Um, ah, well. . .
Welcome back, Lucy and football. Paging Mister Brown. Mister Charlie Brown.
It’s uncanny, isn’t it? In some very deep and existential way, the Cincinnati Bengals exist to torture you. Somewhere in the cosmos, there is an alien, pulling strings. Fool you once, shame on you. Fool you. . . several thousand times?
That said, it’s gonna be OK. Good teams who play poorly can lose to bad teams playing very well. Fact of NFL life. The Men are the same team today that they were a week ago at this time. Verge Season is better than on schedule. It’s ahead of schedule. The Bengals simply took the Jets a little too for granted. A 4th-year guy making his 1st career start played out of his mind. It happens.
Now, if they lose to the Brownies. . .
Without further ado. . .
TEN THINGS ABOUT JETS 34, MEN 31:
1. 511 YARDS. Five-hundred, eleven yards. The Fighting Mike Whites had every answer to Lou Anarumo’s questions. How else to explain 37-of-45 and starting the game with 11 bulls-eyes in a row? Jets game plan? Keep the passes short and simple and aimed at a few of Cincinnati’s linebackers, who still aren’t good in coverage. The Browns watch video, too.
2. NO PRESSURE. The Bengals played passively on defense. Essentially, they didn’t give White much to worry about. Verrrry few blitzes. Strange way to attack a guy with White’s resume.
3. And the tackling flat-out sucked. Tackling is a little like rebounding. Effort matters most. Technique matters, but not as much as hustling to the right spots and putting the hammer down. Good tackling indicates want-to. Bad tackling?
4. IN A WEIRD WAY, the L showed how versatile the Bengals are, on offense. Boyd-to-Mixon for 46 yards. CJ Uzomah, go-to guy on 3rd-and-long. That said. . .
5. The pass protection too often breaks down in crucial situations. See: 3rd-and-11 on Bengals last gasp. Not the first time this year. Closer to the 10th. And if Carman is down, depth will get a test.
6. There are games that require Joe Mixon’s pounding presence, and games in which Burrow should throw until his arm drops off. Sunday was the latter. Drastic oversimplification, yes. But Burrow is your top man. Get him into a rhythm and he will do what he almost always does. I’m not especially ’ A game plan is not a stock portfolio. There are games when Mixon off-tackle is the prefeconcerned with “balance.’rred play. Not Sunday.
7. It was a strong message that Mixon, Tyler Boyd and Jessie Bates appeared together for the postgame presser. Their reasoning was, we’re a team, we win and lose as a team. Classy move.
8. IMO, a big reason for the L was young guys unfamiliar with handling winning. They heard all week how great they were. When, in fact, they’d gotten to 5-2 with one very good W. The Lions are horrible, the Jags aren’t much better. No one’s sweating the Vikings or the Fading Bens.
It gets serious now. The pastry portion of the schedule is about done. Four more division games, play-dates with KC, the Chargers and Raiders.
9. I’m sure it’s my OG-ness shining through, and I know most of youse aren’t at the games to answer this. But is it really necessary now for every stadium PA person to scream “IT’S THIRRRRRRRRD DOWN’’ like he’s yelling at his worst enemy? So freakin’ tiring.
10. If the Bengals crush Cleve this week, will youse promise not to go crazy with overripe optimism again? No? OK.
Now, then. . .
I just saw A Duvall crush that grand slam in the bottom of the 1st. It’s now official: Dusty Baker will never get into the HOF. Unless the Astros rally and force a Game 6, in which case, I’ll disavow what I just typed.
(Editor's note: Doc sent this in last night and it published this morning. Therefore, we disavow Baker never getting into the HOF. For now.)
TRIP REPORT. . . Had a great time with my newly married (two weeks) son and his bride Saturday. They live in Brooklyn. Every time I visit NY, I’m astounded at the variety of stuff happening all the time. Our original plan was to ferry over to Governor’s Island, a wooded sea of sanity in the middle of the river. Hudson, East, I dunno. Then hit the Strand bookstore and couple used record places.
The weather threatened, so we ended up throwing axes, then going to a Colombian restaurant. Don’t laugh about the axes. It was tons o’ fun. What they really need to do now is get some projectors and project the faces of People We Hate onto the wooden boards that catch the axes. The only thing better than tossing an axe would be tossing an axe at an enemy’s face. An ex-, a boss, Mike Brown. . .
Who’s with me?
THE HARD PART OF NY IS getting to NJ, where I stayed. It only involved one subway and one bus. But getting through the Times Square subway station to the Port Authority bus depot was like finding Oregon with Lewis and Clark. And man, one false move, one missed stop and you’re on that island in Castaway, with Tom Hanks. Wilsonnnn!!!
I was exhausted when I got back to Jersey.
Early AM flight Monday. Keep the faith. Burrow’s still Burrow. He’s only going to get better.
TUNE O’ THE DAY. . . My son-in-law and Jillian’s husband, the estimable Ryan Mavriplis, walked through LaGuardia a few weeks ago, singing New York, New York. We were on our way home from my son Kelly’s wedding. You have not lived until you’ve heard a man born with Down Syndrome do his best Sinatra down a (relatively) quiet concourse. Here’s the Chairman’s version. It’s OK.
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