Titans win! A coin flip

The Titans win! I feel like this morning’s coin-toss victory for the Titans (unconfirmed rumors state that it was heads) over the Panthers starts them at 1-0 this year. Mock NFL drafts struggled because there were three draft pick ties in the first round. The Jags and Bears flipped for the 10th pick. Only the Bears had traded the pick. They probably tanked the call. I wouldn’t be surprised if they told the Jags “go ahead and take it”. The Titans and Panthers flipped for the 16th pick. Once again, the first-round-averse Panthers traded their pick to the 49ers. The temporary owners of the pick lost to the Titans. The Falcons and Texans flipped for the 19th pick. The Falcons won. This was the only flip in which both teams had something to lose.

The Colts didn’t flip for anything, other than the pick-six that Manning flipped to Tracy Porter.

It’s very easy to get overly wrought in today’s mass media world. My minor gripe was that before the coin flip occurred, every mock draft I saw had the Titans picking 17th even though they were flipping for the pick. I guess it had to do with the 49ers getting the pick in trade and the Titans beating the 49ers last year. In your face, Panthers! I mean 49ers!

I thought there were so many tie-breakers that the coin flip wouldn’t be necessary. It’s hard to believe that with all of the advanced sabermetrics in sports that there isn’t another way to break these ties. The NFL Network didn’t even televise the flips, and they’re showing 30 hours of guys in underwear this weekend. I mean the NFL Combine.

I love how the information’s coming over Twitter regarding player size and weight. There’s a newfangled way to measure height. Instead of 6’2, the number would be 6020. If the player was 6’2 and an eighth of an inch, it would be 6021. I’m 6000, just like Toby Gerhart.

Would a player’s height, weight, and arm length help or hurt their draft stock? Quarterbacks need to be tall and so do offensive linemen, so yes. Arm length matters for linemen but I don’t know if it’s that relevant for “skill position” guys.

I’m not going to be like those people who protest too much about American Idol. I won’t say that watching the NFL Combine is a complete waste of time. The fact that I’m considering watching this means that I miss football that much. And love makes you do strange things, like watch a bunch of guys run around in shorts.

RFA tendering has started. It’s time for me to pull out the “surrender to the tender” commercial tag line. How many teams will match these tenders and sign these would-be unrestricted free agents?

Whelmed with the Titans

Here’s a quick summary of the Titans’ offseason moves. They signed Eugene Amano to a giant contract. When the season was over, if someone asked me who the weak link was on the offensive line, I’d say Amano. Roos is a Pro-Bowl caliber left tackle but didn’t make the game because he’s not a running back. Dave Stewart is the mauler at right tackle who will get the occasional holding penalty. Jake Scott has been a fine free agent addition. Kevin Mawae is the crafty veteran.

Amano’s deal is five years, $25 million. Remember when that was a lot of money? Wait, it still is. The Titans obviously thought that continuity was important. They knew that Leroy Harris is ready for the starting gig, and he must be ready for the responsibility of playing center. Don’t forget that he was the starting center in the critical (at the time anyway) win over the Steelers in December of 2008.

Amano gets $12 million this year. Yeah, that’s a lot of cheddar. Compare him to former Titan Jacob Bell, who was good but not great but got a deal worth around $7 million a year from the Rams. I know, it’s the Rams. Offensive line is a premium position. One thing the Titans don’t have is depth, especially if Harris starts. The seventh rounder gets paid.

I am assuming that Amano will stay at guard while Harris will be the center. It’s possible that Amano will move to center and Harris will take over at guard. Could this offseason be less intriguing so far?

The Titans also signed Donnie Nickey. Not a lot of teams are signing players now. The only reason to make a deal so far in advance of free agency is because the player is that important to the team. Nickey has been the 53rd man on the roster, or the 45th if you count inactives, for many years. He plays special teams and the Titans make a point not to play him at his listed position of safety. I feel like an undrafted rookie could do his job but there he is, on the team every September. What’s the emotional state between overwhelmed and underwhelmed? This move leaves me whelmed.

