Post by spiderfan on Dec 8, 2020 20:31:05 GMT -8
December is upon us SCtoC, so it is up to me Spiderfan to tackle Week 13 of the National Football League season. Let us begin!
Upset of the Year!
I said last week after the Steelers mediocre performance against the Ravens that I did not think they would go undefeated. I also said last week that I thought The Artists formerly known as Redskins would win the NFC Least due to their quality coaching. Wouldn't ya know who won the pony? The Artists formerly known as Redskins defeated the previously undefeated Steelers for the biggest upset of the NFL season.
I'm going to start by giving credit to Artists formerly known as Redskins HC Ron Rivera and the coaching staff who rallied their troops to this victory. They were down 14-3 at halftime and even though the Steelers struggled in the 1st quarter, eventually Big Ben and the rest of the bunch managed to break through and make fools of the Washington offense and defense. Even with that being the case, that 3 ended up being important because Washington got a little bit of momentum from it before the half, and then after the half they were completely different going right down the field and scoring a TD. The Steelers were on the ropes the rest of the time and the scrappiness of Washington was clearly something the Steelers were not prepared for, again credit to the coaching staff.
The Steelers despite still having the lead into the 4th quarter were not able to put the game away and Washington would take advantage tying the game at 17 after a Steelers FG drive, and taking a 20-17 lead after the Steelers had a failed 4th down in Washington territory. At this point it is worth mentioning that Steelers QB Big Ben Roethlisberger had multiple passes swatted down throughout the game and FOX analyst Moose Johnston pointed out that at some point that would lead to an interception for Washington. Trailing 20-17 that INT would come and the Steelers would ultimately lose 23-17.
Full congratulations to the Washington Football Team players, coaches, and fans for the upset!
The Final Four Weeks
Speaking of the Washington Football Team they are actually second in the NFC Least due to the New York Football Giants (I won't call them the Tinys this week) upset over the Seahawks and both teams are now 5-7 headed into the last 4 weeks of the season. The Giants schedule for the last 4 weeks is: Cardinals, Browns, Ravens, Cowboys. Being that with the exception of the Cowboys, the other 3 teams are at or above .500 and being that the Giants tend to shrink, I doubt they'll win even half of those of games. The Football Team's schedule is: 49ers, Seahawks, Panthers, and Eagles. With the exception of the Seahawks, the other 3 teams are well below .500 and I would expect them to win more than half of those games except... the Philadelphia Eagles made an interesting change.
See, the Eagles finally benched QB Carson Wentz in favor of rookie Jalen Hurts. It would appear that this Eagles HC Doug Pederson's attempt to save his job, but that is kind of obvious. Here is the thing though: Jalen Hurts is actually pretty good is going to make the Eagles a much better football team and even though the Eagles schedule over the last 4 weeks is the Saints, Cardinals, Cowboys, Football Team, Hurts is such a wild card that I have no idea how it is going to go for the Eagles. I will say that I stand by my prediction of The Artists formerly known as Redskins winning the NFC Least, although with the Hurts news I'm less confident in that prediction than I was before.
Moving to the other conference's eastern division the AFC East, things are more clear cut. The Bills are in the lead with a 9-3 record and ahead of both the Dolphins and Patriots and in their next 4 games play: Steelers, Broncos, Patriots, and Dolphins. It wouldn't surprise me to see the Bills win out, which would firmly leave the Dolphins and Patriots in the wild card discussion. I stated earlier in the year that the Patriots dynasty is dead, and even though they have gone on a run since their bad start, with their remaining schedule consisting of the Rams, Dolphins, Bills, and Jets, I don't see the Patriots making the playoffs. I'm also not high on the Dolphins making the playoffs because their schedule consists of the Chiefs, Patriots, Raiders, and Bills.
With that said, the most notable game of the 4 is the game against the Raiders, because the Raiders schedule over the last 4 games is Colts, Chargers, Dolphins, and Broncos. It appears to me that the Week 16 match up between the Dolphins and Raiders has the potential to decide who makes the AFC playoffs. I say potential because the Colts who the Raiders play next week and then after that play the Texans, Steelers, and Jaguars. The current Baltimore franchise the Ravens meanwhile play the Browns, Jaguars, Giants, and Bengals. The reason I bring that up is to point out that if the Colts and Ravens end up 10-6 and the Dolphins and Raiders are 9-7, the Colts and Ravens are the ones who make the postseason.
