Super Bowl 2015

[thorsten]

Did the spot from Nationwide made it into the top 10?

 

[Macanudo]

If that last play had been a touchdown the same people that say it was a stupid play would have said it was a great play. I'd say it was a great game and leave it at that. Both teams gave it their all and I thought the coaches did an incredible job also. Before the game Belichick said that it's a players game and the team that executes the best will win and I believe that's what happened. I watched the game on my computer for $9.99.

 

[Alicia karr]

Did the spot from Nationwide made it into the top 10?

Find your answer on You tube!

 

[thorsten]

If that last play had been a touchdown the same people that say it was a stupid play would have said it was a great play. I'd say it was a great game and leave it at that.

Totally agree. That's a common theme in all kinds of sports - people are extremely result-oriented. Even a few sports journalists said, that this is a play you should *never* make, which just shows their non-understanding of game theory, as any balanced strategy need to contain that play with a probability >0. This year's season there have been like 60 TDs from the 1 and exactly 1 interception, which was last night. So calling it a horrible play just shows a major lack of understanding.

 

[ElQueso]

I hate to say "for anyone who has ever played sports competitively"...the truth is, it seems so obvious that this was a horrible play that I can't understand how anyone could think differently, even if you hadn't played sports competitively.

I played a number of sports when I was young, including football. Hockey was the one I really played competitively (if anyone knows who Kevin Dineen is, I played a couple of years on an all-star team with him and a bunch of guys who were just fabulous players in the late 70s. His father was the coach of the WHA's Houston Aeros at the time, the time of Gordy Howe and his sons playing together).

Let's think about the whole thing here.

We are talking about the pressure to win a Super Bowl, with millions and millions of dollars spent to show it, professional careers at stake, prestige, the whole nine yards (you don't get to use that phrase in such an apt manner very often in life ). You don't gamble unless it's necessary. It may have been necessary to throw the hail-Mary. And what a freaking catch! That dude was so into his game at that point! Falling and twisting, bouncing around against the defender, he managed to keep himself oriented to the ball, hits the ground on his butt and back, the ball bouncing off him as his helmet is hitting the ground, his head bouncing up sharply as he's grasping for the ball and as he spins on his back is fumbling at the ball, fighting to control it - and he does. Spectacular. But that wasn't the game-winning play at the end, though it should have been. The Seahawks threw that successful gamble away by doing something totally unnecessary.

When you're in such a tight position, the first thing you think of is how far you have to go and what's the best and safest way to get there. When the ball leaves the center's hands, you want that thing as safe as you can keep it and throwing it even 3 or 4 feet is dangerous. We're talking literally inches he had to go. I could understand an end around or something, maybe lose a couple of yards - but for christ's sake, they had three tries to get it into the end zone!!! Not a bad call?? All it took was one defender reading the play and with a modicum of luck and effort he could stop the play and maybe even intercept. And not only did the Patriots do exactly that, but the guy who intercepted it did it with a style that just totally made the Seahawks look like amateurs. The receiver was blind in a tight situation. Utterly stupid call.

Anyone who afterward would have said it was a great play had it been successful would simply have been wrong. Seems to me that most who would have understood what was happening (including the announcers' after-play analysis) would agree it was a good result that won the game, but with a huge risk and would have questioned the play anyway, while being happy with the result (if you were rooting for the Seahawks, obviously. I'd be bitching that we were sitting still and couldn't stop such a horrible play if I were rooting for the Patriots.)

To me, the play was as stupid as if in a hockey game: with 20 seconds remaining in the game, my team up a goal, the puck goes into my team's left corner. The other team's down a man in the penalty box so it was shot from the far end (i.e., not icing) and one forward was skating in fast behind me (I'm the left defenseman) aas I chase the puck into the corner. I sweep close to the boards, see my right wing open across the ice and backhand a pass to him across ice, across the goal. The attacking forward thinks I'm going to go behind the net so he doesn't chase me, but cuts in towards the front of the net to meet me on the other side. Instead of looking up where I'm passing (as i should be), I'm looking down at the puck and don't see the forward cut in toward the net, thinking he's still behind me. He sees me tense as I start the backhand (big tell, you either have to lean into it or move your stick more to get the inertia working right, back and across while moving forward at speed) and as the puck nears him, he's ready; he flicks his stick a little, changes the trajectory of the puck, deflected right at the net, taking the goalie completely by surprise. Never, ever, pass the puck in front of the net in your own end with attackers near.

