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Thank you Bengals for fucking me out of a hefty parlay for a second time this year.

Holy shit that Tecmo Super Bowl Bo Jackson-esque run....

No, don't do it Merk, don't have hope...

Overtime bitches!

Yup God hates me first time ever an NFL game ends in an overtime safety




Fuck you, Bengals, fuck you.

God damn. Awful weekend of gambling. My little bankroll is dying

The Colts had a huge comeback against an almost comically hard luck Texans team so that's a plus! I'll almost assuredly going to win my big "Will the Colts get 9 or more wins this season?" bet which at this point won't put me even for the year yeah... that's how bad it's been.

Tom Brady is one photogenic mofo:

Merk wrote:God damn. Awful weekend of gambling. My little bankroll is dying :(

Bah, you could probably lose money if you were the bookie!
(I keed, I keed).

Merk wrote:The Colts had a huge comeback against an almost comically hard luck Texans team so that's a plus! I'll almost assuredly going to win my big "Will the Colts get 9 or more wins this season?" bet which at this point won't put me even for the year :( yeah... that's how bad it's been.

I do hope Kubiak is OK. I never like to see anyone, player or sideline, get hurt, even if it's not an acute physical injury from the game. I'm sure the coaches are under an absurd amount of stress that will get to them if the sleep deprivation doesn't first.

I do kinda wonder how much of an impact him leaving had on the Texans. They didn't completely fall apart or anything, but there did seem to be a difference. The Colts also came out gunning: Luck obviously realized that, no, Wayne isn't on the field and decided to try slinging it to T.Y. with a reasonable degree of success, and the O-line got it together enough to make that mostly possible. That first half though...ugly. Where the hell was the offensive line, anyway? We didn't get any run performance in the entire game, but given how often the Texans were in Luck's face when they tried to pass during the first half, that's unsurprising, and the second half was basically played as a shoot-out by the Colts.

The officiating was kinda a WTF. I don't think either team really reaped a net benefit from it in the end, but some of those calls, especially the reversals upon review, were real head-scratchers. I can forgive the no-call on roughing the kicker - maybe they just didn't see it - but overturning the fumble recovery, well, I didn't see "clear and indisputable evidence", and the same could be said for overturning that completed pass. I really think both of those should have "stood as called".

And man, what is up with the Colts and last-minute comebacks? Peyton was a master of leading the 2-minute offense and presumably still is, but Luck is amazing at it, too. More power to them both, I guess.

Yeah I'm not sure what to think about the whole Kubiak thing. If anything it looks like he had a brain aneurysm but the media is, as expected, being vague. It might have had a slight impact since the Texans offensive playcalling went from "Fuck it, just throw it deep!" to "Dink and dunk throws and stretch runs" but that was probably more of a function of the fact that they were up three scores and wanted to go conservative - dead Kubiak or not I think things would have played out the same. That kicker is done though, I had absolutely no fear on the 55-yarder at the very end and sure enough his kick didn't even have a chance; it would have missed from 35 yards much less 55.

First half was definitely bad and we looked like how we did in the Chargers game except the O-line managed to look even worse. The run blocking was non-existent (which is par for the course) and the pass protection folded like a God damn house of cards. I'm not sure if people were just missing assignments or what but kudos to Luck for taking sacks and not trying to force a pass that just isn't there.

Officiating was all over the place. The fumble recovery overturn was obviously the most egregious fuckup and I'm not sure if the Andrew Johnson no-catch call was right either. If you look closely there is a *very slight* wiggle of the ball as he was sliding out of bounds which I'm guessing is what the refs considered the indisputable evidence but really it should have stood. The roughing the passer penalty on Luck was 100% correct though, there was absolutely no reason to hit Luck since he was clearly going out of bounds. You could argue that it's a shitty rule but the implementation of it in Luck's case was correct. You're right though I ultimately don't think there was a net gain for either side.

