It’s been a fun two weeks in the NFL, unless you’re a Giants fan. To avoid talking about them for at least another week, I’m going to focus on some standout off-the-field performances. This week we have a bloviator, an abdicator, and a dominator.
The Bloviator
I might be late to the game on this, but Cowboys VP Stephen Jones called Troy Aikman an “armchair quarterback” for criticizing the Cowboys play calling after a lackluster loss to the Panthers. Urban Dictionary describes an armchair QB thusly: some d-bag who is certain that he or she can make better decisions than the coaches or players while watching a competitive sport on television.
Troy Aikman was the actual, not armchair, quarterback of their franchise the last time it mattered. He is a three time SB champion. He might be the most qualified person to opine on the state of the Dallas offense.
While Jones is the quintessential guy who woke up on third and thought he hit a triple. Besides Eric Trump, of course. How about a some damn respect for a franchise icon, Junior?
The Abdicator
You all know by now that Vontae Davis, a ten-year veteran cornerback playing for the Bills, decided to retire at halftime on Sunday. I’m going to go out on a limb and say that is not a good bellwether for state of the Bills franchise.
I sympathize that he found himself on such a sorry team in the twilight of his career. Hell, I’d like to retire in the middle of a bad day in the salt mines myself. I hope this doesn’t start a trend. We can’t have firefighters quitting in the middle of a blaze, cops quitting in the middle of a bomb threat, or congress quitting in the middle of a session. Well, scratch that last one.
But he’s still playing football for an NFL team. I’ve been on the wrong end of some real bloodbaths in my years in sport. We got destroyed in the D1 rugby playoffs back in the day at Cornell. It was so bad their fans were chanting “purple f@ggots” (it was a less tolerant time) at us. But we played to the whistle and went to the drink up. Finish the damn game.
The Dominator
Ryan Fitzpatrick just became the first QB in NFL history to throw for 400 yards and 4 TDs in the first two games of the season. Who didn’t see that coming?
Fitzmagic seems to have an uncanny ability for playing well when he’s the backup but turns back into a pumpkin as soon as he becomes the guy.
Is there a QB in the NFL with a wider range of possible outcomes on any given Sunday? With most QBs you know what you’re getting, but this guy could give you anything from Tom Brady to Nate Peterman.
You had to love his Conor McGregor routine after the game. They should just tell him every week that he’s going back to the bench after this game. At this point he’s on pace for 6,552 yards passing and 64 TDs. If he has one more game like this, they can’t go back to Jameis right away, can they?
Speaking of Nate Peterman, if I were Colin Kaerpernick’s lawyer, my whole case would be wordlessly playing footage of Peterman’s two NFL starts for the jury. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, this man is a starting QB in the NFL. I rest my case.
Come back tomorrow for our own bloviator dominator, Angry Ward. Follow us on Twitter at @BenWhit8, @MeetTheMatts, @Matt_McCarthy00, Instagram @MeetTheMatts and like our Facebook page, Meet The Matts
