Tag: Lions

NFL Stat Oddity: Week 13

~ Scott ~ 9 Comments

Wait, was that actually more of a normal week in the NFL? What does a return to “normalcy” in the NFL in 2021 even look like? It still means a week where the Lions win a game against the Vikings on the final play, the No. 1 seed Ravens lose to their bitter rival, the Dolphins stepped over Mike Glennon’s neck to continue one of the most irrelevant five-game winning streaks you’ll ever see, and the Chiefs beat Denver for the 12th time in a row.

But it was also easy wins for Tampa Bay, Arizona, and the Rams as Rob Gronkowski, DeAndre Hopkins, and Cooper Kupp all got reacquainted with the end zone, territory unbeknownst to the Falcons, Bears, and Jaguars. Jonathan Taylor vacations there every week and he scored two more times to help the Colts beat the Texans 31-0, a rout worse than the first one this season. Thanks for shitting up the product, Deshaun. But at least it was nice to see Kyler Murray and Hopkins return to action for an Arizona team that continues to win in impressive fashion, now 10-2.

Overall, we had just five close games in the fourth quarter this week. Monday night between the Bills and Patriots could be the game of the week, but I am going to start with (probably) the last time Ben Roethlisberger faces the Baltimore defense at Heinz Field. I also have a personal story to share in Broncos-Chiefs.

This season in Stat Oddity:

Ravens at Steelers: Tomlin 16, Harbaugh 14

The Ravens-Steelers rivalry may be an acquired taste, but there are no two teams I’d rather watch play a low-scoring game than these two. The 30th meeting between the Ravens and Steelers since 2008 was another memorable finish with Mike Tomlin taking a 16-14 edge against John Harbaugh with a coaching decision at the end very much being the headline.

But it is also the 21st meeting out of 30 where both coaches had their desired starting quarterback available. Tomlin is now 14-7 in those matchups compared to 2-7 with the quarterback disadvantage.

Ben Roethlisberger, 7-1 against the Ravens since Christmas 2016, may have played his final home game against his main division rival. He delivered one of his best performances of the last three years, completing 21-of-31 passes for 236 yards and two touchdowns. Diontae Johnson even dropped a 35-yard touchdown before halftime, and Ray-Ray McCloud had a 32-yard completion taken away after a suspect review. The numbers could have been even nicer for Roethlisberger, who led the Steelers to three straight scores in the fourth quarter. He now has 11 game-winning drives against the Ravens in his career.

Baltimore hogged the ball early but did not finish enough drives for points. The Pittsburgh defense fluctuated between incredible and terrible as only this 2021 unit can. The pressure was at times unbelievable, and Lamar Jackson did not handle it well, taking seven sacks and throwing a pick in the end zone on the opening drive. But there were plenty of other times where the Steelers displayed shoddy tackling and left receivers wide open.

On Pittsburgh’s game-winning drive, the Steelers had a 2nd-and-2 at the Baltimore 13 at the two-minute warning with the Ravens still having all their timeouts. I’m positive Harbaugh had the Ravens do something smart that I’ve seen them exploit before. The Ravens were blatantly offsides, giving the Steelers a first down without running clock. Had the Steelers taken a few plays to get the first down, they may have been able to run out the clock and kick a field goal on the last snap. This made it easier for the Ravens to use their timeouts and really encouraged the Steelers to convert a third down for a touchdown. They did with Roethlisberger’s pass to Johnson, who stepped up big after his drop earlier. The critical two-point conversion to Pat Freiermuth was also completed with 1:48 left.

Pittsburgh kicker Chris Boswell looked like he might be the scapegoat for this one after badly missing a game-tying extra point in the fourth quarter and bouncing his late kick-off out of bounds to put the Ravens at the 40 with a chance to tie. Again, the defense fluctuated between great and terrible as the Ravens marched for a touchdown with 12 seconds left. Instead of playing for overtime, Harbaugh had his team go for the win.

I liked the decision. Harbaugh mentioned the injuries at corner and was worried the Steelers would continue to march on their defense with ease. Beyond that, I just think the Ravens had a good shot of converting and winning the game on that one play. However, I would have preferred something that used Lamar’s mobility like a QB draw or run-pass option. T.J. Watt, who had a monster game with 3.5 sacks, was able to get just enough pressure on Jackson to make his two-point pass inaccurate for Mark Andrews, who was open to win the game.

The Steelers dodged a bullet, but this season has seen both teams win a lot of close games like this one. Pittsburgh keeps its playoff hopes alive and this could lead to a very interesting rematch in Baltimore in Week 18.

I said I enjoy the low-scoring games between those two. I’m not sure I will feel that way when Roethlisberger moves on and the Steelers are trying to win with the likes of Mason Rudolph and the latest Kordell Maddo’Donnell. But Sunday felt important for this team. You wish they showed some of this intensity in Cincinnati last week, but nothing seems to get this team going quite like a Baltimore game.

If this is the last big one for this era, then at least it ended the way it deserves to.

Broncos at Chiefs: I Should Name My Son Javonte

Do I have to talk about Kansas City’s ho-hum 22-9 win we all watched together on Sunday night, or do I jump straight to my biggest gambling win of the season?

Let’s get the game over with. The defensive turnaround for the Chiefs continues. Barring what the Patriots do on Monday night, this could be the top scoring defense in points per game since Week 6 after being the worst in the first five weeks. Remarkable stuff.

Were the Broncos lighting the league up this year? Of course not, but the nine points are only the second time Denver was held under 13 this year. Meanwhile, the Broncos held Patrick Mahomes’ offense to 16 points, Mahomes under 200 yards passing, Travis Kelce and Tyreek Hill under 50 yards combined, and the Broncos still couldn’t cover a 9.5-point spread. I felt that dropped passes, including another tipped pick, contributed largely to Kansas City’s offense being ineffective in this one. But as I have pointed out before, Denver defends Mahomes better than most. This game will be another data point in favor of that for sure.

Teddy Bridgewater played a terrible game and had his second multi-interception game of the season, including a pick-six to Dan Sorensen in the fourth quarter to put the exclamation point on this one.

Well, one exclamation point. That pick-six helped give the Broncos the ball back in a 22-3 game. Perhaps that took away some of the intensity from the defense, knowing the win was all but in the bag at this point. The Broncos finally marched down the field, and instead of taking 11 minutes to come away with zero points like they did in the second quarter, Bridgewater found rookie back Javonte Williams in the flat on fourth-and-7 for a 13-yard touchdown with 5:12 left.

A meaningless touchdown in the grand scheme of things? Sure, but an extremely important one for me. It was the final leg to five parlays for me, including my biggest win of the season at +15381

The reason there was no Stat Oddity in Week 12 is because I was at home nervously waiting to hear what was going on with my mom in the emergency room. Her blood pressure was out of control, and I wasn’t allowed in the ambulance with her because of the protocol during COVID, the same virus that had just taken my only aunt from me on Thanksgiving Day. The stress of that is what caused my mom’s blood pressure to spike. She does not have COVID.

Trying to watch the Ravens and Browns finish that ugly game was a tough 90 minutes before I started to get updates that my mom was alright. She is doing better this week and will be fine. I got my booster on Wednesday, and it was no big deal. Just a sore shoulder for about 72 hours.

From dark thoughts a week ago to screams of joy at Javonte’s touchdown, these last few weeks really encapsulate the extreme ups and downs that life can bring. Sunday was that kind of day all around, from the Steelers’ nail-biting win over Baltimore to the agony and glory of watching Williams pull off a golden score for me.

It’s the type of successful betting day I feel I should have had three or four times during this crazy season. But I’m happy with this one. I thought for sure I blew it on the final leg again, and I would have blown it either way as I probably would have picked Hill or Kelce or CEH to score for the Chiefs had I not gone for Javonte. Alas, I picked the right guy who scored Denver’s only touchdown of the night in what was a golden opportunity with Melvin Gordon out. Williams shined with 178 yards from scrimmage, but that touchdown will always stick with me as a happy memory during what have been some very unhappy times during this pandemic.

But tonight, I can choose happiness.

Chargers at Bengals: What in Tarnation…

This conference is f’n weird this year. The Bengals annihilated the Steelers a week ago. The Chargers had an ugly loss in Denver. I thought this would be the closest finish in the 1 p.m. slate. So, of course the Chargers jumped out to a 24-0 lead.

However, while the Bengals did not try 8+8+8, they were a two-point conversion away from tying this one late in the third quarter as the Chargers were looking to blow another huge lead in a game with so many ugly, fluky turnovers from both sides. Austin Ekeler especially was trying to create his own Chargers BINGO square with two lost fumbles.

But Joe Mixon outdid him. The Bengals failed on their game-tying two, but they got the ball back down 24-22 going into the fourth quarter. They were in field-goal range too when Mixon just lost the ball, and it was returned 61 yards for a crushing touchdown. The Chargers led 31-22, sacked an ailing Joe Burrow (pinky), and added a knockout score in a game that eventually ended 41-22.

So, it was a blowout, then a huge comeback attempt that made it the tightest game going around 3 p.m., then a blowout again. Just a weird game where both quarterbacks were absolutely under siege at times by the defenses (10 sacks between them). But the Chargers made fewer mistakes and got the big win to move to 7-5.

49ers at Seahawks: Don’t Call it a Comeback

This was my most confident upset pick of the week. As I said on Saturday, Russell Wilson/Pete Carroll/D.K. Metcalf were due a good showing at home after such a poor run of things lately, including that Monday night loss to Washington. Wilson owns the 49ers in his career (17-4 now). Kyle Shanahan is an overrated coach. George Kittle was amazing in this game (181 yards and two touchdowns), but I think Deebo Samuel is a big security blanket for Jimmy Garoppolo, and he’s been a huge part of the running game recently. If Samuel wasn’t out injured for this game, I don’t think I would have been confident enough to pick Seattle. Certainly not enough to put $50 on them in my big parlay that hit above.

Still, it wasn’t the prettiest game. The Seahawks needed a 73-yard touchdown run on a fake punt to get things going. Wilson was an uncharacteristic 30-of-37 for 231 yards, the fewest passing yards he’s ever had in a game with at least 25 completions. He also lost 50 yards on four sacks. Tight end Gerald Everett nearly choked the game away with two lost fumbles, including one at the 2-yard line when the Seahawks could have gone up two scores in the final four minutes.

I always question Shanahan’s late-and-close decision making. The 49ers looked like they wanted to score at the last possible second and either go to overtime or win on a two-point conversion. That’s nice but things rarely work out that way. The Elijah Mitchell runs were not effective on the day, and the 49ers used two downs on them inside the Seattle 7. After one incompletion, the 49ers were already facing fourth-and-ballgame. Garoppolo’s pass was tipped at the line and that was enough for the Seahawks to hold on for the 30-23 win.

I don’t think Seattle is “back” by any means, but at least we know this team can still sweep the 49ers.

Vikings at Lions: 1-15-1 Still Possible

Bust out the Faygo for the 2008 Lions and 2017 Browns. These Lions will not be going 0-16-1. I warned in Saturday’s preview that the Vikings already came dangerously close to losing to this team this year. They had to set up a 54-yard field goal in 37 seconds to win that one.

Dalvin Cook missed both Detroit games for Minnesota, but I don’t think you can fault the way Alexander Mattison played in his place for why the Vikings struggled. Mattison had 124 yards and a touchdown in this one. Adam Thielen left injured, but Kirk Cousins still threw for 340 yards and Justin Jefferson had 182 yards. The offense came back to deliver another late lead at 27-23, but the defense was a huge letdown against Jared Goff and the league’s worst receiving corps. Goff threw for 296 yards and three touchdowns in this one, which Detroit led most of the way.

I want to quickly highlight something stupid Jay Feely said late in the game. I know that’s his brand, but the strategy is worth talking about. He criticized Dan Campbell’s aggressive move to go for a 4th-and-1 at his own 28 with a 23-21 lead and 4:08 left. It was incredibly aggressive as the Vikings had four clock stoppages, would have been in go-ahead field goal range with a stop, and the Lions were down to one timeout. In fact, I probably would have punted there.

But Feely’s reasoning just made me like the decision more. Feely tried to say that the Lions should punt because like on Thanksgiving against Chicago, the Bears ran out the final eight minutes and Detroit never got the ball back. He added that Cleveland ran out the clock on Detroit in Week 11 too. It could happen again.

Well guess what? IT’S MORE LIKELY TO HAPPEN HERE IF YOU GIVE THEM FOUR MINUTES TO SET UP A FIELD GOAL. While converting and running out the clock is the ideal outcome, by Goff getting strip-sacked and putting the Vikings in the red zone, he actually helped facilitate a quicker go-ahead score and saved his offense time for their game-winning drive. The Vikings had to score on a third down with 1:50 left, saving Goff almost two minutes to answer the 27-23 deficit.

He needed every second of it on the 14-play, 75-yard drive. The Vikings used their timeouts late in the red zone, and Mike Zimmer’s defense was shameful in allowing such a large cushion on the last play of the game when you know they have to go for the end zone. How are you going to give someone like Aroma St. Brown a cushion to score the game-winning touchdown with no time left? His name is actually Amon-Ra, but he must have had a strong aroma if you weren’t attaching someone to his hip as the only receiver to run towards the left side of the end zone. Just a ridiculous ending.

But somehow perfectly fitting for the Minnesota franchise. A lead of at least six points in every game this season and the Vikings are 5-7. I knew the Lions would win one this year. Campbell’s had them too close too many times not to.

Hurry-Up Finish

Some quick thoughts as I race to complete more tasks before getting to sleep.

Tampa Bay at Atlanta: Tom Brady for MVP (Mass Volume Player)

Leave it up to Tom Brady to throw 51 passes in a game his team never trailed, where his defense only allowed 10 points on nine drives, and it only looked semi-close because he threw an embarrassing pick-six before halftime to a defensive lineman.

Has the standard at the position fallen off so much this year that we have to seriously consider this as the front-runner for MVP? Oh, and he’ll be getting the Bills on Sunday, fresh off their huge clash with the Patriots in shitty weather and after losing Tre’Davious White to a torn ACL. You see how the stars are aligning, right? While Antonio Brown’s buffoonery leading to a suspension may have been a problem in this past, this offense is simply too loaded when Rob Gronkowski is playing this well to go along with Mike Evans, Chris Godwin, Leonard Fournette, and that offensive line. Brown will be back for the playoffs too…

Washington at Raiders: No Flag, No Win

Tell me you weren’t expecting a flag when Derek Carr threw a bomb, down 17-15, with 31 seconds left to start his final drive. I cannot knock him for the smart, aggressive play to try to immediately get into range for a game-winning field goal. But something tells me he specifically threw that one with the intent to get a flag instead of a completion. The refs did not oblige, and the Raiders lost another low-scoring game to a Washington team that’s suddenly won four in a row.

Washington (6-6) has all five of its games left against the NFC East in a real scheduling quirk. The Chiefs can deliver a potential knockout blow to these Raiders (6-6) in Week 14 – that’s if they didn’t already do it in Week 10. Since their bye week, the Raiders are 1-4 and have been held under 17 points in each loss. Only the flag fest on Turkey Day in Dallas was a high-scoring win.

Eagles at Jets: Minshew Mania Returns

Will Zach Wilson ever have a game in the NFL as good as Gardner Minshew’s first surprise start for the Eagles on Sunday? It’s a legitimate question. Minshew was 20-of-25 for 242 yards and two touchdowns. This was tight end Dallas Goedert’s 57th NFL game and it was the first time he had two touchdowns to go along with a career-high 105 receiving yards. Not bad.