I'm cautiously optimistic about the remainder of the season for the Colts. We are out of the hard part of the season with a really, really unexpected record and the remainder of the season is filled with teams that have not been doing so well. We do have @Bengals and @Chiefs which at this point are likely going to be games that determine playoff seeding. If we can pull off a #2 seed I will be ecstatic but I see us most likely getting a #3 with the Broncos and Patriots taking #1 and #2. Here's how I see things playing out:

AFC

1 Broncos
2 Patriots
3 Colts
4 Bengals
5 Chiefs
6 ..... Jets? I'm not sure it's between the Jets, Dolphins, and ironically the Browns

The NFC is more or less an open race still with no real obvious favorites outside of the NFC West. The NFC East is as usual a huge clusterfuck and there's a 3-way tie for first place in the NFC North so who the fuck knows how that's going to go with Rodgers and Cutler out.

1 49ers
2 Saints
3 Lions (Chicago and Green Bay are free falling at this point and I think the Lions barely win the division on week 17)
4 Cowboys
5 Seahawks
6 Panthers



Man, the start of the second half of the season is the best! Every game has a significant impact on the playoffs and it's truly make or break time

Brian I am sorry about this week.

Merk doubts the Chiefs finishing top 3?

Riot wrote:Brian I am sorry about this week.

No need to apologize. I actually checked in on our matchup periodically from Thursday through Monday. It was back-and-forth, up-and-down the whole time. It seems fitting that it ended so close.

SoDeepPolaris wrote:Merk doubts the Chiefs finishing top 3?

The NFL doesn't do seeding by straight record unfortunately, it's all determined by division winners and then the remaining two teams in each conference get what's called a "wildcard" spot. Essentially I am saying that Denver is going to win the AFC West and the Chiefs are going to take one of the two wildcard spots.

If you recall about two years ago there was some drama over the 7-9 Seahawks getting into the playoffs by virtue of winning their division (NFC West) while a number of >0.500 record teams missed out. Of course the Seahawks went on to crush the defending Super Bowl champion New Orleans Saints




I'm glad people are checking their footbaw points! That genuinely does make me happy.

Merk wrote:The NFL doesn't do seeding by straight record unfortunately, it's all determined by division winners and then the remaining two teams in each conference get what's called a "wildcard" spot. Essentially I am saying that Denver is going to win the AFC West and the Chiefs are going to take one of the two wildcard spots.

But aren't the division winners determined by overall record, first? Tie breaker is division record, then head to head, then I think conference record (if you need more than two tie-breakers...).

Merk wrote:That kicker is done though, I had absolutely no fear on the 55-yarder at the very end and sure enough his kick didn't even have a chance; it would have missed from 35 yards much less 55.

Well, a 55-yarder is far from a "sure bet" even for good NFL kickers. I certainly wouldn't bet the farm on Vinateri making a 55-yarder, though he's not a distance kicker (I'll take him over basically any other kicker in the league inside 35 yards in a must-make situation, though, even at 40 years old). Even the distance guys like Janikowski or Scobee aren't going to be 100% beyond 50 yards. But yeah, he missed some other, more "makeable" ones earlier in the game, including a 43-yarder that would have kept major heat on the Colts. Not that even 43 yards is automatic, and his offense didn't give him a lot of help (preferring to score touchdowns, instead, which isn't bad of course) but being as far off as he was on the 55-yard game tying attempt and missing all but one of his other attempts, yeah, he's probably going to have to make an impression on the coaching staff to keep his job. NFL teams rely on their kickers to put desperately needed points on the board when it counts, and he definitely failed miserably at that allowing the Colts to steamroll them in the 2nd half rather than sneak by. Contrast with Vinateri who made a (albeit nearly "chip shot", by some people's definitions) 30-yarder in the 2nd quarter to give the Colts some much needed light on the board going into halftime.

Merk wrote:First half was definitely bad and we looked like how we did in the Chargers game except the O-line managed to look even worse. The run blocking was non-existent (which is par for the course) and the pass protection folded like a God damn house of cards. I'm not sure if people were just missing assignments or what but kudos to Luck for taking sacks and not trying to force a pass that just isn't there.

They're really going to have to work on that. I have to wonder how much of Richardson's lackluster performance so far has been a simple lack of running lanes (which he's kinda used to having in abundance). Presumably the coaches are harping on this at least as hard as we are, here...

