There are a lot of bad things about living in America’s new snow belt. Losing power is no fun. Seeing people losing their minds in the grocery store is comedic but just a little bit scary. But not getting the newspapers in the morning makes me crazy. Sure, I can read online but it’s NOT THE SAME. I spend enough time sitting at the computer most days without having to sit here to read the papers.
Okay, that is today’s whine-du-jour. Suffice to say it hasn’t been a fun winter in these parts and apparently there’s more to come. The roads still aren’t clear (largely because there’s just no place to put the snow) and more snow is expected tomorrow and Wednesday. The only ones who are happy right now are the kids.
I did manage to make it home from West Point last night—although the last 35 miles was treacherous and frightening—in time to see most of The Super Bowl. My first comment on the game and the telecast is this: Have all the smart advertising execs retired? I did not see every commercial and I probably wasn’t completely focused on a lot of the ones I saw, but it certainly appeared that the days of the memorable Super Bowl commercial have gone the way of the low-key postgame celebration.
Enough already with the talking baby.
Onto the game. Most Super Bowls have three or four moments that stand out and are replayed forever and this game was no exception. The Saints recovery of the onside kick to start the second half will be shown a million times along with announcers crediting Sean Payton (correctly) for taking such a bold gamble. The Tracy Porter interception will always be the signature play of the game, not only because it broke the Colts back but because it rendered Peyton Manning human again. Now we’re going to hear over and over again that Manning has won the same number of Super Bowls as Mark Rypien and Brad Johnson, not to mention little brother Eli.
But for me, the most vivid memory will be Drew Brees’s tears, first when he was holding his one-year-old son Baylen during the (overblown) pre-trophy presentation celebration and then as he stood on the podium waiting for Tom Benson to stop blathering so Payton could finally hand him the trophy.
His voice never cracked on the podium or in his postgame press conference but his emotion was apparent and clearly quite genuine. He talked about feeling as if he was meant to land in New Orleans and to be a part of the rebuilding of the team and the city and the region, but there was no Joe Gibbs/Kurt Warner evangelism just a clear picture that this was a man of faith who felt that his presence in New Orleans was part of a plan he didn’t need to understand but had been able to help carry out.
Good for him. Good for the entire city which suffered the modest angst that comes with a consistently bad football team and then the tragedy of Katrina. It’s a little harder to feel good for Saints owner Tom Benson who was ready to yank the team from New Orleans and move it to San Antonio or Los Angeles after Katrina and is now taking bows for all that has gone right the last couple of years, culminating with Sunday’s victory.
You can’t help but wonder how hard Manning will get hit by his critics for this loss. He did not play poorly by any means—he never plays poorly. But the defining moment of the game was the Porter interception. I don’t think there’s anything that can happen that will remove Manning from the pantheon of great NFL quarterbacks. He’s certainly somewhere on the list although the talk that he is THE greatest will quiet now until he wins another Super Bowl.
I have one other question on the subject of great quarterbacks. Whenever people talk about Joe Montana as the best of all time, they talk about his four Super Bowl wins—as they should. Tom Brady’s three Super Bowl wins puts him in the conversation and then names like Johnny Unitas, Bart Starr, John Elway and old-timers like Sammy Baugh and Otto Graham get mentioned. I never hear Terry Bradshaw’s name. Sure, the Steelers of his era were built around a great defense but Bradshaw was awfully good and his teams won four Super Bowls. Shouldn’t that merit at least a mention, regardless of how many bad commercials he’s made?
Just wondering.
For me, there’s always a sense of relief when The Super Bowl is over. The hype is behind us for a while and we don’t have to dodge every single ex-player on earth, “breaking down the game.” What the playing of the game almost always proves is that all the, “breaking down,” is meaningless. The consensus among the experts was that sooner or later Manning would be too good for the Saints defense. I was among those who thought that, the only difference between me and some of the others is that I don’t consider myself an expert. I’m just someone who has been around football a lot and I think I know SOMETHING about the game but I certainly wouldn’t tell anyone to go out and bet his house on what I think about the outcome of a game. I thought Navy was too beat up physically to go into Notre Dame and win this past season. Shows you how much I know.
Now, unless you are an NFL Network geek who can’t wait for The Combine, football is behind us for a little while. The Winter Olympics begin Friday. I can live without the opening ceremonies and ALL the figure skating. But I enjoy things like speed skating, luge and bobsled and Alpine skiing, even if I don’t completely understand them or know any of the athletes. The hockey should be fun and the best thing about it is that the Islanders can’t lose any more games while the Olympics are going on. (The Caps, if you’re paying attention, may never lose another game. I didn’t get to see the comeback on Sunday but if they didn’t lose that game, that’s it, they’re never losing again).
