What’s hot and what’s Knott in football – Week 10

By Rhys Knott

What do Dan Campbell and Thanos have in common (apart from their unfeasibly large heads)? They’re both inevitable. DC’s half-time interview on Sunday Night Football only served to prove he has the ability to alter the universe with the power of thought.

On the other hand, do you know what isn’t inevitable? Kicking field goals. 24 kickers attempted at least one field goal in Week 10, five guys missed at least one. Three of those misses would prove decisive!  

What’s more, two of those kickers who missed chances to win a game had just returned from a spell on the sidelines, giving coaches difficult decisions to make in the future.  

And that could be problematic. Some coaches in the National Football League demonstrating that overthinking is the new thinking.

Not many people equate offensive coordinators with a 14th-century monk, but Occam’s razor applies to football, too.

What’s hot in football – Week 10

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Quarterbacks stiff arming defensive linemen almost became the hottest part of Week 10. Josh Allen, who else, got a good one in on Dayo Odeyingbo (who had earlier punched him in the head three times).

But the standout manhandling of a defensive end came from Baker Mayfield. Mayfield may as well have been yelling “my body, my choice” at the man they call “little bear”. Not very Alpha male that Nick. Mayfield kept Bosa at arm’s length whilst completing a pass on the run. That deserves some sort of prize!

Thursday night football brought us the thrill of the Chase(s). An injury that could derail the Ravens’ season and an illustration of how having great players doesn’t matter if you’re not using them properly. And with one catch from two targets, Diontae Johnson proved he isn’t the Ravens’ Messiah. He’s not even a very naughty boy.

Despite Ja’Marr Chase going over 200 receiving yards for the third time in his four-year career. The Bengals failed to hold on to a lead against the Ravens for the second time in five weeks! Chase’s 264 yards in Baltimore is just two yards short of his career-high. Chase’s effort put Tylan Wallace’s 115 yards well and truly in the shade.

Chase absolutely destroyed the worst pass defense in the league. The 24-year-old receiver caught 11 of his 17 targets for 264 yards! And he scored three of the Bengals five touchdowns.

Elsewhere, in news that will surprise absolutely nobody, Christian McCaffrey’s return coincided with Brock Purdy becoming the second-best passer in football. Understandably Joe Burrow threw for the most yards in Week 10 (428 to be precise), but Purdy led the chasing pack.

Purdy ended the 49ers victory over the Buccaneers with 353 yards! Purday also threw two touchdowns despite being sacked three times. 

However, nobody threw more touchdowns than Lamar Jackson. He managed four against a Bengals defense that couldn’t stop traffic let alone the Ravens. Jackson ended Thursday Night Football with a 141.4 passer rating (out of 158.3). That’s 14 points better than the next-best quarterback in football, Will Levis (no, really). 

On the topic of the Titans’ maverick signal caller, only one poor soul suffered more sacks than Levis. That ignominious honour was bestowed upon Caleb Williams (more on that shemozzle in Chicago later)!

Unfortunately, horrible pass protection became hotter than fascism in Week 10. 18 quarterbacks hit the deck more than once. Even Trey Lance, who only threw six passes for the Cowboys got sacked twice! 

Good, albeit in a comical way (unless you’re C.J Stroud) is Dan Campbell speaking turnovers into existence during his interview with Melissa Stark. 

Carlton Davis wasn’t the only defender to make impressive interceptions in Week 10 though. 20 different players picked off an opposing quarterback, with Davis and Kamari Lassiter making two each on Sunday Night Football. Only Buffalo’s Taron Johnson capitalised and bagged a pick-six though.

But that’s not all, we can’t focus on the passes and who may or may not have caught them when Chuba Hubbard continued his own personal offensive explosion. The 25-year-old racked up 153 rushing yards in what was his third game over 100 yards this year. He had only recorded three 100+ yard games in his first three seasons! Hubbard also recorded three of NextGen Stats’ top six remarkable rushes this week!

What’s Knott in Football – Week 10

Essentially Todd Monken’s offense. The Bengals did a good job of bottling up Derrick Henry and not allowing Justice Hill to get going. However once Lamar Jackson ran for 10 yards in the third quarter Cincinatti’s defense loosened up. But Moncken still didn’t lean on the run game. 

Monken wasn’t the only play-caller who got lost in a sea of overthinking though. It is becoming an endemic problem in the National Football League. Shane Waldron ignored the Bears’ most effective way of moving the ball downfield against the Patriots. 

