The Tuesday: Week Two
Welcome to Week Two of the Tuesday. Thanks to the more than three of you who read last week! Let’s just jump right into me criticizing big business & capitalism, followed by some thoughts about Chip Kelly & racism, & then finally some thoughts about actual football games.
Remember, questions you want me to talk about next week can be sent to justinryancarter [at] gmail [dot] com, or HMU on Twitter: @justinonsports
Kam Chancellor & Protecting Workers
The Seahawks are 0–2 & I’ve seen more than a few people blame some of their on-field performance to Kam Chancellor’s holdout. At a purely football-level, yes — the loss of Chancellor probably is why Seattle isn’t at least 1–1 right now.
I’ve also seen a lot of people admonishing Chancellor for holding out. I mean — HE SIGNED HIS CONTRACT LAST YEAR. HE SHOULD BE PLAYING, RIGHT?
I get it. Seattle has X amount of cap room & paying Chancellor is pretty hard when they’d probably have to cut money for other players (via cutting them) to make it work. The NFL’s hard cap ensures that every team has the same amount of money to pay 53 players. Everyone fights for a piece of a pie that can’t be rebaked. Take some money & shut up, because someone else also needs money.
I believe in capping the salaries of executives & redistributing that money to their employees. I believe in the rights of a worker to unionize & renegotiate contracts when the size of the pie changes or their role in contributing to the pie changes.
$143.28 million dollars a year is how much each team spends on players. Last year, each NFL team received more than that in revenue sharing. The NFL is the most profitable sport in America. Meanwhile, it’s players are risking their futures for contracts that aren’t even fully guaranteed. If Kam Chancellor believes that his contributions to a team that is making lots & lots of money are worth more guarantees that he’ll get his money, then Chancellor should hold out. Football is dangerous. Protecting the people who put their lives in danger is important —that protection should be both physical & fiscal. Players are making tons of money for owners. They need to be rewarded for this. My solution is to get rid of nonguaranteed contracts. Let teams release whoever they want. The players still get paid. That money partially comes off of a (higher than it is now) salary cap. Let’s create a system where workers KNOW they will be fully compensated for their work.
Chip Kelly. Chip, Chip Kelly.
What is happening with the Eagles.
DeMarco Murray is picking up negative yards like they’re something one enjoys picking up, like cool looking rocks or pennies . Sam Bradford looked great in the preseason & now doesn’t — his completion percentage is decent, but TD/INT is at 2/4. The Eagles are 0–2, including a loss to a Cowboys team that had Brandon Weeden in for a period of the game. WEEDEN. THE 45 YEAR OLD ROOKIE QB WHO NOW, A FEW YEARS LATER, IS PROBABLY 65.
There was a lot of talk in the offseason about Chip Kelly being a racist & also talk about Chip Kelly being too much of a genius.
Is Chip racist? I don’t know. If he is & this racism is what’s causing all these dumb moves, fire him.
Is Chip too smart? I don’t know. I’m more willing to say he’s too arrogant — football isn’t about systems. Chip Kelly is trying to be some large corporation that says hey, we can replace you for cheaper & get the same production because the system works regardless of who we plug in. Hell, maybe Chip is a racist — maybe not overtly, but maybe he’s uncomfortable with black culture to the degree that he makes moves to get rid of players like Desean Jackson & Lesean McCoy because he can find a cheaper replacement for The System that might not make him so uncomfortable. Signing DeMarco Murray doesn’t absolve Chip Kelly of the racist label. It’s not about how many new black players Kelly brings in. It’s about how he responds to them when they’re on his team. It’s about how he wants perfect cogs for a system & the moment a player is perceived as a threat to the Chip Kelly machine, they’re gone. I don’t know if it’s about race, if black players are perceived by Kelly to be bigger threats than white players to his system. There’s a good chance it is, but there’s also a good chance that Kelly is just uncomfortable with all young people, that he’s got major issues with an entire generation & will keep trading & not signing players until he gets the right group that believes more in Chip than in themselves. I don’t know.
I do know the Eagles still have Riley Cooper, which is a big reason I’m having these “is Chip Kelly racist?” questions — that Desean Jackson has friends who might be in a gang so BYE, but Cooper says the n-word on camera & he’s still in Philly. Cooper’s actions suggest he’s not a perfect, quiet cog. Why’s he still part of the machine?
