NFL Stat Oddity: Week 15

~ Scott ~ 6 Comments

Just another strange week in the NFL in the 2023 season. It started with the end of the Brandon Staley era in Los Angeles after the Raiders scored 63 points. One of the best halves of the year was played between Nick Mullens and Jake Browning in Cincinnati. There were multiple eventful Hail Mary attempts in Cleveland. The game of the week was a 21-point blowout.

All that just to tell us the 49ers are the best team in the league, and we’ll see if the Ravens have anything to say about that next week. But that’s next week.

This week is still going with MNF to come, but we have only had 4 games with a comeback opportunity. That would tie the lowest mark in the 13 seasons I’ve been doing this weekly, and it would be the lowest in a week where all 32 teams played. We had four teams win a game after trailing by double digits, which is a high number, but just not much drama late in games.

I would be shocked if Monday night did not get this week up to 5 opportunities given it’s Pete Carroll’s Seahawks on a Monday night, the 2023 Eagles are going to be there, and maybe a Flu Game for Jalen Hurts (questionable with illness).

I’m not going to cover the Saturday tripleheader below, because I think it was pretty self-explanatory. The games got progressively more one-sided as the day went on with Detroit blowing the doors off the Broncos, making them look like the team that started 1-5 and gave up 70 points in Miami. See what happens when Detroit protects the ball and the Broncos aren’t feasting on turnovers?

The Steelers blew a 13-point lead (5th time under Mike Tomlin) and still went on to lose by 13-plus points for only the second time in franchise history. Tomlin’s decision to punt, down 11 points, with one of the best kickers in the league was another low point for him.

The sloppy first half of Vikings-Bengals actually paved the way for one of the best finishes of the season in overtime. Jake Browning now has as many 7-point comeback wins in the fourth quarter as Joe Burrow in his career (2). Nick Mullens threw arguably the funniest interception of the season, but it was also the 6th game this season where both quarterbacks passed for over 300 yards and multiple touchdown passes:

Tee Higgins had one of the best plays of the year, showing the awareness at the goal line and why he would be a No. 1 wideout on most teams. But that whole half was a good example of what can happen when quarterbacks, even backups like Mullens and Browning, give their great receiving talent chances to make plays.

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

Cowboys at Bills: Familiar Tune for Dallas, New Hit for Buffalo

I need to stop putting high expectations on these big matchups this year. If Mike McCarthy didn’t put his starters back in facing a 31-3 deficit, this might have ended with the Cowboys failing to score a touchdown and neither starting quarterback passing for 100 yards. Yeah, there was rain, but this game was pain.

There are certainly more important things than the MVP award, but I think Dak Prescott just threw it away this year after doing the only thing he couldn’t do: have a total dud performance. Prescott threw for 43 yards in the first half and never looked comfortable, running into a sack on an early third down. The Cowboys have some explaining to do in how the offense can look so unstoppable at home and pedestrian on the road. Only a low-pressure drive, down 31-3, got the offense into the end zone with the game out of reach.

Throw in some early 15-yard roughing penalties on the Cowboys, and this was quickly a 14-0 game when it could have only been 3-0 and maybe the offense could have figured things out. But the Cowboys took themselves out of this one early and never recovered, and that’s been a theme in their big losses under McCarthy. That’s why this team going on the road in the playoffs every round is a big problem.

As for Buffalo, we have gotten so used to the Bills putting the ball in Josh Allen’s hands in big games since 2020 to the point where they don’t even try to run the ball with their running backs. If there is any clear difference in the offense since Ken Dorsey was fired as the offensive coordinator, it would be the impact of running back James Cook.

He had the best game of his career Sunday, making this the least Josh Allen game ever as the quarterback only threw for 94 yards on 15 passes. He even finished with just 8 runs for 24 yards and another touchdown run. But this was the Cook show with 25 carries for 179 yards, a touchdown on the ground, and 42 receiving yards and a great touchdown grab.

Cook did anything he wanted to this defense in the rain, which was a good strategy for sure. But it was still surprising to see Allen throw just 15 passes, or for Dalton Kincaid to have multiple drops at tight end. This was the least the passing game had to do for Buffalo in a game in years.

I’m not sold this is going to be the strategy for Buffalo moving forward, but it did lead to 28 first downs and 31 points against a solid defense. Those early penalties did help extend drives that otherwise end with a field goal attempt and punt, but the Bills moved the ball well and only had 6 possessions with Allen before calling off the dogs in the fourth quarter.

It was just nice to see Buffalo try something different in a big game and make it work. It was disheartening to see Dallas falter in familiar fashion. I flirted in the summer with this being my Super Bowl matchup, but if I had to pick one of these teams to go the distance right now, I’m going with Buffalo, which is still only the No. 9 seed as things currently stand.

But Buffalo will be one of the most “team you don’t want to face in January” teams in years. The Cowboys could lose to Baker Mayfield in the wild card round at this point if this is how they are going to continue playing in big road games.

Ravens at Jaguars: Not a Top Tier Team in Jacksonville

Sunday night could have been a really good game, but Jacksonville’s shortcomings and the way the Ravens control games this year made for a dud of a finish. Once the Ravens scored a touchdown to start the fourth quarter and take a 17-7 lead, the life was sucked out of this one with Jacksonville’s 3-and-out. The Ravens added a field goal, Trevor Lawrence was strip-sacked, the Ravens added another field goal (23-7), and Jacksonville eventually turned it over on downs in the red zone with 3:19 left.

But what a crazy first half. The Jaguars repeatedly moved the ball into scoring territory, but they missed a pair of long field goals, Lawrence flat out fumbled the ball in the open field on a scramble, and he botched the end of the half by not spiking the ball and throwing a pass in bounds inside the 5-yard line to see the clock expire with the Jaguars out of timeouts. Major mistake.

But a game like this does continue to show the flaws in Jacksonville’s roster, especially with Chrisitan Kirk out injured. The Jaguars only scored 9 points against the Chiefs, 3 points against the 49ers, and now 7 points against the Ravens – three Super Bowl contenders that they got to host at home this year and lost to.

Lawrence’s accuracy is too inconsistent, Calvin Ridley (39 yards on 12 targets) hasn’t been the No. 1 stud we thought he could be, and the running game with Travis Etienne just hasn’t been there most of the year.

As for the Ravens, they are just a lot to deal with given Lamar Jackson’s unique skills. He only passed for 171 yards in this game, but he made some key extended plays, and he ran for 97 yards on the way to the team rushing for 251 yards.

The Jaguars are in real danger of losing the AFC South title now that the Colts and Texans are all 8-6. But it feels like this team is going to be limited in playoff success this year regardless of where it finishes in the regular season.

With Baltimore, we’ll see the ultimate test when they travel to San Francisco next Monday night.

Chiefs at Patriots: They Still Haven’t Cut Toney?

As far as Kansas City games go in 2023, this 27-17 win in New England was tame. But they may have been in trouble if they were playing a better team than the Patriots, who were 2-of-12 on third down.

The Chiefs lost another turnover battle (2-1) thanks to a couple of interceptions thrown by Patrick Mahomes on passes that went to his receivers first before they were taken away. The egregious one was yet another play by Kadarius Toney that looked just like his Week 1 drop-to-pick against the Lions. At least this one didn’t get returned for a touchdown, but it did set up the Patriots on a short field for their last touchdown drive to make the game 27-17. Toney just has to go. It is ridiculous to keep putting him on the field when his 4 targets resulted in 5 yards and that turnover.

Travis Kelce was held to 28 yards, but this was a big game for CEH, who had to carry the load with Isiah Pacheco out again. His 20-yard run was the only rushing play of note for the Chiefs, but CEH had a strong receiving game with 64 yards and a very nice touchdown grab.

We’ll see how the Chiefs fare at home against the Raiders next week after Vegas scored 63 points on the Chargers largely by feasting on turnovers. The Chiefs were dying to cough up the obligatory fumble in this game, so they better start protecting that ball better because you’re not going to play the likes of Bailey Zappe and Aidan O’Connell in the playoffs.

Texans at Titans: Luv Ya Blue (No Tie)

It sure did not look like the Texans showed up to play after allowing a big opening touchdown drive by rookie Will Levis, and then Case Keenum threw a pick-six on a play that looked like a new quarterback out of sync with his players. The Texans trailed 13-0 at that point while the Oilers Titans were thriving in their Houston throwback uniforms, which apparently ticked off some of the natives in Texas this week.

But Keenum settled down and the Texans basically beat the Titans at their own game. Devin Singletary rushed for 121 yards while Derrick Henry, the Houston Killer, was held to 9 yards on 16 carries. Levis was pummeled and sacked 7 times.

Keenum got away with one of the dumbest, most dangerous passes of the season that Dalton Schultz somehow turned into a catch, and the Texans forced the game with a touchdown to Noah Brown, who stepped up with Nico Collins out.

After 7 straight scoreless drives and the game getting late into overtime, it really looked like a tie was inevitable, something this 2023 season has avoided so far. When Singletary’s 34-yard touchdown run was wiped away for holding, it really felt like we were going to get a god damn tie.

But much love to returning kicker Ka’imi Fairbairn for making a 54-yard field goal to give the Texans a 19-16 win and avoid that tie. We now have a 3-way tie at 8-6 in the AFC South. That’s the only kind of tie I want to see in the NFL.

49ers at Cardinals: Is San Francisco Inevitable?

It was only Arizona, but San Francisco’s 45-29 win to complete the sweep and clinch the NFC West was the team’s 6th-straight win by at least 12 points, something that’s only been done 23 times now.

In the salary cap era, only the 1996 Packers, 1999 Rams (twice), 2005 Colts, 2007 Patriots, and 2009 Saints have had a streak this long before these 49ers. Those are historic teams with three of them winning the Super Bowl.

Brock Purdy threw 4 more touchdown passes and has taken a considerable lead over Dak Prescott in QBR while adding to his other league-leading efficiency stats. He is the MVP favorite now with roughly -150 odds after Dak Prescott’s dud in Buffalo. Deebo Samuel scored another pair of touchdowns and Christian McCaffrey put in 3 more. Both were left completely wide open on one of their touchdowns, which is crazy to think could happen.

Even in a game where Arizona piled up 234 rushing yards, it never really felt like the Cardinals had much of a chance. In fact, the Cardinals are the first home team in NFL history to score at least 29 points and rush for at least 200 yards and lose by more than 14 points.

The 49ers have really been the NFL’s best team since Purdy took over at quarterback, and injuries have been the main thing to hold them back in their losses in that time. We’ll see how they look next Monday night at home against the top-seeded Ravens. But if it’s anything like the streak the 49ers have been on, the Super Bowl odds are about to get even better for this juggernaut.

In a league lacking in consistency, the inevitably of the 49ers is impressive.

Bears at Browns: Hail Flacco

This felt like one of those fluky Chicago games from one of their playoff seasons where they get a tipped ball for a pick-6 after an earlier pick set them up for a 1-yard touchdown drive.

Basically, this game was a good example of why the Cleveland defense does not have a better ranking in points allowed, because the Chicago offense barely contributed more than 3 points to this score. Joe Flacco got a little loose with the ball in his third start for the team and was intercepted 3 times.

But against a tough run defense like Chicago that held the Browns to 17 carries for 30 yards, you need a quarterback to hang in there and pass on them. Flacco can still do that as he put the ball up 44 more times in this one for 374 yards.

Flacco passed for 212 yards in the fourth quarter alone as the Browns have a formidable offense with Amari Cooper and tight end David Njoku. But the Bears are also one of the great fourth-quarter collapse teams in the league, and you could feel that 17-7 lead wasn’t going to hold up for Matt Eberflus. Hell, the first play of the quarter was Justin Fields taking a sack on a 4th-and-1.

Flacco eventually led the team back with a 51-yard touchdown threaded in there to Cooper, who did the rest after the catch. The defense forced a quick 3-and-out, and Flacco found Njoku for gains of 31 and 34 yards to set up a go-ahead field goal with 32 seconds left.

That is barely enough time for Chicago to get into range, but kicking was probably going to be difficult on this day. Eventually, they settled for the Hail Mary finish after already getting a crack at it to end the first half with Fields’ pass intercepted in the end zone.

This one was quite the adventure with Darnell Mooney having a real shot at it on the ground, but the ball left his hands, and he kicked it to a defender for another interception in one of the wildest finishes we’ve seen this year.

This is the kind of ending we are used to seeing go against Cleveland, but not this year. At 9-5, the Browns have clinched a second winning season under Kevin Stefanski, and they are in position for the No. 5 seed. That might be Coach of the Year material for the 2020 winner of the award.

Buccaneers at Packers: Refreshing to See Some Great QB Play in Tampa…

There was a time when a Florida team winning at Lambeau Field in December would have been a huge headline, but it was only 42 degrees, and the Packers haven’t had the best week after losing to Tommy DeVito and the Giants on Monday night.

This was also the third year in a row that Baker Mayfield played in Lambeau in December, and with his third different team, he was not walking away a loser again. In fact, he had arguably the best game of his career with 381 yards, 4 touchdowns, and a perfect 158.3 passer rating. He did take 5 sacks and lose a fumble as the pass rush was on him early, but the passes Baker got off, he was slicing and dicing the Packers down the seams.

Every time the Packers pulled within a score in the second half, Baker had an answer. His 52-yard touchdown pass to ice it to David Moore almost ended in disaster with the receiver foolishly releasing the ball close to the goal line. But the touchdown stood and Green Bay trailed 34-20.

It was the sixth time this season the Buccaneers (7-7) scored at least 20 offensive points on the road. They didn’t do it even once in 2022.

Falcons at Panthers: We Might Need to Get Arthur Smith Up Out of There

I kind of love this stat: Carolina is 2-12 but has yet to run a single play with a fourth-quarter lead this season. Both wins have come on field goals on the final snap of the game. They did it to Houston in Week 8 and now again to the Falcons for the second year in the rain in a 9-7 barnburner.

I knew this game was trouble when the weather reports came out, so I largely avoided any bets on it. You just can’t trust the Falcons, but they probably should have won this one.

Atlanta, leading 7-3, was running a give-up play to Bijan Robinson on a 3rd-and-10, and he ended up fumbling, giving the Panthers the ball at the Atlanta 21 as the game was moving to the fourth quarter. The Panthers stalled but were right to kick the field goal to make it 7-6. You just can’t trust the Bryce Young-led offense to convert a 4th-and-4 from the 7, keeping it a 7-6 game would likely keep Atlanta in conservative mode instead of playing from behind, and you can just win on a field goal. Oh yeah, it’s also the Falcons, the NFC’s version of the Chargers.

The defense wasn’t holding up its end of the bargain with Atlanta driving into the red zone, but that’s when Desmond Ridder threw a pass that his season, if not his time in Atlanta, may be remembered best for:

https://twitter.com/tankathon/status/1736487658442916294/video/1

What the hell was that? Point shaving? Anything even remotely conservative should lead to a field goal and 10-6 lead with under half a quarter left, making the Panthers think touchdown or bust. Just an atrocious decision that could cost this team the playoffs.

Young still had to drive his offense from the 5 in the rain, but he only needed to set up a short field goal for a win. He got the job done with one of his only good drives all season, moving the ball 90 yards on 17 plays, mostly through his arm. The Falcons burned all their timeouts and still couldn’t stop Chuba Hubbard on a 3rd-and-3 run, allowing for the 23-yard field goal by Eddie Pineiro to be the final snap of regulation.

He made the kick and for the second time this season, the Panthers earned a win on the last play. It was the first time since October 21, 2018 that the Panthers won a game after trailing by more than 1 point in the fourth quarter.

Of course, it had to be at the expense of the Falcons.

Giants at Saints: [Insert Somehow Still Acceptable Derogatory Reference About Italians]

I think Tommy DeVito needs about 2 more wins before his agent can get Adrien Brody to play him in a movie. But it’s not going to happen like this. The Giants scored two field goals in New Orleans, including one from 56 yards away that saw the kicker get injured in the process. DeVito also had to leave the game temporarily for a concussion check, but he returned to end up in more pain as he took 7 sacks.

I said it was a miracle that the Packers did not sack him once on Monday night, because his sack rate is abysmal and should be over 20% again. Saquon Barkley also had his worst game in a while with 14 yards on 9 carries as the Saints just dominated up front. Meanwhile, Derek Carr was kept clean and finished 23-of-28 for 218 yards and 3 touchdowns, somehow playing his best game without the services of Chris Olave.

In all, a pretty bland 24-6 win. No spicy meatballs for the Paisan.

Commanders at Rams: Is There a Coaching Staff in Washington?

We know Jack Del Rio’s dusty ass was fired during the season, but is there even a coaching staff left in Washington? People really want Eric Bieniemy to be a head coach, and sure, it’s tough to not want a coordinator who sees his offense go into halftime scoreless.

But then I had to love how Cooper Kupp was left wide open on a 62-yard touchdown to start the second half. Gotta love when a defensive back is peeking 20+ yards into the backfield as if keeping an eye on Matthew Stafford from that distance while Kupp blows past you is going to do anything.

Then the Commanders, down 28-7, seemed to pull the plug a little early on Sam Howell with 9:05 left, but maybe it was because of the pick he threw on his last play. But Jacoby Brissett entered the game and this almost turned into some 2005 Mark Brunell to Santana Moss kind of batshit craziness. Terry McLaurin caught a 29-yard touchdown, then it looked like he had a score from 49 yards out with 4:47 left, but he was down at the 1.

Remember when Andy Reid was known for horrible clock management? Bieniemy must have made him proud as it took 3 minutes and 1 second over 9 snaps for the Commanders to finally score the touchdown to make it a one-possession game:

I can’t believe that sequence was real life. This could have very well been a game with a realistic 21-point comeback there if they got that score much quicker. Then Ron Rivera must not have watched the Titans on Monday night, because he botched not going for 2 here. The extra point was blocked, fittingly, and it was still 28-20 anyway with 1:46 left.

The Commanders did have all of their timeouts, but maybe they would have gotten the ball back if they didn’t take an eternity to score from the 1. This is another team that needs major housecleaning in the offseason.

