Boo!

 Today is All Hallow's Eve, popularly known as Halloween, which means tonight tiny "Frozen" princesses and Spider-Men will be coming to extort candy from law-abiding citizens like yourselves.

Naw, I'm kidding. I love Halloween. Love the kids. Love handing out the candy so long as the little goobers don't take it all.

(In my day, it was apples, popcorn balls and Milky Ways the size of Lincoln Logs. Of course, Mom always made us eighty-six the apples and popcorn balls on account of that silly urban legend about psychos hiding razor blades in them. Ticked me right off.)

Anyway ...

Anyway, this being a night for fright, it occurred to me that in Sportsball World there are plenty of things scarier than ghosts, goblins and Donald Trump masks. And seeing how I have way too much time on my hands, I started thinking of what those might be.

Here's what I came up with:

* Aaron Rodgers showing up at former Jets head coach Robert Saleh's door dressed as Aaron Rodgers. Trick or treat, mother(bleeper)!

* A kid in a Washington Commanders jersey showing up at the Chicago Bears complex with video of Jayden Daniels' Hail Mary on continuous playback.

* A kid in a Freddie Freeman jersey showing up at the New York Yankees complex with video of last night's fifth inning on continuous playback.

* Six tiny Caitlin Clarks showing up at Angel Reese's door.

* Six tiny Angel Reeses showing up at Caitlin Clark's door.

* A miniature trans athlete showing up at the door of any number of fear-mongering politicians.

* A kid dressed as the transfer portal showing up at the door of any number of college football and basketball coaches.

And last but not least ...

* A couple of tykes dressed as the Kelce brothers, and another dressed as Patrick Mahomes, demanding you buy more Reese's Puffs and Subway and State Farm and T-Mobile and ...

Karma's a ... well, you know

 Don't know what happened to the two Yankees jamokes who assaulted Los Angeles Dodgers outfielder Mookie Betts as he made a catch at the wall in Game 4  of the World Series (and, yes, "assaulted" is the proper word), but they got theirs last night.

First, they were ejected and banned from attending Game 5.

Second, wherever they were last night, they got to see their baseball team take a 5-0 lead into the fifth inning (Oh, yeah! We're BACK, baby! The Dodgers are hearin' footsteps!). Then they got to watch their team clumsily blow every bit of that 5-0 lead in the fifth (Wait ... what?). 

Then they got to watch the Dodgers win 7-6 and celebrate their eighth World Series title in Yankee Stadium, right out there with the monuments and the ghosts and Babe Effing Ruth (Oh, god. Oh, god. Look out, I'm gonna hurl!)

All the Blob has to say about that is, karma lives.

'Cause somewhere in the night, Mookie Betts was slammin' champagne, and the two jamokes were ... not. Because their Yankees went down easy, in five games, beaten by a 35-year-old with a bum ankle (Series MVP Freddie Freeman), who batted .300 with four homers and 12 RBI in those five games.

Stick that in your pinstripes and smoke it, boys.

Changing horses

 Well, this is interesting.

Three days past the eighth game of the season, 18 months after the Indianapolis Colts handed him their future (because what else does taking a quarterback with the fourth pick in the draft imply?), the Colts are moving on from Anthony Richardson.

I'm sorry, what?

Yeah, OK. "Moving on" is a bit much. For now, anyway.

For now, Richardson's just going to the sidelines, and the Colts will hand the keys to 85-year-old Joe Flacco, or at least 39-year-old Joe Flacco. This indicates a couple of things, both of which are admittedly bald-faced conjecture.

One, management has decided, at least for the present, to play for the present.

Two, Chris Ballard 'n' them are admitting Richardson -- who was just 21 years old and had a small college sample size when the Colts drafted him in '23 -- wasn't ready to for the deep end right off the jump.

Neither of those might not be true, of course. But if the latter is at least in the ballpark, imagine how hard it was for Ballard in particular to admit he screwed up in pushing the kid too fast. 

Not that he ever would admit it, Ballard being Ballard.

In any case, Richardson will sit, the geezer will play, and it's fair to wonder how much of what happened Sunday played into that. Was it just that Richardson was mostly atrocious again? Or was it because, late in a tight battle for first in the AFC South, he tapped out of the game on a crucial third down with the Colts driving?

Said he was gassed, and needed a breather. Wasn't the first time it's ever happened, but it's not what a franchise QB is supposed to do -- especially when it so clearly violates bedrock NFL protocol.

Maybe that was the tipping point. Maybe it wasn't. Again, bald-faced conjecture.

At the very least, though, benching Richardson after just 10 starts -- half of which he didn't finish -- suggests the Colts are starting to get a trifle queasy about their roll of the dice 18 months ago. They're still a long way from Omigod we blew the quarterback pick, but changing horses in mid-stream is never a confident look.

They can defend it by saying Flacco gives the 4-4 Colts their best shot at making the playoffs, and making the playoffs (even as a team that doesn't appear to have a deep run in it) is a big deal in the modern NFL. If nothing else, it gives you something to build on.

