AROUND THE NFL
Daily Briefing
|
It’s a new world in NFL television as the biggest NFC game of Wild Card Weekend goes not to FOX, ESPN or NBC.
SUPER WILD CARD WEEKEND
Saturday, Jan. 15
AFC: 4:30 p.m. (ET) (NBC, Peacock, Universo)
5 Las Vegas Raiders at 4 Cincinnati Bengals
AFC: 8:15 p.m. (ET) (CBS, Paramount+)
6 New England Patriots at 3 Buffalo Bills Sunday, Jan. 16
Sunday, Jan. 16
NFC: 1:00 p.m. (ET) (FOX, FOX Deportes)
7 Philadelphia Eagles at 2 Tampa Bay Buccaneers
NFC: 4:30 p.m. (ET) (CBS, Paramount+, Nickelodeon, Amazon Prime Video)
6 San Francisco 49ers at 3 Dallas Cowboys
AFC: 8:15 p.m. (ET) (NBC, Peacock, Telemundo)
7 Pittsburgh Steelers at 2 Kansas City Chiefs Monday, Jan. 17
NFC: 8:15 p.m. (ET) (ESPN/ABC, ESPN2, ESPN+, ESPN Deportes)
No. 5 Arizona Cardinals at No. 4 Los Angeles Rams
The NFC’s top-seeded Green Bay Packers and the AFC’s top-seeded Tennessee Titans are on bye.
Enjoy!
– – –
Good point by Armando Salguero:
@ArmandoSalguero
Impressive how teams with nothing really to play for — Seattle, Jacksonville, Detroit, and, yes, Miami — have fought so hard and had success against playoff teams on season’s final Sunday.
You could add the Jets in Week 17 against the Buccaneers (and they played hard, but without success, in Buffalo on Sunday).
– – –
An NFL VP – who Peter King thought was on the short list of Roger Goodell successor candidates – is departing:
I think the NFL suffered a big loss last week, with the news that chief strategy and growth officer Chris Halpin, 45, was leaving the league to take a big job with media holding company Interactive Corp. Halpin would have been one of the strong candidates to replace commissioner Roger Goodell whenever Goodell steps down. Halpin had imagination, and he knew how to get things done.
Case in point: Last year, he pushed hard for franchises to be able to do individual team marketing deals outside the United States. Usually, such marketing deals are split into 32 equal pieces and shared by every team in the league. Halpin thought: That wouldn’t motivate any team to work hard in a foreign country. Let’s incentivize teams to want to work overseas to build their brands. So he proposed a system whereby teams would apply to the league to work in one or more countries. In years one and two, the teams would keep 100 percent of all revenue generated through marketing and sponsorship deals; after that, teams would keep 80 percent of the revenue and share 20 percent with the other 31 teams. The measure passed 31-1, owners energized by the thought that they could make incremental money in football-hungry lands like Mexico, the UK, Germany and Brazil. Eighteen teams were awarded rights in eight countries in round one of the application process. The 49ers, one of nine teams to get rights in Mexico, already has inked deals with United Airlines and Levi’s in Mexico.
It would have been wise for the league to find a way to keep Halpin, who loves football. Without him, the NFL needs to find someone with the imagination and business sense who can keep pushing the ball forward on the international and strategy front.
|
|
NFC NORTH
|
|
CHICAGO
Matt Nagy is gone, and so is the GM, Ryan Pace, who hired him and traded up for QB MITCHELL TRUBISKY. Kevin Seifert of ESPN.com:
The Chicago Bears fired coach Matt Nagy and GM Ryan Pace on Monday after the team finished with a 6-11 record this season.
Nagy was named NFL Coach of the Year after his first season in 2018, when he led the Bears to a 12-4 record and reached the playoffs for the first time in eight years. He earned praise that season for his offensive wrinkles and humble disposition, but the Bears couldn’t sustain that success over the ensuing three seasons.
They finished 8-8 in 2019 and then again in 2020, when the league’s expanded playoff field put them into the wild-card round. Nagy was never able to duplicate his first season, in part because the quarterback he inherited — Mitchell Trubisky, the No. 2 overall pick of the 2017 draft — never made the necessary improvement.
Trubisky departed via free agency last spring, after the Bears traded up to draft quarterback Justin Fields. The Bears were 2-8 in Fields’ 10 starts, and he finished the season ranked last in the league in Total Quarterback Rating (26.0). In four seasons, the Bears were 34-31 under Nagy in the regular season and 0-2 in the playoffs.
Monday’s news has been brewing since the end of November, when a local report emerged that Nagy would be fired after the Bears’ Thanksgiving Day game at the Detroit Lions. Nagy said at the time that he was unaware of his impending firing, but no member of the Bears’ front office or ownership immediately stepped forward to publicly deny the report.
A day later, owner George McCaskey told players during a team meeting that Nagy would not be fired after the game. The Bears beat the Lions 16-14, but it was their only win amid a 1-8 streak that ran from Weeks 6-15.
Nagy, 43, came to the Bears after eight years working for longtime head coach Andy Reid, including five with the Kansas City Chiefs and three more with the Philadelphia Eagles. Reid promoted him to offensive coordinator in 2017, one year before the Bears hired him.
Pace spent seven seasons with the Bears, hiring two coaches and trading up to draft two quarterbacks during his tenure. His teams made two playoff appearances but did not win a game. The Bears last won a playoff game in 2010 and are 1-3 in the postseason since appearing in Super Bowl XLI after the 2007 season.
Nagy was the second coach Pace hired. Predecessor John Fox spent three seasons with the team as it transitioned away from quarterback Jay Cutler. Pace proved to be an aggressive trader, acquiring pass-rusher Khalil Mack in 2018 in addition to making deals to draft Trubisky and Fields.
But those deals continued a trend of giving up first-round picks that had begun with the Bears’ deal to acquire Cutler in 2009. The organization traded away its first-round picks in 2009, 2010, 2019 and 2020 and do not have one for 2022, either. Of the four first-round picks that Pace did make in his tenure — receiver Kevin White (2015), linebacker Leonard Floyd (2016), Trubisky, linebacker Roquan Smith (2018) and Fields — only Smith has proved a long-term answer.
Pace did have some success in free agency, hitting on receiver Allen Robinson II and defensive tackle Akiem Hicks, among others, and he also drafted impressive receiver Darnell Mooney. But it was not enough to make the Bears annual playoff contenders.
|
|
NFC EAST
|
|
NEW YORK GIANTS
Jay Glazer on the fate of Coach Joe Judge:
@JayGlazer
I believe Giants brass is torn on what to do w Joe Judge bc of revolving door of coaches they’ve had in recent years. Have hesitation to move on bc they’d add to that revolving door. At same time I have heard a ton of frustration inside that locker room. Not a little, a lot
Field Yates:
@FieldYates
The Giants used a first-round pick on a WR in Kadarius Toney and made Kenny Golladay the highest-paid WR in free agency by spending $72M over 4 years.
Neither scored a TD this season. Not an ideal start.
|
|
WASHINGTON
Peter King once made it his quest to get the name of Washington’s football team changed.
His success has not slowed his ardor for change. Now, he wants Daniel Snyder and his family out.
I sincerely hope Daniel Snyder comes to his senses in 2022 and sells the franchise. It’s over, Dan. Or, rather, Mister Snyder. Beyond the over-protectionism of the NFL in the past year (the morally bankrupt over-protectionism, I might add), there is the simple fact that fans have long since surrendered their loyalty to the team, and won’t be back as long as Snyder is the owner.
