The Colts' Quarterback Situation: A Timeline

Browsing /r/nfl, I was stunned to find that the Colts have employed ten different quarterbacks over the course of the 2015 season. As a result of this, I figure some of you, like me, may be confused about the convoluted series of events, inextricably linked to the Titans' fortunes, that has led to a veritable quarterback catastrophe over in Indianapolis. But no longer! Just refer to this helpful, incredibly simple timeline, beginning at the close of the preseason:

September 5: Indianapolis releases Bryan Bennett, an undrafted free agent from Southeastern Louisiana and, further in the past, Oregon. This leaves Andrew Luck and Matt Hasselbeck as their two quarterbacks. Bennett had one of the worst preseasons of any quarterback, completing 20 of his 49 passes for only 222 yards with no touchdowns and five interceptions. Consequently, he was not offered an invitation to the team's practice squad, leaving the Colts with only a pair of quarterbacks, Luck and Hasselbeck.

September 27: Andrew Luck sustains a mysterious injury against the Titans. He's limited in practice as 40-year-old Matt Hasselbeck, himself a former Titan starter, takes on increased reps.

September 29: REVENGE! The Colts weakly strike back at the Titans for hurting their star by signing renowned trick-shot quarterback ("better than Johnny Mac!") and ex-Titan, the pride of Monmouth, Alex Tanney. The Colts are his sixth team in three years. Since being released in final cuts by Tennessee, he had a short stint with the Bills, and would later make his fateful return to Tennessee. Stay tuned!

October 2: Clearly judging the trick-shot master unfit to play, the Colts pick up ex-Harbaugh-protégé Josh Johnson, a quite capable scrambling quarterback last seen with the Jets in August. This is his sixth team, too.

October 4: Hasselbeck starts and pulls off a narrow win over the Jaguars in overtime thanks to a missed field goal from Jason Myers.

October 12: Johnson is released after having been released and re-signed during the previous week. This is a trick pioneered by Jim Harbaugh (using Johnson, in fact) that provides an effective 54th roster spot.

October 20: Clearly disappointed by his lack of success as an actual NFL passer, the Colts release Tanney, too, and replace him with another practice-squad-level quarterback, Matt Blanchard, whose latest action had come as something of an afterthought for Green Bay in the preseason. (He had been signed after Mike McCarthy invited him in for an offseason workout and asked him "Why the hell don't you have a job?" McCarthy clearly found out the reasoning quickly; Blanchard was released during the preseason.) But with Luck having come back, and a period of apparent stability approaching, why would they even need him?

November 10: The Colts announce that Luck has become mysteriously injured — again. Neglecting to slide on a scramble in an upset victory against Denver earned the franchise quarterback a lacerated kidney and a torn abdominal muscle. The Colts also swap out Blanchard for Tanney, who spent only three weeks out of a job.

November 12: The front office goes into action immediately to address the unexpected issue with Luck. With Josh Johnson having migrated north to Buffalo, Grigson and co. are left no choice but to claim Charlie "Clipboard Jesus" Whitehurst off waivers from Tennessee (no surprise there).

December 7: After back-to-back wins over NFC South opponents, the Colts, as well as Hasselbeck's torso, get crushed in a 45-10 loss to Pittsburgh. Clipboard Jesus rises from the bench to take his place. The rib injury continues to plague Hasselbeck during the remainder of the season.

December 21-24: Another backup quarterback exchange is in order. A needy Titans team, having shut Marcus Mariota down, requires some assistance for Zach Mettenberger. They pluck Tanney from the Colts practice squad. Indianapolis chooses to replace him with undrafted free agent Stephen Morris, whose services are required much sooner than anyone anticipated when...

December 27: Disaster strikes. Hasselbeck leaves in the middle of the game once again (for the fourth time, actually), but this time he doesn't come back. Whitehurst, much like his namesake, engineers a miracle, but this one goes only to preserve the team's minuscule playoff hopes with a victory against a sputtering Dolphins team. In the process, however, he himself suffers a hamstring injury. The Colts defense holds firm so that Morris isn't forced to enter after three days of acquainting himself with the playbook, but all signs point to him starting against — guess who — the Titans in Week 17.

During the week leading up to this climactic game for the Colts, Matt Blanchard, having rejoined the practice squad of the first team to give him a job, the Chicago Bears, turns down an offer from an unspecified AFC team, instead choosing a pay raise and a comfy spot on the Bears practice squad. With what was probably their plea denied, the Colts are forced to turn...elsewhere.

