Deshaun Watson looked better in week 11; credit for PJ Walker and Joe Brady

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It’s Thanksgiving week. One game tonight, three more on Thursday, let’s go …

deshaun-watson-patrick-mahomes-pj-walker-maqb — Jim Dedmon-USA TODAY Sports (Walker); Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports (Mahomes); Troy Taormina-USA TODAY Sports (Watson)

• Deshaun Watson looked different on Sunday against New England. Part of that may have played a New England pass rush that’s really struggling right now. But there was more to it. Watson threw a touchdown in the first quarter with great anticipation against Randall Cobb, and he put his precision in evidence on critical 25- and 24-yard throws from the field against Jordan Akins, and these are just three examples of the way his game has been tightened. In general, his mechanics were better, he was more patient in the pocket and this is not all a mistake. Watson has been spending bits of Mondays and Tuesdays lately doing extra detailing and mechanical work with his throwing trainer, Quincy Avery, and it looks like it’s showing up now. And that continued growth would be seen as very good news for whoever will be Watson’s next coach.

• I don’t want what the Panthers team did on Sunday go without saying anything – because PJ Walker entered Bank of America Stadium with 15 career passing yards and came out after completing 70.6 % of his throws against the Lions for 258 yards and a touchdown in a 20-0 win. And while Matt Rhule deserves a ton of credit (and maybe even a Coach of the Year Mention) for having Carolina so competitive while going through an overhaul of the NFL’s Weirdest Season roster For decades, when it comes to Walker’s performance, it’s worth looking down. the staff list a bit. That will take you to offensive coordinator Joe Brady, the 31-year-old phenomenon Rhule snatched from LSU earlier this year. Brady was probably already going to have head coach looks in January depending on the work he did with Teddy Bridgewater – in addition to what he accomplished last year in Baton Rouge. And what Walker did on short notice will only bolster the case that someone should shoot Brady in 2021. The interesting thing about last week? Brady actually prepared Bridgewater, Walker and Will Grier to start with, and built wrinkles into the game plan for each of them. Because of this, the truth is that the Reps went their separate ways last week, which makes what Walker and Brady have achieved even more impressive.

• Part of my process on Monday is to shop around and ask people for interesting details or quirks about the signing performances on Sunday. Obviously, one of the guys I chased on dating this Sunday was Chiefs supernova Patrick Mahomes. And a question I asked about his win over the Raiders on Sunday night was this: Was there more than Mahomes just being an alien in general? “That’s basically it,” said a response I got. “He’s just better than everyone else.” That pretty much sums it up.

• You won’t win a lot of money betting against Joe Burrow, and I certainly won’t make the mistake of doing that here. But while he may go back in time for the opener of 2021 – and while the Bengals are optimistic he’ll be ready for next season, it’s hard for anyone to know for sure before the operation is over – he will lose a lot. . The injury will almost certainly destroy his ability to do competitive field work in the spring and may well limit him to training camp as well. The period between Year 1 and Year 2 is critical for a young quarterback, so there is nothing to sneeze at. Again, ask me to push my chips, and I push them on Burrow. But he’s going to lose ground here, and will have to catch up as part of his recovery.

• I forgot to mention in my Colts article in this morning’s MMQB the bizarre penalty circumstance that drove the Colts towards the end of settlement. In Indy’s last possession of the settlement, officials threw eight flags – six of them on the Colts and five for outfit (from four different players). It cost the Colts three points, having knocked them off the range, and naturally that’s the first thing I asked Frank Reich when we spoke on Sunday night. His response: “I was going crazy. Obviously, I didn’t see the calls and I wouldn’t criticize the calls even if I had seen them. All I know is we can’t even afford the opportunity to make those calls. So it’s a combination of training him better and playing better. We all know that when you get a four-minute drive away, you don’t give the officials a chance to make such a call. I’d rather have a minus-2 race than a waiting penalty. And it’s not just the gamers. These are the coaches. We need to better frame this. And it starts with me. And we just need to be cleaner there. The other side of the coin? The flip side, for Reich, was that his players did not deviate from the calls, which helped them resolve the issue and win the game in overtime. “Of course,” continued Reich. “And again, it comes down to the resilience and mental toughness of the team. And belief in each other. And so, hey, if offensively we’ve had a chance to put it away, and we haven’t, well the defense has to do it and the special teams. And that’s what happened.

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• Here’s what Dolphins coach Brian Flores said about Tua Tagovailoa’s bench one day after the fact: “He’s the starting quarterback. He knows it. We had this conversation. He played well. And I expect him to continue to play well. … He’s a resilient child, like I said. He is also a talented child. I expect him to bounce back. I expect our whole team to bounce back, to be honest with you. I don’t know why Flores did it. But if I had to guess? I would say he probably forces other players to the same level and feels like if he takes one off the pitch to be deficient in any area, he has to deal with the others the same. Also, I think there’s a second message in the locker room that I pulled out of it, which I think is pretty clear: Miami is now in the playoff race, and the coaches are going to do it all.

• We can mark the Bears now, regardless of the coach, as a team in the mix for a big quarterback acquisition (whether through draft, trade or free agency) when we have out of season. Mitch Trubisky saw his option declined and was dismissed. Nick Foles may be set to be put on the bench after losing the summer competition for the job. So yeah, up there correcting the offensive line will at least be the task of taking a close look at every quarterback option on the market in 2021.

• A fun side light for the Patriots – Cardinals game on Sunday: Arizona coach Kliff Kingsbury played for Bill Belichick 17 years ago, and that year Belichick put Kingsbury on the reserve. injured and essentially turned him into a quality control assistant. Kingsbury is the son of a coach, like Belichick, and Belichick figured he would like to get into the business after he was done playing. This 2003 season has become like a college level course for him. We had an element on it last August at the MMQB, and it was then pretty clear how much the now-Cards coach was enjoying the experience: “I was there snacking with the coaches. And that was basically the role that I played in, helping out with blackouts, printing things, helping offensively in any way they could use me under Charlie Weis and really good coaches. But after this year? Kingsbury wasn’t sure he really wanted to dive. “I think at that point I was like, ‘Hell no, I never do that,’ Kingsbury said with a laugh. ‘But looking back, it was huge from what I know. Learned a crash course from the best organization to ever do that, really. Coach Belichick and Charlie Weis, day in and day out, it was like getting a PhD. in football. “And now he’s here.

• We mentioned it before: Sometimes, going past the transaction deadline can make a difference for players who have bought. Browns DE Olivier Vernon seems to this kind of case. He was available in October, the Seahawks engaged Cleveland in talks about him before dealing with Carlos Dunlap, and there was some sense in the Browns’ organization that Vernon was less than involved throughout this process. . There are also statistics to confirm this. He didn’t have a single bag in September or October. Since November 1? Five sacks in three games.

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