RealGM Wiretap
The AFC The Buddy Nix Brian Galliford of Buffalo Rumblings: "The Buffalo Bills signed quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick to what is effectively a seven-year, $62 million contract on October 28. The deal guaranteed Fitzpatrick $24 million -- $10 million of which has already been paid -- and will pay him $33 million in base salary in the first three years of the deal. When Fitzpatrick signed the contract, he was in the midst of putting together a career year." The Jeff Ireland Omar Kelly of The South Florida Sun-Sentinel: "Fred Jackson came into Sunday's game as the NFL's leading rusher, the talk of the league. Buffalo's leading rusher was on the doorstep of surpassing the 1,000 yard rushing threshold. But he'll have to wait another week." The Jonathan Kraft Richard Hill of Pats Pulpit: "And just like that ... the Patriots are back in the 1st Seed of the AFC." The Mike Tannenbaum Gang Green Nation: "The stats and progressions, as well as the problems and complaints, are remarkably similar for all 3 players through Year 3. Remember when David Carr was gonna be a star? Remember when Eli manning wasn't the answer? Made too many mistakes, had happy feet, was regressing, etc.?" The Ozzie Newsome Bruce Raffel of Baltimore Beat Down: "Baltimore rookie wide receiver Torrey Smith had six catches for 165 yards and a touchdown in the Ravens' 31-24 win over Cincinnati. Smith joins Ken Burrow (two in 1971) and Randy Moss (three in 1998) as the only rookies to have multiple games with at least 150 receiving yards and a touchdown catch since 1970." The Mike Brown Joe Reedy of The Cincinnati Enquirer: “The Calvin Johnson rule has caused heartache for many teams over the past two seasons. On Sunday, it was the Bengals' turn to be bitten by it. With 5 minutes, 43 seconds remaining in the game, Jermaine Gresham appeared to have a 9-yard touchdown catch from Andy Dalton to bring the Bengals within a field goal. Gresham beat Ravens cornerback Cary Williams in single coverage near the left sideline, caught it at the Ravens 3, bobbled it but hauled it in at the 1 as he crossed the plane.” The Tom Heckert Dawgs By Nature: “Our offense is bad. The good news is we were able to see some success between the 20s last week against a fairly poor Rams defense that only got worse with injuries during our game. Our weak point last week was easily red zone offense, as evidenced by four Phil Dawson field goals and zero touchdowns. Contrary to frustrated fan opinion, we did try to pass the ball in to the endzone on multiple occasions, we just couldn't execute.” The Kevin Colbert Scott Brown of The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review: “With injuries as much an unpleasant fact of life in the NFL as TV timeouts, the Steelers have needed players like Chris Hoke to embrace the designation that coach Mike Tomlin assigns to those on the 53-man roster: starters and starters-in-waiting.” The Rick Smith John McClain of The Houston Chronicle: “Bryant Johnson and kicker Neil Rackers played with Leinart at Arizona. Rackers kicked for the Cardinals during Leinart’s four seasons (2006-09). “We’re in good hands,” Rackers said. Because the Texans have the NFL’s third-ranked running game and top-ranked defense, Leinart isn’t being placed in a situation where he has to throw 40 times to win or has to try to win the game by himself.” The Chris Polian Nate Dunlevy of 18to88.com: “The 1997 Colts were the worst team in football. They lost the first 10 games of the year. The 1999 Colts were one of the best teams in football, winning 11 games in a row. What changed between 1997 and 1999? How did the Colts manage to turn over the whole roster to go from also-ran to contender in just two seasons? Surely, there must have been a major influx of talent that made the difference.” The Gene Smith Alfie Crow of Big Cat Country: “The Jacksonville Jaguars currently lead the Cleveland Browns 7-0, thanks to a long nice drive by Blaine Gabbert and Maurice Jones-Drew. Jones-Drew wound up punching the ball in for a touchdown on the drive, but decided to troll the city of Cleveland with his touchdown celebration by doing the LeBron James chalk toss.” The Mike Reinfeldt Hank Koebler IV of Music City Miracles: “Time to stop making excuses and pulling punches. Chris Johnson has been nothing short of god-awful this season. Yes, the offensive line has had issues with run-blocking, but it was an inconsistent run-blocking unit last season, too. Yes, he had a great game against the Panthers last week, but an old woman pushing a walker can get 100 yards against the Panthers’ defense.” The Brian Xanders Tim Lynch of Mile High