JTMacc99

He's suspended for the first two games of the year. I'm thinking he's unsigned until some team REALLY needs a QB, like if somebody loses a starter very early into the season, Jimmy G will get a call.

As you know, I have no love for the Ravens. But I do think that Henry running for them would be fun to watch. It's not like that move is suddenly going to make them a team that will win playoff games. So I'm okay with it for entertainment purposes only. Lock's big problem is that he makes seriously dangerous throws way too often. I would imagine that Lock, especially if he has to play significant time for the Giants this year, will get the same "THOU SHALT NOT TURN THE BALL OVER" beating that Daboll gave Jones in 2022. Would that increase Lock's completion percentage and lower the number of what PFF calls "big time throws"? Probably. Would it make him a good quarterback? Probably not. But it might make him an acceptable one, which is kind of all you need your backup QB to be.

I'm cool with the direction the Giants went this year. They did exactly what I thought they should do, and that was add a legitimate starting guard and a slightly older veteran lineman who could play tackle if necessary. They stayed true to positional value and let somebody pay A LOT for Barkley and unfortunately starting safety McKinney. But $30M for a RB and a S is not good allocation of resources. Especially when you gave up eighty-million sacks last year and could send some money towards that problem. And then they essentially took the same compensation (R2 and R5 picks) they got from Seattle for Leonard Williams, and exchanged that for a young and very talented Edge rusher. Didn't see that one coming, but it makes a lot of sense. I assume they'll free up a little more money when Waller decides if he wants to take the pay cut the Giants obviously asked him to take or retire. They'll likely turn that around and spend it on some DB help.

I actually think that's a fun signing. All of the teams in that division have to think they have a shot at winning the division, so they all need to make moves. Ravens adding that guy to an already difficult to deal with running attack. Steelers taking a crack with a legitimate starting NFL QB. Browns doing Browns things. And Cincinnati pretty much thinking, "we get Burrow back, and we'll be fine."

I thought about it for a bit, and I'm over it. The report says there are around $3M of incentives per year over the $12.5M per year of salary. Saquon has a lot of confidence in his ability. Unfortunately for him, he's writing checks his durability can't cash.

The Bills this week: And then when you thought they were done....

Taking the medical talk to the dedicated health and wellness forum was a decision made more than two years ago. It applied first to Chit Chat and then over here to Pet Peeves. The new moderating team, in my opinion, should continue to enforce that decision. Here's the thing: When people got going in these topics about something that was health related, EVERYBODY chimed in with their own problems. Every single time, it would turn into two pages of "Your rash reminds me of my cousin's ear infection issue" to "I took vitamin Q when I had a toenail infection" to "Don't get me started on vitamins..." When somebody would post "My sister in law had her spleen stapled to her pancreas during a routine colonoscopy, and then when she got Covid, she died." in Chit Chat, normal people who showed up to say something about the cute hat they just bought are like "Damn. I guess my hat story doesn't rate."

At least the 2007 team was getting its act together at the end of that year. They did give up 38 points to the Patriots in the last game of the regular season, but Spagnolo got them all rowing in the same direction once the playoffs started. Then they were terrific in 2008, and the team in general was the best one under Coughlin right up until Plaxico shot himself. Spagnolo left after 2008, and I think we can see that they never really replaced what he brought to the table. Right? And yet he'll probably go to the HoF as a uniquely awesome special teams player. I heard one ex teammate on the radio yesterday say that when he got to the Patriots, he couldn't believe that other teams were TRIPLE teaming Slater on their return team units. Like, that was crazy. LOL

Look how good the Steelers were during that run! And then because us Giants fans are aware of this, but others are not, here's the garbage that my team churned out on defense for that same period:

Okay, curiosity got the best of me, so I looked at Brady's 21 seasons (not counting rookie year and 2008 when he didn't play.) His AVERAGE defense in 21 years was 7th in the NFL for points allowed. Only four times in his entire career did he play for a team that was ranked outside of the top 10 for points allowed: 2002 - 17th 2005 - 17th 2011 - 15th 2022 - 13th For comparison, Peyton had 8 of 17 years with a top ten ranked defense. Eil had a total of 2 of 14. He had only 4 seasons in his entire career with a defense that finished better than Brady's two worst ranked (17th) seasons. 2005 - 14th 2008 - 5th 2012 - 12th 2016 - 2nd Here's how Brady's teams finished ranked for points allowed:

