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2020 Week Eight Picks

01 Sunday Nov 2020

Posted by in Gee's Thoughts, Picks Competition

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It was a rough start to the week eight picks competition for me, but I was going on the information I had available and I think I would make the same pick again. Clearly I need to be careful about what to make of the Falcons going forward but I can’t over adjust as I have been slowly whiltling down Dan’s lead. Let’s see if I can get any closer to Dan this week as I go through the games that leap out to me across the rest of week eight.

Early Games:

For the second week in the highlight of the early Sunday games feature the Pittsburgh Steelers who after holding on for the win against the Titans now travel to Baltimore to take on the Ravens. We get to see this matchup at least twice a year, and it is particularly tasty this season as the Steelers take their unbeaten record to a rested 5-1 Ravens team. The only loss the Ravens have was against the Chiefs, but despite their bye there are questions about their offence as it is not running as smoothly as last season and their blitz heavy defensive scheme is not an ideal matchup against Ben Roethlisberger who is getting the ball out as fast as any quarterback in the league. I can see either team winning this one, but with the consensus number being higher and the extra half point the Ravens are laying over a field goal I’m going to take the Steelers.

The other game that grabs my attention is as much about the importance of the result as the play of both teams. The New England Patriots travel to face the Bills on a three-game losing streak and are struggling on both sides of the ball. Cam Newton has not looked right since he came off the Covid list and the Patriots have just put their most productive receiver Julian Edleman on IR. As strange as it feels to pick against Bill Bellichick (even under these circumstance) and particularly as the Bills have been struggling in recent weeks as defenses adjust to Josh Allen’s hot start to the season, the numbers indicate the -3.5 line should be higher and so with a little reluctance I am backing the Bills in a game they need to win to maintain their hold on the AFC East and to keep themselves ahead of the lurking Dolphins

The Dolphins are my other game from the early set to watch, both because I am curious to see how the LA Rams do with yet another trip across the country (their fourth in eight weeks) but mainly because this game sees rookie quarterback Tua Tagovailoa make his first start. Even only residing on the periphery of Dolphins fandom through my friendship with Dan, I can feel the excitement over Tua time and I just hope that everything goes well for him. That said, with he Rams travelling to Miami I am also grabbing the points so I will have my own selfish reasons for hoping the Dolphins play well, even it is the hope is that they can keep the game closer than four points.

  • The Titans will be looking to bounce back from their loss to the Steelers while the Bengals have been dealing with some malcontents in the lockeroom. The numbers all show that the Titans are the team to pick, which feels odd as the Bengals have been in all their games bar the Ravens and given how the Titans’ defense is playing and recent performances by the Bengals I am going to back them to stay within six.
  • The Raiders and Browns are right next to each other by overall DVOA, and this could be a close game, but the numbers are telling me to take the Raiders so that’s where I’m going. However, it is interesting to me that the Browns as the twenty-second ranked team by DVOA have a 5-2 record while the Raiders at twenty-third are 3-3.
  • The Detroit Lions come off a win that to an extent they lucked into with the Falcons haplessly scoring a touchdown to give the Lions the ball back, but Matt Stafford still had to drive down the field and score the Lions’ own game sealing touchdown. However, the Colts are coming off a bye and this has the potential to turn into one of the more interesting games of the week, but with the Lions consistently underwhelming under Matt Patricia they didn’t quite make the cut for a highlight game.
  • A big divisional game like the Vikings taking on the Packers should be a highlight of any week, but with the Vikings making moves for the long term and the Packers bouncing back after their tough loss to the Buccaneers it feels like this game is only going one way. That is a little dangerous as anything can happen in the NFL, particularly with divisional games, but it is hard to see any other result than a big win for the Packers in this season’s iteration of these two teams.
  • Somehow the consensus line for the Jets’ visit to the Chiefs is even higher than the -19.5 points we are picking on, but I do have a slight hesitation as the Jets did cover for me last week against the Bills. However, there is a world of difference between playing a divisional rival at home and travelling to take on the Chiefs, even if the legendarily noisy Chiefs’ crowd won’t be there. I did think about picking the Jets but I just can’t do it with the Chiefs ranked best in the league on offence by DVOA.

Patriots @ Bills (-3.5)

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

Titans @ Bengals (+5.5)

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

Raiders @ Browns (-2.5)

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

Colts @ Lions (+2.5)

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

Vikings @ Packers (-6.5)

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

Jets @ Chiefs (-19.5)

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

Rams @ Dolphins (+3.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Dolphins
Dan’s Pick:      Rams

Steelers @ Ravens (-3.5)

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

Late Games:

There are two great matchups in the late games and one intriguing matchup so let’s start with what I think will be the most competitive.

The San Francisco 49ers have remained competitive in a fearsome NFC West division despite their extensive injury list and having beaten the Patriots convincingly in week seven must now travel to take on the Seattle Seahawks. It is a testament to the coaching job that Kyle Shanahan and his staff have done that the 49ers are ranked eighth overall by DVOA (one place higher than the Seahawks) despite their injury list and are around top ten in all three phases of the game. The Seahawks meanwhile are relying on their offence with Russell Wilson playing as well as he ever has but the defense, and in particular the Seahawks pass defense is struggling and this makes for an intriguing matchup. This is definitely one of the games to watch this week, but I don’t have a strong hunch for it and I am making a play based on getting an extra half point.

The Chicago Bears get a real test this week as they put their 5-2 record and top ten defense to the test against a 4-2 Saints who are still a good team despite them not living up to the expectations we had coming into the season. The Bears really don’t convince on offence and the consensus line being the Bears getting four I am going to pick the Saints, but I think this could be a sneaky interesting game, particularly when the Saints have the ball.

The other late game sees the LA Chargers visit the 2-4 Denver Broncos with rookie quarterback Justin Herbert coming of his first career win and the Broncos have been beaten heavily by the Chiefs in week seven. The Broncos were hoping they had found their quarterback of the future in Drew Lock but injuries have muddied the water on how good he can be. The Chargers only need a field goal to cover this line and with the consensus number being on the other side of three points I will back the Chargers, but I could see the Broncos springing a surprise.

Chargers @ Broncos (+2.5)

Gee’s Pick:       Chargers
Dan’s Pick:      Broncos

Saints @ Bears (+2.5)

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

49ers @ Seahawks (-3.5)

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

Sunday Night Football:

Cowboys @ Eagles (-6.5)

The Sunday night game must have looked so good for the schedule makers before the season, but with the Cowboys season in disarray already this feels like a very one-sided affair. The Cowboy are starting their third different quarterback in seventh round rookie Ben DiNucci who is going to have an incredibly tough time given how injured the Cowboy’s offensive line is and straight bad their defense is. The Eagles only have a 2-4-1 record compared to the Cowboys’ 2-5 record but feel like they are in a very different place even if they have their own long list of injuries. The line would give me pause except that the consensus line I am seeing sees the Eagles giving eleven points to the Cowboys so under a touchdown seems a comparative bargain. In another world I might still take the points, but with the Cowboys shipping out or cutting underperforming members of their defense and starting a seventh round rookie quarterback I simply can’t pick them.