Some grist for that mill: WFT won the NFC East last year (albeit with a 7-9 record), made the playoffs and played respectfully in an exciting wild-card home loss to eventual Super Bowl champ Tampa Bay last year, and entered this year picked by some to contend for the division title again. The Jacksonville Jaguars, on the other hand, have lost 75 percent of their games over the past decade, went 1-15 last year, hired a new coach and quarterback last offseason, and watched the promise of yet another expensive rebuild go down the toilet with the unceremonious firing of savior coach Urban Meyer. Entering Week 18, savior QB Trevor Lawrence was the lowest-rated passer, among qualifiers, in the league. The Jags are 4-29 in the last two years, 9 wins fewer than WFT. And yet:
Jacksonville drew 7,217 more fans to home games this season than Washington did.
Only one team in the NFL played to less than 75 percent capacity this year, Washington, which sold 64.3 percent of its seats for eight home games. Those at the last two games, versus Dallas and Philadelphia, are certain more than half the crowd at each game rooted for the visitors.
This is the team, and the ownership, that the league office has spent so much time defending in the wake of the sex-harassment scandal that shook the franchise in 2021.
The DB is old enough to remember when the team now called WFT touted a waiting list in the 10s of thousands.
|
|
NFC SOUTH
|
|
TAMPA BAY
Peter King’s deductive powers point to the Buccaneers taking a 2022 home game to Germany:
When the NFL announced in December that teams could apply for marketing rights in foreign countries, 18 teams were awarded the rights to market their brands in eight countries, beginning Jan. 1, 2022. I am hearing the NFL may schedule some games with those teams in their new marketing countries soon, as early as next season. One possibility on the table: Tampa Bay could play one of its nine home games this fall in Germany. “Could” is not probably, but the logic is there.
The Bucs, Carolina, Kansas City and New England all were awarded rights in Germany, a huge and relatively untapped market for individual teams. I’m hearing each team could play a home game in Germany, one per year, in 2022-25. That’s not set in stone. But Tampa has the sexiest home schedule in football in 2022, with the Bucs hosting the Rams, Seattle, Baltimore, Cincinnati, Green Bay and Kansas City, and assuming Brady returns for a 23rd season at age 45, the attraction of the Bucs versus any of those six or even a division foe would be tremendous for the first NFL regular-season game ever on German soil.
One other factor of interest: Bucs co-chair Joel Glazer is the chair of the NFL’s International Committee. It’s an interesting story to watch. I would also watch Dallas and Pittsburgh as possible participants in games in Mexico in the next year or two. Also, I’d expect the NFL would try to schedule most games overseas using a home game from a team with nine home games in that year, leaving the overseas teams with eight each year. With the 17-game schedule, NFC teams will have nine home games in even-numbered years going forward, AFC with nine in the odd years.
Finally, look for three games in London next year, one in Germany (either Munich, Frankfurt or Dusseldorf) and one in Mexico, assuming the Covid scourge has calmed by then in all places. The league ideally would like no fewer than five of the 272 regular-season games played outside the U.S. in 2022.
– – –
As Antonio Brown whined, QB TOM BRADY was a loyal teammate to WR MIKE EVANS and TE ROB GRONKOWSKI. Evan Winter of SI.com:
By halftime of the Buccaneers’ Week 18 tilt with the Panthers, it didn’t look like the Buccaneers were going to be breaking a lot of the attainable records that were available coming into the game.
The Bucs gained just 48 total net yards on their first three drives of the game and didn’t score a touchdown until the offense drove 99-yards downfield right before halftime. As it turned out, that drive sparked what would become a 38-10 drubbing after the Panthers led, 7-3, right up to the half.
Tom Brady, Rob Gronkowski, Mike Evans, and the Buccaneers as a whole saw numerous records fall into their laps once the offense began to click. Instead of writing all of them out, we will separate them into lists/categories per each player, because yea, there were that many records broken on Sunday.
Everything listed below is a record that has since been taken over or shared with another player:
The Buccaneers
The Buccaneers’ 13-4 record is good for the most wins in a regular season in franchise history. The .765 winning percentage is also a franchise-best.
The defense recorded 123 quarterback hits, which is the most the Bucs have ever recorded since the stat became official in 2006.
Tampa Bay’s 511 points, 6,901 net yards, 5,229 passing yards, and 404 first downs are all franchise-bests.
Tom Brady
Brady eclipsed 5,000 passing yards during the game, which makes him just the second quarterback in NFL history to record 5,000 or more passing yards in two separate seasons.
Brady’s completion to Breshad Perriman in the second quarter allowed him to pass Jameis Winston for the most passing yards in a single season. Brady finished 2021 with 5,316 passing yards.
Brady now owns the most passing touchdowns (43) in a single season with the Bucs after breaking his previous record of 40 in 2020.
Brady. now has 66 games with three touchdowns and zero interceptions, which is the most in NFL history.
Brady has thrown a touchdown to 90 different players throughout his career.
Brady set the all-time single-season completion record with 485 completions in 2021.
Rob Gronkowski
Gronk’s 137-yard performance was not only his career-best as a Buc, but it gave him the record for most 100-yard games by a tight end (32).
The 137-yards also marked his third 100-yard game on the year, tying Jimmie Giles for the most 100-yard games in a season by a Bucs tight end.
Mike Evans
Evans extended his streak of consecutive seasons to start a career with 1,000 receiving yards to eight.
Evans broke his own franchise record of 13 receiving touchdowns in the regular season after catching two touchdowns during the game. He finished the 2021 regular season with 14.
It’s pretty impressive to break 13 records in a single game. Some teams don’t even score 13 points in some games.
Congrats to the Buccaneers and all of their players who shared in the records this year. While the individual names are what will be written in the history books, it’s the team as a whole that allowed these to be broken.
This from TMZ.com:
Buccaneers QB Tom Brady refused to come out of Sunday’s game against the Panthers … until his tight end and good friend, Rob Gronkowski, got the stats he needed to trigger two separate $500,000 bonuses in his contract.
Gronk entered Week 18 — Tampa’s regular season finale — with 48 catches and 665 receiving yards. He needed 7 catches and 85 yards to trigger both bonuses.
Well, TB12 was gonna make sure he got ’em, ’cause with under 7 mins left to go in the game, the Bucs were up 31-17 in the fourth quarter … and head coach Bruce Arians was preparing to pull his starters.
But, check out the video … you see a defiant Brady appear to tell Tampa’s coaching staff “he’s not coming out of the game” as he grabs his helmet and heads back onto the field.
The reason?? Likely ’cause Gronk — who already hit his yardage bonus earlier in the second half on a 42-yard reception — was still one catch shy of hitting his receptions bonus.
So, the G.O.A.T completed a short pass to Rob in the flat … giving him the numbers he needed to cash in.
Gronkowski ultimately finished the day with 7 catches for 137 yards.
Of course, Tom is no stranger to looking out for his teammates … despite some of the comments Antonio Brown recently made about him.
Oh, and TB also set a new career-high in passing yards (5,316) — eclipsing his previous career-high mark set back in 2011 … as the Bucs defeated Carolina 41-17.