Jets at Dolphins: Just End the Season

Seriously, we’ve seen enough of the 2023 Jets. They have been eliminated from the playoffs after losing 30-0 to a Miami team that didn’t have Tyreek Hill. The Jets had 80 net passing yards on 43 pass plays due to sacks. Maybe that will end this silly talk of Aaron Rodgers returning from a torn Achilles, because why would anyone even want to play behind this line? They still can’t run block either, finishing with 12 carries for 23 yards.

The Jets join the 2018 Redskins (lost 24-0 vs. Eagles) and 1999 Browns (lost 43-0 vs. Steelers) as the only teams since 1990 to not pass for more than 80 net yards and not rush for more than 25 yards in the same game.

Next week: Seven island games in one week? The NFL really wants to take over our Christmas with TNF, a Saturday doubleheader, a normal Sunday lineup, and a Monday tripleheader. Not many games are appealing either, but TNF is actually legit with seeing how Derek Carr will fare in a pseudo playoff game against the Rams. There’s also the crazy possibility of Mike Tomlin’s final home game if things go off the rails here the rest of the way. Maybe Dallas will fare better in Miami’s weather, but yikes, talk about two teams who don’t beat the good teams this year, especially on the road. The highlight of the week is clearly the finale on MNF with Ravens-49ers, a possible battle of No. 1 seeds, a possible Super Bowl preview for Christmas.

NFL Week 15 Predictions: Saturday Dogs Edition

~ Scott ~ Leave a comment

Just enough time for a very quick NFL Week 15 preview as I am still dealing with sinus and segmented sleep issues. A tripleheader on a Saturday isn’t helping matters but I do like the underdogs in 2-of-3 games.

This Week’s Articles

NFL 2023 Award Races – Looking at the Purdy vs. Prescott MVP race and a very open Coach of the Year race, among other awards

NFL Week 15 Predictions

I liked the Raiders to cover but god damn, they got Brandon Staley out of there with a 63-21 win.

A lot of underdogs won last week and I am on a few this week, including the Steelers and Broncos on Saturday. I also am going with Tommy DeVito and the Giants in New Orleans (link above).

The big one is Bills and Cowboys, and I’ve compared those teams several times in recent years as they are two of the NFL’s only teams that have been elite on both sides of the ball since 2021. They are doing it again this year, but Buffalo needs the game more with a 7-6 record and the playoffs still in doubt. But I ended up going with the home team as I really did just factor that into the equation. Dallas hasn’t been as great on the road, and home teams are winning over 55.5% of games this year, so that appears to be back to a normal advantage from recent years where it dipped under 50%. The Bills are in playoff mode already and I think they pull that one out, though it will be interesting since both teams love to win by double digits and aren’t used to winning the tight ones.

Not overly confident in the Ravens to not blow a lead on SNF, but I just think they are a better team than the Jaguars and should have won that game last year on the road.

NFL Stat Oddity: Week 14

~ Scott ~ 7 Comments

Week 14 in the NFL was a lot to take in. Or a little if you were caught watching either of the two games that were scoreless at halftime. Seriously, we go 4 years without a scoreless first half and get two in one afternoon? That second one almost went the distance to 0-0 in regulation but thank God for Nick Mullens (said no one ever).

The Cowboys blew out the Eagles, who lost back-to-back games against their main NFC contenders by 20 points. Sounds pretty 2022 Vikings to me.

The Bills won another game in Kansas City after an egregious offside penalty on the offense wiped out one of the coolest, game-winning type of plays you’ll ever see. But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t a dumb penalty, Kansas City.

Did offense feel worse than usual this weekend? We still have a MNF doubleheader that does not look good, but there has yet to be a quarterback to post a 75.0 QBR this week. Most weeks have multiple players in the 80s and 90s. The highest was Matthew Stafford (73.4) in a loss in Baltimore. This is so unusual that it hasn’t happened in any week of the regular season since 2006, the first season we have QBR data for. Maybe Tua or Jordan Love puts an end to that tonight, but Monday night shenanigans, the MetLife playing surface, eh, we’ll see.

There were 7 games with a comeback opportunity this week, though for the second time this season, no team came back to win from 10 points down. The Steelers and Chiefs almost did that, but again, we’re seeing arguably the darkest patches of the Mike Tomlin and Andy Reid eras in Pittsburgh and Kansas City. Losing back-to-back home games to 2-10 teams is brutal (and historic), and the Chiefs are on a 2-4 slide and just lost wire-to-wire in back-to-back games for the first time with Mahomes at quarterback.

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

Bills at Chiefs: Toney, Toney, You Gotta Go

Another week, another Kansas City loss where the Chiefs gave up two early touchdowns, lost the turnover battle, a receiver royally screwed up a lead-changing play, and Patrick Mahomes’ last gasp on 4th-and-long fell incomplete.

Then there’s the latest officiating controversy.

But I don’t think it was that controversial. The irony of it was Kadarius Toney scored the touchdown and it would have been his most memorable play had the schmuck not lined up offsides.

Offensive offsides, who even does that? But before that ending, it was another game where the Chiefs played disappointing, mistake-filled football. They let the Bills dominate early with passes to their running back (James Cook) while Mahomes seemingly can’t throw a screen to CEH without disaster happening like an opening-drive interception in Buffalo territory.

Rashee Rice provided the obligatory fumble late in the third quarter when the Chiefs were driving in a 17-14 game. They did tie the game in the fourth quarter, but a quick 3-and-out with a chance to take the lead wasn’t good, then Josh Allen continued to show why he’s been so successful in Arrowhead with a go-ahead drive for a field goal.

The only problem with that was a total mismanagement of the clock, and you would think Buffalo more than any team would be observant of the clock against the Chiefs. They are 13 seconds away from going 4-0 in this building since 2021. The Bills had a chance to set up the field goal as the final play, but Allen threw 3 low-percentage balls to receivers that all fell incomplete and stopped the clock with the Chiefs keeping 2 timeouts. It made no sense. Even the last throw before the 2-minute warning was barely caught for a 1 yard to run clock.

So, Mahomes had a full 1:54 in a 20-17 game, which is an eternity for him to get a go-ahead touchdown, let alone a field goal. But four plays into a good looking drive, it happened. Mahomes found Travis Kelce over the middle and he somehow had the stones to lateral the ball across the field to Toney, who went the final 24 yards for what should have been a huge go-ahead touchdown and possibly the game-winning score to end Buffalo’s season.

It will go down as an all-time great play that never counted. It was aesthetically pleasing, in a big moment, risky as hell, and a huge reward. But it’s all for naught cause the biggest clown on the roster was lined up offsides.

Is that going to be called 100% of the time on the offense? No, I don’t think so. Is it ever called on the offense? Apparently 11 times this year, so less than once a week. I understand the argument that it was inconsequential to the play, but I also think the strong reaction from the Chiefs, namely Mahomes and Andy Reid, is way overblown. Just don’t line up offsides and it’s not a penalty. How hard is that? Does a veteran really need a warning for this late in the fourth quarter? I could see if he was repeatedly doing it in the game, then the officials should inform him of that. But there’s just no excuse to line up in the wrong spot on a play where the clock wasn’t even running.

Like the other Kansas City drives this year, they fell apart after the big play was not made. Think of the Toney drop against Detroit that could have easily set up a game-winning field goal, the MVS dropped touchdown against the Eagles, the no-call for DPI on MVS against the Packers last week, and now this offsides wiping out a touchdown.

It’s like the Chiefs get so frustrated from these plays that they forget to finish the drive. Namely, the offensive line forgets as the protection turning to dog shit has a lot to do with these drives fizzing out a couple plays later. Mahomes had to throw away passes under pressure, and just like that, it was 4th-and-15. Here we go again.

Mahomes’ arm was hit just as he threw the ball and it came out funny with no chance of ever being caught. Another game over after Mahomes threw incomplete on a 4th-and-10+. That’s happened in all 5 losses this year. It happened in exactly one Kansas City game in 2018-22 and that was Super Bowl 55 with a lopsided score.

The Chiefs are 8-5 and barely hanging onto the No. 3 seed right now. It is looking likely that they will have to play a road playoff game this year. I guess it is possible for the Chiefs to win out (12-5), then hope Miami loses multiple games to Cowboys/Ravens/Bills to finish with a No. 2 seed or better. Then they’d have to hope No. 1 (Baltimore) chokes in the divisional round, which isn’t impossible of course. But it’s not looking good. At this point, the Chiefs might get shut down by New England and lose to Bailey Zappe next week. Jake Browning with the Bengals is a possibility too.

Mahomes’ strong reaction to the ending was weird to me. It almost felt like he was letting out years of frustration with calls like this, maybe even going back to the Dee Ford offsides in the 2018 AFC Championship Game loss, another rare offsides call that had nothing to do with the play at hand. Hard to think of any team in between 2018-23 with bigger offsides penalties than the Chiefs with these two. Then with the way last week’s game ended in Green Bay, it’s just been a frustrating season for Kansas City and I think he chose to take it out on the refs instead of strangling Toney, who really needs to be cut. He provides no value and has almost single-handedly cost them games against the Lions and Bills this year.

But not knocking out the Bills (7-6) when you had a chance could prove fatal. Imagine if this propels Buffalo to make the playoffs and this ends up being a 7/2 or 6/3 wild card matchup. That would not be good for the Chiefs, who struggle with Buffalo as much as any opponent.

But we’ll see how things go from here and if Buffalo can build from this with a tough remaining schedule. The Chiefs only have 4 games left to improve, but it feels like both sides of the ball are declining right now.

Trading away Tyreek Hill and trading for Kadarius Toney is epic team mismanagement. That’s almost as bad as getting Trent Richardson for Andrew Luck in Indy when he literally needed any other good player besides a running back.

This is the first time since 2017 where the Chiefs failed to have a lead in back-to-back games. Those were the ugly losses to the Giants (12-9 in overtime) and Buffalo (16-10). Do you know what that slide led to? Andy Reid gave up play-calling duties to offensive coordinator Matt Nagy, who is the OC now in 2023.

Might need a new plan here, because this isn’t working. I made this prediction before Week 7 when the Chiefs were 5-1, and it was tongue-in-cheek at the time. But my goodness, this is where the Chiefs are seemingly every week now. A game-winning play is botched, the offensive line falls apart, and there’s Mahomes throwing a miracle ball on 4th-and-long to end the game.

This is who Kansas City is in 2023 and I don’t see it changing this time. And that is why the frustration is boiling over on the field now.

Eagles at Cowboys: Another NFC Stomping

The big NFC round robin is complete now, and the 49ers come out looking like the best team after stomping the Cowboys (42-10) and Eagles (42-19) this year. The Cowboys and Eagles split their matchups with Philadelphia winning 28-23 at home and then Dallas returning the favor with this 20-point win.

So, only 1-of-4 games ended up being a competitive 60-minute game. But this is what I was saying about the Eagles the last few weeks. They rely on winning close games this year while the 49ers and Eagles blow teams out. They are your classic “win big, lose close” teams, and they just blew the Eagles out by 20 points in back-to-back weeks.

The crazy thing with this game is that the Eagles never even scored a touchdown on offense. Their only touchdown was Jalen Carter returning a fumble of Dak Prescott 42 yards for a score in the third quarter, the last time this looked like it might be a game.

Prescott said as much after the game that he didn’t have his best night, and he certainly didn’t. The Cowboys left plenty of points on the field, and we did at least see how awesome their new kicker is as Brandon Aubrey improved to 30-for-30 on the season at field goals with makes from 60, 59, 50, and 45 yards, making it look easy in the process. Yes, this has “misses first time all year in a crucial playoff moment” written all over it, but he was money in this game, becoming the first kicker to make from 59 and 60 in the same game.

But Prescott did not hurt his MVP case. In fact, he’s the outright leader now after he threw for 271 yards and 2 touchdowns, notching a 12th-striaght home game with at least 27 points scored (third-longest streak in NFL history).

Dallas was in control and moving the ball well from the opening drive. The Eagles were too sloppy with the ball. Jalen Hurts, who didn’t even pass for 200 yards again, lost a fumble on his team’s opening drive. A.J. Brown had a nice game, but he also fumbled on the team’s opening drive of the second half at midfield, down 24-6.

Down 27-13 late in the third quarter, Hurts threw for 3 yards on 3rd-and-11, then a 1-yard completion to DeVonta Smith on 4th-and-8. Those are failed completions. Finally, any chance of an improbable 17-point comeback was snuffed out when Smith fumbled a completion in the red zone with 6:38 left. Game over. The Eagles’ top 3 skill players all lost fumbles in this one.

But as I said last week, the 49ers and Cowboys could have beat the Eagles by 50 points each in these games, and there’s still a good chance Philadelphia gets the No. 1 seed, the bye week, and gets to host the rematch with these teams, who are now all 10-3. The Eagles don’t play any good teams the rest of the way. The Cowboys have to go to Buffalo and Miami the next two weeks, tough road games against contenders. The 49ers have to host the Ravens on Christmas, a tough game.

But we can save talk about future games for down the road. It’s just an eyesore on Dallas’ resume to lose that game to Arizona as a 13-point favorite, because that could be the one that costs them a No. 1 seed. Strong performance here by the Cowboys, and maybe the back-to-back beatings puts some doubt in the Philadelphia locker room.

But chances are the Cowboys (and 49ers) will have to do it again to Philly in January.

Rams at Ravens: Unexpected Hero in Unexpected Overtime Classic

Lamar Jackson is now 19-1 against the NFC in his career, but this may have been the toughest win to earn yet. I really did not see this coming as the Rams were a 7.5-point road underdog, and we’ve seen the Ravens destroy some NFC teams at home this year like the Lions (38-6) and Seahawks (37-3). My thought on Lamar against the NFC is that those teams just aren’t familiar with playing him yet and it takes some experience as he is such a unique talent.

But the Rams scored on 4-of-5 drives to start the game, had no turnovers on the road, and Matthew Stafford showed up for this one. Both quarterbacks had 3 touchdown passes and Stafford was only 6 yards away from matching Lamar with a 300-yard passing game. Jackson also rushed for 70 yards.

It was a tight, enjoyable back-and-forth game with plenty of points – exactly the kind of experience we almost never get in 2023. The Rams took a lead on a safety at one point when a bad snap was kicked out of bounds by Jackson to avoid a touchdown going on the board. But the defense made a stop, and Jackson put Justin Tucker in range for a 33-yard field goal to regain the lead with 11:17 to play in a 23-22 game.

A couple drives later, Stafford threw a touchdown, but the Rams failed on the 2-point conversion, leading 28-23 with 4:41 left. Not many comeback drives in situations like this in Lamar’s career, but he pulled this one off just when it looked like things were falling apart at the end with a 3rd-and-17. Zay Flowers was left open for a 21-yard touchdown with 1:16 left, and the Ravens made the crucial 2-point conversion this time to take a 31-28 lead.

Stafford has plenty of experience doing this, and a big play to Cooper Kupp moved the ball to the Baltimore 22. But the Rams were not able to get any more than 4 yards from there, so they settled for a game-tying field goal and overtime.

The Ravens went 3-and-out in overtime, which we don’t penalize enough for the team that goes first on offense, because now all the Rams had to do was get a field goal to win. But the Rams also went 3-and-out, and Sean McVay let an inexcusable delay of game penalty happen on the drive to make it 3rd-and-9. You get timeouts in overtime; you should use them there to avoid that mess.

The Rams punted, and while you usually don’t expect much on these plays anymore, the Ravens made them pay with Tylan Wallace returning the punt 76 yards for a touchdown. It almost had a Steve Young vs. Vikings quality to it with Wallace stumbling after 3 broken tackles, but he housed it for only the 4th game-winning punt return touchdown in overtime history:

And that is the shocking way the Ravens moved to 10-3 and the Rams dropped to 6-7. A much better game than you could have expected from this one. This is the second non-offensive game-winning score of the year. The first was T.J. Watt’s fumble return touchdown from Deshaun Watson in Week 2 in Browns-Steelers.

Vikings at Raiders: Almost 0-0

I thought 6-0 last week in New England in decent weather was bad, but 3-0 indoors in Vegas?

At some point, I stopped being mad at the lack of scoring and was rooting for history to be made with a scoreless overtime tie, which has never happened in NFL history. It may have happened without a quarterback change by the Vikings, which led to the game-winning drive as Nick Mullens finally strung together some completions after Joshua Dobbs could not.

We were really close on this one:

  • The last scoreless tie in the NFL was in 1943 between the Giants and Lions before overtime existed.
  • Vikings-Raiders is only the 11th game since 1940 with no more than 3 combined points.
  • It is the NFL’s first 3-0 game since the 2007 Steelers beat Miami in the game where the punt stuck in the ground. Pittsburgh’s score came with 17 seconds left, so this game was the longest an NFL game had gone scoreless since this one in 2007.
  • Almost 30 years to the date, the Jets and Redskins played a 3-0 game on 12/11/1993 with the Jets scoring in the first quarter. That makes Vikings-Raiders and Dolphins-Steelers the only games with fewer than 6 combined points in the salary cap era.

So, we didn’t get the record, but we can say this is the 2nd-longest game to last scoreless since 1978.

Given the shitshow the Vikings put on against the Bears their last timeout, Kevin O’Connell has to explain why things are broken right now, and Dobbs may be out of the starting lineup next week now that a division title is within reach.

Justin Jefferson returned from his hamstring injury in this game, but he unfortunately didn’t last long after taking a nasty shot to the back. But the Vikings still have weapons. Certainly enough to do better than 9 punts on 11 possessions. The game only had 1 missed field goal (by Minnesota) and the Raiders turned it over 3 times in the second half, including a big fumble in the red zone by Hunter Renfrow, and Aidan O’Connell was immediately intercepted after Greg Joseph’s 36-yard field goal provided the only points at the 2-minute warning.

I’m not sure Mullens is the answer going forward, but it doesn’t look like Dobbs is. I’m also not sure you can hire an interim coach who loses a home game indoors 3-0 like Antonio Pierce just did.