This was actually a shootout at first with the Jets scoring three touchdowns on their first three drives. But they soon remembered they were the Jets and scored nothing on their last five drives. The Eagles scored three touchdowns, four field goals, then punted on their eighth and final possession.

In a game between the Jets and Eagles with Wilson and Minshew getting the starts, a 33-18 finish with only one ugly Wilson interception is about the best experience you could have asked for.

Next week: Depending on how the Bills look against the Patriots on Monday night, this could be two weeks in a row where MNF draws the best game. Next week has Arizona-Rams, an important one in the NFC. While Bills-Buccaneers looked like the great one on paper from April through recently, I’m not sure these teams are delivering on expectations so far. But that won’t stop Tony Romo from salivating over it as a Super Bowl preview.  

NFL Stat Oddity: Week 11

~ Scott ~ 10 Comments

What did I say Saturday about Jonathan Taylor scoring a touchdown being the safest bet in the NFL this season? I never imagined him scoring five in Buffalo, the first time anyone has scored five touchdowns on a defense that ranked No. 1 that week, but he delivered in a big way to shake up the AFC playoff picture again. The Bills have fallen to the No. 7 seed while the No. 3 Patriots are leading the AFC East behind a dominant defense, great special teams, and a young quarterback propped up by the media for his win-loss record.

While I am going to lay into Josh Allen below, I swear to f’n Christ the last reboot I want to see is the Patriots dynasty. Buffalo better figure this out ASAP.

But Indy’s Taylor not only should be the front-runner for Offensive Player of the Year, but I think we need to punish the inconsistent QB play this season and put him in the MVP conversation. It’s not like anyone has stepped up to earn it with consistently high-level play.

Did the close games return in Week 11? Not exactly. We had seven games with a comeback opportunity and a couple fake close games in the late afternoon, but at least there were three games with multiple fourth-quarter lead changes this week. Aaron Rodgers, Andy Dalton (!), and Ben Roethlisberger all registered a lost comeback after their go-ahead efforts were wasted on Sunday. But we really haven’t seen too many finishes like that this season regardless of the NFL trying to push “games decided on the final play” graphics on us.

This season in Stat Oddity:

Steelers at Chargers: No BINGO This Time

I want to re-share one of my favorite bits of research from the offseason on the Justin Herbert-era Chargers:

We were so close to getting the first blown 17-point lead in the fourth quarter of the Brandon Staley era, but once again, this team has been different this year. Despite Pittsburgh scoring 27 points in the fourth quarter and taking a 37-34 lead, Herbert calmly responded with a game-winning drive, exploiting a blown coverage for a 53-yard touchdown pass to Mike Williams with 2:09 left. The defense responded immediately with back-to-back sacks of Ben Roethlisberger to set up a 4th-and-32 incompletion to clinch the 41-37 win.

The Chargers are tied with the Ravens for the most game-winning drives (five) this season, and no defense has more holds (five) of a one-score lead than Los Angeles. In fact, the only game the Chargers lost with a fourth-quarter lead this year was against the Patriots, and that was Herbert throwing a pick-six to turn a 17-16 lead into a 24-17 deficit.

This team is 6-4 and refreshingly different. Now on Sunday night, they got a break with Pittsburgh missing key defensive starters in T.J. Watt, Joe Haden, and Minkah Fitzpatrick. But Pittsburgh still had Cameron Heyward, who wasn’t going to allow the Chargers to score on every drive as they did through three quarters. With the help of a blocked punt and a tipped ball for an interception, the Steelers scored on some short fields to make this a tied game. Then they got a fourth-and-1 stop in Los Angeles territory to take over with 3:43 left.

That’s where I think Pittsburgh really blew the golden opportunity. That could have been a moment to run out the clock and win on a field goal, but the Steelers couldn’t even get a first down. Maybe the lack of push all night on the ground and the absence of Najee Harris (concussion protocol) at the time limited their options, but that drive was poorly run. That led to the Chargers going 75 yards in just three plays after Herbert became the first quarterback to ever pass for over 380 yards and rush for over 90 yards in the same game. The Steelers had 18 carries for 55 yards against the worst run defense in the league.

I thought Roethlisberger looked very good after missing time and practice with COVID. He made some of his best throws in the last few seasons in this game. That last drive falling apart so quickly was a disappointing finish to a wild game. The Steelers (5-4-1) should have better defensive days ahead, but with the tough schedule, it’s going to be hard to finish better than 8-8-1.

Offense had been a struggle for the Chargers in three of their last four games coming into this one. I think the defense still showed a lot of cracks, but if Herbert can play at this level in the big games more often, then this team can hang with anyone this year.

It’s not like any team is running away with things this season.

Cowboys at Chiefs: The Shootout That Wasn’t

Thanks to the Steelers and Chargers for delivering the game we were supposed to get from the Chiefs and Cowboys. Both teams have had their offensive hiccups in the last month, but they were both red hot in Week 10. I can’t get behind the injury excuse for Dallas when we’ve seen this offense soar without Tyron Smith in the past and on days where Amari Cooper (COVID) was especially quiet. CeeDee Lamb played the whole first half on Sunday before leaving injured and was just ineffective as the whole Dallas offense was off.

While the Chiefs looked great in scoring on their first three drives, they too hit a funk in this surprising 19-9 final. There were two more turnovers for Patrick Mahomes, who again got hit with an interception on a pass that Travis Kelce should have caught. Kansas City only managed a field goal on its last eight drives, but that was enough to hang on for the win as the defense stepped up once again.

Prescott was just off and spent much of the game under 4.0 YPA. He finished with 216 yards on 43 passes but also took five sacks as the line was no match for an energized pass rush by the Chiefs. Chris Jones more than doubled his season sack total with 3.5 on the day.

It wasn’t the resounding “they’re fully back” performance the Chiefs may have hoped for, but it’s scary when you give Mahomes a defense. He is 38-1 when the Chiefs allow fewer than 27 points. The last time they played a stretch of football this ugly, it was 2019 and they were about to go on a Super Bowl run. They still have to avoid those bad-luck turnovers, but the defense has absolutely turned things around and getting to the bye with a 7-4 record against this schedule is an achievement.

As for Dallas, I think you have to be worried this is a typical Mike McCarthy team. Pass-happy offense and turnover-reliant defense. They’ll be ready for most of the scrubs on the schedule, but put them up against a good opponent, especially on the road, and they won’t look prepared or adaptable. That may work for a wild card win over a lesser foe, but go on the road against Green Bay, Tampa Bay, or Arizona, and I don’t see it working out for them this year.

Colts at Bills: Maybe Josh Allen Is Carson Wentz 2.0

The episode of What If…? that Marvel didn’t show you:

From the archives:

I still believe Carson Wentz’s success in 2017, which proved to be the outlier to his career, had people looking much harder than they normally would have at a raw Wyoming prospect named Josh Allen in 2018. Allen would struggle with accuracy and consistency for two years before putting together an MVP-caliber season in 2020.

But this year, right from the Week 1 loss to Pittsburgh, something has looked off with Allen. The offense added the capable Emmanuel Sanders and tight end Dawson Knox has really taken off this year to give the Bills a deeper receiving corps than 2020. Yet Allen’s QBR has dropped from 76.6 to 58.8. NBC’s Cris Collinsworth was ready to give him the MVP in Week 5 just because the Chiefs couldn’t cover deep passes. But in the weeks since, we’ve seen Allen come up short at the end of the Tennessee game, play one ugly and one great half against Miami, implode against the Jaguars, light up the lousy Jets on an abundance of play-action, and now he struggled at home with the Colts on Sunday in a blowout loss.

Last year, I thought that wild card playoff game between the Colts and Bills to open the tournament was the best-played playoff game we got. It is the only good playoff performance for Allen in four tries so far. It was a rare feat of the pass-happy, offensive juggernaut overcoming bad field position and a balanced team to get a win.

But on Sunday, the Bills were anything but ready to match the Colts, who got an MVP-caliber effort out of Jonathan Taylor with five touchdowns and 204 yards from scrimmage. Buffalo’s No. 1 defensive ranking was influenced by a soft schedule, but the Bills were shredded by the running game in this one. Wentz only completed 11-of-20 passes for 106 yards as Frank Reich mostly kept him in a game manager role.

Wentz has had much better games this season, but what if covering up some of his flaws with a running game is something the Bills should be looking into for Allen? He was the show last year and it worked (outside of Kansas City games), but now the Bills are trailing the Patriots in the division and still have to play them twice.

Both the 2016 and 2018 quarterback draft classes have shown that we shouldn’t rush to conclusions and that situation does matter for how good these quarterbacks really are. But what if like 2017 for Wentz, 2020 was just the career outlier for Allen? A perfect storm that produced a mirage of an elite quarterback, but the rest of the career shows a talented athlete with some aggravating flaws still in his game.

After 2020, I thought Allen was legitimately going to remain a top-tier quarterback and not repeat Wentz’s career path. But after 10 games this season, I’m starting to think Wentz 2.0 is what Allen was destined to be. That doesn’t mean he can’t be an upgrade on the original, but like with Wentz, let’s not pretend the one season outweighs the rest combined.

Texans at Titans: They Didn’t Get Away with It This Time

Suddenly, losing to the Patriots wouldn’t be surprising for Tennessee. While I was joking in the tweet above, how does a team beat so many contenders, usually in impressive fashion, and take such ugly losses to the Jets and Texans in 2021? I liked and picked Houston +10.5. I cited on Saturday the two close games last year and that Tyrod Taylor might be able to play closer to the player he was in the first two games this season.

That happened in this one. Taylor rushed for Houston’s only two touchdowns. But it’s not like Houston’s offense did much to win this one. The Texans were 6/17 on third down and finished with 190 yards. This was about turnovers. Not only did Ryan Tannehill throw four picks, including a dagger in the fourth quarter when he was down 19-13 and had another chance for a game-winning drive. But that muffed punt on a fluky play halfway through the third quarter was a killer. That led to a 5-yard touchdown drive and 19-0 lead for Houston, which pretty much went into the tank offensively after that.

The Titans had the ball six times in the fourth quarter alone and only scored one touchdown. They had numerous chances in this one, but the offense doomed them with mistakes. This was bound to happen when you take away Derrick Henry and Julio Jones, but I still expected better than this. I can’t imagine Tannehill has had a worse game for the Titans than this one.

This team works better as an underdog. The conference-leading favorite? I never liked that role for them. Now we’ll just see if they can stop the Patriots from getting the top seed.

Cardinals at Seahawks: Russ & Pete Going Out Sad

Remember when the Giants won in Seattle last year as a double-digit underdog despite starting backup Colt McCoy? That was a rough day for Russell Wilson and the offense as McCoy did very little. Well, he won in Seattle again as the backup-turned-starter, and this time he outplayed Wilson in his second game back from injury.

The Cardinals leaned on McCoy, and he responded with a dink-and-dunk masterclass, completing 35-of-44 passes for 328 yards and two touchdowns. He got away with three fumbles in a game that finished with zero turnovers. Even after Seattle closed it to 16-13 in the fourth, McCoy delivered a great touchdown drive to put it away at 23-13. It would have been decided sooner without an atrocious day by the usually reliable Matt Prater. He missed two sub-40 yard field goals and an extra point. But A.J. Green and Zach Ertz put in vintage performances to help this offense thrive without Kyler Murray and DeAndre Hopkins again.

The Cardinals are a league-best 9-2 and I think you have to say Kliff Kingsbury is the front-runner for Coach of the Year. The Seahawks are 3-7 and look like they will be shopping for a new coach and possibly moving Wilson in 2022.

Packers at Vikings: Captain Kirk’s Lucky Day

I don’t know if I even want to entertain Aaron Rodgers’ Toegate saga, but I know he was healthy enough to throw a touchdown pass on his last four drives after a slow start. He looked just fine doing that. This game was more about the other matchup where Minnesota’s offense really took it to Green Bay’s defense, which had been garnering praise this season. But remember, the Cardinals were crushing teams defensively and still should have lost to Minnesota, 36-34, had it not been for a missed field goal at the end. Most Minnesota games this season come down to a clutch field goal as this one did.

Minnesota (+1.5) was one of my favorite upset picks of the season in this one because this was the best team in the league with a losing record going into Week 11. They get a good lead on everyone but haven’t been able to hold enough of them. Their stars all showed up for this one as Dalvin Cook, Justin Jefferson, and Adam Thielen all scored a touchdown.

Kirk Cousins had one of the best games of his career against a defense that has embarrassed him in recent years. But he absolutely caught a break in a tied game just before the two-minute warning when a Darnell Savage interception was overturned for not completing the process. Tough break for Green Bay, but a game-changer for Minnesota. Cousins completed his next three passes and set the Vikings up for the game-winning field goal from 29 yards out. They did not Blair Walsh this one and got the 34-31 win to move to 5-5.

Bet the farm on the Packers in the Week 17 rematch in prime time.

Hurry-Up Finish

Some quick thoughts as I race to complete another preview before getting to sleep.

Washington at Carolina: Ron vs. Cam

I think it’s a safe prediction that Ron Rivera and Cam Newton will enjoy their most NFL success together rather than apart, but they were opponents on Sunday for the first time. Rivera got the better of things behind a stellar game from Taylor Heinicke, who outdueled Newton in his first start back with the Panthers. Newton did rush for a 24-yard touchdown, which is only the third time out of 74 career scores where he was outside of the red zone on a touchdown run. But Heinicke threw three touchdowns and finished with a Week 11-best 92.5 QBR.

As the case has been for his whole NFL career, Newton came up a drive (and a yard) short in the fourth quarter. He threw a yard short of the sticks to Christian McCaffrey on a fourth-and-3, and then took a sack at midfield on another fourth-and-3 to end the 27-21 loss.

Carolina coach Matt Rhule is now 0-12 in games where his offense has a 4QC/GWD opportunity. This was the first loss with Newton, but if Cam’s career continues the way it used to go under Rivera, he won’t be helping Rhule on that record. Newton’s 20-44-1 (.315) record at 4QC/GWD opportunities is the worst among the 16 quarterbacks to win NFL MVP since 1984.

49ers at Jaguars: The Longest Drive Ever?

There’s not much to say about the 49ers blowing out a terrible Jacksonville team 30-10, but how about that opening drive? San Francisco ran 20 plays to cover 87 yards before settling for a field goal (after a timeout, no less) on a drive that consumed the first 13:05 of the game. It’s probably the second-longest drive in the NFL since 1997. Maybe the second-longest in history. Not sure.

The previous longest drive in Stathead’s database going back to 2001 is 13:00 by the 2010 Giants in Seattle during the fourth quarter of a 41-7 win. A drive people used to say was the longest (it’s not) was the 2000 Giants running out the final 12:53 in the NFC Championship Game against the Vikings, a 41-0 rout. I have seen the play-by-play confirm a 13:27 drive by the 1997 Titans against Dallas, a 21-play, 90-yard drive that started in the third quarter and ended in the fourth. There are reports of the 1935 Boston Redskins, led by the incomparable Sammy Baugh, having a drive that lasted 14:03 against the Bears.

The previous longest drive to start a game since 2001 also belongs to the 49ers. It was a 12:07 drive that also ended in a field goal against the 2002 Rams in a game where the 49ers blew a 20-3 fourth-quarter lead after allowing St. Louis to score four unanswered touchdowns.

Let’s just say it might take the 2021 Jaguars the better part of a month to score four touchdowns.

Ravens at Bears: The Tyler Huntley Game

How is it the Ravens prepare Tyler Huntley in a surprise start without Marquise Brown better than the Bears prepare Justin Fields after a bye week and his best game in Pittsburgh? Oh, that’s right, a thing called coaching. This was shaping up to be your classic Kyle Boller vs. Craig Krenzel 9-6 game between these teams, but some offense broke out at the end. An injury to Fields gave way to Andy Dalton, who basically hit two fluky touchdown passes as Chicago’s only real offense on the day. The second came on a fourth-and-11 as Dalton tried to repeat his 2017 magic when he knocked the Ravens out of the playoffs in Week 17.

