There are mysteries in this world. Why didn't Christ walk the earth at a time of greater worldwide communication? Why wasn't there a sequel to The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension? Why is three always the magic number for illustrative examples used in rhetorical pointmaking? These are questions taken for granted among thinking persons, and among such persons, we reasonably assume that they will go unanswered, perhaps because to answer such questions would be to make sense of something whose capacity for mystery is immutable and eternal. For our purposes, a similarly unanswerable query is "Why have so few NFL greats worn the number 31?"
Yes, I recall Jim Taylor, the gravely reticent Green Bay Packers running back from the 1960's. But there's been remarkably few in the annals of the game with #31. This dearth extends itself to the New York Jets. Number 31 is the first in our collection since #20 that will be covered in one entry. Unless I keep babbling like this.
Sometimes I'm not that bright. Certainly I couldn't be as a bright as I think I am, but often I'm nowhere near as bright as people think I am. Since I am a teacher, this is a reality I tend to keep to myself for professional reasons. If my colleagues are listening closely enough, they will occasionally catch snippets of things I say that are badly thought out or curiously out of tune with basic logic. Less often I will find myself doing it in class, but then I never have to worry about that because my students don't really listen to what I say, anyway. I remember having a deep discussion with somebody while in college about a particular political figure whom I asserted would, in no time, find his image burning in "effiggy" somewhere in the Middle East. That pretty much solidified the end of the argument and created a new line of discussion about how dumb I was. I'm not dumb, but I do and say dumb things on occasion just like everybody else. I may even do it more often than you.
So I feel reasonably at home telling you that when I first saw Marion Barber run for the Dallas Cowboys two seasons ago, I said to myself, "Holy God. He played for the Jets in #31 during the 1980's!" I couldn't quite remember when in the decade, but that shouldn't have mattered. "Just how old is Marion Barber?" I asked myself. Before thinking rationally and consulting the credentials of the Cowboys' running back in question, I decided to calculate the age of the Marion Barber about whom I was thinking. I roughly ascertained that the man I was watching on TV, who was short, powerful-looking and lithe, was probably anywhere between 45 to 50 years old. I regret to say that it took me a few more confused seconds - like the seemingly endless ones we experience when coming out of the stupor of a particularly vivid dream - to realize that I was confusing a father and son. The father the Jet, Marion Barber, Jr; the son a Cowboy and Marion Barber III. There. I've admitted it.
****
Ahmad Carroll #31 came to the New York Jets from exile in Arena Football after having a remarkable number of firearms convictions in one fell swoop. He was sent there after being cut by Jacksonville in 2006, during a movement in the NFL toward a "no-tolerance policy" regarding criminal activity in the league. (Sadly this way of being was not extended toward the Cincinnati Bengals' uniforms.) He joins Abram Elam as another former member of our secondary who is trying to become a good citizen once again. There were good performances he gave in 2008, particularly against Seattle and Miami - games whose clips we would link to if they did not give us intense pain. After he was let go, he went where all forms of promise go - to the purgatorial world of the Hartford Colonials, formerly of Downing Stadium, NY. Such is the way. You come from Arena Football, you go back to the UFL.
Rabu, 28 Januari 2009
Senin, 26 Januari 2009
NY Jets By the Numbers - #30 (Part 2)
The first time the New York Jets played a regular season game at the New Jersey Meadowlands was the second game of the 1977 season, when the Jets fell to Baltimore 20-12. The Jets had managed a safety and Leahy field goal all day, and many of the masses departed early to tackle the then unfamiliar commute from New Jersey back to Long Island and the city. Under threatening skies, Jets fullback Charlie White #30 scored a one-yard touchdown to narrow the Colts' lead to eight. It would be the only touchdown of a brief career that would end the next season in Tampa Bay. Ironically, the year after that, an entirely different Charles White of USC would win the Heisman Trophy.
In the category of brushed with greatness, consider the Jets' safety #30 Chris Hayes, who spent one season with the championship Packers of 1996 and one with the defending champion Patriots in 2002. (Did Bill Parcells see something in Hayes during Super Bowl Somethingorother when the Patriots fell to Favre's Pack such that he brought him to the Jets for the following training camp?) Sandwiched in between, Hayes spent five seasons with the New York, from 1997 to 2001 - years I like to think of as the Jets' modern era of confused expectation. As long as he didn't have to play on Kotite's squads, he should have counted his blessings.
Dean Look has a great name, even if his history in the AFL consists of a single season with the New York Titans. He is our first #30 in franchise history. I knew a guy in college named Dean. Every time we saw him, we used to yell, "Dean! Look!" He would reply, "Holy shit!" every time. We didn't know about a Dean Look from the New York Titans or anything. You really had to be there.
Did you know Chuck Mercein #30 played for the New York Jets? I didn't either. Do you know who Chuck Mercein is? Chuck Mercein is the guy you see holding up his hands to signal that he is not pushing Bart Starr over the goal line in the final seconds of the Ice Bowl in 1967. This is because Mercein was promised the ball in the huddle, but Starr decided to keep, leaving a startled Mercein behind to fall atop the pile. His heroics on the final drive led the Packers to the goal line. None of these adventures manifested themselves for the Jets in 1970, his first and only season with us (and the last season of his career). Hopefully the final drive on New Year's Eve 1967 made it all worthwhile, for he never even carried the ball in Super Bowl II, and he appears to have missed the entire 1969 campaign for the Packers. Much of his career seemed to be about waiting around for his chance, which must have been frustrating. Sometimes that's the way life has to be.
And finally, Mark Smolinski, the Jets' standard bearer for the #30, whatever that means. During a fairly entertaining and enlightening HBO special on the history of the AFL - which my brother kindly taped for me while I was laboring under the strain of only 13 channels in a miserable Philadelphia apartment - we see that the league was indeed progressive-minded. AFL players refused to play the All-Star Game in New Orleans in 1964 when they realized that the city would not to offer rooms in the reserved hotels to African-American players. The league franchises made black and white players feel more at home with each other than players in the other league felt. In a seemingly unrelated point, John Madden mentioned that the AFL was the only league that insisted players' names be put on the backs of uniforms. To illustrate Madden's point, the film showed a clip of a crew-cut Jet player from the back bearing the name "Smolinski" and the #30. They might just as well shown the extraordinary length the to which the Buffalo Bills went to print the name "Schottenheimer" on the back of a certain small linebacker's jersey, but there you are.
But then I guess if you put a player's name on his jersey, he feels more like an individual. Is he then more inclined to see his colleagues that way, too, such that when Abner Hayes, Cookie Gilchrist and Dave Grayson were refused a room, Jack Kemp, Keith Lincoln and Mark Smolinski (had been an All-Star that year) took offense? What's in a name?
Along with the late Johnny Sample and Bake Turner, Mark Smolinski was also cut by the Baltimore Colts in the early 60's, only then to return to haunt Baltimore in the last game of his career, Super Bowl III. Smolinski's last touchdown as a pro came in week 2 of 1968 in (of all places) Birmingham, AL when he blocked a Terry Swanson punt and downed it three yards away in the Patriot end zone to give the Jets a ten point lead on the Boston Patriots in the third quarter.
In the category of brushed with greatness, consider the Jets' safety #30 Chris Hayes, who spent one season with the championship Packers of 1996 and one with the defending champion Patriots in 2002. (Did Bill Parcells see something in Hayes during Super Bowl Somethingorother when the Patriots fell to Favre's Pack such that he brought him to the Jets for the following training camp?) Sandwiched in between, Hayes spent five seasons with the New York, from 1997 to 2001 - years I like to think of as the Jets' modern era of confused expectation. As long as he didn't have to play on Kotite's squads, he should have counted his blessings.
Dean Look has a great name, even if his history in the AFL consists of a single season with the New York Titans. He is our first #30 in franchise history. I knew a guy in college named Dean. Every time we saw him, we used to yell, "Dean! Look!" He would reply, "Holy shit!" every time. We didn't know about a Dean Look from the New York Titans or anything. You really had to be there.
