Chicago Sky general manager Jeff Pagliocca said Friday the franchise is preparing for star forward Angel Reese to be on the roster next season despite a rocky finish to the 2025 campaign that saw the All-Star suspended and sidelined.
Reese, 22, missed the final two games of the year with what the team called a back injury after being issued a half-game suspension on Sept. 7 for criticizing the organization in an interview. She apologized to teammates, but frustration over the Sky’s direction lingered with fans late in the season.
‘Angel is an ascending young talent in this league who’s had two very, very good seasons here in Chicago,’ Pagliocca said Friday. ‘Obviously we went through what we did. I feel like we closed the chapter on it. She spoke to her teammates, she spoke publicly. We moved on as a team. She’s a special player. And I have good conversations with Angel daily, with her team daily. They’re constant, and they’re productive.’
Reese led Chicago with 14.7 points and 12.6 rebounds per game this season, pacing the WNBA in rebounding and double-doubles (23 in 30 games). But the Sky finished tied with the Dallas Wings for the worst record in the league at 10-34 — just one year after going 13-27 and parting ways with coach Teresa Weatherspoon.
Current coach Tyler Marsh and Pagliocca both have pledged changes to improve the roster, but the Sky don’t have their 2026 first-round pick because they swapped it to the league-leading Minnesota Lynx prior to the 2025 draft.
What does the daily life of a legendary philosopher look like? Learn about Arthur Schopenhauer’s unique routine that he consistently followed for over 27 years.
Arthur Schopenhauer was a major figure in German philosophy throughout the 19th century along with Friedrich Nietzsche and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel.
While he’s known for his pessimism and negative outlook on life, there’s no denying that Schopenhauer was an intellectual powerhouse of his time who influenced many great thinkers, philosophers, and artists long after his death.
His book Essays and Aphorisms is a great introduction and overview of his philosophical ideas. It explains his core metaphysical belief of “world as appearance,” continuing the legacy of other idealist philosophers like Plato, Kant, and Indian philosophy, which warn about viewing the world strictly through a materialist lens.
The beginning of the book provides a nice biography of Schopenhauer’s family background, education, and life history. There’s one interesting section on his daily routine that caught my attention and wanted to share; it’s always fascinating to gain insights into the habits and lifestyles of influential figures, especially potential role models we can emulate and borrow from.
This specific routine characterizes the last third of Schopenhauer’s life:
“From the age of 45 until his death 27 years later Schopenhauer lived in Frankfurt-am-Main. He lived alone… every day for 27 years he followed an identical routine.”
Keep in mind, I’m only sharing this for educational purposes. I don’t necessarily recommend this way of living, but there are interesting lessons to takeaway from it, including how some of these habits relate to Schopenhauer’s overall philosophy.
Arthur Schopenhauer’s Daily Routine
Here’s a breakdown of Schopenhauer’s daily routine for the last 27 years of his life:
“He rose every morning at seven and had a bath but no breakfast;
He drank a cup of strong coffee before sitting down at his desk and writing until noon.
At noon he ceased work for the day and spent half-an-hour practicing the flute, on which he became quite a skilled performer.
Then he went out to lunch at the Englischer Hof.
After lunch he returned home and read until four, when he left for his daily walk:
He walked for two hours no matter what the weather.
At six o’clock, he visited the reading room of the library and read The Times.
In the evening he attended the theatre or a concert, after which he had dinner at a hotel or restaurant.
He got back home between nine and ten and went early to bed.”
While Schopenhauer mostly kept to this strict routine unwaveringly, he was willing to make exceptions under specials circumstances such as if he had friends or visitors in town.
Key Lessons and Takeaways
This daily routine seems fitting for a solitary and introspective philosopher, but there are key lessons that fit with conventional self-improvement wisdom:
Early Rising: Schopenhauer started his day at 7 a.m., which aligns with the common advice of many successful individuals who advocate for early rising. This morning ritual is often associated with increased productivity and a sense of discipline.
No Breakfast: Skipping breakfast was part of Schopenhauer’s routine. While not everyone agrees with this approach, it resonates with intermittent fasting principles that some find beneficial for health and mental clarity.
Work Routine: Schopenhauer dedicated his mornings to work, writing until noon. This emphasizes the importance of having a focused and dedicated period for intellectual or creative work, especially early in the day.
Creative Break: Taking a break to practice the flute for half an hour after work highlights the value of incorporating creative or leisure activities into one’s routine. It can serve as a refreshing break and contribute to overall well-being.
Outdoor Exercise: Schopenhauer’s daily two-hour walk, regardless of the weather, emphasizes the significance of outdoor exercise for both physical and mental health. This practice aligns with contemporary views on the benefits of regular physical activity and spending time in nature.
Reading Habit: Schopenhauer spent time reading each day, reflecting his commitment to continuous learning and intellectual stimulation.
News Consumption: Reading The Times at the library suggests Schopenhauer valued staying informed about current events. It’s worth noting that he limited his news consumption to a specific time of day (but it was easier to restrict your information diet before the internet).
Cultural Engagement: Attending the theater or a concert in the evening indicates a commitment to cultural engagement and a balanced lifestyle.
Regular Bedtime: Going to bed early reflects an understanding of the importance of sufficient sleep for overall health and well-being.
While Schopenhauer’s routine may not be suitable for everyone, there are elements of discipline, balance, and engagement with various aspects of life that individuals may find inspiring or applicable to their own lifestyles.
The Immovable Mind
Schopenhauer was known for his persistence and stubbornness – his consistent daily routine is just one manifestation of this.
He wrote his magnum opus The World as Will and Representation in 1818 when he was only 28 years old, and he never fundamentally changed his views despite continuing to write and publish until his death at 72.
Schopenhauer has been described as an “immovable mind,” never letting himself deviate from the course he was set out on.
His two hour walk routine in any weather is one of the most popular examples of this. From the biography in the book:
“Consider the daily two-hour walk. Among Schopenhauer’s disciples of the late nineteenth century this walk was celebrated fact of his biography, and it was so because of its regularity. There was speculation as to why he insisted on going out and staying out for two hours no matter what the weather. It suggests health fanaticism, but there is no other evidence that Schopenhauer was a health fanatic or crank. In my view the reason was simply obstinacy: he would go out and nothing would stop him.”
While this immovability has its disadvantages, you have to admire the monk-like discipline.
Schopenhauer was a proponent of ascetism, a life without pleasure-seeking and mindless indulgence. A lot of his philosophy centers around a type of “denouncement of the material world,” so it’s not surprising that a little rain and wind wouldn’t stop his daily walk.
This way of living is reminiscent of the documentary Into Great Silence, which follows the daily lives of Carthusian monks living in the French mountains while they eat, clean, pray, and fulfill their chores and duties in quiet solitude.
One of the hallmarks of a great routine is that it’s a sustainable system. The fact that Schopenhauer was able to follow this regimen for the rest of his life is a testament to its strength and efficacy, and something worth admiring even if it’s not a lifestyle we’d want to replicate for ourselves.
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I’ve had atopic dermatitis (AD) as long as I can remember. The first time a doctor gave me a diagnosis was when I was 18 years old and in the Marines.
Having AD used to affect my mood a lot. When I was younger and more insecure, I wouldn’t wear short sleeves if I was having a flare-up. I hardly ever wore shorts. At the pool, I wouldn’t take my shirt off. I’d even cancel plans with friends.
Now that I’m in my 40s, I’ve gotten past all that. I care less about what people think. Now, when I choose what to wear, it’s based on how comfortable it is. My AD doesn’t really change my mood unless I’m having an episode that I can’t get under control and the itching is nonstop.
It’s taken some trial and error, but I’ve gotten better at managing my daily life with AD.
Daily Rituals
On a typical morning, I wake up and take a cool shower. I avoid hot showers because they increase inflammation, which makes my AD worse. Then I moisturize my body, focusing mostly on my arms and legs.
I make sure to drink a gallon of water every day. I’ve found that if I’m dehydrated, I get dry skin, which can make my eczema flare up.
When I leave the house, especially in the summer, I’ll take a bottle of lotion, itch cream, hydrocortisone cream, and allergy pills with me. It’s good to have them on hand in case I need them when I’m out.
I find that my AD gets worse in the spring. Pollen has a really negative effect on me and my AD, so springtime can sometimes feel miserable.
Treatment: Trial and Error
My AD mostly shows up behind my knees and on my arms, especially my elbows. But in the past few years, it’s started to show itself in my eyebrows. Heat, stress, and spring allergies cause it to flare more than other times of the year.
Continued
I’ve tried a lot of treatments and remedies. I’ve tried medical-grade lotions, oatmeal baths, oral allergy medication, anti-itch medication, warm baths, and mild soaps. I’ve even tried some late-night infomercial remedies, which never work.
I found that what works best for me, besides changing my diet, is hydrocortisone steroid cream. It reduces the inflammation, which eases the itching and allows it to heal faster. I use the steroid creams when I get a flare-up, and then I apply it twice a day for a few days.
When I’m about to get a flare-up, it’ll start to itch, and then my skin will become red and inflamed. I’ll put the steroid cream on and wait to see how bad it gets. If it doesn’t go away after 7 days, I’ll have to see my dermatologist to get a stronger ointment.
I owe a lot to changes I made to my diet. When I was in my late 20s, a friend and I made a bet to see who could lose the most weight. I started eating healthier and stopped drinking alcohol, and I noticed that my flare-ups and everyday rashes decreased. So I made the connection and never went back to my old habits.
I no longer drink alcohol. I don’t eat processed or greasy foods. These changes have helped more than any other treatment has, especially not drinking alcohol and eating a whole-foods diet.
(If you were wondering, I did win the bet.)
I’ve also stopped using things that cause flare-ups, and I’ve found a few tricks that make it easier. I shaved my head years ago because it kept me cooler, and I figured out that certain types of shampoo and conditioner would make AD flare up on my eyebrows.
Now that I know what I’m doing, my flare-ups are less severe. I think knowing your triggers and avoiding them makes a big difference. For me, it’s heat, dehydration, greasy or processed foods, alcohol, and spring allergies.
Continued
Getting Over the Hurdles
My biggest hurdle is being disciplined when it comes to my diet. If I have one day where I let myself eat greasy or processed foods, it can take me weeks to get my skin back to normal. I’ve become much better at staying on track as I’ve gotten older.
Stress is another hurdle. It definitely plays a role in my flare-ups. I’ve had to learn how to manage my stress and anxiety to keep it under control. My doctor prescribed a mood stabilizer to control my anxiety problems. And as I’ve gotten older, I’ve learned to always do what’s best for me and my family over anything else, which makes my worries and anxiety very low.
Every day is different, but it’s been a learning experience. Now I can say I’ve figured out how to live well with AD.
Austin Pets Alive! is a private nonprofit dedicated to eliminating the needless killing of shelter pets. We have been extremely successful because of the strategy we employ to make Austin, and now other cities, No Kill.
Our No Kill strategy is simple and two fold:
We save lives by drawing attention to, and taking pets off, the daily euthanasia list while
Allowing that attention to apply pressure on the city to get the proper resources they need to decrease the euthanasia list themselves.
In 2021, we worked with the city council on an amendment to our city contract that has caused some community and government staff confusion that we hope to dispel with these three points:
1. Foundational to APA! is to pull only from the euthanasia list to have a measurable effect on the kill rate which ultimately helped the city achieve No Kill status in 2011. It is important to note that critical to this strategy, and implied by the creation and use of a euthanasia list to eliminate pets that they do not have the resources to care for, is that the city can manage and care for all the animals not on the euthanasia list.
2. Our long term contract was extraordinarily overdue and in need of an update. The old contract created in 2011 was built on a guesstimate of the size of future years’ euthanasia lists; this contract stayed in effect for years past its expiration date with extension after extension after extension which ultimately led to operational misalignment between AAC and APA!. This was resolved in contract negotiations in 2018, when it was mutually agreed that APA! would continue to focus on the euthanasia list, but always have a 12% minimum, as long as we used TLAC. Even though that was documented in 2018, land issues prevented it being signed and so in 2021, APA! worked with city council to bring the extension-riddled contract in line operationally to match the agreement from 2018. The current contract wasn’t finalized until 2023 due to TLAC land issues.
3. In response to the community demand that AAC do better for the pets that are not on the euthanasia list, the city council has more than doubled the AAC budget between 2008-2023 to allow AAC to reduce the euthanasia list, provide in house medical and behavioral care, as well as community support to meet their stated mission.
/EIN News/ — Hacienda Heights, California, March 20, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Burning Daily is excited to announce its new range of CBD as well as Hemp products to its online customers. Burning Daily is a leading provider of the most trusted and highest-quality hemp and CBD-based products. Their mission is to provide customers with the best and safest cannabidiol or CBD products and services possible and committed to providing customers with an enjoyable, safe, and responsible experience.
Leading Online Hemp Retailer
Founded by Dennis Sanders, Burning Daily has grown into a leading online retailer of hemp products such as Delta-8, Delta-10, THC-O, and HHC.
CBD Trends
According to recent studies, one in three American adults has tried some type of CBD product.
Those numbers are even higher among younger generations, especially millennials. The rise in popularity of these products has also led to a significant influx of producers and providers claiming to sell high-quality and safe products, while that’s not always the case.
In fact, CBD product sales in the United States were estimated around $4.17 billion in 2022. By 2026, that same study estimates CBD product sales are expected to reach roughly $4.23 billion in value. Finding a trusted source for quality and safe CBD products, like Burning Daily is the key to having a positive experience.
This week marks the 20th anniversary of Dallas Cowboys great Emmitt Smith breaking Chicago Bears legend Walter Payton’s all-time rushing record of 16,726 yards. Of course, Smith wasn’t quite finished yet; he played for 2½ more seasons, winding up with 18,355 rushing yards.
This is a milestone that is unlikely to ever be broken. For one thing, it’s Emmitt Smith we’re talking about. The man rushed for 1,000-yard seasons like clockwork basically forever. But the NFL also has changed quite a bit since then. Offenses don’t focus on running backs like they used to, and playing as long as Smith did as a ball carrier is seemingly impossible. Adrian Peterson, who hasn’t played this season, is the closest “active” yards leader at 14,918, to give you a sense of how out of reach is Smith’s record.
That got us thinking about other sports records that are seemingly unreachable, whether it’s because of the way the game has changed since they were set, the absurd talent of their holders as compared to the rest of the league or a mixture of both. Here’s a short list of records you’ll probably never see broken — at least not in our lifetimes.
Rice had an incredible 14 seasons with 1,000 or more receiving yards, including three with more than 1,500. A big part of this was his incredible durability; he only played fewer than 16 games two out of his 21 years. Rice also had the good fortune of going from one Hall of Fame quarterback (Joe Montana) to another (Steve Young). But let’s be real: Rice was more or less uncoverable for two straight decades all on his own. It also explains why no one is ever going to catch his receiving touchdown record: He has 197, and the next-highest receiver, Randy Moss, has 41 fewer scores.
The old saying about “The Great One” is that if he never scored a single goal in his career, he’d still lead the NHL in total points on assists alone. To give you a sense of just how difficult it would be for someone to do that, he would have to average 98 assists a year over a 20-year career just to approach that total. No one has actually had 98 or more assists in a single season since … Wayne Gretzky, in 1990-91. In all, it’s only been done three times by a player not named Wayne Gretzky (twice by Mario Lemieux and once by Bobby Orr).
Unless there is a dramatic change in how teams approach pitching — something on the level of “all the pitchers are now literally robots” — there’s no way anyone gets close to Young’s complete game mark. All MLB pitchers combined had 36 complete games in 2022; Young had 36 or more complete games by himself in 11 separate seasons. While we’re at it, it seems extremely unlikely that anyone is going to get close to Young’s 511 wins or 315 losses anytime soon, either.
Wilt Chamberlain: 50.4 PPG in a single season (1961-62)
Kobe Bryant was what we could call a prolific scorer, right? He had 10 50-plus-point games in his 2006-07 campaign. In 1961-62, Wilt had 45 50-plus-point games, 15 60-plus-point games and three 70-plus-point games — oh, and one in which he scored 100 points. Unless the NBA introduces a 4-point shot, this isn’t happening. And even then …
You know how hard it is to win just one title in the NBA? The Shaquille O’Neal/Kobe Bryant Los Angeles Lakers managed three straight. The Stephen Curry/Klay Thompson/Draymond Green Warriors almost did it four times in a row, save for LeBron James & Co. defeating them in 2016. James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh managed back-to-back titles. These were some incredible teams … but in the modern NBA, almost every team is tough to beat come playoff time. The Celtics had the advantage of an all-time player in Bill Russell, an all-time coach in Red Auerbach, a seemingly endless array of other players who were considered legends and an NBA that had fewer than 10 teams.
To give you a sense of how far away Biles is from her competition, the next-most-decorated gymnast in terms of world gold medals, Svetlana Khorkina, has nine. No other active women’s gymnast has even two — likely because they’ve had the great misfortune of competing at the same time as Biles.
This is, again, one of those records that is more about how the game is played these days than anything else. Ripken was unusually durable, for sure. But these days, it’s likely he would have been encouraged to take a few days off every now and then just to make sure he was well-rested.
The next-highest streak on this list (90) also is held by the UConn Huskies, so if we’re going to see it broken ever again, it’s probably going to happen out of Storrs, Connecticut. Although, realistically, Geno Auriemma’s squads have been so historically dominant that it’s hard to see even a new version of them going on such an absurd undefeated streak again.
Baseball writer Bill James once said that if you split Rickey Henderson in two, you’d have two Hall of Famers. Well, if you split him in four, you’d still have a guy with more stolen bases than the current active leader. People still do put up big stolen-base campaigns; Jose Reyes stole 78 as recently as 2007. But Henderson’s sheer consistency and longevity make this record unreachable. To put it another way, someone stealing 78 bases a year would have to keep that mark up for more than 18 seasons to break Henderson’s record.
Not only does Phelps have the most Olympic medals ever, he also holds the records in gold medals (23) and individual gold medals in a single Olympics (eight, at the 2008 Beijing Games). Swimming has a lot of events and therefore a lot of opportunities to win, but Phelps’ dominance remains unmatched by any other Olympian.
Phil Kessel is set to play in his 990th consecutive game Tuesday night (10:30 p.m. ET, ESPN), meaning the Vegas Golden Knights winger will pass retired defenseman Keith Yandle to become the NHL’s all-time iron man.
It’s the latest, and perhaps greatest, moment in a career that’s been equal parts eclectic and electric, historic and hysterical, with enough surreal milestones to make the 35-year-old hockey’s answer to Forrest Gump.
He was the player who overcame testicular cancer as a rookie, played on two U.S. Olympic teams and used his wicked shot to score close to 400 goals in the NHL.
He’s also the player whose attitude was questioned, whose conditioning was maligned and who once was accused by a Toronto columnist of visiting a hot dog vendor every afternoon — a story debunked by fans who have passionately defended Kessel against such critics.
He’s Phil Kessel: an enigma to some and a legend to others.
In an effort to better understand “Phil the Thrill” and how he became the NHL’s iron man, we spoke with individuals connected to all five of his stops on the NHL: with the Boston Bruins (2006-09), Toronto Maple Leafs (2009-2015), Pittsburgh Penguins (2015-19, winning back-to-back Stanley Cups), Arizona Coyotes (2019-22) and the Golden Knights this season.
Kessel in Boston: ‘He’s always been a popular teammate’
Shane Hnidy was a defenseman for the Boston Bruins for a season and half, during Kessel’s second and third NHL seasons. Hnidy is now a television analyst with the Vegas Golden Knights, where he reunited with Kessel this season.
If you had told me when I first met Phil that he would set the NHL’s iron man record, I would have called you absolutely crazy. I would have said you are out of your mind. I would have taken whatever odds were on it at the time.
You still kind of shake your head. To play that many games in a row is near impossible. So all the respect in the world for what he’s been able to do.
As a young player in Boston, Phil was talented. Extremely talented. You could see at that young age that he had that ability. I think he’s a super-intelligent player that gets underrated for his hockey IQ. That speaks to his game streak: You can’t play that long, be that successful and not put yourself in vulnerable situations if you don’t have a high hockey IQ.
No, he’s not the guy diving in front of shots. No one is going to claim he’s a defensive specialist, but there are a lot of elite players that fall into that category. But he’s also a guy who’s not afraid to go into the corners. You don’t put up the points that he does without going to certain areas of the ice where there are battles.
What guys like him and Keith Yandle have been able to do is staggering to me. Even if you purposely tried to stay away from injuries, there’s a good chance that over 500 games you’d get one. You have to play through some stuff. I almost lost an eye once — in practice. Freaky things happen all the time.
It was exciting to have him in Boston at that moment. The city embraced us. The team was starting to turn the corner, with guys like Phil and Marc Savard and Patrice Bergeron and Milan Lucic. The 2008-09 team just missed the Presidents’ Trophy and then lost in the second round to Carolina. Phil and I have talked about that being one of those teams where it felt like we could win the Stanley Cup but didn’t.
