5. 145 – 79 (64%) (7)
AnckSuNamun

Hopefully I'll have a good week. I better at least be in the top three when this is all over

TMPletz said:

I was to busy listening to Don't play "with" me

lilgish said:

That's really sad news. I heard it on the radio this morning. God be with them.

Thursday, December 22, 2005 ·
Saddened Seahawks have ties to Dungy, son

By GREGG BELL
AP SPORTS WRITER

KIRKLAND, Wash. -- Coach Mike Holmgren led all Seahawks in taking a knee on the field and bowing their heads for a moment of silence after practice Thursday.

That was how Seattle honored James Dungy, the late son of Tony Dungy, the coach of the Indianapolis Colts the Seahawks will host Saturday.

James Dungy, 18, was found dead early Thursday in his Tampa, Fla.-area apartment. Soon after, Tony Dungy left the Colts and flew to Florida.

"He's a good friend," Holmgren - a father of four daughters - said of the elder Dungy.

He was sighing and spoke in a hushed tone.

"As a parent, that's the toughest news you can get. We prayed for Tony, (wife) Kathy and I did, this morning when we heard. It's definitely tough."


When asked if he expected to see Dungy in Seattle Saturday, Holmgren said, "No, I don't."

Seattle defensive tackle Chartric Darby was a Tampa Bay rookie in 2001. That was Dungy's final season as Buccaneers coach. He received the news of James Dungy's death Thursday morning in a phone call from Tampa from Buccaneer Ellis Wyms. Both Darby and Wyms were rookies in Tampa Bay in '01.

Darby said James and his four siblings were always around the team.

"They traveled to every game with us. He and all coach Dungy's kids were on the buses, the planes. They would always be there," Darby said. "It's a tough situation. My heart goes out to his family.

"Good kid. Good pops. Good mom. Good family. Nothing but love there.

"It's just a tragedy," Darby added. "I know everybody is praying for their family."

Tim Ruskell, now Seattle's president of football operations, was Tampa Bay's scouting director and then its player personnel director during Dungy's Buccaneers tenure from 1996-2001.

Ruskell remembered James being a tall teenager who got even taller through a growth spurt. James Dungy was 6-foot-7 when he died.

"Just a quality kid. Just a great family," Ruskell said. "It is a terrible tragedy."

Ruskell agreed with the widespread belief Dungy is a family man first and football coach second.

"He's a great man. He has such high moral character, a high value system," Ruskell said. "And he instills that in his team and the people that work with him.

"His family would be around the practices and the facility. He would encourage that with our coaches. And he would run our coaches out of there to get home to his families when it got too late in the night.

"My wife and I got the news this morning and we were just devastated. ... It's absolutely terrible. I can't imagine what he's going through."

Still, there will be a Colts-Seahawks game Saturday. It means little to Indianapolis (13-1) because the Colts have already clinched home-field advantage throughout the AFC playoffs. But Seattle (12-2) still needs a win - or a Chicago loss - over the final two regular-season games to clinch home-field advantage in the NFC.

Holmgren acknowledged that it will be somewhat awkward to coach against the Colts with all they are suddenly enduring.

"But we must separate that," the Seahawks coach said. "We still have a lot at stake. We must be able to do that. So that is what we are going to do."

lilgish said:

AnckSuNamun said:

bad week last week, you gotta get by TMpletz and carrie lee first.

lilgish said:

AnckSuNamun said:

At least you were the only one to go 16 - 0.

TMPletz said:

I'm coming to get you

lilgish said:

AnckSuNamun said:

Atlanta at Tampa Bay
Buffalo at Cincinnati
Dallas at Carolina
Detroit at New Orleans
(San Antonio, TX)
Jacksonville at Houston
N.Y. Giants at Washington
Pittsburgh at Cleveland
San Diego at Kansas City
San Francisco at St. Louis
Tennessee at Miami
Philadelphia at Arizona
Indianapolis at Seattle
Oakland at Denver

Sunday, Dec. 25

Chicago at Green Bay
Minnesota at Baltimore

Monday, Dec. 26

New England at N.Y. Jets

tough games this week.

