This week in football feels really weird, doesn't it? It's just sort of a sidebar on one of the most utterly insane weeks in American politics. With all the hoopla leading up to November 8 and the shocking result, it just seems like this weekend was more about recovering from the "historic election" we just endured.
And the election truly was historic - America just elected its first Oompa-Loompa President. Big ups for that minority group, but not so much for, you know, all the non-fictional ones. And that's all I have to say about that because if I say any more about it, I will get to experience first hand the "political discourse" of the 21st century. Which, thanks to Facebook, Reddit, et al. is now a bunch of people shrieking in caps lock about who lied, who cheated, and who had people murdered to cover up the lying and cheating. On a totally unrelated note: How good are you at receiving televised NFL games, any of the Scandinavian countries?
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It's Monday Morning... What Just Happened
Anyway, the NFL celebrated being out from under the election's thumb by having undoubtedly its best game of the season this week - Cowboys/Steelers had everything NFL fans could ask for. Exciting young stars, down-to-the-wire action and a complete lack of touchdown celebrations that would violate Victorian-era social taboos produced the strongest product the NFL has seen in weeks. Of course, this being the NFL, they also had the Rams and Jets play each other and that game went exactly how you're envisioning it in your head, so it all sort of evened out to "meh." Maybe next week, the NFL.
The AFC South had a predictably putrid intra-division game...
It's lucky for the Texans and Jaguars that the Rams and Jets played the worst game of football this weekend (and decade [and century]), because it allowed this shitstorm to go mostly unnoticed. The Texans had 99 yards of total passing offense in the game - and won, 24-21. Their $72 million quarterback threw to DeAndre Hopkins 13 times, but Hopkins only managed 5 receptions for 48 yards.
And then of course you have the losing team. Blake Bortles once again reclaimed his title as King of Garbage Time, saving the fantasy day for Allen Robinson owners by hitting Robinson in the end zone with 2:17 left to play while down 11. Aside from that, the Jaguars were yet again a graveyard from both fantasy and real-life football perspectives. Just remember that this team was a trendy deep sleeper playoff pick because they got Jalen Ramsey when the Cowboys reached for Ezekiel Elliott. More on that later.
...but the Titans saved the day for their division.
The Titans continued their quiet playoff push by beating Green Bay 47-25, which is definitely confusing. I mean, I understand why it's happening - Marcus Mariota and DeMarco Murray have been resurgent after somewhat disappointing 2015 campaigns, and their defense has been noticeably more competent than it was last year, but still. They're coached by a guy who described his offense as "Exotic Smashmouth," which is not only 100% oxymoronic, but also sounds more like how some awful college freshman with a Hawaiian shirt would describe his fusion band's cover of "All Star." Which is now stuck in your head. Sucks to be you, I guess.
The Seahawks stonewalled the Patriots four times at the goal line with 11 seconds left in the game.
And I'm sure that the meaningless regular-season goal line stand has healed the pain from losing the Super Bowl at the goal line two years ago.
Seahawks fans who are now in pain should know that I thought about passing on that joke, but I ultimately decided that I should just run with it.
The 49ers and Browns continued their campaigns to draft...someone.
Both the 49ers and the Browns are terrible this season and are in desperate need of franchise quarterbacks. However, as it has in seemingly every year since Andrew Luck and Robert Griffin III were drafted, the luster has come off the quarterback class of 2017, and it may be the worst in modern history, and to be honest I would rather draft an actual tiger to play quarterback than Deshaun Watson of the Clemson Tigers, yadda yadda yadda. Maybe if the NCAA just accepted its role as a free farm system for the NFL and turned out 6'4" pocket passers who moved at approximately the uphill travel speed of molasses, teams wouldn't have this problem. What a bunch of assholes.
The Cowboys-Steelers game though
I'm trying to think of things in this world that I love more than Ezekiel Elliott, and I do not anticipate success. Zeke is on pace to break the rookie rushing record, he had an 83-yard touchdown reception in which he did absolutely filthy things to the Steelers' secondary while moving at top speed, and the 2015 Sugar Bowl is what I think of whenever someone asks the question "what was the best day of your life?"
Then, of course, someone tells me that I have said things just like this about Antonio Brown, and he was in this game too, and he did more Antonio Brown things, and for just a moment after a fake spike TD in the fourth quarter of an absolute dogfight between the league's two premier franchises, everything was pretty much perfect and the nation began to heal.
Then someone posted a Trump meme on Facebook, someone else posted a long-ass tirade about Crooked Hillary, and we all went right back to hell. Fuck politics.