Post by spiderfan on Dec 18, 2023 22:56:27 GMT -8
Ahoy Sports Coast to Coast, Spiderfan your official NFL Analyst here, presenting you with the Week 15 edition of Red Hot Gridiron. Without further ado, let us begin!
The MVP Race (of this column)
Here's the way I look at the MVP race of as Week 15. The Baltimore Ravens lead the AFC right now. The San Francisco 49ers lead the NFC right now. Lamar Jackson and Brock Purdy are MVP candidates respectively. The Ravens and 49ers play each other next week. Whoever leads their team to victory in that game should significantly further their chances to be MVP. Assuming it is the Ravens, their game after the 49ers is against the Dolphins who have an MVP candidate themselves in Tyreek Hill. If the Ravens win, even if Hill has a good game, the MVP should go to Lamar as he will have head to head victories against both of his MVP competitors.
Now, if the 49ers beat the Ravens, and the Ravens beat the Dolphins, the MVP should probably go to Brock Purdy. I say probably because hanging over the MVP discussion is the possibility that Tyreek Hlll breaks the single season receiving yards record (he's only 255 yards away). If he manages to do that and the Dolphins beat the Ravens, then he should get the MVP. Now, the argument can be made that as long as he breaks the record he deserves the MVP, which is fair argument that I don't entirely disagree with. To me the head to head matchup against the Ravens matters in the context of the MVP race. Whether it does in reality, we shall see.
Browns and Bears Oh My!
I did not think I was going to be a writing a segment about Bears-Browns prior to Sunday, but it turned out to be the best game of the day, so here we are. Because of the final outcome I could approach this segment from the "Never Underestimate Just How Bad A Bad Team Can Be" angle and pick on the Bears for choking a game that they totally should have won. I'm not going to do that. 1.) That is a stale formula that goes best with the Tinys or a team I feel like picking on 2.) I don't feel like picking on the Bears 3.) I want to talk about how good the Browns are. So you might ask "Why do you not feel like picking on the Bears?" Because having watched the Bears throughout this season, they feel close. They really are a better team than their record indicates and when infused with the high draft picks they are going to get next year, they are going to be a force to be reckoned with. HC Matt Eberflus will probably lose his job, but as far as the jobs that are going to open up, I'll argue from this point forward that the Bears job is the best one. If not for multiple blown leads this season the Bears would be in the playoff picture right now. How often is it that teams that are playoff caliber have open HC jobs? Not super often.
I want to talk about how good the Browns are because as their comeback was unfolding I came to form a hot take that stuck with me throughout the day and that I feel extra confident in. I think the Cleveland Browns are going to make the AFC Championship Game. Every few years there is a team that makes a conference title game run out of nowhere. In the years I've been doing the column there has been 2017 Minnesota Vikings quarterbacked by Case Keenum, the 2017 Sacksonville Jaguars, and the 2019 Tennessee Titans quarterbacked by Ryan Tannehill, and even the 2021 Cincinnati Bengals who actually ended up being thisclose to winning Super Bowl LVI. I think the Joe Flacco quarterbacked 2023 Cleveland Browns will join that group. Now is saying that after a 17-7 4th quarterback comeback against the recurring choke artist Chicago Bears a total hot take that has the potential to age terribly? Absolutely, and I won't argue that it isn't. However, I do want to make argument as to how I got to that point.
Defensively, the Browns defense have been lights out this season, once again proving that Jim Schwartz is one of the best defensive coordinators in the league and deserves another shot at being a head coach. Offensively after a rotating room of QBs featuring an inconsistent and underperforming Deshaun Watson, an inconsistent and underperforming former XFL MVP PJ Walker, and wrong place in the wrong time rookie Dorian Thompson-Robinson, guy who was unemployed less than a month ago Joe Flacco has come in and been the best QB the Browns have had all year. While you can certainly make the case that isn't saying a whole lot, considering the Browns managed to scrap and claw into an above .500 record DESPITE the QB play, having the best play coming out of the QB position at this point in the season is MASSIVE. The Browns offense which has weapons like Amari Cooper, David Njoku, and Kareem Hunt now have a quarterback that is skilled enough to put them in position to make plays.
You could feel the energy of the team and of the fans during the comeback. The belief was there. When you have belief combined with talent, good things are going to happen. And let us not forget that despite his mediocre regular season career, the man has appeared in 3 AFC Championship Game and won a Super Bowl of which he was the MVP. There was a time when there was argument whether or not his playoff performance made him an elite QB. When/if the Browns make the playoffs, there is precedent for a Flacco led team having success. And right now, I don't see why that success can not repeat all these years later.
New York, New York
Sunday was not a great day for the New York City football teams that play home games in East Rutherford, New Jersey. To be fair, for most of the time this column has existed neither the Jets or Tinys have had much success, but Sunday felt notable as both teams were lacking success simultaneously for differing reasons, that I felt were worth discussing.
