QUICK SLANTS: The NFL season so far. (NFL)

 Well, were already at Week 7 of the NFL season, and I'm going to list what the main points have been thus far, and where things might ultimately be heading as we progress even further. Let's get started then, shall we?

1) The Giants suck. Thursday night's game was an unmitigated disaster, with the Giants really doing a lot of nothing, and having little to no rhythm whatsoever. I'm really not understanding what it is that head coach Joe Judge is trying to do, nor do I understand what QB Daniel Jones is doing on any given game day. He tries to make plays, but ends up making things worse. And no, the last thing anyone wants is to see Colt McCoy start instead. That would be a very bad idea.

2) Carson Wentz should be benched. I'm sorry, but his ten interceptions is the highest in the league, and his decision making process is brutal at best. Watching that TNF game between his Eagles and the Giants was painful in more ways than one, and watching Carson Wentz takes the cake. That man needs to be benched for a while, as I don't think he's capable right now of being a starter. He throws into double and triple coverage, tosses laterals that are questionable at best, and can't seem to complete much of anything. Something's got to give in Philly.

3) NFC East. What a terrible, nasty division in which the eventual division champion will make it into the playoffs with a significant losing record. That whole division is a mess, with the Cowboys now missing their starting QB, the Giants don't know how to win, the Eagles are a mess, and where do I even begin with the Redskins right now???

4) Injuries. More and more players are getting injured at an alarming rate, and if you play fantasy football as I do, you'll know this is a disaster in more ways than one. I've seen a lot of injuries in all the years I've been a football fan, but this season takes the proverbial cake. If this keeps up, the NFL will need to bring in some local farm animals to round out the rosters of most teams. Not sure why this season is so bad with the injuries, but it can only get better from here on in, right?

-TTS

Questions? Have a comment? Leave your thoughts below!

Thoughts on the NCAA schedule this season. (NCAA)

 Several weeks of the NCAA football season are now in the books, and I have personally managed to catch at least a game or two in each of those weeks. The thing I really don't understand however, is why most conferences are only playing within themselves. Now, I know someone is going to start yelling "COVID-19!" right about now, but I am going to stop you right there. It's a poor excuse to only play inter-conference games, and I will tell you why.

1) Lack of proper competition.

One of the main things that makes NCAA football so enticing is the diverse match-ups due to the large amount of schools that participate in the top tier, as well as the histories that encompass many of the rivalries and battles that we get on a normal week of action. Yes, there are some schools within the same conference (TCU vs. Texas is one example) that have decent rivalries, but we as football fans expect that sort of thing, and can't just live off inter-conference games.

2) Rankings.

The bigger question here is to how this will all affect the rankings when the regular season comes to and end. How can there be proper rankings this season with mainly inter-conference games? Teams are not properly challenged by that diverse schedule that we usually get to see every year. I am of the opinion that rankings should have maybe been reconsidered for this season under these circumstances, or completely put aside so as to not get it wrong.

3) Bowl games.

Just like with the rankings, the bowl games might not be much more than inter-conference match-ups that we have either already seen, or do not desire. I for one, am not sure what to expect when the slate of bowl games come around, nor do think it will be business as usual. In any case, the players and the fans will both end up getting shorted due to all of this.

As much I love college football, more thought should have gone into the season before any decisions were made, and this may all end up backfiring on the NCAA in a big way.

-TTS

Agree or disagree with this article? Leave a question or comment below!

Meanwhile, over at the hospital... (NFL)

 We are only two weeks into the NFL season, and it seems that the second week has been the most brutal in terms of players getting injured, with some of them suffering season-ending injuries. Most teams came out of the first week relatively unscathed compared to the second week. I was astounded at the injury reports that kept popping up throughout Sunday's action.

Key players now on injured reserved or for the whole season include:

- Jimmy Garoppolo (QB - 49ers), Greg Kittle (TE - 49ers), Saquan Barkley (RB - Giants), Jalen Reagor (WR - Eagles), Tevin Coleman (RB - 49ers), Julio Jones (WR - Falcons), Christian McCaffrey (RB - Panthers), Drew Lock (QB - Broncos), Nick Bosa (DB - 49ers), Raheem Mostert (RB - 49ers), just to name the notable players.

Now, with that being said, some of it could be blamed on the lack of any preseason games, but we really can't go that route. Anyone that has watched football for nay length of time knows that even with preseason games, a lot of good players suffer injuries during the first match up. This is still surprising in this day and age with all the various mini camps and training camps.

Players push themselves and keep training throughout the year to be ready for the season, but this year's crop of injuries has taken the proverbial cake. If you are like me and are also heavily into fantasy football year after year, you know that a rash of injuries this encompassing can easily ruin your fantasy team instantly, and leave you on the outside looking in for the rest of the season. 

One can only hope that we don't see any more significant injuries as we move into Week 3, and that this already trying season doesn't get any worse.

-TTS

Questions or comments? Have something to say about this? Leave your opinion below!

QUICK SLANTS: Takeaways from Week 1 (NFL)

Well, Week 1 of the NFL season is in the books, and there are a few things I've noticed right off the bat that I guess you could call pros and cons, from a certain point of view.

1) No preseason? No problem. There didn't seem to be any rust on the players for the most part, and the teams in the games that I was able to watch over the weekend (and Monday night) seemed to execute well for the most part. The only exception to this was Miami's Ryan Fitzpatrick, who in one game so far has thrown three interceptions.

