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"SPEECHES! SPEECHES!"
In the visitors locker room in Tampa Bay, the ridiculed Shianters coach Pat Shurmur had just passed the ball to rookie goaltender Daniel Jones, who was being harassed and ridiculed. by succeeding local football Jeter, Eli Manning. Giants 32, Bucs 31. And now his 52 teammates wanted to hear him.
"SPEECHES! GO!"
Quick jerk of Jones's head, smiling, like: I will not make speeches in the locker room, thank you.
"Decompose us, D.J.!" Shouted security, Jabrill Peppers.
Holding his right arm in the air, the centerpiece of a team acclaim, Jones said, "Giants to three! One two three three, the giants!
Doing something rah-rah-team was so much better than a speech for Jones, who, like the man he did, is not very good at speech. But when you play as he did on Sunday (two touchdowns and two touchdowns, including the winning goal at seven yards with a time remaining at 1.21), you can be as quiet as you want. This is not a big team of giants. In fact, it's probably not good; time will tell us. But once you have your quarterback, and you can build around this quarterback, life is simply better, and you feel like a competing NFL franchise again. Winning eight of the previous 34 games, with a poor 38-year-old quarterback or worse for much of the past seven seasons, has made the future look bleak. Apart from former faithful teammates (It's not Eli's fault!) Shurmur who was turning to Jones seemed not only long-awaited but almost as merciful to Manning.
It's amazing how quickly the fortunes can change in the NFL.
The non-Antonio scenario of Week 3: Eight teams have a quarterback instability. Examine how they did:
• Giants did not need a plane to get to Tampa. Daniel Jones has passed his first test on the quarterback of the future.
• Jaguars, To the delight of their good old boys, Gardner Minshew, a good old boy smuggler from the Mississippi, sank Tennessee.
• The panthers Kyle Allen, who looked better than Cam Newton looked like the year, whipped Arizona.
• The foals, Thanks again without Andrew Luck, who beat Atlanta behind the fourth-ranked passer, Jacoby Brissett.
• The Saints got a nice match from Teddy Bridgewater in Seattle while Drew Brees was resting after the thumb operation. New Orleans 33, Seattle 27.
• The Steelers fell to 0-3 as the reality of playing the year without Ben Roethlisberger strikes. The bricklayer Rudolph was totally in agreement when defeated against the 49ers.
• The Dolphins Josh Rosen has been replaced by Ryan Fitzpatrick. But they can not win and have not done so in Dallas.
• the jets Luke Falk, third member of the team, played as a ninth in a toothless defeat in New England. Heal Sam Darnold, heal.
Five teams with quarter instability won. Three lost. I'll cover Minshew and Allen in a moment. But let 's go back to Jones and the Giants first.
Giants fans did not have to wait long to see what the coaches had seen at camp and preseason. In the second quarter, Jones simulated an inside RPO and kept it, spinning the stretch for a seven-yard touchdown. Turning 28-10 at half-time, he made the first pass of the third quarter to the tight end, Evan Engram, on the left. a 75-yard touchdown resulted. Then, with his Sterling Shepard double in the end zone, Jones threw a line to a diving Shepard where only he could catch it. Landing.
That boiled down to this: Bucs up 31-25, 1:21 left. The giants play at Tampa 7. Fourth and five. Shurmur planned to flood the ground with five receivers: three wide, one back and one close. Thanks to a decisive pass to catch Saquon Barkley on crutches with a sprained ankle, the Giants were reduced. But at the time of the shooting, the five receivers moved away from the center of the field – turning Wayne Gallman to the right; Shepard at the left apartment; Congratulations Bennie Fowler on a crossover route from left to right; Engram takes two defensemen from the Bucs on a single left turn at a depth of two meters in the end zone; and rookie Darius Slayton trolling behind the end zone. In total, seven Bucs hung on five giants.
"What did you see at that time, when these receivers were on their way?", I asked Jones an hour after the match.
"Space," said Jones. "A little open there in the middle of the field. I saw grass.
When Jones came out of the scrum, he might have been able to hit Slayton running from right to left in the end zone, with corner Carlton Davis in pursuit but with a small window. But why throw? With northern New Jersey and Staten Island and Brooklyn and Manhattan and Yonkers and Queens and upstate New York and Greenwich and Stamford and Danbury, all screaming on TV: Run, Daniel, run! he ran straight into the NFL Open Space Central Park. No Buc was within six meters of him when he crossed the goal line. I heard that the Giants did not intend to make the play turn into an easy touch, but whatever the intention was, the reality seemed great.
Fortunately for the Giants, the Bucs kicker, Matt Gay, played with the tabloid story, missing a 34-yard stick goal to secure the shot on goal. The final: Giants 32, Bucs 31. The sleepy franchise has life. This morning, the last page of the post sounds:
NEW MANN IN CITY
"It must be incredibly rewarding," I told Jones.
Bait not taken.
"Yes, I mean … fun to win, but at the end of the day it's a game. We are eager to get by. I have to go. Thank you!"
Jones has made the Giants interesting now, for the rest of the year 2019, and presumably with some reinforcements, including a sleight of hand, a top – out and a better offensive line, for the future. Looking at him Sunday, you have seen a quarter of the present and the future. Eli Manning's has had seven touchdowns in a 15-year career. Jones had two in three hours – and one was on a planned course. His arm was precise and clean. He had a good idea of the pocket and the pressure felt.
You have probably heard how much Manning Jones is. True. They are both too humble and their loved ones say that neither one nor the other is acting. When I asked Jones about the help he had received from Manning this week, he said, "I am extremely grateful for his support. His biggest message to me was to keep things simple. Do not try to be perfect. Do not try to get the perfect call nor the perfect check every time. Put yourself on the same page, be clear in the group, be confident and do it. It was a terrific piece of advice. I am a first-year player. I need that. "
"He is mature beyond all our years," said Shurmur. The Giants will win in an uncertain future, but much more promising after the third week than after the second week.
If Patrick Mahomes stays in good health, he leaves with his second most valuable player of the year. The Ravens have invaded the Mahomes, with 12 bags / hits / pressure, by Pro Football Focus. But he continued his incredible game, even without the injured Tyreek Hill. His pass marks per game are 143.2, 131.2, 132.0 – for an average of 134.9. He is a 72% passer, averaging 398 yards per game, with 10 touchdowns and no choice. He is so in control that even when a team beats him (and the attack of his horse, as the Ravens did on a Sunday), he gets out of trouble and in the manner of Favrian but without the interceptions, he finds another. speedster or his oak, Travis Kelce. Mahomes has now advanced to the point on the Reid confidence ladder that Reid has handled the game Mahomes has chosen to close the game on Sunday. With a five-point lead and 1:51 left, with a third and ninth at the 37th Chiefs, he returned a 16-yard pass to attacking halfback Darrel Williams to clinch the match. Mahomes just turned 24 and contributes to the game plan now. "You simply can not give him enough knowledge," Reid said.
Andy Reid has passed Chuck Noll on the list of victories of all time. Reid's 210th win gives him a lead over Noll, but everyone (including Reid) knows a pretty big number is involved. Super Bowl Victory: Noll 4, Reid 0. New England is still Reid's roadblock, and the Patriots' defense will be a tremendous challenge for Mahomes and Reid in Week 14 at Foxboro. The way these two teams play, this match could determine the starting ground for the CAF playoffs.
