Cowboys Over Philly and Commanders Go 9-8

Dallas is plus 8 at Philadelphia. The over/under is 47.5. I like Dallas.

Not just to cover. But having the out-and-out gall to win. 

Philly often opens like they just got out of bed. It isn't that Dallas will win on skill. It's another kickoff return for a touchdown and they win 21-20.

Nicki Jhabvala made waves predicting an 8-9 Commander Season. That sounds reasonable. I'll go 9-8 on the strength of a late season surge. They are going to get bunched with the Giants and Cowboys while Philly makes another Super Bowl run.

I have questions about the defense. I'm a little worried the scheme is not right. Or out of date. Is it a match for an up tempo offense? The depth does not appear to be good. Which retards platooning. And discourages the necessary playing time for improvement to germinate. This offense seems to gas its own defense. That makes for entertaining 45-40 AFL-type games. But the Super Bowl? 

No.  

The way teams beat John Elway was to get so far out in front his endgame magic couldn't win. That's how the Eagles beat Jayden. That's how teams will try to beat the Commanders this year. And if there has been no progress on defense, a standard NFL Offense could beat the Commanders using that strategy.  

You are assuming you will outscore everybody. And if you can't platoon an older defense, it will be done well before the playoffs. 

The preseason in no way prepared the team for the season. That lack of preparedness will hurt the early going. They'll be tempted to grab wins by playing the Vets. That might work. But that equals a late slide to my mind. A Ron Rivera type year.

They haven't prepared. The toilets aren't clean. The floor hasn't been swept or mopped. The walkie talkies don't have batteries.

Like the Eagles, they haven't gotten out of bed and are already late for school.

Ergo, they start 0-2. Last place. Where they'll be until midseason.   

That's when coffee is served. 

The Professor: The Joker is Wild

Commanders going down to Dallas this weekend. They clinched a playoff spot. With a win they could lock up the 6th seed.

Washington is a 4 point favorite. The over/under is 44. The Over is 11-5 in both Cowboy and Commanders games this year. Dallas is 4-1 the last five games against the Commanders including a 34-26 victory in D.C. earlier this year. Cowboys are 2-6 at home and have closed their away season at 5-3. Dallas likes going on tour.

According to si.com, the Skins are 10-5-1 against the spread this year. Dallas is 6-10.

Washington closes its season at home with a 7-2 winning record and can clinch a winning road record with a dub at Jerry World.

Washington scores 28.9 points a game. They surrender 23.3. Dallas scores 20.7 a game. They give up 27.8. That averages to Washington 28.4, Dallas 22. Ceding the traditional field goal to the home team, you get either Commanders 28.4, Dallas 25 or Commanders 25.4, Dallas 22. Both scores are over 44. In both outcomes, Dallas covers.

Washington runs for 156 a game. Cowboys cough up 138 a game. Washington throws for 219 a game. Dallas allows 227 a game. 

Dallas runs for 97 a game. Washington gives up 136 a contest. Dallas passes for 222 yards a game. Washington gives up 187 a matchup.

Dallas ran for 91 and passed for 247 in the first game. Washington ran for 145 and passed for 275. Dallas won time of possession and the turnover battle. KaVontae Turpin had 4 kick returns for 179 yards with one spanning 99 yards for the touch. 

There are confounding variables of a non-numerical nature. Motivation for the Dallas-Washington finale is once again ambiguous. If you remember, the Cowboys a few years ago had also clinched the playoffs. Their only motivation was to add a little window dressing to their status with a longshot acquisition of a higher seed. In their confusion, they lost 26-6.

Washington is in a similar no man's land. 

The Dallas Fan Base would love to see a fifty burger hung up on Dan Quinn as many of them see Quinn as the reason Dallas did not go to the Super Bowl last year. Ironically, the man Dallas Fans most want out of Dallas is Jerry Jones, who no doubt sees dollar signs in one Jayden Daniels and would enjoy displaying said Daniels's Pelt on his wall to galvanize investment in the Cowboys. 

