The NFL awards were a mess, and these were the worst votes

Every vote in the NFL awards is subjective, we get that — but at some point you have to start questioning the methodology of voters. When some outliers are so pronounced, it affects who takes home awards. The system has a problem, and Thursday night put it on full display.

From bizarre choices, to inconsistent internal logic, and even some votes that went against the rubric of the awards themselves, it’s clear that the current panel of votes aren’t on the same page to the extent that something has to be changed in the future.

I’m not going to litigate Josh Allen winning MVP. I thought a fair case could be made for Allen, Jackson, or Saquon Barkley — and with the understanding that Josh had fallen short before I do understand giving him the edge in 2024.

What makes absolutely no sense, however, is putting Lamar Jackson fourth on your ballot.

The offending ballot had Allen, Barkley, Joe Burrow, then Jackson. I would love to understand what justification was being used other than “I don’t want Lamar to win MVP.” It wouldn’t have changed the outcome of the award, but it brings into questions what priority was being used here.

Voting for Allen over Jackson assumes that QB wins are being weighted more heavily, with the Bills having a better regular season record than the Ravens, as well as an additional playoff win. I can respect that, but then how do you reconcile that logic with putting Burrow over Jackson when the Bengals only went 9-8 and failed to make the playoffs?

The response to that would be Burrow’s numbers, in which he threw for an astounding 4,918 yards, 43 TDs and 9 INTs. Those are monster results, but then if stats are more important how do you justify putting Allen over Jackson when he was objectively worse across the board?

Again, I’m not saying Josh Allen didn’t deserve MVP — but having a voter put Jackson fourth is simply ridiculous.

This award is an absolute mess. A year ago the rubric of the award was changed and given to voters to inform them that the focus would be on players who suffered injury, or missed playing time due to circumstances outside their control.

The spirit of the AP Comeback Player of the Year award is to honor a player who has demonstrated resilience in the face of adversity by overcoming illness, physical injury or other circumstances that led him to miss playing time the previous season. The decision to provide this guidance was made last December but could not be implemented for the 2023 awards because the season was almost completed.

The extremely cynical way to look at this is that the change was made to ensure Damar Hamlin would win, but that didn’t happen anyway. What did happen in the CPAY was a mess.

Joe Burrow definitely deserved to win this one. The issue is that there’s a guideline for eligibility and voters either ignored it, or stretched the justification so far that it’s meaningless.

This award should clearly be anyone who returned to form or broke out after a terrible season, regardless of whether it was caused by injury, poor performance, or bad coaching. A “comeback” shouldn’t solely be defined by someone who was hurt — because it fails to account for some of the best stories in the NFL.

Someone needs to find out who in the Boston media voted for Alex Van Pelt. The Patriots offensive coordinator led a unit in 2024 which was:

The Pats had one of the worst offenses in the entire NFL, and yet someone voted Van Pelt as one of the best coordinators in the league. Oh, he was fired by Mike Vrabel, by the way. Perhaps someone should have let the Patriots new coach he had one of the best OCs in the NFL on his staff.