The Philadelphia Eagles are so funny to me.
On one hand, they’re the Super Bowl champs, they’re 8-2, and they spend every game suffocating the life out of the opposition. They’re in the driver’s seat to have the #1 seed in the NFC, and they currently have the best Super Bowl odds in the conference.
On the other, every one of their games is excruciating to watch, all of their fans are mad all the time (potentially just a Philadelphia thing), everybody agrees their offensive coordinator is one of the worst in the NFL, and every week is a new chapter in the saga of their publicly frustrated WR1. (Last week he went on a Twitch stream to talk about how the Eagles were making him miserable.)
I love them. They’re gonna win the Super Bowl again. Go Birds.
– Rodger Sherman
The King of Backups sets his record
If I told you that an NFL quarterback set an all-time passing record yesterday, you’d probably picture a superstar powering his team to a huge victory: Maybe Patrick Mahomes setting the single game passing yardage record to match the NCAA record he holds, or Josh Allen throwing for eight touchdowns. (Close, he had six touchdowns, but three of them were runs.)
Wrong. On Sunday afternoon, career backup Jacoby Brissett set the NFL’s all-time record for passing completions in a regular season game … and he did it in a loss. By three touchdowns, in fact. This is the story of an odd record that was heavily influenced by game script and defensive strategy.
As a long time Jacoby Brissett Appreciator — a distinction shared by true ball knowers everywhere — I’m gonna go ahead and hype this up.
I’d love to drop in a highlight reel of Brissett’s 47-for-57, 460-yard performance, but, uh, the NFL hasn’t uploaded a video of it yet. You’ll have to settle for this passing chart:
The completions record, as it turns out, isn’t correlated with winning. The previous record was 45 completions, held by Drew Bledsoe and Jared Goff. Goff’s record-tying day came in a 55-40 loss to the Buccaneers. It’s a situational record … and Brissett was in a perfect situation Sunday:
The Cardinals are wracked with injuries. They went into Sunday’s game without their top two running backs (James Conner and Trey Benson) and two of their Week 1 starters at wide receiver (Marvin Harrison Jr. and Zay Jones), and lost backup RB Emari Demercado during the game. Brissett had to do everything.
The 49ers scored on their first play of the game, and were up 13-0 within five minutes. This meant that the Cardinals would need to throw all game to try to catch up. And with a big lead for most of the game, the Niners were content to sit in a bend-don’t-break scheme and give up easy chunks.
The Cardinals committed 17 penalties for 130 yards, the most by any team since 2019. Thirteen of those penalties went against the offense (including a stunning six holding penalties, gotta be a record.) When it’s second-and-20 or third-and-15, what are you going to do: Hand the ball off to your third-string running back, or let Jacoby sling it?
And Brissett is maybe the ideal quarterback to set this record as an Ethical Hooper of the highest order. He’s not here to create highlights. His one fit pic on Instagram shows him wearing khakis and a “fun” button-down shirt. Progressive had him doing taxes in a commercial. He probably doesn’t know what TikTok is. He’s a 1990s-model Pocket Passer who showed up in the 2010s, ready to stand tall and throw strikes. He doesn’t take sacks. He doesn’t throw picks. He would rather die than scramble. He was born to stand in the pocket and complete passes, and by god, that’s what he did.
Brissett is now in his 10th year in the NFL, and it feels like he could play another 10, easy. For a guy who has rarely started, he has built an incredible legacy. He now holds two NFL records: This single-game mark, and more impressively, the career record for lowest interception rate, just ahead of second-place Aaron Rodgers. He’s got a Super Bowl ring with the Patriots (well-deserved, he won a game for them that year!) And he’s credited by Nick Sirianni as the inspiration for the Tush Push (although I have a video about why that’s probably not true.)
Sunday’s game was a snapshot of his career. Brissett is a pro’s pro who can provide stability under any circumstances. (Literally. He doesn’t move.) He deserves this record.
Obligatory Shedeur Sanders entry
Shedeur Sanders, the most famous fifth round draft pick in NFL history, made his professional debut Sunday for the 2-8 Cleveland Browns, playing poorly after Dillon Gabriel was knocked out of the 23-16 loss to the Ravens. I think two things are true:
Sanders was absolutely awful.
He was 4-for-16 for 47 yards with a (really bad!) interception, and lost 27 yards on sacks, plus 10 more on an intentional grounding call. Basically, he got 10 yards on 19 dropbacks. Of the 134 quarterbacks to throw at least 10 passes in their NFL debut since 2000, Sanders had the 131st-best passer rating, and that doesn’t factor in the sacks or penalties. What’s more, his poor production contributed to the loss: He entered after halftime with his team leading 16-10, then the Browns went scoreless in the second half and lost 23-16. And Kyle Hamilton used Shedeur’s signature celebration after one of his sacks, which is one of the dangers of being a third-string QB with a signature celebration.
