Michael Clayton - 17 Years Too Late

 

Michael Clayton was one of those “I can’t believe you haven’t seen it” movies for me, so, 17 years late, I finally watched it. It was … fine, but I think my lack of enthusiasm for it was due to two things. First, the movie advertises Clayton (played by George Clooney) as a “fixer” who has to get a partner at his law firm under control after the man suffers a mental breakdown during a high stakes, multi-billion dollar class action case involving a cancer-causing pesticide. To me, “fixer” has a very specific connotation – a person who comes into a messy situation and cleans it up discreetly, with no fingerprints so to speak, and does not linger over the morality of what they are doing. The perfect example is Pulp Fiction’s Winston Wolf.

Here however, it is hard to call Clooney a “fixer.” Early in the movie, he is called out to a mansion in Westchester County because one of the firm’s clients was involved in a hit and run and fled the scene. Now, a true fixer would have a 24-hour tow service on speed dial, removed the offending vehicle from the residence and turned into a metal cube while the fixer constructed a believable alibi for the offender while also checking to make sure no traffic cameras might have caught him in the act. But that’s not what happens. Instead, Clooney basically tells the guy he (Clooney) can’t help him other than to tell him to get a good criminal defense lawyer. Uh, duh.

But Clooney’s primary mission is flying to Milwaukee to babysit the rogue law firm partner and he fails miserably at that too. The attorney, Arthur Edens (played by Tom Wilkinson) gives Clooney the slip in his hotel room and flies back to New York City. Clooney does eventually find him, but it does no good because the evil corporation’s general counsel, Karen Crowder (played beautifully by god-tier actress Tilda Swinton) has hired *actual* fixers who track Edens, put him under surveillance, and ultimately murder him, making it look like a suicide.

(There is also a whole sub plot going on showing Clooney to be a degenerate gambler who is also in hock because a restaurant he opened with his drug addicted brother went under and he doesn’t have enough money to pay off his creditors. He’s also divorced with a son, which is another sub plot that does not really go anywhere.)

In the end, Clooney does one fixer-like thing – he gets his other brother (a cop) to give him a police seal so he can break into Edens’s apartment after his death, search it, and then replace the broken seal so no one knows he was there. Of course, the evil fixers still have the apartment under surveillance and call the cops, who arrest Clooney and put his brother’s job in jeopardy; but Clooney does find a receipt in a book Edens bought at Clooney’s son’s recommendation showing he had 3,000 copies of an internal, evil corporation memo acknowledging the pesticide was dangerous (I should note the receipt said it was a COD job and Clooney’s financial problems beg the question of how he paid for them.) Obviously, the memo is extremely damaging to their case, but instead of burying it (which an actual fixer would do) Clooney leverages it to get Crowder to pay him off for his silence only instead of doing that, what he was actually doing was getting her on tape offering him a bribe. Clooney’s brother and other cops swoop in, arrest her, and the memo is presumably used by the plaintiffs to extract a massive settlement.

Which brings me to my other problem with the movie, and perhaps it is one borne of the fact I’m a lawyer – the legal stuff made NO sense. For one, Edens’s multiple contacts with the lead plaintiff would have been a clear violation of rules of professional conduct. So too would have been his decision to leak the internal memo. There was some vague mention of potential legal malpractice, but that had to do with Edens’s meltdown during a deposition, not his other, flagrant violations of the rules of professional conduct. Possession of the internal memo and its use by the client’s own law firm against it would have been another problem in the real world, but was required as a narrative device for the story.

The whole thing would have made more sense if Clooney was not marketed as a “fixer” or instead, actually was a fixer who did evil stuff on behalf of the evil corporation. I think the movie could have also worked better with an ambitious younger lawyer who becomes disillusioned when they find out the evil corporation is in fact evil, and turns into a whistle blower. To me, this is a two, maybe two-and-a-half star movie.  

Ten NFL Takes - Week Eleven

 

Take number one: Call him what you will, Playoff Lamar, Bizarro Lamar, January Lamar, regardless, that guy, and not the incandescent talent who has already won two MVP awards and appeared on a glide path to a third, showed up yesterday in Pittsburgh. I have no idea why this version of Lamar – the one who is trying to force big plays, making bad decisions, turning the ball over, and generally looking lost – shows up at the most inopportune times, but boy howdy did it resemble that 2024 AFC Championship game against the Chiefs and to a lesser extent, Lamar’s other post-season turkeys. Maybe it’s the coaches who are unable to make adjustments or Lamar feeling like a Ferrari being asked to drive the speed limit through a school zone but for a team that looked like the league’s best, they are suddenly sitting at 7-4 and may be at risk of not making the playoffs! Four of their last six games are against teams that are either locks for the playoffs (Philly, Pittsburgh, and Houston) or challenging for a wild-card (Chargers) and while their defense looked great yesterday against a “meh” Steelers offense, should we expect a similar level of play? If not, and Bad Lamar rears his head again with Tucker suddenly losing his kicking mojo, this entire season will have been wasted.

Take number two: I’m marveling at the Steelers. I am. Their defense just throttled Baltimore, there is no other way to describe it. T.J. Watt wrecked that game from the first snap to the last, their secondary was sticky and aggressive, and their linebackers didn’t give Lamar any space to operate. Russ may only be cooking at a low simmer, but apropos of take one, this is a team that knows who it is and is willing to slug it out, grind out three yards and a cloud of dust, and kick six field goals if that is what it takes to win.

Take number three: Did that Josh Allen scramble to seal Buffalo’s win yesterday break the spell the Chiefs have over them? Yes, I know regular season Josh has a winning record against regular season Pat, but the Bills were the better team yesterday and it was not particularly close and that was without Allen’s full complement of receivers. The question remaining for the Bills is whether they want to make a push for the one seed or start load managing some of their players. The division is all but clinched so it’s really more the risk/reward of getting that one week bye versus sneaking in some rest for players down the stretch but playing an extra game and not having home field for the conference championship.

Take number four: Chiefs kingdom should not overreact to yesterday’s loss but they should not dismiss it either. The glaring shortcomings of this team have been on display all season but it was not until yesterday that a team exposed them so thoroughly and then went for the jugular when they had the chance. That said, the remaining schedule has three cupcakes, including the next two, against Carolina and Las Vegas, and four competitive games against the Chargers, Broncos, Steelers, and Texans. Three and oh against the cupcakes and a split with the good teams gets the Chiefs to 14 wins, which should be good enough for the one seed, but does not guarantee it.