After clinching the No. 2 seed in the NFC … Tampa will play the Eagles next Sunday during Wild Card Weekend.
|
|
NFC WEST
|
|
SAN FRANCISCO
Andrew Brandt:
@AndrewBrandt
The 49ers mortgaged the future to acquire a quarterback to replace Jimmy Garoppolo, who just dramatically beat a QB for whom the Rams mortgaged the future to acquire.
|
|
SEATTLE
Late in the mess of Seattle’s 2022 season, RB RASHAAD PENNY is re-born. Peter King:
Rashaad Penny, running back, Seattle. Once consigned to the first-round-bust bin, Penny has re-made his career late in this Seahawk season. That continued in Arizona on Sunday, as the Seahawks played spoilers in the NFC West. Penny’s 62-yard TD run, the longest of his career, added to the best rushing day in the NFL in Week 18—21 carries, 173 yards, one TD—as Seattle brawled to a 7-10 finish in the toughest division, top to bottom, in football.
|
|
AFC WEST
|
|
DENVER
Peter King with another example, one he approves of citing, of someone being ripped by the media for speaking simple truths:
I think one of the silliest things I saw Saturday night after the Broncos loss was a headline or two about Denver coach Vic Fangio “ripping” quarterbacks Drew Lock and Teddy Bridgewater. At his post-game press conference, Fangio was asked what was separating the Broncos from the three other teams in the division. He said, “Those three other teams have top-shelf quarterbacks, which is obvious to everyone. We just need to get a little better.” He didn’t say Lock stinks. He didn’t say Bridgewater stinks. He just implied Patrick Mahomes and Justin Herbert and Derek Carr are better. Stop the presses!!!
It would be wonderful if coaches could simply say what they think consistently, rather than telling the very mild truth and getting raked over the coals for it. You don’t win in the NFL without quality quarterback play. Ask Matt Rhule and Robert Saleh and Matt Nagy and Dan Campbell and Joe Judge. Would you rather Fangio have said, when asked what was separating Denver from the rest of the division, something like: “I don’t know—I’ll have to watch the film?” It’s just nonsense.
|
|
KANSAS CITY
Peter King:
Kansas City won its 13th straight road game in the AFC West on Saturday, which, despite the overall weakness of the division until this year, is a pretty amazing feat. The last time KC lost in the division, Oct. 19, 2017:
• Kansas City lost on a Thursday night, 31-30, at the Oakland Coliseum.
• Amari Cooper caught two TD passes for the Raiders, and Michael Crabtree caught the tying TD as time expired.
• Milan-born Giorgio Tavecchio kicked the winning PAT with no time left on the clock. (He hasn’t kicked in the NFL for the last 38 months.)
• Leading tackler in the game: NaVorro Bowman of the Raiders, with 11.
• It was the seventh game in NFL uniform for Patrick Mahomes, and the seventh time he didn’t get off the bench.
• Jon Gruden, ESPN Monday night analyst, watched the game on TV.
• The Kansas City coordinators that night: Matt Nagy, Bob Sutton.
• Vet backs C.J. Spiller (KC) and Marshawn Lynch (Oakland) combined for nine rushing yards in the game.
• Half a country away, star linebacker Nick Bolton of Frisco Lone Star (Texas) High School was prepping for a Friday night tilt against Frisco Wakeland High in the midst of a 130-tackle senior season. Bolton accepted a scholarship to play college ball at Missouri. On Saturday night, Bolton, a Kansas City second-round rookie, scooped and scored the winning touchdown in the 13th straight road win with an 86-yard fumble return.
Been a while since Kansas City lost a road division game—1,543 days, to be exact.
|
|
LAS VEGAS
Rich Bisaccia had to navigate an overtime period that involved his team’s best interest going forward, NFL integrity and the natural desire to finish what you started with a win. Peter King tries to sort it all out:
I am still trying to process the end of game 272—Raiders 35, Chargers 32, in overtime, sending Vegas to the playoffs, sending befuddled L.A. home, and sending the rest of us to Harvard to study Tieology.
Truth in columnizing: I talked to Roethlisberger around 8 ET Sunday night, then finished the above chunk of the column about 10:20, then caught up with the SNF game while finishing the Awards section and a few other things. Around 11, the game sucked me in, and I was transfixed, and Justin Herbert gave the Chargers adrenalin, and then it was in overtime, and I started to get this feeling that all the Roethlisberger stuff above could be naught. This damn thing could end in a tie. A tie, incredibly, would leave the AFC with three 9-7-1 teams fighting for the last two AFC playoff spots, and the Steelers would be out by tiebreaker.
I imagined the Steelers sitting home watching this game, stomachs sinking. We were just celebrating making the playoffs! You can’t just take back Mike Tomlin dancing on Instagram! Sure enough, I looked at Twitter as the clock wound down below a minute. “Nonononono not like this,” tweeted Chase Claypool.
More truth in columnizing: I think it’s impossible to say anything with certainty about how this game should have been played at the end, and what split-second decisions should have been made. No NFL coach has ever had to consider the options that L.A.’s Brandon Staley and Vegas’ Rich Bisaccia had to consider. No coach ever got to the final seconds of the last game and thought about whether to play for the tie or the win, with playoff berths for both on the line, on the edge of a cliff.
One spot in the final minute is particularly vexing to figure. The Raiders had the ball, third-and-four at the Chargers’ 39, clock ticking below one minute to play. Both teams had both overtime timeouts left. Would both teams just let the clock run and not try to score, putting both in the playoffs? Would they play it safe and avoid risking a turnover or, in the Raiders’ case, a blocked field goal?
Or would the Raiders, at least, try to score? A win would send them to Cincinnati, a tie to Kansas City. I doubt Bisaccia would purposely do what he could to tie; surely he’d rather win, to avoid playing a team he lost to by 27 and 39 points this year.
As the clock wound down on the third-and-four play, Derek Carr prepped to take a snap in the shotgun. So he wasn’t planning to kneel. At the 38-second mark, Staley called a timeout. He posited that the Raiders were going to run, and he wanted time to put his best run-defenders in the game. He said later he wanted to put the Raiders back as far as possible in case they were going to try a field goal. The best run defense came in the game … and running back Josh Jacobs still ran for 10 yards. Now Bisaccia let the clock wind down to two seconds, and kicker Daniel Carlson came to try a 47-yard field goal. It was good, and the Raiders won by three.
A hundred questions, but if Staley hadn’t called time, I find it hard to believe the Raiders wouldn’t have tried to convert the third down against the personnel Staley had on the field. If they made the four yards, would they have use a timeout and tried one more run to get closer for a Carlson field goal? Would they have tried a longer Carlson field goal than the 47-yarder he made? We don’t know. It depended, I think, on how many yards Jacobs gained on third-and-four. The 10-yard gain made the field-goal choice pretty easy.
The Las Vegas win let the Steelers breathe. It set up Staley for an offseason of second-guessing. I don’t think that’s fair. We just don’t know what would have happened if the Raiders ran the third-and-four against a different defense. As it is, Roethlisberger and the Steelers, not the Raiders, take the trip to Kansas City. Vegas gets the Bengals.
Bill Barnwell of ESPN.com stayed up all night to give you this:
Pure, unadulterated chaos. The final game of the 2021 NFL regular season was arguably the most dramatic of the entire league year. We’ve seen nail-biting finishes in this game before, like the 49ers-Seahawks matchup that decided a division by an inch two seasons ago. Leaving aside the elephant in the room that I’m about to discuss, this was a fabulously entertaining football game that the Raiders won in overtime 35-32. The Chargers converted seven consecutive opportunities on plays in which a failure would have ended their season with an average of more than 11 yards to go. There were moments in which it felt like each team was holding on for dear life.
