Abuse and misconduct were both pervasive and systemic at the highest tiers of women’s professional soccer, and the sport’s governing bodies and team executives repeatedly failed to heed warnings or punish coaches who abused players, according to an investigative report released Monday by the U.S. Soccer Federation.
The year-long probe by Sally Q. Yates, the former acting attorney general, found that some of the game’s top coaches were the subjects of numerous allegations of sexual misconduct, including some that have not been previously made public. The coaches also leaned on vicious coaching tactics, Yates found, including “relentless, degrading tirades; manipulation that was about power, not improving performance; and retaliation against those who attempted to come forward.”
“Players described a pattern of sexually charged comments, unwanted sexual advances and sexual touching, and coercive sexual intercourse,” Yates wrote in the executive summary of her report.
U.S. Soccer hired Yates to investigate last year amid reports in The Washington Post and The Athletic of widespread allegations of abuse against coaches in the National Women’s Soccer League.
“Our investigation has revealed a league in which abuse and misconduct — verbal and emotional abuse and sexual misconduct — had become systemic, spanning multiple teams, coaches, and victims,” the report states. “Abuse in the NWSL is rooted in a deeper culture in women’s soccer, beginning in youth leagues, that normalizes verbally abusive coaching and blurs boundaries between coaches and players. The verbal and emotional abuse players describe in the NWSL is not merely ‘tough’ coaching. And the players affected are not shrinking violets. They are among the best athletes in the world.”
Yates also found the sport’s powerbrokers repeatedly failed the players by ignoring red flags and dismissing complaints. Both the NWSL and U.S. Soccer “appear to have prioritized concerns of legal exposure to litigation by coaches …. over player safety and well-being,” she wrote.
Rory Dames was accused of misconduct decades ago. He coached his way to prominence anyway.
“[T]hey also failed to institute basic measures to prevent and address it, even as some leaders privately acknowledged the need for workplace protections,” the report states. “As a result, abusive coaches moved from team to team, laundered by press releases thanking them for their service.”
While several allegations of abuse and misconduct have been made public in media reports, Yates’s report opens with a previously undisclosed allegation involving Christy Holly, the male former head coach for Racing Louisville FC. According to the report, Holly requested a one-on-one film session with player Erin Simon in April 2021.
“She knew what to expect,” the report states. “When she arrived, she recalls Holly opened his laptop and began the game film.”
The coach told Simon that he intended to touch her for every bad pass, according to Yates’s report, and “pushed his hands down her pants and up her shirt.”
“She tried to tightly cross her legs and push him away, laughing to avoid angering him,” the report states. “The video ended, and she left. When her teammate picked her up to drive home, Simon broke down crying.”
According to the report, the Louisville organization declined to aid investigators with any information concerning Holly’s employment, pointing to nondisclosure and nondisparagement agreements signed with Holly. Louisville abruptly fired Holly on Aug. 30, 2021, but never disclosed the circumstances surrounding his dismissal. “As a result, Holly’s misconduct has remained largely unknown, including to anyone who might seek to employ him as a coach,” the report states.
“There are too many athletes who still suffer in silence because they are scared that no one will help them or hear them,” Simon said in a statement Monday. “I know because that is how I felt.”
The report was based on interviews with more than 200 people, including more than 100 players, plus coaches, owners and front office staff from 11 current and former teams. But Yates’s team encountered several obstacles.
Louisville blocked both current and former employees from speaking with investigators about Holly, the report says. The Portland Thorns, whose coach, Paul Riley, has been accused of abusing players, “interfered with our access” to witnesses and “raised specious legal arguments in an attempt to impede our use of relevant documents,” according to the report. And the Chicago Red Stars, whose coach, Rory Dames, has been accused of mistreating pro and youth players, “unnecessarily delayed the production of relevant documents over the course of nearly nine months,” the report states. Some witnesses, such as Jeff Plush, the former NWSL commissioner, didn’t respond to investigators.
The report focuses largely on Holly, Riley and Dames, recounting allegations of sexual misconduct, abusive behavior and coercive tactics.
During his time as head coach of the Thorns, Riley “sexually pursued” player Meleana Shim for months, the report states, “and benched [her] after she declined his advances.” The team investigated, and the NWSL was aware of the allegations, but he was allowed to depart the team and take another coaching job in the league without the wrongdoing becoming public. The report also details a sexual relationship, first reported by The Athletic, that Riley is alleged to have had with another player, Sinead Farrelly, and noted that the NWSL failed to investigate a complaint she filed in 2021.
Both U.S. Soccer and the NWSL were aware of anonymous player surveys as far back as 2014 in which players said Riley was “verbally abusive,” “sexis[t],” and “destructive,” the report states. Neither organization acted on those complaints, according to the report, which calls Riley’s conduct — which allegedly included grooming behavior, late-night texts with players and flirtatious comments — an “open secret.”
Shim’s complaint was received in 2015, and U.S. Soccer received further warnings about Riley in 2018 and 2019, when he was under consideration for the U.S. women’s national team head coaching job.
Yates found that the NWSL received a series of four complaints about Riley in Spring 2021. “The League largely ignored the complaints, and instead, weeks before the publication of The Athletic article, NWSL Commissioner Lisa Baird was actively trying to keep Riley from resigning over his anger about the post-season schedule,” the report states.
Player surveys in 2014 and 2015 also included allegations that Dames was “abusive” and “unprofessional,” warning that players would not “be as honest out of fear,” according to the report. National team players complained to former U.S. Soccer President Sunil Gulati and Jill Ellis, the national team’s former head coach, that Dames “created a hostile environment for players.”
‘Nobody cares’: NWSL players say U.S. Soccer failed to act on abuse claims against Red Stars coach
But when the feedback was shared with Arnim Whisler, the owner of the Red Stars, he said the national team players wanted “this league to shut down” and simply had an “axe to grind” with Dames,” according to the report. Dames abruptly resigned from the Red Stars last November, two days after coaching in the NWSL title game, as The Post prepared to publish a story detailing players’ allegations against him. Dames never faced a background check, according to Yates’s report, despite having faced allegations of misconduct as a youth coach in the 1990s.
Holly was also allowed to pursue another coaching job despite past allegations of abuse. He was forced to leave Sky Blue Football Club midway through the 2016 season because of his “verbal abuse” and his “relationship with a player,” according to the report. But the details never became public, and Holly went on to perform contract work for U.S. Soccer, coaching with the under-17 and under-23 teams.
That experience helped Holly land the coaching job in Louisville in 2020, where, according to Yates’s report, he “repeated the same pattern of misconduct.”
The report says he sent Simon explicit photos. He requested that she come to his house to review game film, “and showed her pornography instead, masturbating in front of her before she left,” the report states.
“This investigation’s findings are heartbreaking and deeply troubling,” U.S. Soccer President Cindy Parlow Cone said in a statement. “The abuse described is inexcusable and has no place on any playing field, in any training facility or workplace.”
The NWSL’s abuse scandal exploded into the public eye last year after the reports in The Post and The Athletic led players to demand action from soccer officials. Games were canceled, five of the league’s 10 coaches resigned or were fired and Baird, the NWSL’s former commissioner, resigned. In the aftermath, U.S. Soccer retained Yates and her law firm, King & Spalding, in October 2021 to investigate.
The NWSL and the players’ union have separately retained the law firm Covington and Burling to investigate. Early findings from that ongoing probe have already led to temporary suspensions for Houston Coach James Clarkson, Orlando Coach Amanda Cromwell and Orlando assistant coach Sam Greene.
Yates’s report notes numerous systemic issues that acted as barriers to players reporting abuse: The league didn’t have an anti-harassment policy until last year. Most teams lacked a human resources department. There wasn’t an independent, anonymous reporting line until last fall. And the league and U.S. Soccer didn’t have someone on staff responsible for player safety.
The report also highlighted cultural issues that remain prevalent in women’s soccer, beginning at the youth level. The report states that players, coaches and staff were “conditioned to accept and respond to abusive coaching behaviors as youth players. By the time they reach the professional level, many do not recognize the conduct as abusive.”
Further, it noted that the league didn’t adopt an anti-fraternization policy until 2018, and intimate relationships between coaches and players “normalized.” It noted that coaches like Riley, Dames, and Holly all married former players.
The Yates report includes a series of recommendations, though it notes that U.S. Soccer has limited authority over league and team operations. The report urges teams to accurately disclose and explain misconduct to prevent other teams from hiring coaches and suggests U.S. Soccer have better engagement with its licensing process, which could help “weed out problematic coaches.”
U.S. Soccer should require the NWSL to conduct timely investigations into allegations of misconduct, and league and team employees should be required to participate. The report also recommends training for players and coaches and roles dedicated to player safety at the team, league and federation levels.
The report did not make employment recommendations, noting that Riley, Dames and Holly are all out of the NWSL. But Yates did urge U.S. Soccer to take steps “to prevent their future participation in USSF landscape.”
Similarly, both U.S. Soccer and NWSL have new leadership teams in place, but the report notes that many team owners remain in power. “Consequently, we recommend that the NWSL, which has governing authority over NWSL teams, owners, and personnel, determine whether disciplinary action is appropriate for any of these owners or team executives, in light of our findings and the findings of the NWSL/NWSLPA Joint Investigation,” the report states.
An NWSL spokesperson did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
U.S. Soccer said it will immediately begin working on implementing Yates’ recommendations. The organization will establish an office of Participant Safety, will publicize records from SafeSport’s database and will mandate minimum standards for background checks from youth soccer through the sport’s highest levels. It will also establish a committee that will focus on implementing these recommendations, headed by Danielle Slaton, the former USWNT player, with an action plan due by the end of January 2023.
“U.S. Soccer and the entire soccer community have to do better,” said the USSF’s Cone, a former player with the U.S. women’s national team, “and I have faith that we can use this report and its recommendations as a critical turning point for every organization tasked with ensuring player safety. We have significant work to do, and we’re committed to doing that work and leading change across the entire soccer community.”
Paul Chryst’s ouster from Wisconsin Sunday was a surprise. But Karl Dorrell? Not at all.
Colorado is 0-5 and 4-13 in the past two seasons. The roster is dreadful by Power 5 standards. This is going to be a really tough job. It doesn’t have a great recruiting base, and it’s got a pretty shaky positioning regarding conference stability. Colorado also hasn’t had back-to-back winning seasons in almost 20 years, dating back to 2004-05. There’s been just one Top 25 season in the past 20 years, a No. 17 finish in 2016 under Mike MacIntyre.
How can Colorado fix this? Who wants to try? The latter is just as important a question.
We think Colorado will try and keep the search focused on candidates with head coaching experience, but there are a couple of men without that experience we think the Buffaloes may consider.
Candidates with head coaching experience
Bronco Mendenhall: Former BYU and Virginia coach Bronco Mendenhall is available. He’s a defensive-minded coach who had a solid run at Virginia after going 99-43 at BYU. He knows this region well and would feel like a pretty safe hire. Would he fire up the fan base? Probably not, but could he develop the Buffaloes into a bowl team? Probably.
Kalani Sitake: The guy who followed Mendenhall at BYU, Sitake would also make some sense. His teams are always very physical and play hard.
PHILADELPHIA – “Fifty-something degrees, wind’s blowing 20 or 30 miles an hour, raining sideways, down 14-nothing,” Jalen Hurts said an hour after the remnants of Hurricane Ian had played havoc with a football game here.
He could have continued this way: We’re 20 minutes into a game where we’re getting nothing done, I’ve thrown a pick-six, now it’s third-and-goal from the Jacksonville 16, and I scramble for 13 desperate yards, trying to get something going. Now it’s fourth down just inside the Jacksonville four-yard line.
The play here’s the gimme field goal. Get something on the board.
No. Coach Nick Sirianni chose to go for it. Offensive coordinator and play-caller Shane Steichen dialed up a pass. Hurts took a shotgun snap, looked fast at three covered targets, and took off around the 13-yard line. “Good quarterbacks bail you out when you don’t call the right play,” Sirianni said later. Around the three-, Hurts dove for the end zone and pinged violently off 235-pound rookie linebacker Devin Lloyd at the goal line, the ball bouncing out of Hurts’ hands when he was clearly over the line. Touchdown.
The collision … intense. “It happens, it happens. Football. You just do what you gotta do right there,” Hurts said.
Hurts, coach’s son, isn’t a celebrator, and he jogged to the sidelines. The Eagles were back in it on this miserable day. Sirianni found Hurts.
“You know why I went for it?” Sirianni told him. “I went for it because I trusted you.”
Eagles 29, Jaguars 21. The 4-0 Eagles, the NFL’s last unbeaten team. Now, in a hallway outside the Eagles’ locker room, Hurts looked like he was ready for a GQ cover shoot: Sky blue suit, white shirt with HURTS embroidered on each cuff, skinny navy tie, shiny blue pocket square, polished black dress shoes, gold watch. The playing conditions, a distant memory.
