The Draw Play

THE WEEK IN CHAOS
–As we get closer and closer to the playoffs things still feel deeply murky. The Patriots and Rams feel the most secure as plain solid teams. The Bears and Broncos feel…fraudulent. Everyone else is flawed or very suspicious. The Colts are this season’s blitzkreig team: hot out of the gate, fades in the stretch. Danny tore his achilles, the Colts are toast. Sad to see it happen this way.

But now we’ve also hit the time of eliminations. 9 teams are out. Teams like the Bengals and Vikings are inches from the edge. Now we have two brackets. The playoff bracket and the loser bracket. While many of these loser teams are irrelevant, they can still play meaningful games.

Case in point: the Titans and Browns delivered in the battle at the bottom. The Titans probably have the worst roster in football and Cam Ward is in hell, but the Browns aren’t much better outside Garrett, who is now 3 sacks from the record (I hope he gets it). Shedeur threw some bangers on Sunday but the Titans managed to prevail.

Other things of note! The Steelers did that Steelers thing they do when they tank the vibes and then win an important game and reset the status quo. One week ago it was about how Tomlin had lost the fandom. Now he’s blowing kisses and knocking the Ravens into the dreaded “in the hunt” territory. They will probably lose again next week and tank the vibes again.

The Saints managed to squeeze out a fun victory against the hobbled Bucs, who now sit very precariously on the edge of the division with the upstart Panthers right next to them. I don’t know what the Saints are going to do this offseason and the roster is a mess but I think Kellen Moore is a good enough coach.

The fucking Bills man. I can’t quit you. Snow football with the Bengals in a shootout is what football should be. Football Moose

Despite all vibes pointing against them, the Lions handly beat the Cowboys in a Thursday Thriller. Barring a truly epic collapse by Philly, this sadly put some nails in the coffin for the heralded NFCE winner streak.

But one interesting game this week was Vikings/Commies. JJ McCarthy put together his best game by far against the woeful Commanders. Maybe there is a technique here for developing QBs. Cast them into the fire, make everyone give up on them. Then bench them for a time. Then they come back and play passable football and the expectations are now much lighter. We can call this the Bryce Young Method.

GIANTS CORNER
–The Giants were on bye this week so most of the discussion has been regarding Joe Schoen. Should he keep his job? This humble blogger says no. For whatever defense of Schoen I am willing to give, he hasn’t been good enough, and it would be a dreadful mistake to keep him around as a dead duck for a new regime. Schoen has made several mistakes that I feel are forgivable in context, such as the Jones contract, letting Barkley/McKinney walk, drafting Evan Neal or Jaylin Hyatt, etc. But part of being a good GM is seeing those mistakes before they backfire, and he is awful at that. When so many moves, even when they are sensible in context, backfire, that’s a pattern of failure.

I like how he’s managed the cap to a healthier position, but I hate how he’s managed the kicker position. I like that he’s managed to fix the o-line into a workable, functional unit. I hate how he’s managed the WR position. Why has Jaylin Hyatt kept a roster spot for years despite never seeing the field? Why did we let Isaiah Hodgins walk while this bum sticks around? Why is Darious Slayton getting paid when as a player, he’s expendable? I love Slayton as a person, but on the field, he’s #3 WR quality.

I think the lack of depth is an overstated problem that most teams have, and depth is also a coaching issue. Having great depth in this league is a luxury, not a common feature. I think Brian Burns was a great trade, but flipping Toney for Darren Waller was a wash at best.

Why wasn’t Shane Bowen let go last season? He would have been an easy jettison. Why was firing Daboll a Mara/Tisch choice? Bottom line is I do not trust Joe Schoen to be good enough to pull this team out of the hole. With him, we’ve gone even deeper. Let him go before he makes another mistake and wastes another 2 years of this team picking a bad coach.

The Giants currently hold the #1 pick thanks to the Titans win. If they finally complete the tank job the one year they dont need a QB, and nobody wants to trade up, it will be infuriating.

