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Lazuli  1mo ago (text post)   491 thread views

Weekly NFL Thread: Week 9

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

Thu 2024-10-31 8:15PM Houston Texans @ New York Jets
Sun 2024-11-03 1:00PM Dallas Cowboys @ Atlanta Falcons
Sun 2024-11-03 1:00PM Denver Broncos @ Baltimore Ravens
Sun 2024-11-03 1:00PM Miami Dolphins @ Buffalo Bills
Sun 2024-11-03 1:00PM New Orleans Saints @ Carolina Panthers
Sun 2024-11-03 1:00PM New England Patriots @ Tennessee Titans
Sun 2024-11-03 1:00PM Las Vegas Raiders @ Cincinnati Bengals
Sun 2024-11-03 1:00PM Los Angeles Chargers @ Cleveland Browns
Sun 2024-11-03 1:00PM Washington Commanders @ New York Giants
Sun 2024-11-03 4:05PM Chicago Bears @ Arizona Cardinals
Sun 2024-11-03 4:05PM Jacksonville Jaguars @ Philadelphia Eagles
Sun 2024-11-03 4:25PM Detroit Lions @ Green Bay Packers
Sun 2024-11-03 4:25PM Los Angeles Rams @ Seattle Seahawks
Sun 2024-11-03 8:20PM Indianapolis Colts @ Minnesota Vikings
Mon 2024-11-04 8:15PM Tampa Bay Buccaneers @ Kansas City Chiefs
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Week 10 thread live: https://www.themotte.org/post/1234/weekly-nfl-thread-week-10

No thread this week but the bills/dolphins game had me sweating.

These last few weeks have been fun

There's always a thread.

I spent Sunday sitting bedside for an ill relative, she was mostly unconscious so I wound up watching three straight games on mute in between reading, helping her reposition herself, and reassuring her that no, she was not standing on my foot, she was in fact laying down.

Luckily it was an excellent football Sunday.

The Eagles had their most convincing game since 2022, winning in Cincinnati for the first time in franchise history. They won the turnover battle 2-0, for what feels like the first time in forever. Hurts played his best most complete game, hitting some deep balls, running enough designed run plays to keep the defense worried, scrambling when he isn’t contained, and of course hitting the Brotherly Shove trick for first downs and TDs. This is the best version of Hurts: a pretty good Lamar Jackson imitation with a cool trick to get one yard on command. Barkley crushed it, the local boy has loved playing for Philly. The ball spread around reasonably well to Smith, Brown, and backup TE Calcaterra. Still waiting for Jahan Dotson or any other receiver to do much of anything. But when Hurts is at his best, with Barkley in the backfield, 2.5 possible targets is enough to run a passing game because the defense is on a swivel trying to keep eyes on the run game. The Eagles Defense finally got some takeaways! The Bengals will probably be downgraded as a win by the end of the season, they are probably just bad if they lost to the Eagles like this at home, but they’re at least a real team that was playing to save their season this week. They have a fantastic quarterback and a star receiver. They’re not tomato cans. This loss probably ends competitive hopes for the Bengals season, unfortunately.

With Jameis Winston stepping in for the injured Deshaun Watson, the Browns snuck past the Ravens on some hero ball from Winston. The Browns season is probably already over, they’d have to win out to get to 11 wins, which makes some good performances from Winston so exquisite for me as a hater. Winston can play competently, or at least not worst QB of all time bad, get the Browns nowhere because they’ve already lost six games in a tough division, and then Winston is going to want starting QB money somewhere, or at least a shot to start, and will probably leave Cleveland where he is only under contract for one year. Cleveland still probably has no realistic way out of the Deshaun Watson contract (unless I’m right that the injury is fake and he simply never comes back letting the team take the insurance payout as a salary cap relief), they can’t pay two QBs and field a competitive team around Winston, and the mess will be fantastic in the off-season, with the team and its fans faced with just how stupid and immoral trading for Deshaun Watson was. I was really ready to root for the Browns in the Mayfield era, now I’m a hater, and not just a hater rooting for them to lose, I’m happy to see them win just enough to make them suffer more.

