Point Blank – October 6
What a “Bettor Better Know” – NFL #4
The week that was in the NFL, and if you ever thought about trying out to be a kicker, or a back judge, have your resume ready…
Item: About that Seattle ending (Who’s to Bless and Who’s to Blame)
OK, so you turned the television off after Russell Wilson converted that third down pass in the final minute last night and went to bed. Who could blame you, if you live anywhere east of the Pacific Time Zone. And even out west, you still turned the television to another channel. Now you wake up and find that you missed a rather interesting post-game. Much like back judge Greg Wilson, who official missed a rather significant call.
The quick recap – after Kim Chancellor made a terrific play to knock the ball lose from Calvin Johnson near the goal line, K. J. Wright got to the loose ball in the end zone and knocked it out of bounds. It was ruled a touchback, Seattle ball at the 20-yard line. Instead it should have been ruled an illegal bat by Wright, which would have given Detroit a first-and-goal half the distance from where Johnson lost control.
Here is where Wilson was positioned, where he could not miss the action –
This is what Wilson saw –
This is what Wright said that he did – “I wanted to just knock it out of bounds and not try to catch it and fumble it.”
This is what NFL vice president of officiating, Steve Blandino, said afterwards – “The back judge was on the play and in his judgment he didn’t feel like it was an overt act so he didn’t throw the flag.”
And that was that. Did the official genuinely believe Wright’s bat was not intentional? That is an almost impossible judgment to have made. Or did he just simply blow the call by not grasping the rule? It is not much of a handicapping issue, of course, unless it becomes a way to motivate an 0-4 Detroit team that could easily go flat, but I just thought that I would shed some light on that ending. With a long read ahead, and with your heads possibly scrambled a bit, a little musical background is needed, some solace for Jim Caldwell -
“Don’t complain about your chances, boy, it’s the only game in town…”
By the way, Wilson has been sacked a half dozen times in two games already this season. It makes one shudder to think what a QB lacking his mobility would look like operating behind this OL.
Item: Scobee or not Scobee, that was and is the question
Scobee was one of many kickers that had a tough go of it this week, and it is becoming clear that the longer PATs are having an impact in an area that the rules makers may not have necessarily thought of – without banging away at the 99 percent rate from short distance in practice and in games, there are a lot of kickers out there with a lower level of confidence at crunch time. That showed in a rather unusual count of four different kickers missing potential game winners this week alone, although San Diego’s John Lambo got a break, and was able to try a second time via a penalty.
Because of Scobee’s failures on Thursday, he is no longer a Pittsburgh Steeler, despite the franchise having traded away a draft pick for him, making it a rather expensive cut. But was it a smart move? Did the Steelers perhaps make a mistake by signing Chris Boswell before the Sunday games were played, and a dozen more FGs were missed? If the bar is indeed going to be set a tick lower on the expectations of kickers, might Scobee’s experience still be worth something, with Boswell having punted, but never attempted a FG or PAT, in an NFL game?
Let a guy who knows the drill take the podium, Jay Feely, who kicked in 14 NFL seasons, talking to Fox Sports on Sunday - "It just helped in general to have no pressure, to have a play where you can go out there and not worry about the result and focus on your form. That helped you get grooved in because you have to do something terrible to miss it. It reminds me a lot of the play-calling for a quarterback at the beginning of a game when you try to get him in a groove and you throw a couple of slants or screens or different things like that to allow him to get comfortable in the game. But now, it's not like that at all. There's pressure on that kick, so you can't relax at all and you can't take that in-game practice to get comfortable."
But then add a key – while many late-game pressure kicks have indeed been missed the overall success rate is not that much different. In 2013 kickers were at 82.7 percent through the first four weeks, in 2014 it was 84.7. This season? How about 83.5, are almost dead on the combined average of those past two campaigns.
There may be some levels of semi-panic going on right now that are not proper. Consider Kai Forbath, a former Redskins kicker, who has had three different try-outs over the past week, and may be one of the guys invited in by the Saints for tryouts this Wednesday. Are teams that made thought-out decisions as to whom their kicker was going to be back in training camp being a little too quick on the trigger?
Of course, one can not fault Tampa Bay for releasing Kyle Brindza, with Lovie Smith’s failure being in waiting a week too long – missing five FGs and a pair of PATs over a span of two games gets you rightfully gone.
Item: Alex Smith threw for 386 yards, and the Chiefs did not score a TD
One of the teams that does not have to worry about their kicker is Kansas City, with Cairo Santos turning in a perfect 7-7 at Cincinnati. But that was not a reason for Any Reid to come away happy – seven FGs and zero touchdowns is not going to win many NFL games. And for the second week in a row, Alex Smith statistics must be taken with a grain of salt.
Last Monday at Green Bay, Smith threw for 290 yards, and led the Chiefs to 28 points. But three of the four TDs came in the final 15:56 of play, after KC had fallen behind 31-7. The last two came in the final 5:04, after it was 38-14. Then come Sunday, when the Chiefs were able to dink and dunk their way to 24 first downs and 461 yards, without scoring a TD. That is part of the package that comes with Smith at QB – a guy that can manage a game, but lacks an extra. It means to score TDs you have to execute a lot of plays, since few big strikes will happen, but then it also means that it is back on Smith’s shoulders to execute in the red zone.
