2015 NFL Week 1
 

Patriots versus Steelers. The NFL can't handle an angry Tom Brady.

Thats where I stand on it.

Pats 38-31. Brady with at least 4 TDs.

Let's go beloved Cardinals, may your QB's stay healthy this year! (thank god Lindley-last I saw-was with the Patriots

good luck to "your" team this season!

The Lions could very easily start 0-4 this year.

Cowboys-Giants games are always entertaining...I'm expecting a Cowboys win Sunday night, but it'll probably be close.

I really hope Brady drops 42 on a inept Steelers D. II dunno why I get such perverse joy out of seeing it happen to my team, but It's pretty funny

Think I'm skipping tonight's game. I don't need to listen to them yammer on for three more hours about deflated footballs after listening about it for the last eight months.

My interest in Tonight's game is /slightly/ above my interest in watching the Super Bowl which I had no interest in.

Going to be interested to see how the Patriots play coverage. Will they single up Malcolm Butler on Brown at times, constantly roll a safety over to that side, or play a lot of zone? Le'Veon Bell (and to a lesser extent Martavis) being out is a huge difference, so let's see if the secondary can hold up against a pretty one dimensional offense. That and Gronk's health are our two biggest question marks right now. (I'm not worried about the WR's - Edelman and LaFell will be healthy eventually, and we have plenty of experience with shitty receivers.)

Football is back. This makes me happy. I'll watch some football. Can always mute the announcers!

https://instagram.com/p/7dEGVFs10x/

I'm so glad Rex is still in the division.

Is that the office the Head Coach in Buffalo gets? No wonder they can't attract anyone.

It is football so I'll watch. Despite the horrible off field stuff going on in the NFL, I still do love the game of football.
I would love to see the Pats get stomped tonight, Brady throw a couple of picks and the Pats lose a few fumbles en route to a 44-0 loss. :)

Probably in no small part because the Bears are going to be utterly awful this year, I've found it incredibly difficult to give a shit about football this season.

I haven't been this disinterested in a long, long time. It's odd.

The more I think about it, I see Tom having an Eff You Mode™ season, like 45 TD 4800 yards.

Can we set the rules for how we are going to deal with this sort of season from the Pats? Is it going to be unsportsmanlike for Brady to be chucking the ball down the field with the Pats up 56-0 in the middle of the 4th quarter or not?

I predict the league has an FU Pats season, and they win just 8 games.

Brady is a slow starter and looked awful in his limited pre-season appearances. I'm sure he wants to do what he did last year after the Chiefs debacle, but he's at the age when the end has a high probability of coming every year.

You can't get fuel from feeling persecution. That's all window dressing and media horse-hockey. They win from being prepared and having the ability to execute plans. It will be interesting to see if Brady can still throw anything resembling a deep ball.

I think this one will be anything but easy. It helps that Pittsburgh's defense is far from the best they'll face this season.

If they try that, Brady won't survive the season.

My second prediction was that this is Brady's final season in New England.

As in, he plays elsewhere next year? Why? That will never happen.

Bill's not a sentimental guy.

I haven't been this pessimistic and ambivalent about the start of the NFL season in years. I'm still excited that it's here, but it's just not in the forefront of my thoughts anymore. I'm think it's the fear that the preseason Steelers are going to show up and spend the whole year playing like that. No faith.

Hey, but we can draft another LB in the first next year!

He's going to be pretty good, cause if we play like that, we'll be in the top 5.

Alright guys. Everything is working so far this drive. What we need to do here is have Antonio Brown throw a pass. No idea who HE is going to throw it to, but if we keep running a normal offense we are going to score a touchdown so we have to do something here.

I would be so much more excited for the start of the season IF I HADN'T BEEN FUCKING SWAMPED IN FUCKING NFL TALK SINCE FUCKING JANUARY WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK SPORTS TALK RADIO

ahem

I'm sorry, I don't know where that came from.

Yay, Packers. I guess. Whatever.

LOL communications issues in Gillette Stadium. The NFL will do anything to make the Patriots look bad.

Of all the games to have audio issues...

Brady is hot...


And oh...GRONK!

Ummmmmm...


Dude.

Right there with you. I just found out the Niners were playing Pittsburgh next week.

OMG, Hayward-Bey actually caught a pass. This game engine is broken.

Scobee better not have taken a long term lease out in Pittsburgh

Steelers kicker #4 coming on monday

With any other position. Bill knows all of his credit is due to Tom, he's not stupid. And Krafty wouldn't let Tom walk.

I just jerked off thinking about how happy all the Patriots fans were right now. I was all ,"Brady Brady Brady...Groooooonk!"

Will Allen plays a great turnstile

This is playing out much like expected.

Thanks USAA. I forgot all about how the military paid for the privilege of being honored on those military appreciation days.

Lol, that's why Hayward Bey is terrible

THAT is the Hayward-Bey I remember. He is who we thought he was.