December 29: Enter a pair of NFL pariahs: Josh Freeman and Ryan Lindley. Freeman, once hailed by Skip Bayless as a better bet in the long term than Cam Newton, managed to burn all bridges with the team that drafted him, Tampa Bay. After a much-ballyhooed stint in Minnesota in which Freeman came in, started ten days later, accumulated a YPA of 3.6 and got embarrassed by the Giants, he faded into obscurity. Before this unexpected signing by Indy, he had been serving as the fumble-prone face of the FXFL's Brooklyn Bolts.

Lindley, meanwhile, actually started a playoff game under similar circumstances at the end of last season. He led the once-promising Cardinals to an embarrassing first-round exit. He had a chance to maintain a job with New England at the tail end of the preseason, but the repealing of Tom Brady's suspension made him an unneeded luxury behind Jimmy Garoppolo. He found himself unemployed until this lucky break.

January 3: The Colts ultimately couldn't pick a single quarterback from the pool of three. And improbably, their decision paid off. Freeman was assigned the regular offense, Lindley the two-minute drill, and the team's ninth and tenth quarterbacks of the year contributed a pair of touchdowns in the first half. Morris was left out completely.

On the opposite sideline, an ineffective and supposedly injured Zach Mettenberger was replaced in the third quarter by none other than Alex Tanney. In spite of the quarterback-killing Titans' best efforts and Tanney's first career touchdown pass, however, the rally fell short and the Colts' unrecognizable motley crew pulled off a 30-24 victory.

A team that entered the season with one of the most secure quarterback situations in the league finished it with an undrafted free agent and two disgraced disappointments — successfully. I can't recall any other instances of as much turnover at a single position as the Colts experienced this year at quarterback, but miraculously, the team finished the season close to a playoff spot and Pagano and Grigson kept their jobs.

I hope this timeline has been useful for those of you who might have been confused by the unexpected appearance of a pair of ghosts of post-Christmases (at least in Lindley's case) past. More actual playoff-related content coming soon to this blog.

Insufficient Canadians in the Canadian Football League

On November 8, the CFL's moribund Montreal Alouettes fell to an even worse team, the Saskatchewan Roughriders, who claimed only their third win in eighteen games that season. The Alouettes had led 24-6 in the fourth quarter, but allowed Saskatchewan to rally, force overtime, and take a 30-24 lead behind a touchdown pass from Brett Smith to Weston Dressler (the latter of whom had tried to bolt the league for the Kansas City Chiefs a year earlier, only to be released in the team's final cuts).

Montreal quarterback Brandon Bridge, one of seven quarterbacks to throw a pass for the Alouettes that season, had already thrown for a pair of touchdowns and no interceptions in his first career start, and was given a final opportunity to rally his team thanks to the CFL's NCAA-like overtime rules. However, his final drive stalled ten yards from the end zone. With their victory, Saskatchewan avoided producing the worst season in team history, instead tying their previous worst.

Bridge, however, had indeed made history; that season, he had become the first Canadian quarterback to play in the CFL in five years, and more notably, his start against Saskatchewan made him the first Canadian quarterback to start a game — in the Canadian Football League — since Giulio Caravatta in 1996, and the first black Canadian quarterback to ever start. Bridge was then, and is currently, the only non-American quarterback on a CFL roster. In fact, Bridge, a two-star recruit out of high school, hadn't even chosen to play college football in the CIS (Canadian Interuniversity Sport), instead playing for the FCS (within the NCAA) Alcorn State Braves, then the South Alabama Jaguars.

What's with the lack of Canadian-born, Canadian-raised quarterbacks? Former backup quarterback Frank Cosentino, in an interview with Canada.com, notes a so-called "glass ceiling" for Canadian quarterbacks, a general perception (among coaching staffs composed primarily of Americans) that Canadians aren't worth spending time on, while Americans can improve with enough practice.

