The Game of Perfection
Posted: December 30th, 2009 | Filed under: Other Sports | 96 Comments »
Yes, the Indianapolis Colts thing has already been wrestled to the ground and kicked a few times by now, but I want to point out some interesting work by Brilliant Reader Jonathan on the subject that you might startle you. Well, “startle” might be an over-verb. I don’t suppose I have been startled by football stats in a while.* The point is it’s good stuff.
*Actually this isn’t true — I was startled to learn that Ben Roethlisberger this year became the first Steelers quarterback ever to throw for 4,000 yards. I mean … three Kansas City Chiefs quarterbacks have thrown for 4,000 yards in a season (and you would have to be a real fan to know those three are Trent Green, Elvis Grbac and Bill Kenney). I mean … Jeff George, Jake Plummer, Scott Mitchell, Kerry Collins, Marc Bulger and Steve Beuerlein have thrown for 4,000 yards. Please.
Back to the Colts. First, I should probably say that watching the 14-0 Colts give up against the Jets was one of the odder and more conflicted sports viewing experiences of my life.
The reason is this: I am not particularly swept away by the perfection bug that seems to be sweeping American sports. Or, anyway, that’s what I told myself. Sure, perfection was fun when they were giving Nadia Comeneci 10s back in ‘76. It’s fun when a pitcher throws a perfect game*. And it’s fun to play the board game Perfection.**
*I especially used to love the tradition of radio and television announcers refusing to say anything about the perfect game for fear of jinxing it. Sadly, this bit of voodoo mostly has gone away — it seems we have become too sophisticated as a society to believe that, you know, an announcer calling a game 80 feet above the field of play can hex a pitcher and produce a hit by saying a few words the players cannot hear. I miss it though — miss the extraordinarily uncomfortable way announcers would try to talk around the story without actually MENTIONING the story. I always thought it would be fun to write a story about a perfect game without saying that it was a perfect game. But the only perfect game I ever saw was in Japan, a clinching game of the Japan Series, and it was thrown by two pitchers (yes, the starter was pulled during a perfect game), and it was just too odd a game to try my little trick.
**When you’re into Perfection
Keep on your toes.
You gotta be quick
Cause here’s how it goes.
Pull the plunger down, set the timer
Fit the pieces in place, don’t be slow
With Perfection, you’ve gotta move on fast
(move on fast)
or the pieces pop out before you put in the last.
And that’s Perfection!
That, friends, is the best ever commercial jingle that fully explained how a kid’s game was played. Or at least I think so. I put the beginning of the jingle up on Twitter figuring FOR SURE that people would be climbing over each other to finish it. But, actually, no one responded. Not one person. Weird. Maybe I’m the only one who remembers the jingle.
But these days, there’s just perfection overload. College football teams have to be perfect or the season is pretty much meaningless. And even if a team IS perfect, that’s no guarantee that it will be playing in the meaningful bowl game either.
If you watch any golf tournament, you are bombarded by announcers declaring “That drive was absolutely perfect” or “He hit the putt perfectly.” “That chip was perfection.” On and on. And none of these shots actually go in the hole. It is so overbearing that at some point I invented the word “Perquist” — an homage to Verne Lundquist — to describe “a golf shot that does not go into the hole and, as such, falls short of perfection … but it’s still a really good shot.” So far, the term has not caught on, and golfers keep on hitting perfect shots that do not go in.
A free throw that goes in might be called perfect. A serve that hits line might be called perfect. A screen pass on a blitz might be the perfect call, and a fastball on the outside corner might be the perfect pitch, and a hitter can go a perfect three-for-three, and a cross that finds the head of a streaking teammate might be the perfect pass, and a defender who prevents a receiver from catching a ball was probably playing perfect coverage, and a bloop that drops in front of the outfielder is perfectly placed, and a triple lutz landed without a bobble will most definitely be called perfect. It just never occurred to me before that perfection was so easy to come by.
The New England Patriots a couple of years ago really heightened this perfect storm.* By going 16-0 during the regular season, they convinced America that there could be a larger purpose to this game of professional football — and to sports in general. The Patriots were not just after the Super Bowl trophy. No, they were after history. They were after the ultimate. They wanted to fly close to the sun. They wanted this thing called perfection.
*See what I did there?
And they almost pulled it off — the 19-0 season. They made it all the way to the Super Bowl, and they had the lead late in the game, and it took one of the more improbable throws and catches in football history for the Giants to win and turn the Patriots perfect season to stone. The ‘72 Dolphins players raised their glasses of champagne* like they do every year when the last team loses, and there was some talk about whether or not the perfect football season was, in fact, fool’s gold.
*The 1972 Dolphins have been a target of our friend Michael Schur/Ken Tremendous, whose most recent Tweet on the subject was as follows: “Congrats to the 1972 Dolphins! Even though the 2006 Iowa State Cyclones could beat you by 40, you’re still the best ever!!!!” Michael feels that the game has changed so much that the 1972 Dolphins could not stay on the field with today’s bigger, stronger, faster players. I think that’s a tough to argue.
But I’ve come to find it oddly charming and funny that they toast each every year after the last team loses … hey, why not? I always think about the late and great Hank Bauer, who used to have the World Series hitting streak record. We called him up once when someone — Marquis Grissom, I think — was close to breaking it and asked him how he felt about it. We expected the usual “Records are made to be broken” tripe. Instead he said: “Hell no, I don’t want my record broken.” I thought that was a lot more human.
All of this is just a long-winded way to say that I really was prepared to not care when the Colts pulled their starters against the New York Jets on Sunday. So what? The Super Bowl is the thing, right? They don’t give you a bigger trophy for being perfect, right? Getting a key player hurt in Week 15 against the Jets while chasing some sort of bland form of perfection to me would be the height of narcissism. And that’s another point: Is this really all it takes to be “perfect” Just don’t lose? If the Patriots get an extra six inches on fourth down, the Colts lose. The Dolphins thoroughly outplayed the Colts in Week 2 and lost on a Peyton Manning rally. The Ravens could not punch it in from the 1-yard line and they threw an interception late or they probably would have won. Jacksonville — not exactly a powerhouse — scored on every drive for the first three quarters against Indy and then blew up late. And so on. Understand, this is not to downplay the brilliance of the Colts — they had won their first 14 games, and that’s what matters, and it was a magnificent thing. But perfect?
The point, again, is I was prepared to not care at all if the Colts rested their starters in order to prepare for the playoffs. I felt sure that I was burned out on perfection.
And then they pulled Peyton Manning and the first-team guys, and a funny thing happened. Suddenly, inexplicably, I was furious. I yelled at the television. All of those feelings I had so clearly drawn up in my mind went out the window. It was one thing, in theory, to say that the Colts owed it to themselves to play it smart and do what they felt like they had to do in order to make a Super Bowl run.
