4 comments MMQB Review: The Seahawks Aren't Dead, But the Eagles Are Edition

Peter King used lyrics by The Knack to reveal that he potentially had sexual feelings for Marcus Mariota in last week's MMQB. Either that, or Peter doesn't really understand what "My Sharona" is about, which is probably more likely. Peter also discussed the Week 1 action and still clings hard to the idea there will be plenty of defensive encroachment calls on extra points (despite this not being true last year) that it will leave head coaches in a pickle as to whether to go for the extra point or try the two-point conversion. NFL head coaches are conservative by nature, good luck trying to get that change. This week Peter talks about how the Seahawks should not panic, five things NOBODY saw coming that are really six things that nobody saw coming (counting be hard...also, the Seahawks shouldn't panic but the Eagles should), and defends his friend Scott Pioli just a little bit. 

There is no travel note this week, but Peter does the Adieu Haiku of course. It can't all be perfect I guess.

Moral of the story after two weeks in the NFL: Nobody knows nothin’. 

It seems like every single NFL season Peter writes some variation of the revelation that nobody knows anything. Can we just assume from now on that nobody knows anything and the NFL is unpredictable instead of constantly expecting predictability and then being surprised when it doesn't happen?

I know that, after the second Sunday of the season, it looks an awful lot like a Green Bay-New England Super Bowl.

Because after Week 2 it's in no way incredibly way too early to say "It looks like these two teams will meet in the Super Bowl." Later in the 2015 season Peter will say, "we" thought that the Packers and Patriots would be in the Super Bowl earlier this season, but it turns out that was wrong. Then he'll act shocked his assumption after Week 2 was incorrect and blame "us" for thinking the same thing he did.

But football rarely looks in January the way it did in September; the four teams that played in the conference championship games last year were a combined 8-7 after four weeks.

Welp, nevermind then. It looks like a Packers-Patriots Super Bowl, unless you look at the historical data from last year. In that case, it looks like NOBODY KNOWS who will appear in the Super Bowl after Week 2. This is breaking news.

The Seahawks are not finished. At all.

I don't think anyone is writing the Seahawks off. I will say it is interesting that Peter's main feature in MMQB is how the Seahawks aren't done, while he seems to write-off a few teams later in this MMQB. So it's too early to write Seattle off, but other teams are finished?

But I ask you this: If the first quarter of the Seattle schedule had been reversed—Chicago and Detroit at home to start the season, St. Louis and Green Bay on the road in Weeks 3 and 4—the Seahawks might well be 2-0 right now, and no one would be throwing themselves off the top of Mount Rainier this morning. 

Okay, but the schedule wasn't reversed so this isn't a good point. The Seahawks lost on the road to a decent and really good team. They didn't play at home. If the real world was different, then yes, the Seahawks' record would be different. The real world isn't different, so the Seahawks 0-2 record is their real record. If a frog had wings then it wouldn't bump it's ass on the ground.

The way the schedule fell this season is that Seattle had its toughest two games in Weeks 1 and 2—at St. Louis (1-3 in the last four years there) and at Green Bay (best team in the NFC right now).

Yeah, fuck you Arizona. You aren't a difficult team to play at all. The Seahawks are excited they get to play those easy-to-beat Cardinals. I guess it's no big deal playing at Baltimore anymore. A few weeks ago it was crucial for the Ravens to get a home playoff game because they are so good at home, but now Peter thinks it's harder to play the Rams at home than it is to play the Ravens at home. Things change quickly in Peter's world it seems. Apparently the Ravens homefield advantage is good enough to get them to the Super Bowl, but not as strong as the Rams homefield advantage over the Seahawks.

I’ll be surprised if Seattle isn’t 2-2 when they head to Cincinnati in three weeks. The flawed Seahawks are still a top-10 team, even with the zits that have shown up in the first eight quarters. If I were offensive coordinator Darrell Bevell, I’d be incorporating Jimmy Graham far more into the game plan as a post-up intermediate presence; Graham has been targeted only 10 times in eight quarters. It’s ridiculous that he has only 62 yards worth of catches so far. Wilson’s got to look for him more often. Rookie Tyler Lockett (six catches, 51 yards) needs to be featured more too. 

So let's see...Peter thinks Graham and Lockett need to be featured more, which means the Seahawks need to throw the football more, which means they should hand it off to Lynch less, which means they need to go away from the strength of the team. As a non-Seahawks fan, it sounds great to me. If I were a Seahawks fan, I would probably think it's good to get Graham and Lockett more involved, while also asking whether it's smart for the Seahawks to try and target Graham as much as the Saints did. Don't go away from the strength of the team to target these two guys.

But those are play-calling points of emphasis that can be fixed. Seattle is wounded, but with the Chancellor holdout and the schedule, we could see that coming. So much else around the league, we couldn’t. 

WE HAD NO IDEA THESE OTHER THINGS WOULD OCCUR! PETER DIDN'T SEE IT, WHICH MEANS NO ONE ELSE SAW IT EITHER!

Here is the Super Bowl matchup that it looks like will happen in February, unless it doesn't of course. It's going to be Packers-Patriots in the Super Bowl, unless it isn't. 

The five things we never saw coming

Except Peter lists six things "we" never saw coming. Five things or six things. Either way, just read it. Accuracy be damned. 

1. The NFC East is going to be one bizarre division this year. If you took a poll of fans of a certain knowledge before the season, my guess is that Washington would have been ranked fourth of the four teams in the division. This morning, with the crippling injuries to Dallas (and I think the Cowboys overcome them, because of their good defense and because Tony Romo and Dez Bryant should return for the final five or six weeks), Washington might be first.

I like how it's too early to count some teams out, but it's never too early to count some teams in. Washington has played the Rams and the Dolphins, with both games at home. If we can't count out the Seahawks because the first two games were against decent teams on the road, can't we not count on the Redskins being 1st in the division because they are 1-1 after two games against decent teams? Both teams played the Rams. One beat the Rams at home, one team lost to the Rams on the road. Apparently one result means something and the other result does not mean as much.

2. Incompetent Eagles. How is it possible that nothing works right for a Chip Kelly offense? I mean, nothing?

The Eagles are two games into the season with a new quarterback and a bunch of new personnel. I'm going to make excuses for them because I chose them to be in the Super Bowl, but it's possible nothing works right in Kelly's offense because of all the new personnel.

The second-most efficient running team in the league over the past two years is dead last running now, despite a huge commitment to it in the off-season. There is no more stunning statistic after two weeks than this one: 2014 rushing champion DeMarco Murray has rushed 21 times for 11 yards. The sacrificing of Evan Mathis and Todd Herremans on the offensive line has wounded the running game, and the inability of Sam Bradford, who looked absolutely incapable against Dallas on Sunday (first seven Eagle drives: 9, 6, 0, 2, 4, 12 and 0 yards) is something Kelly has to fix right now. Why? 

It seems like Peter answered this question of "why" when giving this information. Is it fixable? Yes, it definitely is. Will it be fixed? Who knows and that's why it's ridiculous to draw any conclusions after two games. It's too early to count any teams in or out.

3. Broken Baltimore. Something odd about John Harbaugh’s eighth team in Baltimore: It’s his first one to start 0-2. The mantra around the team after the 19-16 loss in Denver in Week 1 was that the loss of Terrell Suggs to season-ending Achilles surgery wouldn’t be deadly, because the defensive depth was good enough to cover up for him. Well, that was before Sunday’s game in Oakland. 

Two losses on the road...BUT ALL THE MORE REASON WHY IT'S SO IMPORTANT THAT THEY GET A HOME PLAYOFF GAME! AM I RIGHT OR WHAT?

Before the year, the Ravens told the league they’d prefer their four western games—at Denver, Oakland, San Francisco and Arizona—be parceled out, two at a time. So the league scheduled Denver and Oakland roadies in Weeks 1 and 2, and Niner and Cardinals games in Weeks 6 and 7. Surely the Ravens didn’t count on being in an 0-2 hole with a brutal five-game stretch coming up beginning Sunday. 

Oh no, I'm sure the Ravens were counting on losing their first two games of the season. They had it all planned out to lose their first two games and then win the rest of their games in order to get homefield advantage and win the Super Bowl. Losing the first two games was crucial to this plan.

4. Atlanta is 2-0. I credit Dan Quinn and the pass-rush he imported, an improving offensive line, a steady Matt Ryan, and the most acrobatic, sure-handed receiver playing today. Julio Jones has twice as many catches (22) as DeMarco Murray has rushing yards.

I am three times as old as DeMarco Murray has rushing yards! Every NFL team has scored more points than DeMarco Murray has rushing yards! I enjoy randomly comparing two statistics that really don't mean too much when compared to each other.

5. It took eight days for Johnny Football to produce a quarterback controversy in Cleveland. As I said on NBC Sunday night, my gut feeling is that if Josh McCown passes his concussion protocol this week—and McCown was not even at the stadium on Sunday, with the team preferring to keep him away from the bright light and noise that can sometimes exacerbate head trauma—he’ll keep his starting job.

McCown can't be near bright light and noise, does he have a hangover or a concussion? Because Johnny Manziel has had similar symptoms before and no one seems to have sympathy for him. 

“Johnny is definitely arrow up right now,” coach Mike Pettine said from Cleveland Sunday night. “He has been very interactive with the coaches, very involved, and those are the things we like. He’s been different, very different, in a positive way. On the other hand, you talk to some of the veterans, Joe Thomas and Brian Hartline, and they’re big fans of Josh too, as a player and a leader.”

Basically, the veterans want McCown to start, so no matter whether this is good for the current or future state of the franchise this is what is happening. 

6. The Bengals are Old Man River.

So what are we to make of the Bengals’ 2-0 start, and Dalton’s terrific start? Dalton has completed 68.3% of his throws in wins over Oakland and San Diego, with five touchdowns and no interceptions. The difference for Dalton this year could end up being a tight end the offense trusts instead of the inconsistent Jermaine Gresham. Tyler Eifert leads the team with 13 catches on 17 targets, 153 yards and three touchdowns—more, in each count, than star wideout A.J. Green.

Tyler Eifert has more catches than DeMarco Murray has rushing yards and has almost 15 times the number of receiving yards as Murray has rushing yards. 

With Green, Marvin Jones and Mohamed Sanu, and a very good receiving back in Gio Bernard, Dalton has five legitimate threats. If they stay upright, Dalton might finally break his January schneid this year. Might, mind you; might.

Or maybe not. Sure, Dalton had all five of these threats last year and wasn't able to win a playoff game, but things could be totally different this year. Maybe, it could happen. Might. Potentially, but not surely. It's uncertain. 

While it’s true the Bengals have to get the playoff thing off their backs, what they’ve done in the first two games shows it’s not something that beats them down. The next three weeks—at Baltimore, and Kansas City and Seattle at home, all defenses that can pressure the quarterback well—will give a good indication whether Dalton has enough weapons and can rise to the pressure he has to be feeling.

I like how Peter King has all along insisted the Bengals play well during the regular season, but it's the playoffs when they struggle, yet this year the Bengals are playing well during the regular season and Peter thinks this could mean something for the playoffs. Using Peter's past logic that the Bengals play well during the regular season then choke out in the playoffs, why would he be impressed regarding the Bengals playing well during the regular season? Why would things be different this year in the playoffs for the Bengals just because they are playing well in the regular season?

It’s the most worrisome time of the year

For the Romo-less Cowboys. Owner Jerry Jones is the sunniest guy in the NFL. Losses always have silver linings. But it was a sign of how down the Cowboys were, even after making the Eagles look like a bunch of Bad News Bears Sunday in boo-happy Philly, that Jones said he felt “as low as a crippled cricket’s ass.” (Raise your hand if you’ve ever heard that one

(Bengoodfella raises his hand)

… I didn’t think I’d see any hands.)

I just raised my hand. Just because Peter hasn't heard of this phrase doesn't mean no one else hasn't heard of the phrase. 

Dallas doesn’t have a strong backup (Brandon Weeden), and may be in the market for quarterback help this week. (Matt Cassel? Chad Henne?)

Do either of these players count as "quarterback help" really? 

For the 0-2 Giants. Sunday was the 50th game since their Super Bowl 46 win over New England. They’re 22-28, with zero playoff trips, since. Team president John Mara, seething at the end of the last season, has to be apoplectic after the Giants, who have now blown 13-point and 10-point leads—both in the fourth quarter—

It’s New York, so it won’t be long before the drumbeats increase for Tom Coughlin’s job.

