Monthly Archives: November 2011

by | November 30, 2011 · 8:46 am

Rules Rant: Offsetting penalties

I could have written about the Suhspension today, but that felt like beating a dead horse with another dead horse.  There’s also the firing of Del Rio in Jacksonville and the ownership mess there, but then I decided that I really just don’t care.  So instead I’m going to throw another tantrum about the confusing, and often times maddening, NFL rulebook.

Let’s say you are being chased by a serial killer through some alleys.  Its late at night, you’re scared, and he looks like this!

AAAAAAH!

This isn’t a whimsical shampoo commercial, he’s out for blood!  Eventually you come across a busy street and run across it.  The police notice this commotion and pick both of you up.  The other dude is carrying a huge knife, so he gets charged with attempted murder and you get charged for jaywalking.  What if the police eventually ruled that these things cancelled each other out and you were both free to go.  This wouldn’t make any sense, right?  Of course it wouldn’t.

Such is my issue with offsetting penalties.

In the NFL when one team commits a personal foul, like roughing the passer or an illegal blow to the head, it can be cancelled out by a holding penalty.  Once again the league seems to be talking out of both sides of its mouth.  If we are really going to send the message that player safety is important, and players should be held accountable for their actions, how does this rule make any sense?

There are a variety of solutions but the one that makes the most sense to me is simply marking off the distance in yards.  I don’t think this should carry over to every foul per se.  A ten yard holding penalty and a five yards offside penalty can still cross each other out because there is nothing malicious there.  But teams that commit major penalties like unnecessary roughness should have to eat the difference in yards and replay the down.  I think you also take the automatic first down out of the personal foul when there is offsetting penalties.

Now as far as debating when the referees call a personal foul like roughing the passer?  I’m not touching that one.  I actually have to get some stuff done this week.  What do you think?  Is the way the rules set up actually fair?  Or is this just something you couldn’t give two shits about?

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by | November 29, 2011 · 7:59 am

The Unveiling of the Stevie Johnson Memorial Moves Like Jagger Award

I was going to write about Josh Freeman being really disappointing this week, but I’m not sure that I need to go into detail about it. Dude has 12 TDs vs 16 picks, his team has lost 5 straight, and his hair isn’t as awesome as it could be.

Josh Freeman's non-football ventures

So yeah, there’s your favorite player sucks. Maybe I’ll expand if he tosses two INTs to the Panthers next week.

What really pushed me away from writing about Freeman was last night’s lashing on Monday Night Football. There are plenty of storylines coming from last night’s game, and a lot of them are interesting. The Saints stay ahead of the Falcons, the Giants are on a 3 game skid, not mentioning Mark Ingram without saying his dad is in jail (okay, maybe that’s not interesting at all and more annoying than anything). But what I liked more than anything last night was the dancing. Oh, the dancing. With 73 points scored between both teams, there was a lot of celebrating. So here are last night’s nominees for what I am now calling the Stevie Johnson Memorial Moves Like Jagger Award:

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Lance Moore Does the Bernie

After his second touchdown of the night (and on my fantasy bench, naturally), Lance Moore dropped the touchdown and decided to do a move known as the Bernie. I loved every second of it, especially the nod before and after.

My favorite part is what the video doesn’t cover: how he grabs the football and runs all the way to the other side of the field. I thought the celebration was going to continue, but instead he Barry Sanders’d it to the ref on the far side. Like I said, I loved it, but I don’t think the Giants did. Because when they scored, Brandon Jacobs had his own dance.

Brandon Jacobs Dances for an Uncomfortably Long Time

Look at that big boy go. I didn’t like a lot on this drive. I didn’t like the defenseless receiver call on Quddus. I didn’t like the lack of tackling from the Saints. I didn’t like the fact that 21-10 was now more manageable for the Giants than 21-3.

But boy do I love those moves. If I hated on it, it would just be out of envy.

I think a lot of Saints fans had a problem with how long it went on, but I kind of liked it. It made the Saints angry; they played Jacobs harder, and he didn’t do too much more for the rest of the game. Also, no one should ever make a big man stop dancing.