In his rookie year, he had testicular cancer and kept it quiet. When it got into the media, he was upset about it because he’s just a private guy. He was always that quiet guy. That was hard on him. I wasn’t there for it, but the guys said he handled it with his humor. He barely missed any time.
I’m going to try to phrase this the right way: But at times, early on, he frustrated us veterans. Myself, Zdeno Chara, Glen Murray … we’d talk about trying to get a rise out of him. I remember in the 2008 playoffs, we needed him to come. We tried to get him rah-rah’d up, and he wouldn’t. We tried to find different ways to get a reaction out of him, and we couldn’t. It’s not his personality.
But he still scored some big goals. Then he scored 36 of them the next season. We finally figured, “OK, he’s got his own motivation.” You try to find ways. You try to set examples. But later in my career I realized that for certain guys, if it works for you, it works for you.
We had a couple of them like that. Tim Thomas was another. Now, he was a different dude. And he certainly didn’t abide by today’s standards of nutrition. But he stopped the puck and worked hard, and that’s all you wanted. Because Phil was able to perform, to do what was needed of him, it was like, “Well, OK, whatever.” But I will say that here in Vegas, he’s in some of the best shape I’ve ever seen him in. He’s motivated. He felt lost in Arizona.
I think sometimes he’s misunderstood as aloof, but he does care. He wants to win. You’ve seen that in his career. He hasn’t changed. There’s this mystery about him, as this laid-back guy. And he is one. But it’s all about in the room. He’s always been a popular teammate. There are guys in today’s game that pay too much attention to the noise, and he doesn’t. He just wants to score goals and get points. You could see that as a young guy.
I was surprised when Boston traded him. He was a talented guy for them.
Kessel in Toronto: ‘He’s unapologetically himself’
He was always a mythical figure. When I was with the U.S. national development program, I came in the year after he left. He was with that 1987 [birth year] group that was legendary, not only with how many talented players they had but how many characters they had. My first world juniors I ever saw was in North Dakota. Phil was 16 or 17 years old, and he was just flying around, scoring goals.
The first time I met Phil was when his brother, Blake, brought a bunch of us to a Bruins afternoon game. After the game, we went to a Qdoba and Phil showed up eventually to join us. I guess he was on his entry-level contract and times were tough, but he picked up the tab.
He was in Toronto before I got there. He was just a complete character. He loves to stir the pot, making dry comments. It’s good to have someone that will speak his mind in the room in certain scenarios. Those dialogues are really healthy and good.
Phil’s the unintentionally funny guy. He’s not trying to be funny, but he ends up being hilarious. It got to the point where my close friends would text me once in a while, and instead of asking how I was doing, they’d say, “Give me the latest Phil story.”
He’s a super-competitive guy. We played poker on the plane all the time. I remember him being middle of the road. Athletes in general tend to be bad card players because of that competitiveness, instead of using your brain and math. But we had some fun times.
Ultimately with Phil — and I respect this about him — he’s unapologetically himself. He just did his thing and didn’t get too wrapped up in the outside noise that you get playing in Toronto. It wasn’t the fans. I think some of the stuff [about him] got covered [in the media] a little unfairly. Phil didn’t let it bother him enough to go back against certain people. I’m sure he was aware of the perceptions of him, but he was a super-productive player when he was there and his numbers spoke for themselves.
He loved playing in Toronto. Loved that white-hot spotlight.
My favorite Phil Kessel story is when he was playing in Pittsburgh. It was the first game after he was traded from Toronto. My line’s lining up against him on the opening draw. So just to f— with him a little bit, I chop him on top of the laces. Not too hard. Maybe like 50%. And he looks over at me, doesn’t smile, and he says, “James … don’t forget who made you a player in this league.”
No one calls me James, either. He’s the only guy that calls me James. It was priceless.
With this record, the biggest thing is that he’s a gamer. I have this quote from Phil burned in my head that I’ve been thinking about a lot as he’s come close to the record:
“I just love playin’ the games, eh?”
[Editor’s note: James van Riemsdyk does an impeccable Phil Kessel impression.]
I feel like that sums it up perfectly. He loves playing the game. He wouldn’t have played this long, or wouldn’t have been as successful, without that love.
We both were traded to Pittsburgh in summer 2015. His was the bigger trade, I think.
I was excited to meet him. You’d just hear things around the league about what kind of character he was. They had that [HBO 24/7] documentary when he was in Toronto, and there was stuff from that everyone was talking about. Like him going, “Good one, Randy” to [Toronto coach Randy] Carlyle.
There’s a reason everyone lights up when they talk about Phil Kessel. When he’s in the room, guys rip on him and he rips on them, which I think is important in a good teammate. He wasn’t closed off like he can be in interviews.
Unique. One of a kind. Great guy and a good friend.
My favorite story is probably the one with Pierre McGuire and the breath.
[Editor’s note: In 2016 during the Eastern Conference finals, NBC Sports announcer Pierre McGuire had a postgame interview in which he asked Kessel “how’s your breath?” McGuire meant to inquire about Kessel’s conditioning after the forward played over 19 minutes against the Tampa Bay Lightning. Instead, Kessel thought it was a question about his hygiene and responded “it’s not good, eh?”]
Phil came back into the room after that. He looked at us and just shook his head. He said, “Boys … you’re gonna get a kick out of this when it comes out.” Like, he knew what was going to happen. So the next day, he had a bunch of Tic Tacs and gum piled high in his stall.
The line with him, me and [Hagelin] … that was fun. The opportunity came about because Geno [Malkin] got hurt. It was one of those times in my career where it felt like everything we did was right and everything we shot went in, from Game 60 all the way through when we lifted the Cup.
Haggy was so fast and so smart and knew exactly where he needed to be. I just tried to get pucks to them and be responsible. I was so fortunate to play with Phil. He can shoot the puck like few can in this league. He’s just got such a flex on his stick that he can snap it off, and he can do it in motion, too. I hadn’t seen anyone come down the wing and shoot it in stride like he does. He’s fast. When he gets a step on you, that’s all he needs. And then he’s shooting before the goalie is set.
The popularity of our line was a whirlwind. Something I hadn’t experienced before. I imagine that’s what it’s like for Sid everywhere he goes, or these top guys. When you’re producing and doing well, the fanfare comes with it. Especially in a city like Pittsburgh, which is so sports-crazed.
I played cards with him. I wouldn’t play poker because he was so good at it. But we’d play a bunch of games on the plane. One thing I’ll never forget: playing cards with Phil out of the Stanley Cup on the way back from San Jose. We set it up in the middle of the aisle between us. That was our card table. We were throwing our cards inside the Stanley Cup.
It’s funny: I played with Andrew Cogliano, too, who had such a long consecutive games streak himself. I think every guy is different, but they both have a durability to them. Regardless of what was going on with Phil, you knew he was going to play. He wasn’t taking a maintenance day. He was playing. OK, maybe not so much in practice, but you know that in the games, he was going to be there.
He’s a gamer. He wanted to win, whatever he did. Whether it was cards or shooting hoops or playing hockey. You gotta have that drive if you want to play that many games in a row.
Kessel in Arizona: The veteran mentor
Arizona Coyotes forward Clayton Keller was Kessel’s teammate during Phil’s three seasons with the Coyotes from 2019-20 to 2021-22 — including a game on March 8, 2022, when Kessel played one 30-second shift against the Detroit Red Wings to keep his streak alive before hopping on a charter flight arranged by the team for the birth of his daughter, Kapri Mary Kessel.
Phil was an unbelievable teammate, on and off the ice. Someone that I loved playing with. Probably one of the best guys that I’ve ever played with. I definitely miss him.
When I first met him, he was just a normal guy. Loved to play golf, so one of the first days that we were together, we went out and played. That’s when you can really get to know someone, on the golf course. And he was super-fun to golf with. It’s nice because it’s away from hockey and you’re just talking about life and things of that nature.
He also loves to chirp, and he can back it up. He’ll tell you he’s a bad golfer. But he’s very good. Really good putter. Good short game in general. His drives are good too, but if I was going to say one thing [is his best], I’d say putting. He’s got soft hands.
He’s a competitive guy, no matter if it’s hockey or golf or cards on the plane, he wants to win. And if he does, he’ll let everyone know about it.
It was awesome to have him on the Coyotes. He’s a guy that’s played in big games and played in Stanley Cup Finals and won Stanley Cups. So he knows what it’s like. It was nice to pick his brain on some of the teams he’s been on, why they won and things of that nature.
We all knew the situation [with his daughter’s birth]. It was pretty crazy and awesome for the team to do that. Everyone kind of had an idea, but no one knew exactly what was going to happen. You didn’t know when the baby was going to arrive. So he played one shift, got on a plane and he was back with us the next game. We all got him something for the kid.
Like with his streak, he wants to be a part of every game. He’s definitely had injuries throughout his career that he’s played through to get to that level. I hope he gets all the way there and holds that record for a long time.
It’s a long season. There are tough days. But every time you come to the rink and see Phil, he puts a smile on your face. Every day was something new. I miss the laughs and the jokes. I miss playing with him. He cheers you up.
Kessel in Vegas: How hockey is (and isn’t) like poker
Daniel Negreanu is a professional poker player who has won six World Series of Poker bracelets. He has played cards with Phil Kessel and now watches him as a fan of the Vegas Golden Knights.
The first time I met Phil was in Toronto at a mutual friend’s house. A couple of guys on the Leafs loved playing poker, and I met him at a game inside that friend’s house. Phil wanted to “test his skills.” Me being a big hockey fan, I thought that was cool.
I knew about him before that night. Toronto media is very in your business. They go above and beyond trying to get the inside scoop, and sometimes they completely make s— up — like the hot dog thing, which wasn’t even real. But I never experienced him as a person until then. And as I got to know him over the years, he’s probably my most famous friend.
He’s an easy-going guy. When you see him on camera doing interviews, he’s kind of uncomfortable. He doesn’t like it. That’s why during the World Series of Poker, whenever he was there, I would bring my vlog camera out and put him on it and drive him crazy. He’d try to hide.
Once you get to know him, it makes sense that he’s kind of streaky as a player. Mindset for him is incredibly important. When things are going badly, he sort of has a woe-is-me attitude. “Aw, man, puck isn’t going in, eh? Puck’s just not droppin’, eh?” But in hockey, just like in poker, he’s a competitor. He might not look like it, but he’s a competitor.
He was at the World Series of Poker with me when Toronto traded him. I asked him where he was headed, and he said “Pittsburgh.” I told him that you could think of worse places than playing with Crosby and Malkin. He said, “Yeah, not too bad, eh?”
I’m really hoping this works out for him in Vegas. It’s a good opportunity. But he wanted people to know that he didn’t come to Vegas to play poker. He’s here to play hockey and to take it very seriously.
He was in a horrible situation in Arizona. At the trade deadline, he and everybody in the world thought he was going somewhere, but they didn’t have anywhere to move him. Vegas was always in his sights, but they were up against the cap. But they needed a guy for the power play, and who else is a better fit than Phil Kessel, one of the best power-play guys in the NHL? So I was super-excited when he signed with the Knights. It was time to get another jersey with “Phil The Thrill” on the back.
When I first met him, I would have been surprised by him setting this record. But not as surprised as the average NHL fan.
When you play in Toronto, the media creates the narrative for you. So what’s the narrative on Phil Kessel? He’s fat. He likes to eat hot dogs. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t try. He doesn’t play defense. And he doesn’t even like hot dogs. The defense thing … maybe in the regular season, he’s not hitting. He’s maybe coasting in a 4-1 game.
But watch him in the playoffs. Watch him in those Pittsburgh runs and tell me who was backchecking and playing really hard. And if you ask guys around him, when he’s in the gym and under a squat rack, he’s strong as f—. He’s got a very strong lower body.
In poker, he likes to play a game called Pot Limit Omaha. That’s his favorite. And that game has a lot of luck involved, so you can go on these really big swings were you can win or lose a lot in one session.
With poker, you have to be a little even-keeled. But he’s very emotionally attached to swings. He’d say things like, “Bro, I had aces seven times in a row and the guy cracked, eh?” And I’m like, “We should focus on your game. Focus on the things you can control.” He gets caught up in that stuff occasionally.
One year, he was sitting down in a tournament for Pot Limit Omaha at the World Series of Poker. I happened to roll up and I was seated at his table, playing for a world championship. I know how he plays. He’s not a big bluffer. He’s not going to outplay me or anything like that … except on this one hand, when he went absolutely nuts on me and I didn’t see it coming. He completely outplayed me and bluffed me, and everyone started laughing.
I was like, “What the hell, Phil? Where did you get that from?”
It was a high-level play. I didn’t think he was capable of it. The joke was on me.
The 49ers’ 44-23 loss to the Chiefs on Sunday reinforced both sides of the debate surrounding Thursday’s dramatic trade for Christian McCaffrey. If you loved the deal — which saw San Francisco give up 2023 second-, third- and fourth-round picks plus a fifth-rounder in 2024 — you saw flashes suggesting the running back could be a special talent in the San Francisco offense, as he turned his 10 touches into 62 yards and three first downs. The 49ers didn’t win, but they were much worse on offense after halftime, when McCaffrey played just four snaps. Once he has learned the offense and can be an every-down player, the possibilities for what this offense can do seem endless.
And yet, the Niners lost by 21 points in a game in which the Chiefs picked on their offensive line and secondary, the two weakest parts of their roster. They averaged 5.6 yards per play with McCaffrey on the field and 6.4 yards per play without him. Over in North Carolina, the Panthers upset the Buccaneers in a game in which the combination of Chuba Hubbard and D’Onta Foreman, who were afterthoughts behind the 26-year-old McCaffrey in the offense, combined for 218 yards from scrimmage on 28 touches.
The McCaffrey trade is one of the most fascinating deals we’ve seen in the NFL in recent years, even as the league has gotten more and more trade-friendly. The upside for the 49ers is stratospheric and could give them one of the best sets of playmakers the league has ever seen. The downside is that he is an injury-prone, short-term rental for a team now below .500 and already was without its first-round pick in the 2023 draft. And unlike some trades, where those possibilities are remote, the best- and worst-case scenarios for this deal appear to be entirely plausible for Kyle Shanahan and his 49ers.
Having given the deal a couple of days of thought, I wanted to answer a few of the questions I saw in the immediate conversations after it. Several of the comparisons I’ve seen don’t hold up under much scrutiny. Others are more reasonable. Leaving aside what we saw Sunday, let’s get into the key questions from the McCaffrey trade, starting with the positives:
Is McCaffrey really a perfect fit for this offense?
To the extent that any running back can be that sort of difference-maker, yes. Before the season, when I wrote about quarterback Trey Lance, I mentioned the idea of how Shanahan wanted to fill his offense with playmakers capable of doing just about anything with the ball in their hands on a snap-to-snap basis. (Of course, this was before Lance went down with his fractured right ankle in September.)
Shanahan wants the plausible deniability of being able to line up in any personnel grouping and get to any of his rushing or passing concepts. His offense is the closest thing the NFL has to the sort of positionless basketball we’ve seen the NBA adopt over the past 15 years. Only in a Shanahan offense can his top wide receiver turn into the team’s lead running back at midseason, as Deebo Samuel did a year ago. Only the 49ers have their fullback running wheel routes for big plays up the sideline. (Well, until teams that hired Shanahan assistants started emulating him.) Every eligible receiver in a Shanahan offense should be capable of doing anything in that offense on a given play.
From that perspective, McCaffrey makes total sense. For whatever he offers as a traditional running back, his output as a receiver in Carolina was remarkable. During his five-year run as the lead back for the Panthers, he was the focal point of the passing attack.
With middling quarterback play for most of his tenure, McCaffrey drew targets on nearly 29% of his routes and averaged 2.1 yards per route run. To put that in context, those numbers are right in line with what Chargers wideout Keenan Allen has done over the same time frame on a route-by-route basis, and Allen has had better quarterback play without adding any significant rushing value. Those numbers also haven’t diminished over the past several seasons, when McCaffrey has struggled to stay healthy.
As a receiver, his ability to create mismatches is already obvious. Just as the Saints have done for years with Alvin Kamara, the Panthers loved running McCaffrey out of the backfield and getting him matched up on option routes against slower linebackers in space. The Rams spammed that choice concept with Cooper Kupp to create completions last season.
With the 49ers preferring to use formations with Kyle Juszczyk and George Kittle on the field, teams have to match that sort of blocking ability by playing their base defense. Playing base defense means McCaffrey (or George Kittle) will be up against a linebacker in coverage on passing plays. In an offense that wants to give quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo easy answers and its receivers opportunities to make plays after the catch, it’s easy to envision the 49ers incorporating plays in which McCaffrey is the primary read in a passing progression, let alone whatever else he’ll offer on screens and checkdowns.
Is this McCaffrey the same guy we saw at his peak?
As a runner, I’m not sure McCaffrey is a difference-maker in quite the same way. The 2018-19 superstar model of him exceeded expectations, generating 372 rushing yards over expectation (RYOE) across 497 tracked carries, for an average of 0.8 RYOE per attempt. By that model, which comes from NFL Next Gen Stats, the suggestion is he gained nearly a full yard more per run than what an average back would have gained with the same blocking against the same defenders in the same situations.
Over the ensuing three seasons, though, McCaffrey hasn’t been as productive. With 243 tracked attempts, he has generated minus-14 RYOE, suggesting he’s been about as productive as a league-average back on his carries. He’ll be taking over the lead back role from Jeff Wilson Jr., who has generated 117 RYOE across 88 carries this season, which ranks eighth in the NFL on a per-rush basis.
It’s possible the 49ers actually take a step backward in their running game with McCaffrey in the mix. They also were using regular carries from Samuel, who had generated 42 RYOE on 24 carries. If they use McCaffrey as something close to their every-down back, they’ll be returning Samuel to a role where he’s strictly a wide receiver, which is less valuable than the role Samuel was in before 2021.
It’s likely that we’ll see the 49ers mix and match backs and retain a role for Samuel and Wilson in the offense, but that they’ll use McCaffrey more than they used Wilson as their primary back. There’s nothing wrong with doing so, but it makes the trade harder to justify if he’s touching the ball 12-16 times per game than it would if he was expecting to take 20-24 touches.
During that run in 2018-19, McCaffrey was nearly an every-down presence for the Panthers, playing more than 90% of the offensive snaps in both campaigns. To put that into context, across those two seasons, he played 1,928 offensive snaps. The only other back within 350 snaps of the second-generation back was Ezekiel Elliott, who racked up 1,745 snaps for the Cowboys.
Between the two subsequent seasons of 2020 and 2021, Elliott was the only back to top 1,400 offensive snaps, and Chicago’s David Montgomery the only other one with more than 1,300 snaps. McCaffrey’s workload in terms of snap count was an enormous outlier at the time and only looks even more preposterous with a few years of context. And yet, at the same time, he was playing 85% of the offensive snaps for Carolina before the trade.
It’s impossible to attribute injuries solely to workload — and we know that backs who have smaller workloads can also get injured — but I have to imagine McCaffrey’s best chance of staying healthy for an entire season is playing less often on a week-to-week basis. Shanahan has been forced to rotate backs in and out of the lineup because of injury, but we’ve seen him create opportunities for multiple players on his roster. It’s clear Wilson should still figure into the offense. The Niners brought back Tevin Coleman off the street and gave him meaningful snaps in October. They used a third-round pick on Tyrion Davis-Price and should get back Elijah Mitchell, who was their lead back for most of 2021, from injured reserve later this season.
Even if McCaffrey is the primary back, I’d expect this to be a rotation where plenty of guys get touches. This leads to the next question …
Why does Shanahan keep investing in running backs?
I said I would answer the questions, but I didn’t say the answers would all be satisfying. I don’t know why Shanahan insists on making expensive additions at the position. Going back to his father Mike’s time in Denver, the Shanahan offense has been creating valuable backs out of mid-to-late-round picks and undrafted free agents for 25 years. That list includes Terrell Davis, Mike Anderson, Arian Foster and Devonta Freeman.
Even more notably, we’ve seen this effect during Shanahan’s time as the coach in San Francisco. In 2018, the 49ers signed Jerick McKinnon to a massive, over-market deal in free agency, only for the former Vikings back to lose two seasons to knee injuries before struggling after his return. Coleman, signed to a smaller deal the next year, averaged 3.5 yards per carry during his first stint with the team.
I don’t think we can blame Shanahan for the injuries, of course, but his priority draft picks at the position have been fiascoes. The 49ers traded up in 2017 for fourth-rounder Joe Williams, who never played an NFL snap. They used a third-round pick in 2021 on Trey Sermon, who immediately landed in Shanahan’s doghouse and was dumped after one season. Davis-Price, their 2022 third-rounder, doesn’t have a path to playing time with McCaffrey in the fold.
