The Panthers win ugly, but win nevertheless

The Carolina Panthers victory yesterday was one of the ugliest, most boring football games you’d hope never to see, but it was a win never the less and The Panthers now lead the NFC South Division with a record of 8 & 3.

For all but the last five minutes of the game it was a battle of who was going to hypnotize the other team into deep slumber first, trying to accuse both teams of putting the other team to sleep from sheer boredom would be almost too cruel so I want to use slightly nicer language, but then it was like The Panthers woke up from their nap with a “hey, we’re the friggin’ Panthers and we do have Steve Smith who leads the NFL in all major categories as a wide receiver so maybe we should get the ball to him now that we’re near the goal line” and BOOM – touchdown – which was the margin of victory over, over whoever the heck they were playing, oh that’s right it was the Buffalo-Boring-Bills, 13-9.

Sure, The Panthers are a much better team that what was exhibited yesterday, but it is Week 11 of the season and now all teams and all players are starting to get nicked up and the recovery cycle of snapping back from the physical fatigue of taking ten consecutive weeks of hard beatings is basically gone, even the most fit of atheletes about this stage hurt like mothertruckers every single moment of every single day from now through the (hopeful for them) playoffs and this is where the truly better teams start to show themselves as being the class of the field, when their star players start showing less effects from the accumulated pain cycles than do lesser atheletes on lesser teams. You might not think a player who can normally run a 4.5-40 yard dash now slowed in Week 11 down to a, say, 4.8 or 5-Flat makes a huge difference, but in the world of The NFL where it’s the best 500 physical-based atheletes (sorry NBA and MLB and MLS fans, but the gestalt pain threshold for NFL players is in a differrent universe when compared with “your” sports) who also have raw world-class speeds, Yes, it makes a huge difference.

Anyway, will The Panthers win their division? Let’s see, they play Atlanta this coming Sunday and all but one of their remaining games are with division opponents, so, if I was a betting man – which I’m not – I’d say no they won’t win the division, there’s simply too much and better roster talent out there, but they’ll probably get a wildcard spot on the basis of their overall record.