It's any NFL city, so the drumbeats increase for the head coach's job in this situation no matter what city the team plays in. Wanting the head coach to be under fire or just fired isn't specific to New York. Most cities with an NFL team would have increased drumbeats for the head coach to lose his job if that team has a losing record over the last three seasons and starts off blowing two leads during the first two weeks of this season. 

For Matthew Stafford and the winless Lions. Detroit is 0-2, and this is the Lions’ reward: consecutive prime-time dates with Peyton Manning and the 2-0 Broncos Sunday at home, then at Seattle eight nights later in a game the Seahawks will have to have.

It is too early to draw conclusions, but remember how I was so skeptical the Jim Caldwell hire was a good one? Well, I was. I don't believe he is capable of sustaining a team's success when he's the head coach. I will say the Lions struggles this year is part of what I think to be an ongoing trend with Caldwell as the head coach.

Three questions with a UNC

Even the most rabid NFL fans will say, in response to that header, “Why are you asking questions to a University of North Carolina?”

Even the most ignorant resident of North Carolina will say there is no such thing as a University of North Carolina.

This UNC stands for unaffiliated neurotrauma consultant. There are two of these at each NFL game, one on each sideline. During a game they stand on the sideline. They have the power to stop the game if they see a player struggling with what appears to be a head injury.

They have "the power" to do this. Much like I have "the power" to do a lot of things at my job, except for the whole part when I get overruled. You can read some of the answers from this UNC and see that he seems to be very pro-NFL and very pro-"The NFL is doing all they can to help stop head trauma and I think they are doing a great job," which makes me wonder how much power this person truly has. 

The MMQB: In your time doing this, have you felt any subtle or overt pressure from teams to get a player back in the game?

Manley: I have never felt any pressure to keep a player in the game. I have been treated with the utmost respect. All I have felt is the teams are very proactive to do the right thing on the sidelines. I really have the ability to have a second opinion. Believe me, I wouldn’t do this if I felt I was being marginalized.

This is just the answer the NFL would want this gentleman to give. Roger Goodell is pleased.

The MMQB: Do you feel this is helping the league get players off the field who would otherwise be staying on the field with a head injury?

Manley: I know the NFL gets a bad rap in this area, but I can tell you they’re trying really hard. Guys who come to the sidelines get some of the best medical care that I see.

Guys, the NFL is trying SO HARD to make sure the players that end up with concussions get the best medical care, which is helpful considering doctors aren't entirely sure when a player may have a concussion that affects their brain in some way and there's no telling if a hard hit can jar the brain as much as a hit that doesn't look so hard. This medical care is super-important considering very little seems to be known about concussions and the exact effect they have on the brain. But if a player looks like he might have a concussion, the NFL is totally concerned. So when you see information about how many retired players have brain injuries, just remember how TOTALLY HARD the NFL is trying right now to cover up for  keep their players healthy.

I followed up with a question over the weekend, via email to Manley, about whether he has the power to keep a player out of the game if other medical authorities on-site disagree. In other words, can the UNC trump the other medics at the game?

I'm sure he CAN trump the other medics at the game. Excuse my jadedness (not a word?), but I don't know if I believe he would trump the other medics at the game in certain situations. So his word can trump the word of others, but would it always work this way like it's supposed to?

“It is my understanding,” Manley wrote back, “and it has been my actual experience, that if I believe a player has had a concussion, they cannot return to game.”

I believe this is true. I also believe that whether a player has a concussion or not could be a debate. For example, Jay Cutler clearly had a concussion in last week's game, but the Bears team refused to acknowledge this is true. Tony Siragusa desperately tried to get John Fox to acknowledge Cutler had a concussion (in a halftime interview) and Fox would not confirm. So the debate can lie in whether a player actually has a concussion or not. 

It’s not altogether strange for the top of a draft to crap out. But so fast? That could be the lasting story of the 2013 first round. The first overall pick, tackle Eric Fisher, is on the bench with the Chiefs. Four players in the top half of the first round look like looming busts, and the bottom half of the round looks stronger than the top half already.

These are the things that happen in a draft that is described as being weak by many draft analysts. Depth can be found where top-end talent can not be found. 

Surveying the carnage leads to one overriding conclusion: We hype drafts to a silly level of expectation. We overrate players just because of where they are picked. We can’t wait to see how they play before we rate success and failure. And then, a couple of years later, we look at a draft like the 2013 draft and say with some incredulity, “W-w-w-what happened?”

Yes, "we" hype drafts to a silly level of expectation. I hate how "we" write articles about the draft and post them on "our" NFL site for weeks on end during the months of March and April. I hate how "we" report from the combine and relay information "we" learned about what teams really think about certain players. I guess it's just part of how "we" hype the draft too much. Really, it's a great observation from Peter King about how "we" are responsible for his site's draft coverage. 

I’m going to get to the lesson of why a volume of compensatory picks should be as valuable as first-round picks in a few moments.

We know Peter feels this way because he's always infatuated with what team "owns" the upcoming draft because they have a boatload of picks. I can argue picking players smartly in the first round is much more important than compensatory selections. Here is some anecdotal evidence...in the last five drafts, my favorite team has only had 31 selections. They started as a 2-14 team after the 2010 season and from those 31 selections they have formed the core of their current team. They have 8-9 starters from these drafts. Throwing in the 11 selections from that team that are no longer with the team and you can see it's not the quantity of the selections that improved the team, but the fact they have chosen their first round and late round picks very wisely. A volume of compensatory picks can be valuable, but they are not as valuable as a first round pick that is chosen wisely. Compensatory picks give a team more chances to hit on a good player, but first round picks are generally players with higher-end talent.

If I were to rank the top quarter of that draft’s first round, I’d go this way:

1. Sheldon Richardson (13th overall).
2. Travis Frederick (31st).
3. Desmond Trufant (22nd).
4. Kyle Long (20th).
5. Xavier Rhodes (25th).
6. DeAndre Hopkins (27th).
7. Sharrif Floyd (23rd).
8. Ziggy Ansah (5th).

There are several messages here. The easy thing to say is that scouts stink, and the thought process of teams is flawed. What I would say is that scouting is an incredibly inexact science.

WHAT? Scouting is an inexact science? You don't say, Peter? Have you shared this insight with some of your NFL contacts so they can be as amazed as I am?

Peter then uses this opportunity to defend his friend Scott Pioli, who he thinks got a raw deal in Kansas City. If Scott Pioli was the GM of a team coached by Greg Schiano then I think security would have to physically remove Peter from the premises. Peter would want to be in that team's draft room, sidelines and potentially even disguise himself as a plant in the lobby of that team's building, just so he can be around the team as much as possible.

In this draft-evaluation business, you’ve got to be careful with making absolute statements. For example, GM Scott Pioli was ridden out of Kansas City after four seasons, in early 2013. But from his four drafts come the guts of the current Chiefs defense that looks so good right now: Dontari Poe and Allen Bailey on the line, 2014 NFL sack leader Justin Houston (with the 70th pick in 2011) at outside linebacker, and Eric Berry in the defensive backfield (if he can continue his comeback from lymphoma). The left tackle, Stephenson, was a Pioli third-round pick in 2012.

Yes, Pioli didn't do an awful job in every facet of his job. He hired Todd Haley and Romeo Crennel as his head coaches and the Chiefs went 23-41 during his time as GM. I don't know, that doesn't seem very good. 

Pioli had his share of misses, and didn’t leave Andy Reid with a quarterback of the future. 

The most important jobs that a GM has is to hire the right head coach, find a quarterback, draft well, sign free agents in a smart fashion so the team can win games. Pioli didn't do the first two well, and despite Peter's listing of only the good picks Pioli made, he spent first, second and third round picks on the following players in four drafts.

Tyson Jackson
Alex Magree
Dexter McCluster
Javier Arenas
Jonathan Baldwin
Jeff Allen

Pioli outright missed on two of his first round picks and hit on one second round pick. Oh, and he didn't find a quarterback (in fact, traded a second round pick for Matt Cassel) and never found a good head coach. Yes, he didn't draft terribly, but his team didn't win games. That's how he is judged, regardless of whether Peter King likes it or not.

But his hits go to show you—and the team’s relative success since his dismissal—that the tar-and-feathering business in personnel evaluation can be pretty misleading.

Pioli wasn't tar-and-feathered. He didn't win games, didn't find a quarterback, missed on 50% of his first round picks, and hired Todd Haley and Romeo Crennel as his head coaches. 

Also, I’ve become convinced—and this started with the way Jimmy Johnson/Jerry Jones were wheeling and dealing when Johnson got to the Cowboys—that the number of picks in a draft is far more important than the location of the picks. Johnson proved that, with lots of low-round gems that were drafted, in part, because the Cowboys believed in carpet-bombing drafts, collecting lots of picks because history says teams are bound to be wrong on even some of the seemingly surest things.

The Patriots and 49ers have carpet-bombed on picks over the past few years (much to Peter's glee as they "owned" the draft) and it's had mixed results for them in terms of finding talent. It all depends on how well that team drafts. That's always what a team's success is dependent on though. 

In the past five drafts, the Ravens have had 15 compensatory picks and turned them into two key pieces of the offensive line—starting tackle Ricky Wagner and third guard John Urschel—and starting fullback Kyle Juszczyk and pass-rusher Pernell McPhee. Love this irony: McPhee could net the Ravens a pick at the end of the fourth round in 2016 after he signed a five-year, $39-million contract with the Bears last spring. That’s the kind of personnel discipline, knowing when to let good players leave because you trust you can train new players who cost much less, that consistently good teams have.

Right, but there is a cycle there. Good teams draft well. The Ravens were smart to draft McPhee and then smart to draft his replacement so they could let him go. This isn't just a compensatory pick issue, but an issue for any team drafting. Every NFL team would love to draft a player and then have his replacement handy when he gets expensive. Good teams draft well. We know this already.

In the past five drafts, the Ravens hit on 4 of 15 compensatory picks. They have had five 1st round picks in that time and have hit on three of those picks that form the core of their defense. Compensatory picks are great, but first round picks is where more of the talent will lie. Good teams draft well though. Yes, we know.

“I haven’t heard anyone on our side talk about 18 games in a long time.”

—Steelers president and Management Council executive committee member Art Rooney II, on reports that the league’s owners want an 18-game regular-season schedule.

The reason no one on their side has talked about 18 games is because Roger Goodell is the one doing the talking for the owners AND because Goodell is holding this as a trump card for when he feels it's best to use it. What Rooney forgets is that Goodell does most of the talking for the owners on matters like an 18 game schedule. 

OFFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE WEEK

Derek Carr, quarterback, Oakland. Few young players in the game have gotten puffed up the way the football world has puffed up Carr. Watching Sunday against the Ravens, Carr deserves it.

Who the hell has been puffing up Derek Carr so much? I don't even begin to understand this comment. How did I miss Carr being puffed up? If this is true, which I'm not sure of, then I completely missed it. This feels like a random comment to me. 

GOAT OF THE WEEK
 
Sam Bradford, quarterback, Philadelphia.

Jamaal Charles, RB, Kansas City. I know, I know. Andy Reid called the play with 35 seconds left in a tie game at his own 20, and Charles fumbled the ball, and Denver’s Bradley Roby ran it in for the win. Just kneel down, coach, and play for overtime. I agree. But Charles, to me, is the no-doubt GOTW.

Charles is the no-doubt Goat of the Week, except for the other guy that Peter named co-Goat of the Week. So Charles is no-doubt Goat of the Week, except for the fact there is doubt since he shares this non-honor. You gotta love Peter King.

The CBS/NFL Network telecast of the Thursday night between Denver and Kansas City was 5 hours and 7 minutes long, including a pre-game show and (longer) post-game show, which lasted longer on NFL Network than it did on CBS.

If you think the weekly fantasy football commercials are, say, plentiful, and if you think the competition for your weekly fantasy football dollar is pretty intense, well, you’re right on both counts. The breakdown of the stream of fantasy-game ads in the football telecast:

Total fantasy football spots: 19

Make them stop. Please, make them stop. I'm so tired of these commercials. 

FanDuel: 11 (including nine in pre- and post-game shows)
Draft Kings: 7 (including five during the game)
NFL.com: 1.

