CHAOS REPORT WEEK 10: Dobbs Is Fitzmagic 2.0
THE WEEK IN CHAOS
Ryan Fitzpatrick was a chaos superstar in the league. A singularly weird player with a distinctive career and vibe. A guy who went to Harvard, balled his ass off as a dumbass gunslinger for half the league, and charmed us all in the process. It was hard not to root for Fitzmagic. When he retired, he left a void that I wasn’t sure would ever be filled. It is filled. The Fitzpatrick Energy is now flowing within our bald ballista, the Passtronaut. I didn’t see the parallels before, but I do now. Mercenary backup caliber QB? Check. Goes so much harder than he has to? Check. Is uncharacteristically smart as hell? Check! Dobbs has a degree in rocket science. He interned at NASA. That’s going to be the new “he went to Harvard”. He even has his own signature hair situation! In Dobbs’ case it’s Alopecia, so kinda the exact opposite of Fitzy’s beard, but still, his follicles are a signature trait!
Like Fitz, Dobbs wasn’t great out there on Sunday, but he had his moments. It was enough to carry the Vikings to a 5th straight win, and brought them into genuine playoff consideration. The man is getting a chance and we should all appreciate him. I don’t expect him to remain a Viking at season’s end but I do expect him to get a decent backup contract somewhere and stick around. I am now on team Dobbs. I wish him the best.
This was a weird week. It didn’t seem that chaotic while I was watching, but all of a sudden a ton of games ended up being decided on last-second kicks. We had a few absolutely great wire-to-wire experiences. Lions/Chargers was an absolute delight of a game. It also felt like another classic Chargers experience: put up a ton of points, keep pace with a better team, then lose at the end. The Chargers are cursed to always feel like a bridesmaid. The Chargers are absolute masters of the tease. Falcons/Cardinals, despite being between two losers, was still fun. Kyler Murray is back, and he absolutely provided something of an identity to the Cards. I hope they win at least 4 more games. Steelers/Packers was tighter than I expected but the Steelers managed to do the usual win at the end of a slugfest. Commies/Seahawks went down to the wire, and how about those Browns? Down for most of the game, they organize a huge comeback and kick the Ravens in the teeth. Massive ups for the Texans and Bengals, who gave us a wild ending in a week with a number of wild endings.
GIANTS CORNER
I think I’m just going to watch other games the rest of the year and if I ever see the Giants on Redzone I’ll smile and think about next year. I’ve watched the Giants be putrid for a decade now, and this might be the most unwatchable they’ve been in that timeframe since 2012. The only competition is the phase during Joe Judge’s second season when they were down to Mike Glennon and Jake Fromm. I don’t know why they didn’t pick up somebody at the trade deadline like Wentz or Dobbs. They clearly have zero faith in Tommy DeVito (because he’s a practice squad-level QB playing like one) so unless their goal is genuinely tanking, why? Why play the most worthless conservative offense out there? What do we have to lose trying weird shit, at least make the games interesting by using this era of no expectations to try out ideas. I do not root for tanking. I don’t believe teams genuinely ever really want to tank. The players likely don’t. I don’t know how Daboll could look like a great coach last season and look so awful this year. I don’t know who the real Daboll is now. This team is unwatchable.
CHAOS OF THE WEEK
I originally had Bengals/Texans here, and then the Bills game happened. The entire game was kind of a mess from start to finish. We had fumbles. We had Courtland Sutton making the touchdown catch of the week. We had Josh Allen throwing a pick immediately before halftime and giving the Broncos another field goal. We had a fumble that turned into a 30 yard scamper (see below). We had an incredibly stupid ending. The Broncos went ahead with a go-ahead TD in the 4th, but botched the extra point, leaving the Bills wide open for a TD win. They would proceed to score that TD and MAKE the extra point, giving them a 22-21 lead. They scored too fast for Russell Wilson. After an unfortunate DPI call (I hate it when DPI is called on underthrown balls where the defender doesn’t have the time to re-adjust and runs into a suddenly slowing up WR), we then had a BALL DONT LIE moment from the cosmos when the Broncos would proceed to shank the game-winning kick wide right. Except…the Bills had 12 men on the field. The Broncos made the next kick with ease. Game over. Bills, you stupid motherfuckers.
