What’s Hot and What’s Knott in Football – Week 18

By Rhys Knott

Week 18 delivered plenty of Knott.

A division that wound up being decided by a game where neither combatant could actually make the playoffs! While another would be decided by a misfiring kicker!

Some Week 18 games featured the most beige offense imaginable as coaches tried to keep their powder dry for the playoffs. But by and large, it looked simply awful! 

“There’s no such thing as bad weather, just inappropriate clothing”, according to British author Alfred Wainwright. Alfred has obviously never been to an NFC South divisional game in Tampa. 

In the first of two very uninspiring Saturday night games, the Panthers dissolved in the rain.

Then, in much better conditions, the 49ers were swept aside by Aden Durde’s Seahawks defense. 

But the 49ers’ “Rivalries” uniforms are far and away the worst thing to happen on Saturday night! 

Embed from Getty Images

What’s Hot in Football – Week 18

Jared Goff put up some hotness, even though the Lions’ season became meaningless back in Week 17!

31-year-old Goff threw for 331 yards against a Bears team that didn’t really care. Even though Detroit’s campaign has been derailed by injuries (again), it’s the second time Goff has lit the Bears up this season! 

In the last three weeks, Goff has completed 71% of his 70 passes against Da Bears. The former Ram has racked up six touchdowns and just one interception across their two games.

Ben Johnson will be delighted that his team are playing the Packers next week instead! 

In a very “Week 18 chaos” move, Mitch Trubisky is also very hot this week.

Some may argue that if you’re hot against the Jets defense you’re really not that hot at all. But 22 of 29, with four touchdowns and zero picks, gives Trubisky a 142.1 passer rating in Week 18! That’s hot against any defense. 

The Bills threw up another “it could only happen in Week 18” performance from running back Ray Davis.

Davis is low-key brilliant, but he’s behind James Cook and (bizarrely) Ty Johnson in Buffalo. 26-year-old Davis has already made an appearance in this season’s hot section after his Week 12 kick return for a touchdown, but he’d never had a 100-yard rushing day until this week. 

Rhamondre Steveson had himself a day too; the Patriots back ended Week 18 with 153 yards from scrimmage and a hat-trick of touchdowns! But it came against a Dolphins team that had 22 players injured! And they were pretty rubbish when all those guys were fit! 

Picking a hot receiver is a tricky task though. Amon-Ra recorded more receiving yards than any other pass catcher this week, but he failed to find the endzone. The Sun God racked up 139 yards on 11 catches.

Zay Flowers racked up 138 yards with two touchdowns, as the Steelers’ defense appeared to be completely ignoring him. The former Boston College Eagle could have gone over 200 yards if the Ravens had a functioning offense. 

Alec Pierce had a big game before he decided to get all up in an official’s grill (more on that later).

But if we’ve learned anything at the end of the 2025 NFL season, it’s that the real entertainment comes from defensive plays. And you’ll be delighted to know that the hilarious interceptions are back! 

17 players grabbed a pick in the carnage that took place in Week 18! Devin Bush hoovered up a simple deflected pass, not sure what Myles Garrett thought would happen here, mind you. 

Carl Granderson’s interception isn’t that funny, but it’s undeniably hot! 260-pounders shouldn’t have this sort of body control! 

Kevin Byard pounced for this one after Jaquan Brisker beat Amon-Ra to the ball. 

Technically, Drake Thomas caught this pick, but Christian McCaffrey practically handed it to him! 

But T.J. Watt made the funniest and most complicated pick of the week! 

Right, that’s the hilarity out of the way, let’s get into the legends who deserve 2025 Hall of Fame recognition, even if it is 2026.  

Jalyx Hunt might be the reason that the Eagles are headed back to the Super Bowl (trust, they just are). In his last five games, the second-year linebacker has recorded 4.5 sacks, made an interception, forced a fumble and even recovered a fumble!

Jaxson Dart might have only started 12 games this season, but anyone who can throw touchdown passes like this is going to the Hall! 

For an absolutely horrible team, the Vikings have more than their fair share of Hall of Famers. Harrison Smith made it into our own special hallway last week, C.J. Ham had a serious chance at a spot this week, but he is usurped by two other Vikes. Andrew Van Ginkel is first up. 

Van Ginkel might not be retiring like 32-year-old Ham is, but Van Ginkel leads the Vikings in passes defended, is second for interceptions and leads the defense in fumble recoveries! J.J. McCarthy leads the Vikings team in fumble recoveries because he’s grabbed four of the six balls he’s dropped! 

Van Ginkel has started 11 games this season, and the Vikings have won eight of those games. They’ve only won nine all season! 

Another Viking deserves to be inducted into our completely fabricated Hall of Fame is another Viking, the one, the only, the other J.J., Justin Jefferson. Jefferson has looked far from happy in purple this year as the offense has oscillated between shooting themselves in both feet and making even more catastrophic mistakes. But somehow the 26-year-old has still made history!  

We’re also putting a Bear in the Hall of Fame.

Normally, inadvertent racism would fall into the Knott category, but this is so funny it has to be hot. Getting the Eagles’ “exciting whites“ confused is actually pretty difficult.

Cooper DeJean is 6 feet tall and 198 pounds; he just looks like a cornerback. Reed Blankenship is only an inch taller and five pounds heavier, but he’s got arms like tree trunks and looks very much like a safety! That didn’t stop Sam Franklin, though.