But it was quite another thing to watch an undefeated team pull its starters and throw a game against the New York Jets. I know what I WANTED to feel. But what I DID feel was that the Colts had spit in the eye of history. What I DID feel was that that Colts had cheated their fans and football fans. What I DID feel was that the Colts had cheated themselves.
You could see it on the faces of the players, too. They did not want to lost their undefeated streak this way. They KNEW it was wrong to lose from the sidelines — they just knew it. Football players only have so many games. Football teams only have so many chances to do something memorable. Everyone in football only have so many shots at writing sports history. Laugh at the ‘72 Dolphins if you like, but here they are, 37 years later, and you know who they are, you know they went undefeated. They are men in later life who once a year get the chance to toast … themselves.
I mentioned at the start a bit of research down by Brilliant reader Jonathan Joyce. He wanted to see if momentum exists in the NFL playoffs — that is, if it actually matters if a team loses apparently meaningless games at the end of the year.
What he found was … yeah, momentum actually might matter. Well, sure, you can read the data any way you like, and I’m sure there’s plenty of counter-data. But here’s what I took out of Jonathan’s work:
1. Only three of the last 15 Super Bowl winners lost their last regular season game — none went into the playoffs with a 2-game losing streak.
2. Only four of the last 15 Super Bowl LOSERS lost their last regular season game — and only the 2005 Philadelphia Eagles lost two going into the playoffs.
3. Every Super Bowl winner or loser the last 15 years, except one, went into the playoffs with a winning record in its last five games. Nine of the 30 were 5-0 going into the playoffs. The one exception: You got it, the 2007 Indianapolis Colts, who were 2-3 in their final five games.
4. There is some anecdotal evidence that losing the last game of the season — even if that game seems meaningless — might not be a great plan. Just in the last 10 years …
– Last year, the Tennessee Titans had the best record in football at 13-3. They rested their starters in a 23-0 loss to Indy in the final week of the season. They lost their first playoff game.
– Last year, the New York Giants tied for the best record in the NFC and were defending Super Bowl champs. They rested their starters late and lost to Minnesota in the final week. They were bludgeoned by Philadelphia in their first playoff game.
– In 2007, the Dallas Cowboys tied for the best record in the NFC at 13-3. They rested starters in the final week, a 27-6 humiliation at the hands of rival Washington. The Cowboys lost their first playoff game.
– In 2000, the Minnesota Vikings were 11-2 and considered perhaps the best team in football. They lost their last three games of the season. They did win a playoff game against the Saints. But they were promptly obliterated 41-0 in New York — I had the misfortune of being at that game. I have never seen a team give so little in a game that mattered.
– In 1999, the Indianapolis Colts were 13-2 going into the final week of the season, and they got demolished 31-6 in Buffalo (hey aren’t the Colts going to Buffalo this week?). The Colts lost their first playoff game to Tennessee (a team that won its last four regular season games and went all the way to the Super Bowl).
And so on. Now, look, this doesn’t prove anything at all. I could point out that the 1997 Kansas City Chiefs, with the AFC’s best record, won their last six games of the season and still lost their first playoff game. Meanwhile, the 2006 Chicago Bears rested their starters in the last week of the season, got crushed, and still went to the Super Bowl. There are no hard rules here. All of this searching for momentum might be mumbo jumbo.
But there might be something to it, too. Football, I think, is the most emotional of big-time American team sports. The emotional gap between winning and losing, I think, is much wider than in baseball or basketball or hockey. It is that way for the fans, and it is that way for the coaches, and it is that way for the players. The game is painful to play. The game is excruciating to coach. The game is emotional to watch. All of it is violent beyond words. And to give so much of yourself and LOSE, well, as football players have been saying for decades now — the bruises and cracked ribs and twisted limbs hurt a hell of a lot more when you lose.
So I think it’s logical that a team that goes into the playoffs winning feels more confident, more focused and more alive. The Colts’ story has not been written yet. They might roll right through the playoffs, win the Super Bowl, and leave everyone to admit that, yeah, maybe it was a good decision to rest the starters. Or maybe they win the Super Bowl and leave everyone to wonder if they could have gone undefeated had they shown the backbone. Or maybe they will lose before they even get to the Super Bowl, leaving everyone to wonder if they were just victims of their own bad karma.
I don’t know the right answer. I don’t even know that it was wrong to do what Jim Caldwell and the Colts did. I can definitely see the other side. I only know that when I saw Peyton Manning stewing on the sideline while the Colts’ undefeated season flushed away, that it FELT wrong. Because, I guess, at the end of the day, if you’re not trying to be perfect … what are you trying to be?
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“Laugh at the ‘72 Dolphins if you like, but here they are, 37 years later, and you know who they are, you know they went undefeated.”
This, for me, is the key: going undefeated for the whole season means being remembered by everyone and not simply grouped together with every other Super Bowl winner (granted, not all SB winners are equal). And in the end, it’s human nature in most of us to want to be remembered, so I would guess the players themselves feel the same way about giving up the chance to be singled out for their accomplishments.
I find the momentum vs. rest argument to be utterly beside the point. It seems to be an attempt to shoehorn logic in defense of an emotional position.
The Colts this past week confirmed something that had been burrowing around my mind since the Yankees won the World Series: winning a championship is not the reason you play the game. There is a lot of great baseball competition to enjoy, despite uneven playing field, and even if the Colts win the Super Bowl, they will regret their spitting in the spirit of sport.
If you can explain it to the team, if you can plan for it, if everyone is on the same page, then this was a reasonable decision. This is obviously not what happened. Peyton damn near lost his mind arguing that he needed to go back in. You do not do this to Peyton Manning. You do not, as an organization, decide that the premier (or one of the two premier) quarterback(s) 0f the last decade doesn’t deserve to win games he worked for. You don’t take him out of a game he’s winning and pat him on the back and say “good try champ”. Can you imagine how he’ll feel if they win the Superbowl? How much “what if” will be involved? They were 14-0! You take history away from them? For what? For negative possible outcomes? What about the other side? Even if they win they will lose. They will be asked about it for the rest of their careers. They have created an unnecessary monster. Sometimes playing things smart is dumb.
It seems to me that the Colts didn’t care if they won or lost. So why even play the game if you don’t care? Why not throw in the towel before the kickoff? I agree with #2, the attitude is against the “spirit of sport.”
I understand the desire to keep the team healthy for the truly important games but I too was furious at the decision.
Ironically, this decision is generally going to go down as a losing decision. Even if they win the SB, people will point fingers at them (not guessing which ones) and say they could have…
And if they lose – as they have done every year they coasted through the final few games – then I’d argue that they will just get pounded.
