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As Seasons Turn

28 Wednesday Oct 2020

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The NFL season feels as if is nearing the turn. We are looking at the week eight games coming up, the trade deadline is next Tuesday when the US goes to the polls (although many have already voted) and after week nine all teams will have played half of their sixteen games. It might simply be because the clocks have just gone back in the UK, but it feels as like we are properly into the autumn now, but I don’t want to wish away the year so let’s take a look at what happened in the week seven games.

What I Saw

The week seven Thursday night game was a slightly odd spectacle that saw the New York Giants fall behind the Eagles as the team from Philadelphia marched on their opening drive of the game to score a touchdown, then work their way back to take a 21-10 lead with under ten minutes left on the clock, but the Giants ultimately lost 21-22. The big talking point out of this game was Daniel Jones running for eighty yards and tripping over with no one near him only eight yards from the end zone. However, it is perhaps the play of Eagles’ quarterback Carson Wentz that is the most significant for the rest of the season. As I mentioned earlier, the Eagles moved the ball smartly on their opening drive, but after this initial six and a half minutes or so, Wentz looked like he was broken, trying to do to much rather than throw the ball away as the offence really struggled. Now with the injuries on the offensive line and at the skills positions there are some valid reasons for this, but it’s the stark disparity between this bad football and then Wentz finding his way in the fourth quarter to lead his team back that is confusing. Wentz finished the game with three-hundred and fifty-nine passing yards and two touchdowns to go with his interception, but he needs to find a way to lessen the lows to give his team a better chance of winning each week. Even with all their injuries the Eagles probably look best placed to win an NFC East division where all the teams are struggling, but if they can beat the Cowboys in the Sunday night game then their week nine bye could be the very real moment where they can try to get some players back healthy. Meanwhile, for all the Giants’ struggles this season, they have kept the last three games close and beaten the Washington Football Team in the process, but this week’s game against the Buccaneers is going to be a very different level of test.

The pick of the games when I checked the schedule for week seven was the unbeaten Pittsburgh Steelers visiting the unbeaten Tennessee Titans and ultimately winning out 27-24. The Steelers built a commanding 24-7 lead in the first half and was able to hold on for the win despite a strong comeback from the Titans in the second half. That said, the Steelers continue to show great balance in all three phases of the game, and even if their offence did slip out of the top ten by DVOA this week, they have a number of good young receivers that meant that with the Titan’s focussing on rookie sensation Chase Claypool they still were able to amass two hundred and fifty yards of passing offence. The defence looks to have coped despite the loss of linebacker Devin Bush and whilst the loss doesn’t change my mind about the Titans, you can definitely see why the Steelers are the sole unbeaten team in the NFL right now, but their schedule doesn’t get any easier this week as they take on the rested Ravens.

The Cleveland Browns played and entertaining game with the Cincinnati Bengals in a game that was decided by who had the ball last as neither defences were able to consistently stop each other. It was Baker Mayfield who was able to drive the Browns seventy-five yards in under a minute to seal the game 37-34 with a touchdown pass to Donovan Peoples-Jones. Rookie quarterback Joe Burrow continues to impress for the Bengals and threw for over four hundred yards this week, but a promising set of receivers does not a winning offence make and with continued issues on the offensive line as well as the defense we know what the Bengals are this season. There are some who think that this is okay as another poor record will secure the Bengals another high draft pick to build the team with, but there have been problems on the o-line and defence for too long now for me to be certain that the current regime can succeed in that endeavour. The Browns continue to make me think that they are on the right track, and even if Baker Mayfield is not the long term at quarterback, a 5-2 record is not to be sneezed at and this is not your usual 2.0 version of the Browns that have only made the play-offs once in the twenty-two seasons since the franchise returned in 1999.

The final game I saw this weekend was the rip-roaring game between the Arizona Cardinals and the Seattle Seahawks that saw the Cardinals manage to kick the game winning field goal in overtime on the second attempt having handed the ball back to the Seahawks on second down the previous drive after their first game winning attempt was missed. For all that there were some questionable decisions late in the game, this was a highly entertaining matchup where the defensive play of the contest was made by Seahawks receiver DK Metcalf chased Cardinals Safety Budda Baker down after he intercepted a Russell Wilson pass and ran it the length of the field, expecting to get the touchdown when Metcalf not only made up the yards to catch Baker but then made a great tackle. It was a game turning play because even if the Seahawks ultimately lost, they stopped the Cardinals from scoring in the following drive and then marched the ball down the field to score themselves and in this close a contest that really mattered. However, the three interceptions Wilson threw meant his continued production was not enough for the Seahawks to win the game this time. The NFC West is a monster of a division in 2020, with all four teams having winning records and if this game is anything to go by, there will be plenty more great divisional games to come during the rest of the season.

What I Heard

There has been lots of discussion about the trade deadline next week, not least because the salary cap is going to come down significantly next season thanks to the revenue drop from not having full stadiums. Already we have had some players moving including a disgruntled Carlos Dunlap heading from the Bengals where he is their all time sack leader to a Seahawks team who desperately need some pass rush.

It feels like because of the complexities of football the possible upsides from such trades is unlikely to match the fan excitement, but I do wonder if we will see more action because of the effects of Covid-19 and we have all ready seen teams signing veterans to the practice squad so they can get a longer look at them and get the player acclimatise before they have to carry them on the roster. The best teams are always looking to make best use of the rules they can so we have to see if someone can make a material improvement to how their team looks.

What I Hope

With the Bengals are hosting the Titans this weeken,d I fear for our run defence against Derrek Henry so I mainly hope we can keep the game competitive and Burrow healthy.

What I am really excited about is the chance to watch Tua Tagovailoa make his first start for the Dolphins against the Rams, and I just hope the bold prediction Dan forced me to make on the pod doesn’t coincide with something bad happening to Tua.

2020 Week Seven Picks

25 Sunday Oct 2020

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I am so annoyed with myself regarding the result of the Thursday night game because as much the numbers were telling me one thing, I wrote that the Giants had been playing hard, I knew that the Eagles were fighting injuries and I don’t know why I thought the Eagles were going to be four points clear. Luckily Dan made the same mistake but I need to make sure that I am careful with the lines that I am offered in what looks to be a tough week of picks.

Early Games:

The king of the early games is the unbeaten Pittsburgh Steelers taking on the unbeaten Tennessee Titans in a something has got to give match that is my game of the week. The Titans have come back strongly from their Covid-19 outbreak and won two games in six days but their defense is creaking and not as strong as last year whilst the Steelers are top ten in all phases of the game. I haven’t had a chance to watch the Steelers yet this season so I am really looking forward to seeing if Ryan Tannehill can maintain his level of performance against the league’s second ranked defense by DVOA as well as what physical feat Derek Henry can manage next. This is a meeting of two hard nosed football teams and is not one to be missed.

The other game I am really interested to see the result of is the New Orleans Saints coming of a bye hosting the 3-3 Carolina Panthers. This should be a fun divisional matchup where the Panthers may have lost to the Bears last week, but they will still pose a stiff challenge to a Saints team that just hasn’t clicked this season despite their talent on paper.

My thoughts on the other early games:

  • Both the Lions and the Falcons are coming off wins, but the Lions are going to need to do a lot more to convince whilst we will soon find out if the Falcons turn around last week was a bounce back after their coach was fired or if it is something that can be built upon.
  • The Bills have lost two tough games in a row and some cracks are showing in their defense so a trip to face the Jets is probably just the pick me up they need. I’m not sure about the line, particularly with a number of Bills’ players testing positive for Covid-19, but it’s hard to see where the Jets are going to get a win from at this point.
  • The second battle of Ohio of the year gives the Bengals a chance to avenge their earlier loss against a Browns team whose quarterback situation is even murkier with Baker Mayfield nursing injured ribs. The Bengals need to learn how to finish having taken a twenty-one point early lead against the Colts last week so we shall have to see if the coaching staff can get things heading in the right direction.
  • The Cowboys were abysmal on Monday and the noise surrounding the coaching staff this week were not exactly encouraging although Mike McCarthy does have a point about anonymous sources. Still, if the Cowboys can’t be a struggling Washington team then it could well be time for full panic stations in Dallas for those who are not there already.
  • The Packers will want to prove that last week’s performance was a one off, and it will certainly help that no-one can confuse the Texans defense with the Bucs separated as they are by twenty-four places in the DVOA rankings. The Texans are a team that I need to watch soon to get a better feel for them but I think their offence could give the Packers defense some problems so this could be one of the more entertaining games of the week.

