Last week the Jags got their first win, justifying their status as favorites over the Colts. The Vikings hung on against the Jets in London to remain undefeated, and the Falcons won a wild OT game over the Bucs on TNF. The Commanders improved to 4-1, and the Bengals dropped to 1-4 with an OT loss to the Ravens. The Bills dropped their second straight, while the Broncos improved to 3-2. The Niners and Seahawks both lost close home games, and they remained tied for the NFC West lead. Last night in Arrowhead, KC defeated the Saints to also improve to 5-0.
The Seahawks and Niners meet on Thursday night to determine the division leader, while the Bears and Jaguars make the trip to London. Washington travels up the road to meet the Ravens, and the Lions and Cowboys face off in Dallas. The Bengals will try to right their ship against the Giants in New York on Sunday night, and the next night the Bills and Jets will also square off in MetLife Stadium.
This week’s games. All spreads taken from ESPNBet on Tuesday, October 8 at 9:25 am CT.
They can’t fire Rodgers, too, and his dead cap hit is massive. So he’s on the team through next season but probably not much longer after that. And you know he’s going to want approval on any coaching hires, so the decision to get Saleh and Rodgers will have cost them the last couple years plus the next few.
I haven’t bothered listen to NY sports radio today. This is 100% on Rogers and his inability to be coached. He refuses to run an offense with motion. He refuses to do play action. He demands to throw on just about every down. That didn’t come from Saleh. Rogers doesn’t have the talent anymore to pull off things the way he used to. He has the talent to still win but he can’t play like he used to. That won’t change with a new coach.
ETA: he threw 54 passes last week and only completed 29 with three picks. That’s not a winning strategy
I too have been wrong on occasion. I don’t see it either. Belichick wants complete control of an organization. He wants input on personnel. I don’t see him inheriting someone else’s midseason shit show. I won’t rule out him coming back somewhere next year, but it seems like he’s having fun doing what he’s doing for now.
Continuing the discussion regarding the Chiefs defense from last week’s thread, here are the yards allowed by KC to the opponent’s leading rusher each game, and the season’s yards per game average by each rusher.
There are some questions about Josh Allen’s fitness to continue playing in last week’s game and readiness for this week’s.
“The more I watch this video, the more I’m troubled about what happened,” Nowinski, co-founder of the Concussion Legacy Foundation, told CNN’s Brianna Keilar and Boris Sanchez.
“As Josh Allen was going down, you see he is raising his left arm to protect his head, which is a very natural movement when you’re falling like that, and then after his head bounces so high off the ground, that arm goes limp and you see his wrist catch against the ground which can break your wrist.
“That’s something that any athlete if they were aware would avoid, so I really do think he was unconscious there for a moment after that hit … Ethically, the idea that he was trying to be a hero and no one told him: ‘Hey dude, you were knocked out, your teammates had to roll you over’ really makes you wonder what happened here and this does need to be investigated.”
Nowinski, a former college football player and WWE wrestler, added that “the optics of being handed smelling salts walking out of that tent is an absolute disaster and should not happen.”
I thought that can’t be his average then I remembered this is Derrick Henry.
When I watched it happen in the game, I was sure hitting his head knocked him out. Then he claimed afterward he hurt his ankle and that’s why he came out. That really smelled fishy to me.
I, of course, understand the reasoning there. It makes sense, but let me play Devils Advocate for a second.
First, Belichick has an ego. Undoubtedly he’d want to be coming into a prime situation and calling the shots, but things have changed. Since he was canned by the Pats he didn’t really get any serious interest from other teams. He’s been working for media and doing a million interviews and other segments. At a glance it looks a lot like he’s a guy shifting gears into his post-football career. But I’m not convinced Bill is happy with that outcome. If he really wants to get that all time wins record he’s going to need to get working again and he probably doesn’t want to be starting in the middle of some ground up rebuild.
The Jets, in spite of being the Jets, have a decent situation. Rodgers has his issues of course, but he’s a veteran QB and a guy that knows how to win games. I think Bill would prefer someone like that over another rookie or a guy looking for a second chance like Fields or Tua.
I think the Jets too might be willing to give Bill enough autonomy to make it appealing. They hitched their wagon to Rodgers, and him to them. If Rodgers implodes the Jets are cooked, so might as well go all in. If the Rodgers+Belichick marriage is a train wreck I don’t think they are any worse off than Rodgers flaming out on his own. Certainly the Jets bending over backwards for Rodgers hasn’t worked out great, if anyone can get Rodgers to act like a professional you’d think it’d be Bill.
All in all, I think the bad blood between Bill and the Jets is the biggest hurdle. But Bill would probably be happy to thumb his nose at Kraft and the Pats a bit. I also think Bill would really like being in New York instead of say Carolina or Las Vegas.
All that said, if the Jets don’t move mountains to try and hire Vrabel they are hopeless as a franchise.
Any decent coach has got to be wary about signing up with an owner willing to ditch a pretty decent coach 5 games into the season (I give Saleh a lot of credit for going 7-10 last season without Rodgers and still giving KC all they could handle). Especially after only really having Rodgers for basically 5 games. Woody Johnson is now rivaling Jimmy Haslam levels of “ooh, shiny new toy”.
Let’s see if the Jets have a dead cat bounce next game. They are still done for the season but maybe they get a game or two. The defense was good. Saleh controlled the defense. The offense sucked. Hackett still has a job. Makes sense. But Hackett didn’t stroke Rogers ego enough.
And who knows if Josh Allen will be at 100%. He played poorly last Sunday, both before and after the blow to the head. He was only 9 for 30 for 131 yards. And I think just four of those passes were after his head hit the turf.