Never, ever, pass on second and goal with inches and the Super Bowl outcome depends on it.

Sorry about the hockey game play-by-play - just started thinking about old times

 

[thorsten]

ElQueso, anyone who has ever played sports competitively should know better than to use words like "gamble" - all that matters is the expectation of a play. And it also doesn't matter if it's a regular game during the season, the playoffs or the super bowl: if a play X has a higher expected value than a play Y, play X should be played no matter which game you are playing...

 

[hannstew]

Totally agree. That's a common theme in all kinds of sports - people are extremely result-oriented. Even a few sports journalists said, that this is a play you should *never* make, which just shows their non-understanding of game theory, as any balanced strategy need to contain that play with a probability >0. This year's season there have been like 60 TDs from the 1 and exactly 1 interception, which was last night. So calling it a horrible play just shows a major lack of understanding.

If most of the Americans that grew up with an understanding of Am. football agrees its the wrong play, but one person (not American) thinks its the right one, that pretty much just shows you dont "know" the game or its stratagy. I would explain it to you but dont have the time now.. Maybe next yr we could meet during a game for a refreshing coctail and you can be schooled.

 

[AmigoArtistico]

Haha. That was the play in the whole game, everything else being nearly equal. Patriots came back with a good amount of time remaining. Seahawks make a spectacular, hail-Mary play that puts them inches from the goal line a play or two later and they had three plays to cross that line and they threw a short little pass that was the stupidest play ever called.

I wasn't rooting for either team, but the Patriots certainly deserved to win because the Seahawks gave up their chance to win with stupidity.

One has to wonder why they called that play...

If you want to use that logic, then the Seahawks should never have even been in the Super Bowl, because to beat Green Bay, they needed a similar play from Green Bay to win the game. Seattle made an onside kick at the end of the game, a desperation move at that point in the game, and a Green Bay player made a ridiculous blunder and Seattle got the ball. Without that one play, Green Bay, not Seattle, was in the Super Bowl.

Also, it was noted during the game, or just after the game, by one of the analysts, that during the season, Marshawn Lynch was only 1 for 5 on scoring attempts from the one yard line, and the Patriots had their "heavy" package in to defend the goal line. If Lynch doesn't get in, Seattle has to use their final time out and then they have to try two passes anyway.

The pass play (a pick play) that Seattle used was a play that they used often during the year with success and without any interceptions.

The Patriots made a great play, one of many that they made during the entire sixty minutes of the game.

It's very simplistic to suggest that Lynch would have just pounded the ball across the goal line and the game would have been over, especially against the Patriots, who have had some very notable goal line stands in the past 10 years. It's very easy for everyone sitting on the sidelines (including most of the so-called "experts," most of whom picked the Seahawks against the Patriots) to second guess what happened. It's another to actually play the game.

I did a little checking and discovered that most of the "experts" who have been most critical of "the call" also happened to pick the Seahawks to win the game. Almost none of them who picked the Patriots have done so.

There seem to be plenty of sour grapes to go around.

 

[AmigoArtistico]

All Patriots fans remember this huge, important game against the Colts during the Patriots 2003 Super Bowl run, against Peyton Manning and running back Edgerrin James (who was dominating then like Marshawn Lynch is now):

James ran it 3 times from within the 2 yard line for no gain.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZdD2d3t_5A

 

[AmigoArtistico]

deleted.. waiting for moderator approved post, but, since I won't have a chance to edit the post...

P.S., before you jump all over me when the post appears, the video link is wrong in the post waiting for moderator approval; it was mislabeled in the post I found.

Apparently it (the video) was yet another successful and important goal line stand, but by the New York Giants against the Patriots.

In any case, there are lots of examples of successful goal line stands against dominant runners in the NFL (as well as innumerable examples of similar stops on critical 3rd and 1 situations during games). To mindlessly think that a run by Marshawn Lynch in that situation would have guaranteed a victory is weak-minded thinking at best.

Even many analysts, in their remarks, were saying, "You've got to run Lynch in that situation. Then, if it didn't work, at least you gave it your best shot." If it didn't work???

Armchair analysis at it's best.