On our mind after most of the action in week 14 is the deserved firing of Jeff Fisher from the Los Angeles Rams, the horror performance by Russell Wilson which dragged down the Seattle Seahawks with him, and the non-story revolving the Dallas Cowboys and Dak Prescott, who is no way at risk of losing his starting quarterback job because of one bad outing and only his second loss as a rookie.
Los Angeles Rams: Ding, Dong, Jeff Fisher’s Gone
What more can be said about Fisher? The numbers speak for themselves. You want historical or current? We can combine it. They’re historically bad this season, averaging only 14.9 points per game. Their quarterbacks have thrown more interceptions than touchdowns. Fisher himself fell to 4-9, which means he could have wished for a 7-9 finish, which was his best since joining the Rams in 2012, going 31-45, never finishing better than 3rd in the NFC West.
Maybe Fisher had some bad luck with Sam Bradford’s injuries, but this season suggests he wouldn’t have saved the Rams anyway. It’s a team that kept building slowly to fix certain problems: Offensive line, defense, running back. But this year besides not having a competent quarterback, the offensive line fell apart, and all they invested in wide receivers didn’t pay off. Fisher hasn’t had a winning season since 2008. He’s been to the playoffs only six times since 1994. This was probably his last job as a head coach, while the Rams finally show ambition to be more than mediocre.
Seattle Seahawks: Russell Wilson Freezes in the Cold
The Seahawks lost back to back road games after everyone thought that with a healthy Wilson and the best defense in the league, they were the best in the NFC. They’re only 2-4-1 on the road this season, and they’ll probably need to win two games away from home to make it to the Super Bowl for a third time in four years. As magical as Wilson is and as unbreakable as his defense may be, playing behind such a bad offensive line without Marshawn Lynch to divert attention could be too much for this team.
As for Wilson, he’ll have to bounce back from throwing five interceptions in Green Bay, suffering the worst loss of his career in his worst performance. He actually had worse passer ratings before, including in the loss at Tampa, but Wilson has never looked so helpless, and so unable to cope with the conditions around him. Didn’t he play college ball in Wisconsin? Despite their defense, the Seahawks need Wilson to be MVP-like in order to go all the way, and the last few weeks suggest it’s not something worth putting your entire faith in.
Dallas Cowboys: Dak Prescott is Safe
So Prescott had a bad game, throwing two interceptions, his first multi-interception game, in the 10-7 loss to the Giants. If it wasn’t for Dez Bryant dropping the ball, we could be writing a very different script this Monday. He has only four thrown interceptions this season. He had no interceptions thrown in the previous five games. It was only the third time this season he finished with a passer rating under 100. The Cowboys needed to take some risks, but played like this was Prescott’s first or second game in the NFL, not his 13th.
Tony Romo is still going to wait. Jerry Jones shouldn’t have made comments about him. He’s not going to change his quarterbacks now, not even if the Cowboys lose again next week. While Prescott has shown pressure is something he can play through and with, I don’t believe his GM’s words didn’t have any effect. But the Cowboys shouldn’t change because of their loss in New York, a game that could have gone either way. Only fix subtle things, including Jason Garrett’s decision making, which has always been here or there in crunch time.
0 comments:
Post a Comment