But Dalton left too much time for… Is it Tyler or Taylor Huntley? Tyler Huntley. Taylor is the MAGA one. Huntley had his struggles, but that 29-yard pass to Sammy Watkins to set up Devonta Freeman’s 3-yard touchdown run with 22 seconds left was a thing of beauty. That was all the Ravens needed to get to 7-3 and their fifth game-winning drive of the season.

Lions at Browns: Tim Boyle Edition

The top NFL rivalry of the early 1950s, these two teams have not seen much glory since. How about some memorable meetings? Remember the Brady Quinn-Matthew Stafford shootout in 2009? Well, Sunday’s game looked nothing like that. It was closer to the 2001 meeting where Detroit’s Ty Detmer threw seven interceptions, yet Tim Couch threw the only pick-six in what was still a 24-14 win for the Browns.

This time, Baker Mayfield (8.6) and Tim Boyle (6.7) had the only single-digit QBRs for Week 11. The Lions probably could have won this game with a healthy Jared Goff, but it was not meant to be. Boyle, who wasn’t even good in college, making his first NFL start and throwing to the worst receiving corps in the league. What could go wrong? Apparently, not enough to not cover the spread (+13) as the Lions were in this one thanks to their run game and defense. But the understandable lack of trust in the QB proved fatal to the Lions (0-9-1) in this one. Detroit ran the ball on a 3rd-and-14 with just over three minutes left before punting the ball back in a 13-10 game. Despite having four clock stoppages left, I feel that the run was a bad decision as it burned more clock. Let the bad QB throw a bomb and if it’s picked, it’s an arm punt. The Browns actually screwed up by Nick Chubb twice running out of bounds on runs that gained first downs. So it took three first downs to finally put the Lions away.

Who wants to learn how to cook this Thanksgiving instead of watching Andy Dalton vs. Tim Boyle?

Saints at Eagles: Hurts Them Again

Two of the trickiest teams in 2021, I improved to 3-7 ATS in picking New Orleans games this season by going with the Eagles (-2.5). I guess Jalen Hurts just owns the Saints on the ground after last year’s upset and now this effort with three rushing touchdowns. The 40-29 final – somehow not an NFL first – was more points than this one deserved, but the Eagles briefly made it too close for comfort despite leading 33-7 going into the fourth quarter.

Trevor Siemian warmed up after a terrible start and the Saints were only down 33-19 and in the red zone with half a quarter to play. But I have no idea what Sean Payton got out of kicking a 28-yard field goal on fourth-and-7 with 7:14 left. It was still a two-possession game. That seemed like one of the worst decisions this week. The Eagles then made the Saints burn their timeouts before Hurts put them away with his third rushing touchdown. The Saints were an elite rushing defense this season, but the Eagles finished with 50 carries for 242 yards in this one. Washington (131) had been the only offense to surpass 90 yards on the ground against the Saints before this game.

I still don’t know what the plan is for Payton this year, but at least things are trending in the right direction for Sirianni’s Eagles.

Bengals at Raiders: This Turkey Is Cooked

The Raiders really came out of their bye week with a 5-2 record before failing to score more than 16 points in their next three games, all losses. They haven’t even cracked 300 yards in the last two. They’ve had three straight games with multiple turnovers after having none in the first seven games. They are terrible on third down (1-for-7 in this game). The Bengals were nothing special in this one themselves, also failing to hit 300 yards and averaging 4.1 yards per play. But they finished drives in the fourth quarter and got Derek Carr to throw a bad interception with 4:43 left in his own territory.

This was one of the picks I was most confident in this week, but even I was surprised at a lifeless 32-13 final (surprisingly the fourth game in NFL history to end with that score).

Next week: All six teams playing on Thanksgiving lost on Sunday. Sounds fun. At least Sunday looks loaded as far as this season goes. Titans-Patriots and Rams-Packers are the marquee games of the day, and Bucs-Colts and Steelers-Bengals aren’t half bad either. Even Vikings-49ers is a potential launching point towards the No. 7 seed game in the NFC.

NFL Week 10 Predictions: Impending Disaster Edition

~ Scott ~ Leave a comment

You think you know what’s going to happen next this NFL season? That’s cute, even if it’s completely impractical. I’m just going to rant about several games this week as I have no real theme to this week’s predictions. Kind of like how the 2021 season has no real rhythm or purpose to it.

The Dolphins still suck, right? Baltimore apparently didn’t get the memo. The Ravens made the Miami defense look all-world while the Dolphins won a game after Tua came off the bench to replace an injured starter. Isn’t it supposed to be the other way around? Tua gets injured and the backup saves the day? That whole game was ass backwards, but the Ravens really put on one of the worst team performances I’ve seen all season. The AFC North is as wide open as I can ever recall.

My full previews for this week: Saints-Titans, Chiefs-Raiders, Rams-49ers.

Before you start thinking this might be Tennessee’s year in the AFC, don’t discount the possibility of Trevor Siemian throwing three touchdowns to Taysom Hill this Sunday or some other weird shit to get the Saints (without Alvin Kamara) over the hump. God knows that team has been the hardest to figure out this year. I was talking about the Saints, but the Titans are up there too with that sentiment. Lose to the Jets, pound the Chiefs and Rams. Okay. Be a bit nervous about that offense without Derrick Henry after it averaged under 3.5 yards per play last week. The defense won that game in LA.

Favorites of more than 7 points were 26-1 SU this season coming into this past Sunday. They are 1-4 since after the Bills (at Jaguars), Cowboys (vs. Broncos), Rams (vs. Titans), and Ravens (at Dolphins) all lost. Your gut might be saying go all in on the Bills and Cowboys (and maybe Rams) rebounding to win, and go all in on the Jags returning to their losing ways as a 10.5-point underdog to the Colts. I get it, but what if Buffalo shits the bed again and the Jets really do have some Brady-like dink-and-dunker who sold his soul to the devil in Mike White? I’m a bit worried about the Bills after struggling with Miami and Jacksonville. As for the Cowboys, a game with Atlanta where Dan Quinn might forget which side he is on worries me. No Tyron Smith against Atlanta? What is this, 2017 all over again? Amari Cooper basically said he and CeeDee Lamb couldn’t run last week, which I said in this very blog spot could be a concern against Denver. I’m not sure how playing a game and practice gets you healthier, but hopefully they will be because Matt Ryan is playing quite well again. And we know the only reason Atlanta lost to Dallas last year was that absurd onside kick recovery. I’m definitely taking Atlanta to cover, but just remember the golden rule of NFL gambling: never bet on the Falcons to win. Another golden rule is to bet against Carson Wentz against a good team, but the Jaguars are not good. I think the Jonathan Taylor TD/Colts ML parlay pick is still safe this week.

Then we’re dealing with mounting injuries and COVID situations.

Seahawks-Packers was a marquee game on the schedule in April, but it’s lost some luster with the way this season has unfolded so far. Is Aaron Rodgers going to be totally fine after missing a week for COVID or will he pull a 2020 Cam Newton and implode in his first game back? Is Russell Wilson really ready for this one after being ahead of schedule on his recovery? I think I’ll be avoiding it.

I’ve been avoiding New England games all season. The Browns are back to D’Ernest Johnson at RB after COVID has taken out the rest of the backfield. The Patriots are gaining confidence too. Mac Jones might even start attacking Myles Garrett with a lead pipe in the parking lot to gain an advantage.

Kyler Murray is a game-time decision again this week. Would be nice to have more clarity on that one. Apparently it’s going to be P.J. Walker for the Panthers. But if it’s against Colt McCoy, could Carolina cover? I kind of love that pick because Kyler is 0-2 against the Panthers and was under 4.3 YPA (!) in both games the last two years. Maybe the Panthers just have a good feel for that Kliff-coached offense and now Sam Darnold is out of the picture for the offense with Christian McCaffrey back. Seems too good to be true for a Carolina cover, but I’m on that one in a week where I struggled to find underdogs I like.

Speaking of underdogs, is this the Mike Tomlin Special at home against 0-8 Detroit? The Steelers haven’t beaten anyone by more than 8 points in nearly 51 weeks. Chase Claypool is out. Ben Roethlisberger is a bit beat up and the Steelers just had that dramatic win on Monday night against Chicago. The offensive line was poor in that game. Jared Goff with a weak supporting cast at receiver doesn’t give me much confidence, but this feels like that classic trap game for the Steelers who have a golden gift with Baltimore’s Miami loss to move into first place in the division. I don’t think I’d put big money on Detroit winning, but the cover (or Steelers by 1-13 points) is a favorite bet of mine this week.

The Eagles are another team I’ve been avoiding, but it’s amazing how many quarterbacks (5-of-9) they have allowed to complete over 80% of their passes this season. You would think Teddy Bridgewater could do it here, but what is the impact of offensive coordinator Pat Shurmur likely being out from calling plays due to COVID? Denver overachieved in Dallas last week. I’m not sure they stack wins here, but I am picking Denver this week.

If I had two locks this week, it would be Tampa Bay beating a terrible Washington defense and the Vikings-Chargers game being decided by single digits. That leaves me with this parlay that I will do my best to hedge from the impending disaster that Week 10 could be.

Or maybe we got the big upset of the week out of the way early…

NFL Stat Oddity: Week 7

~ Scott ~ 14 Comments

I knew we were in for a rough two weeks of NFL action, but I didn’t think it would be this bad. While Week 6 only featured five games with a comeback opportunity, at least it ended on a high note on Monday night between the Bills and Titans. But in Week 7, we’ve had just three of the 12 games feature a comeback opportunity. That’s eight games in two weeks after there were 11 close games in just Week 5.

That’s why announcers need to stop playing up the number of overtime games or this cutesy stat about a record number of games where the winning points were scored in the final minute – again, something directly correlated to the overtimes. This season is not giving us many close games and I have some theories below on why that is the case.

Going into Monday night, the average margin of victory in Week 7 is 18.6 points. That ranks as the third-highest week (regular season only) since 2001, only trailing Week 7 in 2009 (20.3) and Week 15 in 2012 (18.7). As long as Seahawks-Saints is decided by at least six points, it will stay as the third-highest week in the 21st century.

Without gambling, a lot of these games would be unwatchable. Hell, even with it I’m having a hard time.

This season in Stat Oddity:

Cardinals/Rams/Bucs: Big Favorites Win in Top-Heavy NFC Race

I wrote on Saturday how big favorites (11+ points) almost never all cover the spread. It happened again as the Cardinals hit scorigami with a 31-5 win over Houston and the Bears repeatedly gave Tampa Bay a shortcut to the end zone, but the Rams had a tight one with the Lions before finally winning 28-19 in one of the only two 4QC/GWD this week. Go figure, Matthew Stafford had his 40th game-winning drive against his former team.

Stafford had a nice revenge game but hats off to Dan Campbell for coaching the Lions the way a huge underdog should approach a David vs. Goliath matchup like this. He had a surprise onside kick and fake punt in the first quarter as Detroit led 10-0. Jared Goff had arguably his best game of the season, but in the end, Goff goofed in the red zone and threw an interception to Jalen Ramsey when he had a chance to throw a go-ahead touchdown.

It did not feel like the Cardinals brought their A-game against the Texans, but the fact that they still won 31-5 and got all their main weapons, including new tight end Zach Ertz, involved for touchdowns tells you just how bad Houston is. Huge game coming up Thursday against Green Bay. Kyler Murray took a lot of big hits in this game, but he should be okay for Thursday. It’ll be a great opportunity for the Cardinals to show how serious they are as Super Bowl contenders in a prime-time game with a chance to go 8-0.

Chicago basically TKO’d itself in the first quarter in Tampa Bay, spotting Tom Brady three possessions inside the 40 in the first quarter alone. Tampa Bay ended up starting six drives inside Chicago territory in the game. Half the league came into Week 7 without six such drives on the season. It was last season when the Buccaneers had a league-high 23 drives start inside the opponent 40 when you add in the six they had in the playoffs. Now they had five such drives in this game, scoring three touchdowns and a field goal on them. Teams have no shot if they’re going to keep gifting the Bucs these short fields. I’ll be surprised if Matt Nagy survives the season in Chicago.

But this does create a very interesting NFC where the Cardinals are 7-0, the Rams and Bucs are 6-1, and the Cowboys (on a bye) are 5-1. Those four teams have only lost to each other with the Cowboys losing to a late field goal in Tampa Bay, and the Bucs were blown out by the Rams, who were blown out by the Cardinals. The Packers are also 6-1 but we’ll see how they fare against Arizona this week and the Rams in Week 12.

Chiefs at Titans: STOP THE COUNT! Kansas City Is Dazed and Confused

Was that the worst game of Patrick Mahomes’ NFL career?

It was the question we asked after the Chiefs scored 17 points and barely beat the Falcons in Week 16 last year to clinch the No. 1 seed.

Was that the worst game of Patrick Mahomes’ NFL career?

It was the question we asked after the Chiefs lost 31-9 in Super Bowl 55 against Tampa Bay, the first time Mahomes lost by more than eight points and the offense failed to score a touchdown.

Was that the worst game of Patrick Mahomes’ NFL career?

It was the question we asked after the Chiefs lost 38-20 at home to the Bills in Week 5 with Mahomes having more turnover problems in the worst home loss of his career.

Was that the worst game of Patrick Mahomes’ NFL career?

It is the question of the day after the Chiefs lost 27-3 in Tennessee, the first wire-to-wire loss in Mahomes’ career, and the answer is undoubtedly yes. This is the lowest point of the Mahomes era in Kansas City. But can it get lower?

It is not a good sign that this question about the worst game has come up four times in the last 11 starts for Mahomes. But for the first time since Week 12 against Buffalo in 2017, the Chiefs failed to hold a lead in a game. That snaps a streak of 68 straight games with a lead. The only known streak longer than that in NFL history is the first 70 starts of the Russell Wilson era in Seattle.

Never losing wire-to-wire was about the last streak the Chiefs had left. While I picked the Titans to win on Sunday, I never expected a 27-0 score at halftime, or that the Chiefs would score the only points of the second half on a field goal. Stopping Derrick Henry (29 carries for 86 yards) was about the only thing the Chiefs did well, but that seemed to make them bad against everything else as Ryan Tannehill had plenty of open receivers and time to throw, and Henry even faked a run for a touchdown pass to start the game. The Titans just beat Buffalo with great offense, but it’s not like the defense was masterful outside of stopping a couple late Josh Allen runs. But three points to the Chiefs? Really?

Sacks and turnovers led the Chiefs to self-destruct in the first half. Mahomes had another tipped interception but also lost a fumble on a scramble at midfield. The Chiefs never really threatened in the second half, and Mahomes had to leave the game after getting sandwiched on a nasty hit (but not illegal or intentionally violent) to the face as he was going down. Mecole Hardman fumbling at the Tennessee 6 to end the game and ensure that the Chiefs would not score a touchdown and have another turnover to add to their league-high total was the perfect ending for this shitshow.

The Chiefs are 3-4, in real danger of missing the playoffs, and they don’t scare any contender in the AFC anymore after losing to the Ravens, Chargers, Bills, and Titans. Of course, that tough schedule is having a big impact on this poor start to the season. The Chiefs could potentially face 11 games against playoff teams this season, which (albeit with a 17th game added in 2021) would tie the single-season record by the 1993 Buccaneers.

