Post by spiderfan on Nov 13, 2023 22:14:41 GMT -8
Hola Sports Coast to Coast, it is I, Spiderfan, the official NFL analyst of this great forum coming to you with the Week 10 edition of Red Hot Gridiron. Without further ado, let us begin!
Lincoln Riley Is Not NFL Head Coach Material
Late Saturday night I was watching the USC-#6 Oregon game and I was watching it I had a thought that I thought was profound. In his years being the head coach of Texas Tech, now USC QB coach (and HC of the Arizona Cardinals up until this season) Kliff Kingsbury's teams were notorious for their lack of defense. This was one the reasons why Patrick Mahomes was able to put up the numbers that he did as the Red Raiders quarterback, as he always had to score to keep Texas Tech in the game, something that actually helped him with the Chiefs as the Chiefs have had a similar dynamic arguably until this season. Mahomes' NFL success and Kingsbury's offensive prowess got him to be the HC of the Arizona Cardinals where he had a mixed bag tenure that ultimately resulted in him no longer being the coach.
In his years of being the head coach of Oklahoma and especially over the last couple years as head coach of the football team that people LA actually care about USC, Riley's teams have been notorious for lack of defense, resulting in the recent firing of USC (and Oklahoma holdover) DC Alex Grinch. Considering both Riley and Kingsbury come from the late Mike Leach's coaching tree, the profound thought I had was that if Kliff Kinsgbury had the talent of a Oklahoma or USC his college coaching record would have been the same as Riley's and if Lincoln Riley had the relative lack of talent that Texas Tech had, Riley's college coaching record would have been as the same as Kinsgbury's.
Now why am I talking about this in a NFL column 1.) I don't get a chance to talk about college football very often and 2.) Because of Caleb Williams' likely #1 pick status, the conversation around Lincoln Riley becoming a NFL HC has started up again. Having seen how the Kingsbury-Murray package deal ended, despite the great amount of optimism that surrounded the beginning and even middle of it, I don't see a Riley-Williams package deal having a different ending. Kingsbury turned out to not be a great NFL HC despite having the quarterback that he tried to bring to Texas Tech, and Kyler Murray kinda underperformed considering he had an offense perfectly tailored for him. Now maybe the failure of the Kingsbury-Murray tandem has more to deal with Kyler Murray not being up to being a NFL quarterback as it has to do with anything else. It is certainly possible that Caleb Williams will pan out better than Kyler Murray has as he is a different person, and it is possible that Riley learns from where Kingsbury failed. But I can't help but think when I hear "Lincoln Riley and Caleb Williams package deal to the Bears", yeah that was already tried and didn't work.
The Bungling Bills
For a team that has been in the AFC and Super Bowl conversation for the last few years to be 5-5 (and a missed holding call and a lack of awareness incomplete Hail Mary from being 3-7) and out of the playoff picture at the moment WITHOUT a major injury to their quarterback, is a disappointing at best and an utter failure at worst, depending on how hot of a take you think is appropriate. I tend to lean toward the latter considering they lost on MNF at home to a team that is lucky to be 3-5, the Denver Broncos.
Josh Allen has totally regressed and looks like the guy who there was doubt about coming out of Wyoming. The lack of a Cole Beasley to check down to and the lack of a Tyreek Hill style deep threat has brought out all of Allen's worst tendencies in the passing game. He's more of a threat as a runner than a passer and is not doing as much running as he needs to do to make up for his lack of quality production in the passing game.
The ending of the Broncos game totally falls on the Bills coaching staff. Two timeouts were called prior to the Broncos end of game FG attempt by the Bills. Everything should have been set and ready. Instead there were 12 guys on the field, meaning that when Will Lutz missed the kick, he got another try at it, which resulted in a Broncos win.
I bring that all up to say that I have no sympathy for when the Bills make Sean McDermott and the rest of the coaching staff as fall guys for the lack of success as it relates to expectations. Even though his tenure as Tinys HC has not resulted in success this season, in the event that Brian Daboll is fired (which considering the Tinys may not win another game seems likely) he should be the next Bills HC as his time as OC of the Bills was when the Bills convinced everyone that they were contenders.
Other Thoughts:
-The Bears were the biggest winners of Week 10 by far. Not only did they get a win in primetime, they also put themselves in better position for the #1 pick.
-I thought about talking about the Patriots in a full segment, except I feel like until it becomes more clear that Belichick is for sure losing his job there isn't much to talk about.
-I still can't believe the Ravens blew that game against the Browns. Although on further inspection, the Ravens have a recent history of losing games like that so it shouldn't be all that surprising.
-Is it just me or is it really weird that Packers-Steelers ended the near exact same way as the Titans-Steelers game did last week?
-The Jaguars had a real opportunity to show that they were contenders not only in the AFC, but in the NFL at large AAAAAANNND they failed the test. Not the first time this has happened with the Jags, nor it will it be the last time.
-Whether or not Josh Dobbs can keep playing at as high of a level as he is currently playing at, he'll lead the Vikings to enough wins to keep the Vikings from bottoming out, which will almost certainly lead to Kirk Cousins keeping his job... unless of course Dobbs pulls a 1997 Randall Cunningham and keep the job for himself.
-Barring injury, the Houston Texans are going to be a playoff team, which is not a sentence that has been said about the Texans in years.
-Will Levis has come back down to earth after his stellar debut. If the Titans still want to make the playoffs, they might want to consider putting Ryan Tannehill or even Malik Willis in at QB.
-Because of the Lions win, the LA sports media complex can now go back to talking about how badly they want Brandon Staley to be fired.
-Congratulations to Kyler Murray for his victorious return! If he can keep playing like that, Caleb Williams nor Drake Maye will not be a Cardinal.
-40-0 and 49-17. Suffice it to say the Cowboys had dominant performances against the Tinys this year. The Tinys because now they are firmly in the Caleb Williams or Drake Maye sweepstakes.
-The Seahawks have the exact same record through 9 games as they did last year, a season in which they finished 9-8 and barely made the playoffs. I feel less optimistic about the Seahawks than I did at this point last year, as a Seahawks fan I hope they prove me wrong.
-Because of their wins against both NYC teams, the Raiders are very much back on the map at 5-5. Unless Aidan O'Connell plays better than he did on Sunday they will quickly fall off the map.
-NBC's choice to have the star of Heidi do the introduction to the Jets-Raiders game, in honor of the 55th anniversary of The Heidi Game was spectacularly awesome. It reminded me that football has been the greatest game in the world for a long time.
And that is all for this week's Red Hot Gridiron. As always I hope ya enjoyed and I hope to see ya again next week. This is spiderfan out.