NFL 2015 Season

[Volourn]

"Arizona is the best team in the NFL"

 

Nah.

[Bartimaeus]

In the Pack's defense, Arizona is the best team in the NFL and my pick to win the Super Bowl.

 

Yeah, they've been my non-Packers favorite since last year. Seems like they have an even better chance this year than last. I almost hope the Packers lose the division to the Vikings this upcoming week so we don't have to face the Vikings in the wildcard round and then Arizona again immediately after...but I suppose it makes very little difference if we can't even beat the Vikings, so we might as well make terrible Vikings fans cry by taking the division away from them when they expect to handily beat us again.

[Nepenthe]

 

and Breesus's 13th 400 yard game.

 

Maybe Breesus is juicin' like 5Head Manning? 

Considering the major injuries they've bith had, I'd be surprised if he hadn't at the time. Breesus's ~half-dozen kids make continued use seem unlikely.

[Keyrock]

So, the Chip Kelly experiment is over in Philly.  As a Cowboys fan, nothing delights me more than turmoil and failure for the Iggles, though that's only partial consolation after the year the Boys have had.  I do feel, however, that Chip was fired too soon.  On the one hand, he did get rid of not only his team's best player, but also their second best player, plus he put his eggs in the Sam Bradford basket, and while I think Sam is a decent QB, his body is made of papier-mache, so it's rather risky to bet your future on him.  On the other hand, while this was Chip's 3rd year, this was the first year where he was given essentially full control over football decisions, and if you're going to give a guy that kind of power and he makes sweeping changes, as Chip did, you need to give it more than 1 year to play out.  Either way, it's over now.

[Enoch]

Yeah, the Chip thing is wacky.  (And hilarious.  And a beautiful source of schadenfreude.)  There must have been some serious behind-the-scenes drama to make ownership do such an about-face less than a year after giving Kelly final personnel authority.  After how patient they were with Reid, I figured it was a given that Kelly would get at least another year or two. 

 

That said, I still think that the Bradford trade was one of the silliest moves I've seen in recent years.  Foles and Bradford are pretty near-equivalents as low-tier NFL starters-- you can get by with them, but neither one is good enough that a team currently starting him shouldn't be looking for a replacement.  Giving up a 2nd-round pick for a like-for-like swap (and with the party you're getting only signed for 1-year, at a stupidly high base salary) is dumbfounding. 

Edited December 30, 2015 by Enoch

[the_dog_days]

That said, I still think that the Bradford trade was one of the silliest moves I've seen in recent years. Foles and Bradford are pretty near-equivalents as low-tier NFL starters-- you can get by with them, but neither one is good enough that a team currently starting him shouldn't be looking for a replacement. Giving up a 2nd-round pick for a like-for-like swap (and with the party you're getting only signed for 1-year, at a stupidly high base salary) is dumbfounding.

Yep, as a lifelong Oklahoma Sooners fan I still say Bradford, when healthy, is okay at best. There are lots of other Sooner fan who have been claiming for years that he just needs a supporting cast, but he's six or seven years into the league and has had one good season (rookie year) where he was health for more than two thirds of the games.

[Keyrock]

There is talk of "toxic working conditions" and Chip having lost the team and whatnot, though I don't know how much stock to put into those talks.  To switch sports for a moment, as a Red Sox fan, I still vividly remember how hard the owners threw Terry Francona under the bus when he was shown the door.  If I were to believe everything that was said about Tito, I'd think he was the devil himself.

Edited December 30, 2015 by Keyrock

[Bartimaeus]

Yikes, the Seahawks are eviscerating the Cardinals about as badly as the Cardinals eviscerated the Packers last week.

[ManifestedISO]

New documentary proves Peyton Manning bribed Chargers defense early this morning, likely with bacon, into forcing five Denver turnovers, ensuring removal of Brock Osweiler at quarterback and a storybook season ending for Manning. You're welcome, Peyton!  

[Enoch]

The day's best highlight.

[Volourn]

"Arizona is the best team in the NFL"

 

Nah."

 

I repeat. NAH.

[Enoch]

Because I know Volo won't, I'll be the Giants fan around these parts to say thanks to Tom Coughlin.  I can appreciate that, at 69, his time was coming sooner or later, so I can accept it if the Giants brass thinks that this was going to be the best time to transition to a new Head Coach.  Tom's not a perfect coach by any stretch of the imagination (and he'd be the first to tell you that), but the chances that NYG can find somebody as-good or better to take his place are not particularly strong. 

