Peter King's MMQB - Skins Bashing

[frankbones]

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/inside_game/peter_king/news/2003/06/02/mmqb/

Here's the link, definately an unneeded shot at the skins at the end (kind of made me chuckle though:laugh:)

Roiling Seahawks

Rejuvenated Hasselbeck sees playoffs in Seattle's future

Posted: Monday June 02, 2003 11:42 AM

One of my freshest memories of the 2002 NFL season comes from sitting at a Clifton, N.J., sports bar with the family on the last Sunday of the regular season (Sports Illustrated had wrapped up a year-end double issue that week, so I had a rare in-season weekend at home), watching, of all games, the meaningless Seattle-San Diego finale. I hadn't seen either team live all season, and with the Packers-Jets outcome decided, I spent much of the second half spying two relatively unfamiliar teams.

And I kept thinking: What in the world has gotten into Matt Hasselbeck?

I mean, wow. He's pretty good. The thing that struck me about Hasselbeck that day was his accuracy, his ability to hit his Seahawks receivers in stride downfield, and to throw the ball (mostly) where only his guys could catch it.

I looked up Hasselbeck's numbers from that Sunday (36-of-53 passing, 67.9 percent completion rate, 449 yards, two touchdowns, two interceptions against a pretty good Martyball Chargers defense, with only one ill-conceived pass, an interception, among the 35 or so balls I saw him throw). I just remember thinking: He looks good, confident. He looks like he's going to make it. Which, in midseason, was no lock. Mike Holmgren had traded a first-round pick to Green Bay to get his former Brett Favre understudy (actually, he swapped first-round picks, moving higher in the round), and over a year and half Hasselbeck had played pretty lousy. Then the explosion.

And so as the Seahawks passing camp dawned last week, I thought it might be a good idea to check in with Hasselbeck to see what in the world happened last year, and to see if he thinks he can duplicate what he did over the last two months of the 2002 season, when he threw for more yards than any passer in football.

"It's going to sound weird," he told me, "but at the end of the season I wasn't doing anything wonderful. I was just doing what I was supposed to be doing. I think a lot of this had to do with something that happened the week before we played Kansas City [in November]. Mike came up to me and said something that really ticked me off, even though he didn't know it. We were talking about how I played the previous week, and he said, 'You didn't play bad. You just didn't DO anything.' Then he said, 'This week, throw some interceptions. I don't care. Just take some chances. Push the ball downfield.'

"Now, we had Jeff George here. And you know what everybody says about him, about he's not a team guy. Well, Jeff was fantastic here. Awesome. And right then, at practice that day, he started telling the guys, 'Mike says he's putting it up! We're going downfield!' He kept saying [that] all the way up to the game. And so we entered the game, ready to make all the plays, and Mike kept calling them, all day. Deep ball, deep ball, deep ball."

Final score: Seattle 39, Kansas City 32. Hasselbeck's line: 25-36, 69.4 percent, 362 yards, three touchdowns, no picks.

"That game was sort of the defining moment for our revival," Hasselbeck said.

Smart move by Holmgren, because to that point, since being reunited in Seattle in 2001, he and nice-guy Hasselbeck had been mostly gritting their teeth about their relationship. Hasselbeck thought Holmgren was being too conservative and holding back his potential to throw it downfield. Holmgren didn't know if he could trust Hasselbeck to run the offense full-throttle. Why shouldn't Holmgren be skeptical? He hadn't seen the kid do it. He'd seen him make more mistakes than progress. But this unleashed a month to die for. In December, Hasselbeck threw for 1,700 yards in five games, strafing three playoff teams in the process. The week after the Kansas City explosion, at San Francisco, trailing big early, Holmgren said into his quarterback headset: "I need you to start taking shots."

That was then. This is now.

"We feel we'll win our division this year," Hasselbeck said. "I have no doubt Koren Robinson and Darrell Jackson will have huge years. I expect to play well, too."

"Any reason you can't put up Manning-type numbers again?" I asked.

"No reason," he said. "It's what I expect now."