It is also less than five weeks now to Selection Sunday. I went through the conference standings this morning and I have to tell you, coming up with a list of 34 teams that are absolutely, without question deserving of a bid wasn’t easy. Which raises this question: If coming up with 34 teams is tough, how the heck does the NCAA propose to come up with 65 at-large teams with a 96 team field?
This is the worst idea anyone has come up with since New Coke. Even Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany and I agree on this and we agree on NOTHING. Of course that probably means that it is a lock to happen.
Okay, I have to go and find food for my family before it starts snowing again tomorrow. I wish I was joking.
Showing posts with label New Orleans Saints. Show all posts
Showing posts with label New Orleans Saints. Show all posts
Monday, February 8, 2010
Monday, January 25, 2010
Peyton Manning was too good, the Favre Achilles heel; Notes from the last few days
I’m brooding just a little bit this morning. To be honest, it’s tough to feel THAT bad about the Jets loss to the Colts. Peyton Manning was just too good. I think if his wide receivers were Don Maynard and George Sauer Jr.—today, not 41 years ago when they were catching passes from Joe Namath—Manning would find a way to get them the ball. He’s just that good.
Although I’ve now seen all the highlights, I heard a lot more of the game on the radio than I saw on television. I had to drive to the eastern shore of Maryland yesterday for a funeral. Pat Hughes, the wife of former Maryland Governor Harry Hughes, passed away on Thursday after a long, difficult battle with Parkinson’s disease. They had been married just a little less than 60 years. Governor Hughes gave an emotional, touching eulogy, revealing something that he said even his children didn’t know: he and Pat had secretly gotten married when she was 19 and still in college almost two years before their, “wedding.”
“I have a feeling if her dad had known he wouldn’t have sprung for the party,” Governor Hughes said, drawing laughter in the packed church. He choked up on a couple of occasions, pausing once to say, “I’m going to get through this,”—and did. It was typical Harry Hughes: clever, funny, touching, genuine and classy.
The respect people have for him was evident: Martin O’Malley, the current governor, was there and so were both of Maryland’s U.S. Senators—Ben Cardin and Barbara Mikulski. Steny Hoyer, the Majority Leader of the House was there and so was former Senator Joe Tydings along with—as you might expect—many members of the state legislature, which is where Governor Hughes began his political career. I believe I was the only sportswriter in attendance but there needed to be one since Governor Hughes signed with the Yankees out of college and had a brief minor league career.
“No signing bonus,” he noted in the eulogy.
I had driven down with my old friend Tim Maloney— a former House of Delegates member—and, after we’d stopped by the house for the reception, we headed home. The Hughes house is on The Greater Choptank River (the governor corrected me when I called it The Choptank River) a couple of miles from the Harry R. Hughes Bridge that crosses the Choptank. Pretty cool, I think.
It was halftime by the time we were back in the car and the key moment of the game—the Colts late second quarter drive—had just taken place. With the margin at 17-13 I wasn’t optimistic about the Jets chances. Mark Sanchez had played very well in the first half apparently but I knew the Colts defense was very solid.
We all know what happened in the second half. I honestly don’t believe the Saints can beat the Colts in The Super Bowl but upsets do happen. Maybe the Colts will turn the ball over five times. One thing I’m about 99.9 percent sure won’t happen is Manning making a mistake like the one Brett Favre made at the end of regulation, a mistake so heinous that even see-no-evil ex-quarterback Troy Aikman had to call it, “a cardinal mistake.”
Look, to do anything but respect Favre’s grit is simply stupid. He took a hit on his ankle and knee that would have had most quarterbacks in the locker room and never missed a snap. He could barely walk to and from the huddle, yet every time he took a snap and dropped back, you were pretty certain the ball would be on target. Even after the Saints went up 28-21, Favre brought them back and had them one play—plus a successful field goal—from winning.
I’m not sure who screwed up when the Vikings came out of the time out with 19 seconds left with 12 men in the huddle, but one way or the other, that’s on the coaching staff. My God was this game full of bad plays: the turnovers, the penalties—I didn’t think the officials had such a good day either—the fumbled snap (Drew Brees) on a key third down. Was it just me or did it seem as if every single play of the last hour was a bobbled pass, a questionable call or another dreaded booth review. I’m surprised there wasn’t a booth review of the coin toss before overtime.
