NFLPA newsletter. "Our collective level of play across the league has actually never been higher."
Tretter pointed to a record-setting number of points through 16 weeks of play, lower penalty numbers and fewer missed tackles.
While Tretter's citations are valid, NFL owners are unlikely to agree to a virtual offseason.
According to ESPN, the decrease in penalties could be attributed to the league instructing officials to throw fewer flags. To Tretter's point, however, coaches around the league have pushed for a reduced body of work during the offseason, going back to the 2011 collective bargaining agreement.
Tretter believes another reduction of offseason work is coming, saying the NFL is the only major sports league with an offseason program.
"The most physically demanding sport is the only league that brings their players back for extra practices outside of the season. The argument in favor of these offseason practices is based on the assumption that players need reps during OTAs to develop and learn while teams need the practices to gel. Yet, the lack of OTAs this year demonstrated that those theories aren't substantiated. New and first-year head coaches had success. Newly assembled teams had success. Rookies stepped in and played at a high level all across the league.
"... We do not need to be brought in during April-June to practice against each other–it's simply unnecessary."
Beyond Tretter's work to push for the reduction of offseason activities, he has been instrumental in the push to eliminate turf fields in stadiums and producing the league's COVID-19 protocols that included daily testing.
Fitzpatrick missed Miami's practice on Thursday. Under the latest NFL protocols, players with a confirmed positive COVID-19 test must isolate for 10 days regardless of symptoms or subsequent negative tests. The protocol jeopardizes Fitzpatrick's availability for a potential AFC wild-card playoff game in early January.
According to Pelissero, the NFL conducted contact tracing after Fitzpatrick's positive COVID-19 test, and no other Dolphins players were identified as high-risk close contacts, including rookie starter Tua Tagovailoa.
Fitzpatrick led the Dolphins to a 26–25 come-from-behind win over the Raiders last weekend, putting them in a position to possibly reach the playoffs. The team can advance to the postseason with a win over the AFC East rivals Bills, who have already clinched the division title.
Fitzpatrick opened the 2020 season as Miami's starter but was demoted in late October when Tagovailoa took over. In nine games this season, Fitzpatrick has thrown for 2,091 yards with 13 touchdowns and eight interceptions.
Tagovailoa was joined by quarterback Jake Rudock at practice Thursday. Rudock has been added to the Dolphins' 53-man roster to serve as Tagovailoa's backup, according to his agent Mike McCartney.
Rudock was selected by the Lions in the 2016 draft out of Michigan. In three games in 2017, he went 3-for-5 while throwing for 24 yards with one interception. The Dolphins signed Rudock in January to a reserve/future contract, and he has bounced on and off their practice squad since October.
Jalen Hurts provided the requisite “spark” at quarterback over the final weeks of the season, but we should clear a few things up: He had a better passer rating than Wentz but not as good a total quarterback rating. His yards per attempt were better but his yards per game were less than half. Wentz had a lower bad throw percentage and was pressured significantly more than Hurts was (almost 8% more frequently). So yes, did the Eagles correctly guess that Wentz might ultimately not have the “stuff” to be their long-term quarterback of the future? Sure. Did they find his replacement? That’s harder to answer.
2. What went wrong this year?
Everything. The Eagles were ravaged by injuries and couldn’t stay afloat long enough to win the worst division in modern NFL history. Their roster is showing its age and a ton of their biggest stars have no guaranteed money left on their contracts (Fletcher Cox, Zach Ertz, Jason Kelce, Brandon Graham, Malik Jackson). They will likely need to make moves on some or all of them to get under the salary cap for 2021, transforming the heart and soul of their championship roster.
3. The Big Question this offseason
What do you do with Carson Wentz? Reportedly, Wentz has no interest in being a backup over the long term but, in the eyes of his head coach, has not displayed enough to be the starting quarterback. It’s a difficult situation given how immovable Wentz’s contract is right now. While there are certainly possibilities out there (Frank Reich is in Indianapolis, after all, and Philip Rivers was on a one-year deal), so much of the Eagles’ time and energy next year will be devoted to downplaying any possible quarterback controversy while internally navigating its obvious pitfalls.
4. Coach/GM outlook
Could the Eagles conceivably move on from the coach and GM tandem that brought the franchise its first Super Bowl? I think if you’re Jeffrey Lurie, everything is on the table. He has made bold decisions before and, unlike many owners, has enough of a presence and pulse to complete a hardcore surgery like this to his front office. We’ll get into this more down below, but the Eagles need more of an offensive philosophy. They need an idea of who they are and where they are going in the near future beyond an itineration of the club that was successful a few years ago.