The Dunks: How To Do It

Getty Images

Jimmy Graham. Look at the elevation. And he didn’t even break the goalpost this time!

How Not To Do It

So...close...

Aw, Drew. Poor guy, too short to get up there and dunk it. I love that he apologized to Michael Jordan for this.

Keeping With Basketball: The (Sorta) Alley-Oop!

The best part of this video (found here) is not so much the celebration, but the way Pierre Thomas waves Aaron Ross away. “Dude. You’re not going to catch me. You’re going to spend one more breath than you have to. Save it for when you really need it, man.” At least that’s what I thought his brief hand wave said. It could have been a mocking wave telling Ross to try and tackle him. Whatever, I like my version better.

But then when he gets into the end zone, he waits for Jermon Bushrod to come celebrate, then tosses him the ball so the left tackle can spike it. This was obviously planned, and while I’m making up conversations that probably never happened, why not add this one:

Pierre: Jermon…I’m sorry. I had sex with your girlfriend.

Jermon: Dude. That’s not cool.

Pierre: I’m sorry man, I was drunk and she…I’m sorry. How can I make it up to you?

Jermon: Can I have sex with your girlfriend?

Pierre: No.

Jermon: Oh. Well, can I spike the ball if you score?

Pierre: Fine. But only if it’s a TD that puts us up by 25 points.

Jermon: Oh come on, that’ll never happen.

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So those are the nominees. And the winner is…this is so exciting!

Brandon Jacobs Dances for an Uncomfortably Long Time!

I know my Saints fans will be upset with me for this, but there is sound logic behind it. After last night and three straight losses, the Giants needed to win something.

Go ahead, big fella. You dance all night. Nobody’s stopping you.

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by | November 28, 2011 · 10:51 am

Monday Morning Jerkface: Week 12

With the Monday night game still to come, there weren’t any surprising results in week 12 but plenty of surprising moments.  With the Suhspension still on the horizon, there’s plenty to talk about!   I just told Microsoft Word to learn the word “Suhspension” by the way, as I doubt this is the last time I’ll be using it.

On the inside, I'm still laughing

Stevie’s Dance

By now I hope you have seen Stevie Johnson’s epic touchdown dance but if not, click the link.  After Buffalo takes a 13-7 lead against the Jets on Sunday he starts to dance, and them pretends to shoot himself in the leg before transforming into a Jet and crashing into the ground.  The first part of this dance is obviously aimed at Plaxico Burress who spent a bit of time in prison after accidentally shooting himself in the leg at a night club.  I was monitoring twitter closely when this happened, and the response was interesting to say the least.

At first everyone was laughing their ass off, posting and retweeting links to the dance.  Then as time went on a different group of people began to let their voice be heard.  It was the party poopers who thought this was a disrespectful and awful act.  I saw people calling for fines.  Well, it certainly was disrespectful…but to what level should we really be concerned about this?  Charlie Sheen’s meltdown has been referenced and parodied by people in his field, why is this any different?  If you don’t like the dance I understand, but lets just keep it in perspective.  If the personalities and celebrations I didn’t care for weren’t on center stage, my enjoyment of the game would probably be lessened.  The league could stand to be a little bit more fun from time to time.  Burress himself didn’t have much of a problem with it, saying that the mockery “Doesn’t bother me at all”.  The only people Johnson really has to apologize to are his teammates for getting a penalty.  And for the record, the gunshot part of the celebration didn’t even earn the penalty.  It was when he went to the ground that the flags came out.

That being said, I wouldn’t have a problem if Plax was pissed off.  The prison term was no doubt a very hard time in his life.  Jets fans have a right to boo Johnson, post about it on message boards, etc, but that’s where it ends.  Being made fun of is a small price to pay for being paid millions of dollars to play a game and I think Burress understands that, so good for him.

After all, he did get the last laugh.  Perhaps the next time Plaxico scores a touchdown against the Bills he will throw the ball up in the air and then drop it, Stevie Johnson style.

Tebow time…sort of.

Every week I say to people, “this just can’t keep happening” and then like clock work, once a week…it happens.

