We Don't Practice Fucked

We’re only two weeks into the NFL season, and already the biggest story of the year is injuries. Specifically injuries to quarterbacks, as several of the biggest names in the sport have gone down for varying periods of time.

It started even before the season, when injuries convinced Andrew Luck to retire rather than fighting through another rehab cycle, and it continued in Week 1 with Jacksonville’s big money addition Nick Foles suffering a broken clavicle. And it only got work this past week, as a pair of future Hall of Famers in Drew Brees and Ben Roethlisberger were lost with thumb and elbow injuries respectively. The Jets are actually down a pair, with Trevor Siemian out for the season with an ankle injury he suffered filling in for Sam Darnold after he contracted the plague. And now it sounds like Cam Newton will be out for some length of time after stressing a foot sprain last Thursday.

That is a lot of big names to go down for any position, but it is even more meaningful at quarterback. Some years ago Colts offensive coordinator Tom Moore was asked why Peyton Manning was getting all the reps in practice, to which he responded, “If 18 goes down, we’re fucked, and we don’t practice fucked.”

If you’re starting quarterback goes down, your season is basically over. Or that was the logic, until two years ago Foles came off the bench and won a Super Bowl for the Eagles. Now, we have to accept that things are a little less black and white than that.

Below I’ve ranked teams based on just how fucked they would be if their quarterback went down. This is a bit more involved than just a ranking of backup quarterbacks. It also takes into consideration how good the starter is, to measure how much is lost by a quarterback going down. And it looks at situation, particularly the team’s expectations and how this affects the goals of the season. Losing three wins is always bad, but it is much worse to drop from 11 wins to 8 wins than it is to fall from 5 to 2.

And yes, this is subjective as hell. So if you want to argue, feel free to contact me on any platform you can find.

Waiting in the Wings

“Fucked” might not be the best word for these teams. They clearly don’t have anything good at quarterback, but they have potential on the bench, waiting to take over.

New York Giants

Starter: Eli Manning

Backup: Daniel Jones

Okay, this first one is kind of cheating. Jones has already been promoted to starter, after Manning was dreadful enough through two games to finally bring his era to an end. But for now I’m still going to treat Manning as the starter, mostly to fit the Giants in with the next two teams. We all knew Manning was cooked before the year, and they gained nothing by sticking Jones on the bench. I’m not a believer that a quarterback can be “damaged” by playing too early, and I think they're making the right decision tossing Jones out there now to swim or sink as his talent dictates.

Washington Redskins

Starter: Case Keenum

Backup: Dwayne Haskins

Keenum has been fine the first two weeks of the season, which has allowed him to hold off calls for Haskins so far. But the Redskins sit at 0-2, and eventually fine won’t be enough to keep their first round pick on the sideline. Haskins is a lot more talented and more ready than Jones, and I expect him to have a good deal more success when he makes it onto the field.

Denver Broncos

Starter: Joe Flacco

Backup: Drew Lock

I’m not sure what the Broncos expected when they added Flacco, but they are certainly getting the Flacco experience. Through two games their offense is anemic, and the quarterback who was supposed to game-manage their strong defense to the playoffs hasn’t even been able to do that. The only thing keeping him on the field is the fact that Lock was a second round pick and really isn’t that good, probably not the real future of this franchise.

It Doesn’t Matter

These teams will make a quarterback change at some point this year. Not due to injury, just desperation. Most people won’t even notice.

Miami Dolphins

Starter: Ryan Fitzpatrick

Backup: Josh Rosen

In theory this could have gone in the group above. But the Dolphins clearly don’t see Rosen as their future, and even if he does have that potential, he’s not going to show it on a team that has been stripped for parts. Neither quarterback has a prayer of succeeding in Miami. Both will get their chance to be beaten into a bloody pulp before the season’s end.