5. Key free agents
• Jason Peters, tackle
• Jalen Mills, safety
• Nickell Robey-Coleman, DB
• Vinny Curry, defensive end
• Hassan Ridgeway, DT
• Cre’Von LeBlanc, cornerback
• Richard Rodgers, tight end
• Boston Scott, running back
• Travis Fulgham, wide receiver
• Duke Riley, linebacker
• Corey Clement, running back
• Greg Ward, wide receiver
The Eagles are devoid of an identity, which is why some of their best offensive moments in 2020 were thanks to Jalen Hurts or Carson Wentz extending dying plays with their legs and making incredible throws. It seemed like they tried to infuse what they’d done well in the past with a more modern wide zone running approach but they ended up non-committal, which was obvious during so many of their worst offensive performances.
The solution is to infuse some life into the offensive staff. Doug Pederson is a great coach to work for. He strives for collaboration and empowers his staff up and down the board. It would be a great place to break in some bright new offensive minds.
Pilfer one of the top non-coordinator assistants in San Francisco or Los Angeles. Or, if Eric Bienemy does not get a head coaching job, punch the throttle on bringing Andy Reid’s offensive coordinator in waiting, Mike Kafka, on board. There is a lot of talent in that Chiefs room beyond Kafka as well, which could aid in rejuvenating Pederson’s play-calling ability.
9. Outside-the-box idea to fix them
Trade Carson Wentz and replace Doug Pederson with Todd Bowles. Bowles can pinch a solid offensive coordinator from Bruce Arians’s staff in Tampa Bay and bring a different vibe to the roster in Philadelphia. The Eagles will be woeful defensively and having a solid coordinator can mitigate some of those shortcomings. To be clear, I think Pederson is worth keeping aboard, but Bowles would be the kind of mood stabilizer who could keep the Eagles’ roster from burning down amid an investable salary cap purge. No matter what, if they decide to gut the roster, an incoming head coach will need to factor that all in, making it difficult to attract a top-tier candidate.
10. Next time we'll realistically see them in the playoffs
2023. The NFC East is going to be good again at some point, after all.
I don’t know if anyone could be happier, retrospectively, than general manager Rick Spielman, who dealt Stefon Diggs to the Bills. Diggs was one of the league’s most productive wide receivers this year, however, the replacement Minnesota netted made some serious noise in the Rookie of the Year conversation. Justin Jefferson gives the Vikings Diggs-esque production without the immediate need for a new, cap-altering contract, although that certainly doesn’t feel very far away right now. Nailing that pick shielded the franchise from some serious scrutiny.
2. What went wrong this year?
This was the highest pressure rate that Kirk Cousins faced since Pro Football Reference began tracking the stat back in 2018, and while Cousins got better at netting yardage once he left the pocket, the razor-thin pocket time certainly seemed to impact Minnesota’s flow offensively. The Vikings were still sixth in points and a top-15 offense in terms of yardage. Dalvin Cook still had a Herculean stretch, which placed Minnesota’s passing offense even further on the backburner. Only five teams in the NFL attempted fewer passes than the Vikings in 2020. Their defense, though, headlined what was an uncharacteristically bad season for Mike Zimmer the play-caller. Minnesota was 30th in net passing yards per attempt and 28th in points surrendered.
3. The Big Question this offseason
While it’s unlikely the Vikings will wind up with a top-10 pick—their moderate to high levels of success these past few years are exactly why a team needs to depend on the veteran QB market, after all—the near future with Kirk Cousins will be under some scrutiny. To be clear, I like Cousins in Minnesota and I think he is a quarterback of the future—a smart, ball-control player who is good at manipulating defenses and getting the ball to his playmakers. However, Cousins does make mistakes and he does miss reads. The physical tools may not line up over the long term. Do they want to continue operating under this fully-guaranteed pay structure which makes reupping future contracts more problematic for long-term flexibility? Will they consider, while they are this low in the draft pool, taking a swing at someone who can challenge Cousins next year when his dead cap is less prohibitive?
4. Coach/GM outlook
Before this season, Zimmer signed a contract extension through the 2023 season. He and Speilman have certainly done enough to warrant coming back for 2021 and beyond. This is a stable franchise in the middle of a division that requires defensive expertise. There are few coaches who would get the benefit of the doubt so readily to eventually figure out how to counter the wave of Shanahan-lite systems plowing through the NFL. Zimmer is one of them.