The trading market of Jalen Ramsey seems to have cooled down. It will take a daring team to pay a huge price (two more plus, or a single choice and a good player) for a half corner that you will probably have in your team for 1.75 years. Keep hearing that Ramsey will honor his contract and will play the fifth grade option, but he then wants to be a free agent. We will see if a team like Philadelphia becomes desperate.
Lions score 2-0-1 and do not fight. They looked like the same old Leos after exploding in Arizona during the first week. But they had physical wins over the Chargers and Eagles, two teams in last year's eighth final and good hopes for the Super Bowl this year. . In Philadelphia, Matthew Stafford did not hand him over and he was not fired. It's a rare double daily for him. "Welcome to the NFL, here's how it feels," said coach Matt Patricia to his team after the game. Very interesting Sunday match in Detroit: Chiefs-Lions, combined 5-0-1, in a surprisingly interesting game.
The teams in difficulty:
• Denver is 0-3. The Broncos have lost seven straight games, Joe Flacco has been sacked six times, a peak in his career. Coach Vic Fangio said Flacco needed to get rid of the ball more quickly. These things are alarming. This is the most alarming: after three games, the Denver defense has neither a bag nor a delivery. With Von Miller and Bradley Chubb on D, it's a disturbing trend. "It's one of the cleanest games for my jersey," Aaron Rodgers said after Green Bay's 27-16 win over Denver. A team of Vic Fangio, unable to get to the quarterback nor return it. Very disturbing.
• Pittsburgh is 0-3. The offensive is fighting and will continue to do without the big three of 2017 (Ben, Brown, Bell), but it is the fortified defense that surprises early. The Pittsburgh have awarded 28.3 points per game and their defense pass allows a precision of 74%. They swept Jimmy Garoppolo Sunday in California, but could not take advantage of the five turnovers they forced. Mason Rudolph has something to improve if he is to be considered a day heir to Ben Roethlisberger.
• Cincinnati is 0-3. I did not expect much from the Bengals. In fact, they are almost exactly what I thought, especially without the injured A.J. Green. You are not going to have much success in the NFL in today's game with an average of 18 points per game, and especially when you use it at only 2.4 meters per race.
The Rams really impressed me on Sunday and they did not even destroy the Browns. It was not an easy game, to go into the emotional hole at Browns Stadium, where fans were delighted to have organized a Sunday night for the first time since Mastadons roamed the Earth. Rams, by PFF, had 25 quarterback disturbances (sacks, shots, squeezed significantly), seven by Aaron Donald. Baker Mayfield will have Donald's nightmares. But he is not the only one. Two rushers acquired over the past year, Dante Fowler Jr. and Clay Matthews, have combined for 12 Mayfield disturbances. In particular, when Mayfield tried to roll right and throw – an essential part of his mobile game – he could barely breathe. The final was at 20-13, and the Rams must feel good about three things: they traveled twice in Eastern Time in the first three weeks and beat competitive teams Carolina and Cleveland. They have not played their best offensive football yet, which is a little worrying as Cleveland High School was so exhausted on Sunday. And the return of Cooper Kupp makes him a good receiver of body. I buy Ram shares.
Clash at the Mafia Corral Bills. The Bills are 3-0, and they host the 3-0 Patriots Sunday at Crazytown. I strongly believe that the home field is particularly valuable at Orchard Park, especially against the hated Patriots. The problem is that New England has won seven in a row in western New York. It's probably a year or two before the reconstruction of the Bills is paying off, especially against the Patriots. But it will be a good game of measurement for the Bills and quarterback Josh Allen, who made a few saves to save the game and throws at the end of the 21-17 survival test on the Bengals on Sunday.
Take your time, Cam. It's hard not to notice the difference between a rusty and evolutionary Newton Cam in the first two weeks of the season (56.2% completions, no touchdowns, five runs for less than 2 yards) and what a backup Kyle Allen ( 73.1% accuracy, four markers, no interception) delivered Sunday in a 38-20 victory in Arizona. Allen was consistent and productive in Newton's relief, with a sore foot for who knows how long. Allen comes from the nearby town of Scottsdale, so what a landmark event of his life had to be leaving the bench in his home town and delivering the battle in the clutch. "I have not even thought of everything that's going on outside," Allen said. "I'm trying to make football as simple as possible. He found Greg Olsen for two touchdowns and used the speed of his high ground and Christian McCaffrey to thwart an Arizona defense that had no solution for the Carolina race or pass. Afterwards, Allen said that he had absorbed what he had done. "I had to take it, standing on the ground, looking around me. I thought, "Dang, I'm in the NFL and I play in my hometown." It's really wonderful. Here's another quirk: In Sunday's game, Allen played in the city he grew up in. This week, if he continues to spell Newton, he will play in Houston, he went to college at the University. from Houston, at least he will be used to nostalgia.
It's getting late in the east of the NFC. The 3-0 Cowboys do not have many weaknesses and they now have a two-game lead over the Eagles and Giants defeats, and Philadelphia has a short-week match in Green Bay 3-0 on Thursday. Admittedly, I'm not saying that the Cowboys can not be caught, but I would feel better if the division race was really a race if the Eagles were not so injured and if Dallas was struggling to Something.
After the Tennessee Jaguars' 20-7 win on Thursday night, Antonio's glorious season-long NFL scenario has come to the fore: sixth-round rookie quarterback Gardner Minshew II of Jacksonville could be a real devil football player.
What a story it is too. From 2015 to 2018, Gardner Minshew traveled the country in search of an ambitious quest – from Troy University to the Northwest Mississippi Community College, through to East Carolina and the United States. Washington State – to find a quarterback position at the highest level. Even during his two years in East Carolina, he never won the starting position. And it's amazing to think that instead of being a rising star in the NFL, he could either support Tua Tagovailoa in Alabama, or work as a graduate coach of the Alabama team led by Nick Saban. A source close to Alabama's program said, "Nick really wanted it as a backup. [in 2018], in case Jalen Hurts or Tua [Tagovailoa] transferred after the spring ball, depending on who lost the starting job. Then Nick would have kept him as AG because he probably would not have been admitted to the NFL, and because Gardner wanted to become a coach every time he stopped playing. "
As Minshew still had a year in a red shirt, he could have sat last year and come back this year behind Tagovailoa – if 'Bama had approved it.
But all of this became questionable because Washington State had experienced a year of uncertain shifts in 2018 following the suicide of likely starter Tyler Hilinski. Washington State coach Mike Leach told me last night that Hilinski had lived, "so we do not look for a quarter." A few weeks after Saban courted Minshew, Leach gave him a good chance to come to Pullman and win the starting position.
As Leach told me, "I quote," Do you want to go to Alabama and hold a notebook, or do you want to come here and lead the nation by the way? "It did not take long for Minshew to take Leach's offer.
"Nick," said the source for Alabama, "was really disappointed."
"Gardner just felt like he was not done playing," his father Flint Minshew told him from the family home in central Mississippi Saturday night. "In his heart, he's been told that he could be coaching the rest of his life, but he may have only one more chance to play a football season." university. But he was so grateful to coach Saban for recognizing he could really play. After high school, no one wanted it. Even his public schools, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, Southern Miss, have never aroused interest. You can probably hear it in my voice – I am always pissed off about it. "
Gardner became a phenomenon in Washington, scoring 4,477 yards, winning the Pac-12 Offensive Player title and deserving of a trip to the combine. The Jaguars have chosen 178th overall. Thursday night, there was no doubt that the quarterback seemed to have a better future: Minshew, on the second overall pick in 2015, Marcus Mariota Titans. Minshew performed four fine finishes in depth, played with the confidence of a five-year veterinarian, and his head coach, Doug Marrone, sprang. "I thought I was going into this game." How many times has this guy played a game and then had a short week to get ready to play another one? "It does not happen at the university, if it does something good, you'll see it banging on the ground, but by the time it approaches the sideline, he moved on to something else. Hey, I have to do it better. This is what happened in the fourth piece of this series. Hey, did you see that as I saw it? He is really good at communication and has a manic work ethic.
