Tough Decisions Ahead

Chris Schultz

12/26/2007 12:34:18 PM

It is Week 17, game 16, and some decisions need to be made as every NFL team evaluates its present situation.

Situation No. 1
You are in the playoffs by winning your division and have the best or second best record in the AFC/NFC. What do you do with your top players? Decision: only play your top players half the game. Two full weeks before another game is too long, but if a player is even remotely injured, sit him down. Right now physical and emotional rejuvenation is everything.

Situation No. 2
You are in the playoffs as the division winner or wildcard representative. The game is meaningless to you but you want to compete. In this case, your top three, maybe top five players, do not play them. Anyone that is hurt, keep them off the field. Your achievement of the primary goal has happened, you made the playoffs. Do not mess it up because of ego or outside pressure.

Situation No. 3
You need to win to get in and because of that, everyone plays. In some way this is not a bad situation to be in because it creates desperation and urgency which instills a mental toughness. Once the regular season is over, all 16 games, it transforms into a four game season which means every game is similar to the previous one played and its intensity. Remember, the Pittsburgh Steelers won the 2006 Super Bowl because from the mid-point of the season on they had to win to not only make the playoffs, but catch up to the Cincinnati Bengals. What happened was Pittsburgh won three road playoff games and the Super Bowl in Detroit by being truly better tested; by no means physically rested. Situation number three is not a bad place to be.

Situation No. 4
Your team is out of the playoffs, and looking on to 2008. The best way to describe it is awkward. Playing football without purpose is like going to work with a pay cut pending. You subconsciously ask yourself ''Why Bother?'' Your public answer is that ''I am a pro and I get paid, so act like a pro and earn your money.'' It can be a fearful time because if the head coach sits you so that he see how another player plays as a starter, he might do it again come July - not a good omen. Do players pack their bags ready to go before the game begins? Not that much. But, there is a major fear of injury, because if you break a leg or tear an ACL, what you were going to do in January and February vanishes because the first six months of 2008 become a personal rehabilitation challenge that depends on the severity of the injury. Yes, players do watch the game clock in a different way when its week 17 and there is no playoff possibility. It can go fast enough.

Situation No. 5
Simple question, do you take the risk with Tom Brady, Randy Moss, Teddy Bruschie, Junior Seau, Asante Samuel, Richard Seymour... I could go on and on with more names. Or is a 16-0 season that important compared to a fourth Super Bowl trophy? I think Bill Belichick will play everyone and try to beat the Giants in the first half, if not the first quarter. All year the focus with New England was about winning, and also finishing. It would be a contradiction in its highest form not to finish the season the way you started, winning. I can't see anyone on the Patriots not wanting to finish the season 16-0, and I definitely can't see the message of fourth quarter ruthlessness changing in the fourth quarter of the 16th game. Others have tried and failed in the Super Bowl era of the NFL.

I think everyone with the Patriots wants regular season perfection and will get it, as I doubt that the Giants will play Plaxico Burress, Brandon Jacobs, Michael Strahan and maybe Eli Manning for more than one half. After 15 games of paying the price to say you're the best, do not give in, remain the best by showing no weakness.