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These are only excerpts from this article. To read the whole article click the link below. Btw Peter King's man-love for :shooting: Brady and :wabbit: Belichick, which covers about 40% of his articles, will never again be posted by yours truly. Mike Ditka's farts were mentioned along with the Patriots about 50 times, but this one item is all PK posted about the Rams: 
I think this is what I liked about Week 7:
Lamarcus Joyner’s excellent open-field tackle for the Rams, forcing a Cleveland punt.
*************************************************************************
http://mmqb.si.com/mmqb/2015/10/26/nfl-week-7-yahoo-live-stream-greg-hardy-miami-dolphins
Streams and Streaks: A Historic Sunday of Football
The NFL’s first live internet-only game broadcast was an international hit, while the perfect start for the Panthers puts them in a unique club. Plus more Week 7, including explosions by Miami and Greg Hardy
by Peter King
Sunday was a historic day in the NFL, a little bit on the field, and a big bit off. On: Carolina’s 27-16 win over the Eagles means the NFL has five 6-0 teams simultaneously for the first time in league history—Carolina, Cincinnati, Denver, Green Bay and *** *******.
Off: Also for the first time since the NFL has been televising its product, a game was streamed live, free and exclusively on the internet. And though Buffalo-Jacksonville in London wasn’t a marquee game, it accomplished just what the NFL and Yahoo, the provider, had hoped. Yahoo announced that it had 15.6 million unique viewers and 33.6 million total live streams of the game; roughly 33% of that viewership came from outside the U.S.
“We’re a lot closer to the internet being a real, legitimate distribution platform for NFL games than we were one or two years ago,” NFL executive vice president of media Brian Rolapp told me late Sunday night. And there’s little doubt that, though the league treats its 256 regular-season games like home-TV gold, it’s likely to parcel out more than one game to an internet company in 2016.
That will make fans around the world happy. “The streaming quality was fantastic,” said Marcelo Fujimoto, a Cleveland-raised Browns fan who watched in São Paulo, Brazil. “It was like watching a game on TV.”
Vietnam checked in with praise. “It was better than I expected,” said Tyrone Carriaga, another football fan who watched in Ho Chi Minh City. “No freeze screen at all.”
* * *
The football folks we’ll be discussing today.
Greg Hardy. I think the sooner we realize that Hardy is a member of the Dallas Cowboys only and absolutely only because he is a very good defensive end with rare pass-rush skills, the better off we’ll be. Then we can ignore the Jerry Jones enabling and the incessant wagon-covering by the Cowboys for someone who is impossible to like, respect or admire.
The video put on air by Mike Florio at NBC on Sunday night, showing Hardy in a sideline conflagration with Dallas special-teams coach Rich Bisaccia—slapping the clipboard in the coach’s hand threateningly, causing the coach to shove Hardy and Hardy to get in his face—showed a player bordering on out of control.
I don't expect the Cowboys to cut Hardy. He plays too well. But it would be nice if, instead of saying things like what a great and fiery competitor he is, someone with the Cowboys would say: “If Hardy continues to act volcanic, he’s going to have to find somewhere else to play. If anyone will have him.”
Ryan Tannehill. Somehow, he got very short shrift Sunday. Very. Tannehill completed his first 18 throws, and he threw only 19. It was sort of heartbreaking to see what happened on the 19th. Midway through the fourth quarter in a rout of Houston, Tannehill threw a 10-yard out pass to backup tight end Dion Sims. It was high, but Sims raised one hand and the ball bounced off it. Had he put both hands up, who knows? But it was a catchable ball, for sure. So Tannehill finished 18 of 19 for 282 yards with four touchdowns (all in the first 16 minutes) and no interceptions.