What wasn’t a distant memory?
“I went for it because I trusted you.”
Thinking about it, Hurts smiled slightly. “That’s something I really appreciate,” said Hurts, an unemotional sort.
Just five years ago, the Eagles were basking in the glow of their first Super Bowl win. Now, with almost an entirely new cast led by the 53rd pick in the 2020 draft, they might contend to win number two. Just as Doug Pederson trusted Nick Foles in 2017, Nick Sirianni trusts Jalen Hurts in 2022. Football’s a funny, and transient, game.
From A to Z, Adams (Davante) to Zappe (Bailey), with a lot of alphabetic trouble around the letters “UNC,” this was one crazy week in the league where they play for pay.
Davante Adams made some beautiful music in the Raiders’ first win of the year, catching nine balls for 101 yards and eliminating the dumb “Where’s Davante?” questions.
“Gross motor instability” will disqualify players from playing football in that game, per Mike Florio, which is wise.
Jack Jones, a totally unknown New England rookie corner, pick-sixed Aaron Rodgers and then had the nerve to diss him. Kids these days.
Pick-6 for the rookie Jack Jones! @presidentjacc
📺: #NEvsGB on CBS 📱: Stream on NFL+ https://t.co/YPHqeLC4zg pic.twitter.com/OJItBVOmYW
— NFL (@NFL) October 2, 2022
Mahomes. That’s it. Just Mahomes.
Zach Wilson of the 2-2 (!) Jets beat the Men of Tomlin. Caught a TD pass too.
Cooper Rush will never lose a football game again. Question is, will he ever start another one?
DOINK! DOINK! Saints will hear that in their sleep.
Jim Irsay is not going to stand for this. He really isn’t. I can feel him fixing to blow from here.
Saquon the QB! Of the 3-1 Giants!
Jamaree Salyer played one of the best games in the NFL Sunday, and you’ve never heard of him. Admit it.
“Hindsight you take the points.” John Harbaugh’s not apologizing. Huge win for the Bills, another crusher for Baltimore.
The Lions. My gosh, the Lions. Average score of their four games: Foes 35.25, Detroit 35.00. Leos are 1-3.
Bailey Zappe (pronounced Zapp-ee) gave the Patriots a chance in Green Bay Sunday, which means that I’ve buried the lede in this column.
Aaron Donald … is in my Lawrence Taylor League now. To me, it’s a big deal.
Now back to the Eagles, and to Jalen Hurts. Hey: I thought it was always sunny in Philadelphia.
It is sunny, on Jalen Hurts’ side of the street. You know why? Because his team won the game. The Eagles won it in a different fashion than in the bombs-away way they’d won in September, running it 50 times for 210 yards, keeping the ball for almost 40 minutes. Fine with Hurts.
“The point about today,” Hurts said, “is more so about the conditions of the football game and not letting that deter us from our goal and our execution and what we wanted to do. Our ball security – we had that interception early, the pick-six. But you look at the turnover differential, I think it was five to one, just one for us. (True.) We put ourselves in a 14-0 hole. We hadn’t been in a hole like that all year. In these conditions, we played a different game. We just handled it.”
This is the thing you notice about Hurts. He knows the only thing that matters is winning, particularly in a city like this one. Winning humbly, winning with a worker-bee attitude, winning with gratitude.
Philadelphia is ferocious and merciless. Cross Philadelphia, and you’re dead. Play with a Philadelphia attitude – as Hurts did Sunday, down 14-0, knowing he’d sacrifice anything to score on the fourth-and-goal run, and car-crash into the end zone – and you can be a king.
Time will tell if that happens with Hurts here. But his center, Jason Kelce, already thinks Hurts is “the epitome of what a Philadelphia athlete is. He’s the ultimate underdog, and this city loves underdogs.”
The quick bio doesn’t really start off as an underdog story: Hurts was coached by his dad in Channelview, Texas, and recruited by Nick Saban to quarterback Alabama in 2016. He won the job as a true freshman, kept it for two years, lost it to Tua Tagovailoa in 2018, and transferred to Oklahoma for the 2019 season. (I wonder how many quarterbacks have been both first-team all-SEC and first-team all-Big 12. There’s at least one.)
Doug Pederson didn’t see a short (6-1) quarterback with good mobility (4.59 seconds in the 40-). He saw a smart quarterback who knew when to run but didn’t use it as a crutch, with a plus-arm that many draftniks didn’t see, with a chip on his shoulder that he’s used in the right way. GM Howie Roseman wanted a good backup QB for Carson Wentz because he’d been hurt a lot, and so late in round two in April 2020, here came Hurts.
He’d been through so much at such a high level by the time he got to the Eagles that Wentz feeling threatened by him was something he never paid attention to. That wouldn’t help him be a better player. “First time he ever stepped in the huddle as a rookie was in Green Bay,” Kelce said. “You want your quarterback to be confident in his ability but almost stoic. He made everyone feel he was in complete control. Ever hear that saying that 80 percent of how you communicate is by body language? Jalen’s definitely one of those 80-percent body-language guys.”
He’s got one other Rocky Balboa trait: To knock him off, you’re going to have to knock him out. He just sprang up from that hit by Devin Lloyd Sunday. I don’t know how. But that was a powerhouse right hook from Apollo Creed, and Hurts acted like it was a glancing blow.
QB1 punches it in😤#JAXvsPHI | #FlyEaglesFly pic.twitter.com/8BNkfOelNl
— Philadelphia Eagles (@Eagles) October 2, 2022
“I’ve never lost faith,” Hurts told me. “I’ve been at the top of the mountain and I’ve been in the valley low. Through it all I’ve always been who I am and I’ve tried to stay true to who I am – being a man of God and keeping Him at the center of everything. I’ve never lost faith. I’ll never ever ride waves. Never get too high, never get too low. I just always try to keep the main thing the main thing and control what I can and try to be the best quarterback and best man I can be for my team.”
Talk to people around the Eagles, and you’ll hear this recurring theme about Hurts: This is the first year he’s had the same offense two seasons in a row, so of course he’d be a better player. And he certainly is. Who’d have thought, a quarter of the way through the season, that you’d look at the leaders in yards-per-pass-attempt, the category that most often has the big throwers atop the list, and see this man in first place:
Jalen Hurts, 9.1 ypa
Having two deep threats, A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith, helps. But it’s more than that. It’s the quickness of his decision-making. It’s comfort in the system. It’s, even when he tucks and runs, as he did down 14-0 near the goal line Sunday, the discipline of going from 1 to 2 to 3 so fast, and knowing the throw’s not there and knowing instantly the best option is to run. That knowledge base is helped by having the exact same people around him daily for a second straight year—Kelce the center, Sirianni the head coach, Steichen the offensive coordinator, Brian Johnson the QB coach, Kevin Patullo the passing game coordinator.
As Sirianni said post-game, the benefit of players like Tom Brady and Drew Brees and Philip Rivers commanding the same offense year after year is obvious. “They have a mental rolodex, and they know when the defense looks a certain way, they’re going here with the ball, period.”
I fully expected Hurts to say what a great relief it was to finally have the same offense and same mentors for a second year. But he didn’t. Again, he saw the sunny side.
“I’ve always tried to use that as a positive,” he said. “I learned something from Lane Kiffin, from Brian Daboll, from Mike Locksley, from Steve Sarkisian, at Alabama. Learning all those different ways of thinking of football conceptually really helped me. Then coach [Lincoln] Riley at Oklahoma. Then coach Pederson. Now my coaches here.
“I’ve been a sponge. I’ve observed and learned. I apply their lessons to the way I think.” All the way back to high school, and coach Averion Hurts in Channelview, Texas.
“Everything’s simplified in high school,” he said. “You play your best when you have a simple mind, right? Sometimes, when I run a play now, and it’s something like high school, I think, ‘I ran that play for coach Hurts back at Channelview.’”
One other point about Hurts that’s compelling. It’s too early to think the Eagles are certain that Hurts is their quarterback for the next 10 years. Why make that call now anyway, when there’s no real reason to? It’s certainly trending that way – that Hurts will be the franchise guy here. But until he is, and until the Eagles have to lay out the money for Hurts, they can build a more complete team. That more complete team was on display Sunday in the south Philly rain.
The Eagles signed free-agent pass-rusher Haason Reddick for three years and $45 million; he had two strip-sacks of Trevor Lawrence in the fourth quarter. And Roseman took advantage of the Giants’ horrible cap management by pilfering corner James Bradberry for one year and $7.25 million. With five minutes left in the third quarter and the Jags down 20-14, Bradberry baited Lawrence into a huge interception at the Eagles’ seven-yard line.
The Eagles are a continuum. From the looks of it, the 24-year-old Hurts will be at fulcrum for a long time. Good for the Eagles. Bad for the rest of the NFC East.
The best stories in the NFL on Sunday:
1. The Zappe-Rodgers showdown was a barnburner.
Packers 27, Patriots 24, overtime. In fact, Green Bay had to play all 70 minutes to get the win, and afterward Aaron Rodgers said, “This way of winning, I don’t think, is sustainable because of the pressure it puts on our defense.” Weird season for the Packers, who are 3-1 despite missing Davante Adams desperately. Lucky season too, because the Pack is in the midst of the most generous six-game stretch – Chicago, at Tampa Bay, New England, Giants (in London), Jets, at Washington – on its schedule, by far. Amazing to think Green Bay’s got the 3-1 Giants in London next Sunday. Yes, 3-1.
Against the Patriots, it wasn’t so much what rookie Bailey Zappe from Western Kentucky did; it’s what Rodgers didn’t do. Among other things, Rodgers threw a bizarrely late sideline route that rookie corner Jack Jones picked off and ran back for a touchdown. What’s more, Jones threw shade at Rodgers for it. “Personally,” Jones said, “I feel it’s disrespectful to throw an out route on me.” Hey kid: They threw out routes on Deion Sanders! (Not many, but some.) How did the 121st pick in the draft get so big-headed to think one of the best quarterbacks ever was insulting him by throwing the kind of route that’s thrown 162 times a week in the NFL? Man, that was weird.
Rodgers and Belichick post-game. (Photo by Patrick McDermott/Getty Images)
On the bright side, it was cool to see Bill Belichick and Rodgers, in what is very likely their last meeting on the field, spend significant time talking before and after the game. Belichick, 70, and Rodgers, 38, would have to meet in a Super Bowl unless both hang on till the next Pats-Pack meeting in 2026.
2. Every year in the NFL, reality bites.
I remember on my visit to Steelers training camp how taken aback Mike Tomlin was by the mere suggestion that the Steelers might regress to the mean this year, post-Roethlisberger. Well, we’re just about there. Sunday in Pittsburgh: Jets 24, Steelers 20, dropping the home team to 1-3.
And while we’re at the business of strange NFL developments, consider this: Teams repping New York City (Jets, Giants) are a combined 5-3. Teams repping the state of California (Niners, Rams, Chargers) are 5-5.
Anyway, what the Towel-wavers probably cannot fathom is Jets QB Zach Wilson carrying a 20-10 deficit into the last 13 minutes, driving New York 81 yards in 11 plays for a TD to narrow it, and then driving 65 yards in 10 plays for another TD to win it. “That was some of the most fun I’ve had playing football,” Wilson said. Well, overcoming a 10-point deficit in the fourth quarter by completing 10-of-12 to beat the team Mike Tomlin coaches is a pretty big deal.
Re: Tomlin, the fact that he yanked starting quarterback Mitchell Trubisky less than three-and-a-half games into his Steeler trial is another big deal. Now it’s Kenny Pickett’s turn to try to justify the faith the Steelers placed in him by drafting him 20th last April. Talk about a trial by fire: Pittsburgh faces Buffalo, Tampa Bay, Miami and Philadelphia in the next four weeks. Yikes.
3. Great Mahomes throws, ranked:
No-look pass to Demarcus Robinson, 2018, vs. Baltimore.
Fourth-down cross-body bomb to Tyreek Hill, 2018, vs. Baltimore.
Lofted basketball shot over traffic to Clyde Edwards-Helaire, 2022, vs. Tampa:
Not in a playbook you’ve ever seen 😏
📺: #KCvsTB on @SNFonNBC pic.twitter.com/D8vrtkPvek
— Kansas City Chiefs (@Chiefs) October 3, 2022
Discuss.
That’s how I’d rank them, anyway. Mahomes on the two-yard hoop shot to Edwards-Helaire: “I saw Clyde and just kinda flicked it up to him. I was thinking about getting to the pylon, but then I realized Clyde was open.”