Take number five: The Commanders are just toying with our emotions. It’s like that girlfriend you finally broke up with and moved on, but then you run into her years later and all the stuff that made you leave in the first place seems less important and you focus on the good times you had and then two weeks into the reconciliation you are shocked back into reality. Two losses in five days, albeit to playoff teams, is concerning, as is Jayden Daniels’s apparent regression and the return of the second half of the season Kliff Kingbury fade. With the punchless Cowboys up next, the team better right the ship.

Take number six: Sports are cruel, they just are. Imagine you’re a Bears fan right now. Your season started out with so much promise and then within the span of a few weeks, instead of stealing a game on the road in D.C. you lose an a Hail Mary that will be replayed over and over as long as you live, you got pummeled in the desert by the Cardinals, and then, after all the sturm und drang, the o/c firing, the whispers in the locker room, the dead man walking watch on your head coach, you outplay your oldest rival on your home field, your rookie quarterback who had looked lost for the past three weeks leads a picture perfect two-minute drill while flashing all the talent that sold you on him in the first place, you milk the clock down to three seconds, line up for the winning field goal and … it’s blocked. Not only is your season effectively over, but you have now lost twice in the last month on the last play of games you should have won. Brutal.

Take number seven: Good teams beat bad teams. Great teams pummel bad teams into oblivion. That is Detroit right now. And yes, I know they lost another key piece on their defense, but I am pretty sure what they did to Jacksonville is illegal in twenty-three states.

Take number eight: Sneaky Bo Nix for rookie of the year candidacy brewing. I won’t lie and claim to watch enough Broncos football to speak with real intelligence about what this kid is doing right, but the results speak for themselves. Sean Payton may be an arrogant jerk, but that dude has cleaned up a franchise that was adrift and set it on the right path.

Take number nine: Speaking of arrogant jerk coaches, Jim Harbaugh also doing a bang up job with a team that had become the poster child for giving up fourth quarter leads and generally spitting the bit in close games. You think the good people of Chicago aren’t steaming right now that ownership didn’t dump Eberflus in the offseason to make a run at a guy who used to play for them?

Take number ten: Thoughts and prayers to all those who will need to spend more time with their families on Thanksgiving because the late afternoon match up of the Cooper Rush-led Cowboys playing the Tommy DeVito-led Giants will test the patience of even the most die-hard sports fan.

A Note To My Blue Sky Followers

Greetings! If you made the exodus from Twitter to Blue Sky with me, let me first say thank you for following me, whether you did so recently or have been with me since I started tweeting in 2010 or jumped on the bus sometime in between. I am posting this as a public service announcement so you can decide if you want to continue on this social media journey with me.

First, I am not leaving Twitter. I am keeping my account there for a couple of reasons - on the off chance Elon dumps it and it goes back to being a decent platform, because I have accounts I follow and enjoy on the site and who are not migrating elsewhere, and also because hey, let’s face it, there is no guarantee Blue Sky survives long term and I don’t want to start from zero (again). I will keep posting on Twitter, although with far less frequency.

Second, I will not be posting nearly as much about politics or the media as I did on Twitter. For one thing, the idea of rubbernecking past democracy’s end does not hold that much appeal to me. I used to say that politics had become pro wrestling, but it’s worse now because in pro wrestling the performers know the outcome, the audience does not. In a check-and-balance free world, which is what Washington, DC will be once Trump is inaugurated, the performers *and* the audience (us) know what will happen. On any given topic, be it the budget, a Supreme Court nominee, or any of the myriad of other things that involve one or more of the three branches of government, Trump is going to win, Democrats (and the country) are going to lose and the media will cheerlead the former and ask why the latter is impotent. It’s just not that interesting to me. 

Third, I do plan on using my Blue Sky account more like how I used my Twitter account when I first signed up - as an outlet for discussing things happening in my life, what I am interested in, and linking to my long-form blog posts. If that’s not your cup of tea, I will not be at all offended, but I just want everyone to know ahead of time that this account will not simply mimic what I had over on Twitter. 

Finally, feel free to reach out! It is going to take me a little while to get the hang of this new account and who did (and did not) come over from Twitter. Let me know if you’re here so I can follow you back or point me to others I might have missed. 

Ten NFL Takes - Week Ten

Take number one: When your quarterback tosses five picks on the road against a team that won its division last year (and will probably win it again this year), you're down sixteen points at halftime, but come back to win because your kicker (who was in the equivalent of the pro football minor league last spring) burns the uprights not once but twice, it just might be your year. We need to get our heads around the idea one of the few teams never to have made a Super Bowl, much less win one, might change both of those things this year. Great win, Detroit.

Take number two: I have written about how Kansas City's secret sauce is its scouting and drafting. Consider that they have *three* future Hall of Famers on their roster who they drafted out of college (and traded away a fourth a few years ago for a haul of picks) on top of other key contributors like Creed Humphrey, Isaiah Pacheco, Trent McDuffie, George Karlaftis, and Rashee Rice (pre injury) and you understand why someone most of us have never heard of (Leo Chanel) steps up at the end of a game they should have lost, blocks a field goal and saves their undefeated season going into the game of the year at Buffalo next weekend.

Take number three: Maybe we should not have been surprised that the rap on a quarterback prospect coming out of college was that he was inaccurate and did not perform well if his offensive line was leaky would struggle with accuracy in the pros when his line could not protect him. People forget that in limited preseason action, Caleb Williams was a 50% passer. A couple of good games against bad teams led people to believe Williams had "figured things out" but he has regressed back to the hold-the-ball-too-long, is-not-reading-defenses rookie he was for the first few games earlier this season. Twenty three drives since losing to the Commanders have resulted in precisely zero touchdowns and since their bye, they have scored twenty-seven points in three games. In retrospect, the Bears should have traded up from the ninth pick and taken a bookend offensive lineman (of which three were available) instead of another wide receiver when their offense already had plenty of weapons. 