The Joker is wild. And Jones is the Joker in this poker game. He will find a way to get in on any deal he thinks will make him some money and beating Jayden would do that. He's done it once and wants to do it again. And he does it in grand style. In a supersized way. For Jerry, a thorough whupping of the wannabe Commanders would be a delicious sugar substitute for the Lombardi Trophy.

Because of Quinn's involvement, Dallas Fans find themselves in rare agreement with the Ring Master.

They both would enjoy the hell out of making Quinn and the Commanders out to be frauds.

With the Eagles digging deep the coffin on the Commanders the following week in a Winter is Coming concrete galoshes type game.

But I'll go Commanders 25, Dallas 22. They win. Dallas covers.

Jayden and Magic get a homecoming game in LA. 

Which also makes Jerry and Roger Goodell money.

Musical Spheres of the Championship Years and 1972

The year 1972 was a great year in music and a great year for Washington NFL Football. 

The Washington Redskins won the NFC Championship beating their arch nemesis the Dallas Cowboys 26-3 before losing the Super Bowl to the undefeated Miami Dolphins. 

Like people say, whenever the Skins beat the Cowboys in the NFC Championship game, the Super Bowl always seemed like an afterthought.

The Watergate Scandal was born in 1972. Only Nixon could go to China. Fischer defeats Spassky. Here's Nixon schmoozing with George Allen parts 1 and 2. This is the game Tricky Dickie and Coach were apparently talking about.

My favorite song from 1972 is Johnny Nash's I Can See Clearly Now. If you hadn't known the background of Nash, you'd swear you could hear a dash of Reggae in the tune. Good ear. The Covers out there unfortunately seem to subtract the Reggae elements. Jimmy Cliff did a great rendition. It is time for an Orchestral Reggae treatment. Maybe one's already been done.

Some all-time great records were getting airplay in 1972. The reissued Nights in White Satin and November of '71's Stairway to Heaven.

You probably don't remember Mouth and MacNeal. They made a catchy little tune called How Do You Do which made Number 8 on Billboard. 

Man of La Mancha, the film version, came out in 1972. Johnny Mathis did a wonderful medley from the musical.

Morning Has Broken charted in '72, making number one Easy Listening. It was not a Cat Stevens original. Here's more on that story.

If you went to the movies in 1972, you could see Jeremiah Johnson, Superfly, Boxcar Bertha, the Poseidon Adventure, and my personal favorite, The Legend of Boggy Creek, Rated G.

Time is of the Essence

There are structural things in place in the NFL which will retard the progress of the Washington NFL franchise as they construct a new era of football. 

The primary retardant is Time. Time is against them. I would be surprised to learn the New Owners didn't maximize their opportunities to pursue front office personnel. They have had time for research. It is not unreasonable to expect a New GM right off the bat. If not, valuable ticks off the clock will ensue.

Yes, for you clock managers out there, if the Commanders are to do well this offseason clock management will be the thing.

The NFL, at least last I heard, doesn't allow interviews of assistant coaches still in championship contention. For an organization that claims to be a proponent of equal employment opportunity, that's a disgrace. Big name assistants like Ben Johnson may find themselves bereft of opportunities even though they are sought after. 

There are people available for consideration right off the bat for coaching duties. Bill Belichick and Jim Harbaugh being two who could also double as GM. Eric Bieniemy is in the building and should be interviewed as a matter of course. David Shaw is out there. The tempo would thus be just about the same as if you had incumbents in place. Then that would clear a path for a less rushed approach to free agency and the draft.

But before we get to all that, seems like it would be expedient to see a Jacoby Brissett advertisement against Dallas. As part of research for the new era. And as part of Brissett's pay scale elevation cultivation. And if some in the new group want to pass on Brissett, a nice sign and trade may harvest some veteran leadership, offensive or defensive, for next year.

Jacoby comes in and pounds Dallas he's a jewel. 

They pound Dallas and they increase ticket sales for next year. 

