Week 2 has (almost) come and gone, and I'm fairly certain it kicked the pants off of Week 1. Very few games were blowouts, and the ones that were you probably would have guessed said blowouts would occur (unless you're a Giants fan, oops). What did we learn this week?
-CLOSE GAMES ARE EXCITING. From my Bears scoring a touchdown with ten seconds left to Stevie Johnson giving the Bills a win with maybe the most wide open touchdown ever scored from within the 5-yard line, there were a whole host of games decided by a field goal or less. And that's AWESOME. There's one game in particular I'd like to call out, though...
-The end of the Texans/Titans game was full of all kinds of shenanigans. For starters, the Texans ran a play to center the ball and wind the clock down for a potential game-winning 46-yard field goal. Houston's kicker, Randy Bullock, had already missed two attempts earlier in the game. Now, if I'm Tennessee, and I have ALL THREE TIMEOUTS remaining, I'd probably use one of them to save some time. But they didn't--they let it run all the way down to five seconds. I get that you want to ice the kicker and all that, but kickers tend to be waiting around all game anyway. And I'd rather have the extra 20 or so seconds to, you know, not immediately lose the game if he makes it, or to start at midfield with 20 seconds left (instead of zero), if he misses it. Anyway, Bullock made his first kick, but it was nullified by a Titans timeout. The second kick got blocked, but it was due to a Titans player jumping offside to block said kick. The third attempt hung in the air forever, then finally dinged the left upright and missed. CHAOS. Fortunately, the Texans managed to win in overtime anyway, but I doubt Randy Bullock will be employed this time next week. Or even this time tomorrow.
-Today I learned that, during a punt, a player on the receiving team can touch the ball without penalty if someone on the kicking team touches it first. In a pair of different games, that exact thing happened, with a player on the kicking team making one of those cool "jump-from-in-front-of-the-endzone-catch-the-ball-in-the-air-and-toss-it-back-into-the-field-of-play" moves, then the ball hitting a player on the receiving team. Despite a lot of confused announcers and refs throwing their hats, it seemed that the receiving team would still get the ball, had said ball not ended up out of bounds in both instances.
-The Chiefs and Dolphins are sneaky good. The Giants and Redskins should be nervous as held. The Jaguars are bad and they should feel bad. And the Lions seem incapable of beating the Cardinals, despite the latter not having an offensive line for years. So...maybe Lions fans should be nervous, too.
-Our Worst Team of the Week is once again the Jacksonville Jaguars, who for much of the game were held to three points. Which would have meant that through two weeks they had a field goal and safety to show for 120 minutes of playing. But they got a late touchdown (with a failed two-point conversion), so now they're up to nearly a point every 10 minutes. Not too shabby? No, it's beyond shabby. Because shabby equates to ramshackled, and to say the Jags are that is an insult to the word.
-The Stupidest Player of the Week award goes to the Niners' Aldon Smith, who slapped Breno Giacomini in the face...er, helmet after the Seahawks picked up about half of a 2nd and 28. Of course, slapping is a personal foul, and the Hawks got a first down instead of a 3rd and 13 or whatever it would have been. Silly.
-Our Worst Team of the Week is once again the Jacksonville Jaguars, who for much of the game were held to three points. Which would have meant that through two weeks they had a field goal and safety to show for 120 minutes of playing. But they got a late touchdown (with a failed two-point conversion), so now they're up to nearly a point every 10 minutes. Not too shabby? No, it's beyond shabby. Because shabby equates to ramshackled, and to say the Jags are that is an insult to the word.
-The Stupidest Player of the Week award goes to the Niners' Aldon Smith, who slapped Breno Giacomini in the face...er, helmet after the Seahawks picked up about half of a 2nd and 28. Of course, slapping is a personal foul, and the Hawks got a first down instead of a 3rd and 13 or whatever it would have been. Silly.
-It's only Week 2 and I'm already kicking myself for benching various people on my fantasy team. This is gonna be a loooong season.
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