WEAK 12 REPORT AND AUTOPSY

WEAK 12 CHEESE BALL BOMBS

FADING HOPES IN COLD CLIMES and

BEING JUST BADENOV, BORIS

DOORMAT DIVISION STANDINGS WEEK 12

AFC
Cleveland -    0-12
Jacksonville - 2-10
NY Jets -        3-8
Cincinnati -    3-7-1
San Diego -    5-6

NFC
San Francisco - 1-10
Chicago -          2-9
Los Angeles -   4-7
Carolina -         4-7
Green Bay        4-6


BROWNOUTS 13, GIANTS 27
Who can lose a game where the opponent punts 9 times?  The Browns!  Who can lose a game where your opponent gets only 13 first downs?  The Browns!  Who else can lose a game where your opponent gets 100 penalty yards to your measly 35?  Nobody but the Browns!!  Of course fumbling away the ball 3 times, with one of those for a fumble-six, kinda helps.

0-12 AND the worst uniforms in the NFL. C'MON, those are ghastly.  Somebody get that ownership a medal, and make it out of an old Trabant (worst car ever made) grill.  

LAMBS 21, SAINTS 49
Maybe Saints coach Sean Payton is still a little steamed at his old defensive (hits for cash!) coordinator, who now works for the Lambs. It has to hurt your eyes after a while, doing the laser glare at the opposing bench for an entire game.  Actually, Lambie QB Jared Goff must have felt like he was back at Cal:  high scoring game that is exciting for 3 quarters and then you end up getting blown out. Trick plays by the bushel in this one.   

WHINERS 24, DOLPHINS 31
Honesty: Chip Kelly and Colin Kaepernick seem to be getting on the same page.  Kaepernick accounted for over 400 yards of offense yesterday.  He was THE man.  They nearly tied the game with 2 seconds to go.  Man, that was a close one.  Luckily for the Whines, he does not play defense, and whoa is that defense just as porous as Chip's most porous Oregon defenses over the years. I swear they couldn't stop a baby stroller pushed by an exhausted diaper-whipped dad. And I should know.  Humongous game next week vs. the Bears.  

JESTS 17, PATRIOTS 22
Another close call for a Doormat yesterday.  Good God, what were the Jests thinking, being ahead deep in the 4th quarter??  Well, relax, fans- the Patriots were safely guided down the field for the go-ahead TD, and Jets QB Ryan "Let Me Blow This" Fitzfumble fumbled away the Jests last fumbling 'chance.'   Jests still in the hunt for the Moldy Carpet, but not really because the Browns will win 1 game at most.  

BEARS 21, TITANS 27
The Barelys do it again- look like they are getting shellacked, and then stage the Futile Comeback and make it look like they tried.  It's a lot of Looking Like, and very little of Actually Being.  Who knew that Soldier Field was a land of fantasy?  Titans have risen to 6-6.  Look out world, a Doormat is crawling up out of the muck.

BUNGLES 14, RAVEN-POES 19
At the beginning of the season, the Bungles were a favorite to challenge for the AFC Championship.  Oh PLEASE. This is the Bungles we're talking about here, and they've already had two winning seasons in a row, and that's way way way more than should be asked for here.  Are they burning Andy Dalton jerseys in their BBQ's in the parking lot?  Are there still scraps of a Carson Palmer jersey in there?  You gonna eat that chicken leg?

GAGUARS 21, BILLS 28
Gags extend their losing streak to 6 games, now, and in this one showed a lot of savvy in losing the lead 5 times.  Not to be denied!  Rack it up!! Wild game up in Buffalo...look out, the Bills are 6-5.  How long has it been since they've been over .500 this late in the season?  Usually by now you know they'll get to 10 losses.  ANOTHER DOORMAT crawls out of the BASEMENT!!!

BUCS 14,  SEAHAGS 5
And yet another perennial loser and close friend is breathing the rarified air in the winning column.  6-5 and snuffing the Hags with ferocious defense (3 turnovers) has GOT to feel good.  

RAIDERS 35, PANTHERS 32
The Raiders' Derek Carr goes out for one series with a jammed pinkie, and the Panthers pounce on it like it was 25 points, which is what happened. But...Carr came back in, and this guy is amazing.  Well, here's our fabulous  Doormat Champ stomping all the way to the #1 seed in the AFC today.  GOOD GRIEF.  

aaaaaand THAT'S THE VIEW FROM THE BASEMENT!!!!!!

Doormat Week 13: RAIDERS TAKE CHARGE!!

