Sunday, February 3, 2019

By The Pigskin Of Our Teeth: Men Out Of Time

Puppets? That's a RISK.



Marcus Peters has been secretly kinda bad this season. Dropped in the end zone! Field goal team comes on. It's good. Not sure why the Jets let Demario Davis walk. And that was before he intercepted Goff. That went off Gurley's fingers but Goff was under pressure. Rams are blessed to only be down 6-0 after all that. Goff's helmet is having technical difficulties, Chris Myers tells us. Goff misses Woods and the Rams are three-and-out. Josh Hill takes a tight end screen 24 yards. A Taysom Hill keeper would have worked there, but as Aikman says, why take Brees off the field on 3rd and 4 unless, as the Saints do, they go for it on 4th. Did the Rams ACTUALLY JUMP? Jesus. First down Saints.



Touchdown... Garrett Griffin? Sure, why not. Saints kick it to go up 13-0. Rams fake the punt and Hekker throws to Sam Shields for a first down. They needed to do SOMETHING.



Bad drop by Gurley. Field goal puts the Rams on the board. Cooks with a catch and it's first and goal finally. Touchdown Gurley! Extra point is good. 13-10 Saints with 23 seconds before halftime. Maybe "somebody other than Woods" next time, Rams. Kamara's been the one guy who's put up consistent numbers so far. Strong run by Ingram for 16. Robey-Coleman got very lucky that he was somehow able to turn Thomas around, as that should have been a touchdown.



It's amazingly loud in here and the Rams still have not figured that out. Cooks! Reynolds takes a reverse and goes down just short of the goal line. Play action to Tyler Higbee hits pay dirt. Rams could have used a fumble recovery there.



Fourth quarter starts with Goff getting sacked. The Saints started that drive in Rams territory, lost seven yards, and almost got intercepted and Ted Ginn killed simultaneously. Gerald Everett gets 39 to pick up a big 3rd and 3. The Saints' linebackers can't be expected to cover the Rams' wideouts. Good coverage by the Saints to make Goff roll out, then keep it himself. C.J. Anderson doesn't quite make it. Field goal team is out. They're kicking this, I'm sure. And I don't like it. It's good and we're tied.





Kamara surviving that hit is impressive. Bomb to Ginn inside the 15! That's why you go for it if you're the Rams. Make them score a touchdown.  Because now, the Saints can play to run the clock out and kick the game-winner, and you'll never get the ball back.  Then the Saints throw an incompletion on first down. OK then. How the hell is THAT NOT DPI?



And as Aikman points out, if Robey-Coleman plays the ball, it's a pick-six. Horrific. Field goal is good. Still about a minute and a half left, and the Rams still have a time out. Woods makes the catch but stumbles, and he rolls into Zeuerlein's range. Goff rushes a third-down throw and no one's even close to it. Zeuerlein from 48. After getting iced, he hooks it back in, as it started to fade. OVERTIME.





Saints get the ball first. Donald blows up Ingram. INTERCEPTED! Johnson and Thomas made contact, Johnson fell down, and caught the ball on his back! Fowler hit Brees' arm as he threw it.



Drive fizzles. Are they gonna try this? Zeuerlein's got the strongest leg in the league, but 57 yards. Oh that's right, overtime is still 15 minutes in the playoffs. High snap? IT'S GOOD!



And McVay's players bail him out. The Superdome is a tomb right now. (Rams 26, Saints 23, OT)

It is COLD. A half-zip over a shirt and tie, Nantz? Really? That field's looked better. Pats get the ball first. You know what they could use? A dynamic tight end. White picks up his second third-down conversion of the drive. Patriots doing a grind-it-out drive. Touchdown Michel.



Mahomes is incomplete on 3rd and 7 but the Patriots get flagged for holding. New set of downs and then he loses 14 yards on a sack. Nice work. Patterson being used as an actual wide receiver again? How novel. INTERCEPTION. Dude, don't run it out. Mahomes to Hill for 42 yards! Mahomes overthrows Williams for what would have been a touchdown. That's the second big sack the Chiefs have given up, and this one takes them out of field goal range.



