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| Tuesday, October 6, 2020 |
| The NFL must have gotten word that we revamped the Pick Six newsletter on Monday because that's the only way to explain how the first day of the revamped newsletter also happened to be one of the craziest Mondays in recent NFL history. |
| Ladies and gentlemen, it is I, John Breech, and I'm back here for a second day. I think I once read somewhere that if you don't quit your job after the first day, then you're probably going to stick around for awhile, so you guys are now stuck with me. |
| As for that crazy day I just mentioned, not only did we get a rare midseason Monday double-header, but we also got our first firing of the season. If Houston had a problem, they don't anymore, because they just canned Bill O'Brien. |
| Although you see coaches get fired during the season almost every year, it almost never happens this early. O'Brien's firing marks the first time in five years that a coach was canned before Week 5. The last coach to lose his job this early was Joe Philbin, who, God bless him, got fired by the Dolphins after losing a Week 4 game in London. That's why you should never go to London. |
| O'Brien becomes the fifth coach over the past 30 years to get fired before Week 5, joining Philbin, Dennis Allen (Raiders), Scott Linehan (Rams) and Lane Kiffin (Raiders). We'll talk more about O'Brien's firing below. |
| Anyway, we've got a full newsletter for you today, so let's get to the rundown. |
| 1. Today's Show: Patriots-Chiefs recap |
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| The only thing better than one Monday night game is two Monday night games and that's exactly what we got last night. Although it was a fun night for football fans, I'm guessing it wasn't a fun night for Brian Hoyer, who probably sat as far away as possible from Bill Belichick on the flight home from Kansas City. |
| Hoyer's disastrous performance was one of the main talking points in our podcast from late Monday night where we recapped both games and you can listen to that by clicking here. With Cam Newton out due to the pandemic, the Patriots chose to start Hoyer because he's a veteran who "knows the system." Now, I'm not sure what system he knows, but I don't think it's New England's. |
| During the Patriots' 26-10 loss , New England drove down inside of Kansas City's 10-yard line two different times in the first three quarters, but came away with ZERO points on those drives due to embarrassing mistakes from Hoyer. The first mistake came with eight seconds left in the first half. With no timeouts, the Patriots had time to throw one pass into the end zone, and if that failed, they could kick a field goal. However, they came away with zero points because Hoyer ended up doing the one thing a quarterback can't do in that situation: He took a sack. To add insult to injury, after the sack, he immediately got up and tried to call a timeout, which didn't work, because you don't get four timeouts in a half. |
| Hoyer also lost a fumble in the third quarter after driving the Patriots down to Kansas City's 10-yard line. You know what, now that I'm thinking about this some more, for his sake, I hope Hoyer was on completely different flight than Belichick. I might have even just rented a car. |
| Although the Patriots lost by 16 points, it was arguably a moral victory. Not only did they keep Patrick Mahomes mostly in check, but they kept this game close despite having the deck stacked against them: They had to play on the road in a pandemic, without their starting quarterback who contracted COVID-19, and they had to do all that on a Monday where their three-and-a-half-hour flight didn't land in Kansas City until 11:30 a.m. CT, which was just six and a half hours before kickoff. |
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| 2. Today's show Part II: Falcons-Packers recap |
| This part of the podcast wasn't so much a recap as it was us trying to figure when Dan Quinn is going to get fired. In the least surprising outcome of Week 4, the winless Falcons lost another game. If there's one silver lining for Quinn following his team's 30-16 loss on Monday, it's that they didn't blow another double-digit lead. I'm not sure what it says about your franchise that losing by 14 points is a good thing because it means you didn't blow a gigantic fourth quarter lead, but what I can I say, this is the Falcons we're talking about. |
| At 0-4, the Falcons now have six weeks until their bye, and the big question is whether or not Quinn will survive that long. We debated this topic on the podcast and it seems we don't see eye to eye on what it's going to take for Quinn to save his job. |
| Of course, we also talked about the Packers, because how could we not? The Aaron Rodgers scorched earth tour is now four weeks old and I'm not sure how much earth there is left to scorch, because the man has been on fire. Rodgers threw for 327 yards and four touchdowns, including three to some guy named Robert Tonyan (If you played against Tonyan in fantasy this week, I would like to send my sincerest condolences). |
| For our full recap of the game, be sure to head over to the podcast by clicking here. If you're more of a written word person, you can also check out our grades for all four teams that played on Monday by clicking here. |
| 3. Texans fire Bill O'Brien |