Lions @ Falcons (-2.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Lions
Dan’s Pick:      Falcons

Bills @ Jets (+12.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Jets
Dan’s Pick:      Bills

Browns @ Bengals (+3.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Bengals
Dan’s Pick:      Browns

Cowboys @ Washington (+3.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Washington
Dan’s Pick:      Cowboys

Packers @ Texans (+3.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Packers
Dan’s Pick:      Packers

Panthers @ Saints (-7.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Panthers
Dan’s Pick:      Panthers

Steelers @ Titans (+2.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Titans
Dan’s Pick:      Titans

Late Games:

The highlight of the late games for me is the Tampa Bay Buccaneers riding high from their convincing win over the Packers travelling to take on the high scoring Raiders coming of the bye. I clearly don’t have a great feel for Raiders as in week five I stated they would struggle against the Chiefs with their defense ranked in the thirties by DVOA and yet they won that gamet. That said, the Buccaneers defense is a very different proposition to the Chiefs and with the Raiders only managing seven sacks so far this season you can seen Tom Brady being comfortable and picking apart that same thirtieth ranked defense. If the Buccaneers can get more of their receives healthy and in sync with the Buccaneers they could be very scary by the end of the year and this will be a good test of how serious a threat they are.

Late game thoughts:

  • The Chiefs are giving a lot of points to a Broncos team who have won two straight including prevailing over the Patriots last week. I do not think the Broncos have a defense that can stymie the Chiefs that much, but I do wonder if this divisional game might be closer than this line suggests and could have a surprise or two in store.
  • The Patriots struggled last week and Cam Newton did not look good returning from Covid-19 but Bill Belichick teams seldom lose two weeks in a row even if they also don’t usually have a losing record. The 49ers at 3-3 are hanging in despite their injury list and this could be an intriguing game, particularly with Kyle Shanahan scheming again the Patriots defence.
  • The Jaguars are not good, but this is a lot of points to lay for a 1-4 Chargers team whose only win was a close fought affair against the Bengals in week one. As much as rookie quarterback Justin Herbert has impressed, I wonder if they can win this game as convincingly as the line suggests or if this game will be close given how often the Chargers seem to be in close games.

Buccaneers @ Raiders (+2.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Buccaneers
Dan’s Pick:      Raiders

Chiefs @ Broncos (+8.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Broncos
Dan’s Pick:      Chiefs

49ers @ Patriots (-2.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Patriots
Dan’s Pick:      Patriots

Jaguars @ Chargers (-8.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Jaguars
Dan’s Pick:      Jaguars

Sunday Night Football:

Seahawks @ Cardinals (+3.5)

The Sunday night game showcases the NFC West meeting of the Seattle Seahawks amd the Arizona Cardinals. The curious thing about the Cardinals is that Kyler Murray only completed nine of his twenty-four attempts against the Cowboy last week as they still ran out easy winners, but they will need to be more efficient than that this week as despite their problems on defense, the Seahawks offence with Russell Wilson playing so well is more than capable of keeping up with the Cardinals. This is a game that definitely has the potential to be a really good contest and whilst I think I do give the edge to the Seahawks, I am not convinced by this line.

Gee’s Pick:       Seahawks
Dan’s Pick:      Seahawks

Monday Night Football

Bears @ Rams (-5.5)

This is an intriguing game where I think the line might be off. The LA Rams have shown plenty of potential this season but are probably a tier below the front runners in the NFC. This is a real test for the Rams as whilst the visiting Chicago Bears are once again limited on offence and relying on their defense to keep them in games, this formula has been enough for them win five games so far this season. The Bears definitely have the players to disrupt quarterback Jared Goff with pressure and so I wonder how the Rams offence will look and whether this is a close tense game or if Sean McVay can scheme enough productivity that the streaky Nick Foles led Bears offence struggles to keep up. A fine matchup to finish off the week.

Gee’s Pick:       Bears
Dan’s Pick:      Rams

DVOA is Football Outsiders statistic for measure a team’s success on every play versus the league average and you can read more about it and other football topics at https://footballoutsiders.com.

Competition Thursday: 2020 Week 5

08 Thursday Oct 2020

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I had a terrible week four picking games and have yet to record a positive score and having fallen 9 points behind Dan so I’m beginning to wonder if I need to completely overhaul my process or be even more trusting of the numbers, and this game is doing nothing to help me make up my mind.

Gee:Week 4:  4 – 11Overall:   28 – 35
Dan:Week 4:  9 – 6Overall:   37 – 26

Buccaneers @ Bears (+5.5)

I am really looking forward to watching this game as I haven’t seen the Bucs since their underwhelming opening game against the Saints, or the Bears at all, but I absolutely hate this line which sits right that awkward zone between points around a field goal win and a touchdown win. Given the consensus number I’m getting an advantage for the Bears from this line, and a fairly sizeable one at that, but the Bucs have won three straight, are the best team by overall DVOA, have the second ranked defence and Tom Brady. I don’t trust the Bears offence as they shuffle quarterbacks and even with tight end OJ Howard going down I feel like the Bucs have too many players that can hurt the Bears defence. This might be the wrong move right now, but given how previous methods have failed me I’m trusting my gut on this one.

Gee’s Pick:      Buccaneers
Dan’s Pick:      Bears

Survivor Competition

Well we are finally scoring some points and I’ve managed to maintain my slender advantage, but the combination of games and who we’ve already picked is making this a tricky week or at least that’s how it feels to me. Dan is rolling with his plan to pick against the Jets and hoping the Cardinals break their two-game losing streak whilst I’m finding it really hard to find a team that convinces me. There’s a couple of options, but given I don’t like this week I’m going to throw in one of the better teams and hope it doesn’t bite me later in the season.

Current Score

Gee: 3
Dan: 2

Week 5 Selection:

Gee:     Chiefs
Dan:    Cardinals

Bold Prediction of the Week

Sorry all, but with Dan on holiday and podcast taking a week off I’m not doing something I don’t like without the evil producer pointing me in that direction.

2020 Week Two Picks

20 Sunday Sep 2020

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We are still early enough in the season that every game holds plenty questions as we don’t truly have a handle on how all the teams compare.

Early Games:

The games that leap out of the early slate first are the ones that see two 0-1 teams facing each other as one team will get over the early loss and another is going to be looking at a very tough if not impossible task to get to the play-offs.

The Cowboys host the Falcons is one such game and having talked about the use of analytics and indeed gone for it on a fourth down, this year’s Cowboys under Mike McCarthy don’t look that different to last season’s only the defence appears to be thinner and already weakened by injuries. The Flacons looked like their defence was still a problem and their offence generated plenty of stats but could not keep up with the Seahawks last week. I like the Cowboys to win this game, but I am not sure they are going to do it by six points, although I think this could be a very entertaining game with plenty of scoring..

The Vikings will be looking to get over last week’s heavy loss to the Packers, but they face a Colts team who moved the ball well enough and I am still concerned about the number of new players on the Vikings’ defence. I am making a numbers based play in this game, but this is definitely one to watch for me as I’m still trying to figure out these teams.

Finally, the Eagles lost to a surprisingly tough Washington Football Team in week one, with their offence struggling thanks to the injuries on the offensive line and never quite getting things together. People are already asking questions about Carson Wentz and Doug Pederson and this week they host a Rams team who started with a win against the Cowboys and who look to have some of their offensive mojo back. There are plenty of questions around both teams, but I have that bit more faith in the Rams right now and so I am going against the numbers in my spreadsheet and I am just hoping that I am not wrong.

Other things of interest:

  • Josh Allen threw the ball for three hundred yards last week, but this is a test of whether they can beat the teams that they should, whilst the Dolphins will be looking to bounce back in a second divisional game as Brian Flores tries to build on last season. It will not take many losses for the clamor for Tua to start in Miami.
  • The Giants are not a good football team, but the Bears had to rely on fourth quarter heroics from Mitchell Trubisky to get their win last week so which version of the Bears offence is the true one and can the Giants show signs of improvement?
  • The Broncos were more competitive than I was expecting last week, but they have to face a Steelers team who look like they have the capacity to make the Ravens work for the AFC North title.
  • The Lions looked back to their familiar losing ways last week, so can they truly compete on the road against the Packers, or will Aaron Rodgers continue to look sharp as the Packers try to establish themselves as the best team in the NFC North and I am already wondering if I was wrong about them and they may not regress as much as I thought.
  • The Titans won a close game on Monday, but the offence did not look as strong as it did late last season so given that the Jaguars won in week one with Gardner Minshew looking like he has build on his debut season, I  wonder why the Jaguars are getting this many points
  • I’m not sure what the Jets are meant to be building on going forward, there are plenty of questions surrounding Sam Darnold’s development and Le’Veon Bell is injured and doing little to justify his contract. The 49ers have a cluster of injuries at receiver and lost to the Cardinals last week – I wonder how the 49ers will pull things together but I still would be surprised if the Jets can compete in this one
  • The Buccaneers have plenty of work to do on offence but receiver Chris Godwin being out of the game with a concussion won’t help Tom Brady look better than he did last week. I think the Bucs can bounce back against the Panthers, but I don’t think it is a sure thing given how close the Panthers pushed the Raiders last week so the points looks wonky to me.