Sometimes, I think Mahomes could make fairly normal throws, but tossing the throw like he did in Tampa is just stupidly fun. Why not do it? Why not insert more fun in the game?
4. A sentence and a quote on four other events:
The Colts are in trouble, rushing for just 3.5 yards a carry and getting Matt Ryan beat up, and trust me, the owner is stewing over being 0-2-1 in the division – with a win over Kansas City. “We are all pissed,” defensive captain DeForest Buckner told The Athletic.
The Lions are first in points scored and last in points allowed. “I have a lot of faith in [defensive coordinator] Aaron Glenn, but I think we need to take a deep dive on our defense from coaching on down,” said Dan Campbell.
Cooper Rush is 3-0 as Dak Prescott’s relief pitcher, and I’m not buying his aw-shucks-I’m-so-lucky routine. “All the breaks you catch, I guess I’m just kind of lucky,” he said after the 25-10 win over Washington.
With the Chargers needing to protect QB Justin Herbert (ribs) and left tackle Rashawn Slater out, sixth-round rookie Jamaree Salyer, who moved from guard to play tackle Sunday in Houston, was a gem in the 34-24 Chargers win. “He’s a stud – calm, poised, strong,” said coach Brandon Staley.
Hello, Next Gen: AD & LT
Before I write about Aaron Donald, I want you to watch a short video of Donald’s 100th career sack, eight days ago against Kyler Murray of the Cardinals:
Career sack No. 100 for Aaron Donald! 👏
📺: #LARvsAZ on FOX 📱: Stream on NFL+ https://t.co/Vr11sqlsAh pic.twitter.com/e9LKkTo2Lr
— NFL (@NFL) September 25, 2022
So … There’s an avalanche of newfangled (and very valid) stats we can use as measurable metrics in football today. When I started covering the game in 1984, the NFL was three decades away from tracking the speed and exertion of players with tiny trackers embedded into uniforms, for instance. In the eighties, you had to trust your eyes.
My eyes told me, covering Lawrence Taylor and the New York Giants for four of their glory years, that Taylor was the best defensive player I saw then, and I’d probably ever see, a merciless roadrunner/hostage-taker of offensive souls. Not only was Taylor a sack machine and fast enough to beat any tackle on the edge, but he could bull-rush like a nose tackle. Boy, was he mean. Effectively mean.
Today, I’m here to say Aaron Donald joins Lawrence Taylor on my personal two-player Mount Rushmore of Defense of the last four decades. Donald, truly, is probably better, and I can’t believe I’m saying that. But you know how Bulls-philes who love Michael Jordan said there’d never be anyone like Jordan, ever? Maybe not. But LeBron’s close. Kobe’s close. Same with there’ll-never-be-another-Joe Montana. Well, Tom Brady came along. I’m not a fan of watching some all-timer play and saying there’ll never be another one as good, or nearly as good. There almost always is.
Metrics say it, and my eyes see it in their 39th season of watching great players play: Aaron Donald is at least as destructive, and at least as impactful, on a game as Lawrence Taylor was.
The final bit of proof came eight days ago, in Arizona, in the video you just watched. Donald was lined up across from right guard Will Hernandez of the Cardinals, in an uncommon (for Donald) one-on-one, no-chip-help look. Per Next Gen Stats, Donald was 6.15 yards from Murray, in the shotgun, at the snap of the ball. When Donald beat Hernandez to the inside on the pass-rush, Donald was 2.36 yards from Murray when both were in full gallop, Murray trying to evade Donald. Donald dove at Murray at the Arizona 34-, and clipped the QB’s ankle with one outstretched whack of the hand, and Murray went down. Murray intentionally grounded the ball while going down, but the officials ruled he was down before releasing it, and that was Donald’s 100th sack.
Next Gen Stats records speeds of everything, including players at all points of the game. The burst of Donald coming off jousting with Hernandez showed him running 14.09 mph to catch Murray. What’s significant about that? Donald, while sacking Murray, had a faster burst to catch a quarterback than any of the great edge players in football—Micah Parsons, T.J. Watt, Khalil Mack, Myles Garrett, Joey Bosa, Nick Bosa—had in the first three weeks of this season.
This is the essence of Aaron Donald: At 31, after seriously considering retirement last winter, he can still bull-rush and toss aside a 335-pound guard, then catch one of the fastest quarterbacks in NFL history for a sack.
It’s perfect and just, really, that Donald has more sacks than any player in football since he broke into the league in 2014, and his 100th came against a quarterback who runs a 4.38 40-yard dash in full retreat mode.
“I’m an edge rusher playing inside,” Donald told me the other day, driving home from work.
Those six words have to be the most accurate and telling words that Donald has ever spoken about football, because an edge rusher stout enough to dominate inside is exactly what Donald is.
Donald before last Sunday’s game against the Cardinals. (Photo by Michael Owens/Getty Images)
“I think I’ve opened some doors about the position since I came into this league,” he said. “When I was drafted, I wasn’t that 6-4, 300-pound interior lineman everyone was looking for. I was 6-1, 280 … but really I played at 265. I heard it all: You ain’t big enough. You can’t be an interior defensive lineman in this league at 265.
“I think what people forget is, my sophomore year at Pitt, I played the edge. I played 5-technique. (A 5-technique defensive end plays just outside the shoulder of the tackle and has to be powerful against the run as well as a good rusher.) And I played pretty well. So if I had to do it now, I think I could do it. I don’t know how successful I’d be, but I know I could it.”
Donald would be pretty damn good. But the shorter path to the quarterback fits his quickness and power like no other player in football—outside or inside. One more Next Gen Stats piece of gold: Since NGS began compiling stats in 2016, he has 458 quarterback pressures, 86 more than any other defensive player in football.
There are other Taylor/Donald things to consider. Donald, entering the Rams game at San Francisco tonight, is averaging .77 sacks per game in his 130-game career, rushing mostly from the inside; Taylor averaged .77 sacks per game in his 184-game career, rushing largely from the outside. Donald had two fourth-quarter sacks, critical plays, in his lone Super Bowl win over Cincinnati. Taylor had no sacks in either of the Giants’ Super Bowl wins he played in. That matters, but it’s not huge.
Both play angry. I once saw Taylor, in a replacement game in 1987, try to gouge the eyes of a Buffalo tackle who’d consistently played him dirty. In August, I saw Donald rip off the helmet of teammate Ron Havenstein in a camp brawl and hurl it in the air. Not a good trait, obviously, but indicative that even in practice Donald plays with intensity. Their competitive streaks match.
If I had to draft one of them at 22, I’d take Donald. I can’t think in my little football world of a bigger compliment to give a defensive player than to say I’d choose him over Taylor.
Donald is not a big talker, especially about himself. But on his ride home Thursday, it was clear he knows what he’s done so far, and also that he knows he still has more greatness to chase.
“My expectation entering the league was never this,” Donald said. “It’s so hard to talk about it, honestly, hearing my named mentioned with all the greats. Hard to find the words. I’ve surpassed anything I’ve ever dreamed of, but I have so much more to do. I won’t let it all soak in till I’m finished, whenever that is.”
Donald has committed to play through the end of 2023. Selfishly, I hope there’s more.
Tua and Player Safety
20
The best thing that can be said about the Tua Tagovailoa concussion drama is that the league and the players union seem on the verge of taking the game to a safer place with their joint admission that they “anticipate changes to the [concussion] protocol” in the coming days.
But the process of how they’re getting there is clunky, at best. From the time Tagovailoa was slammed to the turf in Miami eight days ago, to being rag-dolled to the turf in Cincinnati Thursday night and stretchered off the field, what seemed obvious over the five-day period was made questionable by the adults in the room. And late Saturday, after reports of the NFL players union dismissing the unaffiliated neurotrauma consultant (UNC), which is their right under the concussion protocol, the league and union admitted they had a fractured process.
“The NFL and the NFLPA agree that modifications to the Concussion Protocol are needed to enhance player safety,” Saturday’s joint statement said. “The NFLPA’s Mackey-White Health & Safety Committee and the NFL’s Head Neck and Spine Committee have already begun conversations around the use of the term ‘Gross Motor Instability’ and we anticipate changes to the protocol being made in the coming days based on what has been learned thus far in the review process.”
When I talked to NFL Chief Medical Officer Allen Sills Sunday morning, he stressed that no decisions had yet been made about changes to the concussion protocol. He made the point that it’s possible that when players stumble on the field after a play—as Tagovailoa did against Buffalo four days before he was concussed in Cincinnati—it’s not always because of head trauma. “Sometimes players stumble and it’s not coming from the brain,” Sills said. “Did he (Tagovailoa) stumble from a brain concern or something else?”
It’s plausible, of course. We’ve got to be cognizant that it’s possible—possible—that Tagovailoa might not have had head trauma the previous Sunday against Buffalo, when he was shoved by linebacker Matt Milano and his head slammed against the turf. Tagovailoa claims it was his back, not head, that hurt. And apparently the UNC and Dolphins team medical officer who examined him at the half agreed, because he returned to play that afternoon.
But there’s a problem with clearing a player to return to play after he: a) has his head slammed to the turf; b) demonstrates instability getting up; c) has to go to a knee to steady himself to avoid falling. First, did the medical officials see the back of Tagovailoa’s head slam into the turf? They should have, because they’re supposed to review visual evidence of the incident. And when the head hits the turf at great force, and it is followed by a player appearing punch-drunk and needing to go to the ground to avoid falling, that must be cause for a player to be removed from the game immediately.
Mike Florio reported Sunday night that the “gross motor instability” loophole is going to be removed from the concussion protocol. That is the best result from this ugly situation.
Not that other factors should come into play on a pure safety issue. But you’d be naïve to think the NFL isn’t concerned about its long-term talent pool. And think of parents of young athletes who saw Tagovailoa get knocked down, return to play, then get stretchered off the field four days later. What must they be thinking?
I asked my readers, particularly those with kids who might play football, how the situation affected them. This, from George Recine of Andover, Mass.: “I played four years of high school and four years of college football. I believe strongly in the good football has done for me and can do for my 9-year-old son. I want him to be able to play when the time comes. But my wife was watching the game with me Thursday night, and when Tua’s fingers locked in that grotesque position she turned to me and said, ‘And that’s why Charlie’s not playing football.’ What possible comeback could I have had?”
Multiply Recine by how many? Fifty thousand? More? Don’t dismiss those parents. They matter to the NFL.
The NFL says it’s serious about player health and head trauma. Now’s the time to prove it. Force a player to the bench when he suffers a major blow to the head and can’t stand or walk straight. In this case, that’s where the fix must start.
Rob Ninkovich, the former linebacker who won two Super Bowls with the Patriots, retired after his last one five-and-a-half years ago. He played 11 seasons, and Bill Belichick asked him to come back for a 12th in 2017. Ninkovich said no. Now with ESPN, Ninkovich is a thoughtful voice on football, longevity, injuries, risk, and life after football. His thoughts on 24-year-old Tua Tagovailoa:
“I think if 54-year-old Tua could talk to 24-year-old Tua, he would ask him, ‘What were you thinking?’ Twenty-four-year-olds think they’re indestructible. A football player is made to never want to come off the field. He never wants to surrender. And head injuries are the hardest injury for athletes to accept. You don’t know the effect of most of them till later in life.
“But you have to protect the player from the player.
“My career started to come to an end when my daughter was born. I was 30 years old, and we beat Seattle in the Super Bowl that year. My mom wanted me to retire then. She said, ‘You defied all the odds—what else is there?’ Two years later, I was still playing, and we beat Atlanta. But I knew I was retiring.
“The Patriots reached out multiple times about playing, and I was tempted. It was actually a very stressful time. I got shingles that off-season from the stress. It’s one of the hardest decisions you can ever make, as a football player. You’re stopping your lifelong dream, voluntarily. You’re never gonna put the pads on again. It’s so final.
“But if you’ve played for a few years, and you have decent money saved for life after football, and you’re deciding whether to play one more year … The price you pay for one more year of salary is you might take another 850 shots to the head. Is it worth it? It wasn’t for me.
“The league preaches safety all the time. But then they add a 17th game, and one game a year for every team on three days’ rest, the Thursday night game. What really bothers me is Tua is a highly talked-about person in a highly sought-after position, so this gets a ton of attention. Rightfully so. But what about offensive linemen or lesser-known players when this happens to them? Nobody notices. It’s brushed under the rug.
“The whole thing is upsetting. It’s the families, the wives and the children, who will deal with the consequences of things like these far down the road. They’ll be dealing with what happened to these players when they were 24 years old.”