Did you know Chuck Mercein #30 played for the New York Jets? I didn't either. Do you know who Chuck Mercein is? Chuck Mercein is the guy you see holding up his hands to signal that he is not pushing Bart Starr over the goal line in the final seconds of the Ice Bowl in 1967. This is because Mercein was promised the ball in the huddle, but Starr decided to keep, leaving a startled Mercein behind to fall atop the pile. His heroics on the final drive led the Packers to the goal line. None of these adventures manifested themselves for the Jets in 1970, his first and only season with us (and the last season of his career). Hopefully the final drive on New Year's Eve 1967 made it all worthwhile, for he never even carried the ball in Super Bowl II, and he appears to have missed the entire 1969 campaign for the Packers. Much of his career seemed to be about waiting around for his chance, which must have been frustrating. Sometimes that's the way life has to be. And finally, Mark Smolinski, the Jets' standard bearer for the #30, whatever that means. During a fairly entertaining and enlightening HBO special on the history of the AFL - which my brother kindly taped for me while I was laboring under the strain of only 13 channels in a miserable Philadelphia apartment - we see that the league was indeed progressive-minded. AFL players refused to play the All-Star Game in New Orleans in 1964 when they realized that the city would not to offer rooms in the reserved hotels to African-American players. The league franchises made black and white players feel more at home with each other than players in the other league felt. In a seemingly unrelated point, John Madden mentioned that the AFL was the only league that insisted players' names be put on the backs of uniforms. To illustrate Madden's point, the film showed a clip of a crew-cut Jet player from the back bearing the name "Smolinski" and the #30. They might just as well shown the extraordinary length the to which the Buffalo Bills went to print the name "Schottenheimer" on the back of a certain small linebacker's jersey, but there you are.
But then I guess if you put a player's name on his jersey, he feels more like an individual. Is he then more inclined to see his colleagues that way, too, such that when Abner Hayes, Cookie Gilchrist and Dave Grayson were refused a room, Jack Kemp, Keith Lincoln and Mark Smolinski (had been an All-Star that year) took offense? What's in a name?
Along with the late Johnny Sample and Bake Turner, Mark Smolinski was also cut by the Baltimore Colts in the early 60's, only then to return to haunt Baltimore in the last game of his career, Super Bowl III. Smolinski's last touchdown as a pro came in week 2 of 1968 in (of all places) Birmingham, AL when he blocked a Terry Swanson punt and downed it three yards away in the Patriot end zone to give the Jets a ten point lead on the Boston Patriots in the third quarter.
Sabtu, 24 Januari 2009
NY Jets By the Numbers - #30 (Part 1)
Nineteen eighty was a disappointing year in a largely disappointing New York Jets history, and Bobby Batton had an appropriately nondescript year at running back for us. Drafted in the seventh round that year, he might have believed the hype written about the team, only then to see an absolutely miserable 4-12 season. They would come back to nearly win the division the following year, but Bobby Batton would not. Batton's statistics in 1980 are basically as anonymous as could be: eight games, three attempts, four yards gained. But maybe hidden within Batton's work is the Rosetta Stone cuneiform translation of the Jets' meaning in the universe. Three attempts, four yards gained. One step forward, stay in place, disappear.
(In an article written about Wesley Walker's troubles, Ian O'Connor makes brief reference to the Jets of the early 80's, whose promise were tempered by many things - poor conditioning, Studio 54, selfish, hamfisted celebrities, and poor race relations within the team. I need to go back into Gerald Eskanazi's Gang Green and see if he writes about it. Injuries undid the Jets in 1980, but bad feelings probably did, too.)
I say it early and often: the Jets and I have a symbiotic relationship forged out of a mutual sense of futile dedication and our loyalty to the cause of pressing on for the sake of pressing on. Players are supporting cast members in this Wagnerian epic. Brad Baxter #30 is an excellent case example. He played exclusively for the Jets from 1989 to 1995, which were hard lean years for Jets fans.
We saw one playoff appearance through it all. In 1991, probably his best season, Brad Baxter went to the playoffs for the only time in his career - a miserable 17-10 loss to the Oilers. It was a good year for me. Pushed aloft by a false sense of security that only undergraduate honors and success can provide, I scored touchdown after metaphorical touchdown in my imagination (Brad Baxter scored 11 actual TDs in 1991, with 666 yards. Yikes). Maybe he thought there would be another shot at football in January. But by 1994, I was tossed out of a graduate program and had to move out of an apartment I had proudly found myself. In the photograph here, we see Brad Baxter that season being tackled in another 17-10 loss, this time to the slowly improving Packers who have a young talent named Brett Favre. Both in the photograph and in his career, Baxter's run is coming to a close. He is probably feeling like the fleet gazelle that has eluded the big cats for so long that he has neglected to notice that he has lost a step, and now in the paws of his betters, he is facing the truth - it's not what it promised to be, this once long life.
What's that look in Dennis Cambal's eyes? Why did they ask football players to look like this in football cards in the 1970's? In the 60's, overly posed "action" shots like the one we see for Mark Smolinski on the right hand side of the blog were the norm. By the 80's, gametime shots - especially ones taken pregame - were more common.
But public relations and football card shots in the early 70's seem to portray players without their helmets, discovered in moments of meditation and reflection - a perfect compliment to an era when young men were growing their hair long, growing their mustaches in curious ways, and taking on appearances once found among residents of failed Northern California communes. The era of Semi-Tough. Dennis Cambal was probably no freak, even if he looked a little like a hippie, but he probably looked the way a lot of young men who graduated out of William & Mary did in 1972. Drafted by the Oakland Raiders, Cambal had the ill luck to be sent to the Jets just as they were beginning to lag far behind their old AFL rivals. Dennis Cambal is watching that lost opportunity fade into the red cauldron of the Bay at sunset. His lone statistic for the 1973 season, and for his career, is eerily similar to Bobby Batton's in #30: "8G."
Drew Coleman is our current #30, that is until Rex Ryan decides what he would like to do with him. Among a Jets secondary that has made believers out of some, Coleman may yet fade into the haze of the team's future, in much the way he fades into the background of another man's touchdown (Chicago Bears' Mark Bradley, back in 2006). But if Rex Ryan believes that Darrelle Revis is the best cornerback in the NFL, then can't something be said for Drew Coleman? Isn't there hope for all of us in some way?
And finally, the first part of our discussion of #30 will conclude with the most famous #30 in New York Jets' history, Nuu Faaola, a durable short yardage gainer and special teams man for the Jets from 1986 to 1988. Here a rare 1987 clip (not replacement football, mind you) of Nuu at home against Buffalo. The crowd Nuu's at him as he gains a first down, and we hear Marv Albert correctly enunciate his name: "New-ew Fah-ah-oh-la." Here I break with my own self-imposed rules on naming winners of the Booth Lusteg Award for Funniest-Sounding Name. For #30, I temporarily suspend my rule prohibiting a winner whose name sounds "funny" because it is ethnically unique to the sound spectrum of a mostly Western ear. If you listen to Marv Albert say Nuu Faaola's name over and over, while the Meadowlands crows accordingly, I think you'll agree that there is an exception to every rule. (But is that Joe Namath doing the color commentary on the YouTube video? And is there a Monty Python copyright frozen at the last frame? Why?)
(In an article written about Wesley Walker's troubles, Ian O'Connor makes brief reference to the Jets of the early 80's, whose promise were tempered by many things - poor conditioning, Studio 54, selfish, hamfisted celebrities, and poor race relations within the team. I need to go back into Gerald Eskanazi's Gang Green and see if he writes about it. Injuries undid the Jets in 1980, but bad feelings probably did, too.)
I say it early and often: the Jets and I have a symbiotic relationship forged out of a mutual sense of futile dedication and our loyalty to the cause of pressing on for the sake of pressing on. Players are supporting cast members in this Wagnerian epic. Brad Baxter #30 is an excellent case example. He played exclusively for the Jets from 1989 to 1995, which were hard lean years for Jets fans.
We saw one playoff appearance through it all. In 1991, probably his best season, Brad Baxter went to the playoffs for the only time in his career - a miserable 17-10 loss to the Oilers. It was a good year for me. Pushed aloft by a false sense of security that only undergraduate honors and success can provide, I scored touchdown after metaphorical touchdown in my imagination (Brad Baxter scored 11 actual TDs in 1991, with 666 yards. Yikes). Maybe he thought there would be another shot at football in January. But by 1994, I was tossed out of a graduate program and had to move out of an apartment I had proudly found myself. In the photograph here, we see Brad Baxter that season being tackled in another 17-10 loss, this time to the slowly improving Packers who have a young talent named Brett Favre. Both in the photograph and in his career, Baxter's run is coming to a close. He is probably feeling like the fleet gazelle that has eluded the big cats for so long that he has neglected to notice that he has lost a step, and now in the paws of his betters, he is facing the truth - it's not what it promised to be, this once long life.What's that look in Dennis Cambal's eyes? Why did they ask football players to look like this in football cards in the 1970's? In the 60's, overly posed "action" shots like the one we see for Mark Smolinski on the right hand side of the blog were the norm. By the 80's, gametime shots - especially ones taken pregame - were more common.
