It’s Monday which means yet another addition of Hot Takes.  Now, I know you are all use to the fire coming from the one Howard Bender but his electric company has decided to shut off his power again in an effort to prevent forest fires caused by down power lines due to high winds. How crazy is that? A good hot take would be that in 2019 there should be a better plan in place by the electric company other than just blacking out millions of people in northern California. But I digress, this isn’t an article about Howard’s power problems but instead about some of the things we saw happen in Week 8 so let’s get to it.

Freddie Kitchens is One and Done

Listen, the Browns were a great story last season with Baker Mayfield taking the team on that nice run to end the year on a high note. They then made a huge splash in the offseason by acquiring Odell Beckham . However, it appears their down fall to this season was the other move they made this offseason and that was hiring Freddie Kitchens to be the team’s head coach. He who was the running backs coach before being promoted to the offensive coordinator under INTERIM head coach Gregg Williams. Williams wanted the coaching job for 2019 but Baker gave his support behind Kitchens and that has been a disaster. There is already a highlight real of bad coaching decisions he has made whether it be running the ball on fourth-and-nine to yesterday’s mind boggling decision to send the punt team out on fourth-and-11 only to take a delay of game penalty to make it fourth-and-16. He then decided to SEND HIS OFFENSE BACK ON THE FIELD….Uhhh What!! Why isn’t your offense on the field when it is fourth-and-11 if your plan is to go for it?? Well lucky for us we have that answer and it is unbelievable:

Yup, he didn’t want to waste a timeout on fourth-and-11 so he took the delay of game penalty so they could figure out the play to run…..outstanding work there.

Yes, the Patriots Defense Really is That Good!

Maybe it’s because I am a Patriots fan and there are a lot of people out there who are not, especially in the media who are constantly looking for reasons to say the Patriots are overrated despite being 7-0 going into this week and exiting it 8-0. I mean heck, they are only a five-point favorite in Week 9 against the Ravens. What has really gotten my goat these past few weeks has been the narrative that the Patriots defense is as good as it is because they haven’t faced a competent offense. Listen, I agree, the Patriots schedule has been trash to begin the year but they aren’t just putting up good numbers against these teams, they are putting up historic numbers against these teams. They are currently allowing 7.6 points per game this season. They have played more games than they are allowing points per game. They have 19 interceptions which lead the league, 26 sacks which lead the league and six fumble recoveries which ties them for fourth. Do I agree the schedule is going to get tougher? Sure, in a sense, but many pointed at the Browns as the first of those challenges and that game was over after Baker Mayfield pitched the ball into the arms of Lawrence Guy for the team’s third turnover of the game. Everybody in the NFL would live a much happier life if they just accepted the fact that no matter the competition this team’s defense is going to go down as one of the greats.

Matt Nagy Finally Figures it Out

Hey, Matt Nagy, congrats on figuring out what the entire NFL already understood and that was to give the ball to David Montgomery as often as you can. It was no secret that most of the time this season when Monty touched the ball he flashed a little something that had you wanting more unless you were the head coach of the Chicago Bears who wanted to throw with a sub-par QB or run the football with two guys who are essentially receivers in Tarik Cohen or Cordarrelle Patterson just as often as the team’s third round pick. After every week the media would ask Nagy why they aren’t using Montgomery more and every week he would acknowledge after the game that he probably should feature the teams first or second-best offensive weapon more often and yet it never happened. Finally, probably after getting badgered enough, he featured Montgomery in Week 8 and what do you think happened? That’s right. He ran for 135 yards on 27 carries while finding the end zone. He even flashed the receiving ability, catching four passes. We all loved the draft pick of Montgomery because of how Nagy used Kareem Hunt in Kansas City. Let’s hope this is a sign of things to come for the Bears offense.

Those Who Cover the Lions Owe Us Some Answers

Really people? Nobody knew it was going to be somebody called Tra Carson as the team’s lead back heading into Week 8 after the Kerryon Johnson injury? This feels like the Gus Edwards situation all over again only unlike Edwards, Carson didn’t break the slate at least but after being the primary handcuff for Kerryon this season it only made sense that Ty Johnson was the guy but we were oh so wrong. All the FAAB being spend on the wrong guy has likely crippled sometimes all because nobody that covers the Lions had any insight that Carson may have been the choice for the lead back. Now, Carson only rushed for 2.8 yards per carry but he saw 12 carries to Ty’s seven. This week even more FAAB is going to be spent on this Lions RB situation but if you are reading this now, I suggest you let that be someone else’s mistake.

Arizona Loves the Drake

If this is the first sports related thing you have read this morning, then you are now learning that the Cardinals and Dolphins have agreed in principle to a deal that would send Kenyan Drake to the Cardinals for a conditional draft pick. So this leads to the obvious question of how injured are David Johnson and Chase Edmonds ? Johnson didn’t play this past week and Edmonds was injured after just a few carries. Do we really trust Drake now that he is out of Miami? Drake does bring an interesting skill set with his ability to catch the football so maybe there will be fantasy value there. Either way, he is going to be an interesting waiver wire option in leagues where he is floating about.