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This is a combination mini rant and discussion of why Pete's call at the end of the game wasn't nearly as bad as the mediots are making it out to be. Let me start with the rant.
There are a number of reasons I sometimes despair for my country. One of them is the growing tendency for the need to assign blame for EVERYTHING negative that happens. The old expression "**** happens" no longer applies. I guess I blame it on the lawyers. They make billions assigning blame, and thus making everyone think that nothing is ever their OWN responsibility. So then when you are ready to believe that nothing is every your fault, it’s easy to slide into my next complaint, which is hating that we no longer are ever FOR something, because we are spending all our time being AGAINST everything. See the two go hand and hand.
So what does that have to do with what transpired on Sunday? Well this. I think, and most will agree, that the Pats are not getting their fair share of the credit for winning the Superbowl, because the Seahawks are getting much too much blame for "losing it". Not only is it unfair to Pete Carroll, it’s also grossly unfair to the Patriots and what THEY accomplished in the game.
Once again, the public, led by the nose by the "experts" and media pukes, took the easy route and immediately assigned blame to why one team lost the game, rather than assigning credit for why one team won it. Don't forget that if Malcolm Butler hadn't been there to make that play and the Seahawks had somehow won that game, don't think for a second that the parasitic media hordes weren't ready to turn their invective on BB for not calling the TO or immediately allowing the Seahawks to score so the Pats would have 40-45 seconds to try and tie the score.
Well, my friends, upon a day or two of reflection and finding out more about the background of the situation, it turns out that BOTH the HC's made the right decisions. Now when I make that statement I want it made clear that what they did was not the ONLY way to do it. Other options were clearly both available and reasonable. But given what I know now, I believe that the decisions that both coaches reached were probably the best ones for their respective teams. Let me make the case for both.
PETE CARROLL -
The ball is on the one yard line - You have one time out, and 3 downs to get that yard. You also have are likely to have about 17-20 second left after the next play if you don't score. It is very unlikely you are going to be able to run the ball 3 times in that time even with the TO.
Here's your situation. The clock is running down and you don't want to use that last TO. Your star RB happens to be 1-5 this season in running the ball in from the one yard line. In this very game with the a 2nd and short, your star RB failed to get a first down in 2 tries, including one where he lost 2 yds. Just the last game you saw GB fail to run it in from the one 2 times with an excellent power RB. You have been a coach for 40 years and you know how hard it is to get that last yard. BTW- I don’t know what the Pats stats were from the one this year, but anecdotally my recollection was they were pretty tough and weren’t easily run in on.
So if you choose to run, you might only get 2 shots at it and even if you can do a third it would be a rush job. If you throw in a pass, you are certain to have 3 shots at it at a reasonable pace. And if you have half a brain you know that the best shot you have at a successful pass play will be on 2nd down.
The point of this is to point out that while Carroll COULD have chosen another series of plays to attack that last yard, his plan, which was to a. throw the pass, b. run Lynch, and c. run Wilson on a run pass option; was just as reasonable as any….if not more
Now there have been many who have opined that maybe the pass wasn’t such a bad idea, but the kind of pass than was run into the middle WAS the real mistake. That originally made some sense to me until I saw some stills of the play. Once you look at those stills it became clear to me that Wilson wasn’t throwing into a cluttered area. In fact, when he was throwing the ball, the only 2 people even close to the ball were Lockette and Butler. This was a much easier throw for Wilson than a fade, and the area was no more “cluttered” than any other he might throw it to.
Finally, I would point out that on EVERY play you run a risk of disaster. There might have been a bad snap, a muffed hand off, penalty, etc. While, if you pass there is a possibility of a pick, how high is it really? I don’t know what the percentage is of passes attempted vs passes picked, but I’m willing to bet it’s under 5%. What kind of coach are you that would fear to run a play that had, say a 4% chance of blowing up on you. Certainly not the kind of coach that would run a play with 6 seconds left in the half knowing the average play runs just over 6 seconds.