Take number four: When you live on the east coast and don't shell out money for the Red Zone, west coast teams sometimes slip below your radar. This year, the Chargers, Cardinals, and Broncos have all quietly put together solid seasons. I saw the Cardinals for the first time yesterday because local CBS forced me to watch the Jets play them and it was not even a contest. Great example of a *team* that does not have a lot of household names or big contracts, absolutely dog walking another "team" with plenty of big names but zero identity. The Cardinals are a bit of a knock off Ravens team on offense. They bully you in the trenches with a great run game and have a dual threat at quarterback who it is almost impossible to scheme for. Their defense is full of no names put get after the ball and have not given up a touchdown in the last three games. Not too shabby.

Take number five: Is it too soon to look at the off season coaching carousel? The Jets and Saints have already fired their head coaches and barring massive turnarounds, the Jaguars, Bears, Cowboys, and maybe the Browns, Raiders, and Giants will all be moving on from their head coaches too. These are not terrible rosters but to a team, the culture, the vibes, the whatever-you-want-to-call-it just is not there.

Take number six: In addition to the coaching carousel, if we're being real, most of the playoff intrigue is already gone, and it is only week ten. In the AFC, the Chiefs, Bills, Texans, Steelers, Ravens, and Chargers are somewhere between mortal locks and very good chances, leaving that seventh spot (currently occupied by the Broncos) open. In the NFC, the Eagles, Commanders, Vikings, Lions, Packers, Falcons, are in that same position, leaving the three teams in the NFC West probably needing to win the division to get in. 

Take number seven: Ten weeks in, you just know who the bad teams are. You do. Congratulations Carolina, you won two straight, but you're still awful. Ditto the Saints. You won one for your interim coach who was so nervous before the game he clogged the toilet in the coach's bathroom. Start your off season scouting at the top of the draft, G-Men, Cowboys, Raiders, and Browns.

Take number eight: Football can be a cruel sport. A guy like Baker Mayfield, who takes A JOURNEY from first overall pick to cast off *from Carolina* only to rehab himself in L.A. and then find his groove in Tampa, is leading a team playing without their two top wide receivers and they scrap and claw and fight only to lose three straight by one score to superior competition. You deserve a better fate, six.

Take number nine: Speaking of cruel, my hometown Commandos (again, HATE Commanders name) showed why it is a game of inches. A few inches short on a fourth down to keep a drive alive to win the game. A few inches too far when the Steelers go to a hard count that gets us penalized for offsides and a game the R-words should have won ends up as a loss with a quick turnaround up to Philly for a Thursday night game against maybe the hottest team in the league right now. Woke up Sunday 7-2, may wake up Friday 7-4 and no longer leading the division. Tough stuff.

Take number ten: I have nothing to say about the Cowboys play on the field. It's awful, but what I do have something to say is how stupid do you have to be to spend a billion dollars on a stadium and miss a glaring (pun intended) design flaw that results in blinding sunlight shining through the glass on one side of the stadium for an hour plus making it almost impossible to run your offense and why, for the love of god, did you not construct some sort of louver system that could block it out? 

Ten NFL Takes - Week Nine

Take number one: When the Ravens are clicking in all three phases, they are the best team in the league, full stop. A Denver team that had won five of six and has one of the best defenses in the league was embarrassed in Baltimore yesterday. Lamar threw for just shy of 300 yards on 16 completions (which is almost unheard of) and notched his record fourth perfect passer rating, Derrick Henry eclipsed 100 yards rushing, Zay Flowers had 100 plus yards receiving *in the first half* (for the second time this season!) and the defense and special teams both showed up. The Ravens hung 41 on the Broncos without it looking difficult. Their best is better than everyone else’s best but the question for this team is no longer about making the playoffs or even getting to the Super Bowl, it’s winning it all. Sports history is littered with teams that ran up impressive regular season records and contended for a title but never won. The Ravens are one more playoff flameout away from being labeled chokers.

Take number two: It is weird to live in a world where the Detroit Lions are the best team by far in the NFC, but here we are. They thumped Green Bay at Green Bay on a wet field in lousy conditions without their top defensive end and (for most of the game) their do-it-all safety and yet the game was never really in doubt. They can win on the ground, they can win in the air, they can win with special teams, and their defense is solid (although I still think they need to make a trade to bolster their pass rush). The Lions have just one outdoor game left on their schedule where weather will probably play a factor (a December game at Chicago) with every other game in a dome aside from an end-of-the-year road game in San Francisco. They’re going to get the number one seed in the NFC and have to be considered the odds on favorite to represent the conference in the Super Bowl.

Take number three: There is some bad football being played this year. Back in the day, we would get toward the end of the season and some quirk in the schedule would result in what was derisively called “The Toilet Bowl” between two of the league’s worst teams. There were two Toilet Bowl games yesterday – Panthers/Saints and Titans/Patriots, both of which were borderline unwatchable. A quarter of the teams in the entire league have two wins and are going nowhere fast. The Saints fired their head coach and the Raiders dumped a bunch of their position coaches this morning. Expect more to come.

Take number four: I saw a wild statistic on NBC’s Sunday Night pre-game show. It was something to the effect of there have been the same number of field goals made from 60 yards or more this year (four) as were made in the league’s first 80 years. We are living in a golden age of field goal kickers and it is just … weird. When I was growing up, anything beyond 50 yards was rarely made and PATs were chip shots from the two yard line. Now, PATs are the equivalent of 40 yard field goals (and made routinely) and coaches have no qualms about rolling out a kicker at 60 yards or more. They are still low percentage attempts (about which we’ll discuss later) but it is no longer shocking when a ball sails through the uprights at that distance, just ask the Bills and Dolphins.

Take number five: The Jets refuse to leave us alone. Like some football version of WWE’s Undertaker, just when you are ready to bury them, the Jets pop up off the mat. Yes, their win over the Texans at home was decent (although they did nothing in the first half), no, I do not think it will make one bit of difference in the end. That loss to the Patriots doomed their season, the math just is not there for them to make the playoffs.

Take number six: I am a week late to the Anthony Richardson discourse, but First Things First had a graphic I thought was useful. They compared Richardson’s first 10 games in the pros to Josh Allen’s first 10 games in the pros. In almost every category – completion percentage, touchdown-to-interception ratio, quarterback ranking – they were almost identical. The point is not that Richardson will become Josh Allen, just that 10 games is a too-small sample size to draw career-level conclusions about a player. It may be that Richardson simply needs more time to develop better practice and study habits, needs to pay more attention to his conditioning, or just, well, grow up, after all the kid is still only 21 years old, but maybe giving him some time without the pressure of being the starting quarterback will end up working. If not, the Colts are two years away from needing a new signal caller.

