Game Day Thoughts

The Minnesota Vikings are on their bye week. It's a good thing as it gives Roger Goodell and the NFL some time to decide what to do with running back Adrian Peterson now that his legal situation is settle. And, it seems like the league's decision-makers are taking every bit of that time. Nice.

The Vikings aren't alone with a week 10 bye. The Houston Texans, Indianapolis Colts, New England Patriots, San Diego Chargers, and Washington Redskins all have the week off. The bye weeks run from week 4 to week 12. The league would do the teams a great favor if they concentrate the byes between weeks 6/7 and 12. Teams don't really get into a regular season groove until their third or fourth game. It's pointless to give them a week off so early. The league is supposedly all about promoting player safety. Giving teams a bye when they might actually need it would be a step in the safety direction.

Week 10 is a good time for a bye.

Today's games:

Morning:
Kansas City Chiefs at Buffalo Bills
Dallas Cowboys at Jacksonville Jaguars in London
San Francisco 49ers at New Orleans Saints
Atlanta Falcons at Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Tennessee Titans at Baltimore Ravens
Miami Dolphins at Detroit Lions
Pittsburgh Steelers at New York Jets

Afternoon:
New York Giants at Seattle Seahawks
Denver Broncos at Oakland Raiders
St. Louis Rams at Arizona Cardinals

Evening:
Chicago Bears at Green Bay Packers

It's always feels strange to watch a Sunday morning game that doesn't include the Vikings.

At first glance, the Chiefs-Bills and Dolphins-Lions games interest me the most but I'll probably watch the 49ers-Saints. I've got to stick to one game. Watching a little from a lot of games often means watching no games. I'm in the minority but I don't much care for the Redzone channels. It's not watching football games. It's watching highlights. Even if it's live action it's still just watching highlights.

I think that it's Rams-Cardinals in the afternoon. The Rams have been a beast when playing their NFC West foes. They could surprise the high-flying Cardinals.

Bears-Packers in the evening. I've said it many times and I'll say it again. I wish that the talking heads in the media would stop honking about the Bears-Packers being the oldest rivalry in the league history. It's not. The Bears and Cardinals started playing each other in 1920. The Packers joined the league in 1921.

A few thoughts:

A few years ago it looked like then Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Carson Palmer was all but retired. He was done with the Bengals and that pretty much meant that he was done with football. A trade to the Oakland Raiders brought him back to the game but his future was stilll pretty bleak. Oakland was a good place to kill a quarterback's career. A trade to the Cardinals, add Bruce Arians and Palmer's career is alive again. Last week he signed a three-year contract extension. The Cardinals have themselves a quarterback. Palmer has himself a football team.

Cincinnati Bengals running back Jeremy Hill followed up a great last Sunday with a decent amount of stupidity this week. After playing the Cleveland Browns on Thursday night, Hill said that the Browns are "worse than I thought." I'm not sure what Hill was thinking after his own team played "worse" than everyone expected. The Bengals lost to the Browns 24-3. And, it wasn't that close.

I really don't get the scheduling of some college football teams. #1 Mississippi St. won their ninth game of the season yesterday. Nine games into the season and the Bulldogs are playing Tennessee-Martin. I guess that Mississippi St. needed a breather before playing Alabama next week. #11 Mississippi also went the late-season cupcake route. They scheduled the tenth game of their season against Presbyterian. I know that there are often difficulties in filling out a schedule but this is a pretty sad way to stay in the playoff chase. Both Mississippi schools won those pseudo-bye week games.

It looked like Notre Dame and Arizona St. played three games in one. Arizona St. shot out to a 34-3 lead. Notre Dame managed to shave that lead to 34-31 midway through the 4th quarter. Then it fell apart to a 55-31 final score.

Struggling Texas A&M upset #3 Auburn thanks in large part to a couple of very, very ridiculous fumbles.

Speaking of ridiculous fumbles, Utah receiver Kaelin Clay had the most ridiculous, stupid fumble that I've ever seen. I'm really tired of seeing players, usually receivers, showboat their way to the endzone. It's not cool to look like you don't care. It's just stupid. Clay dropped the ball on about the 2-yard line as he was completing what should have been a 79-yard touchdown. No Oregon player was around him. It was a Utah touchdown but Clay nonchalants his way into stupidity. Utah should have had a 14-0 lead. Instead, Oregon picked up the loose ball that should not have been loose and returned it about 99 yards for a touchdown of their own. Instead of 14-0, it's 7-7. This was the most idiotic move that I have ever seen on a football field. I've seen too many stupid plays like this take a touchdown off of the board. I've never seen the dual treat of taking a touchdown off of the board and giving a touchdown to the opponent. Simply stunning.

"The only thing worse than playing fantasy football is living with someone playing fantasy football"
      -Joel McHale
McHale might want to be careful where he spouts this belief.