CHAOS OF THE WEEK
–This is one of those weeks when I have to re-write this entire section because MNF was stupid. Do you like turnovers? Well SoFi was full of them. Hurts pulled off what might be a first for NFL history– to throw an interception AND lose a fumble on the same play. I cannot overstate how wild this is. A guy has to throw a pick, have that pick get fumbled, recover that fumble, then fumble it himself. If this was the only wild play of the night it might win Chaos of the week anyway, but the game featured roughly 75 more turnovers. The ball seemed to desire freedom at all costs.

Saquon finally had a break out run. Herbert took a personal record # of sacks the week after hand surgery. It went to overtime. Jalen Hurts threw his 4th pick of the night. 8 turnovers. Deeply stupid football. Extremely entertaining.

CHAOTIC MOMENTS OF THE WEEK
–Aaron Rodgers, catching his own pass (derogatory)
–FOOTBALL MOOSE RETURNS
-Bengals had the game largely controlled until this moment
-What bad tackling does to a team

THE VIBE CHECK
– I will not dance on the Chiefs grave. Not yet. As of now, they remain mathematically alive. But they’ve never been this close to irrelevance in the Mahomes era, and even if they survive, this current team’s identity (especially on offense) needs a fix. It feels like the Chiefs offense just hasn’t been good since Tyreek left. They’ve won plenty after that, sure, but it was on the back of the defense. I’m gonna be bold and say it: If he hadn’t won multiple Super Bowls and proven himself a HoFer, we’d be getting a lot more questions about Mahomes moving forward. Would these questions be fair? Not really. But I do wonder if Mahomes crossed the success threshold where no question aimed at him is going to be taken fairly. The Chiefs offense is not good. How many years can they get away with that before we are allowed to have “a conversation”.

After so long up top, the Colts had the farthest to fall. Goodbye. Farewell. All that.

Consequently, the Packers and Jags replaced their division leaders and are primed to set themselves up for a good seed. The Texans are also riding high, but good god please get that team an offense.

Meanwhile, the Commies vibes are so bad the Giants are currently favored to win.

CACKLES OF THE WEEK
–Travis Kelce, just hang ‘em up my dude. A bad drop, followed by another bad drop, which results in a pick in the final 4 minutes. This was particularly hilarious because about 30 seconds earlier Collinsworth was Mahomes glazing about how he’s just seen Mahomes come back too many times. This pick effectively ended the game.

BIG OOF OF THE WEEK
-Caleb Williams has a man open in the endzone on 4th down, but he floats the ball and boom, game over.

CHAOS WATCH
–I mean, if JJ McCarthy is “fixed” now, maybe the Vikings will be interesting? They aren’t going to make the playoffs but they could screw over the Cowboys, Lions, or Packers. 
–The Eagles are still capable of the total collapse. If you pray to the gods of Chaos, they must fall. As far as fandom goes, I’d love to see this Eagles team limp into the playoffs and lose, but if we are hoping for more actual entertainment, the Cowboys would honestly make a better contender. They are at least fun to watch.

FRAUD WATCH
–The Bears got exposed and have a negative point differential, but that loss wasn’t actually that discouraging. They held their own in the frozen tundra. A tough loss to be sure, but this team is still going the right way.

My patience for the Ravens is over. Even if they make the playoffs this team sucks.

The Chiefs will remain a sleeper until they are mathematically eliminated. The Bengals are a sleeper because the offense is good enough to cause problems.

I trust almost none of the good teams. Maybe the Rams. I could buy the Patriots if they had an impressive resume, but they dont. They’ve beaten the injured Bucs (okay), they beat the Panthers in Foxboro (eh), they beat the Bills (good!), and that’s literally it for teams with a winning record. I desperately need to see this team play some threatening competition but that wont happen till the playoffs outside Buffalo this week.

SNUFF FILM OF THE WEEK
-The Commies got Gink shamed. This was probably the worst loss of the year for Washington. Jayden Daniels came back to QB a lost season and re-injured his arm on the Ginkle INT. He probably shouldn’t have even come back. After such a great year last year, the Commies are in hell once more.

