Sloppy NFL Play

[stwasm]

From ESPN's The Sports Guy:

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/050923

During one of the last two episodes of "Inside the NFL," they showed a wide receiver sitting disgustedly on his team's bench as the final seconds of a loss ticked away. Based on what we watched this season, in your opinion, which player said the following quote:

"We're killin' ourselves ... we lose games like that all the time, man ... we're killin' ourselves. We gotta make plays AND gotta stop crazy penalties. That's all, play sound football, we'll win every game we play."

Figure it out yet?

Of course you didn't. There's no way you could have guessed when half the players in the league could have said it. Credit actually goes to the great Joe Horn, who was bemoaning the 538th sloppy performance of the Jim Haslett Era. But anyone from the Vikings, Raiders, Packers, Cowboys, Seahawks, Broncos, Bears, Rams or Cardinals could have muttered those words during the last two Sundays. For whatever reason, sloppiness has become the unforeseen epidemic of 2005. Have we seen a well-played game yet? Seriously, can you think of one?

Take last week's San Diego-Denver debacle, which was like watching two drunken buddies having a 2 a.m. argument about the chick with the cold sore by the jukebox who looks a little like Kevin James. You take her ... no, you take her ... no, you go for it. Ever seen a team look like it was playing from behind with an 11-point lead? I'm telling you, it happened. Drew Brees' interception TD to Champ Bailey almost seemed intentional, to the degree that he should have earned fantasy points for it. Meanwhile, the Broncos had two scores called back (including a kick return in which the poor guy's teammates stupidly ran onto the field), missed two field goals and watched their coach desperately try to botch a game-winning drive ... only the Chargers were even more determined to blow the game. And they did.

Of course, that wasn't the only sewage leak last week:

1. The Cards squandered a game-winning drive when the Rams sacked Kurt Warner with 20 seconds left -- a moment so predictable, I even predicted it (with witnesses) -- followed by an unfathomable false start penalty and the rarely-seen, "We're counting down 10 seconds off the clock, game over" ending from the refs (punctuated by a phenomenal helmet-smashing tantrum from Anquan Boldin).

2. The Cowboys choked so egregiously and incomprehensibly against the Redskins on Monday night, and in such swift and stunning fashion, it instantly became one of those, "I'll wait until my buddy who roots for the Cowboys breaks the ice and e-mails ME about it, because I wouldn't feel right about bringing it up first" games.

3. Seattle nearly blew a 21-point lead to Atlanta, followed by Mike Holmgren's telling reporters, "It was a great win for us, a great win. The guys battled their hearts out."

(Um, Mike? You got outscored 18-0 in the second half. When your fans were filing out, they looked like the passengers on that Jet Blue plane that landed with the front wheel going sideways on Wednesday. That's not a great win. That's not a good win. That's not even a half-decent win.)

4. The Raiders killed another possible upset with penalties, to the point that Lamont Jordan admitted afterward that every time they made a big play, he started self-consciously glancing around the field looking for flags. That didn't stop Norv Turner from complaining about the refs after the game, followed by Kerry Collins' pushing his coach down the stairs (note: I refuse to use "throw under the bus" anymore, it's becoming the new "jump the shark") by saying, "That kind of attitude is not going to help ... we're hurting ourselves." Who could have predicted Kerry Collins' evoking memories of the Vito Corleone/Johnny Fontaine "You can act like a man!" scene ... only with Collins' playing the part of Vito? Did that really happen?

5. Even the defending champs submitted a certified stinkbomb in Carolina ... although it wasn't the worst offensive performance of the Belichick Era as some normally astute columnists and broadcasters (Skip Bayless and Cris Collinsworth, to name two) mistakenly argued this week. Remember the Buffalo shutout on Opening Day of 2003, when Brady threw for 124 yards and four interceptions, followed by Tom Jackson's "These guys hate their coach!" comment? I think that was a little worse than a 27-17 defeat, on the road, against a team many people picked to go to the Super Bowl this season. Call me crazy.

Still, nothing compared to the atrocities committed by Culpepper and the Vikings. Look, I watched Moses Moreno in his prime. I followed Spurgeon Wynn and Glenn Carano at their absolute apexes. I lived through the Detmer brothers and the McCown cousins. I remember the heydays of Anthony Dilweg, Rusty Hilger, Scott Secules, Tony Graziani, Turk Schonert and Kelly Stouffer. I even wagered against Babe Laufenberg once. With all of that said, never, ever, ever, ever, ever, EVER have I seen a QB play a worse game than Culpepper played in Cincinnati. By the second half, I called my buddy Geoff (diehard Vikes fan) to make the obligatory, "I think the Warden from Longest Yard visited Culpepper at halftime and threatened to pin Caretaker's death on him unless he got a 21-point spread" joke. This was a once-in-a-lifetime collapse. I can't say enough about it. Culpepper could throw six touchdowns a game for the next three years and I would still never trust him again.

(One more thing: I watched more of the Vikings over the past two weeks than any team other than the Pats. They're finished. They stink. Like many others, I underestimated the effect of Moss' departure on this team -- he stretched the field, made mediocre running backs look good, saved Culpepper's hide 3-4 times a game on those downfield heaves and always got the home crowd going. Now? It's a poorly-coached team with no running game, no playmakers, a mediocre defense and an erratic QB who obviously can't handle the increased burden of being The Guy. Those first two games were not a fluke. I'm writing them off. I implore you to do the same.)