2025 NFL Stat Oddity: Super Bowl LX

~ Scott ~ 1 Comment

Super Bowls are won in the trenches. Defense wins championships. Schedule merchants need not apply.

The New England Patriots almost rode their Most Valuable Schedule to the promised land. But in one of the most emphatic repudiations in NFL playoff history, the Patriots were shellacked 29-13 in Super Bowl LX by the Seattle Seahawks.

It’s almost laughable that the final box score looks as close as it does. The Seahawks barely won the yardage battle (335-331), they only had two more first downs, (20-18), did worse on third downs (4-of-16 vs. 6-of-15) by 15 percentage points, and if you didn’t know any better, you’d think this was a close game until it was blown open by its only three turnovers, all from the Patriots in the final 16 minutes, including a pick-six.

But this really wasn’t close. The Seahawks kept settling for field goals while forcing the Patriots to punt eight times in a row (ignoring the kneeldown for halftime). Then the game’s first turnover happened in the final minute of the third quarter in predictable fashion (a Drake Maye strip-sack), and that led to the only offensive touchdown for the Seahawks from 37 yards out to make it 19-0 with 13:24 left.

It was only in those final 13:24 when Maye passed for 235 yards, reportedly the most in any quarter in Super Bowl history (Doug Williams had 228 in the second quarter of Washington’s 42-10 rout of the 1987 Broncos). But Maye also had 130 of those yards after his pick-six made it 29-7 with 4:27 left. Garbage time intensifies.

That means Maye had 21 net passing yards in the game’s first 46 minutes. He was the one seeing ghosts, and now Sam Darnold is a Super Bowl champion, and we have to deal with the fallout of people thinking the Seahawks are a legendary team after one of the strangest seasons in NFL history.

But I can’t say the ending wasn’t satisfying as it would have been terrible for all discourse if this New England schedule was rewarded with an MVP award for Maye and a Super Bowl ring for that organization. Not this way.

For one last time until September, let’s recap the game with brutal honesty.

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

Seahawks vs. Patriots: The Young Pup Bowl

Before the game even started, I had some people confused on Twitter when I said this was the lowest-stakes Super Bowl since 2000 Ravens vs. Giants. I may have even been generous there as 2000 was about Baltimore solidifying itself as an all-time great defense, a reputation it’d keep up throughout the rest of Ray Lewis’ career as a franchise led by its defense. Then you can argue 1999 had the same impact on Kurt Warner and the GSOT Rams.

But the point I was making was that Super Bowls are about building legacies. Look at the Super Bowls since and you had Warner and those Rams trying to become a dynasty in 2001, only to give birth to one for the Patriots where every subsequent appearance meant more legacy building for Brady and Belichick. Then you had moments like 2005 when Bill Cowher and Jerome Bettis really needed to finish that road trip with a ring to lock up their Canton busts while Mike Holmgren could have solidified his own if he became the first coach to win a Super Bowl for two different teams.

Year after year, more of the same like when top-tier quarterbacks had to make sure they solidified their legacy with a ring in their first Super Bowl appearance like Peyton Manning (2006), Drew Brees (2009), Aaron Rodgers (2010), and Patrick Mahomes (2019) all did.

Last year, it was all about the three-peat for the Chiefs and how legendary that would make that team while the Eagles were looking for revenge from two years earlier. Big-time stuff.

All that legacy stuff? Practically absent from this matchup with it being Year 1 for these quarterback-coach duos with these teams, and most of their star players are either too young (JSN, Milton Williams, Witherspoon, Byron Murphy, etc.) for legacy talk or it’s veterans like DeMarcus Lawrence, Cooper Kupp (too many injuries), or Stefon Diggs who really have no shot at the HOF either way.

Two quarterbacks still in their twenties who aren’t going to be rushed into the elite class with a win except for the efforts by the New England fanbase and media to do so for Maye. But boy, after the postseason Maye just had? They need to walk that the fvck back some.

So, if you thought this Super Bowl lacked some sizzle coming in, that’s the reason. Just not a lot to be gained from a legacy standpoint. As for what the outcome will do for the future, we can only speculate, and I’ll do that at the end (and more in depth later this week).

The First Half Tells

Again, I did not find this Super Bowl to be difficult to predict or size up this week. I said the quarterbacks were not going to impress (they didn’t), a non-quarterback would win MVP (he did), there’d be a return touchdown (there was), and the defense that caused more damage with splash plays would win the game (they did).

I just didn’t think Seattle would be so dominant in the splash play area, winning turnovers 3-0 and sacks 6-1. If you watched the first few drives, you could see each quarterback playing up to (or down to) expectations too. Darnold had some very risky throws that could have been picks in tight windows. Maye took a couple of early sacks as he tends to do. It was going to be about who manages to avoid the biggest mistakes.

But if you watched those early Darnold throws with the Patriots aggressively jumping routes, you would have been shocked to learn that he ended this game with no picks on 38 attempts. I sensed one coming early. NBC’s Cris Collinsworth did too based on his commentary, and I’m sure millions watching the game did as well. But it never happened.

That really ended up being the key to Seattle winning this Super Bowl. Remember, the Seahawks were minus-4 in turnover differential going into Week 18, and Darnold led all quarterbacks in giveaways. But from Week 18 against the 49ers with the No. 1 seed on the line through the three playoff games, the Seahawks were +8 with 8 takeaways, no giveaways, and that’s how they won every game.

But I think it was a good gameplan early by Mike Macdonald to blitz the corner (Witherspoon) as a new wrinkle (something Witherspoon did twice as much more in 2023-24) to throw off Maye, who looked physically fine (the shoulder) but mentally overwhelmed. I also didn’t think much of Josh McDaniels’ gameplan as he kept up to his reputation with no first-quarter touchdowns in a 10th-straight Super Bowl. But where were the screens, the trick plays, the designed QB runs? Pretty lacking all night to battle what both sides seemed to realize was a blocking mismatch.

When Will Campbell said at the draft that he’d die to protect Drake Maye, I didn’t think he meant he’d take the whole team out in a suicide bombing. But the charting numbers out there are suggesting he allowed 14 pressures himself in the Super Bowl, which sounds astronomically high and hard to believe.

But it was pretty telling early on how little respect both defenses had for the opposing quarterback with the way they were blitzing from all angles and jumping routes. Very aggressive styles that you just wouldn’t see if Patrick Mahomes or (God forbid) Josh Allen were playing in this game. The Patriots running the ball on a 3rd-and-5 early in the second quarter especially felt defeatist. Like they knew their only hope was Darnold to make some Jarrett Stidham-like mistakes and give them a short field.

However, Kenneth Walker’s runs of 30 and 29 yards on the same drive led to the second field goal and a 6-0 lead. The Seahawks running on 3rd-and-12 in the red zone also felt like an admission from Seattle that being conservative as hell was the plan tonight.

Darnold missed a couple of touchdown opportunities to JSN, who was held to 27 yards on 4-of-10 passing and also left the game temporarily for a concussion check. Christian Gonzalez and company did their job on the OPOY, though some Darnold inaccuracies helped the numbers stay down.

Still, Seattle kicked a third field goal and led 9-0 at halftime, just the fifth Super Bowl without a first-half touchdown.

The Third Quarter (Struggle Is Real)

At halftime, the Seahawks were up 183-51 in yards. Maye had just 29 yards on 15 dropbacks, so all that “it’s the weather” bullshit his fans tried selling people on his postseason was in fact bullshit. This looked an awful lot like the impotence he showed in Denver before a speck of snow hit the ground.

Yet, the game still felt close enough and Darnold was shaky enough (late on throws and just 9/22 for 88 yards) to think the Patriots could get back in this game. But I was very surprised at how bad they were in the third quarter. Maye had a 2-for-10 success rate in the quarter. His throws were largely off, and after the Seahawks started the half with another field goal drive to make it 12-0 (arguably Darnold’s best drive all night with two 16-yard passes and an 11-yard scramble), I was shocked at the next sequence from Vrabel and McDaniels.

After getting to the New England 41 after a Henderson run, the Patriots soon faced 3rd-and-1 after he was stuffed for no gain. Do you go sneak? Do you run Stevenson or Henderson again? You do something easy to move the chains, right? Instead, they looked like they wanted to set up a deep shot all along and Maye ended up throwing an incomplete pass to Pop Douglas.

Just to get some spark going for your offense in a 12-0 game, I felt like Vrabel needed to go for this. What happened to the coach who said he’d cut off his dick to win a Super Bowl? Looked like he had his balls snipped instead. The Patriots just punted it back, and they were fortunate that Milton Williams came through with their only sack of the night to instantly derail the drive for another three-and-out.

But then Maye took his fourth sack of the night, then couldn’t convert a 3rd-and-4, leading to another three-and-out. I think these three straight three-and-out drives followed by the game’s first turnover on a strip-sack are really where New England lost this game. They just couldn’t get anything going out of the locker room after a long halftime while Seattle still wasn’t doing anything special offensively, and the nerves should have been less of an issue a half into the game. But they didn’t do anything.

And sure enough, it was a strip-sack that led to Maye’s first turnover of the night, putting the Seahawks 37 yards away from the end zone, the only way they were able to get this offense a touchdown all night. That’s what Seattle has largely been doing since November. That also marks four straight playoff games where Maye took at least 5 sacks, a record.

The Fourth Quarter

Darnold made one of the best plays of the night by converting a 3rd-and-9 to Cooper Kupp, then A.J. Barner was wide open for a 16-yard touchdown. We finally got a touchdown in this game with 13:24 left. At that point, with eight punts and a fumble, you had to question if the Patriots would be the first team in Super Bowl history to get shut out.

But in under a minute, the Patriots got into the end zone with Maye finding Mack Hollins open deep for quick gains of 24 and 35 yards. Where was that all night? Another big mistake by Vrabel going for the extra point. You have to try to make it 19-8, giving yourself a chance at 8+3 instead of keeping it a 12-point game and needing two touchdowns for sure on such a tough night of scoring the ball. Again, he coached very conservatively.

After a quick punt from Seattle, there was still almost 11 minutes left in this game. Crazier things have happened. But this drive is where I felt Maye really blew it. You have time to go on a long touchdown drive, make it 19-14, then all the pressure falls back on Seattle to do something cause even a field goal would keep it a one-possession game at 22-14. But instead of doing so, Maye got into panic mode. He threw a deep ball into triple coverage from his own 17 on first down and that should have been picked but two Seahawks fought for the ball and no one got it.

Then after a 16-yard scramble on a third down, it felt like Maye was getting into a rhythm near midfield. This was far from over. Then two snaps later, he threw a horrific deep ball that was picked off and returned 35 yards to the New England 38 with 8:37 left. Forget about it. The pick was so bad even Collinsworth was left speechless.

The Seahawks played it safe and added a field goal for a 22-7 lead with 5:35 left. Again, it’s not actually over yet. That’s the real kicker too as it’s not like New England needed a superhuman effort from Maye in this game. They just needed him to do some of the things Darnold did like complete some passes in the 8-16 yard range, use your legs that are better than his, and protect the ball. But he didn’t do that.

After converting on 3rd-and-8 to little-used Hunter Henry, pressure got to Maye again and it ended up in a pick-six that was originally ruled a fumble, which would have set a record with his eighth fumble of the postseason. Instead, it goes down as his second pick in the Super Bowl, and he tied the single-season record for the playoffs with 7 fumbles and set the new record with 21 sacks (Joe Burrow had 19 in 2021).

It was 29-7 with 4:27 left, and now you can say it was over. A little touchdown drive in garbage time made it 29-13, then the Seahawks almost answered that too with a 49-yard run by Walker that was called back for holding in a game where officiating wasn’t even a topic for a change. You know it was a beatdown when people aren’t complaining about the zebras in a Super Bowl. Seattle punted and Maye padded some passing yardage to get to 295 to end the game. One of the most misleading boxscores you’ll see.

And like that, it was over. Another Super Bowl in the books where the No. 1 defense dominated an overmatched offensive line. The underdog Patriots sure didn’t play with much fire or passion or living up to the underdog role. There were a few opportunities to make this a game and they missed practically all of them. A pretty forgettable Super Bowl overall.

The truth is this is another season where the Patriots robbed us of a better Super Bowl matchup. Not nearly as bad as not seeing a rematch of Dan Marino’s Dolphins with the 1985 Bears, but I think a healthy Bo Nix and Sean Payton make a game of this in the fourth quarter, to say nothing of the Bills or Jaguars. There wasn’t a single fourth-quarter lead change in the playoff games the Patriots and Seahawks played this year. The other games had 14, a single-season record.

I said 2025 Sam Darnold was like 1991 Mark Rypien on the Redskins, right down to beating up on a schedule merchant in the Super Bowl. Turns out the little time the Seahawks spent trailing this postseason was also on par with that team.

Kenneth Walker ended up winning Super Bowl MVP, the first time a running back wins it since Terrell Davis for the 1997 Broncos. Long time ago. Not exactly a traditional MVP performance since he had 59 of those yards on two plays on one field goal drive, and he didn’t score a touchdown. But I guess it was another one of those games where so many defenders played well that they couldn’t isolate one with stats to give the MVP to, so they just picked an offensive player. Like what happened last year with the Eagles.

But make no mistakes about it. Seattle’s defense led the charge on this win two weeks after the offense picked up the slack against the Rams in the NFC Championship Game, the real Super Bowl this year.

Patriots Learned Some Hard Truths

Okay, it’s time for me to get into smarmy Bill Maher mode and get on the 2025 Patriots for this poor showing to end a weak season.

The Patriots won’t and don’t have to apologize for making the Super Bowl ahead of schedule. But it wouldn’t surprise me one bit if we never see them make it back with Maye and Vrabel. Anyone who thinks otherwise hasn’t studied NFL history as Dan Marino and Don Shula went to the Super Bowl in Year 2 (1984) together and guess what? Neither ever made it back.

Other more recent quarterbacks like Donovan McNabb, Matt Hasselbeck, Colin Kaepernick, Cam Newton, Matt Ryan, and Jared Goff all lost their first Super Bowl and have yet to make it back. Drew Brees and Aaron Rodgers won their only Super Bowls in 2009-10 and never got back despite several more great seasons at a level of quarterback play that’s a tier above anything we watched in the 2025 season.

No one knows if they’ll ever be back to the Super Bowl, so you do treat every opportunity as gold.

And I didn’t get a good sense from the Patriots that they took this opportunity seriously enough. More of a “glad to be here” vibe with this team, and maybe that makes sense when you look at the half-assed effort they had on offense in the postseason once they started to play good defenses. Teams like the Jets and Dolphins don’t make the playoffs, you know.

Rarely will you see so many arguments validated by one postseason, but the knock on the 2025 Patriots for being a schedule merchant couldn’t have been more right on. They even kept getting breaks in the playoffs every week with major injuries to their opposing offenses, which is why the defense looked so dominant after rarely displaying such skill in the regular season.

