Super Bowl finish officially a joke
The NFL's replay system worked just fine this season ... unless you want to be picky and include the final meaningful play of a four-point Super Bowl.
Then it had some issues.
The play was a fumble, or so it was ruled on the field. But the Arizona Cardinals believed it should have been an incomplete pass, for quarterback Kurt Warner's arm was in some sort of a forward motion as the ball plopped to the Tampa soil.
Yet before the topic could be brought up for discussion, Brett Keisel recovered, his offensive teammates sprinted onto the field, the ball was snapped and the Pittsburgh Steelers were celebrating a championship.
Meanwhile, millions of TV viewers were begging for an official review.
"We confirmed it was a fumble," said Mike Pereira, the NFL blabbermouth in charge of blabbermouthing. "The replay assistant in the replay booth (Bob McGrath) saw it was clearly a fumble. The ball got knocked loose and was rolling in his hand before it started forward. He has to have total control."
Huh? Is that it? Bob McGrath saw it, and that was plenty? Theeee Bob McGrath?
What? Did B-McG have some more pressing assignment at that moment than taking another 10 minutes to be certain that the league champion really was the league champion?
All sports significance considered, that hasty declaration of a fumble finally took Chris Webber off the hook for calling that illegal timeout at the end of an NCAA championship basketball game.
Maybe Warner did fumble. But deciding not to review that play is officially the No. 1 choke in sports history (non-Billy Wagner Division).
(c) Copyright 2009 The Delaware County Daily Times
Can it happen here with Spagnuolo?
As Rams fans watched Mike Tomlin and Ken Whisenhunt coach in the Super Bowl on Sunday, they wondered if Steve Spagnuolo could work the same magic with their downtrodden team.
Young head coaches are all the rage in the NFL these days. Tomlin and Whisenhunt advanced the cause of top assistant coaches across pro football.
Their success this season with the Steelers and Cardinals inspired owners and general managers to zero in on emerging leaders instead of the old pros. Spagnuolo got the Rams job and Raheem Morris, Jim Schwartz, Josh McDaniels and Rex Ryan filled other openings in the league.
(One more young coach could get the call. Fiery Cardinals offensive coordinator Todd Haley could fill the Chiefs vacancy.)
Morris and McDaniels will be younger than some players they coach. Like Spagnuolo, they were hired to energize their organizations.
"We're certainly in a cycle where the new coach - as opposed to somebody like myself, or maybe a college coach that comes up - (is popular)," former Ravens coach Brian Billick said in Tampa last week. "This is probably the youngest this league has ever been in terms in coaches. It will be interesting to see how it all turns out."
With accomplished veterans like Bill Cowher, Marty Schottenheimer, Jim Fassel and Billick out of the game - and coaching stars Mike Shanahan, Jon Gruden. Tony Dungy, Herm Edwards and Mike Holmgren exiting jobs during the offseason - there has been quite a brain drain in the NFL.
The movement to younger coaches hasn't been a total success. Scott Linehan flopped miserably when he got his chance here.
So did Cam Cameron in Miami. Mike Nolan got nothing done in San Francisco and young Lane Kiffin became overwhelmed in Oakland. Being younger didn't help them relate to the players any better.
"It's in vogue right now to talk about the youth of coaches and being able to relate to today's athlete," Tomlin said last Monday at a news conference. "I don't know if I buy into the concept that today's athlete is different than they were 20, 30 or 40 years ago.
"I think that people who have a way with people and communicate with people, teach people and can convey messages to people, they can do it at 35, 45, 55 or even 71 as in the case with (Steelers defensive coordinator) Dick LeBeau."
Still, owners and GMs marvel at what Tomlin accomplished with the storied Steelers franchise and how Whisenhunt transformed the also-ran Cardinals into NFC champions. Tony Sparano (Miami), Mike Smith (Atlanta) and John Harbaugh (Baltimore) were also big success stories last season.
The Rams braintrust believes Spagnuolo, the former Giants defensive coordinator, can have the same impact here. His hiring drew rave reviews from industry insiders and experts.
"Steve Spagnuolo, his abilities are very apparent," Billick said. "Excellent coach.
"It really is about developing a partnership. The fact he and Bill (Devaney) know one another and can develop that partnership and kind of rebuild that team going forward, I think it's going to be a good marriage.
"Even though it's all the NFL, each job requires a different skill set based on team, based on ownership, based on management, based on the fans. Some guys are better suited than others. It's not like one size fits all."