The problem with the Joyce stats is the lack of a comparison to teams that did not make the Super Bowl. That is, while it is interesting that 80% of the teams that won the Super Bowl in the last fifteen years won their last regular season game, how does that compare to other playoff teams? I would suspect that playoff teams in general tend to win their final regular season game because: a) by definition, these are the best teams in the league in any given year; b) some of these teams are playing against teams that have been eliminated from contention and therefore have less incentive to win. I could be wrong, but I don’t think I am. Assuming that playoff teams generally win their last game at a 60 or 70% rate, it makes the Super Bowl figure less interesting.
Every football fan worth his salt felt like they were kicked in the gut…for what…someone’s concept of a fearful future? And yet, sure, everyone could understand the logic of the decision…to a degree. You could understand the logic, but you couldn’t understand the feelings.
It just didn’t feel right…it didn’t feel good!
It felt very similar to when Buck O’Neal had been left out of the Hall of Fame, when everything on the planet suggested he should be there!
And while Colts’ players spewed the party line with grace and diplomacy, you could sense in that essence of them that’s invisible to the eye…there was a bitter resignation that the only thing that prevented them from potential perfection was their own organization.
It’s like someone’s Mom keeping their kid at home, because she’s afraid he might mispell a word in the spelling bee.
Maybe someday – four or five years from now – after the Colts Super Bowl victory has faded like the waters cascading over the falls in Maui, someone named Ersay or Polian will awaken from a deep sleep in the middle of the night and ask himself, “What did I do?” “What was I thinking?”
I would imagine the captain of the Titanic at some point wondered the same thing!
Each collective group of players is different, and differing team “personalities” naturally require each team to be managed differently. This particular decision was made based on a gm personality, not a team personality. That’s the wrong reason to make such decisions.
It will be interesting to see whether the Colts will keep the edge they had, and whether recognition of “keeping healthy,” which was just shoved down their throats, will actually result in critical injuries. Don’t ask professional players to recognize their own mortality, then expect them to play like immortals when the need arises.
And call me sentimental, but when something is (even imperfectly) perfect, don’t fiddle with it.
Did teams even think like this in the old days? The ‘72 Dolphins, to give one example, were already playing with a backup QB from early in the season. They clinched the division title with about four or five weeks to go, and because of the rotation system in use then, they couldn’t even play for HFA. They ended up playing the AFC title game in Pittsburgh.
Was there ever an actual instance where a team had to go into a playoff game seriously shorthanded because of injuries suffered in a non-essential game? The Colts had to use Tom Matte at QB once, but I think that was in a tiebreaker game, so they had to play it all out just to get there.
Because, I guess, at the end of the day, if you’re not trying to be perfect … what are you trying to be?
A Super Bowl winner. Being “perfect” is not a required prerequisite.
I think eyebleaf is right. For me it seems that the head coach or whoever placed more value on a Superbowl than a Superbowl with perfection. I don’t know how that translates into sports psychology and the eventual effects on players and fans or even if it will matter two years from now, but he made a choice: Any injury to a key player in a relatively unimportant game (if you’re playing for the trophy and not perfection) isn’t worth the risk that perfection costs. For me it is that simple. I don’t know if it felt right, I didn’t see the game, but it doesn’t seem that big of a deal. I guess it is because there are so few games in football that this is even an issue. In Baseball, even Basketball I believe, resting players for the playoffs and important games makes sense and is smart. Perfection (in the sense of being undefeated) isn’t the issue, the championship is.
One thing I find kind of funny is this:
If David Tyree didn’t have a football magnet on his shoulders that he calls a “head” then the conventional wisdom on playing your starters down the stretch likely would have shifted with a 19-0 Pats team. People would have started saying things like “One lesson we learned from Bill Belichick is that you never take your foot off the accelerator.”
And here’s my take on the Colts:
If you really don’t care about winning the game, if it truly doesn’t matter, then just play the JV squad. Why on earth would you risk your top guys for 2 1/2 quarters if you are primarily concerned with avoiding injuries? The decision they made was the worst of both worlds. Expose Manning and Co. for 30+ minutes and then suddenly say “no mas” after 14 1/2 games. This is a mixed message of the highest order. You give up the reward, but still subject yourself to the risks.
If you’re determined to be cautious then, dammit, be cautious. Play your scrubs the entire game. At least everyone would know in advance where you stand. People won’t much like it, but it wouldn’t have nearly the same emotional impact (on fans or players) as the awful, sinking feeling of watching a team quit on a game and a record.
Well, I still have no problem with the Colts decision. But let’s talk about the ‘72 Dolphins for a second.
Does anyone still believe that’s the greatest football team in NFL history? I’m sure some people do, but I’m betting it’s a relatively small percentage. Without even getting into how the game has changed over time – just considering each team on its own merits – it has been well documented that the ‘72 Dolphins played one of the easiest NFL schedules ever.
They don’t compare, in my mind, to the ‘62 Packers, the ‘78 Steelers, the ‘84 or ‘89 Niners, the ‘85 Bears, the ‘91 Redskins, or even – gasp – the ‘07 Patriots. I don’t think the ‘72 Dolphins are one of the top five teams ever. I don’t think they’re top 10. They may be top 20, but I could be convinced otherwise.
I think most football fans remember most of the teams I listed above – and yet none of those teams went undefeated. We remember the ‘72 Dolphins as UNIQUE because they were undefeated, but I don’t think we recognize them as being partcularly great.
Just my 2 cents.
adjective inflation is a serious problem in our country. thank you for pointing out how even a precisely defined word like perfection can quickly lose its meaning.
I sure would hate to be a ticket holder for the Colts last 2 games of the season. People pay alot of money to watch their teams play, and if the best players are not playing, well what a waste of money.
Leadership robbed Manning and the players the opportunity to make history. A cryin shame!
Some coach once said “You play to win the game”…
The Colts attitude to the 2nd half of that game reminded me why a college playoff system might not be such a good thing. I imagine the 2nd half of the SEC and Big 12 Championship Games wouldn’t have been as important to Alabama, Florida and Texas had they already “clinched” a spot in the National Championship playoffs. As such, I could see Colt McCoy not risking injury to Nebraska’s pass rush in that 2nd half (and not to say this would happen, but it would have been much better for the Big 12 for NU to win that game if there are national champion playoffs)
There is more meaning in a football season that just winning the Super Bowl–and I think that’s what we realize when we get upset at the Colts intentionally losing to the Jets. Each game matters, which is why the Colts were upset at losing. Also, the whole regular season matters–going undefeated for 16 games in the N.F.L. is both historic, and amazing. To watch Peyton Manning try and reach for 19-0 would have been beautiful, and exciting, and fun. And to throw away the chance at that feat is small minded.