Yes, they tackled well and limited explosive plays, but their schedule was also pure ass. Seattle was finally a healthy offense, and while they didn’t do a ton in this game, they didn’t have to. Sound familiar?

We also can see the weather excuse for New England was bullshit. Unless climate change has produced invisible snow and wind in the state of California, that game was played in near-70-degree weather and clear skies. No issues with a slippery surface or bad turf.

Just bad offense from the Patriots not unlike what we saw all postseason.

As it turns out, who you play is very important in the NFL. Probably the most important thing as matchups dictate outcomes in this league. Yet, I can think of at least 23 MVP voters who seemed to forget that this year when they still let Maye get this close to that award after the season he had against the schedule he faced.

He was 1-2 against winning teams in the regular season, and the Steelers and Bills didn’t necessarily have elite defenses this year either. Once he started playing winning teams backed up by good defenses like the Chargers, Texans, Broncos, and Seahawks in the playoffs, you saw the dramatic drop-off in his stats across the board.

Then one of the common arguments used for his MVP case, used as recently as the other day on TV, was common opponents. I’m supposed to believe that because Stafford had a few more picks on the road against the Falcons and Panthers in high-scoring losses that that makes Maye’s season superior based on a six-game sample.

Okay, you want to see Patriots fans abandon that argument quick? Run the full numbers now that they’ve both played Seattle and Houston too:

  • Matthew Stafford (11 games): 64% completions, 277.7 passing yards per game, 26 TD, 7 INT, 8.15 YPA, 16 sacks, 6 fumbles, 2 lost, 8.03 ANY/A
  • Drake Maye (8 games): 67.5% completions, 258.6 passing yards per game, 18 TD, 6 INT, 8.62 YPA, 27 sacks, 10 fumbles, 5 lost, 7.54 ANY/A

Way more sacks and fumbles for Maye, who drops almost half a full yard in ANY/A from Stafford in these games against the same opponents. Stafford played great in his last two games at Seattle despite the losses being on the defense and special teams. Meanwhile, his third-worst game against Seattle was still better than Maye’s Super Bowl was.

Maye just does not step up against better competition. He’s now 0-5 in the NFL when he throws more than 30 passes against a winning team. He’s 1-8 when he throws more than 35 passes against anyone in the NFL. He has a long way to go to prove he’s an elite quarterback capable of hanging with the best, putting the team on his back, winning shootouts, leading comebacks that aren’t just freebies against Baltimore, and so much more.

Everything was rushed on this kid, and he clearly isn’t at that level yet. Maybe he gets there, and maybe this is as good as it gets in the Maye era. A bad Super Bowl loss. Only time will tell, but I’m not ready to pencil in the Patriots to win the 2026 AFC East.

Another One Bites the Dust

That will wrap up the 2025 NFL season, my 15th season of full-time coverage. Don’t really have more than a pot to piss in for a retirement plan, but maybe this offseason will be beneficial to me in many ways as I hope to get some new databases and metrics created to better help my in-season content.

Also plan to get my health back on an improving track after slacking off these last few months. The end of the season is a stress reliever, and it’s even greater when the Super Bowl ends in a satisfying way as this one did.

I’ll be writing Monday night (for Tuesday) about lessons learned from the 2025 NFL season, but if you want a quick teaser on that, I’m asking the question straight up: How many of these “new contenders” in 2025 will have already peaked this season?

  • Seahawks (good chance this is the peak of the mountain)
  • Patriots
  • Bears
  • Jaguars
  • Broncos
  • Texans
  • Panthers (technically won the division)

I think it’s possible a lot of them never match or improve on their success this year, but we’ll just have to wait and see. It’s going to be an interesting offseason to ask a lot of questions about the 10 new head coaches, and if the number I read is correct, 21 new offensive coordinators around the NFL. Lots of chances for quick turnarounds in 2026 and questioning if the teams who dominated turnovers (Bears) or close games (Bears again, Broncos), or if the schedule merchants (Patriots, Broncos again) can get it done again.

I plan on watching more movies and TV shows, maybe subscribing to the Criterion Channel to tackle the top 5,000 films list on TSPDT better, and working on more NFL stats and hopefully reading less Twitter. But we’ll see as I may want to dabble in video content if it proves to be rewarding/worth the time.

But I need to tackle my offseason approach differently this year as I just can’t keep wasting time arguing on Twitter with bots/scumbags/dumb people. Time is too precious, and we’re running out of it daily.

So, I want a different kind of offseason because I can’t just stomach daily doses of hearing how some overrated schedule merchant lucked his way to a Super Bowl he shit the bed in, and how Mahomes is “washed” and “never going to be good again”. Screw those people. I put in the work and am confident in my predictions. You can’t change their minds.

I just have to keep putting out good content, backed by facts, and let that speak for itself. And Seattle fans, you’re welcome for that reverse jinx. Still feel like you might owe me for Super Bowls 47-48, but given what happened in XL, I guess we can call it even enough.

Until our rooting interests converge again…

NFL 2025 Super Bowl 60 Predictions

~ Scott ~ 1 Comment

I’ve already spent too much time writing and thinking about Super Bowl 60 to try to hype it up much more here. So, this is going to be brief, but I’m just thinking at 4 AM, about 38 hours from kickoff, at how huge of a difference in legacy talk there is for this game compared to Super Bowl 49 between these teams 11 years ago.

That one had so much attached to it.

  • Russell Wilson could be one ring away from Brady (3 vs. 2) in just three seasons in the league and no Tuck Rule in his history.
  • Pete Carroll could repeat and arguably take over the mantle as best football coach in the 21st century with his success at USC and now a repeat.
  • The Legion of Boom would solidify itself as an all-time great defense that repeated.
  • The Patriots were trying to end their decade-long title drought after so many crushing playoff defeats.
  • Brady was still trying to tie Joe Montana and Terry Bradshaw with a 4th SB win and was in danger of falling to 3-3 in the Super Bowl with three straight losses.
  • It was the “we’re onto Cincinnati” year for Belichick, it was right after Deflategate started.

That game had a lot riding on it, there was no spread (pick ’em), and it ended up being a classic with an inexcusable late-game strategy by the Seahawks that led to the costliest interception in NFL history.

Then you jump forward 11 years and practically everyone involved in these teams is different except for the New England offensive coordinator, who was not the guy to try to call a pass in a tight space to Ricardo Lockette from the 1-yard line when Marshawn Lynch was ready to run through a motherfucker’s face over and over.

But really, what are the stakes here? Mike Vrabel’s penis? Or did he already get it chopped off to help win this ring? It’s just Year 1 for Vrabel-Maye and it’s also Year 1 for Macdonald-Darnold. One year and they’re in the Super Bowl. How’s that feel, Buffalo and Baltimore fans? Eight years and not one of these for those teams.

Instead, we get to see if The Schedule can get it don against Sam Darnold, the No. 1 reason people will still pick the Patriots because they’re afraid of him imploding on the biggest stage. I’m one of those people. But very cool story if he actually kicks their ass and wins this game.

But enough talking. I already gave my final score the other day, so here’s the links with a 7,300-word preview of the game, as well as my supporting stories and betting picks that can help you pass some time before Sunday’s kickoff. We made it.

FINAL: Patriots 23, Seahawks 20

Super Bowl 60 Preview: Seattle Seahawks vs. New England Patriots

2025 NFL Stat Oddity: Conference Championship

~ Scott ~ Leave a comment

Championship Sunday came and went with two close games, not a single fourth-quarter point scored, and that just might be the only formula for how you get a Super Bowl between Sam Darnold and a young Drake Maye doing his best Trent Dilfer impersonation.

I told you this was not my AFC, and one terribly quarterbacked game that was sunk to even lower depths by a huge snowstorm gave way to one of the best quarterbacked championship games you’ll ever see in the NFC. What happened to the AFC having the best quarterbacks?

But my prediction of a 3-point New England win (Broncos covered) and a 27-24 win for the Seahawks were pretty spot on as the favorites advance to Super Bowl 60 where the Seahawks might be a 4.5-point favorite.

It’s not like last year’s story with the three-peat vs. Philly’s revenge. But maybe it will provide a better game, though I’m not sure how the Patriots will actually respond to a good team that isn’t terribly injured. But we have two weeks to talk about that.  

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

Patriots at Broncos: Proof That “Take the Points” Is Sometimes the Right Move

I certainly don’t envy the task Sean Payton had on Sunday.

Trying to beat the NFL franchise with the most devil luck on a day where you didn’t have Bo Nix, you had to start a quarterback who hadn’t thrown a meaningful pass in two years (or ever, in some context), you didn’t have your best back (J.K. Dobbins), and you lost Pat Bryant early on top of Troy Franklin being out at wide receiver. Only your #2 and #3 wideouts in receiving yards this season.

I don’t envy him at all, but I think for the first time ever, I’m going to say a Sean Payton defense was 100% let down by a Sean Payton offense in a playoff loss. In a very winnable game against the Patriots, Payton made some tactical errors that he’ll have to stew over all offseason and maybe longer as this 2025 season may have been the best shot he had at a Super Bowl the rest of his career.

You could tell early on this wasn’t going to be a Josh Allen vs. Patrick Mahomes type of AFC Championship Game. Not with Jarrett Stidham and Drake “The Schedule” Maye.  Both coaches came out running the ball, waiting for the quarterback to make a throw on third down that was nearly a turnover for both.

After Stidham badly missed a screen pass on his second drive, you thought the worst was yet to come. But then he surprised everyone with a perfect deep ball, a 52-yard gain to Marvin Mims, who beat Christian Gonzalez in coverage. Two plays later, it was a touchdown pass to Courtland Sutton, and suddenly Denver was up 7-0.

But it never got better from there. With the Patriots struggling to get any offense going, the Broncos faced a 4th-and-1 at the New England 14 early in the second quarter after a Stidham scramble. I get the argument for being aggressive and going for it, but as I said in the moment, I supported the field goal there.

I think Payton lost the game here.

First, you have to understand this is a game where points will be at a premium with your backup and all the other injuries on offense. The Patriots are playing a lot of sound defense and there was clear pass pressure on Stidham, who didn’t do the best job of handling it with his inexperience. He could stand to learn to throw the ball away better.

Second, if you’re going for it and you’re not going ballsy to throw to the end zone for a touchdown, then you gotta go quarterback sneak (Payton had Russell Wilson dominating these after he was horrible at them in Seattle) to be safe and get it. At best, you’re probably getting a yard or two, so it’s still going to be a first down at the 13 or 12. Can you really say for sure you’re getting a touchdown there? You might be kicking a field goal four snaps later anyway, so that’s another reason I don’t like going for it at the 14.

Third, if the CBS broadcast team knew in the pregame that snow was very possible in this game and the conditions would get worse, then Payton and the Broncos had to know that too. That’s just another reason to take the 3 points now, go up 10-0, and put pressure on a quarterback in his first road playoff start who has been playing like shit.

But the Broncos went for it, Stidham tried to throw a long-developing pass play to the back, and he was nearly picked off. Turnover on downs. That was the turning point, and even though the Patriots punted on the ensuing drive, the Broncos never got the ball past the New England 28 the rest of the game.

New England’s offense was still unable to get going. Maye’s success rate was 1-for-9 to start this game, and not even a 3rd-and-13 conversion to Mack Hollins could get a scoring drive going. They needed a takeaway, which Stidham provided in the worst way on the ensuring drive. Instead of throwing the ball away or taking the sack since it was third down, he tried to get rid of the ball and was charged with a fumble after some ref discussion. He’s lucky they blew the whistle and it wasn’t a fumble-six.

I’m not sure it was a true backwards pass either, but since what Stidham did on the play was so bad and stupid, he deserved to get hit with a turnover. The Patriots got to start with the ball 12 yards away from the end zone, and two plays later, my prediction of a Maye rushing touchdown came true to get the Patriots on the board.

It’s those two killer plays that ruined the game for Denver. The 4th down decision and the fumble. Both teams missed a long field goal to end the first half, but the weather was about to get much worse in the second half.

New England could have started the second half with a three-and-out, but Rhamondre Stevenson was able to catch them off guard with a 3-yard run on 3rd-and-3. That led to a marathon drive where Maye had a key 28-yard scramble on 3rd-and-9 that’s probably the main reason his QBR for this game ended up being a 62.6.

The 9:31 drive ended in a field goal, but that’s a 10-7 lead and it was the last score of the day. It was around this time when the snow started coming down, and that made it very hard on both teams to get any offense going. The Patriots got their long drive in just in time before the snow.

However, no one knew that’d be the last scoring drive in the game, and it almost wasn’t a scoring drive at all. The Patriots used the Tush Push on 4th-and-1 at the Denver 8, and despite beefing up with two defenders in the backfield, they really didn’t get any push on Maye. He’s fortunate that spotting the ball is an unscientific joke in the NFL, because this probably should have been a turnover on downs.

After their field goal drive, the Patriots tried to use the better field direction (snow not in their face) for a 31-yard gain on a flea-flicker pass, but even with the better field, they still missed a 46-yard field goal badly. The Patriots had just two completions that gained more than 9 yards in the game.

In the fourth quarter, Denver had the better field direction for offense. But the offensive line was not able to control the ground game, so it was on Stidham to try to beat this defense in the snow. He just couldn’t do it on this day.

The final turning point was a bad New England punt that put the Broncos at the New England 33 with 6:55 left. What offense in a 3-point deficit wouldn’t kill to start that close? But the weather was a factor again, and the Broncos did not capitalize with great calls. Harvey lost 3 yards on a first-down run, then he didn’t get anything on a catch, then Stidham scrambled for 8 yards to set up 4th-and-5.

Not to trigger Atlanta fans over Super Bowl 51, but this drive’s failure reminded me a little of how the Falcons had a 1st-and-10 at the New England 22 after the great Julio Jones catch. Literally take three knees and make a field goal and you probably win that game. Instead, they lost yards and had to punt in a 28-20 game before the Patriots tied.

At least the Broncos didn’t punt here, but only gaining 5 yards on 3 plays in that golden opportunity for field position was a huge, missed opportunity. I also question if they should have just gone for it here as getting a touchdown was probably their best shot of winning the game. You don’t really care if you get stopped since you don’t expect the Patriots to get any offense going in the wind.

I guess they had to give the field goal a try, but Wil Lutz was blocked from 45 yards out with 4:42 left. Given the magnitude of the game and the moment, I think I could make the argument that’s in the top 5 for the biggest failed field goal in NFL history.

The first one is obviously Scott Norwood’s 47-yard miss for Buffalo with Super Bowl 25 on the line against the Giants. The only do-or-die field goal miss in Super Bowl history. But we also know the only other short do-or-die field goal miss in a championship game was Billy Cundiff (Ravens) from 32 yards out in the 2011 AFC Championship Game at New England.

