Why Does the Associated Press Hate Damar Hamlin?

PropWatch explores the unintended consequences of the Comeback Player of the Year guidelines and takes issue with "the MVP conversation."

Let’s begin PropWatch — an occasional feature that explores the NFL wagering market — with some breathing exercises.

Inhale…exhale.

Not every coach deserves to be fired after a loss.

Not every quarterback needs to be benched after a bad game.

Not every good player is an MVP candidate.

Not every team on a winning streak is a Super Bowl contender.

Sometimes a win is just a win. A loss is just a loss. A touchdown is just a touchdown.

Not everything needs a take.

Not everything needs a take.

Not everything needs a take.

(This meditative exercise was brought to you by the neighbor who demanded that I explain to him why Nick Sirianni wasn’t fired on Monday morning.)

Why Does the Associated Press Have a Grudge Against Damar Hamlin?

I was planning to theatrically boycott any discussion of the Comeback Player of the Year race when I discovered that the Comeback Player of the Year race may be theatrically boycotting itself.

Sam Darnold was the leading CPOY candidate on the betting market before Rob Maaddi of the Associated Press, who serves as a chairman for the awards balloting, indicated on social media that the Vikings quarterback is not eligible for the award. 

The AP, as you might recall, issued guidelines to voters that “the spirit of the 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.” Maaddi cited that guideline in a TwiXter post, adding that “Darnold probably would’ve been a candidate for the Comeback Player of the Year award before the AP issued guidance to voters before the season.”

It’s not clear if Maaddi was tweeting ex cathedra. He does not explicitly ban fellow voters from choosing Darnold for CPOY, instead implicitly suggesting that the new guidelines disqualify him. To my knowledge, no one from the AP contacted voters directly about Darnold. And of course, the rule is just a “guideline.” But none of that matters: if the voting supervisor shouts across the cafeteria that Darnold isn’t eligible, then he isn’t eligible. 

As an anarchist, I hate rules and absolutely loathe Bill Lumburgh-worthy “guidelines” which are really rules.

Furthermore, I firmly believe that having his career mismanaged for years by the likes of Adam Gase and Matt Rhule qualifies as “circumstances that led him to miss playing time” for Darnold.  Gase alone was the coaching equivalent of an ACL tear, and his incompetence allowed Ryan Tannehill to win CPOY in 2019.

New guidelines, however, erase past precedent. The AP doesn’t care about dramatic, inspirational climbs from the scrapheap by much-maligned players who fell short of expectations. The NFL drew criticism by drive-by complainers about Damar Hamlin not winning the award last year (“The NFL [cocked eyebrow] does not care [dramatic huff] if its players nearly die. [Posts with an air of self-satisfaction that’s palpable from 60 feet away] Activism achieved!”). The league loves token efforts to keep up appearances, so it instructed the AP to ensure that the award went to someone who spent a few months jogging in a pool, not years staring into the abyss of self-doubt.

The reclarification of the guidelines posed a problem for sportsbooks. Darnold was the DraftKings favorite to win CPOY at +200 as of October 9th. A book cannot merely take a favorite off the board, it must also rebalance the odds for everyone else. That’s a minor problem if someone like Aidan Hutchinson suffers a season-ending injury – Defensive Player of the Year was back on the board on Monday morning – but a major one if several of the other runners-up might also be impacted by the decision that disqualified the favorite. 

Take Hamlin. I would not have voted for Hamlin last year, because he participated in just 111 regular-season snaps, the vast majority of them on special teams: the “p” in Comeback Player of the Year stands for “player,” after all. I would absolutely endorse Hamlin this year: he is now a starter who has made some big plays for a Super Bowl contender, and last year could be thought of as a continuation of his comeback from that horrific 2022 injury. 

Alas: Hamlin spent most of last season on the weekly inactive list, not the injured reserve or PUP list. Hamlin even played regularly in the 2023 preseason: 22 snaps in the preseason opener, 21 in the second game, 37 in the third. Everyone knows that players only participate in the preseason if they are 100% healthy. Mike Garofalo also declared Hamlin a “healthy scratch” for the 2023 season opener on the NFL Network. A HEALTHY scratch.

By strict interpretation of the AP’s guidelines – the same strict interpretation that excludes Darnold — Hamlin did not miss playing time in the 2023 season because he was overcoming illness, physical injury or other circumstances. Hamlin was just a regular-old benchwarmer like Darnold in 2023 and therefore undeserving of recognition or acclaim in 2024. That’s not me talking; it’s those ghouls at the Associated Press! 