[Bartimaeus]

Yeah, it's sad to hear. May not have lead the most consistent team year in and year out, but two Super Bowl wins - and both against the BB and TB-lead Patriots - is pretty special. Probably the only HC vacancy this year where you can really say it's an end of an era for a team.

[Volourn]

Bottom line is he won crap without the Elite One  leading the way. The fact is he literally was forced to change his coaching style or else he would have been fired after the first season. He did a great job but bottom line is Giants win NOTHINg without Eli. Even though idiots are trying to blame  a QB who led one of the better offenses for the poor season. The defense, the running game (last game notwithstanding) and poor coaching did the Giants in this season.

 

Still, thanks for the SB... and, I agree, seems a waste of a coaching change as I doubt there is much better out there.

[Bartimaeus]

This is just brutal.

[Bartimaeus]

I hope the games tomorrow are better than today: these two today are just terrible so far.

[Bartimaeus]

That game was worse to watch, as a Packers fan, than the 2014 NFCCG. That was easily the worst game I've ever seen in my life. Steelers are my most hated team, and I usually at least moderately like the Bengals, but I was happy the Bengals lost. It is demeaning to the League as a whole - and not to mention disturbing - that what goes on in these games continues to go on, and that these headhunting players are allowed to continue to player with 1-2 game suspensions after some truly despicable behavior such as we saw today, while other players get suspended for a quarter of a season (or more) for testing positive for marijuana, a substance that players use to help deal with chronic pain as a result of playing this incredibly brutal sport. The NFL is a truly disgusting organization, and I absolutely hate supporting it in any capacity whatsoever.

[rjshae]

Good battle today with the Vikings. I figured it was going to be a much tougher, defensive matchup, and the Hawks just got out by the skin of their teeth. Hard luck about that final missed kick; they came in with a good game plan and it very nearly worked.

Edited January 10, 2016 by rjshae

[Nepenthe]

I'm now most looking forward to the east-west shrine game and the senior bowl... >

[ManifestedISO]

Owners vote 30-2 in favor of the Rams moving to Inglewood. Chargers and Raiders will not share a stadium in Carson.

 

San Diego has until next January to decide to move in with the Rams or stay home. If they stay, Raiders get the option to relocate to Inglewood, also with a year to decide, starting from the date of the Chargers' decision.

 

If San Diego and/or Oakland stay in their home markets, they each receive $100 million equity payment from the NFL toward new stadiums ... which sounds decent, but equates to less than five percent of the cost of the Rams' new Los Angeles 'entertainment complex'.    

[Hurlshort]

I think I read the Raiders backed out, so that the Chargers can join the Rams.

 

I hope they can figure out a way to build a new stadium for the A's and Raiders in Oakland.

[rjshae]

Sympathies to St. Louis for losing their team. It totally sucks and is unfair to the fans.

 

P.S. I no longer follow the NBA because of what happened to the Sonics... and I know I'm not alone in that regard.

[Volourn]

" It totally sucks and is unfair to the fans. "

 

It is 100% fair to the 'fans'. The teams have EVERY right to leave like any other business. As far as I[m concerned they   should be  allowed to leave like any other business. PERIOD.

 

The 'fans' - who are evil selfish  piece of crap nazis - can SUCK IT.

[ManifestedISO]

You okay, Barti ...

 

Not supposed to, but I like Peyton and want Denver to go the distance. 

[Bartimaeus]

It sucked to lose to the same garbage overtime rules in the playoffs two years in a row in a time and age where the game favors the offense so much more than the defense...particularly at the end of a game, where defenses are so gassed, and where the coin flip is quite literally the deciding factor. Rodgers remains winless in OT games (both post-season and regular season) over his starting career (8 years, to be exact) thanks to the Packers being spectacularly bad at OT coin flips and his defense being similarly spectacularly bad in the OT period.

 

However, it was a pretty fantastic game, and never expected to go toe to toe with the Cardinals. It was so, so frustrating to see the defense drop literally about 4-5 sure interceptions: we get those, and there's absolutely no way the Cardinals stand a chance. It was amazing see Rodgers make magic again with literally our first (Jordy), second (Cobb), third (Adams), and fifth string WRs (Montgomery) out, as well as our first string TE (Quarless), and to see another amazing "Hail Rodgers" to bring us back when our defense failed him again. Still, fantastic game, didn't hurt too terribly, particularly after last year's total collapse (this was a much, much better performance, IMO, even though it may not be reflected by the scoreboard). I'm also pleased to see the Seahawks getting utterly annihilated by the Panthers right now: happy that either the Panthers or the Cardinals will end up going (well, almost certainly, anyways).