Everyone keep asking me about it - no, I am not upset that the Atlanta Falcons drafted Shaun Sanders, the RB out of Oregon, with our 2nd-round pick. I was surprised, I thought we were going to get linebacker help, or receiver depth, maybe even a backup quarterback - but a runningback makes sense, we cut Marvin Bever, and we need a guy to battle Kedrick Taylor for that #2 spot. No, I don't think the team is trying to send me a message. From what I've seen and heard, Shaun's a solid back, he's a big guy, bigger than me, he'll work nice with our system, but as far as I'm concerned, I'm still the #1 guy. Kedrick's got the start tomorrow in our preseason opener, I'm actually excited to see what Shaun does.

I'm looking forwards to working with him - once I get this contract stuff squared away. The team opens up the preseason tomorrow, against the Chargers, I'll be watching from home, where I've been most of the summer, working out on my own. There's no doubt I'm going to play for Atlanta this season, negotiations have been coming along, slowly, but we're making progress. We will get it settled before the regular season opens up, hopefully.

We had to let DT Rocky Wooden, a former first-round pick, go in free agency. He signed a nice deal with the Dolphins. Rocky was the MVP of our Super Bowl, he's been in Atlanta longer than I have, and he'll be missed. With our first pick, we took Trevor Harris, the DT out of Virginia Tech, who will compete for Rocky's old position. Alan Lee ended his holdout and signed a 5-year deal, he'll be back - which means and safety Joe Woodson and I are the only remaining holdouts. Joe Woodson's not in the best situation, we've got a deep defensive backfield, Joe Jenkins, who's starter caliber, has been working with the first team in Woodson's absence.

Backup QB Lamont Beck also got a new contract - a nice, big contract - the type of contract they usually give to starters. That brings up the question: When is he going to take over? We spent a first-round pick on the guy, coming out of Michigan. He's not the biggest guy, he reminds me of Doug Flutie a lot, but he had a chance to play when Michael Vick was hurt in 2012 and played very well, passed for 1,000 yards. It hasn't become a problem yet, but if it does flare up...who knows? To be honest, I thought we might let him go, a couple teams came calling, the Redskins, Dolphins, a couple others, expressed interest. Lamont's been good about it, but you've got to think that the guy's getting tired of sitting on the bench. I haven't spoken to him since last season, though.

We had a decent draft, I think - a lot of raw guys, to develop, since we don't really have any glaring holes in the lineup. One guy to watch is Shannon Connor, the linebacker our of Miami - he's a great athlete, probably going to play a lot of Special Teams.

$45.75 million over 4 years, $7.8 million in signing bonus - and I'm back in uniform. We hosted the Jags tonight, a 13-7 win. I played more than I thought, Coach Dungy said I'd play a couple plays, get some cheers (or booes) from the crowd, and watch the rest of the game - but our rook tailback, Shaun Sanders, left the game early with an injury - he's not expected to be back for at least two months. So I got two drives, carried the ball 6 times, 21 yards. Nothing special. We let FB Donny Glaser play tailback, since we only had three RBs on the roster. I heard that we called Andre McElroy, who spent a season on the roster here in Atlanta, about signing a short-term deal. He's been out of football for a while, but he knows our system, and is a solid backup, good depth, since we don't know when we'll have Shaun back.

I was impressed with the kid in the week I've had in practice - he's a big guy, but and bulky, and runs with power - he's aggressive, looks to make contact, but he's also got pretty good speed as well. We had some fun with him two nights ago, our last practice in pads - you'll notice that he decided to shave of what was left of his hair, he's sporting the bald head now - if I had taken a photo of what he looked like before, I would have posted it on the website. The man's a horrible singer, so we had to come up with something more...creative with him. That was pretty much the only thing I missed about training camp while I was on my holdout, having fun with the rooks. The most fun was Derrick McKenzie, the CB out of UCLA - he was the last guy picked in our draft that's still on the roster, and he was tied up on the goalpost for a while the other night. We saw him coming back into the locker room about 10 minutes later. Pretty good time, it took me about half an hour to free myself, way back when. He's a skinny little guy, I guess he was able to shake free pretty easy - I was a big 240 lb. rookie, I had some trouble myself.

Speaking of rooks, our #1 guy, the DT out of Virginia Tech, dropped down in the depth chart to #3. He looked ok, but Harold McPherson, a 2nd-year player, has looked almost unblockable on occasion during camp and preseason, and he's earned the starting job, which was vacated when Rocky Wooden left to the Dolphins.

The big story is QB Lamont Beck - we took him with our first pick in 2010, #32 overall (right after winning the Super Bowl...with Brad Banks under center). Saw time his rookie year when Michael Vick was hurt, has ridden the bench ever since. He'll probably start for the Rams, I haven't watched them yet, but I hear he's doing well - we'll see for ourselves in Week 16 when we face them. We have a rookie QB who's name I can't even remember, and a guy we signed off the street, so we've got our fingers crossed that Mike stays on his feet. I think we've got one of the best backfields in the league, me, Donny, Kedrick Taylor, and the rook, when he's healthy.

The feeling that we're gearing up for a big Super Bowl push is in the air - we didn't lose any starters except Rocky, and we even were able to resign Jermaine Hutchinson. Several guys restructured their contracts, backloading them, saving us a lot cap room now, but hurting us down the road. But hey, the world might not even be around next year.

What a way to start off the season, knocking off the defending NFC champion Panthers - in their own home, in the NFL season opener, on a Thursday night, the only game on, in prime time.

