Everybody Beats The Whis!
By 
3-20! Not entirely his fault, of course, but the mismatch between his franchise QB and his own fetish for immobile, big-armed, inaccurate pocket passers was going to get him fired sooner rather than later. (I am also obliged to note that on the Winston/Mariota comparison, the scouts have now pulled ahead of the analyitics. It’s still early, and we will need to see Mariota healthy and with an offense tailored to his abilities.)
In other bad organization news, release the Gabbert! (Alas for 49ers fans, this doesn’t mean “cut.”) I suppose at this point benching and possibly selling low on Kaepernick isn’t a classic “blame your bad performance on your best players” scenario. He’s been a below-average QB for a season and a half and the trend is down. But it is certainly a “don’t make a move with player A without considering what option B is” scenario. Will Kaepernick ever be good again? I have no idea, but just two years ago he was performing on a level roughly comparable to Russell Wilson and Tony Romo. Blaine Gabbert, on the other hand, has very clearly established that he’s not an NFL-caliber QB. It’s not really clear what the 49ers are doing, but then that’s been the case for a while.
Speaking of bad QBs, watching Matt Cassel generously hand the Seahawks a game they were doing everything they could to try to lose, I can’t resist this classic HOT TAKE from a couple weeks ago. When E.J. Manuel had a typically awful first half in London, Bills fans and writers began to pine for the departed Cassel. The problem with this is rather obvious — namely, Cassel is older and even worse than Manuel:
Cassel’s 5-12 over last 3 years with 25 picks in 602 atts (4.1%). Manuel’s 6-9 with 16 picks in 491 atts (3.3%). https://t.co/aWwMYSC7wW
— Bill Barnwell (@billbarnwell) October 25, 2015
As it happened, later that night Cassel started. Like Manuel, he was missing his top wideout. Unlike Manuel, he was playing behind a world-class offensive line. He was also playing a defense that in its most recent game gave up roughly 1700 yards and 40 TDS to Drew Brees. He threw three picks and a nifty 17.9 QBR. (Manuel was at 19.2.) One might think that this would stop someone from going with a grass-is-greener narrative the next day. You would be wrong!
Cassel, given away for a late-round draft upgrade in 2017, started for the Dallas Cowboys on Sunday against the New York Giants. He threw three interceptions and had a pick-six of his own because his receiver fell down on a weak route-running effort.
The Internet scolds surfaced after each of Cassel’s turnovers.
“Comeuppance!” they said. “You were wrong!” they said. “Benghazi!” they said.
I never said Cassel was better than Manuel. I’ve always advocated keeping both backups.
We’ll never know if Cassel would have beaten the Jaguars on Sunday, but I doubt he spots the Jaguars 20 points (they missed an extra point after converting Manuel’s last turnover).
Jacksonville is a bad team. Sunday’s game appeared to be the easiest on Buffalo’s schedule all year. Maybe Cassel saves Buffalo from throwing away a victory, a conference victory that might have tiebreaker implications. Maybe he doesn’t.
But that unimportant 2017 draft upgrade certainly didn’t make any plays in Wembley Stadium.
Matt Cassel turning the ball over three times? That’s unpossible! A conspiracy theory, even! Sure, he threw three picks later that night, and four picks in his previous game as a starter, and last showed any signs of competence in 2010, but the sun got in his receiver’s eyes and the balls were overinflated so they don’t count! Put him in the powerhouse Bills offense and he’d look great!
Really, getting rid of Cassel is the rare Bills move that actually made sense.