Cheaters Never Prosper, or the 2005 Indianapolis Colts Story
Unfortunately, we do know that Cheaters do prosper. Quit often, in fact. But sometimes they don't, and it's always nice to enjoy it when things work as they should.
So where to begin? We'll begin with the Patriots winning their third Super Bowl in four years last year. Great job, go Pats, everyone loves Tom Brady and Bill Belicheck, as they should.
{Author's Note: No, I'm not going to go look up how to spell these names. I don't like football that much. So enjoy watching me spell Bill Beliceck's name 8 different ways, with none of them being the right way. I digress, sorry.}
This was immediately met with the Commissioner of the NFL, Paul Tagliabue, deciding, "I want the Colts to win the Super Bowl no matter what next year."
Now there are two reasons for Taglibue to want this to happen: 1) Taglibue is the architect for our modern "Parity" NFL, where it is impossible to keep a good team together for more than a couple of years (thanks to the salary cap), so any team has a chance to compete any year. Apparently, Taglibue hates dynasties with a passion, and thus he must LOATHE the Pats, since in spite of his best efforts they have managed to establish themselves as such. 2) Peyton Manning--the son of former NFL great Archie Manning (was he even that great? I really don't know I'm asking)--is the Golden Boy of the NFL, and in spite of having several talented teams has fallen short of reaching the Super Bowl every year. The NFL would LOVE to see arguably its most marketable star it has with their fan-friendly high octane offense in the league's premier game. Now I don't know which reason Taglibue had for deciding to crown the Colts the Super Bowl 40 champions--perhaps it was both, but he most certainly did so.
First, he was pleased to note that the Super Bowl would be in a Bowl rather than an outdoor stadium. This is more conducive to the Colts offense. Second, he gave the Pats the hardest possible schedule this season. Next, he gave the Colts the easiest schedule in the history of the NFL. Okay, maybe not the easiest in the history of the NFL, but it was up there. The Colts played the 7 worst teams in the NFL up to their big grudge match with the Patriots in Week 9--which was an incredibly important game for the Colts, as they needed to finally beat a Brady/Bellicheck team in order to lose the psychological disadvantage they had against them--while the Patriots played the toughest schedule in the league up to that point. The Colts even got a bye in week 8 so they would be well rested for the Pats! I mean seriously. At least pretend to make it fair, Paul!
So the Colts make it to 13-0, everything is going EXACTLY according to plan--and then the Peyton Manning Choke Factor kicked in. You see, I don't like Peyton Manning. I hate the way the guy carries himself: he thinks he's God's gift to football, and is the smartest, best player in the history of the game. I hate the way he is constantly moving around and calling out blockers and new plays; I hate the way he constantly waves off coaches calls for whatever he feels like doing; I hate the way he loves to pad his stats by running up the score whenever possible; I hate the way he ALWAYS blames someone or something else whenever anything goes wrong.
Anyway, so once the Colts make it to 13-0 and the "wow, we might really go undefeated!" talk gets realistic and serious...the Colts go out and blow 2 straight. Then they don't play any of their regular players in the last game of the season, in a win against Cardinals. Then they have a first week bye.
Now here's where the Achille's heal of Taglibue's plan reared it's ugly head. It's a very well known phenomenon in sports that I like to call, "The Rest Fallacy". What this is is the belief that extra time off and lots of rest is the most important thing in the world to an athlete. In most instances, however, nothing could be further from the truth. Just go look at teams that take extended time off. They ALWAYS come back flat. Sure, a week in football our a couple extra days in basketball and baseball isn't a bad thing, but any more than that will throw off a team's rhythm dramatically. Once you get rolling as a team/athlete, you don't want it to stop. You want to stick to your routine and ride it out. Even if you're suffering from minor injuries sometimes rest isn't a good thing: your body gets accustomed to dealing with them as they are, so when you get a couple extra days it heals the injury a little--but not nearly fully--and so it throws your body off. So The Rest Fallacy that all the fat white sportswriters think is the most important thing in the world is more often than not a detriment.
So what happens to the Colts after not playing for what, two and a half weeks? They go out and are totally out of sync until the fourth quarter, and are dominated by the Steelers. Peyton Manning is missing receivers, getting sacked, and looking scared to death of the Steelers rush instead of making good tough throws in the pocket. The Peyton Manning Choke Factor is in full affect.
But not to worry! Taglibue is here to save the day! With the Colts down 21-10, Steelers safety Troy Polliemalu (ha!) makes a dramatic interception to end the game for the Colts. But no! He fumbles out of bounds after the catch, but the refs somehow REVERSE THE CALL AND SAY HE DIDN'T HAVE AN INTERCEPTION.
