Does anyone believe we can win @IND? Colts already have 3 conference losses, so we'll own the tie breaker if we beat them.
This Bengals game is suddenly huge. Win and you're 6-5 with wins over Buffalo, Cleveland and Cincinnati with Colts and Ravens left on your schedule.
Tiebreaker is head to head, then division record, then record vs common opponents. The Colts have the inside edge there.
Okay, conference isn't ahead of common opponents... damn that PIT game really hurts. A win @IND would put us tied H2H and divisionally. We need to beat CIN (Colts already did) and possibly BAL, fortunately those are home games. We need Indy to lose to DAL.
I said Mallet let Cleveland know "they would have to guard the entire field" which isn't just going deep, it's covering sideline to sideline as well. He was making throws that Fitzpatrick can't make and with Fitzpatrick at quarterback the offense place in a isolated box. But your response pretty much said the offense was better because of Mallet. And I do believe a healthy Foster would have ran for over 200 yards. Blue was great yesterday but he left yards on the field (I'm not complaining though). Foster more than likely would have broke a couple of long ones like he's known to do.
Colts still have Jacksonville, Tennessee, and Washington. That's 3 wins guaranteed. They only need to win 1 more out of us, Cleveland, Dallas and we'll have to go 5-1. It's an incredible longshot that we can overtake them.
I don't know if our Swiss cheese secondary can lock up Andrew luck, but I have a little less doubts about a win after seeing A taste of what Mallet could do.
Yeah, that's why it's unlikely IMO. We haven't shown an ability to stop TY Hilton. If we can figure that out then we've got a shot.
Our only hope is to play ball-control with the running game and keep Luck on the sideline. NE had a rookie who barely made the team run the ball all over them last night. But we've never won in Indy and, until we do, I will always pick against us when playing there.
We're going to need Clowney to bring his A game against Indy. Him and Watt will be our best defense against Hilton.
I think people need to let Clowney go a little bit. This idea that 11 weeks into his rookie season, he's going to make a sizeable difference, is silly. What they need is for Cushing to be healthy. He's the key. Not a, as of right now, overhyped bust of a draft pick. (I'm not closing the book on Clowney by any means - but this idea that if he just plays at a level near Watt's... give me a break. He's a rookie who's missed significant time dating back to August. That ship - if it hasn't sailed - is pulling away from the dock, in terms of being an impact player this year.)
Luck is the best young quarterback in the NFL.... but he makes mistakes by pressing. We need to take advantage of turnover opportunities and not turn the ball over on our end.
I actually think his overall command of the offense, and his ability to get the team to the line quickly... along with making reads/adjusting formations and blocking schemes at the line/audibilizing from pass to run... is what impressed me the most. Most QB's that make it to the NFL can do so with arm strength or accuracy (or in perfect cases, "both")... but if they can't do the above stuff I just mentioned, they don't make it (meanwhile, there have been several QB's who don't have much of an arm and have only decent accuracy... but can beat teams at the line better than anybody, and thus they end up carving out long careers). I think everybody is still used to the Kubiak "super QB" friendly offense, where everything was dumbed down (no big adjustments at the line), and basically the offense only works if everything is clicking (line protection, line cohesiveness to sell the play actions, zone blocking for running, and sharp/accurate throws). This offense requires so much more on adjustments at the line, hurry-up components to keep the defensive personnel from switching out... you need a QB with total grasp of the offense along with the ability to read defenses, in addition to a guy who can simply make throws. Is Mallett the long term answer? Its still highly doubtful... but any QB they get needs to be capable of doing things prior to the play similar to what he did (and is part of the reason why this regime will not be gaga over simple peripherals like arm strength or 40 speed when they look to who their QB is going to be).
Good game. The ground game really wore them down and broke their spirit towards the end. Defense played well, even though Hoyer was off most of the day. Watt. Dude is just ridiculous. Mallett did a pretty good job. He was definitely confident and managed the offense and flow well. Obviously he has a big arm, which is something we haven't seen in a long time, so it was a change of pace. His accuracy was/is still a bit inconsistent. There were some close calls in terms of ints they could have had. You're my boy Blue!. Great game. He reminds me a little of eddie george. Big, strong and patient runner that finds the holes and manages to get those extra yards, even on seemingly stopped runs.