The New York Football Tinys were unsuccessful because despite their recent 3 game win streak led by new fan favorite Tommy DeVito and despite having a similar record (Tinys being 5-8 and Saints being 6-7), the Saints were just flat out better than the Tinys, especially on the defensive side of the ball. The Tinys were kept out of the end zone and scored only 6 points. What made the loss hurt even more was that the Saints not only mocked DeVito, they also crushed the brief Tinys playoff hype that was brewing in light of the Tiny's recent success, although being real considering the Tinys play the Eagles twice in the next 3 weeks, so even if the Tinys HAD beaten the Saints and DeVito mania had gotten even bigger, they would still have been crushed in all likelihood. I do think that based on his play and the excitement that he brought to an otherwise horrible and uninteresting football team, DeVito does deserve a shot to compete with Daniel Jones for the starting job next year.
Lack of success for the New York Jets made the lack of success sustained by their NFC cousin, look not all that unsuccessful. To be fair, unlike the Tinys, the Jets played a team that had a significantly better record than them in the Miami Dolphins and so being blown out on paper shouldn't be surprising, especially considering the Dolphins blew out the Jets on Black Friday. Except, unlike the Black Friday game the Dolphins lacked MVP candidate Tyreek Hill and the Jets were quarterbacked by Zach Wilson who was coming off his best game as a NFL QB AND the return of Aaron Rodgers was revealed to be imminent and likely to occur in the event of a Jets win, which could have sparked the most improbably last season run of all time, led by a quarterback in Aaron Rodgers with arguably the most improbable injury return of all time. The punchline is the final score was 30-0 in favor of the Dolphins and the Jets were eliminated from playoff contention, which likely means that Rodgers isn't returning as the risk of reinjury is not worth it at this point.
The play that I knew the game was over was during the first Jets possession when Zach Wilson ran backwards and fumbled the ball at the 1 yard line. The second after that play transpired the outcome was obvious. It is a real shame too, because a Rodgers return and late run would have been fun to watch. We didn't get it. There's always next year!
Other Thoughts:
-Congratulations LA based sports media complex, Brandon Staley finally got fired! Have fun dreaming about the Chargers hiring Bill Belichick or Jim Harbaugh meanwhile the Chargers actually end up hiring Todd Monken or Jim Schwartz!
-Jake Browning has the opportunity to do something very few guys like him get. He gets to go from practice squad guy to guy who helps a championship caliber team get into the playoffs without their starter, and put himself into position to become a starter. Right now, he is on pace to do that. Good for him!
-Mike Tomlin made a mistake firing Matt Canada. Not that Canada deserved to keep his job, but because the Steelers continued to suck offensively without Canada has meant the blame has gone to Tomlin who Steelers fans are now clamoring to be fired. If Canada had stuck around, Tomlin could have made him the scapegoat for a non-playoff season, instead of creating the circus that now surrounds the Steelers.
-The Broncos got blown out by the last good team they play this season. Now their remaining 3 games (Patriots, Chargers, and Raiders) are all against teams they should beat in theory. Russell Wilson is still washed up though, so anything can happen.
-The Panthers last second win in the rain against the Falcons was a feel good moment as a non-Falcons fan. To see a team that has only won one game all year, finally win another one in bad weather no less, was special. The fans who showed up to that game despite the record and despite the weather deserved to see their team win!
-Baker Mayfield is playing some of, if not the best football of his career right now. As long as he does that, the Buccaneers are almost certain to make the playoffs.
-Jordan Love is not there yet. He's been up and down for a reason: he's practically a rookie. The fact that the Packers have managed to be in the playoff conversation this long is a credit to their coaching staff more than anything.
-The fact that a game featuring Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs was flexed out of primetime because of just how just bad the Patriots suck, should illustrate just how much the Patriots suck.
-Not gonna lie it was really awesome to see the real Houston team (the Texans), quarterbacked by an alum of University of Houston (Case Keenum), beat a team cosplaying as the old Houston team (the Titans in their Oiler throwbacks).
-The Cardinals continue to be the team that doesn't win games yet looks respectable even at this point in the season. The culture that Johnathan Gannon is building should result in something lasting if he is given the time to build it.
-When the coaching staff of the Commanders gets cleaned out, I wonder where Eric Bienemy will end up coaching next. He isn't the interim of the Commanders, so he isn't getting their HC job and because of the Commanders record he likely isn't going to get any HC job. He should have taken the Colorado Buffaloes job when he had the chance.
-The Bills beat the Cowboys at the line of scrimmage. The offensive and defensive line of the Cowboys were absolutely no match for the lines of the Bills. Hence why you had a 31-10 score that could have been worse if not for a Cowboys garbage time TD.
-When you blow as many red zone opportunities as the Jaguars did against the Ravens you deserve to lose. 5 times no points? Inexcusable.
-What is also inexcusable is the NFL league office being called out for a bad replay review by the rules analyst during a game, especially a big primetime game. It makes the league office look at best incompetent and at worst corrupt.
-I'm not going to spend a whole segment celebrating the Seahawks upset against the Eagles. Was I thrilled to see Drew Lock lead a 92 yard game winning drive? Yes. Do I believe that the Eagles would have won if wasn't for bad play calling on their part? Also, a yes.
And with all of that said, that is all for this week's Red Hot Gridiron. As always I hope ya enjoyed and with the playoff push being as exciting as ever, I hope to see ya again next week. Remember, football is the greatest game in the world. This is spiderfan out.
