4-12, lock it up.  Charlie Whitehurst is not the answer.  How many nights a week do you think T.J. Houshmanzadeh lies in bed and thinks about the fact that of all the teams in the NFL, he chose the Seahawks to voluntarily sign with.  Can you imagine if he had signed with the Texans instead?  Or the Falcons, or even the Bears?  Hell, even the Lions would have been a better decision.

But, at least he didn’t sign with the St. Louis Rams.  Ugh.  I think it’s going to take a few more years for people to finally catch on to just how poorly this franchise has been run over the last five or six seasons.  It’s an absolute disaster.  Hands down the worst franchise in the NFL.  I like to think they’re turning the ship around, and I legitimately think Steve Spagnuolo is going to be a good NFL coach, in the right situation.  But, this isn’t the right situation.  And, looking at that Sam Bradford contract, they’re clearing not turning the ship around right now.  2-14 seems right, just like MIB predicted… and that’s a generous prediction.