I think that moving forward, the NFL needs to drastically reduce the number of preseason games. Four weeks of that is way too excessive, and always leads to way too many injuries and issues. I would think that one or two preseason games is sufficient.

2) Atmosphere. One of the biggest issues I have noticed thus far is the empty stadiums and lack of real crowd noise. Canned ambiance is fine, but it pales in comparison to thousands upon thousands of real, loud fans in the stands, and without masks. The crowd of somewhere around 16,000 in Kansas City was nice, but not loud enough. I got a taste of this on Saturday during the two college games I was able to catch. The lack of noise was shocking, to say the least.

3) Lack of penalties. Most opening weeks in the NFL are always littered with penalties and flags being thrown left and right. It was quite refreshing to see a a very small amount of penalty flags for a change, which helped to keep the game moving.

A good football game can be derailed almost instantly by an abundance of penalties being called by referees and officials that won't let the players play. Watch any NFL playoff game ever if you have any doubts. Good on the officials for keeping it to a minimum.

-TTS

Agree or disagree with this post? Leave a comment below!

Thoughts on last night's NFL Kickoff. (NFL)

Well folks, the 2020/2021 NFL season has finally gotten underway, and I want to offer my thoughts on the game, and what all the take-aways are from it. Without further adieu, let's get started!

1) The crowd. There was somewhere between 15,000 and 17,000 in attendance for last night's match up at Arrowhead Stadium, which was only around 22% of the 70,000 or so that would normally be there for game day. This was due to the pandemic of course, but seeing tarped off areas and sparse fans kind of took away from the game, as we're all used to camera angles from all over a stadium during the game.

2) Andy Reid, and masked personnel. I have no idea what the hell Chief's coach Andy Reid was wearing around his face, but it was completely ridiculous, as were the masks being worn by personnel on the sidelines who were all OUTSIDE. I can understand wearing masks indoors, inside cramped rooms, but not outside. The cameramen also didn't need to focus on this.

3) Broadcast team. While normally I never have a problem with NBC's broadcast team, I was a little miffed due to how they kept reminded viewers throughout the game how rich Patrick Mahomes and DeShaun Watson are. A lot of us watch football to get away from that kind of thing, but it kept being shoved down our throats last night, and that is unacceptable.

If anything, the amount of money being given to both QBs is beyond ridiculous.

4) Uneven matchup, or done purposely? The game wasn't very good, with the Chiefs seemingly having the answer to almost everything that Houston was doing. Personally, I don't think Kansas City is that good, and with a schedule that puts them against a Texans team that is missing key personnel from last year, it makes you wonder if this match up came about to make the Chiefs look better then they really are.

One thing is for sure: We'll all have a better picture of this new season once all of Sunday's action comes and goes.

-TTS


Agree or disagree with this post? Want to offer a rebuttal? Leave a comment below!

The reasons why 'Throwing The Slant' has been inactive.

First off, I would like to apologize for the lack of posts from this blog for quite some time, as there hasn't been anything done since May of this year. Unfortunately, the sports landscape took a bit of a hit this year, and I am going to list the reasons below as to why it has affected this blog, as well as let everyone know what I am going to be doing from here on it.

This blog has been inactive until now because:

- The Canadian Football League season for 2020 has been cancelled outright, and there is little point trying to drum up stories for it at the moment
- Throwing The Slant will not report on anything that has to do with politics, the pandemic, or anything that is detrimental to football coverage. This blog was meant to report on actual football news, not nonsense
- The NCAA season is still in doubt as well, and I'm not sure what is happening there

How TTS will be moving forward from here on in:

- Posts will be less frequent, due to the lack of football available right now
- I will still focus on core football news and notes, even if it's not as often
- There will be absolutely no references to activism, politics (unless it's football politics), and the pandemic. I see no reason to include things that have nothing to do with football whatsoever

I hope that I've cleared everything up, and look forward to getting back to blogging about everything football around here.

-TTS


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Quarterback soup. (NFL)

It seems there is no end to the quarterback carousel going on in the National Footbal League as of late. In the last couple of days, we've seen more moves at that position by teams, and again there is confusion as to why this all went down.

Let's dive in!

1) Andy Dalton. The recently released Cincinnati Bengals QB has signed a one-year deal with the Dallas Cowboys to join that franchise, most likely to back up starting QB Dak Prescott. This move is a little confusing, seeing as how Dalton always under performed in Cincinnati. That being said however, the Cowboys' offensive line is much better, and can provide Dalton (should he need to come into a game) with something he didn't have with the Bengals - adequate protection.

Regardless, it should be interesting to see how Dalton is used in conjunction with the Cowboys' offence, and whether or not he could alternate with Prescott.

2) Mitch Trubisky. The Chicago Bears have declined this year's option on Trubisky's contract, which will pretty much assure that his tenure in the Windy City will come to an end. The Bears traded up in the 2017 Draft to select him over Mahomes and Watson, and while some see his performance as a failure, some of us in the world of football think that his coach is the bigger problem.

With the team bringing in Nick Foles during this off season, and with an impatient head coach such as Matt Nagy still holding the reins, the writing is on the wall for Trubisky. It's unfortunate, as I personally think he has the tools needed to succeed in the NFL, but needs a proper coach that an mold him into a great quarterback.

Only time will tell how this will play out, and TTS will be paying close attention.

-TTS


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