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Colts 41, Aint’s 10. Beginning of a long year for the Saints and their swiss-cheese defense. The offense can only pick up so much slack, you know? As for the Colts, typical beginning to their yearly romp to 13-3. I’m not any more of an appreciator of fine quarterbacks than I am of fine wines. Zeth and guys like him that rave about Peyton Manning’s artistry are terminally boring, in my book. I prefer the artistry of Tony Ugoh being totally incapable of handling an NFL defensive end by himself. He’ll get there. What, you think it’s easy to play left tackle in the NFL? Tell that to the Rams.

Broncos 15, Bills 14. Now, you want some sloppy football, this is the game you want, right here. Marshawn Lynch acquitted himself pretty well, I thought, for a rookie and everything, but as advertised, J.P. Loser Losman was tragically helpless against the Broncos’ pass defense. 14/21 for 97 yards and an interception? Dude. 4.6 yards per attempt. That’s an OK number for a running back. Man, that guy sucks. And Jay Cutler ain’t much better. 23/39 for 304, 1 and 1 is the luxury the Bills’ idea of a defense affords you. Next week they host Oakland, and then: Jacksonville comes to town. It won’t be pretty.

My only comment about the Kevin Everett injury is that he NFL damn well better take care of this guy for the rest of his life. I mean, like 200 grand a year minimum take care of him, plus clear every medical bill he ever incurs, right on down to removing a hangnail. This is what playing NFL football can to do you, kids. Remember that next time you make fun of Tiki Barber for saying “you know what? I have like $27 million in my bank account. Screw this crap.”

Steelers 34, Browns 7. Okay. Romeo Crennel just doesn’t have a clue what he’s doing. This is Exhibit A in the case that in New England the “defensive coordinator’s” duties primarily involve things like feeding Bill Belichick’s dog and giving Bill Belichick a foot massage after every practice. Seriously–if any of you out there can tell me what the difference is between Romeo Crennel and Art Shell, please get in touch with me. I’m very curious about this.

I mean, the Browns have SOME talent. They have at least one good receiver, a good tight end, and some decent guys on defense. But this is just horrendously bad coaching. Their first drive went three-and-out and then they committed four freaking penalties on the same play. On a punt! It’s like they’ve never practiced a punt before! God knows they’ve practiced punts by the carload, these last few years. @#%( the heck is the coaching staff doing all week? Operating their illicit Pokémon ring?

I was not in any particular way impressed by the Steelers. Those four touchdowns are nice and all, and Ben Roethlisberger was, with two exceptions, generally intelligent with the football, but heck, man, that’s about the worst pass protection I’ve ever seen. The Steelers’ o-line is like five Tony Ugohs when it comes to protecting the QB. Turnstiles. I hope Roethlisberger has a good insurance policy on himself. This is going to be a major problem all year for the Steelers. And I still think Mike Tomlin looks like some random dude you might see in some random bar. Suffice to say I have my doubts he can match wits with the likes of Mangini or Andy Reid or anything.

Aside from the fact that Romeo Crennel is clearly not the brightest crayon in the box, is there any reason Brady Quinn isn’t leading this team?

Packers 16, Eagles 13. What the hell goes on with the Eagles the first few games of every year? It’s like they all show up hung over the first six games, then Reid sobers up and goes “OK, guys, from now on you’ve gotta stop drinking by midnight Saturday night. No exceptions! I’m serious!” The Packers defense is good–the d-line especially was really flying around out there. But geez, man, you watch the game and you can tell that, overall, the Packers can’t quite keep pace with the Eagles, but every nine seconds the Packers are committing another stupid penalty or stupid fumble or stupid blown block. That’s why I bet on the Packers: You can count on this kind of stuff from the Eagles early in the year. No team in sports consistently finds weird ways to turn wins into losses quite like the Eagles.

The new, mobility-free Donovan McNabb v2.0 did not impress. Yeah, the rest of his team kinda broke down around him, but he just doesn’t look like the same guy. Looks more like, I don’t know, Donovan McNabb, only when he can’t move and has to unload the thing when pressure gets in his face. I don’t know whether McNabb can keep up like this.

If this game was any indication, Brett Favre is going to begin getting angry about his lack of receivers about… now. I don’t know if more than twice you could qualify any Packer as “open” all game.

Panthers 27, Rams 13. 22 for 42 for 167 yards? 4.0 yards per attempt??? And I thought Losman was bad. Mark it: Yesterday might have been the last we’ll ever see of Orlando Pace in the NFL–he’s done for the year with a torn labrum (translation: “skin is the only thing keeping your arm attached to your chest”), and I know if that if I’d broken down like he has these past two years, I’d figure I’ve kicked enough butts and stop while I can still move. And without Pace, the Rams are finished, a near-lock for a top-five pick next year. Bulger, not exactly Cal Ripken in the health department anyway, isn’t lasting four weeks without Pace watching his blind side, the offense is old, the interior line blows, and the defense would fit right in in the PAC-10. We’re talking 2005 49ers kind of awful here.

The Panthers, like the Steelers, cashed in on playing an opponent so terrible you kind of feel sorry for them, and did nothing that suggests to me they might be a playoff team.

Viqueens 24, Falcons 3. I’m busy stuffing crow into Zeth and Bryan’s faces over the Falcons. In their big hurry to crown Joey Harrington’s ass, they forgot the Falcons’ o-line sucks at pass protection (not a problem with Michael Vick since Vick never stays in the pocket anyway) and the defense is so god-awful they managed to let Tarvaris Jackson throw for 163 yards and a touchdown. Tarvaris Jackson!

Joey Harrington is OK, he probably ranks in the top 32 quarterbacks in the league–29th or 30th, I’m thinking–but it’s not like the dude can throw the Atlanta freakin’ Falcons on his back and go like “hey, I don’t care how covered you are, here’s the ball, look, it’s right there.” He tries that crap, and 350 pound run-stuffing tackles take it 54 yards to the house. Is it possible to do anything more embarrassing than that? I mean, outside of a New Year’s Eve party, of course.

Patriots 38, Jets 14. What an annihilation. Not that annihilations in week 1 mean anything. Bills 31, Patriots 0 in 2003, anyone? But geez, I think I actually saw Tom Brady stand in the pocket and solve a Rubik’s cube before finally getting around to lobbing the ball in Randy Moss‘ general direction. Not just because the Jets’ front seven sucks, but because Doogie Mangini didn’t even make any pretense of going after Tom Brady. He was all “nah, I’m just gonna leave nine guys in coverage and hope Brady throws it to one of them.” Apparently he fell victim to some sort of misinformation that led him to believe Vinny Testaverde would be going for the Patriots. That clever bastard Belichick did it again!

Kellen Clemens… No. Just say no. Ain’t happening. Best case scenario, he’s, like, Jon Kitna or something. And even then it’s more likely he’s Kelly Holcomb or Gus Frerotte. Jets fans, listen, you idiots: You really want Chad Pennington to be OK. Trust me.

More tomorrow or Wednesday or something.