Henry, Derrick

AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyWhat We Learned From Week 14 of the N.F.L. SeasonThe Chiefs did not need perfection to win, the Bears’ losing streak finally ended and the N.F.C. East remained wide open.Kansas City’s Patrick Mahomes was able to recover this fumble, but his day included three interceptions and a 30-yard sack. He also threw for 393 yards and won.Credit…Wilfredo Lee/Associated PressDec. 13, 2020Updated 9:10 p.m. ETMost of the favored teams won on Sunday, but there was still a little drama, including a mistake-filled performance by the leading candidate for the Most Valuable Player Award, an unbelievably bad day for a veteran kicker and an upset led by a rookie quarterback making his first start.Here’s what we learned:[embedded content]The Chiefs are not fair. Coming into the day, Patrick Mahomes appeared locked in for the second M.V.P. Award of his career and had been intercepted just twice in 463 passing attempts. The Miami Dolphins’ opportunistic defense had him flustered for much of the day, picking him off three times in 34 attempts. On top of that, Miami made Mahomes look foolish on a rambling play in which he repeatedly retreated before being sacked for a 30-yard loss. The Dolphins picked up a fourth takeaway on a fumble by Mecole Hardman. And Tua Tagovailoa had the first 300-yard passing game of his career.Despite all that, Miami lost, 33-27. And it didn’t feel that close.The win improved Kansas City to 12-1, and the Chiefs, who clinched the A.F.C. West, have a good chance to secure the A.F.C.’s only first-round bye in the playoffs. Miami dropped to 8-5, but is still a strong contender for a wild-card spot.Philadelphia’s Jalen Hurts threw for 167 yards and a touchdown in a win over New Orleans while rushing for 106 yards.Credit…Bill Streicher/USA Today Sports, via ReutersThe Eagles have a new quarterback. No player had topped 100 yards rushing in a game against New Orleans since Nov. 19, 2017 — a span of 56 games — but thanks to a new-look Eagles offense led by quarterback Jalen Hurts, two players surpassed that mark on Sunday. Hurts showed enough skill as a passer to keep the Saints’ defense honest — his 15-yard touchdown pass to Alshon Jeffery in the first quarter was a thing of beauty — and that allowed Miles Sanders to rush for 115 yards and two touchdowns. Hurts carried 18 times for 106 yards, joining Baltimore’s Lamar Jackson as the only quarterbacks to rush for 100 or more yards in their first N.F.L. start.In five seasons under Coach Doug Pederson, the Eagles are 10-3 in games not started by Carson Wentz (including the playoffs) and 35-33-1 with Wentz starting.The N.F.C. East is far from decided. The Giants’ four-game winning streak came to a screeching halt with a 26-7 loss to the Arizona Cardinals. That result, combined with wins by Washington, Philadelphia and Dallas, kept things interesting in the N.F.C. East, which is making up for its lack of quality by having all four teams in the division race with three games remaining. The Footballers should be in the driver’s seat after improving to 6-7, but that will depend on the health of quarterback Alex Smith, who reinjured the leg that kept him out for nearly two years. The severity of Smith’s injury was not immediately announced.Minnesota’s Dan Bailey was having a terrific season before a brutal two-game stretch in which he has missed four field-goal attempts and three extra points.Credit…Kim Klement/USA Today Sports, via ReutersThe Vikings might need a new kicker. While his missed kicks would not have provided enough points to give Minnesota a win on the road, it was hard not to point a finger at Dan Bailey in his team’s 26-14 loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Bailey missed an extra-point attempt in the first quarter and proceeded to miss field-goal attempts of 36, 54 and 46 yards, with each sailing wide right. According to ESPN Stats & Information, Bailey is the first player to miss three field-goal attempts and an extra point, without a make of any kind, since Washington’s John Aveni in 1961. Bailey also missed two extra points and a 51-yard field-goal attempt last week, making him 1 of 4 on extra points and 2 of 6 on field goals in a two-week period after having started the season 26 of 27 on extra points and 10 of 12 on field goals.With Arizona and Chicago winning, Minnesota (6-7) complicated its wild-card hopes. Tampa Bay, on the other hand, improved to 8-5, and is on its way to its first playoff appearance since 2007.Eighty of David Montgomery’s 113 yards rushing came on one run, but that worked out just fine for Chicago in a win over the Houston Texans.Credit…Stacy Revere/Getty ImagesThe Bears can still make the playoffs — yes, the Chicago Bears. After a 5-1 start, Chicago turned into a laughingstock with six consecutive losses. But the Bears dominated Houston in every way on Sunday and came away with a 36-7 win in which several unlikely things happened. Among them: Mitchell Trubisky outplayed Houston’s Deshaun Watson; running back David Montgomery had his most productive game in nearly a year, rumbling for 113 yards (with 80 of them on a single, electrifying run); and the Bears’ defense sacked Watson seven times, once for a safety. Chicago had more rushing and passing yards, and fewer turnovers, than the Texans. And the win managed to keep the Bears very much alive in the race for the N.F.C.’s third wild card.Derrick Henry has an N.F.L.