Week 4 NFL Takeaways: Joe Flacco Is Still a Great Story
Week 4 is rolling toward Monday. And we're rolling with The MMQB Takeaways from an entertaining NFL Sunday. As we've been doing all season, we'll publish the takeaways Sunday and update them live through Monday morning. So come back again if not all 10 are here yet ...
Indianapolis Colts
Joe Flacco is a great story. Again. The Indianapolis Colts' quarterback is honest to a fault. So excuse him if a little piece of his brain processed the fact that he played as well as he did last year with the Cleveland Browns, and didn't get a shot to start somewhere in 2024, as frustrating.
The rest of us saw it, too. He probably did play well enough to get that chance.
"Yeah, for sure," he affirmed late Sunday afternoon. "You never know what's gonna happen in this league. Some things aren't up to you. So all you can do is go out there, play the best you can and forget about everything else. Listen, there was a lot to it. It was so much fun last year going out, playing the way I did. Definitely, I think you always kind of hope that you get a chance to go play for real again. But, hey, this is the nature of it, and this is where I am.
"So I just got to make the most of it. Enjoy every day. You can't be negative because if you're negative, it's going to affect you in a lot of ways. And a day like today, when you're called on and the team needs to rely on you, you're not going to be there because you're in this negative headspace. And that's the last thing I want to do."
Safe to say, Flacco was in a positive place going into and coming out of Sunday.
Coming in for an injured Anthony Richardson (who'll undergo tests on his hip Monday), the forever-young almost-40-year-old (more on his birthday shortly) was just what the Colts needed to outlast the previously perfect Pittsburgh Steelers 27–24 in Indy on Sunday. He finished with an efficient 168 yards, two touchdowns and 105.9 rating, but was just what Shane Steichen's team needed to get back to .500 going into the season's second month.
And whether Flacco gets an extended run like last year or not-that'll ride on Richardson's health-he remains a great example of a guy who has the right approach to the position he's found himself in, even if that's not quite the position he was hoping for back in March.
The funny thing is this guy with the great approach wasn't quite sure which one to take to the job Sunday. Richardson first got nicked up in the game's 10th minute on a collision with Steelers safety Minkah Fitzpatrick. He left for two plays, during which Flacco got off his first throw of the season, on an underneath angle route to Jonathan Taylor on a four-verts call.
"They came out in two-high [zone] and kind of took away all the deep stuff," Flacco says. "So I just kind of said, All right, just don't do anything stupid here. Take the easy completion. See what happens. And that's what I did."
Flacco came out a play later, but Richardson's return lasted just one play-after he crumpled to the turf awkwardly on a run-after running again into Fitzpatrick. At which point, Flacco says he blacked out.
"I wish I remembered [what I was thinking]," Flacco says. "Definitely not the easiest situation. It was a little weird. I have gone in as a backup for some plays. But I haven't gone in and then finished the game like that. And, initially, I wasn't really sure what [Richardson's injury] was. So I think that kind of delayed the process of really it sinking in and being the guy. But it's definitely a weird feeling, not something that I'm used to. I don't think you would ever get used to that. You kind of just have to go out there and just turn your brain off a little bit and go play. ...
"And then a couple plays later, I'm hitting J.D. [Josh Downs] for a little touchdown, just putting it on his chest. And it doesn't get much easier than that one."
During our conversation, Flacco mentioned that Richardson asked him for his birthday a while back, when Richardson figured out that his backup was born in 1985. "I said, 'January,'" Flacco says. "He said, 'January what?' I said 'January 16.' He said, 'Oh my god, my mom was born on January 8.'"
The two laughed about it, but it's also a good reminder of how much Flacco has seen and experienced. Now in his 17th season, and second stint playing for Steichen (his first, in Philly, was a reason he signed with the Colts), there's a lot he has to give to the game.
But as Flacco will remind you, he can still play a little bit, too. And with all of those years on his body and mind, he has a pretty good perspective and appreciation for days like Sunday.