And oh joy, both teams will be in island games this week with the Raiders playing the Chargers on Thursday night and the Vikings on Saturday against the Bengals.

Seahawks at 49ers: Drew Locked Up Some Millions

Not much was expected from this game with Drew Lock starting for an injured Geno Smith. The spread moved above 14 points, but I did like Seattle to cover that as divisional rematches can be weird.

This one was a little weird as Lock played a competent game and the Seahawks were within striking distance. But the 49ers averaged 9.9 yards per play on their way to 527 yards as the studs were not being stopped on this day. Christian McCaffrey kicked it off with a 72-yard run on the first snap, though he was taken out for a breather and never scored a touchdown despite having odds in the -350 range to do so this week. Ouch.

Deebo Samuel had another huge game with 149 yards and a touchdown. Brandon Aiyuk (126 yards) was also over 100 yards, and George Kittle caught a 44-yard touchdown, because of course he did. Where was that on Thanksgiving when I needed 40 yards from him to win $2,500?

But anyways, it was the Kittle touchdown two snaps into the final quarter that shifted everything as Seattle was only down 21-16 before that score. Lock was then intercepted twice, and the 49ers ran out the clock for another win that all but wraps up this NFC West race.

But Lock probably made himself a few million in the process as a competent start against what looks like the best team in the league could keep him around for years to come in a league starved for quarterbacks.

Yet it is Mr. Irrelevant who continues to break football minds as he had another big game with 368 yards on just 27 attempts. It wasn’t the big YAC plays this week like last week in Philadelphia too as Purdy dropped some balls right in the basket in big moments. He’s legitimately very good in running this offense, and while a lot of quarterbacks may be in his shoes, you look around at the 0-0 scores on Sunday and the other offenses that struggled to find the end zone at all like the Eagles, and you have to say Purdy is a remarkable story.

Lions at Bears: No 12-Point Comeback This Time

I think you have to be worried if you’re a Detroit fan that this thing is about to spiral out of control. No, they still haven’t lost back-to-back games yet this year, but losing out and losing the division title to Minnesota is now a real possibility.

The Lions needed the miracle comeback of the season to erase a 12-point deficit against the Bears at home just a few weeks ago. This performance was even worse in Chicago as the Bears did what they did on offense again, but the Lions had no strong finish this time. In fact, things only got worse with the Lions going scoreless on their 7 possessions in the second half, including a fumble, two failed 4th downs, and an interception on their last 4 drives.

It was an aborted snap by Detroit late in the third quarter that led to a short field for the Bears, who turned it into a touchdown and 25-13 lead. Fittingly, it was another 12-point comeback opportunity, but Jared Goff just didn’t have it in the elements this day. The running game was solid with David Montgomery and Jahmyr Gibbs both going over 60 yards, but when it came time for a 4th-and-1 conversion, Gibbs was stuffed in the backfield for a 4-yard loss.

The Lions were taking their time on the ensuing drive in a 28-13 game, and Goff eventually threw incomplete on 4th-and-17 with 5:16 left. More pressure on him on the next drive led to an interception on 4th-and-24 with 2:31 left to seal it.

Detroit played much better in the first matchup when turnovers put them in a hole. This time, the Bears more or less controlled play from the opening kickoff, something we have rarely ever seen in the Matt Eberflus era.

The Lions have now allowed at least 26 points in all 5 games since the bye week. Without a home win against Denver next week, this is going to get very dicey with games against the Vikings and a trip to Dallas left.

Colts at Bengals: Nice System in Cincinnati…

I hope Jake Browning’s thumb is good because this is getting really interesting in Cincinnati. For the second start in a row, Browning completed at least 75% of his passes with at least 275 yards in a win against another playoff contender in the AFC.

He didn’t take any sacks against the Colts, and his only real mistake was a pick-six that was a receiver error as he handed the ball to the defender on a silver platter. That also proved to be Indy’s final score of the game as the offense only mustered one touchdown drive in a 34-14 loss. It was only the second time all year the Colts failed to score 20 points in a game under Shane Steichen.

They picked a bad time for it with the Bengals in that wild card mix. But Browning clearly won this battle of backups, and Gardner Minshew may have even stayed in the game despite a possible concussion early in the game. The Colts failed to score on their final 5 possessions.

The Colts (7-6) might be in real trouble when you consider how games with the Steelers, their next opponent, usually go. Not only do you have to contend with Minshew’s mistakes, but the running game has essentially gone nowhere in 4-of-5 games.

The Bengals (7-6) are not finished as they have stumbled onto something to work with at the quarterback position in Browning.

Jaguars at Browns: Lawrence Returns But So Has Joe Flacco

Trevor Lawrence has still never missed a start due to injury in his NFL career, but sometimes you wonder if it’s not for the best if a player takes a week to rest. Lawrence barely averaged 5.0 yards per attempt as he threw 50 passes, including 3 interceptions, a 31-27 loss in Cleveland that felt like a 5-hour game.

Cleveland led wire-to-wire with Joe Flacco stepping up to throw for 311 yards and 3 touchdowns, simultaneously making you want to praise Kevin Stefanski for finding quality play in another quarterback not named Deshaun Watson while also questioning just how good that Jake Browning performance was on Monday night if the Jags are playing defense like this. Seriously, David Njoku was left wide open several times for big plays in this one.

But the Jaguars continued to struggle running the ball effectively, and the turnovers were hard to overcome. The game went on so long in part because Cleveland also turned it over 3 times. Each team had 16 possessions (kneeldowns excluded).

The big turning point was the second play of the 4th quarter when Lawrence was picked on a deep ball on 3rd-and-1 in a 21-14 game. I guess the Jaguars can’t even trust Travis Etienne to get a yard when they needed it most. Flacco used that short 48-yard field for another touchdown drive. But the Jaguars kept scoring and applying pressure, even coming up short on a 4th-and-3 with 3:30 left. By the time Jacksonville scored with 1:33 left, there was only time for an onside kick in a 31-27 final. They didn’t recover and the game was over.

Fortunately for the Jaguars (8-5), the Colts and Texans lost too. But the Browns are gaining confidence at 8-5 and just may have a quarterback answer in Flacco if you can believe it in 2023.

Buccaneers at Falcons: Baker Mayfield Brings NFC South Race to a Standstill

The Bucs were 1-15 when allowing 20 points under Todd Bowles since 2022, but make that 2-15 and give Baker Mayfield just as many wins doing it as Tom Brady had last year. The Buccaneers (6-7) are currently leading the NFC South as the Falcons and Saints are also 6-7 for the league’s worst division around.

But Baker did pull out a little Brady in this one as the Falcons were generally the better team, but Younghoe Koo missed two field goals he usually makes, and the Tampa defense was opportunistic in intercepting a screen pass and getting a safety to lead 19-10.

But the Falcons rallied to take a late 25-22 lead. Mayfield’s accuracy and decision making looked woeful on the ensuing drive as he looked like he was playing for a touchdown with under 30 seconds left instead of calmly taking the easy plays in a 3-point game with enough time left. But he finally got on track with a huge 3rd-and-10 conversion to Chris Godwin for 32 yards, then two plays later, he found Cade Otton for an 11-yard touchdown with 31 seconds left to take a 29-25 lead.

The Falcons did a solid job using their 2 timeouts to get into range for the win at the Tampa Bay 31 with 4 seconds left. But that last throw absolutely had to be in the end zone on the final play, and for some reason, Desmond Ridder threw short, completing a pass to Drake London for 28 yards to the 3-yard line to end the game. Didn’t understand that decision at all as Ridder had time to throw a little deeper to the end zone.

The Falcons and Bucs have split with each team winning on the road this year. Who is the best team out of Saints, Buccaneers, and Falcons? Damn if I know. The winner of the division should just be a sacrificial lamb to the NFC East runner-up.

Broncos at Chargers: Did We Just Lose Justin Herbert?

That would be something if this turned out to be the final game of the Brandon Staley-Justin Herbert era for the Chargers. Herbert left with a fractured index finger on his throwing hand, which is obviously not good.

It was already shaping up to be a rough start for Herbert, who had a pick at the line that led to a 3-yard touchdown run by Javonte Williams, his first score on the ground in 2 whole years.

Almost fittingly, Herbert was injured on a 4th-and-2 attempt in the second quarter as Staley bypassed a 47-yard field goal. Easton Stick, a 5th-round pick by the team way back in 2019, replaced him for the rest of the game. That was a tough assignment as the Chargers finished 1-for-6 on 4th down thanks to going 0-for-12 on 3rd down.

The Chargers (5-8) are toast, and the Broncos (7-6) are only a game behind the Chiefs (8-5) in the AFC West if you can believe that.

Texans at Jets: The Most Unexpected 300-Yard Passing Game

What a strange game. It always felt like a trap for the Texans, but who could have imagined 11 straight punts and a knee to go to halftime scoreless, then for Zach Wilson to throw for 301 yards in a 24-6 win?

The weather wasn’t as windy as some expected, so it wasn’t the issue. Not when Wilson was able to pass for 301 yards and multiple touchdowns in his first start in weeks. C.J. Stroud, the rookie who entered Week 14 leading the league in passing yards, only passed for 91 yards before he left the game injured in the fourth quarter.

But this was a case of not having your top two wide receivers and tight end while facing a tough pass defense on the road. The Texans already lost Tank Dell for the year, tight end Dalton Schutlz was still out, and Nico Collins left the game early with an injury. Stroud had his hands full and the Texans just did not deliver this afternoon.

But Wilson had his way with the defense as he completed 27-of-36 passes with Garrett Wilson going over 100 yards, and Randall Cobb even caught a touchdown.

Amusingly, the Jets tacked on 3 field goals in the fourth quarter on drives that all lost yardage as they were set up in Houston territory after 4th down stops by the defense. But the damage was done before that point.

Panthers at Saints: The NFC South Is Really This Bad

The passing offense was absolutely grotesque well into the second half of this game:

Derek Carr ended up finishing with 119 yards on 18 completions, taking him out of record territory, but it was still a putrid showing against the NFL’s only 1-win team. Bryce Young also struggled mightily again as he is regressing instead of showing improvement in his rookie season.

The Saints were almost going to win this one with 7 points on offense and the other 7 from a blocked punt return touchdown. But the defense stopped Carolina on a 4th-and-1 in a 14-6 game, then Carr hit a 44-yard completion that was more yardage than he had in the first 50 minutes combined. That drive was finished with a 7-yard touchdown to Chris Olave, then Jimmy Graham later caught a touchdown to blow it open 28-6.

We can talk about the Saints’ struggles on offense, but the Panthers are beyond putrid. There was already that Week 4 game against Minnesota where the Panthers scored 6 points (two field goals) despite holding the ball for 38:29. They came close to that again in this one with 34:50 in time of possession but only a pair of field goals to show for it.

Not only is Young failing to flash signs of improvement, but he’s f’n boring to watch too. Things are a real mess in Carolina right now and it is unlikely a good coach is going to want to take this job in 2024.

Next week: Are we really going to start the week with Easton Stick and Aidan O’Connell? A Saturday triple-header with no must-see games? It has to be Dallas at Buffalo to carry Sunday, because even SNF (Ravens-Jaguars) has lost some luster with the Jaguars on a losing streak. They flexed KC-NE out of MNF for Eagles-Seahawks, but I thought that was a mistake even before this KC losing streak. I much rather see if the Chiefs can avoid losing to Bailey Zappe than to watch another game with fading Seattle (and Philly for that matter) right now.

NFL Week 14 Predictions: The Dallas Cowboys Have Never Had an MVP QB Edition

~ Scott ~ Leave a comment

It feels like for the course of the Super Bowl era, the quarterback of the Dallas Cowboys has been one of the most popular and scrutinized players in the NFL. Yet that player has never won an MVP award. Troy Aikman was never really in that conversation with Brett Favre and Steve Young in the 1990s. Tony Romo only had a case in 2014 but wasn’t going to topple Aaron Rodgers. Then there was Roger Staubach, the best of them all, but he played in the dead ball era of the 1970s and was never even a first-team All-Pro.

Could this be the year that Dak Prescott brings that award home for the Cowboys if he keeps doing what he has? I don’t want to make an MVP case at 4:39 A.M. when my nose won’t stop running and I’m tired, but let’s just say 20 touchdowns over the last 6 games is the kind of thing you usually only see in an MVP year. If he keeps rolling like this with a tough upcoming schedule, then I think he has the best case of anyone this year.

But performing at a high level on Sunday night against Philadelphia is crucial. If he flops in this game like he did in San Francisco on SNF In Week 5, then you can probably forget him getting this award unless he is lights out in every game after it and no one steps up. But he just has to keep doing what he has the last 6 games, keep doing what he has against the Eagles since 2021, and it should work out for him.

We have a very interesting case study with point differential this week as it will tell you in the NFC that the 49ers (+163) and Cowboys (+168) are much better than the Eagles (+41) and Lions (+41). In the AFC, the Chiefs (+67) are trailing the Ravens (+137), Dolphins (+118), and Bills (+101). But the Bills are the first team since the 1950 Eagles to be over +100 thru 12 games and only have a 6-6 record to show for it. Big game in Kansas City this week for the Bills to try saving this season.

This Week’s Articles

When Should NFL Teams Move on from Coaches Like Mike Tomlin and Bill Belichick? – The Patriot Way is dead, and the standard is no longer the standard in Pittsburgh. I took the time to do a deep dive on why the Steelers and Patriots are unlikely to ever win their 7th Super Bowl with Mike Tomlin and Bill Belichick as their head coach. When should a team move on from a coach who brought them past success? It looks again like that window is about 5-6 years where if things aren’t getting any better, they need to change. Tomlin did himself no favors by losing a 2nd home game this week to a 2-10 team, and the Steelers were outplayed in both games by Arizona and New England. These weren’t fluke losses but I can certainly show you some fluke wins by the Steelers this year.

NFL Week 14 Predictions

I loved the Patriots to cover in Pittsburgh, but I sure as hell didn’t think they’d be sad enough to let Bailey Zappe throw 3 touchdowns in the first half. The over always felt like a trap, but I don’t regret it nor do I regret betting on exactly 31 points to hit. The latter probably does without that blocked punt providing the only short scoring drive after halftime. But what a mess for Pittsburgh as I noted they would miss the only 2 things Kenny Pickett is good at in this matchup (not turning it over and leading a GWD, or things you don’t get from Mitch Trubisky).

A lot of backup QBs playing this week, and I guess you can also say I’m not feeling many of the underdogs this week either.

LAR-BAL: Is Lamar Jackson’s health acting up again in December? Missed practice with an illness but should be good to go. He usually owns NFC teams. But not a game I’m very interested in, betting-wise.

CAR-NO: Derek Carr really doesn’t want Jameis Winston to start so that fans can see he’d get more points on the board. He’ll show up to the stadium in a full body cast and still play if he has to.

Every week I cost myself thousands of dollars in parlay wins because I screw up a game pick or two and get all the picks from that game wrong. That game this week could be Colts-Bengals as I am very high on this being a strong offensive game. Both teams scoring 20+, the over hitting, the RBs scoring touchdowns, Browning playing well again. I like it all. Hopefully it won’t be a 13-10 game with a bunch of turnovers and missed FGs.

JAX-CLE: I can’t believe Trevor Lawrence might play after what happened Monday night, but that’s also why I think Cleveland loses. Just the kind of game they’d blow when you think they’d have a golden opportunity at a win. But I can see the defense stepping up and turning over Flacco a few times as he tries so many deep balls.

TB-ATL: I don’t know at this point. Atlanta won in TB last time, so maybe the Bucs return the favor for a split?

DET-CHI: The Detroit defense is under the radar sucking right now. This has upset potential given the way the Bears should have won the first meeting a few weeks ago if not for the comeback of the year by the Lions.

HOU-NYJ: C.J. Stroud might not throw for a lot of yards, but he doesn’t need them against the Jets, who can’t score 14 points anymore. I like a lot of field goals in this one.

SEA-SF: The spread keeps going up, so I changed my ATS pick to Seattle out of pity. You never know with divisional rematches with teams in must-win mode like the Seahawks. They gave Dallas a scare last week and the backdoor cover is always on the table with 2-touchdown spread. But the 49ers should virtually lock up the NFC West here.

MIN-LV: Again, I don’t know right now. Joshua Dobbs was awful in that last game against the Bears. The Raiders gave the Chiefs a couple good quarters recently. Maybe Justin Jefferson is rusty in his first game back and first game with Dobbs. I originally went with Raiders cover, Vikings win, but then I just changed it to a flat out upset win for the Raiders at home.

DEN-LAC: Check my Scott’s Seven picks for a parlay on this one. I like a close game here of course.

BUF-KC: Bills were my upset pick and I almost feel obligated to go through with them as my pick for that reason. But I am having doubts with this crazy Sean McDermott 9/11 story causing a distraction before a must-win game. The football gods might be in a punishing move, then I look at Isiah Pacheco’s health and the way Josh Allen has played so well in Arrowhead, and screw it, let’s just go with it. Chiefs could use a season with some real adversity as I don’t believe the defense is going to hold up the rest of the year. Already played their worst game of the season in Green Bay last week, allowing 27 points on 7 drives. Now the injuries are starting to hit.

PHI-DAL: Like last week, the Eagles are a team that’s been winning the close ones while the 49ers and Cowboys are classic “win big, lose close” teams. Should be an interesting one as it was one of 2022’s best games with Dallas winning 40-34 against Gardner Minshew, who David Carr probably thinks would be a better start in this game than Jalen Hurts.

TEN-MIA and GB-NYG: Talk about low expectations doubleheader for MNF. I probably should have did some SGP+ for that slate, which would include another 100 yards and a TD for Tyreek Hill, another TD for De’Von Achane,, under 16.5 points for the Titans, Jordan Love 2+ TD passes, and his over in passing yards in a GB win.

NFL Stat Oddity: Week 13

~ Scott ~ 8 Comments

I had some high expectations for Week 13 in the NFL, but it looks like the week peaked on Thursday night when the Seahawks gave the Cowboys their best shot in a 41-35 shootout.

