This is the online version of our morning newsletter, The Morning Win. Subscribe to get irreverent and incisive sports stories, delivered to your mailbox every morning.
Listen, if you’re a Los Angeles Rams fan or a New Orleans Saints fan you’re not going to like what I’m about to write here so feel free to run away and go spend some time today yelling bad words at me on social media.
Ok, now that they are gone the rest of us can agree that we need two things to happen in the NFC playoffs this weekend.
First, we need the Packers to beat the Rams on Saturday, which shouldn’t be so hard for them to do at Lambeau.
Second, we need the Buccaneers to beat the Saints on Sunday afternoon in New Orleans. That will be a bit harder to have happen, but it can definitely be done.
Why do we need these two things to happen?
Because then we would have one heck of a you-know-what NFC title game with Tom Brady facing Aaron Rodgers at Lambeau Field a week from Sunday.
I mean, come on!
Us football fans have long wanted to see these two great QBs (one of which (Brady) is the GOAT) square off in the postseason. Before this year that would have had to have happened in the Super Bowl. But now with Brady on the Bucs it can happen in the NFC title game and it’s something we definitely need here in the year 2021.
Brady, of course, has won six Super Bowls and been to nine. Rodgers has only been to one, which he won, and needs to get back to another to raise his legacy to a higher level.
Beating Brady at Lambeau in late January would be a huge win for Rodgers’ already stellar resume.
Rodgers has long been compared to Brady but hasn’t had nearly the same amount of team success. Imagine if he gets to face the GOAT with a Super Bowl title on the line?
Sign. Me. Up.
Then there’s Brady. The 43-year-old QB needs to beat the Saints for the first time this season to advance to yet another conference championship game. The Saints beat the Bucs at home in Week 1 and then embarrassed the Bucs in Week 9, 38-3.
So yeah, Brady has his hands full. But we’ve seen him win so many playoff games before and this one, especially without a packed Superdome, seems like one he should be able to win.
The Rams, meanwhile, have issues at QB again, as Jared Goff is going to get the start with his bad thumb because John Wolford has been ruled out. They are coming off a big win over the Seahawks and have a very, very good defense, but the Packers have weapons and are rested.
We are two wins away from Brady vs. Rodgers and it’s all I want to see next week.
Which means it probably went happen.
Ugh.
Quick hits: Barkley crushes Harden… Lillard stuns reporter… Ramsey’s message to Seahawks… And more.
– Charles Barkley TORE into James Harden for not telling the truth about his time in Houston and failing when it mattered most.
– This video of Damian Lillard calling out a reporter over a tweet is too good.
– A mic’d up Jalen Ramsey had a hilarious message for the Seahawks late in LA’s win last Saturday.
– Steelers WR Chase Claypool says he’s made up with the Browns after calling them ‘classless’ following last Sunday’s game.
– Mike Sykes says the James Harden deal should have the Wizards thinking hard about trading Bradley Beal.