The All Things PLAYOFFS 2022 Thread

[redskinss]

9 hours ago, BatteredFanSyndrome said:

I loathe having to play Dallas in what could likely be a win and in game for this team.

Especially since they'll be playing a far more talented quarterback who started the season awful got injured, had his replacement come in and win games despite very low production.

They went back to him after a complete stinker from rush and despite early struggles seems to be starting to find a groove. 

 

Thats my one hangup on sticking with heinicke, I think even if we keep this momentum going we'll be screwed when we start facing good teams in playoff like atmospheres.

 

Wentz on the other hand, if we could protect him a little and get him comfortable in this system i believe it's at least possible we could have a competitive offense and not have to keep grinding out wins with time of possession and great defense.

 

 

[BatteredFanSyndrome]

1 minute ago, redskinss said:

Especially since they'll be playing a far more talented quarterback who started the season awful got injured, had his replacement come in and win games despite very low production.

They went back to him after a complete stinker from rush and despite early struggles seems to be starting to find a groove. 

 

Thats my one hangup on sticking with heinicke, I think even if we keep this momentum going we'll be screwed when we start facing good teams in playoff like atmospheres.

 

Wentz on the other hand, if we could protect him a little and get him comfortable in this system i believe it's at least possible we could have a competitive offense and not have to keep grinding out wins with time of possession and great defense.

I think the Dallas defense will be a problem for Heinicke or Wentz.  They pressured Kirk yesterday on 2/3 of his drop backs, breaking some sort of record.

 

They feasted on Heinicke last year twice.  While we have more weapons this year, we don’t have an OL that can hold up to the pressure they will be bringing, be it TH or Wentz back there.

[redskinss]

2 minutes ago, BatteredFanSyndrome said:

I think the Dallas defense will be a problem for Heinicke or Wentz.  They pressured Kirk yesterday on 2/3 of his drop backs, breaking some sort of record.

 

They feasted on Heinicke last year twice.  While we have more weapons this year, we don’t have an OL that can hold up to the pressure they will be bringing, be it TH or Wentz back there.

I think you're probably right, I just feel like with Wentz there's at least a chance we could be more than just kind of competent. 

I certainly could be wrong, I've been wrong plenty of times, Wentz could come back and be historically bad but I can't shake the feeling we didn't quite give him enough opportunity to prove that.

 

[Conn]

 

This team has some special sauce right now, it’s rare we’ve seen this sort of culture have time to grow—which can really only happen in the sunshine provided by wins. Hope we make the wildcard round

[BatteredFanSyndrome]

41 minutes ago, redskinss said:

I think you're probably right, I just feel like with Wentz there's at least a chance we could be more than just kind of competent. 

I certainly could be wrong, I've been wrong plenty of times, Wentz could come back and be historically bad but I can't shake the feeling we didn't quite give him enough opportunity to prove that.

 

No doubt the ceiling is higher with Wentz.  He just doesn’t have the time and reps invested in Turners offense, to offset his lack of mobility, at least in my mind.  Scott could probably help him somewhat by adopting a run heavy approach.  
 

I’m still not convinced we won’t see him again.  It will probably be post multiple losses by TH, that puts him in a really tough spot, needing to win out to make the playoffs.  

[Skinsinparadise]

Underrated reinforcement, part of the reason why the O line didn't fall off the cliff the first two seasons under Masko was Schweitzer was a super sub.  really good run blocker who missed most of this season.

 

 

 

[NeverSurrender]

56 minutes ago, redskinss said:

I think you're probably right, I just feel like with Wentz there's at least a chance we could be more than just kind of competent. 

I certainly could be wrong, I've been wrong plenty of times, Wentz could come back and be historically bad but I can't shake the feeling we didn't quite give him enough opportunity to prove that.

 

Wentz got sacked 9 times against the Eagles,  Ill take TH in this match-up.  A huge reason were winning with TH is because he isn't taking many sacks.  Wentz took  23 sacks in 6 games.  This offense was inept with Wentz in there.  At least were moving the ball up and down the field.  If they start finishing these drive with TDs were going to be a big problem for teams especially with they way we have been running it.  

[BatteredFanSyndrome]

I promise that I’ll be first here to tip my cap to TH and Scott Turner if they can muster enough offense against a healthy Dallas defense to win.  I just don’t see operation handoff being enough to beat them.  I also see TH’s danger balls being right up Diggs alley. 
 

