NFL Power Poll
As we all look around and develop nervous twitches as the narrative turns from “What’s a catch” to “What’s a legal hit on the quarterback” there is a clear and awesome side effect that has abounded through the first weeks of the NFL season.
These games are super close and the offense is on the sharp increase. Simply put, the games are more fun to watch.
The Rams-Vikings in a shootout last Thursday. The Falcons on Sunday. The Titans in a thriller again. Monday night’s drama.
Side note: The NFL’s inability to tell the truth after the fact on all these missed calls only hurts the effort to attain credibility from the general public.
Whether the rule changes – both the hits on the quarterback and the head-hunting changes in the secondary – were designed for player safety or increased confidence and comfort for throwers and catchers, the points are everywhere and the drama has been nuts.
Los Angeles Rams (4-0). How do you stop this bunch? Seriously. Safeties close to the line? Well, Cooper Krupp, Brandin Cooks and Robert Woods will torch you down the field. Drop seven in coverage? Have you seen the monster that is
Kansas City (4-0). Wow, if the NFL MVP race needed a Heisman moment Patrick Mahomes delivered it Monday night with that rolling left, switching hands, and throwing with the left late in last night’s comeback win at Denver. Dude has been amazing, and last night with Von Miller spending a ton of time in the backfield harassing the second-year QB. That offense is crazy good, and next Sunday it faces Jacksonville and the best defense in the league. If the season ended today, Mahomes’ QBR of 87.7 would be the highest since ESPN started the stat in 2006. (QBR is a complicated stat that ways a ton of elements with the highest score is a 100.)
New Orleans (3-1). Another high-powered offense in a game that has become offensively dominated in recent years. The questions of “How do you stop them” apply here as well. And those questions are only about to get more difficult and more multi-dimensional considering that Mark Ingram is returning from a four-game PED suspension this week. It’s a good thing too, because as great as the Saints offense has been (the top three scoring offenses in the NFL are K.C. with 145 points, the Rams with 140 and the Saints with 137) the defense has been almost Atlanta bad. Side question: Is there a bigger discrepancy in sports than how football fans and baseball fans view PED use? It’s hard to think of one.
Jacksonville (3-1). After three straight irresistible forces, the Jags are the league’s most immovable collection of objects. The Jags lead the league in yards allowed (259.2), passing yards allowed (164.2), and points per game (14.0). This bunch is complete and layered. Side note: Former East Hamilton High and Vandy standout Tre Herndon is on the Jags’ 53-man roster and his third-team behind some dude named Jalen Ramsey. Yes, that makes it tough to get on the field for Tre, but there is no player at that position who would be better to learn that craft.
Chicago (3-1). Another defense-first bunch, which will make the rest of the season a lot of fun in a sneaky good NFC North. (Gang, this Bears bunch should be 4-0, but, like William Money told Little Bill at Greely’s at the end of “Unforgiven” “Deserve’s got nothing to do with it.”) Yes, the two best defenses in the league are trusting quarterbacks that hardly have earned that trust, but that’s part of the joy of a hard-salary cap sport. Giddy-up.
Powerless
New York Giants (1-3). OK, be it the play-calling or the play of Eli Manning or the play of a porous offensive line, someone has some ‘splain’ to do. There’s no reason that a team with one of the five best wide outs in the game and one of the five most physically gifted running backs alive is averaging a smidge over 18 points per game in today’s high-flying landscape. And remember it’s now been 36 games – late in the 2015 season – that the Giants scored more than 30 points in a game.
Oakland (1-3). The Raiders delivered the first win to Jon Gruden in almost a decade. How long ago was the last win for Gruden? It happened in late November 2008. It happened on the same day that Lane Kiffin was hired in Knoxville. Seriously. And a big reason the Raiders toppled the Browns was some sketchy officiating on a fumble and a first-down reversal.
San Francisco (1-3). The season-ending injury to Jimmy Garoppolo was a tough blow, and we can all wonder whether Jimmy GQ will be the guy long-term or not. But for a team that had very high hopes coming into the season that is now turning to C.J. Beathard for the rest of the year, this is your leading contender to truly tank. This 49ers nucleus with a top-three pick in a draft with a slew of big-time defensive linemen makes a 2019 look even brighter.
Buffalo (1-3). The Bills are going to be the football version of the Durham Bulls at the start of the season in the classic “Bull Durham.” Cue the manager as he slings the bats in the shower. “You lollygag the ball around the field. You lallygag your way he first-down marker. You lollygag in and out of the locker room. You know that that makes you? Larry?” Larry: “Lollygaggers.” “What’s our record?” “1-and-3” “How’d we ever win one?” “It’s a miracle. “It’s a miracle.”
Arizona (0-4). The Cards are winless and lost Sunday on a last-second field goal to a team that lost its best defensive player to a broken leg and said player was throwing obscene gestures at his own team. Yes, that’s where the Cards are.
Banking statements
It’s Alabama and everyone else. Understatement. The simple and comparatively supreme greatness of Alabama is magnified with the stress and strain that faces other programs. When was the last time Alabama had back-to-back sleep-walking efforts like Georgia just dropped? When was the last time Alabama escaped with a road win like THE Ohio State did when James Franklin was working on his postgame speech? When was the last time Alabama suffered a significant injury that made you go, “Well, that one really hurts” and wonder if they could recover? Exactly.
