Winners and Losers of NFL Week 3

Each week, this NFL season, we will celebrate the electric games, study the colossal mistakes and explain the inexplicable moments of the last slate. Welcome to winners and losers. Which one are you?

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Winner: Danny Dimes

Today is the year 0. Tomorrow is the first day of the first month of NA – After Daniel. (Anno Danieli, if you have technical problems.)

This week, the Giants made a decision in the last five years and finally decided to leave Eli Manning to replace rookie Daniel Jones, a player whose project was training Giants fans, the nerds of the spotlight community, nerds of the testing community, and everyone except the Jones family was stupefied. Jones looked great in pre-season, but it's pre-season. On Sunday, it was time to see if Jones was going to face the actual competition, as many had predicted.

Instead, he shined. Jones threw for 336 yards, two touchdowns and no interceptions. Jones did not really touch Jones – Evan Engram caught a pass and ran faster than tight ends are supposed to run – but one of them was a perfectly placed pass from Sterling Shepard who was covered by a pair of defenders who could not do nothing!

Jones also ran twice, including the final score of New York's 32-31 win:

Jones is, in a way, the first player in Giants history with multiple touchdowns and shots in the same game. That could be a trend: the rookie followed at nearly 20 miles an hour on his first touchdown. Maybe we should start calling him Danny Dash in addition to Danny Dimes?

After exchanging Odell Beckham Jr. and seeing some other great receivers receive injuries and suspensions, the Giants seemed to be entirely dependent on Saquon Barkley, the running back midfielder taking second place in the final standings last year. Barkley was injured in the first half of Sunday's game and left with a sprained ankle. Jones won this match with Wayne Gallman running and a Segway wearing gloves on the handlebars. 2 receiver. Darius Slayton, a fifth round pick in Auburn, had 82 yards after not playing in the first two games. ESPN tells me that 0.1% of the fantastic alignments have Slayton, maybe also the Jones family.

What makes Jones's performance so incredible to me is that he was not exactly an unknown quantity coming out of high school. Jones played 36 games at Duke, starting for three years. There was more than enough scotch on the drafts for them to form an opinion, and more than enough sample for the analysts to form a statistical opinion. And in those three years, Jones never played a match as good as the one he played on Sunday. He never played a college match with 300 yards, no interception and a hurried touchdown, not to mention a match with 330 yards, two touchdowns, no interception and one touchdown in a hurry. He has played only nine games for 300 yards and has made at least 40 assists in eight, including five team losses. He had only 36 pass attempts on Sunday. Jones essentially played a better match in his first ever game in the NFL than he did in three years at Duke. If you must, criticize the defense of the Buccaneers, but I imagine that it would have outperformed most of the defenses of the ACC.

Can Jones play the best game of his career every game?

Loser: Distance

The Giants nearly lost because Jones scored the decisive goal in the minute 16 seconds. (Scoring too easily is a big problem for Jones, the greatest offensive player in the history of this sport.) That gave Tampa Bay 76 seconds to get into the range, which they did by handing over to Mike Evans , who already had 146 yards and three touchdowns in the day. He caught a 44-yard pass to bring Tampa Bay back to the 9-yard line, setting a 26-yard winning goal – a hit for new kicker Buccaneers Matt Gay, an American player and Lou Groza Prize winner of the best college football kicker in 2017

What the Buccaneers then did was … not ideal. First, they broke the bullet to kill the clock. After that, they did not do anything, voluntarily taking a 5-yard penalty for late play, although it would have been easy to line up and play their next game, a knee designed to kill the rest of the game. the clock. Then the Bucs took the ball and moved it back two meters to center it for Gay.

Gay missed it.

The Buccaneers went back 7 meters to get that kick in and, well, if you look at the video, it's clear that it would have been good to go 7 yards. On one side, it seems flukey – Gay scored 37 of his 38 goals out of a total of 40 yards or more in college. By contrast, the Buccaneers were giving Gay a 34-yard goal in the middle of the field, exactly the same kick as an extra point attempt … and Gay had missed two more points earlier Sunday, a blocked and wide to the left.