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

Monday Night Football

Buccaneers @ Giants (+10.5)

The last game of the week is another one-sided contest that sees the surging Tampa Bay Buccaneers visiting the struggling New York Giants. There have been some encouraging moments for the Giants in their last three games but these have all come across fellow NFC East team. Taking on the Buccaneers is a very different prospect and even though this is a big line, I am seeing a higher consensus so whilst I am slightly nervous about this play, I am going to back the Buccaneers and their fearsome defense as Tom Brady continues to find his way with the Bucs offence.

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

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.

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Fallen at the First Hurdle

09 Thursday Jan 2020

Posted by in Gee's Thoughts, Playoffs

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We have had a weekend full of competitive games that yielded upsets and storylines that will rumble on into the offseason, plus there has been a run of new head coach hires so there is plenty to dig into this week.

What I Saw

The first game of weekend saw the Buffalo Bills lose in overtime to the Houston Texans, but whilst the outcome was very similar to what I was predicting before the game – it took a slight detour to get there. For the first forty minutes or so of the game, the Bills had the upper hand, steadily building to a 16-0 lead having scored a touchdown on their opening drive. However, the Bills were unable to make the most of their early offensive success, kicking three field-goals as their defence held the opposition scoreless. The problem was that in the second half, despite being without with receiver Will Fuller through injury, Deshaun Watson was able to lead the comeback as he started connecting to DeAndrew Hopkins, and the highlight of the game was Watson bouncing off two Bills defenders trying to sack him and completing the pass. It was also pretty impressive to watch JJ Watt get a sack with limited use of his arms as he’s not fully recovered from his pec injury. It has to be said there was some questionable game management on both sidelines and fourth down attempts, but the Texans live to fight again whilst the Bills have cause for optimism that I’ll talk about later.

The second game on Saturday is the one that generated all the headlines, even if it was the upset that was being predicted beforehand, but it was still odd to see the New England Patriots have the ball twice in the last five minutes down one point and not be able to get the win. The Tennessee Titans under Patriots alumni Mike Vrabel sealed the win with a last minute pick-six interception of Tom Brady, but the moment everyone is talking about is the Belichick style move Vrabel pulled as he ran out the clock with multiple delay of game and false start penalties before the Titans finally punted the ball having ticked off another minute and a half of clock. What was distinctly un-Belichickian was the two hundred yards of rushing the Patriots gave up to Derrick Henry, although to be fair they did move to the Super Bowl defence of six defensive lineman in the second half and that slowed down Henry some and did disrupt the play-action passing of Ryan Tannehill but not enough to secure the win. This was because once again the Patriots offence couldn’t move the ball consistently enough and of all people, it was Julian Edleman who dropped a crucial fourth down pass when the Patriots really needed it. Take nothing away from the Titans, but their next game could well prove a tougher test.

The first game on Sunday was perhaps the biggest upset of the weekend as the sixth seed Minnesota Vikings travelled to New Orleans and beat the Saints in overtime. This was a slightly curious game as the Saints struggled to get anything going on offence, which is largely down to Mike Zimmer’s defence, but Drew Brees was quiet and suffered his first fumble of the season, whilst the Saints seemed to forget they had one of the better pairs of running backs in the league. There was no bad winner for me in this game as I would love to see Drew Brees get a second ring, but this win at least goes someway to counter all those who say that Kirk Cousins can’t win a big game, particularly as it was his throw to Kyle Rudolph that sealed the game in overtime and he outgained Brees, even if the yardage for both quarterbacks was modest. The Saints didn’t look right for large stretches for the game, but the Vikings are no slouches on defence and got healthy at the right time. I understand why people think the last play should have been reviewed, and you can see Rudolph straightening his arm, but given the standard of evidence they have required to overturn calls this season I am not surprised that the play wasn’t reviewed.

The final game of the weekend was the injury bowl between the Philadelphia Eagles and the visiting Seattle Seahawks. Technically this was the third upset of the weekend, but whilst this game saw the third road winner of the weekend, the Seahawks did have two more wins than the Eagles and didn’t lose their starting quarterback early in the game. The play where Wentz picked up a concussion didn’t look bad, but whilst he was diving forward on a scramble Seahawks’ defensive end Jadeveon Clowney landed on top of him and the contact to the back of Wentz’s head was enough for him to have to leave the game at the end of the drive. I’m not sure it was exactly a dirty play, although it should have been called a penalty, and Clowney was taking the opportunity to let Werntz know that if he ran there would be a prices to pay. The sad thing is that Wentz really did nothing wrong, got through the whole season uninjured and still was missing in the playoffs due to injury. The Eagles had dragged Josh McCown out of retirement to be their backup, and he kept the game competitive, in part because the Seahawks can’t play a normal game but in the end he couldn’t do enough. The standout player of this game statistically was rookie receiver DK Metcalf who had one hundred and sixty passing yards on seven catches, emphasising that he really should not have been the ninth receiver taken in the draft, but once again it was Russell Wilson to the rescue and you feel like as long as the Seahawks have him they have a chance.

What I Heard

There’s quite a lot of new, but before I get to that I want to pick up on something that was discussed on The Ringer NFL Show, namely that in the NFL playoff success is reliant on individual matchups and moments rather than how well a team has implemented current trends in the league. We had evidence of that this weekend with the Eagles struggling through a list of injuries that would have felled most teams only for their quarterback to get injured in the first quarter of their playoff game. The Patriots may well have got a win against another team, but having already lost the to the Dolphins the Titans were well constructed to beat the Patriots, much like the Vikings were a good match for the Saints due to their quality on defence and having beaten them in the playoffs two years before. I dislike the whole judging quarterbacks by how many rings they won as well as some of the wider commentary on the league as the NFL does not play a long season, it is a small sample size mini-league followed by a single elimination cup competition. By record the Ravens were the best team in the NFL this season, and they very well could win it all but whilst it might shock, it would not exactly be that crazy for them to be beaten, just like it was not that surprising that the Titans beat a team who won three more games this season. The margins in the NFL are very small, and there is not even that much difference between the roster talent of the best of the best, and that of an average team.

With that said, let’s take a look at where some of the crucial differences between franchises can be found.

Washington were early enough out the blocks with their hire of Ron Rivera that it got included in last week’s post, but the next team to hire were also one of the latest to let go of their 2019 head coach. Apparently, Jerry Jones wanted to give Jason Garrett a soft landing after nearly three decades round the team and after multiple internal meetings it was finally revealed that Garrett was being let go Sunday evening, The Cowboys wasted no time in announcing they had agreed terms with former Packers coach Mike McCarthy the following day. This is not the college coach hire many had predicted, and a lot depends on how fully McCarthy is committed to the analytics and revamped playbook he was talking about in the press in recent weeks, but they are hoping to keep current offensive coordinator Kellen Moore and are slated to hire LA Rams’ special teams coordinator John Fassel, which are both moves I like. You can’t tell anything at this time of year, but the Cowboys produced well statistically this season an it does feel that if you can manage your owner then this job has the most upside for a quick turnaround. McCarthy seems like a coach who will be happy for Jones to take the limelight so I can definitely see this working out if everything comes together.