And look–someone wins the Super Bowl every single year. Every year. Only one team has ever gone 16-0 in the regular season. People will remember the 16-0 Patriots more than they remember many Super Bowl winners (look at the Bucs and the Ravens and their victories in the early 1990’s–who gives a crap about those winners of those crappy Super Bowls). The 16-0 Pats will be remembered longer than those two teams.
Moreover, the life of a football player is short. They all play for a chance at greatness, a change to be remembered (they are like heroes from Greek epics in that way–to be remembered is to be immortal). The 09 Colts had a chance at greatness and immortality–and their coaches took it away. The average life of an N.F.L. career is what, three years. This opportunity will not come along again for most, if not all of these players. Greek epic has become Greek tragedy.
Finally, it cannot be said that the Colts traded an undefeated regular season for a Super Bowl win. There is no guarantee that this rest will translate into wins over the Pats, the Chargers, and the Saints (or whoever it is they play). It isn’t even clear that resting their players and losing to the Jets even slightly increased their chances of winning the Super Bowl. So, when it comes down to it, they traded the chance to play for historic greatness for absolutely nothing.
Robert (#6) is right about the context. Teams that reach Super Bowls win a high percentage of games every week of the regular season. I once pulled the records of all Super Bowl participants and championship game participants in each regular season game, to see if there was any pattern. I can’t seem to find that specific info though. IIRC, weeks 1 and 2 had the lowest winning percentage, followed by the last two games. The period where eventual Super Bowl teams had the highest relative winning percentage was from mid season until about game 14. So, yes, they did get hotter as the season went on, but due to maybe playing meaningless games in the final two weeks, didn’t necessarily “stay hot”.
I’m also working on a playoff pressure project, where myself and other volunteers are breaking down the tiebreakers from every season over the last 25. All but 4 are done, and then I need to compile it together. Then we can look at whether performing poorly when it doesn’t matter (the team has already clinched seeding) does matter in playoff performance. That should be posted at the pro football reference blog sometime during this year’s playoffs.
Finally, I’m with those who are disgusted by the Colts resting the starters in the middle of a competitive game, like it was a preseason contest. Manning’s chance of serious injury (that would keep him out of a game on Jan. 17) had to be on the order of way less than 1%. That has to be worth whatever psychological disadvantage you lose by giving up on an undefeated season and maintaining your edge.
Let’s face it. This Colts team has not been historically dominant and is more likely than not to lose in a 12 team tournament than win it all. They aren’t that much better than the teams they will be playing in each round. They should have gone for it.
Joe,
Thanks so much for taking the time to look at my work. I shouldn’t go as far as saying that you have made my holiday season, but in truth you did!
In the immortal words of Herm Edwards: “You play to win the game!”
You can’t second guess an injury that didn’t happen.
Ricky @ 12 is entirely right.
The Colts made a “worst of both worlds” decision. By playing starters into the 3rd, they can’t argue that they had some great concern about avoiding injuries and they heightened the emotional impact of pulling the starters with a lead.
Play them or sit them. Anything else is silliness.
I agree with you Joe! People get pissed when a basketball team starts pulling starters for being ‘injured’ when they’re really not in order to secure a better chance at a lottery pick. I don’t think this is really any different. I just didn’t understand the logic behind this – why play them even half the game if you don’t care about winning? Why would you do this in front of your home crowd, people who paid good money to see your team? THOSE are the people you are playing for!! And why pass up a chance at history?? I mean Manning practically never goes down with injury, he’s been sacked very few times, what’s the worry??
I agree with what a poster above said about the Pats…many people are saying “well the Patriots went for it and see what happened!” Even ignoring Tyree’s impossible catch, let’s not forget that Asante Samuel got his hands on Manning’s throw the play before…it looked like an easy interception, and he dropped it. Had he not, the Pats would be “the perfect team”. And yes I do think the 2007 Pats were the best team of all time, even if I hate their guts
Everyone knows the ‘72 Dolphins, but no one knows the players. Most football fans couldn’t name 5 players from that team.
The only reason I cared about the Colts going perfect was to shut the Dolphins up. Every year we have to listen to Mercury Morris talk about how awesome he is. Tanking a game doesn’t seem to be a very good idea. If it’s a blowout, pull your starters. That was the mistake the Patriots made, they never pulled their starters and just ran up the score. Winning the Super Bowl is more important the going undefeated.
I have a lotta respect for Michael/Ken, but he’s crazy if he doesn’t think Bob Griese and a team of HOFers can beat last year’s Lions or a mid-level NCAA team. That sounds like pure ageism to me. He claimed the ‘72 Dolphins wouldn’t even SCORE against the 0-16 Lions. That’s ridiculous.
I suppose what has everyone up in arms is the way the Colts went about it. Nobody complains (ok, maybe a few complain) when Joe Mauer is rested – we accept that he’s only going to play 150 games or so, barring injury. We also accept it when the manager puts in the B team for the second game of a twi-night double header – even though, objectively speaking, resting Joe Mauer or sitting most of your starters in the second half of a double header hurts your chance at winning that game.
I tend to put my lot in with those who see the strive for an undefeated season as something worth doing – after all, as many have already pointed out, the ‘72 Dolphins are hardly considered among the top 5 or 10 teams ever, yet they are the ones, by virtue of being undefeated, that we *always* talk about.
Think of it another way: I think it has been pretty conclusively demonstrated that Cal Ripken’s pursuit of Lou Gehrig’s record hurt his production. It’s been a while now, but I remember seeing evidence to the effect that the lack of (normal) rest over the course of the season caught up with Cal every August and September, such that his production tailed off noticeably. And, the fact is, Cal wasn’t a great – or even good – hitter after age 30. Yet the Streak is what Ripken will always be remembered for, first and foremost. And I’m sure you couldn’t get him to trade his streak for an extra 10 points of OPS+. In short, we *know* Cal’s production was hurt by the streak, yet we cheered for the streak. Can you imagine the outcry if Cal had been sat 50 games short of the streak?
And although we *know* that there was a risk of injury to the Colts starters by playing them – and thus a risk to the ultimate goal of winning a SB, we wanted the A team out their playing their best.
I imagine the 2nd half of the SEC and Big 12 Championship Games wouldn’t have been as important to Alabama, Florida and Texas had they already “clinched” a spot in the National Championship playoffs.
I think you have a different conception of an NCAA playoff than most people. If there is one, it won’t be March Madness. The most logical playoff, and the one that is most likely, is an 8 team playoff (thus 3 games), with the winners of the 6 BCS conferences and 2 at-large bids. I can’t imagine this year’s Florida or Texas playing at less than 100% because they thought they’d already clinched.
He claimed the ‘72 Dolphins wouldn’t even SCORE against the 0-16 Lions. That’s ridiculous.