Falcons @ Cowboys (-5.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Falcons
Dan’s Pick:      Cowboys

Bills @ Dolphins (+5.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Bills
Dan’s Pick:      Bills

Giants @ Bears (-5.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Giants
Dan’s Pick:      Giants

Broncos @ Steelers (-6.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Steelers
Dan’s Pick:      Steelers

Lions @ Packers (-6.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Lions
Dan’s Pick:      Packers

Jaguars @ Titans (-10.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Jaguars
Dan’s Pick:      Jaguars

Vikings @ Colts (-2.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Colts
Dan’s Pick:      Vikings

Rams @ Eagles (+1.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Eagles
Dan’s Pick:      Rams

49ers @ Jets (+6.5)

Gee’s Pick:       49ers
Dan’s Pick:      49ers

Panthers @ Buccaneers (-8.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Panthers
Dan’s Pick:      Panthers

Late Games:

Despite all the turmoil of the off-season, Ron Rivera got off to a winning start with Washington, but I don’t know how good they truly are given the problems the Eagles have. That said, I would expect Washington to be a tougher team to face under their new head coach. The Cardinals got off to a winning start with DeAndre Hopkins giving their offence a boost as quarterback Kyler Murray builds on his promising rookie season. I would not be surprised if the Cardinals win, but this line looks rich to me.

The other games look somewhat lopsided as they feature the two AFC teams who looked ominously good last week. The line might be too big for the Chiefs to cover but I couldn’t bring myself to pick the Chargers, particularly as they lost their starting center as they once again they are struggling with injuries whilst I don’t trust the Texans’ defense to be able to contain the Ravens potent offence.

Washington @ Cardinals (-6.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Washington
Dan’s Pick:      Washington

Chiefs @ Chargers (+8.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Chiefs
Dan’s Pick:      Chiefs

Ravens @ Texans (+6.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Ravens
Dan’s Pick:      Ravens

Sunday Night Football:

Patriots @ Seahawks (-4.5)

The re-run of Super Bowl XLIX features very different rosters but looks a hugely enticing game. The Patriots ran Cam Newton a lot last week, but some of them were read-option plays according to offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels and with the Pat’s chameleon approach to game plans you don’t know if the Pats offence will change this week or if Newton will be heavily running again. However, the Seahawks looked like an offensive team last week with their defense only ranking twenty-first in the league by DVOA while Russell Wilson completed a preposterous thirty-one of thirty-five passes for three hundred and twenty-two yards and four touchdowns with no interceptions. I an really not sure who will run out winners in this one, but it promises to be a fascinating game featuring as it does half of the top four teams in DVOA after week one.

Gee’s Pick:       Patriots
Dan’s Pick:      Patriots

Monday Night Football

Saints @ Raiders (+5.5)

The Saints got the win in week one, but have ruled out Michael Thomas for several weeks with a high-ankle injury and he didn’t look right in week one. However, if the offence wasn’t exactly their high flying best, the defence looked good against the Bucs and the Saints look set for another strong season. The Raiders play their first game in their new home after their week one win on the road against the Panthers. The big question for me is whether the Raiders defense can improve on the last two seasons and this will be a stiffer test than the Panthers new offence last week. The Raiders are one of the teams I am not sure about so I am very interested to see how the Raiders shape up against one of the best teams in the NFC in recent seasons.

Gee’s Pick:       Saints
Dan’s Pick:      Raiders

DVOA is Football Outsiders statistic for measure a team’s success on every play versus the league average and you can read more about it and other football topics at https://footballoutsiders.com.

AFC and NFC West Preview

09 Wednesday Sep 2020

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AFC West

Kansas City Chiefs

How much is there to really say about the Chiefs? They won the Super Bowl last season, kept the core of their team intact including offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy and look set to have another strong season. They extended Patrick Mahomes so they have him for ten years, extended disrupted defensive tackle Chris Jones and drafted a new running back for the offence. Said offence should stay one of the most fearsome in the league and may even be stronger given that Mahomes missed two games with injury last season. The defence will be back under Steve Spagnuolo for a second year and having improved their ranking from twenty-seventh by DVOA in the 2018 season to fourteenth in 2019, all they need to do is maintain a ranking somewhere around there to keep the team winning. You can never guarantee anything in the NFL, particularly this season but the Chiefs feel like one of the safest bets to be making a noise in the play-offs. Given how fun it is to watch an Andy Reid schemed offence, yet alone one helmed by a quarterback of the talents of Mahomes, I am sure everyone is planning to watch the Chiefs a lot this season. I certainly am.

Denver Broncos

The Broncos have not made the play-offs since they won the Super Bowl and have had a losing record  in each of the last three seasons, but there is some hope for the 2020 Broncos as there’s a possibility that John Elway has found a franchise quarterback. It was always going to challenge to follow Peyton Manning, even if he was limited in his passing ability during the final Super Bowl winning year. However, after a number of false starts the Broncos made second round draft pick Drew Lock the starter for the last five games of the 2019 season where he went 4-1. Now judging a quarterback solely on wins is a massive oversimplification so we should be wary of drawing too much from such a small sample of games, but it has at least given the Broncos a plan for the season. In his second year as head coach, Vic Fangio will be looking to get the defence to improve after it was ranked thirteenth by DVOA last season and losing a corner of the ability of Chris Harris will hurt but as defence tends to be more volatile from season to season than offence, a lot could rest on the Broncos being able to maintain a similar standard of defence and the offence improving. This is particularly the case with Bradley Chubb still making his way back from injury and All-Pro pass rusher Von Miller dislocating an ankle tendon and facing the real possibility of being out for the season. These previews have been giving me a series of things that I want to follow this season, and I think I need to take a look at Lock to see how he plays pretty soon. I’m not sure that the Broncos can compete for the playoffs, although with the expanded format it is possible, but it might not take too much to catapult the Broncos up there so definitely a team to keep an eye on.

Las Vegas Raiders

The Raiders get to open the Death Star, or Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas as it’s properly called behind closed doors, and there is still much to uncover about this team. Last season’s 7-9 record was an improvement for Jon Gruden but he has yet to have a winning season since re-joining the Raiders in 2018 and will be looking to get back to winning ways this year. There are still questions about Gruden’s commitment to his starting quarterback Derek Carr, but the offence really wasn’t the problem last season. A ranking inside the top ten by DVOA on offence will not satisfy Gruden, but it was a defence that was ranked thirty-first and special teams that ranked twenty-fifth that sank last season’s team. Ex-Bengals defensive coordinator Paul Guenther had good success in Cincinnati when he took over their Defence from Mike Zimmer, but last season the Raiders’ signing of Vontaze Burfict backfired, and the loss of big hitting rookie safety Johnathan Abram didn’t help. I don’t know if Guenther will be able to improve a defence that has ranked thirty-first by DVOA for two seasons in a row, but if he can’t that will only increase the pressure for Gruden to improve the offence. There seems to be a rotating cast of receivers, although last year’s rookie running back Josh Jacobs impressed until his shoulder injury hampered his ability to get on the field late in the season. This is another team where there is a lot up in the air and with the shortened off-season I don’t know what to expect, but I think the season likely rests on getting the defence to at least be respectable.

LA Chargers

The Chargers are something of an enigma. They have a talented roster but have struggled on the offensive line and have been bitten by the injury bug often. They may have an advantage compared to the rest of the league when playing in empty stadiums as unlike last season where their home games often had more away fans than their own, at least they can control the environment in the shiny new SoFi Stadium. I like Anthony Lynn as a coach and there is a lot of intriguing talent on the roster, but they paired a twelfth ranked offence by DVOA with the twenty-fifth ranked defence and were dead last special teams. Even with Philip Rivers moving to Indianapolis there is hope for the offence and the Chargers have just extended the contracts of pass rushing duo Joey Bosa and Melvin Ingram, but the injury bug has already bit with last season’s rookie sensation First-Team All-Pro safety Derwin James on IR with a torn meniscus. The Chargers won or were within a touchdown in fourteen of their sixteen games last season, so they were close to a much better record, but in a tough division where they have to face the Chiefs twice and travel to face Denver in high-altitude I don’t know if they can expect a huge turn around. I think it is possible, but they would need to be healthy for once and have some bounces go their way. It feels like the Chargers are due a run of luck, but with Tyrod Taylor as starting quarterback it is hard to predict that they will do much more that be competitive this season unless Taylor improves on his previous record.

