Week 4 Open Game Discussion

This has got to be on, on paper at least, one of the best Thursday Night matchups we've ever seen. It would've been more so if the Vikings had performed as expected against the Bills, but it's still what appears to be the best team in the league against another strong contender.

Will somebody please explain to me how, in 2018, the national broadcast begins with the suggestion that the Vikings "keep the Rams offense off the field" by "controlling the ball." It's particularly jarring coming from a guy who spends most of his time talking about the top and bottom of innings. Has Buck ever said something like "I know it's frustrating that Clemens is taking so long between pitches, but he's doing a great job of keeping Pedro Martinez off the mound."?

Incredible throws by Cousins just barely clearing the DB’s hands.

Gerald "Chris" Everett

This may violate Rule #1 (I don't know because I couldn't find a copy of Da Rules, and I checked a lot of the things under About), but even though the Broncos [almost certainly] suck this year the Rockies might just win their division for the first time ever, so that's nice.

That said, both offenses have looked good on their first drives; Cousins was on point with most of his passes, while the Vikes can't seem to stop L.A.'s run game.

Bad call costs the Vikings 4 points early, when Thelien was clearly untouched

That's intentional grounding on Goff according to last week's refs! On two plays in a row no less!

Well, this is a pretty fun TNF game.

Ok this game is getting out of hand. Goff is on FIRE!!

Both QBs are on pace for 500 yards passing. Meanwhile there are only 54 yards of rushing total. Don't know what the record is for combined passage yardage in a game, but it seems like it could be set tonight. Though, I think there's a decent chance the Rams pull away with this one and the game slows down as a result.

Good job by officials getting Thielen checked after that hit.

The Rams have abused Anthony Barr in coverage tonight. Goff is averaging 15.3 yards per dropback—Minnesota is not going to give up 15 yards per carry to Gurley if they pull Barr off the field for a DB.

That Donald sack is a textbook example for what to do under the new rules.

Damn, I thought the Rams were really going for it on that 4th and inches from their own 35. That would have been so ballsy.

Isn't slamming the QB to the turf supposed to be a penalty? We're way overdue a BS roughing call

Rough loss for the Vikings, they played every bit as good as the Rams, but those two horrible calls cost them 7 points, and they went 0-2 in fumble recoveries

Kirk found again a way to screw. Even Troy Aikman said that he should have felt that pressure was getting to him, and should have slid a bit before unloading.(or take the sack and keep the drive alive).
This is a subtle form of mental choke. The only thing he could process at that moment was the movement of his chosen receiver, he even made a pump before being sack, like if the world around him didn't exist, and more importantly, like if it was his last snap.
To me, those kind of plays that literally loose a game for good,while there is still hope, should be weighted more heavily in the evaluation of a QB.
Sure, Cousins did have a great game, great stats, no turnover up to that point. But he blew it all for good, on his own.

Looking at how the Vikings defense has performed so far this season, is it not reasonable to consider that unit a little overrated coming into 2018?

Letting Matt Kalil go to the Panthers cost the Vikings the game last night. If they had let him go to the Rams, Vikings would have won.

Glad to see that LAR is not on the NE schedule. The Rams would have a shot at breaking the single-team game scoring record.

Good for Goff. I basically wrote him off after a historically bad rookie year (contributing factors included his lack of knowledge regarding the rotation of the earth). His second year made me think that he's at least a competent NFL starter (benefiting from great circumstances), but his third year is making me think that he is true franchise QB.

Now Mitch Trubisky, on the other hand...

Ugh, four weeks in and CBS has yet to show a single game with Romo in the booth in my area. At least nobody will be subjected to Aikman this weekend.

I saw that Jeff Fisher is calling the Jacksonville game. That's got to be an even bigger fuckshow than usual.

Here in Colorado, we get New England/Miami and Dallas/Detroit as the early games. As someone who is not a fan of the Patriots or the Cowboys, this does not please me; it's pretty obvious that New England will run a chainsaw through the Dolphins and that Dallas and Detroit will just kinda suck. To make things worse, looking at Fox's schedule I see that Browns/Raiders was a possibility (as a late game); since we usually get those games (AFC West) and that one looks like it will be bad but in a good way, I'm left scratching my head as to why they decided it would be a good idea to serve us Matty Patty vs. The Clapper.

As for the NE game, I get why that's on, but I'd much rather see Cincinnati/Atlanta.

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Geez, almost every pass Brady throws is getting deflected in the secondary, but every one has fallen incomplete.

Josh Gordon sighting! I wonder if he's sober, and if so, if he can still play the same way.

Seems like Bucs games are almost guaranteed to have a 400-yard passer, one way or another. Either from Fitzpatrick or from the opposing QB since the Bucs are so terrible on defense. Trubisky has 3 TDs and 154 yards early in the 2nd.

Is Tannehill always this inaccurate? He's not even been close, really. NE's special teams have been giving Miami great field position too, this is the 2nd drive in a row to start at the 38

Trubisky up to 221 yards and 4 TDs. Ridiculous.

Perhaps the Dolphins are who we thought they were. Unfortunately.

Oddly eenough, Lions-Cowboys is the most competitive (by score, anyway) of 3 available to me. Pats and Packers each had double digit leads early.

Dallas wastes both of their challenges on relatively inconsequential plays in the first half. So that's neat!

