Kramerica Industries

1 hour ago, Pigskin12 said:

It's one of those things that the NFL seems to think is clever/traditional, when in reality it's just annoying.

 

There are other non-glamorous Wildcard slots if the league dislikes the Texans so much. Why not put them Sunday at 1 or on Monday night for a change? Instead it's the least appealing game of the weekend on Monday and the second straight year Tampa is hosting that one.

And trust me, after last year where our wet fart of a season ended with a wet fart of a game in the playoffs, absolutely none of us are happy that we got the Monday game once again. Give us literally any other time slot, I don't care, but this one wasn't it. I would've been thrilled with a repeat of 2021 and playing the Eagles at 1:00 on Sunday.

So after losing at home in the playoffs each of the last two years wearing white uniforms, surely the Bucs are gonna break out the reds next week, right?

(Eagles vs. Bucs, 2021 Wild Card round; Bucs win 31-15)

(Eagles vs. Bucs, 2023 reg season; Eagles win 25-11)

We're wearing white again, aren't we?

Pittsburgh vs. Baltimore

Houston vs. Indianapolis

Tampa Bay vs. Carolina

Atlanta vs. New Orleans

NY Jets vs. New England

Cleveland vs. Cincinnati

Jacksonville vs. Tennessee

Minnesota vs. Detroit

Philadelphia vs. NY Giants 

Dallas vs. Washington 

Seattle vs. Arizona

LA Rams vs. San Francisco

Chicago vs. Green Bay

Kansas City vs. LA Chargers

Denver vs. Las Vegas

Buffalo vs. Miami

I don't like the spaced out stripes, and if they were going to do something with hints towards the original black jersey design, they could've at least put a white shoulder yoke on it. 

Also, the front crest somehow looks comically oversized.

1 hour ago, infrared41 said:

 

I think it's fair to say that Georgia probably wins this thing if they had made it in.

Georgia absolutely wins the championship if they make it into the field and I'm relieved I don't live in a world (yet) where Georgia is a 3x national champion. My program sucks these days; Georgia not winning the NC is all I've got to hope for.

I can't even think right now when the last time a national championship was played between two teams who have gone decades since their last win. This isn't 2016 World Series levels of droughts involved for either side, but Washington hasn't claimed a national championship since 1991, Michigan since 1997. (Almost) always nice to see some fresh blood in the championship game.

Michigan was facing 4th & 2 from their own 35 yardline (or thereabout) with a little over 3 minutes left...full credit for going for that 4th down and trusting the offense. Handsomely rewarded.

39 minutes ago, Dynasty said:

Am I missing something?

Liberty University is a disgusting school created by a huckster televangelist. 

39 minutes ago, GDAWG said:

Packers: Jordan Love is him!

Rest of NFC North: Oh no, not again!

Packers were down for one year and they're already set at QB again for the next decade. Maybe not a HOF QB (but maybe!) but jeez. Turns out they can keep getting away with it.

Week 17 results:

Week 17 winner(s): @Dynasty, @logo-maker, @Sport, @Walter Sobchak, and me (first time all year!). 

Week 18 schedule:

Pittsburgh vs. Baltimore

Houston vs. Indianapolis

Tampa Bay vs. Carolina

Atlanta vs. New Orleans

NY Jets vs. New England

Cleveland vs. Cincinnati

Jacksonville vs. Tennessee

Minnesota vs. Detroit

Philadelphia vs. NY Giants 

Dallas vs. Washington 

Seattle vs. Arizona

LA Rams vs. San Francisco

Chicago vs. Green Bay

Kansas City vs. LA Chargers

Denver vs. Las Vegas

Buffalo vs. Miami

Here's to a happy 2024.

1 hour ago, BBTV said:

 Will likely lose to Baker in TB

Obviously you were watching the Eagles game which was at the same time today, but the Bucs were also absolute ass today in a game where they could've clinched the division and given themselves a de facto bye week next week, and Baker had a lot to do with that.

NY Jets vs. Cleveland

Detroit vs. Dallas

Tennessee vs. Houston

Atlanta vs. Chicago

Miami vs. Baltimore

New Orleans vs. Tampa Bay

New England vs. Buffalo

Arizona vs. Philadelphia

Carolina vs. Jacksonville

Las Vegas vs. Indianapolis

LA Rams vs. NY Giants

San Francisco vs. Washington

Pittsburgh vs. Seattle

Cincinnati vs. Kansas City

LA Chargers vs. Denver

Green Bay vs. Minnesota

1 hour ago, BBTV said:

Trying to trick by sending three players to the referee is harry high-school scat.  Even if 70 is reporting all game long anyway, which is normal just for formation legality regardless of whether he's a target or not, they're not going to trick a professional defense (unless there's some real dummies out there, which is a fair assumption in many cases, but I don't get that sense from the Cowboys.) Especially on 2-pt conversions, where defenses are trained to look for tricks.