DISAPPOINTMENT DUCK
– The Ravens. They were at home. They were favored. The Steelers were in disarray. Pittsburgh didn’t even dominate the game, but the Ravens still lost. The stands were empty. We do not need these Ravens in the playoffs.

MOST UNWATCHABLE TEAM OF THE WEEK
–The Raiders were gifted a pointless final play in the Broncos game due to an iffy delay of game penalty. They kicked a field goal. This allowed them to lose 24-17 instead of 24-14. It may have been the most useless field goal in history. However, it allowed Vegas to cover the spread and it made Dave Portnoy very angry, so that was funny.

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BETS FOR NEXT WEEK: SPONGEBOB WEEK
I get this request a lot. I’ve avoided it for the same reasons I have avoided multiple other good theme ideas: they happen to fall under a particular cultural blindspot. I was a Cartoon Network kid. My only knowledge of Spongebob is like, 1 episode and memes. So this is going to be memes.

FALCONS @ BUCS
The Falcons are trash and eliminated. The Bucs are hurt and falling apart. Classic Thursday Night Football trash incoming!
If the Falcons win, I will draw Kirk Cousins as Tired Spongebob

BROWNS @ BEARS
Bears, beat up these Browns. But also let Myles Garrett get a few sacks for fun.
If the Browns win, I will draw Shedeur as Rainbow Spongebob

RAVENS @ BENGALS
I hope the Bengals offense takes the Ravens out back and ends this farce. Nobody in the AFCN deserves the playoffs.
If the Ravens win, I will draw Lamar and Henry in the “Okay, get in” meme

CHARGERS @ CHIEFS
If the Chargers win this and the Texans win their game, the Chiefs are out. Lets manifest it.
If the Chiefs win, I will draw Chris Jones as TaUnTiNg SpOnGeBoB

BILLS @ PATRIOTS
Bills are way too inconsistent to trust here. Especially in Foxboro.
If the Bills win, I will draw Josh Allen as Strong Spongebob

COMMIES @ GIANTS
The Giants are favored and I kinda get it. The Commies may have lost Daniels again, the defense is awful, the offense is injured, and they haven’t played against Dart yet. Still, the pessimist in me cannot pick my team.
If the Giants win, I will draw Jaxson Dart as Caveman Spongebob

RAIDERS @ EAGLES
Eagles get a much needed gimme win against a puke bag. If this game is within a score it’ll be embarrassing for Philly.
If the Raiders win, I will draw Kevin Patullo as the “imma head out” Spongebob

JETS @ JAGUARS
Is anyone still paying attention to the Jets
If the Jets win, I will draw Trevor Lawrence as MY EYES Plankton

CARDINALS @ TEXANS
Texans defense is smothering.
If the Cardinals win, I will draw Jacoby Brissett as Spongebob burning the Texans

PACKERS @ BRONCOS
Wow who would have expected this game to be so interesting earlier this year. I’ll go home team.
If the Packers win, I will draw Jordan Love as Smug Spongebob

LIONS @ RAMS
Lions are on the outside looking in and this game will not let them get a foot in the door.
If the Lions win, I will draw Dan Campbell as Handsome Squidward

PANTHERS @ SAINTS
I kinda want the Panthers to win the South. That would be funny.
If the Saints win, I will draw Tyler Shough as Giant Mr Krabs over Plankton (Young)

TITANS @ 49ERS
Titans, you earned your one nice win. Sit back down.
If the Titans win, I will draw Cam Ward as Evil Patrick

COLTS @ SEAHAWKS
The Colts collapse continues. Is Philip Rivers going to save them?
If the Colts win, I will draw

VIKINGS @ COWBOYS
Cowboys are a fun team. Vikings are not.
If the Vikings win, I will draw JJ McCarthy as Smooth Spongebob

DOLPHINS @ STEELERS
It would be extremely Steelers to lose this, but they are at home, so maybe they escape the curse of bad teams.
If the Dolphins win, I will draw Tomlin as Blurry Mr Krabs

A TIE
If we get a tie, Crosseyed Spongebob