The Daily Briefing Monday, December 27, 2021

I think the NBC NFL rules expert, Terry McAulay, made a perfect point with this tweet during the weird extra Monday game:

Terry McAulay

@SNFRules

Who is doing what to whom here? This should be a no call, not defensive pass interference.  https://twitter.com/i/status/1473061876594618374

Watch that play a couple of times. And then tell me you’re sure the interference should have been called on Browns defender M.J. Stewart and not on the receiver, Zay Jones. Or there should have been no call. As it happened, the call was defensive pass interference. Las Vegas quarterback Derek Carr, on third-and-five at the Raiders’ 9-yard line, threw it up downfield, and Stewart got flagged for a 46-yard penalty, to the Cleveland 45-yard line.

I’ve said it for years: Defensive pass-interference should NOT be a spot foul. Give me one reason to justify that call on Stewart being a 46-yard penalty. Impossible. It’s a perversion of the rules of the game. It’s downright irresponsible for the NFL to have the max offensive pass interference foul be 10 yards, while there is no limit for DPI yardage. Plus: A third to a half of the DPI calls are hand-fights between receiver and DB, and Stanford coach David Shaw told me a few years ago that the major beef on eliminating the spot foul on DPI and turning into the 15-yard-max college rule—that beaten corners would tackle receivers with two steps on them—doesn’t happen very often in the college game. It’s an easy fix. DPI should be a 15-yard flag.

What is the interference is 8 yards downfield?  Spot foul or max 15?  Or 15?

GREEN BAY

Peter King tries to figure out QB AARON RODGERS:

 I think I would love to see Aaron Rodgers, who was so happy and content and grateful Saturday after the 24-22 win over Cleveland, stay in Green Bay in 2022 and be a lifelong Packer. But more than that, Rodgers has kept his word, from what he told me and others during training camp. He promised to be where his feet are. He said he told his teammates when he reported to camp after his long time away in the offseason to live in the moment—no use in thinking about the future, which is out of everyone’s control. This is a media-crazed league, and it’s clear Rodgers has practiced all season what he preached when he got to camp last summer. He sounds like a man who loves where he is.

I think, having said that, I have no idea what Rodgers thinks deep down inside. And if, as it turns out, he decides he wants to leave after this season, this might be a Rodgers idea for a deal after the season:

a. Say Denver loses three of the last four to finish 8-9. Vic Fangio, with his third sub-.500 year in three seasons as coach, could be replaced with Green Bay offensive coordinator Nathaniel Hackett.

b. Denver could use a good chunk of its $49 million in 2022 cap space to reach a long-term agreement with free-agent wide receiver Davante Adams of the Packers.

c. Denver could trade first- and fourth-round picks in 2022 and a first-round pick in 2023, plus wide receiver Jerry Jeudy, to Green Bay for Rodgers.

Notes: Deal would leave Denver with no first- or fourth-round picks next year, but two picks in each of the second and third rounds … Deal would leave Denver with Adams, Courtland Sutton and Tim Patrick as a legitimate 1-2-3 at wideout … If Rodgers leaves after this season, Green Bay would get significant compensation. If Rodgers stays one more year, he would be an unrestricted free-agent in 2023 and the Packers’ only compensation would be a compensatory third-round pick in 2023 … If Rodgers, as expected, would sign an extension in Denver, his receiver group of Adams, Sutton and Patrick would be with him for three years at least, through the end of the 2024 season—when Rodgers would be 41 years old.

Albert Breer picks up the same positive vibes from Rodgers:

And it came up again during his interview with Fox’s Erin Andrews, as he discussed the record-breaking throw to Allen Lazard (thrown on, per Rodgers, double-stick, one of the first West Coast concepts he learned in Green Bay). “I’m so fortunate to be able to play here in this stadium, with these fans and for this great organization the last 17 years,” he told Andrews. “This is what it’s all about—Christmas night at Lambeau. Like I said last week, where would you rather be? It’s a special place, and I’m eternally blessed. I don’t lose sight of that. That’s the most important thing, as you get older, having that perspective of living life, counting your blessings, not the things you don’t have. And I have a lot of blessings here in Green Bay. I’m really thankful to be here.”

I’ve said all along that Rodgers was not like Matthew Stafford was last year—his football situation is, and has been, much better than Stafford’s was in Detroit. And I do think it’s possible that being put in a position to seriously look around may have brought Rodgers to realize that the grass isn’t greener. Winning a Super Bowl, of course, wouldn’t hurt chances that he chooses to stay. We’ll know more in a couple of months.

The DB thinks his press conference in August, where he clearly, publicly and respectfully aired his grievances seems to have put the whole thing in motion.  The truth shall set you free.

PHILADELPHIA

Two wins last week for Coach Nick Sirianni, all while defeating COVID.  Albert Breer of SI.com:

Eagles coach Nick Sirianni is doing a heck of a job. And he had a heck of a week. The Eagles played on Tuesday night, and again Sunday, and in between Sirianni spent some. time sitting in his car in the parking lot of Philly’s practice facility. It wasn’t by choice. On Wednesday morning, symptoms hit the 40-year-old, prompting a COVID-19 test. He came up positive. Through the days since, he stayed first in a hotel, then back at home. He got encouraging news on his levels on Friday. So he drove to work hopeful on Christmas Day that they’d let him back in. He took another test. He went back to his car. He waited for the call. It came, and he was cleared.