Report: “Tim Tebow mania. Why not call it Broncomania? For that is what it is. The way Tim Tebow wins football games is the way Broncos have won most of their games in the past 30 years. Yes, this is nothing new to the seasoned Broncomaniac, because we've been here before.” The Scott Pioli Patrick Allen of Arrowhead Addict: “Tyler Palko has an up and down game. He did some things very well but also threw a few errant passes that led to three New England interceptions. It was obvious as the night went on that the Chiefs just didn’t have the talent to hang with the Patriots. The injuries have mounted up on the Chiefs and as they now fall to 4-6, their season is slowly starting to turn into one of evaluation.” The Al Davis Silver & Black Pride: “Michael Bush continued to run the ball and run himself into a nice paycheck from someone next year. DHB and Kevin Boss were heavily targeted for the first time in the Carson Palmer era and acquitted themselves well (save one DHB drop that brought back memories of the bad old days).” The Dean Spanos Steve Adler of Bolts From The Blue: “The Chargers traveled to the windy city in hopes of breaking a four game losing streak. As loses have piled up, the frustration of the fan base has increased. Coming into Sunday, I was having a hard time remembering a time when the fan base was so defeated.” The NFC The Stephen Jones The Landry Hat: “After another great game Sunday, where Romo went 23/37 292 yards and 3 TD’s and zero INT’s (for a 3rd straight game) as Dallas won 27 to 24 in OT, the case can easily be made that Tony Romo can claim the month of November for himself.” The Jerry Reese Ed Valentine of Big Blue View: “For the second consecutive week there was no fourth-quarter magic for the New York Giants. Instead, the Giants suffered a second straight disappointing loss Sunday night, falling to the Philadelphia Eagles, 17-10. The loss drops the Giants (6-4) into a first-place tie in the NFC East with the Dallas Cowboys. Most of the game was about offensive ineptitude for the Giants, who couldn't run the ball, couldn't catch it and couldn't seem to block anyone.” The Howie Roseman Bleeding Green Nation: “The Eagles have choked up five fourth quarter leads this season and as they headed into the final frame of this one, it looked as though it was going to happen again. Eli Manning led the Giants on a 5 play, 73 yard drive to tie the game at 10 all and it looked like the weekly collapse was on. But then, something pretty amazing happened.” The Bruce Allen Kevin Ewoldt of Hogs Heaven: “OK, so just when we've all but given up on the Redskins, they reel us back in with a first half lead, send the Cowboys to overtime....and find a way to lose.” The Jerry Angelo Steven Schweickert of Windy City Gridiron: “The running game really struggled early on, and while Matt Forte and Marion Barber started getting a few better carries in the fourth quarter, the Chargers really came to stop the run. Seemed like lots of times the linebackers and safeties were brought in to stop the run while the receivers got to work in one-on-one situations, which even this collection of receivers can work with.” The Martin Mayhew Sean Yuille of Pride of Detroit: “Things weren't looking good early on, but the Lions battled back to beat the Panthers by a score of 49-35. Detroit is now 7-3 and can guarantee its first .500 or better season since 2000 with one more victory in 2011.” The Mark Murphy Acme Packing Company: “Between first down run by Tim Masthay, the first missed field goal of the season by Mason Crosby, and the nearly botched onside kick by rookie D.J. Smith, it was a weird game. Randall Cobb also had a 55 yard punt return, so I guess I'd say overall it was a positive game.” The Mark Wilf Christopher Gates of Daily Norseman: “It would have really been pretty easy for the Minnesota Vikings to have folded up the tents at halftime of their game against the Oakland Raiders on Sunday afternoon. After all, they had just allowed two touchdowns in a very short span of time, they had allowed 24 unanswered points to the Raiders, and had watched their superstar offensive player get helped off of the field.” The Thomas Dimitroff Dave Choate of The Falcoholic: “It's never easy with this team, but sometimes it doesn't have to be. The Falcons played a terrific game on defense aside from a couple of hiccups and got fantastic offensive performances out of Matt Ryan, Michael Turner and Roddy White, among others. It was enough to propel them to a 23-17 win over the Tennessee Titans, who rallied furiously behind rookie quarterback Jake Locker but couldn't close it out.” The Marty Hurney Cat Scratch Reader: “Cam Newton