2022 Season Awards Tournament: MVP, ROY, DPOY, COY (AFC Final Four)
Each year, I go division by division and nominate who I believe is each team's candidate for the major NFL awards and then we discuss/declare who the division's major award winner is for the season…and that player goes onto the divisional Final Four with a chance to go to the Super Bowl/Finals for a chance to be declared my seasonal award winner.
We go division-by-division each day, then to the Final Four for each conference, then the finals to name our winner the day the NFL announces their winners. *And my choices are usually different up and down the line in each category, so enjoy a different take on the NFL awards.
We're down to the Final Four from each conference to determine what players go on to meet in the finals/the Super Bowl to claim our vote for the 2022-23 awards.
*MVP (any position)
*Coach of the Year (any coach on the staff, not just the head coach)
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2022 Season Awards Tournament: MVP
AFC Final Four
AFC East: QB Josh Allen, BUF
AFC West: QB Patrick Mahomes, KC
AFC North: QB Joe Burrow, CIN
AFC South: RB Derrick Henry, TEN
The power three QBs in the NFL are all here to compete to move onto the NFL Finals of this MVP tournament…and because they are such strong candidates, Derrick Henry is quickly dispatched as a candidate among them to move on. So, it's down to the three QBs.
How do you even pick one? They're all three ‘great' and MVPs in their certain way/style. Do you give it to the one with the best stats? How about the most wins? I think there's a lot of logic to that as the determining factor, but I'm not going to immediately default to that.
Josh Allen had the least-best season among these three, so I discount him at this stage and focus on Burrow v. Mahomes.
In the end, I have to give it to Mahomes -- best stats among them, most wins, and did so with the team ripping away Tyreek from him and replacing their best weapon with JuJu and MVS…and still Mahomes was producing better than all the QBs. Mahomes deserves the MVP, and a purple heart award for that.
AFC Champion = Patrick Mahomes, KC goes on to the NFL finals.
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2022 Season Awards Tournament: Rookie of the Year
AFC Final Four
AFC East: CB Sauce Gardner, NYJ
AFC West: RB Isiah Pacheco, KC
AFC North: OC Tyler Linderbaum, BAL
AFC South: SAF Jalen Pitre, HOU
Isiah Pacheco had an impressive rise from 7th-round rookie to earned starter just a few weeks into the season -- great story, but his actual play/output was not ROY worthy this far into the competition.
Tyler Linderbaum started all the Ravens games at center and graded out well but I don't think he had the impact of Jalen Pitre who also started all the games and was becoming a star by season's end.
In some years, Pitre's rookie resume would be a league ROY winner…but Sauce Gardner also started right away and became, arguably, the best player at his position in the entire NFL.
AFC Champion = Sauce Gardner, NYJ
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2022 Season Awards Tournament: Defensive Player of the Year
AFC Final Four
AFC East: CB Sauce Gardner, NYJ
AFC West: CB Patrick Surtain, DEN
AFC North: LB Logan Wilson, CIN
AFC South: CB Stefon Gilmore, IND
Logan Wilson is key to the Cincy defense, the leader…but in terms of ‘best' on the biz…he falls short of the impact the three CBs had this year.
Trying to delineate between the three CBs…they all had good/great pass defense metrics, but Sauce Gardner's were a little better than any of them. If I didn't want to use the pass coverage stats to find a winner…I would just go with what my eyes told me, and that's exactly what I'm going to do -- Gardner is the best cover corner in the league and I changed lineups in Fantasy when a WR was going to face him…I had some fear of Gilmore and Surtain., but full fear of Gardner.
AFC Champion = Sauce Gardner goes on to the NFL finals.
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2022 Season Awards Tournament: Coach of the Year
AFC Final Four
AFC East: HC Mike McDaniel, MIA
AFC West: HC Andy Reid, KC
AFC North: HC Zac Taylor, CIN
AFC South: HC Doug Pederson, JAX
A quality set of options here. First, I'm going to remove Reid and Taylor. Why? Because they have the luxury of working with Burrow and Mahomes. And while I think Taylor is an underrated good/top 10 NFL HC, he and Reid have a gift at QB that covers a lot of sins.
I like the way Mike McDaniel built the offense around Tua-Tyreek, and he didn't make Hill a decoy…but he also didn't get as radical with Hill as I had wondered/hoped. Miami looked like one of the best teams in the AFC East midway through the season, but they fell off when Tua got hurt. Overall, really impressed with the way McDaniel handles his team and the media and how he tried to get by with Tua out and then Teddy out.
But I have to give it to Doug Pederson…a near-miracle work. I didn't think Trevor Lawrence would be decent or good -- but Pederson built an offense to help him, and it clicked. I thought the Jacksonville corners would be an issue -- but they both had terrific years. Up and down the line, both sides of the ball, I'm nothing but impressed with the job Peterson did for a dysfunctional organization.
AFC Champion = Doug Pederson goes on to the NFL finals.
