In fact, I was so annoyed yesterday I decided to illustrate my frustration at the game-tying touchdown – thanks, Rahim Moore – in pictoral form. Pretty stylish, I’d say.
From left: Jacoby Jones, Rahim Moore, Brandon Stokley, Bill Vinovich, Joe Flacco
On Saturday I wrote about a sporting fixture I was looking forward to immensely. One problem: it ended in heartbreaking fashion: probably the worst in that regard other than Wales’s 9-8 loss to France in the 2011 Rugby World Cup. Here’s a post I wrote for a new American football blog the day after the painful night before:
They say it was Denver’s most painful loss since being defeated by Jacksonville at the same stage of the 1996 season.
The morning after the devastating night before, I am still in shock. I have not quite come to terms with the Ravens’ 38-35 double-overtime win at Mile High.
As I write this, I still don’t know the San Francisco-Green Bay score. I watched the first quarter, frozen in my seat, and saw some people in red and gold running around a pitch being chased by people in white and yellow.
What a thing to admit for someone writing an NFL blog: I just couldn’t bring myself to care.
Denver has wasted home-field advantage all the way to the Super Bowl. An all-round team choked. How?
Rahim Moore’s catastrophic misjudgement
It’s not as if safety Rahim Moore won’t be feeling bad about himself anyway, but wow. That was spectacularly, devastatingly, career-stainingly terrible. Denver had a seven point lead in regulation; Baltimore had to go 70 yards in 41 seconds with no timeouts. It was third down, the clock was ticking. Joe Flacco (Joe Flacco!) launched a bomb downfield which Jacoby Jones chased after; Tony Carter, playing zone coverage, watched Jones zoom away into what should have been Rahim’s territory.
The split second before seemed to go in ultra-slow motion. I, like every Denver fan, could absolutely see Moore had totally misjudged the flight of the pass. Jones had to break stride, but Moore was three yards upfield. He leapt desperately to get a finger on the ball. Missed. Jones romped in for the score. Stunned silence.
Champ Bailey being bossed
The final seconds of the first half had also seen Denver give up a long touchdown to Flacco’s arm via Torrey Smith, which tied the game at 21-21 (a minute earlier Matt Prater shanked a long field goal which would have put the Broncos 24-14 up).
Smith got a worrying amount of separation from future-hall of famer Bailey all evening. The changing of the guard? It looked like it. Smith already had an even longer TD, and should have had one more but was overthrown by Flacco, again when he was miles ahead of Denver’s cornerback. Champ was failing to deal with Torrey at the line of scrimmage, allowing the youngster to skip past him downfield. It ended with Denver’s corners dropping five to 10 yards deep at the line of scrimmage, allowing the Ravens receivers to pick up short yardage at crucial points – such as when they were sat deep in their own half on third down in overtime.
The play calling
I am a big fan of John Fox and his coaching team. But who’s bright idea was it to pass on the opportunity of a possible game-winning field goal late in regulation, after Jones scored?
Justin Tucker smashed the kick-off through the end zone, giving the Broncos a touchback. Denver had two timeouts and 31 seconds. BUT PEYTON TOOK A KNEE? Excuse me? We only had to get to the 40-yard line to give Prater a chance to equal his season-long three-pointer. That’s 40 yards needed, in 31 seconds, with two timeouts, with Peyton Manning, with a superb receiving corps of Demaryius Thomas, Eric Decker, Jacob Tamme, Joel Dreessen and Brandon Stokley, perhaps the Broncos’ standout player yesterday. I just fail to comprehend the strategy of preferring to take your chances in overtime. Sure, it’s easy to say in hindsight – but it was also easy to say at the time.
Incidentally, just before the Ravens’ brief possession which resulted in Jacoby Jones’ score, Peyton had a third and short where a first down would have won the game. It was handed off to Ronnie Hillman rather than give Manning the chance to pass. Interesting, the lack of faith in the likely NFL MVP.