I will give them money to stop running these commercials. I think that's the point actually. FanDuel and Draft Kings want to just have the public pay them money to stop running these commercials. 

Ten Things I Think I Think

1. I think this is what I liked about Week 2:

k. Peterson, with what should be the new normal for him: 29 carries, 134 rushing yards, the most in the league in Week 2.

That's actually the old normal for Peterson isn't it? He's been in the Top 10 of rushing attempts five times during his career and has had more than 300 touches in a season five times. I'm not sure why Peter calls it "the new normal" because Peterson getting that many touches seems old to me. 

g. If anyone makes more physical, tough catches in traffic than Antonio Brown, I don’t know who it is.

v. Julio Jones, who is going to be very sore today. Boy, did he take some shots against the Giants. But he made some very big catches.

Maybe Julio Jones makes as many physical, tough catches as Antonio Brown. Or maybe that was just in one game. 

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

b. Of the many disastrous performances by the Eagles against Dallas, Byron Maxwell, who gave up a sloppy insurance touchdown to the Cowboys (and Brandon Weeden), takes the crown.

I can't believe a free agent cornerback got a ton of money in free agency after playing well on a defense with other good defensive players and then struggles to earn that contract on a new team with lesser defensive players. 

j. Ryan Mallett, a 49 percent passer in relief of Brian Hoyer.

Under things Peter liked, he wrote:

c. Carolina’s defense, through two weeks: 26 points allowed, and four of those quarters were played without Luke Kuechly.

So maybe Ryan Mallett was a 49% passer because the Carolina defense was good and didn't allow him to complete that many passes? Compliment the defense, then blame the quarterback for the defense's great play, that's how Peter rolls. 

k. Hold the ball, Vernon Davis.

l. Hold the bal, Anquan Boldin.

Hir an edito Pete. 

m. Detroit, for all we heard about how the loss of Ndamukong Suh wouldn’t hurt the defense. Lions have allowed 416.5 yards, on average, and 29.5 points, on average, in the first two weeks.

I file this under the same "What the fuck?" line of thinking that Peter had when it comes to thinking a lot of people in football have been puffing up Derek Carr. Who thought the Lions defense wasn't going to be affected by the loss of Ndamukong Suh? Who are these people that Peter is talking to who thinks Derek Carr is overhyped and the Lions won't be negatively affected by losing a few good defensive linemen? I feel like Peter is talking to Greg Schiano and that would explain a lot. 

p. Marcus, Marcus, Marcus. We put you in Canton too fast.

"We" didn't. "You" may have. 

w. Yo Adrian: Three fumbles?

Yo, Peter (there is a comma between "Yo" and "Adrian"...hir an edito), this is a reference to a line that is 40 years old. 

5. I think coaches certainly have the right to change their minds. All do it. But Houston Bill O’Brien yanking Brian Hoyer after three-and-a-half quarters for Ryan Mallett in the opener, and then inserting Mallett to start game two Sunday at Carolina, seems knee-jerk...I mean, I am not at practice, and I don’t see what O’Brien sees. But for Hoyer, a veteran who O’Brien knew as a player intimately from his experience with him over the years, to have lost his job after 12 series of one game is just not fair.

Brian Hoyer is only two years older than Ryan Mallett. I looked up their statistics this season and it shocked the hell out of me to see Hoyer was only two years older than Mallett. I could have sworn it was 4-5 years difference between them.

But I’ve got to hand it to Gary Myers of the New York Daily News: He’s done it with his new book, “Brady vs. Manning: The Untold Story of the Rivalry that Transformed the NFL.” (Crown Archetype, due out Tuesday.) There are stories from on the field, from all the games Tom Brady and Peyton Manning played against each other. There are stories from their relationship, and they are fairly close. But the best chapter in the book, for my money is “Boys will be boys,” the chapter on Brady and Manning the practical jokers—and the victims of practical jokes. One of the few players to play with both Brady and Manning is center Dan Koppen, who, having started at center and had both men’s hands under his rear end for a time, is uniquely qualified to discuss both quarterbacks in depth. Koppen’s best reveal, according to the book, happened as the football relationship between Koppen and Brady lengthened:

He farted on Brady’s hands in practice?

"He did,” Brady said, as if he were providing confirmation in testimony in a courtroom.

It's interesting that Myers refers to Brady "providing confirmation in testimony in a courtroom" given the fact Brady just got done doing that regarding his pissing contest with Roger Goodell. There are a lot of jokes about destroyed cell phones and deflated balls that can be made about Brady testifying as if in court about whether Dan Koppen farted on his hands in practice or not. It's an interesting way of describing how Myers believes Brady sounded. 

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

d. I guess, also, that America knows Leonard Fournette now.

I knew Leonard Fournette before Saturday. Maybe you didn't Peter, but that doesn't mean other people in the world were as ignorant as you were about how good Fournette is at football. Don't assume your type of ignorance is seen through the football-watching world when it's just localized ignorance. "We" may watch more college football than you. 

f. I’m definitely going to see “Black Mass,” mainly because of my interest in the life and bad times of Whitey Bulger. But after reading A.O. Scott’s review in the New York Times, I’m preparing for it to be B or B-plus at best. After criticizing the portrayal of women in the movie as coming up short, Scott writes: “It’s possible, though, to think of the shortcomings of ‘Black Mass’ as fitting comeuppance for Bulger. He may have thought he was a big deal, but, in the end, all he merits is a minor gangster movie.”

Saw the movie and it was okay. I don't think the movie treated women any worse than any other movie has ever treated women, so I don't understand this criticism from A.O. Scott. It's not like gangster movies have a history of holding women up as great and any more than (1) minor annoyances that get in the way of business or (2) shrill nags who are only good for having children while the male characters go have affairs with other women who are minor annoyances and eventually get in the way of business. 

i. A three-hour debate? Whose idea was that?

Probably the idea of the 10 people on stage who all want time to tell America their ideas for how they can improve the United States. Guess what? If you don't like it, then don't watch the debate. This is especially true since Peter isn't going to be voting for a Republican anyway. 

j. Welcome, Pope Francis. I know you’ll just be getting to town Thursday evening, but if you want to de-snarl traffic Thursday night and take in a different kind of football game, I’d be happy to take you to Meadowlands for Giants-Washington that evening. New York coach Tom Coughlin and Giants owner John Mara, two of the most Catholic men in the National Football League, would love to see you.

I don't even know what to say to this. I know Peter is kidding, but why would the Pope hang out with him just so he can visit two guys who are very Catholic? He's the Pope, all he does is talk to very Catholic men on a daily basis. 

m. Beernerdness: Congratulations, Magnify Brewing (Fairfield, N.J.), for brewing the second-best Saison I’ve tasted, next to The MMQB Saison from Harpoon Brewery in Boston. Magnify’s Saison, called Search Saison, was a gem I found last week eating with friends at De Novo, a restaurant near the Upper Montclair, N.J., train station, just up the street from where the King family lived for 18 years.

I don't dislike Saison beers, but I'm becoming more belligerent about Peter only drinking fruity or non-beer tasting beer. I feel Peter is a few steps away from recommending a Smirnoff Ice or a Mike's Hard Lemonade.

r. Caught a few minutes of the lyrical Vin Scully on Saturday night, waxing about Roberto Clemente. Scully pointed out Clemente was at his best against many Hall of Fame pitchers. Six homers off Sandy Koufax. Batted over .400 against Warren Spahn. Leave it to Scully to tell his viewers why Clemente, who just had a day across major league baseball last week, mattered.

Don't tell Jerry Green that Roberto Clemente mattered. He's angry that advanced statistics don't give Clemente the due that he deserves, even though Green has no idea how to use these advanced statistics to even determine whether his assertion is true or not. 

The Adieu Haiku

Bad day at the Linc.
The Eagles look like fool’s gold.
Chip Kelly, unbowed.

Every Monday is a bad day when I read Peter's Adieu Haiku. What would Peter expect Chip Kelly to say though? "Oh sure, I've made a shit-ton of personnel mistakes this offseason and I'm changing my entire offensive system because I'm a terrible coach who doesn't understand the difference in college and professional coaching"? Is that what Peter thinks Kelly would say?

It's a long way from the "The Wisdom of Chip Kelly" section in MMQB isn't it?

7 comments Bill Simmons Posts an NBA Playoffs Mailbag and Promises More Mailbags to Come; Essentially Making a Mockery of the "Columns" Heading On His Grantland Page

In the last Bill Simmons post I did, which was about his NBA lottery preview, I wrote the following: 

Bill Simmons must have made a mistake. It seems he actually wrote a column and posted it on Grantland. I keep waiting for it to be pulled back and Bill to admit it was an accident and he didn't mean to actually write a column that isn't a mailbag.

But hey, I'm sure the SimmonsClones are just excited to have another column from Bill they can worship and send in questions to him about, thereby allowing Bill to answer the questions in a mailbag and justify the existence of the SimmonsClone asking the question.

So as expected, Simmons' very next column up on Grantland is in fact a mailbag. Let's just say I'm not entirely shocked. It's all circular. Bill writes a column, waits a week or two and spits out a mailbag. Then his readers respond to ideas in that mailbag and he writes another mailbag about these responses. Hey, it's better than actually having to think of a topic to write about when Bill really has no urge to put his quest for television celebrity status on hold to write like a simple little blogger would write. But, it's expected of him that he spit out words written on to a computer screen, so here is the mailbag reunion tour. Yeah, that's what he is calling it. If you would like to know why, it's easily explained in knowing that Bill Simmons has to have a contrivance for everything he writes now. He just can't write, there has to be a contrivance. Whether it's quotes from a movie, tons of YouTube videos in a column, comparing an athlete to something in pop culture or thinking of a contrivance to call the mailbag to cover up for the fact it's just a fucking mailbag, there will be a contrivance. So here is Bill's mailbag and I can feel Bill's indifference through my computer screen.

But first, it’s a Grantland Basketball Hour alert! On the heels of last night’s “Hardcore Playoff Preview” with me, Jalen Rose and Zach Lowe …

… we have a second playoff special counting down the “25 Most Intriguing People” of 2015’s postseason premiering tonight on ESPN at 7 ET. We’re also running these GBH shows as podcasts and throwing segments online (like this one). And we’re producing four to six more shows during the playoffs, so if you want to contribute a mailbag question, send it to mailbag@grantland.com.

Ah yes, the partial true intent for posting articles or mailbags again rings true. It's a great way to cross-promote Bill's other ventures with Grantland. So Bill answers questions in a mailbag in his columns and answers questions from a mailbag on television. Essentially, he is just answering questions now. He's basically become a sports version of Andy Cohen from "What Watch Happens Live." As usual, I will be making fun of the person asking the question, as well as Bill.

Hey, speaking of mailbags …
 
Q: You do mailbags so infrequently, every time you actually do one, it feels like you’re doing a Mailbag Reunion Tour.
 
—Ryan, Boston

Bill's first question is from a guy who lives in Boston. I don't believe it.

BS: First of all, words hurt. Second, I’d like to welcome everyone to the 2015 Sports Guy Mailbag Reunion Tour! I’m gonna try my hardest to write a Friday mailbag every single week during the 2015 NBA playoffs. That’s 10 weeks in all. If you’ve been reading me for this long, you know that I’m notorious for making column promises that I can never totally keep.

It is difficult to write a mailbag. Bill has to have somebody else pick out the questions he will answer, then that person has to email Bill the questions he is going to answer/ignore/try to top with original ideas of his own, and then finally Bill will have to post the questions and his answers. This time could be better used to try and have conversations with famous people that he can publicly relay to his readers or trying to make tortured comparisons between an NBA team that hasn't won an NBA title in 60+ years and the New England Patriots.

Q: I have gotten laid TWICE since you wrote last. And I am married 10 years with two little kids, so you KNOW that is a long time. Don’t make me get laid again without writing. How about “just a mailbag”? Seriously.
 
—Brian, Harrisburg, PA

It's sad that Brian's life is so empty. His wife probably doesn't want to have sex with him anymore ever since that time she caught him jerking off to one of Bill's podcasts while simultaneously watching a DVR'd re-run of the "Grantland Basketball Hour." That's probably the real reason for his lack of sex.

BS: You got laid twice even though you have two little kids? You need to be happier about this. Cheer up. You’re putting a damper on the 2015 Sports Guy Mailbag Reunion. As always, these are actual emails from actual readers.

