Board 8 > NFL Week 17 Discussion Topic

(+) Yeah! (+)

Kirk Cousins self reported and tested positive for Covid, so he's our against the Packers.

Which means the Cowboys' already slim chances at the 1 seed are now completely gone.

Aaron Rodgers: Haha! You didn't get immunized like I did.
Kirk Cousins: You missed a game too!
Aaron Rodgers: Yeah, but I was immunized.

And Rodgers will get the 1 seed and win the MVP anyway

I've got 3 fantasy teams playing in finals this week and I'm at the mercy of the covid gods here.

Leonhart4 posted...

Kirk Cousins self reported

What happened to "If I die I die"

Gonna be a rough week for Cincinnati with the Bearcats losing by 35 and the Bengals losing by 16.

Crescent-Moon posted...

What happened to "If I die I die"

I don't see how that statement conveys "if I get it I won't tell anyone"

Also I got distracted and thoughtless took the Steelers over the Browns and so far the Steelers are heavily favored which is interesting.

Every other spread underdog is... A massive dog.

Crescent-Moon posted...

What happened to "If I die I die"

He said "if I die I die", not the rest of the team!

MZero posted...

He said "if I die I die", not the rest of the team!

And as they always say, there is no I in team!

I feel like the absolutely pathetic way the Browns lost last week is still really fresh in people's minds even though it should probably be a point in their favor because they were the better team outside of Mayfield. But they just Brownsed it up which inspires no confidence.

Also something something Ben's last home game narrative

The Browns still outplayed and should've beaten the Packers though despite that.

I asked myself if I trusted Baker or the Steelers defense with the game on the line, and then I remembered Packers/Browns and Steelers/Titans.

Baker Mayfield and the Steelers defense have a roughly 50/50 chance of showing up to any given game.

At Home with Baker Mayfield gonna feel weird when he's not a Brown anymore.

Maybe he shouldn't be doing so many commercials ~

At Home with Baker Mayfield will sum up Cleveland's season when they miss the playoffs

All the Browns have to do is win and the division is theirs, and they're both winnable games, so we'll see.

Well ok the Bengals could technically clinch this week but I'd be shocked if they did.

Also if the Browns lose and/or the Bengals win, we may end up with a Week 18 where every division is already decided and so none of those games will matter.

Actually, I guess we also need Rams win/Cardinals lose, but still, I don't understand the scheduling here. They could've scheduled Titans/Colts, which would be likely to matter, but nope, let's go with Colts/Jags and Titans/Texans instead. It's clear they were hoping for Ravens/Steelers to be the regular season finale looking at all the games they scheduled for Week 18.

Steelers @ Ravens and Cowboys @ Eagles are the clear marquee matchups of week 18

And all 4 could either be clinched or eliminated beforehand.

The Eagles clinch with a win and a Vikings loss.

They also need a Saints loss or a 49ers win but they'll get that.

Crescent-Moon posted...

What happened to "If I die I die"

Gonna be a rough week for Cincinnati with the Bearcats losing by 35 and the Bengals losing by 16.

Bearcats going all the way

Steelers @ Ravens and Cowboys @ Eagles are the clear marquee matchups of week 18

And all 4 could either be clinched or eliminated beforehand.

The Eagles clinch with a win and a Vikings loss.

They also need a Saints loss or a 49ers win but they'll get that.

The 49ers clinch with a win and a Saints loss.

All playoff spots, divisions, and both #1 seeds can be clinched this week, leading to a week 18 with basically no drama.

And this weekend's spread heavily favors Cincinnati/Cleveland to be the game of the week next week because everyone else is going to have clinched.

The Colts beating Vegas clinches it for both them and the Pats. The Bills would also need a Chargers loss or a Ravens loss.

The Bills will need to beat the Jets to get in, the Bengals need to beat the Browns to get in, the 49ers will need to beat the Rams to get in, and the Chiefs/Packers will need to beat the Broncos/Lions to lock up the 1 seeds.

That's probably all we're getting next week.

I believe the "week 18 is meaningless" scenario requires a Dolphins/Titans tie.

Wait it's missing the AFC 7 seed.

I was acting like the Bills/Colts/Pats were all wild card.