Tennessee Titans

Starter: Marcus Mariota

Backup: Ryan Tannehill

The Titans are an irrelevant franchise, and if Mariota gets hurt I’m not sure anyone will even notice. Stylistically he and Tannehill don’t have that much in common, but they both exist in the hazy middle territory of “good enough you can’t bench them, not good enough for you to win with them”. The way they reach their ultimate 8-8 record may be different with Tannehill under center, but the end result would be the same.

Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Starter: Jameis Winston

Backup: Blaine Gabbert

Winston is still maddening, because it always looks like there is something there, right up until he throws the ball to the wrong team. At this point I think we’re probably past the point of hoping he’ll change, and we should prepare to see a Fitzpatrick-like career of bouncing around the league and flashing just long enough to give each new team hope before he returns to his normal erratic ways. Behind him sits Mariota’s backup from a year ago, a former top ten pick who has joined the shuffling chair game of bland backup quarterbacks drifting across the league.

Oakland Raiders

Starter: Derek Carr

Backup: Mike Glennon

Carr has been blessed his entire career with an excellent offensive line and a solid receiving corps. Glennon has not been able to say the same, as he’s bounced from Tampa Bay to Chicago to Arizona. He would cry tears of joy if he was able to start on this Raiders team, even though their supporting cast is a far cry from what it was two or three years ago.

Chicago Bears

Starter: Mitchell Trubisky

Backup: Chase Daniel

It has not been a pleasant start of the year for Trubisky, and already people in Chicago are on the verge of panic, wondering if they will once again watch an elite defense go absolutely nowhere thanks to mediocrity at the quarterback position. Trubisky still offers some upside, which is the only justification for continuing to play him over Daniel, a solid veteran with little on-field experience but who would provide some stabilizing presence for a team that needs only bare mediocrity from their offense to have a chance in every game.

Indianapolis Colts

Starter: Jacoby Brissett

Backup: Brian Hoyer

The Colts were devastated to lose Luck, but they’ve bounced back by becoming the league’s premier destination for former Patriots backups. If they lose one of these two options, they can always go out and sign Matt Cassel or Ryan Mallett, neither of whom has anything better to do at this moment.

Never Going Anywhere Anyway

These teams would suffer a drop in performance if their quarterback went down. But a drop in performance for a mediocre team just turns them into a bad team, and that doesn’t mean much in the grand scheme of things.

Jacksonville Jaguars

Starter: Nick Foles

Backup: Gardner Minshew

We’ve already seen what has come of this one, as Minshew has come in and played mostly okay in Foles’s absence. Of course, okay still has the Jaguars at 0-2, likely where they would be even with their big money starter. On paper this looks like a big gap—a hot free agent signing versus a sixth round rookie—but as we’ve come to see Minshew is better than people realize, and Foles is not nearly what he flashed at moments in Philadelphia.

New York Jets

Starter: Sam Darnold

Backup: Trevor Siemian/Luke Falk

Another one we’ve seen in action, for a team now down to their third option. Falk is less proven than Siemian and therefore more exciting, but he’ll quickly join the ranks of “nice to have around, as long as he never sees the field” quarterbacks around the league (see farther down the list). Of course, Darnold hasn’t showed very much special to this point in his career, and besides a few spark plays provided by his athleticism and arm strength, I’m not sure there’s that much to separate him from the less notable names down the depth chart.

Cincinnati Bengals

Starter: Andy Dalton

Backup: Ryan Finley

Finley isn’t good, but Dalton isn’t either. Which makes them a perfect fit for the rest of the talent in Cincinnati.

San Francisco 49ers

Starter: Jimmy Garoppolo

Backup: Nick Mullens

Garoppolo has been good this year, and the 49ers are 2-0. Of course those wins came over Tampa Bay and Cincinnati, but they were convincing enough to convince some people that Garoppolo is finally living up to years of hype. I’m going to have to see a little more, especially after Mullens put up not-bad numbers a year ago in this same offense. Kyle Shanahan remains one of the best play-designers in the league, and I don’t think this team would really miss a beat if they had to go to the backup again.