Some of these actual readers are Bill Simmons reading his own columns and then asking himself questions, so I guess theoretically they are actual readers.

Q: Admit it Bill — Rather than following your instincts and declaring James Harden as the undisputed MVP candidate, you surveyed the field, figured out which way the winds of popular opinion were blowing and chose to give Steph Curry the edge. How could you do this, especially after coming up with the best way to judge the MVP’s candidacy? (‘Replace the guy with a decent guy in the same position and evaluate how the team would have done.’)

—Ram Sridhar, Rutherford, NJ

BS: There are a couple of other ways too. I spent four solid years working on a trial-and-error method of determining the MVP award,

Jesus Christ. This so worthless. Bill insists on creating rules for things where there are no rules because the situation changes from year-to-year.

I settled on four fool-proof questions for determining every MVP season. What better way to solve our most polarizing MVP race in years: Harden or Curry?

These are four FOOL-PROOF questions for determining every MVP season. These rules will not change until they are proven incorrect, at which point Bill will add an addendum as a way of pretending that he simply wasn't wrong about there being a fool-proof way of determining every MVP season. These four questions will stand the test of time (for one year, at the very most) and will go to prove that Bill's opinion on who the MVP is will consistently agree with Bill's opinion on who the MVP is. Few writers are better at using his own opinion to prove his opinion correct.

"Chipotle is better than Qdoba and Moe's due to this three-prong test I just created. LOOK! The three-prong test I created agrees with my already set conclusion Chipotle is better than Qdoba and Moe's."

Question No. 1: If you replaced an MVP candidate with a decent player at his position for the entire season, what would be the hypothetical effect on his team’s record?

This is a fool-proof question that contains two assumptions or questions that are purely subjective. What is a "decent player" and how do we measure the hypothetical effect on the team's record? Both of these are answers that rely entirely on a person's opinion.

Normally, you’d say James Harden wins under this framework — if you replaced him on that injury-ravaged Rockets team with, say, Arron Afflalo, Houston probably would win 35-38 games instead of 56.

Actually Bill, I have Houston as winning 45 games without James Harden.

I don't think it takes a genius to see how worthless this first question ends up being. Bill takes a guess at how many games Houston will win without Harden. It's an opinion-based question that leads to the answer simply being an opinion as well.

Couldn’t you say the same about the Warriors? Yeah, if you replaced Curry with Reggie Jackson, the Warriors might lose 15-20 more games while grabbing a no. 7 seed. 

No, actually I have the Warriors as losing 20-25 more games with Reggie Jackson AND Jackson will drown while swimming in the ocean midseason. Boy, this hypothetical is a brutal one.

It’s an exceptionally coached team with enough depth to just bench David Lee whenever they feel like it. 

I have absolutely no idea why "bench" is italicized here. It's a huge mystery to me.

And their defense has been as good as their offense, which people always forget because it’s so damned fun to watch their offense.

Nope, "people" remember this. "People" don't forget it simply because it's convenient for you to think "people" forget it so that you can feel like you just made an excellent point.

But Curry was the biggest reason that the 2015 Warriors were the seventh member of our .800/10 Club — any team that finished with an .800-plus winning percentage and a plus-10 point differential — which is relevant because the first six teams won a title.

Again, why italicize "won a title"? If you read this sentence aloud and emphasize "won a title" the sentence sounds ridiculous. Play this game at home if you like. It sounds stupid to read the sentence like Bill wrote it.

Oh, and don't forget if you are reading it aloud to use a grating voice as well for the full Bill Simmons effect.

Harden turned a .500 team into a 56-win team. Curry turned a no. 7 seed into one of the best regular-season teams ever, as well as an unforgettable League Pass team and the single best story of the 2014-15 season. So Curry wins this one.

So basically Bill didn't even get through the first question before he was like, "Fuck it, I'm not going to pay attention to my own rules. I want Steph Curry to win, so he will."

These are FOOL-PROOF questions that MUST be answered in order to find out who the MVP will be. By "fool-proof" Bill must mean "questions with arbitrary answers based on the person answering the question's opinion on the topic of who the MVP is and if the person answering the question wants a certain answer to be correct then he can just make up something on the spot."

Question No. 2: In a giant pickup game with every NBA player available and two knowledgeable fans forced to pick five-man teams with their lives depending on the outcome, who would be the first player picked based on how everyone just played in the regular season?

LeBron James. There are no other answers I would listen to as correct.

I love this question.

Bill loves this question. The same question that HE FUCKING THOUGHT OF HIMSELF! WHAT A GENIUS THAT BILL SIMMONS IS! BILL SIMMONS THINKS THAT BILL SIMMONS IS A GENIUS!

As much as I want to pick Russell Westbrook, the thought of hinging my life on a night when Russ might lose his mind and start going 1-on-5 while maybe earning a 16th technical that the league can’t even rescind because the loser of the hypothetical bet would be dead already … I mean, that scares the bejesus out of me. The safest bet? LeBron James 

I feel like Will Ferrell's version of Alex Trebek on SNL's Celebrity Jeopardy sometimes when I'm covering a Bill Simmons mailbag. I just want to rip up the cards with the questions on them and ask Bill, "What conclusion would you like to reach? Just state what you think and we can ignore all the bullshit you use to get there."

In this case, I'm going to try and ignore what "knowledgeable fans" would be considered in this situation. Again, it's a subjective opinion on who is knowledgeable and who is not.

You know who the answer to this question might be? KAWHI LEONARD!!!! 

It might be Kawhi Leonard or it might be Meyers Leonard or it could be Meyer Lansky. All of these would be the right answer in Crazy Land. This is the same Crazy Land where Kawhi Leonard is the first pick in a draft among knowledgeable NBA fans.

If I take Kawhi — who proved after the All-Star break that he’s the most destructive perimeter defender since Apex Scottie Pippen — then I can lock down the other team’s best offensive player and still grab an elite offensive guy with my second pick.

Or you could pick the elite offensive guy with the first pick and still have a few rounds to select Kawhi Leonard. And what if the other team doesn't choose James Harden? Does that ruin part of Leonard's value? I don't know why I ask these questions...

The truth is, there were too many terrific players this season. Westbrook was 2015’s night-to-night balls-to-the-wall alpha dog; LeBron was 2015’s hibernating alpha dog; Harden was 2015’s alpha-dog-as-long-as-Kawhi-wasn’t-around; Kawhi was 2015’s alpha dog stopper; Anthony Davis was the alpha-dog-in-training; and Curry was the alpha dog on 2015’s alpha dog. It’s a cop-out, but there’s no clear answer.

It's a fool-proof set of questions to where the first question has been ignored and the second question didn't come up with a clear answer. THESE ARE THE GREATEST QUESTIONS IN THE HISTORY OF HYPOTHETICAL QUESTIONS AND SHOULD BE ASKED BY ST. PETER UPON ENTRANCE TO HEAVEN! WHO SAYS "NO" TO THIS?

Nothing is more typical of Bill Simmons than to take four years to think of four questions to determine who should win MVP that provide no clear answer as to who should win MVP.

(Important: In mid-June, we might feel differently.)

Yes Bill, since you believe yourself to speak for every NBA fan on the planet because you are the expert of all experts, "we" may feel differently in June. Spoiler alert: I won't. If the Cavs don't make the NBA Finals, I'm still picking LeBron. I'm sure "we" will find out my opinion is wrong though, because overreacting to something that just happened is a specialty of Bill's.

Question No. 3: If you’re explaining your MVP pick to someone who has a favorite player in the race — a player whom you didn’t pick — will he at least say something like, “Yeah, I don’t like it, but I see how you arrived at that choice”?

Oh for fuck's sake. This isn't even really a question. My head might explode so I hope you see the issue I have with this question. How can a question be fool-proof if it is so overly-reliant on the opinion of another person? Riddle me this Simmons!

Applies only if you’re discussing the MVP race with a Cleveland fan who counters, “Um, we were so dreadful that we won three of the last four lotteries, and then LeBron showed up and helped us overhaul our team, and suddenly we’re -230 favorites to win the East, and LeBron has looked like LEBRON for the past three months, and since we’ve already collectively agreed that he’s the best basketball player since MJ and one of the best seven or eight players ever, um, why isn’t he the MVP again?

Bill should be kicked in the groin by a horse for writing "LeBron has looked like LEBRON..." Do Bill's readers realize just how awful he is at writing, arguing a point and just generally putting together a coherent, logical thought? His writing is that of a high school kid, but is it that he's so funny and in touch with today's youth and the struggle they go through that they don't care?

Important: The Bulls went 203-43 during the three regular seasons from 1996 through 1998, then 45-13 in the three postseasons (winning all three titles). They never lost three games in a row and played only one Game 7, even though they played 304 games in 31 months. JORDAN PLAYED IN 304 OF THOSE 304 GAMES.

Important: I don't know why this is important.

And during the second of those three seasons, even though we’d already decided that MJ was the greatest basketball player ever,

Who the fuck is "we" Bill? YOU? YOU decided that Michael Jordan was the greatest player ever? Even if it is true for me personally, it annoys me Bill truly believes because he's just written in 1997 "we" decided Michael Jordan was the greatest basketball player ever that is is true. He should be kicked in the groin by two horses and one of the horses needs to be wearing spikes.

a majority of media members said to themselves, I think Karl Malone was slightly more valuable this season. It’s probably the dumbest thing that ever happened. Anyway, Jordan’s numbers never slipped during that stretch.

Oh, they didn't? And again, read that last sentence aloud and hear how dumb the emphasis on "slipped" sounds in the context of the sentence. Anyway, Jordan's numbers didn't slip. Not at all.

They dipped a little, but that’s it.

So his numbers did slip? See Bill, stating Jordan's numbers didn't "slip" and then using another word that means "slip" in place of "dip" only goes to show that you are making things up as you go along. There is no difference in "dip" and "slip." It's the same thing and attempting to differentiate them is simply a desperate way of making it seem like Jordan's numbers didn't decline just slightly when they did.

LeBron in ’15: 25.3 ppg, 6.0 rpg, 7.4 apg, 49-35-71%, 25.9 PER, .199 WS/48
 
LeBron ’08-14: 28.0 ppg, 7.6 rpg, 7.1 apg, 52-35-76%, 30.1 PER, .283 WS/48

Now that’s a dip.

It's the same things as a "slip." These things I end up arguing about when covering a Bill Simmons article makes me question my sanity.

Question No. 4: Ten years from now, who will be the first player from that season who pops into my head?

Oh for motherfucking fuckityfuckeverlastinglightforallthatisholyfuckityfuckfuck. The last "fool-proof" question depends, yet again, entirely on the opinion that a person holds? This is not fool-proof, this is just an opinion. A regular, boring opinion. It's not a way to find out who the real MVP is (which we all know is Kevin Durant's mom), but this question is just another in a long line of bullshit lists, questions, corollaries, etc that Bill spent all of 10 minutes concocting. These lists, questions, corollaries, etc all end up essentially just being a way to back up the opinion Bill holds by extrapolating out a series of opinions that Bill holds to reach his ultimate opinion. It's always, "My opinion isn't wrong because here is more of my opinion that proves my original opinion correct." The game is rigged to reach the conclusion Bill wants it to reach.

But around 2007, I remember praising Nash for being the only “driver” who could have handled the race car that was the Seven Seconds or Less Suns; they were like a special Ferrari built for his exact qualities. You could say the same about Curry and 2015’s Porsche Warriors.

Okay Bill, let's play this game. If I were a Hawks fan, what if Jeff Teague is the player from this season who pops into my head? Does that mean Jeff Teague is the NBA MVP or does it just mean I'm a Hawks fan and that is the team I identify with most? Nothing can be fool-proof if it relies entirely on a person's opinion. Four opinion-based questions are even less fool-proof when based on four separate opinions. Please stop writing for Grantland.

Last Curry point: I grew up with my father telling me, You missed out on Maravich. Every weekend, they showed one nationally televised college game and we used to pray it would be Maravich. There will never be another Maravich. I always felt cheated that I never caught Pistol Pete in his prime; by the time he landed on the Celtics in 1980, he was pretty much washed up. Fast-forward 35 years: Isn’t Curry really Pistol Pete reincarnated as a more efficient, more unselfish model?

Yes, he is Bill. Steph Curry is reincarnated as a more talented Pete Maravich. You nailed it.

Over everything else, Stephen Curry performed.

Read it aloud. It sounds stupid.