CHAOTIC MOMENTS OF THE WEEK
The Patriots benching Mac Jones for the final chance drive against the Colts felt like a statement of hopelessness. Mac threw some very, very bad balls that game and had pretty much lost the game on the previous drive when he severely underthrew an open guy in the endzone. But to not give him a chance at the end and put in Jones 2 (Bailey Zappe) only to watch Zappe lose the game on a false spike thrown into quadruple coverage was extremely funny. To me, and everyone who hates New England.
In the Bills game the RB had the ball punched out, only for it to bounce perfectly back to him in stride, and he ran for 20 more yards. A blink and you’ll miss it moment that is shockingly awesome.
The 49ers also deserve mention here for having a fumble-six taken away from them because people on the sideline ran onto the field during the play. You can’t do that, dummies!
CHAOS WATCH
The Commies. I cannot figure the Commies out. They can look like absolute shit and then they can look pretty good! Howell is on pace to get sacked into oblivion and he’s also second in the league in passing yardage? What is this team? It feels like they can compete with almost anybody but also can’t actually beat anybody.
FRAUD WATCH
Seahawks. Geno isn’t as sharp this year for whatever reason. He looks less decisive. The Hawks are still winning games but they aren’t having an easy time of it and they are squeaking past mediocre and bad teams. They reek of Wildcard exit.
DISAPPOINTMENT DUCK
Jaguars. 3 points at home? The 49ers had Deebo and Trent Williams back and resumed being the team we fear. The Jaguars, also coming out of a bye, looked like trash again. I had hoped for more fight than that.
MOST UNWATCHABLE TEAM OF THE WEEK
Fuck you, Giants. You could at least try.
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BETS FOR NEXT WEEK – The Coaches!
BENGALS @ RAVENS
Finally, a good Thursday night matchup. Watch this game suck ass. I’ll take the Ravens at home.
If the Bengals win, I will draw Zac Taylor as the Skyline Surfer (think Silver Surfer)
STEELERS @ BROWNS
Apparently its AFCN Battle week? The last game came down to the Steelers winning in 2023 Steelers fashion. The Browns are almost the same team, stifling defense and hobbled offense. I’ll go home team this time. EDIT: Watson is out for the year and they are starting DTR, so Im changing it
If the Browns win, I will draw Kevin Stefanski making the Trollface
RAIDERS @ DOLPHINS
A bad team? Dolphins gonna cream em.
If the Raiders win, I will draw Antonio Pierce roasting dolphins over an open fire
BEARS @ LIONS
The Bears managed to win the battle of suck for moral victory points before going into Detroit to get sent to the 5th circle of hell.
If the Bears win, I will draw Matt Eberflus beating Coach Muscles at arm wrestling
TITANS @ JAGS
Titans are kind of punting the season at this point. Get Levis some games, see what you can do for the rest of the year to prep the rebuild. Jaguars need to actually win and they like to ruin the Titans day lately.
If the Titans win, I will draw Mike Vrabel squirting mayo into his coffee in an unnecessarily suggestive way
CHARGERS @ PACKERS
The Chargers finally get an easy win.
If the Packers win, I will draw Matt LeFleur as LeFleur De Matt, #1 MC of da Piss Boys
CARDINALS @ TEXANS
The Texans are good! The Cardinals are not. Well, not as bad as they used to be, but still not good.
If the Cardinals win, I will draw Johnathan Gannon as PeeWee Herman riding his big red bike
COWBOYS @ PANTHERS
It’s going to be really hard for the Panthers to not be the worst team in the league. They need to figure this shit out because they don’t have draft picks and can’t afford to give the Bears their first overall pick.
If the Panthers win, I will draw Frank Reich as a happy dad, carrying little Bryce Young on his shoulders
GIANTS @ COMMIES
Commies get revenge on the DeVito junker crew. Do not watch this game.
If the Giants win, I will draw Brian Daboll as Tony Soprano
BUCS @ 49ERS
Someone has to win the NFC South. It hurts to think about.
If the Bucs win, I will draw Todd Bowles Bowling
JETS @ BILLS
Jets already beat these Bills, but that was in Metlife. Hopefully the Bills can function here. They are an astoundingly stupid team this season. I hope none of you bet on them to win the Super Bowl.
If the Jets win, I will draw Robert Saleh as Mr Clean (I hate his beard, bring back Mr Clean Saleh, this is me crying for help)
SEAHAWKS @ RAMS
The Seahawks should be able to beat up the hobbled and bad Rams. You’d think. You’d hope.
If the Rams win, I will draw Sean McVay as an annoying 80’s fitness workout tape guy
VIKINGS @ BRONCOS
Russ vs the Vikings in Primetime. Is this game an automatic lock for Chaos of the week? I’m taking the Passtronaut again, why the hell not.