It gets harder for me to pass comment on the next hires as I don’t know as much about them, but following on from the Cowboys hiring, the Carolina Panthers announced their signing of college coach Matt Rhule on a seven year $60 million contract and the New York Giants then promptly hired Patriots receivers coach and special teams coordinator Joe Judge.

The Matt Rhule contract is both long and rich, whilst Joe Judge is not a name that has been widely discussed, although the recent improved performance by members of Belichick’s coaching tree might have helped his chances.

The final interesting point is that this just leaves us with the Cleveland Browns searching for a new coach, which I mention only because apart from their long and tortured history, there was a lot of talk about Josh McDaniels leaving the Patriots but given the way Jimmy Haslam has burned through coachers and GMs I wonder if McDaniels will take what would likely last chance at a head coach position with the Browns or wait another year for a better situation.

Fell at the First Hurdle

Time to say fond farewell to those teams who were unlucky enough to fall at the first hurdle inn the playoffs.

The Buffalo Bills have a lot to build upon from this season, they may still have to go back to 1995 for their last playoff win, but they have now been there in two out of the last three years. They appear to have their front office and head coach working in unison so if they continue to find players and develop it is not hard to see them back in contention next year. I know from personal fandom how hard it can be to jump from a team that can make it to the playoffs to one that gets the win and so Bills fans will hope Josh Allen makes that leap at quarterback soon, but the arrow still seems to be pointing up for this franchise.

I’m sure rumours of the demise of the New England Patriots are slightly overblown, but looking at Tom Brady’s quote, and the age of both him and the roster and it does feel like it could be the end of an era. However, you would trust in the infrastructure to effectively rebuild, but it does seem odd to think that we might be about to see a new quarterback take over the franchise. The Bills are already challenging, and the Dolphins look set to improve, but this off-season more than most will set the expectations for the Patriots’ next season. All things must end, even the most stable period of a success that the league has possibly seen. I’m sure Dan is thrilled about it.

The New Orleans Saints there third straight last play elimination from the playoffs, and if there was a theme from last weekend it was the fall of the last generation of quarterbacks. The Saints look like they can compete for another year, but it is rare for quarterbacks to age gracefully, and it can’t be long before Father Time comes for Brees. In this age of counting rings, it’s worth taking into account the whole of Brees’s career and what he has done for both the Saints franchise and the city of New Orleans. As ever, we should enjoy these players whilst we have them because it may not be for long.

The Philadelphia Eagles didn’t really have any right to make the playoffs given the injuries they suffered. I went into season thinking they had one of the deepest rosters in the league, and that was sorely tested and there were definitely problems at both receiver and corner back. I have faith that the front office will address this in the offseason, but the Eagles have already moved on from their offensive coordinator and receivers coach, which is worth noting as head coach Doug Pederson had voiced his confidence in them only twenty-four hours before. It doesn’t feel like this team has ever recovered from the post Super Bowl brain drain, and they must start again on offence, and hope to get Carson Wentz in position to succeed in the playoffs. They will also likely need to address the backup quarterback position given how often they have had to play through Wentz’s young career and with Josh McCown being forty they cannot expect him to repeat the trick. I’m not totally sure what to expect next season, but Pederson has got this team to the playoffs three years in a row and won a Super Bowl in his second season so he has earned time to get it right again.

What We’ve Been Asked

‘OK just 4 rounds to go and I should start this week’s post with an apology to the Chiefs. Last week, you will recall, I predicted that the Super Bowl would see a narrow win for the Chiefs over the Saints. Well half of that has already gone the way of all flesh when the Vikings triumphed in Sunday’s overtime win.

I recall last year where some discussion was had over the number of road winners in Wildcard games. In truth there shouldn’t be a surprise as the seedings are such that teams will inevitably close. It’s when the top seeds enter the fray that form, and a bye week, can have an effect. This year, for the record, only the Texans scored a home win but there are 3 other sets of fans with that satisfied smile ahead of Divisional week.

Now for the Trivia and Dan started the week with a 3-point advantage, but has he maintained it?

Q1 – After the Dolphins made it to Super Bowl VIII after the 1973 season, what was the next season they saw Super Bowl action?

There was some thought checking here but both Gee and Dan went for 1982 which is, of course, correct. 2 points each

Q2 – Who did the Vikings play in their first Super Bowl, which was Super Bowl IV, played on January 11, 1970?

Well Gee went for Kansas while Dan picked the 49’ers. The Vikings lost to the Chiefs 23-7. So 2 points to Gee

Q3 – The Patriots moved and changed their name in 1971. What was the home city and their name prior to that?

This caused Gee some head scratching but while the City was Boston they weren’t the Whalers, which could have been either a hockey team or a type of boat. Dan however, nailed it .

The Boston Patriots were an original member of the American Football League in 1960. They took part in the AFL-NFL merger in 1970. They moved to Foxborough in 1971 and because of the move, they wanted a name change. They originally wanted the name, Bay State Patriots, but the NFL rejected that one. The New England name was accepted in March 1971.

Gee scores 1 and Dan 2 to bring the current totals to Gee 24 and Dan 26 = but what is coming next?

Well, for Divisional Week I’ve landed in New Orleans before moving up to New York and I promise there are no Joe Namath questions.

For New Orleans I want to know this:  In a game against the Washington Redskins on October 13, 2000, Michael Lewis became only the 7th player in NFL history and the first Saint to do what?

Now it’s the New York Giants so tell me In a game against the Washington Redskins on October 30, 1955, Jim Patton was the first player to achieve what?

Finally for the NY Jets – From 1960 – 62 the NY Jets were known as what?

2 points per question. Pick the bones out of those.’

AAF: How the Super Bowl was Won

10 Sunday Feb 2019

Posted by in Amateur Adventures in Film

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So as usual for my final post of the 2018 season I have gone through the coaching tape of the Super Bowl, and this year I was looking at the New England Patriots’ offence going up against the LA Rams’ defence.

I will probably watch the reverse match-up, but given the media focus on the Super Bowl has featured lots of tape focus and the news cycle moving on to the off-season already it shall be for my own amusement and stay in my notebook rather than generating another post. I mention it because I already know the Patriots’ defence lined up with six on the line and jammed the outside zone rush as this alignment stopped the Rams offence line being able to double team. I know this through the discussions I listened to and whilst I always learn things from such discussions, I do try to limit these posts to what I was able to see myself, so on to how the Rams managed to limit the Patriots to just thirteen points.