Carroll could have easily lived with a broken up pass play. And while a pick was a possibility, you don’t become an NFL HC coach not doing things that have a 3 or 4% chance of going bad.
In the end this isn’t about Pete Carroll or even Russell Wilson making a mistake, this is about Malcom Butler using what he learned from his coaches and studies and his football instincts not just to break up a well-conceived pass play, but to make that 4% play of picking it off. It’s a play no different from the Manningham catch in the 2011, or the Kearce catch just a few seconds before. One of those very rare incredible individual efforts
These are NOT plays that you assign blame to. These are the 4% type plays to assign PRAISE to and glorify. Why diminish what Butler accomplished so you can run and assign blame to another. It’s just sad that this has become the normal way operate now .
BILL BELLICHICK
There are still those who want to question Bellichick about not calling TO after Lynch’s run from the 5 and allowing the Seahawks to score. Here’s why. From what I can gather, the most time the Pats could have possibly gotten would have been around 40 seconds. And that assumes the Seahawks cooperate and score in the fastest possible manner.
Here’s what I believe BB is thinking. He knows that the Pats are going to have to move the ball at least 50 yards in that time (-20 to the +30) going directly into the area of strength of a pass defense that he’s been trying to avoid the entire game. What he basically determined in those few seconds, was that he had a better opportunity to stop the Seahawks from getting into the endzone, than he did from moving the ball those 50+ yds into the teeth of a great pass defense in that short a time.
Like Carroll, BB understands that it is VERY hard to get that last yard on the GL and so he forces Carroll to speed up his thinking that he is not going to anything that will help him slow the pace down.
SUMMARY - You can certainly question Carroll’s call. That’s what we do as fans and mediots. But was it the worst call in NFL history? Far from it. As for BB, there are never a lot of “good options” when your team is on its own 1 yd line nursing a 4 point lead (regardless of how absurd the play was that put them there), but the scenario he chose to follow was as good as any, and made eminent sense to me…..at least
OK, am I nuts or on the money. Let me know what you think.
There are a number of reasons I sometimes despair for my country. One of them is the growing tendency for the need to assign blame for EVERYTHING negative that happens. The old expression "**** happens" no longer applies. I guess I blame it on the lawyers. They make billions assigning blame, and thus making everyone think that nothing is ever their OWN responsibility. So then when you are ready to believe that nothing is every your fault, it’s easy to slide into my next complaint, which is hating that we no longer are ever FOR something, because we are spending all our time being AGAINST everything. See the two go hand and hand.
So what does that have to do with what transpired on Sunday? Well this. I think, and most will agree, that the Pats are not getting their fair share of the credit for winning the Superbowl, because the Seahawks are getting much too much blame for "losing it". Not only is it unfair to Pete Carroll, it’s also grossly unfair to the Patriots and what THEY accomplished in the game.
Once again, the public, led by the nose by the "experts" and media pukes, took the easy route and immediately assigned blame to why one team lost the game, rather than assigning credit for why one team won it. Don't forget that if Malcolm Butler hadn't been there to make that play and the Seahawks had somehow won that game, don't think for a second that the parasitic media hordes weren't ready to turn their invective on BB for not calling the TO or immediately allowing the Seahawks to score so the Pats would have 40-45 seconds to try and tie the score.
Well, my friends, upon a day or two of reflection and finding out more about the background of the situation, it turns out that BOTH the HC's made the right decisions. Now when I make that statement I want it made clear that what they did was not the ONLY way to do it. Other options were clearly both available and reasonable. But given what I know now, I believe that the decisions that both coaches reached were probably the best ones for their respective teams. Let me make the case for both.
PETE CARROLL -
The ball is on the one yard line - You have one time out, and 3 downs to get that yard. You also have are likely to have about 17-20 second left after the next play if you don't score. It is very unlikely you are going to be able to run the ball 3 times in that time even with the TO.