But public relations and football card shots in the early 70's seem to portray players without their helmets, discovered in moments of meditation and reflection - a perfect compliment to an era when young men were growing their hair long, growing their mustaches in curious ways, and taking on appearances once found among residents of failed Northern California communes. The era of Semi-Tough. Dennis Cambal was probably no freak, even if he looked a little like a hippie, but he probably looked the way a lot of young men who graduated out of William & Mary did in 1972. Drafted by the Oakland Raiders, Cambal had the ill luck to be sent to the Jets just as they were beginning to lag far behind their old AFL rivals. Dennis Cambal is watching that lost opportunity fade into the red cauldron of the Bay at sunset. His lone statistic for the 1973 season, and for his career, is eerily similar to Bobby Batton's in #30: "8G."
Drew Coleman is our current #30, that is until Rex Ryan decides what he would like to do with him. Among a Jets secondary that has made believers out of some, Coleman may yet fade into the haze of the team's future, in much the way he fades into the background of another man's touchdown (Chicago Bears' Mark Bradley, back in 2006). But if Rex Ryan believes that Darrelle Revis is the best cornerback in the NFL, then can't something be said for Drew Coleman? Isn't there hope for all of us in some way?And finally, the first part of our discussion of #30 will conclude with the most famous #30 in New York Jets' history, Nuu Faaola, a durable short yardage gainer and special teams man for the Jets from 1986 to 1988. Here a rare 1987 clip (not replacement football, mind you) of Nuu at home against Buffalo. The crowd Nuu's at him as he gains a first down, and we hear Marv Albert correctly enunciate his name: "New-ew Fah-ah-oh-la." Here I break with my own self-imposed rules on naming winners of the Booth Lusteg Award for Funniest-Sounding Name. For #30, I temporarily suspend my rule prohibiting a winner whose name sounds "funny" because it is ethnically unique to the sound spectrum of a mostly Western ear. If you listen to Marv Albert say Nuu Faaola's name over and over, while the Meadowlands crows accordingly, I think you'll agree that there is an exception to every rule. (But is that Joe Namath doing the color commentary on the YouTube video? And is there a Monty Python copyright frozen at the last frame? Why?)
Rabu, 21 Januari 2009
REX !!!!
I don't know if I'm feeling the endorphins kicking in after a particularly grueling season or whether I'm just a complete cockeyed ass/Jets fan, but when I read the news that Rex Ryan was our next coach, and considered the implications for the next few years with this football team, I became nearly happy. Yes. Not just encouraged, but happy. Usually the weeks leading up to the Super Bowl are spent in preparation for the enormous letdown that is the Super Bowl (last year excluded) and its aftermath. But here I am - not just buoyed by the absence of George W. Bush from the White House but positively pleased that Rex Ryan is our Head Coach. After waiting 21 days for the announcement, I have come to the conclusion that this is awesome news.
Why? I don't know. I liked Steve Spanguolo. I wondered why nobody called Jim Fassel, too. I had the abused partner's second and third thoughts about bringing the Tuna back into the house. But this is great.
Yes, it might just be the euphoria one feels early on in a new relationship, either with a significant other or a pet (no, it's different this time; I'm really going to take care of this one; I am!), but Ryan's optimism on defense - an area of the game with which the Jets have sketchy history, Sack Exchange and all - has made me feel rejuvenated. According to the Times' coverage of Ryan's press conference, the new coach referred to Darrelle Revis as the best cornerback in football. Really? Well,...OK! Sure! “I just knew that this was where I wanted to be,” he is quoted as saying. Really? Here? Here. OK. Want a tour of Hell yet? You do? Alrighty, come on in.
One of the things I notice in the coverage of his hiring is that Rex Ryan apparently wants Brett Favre back for next season, which, if you read the article above, is not really what he's saying. He said he would welcome Brett back. He didn't say he wanted Favre. It's a careful way of saying, "Not yes but not no," which, as far as I can tell, means no. You have to welcome him back the way you welcome Nixon to a banquet with the understanding that he's a potential eyesore with a bad track record, but he's an historical icon all the same. What are you going to do? Gods don't answer letters, as Updike suggested of Teddy Ballgame, but they don't need invitations, either. I don't like our odds on offense next year, but then I don't like them with or without Brett Favre. What's more, my only worry (at the present time)is that Ryan will carry over the Ravens' long-standing disdain for the position of quarterback. This year was a lucky strike with Joe Flacco, but it's been too many years since they cheated Trent Dilfer out of a job while trying to pointlessly disprove Vince Lombardi's old assertion that football's weakness is an over-reliance on the QB. But I digress slightly. I don't think Rex Ryan wants Brett Favre back, any more than Brett Favre actually wants to return to the Jets. I don't think either man smokes cheebah, much less the quantity required for such thinking.
And the Haters? Those of Whom We Do Not Speak? Here's the Boston Herald taking a gentle swipe at the selection. They speak as if they never had to cover a sports team that couldn't coach Jim Plunkett, that let Chuck Fairbanks go off to Colorado, that let the guy from Norelco mishandle a sexual harassment case in the Patriot locker room, that hired Dick MacPherson (sorry about that one, Charlie), that couldn't manage a much better winning average than the Jets had until the day Bill Belichick chose them over the Jets. They're like a bunch of shanty Irish pretending to be lace curtain or descendants of Mayflower. Having gone to college in New England from 1987 to 1991, during which the New England Patriots went 29-50, I remember them a little differently.
How differently? I was a sophomore at my small Catholic college in Rhode Island when my friends and I decided that our collective frustrations with the meal plan, the lack of sex, the local TV, all-night studying and general boredom could only be relieved by a gorging at the Burger King located across the street from the local U-Stor-It, which had to be greeted with one of us starting to say, in a Rhode Island accent:
"You stawh-vit."
Answered by:
"Nah, you fackin stawh-vit."
And so on. Repeat. For hours of fun. Inside this Burger King were ceiling-to-floor black and white photographs of New England sports celebrities, courtesy of the moment. There, accompanying our deep, fat-rich dinners, were the Boston Celtics of that heralded era like Larry Bird, Robert Parrish, Denis Johnson, and Kevin McHale. Then there were the larger-than-life Red Sox like Roger Clemens, Wade Boggs, Mike Greenwell, Oil Can Boyd. And the Patriots? A single old shot from the mid-70's of Steve Grogan.
"God," said my floormate Mickey from Chelmsford, Mass. "Fuckin' Pats. They just suck it."
******
But I digress, less slightly this time. Here's the rub. Read Ryan on his defense's new philosophy:
“If you take a swipe at one of ours, we’ll take two swipes at one of yours."
Well. I see. Now that took me aback, or took me back a little. Who does that sound like to you? Is that supposed to sound like somebody I know? Well, the first thing I thought of was a pudgy little gnome from hell who was once a defensive coordinator for the Jets in Super Bowl III and the Bears in Super Bowl XX. There are two things Philadelphia is known for, in the strictly sporting sense: 1) Booing Santa Claus, 1968 and 2) A coach who put a hit on the opposing quarterback, 1988. Buddy Ryan. A Billy Carter look-alike whose sense of comfort owes its charm from ancient Rome's taste for criminal law.
I was probably about three days behind everyone else when I realized that Rex was Buddy's son, and that the sense of satisfaction I took above in Rex Ryan was a Jungian archetype of primal rage that Philadelphians relish sentimentally when they think of Buddy Ryan and the Body Bag Game. And now I'm a little less happy. Now I'm back to normal.
Why? I don't know. I liked Steve Spanguolo. I wondered why nobody called Jim Fassel, too. I had the abused partner's second and third thoughts about bringing the Tuna back into the house. But this is great.