They get pounded by Dallas it doesn't matter a whole hell of a lot. Except if it ends up humiliating Sam Howell once again. He doesn't need that. Sam would be eliminated from the conversation and I don't think that would be quite fair given the fact he has had, worts and all, a fairly solid first year starting in the NFL.

To a certain extent, Josh Harris and Company have had a head start in the GM department. In everything else they are pressed for time. 

The final gun in the Dallas game is the starting pistol in a race against Time.

In Theaters January 6th. Rated G for everyone.

Five of My Favorite Xmas Tunes

While I am wondering if Santa somehow has the magic in his satchell to gift Sam Howell with three 500 yard passing games to end the 2023 Football Season with a team record 5,000 yards, a little Christmas Cheer might be in order.

1. Favorite Things by John Coltrane

2. In Dulci Jubilo by Mike Oldfield

3. Donde Esta Santa Claus by Augie Rios

4. Linus and Lucy by Vince Guaraldi

5. Feliz Navidad by Happy kyazze featuring Rosco

Merry Christmas one and all.

 

Losing is a Being

I detest losing to the Dallas Cowboys. They are hands down the most disrespectful, entitled group of horse hockey jocks ever to damn a football field with their excrescences. They have egos like swole dog ticks that explode when you pick them off.

Losing to them means we are corpses.

Ergo, we in Commanders Land are less than exploding dog ticks.

Losing is a being. It has a life of its own. It is like a flash mob created by an internet lie. It is a living parasite. It is an egregore. An esprit de corps. A mass delusion. A mass hysteria. A group hallucination. It is expectorated by a culture of talking heads who leverage their victims into no-win scenarios. It is a tautology. Beings of losing are the children of no-win scenarios. 

It is a bad case of situational football. And the situation was bad to begin with. Lame duck coaches. Players who work like temps with "I'm just a temp" attitudes.

How can you sell a football team to a fanbase that knows the players and coaches are all from the Temp Agency? They are like guest stars in a bad movie.

This is how the team playing football in Washington, perhaps inevitably, becomes annually the official practice dummies of the National Football League. 

Which in a sense is good because the Dallas Cowboy Community is now gilding its own lilly by bragging about beating a team of practice dummies and are about to suggest its turkey leg chomping sashay through the Washington Commanders indicates they are Super Bowl Bound. 

No. It indicates the onset of a viral case of self-love that does not relent until the annual first round playoff bubble burst the Cowpokes routinely suffer. It is their karma. It is what they get when they brag they are the football Gods now. Like the Queen in Clash of the Titans.

 Source: MovieAndGameClips

That's funny. In Ten Days, Hades releases the Kraken.

That's exactly how much time the Commanders have to release their Kraken.

Do they have a Kraken to release?

Beats me. It seems they have been hypnotized by the Losing Being. The Team seems to have been demonically possessed by the narrative the Sports Moutheratis have composed for them. Guest stars in bad movies always get the worst lines. The Commanders could all be up for Golden Raspberries. NFL Officiating is up for Worst Actor in a Drama Series.

But its all on the NFL and its Media. They're the script writers. And its all depressing BS. It is way past time Washington tore up those scripts. They're stupid. Tedious. Annoying. WRONG. Little better than bathroom wall writing. We get it, slicks. They're not supposed to win. They haven't been supposed to win for years. We understand. It's a damn show. You want the Stars to win big ratings. The Pretty Boys Rule.

We Commanders fans don't think it's a damn show. We think it's a damn fight.

The NFL sticks to its storylines. Only Pro Wrestling does it better. 

Sometimes though you got to be like Bret Hart. You got to hate the Pretty Boy. Tear up the stinkin script and lay waste to everything that stands.  

The scripts written by the NFL and its cognoscenti are toilet paper. You've heard the old saying I wipe my hands of the situation? 

I recommend the Commanders wipe their butts of the situation in the best sense of situational football. In demonstrative appreciation of the literary value of NFL scripts. 

Just tear up the stinkin scripts every swinging guy every swinging play.