So the world is changing for the Seahawks, with a feisty new defensive coordinator, Ray Rhodes, making it hot where it used to be comfortable, and with a maturing offense. I don't think it's outrageous that Hasselbeck believes his team will win the division. The Niners and Rams, I think, still have an edge until Seattle proves it can play defense -- and until Hasselbeck plays this well for another few months -- but at least there's hope now, hope that the Holmgren program and his poor man's Favre can rip up some pretty good teams.

It's a different world in Seattle these days. "Hey," Hasselbeck said before he hung up, "I'm throwing out the first ball at the Mariners game Wednesday. Can you believe that?"

In the two starts he has made trying to win his 300th game, Roger Clemens is 0-1 with a 9.26 ERA. He is averaging 21 pitches thrown per inning in those games.

Not much outrage this week, for a change. Lots of different topics addressed. Here goes:

YOU'RE RIGHT ABOUT L.A. From Patrick Chang of Irvine, Calif.: "Los Angeles may eventually acquire a team, but said team will never last. Perhaps the NFL powers-that-be had never attended an NFL game in L.A.'s environs, or spoken to an NFL fan in L.A., or had forgotten the L.A. teams of yesteryear, but a team here is a tremendously bad idea. We're a bunch of transplants, with displaced (perhaps even misplaced) loyalties. Before the Rams became the St. Louis Rams, I had the joy of attending one of their home games against the 49ers. The stadium was packed -- but with S.F. fans. There was more crimson and gold than gold and blue, which was actually rather pathetic. We are GreenBucsy fans, 49er fans, Giants fans, Bucs fans -- die-hard, too, for the most part -- and it would be difficult to displace that team loyalty. Also, we are hard-pressed to support a mediocre team. And it's difficult to argue that a true expansion team can aspire to be more than mediocre in its fledgling years. And that can be deadly to attendance and interest. If the NFL wants football in L.A. to work, then it has to strike its silly blackout rule, ensure that the team is locked into L.A. for the long term, and be prepared to accept several years of poorer-than-expected attendance."

Excellent points. My thing about football in L.A. is that the stadium has to be a happening place, and that would entail winning pretty quickly. In the NFL, the only way that would happen is to move an established team with some talent (Minnesota? Indy?) and hope a really good GM comes with it.

SOME KNOWLEDGE ABOUT BEER AT FENWAY. From Rick Slater of Worcester, Mass.: "The reason they only sell light beer at Fenway is self-preservation. Around the park before games everyone is already loaded so they have to sell something that will take the edge off."

I understand, I suppose. But what about the sober patrons who want to drink something other than beer-flavored, headless water?

DOES RANDALL CUNNINGHAM BELONG IN THE HALL OF FAME? From Bret Hirsch of Toronto: "Randall Cunningham was one of the few individuals about whom you can truly say changed the QB position to what it is today. His MVP award puts him at the top and his overall stats aren't in the neighborhood of John Elway or Joe Montana, but possibly good enough to get in. Do you think he belongs?"

Well, Randall never won the official MVP award (the AP MVP). He won the Miller Lite MVP once, in 1998. Not that the MVP is a true test of whether a man should be in the Hall of Fame. Not at all. Randall is an interesting case. My first reaction would be no, because I think his body of work was inconsistent. But I will definitely consider his case thoroughly. I agree with you. He changed the way the position was played. And let's not forget his 90-yard punt, too. I think he was one of the greatest individual players I've ever seen.

ONE LAST BLAST ON D'QWELL. From Ethan of Berkeley, Calif.: "A few years ago, a very bright aide to Washington, D.C.'s new mayor, Anthony Williams, answered questions about the city's budget at a press conference. During the Q&A session, he used the phrase, 'niggardly sum.' He used the phrase accurately, understood the definition of the word, and incorporated it as an appropriate cliche. He was fired within the week. Why? Well, he was a young, white educated man, working for a reform mayor who had replaced Marion Barry, seen by white Washington as a corrupt figure.

