Arsenal got a red card and dropped points they will need with a draw against Brighton. Man U could be in for a long season if they don’t start playing better. Chelsea should have won their game today. They outplayed Crystal Palace but couldn’t get the win. There were some good signs with the offense looking fast and getting chances, but they need to win these games.
Start of Season Top 10 QBs
Below are my top 10 QBs in the NFL. I am not solely basing it off last year, but instead the last couple of years plus how I think they’ll perform moving forward.
1. Patrick Mahomes, Kansas City Chiefs
Do I even have to explain?
2. Josh Allen, Buffalo Bills
Allen is the modern day Brett Favre. He is an absurd athlete who routinely makes jaw dropping plays. He will also go rouge every now and then and make you ask yourself what the hell he is doing. His 173 total TDs the past 4 years make up for those mistakes.
3. Joe Burrow, Cincinnati Bengals
Burrow had a tough year, first dealing with a nagging calf injury that hampered him the first 4 games, then going on IR after the 10th game of the year. During the 5.5 games he was healthy, he threw for 13 TDs and showed how good he is. The only thing that can slow him down is injuries.
4. Lamar Jackson, Baltimore Ravens
Lamar balled out and won his 2nd league MVP last year. He is one of the most athletic players we’ve ever seen and can do things at QB that no one else in the league can. He needs to play better in the playoffs though.
5. Justin Herbert, Los Angeles Chargers
Herbert is insanely talented, but has struggled to win. The lack of coaching and injuries around him in the past is reasonable enough to blame. However, with Jim Harbaugh now his coach, there are no more excuses. He needs to start winning games and making runs in the postseason.
6. Jalen Hurts, Philadelphia Eagles
Hurts is a special QB and a great duel threat. He had some up and down moments last year, but the season ended on a bad note. He will need to shake it off this year.
7. Aaron Rodgers, New York Jets
Last season did not go as he wanted it to, however, I am still a believer that this all-time great will come back with a splash this year.
8. Dak Prescott, Dallas Cowboys
Dak played great at times this year, but does not always bring it during big games. The uncertainty around the team could spell a tough year.
9. Trevor Lawrence, Jacksonville Jaguars
Lawrence struggled last year, especially when his team needed him down the stretch. He’ll need to work out some kinks this offseason to return to the player he was two years before. The $275 m over 5 years suggests the Jags still have 100% belief in him.
10. Brock Purdy, San Franciso 49ers
He is definitely aided by his coach and playmakers around him, but he still gets them the ball and plays great. My only concern is that he struggles to bring his team back if they get too far behind. The Aiyuk and Trent Williams situations could cause complications, but he still has weapons around him.
Premier League Match Week 2
The first big upset of the year happened with Man U dropping a game to Brighton. Haaland scored yet another hat trick in Man City’s win.
Chelsea vs Wolves was a chippy and exciting affair. Cole Palmer scored what will end up being one of the goals of the year on the soccer equivalent of a one play drive that ends with an 80-yard touchdown pass. The whole game Chelsea played like the Showtime Lakers. Palmer played the role of Magic Johnson with three assists to Noni Madueke who scored a natural hat trick. All told putting up 6 goals in the first win of the year is a resounding win.
Football is back
Having real football back is the best. This time of year is awesome because we get to have football but the weather is still great. It only last around a month, so enjoy it.
Florida State vs Georgia Tech was as good an opening game as you can have. Two Power 5 schools, including a Top 10 team, playing each other and ending in a last second field goal to produce the first upset of the year is storybook. The whole game was basically a marketing campaign to visit Ireland and now I wanna go there.
This game also highlights why the 12 team expansion is good. FSU would likely have to kiss their season goodbye, but now they are still alive in the playoff race. They probably won’t get there because they do not look very good, but they still have hope.
Another positive consequence of the 12 team playoff is that elite teams will be more likely to play tough non-conference/early season games. Week 1 starts off hot with UNC @ Minnesota on Thursday night; TCU @ Stanford Friday night; 14 Clemson @ 1 Georgia; 8 Penn State @ West Virginia; 19 Miami @ Florida; 7 Notre Dame @ 20 Texas A&M; 23 USC vs 13 LSU Sunday night, and BC @ 10 FSU Monday night.
We are back.
Premier League Match Week 1 Reaction
Chelsea has such a a young team and so many talented players. Having 53 available players is insane and that will likely change as the season progresses. What they need is stability at coach and they slowly need to determine the best lineup possible and let those players grow together. What they don’t need is growing resentment from guys who don’t play which leads to pressure on the coach and key players. It’s a work in progress but the hope is there.