If the Broncos win, I will draw Sean Payton flipping off NASA
EAGLES @ CHIEFS
The Chiefs are winning games not because of their offense this year, but their defense. This game could be another SB preview. I think the Eagles are going to do it.
If the Chiefs win, I will draw Walrus Andy as John Lennon
A TIE
If two teams tie, I will draw both coaches as spidermen pointing at each other
I know as a Giants fan their game was hard to watch (and admittedly I never tried), but the SNF game between the Jets and the Raiders was a national game and completely unwatchable garbage. The game barely cracked 600 total yards of offense between both teams, and had 7 field goals
You picked the Seahawks over the Rams? Speaking as a Hawks fan, you clearly have not watched the Rams become Super Sayian playing the Seahawks.
The Raiders may actually be a legit, good team. They made the Jets D look average in that game. I guess we will see but they are on a hot Streak. Texans look great too. Either of these teams may make thr playoffs and the Texans have a chance at the division.
With respect, I think Zac Taylor should be Star-Lord/Peter Quill. He’s well liked and all, but he’s known to make very, very, VERY questionable actions that turn sure victories into dust in the wind faster than you can snap your fingers.
You got me rooting hard for the Packers this week. The whole “Piss Boys” meme is just stupidly hilarious.
Also somewhat surprised you’re not trying to do a pun with Frank Reich’s name (his name literally just means France in German, not to mention the connotations “Reich” has in English), but I also understand if both are low hanging fruit as well. If only we got the chance to have him in the same QB room with Dave Krieg. The jokes would have wrote themselves.
Drake no: The Passtronaut
Drake yes: The Pocket Scientist
In your chaos roundup you didn’t mention Brock Purdy throwing into Infinite Coverage and still connecting for a TD. I’m still not sure I believe it happened and I saw it stone cold sober.
But is he good though?
A few notes from the week:
-It is glorious to see the Patriots and Packers being just absolutely awful. Like unwatchably bad. I can’t wait to watch them pay their Faustian debt with devilish glee for the next decade+.
-The Bills are a reminder of how quickly a Super Bowl window can close. I’m not saying they’ll be out of contention forever, but after three seasons of being bigtime bullies in the AFC, they….just aren’t there. Sure they’ve still got a lot of talent, but I just kind of get the feeling that it’s over. They’ll scramble and make a few big, risky moves to try and stay relevant, but it’ll end up breaking the chemistry they had. Kind of feels like they’ll end up like the Cam Newton Panthers. QB who does things no other QB can, but not consistently enough to rise above an aging roster.
-It’s weird seeing all of the love go to Dobbs that probably should have gone to Kirk Cousins. I understand what Dobbs has done with the Vikes is incredible. But Kirk was playing his best ball of late. Even last year with an absolutely putrid defense it seemed like the NFL begrudgingly gave Kirk any airtime because of the whole Kirko Chains bit. Nobody took the team seriously because of the defense, so they overlooked how clutch he actually was. This year outside of some bad fumble luck, he’s been one of the most productive/valuable QBs in the league, but now the spotlight is on Dobbs. I guess I just feel bad for Kirk that once he finally got decent coaching, offensive weapons, and defensive help, he goes down while the media makes a sideshow out of his replacement.
I like what Dobbs is doing a lot and I loved Fitzmagic so much.
I am not ready to anoint Dobbs the successor yet.
Also, I think we finally learned that the Bills are fraudulent. It’s sad because I’ve always rooted for them. I like Josh Allen. They don’t deserve to be thought of as the team that lost 4 straight Super Bowls.
They just suck.
It was observed on Something Awful that there hasn’t been a bad Broncos-Vikings game since NINETEEN NINETY-ONE. No matter how good or bad either team has been over their last eight encounters, they’ve always played dynamic, interesting football.
We’ll see if that holds up at the Chaos Bowl this week.
I hope the Broncos manage to stumble our way into the playoffs and utterly humiliate someone in the wild card round before getting knocked out in a 40 point loss the week after
Maybe it’ll be the Jags, for old time’s sake.
My Ravens are 0-2 vs. Deshaun Watson’s Browns. I despise that statistic.
“Fumble-six’. Thank you for not using “scoop and score”, which sounds like winning a door prize at Pinkberry. (Although there’s a better name out there – “pick up six”)
With the Giants winning, can we get Tommy Devito as the “Christopher” to Daboll’s Tony?