A Giant Super Bowl Subterfuge
Okay. So this will not be the seasonal wrap-up post. I will post that and the chaos awards on Friday. I wanted to get the SB summary post out of the way first. But I know you want the picture, so here it is:
So that game kinda ruled?
To my smugness and disappointment, the first half went pretty much exactly how I expected it to go. The Eagles basically controlled the game with ball control offense, moving methodically, maintaining the line of scrimmage, and winning the short yardage fights on 4th downs. The Chiefs were in it, but they were on their heels and had been essentially gifted one beautiful moment of chaos when Hurts fumbled the ball and the Chiefs ran it back. Outside the first drive the Chiefs had, which was a quick score, it felt like the game wasn’t actually that close. I expected the second half to open up into something worse. Instead, the opposite happened. The Chiefs played lights out, perfect football, and the Eagles slowed down. The defense crumbled, and chaos reigned. The Chiefs not only caught up, they pulled ahead! Partially due to former utterly useless Giant Kadarius Toney catching a wide-open touchdown that the Eagles failed to cover and then with the biggest punt return in NFL history, where he switched back after a stumble and took it down to the 5 to set up yet another touchdown the Eagles didn’t cover. But the Eagles weren’t done without a fight, and Jalen Hurts orchestrated another outstanding drive and 2pt conversion to tie it. The Chiefs had 5 minutes to try and win it, and they did. Chaos reigned once more as Mahomes, who had to be high as fuck, scrambled 30 yards on a bum ankle to set them up in field goal range with just under two minutes. That was when the bad chaos crept in, and the refs called a penalty they had ignored all day: defensive holding on James Bradberry, former Giant, and Eagles star corner. Instead of an easy kick and the Eagles getting a chance at a 2 minute drill to thrill us just a little more, the Chiefs effectively got gifted the game, and one of the better Super Bowls in history ended with a sour note in the back of our mouths.
Okay, recap over, opinions time. If you will allow me one short brief interjection of self-indulgence:
HAHAHAHA EAT SHIT PHILLY, YOU PEE PEE AND DOO DOO EATERS
Okay, now that I got that out of the way, a more measured response on many of the topics for discussion, starting with the elephant in the room. The Penalty.
It was defensive holding. I don’t think that part is arguable. You can make the case that it didn’t really affect JuJu’s movement, but it’s impossible to argue Bradberry wasn’t holding his jersey. The problem here was the timing of the call. When certain dipshits argue that the NFL is rigged, it’s plays like this they point to, where a pivotal moment is suddenly affected by refball. While I still don’t think anything is rigged, I get why these people point here. The call was ticky tack, the kind of call that if it wasn’t penalized, probably wouldn’t cause a massive uproar outside some bitter Chiefs fans had they lost the game. It was the fact that it happened then, essentially deciding the game, with a penalty that had effectively been ignored up to this point. The game was pretty well called before this moment. I think the several long replayed calls like the incomplete pass, Goedert Catch, and Devonta Smith drop were all correct. The refs had been doing the usual thing of letting the players play. Maybe that’s why Bradberry figured he could give JuJu a little tug and be fine. It was such a weird time and not extreme enough of an example for the refs to suddenly decide to police this. The call was correct, but it felt wrong, and I think what most of us are really angry about was that it robbed us of a better finish.
Was Philly a fraud this whole time? No. It was fair to speculate whether the Eagles were as good as their record when they faced cake competition for most of the season before this point. Watching this game the impression I got was that the offense was just as legit as advertised, but the defense and their many sacks might have been overrated. You don’t get this far by being a fraud though, give the Eagles credit.
Mahomes is just…he’s fucking amazing. Even now, years into his dominance, I still love watching him play. He’s so much fun. I love him. Honestly, if Hurts wasn’t an Eagle, I’d love him too. Hurts is very likable. I wish I could retroactively give him an Eagles 2017 ring and strip it from Carson Wentz. Andy Reid is a delight and he and Mahomes will probably play out their careers into the sunset together. Nick Sirianni has extreme bro-douche energy, but I kinda like that about him. He’s a good heel.