His passing stats were not completely abysmal (9 for 18 for 143 yards) but he certainly didn’t look all that impressive once again.  It took two missed field goals from Nick Novak and another incredible effort by the Broncos defense to seal the overtime victory.  It’s going to be hard to reason with Tebow-maniacs until he loses a few games, so I will avoid making anymore rational arguments until then, as I really don’t like being shouted down by people who just keep saying “HE WON THE GAME!” as if I am arguing a different point.

In a somewhat related story, as they were also involved in the game, the Chargers have apparently just quit on Norv Turner.  I don’t condone pro athletes doing such a thing, but I think if he was my boss at McDonald’s or something I’d probably react in a similar fashion as he just doesn’t seem to be an inspiring figure.  Which begs the question, why is Norv Turner trying to run the west coast offense at a McDonald’s?  I think I’ve made some good points here.

More Romo

I know there are a few people who thought the guest piece on Romo was a little unfair.  After all, Romo has been criticized by the media as hard as almost any QB in the league and to argue that he is given a pass can seem on the surface slightly disingenuous.  Thing of it is, there is a part of the media who have reacted entirely too hard in the other direction.

Take NFL.com columnist Michael Lombardi, a highly respected journalist who has worked with Bill Walsh and Bill Belichick in the past.  He wrote about Tony Romo after Thanksgiving and tried to explain his tendency to throw interceptions.

“Too much is made of Romo’s interceptions, especially early in the game.  He is like the centerfielder in baseball that can get to almost every ball, which is why he has more errors than a player that can’t cover as much ground”, Lombardi said, and my head exploded.

The Dolphins turned two early game interceptions to a combined total of 3 points.  If they had capitalized on these two picks, which set them up with great field position each time, it is very possible that the Cowboys do not win.  It is easy to glorify late game heroics, and over simplify everything else.  It’s not always as easy to take a look at what happens in a game and put it in perspective logically.  Against a better team he will not be able to get away with this.  The part about playing center field is too goofy to even dignify with a response.

That being said, Romo is playing pretty well overall the last month and has the Cowboys in position to win the NFC East.

Other Stuff

-Interesting thing happened in Baltimore on Thursday night: the 49ers couldn’t run the ball.  And when they can’t run the ball, Alex Smith looks…well, like Alex Smith.  Defensive coordinators definitely took note.

-The Houston Texans are being decimated by a gypsy curse.  They have already lost their best defensive player for the year, their starting QB for the year, their best WR for several weeks, and earlier in the year their best running back for a few weeks…now back-up QB Matt Leinart looks like he is probably done for the year with a broken collarbone.  We are sending them a copy of the Stephen King book “Thinner” in hopes that it provides some kind of solution to the problem.  If you don’t get that joke, it probably means you have good taste!

-The Buccaneers should just wear their awful orange uniforms the rest of the year, since they seem to be as woeful as the teams that donned those putrid things years ago.

-The revised Suh apology seems like it was written by the commissioner himself.  How about that!

-Caleb Hanie threw three picks against Oakland on Sunday but still almost led them to a come from behind victory.  If he would have been any worse the Bears might have tried to explore other options, and if he would have been any better they’d probably feel comfortable.  It will be interesting to see how those NFC wild card spots are sorted out.

Enjoy Monday Night football everyone!

Posted by Ben Van Iten

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by | November 25, 2011 · 10:11 am

Guest Post: Romo Reaction (Or, “The Skirt Steak”)

Today’s post is from Thomas Holzerman, fan of the blog and writer of the fun and informative The Wrestling Blog. Holzerman loves wrestling, the Eagles, and unabashed hatred for certain quarterbacks. Watch as he proves it below!

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What’s the difference between Tony Romo and Rex Grossman? Well, other than the fact that Romo is good more often than Grossman is? Whenever Grossman screws up, people rightfully call him out on his mistakes. Whenever Romo screws up, it’s shrugged off and swept under the rug. Don’t believe me? Just turn on ESPN. Romo has a bad game, and not a word is spoken about how bad he plays. When he plays in a mediocre fashion, but is bailed out by DeMarco Murray or DeMarcus Ware or someone else on the other team (who may or may not have a first name prefixed by “De”), he’s praised like he actually did something.