Yes, it might just be the euphoria one feels early on in a new relationship, either with a significant other or a pet (no, it's different this time; I'm really going to take care of this one; I am!), but Ryan's optimism on defense - an area of the game with which the Jets have sketchy history, Sack Exchange and all - has made me feel rejuvenated. According to the Times' coverage of Ryan's press conference, the new coach referred to Darrelle Revis as the best cornerback in football. Really? Well,...OK! Sure! “I just knew that this was where I wanted to be,” he is quoted as saying. Really? Here? Here. OK. Want a tour of Hell yet? You do? Alrighty, come on in.
One of the things I notice in the coverage of his hiring is that Rex Ryan apparently wants Brett Favre back for next season, which, if you read the article above, is not really what he's saying. He said he would welcome Brett back. He didn't say he wanted Favre. It's a careful way of saying, "Not yes but not no," which, as far as I can tell, means no. You have to welcome him back the way you welcome Nixon to a banquet with the understanding that he's a potential eyesore with a bad track record, but he's an historical icon all the same. What are you going to do? Gods don't answer letters, as Updike suggested of Teddy Ballgame, but they don't need invitations, either. I don't like our odds on offense next year, but then I don't like them with or without Brett Favre. What's more, my only worry (at the present time)is that Ryan will carry over the Ravens' long-standing disdain for the position of quarterback. This year was a lucky strike with Joe Flacco, but it's been too many years since they cheated Trent Dilfer out of a job while trying to pointlessly disprove Vince Lombardi's old assertion that football's weakness is an over-reliance on the QB. But I digress slightly. I don't think Rex Ryan wants Brett Favre back, any more than Brett Favre actually wants to return to the Jets. I don't think either man smokes cheebah, much less the quantity required for such thinking.
And the Haters? Those of Whom We Do Not Speak? Here's the Boston Herald taking a gentle swipe at the selection. They speak as if they never had to cover a sports team that couldn't coach Jim Plunkett, that let Chuck Fairbanks go off to Colorado, that let the guy from Norelco mishandle a sexual harassment case in the Patriot locker room, that hired Dick MacPherson (sorry about that one, Charlie), that couldn't manage a much better winning average than the Jets had until the day Bill Belichick chose them over the Jets. They're like a bunch of shanty Irish pretending to be lace curtain or descendants of Mayflower. Having gone to college in New England from 1987 to 1991, during which the New England Patriots went 29-50, I remember them a little differently.
How differently? I was a sophomore at my small Catholic college in Rhode Island when my friends and I decided that our collective frustrations with the meal plan, the lack of sex, the local TV, all-night studying and general boredom could only be relieved by a gorging at the Burger King located across the street from the local U-Stor-It, which had to be greeted with one of us starting to say, in a Rhode Island accent:
"You stawh-vit."
Answered by:
"Nah, you fackin stawh-vit."
And so on. Repeat. For hours of fun. Inside this Burger King were ceiling-to-floor black and white photographs of New England sports celebrities, courtesy of the moment. There, accompanying our deep, fat-rich dinners, were the Boston Celtics of that heralded era like Larry Bird, Robert Parrish, Denis Johnson, and Kevin McHale. Then there were the larger-than-life Red Sox like Roger Clemens, Wade Boggs, Mike Greenwell, Oil Can Boyd. And the Patriots? A single old shot from the mid-70's of Steve Grogan.
"God," said my floormate Mickey from Chelmsford, Mass. "Fuckin' Pats. They just suck it."
******
But I digress, less slightly this time. Here's the rub. Read Ryan on his defense's new philosophy:
“If you take a swipe at one of ours, we’ll take two swipes at one of yours."
Well. I see. Now that took me aback, or took me back a little. Who does that sound like to you? Is that supposed to sound like somebody I know? Well, the first thing I thought of was a pudgy little gnome from hell who was once a defensive coordinator for the Jets in Super Bowl III and the Bears in Super Bowl XX. There are two things Philadelphia is known for, in the strictly sporting sense: 1) Booing Santa Claus, 1968 and 2) A coach who put a hit on the opposing quarterback, 1988. Buddy Ryan. A Billy Carter look-alike whose sense of comfort owes its charm from ancient Rome's taste for criminal law.
I was probably about three days behind everyone else when I realized that Rex was Buddy's son, and that the sense of satisfaction I took above in Rex Ryan was a Jungian archetype of primal rage that Philadelphians relish sentimentally when they think of Buddy Ryan and the Body Bag Game. And now I'm a little less happy. Now I'm back to normal.
Selasa, 20 Januari 2009
Minggu, 18 Januari 2009
Cardinals 32 Eagles 25
This was one of those weeks where I thought about giving up a lot of things - blogging, abstract thought, hope, the New York Jets. Among my fellow Philadelphians, there was a mixture of dull optimism, but if the Eagles lost in the NFC Championship everyone knew there would be hell to pay. Their optimism was really just an expression of reluctance to let go of their brimming anger. It was supposed to be an early end to a disappointing season, but the Eagles went to the NFC Championship, anyway. This only aggravated Philadelphia's emotional problems. As most of us here know, disappointment is the language Philadelphians know best. It's what's for dinner. They are a people already aggrieved. Maybe it's an anger they've been holding onto for years because of something their mother said. Maybe their father didn't love them enough.
They went to the Phillies' celebrations in November uncertain of why they felt so good. It's just not in their nature to be thus. What would they do now that they were winners? Eventually the Eagles obliged to the city's habits of being. They lost to Cincinnati, and the season seemed very done. I mean, did you lose to the Bengals this year? Me neither. But they also did what Reid's Eagles have always done. They made it interesting. And then they folded. Philadelphians don't normally lose big; they lose painfully: five NFC Title appearances since the early part of the decade, with four NFC Title losses. Herein lies the paradox of Philadelphians' neurotic relationship with hope. Here, a team and its public exist in simpatico.
During the week the big question was not, Will the Eagles win a trip to the Super Bowl? It was, What will be the fallout if they don't? People wondered on talk radio if there would be any mercy for Reid and McNabb if the Eagles fell to the Cards, and the consensus was that there would be none; this was even before the NFC Title Game started.
And then they lost. So there is a terminus waiting for either Reid and McNabb, or for both. The strange, irresponsibly personal relationship fans have had with them both requires it. After all, this is a city that seems to have an odd belief that their own local news anchors have healing properties. This is the city where John Facenda, the NFL's voice of God, was a Philadelphia TV newsman. Such personal feelings eerily resemble worship, but even the ancients were unforgiving to the gods who served them least. It's a relationship more cruel than the one New Yorkers have with their stars only because it is much more intensely personal in nature.
I know I have written about all this before, but it's fascinating as a diaspora New Yorker in residence to watch it all happen again and again. Philly's double-edged affection has driven its headliners, anchors and athletes to obsession, compulsion, and paranoia. The already mentally unstable Terrell Owens had his greatest meltdowns here. Curious personalities like Dick Allen nearly went mad playing in Philly. By being self-assured and slightly defensive, Mike Schmidt was nearly drummed out of town. Now the same can be expected for Ryan Howard. The days are numbered for a stoic, immobile cinder block like Andy Reid and his eccentric quarterback.
And in a game where the Eagles' defense failed its larger team, where officials made dubious calls throughout, you might look elsewhere for blame. But McNabb's quixotic smile throughout the NFC Championship is probably going to be too much for one tightly-wound city to tolerate. If one were to narrow it all down to one or the other, McNabb would seem the most likely (and most willing) casualty of tonight's historic loss to the Cardinals.
Is he interested in being the next unfocused veteran quarterback in our lineup?
They went to the Phillies' celebrations in November uncertain of why they felt so good. It's just not in their nature to be thus. What would they do now that they were winners? Eventually the Eagles obliged to the city's habits of being. They lost to Cincinnati, and the season seemed very done. I mean, did you lose to the Bengals this year? Me neither. But they also did what Reid's Eagles have always done. They made it interesting. And then they folded. Philadelphians don't normally lose big; they lose painfully: five NFC Title appearances since the early part of the decade, with four NFC Title losses. Herein lies the paradox of Philadelphians' neurotic relationship with hope. Here, a team and its public exist in simpatico.
During the week the big question was not, Will the Eagles win a trip to the Super Bowl? It was, What will be the fallout if they don't? People wondered on talk radio if there would be any mercy for Reid and McNabb if the Eagles fell to the Cards, and the consensus was that there would be none; this was even before the NFC Title Game started.
