Week 12 Open Discussion

"CHI / GB: I heard a stat that blew my mind the other day, CHI is 3-17 against GB since 2010."

Wow, you just blew my mind, too.  I thought the Packers-Lions series was pretty one-sided, but Detroit is 8-13 against Green Bay during the same time period.

LAC / BUF: Should be a walkover for Buffalo with the Chargers blowing games like it's a sport.  Between them and Detroit, I don't know who is more consistent in regards to giving games away.

TENN / IND: The Titans are building momentum after an existential crisis, but the Colts are home and have a better defense.  Game will be close with a TO probably being the difference either way.  

ARZ / NE: It was popular this week to pick the Pats in an upset due to Hoodie Wizardry, but these two teams are seemingly world's apart in terms of quality.  It may be close, but Arizona pulls away and wins comfortably.

SF / LAR:  In a division game, it's more about the scheme and particular matchups along with familiarity that decide games.  At this point, I don't know what the Niners are due to injuries and ineffective QB play.  Should be a Rams comfortable win, but never say never.

CHI / GB: Walkover Green Bay.  

KC / TB:  Conventional wisdom says KC comfortably based on how both teams are playing, but Brady has pride and will summon a win.  Expect the TB defense to come up big as well.  If TB has anything left this season heading to the playoffs they need to win this game. A loss dooms them to the last WC spot in the NFC.

SEA / PHI: Most pundits have the Hawks winning this game comfortably but I don't trust the Seahawks in any way, even RW.  Philly will make this game ugly and win close at home because they are in their own division race.  I see Wentz hitting a few crazy plays against the Seattle secondary that effectively end this game.  

I doubt it. There have been a lot of intra-AFC East games. 

...as though some teams are being punished more by COVID-related issues than others.

Denver playing without a starting QB?

Pittsburgh had no official bye.

The Ravens are going up against Pittsburgh on Tuesday without their starting QB and a few other players.  That's almost a guaranteed loss for them.

I suppose we should have expected this, but the quality of play is starting to suffer in terms of the product on the field.

/who else is available?

...a walkover for NO but it could be an ugly game based on the running game.

I suppose that kind of game gives Denver a better chance.

The Colts are without several of their best d-lineman. It certainly shows in this game. Henry had 109 yards in the first matchup, and that was the most the Colts had given up to any RB this season until today. 
 

Give the Titans coaches credit though. They attacked the Colts obvious weakness this game instead of trying to get cute. 
 

As a Colts fan, unfortunately the offense has regressed to early season form, and can’t even make it a shootout like last week with the Packers. 

Nice use of the double post. :)

Double Chinns is a sign of success!

How did SD convert that 4th-27?

Desperation time for the Chargers, a minute left and 4th and 17 from about midfield - Herbert throws a bomb... and it's complete inside the 1!

Except... OPI. Deserved, but I've seen worse.

But now it's 4th and 27 from Chargers territory - Herbert escapes the rush, throws a bomb... and it's complete inside the 1!

And this one stands!

So you've hit two consecutive Hail Marys - that's got to be about literally one in a million - but the clock is running and you're down two scores. What do you do? Hand it off, of course. Fails. Clock runs down too late to do anything.

A few incomplete passes and a fumbled snap seals the loss for the Chargers (EDIT: not a fumbled snap, that was just the world's worst-executed QB sneak), although the Bills cruelly called timeout with literally 3 seconds left up 10. Are you really so concerned about your defense that you're worried they'll give up 2 TDs on one play?

Like I said, no one wanted to win this game. Bills did, though.

Impossible. Kyler is the best QB in the division and Kliff is perfect.

Obviously a true outcome.

They are just so sloppy in execution in all phases game after game. The Simmons penalty was especially bad because it looked like the tackle put *himself* more at risk of a neck injury. 

Matt Rhule looks more like the kind of coach we all thought Kingsbury would be.

It's only pathetic to fans who consistently overrate their team's talent.

Panthers drive, but can't connect on the FG, vikings win.

So he goes in over Mariota? I guess that means both him and Jameis are third-stringers. No one would've expected that a few years ago...

Wow. I’d put in anyone in the Saints-Broncos game in before Peterman.

...are bad.  Nothing surprised me.

When you know Carolina needed a chunk play to get in to FG position, the last thing you do is leave anyone in the middle of the field open.

Neither of these teams are going anywhere.

Now up to -10 halfway through the 2nd.  Not sure what the record for futility is, but woof. . .

In these division games, there are no upsets.

Hoping Shanahan can outscheme again.

...that Broncos/Saints is a bad game?

New Orleans is turning it into a scrimmage.

With Mahomes playing Brady, why would you watch any other game?

Tebow's Broncos won games in unusual ways and most of them had little to do with Tebow's passing.

Tebow is 1-0 against Big Ben in the playoffs...

He was a QB in college, but is now a WR.

At least he'll be able to tell his kids that he started an NFL game.  Most never get that chance.

At least he's completed a pass.  I hope the Broncos give him a nice bonus for being forced to play in a difficult position.

I watched an interview with him sometime back, I believe after they fired Coughlin.