The first thing I should mention is that a numbers fact has my notes wrong about the defence personnel used in my notebook as whilst Mark Barron wore number twenty-six, which to my eyes has him as a member of the secondary, he is listed as an inside linebacker so the Rams played a lot of 3-4 defence. Now, the hybrid line still did come into play when they played nickel and dime as they would stick to three defensive linemen and outside linebacker Dante Fowler rushing from a standing position on either side of the line. It has become increasingly common for linebackers to become lighter so they can match up against the speed NFL defences currently are using, but it does make life interesting when you face a team like the Patriots who still use 21 personnel a lot and you have an inside linebacker like Barron who is only (only!) 230 Ibs.

One  of the interesting things to me watching this game back on tape compared to me live tweeting with Dan during the game, is I remember a period of the game where I was worried about the Patriots getting away from the run, which seemed odd as whilst they were having problems sustaining long drives, they were successful running the ball. Watching back however, it was only at the end of the first half when they were running two-minute offence that they dropped back and passed a lot. However, they did go quite pass heavy at times because one of the features of this game was the way that Julian Edelman was able to get open in the passing game.

The Patriots moved Edelman in motion a lot, allowing him to get free releases and in space without hands on him Edelman is lethal because of how shifty he is. I saw multiple Rams defensive backs fail to stay with him, and even when they moved Marcus Peters to follow him, who did a better job of covering him there were still plays where Edelman got wide open.

However, the Patriots didn’t have it all their own way so what did the Rams do to have the success on defence they did? Well partly, their defensive coordinator Wade Philips mixed in more zone than I am used to seeing with his defence, and he managed to confuse and disrupt Tom Brady enough to stop the Patriots from being able to sustain long drive. This was despite the Patriots running for over one-hundred and fifty yards from thirty-plus carries. Now these figures benefit from some long runs in the fourth quarter, and certainly a combination of Ndamukong Suh, Aaron Donald, and Dante Folwer all stuffed runs for short gains or losses, but the real problem was that apart from Edelman the Patriots receivers were not able to get open consistently. There were some lovely plays by Rob Gronkowski in the passing game, but Chris Hogan couldn’t bring in any of his six targets and apart from two quick passes to Cordarrelle Patterson no other Patriots receiver caught the ball and even the reliable James White out of the backfield connection was off with him only able to catch one of his four targets. This lack in the passing game meant that the Rams were able to make enough splash plays to limit the Patriots and thanks to an outstanding day of punting by Johnny Hecker the Rams defence were never put in bad field position.

There has been talk that Brady has been off this year, and certainly his receivers played a part in not being open, but there were also throws he flat missed with his first being intercepted as he simply didn’t account for the zone exchange between Rams defenders and so Nickell Robey-Coleman was able to get under Chris Hogan and bat the ball into the air so Corey Littleton could get the interception. If the Rams front seven were largely handled by the Patriots offence, Littleton did really impress me as the linebacker who never came off the field, led the team in tackles and got two pass deflections as well as this interception.

If anything won this game for the Patriots, it was a late game adjustment on offence that I have seen the Patriots use before, but which we since heard had not been practised. The Patriots lined up on the drive where they got the touchdown in 21 personnel, but lined up in shotgun flexing out full-back James Develin and this gave them the match-ups they needed to move the ball in chunks and get to the goal-line so they could run the ball in.  The Patriots found one play they ran three times out of different looks and threw the ball to different receivers and that was basically the game. So even when he wasn’t at his best, Brady was able to execute Josh McDaniels’ tactical switch, which is a very Patriots way to win a game as once more it demonstrates why their focus is on smart players and tactical flexibility.

If you had offered the Rams before the game that they would limit the Patriots to thirteen points, I’m sure they would have taken it expecting that to be enough to win the game.  The Rams defence did enough to win this game and Wade Philips demonstrated all his experience, but the Rams offence couldn’t finish the game off and that will hurt for a long time.

The Super Bowl Aftermath

06 Wednesday Feb 2019

Posted by in Gee's Thoughts

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This is not quite the final post of the 2018 season for me as I have at least one coaching tape post that I am going to write on the Super Bowl, and frankly I’m tempted to do both sides of the ball for both teams but I’ll get to that in a bit.

So what can I tell you about the Super Bowl that you don’t already know or saw for yourself? I was intrigued by the game and I really am looking forward to digging into the coaching tape, but no one can claim it was a spectacle. For a season so dominated by high powered offences, the Super Bowl was a demonstration that not only can defences still compete, but they can still win championships.

I joked on Sunday that my dream of a game without touchdowns decided by a safety was still in play after the first quarter, but whilst we got a field goal in the second quarter, we didn’t see a touchdown until the fourth quarter and the game finished 13-3 to the Patriots.

Whilst all the headlines have understandably gone to Belichick and Brady as they won a sixth Super Bowl, it is worth pointing out that Brady had his own problems thanks to the Rams’ defensive coordinator Wade Philips and it was only due to an unpractised switch by Josh McDaniels in the fourth quarter that the Patriots scored any touchdowns. This is the first match-up I am going to look at in the coaching tape so I can see what was happening but Tom Brady started the with an interception on his first pass and the Patriots struggled to move the ball effectively all game. The obvious stand out offensive player of the game was Julian Edelman, which explains why he was declared MVP but as important as his contribution was to the Patriots win, in a game that was so dominated by two sets of defences, perhaps a defensive player should have won that award. After all, Stephon Gilmore finished the  game with five tackles, forced a fumble and picked off Jared Goff, which led to the Patriots effectively sealing the game with a second field goal.

To just put this into context, Bill Belichick and new Miami Dolphins head coach Brian Flores managed to limit the second best offence in the league by DVOA to a field goal. The surprising thing about this was given the innovation that Sean McVay and the Rams have shown all season, they didn’t find an offensive adjustment or try anything on special teams. I felt sure going into this game that McVay would have something up his sleeve, and I need to watch on tape to be sure of what happened but it didn’t feel like the Rams moved away from 11 personnel and that was something I had seen them do in the playoffs. I don’t know if we’ll ever know precisely what was going on with Todd Gurley, but with ten carries and a couple of pass targets he was not a big part of the game. In fact the Rams only gave CJ Anderson seven carries and for a team that builds its offence off running the ball and play-action, they were too often in a third and long situation. The Patriots managed to do what I thought they might, make Jared Goff drop back and beat them with his arm and he was not up to the task. Goff has already spoken up and shouldered the blame, whilst Sean McVay admitted he had been out-coached and veteran left tackle Andrew Whitworth reminded us we are going to die so whilst this loss is going to hurt for a while, I suspect that the Rams will learn and be competitive next season. There are a lot of free agents on their roster so we’ll have to see how they chose to go about assembling a new roster the off-season, but McVay will need to develop an adjustment to what happened in the Super Bowl as defensive coordinators around the league will be studying the coaching tape of it in the off-season.