Here comes 0-3

Blind Spot looks like the offspring of Prison Break and The Black List

Huh? Is the idea Brady is a slow starter based off last year when Gronk was out? Brady's had multiple seasons where he's started fast, but our team is clearly dependent on Gronk at this point (even going back to like 2005, the other times we've looked great were with another elite pass-catcher in Moss.) That one elite guy getting doubles opens up all our other underneath crossing routes.His contract makes it hard to do that. We had the option last year to cut him for almost no guarantee, but once he was kept past like week 6 it guaranteed his salary thru 2018.(17?) And barring injury I don't see him retiring - he's said he wants to play until 45, and I believe he believes it at this point.
Anyone use USAA? I'm thinking of switching over... Any red flags or bad PR I'm missing?

Touché.

But it's not just the local shows. The national shows do it too. Yeah the local ones devote an entire 3 hour show to Packer'ing it up, but even the non-local shows go "okay it's May let's talk about the NFL for 90 minutes oh I guess we should devote five minutes to baseball 'kay civic duty done let's go back to football"

and when they're not talking about the NFL they're talking about college football

and this happens all goddamn year

Out pattern out pattern out pattern out pattern touchdown. Think the steelers need to cover better outside?

As the owner of a fantasy team that features both Ben Roethlisberger and DeAngelo Williams; that was painful.

Hey about this RGIII concussion situation, if his season is over does he get his $16 million?

I think Pittsburgh should just keep running their offense at the goal line instead of full personnel changes and formation swaps. What do I know though?

Steelers play calling in the red zone has been awful. Sometimes you should just do the obvious thing rather than trying to get cute.

The backup RB seems incapable of making anyone miss. He is just putting his head down and hitting the hole. Atleast Williams has been elusive tonight. I would give him those goal line carries and aim them at the tackles.

The backup running back is Will Johnson, the fullback.

That is not a TD

Looks like the Patriots are in good shape now to win this one....HIDE YO ESPN!!!

That is. Why the fuck would you cover Gronk with a LB there?

Do you have a choice? He's just gonna blow a corner or safety off the ball on the goal line.

Mike Alstott he is not.

What. The Crap. Was that?

Rational Pats Fan
Offense gets an a.. defense b minus.. despite only giving up 21.. the steelers moved the ball at will and could easily have 14 more points (end zone catch 2 missed fg and the goal line stand)

Irrational Pats Fan (I get at least one post to gloat, right? :D)

Tom Brady 25-32, 288 yards, 4 TD.. and a Pats record 19 straight completions during the game. Deflated haters say what?

Yeah, you double/shade towards him. Still might not work, but it gives you a better chance than anyone with a number in the 50's covering him 1v1.

Defense deserves a mediocre C as far I'm concerned. That was not an inspiring performance whatsoever from that side of the ball.

Wished the running game had little more zip, but all-in-all hard to argue with that performance in game 1.

NFL takes the blame for Radio-gate:

Ben Volin on Twitter: "NFL releases a statement taking the blame for and exonerating the #Patriots for the headset issue http://t.co/P4tjK6BdXE"

I'm still amazed they rely on such antiquated technology on the sidelines during a game.

Good news: Brady's on my fantasy team.
Bad news: Gronk's on my opponent's team.

Aldon Smith to the Raiders. Got to love the NFL's zero standards.

There was no doubt he was going to get another chance. Will he be suspended now that he is on someone's roster?

And of course in the world of Karma, I've got to fly with an insufferable Patriots fan for 4 days. fml

The Patriots played a terrific game, but I was stunned at how poor Pittsburgh was. The offense was fine, but the play calling and defense were horrible. Throw in a bad kicker and it was a recipe for disaster.

As far as the radios, I think the Patriots will do whatever they can to win a game, inside or outside of the rules. Maybe I'm wrong, but it really isn't because I'm a Broncos fan. (the Broncos are 3-6 against the Pats in the regular season with none of the losses hurting Denver playoff hopes and the Broncos are 2-1 against them in the playoffs over the last 12 years with the loss being the Tebow led Broncos that didn't belong in the playoffs anyway)

Having spewed all of that. . . there is no way in hell the Patriots had anything to do with bad radios during this game. And there is no way in hell the radios impacted the train wreck that was the Steelers secondary. As a full blown Patriots slammer. . . shame on Tomlin.

Yeah, this is the dumpster fire of a team we've worked on building for 5 years now. Every time I say anything negative about Tomlin I get called out, but seriously WTF is going on. We've got 3-5 good Ben years left and probably the best WR and RB in the league and I'd be shocked if we make another AFCCG before Ben retires.