I’d love to be wrong obviously but I can’t snort enough moxie to believe we’ll see much different than TH’s prior two games against Dallas.

[Warhead36]

12 minutes ago, BatteredFanSyndrome said:

I promise that I’ll be first here to tip my cap to TH and Scott Turner if they can muster enough offense against a healthy Dallas defense to win.  I just don’t see operation handoff being enough to beat them.  I also see TH’s danger balls being right up Diggs alley. 
 

I’d love to be wrong obviously but I can’t snort enough moxie to believe we’ll see much different than TH’s prior two games against Dallas.

There is a pretty good chance Dallas will have the 5 seed locked up by then and will have nothing to play for. On the other hand, I don't think Jerruh will allow McCarthy to basically tank a game against us with the whole Snyder fiasco. He's gonna wanna bury us.

[method man]

1 hour ago, Warhead36 said:

There is a pretty good chance Dallas will have the 5 seed locked up by then and will have nothing to play for. On the other hand, I don't think Jerruh will allow McCarthy to basically tank a game against us with the whole Snyder fiasco. He's gonna wanna bury us.

 

The core issue is that Dallas has a lot of depth so even if they rest people, there will be good players getting the reps unless they go to the third string

[Voice_of_Reason]

3 hours ago, NeverSurrender said:

Yeah Kirk is a real stud in big games

As long as the games not on Monday night he’s not as bad as you might think.  And they did win a playoff game.

 

The question is, can Kirk do that again, keep taking a beating from the pass rush and keep getting the ball out.  I give him credit doing it once.  
 

But the offense just has to be better if they are going to compete with the better teams.  Yeah, I get they beat the Eagles, but literally everything had to go their way.  They had no margin for error.  They played as close to a perfect game as they could and it was still a dog fight at the end.  

13 minutes ago, method man said:

 

The core issue is that Dallas has a lot of depth so even if they rest people, there will be good players getting the reps unless they go to the third string

Our starters can beat their backups.  Especially our defensive starters against their backup offense.  It should look something like what we did to the Texans. 
 

I’ll give you, our offense is going to struggle against all defenses.  But we should throttle them from the defensive side of the ball. 

1 hour ago, Warhead36 said:

There is a pretty good chance Dallas will have the 5 seed locked up by then and will have nothing to play for. On the other hand, I don't think Jerruh will allow McCarthy to basically tank a game against us with the whole Snyder fiasco. He's gonna wanna bury us.

I don’t think Jerry is gong to give 2 ****’s about the Snyder situation if they think resting players helps their chances in the playoffs.  

[Voice_of_Reason]

2 hours ago, Skinsinparadise said:

Underrated reinforcement, part of the reason why the O line didn't fall off the cliff the first two seasons under Masko was Schweitzer was a super sub.  really good run blocker who missed most of this season.

 

 

 

If he can play, I think they should consider starting him or rotating him with Turner.  
 

The OL really fell apart when Schweitzer and Rouiller went down.  And Larsen on IR.
 

If Schweitzer is back, that could be a huge boost.  By my eye he played better last year (until he got hurt) than Turner is playing this year.  

[kleese]

Another mixed bag of results, but we got the one we REALLY wanted— Lions over Giants. That result very much opens the door for us finishing 10-7 (4-2 down stretch) and making playoffs as long as the two losses aren’t BOTH to Giants. 
 

If we go 10-7 with one win over NYG, I will be STUNNED If we didn’t get in. I personally believe if we go 9-8 with at least one win over NYG we would still get in— although finishing with 9 wins will make it dicey for sure. 
 

Not kidding when I say this— if we beat Giants in Meadowlands next Sunday (not a lock by any stretch at all) I think it’s possible the Giants finish the season 7-10; 8-9 very possible. I don’t think they are very good, they have suffered some major injuries recently, and their schedule is brutal. Now, if they go and win Thursday in Dallas? Well, that would be massive and it would change my tune. But I don’t see it. 
 

I am crossing off 6 teams now:

 

Packers

Bears

Panthers 

Saints 

Cardinals 

Rams

 

Those team are our friends now. I am also not looking at Eagles or Vikings as I’m conceding decisions to them. So they are are our friends as well. 
 

Here is the group of teams we are battling with (listed from what in view is most to least important/realistic)

 

Giants

Seahawks 

Cowboys

49ers 

Falcons 

Lions 

Bucs 

 

I don’t think the South is getting more than one team in so Atl and TB don’t really matter, but just something to bear in mind. And yes while the Lions helped us Sunday, they did crawl back into the mix in the process, especially with them owning a tie-beaker with us. 
 