We'll see what the future holds, but Minshew probably still has about a month to claim his playing time, until Nick Foles returns from his broken collarbone. It could pose to the Jaguars a ridiculously nice problem in trying to determine whether to play the kid with the mustache and the training, or the Super Bowl champion who killed the Patriots. It's for tomorrow. Today, it is too good a story to ruin it with assumptions.
"When you have to knock on the door all your life to be recognized and try your luck, it's very satisfying for Gardner," Flint Minshew said. "He's never been Johnny Five Star, so I guarantee you that he appreciates everything he has and that he will continue to enjoy and work on."
Jags at Denver, 4:25 pm ET, next Sunday. Maybe you have to watch TV.
Let history guide us as to whether Eli Manning will ever be a member of the Professional Football Hall of Fame. To do this, I separated modern-day quarters into three 20-year periods: 1960-1979, 1980-1999 and 2000-1919. I assigned the quarterbacks of the Hall of Fame to the period when they played all or most of their careers.
I wanted to see how many quarterbacks of the modern era have been spent, to see how this could have an impact on the number of winning quarterbacks that are entering the current era, when passing dominates football more than 39. he has never been in the history of professional football.
1960-1979: with between 21 and 28 teams in this period (AFL and NFL), 11 quarters made the Hall. The 11: George Blanda, Terry Bradshaw, Len Dawson, Bob Griese, Sonny Jurgensen, Joe Namath, Ken Stabler, Bart Starr, Roger Staubach, Fran Tarkenton, John Unitas.
1980-1999: With between 28 and 31 teams during this period, 8 quarters made the hall. The eight: Troy Aikman, John Elway, Dan Fouts, Kelly Jim, Dan Marino, Joe Montana, Warren Moon, Steve Young.
2000-2019: With 32 teams in this period (all but the first two seasons), 2 quarters have made the hall up to now. Both: Brett Favre, Kurt Warner.
Of course, there are no rules that impose the number of players in any position of any given period in the room. But, unless injured or retired by Matt Ryan and Aaron Rodgers, by 2021, nine of the top ten assists and touchdowns will have played most of their career between 2000 and 2011. and 2019. The rules change and the stagnation of inflation will have to be taken into account, surely. A good number of quarters – probably between eight and twelve – could make the room the current era of the NFL.
Favre and Warner are two. Tom Brady, Peyton Manning and Drew Brees have five. The best candidates after that, in a certain order, are Aaron Rodgers, Ben Roethlisberger, Eli Manning and Philip Rivers, apparently ahead of Carson Palmer and Donovan McNabb. Where do Matt Ryan, Russell Wilson, Cam Newton and Matthew Stafford end? To be determined, partly because we do not know how long they will play. I could see Ryan playing another six or seven years and Wilson another decade.
Eli Manning has his negatives, of course. In 15 years as a starter, he is a quarter .500 in the regular season. He never finished in the top three in the NFL in passing yards, yards per attempt or passer – and only one (2015) was in the first three touchdowns. He has, however, led the NFL three times in interceptions. In 13 of his 15 seasons, he has not won a playoff game. These points must count, and they will be counted by the voting group at Manning's election in 2025 or beyond.
But few quarters had higher highs. Manning had two incredible postsecondary, two bigger than his brother Peyton. Twice, in 2007 and 2011, he was unlikely to win the 4-0 series, winning Green Bay on Favre (2007) and Rodgers (2011), and beating Belichick / Brady with two outstanding heroes in two Super Bowls, thus destroying the perfect goal of New England. season in the first. This 17-14 win, with David Tyree's velcro tie, will remain as the most bitter loss for Brady and Belichick in their lifetime. "This one is still eating me," Brady told me two weeks ago.
In the story, there are few good compositions for Eli Manning. Most quarterbacks in the Hall of Fame win in the regular season and in the playoffs. But I found it interesting to compare it to Jurgensen, who never started a playoff game and entered the room on the fourth ballot. Their lines of statistics:
Why did Jurgensen make the room? It was a type of Dan Fouts with strong arms. On five occasions, he led the NFL in passing yards. When he raised 3,723 yards in 1961, it was an NFL record in one season. Twice, he led the NFL in touchdowns. Twice, he was the first team of the pros. Manning has never dominated the NFL in either assists or touchdown passes, and has never been the first or second all-pro team in 15 seasons. Each player has a major flaw on his resume: Manning was a best-of-the-season player who had two post-reasons and had twice won the Super Bowls against the best coach and quarterback of the modern match. Manning will also finish his career in the top 10 passing yards and touchdowns, but to what extent is it the statistical inflation of his day? Jurgensen was a very good regular season player whose teams lost more than they won and did nothing in the playoffs.
Voters in 1983 devoted Jurgensen. Will voters forget Manning's mediocrity in the regular season because he has had two of the biggest successes of a quarter-time?
It will not be an easy call. I will understand those who do not vote for Manning. My instinct is that it happens at some point, but as one of the 48 voters in the room, I found that the only predictable thing about Hall's vote is its unpredictability. This is not a cliché. Before the meeting, I rarely have a good idea of how the votes will be obtained.
One last thing about Manning that should not go without comment:
Manning was clear that this day was coming – his loss to Daniel Jones – the first choice, going back to the day of the repechage. Last Tuesday, like every Tuesday morning, Manning and Daniel Jones went to the Giants' facility in East Rutherford shortly after, at 8 pm, to train and begin their study of the next enemy, outside of the day. Coach Pat Shurmur called Manning in his office to tell him that he was making a shift at the quarterback. Then, when Manning left, Shurmur called Jones in his office to tell him that he was the new starter. These two meetings were finished around 9:45. For five to six hours, Manning and Jones then did what they had done on previous Tuesdays: practice, study the Bucs (opponent of the third week) on a tape and discuss the upcoming match. Only this time, the roles were reversed. Manning was backing up, helping Jones get ready.
Manning did not leave Shurmur's office and did not leave the building, nor did he say, I need a day to think. I'm outside. Manning left Shurmur's office to help his successor beat Tampa Bay. This is the kind of person Eli Manning is.
Offensive players of the week
Alvin Kamara, rider from New Orleans. In the absence of Drew Brees in the noise house in Seattle, coach Sean Payton did what any sensible coach would do: he entrusted the ball to the most dangerous player in the mingled in her locker room. Teddy Bridgewater sent nine passes to Kamara for 92 yards and a touchdown, and handed him 16 times for 69 yards and a touchdown. The 33-27 win over the Seahawks 2-0 before was not that close, and Kamara was the reason. With Dallas 3-0 coming into town this week, I would suggest the same recipe.
Daniel Jones, quarterback, Giants of New York. Impossible for a child neophyte under pressure all day – Shaq Barrett fired him four times alone – for playing better than Jones, especially in the bottom right. Jones finished 23 of 36 for 336 yards, with two touchdowns and no interceptions, but that's not what made the game. It was Jones' legs. Il a participé à deux touchés, ce qui n’a jamais fait partie du jeu d’Eli Manning, et la course de sept verges du centre de la TD au milieu du terrain avec un point à 1,16 était le plus gros match d’une équipe des Giants depuis leur dernière année en séries éliminatoires en 2016.
