Tag: Jets

2024 NFL Stat Oddity: Week 5

~ Scott ~ Leave a comment

Week 5 was a step in the right direction for this 2024 NFL season. More scoring and more lead changes – that’s all I really want in the end. We had a few Game of the Year candidates, and the best of them all was probably played Thursday night in Atlanta against Tampa Bay.

But Ravens-Bengals exceeded the hype, Bills-Texans was oddly exciting, the Cardinals shocked the 49ers, and the Cowboys basically shot themselves in the foot all night before putting the dagger in Pittsburgh.

We had seven game-winning drives this week, the most since Week 1 of the 2023 season, and that’s pretty good with four teams on a bye and one game left Monday night that could easily add to this.

Overall, 10-of-13 games had a comeback opportunity, so it was a lot of close action, and the games that weren’t close were basically shit you weren’t going to care about anyway.

But I sure did get a lot of use out of “Same Old” headlines this week as a lot of these games did maintain the status quo for certain teams and players.

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

Ravens at Bengals: Same Old Bungles (As the AFC North Turns)

Joe Burrow said he’d have to be perfect to win this game, and he was pretty accurate about that. It proved to be one of the biggest shootouts and best games in AFC North history as the Ravens came back to win 41-38 in overtime after some stunning twists and turns down the stretch.

The tide turned in the first half after Derrick Henry was tackled for a safety, then Burrow found Ja’Marr Chase for a 41-yard touchdown to end the first half. From there, it was Baltimore chasing the whole second half.

But Lamar Jackson was game in one of the best passing performances of his career. He threw for 348 yards and 4 touchdowns. Burrow also had one of his best games with 392 yards and 5 touchdown passes as Chase had a monster game with 193 yards.

When Chase took a short pass 70 yards for a touchdown with 8:54 left to give the Bengals a 38-28 lead, it sure didn’t feel like Baltimore’s day. Jackson hadn’t led a game-winning drive in a game where Baltimore allowed more than 17 points since November 2021.

But Jackson led a touchdown drive that culminated in one of the greatest plays of his career:

Up 38-35, the Bengals had a chance to either ice the game with a first down, or they could have added a field goal to take a 6-point lead (as dreaded as that sounds). But Burrow made his only big mistake when he threw a bad interception with 3:01 left.

Baltimore’s drive stalled, but Justin Tucker had the offense’s back with a 56-yard field goal to tie it. Here we were again with Burrow having a chance for a legacy drive with 1:35 left in a tied game, but he immediately took a sack that derailed things. The Bengals went three-and-out and the game went to overtime.

Something had to give here with Jackson not leading any game-winning drive since the 2022 season, and Burrow having his own problems with a lack of a killer instinct.

The Ravens got the ball first, and sure enough, Jackson took his eye off the ball and fumbled the snap in field goal range. The Bengals returned it to the Baltimore 38, setting themselves up to win the game on a field goal. But as we’ve seen before with this team and Zac Taylor, they were content with just running the ball and setting up a very long field goal, which is usually a bad idea unless you have Tucker as your kicker.

After gaining just 3 yards, the Bengals attempted a 53-yard field goal, and a bad hold looked responsible for throwing off the kick as Evan McPherson was wide left. On the very next snap, Henry made up for his quiet game with a 51-yard run down to the Cincinnati 6. Without risking another fumbled snap or screw-up, the Ravens did the right thing and immediately kicked the 24-yard field goal with Tucker to win the game 41-38. You know he delivered.

Just like that, the Ravens went from falling into the 2-3 muck with the Bengals in the AFC North race to back on top after the Steelers lost on Sunday night to also fall to 3-2.

I would say the Bengals are finished at 1-4, but the AFC is not good enough right now to rule them out for a wild card berth. But the division title may be a pipe dream now. That Cincinnati defense is just rotten this year, and while the Ravens have their own issues, a healthy dose of Jackson and Henry is going to be tough to deal with.

I don’t know if I could say in good faith that the Ravens are the best team in the NFL after they should have lost this game. But they continue to be a tough out and unique challenge for everyone.

Cowboys at Steelers: Same Old Steelers

I feel like I’m in some Twilight Zone where people keep giving Justin Fields credit for an “almost comeback” last week as if we didn’t see that several times in Chicago from him. I also don’t get the celebration of the Steelers playing another sloppy grind of a game like they always do as if that’s a good thing. It’s why this team is always flirting with .500 and never winning playoff games anymore. This is not good football when you trial 6-3 at halftime because you’re playing scared, chickenshit offense and your defense is living for splash plays because you give up so many yards otherwise.

Stick a competent quarterback against this defense and it’s going to struggle. Dak Prescott finally pulled his head out of his ass on the final drive to deliver a dagger with 20 seconds left to Jalen Tolbert for the win on a long-developing play:

Great, patient throw. The Cowboys were staring down a 17-13 deficit, a minus-3 mark in the turnover department, and they had a field goal blocked. It’s really hard to win on the road when you face those circumstances, but they pulled it out. They also deserved the win as they outgained the Steelers 445-226. They just shot themselves in the foot more.

I still think the Steelers should start Russell Wilson as soon as he’s cleared. He’ll do more than complete four passes in the first half as it still looks like they’re not fully trusting Fields. Hence doing things like running the ball on 3rd-and-8 while trailing 3-0. That’s not normal for NFL offenses.

Wilson will also give them a bigger edge in close games, something this team can’t seem to escape.

Bills at Texans: Same Old 2019 Josh Allen?

Josh Allen was back in the building where he played his first playoff game in the 2019 AFC Wild Card against the Texans. He lost that one in overtime, a game I remember best for his wild lateral attempt at midfield that he didn’t need to do. But he was a loose cannon back then and not nearly as good as he’d become starting in 2020 when the team acquired wide receiver Stefon Diggs.

Well, Diggs and Allen were back together on Sunday, but this time they were rivals after the April trade that sent Diggs to Houston. It couldn’t have come at a better time too as Nico Collins left this game injured after smoking the defense for a 67-yard touchdown catch. Diggs had to step up in his absence, and he finished with 6 catches for 82 yards.

Meanwhile, Allen finished 9-of-30 for 131 yards, an unfathomable stat line for any quarterback in 2024, let alone Allen. I saw some drops but I don’t know what the actual number was. But Allen certainly looked scattershot and not that confident with the group around him, which didn’t include Khalil Shakir after his injury last week.

It truly was a game where the Bills lacked receivers in Diggs’ absence, and the Texans were aided by the Diggs trade to make up for losing Collins. How fitting.

But while C.J. Stroud had a strong start to this game when it was 20-3 Houston, looking like he deserved to jump Allen in the MVP odds, he did not finish this game like an MVP. Stroud got into turnover problems with a pick in Buffalo territory, a strip-sack that set up the game-tying field goal for Buffalo, and then he got called for an intentional grounding penalty that knocked the Texans out of field goal range in the final minute. Just one mistake after another.

But the biggest story was when Allen’s head clearly hit the ground on a bad play, and he looked like he may have gone to sleep for a few seconds. Everyone was thinking concussion, but somehow, Allen was cleared and only missed one snap. It makes you wonder just how thorough that test was and if he didn’t use his star status to stay in the game. That one didn’t pass the sniff test for me.

Upon returning, Allen sure played as if he had a brain injury. Coach Sean McDermott is taking the blame, but Buffalo’s approach to the final drive in a 20-20 game was mind boggling. They had 1st-and-10 at their own 3 with 32 seconds left, so that’s not an enviable position. You are afraid to run since you might get a safety if you give it that deep to a back, and Houston also had 3 timeouts.

It was realistic that the Bills could run the ball 3 times, the Texans call their timeouts, and you still risk a punt with seconds left with Houston having a shot to do something. On that level, I can understand coming out trying to throw. But you still have to call good plays and make smart throws that will likely be completed and run clock to make the Texans burn those timeouts.

Allen was throwing dangerous passes that could have been picked off, and even if they were complete, the gain wasn’t worth it as the Bills were out of timeouts and would have had a hard time getting into range.

It was just absolutely bizarre as Allen threw three straight incompletions and the Bills punted on a drive that took 25 seconds, gained no yards, and allowed the Texans to keep all their timeouts. Just poor situational awareness.

Stroud completed a 5-yard pass, the receiver went down, and the Texans called timeout with 2 seconds left. Guess what? If they used their 3 timeouts to get the ball back from Buffalo, they wouldn’t have had that option there. They would have needed to get out of bounds, which is harder to do. That’s why the 3 incompletions were such a fvck-up.

Fairbairn was able to connect from 59 yards on the best kick of his career to win 23-20. It wasn’t pretty at all, but have you seen the way the Chiefs are winning? Did you see how Baltimore got past Dallas and Cincy? This will do as the early portion of the game at least showed the Texans could take it to Buffalo, a potential playoff foe down the road.

There should definitely be some concerns with that Buffalo offense. Forget the Chiefs and Jets. The Bills should be in those wide receiver trade markets as I don’t think they have enough here to beat the top AFC teams this year.

Cardinals at 49ers: Same Old Shanahan

It’s hard to identify any real trends in what goes into Kyle Shanahan’s 49ers blowing a game they should have won. All I know is that it happens frequently enough, and that’s why I hated the graphic FOX tried pushing in the fourth quarter of this game that said Shanahan’s team was 38-0 when entering the fourth quarter with a 10+ point lead. The 49ers were up 23-10 at halftime and 23-13 going into the fourth quarter of this one.

First, I hate graphics like this because they lead to people drawing the false conclusion that he’s never lost a game with a double-digit lead in the fourth quarter. This is just the score at the start of the quarter. Isn’t it more relevant what the score was even later in the game?

That’s what I hate about “entering the fourth quarter” stats as the score with 15:00 left isn’t as important as say 7:00 left. Just two weeks ago, the 49ers were up 10 points against the Rams with less than half the quarter to play, and they found a way to lose that one.

Also, this ignores the playoffs where he know Shanahan lost Super Bowl LIX to the Chiefs after leading 20-10 to enter the 4th, and he lost the 2021 NFC Championship Game to the Rams after leading 17-7 to enter the 4th. Those were losses too, among the biggest in his career.

With that said, this one still shocked me as the Cardinals seemed snakebitten. They had a blocked field goal returned for a touchdown. But things took a turn in the second half when the 49ers had to play without kicker Jake Moody. I still think he’s a liability, but he’s better than not having a kicker. That injury led to the 49ers going for a 4th-and-23 instead of adding a 45-yard field goal to their lead.

Even if the 49ers got into field-goal range on the last drive, I’m not sure they would have been able to capitalize given the injured kicker situation. But I also don’t like that Brock Purdy is going to get the brunt of the blame for another loss that’s dropped this team to 2-3.

Yes, he didn’t play his best game, but he had a tipped pick, he had the misfortune of the kicker situation, and running back Jordan Mason really screwed them with a bad fumble on first down in the red zone with just over 6:00 left in a 23-21 game. Not to mention the reason the Cardinals were down 23-21 instead of 23-20 was a roughing the passer penalty on the defense, so the Cardinals took the 2-point conversion from the 1-yard line, a smart move.

The Cardinals took the Mason fumble and drove for the go-ahead field goal to make it 24-23 with 1:37 left. Again, I’m not sure the 49ers would have been able to settle for a field goal on the drive unless it was super short.

But after one completion, Purdy was hit in motion as he threw, the ball fluttered, and it was intercepted to end the game. That’s just how it goes sometimes, but the 49ers again found themselves in a position they shouldn’t have been in.

This happens a bit too often for Shanahan’s team. The only good news is Seattle lost too as a big favorite at home. They’ll meet each other this Thursday night in Seattle.

Jets vs. Vikings: Same Old Rodgers (And Same Old Darnold?)

If you’re Davante Adams, do you even want to go back to the Jets when they look like this with Aaron Rodgers? He threw two picks in the first quarter, a new thing for him, and that includes a pick-six that helped the Vikings take a 17-0 lead. Minnesota has not trailed in a game since the first quarter of Week 1 against the Giants.

But before you thought this would be a blowout, keep in mind Sam Darnold had the worst game of his 2024 season and brief time with Minnesota. He was picked in the fourth quarter too, and the offense missed Aaron Jones after an injury knocked him out. They only scored 16 points on offense this week with Darnold not throwing any touchdowns.

Rodgers chipped away at that defense, but he ended up throwing for 244 yards on 54 attempts, including 101 yards on 22 targets to Garrett Wilson. That’s not very efficient at all. I don’t think the weapons are that bad for Rodgers in this offense, but he just doesn’t seem to have built good chemistry with anyone yet.

Down 23-17 late, it looked like Rodgers might actually pull off the comeback. But while he usually takes interception avoidance to another level in these moments, this time he threw a pass to Mike Williams down the sideline that veteran Stephon Gilmore picked off with 44 seconds left to help the Vikings to 5-0 and drop the Jets to 2-3.

Rodgers took a beating in this game and it’s hard to see him lasting a full season at this rate. I’m not sure adding Adams is the cure-all for this offense, but it is the side of the team that is holding them back. The defense did a good job of limiting the Vikings and keeping this game within reach.

As for the Vikings, they get an early bye and have a huge game with Detroit at home in Week 7. They’ll hope the real Sam Darnold doesn’t come back when they do, because Sunday was not as encouraging as the first four games for him.

Packers at Rams: Same Old West Coast Stafford?

Matthew Stafford always had some Philip Rivers-type gunslinger qualities in him. He was better in crunch time than Rivers, but with Rivers retired, we needed someone to fill the void of a quarterback always stuck in a one-score game in the late window. Sure, Justin Herbert does a good job of that with the Chargers, but he’s been hurt lately.

It falls on Stafford, who once again found himself with the ball late in a 24-19 game against Green Bay thanks to some horrific decisions by Jordan Love, who turned a safety into a pick-six. Will Levis didn’t play this weekend, but his spirit was kept alive by Love here:

But the Packers also picked Stafford with Xavier McKinney adding to his great start to the season. Still, it was only a 24-19 game late and it came down to another last-gasp effort by Stafford. He was unable to convert a 4th-and-5 this time with 1:02 left, and that was the ballgame.

The Packers are actually getting more consistent play from their defense than their offense right now, but if Love can ever get on track this year, they have a chance to go far.

Browns at Commanders: Same Old Sack Merchant

The Washington Commanders had their least efficient game on offense this season, punting 4 times and turning it over twice. Jayden Daniels completed 56% of his passes instead of the 82% he was at.

And still it was good enough to win 34-13 over a Cleveland team that is playing a lot of bad football right now. But for all the problems Cleveland has, nothing is worse than the way Deshaun Watson plays quarterback. He took 7 more sacks as he is just a magnet for defenders even in ways we didn’t see in Houston.

Watson’s QBR is down to 21.0 this season. In any other situation, he’d have been benched already, but coach Kevin Stefanski insists he’s still the QB1 in Cleveland. Keep this up and you’ll be unemployed while he’s still there fleecing the organization, Kevin.

Daniels in Washington just goes to show how quickly you can turn things around in this league with the right pick at quarterback. The Texans did it a couple years after Watson left with C.J. Stroud too. Cleveland never seems to find that guy, but the answer sure as hell isn’t keeping Watson as the starter.

Colts at Jaguars: Same Old Indy in Jacksonville

Something had to give here:

  • The Colts have not won in Jacksonville since 2014, losing eight straight trips there (plus one in London against Blake Bortles).
  • The Jaguars had lost 9 straight games started by quarterback Trevor Lawrence, the quarterback who practically can’t win a game if he doesn’t complete better than 60% of his passes.

Well, it was a wild path to a 37-34 win with Joe Flacco putting the fear of God in Jacksonville fans with some classic deep ball prayers that were answered by Alec Pierce. The Colts just didn’t want to die in this game despite trailing 20-10, 27-17, 34-20 in the fourth quarter alone.

Flacco’s 65-yard touchdown to Pierce tied the game at 34 with 2:40 left. But Lawrence finally had one of those sharp, efficient games as he threw for a career-high 371 yards on his 25th birthday. He completed 28-of-34 passes too, and it looks like the Jags have a stud in rookie wideout Brian Thomas Jr., who had 122 yards and another big touchdown. Tank Bigsby also showed off some big-play ability at running back, so Travis Etienne may be taking a backseat in this offense.

But game on the line, Lawrence did a good job of moving into field-goal range. Certainly better than you saw from C.J. Stroud, Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, and Joe Burrow in the same window on Sunday.

The Jaguars made a 49-yard field goal with 17 seconds left, and that was good enough to hang on for the 37-34 win, the team’s first win of 2024. But it actually may be a more troubling game for the Colts as someone is going to have to ask coach Shane Steichen why his offense does better with Gardner Minshew and Flacco at quarterback than it does the injury-prone Anthony Richardson. That’s troubling.

Giants at Seahawks: Same Old Pete Carroll Type of Loss?

We’ve seen the Seahawks lose at home to a bad Giants team before. I remember the 2020 loss when they were an 11-point favorite. But I really didn’t think it would happen this time without Malik Nabers and Devin Singletary available.

But the Giants marched up and down the field with Darius Slayton crapping out a 122-yard game, and the running back Tracy (Dick?) rushed for 129 yards. Embarrassing stuff. This game shouldn’t even have been this close as the Seahawks only got on the board early with a fortunate fumble at the goal line that was scooped up for a 102-yard return. If that was ruled a New York touchdown on the field, it probably would have stood as it was that close.

Can someone tell me exactly who was out on the defense for Seattle to have such miserable results after allowing the Lions to complete 100% of their passes last week? I know rookie Byron Murphy was out again, and I know rusher Boye Mafe missed his second-straight game. But who else is going to make that much of a difference after the Seahawks played very good defense in Weeks 1-3?

The Seahawks must have been so scared of their defense that they went for a 4th-and-1 at their own 35 while trailing 20-13 with nearly a whole quarter left. I don’t like that call as the offense wasn’t playing nearly well enough to think they’d march the 65+ yards for a touchdown even if they converted. Fail there and you’re almost guaranteed to go down two scores, which they did. Worse, Geno Smith took a sack and gave up 7 more yards in field position. He had great scrambles (72 rushing yards) in this game, but his passing was not up to snuff.

But despite all the struggles, the Seahawks were in position to win this game, or at least force overtime. Down 23-20, Geno’s 32-yard scramble put them in field goal range, but they didn’t get much closer than that. The 47-yard field goal was emphatically blocked with 0:55 left for a touchdown return, and that’s your ballgame, a rough 29-20 loss for Seattle.

