Daily Slop – 29 Oct 24 – Mike Greenberg on Matt Eberflus: “One of the five dumbest things I’ve heard a human being say”

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Jayden Daniels fights through injury to beat Bears

Breaking down Jayden Daniels’ performance in the Commanders dramatic victory over the Bears.

Jayden Daniels…spent the week building up to the game dealing with a rib injury suffered on the opening play of the Panthers game a week ago. His game status was uncertain until pre-game warm ups, when he was confirmed as the starter. While the offense struggled to finish drives, Daniels was very productive. He completed 21 of 38 passes for 326 yards and a touchdown. He also ran for another 52 yards on eight carries. Given the circumstances of his injury and some issues the offense had around him, it was a strong performance from Daniels. He started the game off well too, looking to play from the pocket and work as a passer first and foremost.

On this play, the Commanders run a bow concept. Tight end Zach Ertz aligns to the left and runs a basic cross while running back Brian Robinson works out to the flat. Receiver Terry McLaurin motions across the formation before the snap and spots up in between the two other routes to that side of the field, creating the bow concept. The core of the concept is to create a high-low read on an underneath zone defender. If the defender sinks back under the basic cross, Daniels can take McLaurin on the spot route underneath, but if the defender attaches to McLaurin underneath, Daniels can find Ertz over the middle for a bigger gain.

Daniels does a really nice job here. As he drops back to pass, he aligns himself to deliver the throw to McLaurin on the spot route underneath. He goes as far as faking beginning his throwing motion to fully sell that he’s throwing to McLaurin. This is an effort to manipulate the coverage and open up the window to Ertz behind him. Now, the zone defender in coverage isn’t fooled by this because he never really looks at Daniels. He spots McLaurin’s route breaking off and immediately looks to attach to it, so never sees Daniels looking that way or faking a throw to him. So technically, the manipulation from Daniels doesn’t work, but I love that he was thinking about it and attempting it in order to open up a deeper throwing lane. With the defender attaching to McLaurin, Daniels is able to reset to the middle of the field and find Ertz on his basic cross for a nice gain and a first down.

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The Athletic (paywall)

Jayden Daniels’ Hail Mary throw is latest example that these Commanders won’t flinch

Teammates didn’t sense Daniels was limited by the injury that knocked him out in the first quarter of last week’s home win over the Carolina Panthers. They admired the effort.

“That’s the dog in him,” running back Brian Robinson Jr. said.

“What I love about this team,” tight end John Bates said, “is nobody flinches.”

That certainly is true for the 23-year-old quarterback.

The rib injury that sidelined Daniels complicated his Week 8 status. Missing most team practices in between meant a rare event might not happen. The two quarterbacks, both Heisman Trophy winners, were selected No. 1 and 2 in April’s draft by franchises that spent decades looking for a long-term solution at the sport’s most critical position.

Daniels is a primary reason Washington improved to 6-2 for the first time since 2008. The win marked a 4-0 start at home, matching the 2005 team that won the franchise’s most recent playoff game.

Players and coaches always believe anything is possible. Nobody familiar with reality — or the organization’s relentless misery under previous ownership — saw this coming.

These Commanders are telling a different tale.

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NFL.com

Bears coach Matt Eberflus says Tyrique Stevenson’s responsibility on Hail Mary was to box out Noah Brown

Bears head coach Matt Eberflus told reporters on Monday that Stevenson addressed the team that morning about his actions leading up to the game-winning score.

“You have to be able to have that balance if you’re that type of player that plays with great intensity,” Eberflus said.

Eberflus told reporters that Stevenson’s responsibility on the play was to box out Brown, adding that any discipline levied to Stevenson would be kept in-house.

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New York Post

Video of Bears’ Tyrique Stevenson taunting Commanders fans looks even worse now

In his media availability, Eberflus said he was unconcerned that the Bears let the Commanders have an easy 13-yard gain on a pass from Daniels to Terry McClaurin, where the wideout scampered out of bounds to set the team up for the Hail Mary.

“You’re defending a touchdown there, and they’re throwing a ball for 10 or 13 yards … That doesn’t matter. It’s always going to come down to the last play,” Eberflus said.