5. Key free agents
• Anthony Harris, safety
• Eric Wilson, linebacker
• George Iloka, safety
• Rashod Hill, offensive tackle
• Dakota Dozier, guard
• Jaleel Johnson, defensive tackle
• Hercules Mata'afa, linebacker
• Chris Jones, cornerback
• Ifeadi Odenigbo, EDGE
• Chad Beebe, wide receiver
The Vikings have less work than they seem to on paper. Danielle Hunter is coming back in 2021. Michael Pierce will actually play in 2021. Cameron Dantzler had a good first season and is providing some exceptional value for this third-round price tag. That said, their main priority might be handling their salary cap situation, which has been tight perpetually during the Zimmer era. Things are relatively affordable now, but they need some flexibility and will likely need to restructure some deals in the offseason.
There really isn’t a ton the Vikings need to do here. At their positions of “need” they have developing players. At the gaping holes, they have guys who either missed or sat out the 2020 season. If they could conjure some cap space, getting involved in the second-tier edge market might make some sense. Solomon Thomas, Trent Murphy, Olivier Vernon and Haason Reddick are all players who could pop up in conversation, though some of them will be overpriced.
9. Outside-the-box idea to fix them
Trade Kirk Cousins to the 49ers. Again, you asked for outside-the-box. Kyle Shanahan will be thirsting for veteran quarterback options and if salary cap machinations can take place for this to make enough financial sense, Cousins can go play for his former offensive coordinator and the Vikings can pair a draft pick with a high-upside free agent like Nick Mullens.
10. Next time we'll realistically see them in the playoffs
2021. With the expanded format, it wouldn’t be surprising to see the NFC North consistently send two teams to the playoffs every year. There is no reason to think that the Vikings will sit out of the playoffs again, especially with so many reinforcements on the way.
As we pointed out earlier in the season, I think we all saw the offensive guru who was hiding out all these years, maniacally planning his assault on the NFL once he returned to the league. The problem is that these spurts of brilliance weren’t steady, weekly occurrences and the Raiders don’t have a great deal of excuses compared to other teams. In fact, given Gruden’s repeat offenses of COVID-19 protocols, which cost his team a draft pick, it would seem Las Vegas gave itself more headaches than received them from extraneous circumstances.
Also, their offensive line, while aging in key places, is very good (and very expensive).
2. What went wrong this year?
Everything about this team was just … middling. Derek Carr had a very good season, as did Josh Jacobs. Less can be said about the opportunities schemed up for first-round pick Henry Ruggs, or the performance of fellow first-round rookie Damon Arnette (though the sample size is limited there). I think this team could have won a lesser division, but Mark Davis flouted NFL protocol and sold his soul to bring in Jon Gruden in order to challenge the Chiefs. It is difficult to reconcile the team that beat Kansas City once this year with the version we see on so many other off weeks.
3. The Big Question this offseason
There is no meat remaining on Derek Carr’s contract. I think, and have heard, that he would be a fairly hot commodity elsewhere if he were allowed to hit the market. Gruden has a history of cycling through veteran quarterbacks without really addressing key philosophical problems with his scheme and roster, so that is always a possibility. This was the same guy who took a long sniff on Kyler Murray and was, at least moderately, in the Tom Brady sweepstakes at one point. Pro Football Focus made the argument that Carr was a top-10 QB this year and has been on several occasions. He would be a fascinating, wildly-affordable trade chip for Las Vegas to wield if Gruden was interested in pivoting his rebuild.
4. Coach/GM outlook
Gruden isn’t going anywhere, despite failing to post a winning record over his first three seasons. Firing defensive coordinator Paul Gunther was about as far-reaching as the scapegoating process will go and we’ll roll into Year 4 as scheduled. There is a lot of young talent on this roster, which, maybe you can credit Gruden with, or maybe he made a sound hire in Mike Mayock (which seems more likely). Still, the outlook is that, when an owner is infatuated with a head coach and signed him to a 10-year deal, there isn’t really much to discuss.
5. Key free agents
• Nelson Agholor, wide receiver
• Nicholas Morrow, linebacker
• Erik Harris, safety
• Denzelle Good, offensive lineman
• Johnathan Hankins, defensive lineman
• Takk McKinley, defensive end
• Vic Beasley, defensive end
• Jason Witten, tight end
• Nevin Lawson, cornerback
Las Vegas needs to secure a top-flight defensive coordinator. And while Rod Marinelli is a fine stand-in, Gruden will be up against a handful of other coaching staffs making similar maneuvers under better circumstances. Not many people are going to willingly risk their standing with that roster knowing that they’ll have to face Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs twice a year. One of the advantages, supposedly, of having Gruden head the operation is that you have the kind of cachet to make a big hire. Can he actually pull it off?