“You’re just kind of sitting there and hoping and praying that you’re gonna be ready to go for the game,” he said, on his drive home Sunday night. “So I’m just thankful that I was.” He was, and his Eagles gave him a heck of homecoming present—turning a 3–3 game at the half into a 34–10 rout of the Giants that moved the Eagles over .500 for the first time since Week 1. And there were plenty of things interesting about it (the defense turned the ball over, the run game was effective again and Jalen Hurts was efficient), but maybe more interesting was Sirianni’s work week.

The first-year coach spent Wednesday and Thursday in a hotel and ran meetings over Zoom from there. And over those couple of days, whether he gave it to them, or they to him, the virus spread through his house and hit not just his immediate family, but also those in town for the holidays. Sirianni told me his father-in-law, his brother-in-law, his sister-in-law, his three nieces and all three of his own kids wound up getting it. The upside of that: Sirianni could suddenly afford to go see them, since they were all sequestered in his house’s COVID-19 room (i.e., the basement). His wife and mother-in-law were the only two in the house who didn’t have it, so they got the rest of the place to themselves.

“We’re all just jammed down there in the basement, while the healthy individuals get to sleep upstairs in the beds,” he said. “It’s been wild, it’s been really wild. Like how much it ran through our family, just like that, it was like, everybody’s got it.”

Sirianni still doesn’t know if he got it from one of those family members, or from work or somewhere else. But he can say that it was weird going through it—his coworkers watched him direct the operation on an overhead projector for most of the week, he got to watch more tape than he usually does (because he had more free time than ever before) and, in the end, the Eagles got a win. And along the way, as interesting as his personal situation was, what he liked most was how his team managed it.

“No one feels sorry for us,” he said. “You just handle adversity and try to go through every day, and get better every day, to put yourself in position to win the games. And I think the guys really know that and really believe that, and they work at that. Again, that doesn’t happen unless you’ve got good guys in the building. Good, high-football-character guys. And we definitely have that.” And they’ve got a shot at the playoffs now too, which is almost as unexpected as the messy week the head coach just had was.

– – –

Can RB MILES SANDERS play with a broken hand?  Kevin Patra of NFL.com:

With a playoff berth in their sights, the Philadelphia Eagles might have to battle the final two weeks without their top running back.

NFL Network Insider Ian Rapoport reported Monday morning that Miles Sanders suffered a broken bone in his hand during Sunday’s 34-10 win over the New York Giants, per sources informed of the situation.

The running back will have an MRI and additional tests Monday to determine if there is further damage and whether or not he can play through the injury.

Sanders suffered the injury late in the first half and left the stadium in a soft cast. He finished with seven carries for 45 rushing yards and was quickly ruled out for the second half.

It could be a big loss for the ground-and-pound Eagles, who have become the best running team in the NFL since Sanders returned from missing three games earlier this season.

In Sunday’s shellacking of the Giants, the Eagles leaned on Boston Scott (12/41/1) and Jordan Howard (9/37) with Sanders out. That duo, along with rookie Kenneth Gainwell, will have to step up if Sanders can’t return for the final two weeks.

WASHINGTON

Cris Collinsworth was agog over the dustup on the WFT sideline, but the team downplayed it afterwards.  Ben Pickman of SI.com:

Washington Football Team defensive tackle Jonathan Allen appeared to throw a punch at his teammate, Daron Payne, while the two were both on the sideline during the second quarter of Sunday night’s eventual 56–14 loss to the Cowboys.

TV cameras documented the incident, capturing how Payne stood up and jabbed a finger into the side of Allen’s head prior to Allen swatting Payne away and taking a swing with his right hand.

“Just a little brotherly disagreement; maybe the wrong place, wrong time, but it happened,” Payne said, per ESPN.

Added Allen: “I don’t think it takes a rocket scientist. If you look at how that game went, emotions are high, things are high, things happen.”

Coach Ron Rivera said he was informed of the incident after the game and that he spoke to both players about what happened.

He told reporters there would be no discipline for either defensive tackle.

The two played two seasons at Alabama together and have been teammates in Washington for the past four seasons. Allen was drafted by Washington in 2017 while Payne was drafted in 2018.

Dallas’ 56-point output was the most scored in an NFL game this season.

Washington dropped to 6–9 on the season following the loss, the fifth consecutive losing season for the franchise. The Cowboys had clinched the division prior to Sunday’s victory and moved to 11–4 with the win.

TAMPA BAY

Bruce Arians does a good job of explaining to Peter King (to the DB’s relative satisfaction anyway) why WR ANTONIO BROWN is still a Buc despite a screwup and media clamor.

“Any idea Tom Brady would throw 15 balls to Antonio Brown today?” I asked Bruce Arians after the Bucs trounced Carolina 32-6.

“Yeah, pretty much,” Arians said. “That’s who we had today, and if they were going to play single-high coverage, there was never a doubt in my mind.”

Of all the amazing stats in Week 16, Brown, after sitting since Oct. 14, catching 10 balls and being targeted 15 times by Tom Brady, would be right up there. But last week, the Bucs lost their top back, Leonard Fournette, for a few weeks with a hamstring injury; top wideout Chris Godwin for the season with an ACL tear; and wideout Mike Evans with a hamstring. Brady targeted Godwin, Evans and Fournette a combined 63 times in Weeks 13 and 14. Their replacements this week—running back Ke’Shawn Vaughn and receivers Brown and Cyril Grayson—were targeted two times collectively in Weeks 13 and 14.