R.I.P. Dan Reeves

Wentz is good to go for the Colts tomorrow

CEH out for the Chiefs

We kinda already knew Wentz would be in. It's been a non-story all week.

Same for Lamar Jackson. He can still barely walk and won't be in for this game or week 18

Playing him this week would be a fireable offense that decently likely results in an injury so bad he's not ready to go at the start of next season.

Arians also cleared the protocols so he's good to go against the Jets, although if there's a team that needs their coach the least tomorrow, it's Tampa...!

LeonhartFour posted...

Arians also cleared the protocols so he's good to go against the Jets, although if there's a team that needs their coach the least tomorrow, it's Tampa...!

actually good for the jets

could have been the todd bowles revenge game

0 people are currently on the Jets tomorrow.

Shock!

Ok for funsies I looked up the other games because I wanted to see just how bad this spread was.

0 on the Falcons
1 on the Giants
6 on the Bengals
8 on the Dolphins
1 on the Raiders
1 Jaguars
3 WFT
3 Ravens
2 Broncos
0 Texans
7 Cardinals
2 Panthers
4 Lions
1 Vikings
9 Browns

A few people left to pick and it's not as bad as I expected, though only like 1/4 of the upset picks are from people in relevant positions.

This is what the other league mostly looks like:

Buffalo Bills
Chicago Bears
Kansas City Chiefs
Tennessee Titans
Indianapolis Colts
New England Patriots
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Philadelphia Eagles
Los Angeles Rams
Los Angeles Chargers
San Francisco 49ers
Dallas Cowboys
New Orleans Saints
Seattle Seahawks
Green Bay Packers
Pittsburgh Steelers
LOCK ALL

There are 6 people with that right now, and another 2 with everything the same except for Miami.

Not a lot's gonna happen in the other league this week...

Also I kinda want to take Arizona, I just feel totally adverse to taking another big risk this week.

If there's any game the Cardinals will magically wake up, it's the game after Dallas historically stomped WFT.

Bills 31, Falcons 13
Bears 19, Giants 6
Chiefs 34, Bengals 16
Titans 22, Dolphins 20
Colts 34, Raiders 11
Patriots 27, Jaguars 17
Bucs 26, Jets 9
Eagles 30, WFT 16
Rams 34, Ravens 21
Chargers 27, Broncos 16
49ers 26, Texans 20
Cowboys 27, Cardinals 21
Saints 20, Panthers 13
Seahawks 23, Lions 19
Packers 38, Vikings 13
Steelers 3, Browns 2

yeah this is definitely a game Dallas can blow but I don't think Arizona matches up well with their defense since they've got a front that can actually keep Kyler in the pocket and no Hopkins is a bigger deal than I think people realized

LeonhartFour posted...

yeah this is definitely a game Dallas can blow but I don't think Arizona matches up well with their defense since they've got a front that can actually keep Kyler in the pocket and no Hopkins is a bigger deal than I think people realized

That's the thing.

Everything says that Dallas should win this game. They're the better team. They have the better matchup.

Everything says that Arizona should keep backsliding, given what we've seen this year and what we saw last year. Kliff has a sub .333 winning percentage in the back half of the NFL season. He doesn't make the necessary week to week adjustments and is getting outcoached.

Dallas got blown out at home by the Broncos and dropped one at home on Thanksgiving to the Raiders as really big favorites. Arizona is 5-0 as the underdog this year and has won all 5 games by 10+ points.

I want to pick Arizona, because this feels ripe for a Cowboys letdown. I kinda think the letdown DOES happen, but Dallas finds a way to take it ugly anyway. This may turn into two teams beating themselves.

oh yeah and that's probably the big thing

this might be the only week this season Dallas has the coaching advantage because late season Kliff is a disaster

Crescent-Moon posted...

Dallas got blown out at home by the Broncos and dropped one at home on Thanksgiving to the Raiders as really big favorites.

when the Cowboys weren't healthy on defense yes (not to mention the Raiders game was horrendously officiated)

they haven't lost since they got both Lawrence and Gregory back

Kliff is a near lock to be fired at the end of the season and won't be sniffing a HC job again any time soon.

It's abundantly clear he's outcoached on the NFL HC level.

Crescent-Moon posted...

Kliff is a near lock to be fired at the end of the season and won't be sniffing a HC job again any time soon.

