40 Things
We learned about the NFL on Sunday
The 40 things we learned from Week 8 of the NFL season.
1. We’re going to have a lot to say about sacks. We already knew they became an official NFL statistic in 1982, but keep that in mind — if you were not aware — as you continue reading.
2. It’s time to start thinking about Minnesota Vikings DE Everson Griffen as a defensive player of the year frontrunner. He has at least one sack in all eight games (only the third player to start a season with such a streak) and a total of 10.
3. Los Angeles Chargers DE Joey Bosa became the first player to reach 19 sacks in his first 20 NFL games. He and teammate Melvin Ingram each have 81⁄ 2, giving them an outside shot of becoming the first teammates to each reach 20 in one season.
4. Carolina Panthers DE Julius Peppers recorded his 151st career sack Sunday. Only Hall of Famers Bruce Smith
(200), Reggie White (198) and Kevin Greene (160) have more.
5. Since 2011, Denver Broncos OLB Von Miller has 801⁄ sacks, most in the 2 NFL in that span. He’ll face the Kansas City Chiefs on Monday night and has eight sacks in his last six games against them. Good luck, Alex Smith.
6. New York Jets fans won’t confuse their team with the old New York Sack Exchange. The Jets began Sunday with an AFC-low 10 sacks. At least DE Muhammad Wilkerson managed to bag Atlanta Falcons QB Matt Ryan, collecting the first sack among the Jets’ vaunted group of defensive linemen.
7. The Washington Redskins were without three starting offensive linemen Sunday. No surprise then that the Dallas Cowboys racked up four sacks, including DeMarcus Lawrence adding to his NFL-high figure of 10½.
8. New Orleans Saints QB Drew Brees completed his 6,000th career pass Sunday, making him the third player to join an elite club previously occupied by only Brett Favre (6,300) and Peyton Manning (6,125). Brees reached the bench mark in 240 games, 19 fewer than Manning needed and 46 ahead of Favre’s pace.
9. Much to the displeasure of head coach Sean Payton, Saints RB Mark Ingram lost two fumbles Sunday. A sevenyear vet, Ingram had never coughed up more than two fumbles in a season before this year (he has three in 2017).
10. Still, despite Ingram’s butter fingers and Brees’ failure to throw a touchdown pass for the first time this season, New Orleans (5-2) remains in first place in the NFC South while continuing to win in an unfamiliar way — behind its defense. After limiting the Chicago Bears to 12 points, the Saints have allowed 17 or fewer four times during their current five-game winning streak.
11. New Orleans’ Marshon Lattimore deserves serious defensive rookie of the year consideration. He entered Week 8 as the NFL’s top-rated cornerback, according to the analytics website Pro Football Focus, and ended it with a game-sealing interception, his second pick in three weeks.
12. The Falcons narrowly averted a season sweep by the AFC East, outlasting the Jets 25-20. The defending NFC champs should be thrilled to end the AFC portion of their schedule. Atlanta won its first three games, all against NFC foes, before playing the Bills, Dolphins, Patriots and Jets in succession.
13. Kudos to NFL Research for this one: Josh McCown is the first Jets quarterback to throw multiple touchdown passes in four consecutive games since — wait for it — Ray Lucas in 1999.
14. Welcome back to Panthers MLB Luke Kuechly, who returned to the field for the first time since he suffered his latest concussion Oct. 12. Kuechly had eight tackles (two for loss) and an interception in Carolina’s 17-3 defeat of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. More important, he survived the game unscathed.
15. On the flip side, Bucs QB Jameis Winston had three turnovers, and Tampa Bay’s second-ranked offense was limited to a season-low 279 yards by Kuechly’s Panthers.
16. New England Patriots QB Tom Brady isn’t exactly going deep this year, even though his 2,541 passing yards lead the NFL. The two-time MVP added 333 to his total Sunday, but 166 were accumulated on passes to his running backs.
17. Remember those concerns that the Patriots defense would be the reigning champs’ undoing? Time to rethink that. New England allowed 128 points in its first four games but just 51 over the last four — all wins.
18. Chargers RB Melvin Gordon had an 87-yard TD run Sunday, 76 yards longer than any of his 13 previous career rushing TDs.
19. With Marshawn Lynch suspended, the Oakland Raiders rushed for 54 yards in Sunday’s loss to the Buffalo Bills. The Raiders are now 1-3 this season when they fail to hit the century mark on the ground.
20. Worse, at 3-5, Oakland has already lost more games than it did in
2016.
21. The Bills (5-2) have 15 takeaways in their last five games, four of them victories.
22. With 11 points Sunday, Indianapolis Colts K Adam Vinatieri tied Gary Anderson for second most (2,434) in NFL history. Unfortunately for Vinatieri, he needed two more to beat the Cincinnati Bengals. He’s now 111 from surpassing Hall of Famer Morten Andersen as the league’s No. 1 all-time scorer.