Then I might rank Gary Anderson’s first miss of the 1998 season at No. 3 as it cost his Vikings a 10-point lead late in the NFC Championship Game that should have been enough to beat Atlanta. We were robbed of an all-time great Super Bowl between the Vikings and Broncos because of that one.

For fourth place, you can take your pick of failures in the divisional round:

  • 2000 Titans vs. Ravens: Al Del Greco’s 37-yard FG is blocked and returned for a touchdown in a 10-10 tie with just over 12:00 left (Ravens won 24-10 after getting a pick-six too).
  • 2005 Colts vs. Steelers: “He missed it” as Mike Vanderjagt shanked a 46-yard field goal to deny an all-time great game of overtime.
  • 1995 Chiefs vs. Colts: Lin Elliott missed a 42-yard field goal to force overtime as the No. 1 seed Chiefs fell. He missed from 39 yards in the same quarter.
  • 2006 Chargers vs. Patriots: Nate Kaeding missed a 54-yard field goal that would have forced overtime back when overtime was true sudden death.

At worst you have to put this one in the top 10 since it was a championship game.

The Broncos got the ball back with 3:05 left and 68 yards away from the end zone. But much like in Stidham’s only other game-winning drive attempt in the NFL (2022 overtime vs. 49ers), he threw an interception rather quickly. Just a poor read/throw, and Gonzalez has his playoff highlight now.

The Patriots just needed one first down to ice it, and Maye put that away with his legs on a broken play. He ended up rushing for 65 yards while only netting 65 passing yards on 26 pass plays. He joins Blake Bortles (vs. 2017 Bills) as the only quarterbacks to throw for fewer than 100 yards (min. 20 attempts) and win a playoff game without scoring 14 points.

There are many “records” of futility associated with the Patriots’ Super Bowl run here, and I have two weeks to get into them all, so it’s not like I have to do it right now. But I think scoring the fewest points (54) by any conference champion since the 1979 Rams (49) is a good place to start.

Becoming the third team in NFL history (regular season or postseason) to win three straight games in a single season after allowing at least 5 sacks in each game is another crazy one. Only the 1986 Patriots and 2004 Bears did that, and they weren’t doing it in playoff games. Maye’s 15 sacks are already the second most in a single postseason (Joe Burrow took 19 in four games in 2021).

The Dilfer/2001 Brady comparisons are spot on for Maye. I’d say he has to play better against Seattle to win one more time, but are we sure about that right now? This team is on such a lucky run that they don’t even have to play a single top 10 offense in yards or points per drive despite playing four playoff games.

The Patriots have allowed 19 net points in three playoff games, and they get Darnold next. Defenses that go on runs like this in the playoffs usually do quite well in the Super Bowl, but I’m not sure there’s anything sustainable you can take away from this New England run.

Rams at Seahawks: The Ring That Got Away

If special teams didn’t exist, the 2025 Rams could have been a special team.

In the end, I was right that the Rams were not a good pick to win the Super Bowl this year despite spending several weeks as the odds-on favorite. But their blown leads, including that 16-point lead in Seattle in Week 16, showed a team that lacked attention to detail and closing games out in a championship fashion.

In some ways, Sunday night was their worst performance of the season. It’s the only game this year where the Rams didn’t find a way to get at least a fourth-quarter tie and they trailed by 11 multiple times.

Their pass defense was shredded by Sam Darnold (346/3/0) and JSN (10/153/1). Then there were the third-down woes I kept warning about, and didn’t expect the Seattle offense to go 7/12. But the Rams were just 1/8 on third down, and that was enough stops to keep them behind the eight ball all night in a 31-27 loss.

But the real turning point ended up being arguably the biggest weakness this team had all year: Special teams.

  • They gave up two blocked field goals in the fourth quarter against the Eagles to blow that game they led by 19 points and should have won.
  • They missed a go-ahead extra point in the San Francisco loss.
  • They gave up a punt return touchdown in Week 16 in Seattle to get that comeback going for the No. 1 seed, and they missed a go-ahead field goal in that game too.

The Rams fired their ST coordinator during the season but to no avail. It cost them again on Sunday. Xavier Smith muffed a punt in the second quarter but got it back. In the third quarter, with the Rams trailing 17-13 and about to get the ball back, he made one of the worst plays ever, falling down while the punt was coming and losing that one for the game’s only turnover.

Just a horrible play that the Seahawks immediately used to score a 17-yard touchdown and go up 11 points, making the Rams chase the rest of the night.

That’s not to say the Rams had a perfect game otherwise, but that was definitely the turning point. There was another before the second quarter ended when the Rams got the ball back with a 13-10 lead and 1:33 with two timeouts. A good drive there and you’re going into halftime up 16-10 or 20-10. Instead, the Rams had a quick three-and-out with two incompletions, and the Seahawks got the ball back with 54 seconds left. They were able to drive 74 yards for a touchdown in 30 seconds. Rams trailed 17-13 at halftime. Inexcusable.

Otherwise, there weren’t that many mistakes from the Rams on the road. After the botched punt return and 24-13 deficit, Stafford did a great job with some quick strikes to get a touchdown on the board and make it a game again. But I thought McVay nearly gave it away with a bad run call on a 2nd-and-15, then it looked like the Rams had to punt until a stupid taunting penalty on Riq Woolen wiped out a 4th-and-12 situation.

Keep in mind that’s after Woolen dropped a pick. Then he immediately gave up a 34-yard touchdown to Puka Nacua, so that was an unbelievable 3-moment sequence of shame for Woolen, and it made the game 31-27 with just over 17 minutes left.

But like the first game, there were no more points added. I do see the criticism and application of why McVay wouldn’t go for two there to try to make it 31-28. That way, if you’re down late in a 3-point game, you can settle for the game-tying field goal. But down 31-27, they ended up turning it over on downs on a spot you’d rather be kicking a field goal. So, that did kind of come back to haunt them. If they didn’t get the 2PC, then it’d still be 31-26 and the situation would be the same, needing a touchdown. So, I do think McVay goofed there a bit.

After the Rams finally got a stop thanks to a big sack, Stafford had his shot at what needed to be a third-straight game-winning drive on the road this postseason. He had a pretty great game, but the Rams turning in a marathon drive where they had to overcome a 4th-and-1 with a Stafford scramble after a terrible Colby Parkinson drop ended up really hurting the Rams in the end.

Their drive consumed almost half the quarter and ended in no points. On 4th-and-4 from the Seattle 6, Stafford tried forcing a pass to a backup tight end and it just wasn’t there. According to McVay and Stafford, the Seahawks were fortunate to “blow” a coverage and double team running back Kyren Williams, who apparently was supposed to be the target for a go-ahead touchdown. He was doubled, so Stafford had to panic and go elsewhere for a big incompletion with 4:54 left.

Could they have kicked the field goal there and made it a 1-point game? Yeah, I think there’s an argument there. But when you’re in a 31-27 game and the quarterbacks were playing at a high level with both over 340 yards, 3 touchdowns, and no picks, I think you have to put the ball in the hands of your MVP in that spot and trust your best unit. It just didn’t work out.

Then the Seahawks did a really great job in the four-minute offense, an area of the game where I always criticize McVay for his shortcomings. The Seahawks stayed smart and aggressive, mixing in several second-down pass attempts. They ended up getting four first downs to help run out all but 25 seconds of the clock and the Rams’ three timeouts.

The “controversial” play was a 3rd-and-7 to Cooper Kupp, who also scored a touchdown against his former team. He was ruled to get just enough for the 7-yard gain with 3:11 left, or the Seahawks would have had an interesting decision. First, I think it was a catch and down by contact all the way. But are we sure Kupp got to the 35 and the first down? Should McVay have challenged that one to burn a timeout instead of just using a timeout? I think there’ s an argument to challenge the spot here.

Alas, it ended up counting as a first down, then JSN had a big 14-yard catch for another first down, then a defensive holding penalty really put the Rams in a bind. By the time Stafford got the ball back, only 25 seconds remained and he had to go 93 yards. He got 44 to Puka, but he was unable to get out of bounds (close) on the last catch to at least set up a Hail Mary finish from the Seattle 49.

The Seahawks hung on, and Stafford becomes the first quarterback ever to throw for 350 yards, 3 touchdowns, and no turnovers in a playoff loss. It’s hard to play better than he did in the two games at Seattle, the No. 1 scoring defense, and he still took the loss in both games.

That tells me maybe he will win that MVP, because it’d be yet another year where the MVP didn’t win the Super Bowl. Only Patrick Mahomes (2022 Chiefs) has done that in the 21st century as teams built this way to win with the passing game are a dying breed, and it’s just hard to pull that off in the playoffs when you need competent plays from your special teams and defense.

The Rams didn’t get enough of those this year, and that’s why they were on the road here, and that likely made a difference as I can’t see Darnold playing this comfortably on the road even if the SoFi crowd is a little soft. They weren’t soft enough for him not to throw four picks in the first meeting, but that’s an afterthought now.

Darnold is in the Super Bowl, he’s the favorite, he’s got a good defense that has shown some major cracks against the Rams, but it’s just one game against the Patriots to win it all now.

What do you think is going to happen in two weeks? It feels inevitable, doesn’t it? The ghosts of failures past coming home to roost. Cinderella turning into a pumpkin at midnight. Mike Macdonald losing another defensive gem after losing a 17-10 game at home in the 2023 AFC Championship Game with Baltimore against the Chiefs.

Can he overcome his quarterback’s nerves? Can someone hire Klint Kubiak to be their head coach after this showing? Guess we’ll find out all of these things in the next two weeks. I’d say I can’t wait, but I got a Tubi watchlist and ~10 inches of snow that’s going to take a week or longer to melt that also have my attention.

The Mark Rypien vs. Trent Dilfer Super Bowl can wait a little.

Next week: Certainly not watching the Pro Bowl. I’ll have Super Bowl-related articles for the next two weeks, including a topic I had in mind since September that relates Sam Darnold, MetLife Stadium, and the Patriots together in a satirical but still factual way.  

NFL 2025 Conference Championship Predictions: “Not My AFC, Not My President” Edition

~ Scott ~ Leave a comment

Some days it’s really hard to get the motivation to talk about football and ignore what’s going on in the country. This weekend is one of those times, but I’m going to get these picks out before Sunday’s games as I always have. That doesn’t mean I’m not disgusted with ICE and what’s happening in Minnesota, and the way MAGA will support anything their guy does no matter how depraved it is or how hypocritical it makes them look.

I hope justice is served for these people, but I have my doubts.

Fuck ICE
In a just world.

2025 Conference Championship Predictions

So, we got two games on Sunday to decide who plays in Super Bowl 60. I have in-depth previews and picks already for them.

2025 NFC Championship Game Preview: Rams vs. Seahawks Is Super Bowl LX Two Weeks Early
2025 AFC Championship Game Preview: Bizarro AFC Leads to Drake Maye vs. Jarrett Stidham
Scott’s Seven NFL Picks: 2025 Conference Championship Games

FINAL SCORES

  • Patriots 23, Broncos 20
  • Seahawks 27, Rams 24 OT

I think Jarrett Stidham makes it a game because his OL is way better than the Chargers/Texans and Denver is a tough place to play. But his inexperience will show up and be the difference. Denver’s best hope is turnover regression continues in their favor and that pass rush dominates Maye in his first road playoff game. Remember, he’s been playing poorly at home. Now he’s on the road, but that’s why the spread moved ~6 points in going from Bo Nix to Stidham. I’ll always believe the Broncos win this game if Nix was healthy and starting, but we’ll see what happens today.

As for the NFC game, many ways that can play out. Watch which QB protects the ball better and doesn’t give up the short fields, especially the way the Seahawks have been feasting on short fields since November. Make Darnold drive a long field. Watch the 3rd down matchup of Rams’ offense (underwhelming on 3rd down despite facing shortest distance) vs. No. 1 Seattle defense as that could be decisive too.

Sean McVay is a man now (he’s 40), and he’s been the man in close playoff games with a 7-2 record in one-score games and 6-1 record in games decided by 1-5 points. But I think the Seahawks get this one at home by a FG in overtime again. Stafford has taken a Mike Macdonald defense to overtime in 3-of-4 meetings since 2023. I’m predicting another here as these teams have played two very tight games at the end this year.

Super Bowl 49 rematch it is, and it won’t come close to touching that game’s legacy.

Fitting too since 2015 was about the last decent year we had as a country.

2025 NFL Stat Oddity: Divisional Round

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The 2025 NFL Divisional Round was a mixed bag of a weekend. We had an overtime classic that played out like a Greek tragedy that probably had both locker rooms crying after it was over.

We had a total rout that you could have called after the opening kickoff return for a touchdown. Spike their boombox and everything. We had a disgusting game in snowy New England on the 22nd anniversary of the 2003 AFC Championship Game that looked familiar. Then we had another game that maybe won’t reach overtime classic status because of the overtime itself, but it did offer one of the most thrilling game-tying touchdowns in defeat in NFL playoff history.

But we’re left with a final four of the Broncos, Patriots, Rams, and Seahawks. It was that close to being the top two seeds in each conference, which would have been incredibly lame for such an unpredictable season.

But in the end, it’s those AFC schedule merchants (minus QB1 in Denver) and the two best teams in the best division in the NFC West getting a rematch for the Game of the Year.

First, a recap of what could be a significant weekend in NFL history, or maybe it’s just a one-off leading to the ridiculous conclusion of Sam Darnold holding a Super Bowl MVP trophy that Donald Trump will want, or God forbid, Jarrett Stidham doing his best Nick Foles impersonation and going to the Jets for $80M to shit his pants the next few years.

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

Bills at Broncos: The One Where Both Teams Lost

In a game that could have catapulted Josh Allen or Bo Nix to their first Super Bowl, Saturday’s 33-30 overtime classic ended up being a great day for Drake Maye instead. A game that could have huge ramifications in the AFC going forward, it was one where I joked during it that I wish both teams could lose, and they kind of did.

While many in the media want to push this narrative that you have to “feel sorry” for Josh Allen and the Bills, I don’t. I only feel sorry for Bo Nix and the Broncos fans as he was actually the one quarterback this postseason who really played well enough to elevate his legacy. And now he can’t continue this season after breaking his ankle in overtime.

In a game where people thought you had to attack the Buffalo defense with the running game, Sean Payton put it in Bo Nix’s hands on 58-of-68 plays (85.3%), often ignoring handoffs altogether on first downs. In the end, he sure wishes he would have called a RB carry on first down instead of this funky play that I blasted right away on Twitter, not knowing the 2-yard loss would be the play that broke Nix’s ankle and ended his season for surgery.

Nix didn’t take a single sack. He tied the single-season record with his eighth game-winning drive of the year, and now it’s over as Jarrett Stidham has to start the AFC Championship Game against the Patriots, his former team, next week. Just doesn’t seem real or fair, but that’s the outcome here for Nix after he played really well.