And yeah, Luck seems to have his head about him on matters like this. Not to denigrate Peyton's abilities in these areas - to be sure, he's damn good - Luck seems to have the whole "game situational awareness" thing going. That's something I always like about the "previous generation" Colts, and it seems to be continuing. They don't just slam the ball down the field (air or ground), but rather they play the game and take advantage of whatever opportunities they're given.

Merk wrote:Officiating was all over the place. The fumble recovery overturn was obviously the most egregious fuckup and I'm not sure if the Andrew Johnson no-catch call was right either. If you look closely there is a *very slight* wiggle of the ball as he was sliding out of bounds which I'm guessing is what the refs considered the indisputable evidence but really it should have stood. The roughing the passer penalty on Luck was 100% correct though, there was absolutely no reason to hit Luck since he was clearly going out of bounds. You could argue that it's a shitty rule but the implementation of it in Luck's case was correct. You're right though I ultimately don't think there was a net gain for either side.

Like I said, I think both of those should have "stood as called". I saw no evidence that I'd call sufficient to overturn them, but I also wouldn't have seen sufficient evidence to overturn had they been called the other way on the field. In the end, both teams ended up getting burned by those video reversals at somewhat critical moments, so yeah, I don't think either team really derived benefit. And hey, I'm not the referee. I'll readily admit that, much as I may be a rule geek, I get surprised sometimes and later learn that they made a totally correct call.

Yes, they got the call on the roughing the passer 100% correct "by rule". While I agree a bit that the rule gives a lot of power to the quarterback, I think it's a good rule. It makes the game a fair bit safer, and the QB doesn't exactly wear a ton of padding. He had clearly passed the ball by the time the hit occurred and was clearly going out of bounds. You have to pull up at that point as the tackler - no hit you can make is going to help; you might as well go for the deflection and take the heat off the passer himself.

Right, division winners are determined by record and then if there's a tie there's something like a dozen or so tie breakers with the first being division record, then conference record, and then it gets a little more obtuse from then on: Strength of schedule, margin of victories amongst common opponents, number of touchdowns, etc., etc., until finally they decide the division winner by coinflip if all tiebreakers end up being equal. A cursory Google search does not bring up any results for a division winner ever being decided by coinflip.

I guess what I meant was that the six teams with the best records do not necessarily go to the playoffs and that the record they do have does not always dictate their seed in the playoffs.

I am really pessimistic when it comes to field goals and the Colts. The infamous Vanderjagt kick, the miracle Josh Scobee kicks, and the Nick Folk kick that knocked us out of the playoffs (I got fired from my first job the very next morning) all give me PTSD flashbacks. Allegedly the Texans kicker was really good in college so I don't know if he's having an off year or what but I had no faith in him after I saw him miss the first kick in that game.

Richardson is serviceable and I maintain that it was a good trade that will likely benefit everyone. He hasn't had any egregious pass blocking errors and he's able to pick up and, more importantly, fight for yards when needed. He is enough of a threat that defenses have to be honest which is something the Colts desperately needed after Ahmad Bradshaw went down and the only RB we had was Donald "God damn it Donald" Brown. I wouldn't say that Richardson, or any RB for that matter, is necessarily worth a 1st round pick but the fact that next year's draft is pretty much a bunch of solid QBs, two good defensive tackles, and then a *lot* of middling players means that the Colts would likely be able to draft whatever skill position players are needed in the second round anyway. There's no way Richardson ends up being more of a bust than Jerry Hughes or the aforementioned Donald Brown. I feel like the problem has more to do with coaching and the mindset that the Colts aren't a running team - ya know?


God damn, I have no idea how the refs keep all the rules and their respective penalties straight since there are a shit ton of obscure ones.

• Luck has not been with Awesome Cats, as five of their seven losses have come when their opponent scores higher than their season average.
  Awesome Cats has lost three straight games, the longest current losing streak in the league.
  Awesome Cats scored 77.58 points against a projected 90.63 and underachieved for the sixth time this season, including the last five weeks in a row.
  With a combined 29.00 points from their RBs, The Lulz got their highest combined scoring output from the RB position this season.
  Awesome Cats got a combined 4.40 points from their RBs, their lowest combined scoring output from the RB position this season.

Fuck it, I'm playing Riley Cooper this week. Picked up Case Keenum, too, but I have Brees...