23. After losing five consecutive games by a field goal or less, the winless San Francisco 49ers have dropped their last two by a collective 53-point margin.
24. Browns coach Hue Jackson is now 1-23 in Cleveland, with 14 of those losses by double figures after Sunday’s
33-16 defeat to the Vikings in London. But Browns fans hoping for a bye-week ouster are likely to be disappointed given Jackson is scheduled for a conference call with reporters Monday.
25. On the bright side, if you’re into glasses that are 2% full, Browns rookie QB DeShone Kizer did not commit his
14th turnover of the season, allowing him to play an entire game for the first time since Week 3.
26. Spencer Drango was Cleveland’s starting left tackle Sunday. The last person to man the post not named Joe Thomas, whose streak of 167 consecutive starts officially ended Sunday after he had season-ending triceps surgery last week, was Kevin Shaffer on Dec. 31,
2006.
27. If the season ended today — it doesn’t — the Vikings (6-2) would be the NFC’s No. 2 playoff seed, just behind the Philadelphia Eagles and their NFL-best
7-1 record.
28. The last time the Eagles started
7-1 was in 2004 — yep, the last time they also reached the Super Bowl.
29. However, it’s worth noting that Eagles QB Carson Wentz, who’s on the short list of MVP candidates, was sacked three times and hit seven during his first game without injured Pro Bowl LT Jason Peters.
30. Since the start of the 2016 season, Minnesota QB Case Keenum is 8-7. The man he’s filling in for, Sam Bradford, is
9-8 over the same period.
31. The Jacksonville (er, Sacksonville) Jaguars made a little noise during their bye week, acquiring former all-pro DT Marcell Dareus, who’d fallen out of favor in Buffalo, in a trade over the weekend. Dareus joins an imposing defense that leads the league with 33 sacks and is on pace to break the 1984 Chicago Bears’ single-season record of 72.
32. Might the moves of Dareus and, previously, Adrian Peterson be the harbinger of an active trade deadline, which is Tuesday afternoon? Jimmy Graham, Carlos Hyde, Eric Ebron, Matt Forte, Martavis Bryant and even Calvin Johnson are among the names that have surfaced as potentially being on the move.
33. NFL officials are still reluctant to eject players for egregious illegal hits. Whether you think Miami Dolphins LB Kiko Alonso’s concussion-inducing hit on Baltimore Ravens QB Joe Flacco on Thursday night was dirty or not, it was most definitely against the rules to hit Flacco — even though he was sliding — forcibly to the head. And was it really necessary for Alonso, who was commit- ted to hitting Flacco on a bang-bang play, to lower his shoulder, too?
34. With a bye just around the corner in Week 10, sitting next Sunday might not be the worst idea for Flacco, who’s not only recovering from his head injury but also is on pace for his least-productive season (six TD passes, 72.3 passer rating at the midway point) after missing preseason with a back injury. With two TD throws and a 103.1 rating in spot duty this year, Ryan Mallett seems like a lateral move when considering he could provide Flacco nearly three weeks to recuperate.
35. What a difference Ravens NT Brandon Williams makes. He’s appeared in only half of Baltimore’s eight games due to foot problems, and the team entered Week 8 last in the NFL in run defense. But Williams played against the Dolphins, who managed just
45 yards on the ground. In four games with Williams, the Ravens are allowing
96 rushing yards per game but 169.5 without him.
36. The Seahawks’ 33 rushing yards Sunday were tied for their fewest in a winning effort since Pete Carroll became the head coach in 2010.
37. The Ravens’ 40-0 win was the most lopsided in their 22-year history.
38. Houston Texans rookie QB Deshaun Watson now has 19 TD passes, a number no quarterback has ever managed in his first seven NFL games. (Kurt Warner previously owned the mark with 18.) Only Watson, Peyton Manning, Marcus Mariota and Dak Prescott have four three-TD passing games as rookies since the 1970 merger ... and Watson now has nine chances to own that record by himself.
39. Unfortunately for Watson, he was also picked off three times by the Seattle Seahawks and became the fifth consecutive rookie passer to lose at CenturyLink Field. The Seahawks defense hadn’t allowed a fourth-quarter TD in
2017 before surrendering a pair of TD passes in the final period. But CB Richard Sherman swiped Watson’s final pass to ice the outcome. It was Sherman’s sixth career game with two interceptions.
40. Cowboys RB Ezekiel Elliott now has 413 rushing yards over the last three games after his 150-yard outburst Sunday. But his latest round of jurisprudence this week will determine if he and the team maintain their momentum.