And if we’re going to slate the kickers who get it wrong (and we really are) then we have to show some love to the few who get it right. Take a bow Cam Little

Seattle’s defense is so hot that we’re about to start the “Aden Durde for head coach” rumours! They stymied the 49ers’ offense, even if the 49ers didn’t exactly dust off their best plays.

Nothing is more Hall worthy than a big guy scoring a touchdown!

Bringing your city’s newest pitcher to his first home game is very hot!

Oh yeah, and Myles Garrett broke the single-season sack record.

That’ll get a guy into the Hall, but Myles is still the least athletic person in his relationship with Chloe Kim (eight X-Games snowboarding halfpipe gold medals, two Olympic golds and three world championship titles, thank you very much). 

Finally, catching a pass one handed will always land you in the hot section. Tee Higgins can do that.

So can Ronnie Dell, this is his first tuddy since 2023!

What’s Knott in Football – Week 18

It is a banner week for the Knott. From quarterbacks making quarterbacking look impossible to wide receivers upsetting officials, and even fake punts at the double, it’s all here. 

Shedeur Sanders taking back-to-back sacks against the Bengals is very Knott. The rookie has now thrown seven touchdown passes in his seven starts, 10 interceptions and taken 23 sacks!

Meanwhile, Max Brosmer is finding new ways to cock up doing a football? Oh, you know that’s Knott! 

This might not even be the quarterback’s fault, but whatever it is by the Cowboys, it’s absolutely Knott!

We all love Jameis, but Jameis singing? That’s pretty Knott.

Likewise, we all love a graph. But this graph is very Knott for the Ravens. Dear oh dear.

Sadly, that’s not it for the Ravens either. They’re incredibly Knott when Kyle Hamilton isn’t on the field!

We’ve already covered how back-to-back sacks are Knott, well, so are back-to-back fake punts. Yes, the Colts made it work, but they lost the game 38-30, and Davis Mills only completed three passes in the second half!

The most Knott thing in football is penalising players for being pumped up. Taunting is a terrible penalty, mainly because nobody wants to watch sterile, emotionless football, but also because it’s such a subjective decision. NFL defenders are paid to literally smash quarterbacks. Why wouldn’t a quarterback be hyped about getting his own back? (Granted, J.J. McCarthy is made of glass and should just slide, but still.)

In one of those football dichotomies, the 49ers offense became very Knott, and the Seahawks pass rush matched it. 

San Francisco managed just nine first downs on Saturday night; only one of those came on the ground! Seattle’s run defense stepping up is no surprise; it’s been the toughest in the league for the majority of the season, but the 49ers’ uninspiring play design is a shock and a worry for the playoffs. 

No Trent Williams is undoubtedly going to affect any offense. But with George Kittle, Jake Tonges, and Kyle Juszczyk, San Francisco should have at least been able to slow down the Seahawks defense with some 12 (or 13) personnel. It’s not like Kyle Shanahan to collapse in a high-pressure situation! 

On the other hand, Mike Macdonald’s Seattle defense has been battling a pass rush issue all season. The Seahawks don’t have a huge problem getting to the quarterback; their 26.1% pressure rate is fifth in the league, but their 44 sacks rank them seventh and are 20 behind the league-leading Broncos! 

It’s difficult to know what is going to be a bigger issue heading into the postseason, but there’s a chance the Seahawks meet the Rams (possibly the Eagles) or the Bears in the postseason. Sacking the quarterback will be crucial to slowing down those offenses. 

Caleb Williams has lost just one game this season when he hasn’t been sacked. That result came in that wild game against the 49ers in Week 17!  When the Rams have kept Matt Stafford clean, he has won three games and lost one, but he’s thrown 13 touchdowns and no interceptions!

And the game the Rams lost involved a bizarre 2-point conversion call by the officials, in Seattle! 

If Seattle meets the Eagles in the playoffs, then sacking the QB may not be a deciding factor. Jalen Hurts has played in eight games when he has been sacked one time or less, but he’s won four and lost four. That’s symptomatic of how erratic the Eagles have been, but their Week 17 display in Buffalo seems to show they’re back to winning ugly. 

But it’s time to talk about another “Rivalries” uniform. The NFL’s version of MLB’s City Connect special edition outfits has thrown up some very strange ensembles.  

San Francisco’s attempt isn’t that new or odd; they’ve played in black uniforms before, since 2015 in fact. But the black helmets makes it look like there are 11 Darth Vaders on the field, and the 9ers had a similar result to Vader and the rest of the Sith. 

Two defenders getting to the quarterback and then forgetting to tackle that quarterback is wildly Knott! 

Scaring an official into ejecting you from the game, as Alec Pierce did, is Knott, too.

One of the most egregiously Knott things to happen in Week 18 is goal kicking (because time really is a flat circle). There is no way that kicking a football through a set of posts can be as difficult as these guys make it look! 10 kickers missed a field goal attempt in Week 18! Evan McPherson even missed two extra points as the Bengals succumbed to the Browns 20-18! 

Staying in the AFC North, Chris Boswell missed an extra point that would have meant the Ravens needed to score a touchdown to win the division.  

As if that isn’t bad enough, Tyler Loop then failed to capitalise on the opportunity the Steelers afforded him. As terrible as slicing a potential game-winning kick is, this is all on John Harbaugh. The Ravens had a timeout left to use, a running back going for 6.3 yards per carry and a receiver averaging 34.5 yards per reception! Taking a knee and draining the clock took all the momentum away from a Ravens team that had just gone 34 yards in 22 seconds! 

Also, there this happened.

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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