Over that time frame, Shanahan’s most productive backs all have been acquired on the cheap. Matt Breida was an undrafted free agent. Raheem Mostert was signed off the Chicago practice squad as a special-teamer before Shanahan arrived. Wilson was an undrafted free agent. Mitchell was a sixth-round pick. Even without those 25 years of preceding evidence, if you look at what has actually worked for the 49ers on the field, it’s been the backs who were afterthoughts with something to prove.
This often gets used to suggest running backs are all interchangeable and that teams can plug in anybody and succeed in a Shanahan-style offense. That isn’t fair. What I would say, though, is that there are more good running backs in and around the league than there are opportunities for running backs to get touches.
I think it’s clear that McCaffrey offers a level of receiving aptitude that other backs on San Francisco’s roster simply do not have. I would also argue there are backs who can catch passes available in free agency or on the bottom half of rosters who could also have been acquired for far cheaper and still offered passing-game help. Devontae Booker, who was solid for the Giants last season, is out of the league. Ameer Abdullah, Antonio Gibson and Cam Akers can catch the ball and wouldn’t cost much to acquire, while Duke Johnson is on the Buffalo practice squad.
McCaffrey is better than all of those guys, of course, but is he that much better to justify the four picks the 49ers paid to acquire him? And can the Niners afford to have him on their roster in 2023? The answer might depend on whether they perceive McCaffrey as a running back at all.
What could happen with McCaffrey after the season?
The 49ers had only a few million dollars in cap space when they made this deal, but it was easy to get a trade done and fit McCaffrey under their 2022 salary cap. That’s because the Panthers restructured several deals in March to create short-term cap space, when they were attempting to trade for quarterback Deshaun Watson.
One of the deals they restructured belonged to McCaffrey, who had $7.4 million of his base salary converted into a bonus. He got his money up front, while the Panthers spread the bonus over four years for cap purposes. As a result, he had only a little over $1 million in base salary on his deal in 2022, and with the Panthers paying out the first six weeks of the deal, San Francisco only is on the hook for $690,000 this year.
Next year, that changes. McCaffrey has no guaranteed money left on his contract, but he’s owed $12 million in 2023, $12 million in 2024 and $12.2 million in 2025. After two years of injuries, it’s safe to say he wouldn’t get that much on the open market if he hit free agency. With the 2023 free agent running back class set to include Saquon Barkley, Josh Jacobs, Kareem Hunt, David Montgomery, Miles Sanders and others, it’s unlikely McCaffrey would be in position to get more than $6-7 million per year on a new deal.
The 49ers have flexibility, but they’re left in an awkward position. They’re projected to have about $6 million in cap space with McCaffrey on the books, but that’s without new deals for Garoppolo, safety Jimmie Ward, tackle Mike McGlinchey, kicker Robbie Gould and several other key players, let alone making additions elsewhere. General manager John Lynch might choose to let some of these veterans move on, but they also need cap space to go after replacements.
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Field Yates breaks down why he still has Christian McCaffrey as a top-five fantasy running after a solid 49ers debut.
If McCaffrey looks like a superstar, they’ll happily pay the $12 million and go year-by-year. If he falls anywhere short of that standard, San Francisco would probably want to get him down on a reduced salary, which won’t be a fun negotiation. His representation will know the 49ers won’t want to lose a player months after trading four draft picks to acquire him. The Niners will know he will get less money on the open market and wait for him to change his mind.
Sometimes, this works out in a deal that fits both sides, as it did with Garoppolo and the 49ers this offseason. Stuck in a staring contest while Garoppolo recovered from shoulder surgery and the trade market cratered, the two sides agreed on a pay cut in August that offered Garoppolo the upside to make significant money if he regained his starting job, as he eventually did because of Lance’s injury. With McCaffrey’s long-standing relationship with the Shanahan family dating back to Denver and the possibility of staying out in the Bay Area, it’s possible he will be amenable to a renegotiation. It’s also possible — maybe even likely — that this is a one-and-done deal.
One way to make the financial math work for the 49ers comes to mind. I’ve talked about how significant and valuable McCaffrey’s role is in the passing game. What if the 49ers see him primarily as a receiver as opposed to a running back? They used him more as a traditional back Sunday, but it’s easier to give him those initial touches before he learns the playbook as a runner as opposed to taking snaps as a receiver. I don’t think he will be taking 80% of his touches as a runner for the majority of his time in San Francisco.
In the market for running backs, McCaffrey’s $12 million salary would make him one of the league’s highest-paid backs. As a receiver, though, that’s midtier money. Three years and $36 million is in line what Corey Davis and Curtis Samuel got paid in free agency before the 2021 season, and it wouldn’t even have as many guarantees. If McCaffrey is going to be targeted seven times per game and continues to be as efficient in the passing game, you could make the case he should be treated like a receiver, regardless of what he contributes as a runner.
Even if that happens, can Shanahan afford to pay McCaffrey that much? Samuel’s cap hit is only $8.7 million next year, but that jumps to $28.6 million in 2024. Offensive tackle Trent Williams has the largest contract for an offensive lineman in league history. Kittle is making $15 million per year. Edge rusher Nick Bosa is in his fifth-year option next season and should get a massive new deal, although the Niners will also probably reduce his $17.9 million cap hit as part of that extension. Wideout Brandon Aiyuk is eligible for an extension and a significant raise next offseason. The 49ers can probably squeeze it in if they want to keep McCaffrey, but it’s cash and cap space that could be applied to more vulnerable spots on their roster.
There’s another team that seemed to ignore the cap, added key players last year and won the Super Bowl. Let’s discuss the 49ers’ NFC West rivals …
Aren’t the 49ers just doing what the Rams did?
No. On the most basic level, the Rams added veterans to their roster last year and have traded draft picks for players, both last season and during their run in the Sean McVay era. This isn’t the same sort of deal for the 49ers. We could do a whole other article on the Rams and how they’ve used draft picks to trade for players, but there are a few key differences between what L.A. did and what the 49ers are doing.
For one, some of the additions the Rams have made haven’t been trades at all. Los Angeles signed receiver Odell Beckham Jr. and safety Eric Waddle as free agents last season for the veterans minimum, without having to give up any draft picks.
When the Rams have packaged first- or second-round picks, it always has been to acquire players who play premium positions by the NFL’s salary structure. Those deals have been to go after quarterbacks (Matthew Stafford and, before McVay arrived, Jared Goff), wide receivers (Brandin Cooks and Sammy Watkins), edge rusher (Von Miller) and cornerbacks (Marcus Peters and Jalen Ramsey).
Those are four of the five most valuable positions. All of those players besides Miller and Stafford were acquired while they were on rookie deals, which reduced the financial exposure and made it likely they were acquiring players entering the prime of their respective careers.
Running back is 10th out of the league’s 14 broad positional definitions when it comes to contract value for its top 15 players, ahead of only centers, tight ends, kickers and punters. McCaffrey is in his sixth season in the league and already has nearly 1,300 pro touches under his belt. Given what we know about running back aging curves, it’s more likely he is closer to the end of his career than he is to its beginning.
The Rams also have been in position to get compensatory picks when Watkins, Miller and Beckham left after their contracts expired, although the Miller pick was canceled out by the Allen Robinson signing, and Beckham’s injury prevented the Rams from realizing any sort of compensatory return when he didn’t sign a deal in free agency. As much as the Rams have playfully adopted the mantra of doing something very inappropriate to draft picks, they often stockpile midround selections and use them to supplement their roster.
During McVay’s time with the team, the Rams have had between eight and 11 draft picks in each of their six drafts. After trading away their first-rounder in the Lance deal and their second-, third-, and fourth-round picks for McCaffrey, the 49ers project to have seven picks in next year’s draft, just two of which will come before Round 5. That’s far less draft capital than what the Rams have worked with in the past.
San Francisco will still have two third-round picks by virtue of the compensatory selections they received when assistant coaches Robert Saleh and Mike McDaniel were hired by other teams. I’ve seen it suggested the extra picks mean the 49ers can somehow better afford making this sort of deal because they have extra ammunition in the draft, which doesn’t add up. As former NFL executive Joe Banner once put it, “Once the house money is in your pocket, it’s no longer house money.”
When a team makes a trade like this by giving up unknown draft picks for a player, it’s often too easy to ignore the other effects of the deal. By acquiring McCaffrey, the 49ers are incurring the opportunity cost of possibly paying him $12 million in cap and cash in 2023, which is money that could go to a player at another position.
More notably, by trading away three draft picks, they are missing out on low-cost additions who could supplement their roster at a fraction of their actual market value. A year ago, the Niners got an All-Pro season from Samuel, a second-rounder who was making just $1.1 million. This season, they have seen fifth-rounder Talanoa Hufanga break out at safety while making a mere $825,000. When a team trades away those picks, it misses out on the opportunity to find bargains for three-plus years and then either has to spend more money in free agency to grab replacements and/or use lesser players to fill those roles.
play
1:49
Sam Acho and Ryan Clark discuss how acquiring Christian McCaffrey from the Panthers improves the 49ers’ Super Bowl chances.
Different teams have different ideas of what draft picks are worth, but even if the 49ers just pay McCaffrey the minimum this year and get him to take a pay cut next season, they’re incurring a significant cost by trading away second-, third-, fourth-round picks in 2023. By Chase Stuart’s chart, even if the 49ers finish with the 24th pick in each round, trading those picks is the equivalent of shipping off the 12th overall pick in a typical draft. My estimate based on trades is that those picks would probably be worth about $15-20 million or so if they could deal them for cash.
Even if they wanted to add veterans right now, the Niners could have used those picks to trade for help along their offensive line or bring in a cornerback. They could have traded for an actual wide receiver as opposed to McCaffrey. Would this have been a better deal to make for Pittsburgh’s Chase Claypool? Would the 49ers have been better off with Gibson and William Jackson while likely paying less in draft capital to land the two Commanders? McCaffrey is going to have to be a difference-maker in 2022 to make this worth their while.
Having said that this isn’t really a Rams style of deal, it’s worth noting the closest bidder to the 49ers in these negotiations was reportedly … the Rams, who wanted to add him to replace Cam Akers. I would have these same questions if the Rams made this deal, but I also think they needed a back more than the 49ers, given Akers’ struggles and the presence of Wilson on the San Francisco roster.
About those picks, though …
Could this trade tell us something about another deal to come?
The McCaffrey deal got me thinking about Lance and his future with the team. The reports during Lance’s second training camp were mixed at best, and while he played only five quarters before going down injured, he didn’t look great in the rain at Chicago. We still don’t have enough public information to make any sort of meaningful inferences about Lance’s abilities as a quarterback, but the 49ers have far more reps and private information on which to base their opinion after evaluating him in practice over the past two seasons.
On one hand, trading for McCaffrey makes more sense if Lance is the quarterback, given that he’ll be relatively cheap in 2023 and possibly still in 2024. Lance’s fifth-year option doesn’t come due until 2025, meaning the 49ers can easier surround him with plenty of expensive talent next season, even given the other contracts they have to complete this upcoming offseason.
On the other, one way to get back draft capital back is to trade Lance. If the 49ers think he isn’t the quarterback they believed they were getting in 2021, the haul they sent away to acquire him is a sunk cost. There would still be teams interested in acquiring Lance to be their quarterback of the future, even if he struggled with the 49ers.
In this scenario, which would probably require a deep playoff run and excellent work on the offense, the Niners would re-sign Garoppolo to an extension this offseason. Lance still probably would net a late first-round pick or early second-round pick in return. I will admit the trade I keep coming back to — given Atlanta’s desire to run the ball and Shanahan’s stockpiling of positionless playmakers — is a swap of Lance for tight end Kyle Pitts. I’m not sure that solves the draft capital problem, but it’s fun to argue about.
This is more of a hypothetical than anything else, and the Niners could use a player such as Aiyuk in trade to replenish their draft capital instead. Either way, given how much they’ve shipped off, it’s important for the 49ers to try to get an additional draft pick or two this offseason.
Was this a fair price to pay for the 49ers?
ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler reported last week that the Panthers were asking for a “first-round pick or more” in return for their star back. In the end, the 49ers didn’t have a first-round pick to send the Panthers in 2023, so the deal had to be for the second-, third-, and fourth-round picks. Those selections add up to a first-rounder by most draft charts, so the Panthers ended up getting something close to their initial requests.
Was that too much to pay? Given McCaffrey’s injury history, the time it will take to get him up to full swing on the offense and the uncertainty surrounding what will happen to him in 2023, this would be on the exorbitant end. This is more than the Rams paid for Miller last year (second- and third-rounders), and that was with the Broncos paying down his contract to do the deal. Miller was older and had his own injury issues in the past, but he played a premium position and was likely to yield a compensatory pick.
The most like-for-like comparison stylistically might be Marshall Faulk. Amid a contract dispute in 1999, the Colts sent the 26-year-old Faulk to the Rams for second- and fifth-round picks. The Rams won that deal, as Faulk won three consecutive Offensive Player of the Year awards after arriving in St. Louis and took home league MVP in 2000. Moving to the Greatest Show on Turf, his receiving volume and rushing efficiency spiked.
At the same time, Faulk might not be a great comparison for McCaffrey’s overall value. The Colts dealt Faulk in the offseason, giving the future Hall of Famer an entire offseason to learn the playbook. Faulk didn’t have a significant injury history, missing just three games during his first five seasons. He was coming off a season in which he had made the Pro Bowl, been second-team All-Pro and finished fourth in the Offensive Player of the Year balloting. Faulk was also playing in an era in which backs were regarded as scarcer and more valuable than they are now, and when teams ran the ball more often in neutral situations.
A second-round pick probably would have been about as much as I would have been willing to give to get this deal done. Third-, fourth- and fifth-round picks might not seem like much, but sometimes, those picks turn into stars. The path for this deal to be a success is too narrow given all the factors involved. The Niners would have lost McCaffrey to the Rams or another team in that scenario, but getting the most prominent player available doesn’t always guarantee success. The Rams eventually won a Super Bowl with Ramsey, but when they traded two first-round picks for him in 2019, they dumped Peters for peanuts and eventually missed the postseason.
Naturally, the Rams’ success likely has raised the price of veteran players in the trade market during the season. If the Miller deal didn’t lead to a Super Bowl last season, maybe this trade gets done for a second-round pick and a fifth-rounder, like the Faulk swap. We’ll see if that holds up as more veterans move between now and the trade deadline on Nov. 1.
Should the 49ers have gone all-in for McCaffrey?
All-in is a relative term, but the 49ers traded away most of the assets they had available this offseason. Most of their core players are on deals that would be difficult to trade, and they can’t deal Lance until the offseason. Unless they were willing to give up significant draft capital just to keep McCaffrey from the Rams, this is a deal Shanahan and Lynch made to try to win this season.
While I did pick the 49ers to make it to the Super Bowl before the season, it’s a little weird to see them making that move now. They were 3-3 when they acquired McCaffrey and are now 3-4. ESPN’s Football Power Index (FPI) loves them, projecting them to have a 63.4% of winning the NFC West before losing to the Chiefs. Now, FPI has dropped them to 52%. When the Rams traded for Miller last season, they were 7-1 and virtual locks to make it to the postseason, although they were in a divisional race with the Cardinals.
Then again, when the Rams made that trade a year ago, the Niners were 3-4, too. They proceeded to sneak into the playoffs by beating the Rams in Week 18 and then came within a drive of beating L.A. again and advancing back to the Super Bowl. The NFC looked like a wide-open mess before Sunday, and the conference looks even more wild after the Buccaneers and Packers lost. Being 3-4 isn’t down and out in a conference where just five of 16 teams have a winning record.
I wouldn’t have made this deal, but selfishly, I’m happy the Niners decided to do it for one reason: It’s fun. Lynch and Shanahan run their roster like people who really wants to see what Shanahan would do with an exciting offensive playmaker, and while that isn’t always the best thing for the organization, it makes for fun tape. Outside of fantasy football considerations, there was no point in having McCaffrey rack up garbage-time targets for a Panthers team heading nowhere. I’m not sure the 49ers will look back and love this trade, but it’s likely we’ll end up seeing very entertaining moments with McCaffrey wearing red and gold.
Starting Friday, the Houston Astros and Philadelphia Phillies will clash for the Commissioner’s Trophy in a meeting of one league’s favorite and the other league’s biggest underdog.
Under MLB’s new playoff format, the Phillies entered as the sixth and final seed in the National League but advanced all the way to the Fall Classic, while the American League’s No. 1 seed, the Astros, rolled over the rest of the Junior Circuit.
What has October taught us about each of these teams? What do they need to do to come out on top? And which players could be the difference-makers on both sides? ESPN MLB experts Jeff Passan, Joon Lee, Jesse Rogers and David Schoenfield break it down.
What’s the most impressive thing about the Astros this postseason?
Passan:Everything is a thing, right? Fine. If a single thing defines the Astros, it’s their pitching depth. They have Justin Verlander and Framber Valdez, both frontline starters, at the top of their rotation. They follow with Cristian Javier and Lance McCullers Jr., each of whom would be a frontline starter on most teams. As good as their starting pitching is, the sheer amount of relief talent in their bullpen — from closer Ryan Pressly to Rafael Montero to Ryne Stanek to Bryan Abreu to Hector Neris to Hunter Brown — makes any lead feel comfortable. The Astros are excellent at everything, but their pitching is why they remain undefeated this postseason.
Lee: The depth across Houston’s roster. If you had told the Yankees heading into the American League Championship Series that through three games, Yordan Alvarez and Jose Altuve would have just one hit apiece, New York would have been ecstatic. Instead, the rest of the Astros have led the way, from Yuli Gurriel to Alex Bregman to Chas McCormick to Jeremy Pena to Martin Maldonado. This Houston team can beat you in so many different ways, from its incredibly deep pitching staff to its lineup, which can knock you out with the long ball or beat you into the ground with singles and doubles. On top of that, it’s the consistency. Depth and consistency usually play well in October, and Houston has proved that against both the Mariners, in the AL Division Series, and the Yankees.
Why will it (or won’t it) work against the Phillies in the World Series?
Passan: Certainly the Phillies’ lineup, the way it’s hitting right now, poses a greater challenge than the Mariners or Yankees did for Houston. But as long as Dusty Baker manages with proper urgency and uses his bullpen as he can — mix and match and do not allow Kyle Schwarber, Rhys Hoskins, J.T. Realmuto and Bryce Harper third looks unless the starter is truly cruising — Houston has the goods to neutralize Philadelphia’s offense similarly to how it did Seattle’s and New York’s.
Lee: The Astros are the better team on paper, but being underdogs hasn’t stopped the Phillies so far in the postseason, after coming in as a third-place team from the NL East and beating the Cardinals, Braves and Padres on their path to the World Series. There’s also something to be said about that October magic, and getting hot at the right time. We’ve seen this run out for teams in the past, but Philadelphia has taken a cue from last year’s Braves and gotten scorching hot when it counts the most. Harper’s go-ahead homer in the National League Championship Series clincher was a sports moment too on-the-nose for the movies, but it felt written in the stars by the baseball gods.
Who is the one player who must deliver for the Astros to be champs from here?
Passan: Considering the Astros have gotten to the World Series with him practically nonexistent, perhaps Jose Altuve is a foolish answer. But to derail a hot and confident Phillies team, Houston needs production from the top of its order, and an Astros lineup with Altuve getting on base takes an engine that’s already spitting out plenty of horses and turbocharges it.
Lee: Pena has been Houston’s X factor so far in October. When Altuve and Alvarez have struggled, the previously unheralded rookie has come through and been a star for the Astros. If Altuve and Alvarez continue to struggle, guys like Pena, McCormick, Trey Mancini and Gurriel will need to help carry Houston to a World Series title.
What’s the most impressive thing about the Phillies this postseason?
Rogers: They instantly became the team everyone in the organization thought they could be, one with great starting pitching and massive power — enough in both areas to overcome any defensive flaws or bullpen unevenness. Harper, Schwarber and Hoskins aren’t missing mistakes and are playing with the most confidence they’ve had all year.
Schoenfield: The stars are hot — not just the sluggers, but also Zack Wheeler, who has a 1.78 ERA in his four starts. He could start Game 1 on full rest, but it might make sense for the Phillies to go with Aaron Nola and then Wheeler in Game 2 given that Wheeler started to tire around the 80-pitch mark in both of his starts against the Padres. An extra day of rest might help. But let’s mention something else: The Phillies’ bullpen has kind of figured things out a little bit, and manager Rob Thomson has done a great job adjusting on the fly and going with the hot hand. Seranthony Dominguez has allowed just one run in 7 2/3 postseason innings with 15 strikeouts and no walks — and that one run was in part a result of the wet conditions on Sunday. Jose Alvarado is throwing heat from the left side, and David Robertson has plenty of postseason experience. Thomson was even willing to use starter Ranger Suarez to close out Game 5 of the NLCS.
Why will it (or won’t it) work against the Astros in the World Series?
Rogers: The Phillies’ mojo will keep the Astros from winning in a short series, but eventually all that pitching will win out for them. The longer it goes, the better it is for Houston, as Philadelphia can’t match the Astros arm for arm. A best-of-seven usually isn’t won at the plate but on the mound. That’s where Houston prevails.