We had a king of funny game plan coming in - we let Kalen Thomas run the ball, but we shut down the passing game, went after Eli Shannon - and it worked. We sacked him 5 times, and he has a miserable 5 interceptions (although a couple weren't his fault at all). Kalen didn't even do that well, less than 100 yards on the ground, as the Panthers were forced to abandon the running game by themselves anyways. We knew they wanted to pound the ball with Kalen all game, and we knew that he's careless with the ball - in the championship game last year, he even fumbled while showboating towards the endzone.

Joe Woodson's an incredible athlete - he signed his new contract a couple days - literally, days - ago, ending his holdout. He practiced with the team Monday and Tuesday, was at the walkthrough Wednesday morning, and started the game for us. We flew in on Wednesday night, kickoff was at 8:00 PM, Eastern. And on our first defensive play, Joe steps up, picks off a pass, and runs 35 yards for a score. This is a guy who missed all of training camp and preseason, on two real days of practice.

Joe also came up big late in the game, we were holding onto a 23-21 lead, and he knocked the stuffing out of Kalen in the backfield, caused a fumble, that we turned into a touchdown a couple plays later. He also recorded the 5th interception, which sealed the win for us.

I did look a little rusty, I guess, but I don't think it was my holdout, I just think the Panthers were stacking the line, trying to shut down the run. I had plenty of carries, almost hit 100 yards, but they were all hard-earned yards.

I got some nice action in the passing game - my favorite play wasn't even intended for me. Jeff Rutledge ran a deep route, I was in the flat, wide open, yelling for the ball. Michael Vick ignored me, threw it deep to Jeff, and I started going down there, to help block for Jeff, or whatever. The CB jumps in front of him, almost picks the pass off, but can't get it. It bobbles around, bounces off a guy's helmet, and I see it sailing through the air - right towards me. I didn't really think about it, I just stuck my hands out - and made the catch. A 48-yard reception.

The ball just bounced like that for us this game. A Panthers receiver bobbled a pass late in the game, it went off his hands, bounced off his back, and into Gary Jones' hands - and he went down the sidelines for a score, his 2nd pick of the night. He's 31-years old, and he's still just as good as the player he was when he first came into the league - the man's got a great work ethic, people wrote him off as too old a couple seasons ago, and he was named NFL DB of the Year that season.

We've got a long road trip to open the season - our home opener is in Week 7. It reminds me of 2009, when we had a similar schedule, no home games early in the year. If you don't remember what happened that season: We did fine, earned a playoff spot, and won the Super Bowl. So I'm not complaining about our schedule at all.

This season is the NFL's 95th anniversary season. To honor that, every team is going to play at least one game with throwback uniforms, like they did in 1994, the NFL's 75th anniversary season. I think we've got about 5-6 games where we're going to don the throwbacks, with the old Falcons logo and the red helmets, but we'll see. Common sense would dictate that they would wait until the NFL's 100th anniversary season, but hey - you never know. A lot can happen between now and then, I guess it's just better to do it early than never.

That Saints offense looks different without Deuce McAlister in the backfield, after his retirement - but that New Orleans defense looks the same, maybe better - they held us to 3 points, but they themselves couldn't score, in our 3-0 win.

This was our first game in the throwback uniforms, for the 95th anniversary thing. It was also the 13th anniversary of 9/11, and we had an extended pregame tribute to that directly before the kickoff. I was in high school 13 years ago when it happened. The NFL took a week off, but most high schools didn't - the opponent we were supposed to face canceled the game, so we had to find an emergency replacement, went about 20 miles to play some other school.

Anytime you have a game with 3 total points, you know that the defense mauled the offense, and that was the case today - not so much as we shot ourselves in the foot, I thought we played well, but the Saints' defense and our defense made plays, especially at big times. We almost went into halftime tied 0-0, but Michael Vick rebounded from two interceptions to put together the only scoring drive of the game, mostly through the air. Jermaine Hutchinson had a couple big catches, and Mike himself converted a 3rd-and-15, scrambling, to set up a field goal by Glenn Jackson from about 49 yards out with about 2 seconds left in the first half.

We went in at halftime, tried to fix some things on offense, mainly blocking - there weren't any holes to run through. I also tried to bounce it outside too often, and got stopped for nothing - Coach Dungy told me just to go north-south, get 2 or 3 yards, that was fine, and not to go for the big play, the 40-yard run. I think my longest run was about 9 yards - the running game opened up on the final drive as we were trying to kill the clock, but I guess it's better late than never.

Defense gets the game ball, obviously - no one in particular, everyone made plays, they played extremely well together. They took advantage of some mistakes by the Saints' offense which featured rookie tailback Joel Dwight. Joel's a big kid, about 245 lbs., he's a pounder, a good, powerful runner, with plenty of physical gifts - but his inexperience showed today in crunch time. The Saints were driving for a typing field goal, and got down to about the 30-yard line, with less than 2 minutes left, thanks to some nice passing by QB Mark Spielman. On first down, Joel runs it, and tries to make something out of nothing, was dropped for a couple yards - he should have just taken a no gain, instead, he ran backwards a little, and put them on the edge of field goal range. On the next play, Alan Lee busts loose through the middle on his pass rush, runs over Joel, and logs a sack. On 3rd down, another pass, Bryce Middleton comes hard from the outside, rips right through Joel, and gets a sack as well, which puts the Saints back at around the 40-yard line or so. Too long for a field goal, they went for it, 4th-and-forever, and it was well short, turnover on downs, and we kill the clock.

