Plus: Deebo Samuel's new deal, touchdown in Munich and Deshaun Watson's arrival in Cleveland. We explore some of the NFL's big storylines after a dramatic offseason; watch Buffalo Bills @ Los Angeles Rams, live on Sky Sports NFL, 1.20am, Friday
Thursday 8 September 2022 15:51, UK
The 2022 NFL season is finally here following what can only be described as one of the wildest offseasons in recent years.
There were retirement reversals, record-breaking new contracts, blockbuster wide receiver trades, Las Vegas Draft theatre and a new global venture.
We reflect on just some of the big offseason storylines ahead of the Week One action...
Aaron Rodgers intrigue has long been a gimme on NFL offseason bingo cards, and this year is no different.
The Packers quarterback finally shed some clarity on his own future by signing a new three-year contract worth $150.8m and $101.5m guaranteed in March, before seeing the Robin to his Batman depart as Davante Adams was traded to the Las Vegas Raiders. Adams' target share over the past two seasons has been 29.65 percent (2021) and 28.33 per cent (2020), while he has combined for 2,927 yards. It is not a drop-off, but rather a chasm in production. It leaves Matt LaFleur working to find success with a brigade of understudies.
Allen Lazard has emerged as Rodgers' favoured, if forced, No 1 target following the added loss of Marquez Valdes-Scantling, having made just 73 catches for 964 yards over the last two seasons. Randall Cobb will be relied on heavily, trusted tight end Robert Tonyan is coming back from a torn ACL, Sammy Watkins was acquired in free agency, there is excitement surrounding second-round rookie Christian Watson's yards-after-catch expertise, and fourth-round wideout Romeo Doubs has been the poster boy of training camp stories. An innovative scheme is muddied by personnel, and snags may beckon.
Rodgers, who publicly expressed his frustration over young receivers dropping catches in practice, joked running backs Aaron Jones and AJ Dillon could both end up making 50 catches each out of the backfield; spoiler, he was not joking.
The Browns welcomed unrivalled scrutiny long before a single snap was played this season. Cleveland traded for Deshaun Watson on March 18 and signed Jacoby Brissett as an insurance policy of sorts on March 25, all while freezing out a Baker Mayfield that has since won the starting job for the Carolina Panthers. It means Cleveland have had five full months in which to decide whether they are comfortable starting Brissett, whether they could have found a better solution than Brissett, whether they are competing/surviving/praying with Brissett, knowing the inevitability of Watson missing a significant chunk of the campaign through suspension.
Watson, who was handed a fully guaranteed $230m deal, will miss the first 11 games of the season after the NFL appealed an initial six-game ban following allegations of sexual misconduct in massage sessions during his time with the Houston Texans. He is eligible to return in time for Week 13, when the Browns will face the Texans.
Brissett's job has ranged from opportune shock-Andrew Luck-retirement solution to short-yardage specialist in recent years, without ever really dropping the curtain on a long-term starter. His newest role might well be considered that of a nightwatchman in keeping a playoff-calibre roster competitive and safe of catastrophe before Watson, an albeit rusty Watson, is ready to take the reins. Fortunately, he has a Nick Chubb-shaped bulldozer and a mauling Myles Garrett for company.
The Cardinals and Kyler Murray reached a resolution to an increasingly-awkward contract situation in July when the quarterback agreed a five-year extension worth $230.5m with $160m in guaranteed money, months having removed any and every reference to the team from his Instagram page. The awkwardness was just getting started. It was revealed in the aftermath the deal included an independent study clause, requiring Murray to study film for four hours per gameweek through the season. The Cardinals subsequently rescinded the clause, before head coach Kliff Kingsbury handed play-calling duties over to Murray during a practice session at training camp.
"I just wanted him to know that, hey, this s*** ain't easy," Kingsbury said. "Every now and then, he starts shaking his head when I'm calling it in there, I'm like, 'Alright big dog.'"
An expression of faith in Murray marked added pressure for Kingsbury to rectify late-season regression on offense that saw a 7-0 team lose six of their final 10 games before suffering a humiliating playoff defeat to the Rams. The Cardinals learned in May star receiver DeAndre Hopkins will be suspended for the opening six games for violating the league's performance-enhancing drugs policy, though they did reunite Murray with his favourite college target Marquise 'Hollywood' Brown in a trade that saw the Baltimore Ravens receive a first-round pick.
Speaking of the Ravens, Lamar Jackson's own wait on a new long-term, likely hefty, contract continues to linger.