Schoenfield: The bullpen depth is still a little questionable — although Connor Brogdon had a clutch seven-out effort against the Padres in Game 4 and Andrew Bellatti has pitched well enough in his five appearances and could be a good matchup against Houston’s righty-heavy lineup (he allowed a .608 OPS against righties, but .866 to lefties). But what if Brad Hand has to face the Alvarez/Bregman/Kyle Tucker part of the order? And Thomson has been careful in his usage with Dominguez, who is in his first full season back from Tommy John surgery. He pitched just 11 times on back-to-back days in the regular season and has had days off between all six of his postseason appearances — at least two days in five of those. At some point, he’s going to have to go back-to-back days and maybe for a longer stretch of pitches.
Who is the one player who must deliver for the Phillies to be champs from here?
Rogers: It might be cliché to pick Harper, but he’s the guy. The Phillies’ heartbeat runs through him. They’ll be underdogs, deservingly, and they’ll need an extra special series to beat Houston. Who better to energize them once again than Bryce Harper? He’s already having a great postseason. As he goes, so goes the Phillies’ offense, which could shock the world by getting to a dominant Astros staff. It starts with Harper.
Schoenfield: I’m banking on another big series from Harper, but my key guy is Nola. Wheeler has the potential to dominate in his outings. The Astros are going to have the starting pitching edge in the games Suarez or Bailey Falter (or Noah Syndergaard) starts. Nola had two great postseason starts — 6 2/3 scoreless innings against the Cardinals and then one unearned run against the Braves. Against the Padres, however, he had a 4-0 lead but allowed back-to-back home runs in the second and then four runs in the fifth. Nola is also extra vital because if he can go deep, that means more fresh arms for the Suarez and No. 4 starter games. Oh, one reason to start Nola in Game 2 instead of Game 1: He had a 3.84 ERA in the regular season on four days of rest (14 starts), but 2.79 on five days (13 starts). If he starts Game 1, he would go again in Game 5 on four days of rest, but if he goes in Games 2 and 6, he gets five days of rest. The Phillies have an interesting decision on how to align their rotation.
Our NFL Nation reporters react with the biggest takeaways and lingering questions coming out of this week’s matchups and look ahead to what’s next. Let’s get to it.
What to know:Tua Tagovailoa is back, but he has some rust to knock off before this offense can truly say the same. The Dolphins led the NFL in points per drive through three weeks to start the season, and displayed that same efficiency with a touchdown and two field goals in their first three drives Sunday night. Their offense sputtered from there, and Tagovailoa played like someone who hasn’t played in 24 days. At least four of his passes were dropped by Steelers defenders, and his timing with his receivers was hit or miss throughout the final three quarters. It’s nothing to be overly concerned about — although you have to wonder whether Mike McDaniel will remind him to slide after he finished a couple of runs by lowering his shoulder into a defender. The Lions’ NFL-worst defense seems like an opportune opponent in Week 8.
Will the Dolphins’ pass rush please stand up? The Dolphins have generated the fourth-fewest quarterback pressures in the NFL through 7 weeks — despite owning the NFL’s fifth-best pass rush win rate. Even more concerning is the fact that Miami blitzes at the 10th-highest rate in the league yet ranks 24th in sack rate. Defense is complementary, meaning coverage and rush help one another. But with the injuries the Dolphins’ secondary is facing, their pass rush will have to carry more of the load until their counterparts get healthy. Their nine blitzes Sunday night generated just one pressure — that simply won’t cut it moving forward. — Marcel Louis-Jacques
Next game: at Lions (Sunday, 1 p.m. ET)
Steelers
What to know: After surrendering a big first quarter, the Steelers’ defense dampened Tua Tagovailoa‘s return on Sunday night. The defensive backs just barely missed four would-be picks, and after giving up 13 points in the first quarter, the Steelers held the Dolphins to just three points over the final three — including a shutout in the second half. The defense gave up big plays in spots to Jaylen Waddle and Tyreek Hill, but in the second half, the Steelers held the Dolphins on fourth-and-3 and forced four consecutive punts — including two three-and-outs. While the offense struggled, the defense played soundly in the second half, giving up only 127 yards after surrendering 246 in the first half. It’s the second strong performance — including crucial halftime adjustments — by the defense after beating Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers a week earlier. With T.J. Watt nearing his return from a Week 1 pectoral tear, the Steelers’ defense is shaping up to be a much stronger unit than it looked in the first month of the season.
Can the Steelers’ offense find consistency? Rookie quarterback Kenny Pickett was inserted at halftime of the Jets game to give the Steelers’ offense a spark. In two starts since, the offense flickers like the flame of a lighter running out of butane. Occasionally, everything clicks — like the second-quarter drive in which George Pickens hauled in four targets and scored his first NFL touchdown. But other times, it quickly fizzles out, like the two would-be game-winning fourth-quarter drives that ended instead with red zone picks. Pickett’s offense is undeniably a work-in-progress, but the Steelers have struggled to sustain drives more often than not with conservative playcalls and costly, untimely mistakes, and playmakers like Pickens disappear for long stretches. The pieces are there, but the Steelers haven’t been able to consistently put them together. More time together could help the offensive cohesion, but partly because of the midseason quarterback swap, it has been a slow-developing process. — Brooke Pryor
Next game: at Eagles (Sunday, 1 p.m. ET)
Seahawks
What to know: With an offense that’s still rolling and a defense that has finally caught up, the Seahawks look like legitimate contenders, but DK Metcalf‘s knee injury is a cause for concern. The Seahawks are now in sole possession of first place in the NFC West at 4-3 after a complete performance in their win over the Chargers. Their offense got another efficient outing from quarterback Geno Smith and a pair of rushing touchdowns from rookie running back Kenneth Walker III, including a 74-yarder. With three sacks and two takeaways, their defense looks like it has turned itself around after another miserable start.
Can the offense keep this up if Metcalf misses time? Metcalf was carted off the field in the first half and quickly ruled out. The Seahawks have the luxury of essentially having two No. 1 receivers in Metcalf and Tyler Lockett, but Metcalf makes so many things happen with his ability to make contested catches, stretch defenses and free up teammates by taking up double-teams. Marquise Goodwin stepped up in this game with a pair of touchdown catches. Seattle will need Dee Eskridge to do the same if Metcalf’s injury is serious. — Brady Henderson
Next game: vs. Giants (Sunday, 4:25 p.m. ET)
Chargers
What to know: The Chargers managed a couple of ugly wins in a three-game win streak but failed to show up Sunday and suffered one very ugly loss to the Seahawks. Squandering an opportunity to improve to 5-2 and earn their first four-game win streak since 2018, they instead drop to 4-3 and go into a bye week with an urgent need to do some soul searching in regard to who they are and where they want to go.
How do the Chargers manage their injuries? It has been a season marked by injuries, and now they can add two more significant questions after cornerback J.C. Jackson left the field on a cart because of a right knee injury and wide receiver Mike Williams suffered a right ankle injury. — Lindsey Thiry
Next game: at Falcons (Sunday, Nov. 6, 1 p.m. ET)
Jets
What to know: The Jets are 5-2 for the first time since 2010, their last playoff season, and have adopted the same style of play: fantastic defense, low-mistake offense. It’s not pretty, but it’s working for the Jets. They had no turnovers for the third straight game — they hadn’t done that since 2010 — letting their defense win the field-position game. They frustrated Denver backup QB Brett Rypien with excellent pass coverage, highlighted by a Lamarcus Joyner interception and three pass breakups by Sauce Gardner. Say this for the Jets: They now boast a 4-0 road record. They haven’t done that since … you guessed it, 2010.
Can the Jets’ offense manage without Breece Hall? This was a costly game for the Jets, as they lost rookie standout running back Hall to a knee injury in the second quarter. It would be devastating if it’s a long-term injury. Hall, who scored on a 62-yard touchdown run, is the face of the offense. He helps take the pressure off quarterback Zach Wilson, who struggled for the second week in a row. Michael Carter is a solid RB2, but he doesn’t have Hall’s home run speed. — Rich Cimini
Next game: vs. Patriots (Sunday, 1 p.m. ET)
Broncos
What to know: There was optimism in recent days the Broncos could find their rhythm on offense with backup quarterback Brett Rypien in the lineup. File that away because the Broncos had their sixth game of the season with 16 or fewer points and their third with 11 or fewer. Despite Denver’s defense keeping the Jets to under 300 yards, it didn’t matter.
What can the Broncos’ offense do to find some points? The Broncos were better Sunday when they bulked up on offense — formations with two or three tight ends and two backs. They moved the ball better Sunday when they were in those groupings and lost their way, again, when they got in catch-up mode and leaned on their three-wide receiver sets. They simply have to accept that they can’t play how they want to right now and have to play the way they need to. — Jeff Legwold
Next game: at Jaguars (Sunday, 9:30 a.m. ET)
Chiefs
What to know: There is life in the Chiefs’ pass rush beyond defensive tackle Chris Jones, after all. The Chiefs started slowly with their pressure against 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo but got their rush going, and it was productive — particularly in key moments of the game. Their defense will be difficult to deal with if they can continue this kind of pressure.
Can the Chiefs afford to continue using rookie Skyy Moore to return punts? No Super Bowl contender could afford to do that. Moore is learning on the job. He didn’t return punts in college and had his second fumbled return of the season against the 49ers. The first one helped the Chiefs lose a game against the Colts in Week 3. This one didn’t, but the Chiefs need to give him some time to learn his new craft on the practice field instead of in game action. — Adam Teicher
Next game: vs. Titans (Sunday, Nov. 6, 8:20 p.m. ET)
49ers
What to know: Much was made of the 49ers’ addition of running back Christian McCaffrey, but general manager John Lynch warned last week that McCaffrey isn’t a magic cure for what ails the Niners. That was readily apparent Sunday, as the defense got torched by Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes and the offense failed to keep up, settling for field goals when touchdowns were needed. McCaffrey can and will help, but at 3-4, the Niners are going to need plenty of improvement elsewhere.
What’s wrong with the 49ers’ defense? The Niners’ defense has come crashing back to Earth. That was to be expected as the opponents got better and injuries piled up, but Sunday was a rude awakening. The Niners had Kansas City in third-and-20 and third-and-12 in the second half with a chance to get off the field. They gave up a combined 91 yards on those two plays. Injuries aside, there’s enough talent here to prevent those types of things from happening. — Nick Wagoner
Next game: at Rams (Sunday, 4:25 p.m. ET)
Raiders
What to know: The Raiders are ready to go on a post-bye run. While they were 1-4 coming into Sunday, just 3-16 after the bye since 2003 and had lost their past five such games by an average of 17.8 points, their talent suggested they were better. Much better. And after beating Houston, the schedule lightens up considerably, with none of their next five opponents boasting a winning record entering this weekend. In fact, ESPN’s Football Power Index favors Las Vegas to win nine of its last 11 games.
Is Josh Jacobs the Raiders’ MVP? Yes. Jacobs, who had his fifth-year option declined by the new regime, is playing for a contract. Davante Adams might be more explosive, and Derek Carr is at the controls. But Jacobs — who became the first player in franchise history with three straight games of 100 rushing yards and a rushing TD and joined Marcus Allen with his fifth career game gaining 100 rushing yards and scoring multiple TDs — kept the offense afloat again. He finished with 143 yards and three TDs on 20 carries, becoming just the third back in franchise history with multiple games with three rushing touchdowns, along with Allen and Pete Banaszak. — Paul Gutierrez
Next game: at Saints (Sunday, 1 p.m. ET)
Texans
What to know: Quarterback Davis Mills played his best game of the season. Prior to the bye, Mills looked shaky, completing 62.7% of his passes for five touchdown passes with four interceptions. But against the Raiders, he was much better. He completed 68% of his passes, threw two touchdown passes and logged a season-high 302 yards. Mills was also money on third downs, throwing both of his TD passes on that down. However, he did throw a pick-six late in the fourth quarter, which blew the game open.
What’s going on with the Texans’ run defense? The Texans have allowed the third-most rushing yards in the NFL (989), and their issues stopping the run cost them a potential win in a game they led 20-17 early in the fourth quarter. Jacobs rushed for 143 yards and three touchdowns, two coming in the fourth quarter, against the Texans as Houston’s run woes looked eerily similar to the Week 3 loss to the Bears, when it allowed 281 rushing yards. The Texans have to figure things out — fast. — DJ Bien-Aime
Next game: vs. Titans (Sunday, 4:05 p.m. ET)
Panthers
What to know: The rest of the NFL might have declared the Panthers (2-5) in tank mode after they traded star running back Christian McCaffrey to the San Francisco 49ers on Thursday, but interim coach Steve Wilks and his players aren’t going there, as they promised all week. They put together their most complete game of the season, finally getting enough offense to back yet another solid defensive performance. They showed they still have the fight to remain in the race for the NFC South, moving within a game of Tampa Bay (3-4) and Atlanta (3-4) with the Falcons next on the schedule. And quarterback PJ Walker showed he should remain the starter even when Baker Mayfield and Sam Darnold return from ankle injuries. And, oh, that McCaffrey fellow. The Panthers got almost 200 yards rushing out of their new duo of D’Onta Foreman and Chuba Hubbard.
Should PJ Walker remain the starter next week against Atlanta even if Baker Mayfield is ready to return from an ankle injury? Absolutely. Walker was allowed to do what he does best on Sunday in terms of getting the ball downfield, and he responded with two touchdowns on an efficient 16-of-22 passing. He’s now 3-1 as an NFL starter, 1-1 this season. Mayfield won’t like it, but this might signal the end for him at Carolina. It felt like it was the end even before today, given the league-low numbers Mayfield was putting up. — David Newton
Next game: at Falcons (Sunday, 1 p.m. ET)
Buccaneers
What to know: For the second week in a row, Tom Brady and the Bucs were favored by 9.5 points, and once again, they stunk it up, this time against a team that fired its head coach and recently traded away two offensive stars. The Bucs’ offense looked absolutely dreadful with an abundance of dropped passes, miscues, questionable playcalling and, of course, protection issues, mustering three measly points. Perhaps the only positive: The Falcons lost too, meaning that at 3-4, the Bucs are still tied for first place. But what consolation is that when they’ve now lost four of their past five?
What went wrong this time? More like, what didn’t go wrong? Mike Evans dropped what might have been the most wide-open touchdown pass of his career on the opening drive. The Bucs were stonewalled once again in short yardage with Leonard Fournette going nowhere on third-and-1 and fourth-and-1. And Brady failed to connect with Evans, Chris Godwin and Russell Gage in the end zone on three straight incomplete passes from the 8-yard line. Defensively, they couldn’t stop the run — surrendering 173 yards, including a 60-yarder from D’Onta Foreman. Hosting the Baltimore Ravens in four days, they’ll also now likely be without Antoine Winfield Jr., who left Sunday’s game with a concussion. — Jenna Laine
Next game: vs. Ravens (Thursday, 8:15 p.m. ET)
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0:34
D’Onta Foreman breaks free for a 60-yard run, and Chuba Hubbard runs in a 17-yard touchdown on the next play.
Cowboys
What to know: If there was a doubt — and by now there shouldn’t be — the defense will carry the Cowboys to success. Not even quarterback Dak Prescott’s return after a five-game absence could get the Cowboys’ offense rolling. But the defense came through. Again. After allowing two touchdowns last week versus Philadelphia for the first time this season, the defense did not allow a touchdown against a Lions offense that came in averaging 28 points a game. The defense changed the momentum of the game with five takeaways in the second half that the offense turned into 21 points: a Trevon Diggs‘ interception, an Anthony Barr fumble recovery at the Dallas 1, a Jourdan Lewis interception in the fourth quarter, a Sam Williams‘ sack/fumble and a DeMarcus Lawrence fumble recovery to end the game.
Will the Cowboys ever figure out their third-down woes on offense? If they don’t, they will not be a serious threat. They entered the game converting just 32% of their third-down tries, and things were supposed to be better upon Prescott’s return. They were 3-of-9 on third down. Through three quarters, Prescott was 0-for-1 with two sacks on third down. In the opener against Tampa Bay, he was 3-of-9 with an interception on third down. In the fourth quarter, they were stopped on third-and-1 when the Lions snuffed out a toss play to Tony Pollard. — Todd Archer
Next game: vs. Bears (Sunday, 1 p.m. ET)
Lions
What to know: Turnovers absolutely hurt the Lions in critical moments. Quarterback Jared Goff threw two interceptions — and added two fumbles in the fourth. Also, running back Jamaal Williams fumbled twice — including one at the goal line to start the fourth. Detroit was already facing an uphill battle after losing wide receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown to a concussion during the first quarter. And the Lions were playing without receiver DJ Chark (ankle) — who was recently placed on injured reserve — and running back D’Andre Swift (shoulder/ankle), who has missed the past three games. So those mistakes proved to be costly while Detroit was undermanned.
Will the Lions’ defense improve from this performance moving forward? This season it’s been tough to get the offense and defense on the same page. Entering this game, Detroit’s defense was allowing a league-high 34 points per game, but during the bye, defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn made some changes, notably having No. 2 overall pick Aidan Hutchinson work with both the linebackers and defensive linemen to position him better for success. It worked in Dallas, as he racked up 1.5 sacks. Plus, Texas product Jeff Okudah played inspired football with a career-high 15 total tackles. So, yeah, the Lions certainly can’t do any worse than the first four games, when the defense was horrendous. On a bright note, they allowed a season-low 24 points to the Cowboys — but a loss is a loss. — Eric Woodyard
Next game: vs. Dolphins (Sunday, 1 p.m. ET)
Titans
What to know: The Titans completed a sweep of the Colts to strengthen their lead atop the AFC South. The Titans’ defensive front dominated the trenches, harassing Colts quarterback Matt Ryan for most of the day. Denico Autry continued his revenge tour against his former team with a sack. Bud Dupree and Jeffery Simmons also had sacks. Pressure from Dupree led to two interceptions for the Titans. One of the interceptions was returned 76 yards for a touchdown by safety Andrew Adams. Tennessee has four more games within the division and now has a 4-2 record, thanks to a four-game winning streak.
Can the Titans continue to win games in such an ugly manner? Although it counts as a win, the Titans’ victory wasn’t pretty. Tennessee won primarily on the strength of its defense with two interceptions, including the pick-six by Adams. The Titans don’t deliver many explosive plays, instead relying on long drives to get onto the scoreboard, as evidenced by their 31-minute time of possession on Sunday. Derrick Henry has three 100-yard rushing performances in Tennessee’s four wins. Simply put, this team finds a way to win. However, things will get tough for the Titans over the next five weeks, with matchups against the Chiefs, Packers and Bengals on the docket. — Turron Davenport
Next game: at Texans (Sunday, 4:05 p.m. ET)
Colts
What to know: The Colts thought they had found a viable path on offense with their best showing in Week 6 against Jacksonville. But the heavy passing attack didn’t work as effectively against Tennessee, as the Titans harassed quarterback Matt Ryan throughout and dominated the Colts’ offensive line. Ryan threw two interceptions — including one that was returned for a TD — and now has 12 turnovers for the season. The return of running backs Jonathan Taylor and Nyheim Hines from injuries didn’t change the outcome for the Colts, who are running out of time to salvage their floundering offense.
Can the Colts fix their offense? Against teams that don’t have dominant defensive fronts, the Colts likely have enough firepower to make things tough on opponents. But when they fail to win up front, as they did on Sunday, it’s easier for a defense to neutralize receivers Michael Pittman Jr., Alec Pierce and Parris Campbell. Their problems are fundamental: an offensive line that is playing at an unacceptable level and a quarterback who is shrinking in the face of the resulting pass rush. How do you fix that? — Stephen Holder
Next game: vs. Commanders (Sunday, 4:25 p.m. ET)
Bengals
What to know: Earlier in the week, Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow said a three-game stretch against the Falcons, Browns and Panthers was going to define Cincinnati’s season. It represented three opportunities to bank victories in a tight AFC North race heading into the team’s bye in Week 10. Behind a record-breaking day from Burrow, who became the first player in NFL history to have five games of 400 or more passing yards in his first three seasons, the Bengals started out with a win.
Buy or sell WR Tyler Boyd‘s performance? Buy. Boyd had a career-high 155 receiving yards, with the bulk of that coming in the first quarter. Even with an offense that features Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins, Boyd showed why coach Zac Taylor considers him one of the best slot receivers in the league. — Ben Baby
Next game: at Browns (Monday, Oct. 31, 8:15 p.m. ET)
Falcons
What to know: On an ugly day all around, especially for a defense left short-handed by A.J. Terrell‘s hamstring injury, there might yet be good news for the Falcons: Not many offenses are as explosive as that of the Bengals. And with a stretch that includes games against the Bears, Commanders and Steelers and two against the Panthers coming up, the Falcons have to hope this was a bad matchup instead of a sign of problems to come.