Increasingly, though, owners believe that one age group fits all. Like Billick said, it will be interesting to see how it all turns out.
stltoday.com
Super Bowl Showdown: Quarterbacks
STEELERS
Without a doubt, Ben Roethlisberger is the leader of the entire Steelers team, not just the offense. His stats (3,301 yards, 17 TDs) aren't the prettiest, but there's no doubt about which Super Bowl QB has the mental and physical toughness to lead his team to victory in the fourth quarter. Big Ben's ability to take a beating behind a shaky offensive line the past couple of seasons has earned him lots of respect. Historically, Roethlisberger appears to already be fast-tracked for the Pro Football Hall of Fame because of his ability to get the job done in the playoffs. He is only 25 years old and is already on the verge of winning his second Super Bowl championship. Only Tom Brady has more playoff victories in his first five seasons (9) than Roethlisberger (7). And since 2004, only Brady has more postseason touchdown passes (14).
CARDINALS
Call this the second act of a potential Hall of Fame career. After winning the NFL MVP award in 1999 and 2001, Kurt Warner looked washed up during the middle of the '04 season when the New York Giants benched him in favor of rookie Eli Manning. After winning a preseason quarterback battle with Matt Leinart last summer, Warner looked like his old self again. Just like when he was in his prime with the St. Louis Rams, Warner's accuracy is lethal. He was second in the NFL in completion percentage (67.1) and third in touchdown passes (30) in 2008. Unlike Roethlisberger, who was sacked 46 times this season, Warner only hit the dirt 26 times. But when the defense is able to get to him, he's prone to fumbling the football. A key factor in the game will be how much pressure Pittsburgh's aggressive defense puts on Warner, and if it can cause some fumbles. I think it will.
GURU'S EDGE GOES TO: STEELERS
Copyright (c) 2007 Sports Illustrated KIDS
Fitzgerald, Warner Lead Cardinals to Their First Super Bowl Trip After They Blow 24-6 Halftime Lead Vs. Eagles
GLENDALE, Ariz. -- Down and out for decades, the Arizona Cardinals have turned a bad joke into a Super Bowl-bound team.
Yes, the Cardinals, founding members of the NFL but historically among the most dysfunctional of franchises, are heading for the championship game in Tampa.
Capitalizing on Larry Fitzgerald's three first-half touchdown receptions, then coolly marching downfield to Kurt Warner's 8-yard scoring pass to rookie Tim Hightower with 2:53 left, they beat the Philadelphia Eagles, 32-25, Sunday for the NFC championship.
"I want to say Arizona Cardinals and Super Bowl in the same sentence," a jubilant Warner said. "The Arizona Cardinals in the Super Bowl. How about it?"
Arizona (12-7) will face the Pittsburgh Steelers in two weeks in Tampa for the NFL title.
"To make it to the Super Bowl and to have a chance, an opportunity to win it, you relish those moments in your career," said safety Adrian Wilson, the longest-tenured Cardinal. "This being my eighth year, and to be in this organization at this time with these players and these coaches, it's a great moment."
A stunning moment that nearly didn't happen. Donovan McNabb was superb in leading Philadelphia's second-half rally from 18 points down to a 25-24 lead, but after Hightower's score, he misfired from midfield four times in the final moments.
If the Cardinals, the first No. 4 seed to host a conference championship game, were supposed to be thunderstruck by their surroundings, they instead responded like playoff veterans.
Sure, they blew that 24-6 halftime lead. But then the 37-year-old Warner, a Super Bowl MVP from almost a decade ago with the St. Louis Rams, engineered a precise, 72-yard drive to win it with his fourth TD pass of the day.
He finished the comeback with the 8-yard pass to Hightower, then hit Ben Patrick for the 2-point conversion.
"The demeanor in the huddle didn't change at all," Fitzgerald said. "The guys were focused and ready to go. You could see the look in guys' eyes. Nobody wanted to be the guy who let this team down. Everybody did their job when we needed them to do it."
But the key was the unstoppable Fitzgerald, who had nine receptions for 152 yards, including two big catches on the decisive drive. The All-Pro set a single postseason record with 419 yards receiving, surpassing the great Jerry Rice. And Fitzgerald has one more game to go - in the Super Bowl.
Can you imagine?
They surely never looked this good before in the Phoenix area, or their previous homes in Chicago and St. Louis.