Running on empty

I’m going to blog about sports, but it’s time to get personal. I exercise a lot. It’s my real-life version of Farmville. I go to the gym twice a week and do weights or Wii Fit for the rest of the week. Sometimes I enjoy it and sometimes it’s a pain.

Sunday afternoon was my first opportunity to jog in my new neighborhood. I hadn’t gone for a run in five weeks. We were in move mode and then we were in endless winter mode. Today’s high temperature, which was around 45 degrees, would have qualified as a deep freeze in previous years. Now it’s practically balmy.
On Sunday it was 65 degrees. People were out in shorts, and not just the nutso joggers who wear shorts no matter what the weather is. I walked a bit with the wife and started on the Appetite for Destruction.

We forget, more than 20 years later, that Appetite for Destruction was an oasis in a desert of mostly horrible synth 80s music. I say mostly because I do like to rock the Tears for Fears from time to time. I gave myself a goal. Run for ten songs. Ten songs usually ends up around 30 to 35 minutes. Welcome to the Jungle is around 4:30 and sets the tone. Paradise City is almost seven minutes long and while running seems more like two hours. I was in the middle of Sweet Child of Mine when I ran up the hill and called it a day. Less than nine songs translated to around 37 minutes. I had made it.

But a run is never really done until the following day. Therin lies the soreness. When my gym replaced the ellipticals, my calves were sore for three days. On Monday my thighs felt like Albert Haynesworth had taken a nap on them. Walking was only painful when I moved.

I skipped my usual Monday afternoon gym trip because of the thighs. On Tuesday afternoon I felt barely better but tried it anyway. I do around 40 minutes, half on reverse and half on forward. Forward tends to be harder. The first 20 minutes were tough. The second 20 minutes were a breeze. It’s rare when the time just melts away and you’re moving at nearly a sprinter’s pace. I completed the 45 minutes including the cool-down and did 6.99 miles. Yes, I rounded up.

The value of a z buck

The Zealots free agency madness continues. There’s nothing compelling about getting in a bidding war for Cameron Wake or bumping people’s bids up a few hundred zbucks. It’s a way to pass the time.

I thought one transaction in z17 was particularly interesting. Zbucks generally have no real value. It’s a waivers/draft league for the most part except for this free agent period. For the most part you’re dealing with the long-shots and the backups in the NFL. What’s the real value of zbucks? One team decided to find out. The deal was z5000 for a fourth-round pick. At first I thought that the team who netted the draft pick came out a winner. Did they really?

In my league we have one auction that finished at z5050 for Devin Aromashodu. Maybe Mike Martz makes him a viable WR3. Let’s not get too carried away. The other 21 players went for 11,600 zbucks. That’s about z550 per player. So this team could get nine players for their z5000. It’s a little like what the Patriots did prior to the 2001 season. Sign a ton of low-level free agents and hope for the best.
In exchange, the 4.12 pick doesn’t usually end up well. You’re reaching for a low-end wide receiver or a decent IDP guy. The best player I saw in the rookie drafts from my two leagues at that slot was Lofa Tatupu. I drafted Jared Cook at 4.12 last year but the return so far has been nothing.

Ultimately the trade isn’t going to be a league-winner for either team. It’s interesting, and in this slow time of the offseason we’ll take interesting. We’ll take this over news that the Raiders are paying their kicker and punter a combined $8 million a year.

Frank Thomas

Frank Thomas was a one-dimensional player. All he did was hit. Sure, the White Sox played him at first base in the early years of his career. He was a big guy without a ton of agility who probably could have played in the NFL as a tight end. He was huge.

He came up to the major leagues in 1990, which was in the midst of the first period of the team being good since the disastrous playoff series in 1983. The Oakland As were the juggernaut. They were a bit of the precursor of the 90s Braves and the 00s Colts. They were the best team in baseball for an extended period of time but only won one title. As a White Sox fan, one title seemed like an infinite number. In August he and Alex Fernandez were called up on the same day, along with a lanky outfielder called Sammy Sosa.

Thomas came to the league slightly ahead of the sabermetric revolution. In the early 90s, the batting title was all that mattered. In his first eight seasons, he hit better than .300 with an on-base percentage no lower than .426. He hit a lot but he walked a lot as well. His walk-heavy tendencies hurt his overall hit total for sure.

