The NFL Player of the Week award recognizes the top player in three categories for Week 15. Admittedly, it was a disjointed week, like your primary school friend that used to make their thumb do bizarre stuff and made it look like their bone poked a hole where the hand meets the finger. My apologies for painting that somewhat graphic picture in your head — as I said, this was a weird week for all of us.
NFL Player of the Week | Week 15
This week also reminded me of an old System of a Down lyric.
Everybody, everybody, everybody livin’ now
Everybody, everybody, everybody sucks
Don’t get me wrong — a few individuals had some decent statistical performances, but not much jumped out and grabbed me this week. Jonathan Taylor continues to be a mutant as a runner. His quarterback completed 5 passes against Bill Belichick and the Patriots (who were on a six-game winning streak), and the Colts still won.
Jared Goff had a renaissance performance against a team I spent 14 weeks calling the most consistent team in football, but he wasn’t forced to fight through much adversity throughout the game.
NFL Quarterback of the Week | Aaron Rodgers
Aaron Rodger is inevitable, like the Omicron variant spiking positive COVID-19 cases around the winter holidays. We should have expected Rodgers to come out on top of the MVP discussion in a season where quarterback efficiency has seen wild ebbs and flows. And for the second straight week, he is the NFL Player of the Week for quarterbacks.
Nobody in NFL history has been able to straddle the line between aggression and safety the way Rodgers has in his career. He’s thrown 2 interceptions in his last 12 games, and he’s thrown 30 touchdowns in that time.
There’s no denying that Baltimore’s secondary is depleted. Rodgers didn’t have this game against Marcus Peters and Marlon Humphrey. But he is also missing three of his most critical offensive linemen. He finished the game by completing 23 of 31 passes for 268 yards and 3 TDs. He also had a completion percentage over expectation (CPOE) of 13.8, meaning, he was expected to complete only 60.3% of his passes.
With Cleveland, Minnesota, and Detroit left on the schedule, it’s hard to imagine any kind of implosion leading to him losing out on his second consecutive MVP award.
NFL Offensive Player of the Week | Travis Kelce
Travis Kelce is so smooth with it. This man is nearly 260 pounds and outrunning cornerbacks. If you’ve ever seen an episode of Catching Kelce or watched him give an interview, you’d know he’s almost everything an elite tight end appears to be.
Kelce, George Kittle, and Rob Gronkowski. They’re all certified, meat-headed weirdos. We don’t know much about how Kelce would have tested if he’d participated in everything at the NFL Combine, but I’d be surprised if he didn’t test out as one of the better athletes at the position.
He’s legitimately elusive, especially for a tight end. And unlike Gronk, the game hasn’t taken much away from his body yet.
Against the Chargers, Kelce caught 10 passes for 190 yards and 2 TDs, including the game-winner. And, of course, his longest catch went for 69 yards — which I’m sure would cause him to duck his head, look at the nearest camera, and swiftly raise his bushy eyebrows twice as he donned the biggest of smirks.
NFL Defensive Player of the Week | Cameron Jordan
There is no more beautiful sight in football than watching a power rusher win quickly — and against great offensive linemen to boot! That’s exactly what Cameron Jordan did against Alex Cappa and Tristan Wirfs in Week 15.
On third down, the 270-plus-pound Jordan lines up in a two-point stance and gets to rush on the interior. His wide alignment creates space between him and Cappa, who is undoubtedly thinking Jordan will try to go through his chest and convert speed to power.
He gets just a hair impatient and lunges to contact Jordan, who controls Cappa’s left shoulder and hits him with a swim move that the Bucs guard cannot counter.
This rep shows just how powerful Jordan is. Wirfs is one of the best tackles in football, and he very well might be the most athletic. Jordan goes at Wirfs’ chest and forces him to drop a hard anchor. When he feels Wirfs lean, Jordan immediately uses his own momentum against him. He clubs with his left hand and rips through to finish the sack on Tom Brady.
Jordan also hit the century mark for career sacks in this game.