Da Bears averaged 3.7 yards per carry, D’Andre Swift could only manage 59 yards on 16 carries. Roschon Johnson’s only carry went for –4 yards, but Caleb Williams averaged 7.5 yards and only ran twice. Chicago has only won once when Williams has carried fewer than five times. Even then he carried four times in the victory over the Jaguars. 

Bobby Slowik’s Texans just kept running Joe Mixon into the congested part of the field. Unsurprisingly Mixon averaged 1.8 yards per carry by the end of the game while J.J. Taylor, who averaged 7.7 yards on the ice rink that is the MetLife field didn’t get a single carry. 

The Texans also targeted Xavier Hutchinson downfield on one occasion, resulting in a 41-yard pass interference call on Terrion Arnold. The Texans failed to gain any more chunk plays, if isolating Arnold worked why not try that regularly?

And Joe Flacco’s display for the Colts highlighted how it doesn’t really matter who is playing quarterback in Indy. The issue appears to be the coaches are asking their QB to make passes they aren’t comfortable throwing. Flacco threw three interceptions, suffered four sacks and fumbled the ball to the Bills’ defense. Anthony Richardson’s turn next week then Shane?

When it comes to play calling the line between showing your hand to your future opponents (every team has assistants who break down their opponents’ plays from the week before) and winning the game grows finer by the week. But every offense needs a figurehead, if your quarterback is your figurehead and you can’t protect him you’re in trouble.

Jonathan Taylor averaged 5.4 yards per carry for the Colts in Week 10, but they were playing from behind from the get-go, so they tried to get the passing game going with Flacco. That did not end well.

Back to Todd Monken on Thursday Night Football. Henry only touched the ball on 29% of the Ravens’ plays. If 29% sounds like a lot, when the Ravens beat the Bills 35-10 back in Week 4 Henry touched the ball on 50% of the snaps!

It wasn’t just a Ravens problem though, the Bengals had 75 total plays and 56 of those were Joe Burrow passes! When a receiver like Chase is averaging 24 yards per reception involving him in the run game (on a reverse or a screen pass) is a good way to manipulate the defense and would help keep Burrow in one piece.

Ultimately that didn’t matter when the Bengals failed to convert a 2-point conversion. And that play also falls squarely into the Knott category. Kirk Herbstreit highlighted Ja’Marr Chase lined up against single-man coverage on the outside, but Zac Taylor called a time-out which killed the Bengals’ momentum.

After the time-out, the Bengals seemed to have Chase one-on-one against Brandon Stephens, but Burrow looked for Tanner Hudson on the opposite side of the formation. Rarely has Mike Tomlin had a better Thursday night on the sofa. 

There were also at least three missed penalties on the 2-point conversion attempt (a hold on the offense, a roughing the passer and a defensive hold), but we shouted at the officials in Week 9’s Knott, so we have to let Clete Blakeman’s crew off this week. Officials letting them play beats throwing flags for non-penalties.

Now, let’s talk kickers. Graham Gano returned from injury for the Giants in Munich to miss a field goal in a game his team would eventually lose in overtime! Jake Moody also returned from injury for the 49ers (who managed to get Moody’s replacement injured too) and proceeded to look like he’d never kicked a football before! Moody missed three(!!!!!) attempts, but unlike Gano Moody popped the important one over as San Francisco won 23-20 in Tampa Bay.

Younghoe Koo joined the “I missed three kicks today” club too, but unlike Moody, he didn’t get the chance to redeem himself as the Dennis Allen-less Saints downed the Falcons. But on the plus side, none of Koo’s teammates tried to beat him and his long-snapper up on the sideline!

Not to be outdone Ka’imi Fairbairn, who kicked a 56-yard attempt in the second quarter, ended the Texans’ second-half malaise by missing a 58-yarder. Not many people have seen a football go that wide, Fairbairn’s attempt would have put Houston ahead with less than two minutes left.

But, by far the most egregious kicker fail came in Kansas City where the Broncos’ Will Lutz had a last-second, 35-yard chip shot blocked by the Chiefs. Lutz, another returning from an injury ended the game 0 for 2 on field goals in a game the Broncos lost by two points! Presumably, Sean Payton had some choice words for Lutz in the locker room.

RHYS KNOTT

NFL/FANTASY FOOTBALL ANALYST

Rhys has been watching the NFL for 30 something years and still hasn’t managed to pick a team to support. When he’s not fixatED on pass rushers you can find him blithering on about most sports on Twitter @wrhys_writes

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