This was a virtuoso performance that included staggeringly good individual efficiency and once-a-decade team success. When I think about the 2014-15 regular season, I will remember Curry and the Warriors first … and then I’ll remember everyone else. He’s my MVP.

But Bill, you said these four questions would figure out who the MVP was and you worked on these questions for four years (again, I feel like I'm Will Ferrell's Alex Trebek where there is so much stupidity being thrown at me I can't even focus on piece of that stupidity...Bill worked on these four questions for FOUR YEARS?...It would have taken me possibly an hour to come up with these rules). After four years this is all you got? These four questions figure out who you think is the MVP, so as I said, they are basically just a way to reinforce your own opinion. I think of LeBron James when I think of this NBA season. Let's pretend. So does that make him the MVP? That's what I remember most, so he's the first guy I would choose in a pick up game and if you take him off the Cavs we've seen what happens, plus it's never bad to choose LeBron and it's hard to disagree with LeBron as a choice. So this means he's MVP according to Bill's "fool-proof" four questions. Then how come Bill's MVP was Steph Curry?

Q: You once wrote that every MVP trophy’s size should depend on “the quality of the MVP race” and the “transcendence of the season itself.” How large should 2015’s trophy be?

—Josh, Grand Rapids, MI

Bill had separate weights for each MVP season and the heavier the trophy then the closer and more exciting the race was...or something like that. It obviously doesn't matter because it's another example of Bill just making things up and mistaking it for creativity.

Well, 2015 was an undeniably memorable race (along with 1987, 1990 and 1993, one of the four best of the past 30 years) … and Steph Curry is a future Hall of Famer (if he stays healthy) … and Curry definitely gutted out that award (we don’t even know if he won). So I’m awarding 25-pound status for the 2015 trophy.

(Bengoodfella makes a wanking motion with his hand)

The rest of my 2015 awards ballot, since we’re here: Andrew Wiggins for rookie (over Noel and Mirotic); Lou Williams for sixth man (over Isaiah Thomas); Steve Kerr for coach (over Budz and Pop);

Here is where I am a little confused. Steve Kerr is Coach of the Year because he took a team that was already a playoff team (got 6th seed over the last two seasons) and has the MVP on the roster over the Hawks, who were also a playoff team previously, but added no real impact players in the offseason and have almost zero stars on the team. The Hawks went from an 8-seed to the 1-seed in a matter of one season without adding real impact players, meanwhile Steve Kerr had the MVP (according to Bill) on his team.

Which guy did the better coaching job? The Warriors won 51 and 47 games over the last two seasons, while the Hawks won 44 and 38 games over the last two seasons. Both teams got a 1-seed and the Warriors went from 51 to 67 wins while the Hawks went from 38 to 60 wins. Which coach did the better coaching job again? Bill's buddy Steve Kerr of course.

Q: Don’t you think Byron Scott could play a police commissioner in a TNT drama? He definitely has the stache for it.
 
—James Houston, Redondo Beach

Uh-oh, one of Bill's readers has an original idea. We all know what this means. Bill has to shit on it and think of a much funnier, more clever idea to be the most clever guy in the room.

BS: I think it’s more fun to watch him play Unfrozen Caveman NBA Coach. I don’t believe in your pace-and-space offenses or spreading the floor so players can attack the basket. I see someone taking a 3-pointer and say to myself, “Why wouldn’t he just take two more dribbles and fire off a 20-footer?” I’m just a caveman! I was frozen during the 1988 Finals and recently thawed out to help turn the Lakers into a perennial lottery team! 

Yep, not really that funny. But hey, it's important to know that Bill heard a reader's funny idea and managed to again be the most clever guy in the room. It's about Bill's ego.

Q: How many more hours of motionless staring does Derek Fisher need to record during games before we can start calling him NBA Jim Caldwell?
 
—Ross, Santa Barbara

An idea that Bill wishes he had thought of writing down. That means he'll have to acknowledge this joke and then change the subject quickly so that everyone thinks Bill is the smartest, most clever guy in the room. Bill has jokes!

BS: Um, zero! We’re here! I always wanted an NBA Jim Caldwell. It’s too bad that Wittman doesn’t have an NFL equivalent; you can’t run the Clogged Toilet offense in football. We’ll have to wait for an NFL coach who spends every first and second down running the ball into the middle of the line, then every third down throwing it 25 yards downfield. Maybe this will be Jim Tomsula’s new offense for the 49ers. I mean, would you rule out anything incompetent with the 49ers at this point?

Bill is that guy who always turns one person's joke or idea into a dick-measuring contest where he feels like he can't stop talking until everyone has acknowledged HIS joke or idea is the best one yet. Bill has to be considered the best and therefore receive the most attention. It's shocking to know he's an only child when he certainly feeds the stereotype.

Q: Putting aside the once and future king (Jim Dolan), which team owner do you think is currently despised by the greatest percentage of the fans of their team? Right now I’d go with a toss up between Jed York and Jimmy Buss — they both feature similar combinations of ran great coaches out of town/running team solely due to nepotism/entitlement/general desire to be treated like a big boy by employees, media and fans without ever having earned it. Thoughts?
 
—James F., San Francisco, CA

BS: But in Jimmy Buss’s case, it actually is impossible — he couldn’t run a Jack in the Box, much less the Lakers. Still, everyone knows he’s getting pushed out by his sister soon. And also, he’s just been more hopeless and sad and overmatched than anything. I live in Los Angeles

You do, Bill? You live in Los Angeles? Why haven't you mentioned this little fact before in your columns? This is brand new information.

(By the way, I love how Bill's initials are "B.S." It's just very apt)

and don’t know any Lakers fan who actually hates Jimmy Buss. He’s the closest we’ll ever come in real life to Fredo running the Corleones. I feel bad even writing this paragraph.

And if Bill doesn't know any Lakers fans who like Jimmy Buss then obviously there are no Lakers fans who like Jimmy Buss. After all, how could the people that Bill knows personally NOT be a sample size that reflects the opinion of everyone?

Then again, nobody has a lower fan approval rating than Washington’s Daniel Snyder, who inspired me to write a December 2014 column based on the premise, If you’re a D.C. football fan, would you be OK if Snyder moved your team … as long as you got another NFL team three years later? When D.C. sports guru Dan Steinberg tossed that question to his readers, more than 80 percent of them responded “YES!!!!!” Now that’s a disapproval rating! Nobody is topping Daniel Snyder right now. Sorry, Jimmy Dolan haters.

But if zero Lakers fans like Jimmy Buss then that is a 100% disapproval rating. It's hard to beat that. Unless everyone Bill knows personally doesn't reflect the opinion of Lakers fans everywhere, which is an impossibility.

Q: Simple NBA lottery fix — what if any team that picks 1-thru-3 isn’t eligible for those picks the following year? So in 2015: the Cavs, Bucks and Sixers would be ineligible.
—Jordan D., Portsmouth, NH

BS: So everyone gets the same amount of lottery balls like always, but if Philly wins a top-three pick, they just slide into the no. 4 spot and that’s that? Fine by me.

Wait, Bill acknowledged a reader's idea wasn't bad AND didn't try to top that idea? I'm overcome with positive emotion.  

I’d also create a “no NBA team can win the first pick twice in a five-year span” rule. 

Oh. I guess Bill didn't top the idea, he just added to it. The positive emotion still somewhat continues.

Q: If Boogie pushes his way out of Sacramento this summer, which team is the favorite to get him? Probably not my Hornets I am guessing.

—Thomas, Ballantyne, NC

BS: You guessed right.

Because the favorites to get Cousins are the favorites that Bill will decide are the favorites.

I came up with three Boogie Summer Trade medalists without including the Celtics and their armada of future first-rounders.

Amazingly, Bill manages to include the Celtics in this discussion by not including the Celtics in this discussion. Everything NBA-related revolves around the Celtics, even when it doesn't.

THE BUCKS (Bronze) — What about Giannis, Zaza Pachulia and Milwaukee’s no. 17 pick to Sacramento for Boogie?

Stop it. A week ago Bill was comparing Giannis to Tracy McGrady. Now this.

And if I’m the Bucks, deep down, I know Giannis might be kinda sorta maybe slightly expendable with Jabari Parker returning next season.

I will admit Bill knows more about the NBA than I do, at least in general. But Jabari Parker is not anywhere close to the same thing as Giannis. Parker is a scorer who can play small forward and power forward in a pinch, while Giannis can guard seven positions on the court and can blend in well with pretty much any lineup the Bucks put out there. There is no such thing as another player duplicating what Giannis does, much less Jabari Parker being the guy doing the duplicating.

(My verdict: I don’t think Milwaukee should put Giannis on the table. It’s just fun to discuss.)

Kidding, not kidding!

THE KNICKS (Silver) — Let’s say they win a top-two pick, even if the odds dipped a little after Derek Fisher’s boys beat Atlanta on an unusually devastating night even for the always-devastated Knicks fans. Would you flip the rights to Karl-Anthony Towns or Jahlil Okafor for Cousins? And what would be more fun than Boogie in New York? Anything?

Why on Earth would the Knicks do this?

(My verdict: I’d do it if I were Sacramento … but I wouldn’t do it if I were the Knicks. Instead, I’d draft Towns or Okafor and spend Boogie’s money on a free agent.)

By the way, Bill is giving his verdict on what he thinks about trade ideas that he himself has thought of. This is like the first cousin to Bill using evidence he creates based on his opinion to prove his own opinion correct. So the first two trades ideas that Bill thinks about are both not going to work because Bill thinks his own ideas are bad. Thanks for killing space, Bill. 

THE MAGIC (Gold) — Your clear favorites. In July, the Magic could whip out a Nikola Vucevic/top-five 2015 pick package and maybe even throw in their future Lakers pick just to show off...And Orlando could build around their electric Elfrid Payton–Victor Oladipo backcourt, Boogie, Aaron Gordon and Tobias Harris (if they re-sign him), plus cap space galore.

Or the Magic could just keep Vucevic and the top-five pick and build around Payton-Oladipo-Vucevic-Winslow/Russell/Cauley-Stein-Gordon and Tobias Harris. Can you imagine Aaron Gordon and Cauley-Stein on the same team? They may set a record for "Most physical talent without any offensive game at all between two teammates." (How's that for a Bill Simmons-esque category?) Both Gordon and Cauley-Stein are great basketball players on paper, but their offensive games need a lot of help AND they would be on the same team? That would be fun to watch.

(My verdict: yes for Orlando, no for Sacramento unless Boogie unequivocally says, “GET ME OUT OF HERE.”)

Cousins is great, but I would almost keep the two high picks the Magic have and see how they shake out rather than trade them for Cousins.

Q: You said on a recent NBA podcast that the Thunder should have held out Durant longer, and that you can’t always trust the player’s judgement in this matter. I think you’re right. Look how Pop handled Kawhi’s wrist injury. Kawhi said his injury wasn’t that serious; Pop shot that down immediately. Even if Kawhi missed almost five weeks, look at the end result. The lesson, as always, is: Do things like the Spurs do them.
 
—Felix

BS: Should we be worried that Westbrook and Durant had six combined surgeries for two injuries? Who is the head of OKC’s medical staff, Dr. Dre?

The 90's called and they think this joke is hilarious. Couldn't there be a better punchline than "Dr. Dre" to this joke? How about an actual doctor who is incompetent or a television doctor who is incompetent? I mean, "Dr. Dre" as the punchline? That's some half-ass writing.

Q: What NBA starting Five would make for the best “5 guys who have to live in a Jersey Shore apartment” together? I first thought Cleveland, but the more I think about it I think The Clippers would be the best.

—Jonathan, North Hollywood

BS: Great call. 

TWO IDEAS! BILL HASN'T TRIED TO TOP TWO OF HIS READER'S IDEAS! IT'S A MIRAC---

That’s not your winner, though.

Sadness accrues. It wasn't meant to be.

But here’s your NBA/Jersey Shore winner: the Phoenix Suns. You know, the team I described earlier this season as, “If you put all 30 NBA teams in the same nightclub, the Suns would be the ones that kept getting kicked out for reasons like ‘We didn’t like the way Blake Griffin was looking at us’ and ‘Who does Draymond Green think he is????’” You’re not topping Alex Len, P.J. Tucker and Markieff Morris living in the same Jersey Shore house, especially when Marcus Morris keeps sleeping on the sofa because he refuses to be left out of the show. It’s just not happening.