Offensive players of the week
Cooper Rush, quarterback, Dallas. With Dak Prescott openly campaigning to play next week at the Super Bowl champion Rams, let’s take a moment to appreciate Cooper Rush. He’s now 4-0 as a Dak relief pitcher, including three wins in a row since Prescott went down opening day with the broken thumb. He’s also the first Cowboys quarterback in history to win each of his first four starts. In Sunday’s 25-10 win over the Commanders, Rush went 15-of-27 for 223 yards and two touchdowns, including a 30-yard pass to CeeDee Lamb at the start of the fourth to make it a two-score game. Will Dak Prescott be ready to regain his job next week? Suddenly, it’s not so vital.
Saquon Barkley, running back, New York Giants. Barkley’s splashy return to form continued this week in the Giants’ win over the Bears with 31 carries for 146 yards, his second game of the season surpassing 100 rush yards. The Bears’ defense has been its (relative) strength this season, but they had few answers for Barkley. Daniel Jones added 68 yards on the ground and rushed for two scores of his own before leaving the game with an ankle injury. When backup Tyrod Taylor entered concussion protocol, Barkley stepped up to play Wildcat QB. “Like you were eight years old playing with your friends,” Barkley said post-game of watching Brian Daboll draw up plays on a grease board on the sideline.
Saquon in the Wildcat?
📺: #CHIvsNYG on FOX 📱: Stream on NFL+ https://t.co/6YoRNVzkae pic.twitter.com/YDu4jLqAAC
— NFL (@NFL) October 2, 2022
Zach Wilson, quarterback, New York Jets. It wasn’t a perfect performance from Wilson in his first start since his August knee surgery, but it was a fun one. The second-year QB went 18-for-36 for 252 yards, a touchdown and two interceptions against Pittsburgh. Before he ever threw a touchdown pass in the 2022 season, he caught one. In a Jersey twist on the Philly special in the second quarter, Wilson handed off to wide receiver Garrett Wilson, who flipped it to Braxton Berrios, who found Zach Wilson in the end zone for the 10-0 lead. More importantly, Wilson powered the Jets to the fourth-quarter comeback: Down by 10 in the fourth, he went 10-of-12 for 128 yards and a five-yard TD pass to Corey Davis. More amazing, perhaps, than winning in Pittsburgh: the Jets are 2-2.
ZACH WILSON IS BACK AND CATCHING TOUCHDOWNS.
📺: #NYJvsPIT on CBS 📱: Stream on NFL+ https://t.co/95ssqnYCaC pic.twitter.com/WrOzZN5K7l
— NFL (@NFL) October 2, 2022
Rashaad Penny, running back, Seattle. A bit like his team, Penny got off to a slow start this season, with zero touchdowns entering this week. In Detroit, Penny cemented the Seahawks’ win with a pair of long second-half touchdowns, from 36 and 41 yards out, the latter extending Seattle’s lead from three to 10 points with 2:14 left to play. When the Lions again closed the gap to 3 points, making it 48-45, Penny ended their comeback hopes when he converted on third-and-five with 58 seconds remaining. He went for 151 yards, 10 more than his season total entering the game.
Defensive players of the week
Jordan Poyer, safety, Buffalo. Late in the fourth quarter of a game tied at 20, the veteran safety picked off Lamar Jackson in the end zone on fourth and goal, arguably the most pivotal moment of the Bills’ 17-point comeback and 23-20 win over the Ravens. Credit as well to rookie defensive tackle Prince Emili, who was elevated from the practice squad for each of Buffalo’s last two games and who tipped Jackson’s pass. It was the second interception of the day for Poyer (both came in the fourth quarter), and his fourth of the season – he has at least one interception in each of the three games he’s played in this year.
Haason Reddick, linebacker, Philadelphia. More fourth-quarter heroics as Reddick strip-sacked Trevor Lawrence twice in the final frame. The first put the Eagles on the road to a Miles Sanders touchdown and a 29-14 lead. The second came just inside the two-minute warning, with the Jaguars at the start of a fresh set of downs, and sealed the 29-21 victory for Philadelphia, the only undefeated team in the NFL. Reddick, who has been making impact plays at Lincoln Financial Field since his days at Temple, signed a three-year, $45 million deal with the Eagles ahead of this spring, and has so far played up to the money, with 3.5 sacks through four games to start the season.
Special teams player of the week
Ryan Wright, punter, Minnesota. Executed a classic fake punt to rescue the Vikes after another stalled drive, late in the third quarter in London against the Saints. With Minnesota up 16-14 late in the third quarter, on fourth-and-two from the New Orleans’ 47-yard line, Wright, a rookie, tossed a 13-yard completion to another rookie, wideout Jalen Nailor. Minnesota turned that into a 46-yard field goal and a 19-14 lead early in the fourth quarter. Wright, by the way, was a pretty logical faker: He threw 30 touchdown passes as a high school quarterback in 2016 and ’17 in California, at the aptly named California High School. Vikes 28, Saints 25.
The punter can toss it too. @rjwright34
📺: @NFLNetwork pic.twitter.com/e8LyXTXrab
— Minnesota Vikings (@Vikings) October 2, 2022
Coach of the week
Bill Belichick, head coach, New England. All you need to know about the Belichick gameplan is this: Someone named Bailey Zappe played most of the game at quarterback for New England in hallowed Lambeau Field against Aaron Rodgers… The game went to overtime … Zappe had a higher passer rating than Rodgers … Rodgers threw a pick-six to another unknown Pats rookie, Jack Jones… And the Packers needed all 10 minutes of OT to eke out a 27-24 win. The Patriots are 1-3, but if Belichick ever coached a game that was a moral victory, this was it.
Goat of the week
Trevor Lawrence, quarterback, Jacksonville. Football giveth, football taketh away. A week after he gave a 262-yard, 3-TD, no-turnover performance in a road win against the Chargers, Lawrence all but handed the Eagles a win on Sunday – or perhaps it’d be more accurate to say he dropped the win in their laps. After the Jaguars went up 14-0 early, Lawrence turned the ball over five times – including four lost fumbles for a 21st-century record, per ESPN – resulting in 22 of the Eagles’ 29 total points on the day. The Jaguars fall to 2-2 in rainy Philadelphia.
Hidden person of the week
Jason Kelce, center, Philadelphia. Should a 12-year veteran of the trenches really still be road-grading people at age 34, at the highest level of the game? Kelce is. In his 126th straight start, Kelce was the center of a great Eagles offensive line against a strong Jaguar defensive front Sunday. Case in point: 30 seconds left in the half, game tied at 14, Philly ball at the Jax 10-. Handoff to Kenneth Gainwell, and Kelce erased defensive lineman Adam Gotsis at the point of attack, then veered off to shove a Jags linebacker on the next level. Kelce too often is the hidden guy—to everyone other than those who know the game.
The Jason Jenkins Award
“Life always deals you a card. It’s all about how you respond to it, how you face it.”
On Monday, John Metchie III surprised his hospital family with a special evening at NRG Stadium to thank them for their support throughout his cancer treatment. pic.twitter.com/dnppQuuAqi
— Houston Texans (@HoustonTexans) September 30, 2022
John Metchie III, wide receiver, Houston. In July, Metchie, a second-round pick for the Texans out of Alabama, announced that he’d been diagnosed with a form of leukemia that would likely keep him out for the entirety of his rookie season. This week, he brought his “hospital family” to NRG Stadium for a surprise tour and dinner to thank them for their support and compassion – the group included nurses, doctors, and some of the patients the 22-year-old Metchie met during treatment. “Keep a strong faith, win day by day and brick by brick,” Metchie said of what he’s learned while fighting Acute Promyelocytic Leukemia. “No matter what situation you’re in, how down you are or up you are, it’s always a blessing to be able to be a blessing to somebody else.”
I.
CTE takes you to a dark place, and I want these players to know, it’s not worth it. Please take care of yourself. Don’t depend on the NFL. Don’t depend on anybody.
—Rodney Harrison, on NBC’s “Football Night in America,” with a poignant message for current players.
II.
I’m going to look at everything.
–Detroit coach Dan Campbell, after his defense gave up 48 points to a mediocre offensive team, Seattle, on Sunday.
III.
In the end, Rodgers was just too good. He made some throws that only Rodgers can make. We had pretty good coverage on some of those and he was just too smart, too good, too accurate. In the end he got us.
—Bill Belichick after what might’ve been his last game against Aaron Rodgers, an overtime loss for the Patriots at Lambeau.
IV.
I probably evaluated over 100 players in the NFL with concussions or potential concussions in my 26 years in the league. If you’re trusting the players to give honest objective information, you shouldn’t, because the brain is not functioning the way it should and won’t give you necessarily the truth.
—Mike Ryan, longtime NFL athletic trainer and current NBC sports medicine analyst for Sunday Night Football.
V.
Greatest receiver in the history of football and certainly in that era.
—Bill Belichick on Hall of Famer Green Bay receiver Don Hutson who, in the first quarter-century of professional football, had three times as many catches for three times the yardage and three times the touchdowns of any receiver in football.
VI.
It’s a blessing to be an American.
–Philadelphia 76er Joel Embiid, who was born in Cameroon, on being sworn in as an American citizen in Philadelphia last month.
Number of undefeated teams entering October 2020: 7.
Number of undefeated teams entering October 2021: 5.
Number of undefeated teams entering October 2022: 1.
I.
Let the record show that the first in-game lead of 2022 for the Arizona Cardinals came on Oct. 2 at 6:34 p.m. ET.
II.
On Sept. 29, 2019, Teddy Bridgewater threw for 193 yards quarterbacking the New Orleans Saints, with left tackle Terron Armstead protecting his blind side. On defense that day for the Saints: defensive end Trey Hendrickson, cornerback Eli Apple and safety Vonn Bell, who accounted for two takeaways (both fumble recoveries).
On Sept. 29, 2022, Teddy Bridgewater threw for 193 yards quarterbacking the Miami Dolphins, with left tackle Terron Armstead protecting his blind side. On defense that day for the Bengals: defensive end Trey Hendrickson, cornerback Eli Apple and safety Vonn Bell, who accounted for two takeaways (both interceptions).
I.
BOSTON—This is what happens when you take the train to Boston for a noon lunch, have four hours till your train back to New York leaves, and there’s a meaningless baseball tilt in town on a lovely early-fall day. You’ve just got to walk over to Fenway, take full advantage of your four hours, drink a couple of Cisco Shark Tracker Light Lagers from Nantucket, and enjoy J.D. Martinez’s last big hit in Boston (very likely), a two-run eighth-inning home run, to top the pesky O’s. The evidence of the day:
II.
Francisco Alvarez, a highly touted 20-year-old catcher for the Mets’ Triple-A affiliate in Syracuse, finished his season, or so he thought, last week with a Wednesday home matinee against the Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs. He, his parents, and a friend set out Thursday morning for a 24-hour drive to Miami, where Alvarez would begin his off-season.
About 13 hours into the drive, on Thursday night, Alvarez was near Greenville, S.C., when his phone rang. It was a representative of the Mets, telling him he was being called up by the Mets for their series against the Braves, which just so happened to be the biggest series of the baseball season, beginning Friday night. You’ll need to get to Atlanta, the rep said.
Luckily, Atlanta was just a 2-hour, 20-minute drive south on I-85, so Alvarez got there in time to get some sleep. About 26 hours after getting the fateful phone call, Alvarez, who started and batted seventh for the Mets, strode to the plate with the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth inning, Mets down 5-2, one out, and 42,402 in Truist Park on their feet (37,000 more than in his final game of the Triple-A season) and loud. Alvarez, facing vet closer Kenley Jansen, with 387 career saves.
First pitch, fouled off. Second pitch, swinging strike. Third pitch, flailing strike.
The Mets lost 5-2, and the National League East was tied exiting the evening, Mets and Braves, at 98-59 with five games left.
There will be better days, Francisco. But probably none as unusual.
I.
I was just told somebody leaked some personal information about me and it’s going to be reported on today.
I went into A-Fib on Wednesday, had my heart shocked back into rhythm on Thursday and I’m playing today.
That’s it.
— JJ Watt (@JJWatt) October 2, 2022
Oh.
II.
Dougie P. ain’t messing around.
— Jeff McLane (@Jeff_McLane) October 2, 2022
McLane, who covers the Eagles for the Philadelphia Inquirer, as Doug Pederson’s Jags were stomping the Eagles 14-0 at the Linc after one quarter Sunday.
III.
Great drive!! ⚜️ Keep running that damn ball!
— T. Stead 🎤🎧 (@T_Armstead72) October 2, 2022
Terron Armstead, the former Saint, watching his old team take the lead over Minnesota in fourth quarter on a run-dominated drive.
IV.
So proud of my daughter, Harley, who committed to the University of Georgia and earned a full athletic scholarship. Freshman Class of 2024. Let’s go. pic.twitter.com/kbXx1uFueq
— Mike Tomlin (@CoachTomlin) October 1, 2022
Mike Tomlin showing some dad pride.