Game 3 of our 5-game road trip is up at Cincy next week, against the 2-0 Bengals. We haven't played them since 2010, the season opener in the rain up there, so we're going to watch a ton of film on them this week, as I don't know much about them.

Some injury news - Shaun Sanders is still out with his torn biceps, he's expected back around November or so. We got another one today against the Saints, when Harold McPherson left the game with an elbow injury, and he's not expected to be back for another month, at least. The rookie, Trevor Harris, our first-round pick, moved into the starting lineup because of that. We lost Rocky Wooden to free agency, to the Dolphins, but Harold played very well in preseason and won the job - you've got to feel kind of bad for him, he's a 2nd-year man, finally got his shot, and now he's hurt.

Numbers usually don't lie - but in this case, the numbers don't do justice to how our defense played today. In my mind, they went a 2nd-straight week with a shutout, after that 3-0 game last week. The Bengals ended with 14 points on the board, but they were both my fault. One TD was a pick returned for a score, and I missed a tackle at the 10-yard line, the other was a fumble deep in our end.

Late in the game, the Bengals, down 24-7, were driving, got inside the redzone, looking for some points, and defense steps up, plays a great series, and stops them on downs. I was at 99 yards on the day, a pretty average day, looking for my first 100-yard game of the season, and I had a huge hole up the middle, got about 13 yards...and fumbled the ball away. I wasn't holding it particularly loosely, the guy just came bye and gave it a whack, and it came out - I hate it when that happens. This was a real fumble, not a "fumble" - so we didn't replay challenge this one, I went straight to the sidelines, didn't say a word. So by my count, I think it was my 3rd or 4th career fumble. Bengals scored a couple plays later, on 4th down. I tried to avoid eye contact with the defense as they came off, that's got to be one of the worst feelings in football, the guilt.

Things got worse on the next kickoff - Jeff Rutledge appeared to fumble the ball away, but it was only a "fumble", and a replay challenge fixed that. On my first carry of that drive, I went about 40 yards, longest run of the day - and that seemed to kick start the running game into high gear, I finished with 189 yards...so about 90 of my yards came within the last 5 minutes of the game, or so.

Good win, at any rate, we're sitting pretty at 3-0, heading into the bye week. I'm reminded of 2009, the schedule looks similar - pretty weird, but our home opener was in week 7 that season, and it is again in week 7 this season. And we won the Super Bowl that season. Does history really repeat itself?

It's still early to be talking about that stuff, but one thing we really need to work on are dropped passes - plenty of drops all around today and the past two games, lucky we've got probably the best defense in the league right now, or else we could easily be 0-3.

We'll work on that, rest up, and get ready to face the Steelers in week 5...on the road. We're also going to see if we can get our two guys back healthy during our bye.

It's upsetting when teams run up the score on you a little bit, but I don't blame the other team - it's your own fault if they score again and you can't stop them.

Things were looking great one moment, worse the next, and after that...you kind of wanted to just get back on the plane and go back home. If you look at the box score, things don't really look all that bad, and it wasn't - until a miserable 4th quarter. We just didn't finish the game.

We jumped to a 14-3 lead early, thanks to a 76-yard run by me, off left tackle - I had a huge hole and just outran everyone. The other score was me again, down at the goalline. I was having a great day at the half, I think I was over 125 yards, and a pair of scores. Mike was on fire, I think he completed his first 5 or 6 passes on the day, moving the ball up and down the field, as defense held the Steelers to only a field goal.

They seemed to wake up after my 2nd score, got one of their own, and another three just before the half, to pull to within 14-13. Halftime was a lot of yelling, mostly at the defense, for letting Pittsburgh get back into the game like that - we were receiving to open up the 2nd half, looking to get that score early, and jump up once again. We didn't get it - but at least the Steelers didn't get any closer, as we entered the 3rd quarter still holding onto that 14-13 lead.

The collapse started innocently enough - a field goal by the Steelers to claim a 2-point lead, set up by a long run by Greg Brown. And then another, set up by Michael Vick's interception in the endzone - Tim Matthews made a leaping 1-handed pick in front of the receiver - we still weren't worried at all, a 1-score game at 19-14. We got the ball back with about 5 minutes left in the game, taking our time, working downfield looking for a game-winning score. Unfortunately, we didn't stall long enough, reached the goalline with still about 2:30 left. Two runs went nowhere, on 3rd down, I motioned out right, drew coverage from the corner, as 2nd-year TE Derek Carter snuck out behind me and caught the go-ahead touchdown. A 1-point lead, and we went for the 2-pointer. Power left, I tried to cut it back inside, and got nothing.

We left way too much time on the clock, though - the Steelers drove downfield easily and scored as we converted a pair of third downs for them with facemask penalties. And then, Mike threw his 3rd pick of the day, trying to hit Jermaine Hutchinson on a deep out pattern, the guy made a great play. Steelers ball around the 30, and a couple plays later, Greg Brown scores, runs straight up the middle untouched. We know they're going to run it, there's less than a minute left, all they were running were basic dive plays up the middle - and we couldn't even get a hand on him. 34-20, and that was the final.

The good news: We've still got a lead in the division, and a chance to widen the gap just a bit next week against the Buccaneers, on the road.

For a moment there today, I saw shades of last week's collapse - there was a period where the Buccaneers scored two touchdowns in a matter of seconds. We had built a 28-3 halftime lead, we were just suffocating Tampa, and then we go out there, 3rd quarter, and Cedric Harper fumbles away a punt return. He "fumbled" one earlier, and it was fixed via replay challenge, so we challenged again - no dice. Bucs scored a couple plays later, they ran that weakside toss to Derek Watson that they really seem to like - I saw it coming, I think a couple guys on our defense saw it coming, but they couldn't get there in time to stop it - Joe Woodson was alone at safety yelling it out, and he cheated towards it, but got caught up in traffic.

