28-3…..Sigh…
Brady was getting clobbered. Taking hits that a guy of his age and ability
shouldn’t be taking….Atlanta’s Defense was relentless. I won’t say I had lost all hope, but I was
close. I was sitting watching the game
and occasionally checking social media where streaming tweets were exploding
with some of the following:
“OVERRATED!”
“GOAT
– NOT! Barely greatest on Patriots!”
“Can
the GOAT for Brady be laid to rest now?
Overrated and probably done in the NFL….”
I was sitting there thinking that at 25 points of
separation, wouldn’t this be the GREATEST COMEBACK EVER (See Below) in
all of sports if the Patriots could somehow figure out a way to win
this game in the last 17 minutes. This
would be BETTER than coming back from 3 games to 1 deficits. Better than any comeback EVER! ….IT would certainly shut up the haters and
naysayers that were elated about the Falcons at that moment in time…
And then, the Pats scored.
I know – everybody thought the same thing. “Yeah, they scored and somehow they’ll make
it close in the end.” But I
noticed that the Falcon’s Defense wasn’t moving as fast as they had moved in
the 1st half. I also noticed
something in one shot they gave us of Brady:
Determination.
Athletes and, to a certain extent, business people,
gamblers, hell, everybody out there reading this has to have a little “Heart”
from time to time. I’m defining “Heart”
as the ability to stand up and keep going when the chips are stacked against
you. When everyone else would roll over
and give up, you stand up and give it another go.
I don’t know how you measure “Heart”. But I certainly know it when I see it. Gibson in the World Series…Jordan on the court….I’ve
been in poker tournaments when you’re sometimes sitting with a lone chip and a
chair and you think, “Hey, I’m not out of this yet! And if I lose trying to win, that’s not such
a bad thing….” Heart. You have to have it in every walk of life or
your first setback will be your last as you won’t have the will to stand up and
take another swing.
I had a baseball coach that preached a bit of wisdom that I
passed on down when I was coaching my daughters, “One of three things can
happen when you go up to the plate. Sometimes
you’re going to strike out. Sometimes
you’re going to walk, and sometimes you’re going to hit the ball. I really don’t care about the result as much
as I care about this: Are
you seeing the ball and are you taking the best swing you can during this at
bat? Are the mechanics right? Are you doing the best you can do at this
very moment to hit the ball?” I
know, sounds wordy, but the point was, don’t think about the score or if there’s
runners on base or anything else. You’re
holding the bat, the pitcher’s pitching the ball, and you need to see it to hit
it.
All the Patriots could do yesterday at a certain point in the 2nd
half was PLAY THE NEXT PLAY. They had to
score. Any and all game strategy was out
the window. The “situation” had
become very, very simple. Take the best
swing you can take. And they scored! And OF COURSE they immediately missed the
PAT. Seemed almost like a little tease
for the Falcon fans that hadn’t figured it out yet.
Brady drove the Pats down again but couldn’t punch it in. Still, 3 points is better than ZERO points in
the NFL (That’s foreshadowing….).
And the Pats got the ball back again after what I thought
was a series that nobody was talking about.
Atlanta should have been running the ball and doing whatever they could
to get rid of that clock. The Probability
Game Winning Tracker had Atlanta at 94% late in the 2nd quarter and
that rose to 98% in the 4th quarter.
Till things started happening…
One of those things was that Brady found a way to score
again with 9 and change left. AND they
made a two-point conversion.
28-20…And
I started to believe.
In fact, it wasn’t believing as much as it was not doubting. Anyone who’s watched Brady knew the Pats were
going to get at least one more shot, but would probably need two more shots as
the Falcons would score something on the next drive…
Atlanta, needing a score in the worst way, made a
succession of the worst calls and plays imaginable. Well within Figgie range that would have
changed the entire complexion of the game that was sacrificed in two boneheaded
calls and plays. 2nd and 11
on the Pats 23 (!) and you should have been thinking, “Run the ball!” But Atlanta tried passing. Ryan went back and the Pats made him pay
dearly with a 12 yard TFL!!! Okay, still
not out of FG range, but then a killer penalty that DID force them out of range
and resulted in a punt. Again, ZERO
points in the NFL is usually a VERY BAD THING….
And
Brady was back.
