JTMacc99

The embracement of DeVito is predictable: Undrafted kid forced into starter role (Everybody loves an underdog story. Even me, who is underdog averse, likes this one.) Wins 3 of his first 4 starts (Winning is winning) Local kid with the whole, "Shouldn't be starting but has been thrust into the role, but wait! He still lives with his parents and eats his mom's cutlets for dinner." (Relatable) Italian American schtick, which is right up our alley. And when I say up OUR alley, I mean Northern New Jersey Giants fans such as myself who have Italian ancestors. Even if you're not of Italian heritage, you have a connection to it with the food and your friends. (Again, relatable) The TEAM, starting with Saquon, clearly likes him and is much more enjoyable to watch seeing them having fun. (Winning is fun) NOBODY in sports is more popular than the backup QB. Everybody loves that guy. And if that guy ends up going 3-1 in his first four starts (as opposed to let's say... Tim Boyle), well then, we have a lot of fans feeling justified in their love of anybody but Daniel Jones.

He is, unfortunately, exactly what he has looked like he is this year with Kansas City. I hope he's been saving his money from his rookie contract, because he's dangerously close to being released and then hanging around as a fringe player for other teams. He's got drops all throughout the season. He's missed games with injuries. And then he made that mistake last night. He has not looked like a reliable player so far in his career. He is sometimes electric and exciting to watch, but reliable? Not even a little bit.

I didn't mean to imply that I think Williams should be considered for MVP. I just wanted to point out that the 49ers are 0-3 when they go from having the best Left Tackle in football to just some guy, versus 9-0 when he is in the lineup. It is not a coincidence. He's like a front left tire on the car. It's not a car with just a great front left tire, but the car's performance is severely compromised when it's bald or flat. And Joe Thomas, poor Joe Thomas. The Browns traded their 2008 R1 pick to trade up in that same 2007 to pick Brady Quinn. If he had turned into a good QB, the Browns would have had a very different experience during Thomas's career. (QB > LT and pretty much every position.) Looking at the drafts from the several years after 2007, the Browns never really even had a shot at getting a good QB with their first round picks. Closest would have been when they traded their pick to the Jets who took Mark Sanchez. They also traded away a high R1 pick which was used to pick Julio Jones, which: Oof. But on the other hand, great WR and great OT still doesn't overcome trash QB.

I can boil it down to ONE player above all else. Trent Williams, 2022 1st team All Pro Left Tackle, got hurt in the Cleveland game and missed the next two games. 49ers record in games when Trent Williams played hurt or missed: 0-3 49ers record in games where Trent Williams was healthy: 9-0. Side note, 2022 2nd team All Pro Left Tackle Andrew Thomas got hurt on the first drive of the first game of 2023 (and if can make it so, this will be known from now on as the "Aaron Rodgers Special"). Giants record in games when Andrew Thomas played hurt, compromised, or missed: 2-7 Giants record in games when Andrew Thomas was healthy: 2-1 Shout out to the big men who can play Left Tackle at a high level in the NFL. They get PAID correctly, but we kind of forget to include them in the conversation about how damn important they are.

I feel like the Niners players REALLY want to win. They give off that kind of vibe. I think from a strategic standpoint, it would be the Eagles who benefit more from a win. It virtually guarantees the one seed, the opportunity to rest banged up players last week two, and the week off. But strategic reasons typically don’t motivate players.

Sam Esmail gives update on Peacock's Battlestar Galactica revival. I think it's important to give an update every 3-4 years.

Heh. Whenever anybody asks me what movie brings a tear to my eye, I always say Major League. And I'm a Yankees fan. And not only that, I'm very loud about not being a fan of rooting for underdogs. But when it comes to fictional Yankees and fictional underdogs, I'm all in for the Major League Cleveland Indians every time. My brother bought me a pair of tickets for a 20 game package to the Yankees in 1998. (AKA: Happy Birthday bro! Enjoy getting to drive me to 20 Yankees game this summer.) Having said that, he picked the absolute best year to do that.

I'm actually working on my proposal to send to Goodell about starting a permanent league matchmaking service. Me and my team of public relations professionals, relationship gurus, and astrological matchmaking experts will see to it that every NFL team has a minimum of 2 celebrity love interests at all times. We plan to set up Wink Martindale with Cher. We think that sparks would fly between Jake Elliott and Dua Lipa. We're pretty sure we can see to it that by the end of the 2024 season, no NFL game will go without at least 45-60 seconds of panning to a celebrity in a luxury box over the three hour broadcast. I'm thinking I could probably ask for a starting salary of at least $250K plus incentives.

