A Friendly Correction for those Man-Haters who Delve to be Single

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Sidd Finch

I hate baseball, but this thread is making me wish the season would start sooner. Just sayin'.

I love baseball, but 2. We all know playing football makes you brain damaged and these guys who never played are acting like the former players who are now coaches shouldn't be expected to make mental errors.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Sidd Finch

I hate baseball, but this thread is making me wish the season would start sooner. Just sayin'.

Wait, Sidd Finch hates baseball? WTF? I always thought it was the best baseball name around.

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally Posted by Sidd Finch

I hate baseball, but this thread is making me wish the season would start sooner. Just sayin'.

Remember when Adder told Thurgreed that he shouldn’t call other people stupid?

Good times.

[Sidd Finch]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

Wait, Sidd Finch hates baseball? WTF? I always thought it was the best baseball name around.

Consider it a comment on the duality of man.

I hate baseball, but I loved that story -- an April Fool's prank, played with true vigor and commitment. Plus, it was right around April Fool's when I picked the name.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Atticus Grinch

Remember when Adder told Thurgreed that he shouldn’t call other people stupid?

Good times.

in 7th grade I had very bad acne. Ron Plettl was my friend, read only person who would be seen with me. Then Charlie Webb started hanging with me. We were the bottom of the social scale.

Walking home from school one day, Charlie and I decided to beat up Ron, so we did, not really beating him, more pushing him and insulting him to get over our own insecurities.

The girl with the biggest tits in 7th grade, Barb Hornung, walked by and looked at us, and the look in her eyes was this, I don't know if I can articulate it, but it made me aware she was noticing us for the first time, and she wished she hadn't. She had no idea the bottom had feelings or anything.

That's how most people see you and adder fighting. Not me, I love you, but most people.

[Did you just call me Coltrane?]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

in 7th grade I had very bad acne. Ron Plettl was my friend, read only person who would be seen with me. Then Charlie Webb started hanging with me. We were the bottom of the social scale.

Walking home from school one day, Charlie and I decided to beat up Ron, so we did, not really beating him, more pushing him and insulting him to get over our own insecurities.

The girl with the biggest tits in 7th grade, Barb Hornung, walked by and looked at us, and the look in her eyes was this, I don't know if I can articulate it, but it made me aware she was noticing us for the first time, and she wished she hadn't. She had no idea the bottom had feelings or anything.

That's how most people see you and adder fighting. Not me, I love you, but most people.

More of these types of posts please.

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Sure. But since he anticipates what happens moments later, one can surmise he's saying something key there. I'd love to see a reporter ask him what he said there. Obviously Simmons doesn't know any more that you or I do, but I do credit him with finding and sharing the YouTube clip that shows something I hadn't seen.

Uh...you credit him with finding a youtube clip you hadn't seen and then completely speculating on what was said? You're kidding. Do you apply this set of non-existent expectation of journalistic standards to every topic or just New England sports?

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I think you could have just stopped after you said the play was fantastic. Any halfway decent corner may know that, but it's hard to do.

I don't understand why you are incapable of looking at this critically at all. It's like you want to hear that every player, coach, assistant, and secretary related to the Patriots is a brilliant genius with skills and insight above what any person could possibly expect. The guy made a great play. But if you are a cornerback (any cornerback) and you think a quick slant is coming and you're closer to the goal line than the receiver you had better beat him to that spot or it's game over. Also, cornerbacks are typically quicker than receivers because they have to change directions and react, whereas receivers run a predetermined route.

I am not taking anything away from Butler. It was a great read and a great play on the ball. You seem to think it was something superhuman. I'm telling you that once he read the play, 80% of the job was done. That doesn't mean that 100% of what he did wasn't spectacular.

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Simmons is really, really annoying in all sorts of different ways, which is why I rarely read him. But he is better than just about anybody else I can think of at watching a game and noticing things that other people haven't seen or put together. Most sports journalists don't do this, they rely on their access to insiders and then they share quotes and insight, which is why Marshawn Lynch's refusal to be a trained seal during interviews bugs them so much.

