NFL Wildcard weekend roundup

January 5, 8:03 AMSports ExaminerPaula Duffy

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Darren Sproles of San Diego

Two favorites won and two favorites lost. Saturday was upset day and Sunday, the visiting teams did what they were predicted to do. Over all we had one great game in San Diego, a good game in Arizona and two yawners.

For those that think I'm being harsh about the Philly/Vikings contest by calling it a yawner, I understand that until the Westbrook touchdown the Vikes had made it a contest and hung in there only two points down.

But I never felt the Eagles were in trouble despite their inability to score an offensive touchdown. Did you ? Here is the breakdown on the games the way I see it all. Scoring drive summaries are available here for the Cards/Falcons contest and here for the Dolphins/Ravens games

Atlanta Falcons vs. Arizona Cardinals   Final score: Arizona 30-24

The coach of the year (by the smallest margin) and the rookie of the year went down to defeat at the hands of one of the game's oldest starting quarterbacks and a defense that was much maligned during the regular season.

It helped that the missing man, Edgerrin James was taken out and dusted off for the kind of game he knows well from his All-Pro years with the Colts. 16 carries for 73 yards kept the Atlanta defense from keying on the Cards uber-receivers .

On the Falcons side of the ball, Michael Turner was bottled up and that left the game in the hands of Matt Ryan who surely played better than a rookie usually does but his botched hand-off resulting in a fumble in his own territory and his inability to get the ball out of his hands in the end zone both resulted in points for the other side.

The Falcons defense needs some bulking up in the off-season and this team should continue to improve in its division. They might want to go out and get a stud receiver for Ryan to throw to as well.

Indianapolis Colts vs. San Diego Chargers        Final score: San Diego 23-17

Did you notice how LT was standing on the sideline watching his teammates this year and not on the bench underneath a cape with that Darth Vader helmet securely fastened? Think that had anything to do with the fact that his replacement, the "roll out the barrel" mascot named Darren Sproles was setting the world on fire?

Sproles had a player's playoff dream of a game with more than 300 all purpose yards that put him up there in the third spot for playoff performances. And although as the broadcasters noted, Philip Rivers can't run well, he did what he had to and extended plays out of the pocket and ran for his life toward the first down markers without diving out of bounds on purpose.

The Colts had success when they tried to confuse the Chargers with their hurry-up plays and yet Joseph Addai and Dominick Rhodes couldn't carry the load that has fallen to them now that Marvin Harrison isn't Marvin Harrison any longer. The San Diego punter kept the Colts pinned way back in their own territory and we learned his name, which in and of itself is a surprise for a football game: Mike Scifres.

In the end, the Indy D couldn't stop the Chargers on their game tying drive nor in overtime. It was a sad ending to a career for Tony Dungy, unless he comes back of course. The Colts should also be wide receiver shoppers this off-season.

Baltimore Ravens vs. Miami Dolphins             Final score: Baltimore 27-9

Bill Parcells couldn't have been happy that his darling QB, Chad Pennington threw the game away. His calling card this year was his ability to protect the ball and manage his offense. He had some big passing games but in general he just didn't put the team in jeopardy.

The sad thing about it is that he was hitting on all cylinders on at least two drives that should and could have resulted in scores which would have given some hope to the Dolphins and slowed down the blitzing and rough and tumble secondary coverage of the Baltimore D,

On the Baltimore side, Joe Flacco and his rookie coach, John Harbaugh gave the AP writers a flip of the finger for their votes in the rookie and coach of the year contests. Flacco is about the ugliest runner among QB's except for Peyton Manning but he gets it done.

Ed Reed shoud start his campaign now for defensive player of the year.

 Philadelphia Eagles vs. Minnesota Vikings     Final score: Philadelphia 26-14

After his coach and QB talked Brian Westbrook off a ledge he finally ran to daylight and scored the put-away touch down against the Vikes. He had been aggravated that he kept hitting a wall of defenders but give credit to Andy Reid who kept calling plays for his RB.

As I said up top, although the score was stuck at 16-14 for a long while, the Vikes didn't threaten after they got put back, waaaay back, by the other punting star of the weekend, Philadelphia's Sav Rocca whose kicks resulted in one yard of punt return yardage.

Tarvaris Jackson stayed in the pocket and got creamed and in the fourth quarter, after the team needed two scores to win, he showed his scrambling style. Sometimes keeping mobile QB's from strutting their stuff is a good thing. But to do it to the exclusion of the benefits it might bring isn't. Difficult balance for sure.

The Minnesota D did its job on the run game but McNabb got great protection and only threw one pick.  Tough loss for the Vikes.