JACKSON AND RAVENS TAKING NFL BY STORM
Dynamic QB emerges as MVP candidate by driving Baltimore’s dominant offence
It’s no wonder everybody is jumping aboard that purple Baltimore Ravens bandwagon being steered by Lamar Jackson.
Hell, if I had more money, I would bet a good chunk that Baltimore’s home game this Sunday against the San Francisco 49ers will be a Super Bowl preview.
New England’s run has to end sometime. Right?
The Ravens have won seven in a row, the last three by a combined score of 135-24 (that’s an average of 45-8 to save you doing the math). After giving up a combined 73 points in Weeks 3 and 4, their defence is now ranked 11th in the NFL.
And as the leader of the best offence in the league, Jackson is playing the quarterback position like it’s never been played before.
It’s not just that in his first full season as a starter he’s tied with Russell Wilson for the league lead in touchdown passes (24). Or that, against the Los Angeles Rams, he became the first player in NFL history to throw five TD passes in his Monday Night Football debut. He also became the youngest QB at 22 in NFL history with multiple games with five TD passes. He’s the first player in NFL history with four TD passes and at least 50 yards running in consecutive games.
And he’s the first player in NFL history with at least 3,000 yards passing and 1,500 yards rushing in his first two seasons.
With five games left on the schedule, Action Jackson is
10th in league rushing with 876 yards, just 163 back of the single season quarterback record set by Michael Vick in 2006.
With five weeks left for someone to prove otherwise, he should be declared the best player in the league this season.
“There’s a reason why people are talking about him as an MVP,” Rams coach Sean Mcvay told reporters after the game. “It felt like it tonight.”
“He’s a hell of a player, and I wish him the best,” said L.A. quarterback Jared Goff, before making reference to the fact Jackson was selected 32nd overall in the 2018 NFL draft — behind four other QBS.
“I think he’s really proving a lot of people wrong, and you always love to see that.”
Mcvay and Goff probably enjoyed fielding questions about the opposition, rather than their own embarrassing performance. This is the young duo that last season carried the Rams to a 13-3 record and a Super Bowl showdown with the Patriots. Many believed they would be back at least contending for the NFC championship again this year and for many more seasons to follow.
But the Rams have fizzled badly, losing two of their last three and five of their last eight, and with a 6-5 record and games against Seattle, Dallas and San Francisco still on their schedule, it doesn’t look like they’ll make the playoffs.
SECOND AND LONG
It’s an indictment of Mason Rudolph that the Pittsburgh Steelers are turning their playoff hopes over to third string QB Devlin (Duck) Hodges.
Asked why he’s going with Hodges as his starter against the Browns, Pittsburgh coach Mike Tomlin said: “He hasn’t killed us.”
Hodges, who will be making just his second start, has connected on 27-of-40 passes for 318 yards in his career. Rudolph has thrown five interceptions in his last five quarters.
Speaking on Dallas-fort Worth radio station 105.3 The Fan on Tuesday, Cowboys owner Jerry Jones reiterated his displeasure with the performance of his 6-5 team, especially as coaching decisions contributed to a 13-9 loss in New England on Sunday.
“When you’re general manager, which I am, those coaches are out there at my ultimate decisions,” said Jones. “It’s very much within my realm of purview, if you will, to not only be standing there as an owner, but to be standing there as the general manger who put the staff there to begin with. People seem to think it’s particularly harsh to have criticism and they think, when you look at the other side of the field and call a job well done, that might mean that’s extraordinary criticism of the job you’ve done on the other side of the field. At the end of the day, the buck stops with me.”
In position to clinch playoff spots this week are the Patriots, Saints and 49ers, who have gone five years without qualifying for post-season play.
EXTRA POINTS
How important is a good centre? We’ll find out in Baltimore, where it was announced Matt Skura will miss the rest of the regular season with a knee injury suffered Monday. Skura is currently second in Pro Bowl voting.
Good news for the Vikings, who had Adam Thielen join them as they returned to practice after their bye week. The standout wide receiver has missed three of the last four games with a hamstring injury.
49ers kicker Robbie Gould is close to returning from a quadriceps injury that has sidelined him since Week 10. The question is, will he be back to being himself? Gould, who has a field goal success rate of 86.7 per cent over his 15-year career, was having his career-worst season, hitting at just 65 per cent, when he went down. Chase Mclaughlin was a solid replacement as San Fran won two of its last three.