32. New York Giants
(2-10. Last week: 31)
Giants head coach Pat Shurmur has now presided over exactly as many games as his predecessor, Ben McAdoo. McAdoo coached 28 games before he was dismissed three quarters through the 2017 season, and put together a 14-18 record in that time. Shurmur has a 7-21 mark. Shurmur’s Giants haven’t won since Week 4 against the Redskins, and there isn’t one positive aspect of this team that stands out. After Big Blue’s 31-13 loss to the Packers on Sunday, cornerback Janoris Jenkins criticized his own coaching staff, saying that he should be shadowing opponents’ top receivers. Jenkins didn’t do so against Davante Adams, who ripped New York’s secondary for two touchdowns on six receptions. He didn’t do so against Allen Lazard, who gained 103 yards and scored a touchdown on three catches, showing serious issues in defensive coordinator James Bettcher’s ideas about quarters coverage. Jenkins has a point, in that he is by far his team’s most effective cornerback, but he’s also hamstrung by a lack of talent around him — which seems to be the story regarding any Giants player who’s shown anything this season.
31. Cincinnati Bengals
(1-11. Last week: 32)
The Bengals were finally able to break a winless streak that went back to Week 16 of the 2018 season with a 22-6 victory over an inconsistent Jets team. Cincinnati was buttressed by the return of quarterback Andy Dalton, who had been benched in favor of Ryan Finley earlier in the season. Dalton completed 22 of 37 passes for 243 yards and his 198th career touchdown pass, which broke Ken Anderson’s franchise record. He also broke Anderson’s franchise record for completions at 2,669.
So, it was a big day in several respects. Dalton, Cincinnati’s second-round pick in 2011, has started 129 games for the Bengals, but probably doesn’t have much of a future with the team. He would represent a $17.7 million cap hit in 2020 in the final year of the six-year, $96 million contract extension he signed in 2014, and there’s no dead money if he’s cut. Finley may not be the future either — the Bengals are positioned for the first overall pick, and there are several interesting quarterbacks from the college ranks ready to avail themselves to the 2020 draft.
30. Denver Broncos
(4-8. Last week: 28)
Last week in a 20-3 beatdown at the hands of the Bills, quarterback Brandon Allen completed just 10 of 25 passes for 82 yards and an interception, receiver Courtland Sutton caught just one pass on eight targets, and the Broncos finished the game with five straight three-and-out drives totaling 7, minus-3, minus-9, 7 and zero yards. With nothing left to lose, Denver turned to rookie quarterback Drew Lock, whom head coach Vic Fangio has been saying through most of the season simply wasn’t ready. Perhaps the specter of another offensive embarrassment against the Chargers forced Fangio’s hand, but it worked out pretty well. In Denver’s 23-20 win, Lock appeared to be the big guy with the big arm John Elway wants above all else, completing 18 of 28 passes for 134 yards, two touchdowns, one interception, and two completions of 20 or more air yards. Not amazing numbers, but Lock’s mobility and velocity did bring a spark to Denver’s passing game we haven’t seen in a very long time. Fangio and his staff should accept that there will be lumps with a talented but underdeveloped quarterback, and take those lumps in an otherwise lost season.
29. Washington Redskins
(3-9. Last week: 29)
Washington’s 29-21 win over the Panthers on Sunday was a validation of interim coach Bill Callahan’s rushing fundamentalism, as Adrian Peterson and Derrius Guice combined for 228 yards and three touchdowns on just 23 carries. Meanwhile, a Redskins defense that has been under the weather for most of the season held Christian McCaffrey to just 44 rushing yards, put up enough decent coverage to limit Carolina quarterback Kyle Allen to 27 completions on 46 attempts for 278 yards, and sacked Allen for a 23-yard loss on the Panthers’ final play of the game. Add a decent performance by quarterback Dwayne Haskins, and this game went about as well as any has for this franchise all season. Callahan’s team travels to Green Bay for an entirely different challenge next Sunday.
28. Atlanta Falcons
(3-9. Last week: 26)
Forget about Atlanta’s defensive regression after two surprisingly strong games against the Saints and Panthers earlier this month — at this point, the primary concern for the Falcons has to be the ability of quarterback Matt Ryan to survive the rest of the season. Against the Saints in a 26-18 loss on Thanksgiving, Ryan was pressured on 29 of his 62 dropbacks. He was sacked nine times and suffered 13 quarterback hits. He’s been sacked 15 times over his past two games, leads the league with 38 sacks on the season, and is on pace to eclipse his career-high of 44 in 2013. Most of the problem is a questionable offensive line to be sure, and it didn’t help that he was without Julio Jones and Austin Hooper, but it also can be said that Ryan doesn’t currently possess the athleticism he’s shown in the past — more often than not last Thursday, he was a sitting duck for Cameron Jordan and the rest of New Orleans’ pass-rushers. Head coach Dan Quinn has said that his team will compete through the end of what has become a lost season, but one wonders how wise it is for Quinn to allow his quarterback to keep getting decked this frequently.