Is there a more transformative non-quarterback-playing offensive asset in the NFL than Tyreek Hill? A certain wide-back in San Francisco may have an argument; beyond that, perhaps not. In March the Kansas City Chiefs traded away their scheme-torpedoing walking first-down to the Miami Dolphins for a 2022 first-round pick, a 2022 second-rounder, two fourth-rounders and a 2023 sixth-round selection. In doing so altering the outlook for both teams.
Hill feels he was cast aside, while the Chiefs feel their arm-contorting quarterback is special enough to find a way without his chunk-yard merchant. Andy Reid will have sought to keep their best-laid contingency plans under wraps in practice, but teaser trailers have seen rookie receiver Skyy Moore hover between flanker and the backfield, and free agency addition JuJu Smith-Schuster defy slot expectations as a jet-sweeping motion man, all while Marquez Valdez-Scantling, Mecole Hardman and Travis Kelce are floating across every role in every alignment. Defenses employed two-high safety looks to blunt Mahomes and Hill last season; they now face fresh unpredictability.
In Miami, Hill slots tantalisingly into a Mike McDaniel wide zone West Coast system that helped raise the curtain on the aforementioned wide-back marvel that is Deebo Samuel. He joins a fellow flyer in Jaylen Waddle as a two-pronged punch of catch-and-run fireworks that can buzz around the backfield or devastate out-of-spread formations. Between the added arrival of left tackle Terron Armstead and a bolstered running back room, Tua Tagovailoa could not have asked for much more.
The 49ers' preparations for a new era under second-year quarterback Trey Lance were dealt a scare this offseason when wide-back inventor Deebo Samuel requested a trade amid his push for a long-term contract in reward for his absurd 2021 campaign. Order was eventually restored in the form of a new three-year $73.5m extension including 58.1m guaranteed.
Samuel was third in the NFL for total yards from scrimmage (1,770) in the regular season, had 6.2 yards per rushing attempt from 59 carries, led the NFL in yards per reception (18.3), was second only to Cooper Kupp in yards after catch (780) and recorded the most rushing touchdowns by a receiving in a season since 1970 with eight. His production stemmed from a role that shared snaps between the backfield, the slot, tight end and on the outside as Shanahan and McDaniel's do-it-all cherry-on-top to one of the league's most accomplished blocking units.
At the time of his trade request, it had been reported Samuel was unhappy with the team's heavy use of him at running back, before the man himself appeared to quash such a theory a few weeks later. Though as an athletic, bootlegging Trey Lance more prone to a deep-ball than Jimmy Garoppolo enters the fold, there is new intrigue over the role Samuel might play. Yet there's every chance defenses remain helpless to his no-so-cloak-and-dagger prominence.
He is still the story. Only the final two pages of the story book appeared to have stuck together to signal a premature conclusion. On the evening of Saturday January 29 ESPN's Adam Schefter tweeted to report Tom Brady was retiring from the NFL after 22 seasons, prompting hours of congratulatory tributes from every corner of sport, including from Brady's own TB12 company, which then deleted its tweet as questions emerged over the truth of the story. Tampa Bay Buccaneers GM Jason Licht and then-head coach Bruce Arians suggested they had not yet received an answer from Brady over his future, before the quarterback's dad played downplayed the reports. As it were, Brady would eventually call time on a history-making, record-shattering career on February 1.
Just 40 days later, Brady reversed his decision and returned with the Bucs to begin his pursuit for an eighth Super Bowl ring while fulfilling his ambition of playing at the age of 45. His initial retirement had not been built on physical deficiencies late in his career, but rather the intention to spend more time with his family. In fact, Brady is coming off a season in which he set an NFL record for competitions (485) and led the league in passing yards (5,316) and passing touchdowns (43), as well as inspiring the Bucs to 24 unanswered points from 27-3 down in a very Brady-esque comeback against the Los Angeles Rams in their eventual Divisional Round loss.
Nobody quite knows what happens next. Todd Bowles leads a new chapter as Arians' successor, the offensive line tasked with protecting their Hall of Fame quarterback has been shredded by injuries and Brady himself was absent for two weeks in August for personal reasons. But the master pocket manipulator and coverage-decipherer is still here and still an X Factor.
The fate of the 2021 first-round quarterbacks might prove one of the defining storylines of the next five to 10 years in the NFL. That starts with Trevor Lawrence who left Clemson riding the momentum of a reputation likened to that of Andrew Luck only to find himself fielding questions surrounding the mistakes of his head coach. Urban Meyer is gone, Doug Pederson is in, college companion Travis Etienne is healthy again, the Jaguars invested in upgraded pass protection and life looks a lot more dandy for a future face-of-the-league candidate. Clean slate.