On the kickoff, Jeff Rutledge fumbled, and Troy Santiago, the former Falcon linebacker, scooped it up and ran it back for a score - closing the gap to 28-17. Gulp.

Fortunately, that was the end of it, we got back on track, two field goals in the final quarter, and won, 34-17. The game started off promising - I went about 70 yards or whatever it was on the first play from scrimmage, touchdown, finished with almost 150 yards. Our running game started off slowly this season, but we've really come on strong the past couple weeks, ever since that game against the Bengals.

Two former Falcons saw plenty of playing time in addition to Troy, Rick Owens, their strong-side LB, and Derek Watson, the tailback, both started. Rick had a great game, the guy was everywhere on the field. We ran a blast away from him once, as he lined up in their 4-4 defense (same defense and same position he played while he was in Atlanta), shot the gap, just shook off a blocker. I got the ball, saw a pretty good hole, as Isaac Quick cleared out the weak-side backer, was thinking, at least 10 yards - and then I felt something crash into me from behind, I go down. I look over and it's Rick, and he says something like, "Hey, Mert, how's it going?" Rick was in the backfield a lot today, the man's just got incredible instincts and a nose for the ball.

I talked to Troy after the game - he asked for a trade, since Keith Brooking's still around for us, but the situation in Tampa hasn't really worked out for him, he didn't get the start today. He's portrayed as sort of a bust for Tampa, they parted with a 2nd-round draft pick for him, and he was supposed to be their future starter - but it hasn't worked out.

We went with the throwback for the 2nd time this season, the Bucs chose to wear their whites (good thing, too, their old orange jerseys are rough on the eyes), so we got to wear our red jerseys. To be honest, I'm actually a big fan of these throwbacks, I think the red helmets/jerseys are a nice combo. The Bucs' throwbacks? I can't say anything really great about them.

We'll probably open up our home schedule next week against the Saints with the same uniforms, if they decide to wear theirs as well. It'll be great to finally head home, play in front of that home crowd. We edged the Saints 3-0 last time, and they still haven't won - they're 0-5, just two seasons after winning the NFC.

I think it's safe to say that we ruined Browns QB Bryon Douglas' trip to Atlanta - he found himself staring up right at our pass rush most of the day from his back - he was sacked 4 times, tossed two interceptions, and fumbled late in the game deep in his own end - which set up our final field goal.

I only played the first half, so you know how the game went. Michael Vick, Mike Williams, Gary Jones, and a couple other starters also spent the second half screwing around on the sidelines as well, after we built a 42-10 lead early in the 3rd quarter.

I scored early in the game, an 85-yard run, just a trap towards the right, bounced outside, and went down the sidelines, easy touchdown. Cedric Harper returned a punt for a score, Gary Jones returned an interception for a score, Cedric set up a short TD dive by me with a 50-yard kickoff return, Kedrick Taylor rushed for a score of his own, and we had a 35-10 halftime lead.

The Browns went 3-and-out to open the 3rd quarter and punted to Cedric - and he returned the punt for his second touchdown on the day. I was watching on the sidelines as the FG team nailed the extra point, and Mike Vick goes up to me, says, "Coach says we're done." Coach Dungy even took Cedric out of the game, sent in a rookie to return punts.

So I got to watch the rest of the way, on the bench, drinking up all the Gatorade™, watching the cheerleaders. In a game like this, actually, I don't really mind getting pulled all that much, I had fun. If I had played, I think I might have come close to 300 yards, though. Plenty of room to run, although when Kedrick Taylor went in there full-time, he struggled, as we had backup QB Richard Carter in there.

Rich did pretty well, he looked almost like Mike on one play, rolling out and running about 30 yards - he's got some serious speed. By the way, speaking of QBs, I've been hearing about mighty-mite Lamont Beck with the Rams, now that he's a starter - we'll see him for ourselves in Week 16, but apparently he's been tearing up the NFC.

Anyways, a guy who looked really good was the rookie tailback, Shaun Sanders, who's been hurt - he came in during the 4th quarter, and had a couple good runs, showed some good power. This is the first time I've really seen a lot from him, and I've got to say, he looks pretty promising. Kind of like me as a rookie.

Defense made all this possible, getting in Douglas' face all day long, knocking him down, hitting downfield. They punted 8 times - that's how bad it was. I think they had about 15 yards of offense or something up until they scored in the 2nd quarter, when we were up 28-0.

Ford Field, in Detroit, was the venue where the Falcons won their first-ever Super Bowl, over the Chiefs in Super Bowl XL, January 2006. I was a sophomore in college at the time, I wasn't with the team, but plenty of guys from that squad are still with the team.

DE Bryce Middleton, our sack man, was a rookie that season and had a great game, he was in the backfield terrorizing the quarterback every other play during that game, and today, he did the game, putting the pressure on Joey Harrington and eventually logging his 11th sack of the season late in the game.

Things looked like they were slipping away yet again in the 4th quarter, as we could do nothing offensively, and the Lions broke the long-standing 13-13 tie with a 47-yard TD pass from Harrington to Charles Rodgers - Gary Jones was locked up with him on a comeback route, and Charles just wrestled the ball away from him and sprinted about 30 yards for the score, with about 9 minutes left in the game.