Can Atlanta’s offense sustain when it gets into a hole? Based off what we’ve seen this season, it’s still a bit unclear. But Sunday did not provide much confidence. Trailing by 18 points in the fourth quarter, the Falcons appeared to stay in their same run-based offense. It worked in near comebacks against the Buccaneers and Rams, but against a more explosive offense in Cincinnati, and with the team’s secondary decimated by injury, it didn’t work. This is going to be something to pay attention to going forward but isn’t a huge concern. Yet. — Michael Rothstein
Next game: vs. Panthers (Sunday, 1 p.m. ET)
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Ja’Marr Chase goes 41 yards into the end zone for another Bengals touchdown.
Ravens
What to know: The Ravens still have fourth-quarter issues but finally got some good fortune at the end. It looked like Baltimore was about to give away another double-digit lead after running back Justice Hill fumbled with 3:12 left in the game. But Malik Harrison blocked a potential game-tying 61-yard field goal. Then Ravens safety Geno Stone forced a fumble on the Browns’ final possession as the game ended. The Ravens avoided becoming just the third team in the past decade to lose four times in the first seven weeks in games in which they held double-digit leads.
What’s going on with Lamar Jackson throwing the ball? Defenses have turned up the heat with blitzes, and Jackson has not been sharp or decisive with the ball. On Sunday, he finished with 120 yards passing, the sixth fewest of his five-year career. Two completions — a 31-yard pass to Devin Duvernay and a 19-yard dump-off to fullback Patrick Ricard — accounted for 50 of those yards. Jackson said this week that the Ravens need to stop overthinking and just play. But Baltimore’s issues go deeper than that. Over the past four games, Jackson has thrown three TDs and four INTs. — Jamison Hensley
Next game: at Buccaneers (Thursday, 8:15 p.m. ET)
Browns
What to know: Cleveland played arguably its best game of the season in Baltimore. But too many errors on a potential game-winning drive sank the Browns, giving them their fourth straight loss. An offensive pass interference call on Amari Cooper negated his go-ahead TD reception. Then a false start on a game-tying field goal forced Cade York to attempt a 60-yard try. The kick was blocked, sealing the victory for Baltimore.
Can Cleveland recover from four straight losses? The Browns desperately needed this victory to hang around in the AFC North race. Now, at 2-5 with arguably the league’s toughest remaining schedule, Cleveland’s season is officially on life support. A loss to Cincinnati next week on “Monday Night Football” would effectively be the death knell — before the Browns even reach their midseason bye. — Jake Trotter
Next game: vs. Bengals (Monday, Oct. 31, 8:15 p.m. ET)
Commanders
What to know: Quarterback Taylor Heinicke‘s game won’t win any beauty pageants, but he excels at ignoring the aesthetics and competes. It’s why he can have a brutal start — with a first-half pick-six and numerous ugly incompletions early — and later lead a win. It helped that Washington ran the ball for 167 yards, and receiver Terry McLaurin came through with a big second half with a touchdown catch and key completions on the final drive. But Heinicke’s grit allows him to ignore plays that could ruin other quarterbacks coming off the bench. It’s why Washington has won two in a row.
Has the defense turned it around? The Commanders have benefited from facing struggling offenses the past two games in Chicago and Green Bay. But they have played better largely because of their ability to stop the run; they’ve allowed only 3.67 yards per carry in the past five games — fourth best in the NFL. Also, with cornerback William Jackson III sidelined, they’ve been more consistent in coverage, especially in zone. With Chase Young possibly back within two weeks, the defense could be the reason for a resurgence. — John Keim
Next game: at Colts (Sunday, 4:25 p.m. ET)
Packers
What to know: If the Packers can’t beat the New York Giants, New York Jets and Washington Commanders, imagine what the Buffalo Bills are going to do to them next Sunday in Orchard Park, New York. The Bills have the most explosive offense in the NFL. They lead the league in yards per game and rank second in points. Their defense leads the league in fewest points allowed and ranks second in yards. Oh, yeah, and the Bills were on their bye this weekend and play the Packers at home in a prime-time game. This was supposed to be a get-back-on-track game after two straight losses. Instead, the Packers have their first three-game losing streak since 2018.
Now will the Packers get another receiver? Yes, it’s the same question as last week after the loss to the Jets. The trade deadline is a little more than a week away, and without a significant addition, it’s hard to see how their passing game will improve. The return of Sammy Watkins, who missed four weeks because of a hamstring injury, didn’t immediately help. Aaron Rodgers had not attempted a pass that traveled more than 10 yards in the air until the final two minutes of the first half on Sunday, and when he finally did, Watkins wasn’t fast enough to run under it. It was so far off that flags for pass interference were picked up because the ball was deemed uncatchable. Their fastest receiver, rookie Christian Watson, missed a second straight game because of a hamstring injury. — Rob Demovsky
Next game: at Bills (Sunday, 8:20 p.m. ET)
Giants
What to know: The Giants keep finding ways to win, even if it’s just by 1 yard. Trevor Lawrence and the Jags’ offense were on the doorstep late in the game, but Lawrence’s pass to Christian Kirk was stuffed at the 1-yard line as time expired. The Giants leaned for most of three quarters on the arm — and legs — of quarterback Daniel Jones, with Jacksonville concentrating on limiting Saquon Barkley (72 of his 110 rushing yards came in the fourth quarter). Jones threw for 202 yards and a touchdown and ran for 107 yards and another score. It’s what they needed against a Jaguars defense that has been strong in stopping the run. This was the kind of game that showed Jones (despite five dropped passes) has the ability to not only manage games but win them. He led his fourth fourth-quarter comeback this season.
Just how bad are the injuries? Rookie right tackle Evan Neal (knee), tight end Daniel Bellinger (eye) and left guard Ben Bredeson (knee) all left the game in the first half. Those are three starters. Early indications are Neal and Bredeson avoided serious injury, according to sources. That’s a positive. Bellinger was taken to a local hospital for further evaluation. The Giants’ offense was already limited entering Sunday. It can’t afford for any of these injuries to be long term. The injured trio from Sunday has started every game this season — Jordan Raanan
Next game: at Seahawks (Sunday, 4:25 p.m. ET)
Jaguars
What to know:Travis Etienne Jr. has taken over as the Jaguars’ top back. He started for the second consecutive week and had the breakout game that many have been expecting (114 yards rushing). Etienne averaged 8.1 yards per carry and scored his first NFL touchdown on a 7-yard run. James Robinson, who had started the first five games this season and 32 overall, didn’t have a carry or a reception in a game in which he has played for the first time in his career. He was targeted just once, on a pass that Trevor Lawrence overthrew in the end zone.
Where is the pass rush? The Jaguars’ pass rush looked formidable after putting up seven sacks in the first two games, but it has managed just six since — and only two in the past two games (just one against Daniel Jones). Head coach Doug Pederson said teams are devising game plans to stop No. 1 overall pick Travon Walker by chipping him or double-teaming him. But that means Josh Allen should be getting to the QB more. He did enter the week with 25 QB pressures, per NFL Next Gen Stats, but he hasn’t had a sack since Week 4 and has just three this season. Those two have to be more productive. — Mike DiRocco
Next game: vs. Broncos (Sunday, 9:30 a.m. ET)
play
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Daniel Jones pushes his way through to the end zone to put the Giants ahead late in the fourth quarter.
Thursday
Cardinals
What to know: The Cardinals’ offense isn’t out of the woods yet. Yes, it played as well as it has played all season during Thursday’s win over the Saints, but Kyler Murray said there’s things that the offense still needs to work on. And he’s not wrong. The Cardinals were saved by the defense, which returned two interceptions for touchdowns. Take those away, and the Cardinals would’ve lost. Next week in Minnesota will be the true gauge for this offense to see if it’s making strides or still stuck in the mud. Having nine days between games will give guys such as DeAndre Hopkins and Robbie Anderson a chance to get acclimated more, and players such as James Conner and Rodney Hudson a chance to get healthy.
Was Thursday night the spark the Cardinals’ needed to turn around the season? It’ll help, no doubt, but the win was somewhat built on false pretenses because the Saints were down to their top two corners and top two receivers. If Arizona plays well and can beat the Vikings convincingly next week, then yes, the Cardinals will be on their way to turning around the season. — Josh Weinfuss
Next game: at Vikings (Sunday, 1 p.m. ET)
Saints
What to know: The Saints are a mess on both sides of the ball, but none of these problems are new. Turnovers, missed tackles and penalties have defined the Saints’ identity this season, and even wide receiver Tre’Quan Smith said self-inflicted wounds are killing the team. Smith said that Alvin Kamara told the team after the game: “We’ve got to really police ourselves, hold our own selves accountable, hold our teammates accountable.”
How does the coaching staff fix the team’s problems with multiple injuries? Saints coach Dennis Allen said the problem starts with him, and when asked how the coaches make changes going forward, he said it’s about “getting the right people in the right spots.” Allen admitted that is a tough thing to do, especially considering the health of the team is his biggest concern. With the Saints down three cornerbacks and several players on offense, there might not be many options for the Saints to turn to. — Katherine Terrell
On Saturday, Clemson turned the ball over four times, trailed by as much as 14, benched its starting QB and won. That, Dabo Swinney said, is the headline.
Got it?
No, don’t ask about that quarterback controversy. It doesn’t exist. Figment of your imagination. Swinney is essentially Kevin Bacon at the end of “Animal House,” standing in the midst of a stampede and yelling, “All is well!”
Swinney spent the entire offseason hyping DJ Uiagalelei, despite his struggles in 2021. The coach has spent the first seven weeks of this season dishing out one “I told you so” after another, including as recently as last week, when he called doubts of Uiagalelei “embarrassing” and a product of “the world we live in now.”
And when Clemson was trailing by 10 and Uiagalelei coughed up his third turnover of the game midway through the third quarter, Swinney came with the hook.
Why? Swinney believed freshman Cade Klubnik could give the offense a spark, and the move worked. Clemson scored on three of its next four drives. Sure, Klubnik completed just two passes in the game, so his inspiration was more Rob Schneider in “The Waterboy” than Bill Pullman in “Independence Day.” But hey, a win is a win.
In the aftermath, Swinney emphatically assured Clemson fans that Uiagalelei is still the starter as the Tigers, now 8-0, head into an off week with their ACC Atlantic Division crown all but assured. They will not play another ranked opponent this year.
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Clemson switches quarterbacks in the second half and overcomes four turnovers to beat Syracuse 24-21.
But Swinney is right. The world is a cold, callous place, and so we must also ask the bigger question: Is this an 8-0 team capable of winning a national championship?
Before last season, the answer might have been an emphatic, “Yes!” After all, we’d seen Clemson shrug off mediocrity before and still keep winning. Look back at Swinney’s first national title in the 2016 campaign. That season, the Tigers struggled against Troy, only beat NC State because of a missed chip shot as time expired and lost to Pitt. But Deshaun Watson still found Hunter Renfrow in the back corner of the end zone at Tampa’s Raymond James Stadium in the title game against Alabama, and no one needed to remember those regular-season struggles after that.
But then 2021 happened, and despite its 10-3 finish Clemson was clearly vulnerable. The wins were less destiny than they were rugged determination. That is commendable but perhaps not sustainable.
Clemson needed double overtime to get past Wake Forest and nearly coughed up a big lead a week ago against Florida State. And if not for Syracuse‘s utterly mind-boggling decision to put Sean Tucker into witness protection Saturday — “I felt like he was the one guy who could flat-out beat us,” Swinney said afterward — there’s every reason to think this might be more 2021 than 2016.
And yet, is this question any different from the ones posed at Oregon or Alabama or Michigan and on down the line?
The Ducks demolished UCLA on Saturday and established themselves as the clear front-runner in the Pac-12, but does that matter when they’ve already been curb-stomped by Georgia in the opener?
Should we forget the way the Bulldogs demolished them way back when if the recent data points are far more impressive? Do we need a rematch of a game that was over by the end of the first quarter? It’s complicated.
Ole Miss offered the SEC an alternative to the Crimson Tide, but LSU sent the Rebels scurrying on out of Louisiana like a crawdad in a steam pot, as Brian Kelly would say.
But Lane Kiffin’s crew will still get its shot at Alabama, and if it should win, wouldn’t the Rebels be a playoff team? It’s complicated.
Or how about those Crimson Tide? Nick Saban likely spent this week of practice like Jigsaw, planning ever more sadistic dilemmas for his team to maneuver, but the rat poison was successfully expelled from Alabama’s system with a 30-6 win over Mississippi State. Yes, the Tide have appeared vulnerable against Texas and A&M and lost to Tennessee, but does anyone really think Alabama can’t be a playoff team? Well, it’s complicated.
Despite the easy win, Alabama finished with just 290 yards of total offense — its lowest production in an SEC game since 2014.
Are we sold on Tennessee? Has Georgia just been easing into the season like it’s a warm bath? Is Michigan a fitting adversary for Ohio State?
Max Duggan wasn’t perfect Saturday in the 38-28 TCU win, but he was exceptional when he had to be, and the Horned Frogs’ ground game pounded away at Kansas State until the Wildcats finally gave way. TCU has been tied or behind in the second half of each of its last three games, including against Kansas State’s backup QB on Saturday, all of which might underscore just how narrow the margin is for the Horned Frogs, but it’s a line they’ve yet to cross. Does that make TCU a playoff team? Well, it’s complicated.
If we’re nitpicking, we’ll find nearly all teams left wanting. In other words, it’s all complicated.
But Swinney isn’t nitpicking. Well, sure, he picked a few nits with his starting quarterback Saturday, but bygones are bygones now. The point is, Clemson won. So, too, did Alabama and Oregon and Penn State and Oklahoma State. Their chase continues.
In the end, Clemson is 8-0, one of just six teams (Georgia, Tennessee, Ohio State, Michigan and TCU) left with a zero in the loss column.
And when it comes time for the committee to pick nits and split hairs, that zero looms awfully large because winning every game is the one way to erase all the complications and make the committee’s decision simple.
Nix, Ducks roll past UCLA
We would like to issue a formal apology to Bo Nix. He is not the reason Auburn fans spent four years beating their heads against a wall, shouting “Make it stop! Make it stop!”
Nix bested UCLA 45-30 with a brilliant performance Saturday, completing 22-of-28 passes for 283 yards and five touchdowns. He ran for 51 more yards. He electrified a fan base that remains blissfully unaware of all the pain he once helped inflict in his old life.
Yes, the numbers at Auburn seemed to suggest Nix was at the root of the problem, but as Mark Twain said, there are lies, damned lies and statistics, and Nix’s numbers were the most insidious of lies.
Yes, we watched Nix struggle in his Oregon debut as the Ducks were steamrolled by Georgia, but that was an unfair sample. It was like starting fresh at a new high school with a chance to finally fit in with the cool kids, only to bump into an old classmate at the mall. Georgia knew Auburn Bo Nix too well.
But look past all that. Look at what Nix has become now that he’s clear of Auburn, past Gus Malzahn and Bryan Harsin and … boy, it feels like there were six or seven other coaches in there, too. Oh, sure, Nix was an Auburn legacy and a five-star recruit, but The Plains has eaten up better men than that. But after years of tumult, Nix finally realized that this relationship was toxic, that he had to move on. Nothing in Taylor Swift’s discography captures the emotion of this breakup.
And when Nix left, he got as far away as he could go. And at long last, he was free.
Nix has Oregon at 6-1 and undefeated in Pac-12 play. Despite that brutal opener against Georgia, the Ducks have miraculously forced their way back into playoff conversation. Nix’s performance Saturday helped the Oregon fan base fully exorcise one of its demons, forcing Chip Kelly to return, defeated, to the sad suburban condo with the empty pool that we all assume he lives at.
What happened at Auburn was inevitable. Nix just happened to be playing QB at the time, like the activities director on the Titanic. So, consider this Nix’s “Good Will Hunting” moment. It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault.
Eight is enough
Over the summer, Mario Cristobal wanted to assure the public that Miami was serious about winning and didn’t need any gimmicks to get the job done. So, Cristobal said, no more turnover chain.
Big mistake.
The turnover chain was not a gimmick. It was a sacred relic, and its destruction has signaled the end times in Coral Gables.
Duke annihilated Miami 45-21 on Saturday, as the Hurricanes coughed up the football eight times.
Eight. Times.
Now, it’d be easy enough to chalk up all the turnovers to the simple fact that Miami is a very bad football team. But that would be like suggesting there are so many “Fast and Furious” movies because Vin Diesel is America’s greatest living thespian. Both things are true, but those facts alone cannot explain such prolific output.
No, for Miami there can be but one obvious culprit: Cristobal angered the football gods, and he must now go on a mythic quest, through corridors haunted by the ghosts of Al Golden and Randy Shannon, scale the unconquerable mountains of the ACC Coastal Division and survive an epic freestyle battle with Uncle Luke to retrieve the turnover chain and return it to its rightful place on Miami’s sideline.
Quinn Ewers has had some rough moments this season. His car was towed. He hurt his shoulder. He had to watch Oklahoma play for an entire game. But Saturday was his rock bottom.
Ewers completed just 19 of 49 throws and tossed three interceptions in Texas’ 41-34 loss at Oklahoma State.
The Pokes were playing with a battered offensive line, but Spencer Sanders still delivered some critical throws, tossing two touchdowns, while Jaden Nixon showed he could’ve run over Texas’ defense wearing bedroom slippers.
It was a huge bounce-back win for Oklahoma State after blowing a late lead against TCU last week. The Cowboys are 6-1, and Sanders has firmly established himself as either the best bad QB or worst good QB in the country.
After the Longhorns lost twice without Ewers earlier this season, Saturday’s defeat can at least remove any linger “What if” debates and allow Texas to completely turn its attention to keeping trick-or-treaters safe from monkey attacks this week.
Iowa finally benched Spencer Petras on Saturday, after he managed just eight completions — six to his team, and two to Ohio State. But honestly, benching isn’t enough salvation for Petras. It’s time Quarterback Protective Services steps in and removes him from his home. He deserves to run free on a farm upstate.
Even after Petras was benched, things didn’t get better for the Hawkeyes. Alex Padilla completed just five of 10 passes for 32 yards and an interception, essentially assuring Iowa’s QB depth chart is just the two Spider-Mans pointing at each other meme.
How bad was it?
Iowa was 1-of-13 on third-down tries.
Iowa had six turnovers. (Miami can expect a thank-you card from coordinator Brian Ferentz this week.)
Iowa averaged 2.2 yards per run and yet the QBs were so bad the Hawkeyes still chose to run it 35 times.
There’s only one logical solution to Iowa’s offensive woes at this point. It’s time for Kirk Ferentz to fire his son and hire Jeff Bowden.
Under-the-radar play of the week
If you missed the ending to Stanford vs. Arizona State, we understand. Watching that game was punishment for shoplifting in several states. And perhaps fittingly, the final moments were every bit as unfortunate as a matchup between two bad teams would suggest.
Trailing 15-14, Arizona State chucked a Hail Mary throw down the sideline on fourth-and-19, which appeared to be hauled in by Elijhah Badger to set up a game-winning field goal with just seconds remaining.
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0:52
Arizona State falls to Stanford in the final seconds as Emory Jones has one foot out on the 4th-and-19 catch that would have set up a game-winning field goal.
Upon replay review, however, the call was overturned, with officials saying Badger had a toe out of bounds on the catch, allowing Stanford to snap a 10-game conference losing streak.
Under-the-radar game of the week
Rhode Island and Monmouth put on a marathon Saturday, playing seven overtimes before the Rams emerged with a 48-46 win. Not since the famed Texas A&M-LSU epic has a college football game between two teams no one cared about gone on so very, very long.
The game featured seven ties and four lead changes. Monmouth QB Tony Muskett — who also may have been a character on “Bonanza” — threw for three touchdowns. Rhode Island QB Kasim Hill threw for 352 yards and three touchdowns, including a 73-yarder to Marques DeShields with 3:23 remaining to tie the game at 35, but he also tossed three picks.
In the first OT, both teams traded touchdowns. Both went scoreless in the second frame. Then it went to 2-point tries, and the Rams and Hawks stayed even through four more frames. In the seventh OT, Rhode Island broke up a pass in the end zone, and Hill completed his throw to Ed Lee to secure the win.
Sadly, Jimbo Fisher’s nephew was not able to attend, so this seven-OT game did not end with fisticuffs, and frankly, we cannot truly embrace seven overtimes unless someone wearing khakis starts taking swings at complete strangers.
We hate to be the ones to bring this up, but it needs to be said: Liberty is 7-1.
We know, we know: When quarterback Malik Willis left, we all hoped we could safely stop paying attention to the Flames. But somehow, they’ve kept winning, including a 41-14 stomping of BYU on Saturday behind 213 rushing yards from Dae Dae Hunter.
Liberty’s lone loss came on a missed 2-point try against 6-1 Wake Forest.
Liberty has won with three different starting QBs.
Liberty is — deep breaths — good.
Is it possible Hugh Freeze is fueled by the country’s anger at him, like the emperor in “Star Wars?” (We also assume that if Twitter existed in a galaxy far, far away, Palpatine would slide into Obi-Wan’s DMs to complain about rebel criticisms too.) There’s simply no keeping the guy down (even when he is literally kept down).