The only good news is the 49ers blew their game against Arizona, setting up an awkward battle this Thursday night in the NFC West.

Panthers at Bears: NOT the Same Old Chicago Offense?

There’s not much complaining now about Caleb Williams after three games that have been much more promising after that rough start. Such is the life of a rookie quarterback in this league. Williams finished with 304 yards and 2 touchdown passes in this one, and he almost had a highlight-worthy touchdown run that was taken away by penalty.

But this is more along the lines of what we thought when writing this offseason that the Bears were putting the best situation around Williams among all No. 1 picks. The defense was again very good as Andy Dalton was eventually benched for Bryce Young in the 36-10 loss. D.J. Moore had a huge game with 105 yards and 2 touchdowns. Williams only took 1 sack against 29 passes thrown.

The Bears are 3-2 and things are moving in the right direction. But it will get harder once they start playing these NFC North games. It looks like the best division this year as none of the teams are objectively bad.

Raiders at Broncos: NOT the Same Old Raiders vs. Denver in the 2020s

Did you know the Raiders were 8-0 against Denver since moving to Vegas in 2020? Well, that streak is no more as Sean Payton helped end another one for his Broncos in the AFC West. They ended their 16-game losing streak to the Chiefs last season.

This one didn’t start well with a 10-0 deficit as rookie tight end Brock Bowers produced a big play for his first touchdown. But Gardner Minshew made some ghastly interceptions that I thought would get him benched this week, but Antonio Pierce wasted no time and pulled him in this game for Aidan O’Connell. But that predictably didn’t help, and it appears Bo Nix is decent every other week as he had another solid game in this one after last week’s embarrassment (despite the win) in the rain.

Denver went on a 34-0 scoring run to win 34-18. It was a lot of scoring on short fields, almost like they did in 2023, so I wouldn’t get too excited yet. But that is three straight wins for Denver, and they finally ended that losing streak to their rivals from Las Vegas.

But the coolest thing in this game? Those throwback uniforms for Denver:

Dolphins at Patriots: Same Old Offensive Woes in New England

These teams predictably struggled to score in a 15-10 game between the NFL’s worst scoring offenses. But the Patriots had a 10-9 lead in the fourth quarter. They picked a bad time to throw the ball on consecutive attempts on the outskirts of field-goal range, and that allowed the Dolphins to get the ball back in a 10-9 game and drive for a long touchdown march after discovering the running game worked in New England.

Down 15-10, Jacoby Brissett looked like he had a go-ahead touchdown to rookie Ja’Lynn Polk, but he didn’t come down with the completion on a missed opportunity. The Pats turned it over on downs, then rushed a throw to the Miami 11 as time expired on their latest loss.

You can get Tua Tagovailoa back or start Drake Maye, but neither team appears to be going anywhere this season.

Next week: We’ll see what the Chiefs do Monday night, but it’s possible both 5-0 teams (KC and Vikings) are on a bye in Week 6. Thursday night’s 49ers-Seahawks game takes a weird turn after both teams lost as touchdown favorites at home on Sunday. No chance I’m getting up early for Jags-Bears on Sunday. Commanders-Ravens in the early afternoon slot sounds great. Lions-Cowboys headlines the late window, then we get Bengals-Giants on SNF. Who possibly could have thought that was a good idea? Then it’s Bills-Jets on MNF, which very similar to TNF, it’s a first-place battle between teams that are disappointing us so far. But sure, sign me up for Jayden Daniels against this vulnerable Baltimore defense.

2024 NFL Stat Oddity: Week 2

~ Scott ~ Leave a comment

The season where Derek Carr turned into 2007 Tom Brady and held off Sam Darnold and Baker Mayfield for the MVP nearly broke me.

I’m trying to keep the big picture in mind for the 2024 NFL season, but after an upset-heavy Sunday where a lot of offenses struggled again, I’m skeptical about what’s to come. This could be a season like 2021 where no one is truly great, and you end up with a Super Bowl between No. 4 seeds.

Though, it probably won’t be the Bengals vs. Rams again as both teams are 0-2 and not looking great. But even the Ravens are 0-2, easily the biggest surprise in that group as you had to think a home game with the Raiders was a given, right?

But nothing is a lock. In fact, the three biggest favorites by the point spread are 0-3 this season. Those were all favorites of 7.5 points or more, including the Bengals last week against New England. Teams favored by that much in Weeks 1-2 were 30-1 SU since 2018. The only other seasons in the 16-game era where three favorites lost this quickly were 1978 and 2003. Those seasons still finished with a traditional Super Bowl rematch (Steelers vs. Cowboys) and the Patriots were in another one (albeit against Jake Delhomme).

Get your Chiefs vs. Saints Super Bowl LIX futures in now? Eh, long way to go, but it was a wake-up call day for a lot of teams. Following 10 games in the early window was insane too. The NFL should really rethink that as the 3-game late slate is not good enough.

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

Bengals at Chiefs: Game of the Week

When Joe Burrow says the Bengals are built specifically to beat the Chiefs, I wonder what he means exactly. On the offensive side of the ball, I don’t really see it. At least not with the current makeup of the Bengals without Tyler Boyd, Joe Mixon, and with Tee Higgins injured.

But Sunday went against type for the Bengals as they used their tight ends the most they ever have in a game with Burrow, copying some elements of how the Ravens had success with Isaiah Likely in Week 1 using multiple tight ends. When Mike Gesicki (91) and Drew Sample (28) are more than tripling Ja’Marr Chase in (35) in receiving yards, something’s up.

It almost worked out too, but Burrow did not hold up his end of the bargain. Much like in the two AFC Championship Games these teams played, he had a bad turnover in the fourth quarter. But this time it was a strip-sack returned for a touchdown while the Bengals led 22-17. That was huge with the Chiefs struggling to stay ahead of the Bengals in this game.

One could argue the Bengals bring out the worst in the Kansas City offense. In this game, they were able to hold Patrick Mahomes to 151 passing yards, the first time he’s ever been under 166 yards in a game he completed. He only threw it 25 times, but they also got two interceptions, including a brilliant one-handed catch late in the third quarter. Throw in the obligatory fumble from the Chiefs, and the Bengals were up 3-0 in turnovers with the ball before Burrow’s massive fumble.

But if we can back up, why did the Bengals not go for two on a touchdown that made it 22-17 with minutes left in the third? They should have tried to make it 24-17. But Evan McPherson missed the extra point, and that set us down a path that ultimately led to the Chiefs escaping with a 26-25 win. Things would have been different at 24-17. The fumble would only have tied the game, and so would a late field goal by the Chiefs as overtime would have been a possibility.

Going for the extra point was the first mistake, Burrow’s fumble was the second, and the third came on the next drive when Chase lost his cool and picked up a 15-yard flag from the refs. Instead of a 3rd-and-7, the Bengals faced a 3rd-and-22. They were able to salvage that drive for a field goal attempt, and McPherson redeemed himself with a 53-yard field goal to give the Bengals a 25-23 lead.

The Chiefs have a real problem right now with rookie left tackle Kingsley Suamataia being outmatched by an edge rusher on par with Trey Hendrickson. After Mahomes was sacked, the rookie tackle was also flagged for a hold that negated a 41-yard play to Travis Kelce, who only finished the game with a 5-yard swing catch.

Running out the final 6:57 would have been tough, but the Bengals were doing well until Burrow took another third-down sack and the team had to punt. The Chiefs had 2:35 to get a field goal, but it really felt like they came out of the two-minute warning with a lazy approach as if they weren’t down and this was really important.

A 1-yard run, a nonchalant throwaway, and just like that it was 3rd-and-9 where pressure forced a short throw to bring up 4th-and-6. Then the game got a little goofy. Mahomes made what should have been another game-winning type of play, finding Rashee Rice for 21 yards to the Cincinnati 34. Bang, there’s field goal range in the final 50 seconds with the Bengals down to one timeout.

But a lineman (not Kingsley) was flagged for illegal hands to the face, and it’s hard to say the call was anything but correct. Shades of 2023, the Chiefs were shooting themselves in the foot and had to convert a 4th-and-16. Mahomes threw deep for Rice, but it bounced incomplete off the defensive back’s head only for a flag to come in for pass interference on Daijahn Anthony, a 7th-round rookie who played 2 defensive snaps last week, and somehow he found himself defending the Chiefs’ best receiver on 4th-and-ballgame.

You’ve seen it, I’m sure. Was it not textbook pass interference?

You might get some leeway on defense in a Hail Mary situation, but this was not a Hail Mary throw. It was to a spot where Rice or Anthony could catch it, and Anthony clearly arrived early and tried to play the ball through the receiver by making contact high and to the head. I think they actually might let that one go if he jumped straight up with Rice, but he leaned into him too much and that’s a penalty.

Every little penalty in a Chiefs game turns into this big controversy now, but I see two penalties on crucial fourth-down plays, and both were correct. Had the first one not been called, the Chiefs are running the ball a couple of times and kicking a field goal from the same distance or even shorter than they ultimately did. You can’t just harp on the 4th-and-16 and ignore that the Bengals were fortunate they got a 4th-and-6 call that negated a conversion.

The Chiefs didn’t make it any easier on Harrison Butker, but from 51 yards out, he was money right down the middle again for the 26-25 escape to drop the Bengals to 0-2.

The prospects of the 2024 Chiefs fielding their strongest team yet are not looking great. They’re 2-0 against arguably two of their main AFC rivals, but is that saying a lot right now? New England beat Cincy and the Raiders just beat the Ravens.

I don’t doubt the Chiefs won’t be the toughest out for anyone in January, but you combine a Hollywood Brown injury that will keep him out of the regular season with this very unproductive Kelce start and add in a Pacheco injury at the end of this game, and things aren’t looking the greatest.

But I think if you’re just being honest as a Chiefs fan, you don’t want to see this Cincinnati team again this season. They just have that way of bringing out the worst with this offense.

Raiders at Ravens: Upset of the Year

In Week 3 last season, the Ravens lost 22-19 at home in overtime as a 7.5-point favorite against Gardner Minshew and the Colts. This year in Week 2, they lost 26-23 at home as an 8.5-point home favorite against Minshew and the Raiders. It’s the worst spread loss for the Ravens in the regular season in the Lamar Jackson era.

What is going on in Baltimore? They usually save these disappointments for January, but Justin Tucker is missing 50-yard field goals while the rest of the league crushes them, Derrick Henry struggled to get going for a long time Sunday, and once again Minshew led the game-winning drive Jackson couldn’t. Remember, Jackson didn’t have a single game-winning drive last year despite the team’s 13 wins in his MVP season.

This game was too close for comfort for a long time, but it sure looked like the Ravens had it in the bag when Henry scored to make it 23-13 with 12:11 left. But the Raiders got a field goal, Henry was called for a false start to knock the offense out of a 3rd-and-1 on a three-and-out, and the Raiders were bailed out on a 3rd-and-17 incompletion with a defensive pass interference penalty in the end zone.

We looked at the Kansas City DPI, so here’s the Baltimore one:

I don’t like the call, but I can kind of see the optics for why Davante Adams was able to sell it for a penalty. I see Stephens initiate the contact with his left hand on Adams, but they were both grabbing and fighting each other into the end zone. But at the last moment, Adams positions himself to dive for the ball while Stephens takes a different angle and bats at it. Maybe if did more to let Adams go to try going for the pick, they would have let it go.

But that is definitely a tough call. Adams caught a touchdown on the next snap and the game was tied with 3:54 left. Maxx Crosby immediately sacked Jackson to blow up another drive for a 3-and-out. Just a terrible drive for the Ravens there.

The special teams are usually great, but the Ravens hurt themselves with a 24-yard punt, so Minshew got to start at the Baltimore 43. The drive moved 23 yards and Daniel Carlson was good on a 38-yard field goal to take a 26-23 lead with 27 seconds left.

You still have a chance with Tucker’s leg despite recent misses, but the Ravens were out of timeouts. With one snap left and 59 yards away, I guess Lamar thought his best shot was to run for it and lateral, but I’m not sure why he didn’t keep going down the left sideline before starting that part of it.

The Raiders rushed for just 27 yards in this game while Baltimore had 151 thanks to that last play being their longest in the game. But this makes the Raiders the only NFL team since 1970 to win as an 8.5-point underdog while rushing for less than 30 yards and getting outrushed by over 115 yards.

Just a brutal loss for the Ravens (0-2). Was the loss of defensive coordinator Mike Macdonald to Seattle even bigger than expected? They were still blowing a handful of multi-score leads under Macdonald in 2022 as well, so maybe 2023 was the outlier here.

It’s not getting any easier too. The Ravens are in Dallas before hosting Buffalo the next two weeks. There’s at least precedent for them losing at home by a field goal to Minshew and losing to Mahomes, but they have to start showing more than they have so far in 2024.

Saints at Cowboys: Did Carr Absorb Brady’s Powers Before the Game?

Well, I was right about Derek Carr throwing an interception in Dallas. But that was only after he hung 41 points as the Saints opened with six straight touchdown drives, looking like some mixture of the 1999 Rams, 2007 Patriots, and the 2023 Packers team that went into Jerry’s World in January and embarrassed Dallas.

I liked the Saints to make the playoffs and possibly win the NFC South this year, but where the hell did all of this come from? I guess maybe beating up those South teams wasn’t meaningless as they only just added to this figure of dominance from last week and late in 2023:

The 2023-24 Saints join the 1941 Bears, 1968 Browns, 2007 Patriots, and 2018 Saints as the only teams in NFL history to score at least 44 points in three straight games. That’s historic company for a team no one was expecting this from. Alvin Kamara is out there playing like he’s 1999 Marshall Faulk. Carr’s 96.2 QBR leads the league and he’s treating Rashid Shaheed like he’s his Randy Moss.

But in one of the most shocking stats I’ve ever heard, Derek Carr started this season with 15 straight scoring drives.

How did he do that? That’s 9 straight scores against Carolina, then he was benched for the backup on the final two drives (both punts) with the game in hand, then he led 6 straight touchdowns in Dallas to get to 15.

I’m not sure if any quarterback has done that before even if you search through prime Peyton, Brady, Brees, Rodgers, or Mahomes. Even when Josh Allen reached some offensive perfection in the 2021 playoffs by going 7-for-7 on touchdown drives against New England, and best you can stretch that out to 10 straight scoring drives by including the regular season finale and the next playoff game in Kansas City. He started that one with a punt on his second drive, so even him playing his best didn’t come close to 15 straight scores.

The quarterback being pulled for the score is certainly a strong factor for why this streak can even exist. But I honestly don’t know if you can find another streak like this for a quarterback in the NFL.

And it’s Derek Carr who did it? Insane. Carr only threw 16 passes in Dallas but they went for 243 yards. It was an onslaught of big passing plays and a consistent ground game. The Cowboys never had much of a shot to keep up as Dak Prescott threw for 293 yards, a touchdown, and 2 picks. The first pick was the swing moment just before halftime when the Cowboys were down 28-13 and just converted a 3rd-and-10. The pick felt a little similar to the pick-six he threw in January to Green Bay to make it 27-0.

But I still never would have believed the Saints had this type of performance in them. When we’re asking for a team to step up this year and show it’s great now, could this really be the team that does it? Is new offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak a nepotism hire that’s worth its weight in gold?

Very curious to see where this goes as the Sains have been blowing teams out for longer than two weeks. No one cared late in 2023 because they were missing the playoffs. They should have everyone’s attention now.

49ers at Vikings: They Haven’t Won in Minnesota Since WHEN?

I couldn’t believe this stat when I heard it, but the 49ers haven’t won in Minnesota since December 1992, or a month after Bill Clinton won his first presidential election. The 49ers were on an 0-7 streak in Minnesota.

Make it 0-8 now. I knew they lost in Minnesota last season on a Monday night, and I chalked that up to injuries (Christian McCaffrey), a fluky touchdown to Jordan Addison before the half, and Purdy suffering a concussion late in the game before he threw some bone-headed picks. I liked the 49ers, who were without CMC again, to roll with Jordan Mason and overcome that loss last year.

Welp, I was wrong. They let Sam Darnold hit Justin Jefferson for a 97-yard touchdown that could go down as the longest play from scrimmage in this entire season. The 49ers also had a punt blocked, turned it over on downs twice, and Brock Purdy coughed up the ball on a drive that should have led to a 27-7 lead for the Vikings in the fourth quarter, but Aaron Jones fumbled on his way to the goal line to keep some hope alive in a 20-7 game.

But there was no comeback. Despite a 99-yard touchdown drive after the Jones fumble, the vaunted San Francisco defense couldn’t get Darnold off the field in several crucial third-down chances with Jefferson sidelined with an injury. Addison was already out before the game, and the Vikings haven’t even had tight end T.J. Hockenson available yet in these games. They could actually get better.

But their 6:46 drive for a field goal was a dagger as the Vikings were back up 23-14 with just 3:30 left. The 49ers added a field goal with 1:12 left to make it 23-17, but they couldn’t get the ball back after the onside kick failed.

I guess Brian Flores’ scheme is the magic weapon against the 49ers (without CMC)? Mason still rushed for 100 yards. Purdy still threw for 319, but it was the 6 sacks and the timely stops that frustrated the 49ers the entire game.

Buccaneers at Lions: Something’s Missing with Detroit

This spread (Lions -7.5) felt too high even if Detroit technically covered it twice last year against Tampa Bay. But the Buccaneers looked great last week, and Baker Mayfield has been playing very well. I wasn’t that impressed with Detroit last week in the overtime win over a battered Rams team, and sure enough, they were worse in this game.

Something just feels off with Detroit right now. Jameson Williams had a 50-yard catch again and looks better than Josh Reynolds ever did, so it’s not the lack of a WR2 or anything. Maybe it ‘s a slow start for tight end Sam LaPorta (13 yards) or how the running game hasn’t really been that great outside of the overtime drive last week.

But it always looks worse when Jared Goff is throwing his Jared Goof picks, and that happened a couple of times in this one. Even though the defense, led by an incredible effort from Aidan Hutchinson (4.5 sacks) got to Mayfield 5 times, they still gave up a rushing touchdown to Mayfield late in the third quarter to trail 20-16.

That still left Goff with four opportunities to get the go-ahead touchdown in the fourth quarter, and despite each drive crossing deep into Tampa territory, the Lions went scoreless. Goff had a bad pick and later turned it over on downs twice despite the defense continuing to get him the ball back.

