They were trading the entire team and firing the coach by Sunday morning

I watched all four games over wild card weekend and now all four winners must travel to the next round and become instant underdogs. The Jets at San Diego, Arizona at New Orleans and Baltimore at Indianapolis are all seven-point dogs which is “huge” as sports commentators like to say. Dallas is given the best chance at minus three going into Minnesota.

Speaking of dogs and Michael Vick, if your team was trounced and bounced early do you switch allegiances to a team you sort of like or to the club you hate the least of the ones left standing? I like the Jets, New Orleans, Indianapolis and Dallas.

In Philly, fans, writers and radio hacks were trading the entire team and firing the coach by Sunday morning. Donavan McNabb is once again the scapegoat for everything proving what Jimmy Rollins said: “The sports fans of Philly are front runners” and what Charles Barkley said years ago: “Philadelphia is a racist city.”

I do believe Donavan looked past his prime against Dallas. Bret Farve and Kurt Warner, each NFL old guys, show up on game day. Warner just stands there - has no feet whatsoever - and throws five touchdown passes on 29-of-33 passes?

The Eagles were “out schemed”  by Dallas - I hate when that happens - which was revealed by analyst Chris Collingsworth, who is the best in the booth at breaking games down to basic elements.

Back when the Eagles lost an NFC championship game at home against Carolina, after the Panthers scored the game’s first touchdown, Collingsworth said, “The other shoe just dropped and we’re only halfway through the first quarter.” Many Eagles fans anticipate and expect then are quickly resigned to failure. It’s hard for a fan who doesn’t work at the Camden Aquarium to look in the mirror and admit, “I went into the tank early.”

SEMI TOUGH - Players can give it all they’ve got and coaches can coach hard and teams can still lose. And sometimes they can lose a lot. The Sussex Tech boys’ basketball team is now 0-9 and is coached by Steve Perry, a man who was successful at North Caroline and is generally considered a good basketball coach. I’ve seen the Ravens play twice and I consider them decent, but certainly not winless after nine games. Indian River is also winless at 0-8, with Jerome Hitchens and Marvin Phillips listed as head coaches. The Golden Knights of Sussex Central are 1-5 behind first-year head coach Jamal Bivens. Central basketball fans have been known to eat coaches for dinner so I’m sure Bivens is feeling the heat. Delmarva Christian made the tournament last season while this year the Royals are 1-8 and they have 6-foot-8 Mike LaPointe, who can actually play. Saint Thomas More is 2-5 and when you check their roster and players are listed as “perimeter or post” you just know that in Magnolia it is 1958. Woodbridge lost four in a row and fell to 2-6 as rookie head coach Greg Smock quit and was replaced by Emilio Perry.

DISRESPECTING DUNK - A game last Thursday in Philly high school basketball featured Frankford at Olney. It was unruly throughout with several game stoppages as unemployable neighborhood young adults kept standing courtside shouting at the referees who called the crowd a disgrace.

Then gas was thrown on the raging fire of discontent when a Frankford played dunked on an Olney player, which in the subculture of $5 foot long hoagies and hijacked Domino Delivery Nissans is a sign of disrespect calling for paybacks. The Frankford team and their coach were attacked in the parking lot after the game - a hundred vultures were circling - while trying to get onto the team bus.

I’ve been inside a few of these psychotic throw downs at different stages of my long life and can honestly say that 20 years ago I witnessed a young mother hand off her baby – “here hold this” - then charge the court randomly flailing at anyone who crossed her path.

“But what’s the moral of the story, Fredman?”

How about what chance do kids have when the adults they see every day are totally lawless and out of their minds?

SNIPPETS - If you go to the gym on a mission to “chat somebody up” my advice is to get a dog. Let people do their workouts and, by the way, if you have to carry a water bottle everywhere you go then what kind of shape are you in anyway?