MMQB Review: The Best Week Ever Edition

Peter King informed us last week that the NFL wants to create a committee to help NFL teams choose or become aware of head coaching candidates. This committee would naturally be led by the great Tony Dungy. Peter also wanted us to know that Josh Freeman has been a real bust with the Vikings and updated us on what Favre was doing in his spare time, because apparently Peter believes there are people who still care about Brett Favre. This week Peter talks about the best week of football yet, how the NFL officials have a really hard job but they are also not very good at that hard job, and Peter is impressed with just how smart he finds himself to be. Oh, and Peter gives out fake awards for some reason. It's Week 14, which isn't the halfway point of the season, the 75% point of the season, nor is the season over. So Peter hands out "81.25% of the Season Awards" for some reason. Potentially for the sake of entertainment, even though it doesn't feel entertaining to me.

The envelopes, please.

Oh, fake awards. Great.

Performance of the Year by a running back: Philadelphia’s LeSean McCoy, who ran through eight inches of snow in the greatest fourth-quarter performance ever by an Eagle back—11 carries, 148 yards, two touchdowns. How does he not slip when everyone else does?

Magic Peter, pure magic. Either that or it is the cleats that he was wearing which allowed him to run in the snow while the other players could not. It also helps that a running back knows where he is running when running in the snow, while the defensive player has to react and this could give him a better chance of slipping when reacting to where the offensive player is running.

Dreads of the Year: DeSean Jackson and the dreadlocked Louis Delmas went crashing into the deep end-zone snow in the fourth quarter in Philly—and Delmas’ black dreads came up snowy white.

Minorities and their hair look so funny in the white snow!

Explosion of the Year: In 14 games, NFL teams scored 88 touchdowns, the most on any day in the 94-year history of the league.

I think half of these touchdowns were given up by Carolina in the second quarter of their game against the Saints on Sunday night.

Injury of the Year: New England all-world tight end Rob Gronkowski, lost with an ACL tear, crippling New England’s chances to win a fourth Super Bowl in the Belichick era.

It's a huge loss, but I have faith the Patriots will recover. When the Patriots are in the Super Bowl again this year Peter is going to marvel at how they did it without Rob Gronkowski, as if the Patriots have never proven themselves capable of winning games without vital pieces of their roster healthy.

Kansas City 45, Washington 10, and it wasn’t that close. I now do not wonder if Shahanan will get a contract extension in Washington. I now wonder if he’ll be working for Snyder at the end of the day.

It's almost like Shanahan's track record without John Elway as his quarterback is his true track record and he isn't worth spending $7 million per year on to hire as the head coach, nor is he the kind of coach you necessarily also want to give final say on personnel matters to. I hope some NFL teams remember this during the offseason when Jon Gruden floats his name out there as a candidate for nearly every open NFL head coaching job.

There is no question Snyder will think the ESPN story was borne of the close relationship between Shanahan and Adam Schefter of ESPN, no matter what Shanahan tells him.

And that would be crazy talk to believe that Adam Schefter, who is a close friend of Shanahan, would have anything to do with the report that Shanahan was about to quit his job as the Redskins head coach that came from Schefter's employer. I'm sure Schefter knew nothing about this report prior to it being reported and he would never use his personal relationship with Mike Shanahan to try and further a work-related agenda that Shanahan would want Schefter to further. Never. I also believe because Jay Glazer has a business relationship with some NFL players that this has absolutely nothing to do with how he reports on NFL news or in any way affects his coverage of these players. I completely believe this too.

Won’t be long before Snyder’s looking for the eighth coach of his stormy tenure.

Well, if Snyder's history of hiring coaches holds up then he will hire either Jon Gruden, Steve Spurrier (I'm kidding about this one...maybe), Nick Saban, Art Briles or another coach with a history of being a good head coach (with the word "history" being the key word for some of these coaches). My money is on him making a run at Jon Gruden if Mike Shanahan gets fired. Snyder should look for a head coach with no experience as a head coach, but with experience in the NFL as a coordinator, yet I'm concerned Snyder will be too concerned about making a splash to do that.