That’s the big news out of this one, and I have all week to cover where the Broncos go from here with Stidham. But the other story is Allen and the Bills losing for the seventh-straight postseason short of the Super Bowl after it was supposed to be their year. This one felt different, didn’t it? Players were visibly crying, including a teary-eyed Allen in his post-game presser.

This team has lost some huge games during this run, but I think they’re taking this one the worst because they knew this was their year. The “no excuses” stuff in the media for Allen was never hyperbole. Without the Kansas City Chiefs, the team they were 0-4 in the playoffs against, in the playoff field, this was their best shot. If you watched the way the Patriots and Texans played on Sunday, then you know damn well this was their best shot yet at getting to that elusive Super Bowl before Allen’s 30th birthday in May.

But the league’s greatest bridesmaid has to make peace with the fact that he had his worst playoff game yet, turning it over four times on one of the most feast-or-famine performances in NFL history. The Bills are the only team in NFL history to have three touchdowns, three field goals, five turnovers, and zero punts in a game. All 11 drives were scores or turnovers, and James Cook only had one of the turnovers that weren’t charged to Allen. Otherwise he had over 100 rushing yards.

Khail Shakir had a huge YAC play, Keon Coleman made a nice touchdown, and Dalton Kincaid played very well and caught a touchdown. Again, the “no excuses” thing was not hyperbole, and for all the talk about Allen needing to be Superman, it’s a miracle you can turn the ball over five times and still have a chance to win this thing on the road. That just proves the margin for error for Allen was actually higher than some believe.

Allen did some very good things in this game and was effective enough to score 30 points. But there were key mistakes and misses that will haunt him all offseason.

  • There was the horrific decision to be aggressive with 0:16 left in the half where Allen scrambled and fumbled, gifting the Broncos 3 big points.
  • Allen’s strip-sack to start the second half led to another Denver field goal, a win for the Buffalo defense that had to defend a short field and only gave up 2 yards.
  • Allen wasted a Nix interception by throwing one of his own.
  • Leading 24-23, Allen short-hopped a bad throw to Shakir on a 3rd-and-8 with 4:14 left, and the Bills had to settle for a field goal instead of a touchdown.
  • Allen missed a very open Dawson Knox for a potential game-winning touchdown before settling for a field goal and overtime.
  • In overtime, Allen threw a very low pass to Mecole Hardman that he tried to reach down for before losing control of it. A better throw gets a big play there.
  • That set up the fateful 3rd-and-11 where Allen underthrew a deep ball that Brandin Cooks had to slow down for, which helped Ja’Quan McMillian catch up to the receiver and take the ball from him for an interception that ended up being Allen’s last play of the game.

I’ve said for the last year that Allen is a turnover waiting to happen in the playoffs. His turnover numbers have always been misleading because of all the dropped interceptions he’s had in games against Kansas City alone. He also had 12 fumbles with only 2 lost, so that was lucky too.

Guess turnover regression came in every form for the Bills in 2025 as he finally met a defense who wouldn’t drop his picks or fail to recover his fumbles. After the Bills turned it over for the fifth time, the Broncos just needed a field goal. To that point, there were only five penalties in the entire game on both teams, so they were letting them play despite Denver’s poor habits of leading the league in penalty yardage.

One of the biggest calls was a holding penalty that would have wiped out a Keon Coleman touchdown had he held onto it. But he dropped it, so that brought up fourth down on that drive earlier in the game.

But for the most part, the refs were a moot point until they became the story on Denver’s game-winning drive with 53 yards worth of penalties on Buffalo’s defense.

The first penalty, I don’t know if it was a good call or not for DPI, but I know I don’t really care since Joey Bosa was also flagged for roughing for a late hit. So, it was either 15 or 17 yards and an automatic first down either way for Denver. They ended up getting 2 extra yards out of it, so no beef there.

Then the 30-yard DPI flag on Tre’Davious White for contacting Mims early. I think that was pretty textbook DPI. Then White was flagged for throwing his helmet off right in front of a ref, a foolish penalty to take. Then Denver was able to kick the field goal and win it 33-30.

I think the final drive was officiated fairly, but let’s back up to the last Buffalo drive as that’s the one people are throwing a big stink about.

If you want to talk about a cruel twist of fate, this game could have ended 32-30 on a safety for offensive holding on Buffalo in the end zone. Denver would have won that way after a clear hold was missed at the start of the drive, and Bo Nix would be healthy and playing on Sunday to go to the Super Bowl. Alas, it was missed.

Then with the throw to Cooks, you maybe could argue McMillian got there early and we had some DPI. That might actually be the better argument than saying it was a catch, because I can’t believe the number of people this week who don’t understand why this was ruled an interception. The Calvin Johnson Rule, the “complete the process” and the “survive the ground” concepts have only been around for the last 15 years in the NFL.

This was not simultaneous possession because they never both had control of the ball at the same time, so forget that idea of tie goes to the offense. For this to be a catch by Cooks, he has to complete the process of the catch going to the ground, so his knee or shin being down while being touched is irrelevant. He’s not a runner trying to get a down by contact ruling. He’s making a diving catch and he has to survive the ground. He didn’t.

When Cooks lands and flips over, he loses control of the ball and McMillian has it firmly in his grasp and it didn’t touch the ground. That’s an interception. I like the argument of removing the defender from the picture altogether. If Cooks lands there and the ball pops out with no defender to go to, they’d rule that incomplete every time in January 2026. But since the ball was lost to a defender without it hitting the ground, it’s an interception.

I don’t see it as that controversial either. There were closer calls on other plays this year like the pick the Rams got on SNF against Cade Otton and the Bucs when his knee was down as he was trying to get control of a ball he bobbled. This was a pick.

This was a pick for Payton Wilson against the Ravens in 2024 when he took the ball away from Justice Hill who got multiple feet down, then went to the ground and lost control of the ball. Interception.

You may not like the rule or the way it’s written, but I think this clearly was an interception for Denver as Cooks lost control of the ball before he completed the process. If you watch it at real speed (see the last 7 seconds here), it’s hard to deny this was a fluid motion with McMillian emerging with a ball Cooks lost:

Deal with it, Buffalo fans, that was a pick. I also think a big stink over this is because it was thrown by Allen, who we’re told by the likes of Albert Breer and Orlovsky that we’re supposed to feel sorry for after a game like this. Had Bo Nix thrown this pick and the Bills went on to win, I imagine a far quieter outcry over the ruling on the field.

Five turnovers on the road, four from your quarterback, it just can’t happen. That’s why the Bills came up short yet again. It wasn’t the run defense. It wasn’t because Tyrell Shavers was on injured reserve. Their best players turned it over five times on offense, and two of their vets had penalties on the final drive. Allen missed multiple game-sealing throws again.

I don’t get the sense the Bills are going to fire Sean McDermott after this one with so many coach openings out there and some already filled. But I’m not sure they can sell the fans with their new stadium that running this crew back is going to result in anything different next season.

Then with Nix getting injured here, the Patriots might have the clearest path any team’s ever had to a Super Bowl, and that would be disastrous for Maye to get one so early while Allen is still seeking that elusive first Super Bowl. The Bills would have had a chance to kill that noise with another road win next week against a quarterback that’s been so shaky in these two playoff games.

Instead, Buffalo finished second in the AFC East and won one fewer playoff game than it did a year ago despite coming into 2025 as the favorite to earn the No. 1 seed because of the schedule’s advantages.

Denver and New England swooped in there and outdid them instead. If I had to pick which duo of teams wins more AFC Championship Games in the next eight years, I’d still take the Chiefs/Bills over the Broncos/Patriots even with the latter going up 1-0 this season.

But Saturday was definitely the worst playoff outcome yet for Allen and the Bills, so I understand why they are extra emotional about this one. I just wish there was more acknowledgement from fans who want to focus on a fairly clear interception that it was just one of the last mistakes in a long line from the Bills in this game.

I’m still of the belief that 13 Seconds was supposed to be the year for Allen/McDermott, and it’s just never going to happen for them as a duo with this team. As Jim Nantz awkwardly said after this one, the next time you see Josh Allen he’ll be a 30-year-old dad.

Damn, Jim. He’s also 0-7 in overtime, the first quarterback to start his career like that since Aaron Rodgers. But even Rodgers won his only Super Bowl in his third year as a starter (2010) in his second trip to the playoffs.

Allen will have to make history by being the first quarterback to reach his first Super Bowl in his 8th postseason or more. I remember when Buffalo’s greatest quarterback (Jim Kelly) was slandered for losing four straight Super Bowls. Now, Allen is starting to look like he might hold that legacy of being the greatest quarterback to never start a Super Bowl.

That’s his title going into 2026, and we’ll just have to wait and see if this loss snowballs into a New England run that they could have stopped.

Rams at Bears: A Breaking Point or a Sacrificial Lamb Served Up to Seattle Next Week?

It’s hard to say what lasting impact this game will have without seeing the trajectory of the Ben Johnson-led Bears or the outcome for the 2025 Rams this postseason. Maybe it’s the breaking point for the Rams on their way to a second Super Bowl in five years as they were pushed pretty hard in overtime here, if it should have even gone to overtime.

Maybe it’s the game that gets Caleb Williams to work more on the fundamentals and tightening up his throwing motion and hitting the routine plays better next year to go along with the spectacular plays.

Seriously, did anyone have a better highlight reel than Caleb in 2025? The touchdown throw to D.J. Moore against Cleveland that resembled The Catch but deeper, the touchdown to Moore in overtime against the Packers, the 4th-and-8 against the Packers, and then the longest 14-yard touchdown pass you’ll ever see (51.2 air yards) to tie this game up in the final minute are four plays as good as any by a quarterback this year.

But this was a strange game all around. The Bears came out hot until Rome Odunze dropped a 23-yard touchdown from Williams. Two plays later on a fourth down, his pass was intercepted by a diving Ram, and that actually netted 6 yards of field position for Chicago. Still, you’d like to see Odunze step up as WR1 and squeeze that one for a quick score to make a statement.

The Rams had a great opening drive that went 85 yards in 14 plays with Matthew Stafford in command of things. But they really struggled after that with six punts and one field goal the next seven drives as the Bears were getting home with quick pressures, and the Rams weren’t attacking their low-ranked running defense enough.

In the third quarter, Williams threw his second interception, though it could have been argued the refs missed a blow to the head on the play. The Rams had the ball at the 50 but still went three-and-out, so it didn’t have a big impact on the game as a scoreless third quarter remained 10-10 going into the fourth.

We know the fourth quarter is where the Bears have been at their best all year, but the Rams struck first with a 91-yard touchdown drive that focused on the running game again as Kyren Williams scored for the second time. They called a WR run to Puka Nacua on a big 4th-and-1 before the touchdown, shades of the Cooper Kupp play on their game-winning drive in Super Bowl 56.

Also on this go-ahead drive, there was a 12-yard pass to Davante Adams that people are trying to compare to the Brandin Cooks play in Denver. It’s a silly comparison from people who are reaching.

This is not the same play at all. Adams caught the ball in a crowd, established control, then was held up and tackled. As he was going down the ground with the catch already secured, his knee hit the ground, then he was stripped of the ball. But since he already completed the catch, the play is dead the moment his knee hit the ground. It was not a diving catch where he had to survive going to the ground like Cooks did (and did not succeed in doing). Not the same play. Move on.

To answer the touchdown, the Bears drove to the LA 2, but Williams’ fourth-down pass was batted down with 3:03 left. I might have to look into this more if the Rams keep advancing, but I’ve always said Sean McVay is incredibly conservative in the four-minute offense, so it didn’t surprise me the Bears got the ball back in a 17-10 game. I’m just surprised at how conservative the Rams were, because they chose to run Williams five times in a row. He screwed up the one by going out of bounds instead of sliding down.

But with 2:07 left and the Bears down to one timeout, McVay still called a run on third-and-10, which was silly since a pass and punt could still use up the two-minute warning, and the pass might have even given them a first down that could have come very close to wrapping this one up. Instead, Williams got the ball at the 50 with 1:50 left after a poor punt.

He didn’t necessarily make the drive look easy, but he’s been comfortable in the last 2:00 all season, and on fourth-and-4 at the 14, he ran all the way back to his 40 before throwing a pass up to the end zone where either Cole Kmet or one defensive back could get it. Kmet won the battle with ease as the DB misplayed the ball, and the Bears had their clutch touchdown with 0:18 left on an insane play by Williams.

With 18 seconds left, do you go for two? It’s the call that will probably haunt Ben Johnson all offseason, and I imagine next time he’ll go into a playoff game making sure he has the perfect 2PC call. But allegedly he didn’t go for it because he didn’t like the team’s execution in short yardage all night. Fair enough.

I see the argument both ways, going for it and playing for overtime. In the playoffs, overtime really isn’t bad at all anymore since you can about guarantee you’ll have a possession and it won’t be pressed for time either. Johnson already surprised me once this year when he didn’t go for 2 against Green Bay in Week 16 and won in overtime as we know he comes from that aggressive Dan Campbell coaching tree in Detroit.

With 18 seconds left, that’s definitely the right amount of time to justify going for the win. You could also argue that the Rams were shook by such a spectacular touchdown that going for the kill may have been the right call.

Alas, they went to overtime where the Bears won the toss, and I think they were correct to receive. Again, put the shellshocked Rams on the field first, and give Caleb four-down football with that extra margin for error, knowing exactly what he needs. Love that decision and would do it every time here.

It almost worked out too. Predictably, the Rams got conservative and called three straight runs (that’s 10 in a row going back to the fourth quarter) and went three-and-out after their 3rd-and-1 run was stuffed. Those short-yardage failures are something I’ve been highlighting for several weeks for the Rams this season, and between blowing that run and the lead, it looked like their weaknesses were going to eliminate them.

The Bears just needed a field goal for their eighth game-winning drive of the season (tie the NFL record) while the Rams had already allowed five GWD this season. But after a Williams sneak on a fourth down to convert at midfield, things went awry on a 2nd-and-8 at the LA 48. D.J. Moore had a poor effort on a route, and Williams was intercepted by Curl on a miscommunication that really isn’t on the QB or at least not entirely. Bad spot to be off like that.

Just like the Bills on Saturday, the team that just had to get a field goal to win the game threw a pick and never saw the ball again. Stafford finally got involved again with three completions for 43 yards, including a great grab by Adams and a big chain mover on third down to Puka (who else?).

Beyond blowing leads and short-yardage runs, the field goal unit is my other often cited flaw with the 2025 Rams. But rookie kicker Harrison Mevis had his team’s back with a 42-yard kick that was good enough to win this one at 20-17.

It was definitely a scare from the Bears, and who knows what happens had they gone for 2 against these Rams a la Seattle in Week 16. But the Rams escaped with the win, and now we’ll see if they can avenge that loss in Seattle. Barring a Darnold meltdown, it’s probably not going to happen if they play like this next Sunday night.

