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Lazuli  30d ago (text post)   482 thread views

Weekly NFL Thread: Week 8

Let's chat about the National Football League: This week's schedule (all times Eastern):

Thu 2024-10-24 8:15PM Minnesota Vikings @ Los Angeles Rams
Sun 2024-10-27 1:00PM Atlanta Falcons @ Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Sun 2024-10-27 1:00PM Chicago Bears @ Washington Commanders
Sun 2024-10-27 1:00PM Indianapolis Colts @ Houston Texans
Sun 2024-10-27 1:00PM Arizona Cardinals @ Miami Dolphins
Sun 2024-10-27 1:00PM Green Bay Packers @ Jacksonville Jaguars
Sun 2024-10-27 1:00PM New York Jets @ New England Patriots
Sun 2024-10-27 1:00PM Tennessee Titans @ Detroit Lions
Sun 2024-10-27 1:00PM Baltimore Ravens @ Cleveland Browns
Sun 2024-10-27 4:05PM Buffalo Bills @ Seattle Seahawks
Sun 2024-10-27 4:05PM New Orleans Saints @ Los Angeles Chargers
Sun 2024-10-27 4:25PM Carolina Panthers @ Denver Broncos
Sun 2024-10-27 4:25PM Kansas City Chiefs @ Las Vegas Raiders
Sun 2024-10-27 4:25PM Philadelphia Eagles @ Cincinnati Bengals
Sun 2024-10-27 8:20PM Dallas Cowboys @ San Francisco 49ers
Mon 2024-10-28 8:15PM New York Giants @ Pittsburgh Steelers
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It's like every season is an experiment in how much of the team can go to shit before Mahomes alone isn't enough to win.

The defense is still playing at an elite level, and the offense still has a very good line. But the WR situation is a disaster.

We're seeing that happen with Brock Purdy and the 49ers. Most, if not all, of the team's star players are on the injury list. Their days as a Super Bowl-contending team are over.

The niners have had the even year injury curse forever.

It looked like a team that would last for a long time, but now we're seeing it maybe fall apart. Same with the Joe Burrow Bengals, when they made it to the Suber Bowl everyone thought they were coming back soon. Contending windows are short! Makes the Rams look smarter, they made hay while the sun shined.

The Bengals front office is neither smart enough nor aggressive enough in the draft or free agency to have the depth of talent needed to win a championship or to be consistently competitive. They have a solid run about once a decade ('05, '15, '21), but it's usually derailed by a QB injury against a division rival.

EDIT: I say this as a Bengals fan.

Hard to believe it was just three years ago the Bengals were competitive enough to be in the Super Bowl.

It's one of those things where we looked at that Bengals team and said "when they just fix the O-Line they'll be dominant!" But that's easier said than done. Team culture is such an important thing in the NFL, in a way it seems not to be in the NBA or even MLB. Some teams just produce those role players one after another, and some teams don't. The Eagles' Jeff Stoutland can get overhyped by the fans, but they at times they seem to be getting more out of guys like Fred Johnson and Tyler Steen than a lot of teams get out of their starters.

Sometimes they just never figure it out. I'll always love Joe Burrow for that season though, it was such an honorable showing as a QB, going out there and getting blitzed over and over and still doing what needed to be done.

Even as a Steelers fan, I was rooting for the Bengals in that season because that fanbase had put up with so much nonsense over the years, and they finally had a team that could be taken seriously. Even the Marvin Lewis "not your grandfather's Bungles" teams always looked like they were overachievers who would blow it as soon as the playoffs rolled around. Then Joe Burrow showed up at the Super Bowl in that horrible tiger striped suit and I decided to root for the Rams. After all, Aaron Donald is further proof that no matter how mediocre Pitt's football team may have been over the past 40 years, they can still crank out NFL hall of famers like nobody's business.

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