NFC West

San Francisco 49ers

Last season the 49ers finally delivered on the promise they have flashed through the rebuild masterminded by head coach Kyle Shanahan and GM John Lynch. A fearsome defence ranked second only to the Patriots by DVOA was paired with a top ten offence that Shanahan schemed to enough success for them all the way to the Super Bowl and they should be in contention again this year. However, they did trade defensive linemen DeForest Buckner away to allow them the cap flexibility to retain other players and they are already having problems at receiver with multiple players injured before the team have taken a competitive snap against another team. Shanahan is such a good coach that unless the number of injuries gets too big they 49ers should be able to compete, but the NFC West looks like a fearsome division so there could be a surprise or two in store.

Seattle Seahawks

The Seahawks come into the 2020 season on the back of eight consecutive winning seasons, despite having to overhaul the vaunted Leigion of Boom defence in the last couple of seasons. In Russell Wilson they have one of the best quarterbacks in the league and last year’s rookie receiver DK Metcalf flashed alongside Tyler Lockett whilst Chris Carson was again the running back required to fit the run focussed offensive game plan that Pete Carroll wants to run. I do wonder how much home advantage the Seahawks will lose by not being able to play in front of their famously loud home crowd, but it is hard to see them do anything other than compete as that is Carroll’s mantra and even at the start of his time in Seattle, Carroll’s two losing seasons were still 7-9. That said, the usually strong defence was only ranked twenty-first by DVOA and whilst you have to go back to 2016 to find them ranked inside the top ten, their offence has not been that explosive so we shall have to see how this team does without the help of the home crowd.

LA Rams

The Rams failed to make the play-offs for the first time in Sean McVay’s three years with the franchise, and there was plenty of talk that teams had worked out the McVay’s offence. That said, the Rams still went 9-7, and later in the season the Rams started to use more 12 personnel as McVay adjusted to the adjustments opposing defences had made to his scheme. The Rams were also not helped by the dip in play from Todd Gurley that led to him being cut in the off-season and this was one of a number of adjustments the Rams had to make to the roster to get themselves under the salary cap. They also fired defensive coordinator Wade Philips, which is one of bigger decisions McVay has made in his tenure and could be an interesting one to monitor as  the defence was ranked top ten by DVOA last season and Philips is very experienced coach, but the only big names left on the defence are Aaron Donald and Jalen Ramsey. Now Donald is arguably the most important non-quarterback in the league and a bona fide pass rush nightmare, but Donald plus a lockdown corner in Ramsey does not a defence make and with a number of defensive starters gone from last season it is not hard to see a slip on that side of the ball this year. I wouldn’t count the Rams out, but there are enough questions that you can’t simply put them in the play-offs. With the expanded wildcard slots I wouldn’t rule out them being there or there abouts, but this could be a big season for McVay’s long term prospects in LA.

Arizona Cardinals

The Cardinals knew they were in for a long rebuild going into last season, but their 5-11 record was not actually that bad considering the 3-13 disaster it followed and there were some promising things to take away. Although Kyler Murray (their second first round quarterback selection in two years) didn’t set the league alight, he showed promise and proved that he could get through a season despite the size that many were worried about. Murray looked to have the Russell Wilson knack of not taking the big hit and although his college now NFL head coach Kliff Kingsbury had to adjust his scheme when it didn’t work when facing NFL defences, he did just that and so they come into the season hoping to build on last year. The addition of DeAndre Hopkins is upgrade to the Cardinals’ receiver group, although the continuing presence of Larry Fitzgerald also reassures but he must retire soon and so Hopkins is a valuable addition for the next couple of years at least. The defence still needs work but I am curious about how this team does so I look forward to monitoring how they progress this season.

Competition Thursday & The Disappointed Twenty: NFC Edition

02 Thursday Jan 2020

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Well the picks competition is over and for a second consecutive year since he started competing, Dan’s Dad is pick champion whilst I slipped back to third.

Dan’s Dad: Week 17:   6-10 Overall:   143-113
Dan: Week 17:   6-10 Overall:   136-120
Gee: Week 17:   7-9 Overall:   130-126

Looking back at last year I am three points worse whilst Dan has increased his score by eleven (I suspect through not blindly picking the Dolphins) whilst Dan’s Dad added a modest six to beat Dan by seven, which is a three point increase on his lead over me last season.

The moral of all this is that Dan and I will need to really step are games up next season if we’re stop the blog permanently being purple and gold. I’ll let 3D fill in the rest in his trivia write up, whilst I take a run through the teams from the NFC who left us this week.

The Disappointed Twenty: NFC Edition

The Dallas Cowboys have plenty of talent on the roster, but couldn’t convert good statistics into wins with clear issues in coaching. However, there is still no word out of Dallas about Jason Garrett losing his job despite everybody thinking it would happen. His contract doesn’t run out until later this month, but with a series of solid drafts the big question for next season is what is going to happen with the coach and until we know that, you can’t say too much about the Cowboys’ plans for next year, although they do have to make big decisions on who to re-sign.

The New York Giants had a tough season with a few scattered bright spots from rookie quarterback Daniel Jones, but clearly had a disappointing season finishing 4-12. After two consecutive losing season this has cost Pat Shurmur his job, but interestingly not Dave Gettleman. I mention Gettleman not because I have any wish to campaign for someone to be fired, but the Giants have not won for two season and Gettleman was responsible for picking Saquon Barkley with the second pick two years ago rather than taking a quarterback or even listening to offers. Even in last year’s draft he took Daniel Jones at a position much higher than he was predicted to go when he had a second pick in the first round to use on him. It’s hard to know what is going to happen in the off-season, but I don’t have a lot of faith in this franchise to make enough of the right decisions to improve drastically next season.

The seasons of failure continued in Washington, but Dan Snyder has certainly wasted no time in making changes having fired Jay Gruden earlier in the season. Gone from the front office is Bruce Allen whilst the news of new head coach Ron Rivera’s hiring was broken Monday and made official on Wednesday. There is a lot of work to turn around the culture in Washington and a lot will depend on who the new GM is and who has final say in drafting players and roster moves, but they do at least have an experienced coach who has always had a great relationship with his locker room.

The Chicago Bears finished 8-8 with third year quarterback Mitchell Trubisky failing to develop from last season. There are some big decisions coming with regards to their signal caller, and certainly the move to get him is not justifying itself yet so all eyes will be on him until he either proves himself or another player is given a go. It will be worth watching the Bears in the off-season to see if they make any moves at quarterback.

The Detroit Lions hired Matt Patricia to put them over the top having missed out on the playoffs with a 9-7 record under Jim Caldwell. Unfortunately, Patricia decided an overhaul was needed and the Lions have been rewarded with first a 6-10 season and now 3-12-1 so next season is a big one for Patricia who has kept his job. It may be that the saving grace for him was quarterback Matt Stafford being out for the latter half of the year, but the defence hasn’t been good (it’s never good for a head coach if their side of the ball is not great) and I imagine there will need to be a dramatic turnaround next season for there not to be big changes.

The Atlanta Falcons started the season 1-7 but managed to finish 7-9 and come second in the NFC South as the players seemed to rally round their head coach Dan Quinn and were successful in keeping him his job. However, I don’t know if they can turn things round in the off-season given that things haven’t really been right since they were in the Super Bowl and at some point there may need to be a change to get back to winning ways.

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers also finished 7-9, although they started 2-6 but their season can be summed up in the performance of Jameis Winston who threw for over five thousand yards and thirty touchdowns, but he also threw thirty interceptions. It feels like the positive statistics means that you have to re-sign Winston, but unless Bruce Arians can find a way to limit the turnovers it is hard to see the Bucs consistently win.

The Carolina Panthers had a rough season, starting with two losses before Cam Newton was sat with injuries that ultimately didn’t see him return to the field. The Panthers turned to backup quarterback Kyle Allen who was able to get the team back to a 5-3 record before things truly fell apart and they could not win another game this season. This led to Ron Rivera being fired before the end of the season, and has overshadowed the remarkable feat of running back Christian McCaffrey who managed to amass over a thousand yards rushing and receiving. New owner David Tepper says he wants to meld old school football toughness with modern analytics and is also overhauling the front office so we shall just have to see what this results in next year.

The LA Rams finished with a winning record, but could never quite compete with the Seahawks and 49ers in their division. They never fell below .500 but Todd Gurley does not look the same running back and as a result for much of the season Sean McVay couldn’t find the right balance on offence. He is still a really good coach, but there are now structural problems with the roster as they have a lot of money tied up Todd Gurley and Jared Goff. Neither player have really lived up to them, and there are other players who also need signing and not many draft picks to refresh the roster. The front office think they have a different formula to compete, but next season will be key to see if the franchise can bounce back or if things are going to go badly.

Finally, we have the Arizona Cardinals who got five wins in Kliff Kingsbury’s first season as an NFL head coach with rookie quarterback Kyler Murray showing promise. Given how much work was needed to improve the roster, it was no mean feat to improve their season record by two wins and a draw from last year given the quality of the other teams in the NFC West. However, they will need Steve Keim to have a good off-season if the Cardinals are to get enough talent for them to challenge for the playoffs and if they fail to make it for a fifth season then perhaps the position of Keim is the one that will need examining.