It was a big missed opportunity in a winnable game.

Bears at Texans: Not Quite My MVP’s Night

After a Sunday filled with contenders disappointing, I was hoping to see the Texans put on a show Sunday night in an easy win over Chicago. Instead, they scored 19 points on 12 drives, blew the spread, and had to come up with a last-second stop of rookie Caleb Williams, who was under duress all night from the pass rush.

At least the pass rush looked good with 7 sacks and plenty of pressures. But the Texans went from scoring 13 points on three drives to struggling the rest of the game. It looks like the huge Joe Mixon game in Week 1 was more about playing the Colts, a lousy run defense, than expecting any dominance out of the Houston running game this year. Mixon finished with 9 carries for 25 yards in this one as he was banged up.

But Stroud was solid, and that connection with Nico Collins (135 yards) is dominant. There is no denying who the WR1 in Houston is this year.

But I would have liked to see the Texans win in more convincing fashion against a Chicago team that still clearly has flaws with the offensive line, coaching, and Wiliams’ inexperience. He was better than he was in Week 1 at least.

Jets at Titans: Big Dick vs. Big Dick Energy

I guess the Jets can survive a team like Tennessee with this kind of effort, but they still have a lot of work to do to get up to the elite class. Aaron Rodgers might be good for one highlight-reel touchdown a week in this offense, but the highlight largely belonged to Breece Hall for a brilliant 26-yard touchdown that made him look like a wideout. Keep in mind that was on a drive to open the half that was nearly stopped on a three-and-out before a roughing penalty on the Titans negated a 3rd-and-15 stop.

The Titans had a lot of costly mistakes again in falling to 0-2. Will Levis again tried to do too much and had multiple turnovers, and they also had a punt blocked.

But to break a 17-17 tie in the fourth quarter, Rodgers led a 74-yard touchdown drive with 4:31 left. When Levis had to answer, his legs got them within 8 yards, but then things stalled out with a big sack, and Levis threw incomplete on 4th-and-14 to end the game.

The game did at least end a 7-game streak where Rodgers did not throw multiple touchdown passes, a streak that went back to November 2022.

Colts at Packers: Coaching Matters

A good example of how coaching matters. The Packers didn’t have Jordan Love, and their backup Malik Willis has failed to throw for 100 yards in each of his three NFL starts. But Matt LaFleur had a run-heavy gameplan as the Packers rolled up 261 yards on the ground with most of that coming before halftime as Josh Jacobs (151 yards) and company were outstanding. Well, except for that horrible fumble by Jacobs at the 1-yard line as he carried the ball like a loaf of bread.

But the Packers managed the game beautifully without Love. Willis finished 12-of-14 for 122 yards and a touchdown pass while rushing for 41 yards.

At this point, you have to wonder if Shane Steichen should be employing a similar approach with the raw Anthony Richardson, who threw 34 times but was picked off three times, including a Hail Mary to end things in the 16-10 loss. Meanwhile, Jonathan Taylor rushed for 103 yards but only had 12 carries. The Packers had long drives early while the Colts struggled to get into any rhythm.

The Colts are now 0-4 in games where Richardson plays most of the snaps. Not great.

Browns at Jaguars: The Lawrence Splits Continue

I said I was hedging my Week 2 picks with six games where I picked a spread winner different from the moneyline winner. I ended up going 5-0 ATS on those games (Falcons-Eagles pending) and 2-3 SU, so it wasn’t a bad strategy. Just needed a little more courage to pick the Browns and Packers outright to win.

But the reasons I liked the Browns in this one? They beat the Jaguars last year and I feel the defense has the right pieces to force Trevor Lawrence into a rough game, especially after discovering these stats where he basically can’t win a game if he doesn’t complete over 60% of his passes.

Sure enough, he was 14-of-30 in this game, so he was under 50% in the 18-13 loss. It was a rough game that seemingly never wanted to end as the Jaguars tried to make a comeback attempt late. They even had a 2-yard go-ahead touchdown with half a quarter left that was taken away for an illegal shift. They settled for a field goal to make it 16-13, Lawrence couldn’t get out of his end zone with the ball to start the next possession, and that sacked produced a safety with 1:44 left.

But the Browns were not able to run out the clock, and a Deshaun Watson incompletion on third down actually saved Lawrence a solid 40 seconds to make this 18-13 comeback plausible with 1:27 left.

He still had to go 90 yards, but after reaching the Cleveland 28, Lawrence’s Hail Mary was knocked away to end the game and drop the Jaguars to a disappointing 0-2 after both games were winnable.

Lawrence is now 2-21 when he doesn’t complete at least 60% of his passes. Daniel Jones is in the same boat and is now 1-17 when he doesn’t too, the only record that’s worse among the 179 quarterbacks since 1970 with at least 50 games of experience.

This might be how I pick Jacksonville games the rest of the year. Determining if Lawrence is going to complete a high rate or not. Right now, the connection to Christian Kirk is completely broken, and it didn’t help that tight end Evan Engram was injured in warm-ups and missed this game.

Giants at Commanders: OnlyFGs

Jayden Daniels’ first game-winning drive was a historic NFL game. I was skeptical of how Daniels would fare in a Kliff Kingsbury offense, but we have two games of evidence that he has drive engineering skills that can be very intriguing once he gets better at throwing the ball, especially to his wide receivers.

But after only getting the ball 8 times last week in Tampa Bay, each team only had the ball 7 times in this game. The Commanders just happened to turn all 7 of their possessions into field goals by Austin Seibert. That speaks poorly for their red-zone ability, but 3.00 Pts/Dr is still elite.

They took a knee before the half too, but this is really a perfect game if the goal was to score all field goals, and I don’t think there’s another like it in NFL history. If you search for games since 1940 where a team had no punts and no turnovers, only one game comes up showing a team that scored fewer than 26 points, and I’m thinking that’s just an error that they’re missing data for punts or turnovers or something’s off.

Only three teams show up for a game with 0 punts, 0 turnovers, and 5 field goal attempts. Interestingly enough, the Giants scored three touchdowns in this game and still lost because they only scored 18 points. Their kicker (Graham Gano) was injured before the game, made it worse on the opening kickoff, which was a 98-yard return by Austin Ekeler negated by penalty, and the backup missed an extra point. So, the Giants tried to go for two twice and failed both times.

Just an extremely unique way to get to a 21-18 score as both offenses were moving the ball quite well. Malik Nabers also looked the part of a No. 1 wideout with 10 catches for 127 yards and his first touchdown. But he’ll regret not hauling in that last target that he had a diving attempt for on 4th-and-4 at the Washington 22 with 2:09 left.

Instead, the Commanders took over in a tied game and Daniels hit his longest pass play for 34 yards to Noah Brown to set up the final, winning field goal with no time left. All seven field goals were from within 45 yards, and 6-of-7 were from within 33 yards.

You probably won’t see another one like this, but it does point to some interesting ways Daniels can operate in this offense with short passes and timely scrambles/designed runs. He just needs to stay healthy.

Steelers at Broncos: Flag Fest

It’s hard to judge the Pittsburgh offense right now as it seems like every highlight-worthy play gets called back by penalty, and sometimes it’s not even a good call. The Steelers only scored 13 points in Denver, but that was enough to outlast a supposed offensive genius in Sean Payton, who relied on some tricks to get Bo Nix to complete some passes down the field. But Nix wasn’t as painfully inefficient as he was last week in his debut. He’s just struggling on a team that frankly is lousy, and they have no real running game to support him with.

But it was a tough game to watch with 19 accepted penalties for 202 yards between the teams. The Steelers punted 8 times while the only turnover was a pick in the end zone by Nix before he added a second on a last-ditch desperation throw.

The Steelers reportedly gave Russell Wilson a game ball in the revenge game his calf wouldn’t let him play. I wonder what Tomlin is thinking at this point as they are not scoring enough points to beat any decent team, but Fields also isn’t screwing up egregiously yet to bench him for Wilson, a wild card.

But celebrating a 2-0 start when you’re averaging 15.5 points per game is a weird thing to do. They still have a lot of the offensive stink they’ve had since December 2020.

Chargers at Panthers: Stress-Free 2-0 Chargers

It almost happened last week, and it did happen Sunday when J.K. Dobbins had more rushing yards (131) than Justin Herbert had passing yards (130). But Herbert threw for two touchdowns to Quentin Johnston, who held on this time, and it was a stress-free 26-3 win over a pathetic Carolina team. Herbert is owed some layups after what he endured his first four seasons.

But it’s shocking that the Panthers actually look worse in every way this year under coach Dave Canales. Bryce Young is daring to be the worst quarterback drafted No. 1 overall since JaMarcus Russell, and maybe the only thing stopping me from calling him the biggest bust is that he’s a tiny guy with a relatively small contract.

But Young flat-out stinks as he managed to complete 18-of-26 passes for just 84 yards. Young is the only quarterback in NFL history to complete at least 18 passes in a game without throwing for 100 yards.

I didn’t think there was anything Canales could do to get himself fired like Frank Reich did 11 games into the 2023 season, but I might have to rethink that. This team is still the worst in the NFL and there has been nothing they could even hang their hat on from either game so far.

Seahawks at Patriots: Better Played Than Expected

You might have imagined a rough offensive game with this one being a “body clock” game for Seattle, which traveled without the services of Kenneth Walker. But the offenses were actually solid in doing what they do best.

The Patriots didn’t ask Jacoby Brissett to throw much, but they found creative ways to get the ball to tight end Hunter Henry for 109 yards. That supported a running game that piled up 185 yards.

But when it came time to pick up a 3rd-and-1 in overtime, Rhamondre Stevenson was stopped and the Patriots decided to punt from their 39. They never saw the ball again, but that is a tough call to go for it as the game is about to be over with a field goal inside the 40 if you don’t get it. Tough spot to come up short after another good rushing effort.

Meanwhile, the Seahawks couldn’t run the ball without Walker, gaining 38 yards on 14 carries with his replacement (Charbonnet). But props to Geno Smith for a big-time passing game (327 yards) without any turnovers.

The Seahawks blocked a 48-yard field goal with 3:54 left that would have made them have to score a touchdown, so add that to the list of “shit that Tom Brady never had to worry about in New England for two decades.”

That allowed the Seahawks to tie with a field goal to force overtime, and the defense’s impressive stop got them the ball back deep in their own end. Geno delivered on the game-winning drive, and the Seahawks paid it off with a 31-yard field goal to win 23-20 in overtime.

The Seahawks are 2-0, and with Tua Tagovailoa probably being out for Miami in Week 3, they have a real shot to go 3-0 with this schedule opportunity.

Rams at Cardinals: Did You Really Doubt Marvin Harrison Jr.?

It’s funny how we had one week of panic over Marvin Harrison Jr. because he caught one ball for 4 yards last week, and apparently the GPS data said he never ran faster than 16 miles per hour.

Well, we can put that one to rest after he caught 4 balls for 130 yards and two touchdowns in the game’s first 12 minutes. He didn’t add to those numbers, but the team also didn’t need him to as they blasted a battered Rams team 41-10 in a game that was expected to be much tighter. Sean McVay usually is on the right end of these blowouts, but this time it was all about the weapons the Cardinals have (MHJ, Trey McBride, James Conner) and the dwindling options for the Rams after losing Cooper Kupp in the game. They already lost Puka Nacua in Week 1.

Throw in Stafford getting sacked 5 times behind a battered line, and this has the potential to turn into 2022 much quicker than any wild card season for the Rams. It’s getting late early.

Next week: Patriots-Jets on Thursday? I’ll be working on the computer. Texans-Vikings suddenly a lot more interesting than it has any business being. Eagles-Saints could be good, or the Saints could roll yet another team if Jalen Hurts is really as mistake prone this year as he looked in Brazil. Malik Willis Revenge Game in Tennessee, or does Jordan Love already come back? Chargering comes to Pittsburgh, or does it? Steelers might actually need to score more than one touchdown in that game. Definitely a lot of pressure in Cowboys-Ravens game as one will be 0-3 or 1-2 after it. So many amusing ways that one could go. Chiefs should be sharper in Atlanta on Sunday night. A somewhat bland MNF doubleheader (Jags-Bills, Commanders-Bengals), but let’s see if Jayden Daniels can drop Cincy to 0-3 and if the Bills can drop the Jags to 0-3.

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 10

~ Scott ~ 11 Comments

Like I said on Saturday, if you ignore the island game mess, the NFL had a solid Week 10 lined up. Sunday proved to be one of the best days of the season so far with a few big upsets in the AFC North and a handful of games where teams kept exchanging scores before someone kicked a field goal with no time left.

The NFL may not have sent its best to Germany again, nor did it bother using the flex option on Sunday night so we didn’t have to see the Jets fail to reach the end zone again. But with the Chiefs, Eagles, and Dolphins all on a bye week, it is hard to argue with Week 10’s quality. Sometimes the bad weeks on paper tun out to be some of the best played weeks.

In all, we had 10 out of 13 games (MNF pending) with a comeback opportunity. While there were technically only two lead changes in the fourth quarter in Week 10, and one of those didn’t happen until the clock showed 0:00, it was a fantastic week for watching teams match scores in the fourth quarter.

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

Lions at Chargers: Game of the Week or Year?

Ladies and gentlemen, the Chargers are back. This was the Week 10 game I had circled, because I knew we were not going to see the Chargers cruise to an easy win like they had in prime time the last two weeks against the Bears and Jets. We were going to see the Chargers in their element: late afternoon, Justin Herbert trying to bail out Brandon Staley’s defense in a 7-point game in the fourth quarter with a wild finish.

But this was not your usual case of Chargering, because the Chargers actually never led in this game despite the 41-38 final and the Los Angeles offense scoring five straight touchdown drives of at least 68 yards to end the game.

Last season, we saw the Lions tie an NFL record by scoring 45 points in a wire-to-wire loss at home against Seattle in a 48-45 game. This time, the Lions won wire-to-wire despite allowing 38 points. It is only the 20th time that has happened in NFL history.

For the Chargers, I think it was the kind of game we’ve come to expect from them. Herbert played great, he only had one turnover, no sacks, and he threw for 323 yards and 4 touchdowns with a dominant Keenan Allen game (11 catches for 175 yards, 2 touchdowns).

For the Lions, I think it showed the great potential of this offense at full strength. David Montgomery returned and had a 75-yard rushing touchdown to go along with rookie Jahmyr Gibbs rushing for 77 yards and two touchdowns. Jared Goff was very good with 333 yards and no turnovers, and Amon-Ra St. Brown was dominant with 8 catches for 156 yards and a touchdown. Detroit had 533 yards of offense.

If you wanted to nitpick, the game does show some concern that the Lions may be a bit of a paper tiger (or paper lion) on defense. They won’t be able to pressure the top offenses and keep them down on the scoreboard like they’ll need to if they’re going to win a Super Bowl. The Chargers looked great for the most part on offense, and Detroit’s offense had to be spectacular to pull out the win.

Even on the game-winning drive, which started with 3:34 left, we saw the Lions bypass a 44-yard field goal on 4th-and-2 to make sure they could set up the field goal as the final snap. Hard to believe that happened in a tied game, but Dan Campbell has the reputation he does for a reason. Still, you think if he trust his defense he’d consider the field goal with 1:47 left to take the lead. But if you are that concerned about Herbert going for a touchdown, then I understand the call.

Goff delivered the 6-yard gain to Sam LaPorta, which I greatly appreciated, and the win was there. Glad to see our Chargers back on brand.

I would argue the Chargers have played the two most entertaining games of the 2023 season, and they were both home losses to the Dolphins and Lions. I’d probably give the Miami game the edge since it had multiple lead changes and the highlights were a bit stronger. It also ended on a defensive stop, a foreign concept to Staley.

Browns at Ravens: Vintage 2022 Baltimore Football

I just said a couple of weeks ago how no one can stay on top for long this season before getting knocked down a peg. The Ravens were getting a lot of hype, understandably, this week before they had their chance to sweep the Browns and put more of a chokehold on their AFC North lead.

But we have already watched this team beat itself against the Colts and Steelers, shades of what they did often in 2022 even before Lamar Jackson was lost to injury. Sure enough, despite leading at home 14-0, 17-3, 24-9, then 31-17 in the fourth quarter, the Ravens did it again in a shocking 33-31 loss to the Browns, who trailed for all but 40 seconds in the game. They literally threw a pick-six on the second play from scrimmage and trailed until the field goal went through with no time left for their only lead of the game. Hard to top that. The Ravens are just 1-3 in close games this year.

To be fair, there was some fool’s gold feeling about the leads in this game. The pick-6 was a fantastic defensive play, but it was still a tipped ball that bounced the right way. The Ravens also got a 39-yard touchdown run from their new toy Keaton Mitchell, but he somehow finished the game with 3 carries for 34 yards. None of Baltimore’s other 23 runs gained more than 9 yards, and Cleveland had the better ground game with 36 carries for 178 yards.

Baltimore was up 14-0 and Jackson was only 3-of-3 for 30 yards. If Deshaun Watson could just calm down from his horrible start, then they were going to have a chance as the running game was finding traction, and the Ravens have a recent history of melting down after blowing a handful of multi-score leads last year, including 21 points to Miami and 17 points to Buffalo.

The Browns were able to block a 55-yard field goal by Justin Tucker, which is no easy feat, and they intercepted Jackson late in the half, but didn’t get any points out of it after a curious decision to let backup P.J. Walker throw a Hail Mary instead of attempting a 60-yard field goal.

Odell Beckham Jr. showed vintage speed on a 40-yard touchdown catch to start the third quarter, but the Browns started to get in a groove and matched it with their own touchdown. But after Myles Garrett sacked Jackson on a 3rd-and-17, the Browns seemed to commit a fatal mistake with a muffed punt, giving the Ravens the ball back at the Cleveland 12. Despite being that close to the end zone, the Ravens used 3:17 on the clock to go those 12 yards for a touchdown and take a 31-17 lead with 11:34 left. It was a ghastly drive, but it was effective in taking off more time all thanks to penalties on both teams, including a Cleveland penalty that wiped out another Jackson pick.

You normally think the game should be over here, but the Browns drove for another 75-yard touchdown, then the bounce finally went their way as they got their own tipped Jackson pass at the line that was returned for a touchdown with 8:16 left. But instead of tying the game, kicker Dustin Hopkins missed the extra point wide left. Cleveland still trailed 31-30.

The offense burned a little clock, but with the group out of sync, no strong running game to rely on, and an inexcusable delay of game penalty, the Ravens soon punted it back with 4:55 left.