And then they lost. So there is a terminus waiting for either Reid and McNabb, or for both. The strange, irresponsibly personal relationship fans have had with them both requires it. After all, this is a city that seems to have an odd belief that their own local news anchors have healing properties. This is the city where John Facenda, the NFL's voice of God, was a Philadelphia TV newsman. Such personal feelings eerily resemble worship, but even the ancients were unforgiving to the gods who served them least. It's a relationship more cruel than the one New Yorkers have with their stars only because it is much more intensely personal in nature.
I know I have written about all this before, but it's fascinating as a diaspora New Yorker in residence to watch it all happen again and again. Philly's double-edged affection has driven its headliners, anchors and athletes to obsession, compulsion, and paranoia. The already mentally unstable Terrell Owens had his greatest meltdowns here. Curious personalities like Dick Allen nearly went mad playing in Philly. By being self-assured and slightly defensive, Mike Schmidt was nearly drummed out of town. Now the same can be expected for Ryan Howard. The days are numbered for a stoic, immobile cinder block like Andy Reid and his eccentric quarterback.
And in a game where the Eagles' defense failed its larger team, where officials made dubious calls throughout, you might look elsewhere for blame. But McNabb's quixotic smile throughout the NFC Championship is probably going to be too much for one tightly-wound city to tolerate. If one were to narrow it all down to one or the other, McNabb would seem the most likely (and most willing) casualty of tonight's historic loss to the Cardinals.
Is he interested in being the next unfocused veteran quarterback in our lineup?
Sabtu, 10 Januari 2009
Former Jets And Their Current Homes
I realize that you can't hold onto all the good talent on a team, but with a good new coach, I would like to see this kind of thing ended. The following were drafted by the New York Jets somewhere between 1997 and 2004 and are enjoying/have enjoyed the playoffs this year:
John Abraham (Atlanta)
Chad Pennington (Miami)
James Farrior (Pittsburgh)
Derrick Ward (NY Giants)
Erik Coleman (Atlanta)
Jason Ferguson (Miami)
I'm currently watching former free agent acquisitions Justin McCareins and Kevin Mawae for Tennessee against Baltimore, although Mawae's on the sidelines.
Let's not neglect teams that nearly went to the playoffs, like New Orleans, where you'll find first draftee Jonathan Vilma, or Dewayne Robertson's Denver Broncos, and the Jetskins, Santana Moss and Pete Kendall.
John Abraham (Atlanta)
Chad Pennington (Miami)
James Farrior (Pittsburgh)
Derrick Ward (NY Giants)
Erik Coleman (Atlanta)
Jason Ferguson (Miami)
I'm currently watching former free agent acquisitions Justin McCareins and Kevin Mawae for Tennessee against Baltimore, although Mawae's on the sidelines.
Let's not neglect teams that nearly went to the playoffs, like New Orleans, where you'll find first draftee Jonathan Vilma, or Dewayne Robertson's Denver Broncos, and the Jetskins, Santana Moss and Pete Kendall.
Old and New
These videos may have originally appeared around the time that the West Side Stadium was still an issue, but there's still resonance here for those of us who remember seeing the Jets at Shea Stadium, the now ex-ballpark seeing its last gradual disintegration in Flushing Meadow-Corona.
First, former middle linebacker Greg Buttle talks about the feeling of intimacy that Shea unwittingly afforded to fans of football, particularly at the first and second levels. He talks about it as "a big-market stadium with a small market mentality." The franchise and the stadium as one, so to speak (even if the stadium didn't actually belong to the Jets).
Then Wesley Walker - one of my all-time favorites - speaks similarly about Shea. But he also says that though the players did not want to leave Shea, "we weren't allowed to really talk about it." Finally, there's a great shot of one of his touchdowns against the Dolphins at the 1978 opener at Shea, which I saw with my Dad and brother. It was the Sunday before the start of school. I drew a picture of that touchdown when I was asked to draw "what I did on my summer vacation," which drove my Mom crazy on back-to-school night.
Finally, more present problems: who's going to coach our team? I for one am glad Bill Romanowski is not interested in coaching us the way he is with the Broncos. Still, how many people do we need to interview? Caroline Kennedy? Don Maynard? The defensive coordinator of every team? Anthony Fucilli's conversation with ESPN's Larry Hardesty evokes our frustration. I appreciate Hardesty's bemusement at the Browns hiring Mangini when they could have hired Jim Fassel.
And further, returning to Wesley Walker again, this is an article that made me ashamed to be a football fan. He says that if he had known the pain football would bring him in his 50's, he would never have played.
First, former middle linebacker Greg Buttle talks about the feeling of intimacy that Shea unwittingly afforded to fans of football, particularly at the first and second levels. He talks about it as "a big-market stadium with a small market mentality." The franchise and the stadium as one, so to speak (even if the stadium didn't actually belong to the Jets).
Then Wesley Walker - one of my all-time favorites - speaks similarly about Shea. But he also says that though the players did not want to leave Shea, "we weren't allowed to really talk about it." Finally, there's a great shot of one of his touchdowns against the Dolphins at the 1978 opener at Shea, which I saw with my Dad and brother. It was the Sunday before the start of school. I drew a picture of that touchdown when I was asked to draw "what I did on my summer vacation," which drove my Mom crazy on back-to-school night.
Finally, more present problems: who's going to coach our team? I for one am glad Bill Romanowski is not interested in coaching us the way he is with the Broncos. Still, how many people do we need to interview? Caroline Kennedy? Don Maynard? The defensive coordinator of every team? Anthony Fucilli's conversation with ESPN's Larry Hardesty evokes our frustration. I appreciate Hardesty's bemusement at the Browns hiring Mangini when they could have hired Jim Fassel.
And further, returning to Wesley Walker again, this is an article that made me ashamed to be a football fan. He says that if he had known the pain football would bring him in his 50's, he would never have played.
Kamis, 08 Januari 2009
NY Jets By the Numbers - #29 (Part 2)
Number 29 Adrian Murrell was a consistent presence in the Jets backfield from 1993 to 1997, which is no small thing, especially since these encompassed some of the worst of the franchise's squads, historically. The time of which I speak was also a miserably wandering one for me. A couple of years out of college, I thought I was going to be a professor, only to be unceremoniously kicked out of a PhD program. I thought I could make it on my own, only to be jobless without money for rent and taking up house-sitting just to keep a roof over my head. I thought I found freedom in eventually finding a job, but I was just another sad, sorry, pathetic and abused cubicle cog. I thought I had found true love but discovered instead that I was only the receptacle for a beautiful woman's Daddy issues. Life presented me with the usual kind of disappointments that assault people in their 20's, but they felt like collisions in an endlessly dark tunnel. Through it all, Adrian Murrell was there in the Jets' backfield, reliably getting the ball handed off to him. Or maybe it seemed that way. He ran well in 1995 but would gain a further 1,000 yards plus each of the next two seasons. You could even buy his jersey. How do you gain 1,249 yards for a 1-15 team, as he did in 1996? I kept looking at guys like Murrell and Wayne Chrebet and Kyle Brady (sort of) and Mo Lewis and Hugh Douglas and asking myself, "Can these guys really be that bad?" And the answer was yes. Yes they could. It was the same answer I had when I asked myself, "Could I have screwed it up this badly?" Why yes, boy. Yes.
Yet I remember the last of Adrian Murrell one hot, hot summer day in 1998. Bill Parcells was in his second year as coach, and the Jets were at training camp. I had gone back to teaching part-time, now at the Art Institute of Philadelphia which required that I teach four-hour basic composition to really unpleasant art students. I vividly recall waiting on this particular day for the windowless classroom to become available; I looked down and saw a copy of the day's sports section from the New York Times on the hallway floor. Picking it up, I saw an article about the Jets' running backs for the upcoming year. We all knew that the future of the backfield was now the brilliant running back recently stolen from the Patriots, but I also assumed it still included Adrian Murrell. Imagine, I thought - Curtis Martin and Adrian Murrell. But no. In the article Parcells literally said he was rooting for Jerald Sowell to win Murrell's spot which, eventually, he did. Murrell was released and was then signed by Arizona where he gained another 1,000 yards for the last time in his career. The Jets would embark upon our team's modern era of strange inconsistencies, wrenching highs and bland disappointments - which kind of sounds like my 30's, now that I think of it. Yet Adrian Murrell was destined not to follow me and my team into our new millennium. It felt dishonest and unkind to him. But I have a question - if I buy my dream house or publish something really cool, do the Jets win the Super Bowl? Very likely.