But you can’t write the story of an amazing Sunday without the four calls (and I’m probably missing one or two) that materially affected three games. As you may know, I’m not one to kill the umpire. Or the head linesman. Officials have a tough job, and if you read my three-part opus last week on A Week in the Life of An Officiating Crew, you can see I have respect for the work they do and the difficulty of the job they have.

"I have respect for you and how you do your job. On that note, you suck and have affected the result of three games. Please do us a favor of dying. Please read my three-part series on officiating so you know how much respect I have for you."

Sincerely,
Peter King

And it’s a tribute to the greatness of football Sunday that I’m not going to spend half of this column berating crews in Philadelphia, New England and Cincinnati for indefensible calls that swayed the outcome of all three of those games. I said “swayed,” not “determined.”

It's nearly the same thing. If a player sways the outcome of a game by point-shaving then he has in effect also helped to determine the outcome of the game. I'm not picking nits and I know Peter thinks he is differentiating, but he's not. If the officials swayed the outcome of a game with a bad call, then that's just part of the process in determining the outcome of the game.

The missed Mike Tomlin flag for being on the field during a real live play when two officials were right there is one play. Just one. The Jeff Triplette idiocy on the Sunday night game last week, refusing to call time when two officials had a different down than Triplette, and the game descended into chaos.

The officials are only "swaying" the outcome of a game or two every weekend. That's not so bad. If this happened in baseball Terence Moore would write a column vigorously arguing that these missed calls are good for the game because it involves "the human element."

That’s one too. I saw four Sunday in very big moments.

Officiating mistakes in small moments are no big deal apparently.

1. At Philadelphia, early fourth quarter, Lions up six, Eagles ball, 2nd-and-10 at their 45. A millisecond after Nick Foles releases an incomplete pass, Detroit’s Nick Fairley, not using his head and not hitting above the sternum, plowed into Foles. Ref Ed Hochuli flagged Fairley for roughing the passer, an invented call for which he certainly will be downgraded by the league office. So, instead of the Eagles having a 3rd-and-10 at their 45, they had a 1st-and-10 at the Detroit 40 … and LeSean McCoy promptly romped to a 40-yard touchdown. The made the score Detroit 14, Philadelphia 12.

This along with officials throwing flags and then picking them up. Four straight weeks Carolina has been flagged for something and then had the flag picked up. It's almost like the officials don't know why they made the call and need to discuss why the call was made with the other officials. A penalty either happened or it didn't. I'm fine with officials conferring with each other, but I have seen a lot of thrown flags picked up recently and it's starting to annoy me.

2. On the very next snap in Philadelphia, Foles, attempting a two-point conversion pass, threw it out of bounds. No conversion. But hold on—Detroit’s Ndamukong Suh was flagged by umpire Richard Hall for holding Eagles center Jason Kelce. FOX ran it back three times. A hold never happened. A hold was not close. Hall invented it.

It was snowing pretty heavily out there on the field and the official didn't have the benefit of seeing a replay three times, so I am prone to possibly giving this one a pass. Perhaps I am being too kind.

3. At Foxboro, Cleveland up 26-21, 40 seconds left, Patriots ball at the Browns’ 30-yard line. Tom Brady throws deep down the right sideline for Josh Boyce, into the end zone, with rookie cornerback Leon McFadden in coverage. There is light contact. Incidental contact. The ball falls incomplete. McFadden is flagged for defensive pass interference. The 29-yard penalty puts the ball at the Cleveland 1, and Brady throws the winning touchdown pass to Danny Amendola on the next play. That’s not interference in second-grade flag football, and here, it could well have handed New England a win.

The officials say "you're welcome" to the Patriots in the hopes this serves as a make-up call to cover for the missed call at the end of the Carolina game a few weeks ago.

Where did the flag come from?

From the official standing right there near the end zone who thought he saw pass interference.

