Post by spiderfan on Sept 18, 2023 20:01:04 GMT -8
Aloha Sports Coast to Coast, Spiderfan your official NFL Analyst here, back with yet another edition of Red Hot Gridiron. Without further ado, let us begin!
The Push
The most talked about thing in the sport of football these past couple weeks (outside of Coach Prime's Colorado Buffaloes) has been "The Push". The Push was popularized by the Eagles during their Super Bowl run last year where multiple players lined up behind QB Jalen Hurts to aid him in his QB sneak efforts. This turned out to be a highly effectively play and one that teams throughout the NFL have started to replicate. It has become a topic of discussion primarily because a lot of people think it should be banned from the game due to the unfairness of the play. Unpopular opinion time: I like "The Push". It has forced teams to put the QB sneak play back into their offense making short yardage plays a non-agonizing viewing experience. I have seen too many 3rd and 1 and 4th and 1 plays become testing ground for trick play nonsense or passing plays that should be reserved for long yardage situations. So, is the football viewing experience of someone who had to watch Kellen Moore and Bill O'Brien.
Now, to be fair to the defense the rules where they can't go low need to be removed to make it a more fair play. To me that is the compromise that keeps "The Push" in the game while making it something that is not entirely unfair to defend.
Call It a Comeback
There were not 1, not, but 3 double digit comebacks on Sunday, each of which has their own degree of shocking nature.
To start you had Packers-Falcons where unlike their well documented history of choking (insert link to History of Falcons playlist) the Falcons came back from a 12 point 4th quarter deficit. While the offense obviously produced the much needed points, my biggest takeaway is that the Falcons defense is legit. To force a 3 and out, a 3 and out, and 4 and out all with the game still very much in doubt, against a team coming off a blowout win? That is playoff caliber stuff right there.
Then you had Commanders-Broncos, where the Broncos jumped out to a 21-3 lead, which even though we have hindsight to look back on and hindsight is always 20/20, was always an unsustainable lead. The Broncos scored 3 TDs in their first possessions in an offense where you have a washed up quarterback who is a saddening shell of his former self. The law of averages states you are going to go a while without scoring some points, which is exactly what happened. The Commanders ended up going on 32-3 scoring run which should have been have been 39-3 because the Commanders dropped what should have been a pick six at the goal line late in the game. However, it wasn't which led to a Broncos FG and defensive stop which led to the Broncos getting themselves into Hail Mary range, which led to a completed Hail Mary!....which led to a 2 point conversion because the Broncos were down 8 prior to the Hail Mary. Because Russell Wilson is washed up he missed a wide open Jerry Jeudy at the top of the screen, which people which will forget because Wilson's pass to Brandon Sutton was arguably a pass interference penalty. Nonetheless, the Commanders came out with a win, and in a reverse of Packers-Falcons, my biggest takeaway is that the Commanders offense is legit. Maybe this is the year that Eric Bieniemy's alleged jerk behavior is finally put to the side and he gets a HC job.
And last but certainly not least, is the New York Football Tinys 21 point second half comeback against the Arizona Cardinals, who deserve their own segment.
Tank! Tank! Tank!
I was so looking forward to having a whole segment about how just small the Tinys had shrank to be a team that was being blown out by a team in the Cardinals that everyone in the NFL world knows is tanking, and even discussing how maybe the Cardinals weren't tanking after all. And like what happens every year a potential segment gets scrapped and replaced with a different one. The entire time the Tinys were coming back I kept saying to myself "It's not possible". Something had to happen to keep the comeback from happening. Sure both the Tinys offense and defense played like a different team, much to the shock of the announcers on the broadcast, but these are the Tinys they had to shrink, right? Well, as it turns out the only thing that stop the Tinys from shrinking, is a team that is completely tanking in the Cardinals.