Kadarius Toney. Toney was an annoyance for me this year and I will own my salt about it. I hated the draft pick, I didn’t like his attitude, and I hated that he was basically always hurt and didn’t appear to want to be there. I liked that we traded him away, woeful WR room and all. He did nothing of value for us. Then for the rest of the season he’d occasionally catch a pass and do his wild Toney jukes a few times, and run 50 yards for a gain of 17, and analysts would swoon and talk about how the Giants were so stupid for letting him go. HE DID NOTHING FOR US. HE WAS WORTHLESS AS A GIANT. He had exactly one really cool game last year, that was it, and watching everyone flip out and fawn while he ended the game with 3 catches for 32 yards made me feel like nobody actually knew what the fuck they were talking about. He wasn’t special for the Chiefs either, his magical ability in KC was staying more healthy and catching the occasional pass. He wasn’t even relevant in the SB until the Eagles forgot how to cover and he caught a touchdown anyone reading this could have scored on. But I’ll give him this: he saw my anger, and he decided to spite me, by making probably the biggest game-changing play in the entire bowl with that punt return. The thing is, I would have taken 3 Super Bowl MVP Kadarius Toneys if it meant the Eagles lost, so in the end, thank you Toney. You were a worthless Giant, but I hope you are happy now. People will croon for ages about how the Giants couldn’t find a way to use his talent, but I cannot stress enough that he was worthless for the Giants, and going to KC was probably the best possible outcome for him to succeed, and he still wasn’t special. Yet. Things might change.
Chaos: We had some great chaos! The fumble return, the punt return, the 4th downs, the Eagles falling apart on defense, the Chiefs won the game and the chaos gods were on their side. Root for chaos, my friends.
The halftime show: pretty meh! First off, props to Rihanna for doing that while pregnant, that obviously resulted in certain limitations and I won’t fault her for any of that. But the show itself just wasn’t interesting. The Super Bowl halftime show is a spectacle showcase and her showcase amounted to a bunch of floating platforms slowly moving up and down and some dancers basically doing the same thing the whole time. No special guests, no big set changes, no big choreography showcases, nothing. I know Rihanna was limited, but that wasn’t an excuse for everything else being underwhelming. Katy Perry can’t dance and her halftime show was full of variety and nonsense. The Weeknd isn’t a dancer and he had Covid limits and they still did a bunch of shit with him. If anything this was an opportunity to do more around her. Middle of the pack halftime show. Not bad, especially if you like her music, but won’t go down as a memorable one. I haven’t even seen any good memes out of it yet, which is a bad sign in this day and age.
The commercials sucked, as they always do now. Throwing celebrities at you to mug at the camera using pop culture references to trick you into thinking it’s funny because you recognize the thing. I laughed once, at the Pringles commercial when the air traffic controller guy used his stuck hands as his wands. That felt like a throwback to the ages when companies actually just tried to make a funny 30-second bit.
But let’s take our final moment to talk about possibly the most embarassing thing about the Super Bowl: the field. If you are a grass field guy, you took an L during that game. This single factor may have been one of the quietest yet most influential factors. Players were slipping everywhere, any players trying to cut or turn the corner seemed likely to slide. It may have actually been the reason neither team got much pressure, especially the Eagles, who rely on that. The grass is unbiased so you can’t blame it for one team losing, but that field sucked. I can’t believe the NFL quality control people failed the product! Classic NFL move.
Is this a top-10 SB? I think it might be. Some other contenders (not in order):
42 (18-1)
51 (28-3)
25 (Wide right)
43 (Steelers/Cards)
52 (Philly Special)
3 (Joe Namath’s guarantee)
34 (one yard short)
36 (Tom Brady #1 over the Rams)
49 (Malcolm Butler pick)
47 (49ers/Ravens blackout game)
32 (John Elway Helicopter)
That’s 11, and probably missing a couple of contenders from the 80’s and 70’s, which I don’t remember on account of not being born yet. Would you rank this one higher than at least two of these games? I could be persuaded. The last call really bummed me out on this one but as a game, it really does deserve to be up around here.