Why?

Because he thought he saw pass interference.

How is that call made?

By taking a yellow flag out of his back pocket and throwing it on the field. 

TV color man Steve Tasker agreed. He called the call “horrible” twice and “terrible” once. Couldn’t have said it better.

Really Peter? He used the word "horrible" twice and terrible "once" and you couldn't have said it better? It's not like Tasker was terribly eloquent.

Almost certainly Chapman flicked Green-Ellis’ leg, causing him to fall forward, and his knees and thighs were down before he reached the goal line. Triplette overturned the call. He ruled a touchdown, saying Green-Ellis clearly had not been touched, fell, and could then have reached the ball across the plane because he had not been touched down. We gasped in the room at NBC. Incredible. Jeff Triplette, for the second week in a row, made the kind of decision that makes the American public distrust if not altogether hate the officials who work these games. Triplette made a mockery of finding “indisputable visual evidence.”

At this point, I feel like fans of the NFL have "indisputable visual evidence" that Jeff Triplette is just messing with us now. There's no way he could make such bad calls two weeks in a row without either (a) trying to get fired or (b) just wanting to mess with NFL fans and give the appearance he is incompetent. Triplette is probably laughing and having a beer every Sunday night thinking about the amount of controversy he is capable of starting.

Prater, in fact, was almost late for his record. He had to rush out to the field after Peyton Manning completed a seven-yard throw to Jacob Tamme to get Denver on the outer limits of field-goal range. But he’d never kicked a field goal of 60 or longer in his life. “I really didn’t try many long ones today before the game because it was so cold,” Prater said. “Just figured we probably wouldn’t try any real long ones. I think I kicked one from about 60. That was it. But I hustled out there and we lined it up. When I saw it on the stripe, I knew what it was.”

Meaning: He knew it was for the Holy Grail. Sixty-four yards. The record.

At least Peter isn't being overdramatic about this kick and is managing to keep it all in perspective.

The snapper, a San Diego State kid, Aaron Brewer, is from Fullerton, Calif. The holder, punter Britton Colquitt, who went to Tennessee, is from Knoxville. And Prater is from Estero, Fla. Now, here they were, three warm-blooded guys, trying for history.

They're all so damn precocious!

No one’s ever proven the altitude helps the kicks in Denver, though Sebastian Janikowski, one of four men to hold the previous record, always says he feels he kicks the farthest in Denver. (Janikowski and Jason Elam both kicked their 63-yarders in Denver; the fourth, by David Akers, was in Green Bay.)

Three of the five kicks made from 63 yards or more came in Denver. Either it just happens a lot of times these kicks are made in Denver or there is something about playing at Mile High that helps these longer kicks go through the uprights. I don't know if I believe in a coincidence such as three of the five kicks made from 63 yards out or more came in Denver.

Manning has three games left (at home against San Diego on Thursday night, then at Houston and at Oakland) to break the two passing biggies. He has 45 touchdown passes and 4,522 yards. He needs six touchdown passed to break Tom Brady’s mark of 50 TD throws; he needs 319 passing yards per game to break Drew Brees’ yardage mark of 5,476. Seeing that the 11-2 Broncos are in a race with the 10-3 Pats for home-field edge through the playoffs and would lose a head-to-head tiebreaker, Manning may well have to keep playing in shootouts to keep Denver No. 1. The only way I see Manning missing a fifth MVP is if the struggles a bit down the stretch, loses a couple games and does not breaking one or both of the records. He’s just been too dominant for 13 games, despite his hiccups, to lose it otherwise.

It's always nice to see one of the MVP voters has already anointed Peyton Manning as the recipient of this award with three games left to be played. Why even have a vote? Just give the award to Manning.

The NFL has discussed centralizing the replay system, likely in New York.

For uniformity of calls, mostly. And why not, after seeing the disastrous Jeff Triplette reversal of a likely correct call in Cincinnati? I’d prefer to have the same people looking at all replays. It lessens—though doesn’t eliminate—the chances of a mistake because the foremost authorities on the calls, led by VP of Officiating Dean Blandino, would be overseeing the process from the NFL command center.

