16 stats that tell the story of an eventful NFL Week 13

It took until Week 13, but firing season is finally here. Ben McAdoo became the first head coach fired this season when the Giants decided to clean house on Monday. Jerry Reese was also the first general manager to get the ax, not counting when the Chiefs surprisingly canned John Dorsey in the offseason.

That’s just the start of what will likely be a bleak December, or early January, for a few other NFL teams. A lot happened this week, outside of an early Black Monday in New Jersey, so let’s shift our focus to something a little fun with numbers.

If you had to guess which quarterback had a 70-plus yard run and throw on Sunday, Alex Smith might not be the first guy to come to mind.

But he did that on Sunday. First, he connected with Tyreek Hill on this 79-yard touchdown pass:

Then later in the game, he scampered up the field for this 70-yard run, a career-high and one for the highlight reel he will inevitably show to the grandkids:

Smith catches a lot of flak for not being a guy who throws the ball down the field, but he’s shown he can plenty of times this season. We just didn’t know he had a 70-yard run in him. Too bad it wasn’t enough to snap the Chiefs out of their downward spiral — they’ve now lost six of their last seven games.

Alvin Kamara had already just about sealed his case for the NFL’s Offensive Rookie of the Year. He put an exclamation mark on it this week against the league’s fifth-ranked run defense. His 66 receiving and 60 rushing yards against the Panthers secured a 600-600 season for the Saints running back. Kamara now has 614 receiving yards and 606 rushing yards on the year.

This was one of his runs Sunday afternoon, in which he punished Kurt Coleman en route to a touchdown:

With Sunday’s performance, Kamara joined Charley Taylor and Billy Sims as the only rookies in NFL history to rack up 600 yards on the ground and through the air.

Jameis Winston, Carson Wentz, and Geno Smith all have one thing in common: They turn the ball over way too damn much.

Winston is averaging at least one per game:

And they’re all usually of the head-scratching variety, like this one against the Packers that ended in a spectacular big guy touchdown:

Wentz is a front-runner in the MVP discussion but he’s still fumbled the ball 23 times over the past two seasons, more than any other player. He’s just ahead of Kirk Cousins, who has 21 over the last two years. Winston comes in third with 20.

In Geno Smith’s first (and likely only) start for the Giants this season, he lost two fumbles:

Smith isn’t entirely to blame here. The Giants offensive line is already a liability — now have it try to block Khalil Mack. The Raiders sacked Smith three times and landed three quarterback hits.

These three quarterbacks have one other thing in common: Their teams all lost on Sunday.

Case Keenum really isn’t giving that starting quarterback job back, is he? Ever since Teddy Bridgewater was cleared to return to the Vikings, Keenum has been getting better every week. This week, he had a near-perfect completion percentage against the Falcons:

Keenum’s previous high for the season was 81 percent in a win against the Bears in Chicago.

It’s more impressive that Keenum got that done against a Falcons defense that’s ranked No. 7 in the league against the pass. And he helped the Vikings lock up their eighth win in a row and the top seed in the NFC for now.

The Titans are splitting carries close to evenly between DeMarco Murray and Derrick Henry, but it’s the former Heisman Trophy winner who’s stealing the show. Murray has managed just 3.7 yards per carry, while Henry has 5.0.

The 2016 second-round pick is a 6’3, 247-pound tank who looks like a goal-line running back but is more of a home run threat than you’d expect. When he got in the open field against the Texans in Week 13, he set the fastest speed of the week for any ball carrier by getting all the way up to 21.64 miles per hour.

The Titans may be an underwhelming team for an 8-4 squad, but Henry is a dangerous player who’s always a threat to make a big play.

The Patriots opened the season by playing some uncharacteristically terrible defense. Historically bad, even. New England gave up 128 points in the first four weeks and couldn’t hold any of its first six opponents under 400 yards.

Those days are long gone. Now the Patriots defense is shutting down everybody.

For the first time in the Bill Belichick era, the Patriots have held eight consecutive opponents under 20 points. Not coincidentally, New England has an eight-game winning streak and is tied for the best record in the NFL.

The Miami Dolphins will get another crack at the Patriots defense in Week 14, but it looks like there’s a strong chance the streak will extend to nine.

Tom Brady has played 16 games against the Bills in Buffalo. He’s won 14 of those.

The Patriots’ win over the Bills on Sunday gave Brady a 27-3 all-time record against Buffalo. He took Brett Favre’s place at the top of the leaderboard for wins against a single team.

It was Brady’s 55th career win in the month of December. And because Brady just can’t stop setting records, that gives him the most wins by any starting quarterback in any single month in NFL history.