Of course, there was an added factor making this even more dramatic. Both the Chargers and Raiders knew they would make it into the postseason with a win, but the third scenario made this endgame unique in recent NFL history: A tie would have pushed each into the postseason at the expense of the Steelers, who won earlier in the afternoon. The chances of both teams taking a knee were always nil, but it was fair to wonder whether they would be upset about settling for a tie if they got into a sticky situation late in overtime.
If you fell asleep late Sunday night, I’m here to tell you that you missed that very sticky situation. The Chargers and Raiders were clearly trying to win, but when we got to the two-minute warning and Las Vegas was at midfield, it felt like the competitiveness dam in the stadium burst. Everything was on the table, and after the game, I’ve seen conspiracy theories for what each team wanted to do on both sides.
After watching closely and listening to what was said after the game, it’s pretty clear what happened and what each team wanted to happen. I’m not sure it’s a conspiracy theory or some grand mistake by either side, but I do think it’s worth breaking down. Let’s run through the last offensive series for the Raiders and see what happened with the game on the line:
At the two-minute warning in overtime
Let’s start by setting the scene. After Derek Carr hit Zay Jones on a third-and-8 pass to pick up a first down, the Raiders crossed over into Chargers territory. At the two-minute warning, Vegas was facing a first-and-10 from the Chargers’ 45-yard line. At this point, it was not in anything resembling comfortable field-goal range, given that a kick from this distance would have been a 63-yarder.
From the conspiracy perspective, if the Raiders really wanted to just end the game safely, this would have been the perfect time to give up. Inside two minutes, they could have kneeled three times and run out the clock. The Chargers had two timeouts and could have stopped the clock, but there would have been no reason for them to push the envelope, given that a tie would get them into the postseason. Indeed, when the Raiders ran the ball twice in reality, the Chargers happily let the clock run afterward. They didn’t care about getting the ball back.
From Raiders coach Rich Bisaccia’s perspective, his team did have a reason to try to win, though: playoff positioning. If the Raiders tied the Chargers, they would be heading into the postseason as the No. 7 seed and travel to play the Chiefs. Andy Reid’s team beat the Raiders by a combined score of 89-23 across their two matchups this season. I don’t think they wanted to play the Chiefs a third time.
By winning, the Raiders would get to face the Bengals. Granted, their regular-season matchup against Cincinnati wasn’t much better, as they lost 32-13 when these two teams met in late November. I don’t want to disrespect the Bengals, who have had an impressive season in winning the AFC North, but the Chiefs have a more imposing playoff résumé than Cincinnati. Going in as the 7-seed means a team has to beat the top two seeds in the conference in the first two playoff games. The Raiders didn’t want to miss out altogether, but they had some meaningful motivation to try to win in overtime.
First and second downs
The Raiders didn’t kneel. Instead, they ran the ball on first down. I have to admit that in real time that it didn’t feel like they were running at maximum intensity. Granted, there are a few factors that come into play. There’s the confirmation bias in thinking about the “tie” scenario, given that it had been discussed ad nauseum all week and then throughout Sunday. This was after 68 minutes of football, when everybody on the field was probably exhausted and playing at less than full speed. We also know that the Raiders’ primary goal was to not lose, which might have meant safer run calls and a focus on protecting the football while still trying to advance the ball.
Josh Jacobs lost 1 yard. The Chargers let the clock run after the play. So did the Raiders. This makes sense for both sides. The Raiders don’t want to give the Chargers any chance at scoring, since running the clock down prevents the Chargers from getting back on offense and ensures that the Raiders can do no worse than a tie. Chargers coach Brandon Staley doesn’t want to push the Raiders to try to get into easier field goal range and score, either.
On second down, Jacobs runs outside for 7 yards. I don’t think that this looks like a play in which the Raiders were giving up. Jacobs actually has a chance to hit the C-gap for a decent gain, one in which he could have gone down at the first sign of danger without having to worry about anybody accusing the Raiders of just trying to kneel without kneeling. Instead, he cut outside and picked up a couple of extra yards in the process. If anything, the Chargers were the ones playing it relatively safe on defense, with nobody attempting to shoot a gap or get out of position and allow a big gain.
Again, the clock ran immediately after the play. The Raiders now have the ball on the opposing 39-yard line for a third-and-4. If they get stuffed altogether or throw an incomplete pass on third down, they would be facing a 57-yard field goal. Missing that field goal would have given the Chargers the ball back with a short field and at least one timeout, opening up a possibility for the Raiders to lose. I don’t think there’s a real chance that they would have attempted a 57-yard field goal. They would have punted if the clock had been stopped or let the clock run down to zero if it had continued to run after third down.
The Raiders were also not about to kneel on third down to end the game. As Will Brinson noted, Vegas initially lined up in shotgun on third down, just as it had on second down when it ran the ball. You don’t kneel out of shotgun. And as Mitchell Schwartz mentioned, Kolton Miller’s stance made it clear that the Raiders were not going to throw the ball. This was 100% going to be a run, probably one similar to the play we saw on the prior down.
The timeout
Well, until the Chargers called timeout. Here’s where the conspiracy grows. The easiest scenario is to believe that the Raiders were about to hand the Chargers a trip to the playoffs, only for the Chargers and their analytics-addled coach to outthink themselves and call a timeout. Suitably chastened, the Raiders suddenly tried to win the game and knock the Chargers out of the postseason.
This theory was also aided by a quote immediately after the game from Carr, which was taken out of context. Asked by sideline reporter Michele Tafoya whether the timeout changed the Raiders’ strategy, he said “Yeah, it definitely did, obviously.” That’s great evidence for the conspiracy until you get to the next thing Carr said. “But we knew no matter what we didn’t want a tie,” the quarterback said. “My mindset was to make sure we were the only team moving on after this.” Carr could just be talking like a competitive football player, but we’ve established that the Raiders had meaningful motivation to win throughout the game and were trying to get in field goal range on the prior down.
Did the timeout change anything for the Raiders? In terms of their situation, not really. The timeout came with 38 seconds left in the game and about five seconds left on the game clock. If the Raiders’ plan was to essentially run out the clock on third down and play for the tie, the Chargers calling a timeout makes absolutely no difference in terms of the timing of the next play. The Raiders were either going to run a play with 38 seconds to go in the game (with this timeout) or 34 seconds to go in the game (if there hadn’t been a timeout). With a 40-second play clock, it really doesn’t matter whether it’s run with 38 or 34 seconds; if they run and the ball stays in bounds, they can let the clock run down to zero after the play in either scenario.
Were the Chargers trying to force the Raiders to run a play to get the ball back? Absolutely not. For one, if that had been the case, Los Angeles would have called a timeout immediately after the second-down run. It did not. Furthermore, it had nothing to gain by getting the ball back. Staley’s team is in a vulnerable position given the field position and doesn’t want to incentivize the Raiders to try to score.
Unlike the Raiders, who had motivation in terms of choosing their playoff opponent with a victory, the Chargers would have been the 6-seed regardless of whether they had tied or won outright. Their chances of moving into field goal range after a Raiders punt would have been low and offered no improvement in their win expectancy. They would have kneeled if the Raiders had punted. They would have happily let the clock run down, and I would bet they deliberately waited until the clock was inside of 40 seconds before calling a timeout.
