We Don’t Need Passes Where We’re Going: Monday Night Football Recap

There’s a certain je ne sais quoi to alternative styles of football. There’s the charm of the ol’ hook-and-ladder, which invariably works in those games against Uncle Rich that take place after he sobers up from the noon Thanksgiving slate. There’s the Statue of Liberty play, known as the go-to trick play for every blue, white, and red-blooded upstate New Yawker who still wear their high school letter jacket (and no, they didn’t letter in football). There’s the Cleveland Steamer, famous amongst Odell Beckham Jr. for…reasons. 

And then there’s the “Dead Arm,” when the team simply…doesn’t pass the ball. 

The Patriots / Bills game was played in conditions that came straight out of Most Dangerous Catch. Each team spent the week practicing on a litany of crab-catching boats with captains who were named things like “Scooter Bill” and “Admiral Crapper” while they prepped for the Bering Strait-inspired Monday Night Game. 

And thanks to the weather, about the most entertaining thing I can do about a game between Bill Belichick and the Josh Allen-powered Bills is to make crab-catching jokes. 

The Patriots — helmed by the hoodie that won the famed snow game on that Adam Vinatieri kick so many Tom Brady wins ago — decided that, on Monday Night, he was going to abandon the pass completely. Mac Jones threw the ball a total of 3 times, letting Damien Harris and Rhamondre Stevenson drive the team with nearly 200 combined yards rushing on their way to a 14-10 win. 

Facing snow and winds gusting upwards of a solid summer thunderstorm, Josh Allen completed 50% of his passes and led his team in rushing, as if we needed to be reminded how lamentable Devin Singletary is for fantasy. On a night when running backs were in their primal element — ice on their checks, frozen capillaries in their noses — Singletary ran 10 times for 39 yards. The ghost of Walter Payton cries. 

There was just…the Dead Arm game. Belichick looked at the field and said, “I’m gonna play my way,” and he walked out with the win. It was pretty boring football, unless you’re the kind of sick, sad person who plays in a punter-centric league. In that case, I’m not here to kink shame. 

Legends walk their own way, and it’s not always fun and games for fantasy managers. Well, unless you’re on the Harris/Stevenson train. But for all the rest of us that needed, well, anything from Kendrick Bourne…we can’t help but remember that variance is a mighty spirit best left in the Bering Strait. Sometimes you leave with enough catch to field your family and crew, and sometimes you’re left out at sea. 

Hope you all have a good week, and stay warm wherever it is you are.