As for the game, I thought they played pretty well. Man City by no means dominated them and if they capitalized better on scoring opportunities, they could have won. Haaland scoring his 92nd goal in just 100 appearances for Man City is an amazing stat.
In other news, the Newcastle-Southampton game was a great game. However, the red card called on Fabian Schär was ridiculous. Ben Brereton Diaz unjustly ran up to Schär and shoved him over from behind. Schär got up and barley touched Brereton Diaz, who proceeded to perform an all-time flop to draw the red card. That is the type of stuff the Premier League needs to do better at not calling.
NFL Schedule Future
With the NFL heavily contemplating an 18 game season, here I changes to the schedule I hope to see the NFL make:
- They should remove one of the 3 preseason games and add an 18th regular season game. More games is better and 18 is an even number that is easier to work with than 17. Truth be told, I think the owners wanted an 18 game schedule and rather than add two games at once, decided to take it one at a time. This extra game will also lead to more revenue which will leads to a higher salary cap and more money for the players.
- Add a bye week to the season. Firstly, this will help player’s health, which is the most important thing the league needs to consider since the players make the NFL what it is more than anyone else. The extra bye week will give guys more rest and make them more willing to accept an extra regular season game. This will also add an extra week to the season, which will make the Super Bowl fall on President’s Day weekend and give us Super Bowl Monday off. For years fans have clamored for Super Bowl Monday to be a national holiday. This allows fans to have the day off after inhaling beer, wings, and nachos without adding an extra national holiday.
These changes should make the NFL even better than it already is and I’m all for it.
Darrelle Revis 2009 Insanity
I’m not sure what is crazier, the season that Darrelle Revis had in 2009, or the fact that one of the greatest defensive seasons ever did not lead to a DPOY.
Part of what makes Revis’s season so great is that he matched up with a Hall of Famer or All-Pro 9 different times and shut them all down. He had an NFL Record 31 passes defended and allowed a 32.2 passer rating. Below are the pathetic numbers he allowed:
- Andre Johnson, Houston Texans: 4 Rec, 35 Yds
- Randy Moss, New England Patriots: 4 Rec, 24 Yds, 1 INT
- Justin Gage, Tennessee Titans: 4 Rec, 37 Yds
- Marques Colston, New Orleans Saints: 2 Rec, 33 Yds
- Ted Ginn, Miami Dolphins: 2 Rec, 57 Yds, 1 TD allowed
- Terrell Owens, Buffalo Bills: 3 Rec, 13 Yds
- Louis Murphy, Oakland Raiders: 4 Rec, 58 Yds, 1 INT
- Davone Bess, Miami Dolphins: 4 Rec, 18 Yds
- Mike Sims-Walker, Jacksonville Jaguars: 3 Rec, 49 Yds, 1 TD allowed
- Randy Moss, New England Patriots: 5 Rec, 34 Yds, 1 TD Allowed
- Steve Smith, Carolina Panthers: 1 Rec, 5 Yds, 2 INT
- Terrell Owens, Buffalo Bills: 3 Rec, 31 Yds, 1 INT
- Antonio Bryant, Tampa Bay Buccaneers: 2 Rec, 22 Yds, 1 INT
- Roddy White, Atlanta Falcons: 2 Rec, 16 Yds
- Reggie Wayne, Indianapolis Colts: 3 Rec, 33 Yds
- Chad Johnson, Cincinatti Bengals: 0 Rec, 0 Yds
Despite those performances and the Jets being the number 1 defense in the league, Revis lost out to Charles Woodson for DPOY. Woodson had a great year, but nowhere near what Revis did. Despite not winning any major awards, this season rightly has gone down in history, and it’s good to see that people still talk about it 15 years later.
Major News
The Pats traded their best defensive player Matt Judon to the Atlanta Falcons for a 3rd round pick. This is laughable. I have no problem with them not overpaying for an older Judon coming off a season ending injury. But why not do this before the draft? They could’ve gotten another offensive weapon to help out Drake Maye. Or a defensive player to help replace Judon. Now, they lose their best player and have nothing to show for it this year.
J.J. McCarthy is out for the year. This is sad to see. McCarthy had probably the best situation of any rookie QB with a great offensive coach and a ton of weapons. I definitely think he could’ve won OROY this year. It’s also odd how the situation progressed. He played a great game last weekend and no one was really talking about an injury. Then it seemed liked he had a minor injury that wouldn’t really affect him being ready for the year. And now he’s gone for the year. Regardless, he should still be a solid QB for this team once he’s back next year.