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| In a move that was simultaneously both surprising and not surprising, which I guess makes it the Schrodinger's cat of NFL moves, the Texans pulled off the first firing of the season on Monday when they dumped Bill O'Brien. |
| The reason the move was surprising is because we're not even five weeks into the season. Not only was O'Brien just promoted to general manager back in January, but he's also made the playoffs in each of the past two years, which made it seem like the Texans would likely stick with him through at least one bad season. |
| On the other hand, this move wasn't surprising at all because O'Brien absolutely torpedoed the roster by making bad move after bad move. I'm sure we all remember the DeAndre Hopkins trade or the time that O'Brien gave two first-round picks and a second-round pick to the Dolphins for Laremy Tunsil and Kenny Stills. The scary thing for the Texans is that if they earn a top-five pick this year, they don't even get to use it, because the Dolphins have their first TWO picks in the 2021 draft. |
| When news of O'Brien's firing broke, Pick Six host Will Brinson was busy writing a story on about why O'Brien should be on the hot seat. Before Brinson could even finish, O'Brien had been canned, which means Brinson had to do a total rewrite. The good news for us that no one does a total rewrite quite like Will Brinson and that's why you should click here to read his breakdown of everything that went into O'Brien's firing. |
| When a coach gets fired, the Pick Six Super Friends get together for an emergency podcast and that's exactly what we did on Monday. One of the topics we covered was who should replace O'Brien now that he's out and we came up with a few suggestions: |
| Josh McDaniels: Right now, McDaniels feels like the obvious choice, if only because of the ties between him and new Texans "general manager" Jack Easterby (He's not actually the general manager, but he's the one with the decision-making powers right now). Easterby spent six seasons in New England (2013-18) and it's not too crazy to think that he'd like to create a Texas version of the Patriots organization. Easterby has already tried unsuccessfully to steal one person from the Patriots' front office (Nick Caserio), and now that he's in charge, it's possible he'll be able to convince Caserio and McDaniels to both make a move as part of a packaged deal. Eric Bieniemy: There's no one in the NFL that deserves a head coaching job right now more than Bieniemy. The problem for Bieniemy is that he's been so good that it's actually hurt him. With the Chiefs playing so deep into the season every year, impatient teams haven't been willing to wait to hire him. If I'm Bieniemy, I'm not so sure the Texans job is one I'd be interested in and that's because it's not going to be an easy rebuild in Houston. Not only is their salary cap situation a mess, but they don't have their first two picks in the draft this year. Their roster also needs to be rebuilt, which won't be easy due to that whole salary cap thing I just mentioned. If Bieniemy thinks he can make things work with Deshaun Watson, then he should make the move, but the problem with going to a team that has so many problems is that NFL owners aren't very patient and if Bieniemy struggles early, he could be let go before he has time to turn things around. Greg Roman: The Ravens offensive coordinator has proved time and again that he has one of the most creative minds in the NFL. Back in 2017, Roman had to create an offense for Lamar Jackson on the fly after the team decided to bench Joe Flacco and that's exactly what he did. Since then, Jackson has been thriving in Roman's system. Besides Jackson, Roman also designed an offense for Colin Kaepernick, who led the 49ers to the Super Bowl running that offense in 2012. Roman seems like he'd be a good fit for Watson, but I'll say the same thing with him that I said with Bieniemy: This isn't a slam dunk job and whoever takes it is going to have a difficult rebuild in front of them, but the upside is that they will have Deshaun Watson. |
| To listen to our entire emergency podcast on the firing of Bill O'Brien, be sure to click here. |
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| 4. Pete Prisco unveils his Week 5 power rankings |
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| The most surprising thing about Pete Prisco's Power Rankings this week is that he didn't move his darling Packers up to the top spot. After predicting during the preseason that the Packers would make the Super Bowl this year, it's pretty clear that Prisco has spent the past two months writing down the name of everyone on Twitter who doubted his prediction, because he is still peacocking around and rubbing it in that the Packers are actually good. DO NOT DOUBT PETE PRISCO. |
| I'm not going to spoil his power rankings here, but I am going to give you a few nuggets: |
| The Cleveland Browns made the biggest move by jumping up EIGHT spots, which means they're now in the top 10. I thought I'd see talking hamsters before I'd ever see Prisco put the Browns in his top 10, but here we are. There are six undefeated teams in the NFL right now and even though the Titans are one of those teams, they did not crack Pete's top six. I know we've all been wondering for years what Prisco would do if a team had to miss a week due to an outbreak of disease during a pandemic and now we know the answer: He's ranking them below the other undefeated teams. I have to say, I live in Nashville and I am personally insulted by this ranking, Pete. The NFC West is no longer Prisco's favorite division. When the season started, he had all four teams ranked in the top 12. Now he only has two NFC West teams in his top 15, with the Rams at No. 11 and Seahawks at No. 5. |