Josh Gordon had 85 yards in his NFL return against the Chargers. While that yardage isn’t going to blow anybody out of the water, it’s a little more impressive when you consider that Sunday was the first time Gordon had taken the field since 2014.

And only one other player this season has managed to put up that kind of yardage against the Chargers:

This is an obvious point, but it needs to be said: Gordon also did this with the Browns. They’ve been the worst team in the NFL this season by leaps and bounds, and DeShone Kizer, the NFL’s leader in interceptions, hasn’t exactly been threading the needle in his rookie season.

Though to be fair to Kizer, he hasn’t had a threat like Gordon until now.

Philadelphia was rolling through the NFL before Sunday. The Eagles entered Week 13 with four consecutive wins by at least 20 points. That’s something you’d expect out of a college football powerhouse but not an NFL team.

With one more blowout win, the Eagles could’ve joined the 1999 Rams as the only two teams with five consecutive wins by 20 points or more.

But the Seahawks had other plans:

Way back in Week 5, it was the Rams in the No. 1 spot in total offense. The Seahawks held them to 10 points too in a 16-10 win. Even without Richard Sherman and Kam Chancellor, it’s still not easy to score against Seattle.

A 4:25 p.m. game is like a 40-degree day, if you ask Jalen Ramsey.

Ramsey expressed his dismay for late-afternoon games after the Jaguars’ win against the Colts:

The Jaguars didn’t have any problems with the midday start — they came out with a 30-10 win over the Colts to improve to 8-4 and keep pace with the Titans in the AFC South.

But Ramsey — much like with A.J. Green — isn’t a fan.

The Broncos fired offensive coordinator Mike McCoy in hopes that interim Bill Musgrave could jump start the offense. How’s that working out for them?

They’ve scored just 17 offensive points since the switch, so not great.

Denver has tried quarterback changes, bouncing from Trevor Siemian to Brock Osweiler, to Paxton Lynch, and then back to Siemian after Lynch got hurt. That didn’t help, either, because the issue is that none of these quarterbacks is the answer for the Broncos.

Siemian finished Sunday’s loss to the Dolphins with 200 yards, no touchdowns, and three picks.

“Yeah, I think it’s just a tough day. We’re struggling. It’s frustrating,” Siemian said. “Definitely a couple throws I wish I would’ve had back. It’s a tough day.”

There’s only so much any offensive coordinator can do when the quarterback position is such a question mark.

Joey Bosa has played in only 24 games with the Chargers, but he’s made one hell of an impact. The defensive end climbed to No. 12 on the franchise sacks leaderboard when Kizer shimmied backward into him Sunday for the 22nd sack of Bosa’s career:

With just five more sacks, Bosa can pass John Parrella and Billy Ray Smith — who played 125 and 126 games with the Chargers, respectively — and crack the top 10.

Marshawn Lynch got things started for the Raiders on Sunday with a 51-yard run for a touchdown against the Giants. There wasn’t much to the run — he just made one cut, burst up field and was gone:

But it’s been a while since we’ve seen Beast Mode break free. His last touchdown of more than 25 yards was nearly three years ago when he bulldozed through the Cardinals defense for a 79-yard run that became known as Beast Quake 2.

Lynch finished Sunday with 101 rushing yards — his first 100-yard game with the Raiders — as well as 20 receiving yards. It’s good to have you back, Marshawn.

The Rams did it! They finally got that number on the right side of the win-loss column this season. After years of dealing with 7-9 bullshit at the hands of Jeff Fisher, Sean McVay has his team at 9-3.

This will be the Rams’ first winning season since 2003, which had been the longest active non-winning streak in the NFL.

That season, they were 12-4 under Mike Martz, Torry Holt was their leading receiver, and Marc Bulger was their quarterback. Oh, and Marshall Faulk was their running back.

The Monday Night Football game between the Bengals and Steelers was ugly. There’s a lengthy history between the two AFC North rivals and it often boils over into illegal hits and injuries. The latest meeting was no different.

By the end of the game, several players were injured and Cincinnati topped a franchise record by racking up 173 yards worth of penalties. It’s the only matchup in the NFL that has tallied more than 1,000 yards worth of penalties in the last three seasons:

It’s unlikely that the Bengals will be able to rally and earn a playoff spot, so a third meeting this season between Cincinnati and Pittsburgh looks like it won’t happen. That’s definitely a good thing.

While four teams have been officially eliminated from postseason contention, no teams have actually clinched a playoff spot. See ya next week.