Cleveland’s drive was not pretty, and it had to recover a Watson strip-sack, but it was effective in getting the job done. Watson had a big 16-yard scramble into Baltimore territory, then Jerome Ford’s 12-yard run made a field goal likely. The Browns were able to set it up as the last play and Hopkins redeemed himself with a 40-yard field goal to win it 33-31 to send the Browns to 6-3 and right on the heels of the Ravens (7-3).

It has to be frustrating for Baltimore fans when it looked just like one of 2022’s losses. No lead feels truly safe with this team, and that was not the case in Baltimore for a solid two decades.

As for Cleveland, going into games like this with Watson at quarterback can’t feel good. He did enough to salvage this one, but that defense and running game are going to have to be on point for this to work in January.

But it is getting more likely that the Browns will be in that playoff mix. They could even win the division now that they secured a split with the Ravens, who lost another they should have won.

Texans at Bengals: Chapter 1 in a Future AFC Rivalry?

I think the 2019-22 seasons were largely about figuring out who would rival Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs in the AFC in the 2020s. We needed new power dynamics in the conference like we used to have with teams like the Patriots, Colts, Steelers, Chargers, and some key appearances from the Ravens and Broncos.

Some contenders emerged like the Bills and Bengals, but we might be able to throw Houston into the mix soon if C.J. Stroud is going to be like this.

It was even a step back from his record-setting performance against Tampa Bay last week, but Stroud still managed to impress with another 356 passing yards in leading Houston to 30 points, and it could have been a lot more with that if the Texans protected the ball better. The Texans had 544 yards of offense, but between Stroud losing 2 fumbles early and throwing a shocking interception with a 10-point lead with 3:33 left, Houston had to sweat this one out after dominating for much of the game.

But even with all the turnovers, I want to point out that Stroud produced these big numbers as a 6.5-point road underdog against a defense that has been limiting great offenses the last few years. He also did it without No. 1 wide receiver Nico Collins, who was inactive, a story I didn’t even know about until the game was almost over. Yet, you heard all week how Tee Higgins was going to be out for this game for Cincinnati, and Ja’Marr Chase was questionable, even though he played and had 124 yards and a touchdown.

But the Texans didn’t sweat the Collins injury, and Stroud threw for 172 yards on 7-of-8 passing to Noah Brown, a forgotten receiver from Dallas who was best known for confusing viewers if CeeDee Lamb just added to his stats. Brown was going to be at best the No. 4 wideout in this offense behind Collins, rookie Tank Dell, veteran slot Robert Woods, and maybe even No. 5 behind John Metchie, a second-round pick in 2022. But Brown had 153 yards against Tampa Bay last week and 172 in this game with Stroud.

That’s why I’m saying if Stroud’s going to be legitimate like this, then we could have a new layer to this AFC. Imagine what things can look like if he gets a defense at some point soon under coach DeMeco Ryans.

There were some miscues in this game that he will hopefully learn from. After Joe Burrow threw a horrible interception in the end zone, his second in the fourth quarter, with 3:53 left, this looked like game over with Houston leading 27-17. But three plays later, Stroud threw his own horrible pick that was nearly returned for a touchdown in a spot where he could have ended the game. It was only his second interception of the season, but like I always say, this Cincinnati defense gets the timely ones like that.

Joe Mixon capped off a 4-yard touchdown drive and it was 27-24 with plenty of time. Houston even helped with another 3-and-out after Stroud was unable to put it away on a 3rd-and-3.

Believe it or not in Week 10, but this was the first time all season the Bengals had a 4QC/GWD opportunity on offense. It only took two plays for the Bengals to be deep in the red zone after Tyler Boyd took a short pass and ran 64 yards with it. But Burrow was sacked, then Boyd dropped a go-ahead score on third-and-goal. Not the most egregious drop, and not a definite game winner, but it definitely hurt, and it was a play he usually makes.

The Bengals had to settle for a 31-yard game-tying field goal and hope for overtime. But it was a bad day for defenses on the field late. Stroud was able to shake off his mistakes and found two more 20-yard plays on the day to set up his new backup kicker, Matt Ammendola, for a 38-yard field goal to win the game with no time left.

Stroud just posted back-to-back games with 350 passing yards and a game-winning drive. That’s as many such games as Tony Romo and Russell Wilson have in their careers, and it’s more than the one career game for Burrow, Josh Allen, Deshaun Watson, and Lamar Jackson – the other AFC contenders who have been floated as Mahomes’ rival in the last 5 years. If you’re curious, Mahomes’ number for this is 4 games.

Granted, this 350-yard game with a game-winning drive for Stroud could have been a 300-yard game with a 10-point win or 27-24 win had the rookie converted either of his first two 3rd-down opportunities. But the Bengals have fooled better quarterbacks into bigger mistakes before, and Stroud overcame all of that for a huge win as Houston (5-4) secures a key tiebreaker over the Bengals (5-4), who are in trouble again with a trip to Baltimore on a short week coming up this Thursday night.

Now granted, it was only a couple of weeks ago when Houston lost 15-13 to Carolina, the only win for the Panthers this season. It was also only in 2017 when I said Deshaun Watson was on pace for the greatest rookie quarterback season ever, and we know how that eventually turned out.

But after closing one of the darkest chapters in Texans history, the fans must be thrilled about this first chapter for Stroud.

49ers at Jaguars: Super Dud

My only comfortable read on this game was to take the under 45, because I wasn’t feeling very confident in the offenses going up against these defenses. In the end, it was one of the most lopsided games of the year as the 49ers rolled them 34-3. They even tried to get Christian McCaffrey a late touchdown to try extending his streak to 18 games, but it ended on a day where basically everyone else scored, including Deebo Samuel in his return game.

The 49ers were struggling with turnovers and the Jacksonville defense was tied for the league lead in takeaways. But the 49ers won the turnover battle 4-0, and that had a lot to do with the blowout score. Trevor Lawrence was picked twice and coughed up a fumble, and Christian Kirk had a bad fumble inside the 10 in the third quarter that sucked all the life out of this one at 20-3. The 49ers drove 81 yards the other way to make it 27-3 with Samuel’s 23-yard touchdown run and it was a wrap.

The bye week served the 49ers (6-3) well as this is still the most talented team in the league. The Jaguars (6-3) were outclassed, and I think there are legitimate concerns for why this offense isn’t producing more. The situational stats are lousy on the season, Calvin Ridley has not had a big impact, and Lawrence is not taking the next step forward. They look like they have a hard ceiling on where they can go right now.

Saints at Vikings: Dobbs Delivers in Starting Debut

The Vikings have gone from 1-4 to the longest active winning streak at 5 games after another one-possession win over the Saints in the first start for Joshua Dobbs. He has picked up the offense quickly and was excellent in this game with 268 yards, no interceptions, and he ran for 44 yards and another touchdown, showing off his mobility that has been foreign to this Minnesota offense for a long time.

But the Vikings did almost collapse from a 27-3 lead in the second half. An ineffective Derek Carr was injured and replaced by Jameis Winston, who led a pair of touchdown drives to make it 27-19. With a couple of 2-point conversion runs by Alvin Kamara, we almost were witnesses to the fabled 8+8+8 comeback from a 24-point deficit.

But the skillset of Winston that makes him dangerous to face is the same that makes him dangerous to his own team’s wellbeing. He likes to be aggressive with the ball and throw deep, and that burned him with a pair of interceptions late in the game that he really didn’t need to force because of the ample time left.

Winston had over 3 minutes left at midfield on the first one, and almost a full 2 minutes left in Minnesota territory on the last one, which came on a first down too. By the time the Vikings got the ball back, there was only time for a Hail Mary, which fell incomplete to end the game.

The Saints (5-5) continue to struggle while the Vikings are thriving even without Justin Jefferson for the last month and now without Kirk Cousins for the last two games. But Kevin O’Connell is getting to show that he knows how to coach offense, T.J. Hockenson and Jordan Addison have stepped up, and Dobbs is doing very well.

This can still be a playoff team. Hell, they could win the division if they were to sweep Detroit, but one game at a time.

Commanders at Seahawks: Receiving Backs on the Loose

The closer we got to Sunday, the more I liked this to be a shootout with the No. 1 wide receivers dominating these secondaries. D.K. Metcalf finished with 98 yards, but it was improbably long touchdowns on short throws to running backs that put the only touchdowns on the board early in what was a field goal fest into the fourth quarter. Washington’s Brian Robinson had a 51-yard touchdown catch to start the game and Kenneth Walker created a 64-yard scoring play in the third quarter.

Eventually, the game got to where I imagined with both quarterbacks throwing for over 300 yards and multiple touchdowns. Like some other games on Sunday, it was back-and-forth scoring drives until the end with the teams combining to score on the final 5 drives.

Sam Howell led Washington on two game-tying touchdown drives. The last came with 52 seconds left, and I think that left Seattle a little too much time (with 2 timeouts left) to drive for a game-winning field goal had the Commanders gone for a 2-point conversion to try to take a lead. As we saw anyway in a tied game, Seattle was able to set up Jason Myers for a 43-yard field goal at the buzzer after two big catches by Metcalf for 44 yards.

In the end, it was about the game you’d expect between these teams. The Seahawks are 6-3 despite still being outscored by 1 point on the season. The Commanders (4-6) throw the ball more than anyone and basically have the record they deserve with an ugly loss to the Giants cancelling out an unlikely 18-point comeback win in Denver.

Falcons at Cardinals: Return of the Jedi (The One as Tall as Yoda)

On the 11-month anniversary of his torn ACL, Kyler Murray made his return to the field. Without seeing him in so long, you forget how little he is and how unique his running looks when he’s scooting around the field.

Murray’s return was a success as he led the Cardinals to a 25-23 win over a spiraling Atlanta team that has now lost to three straight quarterbacks making their season debut for their team (rookie Will Levis in Tennessee, Joshua Dobbs in Minnesota, and now Murray).

Meanwhile, the Falcons were getting nothing out of Taylor Heinicke in this game, who had 15 pass attempts and 55 passing yards in the fourth quarter before he was knocked out with an injury and replaced by Desmond Ridder. But if you are going to throw so little, why even bench Ridder in the first place?

Ridder sparked the offense in his return. After he was stopped on a 4th-down run earlier in the quarter, Ridder finished his second drive with a 9-yard touchdown run to give the Falcons a 23-22 lead with 2:33 left. But the Falcons missed the crucial 2-point conversion as Ridder was incomplete for Drake London, who bailed out Ridder with an incredible catch earlier in the drive.

Murray keyed his team’s game-winning drive with a 13-yard scramble on a 3rd-and-10, then hit his tight end Trey McBride for a 33-yard gain, the longest in the game. In fact, this game had 4 plays that gained 19+ yards and McBride had 3 of them.

That was enough for the Cardinals to set up a 23-yard field goal as the final snap for Matt Prater, who nailed it for a 25-23 win. Muray was 19-of-32 for 249 yards, a pick, and he rushed for 33 yards and a touchdown.

I think the Falcons (4-6) are a bit screwed as they head into their bye. I’d go back to Ridder for the next game but not sure it’ll matter at this point. As for the Cardinals (2-8), they are in a weird position. The return of Murray probably means they are not going to get the No. 1 pick, but do they still settle for a different rookie quarterback in 2024, or do they try to make this work with Murray?

I guess it depends on how well he plays the rest of the year. After some of the recent draft duds with these college quarterbacks, sometimes newer isn’t any better.

Packers at Steelers: Mostly on Brand

When this game started with three straight touchdown drives, I felt bamboozled again. These are two of the worst offenses in the league, especially in the first half of games. But apparently, Matt Canada calling the game from the field at least produces a good start.

It’s the rest of the game where the offense doesn’t do much as Kenny Pickett only passed for 126 yards in this one. I was not impressed (again). Pickett’s 24.3 QBR was the lowest of any quarterback to win in Week 10. He got away with an awful pick on the second touchdown drive after the defender just failed to get his feet in bounds at the sideline.

The good news is this was one of the best run blocking performances by the Steelers in the last 5 years. They had 205 yards on the ground. Keeping veteran Dan Moore at his usual left tackle spot and putting first-round rookie Broderick Jones at right tackle has helped improve the line.

But the Steelers had to grind for this one again as Jordan Love was gambling and getting away with it for three quarters. The Packers even started the fourth quarter with a trick play that looked like it would have worked, but the receiver dropped the ball in a 20-19 game. Actually, they ruled it a fumble that the Packers recovered, which is what the team would have wanted ruled earlier when it sure looked like the Steelers had a lateral that Green Bay recovered. But it was ruled an incomplete pass.

Down 23-19, Love was picked in the end zone after Patrick Peterson tipped a ball to Keanu Neal that was intended for Christian Watson. Almost like the Seattle play at the end of the 2013 NFC Championship Game against San Francisco. Love had some success in this game, but he was 2/7 for 23 yards and 2 interceptions when targeting Watson, who I want to start calling Cheesehead Claypool after this disappearing act following a good rookie year. Similar to what Chase Claypool did in Pittsburgh in 2020-21.

But Love had a chance with 59 seconds left to drive 81 yards for the win. He got 46 of them right away with a big play to Jayden Reed, the second-round rookie who continues to improve. It looked like the Steelers might blow this one, but just like last week when they stopped the Titans with a game-ending pick in a 4-point win as a 3-point home favorite, they did the exact same thing here with a game-ending pick in the red zone off Love.

The Packers have now gone 7 straight games without scoring 21 points, their longest streak since a 10-game streak in 1990-91.

The Steelers have been outgained in every game this season and are still 6-3, which has never been done before. In fact, the Steelers are the 107th team since 1940 to be outgained in at least 9 straight games at any time of year, and they have the best record (6-3) among those teams. The only other team out of the 107 to have a winning record was the 1985-86 Browns, who were 5-4. You could say Mike Tomlin is doing some Marty Schottenheimer (Martyball) things with this team.

But it’s really just turnover differential and timely plays. I don’t know how long they can sustain this, but the schedule still looks favorable for 9-10 wins doing exactly this style of play.

Giants at Cowboys: Monster Dallas Win Against Division II Team

The Cowboys did not disappoint with the biggest point spread of the season (-17.5) in a 49-17 thrashing of the Giants. Dak Prescott passed for 404 yards and 4 touchdowns. CeeDee Lamb had 11 catches for 151 yards and scored a rushing touchdown. He is the first player ever to stack three straight games with 10 catches and 150 receiving yards.

But I believe games like this only fuel why people don’t trust the Cowboys. They basically operate in three modes:

  • Blowing out scrubs like the Tommy DeVito-led Giants.
  • Playing down to scrubs like their upset loss in Arizona this year or nearly blowing it as a 17-point home favorite against the 2022 Texans last December.
  • Looking dumb and losing to elite teams like the Eagles and 49ers.

When the Cowboys bring their A game, they look like the best team in the league. But just like how no one trusts the Dolphins this year against the good teams, we have been right to treat Dallas the same way for years.

Also, the Giants have to be the worst team in the NFL, right? Save for a half in Arizona where the Cardinals may have literally tanked, this team has been garbage on offense all year and now the defense is starting to give up huge numbers too.

The Giants are 4-15-1 under Brian Daboll ever since his 6-1 start.

Colts vs. Patriots: We Haven’t Sent Our Best to Germany Since WWII Ended

I woke up at noon and saw it was 10-6 Colts with just under 5:00 left, and all I could do was laugh. Of course, we send the Colts to Germany for their first island game of the season and immediately their streak of scoring 20 points in every game under Shane Steichen ends. That was my only good prediction for this game.

But I started checking the box score and it didn’t seem like a 10-6 game. Each team had a respectable third-down conversion rate (respectable for who these QBs are), there was only one turnover (Gardner Minshew INT) to that point, there were no failed fourth-down plays, and each team missed a field goal.

Looking into it later, what you had was abysmal red zone play by the Patriots, a bunch of third-down sacks taken by Mac Jones, and an 8-minute drive that bled into the fourth quarter before Bill Belichick still settled for a 24-yard field goal instead of going for a 4th-and-goal at the 5. It was 7-3 and your little kick made it 7-6. Why not take advantage of the field position and go for it? Your defense was playing great.

Of course, the Patriots wasted this defensive effort when Jones threw an atrocious interception in the red zone with 4:16 left.

That could have been the end of the Jones era in New England, because he was benched for the final drive when the Patriots got the ball back with 1:52 left. Bailey Zappe took over, and the move might have been permanent if he led this team on a 95-yard game-winning touchdown drive. Things were moving to midfield too before maybe the worst fake spike of all time:

I can’t seem to find the Madden view of this one, because that makes it look even worse. So much for the Zappe era, and so much for the Belichick era ending on a high note. He should have just walked away after 2018, because now he’s going to have to find a new team for 2024 if he’s going to coach long enough to break the all-time wins record.

By the way, this is the first time the Patriots lost a game after only allowing 10 points since September 23, 2001 against the Jets. That was the fateful game where Drew Bledsoe was injured by a Mo Lewis hit and Tom Brady replaced him in a 10-3 loss.

If Belichick was hoping a quarterback change would save his bacon this day, he was sorely mistaken.

Titans at Buccaneers: Can’t Find a Pulse

Admit it, you didn’t care one iota about this game. The Titans have played 6 games away from Nashville this season and have yet to top 16 points in any of them. They are also 0-6 when not home where they are 3-0 and average 27.5 points per game. Fun.

As it turns out, the low success rate Will Levis had in his 4 touchdown debut against Atlanta that was filled with 50-yard bombs has not led to more success for the rookie. This was his worst outing yet as he completed 19-of-39 passes for 199 yards and took 4 sacks in the 20-6 loss. Even the running game was shut down (16 carries for 42 yards) as the Buccaneers looked completely different from the defense that was shredded by C.J. Stroud and the Texans last week.

Mike Evans had a huge game with 143 yards and a touchdown, and he even dropped another score. He had 4 catches of 20-plus yards. The Titans didn’t have a play gain more than 15 yards until they trailed 20-6 with half a quarter to play.

Not much more to say about this one. The Titans’ offense simply hasn’t traveled all year long.

Jets at Raiders: J-E-T-S Just Embargo Touchdown Scoring

Since Monday night, we have watched the Jets play 8 quarters in prime time without the team scoring a single touchdown. The Jets have 8 offensive touchdowns in 9 games this season, so I guess it’s not that big of a surprise. But when you can’t break through against the defenses of the Chargers and Raiders, you have some pretty big flaws.