We got the ball back, 3-and-out. Lions try again, continue to drive downfield - but then Bryce steps up on 3rd down. He had a double team from the tackle and the guard, beat both of them, sized up the runningback, and just ran him over before bringing down Harrington.

We ran a stretch play, and I got about 40 yards - I was thinking touchdown, but Boss Bailey snuck up on me from behind, took out my ankles. That set up the field goal, and on the next drive, we got the passing game to work, and I took it in from about 15 yards, just straight up the middle, hard running, for what turned out to be the game-winner, with about 4 minutes left.

Great win, especially on the road, against a very solid team - they almost had us for a minute, but we pulled through, got the win, and improved to 8-1. Meanwhile, in the NFC South, the rest of the teams seem to have fallen asleep - the Saints have yet to win a game, even, thanks in part to our two wins against them. Don't know what's going on down there, I'm thinking next offseason they're going to look hard for a RB, maybe even with the #1 pick, if they continue to lose. Heck, they might even try to talk Deuce McAllister out of retirement.

Looking ahead on the schedule, we've got the Giants - who are tied with us right now, at home, in three weeks. I don't want to concentrate on that too hard, but that's definitely going to be a huge game. Looking a little further, we've got the Bears, who are also at 8-1. And the Week 16 matchup, against the Rams, should be another great game - Lamont Beck, who we took #1 in the 2010 draft, has them at 6-3, and they are looking very tough right now. Things should get very interesting down the home stretch, our division might be struggling, but the NFC is as strong as ever.

The Giants didn't play like a 1-loss team tonight - we sent them home with their 2nd loss of the season, and moved into the #1 spot in the NFC - actually, the #1 record in the NFL.

I knew I was in for a big game - Monday Night Football, and I came in needing 11 yards for 10,000 career yards. We came in wanting to run, pound the ball - we thought we could wear down the Giants that way, and we were right. Our first fifteen plays were runs (The 16th? A play-action pass). It only too me one play to get those 11 yards, though - the first play of the game, broke a tackle, and went 78 yards for a score.

Had another long TD later in the game, from about 55 yards out, and a short reception for a TD, that was actually counted as a rush, since I guess I ran my swing route a little to deep, and the pass went backwards a little. 238 yards on the night - 10,227 career yards! I've got a little head start on my next milestone.

Even better yet, as I said - we're #1 in the NFC, at 10-2: A win next week and we clinch the division.

The bad news: We lost guard Nick Ellis to injury. We had to let Rex Nalencz go in free agency last season, he was a very god backup - when Nick went down, we had Josh Collins, who regularly plays tackle, fill in for him. I think Nick's going on injured reserve later this week, which means that his season is probably done. A tough loss, but Josh did fine tonight, and we tried to avoid running to the right side - the Giants knew that we were going to run mostly to the left, and they still couldn't stop our running game.

The Falcons are running their "Mert for MVP" campaign - I think I've got as good a shot as any of the possible guys, Clinton Portis is having another great season in the AFC, and Lamont Beck's name has been mentioned as well. I've never won it, the closest I got was last season, when I was #2 in the voting behind LaDanian Tomlinson.

Donald Vann, the little Bears' tailback, used to give us fits when he was with the Buccaneers, he played us twice a year and always caused our defense problems. Nice to see something don't change. Donald ran for 100 yards to help beat us today, but he wasn't the main problem - it was ourselves.

We lost Michael Vick in the first quarter, he got nailed in the ribs and didn't return. Don't know how serious it is, but backup QBs Richard Carter and Daryl Brown both split time at quarterback - Rich came in first, and was taken out in the 4th quarter when Coach Dungy sent in the rookie. No offense to both of those guys, but if we go into St. Louis next week with them under center, we're in for another long day.

We tried to run early, set up the ground game, but those Bears linebackers were everywhere, as usual. Brian Urlacher's been around forever, but he's still as quick as he was 10 years ago, he was all over the field today - especially on the cutback, every time I tried to cut inside, he was right there waiting for me.

We just played a sloppy, miserable game - and so did the Bears, but they weren't as sloppy as us - we just stunk it up.

I feel kinda weird, though, because we played horribly and lost, but so did the Panthers - which means that we've won the division and a playoff spot. We're guaranteed a top 4 seed, and I'm thinking we won't drop as far as #4 - but our last two games are still as important as ever, especially next week's game against the Rams. It's loud in that dome, that's one of the worst places to play on the road - and with a young QB under center, you can almost write us off, especially if you've seen the way the Rams have been playing this season.

Good win, we needed that to get ready for the playoffs, after that ugly loss to the Bears last week. We weren't perfect, but we played good enough to win against a good team on the road, and we fought hard the whole game, no 4th-quarter collapse.

We got up early on the Ramss, Lamont Beck never really got settled down and in rhythm for them and the offense sputtered - we built a 14-3 halftime lead. I scored on the 2nd drive of the game, a run of about 10 yards - went up the middle, nothing, so I bounced outside, outran a defender, and got to the pylon.

The running game wasn't at it's best today, but luckily, Michael Vick had an impressive day passing, he went for 265 yards. Lamont's been having a good season, his first in St. Louis, and there was a lot of talk about it this week, since Mike's been struggling a bit of late, but he shut everyone up with his performance today. Lamont left the organization because he wanted an opportunity to start, and the Rams were desperate for a QB.

The second TD was also my doing, a 20-yard reception off a screen pass, I split out wide in the slot, quick screen, had Martin Bibla and Jermaine Hutchinson lead blocking. Lennox Lynch set it up, he forced a fumble on a punt, gave us the ball around midfield.

