The Wildcard’s NFL Picks - Week 4
Last Week: 10-5-1
Season: 34-13-1
Denver Broncos (0-3) at New York Jets (0-3)
Friday 1.20pm NZT
Three weeks in and things are starting to make sense. Outlier performances are being levelled out, teams have had time to adjust to the lack of a proper preseason, what we’re seeing now is the truth. And what we’re seeing gives me zero desire to bother watching this game.
Like, who is Brett Rypien? Because he’s gonna be starting for the Broncos this week. I refer that question to NFL.com who you’d figure would have the lowdown...
“The nephew of two-time Super Bowl champion quarterback Mark Rypien, Brett Rypien went undrafted out of Boise State in 2019, landing with the Broncos and spending much of his first season on the team's practice squad. 2020 began in similar fashion until an injury to Drew Lock threw a wrench into the Broncos' quarterback plans, requiring the team to promote Rypien to the active roster to back up Jeff Driskel. He replaced Driskel in the second half of Sunday's 28-10 loss to Tampa Bay, completing 8 of 9 passes for 53 yards. The lone incompletion was an interception by Mike Edwards that was more of an excellent grab by the safety than it was a poor throw. Thursday night will be Rypien's first career start, in which he'll become the fifth Broncos quarterback to start a game since the beginning of the 2019 season and ninth different since Peyton Manning retired following Denver's win in Super Bowl 50.”
Okay then, fair enough. Not exactly putting anybody’s mind at ease there though is he? A ninth starting quarterback since Peyton Manning won the Super Bowl four and a bit seasons ago. Literally none of them are starting quarterbacks anywhere else in the league (although Joe Flacco might be fore their opponents here in a few more weeks if Sam Darnold doesn’t figure out what he’s up to) and several of them I haven’t heard from since. It continues to astound that a team with a huge influence by John Elway has been so awful at this.
Trevor Siemian – 24 games
Case Keenum – 16 games
Joe Flacco – 8 games
Drew Lock – 7 games
Brock Osweiler – 4 games
Paxton Lynch – 4 games
Brandon Allen – 3 games
Jeff Driskel – 1 game
Take all that into consideration and know that I’m still pretty confident in picking the Broncos to win this game because football in New York is a shambles at the moment. Hard to decide who’s worse out of the Giants and the Jets at the moment... but at least the Giants have a pathway to get better down the line. Adam Gase has to be on sack watch if they drop this one.
Wildcard’s Pick: Broncos by 9
Indianapolis Colts (2-1) at Chicago Bears (3-0)
Monday 6.00am NZT
I’ll be honest, I thought Mitch Trubisky would hold it down longer than two and a half weeks. Not even sure what the point was if they were gonna give him such a short leash... did they think it was gonna be some magical instant resurgence? Then again I also thought Nick Foles was gonna be the starter coming into the season so I s’pose I’m just clueless on the matter. It was a weird situation from day one but in comes Nick Foles in the second half of that game against the Falcons and he leads the Bears back from 26-10 down to win. Three quick scores all in the fourth quarter. He’s now the starting quarterback for this team moving forward... stating the obvious there.
Nick Foles as the week one starter versus Nick Foles as the backup…
Foles might make a difference to the Bears, dunno. They’re a tough one to get a grasp on at the moment, having only beaten the Lions thanks to a dropped touchdown at the end, then almost let a 17-0 half-time lead slip against the woeful Giants to only win by four points (17-13, while the Giants have conceded 62 combined points in their other two games), and last week obviously it was a massive fourth quarter comeback that got them over the line. Some rougher luck and the Bears are 0-3. As it is they’re 3-0. Football is strange.
As for the Colts, they should be better than they are. Nothing wrong with 2-1 but they’ve looked far from fluent even in big wins over the Vikings and Jets (two winless teams). Most of that I’m putting down to Philip Rivers and it could be that he’s still easing into this offence or it could be that he’s kinda washed at this age and it’s probably a combination of the two.
