The Week 16 PFT PM awards

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It’s Tuesday. Which means it’s time to hand out the awards for the sixteenth week of the regular season.

That happened on Tuesday’s PFT PM. As usual, MDS, Charean Williams, and I named an offensive player of the week, a defensive player of the week, a rookie of the week, and a coach of the week.

The full list of three selections for each of the four categories appear in the attached video. A couple of them merit mention here.

First, even though he played in only one half of Saturday’s game at Detroit, Bucs quarterback Tom Brady had 348 passing yards. If he’d played the second half, he quite possibly would have broken the single-game passing yardage record of 554 yards, set by Norm Van Brocklin in 1951. (If that had happened, who would have been the NFL’s NFC offensive player of the week, Brady or Alvin Kamara?)

Second, Cowboys defensive end Randy Gregory (pictured) had 1.5 sacks, two quarterback hits, and three forced fumbles on Sunday, an amazing accomplishment for a player who has missed plenty of time due to substance-abuse policy suspensions. It will be interesting to see whether the league office makes Gregory the NFC defensive player of the week; teammate Aldon Smith (who also has missed extended time due to suspensions) arguably was snubbed multiple times earlier this year.

Third, MDS made Jets coach Adam Gase the coach of the week. It would have been easy for Gase and the Jets to surrender to what seemed to be an inevitable 0-16 finish. They haven’t, and they’ve now won two games in a row. (To the dismay of plenty Jets fans.)

For all Week 16 selections, check out the video.