Week 16 Takeaways: Patriots Have No Answers for Josh Allen, Chargers Steamrolled in Houston
Welcome to the Week 16 edition of the Sunday FreakOut, where we react and overreact to everything that happened in the Sunday afternoon games. For the full Sunday roundup podcast-style, be sure to subscribe to The MMQB Podcast, in your feed every Monday morning...
Things That Made Me Giddy
Josh Allen Vs. the Patriots: Not to overstate this, but the Patriots’ wind-blown Monday night victory over the Bills a few weeks ago birthed a thousand terrible takes. It was a bizarre game with a unique box score due to the weather conditions, but essentially it was a Patriots coaching staff that knew its quarterback didn’t have the arm talent to succeed in those conditions and called the game accordingly. The bottom of the barrel of the aforementioned terrible takes went along the lines of: Belichick only threw it three times because he thinks so little of Josh Allen and Brian Daboll. It’s bonkers to argue that any coach—let alone the greatest coach in the sport’s history—put together a game plan that banked on multiple red-zone stops while protecting a four-point lead. But more absurd is failing to understand that Belichick not only respects Allen and Daboll, but probably sees this Bills offense in his darkest nightmares (only in his darkest nightmares Belichick also isn't wearing any pants). For the second straight matchup (in non-hurricane conditions), Belichick couldn’t solve Allen—in large part because Stefon Diggs got the better of J.C. Jackson, Isaiah McKenzie did everything but steal Myles Bryant’s lunch money, and Allen couldn't be tackled in some huge moments. And now the Bills control the AFC East.
Isaiah McKenzie Makes Cole Beasley’s Absence Irrelevant: With safety help devoted to the Stefon Diggs/J.C. Jackson matchup, McKenzie on Myles Bryant was the mismatch of the day in Foxboro. McKenzie ended up catching 11 of his 12 targets (the one miss was a drop) for 125 yards and a touchdown. (His previous career highs were six catches and 65 yards.)
Joe Burrow Has Earned Your MVP Buzz: Tom Brady should be the frontrunner, seeing as he’s not only the quarterback but also the de facto head coach, offensive coordinator and general manager of his team. But even coming into this week, Burrow deserved to be in that second-tier conversation, along with Aaron Rodgers, Josh Allen and Patrick Mahomes (and, until Sunday’s performances, Justin Herbert and Matthew Stafford). Burrow is being asked to run a very veteran system that requires high-level processing before and after the snap, and the only knock against him is misleading box-score interception numbers, half of which weren’t on him. And on Sunday—though against a shorthanded Ravens defense—he put up 525 yards on 46 pass attempt (an absurd 11.41 per throw).
Damiere Byrd’s Clincher: Matt Nagy wasn’t going to make anyone stay out there in the cold any longer than they had to. Congratulatory mylar balloons for all involved!
The Raiders Are Still in This!: They gutted one out against the Broncos to stay in the wild-card race, an incredible accomplishment by the remaining players and coaches considering what has happened to this franchise over the past three months. If they get to the playoffs, Rich Bisaccia and/or Derek Carr deserve statues outside that stadium.
Rams Survive Matthew Stafford’s Rocky Day: File it under “get it out of your system” for Stafford, who threw another ugly late-in-the-down interception reminiscent of that Sunday night loss to Tennessee, and underthrew a designer deep shot (that wasn't open anyway) for another pick among his three interceptions. But the Rams had enough defense and even (very uncharacteristically) got a big play from special teams in the victory at Minnesota.
The Texans Don’t Just Compete: They went out and steamrolled the Chargers, running for 189, making Justin Herbert uncomfortable all afternoon, and really just outclassing the Chargers. Again, put David Culley in the Coach of the Year discussion for winning four games—equaling last year’s total for the Texans—with the NFL’s worst roster.
Eagles Had Enough of the Nonsense: After a slow and sloppy start against a Giants team that upset them a few weeks ago, Philly went into halftime tied 3–3 but put together four straight scoring drives—three of them touchdowns—then got a pick-six to score 31 unanswered points to open the second half.
Kyle Pitts Is Wonderful: Though it doesn’t change the fact that this Falcons team is the worst seven-win team in NFL history.
The Jets Win Twice: The victory over the Jaguars (acting head coach Ron Middleton is on the board!) was followed by the good news of the Seahawks, who owe the Jets their first-round pick as part of the regrettable Jamal Adams trade, gacking one away against the Nick Foles-led Bears. That Seattle pick is currently seventh overall.
Regrets
J.C. Jackson’s Departure From the AFC East: He’s a very good player who is going to get paid by someone this offseason. And many good men have been victimized by the Stefon Diggs-Josh Allen combination. But Jackson cannot keep subjecting himself to Diggs and Allen twice a year. Along with getting toasted by Diggs on a second-quarter touchdown, Jackson had three chances to end the Bills’ eventual game-clinching drive. He dropped an interception on an Allen/Diggs miscommunication, later failed to get Allen on the ground on a fourth-and-inches, and then there was this key third down—the missed tackle, followed by the utter destruction at the hands of Dion Dawkins—that pretty much encapsulated his afternoon.
Brandon Staley’s Defense No-Shows: It’s not unusual for this team to get gashed on the ground—Staley typically chooses to go lighter in the box and worry about the pass first, second and third. But Sunday was a reminder that, aside from Joey Bosa (who missed the game while on the COVID-19/reserve list), this team is also not very good in the front seven. On Sunday in Houston, they played a supporting role in Rex Burkhead’s one-man play paying tribute to the career of Earl Campbell. Burkhead carried 22 times for 149 yards, and Houston went for 190 rushing yards and 5.4 yards per rush (excluding kneeldowns) in a convincing Texans victory.