And yet, in that final minute of regulation, Favre had the Vikings at the Saints 33—then the 38 after the penalty. There he was, rolling right on third down with acres of yardage in front of him and no reason not to run since he had a timeout left. Maybe it was the pain in his leg that caused him not to run. Worst case, he’s going to pick up five yards and Ryan Longwell is going to have a long, but makeable (especially in a dome) field goal.
But the old Favre Achilles heel kicked in at the worst possible moment and he threw across his body and across the field right into an interception. Like the one two years ago against the Giants, that’s one Favre isn’t going to be able to get out of his mind because it was his last throw of the season. He had talked all week about this opportunity being a chance to redeem himself after that Giants game. He was thatclose to that redemption. Unlike in the Giants game, where he played poorly all day in frigid conditions, Favre was heroic on Sunday until that last pass.
Even if you felt badly for Favre—how could you not?—you couldn’t help but feel the joy of New Orleans. When players and coaches warble on about how great their fans are after a victory I usually roll my eyes: all fans are great when a team is good. But this was different. These were fans who had been to hell and back and almost lost their team after Hurricane Katrina because owner Tom Benson was ready to ride right out of town to San Antonio or Los Angeles. They truly deserved a moment like this. I have a feeling though that it will be their zenith. We’ll see when they play The Super Bowl, which is in about six weeks. At least it will feel that way once all the hype and chatter are finally over.
--------------------
A few notes from the last few days. My friend Bill Brill e-mailed me on Friday to say my “Duke,” blog on Thursday had caused all sorts of talk on the Duke Basketball Report site. I checked it out and found it interesting.
There were, as you might expect, some loyalists who were angry at me: I’m a bitter person because my friend Tom Mickle didn’t get the Athletic Director’s job. (Damn right I’m bitter because he was SO clearly the right choice and Nan Keohane intentionally picked Joe Alleva for just that reason). I have a lot of nerve implying I belong on the list of ‘distinguished Duke journalists,’ over a woman who was a ‘Survivor,’ finalist. (Guilty again, I really do think my resume is a tad better than hers). The most interesting ones were from people who defended Mike Krzyzewski’s decision to coach the Olympic team again. Some sort of missed my point: I didn’t write that because Duke lost to N.C. State—nor have I changed my mind because it beat Clemson—I felt that way last summer and told Krzyzewski that, not that he does care or should care what I think. What’s more I was NOT against him doing it once because it is—and should be—a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. It was the second time around that he didn’t need in terms of time or energy or ego. He’d done all that. (Note to guy who pointed out that Jim Boeheim is an assistant coach and doing fine: Being an assistant is wholly different. Not only is Krzyzewski giving up time, his entire staff is involved in the effort. Plus, coincidence or not, Syracuse missed the NCAA’s two years in a row right after Boeheim became an assistant).
Anyway, the big defense was, “being Olympic coach has energized him.” Really? Being the Duke coach doesn’t provide enough challenge or energy? I would think going 3-7 the last five years against his good friend Ole Roy while not coming close to a Final Four would be enough to energize Mike Krzyzewski…
And finally, from the category of why it is often tough to take women’s sports that seriously: Two Georgetown women’s players and one Louisville player were suspended by The Big East after a pre-game brawl nine days ago. When the league announced the suspensions it refused to identify the players even though it would become apparent who they were the next time the teams played. Okay, that’s just plain ridiculous.
Then, on Saturday, after Kenya Kirkland (a tri-captain) and Tia McBride were absent from her team’s win over DePaul, Georgetown Coach Terry Williams-Flournoy said this: “I think there’s a privacy right that those kids should have. They’re kids. They’re children. Their names shouldn’t be put out there like that.”
Huh? They play COLLEGE basketball and are old enough to vote. People are asked to pay money to watch them play which means anything they do in that public domain is public. Children? They made a mistake, they were suspended. It happens all the time. Claiming some ludicrous right to privacy just makes everyone involved look stupid…
And then there was this: During the Maryland-North Carolina State men’s game Saturday night, the PA Announcer at the corporate-named Center that replaced Cole Field House pleaded with fans to buy tickets for the next night’s Maryland-Duke women’s game. “Come see the best rivalry in women’s college basketball,” he said.
There aren’t many rivalries in women’s college basketball that anyone not in uniform or related to those in uniform cares about. In fact there’s one: Connecticut-Tennessee. That’s the list.
