2012 Divisional Retrospectives: The NFC East

Overview

Washington Redskins: 10-6

New York Giants: 9-7

Dallas Cowboys: 8-8

Philadelphia Eagles: 4-12

My, how time flies. It seems like only yesterday that the NFC East was the NFL’s most successful division. Between the New York Giants, the 90s Redskins, McNabb’s Eagles and Aikman’s Cowboys, the past few decades have been annoyingly dominated by hogs, hicks, Santa-booers and New Yorkers. Even last year, the Giants won the championship and millions of dumb people started using that to talk to say the NFC East was back (and that Eli Manning was the best QB in the NFL – yeahhhhh).

But now, after two straight years of mediocre teams fighting for a playoff spot, we have to face facts. The East is weak. It’s even weaker than the AFC East, because at least that division has a dominant team. The NFC East has teams that look good some days, then horrible the next. They’re as wishy-washy a division as there is, and with Robert Griffin still ailing, the Eagles in rebuild mode, and Romo and Manning still leading the other two teams, it doesn’t look like much will change.

Except maybe Jerry Jones will step down and hire a competent GM! That’ll totally happen!

MVP

It’s kind of odd to put a rookie here, but Robert Griffin III started dazzling on day one of the season and didn’t stop until he finally collapsed from Shanahan riding him like a racehorse. Hopefully Griffin won’t be sent to the glue factory, because he was one of the only exciting things to watch in the entire division. Unless you get your rocks off by watching puzzling interceptions, in which case Tony Romo’s your guy!

LVP

It’d be fun to say Tony Romo, because honestly making fun of the guy is my anti-drug, but we have to look at the worst team in the division, and we have to look at what player contributed to that. And my general rule is, if you’ve signed a $100 million dollar contract as the team’s most important player, and you can’t get your team any better than 4-12, you win Least Valuable Player of the division (that’s actually an oddly specific rule). And that’s why Mike Vick is the LVP. Sure, he got injured. Sure, Nick Foles wasn’t any better. Sure, Andy Reid was in charge. But that price tag makes him disappointing. Luckily, he restructured his deal, so he won’t be the LVP next year…hopefully.

The Hot Seat Index

Mike Shanahan – 6.2

He gets some good will for making the playoffs last year, but everyone in America blames him for RG3’s injury, and they aren’t 100% wrong. He is quickly losing his “coaching legend” mystique, mostly because people realize without John Elway, he’s just sort of mediocre.

Tom Coughlin – 3.1

Let’s just face facts: Coughlin will never get fired. He has this internal clock when he realizes his team is bad and he’s in danger of losing his job, and he motivates his team to win 4 straight. It’s probably some kind of illegal religious curse, but I’m not Dan Brown so I don’t really care to investigate it.

Jason Garrett – 7.7

It should probably be higher, but that would assume that Jerry Jones has normal human faculties. He might fire him for breathing too loud, or for insulting Tony Romo, or one of a million other bullshit reasons. Personal opinion? Garrett deserves to go unless they make the playoffs.

Chip Kelly – 0.9

Chip Kelly would have to have a disastrous season to be fired after one shot. Then again, this is the Eagles. Who knows what can happen. Still, I’m pretty sure he’ll survive at least a season or two. Feel free to mock me in a year when he’s replaced by Brian Kelly!

DUI ASAP

This is a pretty ripe division for it! I can think of a handful of players who could be caught behind the wheel with too much in them. It would be irreverent to bring up the fact a player from this division was in a high profile drunk driving case this past season, but it would also be missing a golden opportunity. But rather than pick a repeat champion, I’m going outside the box on this one. Chris Cooley technically still plays for the Redskins, and he’s technically pretty crazy. I can see him trying to do something funny for the internets and end up hurting his reputation in the process.

Entirely Too Early Predictions for 2013

New York Giants: 10-6

Dallas Cowboys: 8-8

Washington Redskins: 7-9

Philadelphia Eagles: 7-9

Without RG3, which seems likely, the Redskins will probably take a backslide. The Giants had a down year by missing the playoffs, so it’s natural that they’ll actually do something right this year, causing stupid people to call Eli Manning the best quarterback in the NFL (yes, I repeated this, but that’s because some people need to understand that ELI MANNING IS NOT THE BEST QUARTERBACK IN THE NFL AND JUST DROP IT ALREADY). Dallas has another ho-hum season, and the Eagles pick up behind what will probably be a monster season for LeSean McCoy.

Agree? Disagree? Let us know! Next week we’ll be tackling the North divisions, unless Ben decides to do something different! (Clearly we must communicate better.)