Craig James Previews Week 14

Will the Seattle Seahawks be able to rebound and join the NFL's elite... the St. Louis Rams, the Indianapolis Colts and the Jacksonville Jaguars? Has Eddie George ever bought legal drugs over the counter? And who will have the easier path to Super Bowl XXXIV?

To help you out CBS.com will be sitting down with CBS Sports announcers all season to give you their previews and opinions about current NFL news and each week's schedule.

CBS Sports broadcaster and former NFL player Craig James is hear to kickoff the fourteenth week of the season.

CBS.com: Chicago's Jim Miller was suspended for taking a legal substance that anyone can buy over the counter should the NFL change its drug policy so that an incident like this won't happen again?

Craig James: I think the NFL, the number one issue they are looking out for, is that they don't want to have performance enhancing drugs in the bodies of athletes. And in any sport like that.

A guy that can buy something over the counter in a pharmacy, in my mind, that's a long ways from what they are really trying to get at. That is not the root of the evil. Steroids is what they are trying to stop. And I am not smart enough to figure out how seaweed turns into some kind of enhancing performance drug.

CBS.com: With the performance of Eddie George fresh in our minds, who do you, being a former tailback, think is the top running back in the league right now?

Craig James: Woooh, good question. Eddie (George) certainly ran as well as any running back in the league did. I think when you talk about the best running back in the league, believe it or not, you have to consider a guy like Corey Dillon with the Cincinnati Bengals. The guy playing on a terrible team... he is having an excellent year.

But then you look at Edgerrin James, and what he has meant to the Colts, how good he as played. Marshall Faulk, how well he has played for the Rams. There are several good runners -- Stephen Davis for the Redskins. There are good runners out there who are having good yards per-carry averages that are normally not there for some of the top rushers. And their teams are performing well.

My hat goes off for Corey Dillon... I can't believe the guy is hanging in there on a bad team.

CBS.com: What are the key match-ups for Week 14?

CBS

Craig James

I worry about them, and I say rebound, rebound with the quarterback position. What is going to happen with Charlie Batch, if he indeed plays. Is Gus Frerotte really the guy. Right now, I think he is. I think Frerotte is a true number one quarterback and should be the quarterback for the Lions.

That is a very important game, as it is for the New England Patriots playing down against Indianapolis. The Colts, can they recover from two big wins they had to play. And can the Patriots keep the beat going, because it is do-or-die for them right now.

CBS.com: What has happened to the Seattle Seahawks? Is it a chemistry problem or is it just growing pains under their new coach Holmgren?

Craig James: I think that there is a growth pattern that needs to occur. And what happened for Seattle, is that they had early success. And it wasn't expected, that success, without Joey Galloway.

Now they are having to realize what it takes to be good long term, and not just to stop -- December is here and the game is just begun. Always consider this to be the third quarter... the fourth quarter being the playoffs.

Jon Kitna, maybe there is a little pressure on him that he is feeling. The stress of trying to perform and to meet the expectations that are there -- to impress Mike Holmgren -- to get ready for a new contract.

But this football team, they have got to quickly recover. If they have hit their valley at the right time and they can come back. The playoffs will be good for them.

CBS.com: Looking ahead towards the playoffs, does a team like the St. Louis Rams have an advantage with the easy schedule they have had, or does the advantage go to the teams that come out of the AFC East with the toughest of all schedules?

Craig James: I would have to go and lean to the side of being battle tested. If you are a healthy football team and you have survived the AFC East, there is no question that when you go into a dog fight that you are going to be better off.

The St. Louis Rams on the other hand, you could build a case for them... saying they have experienced so much success, so quickly and so well, that they are used to that tempo. That they expect it. And if they are just going to fly down the field offensively -- and they are going to stop the run -- and they are playing aggressive... moving to the ball.

But there is a different level that you experience when you get to the playoffs. Man, it picks it up significantly. That AFC East, they have been playing up here like this... the Rams have been playing down here. Can they jump up there and match them? I don't know.

Produced by James Hutton and Larry Roth