This week we want:

 

Bills over Lions 

Cowboys over Giants 

Saints over 49ers

Raiders over Seahawks 

Browns over Bucs 

 

If we beat Atl this week, we are likely positioning ourselves to go 3-2 over final stretch to get in. 

[NoCalMike]

The 49ers overtaking Seattle for the NFC West is for sure what we want.  I don't want an actual championship contender loitering around with wild card teams down the stretch.  The Seahawks are much more likely to stay in the pack or fall off even versus the 49ers who's arrow is trending back up to where they were thought to have been before the season started.  In fact, it is probably a long shot, but imagine if the 49ers have that division locked up by the time the Commanders go there on Dec. 24th?

Edited November 22, 2022 by NoCalMike

[Skinsinparadise]

I watched the game last night.  The 49ers look like the upgraded brand of this team's model.    IMO we got to root for Seattle to lose, they aren't as good.  And beating SF in SF with a lot on the line will likely be the hardest game left in the season.

 

A.  QB who seems to win without putting up big numbers all the time and teammates love him.  Jimmy G > Heinicke

 

B.  Running game on steriods.  49ers > Commanders

 

C.  Passing weapons -- I'd give the 49ers the nod because of Kittle

 

D.  Defense -- both really good, 49ers IMO better.

 

 

 

Edited November 22, 2022 by Skinsinparadise

[Koolblue13]

The Commies are what you get if you order The 49ers off Wish .com.

[HigSkin]

I don't know where to put this so I'll put it here.

 

 

https://www.si.com/nfl/2022/11/21/2022-nfl-week-11-commanders-cowboys-eagles-mmqb

 

How the Commanders Saved Their Season by Not Panicking

Ron Rivera installed Taylor Heinicke as his starting QB and stayed the course everywhere else despite a 1–4 start. Now his team is in playoff contention. Plus, big moves by the Cowboys and Eagles pay off.

 

A big shift is underway at the game’s most important position for the Commanders—and we’ll get to that in a second—but, interestingly enough, with that going on, Ron Rivera’s leading Washington out of the wilderness is more about staying the course everywhere else than anything else.

 

Confused? Well, we’ll let Rivera explain why—through a 1–4 start—he wouldn’t waver.

 

“Even though we got beat, you watched them play and then when you broke the tape down, you went to that little finite mentality that we have as coaches, and we watch certain plays and we say, Goddammit, look how f---ing close we are,” Rivera says. “If we can sustain that block a half a step longer, if the quarterback has a half a second more, it’s those types of things. And you sit there and go, Dang. Or on defense, Hey, we gotta get that switch right.

 

“I mean, we were so, so close, Albert. I mean, we really were.”

 

That the Commanders were right on the doorstep kept Rivera from overreacting—in any way to everything around him—even with pitchforks alternately pointed at each of his coordinators over the past couple of months.

 

 

“You don’t make changes to make changes—to show people you’re doing something—if you believe in the people that you have,” he continues. “I mean, I’ve always felt the things that we did with Jack [Del Rio on defense] our first year [2020], we can continue to do, and then obviously we had the down year last year and for specific reasons. But at the end of the day, you gotta keep plugging away. You gotta keep showing people you believe in them.

 

“It’s the same thing with Scott [Turner] and the offense. Our first four games, everybody wanted to get rid of our offense because, ‘Oh, it doesn’t ...’ Well, our running back, he gets shot and we don’t have him for the first four games, and then it took him a couple more before he got his footing back. And now he’s just starting to come into his own.”

 

Even better, as Turner’s unit and Del Rio’s unit have come together, the bounces and close calls have started to go Washington’s way—and there was a prime example off the top of the Commanders’ 23–10 win in Houston. On the second play of the game, Taylor Heinicke threw one up, trying to give Terry McLaurin a chance to come down with a big gainer. The problem? He overthrew McLaurin, and Texans rookie Jalen Pitre was deeper than McLaurin and in position for the easy interception.

 

Only in this case, Pitre dropped the pick, and Washington never looked back.

“In the past,” Rivera continued, “maybe somebody catches it. And next thing you know, we’re in a dogfight all the way through.”

 

Instead, four plays later, the Commanders responded with Kendall Fuller picking off Davis Mills at the Houston 37 and scoring to give Washington a lead it would never give back.

