Super Surprises

The sports pundits are reaching their consensus, which the game may well mock. It often does. What would be the surprises?

For the Packers: if they effectively run the ball.
For the Steelers: if they drop back in coverage more than they come after the quarterback.

Expectations now are for a high scoring game, despite the reputable defenses. So the surprise would be 14-10.

Expectations are that Rodgers will play well indoors. Surprise will be if he doesn't. Perhaps the concentrated Super Bowl dazzle gets in his eyes.

Of course the biggest surprise for the pundits would be: the Steelers win.

Super Bowl Ahead

Judged by the team and player merchandise sold, the Steelers are the most popular NFL team in the world--one writer insists they are the real "America's Team." But a poll claims that most people are rooting for the Green Bay Packers in the Super Bowl.

That pretty much says it all about two teams that are a lot like each other, and enter this game pretty evenly matched. Even the fans and their towns are similar. The Green Bay coach has a stronger Pittsburgh accent than the Steelers.' He's from a few streets away from where I last lived in the Burgh.

Pittsburgh is relatively small and Green Bay is even smaller, and they both lost a lot of people when industries faded (Pittsburgh more I'd guess.) For this and other reasons, their fans are spread out. There are a lot of Steeler fans who've never even been to Pittsburgh, but there are a lot of ex-Pittsburghers who stay in touch to some important degree through the Steelers. Like me, or this woman.

As for the game itself: when a reporter asked Big Ben how he won the championship game he replied, "luck." He's a smart guy. Luck is going to be important on Sunday. But though the Packers are still favored and have the offense to even run away with this one, I'm still giving the edge to the Steelers because of their Super Bowl experience. You saw it this past week already--while the Packers were publicly fighting among themselves, the Steelers were talking each other up, and otherwise pretty quiet. And with a little luck...

(The photos by the way tell a lot about that Super Bowl legacy--that's Franco and Rocky presenting the league trophy after the Jets game, and the scene after the last Super Bowl win.)

Both teams have particularly devoted fans, which led the New York Times to check with mental health professionals, and found that those in Wisconsin and PA are on high alert:

Therapists in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania are prepared. Most have seen plenty of people who suffer from what could be called Football Attention Neurosis (F.A.N.), in their practices, in their living rooms, and sometimes in the mirror.

“The belief that these patients have is that the world will end if the Steelers — uh, I mean, their team loses,” said Mark Hogue, a psychologist at Northshore Psychological Associates in Erie, Pa., who owns a trunkload of Pittsburgh Steelers paraphernalia, including a Snuggie. “As a therapist, you need to take that fear seriously.”

(The rest of the piece is pretty funny.)

But there is a very ugly side to Super Bowl madness. Apart from bad behavior at the games (while on average it may not be worse than before, from what I've heard the worst of it is much worse) there's the dark side of the Super Bowl as an event. And I don't just mean the maddeningly frequent and long commercials (or the fact that they are why some people watch the game at all.) There is growing awareness that trafficking in human slaves, often children, especially for sex is a growing problem, and as the San Antonio Express News put it: "As thousands of fans flock to Texas for America's biggest sporting event, human traffickers are preparing to bring in hundreds of women and children to serve as sex slaves for what is also America's biggest sex trafficking weekend." Another report says that this involves children as young as 11, and that these children have a life expectancy of seven years after they are first trafficked.

The federal government is taking this seriously, as are officials in Texas and in Dallas itself. But some charge that the NFL itself is resisting. Personally I was unaware of this, and I expect a lot of football fans are as well. The NFL and its teams need to talk about this, because theirs are likely to be the most powerful voices to shame it out of existence.

Against All Odds

With the score 24-0 in the first half, it was looking like my kind of game. But of course the Steelers had to make it way too interesting, hanging on to defeat the New York Jets 24-19, aided by a gutsy goal line stand and some brilliant first downs when it counted most to end the game.

Diehard Steeler fans had to be ecstatic with that first half, especially because of all those yards on the ground, watching Rashard Mendenhall run like the reincarnation of Franco Harris (kind of hard since Harris was there, doing the ceremonial coin toss with his running mate Rocky Blier.)

So the Steelers will face the Green Bay Packers in the Super Bowl. Green Bay has already been installed as the favorite, which continues the theme--it's become a cliche, but few really counted on Pittsburgh to get to the Bowl this year, including me. Meanwhile the Packers weren't very impressive on Sunday. They beat a second and then a third string Chicago quarterback, and the third stringer almost beat them. Rodgers, like Big Ben, had a sub-par game, but both made plays when they most needed to. Even so, I'd give the edge to Ben in quarterback play on Sunday.

I'm also inclined to give the edge to the Steelers in the big game, based on their experience, their team play, and Big Ben. He threw some dumb passes on Sunday, but he never gives up, and he's been tested. Rodgers can be brilliant, but he and this Green Bay team haven't been really tested. The unknowns as usual are injuries and the flow of the game on that day. The Steelers lost their young center Maurice Pouncey, and that probably hurt them in the second half. He says he'll play but nobody will know that yet. Anyway, get ready for the hype.

Congratulations Pittsburgh. I can hear you singing: the Steelers are going to the Super Bowl!