V.
Can I get this in a 52 long? https://t.co/k6pEjoonKs
— Chris Carlin (@ChrisCarlin) September 29, 2022
Carlin, who might be a 52 long, hosts a show on ESPN radio.
Reach me at peterkingfmia@gmail.com, or on Twitter @peter_king.
I’m giving you the floor this week. Presented without comment:
“You only get one brain.” From Marc Stewart, of Coeur d’Alene, Idaho: “I was watching the Dolphins-Bengals game with my teenage sons. It was horrifying to watch Tua’s fingers frozen in place. My oldest son, 16, shouted, ‘I don’t want to see that again.’ My youngest, 13, said ‘Is he dying?’ I didn’t know what to say to them except that this why neither one of you are playing football. Soccer is much safer. My wife and I decided that the risk for brain injury, paralysis or death wasn’t worth them playing football. You only get one brain.”
Still loves football. From Matt Kaplan, of Ardsley, N.Y.: “I have three high school sons who’ve played football since third grade and have had no concussions. I thought the Tua situation was an abomination. Just because the independent doctor cleared him doesn’t mean the team and the broader support network should have permitted it. [But] the benefits of team work, discipline and hard work far outweigh the risks for my sons. Their lives have been significantly enriched by playing football.”
He’s sickened. From J Lentner, of Oneonta, N.Y.: “I have been watching the NFL since the seventies. I vividly remember the Theisman injury and watching the replay over and over in college. Thursday night, I was surprised by my reaction. I had to turn off the game. I knew about Tua’s injury on Sunday and the controversy surrounding it. Maybe it’s age, maybe it’s the history of CTE, maybe it was seeing the ‘fencing’ that he went through. So I turned to a baseball game of which I had no rooting interest. I’ll likely watch the NFL on Sunday but I am still living with what I saw.”
Boycotting football. From Bill Piwonka, of Oregon: “My son played tackle football through eighth grade and I absolutely loved watching him play, but was happy when he decided to stop in high school. He graduated college a few years back, and got together with 10 high school buddies Monday, prior to Tua’s injury last night. Every one of them—most played in high school—said they didn’t want their sons playing football.”
Blunt warning. From Nate Taylor, of Loakewood, Ohio: “Our blind allegiance to the shield will be the downfall of this great game. The instant gratification culture has caught up with the NFL at the expense of so many. We don’t let players develop or sit out a week to play it safe because we have to win now. Today. This year. Nothing else matters. You can’t put a price tag on life and health and cognitive awareness. If we are going to continue to ask them to entertain us then we all need to demand that they are treated like humans, not commodities.”
Sad evening. From Jochen Haas: “Thursday was the first time I switched off a game because I was disgusted at myself for supporting young lives being ruined by brain damage for my entertainment. I never thought the NFL ever really took CTE seriously enough but at least was moving in the right direction. I worked in neuroscience for a few years and I still think people do not understand what concussions really do to your brain and the lasting damage it can bring to you and your loved ones.”
Good point. From Jeremy Bullock: “My thought is: I’m glad I have all girls and I don’t have to tell them they can’t play tackle football.”
Two other emails this week:
The Mississippi welfare story. From Jeff Detra: “Your weekly podcast is always a must listen for me, but I have never felt compelled to reach out to you and thank you before. However, your conversation with Anna Wolfe, the Mississippi Today reporter, was riveting to me. She has rightfully received accolades on many platforms for her incredible reporting on the embarrassing Mississippi welfare scandal, but hearing her choke up talking about the people affected by this atrocity shows her incredible empathy and support for those less fortunate. I was deeply moved and impressed by her.”
I think it’s so great that smart, dogged reporters want to cover poverty. Poverty in the state is her beat, and she’s owning it.
I was hoping no one noticed. From David Lopan, via Twitter: “Your Saints are looking great, Peter!”
Lot of season to go, David. (He said bravely, stupidly.)
1. I think, for as shaky as the 1-3 Saints have been, they’re a double-doink – maybe 10 inches of a kick – away from being tied for the NFC South lead.
2. I think if I’d been writing the headline on the Saints’ 28-25 loss to Minnesota for the New Orleans Times Picayune last night, this would have been my headline: DOINK. DOINK.
3. I think I was highly impressed with the Jags Sunday. Competitive team, hustle to the ball at all times, good edge presence led by Josh Allen. Trevor Lawrence needs to have a better sense of pressure in the pocket and he must take care of the ball better, obviously. They could use a receiver to take some of the heat off Christian Kirk. But Duval wasn’t built in a day.
4. I think Jets alums and fans suffered a double blow over the weekend with the deaths of offensive linemen Marvin Powell and Jim Sweeney. Powell was a four-time all-Pro, a mauler and technician on the line. Sweeney was a versatile lunch pail guy. He started every game for 11 straight years in his career, going from left guard to left tackle to center. I knew Sweeney, who was a classic blood-and-guts ballplayer and a valued teammate. I saw his friend and ex-teammate Jeff Lageman—he’s a Jacksonville radio voice—in the press box here Sunday, and he said, “Jim could have played in the fifties, which is the ultimate compliment I can give a player. So tough, such a great guy in the locker room.”
5. I think the hole got deeper for Brett Favre the other day when Katie Strang and Kalyn Kahler of The Athletic reported on some questionable giving patterns by Favre’s Favre 4 Hope foundation. In 2018, they reported, Favre 4 Hope—whose mission was to aid “charitable organizations whose focus is to provide support for disadvantaged children,” plus assistance to breast cancer patients—gave the Southern Miss Athletic Foundation $60,000. That same year, The Athletic reported, no other charity received more than $10,000 from the Favre foundation. Maybe that’s not illegal, but it certainly is unethical.
6. I think it’s not incredibly concerning, because today is Oct. 3, and the draft is almost seven months away. But it’d worry me, if I were a GM with a potential quarterback need, that Alabama quarterback Bryce Young, the potential first pick in the 2023 draft, hurt his shoulder Saturday against Arkansas. Nick Saban played down the injury after the game, but did you hear what Gary Danielson said on CBS during the game? “I tore my rotator cuff on a play exactly like that.” And Pro Football Talk reported that Young “was in pain and could be heard yelling loudly” on the field. We shall see.
7. I think the possible change to MVP voting reported by CBS Sports’ Jonathan Jones is tremendous news. The 50 voters (national NFL media people, chosen by the Associated Press) who choose the MVP after the final game of the regular season have annually been asked to choose one player for the award. Now, per Jones, the AP is considering ranked-choice voting, the way other sports’ MVPs are chosen. Voters would vote for a number of players in descending order, with point values assigned to each. For instance, if the AP asks voters to pick five, the players on each ballot could be assigned point totals of 10 for first place, seven for second place, five for third place, three for fourth place, one for fifth place. I love the idea. As one of the voters, I hope the AP institutes it for this season.
8. I think the NFL doesn’t deserve praise for changing the Pro Bowl to a skills competition and flag-football event. The NFL dallied on this decision for years while an embarrassing display of non-football with players giving 36-percent effort was shown on national TV.
9. I think this Pro Bowl decision should have been made 15 years ago. I’d always hear from the pro-Pro Bowl crowd, But it gets good ratings—better than big NBA games! The NFL could show Patrick Mahomes playing marbles and get good ratings. That’s no excuse for continuing to show a product that has demeaned the NFL for years.
10. I think these are my other thoughts of the week:
a. Hurricane Ian Story of the Week: Linda Robertson of the Miami Herald with a vivid account of what search and rescue is like on Fort Myers Beach.
b. This is startling, eye-opening and tough to read in spots. The power of a hurricane must, must, must be respected. It’s great journalism by Robertson.
c. Writes Robertson, quoting a first responder, a Miami firefighter who traveled to the area to help with search and rescue, describing the task at hand from the front lines:
“We received a head’s up that a neighbor was missing. Fourth house down on Anchorage. But there is no house here. They told us to look for a blue roof. But there is no blue roof here. We found it on the next block,” he said. “We were looking for two bodies on Andre-Mar Boulevard. We had to hunt for clues — the color of the paint, a house number, the make of the car that used to be in the driveway. We found them 200 yards from where the house had stood.”
d. Whew.
e. The American League MVP should be Aaron Judge, and it wouldn’t be close if not for Shohei Ohtani being as other-wordly as he’s been—capped by pitching a near-no-hitter last week and hitting 34 home runs. But Judge should get the award, and probably will in a rout.
f. Winning needs to count in the MVP award, I believe. The Yankees are 26 games over .500, close to winning 100 games. The Angels are 15 games under, and have been under .500 every day since June 5. They haven’t played a meaningful game in the last four months of the season. I realize sometimes an MVP can come from a bad team and should come from a bad team if the performance is so great it overrides a great performance on a great team. But the way Aaron Judge, with the weight of baseball’s biggest franchise on his shoulders for most of 162 games, has carried the Yankees while passing Babe Ruth and (as of today) tying Roger Maris for the most homers in American League history … and for being this close to winning the Triple Crown—he’s got to win it.
g. Story of the Week: Ksenia Ivanova and Catherine Porter of The New York Times on “Panic, Bribes, Ditched Cars and a Dash on Foot: Portraits of Flight from Russia:”
h. “People were running so fast that the wheels from their suitcases were falling off.”
i. Some 200,000 Russians – mostly men – have escaped, including through a thin gorge separating Russia from the country of Georgia. Wrote Ivanova and Porter:
DARIALI, Georgia — They are bus drivers, programmers, photographers, bankers. They have driven for hours, bribed their way through many police checkpoints — spending a month’s wages in some cases — and then waited at the border, most of them for days, in a traffic jam that stretched for miles.
Many grabbed their passports, abandoned their cars and crossed the frontier on foot, fearing that Russia would slam shut one of the last, precious routes to leave the country. The Kremlin dispatched teams to border crossings to weed out draft-eligible men and hand them conscription notices, and rumors spread on social media that it would seal the border.
Most of those who left had no idea when they would return home, if ever.
j. Ivanova, a photographer, found Russians in the woods and on the roads of Georgia and took their photos, and briefly told their stories. One of her subjects was Vladimir, a geologist from St. Petersburg:
His grandmother adores Putin. His mother hates Putin.
Vladimir thinks the Russian president is a madman who isn’t bluffing about using nuclear weapons — one reason he waited in line for 13 hours to cross the border.
“Every Russian family has someone who supports the war, and someone who’s against it,” he said. “It’s just some families fell apart because of it, and some have not.”
He went to one antiwar protest, but quickly realized both its danger and its futility, he said. “There’s probably 10 times more police than protesters,” he said. “It’s all pointless.”
k. That’s one of the things I absolutely love about reporters, about newspapers, about this craft: This story took you somewhere you cannot go, to see things you could not know. Fantastic.
l. Alarming Story of the Week: Oliver Whang of The New York Times on the rising percentage of burnout among American physicians.
m. If 63 percent of all U.S. doctors are experiencing at least one tangible symptom of burnout, we as a country are in big, big trouble. Wrote Whang:
Results released this month and published in Mayo Clinic Proceedings, a peer-reviewed journal, show that 63 percent of physicians surveyed reported at least one symptom of burnout at the end of 2021 and the beginning of 2022, an increase from 44 percent in 2017 and 46 percent in 2011. Only 30 percent felt satisfied with their work-life balance, compared with 43 percent five years earlier.
“This is the biggest increase of emotional exhaustion that I’ve ever seen, anywhere in the literature,” said Bryan Sexton, the director of Duke University’s Center for Healthcare Safety and Quality, who was not involved in the survey efforts.
The most recent numbers also compare starkly with data from 2020, when the survey was run during the early stages of the pandemic. Then, 38 percent of doctors surveyed reported one or more symptoms of burnout while 46 percent were satisfied with their work-life balance.
n. We need more doctors. We need shorter hours for the doctors we have.
o. Football Story of the Week: Eric Branch of the San Francisco Chronicle on 49ers linebackers coach Johnny Holland, who doesn’t sound like he’s battling a disease that may kill him.
p. In 2019, Holland was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a form of cancer that has no known cure. He needs to bottle his optimism, patent it, and sell it for thousands of dollars.
q. “If you can get through the storm, you’ll see the sunshine.” Wrote Branch:
Multiple myeloma has no cure and is infamous for roaring back after periods of remission. Barring a medical breakthrough, Holland’s battle will not end in victory.
Holland is back in remission. He’s in his 11th month of a clinical trial at UCSF that has eliminated the abnormal plasma cells that were multiplying about a year ago, forcing him to leave the team for the only time since he was diagnosed. He feels good. His biggest physical ailment is a balky hip that needs to be replaced, a reminder of the ex-linebacker’s seven-year NFL career with the Packers. So how often is his cancer in the back of his mind?