"I want to say thanks to all of you guys," Warner told the crowd during postgame celebrations that included streams of confetti spewed into the air and the obligatory "We are the Champions" blaring. "When nobody else believed in us, when nobody else believed in me, you guys did and we're going to the Super Bowl."
Blown out by the Eagles 48-20 on Thanksgiving, coach Ken Whisenhunt's team looked completely different in its first title game since 1948.
"And it was appropriate we had a bunch of different people make those plays, and it was a great team win for us," said Whisenhunt, who in two seasons as coach as turned a losing culture into a championship environment.
With playoff victories over Atlanta, Carolina and the Eagles (11-7-1), this is the Cardinals' winningest season. They've already surpassed their total of postseason wins dating back to when the playoffs began in 1933.
The most attention paid to the Cardinals since moving here in 1988 came on a sad note - when star safety Pat Tillman suddenly retired in 2002 to join the Army Rangers, and was later killed in Afghanistan.
"It's been a tough number of years here in Arizona," Whisenhunt admitted.
The last NFC team since the 1970 merger to make it this far, Arizona also is the first team with nine wins in the regular season to make the Super Bowl since the 1979 Rams lost to the Steelers.
For the favored Eagles, it was another disappointing end. Coach Andy Reid's team reached the NFC title game five times in the last eight seasons, losing four. They lost to New England in their only Super Bowl appearance during that run.
"You never want anything to end, and you don't see it ending," McNabb said. "To end this way, it's tough, when you're that close to making the Super Bowl."
This one looked like a romp through the Valley of the Sun for the hosts at halftime. The Eagles knew Fitzgerald was Arizona's most dangerous player, but they couldn't slow him down.
"You've just got to play it play by play and try to shut him down each play," linebacker Akeem Jordan said.
Fat chance.
"He's been on fire," fellow Cardinals wideout Anquan Boldin said, "running wide open, making big plays. He played like a man among boys."
In the second half, though, Philadelphia brought more pressure on Warner. The Cardinals gained only 8 yards in the third quarter, while McNabb hit Brent Celek for touchdowns of 6 and 31 yards.
McNabb, who once this season got benched after a terrible opening half, had come alive with a fury, even silencing the crowd for a while. His 62-yard heave to rookie DeSean Jackson was tipped by cornerback Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie into Jackson's hands near the goal line with 10:45 to go.
Shockingly, Philadelphia was on top, 25-24.
Time for Warner to show his pedigree on a drive that took nearly 8 minutes and carried the Cardinals to victory.
For the well-traveled Warner, the win was his third in as many NFC title contests. He led the 1999 and 2001 Rams to the Super Bowl - he was league MVP both years and St. Louis went 1-1 in those Super Bowls - before his career faded.
Copyright (c) 2009 TheLedger.com
Fans soak up good times at Gator celebration
Grown men got tears in their eyes as quarterback Tim Tebow hugged his University of Florida football role model Danny Wuerffel.
Little kids clad in miniature Tebow jerseys chanted "It's great ... to be ... a Florida Gator."
And some women swooned at the dance moves safety Major Wright pulled on the center stage Sunday.
That was the jovial and welcoming scene as an estimated 42,000 fans sat in Ben Hill Griffin Stadium to celebrate the Gators third football national championship.
Aside from his dancing, Wright was a popular name among fans for his bone-crushing hit during Thursday's game against Oklahoma University player Manny Johnson.
"There are things that really stick out in my mind from this season," said William Iddings, who came from Belleview to watch Sunday's celebration. "Percy Harvin's first reception against LSU, Major Wright's hit on 'No-Show Manny,' and winning the national championship."
If Wright was remembered by fans for his hard hit and dancing, then Harvin will be remembered for that 70-yard reception and the infamous butt-slap.
Coach Urban Myer was the unsuspecting victim during the Oklahoma game of a fanny-tap-heard-round-the-stadium. "Coach, you know I'm sorry," Harvin joked at the celebration. "It ain't nothing but love, baby."
As Tebow announced he was returning for his senior year, the crowd erupted into applause but also a general overflow of affection.
Students kissed passionately, families embraced in group hugs and high-fives were thrown between buddies.
Russ Trapp, a 79-year-old, life-long Gator fan from Jacksonville said that was the single greatest moment of the season. "I wish my dad was here to see it," Trapp said. "He was a true Gator fan."
