RapierFugue
Posts: 4740
Joined: 3/16/2006
From: London, England
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster
Sanchez looked great. Oh well, maybe next year.
My take on it:
1. Agree about stopping the run ... to an extent. What I would say is that the yardage Mendenhall got on several of his really big gains in the first half was down more to immense personal effort than it was poor defence; the Jets got bodies in the right places, and even stopped him momentarily a couple of times, with more than one defender on, but he just kept moving those legs and powered on - the degree to which he got his head down and presented a near-horizontal target was staggering. 2nd half they seemed to put even more bodies on him, and closed up the centre more, but all that did was play into the hands of Roethlisberger.
2. The strip-sack wasn't the game. The game was Steeler offence, 1st half. As per the Bears, you absolutely cannot (at this level) give the opposition a 2 or 3 TD head start and expect to win. If you're behind like that then all the last ditch, 4th quarter heroics in the world probably aren't going to work because you need a load of things to work out for you, in sequence, in order to get the points you need.
3. Steeler defence was just very professional, and very solid. The commentator was rambling on at one stage about Troy Polamalu having a "quiet" game - bullshit. He wasn't putting on the kind of interception/sack-fest rout-show he's capable of, because the Jets simply weren't that bad - they weren't giving him enough mistakes to work with. But almost every single tackle from every key defensive member was solid, with good technique, and apart from the goal-line mix-up collision, they just weren't giving the Jets enough in the way of mistakes to make it possible to do much. To me that speaks of quality coaching, and lots of it, plus plenty of ability.
4. As I postulated earlier in the week, it was Roethlisberger’s ability to scramble that caused the Jets major headaches. The hairy mofo just wouldn't stand still long enough to present a decent target, and although his throwing on the run was frankly pretty poor, accuracy-wise, his receivers made enough space for themselves, and caught well enough, to be able to almost always give Ben an out. I strongly suspect the Packers won't make the same mistake, and will cover the hell out of Ben's secondary receivers much more efficiently.
5. There was a fundamental difference between the way the downfield defences of the Jets and the Steelers operated; the Jets were looking to pick the ball for interceptions to stop that drive whereas the Steelers merely wanted to bat the ball and stop that down. While it’s great to be able to pick off, it’s much harder to do than batting away, and the Steelers seemed more confident generally in their ability to stop each down, so instead of looking the “big play” every down, they just ground it out and took Sanchez’s options away, as often as possible.
6. Neither side did a great job of playing to the play clock; they were both forced to take unnecessary time-outs. The Steelers will need to sort that out if they want to beat the Packers, because I've a feeling that's going to be an even closer game, and it could well come down to the last 2 minutes.
7. In one respect it’s a pity the Packers won – don't get me wrong, I'm pleased for them, and I want a Packers/Steelers Superbowl, but I think the Steelers would have absolutely crushed the Bears, whereas I think the Packers are going to prove very, very tough opposition. I honestly don't know which way it’s going to go.
8. And yes, Sanchez looked superb – I was very impressed. Confident, great throwing action, good release, good eyes, good picks pretty much 90% of the time. Roethlisberger is a better scrambler of course, but that’s not necessarily a good thing; I can’t help thinking that Big Ben’s one big defensive move away from getting smashed into tiny pieces. The Jets defence didn't look capable of coming up with the big one, whereas the Packers did, although I have to say I was shocked at how poor the Bears were; they didn't get anything really right all night, and never got any kind of rhythm going.
But I'm a frood who now knows where his towel is (just behind me, on the arm of the Chesterfield), so I'm going to hang on in there and see how it goes. It has the potential to be a truly great Superbowl.
PS: This is ... odd :)
http://blog.seattlepi.com/zennieabraham/archives/236726.asp
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