Godwin’s gone for the year. Evans will be ready to return, at the latest, by the playoffs. Fournette’s hamstring is more severe than Evans’, and Arians is making no promises about his playoff fate.

This left the Bucs is dire straits entering the last three weeks of the season. Luckily for them, they were slated to play Carolina, the Jets and Carolina again to close the season. Sunday’s game was a gimme, relatively. But it left a big question for Arians to answer: After he told the media (including me) 14 months ago that Brown would be gone with one more off-field screwup, Arians and the Bucs relented this year. Instead of making an example of Brown, they let him stay, and Sunday in Charlotte was Brown’s first chance to pay the franchise back for its loyality.

So Brady’s first, second, third and seventh passes were to Brown. As long as Brown can stay healthy, that trend should continue—even if Tampa will have to answer the same questions over and over about why the franchise kept Brown after he faked his vaccination card to pass the NFL Covid strictures.

“When you and I talked last year,” Arians told me post-game, “we were talking on old experiences with Antonio. When he came back to us, he was a model citizen. There was a new history. I really loved the way he tried to fit in, worked his way in and gave us everything he had to go to the Super Bowl. My whole attitude on him changed. I saw him trying to be a better human being. So I’ve got a totally different relationship than when it was when you and I talked last year.”

I asked Arians if he thinks there’s a lot more out there like Brown who faked the card, but simply haven’t been caught. I wondered how he felt about the NFL’s pursuit of other players using fake cards.

“Yes and no,” he said. “I mean, the NFL’s gonna get their games played. That’s the bottom line.”

So Arians, clearly, hopes that story goes away down the stretch. The Bucs look like they could finish as the second seed if they win out (at Jets, home to Panthers). That means they’d play a wild-card game at home, and if they win, then a divisional game at home. Then Aaron Rodgers, perhaps, awaits.

“If we get four, five of our injured guys back, I feel great,” Arians said. “We’re gonna play at home. We could end up the two. The only place we have to go is back to Green Bay. I feel real good. And I feel good because we have our quarterback. As long as we have our offensive line and our quarterback, I feel real good.”

Meanwhile, after the game, Brown belligerently deflected questions about his screwup:

“You guys is all about drama. This is all about football. We just talk about Carolina, or I don’t want to talk to you guys.”

—Antonio Brown, responding to ESPN’s Jenna Laine asking him after his first game back from an NFL suspension for falsifying his vaccine card what it meant for him to have coach Bruce Arians in his corner during the suspension.

ARIZONA

Peter King on the abrupt decline of the Cardinals:

I think there’s a lot that’s troublesome about the Cardinals right now. But to me, three things stand out.

• They haven’t won at home in more that two months. They’re 0-4 in that span in Glendale, and after falling out of first in the NFC West for the first time all season Saturday night, it’s pretty likely they won’t have to worry about that in January.

• The offense looks totally out of sync — three offensive touchdowns in their last two games. In their recent three-game losing streak, the Cards are scoring 17 points a game, Kyler Murray can’t even get the snap from center down, and there’s nothing Arizona can rely on.

• The Cards scare no one. That’s not scientific. It’s just real.

LOS ANGELES RAMS

Albert Breer of SI.com on WR COOPER KUPP’s pursuit of the two biggest receiving records.

I’m not sure that Cooper Kupp should be league MVP, but that doesn’t make his season any less remarkable.

He had another 10 catches for 109 yards in the Rams’ 30–20 win over the Vikings on Sunday, and through 15 games, he’s at 132 catches, 1,734 yards and 14 touchdowns. He’s 17 catches short of Michael Thomas’s record for catches in a season (149). He’s 230 yards short of Calvin Johnson’s record for receiving yards in a season (1,946). Based on his pace, and role in the Rams’ offense, there’s a good shot he’ll get both marks (Randy Moss’s record of 23 TDs, on the other hand, is well out of reach). And it’s wild that this is happening this way because until this year, Kupp was widely seen as a good-not-great receiver. The last two years, he had 94 and 92 catches. He’s only cracked 1,000 yards once (1,161 in 2019). And yet here he is, at 28, making a big statistical leap. Why? How?

“I’m not sure I can put my finger on one specific thing,” he told me, after the Rams locked up a playoff spot Sunday. “I look back at my rookie year, and it’s embarrassing watching the tape of what my rookie year was. And I’d like to think that at the end of every year, as I watched the full season and tried to reflect on what the year was, what kind of things I saw from myself, I’d just try to just improve the things that [were] most important to improve. And I just take that mentality year after year, try to get better and better and better. Never get comfortable being at whatever I’m at. Never believing that I’ve arrived. So I have taken that mentality, but I don’t know if I can put my finger on one specific thing that’s changed as much. I’ve been hanging out with some really good football players and having a few more opportunities to have the ball in my hands, and I think it really just comes down to those things.”

