Week 11 Score Report

Weekly: 2011 (all games): 43.93. 3rd since 2001. (2005: 44.25. 2010: 45.56)

(The Detroit-Carolina 49-35 game is now the highest-scoring of the season.)

10 week average (all years now equal amount of games except 2001): 44.069. 3rd since 2011. (2008: 44.281. 2010: 44.325.)

And more for Week 10's Fine Blotter

• New England Patriots: Rob Gronkowski: $7,500 for taunting after a touchdown.
• Baltimore Ravens: Joe Flacco (yes, the quarterback -- second one this week!): $7,500 for a horse-collar tackle!
• Jacksonville Jaguars: Derek Fox: $7,500 for a flagrant face-mask.
• Seattle Seahawks: Kam Chancellor: $20,000 for probably using his helmet or hitting a defenseless player.
• Tennessee Titans: Michael Griffin: $7,500 for unnecessary roughness
• Baltimore Ravens: Arthur Jones: $7,500 for same.
• And, finally, a 3-pack of Carolina Panthers, all getting $7,500 fines for personal fouls: Charles Johnson, Byron Bell, Jordan Gross
  

Fine Blotter Week 10: As expected, Lions-Bears dominates the early fines...

One other fine first:

• It took eleven weeks, but the Dallas Cowboys finally have their first fine of the season (at least from what I have found: DeMarcus Ware: $15,000 for roughing the passer.

This now leaves the Indianapolis Colts as the only team in the NFL not to be fined so far, at least from all the information I've been able to glean.

The number of fines from the Bears-Lions game has grown to at least six!

• For the Bears: Earl Bennett: $10,000 for a TWO-TIME LOSER uniform violation IN CONSECUTIVE WEEKS (same illegal shoes).
• DJ Moore: $15,000 for the scuffle.
• For the Lions, the fines are now at four! The hit which precipitated the scuffle by QB Matthew Stafford was deemed illegal and costs Stafford $7,500.
• Rob Sims: $7,500 for his role therein.
• Kyle Vandenbosch: $7,500 for a late hit.
• And to absolutely NO ONE'S SURPRISE: Nick Fairley: $15,000 for roughing the passer.

There will be more from other games, and I'm not so sure the league is done with Lions-Bears either!

If there is a soul left who honestly does not believe the NFL is scripted...

I submit to you the most obviously rigged game in probably the entire history of the league.

It was so rigged that this old codger all but called it as it was happening.

Tim Tebow and his Blessed Broncos have done it again -- 4-1 under God's Quarterback and another last-drive comeback win for Christ.

This was a team who had 135 yards of total offense before Tebow and crew got the ball with about 6 minutes to go in the game.

12 plays, 95 yards, and 4:56 later, Tim Tebow scores the game winner in a 17-13 Denver win, to get the Blessed Broncos to 5-5!!

Tebow had six rushes on the drive, threw five passes, and they had four of the game's eleven first downs for Denver on that drive.

And then the Jets do just enough forward to get a chance that people believe they can do it, but enough self-destruction that they fall to the Quarterback from God.

ARE

YOU

KIDDING

ME???

Couple of NFL notes...

Not that I think the Pack needed any referee help in the 45-7 win over the Vikings (and the 7 was basically a direct result of a punt muff on the part of the Pack), but it is interesting to note that the Vikings were called for 10 penalties in the game. The Packers? ONLY ONE. A false-start on the first snap of the second quarter.

HOW IN THE BLUE HELL DO YOU GO AN ENTIRE NFL GAME IN THIS DAY AND AGE WITH ONE PENALTY AND THAT KIND OF DIFFERENTIAL?

---------

This whole Tim Tebow phenomenon has got me thinking and watching.

Thanks to our friends at Pro Football Reference, I decided to search all games in which the winning team had 8 or fewer passing attempts.

Other than the Tebow Bowl on Sunday, here are the only times since 2000:

• New England 13 - Buffalo 0. 12/28/2008. Last game of the season probably had lots to do with it, as Matt Cassel went 6-8 for 78 yards.
• Dallas 32 - Washington 13. 12/10/2000. Real odd one here, as two quarterbacks split duty to only have 8 passing attempts. (Troy Aikman had 3, Anthony Wright had 5.)
• Carolina 10 - Atlanta 3. 12/24/2006. Chris Weinke, 4-7 for 32 yards and the only touchdown of the match. DeShaun Foster and DeAngelo Williams combined for 49 rushes for 184 yards.
• Finally, San Diego 21 - Cleveland 0. 12/19/2004. Drew Brees, 4-6 for 85 yards and a score. San Diego, led by LDT, had run the ball 51 times. (LDT: 26 for 111 and 2 TD's.)

So only four other times (five total) in the league since 2000, and never, in any of those wins, outside of the month of December.

The next time it happened before that, that a team won with 8 or fewer pass attempts, was December 12, 1982. New England beat Miami (in Foxboro) 3-0, Steve Grogan 2-5 with a pick. I think you can guess that there were probably contributing factors. (Yes, this was the famous Snow Plow Game.)

There have been two pro football games since 1940 in which the winning team attempted no passes. One in 1941, one in 1950.

The March of "God's Quarterback"...

Start getting real scared. The Broncos are 3-1 with Tim Tebow starting, and, with this country taking a hard lurch to the Right...

Here's the kicker: Tebow won the game, playing the whole game, completing only TWO passes out of EIGHT attempts against Kansas City.

Denver is now 4-5, one game behind the Raiders in the division.

Ruh-roh.

(Hattip to Brian Tuohy, though I've heard no end of this already and was probably going to post this anyway.)

Sounds like the NFL offenses have been told to pack up for the week...

Sunday nighter was the highest scoring game of the week so far, and Monday night is the Aaron Rodgers Show in Lambeau, so this might change a bit more.

But week 10, at 39.27, was the lowest scoring week 10 since at least 2001, and by almost two full points, even with the Sunday nighter totalling 53. Last year averaged almost 52 points a game. The next-lowest since 2001? A 41-even average in 2007.

As a result, the average NFL game this year now only averages 44.03, behind 2002 (44.18), 2010 (44.19), and the new leader, 2008 (44.49).

PS: You can expect a significant Fine Blotter this week. Chicago and Detroit got it on a couple of times in this game. Two consecutive clips, one with a brawl and the second with new knucklehead Nick Fairley roughing the passer in the end zone.