Haha! Bill's idea is a better idea than yours!

Can’t this just be a show? What’s stopping us?

Because these players probably don't want to be on a reality television show? Because nobody would watch it? I could go on, but I care not to. I'm sure Bill can relate to simply not giving a shit anymore.

Q: What (somewhat realistic) NBA Finals match-up do you think the NBA fears the most? Portland vs. Atlanta? And do you think Atlanta is getting any calls when it plays Chicago or Cleveland or will it be Kings-Lakers, Game 6, for the entire series?
 
 —Luke, Lee’s Summit, MO

BS: We know this much: From a “Who the F are these guys?” standpoint, the NBA should worry only about Atlanta crashing the Finals. In the past 35 years, the only teams seeded lower than no. 3 that made the Finals were the 1981 Rockets (no. 6), 1995 Rockets (no. 6), 1999 Knicks (no. 8 in a lockout season), 2006 Mavs (no. 4) and 2010 Celtics (no. 4). That’s five times in 35 years! You have an 86 percent chance of seeing two of the following 2015 Finals opponents: Golden State, Houston or the Clippers, and Atlanta, Cleveland or Chicago.

The NBA. The professional sports league that everyone who writes "There needs to be a salary cap in MLB" and "MLB is dying because only certain teams have a chance of winning the World Series at the beginning of the year" columns seem to forget about as an example of a league where only certain teams really do start the year off as having a chance to win the NBA Finals.

Let’s rip through the pluses and minuses of the Hawks making the 2015 Finals.

Hey, it beats Bill shitting on ideas from his readers. 

Pluses: Hawks-Warriors would feature the most diverse crowds, by far, in NBA Finals history … this is important: IT’S REALLY FUN TO WATCH THE HAWKS PLAY BASKETBALL BECAUSE THEY PLAY BEAUTIFULLY TOGETHER … there’s a Tree of Pop scenario if it’s Hawks-Warriors or Hawks-Spurs … oh, and Atlanta pro sports fans have rooted for exactly one championship team since 1958 (the ’95 Braves during the shortened post-strike season when everyone hated baseball).

Yes, EVERYONE hated baseball that season so this championship doesn't really count. It took the Yankees to really make the world love baseball again.

Minuses: I hate typing this because I love watching them, but the ’15 Hawks would unequivocally be our most anonymous Finals team since the ’76 Suns …

"Our" most anonymous Finals team. Because it's an "us" thing who don't know who the '15 Hawks are. By the way, if Bill hates typing this then why did he do it and thereby give credence to this idea?

Atlanta is America’s strangest big city because it doesn’t have a discernible downtown, which makes it a quagmire for “big sporting event purposes” (there’s no epicenter and it’s a traffic disaster)

This is important as it pertains to why it would be bad for the Hawks to make the NBA Finals. I know all the fans that watch on television would be deeply worried about the traffic situation in Atlanta.

if ABC got stuck with San Antonio–Atlanta, they’d have to save the Finals ratings by replacing Jeff Van Gundy, Mark Jackson and Mike Breen with Shonda Rhimes, Kerry Washington and Viola Davis …

Why would ABC do this? Because there are a lot of black people in Atlanta so the only way fans of the team would watch is if ABC replaced a mostly white announcing crew with a black announcing crew you racist asshole?

(I just like calling Bill racist in an absurd fashion...that's all)

Add everything up and there’s some undeniable 1999 Pacers/2001 Bucks/2002 Kings potential here for the 2015 Hawks. The good news: Officiating is better than it was during that 1999-2003 WWE era, and there’s more internal accountability for poor performance, as well as YouTube and GIFs and Vines lingering over everything (and a score of Internet detectives ready to pounce). The bad news: The way Cleveland is playing now, I can’t imagine them blowing Round 3 to an overachieving team that has only one defender to throw at LeBron. It’s just too far-fetched.

Yeah, but Bill, the Hawks have ubuntu and really believe in each other. Haven't you seen how they seem to enjoy playing with each other on the court and are constantly giving each other high-fives? The Hawks players do all this and from my understanding upon reading your columns is this type of team always succeeds because the players believe in each other. 

Q: Who’s winning the title? Who are we betting on in Round 1? Stop watching re-runs of The OC and text me back.
 
—Cousin Sal, Los Angeles

BS: I am making seven gambling recommendations, and only seven …

1. Cleveland to Win the East (-230)
 
Just parlay that number with Floyd to beat Manny (-210) and thank me after Memorial Day.

Yes, because Bill is historically so good at gambling. I'm sure everyone will be thanking him.

You could have maybe talked me into the Hawks if they were running on all cylinders and I had two drinks in me, but after the NYPD took out Thabo Sefolosha for reasons that remain ludicrously unclear, I don’t see how Atlanta beats Cleveland four times.

So after the Hawks lost a guy who played 18 minutes per game? Okay, then. It's not like Sefolosha could guard LeBron or anything like that.

3. Amount of Time Bill Simmons Watches the Hawks-Nets Series (52.5 Minutes)

Take the under. I can’t believe Deron Williams and Joe Johnson crashed the 2015 playoffs; I thought The Walking Dead already had its last episode. And why isn’t this entire series showing exclusively on NBA TV? What’s the point of having NBA TV if not for this series?

Bill just wrote this:

this is important: IT’S REALLY FUN TO WATCH THE HAWKS PLAY BASKETBALL BECAUSE THEY PLAY BEAUTIFULLY TOGETHER 

I hate typing this because I love watching them,

Bill likes watching the Hawks, except not really enough to watch them play a team he doesn't like watching play.

4. Cavs in Five (-120)

Here’s the smart bet. President Stevens isn’t getting swept. Baby Zeke isn’t getting swept. Jae Crowder and Marcus Smart and Avery Bradley aren’t getting swept. There will be one game in this series — in Cleveland, in Boston, doesn’t matter — when the Cavs are sleepwalking and the Celtics just care more. You watch.

Read it aloud again. The word "care" emphasized sounds silly to me.

Hey, Isaiah and Jae, can you measure this Cleveland basket for me?

A "Hoosiers" reference. It's so unlike Bill to make a "Hoosiers" reference.

Houston-Dallas has a chance to be one clunky, ugly, ridiculous, way-more-forgettable-than-you-think series. (I hope not.)

Thanks to Bill for telling "us" how forgettable "we" will find the Houston-Dallas series to be. I wasn't sure how forgettable I thought it would be.

7. Spurs in Six (+250) AND Spurs in Seven (+600)

This Spurs-Clips series is fundamentally overqualified for Round 1. That’s what makes it so great. I can’t imagine this being a dud. Too improbable.

I'm not even sure what the hell this means. This statement seems like an example of Bill giving a label to the series for the sake of something. I'm not even sure why. Apparently there are underqualified Round 1 series as well.

And second, Game 7 would happen on Saturday night, May 2, West Coast time … which would likely put the game head-to-head against Manny-Floyd in one of the all-time TV channel-flipping conundrums in the history of TV channel-flipping conundrums.

It is a channel-flipping conundrum unless a person might realize that it's not 2008, so Manny-Floyd isn't really going to be the boxing match that the headline "Manny-Floyd" makes it seem like it will be. So yep, Game 7 would probably win for me. As Bill would say, "Manny-Floyd" is underqualified for the amount of hype it will receive.

It’s destiny. It’s meant to be the Greatest Sports Night In Recent History. 

The Greatest Sports Night in Recent History, even though it hasn't happened yet to deserve this hypothetical moniker. 

So imagine having the Spurs +600 that night. Sign me up. Enjoy the playoffs, everybody.

Congrats on achieving another mailbag, Bill. The readers who worship you are an embarrassment to humanity.

8 comments MMQB Review: Peter Talks about the NFL Teams that "Control" the Draft Again Edition

Peter King interviewed Roger Goodell in last week's MMQB. Goodell, who is ALWAYS available to be interviewed tried as hard as he could to say nothing of substance. Peter also detailed the rule changes that will be introduced as a response to the Ravens-Patriots playoff game where the Patriots confused Baltimore about who was and was not an eligible receiver. Peter also talked briefly about an underrated U2 song, which is an oxymoron like calling a Bruce Springsteen album underrated. This week Peter talks about how the extra point could change (and the NFL isn't even changing it based on something the Patriots did that pissed off an opposing team, which is a shock to me), provides interesting (to him) quotes from head coaches at the league meetings, and doesn't seem to understand athletes don't write what appears on The Players' Tribune. That changed my opinion of the site and perhaps Peter should stop referring to essays on this site "written" by a certain player, as he does several times in this MMQB.

We’re exactly one month out from round one of the NFL draft. There’s a lot to cover this week, including:

Suddenly, the Saints—who are not finished making over their team—own the 2015 draft

The Browns have plenty of draft ammo—that is, unless the NFL takes some of it to smite GM Ray Farmer

Just what parity needs: the Patriots with three prime selections in a six-pick span

Peter does this shit every year. Every year he writes about what team "owns" the draft or "controls" the draft because of all the picks they have. A few years ago it was the 49ers, it was the Patriots before that, and then the Browns controlled the draft one year. I understand it's fun to talk about, but just because a team has a bunch of selections doesn't mean that team "controls" the draft or is going to make smart picks/moves with those picks. The Saints OWN the draft, you know? Sure, they have no cap room, but they have a bunch of picks, which means they don't even have to worry about those being smart picks. The Patriots have "prime" selections in the draft, like they had in the past when they missed on players they drafted in prime spots, while hitting on 7th rounders like Julian Edelman or a 3rd round pick like Logan Ryan. It annoys me because these teams still have to smart in making decisions with these picks. But yet, every year Peter talks about which team "owns" the draft and then forgets about it a year later. At some point I want Peter to realize having a bunch of picks doesn't mean a team "owns" or "controls" the draft.

But first, the biggest change to NFL scoring in the 95-year history of the league is coming. If you don’t like it, get out of the way.

Peter King obviously likes the change to the PAT. He's been advocating for the PAT to be eliminated or changed for a while now.

Last year, in a general session at an NFL meeting, the league’s 32 teams agreed—almost unanimously—that the point after touchdown was passé. Had to go. Too automatic. And so eight days ago, when the competition committee gathered in Phoenix to go over potential rule changes for the 2015 season, the committee was stuck on the PAT fix.

These are NFL problems. How do they fix the PAT, which isn't really broken, but just isn't as exciting as the NFL wants it to be?

There was nothing the group thought it could sell that would get the required 24 votes from the teams. (A rule change needs a three-quarter vote to pass.)

Thirty of 32 teams said they wanted the PAT to change, as teams, one by one, had a chance to advance their own solutions. But the opinions on what the new rule should be “were all over the map,” one competition committee member told me in Phoenix. “That’s the problem now. No one can agree, and now we have to come up with a compromise that’ll get 24 votes in May.”

All 32 NFL teams can agree that they do like money, then they would decide it would be fun to have 10 preseason games and would increase the regular season to 20 games and ask the union if it was fine if the NFL players all played under one year contracts.

This is the most likely compromise to be advanced, and the most likely way the league will amend how teams can score after a touchdown:

Teams will have a choice whether to go for one or two points after a touchdown, from different distances.

If the offensive team chooses to kick for one point, the scrimmage line will move from the 2-yard-line to the 15-yard line, making it a 32- or 33-yard attempt.

If the offensive team chooses to go for two points, the scrimmage line will be either the 1-and-a half- or 2-yard line. There was much debate about making it the 1, the 1-and-a-half or the 2. The feeling about putting it on the 1 was that it could turn into too much of a scrum/push-the-pile play, or a fluky puncture-the-goal-line-with-the-ball-and-bring-it-back play by the quarterback. Putting it at the 1-and-a-half or leaving it at the 2 would increase the chances of a real football play with some drama.

What I wrote in MMQB last week when discussing this same issue:

c. Moving the extra point back to the 15-yard line. (At least.)
 
d. Narrowing the goal posts.
 
e. Making the line of scrimmage for the extra point or two-point conversion the one-yard line.

Obviously "c" and "e" can't both happen,

Well, apparently both "c" and "e" can happen. I can't believe I underestimated the NFL like this. Here is what else I said on this topic:

Also, moving the extra point back to the 15-yard line essentially takes the two-point conversion out of play, unless the NFL wants a rule which says if a team is going for two then they get the ball on the 2-yard line and if a team is trying an extra point then they have to try it from the 15-yard line. That seems dumb to me.