Whatever you want to attribute it to, those things have paid off handsomely for the Rams this year in breaking in Matthew Stafford, and in managing the loss of Robert Woods, among other things. And that’s worked out to where Kupp’s consistency has become a steadying element for the team—he’s gone over 95 yards 10 weeks in a row, a run that encompassed the Rams’ three-game skid and the four-game winning streak they’re riding now that followed it up, a streak Kupp sees happening because the Rams haven’t wavered much.

“That’s a great little example of what football is. You get up to the line of scrimmage, you gotta execute one play, and no matter how pretty or ugly, there is going to be another play right after that,” he said. “And you gotta be able to move on to that next play and execute your job. And the guys have done a great job of that on this run. We actually continue to do a great job of that, and then not get complacent with anything.”

And as for his own pursuits, records-wise? “No,” he said. “I don’t have social media on my phone, so the only time I ever hear about it is when you guys tell me about it.” My guess would be he’ll hear about it a lot the next couple of weeks.

CINCINNATI

QB JOE BURROW has a chip on his shoulder – one that Peter King says is necessary if you are going to win in the NFL, especially in Cincinnati:

Most players are different than we are. When I covered Boomer Esiason centuries ago, I used to marvel how he’d think no quarterback was better than he was. Marino, Montana, Elway … nope. None of them. Esiason loved them and respected them, but it was part of the QB ethos: When I take the field, I’m the best guy out there.

That’s how Joe Burrow carries himself. Burrow threw for 525 yards Sunday in the 41-21 beatdown of the Ravens. It’s the fourth-highest total in NFL history, yet Burrow, as is his custom, talked about it like he was talking about a Seinfeld rerun. Cool, seen it before, enjoyed it, but what’s next?

“I’ve done it a bunch of times,” he said. “That’s what I expect to go out and do every week. I expect to play that way every single week. It wasn’t surprising to me, that’s for sure.”

I try to think about that level of confidence. Yeah, I expect to win the Pulitzer every year. When I don’t, I’m surprised.

Of course it helped Burrow that the Ravens were cut to the quick with Covid and injuries. No team in the NFL (a few are close) has had the level of Covid and injury issues that the Ravens have had. The Ravens signed each of the two quarterbacks who dressed for them Sunday in Cincinnati within the past 13 days. Won’t bore you with the rest other than to say the Ravens have plummeted from 8-3 to 8-7 and have the Rams coming to Baltimore this week. No rest for the destroyed.

Now to the Bengals. Burrow’s been a godsend, of course. Imagine throwing for 941 yards in two high school games. Burrow has done it this year (a record for most yards against a team in one NFL regular season) against the Ravens and their highly regarded coordinator Wink Martindale. With all the Baltimore absentees, Burrow didn’t know exactly how the game would go. “We weren’t really sure what they were gonna do on either side of the ball,” he said. “They had so many guys out on defense. They had a quarterback [Josh Johnson] who hadn’t played. We had an idea of what they were gonna do, but we really didn’t know. We came into the game with the expectation to have to adapt to a bunch of different things and I think both sides of the ball did a good job of that.”

The Bengals had an interesting philosophy building their team—and that philosophy might be leading them to a divison title in Burrow’s second year. They were determined to get three franchise receivers around Burrow. Tyler Boyd was there pre-Burrow. Tee Higgins was drafted in Burrow’s year, 2020. And Ja’Marr Chase came in the first round this year instead of Oregon tackle Penei Sewell. Against the undermanned Ravens, those three receivers combined for 404 yards and three touchdowns. Each one, in his own right, looks the part of franchise player at times.

They’ll need to be that, and more, to ensure a division title. Kansas City, winner of eight straight, comes to Paul Brown Stadium on Sunday. Burrow has never played Patrick Mahomes, and he didn’t sound too cowed by the prospect when we spoke. “We got a chance to go out and seal the division with that win,” Burrow said. “So we’re excited about that opportunity. Obviously, it’s not gonna be easy. Those guys won our conference the last two years, been to the Super Bowl, great players all around.”

But no one scares Burrow. That’s why this franchise is in such solid shape.

More from Jason LaCanfora of CBSSports.com:

Maybe it was because Ravens defensive coordinator Wink Martindale opined that Joe Burrow and Ja’Marr Chase weren’t exactly Aaron Rodgers and Davante Adams when he addressed the media on Thursday. Maybe it was because the Ravens ran the ball down the Bengals’ throats for 404 yards in Week 17 of last season when the home team could do nothing to mitigate it.

Maybe it was because Joe Burrow was an odd Pro Bowl snub, despite an excellent season coming off an ACL tear last November, and lost out to Ravens struggling and injured quarterback Lamar Jackson. Maybe it was just to show a longtime AFC North bully they could punch back. Maybe it was an indication they were sick of hearing about being the Bungles and squandering opportunities to secure a spot among the AFC’s elite. Maybe it was just because.

Whatever the reasons for the Bengals’ unrelenting beatdown of the battered and tattered Ravens on Sunday, this was a butt kicking that never let up. Cincinnati picked up where it left off in the second half of their Week 7 beatdown of the Ravens in Baltimore, and made a point to keep throwing the ball all over the field deep in the second half, of a blowout, against an opponent utterly devoid of starting caliber defensive backs. There was something decidedly personal, and visceral, about this 41-21 unmasking that wasn’t nearly as close as the score.

