Post by spiderfan on Nov 20, 2018 12:21:55 GMT -8
Happy early Thanksgiving everyone, it is me spiderfan here to bring you my Random Thoughts & Stuff on the 11th week of the NFL season. Let us begin!
Monday Night Madness
I have to start this week's column talking about the epic Monday Night Football matchup between the Kansas City Chiefs and Los Angeles Rams. It was originally supposed to be played in Mexico City, but due to bad field conditions the game was moved to LA.
I would describe the game as a football game with the pace of a basketball game. Obviously, it was high scoring, but the pace felt like an NCAA or NBA game with both teams making runs and having big plays to lighten up or silence the crowd. Not only that, you also had aggressive hero ball in the last minutes of the game, which is something that usually doesn't happen in football.
If this game is a preview of SB 53 then I would like to say that the Chiefs win next time. Why? Because the Chiefs didn't play that good and still nearly won, while on the other sideline the Rams played close to their A game, especially on defense with having 3 defensive TDs. Nonetheless, the game was absolutely worthy of the hype and I hope we see more games like it across the NFL.
Where are they now?
During Sunday's games I had an idea to look at the teams that were in the conference championship games last year and see how they are doing now.
First off, you have the Patriots currently 7-3 and the #3 seed in the AFC playoff picture. While I'm not as confident in them making the big game as I was earlier in the year, my prediction of them representing the AFC in the Super Bowl still stands, so the Patriots despite losing SB 52 are fine.
Second, you have the Jaguars currently 3-7, who went from IMO the best turnaround story in the NFL back to where they were prior to the Tom Coughlin-Doug Marrone regime: football team with a bad record. This was a team that I and others had as contenders before the season started and even early in the season, but after losing 6 straight games the team looks lost. You could say "rebuild/start over", the issue is there is talent on that roster that is worth keeping, as well as management that is worth keeping. Maybe, Coughlin needs to leave the box and return to the sideline. I'll throw that out there for people to think about.
Thirdly, you have the Eagles currently 4-6, who appear to be suffering from the SB hangover which is surprising because I would have thought that with Wentz back that wouldn't occur. However it has and they are going to have a LONG rest of the season.
Fourth and finally you have the Vikings currently 5-4-1 and the current #6 seed in NFC playoff picture, who led by their non-franchise QB Kirk Cousins have shown to be exactly who I thought they would be a team that plays decent to good in games that most of the country doesn't see and when they play in games people actually do see they crumble. They would have at least the same if not better record if they had kept Case Keenum and they would have more cap space. Just saying.
Other thoughts:
-Lamar Jackson is going to be a good NFL QB. I'm sick of hearing people say otherwise.
-NFL coaches DO NOT GO FOR THE WIN AND CALL A PASS PLAY! The Panthers and Titans both tried and failed miserably at it, so please learn from those failures.
-The NFL is weird. The Patriots blow out the Colts who blow out the Titans who blow out the Patriots. Mind boggling.
-Fitzpatrick is benched... again. I'm calling now he'll be the starter later in the year though.
-After the season, the Cardinals need to fire Steve Wilks and Steve Keim and insert a new regime.
-I predict that Mike McCarthy is going to lose his job.
-I'm even more confident than I was last week saying Coach Ostrich is going to keep his job.
-Best Wishes to Alex Smith, hope ya have a great recovery and get to playing football again.
With all of that said, this edition of Random Thoughts & Stuff has concluded. As always I hope ya enjoyed it and I'll be back again next week. This is spiderfan out.
