bad clock management #2

I watched the Saints’ win over the Falcons. After the Falcons turned the ball over on downs with 1:49 left, I thought, “I realize they can’t quite run the clock out, but with an 11-point lead the Saints should kneel on the ball and then punt on 4th down. I realize this is one of those things where people are going to say, “Kevin, you’re only saying this because of what happened.” Well, that’s true; had the Saints run for a first down, had there not been an injury, had there not been a fumble, no, I probably wouldn’t be writing this right now. (I’d still be right, though.) But I definitely thought the Saints should have taken a knee. And my dad said the same thing when I talked to him after the game, and I checked a few message boards and saw at least one more person agreed with us.

the nfl overtime rule

There are about a thousand different ways to deal with a tied football game. You can leave it tied, as was the rule in college for many years. You can let the teams alternate possessions starting at the 25 or the 10, as is the case now in college and high school. Neither of these solutions is ideal. The current college and high school system eliminates the importance of field position, punting, and the vertical passing game, while placing a heavy premium on turnovers, field goal kicking, and two point conversions. And obviously, ties must be avoided in the NFL playoffs. But either of those proposals is a huge improvement over the NFL’s joke of a playoff system. In fact, just about any system would be an improvement. It is far too easy for the team that wins the coin toss to march down the field, kick a field goal, and win the game without a single possession for the other team. Of six NFL overtime games this year, three have been decided by a field goal on the opening possession.

bad clock management

I could devote an entire blog to stupid things done by football coaches–punting too much on 4th-and-short, passing the ball with a lead late in the game when running would all but seal the victory, making ill-advised replay challenges, and so on. But for now I’d like to focus on one especially grievous clock management error which I’ve seen made countless times: kicking a game-winning field goal and leaving time on the clock afterward.

notre dame football

I was going to make my first sports-related blog post about how much I hate Ohio State football, but they just suck (2-6 vs. non-Big Ten ranked opponents since 2005) and are very douchebaggy about putting “the” in front of their school’s name. Not really enough for a whole post. Instead, I’ll turn to another pretentious, overhyped, overrated, craptastic team from the Midwest. Who? Notre Dame, of course. Somehow, a long time ago, they won themselves a large national following, probably because people root for anyone that wins a lot (that explains why so many people root for the Yankees or Red Sox for no apparent reason). It may be hard for you younger readers to believe, but once upon a time Notre Dame didn’t suck at football. They won a whole bunch of national championships, but their last one came in 1988. Since then all sorts of distinguished teams have won national championships, teams like Georgia Tech, Colorado, Washington (!!), and many others. Not Notre Dame. Yet their fans (many of whom are unfortunately employed in the media) keep talking about how wonderful Notre Dame is and even how they’re going to win a national championship this year.* Or, at least, they were going to before they lost to Michigan. Please remember that Michigan went 3-9 last year.