On Mondays during in the fall, the conversation is so dominated by NFL football that the expression “Monday morning quarterback” has entered the vernacular. The phrase is defined by Google as “a person who passes judgment on and criticizes something after the event.” With the popularity of fantasy football, we now have Monday morning quarterbacks talking about football from two different perspectives. We want you to be able to participate in this great tradition, so all fall we’ll be running NFL One Liners on Monday. Use these tiny synopses throughout the day:
Week 6
Sunday, October 12, at 1:00 p.m. ET
New England Patriots 37, at Buffalo Bills 22
Tom Brady and the Patriots are red-hot after a slow start to the season. The Bills, as is often the case, are fading to blue after a hot start of their own.
Line: One day the Bills will be better than the Patriots, one day.
Baltimore Ravens 48, at Tampa Bay Buccaneers 17
The wisdom about professional sports teams is that even the most lopsided matchup between teams should be relatively even. That doesn’t seem to be the case this year with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers who flip wildly from horrible to mediocre and back.
Line: I am so glad I’m not a Tampa Bay fan. [Conversely, if you are a Tampa Bay fan, just say “ouch.”]
Pittsburgh Steelers 10, at Cleveland Browns 31
This game has traditionally been like the Patriots versus the Bills — one team always wins and one team always loses. Today, the order of things flipped for the Browns and the Steelers, much to the delight of Cleveland fans.
Line: Cleveland is for real!
Carolina Panthers 37, at Cincinnati Bengals 37
What? A tie?! Ties are really, really unusual in the NFL. They happen so rarely that sometimes even some of the players don’t think they are possible and expect that the game will just keep going.
Line: How crazy is a tie? Crazy, that’s how.
Denver Broncos 31, at New York Jets 17
The Jets played so much better than anyone reasonably thought they would. And they still lost by 14 points.
Line: The Jets could play the Broncos ten times and lose all ten.
Detroit Lions 17, at Minnesota Vikings 3
At the start of the day, one could have argued that all four teams in the Lions’ and Viking’s division had realistic shots to win it. That’s no longer the case, not because the Vikings lost, but because they looked so helpless doing it.
Line: It’s October and the Vikings’ season looks over already.
Green Bay Packers 27, at Miami Dolphins 24
Miami has a sneakily effective home field advantage. Teams from the north just don’t seem ready to play in the heat. Green Bay is better at football but Miami is better at running around in the sun and heat. Packers’ quarterback Aaron Rodgers had to pull a little magic to get his team over the hump.
Line: The Packers were in a tight spot but Aaron Rodgers pulled it out.
Jacksonville Jaguars 14, at Tennessee Titans 16
This game was all about expectations. The Jaguars are winless and were expected to be bad. The Titans were supposed to be kinda good. So, even though the Titans won, it’s easier to see positives for the Jaguars than the Titans after this game.
Line: Sure, the Titans won, but I think the Jaguars fans are happier.
SUNDAY, October 12, AT 4:05 and 4:25 P.M. ET
San Diego Chargers 31, at Oakland Raiders 28
The same could be said of this game. No one expected the Raiders to play the Chargers as well as they did but they did… and then they lost.
Line: Chargers Quarterback Phillip Rivers might be the MVP of the league so far.
Chicago Bears 27, at Atlanta Falcons 13
The Bears and Falcons are mirror images in many ways. Both have good quarterbacks, great wide receivers, and a shaky defense. Yesterday the difference between the teams was that the Bears could run the ball and the Falcons couldn’t.
Line: It’s a passing league but being able to run can still help a team win.
Dallas Cowboys 30, at Seattle Seahawks 23
This matchup lived up to its hype. The lead went back and forth and back and forth until finally the Cowboys had won against the defending champion Seahawks in Seattle where they almost never lose. It was a great game.
Line: If there were any doubts left about the Cowboys, they erased them, at least for now.
Washington Redskins 20, at Arizona Cardinals 30
The Cardinals starting quarterback had missed the last four games because one of the nerves in his throwing shoulder went “dead.” It came alive late last week and he jumped right into this game to kill, for once and all, the nerves of Washington fans. No need to be nervous anymore, their season is over.
Line: I think we can safely say that the Redskins season is a loss.
SUNDAY, OCTOBER 12, AT 8:30 P.M. ET
New York Giants 0, at Philadelphia Eagles 27
Hasn’t it seemed like a disproportionate number of prime-time games have been blow outs? It seems that way to me. The Eagles jumped the Giants early by scoring fast and knocking Giants Quarterback Eli Manning down even faster. They never looked back except to chuckle at their struggling rivals.
Line: That wasn’t even fun to watch.