Oh, and yes, Adrian Murrell is also yet another West Virginia Mountaineer running back gone to the Jets. Preceded by Michael Beasely, succeeded by Robert Walker. And now we know.
But in the time before our times, Titans roamed the land. There was no one but them. They played before no one, and no one came to see them at the Grounds of Polo. They were lonely. They became the Jets. But during that time, only one man played running back in #29. His name was Bill Shockley, and he is not to be confused with the racist developer of the transistor. He retired in 1962 after his last season with the Titans, but there is a single story that lingers as an epilogue. He suddenly reappears on the radar in 1968 to play, it would seem, a single game at placekicker for the Pittsburgh Steelers. What was it like, at the age of 31, to suddenly return to football after six years? Had he been practicing in his backyard, kicking between lampposts and electrical poles?
It turns out that the lone game was the 1968 opener, a 34-20 Steeler loss to the Giants. He had won a spot with the Steelers but missed his first PAT. He did make all the rest of them, but I don't know if he attempted any field goals in the game. Regardless - and I can't believe I'm saying this - he was released the following week and permanently replaced by our very own and extraordinary Booth Lusteg. By virtue of this serendipity alone, this unparalleled moment of zen, Bill Shockley is to be named an honorary winner of the Booth Lusteg Award for Funny-Sounding Names Among Players Who Wore #29 for the New York Jets Franchise, even if his name isn't all that funny. This award is given posthumously in this case, with no less appreciation for its recipient.
NY Jets By the Numbers - #29 (Part 3)
As the 1972 Jets' Yearbook points out, Rocky Turner's real name was Harley, an innocuous name back in the day. Today, "Harley" is filled with all kinds of conjured lore associated with a specific kind of motorcycle with a specific kind of rider. It seems logical that a man who played a physically brutal game would want to have a name that associated itself with ball-grabbing machismo, so to the present-day person, "Harley" seems like the right one. But prior to the culture's institutionalization of "Harley," "Rocky" was more that kind of name. And before the institutionalization of "Rocky" by Rocky, a man named Rocky was a guaranteed ass-kicker. Or so you suspected.
I'm not sure about Rocky Turner, though. According to the yearbook, he studied biology, which is a little wimpy, but then his hobby was also "snakes," which, no matter how you look at it, isn't wimpy. (I'm not sure it's a hobby, either.) Especially if the guy who keeps snakes (which is what is meant by "hobby," I guess) is named Rocky. Still, Rocky Turner was six feet, 195 lbs in 1972 and, according to the yearbook, "similar to Dan Abramowicz." That doesn't sound macho; it sounds like he's being compared to his dentist. For those of you who don't know, Danny Abramowicz was a scrappy six foot wide receiver for the Saints back in the Billy Kilmer/Archie Manning days. Scrappy. But is that any way to describe a tough guy? To add to our quandary, Turner's career lasted all of two seasons with a declining Jets squad in the mid-70's. But blest as he is in the present day with two macho names, does he really have any right to consider himself unlucky?
Whereas Robert Turner's nickname was "Bake." That's no mistake - the card is from 1970, but the photo is from 1969, Bake Turner's last year as a Jet. Bake Turner was one of my Dad's favorites, an overachiever, playing from 1963-69 for the Jets. There must be something about this number. It produces little guys with big ideas.
He's our #29 from the Super Bowl squad. Dad may really have liked him because he was a star of sorts when the team didn't have a star. His statistics for 1963-64 were pretty good, with nine and six touchdowns at wide receiver, respectively. But by the time the Super Bowl came into the American vernacular, Bake Turner had simply become another one of the supporting characters on a team fronted by Namath, Snell, Boozer, Maynard, and Sauer on offense. Bake was a return guy by then, and certainly not the only one. He had two touchdowns catches in 1968, both from Babe Parilli, and both came in late relief of Sauer or Maynard in assured wins over the Bengals and Dolphins. But revenge can be sweet even for the bench squad. Bake Turner, our official winner of the Booth Lusteg Award for New York Jets Player in #29 With The Funniest Sounding Name, felt as much enthusiasm as Johnny Sample in beating Baltimore in the Super Bowl because like Sample, Bake had also been drafted and cut by the Colts.
But nothing says distinction like a cowboy's song - at least in New York - and apparently Bake Turner could sing. On Johnny Carson no less. Courtesy of Going Long, Jeff Miller's oral history of the AFL, we see that Bake got his fifteen minutes of fame right after the Super Bowl - or, as much fame as "The Singing Jets" could really garner when the only good singer in the group was only a supporting player on the field named Bake. The Super Bowl as an institution has endured the ravages of American popular culture so fundamentally that today a singing or rapping foursome from the winning squad on national television would just seem too amateur - even for a country hopelessly hooked on crack like "American Idol."
But finally - and I know I'm obsessed with this stuff - Number 29 Rocky Turner, whose real name is Harley, replaced number 29 Bake Turner, whose middle name is Hardy.
Little men. Big ideas. It's fitting that we close our discussion of Jets in 29 with their current mighty mite, Leon Washington. A Pro Bowler in 2008, Leon struck fear in the hearts of special teams throughout the NFL. The question that everyone asks at the end of this season is why he isn't being used more often in the backfield? He was astoundingly fast, wasn't he?
The picture we provide here from the Times is the way many people saw him that year - as a small man who gets suddenly smaller very fast, until he is a speck in the distant end zone. My favorite moment of his from this season was his 61 yard kickoff return against New England at Foxboro, a bittersweet sight for sore eyes that sad season. At first Leon appears (if I may paraphrase Bill Cosby on Gale Sayers) to literally split in half and then reassemble his protoplasmic form in enough time to hurtle through space with such speed and that camera man has to expertly adjust and keep up with him. By the time he is about to reach the end zone, the two Patriots chasing him have already pulled up.
Watch him. It's not just the haze of a video of a video. His churning arms and legs are a white blur.
Two thousand eight was a special year for him, as was the year before. But then Leon broke his leg during a meaningless game against Oakland, and the next year he was in Seattle. I do wish this man nothing but the best because he was so much damned fun to watch. Sometimes that's the best reason to care about a sport you love. Players like Leon Washington make it so. Would that he could make it so again for the 12th Man.
I'm not sure about Rocky Turner, though. According to the yearbook, he studied biology, which is a little wimpy, but then his hobby was also "snakes," which, no matter how you look at it, isn't wimpy. (I'm not sure it's a hobby, either.) Especially if the guy who keeps snakes (which is what is meant by "hobby," I guess) is named Rocky. Still, Rocky Turner was six feet, 195 lbs in 1972 and, according to the yearbook, "similar to Dan Abramowicz." That doesn't sound macho; it sounds like he's being compared to his dentist. For those of you who don't know, Danny Abramowicz was a scrappy six foot wide receiver for the Saints back in the Billy Kilmer/Archie Manning days. Scrappy. But is that any way to describe a tough guy? To add to our quandary, Turner's career lasted all of two seasons with a declining Jets squad in the mid-70's. But blest as he is in the present day with two macho names, does he really have any right to consider himself unlucky?
Whereas Robert Turner's nickname was "Bake." That's no mistake - the card is from 1970, but the photo is from 1969, Bake Turner's last year as a Jet. Bake Turner was one of my Dad's favorites, an overachiever, playing from 1963-69 for the Jets. There must be something about this number. It produces little guys with big ideas.He's our #29 from the Super Bowl squad. Dad may really have liked him because he was a star of sorts when the team didn't have a star. His statistics for 1963-64 were pretty good, with nine and six touchdowns at wide receiver, respectively. But by the time the Super Bowl came into the American vernacular, Bake Turner had simply become another one of the supporting characters on a team fronted by Namath, Snell, Boozer, Maynard, and Sauer on offense. Bake was a return guy by then, and certainly not the only one. He had two touchdowns catches in 1968, both from Babe Parilli, and both came in late relief of Sauer or Maynard in assured wins over the Bengals and Dolphins. But revenge can be sweet even for the bench squad. Bake Turner, our official winner of the Booth Lusteg Award for New York Jets Player in #29 With The Funniest Sounding Name, felt as much enthusiasm as Johnny Sample in beating Baltimore in the Super Bowl because like Sample, Bake had also been drafted and cut by the Colts.