The Jets weren’t doing bad in this field goal fest, and I guess a 16-12 final with only 22 total possessions was better than the toilet bowl this game could have been. But once the Raiders finally broke the 9-9 tie by finding the end zone thanks to a 40-yard run by Josh Jacobs, you felt like the Jets had little hope without a massive turnover and easy field position for Zach Wilson and the offense.

Aidan O’Connell wasn’t great for the Raiders, but he only turned it over once, and he threw a game-winning touchdown pass to rookie tight end Michael Mayer. After the Jets caught their break when the defense forced a Jacobs fumble with 6:06 left, Wilson saved his worst decision of the night on an interception from the Raiders 20 by Robert Spillane with 1:14 left.

The Raiders went 3-and-out and saved the Jets a timeout by throwing incomplete on 3rd-and-5, which I would have called a run to Jacobs for. Wilson had 53 seconds left to go 80 yards, an even bigger miracle than the game-tying drive against the Giants this year. Tight end Tyler Conklin did make some nice plays, including a 27-yard grab, to give the Jets a chance, but they wasted a solid 7 seconds by not getting their final timeout in after Conklin was down. Jets coach Robert Saleh alleged he was trying to get the timeout at 20 seconds, but no one acknowledged him. I’m not sure what happened there but it left the Jets only with 13 seconds left and 44 more yards to go. That’s 2 plays.

I have to say Wilson did a very good job of escaping pressure on the final snap and giving his guys a shot at the Hail Mary in the end zone. But it was not caught, and the Jets lost 16-12 to fall to 4-5, which will be no better than 13th in the AFC.

The Raiders are suddenly 5-5 and celebrating wins under interim coach Antonio Pierce like they won the Super Bowl, but these New York teams are not anyone’s Super Bowl this year. The schedule will get much tougher and I’ll be surprised if the Raiders don’t max out at 7-10, which is the record I had for them before the season started.

The Jets gambled on a quarterback staying hot after his 40th birthday, and they made his backup the kid who thinks hotness begins at 40. They are losing for it now.

Because unlike the past boring editions of teams who just try to hide the quarterback by playing great defense and running the ball, the Jets don’t do enough running. The backs had 17 carries for 54 yards in Vegas, and these are no scrubs with Breece Hall and Dalvin Cook. But Wilson himself had 4 runs for 54 yards as a scrambler.

But hey, as long as they keep starting him, we get to see records. Wilson is the first quarterback since the 1970 merger to pass for 260 yards in back-to-back games without leading his team to a single touchdown in either game.

Just put an embargo on touchdown scoring and the Jets might be playoff ready.

Next week: The last time I was this ready for a MNF game, it was cancelled halfway through the first quarter. But Eagles-Chiefs is a big one, and since it’s prime time where offense dies this season, I fully expect the Chiefs to win 16-13. But Bengals-Ravens on TNF is another big one, Steelers-Browns should be a bloodbath at 1:00, and we’ll just ignore the absolute mess they lined up for the late afternoon and SNF (Vikings-Broncos). But I might have a special preview on Chiefs-Eagles or at least something related this week.

NFL Week 10 Predictions: Island Game Slop Edition

~ Scott ~ 1 Comment

The NFL’s Week 10 schedule is not the worst I’ve ever seen, but the sequencing of the games with the choices for the four island games might be the worst this century. Would the week sound so bad if Thursday night started with Seattle hosting Washington, the Germany game was Lions-Chargers, Sunday night was 49ers-Jaguars, and Monday night was I guess the same Broncos-Bills matchup assuming Denver plays better?

The masses had no business seeing Panthers-Bears, Colts-Patriots, and Jets-Raiders, and that was true back in April. Aaron Rodgers and Davante Adams in the same stadium? Who gives a shit? Enjoy the season-low ratings for Zach Wilson vs. Aidan O’Connell since you chose not to flex and spare us, NBC.

But Colts-Patriots is laughably bad for a 9:30 a.m. start. After the disappointment last week with Chiefs-Dolphins, I will not be getting up for this one. In fact, I might get up normal time (12:05), take a shit, take a shower, and maybe I’ll catch the tail end to see if the Colts kept their 20-points streak alive. To think a Colts-Patriots game used to be the biggest thing in the NFL. How the mighty have fallen.

This Week’s Articles

NFL Week 10 Predictions

No one won on Bears-Panthers on TNF with a push. I really didn’t win thanks to 2 f’n yards that Chuba Hubbard couldn’t get.

I want to start by saying favorites were 12-2 SU last week (good spread record too, I believe), so maybe this is a bounce-back week for underdogs, but I didn’t see a lot of enticing ones on the schedule. Just ended up taking the Vikings over Saints, then I also changed my pick from Tampa to Tennessee. Might be letting the Will Levis game vs. Atlanta screw me over twice here as I just think he can hit some big plays against the Bucs, and Kyler Murray might be the next QB to make his season debut for his team and upset the path to doom Falcons.

Honestly, I have no real feel for Colts-Patriots. It might be the biggest gap the Colts have over the Patriots roster-wise since 2005 or even longer ago. But when my brain has gone to “island game = shit offense” and I see the way the Colts didn’t even get 200 yards in Carolina and won thanks to 2 pick-sixes last week, I’m just going to go with the Pats to end the 20-points streak and sneak out an ugly win.

I also think 49ers-Jaguars is a hard game to read since the Jaguars are not statistically strong but win, and the 49ers are super talented but have lost 3 in a row. It’s also an early body clock game across the country. My favorite pick in this game is the under 45.5.

I don’t believe in Cleveland, so I took Baltimore to win by a full touchdown. We’ll see what happens as division games are weird. Same reason I ultimately decided to take the Giants to cover 17.5 points in Dallas. I know it looks bleak, but the Cowboys almost lost straight up to Houston as a 17-point favorite last year. They already lost as a 13-point favorite to Arizona this year. I hate big spreads like this.

Packers are a perfect opponent for Pittsburgh at home. Shit offense (first half under looks great) and not a scary offense. I’m sure it’ll be a nail-biter and maybe even go to overtime.

Texans-Bengals could be interesting but I think C.J. Stroud comes back to Earth a bit from last week. But would be something if Tee Higgins (out) and Ja’Marr Chase (questionable) both missed the game. Huge opportunity for Houston to get a H2H tie-breaker and move ahead of the Bengals in the AFC.

Lions-Chargers is our saving grace of the late afternoon. Should be back to a normal Chargers game, which means Justin Herbert with the ball in a one-score game in the 4th quarter. I also think Seahawks-Commanders has potential to be a tight finish with decent offensive numbers.

I already have to write 2 articles on the prime-time games early in the week, so by Friday night, I’m ready to just get them over with. But I think the Jets use their superior defense to win that stinker, and the Bills should bounce back and win against Denver, which I still think is an underwhelming team.

At least I’ll probably be done early on Sunday night with this slate.

NFL Week 8 Predictions: No Bye Weeks Edition

~ Scott ~ 1 Comment

I’m not sure why, and I’m not complaining, but there are no NFL teams on a bye week in Week 8, which is usually right in the thick of the byes. Instead, we have all 32 teams in action and they still somehow picked one of the worst prime-time slates possible, and I would have said this back in April.

I’ll try to get through Bucs-Bills later without swearing too much, but I really hope Bears-Chargers, a Sunday night game between the league’s two No. 14 seeds, somehow delivers a great game. It seems like those games everyone expects will suck sometimes turn out to be one of the best games that week. Hell, it might even produce more points than Dolphins-Eagles did last week if the Bears show up to take advantage of that Brandon Staley defense.

But yeah, it’s not a schedule worth hyping. That will come next week when we talk Dolphins-Chiefs.

This Week’s Articles

Why Are NFL Quarterback Sacks At a 25-Year High? – My story this week is on sacks, which are at their highest rate since 1998 and we can mostly blame Sam Howell and the Giants for this. But there are other issues like too many inexperienced, mobile quarterbacks, not enough quality offensive linemen, and a long list of great pass rushers.

NFL Week 8 Predictions

That fourth quarter in Bucs-Bills almost ended my days of gambling. Even though I knew early on it was going to end 24-18 so I’d lose both bets ($1600), the way it happened with that ridiculously long, 4th-down filled, penalty filled, tipped and deflected TD and 2PC for 8 point drive was a masterclass in the universe fucking me over. It is enough to probably make me leave out the spread/MOV in these island games. You just can’t trust these teams. Give me props and unders instead this season.

I think Eagles win easy after going to OT with the Commanders to start October.

I really like the Jaguars as I think the Steelers, the lesser team, are due for a loss, and that defense can force this bad offense into multiple turnovers. Only wild card is if Trevor Lawrence gets overwhelmed with quick pressures by T.J. Watt and Alex Highsmith, because the Jacksonville OL does allow that. But if Lawrence has protection, he should shred this secondary with those receivers, and I like Kirk more than Ridley.

Just got a hunch Derek Carr plays his best game in Indy. I’m done with that offense if he stinks in this one.

Got multiple links above to explain my Houston upset by Carolina pick. It’s time. Not only is Carolina winless, but the Cardinals are the only other team who doesn’t have 2 wins already. You can’t tell me this team has been that bad. I also don’t buy Houston as a playoff team yet. Give me Carolina, the team that’s lost 56 straight games when trailing in the 4th quarter. Maybe that finally ends this week too.

Got a 24-20 feel for Rams-Cowboys.

So it’s Will Levis at QB for the Titans? Maybe Malik Willis and Will Levis? Man, will DeAndre Hopkins ever score a TD this year? I like him to, but I’m going to take the Falcons cautiously.

Battle of New York is a better under bet than anything, but I feel like Tyrod gives them a better shot than Daniel Jones would. Either way, feels like the game most likely to end in a push (decided by 3), so I took Giants ATS just in case. But the Jets do have the better defense. I just trust Zach Wilson even less than Taylor in the battle of backups.

Patriots usually bomb in Miami. Might have been a week early on a big Waddle game (100+ and a TD)

I feel like Kirk Cousins and the Vikings are the better team than Green Bay right now, but that’s not really a game I’d bet on for the scoreboard. Check my Scott’s Seven link above for the parlay idea on Cousins & Love.

Browns-Seahawks might be my least confident game of the week. Staying away from it.

Also probably staying away from Bengals-49ers with Brock Purdy’s concussion uncertainty. Generally want to fade a QB coming off a concussion. But I can see a game where the Bengals lose by 3 points after the 49ers finally figure out how to win a close one.

Big spreads the rest of the way but we know the Ravens and Chargers are capable of making any game close. Hell, you could say that about the Chiefs, and I still believe the Broncos have a close one in them this year with that team. That’s why I like Chiefs win by 1-13 more than either team +/- 7.5.

  • Ravens by 11 (Zay Flowers TD)
  • Chiefs by 7 (Pacheco TD)
  • Chargers by 3 (Keenan Allen and D.J. Moore over 80 yards each)
  • Lions by 10 (Gibbs TD/100+ RYD)

A praying mantis visited my kitchen door today. Some believe they are supposed to bring good luck. Let’s hit something huge this weekend.

They owe me after that horseshit Tampa Bay TD drive. WTF? Even Brady didn’t have anything like that in 3 years down there.

NFL Stat Oddity: Week 6

~ Scott ~ 15 Comments

You know it was a crazy day in the NFL when the only teams to blow a double-digit lead were the last undefeated teams (49ers and Eagles) and the only winless team (Panthers). To top it off, the Bills had the largest point spread (-15.5) of any team this season, and they were a yard away from losing to the Giants at home on Sunday night.

But winning ugly is still a lot better than the alternative of losing dumb. There was a lot of bad football played this Sunday, and it is looking like this will be a season similar to 2021 where there are no truly great teams. That’s how you end up with the Titans as a No. 1 seed, a default MVP because they don’t know who else to give it to (Aaron Rodgers), and the only Super Bowl ever without any top 3 seeds (Bengals and Rams were both No. 4 seeds).

You just cannot trust these teams anymore, and a big part of the problem is on the offensive side of the ball. Monday night pending, a whopping 8 teams won this week without scoring more than 20 points – tied for the most in any week in the 32-team era since 2002. That may have been 9 teams if the Raiders didn’t get a safety against the Patriots to finally break 20 points this year.

The only other times this happened in 8 games was in Week 1 of the 2007 and 2010 seasons and Week 3 of the 2011 season. Those were all 16-game slates too while we had 14 games this week (15th on Monday), so it is the highest rate of winners scoring under 21 points in a week in the NFL regular season since Week 5 of the 1999 season when 9-of-14 games were won with fewer than 21 points. That week ended with the Jets and Rick Mirer losing 16-6 to the Jaguars on Monday night, so let’s hope Cowboys-Chargers has higher standards than that.

There were 10 games with a comeback opportunity, though only 3 were successful. They just so happened to be the ones to knock the 49ers and Eagles from the ranks of the undefeated, and Buffalo was spared the embarrassment of losing as a 15.5-point favorite.

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

49ers at Browns: If Brock Purdy Is Tom Brady, Then Jake Moody Is Billy Cundiff

Sunday in Cleveland was the kind of game that a lot of NFL fans wanted to see Brock Purdy deal with to see what he’s really made of. Everything had gone so smoothly for him. He was 13-0 when he threw 20 passes in a game and had a passer rating of at least 87.4 in all of them, a streak we may never see again to begin someone’s career.

Purdy had only trailed in the fourth quarter once in a game where he had both functioning elbows, and that was the Raiders game last year, a defense known for blowing games. There was only one other game that was tied in the fourth quarter, and that was the Dallas playoff game.

This was a major test of adversity as the 49ers were playing a very tough Cleveland defense on the road, there was a little rain, and Deebo Samuel and Christian McCaffrey did not finish the game due to injuries.

Despite leading 10-0 early, the 49ers were down 13-10 in the fourth quarter, and Purdy’s accuracy was shot. He was getting hit, he threw his first interception of the season, he had a few drive-killing sacks, and he was going to have to pick himself up and have an answer for why he’s getting outplayed by Cleveland backup quarterback P.J. Walker.

But Walker lived dangerously in this one, and in fact, his 24.1 QBR was the worst by a winning quarterback in Week 6 and below Purdy’s final number (40.0). Walker threw a second interception and that was returned to the Cleveland 8 with 11:04 left. Jordan Mason immediately rushed for an 8-yard touchdown and the 49ers were back up 17-13. The Browns were held to a field goal, then the 49ers badly botched their drive to put the game away with Purdy getting called for grounding and throwing an incompletion on a drive that lasted 25 seconds. But with Walker throwing wildly and what looked like a 4th-and-10 on the way, it looked like the 49ers were going to survive.

A comeback and game-winning drive where your defense and running game did all the work to bail you out on your worst day, and you blew it in the four-minute offense? Damn, Purdy really is the new Tom Brady.

But there are so many reasons we’ll never see the LOAT again. For one, the NFL has gotten incredibly soft with hard hits, and the 49ers were hosed on a bad call on that 3rd-and-10 incompletion for what looked like a clean hit to the shoulder area. But because it was hard and looked like it hurt, out came the flag for unnecessary roughness, and instead of a 4th-and-10 with the game on the line, Cleveland had a fresh set of downs. It was a messy game with both teams having at least 12 penalties for over 105 yards each.

There was still work to be done, and Jerome Ford did much of it with runs of 14 and 22 yards. Walker didn’t actually gain any yards on this drive, which ended with a 29-yard field goal to put the Browns up 19-17 with 1:40 left.

That set the stage for Purdy, who was going to have to lean on Brandon Aiyuk. That’s where he went for a couple of completions for 33 yards, and the 49ers got conservative inside the 30, which is usually a no-no in this league.

Purdy spiked the ball with 9 seconds left, and you have to say he did his job. But just like his first game-winning drive attempt against the Raiders last year, his kicker failed him. Last year it was veteran Robbie Gould who missed a 41-yard field goal to win Purdy’s 4th start. Instead, it sent the game to overtime where the Raiders threw an interception, gifting Purdy a kneeldown and short field goal for his first game-winning drive.

This time it was rookie kicker Jake Moody, who the team used the 99th pick in the draft to get. Let’s just say this early legacy game for him did not go well as he was 9-for-9 coming into Sunday, but he missed twice in this game. The probable game winner was only a 41-yard kick, but Moody hooked it wide right, and the Browns (+9.5) survived for one of the biggest upsets this season.

It took 14 starts, but Purdy has his first legitimate loss in the NFL, and it came at the mercy of a kicker. Meanwhile, Brady started 381 games in his career and just once, in his 183rd start against the 2012 Cardinals, did he lose a game after a clutch field goal was missed.

Purdy’s hero growing up was Dan Marino, who lost 10 games in his career after a clutch field goal was missed. I’ve yet to ever find a quarterback with more than that (Drew Brees also had 10). Let’s hope Purdy doesn’t turn out like Marino in that regard or as someone who had his best title shots in his first two seasons.

But the 49ers looked awfully mortal in this game. Cleveland earned it on more merit than just getting a weak penalty and missed kick. The Browns beat the 49ers 334-215 in yards. Cleveland has allowed 1,002 yards in 5 games, the 3rd-best mark to start a season since 1970 behind only the 1971 Colts (836) and 1970 Vikings (945).

Thie historic defense got the best of the historic offense this time. Now you just have to hope Moody doesn’t let this crush his psyche because kickers are fragile like that.

Eagles at Jets: Down Goes the Other 5-0 Team in Inexplicable Fashion

I don’t think the Eagles had a second to gloat about the 49ers losing in Cleveland, because their game kicked off with the Jets before the 49ers’ game ended.

This was another shocker with a 5-0 team going down in the second half, but at least there was some precedent for this one. The Jets basically relied on their Week 1 blueprint against the Bills where the defense forces several takeaways from the quarterback, Garrett Wilson makes some plays, and Zach Wilson stays out of the way of the game-winning touchdown. Wilson took 5 sacks but the Jets avoided any turnovers.

Meanwhile, Jalen Hurts led his team in rushing (47 yards and another touchdown), but it was a very quiet day for his running backs (14 carries for 33 yards). Hurts also threw 3 interceptions, which is so unlike him.