As for the Patriots, would anyone be surprised if Bill Belichick was already working on next season. I think it is likely that we’ll see Rob Gronkowski retire given the toll his career has taken on his body and apparently he has been dealing with a bulging disk in his back this season, but Tom Brady is still planning to carry on. As I keep saying, I will believe the Patriots are done when they finally stop winning. They are the masters of doing just enough through the season and peaking for the playoffs so let’s see how they shape up, but given the premium they place on depth of roster I would expect their off-season to be quiet and who can argue with their success. How resilient do you have to be as a franchise to go to so many Super Bowls in a period where the league is designed for parity? As much as you may be fed up of watching them win, we are living through history and we should not take such excellence for granted. That said, a playoff tested Patrick Mahomes won’t be spotting the Patriots a fourteen-point lead at halftime next season so things could well be very different next times the Chiefs play the Patriots.

As I mentioned briefly, Patriots defensive coordinator Brian Flores has been formally announced as their new head coach. The Bengals have also announced that Rams quarterback coach Zac Taylor will be their tenth head coach. We won’t know how either of their tenures will go for a couple of seasons, but we are already into the season of hope as many teams announced via twitter pretty much the moment the Super Bowl was done.

I am going to take a look at the coaching tape of the Super Bowl, focusing on the Patriots offence versus the Rams’ defence this week for a post I hope to get up on Sunday, and I may well look at the job the Patriots defence did on the Rams the week after, but then I will focus on other things for a little while. I’ll write some posts round the major off-season events as well as occasional football posts but I won’t be posting more than once or twice a month until preseason starts.

In the meantime, thank you for reading all season and good luck with the long off-season, but between free-agency and the draft, there’s plenty of news to follow and soon it will be time for training camps.

There’s just one final thing I have to share today, but I’ll let Dan’s Dad, winner of this season’s pick competition and trivia master extraordinaire have the final say on the 2018 season

‘Well, there we go. Another season closes with a record breaking Superbowl in the bag but as we prepare for the quieter months to come we have to put a lid on the 2018 Trivia competition.

You will remember that this final game became a simple shoot out as Dan and Gee were on exactly the same scores so, literally, all to play for.

Question 1 wanted the player making the longest kick off return and it was Dan who took the early lead correctly identifying Jakeem Grant’s 102 yard return ending in a fine TD.

Question 2 asked the same for the longest pass of the year. Well, like the English cricketers the scorers were not troubled here. Patrick Mahomes was a logical choice but Big Ben Rothlisburger who threw a 97 yarder run in for another TD.

Third was a simple NFC/AFC question on which had won the most Superbowls. Well the score, before today, was 27 – 25 in favour of the NFC so Gee draws level.

Well done both on stotting that with 2 points at stake it was likely that there would be 2 QB’s who played in and won 4 Superbowls with no defeats. Well, I’ve dropped a few names into the mix recently so Gee’s choice of Terry Bradshaw and Joe Montana against Dan’s Elway/Montana combo sees Gee gaining 2 to Dan’s 1.

Finally I asked about how many franchises have won a Superbowl. The answer is 20 so again, no points I’m afraid.

Therefore by just 1 point, for the record 22 to 21, this year’s champion in Gee. Congratulations to both for some interesting and impressive answers. I have the benefit of Google but this pair have only gone to it after they have made their responses so Kudos there! 

In closing I had set a tie breaker in case it was needed and, would you believe it, they both went for the same answer so it wouldn’t have got a result after all. I asked about the total Passing yardage for all 32 teams last season. 128,000 wasn’t a bad try but if you are interested it was 121737 – and for the geeks rushing delivered 58643 so now I see why a QB with a good arm is so valuable.

I hope you have enjoyed the quiz – its been an interesting thing to compile but I’ve been pleased by the responses. Enjoy the Off-season.’

Th…Th…That’s All Folks!

05 Tuesday Feb 2019

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Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last couple of weeks, you’ll have seen that Sunday brought the 2018 NFL Season to a close with the Superbowl, which saw the New England Patriots emerge victorious over the LA Rams in what turned out to be one of the lowest scoring and most Defensive ‘bowls in recent memory.

Personally, I didn’t think the game was a classic (Sorry Gee!). You may be aware that I’m more of an offensive man than a defensive one, so the fact that the score was just 3-0 at half time meant that we were in severe need of something worth staying-up for… unfortunately, that meant Maroon 5, who produced one of the worst Superbowl half time shows I think I’ve ever seen!

The half time show feels like it’s lost some of it’s magic. It’s a good few years since we’ve had a show which I’ve genuinely looked forward to… It’s not that long since we had a run of shows which included Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers, The Who, The Boss, The Rolling Stones and Prince, so the latest crop really have struggled to offer up anything worth sticking around at half time for. At least it gave me time to go and make some pop-tarts and a hot chocolate… A stark reminder that I’m getting old!

Back to the game though, and one thing which surprised me was the performance of Jarred Goff. He’s looked good all season and has been a real shining star of Sean McVay’s time with the Rams. He looked very shaky all game, and found himself making poorly judged throws, being rushed often, and got sacked 4 times. On the other hand, Tom Brady (the supposed ‘GOAT’) didn’t do much better – he only made 30ish more yards, and his completion percentage wasn’t a huge amount better than Goff’s, but what he did have was Julian Edelman, the eventual game’s MVP, who did a fantastic job at making extra yards after the catch and generally causing the Rams Defence all sorts of problems.

None of my bets came off either… I stood to win £85 had the Rams won the game! On the plus side, the defensiveness of the game gave us a good look at what Brian Flores, Miami’s newly anointed Head Coach, was capable of. If Sunday was a job interview, I’d say he well and truly passed with flying colours, even if he did have the might of Brucey B behind him.

But I think the main thing which came out of the game, and actually probably of the season as a whole is what a brilliant job the NFL (along with Sky and the BBC) are doing at raising the awareness of the game over on this side of the pond. I lost count of the number of people who spoke to me about it over the weekend, and have spoken to me about how they caught some of the game since, and while neither the game or the halftime show were classics, there’s definitely something to be said about the prospects for the league going forward.

This became even more clear to me on Sunday afternoon when I was walking home from the King Power stadium. 2 young lads were behind me who couldn’t have been more than about 11 or 12 years old. They’d just left a football (soccer) game where they’d seen their team unlucky not to get something of a result, and they were talking about how much they were looking forward to the Super Bowl! One was talking about how Tom Brady was going to have a huge game and throw for “like… 500 yards!” And the other was more concerned about how Todd Gurley was going to get “at least 4 touchdowns!”. While neither of them were correct (it would have made for a much better game, I think we can all agree… well, maybe not ‘all’) I was seriously impressed that 2 lads of their age were talking about The Wrong Football the same as you would expect them to be discussing the ‘other’ football!

We’re winning… keep spreading the news, and I’ll speak to you all in a few months!

@TWFDan

Super Bowl Sunday

03 Sunday Feb 2019

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Here we are on Super Bowl Sunday, and there’s a game to preview and a number of trivia questions to separate Dan and I in our competition.