Saturday, Dec. 24

Atlanta at Tampa Bay
Buffalo at Cincinnati
Dallas at Carolina
Detroit at [b]New Orleans (San Antonio, TX)
Jacksonville at Houston
N.Y. Giants at Washington
Pittsburgh at Cleveland
San Diego at Kansas City
San Francisco at St. Louis
Tennessee at Miami
Philadelphia at Arizona
Indianapolis at Seattle
Oakland at Denver

Sunday, Dec. 25

Chicago at Green Bay
Minnesota at Baltimore

Monday, Dec. 26

New England at N.Y. Jets

seattle is going to beat the colts I think

that is all

Saturday, Dec. 24

Atlanta at Tampa Bay
Buffalo at Cincinnati
Dallas at Carolina
Detroit at New Orleans
(San Antonio, TX)
Jacksonville at Houston
N.Y. Giants at Washington
Pittsburgh at Cleveland
San Diego at Kansas City
San Francisco at St. Louis
Tennessee at Miami
Philadelphia at Arizona
Indianapolis at Seattle
Oakland at Denver

Sunday, Dec. 25

Chicago at Green Bay
Minnesota at Baltimore

Monday, Dec. 26

New England at N.Y. Jets

thoughts & prayers for Coach Dungy and family.

jerseykrs2 said:

that's gonna be a highly emotional game

11/14

newpower99
Rinluv
Cojones

need picks before the games start

2 hours before games

closed

San Francisco yeah I know but hope springs eternal they only lost by one point last week. the bay shall rise again!

Hopefully I can sneak off somewhere to watch the games in peace tomorrow. I just checked the scores on Yahoo.....and once again I sucked this week. wft is going on with these teams. The 49ers....what the hell are they tryin' to win for. They ain't going to the playoffs.....messing up people's picks.

AnckSuNamun said:

" i hear ya'"

yeah a lotta spoliers this week and next week.

I'm an impressive 5-8 so far!

I might as well throw in the towel

pardonme4livin said:

july said:

Great Atmosphere!


Next week. Seahawks at Packers Then


Now on to the Playoffs!

Monday Night Football' Signs Off on ABC

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. - Are you ready for a finale? After 36 years as a television phenomenon, "Monday Night Football" prepared to end its run on ABC with Monday night's game between the
New England Patriots and the
New York Jets.

The series switches networks next season, when ESPN begins an eight-year deal in which it will pay $1.1 billion per year for Monday night rights.

"Obviously we're celebrating a 36-year legacy on ABC and the end of an era but we're also celebrating the start of a new era with this great property on ESPN," George Bodenheimer, the president of ESPN and ABC Sports, said before the game. "It's a bit of mixed emotions."

It's also a long way from where "Monday Night Football" started.

On Sept. 21, 1970, "MNF" kicked off what would be the longest prime-time sports series in television history with the New York Jets at Cleveland. Keith Jackson, Don Meredith and Howard Cosell were in the booth and, it soon became evident, America was watching.

It quickly became appointment television, with the interplay between the Cosell and Meredith providing almost as much entertainment as the play on the field. When Frank Gifford replaced Jackson in the booth for the show's second season, the ratings only went up.

Those announcers have long been gone — though Gifford was at Giants Stadium for the finale Monday night, to be announced by Al Michaels and John Madden — but the program has retained a distinct position in the landscape of American cultural.

"'Monday Night Football' and the bubble-gum card — that was kind of important being in the league if you could do that," Jets coach Herman Edwards said.

It's provided many memorable moments, from Tony Dorsett's record-setting 99-yard touchdown run in 1983 to Brett Favre's emotional 399-yard, four-touchdown performance the night after his father's death. On Dec. 8, 1980, it was Cosell who announced that John Lennon had been shot and killed.

Even the show's misses were interesting: When ratings began to dip, comedian Dennis Miller was hired to be part of the announcing team. He lasted two seasons.

"You look at the body of work that has been completed here over 36 years: the great games, the stars, the story lines, the part of Americana that 'Monday Night Football' is, it's really a magnificent piece of work," Bodenheimer said.

Of course, ABC would certainly prefer a better matchup for its finale. The Jets have long been out of the playoffs, and the Patriots have already clinched a spot, with no chance of improving their position.

With the fracturing of television and the myriad of viewing options that have developed in the era of cable, "MNF" no longer holds the same position it once did. But it is still a top ratings performer week in and week out and its intro — capped by Hank Williams Jr.'s rhetoric "Are you ready for some football?" — are instantly recognizable.

And players still realize its significance. After all, Monday night is still a prime-time showcase, a place to show the country what a team, or a player, is made of.

"It's good to know we're going to be the last one," linebacker Jonathan Vilma said. "That makes it that much more special for us. We're going to be in the history books as the last Monday night game on ABC."