Did the Chargers panic because the Raiders were in a passing formation? Probably not, given that they were in a similar look on second down. Some screenshots floating around Twitter after the game suggested that the Chargers had only nine men on the field, but they were misleading shots from the television broadcast; pictures taken a few frames later made it clear that the Chargers had a full complement of players.
Instead, Staley’s postgame news conference made his intentions clear. The Chargers called timeout because they wanted to get their best run defenders on the field to stop the run they knew was coming. Given that it was going to be a short-yardage run, they swapped struggling 240-pound linebacker Kenneth Murray for 323-pound defensive tackle Linval Joseph. The goal was pretty clearly to try to stop the Raiders for a short gain and force them into either attempting the most difficult field goal possible or letting the clock run out. I think the Raiders would have tried a 57-yarder with a second left if they had been stuffed on third down, but you only have to think back to the 2013 Iron Bowl to remember how an extremely long field goal attempt could go wrong for the kicking team.
Did this suddenly invigorate and incentivize the Raiders? If you extrapolate from Carr’s first line in his reply, probably! If you read anything else — or look at what the Raiders did on second down — probably not. The Chargers weren’t going to get the ball back and score, and the timing of when they called their timeout confirms as much. If the Chargers stuffed the Raiders for a loss, the Raiders would have punted and the Chargers would have been in a hopeless situation, again with no incentive to try to win the game beyond knocking the Raiders out of the postseason for the Steelers.
Again, here’s where Bisaccia’s thoughts have been taken out of context. It’s clear that the Raiders were talking about the possibility of a tie on the sideline. I have no doubt that’s true. He also talked about the Chargers not calling timeouts as the Raiders were running the ball, which is also true early on the drive, on first down of the fateful series, and for the first 35 seconds of the game clock after second down. I think the Raiders felt pretty comfortable that the Chargers were interested in a draw, and Bisaccia’s comments suggest that the Raiders were at least thinking about that possibility.
Third down
Then, third down changed everything. If there’s one definite impact the timeout had on how the game played out, it’s in the play the Raiders chose to run. Before third down, they were lining up in the shotgun and were likely going to run inside zone or something similar. Instead, after the timeout, they brought Carr under center, lined up in the I-formation and ran split zone. Kyzir White lined up Jacobs in the hole for no gain, but Jacobs cut outside, turned upfield and ran through an Asante Samuel Jr. tackle at the sticks.
Jacobs picked up 10 yards, turning the field goal into a 47-yard attempt. That’s a much easier lift for Daniel Carlson. The Raiders still could have kneeled if they wanted to avoid the possibility of a blocked field goal being returned for a touchdown, but at that point, the chances of a miss being returned for a score are off the table. A 57-yarder is probably just risky enough for the Raiders to forgo the chances of avoiding the Chiefs and Titans to start the postseason. A 47-yarder is well within Carlson’s range, as you saw from the final play.
Over the past five years, kickers have hit 47.1% of their field goals from 57 yards out, which is where the line of scrimmage was on third down. Reduce that to a 53-yarder, which is where the Raiders would have been if Jacobs had narrowly picked up a first down, and the chances of converting the field goal jump to 67.4%. A 47-yarder gets the Raiders up to 72.9%. The Chargers definitely wanted to keep Jacobs from gaining even the 4 yards for the first down.
If you want to blame the timeout for getting the Raiders into a better run play, that’s fair. I’m also going to suggest that the Chargers could just as easily have given up a significant gain without the timeout, as we saw the Raiders pick up 23 yards on a third-and-23 draw out of shotgun earlier in the game. Stopping them in the backfield for no gain or a loss is really valuable for the Chargers.
I suspect Staley thought his chances of keeping the Raiders from picking up the first down in short yardage were better with Joseph on the field than Murray, which was also supported by what happened earlier in the game, when the Chargers took Murray off the field and inserted Joseph and stopped the Raiders twice in short yardage near the goal line. Taking Murray out against 11 personnel and using motion forced Samuel to become part of the run fit by matching up against tight end Foster Moreau; Jacobs was able to stretch Samuel before turning upfield for the biggest gain of his career.
The Chargers didn’t give up 10 yards because the Raiders were suddenly upset; they gave up 10 yards because they’re a terrible run defense and the Raiders out-executed them on the biggest snap of the season. We’ll never know if things would have turned out differently without the timeout, but given how much Murray struggled during this game and has struggled since the Chargers took him in the first round in 2020, I don’t think his presence on the field would have saved Los Angeles’ season.
I also don’t think the timeout changed Vegas’ interest or motivation in trying to get into field goal range whatsoever. The Raiders would have accepted a tie if a field goal didn’t make sense after third down, but they were almost definitely going to try a field goal if it was feasible on fourth down, timeout or no timeout. You can disagree with Staley’s aggressiveness on fourth downs in this game or throughout the season, but there’s a logic (and often data) underpinning his decisions. There would be no reason for the Chargers to try to get the ball back in this game, and Staley’s lack of interest in stopping the clock until the game was inside 40 seconds makes it clear that doing so wasn’t a priority.
The conspiracy theory is more fun than the reality. If you spin the coachspeak and playerspeak one way, trust your eyes without skepticism in assuming that the Raiders were giving up on first and second down, and subscribe to the idea that Staley’s decision-making is too aggressive for his own good, you’re probably going to come out of that season-ending tilt thinking that the Chargers cost themselves a playoff berth with a horrific timeout. If the Chargers had come up with a stop for no gain or a short loss on third down, the Raiders very well might have let the clock run out and called it a day, much to the chagrin of Steelers fans.
Taking a closer look, though, what happened at the end of this game is reasonable and hardly controversial. The Raiders wanted to win given their playoff seeding possibilities, but they wanted to not lose more than anything. They got in a position in which it would have been virtually impossible to lose and then slowed things down to ensure that they would be the only team with a chance to win. The Chargers’ only motivation was to avoid losing. When the game came down to one play, the Raiders overwhelmed the league’s worst run defense to set up a season-ending field goal. The Chargers didn’t lose because they poked the bear with a too-cute timeout. They lost because they got overpowered by a more physical team with their season on the line. For all the modern external factors surrounding this game, that’s the oldest, simplest football story in the book.
We wondered how many field goal attempts of exactly 57 yards there had been over the last 5 years as cited by Barnwell. We thought it might be a small sample size, but actually there have been 34 tries, 16 made including postseason.
From 58 yards? 48% 12 of 25
From 56 yards? 60% 30 of 50
From 55 yards? 62% 46 of 74
|
|
AFC NORTH
|
|
PITTSBURGH
Congrats to EDGE T.J. WATT. Peter King:
T.J. Watt, pass rusher, Pittsburgh. The all-time sack record now has Watt’s name on it too. The Steelers outside linebacker tied Michael Strahan’s single-season sack record on Sunday with a second-quarter sack of Baltimore quarterback Tyler Huntley. It gave Watt 22.5 for the season, a feat that took him only 15 games; he missed two games and part of a third due to injury. (Strahan played all 16 games in the season he set the mark.) And Watt’s impact on Pittsburgh’s win was evident: he forced a fumble, batted a pass and recorded three quarterback hits.
The DB was there in Pittsburgh in November when Watt went off the field injured in the tie with the Lions. That he would come back to reach 22.5 sacks seemed a fantasy at the time.
|
|
AFC SOUTH
|
|
INDIANAPOLIS
Rick Eisen:
@richeisen
In the span of two weeks, the Colts went from the team nobody wanted to see in the playoffs to a team nobody is seeing in the playoffs.