This lack of patience manifests itself very often in the CFL. A Montreal Gazette article by Herb Zurkowsky points out that CIS quarterbacks are often converted to other positions, and that Montreal, at the time of Bridge's first action, had two such players on its roster: safety Marc-Olivier Brouillette and wide receiver Kyle Graves (who had played QB for the Montreal Carabins and Acadia Axemen, respectively). Brad Sinopoli, once viewed as a promising CFL quarterback prospect, was drafted by Calgary to play his natural position and also eventually converted. "It's probably an unintentional bias," Cosentino is quoted as saying. "Canadian coaches used to say the same thing about American hockey players... The American kid had to work twice as hard to show that they could play. Once they were given the opportunity... [they] turned out to be every bit as good as Canadian hockey players."

Another reason is built into the CFL's protectionist roster system, which outlines certain numbers of "import" (usually American) and "non-import" (Canadian) players — 19 of the former and 20 of the latter. Three more roster spots are dedicated to quarterbacks, who are excluded from the rule. American quarterbacks are generally better trained, and there's no incentive for teams to develop unpolished Canadian players because it doesn't help to fill the non-import requirement. As early as 2010, the CFL was considering changing this rule, but it remains in place to this day.

However, through a new so-called "internship" program, the CFL is currently encouraging the development of non-import quarterbacks. With the CFL's consent, sixteen Canadian quarterbacks, besides the three who had already signed with teams (Bridge, eventually-cut Jordan Yantz, and Andrew Buckley, who was drafted by the Calgary Stampeders but returned to the CIS to play another season), were given non-binding training camp invites that also did not require the teams to use a roster spot. Interestingly, half of these were in Montreal's camp alone.

(The aforementioned Yantz later claimed he wasn't given a fair shot in Winnipeg camp. He said he "was getting between one and three reps the entire practice"; clearly, creating the internship program alone won't be enough to eliminate the institutional bias against non-import QBs.)

If Bridge continues to excel, and if the internship program takes off, and if more Canadian quarterbacks get the chance to play, maybe we could see a change in the trend. But it's likely that the CFL will have to take action and change a rule that provides a real incentive to keep them on the roster throughout the season, not just give them a couple reps in training camp before casting them off forever.

Fringe Quarterback #1: Cody Fajardo

Hello! In the process of writing my preseason articles, I realized that I spent a lot of time discussing quarterbacks and their successes and failures. How could I utilize this skill during the regular season? When the Colts signed Josh Johnson ahead of practice squad QB Alex Tanney to back up Matt Hasselbeck for the last two weeks, I wondered if anyone who hadn't watched the Titans preseason would understand the move. So now I'm going to take low-level quarterbacks - free agents, practice squad members, perennial inactives - and watch their preseason film, then use it to determine if they have a future in the league.

First off, an apparent failure of a quarterback on my favorite team, one who remains unsurprisingly unsigned: Nevada product Cody Fajardo.

History: At Nevada, Fajardo succeeded 49ers started Colin Kaepernick as the starter. Much like "Kaep," he was a noted dual-threat quarterback, but unlike him, Fajardo lacked the necessary passing skills to get drafted this past spring. The Raiders picked him up and carried him through their training camp, but with Matt McGloin and Christian Ponder ahead of him on the depth chart, his chances of sticking with the team were incredibly slim. He would have to be exceptionally impressive in the preseason to even be in consideration for a spot on the practice squad.

Week 1: Given only a single garbage-time series with a 15-point lead over St. Louis, Fajardo completed a pair of wide receiver screens and was accurate on a halfback checkdown that was dropped by George Atkinson III (who proved vastly inferior to his Raider-luminary namesake). Fajardo showed decent mobility on a scramble. Ultimately, he wasn't asked to do very much.

Week 2: He didn't get a chance until the final drive of the game, down 20-12 to a Minnesota team that had completely shut down the McGloin-led offense. It was an important opportunity for Fajardo to prove his worth, one which he did not take advantage of. He once again showed his ability to evade pressure through several inventive scrambles, but didn't accomplish nearly enough in the passing game for a potentially game-tying touchdown. Fajardo forced a pair of ugly passes to Devon Wylie (another abject failure, by the way, this time a castoff from Kansas City who was only on the roster thanks to a tenuous Fresno State connection to Derek Carr), then an even worse attempt to Atkinson, who had a Vikings player standing right next to him, was unsurprisingly intercepted.

Week 3: Fajardo significantly sat out the entirety of the game commonly regarded as the principal tuneup for the regular season. He was cut two days later. Oakland tellingly passed on Fajardo for their practice squad even after Ponder was released, instead choosing to sign a very publicly terrible quarterback, Garrett Gilbert, who is best known for losing Texas a national championship game, then transferring to the illustrious SMU Mustangs football team.

