monKEYS to the Game

Week three already upon us, and this game, which should be an easy victory for the Hawks, scares the beejeesus out of me. Sure we're at home, sure we beat the Falcons last week, but that's the problem. Will there be a let down this week? Last week in a home opener, it was fairly obvious that the Hawks were playing inspired football against what they knew would be a tough opponent. Will the inspiration be there against the Cards?
With my fingers crossed, and my knees shaking a bit, here are the monKEYS to the game.
Offense: I have only ONE key for the offense this week:
monKEY #1 Get Shaun Alexander on track early and keep him on track all game long. Shaun MUST touch the ball at least 25-30 times for us to be successful this week. Last season we split with the Cards home and away, in our loss SA got 12 carreis for 57 yards with no TDs. In our win, SA got 30 carries for 154 yards and 3 TDs. Any questions? I will not even bother elaborating on that key, the numbers speak for themselves.

Defense: I am sure I will be saying this all year but I must say it again:
monKEY #1 We must get a strong and consistent pass rush throughout this game.The matchup that I will be watching this game will be the matchups of Anquan Boldin and Larry Fitzgerald against Marcus Trufant and Andre Dyson. If Curt Warner is given enough time, even he can find ways to get the ball to these very dangerous recievers. However, if we can get to Warner early and often, we will rattle him and shake his already paper thin confidence, and he will make mistake after mistake after mistake. The Cardinals offensive line is in all reality, pretty pathetic, we SHOULD be able to do this, it's not as if our D-Line will be trying to get around the Pats O-Line or the Steelers O-Line. This is the Cards, and in spite of what the "experts" think, they are still a lousy team, as their play up till now, and their record, clearly proves.
Now here's the part where I say something that may not seem to make much sense, but trust me, it does if you think about it. The best way for the Cardinals to get Warner ontrack is to run the ball effectively early on. I know that on face value that doesn't seem to make sense, but here's the thing; if the Cardinals can run the ball early, forcing us to cheat our safeties up, to help against the run, then not only will Trufant and Dyson have a much more difficult job, but the D-Line will be focused on stopping the run and NOT on getting into Warners facemask.
So having said that, here is:
monKEY #2 Make the proper adjustments to what the offense is trying to do. We MUST be able to stop the run early, then make the adjustments necessary to carry out the pass rush.Sports Weekly, picked us to lose this week (actually they usually do, as does nearly every sports publication around) but the reasons they gave for us losing are that they believe that, (and I quote) "Warner will pick the Seahawks secondary apart." As usual, the "experts" are full of it. While I grant that it is a possibility, (anything is possible in the NFL) the ONLY way this could happen is if they establish a consistent run early on, which would slow down the pass rush.
The way I see it, the Cardinals will no doubt try to establish the run early on, but the way our DT's and LB's have played, I don't see the run as nearly as much of a threat as the passing game potentially could be. So what we need to do is make them one dimensional early, take the run away, right out of the gate, then pass rush, pass rush, pass rush! If we can make the Tards one dimensional, then Warner will throw picks; if in the other hand, they can establish the run, thereby slowing down our pass rush, Trufant and Dyson will be in for a very, very long day.

Quick comments: We may want to pay special attention to Chike Okeafor who will no doubt be trying to make a statement against his former team.
Considering the fact that more experts around the country picked the Cardinals to win the division than the Seahawks or even the Rams, the experts are nuts! As I have said all along, the Cardinals were simply the "sexy" pick this offseason, but the reality is that, the Cardinals are still a 5-6 win team. Their defense is decent, (not nearly great), their O-Line is horrendous, their running game is avaerage to less than average, their recievers are young though very talented, and their QB is hack, a has been, whose confidence is so brittle, that at the first sign of trouble he cracks. What the heck were the "experts thinking? Until the Cards get a young QB that they can groom, to replace Warner, the Cards will still be short of being a real contender for a playoff spot.
My biggest worry, which I alluded to at the beginning of this, is that the Hawks come out flat, coming off of the big win vs. the Falcons. The only real hope the Cards have of beating us, is that we play soft, is that we lack the intensity of last week. This is the kind of game that seperates the contenders from the pretenders. This is the kind of game that we SHOULD win, and therefore, f we want anyone to take us seriously, we MUST win. The thing that makes the great teams great, is that they win games like this, they win the games they should win. Let's hope that this week we take care of businees, and that Hasselbeck figures out how to play for a full four quarters, instead of just two.

My prediction: Seahawks 24 Cardinals 18