On Monday Night Football’s broadcast this week Joe Buck made a very strong statement about this years NFL season. He said that there was a lot of “bad football” being played this year. He’s not the first person to echo this statement, as Tom Brady repeated this sentiment in early October. I can’t say I disagree unfortunately. Besides a couple of standout games (Bills vs. Vikings & Chiefs vs. Bengals), I can’t say I remember a lot of SIGNATURE games. However, I will never complain about NFL football being on TV. Especially, with some Thursday, Saturday and Sunday football. However, we’re here to talk about what happened this past weekend. Let’s get into it.
1. The resurgence of Baker Mayfield??
With just under three days of preparation, Baker Mayfield came in and lead a game-winning drive against a Raiders team that had just won three straight. After a shaky start to his season, Mayfield played efficiently throwing for 230 yards along with the game-winning touchdown to Van Jefferson. The Rams will travel to Green Bay on Monday Night to take on Aaron Rodgers and the Packers at Lambeau. A big test for a team that doesn’t have playoff aspirations.
2. The Detroit Lions are quietly on a roll
The Detroit Lions have won five of their last six games. Their one loss you may ask? A three-point loss to the Buffalo Bills on Thanksgiving. In four of their last five games they have scored over 30 points and they have not turned the ball over in the last two games. Dan Campbell has the boys rolling as they are currently second place in the NFC North at 6-7. Somehow, someway they still have a chance to make the playoffs. Their next four games? The Jets in New York, Panthers in Carolina, the Bears at home and ending the season at Lambeau against Green Bay.
3. The Philadelphia Eagles are very serious
Sitting at 12-1 after 14 weeks is what some would say… pretty good. Jalen Hurts is efficient as ever, rarely turning the ball over and just running all over every defense he plays against. Once again, Miles Sanders went for over 100 yards rushing (144 and two TD’s this week) showing that he can be an elite running back in this league. The defense is another great part of this squad as they are the best passing defense in the league and they are seventh in team defense. The Eagles close out their season against the Bears, Cowboys, Saints & Giants.
4. The Russell Wilson x Nathaniel Hackett experiment has officially failed
At 3-10, the Denver Broncos have been officially eliminated from playoff contention. The worst part about this for the Broncos… their first-round pick now belongs to the Seattle Seahawks due to the Russell Wilson trade. I don’t know what happened, I genuinely don’t. Hackett was coming off a great year as the coordinator for the Packers and Russ has spent the last decade being one of the league’s top quarterbacks. So what went wrong? Twitter will tell you that it all started from the “Broncos Country, let’s ride” video, but I think that it starts and ends with Nathaniel Hackett. I think that he’s just been way over his head as a head coach. He clearly lost the locker room weeks ago and his decision making this year has NEVER not been questionable. Russ hasn’t looked great all year (besides maybe this week against Kansas City) but since you paid him that much money you have no choice but to give him one more year. I just don’t know if he’ll find success with Hackett as a head coach. This was supposed to be the year, can’t believe it went THIS bad.
5. The New England Patriots defense showed out once again
Double-digit sack season for both Matthew Judon and Josh Uche… tears in my eyes. It sucked seeing Kyler go out injured like that though, he’s one of my favorite players in the league and I’m hoping for a speedy recovery for him. Now back to the game. I just would like to have a sit-down conversation with Matt Patricia and just ask him what the hell are you doing? I will always support this team, but it’s really hard to sit there and watch 20+ screen passes when our receiving corps is full of deep threats. DeVante Parker and Rhamondre Stevenson getting hurt sucks too, but to see Pierre Strong Jr. and Kevin Harris step up was great. The Patriots will stay on the West Coast for this whole week as they take on the Raiders followed by two home games against the Bengals and Dolphins. And then comes the season-finale against the Bills in Buffalo. A game that will most likely decide the Patriots playoff fate.
Another week in the books. All-time good character guy Deshaun Watson stunk it up yet again against the Bengals, the Buccaneers looked horrible again and the Jaguars proved once again that the Titans will always be fraudulent in my eyes. This is YSN, until next time, signing out.