Still, gotta respect the longevity... last week Rivers hit his 400th career passing touchdown, which is sixth all time. Same as where he sits on the passing yards marker as he topped 60,000 in the win over the Jets. Both of those marks he achieved in the second quarter last week same as he also went past Dan Marino for fifth on the all-time completions list. He has the eighth most wins as a starting quarterback (124) and the eleventh most starts for any position (226). Incredible career but at 38 years old in his fifteenth season as a starter he’s never made a Super Bowl and only has five career playoff wins (in eleven games).
So many great Chargers teams that never hit their potential. That’s the point of joining these ready-and-waiting Colts this year but I think he mighta waited a couple years too long, so it goes. Then again Peyton Manning won a Super Bowl his last year so anything’s possible. Looking forward to this games as an opportunity for each of these teams to play someone on their own level and give us a decent indication of where they’re at.
Wildcard’s Pick: Colts by 6
Jacksonville Jaguars (1-2) at Cincinnati Bengals (0-2-1)
Monday 6.00am NZT
Monday mornings are so good during NFL season. Set the alarm nice and early and then feast upon some NFL Redzone. Maybe even get a second screen going with a live game to follow the whole way through. The fact that ESPN stopped broadcasting Redzone in NZ a couple years ago was wild but to tell the truth I kinda prefer the streaming option anyway, the streams for NFL games are as good as any sport in my experience and watching that ESPN AUS/NZ channel for any length of time will drive you crazy. The same ads over and over... all of them promos for upcoming sports with wonky voiceovers and yuck it’s so bad.
Meanwhile as much as I despite sloppy, saccharine capitalism of this version I actually sorta like watching the American ads on individual game streams. They’re products I can’t buy so I don’t have to feel like I’m being manipulated into buying something I don’t want/need and I can just soak up that particular brand of advertising humour that you get with those.
Power Rankings the Types of American Telly Ads:
5) Medical products full of smiling old people and soft lens focus which spend half the ad setting a calm and assured and healthy tone and then spend the other half listing excessive quantities of potential side effects
4) Insurance companies who use NFL quarterbacks (or NBA basketballers) in unusual circumstances to test their acting skills (which are often kinda decent, tbf), serving up excellent meme candidacy
3) Jewellery ads which are exceedingly soppy and always include either a mixed-race couple or multiple couples of different races, always with at least one white couple and one black couple, with lots of sparkly lights and often set around festive holidays and built up like the grand gesture at the end of a rom com... so over the top it’s amazing (still waiting for someone to make a jewellery ad that catches that Uncut Gems vibe)
2) Team merchandise ones where they flash through a wide variety of fans cheering in front of the telly and having a good old time... except for the variant where you can trade back your jersey for a new one and it’s all fans crying about devastating losses... probs a lot of NFL Shop hits from Atlanta recently
1) Local small businesses take the cake of course, they’re rare to stumble upon during an NFL broadcast (local NBA broadcasts in small markets are the best) but they do happen, where the low production value offers up so much unintentional humour that it’s hard to tell the difference between the real ones and the satirical ones on skit shows
Umm... didn’t rate what the Jags served up last week in losing to Miami but I think a team like this, with an inexperienced underdog quarterback and a lot of rookies on the roster, is gonna have some off days along the way. They’re not a playoff calibre team. Neither are the Bengals who probably need to figure out a way to not have Joe Burrow throwing 40-50 times per game. And also to not take so many hits, damn. Some of them are his fault but regardless that ain’t what you wanna see from by far the most important guy on the roster.
Wildcard’s Pick: Jags by 3
Cleveland Browns (2-1) at Dallas Cowboys (1-2)
Monday 6.00am NZT
Dak Prescott is on pace for 6300+ passing yards and he still hasn’t had a crack at the deadwood that’s clogging up the rest of his division. The yardage is already there, the touchdowns will follow soon enough. The Cowboys have kept it close against some decent teams... no shame in losing close to the Seattle Seahawks at the moment, serving up the shootout we all expected. With the abysmal state of the NFC East at the moment which has the worst combined record in the league of 2-10, even just going 8-8 is arguably gonna be enough to win it and the Cowboys can comfortably expect to win at the absolute least four our of six against the Eagles, Giants & WFT. So, no, I’m not the least bit worried about this team.
