NFL

ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- Charles Woodson had a big football game to play Thursday in Detroit. What he did before it was more important.

Woodson donated $2 million to the new University of Michigan Mott Children's Hospital and Women's Hospital -- The Charles Woodson Clinical Research Fund will support pediatric research for children with life-threatening illnesses, and the hospital's lobby will be named in Woodson's honor.

The school announced Woodson's gift on Thanksgiving before he played for the Green Bay Packers against the Detroit Lions.

The Wildcast is NFL FanHouse's podcast formation. It's like the Wildcat, but better.

A full Week 12 slate kicks off with a trifecta of games on Thanksgiving Day, and Knox Bardeen and I fired up the ol' podcast to breakdown all the action. We were joined by a pair of FanHouse's senior NFL beat writers, Nancy Gay and Dan Graziano, as we discussed the Lions and Cowboys keeping their holiday hosting duties, Denver's chances against the Giants, the crucial Pittsburgh-Baltimore tilt on Sunday night and much more.

So grab another heaping helping of turkey and sit back and enjoy the latest edition of NFL FanHouse's Wildcast. Audio can be found after the jump.

As a man who lives and works in Green Bay, Wis., Aaron Rodgers knows. He's not blind or deaf. He sees the highlights, browses the web, listens to the talking heads. Like each and every one of his green-and-gold-clad neighbors, Rodgers is aware that the 2009 NFL season has been a turbulence-free cloud surf for Brett Favre and the Vikings and a brutal, muddy slog for his own Packers. You could actually argue that nobody knows this better than Rodgers, since no one else in town has (presumably) been sacked 43 times this year.

But since this is a day on which we're supposed to appreciate all the good things we have in life and take a little break from dwelling on the bad, I hereby invite the good people of Green Bay to fry up some Thanksgiving cheese curds, sit back and watch their man Rodgers dismantle the Detroit Lions. And as you watch, take a second to think to yourselves, "Hey, we could have it a lot worse."

If you're a Steelers fan, there was a lot of things in Sunday's loss to the Steelers that would drive a man to drink, but in rewatching the game with an eye on the offensive line play there was one disappointing aspect that may have been missed when watching the game live.

After not getting any sacks in the first 55 minutes of the game, Pittsburgh's Ben Roethlisberger was sacked three times in the final three minutes of regulation. The first sack came on a third down, forcing the Steelers to punt while the third sack, also on third down, ended Pittsburgh's chances of keeping the game from going to overtime.

Now the frustrating part was that both of those third down sacks came on the exact same blitz call by the Chiefs, both of which took advantage of a flaw in the Steelers' blocking scheme.

The six teams that will play on Thanksgiving are a combined 10-1 this season when their quarterbacks pass for at least 300 yards. Historically, that's unusual: In the past, 300-yard passing games have not corresponded to winning. That, however, is no longer the case.

Before the season, Rex Ryan had no qualms about talking smack. It was pretty obvious what the Jets were getting: a defense-minded, hard-nosed and cocky head coach. "I never came here to kiss Bill Belichick's, you know, rings," Ryan announced on June. He made it apparent, before he had ever notched one victory, that he was putting the division rival Patriots on blast.

It was a welcome departure from Eric Mangini's style and made Jets fans feel they had a leader with some ... cojones.

But words only get you so far. And then you have to actually, ya know, keep winning.

The five stages of grief are being played out in NFL-mad Denver, where Broncos fans -- teased into believing a stunning 6-0 start had canceled out the challenges of a first-year head coach, new quarterback and assorted volatile team personalities -- are well into the process of re-evaluating a season gone horribly wrong.

Broncos players, many of whom came away from Sunday's disheartening 32-3 AFC West home loss to the San Diego Chargers embarrassed, confused and bickering, know they have to regroup in a hurry.

This was a short week, and a Thanksgiving Day game at Invesco Field looms against the revitalized New York Giants (8:20 p.m. ET). Both teams are 6-4, a game behind their division leaders, the Cowboys and the Chargers, respectively.

Antoine Winfield played it safe last week sitting out a fourth straight game with his foot injury. He wasn't needed as a nearly perfect Brett Favre led the Vikings to an easy win over the Seahawks.'

Well it's more accurate to say that the Vikings decided for Winfield that he was going to sit that one out, something that Winfield told the Star-Tribune that in hindsight was a wise choice. But with the division rival Bears on the schedule this week, Winfield is ready to promise he'll be back in action this Sunday.

Charlie Batch's 2009 season isn't over yet, but it's fair to wonder if his Steelers' career is almost over. Hopefully for Steelers fans, his replacement Dennis Dixon's career is just beginning.

When Batch somehow broke his wrist during his four-play, no-sack stint against the Chiefs it marked the second time in two seasons that he's suffered a serious injury -- he missed all of the 2008 season with a broken collarbone he suffered in the preseason. As a 34-year-old quarterback who's starting to break down, there have to be questions about whether Batch has much left.

The Steelers aren't putting Batch on injured reserve yet because there's a hope that he could be back in a month or so after surgery to fix a plate to his broken wrist. In the meantime, the Steelers are showing enough faith in Dixon to not sign a veteran backup. If something happens to Ben Roethlisberger this week (and he is coming off of a concussion), Dixon will be getting his first real game action.

Another week, another game of the century.

This time we'll have to wait through 15 other games -- until Monday night, when the Patriots face the Saints in New Orleans, the second meeting in three weeks with an unbeaten team for New England. And the second one in prime time, so the nation can watch to see if Bill Belichick, holding a six-point lead with two minutes left, might go for it on fourth-and-2 at his own 28 to keep the ball away from Drew Brees.

Given that situation again, he probably would. But not because a variety of "football scientists'' and mathematicians, who surfaced after the try in Indy. Belichick doesn't believe in cottage industries, publicity seekers or New York Times bloggers telling him what to do.