64.0 and falling, one must wonder about the tenure of a QB who makes Jake Utler look good :dubious:
It’s actually worse.
Didn’t the Giants cover?
The Bears covered but it wasn’t that kind of bet. 
It’s up to 27.5, but it is a post-merger record.
FWIW, I’d take the points for 2 reasons:
1)The Jaguars have pride.
2)Fox will eventually call off the dogs.
Yeah, the consensus seems to be that the old record was 24, when the Steelers hosted the expansion Buccaneers in 1976. So, apparently, this is a bigger mismatch than a dynasty playing at home against the worst expansion team in modern sports history.
True, but a bad defense can make a bad offense look very respectable, and while the Bucs have the 3rd worst offense (per DVOA), the Eagles have 4th worst defense, so I wouldn’t be shocked if Tampa put up 24+.
If I didn’t have a rule about not betting against the Giants/Mets (even fake money), I would’ve been all over Chicago in our NFL wagering competition. (Yes, that’s a plug; starting in mid-season is no problem given our format.)
That said, the Giants actually moved the ball pretty well, including a very good day for the running game, against a quality Bears defense. At some point Eli will have to stop throwing three INTs per game (won’t he???), and the Giants will rally a bit. Maybe only enough to take them out of the running for Clowney, but still.
I’m nitpicking myself here, but that’s probably not quite true. The average team in 1976 scored only 19.2 point per game, as opposed to 23.2 per game so far this season, so 24 points then was probably a bigger relative margin than 26 points is today.
Having watched a couple of Bears games, I’m not convinced the Bears have a quality defense anymore. They’re currently 22nd in points allowed per game and their pass rush and safeties are huge question marks. They’ve certainly gotten the turnovers (they’re leading the league in turnovers), but unlike Bears’ defenses of the past, they aren’t nearly as dominant at stopping offensive scoring.
Even bad teams win occassionally in the NFL. But the Giants are a bad team.
How many times will Eli have to hear “Why can’t you be more like your brother?” at the Manning Family Thanksgiving this year?
I’m expecting more of a “No, Eli, of course you’re a great football player. We love you both equally sideways glance”
Oh, no doubt about that. I just think that, as things shake out, the Giants will eventually be considered more like the 24th best team in the league, instead of the 31st. A slight improvement from the O-line and Eli regressing a bit towards his mean would have a disproportionate impact on the offense, and the defense is merely “pretty bad” instead of “godawful.”
That’s the most positive assessment of the Giants I’ve read since pre-season.
I actually forgot about Vick, but I still think Philly’s easy money to win this game, which they only have to do by 1 point. The Bucs offense is really bad and the team appears to be tuning out their head coach.
I wouldn’t touch this one, but gun to my head I pick Denver. What you say is true, but how hard is it for Peyton to be a measly 4 TDs better than whatever Jacksonville is trotting out there (is it Henne?).
What’s the story on Megatron? I heard one source on the radio say he’s out and another said he’s in. Detroit is -1 in Cleveland and my bet would entirely depend on Johnson.
The Giants are worse than the Jaguars, their numbers are not bad, they are horrendous. And, of course, most stunning is the fact that they took the Lombardi home just 20 months ago. At this point, they can only fail to fail.
To which he responds “If I was, I’d only have one Super Bowl ring.”
Well, no, they’re not worse than the Jaguars. Amazingly, as bad as the Giants have been, they’re not even close. The Jaguars might be the worst team through the first five weeks in the past quarter century. They’re historically bad.
As to whether the Giants will continue to be as putrid as they have been throughout the season: that’s entirely possible. It’s just that they have a lot of talent on offense, and the offense has been the problem. It’s been a very good unit for the past few years, and other than the degradation of the offensive line is largely the same personnel. I’d be a little surprised if they didn’t improve (somewhat).
You’re not wrong. It’s semantics, but I’d still call the Bears a quality defense. They certainly aren’t bad. But they aren’t good either, merely average.
The biggest issue is their front 4. Injuries have been devastating, Melton and Collins out for the year, Paea has been gimpy and missed last night. Plus, the DTs were their thinnest group on the team in camp when McBride got hurt and they let Izzy go (gah!). Peppers is just a guy at this point and McClellin is every bit the disappointment that I projected. Every problem with the Bears D stems from here.
The Safeties aren’t nearly as bad as you imply. They are just okay, the problem is that Urlacher is gone, the new LBs can’t fill in that deep middle as well and the Bears are calling plays more aggressively than Lovie ever did. They are much less of a traditional Tampa 2 and Conte and Wright are being asked to do new things. The Bears haven’t shown a trend of getting killed up the middle, most of the big plays against are on the outside against single coverage.
What was the call on the play when the Giants WR spiked the ball in frustration without being down? I didn’t have the sound on to hear the commentary. Can that play not be challenged?
IIRC, it was ruled that the receiver had given himself up, and was therefore down before the ball came loose. And while I love to see stupidity being penalized, I think it was the right call.
I’ll take your word for it, because it didn’t seem like that to me the games I saw. Wright was late and let Randle get a touchdown last night, and was the worst graded Bears defender in the Lions game. Conte likewise, has done nothing to convince me he’s anything but an average Cover 2 safety who can sit back there and not let anyone get deep on him, but can easily get torched by the underneath stuff, as Reggie Bush showed. I may have to watch them more closely.
I think it could have gone either way, and I have seen those things go against the receivers before. He didn’t make any real “I give up” kind of move – he fell down and spiked the ball in frustration. He wasn’t touched before he did it or made any effort to do anything else. In any case, the Bears won so it’s all aces in my book.
At first glance I’d say they took a step back from last year but I think they’re doing an average job. Neither are Troy Polamalu-level safeties and if there was someone better out there, I’d like to see the Bears get him. I think a big part of this is the lack of effective pass rush.