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NFL Playoffs: Hindsight Is 20/20 For Bad Coaching Decisions


Mr. Chatywin et al.

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4 hours ago, Trebla said:

There are board members at State Farm who are currently crying into their scotch and praying Rodgers can bring them back. 

Not quite the same as contemplating my navel but I spend some time attempting scrying into my crotch.  As it turns out, despite my Dolphins being the preseason Worst Team Ever, my manhood is still somewhat more than proportionally sized for my height at least.

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1 hour ago, Fez said:

At least there's risk of the Patriots winning (right? right? there's no obscure rule that they can replace the Chiefs, right?), so it will be a less stressful watch.

On January 24th, the entire Chiefs team comes down with a rare, highly contagious disease that is guaranteed to make any patient (no matter how fit) completely bedridden for at least two weeks. Desperate to have somebody play the Owl (it's by far their biggest media event of the year), the NFL scours the various rules and guidelines for something to do in this situation and discovers an obscure, never invoked provision from the late 1960s with hierarchy of alternatives depending on various conditions. The alternative at the top of that hierarchy is last year's champion (the only condition on it is that it wasn't already one of the two teams in the Owl).

Despite relaxing for most of the past month and some players already undergoing off-season medical treatment, the Patriots are able to get back together in time and play well enough to only be down by 4 points when they get the ball back with just under two minutes to play. Brady leads what appears to be a successful comeback drive down the field until he is strip sacked... but the play is nullified because Dee Ford has (once again) lined up half a yard offside and the Patriots score a touchdown to win their seventh Owl just as time expires. :)

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1 hour ago, Triskele said:

SF is so good in every facet of the game, and Shannahan haters look really wrong right now.  What they were doing today looked like Chip Kelly's Oregon teams at their best where it was like like genius schemes but more running than passing where they were just gutting defenses on the ground but not even eating clock doing it like a Tennessee with Henry approach.  

Kyle Shanahan is an elite coach. He was doing high level shit with the Texans and Matt Schaub 12 years ago and then RG3 8 years ago and then Matt Ryan's MVP season 4 years ago. He got so much shit for blowing that 28-3 lead against the Pats, but lost in the discussion is that he put up 28 points to begin with. Offense did their job, defense didn't. 

I'm happy to see him as head coach in the Superbowl with that killer zone-blocking running attack he learned from his dad with a strong throwback to the Terrell Davis Broncos teams from 20 years ago.

It doesn't always happen but every now and then the NFL coaching meritocracy asserts itself. Andy Reid is a great coach and so is Kyle Shanahan. Whoever wins this SB, it's a great story. Either Andy Reid overcomes 20 years of playoff misery or Kyle Shanahan takes his rightful place among the best coaches in the game. I don't have a prediction. Mahomes is elite and so is the entire 49ers roster. But these were clearly the two best teams in the championship games and I'm glad both showed it today. 

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To me this would be the 49ers game to lose. The chiefs defense is still not good against the run. The 49ers defense is good against the pass and in general very good now that they're healthy. 

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8 hours ago, Triskele said:

It's not hard to imagine these two teams making deep playoff runs for the foreseeable future.  Mahomes is Rodgers but even more of a super cannon and even more mobile and a bit taller.  In hindsight, anyone that did not draft him #1 was utterly insane and I don't just mean teams like the Bears taking Biscuit that were drafting QB.  Once-in-a-generation greatness and like nothing we've seen before.   

I'm always a little reluctant to take that argument though.  If he was drafted by the Bears, would he be "Future Hall of Famer Patrick Mahomes" at this point?  Or would he be a slightly better Mitch Trubisky?

Mahomes went 10th.  Here's the other nine teams.  You tell me if you think you trust their coaching staffs to have developed him.

9.  Bengals took John Ross WR Washington.  He would have sat behind Andy Dalton for a bit, and then... well... it was the Bengals.
8.  Panthers took Christian McCaffery.  Panthers are in desperate need now, but Cam still looked pretty secure then.  Maybe it would have worked for Mahomes to learn there.
7.  Chargers took Mike Williams WR Clemson.  Has been a good pick for them.  Phillip Rivers could have likely used an heir apparent.
6.  Jets took Pro Bowler Jamal Adams.  Zero faith they would have known what to do with Mahomes instead.
5.  Titans took WR Corey Davis.  Given their track record of developing QBs, I don't have a lot of confidence there.
4.  Jacksonville took Leonard Fournette.  Its Jacksonville. I don't need to say more.
3.  Niners took D Lineman Soloman Thomas.  He's now part of the fearsome frontline rotation Mahomes will face in two weeks, but yes Kyle Shanahan could have likely developed Mahomes into what he is now.
2.  Bears.  Trubisky.  :dunno: 
1.  Browns took Myles Garrett.  So maybe Mahomes is doing nifty Progressive Commercials instead of State Farm ones before falling out of the league in another year or so.