looked like a rookie again. The run defense got tired and Matt Stafford lit up the Panther secondary. Yet in spite of giving up the lead they came back and tied the game with just 5 minutes remaining. I was thinking maybe we could hold on and force over time. Just the opposite happened and the Lions scored 14 more points to punch the Panthers in the gut and leave Detroit feeling worse about the loss than they should.” The Mickey Loomis Canal Street Chronicles: “With the break in Saints game action this week as a result of the bye, it makes an opportune time to take brief stock and see where the team is in relation to the 2010 squad, whose season was decent (11-5 and a playoff berth), but ended in Seattle on Wild Card Weekend in most disappointing fashion.” The Mark Dominik Bucs Nation: “In the end, the Buccaneers lost by nine points. And despite all that, this was probably the Bucs' best game of the year in terms of quality of play.” The Rod Graves Jess Root of Revenge of the Birds: “Larry Fitzgerald only had three catches, but with his first one, he passed 9000 career receiving yards, making him the third youngest in NFL history to reach that plateau. Milestones are always a positive, especially when it is a player that will have a bust in Canton one day.” The Billy Devaney Ryan Van Bibber of Turf Show Times: “The St. Louis Rams are officially a disaster. The fans who showed up at the Edward Jones Dome today to watch the game no doubt thought about that as they filed out, at the start of the fourth quarter with the Rams buried by an insurmountable 17-7 lead.” The Trent Baalke David Fucillo of Niners Nation: “The defense almost pitched a shutout, but let up a bit late and gave up an impressive touchdown pass to Larry Fitzgerald. Other than that, the defense put together a fairly ridiculous performance, forcing five turnovers and generally making the Cardinals offense look pretty awful.” The John Schneider Danny Kelly of Field Gulls: “The Seahawks started off with a bang on their first play from scrimmage with an end-around throw by Sidney Rice that went for 55-yards to Mike Williams. Tarvaris Jackson threw it two times after that and both times the St. Louis Rams caught those passes and that tells the story of the Seahawks offense in the first quarter. Seattle trailed 7-0 after the first frame.”
NFL Scoop: 32-Team Week 11 Reactions
The AFC The Buddy Nix Brian Galliford of Buffalo Rumblings: "The Buffalo Bills signed quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick to what is effectively a seven-year, $62 million contract on October 28. The deal guaranteed Fitzpatrick $24 million -- $10 million of which has already been paid -- and will pay him $33 million in base salary in the first three years of the deal. When Fitzpatrick signed the contract, he was in the midst of putting together a career year." The Jeff Ireland Omar Kelly of The South Florida Sun-Sentinel: "Fred Jackson came into Sunday's game as the NFL's leading rusher, the talk of the league. Buffalo's leading rusher was on the doorstep of surpassing the 1,000 yard rushing threshold. But he'll have to wait another week." The Jonathan Kraft Richard Hill of Pats Pulpit: "And just like that ... the Patriots are back in the 1st Seed of the AFC." The Mike Tannenbaum Gang Green Nation: "The stats and progressions, as well as the problems and complaints, are remarkably similar for all 3 players through Year 3. Remember when David Carr was gonna be a star? Remember when Eli manning wasn't the answer? Made too many mistakes, had happy feet, was regressing, etc.?" The Ozzie Newsome Bruce Raffel of Baltimore Beat Down: "Baltimore rookie wide receiver Torrey Smith had six catches for 165 yards and a touchdown in the Ravens' 31-24 win over Cincinnati. Smith joins Ken Burrow (two in 1971) and Randy Moss (three in 1998) as the only rookies to have multiple games with at least 150 receiving yards and a touchdown catch since 1970." The Mike Brown Joe Reedy of The Cincinnati Enquirer: “The Calvin Johnson rule has caused heartache for many teams over the past two seasons. On Sunday, it was the Bengals' turn to be bitten by it. With 5 minutes, 43 seconds remaining in the game, Jermaine Gresham appeared to have a 9-yard touchdown catch from Andy Dalton to bring the Bengals within a field goal. Gresham beat Ravens cornerback Cary Williams in single coverage near the left sideline, caught it at the Ravens 3, bobbled it but hauled it in at the 1 as he crossed the plane.” The Tom Heckert Dawgs By Nature: “Our offense is bad. The good news is we were able to see some success between the 20s last week against a fairly poor Rams defense that only got worse with