We’ve already discussed five of our top hopes for the NFL this upcoming season— here’s a look at the final five!
6) Make Catches Great Again
What better way to make football great again than by making catches great again?
“This is a passing league,” has been said by talking heads ad nauseam. Antonio Brown, Dez Bryant, Larry Fitzgerald, Odell Beckham Jr, Brandon Marshall, Demaryius Thomas, Randall Cobb— there are no shortage of great wide receivers in the league. With all these great pass catchers, why can’t we just get the rules of what is and isn’t a catch right?! If children across the country and washed up writers like me know a catch from a drop but the NFL — the preeminent football organization in the universe — can’t, than something is fundamentally wrong.
To borrow a phrase from another debate that sadly goes nowhere, let’s just make some common sense catch regulation. Subjectivity aside, if it looks like a catch it is a catch. Period. Miss me with the “football move” nonsense or “complete through the catch” idiocy.
7) Keep It Consistent, But Also Keep It Fair
Speaking of calls being made I think that players, coaches and fans alike would appreciate a higher level of consistency from the referees. To be fair, the referees have an exceptionally difficulty job trying to manage these marvels of human athleticism in what are frequently the “bang bang” type of plays. From series to series, half to half the zebras control the total flow of the game. OPI, DPI, holding and false start calls at times can feel random. The competition committee has set up the rules that disproportionately favor the offense, yet how many times have we watched as a skilled offensive player simply pushes off from a defender to no call?! The hand fighting along the line and on the outside are part of the game and the way that they are called can determine the outcome.
And can anyone tell me how all the movement that offensive linemen do pre-snap; up, down, pointing making calls, adjusting the boys and whatnot never gets called as false start?! I’ve been watching the NFL for over two decades and have no idea where the line is.
8) Cleveland Browns: Leaders of the New School?
Are the Browns taking a cue from the reigning former NBA Champion Golden State Warriors?
On a recent HHSR Podcast, we talked about how the Browns have a pattern of installing a new regime, trying to amass draft picks to replenish a barren roster and stockpiling losing seasons until the regime is run out-of-town as if they were a pack of Art Modells before the process begins anew. Well true believers, they’re at it again in “The Land” with new GM, Coach and retread QB.
But this time it’s different! This time it’s analytical!
The Browns brought in a baseball sabermetrics pioneer (apparently) from the New York Mets in Paul DePodesta to take on the role of Chief Strategy Officer and right the ship. DePodesta promoted Sashi Brown, who has been a part of the organization since 2013, to general manager. DePodesta tapped the widely respected Hue Jackson to take over as head coach after stops in USC, DC, Cincy, Atlanta, Baltimore, Oakland and Cincy again.
The DePodesta/Brown/Jackson “fac-gime” (gold star to anyone who gets that reference) acquired Robert Griffin III, the same Robert Griffin III who famously came into the league out of Baylor and set the league on fire and seemingly overnight flamed out eventually losing his job to Kirk Cousins. It’s primarily up to these four men to change the fortunes of the Cleveland Browns and they will reportedly take a page out of the Golden State Warriors manuscript and use an analytics based foundation to build upon.
The question is what does an “analytics based approach to team building” mean in practice and will the Cleveland faithful give this approach the time it will require? Will this be a Philadelphia 76ers “trust the process” campaign reincarnated? Because that’s been the Cleveland m.o. for decades, and we’ve seen how that’s gone.
The Browns once again traded away their top pick for a package of picks in this year’s and next year’s draft, not a totally novel idea or even a surprising move from the franchise. The film “Draft Day” is largely built around the premise of the Browns trading away draft picks. Now it’s up to DePodesta and friends to take their turn to throw everything at the wall and see what sticks.
Laremy Tunsil was gassed up to believe he might be the #1 pick, but fell to #14 after being dimed out on draft night. Is this an episode of “Ballers”?
9) Here’s to Laremy Tunsil Looking Like A First Ballot Hall Of Famer
As you have undoubtedly heard by now, Tunsil was notoriously hacked the day of the draft and shown to be “smokin’ on that gas” while wearing a gas mask. He also all but admitted in a text conversation that he’d received illicit benefits from a coach at Ole Miss. These were targeted attacks meant to eviscerate the draft stock and maximum potential earnings for Tunsil (there were rumors that possibly a family member were to blame). Tunsil has been apologetic and accepted responsibility for these actions but that didn’t stop the media firestorm. All for a kid smoking weed and possibly getting some ends while making a dump truck full of money for his alma mater. Let me get my DJ Khaled on for a minute; “they” can get all the way out of here! “They” don’t want to let a young man make some mistakes in college. “They” want to stick Tunsil for his paper.
We’ll we at HHSR want Tunsil to have a great career and go down as one of the best tackles of all-time (top flight tackle of the world, Craig)! All the hypocrisy in the hate is sickening and hopefully it becomes a major key for Tunsil throughout a long and healthy NFL tenure.
10) Cincinnati Bengals’ Annual Early Playoff Exit Coming To An End
The last time Cincinnati won a playoff game was in the 1990-91 season, however they have made an annual weekend trip to the playoffs every year since 2011. The Bengals have pretty much done it the “right” way by building a perennially above average defense and a potent offense featuring AJ Green, Tyler Eifert, Giovanni Bernard and Jeremy Hill surrounding Andy Dalton.
Last season the Bengals went into their opening and closing playoff game versus the Pittsburgh Steelers without Dalton due to injury and finished without Eifert due to injury. In a penalty ridden slog of a game, the Steelers won 18-16 on a game ending field goal, resulting in a Pittsburgh library being named after Jeremy Hill and Adam Jones for giving that game away.
You can go back and look at the last five years of playoff exits, the Bengals have been outclassed (2014 Colts, 2011 Texans, 2012 Texans), or embarrassed (2013 Chargers), or unlucky/generous (2015 Steelers). The Bengals have been good but not great throughout the Dalton/Marvin Lewis era and at some point they have to win one of these playoff games, right? That’s not to say they “deserve” to be handed a playoff game because we all know, “deserves got nothin’ to do with it“. Odds are that eventually the Bengals will have to come out on top of one of these low scoring affairs— hopefully this is the year.
What are you hoping for his upcoming season? Let us know because the more time we can talk about football the faster it’ll get here.