The ending to this game epitomized the problem many have had with the NFL over the last decade or so: We’ve had so many excellent games ruined thanks to the officials deciding to insert themselves into the game at the absolute worst possible time. That call straight up ruined the game for me because it felt like the players didn’t decide the final result, but rather the refs did. That takes nothing away from KC. They deserved the W with the way they played in the 2nd half, but with how hard Hurts was balling, I wish he had a legit chance to at least try to respond. Like you said, we got robbed of a far better ending and it absolutely sucks because that was otherwise an awesome game.
Can I be a devil’s advocate? The refs wouldn’t insert themselves as much if the players stopped committing penalties, just sayin’. Bradberry is the one to blame here, in my eyes. And his, too, since he fully admitted to holding.
I appreciate the viewers’ desire to see Philly get another drive, but I do NOT want the refs having that on their mind. “I just saw a penalty, but in the service of a more dramatic ending, I’m not going to call it.” No no no, they should be thinking in black and white, rules only. Where it is in the game and what’s happening in the game is IRRELEVANT to me. If it’s a penalty, call it every single time.
This particular penalty has been done a MAJOR disservice because almost all of the replays I’ve seen online show the SECOND hold… Bradberry with his fingertips lightly on the hip. They fail to show the FIRST, and more egregious hold… immediately after the snap, when he was obviously, clearly, 100% impeding his movement, jersey tug and all. This play ends very differently if Bradberry doesn’t drape himself on the guy immediately after the snap and yank the jersey, before the route is even run, when he does it again, less egregiously.
https://ibb.co/SN6jd5Z
(source: youtu.be/BWkt79xkd00&t=942 freeze frame through 15:45-15:46)
It would be great if the officials could be completely consistent in HOW they call these penalties from the get-go, but they’re human, the clarity of what they see and where their eyes are looking changes from play to play, and while it may suck for the drama, I’m fully in favor of that penalty being called every single time. The fact that Bradberry not only didn’t dispute it, but was fully on the “Yea, I totally did it. I was hoping to get away with it.” train… it just makes the whole drama around this kind of… weird. The headlines should be, “Player commits obvious foul and admits it, ruins what otherwise may have been a dramatic finish.” XD
Thank for for being a voice of reason. I’m tired of, “I don’t want the refs to affect the game,” followed by, “The refs need to let it go in that situation.”
It’s like whining about the game being rigged, then arguing the game needs to be rigged. I’ve been seeing it all season (well, many seasons) and I’ve finally lost it with this SB. It was such a great game and the only thing spoiling it is people bitching about a ref doing his job correctly. Call out the DB for the shitty ending, not the ref!
Yea, it’s definitely a double-edged sword, and generally, people seem to only complain when it goes against the outcome they wanted. You’re correct, though, the refs ignoring that penalty is as much of an insert as them calling it is. So if both choices are “refball,” why not just try to get the right call? Enough with “swallowing flags in the big moments.” Call it the right way every time and the players will catch on.
I get where you’re coming from, but I think you’re missing the main issue which is the severe inconsistency of these types of calls. There was a similar situation earlier in the game where Bradberry pretty clearly held or at least impeded Juju on a 3rd down pass attempt, and they let it slide. That play set the tone for the entire night for not only the players on the field, but also for the fans watching. They were letting them hand-fight, tug, pull, grab, push, etc. without foul all game long, but on the single-most important play of the game, very abruptly switched things up and opted to throw a flag on what was a rather minor hold relative to some of the other misses we had seen earlier. Had they been calling things tightly like that all game long, I don’t believe that anyone would be complaining about that call, since it was consistent with what we had already been seeing. But that didn’t happen. They didn’t call a single defensive hold to that point, nor did they call DPI. To make that call, in that situation, after having not done so the entire rest of the game, is naturally going to upset a lot of people, since it basically ended the game right then and there.
Missing a call is not “setting the tone.” It’s just missing a call.
And no, they weren’t letting them push and tug all game. I’d love someone to actually show me where this was happening. Coverage looked so clean in the broadcast all night long beside the one egregrious miss on JuJu.