It's Why They Play the Games

So much for that Atlanta-New England Super Bowl. Both #1 teams lost this weekend, convincingly. The closest game of the weekend was the Steelers coming back to win over the Ravens. Since the Jets beat New England, the AFC championship game will be in Pittsburgh, the Steelers v. the Jets.

After a crisp early drive and a touchdown, the Steelers gift-wrapped 14 points for the Ravens and were down 21-7 at the half. But then they cashed in three Ravens turnovers in the third quarter, and drove to a touchdown to win it in the fourth, with a not-soon to be forgotten 3rd and 18 pass to young speedster Antonio Brown. Looking to the future, the Steelers may wind up with the most potent deep threats in the league, with Mike Wallace and Brown.

So it wasn't 40-31 but 31-24 was still beyond most expectations. Still it wasn't really a shootout since most of the scoring on both sides came from turnovers and a shorter field. But here's what was clearly true: Ben Roethlisberger is a better quarterback than Joe Flacco, especially under pressure.

Speaking of pressure, both the Jets and Steelers will try to make that a big factor next weekend. The Jets used coverage and pressure or blitz packages to throw Tom Brady out of rhythm. The Patriots' offense was kind of a puzzle--it was unrelentingly conservative, except for a couple of big risk plays that didn't pay off. Whatever the Jets defense did, the Steelers better understand it and counter it in prep this week. But the weekend also showed that when it comes to dealing with pressure, Big Ben is better. Specifically better than Mark Sanchez of the Jets.

The Steelers are not a lock to win this game, not against a team that have overachieved to beat two of the highest rated quarterbacks in successive weeks. But the Steelers have a very good chance to win it. In contrast to the Baltimore game this weekend, I think next week's will be a low-scoring affair, along the lines of 20-17. What could well be decisive again is Big Ben and especially his playoff and Super Bowl experience. The Steelers were only weakened by injury on special teams so far, and Troy Polamalu had a quiet game against the Ravens. He didn't play last time against the Jets. I expect he'll make his presence known next week. Tight end Heath Miller also didn't play against the Jets, and that probably cost them the winning touchdown as time expired.

The other league matchup will be Green Bay v. Chicago, one of pro football's oldest rivalries. Green Bay looks unbeatable now, but so did New England until today. What's striking is that except for Big Ben, all the surviving quarterbacks are inexperienced in playoff football. The pressure only mounts week to week. You'd have to say at this point that the Steelers have the best shot. Green Bay would be the stronger opponent for them. But they are fully capable of beating these three teams. They'll have to start though with the Jets.

Steelers/Ravens...Again

Wild card weekend was wild but not wild enough: the one clear favorite that actually won was the Baltimore Ravens. Now the Steelers have to face them for the third time this year, for the privilege of being beaten by New England in the championship game, one would expect. But weird things happen.


Anyway, the Steelers at home have the edge but there's really no clear favorite. Anything can happen. The Steelers may be more rested but if they aren't up to speed right at the beginning, a Ravens score early could be the difference in a tight game, as it was with the Jets. Everyone expects a defensive battle. Which means it could wind up being a 41-30 game. Both teams have potentially potent offenses that have occasionally lived up to their potential. That the Ravens had no problem with Kansas City is a confidence boost for them, on both sides of the ball. But the Steelers have put up a lot of points in their recent games.


As for the other Wild Card games, Indianapolis and New Orleans made quick exits on Saturday though both were favored--New Orleans by a lot over the Seattle Seahawks, who still don't have a winning record. By way of explanation, no truer words were ever spoke than these by Colts Qb Payton Manning: "We would have liked to score more points than them." That way they would have won the game, see?

Commentators talk about the Steelers-Ravens game as brutal, more than hinting that the game can hinge on injuries to key players. Both teams are going into the game about as healthy as they've been all year. The question will be how they come out of it. Will the winner still be healthy enough to compete in the next round?

During the week some Steelers players have talked about how their games with the Ravens always come down to the fourth quarter. This is true, but it also may reveal a mindset. The Ravens played on Sunday, the Steelers are rested and are playing at home. They might be thinking that if they can hold off the Ravens for 3 quarters, they can wear them out in the fourth. If the Ravens are worried about their stamina as well, it's more motivation for them to take chances on offense early and try to run up the score in the first half. The Steelers of course would like to score early and often, especially since they know how to defend a lead this year. But just preventing a Ravens score in the first quarter could be a big advantage for them.

Meanwhile, the Patriots know that once they take care of the Jets, they will be facing a tested but probably very beat up opponent--and if it's the Ravens, a pretty tired one as well. But what's interesting for the Steelers and Ravens is that their game is on Saturday, and the Patriots-Jets on Sunday. So when Pittsburgh and Baltimore play, facing the Jets in the championship game is still at least a possibility, more motivation to win, because the Jets are beatable. As long as Brady is standing, it's doubtful that the Patriots are this year. (Still, the Steelers came back against them after looking completely out of their league for the first half, so...but that's really getting ahead of the game.)