The Rams didn't get a TD until late in the 3rd, a TD from Lamont to Michael Potts on 3rd-and-1, they faked to the back and went deep, Brent James was in position but couldn't make the tackle in time. Since we were up, 14-9, they went for 2 to bring it within 3 points, and made it - short run by Lionel Simms.

We extended the lead, took our sweet time, but still left Lamont about 3:40 to put together a winning-TD drive. Lamont's a little guy, he reminds me a lot of Doug Flutie with his playing style - he runs all around the backfield looking for someone to throw to, and sometimes he decides to just tuck it in and take off and run. That, and he's not the tallest guy out there - see photo above. I'm not the tallest guy either, I'm in the middle somewhere, but I still tower over him. Defense had to watch him, put a spy on him most of the time.

They drove down to about the 20-yard line, had a 4th-and-3, went for it - he dropped back, no one open, rolled out, and took off. Keith Brooking was spying him on that play, and corralled him about a yard shy of the first down.

We got the ball, but the penalty bug hit. Two holding calls in a row put us in a big hole, and I couldn't get much on the ground. I think we had a 3rd-and-18, or something, just ran a screen to Hutch, a WR screen, and he came up about a yard short, we punted with about 40 seconds left, Rams got the ball back around midfield or so.

First play of the drive, Lamont throws it right to Lennox Lynch for the pick - and that was the game.

The season finale will be at home next week, the Packers, who are fighting hard for a playoff spot, will visit. Teams like that, desperate to make the playoffs, are always dangerous, so it won't be an easy win. The only thing at stake for us is playoff seeding - which could turn out to be big. A loss, and we might drop down to the #3 seed, meaning we have to play a wildcard game (and it might just turn out to be a game against these very Packers). A win, and we have an outside chance at taking the #1 seed (if the Giants lose) - home field advantage, and a bye. The bye's always great, that's just one less game you have to worry about, one week to rest up, and one extra week to prepare. I want that bye.

Somewhere during the game I crossed the 1,500-yard mark. Actually, I crossed it twice, I'm told - since we were on the road, no big fanfare, but a stat guy told me afterwards - I cracked 1,500 yards, lost a couple yards, and cracked it again. I'm still trailing Clinton Portis, though, for the rushing title, which has been mine the past three seasons. If Clinton decides to play next season (he's only 32 years old now, so it's likely), he's got a very good shot at breaking Ricky Williams' all-time rushing record, 19,000-whatever yards it is - meanwhile, I'm a little past halfway there myself, about 10,000. I'm thinking this could take a while.

We almost ruined Christmas for the Packers - I'm kinda glad we didn't, actually, I like to be a nice guy. We beat them pretty badly - 41-14, in Atlanta, sent them back to think about that - but they still made the playoffs, not really sure how, but they squeaked in as the #6 seed. We went in as the #2 seed, as expected, behind the Giants.

Not much of a game at all, I played about 3 quarters, they took me out right after I scored my 2nd TD of the day. The Packers had their top two running backs sitting on injured reserve, we didn't respect their ground game at all - most of the game we were running a 3-man line and selling out for the pass. One guy who did stand out on the Packers was Bobby Bennett, who was a 5th-round pick by us in 2011, played a couple seasons in Atlanta, and then signed a big deal with the Packers. He made about 10 stops or so, he seemed to always be around the ball. I never really got to know him when he was playing for us, but nice to see how he's doing.

I got to rest up just a little more, no one got hurt in this final game, which is great news - even better is that we've got a first-round bye, and a home game the week after that, so we're going to have plenty of time to prepare.

All the playoff seeding has been set, and the postseason kicks off next Saturday, Jets @ Bills, and the NFC game, Packers and Bears - if the Bears win, we'd play them, otherwise, we'd play the winner of the Eagles-Cardinals game on Sunday.

Clinton Portis took the rushing title for 2014, with 1,811 yards to my 1,614 - congrats to him, he's also the NFL's MVP, leading the Broncos to the best record and the #1 seed in the AFC. Who knows, maybe we'll meet in San Francisco on January 15th for Super Bowl XLIX.

Anyways, Merry Christmas to all, watch the playoffs kick off next weekend, and root for us the week after that.

Happy new year, everyone!

We drew Philly for our first playoff game, the divisional round, at home - Jim Bates returns to Atlanta, but with his Eagles, who knocked off the Cardinals in Arizona today. Philly's got some injury problems on offense, especially with their WR corps, but Jim's got a tough defense, his trademark - but then again, so do we. We came into their place last year, in the 2nd round, and knocked them off, no reason they can't do the same to us this time around - in fact, they're probably going to be using that memory of last year's game as motivation, and you just know that Jim's going to get his team fired up playing us.

Credit the Packers for shrugging off that loss we gave them last week and fighting off the Bears, up in Chicago, upsetting a very solid football team - the Packers will face the #1 seed, the Giants, next week. We had a rough time against the Bears during the regular season ourselves, which makes that Packers win all the more impressive.

We had most of last week off, I was pretty rested after barely playing three quarters in the season finale, but a break is always nice. I watched both the NFC games, when the Bears lost, we knew it would be the winner of the next game. We didn't face Philly this season, the last meeting was in the playoffs last year, when I got hurt on the first drive, sat out with a bum elbow. Haven't gotten a chance to watch a lot of film on them yet, but they do seem to run the ball much better than they did last season. They've still got that tough defense, which was something like #4 in the NFL, but they've also got a 900-yard runner in James Scholl and a change-of-pace back with Denard Dunn, the former starter, who's now more of a 3rd-down back - Jim's slowly building what he had down here in Atlanta for 8 seasons, tough defense and Special Teams, and a power ground game.