Afterward I said to Tannehill it was a shame about that 19th throw. “What’s that?” he said. You know, I said, the fact that it ruined his perfect day. He acted as if it wasn’t a big deal, because of the way the day was game-planned. “We had a lot of respect for Houston’s pass rush,” Tannehill said, “so if you noticed how I was throwing, it was a lot of short stuff, trying to mitigate the pass rush. Really good game plan by Coach [Bill] Lazor. I felt like every pass I threw was under 20 yards in the air.” Let’s check the touchdown throws:
• On the 53-yard touchdown pass to Rishard Matthews, Tannehill threw it six yards beyond the line. Matthews made the two defensive backs clank into each other, and he was off for the score.
• On the 50-yard touchdown pass to Jarvis Landry, Tannehill’s throw met Landry 13 yards beyond the line.
• On the 10-yard touchdown pass to Landry, Tannehill’s throw, a crosser, hit him four yards past the line.
• And the 54-yard touchdown catch by running back Lamar Miller was on a screen pass. Miller caught the ball two yards behind the line and actually scooted 56 yards for the score.
• Average distance past the line for the four touchdown throws: 5.5 yards.
“It was wild,” Tannehill said. “For a few minutes it was like anything we did worked, and we scored.” Tannehill’s day, added to the final seven completions from his game last week in Tennessee, gave him the NFL record for consecutive completions—25, breaking the mark set by Donovan McNabb in 2004. Obviously, the coaching change in Miami is agreeing with Tannehill. He’s an 83.3 percent passer in the two games since Dan Campbell took over. “He wants us to play like we played as kids, with a love of the game,” Tannehill said. Well, something’s working.
Dan Campbell. Stop saying, “Who cares? He’s beaten Tennessee and Houston, and they stink.” The Joe Philbin Dolphins lost to Jacksonville. The Joe Philbin Dolphins lost to the Bills by 27. The Dan Campbell Dolphins won at Tennessee 38-10, and had a 41-0 halftime lead over Houston on Sunday. “Forty-one to nothing, at halftime,” Campbell said, incredulously. Part of my job at NBC on Sundays is to pay particularly close attention to the 1 p.m. ET games before production work for the Football Night show begins in earnest.
And the difference in the Dolphins has been startling. One sack in the first four games. Ten sacks in the two games since Campbell took over. Clearly the players are playing with more drive, more passion. If you don’t love what you’re doing, it’s going to show in your work, negatively. And it’s clear these players like playing for the new boss. He’s injected an energy into the team that any athlete needs in order to be really good. He’ll need to do it this week, especially. Miami’s got a short week of prep for the big, bad, 6-0 Patriots in Foxboro on Thursday night.
* * *
Stefon Diggs. For one of the catches of the year. Maybe the catch of the year. With the Vikes down 17-15 in the third quarter at Detroit, this emerging rookie star laid out at the goal line, caught a Teddy Bridgewater throw from 36 yards away with his fingertips, parallel to the ground, and kept control of the ball while slamming to the turf.
Folks, this ball is missed or dropped (understandably) 19 times out of 20. Diggs controlled it, and the Vikings took a 22-17 lead in a game they went on to win. The Vikes are 4-2 today with a huge assist from this fifth-round pick from Maryland, who finished with six catches for 108 yards—his second straight 100-yard receiving day.
Rex Ryan. The Bills had the fourth-best defense, statistically, in football last year, and Ryan said in the spring, “I know we’ll be better this year.” They’re 11th this morning. Players are grousing about roles. The quarterback who played Sunday, EJ Manuel, shows occasional flashes of good deep-ball throwing, but he cannot be saved.
The Bills had to dig out of a 27-3 hole against the Jaguars on Sunday, took the lead 31-27, and still lost, 34-31. Rex looked like his dog just died after the game. “Extremely painful loss,” he said. “To come all the way back, then to give it up at the end … a devastating loss, to say the least.”
Arian Foster. He’ll be 30 next summer when (if?) he tries to come back from another major injury—this one a torn Achilles suffered Sunday at Miami. It’s been a heck of a career. If this is it, and there’s no indication it is (though Foster is a worldly guy with money), he’d finish as the 72nd-leading rusher of all time, between Lydell Mitchell and Wendell Tyler.