But nothing says distinction like a cowboy's song - at least in New York - and apparently Bake Turner could sing. On Johnny Carson no less. Courtesy of Going Long, Jeff Miller's oral history of the AFL, we see that Bake got his fifteen minutes of fame right after the Super Bowl - or, as much fame as "The Singing Jets" could really garner when the only good singer in the group was only a supporting player on the field named Bake. The Super Bowl as an institution has endured the ravages of American popular culture so fundamentally that today a singing or rapping foursome from the winning squad on national television would just seem too amateur - even for a country hopelessly hooked on crack like "American Idol."
But finally - and I know I'm obsessed with this stuff - Number 29 Rocky Turner, whose real name is Harley, replaced number 29 Bake Turner, whose middle name is Hardy.
Little men. Big ideas. It's fitting that we close our discussion of Jets in 29 with their current mighty mite, Leon Washington. A Pro Bowler in 2008, Leon struck fear in the hearts of special teams throughout the NFL. The question that everyone asks at the end of this season is why he isn't being used more often in the backfield? He was astoundingly fast, wasn't he?
The picture we provide here from the Times is the way many people saw him that year - as a small man who gets suddenly smaller very fast, until he is a speck in the distant end zone. My favorite moment of his from this season was his 61 yard kickoff return against New England at Foxboro, a bittersweet sight for sore eyes that sad season. At first Leon appears (if I may paraphrase Bill Cosby on Gale Sayers) to literally split in half and then reassemble his protoplasmic form in enough time to hurtle through space with such speed and that camera man has to expertly adjust and keep up with him. By the time he is about to reach the end zone, the two Patriots chasing him have already pulled up.Watch him. It's not just the haze of a video of a video. His churning arms and legs are a white blur.
Two thousand eight was a special year for him, as was the year before. But then Leon broke his leg during a meaningless game against Oakland, and the next year he was in Seattle. I do wish this man nothing but the best because he was so much damned fun to watch. Sometimes that's the best reason to care about a sport you love. Players like Leon Washington make it so. Would that he could make it so again for the 12th Man.
NY Jets By the Numbers - #29 (Part 1)
It's back to the numbers. The comfortable, reliable numbers. A football team may go 8-3 and then lose four of its last five of the season, but numbers can't mislead you. Numbers can't be wrong.
In an effort to pin down the career of #29 Jets' cornerback Donnie Abraham as a man in full, I encountered a pretty consistent message in a number of different places. This man retired before his time because he was ready to. Donnie Abraham had business dealings and a new set of enterprises on the horizen that were more appealing than another lousy two months of preseason training camp and another season of getting his brains beaten in. So valuable and liked was Abraham that Herman Edwards, having coached him at Tampa Bay, let him sit out the Jets' training camp in 2002 in order to make the decision about whether or not to retire. Abraham stayed the summer with his family and then decided to stay with them permanently. How much money did he need to make? How often did he need to wear a football uniform? Did he really need to remain in light for as long as Junior Seau and Ty Law have just to increase the chances of being inducted into Canton? Donnie Abraham did not think so. He will not go to the Hall of Fame, and he is OK with that.
Anthony "A.B." Brown is just another reason why the post-college life seems so dubious in the pros. He played for the nearly great 1988 West Virginia squad that lost to Notre Dame in the National Championship. By Wikipedia at least he is considered a Mountaineer runner of sufficient fame, a state of being enjoyed also by another Jet in another installment for #29 to come later. I've noticed that Wikipedia has an odd thing that they do in listing athletes at certain positions. They mention by whom a player was preceded at a certain position and by whom a person was ultimately replaced. Given the regular turnover in NCAA football, this makes sense. For WVU in 1987, A.B. Brown is listed as being preceded at running back by Undra Johnson and then succeeded by himself. In 1988 he was preceded by himself and sharing the role with Undra Johnson. I don't think I fully understand that any better than I comprehend the name "Undra." But the final note here has to go to Brown's total yardage gains over his four seasons for the New York Jets, the only team for which he played pro ball: 117 yards. It took four seasons to cover the equivalent of a football field plus a touchback. He netted one touchdown, in 1991. Finally, Brown either lost or recovered two fumbles in that same year. For a player with limited time on the field whichever one it actually was - recovered or lost - means the difference between a successful or unsuccessful career.
There wasn't enough time or content to be found in Carl Capria's career with the Jets or with with Detroit who drafted him in 1975. He played 12 games for the Lions, gaining 12 yards on one punt return.
He then played one single game for the Jets in 1976 with absolutely no statistical material whatsoever attached. He therefore wore #29 for the Jets in a game in which I might actually have seen him play, or not play as the case may be. However, we cannot leave Carl Capria before noting that without really looking for it, I found his name on this t-shirt mysteriously advertised on the web. Unfortunately, this item is no longer available. Sorry, Carl. To love another person is the highest of human achievements, but as a man wiser than myself once said, everybody loves somebody sometime.
I was willing to say all kinds of nice things about Johnny Lynn who wore #29 for the Jets from 1979 to 1986. I have a great memory of Johnny Lynn recovering a fumble in the Miami end zone to start their 1979 matchup at Shea. His name conjures an instant memory of that touchdown, and of my leaping and yelling at the top of my lungs in a house where my family was temporarily living in Millwood, NY. It was built in the style of a 1970's A-frame, with a high vaulted ceiling in the den where I was watching the game, so the sound of my pounding feet and my screaming must have been magnified throughout. Maybe it sounded like the very same noise I made this afternoon when Shaun Ellis scored on his recovery of a J.P. Losman fumble; it's not unlike the sound of a person screaming for his life. When Johnny Lynn recovered the fumble for the first score in a 33-27 Jets win over Miami, my mother came running in to see if I were being torn apart by a wild animal.
Yes, Johnny Lynn is attached to that memory. But then Johnny Lynn was the secondary coach for the Niners in the Jets' loss at Candelstick this year, so screw it.
In an effort to pin down the career of #29 Jets' cornerback Donnie Abraham as a man in full, I encountered a pretty consistent message in a number of different places. This man retired before his time because he was ready to. Donnie Abraham had business dealings and a new set of enterprises on the horizen that were more appealing than another lousy two months of preseason training camp and another season of getting his brains beaten in. So valuable and liked was Abraham that Herman Edwards, having coached him at Tampa Bay, let him sit out the Jets' training camp in 2002 in order to make the decision about whether or not to retire. Abraham stayed the summer with his family and then decided to stay with them permanently. How much money did he need to make? How often did he need to wear a football uniform? Did he really need to remain in light for as long as Junior Seau and Ty Law have just to increase the chances of being inducted into Canton? Donnie Abraham did not think so. He will not go to the Hall of Fame, and he is OK with that.Anthony "A.B." Brown is just another reason why the post-college life seems so dubious in the pros. He played for the nearly great 1988 West Virginia squad that lost to Notre Dame in the National Championship. By Wikipedia at least he is considered a Mountaineer runner of sufficient fame, a state of being enjoyed also by another Jet in another installment for #29 to come later. I've noticed that Wikipedia has an odd thing that they do in listing athletes at certain positions. They mention by whom a player was preceded at a certain position and by whom a person was ultimately replaced. Given the regular turnover in NCAA football, this makes sense. For WVU in 1987, A.B. Brown is listed as being preceded at running back by Undra Johnson and then succeeded by himself. In 1988 he was preceded by himself and sharing the role with Undra Johnson. I don't think I fully understand that any better than I comprehend the name "Undra." But the final note here has to go to Brown's total yardage gains over his four seasons for the New York Jets, the only team for which he played pro ball: 117 yards. It took four seasons to cover the equivalent of a football field plus a touchback. He netted one touchdown, in 1991. Finally, Brown either lost or recovered two fumbles in that same year. For a player with limited time on the field whichever one it actually was - recovered or lost - means the difference between a successful or unsuccessful career.
There wasn't enough time or content to be found in Carl Capria's career with the Jets or with with Detroit who drafted him in 1975. He played 12 games for the Lions, gaining 12 yards on one punt return.
