Letters to the Editor
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Sabin? Really?
I had no idea the new coach of the Dolphins had abandoned all that work on the polio vaccine and taken up football.
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Sabin, Saban, Potato, Pot-a-to
King, great article as usual. As a Dolphins fan, I was horrified by the play call near the goal line...the team was running well, pounding both Brown and Williams for good gains. The team was set up well, deep inside Atlanta territory, and they had two plays to get two yards, with over two minutes left.
Calling a pass was an aggressive move, but the Falcons knew it was coming. Frerotte didn't throw it away, instead firing it right to a bad guy. Boom. Chance of completing the upset now zero!
On the other hand, despite this rookie mistake, you're going to be seeing Nick Saban for a long time. Might as well start spelling his name right! Second week in a row that you've called him 'Sabin'.
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Minor correction
King,
Another nice article.
I have got another minor correction for you, though.
You say:
The Chiefs are eighth in the league at 68 percent. The Raiders defense is 19th in the league in such situations, stopping the opposition 65 percent of the time.
For the Raider's statistic, it seems like you must mean "failing to stop the opposition 65 percent of the time" or something to that effect, since stopping the opposition 65% of the time would be phenomenal.
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Vandy-Florida a similar situation
A parallel to Vermiel's decision Sunday was the one faced by Vanderbilt coach Bobby Johnson. After his team rallied from 14 down to pull within 1 point of Florida in Gainesville with less than a minute left, it appeared that Johnson wanted to call a timeout to discuss the possibility of going for two.
That would have been a good gamble because in a college football overtime, Florida would have had the advantage as they had been able to move the ball well all game against Vandy's defense. The Commodores had used an onside kick to get the ball back for their last scoring drive.
But one of the officials called a Vandy player for "excessive celebration" after the touchdown that made the score 35-34. The celebration may have been excessive to just about no one. But with the 15-yard penalty applied to the extra point attempt, Johnson had to go for the longer kick in an attempt to tie the game. The kick was good, but Florida won in the second overtime, 49-42.
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Choices for Reid, Eagles
King, as much as I would like to pile on congratulating the Eagles for doing what needed to be done with Owens, I don't think they had a choice. They may have gone down yesterday to the Natives, but they are still in the mix in the NFC and most importantly have the full support of their ticket-buying fan base. The question now is can Owens even be traded for anything close to FMV for his on field skills. Probably not but the Eagles I'm sure have some excellent contract-law attorneys who are figuring out right now how to pay him a dime on every dollar he's owed and slam the door.
I'm thinking maybe Edmonton Eskimos or Saskatchewan RoughRiders might be able to use a guy like him.
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Shocking News! Football Analyst does not have clue.
I don't know who he was for the KC football game, but, right before KC ran for a touchdown, the TV "analyst" said about three times, with conviction, "They going to have to throw a quick slate pass." Wrong.
Also, why did they have to kick the extra point? I remember reading about some game where the fans overran the field after the winning downtown was scored. They made both teams line up for the extra point. There were about six players remaining on the losing team but they had about 20 fans lining up with them, with an equal number of fans on the other side of the ball. Very funny.
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fourth and one
King et al.,
Actually, I was screaming "go for it" on fourth and less than one at the TV yesterday, except it wasn't at Vermeil and the Chiefs, but rather at Schottenheimer and the Chargers. Now Shottenheimer is the very epitome of the coach who makes the "don't blame me" decision. Late in the game, with an eight point lead and facing a fourth and goal inside the one, with the best player in the league (who had already scored three rushing touchdowns on the day) Marty opted for the field goal. Now, of course, it all worked out in the end, but doesn't the 15 point lead just end the game right there? I think Tomlinson scores way more than 68% of the time from there against that defense, and guarantees that the game doesn't come down to one final play in the endzone the way it did.
Of course one could argue that the eleven point lead was just as good, and I suppose that Marty is pretty confident that he did the right thing in hindsight, but he is the one who put the team in the situation in the first place by giving the ball to O'Neal instead of Tomlinson on the previous play. The Chargers should have broken the Jets' backs, not given them hope. And then Marty wonders why he keeps losing the close games.
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If only Vermeil were coaching the Jets
King, another good column today. I'm not a Jets fan, but the point you made about Saban is equally applicable to the end of the jets-chargers game yesterday.
As I'm sure you know the Jets had first and goal from the 3 needing a TD to win. They ran on 1st down for nothing then had Brooks Bollinger throw 3 times all incomplete to lose the game. You've got Curtis Martin but you let Bollinger try ot make the game winning play. The thing about passing in that situation is that if it doesn't work coaches always seem to feel like they have to keep passing. If you run, you usually get a little closer making the next play that much easier.
On the Chiefs game, their chance of scoring on that play was even higher than usual because the Raiders were expecting a pass.
I was also wondering whether anyone noticed a clock malfunction with about three minutes to go in the Redskins-Eagles game where the Redskins were able to take almost a minute off the clock between their third down play and a punt. It seemed as if the play clock reset as it was running down allowing an extra 20 seconds to run off the game clock.