The Eagles led 14-9 at halftime but never scored again. In the fourth quarter, Hurts threw a pick in New York territory, then Jake Elliott missed a 37-yard field goal with 8:13 left. But the Jets could not capitalize. Hurts had a chance to put the game away with a 3rd-and-9 conversion, but his third interception of the game was one of the worst of his career:

That set the Jets up 8 yards away from the end zone, and immediately Breece Hall scored as if the Eagles wanted him to. That’s kind of a bold decision in a 14-12 game as the Eagles had two timeouts to get the ball back with time for a field goal to win it, but I guess they figured maximizing time for a touchdown was their best shot. Not an easy decision.

Hurts had 1:46 and 2 timeouts to drive 75 yards for a touchdown, which is hard but doable. However, he did not get a single first down and the Eagles turned it over on downs after his 4th-and-8 pass was incomplete.

That formula of forcing 4 takeaways against the Eagles still works well in beating them. It happened twice last year by the Commanders and Cowboys. That’s the kind of crazy effort it usually takes to beat this team, but the Jets hung in there, protected the ball, and chipped away with field goals before getting the ultimate break with that last pick.

It’s not a formula you can sustain, but the Jets are 3-3 going into the bye, and frankly I thought that was the best-case scenario with this early schedule if the team had Aaron Rodgers. The schedule will get easier, and in this sea of mediocrity engulfing the AFC this year, the Jets still have a shot.

Giants at Bills: WTF?

The Bills (4-2) win this week’s award for “Win That Felt Most Like a Loss.” Buffalo came dangerously close to losing to the lowly Giants despite being favored by 15.5 on Sunday night in another barnburner for island games this year with its 14-9 final.

Maybe the spread was wacky, but this was a Buffalo team that recently won 3 games in a row by 28+ points each, and a New York team starting Tyrod Taylor that has been awful in basically every half but one (Arizona) this season.

But it was a game that makes you ask many questions.

Are the Giants better with Tyrod Taylor starting than Daniel Jones (neck)? Maybe so, but they still scored 9 points and botched the end of each half from the 1-yard line. They should have just kicked a field goal to end the first half instead of trying to run Saquon Barkley for a touchdown as time ran out on the Giants.

Did Barkley make the offense better in his return? Eh, he had 24 carries for 93 yards with a 34-yard run his longest play, and he caught 4-of-5 targets for a whopping 5 yards. That’s 98 yards on 29 plays, so that’s not very good, and they lost the confidence to go back to him with the game on the line on the last play, throwing incomplete to Darren Waller in the back of the end zone on a play that made zero use of Tyrod’s mobility. Some wanted a flag but I’m okay with not bailing out the high throw. It was already an untimed down to begin with after a penalty on Buffalo extended the game.

Is the Buffalo offense okay? We know the defense has most of the injuries, but that doesn’t excuse why the Bills were scoreless at home going into the fourth quarter against the Giants. Josh Allen had a bit of Stefon Diggs tunnel vision on the night as Diggs had 100 of Allen’s 169 passing yards. Tyler Bass did not help with a couple of missed field goals, but when push came to shove, the Bills responded in the fourth quarter with a couple of nice touchdown passes from Allen to two of his more unheralded/unknown receivers (Deonte Harty and Quintin Morris).

But the Bills were lucky to be playing the Giants, the team that needed 8 yards and saw Tyrod throwing passes 38 and 47 yards in the air to end a drive on downs with 1:45 left. But that didn’t end the game as Allen threw an incomplete pass on a 3rd down and Bass missed a 53-yard field goal with 1:25 left that would have gave Buffalo a nice cushion at 17-9.

That made the long 14-play march possible to end the game, and the Giants were just one yard, one better play call away from pulling off this upset. Instead, the Giants are who we thought they were, taking their record in prime time to 5-25 (.167) since 2017.

Lions at Buccaneers: Better Team Won

I’m not sure these teams are as good as their 1-loss records suggested going into Week 6, but I do know the better team won this game. Even though the Lions lost David Montgomery to an injury and had no running game, Jared Goff (353 yards and 2 touchdowns) played much better than Baker Mayfield, who failed to lead a touchdown drive.

It was just some of the little things in this game that showed why Detroit is better.

  • Mayfield had a pass tipped and intercepted deep in his own end that turned into a field goal to start the scoring for Detroit. Meanwhile, Goff had a few passes tipped that fell harmlessly to the ground.
  • On a 3rd-and-12, Mike Evans had an awful drop on what would have been a conversion for Tampa Bay. In the third quarter, Evans also negated a 3rd-and-1 with a push off that was flagged for offensive pass interference.
  • On a 3rd-and-13, Amon-Ra St. Brown took a screen pass and got an incredible block from Craig Reynolds to free him up for the game’s first touchdown.
  • Detroit’s other touchdown pass saw incredible adjustment to the ball from Jameson Williams for a 45-yard score.

The Lions are 5-1 with a +55 scoring differential. It hasn’t been this good for the team since 2011 (5-1, +64), and even that felt less impressive than this since Green Bay was undefeated at that moment and the defending champion.

This is finally Detroit’s year in the NFC North, and if Sunday is any indication, maybe the whole NFC if the Lions can stay healthy and improve as the season goes on.

Colts at Jaguars: The Streak Continues

I’m not sure why, but the Colts seemingly lose their shit every time they go down to Jacksonville where they have not won since 2014. This streak has gone on through several coaches and quarterbacks now.

Sunday was easily the worst performance yet by the Shane Steichen-coached Colts, and Gardner Minshew was a mess with 4 turnovers (3 interceptions, 1 lost fumble). The mistakes boosted the Jaguars to 37 points even though Calvin Ridley was held to 30 yards, Trevor Lawrence passed for 181 yards with 3 sacks, and the running game averaged 2.9 yards per carry.

Like I said, the Colts might as well book these Jacksonville games in the Bermuda Triangle instead of Duval County. It looked like it might actually start out as a legit, heavyweight fight with the Jaguars following a long Indy field goal drive with a long touchdown drive that went into the second quarter.

But that interesting start was the end of the efficiency as Josh Allen forced Minshew to fumble on the next snap, and the Jaguars turned that into a 22-yard touchdown run by Travis Etienne. The Colts continued to shoot themselves in the foot, and they trailed 31-6 in the fourth quarter.

There was a rally attempt with the Colts getting a touchdown (31-13) and a Lawrence interception, but I feel like they should have kicked a field goal on 4th-and-5 at the 15 with 11:06 left. Just keep the game going and get it to 2 possessions. But Minshew threw another pick. Even then, the Jaguars went three-and-out and the Colts got a touchdown to make it 31-20, but a long kick return took a lot out of Indy, which gave up a cheap field goal (34-20) before the Colts went 4-and-out (cue another cheap field goal).

With Minshew a mess and Anthony Richardson considering season-ending surgery for his shoulder, it’s looking like Jacksonville (4-2) may have just ended another season for the Colts (3-3).

Seahawks at Bengals: Looked Like a Cincinnati Playoff Game

If you don’t understand the header, let’s do a quick refresher on what a playoff game looks like in the Zac Taylor-Joe Burrow era in Cincinnati.

  • There have been 7 playoff games, and despite the 5-2 record, the Bengals have only gotten anywhere from 17-to-27 points from the offense in each game.
  • The offense has only contributed one touchdown in the fourth quarter of these games.
  • Burrow has passed for 270 yards or fewer in 6-of-7 games.
  • Only the 27-10 win in Buffalo last year was decided by more than one possession.
  • In 4 games, the Cincinnati defense has forced a crucial turnover in the fourth quarter or overtime.

With Seattle coming in as a formidable opponent, this looked like it might be a great shootout with both offenses scoring touchdowns on their opening drives. But it was a struggle from there with the Seahawks only adding a pair of field goals on their final 10 drives. After starting the game with back-to-back touchdowns, the Bengals would have gone scoreless on their final 8 drives if not for a 0-yard field goal in the fourth quarter that was set up by a Geno Smith interception.

Burrow, who only had 185 passing yards, threw 3 straight incompletions before Evan McPherson made a 52-yard field goal to make it 17-13 and conclude the scoring with 11:47 to play. Seattle dominated in yardage (381-214), but between 4 sacks and 2 picks for Smith, the offense kept getting turned away in scoring territory.

Smith had four possessions in the fourth quarter alone and was unable to get points on any of them. Despite D.K. Metcalf (30) and Tyler Lockett (36) each having a 30-yard completion in the final six minutes on two different drives, the Seahawks could not break through in the red zone.

That duo of Trey Hendrickson and Sam Hubbard made sure Geno was stopped with sacks on 1st-and-goal from the 7 and 4th-and-goal from the 6 with 2:03 left. After getting the ball back and getting quickly to the Cincinnati 11 after Lockett’s big catch, the Seahawks again looked frazzled. Smith threw incomplete on 3rd-and-8, and then again under pressure on 4th-and-ballgame with 35 seconds left to end it.

The Bengals are now 3-0 against the NFC West and 0-3 against AFC teams this year. Are they a contender again? It’s hard to say, but they at least picked a good week to win unimpressively when other contenders either lost or looked worse against worse competition.

But seeing Smith repeatedly get turned away in the fourth quarter was a throwback to what has become the typical Cincinnati playoff game for this team. Burrow had some more Fran Tarkenton-esque scrambles in this game that I think can put the calf concerns to rest, but that’s not to say the offense is back on track. Ja’Marr Chase, who had all 3 of the team’s plays that gained more than 11 yards, may be on track, but the rest of the offense has some catching up to do.

Ravens vs. Titans: London Snoozer

Not a lot to say about the last London game of the year as the Ravens held on for a 24-16 win. You had to expect a good Baltimore start after how sloppy things were last week in Pittsburgh. Zay Flowers finally caught his first NFL touchdown.

Derrick Henry hit a long run for 63 yards, but the Titans once again failed to see their offense travel. While technically the home team in this one, the Titans are 0-4 outside of Nashville this year and have not scored more than 16 points in any of those games.

Ryan Tannehill only passed for 76 yards in 3 quarters, but the Titans were cooked with him getting carted off. Malik Willis is not a legitimate quarterback, and I would be concerned as a fan that rookie Will Levis was not the No. 2 quarterback. Willis came into this game with only a 21-13 deficit in the fourth quarter, and we know these Ravens blow leads, but Willis has a bad habit of holding onto the ball too long.

A pair of Willis scrambles led to a punt, the Ravens tacked on a field goal to make it 24-13 with 4:16 left, then it was time for one of the saddest field goal drives you’ll ever see as Baltimore was flagged 4 times and the Titans also had a 5th penalty called. Willis somehow took 5 sacks on the drive and 4 of them still counted as only 1 was voided by a Baltimore penalty. That’s how you end up wasting 1st-and-goal from the 1, but I’m not sure if kicking the field goal on 3rd-and-goal from the 20 was the right call with 41 seconds left. Things were so bleak that you might as well try for the touchdown that close.

What’s Willis going to do from midfield with 35 seconds left if the onside kick was recovered? Take 3 more sacks? But the onside kick was free of drama and the game ended with the Ravens moving back to first place with a 4-2 record. We’ll see what the injury is for Tannehill, but things are slipping away early for the Titans (2-4), who have a bye week.

Panthers at Dolphins: The Team Who Scores, the Team Who Loses

The Panthers jumped out to a 14-0 lead, scored a late pick-six, and they still lost by 21 points to fall to 0-6.

This team feels like a money laundering scheme that involves Adam Thielen catches. He’s the only part of the team that goes off consistently as he had another 11 catches for 115 yards and a touchdown.

But the Miami offense is just too good for opponents like this. Even after going three-and-out twice in the first quarter, the Dolphins scored 5 touchdowns on their next 6 drives with Tyreek Hill dominating deep (163 yards), and Raheem Mostert rushed for 115 yards and scored 3 more touchdowns with De’Von Achane out.

With the Eagles next week and the Week 9 game in Germany with Kansas City looming, I can’t wait to see how Miami does against last year’s Super Bowl teams. Carolina is not the litmus test.

Commanders at Falcons: Ridder the Enigma

The good news: Desmond Ridder stacked 300-yard passing games after he had the best game of his career last week against Houston. The bad news: Ridder threw 3 interceptions in this 24-16 home loss that may have been the worst game of his career.

Sam Howell took another 5 sacks and the Washington running game only averaged 3.3 yards per carry on the way to 193 total yards of offense, so it was not the defense that lost this game for Atlanta. Washington had an 11-yard touchdown drive after a long punt return, and in the third quarter, Washington had a 24-yard touchdown drive after Ridder was picked on a great diving read by Kyle Fuller.

But Washington never scored again, bringing Atlanta to 15 straight games without allowing more than 25 points, the longest streak in the NFL since the 2013-14 49ers (17 games).

The Falcons were able to get one touchdown, missed the 2-point conversion, but it felt like a one-score game with Atlanta unable to do anything for a solid hour. There were numerous chances, including one where a legit roughing the passer call for Ridder wiped out a fumble. That led to a drive that reached the 2-yard line, but Ridder ended up throwing an interception in the end zone with 5:11 left.

The next chance was a quick 4-and-out, then the final drive ended with Ridder’s third interception in desperate times with 26 seconds left after the Falcons reached the Washington 34.

Rough days like this will happen to the best of them, but it sure is weird to see an Atlanta team let down by its offense while the defense was more than serviceable, especially in the fourth quarter.

Patriots at Raiders: Belichick Really Can’t Beat McDaniels

You have to admit it’s pretty amusing that Bill Belichick is 0-3 against Josh McDaniels as a head coach. Now, McDaniels has had home-field advantage for every game, he’s had the better quarterback in the last two games in Vegas, and they have all been one-score games where a turnover (or something on the order of one) killed the Patriots at the end.

This one went McDaniels’ way again even after Jimmy Garoppolo left with a back injury that was serious enough to land him at the local hospital. But Brian Hoyer did a respectable job in his place (6-of-10 for 102 yards), and that means it was two former New England quarterbacks who helped drop the Patriots to 1-5.

At least it was close this week. Mac Jones had an uneven game that will be hard to analyze. He did throw another terrible interception this week, but then he also threw one of the best passes in his career on a 2nd-and-11 deep in his own end with a 19-17 deficit. DeVante Parker dropped it. The drop wasn’t overly egregious and it wasn’t a simple play, but you have to make one like that for your team. You have to wonder why this team settled for a poor man’s DeAndre Hopkins when they could have had the real thing this year. Hopkins makes that catch.

After an inexcusable delay of game – Patriots were sloppy again this week – made it 3rd-and-15, Jones was swarmed in his end zone and Maxx Crosby was there on the sack for a safety.

What an awful way to blow a cover as the Patriots were +2.5. Their only hope was recovering an onside kick on the free kick, but that didn’t work, and the game was over with the Raiders winning 21-17.

It is also amusing that it took a safety to get the Raiders (3-3) to 20 points for the first time all season. But the Patriots had no sacks on defense, and while they got their first takeaway since Week 2, it was a fluky interception on a deflected pass that wasn’t Garoppolo’s fault.

The better team won, and dare I say, the better coach when these two meet up won again.

Saints at Texans: Carr (Repeatedly) Fails First GWD Attempt in New Orleans

One thing I got right about the 2023 Saints is that they are providing Derek Carr with the best defense of his career. The Saints finally became the first team to intercept rookie quarterback C.J. Stroud, but they unfortunately fumbled it right back to him on the play in the first quarter, and the Texans scored a touchdown on that drive to boot.

But the Texans only put up one field goal after halftime, so this game was in Derek Carr’s wheelhouse for another fourth-quarter comeback. This was actually his first attempt of the season as he was injured in the Green Bay loss when the Saints blew a 17-0 lead in the final quarter.

This was supposed to be the spot where Carr would make his mark in New Orleans, but instead, the Saints went scoreless on their last 3 drives in a 20-13 game:

  • Kicker Blake Grupe picked a bad time to have the shortest miss of his season from 29 yards out with 11:07 left. Remember, he’s the kicker who missed from 46 yards to win the game in Green Bay.
  • On a 4th-and-4 at the Houston 15, Carr checked down to Alvin Kamara in the backfield on a play that required a Hulk-like effort to break tackles. Kamara came up short and the Saints turned it over on downs with 4:31 left.
  • Needing to go 85 yards in the final 2:41, Carr got to the Houston 24 before throwing 4 incompletions, including a pick on fourth down just shy of the end zone on a pass intended for Michael Thomas (still without a touchdown this year) with 16 seconds left.

The Saints are 3-3 and not in any real danger with the entire NFC South losing on Sunday. But this team has not scored more than 20 points in 5-of-6 games this year. The Carr-led offense, despite some solid talent at the skill players, is not working out. It also has been outperformed by a Houston offense with a rookie quarterback and some unheralded receivers that had lower expectations this year.

Carr underachieving doesn’t necessarily surprise me, but I thought he’d be better than this.

Vikings at Bears: Hoodwinked, Bamboozled, Led Astray

The Bears (+3) were my upset pick for the week, so this dud at home was a bummer. I knew Justin Fields was out of games against the Washington and Denver defenses, but I did not think highly of Minnesota’s defense either. Naturally, Fields threw for 58 yards on 10 throws and took 4 sacks before leaving the game with a dislocated thumb on his throwing hand.

When you have a quarterback you know is a high injury risk, how do you not do more at backup quarterback than Tyson Bagent?

On the undrafted rookie’s second dropback, he was strip-sacked, and the Vikings returned it for a 43-yard touchdown to take a 19-6 lead in the third quarter. But the Vikings did not do a good job of putting the game away without Justin Jefferson available.

It looked like Bagent might lead a 13-point comeback in the fourth quarter after he ran in his first NFL touchdown with 7:46 left. The Vikings went three-and-out after barely burning a minute off the clock. The Bears were slow rolling their drive down the field with the running game featured, but eventually, Bagent had to throw.

Correction: Chicago chose to throw deep for D.J. Moore just shy of the 2-minute warning in a spot that would have been fine for another run. No need to rush. Bagent badly underthrew the pass and it was intercepted by Minnesota. The Bears had all their timeouts, but after getting one first down, Minnesota was able to run out the rest of the clock with Chicago never getting another chance.

The Vikings (2-4) are still a bad team, but the Bears (1-5) are the worst in the NFC North. I won’t drink the Kool-Aid again this year.

Cardinals at Rams: Cooper Kupp Still Top Dog

Tyreek Hill has an amazing highlight reel of big plays and still has top-end speed. Justin Jefferson is doing incredible things for a young receiver. But for my money, Cooper Kupp is still the best all-around wide receiver in the league right now. No one is more consistent at producing in any matchup, and he does it at every level of the field. Only durability is a knock on him.