Texans at Patriots: It’s the Patriot Way

It’s actually fitting this game took place 22 years to the date of the 2003 AFC Championship Game, the game that ruined quarterback discourse for the rest of time. The game where Peyton Manning threw four interceptions and Tom Brady tried to match him bar for bar against a much inferior defense.

It’s not that Sunday’s game was expected to be a quarterback duel with two defenses on all-time runs of not allowing yards and neither gave up a touchdown in wins last week. It’s not like anyone has C.J. Stroud in MVP talks like Drake Maye, and the consensus was Stroud just needed to be a guy who doesn’t screw things up with his defense.

Well, that was always going to be harder to do without Nico Collins, who was out with a concussion. It got worse when tight end Dalton Schultz, the team’s second-leading receiver in yards (first in catches too), left the game early with an injury, putting Stroud in a familiar position of having limited weapons in the postseason after two years of injuries to Tank Dell (twice) and Stefon Diggs (2024).

But the Texans were supposed to have better depth this year. That didn’t really show up, and neither did their hands on the road as the offense looked like a “dome team” with some costly drops on late downs from Christian Kirk (early) and Cade Stover (late).

But the fact is Stroud was an absolute mess in this game, he threw four interceptions before halftime, including a pick-six I predicted, and there was a stretch where every pass looked like a prayer. Someone just hoping to get rid of the ball with no care where it went.

I’m actually shocked Davis Mills didn’t enter the game to start the second half, and maybe he should have. Mills has as many comeback wins this year as Stroud has in three seasons for Houston. I would have told him he can’t settle down, he’s not seeing the field well in the snow, and we’re going to give Mills a shot. Not that I’d expect it’d help the protection that looked outmatched, and the running game stunk (20 carries for 37 yards). But sometimes you see better protection when a backup comes in as if the linemen know they need to do better for that guy. Sometimes that backup just gets rid of the ball better or more accurately too.

Stroud was awful, and while he was better in the second half, it still didn’t make up for the damage caused early. However, a Woody Marks fumble in the red zone after he lost his shoe was another callback to the 2003 AFC-CG when Marvin Harrison fumbled in the red zone when it finally looked like the Colts had something going.

Despite the five turnovers by Houston, the only one the Patriots got any points off of was the pick-six by Marcus Jones. That’s because the Houston defense did its job by making sure Drake Maye looked pretty awful too. Maye had five sacks as Danielle Hunter and Will Anderson caused about as much havoc as they could on the road. They forced Maye to fumble four times, recovered two of them, and the other two were right there for grabs as well. Could have easily been a 5-turnover day for Maye, who also threw a Hail Mary interception to end the half that didn’t matter.

Still, that’s why it’s so much like the 2003 AFC-CG in that Maye tried his best to match Stroud turnover for turnover, but Houston didn’t capitalize enough.

But Maye looked shellshocked by the pass rush, not unlike what he did against a lesser Chargers defense a week earlier. He was just fortunate his defense was stellar as neither team had 250 yards of offense. The Patriots were also just 3-of-14 on third down.

The turnovers meant each team had 9 possessions by halftime, and the Patriots finished the day with 21 offensive points on a whopping 14 drives. Maye had three touchdown passes, but those plays said more about the receivers helping him out with a good YAC play by Pop Douglas, a very strong catch by Stefon Diggs to hang onto it in traffic in the end zone, then a brilliant one-handed catch for 32 yards by Boutte to put the Patriots up 28-16, the end of the scoring.

The unheralded play of the game happened three plays before that Boutte catch. The Texans had a chance to get the ball back in a 21-16 game in the fourth quarter with the Patriots facing a 3rd-and-8. But Derek Stingley Jr. was flagged correctly for defensive pass interference for 17 yards, and then he was beat on the touchdown too, so a rough series for him and the defense when they had a chance to set up a 4QC opportunity.

But be honest. Do you think Stroud, who is 2-10 at such games, would have capitalized? When the Texans later had the ball in a 12-point game, they punted on 4th-and-18 with 4:17 left. I know no one wants to go for it in that spot, but you at least give yourself a chance to get a penalty to convert or something. With only one timeout left, punting is such a cowardly move, but that’s what Ryans did.

Does he not realize you could end up forcing them to kick a field goal after three snaps and it’s still a 31-16 game? Two-score game. But Ryans did the cowardly punt, and the Texans had 1:45 left when they got the ball back. Just enough time for another Stroud prayer on 4th down to not be answered deep by Hutchinson on a pass broken up by linebacker Robert Spillane.

The Patriots put on a defensive masterclass against a quarterback in over his head. I’m honestly not sure Collins and Schutlz playing the whole game would have made a huge difference for Stroud, who became the first quarterback ever to throw 5 picks and fumble at least 5 times in the same postseason. He did it in just two games.

Stroud was awful, and ESPN’s Troy Aikman had some scathing commentary about how Stroud has been chasing his rookie success the last two years, and it’s just not there for whatever reason.

The Texans are going to have a difficult decision to make when it comes to extending him. This was their opportunity for a Super Bowl, or at least their first AFC Championship Game with this defense. If only Stroud didn’t screw it up.

He did though, and it led to a loss on a day where Maye didn’t show up either with his best stuff.

49ers at Seahawks: Just Keep Hitting Snooze for 3 Hours

They delayed this game’s start by 20 minutes for the conclusion of Bills-Broncos, and even then I missed the live airing of the competitive portion of the game, which was the opening kickoff return. By the time I switched over to FOX, Rashid Shaheed had taken the kickoff back 95 yards for a touchdown and the rout was on.

This isn’t the first time I watched a dramatic playoff game end at Mile High before having a hard time ever getting into the later game that involved the 49ers (Colin Kaeperick’s 176-yard rushing night against the Packers after the Ravens beat Denver in double overtime in the 2012 divisional round).

This one was like 2015 when we watched the Broncos beat the Patriots for the last round of Manning vs. Brady before the Panthers stunk up the joint in the NFC Championship Game at Carolina. That was another game I had high hopes for and was backing Arizona and Carson Palmer only to be disappointed with a dud.

That’s what this was: A massive dud. Seattle played well but the 49ers did almost no favors for themselves as the battered underdog. They gave up that kick return touchdown, then after getting good field position following a landing zone rule quirk, they still wasted it by calling the worst play they possibly could on a 4th-and-1. Seriously, option with Kyle Juszczyk going wide against a fast defense? You can’t be serious with 1 yard to go.

Right from Brock Purdy’s first dropback and incompletion you could see it was going to be a nightmare up front, but the 49ers killed themselves with three turnover on downs and two turnovers. The loss of tight end George Kittle (Achilles) unfortunately had an impact. Backup Jake Tonges fumbled on the second drive near midfield, the third big mistake of the night for the 49ers, and that led to a 42-yard touchdown drive for the Seahawks and a quick 17-0 lead.

The last time this was a game was late in the second quarter. Ricky Pearsall, who missed the last two weeks, had a shot at a 3rd-and-6 catch where if he caught it, the 49ers had a shot to get a touchdown and make this 17-10 getting near halftime. Instead, he didn’t come up with the ball and the 49ers settled for their second field goal to make it 17-6.

That’s when the Seahawks put together maybe their best offensive drive, a full 80 yards this time, as they mostly relied on the run with Sam Darnold suffering that oblique injury on Thursday. But that wasn’t a big deal with the early lead and the way the 49ers struggled in the trenches. Darnold didn’t even have 100 passing yards by the time it was 27-6 in the third quarter. It didn’t matter that the Seahawks still had some red-zone issues in finishing drives with touchdowns.

I don’t think Brock Purdy played that poorly on an impossible night. He even led the team with 37 rushing yards, a bad sign. His first turnover came in the third quarter when it was 27-6, and again it was a play involving a backup tight end (Luke Farrell), who made a pretty weak effort on the route and allowed the defender to cut him off for the pick and another short field. Soon it was 34-6 and rout was in full effect.

Jauan Jennings couldn’t come down with a great 3rd-down pass by Purdy, so the 49ers ended up turning it over on downs with a 4th-down miss, leading to yet another short field (37 yards) for a Seattle touchdown.

Down 41-6, Purdy was strip-sacked with 9:12 left before both teams played backups to run the clock out. The 49ers didn’t have a single play gain 20 yards and only scored 9 points in the last 8 quarters against Seattle in January.

But when they’re doing shit like this, is there any wonder they played so poorly?

I’ll have to eat crow on the 49ers stealing this one, but now we’ll see if the Seahawks can take care of the Rams with the Super Bowl on the line. Hell, I think the 2025 NFC Championship Game is the real Super Bowl this year.

Next week: I’m glad the little AFC appetizer game is on first, then we can make room for the showdown between the Rams and Seahawks that has little chance of living up to the Week 16 meeting. But with a record 14 lead changes in the fourth quarter this postseason, maybe we’ve got one great game left here before a Super Bowl that could be less than stellar.

NFL 2025 Divisional Round Predictions: Not-So-Elite Eight Edition

~ Scott ~ Leave a comment

Every NFL team is fairly flawed in 2025. But someone has to win this thing. Someone (me) just slept on the couch for 4 hours and feels wide awake at 7 AM and is writing this very quickly instead of running up to bed to finish this sleep on the eve of the best weekend in the NFL season, the divisional round.

But my mind is finally clear on what’s going to happen. I have the vision with some themes in mind, so let’s get right to it.

NFL Divisional Round Predictions

  • Bills 23, Broncos 20
  • 49ers 20, Seahawks 16
  • Patriots 20, Texans 13
  • Rams 26, Bears 23

Second-year QBs Bo Nix and Caleb Williams are denied from an 8th game-winning drive on the season.

The Bills’ pass defense stops Nix, coming through for Allen in a way that’s going to be similar to how Peyton/Brees/Rodgers won their first rings with their defenses making timely playoff stops in crunch time.

The Bears miss a game-tying FG in the cold to deny us OT as the Rams get lucky and escape with the 3-point win.

Sam Darnold and C..J. Stroud are who we thought they were.

Darnold’s oblique injury from Thursday limits his effectiveness and the 49ers again hold the Seahawks, who struggle in 3rd down/red zone, under 18 points as Shanahan/Purdy keep the streak alive of reaching the NFC-CG.

Houston’s defense plays very well but Stroud makes some critical mistakes without Collins, and this time it’s the Patriots who score a defensive TD and win with 13 offensive points (ring a bell?).

That’d set up for just the third time ever and second in a non-strike year a Conference Championship Game round that’s two division rematches: 49ers vs. Rams, Patriots vs. Bills.

This Week’s Articles

2025 NFC Divisional Round Preview: The Greatness of the NFC West on Full Display

2025 AFC Divisional Round Preview: Is This Finally the Year for Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills?

Scott’s Seven NFL Picks: 2025 Divisional Round

Not sure why these won’t embed this week but there’s the AFC and NFC previews + 7 picks including parlays on underdogs, interception throwers, and TD scorers.

2025 NFL Stat Oddity: Wild Card Weekend

~ Scott ~ Leave a comment

The story all season for the NFL in 2025 was new contenders. The Chiefs, Ravens, and Lions didn’t even make the playoffs. The Eagles didn’t win a playoff game, so we’ll have a new champion.

We only have three of the same final eight teams from 2024 (Bills, Rams, and Texans). The Broncos, Seahawks, Patriots, Bears, and 49ers are all new in that round. This should have led to a crazy, unpredictable postseason, and if wild card weekend is any indication, we’re getting one of the craziest postseasons in NFL history.

All six games had a comeback opportunity, and the first four all had a game-winning touchdown scored by a trailing team after the two-minute warning, a single-postseason record. There’s never been a postseason with more than five fourth-quarter comebacks, so we have a great shot of tying or exceeding that here.

We’ve also already had 12 fourth-quarter lead changes in six games, another single-postseason record with seven games left. There have been entire postseasons where there wasn’t a single fourth-quarter lead change like 2020 (COVID year with empty stadiums) or 2005 (No. 6 seed Pittsburgh won).

I predicted Eagles over Bills in Super Bowl 60 on Friday night, and that’s already halfway wrong after Philadelphia’s title defense ended in somewhat predictable fashion. The 49ers’ insane 22-year streak of either making the NFC Championship Game (7x) or missing the playoffs with a non-winning record (15x) is still alive and just has to get through Sam Darnold next week to continue for the 23rd year in a row.

But that’s next week. First, let’s recap the weekend, which I think you can argue is the best wild card weekend in NFL history. I don’t think any one game this weekend would make a top 5 list of NFL wild card playoff games, but the collective competitiveness of the weekend and the way these teams were just matching scores (for four games) in the fourth quarter was crazy to watch.

Something truly memorable from a weird season to this point.

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

Texans at Steelers: Same Old Steelers with Their Old Quarterback

The Steelers lost their seventh playoff game in a row as DeMeco Ryans has already matched Mike Tomlin’s last 15 seasons in playoff wins (3) in just three years on the job in Houston. What a job it’s been too. He just won a playoff game by 24 points on the road despite his quarterback, C.J. Stroud, turning the ball over three times with five fumbles (two lost).

But that 30-6 score is going to be one of the most misleading finals in postseason history. This was a 7-6 game at halftime and going into the fourth quarter. It was only 10-6 Houston when Pittsburgh foolishly called another run on 2nd-and-10 that lost 2 yards as they never got a ground game going all night.

Then on 3rd-and-12, Rodgers was buried in the backfield, coughed up the ball, and the Texans returned it for a touchdown. You could definitely argue there was a blow to the head that made his helmet move that could have been called for roughing the passer to negate the turnover and touchdown.

If this is Rodgers’ last playoff game (or game period), maybe it’s fitting it ends with a fumble-six after an uncalled penalty, shades of no facemask call on him in Arizona in the 2009 wild card loss. Actually, his last pass of the night here ended up being a fourth-down pick-six as the Texans have now scored six return touchdowns in just five playoff games in the Stroud-Ryans era. It’s possible his last pass is a playoff pick-six after his last pass as a Packer was a game-ending interception at home in a game with playoff implications against the Lions.

It usually never ends well. For the Steelers, nothing has ended well in the last decade, but I’ll say this one was a little different since you really can’t blame the defense. Sure, they had poor plays on third downs all night, but it was a 10-6 game with 13:00 left. Do something on offense. The Steelers got a Stroud fumble at the Houston 21 and moved the ball 4 yards before settling for a field goal.

They stuck to their guns, which means they have no identity on offense. They had some good plays early to D.K. Metcalf before he dropped a big pass and shut down the rest of the night. Pat Freiermuth’s usage all season was criminal, but that’s what happens when your QB is so WR-centric and your OC is in love with Jonnu Smith.

