That wasn’t the best game, but it was nice to be watching football again. Like when those shrooms kick in, and you realize, “I’m back!”
I had Jared Goff (259 yards, 1 TD) going in the Steak League, and he passed the eye test for me. Made decent throws under pressure, looked like a professional NFL quarterback. The Lions could really use Jameson Williams though, assuming Williams isn’t just another version of Kadarius Toney (more on him below.)
Amon-Ra St. Brown (9-6-71-1) scored a TD, putting in jeopardy my prediction he’d be under six this year. But he almost got tackled inside the five yard line again! That’s just how it goes when you get all your chances on receptions five-yards from the end zone, and you have to run around or through 2-3 defenders to get in. Tyreek Hill, he is not.
Jahmyr Gibbs (7-42-0, 2-2-18) also passed the eye test. He looked quick, fast, explosive and balanced, shook off tackles, gained extra yards. But David Montgomery (21-74-1), who looked sluggish until the Lions took control of the game late, isn’t going anywhere. There’s a chance for the elusive Ingram-Kamara tandem everyone invokes whenever a team has this kind of setup, but that’s obviously the ceiling of ceilings. Still, despite the modest production, I got some FOMO on Gibbs while watching.
Patrick Mahomes (226 yards, two TDs, one INT, 45 rush yards) had a poor statistical game, but he played well. The pick-six was on a Toney drop, Mahomes led the team in rushing, and he was missing his only reliable target.
Toney (5-1-1-0, 1- -1-0) had a terrible game. He had two drops, the first of which resulted in the Lions’ pick six. And he got stuffed on a running play too. When Toney has the ball in space, the talent is obvious, but he was hurt yet again this preseason, and I’m dubious he’ll sustain anything in the NFL.
Skyy Moore (3-0-0-0, 1-4-0) didn’t make the catastrophic mistakes Toney did, but “Skyy” is an awfully ironic name for a 5-10 guy who can’t elevate six inches to catch a pass.
Rookie Rashee Rice (5-3-29-1) was the only receiver who showed a spark. Maybe he’ll emerge, but once Kelce gets back, the distribution of targets will change again.
Clyde Edwards-Helaire (6-22-0, 1-1-7-0) got the first few carries, and I got excited since I drafted him everywhere, but Isiah Pacheco (8-23-0, 4-4-31-0) got the bulk of the work anyway. Jerick McKinnon (who I started in the Steak League) barely played. I watched the 40-minute edited version, so maybe I missed him getting dinged up. Pacheco runs hard, but CEH looked roughly as competent. I’m glad to have a few shares from Round 15.
Dan Campbell showed serious balls, faking a punt deep in his own end on 4th-and-2 which led to the Lions first TD drive. When you play the Chiefs, you should be thinking possessions > field position, and the more outrageous the decision, the greater the element of surprise. (It was odd he punted the ball back to them on 4th-and-3 from the KC 40 in the third quarter. I suppose he didn’t want to fake it again, and the Chiefs had stacked up the run the entire game.)
Marvin Jones had his first career fumble, then followed it up with a couple drops. It’s amazing he’s been around since 2012.
I’m enraged to discover (just now) that even though I changed my Chiefs pick to the Lions in my home picking pool, I never hit “save”, and it registered as the Chiefs. It’s really fucking annoying, especially after I posted this on NOSTR to record the pick:
It’s the dumb-ass CBS sports interface (that we’ve only been using for 15 years) that has the “save” button all the way in the bottom right corner of the screen, and when viewing the site on a 13-inch laptop, you’d have to scroll to see it. So it lets you switch the pick, but it doesn’t go through unless you scroll and save.
Already my first unforced error of the year, and we’re not even at Sunday kickoff of Week 1.