Consider that at halftime the Bengals led 31-14 and had rolled up 333 yards of offense on 33 plays (10.2 yards per play!), with four touchdowns and a field goal in their possessions, compiling 10 plays over 15 yards and two over 50 … And we had only just begun. Burrow was 18-for-21 for 299 yards with three TDs (a perfect QB rating of 158.3), but he was anything but done emasculating what was left of Baltimore’s secondary and Martindale’s scheme. In a season of humiliations for this once-proud defense, this was to be the most profound.

Burrow would go on to throw 25 times more in the second half, despite the lead and despite having Joe Mixon in the backfield. At one point in the fourth quarter, already leading 34-21, Burrow dropped back 13 straight times. This was no accident. This was a signal of intent. He was taking deep shots, spreading it around, rubbing it in, en route to a franchise record 525 passing yards. Four Bengals had 85 receiving yards or more by the time the Bengals did take a knee.

This was about embarrassing an opponent; putting them in their place. Cincy got the ball back off an interception with about three minutes to play, and Burrow hit Mixon downfield for 52 yards, their seventh passing play over 20 yards on the day and, shockingly, third of 52 yards or greater. Young coach Zac Taylor was letting John Harbaugh know this wasn’t the Bengals of old. And this rivalry will certainly have more spice when they meet next.

But the reality is, the Bengals hung 82 points and a staggering 941 passing yards in two blowouts over the Ravens, and Baltimore had plenty of its top defenders available in Week 7. The Bengals have a potentially bright playoff future. The Ravens, at 1-4 in the AFC North and 5-6 in the AFC, can start packing up their lockers.

CLEVELAND

This was noted by Rich Ornberger on Christmas afternoon:

@ohrnberger

Aaron Rodgers has only thrown 2 interceptions in the last 13 games. 

Baker Mayfield has thrown 3 interceptions in his last 13 passes.

PITTSBURGH

Peter King:

I think it’s got to be painful for Ben Roethlisberger, in the sunset of a Hall of Fame career, to be noncompetitive against the best teams in the AFC, as the Steelers have been recently. In the last month, Pittsburgh has lost by 31 at Cincinnati and 26 at Kansas City, and in Roethlisberger’s career, the Steelers had never lost to either team by more than 10 points. Imagine how it must feel for Roethlisberger to bring his family to Kansas City for a game, as he did Sunday (that is rare for him), and to have them sit there and watch the Steelers be as pathetic as they were. The end is not kind to most star athletes, and unless Pittsburgh can sweep Cleveland and Baltimore to finish 9-7-1, Roethlisberger—this is expected to be his last year—will play his last five NFL seasons without winning a playoff game.

And yet, as bad as the Steelers are, they still win the division if they beat Cleveland and Baltimore and Cincinnati loses to Kansas City and Cleveland.

– – –

After the blowout loss to the Chiefs, the Steelers have decided to let OL Adrian Klemm leave for greener (literally) pastures ahead of schedule:

Steelers offensive line coach Adrian Klemm had planned to leave the team after the season for a lateral move to Oregon. The Steelers have announced that Klemm will leave now.

Klemm joined the Steelers in 2019 as assistant offensive line coach. He became the primary position coach this year.

The team announced that assistant offensive line coach Chris Morgan will handle the position for the rest of the season.

Although the Steelers didn’t elaborate on the reason for letting Klemm leave now, it’s impossible to ignore the possibility that the team decided to accelerate the timetable after yesterday’s blowout loss to the Chiefs.

Klemm played in the NFL for six seasons. He has spent the bulk of his coaching career at the college level.

HOUSTON

Peter King has a Texan as one of his Offensive Players of the Week:

Rex Burkhead, running back, Houston. Ladies and gentlemen, the Houston Texans have a two-game winning streak. Thanks to some ball hawks on D and Burkhead’s 22-carry, 149-yard performance, Houston held the ball for 35 minutes and thoroughly whipped the Chargers in a very important game for L.A.’s playoff hopes.

– – –

The Texans needed for something to break their way – and at the moment, it looks like drafting QB DAVIS MILLS was a good thing.  Albert Breer of SI.com:

Quietly, Davis Mills is putting together a case to be the Texans’ quarterback in 2022. And considering that, I had this thought on Sunday afternoon: If he were the 11th pick in the draft (like Justin Fields), or the 15th pick (like Mac Jones), how would we be looking at him right now? He’s got a better passer rating than Fields and Trevor Lawrence. His number is also close to Mac Jones’s, and it’s hard to argue he’s in close to as good a situation as Jones is. The other intriguing thing? He was a high-end high school recruit (the No. 1 high school QB in the class of 2017) who simply couldn’t stay healthy in college at Stanford, meaning there’s a pretty cut and dried reason why he wasn’t drafted earlier. Which is why I wanted to ask him Sunday, after he led the Texans to a shocking 41–29 upset of the Chargers, if he believes he’d have been right up there with guys like Fields, Jones and Lawrence if his college career had gone according to plan.

“I was pretty much asked the same exact question going into my senior year at Stanford, and I’m going to answer it the same way,” Mills said. “I’ve always been confident in my abilities, and when I look at myself with other guys, I see myself at the top and want to keep improving and kind of prove that I can be in the conversation with all those guys when I play my best.”