All you're saying is you tend to agree on whatever significance Simmons places on whatever he's so closely watching. I've seen him talk so far out of his ass so many times that he holds very little credibility. He's a fucking fan. He's not a technical analyst. He crafts a narrative around what he wants to believe.

Remember all the "insightful" reads he had on every single play Doc Rivers drew up and how he just consistently shit all over him? Then Rivers won the Celtics a championship and Simmons looked like a fucking fool.

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

He doesn't skate on that. He says that Carroll was expecting Belichick to take the TO, and that Belichick decided that his odds were better if he didn't, in part because it put pressure back on Carroll.

Just because the first point makes sense doesn't mean the second does. Everyone expected Belichick to take a timeout. Simmons is telling us that he didn't in order to place pressure on Carroll, presumably so he would do something stupid. That is patently ridiculous. You can't possibly think that Belichick, given the Patriots' terrible short-yardage performance this year, would think that Carroll wouldn't run the ball given Lynch's tendency to run through multiple people. It's just Simmons spouting some outrageous, unsupportable theory because he thinks Belichick can do absolutely no wrong. Why the fuck would Belichick say he was going to call timeout if Carroll ran the ball and didn't get in after second down? Wouldn't that remove the pressure he had so carefully crafted? The whole thing is absolutely ridiculous.

The genius of Belichick is that he saw that the Seahawks liked to run quick slants on short yardage plays weeks ago and he practiced them so much that his players were ready for it--even in a scenario in which the Seahawks would be unlikely to run that particular play. That should be enough for you and Simmons. Because guess what? It is enough.

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

About Carroll's decision to throw the slant instead of run, he says:

The Seahawks took too much heat for the final play call; statistically, it’s slightly less likely to throw a pick than fumble from the 1 (according to 2014 data, anyway). You also had Carroll’s lingering 2006 Rose Bowl shadow (the generic fourth-and-2 call to LenDale White that got stuffed and cost USC the game), as well as their balls-to-the-wall attitude in general (the same mentality that got the Seahawks that end-of-the-first-half touchdown and the fake field goal touchdown two weeks ago). That’s not a switch you shut off in big moments. You are who you are.

This is kind of what my buddy said. Carroll wanting to stick it to Belichick to show what big balls he had. I half agree. Maybe he was showing off at the end. Maybe he was overthinking it. Maybe Belichick was in his head.

But Simmons says Carroll was thinking of when he got stuffed in the Rose Bowl. And he was also thinking about the fake field goal and going for the touchdown in the first half, which means he's reckless, right? Somehow that translates into throwing instead of running, given if he ran twice he only really had two plays? Or, he could have run it, called time out, thrown it, and then run or thrown it? Simmons is just imagining shit and writing it down. And you're eating it up.

Originally Posted by More Simmons

Their biggest mistake (in my opinion) was not rolling Wilson out for a safer run/throw/throw-it-away play. Throwing a quick slant to a below-average receiver (Lockette) carried too much unnecessary risk. This wasn’t Randall Cobb or Edelman or Dez Bryant. What if the ball bounced off Lockette’s hands or shoulder pads and went popping up in the air? What if the ball got tipped? This wasn’t a stupid call as much as an arrogant one.

I don't get how he jumps to arrogance. The other analysis, I buy and it's apparently how Burger would have approached that down (although no one can convince me that anyone other than Carroll and Bevell would decide against running the ball). I think Bevell and Carroll just overthought it.

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Then again, look at this

Yes. Look at it. And here's where Simmons shows how very non-technical his analysis is. That photo clearly shows Butler is closer to the goal line than Lockette (see above cornerback analysis). Simmons would throw that pass all day! And you agree! It sure does look like a wide open pass when you capture it at that moment. But given the fact that Wilson and (every professional quarterback) understands that you have to lead a receiver--which necessarily means taking the route of the receiver into account when throwing a pass and throwing that pass to the spot the receiver is going to be instead of the spot he currently occupies--Wilson either, misjudged how close Butler actually is to where he is throwing the ball or he is depending on the inside receiver to actually make the pick play successful since he knows the outside corner won't have enough time to get around the pick to make a play. Again, great play by Browner to blow that pick up and great play by Butler to get there first. But Wilson isn't worried about anyone getting there.