And with 2 and change left on a 1st and 10 Brady
threw the best pass he could throw…But he needed the help of a receiver taking
the best swing he could take and making what I’m calling one of the BEST
CATCHES IN NFL History that will ever be made…
Why is it the best catch in any game that I can ever
remember??? It was 1st and 10….Brady
had more plays. It wasn’t for a score…So
why was it so great? Momentum. TRULY BELIEVING in your team mates
and Believing that this is really going to happen.
That’s why.
Then the Pats scored and converted the subsequent 2-Point attempt. Which, on the math alone, converting two
2-point attempts in the same game should only happen about 25% of the time…
And when the coin was tossed and the Pats called heads and
won, well…
This
fan KNEW it was all over!
There would be no field goal. Atlanta wouldn’t get another chance. The Falcons Defense had seen enough of
Brady. They were reeling. The momentum had turned from a trickling
garden hose into a firehose that they could not control.
Some things are wonderfully sweet when they happen. Especially when they happen unexpectedly and
to your advantage. To anyone that
continues with the “Brady is NOT the GOAT” argument…We now have this to hold up
and we can all simply say,
“Anyone
else done THIS during a SuperBowl???”
Mike
drop….
But there will still be haterz….cause that’s what haterz
do.
Matt Ryan, season MVP, could be held up as the loser in all
of this…The Sack and the Fumble that led to a non-score and a TD were bad…But,
at the same time, Brady gave the Falcons a Pick-6 for a score…
So, while there were mistakes on the Falcon side of the
ball, I’m saying that this was Brady winning.
Winners find a way. Yep – he needed
the help of his teammates. But that kind
of goes without saying.
Best
Picture EVER!!!
Goodell trying to hand Kraft the NFL Trophy and getting a
THUNDEROUS BOOING by the Houston Crowd was asesome!!! And is that Brady and Belechick laughing
there asses off the whole time? You
decide…
The only other picture that I think we could put in the
running is this one that was texted to me…But I’m not sure everyone would agree
as this is a family column and all.
Greatest
OF All Time?
This
one is over, in my humble opinion. All
the bar debates that start will be so easily defeated. I’ll gladly have a discussion about whoever
you want to put in 2nd place.
But Brady easily sits at the head of the table with 5 Superbowl Titles and a Comeback For All Time. For sure all time.
Greatest
Comeback Ever?
This debate needs to be analyzed a little for clarity and
objectivity.
Coming back from a 3-1 deficit in Baseball and Basketball
used to be the impossible. Growing up, when it got to 3-1, it was over. It really wasn’t until recent history, with two
episodes in the last year alone, that overcoming 3-1 was become a plausible recurring
reality.
So, how can we equate or measure 25 points with 17 minutes left in
a football game to a 3-1 deficit in Basketball or Baseball?
Of course, I’m referring to the NBA Cleveland Cavs coming
back in the finals against Golden State and the Cubbies coming back against the
Indians. I’m going to toss in the fact
that Bama
losing in the National Title game to Clemson kind of qualifies also. (Bama WAS 97-0 when leading by double digits
in the 4th quarter).
Now, I need a way to do the math. I’m thinking out loud here, but why not a
spreadsheet calculator!
Initially, for simplicity’s sake, I’m going to assume that
a finals game in either Hoops or Baseball is a 50-50 proposition. I think everyone can agree with that as a
starting point. But after the analysis,
I’ll take the comeback game odds down to the worst possible odds in order to
make my argument that will show that what happened last night is completely off
the charts….Give me a minute and you’ll see…
The Football comeback is going to be way harder because of
all the variables…Atlanta was still a 98% favorite to win after the score was
28-12 with about 14 minutes left.
The
Pats had to do EVERYTHING RIGHT from that point forward and get lucky.
And
the Falcons needed to completely screw up…I go
back to the Falcons on the 23 yard line in the 4th quarter. Perfect FG range. And they chose to pass!!! When running the ball three times for ZERO
Gain keeps them in FG range. Yes, it
looks like a weasely thing to do…but this is still FOOTBALL and this is the NFL! You take points when you can get points. And who’s to say you won’t break one if you
try running it?
So,
how do we put a probability on all that?