-record four career games with 200 or more rushing yards and two or more touchdowns. Two of the games have come against Jacksonville.Credit…Stephen B. Morton/Associated PressDerrick Henry stands alone. After a 215-yard performance in Tennessee’s 31-10 win over Jacksonville on Sunday, Henry has four career games with 200 or more rushing yards and two or more touchdowns, breaking a tie he held with Jim Brown, Barry Sanders and LaDainian Tomlinson, each of whom is in the Hall of Fame. Henry is leading the N.F.L. with 1,532 yards rushing this season — just 8 short of the total he led the N.F.L. with last year — and he has run for 100 or more yards in his last nine road games, one short of Sanders’s N.F.L. record.Henry was so dominant that you’d hardly notice that Ryan Tannehill passed for 212 yards and two touchdowns, one of which was an incredible 37-yarder in which A.J. Brown corralled the ball with just his right hand.Green Bay may sneak into a first-round bye. Most of the talk in the N.F.C. this season has centered on New Orleans and Seattle, but a Packers win over Detroit on Sunday, combined with a Saints loss — and some help from a head-to-head tiebreaker, thanks to Green Bay’s Week 3 win over New Orleans — vaulted the Packers to the No. 1 seed in the conference with three games remaining. Green Bay controls its own destiny as far as a first-round bye is concerned, and the Packers will close their season with winnable games against Carolina, Tennessee (in Green Bay) and Chicago.One* Sentence About Sunday’s Games*Except when it takes more.Colts 44, Raiders 27 There were so many things you could focus on in this convincing Indianapolis victory: Philip Rivers’s two touchdown passes; Jonathan Taylor’s career-high 150 yards rushing (and two touchdowns); or Khari Willis’s 50-yard pick-6. But when you factor in the degree of difficulty, the highlight to remember is Kenny Moore’s one-handed interception in the end zone in the second quarter.Chiefs 33, Dolphins 27 It looked like it could be a long day for Kansas City when the Chiefs fell behind by 10-0 in the second quarter, but thanks to touchdown drives of 75 and 74 yards, the Chiefs led at halftime, and never trailed again.Titans 31, Jaguars 10 Jacksonville has lost 12 consecutive games — one short of the franchise record — and a switch at quarterback to Gardner Minshew in the second half led to a quick touchdown, but that wasn’t nearly enough to make this game competitive.Tampa Bay’s defense produced six sacks and 12 quarterback hits, giving Minnesota’s Kirk Cousins almost no time to work.Credit…Alex Menendez/Associated PressBuccaneers 26, Vikings 14 Tampa Bay had the ball for less than 21 of the game’s 48 minutes, and while Minnesota had the game’s leading passer, leading rusher and leading receiver, the Buccaneers walked away with a fairly easy victory thanks largely to mistakes forced by the team’s terrific pass rush.Packers 31, Lions 24 Aaron Rodgers had 290 yards passing, three touchdowns and only seven incompletions — a typical day for him at this point — and Green Bay clinched the N.F.C. North. Of larger concern for Detroit than the loss was an injury sustained by quarterback Matthew Stafford in which he took a hard hit by Green Bay’s Kenny Clark at the end of a run and appeared to hurt his ribs.Eagles 24, Saints 21 Taysom Hill passed for a career-high 291 yards, but he also threw an interception and lost a fumble. The loss broke a streak of eight consecutive wins by backup quarterbacks for New Orleans.Jamal Adams has already set the N.F.L.’s single-season record for sacks by a defensive back in just nine games with the Seahawks. Credit…Joe Nicholson/USA Today Sports, via ReutersSeahawks 40, Jets 3 Last week felt like the bottom for the Jets, but the team’s former star safety, Jamal Adams, was credited with a sack of Sam Darnold in the second quarter, giving him the N.F.L.’s single-season record for sacks by a defensive back with 8.5. Adams only needed nine games to break Adrian Wilson’s record of eight, which was set over the course of 16 games in 2005. Rubbing some salt in the Jets’ wounds, the team’s former quarterback, Geno Smith, came on in relief of Russell Wilson for mop-up duty at the end of the blowout. The Jets are 0-13.Footballers 23, 49ers 15 A lot of things went wrong for Washington in this game, but the rookie defensive end Chase Young put on a show with six tackles, a sack, two passes defended, two quarterback hits and a 47-yard fumble recovery for a touchdown.Cardinals 26, Giants 7 Arizona’s Haason Reddick became the 16th player to record five or more sacks in a game (since the statistic became official in 1982), leading an all-out assault in which the Cardinals produced eight sacks and 11 quarterback hits. Reddick, who came into the day with only 12.5 sacks in 60 career games, also forced three fumbles.Justin Herbert will be credited with a game-winning drive and Michael Badgley with a game-winning field goal, but it was this interception by Michael Davis that won the game for Los Angeles.Credit…Ashley Landis/Associated PressChargers 20, Falcons 17 It looked like the Chargers were throwing away yet another potential win when Justin Herbert was intercepted with less than a minute remaining. But Michael Davis stole momentum right back for Los Angeles by intercepting a Matt Ryan pass, and Herbert was able to get his team close enough for Michael Badgley to win the game with a 43-yard field goal as time expired.Bears 36, Texans 7 Chicago quarterback Mitchell Trubisky has taken his lumps over the last few years — largely as a result of his being drafted ahead of Kansas City’s Patrick Mahomes and Houston’s Deshaun Watson — but he had a terrific game against Watson’s Texans, completing 24 of 33 passes for 267 yards and three touchdowns.Aldon Smith of the Cowboys returned a fumble 78 yards for a touchdown.Credit…Emilee Chinn/Associated PressCowboys 30, Bengals 7 In his return to Cincinnati, Andy Dalton was hardly perfect, but he did enough to beat the lowly Bengals, tossing two touchdown passes without committing a turnover. Aldon Smith, a defensive end who missed four seasons because of off-field issues, contributed to the scoring with his first career touchdown.Broncos 32, Panthers 27 A lot went right for Denver in this one, with Drew Lock throwing a career-high four touchdown passes, Diontae Spencer returning a punt 83 yards for a score and the Broncos’ defense holding strong against Carolina’s comeback attempt.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More