Adam Thielen - held to just 28 yards with a score - blows up at Bill Belichick
The final three weeks of the NFL season see the playoff race getting clearer - yet also murkier.
The first shocker of the weekend may well be Upset Of The Season as the Cowboys clamped down - hard - on the New Orleans Saints. Limited to ten points the Saints had no answer for a Cowboys defense that was timing its attack on Saints receivers perfectly. This game and the games that followed over Week 13 served as rebuttal to the striking commentary following the 54-51 Rams win over the Chiefs, commentary that portrayed 90-plus-point games as the new normal to where low-scoring defensive struggles were somehow legislated out of the game - and even conveyed a sense that high-scoring football somehow is bad for the game. Defense and offense cycle around and always will.
Titans over Jaguars - Tennessee got back into contention with another comeback win, this one down 16 to the Jets who'd given the Patriots a tough time the week before. Marcus Mariota now has ten comeback wins in this, his fourth season, and he has eight comebacks from down at least two scores (in contrast to Aaron Rodgers with just seven comebacks down two-plus scores in eleven seasons even taking into account seasons truncated by injury). Even so, it's clear how much the Titans miss Delanie Walker and his explosiveness, and one certainly hopes when he comes back in 2019 that firepower is still there.
The Jaguars have lost four of the last five meetings with the Titans but are coming off an impressive grinder of a win - their first since the end of September - over the surging Indianapolis Colts. They also have in Cody Kessler a quarterback who is just 1-8 as a starter but always showed genuine promise in his 2016 season with the hapless Browns.
Patriots over Dolphins - By now it's clear the Dolphins are a better team with Ryan Tannehill than without him. The Dolphins have also largely held their own at home vs the Patriots - but an 8-8 split the last sixteen visits to Davie, FL isn't any trend to worry the Patriots, though the condition of the turf has at times irked Bill Belichick. The Patriots are racing for a playoff bye and also to better flesh out their overall game; expect a competition matchup here.
Bills over NY Jets - The Jets' debut season for Sam Darnold has gone the all-too-common path of a rough initiation for the rookie, expected to start after missing three games with a foot injury. The Bills' quarterback situation, though, is also troubling as Josh Allen continues to struggle with two more picks at Miami.
Browns over Panthers - By firing two assistant coaches the Panthers have signalled the season is lost at 6-6, and four more INTs by Cam Newton showcase how the Panthers have faltered with four straight losses and a turnover differential of just plus-one vs. Cleveland's eye-popping plus-ten. Baker Mayfield's Brett Favre imitation vs. the Houston Texans was the ugly side of the rookie.
Buccaneers over Saints - Believe it or not the Bucs are 5-7 despite all their quarterbacking issues and Jameis Winston, the presumptive starter, has had success against Drew Brees. New Orleans' loss at Dallas punctured the myth of invincibility and this is also a rematch of the 48-40 shootout, the only other loss for the Saints so far.
Lions over Cardinals - The Lions' season is just playing out the string and it's obvious Matt Patricia now needs to start developing a successor to Matthew Stafford. The Cardinals' rookie, though, has not played better than the veteran and the two teams are a combined minus-nine in turnover differential.
Eagles over Cowboys - The Cowboys are now solidly in the playoff hunt, but the Eagles aren't out of it yet, and proved that by grinding out the win over the injury-shot Redskins. The Eagles no doubt remember losing at Lincoln Financial Field so shocking the Cowboys in their own building is added motivation for the defending Superbowl champs.
Falcons over Packers - The firing of Mike McCarthy wasn't unexpected; the timing though is. For the longest time McCarthy has been the punching bag and he certainly has never been an especially gifted coach. But attacks on him have served to hide the uncoachability of Aaron Rodgers, whose poisonous influence on the Packers has now gotten worse - with Patriots offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels rumored a strong candidate for the job it's instructive to remember Green Bay's loss at Foxboro where Rodgers sat alone and made no effort to seek out coaches, while McDaniels and Brian Hoyer were always with Tom Brady on the bench exchanging information.