Big Ben has never been beaten by the Ravens, and his record in the playoffs is 8-2. You could argue that he's due. But how he plays may be the difference. Though the same may be said of Flacco, or the corners, or... Here's the thing. In many ways, some of them a little eerie, these teams are evenly matched. But that doesn't guarantee a close game. The odds are it will be a heart attack, but a blowout is also possible. It's like very existential, dude.

How about that other league? The winner of the Green Bay-Atlanta game will be in the Super Bowl. I saw some tentativeness in Atlanta against New Orleans, so in a pretty even contest I wouldn't be surprised if Green Bay won. Seattle-Chicago may be the most fun to watch because the game is meaningless. The winner ain't going nowhere past the next round.

Pope Football

Let me waste a little more time so I can pontificate on this week's football. Not the bowl games, that endless embarrassing parade of inflated excuses for commercials. I caught the end of one, when the outcome was determined by an official who penalized the scoring team 15 yards on the extra point (they needed a two point conversion to tie) because of excessive celebration in the end zone on the touchdown--the kid who caught the pass saluted the crowd. What a stupid cheat.

Oh, and one of the announcers used the word "palpable" and the other announcers made fun of him. Then he joined in and made fun of himself for using a word that nobody is supposed to understand who watches football. Stupidity enforced, one of the worst self-destructive as well as generally destructive instincts of sports.

No, the last NFL games of the regular season is my topic of the moment. After the unexpected outcome a couple of weeks ago--the Steelers losing to the Jets (predictable, but not having Troy and Heath Miller really determined it) but the Ravens winning over the Saints (not so predictable)--both the Steelers and the Ravens are in the playoffs, but the North title will be decided Sunday, and with it the by. If the Steelers beat the Browns in Cleveland, the title is theirs. But if they lose and the Ravens beat the Bengals, the Ravens win it, and the Steelers must play an extra game, on the road. Conversely (I think that's right), if the Ravens lose, the Steelers win the North no matter what the outcome with the Browns.

On paper, the Steelers are all but in. But this season especially, it's any given Sunday. The Browns can and probably will play with abandon. They can surprise the Steelers, and the way Pittsburgh has been playing, an early touchdown or two against them can be fatal. The Ravens pretty much gave them the game plan to win by what they did to beat the Browns last week--confuse the young quarterback, Colt McCoy, with deceptive defensive looks, and batter the running back early. But if they can't do both, the Steelers may not find this an easy game.

On paper the Bengals are a better team than the Browns, so they should give the Ravens more trouble. Once again, that's on paper. The Bengals are wilting, depressed at this wreck of a season for them. They might put up a fight, and they might not.

It's probably all for naught anyway. Except for that any given Sunday scenario--very important in the playoffs--the Steelers are very unlikely to get to the Super Bowl. They have to hope that somebody else knocks off the New England Patriots, because they've shown no sign that they can. I doubt that anyone will. The Steelers might not even get that deep in the playoffs. Getting Troy P. back will help. If they get the by, they could make it to the AFC championship. They can beat the Jets, if New York gets that far. They will be hard-pressed to beat the Ravens again.

The Atlanta-New Orleans game last week was interesting. They are closely matched, and it was Atlanta's mistakes that cost them the game. If they play each other again, it could again go either way, although I'm still seeing an Atlanta Falcons-New England Patriots Super Bowl, with New England the victor. I guess by now that's conventional wisdom, but it seems right to me anyway.

I'm not even sure I'm going to see it. I'm about to dump my cable TV. It costs much more than it's worth. Who knows, maybe I'll waste less time this way.

Decisive Sunday

The AFC North could be decided on Sunday. Both the Steelers and the Ravens play their last opponent with a winning record, and both games are at home. But based on where teams are at the moment, the Steelers would seem to have a much better chance of beating the Jets than the Ravens do of beating the New Orleans Saints. If the Ravens lose, that pretty much makes the Steelers the AFC North champs, even if the Steelers lose Sunday. Even if they both win, the Steelers still have the edge, but if the Ravens win and the Steelers lose, the Steelers will have to win out-- two games against inferior teams, including the final game against the Browns.

But with the deck stacked like that, and too many commentators counting the Jets out, and with the Steelers at home and the Jets having never won in Pittsburgh, it's a perfect set up for the Steelers to make things difficult for themselves with a sloppy game and a loss. We'll see if this year's Steelers are that kind of team, as some Steelers teams of the recent past have been.

It could be a tricky game. If the Steelers run game isn't popping, it gets dangerous with the Jets excellent defensive secondary against the pass, and in a close game, Santonio Holmes has plenty of personal motivation to make the decisive catch for the Jets. Plus the Steelers have to shut down the Jets run game early. Jets qback Sanchez has had two poor games in a row, but he's also had games where he's made things happen under pressure.

But the flow is with the favorites so I expect the Steelers to win over the discombulated Jets and the exhausted Ravens to lose to the surging Saints on Sunday.

Update: The news that Troy Polamalu is not expected to play for the Steelers materially alters expectations for this game. Tight end Heath Miller also may not play, which really hurts the Steelers offense against the Jets specifically. The New York sports media is so down on the Jets, their coach and quarterback are under such pressure, that unless they are truly in complete disarray, they have more than enough motivation to win this game. This game could go either way now.

