Colossal Collapses

Summary: Organizations that entered the year with hope and now have nothing for the foreseeable future. Yes the Dolphins will never be real contenders with Tua :)

Cleveland Browns

The dawg pound has always taken pride in their squad even when things looked as grim as things could possibly get for an organization. Now everyone knows what happened with this team as upper management sold their soul to acquire a Deshaun Watson fresh off of a record number of pending sexual assault cases. They decided his play would outweigh the turmoil from his record signing that was all fully guaranteed. Turns out the guy would go from an undisputed top five quarterback to the worst NFL quarterback ever statistically. He stopped caring about the game, declined drastically in the accuracy department, and just seemed to no longer use his legs like he once did in Houston. The craziest part about the Browns story is that they had their guy in the building and selected him with the first overall pick. His name was Baker Mayfield. He fit in perfectly with Kevin Stefanski’s play action scheme, almost took the Browns to the AFC championship, and lost the divisional round game against the Kansas City Chiefs on a blown no call that was an obvious targeting penalty at the Chiefs one yard line. This obvious targeting from Chiefs safety, Daniel Sorenson, caused Cleveland Browns wideout, Rashard Higgins, to fumble the football out of the endzone and cost the Browns seven crucial points. Baker found himself in a slump after this colossal robbery with Cleveland losing the game by five points and the organization had seen enough of Baker, assessed his decline in play as teams figured him out, and decided to cut ties with the former first overall draft pick getting a fifth round pick in return. He bounced around the NFL viewed as a failure and got a shot as a free agent signing with the Rams on a short week where he didn’t even know the playbook. One 90 yard game winning drive later and Baker had revived that relentless competitive fire he had displayed at Oklahoma in college. Baker is the poster child for players that aren’t used correctly or are expected to elevate the team on their own when it shouldn’t have been on his shoulders to begin with. The Browns had no real receiving threats while he was the Quarterback with Donovan Peoples Jones, Jarvis Landry, and an extremely raw David Njoku as his only pass catching options. Now the Browns find themselves in no man’s land. Tons of money allocated to a non-existent QB that fans cheered for only after he sustained a season ending injury and a defense full of generational talent that’s being completely wasted on a non competitive team. The team has Owusu-Koramoah who is going to be a top five paid linebacker in the NFL and is a top tier talent, Myles Garrett who will be the highest paid defender once he gets a new contract, and Denzel Ward who is a premier cornerback in the NFL and yet the Browns are the worst team in their division and likely can’t fight their way to the top anytime soon. It’s really sad. Tons of dead money given to a guy who has the worst character in the entire NFL who has barely played and has been dogshit when he’s been under center. Let this be a lesson for teams that neglect character for a player. At the very least character issues can be viewed as a precursor to wasted talent. In Watson’s case, consensus would say karma is a big beotch. 

Dallas Cowboys

There are two things in this world that are universally shared experiences. One being that feeling of being a kid on Christmas morning all giddy to go downstairs and rip open a stocking. The other being the feeling of immense shared joy the football world experiences when the Cowboys are failing or have failed. Now they are completely drawing dead. Looking for a runner-runner straight flush to take down the full houses the Commanders and Eagles possess. The Cowboys are in a situation that is so horrendous that Jerry Jones actually might be forced to sell the team by the fan base. After ignoring the free agent market to address their RB room, the team became an awfully mediocre one dimensional passing attack with no wide receivers outside of Ceedee Lamb in the offense. You know the situation couldn’t be any worse when Jerry Jones is telling Dak to sit out with a “horrific” hamstring injury so he can use his absence as an excuse. Even with Dak in the lineup this team got shelled every week. They were the NFC’s laughing stock and I can’t see that changing anytime soon. The thing is with the Cowboys is that this organization is destined for a fate worse than the New Orleans Saints. At least when the Saints paid Michael Thomas, Cam Jordan, and company there were genuine Super Bowl aspirations in the air. With Dallas an above .500 record seems unattainable in the coming years with the current roster Jones has assembled. Once they inevitably pay Micah Parsons because they never capitalized on his trade value the team will have over two-thirds of their cap space committed to the trio of Dak, Ceedee, and Micah. Jerry is inept as the Cowboys general manager and with the sudden emergence of the Commanders and the steady play of the Eagles there just isn’t any light at the end of the tunnel. Even when looking at the Giants at least they know they must escape from Daniel Jones’ chokehold (THEY DID). The Cowboys have more holes than a sponge and don’t have an above average unit anywhere within their roster. It’s quite sad to see their fall from grace with former players even giving up on AMERICA’S TEAM! Just look at Michael Irvin he just attends every Miami game and pretends like the Cowboys don’t exist. Then when any media holds Jones accountable for his decisions he then threatens to use his money and power to fire your ass! I’m so glad this guy is universally hated. The shit he said on the radio show for the Cowboys to the host was repulsive. He asked him an honest question about Dallas and Jerry said it’s not your job to question how I run the team. With a 3-7 record everyone should be firing off scrolls upon scrolls of questions for ya buddy. Jones then threatened the guy’s job security live on air. Great character and leadership from the Cowboys owner and GM who is solely to blame for their shortcomings. Jones’ ego far exceeds his ability to foster a successful football organization and no more evidence is needed than what happened with him and the team’s most successful head coach, and HALL OF FAMER, Jimmie Johnson.