And the former undrafted free agent got paid once, earning $36 million from the contract he signed in 2012 through the end of this year. Personally, I’ll remember going to dinner with him once in Houston before he’d hit it big and thinking this was one of the brightest players I’d ever met—and that if this magic-carpet ride he was on early in 2010 ever ended, he’d be fine. My thinking hasn’t changed.
Kawann Short. Two sacks last week in Seattle, and the NFC Defensive Player of the Week Award. On Sunday night, on the national stage again for Carolina, Short was better in the 27-16 win over the Eagles: eight tackles, a career-best three sacks, a pass deflection and a forced fumble. So where did this defensive tackle, the one drafted after the big Star (Lotulelei) in the 2013 draft, come from?
In GM David Gettleman’s first draft running the Panthers, he was criticized for taking defensive tackles with the first two picks—Lotulelei and then Short, from Purdue, who’d had questions about his work ethic and college production, and whether he could stay at a weight of near 310 so he could rush the passer. Playing now around 315, Short is quick enough to keep Russell Wilson in his sights, as he did last week, and stout enough to keep linemen off the talented Carolina linebackers.
“They demand double-teams,” Philadelphia coach Chip Kelly said of Short and Lotulelei before the game. Short is the one demanding more attention these days, and he’s proving that Gettleman was smart to eschew a receiver or cornerback early in that ’13 draft. When you can get quick big guys on the defensive front, Gettleman believes you never pass on them—and the pick of Short is proving him right.
* * *
“It’s not over. I promise you, it’s not over.”
—Injured Dallas wide receiver Dez Bryant. Dallas is 0-4 since losing Tony Romo to a broken left collarbone, and 1-4 since losing Bryant to a broken bone in his foot.
“All losses hurt. Some leave a deep scar. This is one of those.”
—Tampa Bay coach Lovie Smith. The Bucs blew a 24-0 lead at Washington and lost, 31-30.
* * *
OFFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE WEEK
Kirk Cousins, quarterback, Washington. With huge pressure on his shoulders after helping his team to a 24-0 deficit at home to the Bucs, Cousins came back with the best day of his career: 33 of 40, 317 yards, three touchdowns, no interceptions … and a six-yard touchdown pass to Jordan Reed to win it with 28 seconds left. “YOU LIKE THAT?!” Cousins screamed on his way into the locker room, presumably to the gathered press. Well, we thought it was a terrific play. And I guess you could say we liked it.
DEFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE WEEK
Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie, cornerback, New York Giants. There’s the Matt Cassel factor here—he threw interceptions on three straight series midway through the Giants’ 27-20 win over the Cowboys on Sunday in New Jersey—but credit Rodgers-Cromartie for being in the right place at the right time for two picks totaling 70 return yards and one touchdown. His 58-yard return on a early-third-quarter pick gave the Giants a 17-13 lead, and New York never trailed after that.
Michael Bennett, defensive end, Seattle. The San Francisco offensive line, which used to be good, got absolutely abused by the Seattle pass-rush Thursday night in the Seahawks’ 20-3 victory. The primary abuser was the man New England thought was Seattle’s best player entering Super Bowl 49, Bennett. He had 3.5 sacks Thursday night and appeared to thoroughly discombobulate Colin Kaepernick.
SPECIAL TEAMS PLAYER OF THE WEEK
Dwayne Harris, wide receiver/kick returner, New York Giants. Dallas 20, New York 20. Fourth quarter. Huge drive by Matt Cassel and company to tie it up. So what does Harris—signed by the Giants from Dallas in free agency last spring—do? He takes the kickoff at his goal line, gets two key blocks 18 and 22 yards downfield, and sprints past everyone for a 100-yard kick return. He couldn’t have picked a better time for his first touchdown as a Giants returner.