Steelers/Lakers

The Steelers avoided a loss to the Bengals with the deceptively lopsided score of 23-7. But the Steelers offense didn't score a touchdown, and have scored only two in the past three games. Meanwhile, on a snowy windy field in Chicago, the New England Patriots offense tore apart yet another team (da Bears) 36-7. That's too many such games in a row to be a coincidence. And Brady is absolutely merciless--he never lets up. It's looking more and more like a New England-Atlanta Super Bowl--with Atlanta as the bigger question mark: New Orleans is their threat. But right now there isn't a defense in the NFL that can stop Brady.

The Steelers host the Jets next week, who lost a close game Sunday after being taken apart by the Patriots. They'll either be resurging for redemption or completely disoriented. Unless the Steelers offfense starts scoring touchdowns, none of it is going to matter. The defense can't win them all. But then Big Ben is looking like a Monty Python routine out there, getting whacked in the head, the face, the knees, the ankles, the foot--what else does he have? He's getting beat up with hits after plays that get flagged when they happen to other quarterbacks.

Meanwhile, the Lakers vulnerability looked pretty clear in their loss to the Chicago Bulls this week. When Gasol is out, they've got nobody to replace him. Bynum is due back soon, and he's not only their missing piece, he's got to stay healthy and produce in the playoffs especially, or (I believe) this could well be his last year as a Laker.

About the NFL (A lot), NBA (a little)

Watching the New England Patriots dismantle the vaunted New York Jets on Monday Night football made me feel a little better about their dismantling of the Pittsburgh Steelers a few Sunday Nights ago. It also confirmed for me the impression I've had for the past several weeks--that it's New England's year. With their schoolyard victory over Baltimore Sunday, the Steelers got closer to the playoffs. But it's unlikely that they or anyone is going to defeat the Patriots this year, with the usual caveat of injury (to Tom Brady) or just a very stinking bad playoff game.

The Steelers' season is also far from over. Big Ben lurched through Sunday's game on a bad foot, and now he has a broken nose (on a play that as usual didn't even draw a penalty, though today it drew a fine. The week before, Buffalo players beat on his knee and perhaps foot after the whistle, with no penalty. The week before that, an Oakland player sucker-punched him and knocked him to the ground after the play was over, with a fine but no suspension. Moral to Steelers' opponents: Big Ben is fair game.)

The Steelers and the Ravens have pretty much the same schedules remaining. They both play Cinncy and Cleveland, and both have one game against a tough opponent: Steelers play the Jets, the Ravens play the Saints. Neither can let down against or look past the Bengals or especially the Browns, who continue to play pretty well in contrast to how they began the season.

The Steelers probably have a better chance to get past the Jets (depending on how they respond to being thoroughly thrashed by New England) while the Ravens must deal with a New Orleans team that is still getting sharper. (On the other hand, if the Jets rediscover their pass rush--which disappeared against New England--it means another harrowing ordeal for Big Ben.) But even if they both lose these games and get past weaker opponents, the Steelers would now win the division. But in a season like this, and depending on how hurt Ben is, nothing is a given, even this late.

And as goal-driven as even spectating is, getting to the Super Bowl is unlikely for either team. That leaves watching for fun. But these days watching the Steelers is not so much fun. Their defense can be smothering, but they can also look porous and bad, as they did on the Ravens' touchdown drive. While it is dramatic to watch Ben in the malestrom of opposing players, improvising pass plays, it's a far cry from watching Tom Brady dissect the defense and hit receivers with passes breath-taking in their speed and accuracy. Much artier, and more relaxing to watch.

Right now the two teams with the best records are New England and Atlanta, and that's a pretty good bet to be your Super Bowl matchup.

Meanwhile, the NBA season is taking shape. All the preseason hoohaw was about the Lakers vs. the new Miami Heat. While the Celtics and the Magic are giving the Heat the competition that many predicted in the East, I don't recall anybody much forecasting that the Lakers were going to be challenged in the West by at least three teams. Right now their perennial rivals, the San Antonio Spurs, are running away with their division, and the Dallas Mavericks are looking good as well. Some folks like Phoenix. In any case, it doesn't look like a walk in the park for the Lakers by any means, even if you discount their recent four game losing streak. At this point, it's not so certain they'll even get to the finals.

Steelers Update

I watched the Steelers Sunday night game with New England while I was in Pittsburgh, with my two best friends, my two remaining friends from high school. The Steelers played a miserable game, and Clayton in particular was upset (he showed up in a Jerome Bettis Steelers shirt) but I had to confess that I was having a great time.

So it's taken a lot of years to have fun while the Steelers lose, but I've apparently achieved it under limited circumstances. But New England was so clearly dominant that it would have fueled sports talk shows for the week if Michael Vick and Philadelphia hadn't had such an amazing game on Monday night, which inspired amazing effusiveness--how he was now unstoppable, had transformed the quarterback position and NFL football, etc. Well, Philadelphia did win its next game, but Vick was relatively quiet, and non-transformational.