Because no one believes this is an actual, sustainable rebuild and is more about people proving people right, it wouldn’t be stunning to see the Raiders gut some of their big-ticket veterans with no guaranteed money in 2021 (Richie Incognito, Marcus Mariota, etc.) and use that money to play in the free agent market. This will be the offseason of the receiver, with Juju Smith-Schuster, Corey Davis, Sammy Watkins, T.Y. Hilton, Will Fuller, John Ross, A.J. Green and Allen Robinson all hitting the market. That is an awful lot of former first-round picks and veteran talent for Gruden to salivate over.
9. Outside-the-box idea to fix them
Trade Derek Carr, gut the veteran portion of the roster and soft-tank for a year with Marcus Mariota at quarterback. I loved watching Mariota under center again in his limited action, and while my hope for his inevitable second chance is to be paired with a better play-caller, perhaps Gruden will take a look at the division around him, opt to shift the offense momentarily and write the season off as an exploration in strategy. You can do these kinds of things when there is no risk of being fired, after all. And if it fails, Las Vegas will be sitting at the top of the draft in 2022 when another handful of promising QBs will rise.
10. Next time we'll realistically see them in the playoffs
2022? Maybe this team will get hot and stumble into a secondary wild-card spot at some point, but are you picking against the Chiefs any time soon and assuming that the Chargers and Justin Herbert are going to be down for a long time?
"If things don't go go the way you want this weekend, it could be... I guess it's healthy to have that thought becaise we're not guaranteed anything going forward," Rivers told Holder.
Rivers, 39, is seeking the eighth playoff appearance of his career. The 17-year veteran spent 16 seasons with the San Diego/Los Angeles Chargers before coming over to the Indianapolis Colts on a one-year, $25 million deal.
Rivers, who tied Dan Marino for fifth place on the career touchdown passes leaderboard with 420 via a 42-yarder to Zach Pascal on Sunday, has thrown for 4,005 yards (ninth in the NFL), 23 touchdowns and 10 interceptions in the 2020 season.
The Colts (11-5) are coming off a 28-24 loss on the road against the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday. However, the Colts can still earn a playoff spot by winning the AFC South division.
To do so, the Colts must defeat the Jaguars and have the Tennessee Titans lose or tie against the Texans, which would allow Indianapolis to win its first division title since 2014. Indianapolis can earn a playoff spot as a wild card team with a win over the Jaguars and a loss or tie by the Baltimore Ravens, Cleveland Browns or Miami Dolphins.
The Ravens will play on the road at Cincinnati. Cleveland has a tough division matchup against Pittsburgh while the Dolphins travel to face the Buffalo Bills.
The Colts' last playoff appearance came in 2018, when Indianapolis was eliminated in a 31-13 loss to the Kansas City Chiefs in the divisional round.
the team announced Wednesday. The Bills currently hold the No. 2 seed in the AFC, and will host a playoff game for at least the first round.
The wild card round will mark the first time in 25 years that Buffalo has hosted a playoff game. All fans who attend the game will be required to receive a negative COVID-19 test through the league's testing partner, Bioreference Laboratories, in order to be admitted into the game.
Tickets will be made available to season ticket holders who opted into buying tickets earlier this year. Fans will also be required to pay for their own COVID-19 test, which costs $63.
The Bills have thrived at home this season despite the absence of their rowdy fans, with a 6-1 home record. They are one of five teams with just one home loss on the year.
The last home playoff game in Bills history came in the wild card round on Dec. 28, 1996, when Buffalo lost to the Jaguars, 30-27. The Bills led, 27-20, in the fourth quarter before Jacksonville ran off 10 unanswered points, taking the lead on a field goal with just over three minutes to play.
That game marked Buffalo's first home playoff loss since the 1966 AFL Championship Game, which the Bills lost, 31-7, at War Memorial Stadium on New Year's Day 1967 to deny Buffalo a third consecutive AFL title.
two years ago, with the Patriots on their way to a sixth Super Bowl title.)
The quarterback. This is an easy one, on the surface. Cam Newton walked into a bad situation that no quarterback would’ve been able to fix (Brady’s passer rating during last year’s 4–5 finish: 80.3), and his play only made it worse, and that’s an obvious starting point for this discussion.
