First off, the Lions finally firing Matt Patricia was expected and should’ve came sooner. This should be lesson to any other team attempting to make themselves into a New England clone: it is harder than it looks.
What will probably happen with the Lions is that they will get stary-eyed for another coach who will talk about changing the culture when the real problem is ownership by the Ford family. Matthew Stafford will be this generation’s Archie Manning, decent quarterback on a perpetually terrible team. The Lions will end up with a top five draft pick where they draft a generational talent a la Barry Sanders and Calvin Johnson who will wow their fans with other worldly numbers but never come close to a championship. And in about 10 years, they decide to hang it up because the organization is not committed to winning followed by the cycle repeating.
As for my players of the week: Chiefs QB-WR combo of Patrick Mahomes to Tyrek Hill. Mahomes threw for 462 yards and 3 touchdowns with Hill catching 13 passes on 269 yards for 3 touchdowns in Kansas City’s 27-24 win over the Buccaneers in Tampa Bay.
This might not be the only trip the Chiefs make to Tampa this season with Super Bowl LV on the currently planned date of 7 February 2021. Kansas City looks like they could the first team to repeat since the Patriots did so in 2004.
But their championship aspirations could be derailed.
Not because of another team, but the COVID-19 pandemic.
How many actually watched the Ravens at Steelers game?
Be honest…
Instead of an AFC North showdown in the Thanksgiving night slot, the game was moved back to Sunday afternoon, then Tuesday, and finally on Wednesday… afternoon… when there would hardly be any viewers to see if the Steelers would keep their quest for perfection going or if the Ravens can stay in the hunt for the playoffs.
And the quality of play was… not great. Mainly due to that many of the Ravens were out with COVID-19 thus resulting in a skeleton squad playing against a Steelers team at full strength.
At least it was not the travesty in Denver when the Broncos had to rely on a receiver who was informed hours that he would be under center after the team quarantined all of their quarterbacks. Notice that I did not say start, as that honor went to running back Phillip Lyndsay who became the first non-QB to start an NFL game since the 1965 Western Conference Playoff between the Green Bay Packers and the Baltimore Colts.
Unfortunately, Lyndsay was not Tom Matte and Don Shula was not on the sideline as the Saints easily defeated the Broncos 31-3.
COVID-19 has also forced the 49ers to play the remainder of their home games in Phoenix at the Cardinals home stadium. Because of people blatantly disregarding public health orders about large gatherings around the Thanksgiving and the upcoming winter holidays, there will be spike in cases. If California issues another statewide stay-at-home order, will the Rams and Chargers be forced to finish their seasons elsewhere? Same questions for the Bills, Jets, Giants, and Seahawks in the respective states they play in.
As I pointed out in my Week 5 picks, if the NFL wants to play a full season, they need to shut it down for two weeks, test and monitor players and support staffs, isolate those that test positive and ensure they recover, do a deep sanitize of facilities, reschedule games not in the Sunday and Monday viewing windows to Sunday, and not allow fans to the games. There are not that many opportunities remaining to shift games around and the hot potato of when the Ravens-Steelers game was going to be played last week demonstrated that difficulty in doing so.
And now the picks
|
|
Me |
|
WEEK 12 |
10-6 |
|
TOTAL |
125-52-1 |
Kickoff times are
Mountain Time
Sunday afternoon
games airing in Denver are noted by (DEN)
Picks are in BOLD
BYE WEEK
Buccaneers,
Panthers
CBS 11AM
Browns at Titans (DEN)
Colts at Texans
Bengals at Dolphins
Raiders at Jets
Jaguars at Vikings
FOX 11AM
Saints at Falcons
(DEN)
Lions at Bears
CBS 2PM
Eagles at Packers
(DEN)
Patriots at Chargers
FOX 2PM
Giants at Seahawks
Rams at Cardinals
SUNDAY NIGHT, NBC
6:20PM
Broncos at Chiefs
MONDAY
Football Team at Steelers,
3PM
Bills vs. 49ers (in
Arizona), ESPN 6:15PM
TUESDAY NIGHT, FOX/NFL
6:20 PM
Cowboys at Ravens
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