How could I be? I mean, just look at this guy! Playing the part and everything...
Random NFL viewing thought: how funny is it when a defensive back clearly commits pass interference and gets back up all quiet as the receiver begs for a flag and then, when the flag doesn't come, suddenly the DB goes into their 'no deal' celebration or whatever they do when they make a play... even though they didn't make a play, the ref just botched it? How funny is that? The sheer pretence of it all, dude.
Wildcard’s Pick: Cowboys by 9
New Orleans Saints (1-2) at Detroit Lions (1-2)
Monday 6.00am NZT
Shout out to the Lions for breaking that 11 game losing streak. Shout out also to the Carolina Panthers who had the next longest losing streak, think it mighta been ten games, and they also won last week. Shout out to Alvin Kamara who roared back to form with some pure excellence last week. Also shout out to all the telly commentators through the week who furiously defender Drew Brees and his ability to throw the deep ball... broseph, the problem wasn’t that he can’t throw deep but that he won’t. The Saints have a dink and dunk quarterback these days which is fine because he’s Drew Brees and he’s still outstanding at that job... but while Michael Thomas is out injured the rest of the offence does need to be playing at like 95% capacity or better for them to win at their usual level. I’ll give them this one though.
One more shout out... Matt Patricia, because I really do admire his commitment to the brand with that yellow pencil behind the ear... aren’t NFL playbooks all laminated? He must have a personal notebook or something. Anyway, I’m partial to some pencilled note-age as I write my articles so fair play. Dude’s getting sacked by the end of the year though, no doubt about it.
Wildcard’s Pick: Saints by 10
Pittsburgh Steelers (3-0) at Tennessee Titans (3-0)
TBD
So... this game got postponed. The Titans had some positive covid tests within the group (players and staff) and it was the only rational thing to do under the circumstances. Except the weird thing is they said it was postponed, and before I could even click through an article there were Stephen A Smith vids and opinion links and all that about the wise decision that had been made... then I read the bloody thing and they’ve only postponed the game a couple days. It’s not like they’ll shuffle some fixtures and call this a bye week, they’ll probably play on Tuesday or Wednesday NZT. Huh?
They’ll probably get away with it because the NFL is pretty insulated and the players have been great with precautions and testing but it really goes to show you that the NFL is not putting health first with this season (no surprises there) and this whole damned tower of cards could come tumbling down with the slightest breeze. They’re lucky no Vikings players have tested positive from the game against the Titans last week... at least not yet. Things have the potential to change drastically so quickly in 2020.
Anyway, the Titans are 3-0 with a +6 points differential. Their average winning margin is two points. Derrick Henry has FOURTEEN more rush attempts than anyone else in the league and second placed Josh Jacobs has ten more than Ezekiel Elliott in third. They can’t keep winning all these close games and they can’t expect Derrick Henry to be able to maintain this workload over a full season. But in the meantime they look pretty bloody useful and that’ll add up to a rather fascinating clash of undefeated teams here with the Steelers having won all their games by 5-10 points, scoring 26-28 points each time (against teams with a combined record of 0-9). Hmm, tricky one. Might have to pick the team that doesn’t have coronavirus.
Wildcard’s Pick: Steelers by 3
Seattle Seahawks (3-0) at Miami Dolphins (1-2)
Monday 6.00am NZT
Everyone loves a good blooper reel play and DK Metcalf pulled off a top tier one last week...
Even with that absolute sitter gone begging Russell Wilson has still thrown 14 touchdown passes in three games. His passer rating is sitting at a mean 139.0. He’s averaging 308 yards per game. The game just seems too slow to keep up with him, it’s all automatic genius. Not only is the man cooking but he’s cooking up enough to feed everyone... Russ has been incredible and Miami have nothing there to stop him tallying up even more enormous numbers.