injuries during our game. Our weak point last week was easily red zone offense, as evidenced by four Phil Dawson field goals and zero touchdowns. Contrary to frustrated fan opinion, we did try to pass the ball in to the endzone on multiple occasions, we just couldn't execute.” The Kevin Colbert Scott Brown of The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review: “With injuries as much an unpleasant fact of life in the NFL as TV timeouts, the Steelers have needed players like Chris Hoke to embrace the designation that coach Mike Tomlin assigns to those on the 53-man roster: starters and starters-in-waiting.” The Rick Smith John McClain of The Houston Chronicle: “Bryant Johnson and kicker Neil Rackers played with Leinart at Arizona. Rackers kicked for the Cardinals during Leinart’s four seasons (2006-09). “We’re in good hands,” Rackers said. Because the Texans have the NFL’s third-ranked running game and top-ranked defense, Leinart isn’t being placed in a situation where he has to throw 40 times to win or has to try to win the game by himself.” The Chris Polian Nate Dunlevy of 18to88.com: “The 1997 Colts were the worst team in football. They lost the first 10 games of the year. The 1999 Colts were one of the best teams in football, winning 11 games in a row. What changed between 1997 and 1999? How did the Colts manage to turn over the whole roster to go from also-ran to contender in just two seasons? Surely, there must have been a major influx of talent that made the difference.” The Gene Smith Alfie Crow of Big Cat Country: “The Jacksonville Jaguars currently lead the Cleveland Browns 7-0, thanks to a long nice drive by Blaine Gabbert and Maurice Jones-Drew. Jones-Drew wound up punching the ball in for a touchdown on the drive, but decided to troll the city of Cleveland with his touchdown celebration by doing the LeBron James chalk toss.” The Mike Reinfeldt Hank Koebler IV of Music City Miracles: “Time to stop making excuses and pulling punches. Chris Johnson has been nothing short of god-awful this season. Yes, the offensive line has had issues with run-blocking, but it was an inconsistent run-blocking unit last season, too. Yes, he had a great game against the Panthers last week, but an old woman pushing a walker can get 100 yards against the Panthers’ defense.” The Brian Xanders Tim Lynch of Mile High Report: “Tim Tebow mania. Why not call it Broncomania? For that is what it is. The way Tim Tebow wins football games is the way Broncos have won most of their games in the past 30 years. Yes, this is nothing new to the seasoned Broncomaniac, because we've been here before.” The Scott Pioli Patrick Allen of Arrowhead Addict: “Tyler Palko has an up and down game. He did some things very well but also threw a few errant passes that led to three New England interceptions. It was obvious as the night went on that the Chiefs just didn’t have the talent to hang with the Patriots. The injuries have mounted up on the Chiefs and as they now fall to 4-6, their season is slowly starting to turn into one of evaluation.” The Al Davis Silver & Black Pride: “Michael Bush continued to run the ball and run himself into a nice paycheck from someone next year. DHB and Kevin Boss were heavily targeted for the first time in the Carson Palmer era and acquitted themselves well (save one DHB drop that brought back memories of the bad old days).” The Dean Spanos Steve Adler of Bolts From The Blue: “The Chargers traveled to the windy city in hopes of breaking a four game losing streak. As loses have piled up, the frustration of the fan base has increased. Coming into Sunday, I was having a hard time remembering a time when the fan base was so defeated.” The NFC The Stephen Jones The Landry Hat: “After another great game Sunday, where Romo went 23/37 292 yards and 3 TD’s and zero INT’s (for a 3rd straight game) as Dallas won 27 to 24 in OT, the case can easily be made that Tony Romo can claim the month of November for himself.” The Jerry Reese Ed Valentine of Big Blue View: “For the second consecutive week there was no fourth-quarter magic for the New York Giants. Instead, the Giants suffered a second straight disappointing loss Sunday night, falling to the Philadelphia Eagles, 17-10. The loss drops the Giants (6-4) into a first-place tie in the NFC East with the Dallas Cowboys. Most of the game was about offensive ineptitude for the Giants, who couldn't run the ball, couldn't catch it and couldn't seem to block anyone.” The Howie Roseman Bleeding Green Nation: “The Eagles have choked up five fourth quarter leads this season and as they headed into the final frame of this one, it looked as though it was going to happen