Just a few thoughts, then onwards to next season

[fieryprophet]

First off, I know the tendency in football is to imagine that the variables surrounding next season will be the same as this season. DON'T. The NFL stands for No Freaking Logic, as in the last decade and a half of football has seen some of the craziest and most illogical seasons in memory, and it will only continue next season. We've seen a modern dynasty win 3 SB's in 4 years, then lose last year to to finish 18-1, even though it had the highest-scoring team in history. The winner of said SB has just been bounced at home by a team that squeaked into the playoffs by virtue of a TIE. The Arizona Cardinals are hosting the NFC championship game, and the Steelers just finished off the Chargers, who beat the Colts and the league's MVP after overtaking Denver who managed to squander a four-game division lead to miss the playoffs. In a way, all of the above just goes to show that the teams we assume will be pathetic next year may come out of nowhere to make a deep playoff push (hello, Ravens), and the teams we assume to dominate might not make it out of the cellar. So, all prognosticating aside, everything we try to plan for can be made moot by the fact that you can't account for everything; in fact, you can barely control what happens to your own team, much less the rest of the league.

What should we do? In a lot of ways. . .the same thing as before. When the landscape around you is as unpredictable as the NFL is, the smartest thing in many cases is to take what positives you develop and continue to work on them. If you were a running heavy, defensive team before, then try to become an even better running heavy, defensive team the next season. Don't try to adjust your game season by season to whatever trends have become the flavor of the month (fleet-footed, scrambling quarterbacks, anyone?), although you should at least try to iron out any glaring deficiencies anyway. A lot of people right now want to get Jake shipped out of town, even though in many ways he fits the mold of this team as well as anyone in this league. If we had not gotten "cute" last night and tried to pass our way past the Cardinals, we probably would not be sitting at home right now. As it stands, we are.

I, for one, think there is some wisdom to keeping the character of the team intact, and make only the adjustments necessary to improve what already works. In many ways, you can win by not adding or subtracting, but by simply building on what you have. What made last night so strange was that we moved away from what was successful for us all season, and what was successful was the running game that John Fox clearly deemed as a priority in the offseason. This offseason should really be about keeping the core intact more so than trying to upgrade any parts at a prohibitive expense. It worked for 12-4 and a division title, and I would daresay that next season this style of football will prove to be a winning one as well. In a league bereft of consistency, that may be the most valuable thing you can have.