But one team that did have his number was Arizona. Kupp played in 31 games since 2021 and the only 4 games where he was held under 79 yards were all against Arizona. But that was a different coaching staff and roster.

Against Jonathan Gannon’s no-name defense, Kupp was dominant again with 148 yards and his first touchdown of 2023. Matthew Stafford only had 78 yards to his other receivers in the game. But the Rams also ran the ball very well with 179 yards.

Despite those big performances and the final score (26-9), this was a 16-9 game to start the fourth quarter with the Cardinals 12 yards away from the end zone. But Joshua Dobbs was intercepted on that play, and the Rams turned that into a long touchdown drive that was almost ruled a fumble through the end zone. But that was definitely a touchdown.

The Rams added a field goal after a strip-sack of Dobbs, so the turnovers have caught up with this offense, and the thin roster made thinner by injuries is starting to get exposed on a weekly basis.

Now we remember why the Cardinals were the favorites to land the No. 1 pick.

Next week: Maybe what this season needs is another classic Herbert-Mahomes matchup in Week 7. It would be even better if the Chargers beat Dallas on Monday night but I’m not so sure about that one. Early on Sunday, what are we getting excited about? Cleveland eating Gardner Minshew for lunch? The Raiders in Chicago after Garoppolo and Fields left Sunday’s games injured? No, it’s Lions-Ravens as the highlight of the 1 p.m. slot. We’ll see which Baltimore team shows up. Sunday night actually nailed it for a change with Dolphins-Eagles. Plenty of intrigue as Philadelphia’s sloppy play caught up to them in a loss, and we have never seen the Hurts-era Eagles beat a good team with a top quarterback like the Dolphins have going right now.

NFL Stat Oddity: Week 4

~ Scott ~ 17 Comments

Rarely do we get such instant context on games from the previous week, but Week 4 was dishing it out early:

  • Miami scoring 70 points on Denver made more sense after the way the Broncos were making Justin Fields look like an all-time great until he inevitably choked away another game in the fourth quarter.
  • Not only did the Bills hold Miami to 20 points, but they gave up 3 points last week to a Washington team that scored 35 in Denver and 31 in Philadelphia.

That Buffalo defense is special even without Von Miller, and the Bills are looking like top dog in the AFC again, which must mean it’s October. This is the time of year we see them go into Kansas City, win the game in impressive fashion, and reach the peak of their season before coming up short in the playoffs. That’s exactly what happened in 2021 and 2022, but this year’s Buffalo trip to Arrowhead will have to wait until Week 14 after their bye.

A lot can change between now and then, and Sunday was a good reminder of how injuries are impacting this season. Still, some teams put up spirited fights outside of one of the worst 4:00 p.m. slates in recent memory. But the only fourth-quarter lead change in Week 4 happened in Chicago, and only 6 games featured a comeback opportunity this week (Week 3 had only 7).

This season in NFL Stat Oddity:

Dolphins at Bills: Game of the Ye-Yeah It Turned into a Blowout

After last year’s trilogy of meetings were decided by 8 points, a 48-20 rout was definitely a surprise here. But Buffalo’s performance was both a triumph and statement that this is still one of the best teams in the league with a level of balance that Miami simply does not have yet.

The Bills scored on 8 of their first 9 possessions and stopped Miami from scoring on 8 of their last 9 possessions. This one started with the look of an epic shootout as the teams exchanged touchdowns on the first 5 drives. But Buffalo never trailed, nor did it leave any real opening for Miami to seize. Josh Allen was fantastic, completing 21-of-25 passes for 320 yards and 4 touchdowns.

Stefon Diggs caught 3 touchdowns, and there was no better display of how far Miami has to improve defensively than his 55-yard touchdown that had abysmal tackling attempts by Miami defenders. That started to blow the game open at 28-14, then Raheem Mostert lost a fumble and the Bills led 31-14 at halftime.

An interception thrown by Tua Tagovailoa in the third quarter may have been the beginning of the end as the Bills turned that short field into another touchdown and 41-20 lead. The Bills sacked Tua on a 4th-and-1 on the ensuing drive, though unfortunately that was the play where corner Tre’Davious White tore his Achilles. He tore his ACL on Thanksgiving 2021, so that is two of the worst injuries in the last three seasons.

But the Bills did a fantastic job on defense even without Von Miller available. Miami’s longest play in the first three quarters was 22 yards. So far, it has been the division rivals (Bills and Patriots) who have held this offense to 20-24 points while the AFC West hacks (Chargers and Broncos) were lit up for 36 and 70 points.

But Miami’s offense will be great this year. The defense is where the team seems to be coming up well short of championship aspirations. The Bills are playing great on both sides of the ball now, and in hindsight, it’s not that surprising they would dominate this game as they usually controlled play against Miami last year too.

Just have to stay in control of the turnover battle, which is probably good advice for any Buffalo game. But props to the Bills for delivering a great performance against a team coming off a historic one.

Chiefs at Jets: I Lack Any Taylor Swift Reference Knowledge

Sunday night proved to be an awkward 23-20 game after it looked like the Chiefs were ready to blow this one apart with a 17-0 first quarter. But the officials were not going to allow this to turn into Mike Tirico and Cris Collinsworth trying to make Taylor Swift jokes for 2 hours, so they botched a face mask penalty in the end zone for a safety, then made up a horse collar tackle while ignoring a New York face mask on another drive that ended with points for the Jets.

Patrick Mahomes was also charitable with two of the ugliest interceptions of his career, and the Jets only trailed 20-12 at the half. They tied it one drive into the third quarter, and it was a stretch where Zach Wilson actually looked like a legitimate starting quarterback.

In fact, some would say Wilson outplayed Mahomes, a thought more taboo than the pornography Wilson almost certainly favors. Things are very close in QBR with Mahomes (66.3) barely edging out Wilson (65.9) in Week 4.

But Wilson cost himself there when he fumbled in the fourth quarter at midfield after the Chiefs took the lead on a field goal. The Jets were driving and looking good, but Wilson got frazzled on a solid snap and lost the ball. The Chiefs pounced on it at the New York 47 with 7:24 left, and then they put together a fairly impressive drive that managed to drain the rest of the clock.

Despite the picks, Mahomes’ QBR was as high as it was because he was the most impactful rushing quarterback of the week. Just as he did in the title games last postseason, Mahomes used his legs to put the opponent away. On a 3rd-and-23, Mahomes scrambled for a 25-yard gain.

Later on another 3rd-and-20 after penalties, Mahomes looked to have thrown his third interception, but it was wiped out by a defensive holding penalty on Sauce Gardner. Last year, Sauce was getting away with a lot of contact as if he was a 5-year veteran in his prime. I never understood why that was happening, but they seemed to unfairly go after him here on a play with marginal contact. He did get a little grab on Valdes-Scantling, but it didn’t seem to affect the play much. This was a more egregious call than the 3rd down in the Super Bowl that allowed the Chiefs to run the clock down for the game-winning field goal.

The refs giveth and the refs taketh away. It was just one of those nights for the officiating. The Chiefs still had work to do and they were converting more third downs. On a 3rd-and-8, Mahomes used his legs one more time by running for 9 yards. He could have easily scored a touchdown to hit the over and perhaps cover the spread, but the smart football play (the only thing that matters) was to go down and end the game. By scoring, you give New York hope with a chance to score, recover an onside kick, and score again. The Browns screwed up a game last year to the Jets when Nick Chubb scored a touchdown in a situation where he should have slid at the 1 like Mahomes did. It’s not worth it when you can end the game with knees and not risk injury to your defensive players.

Very smart play by Mahomes on what was really a bottom 5 kind of night for his career. But the support from the run was there with Isiah Pacheco rushing for 115 yards. The defense showed a lot more cracks this week, but it had a strong start and finish to the game.

But I think you have to take these results with some caution for the Chiefs. If Wilson and the Jets can push them like this, what can a Buffalo or healthier Baltimore team do in the playoffs to them? The lack of wide receiver production is going to be a problem when they run into the teams who can really score, which would also include the NFC contenders (Eagles, Cowboys, and 49ers).

Commanders at Eagles: A Different Kind of Philadelphia Win

Figures, I thought the Eagles were ready to start rolling after a good win in Tampa Bay last week while the Commanders were destroyed against Buffalo. But division games can be tricky, and it was only a year ago when the Commanders shocked the Eagles in Philly as a 10.5-point underdog.

Washington was trying to do it again with an early 10-point lead, and they were doing well at moving the ball on third down and getting the ball out of Sam Howell’s hands quicker this week.

But the ingredient Washington was missing from a remake of last year’s upset were the 4 turnovers by the Eagles, who had none on Sunday. In fact, it was one of Jalen Hurts’ best passing games as he had 319 yards and 2 touchdowns with both scores going to A.J. Brown, who was in rare form with 175 yards.

Brown scored a late touchdown to give the Eagles a 31-24 lead, though he was penalized for taunting after it. The Commanders were able to drive 64 yards for a touchdown, but they stopped shy of going for a 2-point conversion and the win with no time left. What ever happened to Riverboat Ron? It was always a big lie, but this would have been an ideal spot for the underdog to go for the win. Isn’t that the kind of moment you hire a coordinator like Eric Bieniemy for?

So, that was disappointing for Washington. The Commanders went three-and-out in overtime. The Eagles showed their mastery of the QB sneak with a 4th-down conversion at midfield, and they drove into range for Jake Elliott, who was good from 54 yards out to spare us another NFC East tie.

If you’re the Eagles, I think you are a little concerned at how well Washington moved the ball, and how your running game (27 carries for 104 yards) was relatively contained. But this kind of win is good for the Eagles, who don’t want to just be another front-runner who only wins the easy games. They came back from 10 down, they did it without a big running game and Hurts did it using his arm late in the game.

Broncos at Bears: The National Embarrassment Bowl

With the way the Broncos and Bears played last week to start 0-3, this game ending 31-28 did not come as a surprise. The fact that one team would blow a 21-point lead would also not surprise much.

But for Chicago to blow a lead at home like that after getting this kind of stat line out of Justin Fields? That was a bit shocking. This went from the darkest moment in Sean Payton’s history to a victory.

The Denver defense absolutely has problems. The Broncos only faced 6 possessions by the Raiders in Week 1, which concealed some flaws in the defense. More was exposed when Denver blew a 21-3 lead against Washington at home in Week 2. Then of course the Broncos allowed 726 yards and 70 points in Miami last week.

But to allow Justin Fields to go into halftime completing 16-of-17 passes for 231 yards, 3 touchdowns, and a perfect passer rating? Absolutely disgusting defense. It continued into the third quarter too when the Bears added another touchdown to make it 28-7. But Russell Wilson was not playing poorly, and he was able to lead a 75-yard touchdown drive. The Bears punted, and Denver was soon back in the end zone.

Then the stunner happened. On a first down at midfield, the Bears tried to pass and Fields coughed up the ball under pressure for a fumble that was returned for a game-tying touchdown with 6:55 left.

To his credit, Fields made a 20-yard scramble on a third down to extend a drive that reached the Denver 18 with 2:57 left. But instead of kicking a field goal, the Bears went for the first down and were stuffed. I’m not sold on that decision as the Broncos had enough clock stoppages to get the ball back.

Wilson immediately found rookie Marvin Mims for a 48-yard catch, and that was enough to set up Wil Lutz for a 51-yard game-winning field goal. But Fields had 1:46 to answer the field goal. This is the situation he found himself in numerous times last year and they failed at them. Despite his earlier success in this game, this time was no different. Fields was hit with a grounding penalty and then threw a game-ending pick 2 snaps later.

Fields is now 1-13 (.071) at fourth-quarter comeback opportunities in his career. The closet quarterbacks I know to that terrible record are Seneca Wallace (2-12) or Josh McCown (6-37).

The Broncos may still be terrible and in the running for the worst defense in the 21st century. But at least they are not worse than the Chicago Bears.

Bengals at Titans: Cooked?

Was I impressed by Cincinnati’s win on Monday night against the Rams? No, but I was even more worried about the Titans after their lifeless performance against Cleveland last week. I really thought the Bengals would grind out another close win in Tennessee like they did in the 2021 playoffs and 2022 regular season.

But boy did the second quarter put an end to that idea. The Bengals continued to be in their offensive funk as the unit never had a play longer than 17 yards on the day. Joe Burrow was susceptible to pressure on his bad calf, and the Titans were suddenly lighting it up on offense. The Titans quickly strung together touchdown drives of 78, 73, and 80 yards to take a 24-3 lead into halftime. Derrick Henry even threw another touchdown on a trick play to end the run.

The Bengals moved it 72 yards for a field goal on the opening drive, then had next to nothing for the rest of the game. Tee Higgins left with fractured ribs, which did not help.

This game was basically over at halftime. With the Bengals at 1-3, you wonder just how far away we are from declaring their season a wrap too. This team looks cooked.

Ravens at Browns: Fish in a Barrel

The Ravens came into this game as an underdog with an embarrassingly long injury report. However, it ended up being the Browns who were home underdogs after late word that quarterback Deshaun Watson was out to go along with Nick Chubb’s season-ending injury. The Browns had to rely on rookie Dorian Thompson-Robinson.

It went about as well as you’d expect it to for a 5th-round rookie in his first start against a veteran team like Baltimore and coach John Harbaugh. DTR was 19-of-36 for 121 yards, 3 interceptions, and 4 sacks. The Browns were 4-of-16 on third down and managed a single field goal on 12 drives.

The Baltimore defense caught a huge break with Watson and Chubb out. The offense had its hands full with a dominant Cleveland defense, but the one name not on that injury report was Lamar Jackson, who accounted for 4 total touchdowns and completed 15-of-19 passes for 186 yards. Mark Andrews was also active and had 80 yards with 2 touchdowns. Rookie Zay Flowers caught a 43-yard bomb on a 2nd-and-29 conversion.

The Ravens still had some weapons, and most importantly, they had their uniquely skilled quarterback to lead 4 touchdown drives in this 28-3 win.

Tougher tests still to come, but the Ravens look to be in the driver’s seat for the AFC North this season.

Patriots at Cowboys: Belichick’s Biggest Loss Ever

Bill Belichick was coaching his 498th game on Sunday, but this was the first time he ever lost by more than 31 points. The 38-3 loss is indeed the biggest loss of Belichick’s career, replacing the 31-0 season opener against the 2003 Bills.

Dallas was dominant in multiple phases following last week’s upset loss in Arizona. But this game also showed that Mac Jones is not it. Hell, this pick-six shows he is just not a franchise quarterback:

Jones was benched for Bailey Zappe after it was 31-3, but I’m not sure where Belichick can go from here. His roster is so underwhelming and top defenders like pass rusher Matt Judon and rookie corner Christian Gonzalez left the game injured.

Again, the Jets may end up being the only saving grace for the Patriots and why they won’t finish last in the AFC East this year. But if Sunday’s outcomes are any indication, the Jets may still end up finishing ahead of New England in 2023.

Cardinals at 49ers: McCaffrey’s Day

The 35-16 final is probably going to conceal that the Cardinals (+14.5) were again competitive with a team far above their talent level this year. San Francisco was so efficient with Brock Purdy completing 20-of-21 passes that it was hard to get possessions in this game.

The Cardinals went three-and-out on their opening drive, but of their other 6 possessions, they had multiple first downs on all of them and moved the ball well. They just did not finish enough drives in the end zone, and their only turnover on downs came with 7 seconds left in a 19-point game.

But the 49ers showed again how their elite talent can just take a game over. Christian McCaffrey scored 4 touchdowns and had 177 yards from scrimmage. Brandon Aiyuk returned after missing last week and caught 6 passes for 148 yards. On a day where George Kittle had a 9-yard catch and Deebo Samuel never even had a target, the 49ers showed they can run their offense through essentially two players.

Just the other day I looked at the best offensive performances in NFL history. Oddly enough, the 49ers just came very close to being high on that list. Maybe they should for what they did with so few possessions. The 49ers are the third team to have one incomplete pass in a game on more than 20 attempts.

But this game was close to perfection when you consider 2-of-8 drives for the 49ers were taking a knee to end each half. Of their 6 real drives, they had 5 touchdown drives (62, 75,75, 75, and 77 yards) and their only stop was in the third quarter when a sack of Purdy blew things up and the 49ers failed to convert 3rd-and-24.

So close to perfection.

Rams at Colts: The Legend of Puka Grows

It was odd to see this game as a pick ‘em on Saturday night. I felt pretty confident in picking the team with the Super Bowl-winning coach and quarterback over the rookies, and more than that, you had Aaron Donald going up against an interior line combo named “French Fries” at center and right guard.

It was all Rams at 23-0 halfway through the third quarter, but I have to give Anthony Richardson and the Colts credit for hanging in there and tying this game up. Richardson only completed 11-of-25 passes, but he made some timely throws and runs to lead his team back.

Unfortunately, the job wasn’t finished. The Colts went three-and-out with all incompletions by Richardson after they got the ball back in a 23-23 game with 1:32 left. The game ended up going to overtime, which is where the Rams won the coin toss, received, and never gave the ball back after Matthew Stafford found Puka Nacua for a game-deciding 22-yard touchdown, the rookie’s first score of his career.

Nacua has been an unbelievable story with the best 4-game start by a rookie receiver in NFL history. The Cooper Kupp injury has certainly helped open opportunities for him, but it is exciting to think about what this duo can achieve together when they get out there at the same time.

Good job by the Rams to get back to .500, but blowing such a big lead to an inexperienced team is part of the reason why expectations are still a bit low for McVay’s team. But I also found what the Colts did encouraging as last year they were the team that would have blown the 23-0 lead and lost the game.

Buccaneers at Saints: Baker’s Feeling Dangerous

The Buccaneers enter their bye in first place in the NFC South with a 3-1 record. Their 26-9 win in New Orleans snapped the Saints’ 11-game streak of not allowing more than 20 points, which had not been done since the 2013-14 Seahawks.

Getting this type of production from Baker Mayfield in a game where Mike Evans left with a hamstring injury is impressive. I always felt that Mayfield could outplay Tom Brady’s 2022 performance, but I never thought the defense would have his back, or that they’d find as much luck in close games.

But the Buccaneers controlled this game, and in all seriousness, Mayfield’s legs and willingness to scramble are a huge bonus for this offense that it did not have with a 45-year-old quarterback who was tired of being hit last season. Mayfield finished 25-of-32 for 246 yards, 3 touchdowns, and the 26 points were easily the most the Bucs have scored in a road game in the last two seasons. Mayfield’s 69.0 QBR now ranks No. 7 in the league, and he was one of only two quarterbacks above 90.0 in Week 4. Nice.