Well, don’t forget – most of those guys are well into their 50s by now…
Ok, jokes aside – I don’t think we fully appreciate the physical differences between the generations. An O Lineman today probably plays about 100 lbs more than he did in 1972. So, yeah – as a long-suffering Lions fan, I have no problem imagining last year’s woeful edition (not much worse than this year’s!) beating the ‘72 Dolphins handily.
#7: Buck O’Neil
Joe, I love your blog, but the notion that baseball announcers didn’t use to mention perfect games in progress is a fallacy. Vin Scully, Jack Brickhouse, and Harry Caray all called it as they saw it.
They wimped out, and that won’t cut it in football
I don’t know Peyton Manning personally. Don’t know if he is a jerk or an angel. But the guy has been the best quarterback that ever played. To take away a chance for this career guy who has done what he has done over the years to achieve a perfect season is unthinkable and beyond defense. Not only was it a crime to deprive Manning and company (a team I love to see lose by the way) from a chance at history, but it was a crime to all those teams that are involved in the wildcard chase. Don’t forget that the Colts’ rollover also benefitted a Jets team in its playoff chances and that should never happen. The Colts’ leadership should be ashamed of themselves and their fans have every right to be screaming bloody murder.
I’m a Jets fan, and I wanted the Colts to go for it. I think if Peyton still had the monkey on his back about not having won the big one, then I could see doing everything you thought was best to win that Super Bowl. But they already won one. Having that one already should have made it easier for them to say, you know what, we’re going for it.
And the other part of it is the year they did finally win, they did not have a bye in the first week. They hosted the AFC title game because they were the 3 and New England was the 4 that year, the Colts and Pats having beaten the one and the 2 to get there. In the other years when the Colts have clinched homefield/a bye early and rested their starters, they have been upset at home in the playoffs (by the Steelers and Chargers). So whatever the league-wide trends, there is some history specific to the Colts that suggests resting everyone after they’ve clinched does not work out for them.
As a teen, Chuck Norris impregnated every nun in a covet in the back hills of Tunsca, nine months later the nuns gave birth to the 1972 Miami Dolphins, the only undefeated and untied team in professional history.
If the Colts had been 13-1, it still would have been wrong to take out all of the players. Turning the game into a farce was unfair to the fans and the other teams, if not the Colts players themselves.
I would think that the coaches could have devised a game plan that was conservative (lots of rushing?) and gave the starters lots of rest (give the 5th string wr more plays? take out the OL who is banged up but leave in the other guys?), without turning the game into a joke.
Here’s the thing that gets me – if the superbowl is all that matters, and you want to avoid a Peyton injury, then why in the hell was Peyton left in to play the whole game against the Cards, Rams, and Titans – all games where they were up 20+ in the 4th quarter? Why didn’t injury risk matter then?
Joe, that Perfection jingle is, well, perfection. And Perfection is still a good game to play as an adult… or so I hear. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3syQV7WDAU
Felt the same way as Joe, even though I was with a bunch of Jet fans rooting furiously for Gang Green and the idea of this Colts’ team going undefeated seemed offensive to the memory of the 2007 Patriots (because only a team that routinely wins by 30+ should go 16-0).
Wrote about it here: http://npinopunintended.wordpress.com/2009/12/29/unabated-to-the-quarterback-week-16-dont-quit-dont-even-quit/
Do not fuck with a Dan McCarney coached football team. Especially one coming off a Huston Bowl appearance the previous season. They don’t call ‘em the Cyclones for nuthin’…
The last sentence… perfect.
I understand why the Colts were hesitant to leave their starters in a meaningless (from a “making the playoffs” standpoint) game. I understand, because they already have injuries and because no player is as valuable to his team as Peyton Manning (something Curtis Painter reminded us very shortly thereafter), and if he had gotten hurt in the fourth quarter of a meaningless game, the same people who are fricaseeing Caldwell now for pulling Manning would be doing the same for having left him in.
But at the same time, I just don’t understand it. The fans were right to boo. If you’re announcing that the game is meaningless, why start Manning at all? Alternately, why not put him back in once you’d lost the lead and try to regain it, if the point was “Let’s see if we can hold a lead with Manning on the sidelines”? This isn’t baseball; he’s not out for good. Have him come back and throw another TD, then pull him again and see if you can hold *that* lead. To give up the game might have been okay, but it was the way they did it that was just silly.
@Brent (18) – Amen. People think a college playoff would be some magical cure-all, but all it would do is create more controversy and situations where teams essentially quit at halftime to “rest” their stars for the playoff.
My wife freaks out every time we are watching football and the team that is leading takes a knee at the end of the game. I have tried to explain to her that the game is over and they don’t need to run any more plays. She complains that they should have to keep playing until the game is over.
Why is it bad sportmanship to keep playing until the game is over when you are ahead late or way in the lead, but it is also bad to pull your starters in a game that you do not need to win?
The Lama, you are still playing the game when you take a kneel down. It is just one of the safest plays out there. It counts in the stats and you can still fumble. Also, you have the game in hand when you kneel, which is much different from pulling your players to possibly lose the game. I really don’t understand the point that you were trying to make.
Joe -
Bill Barnwell of Football Outsiders actually just did a post on the “Myth of Momentum” in the NFL playoffs for ESPN.com. It’s pretty interesting stuff. http://insider.espn.go.com/nfl/insider/news/story?id=4775542 (ESPN insider only)
Right on, Joe.
I was sort of expecting for the colts to do this. But when it happened and i saw the reaction of the players, i felt sick.
It was cowardly and pathetic.
The pittsburgh game, the chargers and the patriots early beat downs. None of them compared to what i felt in this game.
It was just wrong.
> Most football fans couldn’t name 5 players from that team.
Earl Morrall
Bob Griese
Larry Csonka
Jim Kiick
Mercury Morris
Garo Ypremian
How’m I doin’ so far?
And I’m not even a “real” football fan, although I guess I was a lot closer to being one back then.
As a Pats fan I desperately didn’t want the Colts to go 16-0, but to give it up this way just feels cheap. I was rooting for the Sox to have to go through the Yanks in 2004 (felt very very stupid round about game 3), and it wouldn’t have been the same if they didn’t rally. There’s a pretty good debate about the team of the decade in football and I really want the Pats to define the 00’s the way the Cowboys and 49ers defined the 90’s and 80’s but I also want it to be a real argument. This just kind of leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
I think it was put best by a fan on the forums of the IndyStar who said that tickets to the game were his Christmas present and he didn’t really have the money to go to games these days, but he was just so excited to root for this Colts team on their way to an undefeated season. And then for the team to pull this on him just broke his heart. I’m giving you the cliffs notes version, but it was a little painful to read. The Colts are going to do what they’re going to do and it’s their team and their fans, but I feel a bit betrayed by the whole thing. I was rooting for the Jets, which should tell how much I didn’t want the Colts to win. But by the fourth quarter I just had to turn it off. It became just another game that didn’t mean anything in any larger sense. I can’t even imagine how it must feel to be a Colts fan right now.