It’s hard to beat his first seven full seasons in the majors. During that time he finished no lower than 8th in MVP voting. He led the league in on-base percentage four times. He had 100 RBIs every year, and just one year of fewer than 30 home runs. In that season he led the league in doubles. During 1994’s strike-shortened season he flirted with .400, led the league in runs (the heaviest guy to do so in history) and was on pace for his first 50-home run season. I think he could have hit 12 in the season’s final 50 games. The season ended doubly sadly in that the Sox led the AL Central when the season was cancelled.

2000 was his comeback year. He hit a career high 43 homers with 143 RBI. He was denied a third MVP because Jason “do these steroids make my pecs look fat” Giambi won.

After hitting an early-series home run in the 1993 AL Championship Series, the Blue Jays decided to walk Thomas. He had ten walks in 27 series plate appearances. In the 2000 divisional series he didn’t get a hit in 13 plate appearances. By the time the Sox made their great 2005 run, Thomas was injured. He played in only 34 games that year and when the team got to the playoffs, he claimed that he could play but was not activated. I think he deserves the World Series ring.

2006 was a tough year for me as a sports fan. The Titans locked out Steve McNair due to his horrible contract. My favorite White Sock of all time was not re-signed. Instead they went with Jim Thome. Thomas played angry, signing with the As and winning the Comeback Player of the Year award. It was his sixth top-four finish in the MVP. I thought he looked good in green. He had one great playoff series as the As swept the Twins but was shut out against the Tigers in the ALCS.

He did not look good in Toronto Blue. The Jays signed him to a two-year, $18 million contract. I hope he saved much of that money, as he famously burned through his money by buying a house with a helipad and a dance club and started a record label.

The Jays released him midway though the 2008 season and the As claimed him. At 40 years old he was a shell of himself and hit 240.

No one signed him last year. He finally gave in and retired last week.

Despite his prodigious size, no one’s ever hinted at any steroid use. He was just naturally huge. It’s a little sad that his career ended in a whimper and that he couldn’t stay with the Sox. I can’t connect with any of the current players the way

I connected with Frank. You had to watch his every at bat. He’d glare at the umpire if a strike were called on a ball slightly out of the strike zone. His swing was powerful. He once hit a home run when he broke his bat.

I met him after a game in Kansas City. I was in college. He autographed a picture and said nothing. It was good enough for me.

For me, he was the ultimate player. He satisfied my need for stats and lots of him. Watching him play was a treat. I didn’t even watch one entire baseball game last year. I may not do so again this year. I might not even play fantasy baseball at all. Yeah, it’s the end of an era.

Another lame take on the Super Bowl

Chris Johnson probably didn’t enjoy last night’s game. That’s because the run game is dead. It had some death throes during the Jets’ playoff run but it flatlined last night.

Let’s look at the stats. The Saints ran the ball 18 times for 51 yards. The Colts ran 19 times for 99 yards. The Saints passed 39 times for 288 yards. The Colts passed 45 times for 333 yards. When the Saints ran, it was like an incomplete pass. The Colts had a decent balance but had to abandon the run once it was 24-17.

Both teams played “their” games. The Colts passed at will and had a key goal-line stand. The Saint passed, passed, passed. The Colts were either moving the ball up and down the field or going three and out. They didn’t stall out. The Saints played steady, knowing that they had the entire half to enact the game plan.

Everyone’s talking about the onside kick and deservedly so. Just as important was the Saints stopping the Colts after the goal-line stand. If Peyton can lead the Colts to an end-of-half score, the Saints would have been in big trouble. Instead they made the stop and got points. Momentum was theirs and after the onside kick they rarely relinquished it.

In the championship games the teams with the better run games lost. The Vikings and Jets played to their peak and still fell short. If it weren’t for Sir Fumble A Lot, formerly known as Adrian Peterson, the Vikings would have prevailed.

