Braun
Talk all you want about the Terrible Towel or the terrible Metrodome, but there isn’t any room for curses in the real world.
Only the worst team will go 0-16, and that team is the St. Louis Rams.
Let’s see if we can think of enough adjectives to describe the situation in St. Louis right now. Backward, regressive, inconsistent, poorly-coached and just flat-out bad.
Unfortunately, I took the chance of taking running back Steven Jackson in my fantasy draft. What I didn’t know was he would never get to run in the red zone, and the Rams wouldn’t be able to use their best weapon to score touchdowns.
Also, take away Orlando Pace, one of the best offensive linemen of all time, and that running game doesn’t exactly move the way it used to.
I could sit here talking about the Rams’ internal problems for as long as I wanted, but what makes things even more daunting for the NFC West bottom-dwellers is their inability to win at home, one of the team’s biggest strengths over the past decade. For the rest of the season, the Rams only play one home game against a team that isn’t under .500, and their only game against a terrible opponent is against — you guessed it — the Tennessee Titans.
Curses are one thing, but when a team is just so utterly bad, it’s difficult to overlook its inability to win games. The Titans might be pretty bad themselves, but they will beat the Rams when their record is on the line.
Bleach
Last year’s 0-16 Lions team was so much fun for fans to watch, three other teams in the NFL this year decided they were going to make a run at winless infamy.
While all three teams are worthy contenders, last year’s AFC No. 1 seed, the Tennessee Titans, have the best shot to tie the Lions for one of the most coveted records.
I know on the surface this sounds crazy. You are most likely saying to yourself, this team won 13 games last year and has Chris Johnson. They have to luck into one win at least, don’t they?
Unfortunately, talent doesn’t matter when you are going up against a powerful curse.
Now, we all know sports curses are real. The Cubs are still suffering from a variety of magical maladies. Sports Illustrated routinely jinxes people, and the Madden Curse has a well-documented history of destroying a player’s season.
So what spiritual power did the Titans piss off?
That would be the Pittsburgh Steelers, the most successful franchise in NFL history.
Remember when the Titans took down Pittsburgh in the regular season last year and stomped on the Terrible Towels? Yeah, since that mistake, Jeff Fisher’s team has lost eight games in row.
The curse seems to build in power over time too. After losing in overtime to start the season, here have been the margins of defeat for the last five games:
Three points to the Texans, seven points to the Jets, 20 points to the Jaguars, 22 points to the Colts and then an unnatural 59 point shellacking at the hands of the Patriots.
The Rams and Buccaneers may have less talent, but there is a higher power at work here. The Lions better make way in the record books because the 2009 Titans are a team of destiny that can’t be stopped.