Pat McAfee, punter, Indianapolis. He capped the busiest day of his career—10 punts—with a fourth-quarter 45-yarder that pinned the Saints at their 1-yard line. Tough week for Colts special teams. Figure they could use such a prestigious award as this one: 10 punts, 51.7-yard average.
COACH OF THE WEEK
Bill Lazor, offensive coordinator, Miami. So, Lazor had to adapt to life without Joe Philbin as his boss—and he was close to Philbin and liked him a lot. Now Lazor is working for a man whom he once bossed around, former tight ends coach Dan Campbell. With Campbell as head coach/motivator, the team has played markedly better the past two weeks, and Lazor’s offense has been terrific. Miami’s offense put up 31 points and 503 yards against Tennessee in Week 6 and 37 points and 434 yards against Houston on Sunday. Afterward, Ryan Tannehill told me how comfortable he was with Lazor and the offense, and how much in a groove he felt Sunday.
GOAT OF THE WEEK
The Houston Texans. Just an awful performance, falling behind 41-0, being outgained at one point 275-0. Time to do the proverbial look-selves-in-mirror and the gut-check and, well, all the other clichés.
EJ Manuel, quarterback, Buffalo. I know. The Bills rallied, and came very close to winning the game in London. But Manuel put them in such a deep hole that it cannot be overlooked. Jacksonville didn't have a defensive touchdown in its first six games. On Sunday the Jags had two in five minutes, and both were courtesy of Manuel. In a pathetic display of quarterbacking, Manuel responded poorly to a corner blitz and was strip-sacked, the fumble recovered for a Jags touchdown. He followed that up with interceptions on the next two series, including one right into the arms of Telvin Smith, who returned it for a touchdown.
Great end zone view on the Yahoo stream, with Manuel staring the entire time at the spot he threw to, and Smith baiting and waiting. Easy pick. Buffalo’s worst nightmare—first when drafting Manuel in 2013, then when dealing Matt Cassel to Dallas for a 2017 fifth-round pick. Manuel had a couple lovely throws after his meltdown, but I wouldn’t trust him at all if I were Rex Ryan.
I think this is what I liked about Week 7:
Lamarcus Joyner’s excellent open-field tackle for the Rams, forcing a Cleveland punt.
*************************************************************************
http://mmqb.si.com/mmqb/2015/10/26/nfl-week-7-yahoo-live-stream-greg-hardy-miami-dolphins
Streams and Streaks: A Historic Sunday of Football
The NFL’s first live internet-only game broadcast was an international hit, while the perfect start for the Panthers puts them in a unique club. Plus more Week 7, including explosions by Miami and Greg Hardy
by Peter King
Sunday was a historic day in the NFL, a little bit on the field, and a big bit off. On: Carolina’s 27-16 win over the Eagles means the NFL has five 6-0 teams simultaneously for the first time in league history—Carolina, Cincinnati, Denver, Green Bay and *** *******.
Off: Also for the first time since the NFL has been televising its product, a game was streamed live, free and exclusively on the internet. And though Buffalo-Jacksonville in London wasn’t a marquee game, it accomplished just what the NFL and Yahoo, the provider, had hoped. Yahoo announced that it had 15.6 million unique viewers and 33.6 million total live streams of the game; roughly 33% of that viewership came from outside the U.S.
“We’re a lot closer to the internet being a real, legitimate distribution platform for NFL games than we were one or two years ago,” NFL executive vice president of media Brian Rolapp told me late Sunday night. And there’s little doubt that, though the league treats its 256 regular-season games like home-TV gold, it’s likely to parcel out more than one game to an internet company in 2016.
That will make fans around the world happy. “The streaming quality was fantastic,” said Marcelo Fujimoto, a Cleveland-raised Browns fan who watched in São Paulo, Brazil. “It was like watching a game on TV.”