One thing I find funny about this whole situation is how Polian and Caldwell view 16-0 as meaningless and “all that matters is the Super Bowl”. But do you think they would ever, in a million years, sit Manning against Buffalo and end his consecutive game streak? Never.
I think if Caldwell had left everyone in the game and an important player had suffered an injury he would get crucified by a lot of the sports media. But I also think he would have a good amount of defenders out there. Like Belichick going for it on 4th down against the Colts earlier this year.
I think pretty much everyone agrees this was a terrible move and I haven’t seen any defenders of the decision.
The real problem with the decision is that it ignored the fact that the Jets DID have something to play for, and it gave them a win that they more than likely would not have had without the Colts refusing to try to win. I understand the Colts protecting themselves – that’s why, when the integrity of the league is at stake, the league should do soemthing to force teams to NOT treat games like an exhibition, just because THEY don’t have anything to gain from winning. What the Colts did in that particular situation was a black eye to the competitive integrity of the league. Sure it would have been nice to see them try for “history,” but it would have been even nicer to see them try to compete against a team that still had something to play for.
As a Texan fan, when Houston played the Colts they were hardly perfect.* More like Ivory Snow 99 and 44/100 % pure.
*1st meeting: Texans blew a 17 point 1st half lead and 2nd meeting:missed a 42 yd. FG for OT.
I haven’t seen any national comments/discussion about the Colts regarding this point:
The Colts have habitually rested starters the last week or two for the last several years.
How many Super Bowls have they won?
One.
Does it seem like the resting-starters philosophy actually works, if you only have one Super Bowl to show for it?
I thought this business of “momentum heading into the playoffs” was put to rest a year ago when the Arizona Cardinals, arguably the coldest team to ever enter the postseason, won 3 playoff games to get the Super Bowl, and then were 40 seconds from actually winning it. Apparently we all have short memories.
Whether the Colts win or lose, their momentum at the end of the season will have nothing to do with it. The Colts very nearly lost to the Ravens, Texans and Patriots this season, and if they were to lose to them in the postseason it would not be that big of an upset. This stuff happens every week, regardless of what “momentum” a team has. Momentum is hindsight-based mumbo jumbo that only seems to be applied when it fits the narrative.
I love how people mention the 2006 Colts and how they finished that season by playing every game to the end, without mentioning how they ACTUALLY FINISHED THE SEASON. That was the year the Jacksonville Jaguars ran all over them in a December blowout, and that December was the only time the Colts have ever lost to the Texans. Yeah, they had a ton of momentum heading into that postseason (sarcasm). So please don’t mention the 2006 Colts without actually checking to see what they did at the end of that season. They finished it alright, but not necessarily on a high note.
I’ll back you up Chuck2 @48…
Paul Warfield
Jim Mandich
Larry Little
Bob Kuechenburg
Vern Denherder sp?
Jake Scott
Dick Anderson
Manny Fernandez
Nick Buoniconti sp?
Larry Seiple
I was not a fan of them either but they had recognizable players. Some were mighty good ones too – But I too hate their ‘Champagne Rag’ routine during the latter portion of every NFL season since then…
@43 Bo,
If there were a playoff in college football, why would teams rest their starters at halftime of their conference championship game?
Alabama and Texas are playing 33 days after their conference championship game. What purpose would rest serve if there was a 4-team or even 8-team playoff? They’d likely get at least 3 weeks off and if they lost they might not make it! Imbeciles.
The goal of every sports team should be to win the championship, but in sports like college football, pro football, and even college basketball why not win every game?
I don’t fault a team for making the best decisions solely focusing on a championship, but for me personally, a championship is a hollow goal in the course of it you pull players and essentially quit. Taken as a whole, a group of games are a season, so you win whatever you have to in order to win that season, but individually, I want to win every game. and if that possibility is staring me in the face, I want to accomplish it and the championship. The Colts chose to accomplish one of those goals. Yes, there’s a chance someone gets hurt, but there’s always that chance and I’d risk it for something special rather than what the Colts are going to do in Buffalo next week when they will assuredly trot their stars out of a series or a quarter in a meaningless game where they don’t control the environment. If someone suffers an injury in that Buffalo game…. OH NELSON! (Not that I’m rooting for it. But I am now rooting for a divisional round loss)
I think the context of a team’s record is more or less beside the point when it comes to taking a day (or a half a day) off. I also think how the players feel, while commendable, is also somewhat irrelevant. They get paid quite a bit of money to do what they’re told.
63000 people paid for a product that they thought would be of a certain quality and the people that sold it to them deliberately gave them an inferior product. The number of bilked customers goes up when you consider people paying for premium tv packages so they can watch the Colts.
I like playoffs and championships but people aren’t paying $50-100 a ticket to watch the players they love sit on the sidelines. If I’m growing up loving the Colts and I get to go see them play for the first time and, depending on which year or game it was, I get to watch my heroes sit after half a game, or a single series, or without taking a single snap, I have been cheated.
It’s not like Joe Mauer and baseball because it is understood that players need rest to maintain their excellence over the long season and the effect is minimized by not resting all their best players at the same time. Fans understand going in that you don’t get to necessarily see any given player in a baseball game but expect their manager to put a competitive team on the field and at least see some of their favorites take the field.
I don’t really blame the Colts. They aren’t breaking any rules. No one says they have to put their best team on the field. The players they do put on the field have to try as hard as they can, which I think they did. The NFL doesn’t care or doesn’t understand that it is hurting its fans. They should put a rule in place to protect the people buying tickets and tv packages so that they get the games they are paying for.
I think that was Billy Hatcher who broke the record, not Marquis Grissom. I seem to remember this happy interview with Hatcher saying, “I’m gonna get another hit.. I’m gonna get another hit…”
That is all.
“I told him that a player on a streak has to respect the streak. You know why? Because they don’t – -they don’t happen very often. “
The momentum thing is just not good evidence. Teams that make the Super Bowl are really good, and really good teams win most of their games.
In the last 20 years, if I have added these up correctly, the teams that have won the Super Bowl have regular season records of 251-69, which equates to a record of 12.5-3.5. Super Bowl losers have a regular season record of 246-74, which equates to 12.3-3.7.
So these teams win roughly 78% of their regular season games. So winning 12 of 15 is about as unsurprising as it gets.
And as for the stat about having losing records in their last five games, half of the last 20 Super Bowl winners had three or fewer losses in the whole season, let alone the last five games. I think it is more surprising that it has happened even once than it is that it hasn’t happened more often.
Another great analytical and fact-based article by Joe.