He's a rather impatient type of guy with unrealistic expectations.

You may have figured they were tanking, but apparently the owner didn't share that outlook.

Also, the Jets are and were regarding as the worst team in the NFL.

Surely another year of getting rid of everyone except Doug Marrone will do the trick! Even Jay Gruden would be an upgrade at this point. 

I'm still holding out hope that Minshew recovers, gets signed by the Saints, and goes on to be Dazed and Confused Drew Brees for 10 years.

Hill needs 95 to break Flipper’s receiving record.

75 now.

I was telling you people at the beginning of the year that the NFC West would be won within division.  If the Niners sweep L.A., that really hurts them for the division.

Next week's Zona/L.A. game is huge.

Tampa is a year away, IMO, from doing anything major in the playoffs.  Brady and the offense still isn't on the same page and that's not good enough against the best teams.

Also Tampa's defense is not as good as advertised.  Mahomes shredding them underneath and over the top.  It's like a horror movie where you know the ending, and Tampa was the latest victim.

DVOA is obviously infallible because our eyes tell us a different story.  

TB has a good pass rush, and an O that can field Evans, Godwin, and now Brown as WRs, Gronk as a blocking TE who's still a dangerous threat (see long completion today).  Even with the "Plodding Oxcart" as their brand-name RB (Jones seems to be better), this TB team should be putting up more points than they are, and their D should be keeping other teams in check.

"Should", of course, need bear no resemblance to reality.  But I don't think DVOA was out-to-lunch to rate TB as highly as it did earlier in the season.  The better question, to me, is why do the Bucs suck so much since then?

I think Mr Donald had quite a lot to say about it too, he took it away from the 49ers as much as they gave it away.

Despite all the yardage, Tampa Bay could easily be back in this game if not for two interceptions by Brady in this quarter.

Bucs have left too many points on the field already and still trail by 17.

I haven't seen anything resembling continuity on the Bucs offense to have faith that they'll make that up in 12 minutes.

It's not just about Brady, but the imbalance on the team.  

After the Lions housecleaning yesterday, I had sudden visions of Matt Stafford throwing for 6,000 yards and waltzing to a Lombardi Trophy with the Bucs in 2021.

I got the impression that Mahomes heard he was on pace to break the passing record, and has been trying to break it on every throw since.

...or the Bucs' defense played better?

I saw the latter.

I can easily see the Cards losing to the Giants in a wild card round too.

there's functionally no home-field advantage this year, and there's no scary team in the NFC (though the Bucs should avoid the Saints if they can)

I hope you didn't bypass Mahomes/Brady for that pathetic game.

Please tell me you didn't.

Trubisky looks nothing like a 1st round qb.

It's not all Trubisky.

That first drive ended in a FG after he hit WRs in the hands twice for TDs and they dropped both passes.

Alternatively, Chicago is where QB play goes to die.

Agreed on the Bears making a bad decision, although I’d have to think whether it was the worst ever.  There’s a similar argument that the 49ers blew it by choosing Alex Smith over Rodgers (and I say this as a Smith fan), it was A or B there too and that choice was reported real time.  (I fundamentally disagree with after the fact draft criticisms where the player not selected was not one that at the time anyone suggested should have been selected — such as the Bill Simmons-fostered inanity about the Warriors “passing” on Kobe Bryant.). That being said, for Rodgers v. Smith there’s a nature vs nurture issue here, it’s been written about in this forum.

I’ve always thought the Blazers criticism unfair because many teams would have made the same decision, and the 2012 ESPN documentary on Bowie added to my position.  The fact of the matter is that the Blazers were lied to.  Sam Bowie said his leg felt okay when it did not, as he later admitted in the documentary.  Young adults make mistakes like that so I might not judge him too harshly, but I’m not a hardcore Blazers fan or one of the team’s executives at the time — and they have every right to be very upset, including because Bowie was not apologetic about his lie after the fact.

Revisionist argument. Mahomes was a reach at 10.

QBase liked Mahomes the most on points, although the difference between the top QBs was tiny that year, and included this cautionary tale:

Nonetheless, Mahomes' projection sets off alarm bells -- or more specifically, very loud Air Raid sirens. Every single prospect from an Air Raid offense has underperformed his QBASE projection in the NFL, although obviously you can't shut the book on Jared Goff after just one season. Playing in the Air Raid doesn't mean Mahomes' skills can't translate to the NFL, but it seems clear at this point that the scheme juices passing stats in a way that leads to QBASE overestimating these prospects. Any team that wants to draft Mahomes probably needs to discount his college performance and be very sure that his skills fit its offensive scheme.

https://www.footballoutsiders.com/nfl-draft/2017/qbase-2017

But it basically thought Trubisky, Watson, Mahomes, Dobbs, and Webb were the same guy. The difference between Mahomes and Trubisky was basically only experience.