New York Jets

This is what happens when a GM and ownership worships the ground their quarterback walks on and ignores incompetent decisions as the head henchmen running the organization. It’s honestly pathetic how much sway they have given Rodgers with absolutely nothing to show for. I get he tore his achilles in year one, but upon his return this year Rodgers has hurt the team far more than he has helped it. As the team’s leader and acting GM Arod brought in Allen Lazard and Davante Addams, trashed Mike Williams openly, made comments on how Garrett Wilson needs to get with the program, Insisted Nathaniel Hackett was calling plays in NY, and publicly displayed his hatred for his head coach Robert Saleh. So how has Rodgers’ team done? How is their outlook? Dismal. After Saleh’s firing the Jets defense has gone back to tackling lessons. Tackling lessons for a unit that was consistently top five under coach Saleh. It’s honestly a joke that he got fired and it is completely disgraceful how the Jets treated the man. Rodgers has been a statue and has led an inefficient passing attack that has caused Breece Hall’s production on the ground to fall off of a cliff because the team insists on appeasing Rodgers. What did Coach Saleh want to do when he got fired? Get rid of one of the worst coaches in NFL history, Nathaniel Hackett, but before he could do so and turn this team around the team’s owner magically decided to let him go. It wasn’t him though. It was most definitely Aaron Rodgers who needs everything done his way and can’t accept the regression he has had since his last season in Green Bay. Never in my life have I seen a quarterback assemble a team from a roster and coaching standpoint quite like Rodgers has this year. And then when his team fails he deflects all the blame from the situation and appeases to fans by going on Pat McAfee’s show and saying everyone knows you can’t count me out. You’re done buddy and one of your clauses from the Davante trade was that you’d play another year for the Jets. If that happens there goes another year of Breece’s prime and the Jets are going head first into another poor season. After Saleh’s firing the team went from 6th in defensive EPA to 31st only in front of the Cooper Rush led Cowboys. Rodgers didn’t like the scrutiny Coach Saleh gave him because, like I said, Rodgers called all the shots when assembling this offense and through five weeks the results of Arod’s dream team were uninspiring. People were upset when Saleh commented on Rodgers saying he shows some flashes of old Aaron Rodgers and that statement has been completely factual. I don't care what the team has said publicly about the firing. It was Rodgers who drove him out of town and since then the team is 1-5. Who says this team finds a good Head Coach? Who says this defense can turn it around? So many questions and damage from Rodgers’ moves that the team could be set back for many years following his battle against father time. All this team needed was steady QB play. Not a diva statue who can control any aspect of his team and has magical powers when it comes to finding all the issues with the team that are of course not due to his play. Just stay on the red line Jets receivers and your team will be in the playoffs!