On Sunday, it sure looked like he belongs. He went 21-of-27 for 254 yards, two touchdowns and a 130.6 rating. More than just that, though, the coaches are showing increasing trust in him. Mills’s final throw of the afternoon was on a first-and-10 from the Chargers’ 13. On the play, he hit fellow rookie Nico Collins, running a slant, in stride for a touchdown. And it looked simple but it actually wasn’t. There was a run call on for the play—identical to a call two plays earlier. But on the second of the two calls, offensive coordinator Tim Kelly put a tag on it, allowing for Mills to check to the pass. Which is where the touchdown throw came from.

“That’s four-minute mode entirely right there,” he said. “We’re just trying to burn clock, but that play got called in with that backside receiver tag. And within the rules of the offense, if he has a chance to back and win, I trust him completely to go make that play. And we got in the end zone on it. So it worked out. I’m not getting yelled at by coaches for taking an incompletion, but that’s awesome. Good way to get him his first touchdown, and he made a play.”

And it was another good piece of momentum for Mills, who’s had three 90-plus passer rating games since coming back into the lineup. He’s had a different indoctrination into the league than most, of course, in going in for an injured Tyrod Taylor, then coming out for a month, before returning to the lineup at the end of the year. But as Mills sees it, there’s plenty to benefit from there. “When they called my number, I was ready. It felt like the game started to slow down more for me,” he said. “I have a really good feel of what we’re trying to do on offense, and the time just gave me more time to build chemistry week in and week out with my receivers so we’re all on the same page. And I felt like it was good and I feel like I’m playing some good football right now.”

Good enough, it seems, that the Texans at least won’t have to force anything at quarterback after they (presumably) trade Deshaun Watson in the offseason.

INDIANAPOLIS

NFL Films was embedded with the Colts last week for an in-season Hard Knocks.  Peter King is leaked an interesting moment:

Last Friday, a robotic NFL Films camera in the Indianapolis Colts quarterback room caught the unvarnished real of this NFL season. NFL Films for the first time is doing an in-season “Hard Knocks” show on HBO every Wednesday night, and this debut series is with the Colts. Last Friday, a few hours before the team’s charter left for the Saturday game at Arizona, offensive coordinator Marcus Brady got some unsettling news about one of the most important players on the team and relayed the information to head coach Frank Reich.

Brady: “It is a Covid thing, Frank.”

Reich: “Excuse me?”

Brady: “It is Covid.”

Reich: “Is it? What is it?”

Brady: “Q.”

Reich: “Who?”

Brady: “Q.”

Reich: “Who?!”

Brady: “Q. Quenton.” [All-pro guard Quenton Nelson.]

Reich: (Long pause) “Okay. (Pause.) We’re good.”

Minutes later…

Reich: “Moments like this … I’m not happy about Q testing positive, but I love overcoming those things.”

JACKSONVILLE

RB JAMES ROBINSON is done for the year.  Michael DiRocco of ESPN.com:

The Jacksonville Jaguars lost their best offensive player Sunday when running back James Robinson suffered a torn left Achilles tendon in Sunday’s 26-21 loss to the New York Jets, interim coach Darrell Bevell announced.

The noncontact injury occurred in the first quarter when Robinson came out of his stance in the backfield. He immediately fell to the ground and grabbed his left foot. He was helped off the field and then taken into the locker room via cart with a towel draped over his head.

Robinson had battled a heel and knee injury in November and missed one game.

Dare Ogunbowale and Nathan Cottrell are the only other backs on the active roster. The team signed Ryquell Armstead earlier this week, but he is inactive.

Ogunbowale carried the ball 17 times in Sunday’s loss, rushing for 57 yards and a touchdown.

Robinson is the Jaguars’ leading rusher with 767 yards and has 979 yards of total offense. Robinson had three carries for 10 yards Sunday before his injury.

BUFFALO

Peter King on Buffalo’s win and an unlikely hero in WR ISAIAH McKENZIE:

The Bills weren’t necessarily expected to win Sunday in the de facto AFC East Championship Game either. But this was winnable. It was also crucial to a few things. One: the psyche of this team, beat down three weeks ago in the freaky Monday night weathery loss to New England in Orchard Park. Two: the psyche of western New York, which loves this team the way parent love their first-born. Three: the mental state of the franchise. New England had its two decades and six Super Bowls, and now, post-Brady, this was the Bills’ turn. Damn it, this was the Bills’ turn, and that 14-10 Patriots win with the 40-mph wind simply could not stand.

This is why I thought this was the most important victory of Allen’s NFL life.

He felt it. He knew it. When Allen met his teammates Sunday morning, he told them he woke up with violence on his mind.

Losing was not an option, in other words. They had to pay whatever price it took to win this game. “Violence” is the word newly minted hero Isaiah McKenzie told me early Sunday evening about Allen’s mindset … and it sounded strange, I must say, coming from a man dressed in a Whitney Houston T-shirt in the bowels of Gillette Stadium. “His point in saying he woke up with violence on his mind was we gotta come out and play every play like it’s the most important play,” McKenzie said. “And we felt that from the first play of the game.”

Think of Allen’s job Sunday. He had to beat the great Bill Belichick in Belichick’s house, and he had to win without two receivers he’d targeted a total of 34 times in the last two weeks. Cole Beasley and Gabriel Davis both tested positive for Covid during the week, so Buffalo had to play without them. That meant the elevation of the 5-8, 173-pound McKenzie, who’d never had a big game in his life, never had seven catches in a game, never had 70 yards receiving in a game. He had seven catches all season entering this one, and he’s been deactivated for two games in the last month because of fumbling issues.

