Drunken Ramblings: Week 11
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There was a small stretch at the beginning of this game that I thought Tom wouldn't throw an incomplete pass. My logical brain was saying calm down Johnny, he's obviously going to miss a few. But after he hit his 12th in a row I literally wanted Josh to call only WR screens or shovel passes the rest of the way. God knows we could have beaten this shit bag Raiders team without pushing the ball down the field, and it would have looked so freakin cool to see his final stat line say something like 42 of 42 for 300 yards and 3 tuddies.
Not that 30 of 37 was too far off. Tom was threading passes like he was Andrea Pirlo. BOOM you like that soccer reference? That's how locked in I am today. No down or distance scared me all night because I knew Tom could pick up yards at will. He knew the defense before every snap, which he made clear by playing charades with our receivers all night. I haven't seen hand communication that effective since last Saturday when I crushed my Planet of the Apes marathon. (The new ones, duh)
Plus he was looking agile AF back in the pocket. Side stepping rushers and buying time to allow our receivers to run past the blatantly winded Raiders DBs. But seriously Oakland, good call showing up to Mexico City the night before the game. I love how Tom is better on his feet now than when he was 25 if only for the potential of sentences like this. "You know, this new quarterback isn't a scrambler, but he can really move in the pocket. You have to respect his ability to extend plays with his feet. He's like a young Russel Wilson or an old Tom Brady."
We're you guys as torqued as I was watching The Chef yesterday?? How does 6 catches for 149 and a tuddy sound to you? Because it sounds a lot like Priapism to me. This is the type of shit I wanted for DinDin when we traded for him. I've kind of accepted he isn't a top 5 guy. I've said what I expect from him seemingly every week in this space. Obviously, he far exceeded that on Sunday. Not only did he have the deep tuddy but he he added another 50+ yard bomb to move us down the field. I gotta give Cookie credit because he flat out shows up on every play. And watching him catch that one up the right sideline in stride honestly made me feel like I did watching Moss catch that bomb in Week 1 of 2007 against the Jets. It was an 'our guy is better than your guy' moment and I hope I get a steady diet of those moving forward. We all know I'm getting fat as hell over the next month, so I'd rather fill up on Cookies.
I'm pretty stoked on the offense right now considering we are piling on points without Hoags and Money. Both of whom seem close to a return. Hoags should be back next week, and Money Mitch is sending out cryptic Instas.
Ts and Ps to the rest of the NFL indeed.
Martysaurus saw his snap count go up from 7 to 17 and he finished the game with 3 grabs for 15 yards. I know its not much, but I just love having three tight end sets out there that can we can turn into play action. You get a team to bite on those and they can turn into big plays real fast. Marty definitely looks hurt out there, which we know he is, so I don't mind easing him back into the game. Part of me wants to pull him completely til the playoffs. Tom already trusts him in huge spots. (See Bowl, The Super) and if he irreparably hurts his shoulder against the dumpster fire that is the rest of the AFC East I will be livid.
It was a sad, sad day for Sexy Rexy. Burk did the one thing you can't do on this football team, and that's fumble the football. Thank the old gods and the new that we jumped on that loose luggage, because it kept the opening tuddy drive alive. If that goes the other way that game could be 10-10 at halftime instead of the blowout it already was. Burk didn't get benched like we've seen in the past to Gilly, but his snaps were for sure down. He also had a drop on a screen pass that looked like it might go for 6. Coming off a monster game in Denver, Burk handed in a final product on Sunday that looked a lot like my Monday morning assignments at work. Yea I was there, and I tried pretty hard, but I spilled my coffee my keyboard so now the G key sticks, and I dribbled a little pee on the front of my slacks. Everyday can't be Friday, ya digggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg?
Speaking of big swinging dicks (were we??) how about the baby arm on Stevie G? I was so juiced for that 62 yarder. Even though I wanted the points badly, I still wanted the attempt to be longer. I wanted the record. And make no mistake, that thing was good from 70. Oh well, I'll take 4 for 4 all day. He's had a hiccup or two this year, but at this point I'm ready to declare his season last year the Tokyo Drift of the Fast Franchise.