My feelings on the dumbness of this rule still stands. Perhaps it makes sense and I'm just not used to it. The 32 or 33 yard field goal is still fairly automatic, as NFL kickers still make this fairly regularly. Since NFL kickers do miss these then the intended effect the NFL wants will occur. The PAT isn't automatic, but it is kind of dumb to me that a 33 yard field is worth 3 points and a 33 yard extra point is worth 1 point.

Maybe I'll get used to it. I think it's funny that I said both "c" and "e" could not happen at the same time and that seems to be the option the NFL owners have chosen.

The defensive team would be able to score two points by either blocking the PAT and returning it downfield to the end zone, or by intercepting the two-point attempt and running it back, or recovering a fumble on the two-point play and returning it all the way.

Maybe these plays should be worth 1.557 points to the defense, just to drive Gregg Easterbrook crazy with the choice to use over-hyperspecificity. 

Again, that’s not certain. Anytime you ask 24 teams to agree on anything, there’s a chance it won’t happen.

Which means zero new rules would ever be passed. Congress thinks this is a great idea.

There always will be those who don’t want the scoring system to change, because of tradition, or the attitude that football’s not broken, so why fix it? But the PAT is broken. The current system of scoring was invented by the lords of college football in 1912—six points for a touchdown, one for an extra point, two for a safety, three for a field goal—with the two-point conversion added by the NFL in 1994. Now the PAT cries out to be fixed. It’s simply not a competitive play anymore.

This is as opposed to the kickoff, which is now a more competitive play as kick returners now more and more watch the ball sail over their head and trot off the field as another commercial break begins.

Fifteen teams have not missed a PAT this decade. Tennessee hasn’t missed one since 2005, Kansas City and San Francisco since 2006. The Patriots and Broncos, combined, are 436 for 436 since 2011. Doing nothing would be the mistake.

The extra point should probably be changed. Maybe this will fix the problem the NFL has with the extra point being a competitive play and encourage teams to go for a two-point conversion more often.

The Saints will be a headline act. I don’t believe it involves Drew Brees, because I think the Saints are committed to at least one more season of Brees at quarterback. But I hear New Orleans wants to be even more active before the draft, and that could mean dealing stalwart guard Jahri Evans for a third- or fourth-round pick. Or it could mean signing or dealing defensive end Cam Jordan. As of today, the Saints are the biggest power players in the draft. They’re the only team with five picks in the first three rounds. They have 13, 31, 44, 75 and 78. So actually they have five picks in the first two-and-a-half rounds. That gives aggressive GM Mickey Loomis the ammo to start to remake his team.

THE SAINTS ARE GOING TO "OWN" THE DRAFT THIS YEAR!

You want to pick in the top nine. Here’s what a few football people at the league meetings are thinking about the breakdown of this draft: Nine prime picks, then eight or 10 really good prospects, then maybe 30 or so of the same player.

And when has group-think about how many good players are in the draft and where the best place to draft the difference makers for a team ever been wrong? It's why Tavon Austin is the difference maker he is and how Dion Jordan is racking up sacks in Miami.

The top nine: quarterbacks Jameis Winston and Marcus Mariota, defensive tackle Leonard Williams, wideouts Kevin White and Amari Cooper, pass-rushers Dante Fowler and Vic Beasley, offensive tackle Brandon Scherff and cornerback Trae Waynes. After that, beauty starts to be in the eye of the beholder. I had one GM tell me: “The 17^th pick on our board might be the 53^rd pick on another team’s board—and that could be a team we really respect.”

So what's the point, Peter? Every single year NFL teams value players differently from other NFL teams. Some players aren't even on a team's draft board, while another team values that player as a first round pick. I don't think it's news that different teams have varying values for different players. It's how Mike Mitchell goes in the 2nd round of the draft.

Todd Gurley is the draft’s fascinating player. Every year, draft prospects injured the previous college football season go back to Indianapolis, site of the combine, to have their surgeries re-checked before the draft. This year, the re-checks will be April 17 and 18 in Indy, two weeks before the draft. Gurley tore his ACL on Nov. 15 and had knee reconstruction by Dr. James Andrews on Nov. 25. So he’ll be drafted five months after surgery. The book on Gurley is he’ll be good in 2015 and tremendous in 2016. It’ll be interesting, particularly with the devaluation of running backs in recent drafts, to see who picks Gurley, and how high. I think he’ll be gone by the 25^th pick.

One (Me) would think if running backs are being devalued then some enterprising team might not mind selecting a player who can highly contribute in another year. After all, teams select wide receivers and other position players while expecting to put a year or two into that player's development and aren't bothered by doing this. So accordingly, what's the issue with waiting a year for a guy who shown potential to be a franchise running back? If a team can draft a wide receiver and hope he contributes in a year or two, what's wrong with doing that with a running back...even if the position is being devalued?

New England could be a big power player late on day two. The Patriots have their own picks in rounds one and two, 32^nd and 64^th overall. Then they have their own at the end of the third round, a third-round compensatory pick, and a pick at the top of the fourth round from the Logan Mankins trade last August. They have the 96^th, 97^th and 101^st overall picks. Don’t be surprised to see Bill Belichick/Nick Caserio flip one of those for, say, a prime 2016 pick.

Okay, Peter. Thanks for the breaking news. The Patriots may trade some picks for a pick in the 2016 draft. Would that mean the Patriots will "own" the 2016 draft? If so, consider me to be really impressed.

The Browns and Falcons could lose mid-round picks this week. Cleveland GM Ray Farmer has admitted texting coaches during games, a violation of league rules, and the Falcons have admitted piping in extra crowd noise at the Georgia Dome. Doubt either rises to the level or a first- or second-round pick for a penalty, but I believe both teams will be docked a pick or picks for the violations. The league still has a while to go on the Jets-Patriots tampering case.

With how long it takes the NFL to investigate some things, I was surprised the punishment came down prior to the 2017 NFL Draft.

Ten Questions. Ten [Occasionally Insightful] Answers by Coaches.
Some of the most interesting stuff I heard from coaches at the league meetings in Phoenix:

SEATTLE’S PETE CARROLL

Q: Maybe a torturous one—If you have Jimmy Graham on second-and-goal at the end of the Super Bowl, is your call different?

What kind of question is this? The Seahawks have one of the best running backs in the NFL and that little fact didn't change the call, why would hypothetically having Jimmy Graham get Pete Carroll admit this would change the call?

Carroll: That’s not a torturous question. We didn’t have him! So it’s no big deal. Now, if we were in the situation again, he presents an extraordinary dimension to your offense, and we’ll see how it will unfold for us. We’re looking forward to his factor down there. It’s obvious. Forty-something touchdowns the last three years or whatever it is. [It’s 35.] There’s only a couple of guys who have scored more touchdowns than he has, and one of them is Marshawn Lynch.

So................yes, having Jimmy Graham would have changed the call?

Q: You’ve explained why you called what you called rationally several times. Is your fan base okay with it now?

Yes, the entire Seahawks fan base is okay with it now. Every single Seahawks fan has been polled and they are all perfectly fine with the play call.

Carroll: I might have mentioned it—I don’t know if it was captured or not—we knew we were going to throw the ball down there. If it was gonna take all four plays to score, we knew we were gonna throw the ball down there. That was because of the clock situation. We had prepared for that for years. So it was not a difficult situation. The fact that all the focus goes to it—yeah, that’s what it is. I gotta live with that and with our fans and all that. What I’m feeling from our fans? They’re ready to get going.

Every single one of them. Even Macklemore.

CINCINNATI’S MARVIN LEWIS

Q: Are you worried about Andy Dalton’s play in the playoffs?

It's not entirely certain who is asking these questions, as these are things that Peter King "heard" at the league meetings, but this sounds like a question that Peter would ask. The only way this could be a more obvious Peter King question is if there were a reference to Brett Favre in the question or if he managed to bash Josh Freeman in the question by comparing Dalton's play in the playoffs to Freeman's play with the Vikings.

Lewis: What worries me is our poor performance on defense in the playoffs.

The Bengals have given up 31, 19, 27, and 26 points in the playoffs with Andy Dalton as their quarterback. Obviously the defense hasn't been great, but this could have something to do with the six interceptions Dalton has thrown in these playoff games and the overall poor performance of the offense.

We do know, in order for us to be successful, which we can’t even talk about the playoffs because we haven’t gotten there, but the first thing we do, we have to take care of the ball and play better on defense. … We feel Andy’s our quarterback, and we signed him long-term, and we feel good about him … and we will continue to get better with the pieces around Andy. Andy has done a lot of things so far as a pro that not a lot of people have done. We need to keep playing better around Andy, and that will be helpful to Andy.

Can you say "Andy" a few more times? I'm not entirely sure who you are talking about.

CHICAGO’S JOHN FOX

Q: What do you do to fix Jay Cutler?

More draw plays, take the ball out of his hands with a chance to win the game because there is a 15% chance he will commit a turnover, and of course, more punting on fourth-and-short.

Fox: I think he got to the point that he lacked confidence a year ago. To build that back up is going to take time, daily. It takes trust like any relationship. I think he and [offensive coordinator] Adam Gase having a relationship from back in Denver [is helpful] so I think it starts there. Footballwise, there are things you can do in coaching to minimize some of the exposure.

See, I wasn't kidding. Run the ball, run the ball, draw plays on third down and don't take any chances because SOMETHING NEGATIVE MAY OCCUR and that would be terrible. 

TENNESSEE’S KEN WHISENHUNT

Q: What do you think of Marcus Mariota’s football IQ and his ability to transition to the NFL game?

Whisenhunt: Very high. I think he has very good spatial memory. You say, what’s spatial memory?

Hell fucking no, Peter King isn't asking what spatial memory is! Peter is the one who asks the questions around here! Peter is the one who will use big words and then condescend to his audience by telling them to look the word up. Of course Peter knows what spatial memory is and the next time you ask him a question it will be "Can I at least have the shards of my teeth back?" after Peter curb stomps you for condescending to him. Peter condescends, he is NOT the condescendee.

Like, Oh yeah, that was in this game at this time. Those are the kind of things, to me, that are important for that position. You have to have a memory that can see everything and remember it, because when it happens in a game, then you have to come over and communicate that on the sideline, then you have to have a plan of how you’re gonna adjust to it. That’s what the really successful ones do. So he exhibits that type of quality. We still have a little bit more classroom time with him, but he’s been impressive. He does a lot of things that, no matter what offense you run, transition well to the NFL game.

What's it matter that Whisenhunt thinks highly of Marcus Mariota? Chip Kelly is obviously trading up and selecting Mariota according to the sports media, so Whisenhunt shouldn't even waste his time trying to evaluate Mariota's skill set.

GREEN BAY’S MIKE McCARTHY 
Q: Anything you’d do differently at the end of the NFC championship game?
 
McCarthy: [Pause] That’s part of your scheme evaluation.

Not sure the "pause" notation is necessary since McCarthy had not started speaking yet. Everyone pauses before they start speaking so they can hear the entire question. Or at least, most people pause before speaking.

Personally I’ve gone back and watched the TV copies a few weeks back, just one more time. So as a coaching staff we’ve kind of moved past that. We’re actually starting to put in our installation for 2015.

I take that as a no.

Your spatial memory has not done you wrong, Peter.

“It’s NFL free agency … That’s not a big story.”
—New England coach Bill Belichick, on losing cornerback Darrelle Revis to the Jets in free agency.
Riiiight.

Let Peter tell you about the time he interviewed Bill Belichick and saw "The Art of War" on Belichick's bookshelf...

“I don’t trust the lady on GPS. They don’t send you the right way. I hit the button, I go like this, ‘Park Ridge, New Jersey.’ She comes back on, she’s giving me directions. Now I figure out where I am. I say, ‘Thank you very much, I know exactly where I am now.’ She comes back and says, ‘You don’t have to thank me.’ I swear to God, that’s what she said. Then I couldn’t get her to shut up.”
—Giants coach Tom Coughlin, doing battle with Siri recently as he tried to find the site of one of his grandson’s roller-hockey games in New Jersey.

If I were a Giants fan then these comments would concern me more than any personnel moves the Giants make in the offseason or whatever career trajectory Eli Manning's career seems to be taking. Tom Coughlin sounds like an old man when it comes to using technology and talking about "the lady on GPS." It's the little things like this that worry me the most, hearing a quote like this and thinking there's a 5% chance Tom Coughlin may be going senile in some way.

