If there's anybody in the city taking more heat than Mike Nolan, it's his quarterback, Alex Smith. Smith stands accused by the Faithful of not very being good. The evidence? Overthrowing Receivers. Underthrowing Receivers. Not seeing open Receivers. The numbers back up the evidence-- he has a preposterously low QB rating (57.2) and completion percentage (48.7). He is also 11-19 as a starting QB. In the games we've watched, Smith looked like the same QB he was when he first started-- skittish and inaccurate-- so much so, the Faithful are muttering that Smith, as a #1 draft pick, has been a bust of Lucy Pinder-like proportions (sort of NSFW-y).

There are many theories out there for his general awfulness. Is he still hurt? Is the new offensive coordinator lame? Was the brief glimmer of decent play all due to Norv? He also played in a spread offense in college and there's a theory that QBs who play in gimmicky college offenses don't do well in the NFL. And maybe he just isn't a very good QB?

And speaking of #1 draft picks, there is the Raiders. The only reason to care about the Raiders right now is the eventual Coming of JaMarcus. After all, what else do Raiders fans have left to care about? The Raiders are like this season of "Heroes"-- boring and awful with only the possibility of something interesting happening towards the end as the only reason to keep watching-- Save the QB, Save the World. So why isn't the big guy playing? Is he not ready yet? Or maybe it's because whenever Al reappears from his cryogenic freezer, he mandates that the Raiders still need to just win, baby. After all, the AFC West is God-awful and a Raiders' Colorado Rockies-like run can actually send them into the playoffs and that probably won't happen with JaMarcus at the helm. Then again, it probably won't happen with Josh or Daunte and Andrew at the helm either.