He then played one single game for the Jets in 1976 with absolutely no statistical material whatsoever attached. He therefore wore #29 for the Jets in a game in which I might actually have seen him play, or not play as the case may be. However, we cannot leave Carl Capria before noting that without really looking for it, I found his name on this t-shirt mysteriously advertised on the web. Unfortunately, this item is no longer available. Sorry, Carl. To love another person is the highest of human achievements, but as a man wiser than myself once said, everybody loves somebody sometime.I was willing to say all kinds of nice things about Johnny Lynn who wore #29 for the Jets from 1979 to 1986. I have a great memory of Johnny Lynn recovering a fumble in the Miami end zone to start their 1979 matchup at Shea. His name conjures an instant memory of that touchdown, and of my leaping and yelling at the top of my lungs in a house where my family was temporarily living in Millwood, NY. It was built in the style of a 1970's A-frame, with a high vaulted ceiling in the den where I was watching the game, so the sound of my pounding feet and my screaming must have been magnified throughout. Maybe it sounded like the very same noise I made this afternoon when Shaun Ellis scored on his recovery of a J.P. Losman fumble; it's not unlike the sound of a person screaming for his life. When Johnny Lynn recovered the fumble for the first score in a 33-27 Jets win over Miami, my mother came running in to see if I were being torn apart by a wild animal.
Yes, Johnny Lynn is attached to that memory. But then Johnny Lynn was the secondary coach for the Niners in the Jets' loss at Candelstick this year, so screw it.
Sabtu, 03 Januari 2009
More Dispatches from Hell
I am still reporting from the Bad Place, as Huck called it. I watched the Miami Dolphins fail to come back against the Ravens in the Wild Card, but it had only a minimal effect. I struggled with a desire to see Chad Pennington do well. Even Phil Simms struggled with instinctively saying "this Jets offense" when he talks about Chad Pennington's team. My wife made a sound when she saw Chad brooding over a second half turnover deep in Baltimore territory. Poor Chad. I am sure that the weary and senseless troubles in Gaza are a better example of what constitutes Hell, but as train-set miniature versions go, being a Jets fan sucks.
One person with whom I work suggested that the Jets' circumstances aren't really hell by definition but are more apropos of "Insanity."
"You know what the definition of insanity is, don't you, Marty?" my colleague asked.
Many discussions I've had lately seem to begin with that question. Maybe its predominance is the product of discussions concerning the failure of the Big Three, or the Detroit Lions.
"It's doing the same dumb thing that doesn't work over and over and expecting a different result?" I offer.
He nods his head as if I haven't said anything. "It's doing the same dumb thing that doesn't work over and over and expecting a different result."
But I shake my head. I disagree. The point was that the Jets were hoping to avoid insanity with Chad at quarterback. Chad's lob throws, his limited efficacy in the clutch, his jittery motions in the pocket, his spent body - all of this was going to be history. The Jets had unburdened themselves of a lot of money on a better offense and defense. They needed someone else at the helm of the offense. And now we still do, though don't mistake our current surroundings with an asylum. We are in Hell. On Hockey Night in Canada, Peter King said he had spoken to Brett Favre "for about a half an hour" and King got the sense that Favre will retire for good now. (Peter King always always characterizes his discussion with football players as if they are counseling sessions. He always says things like, "...and we agreed that..." as if the player needed King's input on an important decision.) At the beginning of the season, we had Mangini and Favre. Now we have Kellen Clemens and a coach to be named later. Yep. Happy New Year. From Hell.
Now that you and I have already taken the Inferno tour of our past head coaches, recall that the last time the Jets gave total control of their field and front office operations to a head coach was when Bill Parcells helped us to win the AFC East with the best record in franchise history before and since. Before then, Leon Hess insisted on having a "football man" alongside his coaches, like the late Dick Steinberg who advised Bruce Coslet. Then there were the geniuses advising Rich Kotite. The constant flurry of last summer was exactly the kind of thing three different people nosing themselves into the decision might have come up with. If Eric Mangini had been coach and GM would we have been Favre-less? If the Jets now offered coach and GM in the one job offer, then maybe it would be more appealing to Bill Cowher, Mike Shanahan or (one would presume, God help us) Bill Parcells. Or Tony Dungy, if he's looking.
Is the idea to find the next Mike Smith or Tony Sparano (each of whom lost in the first round of the playoffs)? Was Eric Mangini supposed to be that guy? So who's next? Mike Westhoff or Brian Schottenheimer? Heavens. The spectacle of seeing Westhoff prowling the sidelines next season is rather cinematic but terrible all the same. According to Jay Glazer, the Jets are the franchise sending candidates through the heaviest battery of interviews, all in anticipation of finding the best fit for their boss, Robert Wood Johnson. (I don't call him "Woody"). Personally, I want Steve Spagnuolo; my wife's been helping me practice saying his name since she also has a Sicilian surname with a silent g. He also does not carry the taint of the Jets' failure of this past season.
But in Hell, you have no right to dictate your terms of punishment. It is delivered to you. Raised as I was as a devoutly religious child, I subconsciously hold onto a sense of being a sinner in the hands of a proud and angry God. The retribution dispensed to us for last summer's pride is to sit here now in this circle of the Bad Place. We'll pick somebody who will still be struggling to lead us out of this self-imposed darkness just as Cowher, Dungy, Shanahan, and everyone else who demands front office and field control become available again.
One person with whom I work suggested that the Jets' circumstances aren't really hell by definition but are more apropos of "Insanity."
"You know what the definition of insanity is, don't you, Marty?" my colleague asked.
Many discussions I've had lately seem to begin with that question. Maybe its predominance is the product of discussions concerning the failure of the Big Three, or the Detroit Lions.
"It's doing the same dumb thing that doesn't work over and over and expecting a different result?" I offer.
He nods his head as if I haven't said anything. "It's doing the same dumb thing that doesn't work over and over and expecting a different result."
But I shake my head. I disagree. The point was that the Jets were hoping to avoid insanity with Chad at quarterback. Chad's lob throws, his limited efficacy in the clutch, his jittery motions in the pocket, his spent body - all of this was going to be history. The Jets had unburdened themselves of a lot of money on a better offense and defense. They needed someone else at the helm of the offense. And now we still do, though don't mistake our current surroundings with an asylum. We are in Hell. On Hockey Night in Canada, Peter King said he had spoken to Brett Favre "for about a half an hour" and King got the sense that Favre will retire for good now. (Peter King always always characterizes his discussion with football players as if they are counseling sessions. He always says things like, "...and we agreed that..." as if the player needed King's input on an important decision.) At the beginning of the season, we had Mangini and Favre. Now we have Kellen Clemens and a coach to be named later. Yep. Happy New Year. From Hell.
Now that you and I have already taken the Inferno tour of our past head coaches, recall that the last time the Jets gave total control of their field and front office operations to a head coach was when Bill Parcells helped us to win the AFC East with the best record in franchise history before and since. Before then, Leon Hess insisted on having a "football man" alongside his coaches, like the late Dick Steinberg who advised Bruce Coslet. Then there were the geniuses advising Rich Kotite. The constant flurry of last summer was exactly the kind of thing three different people nosing themselves into the decision might have come up with. If Eric Mangini had been coach and GM would we have been Favre-less? If the Jets now offered coach and GM in the one job offer, then maybe it would be more appealing to Bill Cowher, Mike Shanahan or (one would presume, God help us) Bill Parcells. Or Tony Dungy, if he's looking.
Is the idea to find the next Mike Smith or Tony Sparano (each of whom lost in the first round of the playoffs)? Was Eric Mangini supposed to be that guy? So who's next? Mike Westhoff or Brian Schottenheimer? Heavens. The spectacle of seeing Westhoff prowling the sidelines next season is rather cinematic but terrible all the same. According to Jay Glazer, the Jets are the franchise sending candidates through the heaviest battery of interviews, all in anticipation of finding the best fit for their boss, Robert Wood Johnson. (I don't call him "Woody"). Personally, I want Steve Spagnuolo; my wife's been helping me practice saying his name since she also has a Sicilian surname with a silent g. He also does not carry the taint of the Jets' failure of this past season.
But in Hell, you have no right to dictate your terms of punishment. It is delivered to you. Raised as I was as a devoutly religious child, I subconsciously hold onto a sense of being a sinner in the hands of a proud and angry God. The retribution dispensed to us for last summer's pride is to sit here now in this circle of the Bad Place. We'll pick somebody who will still be struggling to lead us out of this self-imposed darkness just as Cowher, Dungy, Shanahan, and everyone else who demands front office and field control become available again.
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