27. Miami Dolphins
(3-9. Last week: 30)
The play was called “Mountaineer Shot,” and it led to the season’s most amazing touchdown. Named that because center Daniel Kilgore went to Appalachian State, it was a weird fake field goal that resulted in a touchdown pass from punter/holder Matt Haack to kicker Jason Sanders.
RT if we had you fooled đđ #FinsUp pic.twitter.com/RH59wpft4r
— Miami Dolphins (@MiamiDolphins) December 1, 2019
It was also one of several embarrassments suffered by the Eagles in their 37-31 loss to Miami, who have proven unexpectedly resilient this season with three wins in their past five games — when many observers thought they were tanking for the first overall draft pick.
Head coach Brian Flores has always repudiated that notion, and he has been proven correct.
âItâs a team of fighters,” Flores said after Sunday’s game. “This is — we compete. I think thatâs something that we talk about day after day after day. Weâre going to compete. Weâre going to fight. Weâre going to give great effort. Weâre going to try to be a tough, smart, disciplined football team. Thatâs what you need if youâre going to come back — really, if you want to play in this league at a good level against good competition like we had out there today, thatâs what you need.â
The Dolphins have a lot of work to do over the next few seasons before they can become truly competitive on a week-to-week level, but you get the feeling they have the right head coach.
26. Detroit Lions
(3-8-1. Last week: 27)
The Lions kept their streak this season of holding a lead in every game when they went up 17-7 against the Bears on Thanksgiving, led by quarterback David Blough and his electric start to the game. Blough’s first NFL completion was this 75-yard touchdown pass to wide receiver Kenny Golladay.
.@david_blough10 with a SHOT to @kgxix âźď¸ pic.twitter.com/9iwOBRBiPy
— Detroit Lions (@Lions) November 28, 2019
Blough also connected with receiver Marvin Jones on an 8-yard touchdown in the first quarter, making him the fourth quarterback to throw for at least 130 yards and two touchdowns in the first quarter of a game this season. The other guys? Patrick Mahomes, Lamar Jackson and Aaron Rodgers. So, that went well.
Sadly for the Lions, Matt Patricia’s defense had to take the field as well, and that defense (supposedly Patricia’s calling card) allowed Mitchell Trubisky to make “special throws at special times,” as Bears head coach Matt Nagy put it. Trubisky completed 29 of 38 passes for 338 yards, three touchdowns and one interception in what was his second-most efficient game of the season. Trubisky’s most efficient game of this season came on Nov. 10, when he completed 16 of 23 passes for 173 yards, three touchdowns and no interceptions. Guess which defense he did that against? Yep, Detroit. In 2019, in fact, Trubisky has six touchdown passes against the Lions, and seven against the rest of the NFL. Meanwhile, Detroit’s offense is making things work with relative afterthoughts such as Blough and running back Bo Scarbrough. Maybe it’s time to make offensive coordinator Darrell Bevell the interim head coach, and throw a different defensive mind in the soup.
25. New York Jets
(4-8. Last week: 20)
The Jets came into Sunday’s game against the winless Bengals with a three-game winning streak in which they scored 34 points each time. So, this was going to be a laugher, right? Yes, but not in the way Adam Gase’s team intended. By losing 22-6, the Jets became the first team in NFL history to lose two games in the same season to teams that were 0-7 or worse (they also lost to the 0-7 Dolphins), and there was very little resemblance to the team that had shown fire in recent weeks. Incredibly, Gase’s offense didn’t have a single red-zone possession — Sam Darnold got to the Bengals’ 21-yard line at the end of one drive, but that was the end of it. Not a good look against one of the NFL’s worst defenses. The Jets punted six times, gave up a safety, and their last two possessions ended on downs. Darnold was unable to throw a touchdown pass on 48 attempts, and a defense that was supposed to be on an upswing made returning starter Andy Dalton look entirely credible. Were the Jets a better or more consistent team, this would be a “burn the tape” game as opposed to a fair representation of a below-average team at its worst.