The NFC Beast has become the NFC Least in today’s random thoughts

That was the most despicable display of football NFL fans have had to endure in prime time in quite awhile. Five interceptions. Two lost fumbles, while four others were recovered by their own team. And the New York Giants — once one of the NFL’s rushing powerhouses — has yet to have 100 yards rushing in a single game this season. How is that even possible?

I am 40-years old. The NFC East I had the pleasure of watching growing up (which included the Phoenix Cardinals back then) was the cream of the crop of the NFL. From the time I left Kindergarten until the day I graduated college, the NFC East had appeared in 10 of 18 Super Bowls. The Cowboys and Redskins won three each, while the Giants would win two.

It wasn’t as if it were the NFC Central or NFC West, where the Chicago Bears and San Francisco 49ers would dominate. No, the NFC East of the 80s and 90s was a power house, often having three teams with double digit wins, or a logjam at 9-7. Bill Parcells, Tom Landry, Joe Gibbs, Buddy Ryan and Gene Stallings were replaced by Tom Coughlin, Jason Garrett, Jay Gruden and Chip Kelly. And it is simply awful.

The Giants are possibly the most over rated team of the millennium, based on two lucky Super Bowl runs. I don’t care if I get slack for calling it lucky. Tom Coughlin is a lousy coach and Eli Manning is extremely over rated himself. Did you know that over a full season, Eli has never had higher than a 93.1 QB rating?

Let’s take a look at the 2004 draft. Philip Rivers — you know the guy that Eli and Archie forced to be traded to San Diego because poor wittwe Ewi wouldn’t pway so far away from daddy — has had FOUR seasons with a QB rating over 100. Big Ben? He’s had three, and the same amount of Super Bowl wins as the mighty Eli. The 90th overall pick in that draft that Eli went number one in never reached the Super Bowl, but he was able to have higher QB ratings than Eli ever had twice in his career. That’s right, folks, Matt Schaub had two seasons better than the mighty Eli has ever had. But David Tyree and Mario Manningham (and his older Hall of Fame brother) have kept Eli in the spotlight for far too long.

Chip Kelly is a joke. His high-octane, fast paced offense was not pretty last night and was completely bailed out by the ineptitude of the Giants offense, a few long passes and an Eagles defensive touchdown. Kelly is the Wildcat of NFL coaches. He had an idea –almost a novelty if you would — that got them to the playoffs in 2013, but faltered down the stretch in 2014. Yes, he finished with the same record, but he also had the Eagles at 9-3 entering week 14 and finished the season 1-3, including back-to-back losses to the Cowboys and Redskins (their one win was against the 6-10 Giants of course).

This year, Kelly tried to show that his system is infallible by removing all the working parts and bringing in new cogs. Sam Bradford has been great or terrible. Last night in prime time, he posted his worst QB rating of the season to date, an ugly 61.3 number while tossing three interceptions. No matter how poorly LeSean McCoy played last year, the running game has been no more consistent with the additions of DeMarco Murray and Ryan Mathews this year. That Kiko Alonso move, though… brilliant.

Photo Cred: ESPN.com
Photo Cred: ESPN.com

The Dallas Cowboys have been a punchline since Tony Romo bobbled that snap against the Seahawks. Think about that. If you are a 30-something year old, you hate the Cowboys because of how they were the elite team when you were little. Now, you anticipate with predictability how they will self-implode each season.

This year, the injury bug has struck once again in Texas and it struck hard. If Romo and Dez Bryant were on the field, this team would be running away with the NFC East. Sean Lee is back and the defense has performed better than expected (No. 12 defense in the NFL right now) with Brandon Weeden being able to keep the offense on the field for about six minutes a game (I speak in hyperbole people, calm down).

The sad thing is that this division is so bad, that if Romo and Dez can get back in a week or two, the Cowboys could still win it. Technically, so can the Washington Redskins, and that my friends, is awful.

Daniel Snyder is to football what Donald Trump is to the presidential election: a complete and utter comedy of errors. The same way that America sits on the edge of their seat saying, “there is no way Trump can out-dumb himself right here,” the NFL world watches Snyder thinking the same thing. Hang on, folks, it only gets worse.

The whole Robert Griffin III and Kirk Cousins drama is unbelievable. Every week we have to hear about whether or not Cousins has a job. Are you kidding me? NFL news is being monopolized by two bad QBs? When I was a kid, I watched Jeff Hostetler oust Phil Simms as the Giants QB. When I got older, Tony Romo stole the show from Drew Bledsoe. Three of those names are football legends in one regard or the other. Cousins and RGIII are other teams’ backups at best.

ONE time since 2008 have the Redskins not finished dead last in the NFC East (I wish we could have some good ol’ Joe Theismann commentary on that), yet we still have to hear about these guys. No one talks about the Jacksonville Jaguars. No one cares about the Tennessee Titans. You know why? Because the Redskins used to be the prize of the NFC, and it’s arguable that no team has fallen further than the Skins (aside from maybe the Oakland/Los Angeles Raiders). The Hogs would be livid, and it can all be traced back to Daniel Snyder.

Here’s the thing. If you are a young 20-something or teenager reading this, you have no idea what I am talking about. But I was there. I grew up 20 minutes from Giants Stadium and was in the heart of the battle of the toughest division in football. It was once thought that whomever made it out of the NFC East alive would be the Super Bowl victor. Now, you watch, hoping your favorite team gets to play whoever wins the division in the first round of the playoffs.

We are more than a quarter of the way through the NFL season, and no team in the NFC East has a winning record. I know, the NFC South and the NFC West have sent sub-.500 teams to the playoffs in recent years past, but that’s not how the NFC used to work. And I can tell you that the Eagles and Giants of yesteryear would never put on a show on MNF like those two franchises did last night. Somewhere, Randall Cunningham and Mark Bavaro are ticked off.

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