Wildcard Trivia

‘Greetings Friends

Week 17 has come and gone and the end of the Regular Season has delivered what we hope will be a juicy playoff series.

I will be keen to see if the Vikings can reverse their recent collapse of momentum against the Saints, but with the 49ers lying in wait this will be a big ask. Equally attractive is the Seahawks and Eagles vying for a match up at Green Bay. Yet again the NFC seems to deliver some meaty games.

In the AFC I am less excited by the Wildcard games, although never rule out the Pats is one lesson I’ve learned. The excitement though will be in the next games when the oft-unfancied Ravens and the Chiefs re-enter the battle.

I feel that the week’s gap for 4 teams can go either way. Momentum or recovery time can be important and this is one area where a coach earns their corn.

I’ll stick my neck out now and predict that Superbowl LIV will be contested between the Saints and the Chiefs with Kansas running out narrow winners. There, I’ve given you a stick to beat me with. Ho Hum never mind.

Talking of predictions the Picks competition also ended on Sunday and I agree with Gee’s comments in Thursdays post that week 17 is very difficult to call as some teams have nothing to play for while others would be desperate to position themselves well for either the Play-offs or, don’t forget, who will be on the roster for next year. Already we have seen the coaching merry-go-round starting up and I see this being a very busy closed season.

I think the mixed agendas contributed to one of the lowest scoring weeks we have had. What is pleasing though is that as a group we have increased the total of wins by 9 over last season. Dan and I managed a disappointing 6 each but the week was won by Gee on 7. But how I achieved a rank of 2253 in the whole competition I will never know. Maybe it proves I have a smarter pin than I thought.

One thing that is still running through the post season is the trivia quiz and in week 17 I set 2 questions both around LA Quarterbacks. They were:

I was the quarterback that led the Rams to a victory in the 2000 Super Bowl against the Tennessee Titans. I lost my starting job after I fumbled six times in the first game of the 2003 season. Who am I?

This was correctly identified by both Dan and Gee as Kurt Warner

Which Charger quarterback bounced back from a dismal 2003-04 season, winning the Comeback Player of the Year Award, throwing 27 touchdowns to seven interceptions, and landing himself a spot in the 2005 NFL Pro Bowl?

Here too they both named Drew Brees.

So 4 points each being Gee up to 19 and Dan 22.

This week I will drop in at 3 teams and again there is 2 points for each.

First we are at the Miami Dolphins, so no pressure here Dan.

After the Dolphins made it to Super Bowl VIII after the 1973 season, what was the next season they saw Super Bowl action?

Next we relocate to the Twin Cities to ask this about the Vikes.

Who did the Vikings play in their first Super Bowl, which was Super Bowl IV, played on January 11, 1970?

Finally this week it is the New England Patriots,

The Patriots moved and changed their name in 1971. What was the home city and their name prior to that?

Right then, that’s 2019 done and we look for a vision for 2020. Catch you next week’

Separating the Merely Bad from the Truly Awful

06 Wednesday Nov 2019

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With week nine over we have one unbeaten team left, another year of London games completed, and Adam Gase continued to cause the Miami Dolphins problems by being so bad with the New York Jets that they lost to a Dolphins team who are not actually trying to win this year as they reboot their roster. So let’s take a swing through the NFL and what they have coming up.

What I Saw

The Thursday night game was more competitive than I was expecting as the Arizona Cardinals marched down the field in the opening drive and scored a touchdown then late in the game managed to claw their way back into contention but ultimately lost to the visiting San Francisco 49ers. Sadly for the Cardinals, the stretch from the end of the first quarter to early in the fourth allowed the 49ers to build a big enough lead to win. The plus points for the Cardinals were Kyler Murray’s continued improvement, posting a quarterback rating of 130.7 in this game and new acquired Kenyan Drake running for one hundred and ten yards on only fifteen carries as he managed to find creases in the 49ers normally excellent front seven. That said, the pass rush of the 49ers is very impressive and whilst only generated the three sacks, they seemed to be causing problems on most plays with Dee Ford catching the eye opposite rookie Nick Bosa. The 49ers offence was just as impressive with Jimmy Garoppolo posting his own quarterback rating of over 130 as well as four touchdowns and over three hundred yards of passing, all whilst the rushing attack had to use thirty-one carries to get to one hundred and one yards. There are definite signs that Kyler Murray can be productive in the NFL and find his way, but this was always going to be a building year for the Cardinals, whilst after several of their own building years it looks like Kyle Shanahan’s plans are finally coming to fruition as the 49ers remain the team to beat in the NFC, if not the league right now.

The first game played on Sunday was the last of four London games that saw the Houston Texans beings hosted by the Jacksonville Jaguars. I was expecting the Jaguars who are used to the trip to London to perform better than this, but they were never able to get anything going on offence, although it wasn’t until late in the game when Gardner Minshew was trying to make things happen to catch-up that he started turning the ball over repeatedly. It has to be said that the Texans’ offence didn’t look to be running that much better than the Jaguars, but the ability of Deshaun Watson and DeAndre Watson to make spectacular plays was the thing that really separated these two teams and it looks as if the Texans will be competitive to the end of the season, although I’m not sure they are good enough to maximise the all-in moves they have made in managing this roster. It’s not going to hurt them this season, but with all the draft picks they have given away they could have issues going forward. The Jaguars meanwhile, are sliding back in the race for the post-season and the question will be what they do at quarterback now that Nick Foles is near to being healthy, and whether either quarterback can get the team into the playoffs.

The next game I saw was the Minnesota Vikings losing a close game to the Kansas City Chiefs 26-23 at Arrowhead Stadium. The Chiefs are know to have a home field advantage and it certainly sounded loud on the TV. This was a close competitive game that I’m sure will be frustrating to Kirk Cousins as he missed a lot of throws and was not at all up to the level of play we had seen in October, although receiver Adam Thielen did have further problems with the hamstring injury he has been dealing with for a number of weeks. That said, the Vikings were held to under one hundred yards rushing at 3.5 yards per carry, which is pretty good for a rush defence that is currently ranked twenty-eighth in league by DVOA. If the plaudits should go anywhere though, it is to Andy Reid, who has kept his team winning despite losing Patrick Mahomes to a dislocated kneecap and starting Matt Moore at quareterback in his stead, and more was coaching high school football a month ago. Moore may only be 1-1 as a starter this season, but he also contributed to a win when he stepped into the game against the Broncos and it gives the Chiefs the luxury of not rushing Mahomes back. They may not look at their best right now, but they could look good come the playoffs, whilst the Vikings also looked competitive, but there will still be questions about Cousins in big games until he wins more of them.

The final game of Sunday was the match-up of the week for most people, and it was certainly a good game but in the end the Baltimore Ravens ran out 37-20 winners as they hosted the now beaten New England Patriots. Ran out is definitely the right turn as the Ravens amassed over two hundred rushing yards where they got up early on the Patriots and never relinquished that lead. The Patriots did steady the ship after going down 17-0 by the start of the second quarter, but even if they slowed the Raven’s rushing attack, they never really contained Lamar Jackson and needed turnovers to get themselves into scoring positions. The Ravens were able to take advantage of the Patriots offensive line to pressure Tom Brady and limit the Patriots’ running game. It is only one loss, and the only one the Patriots have had this season so it would be unwise in the extreme to write off the perennial contenders, but their looks to be less of a gap between the Pats and the other contenders in the league this season. For the Ravens, I see them having no problem beating up on the Bengals defense next week given their problems at the edges of the front seven, and whilst there are tough games against the likes of the 49ers, Texans and Rams, as well as a not easy game in Buffalo in the coming weeks, the Ravens have two more AFC North games and host the Jets so I find it hard to see them not winning the division and the question is whether they can get a bye for the first round of the playoffs.

What I Heard

There are plenty of people who are happy for the Miami Dolphins’ players as they got their first win, but anyone who was surprised by the result had not been paying attention to how the Dolphins had played since putting Ryan Fitzpatrick back in as quarterback. There were some who greeted his signing in the off-season as not being fully aligned with the rebuilding project that was clearly taking place as he might win them too many games, and he has certainly had a positive effect on their offence in recent weeks. However, the real story is that the New York Jets were major players in free-agency and were meant to be kicking on this season and have done anything but. In truth, this is a franchise in a deep funk that has problems in the front office, on the roster, and the coaching staff so it is not surprising that their franchise quarterback looks to be regressing rather than improving this year. The real problem here is that there is no overall plan and the GM who drafted Sam Darnold is no longer there whilst the team have gotten worse since the firing of Todd Bowles. There is plenty of blame to go around and New York is not an easy media market to function in, but you have to wonder who is going to survive this at the end of the season.

