** I’m a little surprised it happened, because in recent years the Eagles have made a habit of only getting rid of good talent, not overhyped jerks.
** But I’m not surprised it happened that quickly. Eagles owner Jeff Lurie probably planned on waiting until season’s end, but Kelly forced him to hurry it up and get the play over with.
** Lurie actually offered to let Kelly stay if he just run down one reason why he should keep the job. Instead, Kelly called a pass play behind the line and lost three.
** Rumor is that Kelly tried to trade Lurie during the meeting, but ran out of draft picks to throw in the deal.
** The Eagles were 10-8 in the playoffs under Andy Reid, 2-7 in the postseason under the five other coaches they’ve had since 1983. I don’t have a joke here. Just a lot of angry.
Top performers of the yearQBs
3rd place: Blake Bortles, 383.56 pts -- owned by Dad (undrafted)
2nd place: Tom Brady, 410.74 pts -- owned by Jim (8th QB drafted)
1st place: Cam Newton, 423.86 pts -- owned by Jo (11th QB drafted)
** Rough, rough year in review coming here, folks. Every category except one had an undrafted player among the top three performers for the year, which is unfathomable when you consider that 216 players were drafted. That includes 24 QBs drafted, 22 of whom were worse picks than Bortles.
WRs
3rd place: Brandon Marshall, 220.73 pts -- owned by Sam (19th WR drafted)
2nd place: Julio Jones, 230.80 pts -- owned by Dad (7th WR drafted)
1st place: Antonio Brown, 242.74 pts -- owned by Mom Doyle (1st WR drafted)
** This is the only category where our drafted selections look good, and that’s only if we squint and pretend that 18 other people weren’t taken ahead of Marshall. On the plus side, the top WR picked was the top WR, so...
RBs
3rd place: DeAngelo Williams, 197.50 pts -- owned by Jo (undrafted)
2nd place: Adrian Peterson, 225.03 pts -- owned by Ant (1st RB drafted)
1st place: Devonta Freeman, 247.83 pts -- owned by Dad (38th RB drafted)
** Seriously. 53 RBs were picked up in the draft, 17 in the first two rounds. And all of them but Peterson turned out to be the wrong selections. I’m burning the mock draft boards next year.
TEs
3rd place: Gary Barnidge, 157.13 pts -- owned by me (undrafted)
2nd place: Jordan Reed, 164.47 pts -- owned by Jo (16th TE drafted)
1st place: Rob Gronkowski, 178.80 pts -- owned by Mike (1st TE drafted)
** Another top draftee on top of the board. And after that, all folks waaaay down the chart.
Ks
3rd place: Blair Walsh, 153.00 pts -- owned by Mike (undrafted)
2nd place: Graham Gano, 164.50 pts -- unowned (undrafted)
1st place: Stephen Gostkowski, 171.00 pts -- owned by me (1st K drafted)
** OK, yes, but nobody cares about kickers.
DEFs
3rd place: Kansas City, 191.00 pts -- owned by Mike (10th DEF drafted)
2nd place: Arizona, 189.00 pts -- owned by Jeff (6th DEF drafted)
1st place: Denver, 207.00 pts -- owned by Dad (undrafted)
** Even the defenses were a complete mystery this year. How the Broncos can go from “not considered in the top 15” to “best in the league” is worth a separate Denver steroids investigation.
Ds
3rd place: Lavonte David, 71.00 pts -- owned by Bob (undrafted)
2nd place: Deone Bucannon, 72.00 pts -- unowned (undrafted)
1st place: Reshad Jones, 86.86 pts -- owned by Paul (undrafted)
** Paul’s surprising appearance on this list gives every one of our coaches at least one of the season’s top performers on their squad … except Joel. Tough year, man.
“Worst of the year” edition
5th place: Jimmy Garoppolo, -0.50 pts -- on the wire
4th place: David Johnson, -0.83 pts -- on the wire
3rd place: Chris Harper, -1.66 pts -- on the wire
2nd place: Sean Renfree, -1.96 pts -- on the wire
1st place: Glenn Winston, -2.80 pts -- on the wire
Worth noting here that both Harper and Garoppolo play for the Patriots, so it’s a little extra embarrassing to see the one-time #1 seed in the AFC with two terrible fantasy players. Winston did all his damage on the only carry he had all year, losing 8 yds and fumbling the ball. It’s also what would have happened if Demarco Murray only got one carry this year.
** Looking back at some of the pre-season predictions by the sports experts this season … Sports Illustrated had 12 of their top NFL minds guess the playoffs in September. Ten of them had the Eagles in the playoffs, despite the massive offseason turnover. Six had the Eagles in the NFC championship game. Three had them in the Super Bowl. And three had Chip Kelly as coach of the year. For the record, they were incorrect.
** A report from CBS Sports this week said that one of the factors in Kelly’s firing was the team’s annual holiday party, a treasured tradition of Lurie that the ex-coach forced him to reschedule because it conflicted with his mid-week game preparation. And that would be a terrible reason to can a guy, unless you realize the eggnog would have only helped that awful play calling.
** It dropped them in three spots in the draft. Not a huge deal, but when two division rivals get to pick just ahead of you, it’s gonna sting a little more if they steal a skill player.
** It made the Eagles 2016 schedule a worse. The Giants will now get to play the Rams and the Saints, the third place teams in the NFC South and West. The Eagles get the second place teams instead -- the Falcons and Seahawks.
** It made people think Demarco Murray was good. He had a 54-yard TD run on a broken play by the Giants, and all the sportswriters attributed it to Chip Kelly being gone. For the rest of the game, Murray had 11 runs for 15 yards and a fumble. Nice work, bum.
** It prevented a 10-loss season. Teams that lose 10 games are considered really bad, and in need of dramatic changes. But 7-9 you can blame on unlucky breaks, and say you were just a few scores away from 9-7. This team was awful. It deserved to lose 10.
** It ruined all my “The Eagles still haven’t won this year” jokes. I thought I had those available for the next nine long, long months.
Ah, poor Dallas. Your once promising campaign ended with a last-place finish and your star QB and WR on the injured list. True, your junkard pickup RB still rushed for 387 more yds than Demarco Murray, but the whole season seems like a disappointment. But at least you can always look forward to next year, right? Right? Just look at the optimism of your defensive starters...
Dallas Cowboys starting safety James Edward Wilcox
** As soft cowards caw amid jests, next year will go badly
Oh well, maybe 2017 will be kinder. We can only hope not.
** Back and forth, back and forth Dad and I went in our weekly picks, with neither one of us falling too far off pace in the battle of wills. Until this week, at least. With our totals tied for the year, I brought the hammer down in week 17, sweeping all three games we had different (and flipping on two others I could have also taken). That gives me the title for the year, breaking his three-year run of prognosticating dominance.
I went 161-95 on the season, picking the winner 62.9% of the time. That would put me ahead of every ESPN NFL “expert” on their weekly picks list except for Chris Mortensen, who went 163-93. And he does this for a living.
** Bleacher Report has the Eagles with the 13th pick in the draft selecting Michigan State QB Connor Cook, who just got shut out in the college football playoffs. So, yeah. They don’t have the Eagles taking anyone in round two because ohmigawd we really did trade that for Sam Bradford.
** CBS Sports and Bleacher Report have Antonio Brown as their top fantasy draft pick for next fall so congrats Steelers on your season being ruined next year.
Week 17 standings The final league standings -- and the presentation of the Awesome Cup -- will take place tomorrow, after all the scores are calculated and finalized. Until then, make no assumptions. Anything can still happen.
Well, except Paul winning.
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