AFC West breakdown
By thegregone
On this glorious eve of NFL football, its time to chime in on what has transpired up to this point. With the AFC West up for grabs, here’s what The Greg One has seen from the Chargers stablemates:
Kansas City: Great move starting your quarterback in the fourth preseason game against desperate second, third and fourth teamers and subsequently being responsible for his rib injury after a 350-pound backer crushed him like a grape. Rib injuries take a long time to recover from. Cassel may not be ruled out (yet) but he won’t be effective for another month at least. You get to play the Chargers at home in week three and there’s no doubt that the bolts number one defense will be salivating when they see Tyler Palko behind center! May as well put that L down now and pray Palko doesn’t join Cassel in the infirmary.
Denver: You golden child Tim Tebow was given the keys to the Kingdom in the offseason only to have the only smart front office figure, John Elway, take back the keys and reinsert Kyle Orton, who was on the trade block all summer. Again, Elway succeeds at foiling a certain win for the Chargers. With Orton back in the fold and Tebow unable to beat out the waterboy on the depth chart, the Chargers will actually have to come to play to get the win. The Greg One sees a sweep of Denver in the cards but on behalf of Chargers fans everywhere, START Tim Tebow!!
Oakland: Our favorite whupping boys are back to their looney ways. (As if they ever left.) Al Davis pulled the trigger on the worst quarterback to be drafted this season and gave up a third round pick for Terrelle Pryor. Awesome! Pryor can run a sub-4.4 forty yard dash time which should help as he runs from Chargers all game long. What’s funnier than that, Pryor wanted to wear jersey number 2, the same number worn by the infamous JaMarcus Russell. A student of the game this guy is not! Pryor has to sit the first five games of the season but the Raiders don’t play the Chargers until weeks 9 and 16. Your best player, Nnamdi Asomugha ran as far away from Raider stupidity as he could get in Philadelphia which means Philip Rivers will have a field day slicing and dicing the Raiders backfield and starting a new consecutive winning streak. The ‘Start Terrelle Pryor at QB’ campaign will start in five weeks.
San Diego: Its safe to say the west belongs to San Diego and the Chargers will do no worse than 5-1 in the division. The offense is back and better than ever with Jackson, Floyd and Gates on the field from game one. The Chargers retained their entire offensive line, great news for Philip Rivers. The defense added some veteran leadership and resigned the best safety no one knows yet in Eric Weddle to a long-term deal as well as bringing in stud Bob Sanders. The special teams situation has been repaired and with the new kickoff rules in effect there goes Oakland and Kansas City’s best hope. No punt blocks (sorry Raiders) and if Dexter McCluster wants a return touchdown he’s going to have to field that ball from the stands Arena League style. There’s no suspense here as the Chargers will get fat on in division weakness and clinch a playoff spot. The only question is getting enough out of division wins to get one of the top two seeds. Now about that theme song…