Bears v Redskins was a fantastic game. I regret to inform everyone that Jayden Daniels is a legit QB, and will be for some time. The ultimate outcome of the game was luck: if the Bears don’t flub a goal line handoff into a fumble at the 1 yard line, or the bounce on the Hail Mary doesn’t go that way, then the Bears win. But Daniels looked good. The skins have always been an annoying team to play in the division, but now they have some legit talent. Going to be two exciting games coming up. Caleb Williams looked good as well, but expect the Bears to do whatever they need to do to pick up some offensive line help in the near future. Makes me appreciate the Eagles O-Line situation: Stoutland University is a meme, but when you see Fred Johnson come off the bench to replace a Pro-Bowl LT and the team avoids giving up a sack against Hendrickson, that kind of Next Man Up mentality keeps the team competitive when there are problems. The Redskins looked beatable, they only put up 18 points on the Bears, but those are going to be two games to look forward to for the Eagles.

And oh man, the game I was more excited for than the Eagles game: SNF, Dallas against SF, season on the line for both teams desperate to get back on track after tough losses. A Cowboys loss was great, that both Dallas and the Niners looked beatable is even better. I was happy to have a reason to root for Brock Purdy for a change, and he played pretty well. Dak Prescott was in classic form, getting the team deep into a hole throwing interceptions, then leading half a comeback in garbage time so the game ends up looking close, before inexplicably throwing the ball into double coverage to end the game. Classic Boys loss. They'll probably still play the Eagles hard, but it's tough to worry about them going on a run to take the division.

What a weird week of football. We're starting to see the tiers of the league separate themselves, but power rankings are going to be a mess.

Winston will go nowhere with the Browns because they're benefiting from what I call the New QB Effect. Every year, at least one quarterback who had been previously written off as a backup will play in a game or two where he puts up good numbers and surprises everyone. Then he eventually comes back down to earth and people remember why this guy isn't starting. The reason for this is simple: Any QB worth his salt will do well if the opponent doesn't have any tape on him. Once the guy plays a few games, opponents can figure out his tendencies and prepare for them. This is exactly what happened to Mike White with the Jets 2 years ago and to Mason Rudolph with the Steelers last year. It's why the first few weeks of the season are a crapshoot (since the preseason is all backups and coaches don't want to give away their gameplans it's pretty much useless as a study aid). So while I'm glad to see the nonthreatening Browns deliver Ravens loss that helps the Steelers in the standings, I'm not too worried that the Browns will be good enough to beat us when we play them. We'll have three weeks of tape by then, which is coincidentally around the amount it takes to figure a guy out.

Flacco went 4-1 with most of this same Browns team last year. Merely competent QB play could deliver a winning record, though probably not enough to reach the playoffs.

Flacco went 4-1

Anthony Richardson could learn a thing or two.

Joe Flacco left the Ravens after 11 seasons, traded because a rookie named Lamar Jackson upstaged him while he was injured. He started another year and became a backup after failing a physical and having surgery at age 35. the Bucs dumped Jameis Winston at age 25 in favor of a 43-year-old Tom Brady, because the former threw too many picks. Winston would never be a regular starter again. People forget that the guy's only 30, because he feels like a has been. Flacco was able to give adequate QB play because being adequate is what he did all his life. Winston is athletic but turnover-prone. He's also similar stylistically to Watson, and a big part of the problem is that Cleveland runs more of a Joe Flacco type offense than a DeShaun Watson type offense. Watson's best years were running a spread offense where he threw a lot and was able to scramble if necessary. Cleveland runs heavy sets and wants to run the ball a lot. I don't know why they thought he'd be a good fit.

What a play: Jayden Daniel, fresh off an injury, threw a mind-blowing Hail Mary pass for the win in the final seconds against the Chicago Bears.

Not attacking you specifically, but it's weird to me that everyone is giving so much credit to Jayden Daniels. He played a great game on the whole, but he put up 18 points against a weak Bears team, and the play at the end was 90% luck on his part to get the TD. He wasn't even really targeting the receiver who came away with it, it was an arm-punt into a crowd and hope for good luck. That play, executed exactly that way with no additional Daniels contribution, would be expected to have less than a 1/5 chance of success I would guess.

Deserves some credit for scrambling around long enough to buy time for everyone to get down there, but yeah, once it left his hand ....

Good to be lucky.

https://x.com/joe_abdo/status/1850688286022406264

Lets pretend your Bears head coach Matt Eberflus. How should you handle Tyrique Stevenson?

For some background, he's a second year player, was a 2nd round pick a year ago (so still on a rookie contract).

He's a starter now (with fairly middle of the road PFF grades), (so his value relative to his contract is pretty high).