“In theory, freedom sounds great. We all want more freedom. But when I retired and I had all the freedom in the world, the only thing I craved was that structure. It was all I knew. Adjusting to the lack of structure and schedule is one of the biggest challenges of retirement because the real world moves much slower than the football world. Football is week-to-week, and everyone in the real world is working on the fiscal year. You have to slow yourself down because it’s not a sprint. You can’t attack every day like you do in football. You have to pace yourself and find balance. That’s a new concept for me.”
—Former Chargers center Nick Hardwick, who retired at 33 in February after an 11-year career, all in San Diego, in an essay for The Players’ Tribune.

This is the first of a few times that Peter will mention The Players' Tribune in this MMQB. It's disappointing, though I shouldn't be surprised, that many of the players don't actually write those essays found on the site for The Players' Tribune. The "essay" in many cases is really just a summation of an interview the player did with an editor of The Players' Tribune. Now that I know this, I won't say a player "wrote" something on The Players' Tribune, because I'll assume an editor actually wrote it and the essay is more of an interview.

According to cap site Spotrac, here are the most and least active teams in the first three weeks of free agency (the market essentially is dried up now):

The five biggest spenders in total contract value of signed players:

1. Jacksonville: $172.5 million
2. New York Jets: $172.0M
3. Miami: $139.8M
4. Philadelphia: $117.3M
5. Tennessee: $110.2M

What else do the majority of these teams have in common? They haven't made the playoffs over the last three seasons. Philadelphia is the exception of course. These teams have 1 playoff appearance over the last 3 seasons to their credit. I'm guessing the reason these teams haven't made the playoffs isn't because they didn't spend enough money in free agency.

The thrifty five in total contract value of signed players:

28. Minnesota: $9.3M
29. Carolina: $8.8M
30. Detroit: $8.6M
31. Pittsburgh: $6.6M
32. Green Bay: Zero

What else do all five of these teams have in common? They have all appeared in the playoffs over the last three seasons. They have 9 playoff appearances over the last three seasons. Weird how they do that without spending a lot of money in free agency.

Obviously only broad conclusions can be drawn from a list showing five teams spending money in free agency and five teams who didn't spend money in free agency, but I still can't help but notice that free agent spending doesn't seem efficient when viewed from the perspective of teams who have spent in free agency. Drafting players and developing them is still the best way to win games.

“We obviously have a philosophy,” coach Mike McCarthy said. “It’s kind of like Groundhog Day. I feel like I answer this every year, so I’ll try to be creative and answer it differently this year. But it’s just the way we operate. We do the evaluations. We just stick to our plan. Our number one priority always has been to sign our own free agents. We go into every offseason—if we have 10 conversations, nine-and-a-half of them are about our own guys.”

Free agency is a market where the highest bidder almost always wins. It's not the best place for a team to go looking to plug holes in the roster caused by ineffective drafting or personnel choices. Free agency can absolutely work for a team, but I don't think it's a coincidence the best teams don't spend big in free agency.

Bill Madden of the New York Daily News wrote Sunday that the Tigers owe Miguel Cabrera, Justin Verlander, Victor Martinez, Ian Kinsler and Anibel Sanchez $639 million in guaranteed money between now and the end of their contracts.
Costanza voice: “Is that wrong?”

Coming from a Red Sox fan, really? The Red Sox haven't spent huge lately, but they have certainly spent their share of money on contracts. Come on, it's not like Peter's favorite team doesn't spend a lot of money on contracts for their players. They aren't the Yankees, but the Red Sox also aren't a mid-market team either.

Ten Things I Think I Think

1. I think I can now say with certainty that The Other Team in the chase for Sam Bradford—as many have inferred—was Cleveland. The Browns would have been willing to part with a first-round pick in either 2015 or 2016 (I do not know which year) for Bradford, but there were two problems: One, the Browns didn’t have a quarterback to give in return, and Philadelphia was willing to fork over Nick Foles.

The Rams didn't want Thad Lewis? No way. 

Two, Bradford would not have been willing to sign a new contract this off-season if he were traded to Cleveland, and he is willing to consider an extension in Philadelphia. So the Philly deal was really the only one that made sense for the Rams and for Bradford, in the end.

I'm not sure how I feel about the Browns having interest in Sam Bradford. It seems like giving up on Johnny Manziel after one season, while also feeling like not a bad move for the team. I don't see why the Browns would give up a first round pick for a quarterback like Bradford, but there are so many things I don't understand in life. Like, didn't the Browns just sign Josh McCown before they tried to acquire Bradford?

2. I think the Vikings can say a hundred times they’re not trading Adrian Peterson, and I believe they believe they will not. But the Vikings also have to understand Peterson and agent Ben Dogra could be serious about making it very hot for them this summer if they don’t trade him on draft weekend. How could Peterson make it hot? By not reporting to camp. By being a huge distraction that would drive Mike Zimmer crazy. If I were Minnesota GM Rick Spielman, I’d trade Peterson for a second-round pick if I could get it. He’s 30. He is owed $45 million over the next three years.

A second round pick for Adrian Peterson when he is owed $45 million over the next three years? I'm sure there is a team that would take this dive, but best of luck with that turning out well. And I love how Peterson threatens to hold out. How is he going to be a distraction that drives Mike Zimmer crazy? Is Peterson going to show up and photobomb Zimmer's press conferences or interrupt practice by running on the field naked? Sure, Peterson could be a distraction, but the Vikings can simply hold on to him and wait until he realizes he's 30 and the only leverage he has is that he can make life difficult for the Vikings. Plus, acting like an asshole and intentionally becoming a distraction doesn't seem like the best way for Peterson to drum up a trade market for himself.

3. I think the 2014 trades with 2015 draft implications that look the worst are, in order:
a. Buffalo sending a 2015 fourth-round pick to Philadelphia for running back Bryce Brown (2014: 36 carries, 126 yards), now buried behind LeSean McCoy on the Bills’ depth chart.

Except Bryce Brown somehow managed to fetch a fourth round pick for his services when he was buried behind LeSean McCoy on the Eagles' depth chart, so it's not necessarily a status that means Brown can't/won't contribute to the Bills team.

b. Seattle getting only a sixth-round pick, from the Jets, for Percy Harvin.

Seems like it was addition by subtraction to me.

6. I think, after his ignominious performance in 2014, it hasn’t surprised me that the market for Michael Vick is somewhere between grim and nonexistent.

Ouch. Peter King going hard at Mike Vick for being grim and nonexistent. I wonder if Peter has some harsh words for Matt Schaub or Matt Flynn for being grim and nonexistent? My guess is he does not. After all, he justified the Josh McCown signing by explaining what a great teacher McCown is.

7. I think the more I think of New Orleans signing C.J. Spiller—27 years old, making $9.5 million over the next two seasons, 5.3 yards per rush combined in 2012 and ’13 before his lost season in Buffalo last fall—the more I think the Saints made a great deal. I love Spiller.

Especially since the Saints have zero salary cap issues and certainly didn't just re-sign another running back named Mark Ingram this past offseason, so spending $9.5 million over two years on a running back in a draft where there seem to be a variety of quality running backs does seem like a great deal.

9. I think Indianapolis coach Chuck Pagano coaching out the last season of his contract—regardless of whatever Pagano or any team official would say—means that something, either major or minor, is amiss. You do not let a coach with 36 wins in three years coach out his contract, particularly if you are intent on him staying and coaching your team beyond this season. 

This is some major inside information. So teams that want their head coach to continue coaching for them DO NOT fail to re-sign that head coach to a new contract prior to his contract running out? Are you sure about that, Peter? It seems counter intuitive to learn that an NFL team might offer a coach they wanted to keep a new contract prior to his old one running out, but this is just another example of the great information MMQB provides.

Ian Rapoport reported a new deal won’t get done, and longtime Colts beat man Mike Chappelle reported Pagano turned down a one-year extension. Something just doesn’t feel right about it.

It could be the Colts don't want to pay Pagano the money that he wants to coach the team. Maybe the Colts think Pep Hamilton is a better coach or perhaps Pagano is a bit frustrated he was saddled with Trent Richardson for most of the season.

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

b. College Basketball Fever Dept.: New Jersey Institute of Technology travels to Flagstaff, Ariz., to play Northern Arizona for the semifinals of the CollegeInsider.com Tournament.
c. When NJIT and Northern Arizona meet, I mean, you can throw the records out the window.

Yes, let's mock college basketball tournaments because they aren't as relevant as the NCAA Tournament. That's the mature thing to do.

d. I also agree with Dan Shaughnessy: The more David Ortiz talks and writes about not being a PED user (which Ortiz did last week for The Players’ Tribune),

Except Ortiz didn't really write what appeared in The Players' Tribune, but I guess Peter is okay with a fellow journalist not getting credit for what he has written. I'm sure the editors of The Players' Tribune are just the CollegeInsider.com Tournament to THE MMQB's NCAA Tournament, so who cares if they get credit for what they have written?

e. Best piece on The Players’ Tribune, of all of them that I’ve read, was that Nick Hardwick adjusting-to-retirement essay. What a fantastic job of explaining so much about retirement that those of us who never played anything professionally would be able to feel.

Except, again, Nick Hardwick probably didn't even really write this essay. He spoke it and someone else edited and wrote the essay.

f. I like those pieces by the new Jeter site. But (he said, sticking his chest out with some pride) The Players’ Tribune didn’t invent the first-person athlete column. Nor did The MMQB. But our site did a score of them when Jeter was still a shortstop and not a publisher—by Richard Sherman, on multiple topics; by Russell Wilson, on race in the NFL; by journeyman defensive end Austen Lane, a gut-puncher of a piece on what it’s like be cut; by Lydon Murtha, a teammate of Richie Incognito and Jonathan Martin, on life on the inside of the bullying in Miami. And others. Just to set the record straight.

Were these essays all ghost written by someone else too? If so, I can see why Peter has no issue with an athlete getting credit for something another person has actually edited and written.

g. I really like the Yanks’ top two, Tanaka and Pineda. But is C.C. Sabathia even going to be in the rotation by June?

(Bengoodfella uses his psychic skills) Yes, he will be in the rotation in June.

h. Big, big blow if the Red Sox have lost catcher Christian Vasquez, who I keep reading is a Molina-type defender and arm. 

Peter King thinks this was a huge blow to the Red Sox based on something that Peter King has read about this player, and while he has no firsthand knowledge of this player's abilities, based on what others say it was a huge blow, so Peter is just going to adopt that as the truth based on information he doesn't really know.

I can't believe the Braves traded Andy Marte a few years ago, a guy who I kept reading was just like Aramis Ramirez. 

Not that Boston’s going to have enough pitching to win this year, but catchers can make pitchers better.

#analysis

l. Is baseball serious? Opening night next Sunday at Wrigley … and game two, another night game two nights later in Chicago? Why torture fans—and, presumably, frozen-fingered pitchers? Luckily for MLB, the long-range forecast is for temperatures in the 40s both nights.

Nope Peter, it is all a joke that is being played on you. Opening night is actually in Bermuda at an undisclosed location between two teams who were last seen playing in the CollegeInsider.com tournament.

p. Tom Brady cliff-diving one day, playing pickup basketball with Michael Jordan the next. How’s your off-season going?

I have a full-time job that doesn't have an offseason and I have to work year around. So my offseason is going terribly because it doesn't exist. #alwaysriseandgrind

r. Coffeenerdness: Why’d you take away the hazelnut macchiato, Starbucks? That was my occasional guilty pleasure. No more.

Starbucks should continue to make the hazelnut macchiato in every Starbucks in the United States, just for Peter King, because who knows when Peter is liable to wander into any Starbucks in the United States. In fact, baristas at Starbucks should only be trained on how to make coffee-flavored drinks that Peter King likes. Everyone else can just get used to it.

v. Just when you think you’ve seen every possible horrendous thing done by human beings, a pilot crashes a jetliner into a mountain on purpose, and 150 die.

He was actually the co-pilot, but point taken.

The Adieu Haiku

Yo! Trade Adrian.  
Forty-five mill’s too much for
a back who’s thirty.

These haikus are the sportswriting equivalent of a turd sundae as dessert after a four-course meal of expired lettuce, rancid meat, and squirrel testicles for an appetizer.