An unbeaten Notre Dame means the SEC will only get one team in. Overstatement, but just slightly. An unbeaten Irish certainly would throw a wrench into a two-SEC playoff field, but considering the weakness of the ACC and the unrest of the Big Ten, it’s still possible to get Georgia and Alabama – as long as each enters the first weekend in December in Atlanta perfect – in. But that scenario would need help, like Oklahoma and West Virginia splitting the regular-season matchup and the Big 12 title game or a Clemson loss to South Carolina or a mid-level ACC team. (Side note: Is saying “Mid-level ACC team” like Lt. Daniel Caffey asking Col. Nathan Jessup, “Grave danger?” To which Col. Jessup said, “Is there another kind?”)
Florida State is the best betting team in the sport. Statement. How’s this for one of the more amazing stats we’ve seen in a long, Long, LONG time: FSU, once the class of the ACC and maybe all of college football, is 0-10-1 against the number in its last 11 ACC games. Chew on that.
Speaking of that, Mike Leach is every gambler’s best buddy. Statement. Washington State is 5-0 against the number and 3-1 going over. Long live the coaching Pirate. And yes, we are to blame for not seeing this trend earlier.
College football is better when the OU-Texas rivalry matters. Understatement. We are looking forward to this weekend’s Red River Rivalry with the high-flying Sooners and the “are-they-back?” Longhorns. Good times.
Baseball starts
OK, we see you Yaisel Puig. The Dodgers slugging, high-spirited said the Dodgers are coming for Atlanta and headed back to the World Series looking for a different result.
We have long said that baseball talk is background chatter until we get to the ‘er’ months. So as September gave way to October, the playoff fields and match-ups are finally set.
This is going to be a fun ride.
For starters, the Rockies visit the Cubs play a win-or-go home game in Chicago tonight at 8:05. Want to know how close the six-game series between Chicago and Colorado has been? Well, for starters the teams split the series 3-3. To make it more tight, the total runs in those six games ended 33-33.
A sneaky edge for the Cubs is that they have not left the Windy City in almost two weeks as their only ‘road’ series since Sept. 19 was at the White Sox across town.
As for the starters, well, the Cubs hand the ball to Jon Lester, who has a ton of big game experience. This is his third start in a win-or-go-home situation and his 22nd postseason start.
The Rockies turn to lefty Kyle Freeland, who may be the best starting pitcher you know nothing about. He finished 17-7 with a 2.85 ERA pitching half his games in Coors Field. The Rockies are 16-4 in Freeland’s last 20 starts, but amazingly, he has been much better in the altitude – going 10-2 with a 2.40 ERA at home and 7-5 with a 3.23 on the road.
Sneaky edge: This is the first time in Freeland’s big league career that he has pitched on three days rest rather than his usual four days off.
As for the AL wildcard, the 100-win Yankees and the most powerful lineup in baseball history welcome the A’s on Wednesday night.
Couple of things on the AL play-in game:
Did you know that Oakland is 63-29 in its last 92 games to get into the playoffs?
Did you know that the A’s won 97 games and were the ‘second’ wildcard team in the AL? Yes, the A’s, if they were in the National League, would have won each division and had home-field advantage through the entire playoffs.
Did you know that 19 of the 25 players on the Yankees roster were in last year’s wildcard win over the Twins? By comparison, only Jed Lowrie was on the A’s roster the last time they made the playoffs in 2014. (Three total A’s have playoff experience total.)
Did you know that A’s slugger Khris Davis has hit .247 each of the last three seasons? Yes, exactly .247. His career average? It’s .248.
Did you know that the A’s and Yankees split their six-game series this year with the winning team scoring at least five runs in each game?
Did you know that the Yankees hit a MLB-record 267 homers this season? You may have. Did you know that the A’s finished third this year with 227 homes this year?
Did you know that the Yankees incredible home run total has been achieved by an even more incredible balance? The Yankees have 12 players with double-digit homers this season.
Welcome to the ‘er’ months people.
Let the games begin.
This and that
– Jameis Winston has been named the starting quarterback for the Bucs when they get back to work on Oct. 14. Hmmmm, wonder
– Speaking of returns to the field, Le’Veon Bell told ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler that he has every intention to return to the Steelers around the time of Pittsburgh’s bye, which comes on week seven. How this plays out will be quite interesting considering the back-and-forth the current Steelers have had through the media about Bell’s contract holdout situation. Side note: It will be really interesting to see how the Earl Thomas injury and his contract dealings will alter future holdout scenarios like Bell’s and others in the present and the future.
– Speaking of Earl Thomas, Seahawks coach Pete Carroll told folks to give Thomas a little slack for the one-finger salute to the Seattle bench Sunday.
– The NCAA has announced it will investigate Baylor University for how it handled the sexual assault allegations. Wow. Just wow. The DMV is looking at the NCAA and saying, “You guys certainly take your time don’t you?”
– OK, if the reboot of “A Star is Born” is a third as good as its commercials, well, count me in. Sweet buckets of buttery popcorn and that tub of soda, count me in.
– This is simply awful. The fan at the Ryder Cup hit by a wayward drive from Brooks Koepka has lost sight in her right eye.
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Today’s question
It’s a Tuesday. True.
True or false, the Dodgers will return to the World Series.
True or false, you’d take Alabama over the field to win it all in college football.
True or false, the NFL rule changes have helped the offenses.
You know the drill. Answer some T or F, leave some T or F.
Gandhi would have been 149 today. Groucho would have been 128.
Today is also National Name Your Car Day.
Rushmore of cars with names. Go.