People keep trotting out this stuff over and over and over again. It’s just parroting at this point. There’s nothing behind it. Everyone’s so used to just saying it, so they keep saying it.
The refs didn’t switch anything up. They called a clean game and fans are desperate to find someone to blame for a lackluster ending.
Since both you and Jedi Bob interpreted my comment the same way, I’ll assume I wasn’t clear enough. I’m with you in that I don’t like inconsistent calls, and I am in full agreement that it’s currently a big problem across the league.
And I’ll also agree they shouldn’t have let the first Bradberry interference play go. But! Them failing to call it early doesn’t mean they should let the 2nd one go. It’s not ideal, but I’d rather they be “inconsistently correct” rather than “consistently wrong” there. I’m sure the Chiefs gave them an earful after the first one, so the refs may have even been on the lookout for it. I listened to most of the game with a sick infant, so I will confess I did not see most of the game visually, but if they were letting the same holding and jersey tugs go uncalled, I can maaaaybe understand a little of the vitriol. But still, I think this play was pretty clearcut, and I absolutely don’t think letting it go because they let other penalties go is the right answer.
So, I’ll concede the refs should get some blame for digging themselves a hole, but I’m still of the mindset that if a player intentionally committed a penalty, you ultimately can’t blame that on the refs.
Which is exactly why I’m in favor of them ALWAYS calling penalties, regardless of time or circumstance. I think it would help bring the consistency to the penalties system that we all want. The players would be less encouraged to “see what they could get away with,” because they would know that, within human error, penalties will be called if they are seen. Period. As the parent of an elementary school child, I have seen firsthand how letting them get away with something now and again encourages them to ALWAYS be looking for how to get away with it. A consistent zero tolerance policy is a pain in the butt to stick to, but it works.
I think the dilemma is summed up in this: Do we prioritize consistency, or fairness? I tend to side with you, BB. I think we need to be as fair as possible, which means we call fouls when we see them. If we want to change the rules to allow “shirt-tugging within 5 yards of the LOS on zag routes” then go ahead and do that and start calling games that way. But if it’s in the rules, that’s the one piece of understanding all players should expect to know and adhere to. If you play outside of that, you’re taking a risk.
I think you can have both if you prioritize fairness – which is where I think I disagree with a lot of people, who seem to be for letting refs “set the tone,” and then expecting them to step back and “let the players play” in the big moments. Doing that, by its very nature, is wildly inconsistent and gives players mixed messages, because they don’t know what to expect and will always try to push and see what is allowed on any given night with any given set of refs.
If you aim for the correct call, regardless of circumstance, regardless of situation, and if the NFL *properly* pays and trains the referee teams to look for the same thing, creating that fairness will by its very nature lead to consistency. That’s what I believe, at least.
> I appreciate the viewers’ desire to see Philly get another drive, but I do NOT want the refs having that on their mind. “I just saw a penalty, but in the service of a more dramatic ending, I’m not going to call it.” No no no, they should be thinking in black and white, rules only. Where it is in the game and what’s happening in the game is IRRELEVANT to me. If it’s a penalty, call it every single time.
That’s a reasonable mentality, if they had been calling it all game. If the refs had been strongly enforcing defensive holding all game, then James Bradberry commits a defensive hold on the last drive, then calling it is perfectly reasonable. It’s the consistency that’s the issue – either call it all game or don’t call it at all. “I just saw a penalty, but since it’s not particularly egregious and it’s not a big moment, I’m not going to call it” isn’t any better (and IMO worse) than your example. Failing to call things like that all game sets the expectation that the refs are letting players get away with the small stuff, and in the NFL, especially in the Super Bowl, you have to take every single possible advantage you can get to increase your chances of victory.
I also find it unlikely that just nobody committed defensive holding all game until Bradberry did it on the last drive – if players feel the refs are calling a looser game, they’ll adjust their play accordingly. If the argument is that they just didn’t see any defensive holding all game and only spotted this instance of it on the last drive, well… that also reflects pretty poorly on the officiating. In that case, just get skyjudges already.