The Steelers even led 3-0 after the first quarter, a big departure from their usual 21-0 deficit in the playoffs. But the Texans still got to 30 points, extending their record streak to 7 playoff games allowing 28+ points. They also set a record with a fifth-straight playoff loss by double digits.

The Houston defense is great, but the Steelers had them on their heels early and just got worse by the drive. No touchdowns scored. It was actually better when the Steelers would lose a 45-42 playoff game at home. At least the offense could score after some mistakes. This was impotency.

This team was false hope all year. They’d look good for a half against a contender, then they’d get crushed after halftime against the Seahawks, Chargers, Packers, Bills, and now the Texans.

And the sad part is nothing really changes until they fire Tomlin and get lucky with a high draft pick on a quarterback. That’s the only way you’re going to get fundamental change in Pittsburgh.

I think 600 words will suffice, because what more could you say at this point? Same old Steelers.

Packers at Bears: Finally, This Rivalry Is Worth Watching in Prime Time

The 2025 Packers-Bears just gave us the best trilogy since, what, Nolan’s Batman? For years we had to endure this dated rivalry in an island game, but with the arrival of coach  Ben Johnson in Chicago, we got three great games late in the season with the Bears winning both meetings at Soldier Field in dramatic comeback fashion as they’ve done all year.

I’m not sure if Johnson’s vitriol for the Packers stems from his Lions days (jealousy?), or if it’s just manufactured bravado to endear himself with the Chicago community. But he may have ended Matt LaFleur’s time in Green Bay or at least limited it to one more season at best after a total collapse from the Packers, who lost their last four regular-season games before blowing a 21-3 lead on the road, and a 15-point lead in the fourth quarter (only the fourth time that’s happened in the playoffs after Roger Staubach’s comeback off the bench in 1972, the 2002 49ers vs. Giants, and Super Bowl 51).

The wild part is, much like John Harbaugh losing his Baltimore job on the swing of a kicker’s 44-yard field goal, it’s not like Johnson badly outcoached LaFleur in this game. In fact, some curious decisions by Johnson on fourth downs (Dan Campbell’s protégé) helped lead to the Bears trailing 21-3 at halftime. Green Bay kicker Brandon McManus also cost the team 7 points by missing three makeable kicks.

The Packers, who never won another game after Micah Parsons tore his ACL in Denver, wasted one of Jordan Love’s best games of the season. He didn’t turn the ball over, he distributed the ball very well to his wideouts with four of them catching a touchdown, including the first of the year for rookie Matthew Golden after they got him in space to show off his speed. Love did this with Josh Jacobs not producing a damn thing on the ground after halftime, which is part of why the Packers became ineffective and kept giving the ball back to the Bears to make this 18-point comeback.

Caleb Williams looked like a young quarterback going through first-playoff start jitters. He threw two interceptions on fourth downs, one of which shouldn’t have been caught as it cost the Packers 27 yards in field position.

But the Bears were hanging in there at 21-6 in the fourth quarter, then proceeded to catch quite a few breaks. Williams nearly lost a fumble on a 3rd-and-10 sack, but the Bears recovered the ball and were able to kick the 51-yard field goal to make it 21-9.

After Love was called for his second grounding penalty of the half, the Bears scored a touchdown to make it 21-16. The Packers overcame some mistakes and made it 28-16 on Golden’s great touchdown with 6:36 left. That should have been a dagger, but these 2025 Bears don’t know when to die.

But it’s funny how the key turning point of the game was the result of the Bears not being well prepared on offense, which should be Johnson’s expertise area, and getting bailed out for it to save the game. Chicago faced a 4th-and-3 at midfield with 5:37 left. Hurrying to get the snap off, the Bears snapped the ball over Williams’ head, which would have been a disastrous, likely game-ending turnover on downs.

But the Bears were penalized for a false start, setting up a 4th-and-8, and given a second chance, Williams made the throw of his career to find Rome Odunze for 27 yards. Game on from there.

It could have been curtains without the false start, so that’s how another Chicago mistake actually saved the game. The Bears turned that drive into 8 points and it was 27-24 with 4:18 left. But then it was LaFleur’s turn to ruin the game for his team with infuriating timeout usage. He burned one after an incomplete pass brought up 3rd-and-10, then the Packers immediately suffered a delay of game coming out of it anyway. Inexcusable.

That’s when McManus missed the 44-yard field goal with 2:51 left. Not the biggest miss of the game for him if you ask me. He missed the extra point after Golden’s touchdown that would have made it 28-16 with 6:36 left. That would have meant the Bears had to score two touchdowns instead of possibly settling for 8+3 or 3+8.

The Bears ended up scoring 2 touchdowns anyway, but look at the impact that point had. Instead of trailing 31-28 or 29-28 after Chicago’s last score, it was a 31-27 deficit, meaning Love had to get a touchdown with 1:36 and one timeout left instead of a field goal.

Green Bay’s usage of that final timeout was also questionable, then as fate would have it, an injury led to a 10-second runoff, making things even harder. Love almost had Golden for a touchdown on one play, but then he fumbled the final snap and had to fire a pass to the end zone that fell incomplete, and the Bears extended their record with a seventh win this season after trailing in the final 2:00.

Going into this game, I would have thought the rumors of LaFleur getting fired with a loss were BS. But after seeing the way it played out and thinking about all the big-game failures he’s had in seven years, the Packers might be wise for a change of leadership here.

It probably wasn’t going to be a Super Bowl season anyway for the Packers after losing Parsons, but that second half was coaching malpractice. It wouldn’t be so crazy for LaFleur to be moving on to another team for 2026 now.

As for the Bears, what more can you say? Caleb Williams is exactly the reason why a stat like EPA per play isn’t the end-all, be-all of stats for quarterbacks. Can you get the job done and score when you have to no matter how many downs or snaps it takes? He seems to be pretty good at that, and some of the throws are just incredible. Still misses his share of easy ones, but he can get better with that.

It should be quite the game with the Rams next week, another new matchup. The Rams have already allowed five game-winning drives, so Williams might have a shot at tying the single-season 4QC/GWD records with eight each.

Bills at Jaguars: The Trevor Lawrence Legacy Game Goes as Expected

The Buffalo pass defense. Like I’ve been saying for over a month, the Buffalo pass defense in a playoff field without Patrick Mahomes is why this team can get to the Super Bowl even without home games or a good run defense. They just have to stop some unproven quarterbacks in crunch time, and Lawrence was the first on their list, bringing the season totals to 8 saves and 0 blown leads for the Bills.

Oh, there were lead changes in the fourth quarter just as there were in all the early games this weekend. But when it came time for the final drive and Lawrence had a solid minute to get a kicker with incredible range into position, he immediately threw a pick to end the season.

But I think the game was lost well before that. The Jaguars should have had a run-heavy approach in this one. How does Tuten rip off runs of 20, 14, and 13 yards to end the first quarter and get one more carry the rest of the game? How?

They put their eggs in Lawrence’s basket, and while he settled down later in the game and made some nice throws, he killed them early with a pick that led to a 1-yard field goal drive for the Bills. He killed them when he ducked under a defender and his shin was down short on a 4th down in the red zone when the Jags had a chance to go up 14-3 after the Bills fumbled a kickoff.

It was evident early that Lawrence wasn’t on his A game, but the Jaguars didn’t do enough to test that run defense of the Bills. Also, the Jags were gifted a 54-yard field goal attempt before halftime that I’m not sure they deserved by beating the clock (did they really?), and Cam Little, after all the praise for his record-long kicks, missed it. That hurts in a 3-point loss.

But the Bills had a good offensive plan to throw those little short passes to Shakir to pace the offense on a day where James Cook was bottled up by the No. 1 run defense. Maybe a few too many Josh Allen designed runs when he’s banged up, but they made it work. And of course with the season on the line, he went to the Tush Push again, and this time he was pushed ahead for a 10-yard gain on 4th-and-1 with the season on the line.

That play was so weird to me. You obviously want to stop them since it’s fourth down. But once he got moving like that, do you just let them score? It was 24-20, so Buffalo absolutely needed a touchdown, but what if you stop them at the 5? You can still get a stop there to win the game. Once he got to the 1, why not just let him go the distance? Weird play.

Then Buffalo was stuck in no man’s land since you really don’t want to risk wasting a down with a bad play and getting a penalty or something stupid to push you back. Ideally, you’d run clock there and score on 2nd down with the sneak, leaving the Jaguars less than 20 seconds to work with. But they scored on first down, whether by design or not, and the Jaguars were going to get the ball back in a 27-24 game with 59 seconds left.

But you get a wild tipped ball that’s intercepted, and just like that, the season is over for the Jaguars. To evoke Dan Campbell, this may have been their best shot too in this AFC. But that’s one road win and one postseason game-winning drive in the books for Allen, who had neither of those things in his career before Sunday.

Next up is Denver as I predicted it’d be, and I think they have a very good shot of winning that one too because of their pass defense against Bo Nix. Again, someone has to be willing to run to take this team down, and someone better get Allen to the ground on defense. That’s why Houston is really the danger team for the Bills, but they may end up avoiding them here.

So far, so good.

Rams at Panthers: Stafford with MVP-Style Revenge Against Carolina

I kept saying the spread (Rams -10.5) was always too high for a team that’s been shaky in the last month like the Rams, who have already blown games as a huge favorite along with two huge leads in the second half against the Eagles and Seahawks. They already lost in Carolina in Week 13.

The Rams prevailed 34-31 this time, but it did show why they’re a shaky bet to go the distance. The short-yardage runs, the fourth-down decision making, the defensive play as of late, and some turnovers from Stafford and the offense are not leading to dominant play late in the season.

In this game, Stafford completed his first eight passes with Puka Nacua doing whatever he wants. But then Stafford hit his hand on a helmet and wasn’t the same. Nacua dropped a 46-yard touchdown going into halftime, and the Rams had a huge turnover on downs moment late in the second quarter. I get why McVay went for it; to control the rest of the clock and go into halftime up 13-17 points. But by not getting it, the Rams only led by 3.

Bryce Young was more than solid in his first playoff game. Certainly a few plays he’d like to have back, but the running game wasn’t there for him, and he made some clutch throws in big spots to finish with 264 passing yards.

Young did lead two go-ahead touchdown drives in the fourth quarter, but the defense was unable to hold up. They had a chance at a Stafford interception on a mix-up with Nacua with just under 12:00 left, but Puka made a play on the ball to force an incompletion on a drive that ended with a touchdown instead.

But when the Rams got the ball back with 2:34 left, it was all calmness and precision from Stafford on the 71-yard march to win the game. He reportedly told Davante Adams that it was time to go rip their hearts out, which he did. He threw a 19-yard touchdown to Colby Parkinson with 38 seconds left.

Young got the ball back in a 34-31 game with all three timeouts, so that gives you access to the entire playbook and you can use every square inch of the field with no concern for the clock. However, he unfortunately saved his worst drive for the last as the Panthers couldn’t gain a yard, and Young threw four straight incompletions to end the game on downs.

Horn had a chance at a low catch on fourth down, but by that point, you’re down to under 7 seconds and still not in field goal range, so the real failure of the drive came well before the final snap. Just not the execution we saw from Young in these moments in the regular season, and it cost them at the end here.

But it was still a great effort for an 8-9 team that was the biggest home underdog in NFL playoff history. Scary times for the Rams, but they prevailed and are moving onto Chicago.

49ers at Eagles: Repeating Is Hard

The 2025 Eagles were able to end a long drought and repeat as NFC East champions, but the only other repeat they’re going to end 2025 with is reminding us that this offense played half-assed football all season going back to opening night against Dallas when they only scored a field goal after a great first half.

The Eagles repeatedly did this all season, so it’s no surprise their season ended in this fashion. They scored two touchdowns on their first three drives, then never found the end zone on their last seven possessions. A.J. Brown bitched about targets all year and finished this game with 3 catches for 25 yards and some bad drops/incompletions. He might have played his last game with Philly.

Meanwhile, the 49ers hung in there and made it work without Ricky Pearsall, then they lost tight end George Kittle to a torn Achilles early in the game. Demarcus Robinson set the tone early with a 61-yard catch-and-run in stride on the opening drive, which he finished with a touchdown on his way to 111 yards.

Brock Purdy wasn’t perfect with a couple of interceptions, but he played well to get to 262 yards and 2 touchdowns without Kittle and Pearsall. They also couldn’t run the ball for much (16 carries for 51 yards). But on the first play of the fourth quarter, they brought back a trick play from Super Bowl 58 with Jauan Jennings throwing a 29-yard touchdown that required a great diving catch from Chrisitan McCaffrey to take a 17-16 lead. Both teams missed an extra point in the game (Eagles early, 49ers late).

The Eagles didn’t have Lane Johnson at tackle, which hurt as there were some big holding penalties that killed drives in the second half. They were able to turn Purdy’s second pick into a field goal drive that took a 19-17 lead with 8:00 left. But a defense that’s wilted in some fourth quarters blew a fifth lead this year. Purdy led a 66-yard march, finishing on third down with a 4-yard touchdown pass to CMC for a 23-19 lead with 2:54 left after the extra point was missed.

The 49ers probably should have gone for 2 there as 4 vs. 5 is little difference, and at least if you’re up 6 points, the other team might miss the extra point as we’ve seen Jake Elliott do this year.

Anyways, it was on Hurts to deliver a game-winning drive, which would have been his first in the postseason. It was nearly a four-and-out drive after a horrible drop by Brown on third down. But Dallas Goedert cleaned it up with 15 yards on fourth-and-5. However, once the drive reached the San Francisco 20, things stalled out. The poor pass rush for the 49ers got home for a 1-yard loss on a sack, then Hurts threw three straight incompletions to end the season for the Eagles.

On 4th-and-11, Hurts threw to Goedert with three defenders around him and it was closer to a pick than anything. I’m not sure he had any real other options on the play, but that’s season over there. The 49ers pulled it off.

I was going to reply to a tweet I saw before kickoff about the bad EPA rankings for the 49ers’ defense this year, and I keep hearing the sentiment that they’re a bottom-5 defense, which doesn’t jive with their ranking of 13th in points and 16th in points per drive allowed.

Again, this is an example of how EPA can miss some fundamental information. That’s a stat that can get juiced and heavily inflated by splash plays like sacks and turnovers. So, it’s not a surprise the 49ers don’t look good in EPA when they don’t get many splash plays. But they must be doing something right if they’re usually not getting destroyed on the scoreboard.

Throw in the struggles of the Eagles to play a 60-minute game on offense, and the 49ers always had a good shot of pulling this one out as a low-scoring game you win in the fourth quarter. That’s exactly what happened too.

They can do the same thing in Seattle, a team they’ve held to 13 points in both meetings this year. But we have all week to build up that one.

The Eagles are done. No repeat for them like I foolishly picked on Friday night. But I thought the defense would be better than this as I didn’t see getting killed by Robinson and a touchdown pass from Jennings leading to the end for this team.