Verdict: Fajardo's tape from Minnesota reveals a noticeable lack of decision-making skills. Mobility alone does not a quarterback make (hi, esteemed SEC Nation personality Tim Tebow!), and as a result, it's unlikely this inferior Kaepernick will ever be back in the NFL.

More of these to come, plus maybe even a new thing where I critique commentary teams! Stay tuned.

"American" Football Remains, Indeed, American

Basking in his team’s dominant 59-12 victory over Japan, IFAF World Championship MVP wide receiver Trent Steelman had this to say about the American team in a postgame interview: “We’re world champs. That’s what America does. We came in with the mentality that we’re going to teach the rest of the world that this is our game.”

One can forgive Steelman, who played quarterback at West Point, for his slightly excessive nationalism. But his disregard for other countries as part of the worldwide American football landscape is symptomatic of gridiron football’s general failure around the world.

The IFAF, the governing body of worldwide American football, hosts its own equivalent of the better-known FIFA World Cup or FIBA Championships every four years. Unlike its more storied counterparts, however, the IFAF World Championship has only been in existence for sixteen years. The tournament launched without much fanfare in 1999; the USA didn’t even send a team to the first two competitions, likely for the sake of competitive balance. Indeed, since their debut in 2007, the American teams are undefeated, in spite of being largely populated by sub-par amateur players; Steelman himself, the finals’ most exceptional player, failed to make the roster of the Baltimore Ravens after the Championship.

The USA’s IFAF domination indicates a wide chasm in terms of player skill. Excellent athletes in countries like Japan and France, which host some of the not-totally-incompetent international teams (though the USA did smash France 82-0 in their semifinal matchup), are not being raised to play on the gridiron. Most of them are bound for rugby, baseball, soccer, or even basketball careers.

There are football lovers around the world, but they’re the tiniest of minorities. Germany’s GFL, one of the more successful gridiron leagues, draws pitiful crowds (one of the top teams, the New Yorker Lions, brought in 2,250 for its latest game), especially in comparison to those of the German Bundesliga soccer league, for instance (league leader Bayern Munich has an average attendance of over 72,000).

The NFL does not respect these upstart leagues, who are effectively local small businesses whom the NFL seeks to replace with their iconic brand. This has manifested itself in the form of ventures like their failed developmental league, NFL Europe; the now-defunct American Bowl preseason game, held often in Tokyo, Berlin, and Mexico City; and the ongoing effort to gradually increase the number of low-quality regular season games played at London’s Wembley Stadium. Everything the NFL does in Europe and Asia indicates a lack of regard for anything but the success of the NFL brand. There’s no effort to build relationships with local leagues. 

Robert Huber, president of the American Football Association of Germany, put it well in a MMQB article: "You have to compare it to the Harlem Globetrotters in basketball. If they travel abroad, of course that will increase awareness for basketball. But that does not help the local structure, because everyone knows that's the Harlem Globetrotters and we will never play against them." This is in stark contrast to the actions of the Arena Football League, for instance, which in spite of being exceptionally strained financially has tried extremely hard to set up a government-sanctioned developmental league in China that heavily features Chinese natives alongside AFL castoffs.

Obviously, the world is not totally devoid of gridiron talent outside of the land of the free and home of the brave. The NFL has, admittedly, tried halfheartedly on several occasions to bring international players into the fold. A particularly interesting and potentially beneficial NFL initiative was the International Practice Squad Program, which assigned a number of non-American players to 16 teams’ practice squads.

A since-deleted ESPN article lists the 2007 assignees. While most were castoffs from NFL Europe who had been part of its own effort to incorporate so-called “national players” into the teams’ rosters, a select few were very much integrated into their country’s national American football cultures. Per the article, British linebacker and San Diego assignee Jason Brisbane, for instance, had led the London Blitz to a British American Football League championship and won a league MVP award. The article also stated that Sébastien Sejean, who was allocated to St. Louis, had played on the French team in the 2007 World Championship. In a remarkable display of carelessness, ESPN incorrectly referred to the Championship to as the World Cup in the article, which also spells Sejean’s name wrong.

Beginning in 2004, the initiative only produced a single player who actually made a team’s roster: Mexican guard Rolando Cantu, who saw limited action with the Arizona Cardinals in 2005 and has continued with the team in various front-office roles since. Otherwise, the players by and large washed out of the league.

