NFL Sunday Week 1: Cancer is the best job security

Quick question: What’s better than skipping church, sitting on the couch in a dark room watching the Red Zone channel for 12 hours avoiding all real world responsibilities, and gambling on grown men who probably have CTE? Doing it for the first time since February, Welcome to NFL Sunday.

NFL football is finally back! We’ve had the nice appetizer of 2 weeks of college football which is fun but sort of like trying to make a full meal out of mozzarella sticks, it can leave you feeling a little empty inside. The college kids making their schools millions in free labor and advertising can be cute but for true fans nothing will touch the thrill of sundays. Gambling, fantasy, seeing players from your favorite team take a knee during 2 minutes of a 200 year old song before the game and then having the entire country lose their mind over the fact a backup QB can’t get a job, I mean CAN YOU FEEL IT FOOTBALL IS BACK. Each Sunday I’ll give you my picks against the spread in at least 3 NFL games. Before that though I would like to talk about some bad news.

Have you ever had to give someone bad news? Break up with a significant other? Tell someone their dog died? It’s not fun for anyone involved. No person is ever happy when they are forced to give someone bad news but sometimes bad news is necessary, especially when you’re the boss. Employer’s might be the best qualified people to give bad news. They often have to tell their employees the truth, which can be bad, or even there are times when employers have to fire employees.  I’ve never personally fired anyone but I have been bad enough at jobs to deserve to be fired.

If I did have to fire someone I would wait until a Friday, statistically there’s less of a chance for an incident. The one occasion I know I would not be able to fire someone is if I knew they were going through a hard time. I couldn’t bring myself to give that person more bad news. Which brings me to my question? How long is it acceptable to wait after a person has battled cancer to fire them from their job?

Before I attempt to answer that question I would like to state my opinion. Cancer is bad. According to the National Cancer Institute almost 600,000 people die every year in the United States from Cancer. Basically the population of the state of Wyoming dies every year from cancer. It is a horrible disease that has affected almost everyone in our country. Cancer can destroy families and cripple people financially (In certain cases it can even drive innocent chemistry teachers to start selling meth to pay their medical bills and even turn them into drug kingpins).

In case you don’t remember, almost 5 years ago the Indianapolis Colts head Coach Chuck Pagano was diagnosed with Leukemia. He missed 11 games during the 2012 season, and during that time the Colts thrived under interim head coach Bruce Arians. Pagano beat Leukemia and returned to the Colts for a playoff run that season. Pagano went on to lead the Colts to 11-5 records the next two seasons before losing to the Patriots both times in the playoffs. Since they the Colts have struggled, finishing 8-8 over the past 2 seasons, even though they have something everyone in the NFL covets, an elite QB in Andrew Luck.

A huge part of the Colts struggles the past 2 seasons has been Andrew Luck’s health. Luck has missed 10 games in the past 2 seasons mostly with shoulder injuries. You might call QB injuries ‘unLucky’ (ok that was very lame but it was too easy to not say it) or you could say Luck’s career has been mismanaged by the Colts organization. Allowing Andrew Luck, the present and future of the franchise, a player any of the 32 teams would kill to have, play while injured is flat out neglect. He is 27 and should be in the prime of his career and instead he is entering his 6th season on the bench because the Colts have no allowed his injury to properly heal.

Andrew Luck playing with one shoulder instead of two is better than 95% of QBs in the NFL. Which is why the Colts have been able to go 8-8 in the first place the last two seasons. Their roster is much worse than a .500 team but a QB as great as Luck has kept them afloat. Getting blown out in the playoffs in back to back years and then going .500 for the next two seasons should have been enough to lose Chuck Pagano his job this offseason but he is still the HC in Indianapolis. Which begs the question,

How long should you wait to fire someone after they’ve beaten cancer? 

I’d say 4 years is long enough. Chuck Pagano is an inspirational man. Beating cancer is no small feat, but how many more seasons of Andrew Luck’s prime are the Colts going to waste on this 8-8 coach?