MAKE WAY FOR THE KING

RAIDERS 0,  RAMS 52
Leaving no doubt about who is the worst team in the league, in perhaps the most phenomenal defeat in their history (the 1961 55-0 loss to Houston included), the Oakland Raiders played the worst game I've ever seen a pro football team play.  In a complete implosion after their lone victory 10 days ago, the Silver and Blacked Out pulled out all the stops:  5 turnovers. Linebackers falling for fakes that don't work in Little Guy football. QBs running for their lives. Running plays to nowhere. The dinkiest dink passes known to human-kind. A barrage of 3-and-outs in the first half.  Four 3rd-and-1 play calls- sideline pass plays- that had no chance of converting into a first down. 3 of those the first 3 possessions.  For all the world it looked intentional. When you have the biggest moose at fullback in the entire league, Marcel Reese, and you do not run him on 3rd and a yard, there is really something systemically planned going on. Add to this a hysterical chaos that is sometimes called a defensive backfield on other football teams, and you get a hail of touchdowns racked up so fast, the Rams had their biggest lead of the season (14-0) for only about 2 minutes before it got doubled.  The Raiders didn't play defense- they held a charity event.  The Raider 'D' took more bad angles than the drunks down at my local billiard hall.

And just when the avalanche seemed to have stopped, the Blacked Out pulled out forgotten big off-season pick-up Matt Schaub at QB, threw him into the fray, and Matt delivered the cherry-on-top pick-six in the 4th quarter, getting the Rams over the half-century mark.  Pop the champagne!

Raiders coach Tony Sporano said the Blacked Out weren't sharp all week. Not sharp? Coach, coach, COACH.  That was the greatest Doormat performance possible. Sporting the worst Turkey Day hangover of all time must be recognized, but this kind of bad takes at least 2, maybe 3 years of prep, and the Raiders have made it.  Once they got ol' tiresome Al out of the way, and his boob of a son Mark got ahold of the team, it's been a hard charge into the biggest sinkhole in the history of Commitment to Excellence.

The Raiders, the worst team in football for the last 11 years, are now the Worst Team in Football RIGHT NOW.  Mission Accomplished.

Let's have a look at the standings, and then let's skewer the other games:

THE STANDINGS

DOORMAT DIVISION , WEEK 13
 

NFC               W-L              PF       PA       DIFF 

Tampa Bay      2-10              220      314       -94

Washington     3-9                244      322       -78 

NY Giants       3-9                257      319        -62

Carolina           3-8-1             228      337       -85

Minnesota        5-7                233      257       -24

AFC             

Oakland           1-11              176      337      -161            

Jacksonville      2-10             186     329      -143

NY Jets             2-10             190      319      -129

Tennessee        2-10              213      338      -125

*Houston           6-6

THE REST OF THE SORRY PILE

GIANTS 24, JAGUARS 25
In this huge Doormat tilt, staked to a 21-0 lead by the Jaguars, the New York Gnats turn it around with TWO fumbles- one in their end zone and the other run back 41 yards- for Jaguar touchdowns, thus saving the Jags the bother of having to move the football, which is usually not on the clipboard.  The Giants make sure they don't get the last field goal, they hit 7 straight losses, lose to the #2 team in the Doormat, and keep within a game of Tampa Bay in the NFC.  Pow!

BUCS 13,  BENGALS 14
Bengals QB Andy Dalton really really tried, but 3 interceptions will not do it against the Bootineers, not when first place is there for the taking, and 10 losses are on the line. Faced with a first and goal after an interception, and the lead 7 yards away, the Boots refuse to move into the end zone, kick a field goal, and come up 1 point short.  Arr!  The Boots walk their own plank.

DEADSKINS 27, COLTS 49
This was like a college game, where the really bad team somehow stays with the much better team until early in the 3rd quarter, and then they just can't keep up.  The Sunburns run out of gas, hit the gatorade table, and come up with the big loss.  Only one game out of first in the Doormat NFC.

TITANS 21,  ASTROS 45
I mean, the TEXANS.  If you can make Texan QB Ryan Fitzpatrick wind up with a 147.5 rating, you are really really...really scraping the bottom of the tallow bin, baby.  Titanics get Houston out to a 24-0 lead, bring in once-upon-a-time franchise QB Jake Locker, and Jake whips out two INTs and a fumble.
Titanics make it to 10 losses as well.  Glub!

FALCONS 29, CARDINALS 18
The Falcons accidentally got out to a 17-0 lead, had no idea how to respond, and couldn't get back on track.  Cardinal QB Drew Stanton finished being an effective stand-in QB 3 weeks ago, and the Falcons had no response.  Holy Cow, Atlanta won a game.  SCREEECH!

PANTHERS 13, VIKINGS 31
Finally, the Minnesota Vikes played a cold weather game in Minneapolis for the first time since Martin Van Buren was president. And guess what?  They won!  Today's only palindrome score, the Vikings get whacked with TWO easy punt blocks, which they run in for scores, and they cannot recover.  Getting ahead of the Pansies 21-3 is murder.  You're not going to lose.  Cam Newton has you right where he wants you.

aaaAAAaAAnd THAT'S THE VIEW FROM THE BASEMENT!!!!