Iddings said that while other teams like Nebraska and Oklahoma may have more national championships, the Gators' youth made this an unprecedented win.
"I mean, there are kids on that football team who contributed to the season who are 18 years old," said Iddings, whose lawn care company, Advantage Green, is a Bull Gator. "It's not like Nebraska who wiped the floor with us (on Jan. 2, 1996) with a whole bunch of 28-year-olds."
Fretreshia Snead said that even better than winning the big game was the announcement that Tebow will return.
"He's wonderful. He'll be a Gator for life," Snead said.
The fans reluctantly left the stadium once the hour-long presentation was completed. Many people mulled around and compared game notes from a memorable season.
Copyright (c) 2009 Gainesville.com
Texas Tech still haunting rival Longhorns
This is all Texas Tech's fault. Not once, but twice have the Red Raiders gummed up the works in the race for the national championship.
Who knows what we can believe now?
Here, everyone, is the irony of ironies: the same ridiculous voters who gave Texas no credit for beating Oklahoma on the field in the regular season will now most certainly penalize the Longhorns again because of -- are you ready for this? -- Texas Tech's implosion on the field in a Cotton Bowl loss to Ole Miss.
"No one knows how (Associated Press) voters will vote," said Texas quarterback Colt McCoy.
Let's not be naive, people. Voting is all about this week -- not previous weeks.
The problem for Texas: This week -- tonight's Fiesta Bowl against Ohio State -- doesn't mean nearly what it once did. And that makes prospects for a potential AP national title more tenuous.
"We can control what we can control," said Texas wideout Quan Cosby. "And nothing else."
He's not kidding.
When Texas Tech was exposed in the Cotton Bowl, the Red Raiders were reduced to a team whose two losses away from Lubbock were utterly horrific. This, of course, is the same Texas Tech team that beat Texas in November to start the Big 12 BCS rankings madness that eventually left Oklahoma playing for it all and Texas with its face against the window.
Tech gets embarrassed in its bowl game, and Texas feels the collateral damage. I ask you, who has gotten jobbed more than the Longhorns this fall?
"Based on one game, everybody changes their opinion now sometimes on a half," said Texas coach Mack Brown. "That's absolutely ridiculous. Why do we have a year if we look at a game?"
Because this is where we are in the poll-driven, beauty pageant sport. And frankly, who knows what voters will do if Texas beats Ohio State by 30 or by 3? It's all reactionary. It's not who throws the biggest punch; it's who throws the final one.
Or in this case, who plays in the final game of the season.
If all that weren't bad enough, there sits Ohio State on the other sideline in the Fiesta Bowl. You know, the same Ohio State team working on a recent run of futility in big games: blowout losses to LSU and Florida in the last two national title games -- and a blowout loss to USC in September. And for good measure, a home loss in October to Penn State with the Big Ten championship on the line.
In other words, a victory over Ohio State has all the panache of pea soup.
"This is an opportunity for us to put those other games behind us, to show what kind of team we are," said Ohio State offensive tackle Alex Boone.
I'm not exactly sure, but I think Boone used those same words before the USC and Penn State games. And we're supposed to get jazzed about this game?
Nothing is working for Texas. Not the Longhorns' victory over Oklahoma, not Texas Tech's loss to Ole Miss, not Oklahoma State's loss to Oregon, not Ohio State as an opponent in the Fiesta Bowl and -- for the love of God -- not playing the role of sandwich game between the biggest upset of the postseason (Utah over Alabama) and the biggest game of the postseason (the national championship game).
And these guys think they have a chance to sway enough poll voters? I've got a better chance of bench-pressing Brian Orakpo.
Late last week, Texas finally let Blake Gideon face the music at the Fiesta Bowl media day. It was Gideon, Texas' freshman safety, who dropped a sure interception the play before Texas Tech's game-winning touchdown pass against the Longhorns. If it weren't for the drop, Texas would be preparing for the national title game instead of a bowl game that, at best, could lead to a top five preseason ranking next fall.
The guy who hadn't said a word since the drop, said everything by saying next to nothing.
"It was a play that obviously should've been made," Gideon said.
You think Texas has it bad? Gideon was one of the best players on the best defense in the Big 12 as a true freshman -- and that drop could define his career.
"We told Blake there will be a perception by some that that play lost the game," Brown said. "We had a lot of plays that lost that game."
And they're still haunting the Longhorns to this day. Over and over.
(c)2008 SportingNews.com