“He loses his returner position, had his ups and downs,” Allen said afterward. “He comes out and has an absolutely phenomenal day. I know it means a lot to him. It means a lot to us too.”

Allen went to him on Buffalo’s first series, waiting, waiting, waiting till McKenzie, trolling the back of the end zone, had a foot of space back there, and Allen lasered him one. That was a precursor. Allen trusted McKenzie (12 targets, 11 catches, 125 yards) the same way he trusted all-world Stefon Diggs (13 targets, seven catches, 85 yards). “That’s the great part of this day—Josh trusted me all day,” McKenzie told me.

– – –

Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk.com is unimpressed by WR COLE BEASLEY’s argument that his vaccination status as mandated by the NFL, and not his actual health, is keeping him sidelined:

Bills receiver Cole Beasley, who became in the preseason the poster child for the anti-vaccination movement in the NFL, finally has tested positive, amid the ongoing Omicron outbreak. As he did before the season, he has taken to social media to sound off.

“Just to be clear Covid is not keeping me out of this game,” Beasley said on Instagram. “The rules are. Vaxxed players are playing with Covid every week now because they don’t test. One of my vaxxed teammates is in the hospital missing games. I’m sure he didn’t get this same energy. Thank you for those who support. Everyone else, if you don’t get what’s happening then there is nothing anybody can do for you.”

What’s happening is that the NFL and the NFL Players Association continue to strongly encourage players to get vaccinated and boosted. A whopping 96 percent of all players have chosen to do so. Beasley is among the minority. (To his credit, he owned his status and didn’t get a fake vaccination card.)

What’s also happening is that the league and the union have given up, when it comes to spotting the virus in vaccinated players who don’t have symptoms. (Frankly, that’s all the more reason to get vaccinated.)

His comment about a vaccinated player in the hospital missing games is confusing. Some say it’s offensive lineman Jon Feliciano, who said that he spent some time in the emergency room on Sunday. Still, that’s a far cry from being “in the hospital missing games.”

Beasley doesn’t like the rules. He never has. But the rules, as agreed by the league and the union, continue to be the rules. Under the rules, Beasley will miss the most important game of the year.

The good news for Beasley is that, once he returns, he’ll be immune to testing or a five-day absence for “close contact” with an infected player for 90 days. Which will take him through the end of the season.

NEW ENGLAND

Strange media scene of the week, recounted by Peter King:

“I’m doing a story about New Year’s resolutions. I’m wondering if you have any you wanted to share with your fans and our readers.”

—A reporter to New England coach Bill Belichick in the post-game press conference a few minutes after the Patriots lost to the Bills, and probably lost any realistic chance to win the AFC East.

Belichick responded, “No, not right now. Maybe next week.”

Pretty placid of Belichick, considering this from King:

The Bills did not punt Sunday, the first time in Bill Belichick’s 474 games as a head coach that the opponent did not punt, per ESPN.

NEW YORK JETS

Peter King thinks it is too early to put QB ZACH WILSON on a JetBlue plane to Bustville:

I think there’s one thing about very modern football that bothers me a lot, and that’s impatience. This was a headline in The Athletic (which is great, by the way) on Saturday: “Only Zach Wilson can change the Jets’ narrative, and he’s running out of time.” Sheesh. After 14 games, Wilson is on trial for his life? Zach Wilson got drafted by a wayward 2020 franchise, the 2-14 Jets, and he’s struggling. Big deal! Let me remind you of one thing: The first year the Steelers won the Super Bowl was Terry Bradshaw’s fifth season in the NFL. Coming out of camp that year, Bradshaw was beaten out by Joe Gilliam. He regained the starting job, and later in the season, Chuck Noll yanked Bradshaw for Terry Hanratty. Bradshaw won back the job and was the Super Bowl starter that season, the first of four Super Bowl wins in the next six seasons. There’s a reason why the Jets stay awful. Actually there are several. But one is that the media and fans are impatient, and then a collective unconvinced front office/ownership is impatient. In the end, so often, it results in the waste of a very high top pick. Wake up, people.

THIS AND THAT

COACHING CLASS OF 2018

Peter King looks back at the coaching hires for 2018 which had 7 openings, 8 hires, 2 winners:

It’s interesting to look back at the seven 2018 coaching vacancies, and to try and learn from them. The third coach hired that post-season, Mike Vrabel, was Tennessee’s choice. The eighth, Frank Reich, was chosen by the Colts.

Eighth because the Colts had settled on Josh McDaniels in January 2018, but McDaniels decided after the season to stay in New England. So a week after the Eagles scored 41 points and won the Super Bowl, Indianapolis chose the Eagles’ offensive coordinator, Reich.

Four of the seven are gone: Jon Gruden, who went 22-31 for the Raiders in three-plus seasons … Steve Wilks, 3-13 for the Cardinals in one season … Pat Shurmur, 9-23 in two seasons with the Giants … and Matt Patricia, 13-29-1 in nearly three seasons in Detroit. A fifth, Matt Nagy, 32-32 nearing the end of his fourth season in Chicago, is in danger of not returning for a fifth year with the Bears.