Detroit Lions

Starter: Matthew Stafford

Backup: David Blough

This is a grim dropoff on the depth chart. Fortunately, the Lions shouldn’t be concerned. After some injury concerns early in his career, Stafford has been one of the most reliable quarterbacks in the league for some time, at least when it comes to showing up healthy for the games. The actual quality of his play is another story, but with the Lions locked into his contract for another three seasons, they’ll have plenty of time to enjoy the fruits of Stafford’s inadequacy.

What the Hell Are These Teams?

Some quarterbacks are so ingrained in their offensive systems that it’s hard to know what the team would look like without them. In a vacuum the backups might not actually be that much worse than the starters, but removing the centerpiece of this offense could irreparably break the way they want to play the game.

Arizona Cardinals

Starter: Kyler Murray

Backup: Brett Hundley

We’re still getting a handle on just what Arizona’s offense will be. They’ve certainly moved the ball the first two games, with Murray contributing big plays both on the ground and in the air. And maybe Hundley, who is similarly mobile and accustomed to a quick passing attack, would be able to fill in. But everything Arizona is doing is built around the quarterback selected in the first round—imagine if they had tried that a year ago with Rosen—and even two games in it’s hard to imagine this offense with anyone other than Murray under center.

Buffalo Bills

Starter: Josh Allen

Backup: Matt Barkley

Allen was up and down his rookie year, but he’s off to a solid start in 2019. He still misses some throws, and he still makes some awful mistakes with turnovers, but his ability to stretch defenses down the field with his arm strength has helped Buffalo run out to a 2-0 record. Barkley brings none of the positives with all of the negatives, and an offense built around speed on the outside would suddenly have a lot less space to work with if anyone other than Allen was under center.

Baltimore Ravens

Starter: Lamar Jackson

Backup: Robert Griffin III

Baltimore’s offense is like no one else’s in the league, and we really haven’t seen everything they have in store yet. Jackson has been lights out attacking vertically over the first two weeks, but a large part of that has been because teams are still terrified of what he is capable of on the ground. If there’s a quarterback in the league who can slide into the same sort of system, it’s Griffin, but his mobility hasn’t been the same since the injuries he suffered in his Washington days, and even then he was never as dynamic on the ground as Jackson. Losing their starting quarterback would force the Ravens to adopt a more traditional scheme, which would be devastating for a team that needs this edge to make up for their lack of offensive talent.

Cleveland Browns

Starter: Baker Mayfield

Backup: Garrett Gilbert

Things have been a bit rocky for Cleveland’s offense over their first two games. On the one hand, Mayfield has looked downright bad at times, making crucial mistakes and missing open opportunities down the field. But a large part of their struggles have been schematic as well, and they’ve counted on Mayfield to bail them out with his improvisational skills and aggressive accuracy down the field.

Carolina Panthers

Starter: Cam Newton

Backup: Kyle Allen

I guess we’ll get a chance to see how this goes starting this weekend. A healthy Newton is really a one of a kind player, with the ability to pound defenses on the ground to go along with a cannon of an arm that fires balls into windows other offenses could only dream of hitting. But Newton hasn’t been healthy for a while, and he is so reliant on his physical tools to succeed that a few nicks are far more devastating to him than most other quarterbacks.

The Value of Basic Competence

The ranking of these teams says more about their backups than it does about their starters.

Minnesota Vikings

Starter: Kirk Cousins

Backup: Sean Mannion

Cousins was atrocious on Sunday and more or less single-handedly cost the Vikings the game against Green Bay. With one of the most loaded rosters in the league, they really just need him to complete about half of his passes and not throw monumentally stupid interceptions in the red zone. And he can do that! Sometimes. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said about Mannion, who was named the backup despite being thoroughly outplayed by Kyle Sloter during the preseason, largely because Mike Zimmer values the backup quarterback more for what he does off the field than what he could theoretically do on it.