How is trying to trick the defense through administrative stuff like that any different than trying to trick the defense through gadget plays? I'm not really seeing the problem here. The defense might be coached up to be on the look out for sneaky stuff, but that doesn't mean they're always going to catch it when it happens. I think it's worth noting again that Dallas had just called a timeout, and they probably wanted to keep the last one no matter what just in case Detroit converted their 2PA, so if anybody got lost on defense even for a moment in trying to figure out assignments, they were out of luck and having to hope for the best. 

Obviously whether it would've worked or not, we have no idea, because the referee declared the wrong player eligible. We can't know if Dallas would've successfully defended the play or not if they knew Decker was eligible to receive a pass. 

8 hours ago, Dynasty said:

 

I kept seeing headlines saying they were tied for the longest losing streak for like the past three games. I don't know what was up with that, but I know by just looking it up that they are now tied for it. Weirdly expected them to end it against a winning team.

2 hours ago, truepg said:

Exactly, had been seeing that and that they had already set the record even before the game against Boston.

26 games was the longest in-season losing streak of all-time (2010-'11 Cavs). 28 games was the longest losing streak altogether; the 2014-'15 76ers lost their last 10 games and then the '15-'16 team lost their first 18 games.

8 hours ago, BBTV said:

I think the blame falls on number 58, not 68.

 

68 is going over to report, but 58, who's fat ass has no business over there, is shielding the ref from 68.  All the ref could see is 70.

 

They're beating this to death and showing replays over and over, and nobody is mentioning that 58 is there for no reason, and IMO is the one that probably caused the issue.

 

Dan Campbell said that they went over the play with the refs before the game - which is totally normal - and the refs said it was OK.  But then he claims they told him that only one player is allowed to report?  That's simply not true.

 

At the end of the day, it falls on 68, who should have ensured that the ref looked at him and was like "I got you", or told him again when he wasn't announced as eligible.  But I think it was 58 that prevented the ref from hearing, and had he not been there, Detroit wins the game.  I don't think Dallas played defense any differently whether they announced 68 as eligible or not.

#58 Sewell isn't over there for no reason whatsoever. If he's over by the referee, it's because he was instructed to be over there.

In all likelihood, he was there along with Decker and Skipper to try and confuse the defense. I mean, the referee does have to disclose to the defense any players reporting as eligible who would otherwise be assumed ineligible, but this stuff still happens very quickly. More importantly, Dallas already called a timeout, so if anybody got confused on defense, they would be penalized if they needed to call a second timeout (would've moved the ball to the 1-yardline). Furthermore, look at the formation initially, and Sewell was split wide before motioning back into the line. In addition, in most tackle eligible situations, it tends to be the "extra" tackle (I don't know a better way to phrase this right now) who is that tackle eligible (after all, they're in a position usually occupied by a tight end, 3rd man away from the center). Usually your tackle eligible won't be a normal tackle because it leaves your line extremely unbalanced.

In any case, #58 Sewell and #68 Decker were the two players on each end of the line, #70 Skipper wasn't even lined up in a position to be an eligible receiver, so of course he would have no reason to report. However, the moment referee said #70 was the tackle eligible - and only #70 - the play was f--cked no matter what happened. If an OL doesn't explicitly report as eligible, then they're assumed ineligible, so the Cowboys had no reason at all to concern themselves about Decker being a passing option on that play, so if that play had stood as a 2PC for the Lions, then the Cowboys would be the ones with a grievance on that play. Either way, somebody was getting screwed.

To make matters even worse, look at the thumbnail of the video the NFL uploaded for the game.

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=lions+cowboys+ending

("Crazy ending"; it would be useless to embed here because it just gives a gray box saying "can't watch on this website", and I don't feel like screenshotting and uploading to Imgur.)

A pissed off Dan Campbell reacting to getting screwed by the referees. This league is shameless.

I'm a big fan of going for 2 and the win in those situations, but after the penalty and getting pushed back to the 7...insisting on going for 2 from there feels like it crosses the line from "bold" to being just plain reckless to me. 2PA's from the 2 is about a 50/50 proposition, so you can definitely justify it. I have no idea the percentages from the 7, but it's definitely less than 50/50. 

Week 16 results...sorry for being later than usual.

Week 16 winner(s): @logo-maker, @TrueYankee26, @tigerslionspistonshabs, @Walter Sobchak, @JerseyJimmy, and @SFGiants58

Week 17 schedule:

NY Jets vs. Cleveland

Detroit vs. Dallas

Tennessee vs. Houston

Atlanta vs. Chicago

Miami vs. Baltimore

New Orleans vs. Tampa Bay

New England vs. Buffalo

Arizona vs. Philadelphia

Carolina vs. Jacksonville

Las Vegas vs. Indianapolis

LA Rams vs. NY Giants

San Francisco vs. Washington

Pittsburgh vs. Seattle

Cincinnati vs. Kansas City

LA Chargers vs. Denver

Green Bay vs. Minnesota

No MNF this week.