As for Richardson ...

Well, who knows? Maybe Richardson can sit and learn behind Flacco -- same as Aaron Rodgers sat and learned behind Brett Favre, and Jordan Love sat and learned behind Rodgers, and Patrick Mahomes sat and learned behind Alex Smith.

Could work. Might not. 

Out on West 56th Street in Indy, the fingers are crossed.

A few brief thoughts on NFL Week 8

 And now this week's edition of The NFL In So Many Words, the ain't-over-'til-it's-over Blob feature of which critics have said "So when WILL it be over?", and also "Oh, it's over, bucko. It is SO over":

1. "It's over!" (Bears fans before the Commanders last snap)

2. "It's over, schmuck-os!" (Bears defensive back Tyrique Stevenson, taunting Commanders fans while Jayden Daniels was trying not to get tackled before he could launch a desperate Hail Mary with zeroes on the clock)

3. "Aww, bleep!" (Stevenson, seconds later, after Daniels got the pass off, and Stevenson tipped it, and Commanders wideout Noah Brown, standing behind him in the end zone, caught it for a miraculous 65-yard score and an18-15 win)

4. "Holy bleep!" (America)

5. "BLEEP-BLEEP BLEEPER-BLEEP!!" (Bears fans)

6. (Also Jets fans after their Super Bowl-bound football team lost again, this time to the sorry-ass New England Patriots.)

7. (Also Ravens fans after Jameis Winston and the even-more-sorry Browns shocked Lamar Jackson 'n' them in Cleveland)

8. (Also fans of the Bengals, the Saints, the Cowboys, the Vikings)

9. "Hey, remember when we thought we were good?" (The Bengals, the Saints, the Cowboys, the Vikings after another loss)

10. "BLEEP-BLEEP BLEEPER-BLEEP!!" (Bears fans, still, two days later)

Whither AR

 I live two hours and change north and east of West 56th Street in Indianapolis, so I couldn't hear the quiver in Chris Ballard's innards even if there was one. I assume there isn't, at least yet. I also assume we'd never know otherwise, given the bulletproof confidence the Colts GM forever exudes.

But the Horsies lost another football game yesterday, putting up a hell of a fight on the road before the Houston Texans got 'em 23-20. And while you couldn't totally hang the loss on quarterback Anthony Richardson -- he did, after all, throw a 69-yard touchdown pass to Josh Downs -- he once again didn't resemble at all the quarterback Ballard and the Colts  keep telling us he is.

Or will be. Or something.

His numbers yesterday: 10-of-32 passing, 175 yards, one spectacular touchdown, one horrendous interception at the end of the first half. A  31.2 percent completion percentage; a 48.3 quarterback rating.

And maybe, if not yet in Chris Ballard's gut, a building quiver in the guts of True Blue fans everywhere: OMG we blew the quarterback pick. 

The Blob's position is that's still an overreaction, but one that becomes less over-reactive almost by the week. Richardson's anemic showing (save the bomb to Downs) followed a 10-of-24, 129-yard outing last week in a win over the punchless Dolphins. If you're keeping score at home, that makes him 20-of-56 for 304 yards in his last two starts, a 35.7 percent completion rate.

For the season, he's now 59-of-133 (44.4 percent) with four touchdowns and seven picks. Close observers keep saying they're seeing progress; the rest of us see regression from even last season's small sample size.

Which of course is not what you want to see when you take him with the No. 4 pick in the draft.

You take a quarterback with the No. 4 pick, as the Colts did in 2023, you're saying he's The Guy. You're putting the future of your franchise in his hands. You're expecting him, in most cases, to make an immediate impact, because that seems to be the business model these days.

See: C.J. Stroud. See: Caleb Williams. See: Jayden Daniels, Josh Allen, Kyler Murray, a bunch of others.

AR, on the other hand, came in as an admitted project of sorts, a work in progress of whom progress was supposed to come quickly and spectacularly. Instead, he got hurt.

Then he got hurt again. Then he missed most of his rookie season.

In his second year, he's already missed time because of injury, during which old head Joe Flacco came in and won a couple of games, throwing seven touchdown passes against one pick and completing 65.7 percent of his throws. The contrast with Richardson was glaring, and did little to quell the unease among the Colts faithful. Some are even saying now the Colts should bench Richardson and play Flacco the rest of the way.

That, too, is an overreaction, by the Blob's lights. For now, anyway.

This is because I watched bits and pieces of Colts-Texans yesterday, and not everything was AR's fault. He was victimized more than once by drops on balls that were straight money. His offensive line leaked like an abandoned shack, allowing sundry Texans to chase him around the backfield and sack him five times. 

And yet ...

And yet.

A season-and-a-half in, and Anthony Richardson is still the same phenomenal physical specimen we saw on draft day 18 months ago.

But we still don't know if he is, or ever will be, an NFL quarterback.

How good?

 OK, OK, O-kay. So I wasn't completely right.

