The Post Mortem

Are you happy now A.J. Smith? Is your power-hungry ass happy now?

As bad as it was to end a 14-2 season with a playoff loss, at least the Chargers got to the playoffs. The football world got a pretty good indication of just how poorly mismatched Norv Turner is against a credible NFL coach. The only match up that Turner should win this season will be against Lane Kiffin.

Maybe.

There is no guarantee of that, and you have to ask yourself if a 7-9 prediction was a little too generous for this team. Face it, the Chargers were lucky to win last week against the Bears. The Chargers will lose next week at Green Bay, probably beat Kansas City at home, and then lose at Denver . That�s a 2-3 start and there�s still a stretch where they play the Colts, Jaguars and Ravens.

The Chargers will not make the playoffs. Book it.

And why don�t announcers just come right out and state the obvious some times? That being that Norv Turner sucks. He just completely sucks. Where is Tiki Barber's candor now? Just once, it would be great to see an announcer, when asked about the Chargers, just say the obvious truth. "Hey Bob, you see the reason why the Chargers blow is because Norv Turner, yeah, he's not good at his job. Not at all. If it wasn't for Troy Aikman, he'd be coaching high school kids in Flagstaff, Arizona. In fact, NFL Network has about six guys working for its station that could probably do a better job."

The Chargers are not going to make the playoffs this season, and how many years are they going to be willing to invest in this indulgence to Smith�s ego?

• No coach is better than using any perceived slight to motivate his team, so does this Spy Gate actually work in Bill Belichick�s favor?

• The Chargers weekend kind of sucked, but it still has to be considered a great weekend when the St. Louis football team and the Raiders lose. Especially when it is in such horrific fashion. St. Louis is now 0-2 and that offensive line will end Marc Bulger�s career. Lane Kiffin got a serious lesson in NFL gamesmanship from one of the best in the NFL�something that his sniveling post-game press conference proved. Although, it�s one thing for a 31-year-old rookie head coach to get turned out like Schillinger did to Beecher during his first few days in Oz. But it�s quite another when it�s a veteran head coach working on his third stint with arguably the most talented team in the NFL.

• The Saints are definite frauds. There was some doubt, as Drew Brees was undefeated against Tampa Bay, but there is no doubt now. Sorry to all of you guys who drafted Saints players, especially Brees, in your fantasy draft.

• Brett Favre moving closer to reaching the all-time interception milestone. Can you taste the excitement. Don�t worry about Favre breaking the record next week because the Chargers receivers can�t catch.

• You are a certified moron if you picked up the Bengals defense in your fantasy league this week, thinking that they were going to stop the vaunted Browns offense. And who else noticed the idiot throwing a beer on Chad Johnson as he jumped into the Dawg Pound? Dude, that�s like $10. Be smart like an Angels fan and just toss your water.

• How pissed do you think Jim Sorgi's mom gets during those close games? She's probably all tossed yelling, "Peyton you (female dog), you are only keeping this game close because you don't want me boy on the field. You know that he would show up your Kenny Chesney-loving ass."

SATURDAY NIGHT'S ALRIGHT
Remember this? Florida and Tennessee is a much anticipated match-up. Is there any way the Gators don�t run these guys off the field? Florida should win this game by 20, right?

Remember that because that�s the only thing that THN got right in The Weak Ender. The Chargers? Losers. Auburn sucks. Washington , well that was disappointing. If you had to pick on team that was going to eat a merde sandwich this week, you could have thought Oregon could have been ripe for an upset against Fresno State. Instead, it was the Huskies. Hard to figure what to make of Washington because it looked pretty good in the first half against Ohio State, just missing on a few key opportunities that would have had them leading. The Huskies looked like they could make a second half charge, but it wasn't to be.

• And what about USC? Pretty much what you expected. In fact, you have to give credit to Nebraska for a pretty good game plan. By allowing USC to march down the field and score in four plays, the Trojans became disinterested for a little while. What a stroke of genius by Bill Callahan. But USC did become interested long enough to finally go ahead and blow Nebraska out of the building.

• BTW Nebraska fan, that stadium looked pretty empty at the end of the game. Not a good representation of the alleged greatest fans in college football. Nebraska fans, for the past three weeks, had ripped USC fans on the Jim Rome Show, saying that USC fans don�t care and always leave early. But what where Nebraska fans going anyway? Seems like the highlight of living in Nebraska would be going to the football game, so why leave when you finally get the chance to see a real championship caliber team?

• Anybody else notice that USC kicked off to open that game and to open the second half? At least they were trying to give Nebraska an advantage.

• Boise State was decent enough to beat an underrated Wyoming team. Colt Brennan was as good as advertised against UNLV. He will not get any consideration for the Heisman Trophy, but it�s going to be hard to argue against his numbers. Yeah, you can say that Hawaii doesn�t play anybody, but don�t tell that to Wisconsin who had a pretty hard time getting rid of the Rebels the previous week.

• The whole notion of the Pac-10 vs. SEC is pretty silly when Auburn loses at home to South Florida last week, and UCLA rolls over at Utah. The UCLA athletic department needs to make a real fund-raising push to hire a worthwhile coach. There were some deluded UCLA fans looking at 12-0 and a trip to New Orleans. No way. This team looks about 7-5, and a blowout victim at USC this year.

AND FINALLY
O.J. Simpson has been arrested and is being held without bail because of a recent break in attempt at the Palace Station in Las Vegas. (And despite being in Vegas this weekend, we had nothing to do with this.) The Palace Station will always be a special place, mostly because its Irish Bar once celebrated St. Patrick�s Day by hiring a Sting tribute band.

O.J. was arrested when he and a group of armed men, burst into a room, thinking that they had finally, after more than a decade, found the real killers.

But O.J., what were you thinking? You might believe you are impervious to the law, but any former U.S. President will tell you that you can kill all the people that you want, just don�t try breaking into hotel rooms.