Sanders debuted in absolutely terrible circumstances.
He plays for a 2-8 team that entered the week ranked 32nd in yards per play, and had likely never repped with the first team offense before. Since 2000, there have been 43 instances of a rookie QB throwing at least 10 passes in a game after repping all week as a backup. Those 43 players threw a combined 22 touchdowns and 35 interceptions, and their teams went a combined 9-34.
Long story short: Shedeur Sanders looked exactly like a fifth round rookie being forced into action for one of the worst teams in the NFL. If you were expecting more, you were foolish. If you’re making a big deal out of his failure, you’re overreacting.
GAME WINNING PUNT
Much has been made of the rise of the NFL’s SuperKickers. Mainly by me. I won’t shut up about it.
But it would be weird if our greatest Kicking Scientists (Kickologists?) perfected the process of kicking field goals, but not punting downfield. While placekickers are wowing us by making field goals from farther and farther distances, our overlooked punters are also achieving greatness. They’re averaging 47.4 yards per punt this year, which is on pace to break the all-time record of 47.3 yards per punt that they set last year. They’re also averaging the fifth-highest net yardage of all time, and the third-highest ratio of kicks inside the 20-yard line.
Sunday, the punters finally got their highlight moment: A Literal Game-Winning Punt. (EXTREMELY RARE!)
The matchup between the Seahawks and the Rams was billed as one of the games of the year: A chess match between Sean McVay and Mike Macdonald for first place in the NFC West. But the checkmate play didn’t come from a funky offensive formation or a nasty blitz; it was a perfect punt by Ethan Evans with the Rams clinging to a 2-point lead in the game’s closing moments.
LITERALLY perfect. You could not have squeezed another football in between the spot where the the ball went out of bounds and the pylon. He hit a target of a few inches from 50 yards away with his foot. Unreal.
On the Seahawks’ potential game-winning drive, the game was put in the feet of Seahawks kicker Jason Myers, who is not one of the league’s new SuperKickers. Looking at his career stats, you can see almost exactly where his range falls off. He’s 19-for-23 in his career from 55 to 59 yards … and 1-for-5 from 60 or longer, which now includes Sunday’s missed 61-yarder to end the game.
Like I said: Evans’ perfect punt won the game for the Rams. If it had hit the pylon, the game is likely over: The Seahawks get the ball at the 20, and easily move into Myers’ comfortable kicking range. Even if the ball had checked out at the 2- or 3-yard line, Myers would have had a significantly higher chance of making the field goal. But because Evans’ punt maximized every inch, and the Rams won. Give him the game ball (so he can punt it.)
🦬 Like I said above: Josh Allen had SIX TOUCHDOWNS: Three passing and three rushing. Here’s a list of every player in NFL history to have three passing touchdowns and three rushing touchdowns in the same game:
Otto Graham, in the 1954 NFL Championship Game. (Go Cats btw.)
Josh Allen, last year against the Rams.
Josh Allen, Sunday against the Buccaneers.
🐦⬛ The most interesting thing about the Ravens-Browns game was not Shedeur Sanders’ performance, but this absolutely diabolical game-winning Mark Andrews rushing touchdown out of the Tush Push formation:
Charlie Kolar had two blocks to spring the TD, setting the edge before getting downfield to seal off Andrews’ rushing lane.
🇪🇸 On Sunday, the Commanders and Dolphins played the first NFL game in Spain ever in Real Madrid’s stadium. They went a combined 0-for-3 on fourth-and-goal from inside the 2-yard line, doing permanent damage to Spanish fans’ understanding of goal line analytics.
🇨🇦 The Grey Cup was yesterday, and the Saskatchewan Roughriders won the Canadian Football League championship.
I love watching the CFL. The rules are just a liiiiiitle different from the American game, which leads to new strategies and unusual situations. For example: Trailing by eight points last night, the Montreal Alouettes had to return a missed field goal from out of the end zone so that Saskatchewan didn’t get a one-point rouge that would have given the Roughriders a two-possession lead.
Unfortunately, the CFL’s new commissioner has decided to get rid of some of those weird rules to make the game more like American football. Last week, I talked to Ryan Nanni from Phantom Island about those changes, how they’re being perceived by Canadian fans, and what success for a league like the CFL actually means.