Vietnam checked in with praise. “It was better than I expected,” said Tyrone Carriaga, another football fan who watched in Ho Chi Minh City. “No freeze screen at all.”
* * *
The football folks we’ll be discussing today.
Greg Hardy. I think the sooner we realize that Hardy is a member of the Dallas Cowboys only and absolutely only because he is a very good defensive end with rare pass-rush skills, the better off we’ll be. Then we can ignore the Jerry Jones enabling and the incessant wagon-covering by the Cowboys for someone who is impossible to like, respect or admire.
The video put on air by Mike Florio at NBC on Sunday night, showing Hardy in a sideline conflagration with Dallas special-teams coach Rich Bisaccia—slapping the clipboard in the coach’s hand threateningly, causing the coach to shove Hardy and Hardy to get in his face—showed a player bordering on out of control.
I don't expect the Cowboys to cut Hardy. He plays too well. But it would be nice if, instead of saying things like what a great and fiery competitor he is, someone with the Cowboys would say: “If Hardy continues to act volcanic, he’s going to have to find somewhere else to play. If anyone will have him.”
Ryan Tannehill. Somehow, he got very short shrift Sunday. Very. Tannehill completed his first 18 throws, and he threw only 19. It was sort of heartbreaking to see what happened on the 19th. Midway through the fourth quarter in a rout of Houston, Tannehill threw a 10-yard out pass to backup tight end Dion Sims. It was high, but Sims raised one hand and the ball bounced off it. Had he put both hands up, who knows? But it was a catchable ball, for sure. So Tannehill finished 18 of 19 for 282 yards with four touchdowns (all in the first 16 minutes) and no interceptions.
Afterward I said to Tannehill it was a shame about that 19th throw. “What’s that?” he said. You know, I said, the fact that it ruined his perfect day. He acted as if it wasn’t a big deal, because of the way the day was game-planned. “We had a lot of respect for Houston’s pass rush,” Tannehill said, “so if you noticed how I was throwing, it was a lot of short stuff, trying to mitigate the pass rush. Really good game plan by Coach [Bill] Lazor. I felt like every pass I threw was under 20 yards in the air.” Let’s check the touchdown throws:
• On the 53-yard touchdown pass to Rishard Matthews, Tannehill threw it six yards beyond the line. Matthews made the two defensive backs clank into each other, and he was off for the score.
• On the 50-yard touchdown pass to Jarvis Landry, Tannehill’s throw met Landry 13 yards beyond the line.
• On the 10-yard touchdown pass to Landry, Tannehill’s throw, a crosser, hit him four yards past the line.
• And the 54-yard touchdown catch by running back Lamar Miller was on a screen pass. Miller caught the ball two yards behind the line and actually scooted 56 yards for the score.
• Average distance past the line for the four touchdown throws: 5.5 yards.
“It was wild,” Tannehill said. “For a few minutes it was like anything we did worked, and we scored.” Tannehill’s day, added to the final seven completions from his game last week in Tennessee, gave him the NFL record for consecutive completions—25, breaking the mark set by Donovan McNabb in 2004. Obviously, the coaching change in Miami is agreeing with Tannehill. He’s an 83.3 percent passer in the two games since Dan Campbell took over. “He wants us to play like we played as kids, with a love of the game,” Tannehill said. Well, something’s working.
Dan Campbell. Stop saying, “Who cares? He’s beaten Tennessee and Houston, and they stink.” The Joe Philbin Dolphins lost to Jacksonville. The Joe Philbin Dolphins lost to the Bills by 27. The Dan Campbell Dolphins won at Tennessee 38-10, and had a 41-0 halftime lead over Houston on Sunday. “Forty-one to nothing, at halftime,” Campbell said, incredulously. Part of my job at NBC on Sundays is to pay particularly close attention to the 1 p.m. ET games before production work for the Football Night show begins in earnest.