Mike Wells of ESPN.com was there as the Colts came up tiny in Week 18.
The Indianapolis Colts had one job to do: win one of their final two games of the regular season to clinch a playoff spot.
They couldn’t get it done.
The Colts put on an embarrassing performance in their 26-11 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars on Sunday, and they were officially eliminated from making the playoffs about 45 minutes after the game when the Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Baltimore Ravens 16-13 in overtime.
“You’re tired of looking for help,” Colts linebacker Darius Leonard said. “Always looking for help when we can’t help ourselves. We go into a game, this team [Jacksonville] is 2-14, not taking anything away from them, but how do we expect to win or want to get in if we can’t even beat the team we were supposed to beat?”
The Colts used the word “shock” countless times during their postgame news conferences. That’s because they didn’t think their season would end Sunday.
They rebounded from an 0-3 and a 1-4 start to the season to become one of the hottest teams in the NFL, a team that had seven players named to the Pro Bowl and the type of team some said could go deep in the playoffs.
“Never expected to be sitting here at this moment right now, not like this,” Colts coach Frank Reich said with a look of disbelief on his face. “We just didn’t get it done, coaching or playing.”
The Colts weren’t prepared for the Las Vegas Raiders in Week 17, and it seemed fitting that they had their playoff hopes dashed in Jacksonville. They haven’t won in Jacksonville (or London) since 2014, and they never truly threatened the Jaguars on Sunday, trailing from start to finish.
“Kind of a shock to everybody,” Colts center Ryan Kelly said. “Not many words to describe it. To come here, controlling your own destiny the last two weeks of the season, to go in and not handle your business is a sting that will hurt for a long time. We have to look at ourselves for that. We certainly have the talent and leadership in the room to do it. We just didn’t do it.”
The Jaguars enjoyed being able to knock their AFC South counterparts out the playoffs.
“We were playing a divisional opponent that had a chance to go to the playoffs,” Jaguars interim coach Darrell Bevell said. “I think that’s enough, but there’s so much other [stuff]. I can’t even talk enough about how much these guys work, how hard it is, and all the time that they put in, the time that people don’t see.”
Things were supposed to be even better for the Colts this season after they made the playoffs in 2020. They gave the Philadelphia Eagles a first-round draft pick for quarterback Carson Wentz in an attempt for him to be a significant piece to go with running back Jonathan Taylor and a defense that finished second in the NFL in forced turnovers.
Wentz, instead, played a role in the Colts’ falters. The Jaguars limited Taylor, the NFL’s leading rusher, to 77 yards, which put the game in Wentz’s hands. Wentz was 17-of-29 for 185 yards with two turnovers. He threw for more than 200 yards just twice in the final eight games of the season.
“It’s a bad feeling,” Wentz said. “Knowing that we were in control in our destiny the last two weeks and didn’t get it done. Definitely left a bad taste in my mouth, a lot of guys’ mouth. Not what we expected. We expected to finish stronger than we did. A bad, bad feeling.”
|
|
JACKSONVILLE
The Jaguars had wins over Buffalo, Miami and Indianapolis this year.
@JohnEkdahl
The Jaguars went 3-14 this year.
The combined records of the three teams they beat (all over .500 teams) was 29-22.
They didn’t beat any team with a losing record this year.
Try to make any sense out of that.
|
|
TENNESSEE
The Titans are the top seed in the AFC, and they did it without their best player who is back for the playoffs. Mike Sando of The Athletic sings the praises of Coach Mike Vrabel:
The Tennessee Titans are the No. 1 seed in the AFC. How is Mike Vrabel not NFL Coach of the Year?
Bill Belichick was my choice three weeks ago. The Titans had lost three of four at that point as injuries threatened to derail their season. The Titans are 3-0 since then and secured the top seed in the conference after Kansas City lost at Cincinnati in Week 17. New England has lost three of its past four after a seven-game winning streak.
It’s Coach of the Year, not Coach of the First Three Months.
Vrabel has a better record than Belichick since taking the Titans’ job in 2018: 41-24 over those four seasons, compared to 40-25 for Belichick. Only five coaches have higher winning percentages than Vrabel since 2018: LaFleur, Andy Reid, Sean Payton, Sean McVay and John Harbaugh.
“Defense and special teams are Vrabel’s strongest areas because of his history as a player, but what impresses me the most is his ability with the offensive staff changes,” an exec from another team said. “He goes from (Matt) LaFleur to Arthur Smith, and then from Arthur Smith to Todd Downing, and they are all productive enough for the playoffs. LaFleur and Smith were first-time coordinators. Downing had one year. Those are really important hires for a defensive-minded head coach, and Vrabel has gotten them right.”
Tennessee beat the Bills, Chiefs, Colts, Rams and Saints in succession this season, then beat the surging 49ers in Week 16. The Titans played their final nine games without MVP candidate Derrick Henry. They played seven games without trade acquisition Julio Jones. They played five games without top receiver A.J. Brown. Their 2021 first-round pick, Caleb Farley, played in three games. Their 2020 first-rounder, Isaiah Wilson, never played for the team. Their most expensive free-agent addition this season, Bud Dupree, missed six games and played only 378 snaps.
The Titans had to win in different ways this season, and they did. Their offense was 10.5 EPA per game worse from 2020, one of the five largest year-over-year declines in the league. Their defense was 10.0 EPA per game better, the second-largest gain in the league behind Dallas. Vrabel and the Titans keep finding ways to disprove skeptics even though those skeptics, myself included, seem to have valid reasons to be skeptical. Tennessee covered the spread 10 times in its first 16 games, tied for the third-highest rate in the league, before winning narrowly against Houston on Sunday to secure the top seed.
Tennessee has put together six consecutive winning seasons since Vrabel took the job, second in franchise history to a seven-season streak from 1987-1993, when Hall of Famer Warren Moon was the quarterback under coaches Jerry Glanville and Jack Pardee. Only Reid’s Kansas City Chiefs own a longer active streak (nine).
|
|
AFC EAST
|
|
MIAMI
The DB has never been one to cry “racism” at every turn, but we would note that of the times that coaches have been fired after winning seasons or one understandable down season, quite a few of those coaches were Black. Tony Dungy after 2001 (9-7), Denny Green in 2001 (first losing season in a decade) and Jim Caldwell in 2011 (Manning injured) come to mind.
And now, today, in Miami, as Jim Harbaugh rumors arise. Marcel Louis-Jacques ofESPN.com:
The Dolphins fired head coach Brian Flores after three seasons with the franchise, the team announced Monday morning, barely 12 hours after he coached the team to a 33-24 victory over the New England Patriots.
General manager Chris Grier will remain with the team in his current role, ESPN’s Jeff Darlington reported. Next season will be Grier’s seventh season as the team’s GM.
The decision came from Dolphins owner Stephen Ross, who released a statement offering an explanation.
“I made a decision today to part ways with Brian Flores,” Ross said. “After evaluating where we are as an organization and what we need going forward to improve, I determined that key dynamics of our football organization weren’t functioning at a level I want it to be and felt that this decision was in the best interest of the Miami Dolphins. I believe we have a talented young roster in place and have the opportunity to be much better in 2022.
“I want to thank Brian for his hard work and wish him nothing but the best in his future.”
Despite speculation that Ross was interested in hiring Jim Harbaugh as coach, the Dolphins are not targeting the Michigan coach, sources told Darlington.