Jacoby Brissett, quarterback, Indianapolis. Les 23 premières minutes de la victoire de 27-24 sur les Falcons, sujettes aux erreurs, sont: 16 pour 16, 178 verges. Les trois premiers jeux de 2019: précision de 71,7%, ratio de 7-1 TD-pick, 112.0. Les Colts sont une victoire à domicile à Oakland dimanche prochain, après avoir été 3-1 au premier quart de la saison, avec un quart jouant tout autant que Andrew Luck l’a fait la saison dernière, s’il n’est pas aussi explosif.
Gardner Minshew, quarterback, Jacksonville. Bon mais pas grand nombre (20 sur 30, 204 verges, deux touchés, pas de médiateur), impact maximum. Il lança trois boules profondes très bien couvertes par Malcolm Butler et les compléta toutes – deux à D.J. Chark, l'un à Dede Westbrook. Sa présence, son sang-froid, son bras profond… le tout de la part d'un gars qui a l'air d'avoir conduit au match dans une camionnette et en train de faire la queue pendant trois heures. "En fait, c’est remarquable", a déclaré l’entraîneur Doug Marrone. Ce commentaire de Minshew: «Beaucoup de gens n’ont jamais pensé que j’aurais cette opportunité. Maintenant que je l’ai, je dois en profiter au maximum. Je sais que, grâce à tout ce que j’ai appris au cours de ma carrière et dans la situation dans laquelle je me trouve, il est possible que [chance] alors vous devez en tirer le meilleur parti. "
Joueurs défensifs de la semaine
Calais Campbell, fin défensive, Jacksonville. En 2017, les cardinaux ont laissé Campbell, alors âgé de 30 ans, se déplacer en liberté, estimant que ses meilleurs jours étaient terminés. Homme, les cardinaux avaient-ils tort? Campbell a joué l'un des meilleurs matchs de sa carrière largement sous-estimée pour Jacksonville jeudi soir, dominant le Tennessee avec un jeu à trois sacs, deux coups sûrs et cinq pressions de Marcus Mariota lors de la victoire des 20 à 7 Jaguars. Voici à quel point ce match a été fantastique pour Campbell. PFF a attribué à Campbell une note individuelle de 12,9 pour le jeu, ce qui est énorme. Pour mettre cela en perspective, Aaron Donald, le meilleur défenseur du football sans aucun doute, a disputé 84 matchs en carrière dans la deuxième semaine. Sur deux des 84 joués, Donald a été classé à 12,9 ou plus. Les 10 jeux de pression de Campbell sur Mariota ont donné le ton à une performance défensive dominante des Jags qui, jusqu’au quart de finale, ont empêché les Titans de sortir pour les huit premières commandes et 47 minutes de la partie.
Preston Smith et Za’Darius Smith, secondeurs, Green Bay. Le directeur général Brian Gutekunst s’est donné comme priorité d’acheter une passe décisive à l’intersaison, en signant les Smiths de Baltimore (Za’Darius) et de Washington (Preston). Ils paient des dividendes très rapides. Preston avait trois sacs et Za’Darius deux contre Joe Flacco à Green Bay. Les cinq sacs ont entraîné 45 verges perdues et un échappé forcé. Ils ont été énormes lors de la victoire de 27-16 contre les Broncos.
Eric Wilson, secondeur, Minnesota. Comme si les Vikings avaient besoin d'une autre arme à l'avant du septième passage. Wilson, un joueur autonome peu développé de l'Université de Cincinnati, a récolté deux sacs et sept tacles dans la défaite 34-14 des Raiders. Il a scellé la victoire à neuf minutes de la fin, enterrant Derek Carr avec un sac de 15 verges. Il faisait partie d'une défense qui ne laissait jamais les Raiders respirer.
Joueurs de la semaine des équipes spéciales
Matthew Slater, capitaine des équipes spéciales, Nouvelle-Angleterre. À cinq minutes du quatrième quart, alors que les Pats marquaient des 40 points, Jake Bailey de la Nouvelle-Angleterre voulait coincer les Jets dans leur 10e. Slater sprintant vers le terrain, la balle tombait à environ 1,5 le saisit habilement et le redirigea vers sa droite alors qu'il fonçait dans la zone des buts. Le ballon a rebondi sur la ligne des deux pieds et a été abattu au 1 er match des Jets. Juste un jeu génial de Slater, l’un des meilleurs joueurs de l’équipe spéciale de l’histoire de la NFL.
Deonte Harris, punt-returner, Nouvelle-Orléans. Je crois que c’est la première fois dans l’histoire de la FMIA que des athlètes du Collège Assumption (Mass.) Se présentent en semaine consécutive. (La semaine dernière: Zach Triner, le vivaneau de Tampa Bay). Harris est une histoire assez étonnante. Premièrement: il a 21 ans. Seconde: Deux fois Au cours de sa carrière universitaire (NCAA Division II), Harris a retourné deux coups francs pour des touchés au cours d’un match. Troisièmement: il a 5 pieds 6 pouces. Mec électrique. Il a fait du camp d'entraînement les saints en tant qu'agent libre non dessiné (évidemment). Avec l’équipe dimanche contre Seattle à cause de l’absence de Drew Brees, Harris a fourni l’étincelle à la première bottée du jeu, un travail inhabituellement court de la part des As que les Seahawks ont infligé à Michael Dickson. Le botté de dégagement de 38 verges a été mis en place par Harris. Au retour, Harris avait l’air de jouer à une vitesse différente. No Seahawk had a good shot at him, and the 53-yard touchdown return was finished fast. What a weapon. Now, Harris almost negated this august award when he fumbled away a punt return in the second half, but Seattle didn’t score with the turnover, so we’ll let Harris slide.
Jamal Agnew, kick returner, Detroit. Four minutes into Lions-Eagles at Philly, Agnew set the tone for the Lions. His 100-yard kick return stunned the crowd and helped them to a 20-10 halftime lead. Special-teams play has been a huge point of emphasis by Matt Patricia, and it paid off Sunday in Detroit’s upset of the Eagles.
Coach of the Week
Pat Shurmur, coach, New York Giants. Why’d you bring Eli back? Why’d you pull the plug on Eli after only two games? Why are you giving up on the season after only two games? It’s not Eli’s fault—the defense stinks! I think I’ve accurately quoted the Giants fandom/talk-show callers/public-at-large in greater New York over the past week—and I haven’t even included the king of New York sports talk, Mike Francesa, semi-berating Shurmur on the air the other day, causing the Giants to end the Shurmur/Francesa show on WFAN. But the way Jones played Sunday is why Shurmur made this call. For one week anyway, he can sleep well, knowing he made the call that was inevitable, even if it seemed precipitous. “We believed in Daniel from the day we drafted him,” Shurmur said after the 32-31 win in Tampa.
Goat of the Week
Matt Gay, kicker, Tampa Bay. Missed two PATs early, and those two points were huge in allowing the Giants to come back and take a 32-31 lead in the final minute. But Jameis Winston drove Tampa back to chip-shot field-goal range with four seconds left. Gay, the fifth-round rookie, drafted to end the nightmare that is Buccaneer kicking life, had a 34-yard attempt from the middle of the field on a lovely south Florida early evening. Snap fine. Hold fine. Kick wide right by inches. Bucs lose, 32-31.
I
“I should have run it one time [on Cleveland’s last four offensive snaps]. That’s why I’m kicking myself in the ass right now.”