And the difference in the Dolphins has been startling. One sack in the first four games. Ten sacks in the two games since Campbell took over. Clearly the players are playing with more drive, more passion. If you don’t love what you’re doing, it’s going to show in your work, negatively. And it’s clear these players like playing for the new boss. He’s injected an energy into the team that any athlete needs in order to be really good. He’ll need to do it this week, especially. Miami’s got a short week of prep for the big, bad, 6-0 Patriots in Foxboro on Thursday night.
* * *
Stefon Diggs. For one of the catches of the year. Maybe the catch of the year. With the Vikes down 17-15 in the third quarter at Detroit, this emerging rookie star laid out at the goal line, caught a Teddy Bridgewater throw from 36 yards away with his fingertips, parallel to the ground, and kept control of the ball while slamming to the turf.
Folks, this ball is missed or dropped (understandably) 19 times out of 20. Diggs controlled it, and the Vikings took a 22-17 lead in a game they went on to win. The Vikes are 4-2 today with a huge assist from this fifth-round pick from Maryland, who finished with six catches for 108 yards—his second straight 100-yard receiving day.
Rex Ryan. The Bills had the fourth-best defense, statistically, in football last year, and Ryan said in the spring, “I know we’ll be better this year.” They’re 11th this morning. Players are grousing about roles. The quarterback who played Sunday, EJ Manuel, shows occasional flashes of good deep-ball throwing, but he cannot be saved.
The Bills had to dig out of a 27-3 hole against the Jaguars on Sunday, took the lead 31-27, and still lost, 34-31. Rex looked like his dog just died after the game. “Extremely painful loss,” he said. “To come all the way back, then to give it up at the end … a devastating loss, to say the least.”
Arian Foster. He’ll be 30 next summer when (if?) he tries to come back from another major injury—this one a torn Achilles suffered Sunday at Miami. It’s been a heck of a career. If this is it, and there’s no indication it is (though Foster is a worldly guy with money), he’d finish as the 72nd-leading rusher of all time, between Lydell Mitchell and Wendell Tyler.
And the former undrafted free agent got paid once, earning $36 million from the contract he signed in 2012 through the end of this year. Personally, I’ll remember going to dinner with him once in Houston before he’d hit it big and thinking this was one of the brightest players I’d ever met—and that if this magic-carpet ride he was on early in 2010 ever ended, he’d be fine. My thinking hasn’t changed.
Kawann Short. Two sacks last week in Seattle, and the NFC Defensive Player of the Week Award. On Sunday night, on the national stage again for Carolina, Short was better in the 27-16 win over the Eagles: eight tackles, a career-best three sacks, a pass deflection and a forced fumble. So where did this defensive tackle, the one drafted after the big Star (Lotulelei) in the 2013 draft, come from?
In GM David Gettleman’s first draft running the Panthers, he was criticized for taking defensive tackles with the first two picks—Lotulelei and then Short, from Purdue, who’d had questions about his work ethic and college production, and whether he could stay at a weight of near 310 so he could rush the passer. Playing now around 315, Short is quick enough to keep Russell Wilson in his sights, as he did last week, and stout enough to keep linemen off the talented Carolina linebackers.
“They demand double-teams,” Philadelphia coach Chip Kelly said of Short and Lotulelei before the game. Short is the one demanding more attention these days, and he’s proving that Gettleman was smart to eschew a receiver or cornerback early in that ’13 draft. When you can get quick big guys on the defensive front, Gettleman believes you never pass on them—and the pick of Short is proving him right.
* * *
“It’s not over. I promise you, it’s not over.”
—Injured Dallas wide receiver Dez Bryant. Dallas is 0-4 since losing Tony Romo to a broken left collarbone, and 1-4 since losing Bryant to a broken bone in his foot.
“All losses hurt. Some leave a deep scar. This is one of those.”
—Tampa Bay coach Lovie Smith. The Bucs blew a 24-0 lead at Washington and lost, 31-30.