Speaking of the AFC North, the Believeland Browns are 9-3 and barring something crazy happening with their final 4 games Ravens, Giants, Jets, and Steelers they are highly likely to make the postseason for the first time since 2002. Another team highly likely to make the postseason are the Tennessee Titans who play the Jaguars, Lions, Packers, and Texans in their final 4 games.
Moving to the other conference's northern division the NFC North, the only team in the NFC right now (with the exception of the Saints who have already clinched a spot in the NFC playoffs) that is highly likely to make the postseason in my opinion are the Green Bay Packers whose final 4 games consist of the Lions, Panthers, Titans, and Bears. Because of the Saints dominance up to this point, the Tommy Bay Buccaneers are going to be a wild card team and even with that being the case, a postseason berth for them is likely due to their easy schedule of Vikings, Falcons, Lions, and Falcons. Going back to the NFC North for a second, the Vikings like the Patriots had a bad start to the season and thus have an uphill climb to the postseason. The Vikings final 4 games are the Buccaneers, Bears, Saints, and Lions. Barring them winning out, I don't see the Vikings making the postseason, but I say that having zero predictions of how the NFC West will pan out.
See, the NFC West is so tight right now it is hard to say how many teams from it will make the playoffs. The Cardinals schedule is Giants, Eagles, 49ers, and Rams. The Seahawks schedule is Jets, Artists formerly known as Redskins, Rams, and 49ers. The Rams schedule is Patriots, Jets, Seahawks, and Cardinals. Even though the 49ers are basically out of it they could play spoiler, and the other 3 teams have games that are inter-division games and games that could be trap games. I'm not going to make a prediction because I know it is likely to be wrong, but I'm curious to see here what the community here has to say.
This is all a very long winded way of saying that the final four weeks of the NFL season are going to be awesome, and these are the weeks that make the NFL the best professional sports league in the world.
Other thoughts:
-Congrats to Colt McCoy for his first win as an NFL starter since 2014!
-Congrats to the Saints and Chiefs for clinching their spots in the postseason!
-Deshaun Watson's fumble saved the Colts season.
-Mitch Trubisky's fumble ruined the Bears season.
-I think the Chargers job will be very attractive when it opens up after the season.
ROAD TO 0-16
1 team is currently 0-12. I will keep doing this segment until that team has a win or a tie. The team that is currently without a win or tie is:
New York Jets
The Jets have been the worst team in the NFL all season long. They have been blown out a number of times and choked a few times, but have never been as close to winning as they were on Sunday against the Raiders. They started out with a early lead but like usual they blew it, and the Raiders took a 2 possession lead late in the game. I didn't think there would be much to say, but then the suckage of Derek Carr came and desperately tried to get the Jets off on the exit ramp and leave the Road to 0-16. When the game was 24-21 in the 4th quarter, Raiders QB Derek Carr fumbled the ball and set up a Jets TD with them taking a 28-24 lead.
However, the Raiders had the ball and plenty of time to win the game on a final TD drive. As previously stated the suckage of Derek Carr came into play and the Raiders failed on a 4th down in the red zone and the Jets maintained their 28-24 lead. Derek Carr's face was one of someone with complete and total humiliation and on the brink of tears something which Carr has done before. The Jets were chewing clock and even though the Raiders would get the ball back one last time, there was barely any time left, and the Jets had a 96.8 percent chance of winning according to ESPN win probability. The Jets were getting off on the exit ramp...
Whether it was his own selfish desire to sack Derek Carr or the dedication to the tank, either way Jets DC Gregg Williams was still fired. Even so, this moment will go down in Jets history, because with the Jets facing all well above .500 teams in the last 4 weeks, in all likelihood they are going 0-16 fending off the Jaguars tank, securing the #1 pick and with it Clemson QB Trevor Lawrence... and Bill Cowher?
A new segment will debut here next week
That is all for this week's Web of Football. As always I hope ya enjoyed and as stated before we are in December which means the playoff hunt is heating up and I hope to see y'all for it. This is spiderfan out.