“Oh, all the time,” Holland said. “‘When is it going to come back? How long will this treatment work?’ You just don’t know.”
r. Radio Story of the Week: From NPR’s Weekend Edition Saturday, Eric Westervelt reports on the five-year anniversary of the Las Vegas shooting that killed 60 people.
s. Never found a motive. How is it possible that no motive was ever found?
t. “It’s something that’s forever, unfortunately, going to be part of me.”
u. The crime scene is now one of the parking lots for the Las Vegas Raiders.
v. No easy segue from that.
w. Newspaper Tease of the Week: A lifestyle section tease, referring to a story inside the paper, from The Wall Street Journal: “Can you teach an old dog to crop his pants?” Crop, meaning cut off the bottoms so the pants will be shorter. And not meaning anything else. At all.
x. Hey Dave Sims! Great call on the Cal Raleigh home run that sent the Mariners to the playoffs for the first time in 21 years.
y. “THE DREAM LIVES! THEY ARE GOING TO THE PLAYOFFS! THE DROUGHT IS OVER!”
“THE DREAM LIVES! THEY’RE GOING TO THE PLAYOFFS! THE DROUGHT IS OVER!” @TheDaveSimsShow just doesn’t miss. pic.twitter.com/DmbJRvsbJW
— Seattle Mariners (@Mariners) October 1, 2022
z. I HAVE TO SEE “The Greatest Beer Run Ever.”
San Francisco 23, L.A. Rams 20. Toughest game of the weekend to pick. Rams are better, Niners more desperate at 1-2 and coming off a pathetic offensive performance in the 11-10 loss in Denver. Until the Rams edged San Francisco in the NFC title game last January, Jimmy Garoppolo was 6-0 as a starting quarterback against the Rams. I’m gambling Garoppolo will play well enough at home tonight, and use Deebo Samuel as his 2021 self, to make it 7-0 in the regular season against L.A.
Brutal week of games coming up. Might be a good week to peek at the foliage, because this could be the worst slate this year. Picking through the iffy tilts:
Miami at N.Y. Jets, Sunday, 1 p.m., CBS. All eyes, all week, on Tua.
Dallas at L.A. Rams, Sunday, 4:25 p.m., FOX. Cooper Rush, 4-0, might have another week or two before Dak Prescott returns, but no player in the NFL has improved his stock as much in the first month of the season as Rush has.
Philadelphia at Arizona, Sunday, 4:25 p.m., FOX. Jalen Hurts at Kyler Murray. The future at the future.
Cincinnati at Baltimore, Sunday, 8:20 p.m., NBC. Tough slate for Baltimore here. Miami, New England, Buffalo and Cincinnati, all in the span of 22 days, and then roadies at Tampa and New Orleans before the week 10 bye. Ravens could know their ’22 fate by the middle of November.
Remember late April and early May, when the college football world’s main topic of discussion was if Jordan Addison would transfer from Pittsburgh to USC? We remember Pitt coach Pat Narduzzi throwing Addison under the bus and greatly diminishing his accomplishments as a member of the Panthers in 2021.
Narduzzi said, “We helped him win a Biletnikoff and be the player he is. He had one of the best quarterbacks in the country throwing the ball every day. I think sometimes people forget how they got where they are.”
It was the system, not the athlete. It was the structure, not the athlete. It was the program, not the athlete.
Addison is having a very productive year for USC. Let’s check in on Pitt. The Panthers had a horrible Week 5. Let’s dig into the details of their loss to Georgia Tech at home before a sparse crowd:
FIRST OF ALL
Pittsburgh was a 21-point favorite against Georgia Tech. The Yellow Jackets just fired coach Geoff Collins the previous weekend and were in total disarray.
STUNNING STAT
Pittsburgh’s offense scored just seven points in the game’s first 58 minutes. Pitt scored two garbage touchdowns when trailing by 12 points in the final two minutes, the second TD coming with 16 seconds left.
BACKGROUND
Georgia Tech came into this game allowing an average of 36.25 points per game.
DECISIVE
Pitt was just 2 of 12 on third downs. That proved decisive.
ALSO SIGNIFICANT
Pitt committed three turnovers, Georgia Tech none.
RUSHING YARDS
Pat Narduzzi complained that Pitt didn’t run the ball enough last year, even though the Panthers won the ACC championship with Jordan Addison’s help.
In this game, Pitt was outrushed by Georgia Tech, 232-106.
Georgia Tech won despite completing only 11 of 27 passes for 102 yards.
KEDON SLOVIS
The former USC quarterback was throwing for lots of yards when trailing in the fourth quarter, a lot like his 2021 USC season. He threw one interception and was not able to finish drives until it was too late for Pitt.
NARDUZZI AFTER THE GAME
“Offense didn’t really get started until the last two series of the game,” Narduzzi said. “If we would’ve done that (have any rhythm) the whole game, we would have had a chance … Obviously I didn’t do a good enough job of getting them ready.”
Giants running back Saquon Barkley said late last week that he feels like he’s back to being the player he was during his first couple of years in the NFL, but Sunday’s game against the Bears offered Barkley a chance to do something new.
Daniel Jones left the game with an ankle injury and backup Tyrod Taylor had to come out for a concussion evaluation, which left Barkley in position to take snaps as a Wildcat quarterback. Jones eventually came back in to hand the ball off, but the Wildcat helped set up a field goal as the Giants finished out a 20-12 victory at home.
Barkley ended the day with 31 carries for 146 yards and a good feeling about his cameo as the quarterback.
“When I saw Tyrod go down, I kind of realized I’m up next,” Barkley said. “I’m the quarterback. First of all, you have to give credit to DJ coming back in the game. I can’t curse, he’s a tough you know what. Nothing but respect for him to go in and continue to fight through that for his team just shows you the type of person and type of player he is. I think I just tried my best to read it. It’s really not that hard, I guess, but I think I made the right reads on them. But we were able to keep the ball moving, get down field, get some points and the defense did a great job for us.”
The Giants will be hoping that Jones is well enough to play against the Packers in London this week, but the first four weeks have shown that the offensive focus should be on Barkley regardless of who is taking the snaps.
The Paul Chryst era at Wisconsin is suddenly over. Chryst was fired Sunday, one day after a 34-10 loss to Illinois and former head coach Bret Bielema dropped the Badgers to 2-3. Defensive coordinator Jim Leonhard will take over as interim head coach.
“After a heartfelt and authentic conversation with Coach Chryst about what is in the long-term best interest of our football program, I have concluded that now is the time for a change in leadership,” athletic director Chris McIntosh said in a release. “Paul is a man of integrity who loves his players. I have great respect and admiration for Paul and the legacy of him and his family at the University of Wisconsin.
“I also have confidence in Jim Leonhard to guide the program for the remainder of the season. There is still a lot of season left to play and I know Jim will do a great job while the program is under his leadership.”
Chryst went 67-26 as Wisconsin’s head coach, including 9-4 last season. He won three Big Ten West division championships and reached three New Year’s Six bowl games, winning two of them. The Badgers haven’t been at their standard for a while, though. They are 15-10 over the past three seasons and have lost two home games at Camp Randall Stadium already this year, along with a 52-21 loss at Ohio State.
Chryst’s 67 wins at Wisconsin are the third-most in program history. Bielema is second with 68.
Happy Michigan State week, Eleven Warriors readers.
Ohio State is 5-0 and on the go after defeating Rutgers, and I’m sure you all know what the best part about being 5-0 is…
Let’s have a good Monday, shall we?
Wait. One more quick thing. Check out this monster block from Cade Stover.
Cade Stover is a mad man. pic.twitter.com/7ffW7f8OuM
— Cory (@realcorykinnan) October 3, 2022
OK, have a good Monday. See you in the comment section.
CONSISTENT DOMINANCE. When Rutgers became a member institution in the Big Ten in 2014, then-commissioner Jim Delany cited the Scarlet Knights’ “athletic excellence” as one of his driving factors for adding the school.
Eight years later, the only thing I consider excellent about Rutgers is its ability to be a doormat for Ohio State every season. According to ESPN, the Buckeyes’ nine straight performances of at least 49 points against the Scarlet Knights represent the longest streak of any team against a single opponent since 1936.
Ohio State has scored 49+ points in nine straight games vs Rutgers. That is the longest streak by any team vs a single opponent in the AP Poll Era (since 1936). pic.twitter.com/GcPt6CYZ5D
— ESPN Stats & Info (@ESPNStatsInfo) October 1, 2022
That’s dominance.
Quite frankly, I don’t see a time in the near or distant future when Rutgers won’t be exactly what it is currently in the Big Ten. The school feels like it doesn’t belong in the conference, and that becomes clear when Ohio State bullies them around like a Group of Five team the Buckeyes would face in the non-conference schedule.
Even on Saturday, when many would say Ohio State’s offense – which was without TreVeyon Henderson and Jaxon Smith-Njigba – looked sluggish outside of Miyan Williams, the Buckeyes still won by 39 points. So, yeah, maybe Rutgers doesn’t belong, but the Scarlet Knights are here anyway. Have fun with a free win against them for the rest of time, Buckeye Nation.
FAKE PUNT FIASCO. I can’t bring up Ohio State’s 49-10 win over Rutgers without mentioning the Buckeyes’ fake punt that went viral on Saturday. There’s just too much that happened on and after this play not to talk about it.
With a little over 10 minutes remaining and Ohio State up 39 points, Jesse Mirco was set to punt the football to Rutgers. Instead, the rugby-style punter saw a lane open up in front of him and took off for a 22-yard gain. At the end of the run, Rutgers wide receiver Aaron Cruickshank delivered a late hit. That’s when all hell broke loose.
To be clear, it wasn’t a designed fake. The Scarlet Knights had eight players at the line of scrimmage and sent the house to block the punt. After Ohio State successfully defended the rush, Mirco recognized nobody stood between him and the first-down marker, so he tucked the ball under his shoulder and ran. That’s how his teammate, Noah Ruggles, sees it, at least.
Rutgers sent the punt block team all out overloading one side in the 4th quarter down 39! We aint call no fake! Boy saw the open field & put it in turbo. Sorry boutit my boy gonna expose ya if you let him @Jesse_Mirco29 https://t.co/niyavj4y3B
— Noah Ruggles (@noahruggles) October 2, 2022
After Cruickshank’s hit and the ensuing scrums, Greg Schiano sprinted across the field to confront Ryan Day and break up the scuffle. The coaches shared some choice words as things got heated in Columbus.
In his postgame press conference, Day said he has “no hard feelings” for Schiano and added that he has “unbelievable respect” for the former Buckeye assistant. Whether or not you believe that is up to you, as is what to make of the fake punt by Mirco.
I won’t go as far as to say that the Ohio State coaches approved of Mirco’s decision to fake the punt, but he must have done something right to earn the program’s special teams player of the week award.
For the brand pic.twitter.com/98n3uR016L
— Ohio State Football (@OhioStateFB) October 2, 2022
FEED. MIYAN. How about Miyan Williams’ performance against Rutgers? The third-year running back took his 21 carries for 189 yards and five touchdowns on Saturday. His five scores tied him with Pete Johnson (vs. North Carolina, 1975) and Keith Byars (vs. Illinois, 1984) for Ohio State’s single-game rushing touchdown record.
Miyan Williams. Program record.pic.twitter.com/tEh5TfXyPq
— Eleven Warriors (@11W) October 1, 2022
“It’s a blessing to be up there with them names,” Williams said after the game. “Those are legends here, so it’s definitely a blessing.”
Williams is right about Johnson and Byars being Buckeye legends. Their names are littered throughout the program record book on the football website. While they’re not Archie Griffin – who played with Johnson – or Eddie George, both running backs deserve a seat at the table of the greatest ball carriers in Ohio State history.
Let’s look at how those legends played in their five-touchdown games, starting first with Johnson’s performance against the Tar Heels:
Sept. 27, 1975: Ohio State 32 – North Carolina 7
Pete Johnson: 26 carries, 148 yards, 5 TDs
2Q, 3:20 – Johnson 2-yard TD run
2Q, 0:31 – Johnson 5-yard TD run
3Q, 8:32– Johnson 1-yard TD run
4Q, 13:01 – Johnson 2-yard TD run
4Q, 8:48– Johnson 3-yard TD run
Fun fact: Griffin had 22 carries for 157 yards in this game and won his second Heisman Trophy at the end of the year.