My Aggies are playing tomorrow, against Florida - I've got a little wager on that game, with Cedric Harper (former Gator). A&M hasn't been the same in past years, they haven't had a real workhorse tailback since Lonnie Woodson a couple years ago, and before that, me, but they've found other ways to win. Go Ags! I was also watching that USC-SJ State game yesterday, man, those Trojans suck. That was one of the worst team efforts I've ever seen. How they even got into a bowl game (it was the Silicon Valley Bowl) is beyond me. I used to rib Travis Claridge, the former Trojan, about his boys all the time when back he was with the Falcons a couple years ago. Good times.

Great job by the defense tonight. I don't like having the game out of my hands, just standing on the sidelines, nervous as hell, with the game on the line, but that's what I was doing late in the game. Things looked good early, but just as expected, it turned into a defensive slugfest, a pretty ugly game from an offensive standpoint, but that figures, since we've got two of the better defensive teams playing. We scored early, Michael Vick tossed a TD to Cedric Harper on the opening drive, we were rolling. And then we just stopped - the Eagles adjusted, came out hard the next time around, 3-and-out. We mustered a field goal, were clinging onto that 10-0 lead, which wasn't all that much, it seemed like.

Philly got on the board when L.J. Smith, their biggest offensive threat, took a short pass about 60 yards for a score - the guy can really run for a TE. Jeff Rutledge got us right back on the kickoff, though, taking it back about 88 yards - he just went laterally across the field and turned on the speed, left a couple guys eating turf right as they dove for his feet.

17-7 at halftime, our main adjustment was to basically abandon the pass, which had worked well on that first drive, and just pound away, a couple yards at a time. We were in double tight sets for most of the 3rd quarter - just sitting on the ball and that 10-point lead. Unfortunately, the Eagles were able to chip away at it late in the 3rd - they converted a 4th-and-3 near midfield, we were playing the punt, and someone noticed that they came out to go for it, everyone was running around trying to get in position, and they went quick count and got the first down. That was the kind of aggressive play-calling the Eagles showed throughout the game, and especially late in the contest - I'll get to that later, but it seemed like Jim Bates wanted this one really, really bad, that he was trying to make a statement - maybe he was taking it a little personally, because it was his old team, and we beat them at their place last year.

The game came down to Jim's decision with about 20 seconds left in the game. Down 10-17, the Eagles scored on a short TD pass to Troy Hutton, and were about to tie the game with the extra point. But Jim sent out his offense one last time for a 2-point conversion, going for the win. I don't know what he was thinking, no one does, but that was his call - wouldn't have done it, I would have gone for overtime, but I'm not the head coach of the Eagles. We were kind of confused, but Keith Brooking got the defense ready, on the field, and in position. At the snap, he sold out on the run...lucky him, they ran right at him, and he stopped Jim Scholl a yard short of the endzone. 17-16 Falcons, and we recovered the onside kick and won the game.

The media up in Philly is going to have a field day tomorrow when Jim gets off that plane at the airport - he's going to be second-guessed on that call all offseason, I'd hate to be in his shoes. I don't blame him for going for the win, he was in a hostile environment on the road, and had a shot to win the game and go home. The Eagles offense was gaining momentum, though, if we had gone to overtime,

The similarities between this season and 2009, when we went to the Super Bowl, run pretty deep. That season, we had that long road trip to open the year, we didn't get a home game until week 7 or so - same deal this season. That season, we had some injuries and shuffled some guys around - same thing now, we've got Nick Ellis done for the season, almost no drop-off. We were the #2 seed then, same now - and then, we withstood the Giants in the divisional playoffs, with a dramatic 4th-quarter comeback to win it, this time - a dramatic 4th quarter stand to win it. In 2009, we played for the NFC title on the road, at Dallas - this season, we're going to New York for the NFC Championship. And last time, there was the Ravens staring at us from across, in the AFC, who would eventually reach the Super Bowl - they're seeded #2 this season as well. Now, let's see if these two seasons can both end the same way.

The NFC title game up in NY next week! I've got a good feeling - all that stuff above, and this: The Falcons haven't lost to the Giants dating back to the 2003 season, we're 6-0. Don't know why I don't remember anything from before that year, it's actually kind of weird. But since 2003: Falcons are 6-0 over the Giants, including a convincing win this season.

I've heard coaches talk about "leaving it all on the field", but now I think I know just what that's like. No one can say that we didn't want it - we showed the world just how bad we wanted that trip to the Super Bowl, the ball just didn't bounce the right way for us today. But what a game. I've never played a contest like that in my life, I don't even know how to begin to describe it. We're all exhausted, everyone on both sides, right now, so a couple of the details are a bit hazy for me, I don't remember all of it - the first half of the game seems like we played it 10 years ago.

It was a cold, windy day up in New York, both teams came in with solid defenses, and that's how the game played out. The Giants kicked a field goal early on the opening drive, and that was the first half in a nutshell. I didn't run well at all, and Michael Vick had only a couple yards passing late in the 1nd quarter - I think at the end of the first quarter, we had a team combined -1 yard passing and 30 yards total offense, the Giants had something similar.