Buccaneers coach Bruce Arians confirmed that the decision to be late for the match was intentional, as apparently it would make the kick easier.

I've heard about teams taking intentional game delays to facilitate shooting in college, if they were trying, for example, to do 19 yards off the width of the posts and to prevent that their kicker is not forced to take the angle. bullet through the amounts. But that does not apply here for a variety of reasons: the hash marks of the NFL never go further than the goalposts and the Buccaneers still have time to place the ball in the middle of the field. I can not imagine why this decision was made.

I need more details about this. I'm sure it's complete BS, because the closer things are obviously easier in all skills in all sports. But if Arians will pretend that there was a logic here, I needed him to explain it. If more difficult shots are easier, why not just take a dozen game delays and kick at 115 yards? Is there a great place, like Gay is particularly good at 43 yards? Why do Buccaneers bother to use quarterbacks and wide receivers if they could only score goals with their best against Legasus by the time they get the ball to get three points guaranteed?

Winner: The fountain of the great receivers of the chefs

During the first week of the season, the Chiefs lost Tyreek Hill as a result of an injury to the joint that could prevent it from entering for a month. Hill is not the most important leader – um, of course, it's Patrick Mahomes – but it still seemed like a loss that could derail Kansas City's massively prolific offense. Hill, a competitive sprinter who ran a 40-yard run with an average of 4.28 seconds at his college, was fifth in the NFL receiving yards last year. He was the only guy able to run fast enough to settle under the stadium-length bombs thrown by Mahomes, a stretcher that forced the defenses to keep the whole length of the pitch (and made them pay if they did not do it) .

In the end, the injury does not seem to have affected the leaders. Last week Fourth-year receiver Demarcus Robinson scored two touchdowns and second-round pick, Mecole Hardman, added his first career score. But no matter, it was against the Raiders.

Sunday, they repeated their excellence. Hardman, who ran 40 yards in 4.33 seconds in the NFL combined, sprinted for 83 yards:

And Robinson made one of the best catch of the young season: a one-handed snag on a pass, even Mahomes seeming to consider a prayer.

Neither Hardman nor Robinson were part of Kansas City's plans while Hill was active, combining for a catch and zero yards in the opening win of the season against the Jaguars. What happens when Hill returns? Are the Chiefs just testing Hardman, whose speed game is like Hill's? Does Robinson start taking pictures of Sammy Watkins, older and less spectacular? They can not go to four because Travis Kelce exists.

It's a good problem to have, I guess. But finding talent never seems to be a problem for the Chiefs of the Mahomes era: last year, the team eliminated Kareem Hunt in the 12th week, to then do little with Damien Williams, Darrel Williams and eventually Deron Williams, Michelle Williams the actress, Michelle Williams of Destiny's Child, and William Carlos Williams. It seems that no player can be replaced by the leaders.

Loser: the future of the patriotic dynasty

It's a difficult time to be a fan of one of the 31 teams praying for the fall of the Patriots. Tom Brady still exists, the New England defense has not left a touchdown for three weeks, and the Patriots are 3-0 with an average margin of 29.7 points. On Sunday, New England played against the unfortunate Jets, who only managed a total of 105 yards rushing, the smallest number of passes allowed by the Patriots since 1988, decades before their domination of the era Belichick. (We can not really have fun with the historical facts about the Jets, who play pretty badly on a regular basis: they only managed a hundred wins in a game against the Broncos in 2017).

But on Sunday, a breach emerged in New England's grip on the league. Brady left the game in the fourth quarter, allowing Jarrett Stidham, a fourth-round draft pick, to make his NFL debut. And it was a disaster! At the third pass of Stidham, he made a choice of six:

After the interception, the Patriots judged the game competitive and brought back Brady. (Do me a favor: read Jon Gruden's next sentence) "I call this guy from Stidham the rebreather because he takes the time of a stroke, it's no longer hogwash. (OK, you can stop reading in a low voice, Jon Gruden's.)