Then, after Duke had won a close game on Sunday, Maryland Coach Brenda Frese said this: “This proves we can play with anyone.”
Really? Her team loses at home to a team that lost at home earlier in the week BY THIRTY-THREE to Connecticut and this proves her team can play with anybody? Sometimes I think coaches—in all sports—just throw stuff out there and figure it will go un-challenged because often it does. If Duke and Maryland combined forces they would lose to U-Conn by 20. NO ONE in the women’s game can play with Connecticut right now—which is a problem for the women’s game.
Maybe Frese should have insisted on not making public the names of the women on her team who missed shots. You know, they’re just children. They have a right to privacy.
Although I’ve now seen all the highlights, I heard a lot more of the game on the radio than I saw on television. I had to drive to the eastern shore of Maryland yesterday for a funeral. Pat Hughes, the wife of former Maryland Governor Harry Hughes, passed away on Thursday after a long, difficult battle with Parkinson’s disease. They had been married just a little less than 60 years. Governor Hughes gave an emotional, touching eulogy, revealing something that he said even his children didn’t know: he and Pat had secretly gotten married when she was 19 and still in college almost two years before their, “wedding.”
“I have a feeling if her dad had known he wouldn’t have sprung for the party,” Governor Hughes said, drawing laughter in the packed church. He choked up on a couple of occasions, pausing once to say, “I’m going to get through this,”—and did. It was typical Harry Hughes: clever, funny, touching, genuine and classy.
The respect people have for him was evident: Martin O’Malley, the current governor, was there and so were both of Maryland’s U.S. Senators—Ben Cardin and Barbara Mikulski. Steny Hoyer, the Majority Leader of the House was there and so was former Senator Joe Tydings along with—as you might expect—many members of the state legislature, which is where Governor Hughes began his political career. I believe I was the only sportswriter in attendance but there needed to be one since Governor Hughes signed with the Yankees out of college and had a brief minor league career.
“No signing bonus,” he noted in the eulogy.
I had driven down with my old friend Tim Maloney— a former House of Delegates member—and, after we’d stopped by the house for the reception, we headed home. The Hughes house is on The Greater Choptank River (the governor corrected me when I called it The Choptank River) a couple of miles from the Harry R. Hughes Bridge that crosses the Choptank. Pretty cool, I think.
It was halftime by the time we were back in the car and the key moment of the game—the Colts late second quarter drive—had just taken place. With the margin at 17-13 I wasn’t optimistic about the Jets chances. Mark Sanchez had played very well in the first half apparently but I knew the Colts defense was very solid.
We all know what happened in the second half. I honestly don’t believe the Saints can beat the Colts in The Super Bowl but upsets do happen. Maybe the Colts will turn the ball over five times. One thing I’m about 99.9 percent sure won’t happen is Manning making a mistake like the one Brett Favre made at the end of regulation, a mistake so heinous that even see-no-evil ex-quarterback Troy Aikman had to call it, “a cardinal mistake.”
Look, to do anything but respect Favre’s grit is simply stupid. He took a hit on his ankle and knee that would have had most quarterbacks in the locker room and never missed a snap. He could barely walk to and from the huddle, yet every time he took a snap and dropped back, you were pretty certain the ball would be on target. Even after the Saints went up 28-21, Favre brought them back and had them one play—plus a successful field goal—from winning.
I’m not sure who screwed up when the Vikings came out of the time out with 19 seconds left with 12 men in the huddle, but one way or the other, that’s on the coaching staff. My God was this game full of bad plays: the turnovers, the penalties—I didn’t think the officials had such a good day either—the fumbled snap (Drew Brees) on a key third down. Was it just me or did it seem as if every single play of the last hour was a bobbled pass, a questionable call or another dreaded booth review. I’m surprised there wasn’t a booth review of the coin toss before overtime.
And yet, in that final minute of regulation, Favre had the Vikings at the Saints 33—then the 38 after the penalty. There he was, rolling right on third down with acres of yardage in front of him and no reason not to run since he had a timeout left. Maybe it was the pain in his leg that caused him not to run. Worst case, he’s going to pick up five yards and Ryan Longwell is going to have a long, but makeable (especially in a dome) field goal.