Finally, I don’t think it’s hindsight to question why Nick Sirianni didn’t try to get that No. 2 seed last week by beating Washington. Wouldn’t you rather face a banged-up Green Bay team that’s lost four in a row? A team you already beat in a low-scoring game instead of a 49ers team that is well coached and still has some elite players, and they never seem to go one-and-done in the postseason. They can score too with Purdy, so yeah, I think that was a tactical error by Sirianni.

Not to mention getting home-field over Chicago if you’re the No. 2 seed. I didn’t like that decision to rest last week, and I really don’t like it now after what we saw from the Eagles on Sunday.

Chargers at Patriots: Roman, Lend Me Your Ears So I Can Whisper “You’re Fired”

The last NFL team to score 3 points in a playoff game before the Chargers on Sunday night was the Ravens in Buffalo during COVD. Who was the offensive coordinator? Greg Roman. I think we’ve seen enough of him here, and while it’s clearly not all his fault, he’s wasting Justin Herbert’s talent and hasn’t gotten any good results in the big games the last two years. I think they should make him the sacrificial lamb and fire him over this one after the Chargers scored 22 points in the final three games of the season.

Moving onto the quarterback, these Herbert playoff appearances keep getting worse. Now 0-3, I actually think he was better last year when he threw four interceptions (one dropped, one down 20) in Houston compared to this impotent performance with 3 points making the 2025 Patriots look like the 2003 Patriots. The weather wasn’t even an issue.

I also think that Houston game might be messing with him mentally, because how do you not pull the trigger to McConkey on this play early?

You can’t be too worried about throwing picks in a game like this. That’s how you end up scoring 3 points and just running or taking sacks all night because you’re scared of putting the ball 10 yards down the field. Terrible mindset to have in a playoff game.

The thing is the pass protection wasn’t really that bad until it was 16-3 in the fourth quarter. Then Herbert was swarmed and engulfed. But the damage had already been done earlier on the first seven drives.

As for Drake Maye in his first playoff game, he was bad. He was inaccurate against a zone defense. He turned into a sack merchant again, going down 5 times (lost over 6 yards per sack too this time so he wasn’t even mitigating the losses this week), and he should have had two lost fumbles, and the second one could have been an easy touchdown for the Chargers that would have made it an interesting 16-10 game with time. Most of his big plays were blown coverage or huge YAC on a checkdown to Stevenson.

Just not impressed, and objectively I don’t know how people can praise a 16-point performance like this from a quarterback. But it was his first playoff game, and he at least did better in the second half after a poor first half. Just interesting to note that in his second NFL win over a winning team, he had a 6-3 lead at halftime in both games (this and at Buffalo).

There’s also the fact that Vrabel and New England are used to these low-scoring playoff wins.

What’s next, two special teams touchdowns against Houston while Josh Dobbs has to come off the bench and direct a win? Then beating the Rams in the Super Bowl with 13 offensive points? Or is that only reserved for Brady?

Neither the Texans nor Patriots allowed a touchdown this week, so who knows what to expect from that one. But based on this game, I wouldn’t expect a ton of scoring from Maye in the passing game.

But the Chargers are in a tough spot as they need a new OC and they’ll probably lose their DC (Jesse Minter) to a head coaching Job. I’m not sure you can ever trust Herbert in one of these games until he proves he can get the job done. And they’re always on the road because they can seemingly never win this division. The Chiefs won’t be down for long, and the Broncos have a lot of good players and a coach on par with Harbaugh.

The 2025 Chargers had that built-in excuse with the offensive tackles going out, but I’m surprised at how little of a factor that was for three quarters on Sunday. Just played a lot of bad, passive football and that can be even worse than getting aggressive and throwing some picks.

At least they scored more points last year in Houston.

Next week: I always say the divisional round is the best weekend of the NFL year, but it’s got a high bar to clear after what we just saw. It’s also going to try to do it by introducing the top seeds, Seattle and Denver, into the mix. We’ll see if the Texans can sack the Patriots, and Rams vs. Bears could be the shootout of the postseason.

NFL 2025 Wild Card Predictions: Path to Super Bowl 60 Edition

~ Scott ~ Leave a comment

The 2025 NFL season has been so hard to predict that I wish I could find a way to write off all 14 playoff teams. The good news is 13 of them will lose in the next month, and this is the moment where I make that prediction for the last team standing.

There are so many teams that I feel like you can immediately write off for one huge reason that will inevitably doom them in trying to win 3-4 playoff games in a row:

  • Panthers – They’re just not good enough.
  • Patriots – Schedule merchants who aren’t ready to go the distance
  • Steelers – Tomlin’s playoff defense will eventually implode
  • Texans – Defense is great but that offense is going to tank them eventually
  • Chargers – Offensive line won’t hold up for 4 road wins
  • Broncos – Stagnant offense that waits until the 4th quarter to score will doom them
  • Bears – Way too reliant on D/ST fueling late-game comebacks
  • Packers – Not enough horses to go on No. 7 seed run without Parsons and Kraft

That leaves six teams who I feel can win it all even though they have a glaring issue that concerns me. But it’s something I feel the rest of the team can cover up for a game or two that they can maybe squeak by.

  • Bills – Run defense has been playing better and not sure who in the AFC can really run wild on them.
  • Jaguars – A shame one has to lose Sunday but this could either be Trevor Lawrence’s chance to be Eli/Flacco/Foles or he implodes with too much responsibility
  • Seahawks – I don’t trust Sam Darnold but he probably has the best situation going for him and he almost beat the Rams after throwing 4 INTs because of that team support.
  • 49ers – Still think a core that’s been to two Super Bowls can get back home for SB 60 but the injuries (Bosa, Warner, Pearsall, etc.) make it so tough on the road.
  • Eagles – Yes, their offense should probably have them in the first category, but this is why track record matters and I’m still willing to give the 2-time NFC champs with the reigning SB MVP a shot (defense is better than a year ago too).
  • Rams – Probably played as well as any team has all year but they’ve blown five games and struggle to close and it’s usually the little things (short yardage runs, FG kicking, 4th down stops on D, etc.).

So how do I see it playing out? Many, many ways if I’m being honest. But if you want one version of my vision today, here it goes:

Rams take care of the Panthers, Packers eliminate the Bears, and the Eagles take out the 49ers this weekend in the NFC.

Bills outlast the Jags, the Chargers go chargering in New England, and the Steelers finally win one for Tomlin to take out the best defense.

Seattle survives a scare from Green Bay in the 7-1 matchup, and the Eagles find a way again to deny McVay and Stafford.

Buffalo eliminates Denver for the second year in a row, and the Steelers lose a game they should have won in New England.

Vic Fangio puts Sam Darnold in a blender and he implodes against that secondary like everyone expected him to do.

The Bills do it to the Patriots again at Foxboro as Josh Allen has his first playoff game-winning drive while Maye can’t close again.

Super Bowl 60 is a rematch from Week 17: Bills vs. Eagles but in good weather. However, the Bills’ lack of wideouts hurts them against that defense again, and the Eagles find a way to repeat despite hearing all year how their offense is garbage. But don’t sleep on that defense, and I still think Jalen Hurts has the ability to rise to the occasion with the talent around him to make some necessary plays that he didn’t really have to do last postseason. This time, he gets it done and the Eagles do in fact pull off the repeat.

I don’t love it. In fact, I’d rather see something like Texans vs. 49ers since I bet on it over a month ago, or maybe the Packers do the unthinkable and go to the Super Bowl as the first No. 7 seed after I picked them the last two years to do so.

But this is where I am. I’m also very open to the Rams getting it done by actually closing games out, which would mean getting rid of the Eagles in the divisional round and getting some revenge on Darnold for that blown 16-point lead in what was the game of the year for the regular season. Jacksonville winning this weekend would also throw a huge wrench in my vision, but if that happens, then I really do believe Lawrence can do the Eli/Flacco/Foles thing here.

We’re overdue for one of those anyway, aren’t we?

NFL Wild Card Picks

Already let the cat out of the bag with this weekend’s picks, but for spread purposes, here are my wild card picks:

  • Rams 26, Panthers 20 – That spread (Rams -10.5) is too high but the Rams move on
  • Packers 24, Bears 17- Snow game? Run the ball, GB.
  • Bills 24, Jaguars 20 – Maybe lower scoring than expected, but I think the Bills will have more balanced offense and Lawrence will have a big pick.
  • Eagles 20, 49ers 17 – Lowest scoring game of the week.
  • Patriots 23, Chargers 20 – Dicker the Kicker choke incoming? Does Maye have a Tuck Rule moment in him for his first playoff game?
  • Steelers 26, Texans 23 – More points than expected as Aaron Rodgers finds a way to get it done against the top defense.

This Week’s Articles

Guess I really wrote this ass-backwards this week, but here are links to my final QB rankings of 2025 (won’t be doing anymore until July), Fraud Alert Ratings for 2025 playoff teams, and about 12,000 words in full previews on every Wild Card game.

2025 Final NFL Quarterback Rankings: Matthew Stafford Is the MVP
2025 NFL Fraud Alert Rating: Should We Trust the Bears and Patriots in the Playoffs?
2025 NFC Wild Card Preview: Are We Sleeping on the Philadelphia Eagles Repeating?
2025 AFC Wild Card Preview: Without the Chiefs and Ravens, Things Feel Wide Open This Year
Scott’s Seven NFL Picks: 2025 Wild Card Weekend

2025 NFL Stat Oddity: Week 18

~ Scott ~ 1 Comment

After a Week 18 finale that saw nine comeback opportunities, the 2025 regular season is in the books. I can’t recall a crazier season than this one with none of the Chiefs, Ravens, or Bills winning their division, and the first two didn’t even have a winning record.

Seven new division winners is a record, and somehow the only team that repeated (Eagles) is from the division that never repeats (first time since 2004).

We might see a Trevor Lawrence vs. Sam Darnold Super Bowl at this point. That’s why I was worried my preseason predictions would be the worst they ever were, but they weren’t. In fact, by being off by an average of 2.72 wins, I’ve had five seasons since 2013 that were less accurate.

One difference this year is I only got one team exactly right, and it was the Steelers finishing 10-7. Barely. But I only had five teams where I was off by 5+ games, so that’s not too bad.

Onto the playoffs.

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

Seahawks at 49ers: The No. 1 Seed

It didn’t necessarily look like a battle for the No. 1 seed in the NFC, because the Seahawks and 49ers repeatedly made mistakes to keep the score so low in this 13-3 final. In fact, the game set history for the fewest points ever in the NFL despite both quarterbacks completing over 70% of their passes and both running games averaging over 4.0 yards per carry:

But the Seahawks prevailed because their defense was the best unit in the game. It helps when the 49ers didn’t have Trent Williams or Ricky Pearsall, but the 49ers scored their fewest points in a game under Kyle Shanahan since they managed just a field goal in his debut against Carolina way back in 2017.

Brock Purdy was held to 127 yards on 19 completions, and Christian McCaffrey had a rough night with 23 yards on 8 carries. He also tipped a pass deep in the red zone for a killer interception in the fourth quarter when the 49ers trailed 13-3.

Speaking of which, the 49ers are now 0-50 when trailing by 8+ points in the fourth quarter under Shanahan. I’ve seen the stat posted as 0-47, but I think that misses a couple playoff games, and it’s possible Stathead has a data error for a game that doesn’t belong. But I know the 0 wins is 100% accurate as Shanahan’s teams have never been able to make these comebacks, and butterfingers on a pick like that won’t help.

Sam Darnold got through a big game without any turnovers, though he did nearly lose a fumble and got lucky on a sideline throw where a defender only got one foot in bounds. But he was okay outside of taking a brutal sack on 1st-and-goal at the 1 on the opening drive before misfiring on fourth-and-goal. His running backs absolutely dominated with 230 yards from scrimmage between the duo.

The Seahawks missed field goals from 47 and 26 (WTF?), so that kept the score low too even though they dominated the game in first downs (23-9) and yards (361-173).

It means Seattle has a week off and home-field advantage throughout the playoffs, something they had in their three previous Super Bowl trips (2005, 2013-14). The 49ers will have to travel and win some road games if they want to get back to Levi’s Stadium for Super Bowl 60.

The 49ers’ stock definitely takes a hit from this game, but I’m still not sold on the Seahawks as a Super Bowl team. But we have time to get into that the next two weeks or more.

Ravens at Steelers: Game of the Weekend

I can tell my Steelers fandom isn’t what it used to be, because I should have been a basket case watching that fourth quarter, which was as dramatic as any game this season with everything on the line.

But I was almost resigned to the fact of a Baltimore win, and I had a good vision for the playoffs with a Baltimore win, including a potential AFC Championship Game between the Bills and Ravens.

But that’s all moot now after Aaron Rodgers delivered one of his most clutch comebacks in his long career given the D.K. Metcalf suspension and the way they leaned on him heavily with a season-high 294 passing yards. That good old Baltimore defense, always ripe for hitting up for big yards and a double-digit comeback. You could see things trending that way even before Kyle Hamilton was injured in the third quarter as the Steelers should  have finished the last drive of the first half with 6 before a goal-line stop.

However, the Steelers had some mental lapses on defense and left receivers wide open for Lamar Jackson, who hit them either for long touchdowns or what should have been a game-winning play to Likely to set up the field goal. But you definitely don’t love taking a 2-yard knee and not giving the ball to Derrick Henry for some more yards to get closer when you had a timeout left. Always get closer in that stadium for a kick of 40+ yards.

I had picked the Ravens to win the Super Bowl this year with the idea that 2025 would finally be the year they protect the ball and not screw things up with the season on the line. But my worry this summer was the rookie kicker, Tyler Loop, screwing things up in taking over for [REDACTED] and missing a do-or-die field goal.

Remember, the Ravens were in this position because Chris Boswell, usually one of the most reliable kickers in the game, missed the extra point. He’s been terrible the last three weeks for some reason, and he almost helped end the team’s season as they hung onto a 26-24 lead instead of 27-24.

But whether it was nerves for a rookie, a cold night, or the holy water thrown on that end of the end zone before the game, but fate smiled on the Steelers and Loop’s 44-yard field goal was wide right, ending Baltimore’s season, maybe John Harbaugh’s coaching tenure, and sending the Steelers to the playoffs with their first AFC North title since 2020.

Talk about streaks colliding next week. The Steelers are on a 6-game losing streak in the playoffs, allowing at least 28 points in every game (NFL record). But they’ve won 23 straight home games on Monday night with no losses since 1991, and it’s a Monday night game with Houston, who I felt last year was the kind of team the Steelers would need to face to end the streak as they shouldn’t have the offense that can light up the Steelers.

Maybe things with Rodgers, who gets Metcalf back, will be different this time. Maybe it’ll be another 21-0 deficit before you can blink (Chargers did fall behind 14-0 to Houston in 5:00 two weeks ago).