Here's your situation. The clock is running down and you don't want to use that last TO. Your star RB happens to be 1-5 this season in running the ball in from the one yard line. In this very game with the a 2nd and short, your star RB failed to get a first down in 2 tries, including one where he lost 2 yds. Just the last game you saw GB fail to run it in from the one 2 times with an excellent power RB. You have been a coach for 40 years and you know how hard it is to get that last yard. BTW- I don’t know what the Pats stats were from the one this year, but anecdotally my recollection was they were pretty tough and weren’t easily run in on.
So if you choose to run, you might only get 2 shots at it and even if you can do a third it would be a rush job. If you throw in a pass, you are certain to have 3 shots at it at a reasonable pace. And if you have half a brain you know that the best shot you have at a successful pass play will be on 2nd down.
The point of this is to point out that while Carroll COULD have chosen another series of plays to attack that last yard, his plan, which was to a. throw the pass, b. run Lynch, and c. run Wilson on a run pass option; was just as reasonable as any….if not more
Now there have been many who have opined that maybe the pass wasn’t such a bad idea, but the kind of pass than was run into the middle WAS the real mistake. That originally made some sense to me until I saw some stills of the play. Once you look at those stills it became clear to me that Wilson wasn’t throwing into a cluttered area. In fact, when he was throwing the ball, the only 2 people even close to the ball were Lockette and Butler. This was a much easier throw for Wilson than a fade, and the area was no more “cluttered” than any other he might throw it to.
Finally, I would point out that on EVERY play you run a risk of disaster. There might have been a bad snap, a muffed hand off, penalty, etc. While, if you pass there is a possibility of a pick, how high is it really? I don’t know what the percentage is of passes attempted vs passes picked, but I’m willing to bet it’s under 5%. What kind of coach are you that would fear to run a play that had, say a 4% chance of blowing up on you. Certainly not the kind of coach that would run a play with 6 seconds left in the half knowing the average play runs just over 6 seconds.
Carroll could have easily lived with a broken up pass play. And while a pick was a possibility, you don’t become an NFL HC coach not doing things that have a 3 or 4% chance of going bad.
In the end this isn’t about Pete Carroll or even Russell Wilson making a mistake, this is about Malcom Butler using what he learned from his coaches and studies and his football instincts not just to break up a well-conceived pass play, but to make that 4% play of picking it off. It’s a play no different from the Manningham catch in the 2011, or the Kearce catch just a few seconds before. One of those very rare incredible individual efforts
These are NOT plays that you assign blame to. These are the 4% type plays to assign PRAISE to and glorify. Why diminish what Butler accomplished so you can run and assign blame to another. It’s just sad that this has become the normal way operate now .
BILL BELLICHICK
There are still those who want to question Bellichick about not calling TO after Lynch’s run from the 5 and allowing the Seahawks to score. Here’s why. From what I can gather, the most time the Pats could have possibly gotten would have been around 40 seconds. And that assumes the Seahawks cooperate and score in the fastest possible manner.
Here’s what I believe BB is thinking. He knows that the Pats are going to have to move the ball at least 50 yards in that time (-20 to the +30) going directly into the area of strength of a pass defense that he’s been trying to avoid the entire game. What he basically determined in those few seconds, was that he had a better opportunity to stop the Seahawks from getting into the endzone, than he did from moving the ball those 50+ yds into the teeth of a great pass defense in that short a time.
Like Carroll, BB understands that it is VERY hard to get that last yard on the GL and so he forces Carroll to speed up his thinking that he is not going to anything that will help him slow the pace down.
SUMMARY - You can certainly question Carroll’s call. That’s what we do as fans and mediots. But was it the worst call in NFL history? Far from it. As for BB, there are never a lot of “good options” when your team is on its own 1 yd line nursing a 4 point lead (regardless of how absurd the play was that put them there), but the scenario he chose to follow was as good as any, and made eminent sense to me…..at least
OK, am I nuts or on the money. Let me know what you think.
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