I also know The System is failing through two games.
Which 2–0 Team Is Best?
In lieu of actually figuring out storylines, I’m thinking I’ll just talk about all the remaining unbeaten teams each week until there aren’t any left. Here they are in tiers.
Tier One: New England Patriots, Green Bay Packers
New England is probably the best team in the NFL, although they did give up a bunch of points to the Bills. Green Bay is actually maybe better than New England except that pesky Jordy injury & a possible Lacy issue.
Tier Two: Denver Broncos, Cincinnati Bengals, Atlanta Falcons, Carolina Panthers, Arizona Cardinals
All these teams could be playoff teams. Denver should, despite Old Manning, be fine in the AFC West. The Bengals are getting good performances from Andy Dalton. The Falcons are getting Alien Julio. Carolina & Atlanta are going to be fun in the NFC South this year, maybe. The NFC South is going to rebound like the NFC West did that time they put a sub-.500 team in the playoffs, OKAY? [Okay, probably not.] Arizona — meh, Carson Palmer is aight.
Tier Three: Dallas Cowboys, New York Jets
The Romo & Dez injuries should kill the Cowboys, although the NFC East is a joke right now. The Jets have Ryan Fitzpatrick still. I like their defense, yeah, but I’m not quite sold on them yet.
CJ Anderson Hype Train
I promise I won’t let my fantasy team dictate what I talk about all year, but I can’t ignore CJ Anderson right now. He was #hype on all the pre-draft rankings, a projected first rounder that I felt lucky enough to grab as the first pick of round three. Two weeks in, I feel less lucky.
Anderson is getting NOTHING this year — 2.3 yards per carry, only three first down runs. The Broncos are 2–0 behind an offense that has been playing pretty poorly. Manning channeled Classic Peyton late against the Chiefs, but his QB rating through two games [YEAH I KNOW SMALL SAMPLE SIZE] is twenty-three points below his career average. Demaryius Thomas & Emmanuel Sanders can’t prop up Peyton forever if he’s really hit That Point, & without a strong passing game the Broncos running game isn’t going to work.
It’s early. Saying Manning is done, or saying the Broncos offense is done, isn’t a proclamation I’m ready to make, but I’m probably benching CJ next week for team Too Many Dolphins.
Speaking Of That Thursday Game
Madden coach Justin & real life Justin both hated the Chiefs play call at the end of Denver/KC. There are two things a team can do in that situation (well, three, but throwing bombs to the end zone isn’t really an Alex Smith thing). First, they kneel the ball. They take the game to OT. They cross their fingers & hope they get the ball first so they can drive down field & get a Charles TD. There are some drawbacks to this — with possession of the ball, their fate is in their own hands. In OT, they might have to hope Peyton doesn’t connect on a 75 yard TD on the first play.
The other is to play for the field goal. Some out patterns, maybe, MAYBE, a run to the outside.
I know that Jamaal Charles is one of the best running backs in the NFL. I know he has the ability to break a big gain.
I also know that running between the tackles with such a short amount of time on the clock & a large amount of yards needed isn’t a good idea. End of half dive plays get backs injured. They rarely, rarely succeed.
You can’t anticipate fumbles, but you can take a second to think about potential outcomes & risk management.
I’ve been playing weekly trivia for the last three or four months. My team is pretty good — we’re probably first place in League right now. Every week, there’s a final question where every team wagers between zero & twenty points. Some weeks we get a little fucked-over on the last question — it’s always the hardest one. Depending on how big our lead is, we decide how many points to bet, but we also take into account other factors: how many teams we think will get the question right, how many teams are within X points of third place & thus the money, how confident we feel in our own answer.
Here’s what the end of that game is like: KC doesn’t know the answer to the question. They can bet zero & hope Denver doesn’t know either so they can just worry about the tie breaker/OT. They can bet small (a few safe throws to try to get into FG range) — if they luck into the right answer, well — maybe they win! If they don’t, they’ve still got a decent shot at the money.