again. Eli Manning led the Giants on a 5 play, 73 yard drive to tie the game at 10 all and it looked like the weekly collapse was on. But then, something pretty amazing happened.” The Bruce Allen Kevin Ewoldt of Hogs Heaven: “OK, so just when we've all but given up on the Redskins, they reel us back in with a first half lead, send the Cowboys to overtime....and find a way to lose.” The Jerry Angelo Steven Schweickert of Windy City Gridiron: “The running game really struggled early on, and while Matt Forte and Marion Barber started getting a few better carries in the fourth quarter, the Chargers really came to stop the run. Seemed like lots of times the linebackers and safeties were brought in to stop the run while the receivers got to work in one-on-one situations, which even this collection of receivers can work with.” The Martin Mayhew Sean Yuille of Pride of Detroit: “Things weren't looking good early on, but the Lions battled back to beat the Panthers by a score of 49-35. Detroit is now 7-3 and can guarantee its first .500 or better season since 2000 with one more victory in 2011.” The Mark Murphy Acme Packing Company: “Between first down run by Tim Masthay, the first missed field goal of the season by Mason Crosby, and the nearly botched onside kick by rookie D.J. Smith, it was a weird game. Randall Cobb also had a 55 yard punt return, so I guess I'd say overall it was a positive game.” The Mark Wilf Christopher Gates of Daily Norseman: “It would have really been pretty easy for the Minnesota Vikings to have folded up the tents at halftime of their game against the Oakland Raiders on Sunday afternoon. After all, they had just allowed two touchdowns in a very short span of time, they had allowed 24 unanswered points to the Raiders, and had watched their superstar offensive player get helped off of the field.” The Thomas Dimitroff Dave Choate of The Falcoholic: “It's never easy with this team, but sometimes it doesn't have to be. The Falcons played a terrific game on defense aside from a couple of hiccups and got fantastic offensive performances out of Matt Ryan, Michael Turner and Roddy White, among others. It was enough to propel them to a 23-17 win over the Tennessee Titans, who rallied furiously behind rookie quarterback Jake Locker but couldn't close it out.” The Marty Hurney Cat Scratch Reader: “Cam Newton looked like a rookie again. The run defense got tired and Matt Stafford lit up the Panther secondary. Yet in spite of giving up the lead they came back and tied the game with just 5 minutes remaining. I was thinking maybe we could hold on and force over time. Just the opposite happened and the Lions scored 14 more points to punch the Panthers in the gut and leave Detroit feeling worse about the loss than they should.” The Mickey Loomis Canal Street Chronicles: “With the break in Saints game action this week as a result of the bye, it makes an opportune time to take brief stock and see where the team is in relation to the 2010 squad, whose season was decent (11-5 and a playoff berth), but ended in Seattle on Wild Card Weekend in most disappointing fashion.” The Mark Dominik Bucs Nation: “In the end, the Buccaneers lost by nine points. And despite all that, this was probably the Bucs' best game of the year in terms of quality of play.” The Rod Graves Jess Root of Revenge of the Birds: “Larry Fitzgerald only had three catches, but with his first one, he passed 9000 career receiving yards, making him the third youngest in NFL history to reach that plateau. Milestones are always a positive, especially when it is a player that will have a bust in Canton one day.” The Billy Devaney Ryan Van Bibber of Turf Show Times: “The St. Louis Rams are officially a disaster. The fans who showed up at the Edward Jones Dome today to watch the game no doubt thought about that as they filed out, at the start of the fourth quarter with the Rams buried by an insurmountable 17-7 lead.” The Trent Baalke David Fucillo of Niners Nation: “The defense almost pitched a shutout, but let up a bit late and gave up an impressive touchdown pass to Larry Fitzgerald. Other than that, the defense put together a fairly ridiculous performance, forcing five turnovers and generally making the Cardinals offense look pretty awful.” The John Schneider Danny Kelly of Field Gulls: “The Seahawks started off with a bang on their first play from scrimmage with an end-around throw by Sidney Rice that went for 55-yards to Mike Williams. Tarvaris Jackson threw it two times after that and both times the St. Louis Rams caught those passes and that tells the story of the Seahawks offense in the first quarter. Seattle trailed 7-0 after the first frame.”