Okay, before I get any further, I’ll have to provide full disclosure here. I am a rabid Eagles fan, and there are few entities in this world I hate more than the Dallas Cowboys. Then again, I have no problem pointing out when someone on that team is a good player. Ware, for example, is a guy that I wish wasn’t on the Cowboys so I could root for him, because the guy is a beast. Miles Austin is another player that I wouldn’t be mad at torching my team if he didn’t have that dang-blasted star on the side of his helmet. Jason Witten, Murray, hell, even Dez Bryant guys that are only on my shit list because of the team they play on.

So maybe I’m not biased when I say that Tony Romo makes Jason Campbell look like Aaron Rodgers, Aaron Rodgers look like Joe Montana and Joe Montana look like Joe Montana from Tecmo Super Bowl played by an expert against the computer on preseason mode. Maybe in this case, I am the only sane one in the lot, while the rabble from the networks and major news sites are the ones out of whack. Or maybe I’m just crazy.

Either way, I look at Romo’s performance against the Redskins on Monday night in week 3, one where he missed a ton of throws, led his team to exactly zero touchdowns and threw one pick and thought that his defense and kicker bailed him out. I listen to the narrative though, and one might think that he was John Elway in an AFC Championship game against the Browns. More recently, I look at what he did against the Dolphins on Thanksgiving and see that he had a mediocre game, totally outplayed by Matt Moore. The stats bear that out, as Romo’s rating was 78.8 and he threw two picks to go with his two touchdowns and 226 yards. Moore’s rating, however, was 99.5, and he threw no interceptions to go with his touchdown and 288 yards.

I’m very much a believer that statistics can tell a story in sports analysis. Unlike in baseball though, stats rarely if ever tell the whole story in football. It’s the nature of the game. Many people will say that Romo’s performance transcended the numbers here. Okay, if I hadn’t watched the game, maybe I could buy that. However, that’s not the case. I saw a good bit of the game, and yeah, the stats told a good part of the story here, at least on Romo’s end.

The second touchdown drive by Dallas was telling in how much Romo was aided by good fortune. The first play of the drive, Romo was being chased for his life by Cameron Wake. The former CFL standout defensive end had Romo in the grasp by the ankles, bringing him down. Romo heaved a desperation ball up that he incredulously completed to Murray. Vontae Davis had a clear shot at the ball, but mistimed it by a second. Furthermore, Kevin Burnett read the ball the wrong way and ran in the other direction. Murray got there at the exact right time after playing the ball in exactly the right fashion. That completion and catch and run was all Murray, as Romo had no control over how far or where that ball was going to go. He had a similar play where he was hit as the ball was coming out, but it went right to Laurent Robinson in a stroke of luck.

The straw that broke the camel’s back for me was the play right before the touchdown. Romo scrambled around and was just about to take a sack from Marvin Mitchell. As he was hit, he shot putted a ball that went knuckling on a high arc. Witten reacted to it, ran right to the ball, and made an amazing play to save a first down. On the next play, Romo finally made a good pass, sending a laser to Robinson in the end zone on a play that even I couldn’t hate on.

That being said, Romo threw five passes on that drive. Three of them were completed on sheer luck. However, listening to Phil Simms call the game, one might think that Romo had something more to do with the balls getting to their receivers than fortune, his receivers making plays or the defense being slightly out of position did. He praised Romo for making the throws when they counted as if he was throwing tight spirals in holes before feeling the pressure. On all three throws in question, he got hit by the defense. On that first play, he made a throw that every offensive coach would tell their quarterback NEVER to make. Simms said Romo was making escapes. I don’t know what he was smoking, but no, he didn’t make any escapes. Donovan McNabb eluding Cowboys pass rushers in that legendary scramble and toss to Freddie Mitchell on Monday night about five or so years back? That’s escaping. Michael Vick shedding defenders like he’s covered in grease? That’s escaping. Ben Roethlisberger shrugging off would-be sackers like they were mayflies before resetting his feet and throwing bullets? That’s escaping. Getting hit and tossing wounded ducks is not escaping.

