The NFL has re-embraced transparency in officiating. Kind of. Sort of. At least for a little bit.
Appearing on NFL Network’s GameDay Morning, the NFL’s mouthpiece for officiating had some surprising words escape from his mouth. For the first time since the days of Dean Blandino and Mike Pereira, the league publicly admitted to an officiating mistake.
Actually, two of them.
First, Anderson acknowledged the Eagles cornerback Cooper DeJean shouldn’t have been flagged for pass interference after he pulled the jersey of Commanders receiver Noah Brown during the opening drive of the third quarter. Anderson acknowledged that, while the pulling of Brown’s jersey could have been ruled defensive holding before the ball was thrown, it wasn’t a sufficiently significant hindrance to Brown. And thus shouldn’t have been called.
Anderson was somewhat reluctant to say what he said, and for good reason. That’s the kind of thing that can spark a sudden lightning bolt from the ivory tower at 345 Park Avenue. Indeed, Anderson had the demeanor of a kid being told by his parents, “Sure, you can drink that beer. Go ahead. What are you waiting for?”
Anderson apparently got tipsy on the first sip, because then he admitted to a missed roughing the passer call for a hit on Commanders quarterback Jayden Daniels.
It’s critical that the league embrace candor and honesty when it comes to officiating mistakes that everyone sees. Circling the wagons gets people to don tinfoil hats, especially in this age of HEY EVERYONE, GO GAMBLE ON YOUR PHONES!
Still, the best approach is to not make mistakes. While some will always be possible, the league can do more to create the impression that it’s doing everything possible to get the calls right (like full-time officials and a more complete embrace of technology). But if/when calls are gotten wrong, the far better option to pretending it didn’t happen (which the league usually has done) is to admit it.
Yes, there’s risk involved. First, there are more mistakes in a given week than can be covered by the sliver of time they devote to Anderson during a four-hour show. Second, it will piss off the officials to have their mistakes publicized.
As to the former, that’s on the producers of the show, who at times seem to be prioritizing performative nonsense over substance. As to the latter, suck it up. Don’t make mistakes. And own the ones you make.
The NFL needs to do it. Time will tell whether Sunday’s comments from Anderson are an aberration or the start of a trend.
As you might have heard, Sunday’s game between the Chiefs and Bills will be only the fifth time since 1970 that two teams with eight or more wins will meet in Week 11 or earlier. There’s another nugget that demonstrates the divide between the great and not-great-Bob teams in 2024.
For the first time since 1970, three games in Week 11 feature teams with seven or more wins.
In addition to the 9-0 Chiefs facing the 8-2 Bills, the 7-3 Ravens play the 7-2 Steelers and, on Thursday night, the 7-2 Eagles beat the 7-3 Commanders.
That’s what happens when 11 times have three or fewer losses. Someone else will have the wins. Six teams with plenty of them will be squaring off this weekend, with one game done and two big ones to go on Sunday.
As mentioned in the item about the potential looming Netflix Christmas NFL fiasco, pro football benefits from an endless supply of bright, shiny objects to distract the media and fans from any and all in-season controversies.
If, for example, Chiefs-Steelers and/or Ravens-Texans become a debacle on Christmas Day for the NFL, there’s another game the next day, on Amazon Prime.
But there’s a problem. As scheduled, it’s Seahawks at Bears. While both are still alive at 4-5, both are trending downward. Seattle has lost five of six, and Chicago has lost three in a row and hasn’t scored a touchdown for 25 straight drives.
Amazon undoubtedly will want to flex out of that game. For the NFL, having a big game the day after the Christmas Day doubleheader could provide a useful diversion to potential Boxing Day criticism that Netflix failed to fix its boxing night flaws.
Here’s the problem. There aren’t many games that stand out in Week 17, especially with two of the best games (Chiefs-Steelers, Ravens-Texans) earmarked for Christmas.
Already, the NFL might need to move a 1:00 p.m. ET Sunday game to the 4:25 p.m. ET slot, since it’s currently occupied by Cowboys-Eagles. Meanwhile, the Sunday night game for that week — Dolphins-Browns — looks to be a potential stinker.