Flores now is expected to be a prime candidate to get head-coaching consideration elsewhere during this next hiring cycle, sources told ESPN’s Adam Schefter.
Miami was expected to compete for an AFC East title in 2021 after finishing 10-6 and missing the playoffs in 2020. The team won its opening game before losing seven straight, putting itself in a hole no other team in NFL history has come back from to make the playoffs. However, Miami responded to its seven-game losing streak with a seven-game winning streak — becoming the first team in league history to do both in the same season.
However, the high of that winning streak came to a sudden stop when the Dolphins were blown out by the Tennessee Titans in Week 17, knocking them out of playoff contention for the fifth straight season.
Flores was just the fourth coach in franchise history to record two winning seasons in his first three years with the team, going 24-25 in his tenure and 4-2 against his former boss, Bill Belichick — the best mark of any coach against Belichick while at the Patriots’ helm.
Thoughts from Mike Florio:
The Dolphins have struggled in recent years to find any real flow or rhythm. A big part of the problem is that the owner of the team doesn’t spend nearly enough time in the building to assess how or where or why things are going.
Stephen Ross lives and works in New York. He’s one of the NFL’s various absentee owners. And this has not helped the Dolphins craft the kind of consistency that allows long-term stability and success.
Without Ross there to constantly assess and monitor the vibe of the organization, the inevitable adversity leads to dysfunction. Someone will be blaming someone else for whatever goes wrong. Turf battles inevitably will emerge. The owner will be making decisions based on limited information brought to him by people who may be trying to nudge him in a specific way.
It happened when Jeff Ireland, Dawn Aponte, and Joe Philbin constantly struggled and bickered and fought for the approval and favor of the owner. It quite possibly has happened more recently, with Brian Flores on one side and the front office on the other side.
The problem is that the coach, who’s busy coaching the team, doesn’t have the luxury of whispering to the owner all of the various problems caused by, for example, poor decisions when it comes to drafting players. The G.M. and others in the front office, however, have much greater access to the owner on the one day when he happens to show up — game day. It gives the non-coaches in any power struggle/blame game a huge advantage.
If Ross were in the building every day, talking to his head coach on a face-to-face basis repeatedly, he’d be in a much better position to assess where and how and when blame should be placed and changes should be made.
The Dolphins already are putting out the word that the problem with Flores was “relationships.” Shockingly, a guy who spent years with Bill Belichick isn’t adept at kissing asses and/or blowing smoke up them. If they’d won more games, it wouldn’t have mattered.
That will continue to be the challenge for all former Belichick assistants. Even if they think they’re different, they’re far more like him than they’d ever recognize. Throw in an owner who isn’t around nearly enough to understand the broader dynamic, and it becomes easier for the various members of the front office to gang up on the guy who is all about football and not about playing politics or “being nice” or anything other than trying to win as many games as possible.
Wherever the Dolphins go from here, the problems will continue as long as Ross serves as an absentee owner. As another owner said several years ago when asked about the fact that Ross doesn’t live and work in his team’s city, “I love competing against him.”
Ross denies that he will raid his alma mater:
University of Michigan head coach Jim Harbaugh has been mentioned as a candidate to move back to the NFL during the current hiring cycle and his name came up again on Monday morning when the Dolphins fired Brian Flores.
Dolphins owner Stephen Ross went to Michigan and is a major donor to the school, so there’s a connection between the two men that many pointed out when word of Flores’ ouster broke. Reports after the firing suggested that the change was not linked to a move for Harbaugh and Ross said the same to reporters at a press conference.
“I’m not going to be the person who takes Jim Harbaugh away from Michigan,” Ross said.
As for why they did fire Flores, Ross said he didn’t think the Dolphins, who were 19-14 over the last two years, were “working well as an organization” with Flores as the head coach. Chris Grier will remain as the team’s General Manager and Ross said he feels the team has done a good job of acquiring young talent in recent seasons. That will put Grier at the forefront of what Ross says will be a “thorough” search for a head coach who the team feels can produce more success that Flores did.
But what if Harbaugh is ready to sign with say, the Broncos, would Ross swoop in?
|
|
THIS AND THAT
|
|
QB CAROUSEL
Mike Sando on how the offseason QB movement will shake down:
Nineteen teams could realistically be in the market for new quarterbacks this offseason. Here’s my betting guide to all 19, starting with those most likely to make a change. Pittsburgh leads the way at -1000 to make a change.
Jimmy Garoppolo, Matt Ryan, Derek Carr, Kirk Cousins, Deshaun Watson, Russell Wilson and Aaron Rodgers are the veteran quarterbacks teams have to at least consider as potentially available. All have vast experience. All would be preferable in the short term to quarterbacks available in the 2022 draft, according to most evaluators. And they’re much preferable to free-agent options that could include names such as Teddy Bridgewater and Marcus Mariota.
But if only one or two become available, some of these teams will be stuck.
Group 1: Teams that absolutely, positively need new QBs
Pittsburgh Steelers (-1000): Ben Roethlisberger plans to retire, and the Steelers must decide whether to pursue a veteran starter or ride with Mason Rudolph. Last month, an exec suggested the Falcons’ Ryan as a trade candidate.
Denver Broncos (-750): Bridgewater was 26th and Drew Lock 31st among the 34 veteran quarterbacks rated by 50 coaches and evaluators in my 2021 Quarterback Tiers survey before the season. They aren’t rising after this season.
Washington Football Team (-500): Ryan Fitzpatrick and Taylor Heinicke aren’t the long-term answers. Can Ron Rivera let a third year pass without addressing the position more aggressively? That would be hard to justify.
New Orleans Saints (-500): Sean Payton isn’t contending for the Super Bowl with Taysom Hill or Jameis Winston at the position. The Saints will be mentioned in the Russell Wilson and Aaron Rodgers conversations despite their salary-cap restrictions.
Group 2: Teams that belong in the first group but deserve their own
Carolina Panthers (-400): Ownership’s interest in Watson appeared strong enough for some in the league to suspect Carolina is where the former Houston starter will wind up if/when a trade is viable. Yes, Sam Darnold has $18.8 million in fully guaranteed fifth-year option salary coming to him in 2022, but the perception here is that Panthers owner David Tepper won’t let the Panthers go all-in on him again.
Houston Texans (-300): Davis Mills has been a pleasant enough surprise for some to think Houston could consider going another season with him, no matter what the Texans think of his long-term prospects. Timing is a key variable. If the Texans do trade Watson, they could have the capital to strike for a quarterback in 2023, when evaluators think the QB options in the draft will be better.
Group 3: Caught in between but probably changing
San Francisco 49ers (-300): Garoppolo remains under contract for next season, and if he leads a deep playoff run, the situation could become interesting. But the odds favor San Francisco transitioning to Trey Lance. At that point, holding onto Garoppolo and his $27 million cap number for 2022 wouldn’t make sense. This offseason could be a good one for trading a veteran if teams continue to see few immediate starting options through other means.
Group 4: Teams married to quarterbacks they would ideally ditch for better options but might stick with for another year
New York Giants (+100): A potential change in Giants leadership could affect how the organization values Daniel Jones. The team needs to decide by the spring whether to exercise Jones’ fully guaranteed fifth-year option.
Miami Dolphins (+100): Ownership pushed for Watson before the season. Ownership could make another push in 2022, but the most likely scenario could involve Tua Tagovailoa returning, even though the Dolphins finished a league-high 15 of 17 games this season with negative expected points added (EPA) on offense, according to TruMedia.