I did hear an interesting discussion around the Trent Williams holdout and the reason why Williams is not happy with Washington’s medical staff. His grievance is about a growth he had for a number of years that turned out to be cancerous, and I thought that doctor David Chao did an excellent job of walking you through the medical side of things so if that sounds of interest then I recommend you take a look at this tweet and go from there.

What I Think

I want to take a quick look at a few of the losing teams because despite there being four teams with one win and the winless Bengals, I do think there is a difference between the bad and the truly awful. The first place to start in the separation is the Miami Dolphins, who for years have been suffering in mid-table mediocrity as they were to good to get elite players in the draft but weren’t making the playoffs every year. Losing was the plan this season, not as an aim in of itself, but in rebuilding with young players through next year’s draft and so whilst we don’t know if things will turn around the results this year are not a disaster but a calculated consequence of their method of rebuilding.

The rest of the teams are meant to be competing but there are perhaps extenuating circumstances for some. The results are of course going to be a worry for the Atlanta Falcons, and I don’t know if Dan Quinn is going to keep his job, but there is a lot of talent on this roster, but it is not deep and they have struggled with developing both lines. There is talent and a franchise quarterback so the right person might be able to turn this things around but it will likely require a change of approach by the front office if not new leadership.

The Cincinnati Bengals were pretty much sunk before the season started and my concerns quickly came to fruition. The loss of three starting lineman to injury and or retirement before the season was the precursor to their problems protecting Andy Dalton and I was always concerned about the hire of Jim Turner given his chequered history, but the loss of AJ Green to an ankle injury at the first practice o a high school field that the team should never have practiced on is particularly galling. I can’t help but wonder if a more experienced coach might have stopped the event when he saw the field. The Bengals were once a laughing stock, but Marvin Lewis brought respectability and Mike Brown has invested in the largest coaching staff the Bengals have ever had and renovated the building as they committed to Zac Taylor’s vision. It has done anything but pay off so far, but I’m not sure previous regimes would have turned the offence over to the rookie quarterback who looked promising in training camp to see what they have in him. They could have given more time for Dalton to try to find another team once they decided to bench him, but they probably want Dalton to be a mentor for Ryan Finley and it sure looks like we’ll see him in a different uniform next season.

However, this is where I think the extenuating circumstances end. The Jets as I said earlier were meant to be competing but their dysfunction starts with ownership and how they have approaches solving their problems in recent years and until they find the right GM to establish a culture and commit long term to its implementation they will continue to struggle.

The final team are the Washington no-names, who have an argument to have one of the worst owners in American sports. It’s not like Dan Snyder hasn’t spent money but he has presided over a mess in the front office and I’m not sure what Bruce Allen has achieved as president to earn such loyalty. Snyder bought the team in 1999 and since then Washington have had six winning seasons if you count 2016 8-7-1 and haven’t won a playoff games since 2005. Not only has the on-field performance been bad, but the franchise has gone from being the preeminent part of the Washington sports seen to a team that regularly sees more away fans than home in the stadium.

All of these teams need a lot to go right to turn them round next season, but I really do fear for the Jets and Washington.

I would also like to give a bonus mention to the Cleveland Browns who can’t get out of their own way and I’m not sure the Denver Broncos are truly going to compete until John Elway can find another quarterback.

What I Know

I had a terrible week in the picks competition last week, but what I know is that sometimes you modify your numbers by gut and your right, and sometimes you get led astray but it’s the over-correction in the following week that you have to watch.

If I put as much thought as I do into just picking games, I know that the staffs on these losing teams will be working as hard as they can to improve their team’s situations. There is a lot of work going on behind the scenes, no one is trying to lose and what I hope is that they learn from this situation and improve.

After five years of blogging about the entire league I spend my time wishing success for people – I want things won through skill and clever strategy and for players to be as healthy as they can when they get out.

What I Hope

I really hope that Ryan Finley gives the Bengals a spark and that if the tean are to move on from Andy Dalton, that they can take best player available or even drop back and pick up some extra picks in next year’s draft. After all, as we have had ample proof recently, there really is no such thing as guaranteed franchise quarterback just because they were selected in the first round.

The Unknowable NFL

02 Wednesday Oct 2019

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All bar the two teams on a bye last week have sailed past the quarter pole of the season and this Sunday sees the first of the four game London series getting played so we can definitely say that the 2019 season is in full swing, but as so often the case it feels like we know less for certain than ever about how the teams are going. Let’s see if I can explains some of that as I take you through my week of the NFL.

What I Saw

Week four started with one of the more entertaining games we have seen this year with he Philadelphia Eagles running out 34-27 winner in Green Bay against the Packers. The game started out as I expected with the Packers defence looking strong and the packers taking an early touchdown lead but in the second quarter three Eagles’ touchdowns saw them take a lead that they would hold until late in the third quarter and retake in the fourth. A strong offensive line performance enabled the Eagles to rush for one hundred and seventy-six yards and not give up any sacks whilst their defence held the Packers to under four yards per carry until the Packers virtually gave up on running that ball. What the Packers were able to do was throw the ball and it was Aaron Rodgers who kept them in the game (despite losing tackle Bryan Bulaga early) thanks to a four hundred and twenty-two yard passing day. The offence may not be clicking yet for the Packers but I think that Rodgers and Matt LaFleur will find a way and the league had better watch out when they do given how the Packers defence has played. The Eagles meanwhile really needed that win to stay in the NFC East race now that the New York Giants have found two wins in the opening four games. They had some players come back from injury but it was good to see the coaching staff get the win despite the players they were still missing.

The first of the Sunday games that I watched was between the Houston Texans and the Carolina Panthers who through a defensive game that saw only two touchdowns but nine sacks as the Panthers ran out 16-10 winners on the road. This win was built on the Panthers’ derfence’s ability to contain the Texans offence, particularly in the passing game where Deshaun Watson only threw for one hundred and sixty yards whilst getting sacked six times and harried a lot more. There are still problems with the offensive line (which might be worth a coaching tape look at some point) and Watson has a tendency to hold onto the ball trying to make a play. You can hear him talk about the coverage in this clip that got a lot of people talking about his honesty so it’s worth having a look. Meanwhile the Panthers have got their second straight win since Kyle Allen has replace the injured Cam Newton, but whilst he was efficient enough to get the win he has to work on his ball security/pocket awareness as you can’t expect to fumble away the ball three times and expect to keep winning games. The defence played well, but in this era of multiple offences and running back by committee special mention has to go to Christian McCaffery who played all sixty-eight of the Panthers’ offensive snaps, amassing ninety-three yards on the ground with the teams only touchdown as well as eighty-six yards catching the ball. The Panthers look to be holding things together whilst they wait for Newton to get properly healthy, but they have an awful lot resting on the body of McCaffery at the moment and I just hope he can keep carrying the load until Newton comes back. Meanwhile the Texans are one of the four AFC South teams that are 2-2, which looks again to be a division that will beat each other up all year and then one or two teams will get hot at the end of the season and make the playoffs. The long term concern is the roster construction given the draft picks they have traded away going into the season as it does not appear that they are as close to challenging for the Super Bowl as the trades would suggest they think they are.

The second Sunday game I watched was another low scoring affair (if I wanted offence the Buccaneers @ Rams was the way to go) as the Dallas Cowboy lost a close one on the road 12-10 to the New Orleans Saints. This was a game that only saw one touchdown and that was for the losing Cowboys as both defences dominated the day. For all their early season success the Cowboys struggled to move the ball, particularly on the ground where they were only able to get forty-five yards as the Saints defence new exactly where to be for each run. The Cowboys were not able to get enough done through the air to win the game with Presscott throwing for two hundred and twenty-three yards and an interception. If the Cowboys didn’t quite look like themselves on the road, the Saints look to have a really good defence that is allowing them to win games without Drew Brees. Teddy Bridgewater threw for under two hundred yards in this game with a long of only twenty yards but the offence managed to rush for over one hundred yards thanks in large part to the power and balance of Alvin Kamara. The Saints will be hoping to keep themselves in the hunt until Drew Brees gets back, but I don’t know if they can keep relying on their defence to play like they did in this game. Meanwhile, the Cowboys have to hope that this was a blip road loss, but the offence did not look like it was flowing properly and that’s something to keep an eye on.

I don’t want to write about the final game of the week, but given that the Cincinnati Bengals were playing in the Monday night game against the Pittsburgh Steelers I have no good reason not to cover their miserable 3-27 loss on the road. The problems are perhaps obvious and to an extent predictable as the Bengals kept losing offensive line starters before the season had even started and four games into the season they are struggling to make room in the running game or protect Andy Dalton when passing the ball. The other worry I have is at linebacker and in particular at the edges of the defence and this came to pass as the Steelers used Jaylen Samuels to take direct snaps and touch passes to attach the edges. It’s hard to tell how much of a turnaround this is for the Steelers given how Bengals have played this season but it’s a step. Meanwhile, the Bengals are facing a huge game this Sunday as in only their second home game of the season they welcome another winless team, the Arizona Cardinals and if they don’t win that one then this thing could get really ugly. I’m probably clinging to tightly the fact that two of the games were really competitive and the Bengals have face three tough road games so far but that comes to an end this week.

