Monday Night Meltdown

Well, that was just darn fantastic. Really. Splendid, even. Nothing better than to watch the Denver Broncos lose one of its 12 home, eight prime-time football contests in such humiliating fashion.

To Denver's credit, their pass rush stayed alive, getting to Big Ben Roethlisberger and generating a fumble, one that was returned for a touchdown. Beyond that? They were terrible. Terrible shreds of yellow-and-black towels. And Pittsburgh's pick six? Serves McDoogs right for drumming up something as gay sounding as "Wild Horses." But, I have two points to make, points I've been saying since the season was a couple of games underway, and I'll share them with you, after the jump.

First, it is now officially time to remove the words "shutdown" and "corner" from any vicinity wherein one finds Champ Bailey's name. He's still one of the better defensive backs in the game, but he is far removed from any sort of a shutdown variety. He got owned, schooled, and worked over tonight time and time again.

Second, is the Denver schedule. Deny it all you want, Denver: Your early portion of the 2009 schedule was soft. You won by a stroke of luck to open the season against Cincinnati. You then beat Cleveland (now 1-7), Oakland (now 2-6), Dallas (now 6-2) in a win that Tony Romo handed you on a silver-and-blue-starred platter, New England (now 6-2) in a win that you certainly deserve credit for, albeit you know your coach got way the eff up for that contest, and San Diego (now 5-3) which was an impressive road win.

Well, that's ridiculous, you say. Four of those six teams are +.500. We dominated in all of those wins.

Fine, fine. Say your piece. My point, though, is that you went on the bye, and came back to face Baltimore at home and host Pittsburgh. You dropped both of those contests, were outscored 58-17, and here, in your effort this evening, saw your coveted game manager toss three picks and couldn't even generate a rushing first down in the entire game. But hey, at least Brandon Marshall had some 10 catches, and the announcing crew got to say "Ryan Clady is special" half a dozen times.

Next week you travel to Washington. Guaranteed win, right? Hell, even the Chiefs beat them. But wait. What if Danny and Jimmy pick up Larry Johnson, and he's looking to prove himself to the world, and has a chance to do so against a team he probably doesn't care for too much. Not that he cares for anyone not nicknamed L.J., but you see my point. Then you host the again hot-on-your-heels Chargers, who'll be hungry for revenge, and the Giants, who've lost four straight, but have this week off and a home game against Atlanta to figure it all out. And then you come to Arrowhead for the first of your two losses to Kansas City.

Granted, I know you didn't have immense expectations for this season, but if you're not a tad concerned about that rickety wheel you hear, allow me to tell you you should be.