Give credit to the San Francisco 49ers- no, on second thought give credit to 49ers QB Alex Smith. He made some big throws and one great play with his feet when he had to and kept the Saints on the ropes.

What impressed me most about Smith's three TD no INT performance was that two throws involved incredible accuracy; while the third was a nice job of defense recognition and changing the play to allow a nice pass to WR Michael Crabtree.

Speaking of Crabtree, I found someone with worse hands:

But I digress...

I said for the Niners to win they needed two Brees turnovers, avoid turnovers themselves and run the ball. Check, check, and check. However, I didn't pick the Niners because I thought for sure this was the week we would all be disappointed that Alex Smith isn't what Niners fans hoped he was.

He proved me wrong. Color me impressed. Just don't Color Me Badd.

In the other game, we saw Bill Belichick emasculate Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow in front of the world. This was about as difficult to watch as the BCS National Championship game.

And as if to stick that proverbial middle finger up at the world, the hooded wizard calls a "quick kick" on 3rd and 10, up 35 points with 3:10 left in the game. This of course resulted in a fracas as Von Miller started a brawl.

I don't support fighting on the field normally, but I actually understand Miller here. He got his ass kicked, for sure, but at least he showed a little pride. Of course, there's better ways to react to a classless move but at least it provided a little excitement to an otherwise channel-flip-fest of a game. It kind of reminded me of this:

So the Tebow thing is over, and it's alarming how fast ESPN is now distancing itself. While doing highlights of the Niners win, when describing Alex Smith's TD run Trent Dilfer described it as: "...if Tim Tebow makes this play, we do an hour long special about it".

He's right, but wow- that didn't take long.

And now onto Sunday's games...

Houston Texans at Baltimore Ravens This game will be more about "what could have been" than what actually transpires. The Texans have one of the more prolific running games that unfortunately has to be paired with a third-string QB.

Now to his credit, TJ Yates has been "Caleb Hanie" horrid. He's just not Matt Schaub and against a superb defense like the Ravens. They hold opposing quarterbacks to a 68.8 rating. The teams played earlier this year, but the Texans were without All-World WR Andre Johnson. Now they're without the most important position on the field and a 29-14 score like we had in week 6 is probably going to show its face again.

The impetus is on the Texans defense to make Ravens QB Joe Flacco turn the ball over. The Ravens can run the ball too this game will come down to which team can force the other to be one-dimensional. To do that, you need to stop the running game and make the quarterback beat you.

Flacco can do that, I'm not sure Yates can on the road against this defense. I'll take the Ravens, 17-7.

New York Giants at Green Bay Packers After the Giants held a talented Falcons team to only two points, it would be easy to get ahead of ourselves.

Now they face a 15-1 Packers team teeming with confidence and with a week off to get healthy. Packers QB Aaron Rodgers has assumed the top of the mountain as far as QB play goes and their defense has intercepted the opposing QB 31 times this year.

Now read this.

The Giants have not statistically run the ball well all year, despite having two talented RBs in Brandon Jacobs and Ahmad Bradshaw. On the flip side, they have surrendered more than 110 yards per game on the ground.

The Packers are not a very good rushing team, however if they can run in this game it's over. There are two "X" factors in this game and they both are on the Giants: the Giants defense and Eli Manning.

If Manning throws more than one interception, it will be very hard to overcome this Packers team. For the Giants to win, they need mistake free football from Manning, over 100 yards rushing, and keep the Packers throwing- much like the 49ers did to the Saints.

It sounds like lunacy to dare Aaron Rodgers to throw but the more he puts it up, the more chances there are for turnovers. He's as accurate a passer as we've seen in the NFL, however everyone has human moments and the Giants only chance is to force turnovers. They have to take this game, it won't be given to them.

Now that I wrote all that and made my case for what the Giants have to do, I'll tell you that it won't happen and the Packers will come away with this one, 31-17.