Make Them Wear Leather Helmets
Baugh was the best all-around player in an era when such versatility was essential. In 1943, he led the league in passing, punting and defensive interceptions. In one game, he threw four touchdown passes and intercepted four as well. He threw six touchdown passes in a game twice. His 51.4-yard punting average in 1940 is still the NFL record. (via AP wire)
Somewhere between Sammy Baugh’s death last Wednesday and this weekend’s glut of NFL mediocrity, it hit me: The NFL has devolved from a sport played by men on a field to a three-dimensional strategic board game devised by men in headsets and carried out by players who seem more like specialized robots than flesh-and-blood players.
Yes, NFL players are highly skilled, but they are not all-around athletes. They are trained to do one specific skill (pass, catch, run, maim) and do it with extraordinary efficiency. These men are then deployed for about 30 seconds in highly technical plays. Then, a third of them are substituted and new personnel is brought in for another 30-second formula.
No matter what the marketing folks tell you, the NFL is not about the players — it is about the coaches and how well they can conceive plays and keep the players motivated to complete the tasks they are asked to perform.
The players, for all their training and ego, are little more than tools in the arsenal of the coaching staff. Yes, there are players who are slightly faster, stronger, or have a better passing arm than others, but once you get to the NFL the difference between a Jason Campbell and a Ben Roethlisberger is in small degrees, not large.
There are certain players with an “X factor” who can sometimes win games single-handedly, but a good coach can construct a winning team without them — see Jeff Fisher and this year’s Tennessee Titans.
In the modern NFL, players don’t win games, coaches and coordinators do.
Now let’s look at the excerpt above and think about how mind-blowing it would be to say that about a player today. Hell, think about how mind-blowing it would be to have a players consistently line up on both sides of the ball for four quarters.
It’s not like today’s players don’t have the physical ability to do this — it’s just that with today’s equipment and style of play, it’s too damn dangerous.
In Baugh’s day — with leather helmets and little more than shoulder pads — players functioned as athletes, throwing the ball, punting it and intercepting it. They played multiple downs on offense and defense and they were tough, but sane players.
In today’s game — with full cage face masks and flak jackets — players function as high-tech weapons. In short, NFL football is like no other sport in the world. (Can you imagine if we didn’t expect our baseball, basketball, hockey and soccer players to play both offense and defense?)
I, for one, would love to see a true throw-back game, with players wearing only the equipment used in Baugh’s day. Actually, I’d like to see a whole season played this way. My guess is that injuries — particularly life threatening and career ending injuries — would fall sharply.
As I’ve heard Sonny Jurgensen say several times, the best way to protect players would be to remove the face mask. Without that protection you would not longer have tacklers leading with their heads. I would guess that with less equipment hits would be far less jarring and coaches would be relying much more on the individual skill and creativity of the players.
In fact, the NFL would probably start to look more like rugby where the game is free-flowing, the action is constant and the physicality is certainly still present.
Take away the equipment and half the coaching staff and all of a sudden you might have a game that relies on the players again. Heck, you might have a game that’s watchable again.
Notes on the Redskins Win in Seattle
After dropping two straight — to the Steelers and the Cowgirls — the Redskins got a modest 20-17 win today in Seattle. The score wasn’t impressive, but the Redskins seemed to control the game for most of the afternoon, pounding the Seahawks with the running game — it was another stellar for Clinton Portis — and hitting some key passes when they needed to.
While a win was encouraging — and Washington continues to control its own destiny in the wild-card picture — there was no evidence on the field today that the team is capable of beating the Giants next week.
The offense continues to struggle with getting big plays down field and, specifically, giving quarterback Jason Campbell the time to throw vertical passes. They did have two or three vertical throws this afternoon — one of which resulted in a pass interference call that eventually led to the Redskins’ only touchdown — but I would still classify the offense as fairly anemic.
With Portis back and running the ball exceptionally well — if he can stay healthy — the Skins should be able to implement some play action passing and bring opposing linebackers into the box — and freeze them — to free up the passing game. Let’s see if that happens.
