Welcome to the 2024 NFL season. With just Jake Moody days until the start of the regular season, the industrial-scale and artisan take shops are running at full steam. Who will win the MVP? Is Caleb Williams all that? Can CJ Stroud win MVP? When will Lamar ever crack the Tier 1 of the QB tiers? Is Harbaugh going to turn the Chargers around? Will the new kickoff rule be any good? etc etc etc. It's around-the-clock shift work as everyone's trying to beat the opening night deadline.
Yet there's only one take that matters this season: Will the Chiefs win their third straight Super Bowl? (Note: We can no longer say Superb Owl. Draw Play Dave has just declared that it's as annoying as Get in the Hole Guy, Sportsball Guy and Stop Saying We guy.
The Chiefs are seeking to become the first team to ever win three straight Superb, er, Super Bowls. The Packers (I and II), Dolphins (VII and VIII), Niners (XXIII and XXIV) Cowboys (XXVII and XXVIII), Broncos (XXXII and XXXIII) and Patriots (XXXVII and XXXIX) have all won two straight, and the Steelers (IX / X and XIII / XIV) did it twice. Just making it three straight times (like the Dolphins did in the '70s and the Patriots did after the 2016-18 seasons) or even four (Bills in the early '90s) is pretty rough but not impossible. But three straight wins? It's not probable. Hell, it's probably impossible with all of the nonsense (and good QBs these days).
Yet we need the Chiefs to win to reopen the GOAT wars. Brady has his three MVPs and seven rings. But back-to-back-to-back rings? Brady never did that, and neither did Belichick. The Chiefs are both the sanity pick and the chaos pick this season. Go Chiefs?
WEEK 1 SCHEDULE
(all games rated from 0 to 5 stars on how watchable I think they'll be)
Thursday
Ravens at Chiefs, 820p (NBC) *****
Friday
Packers at Eagles in Brazil, 815p (Peacock, y'all) *****
Sunday early
Steelers at Falcons (Fox) ***
Cardinals at Bills (CBS) **
Titans at Bears (Fox) ***
Patriots at Bengals (CBS) **
Texans at Colts (CBS) ***
Jaguars at Dolphins in the Florida Bowl (CBS) ***
Panthers at Saints (Fox)
Vikings at Giants (FOX) **
Sunday late
Raiders at Chargers (CBS) **
Broncos at Seahawks (CBS) *
Cowboys at Browns in Tom Brady's booth debut (Fox GOTW) ****
Commanders at Bucs (Fox) **
Sunday night
Rams at Lions in the Goff Bowl, 820p (NBC) *****
Monday
Jets at Niners, 815p (ABC, ESPN) ****
Coverage maps: Here on Wed
Some notes about the star system:
* Games with the Saints and/or Sean Payton will lose at least one star
* Panthers games will automatically lose two stars until further notice
* Any game with Chris Myers and Mark Schlereth in the booth will be awarded no more than two stars and probably just one. Those two guys are the worst. Even worse than Herbstreit on Thursday nights!
Now for the audience participation portion of our program: Use one photo / video / GIF to describe your team. I'll start:
I stopped watching sometime in December. It's not that I can't bear to watch the Panthers lose. It's just that they were boring, and there are so many better things to do in the weeks before Christmas than watch your team not score. Speaking of, the Panthers haven't scored a TD in a game that counted since Christmas Eve.
As for 2024, the Panthers should be more, ah, interesting. They upgraded the O-line and the WR room, but they drafted poorly, a lot of guys are already hurt and they got rid a lot of good defensive players. And even though it's a rebuilding year, the Panthers somehow have one of the oldest rosters in the league AND they're $8M+ over the salary cap. Look for Carolina to score more but suck worse on defense (which wasn't very good last season, as it turns out). Instead of losing by 24-13, they'll lose 35-21.
The only thing in their favor at the moment is that seven of their first 10 games are against other dregs who are 20th or worse in the power rankings (Saints twice, Chargers, Raiders, Commanders, Broncos, Giants). Vegas has their win total pegged at 5.5. I'm taking the under. But four wins is twice what we won last year, right? Progress!