| If you want to know where your favorite team ended up in Prisco's Week 5 Power Rankings, be sure to click here. If you want to argue with Prisco over his rankings, you can do that on Twitter by clicking here. |
5. Breech's Week 5 NFL Picks
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| If it's Tuesday, that means it's time for my weekly picks. First, I'd like everyone to know that my new strategy for the rest of the season is going to be to pick against any NFC East team any time they play. I don't care if it's two NFC East teams playing each other, I'm picking them both to lose. The division has been total garbage this year and I'm not letting them take me down with them, even though I kind of already did since the Cowboys were my preseason pick to get to the Super Bowl (Yikes). |
| For my Week 5 picks, I'm going to share with you my biggest upset and my "Lock of the Week." The "Lock of the Week" got off to a hot start this season, but then it blew up in my face because I picked an NFC East team to win (Cowboys over Browns). Did I mention that I hate the NFC East? |
| Despite that setback, the lock is still 5-1 straight-up and 5-1 against the spread this year. This week, my lock is the Saints over the Chargers. The Saints have somehow not lost an October game since October 2016. Since then, they've won 13 straight games in October, which is absurd. I am never picking against the Saints in October. |
| My biggest upset of the week is Dolphins over 49ers. Look, I know we like to pile on the Dolphins, but if I've noticed one thing about them this year, it's that they're just good enough to stay competitive with good teams (They LED the Bills in the fourth quarter in Week 2. They were only down two points to the Seahawks in the fourth quarter on Sunday. They were only down three points to the Patriots during the fourth quarter of their Week 1 game in New England). You combine that with the fact that everyone on the 49ers roster is injured and you have the recipe for an upset. |
| To check out the rest of my picks for Week 5, including who I think will win the Colts-Browns and Bills-Titans games, be sure to click here. |
| 6. Rookie Power Rankings |
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| Pete Prisco isn't the only one who releases his power rankings on Tuesday. We also get a rookie power rankings from CBSSports.com NFL Draft writer Josh Edwards. If you're wondering who might be in the running to win rookie of the year, then Edwards' piece is a must-read for you. That being said, as the resident Bengals homer here at CBSSports.com, I will be boycotting everything Edwards writes for at least the next 48 hours and that's because he has JUSTIN HERBERT ahead of JOE BURROW in this week's rankings. |
| Although you probably aren't surprised to hear that two quarterbacks are at the top of the rankings, there are some things on the list that might surprise you. Here are a few nuggets: |
| There are three defensive players in the top 10. Although Chase Young is the highest at No. 6, it looks like he could have some competition for defensive rookie of they year from two defensive backs who are ranked just below him. There are as many offensive tackles in the top five as there are quarterbacks. There's an UNDRAFTED free agent in the top 10! (Spoiler alert: It's Jaguars running back James Robinson). |
| If you want to know who the top-15 rookies are heading into Week 5, be sure to click here so you can check out the entire list from Edwards. |
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| 7. The Kicker! |
| As the special teams guru on the Pick Six podcast, I figured this newsletter needed a special teams touch, so that's exactly what you'll be getting. As such, I'll be ending the newsletter each day with the "The Kicker," which will basically just be me picking out a special teams play or player that impressed me. |
| Since punters are people too, I thought I should recognize a punter this week and I'm recognizing him because he also happens to be the greatest passer in Ravens history. During Baltimore's 31-17 win over Washington on Sunday, the Ravens converted a fourth-and-9 when they ran a fake punt that involved punter Sam Kock completing a 15-yard pass. The most shocking thing about the conversion is that Koch is now 7-of-7 for 82 yards in his career. (You can see the play by clicking here.) |
| My favorite reaction to the play came from Lamar Jackson, who was asked about Koch's career numbers after the game. |
| "That's lit. I'm trying to get where he's at," Jackson said. |
| Imagine that, the reigning NFL MVP wanting to get where a punter's at. That's a victory for specialists everywhere. |
| Finally, I have some very important news. I'm only in charge of this newsletter four days per week -- Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday -- which means you'll be hearing from a new person tomorrow, which means you'll definitely want to click on this newsletter to see who the surprise writer is. As for me, I'll see you guys on Thursday, just in time for some more football. |
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