So out of that list, I would have trusted three teams with Mahomes.  Panthers, Chargers, Niners.  All three had QBs in place at the time and were looking for different positions of need and all three actually drafted pretty well.  Even the rest of the picks before him aren't really the usual collections of WTFs like you usually see when you go back and look at these things in retrospect.  Given that Mahomes was coming from a gimmick college offense and really never displayed the skills that we see now to their fullest, I really can't judge any of those teams.  The Chiefs taking him as high as 10 was a bit of a surprise actually.  Sometimes dudes just blow up despite anything you would expect.

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Mahomes is clearly more gifted than Trubisky in any way, but that's not the real sin of the Bears.

Deshaun Watson carried Clemson to back-to-back championship games on his fucking back and played like a god on the biggest college stage available against what was essentially a low-end NFL defense. But I'm sure his skull dimples weren't conducive to analyzing defenses or something...

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4 hours ago, Rhom said:

I'm always a little reluctant to take that argument though.  If he was drafted by the Bears, would he be "Future Hall of Famer Patrick Mahomes" at this point?  Or would he be a slightly better Mitch Trubisky?

Mahomes went 10th.  Here's the other nine teams.  You tell me if you think you trust their coaching staffs to have developed him.

9.  Bengals took John Ross WR Washington.  He would have sat behind Andy Dalton for a bit, and then... well... it was the Bengals.
8.  Panthers took Christian McCaffery.  Panthers are in desperate need now, but Cam still looked pretty secure then.  Maybe it would have worked for Mahomes to learn there.
7.  Chargers took Mike Williams WR Clemson.  Has been a good pick for them.  Phillip Rivers could have likely used an heir apparent.
6.  Jets took Pro Bowler Jamal Adams.  Zero faith they would have known what to do with Mahomes instead.
5.  Titans took WR Corey Davis.  Given their track record of developing QBs, I don't have a lot of confidence there.
4.  Jacksonville took Leonard Fournette.  Its Jacksonville. I don't need to say more.
3.  Niners took D Lineman Soloman Thomas.  He's now part of the fearsome frontline rotation Mahomes will face in two weeks, but yes Kyle Shanahan could have likely developed Mahomes into what he is now.
2.  Bears.  Trubisky.  :dunno: 
1.  Browns took Myles Garrett.  So maybe Mahomes is doing nifty Progressive Commercials instead of State Farm ones before falling out of the league in another year or so.

So out of that list, I would have trusted three teams with Mahomes.  Panthers, Chargers, Niners.  All three had QBs in place at the time and were looking for different positions of need and all three actually drafted pretty well.  Even the rest of the picks before him aren't really the usual collections of WTFs like you usually see when you go back and look at these things in retrospect.  Given that Mahomes was coming from a gimmick college offense and really never displayed the skills that we see now to their fullest, I really can't judge any of those teams.  The Chiefs taking him as high as 10 was a bit of a surprise actually.  Sometimes dudes just blow up despite anything you would expect.

Yeah i remember that draft and people were a little surprised that KC jumped up to take him and thought they paid too much. Gimmick offense was the key word used to explain his stats. Now I will say that Trubiski, yeah I remember thinking that was a mistake.  I also have to agree that had Mahommes gone someplace else he may be a totally different looking QB right now. He landed in exactly the right spot, speed to burn around him and a coach that was will to use him for what he is, uber talented, cannon arm and sees/reads the field perfectly. 

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Both these coaches have a monkey on their back, Reid way more than Shannahan. SF looked amazing yesterday but I just think this is the Chiefs year. I would be nervous as a SF fan trying to have Jimmy G go toe to toe with Mahomes because I would venture they don’t run it on KC like they did on GB. Big question to me is can SF get to Mahomes consistently, without him doing damage with his legs.