—Cleveland coach Freddie Kitchens, after Baker Mayfield threw three incompletions and an interception in the last 43 seconds Sunday night, sealing a 20-13 Rams victory over the Browns.
II
“As far as the allegations, I don’t know what’s true, so I will not call these women liars, and I will not say that Antonio Brown is guilty. But as far as his actions, when it comes to how he is just burning bridges everywhere he goes, it’s the last thing from genius. It’s very self-destructive behavior, which is unfortunate. The world is going to provide obstacles in front of us. You don’t need to provide them yourself.”
—CBS NFL analyst Nate Burleson, Sunday, on “The NFL Today.”
III
“I watched it very, very closely. I was so impressed with Eli. We are friends. I have watched him for his whole career—we came in in the same draft class. The way he handled this, I don’t know how you handle a tough situation like this any better. To me, the most amazing thing about Eli is how he’s handled himself his entire career. Think of it. The biggest market in the country, no ugly headlines. No scandals! Sixteen years! It’s amazing, I think.”
—Arizona wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald, to me, on the Eli Manning demotion last week.
IV
“Right now we’re 0-3, living in a world of suck.”
—Denver wide receiver Emmanuel Sanders, to ESPN.com’s Jeff Legwold.
V
“He’s a liar. He lied to everyone. So that’s a man I do not trust. I would hope nobody else would too.”
—Washington safety Landon Collins on the general manager of the Giants who allowed him to walk last March, Dave Gettleman.
Ryan O’Callaghan • Former lineman for the Patriots and Chiefs • Photographed in Napa, Calif.
O’Callaghan played 51 NFL games from 2006 to 2010. He came out as gay in 2017. In his book, “My Life on the Line: How the NFL Damn Near Killed Me and Ended Up Saving My Life” (Akashic Books), written with Cyd Ziegler, O’Callaghan details a football life that veered into heavy opioid use. He says he planned to kill himself after his career ended. His story is detailed in the book, and in “The Peter King Podcast” out this week.
“I chose football as a cover for my sexuality. Football was my beard. No one would ever think a macho football player could be gay. It worked for quite a long time. I never had long-term plans. I hated myself. I was absolutely miserable. My friends didn’t know who I was.
“My whole plan was to play football and kill myself. I was convinced from a young age that my family would never love me if they knew who I really was. The things you hear as a child—every time you hear someone say ‘faggot’ or talk bad about a gay guy, or see something on TV and make fun of that. If you have a closeted kid, he hears every one of those times you say something. It sticks with him. This was 25 years ago. Most of the things they said were out of ignorance, not hate.”
A psychiatrist convinced O’Callaghan that, as long as he planned to kill himself, why not tell those he was closest to before he committed suicide, just to see what their reaction was, and to see if he was right about them. At 29, he came out to his family.
“So I hadn’t really been speaking to my parents in the months leading up to it, because in my mind I was pushing them away to make it easier on them when I killed myself. So I called them. I said, ‘Hey, I’m gonna stop by. We need to talk.’ We all sat down in the family room. I broke down, and I ended up telling ‘em, ‘This is what’s going on: I’m gay.’
“It was quiet for a second. Then my mom got up, gave me a hug. She had a look of relief on her face. Turns out she thought I was gonna tell them I was terminally ill, because I was like, Hey, we need to talk. She was almost relieved. My dad at the time was quiet. It took him a little while to come around. Looking back, I might have expected him to be okay with it quicker than he was, but he spent 29 years picturing his son as something that he wasn’t. So, of course, he’s not gonna be totally on board overnight. I’m happy to say we have a better relationship now than we ever have.
“Time went by. I ended up meeting someone. The first time I introduced my parents to someone I was dating was right before [induction] in the Shasta County [Calif.] Hall of Fame, and I was going to bring him. I did bring him. So we went by my parents house before, and I introduced him, and so after that night, my dad, the next day or a couple days later, he said, ‘Well, Brandon seemed nice.’ Since then, it’s been great. It went a thousand percent better than I ever imagined it would go.”
It’s early, of course, but let’s compare the New England defense in its last four games to the last four games of one of the most dominant defenses of this era, the 2000 Baltimore Ravens.
The Patriots games stretch back to the Super Bowl against the Rams and include the first three games of this season. The Ravens played four playoff games in 2000, so those are the games we’ll use for comparison.
Touchdowns allowed: Baltimore’s defense allowed one in four playoff games of 2000. New England: zero.
Yards allowed per game: Baltimore’s defense allowed 209.3 yards per game. New England: 214.3.
Third-down conversions: Baltimore’s defense allowed 12. New England: 8.
In fairness to the Ravens, they were playing four playoff teams; two of the Patriots’ four foes have been the moribund Dolphins and third-string-QB Jets.
But it’s a pretty amazing thing to note that, against any foes, a team in today’s football can go four straight games without allowing a touchdown.
Starting quarterbacks for Adam Gase in his 52-game NFL head-coach career: Ryan Tannehill (24), Jay Cutler (14), Matt Moore (6), Brock Osweiler (5), Sam Darnold (1), Trevor Siemian (1), Luke Falk (1).
That’s seven. In effect, it’s eight: In the final game of 2017, Cutler played the first three snaps and David Fales the final 68.
Eight quarterbacks in 3.2 seasons. Gase’s record coaching the Dolphins and Jets: 23-29.
I did not travel during the week, but I did walk from Manhattan to Brooklyn over the Brooklyn Bridge. I strongly recommend it, though maybe not on a lovely Saturday in the middle of the day. There’s a platform above the road level, with pedestrian and bicycle traffic, and visitors to the city pausing at just the right spots—there are many—to take photos. Turns out on Saturday that hundreds of people had the same idea as we did—Hey, what a beautiful day! Let’s walk the Brooklyn Bridge! Still good to gaze at two lovely boroughs and the Statue of Liberty though, even competing with the bicycles for space.
1969: The integrated Kansas City Chiefs, in the last season of the American Football League, change football.
In Michael MacCambridge’s new book “’69 Chiefs: A Team, A Season and The Birth of Modern Kansas City” (with terrific black-and-white photos by Rod Hanna), the side stories are the best stories. Such as: The Chiefs, in 1963, were the first pro team to employ a full-time African-American scout; Lloyd Wells worked the historically black colleges mostly. In 1967, Willie Lanier became the game’s first black middle linebacker, significant because that position was considered the quarterback of the defense. And by 1969, the Chiefs were the first pro team to have a majority of black players in the starting lineup.
In the 23-7 Super Bowl win over Minnesota, Mike Garrett and Otis Taylor, both black, scored the Chiefs touchdowns. Five defensive starters—Curley Culp, Buck Buchanan, Bobby Bell, Lanier and Emmitt Thomas—in the game, all black, went on to make the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
MacCambridge wrote: “The blend of personalities worked in ways that they clearly didn’t on teams of the same era. ‘You could have men from the South, men from Alabama, and you would have some from the West Coast, where Huey Newton was gaining prominence, and you had some of us from the East, who were perhaps a little more elitist,’ said Willie Lanier. ‘But you had all of that coming together, and people got along. People allowed whatever philosophical and political philosophies to be left at the door, and to become part of this thing called the Kansas City Chiefs, and the objective was to win and to be better than anyone else and to get to this important step, which was the Super Bowl. I can’t remember any racial strife at all.’ ”
That’s 50 years ago. Pretty interesting.
What’s your best habit, Rams wide receiver Cooper Kupp?