As for the Saints, maybe Derek Carr needed to rest that shoulder for a week, because 23-of-37 for 127 yards passing is nasty work. In fact, it’s historic as the 127 yards are the fewest anyone has ever had in a game with exactly 23 completions.

But the culprit for this low total was Carr completing 13-of-14 passes for 33 yards to running back Alvin Kamara, who made his season debut after serving a 3-game suspension. Carr’s first game with Kamara was downright historic but for all the wrong reasons:

  • Kamara had 13 catches for 33 yards with a long of 10 yards.
  • Before Kamara, no one ever had at least 13 catches for fewer than 71 yards in a game.
  • Before Kamara, the fewest yards for anyone with at least 10 catches was 34 yards by running back Jamel White in 2002 for the Browns against the vaunted 2002 Buccaneers.
  • Brian Westbrook once had 12 catches for 46 yards against the 2006 Titans, which was the only other time someone had fewer than 50 yards on at least 12 catches.

It looks like Kamara had a success rate of 6-of-13 on his catches, which is better than expected but still not great. It’s 4-of-13 if you go with the standard of needing 45% of yards on first down instead of 40%. Kamara had catches that lost 7 and 6 yards, which are the plays that dragged his numbers down the most.

The Saints have been struggling on offense all season, and facing a familiar division foe did not help here. But if Mayfield can keep this up, then Tampa Bay may still be the best team in the NFC South.

Vikings at Panthers: Not Even Regression Could End Carolina’s Streak

Carolina is now the only team that has not had a lead in the fourth quarter this season. I really thought the Panthers would end their 53-game streak of losing when trailing in the fourth quarter. The stage was set with the Vikings leading 21-13 and a whole quarter to go.

But while rookie Bryce Young had better passing stats (25-of-32 for 204 yards), he took 5 sacks and some big hits on the day that hurt the offense, which only chipped in two field goals. Carolina’s only touchdown was thanks to a 99-yard pick-six thrown by Kirk Cousins. But Cousins also threw two touchdowns to Justin Jefferson, who was held to 85 yards this week.

It was an odd game as Carolina held the ball for 38:29 but never found the end zone on offense. By my research, this is the most time of possession in a game that a team has ever had without scoring an offensive touchdown. The only other team in modern history to hold the ball for at least 35 minutes without a touchdown was the 2012 Colts (37:32) in a 24-9 wild card playoff loss to the Ravens in Baltimore.

I also have the Panthers as the only team in NFL history to hold the ball for more than 38 minutes and score fewer than 17 points. Just a weird game.

But props to the Minnesota defense for shutting the door twice in the fourth quarter, making those long drives by Carolina meaningless without any points. The Vikings sacked Young on 3rd-and-8 at the Minnesota 35 on the first attempt, which led to a punt. The final drive saw the Panthers with a 1st-and-goal at the 9, but Harrison Smith ended up sacking Young twice on the final 4 plays, including a game-decider on 4th-and-18. Smith finished with 3 sacks as the Vikings were again not afraid to blitz with Brian Flores calling the shots. Smith should probably win a Defensive Player of the Week award for this performance, which also saw him sack Young in the third quarter, which produced a go-ahead fumble return touchdown.

The pressure on Young led to Minnesota’s first win of the season. Cousins was once 0-29 to start his career in games where he had a passer rating under 85.0. He is 7-3 ever since and leave it up to the Panthers to allow the Vikings to get by in a close game again.

Falcons at Jaguars: Hide Desmond Ridder’s Passport

There was no way I was getting up early to watch this one. When I did wake up (still earlier than usual), it was already 10-0 Jacksonville before Desmond Ridder threw a pick-six to make it 17-0 in the second quarter.

I saw this unfold live on the Disney+ app, so I was watching the Toy Story version of this game. Since I did not have the real game to compare it to, I cannot say how great it was, but I thought the technology was very interesting and impressive that they could do this on the fly with a delay of only a minute or so from the live action. I’d hate to watch a more important game like Bills-Jaguars or Dolphins-Chiefs in this format, but for some turd like Falcons-Jaguars, it was a fun little experiment. I did notice some ball carriers glitched badly in their animation in the fourth quarter.

But nothing was worse than the Atlanta offense, which has 13 points over the last 8 quarters as we are getting more evidence that Ridder simply is not the guy for the job. He is still young and inexperienced, but the Falcons have some questions to answer like how backup tight end Jonnu Smith can have 6 catches for 95 yards in this game – numbers Kyle Pitts has put up in only 3-of-31 career games for Arthur Smith.

I can only imagine what it was like to be a Falcons fan and get up early to watch this mess:

Raiders at Chargers: It’s Never Easy with This Team

Can the Chargers ever just win a normal game without making it look so hard? Even on a day where they drew rookie quarterback Aidan O’Connell and Khalil Mack sacked him 6 times, the game still was hanging in the balance in the final minutes.

Part of it was an uncharacteristically poor passing game by Justin Herbert, who had his first game with multiple touchdown runs, but he took some shots from the Raiders and injured his hand. That did not help matters with the passing, but it was wild to see Herbert struggling so much on a day where the defense and running game showed up despite Austin Ekeler, Derwin James, and Joey Bosa all out with injuries in addition to Mike Williams, who tore his ACL last week.

But I’m seriously getting annoyed with the volatility in the results we are seeing from offensive coordinator Kellen Moore.

  • Week 3 at Vikings: Herbert had a career-high 40 completions and 405 passing yards
  • Week 4 vs. Raiders: Herbert had a career-low 13 completions and 167 passing yards

Talk about regression to the mean. Herbert was barely over 100 yards before he hit a 51-yard dagger to Josh Palmer with 1:51 on a 3rd-and-10 to finally ice the 24-17 win.

It shouldn’t have been this hard but the Chargers struggled to put the Raiders away. Vegas scored a touchdown to make it 24-17 with 3:59 left. Herbert was still running and giving it all despite the hand taped up, and he nearly pulled off a great 3rd-down scramble. That set up 4th-and-1 at the Los Angeles 34 with 3:34 left. When I’m facing a rookie quarterback that’s taken so many sacks like O’Connell did, I’m punting there. Brandon Staley decided to go for it, and the Chargers botched the quarterback sneak again with Herbert getting stopped short.

Why give an unproven quarterback such a short field as an advantage? Davante Adams made a spectacular catch on 4th-and-10 to put the ball at the 3-yard line. Chargering was about to do it again. But on the very next snap, O’Connell reminded us he was a rookie and threw a bad pick to Asante Samuel Jr., who inexplicably went down at his own 11 with 2:33 left instead of returning that pick for a touchdown like his father surely would have. Some suggest Staley was signaling for Samuel to go down, but that is unclear on the video.

That mistake could have come back to bite the Chargers, but Herbert’s perfect pass to Palmer was the final dagger in this one. I still find it very hard to trust the Chargers with this coach and game management, and we know Mack just had his biggest game as he only shows up to stick it to the Raiders these days. But the Chargers are back to .500 even if that only puts them at 11th in the conference right now.

Steelers at Texans: AFC Is Passing Pittsburgh By

You probably have to go back to the 2000 season, the days of Kordell Stewart, to find the last time I watched so few live snaps in a Steelers game. That was the last year where I did not spend my entire Sundays watching football as I was a wrestling fan back then.

I just couldn’t be bothered to care about this game while more interesting ones were on the RedZone channel. Pittsburgh’s offense continued to be terrible and unwatchable, and the defense was also picked apart by a Kyle Shanahan disciple (Bob Slowik) who likely loved what he saw in the Week 1 tape between the 49ers and Steelers.

Right now, the Steelers look like a team that can only scrape by teams with quarterbacks who will make enough dumb mistakes against them like Deshaun Watson (Browns) and Jimmy Garoppolo (Raiders) did. Otherwise, they’re getting their ass kicked by 23-24 points this year.

But there’s nothing more defining for the Matt Canada era than what happened late in the third quarter. Pittsburgh’s offense had done nothing all day, but Najee Harris made a few impressive efforts on runs and catches to give the team a chance. Instead of going to Harris on a 4th-and-1, the Steelers call a shotgun pass and it ended with Kenny Pickett getting sacked on the play that injured his knee. The severity is unknown, but it is possible he avoided a season-ending torn ACL.

But it’s still an awful outcome for this team as they need to get as much of the evaluation on Pickett as they can this year before deciding what to do in 2024 at quarterback.

Meanwhile, C.J. Stroud looks like the real deal for Houston after another 306 yards, 2 touchdowns, and no picks. He also took 0 sacks despite playing behind a makeshift line. Add Houston to the list of 12 or 13 AFC teams that have a better quarterback situation than Pittsburgh right now. I also wasn’t familiar with Nico Collins’ game before the season, but he looks like a legitimate No. 1 wide receiver, which have killed Pittsburgh’s defense every week. Collins had 168 yards and 2 touchdowns in this one.

The Texans are right in the thick of this AFC South race. The Steelers look like a team that will only continue to slip in the conference until major changes are made. Mike Tomlin said changes are coming, but at some point the criticism is going to have to fall on him for not having this team prepared on either side of the ball.

The Steelers rarely would lose games in this fashion. But the 30-6 loss in Houston is the 6th time in the last 29 games where the Steelers lost by more than 21 points. They had 6 such losses in all of 1998-2020 combined (23 seasons).

No wonder my viewing habits on Sundays are changing. The standard is not the standard anymore.

Next week: We go from one Game of the Year to another in the NFC with the 49ers hosting Dallas on SNF. The Jaguars are also staying in London to play the Bills in what should be a better game than the Atlanta one. I’m already not looking forward to the Steelers playing Baltimore in what could be another game between the two where a backup quarterback is starting. Not like Mitch Trubisky is a downgrade from Kenny Pickett, of course. Finally, Arizona has a chance to do the once unthinkable and put the Bengals in a much better position for the No. 1 pick in the draft than anyone could have imagined.

NFL Week 4 Predictions: Early Game of the Year Edition

~ Scott ~ Leave a comment

As it turns out, sleeping on the couch for 5 hours before going up to bed and sleeping for another 5 hours does not help you be that productive the next day. I’ve been running behind all day and just have a quick moment to get these picks out.

First, I can’t wait to see how Dolphins-Bills plays out as the early Game of the Year in the AFC. The 3 games last year were decided by 8 total points, and it could have been 3-0 one way or the other very easily instead of 2-1 Buffalo. While I don’t think Miami touches the 1950 Rams’ record of scoring 70 and 65 in back-to-back weeks, I think they score enough to win this first matchup in Buffalo, which can get revenge later in the season when Von Miller is back. But I have to say the Buffalo defense has been impressive so far. The Miami offense has just been better and has even more speed at running back this year with Devon Achane getting unleashed last week. Throw in Jaylen Waddle coming back and I’ll take the offensive team in a Week 4 game.

This week’s articles:

I was 5-1 on computer picks and 7-3 on props last week, so hopefully the picks won’t be shit this week.

NFL Week 4 Predictions

Figures, the first time I pick Green Bay to win a game this year and they played their worst game.

No strong feelings about the London game, which I’ll probably end up watching more of than expected since I got up so early today. Do I like a Calvin Ridley revenge game? Sure, the over at least should hit.

I really wanted to pick the Steelers to lose since it’s the first time they’ve been favored this year and they would be a team that would fall flat in a game like this. But I just think T.J. Watt and Alex Highsmith against that OL can make C.J. Stroud, who is due for his first NFL interception, look like a rookie. I do like Nico Collins to put up numbers though.

I need a sportsbook to offer a 4th quarter comeback game prop, because it’s hard to bet that as spread and moneyline for the quarter don’t always get the job done. But I think it’d be hilarious if Carolina ended its 53-game streak of losing when trailing in the 4th quarter against Minnesota. Less likely to happen with Bryce Young instead of Andy Dalton, but I’m taking a chance and fading the Vikings with a 4.5-point spread.

Broncos vs. Bears is a real shit bowl, but I still think Russell Wilson and Sean Payton avoid going 0-4 and losing to a team that bad. Incredibly, the four 0-4 teams are all playing each other this weekend.

I think the Chiefs win a boring 20-9 game on SNF against the Jets.

I initially picked the Giants to win on MNF, but I think I’d stick with the over being the best pick there. The offense should find better success, but Pete Carroll usually has his team ready to play on MNF. I’m also beyond tired of seeing the Giants in these games.

I won’t rush through tomorrow night’s recap like I did this preview. Should be a fun day.

NFL Week 2 Predictions: Playoff Revenge Edition

~ Scott ~ Leave a comment

The NFL’s Week 2 schedule already features some heavyweight matchups, but are these teams playing well enough for these games to be as good as possible? We are already seeing major injury concerns for several teams, which is unfortunate at such an early point in the year.

But one of my favorite stats this week is that the Chiefs, Bills, and Bengals are all 0-1 after entering the season as the Super Bowl favorites in their conference. That has not happened since the NFC did it in 1982, and none of the Cowboys, 49ers, or Rams made the Super Bowl (won by Washington). Of course, it ended up being a 9-game strike season after the players went on strike following Week 2, so maybe that’s not the best comparison to make this year. All I know is the Chiefs (drops) and Bills (turnovers) largely had self-inflicted losses against teams that had serious playoff aspirations. The Bengals did their annual disappearing act against the Browns, but 24-3 and Joe Burrow passing for 82 yards feels like something potentially different this time. We’ll see if the Ravens, my Super Bowl pick, can capitalize this week.

Bengals-Ravens is just one of the big matchups this week. The Jaguars will also try to get playoff revenge on the Chiefs after adding Calvin Ridley to hopefully have the firepower necessary to deal with that team, which should be getting Travis Kelce and Chris Jones back. The Lions can also get some revenge on the Seahawks for last year’s 48-45 loss that provided the tie-breaker for Seattle to get the No. 7 seed.

This week’s articles:

Week 1 Story: Why were offenses so bad in Week 1? I look at everything from the injuries, rain, high number of division games, and the main culprit being the historic lack of experienced quarterbacks starting for teams they have multiple years of experience with.

Scott’s Seven NFL Picks: Week 2 at 365Scores – I’m pissed I went 0-7 on this last week when so many of my other articles were strong (6-1 on prime-time picks, 5-1 on computer picks, 2-1 on best bets, and 6-4 on player props)

NFL Week 2 Predictions

I’m taking the push for TNF because the article I wrote Wednesday night had a pick of Eagles -6, and I should have knew something fishy was going on when it was changing to -5.5 on FanDuel just before kickoff. Having said that, the Eagles covered Week 1 in NE when they really didn’t play well enough to deserve it, and they wouldn’t have deserved it in this game either. The Vikings lost 4 fumbles, including one of those stupid through the end zone plays, and the Eagles again looked rough in the passing game outside of two bombs to DeVonta Smith. But they are 2-0. The secondary is just lacking with lost players and injuries right now.

Home favorites are only 2-8-1 ATS this year. Rough start.

I found myself liking the regression there with these first four picks, but really I just liked Atlanta all week with Green Bay’s hamstring injuries, the Lions to light up Seattle, the Bills to get right against the Raiders, and I am fading Chicago after last week’s garbage performance.

Then by the time I got to the Tennessee game I figured I need to throw an upset in there as I just feel like that is a tricky game for the Chargers, who are unlikely to have Austin Ekeler. They probably wouldn’t run much on the Titans anyway because of that defensive scheme, but really my favorite picks for that game are the under 45.5 and the over in Herbert’s pass attempts (38.5).

Last year the Colts couldn’t beat the Texans, but I’m just basing things off what I saw in Week 1 and I feel like Richardson can move his offense better than Stroud and use his legs for a win. I really like Richardson anytime TD scorer again this week.

Big AFC games: I’m going with the Ravens and Chiefs in close ones. Maybe 27-24 for Kansas City and 23-20 for Baltimore. I just don’t think Joe Burrow is healthy enough on that calf and he was not effective against the Ravens last year. It sucks that Baltimore already has a lot of injuries, but it sounds like Mark Andrews is playing. Most importantly, Lamar is there, and it’s time this team gets to have him in a big game. As for the Jaguars, I like what Ridley adds to the offense, but I’ m still going to trust the Chiefs with their other 2 elite players back.

Good win for the Rams last week but McVay has been owned by Shanahan outside of one quarter since 2019. I really like Brock Purdy to throw over 1.5 TDs again, something he’s done in 8-of-9 games when he throws 20+ passes. Remember, the Rams were a defense Garoppolo usually had good numbers against. Now the Rams have Aaron Donald and a lot of random starters. I like Purdy to keep rolling here and Stafford to not get the same protection he had in Seattle.

NYG-ARI is a toilet bowl I wouldn’t put much money on. Brian Daboll is 7-0 ATS after a loss, but after seeing how Arizona sacked Sam Howell 6 times and what the Giants did, I’m at least hedging my bets and having the Giants escaping with a 1-to-4 point win in that one. They could lose it too. You don’t really think Arizona is going 0-17 yet do you? They almost clipped Washington last week.

NYJ-DAL is the other New York trap game after what happened last week. Obviously, Dallas should roll to an easy win over Zach Wilson, but something about trusting the NY defense here makes me think it’ll at least be close as long as Wilson does not gift them turnovers. It’s not like Dallas was on fire offensively in Week 1. I also remember Sam Darnold beating Dallas in another year with big playoff expectations. If anyone is capable of screwing this up, it’s Dallas.

Coin flips for DEN & MIA games but I like Jerry Jeudy coming back and the NE OL is really injured. Mostly just curious to see if Belichick holds Tyreek under 100 again on SNF.

Monday double-header: I think the Saints get their first game-winning drive from Derek Carr and the Panthers lose a 52nd straight game when trailing in the 4th quarter. As for the Pittsburgh game, my best bet is Steelers over 9.5 1H points. They can’t be worse than last week, right? I’m picking them for the upset too just out of history. The Steelers have won 20 straight home games on MNF (9-0 under Tomlin). They usually deliver as a home underdog, last week aside, but I also think the 49ers are way better than Cleveland. Maybe T.J. Watt can force Watson into strip-sacks that set up short fields for the offense. But if the Steelers implode in this one then I’m quickly fading them going forward.

I did say watch them go from being the hottest offense in August to one of the worst in September when real games are played.

But I’ll be back Monday morning with the recap of Sunday’s action.