Reviews

Two Morals to the Super Bowl

2/3/2014

Go left, go right, react.

The aggressive swarm of Seattle Seahawks reminded me of a young HC of the NYJ.

Not Bill Belichick, but Pete Carroll.

Carroll was the new head coach in 1994. He had an outdoor basket put up in the Jets’ bunker, on the theory that team members might enjoy shooting hoops in their spare time.

Some football people snickered at this unorthodox maybe-Left-Coast way of doing things. The Jets went 6-10 and Carroll was fired by the owner, Leon Hess, the oil man who used to tell a Times reporter to please not write that Hess had visited Jets’ camp because he was supposed to be in the office.

Carroll later coached the Patriots and won a national title at Southern California, where he ran around at night with youth gangs, urging members not to tear up their world.

Now the Seahawks have humbled the Broncos, showing not only speed and power but also the flexibility to make big plays. They could react, not just follow orders.

I thought about the outdoor basket at the Jets’ bunker, and the new coach who had a somewhat different way of doing things.

* * *

There was another moral to the Super Bowl. The NFL tempted fate by putting a Super Bowl in a northern clime, in what is turning out to be a nasty winter. Some gloom-and-doom types, no names mentioned, forecast a blizzard.

But the Giants built pro football in New York by selling a few hundred extra tickets on Sunday mornings when rain or snow or chill somehow dissipated and people felt like going out to watch a game. In New York, this glorious tradition is known as Mara Weather, after the family that still owns half the team.

The Super Bowl was played on an early November or early April day. Mara Weather. Never, ever, forget it.

Alan D. Levine

2/3/2014 06:48:03 am

Fugedaboudit--There's an AP story on the Times blog that Derek Jeter took batting and fielding practice outdoors today. It may be snowing outside but Spring is just around the corner.

George Vecsey

2/3/2014 08:26:29 am

Alan, I have a jeter piece ready to roll, but could not resist reacting to Carroll's super bowl victory.
It is definitely snowing outside. That's all I know at the moment.
see you in April.
best
GV

Alan Rubin link

2/3/2014 12:53:10 pm

George

The only time I watch football is with my grandson at Thanksgiving in Madison, WI, both the Badgers and the Packers, and the first half of the Super Bowl at a friend’s annual party. They are a fun group and it impolite to eat and run.

Someone criticized Pete Carroll as being a rah, rah college type. He was so dogmatic that I elected not to say anything.

That is what I like about Pete, the joy and enthusiasm that he brings to the game. Although the pros are the epitome of professional sports, they are not much different than all the lower levels.

This was evident at the recent NSCAA Coaches convention in Philadelphia when I took a Level I Goalkeeper course with Tony DiCicco, Lisa Cole and Jason Grubb, all excellent goalie coaches. I was particularly impressed that they all emphasized the importance enjoying the game at every level.

I happened to catch Tony for a fifteen minute conversation in the exhibit hall between his many commitments. He talked, and gave some examples, of how coaching the pros at the highest level have many of the same requirements as coaching youth soccer. He indicated that pros who do not enjoy the game do not last long.

Baseball may be around the corner, but so is American professional soccer, MLS and WNSL.

George Vecsey

2/4/2014 12:04:39 am

Alan, I was watching the Houston keeper warming up down our way before the last Red Bulls game. It is such an independent position -- rolling around, grabbing every ball at every angle. Who wouldn't want to jump out of the stands and warm up the same way? At least until the cannonballs start flying at the whistle.

Carroll is enthusiastic. As Bill Rhoden pointed out, not that USC didn't cheat. But I say, at least the cheating was with panache.

Time for Real Football.

GV

Mike from Whitestone

2/3/2014 01:02:10 pm

GV,
The Farmers Almanac was thisclose.........imagine that.
The mass transit out of MetLife would've really been some story.

Different topic, RIP Phillip Seymour Hoffman, maybe his passing will open some eyes to the proportions of the heroin usage and those with influence will remove the blinders.
Just sayin;
.

George Vecsey

2/4/2014 12:08:15 am

The snag at Secaucus was always going to happen. NJ never wanted mass transit into the Meadowlands. Then again, Atlanta avoided even a spur line near the ball parks. Now the Braves are moving out to the Beltway.
Maybe Christie planned the backup at Secaucus. Just to keep in practice for his enemies and critics.

Hoffman had 70 bags of heroin. As the runners in Latin America say, they do not create the market for this stuff. Talk to your affluent people who buy the stuff.

GV

Alan Rubin link

2/4/2014 03:48:19 am

George--you are in good company. Many professional soccer players, when they are spectators, have commented that they enjoy getting to the pre-game warmup to watch the goalies.

This makes sense as you see more great saves then you would during the game.

Fans would enjoy a soccer game more if they had a greater understanding of the importance of the goalie to their team. They do much more than making saves, which is only about 20 percent of their game activities. Goalies never take their eyes off the ball, or should not, and they are SHOUTING instructions to both the offense and defense.

I would love to see a mike pick up the goalies during a game.

Even at the highest professional level, coaches often complain that their goalie does not talk enough, or loud enough.

I would also like to hear what the referees are saying, which would give the fan a sense of how they control a game, or not.

George Vecsey

2/4/2014 05:31:30 am

Keepers don't talk enough? Friedel....Tim Howard....and Meola. Tony blistered Mike Petke when Mike was a rookie with the MetroStars.
And Buffon -- not just his singing the anthem.

GV

Ed Martin

2/5/2014 10:38:53 am

Would you like to guess from reading this post what position Alan played at Lehigh? Hint--it wasn't striker.

George Vecsey

2/6/2014 12:13:01 am

Ed, one's soccer position is a giveaway of personality. I was a defender -- I liked disrupting people, stop the sneaky forwards in their tracks. (Not that I could.) Alan became a good businessman. He liked a good view of the field. Hint. Hint. GV

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