‘A bumper crop of questions in the hope that a winner can be found – along with a tie breaker which would only come into play if we are still at loggerheads. So, here goes:

In the 2018 Regular season – who scored the

  1. Long kick return   (For 1 point)
  2. Longest Pass   (1 point)
  3. For Superbowl LIII I want to know which conference has had most wins in the preceding 52? To be clear the NFC includes the NFL and the AFC the AFL.   (1 Point)
  4. Which QBs have Played in 4 Superbowl’s and won all 4   (2 points)
  5. How many franchises, including teams that have relocated to another city, have won the Super Bowl?   (1 point)

And finally, the Hail Mary Tie-breaker……… IF it’s needed.

In the 2018 season what was the Aggregate Total of Passing Yards of all 32 Teams.

Its Game On – Over to you.’

So this is a pretty tough set of questions and I’ll try to work my way through with guess work as I don’t know:

  1. I’m struggling on this one, but I think Alex Erickson of the Bengals had a long one, like over seventy yards, and whilst it wouldn’t surprise me if there was one from the endzone, I can’t think of it.
  2. I’m not exactly sure on this one either, but I feel comfortable in plumping for a guess of Patrick Mahomes as it’s not exactly a stretch for him to have the longest pass of the season.
  3. Okay, so I’m going to go with the maths on this one, and hope that fifty-two is a large enough sample size for the big runs to even themselves out. However, whilst I suspect the numbers are close, I do remember the ridiculous run of NFC winners we had in the mid-eighties into the nineties thanks to the Cowboys and 49ers so I’m guessing NFC.
  4. This one is one that I think I have a solid guess at assuming I’m right in thinking two points equals two names, and whilst there are a few quarterbacks with a great pedigree, I’m going to name Terry Bradshaw and Joe Montana as the logical guesses given their team’s successes and hope that Steve Young isn’t going to trip me up!
  5. So I think this is actually going to be surprisingly low given that there have been fifty-two games, but we have had a lot of teams like the Steelers, 49ers, Patriots who have won a lot so even throwing in moved franchise I’m going to guess at something like twenty-five

Bonus question time!

I could actually work this out from data but I’ll employ a little maths and as I know that the Chiefs threw for over five thousand yards, and guessing the lowest is somewhere around say three thousand so the mid-point is say four thousand yards. That would give me total of one-hundred and twenty-eight thousand passing yards for thirty-two teams as a rough guess.

‘Ok, my final trivia answers. With everything neck and neck (we promise it wasn’t planned this way!!):

  1. Long kick return – I feel this is unfair, but I’ll take it! Jakeem Grant of the Dolphins got a 102 yarder against the Titans week one. It was also the longest game of the season. I’ll take the extra point there too…!
  2. Longest Pass – Not sure about this, it really could be anyone. I’ll say Patrick Mahomes.
  3. For Superbowl LIII I want to know which conference has had most wins in the preceding 52? – Hmmm… bit of a toss-up here. I’ll guess at the AFC
  4. Which QBs have Played in 4 Superbowl’s and won all 4 – it’s going to have been a while back, so I’ll go with John Elway and Joe Montana
  5. How many franchises, including teams that have relocated to another city, have won the Super Bowl? This will be quite high, but I know not everyone has… I’ll go with 26

In the 2018 season what was the Aggregate Total of Passing Yards of all 32 Teams. – 128,000 is my guess. To show my working, I’d say the best teams get about 5000, and the worst end up on about 3000, so averaging at 4000 per team, over 32 teams, makes 128k.’

So with the trivia competition out of the way it is time turn our attention to tonight’s game.

New England Patriots vs Los Angeles Rams

I will start by looking at both teams when they have the ball and the I’ll throw in some final comments and there will be nothing left to write before the big game.

The match-up of the game for me will the Patriots’ defence going against Rams’ offence so that’s where I will start. The often-cited tactics of Bill Belichick is to take away what you want to do and force you to play left handed. I’m not sure who they will focus on in terms of coverage, but I imagine given how much of the Ram’s offence is based off running the ball and play-action, that the Patriots will want to force Jared Goff to be a drop back passer and dare him to beat them with his arm. Now the Rams almost lucked into a powerful backfield duo when they picked up CJ Anderson late in the season to spell Todd Gurley who was struggling with a knee injury. The Rams are insisting that Gurley is healthy despite him spending most of the Conference Championship game on an exercise bike and one of the big unknowns in this game is how effective Gurley will be. That said, Anderson has rushed for over one-hundred yards in three of the four games he has played for the Rams since getting signed in December.

The story of the Rams’ offence this season has been the use of 11 personnel and the myriad of looks and motions they build of this group of starters who predominantly play the whole game. However, in recent weeks they have been mixing in more 12 personnel with the extra tight-end helping in both the running and passing game. The don’t have a dominant receiver, with both Robert Woods and Brandin Cooks finishing the regular season over twelve-hundred yards and within fifteen yards of each other. The loss of Cooper Kupp to injury did seem to disrupt Jared Goff but Josh Reynolds has done what he can from the slot to replace him.

I am really looking forward to this match-up as it is the meat of the contest between the all time great Bill Belichick and the young genius as Sean McVay has been heralded, and I think it is likely to be the most important for the Rams if they hope to win. I’ll come back to that later, but for now I will just say that I am intrigued to see what McVay and his staff have cooked up in terms of things that run counter to the Rams’ usual offensive tendencies that will be tried in an effort to catch Belichick out.

When the Patriots have the ball things will be just as interesting, and the contest between Josh McDaniels and Tom Brady going against Wade Philips is hardly less intriguing what I’ve just written about. Particularly as Philips has already masterminded a winning defence against Brady and the Patriots on the way to a Super Bowl win with the Broncos. In Aaron Donald the Rams’ have a pass rusher every bit as effective as the Broncos’ Von Miller and they can also line up Ndamukong Suh next to him. The conventional wisdom is to beat Tom Brady you need to be able to get pressure with four pass rushers and with these two supremely talented tackles and Dante Fowler the Rams stand some chance of doing this. The difference between this defence and the one the Philips and the Broncos used to beat the Patriots is the secondary is not as talented and in a game such as against the Saints what the Rams have are explosive moments rather than consistent play. Yes both Suh and Donald has outstanding moments, but the Saints were able to get them on their heels and I have feeling that the recent tactics of the Patriots could well negate the Rams’ defence.

The Patriots, as has often been their want have recently reinvented themselves as running football team using 21 personnel and fullback James Devlin as both a lead blocker and pass catcher. In addition, in the last few weeks Rob Gronkowski has looked really effective as a blocking tight-end who has caught some passes and whilst he’s looked for from his league conquering best, in the last few games he has looked closer to it. The form of Julian Edelman in the playoffs has also been a big boost to the Patriots whilst their running backs committee was able to generate one-hundred and seventy-six yards and four touchdowns against the Chiefs. This may not be the high flying iteration of the Patriots’ offence that has so dominated previous seasons, but they have found a way to control the clock and win games comfortably having earned yet another playoff bye.

The advantage this gives the Patriots is that if they can grind out the game against a defence that was twenty-eight in the league against the run during the regular season then they can dominate time of possession and win a close game.