“Moving forward. In life and football, you face adversity. It’s inevitable. When adversity hits, be able to reflect, rectify and respond. When you respond, you’ve already fixed what needed to be fixed. I don’t like living in the past. There’s no point in looking back on things, saying ‘What if I had done this?’ You know, sulking on it. You feel all the guilt and shame when you do something wrong. To be able to move forward on that and be able to learn from that and not make that mistake again is something that I pride myself on.”
What’s your worst habit?
“The phone. I’m probably on my phone too much. But we’re working on it. My wife’s helping me out with that one. When I come home from the facility, just be able to put my phone down, let it be until the next day. It’s helped a ton also having a child—my son’s 14 months—to be able to come home to him and my wife is so much fun for me. That’s definitely helped.”
I
II
III
This was brought up on the Thursday night telecast of Tennessee-Jacksonville, causing Troy Aikman to say: “Tom Brady, one of the least-controversial people we have in our game. He is league royalty. When he makes a statement like that, that should get somebody’s attention. I agree. This is ridiculous.”
IV
V
VI
Each week, with the aid of Pro Football Focus research, I’ll take a big call in a game from the weekend and explain the whys, and whether it made sense from an analytical view.
Game: Baltimore at Kansas City, Sunday.
Situation: Kansas City up 30-19, 12:27 left in the game. The Ravens have just scored to pull within 11 points, and Baltimore coach John Harbaugh has a decision to make on the conversion—though most coaches would just kick the PAT.
The decision: Harbaugh chooses to go for the two-point conversion to try to cut the lead to nine points, rather than kick the PAT to go down by 10 with likely two possessions left in the game. On TV, Ian Eagle thinks the way most people think: “The math just doesn’t work.”
The thought process: Harbaugh said after the game it was a “clear analytic decision to go for two. We had a mindset that we would come in and score as many points as we could … We are not going into it blind. We got the numbers.”
The analytics: According to Eric Eager of PFF: “Had the Ravens converted the two-point conversion, they know that scoring a field goal and a touchdown with a conventional PAT wins the game outright, instead of leaving similar decisions to the end of the game. Mathematically, if Baltimore missed the two-point conversion attempt, the Chiefs were 94.3 percent likely to win, Baltimore 5.7 percent. If Baltimore made the two-point conversion, Kansas City was 89.1 percent likely to win, Baltimore 10.9 percent. By kicking the PAT, Kansas City was 92.8 percent likely to win, and Baltimore 7.2 percent. The benefit of making the two-point conversion over kicking the PAT was 3.7 percent win-probability points, while the loss via missing the two-point conversion over kicking the PAT was just 1.5 percent. Assuming the Ravens are a modest 50% on two-point conversions, this is easily the preferable decision.”
Le résultat: Lamar Jackson threw incomplete to Nick Boyle on the two-point try, and the Ravens lost the game 33-28. On the day, Baltimore was zero of three on two-point tries. “We are going to keep playing that way, for the record,” Harbaugh said. “When you write your articles … we will disagree with your criticism. This is the way we are going to play all year.”
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Mail call. Contact me at [email protected], or on Twitter.
Too soon to tell. From Ernie L., of Columbus, Ohio: “Is Antonio Brown a Hall of Famer?”
I’ll say the same thing I said when asked after Eli Manning beat the Patriots in the Super Bowl for the second time: Let’s wait till the end of his career, and judge the career in its entirety. We don’t know how it’s going to end, or if it’s over right now. But to this point, he certainly is trending toward a Hall of Fame level: four first-team all-pro honors (huge in this aerial era) in eight seasons, and he’s led the league twice in receptions and in receiving yards. For probably six of his eight NFL seasons prior to this one, Brown was a dominant player at a position of immense competition for greatness, with so much talent across the board. I just think in any player’s case (except maybe right near the end of a career like Marino’s or Barry Sanders’), there’s no sense in judging it before it’s over—because a player’s case for the Hall is not heard till at least five years after his career ends. Remember: Hall of Fame bylaws prohibit voters from considering what happens outside football.
Eli doesn’t belong in the Hall. From Ian Lakin: “Please tell us you won’t vote Eli Manning for the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Please, he’s played 16 years and made four Pro Bowls. He has never had a great season. He certainly has had awful ones. In the two Super Bowl victories he played well, but was far from great. I never watched a game and thought he would dominate. I would appreciate your thoughts.”
Happy to give you my thoughts, Ian. One: I am 62, and I doubt I’ll be a voter when Manning’s case is first heard, say, in around 2026. Two: I’ll dispute you for a long time on how he was “far great” in the two Super Bowls. In the first game, against one of the best teams of all time, the 18-0 Patriots, he had 80 and 83-yard drives that ended in two fourth-quarter touchdowns to win 17-14. In the second games, he drove the Giants 88 yards in the last five minutes to score a touchdown that beat the Patriots 21-17. In those eight quarters, Manning was a 67-percent passer; he turned the ball over once. Two for two in Super Bowls against the great Belichick. Assez bon. Three: I totally, absolutely understand the anti-Eli sentiment over him not dominating games and being a .500 regular-season quarterback. Vous avez raison. That’s why his Hall of Fame case is a puzzler.
I don’t know how much the league can do to stop power plays. From Alex Ferrari: “The trend of having disgruntled players forcing their way off losing teams seems to hurt mediocre teams and unfairly help top teams. Is this an issue for the next collective bargaining agreement?”
Interesting question, and of course the NFL hates the trend that is mindful of recent behavior in the NBA. But you can’t force players to play for a team. It’s going to take two or three times when a team says, “If you don’t play for us, we’re not trading you, so you won’t play.” Not sure that is the smartest thing either, because it creates a never-ending distraction till the player leaves town. It’s a dilemma.
1. I think this is what I liked about Week 3:
une. Dana Jacobson’s pregame on-camera question to Bill Belichick: “I think I’d be remiss if I didn’t ask, what was the final straw with Antonio Brown?” Perfect. Not dramatic. Just 17 words that needed to be said/asked.
b. Andrew Marchand of the New York Post calling Belichick’s three-second reaction, a bush-league piercing glare at Jacobson, “the death stare.” Just what it was.
c. Bill Cowher on Brown: “He doesn’t need a football field. He needs counseling.”
ré. The athleticism/pirouetting ability of Travis Kelce, who is the biggest tight-end threat in the NFL.
e. Phillip Lindsay runs like a runaway semi truck when he’s near the goal line. I like that.
F. This Lindsay is marvelous. At 190 pounds, he’s a goal-line back. Sérieusement. He runs at the goal line like his life’s on the line.
g. The Tom Brady-Phillips Dorsett chemistry is really growing. No longer is the Dorsett-for-Brissett deal wholly one-sided. Dorsett’s really valuable.
h. Every game I watch Christian McCaffrey, he looks better. Not getting caught on his 76-yard touchdown run in Arizona, for instance. Even when defenders have good angles on him, he’s got a sense of how close they are and what he has to do to not get tackled. Plus the speed, of course.
je. Loved, loved, loved Josh Rosen looking aghast, down 10-0, when Brian Flores chose to go for the field goal instead of the touchdown on fourth-and-three at the Dallas three. I get that it’s maybe a 35 percent chance you’re making a touchdown there. But Miami needed sevens in that case, not threes.
j. Robert Woods is a far better receiver that he gets credit.
k. Vegas oddsmakers. Pats were 20.5-point favorites over the Jets; it was 20-0 two minutes into the second quarter. Cowboys were 22-point favorites over the Dolphins. Dallas won by 25, New England by 16. The Patriots were 30 points better than the Jets, but sometimes the score just doesn’t reflect the difference between the two teams. That’s why betting on football is absurd, IMO.