All This Time You Thought It Was Ben Roethlisberger and the Offense: But all along it was actually this Steelers defense. And also Ben Roethlisberger and the offense. Defensively though, the Steelers are shockingly, and uncharacteristically, lacking physicality. They are having a historically bad year defending the run, and more often than not they just… don’t tackle people.
Steelers’ First-Half Offense: They haven’t scored a first-half touchdown in five straight games.
Diontae Johnson Forgets He’s Carrying a Football: He’s a really good young receiver, but holy cow…
The Josh Johnson Ravens: Johnson was actually pretty good (many of his 304 passing yards came when the game was already out of reach, but 304 is 304). But Baltimore’s short-handed defense and lack of a run game basically meant Johnson was going to have to go shot-for-shot with (again, legitimate MVP candidate) Joe Burrow, and that wasn’t going to happen.
Panthers Can’t Settle on a Quarterback, an Offensive Coordinator, or Even an Offensive Identity to Build Toward: It’s a team that should have come into the season with something in the range of 5–12 or 6–11 expectations, but the 3–0 start seems to have caused many in that building to lose touch with reality. Matt Rhule, apparently under the impression in November that he was coaching for his job, began the NFL coaching equivalent of mashing all the Madden controller buttons at once. Carolina fired their best coach, offensive coordinator Joe Brady, presumably to re-write the offensive playbook around Cam Newton’s strengths. But they haven’t even been able to commit to Newton, and on Sunday turned things back over to Sam Darnold in the latest sign of devolution for this offense, this team and this organization.
Trevor Lawrence Needs to Be Better: Lawrence is going to be good. Probably very good and, more likely than not, great as long as the melvins running that organization don’t get in the way. Lawrence equipped himself well against a (very bad) Jets defense on Sunday, though the end of the game was a comedy of errors. Facing second-and-goal at the Jets’ 5-yard line with the Jaguars trailing by five, Lawrence put a ball into linebacker C.J. Mosley’s hands that should have ended the game, but instead ended up with his receiver, Marvin Jones, at the 1-yard line. The Jaguars had plenty of time for two more plays, but instead spiked the ball to stop the clock with 12 seconds left, making it fourth-and-goal and giving them one chance to win it instead of two. It’s a product of the utter lack of preparation Urban Meyer built into this program—and they were called for an illegal shift on fourth down (an incomplete pass anyway) that actually would have erased that extra down and possibly ended the game. (It’s also worth noting this team rarely uses motion and shifts, presumably because of Meyer’s decision to throw away most of the summer as he devoted preparation time to Gardner Minshew.) Regardless, it was a stunningly inefficient decision to make in an end-game situation.
Picking Up This Flag?: It’s not necessarily a dirty play—it’s a mess because Jerry Hughes regrets committing the obvious foul and is trying to hold Mac Jones up, but ultimately that makes things even more dangerous. Regardless, Hughes shoved a quarterback when that quarterback was pretty much on the other side of the white. That is absolutely a penalty. (And then Trent Brown draws a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct flag for continuing to argue about it well after the flag had been picked up, which erased any chance for the Patriots to get points before halftime and was just super dumb.)
To Be Fair, This Is Also a Penalty: And, unlike Hughes’s push, this is an absolutely filthy play as Judon goes after Josh Allen’s injured left foot. (Also, I’m not really sure who I’m being “fair” to, but I’ll leave that phrasing in anyway.)
CBS’s Game Management: They announced they were switching from the Chiefs-Steelers blowout to the competitive Raiders-Broncos game (good!), then proceeded to play an extended block of commercials and failed to show the game-clinching series in Vegas. By the time they cut to the action the Raiders were in victory formation, and viewers were subjected to an awkward Tiki Barber filibuster.
Jaguars at Jets, Dec. 26: God bless you for enduring this season, John Shipley and the rest of the assembled Jaguars media.
Moments We’ll Tell Our Grandkids About
These Tackle Attempts by Jacksonville’s Starting Safeties: Rudy Ford and Andrew Wingard. You don’t usually see this kind of incompetence on a football field unless the Make-A-Wish folks are involved.
What We’ll Be Talking About This Week
Chiefs Are the Best Team in Football: As has been the case since September, you were just all worked up over fluky turnovers.
Current Temperature of Various Seats: It seems Matt Rhule has joined Matt Nagy in the “it’s inevitable” group, while Joe Judge’s job security certainly deserves a second look.
There Are Too Many Playoff Teams: Last year, we were subjected to the Mitchell Trubisky-led Bears on Wild-Card weekend. With two weeks left in the season, the threat of the utterly unwatchable offenses of the Dolphins and Steelers still looms over us. That’s no way to ring in the new year.
The Continued Enablement of Antonio Brown: Brown still considers himself a victim. He is not trying to be better because the Bucs organization has never made it a requirement, despite Bruce Arians and the empty words of a small, sad man. The quotes below, from Brown (in response to an appropriate question posed by ESPN’s Jenna Laine, additional quote via The Athletic’s Greg Auman) are the words of a man who is absolutely lost. Brown is responsible for his own actions, but Arians, Tom Brady, the teammate with the crappy podcast (which was the only time Brown has personally addressed the fake-vaccine card scandal, at which time he again spoke in vague terms about how he’s a victim) and the entire Bucs organization is responsible for creating a world in which Brown never has to face any significant consequences for his actions, and remains, upsettingly, untethered from reality.
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