While there have been 9 games with a comeback opportunity this week, the only one on Sunday with any fourth-quarter lead changes was Colts vs. Titans. You know it’s a weak slate when Gardner Minshew vs. Will Levis was the highlight game of the afternoon with a wild variety of big plays leading to a walk-off overtime touchdown that could have the Colts in a better playoff position than some of these teams like the Steelers, Browns, and Broncos.

The NFC’s Game of the Year saw the 49ers blow the Eagles away over the final 45 minutes, scoring 6 straight touchdowns before running out the clock in a 42-19 win. The way it happened only further complicated the MVP race in my book, but I knew going in Jalen Hurts was not the choice.

One thing that caught my eye this week was that even if you fire Frank Reich (Panthers), Matt Canada (Steelers), and Jack Del Rio (Commanders), the roster flaws are still going to be there this late in the season. It’s too hard to shake those deficiencies, and if the in-house promotion taking over those roles was good enough in the first place, things would have been working better earlier in the season. Coaching matters but firing a coach near wintertime is unlikely going to spark much change. You have to wait until the offseason to really clean house and fix things for next year.

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

49ers at Eagles: Having a QB to Get Those Receivers the Ball Did in Fact Matter a Lot

Yeah, I may have reverse jinxed the Eagles this week if all the talk about point differential and Jalen Hurts being a sham of an MVP season weren’t clues to that. But even I was surprised at the switch the 49ers hit in the second quarter after the first 15 minutes, which they usually do great in, saw Brock Purdy complete 0 passes and the Eagles take a 6-0 lead. The Eagles looked ready to throw early with Hurts playing decisively on third downs to his wideouts. But the 49ers stiffened in the red zone and held them to field goals.

Once the 49ers got their initial first down, it was lights out from there. They scored 6 straight touchdowns on drives that covered 85, 90, 75, 77, 75, and 48 yards. No one can compete with an offense in that kind of rhythm. Christian McCaffrey had a solid day on the ground (93 yards), but it was the incredible YAC by Deebo Samuel and the receivers that won the day again for the 49ers.

Samuel showed his rare mix of speed and strength on a 48-yard touchdown in the third quarter when it looked like the Eagles might make it close, and then even Jauan Jennings showed a nice move on an 18-yard touchdown in the fourth quarter. Samuel had one more in him from 46 yards out that was mostly YAC, and he had a rushing touchdown earlier, so it was a hat trick.

Purdy threw for 314 yards and 4 touchdowns. Not bad for a quarterback who had no completions in the opening quarter, and who didn’t escape the first drive of the title game without a major injury. He orchestrated the offense perfectly, though I would say he was much more impressive as a passer against Dallas in Week 5, the other game this year when he threw 4 touchdowns and dropped 42 points on a main NFC contender. I don’t know what you do with this MVP race now, but I know Purdy and Dak Prescott should be ahead of Hurts, who quietly finished with 298 yards and 2 total touchdowns in a game the 49ers controlled for the last 45 minutes. Hurts also momentarily left for a concussion check but finished the game.

For a big game with such a lopsided 42-19 score, it was odd to not see a single turnover or missed field goal. There wasn’t even a failed 4th down until 2:07 remained and the Eagles gave it back.

We can assume these teams are both going to the playoffs, so this could be only the third game since 1970 between playoff teams where there were no turnovers and someone won by at least 23 points. The Eagles have the worst such loss in 2013 when they lost 52-20 to Peyton Manning’s Broncos. Manning’s Colts also beat Jeff Fisher’s Titans in a 23-0 game in a Week 17 playoff rest scenario.

But as I was saying Saturday, the Eagles’ fortunate close wins against the Chiefs and Bills combined with their remaining schedule still gives them an edge for the No. 1 seed, so Dallas or San Francisco could still have to come back to Philly in January to get to the Super Bowl. We’ll see what happens next week in the NFC East rematch, but maybe if the Eagles are 0-2 against those teams in December, they’ll both have confidence they can come back to Philly and win again.

Chiefs at Packers: A Slightly Different Kind of KC Loss

You rarely see Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs lose a game like this. In fact, it’s the first time in his career where the Chiefs scored more than 9 points and never held a lead. It is only the third wire-to-wire loss in Mahomes’ career, joining the 2021 Titans (27-3) and 2023 Broncos (24-9).

This was a limited-possession game with each team only getting the ball 7 times, which means every mistake gets magnified. The Chiefs arguably lost it in the first half when they converted their two long drives into field goals after Mahomes took a career-high 3 sacks in the red zone as Green Bay’s pass rush was great again. Meanwhile, the Packers converted their drives into touchdowns and led 14-6 behind another strong showing from Jordan Love, who became the first quarterback to drop 27 points on the Chiefs defense this year. The defense had a few injuries in the game and failed to impress.

While the Chiefs had back-to-back touchdown drives and were in position to take their first lead in a 21-19 game in the fourth quarter, we got a taste of the officiating blunders to come. Mahomes threw incomplete on a 3rd-and-8 to a receiver (Richie James) who was on the ground and he thought he’d get the flag call, but it didn’t come. It was the only 3-and-out in the game.

The Packers turned that into a field goal and 24-19 lead. After getting a soft defensive pass interference flag, the Chiefs turned the ball over when Mahomes floated a bad decision throw to Skyy Moore, who was beat to the ball by Keisean Nixon for an interception with 5:14 left. Good things just never happen when this offense goes to Moore, and I’m not sure why that was the call when Travis Kelce and Rashee Rice had solid nights. So did Isiah Pacheco on the ground, but the Chiefs even went away from him in some key moments to try getting their worst players involved again. A recurring theme this year.

The Packers burned more clock and made the Chiefs use their timeouts before kicking a field goal to make it 27-19. Mahomes had to drive 70 yards in 69 seconds, but that’s doable. The officiating was just horrendous on this drive as penalties seemed to be switched to random mode:

  • They called the Packers for a 15-yard unnecessary roughness hit on Mahomes on the sideline when he was still in bounds on a scramble. Bad call.
  • They blew a live fumble play that wasn’t a fumble as Rice was down, and in the ensuing scrum, they disqualified Pacheco for hitting someone back in retaliation, a dumb 15-yard flag.
  • Mahomes went for a deep shot to Marquez Valdes-Scantling, and after one of the most blatant defensive pass interference you’ll ever see, no flag came out. The ball should have been inside the 5.
  • MVS got out of bounds on a 9-yard gain with 19 seconds left, but his forward momentum was stopped and it should have been a running clock.

The Chiefs’ strategy from the Green Bay 33 made little sense as they only had one great shot at the end zone, and it was the final play on the Hail Mary. There was a clear shove on Kelce in the end zone, which could have been called for DPI and an untimed down, but no flag came of course.

What a mess. I’m actually okay with the no call on the Hail Mary. It needs to be something really egregious like pushing a guy to the ground or holding his arm back or not playing the ball at all and tackling the receiver. But that no call on MVS was ridiculous. Textbook DPI and they were afraid to call it on the home team in a big spot.

It was the first time this year the Chiefs lost and Mahomes wasn’t seen throwing incomplete on 4th-and-25+ to end the game. But given they were 33 yards away from the end zone on the last play, that 4th-and-10 might as well have been 4th-and-33.

The Packers (6-6) are very much in this playoff race. Beating the Lions and Chiefs in back-to-back weeks is more impressive than any wins teams like the Dolphins and Cowboys have this year.

As for the Chiefs, what can be said that wasn’t clear going into the season? They gambled on a bad wide receiver room, and it’s been the main source of their problems this year along with Kelce losing a step at 34. Even in the first half of this game, those were coverage sacks in the red zone with receivers not getting open. You don’t expect to only get 7 cracks at the ball, but that can happen, and that’s why the Chiefs are a liability to get into a shootout this year since they are simply not as efficient on offense as they were in 2018-22. The defense played its worst game of the season and the result shows it. Never led.

I could see the Chiefs, who are 2-3 against NFC teams this year, losing to Buffalo next week too, a team that has success against them and is playing for their playoff lives.

Colts at Titans: Amusing AFC South Battle

I keep saying it every week but the Colts are doing an exceptional job at scoring with backup offensive players in a year where so many offenses are struggling. If the Colts (7-5) keep doing this and sneak into the playoffs, I think you have to look at Shane Steichen for Coach of the Year.

This was a one-sided game early with the Colts trailing 17-7, but they crawled back with field goals, then things got wild late in the third quarter when they blocked Tennessee’s punt and returned it for a touchdown. But in going for a 2-point conversion, Minshew’s pass was intercepted and returned the distance for the rare pick-2 to make it a 22-19 game with the Colts ahead.

Incredibly, the Colts blocked the next punt too after demolishing and injuring punter Ryan Stonehouse. But despite having a 1st-and-goal at the 7, the Colts settled for a field goal and 25-19 lead. The Titans were able to tie it with Will Levis throwing a 3-yard touchdown to DeAndre Hopkins, but Nick Folk was wide left on the extra point, failing to give his team the lead. Stonehouse was the regular holder on kicks, but quarterback Ryan Tannehill had to take over for him due to the injury. Maybe that threw off the kicking process for Folk, who later had to punt in the game and did an adequate job with that.

The teams traded punts to eventually go to overtime where the Titans won the toss and received first. After a lengthy drive with penalties, they settled for a field goal and 28-25 lead. But like we saw last week with Bills-Eagles, the team going last with the ball was able to calmly drive with over 4 minutes left for a game-winning touchdown, playing 4-down football without having to conserve much time. Minshew hit a 55-yard pass to Alec Pierce, then two plays later the Titans played some unbelievably soft coverage on Michael Pittman Jr. in the end zone on a 4-yard touchdown to walk it off for the Colts. That was open all day for the Colts an Pittman, who had 11 catches for 105 yards.

The future of the AFC South looks to be in good hands with Jacksonville thriving, and the Colts and Texans are already competing for the playoffs in Year 1 of their regimes.

Lions at Saints: The Almost Comeback

When you see a team jump out to a 21-0 lead not even 7 full minutes into a game, you do get a bit more worried about a big blown lead than if you built it up more naturally with long drives and less time left.

The Lions were all over the Saints early, but it was a shaky finish to a 33-28 final. The Saints were down 27-21 going into the fourth quarter, but that’s when Derek Carr lost a fumble, and the Lions had another short-yardage drive for a touchdown. Carr was injured on the next drive with a concussion, shoulder, and back injury. Maybe a rib too because why not? Rough day for him all around.

Jameis Winston took over and the Saints saw the full Jameis experience again. Chris Olave helped this comeback get close with some circus catches on the day, including a deflected ball by Jameis that Olave caught for 30 yards to convert a 3rd-and-13.

But down 33-28 late, Winston threw 3 straight incompletions with 6 yards to go at the Detroit 40. The Lions were able to run out the final 2:56 on the clock after Jared Goff made a nice little throw on the run to convert a 3rd-and-9 to Josh Reynolds, who ducked down to make the low catch for 12 yards to end the threat.

Two qualities Carr was supposed to bring to New Orleans was solid durability, but he’s been knocked out of multiple games with injuries this year, and the other was an edge in close games as he has pulled off a lot of comebacks and game-winning drives in his career. But the Saints are now 0-5 at comeback opportunities, the worst record of any team this season.

Chargers at Patriots: Everything Is Over in New England Except for the Score

Bill Belichick is a noted historian of the game, so I wonder what he thinks of this run his team is on right now.

The 2023 Patriots are on a 3-game losing streak where they lost 10-6 to the Colts, 10-7 to the Giants, and now 6-0 to the Chargers. This is not normal in any era of professional football that’s happened after Hitler invaded Poland in 1939.

These are the only teams since 1940 to go 3 straight games without scoring or allowing more than 10 points: 1940 Steelers (4 games), 1940 Lions (3 games), 1946 Steelers (3 games), 1993 Jets (3 games), and 2023 Patriots. At least when the Jets did it in 1993, they still found a way to go 2-1 in those games.

The 2023 Patriots are the first team since the 1938 Chicago Cardinals to lose at least 3 straight games when allowing no more than 10 points. It happened to those Cardinals in 4 straight games.

I almost feel bad for Belichick (not really) in this one, because it may have turned out differently if Rhamondre Stevenson didn’t get injured and fumble on a play in the first quarter when it looked like the Patriots were driving. Stevenson was off to another good start with 39 yards in the quarter, but he was knocked out with a serious leg injury and lost a fumble on top of it. The Patriots never got deeper than the Chargers 28 the rest of the game.

But do you know how absurd it is to have a 6-0 game in 44-degree weather with marginal wind and no precipitation? They held Justin Herbert to 6 points and still lost. Philip Rivers, who lost so many big games to the Patriots in his career, had to be jealous as hell watching Herbert get a win here.

Because it was a ridiculous game all around. The Chargers scored two field goals on drives that went 27 and 7 yards. That’s it. This game somehow ended 6-0 despite no missed field goals and the only turnover was Stevenson’s fumble.

This is only the 5th game in the salary cap era (since 1994) to have 6 combined points or fewer, and only the 2nd that wasn’t influenced by extreme weather or rested starters:

  • 2003 Steelers at Jets (W 6-0): One of the worst football watching experiences I ever had as very heavy snow killed the game, but the Steelers also missed a pair of short field goals (43 and 20 yards).
  • 2007 Dolphins at Steelers (W 3-0): The infamous wet field that was so bad a punt landed and immediately stuck to the ground.
  • 2017 Cowboys at Eagles (L 6-0): Week 17 game where the Eagles (No. 1 seed) were resting starters and the Cowboys missed an extra point on their only touchdown.
  • 2018 Colts at Jaguars (W 6-0): Jacksonville might as well be the Bermuda Triangle when the Colts go down there, and this was the weirdest loss of Andrew Luck’s career.

The Patriots did fail on a couple of 4th downs to turn it over, but this was still a historic, low-scoring game. The Chargers sacked Bailey Zappe 5 times to help win the game. Herbert converted a late 3rd-and-11 to seal the game and not give the Patriots one more try.

We know they weren’t going to score anyway. Now with the Steelers and Mitch Trubisky up next, the Patriots may continue this unfathomable streak of sucking all the points (and joy) out of games.

Broncos at Texans: Russ Wasn’t Cooking Today

I wanted to see what Denver’s offense would do against a formidable Houston offense that doesn’t turn it over much, so they would unlikely fuel Russell Wilson with a bunch of short fields like he’s enjoyed during the 5-game winning streak for Denver.

Sure enough, the Texans had no turnovers, and sure enough, the Broncos struggled to move the ball. The Broncos were down 13-0 and Courtland Sutton didn’t even make a catch until late in the third quarter on a great 45-yard effort.

But instead of a comeback win to keep this streak going, Wilson ended up throwing 3 interceptions on the team’s final 4 drives. But since the Houston offense lost Tank Dell to injury and C.J. Stroud had some misfires and took 5 sacks, it was a 22-17 game late. Houston definitely left some points on the field in this one and had to rely on the defense to put it away.

It looked like Wilson might pull this one out after he scrambled for a first down on a 4th-and-2 at the Houston 8 with 23 seconds left. But the defense stiffened, and after trying to scramble and make a heroic throw, Wilson was picked off in the end zone to ice the win for Houston (7-5), a key tiebreaker in this AFC race.

Falcons at Jets: The Beat Goes On

The Falcons squeezed out a 13-8 win in a game where neither team’s starting quarterback had 150 passing yards, neither team reached 14 points, and neither team averaged better than 2.6 yards per carry.

That sounds about right. But for as unimpressive as Desmond Ridder can be, he didn’t let the Jets take advantage of a big turnover. The Falcons had to survive 9 punts and a safety, but they did it thanks to a defense that finished strong.

The Jets benched starter Tim Boyle for veteran backup Trevor Siemian, but he was not an improvement. He had 4 opportunities at a go-ahead touchdown in a 13-8 game, but he never got deeper than the Atlanta 48, and that even includes a drive where he took over at the Atlanta 48.

The Falcons (6-6) weren’t about to let Siemian add his name to the list of quarterbacks to upset them this year. The Jets have gone 6 straight games without scoring more than 13 points. One more game and it will tie the longest streak in the NFL since the 2003 Giants had a 7-game run of futility.

Browns at Rams: Flacco vs. Stafford in the Year 2023?

I don’t know where Cleveland’s season is heading at 7-5, but I hope people can understand these back-to-back 17-point losses to the Broncos and Rams were much closer than the scores suggest. Last week it was a big fumble on a doomed play call in a 17-12 game that started the avalanche.

This time, it was Joe Flacco’s first start with the team, and let’s be honest, he played better than the average Deshaun Watson start for Kevin Stefanski. It was not surprising to see him have a connection with Eljah Moore (83 yards) after they played together with the Jets last season.

But Flacco may have trusted his arm and Moore a little too much on an ill-advised pass. Flacco had just led a touchdown drive that should have tied the game, but the Browns were wide right on the extra point, keeping the Rams ahead 20-19. Flacco got the ball back, but instead of taking his time to set up the go-ahead field goal, he immediately threw deep for Moore and was intercepted with 6:32 left. The interception was also returned deep into Cleveland territory, setting up a 24-yard touchdown drive after Cooper Kupp caught a short score with 3:48 left.

I thought that would have been a great spot for a 2-point conversion to go up 9, but Sean McVay settled for the 27-19 lead. The Browns went 4-and-out, setting up the Rams for another short field and 30-yard touchdown drive to make it 34-19. With the game basically out of reach, Flacco was hit with an intentional grounding penalty and a pair of sacks to end up with a safety for the Rams, which is how we got to 36-19 (surprisingly, not a unique score in NFL history).

The short fields didn’t help, but the Cleveland defense also failed to get any sacks or takeaways. This team isn’t going to win many more games if that continues to happen. Meanwhile, the Rams are 6-6 and right back in the playoff mix.

Dolphins at Commanders: You’ve Watched Tyreek Hill Play Before, Right?

The Dolphins have lost their No. 1 scoring team status to Dallas for the time being, but what do you think happened when they played the No. 32 scoring defense in Washington? They dropped 45 points on them too like Dallas did on Thanksgiving, including a pick-6 on a screen.