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2 minutes ago, The Last Storm said:

Both these coaches have a monkey on their back, Reid way more than Shannahan. SF looked amazing yesterday but I just think this is the Chiefs year. I would be nervous as a SF fan trying to have Jimmy G go toe to toe with Mahomes because I would venture they don’t run it on KC like they did on GB. Big question to me is can SF get to Mahomes consistently, without him doing damage with his legs.

KC had a slightly worse run defense than Green Bay so what makes you think they can't run on them? I don't expect a 200 yard performance again but there is nothing to suggest that KC will stop the SF run game. KC did a solid job against Tennessee but that was Tannehill at QB and one real receiving threat, not JImmy G with Samuel and Kittle.

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14 minutes ago, dbunting said:

KC had a slightly worse run defense than Green Bay so what makes you think they can't run on them? I don't expect a 200 yard performance again but there is nothing to suggest that KC will stop the SF run game. KC did a solid job against Tennessee but that was Tannehill at QB and one real receiving threat, not JImmy G with Samuel and Kittle.

Spags will stack the box and make Jimmy G beat them. I’d be pretty confident as a KC fan considering what they did to the Titans. 

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3 minutes ago, Triskele said:

It's probably naive on my part to overlook how important coach and environment is to a young QB, but I think that Mahomes is so good that his worst case scenario would still be solid and maybe just not quite as dominant as he's been with the big red coach in KC.  

Do you think Aaron Rodgers would really the the A-A-Ron of today if his head coach had been Mike Nolan?

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Just now, The Last Storm said:

Spags will stack the box and make Jimmy G beat them. I’d be pretty confident as a KC fan considering what they did to the Titans. 

Teams do that and the Niners still run successfully.  And even if they didn’t, ask Drew Brees how well it worked out.

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4 minutes ago, Triskele said:

It's probably naive on my part to overlook how important coach and environment is to a young QB, but I think that Mahomes is so good that his worst case scenario would still be solid and maybe just not quite as dominant as he's been with the big red coach in KC.  

I'm not really knowledgeable enough to judge it but the impression I got from listening to experts talk about it last year was that Nagy actually had a pretty well designed offense around Trubisky last year? Maybe that's less the case this year but it's not like Trubisky was given completely no chance to succeed.

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1 minute ago, Rhom said:

Teams do that and the Niners still run successfully.  And even if they didn’t, ask Drew Brees how well it worked out.

Sucks we have to wait 2 weeks to find out. Think I saw the early line as KC -1.5.

This KC has been on a mission since last year while SF went from worst to first basically. It’s really a toss up, but I’ll go with KC because of the superior advantage at QB and skill players.

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Reid is such a beloved guy, impossible not to root for.

I am rooting to see his walrus moustache dripping with bitter tears to such a saturation point it has to be shaved off in case it drowns him in his pill-and-alcohol induced lonely sleep in some dingy hotel room he’s run to after telling his family he blames them for his failures and never wants to see their ridiculous free-loading faces that to him will from this day forth have a vaguely golden hue that makes him nauseous and depressed. 

Does that make me a bad person?

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6 hours ago, Jace, Basilissa said:

Deshaun Watson carried Clemson to back-to-back championship games on his fucking back and played like a god on the biggest college stage available against what was essentially a low-end NFL defense. But I'm sure his skull dimples weren't conducive to analyzing defenses or something...

Yeah, this.  I thought it was completely ridiculous - at the time - that Trubisky was being considered even in the same league as Watson - who thoroughly proved himself at the highest level of college football.  To a lesser extent, I thought it was completely ridiculous Jackson dropped as far as he did based on his performance, skills, and talent.  But Mahomes?  Eh, I'd barely heard of him until he shot up the boards as a pre-draft wonder.  Was honestly surprised the Chiefs took him as early as he did.  That seemed much more a compliment to the Chiefs' talent evaluation than an indictment on the rest of the league's.

On Jimmy, let's not forget he won a shootout against Drew Brees in the Superdome about two months ago.  He's kept the Niners in literally every game this season, and they've been a host of different types of games.  While I don't have the greatest confidence in Jimmy, one thing I like is that he seems to perform best under pressure/in big moments.  That's what makes it so frustrating when he makes a handful of dumbfounding decisions/throws each game in very easy/low pressure situations.  But, I'd rather have it that way then the other way around - especially going into the Super BOwl.

 

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