Was that a banner for the Alliance of American Football or am I seeing things? Pats going back to feeding Michel. Brady hits White for 30 yards. This Chiefs secondary is... bad. Brady to Dorsett for the touchdown! 14-0 Pats at halftime.

Watkins! Touchdown Kelce! Chiefs on the board almost instantly. Tyreek Hill ran himself out of options on that punt return. A first down puts the Patriots in field goal range, and there it is. Gostkowski hits from 47. Mahomes beats Adrian Clayborn's rush with a sidearm throw to Watkins. Kelce gets tackled in the end zone, drawing a pass interference flag. Fancy that. Mahomes gets chased out of the pocket and throws through the tiniest window to Damian Williams for the touchdown. 17-14 Patriots. James Develin with a catch. Fourth and inches here from the... Chiefs' 25? NOPE. Why run Burkhead in that spot? Give it to Michel or just try to sneak it if you're gonna do that.








Did Edelman muff this? It's not a touchdown. I'm not sure it touched him, looking at these replays. The refs say it did touch Edelman. Does this automatically get reviewed? I guess so, since it's a change of possession.






I think the Patriots are getting this ball. They overturned it. I think that's right. Lost in all of this is that Edelman's returned enough punts to know better than to try and field that short hop. INTERCEPTION! And it's off of, guess who, Edelman's hands and goes to Sorenson, who made the big 4th down stop earlier. Shooter's roll, man. Patriots challenge this Watkins catch and this one's an obvious reversal. It's overturned. Damian Williams scores on the next play! Extra point is GOOD. 21-17 Chiefs with 7:45 left. How is that roughing the passer? THAT'S NOT THE PASSER. Pats get a free first down. Hogan makes the catch that Watkins tried to make earlier but couldn't. Reid's gonna lose this challenge. Yep. I'm legitimately surprised Gronk has more than two catches today. He looks like he's about to fall apart. Another fourth and inches, this time from the Chiefs' 15. THIS time, Michel slices through... and scores. Pats retake the lead. 3:25 left. We calling this a fumble or an incomplete pass? It's Patriots ball if it's a fumble. There's also a flag — for defensive holding before the pass, so it doesn't matter. Chiefs keep it. Chiefs stay picking on J.C. Jackson, but there was also a roughing the passer flag. Then the Pats drop an interception in the end zone. Watkins to the 2!



Touchdown Williams! Extra point is good, but 2:03 and three time outs? This isn't over by any means and you know it. First pass goes to Edelman, who gets to the Chiefs' 45. Hogan for another first down. This one's being looked at — and they change it to an incompletion! ANOTHER pick? But there's a flag. Chiefs were offside. WOW.





Brady finds what's left of Gronk and it's first and goal, because of course he does and of course it is. Touchdown Burkhead! And that's the best the Chiefs could have hoped for at this point.



That's a good kickoff return. Spencer Ware (!) with a 21-yard catch and run. Mahomes hits Robinson for 27 yards to the Patriots' 21, and this penalty flag will stop the clock. It's offsides Patriots, but they'll decline it. The Chiefs have time to take two shots into the end zone here, or work the sidelines twice. Sixteen seconds left. Incomplete. I do not like kicking it now. There's time for another play. It's good, though.

We are now in uncharted territory — both conference championship games have never gone into overtime before today. Patriots win the toss, which is terrifying. Hogan starts it off with a first-down catch. Edelman for 20. Edelman again!





First down Gronk at the Chiefs' 15 on another 3rd and 10. This is over. The Chiefs can't stop them.



Burkhead clinches it.



So it's Patriots-Rams. The matchup that started it all. Seventeen years to the day, Nantz says. Is this where it ends? (Patriots 37, Chiefs 31, OT)




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