But it was touchdowns of 78 and 60 yards to Tyreek Hill that highlighted Washington’s awful day on defense. They have watched Hill play before, right? Eric Bieniemy could have told the defense a thing or two about what this guy does, but they were still burned twice for big ones as Hill finished with 157 yards, good for his pursuit of 2,000 yards.

It was just a weird, pointless game in that Washington trailed 31-7 at halftime and still finished with 28 runs to 26 passes. A couple of those runs were Sam Howell scrambles off passes as he picked up another 2 rushing touchdowns, but that’s still pretty much 50-50 play calling despite the huge margin.

Cardinals at Steelers: Playing Down to the Competition Isn’t What It Used to Be When the Standard Is This Low

On the one hand, the Steelers losing 24-10 at home to the 2-10 Cardinals with James Conner seeking a revenge game (105 yards, 2 TD) wasn’t that surprising. It’s hardly the first time in the Mike Tomlin era they played down to the competition. But the way they looked so outmatched in a game that took over 4 hours to complete because of two weather delays was appalling. They made Trey McBride look like prime Gronk, and the Cardinals almost couldn’t miss on third down for a long portion of the game.

Then there’s the offense, which is averaging 3 points per first half without Matt Canada, and 13 points per game without Canada. They basically call their best plays on the opening drive, then it’s back to the same old garbage for the rest of the game. You see Kenny Pickett throw a play-action bomb to George Pickens on a 2nd-and-1 for 38 yards and think that’s smart, that’s anti-Canada progress. But where is anything like that the rest of the game?

Then Pickett was injured again, the 5th time in 25 appearances that he was unable to finish because of injury, which is an absurd number. He’s almost ready to match Ben Roethlisberger’s number and he played 18 years.

The Pickett injury preceded the game’s critical swing point. The Steelers faced 4th-and-1 at the 1 and of course you’d go for it there. Mitch Trubisky was at quarterback and they tried to hammer it in with Najee Harris, but I bet you a spread run with Jaylen Warren had a better shot of converting. Maybe they wanted to keep it simple with Trubisky coming into the game cold on a rainy day, but that was a blown opportunity.

Still, you don’t expect the Cardinals to drive 99 yards for a touchdown to end the half with a 10-3 lead. McBride came up huge on the drive, and he had what I thought was a touchdown that replay took away, meaning we still don’t know what a catch is in 2023. At least he got the touchdown on the next play, so no controversy there.

Trubisky fumbled a low snap in the third quarter and the Cardinals turned that into a 21-yard touchdown drive. Chris Boswell then missed a 45-yard field goal to make sure it was a shit sandwich with all three units contributing. A facemask penalty on a punt return set up Conner for his 2nd touchdown run on what was a 33-yard touchdown drive. So, the defense allowed touchdown drives of 99, 21, and 33 yards. One clearly their fault, the others more questionable, but none of it really mattered because the offense was lousy again.

Pickett has shaken off his injuries before and played the next game, but it sounds like this ankle one will knock him out for a few weeks, especially with the Patriots up next this Thursday night. Does it even matter for the team’s performance? Nope. But it could only complicate how they view him going forward, because making the playoffs when poor play like this is still so rampant with the team would be a bad thing.

They need to start thinking about the future – a real one, and maybe one that includes a whole new coaching staff, because the standard is just stale.

Panthers at Buccaneers: Same Old 4th Quarter Story

Chris Tabor is the interim head coach of the Panthers, and in the first game after Frank Reich was fired, it was the same old story for Carolina. Nothing sparking in the passing game with Bryce Young, defensive lapses that led to Mike Evans dominating (162 yards and a 75-yard touchdown) despite Baker Mayfield not finding any of his other receivers, and of course a failure to rally in the fourth quarter.

The Panthers were able to turn a 21-10 game into a 21-18 game, but when Young got the ball back, he couldn’t convert a 3rd-and-1 and 4th-and-1 with the game on the line. First, why is he throwing on both critical downs when Chuba Hubbard had over 100 yards rushing and there were over 2:00 left? Just run the damn ball once or twice. You had the 2-minute warning and were at your 40 in a 3-point game. Like I said in the intro, these interim coaches are unlikely to be any better, and in some cases, they’ll be even worse.

Good night, Irene. The Panthers are 1-11. Too bad they can’t get the No. 1 pick and take a franchise quarterback in 2024…

Next week: The NFL clearly had high expectations for Week 14, but the teams weren’t up to the task. Bills-Chiefs is at least still interesting because Buffalo’s season is on life support and they basically need to win out, and the Chiefs are more vulnerable than ever. But it’s not as strong as the build-in to their last meeting. And while Eagles-Cowboys is a big one on SNF, it’s not really for first place in the NFC East like you’d hope it would be. I still think Eagles can win out even if losing this game and claim the division on a tiebreaker. But it is another chance for Dallas to establish some dominance and confidence against a key rival.

NFL Week 13 Predictions: NFC Game of the Year Edition

~ Scott ~ Leave a comment

We are running out of big games in this 2023 NFL regular season now that Bills-Chiefs and Bengals-Chiefs have lost a lot of luster. But we will get the NFC Game of the Year this Sunday in Philadelphia, and hopefully it can live up to what we saw last week with Bills-Eagles.

Having said that, I’ve been looking at the standings and remaining schedules and it’s not as big of a game as I’d like this weekend. Even if the Eagles lose at home to the 49ers, we still might see the Eagles finish No. 1, 49ers finish No. 2, and Cowboys stuck at No. 5 even if they finish 14-3, so that’s a bummer.

Basically, the 49ers need to win this game and hope the Cowboys take care of Philly next Sunday night in Dallas. That way if the 49ers win out and both teams finish 14-3, the 49ers get the top seed due to the head-to-head tiebreaker. Even if the 49ers, Eagles, and Cowboys were all 14-3 (it could happen), the 49ers would get it based on beating both while the Eagles would be 1-2 in those games and the Cowboys would be 2-1.

Cause I can’t see the Eagles losing to Seattle, Giants (twice), or Arizona after this stretch. Maybe Seattle if Geno Smith plays so well like he did Thursday night, but Dallas still won that game and Seattle may be on their way to an 8-9 finish and no postseason. So, it has to be the 49ers and Cowboys these next two weeks that stop Philly’s momentum as this team keeps winning almost every close game this year, a sharp contrast from the 49ers and Cowboys blowing teams out for the most part. (That’s your first hint which way I’m really leaning here as we are in #ReverseJinxSeason)

If the Eagles beat the 49ers, then it’s almost a lock going into Week 14 that it’ll be No. 1 Eagles, No. 2 49ers, and No. 5 Cowboys, so that would also make next week’s NFC East rematch less important. Basically, we need to blame the Chiefs and Bills for screwing up the last two weeks and not beating Philly to make this 3-team NFC race much more interesting if they all had 3 losses.

Final NFC note: I’m well aware the Lions are 8-3 too but I feel confident that team is of a lower caliber than these teams, and they will lose in Dallas, and maybe even lose a Vikings game to finish 12-5 at best. They shouldn’t interfere with my 1-2-5 seed predictions. Solidly No. 3 in the NFC, which is almost like winning a Super Bowl for the Lions.

I think the best outcome for the playoffs in the NFC would be Dallas crushing the NFC South winner, the weak wild cards losing to the No. 3 Lions and No. 2 49ers, who would then meet in the divisional round in a fresh matchup. The No. 5 Cowboys return to Philly to face the No. 1 Eagles first and see if they can knock them out, then maybe it’s another trip back to San Francisco to complete the revenge tour to get Dak Prescott, who is gaining steam for MVP, in the Super Bowl like I predicted before Week 1.

But the main thing is getting Cowboys-Eagles first instead of seeing Dallas lose to SF again and the Eagles only having to beat one of those teams in January.

This Week’s Articles

The 10 Greatest Field Goals in NFL History – Thanks to Jake Elliott’s 59-yard game-saving FG, I jumped on the chance to research the best FGs in NFL history and found that a few kickers are worthy of ranking twice on that list. But No. 1 is not up for debate.

NFL Week 13 Predictions

Welp, I should have learned my lesson from TB-BUF to not bet on the final score for TNF this year. I nailed the props and TD scorers in this game, but screwed myself thinking Dallas was going to win by double digits and the Seahawks wouldn’t score over 17.5 points. They doubled that with 35 points in one of the most unexpected shootouts of the year.

But TNF hasn’t been that awful this year. It’s SNF and especially MNF where scoring goes to die this year, and I’m still making bets that way this week.

LAC-NE: I’m just taking a swing that the Chargers are going to commit a comedy of errors like they usually do against the Pats, and that Bailey Zappe gets Brandon Staley fired.

ARI-PIT: The Steelers have a chance to play really well at home against an overmatched opponent, but Kyler Murray is a veteran QB, something they have not faced recently. In other words, look for the Steelers to win a 24-20 nail-biter against a 2-win team. But I do like the rushing props in this one as it might rain Sunday.

DEN-HOU: Should be a one-score game. I’m still backing Houston but it’s a bummer tight end Dalton Schultz is out as I wanted to bet on him as I think C.J. Stroud gets his slots and seams receivers going this week.

DET-NO: I’m just counting on the Lions to get back on track and win by a TD. Could be a game where both teams score in the 20s if the Lions don’t start playing better offense, but we know the Saints settle for a lot of FGs with Carr at QB.

IND-TEN: I like the over more than picking the winner here. Titans usually score more at home and Hopkins and Moss went off in the last game that was more offensive than the 23-16 score suggests (low possession game).

ATL-NYJ: Could there be value again in betting on high reception totals for the Jets (Wilson/Conkln/Hall) if Tim Boyle is going to keep dinking and dunking? Scary proposition for an Atlanta defense that already lost to Levis/Dobbs/Kyler in a 3-week stretch. Not a game I’d put much on but Falcons should win a low-scoring game.

MIA-WAS: I think Sam Howell will throw a lot of passes and Tyreek Hill will have a lot of yards and score at least one touchdown. Firing Jack Del Rio was necessary but it’s hard to imagine a good game from the Washington defense here. But I think it could be a 31-24 game.

CAR-TB: Firing Frank Reich was kind of stunning given the timing, but they were playing awful football for him. Not sure that changes much this week. I like Rachaad White to find the end zone at least once.

SF-PHI: Think I’ve shared a lot on this game in the links above, but I do look at the 49ers as a front-running team that could play into Philly’s comeback hands in the second half. But my favorite bet is the over as I think it’ll look a lot different from the title game. I also think Jalen Hurts is going to struggle to throw for many yards for the 3rd week in a row, and it will come down to turnovers as it always does for these teams.

Since 2022, the 49ers are 23-1 when they have 0-1 giveaways and 0-7 when they have 2+ giveaways.

CLE-LAR: The return of Joe Flacco. God, we need to see him start a playoff game again. Get more data points on that. I think the Browns could upset this one for sure, but I hedged and took CLE ATS/LAR ML. But could see Myles Garrett and company getting after Stafford. Flacco is a wild card; not so much in thinking he will be great, but what degree of terrible could he be on short notice? Not a fun game to bet on.

KC-GB: When these teams played in 2021, it was the lowest-scoring game (20 total points) and fewest passing yards (166) of any game in Patrick Mahomes’ career that he started and finished. That gave me assurance to take the under, as did the season-long performance of these teams, and I also think it’s another spot for the Chiefs to win but opponent covers. Should be a good one that wasn’t looking so good a few weeks ago before Jordan Love started playing better.

CIN-JAX: Can I just get one Evan Engram TD in 2023? Even if it’s a 24-13 game, let’s just see a little more action than that garbage game the Vikings and Bears played last week.

NFL Stat Oddity: Week 12

~ Scott ~ 8 Comments

The holiday games left a lot to be desired for this NFL season, but Week 12 managed to follow it with a game of the year candidate between the Bills and Eagles. It was the only game all week with a fourth-quarter lead change, and there were multiple lead changes at that.

The only other game-winning drive in Week 12 went to the Giants after another low point for Bill Belichick’s 2-win Patriots. Week 12 has 8 games with a comeback opportunity so far, which is a low number given 15 games have been played. We are almost at the point where the bye weeks are over and everyone’s played an equal number of games.

I’m only going to cover Sunday’s 11 games below as I think Thanksgiving was straightforward. The only surprise was that Detroit is suddenly looking vulnerable and Green Bay might be figuring things out with Jordan Love. The Lions have rarely looked good on defense since the blowout loss to the Ravens, and the offense is in a turnover funk right now with Jared Goff (3 picks, 3 fumbles lost over the last two games). We’ll see if Minnesota can sweep Chicago on Monday night to keep the pressure on the Lions for the NFC North since they still have to meet twice this year.

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

Bills at Eagles: Game of the Year Edition

Finally, a game that lived up to and exceeded the hype. If you want to see points and drama in an NFL game this year, you have to focus on the big matchups in the afternoon as the island games have been awful all year. We can only be so lucky that 49ers-Eagles turns out this good next Sunday afternoon.

But an easy way to trigger all the PTSD in a Buffalo fan is to tell them their season is going to end on the wrong side of a clutch field goal kick, a go-ahead Gabe Davis TD called by Nantz and Romo that doesn’t hold up after the 2-minute warning, and an overtime game where Josh Allen doesn’t have the ball last. I think we covered about everything except the Music City Miracle, but maybe the Eagles are saving their kickoff return dark voodoo for next week.

This is going to fall on deaf ears for Buffalo fans who are tired of hearing this in the Sean McDermott era, which may not have many games left to it, but the Bills should have won this game.

Since 1991, teams with at least 29 points and 12 third-down conversions were 53-0. Make that 53-1 now.

Buffalo had 505 yards and was 13-of-22 on third down. Since 1991, teams with 13 conversions on third down are 29-4, and this Buffalo team has half the losses. They somehow lost 42-16 to the Titans in 2020 in a game where they were 13-of-17 on third down.

Just like the Chiefs on Monday night, the Bills led Philly 17-7 at halftime, but it should have been more than that. While Josh Allen looked outstanding in the rain, his kicker did not. Jalen Carter blocked Tyler Bass’ 34-yard field goal with 1:24 left in the half, and then he was wide right on a 48-yard field goal in the third quarter.

While Allen had over 200 yards at halftime despite the rain and his linemen’s penalties, Jalen Hurts was not handling the elements well. He was 4-of-11 for 33 yards, an interception, and a lost fumble at halftime.

But you know the Eagles can come back, and you know the Bills are either a blowout win or close loss team. It did not look like they would blow the Eagles out, though the yardage margins were so out of whack (276-99 at halftime) that they probably should have.

Even after Allen scrambled for a 16-yard touchdown, his second of the day on the ground, to take a 24-14 lead into the fourth quarter, it still didn’t feel safe for Buffalo. After the Eagles had their best drive for a touchdown, Allen was intercepted again, giving the Eagles the ball 24 yards away from the lead. Quick, someone fire Ken Dorsey again.

But after moving backwards on two plays, the Eagles faced a 3rd-and-15. McDermott’s defense could have stepped up and made a play, but instead they looked like Auburn’s defense against Alabama on Saturday as Zaccheaus caught a 29-yard touchdown in the end zone to give the Eagles a 28-24 lead.

In a game where he dropped back 60 times, Allen took his only sack on third down on the next drive, but the Eagles went three-and-out. Allen did not waste his second opportunity, and he threw a 7-yard touchdown to Gabe Davis with 1:52 left.

The Eagles drove to the Buffalo 34 before things got dicey. Jason Kelce had a pair of false starts, which you don’t expect. A designed run by Hurts only gained 3 yards when it looked like the hole was there. Then Hurts threw an incompletion on 3rd-and-17.

Jake Elliott was going to have to make a 59-yard field goal in rainy conditions to save this game for overtime. Things looked bleak, but I actually thought Buffalo screwed up by not letting A.J. Brown catch the short pass Jordan Poyer knocked away from him on 3rd & 17. It was only going to gain a few yards. Make them rush the field goal unit out there (no timeouts) for a hurried kick from 55+ yards. Instead, they had time to prepare, and McDermott even iced the kicker with a timeout. I didn’t like that move by Buffalo.

Sure enough, Elliott snuck the field goal through to tie the game at 31. It may only be a regular-season game, but that should go down as one of the best kicks in NFL history. Not going to top what Adam Vinatieri did in the Tuck Rule game and the snow to save a title run in the playoffs, but as far as regular-season kick goes, you’d have a hard time finding something better.

Buffalo had 20 seconds and 1 timeout left. This team more than anyone should know about what you can do in 20 (or 13) seconds. Why not let Allen throw a pass and try to get a drive going? Did they not trust the kicker that much, or did they not trust Allen to throw a pick? Either way, I hated the kneeldown too.

In overtime, the Bills took the ball first, which is understandable in a game like this. But you have to make that drive count, and Allen came up short again when his third-down pass was a miscommunication in the end zone with Davis. That could have been the winner. Buffalo settled for the field goal and Bass at least hit from 40 yards this time.

We got to see that rare bit of football where you have 4 downs and virtually no hurry with 5:52 to move down the field. Brown almost fumbled the game away, but I thought the officials got it right with a bang-bang play. Incomplete pass but that’s just another example of how thin the margins are for the Eagles all year.

After DeVonta Smith made a third-down conversion, the Bills were in trouble. Swift had a 16-yard run against a tired defense, and then a bad play call by McDermott left the middle of the field wide open for Hurts to race 12 yards into the end zone to end it. Eagles win 37-34.

Allen falls to 0-6 in overtime games in his career, and Buffalo can’t say there weren’t multiple chances to put this one away. The Bills go into their bye thinking they had a season-saving win, and instead it’s a heartbreaking loss to fall to 6-6. They still have to go to Kansas City next and host Dallas. The playoffs are looking like a longshot, and that’s now a league-high fourth blown lead in the fourth quarter for the Bills this year, who are 2-5 in close games.

