Conference Championship Picks

I am going to keep this short and sweet as I know there are only about one million and four different articles, game match-ups and feature stories on the AFC and NFC Championship games that have been written this week. What I can promise you is that there is going to be at least one convincing win this weekend. I say this because every year since 2002 one of the two conference championship games has been decided by two scores or more and in four of those eight years both games have been one-sided. The last four years, however, has seen one convincing victory and one close game decided by seven points or less. I think this trend continues and we see one lopsided victory and one close game. Here are the picks…

New York at Pittsburgh (-3)

Haven’t we been here before? Sanchez is being praised for going on the road and knocking off two supposedly superior teams. Rex Ryan is a defensive genius and Darrelle Revis is the best cornerback in the league. Well that last sentence is true, but this has all the feelings of last year’s AFC Championship Game when the Indianapolis Colts and Peyton Manning ended the Jets’ Super Bowl dreams. Ben Roethlisberger is going to make plays with his feet unlike Manning and Brady were capable of the past two weeks and the Jets defense is going to be pressured in a way they haven’t seen all year. I expect big plays from both the offense and defense in a fairly convincing Steelers victory. Pick: Steelers (-3.5).

Green Bay (-3.5) at Chicago

Well if you read the opening paragraph you can probably guess that I think this is going to be a close game. I love Aaron Rodgers, I love the Packers’ offensive weapons and I love that attacking defense, but going on the road against a very good to great Bears defense, playing on terrible field conditions and facing a team that feels like it is us against the world is going to be an awfully difficult task for the Packers. I think this game comes down to the fourth quarter, and I think it is decided by one score. The difference, however, will be Rodgers. With the game on the line in the fourth quarter I have trust in the Packers QB to make a play while I have no such confidence in Jay Cutler. I wish the line in this one was three, but I am going to stick by Green Bay and hope they pull this one out by a touchdown. Pick: Packers (-3.5).