About the screenshot, I took a look at it and the video of the play. It’s hard to tell from that distance, but I’m not 100% sure I see a hold there before the jersey grab. It’s within 5 yards of the LOS, so the DB is allowed to make contact and play press, as long as there’s no grabbing. That screenshot looks like there COULD be a hold, if his hand is actually pulling his jersey there, but it could just be extended in front of him, trying to block his movement before the receiver changed directions. I think we’d need a closer view to tell for sure.
I mostly replied to your comment in my reply above to Stunkei, so I won’t rehash those points here, but I don’t think I was clear enough that I agree with you in premise. Calling an inconsistent game is far from ideal. I just think “sometimes right” is less awful than “always wrong.” But, yes, we absolutely need to be aiming for “always right,” knowing the best we’ll get is probably “almost mostly sometimes right,” because humans suck at this kind of thing.
Otherwise, I agree with your points, except the last. One frame is hard to capture it, but there are a few frames in the 15:45 timer where you can see the back of the jersey spiking out, and one of the other angles shows the WR leaning back off balance to compensate for the yank with his right arm fully extended behind him. That doesn’t happen if he’s not being pulled off balance, and while I agree a closer view would be helpful, there’s enough there to seal the deal for me, especially since Bradberry fully admitted he did it.
Also, I LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOATHE the Iggles, so honestly, I would be standing up and applauding even if it wasn’t a penalty at all and they just called it ‘cuz. LOL. I jest, I jest… mostly. Ok, not mostly. Ok, not at all. Every play should have been a penalty on the Iggles. THERE I ADMITTED IT, ARE YOU HAPPY NOW!?
We Have to give credit to the Chiefs second half adjustments, especially on offense and the Defense did just enough to help them win the game. But most of all, Andy Reid for once managed to handle the Clock correctly.
For sure. My discussion of the officials is not an attack on Kansas City. Regardless of that call, the Chiefs 100% earned that victory. That was a masterful second half conducted by Andy Reid, Patrick Mahomes, and the entire team. They adjusted, attacked Philly’s weaknesses, slowed down an offense that was on fire to that point, and took home a well deserved second ring to make up for the absolute disasterclass they put up two seasons ago. As much as I dislike Kansas City as a team, I have to give credit where credit is due. They were and are the best team in football, and it will likely stay that way for a long time.
I didn’t mean it that way, I was just saying KC ball control at the end and 2nd half adjustments is what won them the game, not the holding call. The Holding was correctly called, and while the refs did call the game inconsistently, the way Patrick Mahomes threw the ball is what got Bradburry called. Everyone and their Mothers knew it was a holding since the WR should have been near the ball, but was instead of at least 5 yards away.
I’d add Super Bowl 38 up there, maybe just outside the top 10. Yeah, the first half was boring, and the Halftime Show is all anyone remembers, but looking back on it, Jake Delhomme going blow-for-blow with Tom Brady in the second half is impressive, and the Panthers were one John Kasey out-of-bounds kick away from actually postponing the Patriots dynasty.
Yea Replace it was Super Bowl 3, which is way too overrated (as a game).
Id put super bowl 13 over 25 as most of 25 was just Otis Anderson running up the middle for 4 yards and Jim Kelly throwing incompletions for 60 minutes
i love how we’ve reached a stage where a pregnant woman and one of the most talented singers of our generation can dress as a literal uterus and belt out a halftime show while platforming around hundreds of synchronized dancers dressed like sperm all to flashing lights that would make anyone with a neurological condition convulse and somehow, somehow this is all rated “meh” because katy perry rode a fucking animatronic lion a few years back and there havent been any lulzworthy memes in the days following, because you know i have to wait for the memes before deciding if something was cool
Yeah, I liked the half time show. It was more like a concert, and less like a circus.
(Note: I haven’t watched the Halftime Shows since the ’90s so I cannot comment on the show itself.)
It may have been overhyped. When something is billed as The Greatest Thing You’ll Watch This Year, “very good” isn’t good enough.