Justin Fields (+1600) was on the CPOY shortlist before Darnold’s kinda-sorta disqualification. Fields did miss four games with a thumb injury in 2023. So it’s probably OK to wager on Fields to win the award, since we all know that what we are witnessing in Pittsburgh is a young quarterback’s courageous return from a thumb injury that you had probably forgotten about until I just brought it up.

The problem here, of course, is over-legislation in the form of passive aggressive “guidelines” with a “spirit” that’s enforced through social media peer pressure. As I wrote when the AP issued its guidelines in the summer,  no one remembers the non-Chad Pennington Comeback Player of the Year Award winner five years later.  Feel free to be inspired by whomever and whatever inspires you.

Wagering on the award, however, feels like a fool’s errand under the circumstances. CPOY still was not on the DraftKings board as of my final edits on Wednesday morning: a sign of oddsmakers’ reluctance to even take action on the award amid the current confusion. When the CPOY board returns, Kirk Cousins and Aaron Rodgers will top it, and bettors will get to pick which old quarterback will be the most un-embarrassing down the stretch, with J.K. Dobbins as the darkhorse who will get overlooked because no one watches the Chargers.

If that sort of wager floats your boat, go for it. If you wanted to wager on something that felt more like compelling personal drama, sorry: the AP outlawed that. 

Jayden Daniels is the MVP of Our Hearts

The Jayden Daniels MVP market is schmuckbait.

The Daniels MVP moneyline is +1100 this week, up slightly from +1000 entering Week 6. Daniels’ odds sagged a bit after the Commanders’ loss to the Ravens: Daniels played well, but not at an MVP level, while Lamar Jackson did. Jackson improved his moneyline to +550, third behind Patrick Mahomes at +350 and Josh Allen at +475 after a Monday night victory over the Jets.

A +1100 moneyline implies an 8.3% probability of an outcome. Daniels does not have an 8.3% chance of winning the MVP award. He has about a 0.83% chance. No rookie has won the award since Jim Brown in 1957. That’s because rookies have their own award, and also because they rarely have truly MVP-caliber seasons. You don’t wager at +1100 on something that has never happened in most people’s lifetimes.

What’s more likely: Daniels playing at his current dizzyingly-high level for three more months or Mahomes, Jackson and/or Allen holding serve? Keep in mind that Allen’s odds improved considerably after throwing for 215 yards in a narrow win on Monday night. Yes, Allen produced all three Bills touchdowns, but he is still graded on a curve that does not require him to shatter weekly records to stay on the shortlist. Daniels is one bad game from, “welp, that’ll happen to a rook.” 

Joe Burrow, Jalen Hurts or even Dak Prescott could have a second-half surge. Voters could stop compartmentalizing Brock Purdy and Jared Goff as system quarterbacks if their MVP-type seasons continue. Daniels playing at an MVP level for the rest of the year may be more likely than some of those scenarios, but it has to be more likely than all of them for him to win. If the choice comes down to, say, Allen-versus-Purdy, most voters might hand-wave Purdy away, fairly or otherwise. If it comes down to Purdy-versus-Daniels, the majority of voters will relegate Daniels to the kiddie pool because it’s simply the most elegant solution. 

What about Jordan Love, with 12 touchdowns in four starts? Love is at +2200; his early-season injury positioned him at the back of the field. Do you really think that Love, with more experience and better receivers, is going to look like a weaker candidate than Daniels come early January?

A Brief Tirade. If you have ever heard me bristle on a podcast or radio show about “the MVP conversation,” this is why. The “conversation” is prattle. It’s sportstalk kabuki theater. It’s mealy-mouth name-dropping without making a firm assertion. I’m not saying he should win the MVP, but he at least belongs in the conversation roughly translates as this guy has had a few awesome games and I am conditioned to turn every banal observation into something hyperbolic and search-engine friendly. 

Seriously: have you ever even had an “MVP conversation?” Like, sat at the tavern or in the breakroom at work with some pals and said, “Let’s have some fun comparing the strengths and weaknesses of the NFL’s top players?” 

I have been involved in Hall of Fame debates, argued about teams’ chances to reach the Super Bowl and bickered about the merits of draft prospects, not just professionally but in my free time. I have chanted “M-V-P” at the bar after touchdowns by Donovan McNabb and, um, Carson Wentz. But the only MVP “conversations” I have had were radio and podcast segments, often lame ones, though needling Aaron Schatz about voting for Allen over Jackson last year was kinda fun ;). 

Fuzzy reasoning about the MVP race is fine: you, as a fan, are entitled to like who you like. Fuzzy wagering about the MVP race, however, is a waste of money. 