Or, they bet twenty. They don’t know the answer, but they go with the thing with the most risk for screwing them up with the small, small chance that they’ve made the right move & pull a win out. They dive into the heart of the defense. They give it all they can — maybe they’ll break free, get a long game-winning run.
Some Random Thoughts
- Okay, maybe Ryan Mallett wasn’t the best idea. Houston has a solid group of receivers, but no one to get them the ball. Also Chris Polk is their best rusher right now.
- JJ Watt keeps getting sacks.
- The Saints losing to the Bucs says more about New Orleans than Tampa.
- HEY MIKE EVANS WHY YOU NO HAVE ANY CATCHES?
- Saints have to get CJ Spiller more involved going forward.
- Chicago is going to have BIG issues with Jimmy Clausen, who is sub-Gabbert level.
- Idk if it is time to trust a New England RB, but Dion Lewis looks kinda maybe like someone I would claim off waivers?
- Travis Benjamin Hype Train reminds me of that time everyone loved Eddie Royal.
- That Manziel’s two TDs came on plays where Benjamin was so crucial doesn’t make me that confident in Manziel.
- Washington’s running game looked dangerous. Will they keep it up? Ehh.
- Did the Rams win the Foles/Bradford deal?
- AP is back, right? No more of those weird Week One performances?
- That Lions defense is like putting Jimmer on Steph Curry.
- DeAngelo Williams isn’t even that good & the Steelers offense is going HAM. Bell coming back? Bryant in a few weeks? LOTS of potential.
- No idea what to think about Oakland. Looked terrible against the Bengals. Looked great (offensively) against the Ravens. That Crabtree/Cooper duo is #strong.
- Who is Allen Robinson?
- What is the AFC South?
- ANDREW LUCK.
- The Miami offense has just decided that the idea of running the ball is too archaic. Maybe a good move in terms of moving toward a type of football that minimizes collisions?
- Are the Jets, like, for real? Was Brandon Marshall the missing piece?
- Okay, again — what is happening to the Colts? They’ll win the AFC South, because Houston has no QB & the other two teams are Jacksonville & Tennessee, but could they win it at 8–8? 7–9? Could we see Houston or Jacksonville get lucky a couple of times against the Colts & suddenly one of them wins this year’s version of the 2014 NFC South?
The Q&A
We got our first question this week! Here it is:
I’m terrible at rankings, especially something like this, but let’s discuss the five best NFL foreheads in no particular order.
Peyton Manning
Yeah, this is too easy, & maybe he’s not shiny enough in this picture, but when I think about giant foreheads, I think Peyton Manning.
Aside: These new Peyton Nationwide commercials are, in the words of Brad Paisley, Crushin’ It. I keep singing “Chicken Parm You Taste So Good” to myself. I have forgiven Manning for all those years he was a Colt now.
Brian Hoyer
Hoyer has the classic “what is forehead & what is head” thing going on.
Hoyer is shown here in a Browns jersey because I am trying to forget about his Texans career, which has already been two weeks longer than it ever should have been.
Adrian Peterson
Peterson is basically just Brian Hoyer except there’s more forehead, & also people know who Adrian Peterson is.
Sebastian Janikowski
Kicker is a position that people can play for a long, long time, so you tend to see more bald kickers around the league.
I’m also only 90% sure this is a picture of Janikowski & not just some random Raiders fan.
Terrell Suggs
This picture is a little old & he is more bald now.
Honorable Mentions (aka retired players): Antoine Winfield, Tiki Barber, Eddie George, Brian Urlacher, Trent Dilfer.
Also, from the NASCAR world, Todd Bodine, pictured below in all his glory:
NASCAR Corner
The Chase started but I didn’t watch it because football was on. Kevin Harvick got into a little wreck trouble & UH OH he might be in danger of not making it to the second round, which would be a goddamned joke & fuck you, NASCAR, if your shitty playoff system keeps someone who has spent the first 2/3 of the year on a record setting pace for top 10 finishes from advancing out of round one. If this happens, watch for me to complain even more in a full column about how much the Chase sucks.
Joe Gibbs Racing is unstoppable.
After one race, these are my picks for who gets eliminated: Bowyer, Menard, McMurray. I’m not picking the fourth spot yet because I’m still mad it could be Harvick.