You're a white male. So am I. We are the ONLY social group in this country that has the luxury to argue points purely in terms of reason. D'Qwell may seem like a funny name to you, but I'm sorry, you're an educated, upper-middle class white man writing from suburban New York City, for God's sake. So, sorry, but you don't get to crack even the lightest of jokes about name origins, however you may feel. And you don't get to tell everyone to lighten up."

Sorry. It's a funny name to me. I can chuckle at funny names, like Larry Derryberry and Heinie Manush and D'Qwell Jackson, and if you choose to think me racist or unfeeling, you are welcome to.

YOU OVERRATE KURT WARNER. From Arturo Calderon of Mexico City: "I think you are one of the best football writers, but you made a big mistake last week when you mentioned that Kurt Warner is on the same level with Elway and Montana on the evidence that he has had better statistical seasons. Elway won a lot more than Warner with much less talent around him. If you put Elway and Montana for three consecutive years with the talent of the Rams offense, either of those guys wins the Super Bowl three consecutive years."

Good point, Arturo. And you may be right. What I was trying to point out is that no quarterback has had three better statistical seasons in succession, and people who criticize Warner for playing great with a great cast … well, it's something I just don't get. We'll see if Warner becomes a Hall of Famer. He still needs six or so years of really good football, and I don't know if he has that in him. As for your comment about those other guys winning three straight Super Bowls, I would disagree. You can't play better than Warner played -- with the exception of his uneven job in the Super Bowl against New England -- than he did from 1999-'01.

1. I think this will be the ho-hummest June in NFL free-agent history. This time of year has always been a significant time for the league because teams can now whack players from their rosters and not take the whole salary-cap hit during that year. The cuts Tuesday will include Denver QB Brian Griese, Cincinnati QB Akili Smith, San Francisco WR J.J. Stokes, and maybe a couple from among Chiefs cornerback Ray Crockett, Giants running back Ron Dayne and Cardinals running back Thomas Jones. Not much there. Stokes appears headed for Jacksonville and Griese for Miami. The funniest cut will be Jags wideout R. Jay Soward, one of the worst first-round picks in recent history. Nice memory, Tom Coughlin.

2. I think I am begging the weather gods: Please, make the 51-degree, biting-wind, sideways-rain days of faux spring stop. I will give anything for a real spring in the Northeast. Anything. That's right. I am begging. It was 53 on April 2. Then it snowed eight inches a week later. Then it rained for seven weeks. It was 51 degrees on Sunday. We are starting to get really ticked off here. It is June 2, and I have a winter cold right now, the kind of heavy-sneezer I usually get the week after the Super Bowl.

3. I think I would love to know if the NBA has crowed a champion yet. Oh, they still haven't started playing the Finals yet? Who in the name of David Stern had the brilliant idea of taking 11 days between the end of one conference title series and the beginning of the league’s championship series? The NBA will tell you it'll make all the difference in the ratings, but it won't. Ratings stink across the board. And the NBA has lost its momentum entering a marqueeless championship series by making teams sit for far, far too long.

4. I think the Shane Matthews signing will be a good one for Cincinnati, strangely. He’s good at managing a game, but not necessarily winning it, and there's not a better team guy playing. The Bengals landed themselves one of the best third quarterbacks in football, and before you laugh at that, consider how many third quarterbacks actually end up playing. Lots.

5. I think if the New York Jets wanted to put pressure on Sappesque defensive tackle Dewayne Robertson, they couldn't have done it much better than by making him split a position with Josh Evans, who has been a substance-abuse danger guy. Now, if Evans is suspended for the year following his latest experience with the dark side, Robertson will be slated to start at the most important position on a defending division champion's defense as a rookie … after a college career at Kentucky in which he sacked the quarterback a whopping 10 times.

