Jason Gay
Football doesn't exist to entertain or enlighten. Football exists to make us feel superior to paid professionals, even when we are flat on the couch covered in Cheetos dust.
The latest example: This weekend's follies in the NFC East, where a pair of victories were lost in baffling last-second fiascos that showed the humble limits of human function.
It's kind of charming, if you think about it. At the moment, groundbreaking AI bots -- when they aren't actively plotting civilization's demise -- are composing elaborate symphonies and solving knotty, generations-old math problems.
Meanwhile, human-powered NFL teams are still trying to recall basic facts, like how many seconds are in a minute.
(If you live in Philadelphia or Washington, I understand that you don't find this charming, and all you want to do is put your television in the driveway behind your car and back over it repeatedly.)
Let's begin our review in London, where the Eagles took a 17-16 lead on Jacksonville with eight seconds left.
The Eagles should have run a little more clock down, but wrapping this baby up should have been easy, right? Kick the ball out of the end zone for a touchback, and let Jacksonville try to run an epic last-second play from scrimmage.
Or: Dirt-ball a hard-to-field ugly kick to the Jaguars and make sure to tackle them deep in their own territory.
Philadelphia elected to try door C: neither!
Instead the Eagles generously booted a crisp line drive to Jacksonville returner Ameer Abdullah, who raced 53 yards up the field and got tackled with one second left -- like, literally the one thing you're not supposed to let happen, happened -- putting the Jags in position for a 57-yard field goal.
Which, of course, Jaguars kicker Cam Little attempted, and made, sending the Eagles back home across the Atlantic with a shocking 19-17 loss and a carry on of gloomy vibes.
"I didn't make the right decision, and I lost us that game," Eagles coach Nick Sirianni said when it was over.
Was the coach truly contrite, or covering for player goofs? Had Sirianni been unnerved by a similar scenario a couple of weeks ago, when NFC East rival Dallas kicked the ball out of the end zone with a slim lead against Baltimore, and watched as the Ravens ran a fast play from scrimmage to set up their own field goal winner?
We may never know!
The good news for the Iggles was they were about to be eclipsed in brainlessness by Washington, as the Commanders would blow a near-certain triumph when, deep in New York Giants territory, they let time expire on the clock instead of kicking an overtime field goal.
This one they'll teach forever in coach-and-quarterback school. Washington head coach Dan Quinn and QB Jayden Daniels know what to do in that scenario: Stop the clock in order to give the kicker the opportunity to win the game.
This is basic life stuff, like don't put metal in the microwave and don't ever ask anyone at work about their fantasy football team. And if you're still worried, there's a radio in the helmet for the sideline to communicate with the QB.
With no timeouts, Washington simply needed to spike the ball, or chuck it out of bounds. That would stop the clock and leave time for the winning kick.
Instead, the Commanders chose door C: Neither!
Daniels instead dropped back to pass, ran forward, and inexplicably let himself get tackled. As with the Eagles in London, literally the one thing you're not supposed to let happen, happened.
Had Washington not adequately communicated the scenario to its quarterback? Did Daniels think the Commanders had a timeout remaining?
We may never know! Time ran out. Leaping Giants celebrated a miracle 29-29 tie. A furious Quinn spiked his fancy headphones into the mud.
Afterward both coach and quarterback chivalrously protected each other by taking responsibility for the debacle.
"Ultimately it's on me," said Daniels.
"It falls on me," said Quinn.
Adorable -- matching mea culpas. It won't comfort Commanders fans, who continue to wonder if Washington's brilliant 2024 playoff season was an anomalous ripple in the space-time NFL continuum and this franchise remains just as cursed as it was when Dan Snyder owned them.
(The aftermath also underlined the need to have fans present in postgame press conferences. It's one thing for coaches to face a tired press in a climate-controlled room. Let's watch Backwards Hat Quinn stand there and explain the final seconds to a furious, soaked-to-the-bone Washington fan who paid to stand in the driving rain in the Maryland burbs for four hours to watch their team bumble to a maddening tie.)
For the rest of America, these gaffes become our treasured pastime: Schadenfreude theater. Sirianni and Quinn now have to listen to a week's worth of mocking from laypeople, podcasters, and worst of all, sports columnists at financial newspapers. Team owners have to endure questions about coaches as they wonder when it will be culturally acceptable to hand the job to an AI bot.
Why am I paying this person many millions and having dull weekday lunches when I could just fork the whole operation over to Claude?
It isn't hard to be amused. No organization on earth is more puffed-up about itself than the NFL -- excuse me, the National Football League, as all the television surrogates say -- and yet it's as capable of the same blunders as anyone else.
It may not be entertaining. But it does make us feel better.
Email: jason.gay@wsj.com