One of the worst personal foul calls of the year: Dak gets in trouble in the backfield, falls down, gets up, and gets pushed down by a Lion (he has the ball this whole time). NO WHISTLES HAVE BLOWN. The official ruling? Unnecessary roughness.

Watching RedZone. They just showed the Tyler Eifert ankle injury. Sickeningly ugly, like the Joe Theismann broken leg. Eifert seems to be cursed by injury, but this could have happened to anyone.

Trubisky up to 6 TDs with 10 left in the third. The Bears are probably going to be able to get him the single game passing TD record if they want to. Just one more to tie, two to be the first to ever get 8 in a game.

"Robert Alford is an All-Pro for a reason"
-Idiot broadcaster

Uhhhhh, Alford is a fine player and all, but he's never been to a pro bowl, let alone the all-pro team. They're just saying anything now apparently

This week makes Minnesota's loss to the Bills last week even more confusing

The Bengals complete one of the ugliest GWGs you'll ever see

Browns just missed on a long bomb. The first think I had was, "Gordon would have caught that".

Crazy finish in atl-cin. And phi-ten and hou-ind locked up in overtime.

Texans might be a contender for the best DVOA ever for an 0-4 team if Indy completes this drive.

Titans have converted three 4th downs on this OT drive down 3. The last came within FG range but they decided to go for the win. I'm not sure I would've done that since they were basically giving up an automatic tie, while even after the conversion they still have lots of work to do to get the win.

I'm gonna be a crotchety old man here. I just saw that apparently, OT can be extended with a tying field goal. This, I feel, is stupid. If overtime exists to avoid ties, quit making ties more likely. Sudden death was fine. The TD rule was fine. Allowing them to trade field goals is just asinine. Either force somebody to score a touchdown, go back to sudden death, or, novel idea, GET RID OF OVERTIME IN THE REGULAR SEASON AND JUST HAVE TIES. These rules are amazingly dumb.

What are the Colts doing going for it on fourth down from their own half in a tied OT game??? I don't understand. Most NFL coaches are far too unwilling to risk it on fourth down. This is way, way the reverse of that.

Loved the colts going for it on 4th and 4 in their own territory. Didnt get it though..can they hang on and win?

If you're gonna go for it there, you have to do it on the first play. Pretend that you're trying to draw the defense offsides and then run something when the play clock is down to 3 seconds.

One of the big problems with that Colts fourth down decision, for me, was that even after a conversion they wouldn't have been all that likely to win. There were only 24 seconds left. You have time for just a couple plays, and would likely have been forced to, at best, hit a pretty long FG. Failing just set Houston up in a position where they only needed to have one good play to get a good FG chance.

Great game by the Titans. D-line harassed Wentz all day. Refs were questionable for both teams today. Massive cajones by Vrabel going for it on 4th down, in OT, instead of trying the 50 yard FG for the tie. A lot of drops in this game too. Surprised Eagles didn't come up with a stop on that last TD drive by the Titans in OT as that has been what they do to win games.

Who is announcing the Browns - Raiders game? Those two are awful.

Chargers PK misses his 2nd PAT today. Sliced both of them. Gotta be correctable, right?

(Somebody's autocorrect changed "correctable" first to "forgettable", then to "corrective". How do I shut it off?)

Commentators for SF-LAC game keep talking about importance of 2 missed PATs by Chargers kicker, forgetting that Chargers got one back by converting 2pt play earlier. They're all dumb.

Robbie Gould has now made his 33rd consecutive FG. Anyone remember why the Bears released him?

Scary hit on CJ Bethard… the hit was 100% clean on a scramble, but he flopped around and hit the back of his head on the turf, showing a clear fencing response after that. Terrible bit of running, he was in over his head, it looked like. Horrible seeing that.

WTF THEY JUST SAID HE WILL RETURN NEXT SERIES, AFTER HAVING THE "WIND KNOCKED OUT OF HIM" THIS IS NOT FUCKING OKAY NFL

Kyle Shanahan goes after refs after apparent fumble recovery by Chargers. Why don't head coaches remember that turnovers are automatically reviewed by NFL officials?

What is it with Shannahans and playing injured QBs to get them more injured. This is fucking disgusting now. Fuck fuck fuuuuuckmmmmkkkkkk

Congrats Raiderjoe...

Man, that attempt by the Ravens to draw the Steelers offside was just silly. In that situation you would obviously want to run a play as quickly as possible if you were really going to go for it. Who's going to be fooled by you letting the clock drain drain like that?

Collinsworth: "you don't get drafted [by Pittsburgh] unless you're aggressive"

Dude, you don't get drafted anywhere unless you're aggressive. That's not some unique Steelers thing

It appears that reports of the death of the Patriots have been greatly exaggerated... For anyone who follows the MIA personal more closely than I do; Did the Pat's LB's play with that much more speed this week or does MIA just not have competent RB's & TE's to attack matchups in the short passing game? It didn't surprise me to see the Pats front 7 come out with lots of life against the run coming off an embarrassing loss and coming back home - but I didn't see a decent gain on a dump-off until late in the 4th quarter when the starters were on the bench on both sides.

The Chiefs rushed up to the ball after a long run even though there wasn't anything apparent to challenge. That seems like a good policy in general.

Ugh. Awful, heartbreaking loss for the Broncos. They HAD that game, except the offense is really kind of terrible -- why all the empty backfield plays? -- and the entire defense had Steve Sax syndrome when it came to tackling Mahomes for a sack.