The dysfunction of the Packers gives the slumping Falcons some opportunity, but they too are a team with coaching issues, line issues, and quarterbacking issues with Matt Ryan in his eleventh season.
Texans over Colts - The last time these two met the game was a mind-blowing overtime affair. Frank Reich's fourth-down call in overtime we doubt will be repeated, but then the Texans have gotten a lot better since then as well and are 5-1 at home vs the Colts at 2-4 on the road. Andrew Luck's career has feasted on division opponents - 22 wins vs 27 against the rest of the league - but he's struggled against the Texans with three straight losses.
Chiefs over Ravens - The Chiefs' firepower speaks for itself, while the Ravens have quietly clawed into the playoffs and rookie Lamar Jackson has won three straight starts, but in his three games he's already second in team rushing at 404 yards vs Alex Collins' team-leading 414. His passing game in three games is averaging 180 yards per game - at seven yards per pass - with three INTs to two scores. Even with that the Ravens are 13th in scoring heading to Arrowhead Stadium. This is only the second meeting between the two since Andy Reid became Chiefs coach.
NY Giants over Redskins- Odell Beckham showed anew with his perfunctory effort at an onside kick vs the Bears why despite his undeniable athletic prowess he's not an especially competent or reliable player, and the enabling the Giants appear to have always given him helps explain why they've faltered as badly as they have. But here they have to face Mark Sanchez, signed to the Skins a few weeks back with Alex Smith and now Colt McCoy both out for the year. The supreme irony involved is Sanchez reenacted his buttfumble of 2012 but this time recovered his own fumble.
Chargers over Bengals - The rumbling that Marvin Lewis is done after this season continues and the bizarre story that con-artist coach Hue Jackson will take over is something no one involved should want.
Jackson's incompetence as a coach was even further illustrated first on Hard Knocks and his belligerent hands-off approach to discipline and player preparation, and then by his post-firing media tour where he refused to be accountable for his struggles. San Diego is now almost assured a playoff spot and picking off the faltering Bengals is another step.
Broncos over Forty-Niners - Denver's resurgence is now on a three-game win streak and is seeing the emergence of running back Phillip Lindsey. Although Case Keenum's completion percentage remains below 60% in that streak he's nonetheless posted passer rating at 95 and 99 in the last two games. The Broncos late-season playoff contention gets a Niners team that looks like it has given up.
Raiders over Steelers - This has mismatch written all over it - 7-4-1 vs 2-10. But the mismatch is deceiving, for the Raiders have won three of the last five meetings with the Steelers and exploded to 35 points (and erased a 14-point gap in the fourth quarter) in this 2015 shootout. The Raiders are also better at turnover differential than the Steelers, though it's not much to sing about at minus-5 to Pittsburgh's minus-8. The big picture heading into this game is the Steelers are 0-for-the-season against the AFC West and the me-first culture of the team is starting to show up again with three straight poor performances, and combined with the Ravens' recent surge the Steelers now face their 1998 season collapse twenty years later.
Seahawks over Vikings - The Seahawks, largely unnoticed, have won three straight, stand with a plus-11 turnover differential, and stand as the NFC's number five seed, and they get a Vikings squad that has lost three of its last five and showed to be weaker than advertised, and which has yet to beat Pete Carroll since he joined the Seahawks. Of course Kirk Cousins was bound to bring this result, as despite over 3,400 yards and twenty-three touchdowns this year he showed with the Redskins he isn't that good, and passer rating below 77 in two of his last three games - not to mention two other games where he didn't reach 90 in passer rating - merely illustrates further his bombastic mediocrity.
Contrast this with Russell Wilson, who has stormed past 110 in passer rating eight times this season and is above twelve average yards per pass in his last two games.
Thus is the stretch run on.
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