If Russell Wilson keeps up this pace over 16 games (which is damn near impossible but just to prove a point), this is what his numeros will look like:
76.7% COMP | 4933 YDS | 74 TDS | 5 INT | 139.0 RATE
SEVENTY FOUR TOUCHDOWNS. He’s set the record for the most through the first three games of a season and his touchdown percentage is a mind-exploding 13.6%. As in... he throws a touchdown every seven or eight pass attempts. In any normal season he’d have won the MVP award last year but Lamar Jackson came through like a wrecking ball the year after Patrick Mahomes had done the same... but we all know that the Most Valuable Player is a narrative award so love seeing Wilson setting the bar nice and high early on and establishing himself as the early frontrunner for when it’s appropriate to start talking about all that.
Wildcard’s Pick: Seahawks by 14
Los Angeles Chargers (1-2) at Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2-1)
Monday 6.00am NZT
Maaaaaate. That’s not even a tough play and if Austin Ekeler catches that he’s gonna stroll into the endzone for the victory. When you come from New Zealand where rugby skills are second nature to kids from just throwing a ball around you have certain expectations about what can be achieved with an egg-shaped ball and that little offload and catch is definitely in that realm. Seriously, I reckon the lateral pass is the most underused super-play out there, so many touchdowns go begging in this exact way because players are so rigidly stuck to the playbook and coaches are so rigidly stuck to the way things are Supposed To Be. Gotta get Sean McVay and Kyle Shanahan and those blokes watching a bit of Mitre 10 Cup and see what happens to their offensive systems after that. The potential is limitless.
Speaking of the NFL being bad at things that similar sports consider routine...
Extremely fair call on this occasion. I actually looked up the stats for missed tackles and no surprises that the awful Jets lead the way there with 47 of them already, followed by the Raiders (42) and Chiefs (36). The Chicago Bears are the best with only 8 missed tackles... which helps explain how they can be 3-0 even though their starting QB has been bad enough to already be benched.
Wildcard’s Pick: Buccs by 3
Baltimore Ravens (2-1) at Washington Football Team (1-2)
Monday 6.00am NZT
Enormous bounce-back potential for the Ravens here. Lamar Jackson had 97 passing yards against the Chiefs (on 15/28 completions... a mere 3.47 yards per attempt, his lowest ever as a starting QB). Now he gets a crack at the Washington Football Team, what a blessing. Washington are scrappy, they’ll upset some more teams as the season goes along, but they don’t have the talent to hang with a fired up Baltimore team. Not even close.
Worth mentioning that the Ravens had won 14 straight regular season games in a row before getting dropped by KC... and Mahomes is 3-0 against Jackson with LJ calling him their kryptonite. Point being that what the Chiefs do to a team does not reflect what anybody else will.
In other news, have a peek at an amazing NFL story from the days of yore...
Especially poignant at a time when black quarterbacks are utterly dominating the league.
Wildcard’s Pick: Ravens by 17
Arizona Cardinals (2-1) at Carolina Panthers (1-2)
Monday 6.00am NZT
Outstanding trade.
Wildcard’s Pick: Cards by 4
Minnesota Vikings (0-3) at Houston Texans (0-3)
Monday 6.00am NZT
Woah talk about a tragedy, not sure too many folks would’ve expected these two to be winless after three games but not only is that the case... they also deserve to be exactly where they are. This isn’t like an Atlanta Falcons thing where they should’ve won the lot of them. The Vikings have been trash. The Texans have been trash. Different varieties of trash, the Vikings are like leftovers from dinner last week that’s starting to gather mould while the Texans are more like plastic packaging which came with a bit of furniture that you still use all the time, it’s great, but the mess it came with feels kinda excessive and unnecessary.
Let’s start with the Vikings, what do you reckon Mike Zimmer?