Hopping from one coast to another, Lance takes the reins of the 49ers offense on a full-time basis armed with a Shanahan, a Deebo, a George Kittle, a Trent Williams and bundles more with which to flex his undeniable talent while easing uncertainty the smallest sample size of any starting quarterback in the league. Zach Wilson was erratic as a rookie and preparations for year two have been hindered by a preseason injury, but the New York Jets drafted Ohio State standout Garrett Wilson to accompany wide receivers Corey Davis and Elijah Moore, added two-way rookie running back Breece Hall alongside Michael Carter in Mike LaFleur's wide zone scheme, reinforced the offensive line - which did lose Mekhi Becton to injury - with free agency pickup Laken Tomlinson, and upgraded at tight end with CJ Uzomah and Tyler Conklin. He has everything he could want.
'If only', says Justin Fields. Maybe. Probably. Year two with the Chicago Bears looks like an unsettled offensive line and enormous pressure on Darnell Mooney as the leader to a receiving core desperately short of proven production. In Foxboro the Patriots for whatever reason decided to move away from what, at times, worked well for a rookie Mac Jones and install an outside zone offense headed up by Matt Patricia and Joe Judge. Hmmm.
The Denver Broncos became Super Bowl contenders this offseason. Trading in Drew Lock for Russell Wilson will do that to a team. That it took sending Lock, defensive lineman Shelby Harris, tight end Noah Fant, two first-round picks, two second-rounders and a fifth-rounder still feels a lot like a bargain when considering the potential reward.
How Wilson marries himself to first-year head coach Nathaniel Hackett and his Aaron Rodgers-rubber stamped system, how much of which Hackett himself influenced remains uncertain, will be defining, though already it looks a remedy to 'Let Russ cook' calls of recent time. Denver finally has itself a create-for-himself quarterback that can freelance and dazzle on third-and-long or strap an offense to his back and say 'let's ride' in the fourth quarter.
Wilson's upper-tier athleticism remains intact as far as the NFL is aware, that deep ball is as pretty as ever, and in Courtland Sutton, Jerry Jeudy, Javonte Williams and Melvin Gordon the Broncos are anything but starved of firepower.
The 33-year-old, who has won at least 10 games in eight of his 10 seasons in the league, signed a five-year, $245m extension with the Broncos earlier this month. He is their road back to the playoffs.
Those that watched Kirby Smart's Georgia Bulldogs open their National Championship defence with a 49-3 win over Oregon on Saturday might have been wondering how it could be that they lost an NFL Draft-record 15 players earlier this year. But it's true. That haul included a record five defenders in the first-round in No 1 overall pick Travon Walker, who landed with the Jacksonville Jaguars, followed by Philadelphia Eagles defensive tackle Jordan Davis (No 13), Packers linebacker Quay Walker (No 22) and defensive tackle Devonte Wyatt (No 28), and Minnesota Vikings safety Lewis Cine (No 32). Linebacker Nakobe Dean had been widely-projected as a first-round pick before being taken by the Eagles in round three, and Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver George Pickens, already bullying defensive backs at the snap, may well have been a first-rounder were it not for his ACL injury.
Wide receivers were a chief talking point once again, the Tennessee Titans notably trading AJ Brown to the Philadelphia Eagles in exchange for the 18th overall pick, which they then used to grab Treylon Burks. The Arkansas star was one of six wideouts taken in the first round after Drake London (Atlanta Falcons), Garrett Wilson (New York Jets), Chris Olave (New Orleans Saints), Jameson Williams (Detroit Lions) and Jahan Dotson (Washington Commanders). The 2022 quarterback class was somewhat less popular, Kenny Pickett landing with the Pittsburgh Steelers at 20th overall before Desmond Ridder (Falcons) was the next play-caller to be taken at 74th in round three, where Malik Willis and Matt Corral also went off the board.
The NFL advanced its quest for global domination this year when Commissioner Roger Goodell announced Munich and Frankfurt will host two regular season games each over the next four years. It followed the league's lengthy search for a suitable host partner in Germany in view of taking live games to the largest NFL fanbase in Europe.
Munich will raise the curtain on yet another new venture for the league oversea in November as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers face the Seattle Seahawks at the Allianz Arena. It features as one of five International Series Games set to be staged in 2022 alongside three in London and one in Mexico City.
Tampa Bay are one of four teams alongside the Carolina Panthers, New England Patriots and Kansas City Chiefs to have been awarded marketing rights in Germany as part of the International Home Marketing Area initiative, which is designed to allow franchises the freedom to expand their fanbases and presence outside of the United States. Kansas City hold a long-term relationship with Bundesliga team Bayern Munich courtesy of their partnership with the Hunt family-owned FC Dallas in the MLS.