Vrabel is 41-26, with two playoff appearances and likely a third this year. Reich is 38-28, also with two playoff appearances and possibly a third this year.

Look at the wins each has had this season. Vrabel’s team has beaten Kansas City, Buffalo, the Rams, the Colts twice, New Orleans and San Francisco. Reich’s Colts have beaten Buffalo, New England, Arizona and the Niners.

My four points on the lessons coach-seeking teams can learn from Vrabel and Reich:

1. Don’t hurry. In the aftermath of the 2018 regular season, eight teams had coaching vacancies. Every one was filled in a four-day, early-2019 span between Jan. 7 and 11. (That includes informal agreements by the Bengals and Dolphins with Zac Taylor and Brian Flores, waiting till their teams’ season would be over.) I’m sure the Packers (Matt LaFleur) and Bucs (Bruce Arians) are fine with making the quick calls. But do you think the Jets (Adam Gase) and Browns (Freddie Kitchens) are? Why do teams sprint to the finish line when it’s been shown time and again there are coaches like Reich (picked on Feb. 11, 2018), Bill Belichick (Jan. 27, 2000), Mike Tomlin (Jan. 22, 2007), Tony Dungy (Jan. 22, 2002) and Vrabel (Jan. 20, 2018) available with deliberation?

2. Pair the coach with a GM who’s a good partner. In Tennessee, GM Jon Robinson knew all about Vrabel from his days as a scout with New England. He knew they had the same ethos: strong defense, running game, quarterback who will make plays and not lose the game. In Indianapolis, Ballard has often said he was fortunate to get to choose Reich after every team had picked their coaches. Look at their chemistry. They’re close enough to be brothers.

3. Don’t stop till you get the quarterback right. Tennessee didn’t get stuck on Marcus Mariota when he struggled, opting for a trade with Miami to get Ryan Tannehill in early 2019. When Andrew Luck retired unexpectedly in August 2019, Indy went through a few options in ’19 and ’20 before settling on a big deal with Philadelphia to obtain Carson Wentz. Still uncertain if Wentz will be a top quarterback, but he’s a better long-term option than Jacoby Brissett.

4. Let the world, and all your players, know the coach is in for the long haul. Vrabel’s likely to get a rich extension in Tennessee. Reich has gotten one in Indianapolis. They’re steady and smart. Players who go to the Titans and Colts know exactly what to expect from the coach.

BROADCAST NEWS

Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk.com has his naughty list of coaches who could be terminated by soon:

Teams with head-coaching vacancies as of 8:00 a.m. ET on Tuesday, along with teams who have told their coaches they won’t be back, can begin interviewing assistant coaches from other teams, 12 days before the conclusion of the regular season. So which other coaches could learn in the next 40 hours or so that they’re out?

Here’s a list of guys who potentially have reason to be concerned, ranging from those who should be most concerned to those who should be least concerned.

Matt Nagy, Bears: Dysfunctional teams do dysfunctional things. And the Bears seem to be sufficiently dysfunctional to fire a guy with two playoff appearances in three seasons, eight months after authorizing a trade up to get a potential franchise quarterback, whom the next coach may not want. If they’ve already decided to make a change, there’s no reason to delay the implementation of the move. Which probably means they will.

Matt Rhule, Panthers: Owner David Tepper covets having greatness at quarterback, coach, and G.M. Once he decides that a given guy won’t be great, Tepper cuts the cord. Will he do that after a pair of so-so seasons from Rhule? The buyout would be enormous, but it’s the cost of doing business. Tepper, if he’s no longer sold on Rhule, would rather pay him not to coach and to pay someone else to do the job.

Vic Fangio, Broncos: New G.M. George Paton surely wants to hire his own coach, but the Broncos remain in the fringes of the playoff chase. Also, the possibility of a looming change in ownership could prompt the current power structure to tread water so that the new owner can hire the next coach, perhaps after 2022.

Mike Zimmer, Vikings: They remain alive for a playoff berth, and there’s not an ideal interim replacement on the staff. Which means that the Vikings will sit tight and then fall behind the other teams looking for new coaches, after the Vikings inevitably fail to make the playoffs.

Pete Carroll, Seahawks: He wasn’t originally on this list, but Sunday’s loss to the Bears merits a mention. No one knows what owner Jody Allen will do when the dusts settles on the season, but she could decided to kick up plenty of dust by nudging Carroll aside now. If she has decided to do it after the season ends, there’s no reason to wait. Other than to show respect to Carroll by letting him finish the season.

David Culley, Texans: He has seemed overmatched from the get go, but it’s becoming more and more clear that he got the job so that G.M. Nick Caserio can essentially be the shadow coach, communicating with Culley during games on matters of strategy and whatnot. Caserio would lose plenty of that influence and freedom with a coach who would scoff at the idea of being micromanaged by the G.M. That will make Caserio inclined to stay the course. A late-season winning streak doesn’t hurt, despite the damage it will do to Houston’s draft priority.

Robert Saleh, Jets: It’s highly unlikely that Saleh will be one and done. The bigger potential problem would happen if the Jets fire G.M. Joe Douglas and then hire a new boss who may want a different coach. Like Douglas did after he got the job.

Joe Judge, Giants: He’s reportedly safe. Some think he shouldn’t be. But all that matters is what ownership wants. And ownership apparently wants to break its trend of firing coaches after two seasons.