Dolphins

There’s so many problems with how this team is run I do not know where to start when talking about the Phins. You have three guys with sub 4.3 speed and your offense is stagnant against any solid defense. Tyreek, Waddle, and Achane should be leading the best offense in all of football, but instead Tua’s tenure in South Beach has played out like a broken record. Beat the piss out of the NFL’s bottom feeders with 70+ point performances, lose to anybody with a winning record including almost every primetime matchup, and come playoff time look like a fish out of water in any road game environment where the weather is bitterly cold. Tua in the playoffs, which he’s only made once, is actually useless on the field. His game of throwing the ball into windows and dumping off screen passes doesn’t quite get the job done versus teams that can patrol the middle area taking things out of the game plan. Just look back to last year in the playoffs where Miami put up seven points and Tua averaged five yards per toss. This also applies to his late season performances that dictate whether or not the Dolphins make the playoffs where he just unravels. He has a below average arm, average mobility, no decision making process, poor pocket maneuverability, and no physical prowess to justify making him one of the top paid quarterbacks. Yet when speaking to anyone in the Dolphins organization, especially Mike McDaniel, the consensus is that he is the team’s heartbeat and has the ability to lead this squad to the promised land. I simply don’t get it. What’s the direction of this roster? You already have everything imaginable on offense to do the job. You have some budding pieces on the defensive side of the ball, though it has been a little rough. One must consider the squad had Skylar Thompson to lead them in battle after Tua slammed his head on the turf for the tenth time in his career and that Tua’s turnovers this year led to many scores by opposing teams. Your ceiling in Miami with Tua is a singular playoff win, if that. I just don’t understand the organization’s thought process with holding onto him as their guy for the future. It's oddly common nowadays to see team’s hold on to QB’s regardless of performance because of how high their guy was picked or because of the past. Dak Prescott, Daniel Jones, and Aaron Rodgers all fit that billing coming into this year. With Rodgers showing he has played his last meaningful downs in the league years ago, Jones becoming a 3rd stringer, and Prescott now out for the season with the most severe groin injury in the history of mankind, (Sarcasm) teams might reconsider the idea moving into the future of waiting too long for QBs justify their value. I think this became a narrative among teams in the NFL after the Browns gave up on Baker to have him grow into a player that is far more polished than most would have expected out of him after his catastrophic fourth year in the NFL back in 2021. I’m afraid the Dolphins are missing out on years of contention to keep the Tua fairytale alive when they can jump ship and acquire a quarterback that could really take this offense to a consistently historical level each and every year. You only get Achane on this contract for so long along with Waddle and Tyreek in your receiving arsenal. Time is too precious to waste right now. 

Jaguars

This might just be the most embarrassing story in the history of the National Football League. What GM comes out and says we have the best roster in the history of this franchise to have the team go out and start the year with a 2-9 record? Their offseason full of HUGE SPLASHES is looking more and more like a complete joke each and every week. At this point if you are a Jacksonville fan do you laugh or cry? This year's offseason splashes have been equivalent to the tiny plumes of water that come out of Walmart’s fanciest kiddie pools. Erik Armstead and Gabe Davis have just been inadequate making no real impact on the field, Mitch Morse at Center might be their only decent signing, and Devin Duvernay just shouldn’t even be talked about as a major transaction. He’s a damn punt returner. This team failed in the offseason and everyone knew that, but the team doing this badly is just pathetic.They have Brian Thomas Jr. moving forward and that’s essentially it considering how dreadful their offensive line play has truly been. The Jaguars thought they had Joe Burrow or Peyton Manning by drafting Lawrence and he just simply cannot elevate this team like the front office had envisioned. A revolving door of head coaches, no offensive line, and a relatively weak receiving core in Jacksonville have been the problems that have plagued TLaw so far throughout his career. The front office keeps whiffing and reaching on offensive lineman to the point where fans need to wonder if the Jags can ever truly get the job done in the trenches. Just look at all the best teams of football and how they perform in the trenches. It’s where games are lost and won. Yet, the Jags GM acquired zero offensive lineman of note aside from Morse in the offseason after it was glaringly obvious the team had a huge issue protecting Trevor. Trent Baalke should just resign as the GM now to be honest. He brainwashed a fanbase into thinking Gabe Davis and Arik Armstead were a bargain at $27 million a season. Shit, I could do a better job assembling a roster off my couch. Armstead never really had a season in his career that justified a payday for him and Gabe Davis essentially has his career game against the Chiefs in the playoffs, a few primetime multi touchdown performances, and nothing else of note. I’d love to see the reaction of Baalke’s peers when he made the earth shattering moves he did this offseason because when I opened my phone to Jacksonville’s offseason moves I swear I heard a whoopie cushion sound effect. Baalke has done nothing besides throw gasoline into the fire with every transaction he has made. It’s getting comical at this point and with the Colts and Texans on the rise this team is destined for doom. Cut your hair TLaw!