Who is the incompetent boss in charge of keeping Chuck Pagano? None other than this guy, Jim Irsay.

It all makes sense now. How does a franchise with the best young QB in the league go from a top playoff contender, to back to back 8-8 seasons and refuse to fire their coach? That team is owned by this guy. It really does make sense why the Colts are so dysfunctional when you look at their owner. I don’t need to explain much more than Jim Irsay’s rap sheet Wikipedia page. DUI, drug possession, randomly tweeting out a picture of a naked women in the middle of the night. They say leadership starts at the top and its not hard to imagine why Irsay has never got around to firing Chuck Pagano. Hard to tell a man who beat cancer he’s out of a job when Irsay can’t go 6 months with out taking a mug shot. If I were Jim Irsay (first of all I’d stop getting DUI’s and posting pictures of naked women on the internet) I would sit Andrew Luck out for the entire season. Seriously an option to consider, he is the future of your franchise and it is not worth trying to go 8-8 again just to see him farther injury himself. The Colts need to make up their minds and stop wasting Luck’s prime going 8-8. Fire your coach, (even though he is a hero for battling cancer), Play Jacoby Brissett, go 4-12, and draft nothing but offensive linemen next year to help Luck out.

NFL Week 1 Picks

All Lines used from the Las Vegas Westgate Supercontest

6.5 point tease: Patriots -2.5 Falcons -0.5

Cardinals -2

Rams -3.5

Patriots -2.5 Falcons -0.5

Originally the Pats are favored by -9 and the Falcons are favored by -7, with the 6.5 point teaser I’m taking both these teams to cover smaller spreads for a -150 payout. Let’s start with the Pats, they open the entire NFL season at home on Thursday night against the Chiefs. Roger Goodell will be in attendance and Gronk will be healthy for the first time since he was in high school*. Since Bill Belicheat became the head coach the Patriots are 98-0 in home openers probably. The Pats are going to take care of the Chiefs. As for my Falcons, yes I am worried they are all suffering from 28-3 PTSD, but there is one reason I am very confident they will win Sunday. The Falcons are playing the Bears and Mike Glennon is the starting QB, Stop, don’t over think it. The Falcons might have suffered the worst lost in the history of the NFL, Football, Sports, human history, the entire universe, but they aren’t gonna lose a game to Mike Glennon.

Cardinals -2

Remember when Chuck Pagano had cancer and an interim head coach led the Colts to an 11-5 record? Turns out that interim head coach was actually a pretty great coach. The Cards had a disappointing year last year after reaching the NFC championship the year before partial due to the fact they opened the season on the road at New England. After losing to the Pats week 1 it was all downhill from there. Bruce Arians is not about to let that happen twice. The new and improved Cardinal defense will get after Matt Staford and the Lions who happen to be missing their best defensive player for week 1.

Rams -3.5

Tough to bet against the great Andrew Luck in week 1. Oh wait, Luck isn’t playing? There hasn’t even been a game yet how is he hurt? His injury is from last season? How is that possible? BECAUSE HIS TERRIBLE COACH AND TERRIBLE OWNER NEVER LET THE FRANCHISE PLAYER HEAL HIS INJURY 100% AND THEY SHOULD BE SENT TO FOOTBALL JAIL FOR PUTTING HIM IN GAMES BEFORE HE IS HEALTHY. The Colts are starting Scott Tolzien week 1 on the road in LA, and I don’t even care if the Rams are trash and Jared Goff doesn’t know which direction the sun sets. Scott Tolzien is not winning a game on the road, even without Aaron Donald the Rams are winning this game.

 

Thank you to everyone for reading and apologizes to Colts fans for having such a terrible owner. Be sure to check out Bart’s Best Bets for college picks and come back next week for more NFL. Happy week 1 everyone and remember don’t let your life get in the way of your football.