Take number seven: If the Bears knock down that Commanders Hail Mary last week, the various sins committed – the goal line hand off to the back up center, the out route the Bears conceded on the penultimate play of the game that got Washington to midfield, the linebacker spying Daniels on the last play, and Tyrique Stevenson jawing with the crowd – all get forgotten in the narrative of a spirited comeback. Instead, Bears fans marinated in that loss for a week and then watched the team lay an egg in Arizona yesterday. Why do I bring that up? Consider the Eagles. They were cruising against a bad Jaguars team, let that bad team back in the game, and then, up five late in the fourth quarter, instead of punting on fourth down and pinning the Jags deep in their own territory, the Eagles try a 58-yard field goal to try and go up by eight. The kick misses, Jacksonville gets great field position, is marching down for a touchdown that will put them ahead, and the Eagles get bailed out because Trevor Lawrence is, as I mentioned last week, a rich man’s Daniel Jones. If the Jags score instead of turning it over, Philly talk radio is Three Mile Island level radioactive this morning and the narrative is much different. Instead, the Eagles are a half-game out of first place, riding a nice winning streak and everyone is going nuts over Saquon’s reverse hurdle.

Take number eight: Jameis Winston went into yesterday’s game against the Chargers with 99 career starts and 99 career interceptions and in true Jameis fashion, he made sure that his one interception per game average remained intact by throwing not one, not two, but three picks. As I said last week, it’s feast or famine with this guy. What makes no sense to me is that this is a team that clearly needs to rebuild and has contracts they could unload in order to mitigate the dead cap hit they are going to take (it’s just a question of how much) when they inevitably cut ties with Deshaun Watson but they are stubbornly refusing to do so even though their season is over.

Take number nine: Dunking on the Cowboys never gets old. In recent years, it was reserved for their playoff failings, but this year, the fun is beginning much earlier. In retrospect, we should have seen this coming. The team’s failure to lock in Lamb and Prescott handicapped their ability to sign free agents, the offense is one dimensional, the head coach was not extended, and they brought in a new defensive coordinator whose recent track record was lousy. While the team has been a bit unlucky with injuries, that is not the only reason Dallas is sitting at 3-5. Jerry can talk all he wants about making moves at the trade deadline, the reality is that the season was lost before it ever began.

Take number ten: That the Giants and Panthers are playing in Munich this Sunday goes to show that we are still punishing the Germans for starting those two world wars. You would be hard pressed to find a worse match up, perhaps the first foreign Toilet Bowl game.

Ten NFL Takes - Week Eight

 

Take number one: If you are a Washington football team fan (nb. I *hate* the “Commanders” name, awful), for 59 minutes and 48 seconds of Sunday’s game against the Bears it felt like déjà vu. Washington outplayed the Bears for most of the game but settled for field goals instead of touchdowns, allowing the Bears, with one long run and one good drive, to take the lead with less than 30 seconds to play. After shutting down Caleb Williams for three quarters and turning him back into Week 1 Caleb, the guy who was spraying throws around the field and chalked up less than 100 yards passing, the Washingtonians let Caleb spin some magic in the fourth quarter and it looked like the team had played just well enough to lose. We’ve seen this movie too many times to count in the last 25 years. Then, Jayden Daniels hurled a Hail Mary with the clock at zero that was tipped in the air directly into the waiting hands of Noah Brown for the game-winning touchdown and all “hail” broke loose. I am here for the Zapruder-film level of analysis that will take place of the winning play – Daniels eluding a tepid Bears rush for more than 10 seconds, Zach Ertz recognizing he could not make the catch but going up to keep the ball alive, the Chicago defender inexplicably doing the same, the ball dropping perfectly into Brown’s arms, all of it, and yes, Tyrique Stevenson posting up late to the play because he was too busy taunting the fans. That too. There is no telling how Williams’s and Daniels’s careers will turn out and Williams is having a good rookie season, but if any doubt remained about who the better quarterback is right now, Daniels’s last second magic put an end to that discussion.

Take number two: It is not just that the Jets are done, they were done last week, it is that the team, led by a no-doubt, first-ballot Hall of Fame quarterback, looks worse than it did with the guy the fans ran out of town and is currently sitting third on the depth chart in Denver. I watched (suffered through?) most of the Jets loss to New England and was just amazed at the low level of preparation and execution. The offense had to take multiple time outs because they could not run plays run in time. Sauce Gardner, a very talented defensive back, got burned on a deep pass by a guy who at best rates out as a wide receiver three on an average football team. The defensive line got pushed around all game long and the field goal kicker stinks. Losing by three when your kicker leaves four on the board is a very Jets way of losing, but the rot is much deeper. They went all in on Rodgers and it is now time to go all out. Start the fire sale now, not in the off season. You’re going to be picking in the top 10 (again) and selecting your third franchise quarterback in less than 10 years. Might as well harvest some of the talent you do have on your team for additional picks because you are now in full-on demolition and renovation mode.

Take number three: The Jameis Winston experience can be summarized in two plays that occurred back-to-back during the Browns’ game winning drive yesterday. On the first play, Winston badly overthrew his wide receiver and right into the hands of Ravens All-Pro safety Kyle Hamilton, who inexplicably dropped what would have been a game ending interception. On the very next play, Jameis avoided a blitz and launched a perfect bomb to Cedric Tillman in the end zone to win the game. He is either throwing a soul crushing pick or a game winning TD. There is no middle ground. On a side note, the Ravens are their own experience. They can pound teams into veal scaloppini week after week and then throw up a clunker that makes you question whether they can win a title.

Take number four: I probably hate the Eagles more than any team in the league, and it pains me to say this, but it looks like they (kind of) figured out that when you pay premium money for a running back, it makes sense to feature that player prominently in your offensive scheme. Even if Hurts has hit a ceiling (or even regressed) from his 2022 campaign, with the weapons this team has on offense and a defense that looks … decent (?), they are going to contend for the division title this year. Maybe not a Super Bowl quality team, but definitely playoff bound.