But the old Favre Achilles heel kicked in at the worst possible moment and he threw across his body and across the field right into an interception. Like the one two years ago against the Giants, that’s one Favre isn’t going to be able to get out of his mind because it was his last throw of the season. He had talked all week about this opportunity being a chance to redeem himself after that Giants game. He was thatclose to that redemption. Unlike in the Giants game, where he played poorly all day in frigid conditions, Favre was heroic on Sunday until that last pass.
Even if you felt badly for Favre—how could you not?—you couldn’t help but feel the joy of New Orleans. When players and coaches warble on about how great their fans are after a victory I usually roll my eyes: all fans are great when a team is good. But this was different. These were fans who had been to hell and back and almost lost their team after Hurricane Katrina because owner Tom Benson was ready to ride right out of town to San Antonio or Los Angeles. They truly deserved a moment like this. I have a feeling though that it will be their zenith. We’ll see when they play The Super Bowl, which is in about six weeks. At least it will feel that way once all the hype and chatter are finally over.
--------------------
A few notes from the last few days. My friend Bill Brill e-mailed me on Friday to say my “Duke,” blog on Thursday had caused all sorts of talk on the Duke Basketball Report site. I checked it out and found it interesting.
There were, as you might expect, some loyalists who were angry at me: I’m a bitter person because my friend Tom Mickle didn’t get the Athletic Director’s job. (Damn right I’m bitter because he was SO clearly the right choice and Nan Keohane intentionally picked Joe Alleva for just that reason). I have a lot of nerve implying I belong on the list of ‘distinguished Duke journalists,’ over a woman who was a ‘Survivor,’ finalist. (Guilty again, I really do think my resume is a tad better than hers). The most interesting ones were from people who defended Mike Krzyzewski’s decision to coach the Olympic team again. Some sort of missed my point: I didn’t write that because Duke lost to N.C. State—nor have I changed my mind because it beat Clemson—I felt that way last summer and told Krzyzewski that, not that he does care or should care what I think. What’s more I was NOT against him doing it once because it is—and should be—a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. It was the second time around that he didn’t need in terms of time or energy or ego. He’d done all that. (Note to guy who pointed out that Jim Boeheim is an assistant coach and doing fine: Being an assistant is wholly different. Not only is Krzyzewski giving up time, his entire staff is involved in the effort. Plus, coincidence or not, Syracuse missed the NCAA’s two years in a row right after Boeheim became an assistant).
Anyway, the big defense was, “being Olympic coach has energized him.” Really? Being the Duke coach doesn’t provide enough challenge or energy? I would think going 3-7 the last five years against his good friend Ole Roy while not coming close to a Final Four would be enough to energize Mike Krzyzewski…
And finally, from the category of why it is often tough to take women’s sports that seriously: Two Georgetown women’s players and one Louisville player were suspended by The Big East after a pre-game brawl nine days ago. When the league announced the suspensions it refused to identify the players even though it would become apparent who they were the next time the teams played. Okay, that’s just plain ridiculous.
Then, on Saturday, after Kenya Kirkland (a tri-captain) and Tia McBride were absent from her team’s win over DePaul, Georgetown Coach Terry Williams-Flournoy said this: “I think there’s a privacy right that those kids should have. They’re kids. They’re children. Their names shouldn’t be put out there like that.”
Huh? They play COLLEGE basketball and are old enough to vote. People are asked to pay money to watch them play which means anything they do in that public domain is public. Children? They made a mistake, they were suspended. It happens all the time. Claiming some ludicrous right to privacy just makes everyone involved look stupid…
And then there was this: During the Maryland-North Carolina State men’s game Saturday night, the PA Announcer at the corporate-named Center that replaced Cole Field House pleaded with fans to buy tickets for the next night’s Maryland-Duke women’s game. “Come see the best rivalry in women’s college basketball,” he said.
There aren’t many rivalries in women’s college basketball that anyone not in uniform or related to those in uniform cares about. In fact there’s one: Connecticut-Tennessee. That’s the list.
Then, after Duke had won a close game on Sunday, Maryland Coach Brenda Frese said this: “This proves we can play with anyone.”
Really? Her team loses at home to a team that lost at home earlier in the week BY THIRTY-THREE to Connecticut and this proves her team can play with anybody? Sometimes I think coaches—in all sports—just throw stuff out there and figure it will go un-challenged because often it does. If Duke and Maryland combined forces they would lose to U-Conn by 20. NO ONE in the women’s game can play with Connecticut right now—which is a problem for the women’s game.
Maybe Frese should have insisted on not making public the names of the women on her team who missed shots. You know, they’re just children. They have a right to privacy.
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