It didn’t take long for the NFL to get bored of not producing significant results. The program was shut down in 2009, though the NFL supposedly still allowed for an exemption for an extra practice squad member for any team that wanted to employ someone from outside the United States. But when the Detroit Lions, four years later, attempted to use this rule to keep YouTube sensation Håvard “Kickalicious” Rugland on their roster, they were rebuffed by an NFL ruling stating that the rule was intended for NFL Europe. Clearly, in another example of NFL apathy toward actually cultivating international players, the league had left it in by accident, because it was silently removed sometime before this year. Vikings fansite writer Christopher Gates recommended that the team use the exemption to keep Polish project Babatunde Aiyegbusi around, only to discover, much to his embarrassment, that the newest collective bargaining agreement had simply omitted any discussion of the rule.

So as the situation stands currently, there has been no movement by the NFL to build relationships with leagues around the world, nor is there any remaining NFL program to encourage the development of non-American players. However, a recent IFAF proposal aimed to have gridiron football recognized as an Olympic sport, with provisions to begin playing it as soon as the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo (where gridiron football is taken somewhat seriously).

While this proposal was ultimately rejected by the IOC, Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman later spoke out in favor of American football as a potential Olympic sport, providing at least some publicity to the IFAF’s fruitless efforts. If there is ever a breakthrough, the Olympics could be a fantastic way for gridiron football to show its merits on a worldwide stage without being subject to the NFL’s jurisdiction.

edit 10/4: added Robert Huber quote

August 21st and 22nd Preseason Notes

Here are some notes related to the games I focused on from last weekend.

Jets 30, Falcons 22
- The Falcons' passing offense continues to amaze. While Atlanta is experiencing similar running back problems to Buffalo's, forcing them to use a fourth-stringer named Terron Ward, Matt Ryan's performances have been more than enough to carry the team so far. A nice throw to Collin Mooney left Jets linebacker Quinton Coples flat-footed and set up a 59-yard gain, then Julio Jones drew a pass-interference flag on Darrelle Revis to set up Ward for the easy touchdown. Ryan is even making mediocre players like Leonard Hankerson, scorer of the second touchdown appear competent.

- The Jets' first-team offense, on the other hand, is totally devoid of excitement. Not a single player is fun to watch. Chris Ivory showed some good vision on a touchdown run late in the first half, but the New York offense was entirely stagnant otherwise, as they were against Detroit. I foresee an awful inaugural season for Todd Bowles.

- TJ Yates, in limited playing time, managed to both take a safety and throw a costly interception. Perhaps there is a correlation between the fact that Yates was remarkably terrible both this week and last and the fact that Renfree experienced an increase in playing time. Who knows?? (Apparently Renfree has also been taking second-team reps in practice since last week.)

- The Falcons commentators thought it was hysterically funny when Jeremy Kerley tried to convince the officials that he had completed a questionable catch. They kept calling him a "litigator" and inexplicably chuckled a great deal when one of them said "Okay, it's time for you to stop being a litigator and go back to being a football player!" Also: "[Hester] simply emasculated that coverage team!" later in the game.

- There was a bit of debate between the commentators as to whether or not Bryce Petty would be able to develop quickly enough to serve as the primary backup to Ryan Fitzpatrick (following the Matt Flynn signing). Judging by this game, he has a long way to go. Every throw of his, at least on the drive I watched all the way through, seemed to be a risky deep pass; every once in a while one paid off, and it looked like a brilliant throw, but most of the time Petty missed by a wide margin.

Panthers 31, Dolphins 30
- The Panthers' play-by-play announcer had a strange habit of referring to quarterbacks by their full names. I thought it was strange enough when he introduced "Ryan Timothy Tannehill III," but it wasn't a one-time thing, as he also mentioned "Cameron Jerrell Newton."

- Carolina's first-team offense was just as terrible as I had anticipated. Jonathan Stewart is, and always has been, a mediocre running back, and Cam Newton started out 0 for 4 with an interception before completing a few passes against a Miami unit that, as it was the second quarter, may have contained some reserves.

- Newton's sheer mediocrity was especially noticeable because of how good Ryan Tannehill, and Miami's first-team offense as a whole, was in comparison. In general, this game followed a similar pattern to the Falcons-Jets game, in that one team completely dominated the first quarter, but comparatively mediocre backups squandered the lead.