The Dallas Lesson All But Forgotten

Last year, the Dallas Cowboys, the fair-haired boys of the NFL since the dawn of Texas, came into the DMV ostensibly with something to play for but got caught in motivational limbo and ended up losing to a team the Media felt sure was going to take a sick day.

Seems like the Media is trying to pull another fast one. They are contending the Arizona Cardinals are going to take a sick season. Washington should pound the Red Birds into that 2024 season the Cardinals are deferring to.

Those same wonderboys, Dallas, came to D.C. once upon a time, having not won a ballgame, and defeated the much ballyhooed Washington Redskins. If memory serves, that was the ONLY ballgame the Hollywood Hendersons won that year.

There is an old saying in the NFL: Kill the motivational head and the performance will die.

In the annals of football, history is replete with games where teams that had no business winning games in fact do win them and sometimes win them going away.

The present RPO era is a great talent leveler. It's communist football. Equality is paramount. You focus on equalizers in game planning and play calling. You can pull a quarterback out of Food Lion and beat somebody with him. 

The Cardinals have better QBs than you can get in Food Lion. They can both run RPO and stick it in the end zone on you. Essentially, they will be the kid brother of the Philadelphia Eagles. This is the first Eagles game. You can bet the Eagles have a guy or guys watching this game. Anything the Red Birds do that embarrasses the Commanders, the Eagles are going to store on their Honey-Do List. So will everybody else but the Eagles, who we do take seriously, in particular.

That means there is a three loss in one disaster possible here.

Will that be enough to wake up the Commander Defense? 

Because the defenses under Ron Rivera seem to take quite some time to get ready. They become quite good after four or five games into the season. This is the first game of the year. It is not time yet for them. I see some on defense are already taking a mental health day against the Cardinals. If that has changed, let's see it, dadgummit.

The trend in Media is if Washington loses this game it will be because E.B., Sam Howell, and the offense lost it. The opposite is the case. The Ego of this Washington Commander defense has been inflated the whole preseason. People expect them to be as good now as when they beat the brain-eaten Dallas Zombies the last game of last season.

No. This is a slow-starting weedeater. It usually starts when there is six foot worth of snow on the ground.

The Offense will have to carry the team the first five games. If they execute, and I think they will, they can win a few if not all of them. 

Whether it be lack of mental sharpness or the faster tempo they will be playing, the Defense will have problems early. They aren't used to coming back in after two-minute offensive touchdowns. They are going to be gassed. And it doesn't look like they will have the depth they need to keep from collapsing at the end of the 400 meter dash.

The Offense is ready. The Defense isn't. 

I guess that is better than last year when neither was ready.

 

How About Them Cowboys?

I was looking at last year's games against the Dallas Cowboys and it is almost as if we didn't play the Dallas Cowboys last year. Injuries and lineup changes impacted both games. There was a bizarre playoff scenario which twisted the minds of the Cowboys in the second game.

I doubt the same situation will happen this year.  Carson Wentz is gone. J.D. McKissic, Antonio Gibson, and Jonathan Williams were the running backs in that first game. Dallas didn't stop the run. Cooper Rush had a good ball game. A couple turnovers burped up by Wentz ended Washington's chances.

Not knowing where the Cowboy psyche was, the rematch is hard to evaluate. Again, Washington had success on the ground. The Cowboys stuck with the running game. As in the first match, they didn't do much.

Why Dak Prescott was playing I never figured out.

It looks like they are going to want to pass. I don't know what their running game will look like. Not a good time to go all pass against the Commanders but maybe with Brandin Cooks and CeeDee Lamb, they got the goods. 

The trend in the NFL is the running game is BS. Dak Prescott is like Warren Moon. He will light you up with 400 plus passing. But the Cowboys still need the running game. Is Pollard going to be enough?

The Cowboys are going to the Super Bowl. Just like the New York Football Giants. And the Philadelphia Eagles. Their fans are all in for the Trophy.

It's going to be interesting.