So, do we need to take Liberty seriously? The only acceptable answer is yes. To embrace Freeze is to take away his power. Or, if not that, maybe Iowa should hire him.
Heisman Five
Even in a week in which three of the nine remaining undefeated teams lost, there wasn’t much room for shake-ups at the top of the Heisman hopeful list.
Tee Martin won a national championship at Tennessee. UT Martin, on the other hand, struggled badly at Tennessee on Saturday. The Skyhawks had no answers for Hooker, who averaged more than 11 yards per throw and tossed three more touchdowns.
Exposure to the Hawkeyes’ offense took its toll on Stroud, who struggled through the first half, but thankfully Ryan Day was able to perform a full Iowa exorcism (it involves spewing creamed corn instead of pea soup) and Stroud rebounded with four second-half TD throws.
Young did all he could to pull Alabama over the finish line last week against Tennessee, but we were still worried he might catch some strays from Saban during practice this week. Thankfully, he survived, and he returned with another strong day, throwing for 249 yards and two touchdowns in the Tide’s 30-0 win over Mississippi State.
Wake is 6-1 after drubbing Boston College, and in the lone loss, Hartman had six touchdown passes. He nearly matched that total Saturday, throwing for five touchdowns and running for a sixth in the win. Hartman now has the third-most passing TDs in ACC history (93), trailing only Tajh Boyd and Philip Rivers, all despite also working part time as a 1920s mafia hit man.
No. 2 Sam Hartman, Wake
Really good balance between clean lines and fullness of the beard. Worked better before he cut his hair though. He looks like a shampoo commercial model now rather than last year’s Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer. Borderline elite, 4.5 stars pic.twitter.com/sRh8c0Urfy
The most college football thing to happen Saturday
We talk often about the plague of #CollegeKickers, with flubbed chip shots invariably costing teams a needed win on an almost weekly basis. Long-snappers, on the other hand, tend to fly below the radar.
Unfortunately for Weber State‘s Grant Sands, his Saturday will be remembered for a long time.
Sands snapped the football over the punter’s head and out of the back of the end zone for a safety four times against Montana State on Saturday, handing the Bobcats eight points in a game that Montana State ultimately won 43-38.
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Weber State is on the wrong end of the record books as it surrenders four safeties on errant special teams snaps.
Big bets and bad beats
Miami has been favored to win four times this season. The Hurricanes are now 1-3 in those games after a miserable eight-turnover loss to Duke on Saturday. Miami has now lost as a 25.5-point favorite to Middle Tennessee, a 10-point favorite to Duke and a four-point favorite to North Carolina. The Hurricanes’ lone win as a favorite came against Virginia Tech, after they failed to cover a nine-point spread in a 20-14 victory.
Clemson trailed Syracuse 21-10 at the half on Saturday, which was just about the perfect spot for the Tigers — or at least for sharp bettors. The Tigers were -9.5 in the second half, and they covered that number easily, outscoring the Orange 17-0 in the final two frames. That makes Clemson coach Dabo Swinney 11-2 against the second-half spread in his career when trailing at halftime.
“Father’s plan” worked. Islam Makhachev is the new lightweight champion after defeating Charles Oliveria by second-round submission (arm triangle) to win the vacant belt at UFC 280 in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates on Saturday. Makhachev entered the fight on a 10-fight winning streak and was set to finalize the plan of his coach and longtime teammate Khabib Nurmagomedov, the former UFC lightweight champion: To win the belt.
For Oliveira, who lost the belt on the scales back in May, this was his first defeat in 11 fights.
Earlier on the card, the bantamweight division took center stage. Champion Aljamain Sterling dominated TJ Dillashaw with a TKO victory, while Sean O’Malley escaped with a split-decision win over Petr Yan. Should the winners fight each other? And how about the losers? A fight between either pair could be a must-see.
So what should come next? Let’s take a look at what fights could be ahead in 2023.
Islam Makhachev, lightweight champion (defeated Charles Oliveira to win the vacant lightweight title)
Well, Makhachev, Khabib Nurmagomedov, Volkanovski and the UFC made this one pretty easy. Everything is lined up. Makhachev gets to defend his belt against the No. 1 pound-for-pound fighter in the world. And Volkanovski gets a shot at a second title — in his home country of Australia.
Send the contracts. Print the fight posters. We’re going to Perth, Australia on Feb. 12 for UFC 284 and this is the main event.
Dariush is so, so, so deserving of a title fight, but even he seems to know it isn’t in the cards — yet. There are just too many big fights ahead of him right now. One would think he’ll have to get his chance if he continues to win, but it won’t be right now.
Charles Oliveira (lost by second-round submission to Islam Makhachev)
Oliveira is a perfect foe for McGregor, if and when McGregor ever returns. He keeps saying he will, but it feels like we’re never any closer to it.
If he does come back though, this is the one. Oliveira has arguably the most exciting style in the sport right now. He’s already beaten a lot of the obvious opponents you’d book him against next. He deserves the attention a megafight against McGregor would bring him. And I bet he’d even take the fight at 170 pounds, if that’s what McGregor demanded.
Wild card: Beneil Dariush
If Dariush doesn’t get a title shot, which doesn’t feel likely, this would be a big fight for him, and one Dariush deserves.
From a rankings standpoint, it makes perfect sense. Would love to see Oliveira in the biggest fight possible. This probably isn’t that, but it’s a quality, quality matchup.
Sean O’Malley, middleweight (defeated Petr Yan by split decision)
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Sean O’Malley beats Petr Yan via split decision after an explosive third round. (edited)
What should be next: Sterling vs. O’Malley
UFC president Dana White said the two winners of these fights would square off, and there’s no reason to deviate from that after watching them play out.
Whether you agree with the scoring of O’Malley’s split decision win over Yan or not, there’s no doubting he proved himself to be elite. He just beat the No. 1-ranked contender and a former champion. And Sterling feels even more like an undisputed champion now, getting the better of one of the best bantamweights of all time.
Convincingly. Sterling wants big fights, because big fights equal big money. O’Malley is instantly the biggest fight for him, and the rankings justify it. This should be the next title fight at 135 pounds.
This would feel out of place, and I don’t see it happening, but we still don’t know what is going to be next for Cejudo. He’s coming back and obviously wants a shot at the belt. Again, Sterling wants big fights, and this would be one that’s easy to sell. There would be a storyline behind it. Cejudo walked away a couple years ago as the champ, on a dominant run that included two divisions. He’s a character in this story, but it’s hard to see him getting a shot ahead of O’Malley.
TJ Dillashaw (lost to men’s bantamweight champion Aljamain Sterling by second-round TKO)
Petr Yan, middleweight (lost to Sean O’Malley by split decision)
What should be next: Dillashaw vs. Yan
You’ve got to feel a little bit for Yan. That’s back-to-back fights that plenty of observers felt he won. Sometimes, the margins in this sport can be cruel. The difference between two massive wins and two stinging losses comes down to fine details.
Yan is still considered one of the best, as is Dillashaw. Stylistically, this is a sick fight. Both of these guys hit hard, incorporate kicks, switch stances. It’s a Fight-of-the-Night candidate on paper, and the obvious next move for both, depending how Dillashaw’s health is coming off what appeared to be yet another shoulder injury.
Belal Muhammad hands Sean Brady his first career loss with a flurry of punches in a TKO victory.
What should be next: Wait.
Wait for what? I’m honestly not sure. Something to open up. Right now, you’re looking at Leon Edwards vs. Kamaru Usman III next. And the UFC is going to try to book Khamzat Chimaev against Colby Covington. That only leaves Gilbert Burns as far as a welterweight ranked higher than Muhammad, but the UFC wants to book Burns against Jorge Masvidal.
The only answer is to wait. He’s officially unbeaten in his last eight contests so, if Muhammad refuses to fight anyone else, you can’t blame him. Maybe Covington refuses to fight Chimaev. Maybe Masvidal refuses to fight Burns. My guess is Muhammad will be in no rush to book any other fight and let those scenarios play out.
Rakhmonov is looking a little like a boogeyman at 170 pounds, and Neal is back on track with two consecutive wins after suffering a pair of losses. Whoever wins this fight on Jan. 14 will be looking up the rankings, and Muhammad will make for an obvious target.
If all of the names ahead of Muhammad are booked, don’t be surprised if the UFC asks Muhammad to stay active and accept a fight against one of these two. We’ll have to see where things stand by Jan. 14, but this figures to be a real option for Muhammad come early 2023.
It was 5 p.m. on a Saturday in September, about five weeks into his camp for this weekend’s bantamweight fight against Petr Yan at UFC 280 in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. O’Malley had looked great in sparring that morning and was sitting down to a well-deserved steak with his head coach, Tim Welch. Moments before, he had lit up a joint, as he’s known to do.
Smiling, O’Malley opened Twitter on his phone and wrote, “I’ll be surprised if I get hit once.”
O’Malley is an admitted internet troll. And in that moment, he knew exactly what he was doing. To suggest Yan, a former UFC champion and one of the most skilled strikers in the sport, would fail to even touch him in a 15-minute fight — O’Malley knew everyone would find the notion absurd.
“This will be funny,” O’Malley said as the post went live.
Sure enough, hundreds of responses flooded in. Many said something to the effect of O’Malley wouldn’t last a round. One response predicted he’d leave on a stretcher.
For O’Malley, or “Suga” as he’s known, this was the desired result — and it’s why he’s already one of the top stars in MMA, despite the fact that he has yet to even crack the top 10 of his division. In a world where, increasingly, engagement is king, O’Malley is thriving. He has 2.4 million followers on Instagram, more than all but two of the UFC’s current champions. And he does well converting that following into profit.
But the easy engagement wasn’t the only thing on O’Malley’s mind when he wrote that post. And this is where it gets interesting. This is what makes the fight between O’Malley (16-1) and Yan (16-3) so intriguing.
O’Malley actually believes it. He’s prepared for the most difficult fight of his career, but he also believes he’s capable of completely outclassing Yan in Abu Dhabi. To some, he is a can-crushing, overhyped creation of social media and the UFC and this is the fight that will prove it. But to O’Malley, he’s one of the best fighters in the world and this is the fight that will prove that.
“It’s all going to change after this fight. I’m 100% positive of that,” O’Malley told ESPN. “People will see this and say, ‘Damn, he is elite.’ So, yeah, the tweet was kind of a joke. But also … let’s see.”
THREE DAYS AFTER O’Malley’s last fight — an unfortunate no-contest against Pedro Munhoz in July that ended in an eye poke — UFC matchmaker Sean Shelby went to Dana White with a proposal: O’Malley vs. Yan.
Yan, 29, embodies every cliché one could use in describing a phenomenal mixed martial artist. “A terminator,” Welch calls him. Yan has knocked out the likes of Jose Aldo and Urijah Faber. He took four of five championship rounds against a very tricky Cory Sandhagen. Some felt he beat Aljamain Sterling in his most recent fight in April and should still be the UFC’s 135-pound champion.
This is the man Shelby believed O’Malley should fight next.
“I said [to Shelby], ‘Are you out of your mind? You don’t make that fight right now,’” White said. “He told me why you make it. He told me O’Malley is ready, and he’s about to be 28. He’s in his absolute prime. He hits like a truck. [Shelby] ended up selling me on it.”
One can understand White’s initial reaction even if it didn’t take long for him to come around on the matchup. It’s the same one many had.
O’Malley has been in the UFC for five years, but it still feels as if he’s in an early phase of his career. A development phase, if you will. A building phase. He’s been no less than a 3-to-1 betting favorite in his past seven appearances. Six of the nine opponents he has faced in the UFC are no longer with the promotion. In other words, on paper, Yan is a massive step up.
Even Welch, who has coached and trained with O’Malley since he was a teenager, hesitated regarding this one. He believes O’Malley is ready and this matchup was always going to happen at some point, but he also understands risk. There is an elevated danger factor to this fight, and with everything going so well for O’Malley, is this the right time to take it?
“Right when it was first announced, I was like, ‘F—,’” Welch said. “I was a little scared about it, because I know what getting beat up can do to a fighter’s mentality. Suga’s confidence is really high, and that’s a big part of everything he has going on. With a striker as dangerous as Petr, you’re running the risk of getting knocked out, and it takes a special person to come back from getting knocked out.
“I do think Sean is that special person who would come back from it, but of course, you want to avoid it — especially where he is in his career right now.”
The one who didn’t hesitate? O’Malley. He was standing in the sprawling backyard of his Arizona home when Shelby called him about the fight. He said he’d need to talk it over with his team, but he liked it. Yan is actually one of O’Malley’s favorite fighters to watch, and the two had gone back and forth on social media before. The idea of fighting Yan certainly didn’t scare him.
“There is nobody out there less than 5-foot-6 who scares me,” said a laughing O’Malley, who is 5-11, compared with Yan, who is actually 5-7. “Petr could go out there and whup my ass and I still wouldn’t be scared of him. He should be scared of me.”
What makes O’Malley so confident, in a fight where he is now in the role of a significant underdog?
His answer to that almost sounds like another troll job because it involves two things he is constantly accused of lacking: his ability to deal with adversity and his dedication.
Because the UFC has, arguably, booked him a preferential schedule of competition thus far, some believe he will crumple when faced with real adversity. And because his very popular Instagram account is filled with videos of him partying with popular YouTubers the Nelk Boys and smoking marijuana, some believe he’s not completely dedicated to his craft.
Here’s what O’Malley doesn’t promote quite as heavily on social media: He cold plunges and meditates every evening for physical recovery and mental growth. He regularly runs blood analysis with physicians, to hone his diet and training schedule for peak performance. He meticulously monitors his sleep patterns and has done so for the past five years.
And in addition to all of those subtle details, which O’Malley is convinced make the biggest difference when you’re at the highest level of the sport, he has also done the one absolutely necessary thing to be the best: He has lost over and over and over again in the gym.
“A lot of good guys get into the sport, but it’s knowing that you have to take a decade of your life, train twice a day and continually find people who are going to whup your ass,” Welch said. “He did that. He showed up, twice a day, to get beat up. I was a little worried about that when the money started coming, but he’s on a different level now. He wants to be a megastar, and he knows the level of discipline that’s going to take.”
Any misconceptions some might have about the “easy” path O’Malley has taken to this point, or about any lack of dedication he might have, don’t bother him at all. Worrying about the opinions of others would be a weakness, in O’Malley’s opinion. However, he is aware they are out there. And you know what? It’s good. He likes it. Because after this fight, that doubt will be harder to come by.
“People saying, ‘I don’t think he’s ready, I don’t think he’s ready,’” O’Malley said. “I listen to that s— when I’m on the treadmill. This is the first fight where I’m not supposed to knock the dude out. It’s cool. It’s different.”
IT’S ANOTHER SATURDAY in September, and O’Malley is at the gym for his weekly spar. The fight is now less than one month away. The MMA Lab facility in Glendale, Arizona, is full of professional fighters lightly sparring on the mats, while O’Malley stretches and mentally prepares for three hard rounds in the cage.
When he starts to go with fellow UFC bantamweight Mario Bautista, a small crowd, including other fighters, forms. These fighters are here to work, but many cannot help but take an interest in what’s happening inside the cage. That is the O’Malley effect, and it’s been true from the moment he knocked out his opponent on Dana White’s Contender Series five years ago to earn a UFC contract (and a viral moment from Snoop Dogg). He makes you watch.
“People always watch Suga spar because he does mad s—,” says Jack Eglin, one of O’Malley’s training partners who is cageside. “And even when it’s a chess match of a spar, it’s fun because you’re seeing high-level work. You watch him from the side and think, ‘Oh, I’ll just do this or that to him,’ and then when you’re in front of him, you go, ‘Oh f—, this is different.’
“And when he hits you, he’s not just hitting you hard. He’s hitting your eye socket and your jaw. He’s not just swinging at the side of your head. Suga is pinpoint.”
Five years into O’Malley’s UFC career, it’s very apparent he can make people watch. If he can beat Yan at UFC 280, it will be very apparent he could be a champion. In MMA, if you can combine those two feats, which are both extremely difficult to accomplish, well, you have a superstar. And that’s what O’Malley is aiming to be.
O’Malley finishes up his rounds for the day and walks outside to his neon pink-and-green Lamborghini. He drives home, where his girlfriend, Danya, makes him a lunch of chicken breast and vegetables. Their 2-year-old daughter, Elena, circles the kitchen, intermittently yelling “Dada” in his direction. Between bites of essentially the same lunch he has eaten for weeks, O’Malley grants one of the hundreds of interviews he’ll give before the fight.
What will happen, Sean, if you really do make Yan look silly on Oct. 22 in Abu Dhabi?
“Like, in the division?” O’Malley says.
Like, in your life?
“Oh, God,” he responds. “I’ve been on a bunch of mini rocket ships after each fight, but that would be a f—ing rocket ship. It would make me twice as big of a star as I am right now. I’m taking six months, touring, going on every major podcast in the country. I’m gonna milk that, and then we get a title shot.”
Staring straight ahead, lost in his response, O’Malley pauses at this point. The next thing he says almost seems to be aimed at himself rather than anyone else.
“Yeah, it’ll be big. And that’s when I have to make sure to constantly remind myself that I’ve got 10 more years to stay disciplined. We can enjoy it after those 10 years, but that’s what I’ve been writing about in my journal. Stay disciplined. When I’m 40, I’m gonna look back, and I really, really hope I won’t regret anything. I’m going to dial it in for the next 10 years, stay consistent and live up to my potential. I know that I can become the best fighter in the world and be in the greatest-of-all-time conversation if I just stay dialed in to what I’m doing.”
Anyone listening to O’Malley in that moment would have a hard time telling him that he’s wrong or that he doesn’t take this sport just as seriously as any other fighter on the planet.
But a few days later, he’ll post a video on Instagram of himself in a pink wig, offering a bong rip to a training dummy. And anyone watching will have a hard time concluding “This dude is really gonna beat Petr Yan?”
Is Sean O’Malley a potential UFC champion or a really, really good internet troll? Maybe he’ll prove to be both.
Making the turn. Yes, that’s a golf term. But today, it is also apropos as it pertains to college football. For, as evidenced by all the teams with records of something-and-something that add up to at least a half-dozen games played, and as proven by the fact that the leaves in the trees are now the same brown and red hues as Nick Saban’s face at Neyland Stadium last weekend, the 153rd season of the greatest sport on Earth has just crossed over the halfway point.
Whenever someone makes the turn on the links, they usually swing through the clubhouse and the 19th Hole, where a group of Judge Smails-looking gentlemen are leaning on the bar, overserved, watching college football and declaring who is the best, worst and in between that the game has to offer. They have those conversations amid shelves of dusty trophies commemorating member-guest tourney champs, closest-to-the-pins and holes-in-one.
So, with that true making-the-turn spirit in mind, allow us to pour a glass of amber liquid and hand out some brass and particle board hardware from the local trophy shop, as we present our 2022 ESPN.com Midseason College Football Awards.
The Peyton Manning October Heisman Award
Hendon Hooker, Tennessee. No one ever had a bigger lead in the midseason Heisman Trophy race than the original Tennessee Sheriff did in 1997, but as we know now, Manning finished second in December, just as fellow Vols Hank Lauricella, Johnny Majors and Heath Shuler did before him. Hooker outdueled reigning stiff arm king Bryce Young in Neyland Stadium, but when the ballots are cast at season’s end, Hooker will still have to overcome Vols’ Heisman history and also the recent history of guys winning the game but losing the trophy. See: Deshaun Watson vs. Lamar Jackson (Clemson 42, Louisville 36 in 2016). Then again, Hooker and his team would 100% take Watson’s ’16 consolation prize right now. Celebrating a natty in January.
Side note: Hooker should receive bonus points because he wrote a children’s motivational book with his brother, NC A&T QB Alston Hooker, during the offseason. Side note No. 2: Could someone please remove all the energy supplements from RGIII’s kitchen cabinet?
The Guy You’d Most Want With You in One Those Weird Mall Escape Rooms Award
Tre’Shaun Harrison, WR, Oregon State. Harrison only has three touchdown receptions this season, but whenever he hauls one in, it’s a big one, the latest being the game winner vs. Stanford two weeks ago. But his best effort was a 17-yard screen grab against Fresno State when he managed to emerge from eight would-be Bulldog tacklers like he was Boba Fett emerging from the Sarlacc pit.
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Tre’Shaun Harrison bounces outside on a screen pass and goes 17 yards for an Oregon State touchdown.
The David Blaine ‘Now You See Me, Now You Don’t’ Award
Texas A&M. The Aggies started the season ranked sixth in the AP Top 25 and have since vanished quicker than my brother-in-law when the waitress puts the dinner check on the table. That exit from the poll began Week 2 after A&M was stunned at home by Appalachian State and the Aggies are now 3-3, spared a 2-4 record only by way of a doinked end cap would-be game-winning field goal by Arkansas back in Week 4. The Aggies’ disappearing act comes with so much power that it even rubbed off on the team that derailed them.