Eeeek. When coaches who aren’t Bill Belichick start doing the Bill Belichick thing you know you’re in trouble. Zimmer also had a moan after the loss to the Titans about how his offensive leaders needed to be more assertive and win the game late on when they had the chance which is kinda rude considering they had 464 yards of offence and scored 30 points. Dalvin Cook was superb with 181 yards at 8.2 Y/C with a touchdown... and a first quarter lost fumble but still. The Vikes had a five point lead midway through the fourth quarter. Lots of things are going wrong and a couple more picks from Kirk Cousins ain’t ideal but it’s the defence that’s bottling it worst so when a defensive-minded coach like Zimmer says things like this it’ll cause problems in the locker room...
Opposing Quarterbacks vs Minnesota in 2020:
Aaron Rodgers (Week 1) – 32/44 COMP | 364 YDS | 4 TD | 0 INT
Philip Rivers (Week 2) – 19/25 COMP | 214 YDS | 1 TD | 1 INT
Ryan Tannehill (Week 3) – 23/37 COMP | 321 YDS | 0 TD | 1 INT
That’s 69.8% pass completion between the three of them. The Vikings have just three sacks, only the Panthers (2) have fewer than that. Things are messy.
As for the Texans, I think teams realised straight away that if you threw everything you can at Deshaun Watson and try and take him out of the game as a play maker then there’s not much else going on there for Houston. Watto has already been sacked 13 times, second only to Joe Burrow, and considering they’ve made an effort to plug up that offensive line with trades over the last couple seasons that’s a disastrous thing to be seeing. Watson’s been sacked on 12% of passing plays so far. Constant pressure with no DeAndre Hopkins to throw a 50-50 ball up to go and get... you’re asking for danger there. You’re begging for danger. Danger is pretty much your best friend at that point. Not a good best friend either, who’ll shout the next round of beers and tell good stories, but the kind of best friend who takes advantage of your good nature and leads you down a pathway of temptation and despair.
The one salvation is that the schedule has been very mean to the Texans, who are surely better than they’ve been able to show so far in losses to Kansas City, Baltimore & Pittsburgh. It gets easier from here on out and they should at least get themselves back in the mix from here... if they don’t then maybe Bill O’Brien finally gets the flickskees.
Moveable Object vs Stoppable Force: Kirk Cousins leads the NFL in interceptions with six of the bad boys so far whereas the Houston defence has yet to record a turnover yet in 2020. Something’s gotta pathetically give here.
Wildcard’s Pick: Texans by 7
New York Giants (0-3) at Los Angeles Rams (2-1)
Monday 9.05am NZT
Wildcard’s Pick: Rams by 20
New England Patriots (2-1) at Kansas City Chiefs (3-0)
Monday 9.25am NZT
I mean, what can you even do? Patrick Mahomes has started 34 games in his career and he only has three of them in which his passer rating is below 80 (one of which being a week 17 debut as a rookie). He just doesn’t have off days. And what’s more is that when his passer rating does dip under 91.5 he’s 10-0 in those games, it’s ridiculous. Against the reigning MVP last week he didn’t only outplay him he absolutely destroyed him and Lamar Jackson is no fluke.
Large person catching a touchdown alert...
Great game this one, ordinarily there’s no coaching group you’d have more confidence in finding a way to stop the Chiefs than Belichick and his lot but even they’ve had trouble against Mahomes. Less than most, granted. The Chiefs beat the Pats last season in a week 14 matchup, winning 23-16, although the Pats have beaten Mahomes on two other occasions with a 43-40 shootout win in 2018 and of course they beat them 37-31 in the 2018 season playoffs. But Mahomes had huge numbers in both those losses and they were pretty contingent on being able to go score for score with them. Cam Newton has looked superb for the Pats so far which is amazing given how little time he’s had to figure out the offence there, hence I reckon they’ll continue to unroll new wrinkles as the season goes along, but that’s a lot to bank on. Whatever happens it’ll be fascinating to watch.