I’ve got to disagree a little with his contention that football is “excruciating to coach”. Isn’t baseball the more painful game to manage / coach especially when the starter is lagging and the bullpen choices are Kyle Farnsworth et al?
Doesn’t the football coach have more impact on a game than the baseball manager through play calling, deciding to go, punt, blitz, etc? The control would make it seem less difficult. A baseball manager can make all the right moves and still be blamed, knowing it’s not at all his fault.
Football coaches sign up for the deal: 16 games. Your job on the line each week.
Baseball managers sign up for the deal: Here are your players. Don’t screw it up.
I was really really mad that the Colts intentionally threw away their chance at a perfect season last week. I mean, I ranted and raved and everything. It bothered me to no end. And it made no sense, as I’m not a Colts fan. Actually, I’m a fan of their rivals in the AFC (I’m a Niners fan first, but a Jags fan in the AFC). But chances at history only come along every so often. When you have a chance, a real chance, to do something no one else has ever done before…you have to go for it, right? I mean, intentionally losing a game when you have a chance to create history is like thumbing your nose at the game and the history of the sport you play. You are essentially saying “I don’t care about doing something to further interest in the NFL and don’t care enough about the fans, the sport, and ourselves to give it that shot.”
And that is the kind of thing that drives me nuts. They seemed content to be “good enough” and had no desire to achieve greatness. That’s apathy at its worst. I’m pretty sure the Colts aren’t making it to the Super Bowl this year now.
I can understand people not liking the decision, but I don’t remember everyone being outraged when the other teams listed in the article rested their players before the playoffs. The Colts aren’t the first team to do this, but now is the first I remember hearing about how it is an offense against the game of football.
On a note completely unrelated to the 65 commenters who preceded me here, how jarring was it to read “the … Kansas City Chiefs, with the AFC’s best record, won their last 6 games”?
That sentence brought me to a halt — had to go back & re-read it once or twice before my brain would allow me to go on with the rest of the piece …
As always, Joe, great premise, great article, great ending. I guess what I’m trying to say is, great job
I grow weary of people looking at a past great team, and mentioning that the players could not have played today. Who cares? Players and teams are measured against their own era, whether that era was better of worse(usually worse) than today’s era.
Jesse Owens probably could not qualify for a college sprint now, but does that lessen his accomplishments?
Jim Thorpe would probably not make a college football, track, or baseball team today, but was clearly the greatest athlete of his time. (and was named “Athlete of the century”)
Even some of the smaller guys, were they born into this era, might become better suited to be players in this era by following today’s strict training regimen and bulking up.
The 1972 Miami Dolphins did what no other team has been able to do, and deserve all the credit (despite the smarmy yearly champagne scene) that they get. (And I was a Redskin fan who thought that a healthy Sonny Jurgenson would’ve won that game.)
It is a shame that the Colts gave up their chance through fear and indecision. It goes against the very nature of football, and I think the players knew that. Even worse, they arbitrarily completely changed the wild card playoff picture, and some team will probably be left out simply because the Colts threw the game. Gamblers with the inside info could have made a fortune as well, opening up the question of impropriety.
As a football fan whose favorite teams currently suck, my favorite team in the playoffs will be whoever plays the Colts.
Indy is working the process. most of you fail to understand the depth of the process. bravo
I’m 69!!!!!!!! freakin sweet
Sorry for being off topic here, Joe, but I was wondering what happened to your original “Musial” blog post. I keep trying to reach it, but the link says the post cannot be found. Just wondering what was going on, that’s all. Thanks for everything you give us here.
Lets face it, Caldwell screwed the pooch.
The most frustrating thing about it was that he really teased everyone by playing them into the 3rd quarter…he made it look like they were making a reasonable attempt at going for it and then he pulled the rug out. Once he played them past the first quarter, I think most people reasonably expected them to play the whole game unless it turned into a blowout.
Most of the teams that clinch might play the starters a series or two (usually to keep a games started streak going), and then put in the 2nd string. If Caldwell did this, people would still be disappointed, but I don’t think they would be so violently upset.
And honestly, they should be. It makes absolutely no sense to play your starters that deep into the game and then pull them if the goal of pulling them is to protect them from injuries. If that’s really the goal, don’t play them, or only play them a series to keep some meaningless streak alive.
#42-agreed. Either the game means something or it doesn’t, in which case let Manning sit in a luxury box and sip gin&tonics all afternoon.
It speaks well of Manning that while he was obviously displeased about not going back in, and never took his helmet off , he has not said a single word against Jim Caldwell. In fact, quite the contrary and very unFavre-like. There wasn’t and won’t be any aftertaste because of that kind of leadership. And that means the Colts are going to be a very tough out.
It was a completely unsportsmanlike action to pull the starters in a close game with a lot of playoff implications at stake should the Jets lose that game. The Colts essentially handed the Jets a playoff spot and ‘m wondering why the commish’s office hasn’t looked into this.
Anyway – the main point I would like to make is this:
If the Colts win the Superbowl, this will be a tiny glitch.
Less than that.
Peyton will be asked about the lost chance to be perfect and smile into the camera and say “Gee golly gosh darn there, sir. I sure would have liked to stay in that game, but coach made a decision and coach gets paid to make those decisions and I guess looking at it right now you’d have a hard time second guessing it really. I mean if you really looked at it right? Now where’s my MVP trophy and second ring?”
I’m surprised there have only been a few comments surrounding what I consider to be the real travesty here: the fact that the Colts gave the Jets an easier route to the playoffs.
It would have been disappointing for Indy fans if the Colts had pulled this trick against a team like Buffalo or Cleveland. In that case, they’d just be screwing themselves. What they did, though, alters the playoff picture immensely.
There’s no way of knowing how the game would have turned out if Manning et al had stayed in, but if I were a fan of Denver, Houston, Pittsburgh or Baltimore, I’d be pretty livid right now at the fact that one of my primary opponents got a boost from a team that clearly didn’t much care whether they won or lost.
It’s the same as if you were battling it out with a few guys to make the cut in a golf tournament and saw one of your opponents’ chip shots get kicked into the hole by someone who had already made the cut by ten shots. If the Jets earn their way into the playoffs, great, but for cripes sake, make them earn it.
Justin, I don’t think that is a travesty at all. Bottom line is that coaches have primary responsibility for their teams only. They don’t owe anything to the Texans or the Steelers or the Broncos. They earned the luxury that winning or losing the last two games didn’t affect their seeding, and they can spend that however they please.
#51 Belichik made the RIGHT decision when he went for it on 4th down vs. the Colts. Manning had led the Colts to scores on consecutive drives. If the Pats punt, he likely scores again. Going for it on 4th down led to one of two possibilities: 1) Pats make it and seal the game or 2) Pats do not make it and Manning scores but likely leaves SOME time on the clock and gives the Pats at least a chance.
