If you’re under the impression that NFL special teams have been particularly shaky this season, you’re absolutely right.
But as strange as special teams had been through the first eleven weeks of the season, nothing could compare to what happened on Sunday. Kicker misses and miscues were plentiful, but there were many more blunders than usual on Sunday.
The most prominent of them all was Austin Seibert of the Washington Commanders. The seven-year veteran was perfect on extra points on Sunday and was 25 of 27 on his field goal attempts this season.
And then came the total disaster Seibert brought upon himself against the Dallas Cowboys a loss of 34-26 commanders. With 48 seconds left in the first quarter, Seibert missed a 51-yard field goal. No surprise, as his only two misses this season came from 50 yards or more. Then, after Jayden Daniels scored a touchdown on a 17-yard run with 9:59 left in the third quarter, Seibert missed his first extra point attempt of the season. It didn’t seem like a big deal: Washington still led 9-3 against a Dallas team that had been woeful all season.
Seibert was hit again when his kickoff was returned 99 yards for a touchdown from KaVontae Turpin to give the Cowboys a 27-17 lead late in the fourth. That was bad news for a Commanders team in the playoff hunt, but the touchdown had a lot more to do with Turpin’s skills than Seibert’s shortcomings. Seibert even scored a 51-yard field goal with 1:40 remaining to cut the deficit to seven points and give the Commanders a glimmer of hope. And there is always hope against these Cowboys. First, Dallas recovered Seibert’s onside kick, but had to punt. Then, with 33 seconds left, Daniels hit Terry McLaurin on a miraculous 86-yard touchdown in which Dallas, as has become routine this season, forgot how to tackle.
The score was 27-26 and all Seibert had to do was make the extra point and almost certainly send the game to overtime. You can guess how That went.
But there was more pain to come for Seibert. He attempted an onside kick on the very next play after his miss, and Cowboys safety Juanyeh Thomas returned the damn thing for a 34-yard touchdown to put the game completely out of reach. Two consecutive plays by Seibert had cost his team the victory a detested enemy in a season where they began to turn around their recent reputation as a hapless franchise. It also condemned the 7-5 Commanders to a third straight loss just as their NFC East rivals, the 9-2 Philadelphia Eagles, are riding a seven-game win streak. It’s hard to imagine a passing game being more painful for a single player in NFL history. Seibert’s pained expression told the story in one image.
Give Seibert credit: Some players would rather drop something heavy on their foot than face the media after so many debacles, but he was a standup guy. He refused to blame the bad snap he missed an extra point in the second, and he refused to blame the hip injury that had caused him to miss the Commanders’ two previous games.
In a season where special teams have been anything but, Seibert will become the unfortunate personification of those struggles with one of the most painful games a kicker has ever had.
MVP of the week
Saquon Barkley, RB, Philadelphia Eagles. As if things weren’t bad enough for the 2-9 New York Giants (more on that in a minute). Barkley, the running back they deemed expendable this offseason, rolled over a very competent but very young Los Angeles Rams defense for 255 rushing yards and two touchdowns on Sunday night as the Eagles boat raced the Rams, 37-20. Pending the results of Monday night’s game between the Baltimore Ravens and the Los Angeles Chargers, Barkley surpassed Baltimore’s Derrick Henry for the NFL’s lead in rushing yards with 1,392 yards to Henry’s 1,185. Barkley had touchdown runs of 70 and 72 yards, and set up the ninth most rushing yards in one game in NFL history.
Before Giants fans wonder where this before, this version of Barkley in New York – or anywhere else – is impossible to imagine. He’s playing behind by far the best offensive line he’s ever had, and he has a quarterback in Jalen Hurts who augments Barkley’s rushing threat with his own mobility. It’s a prime example of the perfect player in the perfect situation, and yet another personal hit for Big Blue.
Video of the week
The Carolina Panthers played much closer than anyone expected. In fact, the game was 27-27 with 1:49 left after Carolina converted a two-point attempt.
So the Panthers gave the ball back to the Chiefs and hoped Patrick Mahomes wouldn’t do something ridiculous. That hope was of course in vain. With 48 seconds left, Mahomes drove for a 33-yard run that took the ball to the Carolina 22-yard line, and set up Spencer Shrader’s game-winning field goal as time expired.
If you think you’ve seen something like this before… well, you kind of have. In last season’s Super Bowl, the score was 22-19 in favor of the San Francisco 49ers before Mahomes’ 19-yard scramble three plays later set up his game-winning touchdown pass to Mecole Hardman.
As has been the case with most of the Chiefs’ 10 wins this season, it hasn’t been pretty… but a win is a win.