I’ve compared Mahomes to Peyton Manning many times already, but one thing I have repeatedly noted is that the only two ways Manning ever missed the playoffs in his career (1998 and 2001) was to have a schedule with 10 playoff teams and the worst scoring defense in the NFL. Well, the 2021 Chiefs are looking an awful lot like the 2001 Colts right now with the terrible defense and having a ton of turnovers.

Those Colts finished 6-10 and fired head coach Jim Mora, who delivered his infamous “playoffs!?” speech that season. I don’t know if these Chiefs are headed for that fate, but I do know you can no longer trust this team against any decent opponent. The invincibility is gone. The mystique is gone.

Until further notice, the Chiefs are just another struggling NFL team that’s a one-unit show on a good day and a total mess on a bad day. Sunday was another bad day, and to think it was just last December when we used to say the Chiefs never had bad games under Mahomes.

Bengals at Ravens: Biggest Cincinnati Win in How Long?

You can make the argument that the Bengals just had their biggest win in over 30 years on Sunday in Baltimore. The Bengals have not won a playoff game since the 1990 season. From 1991-2020, the Bengals had just 17 wins against teams that made the playoffs in a season where Cincinnati also made the playoffs. Winning in Pittsburgh in December 2005 was a really big deal as it helped the Bengals win the AFC North that year, but you can absolutely make the argument that this 41-17 demolition of the Ravens in Baltimore tops that one.

At worst, it’s the second-biggest Cincinnati win in over 30 years.

Remember, the Ravens were 5-1 and just got a ton of hype for beating the Chargers 34-6 a week ago. You know, last week’s hyped AFC team as this thing changes every week now.

For three quarters, this was living up to being the game of the week on paper (garbage week withstanding). Both quarterbacks were dealing with good pressure before they started to make plays down the field in a back-and-forth affair. But once Ja’Marr Chase took off for an 82-yard touchdown to highlight his monster 201-yard day, the Bengals led by double digits for the final 20 minutes.

While a much different game script, this performance from Joe Burrow (career-high 416 yards) and the offense reminds me of this 2004 game by Carson Palmer against Baltimore when he threw for 382 yards and the light seemed to click for him late in his first season as a starter. Burrow and Chase look like they have been doing this for much longer than they have, and that’s even acknowledging their one magical year together at LSU. This is one of the top duos to watch right now.

As for the Ravens, the injuries have clearly not helped this season. The defense cannot be trusted like it used to be, though I thought the Chargers performance was encouraging on that front. They went backwards this week. Still, part of me wonders if the increase in blowouts this season has something to do with the record number of fourth-down attempts we are seeing.

The Ravens were down 27-17 in the fourth quarter with 11:43 to play. They faced a 4th-and-7 at their own 38. In past years, this would almost certainly be a punt. Pin them deep, get the ball back in a few minutes down 10 and go from there. But the Ravens went for it and didn’t get it. It’s not a terrible call since giving up the field goal does not change much, but giving up a 38-yard touchdown drive to an offense that was hot basically ended the game with just over nine minutes left. I feel that in past years, John Harbaugh punts that ball and gets it back 27-17 later. But not these Ravens.

Baltimore then failed on a 4th-and-15 from their own 33, setting up another short field for the Bengals to add yet another touchdown to produce the 41-17 final. The game was closer than that score suggests, but these failed fourth downs really sparked the rout this became. I cannot say if that is happening at the league-wide level more than usual this year, but I felt the risky fourth downs deep in their own end is what sunk the Chargers so quickly (34-6) in Baltimore a week ago.

It is something to keep in mind this season as we see teams winning by huge margins quite regularly now. But I will be careful in anointing the Bengals as the team to beat in the AFC. I don’t think such a thing exists right now. These Bengals struggled like hell with the Jaguars during their 20-game losing streak just three weeks ago.

I think it’s just proof that the AFC is up for grabs, and it will not run through Kansas City like it has the last three seasons as hosts of the AFC Championship Game. And competition is a very good thing for this league. You want to see the Bengals’ fortune change after a couple smart picks at the top of the draft from LSU.

As I said in the beginning, this franchise has almost no huge wins in the last three decades. I’m okay with Cincinnati fans wanting to celebrate the hell out of this one. They just have to lose to the Jets next week and the Bizarro AFC is back on track in 2021. The days of one team dominating are over.

Hurry-Up Finish

Some quick thoughts as I have more articles to write before I get to sleep.

Washington Meets Cruel Regression

Coming into Week 7, offenses were 15-for-15 at scoring touchdowns on the Packers in the red zone. Obviously, the Packers were going to get some red-zone stops eventually this season. But the comedy of errors that led to Washington going 0-for-4 in the red zone was too much. The highlight was Taylor Heinicke doing a Lambeau Leap, since of course he idolized Brett Favre, only for the drive to end in no points after he was ruled to give himself up short of the end zone (stupid rule), and then fumbled at the goal line and was stopped short again on fourth down. Washington was a respectable 10-of-16 in the red zone this year coming into the game, but what a disastrous outing in a 24-10 loss that should have been much closer.

The Jets Backup Is the Creator of The White Lotus?

I’m not sure how the Jets came into this season with Mike White as the backup behind rookie Zach Wilson, but that was another mistake for a team that somehow remains the worst in the NFL despite getting rid of Adam Gase and Sam Darnold (a pumpkin in his own right who was benched on Sunday). The Patriots toyed with the Jets on their way to scoring 54 points (seven touchdowns and two field goals on 10 drives). Three players threw a pass, six players registered a rush, and 11 players caught a pass.

Defund the Eagles

Philly really let Derek Carr complete 31-of-34 passes with Darren Waller inactive. The Eagles might be the worst team in the NFC East. I’m still not buying the Raiders until I see them come out of this upcoming stretch (KC/CIN/DAL) with a good record intact.

Atlanta Almost Did It Again

You know it’s a weird week when the Falcons had one of the only two fourth-quarter comeback wins. Of course, it came after the team blew a 13-point lead that never should have been a 13-point lead. Someone needs to teach Arthur Smith that you go for two when up 12 in the fourth quarter. That extra point and 13-point lead kept the door open for Miami, but fortunately Matt Ryan was on point to Kyle Pitts (163 yards) and came through with a game-winning drive.

Wentz Wagon Rebuilding

As soon as I paid Carson Wentz a compliment on Twitter, he tried to throw four interceptions in the next 25 minutes. But the rain made it extra tough on the 49ers and Colts on Sunday night, and he made enough plays to get the win. It’s still the best month of his career and not one of his overrated three-or-four game stretches like the beginning of his career, the end of the 2019 season, or any of his best runs in 2017. Frank Reich’s offense is working out for him, and you just wonder if the Colts dug too big of a hole at 0-3 for it to matter this season.

Next week: Island games that look good or will they be mirages too? Can we at least get some more competitive, close games?

NFL Week 7 Predictions: Trick or Treat Edition

~ Scott ~ 1 Comment

If you thought Week 6 was bad football, take a gander at Week 7. Chiefs-Titans could be a fun shootout (read my preview here), but the only other game that comes close on paper is Bengals-Ravens, and I’m still not sure if the Bengals are ready for a game like this.

I may have lost my mind, but I really did pick 11 underdogs against the spread this week (five to win). It’s a combination of things. It’s probably an overcorrection to a Week 6 that featured a lot of blowouts. It’s also a reaction to the couple large spreads. Since 2010, favorites of 14-plus points are 39-39 ATS. Flip a coin.

Plus I just don’t love certain things like the 49ers playing without George Kittle, the Bucs without Antonio Brown and Rob Gronkowski, and that spread in Green Bay keeps coming down that I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s -6.5 by kickoff.

I do love the revenge games for Matthew Stafford (Lions) and DeAndre Hopkins/J.J. Watt (Texans), but I feel uneasy about picking the Cardinals to cruise to 7-0 (can see Houston losing 34-17), and that Stafford game is interesting after Dan Campbell challenged Jared Goff publicly to do better this week. What better week than Rams week against Sean McVay and Stafford? Crazier things have happened, like when the Jets beat the Rams as a 17.5-point underdog last December. The Lions have given several teams a tough time this year, though that awful loss to the Bengals last week gives me pause. But I do at least love the props in this one for Stafford and for Cooper Kupp and Darrell Henderson to find the end zone. Maybe even Robert Woods and a bomb to DeSean Jackson. The full arsenal.

But one thing I wanted to look at for this week was how much should we trust those biggest favorites of the week to win? I’m talking about Arizona, Rams, and Bucs. They’re all favorites of 11 or more points, and if they come through (along with Derrick Henry), I can hit the parlay with the longest odds I’ve ever hit thanks to actually getting a correct score on TNF right (I took three stabs at it).

Since 2001, favorites of 11-plus points are 350-53-1 SU (.868) and 188-213-3 ATS.

But how safe are they to bet to win when there’s three in one week? It happened this year in Week 2 and all the favorites won. I looked at this data for 2001-present and found 46 weeks where at least three teams were favored by 11+ points. Here are their results:

  • Perfect record: 32/46 (69.6% of the time)
  • One tie: once (Week 10, 2012, thanks Jeff Fisher’s Rams vs. 49ers)
  • One loss: 11 times (4-1 once, 3-1 five times, 2-1 five times)
  • 1-2 record: twice (just happened Week 15 last year when Rams -17.5 lost to Jets and Steelers -14.5 lost to Bengals)

Ah yes, I remember Week 15 well. It’s a week where I needed the Rams and Steelers to come through as huge favorites and I would have won about $36,000. So, that’s not the week I like to think about when I’m expecting a huge Sunday (fading MNF for sure this time).

Hedge wisely just in case. And for those curious, the big favorites were perfect ATS just twice in 46 tries. Four times they were 1-3 ATS and four times they were 0-3 ATS.

NFL Stat Oddity: Week 5

~ Scott ~ 17 Comments

Sunday in the NFL lasted just over 15 hours from the first snap in London to the last snap in Kansas City after a weather delay. If that wasn’t the longest day of action in NFL history, then I don’t know what else could be.

It was a day of ugly field goal kicking, yet the Vikings somehow pulled off a 54-yard game-winning kick. Of course, Detroit helped by making its incredible 10-point comeback (helped by an Alexander Mattison fumble) a 1-point lead by going for two with 37 seconds left. That was too much time with the Vikings having two timeouts. I know Kirk Cousins kind of sucks at comebacks and his kickers are not reliable, but that was a bad decision to go for two there. Play for overtime after holding down the Vikings from scoring much all day. Instead, the Vikings got a drive together because they had to and won the game on a 54-yard field goal that Greg Joseph actually made despite being an employee of the Vikings. At least it gave us this moment:

It was a day of close games as we had 10 comeback opportunities in Week 5, outdoing the previous high of any week this season (eight). Let’s quickly hit on three of them since I need to wrap this up after getting a late start.

49ers at Cardinals: Trey Lance made his starting debut, but he couldn’t keep the rocket launcher under wraps when the 49ers just needed a simple scoring drive in a 17-10 loss to the now 5-0 Cardinals, who apparently are not going to score 31-plus every week this season. Kyle Shanahan loses another close game? Jimmy Garoppolo and George Kittle out with injuries again? Who could have imagined?

Patriots at Texans: The Patriots came through with a comeback win over the Houston Texans after Davis Mills had maybe the most absurd stat line yet for a rookie against a Bill Belichick-coached defense. Mills just had an early contender for worst game of the decade against Buffalo last week, but now he has the ninth game on record where a QB lost with a passer rating of at least 140.0 (min. 25 passes). I guess the Patriots can still win games where their quarterback was not the best one on the field.

Bears at Raiders: Finally, Jon Gruden’s Raiders had their “but his emails” loss at home to the Bears. Maybe it was too much of a distraction, and maybe he just showed his true colors. All I know is once you blow some smoke up his ass, this is the kind of performance you can count on in the next game. The last two sentences are about Derek Carr, by the way.

But the only game that came close to pulling off instant classic status came in the late afternoon slate instead of the prime-time matchup between the Bills and Chiefs. Browns-Chargers was the Shawn Michaels vs. Razor Ramon Ladder Match in WrestleMania X of Week 5 in the NFL, but I have to start with the perception-changing game that played out in Kansas City.

This season in Stat Oddity:

Bills at Chiefs: About That Dynasty…

About the last thing I want to do is write an obituary for the 2021 Chiefs after Week 5 and after a ridiculously tough schedule where the Browns, Ravens, Chargers, and now Bills all gave them their best shot. But there is no denying that the Chiefs failed three of those tests from their key AFC challengers and barely escaped the Browns in Arrowhead in Week 1. The offense has too many turnovers and the defense is going for historic levels of suck. The 2021 Chiefs are the fourth team in NFL history to allow more than 28 points in each of the first five games, joining the 1954 Cardinals, 2012 Titans, and 2013 Giants. It’s like watching the 2000 Rams, the forgotten little defense-less brother to the 1999 and 2001 Super Bowl teams in St. Louis.

But through four weeks, the defense could be excused to a point as the offense was scoring a touchdown on 50% of its drives and converting on third down at a record rate. If not for a fumble in Baltimore, this team could easily be 3-1.

But that took a hit Sunday night as the Bills came in to avenge their two losses from 2020 and wiped the floor with the Chiefs, 38-20, despite a long weather delay at halftime. Getting blown out at home is just another layer of invincibility ripped away from the Chiefs in the Patrick Mahomes era. While the stakes were not as high, the 18-point loss looked worse than the team’s 31-9 loss in Super Bowl 55 to Tampa Bay. At least on that night the reshuffled offensive line was a built-in excuse for the poor pass protection. The Chiefs just couldn’t come down with any of Mahomes’ miracle passes and the defense was stumped by simple play-action throws.

This was more of a beatdown. Mahomes played the first truly awful game of his NFL career, missing often on throws regardless of pressure or an open receiver. He completed 33-of-54 passes for 272 yards and had three turnovers, including a pick-six, a red-zone pick after another tipped ball, and a fumbled snap in the rain to end things. The bounces? They’re no longer going Kansas City’s way and that was predictable.

But this was not another blown lead in the fourth quarter like Baltimore and Los Angeles. The Chiefs led 10-7 early in the second quarter and never led again. The best they could do was make it 31-20 in the fourth quarter. But after Josh Allen seemingly threw an interception from his own end zone, the Chiefs were flagged for roughing the passer. It was a weak call, but it was also in a series of calls on both teams that made me question what roughing the passer and pass interference are in this league anymore. The refs had a bad night, but they didn’t decide this game.

That roughing call stands out the most just because it killed any chance for an exciting finish. Allen was still at his own 23 after that call. The Chiefs could have stopped the Bills, but instead they watched them march 77 more yards for a game-clinching touchdown to go up 38-20.

Maybe that Buffalo defense is for real as this was not a matter of beating up on a wounded offense like in the first four weeks of the season. They smacked the Chiefs around in Arrowhead. I asked in the offseason what really changed to improve this Buffalo defense from the mediocre unit it was a year ago that had no real hope of winning a Super Bowl? Well, one name I underestimated was first-round pick Gregory Roussea. The defensive end did his best J.J. Watt impersonation and tipped a Mahomes pass at the line to himself for a big red-zone pick in the third quarter. The Bills reportedly did not even blitz Mahomes once in this game, choosing to rush four and play Cover 2 to take away the big plays.

The Chiefs had just two plays that gained more than 17 yards in the game, a shockingly low figure for this offense. One was a 23-yard scramble by Mahomes too. This was a big difference in the meetings last year when the Chiefs did what they wanted, and Allen’s offense couldn’t get anything big. On Sunday night, the Bills had seven plays of 20-plus yards, including four completions of 35-plus yards (two for touchdowns).