l. I mean, Dallas was so much better than Miami that Ezekiel Elliott’s backup had a 100-yard game. Tony Pollard: 13 for 103 and a touchdown.
m. Dan Fouts after the speedy Mecole Hardman scored on an 83-yard catch-and-run from Patrick Mahomes: “Remember, Hardman runs a 4.2 40. Looks like he ran a 4.2 80 that time.”
n. How Julio Jones caught that TD pass while being mugged by Quincy Wilson of the Colts … amazing.
o. “We might really have something in this Waller at tight end,” Jon Gruden told me on draft weekend. Sunday numbers for tight end Darren Waller: 13 catches, 134 yards.
p. My Lord. That first-quarter catch by Giants tight end Evan Engram, a one-handed job closely guarded. The best thing about it: Engram caught and lunged for a first down all at the same time.
q. Much respect, Mike Evans and Keenan Allen. Tremendous games in losses.
r. No one thought much of it when the Ravens stole Mark Ingram from the Saints last spring. But Ingram is a big reason why the Ravens are so physically imposing, and not just on offense. He runs angry, and smart. Pretty big getting in the end zone three times in a huge game at Kansas City.
s. What a play by Green Bay cornerback Jaire Alexander, stealing the ball from Denver tight end Noah Fant in the open field. Denver was its own worst enemy in Wisconsin.
t. Catch of the Day: DeVante Parker of the Dolphins with a one-handed catch downfield in Dallas while being interfered with. Lone highlight of the Miami season.
2. I think this is what I didn’t like about Week 3:
une. Drop of the Day: DeVante Parker’s red-zone drop with 40 seconds left in the first half at Dallas, with Miami driving for the halftime lead.
b. Drop of the Day II: Dallas Goedert dropping a TD pass in the end zone—the second straight week an Eagle has dropped a sure touchdown throw in the end zone.
c. I played the flagged Miami onside kick back four times, and I did not see any Dolphin offside, leaving early before the kick. It was close, as Dean Blandino said on FOX, with all 10 Dolphins needing to have at least one foot on the 34-yard line … and I certainly didn’t see any Miami player in the traditional offside, beyond the 35, at the time of the kick. That’s a flag I don’t think was justified.
ré. Marcus Mariota. He is trending toward 2020 free agency, with the Titans letting the second pick in the 2015 draft walk.
e. Shawn Hochuli, the Thursday night ref. Awful roughing-the-passer call on a perfect pass-rush by Tennessee’s Kamalei Correa, who had a textbook hit on Jags QB Gardner Minshew.
F. How was that not a helmet-to-helmet hit by Dallas safety Jeff Heath on a defenseless receiver, Allen Hurns?
g. I don’t know exactly what the Atlanta offense is good at anymore.
h. Miles Killebrew dangerously ripping off Miles Sanders‘ helmet on the Eagle returner’s kickoff return. Man, Sanders is lucky he wasn’t seriously hurt. How do the refs miss that?
je. Huge drop/fumble by Nelson Agholor, leading to a 10-point halftime lead for Detroit in Philadelphia.
j. Bengals: one first down in the first 28 minutes at Buffalo.
k. Horrible news if that Keanu Neal Achilles injury is a season-ender.
l. This is eight days old, but I keep thinking about the end of Bears-Broncos, when a pass play ended with the clock showing :01, and by the time the Bears were recognized for calling time, the clock showed :00, and the officials huddled and put one second back on the clock. That allowed the Bears to have a chance to try—and make—a 53-yard field goal to win. Why I hate this officiating decision: At no other time of game would officials huddle to put one second back on the clock on a pass play in the middle of the field. So why do they huddle and put one second back on the clock after the last play of the game—or what should have been the last play? Why was the last play officiated differently than the other 131 in the game?
3. I think there are five Antonio Brown points I’d like to make:
• Any team even considering signing Antonio Brown should consider that, in a span of 15 days this month, Brown: confronted his GM at practice in Oakland, reportedly calling Mike Mayock a “cracker;” posted a fine letter from Mayock on social media, in anger; missed practice the day after those incidents; posted a video of a private conversation with coach Jon Gruden (which Gruden reportedly approved), with Gruden saying, “Please stop this s—- and just play football;” was fined $215,000 for conduct detrimental to the team; was cut by the Raiders the same week he was a key element in the first game plan of the season; was signed by the Patriots; was the subject in a civil suit by a former college friend and trainer, Britney Taylor, who said he sexually assaulted her three times; was dropped as a client by Xenith, the helmet company; was dropped as a client by Nike; was the subject of a Sports Illustrated profile with a second woman describing sexual misconduct by Brown while she was working his apartment and describing Brown as a serial welsher; texted the second woman—according to her attorney—in a threatening way, apparently as a way of trying to make her shut up; was warned by the NFL to not have any contact with the woman; and was cut by the Patriots the same week he was a key element in their game plan.
• If I’m a club owner or president, I tell my GM and coach, “We are not signing Antonio Brown. We are not even discussing signing Antonio Brown. The only way we’d reconsider is if he is totally innocent in the Britney Taylor case, guiltless in the case with the second woman, and goes though some counseling that can prove to us that he’s capable of being a teammate in a team sport.”
• No player in my 36 seasons covering the NFL has dug himself so many holes in such a short period of time.
• Did you see “Animal House?” Thirty-seven minutes after news hit that Brown was getting cut, agent Drew Rosenhaus Tweeted that Brown was “looking forward to his next opportunity in the NFL.” Which reminded me of this Kevin Bacon scene from “Animal House.” Drew, the house is on fire. Time to call the fire department.
• Must be nice to throw $28.9-million out the window. That’s what Brown did. Per Jason Fitzgerald of Over The Cap: Brown could have made $29,625,000 (including his 2020 guarantee) by showing up and playing the full 2019 season with the Raiders. If the Raiders collected his announced fines and if the Patriots are successful in not paying Brown his guarantees and bonuses this year, Brown will have earned $749,604 from the Raiders and Patriots this year, total. Which means that Brown, by not sticking with Oakland, blew $28,875,396.
4. I think the question everyone is asking about Cam Newton is not, Will he ever regain his MVP form? Il est, Why is he wearing babushkas to his post-game press conferences?
5. I think there’s probably not a good way to prevent teams from tanking without considering a draft lottery, and I think it would be tough to get 24 teams (the NFL changes bylaws only when three-quarters of the teams vote to do so) to approve a draft lottery. I was interested in reading Miami GM Chris Grier’s words about the Laremy Tunsil/Kenny Stills trade to Houston and the Minkah Fitzpatrick deal to Pittsburgh:
“We got a phone call from Houston and they kept pursuing us. Multiple, multiple times, we talked and kept telling them ‘no’ and what it would take and they came and offered it. A funny story I was saying the other day. I called Laremy about the trade, and Laremy walked in my office and saw [the terms] on the board and goes, ‘I would trade me for that.’ But seriously, we were not trying to do it. With Minkah, it was just one of those things. The player had expressed that [it was] maybe time for him to change, so we tried to make it work. Myself, Brian [Flores] and Steve [Ross] … We had multiple conversations with him, saying we wanted him here and viewed him as a core piece and wanted him here. The kid just felt it was time for him to move, and we told him what the value was. We told teams we had multiple offers, and we felt that the Pittsburgh one was the one best for the organization.”
D & # 39; agreement. But what about the next player who wants out? The precedent’s been set.