Then this past Sunday, the Steelers thoroughly trounced Oakland 35-3. As much as I saw of that game, I enjoyed (even by myself.) But analytically speaking, the Steelers getting into the playoffs is not assured. Their remaining schedule has but two games that on paper present real challenges, and one of them is with the Baltimore Ravens, their rivals for winning their division. They are technically tied at the moment, but if the Ravens win this upcoming early December game (in Baltimore), they will hold the tiebreaker by having defeated the Steelers twice. And the Ravens' remaining schedule is no more difficult for them than the Steelers. For both teams, their matchup is the most forseeably key game.

But it's been a weird season, with teams looking brilliant and unbeatable one week, and hopeless the next. So anything can happen really, especially with so many teams with nearly the same record. The league is divided into teams that have won a lot of games and teams that have won very few. That makes wildcard slots really unpredictable. So if the Steelers defeat the Ravens, their chances improve but are not certain. If they lose to the Ravens, their chances diminish substantially, but don't disappear.

There's another interesting factor. The two recent Steelers Super Bowl teams had one thing in common--though they had rocky periods during the season, they got healthy at the end of the season. This week a few key injured players start coming back, but the two most important injured players are not expected back this year at all. So we'll see, but they may not have enough to get deep into the playoffs.

In their games with New Orleans and New England, it was clear that the Steelers did not have the best quarterback on the field. How Big Ben plays from now on will have a lot to do with the Steelers fate this year. But with so many extraordinary quarterbacks--the proven and once again very sharp Tom Brady and Dru Brees, the younger quarterbacks like Vick and Sanchez and even Colt McCoy, not to mention the Manning brothers--it's more of a question where Ben ranks among them.

Another interesting factor though is that the Steelers are now playing with a chip on their shoulder. Before it was just James Harrison apparently being singled out for fines in the laudable quest to stop illegal helmet hits and other concussion-causing collisions. Now it's Big Ben getting slugged by an Oakland player, after the play was over, and the Oakland player not getting suspended, or much of a fine. What if somebody slugged Tom Brady? That's the question the Steelers ask, and because everyone knows the answer, they are going to be playing with an attitude.

They Are Giants

--and no "might be" about it. The last time they won the World Series they were the New York Giants, and there were no major league baseball teams west of the Mississippi River town of St. Louis. In some ways things haven't changed all that much--the series between two western teams, San Francisco and Texas, couldn't draw the audience that the Yankees and Red Sox can--but this Series was classic baseball, and one for the ages.

The Giants are a baseball novelist's dream: a combination of very young players and cast-off veterans. They started the season with a core of drop-dead pitchers and added position players through the year, and it all jelled at the right moment. They led their division for only a month of the season, and won it for good on the last day. Then they defeated the favored, hitter-heavy Phillies and Rangers, shutting them down with shutouts and a total of 3 wins.

The fifth game heroes come out of central casting too. Tim Lincecum, the young long-haired pitching ace, who seemed to have lost everything in August, was utterly dominant from the first pitch. He was so deadly, and speeded up his delivery so much in the late innings that the Rangers seemed stunned and demoralized in the 8th and 9th, when ace reliever Brian Wilson just fired overwhelming strikes, for an amazingly undramatic bottom of the ninth.

The other hero was the elder, Edgar Renteria, injured most of the season and riding the bench, he wound up being the Most Valuable Player of the Series, especially for two key home runs--including the 3 run shot in the 7th inning of this game. And here's the Hollywood kicker: this is the second time in his career that Renteria supplied the hit that won a World Series. And this time, it may well have been the last major league at bat of his long career.

I came fairly late to the Giants' season, but it was a treat following the end of the season through this night, that brought San Francisco its first World Series championship. (I suffered through the terrible loss snatched from certain victory of the Bonds era.) I even learned some more baseball. I was able to watch some of the Bay Area sports channel coverage of press conferences, and noted how carefully the Giants prepared for these games. Their hitting coach worked with hitters to correct new bad habits--that has to provide some confidence, if nothing else. But what impressed me especially was the game plan for how to approach specific pitchers--which ones to be aggressive with, and which ones to wait out and make them throw strikes. This team seems to really have bought into following a game plan--another feature of a team that plays like a team, that has no stars, or players who act like stars.

And I have to think they had a pretty good game plan for their own pitchers, too. In this I suspect their rookie catcher, Buster Posey, was crucial. Pitchers kept saying how he called great games, keeping the hitters off balance. As they talk about this series more, I suspect there will be more about how they handled hitters, and who was in the mix.

So I have a new appreciation for the intelligence that goes into this, the temperament to deal with bad pitches and bad at-bats and still be ready to perform the next time, to accept the bad hop that gets you on base as well as the bad hop that gets you an error. Plus the work--these guys work on their game, their mechanics--it's not a night on the town and playing with hangovers anymore.

The Giants seem to have the perfect manager in Bruce Boche--a great temperament, and a master strategist. His moves worked, whereas a few crucial ones of his opponent didn't (notably the decision to pitch to Renteria today, with first base open and a less experienced hitter coming up.)