Obviously, this three-pass performance and an interception of the only other quarter on the New England list is proof that the Patriots are unfortunately unprepared for life without Brady this year or later. They are doomed! Desperate!

OK, they'll probably win the Super Bowl again this year, as they did last year, and they'll probably have it next year too. But I need to believe in something, okay?

Loser: Penalize the wounded

On Sunday, the NFL referees literally added their insult to their injury. In the Atlanta match against Indianapolis, Keanu Neal, a member of the Falcons' security team, is injured at the end of the season for the second year in a row. Last year, he tore his week 1 of the ACL. This year, he broke his week 3 of Achilles. After helping Atlanta at the Super Bowl as a rookie and doing the Pro Bowl in its second year, a promising career was derailed.

While Neal was sitting on the field, he felt the tremendous physical pain of the injury combined with the emotional pain of a second consecutive season lost. In frustration, anger and anguish, he tore his helmet and threw it aside. And the referees have issued a flag for unsportsmanlike conduct.

The referees will say that they were only doing their job – the rules prevent players from removing their helmets on the court. But we want a level of human judgment on the part of those responsible. We know that a hold penalty could probably be called for dozens of games per game, and by the rule, all kinds of defensive games could be called pass interference. But we expect public servants to judge what is acceptable and what is not.

Yes, there is a rule that removal of the helmet is illegal. But referees must know that a frustrated and angry player by removing his helmet is not a legitimate example of unsportsmanlike conduct. After all, unsportsmanlike conduct means that the person involved is an athlete. And when the largest tendon of the human body breaks, the person who writhes in pain on the ground is no longer a sportsman. It's just a man who lives something horrible.

Winner: North Carolina Sports Radio

The story of the first three weeks of the NFL season was a backup sequence: Andrew Luck retired; the world has learned about Gardner Minshew's existence; Drew Brees suffered a major injury for the first time since joining the Saints; Ben Roethlisberger's season is over. the giants left Eli; Sam Darnold became mono and his backup tore the ligaments at the ankle. The dolphins brought Josh Rosen, because, why not? This week, eight of the NFL's 32 quarterbacks were substitutes early in the pre-season.

The best performance of all substitutes came on Sunday, when Carolina's Kyle Allen made the debut with a 261-yard, four-touch performance in a 38-20 win over the Cardinals. Allen, who did not come out last year, started for a match full of personal significance. Not only did he play in his hometown, Arizona, but also against Kyler Murray, his rival in a contentious battle that was to start at Texas A & M in 2015. (Both players were transferred after the year, the rare battle quarterback in which everyone lost.) But Sunday, Allen proved once and for all that he was the Kylest of both quarterbacks. Look at this piece!

Watch this to play!

We are sure this guy was not crushed last year? For example, the 32 teams had seven shots and did not realize that this guy could come back in assists? Between Allen and Case Keenum, I'm starting to think that NFL teams should use draft picks on Houston quarterbacks just in case.

Allen's game will get people to have opinionsbecause only one start of the match, he already has more touchdowns than Newton in his first two games. In fact, he has four more, because Newton had no touchdown in his first two games. Although Newton did not miss a hitch in the first two weeks, he was clearly upset by a foot injury. He launched a flying V full of ducks and escaped contact after basing his career on the hard quarter races. Some would say that Allen was not just better than Newton, but … probably as good as Newton. In 125 games in nine seasons, Newton has only played six games in four touchdowns like the one Allen had had on his second start as a professional. Allen had a smuggler rating of 144.4; Newton did it only once, in a 38-0 win over Atlanta in 2015.

Is the Allen-over-Newton controversy deserved? In a word, no. Let's not make long-term quarterly decisions based on statistics collected against the Arizona Cardinals, who had a hard time stopping anyone last year … and who were then hired by Kliff Kingsbury, agnostic of the defense, as coach. (Yes, agnostic defense. Kliff Kingsbury does not wish to declare that the defense exists or does not exist; he only knows he does not know it.) I'll need more than one game before I wonder if one of the most dynamic athletes in football history is on the bench, just because this athlete played terribly when he was injured. But do not worry, people will definitely scream at you.