Here's how bad the call was: the NFL came out on Monday and said the wrong call was made. They admitted they screwed up! You could practically hear Taglibue talking to the Ref as he watched the replay with those headphones on yelling, "You reverse that God damn call! That was not an interception! Use the 'football move' excuse; no one has any clue what we're talking about anyway when we say that!" Combine that with a couple other HIGHLY questionable calls against Pittsburgh, and it's no wonder that Steeler's linebacker Joey Porter accused the Refs (correctly) of calling the game against the Steelers.
The Colts score, and then Jerome Bettis uncharacteristically fumbles on the goal line, leaving the Colts with a last second 46 yard field goal for their star kicker, Vanderjafl;ahgiaobao;bvj;liafjeeaa. This guy is good. He's never missed at home. He's never missed in the playoffs. He hardly ever misses, EVER.
And this is where cheaters never prosper. On what should have been an easy kick for this, one of the best kickers in the game, that would tie the game and surely allow the Colts to win in overtime--momentum had changed, and the Steelers were, as Porter said, playing two opponents: the Colts and the Refs. But here Taglibue's tampering caught up with him, and Manning's being a shitty person and player caught up with him, and Vanderja;fljeafjeale being a loud mouth caught up with him, and Karma held sway, and justice was served.
The kick wasn't even close. Wide WAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY right. Justice was served.
After the game, Manning did what he always does: blamed anyone and everyone else for his failures. "I'm trying to be a good teammate here...but we had some problems with protections today." If I were his offense line, first play of next season I would fall over like Billy Bob does in Varsity Blues and let him get laid out. But that's just me. I guess that makes me a "bad" teammate, unlike Peyton Manning.
So justice was served yesterday. Peyton Manning got what was coming to him, and Taglibue's disgustingly obvious plan was foiled. Screw both of them.
And screw the NFL.
So where to begin? We'll begin with the Patriots winning their third Super Bowl in four years last year. Great job, go Pats, everyone loves Tom Brady and Bill Belicheck, as they should.
{Author's Note: No, I'm not going to go look up how to spell these names. I don't like football that much. So enjoy watching me spell Bill Beliceck's name 8 different ways, with none of them being the right way. I digress, sorry.}
This was immediately met with the Commissioner of the NFL, Paul Tagliabue, deciding, "I want the Colts to win the Super Bowl no matter what next year."
Now there are two reasons for Taglibue to want this to happen: 1) Taglibue is the architect for our modern "Parity" NFL, where it is impossible to keep a good team together for more than a couple of years (thanks to the salary cap), so any team has a chance to compete any year. Apparently, Taglibue hates dynasties with a passion, and thus he must LOATHE the Pats, since in spite of his best efforts they have managed to establish themselves as such. 2) Peyton Manning--the son of former NFL great Archie Manning (was he even that great? I really don't know I'm asking)--is the Golden Boy of the NFL, and in spite of having several talented teams has fallen short of reaching the Super Bowl every year. The NFL would LOVE to see arguably its most marketable star it has with their fan-friendly high octane offense in the league's premier game. Now I don't know which reason Taglibue had for deciding to crown the Colts the Super Bowl 40 champions--perhaps it was both, but he most certainly did so.
First, he was pleased to note that the Super Bowl would be in a Bowl rather than an outdoor stadium. This is more conducive to the Colts offense. Second, he gave the Pats the hardest possible schedule this season. Next, he gave the Colts the easiest schedule in the history of the NFL. Okay, maybe not the easiest in the history of the NFL, but it was up there. The Colts played the 7 worst teams in the NFL up to their big grudge match with the Patriots in Week 9--which was an incredibly important game for the Colts, as they needed to finally beat a Brady/Bellicheck team in order to lose the psychological disadvantage they had against them--while the Patriots played the toughest schedule in the league up to that point. The Colts even got a bye in week 8 so they would be well rested for the Pats! I mean seriously. At least pretend to make it fair, Paul!
So the Colts make it to 13-0, everything is going EXACTLY according to plan--and then the Peyton Manning Choke Factor kicked in. You see, I don't like Peyton Manning. I hate the way the guy carries himself: he thinks he's God's gift to football, and is the smartest, best player in the history of the game. I hate the way he is constantly moving around and calling out blockers and new plays; I hate the way he constantly waves off coaches calls for whatever he feels like doing; I hate the way he loves to pad his stats by running up the score whenever possible; I hate the way he ALWAYS blames someone or something else whenever anything goes wrong.
