Briggs A Winner!

With the Face of The Defense out for the season, it's about damn time that Lance Briggs gets his due. All this guy has done is be our best linebacker for at least the last four seasons, and this week he got an honor that has somehow eluded him for his entire career.

Lance Briggs: I present to you the NFC Defensive Player of the Week. 8 tackles, 2 TFL, 1 sack, 1 INT, 2 passes defensed. Nice.

Briggs' problem, to some extent, is that he isn't a sack guy. In his pro and college careers, combined, he has only 17 sacks. (thanks, Wikipedia.) The media likes to recognize LB's like DeMarcus Ware, Ray Lewis, etc., who get a ton of sacks. Lance is something different - he is a monster in coverage and a killer tackler in space, equally able to bring down the NFL's best wide recievers, running backs, and tight ends.

Basically, he turns your average ten yard gain on the weak side into a five-yard gain and third down.

I'll take that over 95% of the linebackers in the entire league any day.