Los Angeles Rams

Starter: Jared Goff

Backup: Blake Bortles

Goff is pretty good, and at times he flashes spectacular. But Sean McVay’s scheme still does a lot of the heavy lifting, and it’s reasonable to wonder what a lesser quarterback could do in that system. As long as they make basic reads, throw accurate passes, and avoid crippling mistakes, everything will go fine. Unfortunately, despite all the experience Bortles has, none of those things were really ever strengths of his.

Dallas Cowboys

Starter: Dak Prescott

Backup: Cooper Rush

I don’t know who Cooper Rush is. I just know that no one wants to see him play quarterback for the Cowboys. Prescott has turned it on early in the season, raising hopes that the Cowboys can make a deeper playoff run this year. But they made the Divisional Round a year ago with total blandness from their offense, and if they had a more experienced backup, I think they would be fine even if Prescott did go down.

Keeping their Head Above Water

These teams have Super Bowl aspirations. Those will go away if they lose their starter long term, but they have a good option on the bench, someone who can fill in for a few games to keep them from bottoming out.

Los Angeles Chargers

Starter: Philip Rivers

Backup: Tyrod Taylor

The Chargers have always done a pretty decent job of finding solid backup quarterbacks, going back to the days of Billy Volek and Charlie Whitehurst. They’ve done it again with Taylor, an experienced starter who led a team to the playoffs just two years ago and could very easily do so again if given the chance with the Chargers roster. Any sort of playoff run is too much to ask of him, but if Rivers has to miss three or four games down the stretch of the regular season, the Chargers will likely be mostly fine.

New Orleans Saints

Starter: Drew Brees

Backup: Teddy Bridgewater

I’m not going to pretend to be impartial here. I love Bridgewater, I think he deserves a chance to be a starter, and I want nothing more than for him to prosper during Brees’s absence. That said, he has looked a little shaky during his limited time on the field since his injury, and he certainly is not Brees. But he has the most upside of any backup in the league, and with a talented cast in New Orleans they can certainly win with him under center.

Seattle Seahawks

Starter: Russell Wilson

Backup: Geno Smith

Smith is no Bridgewater, but as far as backups go he is a pretty damn good option. He has a lot of starting experience, and Seattle’s offense is built in a way that they can easily lighten the load on the quarterback. Wilson makes a lot of spectacular plays outside of structure, but they don’t ask that much of him within the normal flow of things. They would lose a lot of explosiveness with Smith, but they would still be functional on offense.

He’s Still in the League?

Some backup quarterbacks are kept around more as additional coaches than genuine options. No one wants them to see the field. Not us, and certainly not them.

Houston Texans

Starter: Deshaun Watson

Backup: AJ McCarron

Watson plays with an aggressive style behind a terrible offensive line, and I would honestly be shocked if he made it through the entire season without suffering an injury for a second year in a row. I have a feeling that sooner or later we will see McCarron, hopefully just in spot duty but quite possibly for a longer duration.

Philadelphia Eagles

Starter: Carson Wentz

Backup: Josh McCown

An injury to Nate Sudfeld during the preseason forced the Eagles to pull McCown out of retirement, making this the ninth team in his long journey through the NFL. He even briefly made an appearance in a game this past Sunday, which came as a shock to most viewers and I’m sure wasn’t a particularly pleasant moment for him. He’s 40 years old, he has a knack for making coaches fall in love with him, and I’m sure he provides value in meeting rooms during the week. But no one wants to watch him play football.

Atlanta Falcons

Starter: Matt Ryan

Backup: Matt Schaub

Schaub is still in the league! It’s true! Sneaking someone like him into this post is exactly the kind of joke I would pull, but I am not making this up. This is his fourth year in Atlanta, and his sixth year since the last time he was a regular starter for Houston (he did start two games for Baltimore in 2015, but I’d wager not even the most die-hard Ravens fan remembers that). Outside of those two games he’s thrown 20 passes since 2013. If he can avoid expanding on that number this year, then everyone will be happy.