The options for Thursday night (or 4:25 p.m. ET on Sunday or Sunday night) are Broncos-Bengals, Cardinals-Rams, Chargers-Patriots, Colts-Giants, Falcons-Commanders, Jets-Bills, Titans-Jaguars, Packers-Vikings, Raiders-Saints, and Panthers-Bucs.
Then there’s the fact that five games have been flagged for inclusion in a Saturday tripleheader: Broncos-Bengals, Cardinals-Rams, Falcons-Commanders, Chargers-Patriots, and Colts-Giants. (Current guess: the first three make it.)
The best news for Week 17 (beyond the Christmas games, if they work) is that the weekend concludes with Lions-49ers on Monday night.
By rule, a Thursday night flex must happen at least 28 days in advance. Which makes Thanksgiving Day the deadline for replacing Seahawks-Bears with something else. (Sunday reshuffling must happen only 12 days before the day of the games.)
It’s no surprise that Week 17 has so many games that don’t currently ooze drama and intrigue and significance. Eleven teams have three or fewer wins through 10 weeks. Unless some of the have-nots find the gas pedal soon, many of the packages the NFL distributes during Christmas season will contain socks, galoshes, and/or donations in our name to the Human Fund.
It took some time, but streaming-only games are starting to outpace cable-only games.
The week began with Dolphins-Rams drawing only 12.2 million viewers for an ESPN-only game. Three days later, Commanders-Eagles attracted 14.42 million for Amazon Prime.
That’s an 11-percent increase over last year’s Week 11 Bengals-Ravens game, which drew 12.98 million.
Thursday Night Football is now averaging 13.2 million viewers for 2024. It’s a major jump over the full-season average for the first year of the Amazon Prime package, which averaged only 9.58 million.
Did the NFL get ahead of the curve or did the NFL help force the curve? It doesn’t matter, because NFL fans have a knack for finding NFL games, wherever they might be.
Those chants of “Thank you, Giants” in Philadelphia could soon be replaced by something else.
“MVP.”
Some are starting to suggest the Eagles running back Saquon Barkley might be in the midst of an MVP run. Given recent history, however, the odds are against him.
Literally. He’s a 50-1 long shot to win it with one major sports book. It’s 60-1 at another, and 80-1 at another.
A non-quarterback last won MVP in 2012. Vikings running back Adrian Peterson made a late run at the single-season rushing record and, even though he fell short, Peterson overcame Peyton Manning in his first season with the Broncos.
Since then, it’s all quarterbacks. Quarterbacks from teams that earned a first-round bye. Since the playoff field expanded to 14 teams and the byes shrank to one per conference in 2020, the MVP has only gone to the quarterback of a No. 1 seed (Aaron Rodgers, Aaron Rodgers, Patrick Mahomes, Lamar Jackson in 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023, respectively).
Barkley currently has 1,137 rushing yards. He’s on pace for 1,933. With 210 receiving yards, his current yards-from-scrimmage production projects to 2,290. And his 10 total touchdowns through 10 games leads to (reaches for calculator) 17 touchdowns for the season.
It adds up to a special season, but probably not special enough to overcome the quarterback of one of the top-seeded teams.
It becomes intriguing if the Eagles earn the No. 1 seed in the NFC. Would quarterback Jalen Hurts be the de facto MVP candidate from Philly, or would it be Barkley? Throw in the fact that the voters now rank five names for MVP, and Barkley could pull an inside straight if he’s the consensus No. 2 and the voters split the No. 1 between the quarterback from the top seed in the AFC and the quarterback from the top seed in the NFC.
Regardless, Barkley is going to have to go off more, even more than he has, to get serious consideration. The current pace would put him at No. 10 on the all-time single-season rushing list and 12th in single-season yards from scrimmage.
Maybe he’ll turn it up another notch or two. Maybe, in the same way he gets stronger as a game goes on, he’ll get stronger as the season goes on.
For now, however, it’s a little early to get on the train. As evidenced by the betting odds.