Back to the Betting Markets. The big news on the Daniels wagering front is that his Offensive Rookie of the Year moneyline is at -195; it was around -230 last week. Caleb Williams threw four touchdowns against the Jaguars in Week 6 and is now at +165. I think Daniels remains the much better candidate, and he is coming off a loss to one of the NFL’s best teams, while Williams is coming off back-to-back wins over two of the NFL’s worst teams. 

Daniels and Williams face off in a head-to-head battle in two weeks that is likely to reset the OROY market. The Bears defense is much better than the Commanders defense, so Williams might get the better of Daniels in that game.

The long-range outlook for Williams, however, is stormy. The Bears face all three (good-to-awesome) divisional foes twice AND the 49ers in the second half of the season. Daniels gets the Panthers next week, and – good heavens – the Giants might have the toughest defense in the NFC East at this point. 

Daniels at -195 does not sound all that juicy, but those may be the best odds you are going to get. 

If you are bullish on Daniels, you might consider wagering on the Commanders. Unfortunately, the market may be one step ahead of you. The Commanders are -220 to reach the playoffs: not that enticing. Over 9.5 wins at -165 is tastier, though it’s not hard to imagine the Commanders reaching the playoffs at 9-8 because of an NFC East implosion.

The real action for Commanders believers is an NFC East title at +120. The problem with that wager is that the Eagles (+135) have lots of Jaguars and Panthers on their upcoming schedule, and it may be more likely that their star-studded roster figures things out than that the rebuilt-on-the-fly Commanders keep things together. But if Daniels truly has an MVP-caliber season, leading the Commanders to a division crown will be one of the centerpieces of his portfolio. And he will win Offensive Rookie of the Year as a result.

If anything, the Daniels Commanders are a little overvalued right now, in large part because of “the MVP conversation,” which skews perceptions of casual fans. The best way for Daniels/Commanders fans to enjoy their favorite player/team right now is to watch them instead of engaging in some financial wishcasting. The Commanders opened as 7.5-point home favorites over the Panthers, and even that feels a little steep, though I will have my eye on Daniels game props when they are posted. (The Panthers defense, such as it was, has been obliterated by injuries to Jadeveon Clowney and others in recent weeks.) Selected weekly “anytime touchdown scorer” bets for Daniels may pay greater dividends than anything you will find on the futures market.

Oh, and Jordan Love at +2200. You saw that, right?

Weekly Emergency Jets Content

I thought I was done with this edition of PropWatch when the Jets had another of their Tuesday morning pleas for attention, this time appeasing Emperor Surlypants by trading a conditional 2025 third-round pick for Davante Adams.

On the one hand, I applaud the Jets for surrendering the pretense that they are anything other than a sports-media content mill and a pre-retirement hobbyhorse for Aaron Rodgers. On the other hand, Adams does indeed improve the 2-4 Jets, so I figured I would check the betting market in the hours after the trade.

• The Jets are now +500 to win the AFC East. They were +700 in the hours between their loss to the Bills and the announcement of the Adams trade. For perspective, the Packers and Cardinals each have a +500 moneyline to win their divisions.

• The Jets are +155 to reach the playoffs. They were +140 entering the Monday night game. I was not able to determine their moneyline in the brief window between the Bills loss and the trade.

• Their odds of winning the Super Bowl are holding steady at +3000, the same as their odds entering Week 7. The Bengals and Commanders are also getting a +3000 moneyline.

• Rodgers is at +5000 to win MVP. Baker Mayfield and Kirk Cousins are at +3000. Jordan Love, as mentioned earlier, is at +2200.

The house isn’t always right, but sometimes a few moneylines are worth several thousand words. The Adams trade essentially offsets the Bills loss, from a handicapping standpoint. It increases the probability of sweeping the Patriots and Dolphins but does not erase a 2-4 record. It places the Jets in roughly the same playoff bracket as the Bengals and Colts. It does not make them a team you would care about if they weren’t a New York team with a headline-hog quarterback/dictator.

I rather like the Jets at +155 to reach the playoffs because the AFC Wild Card field is so thin. I “like” the Adams trade because the Jets Super Bowl moneyline may have dropped to +5000 without it. I loathe what the Jets have become in their dignity-free effort to make Rodgers like them, but at least there’s an intentionality to their idiocy. And that Wild Card loss by two touchdowns in Baltimore will make it all worthwhile. Right? Right???

Later this week at the Too Deep Zone: a compare-and-contrast of the Vikings and Lions pass rushes and a deep dive into the Ravens running game.

Next week: TankWatch on the loser of the Jaguars-Patriots Loo Bowl!

Halloween Week: Mailbag! Details to come!