I was looking for quotes from Reid on this front, but he knows the drill by now, so the most interesting came from Jeremy Maclin, a newcomer to KC that doesn’t – “Frustrating. You’re not going to beat good football teams not converting in the end zone. You can’t have it. So we better get it figured out, and get it figured out fast.”
The problem, Jeremy, is that many opposing defenses have already figured it out. And it is something the Chiefs own defense needs to figure out that comes front and center next…
Item: Great Offense/Awful Defense, where is the KC pass rush?
The Cincinnati side of the Sunday box score was a thing of beauty; I was certainly not going to spill anything on it (more on that in a moment). The Bengals averaged 8.9 yards per play, the highest count we are likely to see all season, and did not commit a turnover or allow a sack. They are capable of that, with all of those weapons that were a lead topic here earlier in the season. But that kind of box score is also an indictment of the Kansas City defense, especially on the heels of Monday’s flat showing at Green Bay.
Here is the count over the last two games:
74 Points
893 Yards
7.6 Yards Per Play
0 Takeaways
1 Sack (60 drop-backs)
Yes, those were on the road against two of the best offenses in the NFL. But they are also the kind of performances that can impact the swagger of a unit, and rushing the passer is all about being aggressive and playing with abandon. The Chiefs get someone they should be able to throw off kilter this week when Jay Cutler comes to town; that will be a prime setting to put under the microscope to see if Tamba Hali and Justin Houston can get their swagger back.
Item: Buffalo commits 31 penalties in two home losses…
And this is what Rex Ryan had to say afterwards - "I'm proud of the way this team played. Now, can we play a lot smarter? Absolutely. But I'll take a team that will fight over a team that won't, that'll sit back and take it, any day of the week, and bring on the next team. So that's how I look at it.”
That might be fine, if this were a different era. But the NFL these days is much more about precision and tactical adjustments than the raw emotion of beating someone with physical play. Ryan-coached teams have gone 28-40 over the last 4+ seasons, or since the last time one of them was in the playoffs. He made the playoffs in his first two seasons with the Jets, and that has been all. For as interesting as this Buffalo roster is, the lack of discipline, which included two TDs being called back by penalties on drives the Bills later failed to score on, could keep this bunch from getting near their potential. They simply must clean things up. You may not always look at the penalty tables in the box scores, but that is going to be a key area with this bunch.
Item: Welcome to the NFL, Todd Gurley
Gurley has a chance to be special if he stays healthy, an Adrian Peterson level of explosiveness, both as a ball carrier, a receiver out of the backfield, or even a kick returner if Jeff Fisher dares use him that way. The key is to look at this two ways – not just at the numbers that he will post, but on the impact of the offense overall. A team that was as limited as just about any in the NFL at RB now becomes a whole lot different, and that will change the way opposing defenses align against them.
Gurley ran for 146 yards on 19 carries vs. a solid Arizona defense, and it could have easily been 154 – with 1:17 remaining he broke a run from the 38 that would have gone the distance, except he had the savvy to kneel down at the eight-yard line instead of scoring, the latter being the wrong thing to do when you are only up by two points (a missed PAT, and the Cardinals get the ball back down by eight with a little over a minute to drive the field). Gurley also caught two passes for 15 more yards, but his presence also helped the rest of the passing game, with Nick Foles going 16-24 for 171 yards and three TDs, with no interceptions and only one sack.
Foles is still nothing more than an average QB, and the WR/TE cast is below average. That was most evident through the first three games of the season. Having Gurley around will give those average talents a little more breathing room, and given the quality of that defensive front, the Rams can be moved into the category of legitimate playoff contenders.
Item: The Eagles had no points, and two first downs, at the 2:00 warning of the First Half
Live by the sword … you know the rest. When Chip Kelly’s offense works, it wears down opposing defenses, and enables his team to take full control of the play in the latter stages. When it doesn’t, his own defense gets few respites, and becomes the group getting worn down. The offense has not worked this season, and it has led to an ugly -53 in offensive play differentials through four games. You are not going to win often if the opposition is getting the equivalent of two possessions worth of plays more than you are.
That was the issue at Washington. By not moving the chains early the defense got over-extended, and the 79 snaps they faced in regulations was the high in the NFL this week. Did fatigue play a part in the Redskins driving 90 yards for the game-winning TD on their final possession? Remarkably, they walked away saying no. But is part of that a concession to having to play under Kelly’s unique schemes?
First, from DC Bill Davis – “There are no excuses. Our defense was not gassed. We were out there fighting … Credit goes to them, but there’s no excuses here.” But safety Malcolm Jenkins may have let something slip, before correcting himself – “I don’t see it (the system) changing. It’s not something I think anybody on this team talks about. I don’t think it really affected us. I don’t think anybody’s really tired out there. If it’s a long drive it’s not the offense’s fault, if’s the defense’s fault.”
Here is something in particular to file away – it was game #5 for both the Cowboys and the Redskins against the Kelly offense this season, and the Eagles did not score a first half point against either. What does that tells us about familiarity with that playbook and tempo?