Yeah, but Peyton played 13 seasons in Indianapolis with really on 4 of them with a good defense. Two of his four Denver seasons had good defenses. Over his 17 seasons, his defenses averaged around 15th in the league (both points and yards). 16th overall with the Colts and around 9th during the fours Denver seasons. I imagine that if I did this exercise for Marino, it would probably look similar. I did, however, do the exercise for the Giants and Steelers from 2005-2018. As was no surprise to me, Eli got a grand total of TWO seasons with a top ten defense, 2008 and 2016. His average defense ranked 19th in NFL during his 14 full seasons. (So anybody who says that Eli rode his defenses to his successes needs to stop expressing opinions that are not at all supported by facts.) Ben during that same 14 year period had an average defense of 8th overall. I'm not going to do Brady, but he's probably the only QB who got better defenses than this. In the 8 years from 2005-2012, the Steelers were a top five (mostly top two) defense 6 times. Their average defensive ranking was 4th in the NFL.

The Packers had the short run winning 5 of 7 from 1961-1967, and the Niners won 5 of 14 from 1981-1994 and just like Patriots, were a great team for most of that run. But yeah, the Patriots with their 6 wins and the LONG period of being excellent stands out as the most impressive run by a team in the NFL. However that run doesn't stand up the runs that the Yankees (twice) and the Canadiens made in their sports with regard to gathering championships. Having said that, neither of those sports had the competitive balance rules that the Patriots had to deal with, which does make their run more unlikely. The Yankees won 7 of 9 championships from 1936-1943. Then they won 9 of 14 from 1949-1962. The Montreal Canadiens had a few runs, but the big one was winning 10 of 15 from 1965-1979. I'm sure there is a basketball one as well, but I don't care about the NBA.

Baseball is such an interesting sport. In almost every other sport, if you told me that we can implement technology so that something could always be called correctly, I would be like "Let's make that happen immediately." Like this technology being used for tennis is wonderful. The damn ball was or wasn't in play. Period. Vast majority of bad calls and temper tantrums removed. But with baseball, I find myself wondering what Greg Maddux's career would have been like if he couldn't expand the strike zone. And then on the other hand, I think what it'll be like for Aaron Judge to be given a fair strike zone 100% of the time. It's like part of baseball's appeal is getting away with cheating, or at the very least, there is emotion attached to the game because umpires might get things wrong.

I do understand that saying stuff like this is 100% what we do as sports fans. I enjoy comparing one guy or one team or one era to another as much (if not more than) anybody. So I'll happily stick my nose into this conversation. With his third Super Bowl ring by the age of 28, it is totally fair to include Mahomes in any conversation about where he belongs in the greatest QB list. Tom Brady does NOT need anybody defending him just because a couple people are thinking that what Mahomes has accomplished so far is more impressive than what Brady had done by the similar point in his career. FWIW, Mahomes has absolutely been the best QB through his first 7 seasons compared to anybody. Three rings. He's also managed to win two of those rings carrying a team with flaws. Last year the Chiefs were 16th in scoring defense (lots of young players.) This year they were 17th in scoring offense (god-awful WRs.) Brady, for example, NEVER had a team outside of the top 10 in anything. There are only what, like 4 other guys who have 3 rings? It's a big deal. But it's only 7 years so far for Mahomes. He needs to put another 7 in the books before it's even close to fair to compare his body of work to the other guys on the all time list. Singling out the loss to Tampa in that Super Bowl is just somebody trying to take a single data point and use it as a way to "prove" something. Brady himself just the other day said something along the lines of "Patrick ran for like 500 yards in that game, from sideline to sideline." Acknowledging that the Bucs had a hell of a pass rush, and also that the Chiefs OL was at that point using the NY Giants technique of "Anybody who has a jersey with a sixty or seventy number on it needs to report to the OL coach for duty this week." Brady also had his worst Super Bowls when teams got pressure, especially up the middle, on him. Doesn't matter how great you are when you're running for your life more often than not.

I don't remember a SINGLE instance of somebody writing something mean about another guy in a bathroom stall, ever. It's mostly these things: Important wisdom to pass along about pooping/farting. Dick drawings in each person's signature style. [Band name], frequently in that band's preferred way of writing their name. In different handwriting - SUCKS In either the first person's handwriting or a third person's handwriting YOU SUCK [possible insult tacked on. Drawings such as this: That's pretty much it.