You Caught the Patriots on An Off Day, And Still Couldn’t Do Much With It…

I consider myself to be a buffalo wing fanatic, and I wonder why in the hell Hooters serves their wings with the pointy little tips all fried and coated. Those suck. They have virtually no meat, and I usually don’t even gnaw on them unless I’m eating them as an appetizer, and bored waiting for my meal.

This loss to the Patriots is like those pointy-buffalo-wing-tips.

I mean, I could go into a detailed analysis of how and why this game was lost, extrapolate certain flash point problems and elevate them into this week’s “crisis” – but why bother.

The known gap between Bill Belicheck and Jay Gruden, the Patriots 12+ years of a consistent draft & free agency philosophy compared to our haphazard quilt of splurge and purge, and the gap between Tom Brady and Kirk Cousins means only fools expect to grade this game NOT on some kind of curve.

I felt like the Patriots played a “C” level game by their standards – shocking INTs, drops and an Edelman strip-fumble, coupled with the Pats getting whittled down to less than a minimum of 5 healthy o-linemen. And yet, we never had a chance.

Had Garcon not committed that “droperception” and had Grant corralled the borderline insulting onside kick, then yeah…. this might have been… well… interesting.

But they didn’t. And it wasn’t.

So hello, 3-5. Good news: Going 2-1 the next three weeks is very doable. Both the Giants and Saints might make Kirk look like Dan Fouts 1982.

That would make the team 5-6, and worth watching come December. I am sorry to report: this would be progress.

This game highlighted some known existing software bugs with Redskins v.2015. They are as follows, in no particular order.

1. Injuries.
Yes, this team is. But so is every other team in the league. The “organizational depth” required to muddle through these stretches, simply does not exist, because we haven’t been under competent GM supervision for any decent period of time – maybe ever since Dan Snyder bought the team.

2. Kirk
While I think he’s shown increasing “proof of concept” as a starter in the NFL, the recurring knock is that he’s still not an off-schedule play-maker. It’s a fair criticism. While other QB’s league-wide will make 3-5 plays a game that make you say “WOW!” – Kirk has had arguably fewer than that many all year. The evaluation continues.

3. Defense
Putrid. Gap control is non-existent. Perry Riley Jr. is “wrong-way” Riley on a weekly basis. The secondary is.. um.. something. Aside from Breeland it’s a thrown together dog’s breakfast of half-ideas, retreads, and discount purchases. Paea and Francois have been nothing but replacement level additions. Knighton has been a embarrassing bust. Kerrigan needs a decent bookend rusher to be fully worth his new money, and Murphy isn’t panning out as anything more than a decent run stop.

4. Coaching
Jay Gruden seems like a nice fella but is he a motivational plus-coach from Monday-Friday? Is he a tactical plus-coach on Sundays? I don’t know for sure. But the trend is: “underwhelming.”

So in other words, the grind goes on. This is how most of the league operates anyhow, so we might as well embrace it as fans. Good to see DeSean Jackson back on the field at least. He’ll have one more revenge game in burgundy and gold against his former team later this year, if he’s healthy. So at least he’ll be excited about that.

This was like a second BYE week, with a L pre-installed but at least there was a game to watch, and buffalo wings to eat.

QUICK HITS

– I don’t know why Alfred Morris still gets carries. The split should be Jones-Thompson. Period.
– Andre Roberts on kick returns is a bad idea. Who the hell thought of that?
– I didn’t mind going for it on 4th and 11. It didn’t reek of desperation, it just said: “We know we’re not going to FG you guys to death. Besides, Kirk had it converted before Garcon dropped it.