The only prediction I have for this year is that there's going to be a lot of fantasy teams named "Hawk Tua Tagovailoa."
Good thing I bought a year of Peacock right before the Olympics.
What is the best way to watch football as someone without broadcast television?
What is the best way to watch football as someone without broadcast television?
I cobble together a full weekly football menu via a digital antenna, Prime (which we have anyway), Peacock (ditto) and some, ah, creative measures for MNF.
If I had to consolidate, I'd probably go with YouTube TV. It has all the local / broadcast channels plus ESPN, and folks seem to like it OK.
(Note: We can no longer say Superb Owl. Draw Play Dave has just declared that it's as annoying as Get in the Hole Guy, Sportsball Guy and Stop Saying We guy.
"Get In The Hole" guys ruined golf long before LIV.
Now for the audience participation portion of our program: Use one photo / video / GIF to describe your team. I'll start:
We were playing with house money last year after the glorious Brady years, and, had we gone back to six wins, meh, would have been fine; we got a Super Bowl and two division titles out of it. What happened? Baker had a resurgence, Winfield flipped the switch to become legitimately in the discussion for DPOY, loads of young players improved a shocking amount, and a team with $81 million in dead cap won the division for the third year in a row, and even won a playoff game over the festering corpse of an Eagles team desperately trying to get their coach fired wait what do you mean he still has a job never mind.
It was a ridiculous year, and the Bucs are blessed to be in a division with a bunch of goddamn idiots. The Panthers are owned by At The Moment Less Skeezy Dan Snyder and are in eternal freefall as long as Tepper is around, the Saints are eternally worsening a salary cap death spiral and keep paying more and more for worse and worse players, and the Falcons draft like they're a drunk guy showing up at his first fantasy football draft, and the mix of signing aging Kirk Cousins coming off a major injury for huge money as a win-now move and then drafting an old QB in the first round will never cease being funny. The Falcons genuinely could be good this year, but they're the Falcons, so why would we assume they're going to be anything other than themselves?
The Bucs win the South this year again, just because everybody else is run by idiots. If not? Eh, it was a good run. It's a genuinely likeable group of players, beloved icons like Mike and Lavonte stuck around, Graham Barton is going to be the first offensive lineman to win OROY, MVP, and Vice-President (hey, I work for the State of Minnesota, Walz is my boss and I like him), and, like I said, it's all house money at this point.
Now for the audience participation portion of our program: Use one photo / video / GIF to describe your team.
49ers:
The Niners have a Super Bowl roster, but the clock is ticking. People think midnight is when Brock Purdy signs his deal next offseason, but that deal will have low cap hits the first couple of years. 2026 is when the void years on some veteran deals start coming due, and 2027 is when the void years really start coming due. The team has this year and probably next year to make it happen with this roster, before the veteran purge begins.
The team is bringing an even better roster into the season this year, with meaningful CB depth that keeps Ambry Thomas off the field. A huge question mark still hangs over the team until they get Trent Williams signed and ready to play, though.
Jaguars:
From Week 12 2022 to Week 12 2023, the Jaguars went 14-4 in regular season play and 1-1 in the playoffs, taking the eventual 2022 Super Bowl winner into deep 4th quarter waters in their divisional round loss. They were a hot pick coming into the 2023 season, and were holding the #1 AFC seed with an 8-3 record in late November.
Then, Trevor Lawrence got hurt, got hurt again, played like garbage while trying to play through the injuries, and the Jaguars went 1-5 to close out the 2023 season.
With the rise of the Texans, and the excitement of new QBs in Indy and Tennessee, the Jaguars have become essentially forgotten in the AFC South. Never mind the last thing Trevor Lawrence did as a healthy player was beat those very Texans in Houston.
With a new defensive coordinator that will actually play their pass-rushing defensive ends as pass-rushing defensive ends, there's reason for excitement with the Jaguars defense. On offense, Calvin Ridley was never quite a clean fit into the Jags scheme as an outside WR, but his production needs to be replaced, and it falls to a rookie (Brian Thomas Jr) and a one-note field stretcher (Gabe Davis) to do it. The two also need to replace Zay Jones, but that part won't be a problem.