The 3rd quarter was more of the same, until TE Tom Popowski made a play that could have been the back-breaker for us - he went down the seam, caught a pass, and went in for the score - about 40 yards, and we had 4 defenders down there trying to bring him down, stop him short of the goalline, but he was able to score anyways. Great effort, and in a defensive game like this, a 2-score lead can kill you. We didn't get down, instead that kick-started our offense, which was sputtering in the cold. Give us credit for staying in the game at this point, on the road. Jermaine Hutchinson ran about 25 yards on a screen, and Jeff Rutledge went about 40 yards on a PA pass, and we got our first points late in the 3rd, a field goal.

4th quarter - we tied the game up, I went straight up the middle on a 3rd-and-short, untouched, and saw the clear path to the endzone, touchdown, 10-10. We just felt like we had all the momentum at that point, and on the next drive, Cedric Harper got us started off with a great punt return to set up my 2nd touchdown of the day - a 32-yard sprint off left end, I got hit at the line, broke through, juked to the outside, ran by a defender, down the sidelines, and fell forwards into the endzone, dragged someone in with me - our first lead of the day, 17-10, with about 1:20 left.

The joy didn't last long at all, though, as the Giants drove right back on the next play - an 82-yard bomb to Rich Pope...and we were tied yet again. It seemed like Giants were right there as soon as we started to pull ahead, and vice versa - neither team could get the advantage over the other, all game long.

We killed the clock to end the game, and headed into overtime. We won the toss, received, and could only drive to around midfield. Chris Nickerson, who punted 13 times, had a punt downed inside the 5-yard line. He had 5 punts inside the 20-yard line today, I think - a great performance for a former Mr. Irrelevant, he kept us in the game, in a field position battle. We had the Giants pinned down after only gaining about 15 yards or so, they had to punt, and we got it back, but ended up punting it again, over and over. Everything's kind of blurred together, but I do remember at the end of the 2nd overtime period, the Giants started to move the ball. It was like they woke up all of the sudden, we had them pinned inside the 4-yard line or so, and they went no-huddle, caught our guys off-guard. They drove down, and I think that's when they missed their field goal.

We had a couple shots to win the game in OT, I don't blame kicker Glenn Jackson, he did what he could - we didn't help him much, we were trying to kick pretty much every time we got inside the 40-yard line. Throw in the bad wind and the cold temperatures, and it's no wonder. We had to wait until the wind was at our backs to kick, I think after that 2nd overtime period, we killed off about 20 seconds to reverse the field, so Glenn would have the wind. He booted that one, I thought it was good, we all did - we had just begun to swarm the field, and then it just sailed off about a yard or two to the left. I think it was from about 55 yards out or something.

I remember just thinking, "This is ridiculous," at the beginning of the 4th overtime. The 4th overtime. Its like we almost played two full games, back-to-back. We had the ball around midfield, as we did so often during this game. I think it was on a 3rd down, Mike fired off downfield the sidelines, to Jermaine Hutchinson on the hook route, around the 25-yard line, which would have put us in great range for a field goal, to win the game, to go back home, to go to the Super Bowl. Hutch slipped up on the turf, and the man covering him, former Falcons cornerback Drayton Florence, who we let go this off-season, picked it off, a diving interception. The ball bounced off the turf and into his hands - he trapped it. No question, I saw it clearly, he trapped it. You could see the ball bounce off the ground and into his arms, and he just lay there for a second, like even he thought the play was over. And then he got up and ran 76 yards for the game-winning touchdown. And we didn't know what the heck was going on. The Giants were all running around jumping up and down and we were kind of just standing there in disbelief.

No instant replay challenges, after that score, sudden death, the game was over. Right there, we didn't even get a chance to try to challenge it, as soon as he scored, the Giants were all over the field, the place was going nuts, he was being mobbed by his team in the endzone. We were kind of stunned, that the game was over, about a minute into the 4th overtime period - no, that's not a typo - that Drayton had gotten away with his trap, and that we were robbed.

I don't feel as upset as I should. After you play a game like that, play your heart out, you can't feel all that bad no matter the outcome. I carried the rock 51 times - I've never carried the ball so much in my life at any level, but I carried it 51 times today. 51 times. I carried the ball 51 times during 2008, my second season in the NFL - 51 times all season. And I carried it 51 times in one game today, which was more like almost two full games. Incredible, just thinking about it. Some of the numbers from today's game were ridiculous like that, definitely a game for the ages. The ending was controversial, we got screwed - but maybe it's the 51 carries that's messing me up, but I'm not infuriated at what happened - nothing we can do to change that.

Isaac Quick also played an incredible game on the offensive line, running people over, clearing up holes - he spring both of my two TD runs, on the second one, he teed off on a linebacker, and let me get to the outside. He wasn't on the squad that won the Super Bowl in 2009.

You hear about great games like this game today, but you never think about how the losing team feels like, especially in the NFC championship game just one win away. And then there's the business about that interception at the end, Drayton Florence's play to win it - I still stand by my assessment that the ball was trapped. Look at that picture and tell me the ball didn't hit the ground. I don't know what the hell went on in the confusion right after he scored, but there's nothing we can do about it now, nothing except go back home to Atlanta, which we're going right now. We're all sorry to all the fans, that we couldn't come home victorious. I really felt like this was our year, but as I said - the ball just didn't bounce right for us today, we played our hearts out, and things just didn't work out. Good job, Giants, good luck in the Super Bowl against the Texans, representing the NFC - do us proud. If they play as half as good a game as they did today, they'll win, easy, but I'm sure they're going to be feeling this game a week from now - those 51 carries are going to take a toll onto me well into the offseason, probably.

What a way to end the season, though.