That ignited a 20–0 first half in which Washington outgained Houston 246–5 and had 14 first downs to the Texans’ one. By the time the half was over, so was the game. And you might have to consider Caron Wentz’s time as an NFL starter over, too, at least for the time being.

 

Now, Heinicke, to be sure, was no superstar Sunday, throwing for 164 yards and a 78.6 rating on 12-of-22 passing. But he was steady, again, and we’ve seen flashes of brilliance and the belief of his teammates and Rivera in him. Which is why, as we spoke Sunday night, Rivera was ready to declare it Heinicke’s team. He talked with the quarterbacks last week, and now he’s landed there on who gets the keys to the offense.

 

“Yes, Taylor’s our starter,” Rivera told me. “And the big thing is, it’ll always be about one game at a time. This is not, Oh, he’s the starter for the rest of the year. No, we’ll talk only one game at a time. I don’t want people to get us ahead of anything. I want to stay focused on one game at a time, not, Oh, you got a shot at the playoffs. You can beat the Giants.

 

 

“No. No. We have to play Atlanta first, and then we play New York and we’ll see what happens. This is not about predicting or anything like that. This is staying focused on one at a time, one at a time.”

 

That said, Rivera reiterated his main point here: If Heinicke keeps playing well, the job is his.

“That’s the fair way to put it, because that’s the way I’ll judge it,” he continues. “And that is, and this is, about one week at a time. I don’t want anybody to be looking over their shoulder.”

 

Which, really, is how it’s worked everywhere else on the field for the Commanders for quite a while.

 

 

Edited November 22, 2022 by HigSkin

[BatteredFanSyndrome]

26 minutes ago, Koolblue13 said:

The Commies are what you get if you order The 49ers off Wish .com.

Post of the week for sure.

 

 

[BatteredFanSyndrome]

Ron says he doesn’t want anyone looking over their shoulder, yet it’s Taylor’s team week to week.  Being a week to week starter is practically the definition of looking over your shoulder, knowing if you play bad and lose this week could be the last.

[HigSkin]

 

[FLSkinz83]

13 hours ago, Voice_of_Reason said:

If he can play, I think they should consider starting him or rotating him with Turner.  
 

The OL really fell apart when Schweitzer and Rouiller went down.  And Larsen on IR.
 

If Schweitzer is back, that could be a huge boost.  By my eye he played better last year (until he got hurt) than Turner is playing this year.  

 

I'd start Wes over Norwell.   I think Turner is playing better than Norwell.  

[FLSkinz83]

39 minutes ago, BatteredFanSyndrome said:

Ron says he doesn’t want anyone looking over their shoulder, yet it’s Taylor’s team week to week.  Being a week to week starter is practically the definition of looking over your shoulder, knowing if you play bad and lose this week could be the last.

 

Ron has been bad with messaging since he got here.  

[Cooleyfan1993]

38 minutes ago, BatteredFanSyndrome said:

Ron says he doesn’t want anyone looking over their shoulder, yet it’s Taylor’s team week to week.  Being a week to week starter is practically the definition of looking over your shoulder, knowing if you play bad and lose this week could be the last.

Yeah, that’s what my first thought was after reading that too. Don’t let Heinicke know he’s a week to week starter, or he’ll start pressing a bit more, which could lead to turnovers……..

 

although, I guess he’s been week to week since he took over for wentz, and he’s 4–1 now, so…….who knows 🤷🏻‍♂️

[BatteredFanSyndrome]

7 minutes ago, FLSkinz83 said:

 

Ron has been bad with messaging since he got here.  

To the media, that’s fair - he hasn’t been great.  But I think it’s safe to say his messaging to the team is loud and clear, because they’ve had every reason to pack it in each season and haven’t.

[skinny21]

57 minutes ago, BatteredFanSyndrome said:

Ron says he doesn’t want anyone looking over their shoulder, yet it’s Taylor’s team week to week.  Being a week to week starter is practically the definition of looking over your shoulder, knowing if you play bad and lose this week could be the last.

I had the same exact thought, lol.  

 

I will say, I don’t know that there’s a better qb in the league to be able to handle this kind of situation over Heinicke.  He’s mentally tough, he knows the team has tried hard to replace him as the starter, he has said (and seemed quite sincere) that this is Wentz’s team, he already plays each game like it’s his last, and given his history, I don’t think he’s going to take anything for granted.