But in this twisted AFC, I’m actually feeling a little optimistic about the Steelers again and looking forward to Monday night.

Panthers at Buccaneers: The Funniest NFC South Ending, Part 1

Objectively, this game sure felt like the officiating was in favor of Tampa Bay to make sure it came down to Sunday’s game in Atlanta. There were some atrocious calls on a fumble, a weak OPI call that wiped out a big play in the third quarter, Cade Otton getting DPI for tripping over his own feet, a missed facemask, etc.

Officiating aside, I thought the quarterbacks handled the wet and rainy conditions well outside of a bad pick thrown by each. Bryce Young didn’t take any sacks, and he still threw for 266 yards and 2 touchdowns with literally no help from the running game (12 carries for 20 yards).

In fact, the running back position killed this game for Carolina in the fourth quarter when Rico Dowdle fell to the ground and tried to pitch the ball back to Young on a flea-flicker, and the Bucs recovered that fumble in a 16-7 game. Killer stuff, and no, you should never be trying a flea-flicker at the opponent 20 as that takes away the real long deep ball you’d like to set up from that. That’s why I question if that was actually the call or if Dowdle just tried to ad-lib after falling.

That was a crushing blow even with the Bucs getting their 36-yard field goal blocked on the other end. By the time the Panthers scored their touchdown and used their timeouts to get the ball back in a 16-14 game, just 18 seconds remained at their own 3-yard line. Tough for even the Carolina Reaper to do anything in that spot.

Alas, they had a backup route to the playoffs…

Saints at Falcons: The Funniest NFC South Ending, Part 2

We got the perfect ending to the 2025 NFC South as the Falcons did in fact beat the Saints to help Carolina win the division for the first time since 2015. Everything was coming up Carolina’s way in this game, including a late interception by Tyler Shough (otherwise played well) that probably locked up OROY for Tetairoa McMillan too.

Wild that you can get this much going your way by losing your last two games like Carolina did. But even with winning enough games to get to 8-9 and force that three-way tie, the Falcons still fired coach Raheem Morris. Can’t say I disagree with that one. This team should have won the division this year and blew it.

Now, the Saints might end up being the winner next year if they can add a few pieces around Shough.

Chargers at Broncos: Trey Lance Tried (Sorta)

The Chargers started Trey Lance instead of Justin Herbert, and it went about as poorly as you expected. He threw a pick-six, but the defense kept the Chargers hanging around all day before the Broncos pulled away late to win the No. 1 seed.

I get the idea of Sean Payton “saving things” for the playoffs on offense since he could see this team again in two weeks if the Chargers upset the No. 2 Patriots on the road. But it was still not an encouraging game on offense from Bo Nix and company.

Dolphins at Patriots: No Repeat of 2019

I guess you need a Ryan Fitzpatrick at quarterback to go into Foxboro for a finale upset if you’re Miami. That’s a callback to 2019 when the Patriots blew a first-round bye. You don’t get a bye for the No. 2 seed anymore, but the Patriots wrapped it up by making short order of the Dolphins. The running back duo scored five touchdowns in a variety of ways.

I haven’t seen any news on Mike McDaniel getting fired, so maybe he ends up coming back without Tua Tagovailoa in 2026.

Jets at Bills: Mitch Trubisky Caps Off Historic Season for QBs Facing Jets

You see why the schedule matters? The Jets played such a pathetic month of football that they gave up 6 touchdowns to Trevor Lawrence, 5 touchdowns to Drake Maye, and Mitch Trubisky hit them with 4 to end their season allowing 36 touchdown passes with 0 interceptions, new NFL records for futility. Only the Jets.

James Cook is lucky Derrick Henry slowed down in the second half or he would have lost that rushing title to him. But the Bills got to pad some defensive stats in the win and now have to face the Jaguars on the road in maybe the most interesting game of wild card weekend.

Colts at Texans: Maybe Riley Leonard Should Have Started?

I’m not saying the Colts make the playoffs if they start Riley Leonard instead of bringing Philip Rivers out of retirement. But maybe they should trust their coach and start Leonard when he was healthy? I was shocked at how he was taking it to Houston on the road in his first NFL start, and they were playing starters on defense when he did his most damage in the first half.

Unfortunately, even with the Texans calling off some dogs in the second half, Davis Mills led a game-winning drive and the Texans still won 32-30 to get to 12-5. But Steichen can coach offense, and it’s just unfortunate what happened to the Colts this year and how poorly the Sauce Gardner trade will age, especially if they try to get the draft resources together to steal Arch Manning in 2027.

Titans at Jaguars: Short Work

Watching Trevor Lawrence scramble in the third quarter with a 31-7 lead had me holding my breath. Get him on the sideline; this one was over. But great winning streak by the Jaguars to end the season, and Lawrence is playing the best ball of his career. Cam Ward unfortunately got injured on a touchdown scramble run, the first time he missed snaps this year. Get him a coach and he could be much better in 2026.

Chiefs at Raiders: Damn, Can Spags Hold Any Lead?

The Chiefs finish 2025 with 0 saves on defense (upheld a one-score lead in the fourth quarter/overtime) and 4 blown leads. They even gave up two more game-winning drives in the games Mahomes didn’t start. Spags really can’t stop anyone in crunch time, including Aidan O’Connell in the final minute.

The 2025 Chiefs without Mahomes are the first offense since the 2009 Raiders (JaMarcus Russell) to go three straight games without 170 yards of offense. If that was Travis Kelce’s final game, yikes. The Raiders got the win and still got the No. 1 pick on top of it.

But that’s also probably the last game in the coaching career of Pete Carroll. He was fired on Monday after one terrible season.

Browns at Bengals: Garrett Gets the Record in Stunning Fashion

It didn’t look like Myles Garrett was going to set the sack record after all. But with just over 5:00 left, he timed the snap perfectly and buried Joe Burrow for No. 23. I thought it was a little odd the way the game just stopped for it, but the Bengals should have used the time to come up with a better play.

While Joe Burrow did lead a rare go-ahead drive in the final minutes, he botched the critical 2-point conversion. That’s so costly in a 18-17 game where you open yourself up to losing by a field goal, which is more likely than ever now with the new kickoff rule and kicker’s range. Sure enough, Shedeur Sanders led his first game-winning drive with the Browns getting the walk-off field goal to make Garrett’s happy day even happier.

That makes up for Week 1 when the Browns choked on a go-ahead field goal late in the game against the Bengals. But what a sign of the times. The Browns win this game and fire Kevin Stefanski after six years. The Bengals lose again and are keeping Zac Taylor for 2026, reportedly.

Never change, Bungles.

Cardinals at Rams: Stafford Should Wrap Up MVP

The Rams played starters to go for the No. 5 seed, and it was one of those weeks where the Cardinals made it a close game, trailing only 23-20 to start the fourth quarter. But Stafford threw two more touchdowns to push his season total to 46, and the Rams finished 12-5, making the 2025 NFC West the first division ever with three 12-win teams.

I already wrote that I’m voting Stafford for MVP this year. Oddly enough, I think the Seattle loss cemented his case for me, doing what he did that night on the road without Adams in what should have been a win that led to the No. 1 seed. Then you watch what Bryce Young and Brock Purdy, two quarterbacks going to the playoffs, did against that Seattle defense in the next two games. Like two different sports.

The Rams should be disappointed with a 12-5 record though. They were in every game late and just didn’t close enough of them, and quarterback play is far down the list of reasons for that.

But maybe they’ll get a revenge tour in the playoffs, starting with the Carolina Panthers on Saturday.

Lions at Bears: Not Loving the Vibes, Ben

Can’t say I liked the way the Bears were down 16-0 at home when they had a chance to lock up the No. 2 seed with a win and drop Detroit under .500 in the process. They did eventually tie the game, but they didn’t close this time, and the Lions got a walk-off field goal to finish 9-8.

The No. 2 seed still worked out for them, but I wasn’t a big fan of the way Johnson handled this finale. Now it’s a rematch with Green Bay.

Commanders at Eagles: Backup Bowl

It’s not like the Eagles knew the Bears would lose to Detroit, but I’m still a bit down on Nick Sirianni for not trying to win this one with starters and get the No. 2 seed. I think I’d much rather play the Packers (injured team) first than the 49ers, and I’d much rather have home-field than go to Chicago should that 3-2 matchup come to fruition in the divisional round.

But the Eagles blew a 17-10 lead in the fourth quarter to Josh Johnson, and that’s why they’re going to play the 49ers now. A matchup we should have seen in the playoffs by now to get a rematch for the 2022 NFC-CG spoiled by Brock Purdy’s elbow injury on the 49ers’ first drive.

Cowboys at Giants: Why’d They Do Dak Like That?

Dak Prescott had won 12 games in a row against the Giants, had a chance to lead the NFL in passing yards, had a chance to finish .500 (8-8-1), and the Cowboys just ran it and benched him at halftime with 70 yards while the Giants rolled to a 34-17 win. I don’t get that at all, except maybe they wanted the Giants to get a weaker draft pick.

Packers at Vikings: [REDACTED]

If Matt LaFleur and the Packers didn’t care about losing their fourth in a row going into the playoffs, why should I care about their 16-3 loss? Ugly game. Had to call timeout and kick a field goal to avoid a shutout. I’ll just say “Nine” doesn’t seem capable of staying healthy, so that’s a problem for Minnesota going forward.

Next week: Playoffs? You kidding me? I’m somehow going to do the final QB rankings of 2025 for Monday, get Fraud Alert Rating for the season by Tuesday, full wild card previews for Wednesday/Thursday, and betting picks by Friday.

NFL 2025 Week 18 Predictions: For All the Marbles Edition

~ Scott ~ Leave a comment

We’ve reached the final weekend of the NFL 2025 regular season, and it’s hard to remember a crazier season than this with so many new contenders and so many favorites falling off. Who would ever have believed that Philip Rivers (4) would throw more touchdowns in December than Patrick Mahomes (0 in 2 games) in 2025?

I just took a sneak peak at where my preseason predictions stand, and while I was expecting the absolute worst, it looks like they’ll either be slightly better than 2024, and no worse than 2020 or 2022. But I’ll post those results on Monday morning, and I plan on doing a pretty full week of content to wrap up 2025’s regular season and get going on playoff coverage for what should be one of the hardest postseasons to predict.

Is there any “gimme” game in this playoffs besides maybe the No. 5 seed in the NFC going to the NFC South winner? I don’t think so. Anyone can beat anyone here, and we’ve even seen the Rams already lose in Carolina, so even that 5-4 matchup is possibly up for grabs.

But we have three division title games (well, one is a quasi-division title game) this weekend, and we could see the final NFL games ever involving the likes of Travis Kelce, Pete Carroll, and Aaron Rodgers. Maybe the last game John Harbaugh ever coaches for the Ravens too, the 40th edition of Harbaugh vs. Tomlin.

This Week’s Articles

2025 NFL Quarterback Rankings Week 18: The Christmas Where Matthew Stafford and Josh Allen Wish They Were Gifted the Jets’ Defense
Scott’s Seven NFL Picks: Week 18

My picks have a parlay for the Ravens-Steelers, Seahawks-49ers, and two NFC South games. I also have picks for Myles Garrett, Travis Kelce, and a parlay of big winners.

NFL Week 18 Predictions

Hoping to finish strong, but it’s always a tough week when you don’t know how motivated the eliminated teams will be, or how many snaps starters will get for the playoff teams.

2025 NFL Week 18 Picks

CAR-TB and NO-ATL: Give me that NFC South special. The Bucs win on Saturday but still get eliminated on Sunday after Atlanta beats the Saints without Chris Olave (pulmonary embolism; get well soon, brother). 3-way tie at 8-9 goes to Carolina, which will hopefully be the impetus for the NFL to stop giving division winners a home playoff game automatically.

SEA-SF: It’s the biggest one and I respect Seattle being probably the best team in the league this year with all three losses coming in the final minute. But I am going with the 49ers at home as I think that offense is peaking and the Seahawks have a QB in Darnold who has to prove he won’t implode in these moments. I still don’t trust him.

CLE-CIN: Myles Garrett gets his sack record, Bengals still win by 8+. If I was Joe Burrow, I’d lay down to give Garrett the cheapest sack possible for the record. See if he takes the bait. Cause it’s Burrow, you know there will probably be other opportunities later in the game, but that’s what I would do to get it out of the way.

DAL-NYG: *Yawn* Dak beats Giants again to get Cowboys to 8-8-1.

GB-MIN: Are we really about to see Clayton Tune against a Flores defense? Yikes, what an awful way to lose the under 8.5 wins bet on the 2025 Vikings.

IND-HOU: Tempted to take Indy ATS, but I think Houston can win a 20-6 type of snoozer to end the season for the Colts with Riley Leonard at QB.

TEN-JAX: I have Jags winning the AFC South here, but I think Cam Ward can end his rookie season on a high note by at least covering the big spread.

KC-LV: Kenny Pickett returns? Chiefs should win but would it really be beneficial to the draft? Just get Travis Kelce his 10 yards quickly and be done with it.

DET-CHI: What a turnaround for these teams since Week 2. I think the Bears cover at home to get that No. 2 seed and drop Detroit to a losing record without Ben Johnson this year.

LAC-DEN: Trey Lance gets a start, and I know Keenan Allen needs 6 catches for a nice incentive. But I’m going to trust Harbaugh enough to not get embarrassed and cover the spread here. Denver wins the No. 1 seed though.

MIA-NE: This might have been interesting in Miami where the Patriots tend to struggle, but it’s at home in January, so they’ll beat up on a bad Miami team here.

WAS-PHI: Yes, the Eagles can cover without Jalen Hurts against a poor defense and backup QB.

ARI-LAR: I find it hard to believe that Sean McVay will really play starters even if he’s locked into the No. 6 seed. But the Cardinals are 50/50 to get completely blown out, so I’ll take his word on it and take the Rams to cover.

NYJ-BUF: We’ll see if Josh Allen dips after the first snap to keep his streak alive, but I think he should at least do the old Peyton Manning strategy in Indy where you play a drive or two before getting out of there. Plus, it’s the Jets, so he very well could watch James Cook pile up some rushing yards to win the rushing title, then set up a tush push TD to keep Allen’s streak of 40-TD seasons alive.

BAL-PIT: I wrote a detailed preview with a +1200 SGP in the picks piece above, but I honestly think the Metcalf suspension is going to doom them in the end. That decision to give the most WR-centric passer ever one good wideout all season, and then for him to be suspended while they face AFC North defenses in bad weather is just more bad luck for Rodgers, who I honestly think should come back in 2026 if the Steelers can find a way to get him another WR.

But I picked Ravens over Packers in the Super Bowl before this absurd season started, and I’m not backing down now on the Baltimore side of things. A run is still possible in this AFC but let’s see how healthy Lamar looks.