Let’s say the Falcons run three running plays with no
penalties. That’s around a 99%
probability on each play of doing that and not getting a penalty or turning the
ball over for 3 plays. Then they kick
the FG and that’s probably a 98% or 99% probability. Doing
all that math leads to about 95.6% probability of getting 3 points AND TWO
SCORES OF SEPARATION
…leaving
us with 4.4% probability of TOTALLY
SCREWING UP!
And things went haywire. The Falcons tried to pass and got
sacked. Then they got a penalty…TRYING
TO PASS! When running AGAIN
keeps you in FG range (at a lower percentage) but at least you’re not throwing
good money after bad. Yep, in gambler’s
terms, the Falcons completely screwed themselves by not taking the easy points
when they could.
Now,
that’s only one side of the total probability. In trying to figure out what the odds are of
the Pats doing everything perfect, I’m going with the 2% that the
probability tracker had at the 28-12 mark in the 4th quarter. But because that DOESN’T factor in the Falcons
Screw Up Percentage, I’ve got to do that math myself.
Here’s a little matrix for everyone that shows why I
believe this will live as the greatest comeback in all of sports (and
feel free to cut and paste and add to your cell phone photo collection
when the argument comes up. BECAUSE
IT WILL!):
9 in 1,000….Give or take.
So, I even went so far as to take the Baseball and
Basketball odds down to the worst money lines you’ll ever see in those sports
(about 3-2 odds) or only a 40% chance of winning all three games. That still yields a 6% probability or about a
1 in 20 occurrence of a 3-1 comeback!
Which means about every 20 years you’ll see this.
Regarding
this comeback last night…well, maybe your great, great, great, GREAT Grandkids
will see one…
But you’ve seen the one Superbowl comeback for
your lifetime. You might get to see
another 3-1 in some sport at some point in time…
MMPG
Goes Dark
Michigan
REALLY, REALLY needed that W against the Suckeyes Saturday. Walton and Irvin can sometimes amaze me and
other times, they really let me down.
Saturday was the latter with Walton missing shots that you NEED TO MAKE
AT HOME to finish a game.
Michigan is truly on the brink right now and cannot afford
another loss at home. When I feel there’s
hope, I’ll definitely post again. Right
now…The flame is dim.
Brady
needs to go in there and give them a pep-talk about having some heart!!!
5 comments:
You are right on! Amazing Game and truely against all odds! btw, a friend from Boston sent me a commercial that started this AM. Hilarious! - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iCRCA_LiLxk
You are right on! Amazing Game and truely against all odds! btw, a friend from Boston sent me a commercial that started this AM. Hilarious! - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iCRCA_LiLxk
Excellent post on our GOAT. BTW, a hearty THANKS to LLLLLoyd Carr for failure to recognize and develop the GOAT. Imagine what a good QB coach and four years as a started might have wrought for our Wolverines???
PLEASE Tom, when you are done winning SBs and SB MVPs, come back to our program in some official capacity.
Now for hoops, IRVIN IS THE PROBLEM, more so than any other single issue. Between bad passes and poor shot selection and weak defense, he is the worst senior decision maker I have seen since Gardner. He needs to go back to being strictly a 3 specialist and must not be allowed to touch the ball with less than 10 on the shot clock, unless it is to shoot a three.
Beyond that, we just need to focus on three things and we will win far more games: SHOOT THE 3; DENY THE 3; DON'T FOUL. I know, everyone says we need to focus more in the paint. On the surface, the stats show that M is very 3 centric. But how we lose games follows the same pattern nearly every time; we are competitive, we are on D, the opponent either misses a shot or nearly turns it over or something creates a broken play scenario, we collapse on the ball in or near the paint, the opponent feeds to a WIDE open guy outside the arc....splash and the rally is on. Often we follow this with a turnover trying to feed the post, or a missed shot from inside the arc. If Irvin tries one more fade away shot I may explode! I bet that he is 15% on that shot at best! No team in the country can put 5 legit 3 point shooters on the court at the same time. I know it goes against CW, but M needs to be even more focused on the 3. I am sure that they have the skill to hit a high % from the NBA range, so shoot from even further out. Once those start falling, it will be much easier to score the inside goals.
Paul - please send link to my email!! Thanks!
Superfan- couldn't have said it better myself. Let's see what happens tomorrow.
Post a Comment