Wildcard’s Pick: Chiefs by 3
Buffalo Bills (3-0) at Las Vegas Raiders (2-1)
Monday 9.25am NZT
The Bills got away with a bit of a mud pass interference call on their way to coming back to beat the Rams after already blowing a huge lead... it was a weird game with some weird refereeing but at the end of the day Josh Allen did that thing that Josh Allen keeps doing and he found a way to win.
No quarterback has made more of an improvement from last year to this year than Josh Allen, it’s crazy how well he’s playing right now for a dude who last year looked inexplicable. He was terrible with long throws up until this season when he’s suddenly... not exactly Patrick Mahomes but he’s getting the balls more or less where they need to go finally. And he’s hitting his targets over the middle too, dude’s completing at 71% having been in the 50s his first two years. 10 touchdown passes already with 1038 passing yards already and most importantly he seems to be making smart decisions. Less of the panic and run stuff. Assessing his options and allowing plays to develop. Still a few awful moments but hey Rome wasn’t built in a day.
And don’t forget that the Bills have a strong team around him, very good defence with a quality run game, and with Allen stepping up to a new level he’s allowing his coaches to draw up some funky stuff. The Bills, hard to believe it but it’s true, and becoming a really enjoyable team to watch.
Not sure what to add about the Las Vegas Raiders. I watched them beat the Saints the other week and I still don’t really have a line on them as a team. Their defence is a bit crap, that much I’m confident in. Also, funny how this happens after Coach Gruden has already been fined for not wearing his mask properly...
And the team owner is on record saying as how the organisation takes this “extremely seriously” which would be believable if it weren’t for things like this setting the tone...
Whaaaaaat is going on there? Is that a mask or an eyepatch?
Wildcard’s Pick: Bills by 9
Philadelphia Eagles (0-2-1) at San Francisco 49ers (2-1)
Monday 1.20pm NZT
Nothing like a big old spotlight Sunday Night Football game to get everybody talking about what a disaster of a season your quarterback has had through three weeks. I’ll get into some numbers in a sec but I’d be lying if I didn’t admit I’m feeling rather vindicated by all this at the moment. Wentz entered the league in the same year as my guy Dak Prescott and playing in the same division and all the while they’ve been intrinsically linked... even this very year when researching my NFL Rankings I was still finding examples of people who’d put Wentz ahead of Prescott in their own versions. Outrageous. At this point there’s no more debate (nor should there have been last year but okay).
His second half numbers have been even worse, pinch your nose before you read this:
56.7% COMP | 0 TD | 4 INT | 40.1 RATE | 1.47 AY/A
He did rush in for the game-tying touchdown against the Bengals that took them to overtime but then in OT he only completed 4/9 passes for 47 yards with one first down and they tied it. There doesn’t even seem to be any rhyme or reason to his struggles yet... against the blitz or in the shotgun or with play-action... all of it’s been irrelevant. The only minor thing is that his completion percentage is well up when he gets the ball out quickly, although that’s limiting his yards by giving receivers less time to get down the field. Two four yard completions are worse than a nine-yarder and an incompletion. So what are the theories for this inexplicable capitulation?
It’s Just A Phase – Admittedly this is the first time in Wentz’s career that he’s had three consecutive games with a passer rating under 73 (he’d only had two such games in the past three years – only in his rookie season was he ever even close to this level of dud-ness)... but everyone has bad games now and then. Carson will probably lead them to glory this week and sweet as, next thing he absolutely dominates all October.
The Injuries Have Caught Up With Him – Alternatively we do have to remember that this fella in the last few years has had to come back from a torn ACL and LCL in his right knee (2017), a fractured vertebrae in his back (2018), and a pretty heavy concussion in last season’s playoffs. It could be that he’s playing through something at the moment or maybe his mobility has been compromised just enough to affect the rest of his game. Dunno, I doubt it... but while he was far better than this trash last season he also hasn’t ever regained the excellence he showed in 2017 before he did his knee.