- I'm a little irritated by the constant attempts to avoid overtime in preseason games. I understand that the quality of play isn't as high in general, but wouldn't a team want as much time to evaluate its personnel as possible, in as many different game situations as possible? In 2014 there was even a vote to eliminate overtime from preseason games completely. This game was a good example of a team, Miami, losing out on an opportunity to give more playing time to borderline prospects like riches-to-rags Josh Freeman, because they decided to go for two in a situation in which they never would in the regular season.

Vikings 20, Raiders 12
- I was glad to finally have the chance to watch my team in action. Unfortunately, their performance was pretty disappointing. The starting offense at least got into the endzone, with the help of a toe-tapping catch by Amari Cooper (notable because as the commentators pointed out, he's a rookie, and in college, receivers only need one foot down), but the backups were stifled by an endless stream of penalties.  Oakland has been constantly criticized for receiving exorbitant amounts of penalties in the past, and clearly Jack Del Rio has not done much to address that issue.

- There was a strange moment from the commentators, who were otherwise fairly competent, when an Oakland defensive back was called for unnecessary roughness on a touchdown, and the referee announced that the penalty would be assessed on the kickoff. When Minnesota lined up to kick off, a color commentator asked, "Why are they kicking from the 50?" Beth Mowins, the play-by-play woman, explained fairly clearly that the 15-yard penalty would move the kickoff from the 35 to the 50. The color commentator responded, in a tone reminiscent of a frustrated second-grader, "I still don't get it." After a moment of silence, Mowins moved on as if nothing had happened.

- Another preseason convention that bothers me: backup kickers and punters on teams that don't need any sort of competition. Case in point: Giorgio Tavecchio for the Raiders. It's not like Seabass is getting cut any time soon.

August 20th Preseason Notes

Redskins, Lions
- Golden Tate continues to receive targets from Matthew Stafford, as he did last week. Jeremy Ross also caught a few passes from Stafford and, later, a touchdown from the surprisingly competent Dan Orlovsky. This Lions receiving corps is quite capable, even without Calvin Johnson.

- The first-team Redskins defense cannot tackle at all. As a permanently addled Joe Theismann pointed out, three plays on the Lions' first drive, including a Tate catch, were kept alive by missed tackles. Their defensive positioning is correct — they swarm to the ball — but the technique needs work.

- Not surprising that Robert Griffin III got himself inexplicably injured again. Given the excellent performances of Colt McCoy and Kirk Cousins, both in this game and last season, I don't think Washington needs to be particularly concerned.

- Dan Orlovsky has already improbably unseated Lions developmental quarterback Kellen Moore for the #2 spot, at least according to the order in which they played in this game, and it's easy to see why. While Orlovsky completed 13 of 17 passes and threw for a pair of touchdowns, Moore missed on four of his seven throws against third-teamers, including one at pretty much point-blank range. Everyone was rooting for him following his highly successful college career at Boise State, everyone's favorite Cinderella story, but it doesn't appear that he has much of a future.

Bills, Browns
- Tyrod Taylor was able to run the first-team offense effectively. Jon Gruden was quick to discredit him for taking a sack rather than throwing the ball away, but as he was being swarmed by three Cleveland defenders and the offensive line had completely collapsed, I don't hold it against him. Rex Ryan should name him the Week 3 starter, and probably the regular season starter as well. Manuel was similarly impressive and especially good on the final go-ahead drive, which ended in a passing touchdown to the back corner of the end zone from 14 yards out followed by a two-point conversion on a rollout.

- Deonte Thompson, who ran a 4.21 40-yard dash coming out of college, is excellent at getting open, as he showed last week as the recipient of EJ Manuel's beautiful touchdown pass. This week he got a great deal of first-team action and repeatedly found open space. However, he usually failed to come up with Taylor's accurate passes. When his possession skills improve, he'll be an excellent deep threat for a team in need of dynamic receivers.

- The Bills' awful running back situation is pretty funny, to be honest. With the top five injured, we saw the sixth-, seventh-, and eighth-string running backs against Cleveland. All three were acquired within the last two weeks; two were acquired in the last two days. Combined, they rushed for the same amount of yards as Tyrod Taylor.