But the truth is the Patriots lost more than a quarterback in Brady. They lost the ultimate fixer. Brady didn’t create margin for error. He was the margin for error. Got a little less at receiver? Tom will get you in the right looks and throw guys open. Got issues on the line? He’ll give you an edge in setting protections and get rid of the ball faster. Got less on defense? He’s cool to play in shootouts. And so on.
“To me, Brady masked their misses over the years,” said an AFC exec. “Just look at their draft history. You see picks missed on, but Brady, [Rob Gronkowski], [Julian] Edelman, they’d mask those issues. … [Belichick’s] still one of the best coaches—he’s such a good coach, and Josh [McDaniels] is such a good coordinator, and they have overcome lack of talent in the past. But now they don’t have the quarterback, and it’s tough to mask everything else.
“I mean, look at the skill positions. They don’t have anybody you’re scared of.”
“Is their roster ever spectacular?” asked an NFC personnel director. “I’m not sure it ever was, but they had an unbelievable coach and an unbelievable quarterback. … What [Brady] did to bring everyone up around him was incredible. The beauty of what they’ve done, they trade back, they get picks, they bring in bodies, and guys that fit them. Then they lose that guy who’s been making it all work, it’s tough.”
The issues in scouting. The Patriots have bled promising young scouts over the last few years in part because those guys wanted to have a real voice in the process—something very few felt like they had in Foxboro. And drafting N’Keal Harry in the first round is a strong example of it.
Harry perfectly illustrates Belichick’s scouting blind spot. Belichick’s close with Harry’s college coach, ex-Arizona State coach Todd Graham, and Harry crushed his in-house visit with the team in the spring of 2019, doing a better job with his turn in Foxboro than Deebo Samuel or A.J. Brown did with theirs. So despite warning signs from the scouts on Harry, the team wound up taking Harry in the first round.
You know the rest. Brown and Samuel look like future Pro Bowlers. Harry has 397 yards over two years and doesn’t seem like a lock to make the team next year. And he’s just one example. Another is 2020 third-rounder Anfernee Jennings, a limited linebacker who Nick Saban called his “favorite player” to some teams. He, predictably, was overdrafted by Belichick. There are more, too.
This one isn’t that tough to diagnose, of course, and comes not just down to what Belichick values in players, but also in where he’s getting his information. Which makes it fair to question if he’s leaned too much on his college coaching friends and his personal experience with prospects, and too little on the work of his scouts.
The core positions. Simply put, the Patriots are bad at positions they’re normally good at. Quarterback’s the most obvious example. But linebacker and tight end are two more.
The best Patriots teams were highly-invested in those spots, and it makes sense that they were—they’re positions that demand the most versatility, which allows a coach like Belichick to be multiple, and they’re undervalued financially against what, say, top-shelf receivers or corners get, allowing for a team to better manage its resources. Foxboro used to overflow with examples of this. Vrabel, McGinest, Tedy Bruschi, Ted Johnson, Jamie Collins, Jerod Mayo, Dont’a Hightower, Kyle Van Noy, Ben Watson, Daniel Graham, Christian Fauria, Gronkowski, Aaron Hernandez and Martellus Bennett were all among them.
Now, they’ve got Ju’Wuan Bentley, Hall, Devin Asiasi, Dalton Keene and a bunch of other guys you’ve never heard of.
“The first thing that jumps out is how different the tight end position is,” said an AFC personnel director. “It’s so obvious, but to go from not just Gronk, but also guys like Marty [Martellus Bennett], and that staple with Brady, he was so associated with tight ends going up the seam and in the red area, to overdrafted Asisasi and way-overdrafted Keene is jarring. … And then it’s guys like Terez Hall at linebacker. There’s a dearth of talent at linebacker and tight end, and Cam’s issue accelerated the problem.
“Those are heartbeat positions for that team, and they’re just bad at those spots.”
The specialty-player problem. One executive I talked to pointed out how Belichick, every year, will draft and build the team to his schedule. One good example of it working was 2014, when New England faced a gauntlet of explosive passing games, and landed Darrelle Revis and Brandon Browner to prepare for it. More recently, attempts to do this have been less successful.
One came in 2019. With athletic tight ends like Travis Kelce, Evan Engram, Mark Andrews, David Njoku and Zach Ertz on the slate, the Patriots took supersized Vanderbilt corner Joejuan Williams in the second round, thinking he could fill the kind of role Patrick Chung has for them in recent years to deal with them. The idea, on paper, made sense. But the question is whether doing that costs them someone better. And if they keep making decisions like that, how many better players are they passing on?