Take number five: Last week I mentioned the Chiefs were taking a page out of the 2018 Patriots playbook of stifling defense and a “mid” offense. This week let me suggest the Chiefs are also taking a page out of the 2003-04 Patriots playbook that resulted in 21 straight wins over two seasons. The Chiefs are now at 13 after escaping Vegas with a seven point win, but I think we are at that point where when the Chiefs take the field they know they are going to win, the other team knows they are going to win, and the Chiefs know that the other team knows they are going to win. The take havers in the media still look at this team as some variation on the Rams’s old Greatest Show On Turf offense, but it has not been that for going on two full seasons. Defenses have schemed to slow down Mahomes while the Chiefs defense just suffocates opponents like a boa constrictor. The Chiefs are not blowing out many teams any more, but they rarely lose either. Top to bottom, the Chiefs probably don’t have a top 5 roster, but they do have the best team and have to be the odds on favorite to complete the three-peat.

Take number six: Trevor Lawrence is a rich man’s Daniel Jones. No, really, he is. Here are their career stats:

Daniel Jones: 24-41-1 record. 64.1% completion percentage. 13,954 yards with 68 TDs and 44 INTs.

Trevor Lawrence: 22-36 record. 63.6% completion percentage. 13,605 yards with 69 TDs and 43 INTs.

One guy is going to be carrying a clipboard next year while the other guy continues getting fluffed in the media because of one season he had like seven years ago as a college freshman.  

Take number seven: Life comes at you fast in the NFL. The Saints started the season 2-0 and were the talk of the league. Six straight losses later, their coach is probably another loss away from being fired mid-season. Crazy.

Take number eight: Are the Broncos good? I am asking that question legitimately because I do not know. Their rookie QB is having the standard up and down performances, but the defense is legitimate and you can only beat the teams on your schedule. Yes, the Broncos are loading up on cupcakes like the Panthers and Saints, but the Jets, with a better roster, are losing winnable games against equally inferior talent.

Take number nine: Is there a team having more fun than the Detroit Lions? Go on the interwebz and watch Dan Campbell’s post-game speech in the locker room. Great energy, great vibes, and a team that plays for each other to the point that on a day when Jared Goff threw for 85 yards, the team put up 52 points without breaking much of a sweat and cruised to another W.

Take number ten: I grew up in a time when Brent Musberger and the NFL Today crew told you everything you needed to know about Sunday’s games in a neat and tidy 30 minutes. Now, the Sunday pre-game show on the NFL Network is four freaking hours. ESPN’s show is three hours. It’s exhausting and unnecessary. Please, for the love of God, ninety minutes, tops.  

Ten NFL Takes - Week Seven

Take number one: Lamar is in a different stratosphere than the mere mortals playing football right now. Brian Baldinger called Lamar the conductor of the Ravens’ offense and it was an apt term. We have the running back section with a 30-year-old freight train on pace to break the single season rushing record, backed up by a change-of-pace third down wizard and a lead blocker who is as big as an offensive lineman. Then we have the tight end section, with three studs who can block, catch, and get YAC. And let’s not forget the wide receiver section, who are getting favorable match ups because defenses have to guard against Derrick Henry randomly breaking off an 80-yard run. And, last but not least, an offensive line that is mauling defenses. All Lamar has done in the last five games is go 88 for 123 (71.5%) with 13 touchdowns and 1 interception while adding another 288 yards on the ground. Remember, the Ravens are half an Isaiah Likely foot and a fourth quarter defensive meltdown against the Raiders away from being 7-0.

Take number two: The 2024 Chiefs are morphing into the 2018 Patriots. You remember the last Patriots Super Bowl winner, right? Wide receiver room that included such forgettable names as Phillip Dorsett, Chris Hogan, and Matthew Slater. An over-the-hill Rob Gronkowski led the tight ends and their leading receiver was not a receiver at all, it was a running back named James White. What that team did have was a suffocating defense that turned Super Bowl 53 into the biggest snoozefest on record. But you can get away with that when you have the best quarterback in the league behind center and that’s basically what the Chiefs are doing right now. They lost their top two wide receivers (although as I’m writing, there is some buzz they are trading for DeAndre Hopkins) and their top running back, Travis Kelce has yet to sniff the end zone, and the last time the team scored 30 points was Week 12 of last season and yet they have now won 12 games in a row even though Mahomes is having the worst statistical year of his career because they have one of the two or three best defensive coordinators in the league and a dominant defense. So impressive.

Take number three: Not to get too philosophical with the 15 people who are going to read this, but I don’t think there is much justice in this world, but, maybe the closest you can come to it with a guy who was accused of sexually harassing and/or abusing two dozen women is having his Achilles pop like a guitar string on national television, likely ending his career. No, the money he almost certainly paid those women to make their lawsuits go away will not make up for the trauma he allegedly inflicted on them, and I am sure he still has enough money from his fully guaranteed contract to last for generations to come, but the one thing he devoted his life to being has been taken away from him. And, not for anything, a bit of karmic justice for Browns ownership too. You finally built a decent roster, put it in the hands of a terrible human being and now you’re in cap hell with a lousy record and an abundance of questions going forward.

Take number four: Among the four major North American sports leagues, the NFL’s trade deadline has historically been the least interesting, but here’s hoping that changes this year. The Chiefs’ undefeated record notwithstanding, both conferences have a bunch of teams with playoff and/or Super Bowl aspirations and on the other hand, there are a bunch of teams that are going nowhere fast but have desirable players for whom draft picks could be collected by sending them to one of those playoff-bound teams. I am Team Chaos.

Take number five: One trade that did work out for both teams is the quarterback swap Detroit and Los Angeles made a few years ago. The Rams got their ring, the Lions got a guy who is now at worst at top-2 contender for league MVP. It does not hurt that Jared Goff is surrounded by more weapons than a Navy SEAL unit and a brilliant offensive coordinator, but he’s the trigger man, he’s the one delivering those throws, making those reads, and leading that team. Detroit is one of the best stories in the league this year and apropos of my prior point, I do hope they make a deal for a defensive lineman. The NFC is there for the taking.