Allen had 315 yards on 15 completions. Other than a slow third quarter after the 70-plus minute halftime delay, the Bills were just about unstoppable on offense. Combine that with a defense capable of playing the Chiefs like this and it’s a championship combination. The Bills may only be an underdog one more time this season when they play in Tampa Bay. It seems rather likely that this team will be the favorite for the No. 1 seed in the AFC.

The Chiefs may be fortunate just to get a wild card at this point if things don’t tighten up on both sides of the ball but especially on defense.

With the Bills and Ravens stepping up this season against the Chiefs as well as the two teams I’m writing about next (Browns and Chargers), the AFC might be just fine going forward as a super competitive conference where any one of these teams can advance each year. It’s not going to be a runaway for Mahomes and the Chiefs to keep hosting AFC Championship Games and going to the Super Bowl. They had that window for three years and turned it into one championship while the rest of the teams were figuring themselves out.

If 2021 is any indication, those teams have figured out the Chiefs too.

Browns at Chargers: 47-42 Part Deux

What a whacky, fun game with huge plays, terrible tackling, six fourth down attempts (and then some negated by penalty), and 41 points in the fourth quarter alone. Of course, the Browns ended up on the wrong side of history again.

We may need to start calling Baker Mayfield the “Score 42 and Lose” QB after it happened to him for a third time. He lost his first career start, 45-42, to the Raiders in 2018. He lost 47-42 to the Ravens last year after Lamar Jackson returned from taking a shit. Now he’s lost 47-42 again to the Chargers in the second 47-42 game in NFL history. Mayfield is somehow 2-3 when he leads his team to at least 42 points while the rest of the NFL is 69-2 since 2018. The Browns (four times) have broken their tie with Washington and the Chiefs (three each) for the most losses in NFL history after scoring at least 42 points.

None of this is to say that Mayfield is the reason Cleveland loses these games. He was great on Sunday at playing through a torn labrum after some struggles in recent weeks. The offense was fantastic, but it is hard to win on the road when you allow five touchdowns on six second-half drives like the Browns did.

This thing was back and forth and not even a failed game-tying extra point by the Chargers with 3:15 left could derail it. That actually ended up helping the Chargers since the Browns did not go all out in a tied 42-42 game. Instead with a 42-41 lead, they ran on first down and on third-and-9 and let the Chargers get the ball back with plenty of time. Justin Herbert only needed one pass to get into field-goal range. After Austin Ekeler slid down at the Cleveland 3 with 1:38 left, the Browns called their final timeout. That slide tells me the Chargers were content with kicking the field goal to win 44-42 at the buzzer. A smart move even if you are shaky about it given the team’s historic struggles on special teams in crunch time.

So, why wouldn’t Herbert just take a series of knees to bleed the clock and kick the field goal? Head coach Brandon Staley is getting a ton of buzz for his embrace of analytics despite being a defensive coach, but he bungled the end of the Chiefs game by scoring a touchdown and giving Mahomes a shot to answer, and it happened again here. Ekeler got the carry and while he tried to not score, the Browns did the smart thing and pulled his ass into the end zone for the score with 91 seconds left.

Wow, just typing “91 seconds” really sells how much of a mistake this was. They gave a hot offense they couldn’t stop all day plenty of time to answer. It could have been an even more delicious addition to Chargers BINGO given the offense came up short on the two-point conversion and only led 47-42. Now the Browns could win it with a touchdown in regulation.

But it took 50 seconds for Mayfield to move the offense 11 yards as he only made short throws. That was piss-poor execution in that moment. After getting to the Cleveland 46, the Browns could not gain another yard and Mayfield’s Hail Mary fell incomplete with players bumping into each other.

Behind Staley and Herbert, the CHARGERS are leading the league with three game-winning drives. The CHARGERS are 4-1 in close games and lead the league with four defensive holds of a one-score lead.

Staley is far from perfect. His defense just gave up 42 points to a team that scored 14 last week. He’s mismanaged two of the last three finishes. He’s inherited an incredible young quarterback in Herbert who is making strides in his second season. But there is no denying that Staley is pushing this team to aggressively get leads and hold onto them once they have them. The Chargers of old would never be 4-1 right now and that is a credit to this new coach.

The Browns may still be the “good enough to get beat close” team in the AFC, which is still a huge step up from the pre-Mayfield era. But for a change, the Chargers just may have the potential to be closers and real contenders this season. That sounds like the setup for an incoming beatdown in Baltimore next Sunday, but what if this team is just finally different?

Packers at Bengals: Kicking Woes

Weird things always happen when Aaron Rodgers plays the Bengals, but this game takes the cake. If you wanted to script an overtime tie, apparently you have to get the Packers or Bengals involved. I thought for sure this one was headed there after the two kickers combined to miss five go-ahead field goals in a span of six drives.

Fortunately, we got a winner. Fortunately, it was the right winner too as Green Bay should have put this game away multiple times in the fourth quarter and again to start overtime.

Would I have been happy if Rodgers got credit for a game-winning drive after Aaron Jones ripped off a 57-yard run and he threw two incomplete passes? No, but Mason Crosby has to hit that 36-yard field goal after a streak of 27 straight makes. Would I have said Rodgers was unlucky had he lost after his kicker missed from 36 and Cincinnati kicker Evan McPherson hit from 57? Yes, absolutely. But the Bengals called a run on third-and-2 instead of letting Joe Burrow deliver a dagger throw to set up a higher-percentage kick. Shame on them.

Would I have been fine with Rodgers getting a game-winning drive after a 20-yard pass to Davante Adams, who shined with 206 yards, to set up Crosby from 51? Sure, that’s another one-minute drill for him this season. But Crosby was wide left to set up overtime.

Would I have been amused had Rodgers lost another overtime game without touching the ball? Probably. But Burrow seemed to erase any chance of that with an instant pick to start overtime.

Would I have been pissed if Rodgers got credit for a game-winning drive in overtime for losing 5 yards on two Jones runs and watching Crosby hit from 40? Damn right. But the kicker missed again. At least it spared us a crap game-winning drive.

Burrow hit a pass for 21 yards to the Green Bay 41 again, but did they learn anything from the previous mistake? No, they ran the ball three times again and settled for a 49-yard field goal by a no-name kicker. He missed wide left too.

Finally, Rodgers hit passes of 20 and 15 yards to put this one to an end after Crosby finally connected from 49 yards out with 1:55 left. I am content with that being the game-winning drive in this one.

At least it had a winner, because I can’t remember ever seeing a clutch kicking display this bad.

Broncos at Steelers: The Standard Improved?

Last week in Green Bay, the Steelers showed they can score an opening-drive touchdown, and they did it again on Sunday after a beautiful 50-yard pass from Ben Roethlisberger to Diontae Johnson again gave the Steelers the early lead. Last week, the Steelers showed some offensive line improvement and a running game that actually could get gains of 3-4 yards instead of seeing Najee Harris get hit in the backfield immediately. This continued against Denver with Harris rushing for 122 yards to finally snap the team’s 11-game streak of not rushing for 90 yards.

Dare I say, the Steelers showed offensive improvement for the second week in a row? The other problem last week was inaccuracy from Roethlisberger. He was sharp in this game, especially early and especially on third down where the Steelers finished 7/12 compared to Denver going 2/12 on third down (but ¾ on fourth down). One week after a concussion, I was not impressed with Teddy Bridgewater or this Denver offense at all until he started to mount a 24-6 comeback in the fourth quarter. The game got a bit tight at 27-19, but he eventually struggled in the red zone again and threw an interception in the final seconds to end it.

While far from dominant, this was much closer to a classic game from the Steelers where both units played well for much of the game and they were able to win at home. Can they stack another one against the Geno Smith-led Seahawks next week? We’ll see, but if this offense shows up in prime time against that Seattle defense, then it may not be such an ugly display of football from Pittsburgh like in recent times. I was not surprised by the win, but that says more about my thoughts on how legit Denver was. But I can see actual improvement from the Pittsburgh offense in the last two weeks compared to the first three.

Eagles at Panthers: Pumpkins and Pretenders

What the fvck were these teams doing?

Jalen Hurts had nine failed completions in the first half, but none in the second as the offense finally started making plays that gained more than 10 yards. He also got his legs involved as the passing in this game was just atrocious for both teams. At least the Panthers got Chuba Hubbard to rush for 101 yards in Christian McCaffrey’s absence. The Eagles once again barely handed the ball off to their backs until very late in the game.

Sam Darnold had three interceptions and may have turned back into a pumpkin just in time for Halloween. But it was a blocked punt that set the Eagles up at the Carolina 27 for their game-winning drive. Darnold then threw his third pick and the Eagles ran out the clock.

Obviously, the transitive property never has and never will mean a thing in the NFL. If you just judged Carolina and Philadelphia by how they played against the Cowboys, then you wouldn’t have expected the Panthers to blow this one. But they did after leading 15-3 early.

Is either team going anywhere this season? I doubt it, but this was some low-key horrific offensive football.

NFL Stat Oddity: Week 4

~ Scott ~ 17 Comments

You know what this 2021 NFL season is missing? More close games that end in failure by one team, such as the Vikings’ failed comeback attempt in a 14-7 loss to the Browns. It was a shock to see The Kevin Stefanski Bowl end with 21 points on 22 drives, but Baker Mayfield was inaccurate, and the Browns got through Minnesota’s line with ease. But there was Kirk Cousins with a whopping five drive attempts in the fourth quarter, trying to get that elusive touchdown and never doing so.

There were only six games in Week 4 with a comeback opportunity, and one of them was in the Jacksonville-Cincinnati game on Thursday night. Joe Burrow left that one with the first fourth-quarter comeback win of his NFL career. Urban Meyer left for some college comforts at the bar.

But the funny thing is NFL teams are now 19-24 (.442) at comeback opportunities in 2021. In each of the last two seasons, that success rate was just about 30% like it usually is. Now we are seeing closer to a coin flip this season and I think part of the problem is a lack of close games overall as we’ve only had 28 through Week 4.

Some games have been quasi-close with the leading team having the ball in the fourth quarter before extending to a two-score lead or running out the clock. I do not specifically track that number of games weekly, but I might need to start if this keeps up.

This season in Stat Oddity:

Buccaneers at Patriots: Now We Can Get on with the Important Games

After hearing for a week how this was the most “anticipated game of the season” and to see more promos for it than any non-Super Bowl game, you just know I have to vent a bit now that it’s over.

Yes, the most over-hyped regular-season game in NFL history is behind us, but I have to give them credit for playing a competitive, 60-minute game. The low-scoring chess match between Tom Brady and Bill Belichick was at least compelling, and the rain and injuries evened the playing field a bit for an outmatched New England roster.

If only we could have seen the Patriots win a game despite rushing for minus-1 yard (franchise record) and being minus-two in turnovers. But Brady getting his 50th fourth-quarter comeback win at the expense of a coaching blunder and missed field goal in that stadium was all too familiar.

This was really just the fourth all-time matchup of a legendary quarterback returning to face his former team, but on paper it was the weakest one of them all with Brady (of course) having the biggest advantages.

  • Joe Montana (1994 Chiefs) had to overcome a 49ers team led by MVP Steve Young in a 24-17 game where he threw for two touchdowns and a 101.9 passer rating.
  • Brett Favre (2009 Vikings) returned to Lambeau Field to take on the Aaron Rodgers-led Packers in a 38-26 win where he threw four touchdowns and a 128.6 passer rating.
  • Peyton Manning (2013 Broncos) took his team into Indianapolis on SNF to take on Andrew Luck in a 39-33 loss where he still threw for 386 yards and three touchdowns with a 96.1 passer rating.
  • Tom Brady, as only he can, got to celebrate a 19-17 homecoming win in New England against a team with rookie Mac Jones in a game where Brady had no touchdowns and a 70.8 passer rating.

Even in something as trivial as this, Manning takes the loss because the other quarterback was fantastic against his defense while Brady played the worst and still gets the only game-winning drive credit.

It never fails, does it? But I probably should have expected disappointment like this. I shouldn’t have expected Brady to throw for 300-plus yards and three or four touchdowns to his assortment of weapons. After all, Brady and Belichick have given us several of the lowest-scoring Super Bowls in NFL history, including 13-3 against the 2018 Rams. Brady just came off a 31-9 Super Bowl win. He’s the “we’re only going to score 17 points?” quarterback from Super Bowl 42 against the Giants, flopping hard on the big stage as he tried to throw deep and make memorable highlight plays to get to 19-0.

I saw some of that in this game as Brady’s deep ball was off. He was throwing high often. He had receivers open almost every play and adequate protection, but the rain and unprecedented emotions he was feeling about the situation probably played a bigger role than any specific game plan by Belichick. You could also tell Brady was missing Rob Gronkowski as the connection to Cameron Brate in particular looked out of sync. I’m not sure why Brady was throwing deep late to Antonio Brown other than to stick it to Belichick, because that was strategically the wrong move even if Brown had a good shot at making one of those throws a touchdown.

It was just not an impressive performance, and in hindsight, it makes those ridiculous props of Brady throwing for 555 yards or seven touchdowns look even funnier for this game.

You could easily argue that Mac Jones outplayed Brady on what was supposed to be his night. Jones even made a lot of classic Brady plays with the screens and play-action to a wide-open tight end to start the fourth quarter with a touchdown that put the Patriots on top. Jones even put the ball into danger multiple times on a go-ahead drive in the fourth, but the Buccaneers and their ravaged secondary did not make him pay. He completed 19 passes in a row at one point, tying Brady’s career-long streak. It’s too early for anyone to say if Jones is going to be the real deal, but you have to feel better with him after this game than you did a week ago when he played the Saints.

But Brady still gets the win after Belichick of all people mismanaged the final drive. The rain was coming down good at this point with New England down 19-17. Jones just had a pass knocked down to set up 4th-and-3 at the Tampa Bay 37 with 59 seconds left. The Buccaneers had a couple timeouts. You could try the 56-yard field goal, but that cannot be any better than a 50/50 shot, and it would leave Brady with nearly a minute (plus timeouts) to answer. That sounds bad. But if you can convert the fourth-and-3, that should be able to set up a last-second field goal from shorter distance.

That’s what I would have gone for, but Belichick reportedly did not even think about it. He sent out Nick Folk and the 56-yard field goal hit the left upright with 55 seconds left. Game over. Kickers are now 0-for-7 on clutch field goals of 50-plus yards against a Brady-led team. Folk has three of those seven misses, which only includes field goals in the final half of the fourth quarter or any time in overtime, tied or down 1-3 points). While this would have been a bigger miracle kick than most, it’s just something how Brady literally never ends up on the wrong side of these finishes.

In trying to find an old tweet, I stumbled on this research of mine that said the Patriots were 47-1 at home from 2001-2017 when a team threw 40 passes. That record was 53-1 a game into the 2019 season, but the Patriots have since gone 0-4 in these games, losing to Patrick Mahomes (Chiefs) and Ryan Fitzpatrick (Dolphins) with Brady at quarterback in 2019, and getting blown out by Josh Allen and the Bills (38-9) on Monday Night Football in 2020.

Now Brady did it to them last night on 43 throws, but he didn’t throw a touchdown pass. The record since 2001 for road teams that threw 40-plus passes without a touchdown and scoring fewer than 20 points was 8-174 (.044). Ho-hum.

With some better play in the red zone late in the game, the Patriots could easily be 3-1 right now. As I detailed in Week 1 when the Patriots lost to the Dolphins, Jones is quickly experiencing things it took years for Brady to see in New England, if he’s ever seen them at all in 22 years in the NFL. Let’s update a few of those that I said would be coming soon.