Item: Colin Kaepernick is not getting much help, either
Kaepernick and the 49er offense were terrible again. Not to beat a dead horse, after leading last Tuesday’s recap with the notion that he had turned in the worst single-game performance by a QB in NFL history, but instead time to shift the focus a little bit, because the offensive designs vs. Green Bay helped to render that unit impotent. And there may not be a fix here the remainder of this season.
There were a lot of questions about this coaching staff coming into the season. Jim Tomsula is a decent guy that has been well liked by his players when serving as an assistant, but that may be his proper place. OC Geep Chryst? He has not held that position since 2000 with San Diego, and even that was for only two seasons. QB coach Steve Logan is in his first season with the team, and naturally his first with Kaepernick, but even more important is that it is his first season as an NFL QB coach. His entire previous experience? Three seasons coaching the Tampa Bay RBs.
This offense does not have a lot of tools, but it may not matter all that much wit no carpenters on the coaching staff. Even in trailing by multiple TDs in the second half the past two weeks they have not been able to adjust well enough to get back-door production vs. defenses that were not trying all that hard. There may be no collective ability to fix this.
Item: About the Houston tempo (I still don't have a clue; does Bill O'Brien?)
The fact that the Texans were running plays at the NFL’s fastest pace by far through the first three weeks led to some good back and forth in thread discussions last week, in particular questioning O’Brien’s sanity in forcing that pace despite the offense opening without the starting QB, best RB, and best WR from last year. And through those first three games they were only playing fast (#1), they were not playing well (#30 on the Football Outsiders efficiency ratings). So the question naturally became how much that pace would change with Arian Foster available, but there was nothing resembling an answer that could be gathered from Sunday’s mess at Atlanta.
First, attach little to no weight to a box score that read 24 first downs and 328 yards for the Texans to 22 and 378 for the Falcons. That is not the game that was played, with every one of the Houston points coming after they had fallen down 42-0 after three quarters. In terms of pace there is little to be taken away because of that frenetic fourth quarter. The final game count was a mercurial 19.8 per snap, but I honestly do not know what that means going forward. I wonder if O’Brien does either?
Foster was ineffective, managing just 10 yards on eight carries, although he did catch three passes for 25 more. Ryan Mallett struggled mightily as the starting QB, which led to Brian Hoyer getting the mop-up work, and those gaudy statistics vs. a disinterested Falcon defense. Who gets the call this week? O’Brien was non-committal on Monday. There is no line impact between Hoyer and Mallett, but on a short week it sure would help the offense if one of them got designated as the guy. And it just might help a disjointed offense if they simply slowed down until they learned their way.
MLB: It’s Playoff Time
The MLB playoffs are a special time in general, but perhaps bringing even more intrigue this time around, a rare setting in which every remaining team has a legitimate chance to win it all. It will also be a special time at Point Blank, joining forces with Eric Strasser from Palm Tree Baseball to take you deep inside the game. For a look at the Tuesday/Wednesday Wild Card matchups, you can go right here.
Vegas – Monday’s with the Review-Journal NFL box score page
For as tremendous as the upsurge in Asian and Latin American dining options has been across the Las Vegas valley over the past decade, perhaps nothing has been warming the heart more over the last couple of years than talented young chefs deciding to make this their home. The type of “neighborhood” restaurants or bistros that are havens in other major cities have been a blank canvas here, but that is changing, thanks to a new wave that includes the likes of Nina Manchev, Chris Palmeri, Natalie Young, Sheridan Su and Bradley Manchester, to name a few, that are willing to make a go of it off-Strip. When dining downtown at Manchester’s Glutton, you can feel like you are on a street corner somewhere in Seattle or Portland, and on a rainy Monday that brought back memories of two of my favorite cities in North America, it was easy to make the call.
There are several components that make Glutton work, starting with Manchester’s flair for taking traditional notions and elevating them. Add in the sourcing of high quality ingredients, and a wood-fired oven that adds a dynamic to the cooking process, and it is the kind of place you will want to return to until you have worked all the way through the menu. Manchester is also a step ahead of the “squeeze-bottle-tasting-menu-art-on-a-plate” crowd – his savvy comes in knowing how to blend flavors that will hold up through the process of his customers getting fed, which is a vastly under-appreciated skill. To dazzle across a couple of bites is actually easy; to keep the taste buds invigorated through an entire dish is hard (if you are an aspiring young chef reading this, let Emeril Lagasse be an inspiration as a master of the latter).
Monday’s lunch showcased the Manchester strengths, while I was pondering how any defense could face 46 Kirk Cousins’ passes without catching at least one themselves – a “Chicken Hash” sandwich, a riff from their Chicken Hash that is served for brunch on weekends, which brought sautéed spinach, a fried egg, carmelized onions, cheddar cheese, and a spicy bacon mayo on a ciabatta roll. The combination of flavors and textures comes together so well that despite the generous portion it goes down quite easily, a tribute to someone that understands his craft. No matter how hungry you are, and how good those fries taste, you will not finish that pile, but they are great for wiping through the drippings that sandwich leaves on the plate.
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