I’m pretty disappointed how Satanic it wasn’t. That was some lying-assed hype.
It was a meh performance and looked lipsynced.
They’re all lip synced, some are just better at hiding it than others (or actively choose not to hide it like RHCP did).
Nice man! also EAT SHIT PHILLY
This Super Bowl was miles better than last year’s for me but the ending honestly is gonna bring it down to being one of the more average super bowls in my mind. If the eagles lost in a more standard way instead of cause of refball it’s probably a top 15 Super Bowl at worst.
This was the ideal example of Halftime Adjustments. The Chiefs adjusted to the Eagles, but the Eagles didn’t respond to the Chiefs adjusting to their gameplan. Its just a shame that the game is going to be known for a penalty called at the end of the game. It was already a classic (if not Top 10 than damn near close) and with the way the 2nd half was going, there was no way to guarantee that the Eagles would’ve picked up the Field Goal.
“Kansas City gets all the calls.” – Philadelphia Eagles and St. Louis Cardinals fans, probably.
Would have rather seen the Eagles take it because of Hurts (and because I generally dislike DB holding penalties), but the Chiefs are just that gallingly good. On Hurts, though… I’m not sure it can be conveyed just how wild it is for a pro football star to come from Channelview, TX in this day and age.
STOP TALKING ABOUT PENALTY TIMING, FOR FUCK’S SAKE!!!
The refs do NOT insert themselves into a game by calling a foul correctly.
They would be inserting themselves into the game by NOT calling it correctly because of “the situation.” I’m so tired of this fucking argument. The ONLY way, and I mean ONLY way for officials to NOT insert themselves into the game is to call every foul as objectively as they can from the very beginning to the very end. A fucking jersey grab while a receiver makes a cut is literally a by-the-book foul. The DB knows it and we all should, too.
And stop saying they “LET IT GO ALL GAME.” WHAT THE FUCK DOES THAT MEAN? Were there a ton of egregious holds you guys were constantly seeing? They missed on on JuJu, that’s the only video evidence we have, it was probably a mistake, not a fucking voluntary missed call.
Christ, can we stop making these fucking idiotic comments? It was a really well-called game.
If the game ended in sad fashion, it’s the fucking DB’s fault, not the officiating. If you want them to change officiating to literally only call stuff that makes the game entertaining, then just say so.
You took the words right out mouth. Those people are literally advocated for a more scripted outcome
Yeah, the penalty discourse is driving me nuts. Call the penalty regardless of time! Don’t script it!
Loved that the Eagles lost. Their defense just didn’t show up in the 2nd half as evidenced by them letting Mahomes with a bum ankle score on every drive. I wasn’t happy with that call either at the time, but like you said after the fact with multiple angles it was clear Bradberry held twice on that play one being the Jersey tug. One additionally thing to call out is that Bradberry owned it and admitted he held. Props to him for not blaming the refs. I really with the Giants has been able to hold onto him
I’m glad Bradberry is getting a lot of love and recognition for his sportsmanship. He knows that holding and gamesmanship is part of the game and this time he got caught.
Kanye was obviously slated to have an appearance before hand, but he bit the hand that feeds him. I guess Drake wasn’t available.
I knew that in a close game, the ending was gonna come down to refball. Sure enough, the front page of r/NFL is just discussing the calls and no calls. Such a shame, it was satisfying to hear intense booing during the challenges and shit. Cut to commercial, I’m not trying to inspect a dudes feet!
The first half went by quick as a Mark Buerhle MLB game, but ball control isn’t always the advantage that people say it is. That’s how I play Madden, and all it takes is a wild turnover and a home run or two to flip the gameplan on its head. As a Bears fan, fuck Philly!
God, do I love seeing Philadelphia eat shit! The perfect poetic end was Jalen Hurts’ last-ditch effort to be a hero on an all-time great hail mary pass…..falling 25 yards short of the end zone.
I generally agree with everything here! Game was great! Halftime was okay, given Rihanna’s pregnancy, but not overwhelming. The floating domino stages were really cool, though!
