Chill Sports

It’s a natural instinct for sports fans to feel that we could, at times, do a far better job than the athletes, coaches, and executives that work in the games we know so well. Sometimes we can’t control it; I’ve even found myself blurting out the odd “I could’ve caught that!” , or “I would’ve run that route better!” , knowing full well that I would, in fact, not catch the pass in question or correctly run the route in question (and in the astonishingly small chance that I did those two things, I also know that to receive a tackle from any of the eleven defenders on the field would likely turn my skeleton into sawdust). I can’t apologize for such primal reactions, unfortunately. Every so often, however, there are instances when someone on a team we follow makes a very avoidable mistake of epic proportions, where many members of the fanbase could have legitimately made a much better choice. For quite a few hours, I felt that way about the Baltimore Ravens’ failure to re-sign Lamar Jackso...

The Denver Broncos have been an unmitigated disaster so far this season. There’s no need to sugarcoat things; they currently sit at 2-3, which still keeps them in the Wild Card hunt in the AFC, but had they not been playing opponents who so desperately wanted to lose even more than they did, the Broncos could easily be at 0-5. They’ve just put up two of the worst primetime performances in recent NFL history, and their offense currently ranks 26th in EPA/play and 29th in Success Rate, per RBSDM. Despite coming into the season supposedly being just a quarterback away from true contention, and despite the acquisition of a Super Bowl champion and nine-time Pro Bowler, Russell Wilson, at said quarterback position, the Broncos offense flat-out sucks. This was never more apparent than last Thursday night, where the Broncos and Colts played out one of the worst NFL games of all time. Neither team scored a touchdown, each committed two turnovers and many more frustrating blunders, drew a combin...

When analysts are asked to talk about the qualities that make Jimmy Garoppolo a good starting quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers, they often resort to the same subset of talking points: accuracy , leadership , poise under pressure , and intelligence . This is, however, in spite of the fact that Garoppolo as a quarterback does not actually possess many of these qualities. He’s frustratingly jumpy in the pocket with spotty footwork, has trouble deciphering blitzes and making smart decisions when they do arrive, and is accurate only when the system around him simplifies the game down for him to near-rookie levels. His abilities as a leader of men has, for the most part, never been in question, but in truth he has quietly shown a consistent pattern of an unwillingness to take accountability in losses -- including after his disastrous performance in a Sunday Night Football loss to an equally disastrous Broncos team -- and reportedly has a habit of “ van...