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Statistic of the week
There were several misdemeanors in addition to Seibert’s on Sunday, and that has been the case all season (along with a few heroics). But before you think this is happening at an unusual pace in 2024, let’s not let recency biases steer things in the wrong direction. During the first 11 weeks of the 2024 seasonkickers had made 84.9% of their field goals and 96.5% of their extra point attempts. Over the past decade, field goal percentages have been lower each season, from 2014 through 2020, and the success rate is just one percentage point lower than last season’s 85.9%. And this season’s extra point percentage is the highest since kickers shot as high as 99.3% in 2014.
Pro Football Reference’s data tells us there has been an increase in field goal attempts of 50 yards or more this season, which could explain some of the misses, but it’s not a huge change over the past decade. What has always been true is that kicking is an inconsistent and unpredictable art.
Elsewhere in the competition
— Late in Minnesota’s third quarter 30-27 win over the Chicago BearsVikings quarterback Sam Darnold appeared to hit Jordan Addison on what would be a 69-yard play.
The question was whether Addison stepped out of bounds before completing his post-capture journey. According to the broadcast replays, it appeared he did, but after the referees reviewed the play, the original ruling was upheld.
Normally, most people would attribute this to another instance where officials made a call, but there is a subversive and incomprehensible context to this and other repeat statements. As former NFL VP of officiating Mike Pereira explained, the league is not allowed to use side cameras when reviewing replays because not all stadiums have them, and it would throw parity out the window if such replays were allowed when there was a stadium have-nots.
In 2023, the Total NFL revenue exceeded $13 billion. Even the most technically impressive cameras available for the NFL usually come in at less than $10,000: we suspect NFL teams could easily pool their money to cover the costs of getting them into each stadium. Cost is not the problem. Income is not the problem. Why the NFL hasn’t standardized its technology in this regard makes no sense.
— No quarterback ever wants to sit on the bench, but there’s something to be said for the practice of sitting a young signal caller down so he can spend time processing the complexities of NFL playbooks and the speed of NFL defenses. Bryce Young, who looked like one of the worst first overall draft picks in the league during his rookie season of 2023 and well into this season, found himself benched in favor of Andy Dalton three games into the Panthers’ season. He didn’t get the starting job back until Week 8.
But Young is starting to feel more comfortable in his role after the benching, and he definitely was during Carolina’s loss to the Chiefs. Young completed 21 of 35 passes for 263 yards, a touchdown, no interceptions and a passer rating of 92.9. Chiefs defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo repeatedly gave Young a pass, and Young threw those charges right back in Spags’ face. Young was beaten on a season-high 40.0% of his dropbacks, and he completed 11 of his 14 passes for 123 yards and a touchdown against multiple disruptors. The tape matched the statistics; Young just looks like a different quarterback now.
— Of course, quarterback benches don’t always work. If you thought things couldn’t get any worse for the New York Giants after they benched and released Daniel Jones… well, think again. At Big Blue’s 30-7 shame for a loss against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Sunday, replacement Tommy “Cutlets” DeVito completed 21 of 31 passes for 189 yards, no touchdowns, no interceptions and a passer rating of 83.9. In the first half, before things got out of hand and the Bucs played more relaxed coverages, DeVito completed just three of five passes for 31 yards.
2024 first-round receiver Malik Nabers wasn’t targeted until the third quarter he wasn’t happy about that at all.
“It’s not about the quarterback,” Nabers said after the game. “The same thing happened when DJ [Jones] was the quarterback. Go there, first and second quarter, don’t take the ball and aim for the end. You can’t do that. Started getting the ball when it was 30-0. What do you want me to do?”
Nabers said the media should “talk to Dabs” [head coach Brian Daboll] about that. Nabers also called the “soft” versionand he wasn’t the only one. All-world defensive lineman Dexter Lawrence said the Giants “played soft, and [the Buccaneers] beats us today.”
The Giants are 2-9 in a season that has disappeared into the hole they were previously circling, and Daboll is 17-27-1 in his Giants career. The numbers are bad enough, but when your best players are openly questioning coaching and commitment, it looks like Daboll will be the next giant looking for a new job.
Oh…and aside from Barkley’s efforts on Sunday, it was a very good day for other former Giants. Defensive lineman Leonard Williams had 2.5 sacks for the Seattle Seahawks in a 16-6 win over the Arizona Cardinals, and safety Xavier McKinney picked up his seventh interception of the season for the Green Bay Packers in a 38-10 loss to the San Francisco 49ers. If this wasn’t the worst day in Giants history, it was certainly on the short list.