Things That Caught My Eye
Awful year to be a quarterback
Based on Football Outsiders’ Adjusted Games Lost metric, the NFL’s quarterback corps are at 77.8 adjusted games lost in 2017 ahead of this past weekend. Andrew Luck, Aaron Rodgers, Ryan Tannehill, Sam Bradford, Carson Palmer, Deshaun Watson, Jameis Winston, Derek Carr, Marcus Mariota, and Jay Cutler all were or are injured, and 2017 is already the eighth highest AGL since 2000, and we have several weeks left in the NFL season. [FiveThirtyEight]
I’m sorry, Mississippi
The New York Times dove deep on who watches what NFL games on every Sunday. It’s part of a serpentine series of rules blacking out or making constant or flagged for mandatory pullout when it comes to what goes on CBS where. Thanks to rules saying no team’s home market can have a competing game on air, 9 percent of the country’s population didn’t get an NFL game on CBS at 1 p.m., and 86 percent of the country watched New England and Oakland play in Mexico. The fun part is that when deciding where to air a game, sometimes the players come up: Eli Manning plays well in Mississippi, where he went to college, just as Carson Wentz plays well in North Dakota and Marcus Mariota play well in his home state of Hawaii. [The New York Times]
They blew it!
Washington had a 99.7 percent chance of beating the Saints about six minutes before the end of regulation Sunday, and the Saints even had just a 0.2 percent chance of victory with 4:42 into the fourth quarter. Hilariously, Washington blew a 15 point lead and lost 34-31 in overtime. [ESPN]
New record
Katie Ledecky broke her own American record in the 1,650 freestyle at a meet in Texas. The Olympic superstar swam the distance in 15:03.31. [Swim Swam]
Nigeria is going to PyeongChang!
Seun Adigun, Ngozi Onwumere, and Akuoma Omeoga will makeup the first African bobsled team to qualify for the Olympics. They’re also Nigeria’s first ever qualifying team for the games. Canada has won the past two gold medals in women’s bobsledding. [Deadspin]
No major CFB upsets mean no major changes
Right now, Alabama has a 83 percent chance of finishing with a top four strength of record, followed by Miami, Clemson, Oklahoma and Georgia. Wisconsin will be a very interesting case for this season: They’ve got a 32 percent chance of finishing with a top-4 record, are currently undefeated, but as it stands according to ESPN’s FPI there are eight teams that look better than them on paper. [ESPN, ESPN]
Make sure to try your hand at our fun NFL can you beat the FiveThirtyEight predictions? game!
Big Number
11 completions, 6 of which were to the correct team
Rookie quarterback Nathan Peterman started for the Buffalo Bills on Sunday after the team benched Tyrod Taylor. He completed six passes out of fourteen attempts. He also completed five passes to the other team. The five interceptions in fewer than 15 passes in a single game is up there with the worst ever performances by a quarterback at the professional level, and only four other people have matched the achievement, three of whom did so in the 1930s. [ESPN]
Leaks from Slack:
neil:
This Tyrod thing must be the most catastrophic QB switch ever
heynawl-enten:
Seriously
IDK what this even is
tchow:
Eagles should always go for two rest of the season…even if Elliot comes back fine
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