It was a puzzling answer from the Bears head coach given the Commanders were on their own 35-yard line before the gainer, and a Daniels throw would not have been able to reach the end zone from there.

Bears coach Matt Eberflus mocked for ‘dumbest’ comment after Hail Mary disaster

“That’s one of the five dumbest things I’ve heard a human being say, in my entire life, in any context,” Greenberg told the “Get Up” crew on Monday morning.

The play prior, an unguarded 13-yard out route that set up the winning play, left the “Get Up” analysts as mystified as the host.

Rex Ryan stammers his way through pseudo-comprehension before throwing it over to former quarterback Dan Orlovsky.

“Dan, is it easier to throw the ball 50 to 60 yards or 80 yards?” Ryan asks.

Greenberg cut back into the conversation before Orlovsky had a chance to answer, though the camera is following Woody, who has since risen from his chair and is now pacing the studio.

“If he says those 15 yards didn’t matter… Those 15 yards cost you the game every bit as much as the hail mary play at the very end [did],” Greenberg said.

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Windy City Gridiron

10 Bears Takes: Crushing Hail Mary Turns a Comeback Win into a Devastating Loss

[T]he Bears’ rookie quarterback did not have a good game. His accuracy was wildly off for the majority of the game, and he didn’t look comfortable in the pocket. After all, he was pressured on close to half of his dropbacks. All excuses aside, the first three quarters yielded four completions for less than 40 yards. That’s not good enough by any stretch of the imagination.

Bears vs. Commanders Game Balls: Do We Have To?

The bigger story here is the ineptitude of the coaching staff. A head coach who refuses to admit he messed up. An offensive coordinator who can’t seem to get out of his own way. There is no way the Chicago Bears should have lost that game on Sunday given the performance of the defense most of the day. A day that saw the Bears keep Jayden Daniels and the high-powered Washington Commanders offense out of the end zone for almost the entire game.

Almost. Deep breaths. Inhale. Exhale. Okay, moving on.

I’m glad I don’t have to reward game balls to the coaching staff, because if I did, I’d put them at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean and ask the head coach and offensive coordinator to go retrieve them.

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Commanders.com

Game Balls | Four standouts from Washington’s win over Chicago

Johnny Newton

After veteran defensive Jon Allen was ruled out for the season with an injury picked up against the Baltimore Ravens, head coach Dan Quinn said that Newton would be tasked with shouldering a lot of the load left by Allen’s absence. Against the Bears, Newton showed exactly why Quinn feels he’s ready for that sort of job.

Newton got off to a flying start in the first quarter of the Week 8 matchup against Chicago. Bears quarterback Caleb Williams had little time to process what was happening on just the second play of the game as the Commanders second-round pick brushed off his defender and smothered Williams for a loss of six yards.

He opened the game with a highlight play and then tacked one on at the other end of the contest. In the fourth quarter, with the Bears down by five and on Washington’s 1-yard line, Newton gobbled up a forced fumble — his first in the pros. In addition to the tackle for loss and the forced fumble, the 22-year-old finished the game with three tackles and three quarterback hits. After coming back from post-draft surgeries on his feet, Newton seems to be finding the form that earned him Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year honors with the Fighting Illini.

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Commanders.com

Final thoughts | Commanders defense continues to improve

The Commanders’ defense has come a long since Week 1, when they let Baker Mayfield throw four touchdown passes in a 37-20 loss. Over the past two months, the Commanders are now around the league average in several key categories and even top 10 in others. They shut out their last two opponents in the first half — a feat that has not been accomplished since the 1990s.

Quinn wants to believe their performance against the Bear is just another step in the right direction.

Quinn added that they can’t ignore the 56-yard touchdown run D’Andre Swift had or some of the other mistakes Washington’s defense made. Still, the unit is objectively better than it was at the start of the season. The Bears, which had scored 71 combined points against the Carolina Panthers and the Jacksonville Jaguars, didn’t get in the end zone until nearly the end of the third quarter. Williams had just 36 passing yards until the final two drives of the game.

Granted, the Bears’ best offensive days came against struggling teams, but they were still viewed as a step up in competition for the Commanders. There will be other tough offenses later in the schedule, but the hope is that Washington can continue to get better at getting them off the field.