I'm not sure how I feel about this. I don't think NFL replay drags and I'm afraid if the calls had to go through a command center it would cause the replay process to drag a bit and hold up the game. Part of the problem with having the same person look at all the replays is if that person is having a bad day or makes a mistake then the officials at the stadium will have to bear the brunt of the fan's anger. Granted, now these officials bear the brunt of fan anger, but at least they have a chance to review the call themselves. It's sort of a "man behind the curtain" feeling that fans will get on replays and I don't know if that's good for the NFL.

Florio asked on Pro Football Talk: “Should the NFL move the instant-replay function out of the stadium?” By early this morning, 83.7 percent of those responding (5,591 of 6,681) said yes. I asked my Twitter followers last night: “Should the NFL centralize replay in one place?” It was 149-9, yes (94.3 percent).

Wow, I am very much in the minority on this. I'm the Terence Moore of NFL replay. I need to go and do some soul-searching now about the direction my life has taken me.

The time of games (3 hours, 11 minutes, 20 seconds, on average, this weekend) has slowly crept up in the last few years, and the league wants to lasso it and bring it back down. The time it takes for replay is getting onerous. We measured the fateful Triplette reversal Sunday, from the time he announced that the Cincinnati rushing play near the goal line was being reviewed to the time he announced the reversal: four minutes, 10 seconds … even though the time a ref can spend under the hood is only one minute. There is no question that process can be streamlined by getting rid of the mechanical procedures at the game site that accompany the replay process.

Oh, so the NFL wants to make games shorter? That's brilliant coming from a league that comes back from commercial break for the kickoff, then takes another commercial break before the first play of the next drive is run. If the NFL really wants to cut into how long NFL games last they would cut down on the number of commercials and players standing around waiting around on the field. Of course commercials create revenue, so the NFL really doesn't want to decrease the time of games if it costs them or their partners money.

I can see streamlining the review process could maybe save two minutes. Two minutes of a 3 hours+ football game can be saved. That's assuming there is a one minute time limit for the official in New York to review the play. There would have to be a time limit for the official in New York to review the play, right?

For the record, times of games in the last six seasons, including this one through Sunday night’s Saints-Panthers game:
 
2013: 3:08:30  
2012: 3:06:32  
2011: 3:05:48  
2010: 3:04:12  
2009: 3:03:42  
2008: 3:02:12

I would be very interested to see if there are more commercial breaks being taken during these times and if moving the kickoff up five yards had an effect on the time of an NFL game.

Then Peter King calls Julian Edelman "a winning player," because apparently he hasn't spit any hyperbole in this column yet and wanted to do so. Edelman is a good receiver, but there are a lot of winning players that have passed through New England and had Tom Brady throwing them the football.

Peter then answers a few questions about officiating in the NFL and what he learned during his three-part series while embedded with the officials.

From MTN335 (Nathan Murphy): ”Did you get a comment (or at least a sense) about the near-constant accusations of cheating/favoritism by NFL Officials?”

As head linesman and New Yorker Wayne Mackie said, it’s laughable to think he’d endanger his job to help his Jets or Giants win; he’d last 10 minutes in the job if that happened, because his supervisors at the league office would drum him out of the game. I can’t say that stuff has never happened. But all of the officials think it’s absurd.

And of course if there was cheating or favoritism by NFL officials I am sure they would come right out and admit. All of the officials think it is absurd to think that they favor one team over another, what else would Peter expect them to say? Does he think they would say, "Well, sometimes if the NFL tells us that they really want to see Team A in the playoffs then a few borderline calls might go that team's way"?