Look at the last few Super Bowls. Where is the dominant performance by a running back? This year’s starting running backs barely combined for 100 yards. Last year’s Super Bowl starters were Edgerrin James and Willie Parker. I’m going to have to look and see who the last 100-yard running back in the Bowl was. Probably Parker, ironically enough.

The common discussion last week was that Peyton Manning was one Super Bowl win from being the best quarterback of all time. It was hyperbole, but by kickoff it was just about established as fact. It was over the top, and so is today's talk that Peyton Manning is a descendent of the dinosaur Chokasaurus Rex. To my knowledge, less than ten quarterbacks have ever won at least two Super Bowls. Manning would have been in select company had his team won. There might not even be ten quarterbacks who have been to multiple Super Bowls.

Let's get over this discussion of clutch. Had Asante Samuel not dropped an interception or had Eli Manning not avoided two sacks, the only two sacks he's avoided in his life, or had David Tyree not caught that crazy pass, the Giants would have lost. He played through the circumstances and the near misses and won. I think his defense had a lot to do with the win as well. With less than four minutes left, trailing by a touchdown and playing a defense that was gambling like a drunk guy on a hot streak playing craps, a lot of quarterbacks would have fallen short. The slant might have been a little too obvious and Reggie Wayne might have been a little more injured than people knew.

Tom Brady was thought to be invincible in the playoffs. He looked not too different from JaMarcus Russell in his last playoff game. He still has three rings and has been to four Super Bowls. Only one other quarterback has done that. But it's cool to say that now is the best time ever and the players we're watching are the greatest. That's fine. Just don't go overboard. Brady gets this decade. Considering how little he gets hit, Manning might own the next. For now, Brady wins. As much as it makes me want to barf into a wastebasket, the Patriots are the team of the decade. The Colts are the Braves of the 90s.

There are plenty of teams who wish they could take the Colts' place. Only the Patriots and the Steelers would say otherwise. Getting to the Super Bowl is tough. Just ask Dan Marino.

Virtual greatness

Every time I play a game of video football, I wonder if it’s going to be one of “those” games. Most of the time the game is uncontested or lacking in drama. Since I got back into Tecmo, I had one of those games. As San Francisco, I routinely have been blowing teams out. When I played the Colts, and not a particularly good Colts team, I struggled. My offense couldn’t do anything and my defense gave up big plays. When the Colts scored to make it 19-7 and there was about a minute left, I thought there was potential for a dramatic finish.

My previously horrible offense scored quickly. It was 19-14. I needed a stop or an interception. I got an interception on the second play. With about 25 seconds to go, I got inside the ten. I had four plays. In Tecmo, if the defense “calls” your play, it’s not going to work. They called my play three out of the four times. I had one scramble by Montana but could not score. I was short.

Since this is a video game I re-played the game and won easily. Of course. Now I get to play the championship game versus Cleveland (of all teams). Let’s see how it goes.

It went well. My Wii did not react well to our brief power outage yesterday morning. I couldn’t get it to power back up. The only way I got it to work was by unplugging it from the surge protector and plugging it into the other outlet.
I assumed that the team I played in the Tecmo Bowl would be good. The Cleveland Browns did not offer much of a struggle. Because there’s almost no such thing as a breakaway in the game, your best defensive strategy is to make the other team sustain long drives. Sooner or later you’re going to guess right and get an interception. In the first half I had three interceptions and a blocked field goal. I took a 17-0 lead into the third quarter.

This was not a classic Joe Montana performance. I threw four interceptions, including two in the end zone in the third quarter. The Browns scored a TD to make it 17-6. Pretty soon thereafter I scored to make it 24-6 and the rout was on.

I kept stats for this game. In honor of his Hall of Fame induction, Jerry Rice caught 14 passes for 210 yards. He couldn’t get in the end zone. Roger Craig had 13 carries for 54 yards and three touchdowns. Montana ran for the other touchdown.

The 1989 49ers had one of the most dominant playoff runs ever. In the Divisional round they beat the Vikings 41-13. In the NFC Championship they beat the Rams 30-3. In the Super Bowl they pounded the Broncos, scoring a record 55 points. That’s three playoff wins by a combined 100 points. My 38-12 victory pales in comparison.