I can't give them this much credit. I absolutely think that winning wasn't a top priority for a multitude of reasons... mostly assurance from the top that you're fine no matter what and trying to find diamonds in the rough/young guys you can develop during a transition year especially after you've locked up your cornerstones for the next 5+ years. But there's no way in hell they wanted to be this bad. That's a product of terrible coaching.
I mean they lost 5 games by 1 score only. 3 of them by 2 points. They aren’t getting run off the field. They are keeping it close, playing rookies everywhere, and running out the clock at halftime instead of trying to score, for example. They look like a tanking team looks to me
I’m not going to give much credit at all to those close losses outside of the Pitt game. We were being blown out in the Miami and Tampa games going into the 4th quarter and only got close when their defenses let up. We were close vs. Denver and Carolina but even then, once Carolina went up 10-3 I was like ok game over. The scores were close but the reality was not as close as we were so ineffective on offense last two games
I think a team with better coaching would have won at least three of these games though, probably four (Steelers, Dolphins, Bucs, Panthers). That's why I don't think it's intentional.
This was almost certainly the plan. But now that we are staring at a top 5 pick, I feel like they should pivot.