It's abundantly clear he's outcoached on the NFL HC level.

Would you like to take this bet?

yeah I don't expect Kliff to get fired

if they had missed the playoffs maybe but that's not happening

I know theyr'e on a 3 game L streak but like...they are still 10-5? And they're missing their top wideout? How did this turn from "holy cow the cards are a top NFL team" to "Kliff should be fired" in the span of 3 games?

because they've floundered to close out the season in each of the 3 years he's been there

although this year they'll at least make the playoffs

2 of the 3 games they lost on this skid are against teams over .500, including one against the rams. And they've gotten better each year since Kliff has been there, along with Kyler. I'm just saying, feels a little knee-jerky to say kliff is the problem. They were the top pick 3 years ago for a reason, and it wasn't the coach.

Eh, Kliff has routinely made questionable in-game decisions. Like yeah, the Cards are better than they were before he got there, but that doesn't mean it isn't fair to question if they could be even better with a different coach.

Again, I don't expect Kliff to be fired, but it's troubling that his teams get worse at the end of every season. You can even see this trend when he was at Texas Tech.

Kliff is not part of the solution at Arizona and I feel like everyone kinda knows it by now honestly.

It's not a matter of if. It's a matter of when.

Again I'm going to miss the Sunday early games and half of the afternoon games... I'm going to miss the excitement of being able to watch the Giants and Jets get smacked. It's really bad when you have two worthless teams blocking off an entire timeslot.

Ranks 3, 5-10, and 13 are now lock alling the exact same picks on the other league.

Rank 4 and 11 haven't picked yet. Rank 2 and 12 are a single game off.

I've never seen anything like this. This is almost a straight up bye week..

https://www.cbssports.com/nfl/news/jaguars-head-coach-search-retaining-gm-trent-baalke-will-hinder-teams-ability-to-attract-top-candidates/

Jaguars coaching search not going well. Most coaches don't want to work with Trent Baalke. Baalke floating the idea of Bill O'Brien.

*cries*

ShadowYosuke posted...

https://www.cbssports.com/nfl/news/jaguars-head-coach-search-retaining-gm-trent-baalke-will-hinder-teams-ability-to-attract-top-candidates/

Jaguars coaching search not going well. Most coaches don't want to work with Trent Baalke. Baalke floating the idea of Bill O'Brien.

*cries*

Floating BOB is a firable offense right there.

I mean it's the most Jaguars thing possible. We keep Baalke, hire Bill O'Brien, trade Trevor Lawrence for a 2nd rounder and an RB who'll never have another 1000 yard season. The few okay players on our team demand trades and/or release. Leaving us in, somehow, a worse position than we were before. I almost expect it to happen at this point.

The real problem the Jags have is you can't fire the owner.

That's part of the problem, yeah. It's why the Clown Khan avatars are blowing up on twitter just from reports that he's retaining Baalke. Of course the other problem is if we could fire the owner, the Jaguars probably become the St. Louis Jaguars in short order. Or whatever city decides they want a football team.

I think if the NFL had their way they'd be the London Jag-u-ars

If the NFL had their way, there'd probably be 3 or 4 teams in Europe. But the logistics make it unlikely to ever even have one. But watch out if they invent teleportation.

The only way to have NFL in Europe is to have a 4-team division of all European teams.

I think it could work if they did a weird schedule where they did 4 road games, 8 home games, 4 road games, so the teams that face them in the middle of the season can have a bye afterwards if they want it, and the London team isn't traveling back and forth all the time.

Leonhart4 posted...

I think it could work if they did a weird schedule where they did 4 road games, 8 home games, 4 road games, so the teams that face them in the middle of the season can have a bye afterwards if they want it, and the London team isn't traveling back and forth all the time.

Yep, something like this.

I think it'd be something like 3 games in the US, 5 games in Europe, 3 games in the US, 5 games in Europe. Remaining game of wiggle room.

US teams would only travel to Europe at most twice a year. Perhaps once after a TNF game and once before their bye week.

Logistically there are ways to make it "work". It's just not great. You also won't have players who want to actually do it.

But this is really why it requires an actual division to really work. The teams can just stay there for 3-5 week stretches playing each other and playing similar US teams.

Wentz is officially in.

The non-story that's been around all week is finally concluded.