FMQB: Since You’ve Been Gone
Sorry for the hiatus (somebody actually noticed, woohoo!), but I’m back in action!
*Cue Kelly Clarkson music*
Since You’ve Been Gone:
We’ve missed a rockin 5 weeks of the NFL season, including:
- The Bengals knocking off the 5-1 Titans
- Tua starting, winning, then hurting
- The Bears going from 5-1 to 5-6
- The Ravens going from 5-1 to 6-5
- The Vikings have gone from 1-5 to 5-6
- Dez Bryant is back in the league, so is Antonio Brown and Josh Gordon
- Alex Smith back at QB, and having his team leading the division
- Joe Burrow’s catastrophic injury
- The Matt Patricia era is officially over
- DeAndre Hopkins had one of the more insane hail mary catches against 3 defenders
Week 12 Quick Hits:
- Panthers at Vikings ended up being one of the more exciting final few minutes of the week. Panthers had a 95% chance to win at the 2 minute warning
- How do the Raiders beat the Chiefs one week, and get obliterated by the Falcons this week
- In the race no team wants to win, 1 game separates 1st and last place in the NFC East. It’s the Giants now, but all 4 teams have held a share of the lead at somepoint in the season.
For the Record:
- Nathan Peterman consistently had games where he threw more picks than the Practice Squad WR did for the Broncos on Sunday
- The Chargers loss on Sunday was the first game in 11 where the difference was by more than one score.
Most 2020 Week of the NFL:
This week, we had a Wednesday afternoon football game. It was Wednesday afternoon so NBC could broadcast the lighting of the Charlie Brown Christmas Tree that night. RGIII was throwing passes to Dez Bryant. And we had a WR start at QB for a different team.
Stat of the Week:
The Broncos and Saints combined for 75 yards passing, and ran the ball 77 times vs. 25 passes.
Stat of the Week #2:
Panthers defensive Rookie Jeremy Chinn scored his 1st NFL TD on Sunday. He scored his 2nd a mere 10 seconds later
Stat of the Week #3:
There were more positive COVID tests in the past 3 weeks (172) than the NFL had in their first 3 months (168).
Stat of the Week #4:
Tom Brady is 2nd in the league in passing yards, 4th in TD passes, but also 2nd in INT’s.
Stat of the Week #5:
Despite playing 6 ½ fewer games, Dak Prescott still has more passing TD’s than Daniel Jones
Stat of the Week #6:
Dwayne Haskins, in 4 games, has thrown the same amount of TD passes that Cam Newton has thrown all year.
COVID update:
Ravens/Steelers
I’ve heard about 4 different reasonings, but I still don’t understand why the Broncos were told “Play Sunday or you forfeit” while the Ravens were told “let’s postpone, postpone again, and postpone a 3rd time and play on a day the NFL has never played on before so you get healthy.” I also think the Steelers have a legitimate reason to be upset with how this played out. Keep in mind, the same thing happened with them and the Titans earlier this year. The Steelers have essentially been punished twice now, due to the fact that a different team can’t figure out its stuff.
Broncos/Saints
All 4 QB’s were in the same film room, maskless, and 1 tested positive making all of them ineligible to play. If anybody comes back to read these in the future, I want a reminder that the Broncos had 4 QB’s who couldn’t play, so they signed a practice squad WR to play at QB. He was the only QB to complete a pass, he went 1 for 9 for 13 yards, 2 INT’s. A 0.0 rating and a 0.1 QBR.
Undefeated watch!
The Steelers have a legitimate chance to go undefeated this year after starting 11-0. Granted they are blessed with one of the easier schedules I’ve ever seen, and had injury/covid situations help them out.
Remaining Schedule:
Relatively tough final slog, but very winnable games at the same time. They finish with the RedTails (likely win), Bills (tougher), Bengals (easy win), Colts (tougher), and Browns (eh?).
Barely Here:
THAT being said, and it’s really hard to look at an 11-0 team as not even top 2 in their conference, but they’ve BARELY won some games, including ones that should have been fairly easy. 1 Score wins against the Broncos, Texans, Eagles, Cowboys, and a decimated Ravens team. They have played 4 games against teams with winning records (Ravens, Ravens, Browns, and Titans).
Quote of the Week:
“I felt bad for the cardboard fans” Sean Payton, after coaching his own backup QB against a practice squad WR at QB
Memes of the Week:
Catching up a bit here as well
FMQB 