Football Contest: Week 8

Has this season not been magical enough for you?

How about now?!

This week is all retail Magic.  5 retail packs and 1 retail value pack to be exact, jack.  This product is on my list of potential box breaks in the future.

The base design is nice, as I'm sure the Chiefs and Eagles will agree:

Hokie bonus points!

It's like Gypsy Queen but without the horrendous borders.  One of the main inserts is the Supernatural Stars:

Points for the Texans, Titans, Giants, and Broncos

Simple and effective.  One of the main draws of Magic is the minis.  At one per pack, we should have gotten 8, but one pack had a bonus mini, so we landed 9.

The Value Pack also had three special blue minis:



Blue (+1) Mini (+1) Cards (+1)...and an extra (+1) for the RC ones.

This week sees 4 teams with byes: Ravens, Bills, Bengals, and Texans. 

The premier matchup this week is between the Patriots (7-0) and Rams (6-1), the top two teams in the league.

Let's do some games:

MINNESOTA VIKINGS 7, TAMPA BAY BUCCANEERS 0
>>> Minny has had more ties than any other team this year.  This was not one of them.  The Vikings hit 3 RCs.

CHICAGO BEARS 1, CAROLINA PANTHERS 0
>>> Julius Peppers saves the day...and keeps his name atop the Defensive MVP conversation.

CLEVELAND BROWNS 2, SAN DIEGO CHARGERS 1
>>> RC > Base card.

DETROIT LIONS 3, SEATTLE SEAHAWKS 0
>>> The mini Broyles RC above was the only player in this game.

JACKSONVILLE JAGUARS 3, GREEN BAY PACKERS 2
>>> I really thought the Packers would be one of the top teams.

NEW YORK JETS 15, MIAMI DOLPHINS 2
>>> The Dolphins suffered their first loss two weeks ago, then, coming off a bye week, get absolutely thumped bye the Jets.  The mini blue Hill RC was enough, but the Jets piled an auto on top:

Retail pack autos are always great!

PHILADELPHIA EAGLES 9, ATLANTA FALCONS 3
>>> The Eagles put up one of the best non-auto/relic games of the season to knock off the Falcons.  The Eagles had the Vick base card, two minis (1 RC), and a nice LeSean McCoy insert.

You may recognize this Magical Moments design that inspired my banner.

PITTSBURGH STEELERS 2, WASHINGTON REDSKINS 2
>>> The Redskins continue their struggles by losing a tiebreaker to the Steelers.  The Steelers had base cards of Antonio Brown (Central Michigan) and Roethlisberger (Miami OH).  The Skins had Jabar Gaffney (Florida) and Roy Helu (Nebraska).  I had to go with the two small school guys.

ST. LOUIS RAMS 2, NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS 1
>>> That's right...the matchup of two Goliaths goes 2-1.  The Rams' Jackson mini beats a lone base card. Both teams now sit at 7-1.

TENNESSEE TITANS 6, INDIANAPOLIS COLTS 0
>>> It turns out that the Nate Washington mini is a short print.  It also turns out that it didn't really matter since the Colts laid a goose egg.

KANSAS CITY CHIEFS 7, OAKLAND RAIDERS 0
>>> Speaking of goose eggs... 

NEW YORK GIANTS 3, DALLAS COWBOYS 1
>>> Victor Cruz's Supernatural Stars insert made the difference here.

DENVER BRONCOS 5, NEW ORLEANS SAINTS 1
>>> The Von Miller insert up top was enough for the win, but the Broncos wanted to flex some rookie muscle with this Rookie Enchantment card:

Are we sure Beardy didn't design this card? It's framed in a similar manner as Masterpieces and Gypsy Queen.


SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS 3, ARIZONA CARDINALS 0
>>> The Niners had the coolest non-auto in the bunch.  It also happens to be the smallest card I've seen since Topps Micro:

The diminutive Rice is a '48 Magic throwback. Shown next to a standard base card.

I got two base short prints and one other mini short print, but they all went to Bye Week teams.  Scores for those teams: Ravens 4, Bills 3, Bengals 8, Texans 5.  I'm sure the Bengals would have preferred that this wasn't a bye week..

Apparently it was a good week to be the home team.  The home teams won 11 of the 14 games.

Current Standings:

Since we're 8 weeks in we might as well take a look at the budding playoff picture. For those not familiar with NFL Playoffs, the top 4 seeds in each conference go to the division winners in order of overall record.  The 5th and 6th seeds in each conference go to the two teams with the best records among the remaining teams.  The NFL has a full set of tiebreakers that I'll be following.

AFC
1. Patriots (7-1)
2. Texans (5-2)¹
3. Broncos (5-2)
4. Ravens (4-3)²
5. Dolphins (5-2)
6. Bengals (4-3)<sup>3

1</sup>Texans def. Broncos in Week 3.
²Ravens def. Bengals in Week 1.
³Bengals def. Jaguars in Week 4.

NFC
1. Rams (7-1)
2. Lions (5-2)⁴
3. Falcons (5-2)
4. Giants (5-3)
5. 49ers (6-2)
6. Bears (4-3)<sup>5

4</sup>No head-to-head. Both .666 in-conference record. No common opponents. Lions have higher strength of victory than Falcons.
⁵Bears, Eagles, Cowboys tied.  Eagles have better in-division record than Cowboys.  Bears have better in-conference record than Eagles.

We'll revisit the playoff picture after Week 11, when every team has had a bye week.