And I could go on hours about our cap, but we've got a ton of WTF contracts on a 3/4 MLB(Timmons), a freaking Center(Pouncey) and then numerous secondary guys that make me angry to even say their name. Mike Mitchell is one of the worst players I've ever seen. And he's got an upside down contract still. He was a street free agent the year before (I'm pretty sure) we gave him the largest FA contact in franchise history. We draft linebackers like Matt Millen drafted receivers. Back to Timmons, he's a good player but 3/4 ILB are like 1 step up from street free agents and he's been paid considerably more than any other ILB recently. I swear I'm just about done, I'll have to watch this team go between 8-8 and 11-5 til football goes away.

If the Steelers hit both those FG's and punch it in from the 1 the game ends up being a whole lot more interesting. All things considered I would be pretty happy with that showing on the road against the defending champs.

I don't buy that the Pats were terrific and the Steelers were awful. There were several instances in there where one play changes that game.

I do think that the Steelers will need to prepare better going forward. I saw several things during that game where I was yelling at the TV because they were so obvious and for some reason no one on the Steelers' sideline could see it.

Maybe, but you know what? The Patriots coaching staff was a HUGE part of making sure those one or two plays went their way. Big Ben gives a great play fake and wants to throw the ball to the TE. He's blanketed. The Patriots didn't bite and held their ground. Do I really need to get into how Pitt covered the TE on the other side or how the Patriots manipulated the Steelers defense to make it happen?

I think the refs probably missed the yelling of the snap count on the 1. . . but the Steelers had multiple chances before that. I think coaching and gameplan won the game for the Patriots.

I will agree. . . if that gets better and the Steelers have a break or two go their way, they can compete with the Patriots.

I don't know if you can really say a play on the first drive changed the whole game, but that Antonio Brown pass play really was an awful call. Up to that point Williams was running all over the Pats, they were creeping up allowing Ben open receivers in the middle and that one play just took the air out of a brilliant first drive. Just screamed of a scripted play that they were going to run in the red zone whatever happened but it never should have seen the light of day seeing how well the run game and the mid level passing game was going on that drive.

football is back! Hello again RedZone! Let's go beloved Cardinals!

Yep, thankfully we got Cheater-Bowl out of the way before opening day. Now let the games begin!!!

I agree, I was surprised the offense was marching like that on the opening drive. And then the stupid Brown play happened and it felt deflating, even so early on.

Lynch just carried five Rams for five yards.

Man those Cleveland jerseys are HIDEOUS!

Nice to know the Browns are still the Browns!

I guess PI doesn't apply to Richard Sherman?

Taking McCown to the locker room.

Joe Buck has the nerve to admonish the public for making the McCarthy comments a big deal? Pot. Meet. Black.

Nice drive for J Football.

Manziel looks like he might be a QB! :eek:

Damnit RGIII what a stupid pass...:p

Three yards per pass attempt for Tannehill? Can't get a fourth-and-one? Have a feeling it is gonna be a long season in Miami, if this keeps up. :eek:

And no points from that.

Over/under on number of times RGIII will be shown on sideline: 587.

I keep thinking Tannehill is on the short list for a breakout. But it never happens.

I've never seen so many injuries. At this rate, someone's going to get Brett Favre out of retirement by week ten.

Woohoo!!! Points!

Hasn´t he steadily improved so far and was pretty good last year ? Not like he´s stagnated for years now or sth.

German Free TV is actually showing 2 games every week now plus another 1 or 2 as stream, very happy about that :)

He's a checkdown king. With Stills, Landry, Parker and Cameron, I was expecting a bit more throwing the ball down the field this season.

WTF is wrong with Indianapolis?

Which would probably be a totally valid statement after week 8 rather than the first half of week 1 ;)

Russell Wilson made some really stupid decisions in regards to keeping the ball so far (and taking the sack) ...

Yeah, radio mentioned that Tannehill was 27 over 12 last year. You can get a lot worse.

After eight months of waiting, I'm entitled to complain after a single half of football! :rant:

:D

Miami almost had me feeling good there for a second! :lol:

Early thoughts:

1) The Texans really missed the scouting report on the Chiefs. Cover the RB and TE, give Charles some yards and dare Smith to beat you on third and long. (and when it is third and long, watch the pass to the RB)

They decided to stuff Charles, not cover RB or TE and ensure there is hardly any third downs at all. (The Chiefs only third down conversion was on a pass to a RB for 12 yards) Very sound strategy O'Brien. Very sound.

The Chiefs are paper thin IMHO, but if they stay healthy, they will be difficult to beat if you don't game plan them accurately.

2) Tyrod Taylor lighting up Indy. Did not expect that one.

3) Manziel with some good plays. We'll see how he does in the second half.

4) Hawks offense struggling.

5) I haven't seen the game, but what the hell is the ;Miami gameplan? They have ran the ball 5 times for 5 yards and only 4 of those carries wen to a RB? Considering the circumstances, I think his numbers are pretty good.

They are certainly fall-like

Wish I knew?

Does Indy actually have anyone beyond Luck and Hilton?

I guess the Bills are for real?

I don't know? But that defense seems really slow.

Did they change the rules for challenging a play? I though that was a first down on the Jennings catch.