Simmons' analysis is completely focused on the wrong thing (i.e., how open Lockette looks before he throws the ball). Remove Browner and the inside receiver setting the pick, and Wilson either delivers that ball earlier or he doesn't throw it at all even though Lockette would look just as open to Simmons.

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I can't believe Belichick was that confident in the moment -- he didn't look happy at all. But he thought his chances with his defense were better than his chances of letting them score and then getting a field goal (which only gets you to OT). He only had two TOs, and his passing game hasn't been deep balls and sideline throws -- it was a lot of passes underneath that eat up time.

Then why did he say he was going to call timeout if Carroll ran it on second down? Makes zero sense. He was in the moment and trying to figure out how to best stop Lynch and because he had prepared his guys so well in practice, he ended up getting a turnover on a play neither he nor anyone else expected to be called. That's it. That's all there is. And, for a New England fan, even though he mistakenly didn't call a timeout before that play, it's still a great job by your coach.

If you think Belichick thought, "Brady isn't going to be able to get us within field goal range with more than a minute and two timeouts after driving us for two touchdowns in the last 8 minutes," then you're nuts.

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

It reminds me of Bobby Knight's team playing Syracuse in the NCAA final (sorry BnB) and not calling time out, which would have let Syracuse set its defense up.

You remind me of the Bulls fans who think Phil Jackson was an amazing genius for not coaching his players at the end of a game because he "wanted his players to figure it out" when all he was really doing was letting Jordan take over because he would have just given Jordan the ball and told everyone to move out of the way anyway.

TM

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

Do you apply this set of non-existent expectation of journalistic standards to every topic or just New England sports?

I don't have any expectation that Bill Simmons will adhere to journalistic standards, and often that works for me. For example, he called Goodell a liar and got suspended. A bunch of ESPN writers found clever ways to repeatedly call Belichick and Brady liars a few weeks ago, but used their journalistic standards to always add some caveat about, and apparently that was fine.

I don't understand why you are incapable of looking at this critically at all.

I'm just going to give you the last word on most of this because my critical faculties tell me we've beaten it to death.

If you think Belichick thought, "Brady isn't going to be able to get us within field goal range with more than a minute and two timeouts after driving us for two touchdowns in the last 8 minutes," then you're nuts.

Call me nuts then. The Pats had used a time out before they scored the go-ahead touchdown. So when Kearse catches the ball, they only have two. With a minute to go, Seattle runs Lynch on first down, to the 1. If Belichick calls time out there, he has only one left, and Seattle still has three downs. Maybe Seattle scores quickly without the Pats burning the last time out, but maybe not. (If you're saying Belichick should have called time out, aren't you saying he also should have let Seattle score on second down?)

I think Brady was awesome in the fourth quarter, but in that moment I was certainly thinking to myself, Brady is not going to b able to get them within field goal range. Go back and look at those drives and see how often they were throwing to the sideline. Some, but not much. And they didn't have a deep threat. And they ran every so often to keep Seattle honest.

And even then, a field goal only ties the game.

You remind me of the Bulls fans who think Phil Jackson was an amazing genius for not coaching his players at the end of a game because he "wanted his players to figure it out" when all he was really doing was letting Jordan take over because he would have just given Jordan the ball and told everyone to move out of the way anyway.

Sometimes the best coaching decision is to do nothing.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

When I first heard Prince I thought he was saying "count your pussy." I took it as "I fuck more than u!"

[ThurgreedMarshall]

http://www.lawtalkers.com/forums/sho...postcount=3092

http://www.lawtalkers.com/forums/sho...postcount=3093

http://www.lawtalkers.com/forums/sho...postcount=3094

http://www.lawtalkers.com/forums/sho...postcount=3095

TM

[Tyrone Slothrop]

[taxwonk]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I know where that comes from. Shame on you.

[Sidd Finch]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I had heard that trying to "open up" your marriage could be very complicated, but I didn't realize that this is what they meant.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I think I know at least one person in every category.

A camp at Burning Flipside last year was gifting buttons. The "No thank you, I've had my poly drama for the day" button went very quickly.