On the heels of the ref series, we’ve got another fun week for you. Some of the stories we have this week:

If you thought Peter King could just allow Brett Favre to fade into retirement and Brett Favre would be willing to quietly fade into retirement, then you certainly don't know these two people. Here's what I'm talking about:

COACH FAVRE. Jenny Vrentas reports from Jackson, Miss., and the Mississippi 6A high school football championship game, where Oak Grove High, with offensive coordinator Brett Favre calling the plays, won the title 14-7 on a frigid night in the state capital.

Favre has been retired for two years now and Peter King won't stop writing about him, as if Peter's readers really give a shit what Favre is up to. Why isn't Peter catching up with other retired NFL players and seeing what they are doing now that they aren't in the NFL anymore? For three reasons, one being that Peter King is absolutely obsessed with Brett Favre. He can't get enough of Favre and isn't willing to stop writing about Favre now that he has his very own website. I guess we are just lucky that it took Peter King five months of having his own site to catch up with Favre.

The second reason is Peter now has his own website so he can tell his writers to write about what he wants them to write about. I'm also surprised Peter didn't have Jenny Vrentas embedded with Favre for the entire Oak Grove High football season.

The third reason being that Brett Favre absolutely craves the spotlight. I don't need to say this since his three offseasons of retiring/unretiring showed just how much Favre loves receiving attention, but other NFL players are content to fade away and coach a team without media attention. Not Favre though. He wants attention and needs everyone to focus on him and what he is doing now. Favre basically became a media whore over the last few years of his playing career and this doesn't seem to have changed much in retirement. 

Vrentas caught up with Favre and asked what he’s learned from the gig this year. “I realize how much of a pain I was [as a player], thinking I knew it all,” Favre said. “Of course, I still think I knew it all. But all the things the coaches said to me, I’ve said the same thing … Don’t force it into coverage, or take what they give you, or keep it simple. All those things have been said to me time and time again, and I say the same things, because they’re true.”

(Peter puts his head in his hand and begins listening intently) "Tell me more Brett. What are your dreams and hopes for this football team or life in general? How is Deanna? Are you guys getting along? If you want, you can come crash with me for a few years. I have an open bedroom and bought a place in New York with a spare bedroom and attached bathroom just for you. Can I touch you?"

PLAYING IN INTENSE PAIN: WHY DO SOME PLAYERS DO IT? Robert Klemko reports from Houston, where running back Ben Tate seems to feel he has no choice but to play with four cracked ribs; he’s going into his free-agent offseason, and he knows he needs to show teams what a special player he is. Sometimes that means playing hurt. What drives these people? Money? Pride? Both? 

Wanting to get paid. Playing injured in exchange for being seen as a team player and hopefully getting paid in free agency. Would you play football with four cracked ribs for a chance to make $20 million over four years with $10 million guaranteed as compared to sitting out the season and being offered a one or two year contract for $4-$8 million with $2-$4 million guaranteed? 

Fine Fifteen

1. Seattle (11-2). A Twitter follower asked me the other day if I liked my preseason Super Bowl champion pick. Yes. Why, yes I do. I’m not much bothered by a cliff-hanging loss to San Francisco in which the Seahawks held their archrivals to 19 points and 318 yards, on the road on a short week when the Niners had vastly more to play for.

This is as opposed to the mere existence of an upcoming game against the Denver Broncos made Peter move the Chiefs out of the #1 spot in his Fine Fifteen. I guess Peter feels more confident about some teams at the #1 spot in the Fine Fifteen than he does others.

3. New Orleans (10-3). So what did we learn Sunday night, other than Marques Colston’s one of the great players of this era who we never talk about? Just this: No one’s winning a playoff game in New Orleans. Just not happening.

This is false. The Saints can be beaten by a good team at home. I can't wait for January when Peter gets incredibly surprised the Saints lost a playoff game at home. I don't know why Peter insists on making concrete statements like this one and then getting surprised when eventually the statement is proven incorrect.

5. Carolina (9-4). It makes no sense to settle for field goals in the Superdome. That’s the lesson offensive coordinator Mike Shula should take out of this game for 2014 and beyond (and perhaps for a January game).