I don't follow many World Series anymore, but I'm glad I followed this one, not only because San Franciso is where I would go to see Major League baseball (except when I'm visiting Pittsburgh of course) but because this is one of those special teams in baseball history. I also got an education in how difficult Major League baseball had made things for itself, by extending the season into early November, competing these last two classic games with Sunday Night and Monday Night Football (suicidal for ratings) as well as the start of the NBA and NHL seasons. But then the sports world is insane and can't keep this up for many more years. It's all getting to be too much for me, but while I'm still watching, this has been fun. Congrats, Giants. This was a storybook season. One for the ages.

Giant Win

So now what's up with the San Francisco Giants? Nothing, again. This time the hero has the very unsportsherolike name of Madison Bumgarner, the 21 year old pitcher who blanked the Texas Rangers for the first (or maybe second) time this year at home---and definitely for the second time in the World Series.

Texas won the game they absolutely had to win, the third. But San Francisco won the game that they probably needed to win, the fourth. They figured to have the better pitcher on the mound in that fourth game, where pitching is always a bit dicey. But even though Bumgarner has shown he's capable of a performance like this one, no one could reasonably expect it--his first World Series start, on the road, with two ex-Presidents and First Ladies in the house rooting for the home team.

But this time the Giants won it their way--getting an early lead, shutting down the opposition with stellar pitching and solid defense, then adding demoralizing runs in the late innings so the other team is looking at a few runs in the last inning or two as an insurmountable mountain.

Now the Giants have a commanding lead in the Series, needing to win just one of the next three, with two of them at home. Texas must win them all. And the next pitching match-up pits the Texas ace against the Giants', and though you have to guess that Cliff Lee is not going to have two bad outings in a row, but Lincecum is no slouch either. What did that guy on ESPN say? The Rangers could win the fifth game but they won't. I'm not sure what that means.

Meanwhile, the Pittsburgh Steelers couldn't get it done at New Orleans against a Saints team that suddenly looked like last year's. Big Ben is clearly not sharp yet, but if a few key plays had gone the other way, the Steelers still could have won this game. A stripped ball late in the fourth quarter sealed the deal.

This was a big win for the Saints. As shaky as their early season was, they are now expected to win most of their remaining games against weaker opponents and get into the playoffs. The Steelers face stronger opponents and tougher road games, but while losing to this NFC team is consequential, it isn't as bad for them as it is good for New Orleans. These two teams probably suspect they may meet again in the big one.

I haven't had the opportunity to watch the Steelers on TV since the preseason, though they're coming up with several Sunday and Monday night games. This time I was switching between the Steelers game and the Giants game. Maybe that took a little sting out of it, but this was a good football game that came down to a few key plays that the Saints made and the Steelers didn't. Dru Brees was the better quarterback today, and the Saints defense was a match for the Steelers.

The Giants game was also a well-played baseball game, with terrific fielding plays by both teams, and some clutch hitting by the Giants (most of which they did while I was on the other channel, nuts!) I don't know that I'll have many more of these afternoons and evenings wasted in front of the TV watching sports, but at least this time the games were worth watching.

Yes We Cain

What's up with those San Francisco Giants? Nothing. Zero.

Zero is the number of runs that pitcher Matt Cain has given up in the post-season. In the second game of the World Series he pitched brilliantly--with great stuff, but also the fortitude to get out of jams-- and left the game after 7 and 2/3 innings with the Gianst ahead 2-0.

That was enough to win the game. In fact, the solo home run hit by the Giant's #8 hitter (the magnificent veteran Edgar Renteria) was enough to win this game. A team scoring nothing in the World Series is a rarity, but it's even more astounding because Texas has come up with a gameful of zeros only five times all season.

Then in the Giants' eighth inning, the Rangers' bullpen completely imploded, walking in three runs, and allowing several hits, all with two outs in the eighth. The Giants won 9-0.

So now the Giants have won two games, and the Rangers zero. Nothing.

The Series goes to Texas for three games starting Saturday, and of course nobody knows what will happen. Will the home stadium settle their young bullpen, will their big hitters start getting big hits? The Phillies waited for that to happen, and it didn't happen. But one possibility has been erased: the Rangers won't sweep. They must win 4 of the next 5 games.

The Giants scored 11 runs in the first game, 9 in the second, both after dodging early game problems and doing most of the damage in a single late inning. None of that is actually characteristic of their season. Their winning formula is to get a couple of runs early while their pitchers hold the other team in check, and bend but not break in the late innings. The Rangers must be really confused.

If the Giants win the third game, the series is just about over. Confidence is a big part of baseball. Right now the Rangers look befuddled. If they can't channel the energy of the home crowd into effective confidence in their first game there, they're probably done. They will have left their heart in San Francisco.

On the Steelers...

The Pittsburgh Steelers' premier defensive end is out (for the season) and their other starting d.e. may not play Sunday. It's going to be very hard to stop New Orleans on a mission, primarily through the air. And if the Saints get one of their runners back, and Steelers run defense weakens to contain the pass, there could be more trouble.

On the other hand, Aaron Smith's replacement is Ziggy Hood, their #1 draft choice from last year, and this kind of a game is when stars are made. He'll probably have to be one, and the Steelers will have to do a lot of good things offensively as well as defensively.

