Monday News and Links: Syracuse Week

Another Monday. Sigh. At least Clemson is still undefeated. Unfortunately, this week’s game is at Syracuse and on a Friday night. Sigh again. I live on the west coast, so undoubtedly the game will start while I’m still at work, and I have something to do after work so I’ll pretty much miss the entire game. It’s such a habit for me to scroll through Twitter, but I’ll have to avoid doing that until I can get home and watch the game.

• All eyes will be on Kelly Bryant this week in practice. Coach Swinney has said that that Bryant will practice, but that he is day-to-day with the ankle injury suffered during the Wake Forest game. If Bryant can go on Friday, let’s hope we get a lead early so we can take him out. If he’s going to be limited and there’s a risk of making it worse, I’d kinda rather start Cooper or Johnson and see how they do.
• Speaking of Coach Swinney, he also had a message in the link cited above for people fretting about substitutions:

“My thought process is I ain’t trying to please the fans, I’m trying to win. I’m trying to have a great program,” Swinney said. “If they get bored with winning, then that’s their problem. I’m playing the guys that deserve to play. I ain’t worried about all that other stuff. I’m just trying to win games.”

Okay, then. Getting backups reps in competitive situations is all well and good, but can be a bit dangerous if it lets the other team back in the game when there’s still plenty of time left. We’re undefeated right now, so I’ll try and hold the criticism.

• The AJC discusses the shift towards a more run-heavy offense from the pass-happy Deshaun days. Hey, when you’ve got an elite defense that has some question marks further down the depth chart, keeping the opposing team off the field isn’t a bad thing.
• Pawwwl, you mad bro?

Says Pawl, conveniently leaving out Auburn:

“Alabama beat Florida State. It was the biggest first game ever in college football. We act like it did not happen. It did happen. Deondre Francois was hurt late in the game. Not before the game.

Clemson has a win over Louisville, are you kidding me? They have a win over who? I mean, wow, Virginia Tech? Alabama beat Florida State when it mattered.”

Don’t worry Paul, I’m very impressed with your victory over 1-3 FSU. It’s a great argument, by the way, that you should judge the victory more by the rank at the time and not the rank currently.

• In the weekly Deshaun in the NFL watch, former QB Deshaun Watson threw 5 TD’s (ties the rookie record) in a loss to the Chiefs. Unfortunately the Texans defense could not stop the Chiefs at all after two of their top D-Linemen (including some guy named JJ Watt) were hurt early in the game. Watson got the Texans within 6 on the absurd play shown below.

After quickly yanking his arm free, he transfers the ball and chucks it down field accurately for a 48-yard touchdown pass. INSANE. I hope Deshaun gets some so-called pro scouts fired for incompetence.

Wow Will Fuller? More like Wow Deshuan Watson.