6. I think these are my non-football thoughts of the week:

a. Please, if you like to read anything about inspiration and high school sports, click on this link for Boston Globe columnist Dan Shaughnessy -- one of the all-time best, by the way -- about the last softball game of his daughter's life.

b. Montclair (N.J.) Softball Note of the Week: Well, it's over. Officially over. The Mounties won their final makeup game of the year, 1-0, over Nutley on Thursday, getting a game in between deluges. Junior lefty Mary Beth King crafted the complete game and finished the year 9-5 with a 0.87 ERA. Afterward, I annoyed Mary Beth and her senior catcher, Jess Sarfati, endlessly by lining them up at home plate together for pictures for the last time, first alone, then with their superfan Ed Bates, then with their mothers, then with their fathers. Plenty of rolling eyes there from Mary. The two friends have one final softball date: They have agreed to pitch and catch on Father's Day, and will try to mow down the fathers of the 10-under travel team in Montclair, the Montclair Bears, and the team's coach (me).

c. I would love to see Nomar Garciaparra take his hacks in that new Pittsburgh ballpark this week. I love interleague play.

d. Six Feet Under ended for the season last night, mercifully. Good show. Used to be a great show. The show's creators concentrated far too much on seedy crappola and not the business and personality of death. And one pet peeve about Nate, people: You can't tell me that a guy who wanted to dump his wife anyway would turn into a stark, raving, incredibly irresponsible lunatic when she disappeared. It's what he wanted!

e. Is anyone still coaching in the NBA?

f. Anyone notice that Vernon Wells and Carlos Delgado each average two RBIs every single game? It's been generations since anyone drove in 170 runs. Now two guys from the same team are almost on pace to do it.

7. I think it's an encouraging sign that Randy Moss is actually working on football this offseason. He's trying to increase his speed. A better Moss will mean a better Daunte Culpepper.

8. I think, after attending the first game of the Stanley Cup finals last week in New Jersey, that I guess it might be OK to charge people $125 to sit upstairs for a playoff ticket. But don't come crying to the fans when you wonder why some seats at such a big event are left unsold. There were at least 20 empties in our section. The NHL can't get a better TV deal, so its players better wise up and scale down their expectations. Funny thing: I heard that one of the men in the Devils' consortium of owners inquired during one of the games last week: "What quarter is it?" And he was serious.

9. I think the Giants have to dump Ron Dayne. And I think anyone who takes a chance on him had better pay the minimum. With no guaranteed money.

10. I think it's been awfully quiet in Redskinsville these days. Isn't it about time they signed a 37-year-old backup?

[redman]

LOL at King bashing the 'Skins for engaging in the same 'ole silliness when I can't get two paragraphs into a column of his without reading about either his daughter's lacrosse team, or Starbucks coffee, or both!

Shut up and have another donut, fatso! And BTW, we're still waiting on regretting Fred Smoot, like you promised us over two years ago!

[codeorama]

Peter King, Does anyone give a Rat's A$$ about your daughter??:puke:

[Awesome]

Originally posted by codeorama

Peter King, Does anyone give a Rat's A$$ about your daughter??:puke:

God help the poor girl if she looks anything like her dear ole dad.

[codeorama]

Originally posted by mphilips16

God help the poor girl if she looks anything like her dear ole dad.

:laugh: :laugh:

[JimboDaMan]

Ahh, all is right with the world now that this fatuous bag of gas has resumed his completely pointless attacks on the Redskins. After watching Lenny P actually start to behave with a semblance of professionalism I was starting to wonder if PK might do the same. I needn’t have worried.

[tenaciousd]

Damn! You guys beat me to the daughter lacross joke line.

Okay, I'll try another.

Isn't it time for him to predict that everyone should take Danny Wuerffel in the first round of their fantasy drafts because he's going to throw for 3700 yards and 20 TDs?

(Yes, he said that last year)

[Bang]

I would say...

Isn't it about time Peter King cuts back to 10 donuts a day?

Or maybe... "37 yr old cookies? Sure! I'll try one."

~Bang

[TC4]

Originally posted by redman

LOL at King bashing the 'Skins for engaging in the same 'ole silliness when I can't get two paragraphs into a column of his without reading about either his daughter's lacrosse team, or Starbucks coffee, or both!

Shut up and have another donut, fatso! And BTW, we're still waiting on regretting Fred Smoot, like you promised us over two years ago!

Speaking of his brat, how about those softball pitching stats?

9-5 record with a 0.87 ERA?

She must give up a SH!TLOAD of walks........LOL!!!!