"I'm not 23 anymore," he says. "It's not just me and my wife. I have five kids. I have more people that I get to enjoy it with. That's one thing that makes it different. I was out of the league, not being there and realizing that you want to be there. It is a good reminder. No matter what your job is, it is a job. I think at times, for NFL players, you do view this as a job, and every now and then you need to remind yourself that this isn't a normal job. This is the best job in the world.
"And every now and then, something happens that does that for you. And that's kind of what last year was. It was that reminder, like, Dude, how fortunate are you to be able to do this? And when I got back in there last year and had that opportunity again, I definitely was aware of all that, and it definitely made it more enjoyable than ever-because of that. So you need those reminders and little resets to kind of remind you what we do."
As for what was most fun about Sunday? "Winning," he says.
As he showed us all last year, he's still plenty capable of that, too.
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Tom Brady made his mark in Tampa Bay, and what the Buccaneers built around him is very clearly sustainable. This, of course, came up this week with Brady making his first visit to Florida's Gulf Coast in his new capacity as Fox's top color guy. And in doing so, Brady fired back at Baker Mayfield's contention (a contention Mayfield himself said was taken out of context) that he's helped lead a less stressful workplace post-Brady.
"I thought stressful was not having Super Bowl rings," Brady said on the broadcast . "There was a mindset of a champion I took to work every day. This wasn't day care."
Really, it still isn't.
The Buccaneers improved to 3–1 after their 33–16 win over the Eagles, and it's just the latest piece of proof that the mentality Brady instilled lives on as the Bucs pursue a fourth consecutive AFC South title. A good example came with the reaction I got from Lavonte David, the 13th-year Buccaneer, when I relayed Brady's words (he hadn't heard them yet).
He didn't get defensive; he laughed.
"That's typical Tom, man. That's typical Tom," David says. "All you care about is winning-no matter what's going on, no matter what the outside noise is, all you want to do is win and win Super Bowls. And that's the reason why he got seven of them. That's one of the reasons why I love and appreciate him for bringing me one."
This particular Sunday was a pretty good example of what Brady left behind, with a well-stocked roster and a well-run program headed by Todd Bowles.
Last week, a previously winless Denver Broncos team led by rookie Bo Nix dealt the Bucs a 26–7 loss. Sustaining the blow led to a very clear message from Bowles and his staff: If Tampa was going to be a great team, they couldn't let the shiner Denver left them with beat them twice.
It was clear Sunday that wasn't going to happen. The Bucs jumped out to a 24–0 lead before the Eagles registered a single first down. Tampa scored touchdowns on drives of 10 plays and 79 yards, and five plays and 80 yards. They scored another off a Philly muffed punt, then went on a 12-play, 77-yard drive to kick a field goal, controlling the game in just about every way possible.
And when the Eagles made it a little too close for comfort, David himself closed Philly out, sacking and stripping Jalen Hurts on a blitz, and heeding the words of his linebackers coach, Larry Foote.
"If you know my coach, you would know that he'd known about those things, taking advantage of our opportunities," David says. "I was able to do that and make a big play for our football team that was needed. And we didn't look back from it."
Mayfield, for his part, like he has for the past year-plus, gave the Bucs exactly the kind of performance they needed, throwing for 237 yards, two scores and a 107.8 rating in the first half alone, before paying homage to Brady in postgame.
"All we ask is for Baker to be Baker," David says. "Be the great football player that he is, be the great teammate that he is, and everything will take care of itself. I never try to ask him to be more than what he is. Tom is Tom, but Baker is Baker."
And Baker, in so many ways, has been the perfect chip-on-the-shoulder successor to Tom.
But, again, there's no denying what Brady left behind. David reminded Brady of it when he saw the seven-time champ's smiling face looking at him coming down the tunnel Sunday morning.
"He had a huge impact on us," David says. "He changed the organization, with the way he leads, the way he gets everybody going, the way he tried to get everybody going and playing up to their level. And just me watching him, watching the way he worked, with all the success he had, he just worked like he was a rookie every time. And that was just incredible for me to see. And I try to adopt that mentality."
David and a few Bucs have done a really good job of that. Which is probably why they're still playing in so many big games, with another one coming Thursday night in Atlanta.