Lawrence was the 9th highest graded QB in PFF in weeks 1-12 and looked like he was finally hitting his stride, then after injury he was the 33rd graded QB in weeks 13-18. Can he pick back up where that breakout left off?
I’m sorry. There is only one gif to describe the Jags.
With the rise of the Texans, and the excitement of new QBs in Indy and Tennessee, the Jaguars have become essentially forgotten in the AFC South.
The AFC South has low-key become probably one of the most interesting divisions in football after being the NFC South of the AFC for a lot of years. Let's review:
AFC East: Bills / Jets / Dolphins make things interesting
AFC North: OK, this division is brutal.
AFC West: Chiefs + trash
NFC East: Gets way too much media attention (bc market size) for how good these teams are (not very!)
NFC South: What MMD said earlier ("the Bucs are blessed to be in a division with a bunch of goddamn idiots," which gets no argument from me.)
NFC West: See AFC West but with Niners sted Chiefs
NFC North: This'll be fun to watch
So the AFC South is definitely top four (with AFC North, NFC North and AFC East in that order) and maybe ahead of the AFC East. So ... third?
My division predictions
Texans
Bills (Jets overrated)
Ravens
Chiefs
Eagles?
No clue, anybody but Panthers?
Niners
Lions (GB should make it interesting)
They should win a Tony.
My expectations for the divisions:
AFC East: Dolphins feel like the team best set up for the year. Bills are still dangerous but in a cap purge year, and I remember Rodgers was showing decline in Green Bay before the lost Jets season.
AFC North: Ravens and Bengals battle. Watson is just collecting checks and boat-anchoring an otherwise good roster down, and the Steelers offense is a corpse until proven otherwise.
AFC West: Chiefs easy division win. Chargers may Harbaugh ground-and-pound their way into wildcard relevance. Broncos are in a mega cap purge year and cleaning the books for 2025.
AFC South: Texans and Jaguars battle. Titans a year away but sneaky spoilers. I don't trust Anthony Richardson any more so than the Bengals defense that quickly figured him out.
NFC East: Belongs to Dallas until proven otherwise. Eagles feel shaky to me, especially with the seemingly deteriorating relationship between Hurts and Sirianni. Washington in the ground floor of a rebuild. Giants feel like they build 6 win rosters on purpose.
NFC North: Honestly probably the most interesting one. Lions and Packers is a war, Bears can make some noise, Vikings are a good roster that's one Darnold reclamation from wildcard contention.
NFC West: 49ers should take the division, Rams and Seahawks both sneaky wildcard candidates. Cardinals offense has the horses to make some noise but defense isn't there.
NFC South: Not sure yet which team is the one-eyed man in this land of the blind. Honestly I might like the Saints to have the division's best defense (for a little longer at least with all their 30+ year olds) plus a Kubiak finally bringing some 2020s offensive scheming to replace Pete Carmichael's dog-eared late-00s Sean Payton playbook. Feels to me like it's Saints vs. Bucs for the division. Falcons should finally unleash some offense but their D still has a lot to prove, and Carolina is nothing but question marks on both sides of the ball.
Pearsall was back at the Niners facility today and hitting the weight room.
I'm starting to think this guy might actually miss only the 4 weeks that he has to from the NFI designation. I was kinda mentally penciling him in to miss the first half of the season, but I'm starting to think he might even beat Brian Robinson's 6 week return a couple years ago in Washington, after he got shot in the leg during a carjack attempt.
For my Seahawks:
Who knows?
Signs out of camp are very encouraging, the roster looks deep based on roster cuts and the brief glimpses of starters + rookies. But the offensive line is still unsettled (I could have copy/pasted this for 10 years now!) and new schemes, especially more complicated ones like Baltimores', can take a year to install and really get the right talent synergy going. I wouldn't sleep on this team but with an aging QB and a young defense things could get really bad really fast.