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Upcoming opponent

New York Post

Giants wilt again in messy loss to Steelers after ‘MNF’ comeback attempt goes haywire

The Giants once again showed a national television audience what they do best. When the lights come on, they wilt. When things get tough, they capitulate. When the final tally is added up, they have lost.

So it went on another fruitless and at times embarrassing “Monday Night Football” showcase for a team that is growing tiresome in its inability to get out of its own way. This time, they were in it until a third quarter meltdown and then flirted with a comeback before succumbing to their sad identity, allowing the Steelers to beat them, 26-18, at Acrisure Stadium.

The offense was a penalty-laden mess, new starting left tackle Chris Hubbard did not exactly build a wall, second-year cornerback Deonte Banks got benched after yet another bad-look deal on the field and Daniel Jones once again could not get his team across the goal line often enough.

After a feeble three-and-out on offense, the Giants on defense finally caved in, as Russell Wilson lobbed one of his moon balls to Austin, who beat rookie Dru Phillips for a 29-yard touchdown early in the fourth quarter.

The Giants were in a 23-13 hole, but before the dirt was shoveled completely over them, Tracy scored to make it 23-15 with 11:07 left. That was promising. The ensuing two-point conversion attempt was clown-like. The Giants wanted a quick pass to Malik Nabers on the left side, with a wall of blockers lined up in front of him. At the snap, no one on the blocking line moved, allowing Alex Highsmith to race in untouched to nail Nabers as the ball came his way. Jones saw that mental gaffe and threw his arms up in disgust.

Greg Joseph’s fourth field goal pulled the Giants within 26-18 with 5:06 to go. One play later, Micah McFadden forced a fumble from Russell Wilson that Bobby Okereke recovered on the Pittsburgh 37-yard line. The Giants had a chance. But not for long. T.J. Watt sped around Jermaine Eluemunor to nail Jones for a sack, forced fumble and fumble recovery to give the ball back to the Steelers with 2:29 remaining.

The Giants continued their ineptitude on this night of the week, losing for the ninth time in their last 10 games playing under the spotlight on Monday night.

Jones is 1-16 in games played in primetime. He is akin to a vehicle venturing out in the evening without headlights.

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Big Blue View

Giants bench Deonte Banks during game vs. Steelers

Deonte Banks, whose effort has been questioned a number of times this season, appeared to be benched by the New York Giants in the second quarter of Monday’s game against the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Banks, who did not appear to suffer an injury, was replaced by Greg Stroman for the final two defensive series of the first half.

A week ago, Banks, the Giants’ 2023 first-round pick, gave up on a play and allowed Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts to gain extra yardage. Earlier in the season, defensive backs coach Jerome Henderson was not happy with Banks’ effort on a 55-yard touchdown pass to CeeDee Lamb of the Dallas Cowboys.

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Big Blue View

T.J. Watt ‘was supposed to be chipped’ on game-changing strip sack

Brian Daboll says Daniel Jones “feels terrible” about not getting the protection set properly

On the biggest play of Monday night’s game, a strip-sack of New York Giants quarterback Daniel Jones by Pittsburgh Steelers future Hall of Fame edge defender T.J. Watt, the biggest question was why the Giants left right tackle Jermaine Eluemunor 1-on-1 with Watt.

ESPN commentator Troy Aikman asked it. Fans on social media were asking it. Turns out Eluemunor was probably asking it, too, since he was expecting help.

“He [Watt] was supposed to be chipped,” said head coach Brian Daboll. “Jermaine was anticipating a chip.”

Daboll explained that Jones was supposed to move tight end Theo Johnson, aligned on the opposite side next to new left tackle Chris Hubbard, across the formation to help Eluemunor. That didn’t happen.

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Podcasts & videos

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Raising Hail With a Hail Mary! Jayden Daniels & Caleb Williams Matchup Recap | Booth Review | NFL

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Photos

Commanders.com

PHOTOS | Commanders vs. Bears, Week 8

Check out the top photos of the Washington Commanders at Northwest Stadium during their Week 8 matchup with the Chicago Bears, #ShotonSony (Photos by Emilee Fails and Kourtney Carroll/Washington Commanders)