I am really excited by this year’s Super Bowl, which I think should be tactically fascinating but who do I think is going to win?

This has been a year where your defence only needed to be so good given the power of offence, but I feel like the Patriots have a slight edge in match-ups and I have more faith in Belichick and staff’s ability to maximise their team’s performance in the unusual circumstances of the Super Bow given they have been there nine times in eighteen and this is their third in a row. The Rams absolutely can win this game, and I would love for former Bengals stalwart starting left tackle Andrew Whitworth to get a Super Bowl win but whilst my heart wants Rams for this reason, my head says that in a close game the Patriots will edge out winners with their better balance.

Whatevver happens, I think I will have some great coaching tape to dig into next week.

AAF: LA Rams’ Defence

03 Sunday Feb 2019

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So for my final amateur adventures in film post I took a look at the LA Rams defence playing against the New Orleans Saints’ offence.

This was an interesting match-up as the Saints’ offence ranked fourth in league by DVOA and the Rams’ defence ranked nineteenth.

For most of this game the Rams did not play in a base 3-4 four defence, predominantly playing a 3-3 nickel or 3-2 dime defence. The hybrid defensive line consisted of three defensive linemen and Dante Fowler moving to either side of the line as a stand-up pass rusher. This highlighted how important the trade for him mid-season was, and against the Saints the Rams’ defence held them to under three hundred yards. However, whilst the Saints were only able to run for forty-eight yards, there were stretches where they were able to move the ball freely and Drew Brees threw for two-hundred and forty-nine yards and two touchdowns.

The Rams rush defence was not great this season, but they managed to bottle up the Saints pair of runners in Mark Ingram and Alvin Kamara, but this was partly due to moments of brilliant from Suh and Donald rather than consistent run fits, although that did happen on some snaps. Still, it was very impressive to see Suh pushing back a centre of the quality of Max Unger as happened on a couple of plays.

However, for a lot of the game I was more impressed with the design of the Saints offence, with combinations of routes creating natural picks between defenders and several times using motion to get players open in the passing game. In the much talked about play where Nickell Robey-Coleman committed uncalled pass interference and a helmet to helmet hit, he was behind the Saints’ motion from before the ball was snapped so you can see why he desperately flew across the field and committed the interference to stop a touchdown. The problem for him this week will be that he admitted it and so the refs will be likely watching him closely in the Super Bowl and so despite him having some impressive pass breakups in this game, I wonder if he could struggle in a match-up against Julian Edelman in the slot.

The Rams secondary has some impressive names at corner, but Marcus Peters in known to gamble for the big play and Aqib Talib is ten days away from his thirty-third birthday. Too often the Saints were able to move the ball with short plays or scheme someone open, even if Michael Thomas was kept to a modest thirty-six yards, but Ted Ginn continued to prove his used in stretching the defence, whilst Alvin Kamara picked up ninety-six yards through the air as various players tried to follow him round the formation and often failed.

Overall there are a lot of big names in the Rams’ defensive unit, but they are really designed to play with a lead and counter a team passing the ball to catch up. For most of the year this was absolutely fine, but we shall have to see how it fairs this week in the Super Bowl. What price they will pay going forward given the number of high-price free-agents that comprise their star players, but the new acquisitions for this season were meant to get the Rams to the Super Bowl, so as far as the Rams are concerned the gamble was probably worth it.

Conference Championship Games

20 Sunday Jan 2019

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Tonight we get the top two teams from both conferences competing to see who goes to the Super Bowl, which is much more important than our trivia competition but we’re doing it anyway!

‘For this week I’ll keep it simple and its ONE point for each of the 3 questions.

In the 2018 Regular season who had the most sacks?

We have already asked which team has made the most Championship appearances (The Steelers with 16) but who has made the second most?

Finally, which team has won the most Championship games?

Dan still has a 1 point advantage – will that be the case come Sunday?’

Okay, so this is a varied set of questions, but let’s see how we go. I’m pretty certain that the answer to the first question is Aaron Donald, which just goes to show how impressive he is as he got them playing defensive tackle.

I’m slightly worried that there is a trick to the other questions because this brings back to my mind the overall record post I did in the summer before this season and so I am sure that the team with the most championship wins is the Green Bay Packers, but were they super-efficient and got it on fewer tries or are they second to the Steelers in terms of appearances? The Packers got thirteen championships (I have the spreadsheet to prove it) and if the Steelers were first with sixteen then the Packers were in at least thirteen championship games so I’m sticking with them for both questions. I look forward to being proved wrong…

‘I’m really feeling the pressure here – after a terrible pick-em season, I’m desperate to win the trivia competition, and with 3 weeks left (I think) I’m getting nervous!

Question one I’m going to go with Aaron Donald – it’s a bit of a guess but he’s been a sack machine for years so I’ll go with him for the most this season.
Sorry to jump around, but I’m going for the Patriots as the team who have won the most Conference Championships in Q3 and I’m between them and the Packers for second most appearances in question two… I think I’ll stick with the Patriots for both answers.’

LA Rams @ New Orleans Saints

The first game on Sunday sees the LA Rams take their second ranked offence and nineteenth ranked defence by DVOA to play the slightly more evenly spread New Orleans Saints. The Saints actually rank fourth in offence and eleventh in defence but fourth in overall DVOA.

What does this all mean given that all four teams playing this weekend are ranked in the top seven by DVOA?

At this stage of the season I’m not entirely sure. Neither team’s offence has been at the peak of their form in recent weeks, but the Rams performance on the ground against the Dallas Cowboys’ run defence was particularly impressive so you have to think that running the ball will feature heavily in Sean McVay’s game plan. The combination of CJ Anderson, picked up as a free agent late in the season, and a now healthy Todd Gurley created a fearsome tandem that the Rams used to amass two hundred and thirty-eight yards between them with both rushing for one hundred yard. I have again run out of time to finish the coaching tape I was watching this week, but I did see how the Rams managed to run the ball so effectively with 11 personnel. The mix of repeated jet motion, moving the tight end, and even end around runs by Josh Reynolds and fakes of the same created consistent motion going both ways that served to make a good run defence a step slow. The Saints rushing defence actually ranked two places higher by DVOA at the end of the season that the Cowboys, but a big question in this game is how will the injury to defensive tackle Sheldon Rankins last week affect the Saints ability to pressure and hold up in the middle of their defensive line.

The Saints might not be too dissimilar in the way they attack the LA Rams defence given that the Rams finished the season ranked twenty-eighth in rush defence by DVOA and the Saints have both Alvin Kamara and Mark Ingram able to run and catch passes out of the backfield. Kamara is devastating in space, whereas Ingram is a more powerful runner and the Rams will have their hands full dealing with this duo. Getting Ted Ginn back from injury has allowed the Saints to stretch the field more, but the awkward truth is that these days Drew Brees struggles a little to get the ball deep as the opening play interception in the game last week demonstrates because Brees underthrew Ginn. The worry for the Saints is that whilst the Rams rush defence is not great, they do have Aaron Donald who is probably the most disruptive defensive player in the league and left guard Andrus Peat is playing with a broken hand. I know offensive linemen are a different breed when it comes to injury, but this is not a great time to be nursing an injury and the Saints also had centre Max Unger dealing with a knee injury during the week.