“Bill is such a great coach that he’ll always be able to devise plans around your strengths and weaknesses,” said our NFC personnel director. “But you can take that too far, and it seems like too many times he’s settled for lesser players because they can do this one thing really well.”
And that’s where, at times, you’ve seen the Patriots take guys who were good-not-great way too high because they liked a certain thing the player could do—and that even extends to specific skills like long-snapping (hello, Joe Cardona).
“They took Jordan Richards—we had him on our back board, as a free agent, and they took him in the second round,” said our AFC executive. “Without the quarterback, it’s caught up with them.”
Thus, you have players running on and off the field in an ugly Monday-night loss to Buffalo to play a certain situation, and a roster full of guys brought aboard for one or two specific reasons, to make up for a lack of guys who can do everything well.
***
The Bills—the team that laid that 38–9 whooping on New England, and one that could’ve been 59–9 if Sean McDermott hadn’t called the dogs off—provided an interesting contrast on that field. Four years into the McDermott–Brandon Beane era, the Bills are stocked with long-term answers, boasting a cornerstone in every single position group.
It’s Allen at quarterback, Stefon Diggs at receiver, Dawson Knox at tight end, Devin Singletary and Zack Moss at tailback, Dion Dawkins on the offensive line, Ed Oliver on the defensive line, Tremaine Edmunds at linebacker and Tre’Davious White in the secondary. You can say, with certainty, that most if not all those players will be on the team three years from now.
How many Patriots can you say that about? The harsh truth is there might not be one, and that Bills team, along with an upwardly mobile Dolphins group, is what New England will be chasing in the AFC East next year.
Maybe they’ll get their preseason opt-outs back, but even that might not solve much. Chung turns 34 in August, Hightower turns 31 in March, and it’s hard to project whether they, or other thirtysomethings like McCourty, Matthew Slater and Gilmore (and Gilmore could be gone in 2021 anyway) will have much left by the time the Patriots can turn the downward momentum they’re battling against now, with a 10–14 record over the last season and a half.
And here’s another hard truth—it might not be worth fighting against the short-term pain they’re already feeling.
“They do have a bunch of picks coming, with the comp picks factored in, which gives you the ability to go young,” said our AFC personnel director. “And you have a damn good feeling that Buffalo and Miami are gonna be good again, and that one is going to win the division. So it’ll be a hard division to win, and that means this might be the year to do it, just hit reset, play a lot of young guys, and then in 2022, here we go.”
It’s probably tough for a New England fan base that hasn’t faced a reality like this in a generation to swallow the idea of that. But it would be harder to understand the idea of staying the course they’re currently on.
Because at the root of it, the problem isn’t complicated.
“Yeah,” said our AFC exec, “that’s just not a good roster.”
***
POWER RANKINGS
1) Kansas City Chiefs (14–1): Would they beat the Packers on a neutral field? I hope we get to find out on Feb. 7. For now, despite an ugly win on Sunday, I’m going with the team that’s won 23 of its last 24 games.
2) Buffalo Bills (12–3): The best thing you can say about the Bills’ effort on Sunday was that everything looked easy. If McDermott hadn’t started pulling guys early in the fourth quarter, that could have been a historic type of blowout in Foxboro. And the great thing is that the guys the Bills are doing it with are young and still ascending. So like I said, Packers-Chiefs would be a lot of fun. Bills-Chiefs earlier in the playoffs would be too.
3) Green Bay Packers (12–3): Aaron Rodgers is playing at a pretty scary level right now. We detailed some of it in this week’s MAQB. Here, I’ll give you this nugget: His 119.4 passer rating, if it holds, would be the third-best in a single season ever, eclipsed only by Peyton Manning’s 2004 (121.1) and his own 2011 season (122.5).
4) New Orleans Saints (11–4): Sunday was more proof that Drew Brees can be a bus driver with this group, and it should be enough to at least get them to the NFC title game. Whether or not they can win in Lambeau in January … I’m not ready to make that call quite yet.
5) Pittsburgh Steelers (12–3): I like the character they showed on Sunday. Will it be enough to overcome the linebacker losses (Devin Bush, Bud Dupree), and the lack of a consistent offensive identity? I’m not sure. As of right now, it would be pretty tough to see them beating Kansas City or Buffalo.
***
THE BIG QUESTION
What’s Dwayne Haskins’s future in the NFL?
Let’s start with what Haskins has to answer for, with whoever his next employer is …
• Near the end of a blowout loss to the Ravens on Oct. 4, Haskins learned he’d thrown for more than 300 yards and audibly celebrated it. That carried over to the locker room, which rubbed a lot of his teammates and coaches the wrong way. Days later, he was benched.