Looks like we'll get new episodes on 12/08 and 12/15 and then repeats the following two Fridays. The 12/08 episode is described as follows from the ABC press release: (College football this week.)

With the help of guest celebrity advisors, Natasha Leggero and Ice-T, contestants must determine which products are real and which are a sham to advance to the "Snake Pit", for a chance to win life-changing money.

With the help of guest celebrity advisors, Bethenny Frankel and Jay Pharoah, contestants must determine which products are real and which are a sham to advance to the "Snake Pit", for a chance to win life-changing money.

Blumhouse CEO and founder Jason Blum joins as a guest shark.

Pretty much by definition, those are the men who are actively making propositions. A LOT of decent men, mid-30's and older, become perfectly content to be on their own. They're not against getting into a healthy relationship, but actively hunting for one takes a lot of emotional energy (for a good man). They'll often just be pretty damn happy going to work, engaging in whatever activities they enjoy, and that's it.

Yes, I got Peacock at that time last year for like $20 for the year. Greedy overlord here. (AKA: Financial Analyst who does the "Revenue > Expense math or we're all out of jobs" for a living.) TV is expensive to make. That $20 I paid for Peacock is a big money loser for NBC. The only way that makes sense for them is if a significant percentage of people who took the one year discount decide they like the service and keep it at the regular rate when the year is up. Peacock is more like a $20 per month than $20 per year product if that were the only way to get NBC shows.

The Giants beat the Ravens last year 24-20 with Jackson at QB. It is fair to say that the Giants coaching staff had plenty of experience with the Ravens, which went a long way. Llamar threw an atrocious interception with the Ravens leading 20-17 with three minutes to go, which was the big reason they lost that game.

Catching up on Top Chef stuff, so I'm a day late and a dollar short here, but I would imagine that if Michael Voltaggio is involved, Green Bean Casserole and Pot Roast are likely to be "Green Bean Casserole" and "Pot Roast" in name only. It's not really his style to serve anything remotely close to what you would find in the standard Betty Crocker cookbook from 1983.

In non-Swift news, this was a really interesting week. A lot of teams that were previously anointed "Could be the best team in the NFL" sure as heck didn't look like that. I think Detroit gets a bit of a pass from me, as playing Llamar Jackson and the Ravens is almost always really challenging for NFC teams. I think there's a really telling stat about it, where the Jackson led Ravens almost always beat NFC opponents. I don't think we can give a pass to the Bills, Dolphins, or 49ers. (Although Miami had a tough battle against the officials in their game.) All three of them backed up shaky games with a loss. Then there is Philadelphia who bounced back with a good win, and Kansas City practically clinching the AFC West before Halloween. Everybody else just sort of the the middle of the pack. It's like a battle for who can stay the healthiest and have things bounce their way. This quote below about the impact to the ratings for the Amazon game a couple weeks ago clearly demonstrates what you're saying. A third (32%) of the typical viewing audience is female. It's significant, and nobody who understands the business side of the NFL would ever discount that women are a huge part of the fan base.

For sure! It could have just as easily been a man who was only now aware of the Kansas City Chiefs. (But it does seem like this particular spike of interest in that specific NFL team is mostly young women.) We shared a fun video here back in the summer that was put out by the Titans as part of their schedule announcement on social media. They did the same thing with team logos to random people wandering around that main street in Nashville. It was both men and women who were unable to identify the team logos.

Exactly. If somebody said that, they did not understand that the NFL is BY FAR the biggest thing on TV However, the difference between 20 million viewers normally, and 27 million on a Swift attended Sunday night game is INSANE So maybe she helps it be more epic? No! The Swifties are not watching any other games, although the NFL is such a great sport that it's possible that if this goes on for a while, it might create a few more football fans. I saw a super fun reel on Instagram where it was "I ask my girlfriend to identify NFL Teams by their logo. The young woman got Patriots right, but the city very wrong. She called the Rams something like the swooshes, and go another one not even remotely close. Then they showed the Chiefs logo and she immediately said, "Oh, that's Taylor Swift's team, the Kansas City Chiefs. So I think that answers the question if they're interested in any other NFL games. And, no, when Swift heads off to South America next month, it is unlikely that any Chiefs games will have a significant bump in ratings. And all of that is why I've made peace with "When she is at the game, it would be criminal negligence not to put her on TV." I seriously can't dedicate even 0.0001% of a feeling to be annoyed that TV coverage of a three hour football game spends at most three or four minutes showing the extraordinarily popular pop star a few times.