Oct. 13, 1984: Ohio State 45 – Illinois 38
Keith Byars: 39 carries, 274 yards, 5 TDs
2Q, 4:13 – Byars 16-yard TD run
2Q, 0:23 – Byars 4-yard TD run
3Q, 13:40 – Byars 1-yard TD run
3Q, 8:57 – Byars 67-yard TD run
4Q, 0:36 – Byars 3-yard TD run
Fun fact: Byars lost his shoe about halfway through his 67-yard touchdown run in the third quarter. Despite that, he still sped past the Illinois defense and ran all the way to the end zone. As you can imagine, Ohio Stadium went crazy.
Williams was right. Johnson and Byars are Ohio State legends, and these two games from them are only a small part of their stories as Buckeyes. May Williams’ five-touchdown performance against Rutgers be only a small part of his (possibly legendary) story here, too.
A WISH GRANTED (KIND OF). If Ohio State’s season ended after the Rutgers game, Ryan Day would have his preseason expectations of a top-10 defense met by Jim Knowles and the Silver Bullets.
If the season ended today, Ryan Day would see his wish for a top-10 defense granted.
The Buckeyes rank No. 10 in total defense through five weeks (263.8 YPG).
OSU also has the 14th-ranked scoring defense and the No. 7 passing defense in the country right now.
— Griffin Strom (@GriffinStrom3) October 2, 2022
The Buckeyes have the No. 10 total defense (263.8 YPG) and No. 14 scoring defense (14.80 PPG) in the country through five games. Additionally, Ohio State has the No. 7 passing defense (153.4 YPG) in the NCAA this season.
When using conference-only statistics, Knowles’ unit ranks No. 2 in scoring defense, No. 1 passing defense and No. 8 rushing defense in the Big Ten after Ohio State’s wins over Wisconsin and Rutgers in the last two games.
The Buckeyes will face a spiraling Michigan State team this weekend, which should only improve their defensive standing nationally and in the Big Ten, as the Spartans’ offense has struggled to consistently produce in three consecutive losses.
Michigan State’s stats on both sides of the ball through five games are…not good. pic.twitter.com/XYqqJ5FIXO
— Griffin Strom (@GriffinStrom3) October 2, 2022
With that said, Ohio State’s defense is well on its way to meeting Day’s expectations for a top-10 defense. However, it still has some work to do if it wants to meet Knowles’ expectations of a top-five unit. As for Andy Vance, we expected the Buckeye defense to suck 30% less than they did last season, so they’re doing fine in his book.
It’s time for Knowles, Tommy Eichenberg, Steele Chambers and the rest of the Buckeyes to keep this thing moving.
SONG OF THE DAY. “Cigarette Daydreams” by Cage the Elephant.
CUT TO THE CHASE. Chesapeake Bay lighthouse auctioned, with strings attached… Moose back on the loose after rescuers free it from fence… Hurricane Ian ‘street shark’ video defies belief… John Stamos looks back on mindset during sobriety struggles.
Every week of the 2022 NFL season, we will celebrate the electric plays, investigate the colossal blunders, and explain the inexplicable moments of the most recent slate. Welcome to Winners and Losers. Which one are you?
Winner: Cooper Rush, Perfectionist
The great ones are not undefeated. Tom Brady has lost dozens of games in his career, including multiple Super Bowls. Michael Jordan starred in an iconic Nike commercial called “Failure” about all the game-winning shots he’d missed. Cy Young, the guy the Cy Young Award is named after, is baseball’s all-time leader in losses. Greatness means you stick around for a while, and the longer you stick around, the more impossible it is to be perfect.
Cooper Rush, for now, is perfect. The Cowboys’ backup quarterback has started four games in five NFL seasons, three of them this year—and he’s won all of them. Sunday, he threw for 223 yards and two touchdowns in a convincing 25-10 win over the Commanders:
Things looked bleak for the Cowboys after Week 1. Not only did they get demolished in a 19-3 loss to the Buccaneers, but they lost Dak Prescott to a thumb injury which required surgery. They had failed to score a touchdown with Prescott, their Pro Bowl franchise QB with a $160 million contract—and now they were going to Rush, an undrafted 28-year-old who hadn’t seriously threatened to be a starter at any point in his pro career. The Cowboys actually cut him in 2020 when they signed Andy Dalton to be their backup, and there wasn’t much interest in him—the Giants put him on their practice squad for a few months and then cut him. He found his way back to Dallas and started a game in 2021 when Prescott was injured, but when people produced rankings of the NFL’s backup quarterbacks, he wasn’t even considered one of the mediocre ones.
But Rush has been effective. In each of his three starts this season, he has thrown for at least 200 yards, and he has yet to throw an interception. The Cowboys have scored between 20 and 25 points in each of those games. They have been consistent, if not explosive.
There has been discussion of whether the Cowboys should stick with Rush when Prescott is healthy—including comments from team owner Jerry Jones in which he said he would welcome a quarterback dilemma. (Jerry Jones loves making comments. Nobody makes more comments.) Of course, this discourse dumb: Prescott is a better passer, a better runner, and the Cowboys’ franchise player whose $31 million salary in 2023 is already guaranteed. In The Ringer’s QB rankings, Steven Ruiz has Prescott ranked ninth and Rush 32nd. Prescott has averaged 258 passing yards per game in his career; Rush has yet to throw for 250 yards in his three wins this season—so the best we’ve seen out of him is slightly worse than Dak’s average. When Prescott comes back—which could happen next week—he obviously should start.
And besides, I want Cooper Rush to make history. Right now, Rush holds the record for most quarterback starts without a loss. Entering Sunday’s game against Washington, he was tied at 3-0 with Ed Rubbert, Washington’s QB during the 1987 player strike (and the inspiration for Keanu Reeves’s character, Shane Falco, in The Replacements). Rubbert eventually stopped playing because the strike ended, preserving his perfect record. For Rush to stay undefeated, he probably needs Prescott to come back and reclaim the starting job. The Cowboys are not the 1972 Miami Dolphins: They’ve gone 3-0 with Rush thanks to an easy schedule and a defense which hasn’t allowed 20 points in a game yet this season. If Rush keeps playing, he will eventually lose.
For now, Rush has saved the Cowboys’ season. They’ve gone from 0-1 and rudderless to 3-1 and in the playoff hunt in the weak NFC. And he has a chance to be perfect—which you can only do if you’re not one of the great ones.
Loser: Kenny Pick-it
The Pittsburgh Steelers have turned the page at quarterback, subbing in rookie first-round pick Kenny Pickett for Mitchell Trubisky at halftime in their game against the Jets. Unfortunately, it’s a page from one of those Choose Your Own Adventure books where you turn to page 74 and page 74 simply reads “An anvil fell on your head and you were eaten by a jaguar. You are dead.”
Pickett entered the game with the Steelers trailing the Jets 10-6. The home crowd roared when Pickett took his first dropback, with fans’ anticipation growing as he stood in the pocket and focused his eyes downfield, preparing to throw a massive bomb. That first pass was … poorly thrown, into double coverage, tipped and intercepted:
Things improved quickly from there. Pickett led back-to-back touchdown drives, finishing both with touchdown runs, and the Steelers went up 20-10 in the fourth quarter. But with just over three minutes to go, Pickett threw another pick, this one a high throw that his receiver couldn’t bring in:
The Jets took the ball and took the lead. Pickett had one final chance for a touchdown, but his Hail Mary was intercepted.
Pickett is the 13th QB in NFL history to start his career with a zero-touchdown, three-interception game, joining such legends as Matt Barkley, Brandon Weeden, and Will Grier. (Good news! Matthew Stafford did it too!) However, Pickett is the first player with a zero-touchdown, three-interception debut whose last name is also a homonym for “intercept my pass, please.”
If you’ll allow me to take my hater hat off for just a second: The move to Pickett is indisputably a good one for the Steelers. Pickett means significantly more to the future of the franchise than Trubisky does, so the sooner Mike Tomlin made this move, the better. And there were good early signs: Pittsburgh scored more points and gained more yards with Pickett in the game than Trubisky. Every one of Pickett’s passes that wasn’t intercepted was a completion, and honestly, if we look at them in a vacuum, the interceptions weren’t that bad—at least one could’ve been caught, and one was a Hail Mary. And this is without Pickett getting QB1 reps in practice. He’ll get better.
OK, hater hat back on: The Steelers debuted their first-round pick at QB, and he threw three interceptions in one half and blew a double-digit lead at home against the freakin’ New York Jets. He couldn’t even gain the distinction of becoming the first rookie to throw a touchdown pass this season—that honor went to the Pats’ Bailey Zappe, a fourth-round pick from Western Kentucky who was forced into his first action of the year after Brian Hoyer suffered a concussion. Pickett’s introduction to the NFL is about to get even meaner: Assuming Tomlin keeps Pickett as starter, his next four games will be against the Bills, Bucs, Dolphins, and Eagles.
Winner: Patrick Mahomes
For a while, I thought the most impressive thing about Patrick Mahomes was that he could throw the ball really far. And he can! He might be able to throw it farther than anybody in the NFL, although I’d put money on Josh Allen. There are a lot of other impressive things about Mahomes: His many different arm angles on throws; his ability to throw receivers open; his accuracy on the move, and more.
But I think what it really comes down to is this: At any moment on any play, it’s impossible to know what Patrick Mahomes is going to do. His creativity and improvisation are traits which can be defined by this play, one of five touchdowns the Chiefs scored against the supposedly stout Tampa Bay defense in a 41-31 win Sunday night.
Mahomes outran one defender, hit another with a 360-degree spin, then appeared ready to take off for the end zone. But at the last second, he flicked the ball toward the back of the end zone, leading Clyde Edwards-Helaire to catch a touchdown nobody was expecting. Some compared Mahomes’s play to that of a basketball star—you can picture Steph Curry hitting that spin move/pull-up floater one-two combo. But Mahomes didn’t just have to find the hoop. He had to convince Edwards-Helaire to head to the back of the end zone to make this play. The screenshot is almost more unbelievable than the video:
Mahomes doesn’t just do this stuff because it’s fun. The Chiefs scored 41 points on the Bucs—14 points more than all three of Tampa Bay’s opponents in their first three games combined. The Bucs were leading the NFL in scoring defense before Sunday night, and now they’re tied for fifth.
I don’t know who is the NFL’s best player—and I also know answering that question could cause wars. But I know who is my favorite guy to watch.
Loser: Trevor Lawrence’s Butterfingers
When a running back fumbles the ball, it’s common for coaches to bench them—for the rest of the half, for the rest of the game, maybe for the rest of their career. As the expression goes, ball security is job security. But when a quarterback fumbles the ball? There’s generally no consideration of a substitute. QB1 is QB1.
Which allowed for one of the strangest performances in recent memory on Sunday—a game in which Jaguars star signal caller Trevor Lawrence was unable to hold onto the ball. Yes, it was rainy in Philadelphia—but lots of QBs have played in the rain before, and most of them don’t randomly drop the ball with no pressure from the defense, which Lawrence did in the second quarter.
Lawrence fumbled four times and the Jaguars didn’t recover any of them. Part of the problem was Lawrence’s lack of pocket awareness against a merciless Eagles defense that sacked him four times and forced two strip-sack fumbles, and part of it was bizarre mistakes by Lawrence.
According to ESPN, Lawrence is the first player since 2000 with four lost fumbles in a game. Last year, the NFL’s leaders in lost fumbles had six for the entire season. Trevor had almost a season’s worth of fumbles in one afternoon!
Last week we praised Lawrence as the potential god-king of Jacksonville. This week, the guy couldn’t hold on to the ball. I guess we’ll see whether this is a rainy-day fluke or an ongoing issue for Lawrence, who hadn’t lost any fumbles in Jacksonville’s first three games this year. Maybe the Jags should build a dome over their stadium just in case.
Winner: British Kicking
Anybody who is not American will make the same joke about the game we play here in the States: “Why do you call it football?” they say. “You don’t even use your feet, and it’s not a ball! Shouldn’t it be called handegg?” And you’ve gotta admit, they have a point. Most of the world’s games that are called “football” are almost entirely based around kicking one thing into another thing—this is true in the game we Americans call soccer, as well as Aussie Rules football and Gaelic football. American football involves some kicking, but the most important things to happen on the field are generally big throws, bruising runs, and cool catches. Kicking plays are afterthoughts, the least exciting parts of the game. But Sunday, we killed that joke. We sent England a stunning display of high-intensity kicking the likes of which they’ve never seen.
With the Saints trailing by three with less than two minutes remaining, New Orleans’s kicker Wil Lutz nailed a 60-yard screamer—a stunning equalizer from the halfway line:
The Vikings quickly drove down the field and went back to their talismanic goal-scorer, Greg Joseph, who tallied his fifth score of the match. His magisterial strike put the Minnesota side in front with the game in its dying moments.
The Saints had 24 seconds remaining to get the ball into field goal range for Lutz. Miraculously, they did, setting up a 61-yard attempt for Lutz, only a yard farther than the one he’d just drilled. His kick seemed destined to send the game into extra time: It had the distance, and seemed to be headed for the back of the kicking net.