  • Mac Jones lost in his NFL debut with a 102.6 passer rating (29-of-39 for 281 yards, 1 TD, 0 INT).
  • It took Brady 79 starts and 18 losses to lose a game with a passer rating higher than 83.3. He was in his sixth season then.
  • Jones lost in his fourth NFL start vs. Tampa Bay with a 101.6 passer rating (31-of-40 for 275 yards, 2 TD, 1 INT).
  • It took Brady 137 starts and 30 losses to lose a second game with a passer rating higher than 100.0. He was in his 10th season then (it was 4th-and-2 Night).
  • It took Jones four starts to lose a game after a clutch field goal was missed.
  • It took Brady 183 starts to lose a game after a clutch field goal was missed (it’s happened once in 348 career starts).
  • It took Jones four starts to lose a game after leading in the fourth quarter.
  • It took Brady 66 starts to lose a game after leading in the fourth quarter. He threw four interceptions that night against the 2004 Dolphins, a 2-11 team.

A couple things I can say with certainty about Jones so far. He won’t melt in the rain like Davis Mills did for the Texans in Buffalo. But he’s also not destined to be the LOAT like Brady is. If he was, then he would have willed Folk to drill that kick followed by some random defender to intercept Brady to end the game.

This would have been a hell of a win for the Patriots, but now they can just focus on improving and getting back to winning important games in the AFC. Taking the division back from Buffalo. Frustrating Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs better than most have. All the Brady stuff is in the past and the Patriots have to cope with mediocrity for now.

You can’t take a picture of this – it’s already gone.

Steelers at Packers: The Standard Is the Standard

What did the Steelers do differently this week in Green Bay compared to their last 10 games with a broken offense? They scored an opening-drive touchdown! Ben Roethlisberger threw a dime for 45 yards to Diontae Johnson to take an early 7-0 lead.

Unfortunately, this was not a sign of things to come as the normal broken offense returned for the rest of the game. The defense had another letdown before halftime for the fourth week in a row, and the Packers led 27-10 in the third quarter after Aaron Rodgers went on a hot five-drive scoring streak to put up all of Green Bay’s points.

Najee Harris scored a late touchdown for the Steelers to make it 27-17, but it was too little too late after a couple more horrible fourth-down throws short of the sticks. The only reason I can think of Roethlisberger turning into Alex Smith this season is that he doesn’t want to throw more interceptions, since those tend to get quarterbacks benched. But his quick throws on fourth down that lose yards are unheard of. He never had such a play in his whole career, but he now has such a completion in back-to-back games.

But maybe no play better symbolizes how broken this offense is than this 2-yard completion to JuJu Smith-Schuster on 4th-and-5 where he extends the ball as far as he could and is still multiple yards short of the marker.

You have to love how taking a screenshot on Game Pass is worthless these days since the player details won’t disappear even after 10 seconds. App is about as worthless as this Pittsburgh offense.

Not pictured: James Washington pointing like JuJu got the first down. Hilarious. Sad. Fvcked.

In eight of their last 10 games following last year’s 11-0 start, the Steelers have allowed 23-27 points. In seven of their last 10 games, the Pittsburgh offense has scored 10-17 points. This consistency of being so painfully below average on offense and also below average on defense is just ridiculous.

And yet I still say anyone who thinks benching the future Hall of Famer with a cap number just south of $26 million this year for Mason Rudolph or Dwayne Haskins is crazy if they think that solves anything. It is broken and this coaching staff is not qualified to fix it.

NFC West: Tough Day for the McVay and Shanahan Fanboys

While I was busy hate-watching Steelers-Packers, the first two NFC West showdowns of the season took place. Both road dogs, the Seahawks and Cardinals, came through with big wins in games that were far from classics, but they could be seen as real turning points for these franchises in what has been the NFL’s most competitive division since 2012.

Los Angeles’ Sean McVay was 8-0 against Arizona and all but one of those games was won by double digits. He has Matthew Stafford now and they just had that outstanding win over Tampa Bay. I certainly let all of that play into my decision making for betting on this game, but I couldn’t have been more wrong on this one.

The Cardinals just went in there and kicked their ass in a 37-20 final that was never closer than 11 points in the second half. Arizona just may have built something special here as this is the high point of the Kliff Kingsbury era so far. The Cardinals have produced at least 31 points and 400 yards of offense in each of their first four games. That’s only been done by the 2007 Patriots, 2011 Patriots, and 2013 Broncos in NFL history. Two of those teams set the single-season scoring record and all three lost the Super Bowl.

Why not Arizona in the Super Bowl this season? This is what you draft a quarterback like Kyler Murray No. 1 overall for. Murray (80.4) finished sixth in QBR this week – his third top-six game in four weeks – while Stafford (50.2) was 17th in his weakest game yet for the Rams. The Los Angeles running game produced 17 carries for 100 yards, so you could argue it was their best running game of the season. Yet Stafford still had his worst passing game. The Rams were sitting on 13 points until a drive in garbage time. Robert Woods had 30 yards and a touchdown on that final drive but only 18 yards before it. He is averaging just 43 yards per game with Stafford this year, making it one of the least-productive months of his career. That connection has just not taken off yet, and even the Stafford-to-Cooper Kupp connection was off in this one. Cupp had 64 yards on 13 targets.

This will continue to be one of the more fascinating parts of 2021 as so far the running success seems to have no correlation with how Stafford is doing in that game each week. But the Rams were outclassed on both sides of the ball, and this team still has a ton of work to do before we think of it as the favorite in the division. That may have just transferred over to the Cardinals.

The Seahawks will still have their say in this division as long as Russell Wilson and Pete Carroll are there. After beating the 49ers again 28-21, Wilson has still never lost three games in a row in the same season. This week had a different script though. In recent weeks, the Seahawks started fast before fading. On Sunday, they punted five times to start the game, scored four touchdowns over their next six drives, then just held on while the 49ers tried to mount a 15-point comeback with Trey Lance taking over the half for an injured Jimmy Garoppolo (calf).

Lance hit on a 76-yard touchdown pass to Deebo Samuel after a hideous blown coverage, but he showed why he is a raw rookie in need of reps. It sounds like he will be getting them with Garoppolo expected to be out some time. Will it be permanent? That depends on how well Lance plays, but he’ll have to do better than this game.

But with Samuel off to a dominant start and George Kittle still healthy, Kyle Shanahan is really lacking in the excuses department if this offense does not start to take off regardless if it’s Garoppolo or Lance at quarterback.

Ravens Stop Denver from Moving to 4-0, Panthers Finally Trail This Season

No 3-0 teams surprised people more than the Panthers and Broncos, but both had to deal with legitimate offenses in their biggest challenges yet this season.

I liked the Cowboys (-4) against Carolina, but it was a dogfight into the third quarter. But after Zane Gonzalez missed a 54-yard field goal, Dallas’ offense really took off with balance and big plays. Dallas led 36-14 in the fourth quarter before Sam Darnold, who rushed for two more touchdowns as he apparently wants to crush Cam Newton’s single-season record, led back-to-back touchdown drives to make it 36-28 with just over four minutes left. But when you think maybe this was another Mike McCarthy team collapsing with a lead, the Cowboys put the game away on offense and denied Darnold the game-tying drive opportunity.

Dallas has been impressive this season. When the offense is balanced like this – Prescott had four touchdown passes and only 188 yards passing while the backs rushed for 210 yards – they are going to be a challenge for anyone in the league. Clearly, the Carolina defense boosted its stats against cupcakes in the first three weeks. But I wouldn’t just write off the Panthers this season. They do look legitimately improved and D.J. Moore is a legit No. 1 wide receiver. They probably missed the greatness of Christian McCaffrey as an outlet receiver to deal with the pass rush better in this one. Darnold was sacked five times.

I saw very little of Ravens-Broncos, but it doesn’t seem like there was much there. Both teams have a lot of injuries, but the Ravens still have better players to make up for it. Teddy Bridgewater left with a concussion and Drew Lock was no match for Baltimore’s defense.

Lamar Jackson had just his third 300-yard passing game in the NFL and he has thrown for at least 235 yards in all four games this season. The only other time he’s done that in his career was his four-game start to his 2019 MVP season. Marquise Brown held on this week and finished with 91 yards and a touchdown.

Like Carolina, the Broncos were abusing bad, inexperienced quarterbacks to beef up their stats, but Jackson took it to them in one of the most pass-centric games the Ravens have had with him. His 37 pass attempts are tied for his third-highest amount in a game.

The Ravens were actually in danger of not rushing for 100 yards in this game, something they had done in 38 straight games (including playoffs). But after getting the ball back with three seconds left and an insurmountable 23-7 lead, John Harbaugh had the team run Lamar for a 5-yard gain instead of taking a knee like anyone else would. That gave the Ravens 102 yards and a new record of 39 straight 100-yard games, beating out the 1973-76 Bills. This does end their record streak of 38 games with at least 110 rushing yards.

But when coaches tell you they don’t care about numbers or records, there’s a decent chance they are lying. Extending the record, which is ultimately meaningless like most things in life, by having your star quarterback run with three seconds left is the definition of cheap.

Maybe the Ravens get there easier if they could figure out their running back rotation better. Latavius Murray led the way with 18 carries while Le’Veon Bell (4 for 11 yards) and Devonta Freeman (one 4-yard run) also saw action with Ty’Son Williams a healthy scratch. Maybe they’re saving him? Either way, it would be a good thing for the Ravens to continue developing this passing game.

Chiefs at Eagles: Let’s Not Take This for Granted

The Chiefs ended their two-game slide with a commanding 42-30 win, or only their second win by more than six points since the middle of last season. The bad news: the 2021 Chiefs are now the 14th team in NFL history to allow more than 28 points in each of their first four games. The good news: a dozen of those teams started 0-4 and the other (2012 Titans) was 1-3. The Chiefs (2-2) are now back to .500 after nearly having a perfect game on offense that should not be taken for granted.

The Chiefs were 9-of-10 on third down and scored a touchdown on six of their seven drives. Every touchdown drive was at least 65 yards and all but one of them was 75-plus yards. Literally the only mistake all day was a Patrick Mahomes interception forced under pressure on a third down, the only third-down stop of the day for the Eagles.

The Chiefs did it differently by rushing for 200 yards while Tyreek Hill had 186 receiving yards and three touchdowns. No other Kansas City receiver had more than 23 yards through the air. Travis Kelce hadn’t been held to that little yardage and kept out of the end zone in a game with Mahomes since their first start together in 2018 against the Chargers.

But the Chiefs were spectacular on that side of the ball and still left something to be desired on defense. Granted, they limited the Eagles to three field goals in the first three quarters, and Philadelphia’s last touchdown was a garbage-time score with four seconds left.

We’ll see just how ready the Chiefs are for a real test when they get the Bills next Sunday night in another potential AFC Game of the Year. But six touchdowns on seven drives is insane production in the NFL.

Giants at Saints: Seriously, WTF?

No team has puzzled me more on a weekly basis in 2021 than the Saints. They killed Aaron Rodgers and the Packers in Week 1, which looks like we can safely call it a fluke. They were embarrassed 26-7 by the Panthers in Week 2, which looks like a combo of division familiarity, an improved Carolina team, and some injuries and COVID problems in the coaching staff. They picked off Mac Jones three times in New England last week and took advantage of the rookie and limited offense there.

But then this 27-21 overtime loss to the Giants happened in the Superdome with a full crowd on hand, and I am more confused than ever. At least Jameis Winston passed for over 200 yards in regulation this week, but how the hell does a team throw 26 passes and not have one go to Alvin Kamara? He had 26 carries for 120 yards but no touchdowns since Taysom Hill, the touchdown vulture who threw a pick, hijinks happened, and it was the first game in Kamara’s career with no targets.

That is inexcusable, especially with the given lack of weapons in the passing game. But speaking of weapons, how do you let Daniel Jones pass for 402 yards and make only the second fourth-quarter comeback of his career (he was 1-13) on a day where Sterling Shepard and Darius Slayton were inactive? It does not make sense. Jones had failed to pass for more than 280 yards in every start with Jason Garrett as his offensive coordinator since 2020. Yet here he was getting two huge plays for 50-plus yard touchdowns out of John Ross and Saquon Barkley. Both players also delivered in overtime with Barkley taking in the game-winning score from 6 yards out on the only drive of overtime.

This is New Orleans’ 19th loss as a favorite of more than seven points since Sean Payton came to coach the team in 2006. The Saints are 39-19 SU (.672) as a favorite of more than seven points since 2006. Only Washington (6-4) has a worse winning percentage in such games.

I really thought the Saints would play better at home on offense. In some ways, they definitely did. But there were some key misses in this game like Kamara only getting two yards on a 4th-and-3 run, settling for a 58-yard field goal that was missed and led to the Ross touchdown, the Hill interception right after a long Winston touchdown pass was negated by penalty, and not closing out in the fourth quarter.

If this is what the Saints are post-Brees, then I’m out. I want nothing to do with Kamara’s prop bets anymore and I can’t even trust them to beat the Giants in the Superdome. Granted, Payton has lost in this spot more than you’d like to see in his career, but this was a really bad loss for the team. Daniel Jones is only supposed to do this shit against the Washington franchise.

Titans and Lions: Extend the Game vs. End the Game

Finally, I just wanted to highlight two coaching decisions on Sunday. Last week, I was happy when Tennessee’s Mike Vrabel went for two with a seven-point lead. He has been a bit of a renegade in breaking norms on two-point conversions. So, it kind of shocked me when he did not have his Titans go for the win against the lowly Jets after getting a touchdown with 16 seconds left in the game.

The timing was excellent with the Jets out of timeouts. This is the ideal spot to do it in and it’s not like the Jets were doing a great job of stopping Derrick Henry in the game. Ryan Tannehill also found his rhythm late after playing the game without Julio Jones and A.J. Brown available.

If you’re playing a lousy team on the road and the offense is the strength of your team, why not go for the win? That extra point surprised me. The Jets almost ended this one immediately in overtime, but eventually did settle for a field goal and 27-24 lead. The Titans had a rough time answering, needing to convert two fourth downs, but they eventually got into field goal range. It looks like we were about to have a damn tie, but fortunately, Randy Bullock is a bum kicker. From 49 yards out, he was wide left in the final 20 seconds to end the game.

The Jets had their first win in the Robert Saleh era. Rookie quarterback Zach Wilson had his first 4QC/GWD and it is one he can feel good about after a rough first three weeks. Wide receiver Corey Davis (111 yards and a touchdown) had a sweet revenge game on his former team.

While I wanted the Titans to end the game on one play, the Detroit Lions made a mistake of not extending the game. It was a rough afternoon in Chicago for the Lions, but they were down 24-14 in the fourth quarter with the ball. The Jared Goff-led drive stalled, setting up a 4th-and-1 at the Chicago 8 with 4:19 left. I get that it’s tempting to go for it there, but you have to realize you are still down 10 points (two scores) and time is a factor. Even if you go for it and get it, there is still no guarantee you are getting a touchdown here. In three more snaps, you could be kicking a field goal anyway if there’s a bad snap – oh, they had one of THOSE on Sunday – or a sack. Kick the field goal, use your three clock stoppages to get the ball back, and then get a touchdown and go for two or play for overtime.

But the Lions went for it, Goff’s pass was incomplete, and the Bears ran out the final 4:15 on the clock thanks to the Lions being offsides on a punt. Incredibly, the Lions had five drives inside the Chicago 8, and they only scored one touchdown on them, turning the ball over twice on fumbles and twice on downs.

Again, it was a lousy performance for the Lions against a Chicago team that seemed to be on the brink of collapse. But the Bears turned things around and got their second win of the season while the Lions remain 0-4.