Anyway, so once the Colts make it to 13-0 and the "wow, we might really go undefeated!" talk gets realistic and serious...the Colts go out and blow 2 straight. Then they don't play any of their regular players in the last game of the season, in a win against Cardinals. Then they have a first week bye.
Now here's where the Achille's heal of Taglibue's plan reared it's ugly head. It's a very well known phenomenon in sports that I like to call, "The Rest Fallacy". What this is is the belief that extra time off and lots of rest is the most important thing in the world to an athlete. In most instances, however, nothing could be further from the truth. Just go look at teams that take extended time off. They ALWAYS come back flat. Sure, a week in football our a couple extra days in basketball and baseball isn't a bad thing, but any more than that will throw off a team's rhythm dramatically. Once you get rolling as a team/athlete, you don't want it to stop. You want to stick to your routine and ride it out. Even if you're suffering from minor injuries sometimes rest isn't a good thing: your body gets accustomed to dealing with them as they are, so when you get a couple extra days it heals the injury a little--but not nearly fully--and so it throws your body off. So The Rest Fallacy that all the fat white sportswriters think is the most important thing in the world is more often than not a detriment.
So what happens to the Colts after not playing for what, two and a half weeks? They go out and are totally out of sync until the fourth quarter, and are dominated by the Steelers. Peyton Manning is missing receivers, getting sacked, and looking scared to death of the Steelers rush instead of making good tough throws in the pocket. The Peyton Manning Choke Factor is in full affect.
But not to worry! Taglibue is here to save the day! With the Colts down 21-10, Steelers safety Troy Polliemalu (ha!) makes a dramatic interception to end the game for the Colts. But no! He fumbles out of bounds after the catch, but the refs somehow REVERSE THE CALL AND SAY HE DIDN'T HAVE AN INTERCEPTION.
Here's how bad the call was: the NFL came out on Monday and said the wrong call was made. They admitted they screwed up! You could practically hear Taglibue talking to the Ref as he watched the replay with those headphones on yelling, "You reverse that God damn call! That was not an interception! Use the 'football move' excuse; no one has any clue what we're talking about anyway when we say that!" Combine that with a couple other HIGHLY questionable calls against Pittsburgh, and it's no wonder that Steeler's linebacker Joey Porter accused the Refs (correctly) of calling the game against the Steelers.
The Colts score, and then Jerome Bettis uncharacteristically fumbles on the goal line, leaving the Colts with a last second 46 yard field goal for their star kicker, Vanderjafl;ahgiaobao;bvj;liafjeeaa. This guy is good. He's never missed at home. He's never missed in the playoffs. He hardly ever misses, EVER.
And this is where cheaters never prosper. On what should have been an easy kick for this, one of the best kickers in the game, that would tie the game and surely allow the Colts to win in overtime--momentum had changed, and the Steelers were, as Porter said, playing two opponents: the Colts and the Refs. But here Taglibue's tampering caught up with him, and Manning's being a shitty person and player caught up with him, and Vanderja;fljeafjeale being a loud mouth caught up with him, and Karma held sway, and justice was served.
The kick wasn't even close. Wide WAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY right. Justice was served.
After the game, Manning did what he always does: blamed anyone and everyone else for his failures. "I'm trying to be a good teammate here...but we had some problems with protections today." If I were his offense line, first play of next season I would fall over like Billy Bob does in Varsity Blues and let him get laid out. But that's just me. I guess that makes me a "bad" teammate, unlike Peyton Manning.
So justice was served yesterday. Peyton Manning got what was coming to him, and Taglibue's disgustingly obvious plan was foiled. Screw both of them.
And screw the NFL.
posted by Michael Pondrom at 9:27 PM
5 Comments:
I won't say that I thought there was a conspiracy to get the Colts in the Super Bowl, but I did think it was fitting that the kicker miss that field goal.
The truth of the matter is that the Colts just didn't match up well against the Steelers. The Steelers have a great defense with great blitzes. They also have a very good run game, which exploited the Colts fast, but not very big defense. The Colts probably would have been better off playing Denver or New England. At least that's my opinion.
I guess its possible there was a fix, but this coming from a huge fan of the NBA, which screams of 'fixing' every year the lakers won! come on...
Whoever is Anonymous--don't even get me started on the mother fucking Lakers and how the NBA cheated for them for years. That used to make me pull my hair out. So a spade is a spade--I'll call out the fix in any league.