He's already expressed contrition on social media - "To Chicago and teammates my apologies for lack of awareness and focus .... The game ain't over until zeros hit the clock. Can't take anything for granted. Notes taken, improvement will happen. #Beardown" https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/42043231/tyrique-stevenson-taunts-commanders-fans-seconds-bears-lose-hail-mary-td

The twitter comments I read last night indicated that he needed to be cut immediately to send a message to everyone else on the team.

I think this is a space that understands that if twitter comment declare one thing, the wise man should probably do the opposite.

Indulge me the opportunity to knock down the straw man for a second.

I think if Eberflus is smart, he'll do the opposite, he won't publicly blast him, he won't privately blast him in front of the rest of the team either.

I think this is one of those deals where you either destroy your credibility by searching for scapegoats, or build a lot of trust by conspicuously not calling out obviously available scapegoats.

To the media - "I know Tyrique is really embarrassed by what he put on tape there, its obviously not what we want to be doing, and its a brutal way for that to end, its hurts for all of us, hurts for me, hurts for Tyrique, hurts for every guy in the locker room who put in the work to get a W. It was 1 play though, in a game with 120 (or whatever the actual number is) plays. Those 119 other plays were also opportunities to make the plays we needed to get the W. Tyrique learned a hard lesson in a hard way, he'll get better from this. Everyone else in that locker room will get better from it as well"

To the team - (in a calm none yelling voice) "Hey guys, Tyrique made a mistake there, it on you guys to learn from what he did, this a good reminder that we're out there in front of 70,000 fans with smartphone every second, everything you do is something that will be captured. It only take a second to put something on tape the will define you to people who don't pay attention to each play. The margins for winning and losing are small, let's all be better from this".

At least that's how I would advise handling it, it'll be interesting to see how Eberflus actually handles it.

Praise in public correct in private. Have him express contrition to his brothers and give him some nominal punishment like carrying pads for a practice. Then no one says anything publicly, if asked everyone gives a rote answer like, we win and lose as a team not as individuals. We need to perform better to win. Next question.

That fumble was way worse. Losing the ball on the one yard line on a trick play is on the coach. Having what appeared to be a QB spy on a hail mary was also weird.

A coach can't come down hard like that unless he has credibility to do it. Mike Tomlin or a Bill Belichek can cut people, Eberflus can't.

Yeah, I agreed with all that (although I would give the same advice to Tomlin or Belichek) (I didn't actually start watching until the coverage flipped over for the last couple of plays)

So did you startle your relative when it happened?

It was one of those games that they changed over to at the end where I was, I was kind of half watching while washing the dishes while my daughters were on their devices.

It definitely got an involuntary "Whoa!!!" out of me that startled my daughters lol

She was asleep during that game so I managed to restrain myself.

I am comforted by the fact that the last thing she ever watched on TV was an embarrassing cowboys loss. A true birds fan to the end.

Feels like defensive backs need to relearn you're supposed to knock hail Mary passes down not try for the interception.

Absolutely incredible finish. Commanders avoided a very tough-luck loss by handing the Bears one instead.

The Bears' defensive frontline must've been exhausted by the end because Daniels had plenty of time to run and make a big throw, even with his rib injury.

honestly on these hail Mary's I never understand why they don't rush 5. 6 should be enough on the back-end anyways? I guess maybe you are worried about hook and ladder type stuff but Washington kept 6 back to block + the QB = only 4 players downfield anyways. Make him get it out early and there's not a lot that can go wrong (Miami against NE a few years back being one potential counterpoint).

This play was weird though because of the spy, but 6 should be able to block 4 for a while even if they hadn't had the weird spy option.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=Rv0t_S7bl0I&pp=ygUJcWIgc2Nob29s

Interesting breakdown of a similar play by the Colts defended differently by the Texans.

At 27:12

A Hail Mary isn't a typical pass play where the QB is trying to hit an open receiver. The idea is to bunch your receivers at the goal line and hope to create enough chaos for one of them to come down with the ball. The reason they don't rush 5, or even 4, for that matter, is that the play takes so long to develop that they should be able to get adequate pressure with 3. You need to post 3 DBs deep to defend the goal line, plus 4 CBs to jam the receivers at the line and provide trail coverage, plus a linebacker to spy or guard against the hook & ladder. Give up any one of these spots and you're creating a higher percentage play than if you make the WB throw the Hail Mary.

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