* * *
OFFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE WEEK
Kirk Cousins, quarterback, Washington. With huge pressure on his shoulders after helping his team to a 24-0 deficit at home to the Bucs, Cousins came back with the best day of his career: 33 of 40, 317 yards, three touchdowns, no interceptions … and a six-yard touchdown pass to Jordan Reed to win it with 28 seconds left. “YOU LIKE THAT?!” Cousins screamed on his way into the locker room, presumably to the gathered press. Well, we thought it was a terrific play. And I guess you could say we liked it.
DEFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE WEEK
Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie, cornerback, New York Giants. There’s the Matt Cassel factor here—he threw interceptions on three straight series midway through the Giants’ 27-20 win over the Cowboys on Sunday in New Jersey—but credit Rodgers-Cromartie for being in the right place at the right time for two picks totaling 70 return yards and one touchdown. His 58-yard return on a early-third-quarter pick gave the Giants a 17-13 lead, and New York never trailed after that.
Michael Bennett, defensive end, Seattle. The San Francisco offensive line, which used to be good, got absolutely abused by the Seattle pass-rush Thursday night in the Seahawks’ 20-3 victory. The primary abuser was the man New England thought was Seattle’s best player entering Super Bowl 49, Bennett. He had 3.5 sacks Thursday night and appeared to thoroughly discombobulate Colin Kaepernick.
SPECIAL TEAMS PLAYER OF THE WEEK
Dwayne Harris, wide receiver/kick returner, New York Giants. Dallas 20, New York 20. Fourth quarter. Huge drive by Matt Cassel and company to tie it up. So what does Harris—signed by the Giants from Dallas in free agency last spring—do? He takes the kickoff at his goal line, gets two key blocks 18 and 22 yards downfield, and sprints past everyone for a 100-yard kick return. He couldn’t have picked a better time for his first touchdown as a Giants returner.
Pat McAfee, punter, Indianapolis. He capped the busiest day of his career—10 punts—with a fourth-quarter 45-yarder that pinned the Saints at their 1-yard line. Tough week for Colts special teams. Figure they could use such a prestigious award as this one: 10 punts, 51.7-yard average.
COACH OF THE WEEK
Bill Lazor, offensive coordinator, Miami. So, Lazor had to adapt to life without Joe Philbin as his boss—and he was close to Philbin and liked him a lot. Now Lazor is working for a man whom he once bossed around, former tight ends coach Dan Campbell. With Campbell as head coach/motivator, the team has played markedly better the past two weeks, and Lazor’s offense has been terrific. Miami’s offense put up 31 points and 503 yards against Tennessee in Week 6 and 37 points and 434 yards against Houston on Sunday. Afterward, Ryan Tannehill told me how comfortable he was with Lazor and the offense, and how much in a groove he felt Sunday.
GOAT OF THE WEEK
The Houston Texans. Just an awful performance, falling behind 41-0, being outgained at one point 275-0. Time to do the proverbial look-selves-in-mirror and the gut-check and, well, all the other clichés.
EJ Manuel, quarterback, Buffalo. I know. The Bills rallied, and came very close to winning the game in London. But Manuel put them in such a deep hole that it cannot be overlooked. Jacksonville didn't have a defensive touchdown in its first six games. On Sunday the Jags had two in five minutes, and both were courtesy of Manuel. In a pathetic display of quarterbacking, Manuel responded poorly to a corner blitz and was strip-sacked, the fumble recovered for a Jags touchdown. He followed that up with interceptions on the next two series, including one right into the arms of Telvin Smith, who returned it for a touchdown.
Great end zone view on the Yahoo stream, with Manuel staring the entire time at the spot he threw to, and Smith baiting and waiting. Easy pick. Buffalo’s worst nightmare—first when drafting Manuel in 2013, then when dealing Matt Cassel to Dallas for a 2017 fifth-round pick. Manuel had a couple lovely throws after his meltdown, but I wouldn’t trust him at all if I were Rex Ryan.