Take number six: I typically describe myself as a lapsed “R words” fan (the Commanders name is stupid, sorry). And can you blame me? For the last 25 years, the only thing worse than the product on the field has been the ownership of the team, but both those things changed during the off season and then of course, seven games into a new era, our transcendent talent of a rookie quarterback lands awkwardly on a 45-yard run and we hold our collective breath while we spend the rest of the season hoping Jayden Daniels’s ribs don’t crack and he doesn’t suffer any more injuries. And that’s the thing, rookies come into the league like new cars rolling off the showroom floor, but you have no idea when the first dings and scrapes are going to occur or god forbid the head on collisions that total them. Malik Nabers and Marvin Harrison, Jr. have already suffered concussions, Joe Alt sprained his MCL, and now Daniels is now week-to-week. That’s four of the top six picks in last year’s draft who have already missed time and we are not even halfway through the season.

Take number seven: Speaking of that R words game, the Carolina Panthers are not a functional professional football team right now. You might have forgotten that in 2022 they fired their head coach and went 6-6 down the stretch under interim coach Steve Wilks, who relied on a stingy defense and punishing running game. Instead of giving Wilks the gig full-time, owner David Tepper mortgaged the future to move up in the draft to pick Bryce Young and hired Frank Reich to coach him (he lasted 11 games). Since Wilks left, the Panthers have played exactly twice as many games (24) and won exactly half as many (3). Yes, there are other examples of inept franchises in recent memory – the 2017 Browns and the 2008 Lions both went 0-16 – so I guess the Panthers are simply the latest example of what happens when you get that mix of terrible ownership, awful player personnel decisions, and a revolving door at head coach.

Take number eight: Speaking of inept franchises, can we stop talking about the Jets now? The team is 2-5, is listless on offense and suddenly can’t play defense. They need to go a minimum of 8-2 the rest of the way and have already lost to two teams (Pittsburgh and Denver) they will probably be fighting for a wild card spot. They went all in on Rodgers and it is just not working.

Take number nine: Has any team suffered a worse loss this season than the Buccaneers did on Monday night? Their season likely ended with injuries to Mike Evans and Chris Godwin and it just bummed me out. I don’t think it was fair to criticize Todd Bowles for keeping Godwin in the game late in the fourth quarter for two reasons: 1) the rest of the first team offense was also on the field, it’s not like Godwin was out there along with a bunch of second stringers and 2) the game was technically not out of reach. Unlikely, sure, but over, no. Football is a violent sport where fluke injuries happen all the time.

Take number ten: Every football talking head show has one or more gimmick segments. I mean, they play *PICTIONARY* on the NFL Network’s Sunday pre-game show for god’s sakes, but for what it’s worth, here are my five favorites: number five, Big Man Ballin’ (Marcus Spears), number four, Sat ‘Em Down (Jeff Saturday), number three, Chill, Bruh (Adam Rank), number two, Team Tiers (Nick Wright), and number one, Angry Runs (Kyle Brandt), without a doubt the most simultaneously absurd and hilarious feature of them all.

Go Big Red

When Nebraska volleyball star Merritt Beason sets up for a back row attack, it is like watching a bird of prey preparing to take flight. The six foot four inch All-American stretches her body to meet the ball nine, nine-and-a-half feet in the air, coiling her right arm back and then driving it through the ball with such force and velocity it is a wonder a small dent does not appear in the court where the ball either lands out of the reach of a defender or ricochets harmlessly out of bounds off an attempted return. Point Nebraska.

Of the many ways my life changed during the pandemic, becoming a fan of women’s college volleyball might be the most surprising. I do not even remember when I started watching it, likely sometime in 2021, aimlessly scrolling the dial and landing on the BIG 10 network. I do not have a rooting interest in one team or the other, and since the BIG 10 is to women’s volleyball what the SEC is to men’s football, there is talent across the board, which allows me to experience the sport being played at the highest level for the pure sake of enjoyment and appreciation of athletic ability. And nowhere is that truer than in Lincoln, where volleyball is practically a religion.

If the Brazilians play a version of soccer called the beautiful game, Nebraska plays the volleyball version of it. When the team is “in system” as they say, watching the six players on the court move with a level of fluidity and grace that is a sight to behold. It all starts with sophomore setter Bergen Reilly. The setter is the on-the-court quarterback (or point guard if you prefer a basketball analogy), moving as the return of service dictates and then deciding where to distribute the ball. Reilly is a savant, subtly shifting as the serve crosses the net so she is in position to set one of her outside hitters or middle blockers. Like a pitching ace whose release point is identical regardless of the pitch he throws, so too is Reilly’s set, making it hell on the other team to line up their block. She might send her set to one of the two pins, where Beason or Harper Murray, a sophomore who was the BIG 10’s freshman of the year last year, send thunderbolt kills across the net, or opt for a slide attack from fellow sophomore Andi Jackson, whose vertical has to be close to three feet and whips her right arm around the ball with such torque that if it misses a defender’s arm, the ball bounces off the court and toward the stands. And just to keep the opponents honest, Reilly can show off her sky high volleyball IQ with the occasional (and admittedly awkwardly named) setter dump, dropping the ball herself over the tape for a point.

While Reilly apportions out sets that make the Big Red Machine hum, the team’s calling card is defense. On a squad littered with All-Americans and blue chip recruits, it would be easy for them to rely on their dominating offense to win, but for a team with so much talent, the Huskers are a gritty lot. While Reilly leads the offense, it is senior libero and All-American Lexi Rodriguez who sets the tempo on defense. Rodriguez is a marvel on the court, routinely digging out missiles sent by the opposing team’s best hitters, flinging her body across the court with abandon, and rarely failing to reach a ball. Her intensity is matched in the front court where Jackson, along with Rebekah Allick, lead the team’s middle block, but they are far from alone. Beason, Reilly, Murray, Lindsey Krause, along with star transfers Taylor Landfair and Leyla Blackwell are all willing defenders who use their height and physicality to stymie even the most potent line-ups.

When all three phases are clicking, as they usually are, it is a wonder to behold. Leading it all is head coach John Cook. He is not one to prowl the sidelines, rather, he sits on a chair with a slightly annoyed look you might refer to as “Resting Cook Face.” A Wyoming cowboy who comes across as irascible, Cook has 5 national titles and more than 700 wins under his belt at Nebraska, but if you burrow deep enough down the rabbit hole that is Husker social media, you can find him hamming it up with his players in a way that suggests his bark is probably worse than his bite.  