What I Heard

There has been continuing conversations about the new wave of quarterbacks and backups as rookies Gardiner Minshew II and Daniel Jones got their second wins as starters, Kyle Allen got a second win with the Panthers whilst Chase Daniels came off the bench to help the Bears beat the Vikings in a performance that has drawn comments about how Daniels was able to at least get the ball out where it was supposed to and accurately on the underneath throws.

The Vikings offence has been another source of discussion given it’s focus on running the ball despite Kirk Cousins being in the second year of an $84 million guaranteed contract. Normally you might question the offensive coordinator’s but given his track record with OCs this really sits with head coach Mike Zimmer who is always talking about running the ball, but it doesn’t make sense to be so focussed on that when you have arguably one of the best receiving duos in the league. There’s been plenty of criticism of Kirk Cousins, but to my mind that feels a lot like the criticism of Andy Dalton and no these are not the elite of the elite, but they are good enough to win if you put the right team around them. I agree with the commentators who say that you can compete by paying elite but were you get into trouble is overpaying for talent. This isn’t a matter of who deserves to get paid as a human being but how you build a competitive roster in a salary cap sport and the I don’t think the problem is necessarily in the roster of the Vikings (their o-line could be better but so could most teams these days) but there is a disconnect in paying Cousins what they are and then not utilising him. I respect coach Zimmer and was reluctant to see him leave the Bengals although happy he was finally getting a chance to lead a team, but I do wonder if he has reached his level if he can’t allow his offence to run as the current version of the NFL dictates. I have a feeling he’s stubborn enough to keep the team playing like this and so the Vikings will be competitive but I don’t know that they are going to maximise this year’s team and that is a worry as the defence is not getting any younger.

What I Think

I have watched the transformation of Vontaze Burfict from a tone setting star of the defence who got the team lined up and played up to the line whilst straying over it occasionally to a liability who seems lost in his own mythos as his time on the field got less reducing both his productivity and conduct. The hit that got him ejected from this week’s game is being legislated out of the game for a reason, but almost as bad was the grin as trotted off as if he was proud of himself. There are team mates and coaches for the Raiders who are unhappy but I’m not sure that feeling will be shared around the league and there are plenty who are happy to see him gone for the season. In fact it’s not hard to find people who don’t want to see him play again. There is an argument about taking away someone’s lively hood but the fact of the matter is that in no other industry would a disregard of the rules be tolerated, particularly in a matter of health and safety. It’s not always possible to adjust when players are going at full speed but when you have the track record of Burfict you lose the benefit of the doubt.

What I Know

That after a thoroughly miserable time watching the Bengals this week I am hoping to both actually get to some coaching tape and to cheer myself up by watching Khalil Mack who is once again showing just how bad an idea it was to trade him away. It should be a fun subplot this weekend in London as the Bears take on the Raiders for the first time since Mack was trade to Chicago last year.

What I Hope

That one of Dan and I get put out of our misery and gets our first win and that the NFL continues to be as unpredictable as it was this week, even if it is terrible for our picks…

Quarterbacks: The Injured and The Young

18 Wednesday Sep 2019

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One of the things that makes the NFL such a spectacle week to week is that each team only plays sixteen games so every one matters and a teams prospects can change really quickly as several teams saw this weekend. Even a team with the roster depth of the Philadelphia Eagles can get undermined if too many injuries cluster around the same position, but I’ll cover that when I write up their game in the section, so let’s get started.

What I Saw

The week two Thursday night game saw the Tampa Bay Buccaneers break my Thursday night line picking rule and win on the road against a Carolina Panthers team who have now fallen to 0-2. It was not a great spectacle that even started off looking strange as thanks to the weather the broadcasters only had two camera angles available and further lightening problems saw the game paused until it cleared. Neither team really shone, but for the Buccaneers Jameis Winston played without throwing an interception and didn’t get the Buccaneers into trouble while Cam Newton continued to look nothing like himself. It’s hard to evaluate from the outside what is going on with his shoulder and foot problems, but he is not effective at the moment and as good as Christian MaCaffrey has looked, he cannot carry the team when they are struggling in the red zone and Cam is missing so many consecutive passes. A trip to Arizona might help get the Panthers get back to winning ways, but they have not made things easy for themselves.

The final important part of this game to mention was that it was my first safety of the season – now this is actually the third of the year and I need to cover them properly at some point – but yes I am still tracking them! In this one the Bucs were pinned back to the three yard line by the Panthers punt team, and on second and eleven Luke Kuechly burst through the line to tackle Peyton Barber in the end zone and prevent him from getting the whole ball back across the goal line.

It was a slightly light week of watching for me thanks to work and things going on at the weekend so I only got through half of the coaching tape from the week one game between the Dallas Cowboys and the New York Giants but it was enough for me to be impressed. The Cowboys might have started off slowly, but their offence is transformed with the kind of pre-snap motion you see all over the league as well as plays where running backs split out, line up as receivers and run routes, which the Patriots used very effectively last season. The added benefit of this offensive transformation is the way Dak Prescott is playing. There were two throws that impressed me with their precision and timing, but Prescott has also amassed six hundred and seventy-four yards with seven touchdowns and only one interception in his opening two games. Right now the Cowboys look like one of the better teams in the NFL and if they can stay healthy then this could be a very good year indeed for them indeed.

I have watched two games from Sunday and I will start with the painful one from my perspective, as the San Francisco 49ers beat the Cincinnati Bengals very convincingly 41-17. The 49ers managed this whilst not so much looking spectacular on offence as benefitting from some truly awful tackling from the Bengals defence who looked so good in week one. The pass rush still looks good dangerous and it could just be a blip, but in a home opener it was a pretty dispiriting performance. The Bengals’ offence didn’t do much better barring a couple of flash plays. There are receivers in the passing game with John Ross looking good for a second week in a row and Tyler Boyd leading the team in receiving yards, but two one-hundred-yard receivers could not produce consistently enough for the Bengals to keep them in the game. More injuries hampered the offensive line and for a second week in a row the run game never got started. More worryingly the Bengals’ next game sees them travel to an unbeaten Buffalo Bill’s team who might not finish as the class of the AFC at the end of the season but look setup to be a difficult team for anyone to face. I have a nasty feeling I’ll be writing about an 0-3 team next week.

The final game I saw was the Atlanta Hawks hosting and beating the Philadelphia Eagles in a highly entertaining 24-20 contest. The Eagles really struggled with injuries in this game losing multiple offensive players early and Carson Wentz missed a series with a rib injury. It was an entertaining game but at times there was sloppy quarterback play for both teams and five interceptions were thrown between Wentz and Matt Ryan. That said the Falcons did flash on offence several times and sealed the game with a beautiful fourth and three play that saw the left tackle Jake Matthews get down field and block a poor DB to spring Julio Jones for fifty-four yards and the winning touchdown.

What I Heard

There has been much discussion of quarterbacks with two of the elite tier going down injured and the announcement finally coming that Eli Manning will be benched for Daniel Jones. Unusually, Sam Darnold did not even make the start of the week two game having been ruled out with mononucleosis, but has been cleared to return to the facility and is aiming for a week five return. What state the team will be in by then is anyone’s guess as poor Trevor Siemian was lost for the season to an ankle early in the game. The former Denver Broncos quarterback has played well when healthy but was not able to stay that way in Denver and on a one year deal this is pretty much the worse case for him.

The Cleveland Browns did what they should have done and won 23-3 but they are still sloppy. You also have to wonder about the game management when a running back comes out of the medical tent after a concussion check and gets thrown back into the game despite it being the fourth quarter with the game well and truly in hand.

What I Think

Whilst picking games on Sunday I mentioned that there would be more 1-1 teams than 2-0 or 0-2 teams, which is my way of reminding myself that we can’t take too much as set in stone from one game for each team. Unfortunately, I promptly forgot that as I actually made my selections and that partially accounts for me having such a poor week, but it also feels like that the ratio of records is different than in previous years. What I ought to do is go look at the numbers, but it’s my birthday tomorrow so things are a little all over the place and I don’t have time today, but I might well have a look at some point.

What I can tell you is that there are nine teams that have gone 2-0 to keep an unbeaten record and matching nine who have lost both of their games. Thanks to the Detroit Lions’ tie with the Arizona Cardinals we have a team with a 1-0-1 record and a corresponding 0-1-1 record while twelve teams have gone 1-1.