The real question for Belichik is: How much time would have had to be left in the game before punting made sense?
I am neither a Belichik nor Pats fan, but the call made sense to me at the time and makes more sense the more I think about it.
“and a cross that finds the head of a streaking teammate might be the perfect pass …”
If you consider throwing crucifixes at a naked teammate’s cranium a sign of perfection, then … well, don’t let me be your buzzkill, man.
Verily, to each his own.
What is the point of mocking, or even bothering to point out, that teams of bygone era cannot match up to modern teams as your friend Michael Schur?
Often these pronouncements are gleeful, as if the person relishes the thought of such a match up, and watching a modern team grind a historical monument to dust.
Or with metric support, evidence that cerebral might has conquered time, and defeated the grit, hustle, and heart of our grandfathers generation.
To what purpose? Who cares? Unless Peabody and the Boy fire up the way back machine, it serves no purpose other than perhaps an interesting mathematical exercise.
If time is the great equalizer, perhaps there will come a time when those who disparage the accomplishments of times past, will in turn feel the scorn of the generations that follow. Heck of a thing, time.
Starting a sentence with “understand” is … ugh.
with the recent track records of nfl #1 seeds, maybe the colts shouldve considered tanking more games.
Although I must say, the ‘07 Patriots MUCH heralded offensive line (and rightly so) seemed absolutely gassed against the Giants in the Superbowl. By the forth quarter Tuck and Co. were looking like the ‘85 Bears. Perhaps if they had a game off toward the end…?
“Belichik made the RIGHT decision when he went for it on 4th down vs. the Colts. Manning had led the Colts to scores on consecutive drives.”
Not so clear anymore is it? If the Patriots punt, maybe the Colts bench Manning….
Curtis,
I think coaches (and players) also have a responsibility to uphold the integrity of the game. Spirit of competition is one thing, directly affecting the playoff race (through anything other than doing your utmost to win) is another.
Resting your guys is fine, so long as it doesn’t compromise things for other teams. The Colts have beaten the Texans twice, the Jaguars twice, the Broncos and Ravens once apiece, then pretty much rolled over for the Jets. I’d be plenty pissed if I were a fan of any of those teams.
If the Jets do make the playoffs, I would LOVE to see them get through enough rounds to topple Indianapolis (and I say this as someone who isn’t a football fan and has no rooting interest in any one team.) Of course, the odds against that happening are astronomically small, but still, it would be great to see.
The Colts are a business. The owner hired the coach to maximize the value of his asset. The coach ( and maybe the owner) made a business decision, rightly or wrongly, toward that end. Because we fans invest so much emotion into “our” teams we tend to lose sight of the parameters the owners use.
Joe, you might say that Hank Bauer’s answer to the question was…. dare I say… Perfect.
I guess I don’t think they did anything to affect the integrity of the game. Every player on the field did his best to try to win the game. It is not like they started kneeling on the ball and refusing to tackle the other team.
My first response was probably too extreme. But at the same time, I think we would all agree that the coach would certainly be within his rights not to bust out a trick play or a fake punt or something in this game. He would have his discretion to run a more vanilla offense and defense to give less scouting information to future opponents. Nobody would have batted an eye over those things.
Similarly, I think we can all come up with things that definitely affect the integrity of the games – wagering on your team to lose, for example.
To me, resting your starters liberally is closer to the vanilla offense than it is to the betting to lose scenario. Maybe for you, it is the other way.
But if I am a fan of the Texans, I am thinking a lot more about the games against the Colts we pissed away than the Jets’ easier road. And the Steelers lost to the Chiefs! So they complain if they want, but really they need to be looking in the mirror.
I’ve only be reading for a few weeks, but I love your blog. You really have some great insights. My first real disagreement just popped up with this post. I think the reason the Steelers never posted big passing yards is that they were always 1) more committed to the run and 2) not always playing from so far behind. You’ve cited several mediocre teams and seasons which would also support my hypothesis.
A team that could control the ground game and thus the time of possession and, to boot, have a strong defense that would keep opponents’ offenses off the field would simply not need to pass a whole lot.
Full disclosure: I’m a Patriots fan.
God forbid any of Joe’s BR’s miss this unique moment in pop music history…
http://www.hulu.com/watch/115461/the-colbert-report-tue-dec-15-2009#s-p1-so-i0
#87 – true. Also a bit of a different era for most of the ’70s. Bradshaw’s first 300-yard passing game was in Super Bowl XIII against Dallas, in his ninth season with the Steelers, and he’d been a starter for at least 75% of the time.
Tough call. I can’t even recall who won the SB a few years ago. So, that argues for going for perfection. OTOH, some of those guys weren’t on the last SB team, they’ll be just as remembered if they win 3-4 SBs….tough call. Me, I’d go for perfection.
As for integrity of the game, that’s priceless talk on a blog that spends a huge amount of time on baseball. A huge number of games are played in September and October against AAA players…..
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Last summer, I took my 11 year niece to Safeco Field to watch the M’s. The M’s starter, Ryan Rowland-Smith, had a no-hitter going through the 6th. After the bottom of the sixth, I explained the concept of the no-hitter to her and then said while we watch for it, we do not talk about it otherwise it will be jinxed. Top of the 7th, the first Blue Jay batter got a hit to break up the no hitter. My niece turned to me and said, “Its your fault.”
The great M’s announcer Dave Neihaus does not believe in the jinx and will openly talk about a no-hitter. Maybe that’s why the M’s have not had no since 1992.
When I was writing for my high school newspaper I got the money quote from a kid on a team that succeeded with great defense:
“Coach won’t be happy ’til we throw a shut-out.”
Well, Wes Welker of the Patriots went down with a knee injury in the 1st quarter of today’s game. That argues for the “play it safe” strategy. On the other hand, Welker injured his knee on the Patriots opening drive and on his first reception of the game. The only way to avoid that would be to have Welker sit the entire game. Even the Colts aren’t going that far with their starters.
Manning played about a quarter in the shellacking (so far) at the hands of the hapless Bills.
I don’t like the Colts’ decision. I agree with many posters that they should have gone for the perfect season.
But as for their decision helping the Jets and hurting the Steelers or Texans, while I don’t like that much either, it’s a problem that belongs to the NFL, not to the Colts. If you are in charge of setting the conditions of contest, then it is your responsibility to do so in such a way as to discourage dumping. (Not that there is any evidence that the NFL particularly cares.) But I don’t think the Colts’ action was unsportsmanlike, just pathetic.
As for Colts ticket holders who feel they got screwed — I agree, they did. But I don’t have any brilliant ideas about how to fix the problem.
@95
The problem would be solved by a shorter regular season.
Of course, the league is talking seriously of expanding the season to 18 games, so this type of problem is only going to get worse.