Simms to me exemplifies the problem with Romo. It’s not that he’s schlepping through games and nominally helping the Cowboys win. Well, it is, but the thing that makes it even more infuriating is that Simms is part of a HUGE echo chamber of cognitive dissonance as to the glaring flaws of this guy. It’s the same principle that I don’t want to eat skirt steak and have people insist to me that it’s filet mignon. Tony Romo is skirt steak. Simms, Skip Bayless, and even to a point Dan Levy (and I like Dan, I really do) want to tell me that he’s filet mignon.

Of course, when Romo invariably fails sometime in December and/or January, it eases my black, bitter heart, but at the same time, I guess I just don’t like hearing people spread lies so blatantly. Tony Romo isn’t a legendarily terrible quarterback, but to pretend that he’s anything more than a rich man’s Rex Grossman is bad journalism.  Maybe it just annoys me more because it’s a member of the evil, dirty, squalid, fetid Cowboys being pumped up, but then again, why should we stand for mediocrity and misplaced credit being given where it doesn’t deserve?

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by | November 23, 2011 · 11:26 am

Reckless Gambling: Thanksgiving Edition

For most of us, gambling on sports is not entirely legal.  But that doesn’t stop us from discussing hypothetical situations.  For instance, let’s say you drive down to your local sports bar the day before Thanksgiving and you ask them for a parlay card.  The cops know about them, hell some of them even play.  Feel the hypothetical rush as you pick winners, losers, overs, and unders!  Suddenly, turkey day is more exciting than ever!  Holy crap, your team is covering!  You’re high fiving Aunt Janet!  You’re winning money!  It’s so easy!  Pass the corn! Yay gambling! 

Pretty much the cheesiest pic I could find

Potential side effects: losing all of your goddamn money.

This is quite possibly the most compelling day of Thanksgiving football in recent memory; either that I’m just exaggerating like everyone else that discusses football on the internet.  Regardless, here are my gambling thoughts on the day’s games.

Take the over in Green Bay/Detroit – The Packers are favored by 6 points, and while I’m not willing to touch that bet there is still money to be made in this game.  56 is a big number, but these two teams score a lot of points (they each average over 30) and their defenses have had issues at times this season.  Combine that with the fact that the game is indoors and this bet seems like a pretty good idea.  Even if the Lions offense struggles against some of Dom Capers’ trap defenses that could very well mean that Stafford throws 3 picks and GB turns them all into touchdowns.  So, points.  I was going to lay out a scenario where Aaron Rodgers struggles, but I don’t have that good of an imagination!  Yes I’m trying to create a world where Packer fans become as unbearable as Patriots fans.

Dolphins (+7) against the Cowboys – During pregame warm-ups expect team captains to share a good laugh about how badly they’ve each beaten the Bills the last few weeks, but then its down to business.  Expect Dallas to score a long touchdown to Dez Bryant on the first possession and then go dormant for a while as is their usual protocol lately.  But then the Dolphins are going to transport us all into a magical dimension where Matt Moore is a good QB, Reggie Bush is a quality NFL running back, and Brandon Marshall doesn’t act like a big time jackass all the time.  The Dolphins are even talking playoffs now, isn’t that cute!  Anyway, I still think the Cowboys win this game but look for a late touchdown to make it close.  On a side note, doesn’t Jason Garrett look like a Cub Scout leader?  He definitely wouldn’t have fit in when Charles Haley was taking his dick out all the time.

Baltimore (-3) to cover against the Niners – First of all, I’m truly shocked it took our sports media this long to coin the term “Harbowl” for this game.  One of the more popular narratives going into this one is that the Ravens are inconsistent, and while that is true they still have not lost at home.  At first this line gave me the creeps because the number is so small, almost makes me feel like Vegas knows something I don’t (which they usually do) but then I remembered how good the 49ers are and I felt better.  The younger Harbaugh has them playing at a level that week in and week out makes more and more people believers, but this is their toughest game of the year and it just feels like its time for them to drop one.  Yes, how’s that for analysis?  “Just feels like its time”.  You’re welcome!  Going from a home game in California to a road game in Maryland with only 3 days of preparation is pretty brutal as well.  Older brother wins by ten and gives Jim a noogie instead of a handshake. 

Happy Holidays, and good luck!

Posted by Ben Van Iten. 

 

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