While I know no one in the league office is reading this, they should be, because as far as I'm concerned, they should be looking into the Cardinals for tanking. The last time the Tinys had this big of a comeback was when the Cardinals were located in Chicago and before the states of Alaska and Hawaii were states. Something is amiss and if the league office were as serious as they pretend to be, they would crack down on what the Cardinals are doing. And the thing is I know the league office is capable of doing this, because they investigated the Dolphins for their Tank for Tua year. The irony of the Cardinals tank, like the Dolphins' tank is that the HC overseeing the on the field tanking won't last to bear the fruit of the tank. Cardinals HC Johnathan Gannon is a defensive minded head coach, even if he isn't a one and done, once the Cardinals get Caleb Williams or Drake Maye with the #1 pick, his time as the Cardinals HC is going to be borrowed. And I'm assuming Cardinals GM Mossi Ossenfort won't also end up being on the chopping block, or least demoted, because in the event that someone like Jim Harbaugh decides to coach the Cardinals next, Ossenfort will have little to no power to make front office decisions.
Other thoughts:
-The Eagles beating the Vikings has to be the least surprising outcome of the week in my opinion. Sure it ended up being closer than last year, but there was no doubt who the better team was.
-The Seahawks beating the Lions has to be most surprising outcome of the week in my opinion. I really thought going in that the Seahawks were the inferior team and would get beat. The Lions still played respectable though, so there isn't much reason to bring up the Curse of Bobby Layne.
-Golly, the Bills took that loss to the Jets hard.
-Hopefully Nick Chubb didn't suffer a career ending injury.
ROAD TO 0-17
9 teams are currently 0-2. I will keep doing this segment until every team has a win or a tie. Teams currently without a win or tie are:
New England Patriots
Los Angeles Chargers
Denver Broncos
Cincinnati Bengals
Houston Texans
Arizona Cardinals
Minnesota Vikings
Chicago Bears
Carolina Panthers
I know the Texans are in a "we suck but we might be good someday" phase, but I would have thought they would have won one of their first two games. I get the sense they'll be like the Panthers and win a bunch of games late in the year that reduces their draft stock, but makes them feel more optimistic than they otherwise would be. The Vikings feel like they've been brought down to earth after having overachieved last year. The Broncos are where they should be, same with the Panthers, maybe even add the Bears too. The Chargers are going to end up firing Brandon Staley before the year is out, which is what all their fans in the sports media complex have wanted to happen anyway.
Both the Patriots and Bengals feel too early to write off. The Bengals deserve that nod because they were 0-2 last year and ended up almost going to the Super Bowl and the Patriots deserve that nod because the last time they were 0-2, they won the Super Bowl. Ultimately due to their tanking, IMO the Cardinals are BY FAR the team most likely to team go 0-17.
ROAD TO 17-0
9 teams are currently 2-0. I will keep doing this segment until every team has a loss or a tie. Teams currently without a loss or tie are:
Miami Dolphins
Baltimore Ravens
Dallas Cowboys
Philadelphia Eagles
Washington Commanders
San Francisco 49ers
New Orleans Saints
Atlanta Falcons
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Going into Week 3, it is hard to not say that the NFC is the better conference than the AFC. Only 3 of the AFC teams are currently undefeated at this point, even though it is early in the year. As I said last week, I'm skeptical about the Dolphins until I see them succeed late in the year, so the Ravens to me seem like the most likely candidate to be in the #1 seed type position at the end of the year. We've seen them do it once before in the Lamar era, and as I said, while it is only Week 2, it feels disrespectful to the Ravens to be not thinking of them in those terms... at least while Lamar is healthy anyway.
As for the NFC, they are loaded with quality teams, including the surprising (at least to me) Falcons and the not so surprising (at least to me) Buccaneers. I think the NFC East is going to produce playoff teams, maybe all 3 of the current undefeateds, it wouldn't surprise me. I gotta also admit that the 49ers look strong. However I will stand by what I said in Week 1 that the team most likely to 17-0 IMO is the Philadelphia Eagles.
And with all of that said Week 2 is officially in the books. As always I hope ya enjoyed and I hope to see ya again next week. Remember, football is the greatest game in the world. This is spiderfan out.