But graders didn't like the pick. They hated Trubisky, too, but also Watson and McCaffery.

https://ftw.usatoday.com/2017/04/2017-nfl-draft-grades-picks-analysis-results
https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2706180-nfl-draft-2017-round-1-grades-for-every-pick (Tanier hated Mahomes)
https://www.nfl.com/news/2017-nfl-draft-quick-snap-grades-for-all-32-teams-0ap3000000804541 (this one is sunnier; basically that Reid is the QB whisperer)

The evals and comments are hilarious, and many have not aged well. The Newton/Tannehill comp for Trubisky is still true, although the players have switched positions. 

Bowie over Jordan is the #1

I'm not sure if Mahomes would become the Jordan of the NFL, though.  Time will tell.

Even if the Bears had drafted Watson, they'd be in a much different situation.

Arians recently said that he tried to draft Mahomes but couldn't get high enough in the draft to beat KC to him.

Then again, if Arians had Mahomes, he might not be Mahomes...

"Just

End

The 

Season"

could have drafted Dan Marino, instead taking Ken O'Brien.

IMO, the real questionable decision at the top of the 1984 NBA Draft, based on what teams and fans knew at the time, is why Houston didn't trade down with Chicago to the #3 pick or Dallas to the #4 pick and pick up additional assets as part of the trade.  You see, Portland at #2 really wanted a center, Chicago at #3 really wanted a center, AND Dallas at #4 really wanted a center, but Houston at #1 already had a center, and a young, good one at that - Ralph Sampson, who the Rockets drafted #1 overall one year earlier.  Considering the Rockets' needs at positions besides center, it made little sense for them to draft Hakeem (then known as Akeem) Olajuwon.  If they trade with the Bulls or Mavericks, Houston still has a high draft pick at #3 or #4 where they could pick a really good non-center and gain some additional assets as part of trading down.  Meanwhile, Chicago or Dallas is able to leapfrog Portland (and in Dallas' case, Chicago as well) and get the center they wanted (either Olajuwon or Sam Bowie).  If the Rockets trade down to #3 and Chicago takes Olajuwon at #1 and Portland takes Bowie at #2, Houston probably ends up with Michael Jordan, and Phi Slamma Jamma comes back to life in Houston in NBA form.

Portland at #2 was never going to draft Michael Jordan; they already had a very similar, young player on their roster with a lot of upside, a guy named Clyde Drexler.  In retrospect, it's obvious Drexler turned into the kind of player the Blazers thought he'd be, even if he didn't turn into the player Jordan became.  Unless Portland wanted to guarantee themselves Hakeem Olajuwon and move up one spot in the draft by trading with Houston, they were going to select Sam Bowie at #2 if they thought he was healthy.  That ended up being an incorrect assumption.  If the Blazers knew Bowie was still going to the Bill Walton school of foot problems, they could have traded down from #2 and picked up additional assets, plus another good player with the lower first round pick.

One final thing - if Dallas doesn't trade with their in-state rivals further to the south on I-45 and stays at #4 in the draft, they could have chosen Charles Barkley instead of Sam Perkins.  Perkins was a good NBA pro for many years, but he never turned into the great player Barkley became.  Barkley would have given the Mavericks a stronger rebounding and scoring presence than Perkins did.

..and beyond.

The majority of what you just said about Rodgers is also true for Wilson.  Acknowledging Henry is warranted, but be real he has no chance.  Hopefully he will win OPOY.

Go back to Tyreek Hill's cute statement about him not needing to chase down any pick six for MaHomes.  It made for a nice sound bite, but if you care about the truth after that game Wilson had thrown 19 INT's  since Mahomes became a starter.  The exact same amount as Patrick had over that span.

The first few Wilson threw this year were also along the lines of hitting Greg Olsen in the hands and ending up tipped for a pick six.  (While Mahomes had a horrible throw tonight that won't count because of a RTP penalty)

Wilson did go on to have another bad couple games and earned more TO's.  It was out of the ordinary for his career though.  We'll see how the remainder of this year pans out. 

Rodgers on the other hand is actually extremely good at not throwing INT's, having only thrown a little over 5 a year over 16 years.  Now that's something to boast about.

For him just to be in consideration, they would have needed to beat Seattle and probably win the division.

They can still win the division, but he's too far behind now for MVP.

Then again, so is RW and TB.

It's literally Rodgers or Mahomes.

I don't see Henry getting it because the Titans are merely coming back to being "good" after a rough stretch.

Also, Henry is not a game changer like Barry Sanders.  He'd have to be that kind of back to be in serious consideration.

If the Chiefs cruise along as they have been, it's basically a shoe-in for Mahomes.

He needs to falter and Rodgers/Pack have to have a dominant run for him to make up that distance.

If you rough up Seattle, it significantly helps you win the game.

The Eagles are pushing Seattle around a bit early.

Nice goal-line stand.

Still, watching Wentz and their offense is painful.  The receivers dropped two balls that were catchable.  Refs missed a likely DPI just now.

This looks like a sluggish low-scoring game.

I hope the Eagles can somehow win it.

...and saw Pittsburgh scored a touchdown from the 2 yard line on a jet sweep run by Chase Claypool.  Seattle thought they could pull the same trick, but Derek Barnett threw that idea out the window.

What was incredible is Caroll's decision to go for it on both of those 4th downs...

LOL ... just not the one Wentz is working off.

lolz, you're always so funny.