There is one thing that a number of people seem to be forgetting.
Most of the people discussing the last TD make it sound like the Giants could have run the game clock down to, say, three seconds, then called time out and bring out their kicker. If I remember correctly, had New England used up all of its time outs (and the one real problem I had with the TD was, they should have waited for another down so New England would be out of time outs) and then New York kicked the field goal, there still would have been about 20 seconds left, and all New England would need is a field goal of its own.
They could have…and, in fact, it looks like that was what Jacobs was going to try to do, once the Patriots parted in front of him. But, it appeared that he lost his balance while trying to stop at the 1, and tumbled into the end zone.
Yeah, the first thing I thought of was, I wonder what kind of odds Las Vegas would have given you for a prop bet that the guy who scored the winning touchdown would be criticized for it?
Bradshaw says that laying down on the one was not mentioned until he was handed the ball by Eli. Manning said he should have alerted him to the scenario in the huddle. It did not come from the sidelines. Presumably, Coughlin wanted any sure score versus any chance of a muffed kick.
Had Bradshaw stopped on the 1 and the GIANTS successfully converted a field goal, the Patriots would have had ~20 seconds with no time outs to get into field goal range. Had Nicks stayed in bounds the play before, you would have ended up with the same scenario.
Chronos: If Bradshaw had just stood at the 1-yard line, he would have run the risk of a fumble. Or some New England player could have just pushed him in the end zone, like a couple of them seemed ready to do as he was losing his balance. The only thing to do was lie down.
I figured that he stopped and turned around so he could run a few more seconds off of the clock but see if anybody was coming to push him into the end zone (so he would then fall into the end zone rather than running the risk of having the ball knocked loose).
It did look to me as if NE’s defender(s) were/was attempting to push Bradshaw into the end zone at the end of the play. One of the commentators even mentioned it. I am very glad he wasn’t the goat of the game.
I imagine it must be pretty hard psychologically for a player in that situation, too. I mean, you’re pretty heavily conditioned to get the ball into the endzone whenever you can. Crossing that line is what football players live for. It must go against the grain pretty hard to just stop.
Would another alternative have been for the quarterback to just run straight back full speed with the ball, and then throw a long incomplete once time was down far enough? Or was that considered to be too much risk of an interception?
Not much danger of an interception, since he could have headed for the sideline and thrown it into the stands, as long as he made sure it was in a forward direction.
Big danger of a possible fumble or sack, though. Most of the DBs are much faster than Eli.
The problem with this is that an incomplete pass stops the clock until the start of the next play. Much more time is run off between plays than during them, so keeping the clock running between plays tends to overwhelm other considerations.
But they also have to get around the blockers, first, giving him a head start… I would have thought that that would be enough to make up for any speed difference. Then again, there’s a reason I’m not a pro football coach.
Right. But like you said, the longer this play takes, the more likely somebody blasts him and the more likely he takes a sack or fumbles. If he runs toward the sideline, he’s moving away from the offensive line.
It’s like in blackjack when the dealer shows a 7 and you hit on 16 and go bust. Then you say “damn! I shouldn’t have hit!” But hitting is mathematically the correct choice, even if you’re going to lose. The fact is that if you’re dealt a 16, the odds are already stacked against you winning. So the only thing you can do is make the best choice out of a bunch of crappy choices available.
I haven’t read the Slate article, but if the math says that allowing the goal gives you a 10% greater chance of winning as compared to not allowing the goal, then you should allow the goal even if ALL choices leads to a really unlikely chance of winning.
I thought the problem Bradshaw had was well over 50% physical–he was busting his ass to get to the 1-yard (or 1-foot) line, and just had a little too much forward momentum. It looked as if he were expecting some opposition from the Patriots’ D, but got none, so he needed to provide all of the opposing force to stop himself, and he just had too much momentum.
A bit of that, but also a bit of a practice issue as well. Why would these guys ever practice running full speed, then stopping and taking a knee? It’s just not something that comes up more than once in a blue moon. It almost looked like Bradshaw was saying to himself, “Now, how do I do this again? Which knee goes down?”