[Englishman31]

.....advances to the conference champinonship round.


[b:3459473626]#1 The Home team is usually the better team.[/b:3459473626]

No getting around this one, the Raiders have the [i:3459473626]better record [/i:3459473626]over the course of the season, deserve to enjoy the benefits of the home field and are rightly favored by odds makers for these reasons. Add to this that the Raiders beat the Jets head to head on national TV.

I could try to argue that the Jets are dramatically improved and have been as hot as any team in the NFL leading up to this game but we can all cherry pick statistics to back up our points of view and I don't see much point to going down that road. Case in point was the Colts fans last week giving their 10 reasons why the Colts were better than the Jets and why they, the Colts were the only "legitimate" playoff team of the two.

[b:3459473626]#2 Nicked up teams have a chance to get healthy.[/b:3459473626]

Very true IF your team is nicked up. It may the the first and last time in my lifetime that I will ever be able to say this in the second week of the payoffs about ANY team, but the Jets are almost eeriliy healthy. Even guys who were injured early on are now back AND back healthy (big difference that you Raiders may find out this week). In fact the only injuries seem to be to our Punter Turk (groin) and even though nobody is admitting it, it looks to me like John Hall (FG Kicker) has had something wrong for weeks.

However, if someone could guarantee me that my team would emerge completely healthy then I for one would take a wild card game every time. Especially if your team is improving on both sides of the ball (as the Jets seems to be) AND if you have essentially a rookie at QB where every game of experience counts large.

Normally the benefits of getting healthy by far outweigh the downside risk of getting stale or rusty, but that risk does exist I think. Please don't underestimate the potential for damage that can be done by players who try to come back too early from injuries. Curtis Martin and Sam Cowart were awful for the Jets earlier in the year for precisely this reason and it happens to some team in the playoffs every year.

[b:3459473626]#3 Home field advantage/Fan noise.[/b:3459473626]

Usually works to (a) Intimidate the opposing team, (b) Interfere with communications of the opposing QB, and (c) Can have the effect of intimidating the officiating into making some "homer" calls.

(a) Well, playing our 4th game in the black hole in a little over a year means the Jets are used to the black hole. I am sure it will be loud on Sunday but by and large it will be much the same as the Monday night game a few weeks back. The Browns would have had trouble with this one I think but this particular Jets team seems to really like being the underdog and in a bit of a strange way, I think the Jets actually like the whole over the top Raiders fans atmosphere thingy.

(b) Jets don't audible much at the line of scrimmage but this is still a concern.

(c) Again a concern but I think it is offset by the subconcious "get Al Davis" mentality that can exist in some officiating crews. Just as there is a bit of a "get Pat Riley" mentality in the NBA, I think there is some reason for Jet fans to hope that the normal home field officiating might be a wash in this game. And if it aint? Well they still have to play the game anyway.

[b:3459473626]#4 Extra week of scouting the opposition = better game plans.[/b:3459473626]

Normally a biggie, especially getting to see what the opposing coordinators actually did in the wild card week. In this case? I don't think so, these teams have played too often for there to be many surprises left in anyones bag of tricks. They both brought their best game (at that time) to the Monday night game because both of them were in tight divisional races. No hiding tricks for the playoffs there. So again, something that would normally be an advantage is probably not in this case because the teams know each other well. And remember the old saw about how hard it is to beat any team twice in the same season.

All in all, I beleive the Jets are underdogs and rightfully so. But they dangerous underdogs who are quite capable of biting a few more teams yet! Speaking as a long time Jets fan I HATE IT when the Jets are favorites and when they are being picked by the pundits. Last week was driving me nuts when all of those analysts were picking the Jets over the Colts. If you know anything about this team and their history, it is their capacity to break the hearts of their fans in games they are [b:3459473626][i:3459473626]*supposed* [/i:3459473626][/b:3459473626]to win that sets them apart from other teams.

I am also a great believer that you WANT your team to play and beat the best teams if you think your team is the best. I believe the Raiders Vs. Jets this weekend is the [i:3459473626]appropriate[/i:3459473626] test for the Jets and it comes at the [i:3459473626]appropriate time[/i:3459473626]. There are reasons to think that the Packers win might have been flawed and the Colts win was probably flawed, but as the Jets, you have beat the teams they put in front of you.

That said, I'll take underdog label gladly and leave the Raiders fans to worry about all those pundits picking their team for the superbowl.

P.S. I have $100 @ 500-1 on the Jets (when they were 2-5) so I may have jinxed my own team but they sure aint looking like 500-1 shots now.