6. I think this is the most incredible thing about Bruce Arians taking the delay-of-game penalty before the final field-goal try by his kicker, Matt Gay, with four seconds left: Gay’s attempt, as it turned out, was from 34 yards out. It could have been a 29-yarder; Arians said he thought Gay would have an easier time making the kick from 34. So wait. In the first half, Gay missed two extra points. Those are 33-yard kicks. Why would you think it’d be better for him to kick from the 34 instead of about the 29? Makes no sense to me.
7. I think it’s fitting this morning to recall that Cleveland GM Sashi Brown, seven months before getting fired in 2017, picked Myles Garrett over area kid Mitchell Trubisky. Which, of course, allowed the Browns’ next GM, John Dorsey, to pick Baker Mayfield first in the 2018 draft. Both of those decisions should allow the Browns to be competitive for a long time.
8. I think if I were Adam Gase, and Luke Falk looked as awful as he did Sunday in Foxboro, I’d take this bye week and get David Fales ready to play in Philadelphia coming out of the bye. Sam Darnold might be ready, but in case he’s not, I’d start Fales, and get him ready for the next two games after that: home starts with Dallas and New England. Falk’s just not good enough.
9. I think one thing was easy to spot in the Sunday night game: Eric Weddle is one excellent tackler.
10. I think these are my other thoughts of the week:
une. Public Service Announcement of the Week: This is a tough watch, but it’s an important watch in this country at this time. Please take 65 seconds to consume the Sandy Hook Promise video about what our school children are facing every day.
b. We have no excuses to not act, and yet we do not act.
c. Story of the Week: Amie Tsang of the New York Times (with photos and video by Suzie Howell) on how Brexit will wreak havoc with the food chain in Great Britain.
ré. Now, you think: What do I care about how people in England get their food? And truly, it’s not the most pressing issue in the world. But it’s fascinating to take the 1,700-mile journey of a Sicilian tomato with Tsang and Howell, and to see how the 10-day life of a tomato might not be long enough with the political and logistical woes caused by Great Britain leaving the European Union. Fascinating, too, for journalists to see how well a story can be told with not a lot of words, but in pictures and video. Loved this idea and the execution by Tsang and Howell.
e. College Football Story of the Week: Yahoo Sports’ Pete Thamel’s takedown of Jim Harbaugh’s University of Michigan football team after its 35-14 loss at Wisconsin is thorough, with strong opinion backed by undeniable facts.
F. Very strong by Thamel:
“No wins over Ohio State, three straight bowl losses and, still, zero signature victories. Michigan’s last three games against Power Five opponents have resulted in combined losses of 138-68, on average losing 46-23 to Ohio State, South Carolina and Wisconsin. They also outlasted Army in overtime, 24-21, in a game where Army manhandled the Wolverines physically in the trenches. The tenor of those losses, combined with the flailing of Michigan’s offense has raised a question once thought unthinkable: Should Michigan move on from Harbaugh?”
g. Football-Nerdy Story of the Week: Bo Wulf of The Athletic quizzes Josh McCown to see if he can remember all 37 of the men who have caught NFL touchdown passes from him.
h. Good luck to Tony Wyllie, the longtime Washington senior VP of communications, for navigating a very difficult organization for a decade, and realizing the things he could change and those he could not. I remember in 2013 calling Wyllie to give him a heads up that I would no longer be using his team name “Redskins” in stories I wrote because I felt it was a derogatory term. He tried to talk me out of it, respectfully, saying the team would never change it and it was one of 32 NFL nicknames—how could I do that? We went back and forth, never heated. At the end of the conversation, we said goodbye and that was it. No threats, no yelling; just a fairly impassioned defense of the team’s right to use the name. Fine. We disagreed. And no grudge. A week or two later, I called to get one of his players on the phone, and life went on. Wyllie is moving to a big job with Special Olympics, and good for him.
je. Two shoutouts to friends today. Congrats to Robert Klemko for some excellent reporting on the Antonio Brown story last week. It was Klemko’s reporting about a second woman being sexually harassed by Brown that led Brown to try to intimidate her last week, and led the NFL to tell him to lay off, and led the Patriots to cut Brown. Klemko did not set out to get Brown whacked. He set out to report a story about Brown off the field. What he found was a disastrous set of irresponsible and perhaps criminal behavior.
j. Klemko on the lessons from reporting this story that he’d share with journalism students:
“Make the extra phone call. Don’t be scared of taking to a million people and you know you’re only going to quote 10. Take your time. We could have rushed this story. But it was reviewed and edited by six people at SI, and also a lawyer, just to be sure we were doing the right thing.”
k. Conor Orr’s cover story on the Cowboys was illuminating, a story in plain sight about the advantages the Cowboys have at their nirvana football HQ in Frisco, Texas, that included shoulder-rubbing with the DFW business elite. Contracts are good there. The perks post-football are important too. Orr writes about “the underlying promise that, if you succeed here, you’ll never have trouble finding lucrative work once your career is over.”
l. The cool thing for Orr is that, before Mark Mravic pushed to hire him at The MMQB and Sports Illustrated, he was thinking about leaving the very uncertain sportswriting business. And now, here he is, with an SI cover story on the Dallas Cowboys. So happy for him. On Sunday, he drove a copy to his parents in Pennsylvania, to show them. How proud they must have been.
m. Radio Tribute of the Week: Nina Totenberg on the late Cokie Roberts, a fellow NPR fixture.
n. Beernerdness: There’s a gem of a beer bar in my new Brooklyn neighborhood called BierWax. The cool thing is that there’s a bunch of obscure craft beers on tap, plus a slew of canned beers in those funky cans, one weirder than the next. The “Wax” part refers to vinyl. All the music played in the bar (which has a pleasant patio out back) is played on record albums. BierWax has hundreds. On Saturday evening, we ducked in to have one pre-dinner beer with my daughter Mary Beth and her husband Nick, here for a weekend visit. I tried one of the 10 drafts: Baron Von Weizen (Defiant Brewing, Pearl River, N.Y.), a hefeweizen with just the right hint of fruit and coriander. Liked it so much I went back for a six-ouncer before we left.
o. Coffeenerdness: Can I make one last appeal, Starbucks, to bring back the newspapers? Your shops are not the same without them.
Tonight: Landover, Md. Chicago at Washington. “The sky is not falling for us,” said Case Keenum the other day. Perhaps, but with 0-3 looming, and coming off seasons of eight, seven and seven wins, and seeing a stadium with gaps of empty seats, I’m wondering about the patience level of Daniel Snyder. A loss tonight would drop coach Jay Gruden’s record to 13 below .500 with zero playoff wins in his six seasons. Good thing for him that he’s got two winnable games (Giants, Dolphins) sandwiching a home tilt with the Patriots in the next three weeks.
Thursday: Green Bay. Philadelphia at Green Bay. This is a short-week game that the Eagles do not need right now. Man, Philly’s beat up for this game. And the Packers are going to bring the heat with the Smiths (Preston, Za’Darius) on Carson Wentz. Great Thursday nighter. Just hope the Eagles can hang in physically.
Sunday: New Orleans. Dallas at New Orleans, prime time. Very cool story here. Three years ago, while with The MMQB, I did a story on the band at St. Amant High School in Ascension Parish (between New Orleans and Baton Rouge), which had been flooded badly, as had the surrounding community. I appealed to readers to help the school re-stock the instruments lost and ruined in the flood, and America responded. Now, at halftime of this game, the Saints have arranged for the St. Amant Marching Band to play. You may remember this touching story. So great to see the band hit the big stage in the Superdome.
Moral of story:
Simple. Antonio Brown’s
not a good person.
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