Nick, I've got to disagree with you buddy. There's telling the truth about what happened, and there's deflecting the blame. He was deflecting the blame. His tone, his words--this wasn't a player giving an honest assessment about what happened during the game, this was a whiny baby trying to deflect criticism.
And if the blocking was bad, whose fault is that? Manning's. Why, do you ask? Because he likes to change every fucking play, and call out every block. It's one of the things I hate about him. He's constantely running around behind the huddle, telling everyone what to do, who to guard, and when to do it. Peyton LOVES his reputation as the "smartest player in football", and loves to be in charge. Well guess what Peyton. As Uncle Ben says, "With great power comes great responsibility." You want to call out every block and be known as a football genius? Then you take the heat when you're not calling out the right blocks and you're getting sacked.
Also, quit taking 20 step drops and maybe you won't get hit.
Finally, and I hate to bring this up, because as a good capitalist I support every person's right to make as much money as possible, but take a look at your contract Peyton. You're not in a capitalistic system: you have a salary cap. So when you demand an inordinate amount of money from said pool, that leaves less money to spend on other players. Namely, THE GUYS KEEPING YOU FROM GETTING YOUR ASS HANDED TO YOU. You want better blockers? You're going to have to pay more money for them, meaning you will have to make less.
Since you're the "smartest player in football", you should be able to grasp this concept.
Michael
Linda,
Excellent point bringing up Harper. Here's the thing I want to know about before I sing his praises though:
Why did his wife attack him with a knife?
I just want to know that before I'm like, "Wow, he's a warrior out there!" Because I have a tendency to think that people don't attack other people with knives without some sort of reason.
Again, I'm no football expert, and maybe this has already been addressed and his name has been cleared and I just didn't hear about it. If that's the case, he is a warrior. If that's not the case, then Hello Eugene Robinson.
And...that tackle! Come on! No matter how good his game was, that tackle was a Lett/Bebbe moment. I mean, it wasn't even a tackle! Rothelaljjraorjeaoghohajbajbeaefapbaje just flayed his arms around like a frightened chicken, and somehow that tackled the guy? That was horrible! You've got to run over the QB on that!
Yes, Jerome Bettis is a hos, and like the guy who had a heart attack after Bettis fumbled, I'm glad his career didn't end with that play.
Don't worry, Vince Young post is coming, especially after his hilairious press conference when he declared his eligibility. But Michael Jordan Linda? Michael Jeffery Jordan? Slow down there, sister.
Nick...I don't hate Manning for wanting to be the best at what he does. I hate him because he's a prissy prima donna who wants to take all the credit when things are going good and take none when they're going bad. I don't like him because he's a snotty know-it-all who thinks he can do no wrong, when he does in fact err--and quite predictably and frequently when the time is ripe.
Sure I don't have a problem with a QB audibling a blitz Nick. But EVERY FUCKING PLAY? And not just saying, "Hey guys, look over to the left, blitz!", but walking over to each and every lineman and speaking to them individually? And then doing that overly dramatic dance he does to call for the ball? COME ON. Shut up and play! Trust your lineman and coaches to have some semblance of an idea as to what they are doing. It's no coincidence that while Peyton runs a one man show, they keep losing. Sorry.
I'll say this about Payton: I love that commercial he did where he was "being a fan" to all the random no-name jobs. When he gets the waiters apron and starts going nuts, that was genius. Good for you Payton.
But that's about it when it comes to him.
Michael
Nick, truly great players are measured by their championships. I find it notable that you didn't include Marino in that list, but you did include quarterbacks who have won multiple Super Bowls. Peyton has been in the playoffs enough that he should have DONE something by now. Instead, he's 3-6. Hey, he's a great QB. You're just not going to win it all with him...which is the real goal.
I'm trying to think of anytime I've ever rooted for a player who hit his wife...and I'm drawing a blank. That's about nigh unforgiveable in my book, and I just can't give you an "attaboy"--even if it's deserved--after that. And like I said, his Lett/Bebbe moment when he got tripped (I refuse to call that a "tackle" anymore) by Rothajhatjea;wgial;blawjale almost wiped out his good game on it's own merit.
Love the Knight reference, that is greatness.
LOL, without even reading the link Linda I know what you're talking about. I saw that headline a while back, where Skip was announcing his man-crush on VY. You and Bayless definitely have something in common, though it scares me to say that to you buddy.
While I still say you're crazy for your Jordan comment, I will say that the ending to the Rose Bowl was one of the greatest individual athletic moments of all time, in any sport. VY is unbelievably good.
Michael
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