Remaining Week 1 Preseason Notes

Hello! Due to unfortunate circumstances, I missed most of the live airings of the remaining Week 1 preseason games. Fortunately, I was able to re-watch portions of each game using another Game Pass free trial that allows for the viewing of 30-minute "condensed games" that feature only the plays from each broadcast. Here's the next in my series of WalterFootball-inspired notes pages on a few of the games that I managed to watch.

Falcons 31, Titans 24
- As usual, everyone is hyped up about Julio Jones' excellent performance. I'd advise you all to avoid getting too excited; it'll be miraculous if he manages to stay healthy.

- TJ Yates does not look like a quarterback who once started a playoff game. On the first drive he made a pair of horrible throws when the Falcons were in the red zone. On the second he waited way too long in the pocket on one play and threw into coverage on another. Even on the halftime drive that resulted in a touchdown run, Yates nearly missed multiple wide-open receivers and was bailed out by their athletic plays.

- Always thought Harry Douglas didn't get enough credit for his role in the Falcons playoff teams of a few seasons ago; it was nice to see that he's becoming a favorite target of Mariota already. It would be nice if a moribund team like Tennessee could get exciting players like Douglas and second-quarter scorer Dexter McCluster more involved in the offense.

- David Cobb (11 carries for 53 yards) looks like a promising runner who could see some playing time, considering the mediocrity of those above him on the depth chart.

Panthers 25, Bills 24
- It's very telling about the Bills quarterback situation that the GM referred to them being in "quarterback purgatory" as a positive thing. Cassel is consistently mediocre. Taylor is exciting but has zero starting experience. Manuel is just wasted potential. None of the three is good enough to prevent opposing teams from just keying in on McCoy every game.

- The Panthers receiving corps is absolutely terrible without Kelvin Benjamin, who was lost to a torn ACL in a recent practice. The second-team offense under Derek Anderson used recent draft pick Devin Funchess in a similar role, but it remains to be seen if he is capable of being a starter right away. Expect Cam Newton to be relied upon way too much to propel an offense with no consistent running backs or wide receivers.

- The Bills commentators actively cheered on their team throughout the game, yelling at the refs when a flag was thrown too slowly for a dirty tackle and saying "come on!" excitedly as EJ Manuel scrambled out of the pocket, searching for a wide receiver.

- I was under the impression former Viking Joe Webb had given up on playing quarterback, but I'm glad he didn't. He's still an incredibly fun player to watch who possesses remarkable mobility (which he likely developed in an attempt to convert to wide receiver).

Chiefs 34, Cardinals 19
- Is it bad that I can't think of anything other than bodies mouldering in the grave when I hear the name of a certain Cardinals second-year receiver?

- I've always considered Chase Daniel one of the best backup quarterbacks in the league; he's impressed me in a few appearances replacing Drew Brees and Alex Smith. He reinforced my feelings with an amazing stat line against Arizona's second-team defense, by far the best any quarterback has accumulated thus far this preseason: 17 of 21, 189 yards, three touchdown passes, zero interceptions. (He might even have had a fourth touchdown pass had Andy Reid not pulled him in favor of an ineffective Aaron Murray during a third-quarter drive.)A pair of deep passes to backup receivers Williams and Hammond on a quick drive right before the half showcased Daniel's accuracy. Like Green Bay's Scott Tolzien and New Orleans' Ryan Griffin, the Missouri product could be a potential trade target for quarterback-needy teams, if Kansas City considers Murray a viable developmental prospect.

- I pray that CBS sends its #1 commentary team to the October 18th Cardinals-Steelers game and the Cardinals' fourth quarterback somehow makes the roster so that Phil Simms has to discuss Phillip Sims.

- Following a garbage-time touchdown pass by Sims, the commentary devolved into awful filler about a 100-year-old woman in a wheelchair who visited the Cardinals camp and apparently was apparently "walking around" and talking to players. (They showed a shot of her shaking hands with some players, but I have to believe that was the exception, not the rule.) Ron Wolfley, the color commentator, who sounded like he had inhaled sulfur hexafluoride before the game, added some insightful commentary about the invention of the automobile, said the phrase "pomp and circumstance" four times in about a minute, and compared the extra point to having a parade after conquering a city.

As you may have noticed while reading this post, I pay a great deal of attention to backup quarterbacks.

Anyway, my apologies if I passed on a game for which you had expected analysis. I'm lucky to have been able to watch any of these given the limited time I had. Tomorrow I'll be making another post for the first pair of games of Week 2, with a potential format change — stay tuned!