On the other side of the coin, the 2023 Eagles are 9-1 in close games, the best record in the league. That’s literally every game of their season except for the 25-11 win in Tampa Bay. I don’t see how this is sustainable. The Vikings are the only other team to play 10 close games this year and they are 5-5 (11-0 last year and we know how that ended). Which teams have played the fewest close games? Cowboys (3), Lions (4), and 49ers (4), the other top teams in the conference this year.

Next week should be very interesting when the 49ers come to town. They are similar to Buffalo in the “win big, lose close” category, but they’re also a much better team.

Ravens at Chargers: Is Brandon Staley Finished?

It feels like the last few times I wrote about a coach being fired by the time I wake up on Monday, it’s happened. Frank Reich in Indy and Matt Rhule in Carolina come to mind. Sunday night might have been the final nail in the coffin for Brandon Staley.

The Chargers are 4-7 and the No. 13 seed in a competitive AFC despite having Justin Herbert at quarterback. But the Chargers are now 1-7 at game-winning drive opportunities this year, the most losses in the league.

This was another mistake-filled performance, and the reason I say Staley is going soon is this time it was the offense that failed the Chargers the most. The defense actually held a red-hot Baltimore team that had scored 31 points in 5 straight games to 13 points for 58 minutes. Lamar Jackson was only 18-of-32 for 177 yards against the No. 32 pass defense. The Ravens tried a lot of WR screens and just weren’t that impressive on offense.

But the Chargers turned the ball over 4 times, and it was their best players that let them down. Keenan Allen and Austin Ekeler both lost fumbles in the second quarter. Herbert’s only interception was a Hail Mary that didn’t matter to end the half, but he was stripped in the red zone by Jadeveon Clowney in the fourth quarter when it was 13-3.

The Chargers are known for blowing leads, but Baltimore has been quite bad in this area the last few years. It looked like things were turning the Chargers’ way too as a touchdown to Gerald Everett made it 13-10, then Justin Tucker shocked everyone by missing a 44-yard field goal with 2:57 left. I fully thought Tucker would make it to give Baltimore a 16-10 lead, Herbert would answer with a touchdown, and Tucker would win it 19-17 on another field goal. But nope.

The Chargers had a real chance in a 13-10 game at their own 34. But Herbert was disappointing on a drive where Baltimore stepped up and played great defense. It is so hard to keep a team out of field goal range when it’s in this pass-heavy, 4-down mode, but they did it to Herbert here. A well-timed DB blitz on 4th-and-6 got to Herbert and he was flagged for intentional grounding.

Zay Flowers put it away with his second touchdown of the night – this time on a 37-yard touchdown run where he could have just slid down any time after the first down and the game would have ended. But that made it 20-10, and Herbert was unable to move more than 12 yards before another drive turned it over on downs.

The Baltimore defense was very impressive. The offense left something to be desired but you know that unit can be tough to play against with their uniquely skilled quarterback.

But it was a game there for the taking, and the Chargers did not step up again. I’m not sure how many more weeks they let this happen before a change is made.

Jaguars at Texans: Houston Stumbles in Biggest Game in Four Seasons

The Texans were my upset pick this week, but in the back of my mind I knew it was a risky pick. The Texans are the “too much too soon” team in this matchup with their rookie coach and quarterback. They gave Carolina their only win of the season, then followed it with a 3-game winning streak where they outscored the Bucs, Bengals, and Cardinals by a combined 10 points despite huge production from rookie C.J. Stroud.

The Jaguars are the “experienced team” even though they were just 3-7 going into their Baltimore game that turned things around one year ago to the date. But they have a Super Bowl-winning coach and more playoff experience on the roster.

But this game didn’t prove to be too big for the Texans at all. In fact, it was there for the taking, but they just kept coming up short:

  • The offense started with 3 straight punts thanks to a holding penalty and a ticky-tack illegal shift on Tank Dell that wiped out his 62-yard completion on a great throw from Stroud.
  • Backup kicker Matt Ammendola is a huge problem as he missed a 50-yard field goal with 20 seconds before halftime. The Jaguars then hit a 57-yard bomb to Christian Kirk at the 1-yard line with 1 second left, 1-of-4 completions the Jaguars hit for 42+ yards, then tried to run it in with Travis Etienne, but the Texans snuffed it out. Houston still trailed 13-7 at the half.
  • Despite Jacksonville’s numbers on takeaways, the only turnover in the game was an interception by Trevor Lawrence in the third quarter.
  • Leading 14-13, Houston corner Tavierre Thomas was flagged twice for defensive pass interference on third downs to help Jacksonville score a touchdown and 2-point conversion pass, which both went to Calvin Ridley. Jacksonville led the rest of the game.

In the end, it wasn’t turnovers or the moment being too big for this Houston team. It was a bad backup kicker and an ass kicking up front as Josh Allen got the best of Laremy Tunsil.

It looked like Stroud had another game-winning drive in the works in a 24-21 game, but a sack from Allen at the Jacksonville 37 set up a 2nd-and-19. After a short completion, Stroud faced 3rd-and-12. He extended the play for a very long time but eventually threw incomplete with 34 seconds left. That was a bummer as he might have considered scrambling to at least gain some yards for the kicker.

The Texans still felt a 58-yard field goal was a better choice than 4th-and-12, and maybe they were right about that. It’s a tough call. Ammendola kicked it straight this time, but it was too short, and it hit the crossbar before bouncing the wrong way for Houston. Game over. That’s why those few yards Stroud could have gained on a run would have been important.

Ammendola was with the Chiefs for a couple of games last year when Harrison Butker was injured, and if they had to stick with him the rest of the season, I’m not sure the Chiefs win the Super Bowl. He’s just not a good kicker and is an emergency backup for a reason. I’m not sure what the Texans can do there, but he’s going to be a problem if any other games come down to his leg.

For Jacksonville (8-3), a No. 1 seed is still possible with this big win that makes the division title likely. They won in the trenches and Lawrence made some big throws with Ridley delivering the way they envisioned when they made that move. I’m still not sold it’s a team you can count on in January, but this was a good win after the way things usually go when the Jags play Houston.

Chiefs at Raiders: The Second Half Slump Ends

I don’t know if the Chiefs are “back” on offense but trailing 14-0 and winning 31-17 is a very Kansas City thing. The start of this game was shocking as the Raiders moved the ball up and down the field on this top-ranked defense to take a 14-0 lead. It would have been 17-0 if Daniel Carlson didn’t pull a 30-yard field goal.

The Raiders had 221 yards of offense on 3 drives and rookie Aidan O’Connell was carving them up. Josh Jacobs, who has struggled all year behind this line, hit a 63-yard touchdown run.

But the Chiefs adjusted, and the Raiders finished with a field goal and 137 yards on their final 7 drives – an impressive turnaround for the defense.

Once Kansas City’s offense settled down, they scored 4 touchdowns and a field goal on their final 7 drives. With players like Jerick McKinnon and Kadarius Toney out, it felt like the Chiefs did a better job of getting the ball to their best players instead of trying to share the ball with anyone, including the bad targets. MVS only had one target on a catch that lost a yard. Justin Watson, who had 11 targets against the Eagles, only had one catch and it was a broken play touchdown after Robert Spillane dumped him on his ass in the end zone and no one bothered to pick him up.

Meanwhile, Rashee Rice had 8 catches for 107 yards and a touchdown in his best game of the season (despite 2 more drops). Travis Kelce was very good again with 6 catches for 91 yards. Isiah Pacheco handled some of the receiving with McKinnon out as he caught all 5 targets for 34 yards and scored 2 touchdowns. Mahomes efficiently passed for 298 yards on 27-of-34 passing.

But most importantly, the Chiefs ended their 3-game drought of not scoring after halftime. They scored a season-high 17 points after halftime in this game. It was only the second time all year where the Chiefs scored more than 10 points after halftime.

With the offense thriving and the Raiders struggling after their hot start, the Chiefs barely had to sweat the final quarter this week, winning comfortably for a change.

We’ll see the Chiefs next Sunday night in Green Bay in what could be a better challenge if Jordan Love is showing real improvement. But the Chiefs accomplished some good things in this game in showing they can still come back from 14-point deficits by getting hot on offense, and they can score after halftime too.

Steelers at Bengals: Shove It Up Your Arse, Matt Canada

What a fitting outcome. Immediately after firing offensive coordinator Matt Canada, the Steelers finally had their first 400-yard game on offense since the 2020 regular season. They had one in the playoffs that year against the Browns, but this ended a 45-game drought under Canada, and a 58-game streak that was the second longest regular-season drought without 400 yards by any offense in the last 30 years.

The very first play of the game was like one big “fuck you” to Matt Canada. The Steelers went play-action and Kenny Pickett threw deep down the middle of the field to tight end Pat Freiermuth for a 24-yard gain. Exactly the kind of things the Steelers never wanted to do under Canada despite how much sense it makes to do. Freiermuth would finish with 9 catches for 120 yards. Pickett passed for 278 yards, the 2nd-highest game of his career and easily his most in a win.

But to make it fitting for the brand, the Steelers only scored 16 points and had to sweat out the final quarter of a one-score game with Jake Browning in his first career start for the Bengals. This happened in a game where the Steelers outgained the Bengals 421-222 in yards, the first time all year Pittsburgh outgained its opponent. That’s the reminder that the offense still has some flaws that even Canada’s absence won’t fix.

While Pickett was dealing early, his accuracy was an issue later. But that may not have mattered if Diontae Johnson didn’t have one of the worst first quarters I’ve ever seen from a player. First he caught a screen, broke a tackle, but somehow ran backwards to lose 5 yards to kill the opening drive. Then he dropped a 15-yard touchdown that Mike Tomlin should have challenged as Johnson’s third foot was down and the play should have been a score. By not challenging, Tomlin watched Jaylen Warren cough up a fumble on a play where Johnson showed no effort at all:

Just a brutal start that cost the Steelers points, which is why they trailed 7-3 at halftime. Meanwhile, Browning finished his first start with 227 yards, 4 sacks, 1 touchdown, and 1 interception. I’ve seen a lot of backup quarterbacks play over the years. Some were absolutely terrible, including Caleb Hanie, Craig Krenzel, Ryan Lindley, Curtis Painter, and Keith Null. Browning did not look that bad to me. He could even be serviceable if he gets some experience, because some of his mistakes like holding the ball too long are simply not having the reps under his belt. He did get lucky on a couple of tipped balls that still found their way to Ja’Marr Chase (4 catches for 81 yards), but all in all, Browning wasn’t a disaster.

But the Bengals’ season is over without Joe Burrow. It’s easy to see that much. Browning had his shot in a 13-7 game with just over 6:00 left, but T.J. Watt sacked him on third down for a three-and-out. The Steelers added a field goal, the Bengals matched it, but Pittsburgh recovered the onside kick and wisely ran with the ball for 4 seconds to get it to the two-minute warning. With the Bengals already out of timeouts, the game ended there.

As someone who lost several parlays with Steelers Over 19.5 points failing, the 16 points was definitely the most disappointing part of this game for Pittsburgh. But at least the offense made things happen, they used the tight end the way they should have been doing since 2021, and Pickett started the game really sharp.

But I’ll hold my breath that 400-yard games will become a frequent occurrence with this group going forward. Remember, Pickett’s only game in his career with 30 points scored was against the Bengals last year. Two of his 3 games with over 260 passing yards are against the Bengals now. This could be a Cincinnati thing, and the Bengals have been giving up a lot of passing volume for the last month and a half.

But with the upcoming schedule for the Steelers (7-4), they aren’t going to need 400 yards or even 21 points to win a lot of these games. Barring disaster, this team should be in the playoffs. But to be any sort of threat there, Pickett is going to have to continue to grow and play like he did to start this game.

And Diontae Johnson needs to pull his head out of his ass.

Buccaneers at Colts: Indy Continues to Score at Impressive Rate

If the Colts (6-5) make the playoffs, I could be convinced to vote Shane Steichen for Coach of the Year. He has achieved scoring consistency in a season where so few offenses are capable of doing so, and he’s doing it with Gardner Minshew as QB1.

He’s also making some brash calls that have paid off. Up 20-17 in the fourth quarter with 9:11 left, Steichen went for it on a 4th-and-1 at the Tampa 49. It was an aggressive deep pass on a play-fake too, and it was good for 30 yards. Three plays later, Jonathan Taylor was in the end zone for his second touchdown and the Colts used that drive to provide the winning margin.

Tampa Bay lost Baker Mayfield to an early injury on a quarterback sneak, which almost never happens, but he did return. He threw a pair of touchdowns to Mike Evans, but a couple of 3rd-down sacks killed Tampa Bay on its final drives. Mayfield was stripped near midfield with 1:29 left to end the game at 27-20.

The Buccaneers (4-7) are fading to No. 11 in the NFC with the loss. The Colts are the No. 7 seed and would be taking a trip to Kansas City in a wild card game if the playoffs were this weekend. Imagine if they can repeat their Mahomes magic (19-13 and 20-17) in a game like that in the playoffs. But with the way the AFC is, expect many different teams to occupy the No. 7 and No. 2 seeds over the next few weeks. Hell, the No. 1 seed changed hands 5 times since Monday night.

But good for the Colts staying relevant in what could have easily been a lost season. We know they weren’t drafting a quarterback in 2024 anyway.

Saints at Falcons: The NFC South Battle You Expected

In the post-Drew Brees and Matt Ryan era of this rivalry, you have to admit this was a fitting game for first place in the NFC South. A game where both teams had multiple turnovers and looked like they were trying to give the game away.

The Saints got Derek Carr so they’d have an edge in games like this, but they must have forgot that he’s never won a playoff game in his career. Sure enough, in this one he was late on a throw that became a 92-yard pick-six for Atlanta, then he had a hilarious fumble while running in the open field that the Saints were lucky to recover.

The Falcons got Bijan Robinson to take the pressure off Desmond Ridder in this offense. It hasn’t worked as great as expected this year, but it did deliver on Sunday in the most important game so far for Atlanta. While Ridder did his best to make no one believe in him after 2 interceptions to Tyrann Mathieu, he made the throw of the game under pressure for a 26-yard touchdown to Robinson to expand on Atlanta’s 14-12 lead in the fourth quarter:

But of all the turnovers in the game, the biggest one may have been the one that preceded that second Robinson touchdown. The Saints were at midfield after Mathieu’s second pick, and they got into the red zone quickly. It was a struggle there all day as the offense kept settling for field goals, but Taysom Hill took off on a run that would have made it first-and-goal. He fumbled, and the Falcons recovered, setting up that 95-yard drive that ended with the Ridder to Robinson connection.

All the Saints could do from there was settle for another 39-yard field goal, which the Falcons matched to make it 24-15 with 1:47 left. Even in quasi-garbage time, Carr couldn’t get his offense in the end zone. Blake Grupe, one of the most anti-clutch kickers around right now, missed a 54-yard field goal with 30 seconds left to end this one. Also, how do you come up short on a 54-yard field goal indoors?

The Falcons (5-6) take a slight lead over the Saints (5-6) for the NFC South. But we could see another year where a team wins this division with a losing record. However, the schedule is still easy for both. This division is the sacrificial lamb to the NFC East runner-up on wild card weekend.

Browns at Broncos: Another Key Tiebreaker for Denver

Sean Payton’s rope-a-dope following a 1-5 start continues after another win over an AFC wild card contender that will give Denver a key tiebreaker for the playoffs. The Broncos (6-5) already have such a win over Buffalo that could mean a lot come January.

I was sure to not call it impressive, because I’m still not that impressed with this Denver team. Russell Wilson didn’t do anything to distance himself from the Taysom Hill comparisons after he threw for 134 yards, got an amazing touchdown catch from Adam Trautman, and he was in love with the run on this day as he carried the ball 11 times for 34 yards and a touchdown.

The Browns were stuck with rookie Dorian Thompson-Robinson, who left the game spitting out blood after a tough hit. That put P.J. Walker in the game, though I’m a bit surprised Walker wasn’t the starter since he is more experienced and a veteran. You kind of wish Cleveland trusted him more, because the first play of the fourth quarter with Cleveland trailing 17-12 was a disaster. The Browns tried a little trickery with Elijah Moore doing a reverse to Pierre Strong, and it resulted in a huge fumble.

The Broncos had another short field (20 yards) and that was when Trautman made his incredible touchdown grab to make it 24-12. The Browns are not built to come back from deficits like that, so it was just a matter of more turnovers and a sack in the end zone for a safety to get to the 29-12 final.

The Browns lost 3 fumbles and that does not include the drive-ending safety, so Denver’s defense is continuing this takeaway rampage to fuel the offense. They can add another huge tiebreaker win next week if they win in Houston.

Cleveland (7-4) could start to unravel after a loss like this, but the Browns still have games against Chicago, Jets, and Bengals, so 10 wins is possible. Is it enough this year? We’ll see. The AFC is super tight right now, so these little head-to-head losses add up.

The wins are just adding up for Denver right now but don’t start making playoff plans just yet.

Patriots at Giants: Even the Kicker Sucks Ass for New England These Days

The 2023 Patriots are the first team since the 2000 Steelers to play in back-to-back games where they neither scored nor allowed more than 10 points. A 10-6 loss to the Colts in Germany was followed Sunday by a 10-7 road loss to the Giants. The last team to go 0-2 in back-to-back games when not allowing or scoring more than 10 points is the 1993 Patriots, coached by Bill Belichick’s mentor Bill Parcells. How nice.

This latest loss was comedy for the Patriots, who are now 2-9. Tommy DeVito had a 7.4 QBR for the Giants after taking another 6 sacks, but he still won the game and led his first game-winning field goal drive to break a 7-7 tie that seemed like it may not be broken by either offense.

How do you lose to a 7.4 QBR, the worst of any winning quarterback this year? Well, Mac Jones had a 7.2 QBR after another pair of interceptions, so he was benched at halftime for Bailey Zappe.

While Zappe immediately led a 60-yard touchdown drive to start the third quarter, it was the final score for New England. He didn’t throw a fake spike pick this time, but Zappe was intercepted in the fourth quarter, and that led to an 8-yard game-winning field goal drive for DeVito. Yes, 8 yards.