In recent years it has been the home teams who have been getting through to the Super Bowl, but this game feels really tight. The Saints have a great home advantage, and the experience at head coach and quarterback, but there are some injury concerns and the Rams have several players who can take over a game as well as a really well schemed offence. I would lean to the Saints still, mainly because of Drew Brees’ experience as compared to Jared Goff and Sean Payton’s knack of being aggressive at the right time but it wouldn’t exactly be a surprise if the Rams won.

New England Patriots @ Kansas City Chiefs

I have been one of many who have wondered about the form of the Patriots this year, but that does not mean that I think they suck as Tom Brady claimed after their win over the Chargers this week. We are all pretty familiar with the legend of the sixth round quarterback and how he is still using that slight and others to motivate himself. Given the success that him and Bill Belichick have had over the years I was definitely not overlooking them last week, and lo and behold, they demonstrated what they are truly capable of. We had Julian Edleman throw back the clock and catch nine balls for one hundred and fifty-one yards whilst James White caught fifteen balls out of the backfield on screen plays and gained ninety-seven yards. Meanwhile Sony Michel ran for one hundred and twenty-nine yards, helped by the blocking of fullback James Develin and in particular Rob Gronkowski. Gronk may have had only one reception in this game, but he blocked effectively and looked good doing it as the Patriots put up forty-one points to give themselves control for the entire game. Now they take this offence to Arrowhead stadium and have to try to keep up with a great Chiefs’ offence. This the Patriots can definitely do, but it is frequently foolish to try to predict how the Patriots will approach the game. I suspect they will try to use their multiple running backs and short passing game to slow the Chiefs’ pass rush and given that their defence ranked twenty-sixth by DVOA at the end of the regular season they may stand a chance, but I’ll come back to that after we’ve talked the Chiefs properly.

The Chiefs have been one of the dominant teams of this season as well as one of the defining narratives thanks to the performance of Patrick Mahomes in his first full season of starting. The young quarterback has continually wowed with his ability to throw the ball as he racked up fifty touchdowns and over five thousand yards during the regular season. He showed few signs of nerves last week as the Chiefs made short work of a Colts team who had been as good as anyone in recent weeks. The defence has been the weakness of this team through the season, but they looked really good against the Colts even if Eric Berry continues to sit out. The Chiefs lost 40-43 in New England earlier this season and this was one of the few games where Mahomes showed some nerves and he threw two of his twelve interceptions that week. However, this week they welcome the Patriots to their own turf in what should be a second great game this.

This game is really hard to call, there is always an unpredictability to the approach that Bill Bilichick will take, whilst Andy Reid’s team has looked great all season. If anybody can silence the raucous Arrowhead crowd it is Tom Brady, but with a defence that is mid-table by DVOA the Patriots will need to keep up with the Chiefs offence. Given the time of year and the weather we may not get the explosion of points there were in their previous meeting, but Patriots have not been good on the road this season and so despite never wanting to bet against the Patriots I am leaning towards the Chiefs in this one.

We should be in for two great games today and then all of a sudden we’ll have two weeks full of news and no football (no, the Pro Bowl doesn’t count) and then it will be the big day. I’m looking forward to all three games as there are simply no bad matchup in any combination of the four teams left, let’s hope the games live up to expectations.

Back To My Old Self!

06 Tuesday Nov 2018

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Firstly, I just want to say thank you to everyone who read my post last week – it was my highest viewed post since I’ve been contributing, but more importantly, it was REALLY cathartic to write.

With that said, I’m back to my old self this week, and luckily for you I’ve watched some football! Although, that’s a fairly loose term for what I saw during the Dolphins/Jets game on Sunday night. It was one of the most boring games I’ve watched for a long time, which was highlighted especially as I fell asleep while watching the game for 10 play clock minutes in the third quarter, and missed absolutely nothing! Seriously… I’ve been back and watched it… nothing happened!

That being said, I can imagine Gee would have found some positives in it. The Defences were both pretty strong, helped along by two particularly poor offences. Jets’ rookie quarterback Sam Darnold looked… well, very much like a Rookie. He seemed a bit off the boil, and very much a different player to the one I watched in the Away fixture in week 2. He definitely wasn’t helped by a Centre with a broken finger who was providing him with dud-snaps all game, but to throw 4 interceptions in one game is pretty unforgivable.

On the Miami Offence, one thing that baffled me a little was Frank Gore out snapping, and out running Kenyan Drake by 20 attempts to just 3! I’m not sure if there’s more to it than meets the eye here, but it’s a strange choice to allow the veteran 35 year old more carries than the up and coming potential future of the team’s Running Game who is just finding his feet in his third season in the league. Osweiler wasn’t great either. He’s said he wants to make it impossible for Adam Gase to put Ryan Tannehill back into the lineup when he returns to fitness, but if he wants to do that, he’s got to try a LOT harder when he has the opportunity – his deep passes over the last few weeks have been woefully poor, and his accuracy even at mid-range isn’t where it needs to be.

But, a win is a win as they say, and next week it’s on to… oh no… Green Bay.

Speaking of the Packers, they visited the Patriots on Sunday night [The clue is the big Gillette in the above photo – Ed.] , in what (barring an increasingly unlikely meeting at the Superbowl) looks like it’ll be the last meeting of the 12’s before Brady hangs up his cleats. It was a good game too and had a bit of everything including a nice trick play with Julian Edelman completing a pass for 37 yards. What is really encouraging is that Josh Gordon seems to be finding his feet in New England and is connecting well with Tom Brady. Especially nice to see given the knowledge of his off-field problems which have hindered much of his career.

Elsewhere, the Rams took their first loss of the season, meaning there are now no unbeaten teams. They’ve done well to get this far though to be fair, and the Saints are looking equally good in recent weeks. We could very easily see this being a pre-cursor to the NFC Championship game in January – you heard it here first people! Oh, and that had a slightly negative impact on my bet too, which means the chart now looks like this…

I don’t think Gee or I have mentioned yet that London will be hosting 4 games next year, between Wembley and the new Tottenham stadium. Good news all round, I think. There’s only 3 teams who are yet to play in London, so I would expect at least 2 of the Packers, Panthers and Texans to make the trip over the pond. Selfishly, I really hope the Dolphins come over again, but assuming there are no teams playing here more than once next year, a quarter of the league will be visiting London, which is great! This year’s games were a really good advert for the league too, and caused a lot of people to catch games who wouldn’t normally… although most people seem just to be talking about the toll that 3 games in 3 weeks had on the Wembley turf!

What’s your favourite game that we’ve seen over here in London? And what’s your usual pre-match routine when you visit Wembley? Get in touch on Twitter, and lets have a chat!

Until next time…

@TWFDan