But it was off the woodwork … and then off the woodwork again. A Double Doink, from distance:
It was essentially a penalty shootout—and like so many of England’s penalty shootouts, it ended with a stunning miss that left all viewers captivated and baffled. It was football at its finest, in the full sense of the word.
Loser: The Ravens’ Late-Game Strategies
The Ravens might be 4-0 right now if they only played normal football games. Two weeks ago, they had a 28-7 lead on the Dolphins, but allowed four fourth-quarter touchdown passes to Tua Tagovailoa and lost 42-38. And Sunday, they had a 20-3 lead on the Bills, putting the Super Bowl favorites firmly against the ropes. But once again Baltimore frittered away the advantage, and the game was tied 20-20 in the fourth quarter.
With four minutes remaining, the Ravens had the ball on Buffalo’s goal line in a tied game. Facing fourth-and-1, the conventional decision seemed simple: Bring out the NFL’s best kicker, Justin Tucker, and kick a field goal to take a three-point lead. But John Harbaugh is not a conventional coach. With league MVP candidate Lamar Jackson under center, he decided to go for six. But Jackson dropped back, and further back, and further back, and under pressure, threw an interception:
The Ravens defense was struggling, and after getting the ball back with 4:09 remaining, the Bills somewhat easily moved the ball the length of the field. As Buffalo entered field-goal range after the two-minute warning, it became clear that the Bills would be able to kick a game-winning field goal, at which point Baltimore attempted the Madden strategy of allowing a touchdown in order to get the ball back. Unfortunately, second-year edge rusher Odafe Oweh didn’t get the memo, and actually tackled the Bills ballcarrier, Devin Singletary, at the three-yard line. It was the worst tackle of Week 4; the Ravens were forced to take a timeout, Buffalo was able to milk the clock, and Tyler Bass kicked the game-winning field goal as time expired.
Focus on the defence. 10 guys trying to usher the running back into the endzone so they had time for a comeback, one guy not on the same page ruins it for them. pic.twitter.com/1OykHdcqkB
— Cian (@Cianaf) October 2, 2022
Harbaugh is one of the NFL’s longest-tenured and most-respected coaches, but his late-game decisions have backfired a few times as of late. Last year, Baltimore started 8-3 and then lost six consecutive games to miss the postseason by a single game. Five of those losses were by three or fewer points. In two of them, Harbaugh asked his team to attempt go-ahead two-point conversions instead of game-tying extra points, missing both times and losing both games by a single point.
Personally, I like the aggressive mindset, especially when you’ve got Lamar Jackson at QB. But every single button Harbaugh presses seems to be the wrong one—and at a certain point, if you’re wrong every time, it may be time to re-evaluate the thinking.
Winner: DK Metcalf, Poop King
Football fans become filled with confusion and despair when we see players go to the locker room, because in a sport as violent as football, it usually means something awful has happened. Is the player hurt? Is his season over? Will he be the same when he gets back? Sometimes, however, the player just needs to poop.
It’s true: NFL players need to poop sometimes. They have digestive tracts and buttholes, just like regular people! They’re capable of peeing on the sideline without too much trouble, thanks to the privacy of the blue medical tent. But pooping? You can either poop in your pants (which happens) or go to the locker room, like Lamar Jackson did in that Monday Night Football game. And if you take option no. 2 for your no. 2, you could end up missing snaps.
So Seahawks receiver DK Metcalf unlocked a bathroom strategy that could change the pooping game: In the fourth quarter of Sunday’s game in Detroit, he hitched a ride on one of the carts intended for injured players:
At first, people were worried, since players on the injury cart are typically injured. But it was quickly reported that Metcalf was just being practical about his bathroom emergency. It’s reportedly a very long trip from the sideline to the locker room at Ford Field, and Metcalf wanted to conserve time and energy. He explained as much in a postgame tweet: “that clinch walk wouldn’t have made it.”
The choice paid off: Metcalf finished with seven catches for 149 yards in Seattle’s 48-45 win, the highest-scoring game of the NFL season. Clearly, facilitating player poops is a competitive advantage. Every NFL team that doesn’t develop convenient and efficient methods of bathroom transportation for its stars is leaving wins on the table.
Loser: Pre-Dawn Fantasy Chaos
A football fan’s Sunday is like clockwork. You settle in on the couch and set your fantasy lineups at around 12:55 p.m. ET right before the games kick off at 1, then watch SEVEN HOURS OF COMMERCIAL FREE FOOTBALL on NFL RedZone, and follow that with a quick break before Sunday Night Football. But a few times per year, the NFL throws a wrench into the mix by playing games in London, on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. And because London is in a very different time zone, those games often kick off at 9:30 a.m. ET, extending the football fan’s day from 11 to 14 hours. On Sunday, this resulted in fantasy football chaos.
At 8:07 a.m. ET, ESPN’s Adam Schefter revealed that Alvin Kamara was out of Sunday’s game. Kamara, a first-round pick in the average fantasy league, had been listed as questionable with a rib injury, but about 70 percent of players listed as questionable end up playing. (Like last week against the Panthers, when Kamara was listed as questionable with the same injury, but played and ended up having 61 rushing yards.) Most fantasy players—especially those living on the West Coast, where kickoff came before sunrise in California—probably didn’t think to check their fantasy lineups. According to Yahoo Sports, Kamara remained in the starting lineup in 47 percent of leagues, which means millions of people across the country woke up to realize they’d already made a grievous fantasy error. Here is a rundown of what happened in my four leagues (yes, I know, four is too many leagues):
League 1: The commissioner of the league slept through his alarm and told the group chat at 10 a.m. ET that he had “intended to wake up to check [Kamara’s] status but fell asleep before setting [his] alarm,” then requested permission to replace Kamara in his lineup despite the fact that the game had already kicked off. Although his plan was initially met with support, protests soon came. At one point, someone distributed a SurveyMonkey poll to determine whether the retroactive substitution would be allowed. As of publication time, it remains unclear whether the commissioner will abide by the result of the SurveyMonkey.
League 2: Kamara’s manager lives in Los Angeles, and did not wake up before kickoff, because nobody in California set an alarm clock for 6:15 a.m. to watch Vikings-Saints.
League 3: I called my dad, who doesn’t quite get how fantasy football works but is very enthusiastic about it, ten minutes before kickoff to let him know that Kamara was out. He sounded sleepy and confused by the NFL playing a game in London.
League 4: Kamara remained in the lineup, scoring zero points.
So in my four leagues, we would’ve gone 0-for-4 on the Kamara decision if it weren’t for me waking up my dad. Consider this segment a PSA: Giants-Packers kicks off at the same time next Sunday.
Winner: Garett Bolles
As a kid playing football video games, I used to make random players on the field dive at random moments. Of course, a player a few miles from the ball would never hurl himself to the ground for no apparent reason, but the video games allowed me to make them do that. “If that was a real person,” I would think in my little tiny brain, “they would look so stupid.”
My tiny little brain would have very much enjoyed this tackle attempt by Denver offensive lineman Garett Bolles:
Bolles ran a 4.95-second 40-yard dash at the NFL combine in 2017, which is absurdly fast for a 300-pound offensive tackle. No other OT in his class came within 0.2 seconds. Maybe when Raiders cornerback Amik Robertson took off toward the end zone on this fumble recovery, Bolles thought he could catch him. And Bolles gave 110 percent—the platonic ideal of a player playing through the whistle. Watching the video, you can tell that he could probably outsprint you and just about anybody you know that didn’t play sports in college.
But he never came close to catching Robertson, a man with faster legs than Bolles and a big head start. All Bolles could do at the end was flop, like one of the unfortunate bundles of pixels who had the misery of playing on one of my virtual teams back in the day:
All that effort and all that athleticism, and the main result was a viral blooper. You know the lesson.
The Wisconsin Badgers have fired their head football coach Paul Chryst, the school announced on Sunday night. Defensive coordinator Jim Leonhard will be the team’s interim coach.
The move represents a stunning turn of events for Chryst, who won at least 10 games in four of his first five seasons while guiding Wisconsin to three Big Ten championship game appearances during that stretch. But the product on the field steadily declined following the 2019 Rose Bowl campaign.
“After a heartfelt and authentic conversation with Coach Chryst about what is in the long-term best interest of our football program, I have concluded that now is the time for a change in leadership,” said Wisconsin athletic director Chris McIntosh. “Paul is a man of integrity who loves his players. I have great respect and admiration for Paul and the legacy of him and his family at the University of Wisconsin.”
GO DEEPERWisconsin job profile with Paul Chryst out: Pluses, minuses and candidates
Wisconsin finished a pandemic-shortened 2020 season 4-3 by rallying to win its final two games. The Badgers were in position to claim the Big Ten West title last season but suffered a 23-13 loss to rival Minnesota in the regular-season finale and went 9-4 overall. Wisconsin opened this season 2-3 and lost all three of its games against Power 5 opponents.
Washington State defeated Wisconsin 17-14 in Week 2 despite the Badgers being 17.
Things got heated on the Ravens sideline after a collapse from a 17-point lead in Sunday’s 23-20 loss to the Buffalo Bills.
As time wound down ahead of Tyler Bass’ game-winning field goal for the Bills, Ravens head coach John Harbaugh and cornerback Marcus Peters got into it on the sideline. A CBS camera caught Harbaugh saying something to Peters that Peters clearly didn’t appreciate. Peters then slammed his helmet to the turf and had to be held back as he tried to approach the Ravens head coach.
After the game, Harbaugh addressed the incident while telling reporters that he and his All-Pro cornerback are “on the same page.”
“Emotions run high,” Harbaugh said. “We’re on the same page. We’ve got a great relationship. We’ve got an honest relationship. And I love him. I hope he still loves me. We’ll see.”
Harbaugh didn’t address what prompted the exchange or what exactly was said. Peters didn’t speak with reporters after the game.
What sparked Peters’ outburst?
The loss included some strategic Ravens decisions down the stretch that didn’t work out, most notably a late gamble for a touchdown when a field goal would have given Baltimore the lead.
With the game tied at 20-20, Baltimore faced a fourth-and-goal from the Buffalo 2-yard line with 4:16 remaining in regulation. A chip-shot field goal by the game’s best kicker Justin Tucker would have given the Ravens a 23-20 lead. Harbaugh instead opted to go for a touchdown. Lamar Jackson then threw an interception to Bills safety Jordan Poyer in the end zone.
Short of a lengthy return or a pick-six, the result of the play was a worst-case scenario for Baltimore. Coming up short without a turnover would have pinned the Bills inside their own 2-yard line, an outcome that was surely considered in Harbaugh’s decision to roll the dice. Instead, Buffalo started its ensuing drive from the 20-yard line when the turnover resulted in a touchback. The Bills then marched 77 yards and drained the clock before Bass converted a 21-yard field goal as time expired.
Why did Harbaugh pass on field goal?
Harbaugh explained the decision to reporters.
“I felt like it gave us the best chance to win the game because seven [points], the worst that happens is if they go down the field and score — and I think we’ll get them stopped — but if they go down the field and score a touchdown, the worst thing that can happen is you’re in overtime.
“You kick a field goal there, now it’s not a three-down game anymore, it’s a four-down game. You’re putting them out there, you’re putting your defense at a disadvantage because they’ve got four downs to convert all the way down the field and a chance to again score seven, and then you lose the game on a touchdown.”
It was a decision grounded in analytics that didn’t work out for the Ravens on Sunday. Was it the reason Peters was upset? A later decision by the Ravens defense may have also been in play.
Baltimore Ravens head coach John Harbaugh watches from the sideline in the second half of an NFL football game against the Buffalo Bills Sunday, Oct. 2, 2022, in Baltimore. (AP Photo/Nick Wass)
Ravens tackled Singletary instead of letting him score
Had the Bills actively sought a touchdown once they reached the red zone on their final drive, the Ravens could have allowed the them to score with time on the clock to mount a response. An 8-yard run by Devin Singletary to the 3-yard line was Buffalo’s best opportunity to do so and would have left roughly 1:50 on the clock for Baltimore’s offense. But Bills defenders tackled him.
It’s not clear if Singletary would have gone in for the score or had instructions to give himself up short of the goal line to employ a clock-burning strategy. But that’s the strategy the Bills used after his run. They ran multiple plays inside the 3-yard line to burn clock after Baltimore used its final timeout.
It’s also not clear if either or both of the decisions sparked Peters — or if his anger was completely unrelated. But the Ravens have lost two games in three weeks against top AFC competition in games where they held a double-digit lead. They lost to the Miami Dolphins in Week 2 after leading 28-7 at halftime.