The teams that are really in trouble are those like Washington who have lost two divisional games already and the Pittsburgh Steelers who have lost both games and their starting quarterback. The New Orleans Saints have also lost a starting quarterback and will need Teddy Bridgwater to play well if they hope to keep themselves in contention until Drew Brees can return form surgery on his torn thumb ligament. There are some teams that may well right themselves from a solitary loss but I’m finding it hard to see turn arounds for the 0-2 teams which is a worry. The Steelers have tried to strengthen this year’s team despite Roethlisberger being done for the season with his elbow injury by trading next year’s first round pick for Dolphins safety Minkah Fitzpatrick, which is a brave move and if any team can turn it round it might be the Steelers but the defence needs to come together as well as the offence.

What I Know

This is going to be one of those ones that is going to haunt me for a while, as I know that Lamar Jackson is really good and he is going to torture my Bengals for a long time. He is rapidly becoming one of my favourites of the young quarterbacks and we are beginning to amass quite a list: Patrick Mahomes (who somehow is possibly playing better this year), Jackson, Jarred Goff who has been to a Super Bowl, Josh Allen has got the Bills to 2-0 whilst Kyler Murray has already show flashes in a couple of games. I may not be too keen on the way Baker Mayfield conducts himself at times but he was good enough to give the Browns hope whilst Sam Darnold has shown flashes and people were excited by Daniel Jones in pre-season despite him being picked too high. Still, I haven’t had to work hard to find this quarterbacks, and whilst I’m certainly not wish the end of the careers of the likes of Brees, Brady (the Patriots were scary good again on both offence and defence), or Roethlisberger – the quarterbacks that follow them are suddenly looking a lot better than it was only a couple of years ago despite the retirement of Andrew Luck and the stalling of careers like Derek Carr. I’ll finish by saying that Dak Prescott has looked really good through two games so one to keep an eye on as he approaches getting his second contact.

What I Hope

I want the Dolphins to do something in week three that brings Dan joy and the Bengals surprise us all with a win up in Buffalo. Failing that, I hope the Ravens @ Chiefs lives up to the expectations I have them because I think this has the potential to be the best game we’ve seen yet.

Overreaction Week

11 Wednesday Sep 2019

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It’s that time of the season where we have one game of data and we overreact, so let’s see if we can find a nuanced view that sits somewhere between sixteen teams winning the Super Bowl and sixteen looking at the number one pick in next year’s draft.

What I Saw

The season opener that saw the Chicago Bears host the Green Bay Packers was not exactly the explosive opener I’m sure the NFL would have wanted, but it does look as if the Packers are going to have a more balanced team this season. The Packers and their improved looking defence were able to hold the Bears to three points in a 10-3 win. The Packers needed this performance from their defence as the Bears defence looked as fearsome as year but I did also wonder if the lack of game time for their starters might be playing a factor in the Packers offensive output. This did make me wonder about the rest of the weekend’s games given the increased prevalence of teams resting their starters but it turns out there were plenty of teams whose offence hit the ground running. The Bears were not one of them though and there is still a worry about what the ceiling is for Mitch Trubisky. We should be wary of reading too much into one game but we’ll have an idea of just how representative this game was once we have some more to put things into context.

I only managed to watch a little of the last episode of Hard Knocks thanks to various things, so all I saw was the footage of Antonio Brown catching balls in practice before discovering that he was arguing with GM Mike Mayock having posted a fine letter on social media, and then getting cut having had his contract voided. He signed for the Patriots over the weekend and this morning’s headline is that Brown has been accused of rape by a former trainer. I really don’t know what to say other than that this is a deeply troubling accusation, that the courts need to carry out their due process, and at this point does Brown not have to go on the commissioner’s exempt list?

Moving awkwardly back to football I watched three further games this week.

The Cincinnati Bengals did much better than I feared as they ran out 20-21 losers in their trip to face the Seahawks in Seattle. However, the defence played well limiting the Seahawks to two-hundred and sixty-eight yards whilst containing Russell Wilson and sacking him four times. Meanwhile, for all the talk of establishing the run, Zac Taylor ran his offence according to what the Seahawks sent out, and Andy Dalton threw for a career high four-hundred and forty-one yards. The Seahawks showed their experience in winning ugly, but it was a promising start for the Bengals who now need to learn how to win games like this.

The Detroit Lions must still be kicking themselves over the road trip to Arizona as having established a 24-6 lead early in the fourth quarter they froze up as the Cardinals managed to stage a comeback and hold on for a tie in overtime. For most of this game the Lions were in control, but they got too conservative in the fourth quarter on offence and managed to call a time-out on a play that looked to have converted a third down, then ran an awful long shot play that didn’t work, before having the resulting punt blocked. The positive for the Lions is that rookie tight end TJ Hockenson set a rookie record of one hundred and thirty-one receiving yards as well as scoring a touchdown but they’ll need to clean up their game management and have a tough looking slate of games coming up. The Cardinals looked like they could have a long season but even though Kyler Murray looks like a small quarterback, his movement skills are impressive and he managed to avoid taking any big hits. Murray needs to learn to throw the ball away earlier in certain situations, but if he can find and maintain the kind of rhythm he found in the fourth quarter then he could justify the faith the Cardinals showed by taking him first overall.

The final game I saw this week as they New England Patriots sending out a warning to the rest of the league with a 33-3 demolition of the supposed fellow AFC challengers the Pittsburgh Steelers. The Patriots coaching staff seem to absolutely have the number of the Steelers and worryingly for the league, looked sharp on both sides of the ball in their opening game. For a team that have often started slowly in recent years they played well and Tom Brady looked to have the deep ball in his armoury. As for the Steelers, they looked like they weren’t quite there on offence and the coaching staff need to find some way of stopping Brady shredding them, which to be fair is easier said than done. This was a tough way for any team to start the season so it’s not time to hit the panic button yet but the Steelers host the Seahawks in their first home game this week and they’ll want to get their season back on track quickly.

What I Heard

I head an interesting discussion with Warren Sharp on the Pro Football Doc podcast this week, where they discussed how teams seemed to be listening to the people who having looked at the numbers suggest throwing the ball on first down is a more efficient play call. Essentially the suggestion was that a team should call a throw on first down, but switch to a run play if the defence they faced or matchup favoured it, but otherwise passing on first down was more gave better results by trying to get a first down quicker than limiting the distance on third down. This increased uptake of passing first downs might be even more impressive if you remove the outliers like the Minnesota Vikings who only asked Kirk Cousins to throw ten times during the entire game this week.

I would need to see the maths on this to analyse this, but it feels logical to me. Particularly, when advocating that you still run if the situation is advantageous. For all the talk of balance and establishing the run, the Bengals threw a lot of passes against the Seahawks and it could well be that amongst the enlarged staff the Bengal’s new head coach asked for and got, are some more analytics people being listened to. I have thought for a while that it’s not so much that you have to establish the run, as maintain a credible threat so a defence can’t concentrate on stopping one thing. One to keep an eye on.

What I Think

It’s early in the season, so the crucial this is not to overreact. That said, I’m not sure that you can overreact as a Dolphins fan. I was chatting with Dan as the Ravens’ touchdowns kept coming up on Red Zone. The Cleveland Browns proved that an NBA style tank can work, and the coaches and players are absolutely trying to win but this is going to be a long difficult season for the Dolphins.

My suggestion was for Dan to adopt a fun NFC team to watch as he’s not going to stop supporting the Dolphins but for the sake of his sanity he needs something fun to watch on gameday. Here’s how bad it is, after five seasons of always picking the Dolphins to win in the pick’em competition he has announced he’s not doing it this year.

See what you’ve done Chris Grier!

What I Know

The top teams look pretty familiar and expected with the Patriots, Chiefs, Saints, and Rams all running out winners, although no one took that as literally as the Vikings did in week one.

There were plenty of surprises, although I wasn’t that shocked that the Browns struggled, but even I was not expecting them to give away that many penalties. The Titans were competitive last year and with Andrew Luck’s retirement they feel they should be in the mix for the AFC South. I may well have got the Falcons completely wrong, but I think I understand most of where I dropped points in the picks competition, although I clearly didn’t account for the Raiders maintaining their pre-season competitiveness into week one, but let I am not going to make any grand pronouncements until we have four games played.

I took a tenuous point lead in the pick’em competition despite my lack of preparation, but the regular season is marathon not a sprint. I am going to take a look at the Cowboys offence for my first coaching tape of the week as the discussion surrounding how it thrived despite Ezekiel Elliott’s rust interested me. I look forward to seeing how Dak Prescott played.

What I Hope

I am hoping to get through the coaching tape and picks despite being at a music festival this weekend (Hmmmh, I might need to find some extra hours from somewhere) and I hope all those teams who lost this week get a win on the board next week. However, it won’t happen as the season of hope is over – football is here and it is very much a results orientated business.

Still, good luck for the week two teams, I can see a number of teams (and fanbases) who will need it.