Loser: The drawing board of Freddie Kitchens

There was a lot of hype to say that it would be the year when the Cleveland Browns reversed the situation, that the most futile franchise in football could actually win a bit. Baker Mayfield was superb last year! Odell Beckham Jr. is one of the most talented humans I have ever seen playing in every sport! Myles Garrett really seems to be a legitimate star! After three weeks, however, the Browns look like these. Week 1, they lost by 30 to Titans completely mediocre. Week 2, they beat the Jets, which is to raise the level of difficulty to Rookie after a loss to the computer. Madden. On Sunday, the defense played well: a Rams team qualified for the Super Bowl last season with just 20 points, forcing three turnovers. But on offense, the Browns were brutal and scored only one touchdown. Mayfield broke records, completing only half of his passes and averaging 5.4 yards per attempt.

The disorganized and unsuccessful night of the Browns can be summed up in one piece: the fourth and ninth, pulling from behind by four points and into enemy territory, the Browns were aggressive enough to let the offensive on the rather than attempting a 57-yard pass. goal in the field or start a loose punt. But the game they called was … finally extremely bad:

The Browns ran a draw, a fairly simple game where the offense briefly claims that it will throw a pass before trying to catch the opponent off guard by running the ball. It's the most modest thing about football and the Browns thought it would be efficient enough to buy their racing ball at a 9-yard run. He had 2.

It was such a boring piece that she seems to have put Boringness History. According to Bill Barnwell of ESPN, no team has attempted to all rectilinear play at the fourth and eighth years or more in more than 20 years.

(There were games in the fourth and ninth, but they are usually fake bets or quarterback quarrels.)

According to ESPN's Jake Trotter, no team has a draw in such a scenario … ever.

The Browns' excitement this year is due to new head coach Freddie Kitchens, who started last season as a Cleveland Halfback Coach, but who came back to Mayfield after being promoted to offensive coordinator at mid-season. At this point, it seems that Kitchens, who had never been a coordinator at any level before last season, could be outclassed.

The pairing of a head coach for the first time with a blistering machine at the quarterback was questionable, but it was not supposed to be boring. If they failed, they were at least supposed to fail when they were trying to do daring, maybe stupid things. It's a real disappointment to see them try to be historically bland.

Winner: innovation kick

Two things happened on Sunday in the NFL that had never been done before: the draw for 4 and 9, and this:

After a touchdown, the Ravens shot from behind at five minutes, while there was only 2:01 left in the fourth quarter. They only had a dead time left. They had to send the ball back to the Chiefs. It's a little disappointing, because starting at 2:01, the Ravens would lose the opportunity to take advantage of the two-minute warning that stops the clock. Unless, of course, the leaders took no seconds to return the ball.

Basically, the only return that does not take any seconds from the clock is a good draw, but there are not many good shooters to kick off because the ball does not travel high on a shot. sending, because you start a departure and can not really go underneath. You are also not allowed to give a send shot, with the exception of the following shots. However, you are allowed to drop the ball and kick it, which is not an attractive option for most kickers, as the strange shaped ball bounces so strangely. The kicking kick was an integral part of football until the 1930s, when it made the ball sharper and harder to bounce, and is only used occasionally in figure games.

Kickers Ravens Justin Tucker, however, has finally found a use for the kick kick. He threw the ball high in the air, with a ton of rotation, so that the ball landed on its fatest part and came out high enough that it could pass under it. The kick worked, as the leaders claimed, and the Ravens took advantage of the two-minute warning.

So was it a smart game? I am not sure. I think the Ravens probably should have tried for a kick next, which would have given them some possibility to recover the ball. And if the Ravens really wanted a kick without wasting time, they could have just blown the ball out of bounds. The only real benefit in this area is the possibility that the leaders dropped the ball, which seems unlikely given the time they had.

So it was not particularly useful launch innovation. But still: kick off to innovation! For me, it's more exciting than winning football games.