They're capable of it, and on paper they should win this game. But it's hard to conceive of the defending champion New Orleans Saints losing at home on Halloween, which is New Orleans' signature day. My heart is with the Steelers as always, but I'm still the Big Uneasy about this game.

The Big Uneasy

Talk about not making things easy--the SF Giants won the pennant over the Phillies in an excruciating sixth game. I'm sure it will be thrilling to see on replay but it was too brutal for me to watch entirely. Both teams left so many on base, so many opportunities and failures, along with a few key successes, and some luck. I guess I'm too old for this.

Now the Giants face the Texas Rangers in the World Series, another team with good pitching but better hitting, and again the Giants are the decided underdog. Anything can happen in this series--they could be swept, they could sweep, and everything in between.

Meanwhile, the Steelers won an uncomfortably tight game in Miami, as they move into the meat of the season, facing their toughest opponents and (not coincidentally) playing Sunday and Monday night games on national TV. The signs of this game weren't good. More than signs--they lost one of their key defensive players, defensive end Aaron Smith to what may be a season-ending and even career-ending injury. They simply haven't been able to win consistently without him for the past several seasons. He's a big loss, and the defense diminishes significantly.

Sunday's game wasn't a good one for the offensive line either, and that doesn't bode well. Big Ben still had some rust, and that can't become bad habits.

The Steelers play at New Orleans next Sunday night, and the Saints were embarrassed this Sunday by of all teams the Cleveland Browns. So the Saints are likely to play their best game, maybe above their best game, against the Steelers. This is going to be a tougher game for the Steelers than it might seem. The Saints must know that if they don't win it, their season is pretty much over.

Tracking the response and reaction to the blows to the head "controversy": the consensus among the TV commentators I heard was that players avoided such illegal hits without noticeably changing the game this week, and that avoiding those hits is good for the game. So after a week in which the contrary view got aired--that football can't survive this, that players can't figure out how to play without committing these hits--this seems now to be a firm consensus. And it is a good thing. Let's hope it continues. Bob Costas (I think it was) even made my point--that today's hitting is more violent and causes more injuries than in the past, in the 70s specifically of the Steelers great teams, and nobody can claim that wasn't football.

On Head Hits and Big Hits

I hadn't seen the Steelers game Sunday, but I've seen the repeated clips of James Harrison's hits to the head, as well as the others singled out by the League for big fines and warnings of suspensions to come. I can understand Harrison's hurt and confusion at being singled out, and not having good alternatives--to the point where he was considering retirement today. But I for one am increasingly turned off by the sport when I see hits like that, and players carted off.

TV sports coverage bears a lot of responsibility by praising them and showing them over and over on Sportscenter, etc. through the years. I also agree with this column by Gene Collier in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette that notes that those hits didn't get penalties, and it is up to officials to start enforcing those rules:

"Perhaps owing to the unrelenting cadence of high-speed collisions, perhaps in deference to marketing forces that position the game as some celebration of violent acts you'd get arrested for in any other place, the modern NFL official enforces league rules selectively, ignoring some, insisting that others receive 100 percent compliance.

So please, keep those end-zone celebrations tasteful. Catering is frowned upon, certainly.

The most ignored rule in the league's ever-fluid digest of not-terribly-well-written rules is the one about the helmet."

The truth is that football used to be played without these kinds of violent collisions and hits to the head. And if it is true that injury is inevitable whether someone is hit high or low, then it's time to end this game. I don't think it's necessary. I'm sure it's also due to players being bigger, stronger and in many cases faster than players in the past. But this can't be ignored.

Switching to baseball, the Giants started hitting just in time to go up 3 games to 1 over the Phillies. Buster Posey had a career day, with four important hits, two RBIs and a great play at the plate. The Phillies hitters are still dangerous, and the longer the series goes on, the more looks they have at Giant pitchers, but the Phillies bullpen has not served them well, and it may take more than a day off to fix that. I see this going 6, though the Giants seem incapable of making anything easy.

Following Up: A Little Bit of Everything

Both elements of the Steelers-Browns game I worried about happened--but the Steelers still won handily. Big Ben was rusty, and had a shaky first half. Colt McCoy did have a pretty good game, at least statistically. (He also was sacked five times, and threw interceptions.) But by the third quarter the Steelers got tracked, and the Browns got beat.

Helping the Steelers, the Patriots beat the Ravens in overtime. Now the Steelers will really find out how good they are. So far they're certainly much better than I thought they'd be. And nobody else is quite as good as advertised.

Meanwhile in baseball, both series' are 1-1. The Yankees have their hands full with the upstart Texans, and in their second game the Phillies got the timely hits they needed and the dominant pitching they thought they'd get in the first game against the Giants. The third game is very important for the Giants. It's funny how the commentators turned on the Phillies after they lost the first game. If the Giants had taken 2 in Philly, then I'd say they were favorites. But now, they'd have to be 3-1. The Giants still haven't had a breakout hitting game in the postseason. They need one soon.