• Haskins’s handling of the days to follow was less than ideal. His change in attitude was noticeable during the practice week, ahead of him essentially calling out sick that Saturday, which led him to stay home for that Sunday’s game against the Rams, a 30–10 loss that Kyle Allen started.
• When Allen went down in early November, the team turned to Alex Smith, who’d been installed as the backup after Haskins was benched.
• Smith got hurt in a Dec. 13 win over San Francisco, and that meant Haskins getting his first start in nearly two months on Dec. 20. Washington lost that game to Seattle, Haskins didn’t play particularly well, and pictures from later that night with Haskins partying unmasked surfaced early in the next week.
• The team considered cutting Haskins then and there, but decided that wouldn’t be fair to the rest of the locker room, with Washington in contention for the NFC East title. So Haskins started the next game, played poorly and was benched and Taylor Heinecke looked perfectly fine in his place. And having Heinecke as a viable option took the element of “fairness to the rest of the guys” out of it.
Add that up, and you have a guy who didn’t perform well, didn’t have the sense to realize it early on, handled failure poorly and then couldn’t have managed his second chance worse.
I like Haskins. He can spin it with the best of them. He showed, as a collegian, an ability to learn, playing in an NFL-style offense and posting record-breaking production in his first real action at that level. He went to a franchise that needed the reckoning it’s now getting, and wasn’t mature enough to handle starting his career in his hometown. He went through a coaching change, and the new staff wasn’t invested in him. He’s a likable kid. He’s 23.
Now, I don’t think we’re looking at Troy Aikman as a prospect here—Haskins benefitted from declaring into a draft relatively bereft of quarterback talent, where his top-shelf ability to simply throw the ball was enough to get him inside the top half of the first round. And now we’re seeing how far he had to go developmentally.
But Haskins can still be an NFL quarterback, if he wants to change some things. Teams are interested in bringing him aboard as a reclamation project.
The thing is, to do it, he’ll have to show he’s changed and accept a bottom-of-the-roster or practice squad spot, and those don’t come with the second chances that being a first-round pick does. So where this goes from here is really up to Haskins himself.
And that’ll start with who he’s listening to, and who he should listen to is the people who are going to tell him a bunch of things that he probably doesn’t want to hear.
How coaching openings will play into the quarterback market.
I get asked a lot what I think will happen with Carson Wentz. And Matthew Stafford. And Matt Ryan. And Sam Darnold. And my answer on all four is always the same: Tell me who’s making those decisions, and maybe I can answer that better.
Sounds like a cop-out, I know. But it’s the simple reality of those situations.
Let’s start in Philly, where I do think there’ll be some level of change. Whether that’s just to the offensive staff or further up the food chain, I’m not sure. Whatever it is will affect how salvageable the team sees Wentz as being, and how it looks at the idea of trading Wentz away for distressed-asset value while taking on all the cap implications. I’m on record as saying I’d have a Wentz/Jalen Hurts derby for the job in the spring and summer of 2021. But I don’t think Philly’s at the point now where any such decision is close to being made.
In Detroit, Stafford is approaching his 33rd birthday, has been banged up, and the team has kicked the tires on young quarterbacks the last few years. Dealing Stafford would mean eating $19 million in dead cap money, but that would actually save $14 million off his current number for 2021. And that he’s due just $43 million in cash the next two years would make him more attractive to other teams. That said, if they keep him, he provides at least a bridge to the next guy, which is valuable. And makes this is an intriguing call for the next GM/coach.
Atlanta’s situation is a little more problematic. Ryan’s dead money number, if the Falcons trade or release him, is $44.43 million, a higher figure than his $40.912 million cap number for next year. Add to that the fact that the Falcons are already over $200 million in cap commitments for 2021, and that Ryan is 36, and there’ll be plenty of incentive for the new coach and GM to go forward with Ryan, at least as a placeholder in 2021. That he’s a really good guy and still a good player would make that easier to do, too.
As for the Jets and Darnold, everyone knows the score. If they had the first pick, he’d be available and available soon. Now that they don’t, it’ll come down to what GM Joe Douglas thinks of Darnold (I know he likes him, and we’ll see how much), and the quarterbacks other than Trevor Lawrence in the draft class. Remember, if the Jets hang on to Darnold, they’ll have to make a call on a fully-guaranteed option at around $25 million for 2022 in May. Tough to envision them passing on a QB, then declining that option and creating more uncertainty at the position. So it’s likely time to marry Darnold or move on from him.