Minnesota Vikings (+100): Cousins has one season and $35 million in guaranteed salary left on his deal at a time when organizational changes appear likely. His deal would count only $10 million against the Vikings’ 2022 cap if Minnesota traded him. There are complicating factors. A new coach in Minnesota might prefer having a veteran quarterback, as the case was in Atlanta when Arthur Smith inherited Ryan. Also, any team acquiring Cousins might have to consider an extension.
Cleveland Browns (+100): Baker Mayfield has $18.8 million in fully guaranteed fifth-year option salary for 2022. Cleveland might like to upgrade, but the timing could be less than ideal. How aggressive do the Browns want to be in the short term?
Group 5: Teams that could be open to change but could live happily with their current starters for another year
Las Vegas Raiders (+500): Carr has one year left on his contract and could be traded easily from a cap standpoint, but he could be the Raiders’ best option. How Carr fares in the playoffs could influence the team’s thinking regarding him and organizational changes in general.
Detroit Lions (+500): The Lions could draft Pitt’s Kenny Pickett or another quarterback with the second pick this year, but sticking with Jared Goff for one more season seems likely. The team would likely remain in good position to draft a quarterback in 2023.
Atlanta Falcons (+500): Moving Ryan would require the Falcons being comfortable with carrying a sizable salary-cap footprint on the books in his absence, much the way Philadelphia has done after trading Carson Wentz. There would be a market for Ryan if the team did decide to rebuild more openly.
Philadelphia Eagles (+600): Jalen Hurts has done enough for the Eagles to bring him back as their starter, but with a fair amount of draft capital in hand, Philly could keep open its options in case Wilson, Rodgers or Watson became available.
Indianapolis Colts (+600): Wentz started all 17 games in his first Colts season, posted a winning record and put up numbers in line with his 2018-2019 production. But the way this Colts season ended, and given the shakiness Wentz displayed in key moments, the team should ask difficult questions at the very least. More on him below.
Group 6: The potential wild-card surprise team
Tampa Bay Buccaneers (+750): Wait, isn’t Tom Brady going to play forever? Sometimes it seems as though he could. Though Brady’s production remains exceptional, this season has been taxing enough on multiple fronts for some near the situation to wonder at least a little bit whether the end could be nearer than everyone expects.
Group 7: Elephants in the room
Seattle Seahawks (+1000): Wilson has two years remaining on his contract, so the Seahawks would have to agree to trade him. Wilson has a no-trade clause, so he would have to approve any destinations. If coach Pete Carroll returns, Wilson must decide just how badly he wants to play in an offense centered more overtly around a high-volume passing attack. Would Wilson be willing to fight his way out of Seattle at the expense of his legacy there? I considered shortening the odds for Wilson, but let’s see how the coming weeks play out.
Green Bay Packers (+1500): Rodgers seems happier in Green Bay, but we don’t know what promises have been made behind the scenes, or exactly what matters most to Rodgers during the coming offseason. He could have the leverage to push for a top-of-the-market, fully guaranteed extension that could force the team to make a decision on backup Jordan Love, or he could report to work in the spring as usual. Nothing would surprise here.
|
|
BROADCAST NEWS
This from the primary author of FOX’s successful Big Noon college football strategy:
@mulvihill79
Fox and CBS 4:25s are the top two shows on television. Fox and CBS afternoon windows are the most-watched in college football. Why does the industry continue to overvalue primetime?
|
|
2022 DRAFT
Peter King surveys the teams with the best and worst positions in the 2022 Draft, citing the Ravens as a team he likes that is floating under the radar:
Kings of the Draft. Five teams have five picks in the first three rounds: Philadelphia, the Jets, the Giants, Detroit and Denver. The richest, with three first-rounders, is Philadelphia, which owns the Miami and Indy first-rounders as well as its own. So the Eagles have the 15th and 16th picks from the Dolphins and Colts, and their own, somewhere in the twenties, which will be finalized when the Eagles finish in the playoffs. The Jets (fourth and 10th overall) and Giants (fifth and seventh overall) benefited from bad 2021 seasons by trade partners Seattle and Chicago, respectively.
Un-Kings of the Draft. As of this morning, the Rams have zero picks in the top 100. Their first slated pick is a late-third-round compensatory pick, approximately 102nd overall, for the loss of Brad Holmes as GM to Detroit, as part of the NFL’s plan to incentivize teams to develop Black candidates as coaches and general managers. The first-round pick went to Detroit in the Jared Goff deal, and the second- and third-rounders generously went to Denver in the October trade for Von Miller.
Team in the best position. With the forecast of a poor top of the draft and wealthy middle, the Ravens might be in the best position of any team. (What else is new, right?) They’re slated to have seven picks between 78 and 140 overall, and this historically has been a genius team in the middle of the draft. Tentatively, the Baltimore picks will fall around 78, 100, 108, 122, 130, 138 and 140, with the chance that the 138th (a compensatory pick for New England signing Matthew Judon) could become a late-third-rounder, per Over The Cap. Because of the vague mysteries of the compensatory-pick system, the pick could become a third if Judon makes first-team all-pro. So I say the Ravens are scheduled to have seven picks in that 62-pick span. But the history of GM Eric DeCosta suggests more movement before draft weekend. In each of the last four drafts, the Ravens, in rounds three through five, have had six picks.
Brandon Lee Gowton of Bleeding Green shows us that the Eagles have plenty of ammo after the first round:
The Philadelphia Eagles’ own first-round pick is yet to be determined since they’ll be playing in the postseason. But with the Miami Dolphins and Indianapolis Colts eliminated, we know where they’ll be picking: 15th and 16th, respectively. This much according to our good friends over at Tankathon.
The Eagles currently own 10 picks this year in total. The three first-round picks offer Howie Roseman a big opportunity to improve Philly’s roster. And through multiple avenues, too. He can sit and pick at those selections. He can swing a trade for a star player. He can trade back to pick up a first-round pick in the 2023 NFL Draft to have insurance if Jalen Hurts doesn’t pan out next season. Optionality.
Here’s a look at where the Eagles will be picking this year:
1 – from Miami Dolphins (No. 15)
1 – from Indianapolis Colts (No. 16)
1 – Eagles’ own pick (No. 19 through No. 32, pending playoff finish)
2 – Eagles’ own pick
3 – Eagles’ own pick
4 – Eagles’ own pick
5 – Eagles’ own pick
5 – from Washington Football Team
5 – from Arizona Cardinals
6 – from Indianapolis Colts
(Note: the Eagles are not projected to receive any 2022 compensatory picks.)
For context purposes, here’s a look at the No. 15 and No. 16 overall picks (respectively) from the last 10 drafts:
2021 – QB Mac Jones, LB Zaven Collins
2020 — WR Jerry Jeudy, CB A.J. Terrell
2019 — QB Dwayne Haskins, DE Brian Burns
2018 — OT Kolton Miller, LB Tremaine Edmunds
2017 — S Malik Hooker, CB Marlon Humphrey
2016 — WR Corey Coleman, OT Taylor Decker
2015 — RB Melvin Gordon, CB Kevin Johnson
2014 — LB Ryan Shazier, OG Zack Martin
2013 — S Kenny Vaccaro , QB EJ Manuel
2012 — DE Bruce Irvin, DE Quinton Coples
|
|