Dallas Cowboys
The Dallas Cowboys' hope now: that their September was an extended preseason. This dynamic, the one where teams are still working out kinks through the month, has existed for about 14 years, going back to the introduction of 2011 CBA that put stringent rules on contact and practice time through the spring and summer. It's generally hit teams going through coaching changes, or roster turnover, harder.
So it has been for these Cowboys. Mike Zimmer's scheme, which called for more reading and reacting from players along the defensive front, was a departure from Dan Quinn's aggressive system. The team's depth, too, was impacted with players such as Dorance Armstrong and Dante Fowler Jr. departing. Making things even more challenging was that the Cowboys really didn't play anyone in the preseason, and it all seemed to come apart through the first two weeks of the regular season.
In Week 2's mess against New Orleans, it was a fundamentals issue, with guys misaligned and not playing their gaps properly. In Week 3, per the coaches, a first-half implosion against the Baltimore Ravens was more about guys flat-out leaving their responsibilities to make plays.
That led to Zimmer and his staff hammering home the idea of playing team defense on a short week. Evidently, the message got through. In the 20–15 win over the New York Giants on Thursday night, the plays the coaches saw where half the guys were lined up right and half weren't were gone. More guys earned playing time, which allowed the team to rotate, too, which helped.
The results ...
• That leaky run defense allowed just 26 yards on 24 carries (1.1 yards per).
• The big play wasn't a problem-the Cowboys had the downfield stuff (outside of one ankle-breaking Malik Nabers route) covered. They allowed two plays of 20 yards or more all night.
• The young guys settled in. Former first-round defensive tackle Mazi Smith played one of his best games as a pro. Second-year linebacker DeMarvion Overshown-who was hurt for most of his rookie year, and whom the staff feels has All-Pro potential-shined. And guys such as Micah Parsons and Eric Kendricks were steadier.
Of course, now, with Parsons and DeMarcus Lawrence banged up, the challenge will only heighten for Zimmer's crew. But, again, the hope is they're out of the woods on playing in the new scheme.
New York Giants
I suggest starting to look at Daniel Jones as a bridge quarterback. There was a scene in Hard Knocks where Giants GM Joe Schoen said to Bears GM Ryan Poles, with the two together at the Clemson-Georgia game over Labor Day Weekend, "It's gotta be nice to not be looking at the ..." Poles interrupted, "Quarterbacks?" Schoen responded, "Yeah."
That's the reality of the Giants' situation. The Jones contract's final fully guaranteed dollar will be paid at the end of this season. He hasn't played to a $40 million-per-year level, and it's hard to see that happening between now and the end of the year, based on the info we have.
That said, Jones is a good player, and has gradually gotten better the past few weeks. He's breaking in three new offensive linemen, has head coach Brian Daboll's back in the quarterback room daily and as his play-caller, is working with a new No. 1 receiver in Nabers and is just 10 months off ACL surgery. That's a lot of change for one guy in a short amount of time.
It wasn't good in Week 1. But slowly, his chemistry with his teammates, his comfort with his knee, and his rhythm with the new setup has come. His second touchdown pass to Nabers in Week 3 was one where he had good feet, good eyes, and made a good decision with Myles Garrett barreling down on him. As the staff looked at it, the comment made in the room was that it was a throw he wouldn't have made against the Minnesota Vikings in the opener. Those coaches feel, in fact, like his past three games have been his best since his 2022 breakthrough season.
Similarly, he played well against Dallas. He just couldn't carry the team when it needed him to, was a tick off on a couple of shots and was victimized by some inconsistency from promising young slot Wan'dale Robinson. He finished 29-of-40 for 281 yards and a pick (on a Hail Mary). The Giants kicked five field goals in the loss, and that's certainly a problem.
But if we look at Jones like he's the bridge quarterback, it's fine.
And we should look at it that way, because if you listen to what the Giants have said, and look at how they've operated (trying to trade up for Drake Maye), that's just what he is.
This was originally published on www.si.com as Week 4 NFL Takeaways: Joe Flacco Is Still a Great Story .
This story was originally published September 29, 2024, 6:33 PM.