Another lesson Mike Shula should learn and take out of this game is that he needs to quit immediately and have the job be given to someone who is actually a competent NFL offensive coordinator. He's been over his head for most of the year and it really shows against good teams. He's turned Cam Newton into a dink-and-dunk quarterback.

10. Indianapolis (8-5). Well, at least the Kenyan rugby player, Daniel Adongo, played.

Peter thinks the Colts could really struggle in the playoffs now that they lost a game. Next week he will be confident in the Colts again when they beat Houston. The Colts last three games are against the Chiefs, Texans, and Jaguars. Must be nice.

“It’s not the right time or place to talk about my relationship with Dan Snyder. Or it’s not the right time or place to talk about something that happened a year ago.”

—Washington coach Mike Shanahan, declining after an embarrassing loss to Kansas City to talk about an explosive story from ESPN Sunday morning that claimed he almost quit at the end of the last season, in part because of the ultra-close relationship between Snyder and quarterback Robert Griffin III.

This is some high school stuff here. Mike Shanahan wanted to quit because Snyder and Griffin were close to each other? This means if these two are close that possibly Snyder would favor Griffin if there was ever a disagreement between Griffin and Shanahan. Also, by saying "something that happened a year ago" Shanahan is basically admitting he was thinking about quitting at the end of last season.

“I’m gonna be honest with you: You look like a succulent baby lamb.”

—Will Ferrell, playing Ron Burgundy, interviewing the real Peyton Manning via satellite on ESPN.
 
Peyton Manning has been interviewed by a lot of people in his 16-season NFL career, and a lot of observations have flowed back and forth in those interviews. But I feel quite sure no one has ever told him he looked like an edible infant sheep.

Peter has called Peyton Manning "precocious" on several occasions though, which isn't any less weird except that Peter is being serious while Will Ferrell is not being serious.

For the strangest coaching career in the last 30 years, I nominate Wade Phillips.
 
Notable notes on his résumé:
 
• He has been the head coach of six franchises in 28 years.
• He holds the NFL record (unofficial) by being the interim coach of three teams, including the interim coach of the Texans after being the short-term replacement for Gary Kubiak for three games while Kubiak recovered from a mini-stroke. That almost should count twice.

• I once saw him at a U2 concert.

One of these notes on Phillips' resume does not fit in with the others. Phillips also has one less playoff victory than Jeff Fisher does and has as many winning seasons as Jeff Fisher does despite having coached in 9 fewer full seasons than Jeff Fisher has. Not that I take every opportunity to show what an overrated coach Jeff Fisher is of course.

Mr. Starwood Preferred Member Travel Note of the Week

Or as it will be called this week, the note where Peter tells us all how smart he finds himself to be.

“Bet he was here for a speech,” I said. “Google ‘Chris Matthews, University of Louisville, speech.’ ”

What's with Peter King always telling people to "Google" something? He does this in MMQB as well. His answer for any question has now become "Go Google it."

Wall went to work. “Yup,” he said. “Spoke at the University of Louisville Author’s Forum.”

I bet he spoke about John F. Kennedy! Peter rues the day he missed this speech.

Even I sometimes surprise myself with my consistent strokes of genius!

I would take this for self-deprecation if I didn't know it wasn't Peter being self-deprecating. He goes out of the way to tell us this story, so clearly he is somewhat impressed with himself.

1. I think this is what I liked about Week 14:

c. Another 397 yards and four touchdowns for Peyton at home on Sunday. Temperature at kickoff: 14°

Well that completely disproves the larger sample size showing Peyton Manning struggles in colder weather. Case closed.

2. I think this is what I didn’t like about Week 14:

a. Come on, Washington special teams. Look at the extra point after the late-second-quarter Kansas City touchdown. Three Washington players, as Ryan Succop kicked, stood and made no attempt to rush the kick, or do anything. Nice effort.

