The Frankish Reich

We joke about it, but really, it was special teams play that probably was the deciding factor. And that's worth something.

I am in the distinct minority now that thinks Russell Wilson is salvageable. Hackett was really that bad.

Russ lives!

And the Chiefs are trying like hell to give this one away, but let's see how this red zone possession goes ...

Difficult to be seen when you're standing behind 6'5" Touchdown Jesus Kumerow on the depth chart.

But does he play Special Teams?

I don't think you've watched much Broncos football this year ...

And Mahomes throws a totally unnecessary pick. Thank you. Reminder: THE BRONCOS CANNOT SCORE TOUCHDOWNS. THEY WILL LET YOU WIN 20-9. IT WILL STILL COUNT AS A WIN. (Josh Allen, pay attention)

Exactly. Heinecke was 5-3-1 as the starter. Why go back to Wentz this season?

New coach, same inept Broncos offense. But ... it's really nice to see an old guy who just fits the part rather than clown Hackett out there on the sidelines. Baby steps.

I believe Edmunds will be priority #1 for re-signing. At the risk of repeating myself: he will complete 5 NFL seasons before turning 25. Reminder: Stetson Bennett is a 25 year old college boy. Edmunds has consistently improved, and his peak years - in a position that highly values experience - are ahead of him, and McD relies heavily on a MLB covering a lot of territory. He may not make the flashy plays, but he allows other playmakers like Poyer and Milano the freedom to do that. Lock him up.

And I thought I had a quiet New Years Eve.

Edmunds is still only 24 years old. Poyer is 31. That answers which one is more likely to be back.

Gay man? Previously married to a woman? What's the explanation? I don't know, but my guess is that he is really gay. Now nobody's mentioned this before, but I'm guessing the other shoe (how many shoes does this guy wear?) may drop soon (I have seen this happen before in my career): his ex-wife was, I believe, from Brazil. Someone needs to ask him if he filed a green card petition for her ... just sayin' ...

Breece Hall was really, really good, so that's impressive.

Right. "Feature back" doesn't mean what it used to mean: 20 carries per game, etc. There's 2 RBs this year averaging (just barely) 20 carries per game: Henry and Jacobs. Alvin Kamara, Austin Ekeler (yes, some injury time out) typically get about 12 carries a game, plus a few receptions. There's no reason Cook couldn't handle that kind of workload. I know they'd like to see him get better at pass blocking, but realistically there aren't many times in a game where Cook is in the backfield and staying in the backfield on a pass play. I think this is where Dorsey is headed, not next year, but this year, basically splitting carries with Singletary.

This is really interesting. First, the source (paywalled): the Financial Times, kind of the Wall Street Journal of the UK, and a paper that has a clear Conservative Party bias. In other words, it's not a wishful thinking piece from liberals. If you scroll through the tweets, the pattern is pretty clear: millennials simply aren't "aging into" conservative voting patterns in the ways previous generations did. My politics showed a pretty typical age pattern: solid Democrat when young, open to a lot more limited government (at the time, mostly Republican ideas later on (subsequently tempered by Republicans going all Bush 43 adventurism abroad and, umm, the Trump takeover.) Maybe it's just delayed (everything else about their adolescence was delayed, right?), but the graphs don't provide much support for that. My guess: there's something real here. The Republican Party is just toxic to a lot of younger people, and here we're talking about a "generation" (always a loose/general term) that is now hitting 40. So these aren't the 18 year olds who came of age during Trump. What's toxic? I work with a lot of this generation, and they are just turned off by the so-called "social issues" - resistance to same-sex marriage for far longer than public opinion supported it is a big one, but even more important is that the faces of the party are just repugnant to younger people: Trump, Ted Cruz, Marjorie Taylor Greene, etc. Criticize Biden/Obama/AOC and their lot all you want over policy and behavior, it still doesn't equal the revulsion that is common among younger people at current Republican leadership.

I'm just hoping this guy sticks around for a while. He is an endless source of amusement. If SNL did a comedy skit with his excuses ("I didn't say I'm Jewish; I said I'm Jew-ish, you know, kind of Jew-adjacent") we would've groaned at the stupid attempt at humor. And yet, Santos actually said it. Nice work, local press (or what's left of it; that's the problem): you managed to not fact-check anything he said on the campaign trail.

So Burrow is Brady, and Josh is Rodgers. I can live with that for the next dozen years.

That would've been fun. Philosophical question: you're a life-long (in my case, 50 years) Bills fan. Would it bring you more happiness to watch your team go all-in for a 1-2 year time frame and win a Super Bowl (think Rams), and then return to mediocrity and rebuilding for another half dozen years? Or would you prefer to have a team that's in the SB hunt year after year thanks to a great QB and consistent replenishment of the talent base (think Roethlisberger's Steelers), even if you may never be a SB favorite in any given year? Honestly, I don't know my own mind here. I kind of like following a really good team these last few years, so I'm not (yet) to the point where I want to mortgage the future. But still ...

Right. Epemesa in 2020 and Rousseau the next year were the projectable/star potential guys. Basham was a cheaper (at the time) Shaq.

tl;dr -Tua has had multiple concussions and MAY miss time - Mike White has broken ribs but will try to give it a go with a flak jacket - Josh Allen is taking risks, sometimes they pay off big time, sometimes they cause turnovers That's ... Analysis!

He has been a low ceiling/high floor guy, and was ready to contribute almost right away. He’s kind of a slightly worse Shaq Lawson in Shaq’s prime. (I know we hate PFF around here, but their ratings basically confirm my eye test). There’s room to criticize whether we should have used 2 high picks on D linemen last year, or whether we should have gone for a higher ceiling project, etc. But we did, which Rousseau as the high risk/high reward guy who’s so far paying dividends, and Basham as the useful rotational piece. He is what he is — a 61st overall pick who will have a good NFL career but never be a star.

I don't know what your standards are, since I think this started with reference to the Dolphins ... are you saying they're winning a Super Bowl any time soon? Randall Cobb: look back a bit. Two Hall of Famers in their prime is unheard of (am I missing any pair?), so two clear Pro Bowlers at a time ain't bad.

Two Hall of Famers (yeah, one past his prime, but still damn good) would seem to count, wouldn't it?