Matthew Stafford: 8-68 Vs. Teams with a Winning Record

~ Scott ~ 7 Comments

Maybe the Game of the Year in the NFC is coming to us quickly this Sunday in Los Angeles when the Rams host the Buccaneers. It could be the only major road challenge Tampa Bay, still a 1.5-point favorite, faces all year in this attempt to repeat as Super Bowl champions.

It’s also the biggest game of Matthew Stafford’s career, which no one seems to be playing up like they should.

Forget playing on Wild Card Weekend three times as an underdog with the Lions in seasons they weren’t going anywhere. This is a huge chance in his third game with the Rams for Stafford to show that he can be trusted in a big spot like this one, a game that could go a long way in determining home-field advantage in January.

“I just want to play in big games, you know? … I want to have opportunities to make big-time plays in the fourth quarter against really good teams, in big moments, rather than a one o’clock game on a Sunday somewhere,” Stafford told Seth Wickersham in a feature story on ESPN.

Well here you are, Matthew. There could be future opportunities in Green Bay (Week 12) and Baltimore (Week 17) to show what you’re made of on the road, but this is the defending champions in your building. It doesn’t get any bigger than that in the regular season.

The problem is Stafford played dozens of really good teams when he spent a dozen seasons in Detroit, and he didn’t come away with a dozen wins in those matchups.

The Incredible, Seemingly Impossible Matthew Stafford Record

Stafford is 8-68 (.105) as a starter in games against teams that finished the season with a winning record. It’s such a staggering record that I have to include the table (that barely fits on my screen anymore) of every game to prove that it’s legitimate.

Did Stafford play like an 8-68 quarterback in these games? Of course not. He had a few fine performances that still resulted in a loss because he was on the Detroit Lions and the other team was just better. However, some of those eight wins leave a lot to be desired too. Two were against teams that finished 8-7-1, including a 2013 Packers team that did not have Aaron Rodgers. He got a win over Rodgers in his 2014 MVP season, but it was a 19-7 game where Detroit’s defense carried the team. Stafford threw no touchdowns and two interceptions. His only other win against a team with 12+ wins was against the 2017 Vikings (13-3), and that too was a low-scoring game (14-7) where he failed to throw a touchdown.

While the problems Detroit had in the running game and defense were detrimental to Stafford having success in these games, it’s not like those problems hampered the team enough in every other game against non-winning teams. In fact, since 2001, Stafford joins just Teddy Bridgewater and Kirk Cousins as the only three quarterbacks to win over 70% of their starts against non-winning opponents and under 20% against winning opponents (min. 50 starts). That is plotted below with the trio chilling in the far left of the graph:

In going 8-68 against winning teams, Stafford has an 83.7 passer rating, 6.90 YPA, and 5.72 ANY/A, which factors in sacks. Those are not terrible numbers, but they are not that impressive for a franchise quarterback. I’ve plotted every quarterback’s win% against winning teams vs. their ANY/A in those games.

The fascinating part of this whole Stafford to Los Angeles experiment is to see if Sean McVay can get the best out of him and improve on what has been an eyesore of a resume in big games. Can you really get to a Super Bowl when you need to beat so many good teams along the way to finish with a seed high enough to make it realistic? Can you get through a Brady or Rodgers in January with this guy?

  • Stafford has never won more than one game against a winning team in the same season in his career, and he has never won consecutive games against winning teams in his career.
  • Stafford is 5-35 (.125) at home and 3-33 (.083) on the road against winning teams.
  • Stafford is 2-26 (.071) against teams that finished 12-4 or better.
  • Stafford is 0-48 when Detroit allowed more than 24 points against a winning opponent.
  • Stafford is 2-62 (.031) when Detroit allowed more than 17 points against a winning opponent.
  • Stafford is 39-51-1 (.434) at 4QC/GWD opportunities in his career, but that record drops to 2-34 (.056) against teams with a winning record.

How might this play out when Tampa Bay has won 10 games in a row and scored at least 26 points in all of them? At the very least, Stafford has notched a win over a Brady-led team that went on to win the Super Bowl (2018 Patriots), but the Buccaneers bring a lot more firepower to this matchup.

Stafford also comes armed with his best team. He is getting that McVay play-design boost with more YAC/completion than anyone not named Jimmy Garoppolo this season. For only the second time in his career, he has led his team to at least 27 points without throwing more than 30 passes in consecutive games. But people may be overstating just how great the Rams are. After all, Stafford did have Calvin Johnson and Golden Tate as his receivers with Ndamukong Suh leading the defense in an All-Pro season in 2014, the closest Stafford ever came to winning a playoff game (at Dallas). Now Suh is one of the cogs on Tampa Bay’s defensive line where Vita Vea has been dominant this season. The Bucs have not been scary good on defense yet, but they picked off Matt Ryan twice for touchdowns in the fourth quarter last week.

In Week 1 against the Bears, Stafford got off to a great start and had the first 150-plus passer rating game of his career. Practically a statement that this isn’t Detroit anymore, and he is going to feast on these play-action bombs. However, that Week 2 win in Indianapolis felt like a classic 1 P.M. Detroit win with Stafford. It was close, he had an interception, the special teams had a bad screw-up and gave up a touchdown to fall behind late, and Stafford got the job done and led a game-winning drive. Cooper Kupp was awesome on the day, but it’s not like the running backs (23 carries for 99 yards) were dominant or the defense destroyed Carson Wentz, who left injured and watched the backup throw the game away with an interception.

That Indianapolis game basically led me to believe that this is not going to be a super team with Stafford a la what Peyton Manning brought to the Broncos or Brett Favre to the Vikings in 2009. And yes, what Brady did with Tampa Bay last year, though his two-game start there was inferior to what Stafford has done so far. We have to remind ourselves that this is only two games, and there is no better chance for the Rams to make a statement about their contender status than with a great showing on Sunday.

This would be the kind of win that could reshape the whole outlook on the season.

The Goff Comparison

Of course, the other fascinating part to this matchup and the Stafford experiment is Jared Goff. With McVay as his coach, Goff was 17-16 (.515) against teams with a winning record and he was even 5-12 (.294) against winning teams that scored more than 24 points. Not 0-48.

But the game that really stands out this week was the 27-24 upset win in Tampa Bay last season. Goff led an 80-yard touchdown drive on the road to start it, fell behind 14-7, fought back to a halftime lead, then broke the tie twice in the second half, including a game-winning drive for a field goal. The defense finished off Brady, who was picked twice.

Goff also had two picks on an imperfect night, but McVay put the offense on his shoulders. Goff was 39-of-51 for 376 yards, 3 TD, 2 INT, and he took no sacks while the running game provided just 19 carries for 37 yards. Can Stafford do this against the Bucs this week? Stafford is 1-12 in his career when he throws at least 50 passes. Against teams that won exactly 10 games, Stafford was 1-17, beating the Packers in 2015 after Mason Crosby missed a game-winning field goal. That game is worth highlighting since it is the only time in his career that Stafford beat a winning team despite the Lions not rushing for at least 84 yards. Otherwise, the Lions were 0-46 in such games.

When Goff and McVay met the Bucs in 2019, it was a wild and sloppy 55-40 game with Goff turning it over four times. He threw 68 passes and the Rams ran the ball 11 times for 28 yards. The Bucs are really good at stopping the run and have been for a while now. With Darrell Henderson banged up, it is very likely (even if Henderson was healthy) that the Rams are going to get stopped cold in the running game on Sunday.

So it is going to be on Stafford to outduel Brady, the LOAT. He might catch a break with Antonio Brown testing positive for COVID, but Tampa Bay still has three outstanding receivers to work with and plenty more depth to use as well. Brady and Stafford are two of the least pressured quarterbacks this season, so it could be a passing fest and we’ll see who blinks first.

As much as I’d love to see Stafford destroy a Brady-led team like he did in 2018, I’m just not ready to trust him. I need to see it first, and then maybe I’ll believe he can do it again. But regardless of what happens on Sunday, Stafford is going to have to have big games against top teams in a way he never has in his NFL career if this trade is going to work out for the Rams. The NFC West is shaping up to be the toughest division in the NFL too, but right now the real litmus test in the NFC is facing Stafford and the Rams in the face on Sunday.

Final: Bucs 32, Rams 26

NFL 2020: Close Game Summary

~ Scott ~ 3 Comments

While 2020 may have felt like a year for comebacks in the NFL, let’s examine the data. There were 143 games (55.9%) that saw at least one team have a fourth-quarter comeback or game-winning drive opportunity, which is a possession by the team tied or down 1-to-8 points. That is in line with recent years: 142 in 2019, 147 in 2018, and 139 in 2017.

So, the crowd-less, COVID season did not produce any shift in the closeness of games. There were just 43 double-digit comeback wins from deficits at any time in the game, which is an increase of nine or 10 games over 2019 (33) and 2018 (34).

The 2020 season featured 58 fourth-quarter comeback (4QC) wins and 76 game-winning drives (GWD). That is remarkably close to the numbers last regular season with 56 4QC and 77 GWD. This is the third time in the last four seasons that 4QC numbers fell under 60 for the season after ranging from 68 to 73 every year from 2011 to 2016. We also can thank the NFC East for oddities, such as the season’s lone tie when the Eagles came back late on the Bengals, and the only non-offensive game-winning score of 2020 was a fumble return touchdown by the Giants against Washington.  

Success rate for 4QC attempts was 30.0%, or just about average. GWD success rate was in the usual ballpark of 35.0% (2019 was 35.9%).

The following table shows a summary of each team’s success in close games this season. First, the offense’s record in games with a 4QC opportunity is shown. Next is the overall 4QC/GWD record, which also includes the games where the score was tied in the fourth quarter or overtime. For the defense, holds are games where the defense was successful in defending a one-score lead in the fourth quarter or overtime.

The number of games lost in which the team had a fourth-quarter lead is also shown. The last section shows the team’s overall record in close games, which are defined as games involving a 4QC/GWD opportunity on either side of the ball. Playoff teams are highlighted in gray. The table is in descending order of close game win percentage.

This information can be very useful for previewing the playoffs (which teams haven’t blown a lead and which struggle to hold them) or thinking about regression in 2021 for teams that won or lost a lot of close games.

More than usual, the playoff teams had the best records in close games with 11 of the top 12 teams qualifying for the playoffs. The only outlier happens to be Detroit, which was 4-2 in close games but 1-9 in non-close games. That is because of all the ass-kickings this team took this season, including Thanksgiving against Houston, losing 20-0 to P.J. Walker and the Panthers, and that demolition performed by Tampa Bay on a Saturday afternoon.

Washington (5-5) and the Rams (4-4) were only .500 in close games, but that is not uncommon for the coaching careers of Ron Rivera and Sean McVay. The most interesting playoff team here is Baltimore. For the second year in a row, the Ravens played in a league-low five close games. Last year, they were so dominant that they were 5-0 in close games. This year, the Ravens again finished with the best scoring differential (+165) in the NFL and led the league with nine wins of 14+ points. However, they were only 2-3 in close games, including a blown lead and overtime loss to the Titans in Week 11. Now the Ravens will have to avenge some past losses if they are to get back to the Super Bowl.

The Chiefs, Saints, and Titans are the only teams to not blow a late lead this year, though none of those defenses were tested more than four times in close games. The Titans were also bailed out heavily by their offense, including yesterday in Houston. Ryan Tannehill led the most 4QC (five) and GWD (six) in the league this season. Only Buffalo (6-1) tied the Titans for the best record in close games this season. No one really comes close to the 6-1 record the Titans had at GWD opportunities, and the only loss was against Pittsburgh after Stephen Gostkowski missed a field goal to force overtime.

The Seahawks may have blown a double-digit lead in Arizona in prime time this year, but otherwise, Seattle led the league with nine holds of a one-score lead, or two more than any team in 2020. The Seahawks were 9-2 in close games a year after finishing 7-2. It wasn’t as obvious this year since it wasn’t always Russell Wilson leading comebacks like he did on Sunday against the 49ers. But it’s those drives late in games to put away the Patriots, Cowboys, Cardinals, Washington, etc. that added up for Seattle’s 12-4 season. Now if only they can get the offense going like it was early in the season to match with the way the defense has played down the stretch. Then Seattle would have a fair shot of getting to the Super Bowl.

A year ago, the Packers were living off close game success, going 10-1 with eight holds and no blown leads. They added another hold in the playoffs against Seattle before getting blown out by the 49ers in the NFC Championship Game. This year the Packers are again 13-3, but it has come much differently with many more points scored. The Packers are still 5-2 at close games with five holds and one blown lead against the Colts.

The Eagles (15) and Chargers (14) played more close games than anyone. After winning some late in the season, the Chargers actually finished 6-8 in them while the Eagles limped to a 4-10-1 finish. The 10 failed 4QC/GWD (plus a tie) by the Eagles were the most in the league.

The 1995 expansion teams, Jaguars (1-7) and Panthers (2-9), had the worst records in close games this season. Jacksonville came back to beat the Colts in Week 1 and lost out the rest of the season, or what I’d call a “Weinke” as a nod to Chris Weinke and the 2001 Panthers, who also finished 1-15 with a 15-game losing streak.

The Panthers headlined five teams with a winless record at GWD opportunities. Carolina was 0-9 in a brutal year in crunch time for Teddy Bridgewater and Matt Rhule. The Falcons (0-7) did not have a single 4QC/GWD for the first time ever in the Matt Ryan era.

A year ago, I said that Houston could be a team to watch for with regression after 11 4QC/GWD in 2018-19. The Texans were 0-7 in their opportunities this year. The Jets (0-6) and Giants (0-5), with terrible offenses, were not surprisingly winless in these situations too.

It was a close battle, but the right team won in the end. The Atlanta Falcons led the league with five blown leads in the fourth quarter, beating out the Chargers and Texans with four each. All three teams fired their head coach this season. Atlanta (4-12) finishing dead last in the NFC despite only a -18 scoring differential is a shocker, but that’s what happens when you blow such winnable games in incredible fashion like the Falcons did this year.

In fact, the 2020 Falcons are hands down the best team to finish last in a conference in the 32-team era. I would advise owner Arthur Blank not to hang a banner for this achievement, but it is the closest thing the Falcons have to a trophy from this miserable, no good, rotten season.

NFL Stat Oddity: Week 12

~ Scott ~ 9 Comments

We came into Thanksgiving with one 41-25 final in NFL history, and left Sunday with two more of them in four days. Houston’s 41-25 win over Detroit ended Matt Patricia and GM Bob Quinn, and it also vaulted Deshaun Watson into No. 1 all-time in passer rating.

Sunday night was a 41-25 victory by the Packers and former record holder Aaron Rodgers over the Bears. It was a bumpy ride in between, with the Broncos literally having no quarterback to face the Saints, and we are still waiting to see if Ravens-Steelers is really happening this week.

Oh yeah, some guy named Patrick Mahomes hit 1,500 career attempts and now officially qualifies for rate statistics.

Previous weeks in Stat Oddity:

I Fvcking Love Patrick Mahomes: Week 12 at Buccaneers

Forget the GOAT. What about the perfect quarterback?

The perfect quarterback would be one without a weakness who never has a bad game. This would sound asinine to bring up a couple years ago, but through 47 games of his career, Patrick Mahomes has shown no weakness and he has never had a legitimately bad game.

On Sunday, he had one of his best games yet.

The marquee game of Week 12 was Kansas City at Tampa Bay, and wow, did the Chiefs fire the cannons early. The Mahomes to Tyreek Hill connection has never been better than it was in this game. In the first quarter alone, Hill had 7 catches, 203 yards, 2 TD. The Chiefs led 17-0 and only some issues in the red zone (strip-sack, three straight throwaways) prevented them from scoring 30 in the first half.