The results speak for themselves. The team has been volleyball royalty for three decades. Over the past two seasons, the Huskers are 51-3, their only losses coming last year against another powerhouse BIG 10 team (Wisconsin) in the regular season and in the national championship game to Texas. This season’s 18-1 mark is marred only by an uncharacteristic sweep at SMU early on, but the team has rolled to 15 straight wins since then. The Devaney Center, where the team plays its home matches, has been sold out for more than 300 matches in a row, a streak rivaled only by the Green Bay Packers at historic Lambeau Field. In the summer of 2023, Nebraska volleyball played a home match at the university’s football stadium, drawing a crowd of 92,003, which not only shattered the record for the largest crowd at a women’s volleyball match, but was the biggest crowd to attend any women’s sporting event in history. With the sport starting to garner more national attention via nationally broadcast matches on ESPN and now NBC, its popularity will grow as more people are drawn to the athleticism and skill these women display, and leading the charge will be Big Red.

Ten NFL Takes - Week Six

 

Take number one: There are plenty of teams with better records, but is there a better team for soap opera-level drama than the Dallas Cowboys? Four, count ‘em, four, playoff wins in the last 25 years, still living off the glory days of Aikman, Irving, and Smith, yet their owner has kept the America’s Team thing going strong. They got absolutely pasted at home and as the Lions were running their third offensive tackle eligible play you could almost hear the keyboards firing up in Bristol (ESPN) and L.A. (NFL Network) to start a new week of Cowboys discourse. And just when you thought that this defeat – the worst home loss of the Jerry Jones era occurring on his 82^nd birthday - was the icing on the cake, he stepped in it with both feet. First, in his post-game press availability when he got into it with a reporter and then the following day when he got into it EVEN WORSE during a radio interview where he threatened the host’s job. 10/10 on the Real Housewives drama scale, but 0/10 on the football field.

Take number two: If the Cowboys have a rival in the drama department, it is of course the New York Jets. Last week I said trading for Davante Adams was going to be like the couple in the shaky marriage deciding to have a baby to make things better and well, they went ahead and did it. Woody Johnson is fully embracing the sunk cost fallacy and mortgaging the future in hopes a team being put together on the fly with a revolving door among the coaching staff and led by a mercurial, soon-to-be 41-year-old with limited mobility and an eternal resting “b” face, will somehow win 8 of the next 11 games and backdoor their way into the playoffs.

Take number three: Speaking of the sunk cost fallacy, the Browns need to blow it up. Like, full-scale, strip it down to the studs rebuild because whatever they are putting on the field right now is not NFL-caliber football. Announce a fire sale and trade every asset you have to recoup (and then some) the picks you gave up for Watson, bury him on your bench or wait until next season to eat the cap hit you are going to take. Yes, I mean Miles Garrett. Yes, I mean Nick Chubb. Yes, I mean JOK. You’re Cleveland. Fans in your city are accustomed to lousy ownership, poor middle management, and a below average team, they’ll get over it.

Take number four: Caleb Williams is closing the rookie gap with Jayden Daniels and it is not because Daniels is regressing but rather because Williams is starting to find his groove. It is entirely possible by the end of the season Williams’s number will be better than Daniels’s, not because he is a better quarterback necessarily, but the team around him is better. Daniels is making it happen with lesser talent and a defense that just lost its best player, whereas Williams has three stud receivers, a solid tight end, and a strong running game to go along with a lock down defense that has not given up 20 points this entire season.

Take number five: Is there a fan base that travels better than the Pittsburgh Steelers? They played in Las Vegas this weekend and when CBS panned to the crowd, you would have thought you were at whatever they’re calling Heinz Field these days. The Terrible-Towel waving takeover of Reliant Stadium was really a sight to behold.

Take number six: Speaking of that game, maybe I’m showing my age, but I got irrationally angry seeing a fourth-round pick who has not done anything in this league trot out onto the field wearing Ken Stabler’s number 12 jersey. Like, no offense to Aiden O’Connell, I’m sure he’s a nice guy doing his best, but how is The Snake’s number not retired? My team, the former “R” words, are also a little chintzy with retired jerseys (although Darryl Green’s #28 is being retired this weekend), but what they do instead is refuse to issue certain numbers, like #44 (John Riggins), #7 (Joe Theismann (although he did grant a “waiver” a few years back for the unfortunate Dwayne Haskins (RIP) experience)), and #9 (Sonny Jergensen), but when some rumdum they pulled off the streets was given Mark Moseley’s #3, I had a similar reaction. Just don’t do it. Honor your legends and your team’s history.

Take number seven: The NFC is better, top to bottom this year, than the AFC. The AFC is basically a two-team race between the Chiefs and Ravens and maybe the Texans if they stay consistent, but the rest of the conference? Lots of question marks. The NFC on the other hand, has no one dominant team, but half-a-dozen teams that if they get hot and maybe make a trade or two (see below), could end up in the Super Bowl.

Take number eight: Remember the Rams had that famous “F those picks” motto a few years back and went all in on trading for/signing a bunch of veterans to get them that ring? If you’re the Detroit Lions, embrace this philosophy! The Lions were dealt a crushing blow when they lost Aiden Hutchinson for the season, but all is not lost. There are teams … the Raiders … cough … the Browns … cough … the Jets … cough … with more than serviceable replacements on their rosters they might be willing to part with if you F THOSE PICKS. You haven’t won a title since 1957, your offense is clicking on all cylinders, your fan base is rabid, and the conference is wide open. Go for it.

Take number nine: I hate all Philly teams. Like, just cannot stand the vibe in that city. The arrogance of their fans, their chestiness, their embrace of d-bag behavior, they are truly the worst. Since I am stuck in a part of New Jersey about 45 minutes from Philly and am subjected to local broadcasting from there, one thing I do enjoy is watching post-game shows after either the Phillies or the Eagles lose. It truly makes me happy to watch the local talking heads cry when their teams lose. So, while I was hoping the Eagles would lose last weekend, I got the next best thing – their pissy head coach jawing with HIS OWN FANS at the end of the game. Cannot think of a fan base and a head coach who deserve each other more. Just send all them on a space ship directly into the sun.

Take number ten: It is a small thing, and truly, no one outside the greater Washington, D.C. area cares, but when a Baltimore team and a Washington team play – whether it is in baseball or football – it is not a “Battle of the Beltway.” The Beltway, I-495 in and around Washington, is exactly that, a “belt” that wraps around Northern Virginia, Maryland, and D.C. You cannot get to Baltimore from Washington via the Beltway; you can get there by taking an *exit* off the Beltway onto I-95 or you can take the Baltimore-Washington (B/W) Parkway, but the only thing driving on the Beltway does is take you in a big circle around the nation’s capital.  