The defense remains the clear strength of this team. However, this game, and last-week’s loss to Dallas highlight two weaknesses. First, the defensive line has had some trouble stopping the run, relying too often on linebackers and the secondary to make the final tackle. Second, when the Redskins blitz a linebacker the pass defense tends to breakdown. What’s odd about this is that the missing linebacker doesn’t seem to be affecting the defensive scheme — the passes are hitting receivers covered by corners — it’s almost as if the corners and safeties are relaxing a bit on schemes that call for a linebacker blitz. It could also be that the safeties are staying home to protect from the run rather than dropping back in coverage.
This trend was very apparent during the Dallas game last week, and less so today. Certainly, with two interceptions it’s tough to complain about the secondary. Perhaps Defensive coordinator Greg Blache spotted this in the Dallas game and coached the team up.
Based on today’s performance and the fact that the Redskins get the Giants at home, I think next week’s game will be close, but I expect the Giants to win. The Redskins offense just isn’t putting enough points on the board to keep up with them right now.
Technorati Tags: washington redskins, NFL, football, american football, pittsburgh steelers, dallas cowboys, seattle seahawks, new york giants, jason campbell, greg blache, clinton portis
How ‘Bout Them Redskins!
Let me start off by saying that by simply writing this post I am dooming the Redskins to a series of inexplicable losses that will only result in a spiral of despair.
That said, “HOW ‘BOUT THEM REDSKINS!!”
The ‘Skins are 4-1 after beating the Dallas Cowboys and Philadelphia Eagles on the road and sit at second place in the NFC East — arguably the toughest division in the NFL. What’s better is the team is playing good hard-nosed football with a swarming, ball-hawking defense and an offense that can run it down your throat, hit the long bomb and pull the eventual gadget play. Today, the Eagles took away the log ball so Clinton Portis carried the load and their first touchdown was scored on a pass from Antwaan Randle El to Chris Cooley after Randle El took the ball on a reverse.
Washington has not won back-to-back divisional road games since 1987 (a year they won the Super Bowl). In a league with only 16 regular season games and a liberal playoff system, winning divisional games on the road is huge. In addition, the Redskins next three games are against the collectively abysmal Rams, Browns and Lions (teams with only one win between them). Add it all together and you get the feeling that the ‘Skins are punching a ticket to the Playoffs.
Of course, parity rules in the NFL so chances are pretty good the Redskins will inexplicably drop one of those three games. Also, as The Washington Post’s Tom Bowsell reminds us, we’ve been here before — Norv Turner once had the team at 7-1 and was fired in December after the Redskins lost to the Giants following a missed field goal. The game signaled the end of their playoff chances and Norv Turner went West — never to return. (I remember that game vividly. I watched it in Duck, North Carolina at my wife’s family beach house. I was despondent and it was a long ride home.)
As Redskins’ fans, I am used to disappointment, frustration and watching other teams play in the post season — telling myself, “it’s better when you don’t have a vested interest in who wins. You can enjoy the sport of it.” Bullshit. Total bullshit. I remember the 1980s and how much fun it is to see your team go deep into the playoffs.
So why should we believe this year? Well, for one, the Redskins have a quarterback in Jason Campbell and a head couch in Jim Zorn who seem to have had an instant rapport. Campbell’s skills and decision making are, for now, an extension of Zorn’s cool-and-steady, hold-onto-the-ball-for-eight-minutes and take-risks-when-you-need-to coaching style. They also have two hard-nosed and motivated running backs; two dangerous receivers in Randle El and Santana Moss; and a talented blue-collar tight-end in Chris Cooley.
Coach Greg Blache has built a defense that emphasizes team play over individual stars. The Redskins don’t get a lot of sacks — I don’t think they had any against Philadelphia — but they have been smothering opposing offenses over the last four games. They’ve gotten great play out of back-ups — they were missing four starters against the Eagles — and are getting turnovers when they need them.
In other words, this team seems to have a collective personality, rather than being a collection of personalities. When that happens — when the team is more important than the individual — great things happen.
So, I say again (for now), HOW ‘BOUT THEM REDSKINS!