On 15 targets, Hill finished with 13 catches, 269 yards and 3 TD. In NFL history, only two other receivers ever hit all three of those marks in a game. Jerry Rice had 14/289/3 for the 49ers against the 1995 Vikings. Jimmy Smith had 15/291/3 for the Jaguars against the vaunted 2000 Ravens.

The 2020 Buccaneers have had a rough month on defense, but this was dynamic stuff from the Chiefs. The Buccaneers and Ravens have been labeled as Super Bowl contenders this year, but in both games on the road, the Chiefs went in there and piled up over 500 yards of offense on each of them in wins.

It actually feels like a disappointment that the Chiefs only scored 27 points given the 543 yards, including 490 total yards from Mahomes. But again, they had the red zone problems in the first half and then three straight punts in the second half, including a would-be 89-yard touchdown pass to Mecole Hardman that the receiver dropped after it was just a little behind him. The Chiefs also punted on drives after Le’Veon Bell was stuffed on two runs (including 3rd-and-2), and on a fourth-quarter drive that was plagued by so many penalties it ended when Mahomes almost fit in a ball on 3rd-and-27 that would have at least set up an important field goal.

You basically have to hope this offense beats itself to have a chance.

However, even after the Buccaneers made it 27-24, Mahomes delivered in the four-minute offense again, draining the final 4:10 on the clock by gaining three first downs (two via his legs, one final third-down dagger to Hill). Mahomes and the Chiefs have been money in the four-minute offense going back to late last season:

You would have expected more from Tom Brady seeing as how CBS commentator Tony Romo deflated his balls for three hours in a way he hasn’t enjoyed since probably his New England days.

Honestly, if Romo never does another Brady game, it would be a gift to the football world. He could not find any fault with anything Brady has been doing this season, or even in this game where he started by sailing several passes nowhere close to a receiver. Romo saw drops when there was only inaccuracy, he saw miscommunication when balls flew over open receiver’s heads, and he thought a checkdown to Leonard Fournette that lost yards was “awesome” before basically blaming Brady missing an open receiver on the Bucs not running this play enough.

Not even John Madden would have stooped to this level of ass-sucking for Brett Favre during his 2005-06 rough patch in Green Bay. It was that atrocious to listen to.

Meanwhile, the player in this game who actually looks like he could be the greatest to ever play it, adds another memorable game to his growing list. This is the first time Mahomes has won a game in regulation in which he threw more than 45 passes (49).

Now that he has 1,500 career attempts, all those records like highest passer rating, most passing yards per game, and most passing touchdowns per game officially are in Mahomes’ name.

Romo still believes this is going to be the Super Bowl matchup in Tampa in February. After seeing Tampa Bay as of late, that doesn’t seem too likely. However, it does seem more than likely that we’ll watch the Buccaneers in the Wild Card round, and after falling behind by double digits, the TV analyst will remind us that Brady didn’t have a preseason with this team and they’re still figuring things out. You know, very normal things you would bring up about a team in their 17th game of the season.

Modern NFL audiences don’t really know how to handle the best team having the legitimately best quarterback at the same time.

As long as Peyton Manning was around, Tom Brady was not the best QB when the Patriots were the best team.

Troy Aikman in Dallas was never the best QB in the league; not when Brett Favre and Steve Young were around.

Yes, Joe Montana with the 49ers. For a brief period in 1989-90 this dynamic existed, but keep in mind the dynasty of the 80s was a toss-up until the 49ers repeated and won their fourth in 1989. Don’t just forget about the brutal period of 1985-87 where they lost three playoff games in a row and Montana was almost replaced permanently by Young. Montana won MVP in 1989 and 1990, but the three-peat was not to be after Montana was injured and Roger Craig fumbled against the Giants in the 1990 NFC Championship Game. Earlier in the decade when Montana had two rings and uneven playoff performances, the Redskins beat them to three rings and Dan Marino was the dominant, record-setting quarterback for 1983-87. Montana really didn’t get back on top until that 1988 playoff run led into a historic 1989 season.

I’ll always be fond of the Steelers and can admit this was before my time, but I have little doubt that Roger Staubach – not Terry Bradshaw – was the best quarterback in the 1970s. Just like how I’d say the same about Johnny Unitas when Bart Starr (reality: Vince Lombardi) was leading the Packers to five championships in the 60s.

It would be a massive disappointment if this Chiefs team did not have a dynasty run, or at least end this historic drought of a repeat champion. This is different than the 2009-10 Saints or 2010-11 Packers or 2013-14 Seahawks. They’re different mostly because of Mahomes.

He’s Perfect Pat, or Patrick “Mr. Perfect” Mahomes. Are those good nicknames? Beats me. How do people say Tom Terrific and not feel their soul melt? All I know is in 15 years, I hope I’m still here to see Mahomes playing great, and that Tony Romo will be there giving him fellatio for a full broadcast.

Saints at Broncos: Fake Diesel vs. Fake Razor Ramon

It is still hard to believe this game happened the way it did in Denver. The Broncos had all four quarterbacks sidelined with COVID-19 due to Jeff Driskel’s positive test and the failure of the rest of the crew to wear masks. I get that they did wrong, but you’re going to tell me you can delay games a week (like Patriots-Broncos), or several days in Baltimore’s case, but not push this one back a day or two so the Broncos could develop some sort of offensive game plan? They had not even 24 hours before it was ruled on Saturday that those quarterbacks were ineligible to play. The point spread went from Denver +6 to Denver +17, and even that proved to be too generous.

It’s bad enough Taysom Hill was pretending to be a starting quarterback in place of Drew Brees, but now this? Imagine if the WWF in 1994 scheduled Diesel vs. Razor Ramon as the main event on Monday Night Raw, then put fake Diesel and fake Razor out there and acted like everything was legit. That was this game.

Fake Razor Ramon vs. Fake Diesel

Clearly, the integrity of the game was sacrificed by letting this game happen on Sunday. The Broncos lost 31-3, completed 1-of-9 passes for 13 yards with two interceptions, and took one sack as they started running back Phillip Lindsay in the Wildcat before using practice squad wide receiver Kendall Hinton as the “quarterback” for the game.

The teams combined for 75 net passing yards, the fewest in an NFL game since the 2009 Jets-Bengals finished with 63 in a season finale NBC was stuck televising since it pushed Mark Sanchez and Rex Ryan’s Jets into the playoffs. The Bengals just wanted to rest Carson Palmer and company before losing to the Jets in the Wild Card the next week too.

The Broncos are the first team to complete one pass in a game since the legendary Cody Pickett performance in 2005 for the 49ers against the Bears.

Maybe the most depressing stat: despite trailing by 14-28 points the whole second half, the Broncos attempted just three pass plays after halftime. They wanted to get this embarrassment over with. The game finished in a speedy 2 hours and 40 minutes.

The Saints won 31-3 despite Taysom Hill completing 9 passes for 78 yards with three sacks. Last week, Alvin Kamara had the first game of his career with zero catches. This week, he had one catch, but for -2 yards.

What a mess. To be honest, I wish the Broncos would have tried some more trick plays. You basically had a free week to do anything you wanted without any real criticism. It’s an outright shame that Hinton was the only Denver player to throw a pass. Jerry Jeudy should have thrown one. They should have done a fake punt. Lindsay could have thrown a pass to Hinton, who is a wide receiver after all. He’s just never played in the NFL before Sunday, and that was the big problem.

At least if this happened in past years to a team like Pittsburgh, they could have put Hines Ward or Antwaan Randle El in the emergency QB spot. They not only had college QB experience, but they knew the playbook well from playing receiver. Hinton is a nobody from the practice squad. That’s also likely why we didn’t see much from Denver as there just was not enough time to get him ready to run plays. Still, drawing up a few things in the dirt on the sideline during the game should have happened to make this a bit more fun to watch.

Instead it will just go down as one of the saddest game experiences in NFL history.

Old-School New England Win

This might sound familiar. The undermanned Patriots, hosting a playoff-hopeful team from Arizona, picked up a 20-17 win on a long, clutch, last-second field goal after the Patriots’ quarterback had a lousy game (but got benefit of the doubt on a controversial penalty), the defense made a red-zone stop on fourth down before halftime, and the opposing kicker blew a go-ahead field goal with 1:47 left.

Just like how you used to draw them up, right Billy Boy?

I picked the Patriots to win this game, because I thought Kliff Kingsbury would shit his pants in his first game against Belichick. I think it’s fair to say he did just that. Kingsbury decided to go for a 4th-and-1 at the NE 1 to end the first half, leading 10-7. It’s really not a bad decision, but you lose the benefit of putting New England in poor field position if it doesn’t work, because this was to end the half. So you’re basically passing on three free points while also getting the ball first in the third quarter. Also, the Cardinals were getting solid pressure on Cam Newton and already hit him to force an interception. He didn’t look capable of leading a big offensive output in this one. I take my 13-7 lead into halftime and prepare my double score on the next drive.

But Kenyan Drake was stuffed, adding another memorable goal-line stand to a defense that has the most of anyone in the last two decades. The Cardinals also didn’t score for several more drives, and Kyler Murray’s interception set up a short field that Newton took advantage of for a go-ahead touchdown.

Arizona tied the game at 17 in the fourth quarter on a drive that took forever and was aided by multiple penalties on the Patriots. Newton’s second pick with 4:27 left seemed like it would prove costly, but Kingsbury screwed up again. Remember that big boy aggression he showed before halftime? He faced 4th-and-1 at the NE 27 with 1:52 left after the Patriots used their final timeout. That means he had a chance to convert and set up the game-winning field goal as the final play of the game. Kicking here, with your obviously shaky kicker, means you’re banking on a 45-yard field goal and your defense to stop Newton in four-down mode with almost two full minutes.

I know it would sound sacrilegious even 5-10 years

ago to bypass a field goal here, but the game has changed. Even bad offenses can get into field goal range quickly enough now given four downs, a heavy reliance on passing, mobile quarterbacks, and a lot of kickers can make from 50-plus now.

Kingsbury cowered again, and for the third time this year, Zane Gonzalez missed a clutch field goal. The Patriots almost went three-and-out, but Newton was able to scramble for 14 yards on 3rd-and-13, plus 15 more yards for a high hit that was however in bounds. That call was shaky and basically put New England in field goal range. Nick Folk hit from 50 yards out and the Patriots are now 5-6.

The three worst QBR games in a win this season have all happened in this stadium.

Lowest ESPN QBR in a win, 2020

  • 1. Cam Newton vs. Cardinals – 6.6
  • 2. Drew Lock at Patriots – 13.8
  • 3. Cam Newton vs. Raiders – 21.2

Maybe it’s a good thing fans aren’t there to watch this.

It was just in Week 9 against Miami when Gonzalez missed a 49-yard game-tying field goal with 1:53 left in a 34-31 loss where Murray was outstanding. Murray was far from outstanding in this game, but he played better than the winning QB, Newton.

This also means that in November 2020 alone, Kyler Murray (two) has lost more games after his kicker missed a clutch field goal than Tom Brady (one) has had in his 338-game career.

Interestingly enough, Brady’s lone loss was in 2012 against the Cardinals when Stephen Gostkowski missed from 42 yards out in a 20-18 loss. Before you say luck evens out, not so fast. When these teams met in 2016, Arizona lost 23-21 after Chandler Catanzaro missed a 47-yard field goal with 36 seconds left in a game Jimmy Garoppolo started for a suspended Brady.

Two decades of the best clutch kicking skill (and luck) for New England.

Justin Herbert’s First Bad Game

Well, it was fun while it lasted to say that, like Patrick Mahomes, Justin Herbert doesn’t have bad games. The rookie had seven straight games with multiple touchdown passes, but only threw one in Sunday’s 27-17 loss at Buffalo. Herbert had a bad interception that set up Buffalo’s final field goal and the two-score margin. It is also only the second time Herbert was held under 20 points as a starter. The last time was his second start against Carolina, a game where he still threw for 330 yards and would have had a game-winning touchdown pass if a beautiful lateral pitch was not dropped by Austin Ekeler.

Ekeler returned to action on Sunday with mixed results. He only rushed for 44 yards on 14 carries, and Herbert seemed to rely on him too much in the passing game, completing 11-of-16 targets for 85 yards.

Herbert failed to get any completion of over 15 yards against a shaky Buffalo defense until he threw a 55-yard Hail Mary on 4th-and-27 in the closing minute, down 10 points. That could have saved the spread (+4.5), the over, and given him another multi-touchdown pass and 24+ point start, but the Chargers bungled the situation in the most Charger way possible. Instead of running up to spike the ball or throw another pass with 25 seconds left, the Chargers ran Ekeler for a yard to the 1-yard line. By the time the Chargers ran another play there were only 8 seconds left. Keep in mind they clearly needed a quick touchdown, then an onside kick recovery with enough time to set up a field goal. The run call was just inexcusable in that situation.

Earlier in the quarter, head coach Anthony Lynn called a timeout before still kicking a field goal on 4th-and-4. The field goal was fine. The problem was burning the timeout, and he didn’t even burn it quickly to save clock. Also, he went for a 4th-and-1 at the Buffalo 25 to start the quarter when the Chargers were down 10 when he should have been kicking then. That way he could go for it on fourth down next time, down a touchdown.

Oh yeah, Lynn also flirted with a fourth down before halftime at midfield before calling a timeout at 21 seconds before punting. Why not just go for it? If not, why use a timeout? Make Buffalo use a timeout to get the ball back.

Joey Bosa (3.0 sacks and fumble recovery) was amazing, Herbert was disappointing, and Buffalo’s offense was a bummer too to be honest. But Lynn was also a real sore spot for the Chargers, now 3-8, and I think that’s why we will see a change at head coach for the Chargers in 2021.

Adios, Matt Patricia (Who’s Next?)

With the Matt Patricia era over in Detroit, I must point out just how laughably bad he was in managing close games. Patricia’s Lions were 3-15-1 (.184) in fourth-quarter comeback opportunities and 5-16-1 (.250) in all game-winning drive opportunities. Here is how that stacks up to the other 31 current coaches:

You can see Patricia had the worst record of anyone in at least their third season. Of the coaches below him, you have Matt Rhule at 0-7 with Carolina. He is safe as a first-year coach, but there is no denying that offense has been a big disappointment with Teddy Bridgewater and company when it comes to closing out games. On Sunday, they blew an 11-point lead in the fourth quarter to the Vikings, not known for many comebacks with Kirk Cousins. Rhule committed the deadly sin of kicking a field goal to take a 6-point lead with nearly a full two minutes left. He did it facing a fourth-and-goal at the 3 too. Cousins marched down for the game-winning touchdown while the Panthers in return missed on a 54-yard field goal to end the game.

Meanwhile, Zac Taylor and Joe Judge met in likely the only game they’ll ever meet in the NFL (as head coaches at least) as the Giants beat the Bengals 19-17. Taylor (0-12-1) and Judge (0-5) have a combined 0-17-1 record at game-winning drive opportunities. The Giants were up 19-10 with under four minutes to play despite having to finish the game with Colt McCoy after Daniel Jones was injured. The Bengals were in this one with Brandon Allen at QB and even got the ball back at the 50 with 57 seconds to go, only needing a field goal. That’s a great situation to be in, and it likely sets up a field goal if Joe Burrow was still the quarterback. However, on the very first play Allen took a sack and fumbled to end the game.

Taylor is 0-22-1 when the Bengals trail after the 12:00 mark of the third quarter.

Do you know who else got a pass for losing his quarterback for half the season in his second year? Matt Patricia (2019). Maybe the Bengals ought to be thinking about “two-and-done” in this case. That’s still an improvement over what one-and-done usually means in Cincinnati.