Zappe had a chance from the 50 with 3:15 left in a 10-7 game, a dream scenario for a quarterback. The Patriots played for overtime, but rookie kicker Chad Ryland was shockingly wide left from 35 yards away with 3 seconds left. Game over. The Patriots spent a 4th-round pick on this kicker and he still sucks.

Belichick has only lost 6 games in his career with a missed clutch field goal. But this was the first time on a drive with Bailey Zappe, which matches the one time it’s happened with Mac Jones (2021 Buccaneers), which matches the one time it happened in two decades with Tom Brady (2012 Cardinals).

Everything has gotten worse in New England.

Rams at Cardinals: McVay’s Whipping Boys

The Rams completed another sweep of the Cardinals with a 37-14 win. I really did not expect to see Matthew Stafford throw 4 touchdown passes to Kyren Williams and Tyler Higbee (he had none going in), but that happened. It was also another quiet game for Cooper Kupp (3 catches for 18 yards) as he continues to deal with injury.

I don’t think Kyler Murray is making it that difficult on management to move on with a different quarterback in 2024. It’s just that Chicago may have the firepower in the draft to make sure they get the top prize, which I presume is still Caleb Williams.

Panthers at Titans: Turkey Coma Is Preferable

Once you get past Thanksgiving, the interest in games like this really drops. You had two rookie quarterbacks struggle to move the ball all day. Tennessee got a key 15-yard touchdown drive before halftime after a strip-sack of Bryce Young. After that it was just the Titans in survival mode with a 17-10 lead.

Carolina had four chances to tie it and never came close. Your typical Carolina issues with Young taking sacks and Miles Sanders somehow losing several yards on multiple runs. Just a bad line and the Titans took advantage. On 4th-and-6, the Panthers really thought a WR screen was going to save the day, but D.J. Chark, who isn’t even the best option for that play, gained no yards with 1:55 left and it was game over.

Next week: It’s really all about 49ers-Eagles in Week 13. You knew before the season this was the NFC Game of the Year, and hopefully it will live up to the hype. That means no quarterback injury on the first drive this time. And hopefully it doesn’t get decided by the kickers because we know the 49ers are screwed there.

NFL Week 12 Predictions: Leftovers Look Better Edition

~ Scott ~ 1 Comment

Thanks to the NFL shilling for Amazon with a Black Friday game, we’ve already had a 4-game start to Week 12. They were all division games, and they all kind of sucked. The only time any of the games got within one score in the 4th quarter was after Detroit went for a 2-point conversion with 41 seconds left in their 29-22 loss to give the underdogs one big win so far.

But oddly enough, every game so far this week had a spread of 7 or higher. Of the 12 games left this week, Chiefs at Raiders (+10) is the only one with a spread larger than 3.5. There are four games with a spread of 1.5, so expect things to be much tighter this weekend. Hopefully better too as I am looking forward to Bills-Eagles. It’s not an island game so the offenses might actually score several touchdowns.

This Week’s Articles

NFL Week 12 Predictions

My early results were all over the map, but I did at least pick the 49ers and Dolphins to crush the Seahawks and Jets. I could have did without that last Raheem Mostert TD though. Cost me a +86000 win that would have probably been my best longshot win ever.

I’m not sure what to do with some of these games. NE-NYG? Under. TB-IND? Over. ATL-NO? Flip a coin or just avoid it. One of the close games I do like a clear pick in is CLE-DEN. I think DTR struggles more against Denver’s secondary and the Broncos pull that one out to continue this playoff push. No, I still don’t believe they’re a good team, but these turnovers better not dry up against a turnover-prone Cleveland offense that is missing its QB1 and RB1.

If you read my links above, I’m all over the Steelers having their best offensive game in a while in Cincy. That doesn’t mean great numbers for other QBs, but for Kenny Pickett, throwing for 200 yards, a TD (hell maybe 2), and leading the Steelers to 20+ is big time for him. I wouldn’t have picked this if they didn’t fire Matt Canada this week, so we’ll see what happens there. It just seems too fitting that Cincy is literally the only team Pickett has scored 30 against, and his 265 yards last year were his 2nd most in a game. Granted, no Joe Burrow, Jake Browning is a wild card, and it could be another 13-10 AFC North game for that reason. But I think it’s more of an offensive game than expected and like the overs.

CAR-TEN? Damned if I know, but the Panthers are 1-7-2 ATS this year. They just haven’t played well at all under Frank Reich.

I have the Texans as my upset pick, but I’m just hoping the game is watchable since most Jacksonville games aren’t. Let’s hope for both teams to score 20+ and the game to be played within a one-score window the whole time.

LAR-ARI? I’ll pass. Maybe James Conner returns to the end zone this week. But largely avoiding that one.

KC-LV: My favorite research bit this week was finding out the Chiefs are No. 1 out of 1,577 teams since 1970 in the largest split between 1st half and 2nd half scoring through 10 games.

No points after halftime in 3 straight games for the Chiefs, the first time that’s happened in franchise history. I think the scoreless drought ends this week, but I still love the under 13.5 2H points for KC in that game. The Raiders held Miami to 6 points in Miami after halftime last week. Maybe Maxx Crosby has a monster game after wearing out that “You woke up the wrong motherfucker!” clip from Mahomes from the Quarterback show. But I do think the Chiefs get the win. It just won’t be pretty.

BUF-PHI: Love the timing of this game. Get to see if the Bills are still contenders and ready for a run, or if the Eagles win another one over a so-called contender this year. We know the Bills usually have 2 modes: close loss or blowout win, so I’m not feeling their chances to pull it off this week. Probably a game that comes down to turnovers. But I hope it’s a good one.

BAL-LAC: Potential is definitely there for a great game with the way these teams blow leads, but it also could be a Baltimore rout. But I’m thinking it ends up being one of the best island games all year (low bar).

CHI-MIN: Isn’t this why we started using flex scheduling on Monday night? Eh, might play a Dobbs TD again because he’s getting automatic with that, and his highlight reel on them is way more interesting than Jalen Hurts’ reel.

I’ll share my spreadsheet of picks on Twitter tomorrow night as I mentioned last week. I’ve been on a hot streak this week with parlays, already hitting +27000, +22000, +12800, +10000 (a few times), +5400, +4100, +3000, etc.

Let’s keep it going.

NFL Stat Oddity: Week 11

~ Scott ~ 10 Comments

Week 11 in the NFL has been quite good, but hopefully the best is still to come Monday night with Eagles-Chiefs. As for Sunday, we saw suplexes, the craziest comeback of the season took place in Detroit, a game that arguably defines the Justin Herbert era in Los Angeles, and the week you started wondering if Tommy DeVito was a better quarterback than Kenny Pickett. My God, how I miss the days of Big Ben and Eli.

But we’ll rip on Kenny Pickett a few times below. There were better games than that this week, including a solid Sunday night game that saw Russell Wilson move into a tie for 8th place in fourth-quarter comeback wins. Hours earlier, Matthew Stafford moved into a tie with Dan Marino for sixth place on the same list.

Week 11 has 8 games with a comeback opportunity so far. I’m going to need some extra time to prepare for Monday night, so this is going up before 4 a.m. and I look forward to what comes of this next game.

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

Bears at Lions: Never in Doubt

This may be the kind of game we expect to see the Bears lose these days, but it’s usually not a team like Detroit on the winning end of things. Whether they forgot how to face Justin Fields, were looking ahead to Thanksgiving this Thursday against Green Bay, or looking back too fondly of how great they played on offense in Los Angeles last week, this was a trashy performance that needed the comeback of the season to salvage for a 31-26 win.

Jared Goff threw two interceptions in the first half, it could have been three, and it turned into three in the third quarter while the Lions were trailing 20-14, having just fumbled a kickoff that led to D.J. Moore catching a 39-yard touchdown.

This was looking rough all around, but the Bears gave them a little opening in the fourth quarter. After the last Goff pick, the Bears had a drive that extended into the fourth quarter and saw Chicago face a 4th-and-1 at the Detroit 23 with 14:15 left. I think you go for the jugular and go for that one, hoping to make it a 28-14 game with less time on the clock. Instead, the Bears went safe and kicked a 40-yard field goal to make it 23-14.

Detroit still went three-and-out thanks to Montez Sweat killing the drive with a sack. The Bears grinded almost 9 minutes off the clock with what should have been a game-clinching drive. Fields had a 29-yard scramble that put him over 100 yards on the ground on the day, but the Bears did stall out eventually. They kicked a 39-yard field goal on a 4th-and-5 with 4:15 left to make it 26-14. At least that field goal was more defensible since it was 4th-and-5, and it made the Lions have to score two touchdowns to win the game.

With only 4:15 left, it is very hard to manufacture two scores (at least one being a touchdown) to win a game in the NFL. It has now only happened 28 times since 2001, and somehow this is the third time since 2020 that it’s happened in a Bears-Lions game:

Goff got his playmakers involved and Jameson Williams was open on a 32-yard touchdown with 2:59 left. That quick strike only needed 76 seconds. The Bears played right in Detroit’s hands with a run-run-incomplete 3-and-out drive, and Goff had an eternity left with 2:33, a timeout, and 73 yards to drive.

This was David Montgomery’s revenge game, his first against Chicago, and it wasn’t going so well to this point. But he looked determined on this drive with gains of 13, 12, 9, and 10 yards on the ground and on receptions. It was Jahmyr Gibbs who had a pivotal run to the 1-yard line with 31 seconds left when the Bears took a timeout, sensing what was coming next.

Sure enough, Montgomery got his Hollywood script ending and scored on the 1-yard touchdown run with 29 seconds left. Rookie tight end Sam LaPorta, on his quietest day of the season, caught a key 2-point conversion to make it 29-26.

Chicago still had two timeouts, so it was doable. But as I’ve said before, Fields might be the worst quarterback in NFL history at getting a field goal in the clutch. On the first snap of the drive, Aidan Hutchinson got to him and forced a fumble, which was eventually kicked thru the end zone for a safety. Detroit won 31-26, completing the wildest comeback of the 2023 season.

Fields is now 1-14 at fourth-quarter comeback opportunities. The Bears just never seem to be able to put these games away under Matt Eberflus.

It is an exciting win for Detroit, a great story for Montgomery, but it may be a wake-up call that they need to start playing better. The only complete performance over the last month was against the Raiders. The whole team was wiped out in Baltimore, the defense didn’t show up against the Chargers, and this game featured a lot of spotty play in every unit, but Goff’s turnovers were probably the biggest red flag. But he managed to redeem himself against a team known to blow games just like this.

A lot still has to happen before we respect the Lions as a team that wins games like this, but they are 8-2 and keeping up with the Eagles and 49ers in the NFC standings.

Chargers at Packers: A Full Helping of Chargering

Is it possible for a game to go as you expected but still be surprised by the outcome? That was this game for me.

The Packers were my upset pick, and I talked about Jordan Love throwing multiple touchdowns at home for the first time in his career against this bottom-ranked passing defense so that he could break this 7-game streak without Green Bay scoring 21 points. That all happened and he even had the first 300-yard passing game of his career. I also predicted it to be a tight, one-score game, or the usual Chargers game on a Sunday afternoon.

But the level of Chargering in this one was truly something special. Justin Herbert finished with 260 yards and 2 touchdown passes, and he even led the game with 73 rushing yards. It was in a way one of the best games of his career, but the numbers won’t back that up because his skill players short circuited a handful of likely scoring drives. They started the game with a drop on 4th-and-4, Keenan Allen dropped a touchdown early, Austin Ekeler fumbled at the 2-yard line in the fourth quarter, and rookie Quentin Johnston dropped a pass down the sideline on a crucial 3rd-and-6.

It would not have been a routine catch, though I bet Zay Flowers, Jaxon Smith-Njigba, and Jordan Addison make it, but it was very catchable. If caught, it either could have been the game-winning touchdown, or since Johnston doesn’t look that fast on an NFL field, it could have at least set up a game-tying field goal for overtime. Would the Chargers have made the kick? Probably not, because these are the Chargers we’re talking about.

I didn’t even mention the Packers were about to be screwed with a 4th-and-20 coming up with under 4 minutes left, but Asante Samuel Jr. was penalized 24 yards for defensive pass interference, extending what became the game-winning drive. Love threw a 24-yard touchdown pass to Romeo Doubs with 2:33 left. Herbert had a moment of mortality with a quick three-and-out after he was sacked on third down. But the Chargers got the ball back after using their timeouts to stop the run, and that was when Johnston had the big drop with 23 seconds left. The game ended for good when Herbert’s 4th-and-1 pass was incomplete with the Chargers out of timeouts.

Herbert’s QBR (82.9) was the highest for any quarterback to lose in Week 11. It was the highest (82.0) in Week 10 against Detroit out of all losing quarterbacks. This is a consistent theme with the Chargers.

Herbert may not be perfect, but the people trying to blame him for these last two weeks for the Chargers slipping to 4-6 are out of their mind. This is already the third lost comeback of the 2023 season for Herbert, who also led go-ahead touchdown drives in the fourth quarter in losses to the Dolphins and Titans to start this season. While not a lost comeback, he also had game-tying touchdown drives against Dallas and Detroit in games the Chargers still lost.

Looks like I need to start up a new Chargers BINGO card for the Herbert era.

Vikings at Broncos: The Close Game Regression Bowl

When the 2023 schedule came out, I highlighted this game as a big regression opportunity between the team that kept making comebacks last year (Vikings) and the team that kept blowing leads (Broncos). That’s why I had this as a Denver win in my preseason predictions.

Sure enough, the Vikings blew a late lead and are now 5-5 in close games of which they’ve played a league-high 10 of. Last year, they were 11-0 in the regular season in close games. Denver is only 4-3 in close games, but that includes a 4-3 record at game-winning drive opportunities, which isn’t bad at all in a season where under 35% of those are successful.

We have enough history to show that if you give Russell Wilson enough chances, he can make you pay. This was his 34th fourth-quarter comeback win, which ties him with Johnny Unitas and John Elway for the 8th most all time.

I don’t know if the Vikings got premature news on Justin Jefferson’s health or what, but their game plan did not seem right to me. Not nearly enough passes to T.J. Hockenson and Jordan Addison, and they ran the ball 28 times with the running backs, which is also unusual. You had to figure it was going to be a weird night once the Vikings gave a direct snap to T.J. Hockenson on the third play of the game, and he gave the ball to Joshua Dobbs, who fumbled. Did I mention this was to just convert a 3rd-and-1?

But speaking of regression, what is going on with this Denver defense and turnovers? That’s now 12 takeaways in the last three games with another 3 in this game. That was mostly the difference as Minnesota’s offense was better outside of those mistakes. The Broncos were under 300 yards of offense again and they were 2-for-12 on third down.

But what did Denver do? Kept making those field goals, hung in there to get enough turnovers, and down 20-15, Wilson was able to lead his lone touchdown drive of the night to win the game. Courtland Sutton and Samaje Perine were huge on the game-winning drive, which was completed with more end zone stretching highlights by Sutton for a 15-yard touchdown with 1:03 left.

However, Denver failed on the 2-point conversion, so it was only a 21-20 lead with Minnesota having all its timeouts left. The legend of Dobbs could have really grown here with a game-winning drive, but the Vikings got really caught up in a short-yardage situation after Jordan Addison ran out of bounds 1 yard shy of a first down. That led to the Vikings having to burn 2 timeouts, and this was not moving along well. Pressure got to Dobbs, and he was called for intentional grounding, which set up 4th-and-25. Not surprisingly, his deep ball was incomplete, and the Broncos held on for another tight win this week.

Minnesota’s (6-5) 5-game winning streak is over, and the Broncos (5-5) are on a 4-game winning streak. I don’t know if either team is playoff worthy, but close game regression has hit each appropriately this year.

Steelers at Browns: Half the AFC North QBs Go Down and Kenny Pickett Is Still the Worst

It feels like Sunday was a breaking point for many who were still believers in Kenny Pickett after this 13-10 loss in Cleveland to a backup rookie quarterback (Dorian Thompson-Robinson). I’ve always been skeptical of Pickett as a franchise quarterback, and this game was one of his worst yet. He was 15-of-28 for 106 yards, and he took 3 sacks for another 29 yards. That’s 77 yards on 31 passes. That’s nothing.

More than that, Jaylen Warren carried this offense to all 10 of its points, starting with a 74-yard touchdown run after the Steelers were scoreless at halftime. While DTR was not great for Cleveland, I think it says a lot that his coaching staff let him throw 43 passes in such a low-scoring, tight battle. In fact, Cleveland is only the third team ever to throw at least 43 passes in a game it never trailed, a game that didn’t go to overtime, and where they allowed no more than 10 points while scoring no more than 13 points. It only happened in 2007 Ravens vs. 49ers and 2004 Dolphins vs. Browns.

DTR definitely had some accuracy issues, but he was not afraid to let the ball go, and he was accurate late in the game in leading a game-winning field goal drive after Pickett went three-and-out in a drive that only took 24 seconds.

More drives like that and I don’t see how the Steelers don’t go shopping for a quarterback after the season. It’s one thing to be generally lousy in the game like the opening sack he took that should have been a safety where he looked like he had no awareness. It’s one thing to be lousy at scoring points. But if your reputation of coming through in the clutch is going to lead to drives like the last couple in a 10-10 game in the fourth quarter, then you are just wasting the team’s time. You bring nothing to the table.

While watching this game, I was flipping back to the RedZone channel during commercials and saw a rookie like C.J. Stroud move in the pocket, set his feet, and fire bombs to give his guys a chance or threading the needle on dimes to the sideline while under pressure, and I turn back and there’s Pickett with 34 yards at halftime. Only a net of 15 if you take off the sacks. There’s no comparison. And it’s not just Stroud. I could see it in Week 1 when Brock Purdy, the last pick in a 2022 draft that saw Pickett go ahead of every other quarterback, vastly outplay him.

Even Tommy DeVito threw 3 touchdowns for the Giants on Sunday after he had 2 last week against Dallas. He’s up to 6 touchdowns or as many as Pickett has in 10 games this season. Come on.