Time to put out the dumpster fire for the Patriots.
On the bright side, they brought some exciting young blood they can invest in while retaining some key pieces. And the new coaching staff seems to be glued well together.
On the down side, the OL still looked like a disaster in the preseason and that's the one thing that can stunt Maye's growth. Also, the jury is still out on Mayo as a HC. He's a little bit too candid with the press (or maybe that's just culture shock coming from Belichick?) and still a rookie. The true test is going to be how they react as a team when they inevitably lose 2 or 3 games in a row.
This is a slate-wiping year for the Patriots, who have the highest 2025 cap space when including expected 2024 rollovers. If Drake Maye is not garbage, they're set up extremely well for a rebuild.
Totally well thought-out predictions for playoff teams:
AFC: Dolphins, Ravens, Texans, Chiefs, Jaguars (WC), Bengals (WC), Steelers (WC)
NFC: Cowboys, Lions, Buccaneers, 49ers, Packers (WC), Bears (WC), Rams (WC)
For Legion . . . the Super Bowl is 49ers over Ravens.
The best, most accurate pics. *
AFC: Bills, Bengals, Texans, Chiefs (WC Fins, Ravens, Chargers)
NFC: Cowboys, Lions, Falcons, Seahawks (WC 49ers, Packers, Rams)
Superb Owl**: Lions over Bengals
*I also thought Hillary Clinton would be President
**FU Draw Play Dave!!!
Trivia time: What do CB CJ Henderson, OLB K'Lavon Chaisson, WR Laviska Shenault and QB Jake Luton have in common?
All four dudes were drafted by the Jags in 2020 (Henderson and Chaisson in the first, Viska in the 2nd, Luton in the 6th), and all four guys were acquired and then dumped by the Panthers. Chaisson had made the Panthers' 53, but they dumped him Tuesday despite having no viable option at OLB other than Jadeveon Clowney.
If the Jags 2020 draft wasn't the worst ever (and maybe they get a partial pass bc COVID), it's gotta be up there.
If the Jags 2020 draft wasn't the worst ever (and maybe they get a partial pass bc COVID), it's gotta be up there.
I nominate the Patriots 2019 class.
Amateurs.
Trivia time: What do CB CJ Henderson, OLB K'Lavon Chaisson, WR Laviska Shenault and QB Jake Luton have in common?
Two of them are trash, one is a misused superstar in waiting, and one’s Jay Gluten.
Here’s the real worst draft class:
We are going to get a masterclass in "I only wanna talk about what's on the field" answers from Patrick Mahomes this week.
We are going to get a masterclass in "I only wanna talk about what's on the field" answers from Patrick Mahomes this week.
I want him to have Marshawn Lynch sitting next to him to take stupid questions.
We are going to get a masterclass in "I only wanna talk about what's on the field" answers from Patrick Mahomes this week.
Brittany Mahomes vs. Swiftie Nation is just the kind of distraction drama the Chiefs season needs.
Between his wife, his father and his brother, Patrick must be overjoyed the season is starting and he'll get to play.
After the Ricky Pearsall shooting it made me wonder what the NFL was telling players and doing for a game in Brazil.
"Week 1, I'm looking forward to it, I can't wait," Darius Slay Jr. said recently on his "Big Play Slay" podcast. "But man, I do not want to go to Brazil, you want to know why? I'm here to tell you why. They already told us not to leave the hotel. They told us we can't do too much going on because the crime rate is crazy."... I'm like, NFL why y'all wanna send us somewhere where the crime rate is this high and we out the country? You know, the first thing people are thinking is like some terror could possibly happen. I told my family do not come down there because I'm not going to be nowhere to be found. I'm going to be in the hotel chilling, minding my business, playing my game after a long 9½-hour flight."
LOL, yeah, I was going to post about that. Shockingly, Brazilians weren't totally fond of his take and he has since "apologized."
I really can't put big enough quotation marks around "apologized," frankly.
(Also, I think Brazil is more than ready for Philly.)
oh, and some dude from the Commanders got O'Keefe'd (shocked he's still around).
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