Kansas City Chiefs

Starter: Pat Mahomes

Backup: Matt Moore

This is actually kind of a weird one to break down. On the one hand, Andy Reid is the most brilliant offensive mind in the league, and I firmly believe he can make any quarterback at least league average, even someone who wasn’t in the league last year. On the other hand, Mahomes is genuinely one of a kind, and the impact he has on this offense couldn’t even be replicated by any of the other 31 starters. In this case, I’ll lean towards the talent on the field over that on the sidelines and say that losing their starting quarterback would be devastating to Kansas City’s season, though not as much as these last three teams.

Fucked

These teams came into the year with Super Bowl hopes. If they lose their quarterback, they probably aren’t even playoff contenders.

Pittsburgh Steelers

Starter: Ben Roethlisberger

Backup: Mason Rudolph

We start in Pittsburgh, where the worst case scenario has been realized. They are 0-2, Roethlisberger is done for the season, and they just traded away their first round pick, so they can’t even hope to bottom out. Rudolph has some potential, but he was shaky in his first appearance last week. Any hopes of making the playoffs for this team are likely gone, and the window provided by the aging Roethlisberger is very nearly shut.

New England Patriots

Starter: Tom Brady

Backup: Jarrett Stidham

The Patriots reportedly really like Stidham, and he impressed during training camp and the preseason. But a year ago he was floundering to a disappointing finish at Auburn, and for a team that is Super Bowl favorites, nothing could be more devastating than losing their future Hall of Fame quarterback. I’m sure that in a couple years they’ll find a way to trade Stidham for way more than he’s worth, but right now this spot may be the most glaring weakness on their roster, a lack of depth at the most important position that could end their season.

Green Bay Packers

Starter: Aaron Rodgers

Backup: Tim Boyle

In five years of college football across two different schools, Boyle completed 56% of his passes at 5.6 yards per attempt and threw 12 touchdowns against 26 interceptions.

Week One Bullshit Index

Week One is in the books, and it’s only increased my appetite for the sixteen regular season weeks still to come. We saw some great games (Saints-Texans), some ugly games (Packers-Bears), some massacres (Ravens-Dolphins), and some things that really can’t be categorized (Lions-Cardinals).

After months breaking down these rosters as they stacked up on paper, we finally have some game action to look at. But of course, we can’t just throw out everything we thought before this weekend. Some of the things we saw is evidence of trends that will continue deep into the season. Others are just momentary flashes that we’ll have completely forgotten by the time that teams that looked so promising in the opening week are floundering their way to a 6-10 finish.

In the past I’ve broken down these opening weekend trends by giving them a score from 1-10 based on how likely I think they are to stick around. But I’ve since realized that this it he coward’s way out. So this year I’m only splitting things into two categories: Real or Bullshit.

I don’t think I have to explain what each means.

Mitchell Trubisky is going to sink the Bears

On one half of the field, the Bears did everything they could have hoped for in their opening game. They harassed Aaron Rodgers nonstop, and they held the Packers to only 10 points in their first game under new head coach Matt LeFlour. Hell, we can even throw special teams in there, as they made it through a game without missing a kick.

Unfortunately, they didn’t really get many chances to send their new kicker out there, thanks to the putrid offensive performance led by Trubisky. He made real progress from his first to his second year, but if he has a similar step ahead of him in year three, it didn’t show up on Thursday. And he could very easily turn it around next week, and then come out and fall to pieces in week three again. That’s the kind of quarterback he’s been. Last year it worked out because their defense consistently generated turnovers and points off those turnovers, in a way we can’t expect to repeat this season. The first game was a sign of what happens if Trubisky is off and their defense is merely great rather than transcendent.

Verdict: Real

The Ravens have their offense figured out

We know the deal with the Dolphins. Their roster is garbage, and they aren’t trying to win. That said, what Baltimore did to them was completely unexpected. After a season where they made the playoffs powered by their defense and an extremely run heavy offense, they came out on Sunday and showed that not only can they win by throwing the ball, they can light up the scoreboard.