Quick shout out to Dola, who's a warrior. He had 8 for 66 and a tuddy and was a MAN on basically every third down. Love him so much. He took a couple shots early in the game which makes me squirm like a youth sports mother, but he kept bouncing back. I was ready to eviscerate Gilmore for having to go to the locker room with cramps at one point until I saw the same thing happen to Dola. If something slows him down it would slow anyone down, and probably actually kill me.
On the Gilmore topic, I thought he played well again. His size everyone was talking about when we signed him is really coming to the forefront. And I'm not happy that he missed some time, but I was thrilled that the result was some Bad-boi sightings. I will admit he looked much worse yesterday than he did when he was getting spot starts. Way too much cushion IMHFO, but it was sure nice to see him out there again. Jonathan Jones had a ton of snaps since we were in nickel pretty much all night and I thought he competed well in the slot.
And Malcolm bounced back, like he always does. I was the first to shit on him after his debacle in Denver, but I thought he was awesome yesterday. Amari (who should be the best receiver alive but for some reason isn't) had nothing on him. I guess he did torch Malcolm a little on that tuddy. As Tony Romo pointed out, Malcolm had help inside and shouldn't have bit on the slant so hard, but for the rest of the night he was running Cooper's routes for him. When Gilmore and Malcolm are both going good, you can see why our secondary was considered one of the best in the league pre season.
The front seven was more up and down. Van Noy is a little cockroach man. Every week I cringe knowing he is going to play basically every snap at LB, and every week I watch him chase guys down sideline to sideline. I still refuse to admit he's good, but I'm willing to see his value. It's like when your boy gets a girlfriend. She stinks and I will never say otherwise, but sometimes she brings her friends out to the bars and it ain't all bad.
David Harris was a little worse than he has been. It wasn't horrible. And he was at 28 snaps. But he was outpaced (and outplayed) by Marquis Flowers. Huge props to Quis for that forced fumble at the goal line. 14-7 looks a lot different than 17-0. But I have been really into this "Harris gets better every week" thing we had been doing lately. This week felt like a small step back. I'll say it til I'm blue in the face. We are gonna need him to win this whole damn thing, so stay positive David. I've got your back covered, but I'd really appreciate you actually covering our opponent's back.
The Dline was worse. Adam Butler again led the team in snaps, which I find crazy. I love the story, and I think he's pretty good, but his size and speed lend himself to more of an interior pass rush guy. You can see him get pushed around a bit when he's forced to two gap and stop the run. I know we were in nickel, and enough complaining has been done already about Alan Branch not being better, but having Adam Butler and Lawrence Guy be your top two tackles isn't something I signed up for. Malcom Brown looks like he will definitely be back next week. That will be a huge help, one we really need.
Because the Raiders drive that ended in the fumble was hard to watch. They were running it right down our throat. Plays that looked like they should have been 3 yard losses were 7 yard gains. If the score didn't get so out of hand the Raiders wouldn't have had to go away from those plays, and it might have ended much differently. The other reason I need the Dline to be better is because I need Bill to think we are OK without Vincent Valentine. If the Dline needs a boost then VV will get the nod off of IR over Money Mitch. And if you want my opinion (you don't) then I'll take the red area threat.
The last thing I want to touch on is MY BOY Trey Flowers. Feel like we haven't had a big Trey sack in a while. I'm pretty sure he had half a sack last night, with four tackles, and a pass defended. Nothing eye popping in there. But he played 68 of 74 snaps on defense, and is at 91% of snaps on the season. With Marsh back but suuuuper limited (only 2 snaps) so much has been put on Trey and his mad dog counterpart Wise Jr. Not only has Trey been asked to do everything, but also he was asked to make a leap this year, and he did. If we didn't have him we would be SCREWED. So even if its not showing up on the stat sheet like some other edge rushers in this league, tip a little bit of your next Bud Light out for Trey, and then get a paper towel on that carpet asap because we can't afford a steam cleaner.
Hey Dwayne Allen, nice 25 snaps, 2 catches on 2 targets for 25 yards, and a clutch fumble recovery. I'll just go fuck myself.