Look At The Damn Roster – Yeah well... fair point. Philly are missing starting calibre players all over the show and it’s clear to see. Injuries on both sides of the ball are affecting this winless start but in particular Wentz is having to deal with a makeshift offensive line and a severely weakened set of targets with Alshon Jeffrey yet to play and Jalen Reagor having already missed a game. Dallas Goedert is out for the next few weeks. Plus there just isn’t nearly as much talent here as there was when they made the Super Bowl... why the Eagles never made a proper play at trading for DeAndre Hopkins or Steffon Diggs when they were available I have no idea. They also used their second round pick on a quarterback instead of someone to help a quarterback, you may recall.
Dude Can’t Read The Playbook – That’s the intimation you get from what Doug Pederson has had to say, talking about speeding things up and simplifying the play calls and all that. “Unclutter” was a word that got used, as Pederson mentioned giving Wentz fewer decisions to make at the line. Not sure how feasible this is for a fifth-year QB and coach combination, shouldn’t really be an issue surely.
The Coach Is Dumb – At least that’s what Carson’s mumma seems to think...
It’s All Because Of The Hat – No comment required...
Whatever it is, the solution won’t come easy. Philly have already lost to Washington and they could only tie with the Bengals (also losing to the Rams, who are at least decent)... now they face the 49ers, Steelers, and Ravens all in a row. Good luck with that.
Last week the Niners whalloped the Giants despite playing without their starting quarterback, tight end, centre, starting and backup running backs, one of their starting wide receivers, both starting defensive ends, their three best cornerbacks, and one of their best linebackers. That barely even makes sense. Philly are gonna need a whole lot more than just a resurgent Carson Wentz but they sure can’t do it without him... nor will they.
Wildcard’s Pick: Niners by 10
Atlanta Falcons (0-3) at Green Bay Packers (3-0)
Tuesday 1.15pm NZT
The Falcons led 26-10 in the fourth quarter and they lost.
This a week after they blew a game in which they led 20-0 after one quarter, held that lead basically the whole way, and botched an onside kick recovery to end up losing on a buzzer-beating field goal.
Dan Quinn, bro. You sure you’re up for this?
No lead will be safe against these Packers either. Aaron Rodgers is doing what I told y’all Aaron Rodgers was gonna do and lighting up the entire holographic universe... a reference to a book that the commentary team mentioned Rodgers keeps recommending so I looked it up and the first story was about how Rodgers had given the book to Danica Patrick two years ago. Apparently their relationship started after she asked him if he was stalking her on “the astral plane”...
Danica Patrick (in 2018): “We’re interested in unique things that not a lot of people are, and we’re also very open-minded people. We love to learn and educate ourselves, and so when he buys me books called ‘The Holographic Universe’ (by Michael Talbot), I’m like, ‘This is awesome.’ ... I think people generally know this about him, but maybe not at the level. I love that he’s smart. He is a super intelligent person. I love to grow and learn more, and he can help me do that.”
Unsurprisingly they have since broken up.
Also, don’t even ask me to try explain that holographic universe idea, those deep physics theories make me feel all sorts of anxious like all existence is so brittle and insignificant and the atoms of my body could randomly collapse at any moment or the moon could fly out of orbit like in the intro for Third Rock From The Sun (remember that show? Classic). Terrifying stuff... so I just don’t think about all that, lol.
Quick word before we bid each other adieu... Aaron Jones, mate. He’s a guy the Packers have put a lot of time into over the last few years and I haven’t always seen the point of that but he’s looking slimmer and faster than ever before these days and after a monster game against the Lions in week two he’s looking primed for a huge campaign. Dude has at least 16 rushes in each game, pulling off 4+ yards per carry in all three of them, he’s scored in all three of them, plus he’s also getting a couple targets a week in the passing game. Only Alvin Kamara has more total yards per scrimmage. I’ve been critical of the Packers not adding another weapon for Rodgers in that offence and I’m still definitely on that buzz but Jones’ emergence helps cover that gap if he can maintain this consistency.
Wildcard’s Pick: Packers by 7
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