Commercials were a bit better this year than last year, but still lacked quite a bit. It seems like the only thing these marketing departments think people respond to is a semi-zany celebrity endorsement. Sure, it’s kind of neat to see John Travolta singing with Turk and JD, but when the song is just a corporate-shill remake of “Summer Nights” it just feels….not great! Where’s the ingenuity? Where’s the freshness? The most interesting ad was the Tubi one that tricked many people into thinking someone had changed the channel because at least they’re trying to play with the medium. Everything else seemed like some soulless nostalgia grab that didn’t really know who they wanted to target. Say what you will about BK, but you’ve got to admire the confidence for taking the night off since they’ve already completed their mission.
Andy Reid deserved it. He is now part of the convo as greatest coach. 2 Superbowl titles, 4 appearances, 5 NFCCG, 5 AFCCG. The only current coach with a mote impressive record is the Hoodie.
My top coaches:
Bellicheck
Walsh
Lombardi
Noll
Reid
Johnson
Parcells
Landry
Coughlin
Seifert
You could even argue Reid should be higher in the salary cap era but he has guaranteed himself a spot in the HOF.
Oh and fuck the Eagles and that smug dbag Sirianni
Eagles fan here! Certainly disappointed at the result, but KC is never an easy matchup no matter how much green Kool-Aid I drink.
Refs didn’t cost us the game, but they definitely did not help us throughout the game either (for the record I think that Devonta DID maintain that catch, Tyree-style, but that the Goeddert catch was bobbled and should have been overturned had the refs not done a makeup for doing that “call a live play dead because they screwed up” thing and literally giving KC a free chance at a challenge)
This game was about 5% on the special teams, which has been mediocre all season and imploded at exactly the wrong time, and 95% on Jonathan Gannon, who was nationally exposed as the Vikings-level fraud he is as a defensive schemer. His plan for most of the season was to blindly throw talent at each play, and giving the opposing offense whatever they wanted for the chance that the talent would bail him out with a sack or forcing a turnover. Against the woeful offenses of the NFC it worked more often than it didn’t, but KC’s O-line and Mahomes, even at less than 100%, are gonna escape and make you pay EVERY SINGLE TIME with that plan.
The defense weren’t frauds (you don’t have four individual players each fraud their way to 10+ sacks in a season), but when they couldn’t have their home run plays they got sliced to death. Thank Christ that Gannon is now Arizona’s problem. Between him and Kyler being out half the year, I’d put money down early on Caleb Williams being a Cardinal in 2024.
Honestly, I was just happy I didn’t have to hear Cris Collinsworth or fucking Tony Romo literally talk about nothing but Mahomes for 4 hours. Kid is an amazing player and maybe one of the most fun QBs I have ever seen, but goddamn I hate the way his very existence can catastrophically derail play-by-play.
Why do people who bitch about The Penalty (that Bradberry himself copped to) only show photos/videos from AFTER it occurred?
THIS was what was called, not the handchecking afterwards ffs
https://twitter.com/PeteScantlebury/status/1624973241046401026/photo/1
Eagles fans should instead be angry that their vaunted defense got burned for easy touchdowns TWICE on the same pre-snap motion…
Are guys like Collinsworth and Romo so out of touch that they don’t realize how overhyping guys like Brady and Mahomes just makes us hate all of them?
Will the day come when an overhyped player calls the announcers out and says “Stop. Just stop.”? I’d like to think Mahomes would do that. Russel W, no way.
“I haven’t even seen any good memes out of it yet, which is a bad sign in this day and age.”
Smash bros stage: Am I a joke to you?
https://twitter.com/CardySimon/status/1624948408392843268
TBH, it wasn’t that great. Defense being so atrocious meant that the stakes felt lower on any given play because what’s the point, they will score anyways.
Chad Henne is gonna have TWO Super Bowl rings.
TWO.
CHAD. FUCKING. HENNE.
” I wish I could retroactively give him an Eagles 2017 ring and strip it from Carson Wentz. ”
Why? That’s not fair. Wentz is better than Hurts anyway.