I will say Najee Harris has the right outlook on things, noting that the Steelers aren’t going to keep winning by playing poorly like they have been.

The Steelers were outgained for the 10th time this year. There were signs of fool’s gold with their 7-2 finish after last year’s bye week, but at least the 2022 Steelers can say they outgained their opponent in yards in 8 of their last 9 games.

This year’s offense is a joke, and while Matt Canada was taking almost all of the criticism early, people may finally be able to see the quarterback is a huge problem too.

Huge problem.

Buccaneers at 49ers: At Least It Wasn’t 35-7 This Time

Brock Purdy must like playing the Buccaneers. He made his first NFL start against them last year, led Tom Brady’s team 35-0, and on Sunday, he had a rare perfect passer rating (158.3) game with 21-of-25 for 333 yards and 3 touchdowns. He did take 4 sacks to help keep that number intact, but it was one of Purdy’s best games with Brandon Aiyuk having a monster game with 156 yards and a touchdown.

Christian McCaffrey started a new touchdown streak right away in the first quarter, and the 49ers largely rolled along to a 27-14 win. Not as dominant as last year’s meeting, but Baker Mayfield was better than the King of Kings. He just wasn’t able to finish drives off in the red zone in the fourth quarter as the Buccaneers had a couple of long marches stall in a scoreless final 14 minutes.

The 49ers (7-3) could certainly use a Philadelphia loss this week (at Kansas City) or next (vs. Buffalo) to further build the hype when they meet in Week 13, the Game of the Year in the NFC.

Jets at Bills: Buffalo Not So Much Back as Jets Are Good as Gone

The Bills won their first game after firing offensive coordinator Ken Dorsey, and it was fairly convincing as the 32-6 score suggests. But was it really?

Could Dorsey have called a 3-and-out drive that lost 9 yards to start the game after the Bills forced a fumble on the opening kickoff? The Bills still got a field goal out of it, but the offense went backwards. On the second drive, Stefon Diggs had a fumble go out of bounds, so the new OC must be better at using his mind to teleport the ball out of bounds unlike Dorsey on Monday night against Denver.

But the Bills were held to three field goals before another short field (23 yards) presented itself after a Zach Wilson interception. That made it 16-0. The only turnover of the game for Buffalo was a Hail Mary interception thrown by Josh Allen to end the half, but I’m sure that’ll fuel someone else’s narrative on this team.

The Bills (6-5) played fine against an unraveling division foe that benched its quarterback for Tim Boyle in this game. I just think Dorsey was a scapegoat and this one game doesn’t prove anything either way, unless you think the Bills will get 81-yard touchdown passes to Shakir more often now. After all, it’s only the 2nd completion in Allen’s NFL career of more than 75 yards, and that should be credited to the OC, right?

Meh, whatever. We’ll see what happens in Philadelphia next week.

Seahawks at Rams: Not Feeling the Field Goal

It was a little surprising to see the Seahawks blow a 13-0 lead in this one, because the Rams did not look good. Matthew Stafford was having a rough day, Cooper Kupp misjudged a deep ball for a touchdown, and left the game injured. But Kenneth Walker was injured for the Seahawks, and Geno Smith was hurt on a hit that almost led to an interception on a pop-up.

The Rams hung in there while the Seahawks kept settling for long field goals, which would ultimately doom them. Drew Lock’s entry into the game in the final quarter did not help. He had a three-and-out drive and an interception.

The Rams finally came to life with a touchdown run by Darrell Henderson, then after the Lock pick, Stafford took over at his own 21, got bailed out of a 3rd-and-15 with an illegal hands to the face penalty, and the Rams bled the clock down to 1:31 after kicking a 22-yard field goal to take a 17-16 lead.

That’s plenty of time for Seattle to answer, and even better, Geno replaced Lock at quarterback. D.K. Metcalf ended his little touchdown drought earlier in the game, and his 21-yard catch to get the ball inside the 40 looked like a game-changing play. At that point with under 35 seconds and no timeouts left, I think Seattle should have spiked it. Instead, the Seahawks ran the ball for a 2-yard gain, which meant a hurried spike with 8 seconds left, leaving almost no time to run another play unless you want to get risky.

Again, I think they blew the strategy there. Spike it on first down, complete one more good pass over the middle or to the sideline, and you can set up the field goal from there. I flat out don’t get the hurried run with a running clock and no timeouts.

Pete Carroll basically cornered himself into a 55-yard field goal to win the game, and while kickers are better than ever from long distance, that’s a tough kick for Jason Myers. He was wide right with 3 seconds left, and that was the ball game.

The Rams complete the sweep of Seattle, repaying the Seahawks for their sweep last year in close games against Sean McVay’s team. The Seahawks (6-4) have to host the 49ers this Thursday night with a questionable quarterback, so this division race could be wrapping up soon enough.

As for Stafford, he gets his 36th fourth-quarter comeback win, tying him with Dan Marino for No. 6 in NFL history.

Cardinals at Texans: The Shootout That Became Defensive Slugfest

This had great potential to be a fun shootout, and it was in the first half. Kyler Murray threw his first touchdown pass of the season on a 48-yard bomb to Rondale Moore to get the scoring started. By halftime, Houston led 21-10 and rookie C.J. Stroud was sitting on 259 yards and 2 touchdown passes, or what Kenny Pickett might accumulate if games were 20 quarters long.

The third quarter saw Houston’s new kicker miss a 48-yard field goal, Murray scoot into the end zone on a 4th-and-goal touchdown as only he can, and it set up what should have been a dramatic fourth quarter with the Cardinals only down 21-16.

But the score never changed. The Cardinals came up short in turning the ball over on downs, they muffed a punt, Stroud was picked, Murray missed on a 4th-and-4, Stroud was picked for a third time in the game not unlike last week when he had a chance to put the game away in Cincinnati.

Arizona tried to take that last pick the distance for a game-winning drive that started with 4:58 left, but they short-circuited after the 2-minute warning when Murray’s pass to James Conner lost 5 yards and set everything back. Murray has not had the right connection with Hollywood Brown yet in his return, and he was the incomplete target on the game’s last two plays, including a 4th-and-8.

A thing I love about this Houston offense is the way it seems to have a different receiver go nuclear every week. It was Nico Collins earlier this season, then it was Noah Brown the last two weeks, and Sunday’s turn was Tank Dell’s, who had 149 yards and a touchdown. Collins, Brown, and Dell all have multiple games with 140 receiving yards this season, and if that’s not a single-season record for a team, I’d be surprised.

So, I looked it up, and it is a record. The 2023 Texans are the 26th offense to have at least six 140-yard receiving performances in a regular season (record is 8 by 1967 Jets, 2018 Steelers, and 2022 Dolphins), but they are the only one to do it with three receivers having multiple big performances.

Like to see Stroud cut out the big picks late in games while nursing small leads, but that’s about the only thing he’s doing lately that makes you remember he’s a rookie and not an elite veteran.

Raiders at Dolphins: Didn’t Think They Had It in Them

I really did not think the Dolphins had a 20-13 game in them. It’s disappointing for both teams that they didn’t score more in a game where Davante Adams (82 yards) and Tyreek Hill (146 yards) both found the end zone. But Josh Jacobs was held to 39 yards on 14 carries, and the return of De’Von Achane was short-lived for Miami as he left injured after 2 touches for 5 yards.

But these defenses controlled the second half when only a pair of Miami field goals were scored. Every time it looked like the Raiders had a drive going in a 20-13 game, the Miami defense shut the door with a 3rd-down sack, a couple of 4th-down stops, and the final pick was a great play by Jalen Ramsey on a deep ball in the end zone with 25 seconds left to ice the win.

The Miami offense was not up to putting the game away, so the defense stepped up for it. Can they do that against a contender and not a Vegas team with rookie Aidan O’Connell at QB?  We’ll see.

Giants at Commanders: Those Pesky Division Games

I couldn’t believe some of the lines on this game this week with the Giants at +9.5 and the Commanders O/U 23.5 points. Sure, it’s a different offense this year with Sam Howell and Eric Bieniemy, but it’s still a struggling offense that takes too many sacks. That was the case in Week 7 when the Giants beat this team 14-7 in an ugly game.

If there is one thing the Giants have proven they can do consistently over the years, it is beating Washington. Tommy DeVito ended up throwing for 246 yards and 3 touchdowns in this game despite taking 9 sacks. The last team to win a game by double digits despite allowing 9 sacks was the 1984 Falcons, and that’s because they had 8 sacks on defense against the Eagles.

This game is the 145th in the Super Bowl era where a team had 9 sacks on defense while allowing no more than 4 sacks on offense. This is only the second time in those 145 games where the team lost by more than 3 points. The only other game was the 1966 AFL Championship, won 31-7 by the Chiefs over Buffalo.

Sacks were the only thing keeping this close as the Commanders lost the turnover battle 6-0. The sixth turnover was a pick-6 with the ball at midfield and 29 seconds left in a 24-19 game. It happened because of pressure.

Isaiah Simmons could have just gone down and ended the game there at 24-19, but of course my teaser parlays never hit for this reason. 31-19 it is as the Giants have a rookie quarterback who has as many touchdown passes (6) in the last 3 games as Kenny Pickett has in 10 games this year. I promise, that’s the last Pickett mention today.

Circle this one on Jack Del Rio’s resume.

Cowboys at Panthers: Predictable

Dallas accomplished two things it had not done since Week 1’s 40-0 win over the Giants:

  • Win a road game by more than 3 points
  • Get Tony Pollard a touchdown

You probably figured the 33-10 win over 1-win Carolina came easy, but this was only a 17-10 game going into the fourth quarter. That’s when Dallas blew the game open in two snaps. Pollard took off for a 21-yard touchdown, then a Bryce Young pass was intercepted for a touchdown by a defense that was +350 on the day to score, which is ridiculously high. Just like that it was 30-10 and game over.

The Carolina defense did what it could in limiting Dallas to 4.6 yards per play (no plays over 25 yards). But the Panthers lacked any big plays and Young was also sacked 7 times (2.5 sacks by Micah Parsons).

The 2023 Cowboys are only the third team in the Super Bowl era to notch 6 wins by at least 20 points in their first 10 games, joining the 2007 Patriots (8) and 1999 Rams (6). Those were historic Super Bowl teams. I’m not sure Dallas will join them there too, but they definitely know how to squash a scrub (Arizona aside).

Titans at Jaguars: Just Your Typical, Unwatchable Jacksonville Game

The Jaguars are 7-3 after toying with Tennessee in a 34-14 bore that saw the Jags score the game’s first 27 points. Trevor Lawrence threw a pair of touchdowns to Calvin Ridley and rushed for another pair himself.

Rookie Will Levis had 51 passing yards late in the third quarter when it was 27-0 before finishing with a gaudy stat line (13-of-17 for 158 yards, 2 TDs, 0 INTs, and a 143.8 passer rating) that ultimately meant nothing.

I think the Titans (3-7) are largely going through the motions right now, and the Jaguars play a brand of football that just isn’t that sexy or enticing to watch. Their games haven’t seen a fourth-quarter lead change since Week 1 in Indy, and their only other game this year where either team was within 3 points in the fourth quarter was the 31-24 win in New Orleans where a 24-24 tie was broken late by Jacksonville.

At least you can say their games have been decided decisively, but when you can’t score against the contenders (12 points total in losses to the Chiefs and 49ers), you’re going to get looked over for 34-14 wins over the Titans, who look like a 1980s nightclub slowly coming to grips with the Last Days of Disco.

Next week: For Week 12, thanks to Thanksgiving and Black Friday, the NFL is giving us 5 island games that are all division games, and they might all stink. Great. At least SNF has potential with Ravens-Chargers, but that could be a blowout too. I think Bills-Eagles is the week’s best game and that’ll be a 4:25 start. I enjoy those late-window games where they start in daylight and turn dark by halftime. Just hope it’s not decided in the first half too.

NFL Week 11 Predictions: Everybody’s QB Hurts Edition

~ Scott ~ 1 Comment

The writer’s strike may have ended weeks ago, but apparently the NFL already outsourced the 2023 season’s script to ChatGPT or another AI, because we are getting 2017 all over again. First it was the low-scoring games with stats not seen since 2017 around the league, then the quarterback injuries just got too eerily similar after Deshaun Watson (shoulder) and Joe Burrow (wrist) both went down for the season this week.

I was so concerned in not going over my character limit so that this tweet would display to get the full effect that I forgot the Vikings’ QB1 is another match. The 2017 Vikings lost Sam Bradford early and had to roll to the title game with Case Keenum. Now the 2023 Vikings lost Kirk Cousins and are on a winning streak with Joshua Dobbs.

All we’re missing is the No. 1 seeded Eagles to lose their MVP front-runner to a torn ACL and watch Marcus Mariota win Super Bowl MVP after he outplays Patrick Mahomes in Super Bowl 58. And Kenny Pickett and the Steelers can play the role of Jacksonville even better than 2023 Jacksonville can in the AFC Championship Game.

It’s been a rough season, but with the way contenders are dropping like flies, we just might see that Super Bowl rematch after all. We are seeing it for sure Monday night, but that might only be 1-of-2 meetings between the Eagles and Chiefs this year.

This Week’s Articles

Will Chiefs-Eagles Be the NFL’s Rare Super Bowl Rematch in February? – I did a deep dive on just how rare it is for an AFC and NFC team to meet in 3 straight seasons, and it’s still less rare than seeing two teams meet in back-to-back Super Bowls, which has only been done by 1992-93 Bills-Cowboys. But in doing the research for this one, I was absolutely shocked at just how few close calls there have been to another case of this. But I also think the Chiefs and Eagles are uniquely qualified to do it this year. The fact that they are No. 1 seeds entering Week 11 is good proof of that.

NFL Week 11 Predictions

It has always been the Ravens for me in the AFC North this year, but what a bummer of a game to lose Mark Andrews and Joe Burrow for the season. It was the best scheduled TNF game all year and that’s what happened to it. If you would have told me those injuries would happen, Lamar Jackson would go to the blue medical tent and look injured a few times himself, and the game still ended 34-20, I wouldn’t have believed it. But that ended a streak of 13 straight unders in the island games. Is this the week that turns the other way? Would be nice with the games scheduled, but I have my doubts.

Packers are my upset pick. I think they score 21+ points and it’s another close game for the Chargers.

Not sure what to do with TEN-JAX. I’m largely avoiding it but read my prop picks above to see why I’m manifesting the first Evan Engram TD catch of the season.

The Miami spread feels a little high, no? But then I looked at their 4-0 home record with every win by multiple touchdowns against scrubs and it makes more sense. I could see a 31-17 game there.

Kind of hated to pick Dallas to win big on the road since they haven’t really done that since Week 1 against the Giants. But that Carolina offense is so toothless that I just don’t see how they keep up. Dak is in a zone right now. Might be like Week 1, Cowboys finally win big on the road and Tony Pollard finally returns to the end zone.

I had a lot of success with picking games to be high scoring in the late window last week, and I think Cardinals-Texans has the potential for that. I have a nice parlay in my Scott’s Seven for this game, and you could even throw some overs for Marquise Brown and Nico Collins in there on yardage.

I might have picked the Steelers to lose to Cleveland if Watson was playing if only because I think Pickett is going to struggle with the defense on the road, and he won’t get the luxury of 2 return scores like Week 2. Then when I heard Watson was out, I still thought Cleveland because of P.J. Walker. But rookie DTR? I’m changing my pick. I’ll take Steelers to win this game, then lose to Jake Browning in his first start in Cincinnati next week. But I do really like the over for David Njoku in this game. It’s not like the Browns are going to have no yards. Pittsburgh’s defense isn’t great. They’re just timely in close games, and somehow the Steelers are drawing a schedule now with some of the only quarterbacks worse than Pickett.

I don’t trust the Commanders with a spread that big against a team they haven’t scored on in a couple of years. But I do trust Sam Howell over DeVito enough to get the win.

Definitely like Detroit to beat Chicago, and Justin Fields coming back doesn’t change my pick on the spread. I’m cautious on picking David Montgomery to have a big day since Gibbs is more established and the Bears have stopped the run well. But this is also easily the best rushing offense they’ve seen this year. I think you should work a Sam LaPorta TD into your parlays this weekend.

The 49ers crushed Tampa Bay 35-7 last year and it won’t be that bad again, but I like them to build off last week and win comfortably.

I’ll probably be keeping the Bills-Jets game out of most of my bets. Too unpredictable with Buffalo. But I could see a 24-14 game out of that one.

Not feeling Rams-Seahawks as a good betting game either. At least Stafford is back, so I’ll go with the Rams to steal another one. Return the favor for last year’s Seattle sweep.

I’m torn on SNF because I feel like Joshua Dobbs has done a great job, but Denver’s defense is legitimately improved and I could see him struggle, especially if Justin Jefferson doesn’t make his return. You need that extra wide receiver with the Broncos having Simmons and Surtain in the secondary. I still don’t believe in the Denver offense. I think it’ll be a close game and prime-time games involving Russell Wilson are usually batshit. Remember last year’s FG fest with Matt Ryan and the Colts? That was a Thursday. Remember the 6-6 OT tie with Arizona years ago? That was SNF. Take your pick with his Monday night games in Seattle, or just this Monday against Buffalo.

As for Eagles-Chiefs, I think I’ve covered the game enough in my links above at 365Scores about the Super Bowl rematch, my parlay pick, and in the prime-time pick articles. My gut feel is both teams are playing at a lower quality than they were last year, but the ways that they are different favor the Chiefs. Better on defense to keep the score low so it won’t be 38-35, Eagles not as good at running, and too reliant on A.J. Brown which could only get worse with Dallas Goedert out. That’s why I like another big DeVonta Smith game, but again, that under is 11-1 on MNF and we’ve been letdown so much by these “Game of the Year” choices in 2023. I’m rooting for a 24-20 type of game, but I am backing the Chiefs at home.

Let’s win something big this week. I feel like we’re running out of chances as I don’t want to be trying to figure out if Jake Browning can throw for 2 touchdowns in a game.