Their philosophy this offseason was to add as much speed as possible to their offense, and it showed up against Miami. The biggest contributor was first round pick Marquise Brown, who produced two huge touchdowns in limited action. As the Dolphins packed the front to try to slow down the rushing game, Lamar Jackson lit them up over the top.

Not every team is as inept as Miami, and defenses will find new ways to counteract their offensive evolution. But there are limitations to what they can do. With Jackson as a threat to tear defenses apart with his legs, teams have to bring an extra man into the box or risk being outmanned. But if they bring that guy into the box, that leaves them vulnerable over the top. The Ravens can prosper with this style long term, chewing teams apart with small chunks in the running game and then exploding a couple times each game over the top.

Verdict: Real

The Vikings have fixed their offense

Minnesota disappointed last year largely due to the failure of their offense. Offensive Coordinator John DeFilippo didn’t make it to the end of the year, as Mike Zimmer was frustrated by their inability to establish any sort of running game. And this offseason they basically threw everything they had at building that part of their offense. They brought in Gary Kubiak as a consultant to develop their zone rushing attack, and they spent their first four draft picks on that phase of the game (counting Irv Smith, a versatile blocker that allows them to play more multiple tight end sets).

And in the first game, it paid off big time. The Vikings put up 172 yards on the ground, and they only attempted ten passes the entire game, as they got off to an early lead and were able to coast the rest of the way. Kirk Cousins looked perfectly proficient throwing the ball, but he really didn’t have to, as they were able to pick up first downs with repeated handoffs to Dalvin Cook.

That said, I’m not convinced that this is the sort of thing that will recur. Their offensive line looked dominant on some plays when they were able to seal the outside edge, but they were beaten badly on others, usually by Grady Jarrett coming up the middle. Even when Cousins completed passes, he was under a lot of pressure. There are still problems with this line, and they will flare up down the road, in games where the Vikings aren’t fortunate with takeaways and a blocked punt to get out to an early lead.

Verdict: Bullshit

Cleveland doesn’t have it figured out yet

Expectations were high for Cleveland coming into this season, as high as they have been since the team came back in 1999. And yet, for the fifteenth year in a row, the Browns started the year off with a loss, an embarrassing 30 point thrashing at the hands of the Titans. It won’t always be that bad going forward—they had an absurd 18 penalties, and even though all three of Baker Mayfield’s interceptions were definitely his fault, he isn’t going to make that many mistakes in games going forward.

At the same time, this game has to kill most of the optimism around this team this season. The hype for them was out of control, and we had to know there would be some bumps like this along the road. They have a first time head coach, and a brand new defensive scheme. They did a good job adding veteran talent, but they are still relying on young players at a lot of positions. And their offensive line was an even bigger disaster than we expected on Sunday, making Mayfield look frantic and uncomfortable pretty much from start to finish. They aren’t the same old Cleveland Browns, but they’re closer to that than to the Super Bowl contenders some people seemed to think they were, and they showed it in their opening game.

Verdict: Real

Patrick Mahomes is not going to regress

Mahomes had the greatest debut season in NFL history. He threw for 5097 yards and 50 touchdowns en route to winning MVP. And the only question for 2019 was what he could possibly do for an encore. Some regression seemed inevitable. Quarterbacks who have thrown for over five thousand yards in the past followed it up with an average of 4741 yards, and quarterbacks with 45 or more touchdowns averaged only 34.5 the next year. Simple history suggested that while Mahomes might be great again this year, he won’t be as great as he was a year ago.

And after his first game he’s on pace for…6048 yards and 48 touchdowns. So yeah, not really. And it didn’t come against some Miami level defense either. It came against Jacksonville, with arguably the best cornerback duo in the league. And with Tyreek Hill missing a big chunk of the game. At this point, I don’t think I can bet against Mahomes any longer. Putting up back to back 50 TD seasons is pretty much impossible, but Mahomes has made a habit of doing the impossible.