And the really interesting thing is that movement here could create movement elsewhere too. Would San Francisco make Jimmy Garoppolo available if they could get Darnold? Would pursuing Wentz mean the end of Philip Rivers’s run in Indy?
These questions, as it stands now, are fair ones. And until some hires start coming down the pike, it’s tough to answer any of them definitively.
***
THE FINAL WORD
We can argue till we’re blue in the face over the NFL’s handling of COVID-19. But I will say this: There are a lot of people who worked really hard to try and create the safest workplace environment possible for players, coaches and staff over the last five months. And it’s those people—the doctors, trainers and ops staffers, who weren’t making the big-box decisions on whether the season should be played and how—who deserve credit.
We’re 16 games away from the NFL’s goal of 256 games in 17 weeks, and there’s no way we’d be here without them.
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Fan Controlled Football is slated to begin play in February. The 7-on-7 league will reportedly allow fans to set rosters and call plays, featuring teams owned by Richard Sherman, Mike Tyson and Marshawn Lynch among others.
"The more I heard about what this was going to be, the more I felt it was going to be something that was just very fun," Manziel told Seifert. "It's going to be very fan-oriented and something I could get behind without being extremely, extremely, extremely serious, the way that my football career has been in the past."
"I wake up with a smile on my face way more than I used to in the past, when people would have said that I had everything," Manziel told Seifert. "I'm at a point in my life where I'm 28 years old and I'm still trying to figure out what I'm doing moving forward and trying to re-create an identity, and that's what the past year has been about for me."
Fan Controlled Football will hold a six-week season, with games live-streamed on Twitch. League founder Sohrob Farudi said players FCF players like Manziel will also connect with fans through a variety of social media platforms.
Manziel logged eight starts with the Browns in 2014 and 2015, tallying seven touchdowns and seven interceptions. The 2012 Heisman Trophy winner was released in 2016 following a misdemeanor assault charge that was later dismissed.
D’Andre Swift vs. Vikings (1 p.m. ET, FOX): Swift has been hot in recent weeks, scoring 15 or more fantasy points in three of his last four games. I like him to put up good totals this week, as the Lions host the Vikings in a meaningless NFC North battle. Their defense has allowed 17 total touchdowns and the sixth-most points to running backs, including Alvin Kamara’s historic six-touchdown, 56.2-point line on Christmas Day. Swift will be a solid No. 2 fantasy runner.
Malcolm Brown vs. Cardinals (4:25 p.m. ET, FOX): The Rams have lost Cam Akers, and Darrell Henderson to high ankle sprains in the last two weeks, and neither is likely to face the Cardinals. That leaves Brown to be the team's featured back in a smash spot based on the matchup. Arizona's defense has allowed 16 touchdowns and nearly 24 fantasy points per game to opposing running backs, so Brown should produce in an important NFC West clash.
Mike Davis vs. Saints (4:25 p.m. ET, FOX): The Saints are still playing for the No. 1 overall seed in the NFC, while Carolina is simply playing out the stretch. With that motivation in their back pocket, I’d expect the New Orleans defense to step up and keep Davis in check. The Saints have allowed eight touchdowns and the fewest fantasy points to running backs this season, including a Week 7 contest where Davis finished with 36 total yards and 8.6 fantasy points.
Sit ‘Em
Kenyan Drake at Rams (4:25 p.m. ET, CBS): Drake is a tough player to sit, but I would be mindful of a tough road matchup against the Rams. Just one enemy back (Ezekiel Elliott) has scored more than 17.5 fantasy points against them at home, and just one has scored more than 13.5 points against them at SoFi Stadium since Week 4. Overall, Los Angeles has allowed just 10 total touchdowns and the fourth-fewest fantasy points to runners. At best, Drake is a flex option.
Giovani Bernard vs. Ravens (1 p.m. ET, CBS): Bernard has been useful in his last two games, scoring a combined 42.8 fantasy points in a pair of Bengals wins. He did, however, lose 17 touches and five red-zone looks to Samaje Perine. That rotation is a concern moving into this week, as is a matchup against the Ravens. They're in a four-way tie with the Colts, Browns, and Dolphins in terms of the postseason, so look for their defense to keep Gio in check.
Michael Fabiano is an award-winning fantasy football analyst on Sports Illustrated and a member of the Fantasy Sports Writers Association (FSWA) Hall of Fame. You can follow Michael onTwitter,Facebook,YouTube, andInstagramfor all of the latest breaking fantasy football news and the best analysis in the business!
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