Ravens wearing all-white...really wish the Niners hadn't chosen tonight to wear their throwbacks with white pants.

New Orleans vs. LA Rams

Cincinnati vs. Pittsburgh

Buffalo vs. LA Chargers

Washington vs. NY Jets

Detroit vs. Minnesota

Cleveland vs. Houston

Green Bay vs. Carolina

Seattle vs. Tennessee

Indianapolis vs. Atlanta

Jacksonville vs. Tampa

Dallas vs. Miami

Arizona vs. Chicago

New England vs. Denver

Las Vegas vs. Kansas City

NY Giants vs. Philadelphia

Baltimore vs. San Francisco

It's completely the right decision of any top rated prospect on a non-playoff team to opt out of the bowl game. Ever since Jaylon Smith got hurt in the Fiesta Bowl as a top-5 lock, this has become the standard practice. Can't blame any players for protecting their future over meaningless bowl games.

The obvious downside is that bowl games that used to mean something have now become mostly obliterated between opt outs and players hitting the transfer portal between the last reg season game and the bowl game...bowl week used to be a marquee event, now it feels like a huge waste of time, which is a shame.

9 hours ago, the admiral said:

 

Something else I've noticed about every week's "you know we had to do it to em" reveals on Twitter is that they're using "x" where it doesn't really make sense to do so: "[Seahawks logo] x [Titans logo]" in the above graphic. This is fashion/hypebeast culture bleeding in. The teams are playing against each other, the game is Seahawks versus Titans, not a hot fire-emoji collab between two amazing brands. Or is it?

This is almost certainly more coincidental/cultural/whatever, but I can tell you that using "x" where we normally use "vs." is standard practice in Brazilian football. "Palmeiras x Flamengo" yada yada. (Of course, "vs." doesn't exist in Portuguese and their equivalent word would be "contra".) 

I guess the only point in writing this is to say that it's not an entirely unprecedented practice.

The Saints have four different uniforms in their collection and all of them have combinations that look fantastic.

Primary black: with gold pants and black socks

Road white: with gold pants and black socks

Throwback white: with white pants and black socks

Throwback black: also with gold pants and black socks

(no black helmets)

They have four different uniforms, which means they have enough to work with to keep everything "fresh" throughout the season. If they stuck with those four looks throughout the season, they'd be the one the league's best looking teams every single week.

S--t, if they even did as much as have black pants with a striping pattern, at least those would be acceptable in design even if they'd still be an inferior option to wear compared to gold pants. 

It's painful as hell that they wear stripeless black pants as often as they do home and away, and that they often wear stripeless white pants as well. They actively choose to look far from their best more often than not. 

The saddest thing in life is wasted talent.

(But at least, socks aside, they look good tonight.)

Week 15 results:

Week 15 winner(s): @Dynasty, @Sport, @TrueYankee26, @Walter Sobchak, @oldschoolvikings, @JayHawk786, and @Maroon

Week 16 schedule:

New Orleans vs. LA Rams

Cincinnati vs. Pittsburgh

Buffalo vs. LA Chargers

Washington vs. NY Jets

Detroit vs. Minnesota

Cleveland vs. Houston

Green Bay vs. Carolina

Seattle vs. Tennessee

Indianapolis vs. Atlanta

Jacksonville vs. Tampa

Dallas vs. Miami

Arizona vs. Chicago

New England vs. Denver

Las Vegas vs. Kansas City

NY Giants vs. Philadelphia

Baltimore vs. San Francisco

47 minutes ago, the admiral said:

 

It's the football version of hockey's "coach messes with the lines too much"

Baseball equivalent for "we suck hitting with runners in scoring position".

2 hours ago, the admiral said:

We could use a good field-level crowd for a World Series win again. If the Cubs had done it at Wrigley, I think we could have gotten away with it. It'd be iconic. Every win now is just guys hopping up and down in a circle. 

In the same way...sometime after the 2021 NHL season ended, NHL Network had something of a "Lightning day" where they aired the broadcasts of all three Cup-winning games they've played in, and one thing struck me immediately looking at how they celebrated in 2004...the process of hoisting the Cup, who got it in what order, how long they held it, etc. looked so much more spontaneous than what we see today. It seems so much more choreographed these days. Captain gets the Cup (obviously this part of standard), does a lap around the ice, then usually a highly respected veteran in the locker room gets 2nd lift (bonus points if they were Cup-less), does a lap around the ice, so on and so forth...like, it just looks like the same thing over and over again. There was something I appreciated more about watching the celebrations where it was more like each player couldn't wait to rip the Cup out of another player's arms...captured the organic ecstasy much better.