Steelers Beware--and Be Good

In way too many ways, the Cleveland Browns don't have a chance when they travel to Pittsburgh Sunday to play the Steelers. Even in the Browns' good years the Steelers dominate them at home, and this isn't a good year by any stretch--they are 1-3, the mirror opposite of the Steelers. Their quarterbacks are hurt, so they are starting their rookie, who has never played an NFL game. Their star running back, pretty much their entire offense so far, is hurting.

On the Steelers side, they have won 3 games with their 3rd and 4th string quarterbacks. They are out for revenge for their poor game losing to Cleveland at home last year. And, oh yeah, they are getting their quarterback back, Ben Roethlisberger.

Expectations are high, not only for this game, but James Walker at ESPN makes the case for them as the NFL's one dominant team. Though I anticipate that possibility, this snowballing of expectations could be trouble.

Apart from the Steelers not putting out the effort--which I think is unlikely--there are two main dangers which could combine to shoot up those expectations. The first is rust: Ben hasn't played significant minutes even in exhibitions, and he's playing in his first game of the season with a team that's coming off a bye week. Rust can translate into turnovers, and that can quickly become Cleveland points, as well as missed Steelers opportunities.

The second is Colt McCoy, the rookie quarterback for the Browns. At Texas, he won more games than any NCAA college quarterback ever. With the Browns he is an unknown quantity, and the unknown is not what defenses like. He could get them off balance and out of rhythm by being better than they expect and above all, unpredictable.

So on paper the Steelers should win in a blowout. But if Ben and the Steelers offense aren't sharp early in the game and don't score much, and Colt McCoy gets hot later in the game, then things could be a little too interesting.

Of Sports Past

Jeez, this is my de facto sports blog and it's just about the only one that doesn't have a post or two on the 50th anniversary of the 1960 World Series seventh game in Pittsburgh. But there are photos and words on that here, here, here (with some repetitions) and hell, here too-- just an easy click away, with links there to the Pittsburgh Post Gazette stories, including several they printed in the Oct. 14 editions of 1960, and some pretty neat video, including Mazeroski's home run.

Also in sports past, this month marked the passing of George Blanda, a professional football quarterback and kicker--for 26 years. He won a lot of games and holds all kinds of records. His last game was at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh, when he was just shy of 49.

I remember seeing him play on TV, including some of his game-winning heroics for Oakland late in his career, but I watched him with particular interest because he was born in Youngwood, Pennsylvania, the same tiny town where my mother grew up--they went to the same high school, though at different times--and where my grandparents still lived when I was growing up. People had stories, none of which I remember, but in addition to being still remembered in Oakland, he was a hometown hero in Youngwood.

Fun While It Lasts

The SF Giants escaped with a win in Atlanta to take the series and move on to face the Phillies. It's certainly sweet to defeat Atlanta, with its obnoxious and demeaning tomahawk chops, and payback for all that pain in Pittsburgh can never be enough. But the SF team nicknamed Torture should celebrate well, because they have very little chance against the Phillies. They squeaked past the depleted Atlanta team, getting few timely hits and a number of timely calls going their way. The Phillies have better pitching than Atlanta and much better hitting than Atlanta and the Giants put together. I'm sure SF will relish the underdog role and I wish them well, but I'm too old to invite the pain of watching them very closely. But if they get past five games...

They Might Be Giants

The San Francisco Giants had everything going for them in the second game of their playoff series with Atlanta. They had an unaccustomed early lead of 4-0, and with Matt Cain pitching, that normally is very comfortable. Thanks to Tim Lincecum's brilliant complete game 1 after the off-days, their bullpen was rested, and they had the strongest stoppers and savers in the league. They were playing before a huge and enthusiastic home crowd, a sea of orange.

But their stoppers didn't stop and their saver didn't save. Yet in the bottom of the 10th, they still had a clear advantage: the bases loaded and one out for their clutch-hitting rookie catcher, Buster Posey. There was only one thing he could do wrong. If he got a hit or just a ball to the outfield, the Giants win. If he struck out or popped up, the Giants would still get another chance with the bases loaded. If he got a walk, as the previous batter had, the Giants win, and go up 2-0. And it did appear that the three pitches he saw were out of the strike zone. He swung at one and missed. He took the next. Then he swung at the third and did the only terrible thing it was possible for him to do, he hit into an inning ending double play. Atlanta promptly got a run in the 11th, the deflated Giants didn't answer, and the series was tied 1-1 going to Atlanta.

This is how Atlanta breaks your heart. It's how they did it to the Pirates in the 90s.

In the third game, the Giants again got a very strong pitching performance, from Jonathan Sanchez. And again, they failed time after time to get timely hits. They left tons of baserunners, and practically dared Atlanta to pull the game out in the late innings with the Giants up 1-0. And that's exactly what they did--with one swing, a pinch-hit homerun that barely got over the fence in fair territory, put Atlanta up 2-1 in the bottom of the eighth.

Fortunately the Giants did get a timely hit and a lucky bounce in the 9th, and their saver saved. Frankly I didn't expect them to win their first game in Atlanta, and they'll probably have to play better to win the series. The fact that they're in the driver's seat now--needing one more win, and with their ace Lincecum available for the fifth game if necessary--doesn't mean a thing when it comes to the Atlanta baseball club. They specialize in breaking your heart.