BAD BEATS: NFL WEEK 11

BY ADAM GREENE

Unlike past Sundays, there wasn’t a glaring Bad Beat from Week 11. Sure, we’ve got a game to go with Monday Night’s Los Angeles Rams at Tampa Bay Buccaneers, but normally the guilty contest rears its head long before the lights go on in the final prime time game of the week.

A Bad Beat usually comes out of nowhere. It’s a phenomenal catch on a Hail Mary pass as time expires or a backdoor cover that has no effect on the final outcome of the game, but steals hard-earned cash directly from your wallet.

What we got this week was neither of those. Instead, it was the slow burn of a Bad Beat brewing like beef stew in a crock pot. An agonizingly plodding Bad Beat that took forever to finish and, for a good while, all it really did was stink up your house.

I’m talking, of course, about Houston Texans 27, New England Patriots 20.

You had plenty of reasons to believe in the Patriots, who won two straight and knocked off the favored Baltimore Ravens the week before, 23-17. While many have already started engraving New England’s tombstone this season, you know that the devil is real and he is a liar.

The Pats aren’t out until they say they’re out. We’ve been down this road before.

So you had that going for you when you looked over at the Houston Texans’ sideline and saw Romeo Crennel, interim head coach with a career record of 30-58. The Texans, in spite of the talent on their roster, had won just two games this season, got their head coach and general manager fired (it was one guy, Bill O’Brien) and the two wins they did have both came against the Jacksonville Jaguars. One of those was by just two points.

New England was favored to win this game by -1. It was basically a pick-em. A coin flip. You were comfortable laying down your money on Cam Newton and Bad Bill and already knew exactly what you wanted to do with your winnings; convince your significant other to add another streaming service to your monthly bills to go with the 14 you already have because not only is HBO Max releasing the Snyder Cut of Justice League next year, but Wonder Woman 84 is premiering on Christmas Day.

Yes, as the movie theater industry audibly coughed blood into a hankerchief then hid it in its pocket, you and yours would be enjoying the lovely Gal Gadot do battle with the also lovely Kristin Wiig with the help of the lovely Chris Pine when the real villain is obviously the lovely Pedro Pascal, who already roped you guys into signing up for Disney+ so you can see him shoot Stormtroopers in the face while cuddling Baby Yoda on The Mandalorian.

And as the fourth quarter began, you were feeling dicey, but weren’t in bad shape. The Pats had just pulled within four, 24-20 with a Nick Folk field goal. Which was kind of perfect. If they get the stop, they have to go for the TD. New England gets that, wins by three, you cover and get to enjoy Patty Jenkins’ vision for the Daughter of Zeus in the comfort of your own home as your kids angrily pout around the house because all the X-Box Series Xs and PS5s were sold out.

But Houston didn’t just quit playing. They drove down for a field goal of their own to make it 27-20. Bad, but not a disaster. There was 4:11 still on the clock and now the Patriots would be playing for overtime. All you needed was a single point and in OT you could get three.

But then, 11 plays later, Newton’s fourth down pass fell short and so did your hopes of rewatching all the DCEU movies, even the bad Justice League, just to see all the wholesale changes Zack Snyder is going to make in a four hour movie that people on the internet will still find a way to complain about.

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