Verdict: Real

Gardner Minshew is the savior in Jacksonville

I don’t know if anyone really expected Nick Foles to turn things around when he signed in Jacksonville, but he was expected to at least be an upgrade over Blake Bortles. And he was, right up until he suffered a fractured clavicle that will keep him out until at least November. And it seemed like the Jaguars were in for another season of dreadful quarterback performance.

Then rookie Gardner Minshew came in, and he was pretty damn good. Obviously he couldn’t actually bring them back against Kansas City, but his numbers certainly raised a few eyebrows. He completed 22 of 25 passes for 275 yards, showing the ability both to get the ball out of his hands quick and on target and to hit big shots down the field.

It seems a little ridiculous that a sixth round rookie could be a major difference maker, and my title above was a bit tongue in cheek. But for those who don’t know anything about Minshew, let me tell you that you shouldn’t count him out on anything. His college career was a journey, starting at Northwest Mississippi Community College, then to East Carolina, and ending at Washington State as a grad-transfer (his other option was to be a backup at Alabama, with the intention of transitioning from there into coaching). Instead he earned the starting job under Mike Leach and turned that into a fifth place Heisman finish. He’s an old fashioned gun-slinger in both style and look, and even if he doesn’t succeed as an NFL quarterback, he’s certainly a fun story to tell.

Verdict: Bullshit, but fun bullshit

The Steelers are lost without Le’Veon Bell and Antonio Brown

Okay, let’s address the first part of this: Bell should not be included in this discussion. He didn’t play a single snap for the Steelers all of last year, and their offense was just fine without him. The only real loss that Pittsburgh suffered was Brown, and that appeared to be a major issue on Sunday.

JuJu Smith-Schuster has been tremendously productive over the past two years, but for the first time in his career he is the primary receiving threat on an offense, and against New England he struggled to fill that role. He finished with six receptions for 76 yards—not a bad day statistically, though a good chunk of that came after the game was out of reach. More troubling were Pittsburgh’s other receivers. Donte Moncrief led the team in targets but struggled to catch the ball, while Vance McDonald and James Washington combined for four receptions. Pittsburgh’s passing attack looked completely toothless, and their offense only managed a single sad field goal.

It's reasonable to be concerned, but I’m not writing this offense off just yet. Smith-Schuster has been productive when Brown was out in the past, and they will have much easier matchups ahead of them than they had against the Patriots. They still need to find alternative options at wide receiver, as by now it should be clear that Moncrief can’t cut it in the NFL. But they have some young options at wide receiver, and they can develop as the year goes along to give the Steelers at least some semblance of the passing attack they had when Brown was around.

Verdict: Bullshit

The Patriots are going to be unstoppable once they add Brown to their offense

(I wrote this before the rape lawsuit surfaced against Brown on Tuesday. I don’t know if this will affect his long term availability, but if he does join the team, the analysis below remains the same.)

On the other side, Brown’s new team cut through his old one like they didn’t have a defense out there. Tom Brady was barely bothered all night as he distributed the ball across the field, hitting deep shots to Josh Gordon and Phillip Dorsett to go along with his normal brutal efficiency underneath. Add in the league’s best route runner who presents matchup problems at every level of the defense, and what can opposing defenses hope to do to stop the Patriots?

There may be some mitigating arguments. Pittsburgh is notoriously bad against New England, especially with their current defensive coordinator who seems to have a fascination with asking linebackers to cover receivers in the slot. And the Patriots are always extra difficult when Bill Belichick is given extra time to prepare. Plus, we have no idea how Brown in New England will work out. Maybe his improvisational style won’t mesh with the demanding and precise Brady, a quarterback who hasn’t always had the best relationships with his star receivers.

But if it does work, then yeah, it isn’t a good thing for the rest of the league. Before this addition the book on the Patriots was that they were the clear favorites in the AFC, but that there might be teams in the NFC who could handle them thanks to the weakness of their offensive weapons. Since then they went out and added one of the top ten receivers of all time, and it’s hard not to call them the clear favorites to repeat as Super Bowl champs.

Verdict: Real