They Stand Alone Atop The NFC

It was billed as the second best game of the week, but in actuality it was the best game of the week. Perhaps the best game of the year, but that’s an indictment of the state of the NFL. Reason I say it’s an indictment is that it isn’t until Week 7 that you can confidently say this is the best game of the year by far. Anyway, I digress. Minnesota’s defense looked great to start, fizzled out in the 2nd and 3rd quarters, but started to get the Vikings back into the game and within reach of winning it. For Detroit, even without DE Aidan Hutchinson, they were able to force Vikings QB Sam Darnold into throwing a crucial interception and sacked him four times helping to set the Lions offense up to continue scoring points. As I mentioned with the Vikings defense they did manage to force a fumble late and returned it for a score. That could have been the death nil for previous Lions teams, but this one is different. They marched right back down the field and kicked the game winning field goal. Record wise they are tied with Minnesota for the best record in the NFC, but in reality they are the best team in the NFC right now.

Carbon Copy Of Last Season

We saw this script before with the Kansas City Chiefs last season. Their record was not the same as it was this time last season. The one constant though is that the reason the Chiefs are winning is because of their defense. QB Patrick Mahomes has 6 touchdowns to 8 interceptions. Going into this last week he had 6 interceptions, but ended up throwing two more in a wildly inconsistent season for him. You can blame it on injuries galore to the receiving corps and his backfield, but Mahomes has made some terrible decisions on these throws. Even if they aren’t being intercepted. I would like to think that if the 49ers were a fully healthy team, that this matchup would have been much more competitive. Yet, the Chiefs are continuing to show that they are the better unit and specifically the better defense right now.

Some Guys Should Not Be Head Coaches

Whether you’re Dave Canales of the Carolina Panthers, Antonio Pierce of the Las Vegas Raiders, Jerod Mayo of the New England Patriots or Dennis Allen of the New Orleans Saints. Some guys just aren’t cut out to be head coaches in the NFL. In the case of Canales and Mayo, it’s their first season as a head coach currently. Maybe they can turn it around, not likely, but maybe. For Pierce, he was an interim coach in the middle of last season and showed promise, but during this season it has looked so much worse. Dennis Allen is currently in his second job as a head coach. His first was from the 2012-14 seasons with the then Oakland Raiders. They were 4-12 in his first two seasons and was fired after starting 0-4 in his third season. Now he was a defensive coordinator for the Denver Broncos in 2011 and parlayed that into getting hired by then Raiders owner Al Davis. After he was fired by the Raiders, he went back to the New Orleans Saints and was named the defensive coordinator there. He was a secondary coach prior to the job in Denver. He had seven straight seasons as the coordinator of a very good defense in New Orleans and when former head coach Sean Payton departed, Allen was named the successor. At the time I understood that the way the defense had played he was worthy of the job, but he had a track record as a head coach and it was a disaster. Yes, it was the Raiders, but QB Derek Carr was there when Allen was and that’s why Carr went to New Orleans, to play with Allen again. Allen’s first season was a 7-10 record where they did make a late surge to finish the season and expectations were that it would carry that momentum into year two. The second year was nearly identical as far as the start in an awful winnable NFC South. They made another late season surge, but a crucial loss to the Los Angeles Rams cost them the division title. They finished 9-8. With the way the Saints started this season having two blowout victories, everyone was on board the hype train. Not me. I waited and figured this would flame. Not that I expected QB Derek Carr to suffer an oblique injury that will keep him out for a while, but after that loss to the Kansas City Chiefs my suspicions were confirmed. This team doesn’t have a reliable head coach. To finish this if you were unfortunate to watch their Thursday night snooze fest against Denver (I did not watch, only highlights), you saw one of the dumbest things in a NFL game. The Saints are down 16-3 just before halftime. There’s 16 seconds left and they have two timeouts left in the half. New Orleans is starting from their own 30-yard line and they will be getting the ball to start the second half. Again, they will be getting the ball to start the second half. If you have your wits about you, the team will take a knee and go into the locker room and get ready for the opening drive of the second half. Not if you’re Dennis Allen. The Saints completed two passes for a total of 6 yards by their rookie QB Spencer Rattler. The clock went down to 4 seconds when the Saints called their last timeout. Well, what do you think they attempted to do after that timeout? A Hail Mary? A screen pass? Some kind of trick play? Nope, Rattler took a knee and the team went into the locker room. This is Dennis Allen, the head coach of the New Orleans Saints. Some guys are better coordinators than they are head coaches. This is the best example of that right now.