Peyton Manning’s late interception
Still, the second pick Manning threw, towards the end of the first overtime period, showed the veteran up. Scrambling right from a disintegrated pocket on third down, he attempted a John Elway-style throw across his body towards his safety blanket Brandon Stokley. But Stokley, who had caught a fine TD pass in the first half and had an even better catch from a poor Peyton pass to keep alive an earlier overtime drive, was unable to get in front of Corey Graham, who nabbed his second INT of the match. It was already in long-field goal range, and handed Baltimore the win. What possessed Manning to try to make that throw is perplexing to say the least.
The officiating
I don’t like criticising officials, but find me someone who thinks they took charge of this game well. “Led” by Bill Vinovich, some of the decisions were dubious, some downright absurd. Denver fans will argue Eric Decker was impeded on Manning’s first interception, a pick six; Baltimore supporters will say it was a “bang bang” play and contact came just about at the same time as the ball arrived. Still, you’ve seen them called. In any case, a clear DPI which impeded Demaryius Thomas was missed earlier in the drive.
And I’m sorry, but what was that call on Champ Bailey in overtime? Defensive pass interference for that? You have got to be kidding. And in third down in overtime. What a killer. Talking of which, how can that Anquan Boldin “catch” be ruled a completion? If the ground didn’t help him hold on then I’m a Dutchman (and I’m not).
The third quarter lasted nearly an hour and a half, by the way. That was in part down to the officials taking about 20 minutes to sort out a five-yard illegal hands to the face penalty on Baltimore. I’m not saying the delay was engineered to give the flagging Baltimore D a break, but…
Peyton Manning’s fumble: when exactly is the tuck rule supposed to come into play? I’m no fan of it, obviously, and is Tom Brady the only person ever to benefit from it?
And one more thing: Justin Tucker came onto the field to practise a long field goal in the break between the two overtime periods. There’s no penalty against it, but officials are not supposed to let it happen. How did they all manage just to watch him warm up and fail to intervene?
If the replacement refs had been as poor, they would have been absolutely crucified.
This blog likes to support lesser sports, grassroots competition and those teams who don’t always find their way into the public eye. In other words, sport at its most pure. But at the same time it is impossible not to be swept up into the frenzy which elite sport brings with it.
The only problem is that I have gone right off football since the summer: I think it was mainly because there was a void after the Olympics and Paralympics which the ref-abusing, foul-mouthed, diving, pampered footballers (who are nevertheless worshipped by the likes of Sky Sports News) just couldn’t fill.
Since October, I have watched just one football match for more than about half an hour – MK Dons v AFC Wimbledon in the FA Cup, and that was only because I was interested in the back story more than the game itself.
The new Mile High stadium, home of the Denver Broncos. Photo: Flickr, rphelan
By contrast, I have watched club rugby on a greater scale than before. It helps that I now live in a rugby-supporting part of England, and have easy access to watch Northampton Saints and Leicester Tigers home games. I enjoy cheering for the Saints and whoever the Tigers are playing, but I still can’t get fully into it because I’m still an outsider here (I don’t wear tweed to the rugby and I have no idea why Northampton are called the “Jimmies”).
And being a Welsh rugby fan has not been easy this season: whitewashed in the autumn internationals, pessimism ahead of the Six Nations and a club game which is haemorrhaging players to richer clubs and which has continued to recede in Europe.
So for the first time in months, I am properly excited about watching a elite sports match tonight. It’s in the NFL, as the Baltimore Ravens take on the Denver Broncos (my team since a chance encounter with the squad at Denver International Airport in December 2005) in Colorado.
I hear what people say about American football being rugby for people who need full-body pads and a break every 20 seconds, but it is more than that: it is an intricate, complicated game which requires great nous; it is not just fat men pushing each other (you might be thinking of sumo wrestling).
Nearly 80,000 spectators will pack into the Sports Authority Field at Mile High for the game this evening. It will be snowing, it will be -12C, it will be exciting and I cannot wait.
An Early Bath 