Honorable mention: Appalachian State. The Mountaineers beat A&M, hosted College GameDay and won a last-second thriller over Troy but have been 2-2 since and are mired in the middle of the Sun Belt East. Still, they are ahead of Marshall and Georgia Southern, both of whom have battled the .500 line after knocking off Notre Dame and Nebraska on the same day App State beat A&M.
The Cole Trickle ‘Remember Me?’ Award
TCU.As A&M has dropped out of the preseason top 10 like a brick on a pile of molten marshmallows, it has been replaced in those lofty rankings by a former Southwest Conference rival in the Horned Frogs. TCU received precisely zero preseason AP Top 25 votes and was picked to finish seventh in the 10-team Big 12. Now it is 6-0, ranked No. 8 and, according to ESPN’s FPI machine, has a 23.6% chance to win the conference, second to only Texas at 55.1%. The Frogs travel to Austin on Nov. 12.
Honorable mentions: Tennessee, Syracuse, Illinois (wow, wearing orange seems to be working well, doesn’t it?), the Pac-12, Tulane, Chip Kelly.
The Donnel Pumphrey Offensive Player We Should Be Making a Bigger Deal Out of Than We Are Award
Chase Brown, RB, Illinois. Named for the former San Diego State running back who in 2016 set the NCAA FBS single-season rushing mark and somehow everyone figured out a way to cheapen and/or ignore it. The 6-1 Fighting Illini are receiving plenty of props for their defense and another Big Ten running back, Michigan‘s Blake Corum, is garnering the Heisman hype. But Brown is the nation’s only 1,000-yard back, with 1,059 yards over seven games, and has yet to be held under 100 yards in a game.
Honorable mention: Kyle Vantrease, QB, Georgia Southern. Dude has thrown for 2,512 yards, second only to Washington‘s Michael Penix Jr. Quick reminder: These aren’t your granddad’s triple option-running Eagles. Clay Helton is in charge in Statesboro and he brought his USC offensive playbook with him.
The Jaylon Ferguson Defensive Player We Should Be Making a Bigger Deal Out of Than We Are Award
Jackson Mitchell, LB, UConn. Named for the former Louisiana Tech defensive end who in 2018 set the NCAA career sacks record and everyone, again, somehow figured out a way to ignore it. Chances are you haven’t been paying attention to the turnaround that’s happening in Storrs, but the Huskies have three wins, which already matches the combined total from their past two seasons. The anchor of that effort is Mitchell, who has 88(!) tackles. He has four double-digit efforts in eight games and a combined 35 over three weeks against a triumvirate of AP Top 25 teams in Syracuse, Michigan and NC State.
The Ricky Bobby ‘I Don’t Know What to Do With My Hands’ Sideline Interview Award
Mike Leach on weddings. The Pirate has had the Mississippi State Bulldogs moving up and down the field all season, sitting 5-2 and spending most of the year ranked. But everyone knows that Leach’s best work is when he is in a football situation and doesn’t actually talk about football. Anyone who has ever gotten married and/or has kids who are getting married knows that there are zero lies in what he had to say to SEC Network’s Alyssa Lang after MSU’s huge Week 5 win over Texas A&M.
No football coach has stronger opinions on weddings than Mike Leach
After we talked about the win, I got some advice straight from the source..
The Tim Gunn Rock the Runway Best Special Uniform Award
BYU vs. Notre Dame, Oct. 8.This has been the season of blackouts when it comes to one-off uniforms, from North Texas flipping the Mean Green and UCF‘s “Space U” to Oklahoma‘s “Unity” threads and Rutgers with the “Dark Knights.” But no one has pulled off the combination of complementing its school’s signature look with a swath of black like BYU did when it countered Notre Dame’s all-white Shamrock Series fit for their matchup in Vegas. The Cougars even employed a UFC fighter and a magician to help with the reveal.
The Bugo Hoss/Guiccy Knock-off Clothing Brand Award
Gardner-Webb. The Runnin’ Bulldogs are an Under Armour school and have always had an underrated look. Trust me. I grew up there. When they go all-white on the road it looks amazing. But during their Week 3 showdown with Mercer, at least one player appeared to be wearing some Blunder Armor britches picked up at the outlet mall in nearby Gaffney, South Carolina.
Eugene PD. With the Cardinal down 45-17 at Oregon, I swear if you listen closely enough you can hear the googly eyed “Charlie Brown Christmas Special”-looking Stanford Tree saying to this Eugene, Oregon, police officer, “I know y’all love trees around here, but please, just put me out of my misery already.”
The Bette Midler ‘But Enough About Me. Let’s Talk About You. What Do You Think of Me?’ Award
John Daly on ‘Marty & McGee’. I co-host this little show Saturday mornings on SEC Network and we got off to a tipsy start during Week 1 and we’ve been stumbling along ever since. Plus, this clip brings us back to the making the turn/19th Hole theme we started with. Enjoy the second half of the season y’all.
The San Francisco 49ers have mostly watched as the NFC West division rival Los Angeles Rams have repeatedly swung for the fences to try to win the Super Bowl. That approach worked for the Rams last season. The Niners believe it’s their turn, which is why they pulled off a stunning trade for running back Christian McCaffrey late Thursday night.
The Niners sent second-, third- and fourth-round picks in 2023 and a fifth-round pick in 2024 to the Carolina Panthers for McCaffrey in hopes he can help jump-start a sagging offense.
Through the first six weeks, the 49ers have been plagued by injuries all over the roster, and their offense hasn’t played close to the level of their dominant defense.
Coach Kyle Shanahan doesn’t want a repeat of 2019, when the Niners wasted an elite defense as the offense couldn’t close out the Super Bowl against the Kansas City Chiefs.
Put simply: San Francisco believes it is in a championship window, and trading for McCaffrey sends that message loud and clear to the rest of the league.
How will McCaffrey fit into the 49ers’ offense?
This should be relatively seamless for McCaffrey, who has plenty of experience operating in an outside zone-heavy scheme and brings the type of versatility that will allow Shanahan to mix and match him with the team’s skill-position options. And make no mistake, while McCaffrey will be the team’s No. 1 option at running back, Shanahan will use him in the pass game plenty and create more headaches for defenses, who now have to keep track of him and the likes of receivers Deebo Samuel and Brandon Aiyuk and tight end George Kittle. — Nick Wagoner
Did the 49ers give up too much?
On paper, it seems like it. But when you make an all-in move like this, there’s no price that’s too high if it pays off. The risk is obvious: McCaffrey has missed 23 games in the past two seasons, and he’s joining a team that is consistently snakebit by injury. And while the Niners have a couple of third-round compensatory picks, they’re essentially punting on the 2023 NFL draft. Adding young, cost-effective players is important for a team that has so much high-priced talent and is planning to pay defensive end Nick Bosa an enormous amount of money this offseason. But if McCaffrey, who is under contract through 2025, is healthy and on the field, he gives the 49ers one of the best groups of skill-position players in the league, and the loss of multiple Day 2 picks won’t sting much at all. — Wagoner
Does adding McCaffrey put the 49ers over the top in a tight NFC West?
It should, but that comes with the significant caveat of whether the Niners and McCaffrey can get (and stay) relatively healthy. No team has been more banged up than the Niners in the first six weeks, and while many of those players are expected to return, there are no guarantees when it comes to health. If their injury luck turns for the better, the Niners, who are already 2-0 in the division, have the best roster in the NFC West and should be able to not only win the division but make another deep postseason run. — Wagoner
After firing their coach and getting rid of McCaffrey and Anderson, is this a complete rebuild for the Panthers?
The Panthers might not call it a complete rebuild because the defense is in good shape for next season. Defensive tackle Matt Ioannidis is the only starter not under contract. But this is a complete rebuild when you consider the Panthers will have a new coaching staff, since Matt Rhule already has been fired; a new quarterback, since Baker Mayfield and Sam Darnold aren’t the answer; and a new face of the franchise, since McCaffrey is gone.
On top of that, the receiver room is a mess. DJ Moore is the only legitimate threat now that Robbie Anderson has been traded to the Arizona Cardinals. And none of Carolina’s tight ends are legitimate weapons. Not to mention the offensive line ranks near the bottom of the league in pass win and run win rate. One could argue 2022 first-round pick Ikem Ekwonu has had growing pains thus far at left tackle. He might be better suited for the right side or at guard. So call this what you want, but it’s a rebuild. — David Newton
How does this set up interim coach Steve Wilks?
Wilks never got a fair shake in his one season (2018) as the head coach of the Arizona Cardinals because he didn’t have the talent to compete and coached with mostly an inherited staff. He has the same situation now with Carolina. And now he loses his most valuable offensive asset. McCaffrey was his offense, accounting for 75% of the team’s yardage in Sunday’s 24-10 loss to the Los Angeles Rams. Wilks has to replace him with second-year back Chuba Hubbard and journeyman D’Onta Foreman.
The offense is already rated last in the NFL in total yards and in third-down percentage, and former XFL quarterback PJ Walker is starting his second straight game Sunday against Tampa Bay while Baker Mayfield and Sam Darnold recover from ankle injuries. Owner David Tepper said Wilks would be considered for the full-time job if he does an exceptional job the remainder of this year. Instead, it appears he has been set up for failure once again. This feels like a total tank to build for the future. — Newton
What are the contract and cap implications of the deal?
McCaffrey is a one-year rental on a cheap contract for San Francisco, with a $1.035 million salary thanks to Carolina’s offseason contract restructure. Next year it gets more complicated, as McCaffrey is owed $11.8 million. But the 49ers don’t inherit McCaffrey’s signing bonus proration, which lessens his $19.5 million cap hit in 2023 by several million. This is all manageable but still steep for a running back. — Jeremy Fowler
What other teams were involved in talks?
Several contenders at least made the call, but as of midweek talks were slow to develop. Despite hype about their interest, I never got the sense the Buffalo Bills were all-in. Teams I’ve talked to believe the Rams and Denver Broncos were involved to some extent but were unwilling to reach the price point the 49ers ended up paying.
The Panthers also have received multiple trade calls on their other top playmaker, wide receiver DJ Moore, per sources, but the team considers Moore a foundational piece for the roster in the long term. — Fowler
The NHL’s Reverse Retro jerseys were a sensation two years ago, creating significant sales and conversation among hockey fans. Adidas felt the pressure of creating a sequel to that blockbuster with its 2022-23 season retro sweaters.
“How many amazing remix combinations are out there?” said Dan Near, senior director at Adidas hockey. “We spent a lot of time debating about whether the franchise should evolve into something else or is this a sequel. We went with the latter.”
As with any sequel, there are a few differences from the original. The 32 new Reverse Retro jerseys feature more white sweaters than the 2020 collection. Please recall that because of the COVID pandemic, the 2020-21 season was played without interdivisional games. Now, Adidas hopes to see more retro vs. retro games, such as the Pittsburgh Penguins vs. Buffalo Sabres game on Nov. 2.
This line also features more embroidered and raised elements on the team logos, which is something that arrived when Adidas started making jerseys with 50% recycled materials.
Another big difference was the level of anticipation. Near said that Adidas is aware of all the speculation, mock-ups and social media scuttlebutt about this collection of jerseys.
“We’re excited about the speculation. I think if you look back at the first time we launched in 2020, it came out of nowhere. Nobody knew what it was,” Near said. “We didn’t announce it was coming back this time, but people seemed to know it was coming. The rampant speculation and energy is making this unique and exciting. We track it. We see what people are saying. Sometimes they’re right on the mark. Other times they’re on a completely different planet. Nothing is official until it’s official.”
But it wasn’t just the fans anticipating the next wave of Reverse Retro jerseys. The NHL teams were as well.
“There was plenty of meat on the bone to do this again,” Near said. “What made it unique the second time around is that you have the teams thinking ‘I want to win Reverse Retro.’”
Which ones were victorious? Here is our ranking of the 32 NHL Reverse Retro jerseys for the 2022-23 season. Keep in mind that we based this just on the jerseys themselves — some really cool elements will be revealed with the full uniform kits, but they didn’t factor in here.
What a concept: It’s only taken nearly 30 years, but a team that plays in South Florida finally has a jersey that’s evocative of South Florida.
This is a mix of the team’s stick-and-palm secondary logo that’s been with it since the 1990s and the light blue from the third jerseys it rocked in 2009. The rays of the sun are slightly raised to give the crest a 3D quality. The colors on the stripes pay homage to the Panthers’ current primary colors. The rest feels like you’re staring at a frozen blue Hawaiian through a pair of expensive sunglasses.
Sure, seeing the alternate logo makes one realize how close that hockey stick looks to a golf putter … but that’s also kind of thematic to the franchise, if we’re being honest.
It was inevitable that the Sharks eventually would honor their Bay Area ancestors with a Reverse Retro jersey. The California Golden Seals’ greatest legacy might be their aesthetics, including a turn to teal 17 years before the Sharks swam into the NHL.
These are essentially the Seals’ 1974 home jerseys with “Sharks” written on them instead, and they’re sublime: a little California love, a little Jackie Moon. That Seals team won 19 games. Given what we’ve seen from San Jose this season, perhaps it’s just dressing the part.
The Youppi! of Reverse Retro jerseys.
Montreal claims this is meant to honor its 1979 look, when it won its fourth Stanley Cup in a row. Adidas claims the light blue is “inspired by the city of Montreal colors.” But for the love of Tim Raines and Larry Walker, we know what’s up with these sweaters: It’s the Habs as the Montreal Expos, and we salute them like Andrés Galarraga admiring a home run.
The most remarkable thing about this Reverse Retro Kings jersey, which honors the 40th anniversary of the “Miracle on Manchester,” is that one swears that it has previously existed. But the crown logo in the 1980s was on either a gold or “Forum Blue” jersey.
This is the first time the iconic sweater has been executed in white, and it looks awesome. Bonus points for creating raised gems on the crown for a 3D look.
The Avalanche topped the 2020 rankings with their ode to the Quebec Nordiques. This year’s model could be seen as an homage to the NHL’s Colorado Rockies, but their logo inspiration was the same as this Retro jersey: the Colorado state flag.
Nothing is going to top the remixed Nords sweater. But this looks clean and sharp, and like other Avalanche alternate logos is an improvement over their primary one.
The Golden Knights had a Reverse Retro jersey last year inspired by the now-defunct Wranglers minor league franchise. This time, they’re inspired by a team that doesn’t exist.
This sweater “imagines what a Golden Knights third jersey might have looked like in 1995.” The font and numbering are inspired by vintage hotel signage on the Strip. Oh, and just to make sure you get the full Vegas ostentatiousness: There are hidden glow-in-the-dark stars incorporated in the crest that can be seen in the dark and under a black light.
“When you think about the glitz and glamour of Vegas, it requires a little ingenuity,” Near said.
The Blues chose poorly last season, resurrecting a nauseating jersey design and inexplicably making red the primary color. This time, they understood the assignment.
The Blues’ Reverse Retro is based on a 1966 prototype worn by the team’s ownership a year before the expansion franchise actually hit the ice, which is like giving an Oscar to a teaser trailer. Despite being their second most prominent color, this is the first primarily gold jersey the Blues have worn. It incorporates the light blue seen on their Winter Classic jerseys.
Sound the trumpets: These rule.
This is the most “meta” Reverse Retro jersey in the collection.
In 2020, the Coyotes honored their much-maligned 1998 thirds, which magnified the head of the “kachina jersey” logo, made green the primary color and ceded the waistline to “a painfully obvious desert landscape complete with cacti,” as the Five For Howling blog noted. Their first Reverse Retro jersey swapped the green for purple from the team’s crescent moon alternate logo, and it was one of the best of the lot.
Now they’ve gone Reverse Retro on their Reverse Retro, swapping out the green for sienna, marking “the first time this trending earth tone color has been worn by any NHL team,” according to Adidas. The million dollar question: Are these supposed to abstractly evoke Arizona State athletics colors or is this simply coincidental?
The Pooh bear has returned!
The Bruins wore this logo from 1995-2006 on a third sweater. The blog Stanley Cup of Chowder called it “the greatest jersey in Bruins history.” The Pooh bear was originally featured on a gold jersey. This time it’s a white background, all the better to see the kind eyes, parted hair and Marchand-esque smirk on the bear’s fuzzy mug. Put one on and snuggle up with a pot of honey.
“What’s the design I could do that could pay homage to the Oilers but also just be cool to look at?” he pondered. “Selling it to someone in Edmonton is preaching to the choir. How do I sell it to someone in Miami?”
We’re not sure how it played in Florida, but its initial run in Edmonton wasn’t unanimously beloved. But this version might be an improvement.
His “dynamic gear surrounding an oil drop” logo has been enhanced by being raised in some areas and with that splash of orange in the middle. Each spoke represents a different Oilers Stanley Cup championship, and sadly that hasn’t needed to be edited since it debuted in 2001.
The Islanders have slowly reclaimed the ill-fated legacy of the “Fishsticks” logo that reigned from 1995-97, selling gear with that logo and color scheme in their official store in recent years.
For the team’s 50th anniversary, Adidas has added “the most requested uniform” for its Reverse Retro series.
Here’s the thing: The slight modifications they’ve made to the logo — like the TRON-esque orange highlights and the current color scheme — tone down the kitsch and the charm. One could argue the original Fishsticks jersey’s Aquafresh palette and queasy waves are more in keeping with the Reverse Retro aesthetic.
There’s an interesting separation between Canucks fans and outsiders when it comes to this Reverse Retro jersey. It’s inspired by their Western Hockey League look that featured Johnny Canuck, only this one has raised embroidered gloves and suspenders.
But the Canucks Army blog notes that Vancouver fans (a) feel this look to too close to that of the Abbotsford Canucks, who also use Johnny Canuck, and (b) were hoping for a less predictable experiment like “a green and blue edition of the Flying Vee or Flying Skate jerseys.”
In 1995, the Capitals went from red, white and blue to blue, black and bronze. They had a black third jersey for 10 years during that fad, with the capitol dome logo seen on the shoulders of this Reverse Retro jersey.
Now they’ve turned the “Screaming Eagle” into another black alternate sweater, with some really nice tweaks to the formula. This jersey features metallic copper and “Capital Blue,” giving the whole thing a sleeker look.
You can’t improve on perfection, which is why the Red Wings’ first Reverse Retro attempt looked like a practice version of their iconic sweater. But give the Red Wings credit for taking a swing with version 2.0.
An homage to their 1991 NHL 75th anniversary jerseys, which were red and white, this bold red and black look is accented by a DETROIT wordmark inspired by the 1920s Detroit Cougars. For a young team developing its swagger, we’ll allow it.
This Ducks jersey is cool. It’s clean looking. It’s got the proper logo on the front. They’re going to slap “ZEGRAS” on the back of these and move racks of them.
But after much debate inside the ESPN fashion offices, we came to a consensus: If Anaheim is dipping back to the inaugural Mighty Ducks season and their Reverse Retro doesn’t have even a hint of jade or eggplant, then what are they even doing this for?
The Rangers finished No. 2 on the 2020 rankings by simply bringing back to the Liberty Head logo for the first time since around 2007. They went back to that well for this Reverse Retro jersey, slapping it on a royal blue jersey with red sleeves.
The whole thing honestly feels like one of those sweatshirts that costs $50 more than it should, and hangs untouched with its friends in some distant corner of the NHL Store.
ROBO PENGUIN! Memories of Mario Lemieux, Jaromir Jagr and Petr Nedved come rushing back as we celebrate the majesty of this flightless fowl.
But we had to award some demerits for what could have been: This is the Penguins’ 1992-93 jersey flipped from white to black, leaving out some of the more audacious Robo Penguin gradient designs from the latter part of the decade. It’s a jersey that thinks the 1990s stopped with grunge, when “Bills, Bills, Bills” actually dropped in 1999.
The most interesting aspect of this Stars jersey, which is a homage to their inaugural season look back in 1993-94, is the dimensional embroidery on the crest to give the star a 3D quality.
Otherwise, the current “victory green” color integrated with this classic design makes for a fine looking sweater. But we’re now two Reverse Retro jerseys deep and the “Mooterus” has yet to return, so we really can’t go any higher than this for Dallas.
The Jets’ first Reverse Retro jersey was one of our favorites, but this one isn’t nearly as bold.
Winnipeg remixed the Jets 1.0 jersey from 1990 with the team’s current color palette, minus the red. A great sweater for Teemu Selanne completists but one that doesn’t come close to the streetwear grandeur of the previous Retro hit.
More debate inside the ESPN fashion offices on this one.
The Devils pay tribute to the Colorado Rockies 40 years after the team relocated from Denver to East Rutherford. It’s certainly a fun look, with the Rockies’ gold, red and navy accenting the jersey. But we’re a little disappointed that the color scheme only carries through to the logo via a blue circle around the “NJ,” when this could have been a fun opportunity to play around with that logo.
As it stands, this sorta looks like when a pro shop irons the right crest on the wrong jersey.