Ten NFL Takes - Week Five

 

Take number one: Deshaun Watson is broken. Whether you want to believe he “quit” on his team on 4^th down near the end of the first half or it was just a communications glitch in his helmet, he’s done. Draw your own conclusions as to why that is, but Kevin Stefanski’s stubborn refusal to bench him suggests one of two things, either he does not have the final say on who plays or he is trying to get fired, assuming his two coach-of-the-year awards will land him a gig somewhere else.

Take number two: Remember when Gary Kasparov was the world chess champion, IBM designed a computer chess program, and Kasparov “played” the computer? He won, but then there was a rematch and the computer won. That’s the New York Jets offense. They are the only team that relies entirely on their quarterback to get to the line of scrimmage, look at the defense, and call what he thinks is the best play against it. And yes, Aaron Rodgers is probably Kasparov-level good at doing that, but the defenses have become IBM-super computer sophisticated and too much for him to compute all the options in real time. It was assumed that so long as the Jet defense held teams to 20 points or fewer, they should be a playoff team. Well, in the last two games the defense gave up 10 and 17 and they lost both. The team is now 2-3 and trading for Devante Adams feels like the couple whose marriage is shaky and decide to have a kid to solve their problems. Really bad vibes right now.

Take number three: As a native Washingtonian who lived through the last quarter century of awful Commanders football, watching Jayden Daniels is a “pinch me” moment. I finally got to see a full game and he is all that and a bag of chips. Calm, in control of the offense, and his deep passes are a thing of beauty. Against a defense that ranked *number one* in the league last year, he never seemed rattled and picked them apart like a ten-year veteran. The stadium, which for so long had been half-full (and with a not insubstantial number of the visiting team’s fans) was loud, boisterous, and supportive throughout. If you look at the Commanders historically, they basically had about 80 years of mediocre to bad teams with a roughly 10 year period in the 1980s (and a fluke run to the Super Bowl in 1972-3) when they were one of the three best teams in the league. Fans tend to downplay the former and marinate in the latter, but with the stench of Snyder’s run as owner starting to abate and the potential for a return to D.C. in the offing with Daniels at the helm, things may be looking up again.

Take number four: How is it that the league tells us they care about player safety but somehow Josh Allen only missed like four plays after his head bounced off the turf at Reliant Stadium like a basketball and he appeared to be knocked unconscious? You can tell me all you want about helmet improvements and guardian caps, but the frequency with which players who appear severely injured somehow get back in the game is troubling. McDermott’s play calling at the end of the game was also a head scratcher and the Bills are now coming back down to Earth. If Allen was concussed or misses time, their season could go downhill fast.

Take number five: One of my favorite sports sayings, which I attribute to Tony Kornheiser, is that “the other team has coaches too.” I say that in regards to the Houston Texans, whose offense does not look nearly as explosive or dynamic as it did last year and you can’t blame it all on Joe Mixon’s injury because their running game was awful last year too. No, I think other teams have coaches and those coaches figured out how to scheme against Bobby Slowik and it’s now his job to counter their counter moves because this Texans team, while good, is not living up to its potential.

Take number six: Few things in football are more exciting than the 14-point flip. You know, Team A is near Team B’s goal line, about to punch it in for a score and then a fumble or interception happens, Team B takes it back for a touchdown and the whole game shifts. Now, imagine that happens twice on one Sunday. Gardner Minshew threw an awful interception that was returned the other way for a touchdown and a Giants running back fumbled at the goal line and Seattle took it back as well. Great stuff.

Take number seven: You know who I would not want to be today? Shane Steichen, who is in a classic no-win situation. His best option at quarterback is 39-year-old Joe Flacco, but last year his team drafted Anthony Richardson, a 21-year-old with fewer than 15 starts in college (by way of comparison, Jayden Daniels had 55) but raw athletic ability you rarely see in a signal caller. The problem is Richardson needs reps to get better but when he is on the field, the flashes of brilliance are few and the errors are many. If you stick with the old guy, you have a better chance of winning, but by doing so, you are tacitly admitting your young guy is not ready. On the other hand, if you give your young guy the reps he needs and the losses pile up with him behind center, you probably lose your job. Just a bad deal all around.

Take number eight: This Sunday marks the beginning of that weird, now two-week period where we pretend the Jacksonville Jaguars are somehow the “unofficial” team of London, England, like the two places are sister cities and the team is part of an exchange program, and I hate it. Making the Jaguars the “unofficial” team of Great Britain is cruel and unusual. I get that the league is almost pathologically motivated to squeeze every last penny of revenue it can out of the product, but you will never convince me those stadiums (sorry, pitches) in England are filled with Jaguars-loving Englishmen (and women) and not Americans who thought it would be a hoot to take a trip across the pond to watch an NFL game in another country. Fire all these games (and the ones in Germany, Brazil, and wherever else the league is going to do this) straight into the sun.

Take number nine: Speaking of ineptitude, we have seen this Bengals movie before. A Super Bowl contending team in the 1980s that slowly fell into irrelevance, a brief resurrection under Carson Palmer that never met its potential because he suffered a devastating knee injury, a few decent years with Andy Dalton that fizzled out because they would not re-sign their own players, and now this. I think we are going to look back at Cincinnati’s run in 2022 as the high water mark of the Joe Burrow era. The defense lost key contributors that have not been replaced, Tee Higgins will be leaving at the end of the year, and what they’ll be left with is a high priced quarterback/receiver combo without much else around them because Mike Brown is a notoriously cheap owner/GM who still runs his franchise like it’s the 1970s. They lost on Sunday to not one, but two guys who are cheat codes at their positions and a bad hold on a game winning field goal after some bizarre decision making by their head coach in overtime. At 1-4, their chances of making the playoffs are slim and their roster will be worse, not better, next year.

Take number ten: Non-football take. The tension generated in playoff baseball games is off the charts good. Now that each league lets in seven teams, the regular season is a boring, unnecessary six month slog, but when you have 45,000 people in a stadium living and dying on every pitch late in a one-run game, there are not many things better in sports.