How to Stream Patriots Games This Year
In my article reacting to the NFL schedule release (https://wordpress.com/post/wheelhouseblog.com/1308), I mentioned how if an NFL fan wants to watch every game this season, it would cost at least $850 and require 6 different streaming services. Many fans mainly care about being able to watch their team every week. As a Patriots fan, this is what to do to watch every Pats regular season game if you don’t have cable/YouTube TV and don’t want to rely on random NFL streams.
- Paramount Plus Subscription to watch 7 games scheduled for CBS: $6/ month for 4 months = $24
- Venu Sports (Brand new combination of Warner Bros. Discovery, Fox, and ESPN for sports) to watch 6 games on FOX: $43/month for 4 months = $132 (UPDATE AS OF 8/16: A judge has blocked this venture and it could cause it to be delayed)
- Prime Video to watch 1 TNF game (9/19/24) on Prime: $9/month for 1 month = $9
- NFL Plus to watch 1 game (10/20/24) on NFL Network: $7/month for 1 month = $7. NFL Plus can only be watched on a phone or tablet. If you are okay with watching games on a phone or Tablet for the whole year, NFL Plus has local and primetime games for $7/month ($28 for the 4 month period 9/8/2024 – 1/5/2025). This should allow you to watch most (if not all) Pats games for a very low price.
- Two of the Pats games are TBD and likely will be 1 pm or 4 pm games on CBS/FOX because it’s unlikely the Pats will get a primetime game Weeks 17 or 18.
- NOTE: *The Pats regular season is from 9/8/2024 – 1/5/2025, so this blog is assuming you would purchase the subscriptions for Paramount and Venu on 9/7/2024 and cancel on 1/6/2024. If you keep them for longer in order to watch the playoffs, it will cost more.*
All told, it will cost you $172 for the year to watch every Patriots game on your TV (with the exception of the NFL Network game), which isn’t too bad. Additional benefits of the above platforms: Paramount Plus has Champions League and some other CBS NFL games. Venu will provide some other FOX NFL games, Monday Night Football, MLB (including the World Series), NHL, and college football games. Prime Video will also provide other TNF games. And of course, Paramount Plus and Prime Video have shows and movies. All told, each person will have to make the decision of the best way to watch their favorite teams play. Following the above strategy is a little annoying, but also is doable and not crazy expensive.
NFL Market Cap
Sportico released their list of most valuable NFL teams today. From Sportico’s estimate, all 32 NFL teams combined are worth $190 billion, which includes team related businesses and real estate. If the NFL was a public company, a market cap of $190 billion would make them THE 36th MOST VALUABLE COMPANY IN AMERICA. The Cowboys have become the first sports franchise to be worth over $10 billion dollars ($10.32b) and the next closest NFL team is worth $7.79b (Los Angeles Rams). The full list:
- Dallas Cowboys, $10.32 billion
- Los Angeles Rams, $7.79 billion
- New York Giants, $7.65 billion
- New England Patriots, $7.31 billion
- San Francisco 49ers, $6.86 billion
- New York Jets, $6.8 billion
- Miami Dolphins, $6.76 billion
- Philadelphia Eagles, $6.75 billion
- Las Vegas Raiders, $6.7 billion
- Washington Commanders, $6.3 billion
- Chicago Bears, $6.26 billion
- Houston Texans, $6.01 billion
- Atlanta Falcons, $5.9 billion
- Seattle Seahawks, $5.59 billion
- Pittsburgh Steelers, $5.55 billion
- Tampa Bay Buccaneers, $5.5 billion
- Denver Broncos, $5.49 billion
- Kansas City Chiefs, $5.43 billion
- Green Bay Packers, $5.39 billion
- Minnesota Vikings, $5.32 billion
- Tennessee Titans, $5.29 billion
- Los Angeles Chargers, $5.22 billion
- Cleveland Browns, $5.14 billion
- Carolina Panthers, $5.13 billion
- Baltimore Ravens, $5.12 billion
- Buffalo Bills, $5.08 billion
- Indianapolis Colts, $4.99 billion
- Detroit Lions, $4.93 billion
- Arizona Cardinals, $4.85 billion
- New Orleans Saints, $4.79 billion
- Jacksonville Jaguars, $4.76 billion
- Cincinnati Bengals, $4.71 billion
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