When the players give up and stop giving an effort...that's probably the point where a change needs to be made. There's a difference in a team simply not playing well and being out-coached and when a team quits on their coach and quits giving an effort.

c. The knee injuries. Rob Gronkowski and Tyrann Mathieu both went down with apparent ACL tears. Hate to see that happen to anyone, let alone two of the league’s brightest young stars.

Jonathan Stewart went out with a torn MCL. Unfortunately, that's only worth $10,000 in the Saints locker room. I think it's $25,000 for a torn ACL, if I'm not wrong.

f. What a mess in Washington. Just an embarrassing loss to the Chiefs at home.

g. RGIII’s interception to Derrick Johnson. Telegraphed all the way.

Can you tell that Peter didn't like the Redskins performance on Sunday? Has he made it clear enough for you?

7. I think there’s more to come on the Mike Tomlin sanction, which means I erred when I reported Friday on NBC Sports Network’s Pro Football Talk that the penalty for the Steelers will likely end with the $100,000 fine from the league. It won’t, and I apologize for the mistake. The league will either take a late-round pick from the Steelers (which, if the team gets a sixth- or seventh-round compensatory pick, would mean in essence that the team won’t get compensated for losing a mid-range free agent next spring) or diminish the value of a pick or picks by lowering one or more of them.

In my opinion this is absolutely ridiculous. I think a fine is in order but the NFL is killing an ant with shotgun by taking away a draft pick or diminishing the value of a draft pick. It's just an overreaction. Tomlin was in the wrong, but taking away draft picks seems kind of silly to me.

8. I think the story of the weekend belongs to Dan Graziano of ESPN.com. He alleges Mike Shanahan almost left Washington at the end of last season because he didn’t like the favoritism owner Dan Snyder was showing Robert Griffin III. Graziano’s good at his job, and it bears watching very closely whether Shanahan would even entertain a contract extension, or whether Snyder would even entertain offering him one at the end of the season.

Really? Why would the Redskins offer Mike Shanahan a contract extension with the current state of the team and why would Mike Shanahan accept a contract extension to be in a situation he simply doesn't like?

10. I think these are my non-NFL thoughts of the week:

d. Re Jacoby Ellsbury signing with the Yankees and Jarrod Saltalamacchia signing with the Marlins: Two hard-working, tremendous guys to root for over the years, professional to the core. They’ll be missed, at least by me.

Not for how much money Ellsbury received will he be missed by too many Red Sox fans. He's a great player, but that's a lot of money for him in my opinion.

f. Robinson Cano’s going to regret that deal. He’s just not a face-of-the-franchise type, and now the Mariners are going to demand it.

Robinson Cano isn't going to regret shit. He has $241 million reasons to not regret that contract. The Mariners may demand he be a face-of-the-franchise type player and Cano many never be that, but he just made $241 million over the next 10 years. I would say any criticism he gets for not being the face-of-the-franchise will be blunted by getting paid in free agency.

i. Coffeenerdness: It really shouldn’t happen, Starbucks, that I have to nerdily tell a new barista that the shots in a macchiato get put in at the end of the drink, on top of the foam. But that happened this week, at a midtown shop. The barista looked at me and said, “Really?”

I guess Peter's week of supporting the new small coffee shop in New York has ended and he is now back to going to Starbucks. I can't help but wonder if this barista was being sarcastic to Peter when he said "Really?" I'm thinking he might have been trying to be sarcastic in response to Peter telling him how to do his job.

l. The more I look at Pope Francis, the more he looks like Chance the gardener.

One week after rededicating himself to going to church because this Pope said he wishes we as a people worried as much about the homeless man on the corner as we do what the stock market will do, Peter is comparing the Pope to a man who can walk on water in the movies. Interesting. What has made Peter such a fan of the current Pope when I don't recall him mentioning the previous two Popes once in his MMQB during their tenure as Pope?

The Adieu Haiku
Frank Gore. What a back.
Appreciate him now, please.
Soon, he’ll have to go.

Are there people who give Peter positive feedback on these haikus? If there are, I would love to hear why. These haikus aren't even interesting.