Said yesterday I had a nagging suspicion Notre Dame-Navy was not going to be the slugfest some people might have expected, and that it would more likely be another Notre Dame-Navy extravaganza. Meaning the Irish would stroll into East Rutherford, N.J. and walk away with a win in, oh, let's say the 35-14 range.

I was wrong.

Notre Dame beat the previously unbeaten Middies 51-14.

Riley Leonard -- who can't throw, remember -- threw for 178 yards and two touchdowns. . He also took off running 10 times for 83 yards and another score. Jeremiyah Love had another 100-yard day (102 and two scores in just 12 carries), the Irish rushed for 265 yards and averaged 6.6 yards per carry, and the defense forced six turnovers, including five fumbles. 

Meanwhile, downstate ...

Yes, Indiana won again, in front of former coach Lee Corso and the rest of  the ESPN Gameday crew, and another full house. Beat Washington by two touchdowns, ho-hum. Starting quarterback Kurtis Rourke was out with a hand injury, so backup Tayven Jackson stepped in, completed 11-of-19 passes for 124 yards and a touchdown and ran for another score.

The Hoosiers are 8-0 now. Notre Dame is 7-1.

"But how good are they really, Mr. Blob?" you're saying now.

The Blob's answer: I don't know.

Pretty darn good, obviously. Better than any lingering doubters might think, almost certainly.

The doubters are gonna say what they always say, which is that Notre Dame is beating up on the usual imposters and Little Sisters of the Poor, and Indiana also has benefited from a soft-serve schedule. This is partly true.

But it's not true enough to dismiss them as imposters themselves.

No, Notre Dame isn't going hand-to-hand with Texas and Georgia every week, but the Irish haven't gotten fat on Directional Hyphen Tech State, either. They went down to College Station the first week and outslugged Texas A&M 23-13, and the Aggies hasn't lost since. Last night they got No. 9 LSU in Kyle Field and whipped 'em 38-23.

The Irish, meanwhile, beat a decent Louisville team at home by a touchdown, and crushed a decent Georgia Tech team 31-13 on the road. 

And Indiana?

Yeah, the Hoosiers filled up early on some cream-filled pastry. But last week they dropped 56 on a Nebraska team that was giving up just 11 points per game, and yesterday they took care of Washington, and they still haven't trailed in a game so far this season. 

Next week they're at 4-4 Michigan State. Then they get Michigan, 5-3, at home. Then they go to Columbus to face Ohio State, which is where the doubters figure they'll finally get exposed as the usual Indiana wannabes.

Except.

Except one week after Indiana upholstered Nebraska 56-7, the Cornhuskers traveled to Columbus themselves. And the No. 4 Buckeyes beat them, too.

The final score?

21-17.

 And Ohio State needed a touchdown with six minutes to play and then a game-sealing interception to pull it out.

Sooo ...

So, again, I don't know. But I do know this: There are a whole pile of decent Power 4 teams who aren't 8-0 or 7-1 right now. And most of them aren't playing Texas or Georgia every week, either. 

Nor will they make the new 12-team playoff. Says here Notre Dame and Indiana will.

Today in Sure To Be Wrong

 And now, the University of Navy, as Lou Holtz used to call it.

Notre Dame has been playing the Midshipmen since Calvin Coolidge was president and Capone was buying cops and whacking Bugsys, which is to say 1927. Only Covid in 2020 interrupted a string of Irish victories that is not unbroken but close enough.

Today that script might flip like Simone Biles. Or so we've heard.

This Navy team, it seems, is not your father's Navy team (or maybe it is if your father was around for the Roger Staubach years.) It's undefeated, for one thing. It's ranked 24th in the nation. And it's No. 4 in the nation in scoring, averaging 44.8 points per game while trouncing six opponents by just shy of 25 points per game.

Also: Under second-year head coach Brian Newberry, the Navy quarterback occasionally throws the football. And Navy receivers occasionally catch it.

Conventional wisdom says that's why the University of Navy will be more than just brave in the attempt not to lose 42-7 like usual. It says Marcus Freeman and Notre Dame better show up in East Rutherford, N.J., with their chinstraps buckled, because the Brigade of Midshipmen will be especially baying for a chunk of Domer hide, and this Navy team is capable of delivering it.

However.

However, the Blob, whose wisdom has never been conventional nor even particularly wise, thinks this might be one of Those Games.

As in, "One of those games everyone thinks will be a real dogfight, but instead winds up as dogs merely playing before one of them wins, um, 42-7 like usual." 

Understand, I don't think it will be that lopsided. But I have a nagging suspicion the Brigade is going to go home more than a bit deflated at the end of the day. This is because Notre Dame knows Navy will be especially jacked, and so the Irish will be especially jacked, and a jacked Notre Dame is going to beat a jacked Navy all day long because Notre Dame simply has better athletes.

So, let's call it 35-14, 35-21, something like that. Coming to you direct from the Sure To Be Wrong Division.

Ridicule away, Middies.