“Say kids, did you like the Minnesota North Stars-influenced Reverse Retro jersey? What if we told you that it’s now available in … green?”
Seriously, no points for creativity, but these remain pretty dope.
Inspired by Chicago’s 1938 uniforms and their 2019 Winter Classic gear, this Blackhawks jersey had the unfortunate timing of being immediately market-corrected by a similar — but much better executed — Red Wings Reverse Retro.
Sorry, but this just doesn’t work. The “goat head” logo loses its magic when stripped away from the red, black and silver color scheme that evoked images of Dominik Hasek saves and Miroslav Satan goals.
Outside of the nostalgic kick of having this logo back on a Buffalo sweater, applying the traditional Sabres colors to it feels slightly blasphemous.
What’s a nostalgic Kraken jersey? A Mark Giordano sweater?
Obviously lacking history, Seattle just decided to make a sea green jersey that makes it look like they’re wearing a cummerbund under their own logo. It’s not a bad looking sweater. It’s just not as audacious one might expect from a team nicknamed after a mythical sea creature. It’s a Reverse Retro with real “why don’t we make our mascot a troll doll?” energy.
Missed opportunity here. There was speculation that the Predators were going to put their 2001 third jersey logo on a navy jersey, which would have properly remixed their mustard stain sweater with a currently used color.
Alas, they went with gold, making this jersey practically redundant with their current ones.
It’s their current away jersey remixed into a red sweater, with two sets of hurricane warning flags on the shoulders.
Your mileage here is entirely dependent one how you feel about nicknames on jerseys instead of full nicknames.
Adidas says this is a remix of the jersey the Senators wore during their 2006-07 Stanley Cup Final run with “the current Ottawa color scheme and breakouts.”
Sure. It’s very much an Ottawa Senators jersey. But we’ll wait and see the full kit, as Adidas notes these Ottawa jerseys will be “presented in a powerful black head-to-toe visual including the helmet, pant and sock complimented by a thick super-sized player name and number system.”
The Blue Jackets got a little funky last time with a primary red jersey that sported their original logo. This is the first black jersey the Jackets will have worn, with blue sleeve accents that evoke their current third sweaters.
These FrankenJerseys are on the borderline of looking like a stitching accident, but in the end we like our jerseys like we like our steaks: black and blue. But maybe not as cold.
Toronto is honoring its 1962 Stanley Cup championship, remixing a primary white jersey into a primary blue jersey with white shoulder pads.
Have you ever seen a movie where one bad performance ruins the whole thing? The Flames have a cool black jersey, with an iconic logo and an eye-catching color scheme.
They also decided to bring back to truly bizarre “diagonal pedestal hem stripe” from their mid-1990s sweaters.
It just ruins the whole thing and makes it look like the Flames are wearing an achievement belt from a strip mall taekwondo academy.
“I don’t want my guys looking like a [expletive] crayon box. I don’t want them wearing a bunch of whozies and whats-its. Just make a Flyers jersey. Who cares?” — John Tortorella, maybe.
Nostalgia can be comforting. Nostalgia can be inspiring. But nostalgia can also cloud one’s judgement on what should or should not be mined from the past for the benefit of the present.
To that end: These Lightning jerseys should have remained buried under whatever landfill in which they were decomposing. Tampa Bay wore these jerseys from 1996-99, during a time when the NHL had its share of ghastly third jerseys. They had storm waves across the waist; lightning bolts on the sleeves, and in perhaps the single worst aesthetic touch for an NHL jersey in the last 30 years, “bold rain” flecked across the front of the sweater that looked like it was taken straight from an 8-bit video game.
Whatever Lightning player feigns excitement the most for these monstrosities should win the Lady Byng, full stop.
Dan Near of Adidas offers a brief rebuttal about this jersey: “There were some jerseys from that era that we presented and the teams weren’t excited about. There were others that the teams embraced right away. This isn’t a permanent choice. This is a celebration of a moment in time and the nostalgia about a team. Maybe we don’t have to take ourselves so seriously and bring something back that might have been polarizing but that in today’s day and age is very trend-right. I give a lot of acclaim to the Lightning for making a risk well worth taking.”
The Phillies have been one of the biggest surprise teams of the MLB postseason. They got into the playoffs then promptly swept the St. Louis Cardinals and then pummeled the reigning champion Atlanta Braves. Philadelphia has lost one game this postseason and is outscoring opponents by 3.5 runs in wins.
The winning continues in football. After beating the rival Dallas Cowboys on Sunday, the Philadelphia Eagles are the lone remaining undefeated team in the NFL. Quarterback Jalen Hurts is eighth in the league in passing and, according to ESPN Stats and Information research, he is the fourth-youngest quarterback to start 6-0. The Eagles are also the fifth team in the past 35 seasons to not trail in the second half of their first six games. Two of the prior five teams to do that won the Super Bowl.
And, in hockey, the Philadelphia Flyers have started the season 3-0. They most recently defeated the Eastern Conference champion Tampa Bay Lightning. Gritty, the Flyers’ mascot, has crowned the city as the best in sports.
Absent from all the winning is the Philadelphia 76ers. They lost to the Boston Celtics on Tuesday in their first game of the season. On the bright side, James Harden looked super cozy in his pregame attire, and the city’s MLS team — the Philadelphia Union — is atop the league standings.
We’re officially over halfway through college football’s regular season, so what better time to check on the Heisman Trophy race than now?
After several high-profile games this past week, our Heisman watch has been turned upside down with three new faces on the list since our last check in — congrats on making the cut once again C.J. Stroud and Bryce Young.
This week, you’ll see our Heisman standings, top Heisman moments of the week, what to watch for in Week 8, plus a Q&A with Michigan RB Blake Corum.
Voting methodology: 13 voters ranked their top five candidates, with five points for a first-place vote down to one point for a fifth-place vote.
Notable: Hooker has been the breakout star of the college football season so far and his best came last Saturday against Alabama. He finished 21 of 30 for 385 yards and five touchdowns as the Volunteers beat the Crimson Tide for the first since 2006.
Notable: Stroud has been the picture of consistency this season as the No. 2 Buckeyes are off to a 6-0 start. Stroud has thrown for over 350 yards three times this season, including his last time out when he threw for 361 yards and six touchdowns against Michigan State. He’s thrown for 4+ touchdowns in four games this season.
Notable: The Crimson Tide may have taken a loss at Tennessee but Young’s return was still something to behold. He threw for 455 yards and two touchdowns while keeping Alabama in the game as Hooker was lighting up the scoreboard. Young is looking to be the second player in history to win back-to-back Heisman trophies.
Notable: The Bruins are off to the program’s best start under Chip Kelly and the success starts with the quarterback. Thompson-Robinson put UCLA on the map on Sept. 30 when he threw for 315 yards and three touchdowns in a 40-32 win over a ranked Washington team. If Thompson-Robinson wants to thoroughly place himself in the Heisman conversation, a big performance in Eugene this week against Oregon will do it.
Notable: Much like Young, one of Williams’ best performances of the season came in loss. The Trojans fell late to Utah this past week but Williams threw for 381 yards and five touchdowns in the 43-42 defeat. He also ran for 57 yards against the Utes.
Heisman odds: +800
Others receiving votes (total points in parentheses): Blake Corum, RB, Michigan (8); Drake Maye, QB, North Carolina (3)
Q&A with Blake Corum
After Michigan’s 41-17 win over Penn State in Ann Arbor, ESPN’s Adam Rittenberg and Chris Grandstaff talked with Corum about his season and the Heisman.
ESPN: Reggie Bush has attended your last few games [as a Fox analyst]. What have your interactions been like with him?
BC: I’ve become really cool friends with Reggie the last couple weeks. I talked to Reggie after every game. The respect is mutual. Reggie is one of the best running backs ever, especially when you talk about college, he killed it. He told me what he thought about my cutting ability and what type of running back I am. He said I’m one of the best. He is the best, so getting those words from him meant a lot. I talked to them after the game yesterday, and then when he was leaving, the police were escorting their cars, and I was walking out with fans, and he saw me, he rolled his window down [and said], ‘Keep being great.’ Then he told me, ‘You’re the best running back in the nation.’ That meant a lot. If I’m able to win the Heisman like Reggie, it would be a blessing.
ESPN: Did you see Charles Woodson at the Penn State game?
BC: Yeah, I’ve met Charles Woodson a couple of times. I talked to him before the game, he came up to me. Desmond Howard, I’m really cool with him. I know a bunch of guys who used to play here.
ESPN: Obviously those two guys won the biggest award you can win in the Heisman. What would it mean to be in that mix and ultimately have a chance?
BC: It would be amazing, but I’m not looking too far ahead. I’m really focused on trying to get better, how can this team get better and keep winning? When you’re winning, everyone’s looking at you. Those awards that happen at the end of the season, they’re at the end of the season for a reason. I’m not going to win the Doak Walker [Award] today, I’m not going to win the Heisman today. I have to keep producing, I have to keep eating, and that’s going to take work. Obviously, it would be a blessing to be up there on that wall next to the greats. It would be a dream come true.
ESPN: Growing up, what was your Heisman Trophy memory? What player do you remember most?
BC: I don’t have too many Heisman memories, because more times than not, it’s a quarterback winning it. But when I committed to Michigan, I went on YouTube and actually looked at the [Heisman] ceremonies of Desmond and Charles. Obviously, Johnny Manziel, that was cool with the money sign, that was a big year, that was fun, everyone was rooting for him. He was a heck of an athlete.
ESPN: How do you view your role last year as opposed to what they’re asking of you this season?
BC: I look at it as Donovan [Edwards] took my role and I took Hassan [Haskins’] role. Hassan last year, he set it up for me. He got those hard yards, and then I come in and break a 50-yarder. It’s a little different now because he wasn’t really breaking too many 50-yarders. I’m still breaking some long ones, but he was getting 20-plus carries a game, really inside zone, he wasn’t going outside too much. I feel like I’m that thunder with some lightning as well. That’s what my role is. I can take the load and then Donovan comes in and does his thing, too. I was lightning last year. Now I get to the goal line, like third-and-1, I’m in as a power back. Red zone, I’m in.
ESPN: How important has it been for you to prove you can do that and still break a 60-yarder?
BC: It’s been very important. A lot of people have doubted my durability, maybe my size, it starts with my height [5-8], but at the end of the day I’m 210 [pounds], weighed in at 212 today. So the weight isn’t a problem. But being able to get 28 to 30 carries in the last four games, I feel has shown a lot to whoever may have been doubting that.
ESPN: Who have you tried to model your game after?
BC: I love Barry Sanders. He was a little before my time, so I didn’t really get to watch him on TV, but I love watching him on YouTube, just how elusive he was and how he was able to get out of cuts and get out of tackles, break tackles, not get touched. I admire his style. Then, when it comes to power, because I like inside zone, I like running up the middle, I’m not afraid of contact, so I like Marshawn Lynch. He likes getting hit, he likes hitting people. He has that thing where he says, ‘Hit ’em over and over and over again.’ I like that mentality.
ESPN: You mentioned earlier that the Heisman is often a quarterback’s award. What would it mean to win it as a running back?
BC: It would mean a lot because it is kind of like a quarterback award. Obviously, [Michigan defensive end] Aidan [Hutchinson] went last year, didn’t get a chance to win it. If I’m able to go [to New York] and win it, I don’t know what I would do, honestly. I just know it would mean the world to me. I would definitely have come back and give my offensive linemen and big ol’ present. If I’m able to win it, I don’t know what the emotions would be like. It would mean a lot, especially another No. 2 at the University of Michigan winning it. They may have to retire the jersey after that. I thought they would have already retired it after Charles, just because of the legend he is, but if someone else wins it wearing No. 2, oh man, it would be a blessing.
play
0:27
Blake Corum gets down to the 1-yard line with a 50-yard run. On the next play he finished the drive off with a short touchdown run.
Top Heisman moments this past week
1. Let’s be honest, Hooker’s entire performance against Alabama is why he’s No. 1 on the list this week. But here’s one of his many dimes from the 52-49 win.
No. 9 UCLA at No. 10 Oregon (Saturday, 3:30 p.m. ET, Fox)
As previously mentioned, if Dorian Thompson-Robinson is a true Heisman candidate, this will be the game to show it — until the USC matchup, of course. ESPN’s College GameDay is heading to Eugene for the game and, with both teams in the top 10, UCLA coach Chip Kelly’s return to Oregon should be one of the Pac-12’s most electric games of the season. Oh, and Oregon quarterback Bo Nix isn’t too shabby, either.
Six weeks into the 2022 NFL season, the league’s Most Valuable Player race is starting to come together, highlighted by a host of quarterbacks emerging as candidates. The leader of the AFC’s only one-loss team owns the best Vegas odds and the most first-place votes from our panel, while the QB of the NFL’s only remaining undefeated team has skyrocketed through the first third of the season. Those jockeying for the frontrunner spot have 12 more weeks to make their case.
We asked a group of analysts — Stephania Bell, Matt Bowen, Mike Clay, Courtney Cronin, Jeremy Fowler, Dan Graziano, Matt Miller, Sal Paolantonio, Jason Reid, Mike Tannenbaum, Seth Walder and Field Yates — to vote on the top players in the MVP race right now. Then we used those 12 sets of rankings to give our top five candidates, using Heisman Trophy-esque scaling for each ranking to determine how the field stacks up.
We’ll also look at a few names who have seen their MVP stock either spike or plummet in the early going, and ESPN analytics writer Seth Walder also weighed in on an under-the-radar MVP-caliber player. Here’s a look at where things stand after six weeks.
Early season returns reveal an undisputed truth: Allen is the best quarterback in the NFL, an honor he began wrestling away from top AFC rival Patrick Mahomes in last year’s playoffs. Allen entered the season with the best odds to win the MVP and strengthened his case against the Kansas City Chiefs in Week 6 by outdueling Mahomes in a 24-20 thriller, which he capped off by leading a 76-yard, come-from-behind scoring drive with a little more than a minute remaining.
That was the second game-winning drive he’s led the Bills on this month (the other was in a 23-20 win over the Baltimore Ravens) and his first fourth-quarter comeback since Sept. 27, 2020. Allen is the first starting quarterback to beat Mahomes twice at Arrowhead Stadium. He leads the league in passing (both in yards and yards per game) and his 753 passing yards over the last two games are the most in a two-game span in Bills franchise history.
Hurts’ ascension — where he’s seen vast improvement in areas such as completion percentage (66.8%, ranked ninth), passer rating (98.4, fifth), average release time (2.76) and yards per attempt (8.2, second) — has Philadelphia off to its first 6-0 start since 2004. The 24-year-old QB has won nine games in a row dating to 2021, tied for the longest win streak by an Eagles starting quarterback in 22 years, and he is the fifth player in league history to pass for 1,500 yards and rush for 250 through his team’s first six games.
The Eagles boast the most offensive balance of any team in the NFC (394.5 yards per game, ranked third; 26.8 points per game, fourth) with a steady run game and explosive passing attack. Hurts has played a big role in what the Eagles are doing on the ground, with 11 more carries on designed runs (38) than any other quarterback and 16 of those coming in the red zone, according to Next Gen Stats. He’s also completing a career-high plus-2.7% of his passes over expectation, the third highest in the NFL.
A lot was made about how the Chiefs offense would function without wide receiver Tyreek Hill. His absence has forced Mahomes to spread the ball around and become a more efficient, patient passer. Through six games, Mahomes and Allen are tied for first with 17 touchdown passes. Mahomes continues to be incredibly effective when under pressure, ranking first in touchdowns per pass attempt and third in first downs per pass attempt, according to ESPN Stats & Information research.
But the pressure he faced late in Week 6 determined the outcome for the Chiefs. Against the Bills, Mahomes accounted for 92% of Kansas City’s offense when he threw for 338 yards, two touchdown passes, two interceptions and completed 63% of his passes. While Allen led Buffalo on a touchdown drive to take the lead late, Mahomes responded by throwing an interception while under duress, his third pick on a game-winning drive attempt dating to last year’s AFC Championship game.
Jackson’s MVP candidacy is on hold — for now — after a hot start. He ranks third in touchdown passes and leads all players in yards per rush (8.1) and yards before contact per rush (6.3), becoming the first player to be top 5 in both categories through the first six weeks of the season since the NFL-AFL merger, according to Elias.
Jackson is at his strongest early in games, with 12 of his 13 touchdown passes coming in the first three quarters. On the flip side, four of his six interceptions have occurred in the fourth quarter. His QBR in the first three quarters is better than fellow MVP candidate Hurts, but his QBR in the fourth quarter is worse than Chicago Bears quarterback Justin Fields.
play
2:06
Marcus Spears discusses Lamar Jackson’s fourth-quarter struggles and how he can fix them.
A quarterback or running back has won the MVP every year since 1987, but Parsons deserves consideration after a strong start to the season, as he is tied for first in total pressures (31) and second in sacks. Aside from a 26-17 loss to the Eagles where Parsons was largely contained, Dallas has won games this season due to a dominant defense. The Cowboys went 4-1 during a stretch where quarterback Dak Prescott was injured thanks in large part to the defense, which leads the league in sacks (24) and is third in points allowed (98).
Herbert set a record for the most passes thrown (57) without a touchdown in the Chargers’ 19-16 OT win over the Denver Broncos on Monday, according to Elias. He’s still in the MVP conversation thanks to where he ranks in passing yards (fourth), touchdowns (sixth), interception percentage (fifth), passing first downs (eighth) and QBR (eighth), but he’ll have to go on a run over the next 11 games to be in contention with the frontrunners.
For the first time in the Super Bowl era, the Giants have posted four upset wins in their first six games of a season in large part due to the identity they’ve established with Barkley, who looks like the best running back in the league. He leads the NFL with 771 yards from scrimmage and his four touchdowns this season are two more than he had in the combined 15 games he played in 2020-21. At minimum, he’s a front runner for the NFL’s comeback player of the year award.
Cousins broke the Vikings’ franchise record for consecutive completions when he started 17-of-17 in a Week 5 win over the Bears and followed that up by throwing for two touchdown passes in a win over the Miami Dolphins. Coming off his third Pro Bowl season, the 34-year-old has yet to throw for 300 yards in a game but his efficient play has the Vikings off to a 5-1 start.
Smith leads the NFL in completion percentage over expectation (plus-9.6%), according to Next Gen Stats, and leads the NFL in completion percentage (73.4%) through six weeks. He’s thrown for 1,502 yards and nine touchdown passes, which ranks ninth and eighth, respectively, among qualified starting quarterbacks. The Seahawks would be nowhere close to a .500 record without Smith, which is why the franchise should consider him as an option at QB beyond this season.
Burrow bounced back after the Bengals got off to an 0-2 start, and he has completed more than 62% of his passes in each of his first six games. In a come-from-behind win over the New Orleans Saints, the Bengals’ QB completed 28 of 37 passes for 300 yards and three touchdown passes and didn’t turn the ball over. With Atlanta, Cleveland and Carolina coming up, Burrow could work his way into the MVP mix.
Rodgers is struggling to compensate for a diminished supporting cast. He had a total QBR of 17.0 in a loss to the New York Jets, which was his second worst of the season (10.8 vs. Minnesota Week 1). Last year’s MVP has six turnovers through six games after turning the ball over four times all of last season. He’s lost three fumbles this season after losing two in the previous two seasons combined.
play
1:42
Field Yates breaks down Aaron Rodgers’ dismal fantasy season.
Bradberry is worthy of a top-10 MVP vote, in my view. His nearest defender numbers from NFL Next Gen Stats are outrageous. Among outside corners with 125 coverage snaps Bradberry ranks:
Second in yards per coverage snap (0.5)
First in targeted EPA by a wide margin (minus-25.8)
Second in completion percentage over expectation (minus-20%)
First in receptions allowed over expectation (minus-8.0)
To put the second number in context, the Bengals have recorded plus-28.7 EPA on Joe Burrow dropbacks this season (I’m mixing between NGS and ESPN EPA models here — not ideal, but you get the point). To record a level of production as a corner that’s in the same ballpark as a higher-end QB is incredibly valuable. Yes, a bunch of that was generated on a deflection that he turned into a pick-six off Jared Goff but it was hardly a one-off: Bradberry has been superb the whole year.
Cleveland has reinforcements, with Shane Bieber on normal rest and available to pitch if necessary. Like much of the first few games of the series, the decisive Game 5 could be determined by who scores first, especially with the bullpens of both teams pitching well through the first four games.
One notable change for the Yankees is the absence of shortstop Isiah Kiner-Falefa from the lineup. The infielder was a polarizing player for the Yankees’ fan base because of the past Gold Glove winner’s struggles in the field, culminating in multiple missed opportunities in Game 4 that contributed to runs for Cleveland. New York will lean on rookie Oswaldo Cabrera, who has become a super utility man over the past few months of the season.
Yankees jump ahead
Fans in the right field stands got two treats, as Giancarlo Stanton hit a three-run bomb in the first and Aaron Judge followed it up in the second with a solo shot.
2. C.J. Stroud, QB, 
3. Bryce Young, QB, 
