I amy be the only Giants fan who DIDN’T really have a problem with what the Tampa Bay Bucs did on the last play of the game.
As I see it…
The Bucs were only down by one score. That makes a HUGE difference to me. If they had been trailing by 21, they should have just gone through the motions, gone to the locker room, and started getting ready for next week. But down by just ONE score, they had every right to keep playing hard. Their odds weren’t good, but there was certainly a SLIM chance that Gerald McCoy could have gotten through, knocked the ball loose, and given a teammate a chance to recover and even advance a fumble.
With 5 seconds on the clock, if they’d managed to get a turnover, there was at least SOME chance they could have gotten the ball back with a second left on the clock. That’s all it would take to give Josh Freeman a crack at a Hail Mary pass.
Even if the Giants initially assumed the Bucs would simply let time expire, by the time they got to the line of scrimmage, they SHOULD have seen that the Bucs were coming in force! They SHOULD have been ready for it. Hence, if someone on the Giants HAD gotten injured, I think it would have been their own fault for not paying attention.
The game was NOT over, and the Bucs were just MOSTLY dead (to steal a line from Bily Crystal). They had every right to fight hard until time was gone. The Bucs did exactly what I’d HOPe the Giants would do if the roles were reversed.
There’s no reason for the Giants or my fellow Giants fans to gripe.
Devil’s advocate… Okay the Giants do run a play while leading with time running out and it results in a touchdown. Are they open to criticizm of running up the score?
I think not. If Tampa Bay wants to try to bust through a kneel down then they need to accept the possibility of a stinging add-on at the end.
100% wrong. Unlike on other plays, when the quaterback’s knee touches the ground the play is dead. There is no way the Bucs have a chance. The game was over. The only thing it proved was some Bush league point Schiano was trying to make to his team. Its something his team is not going to appreciate when they are getting knocked around all year during garbage time. And they will be.
I am a Giants fan. But I am also a Rutgers fan and a Schiano fan. Hell, I put $50 on the Bucs to win the Superbowl in Vegas preseason at 100-1. He proved himself to be a college coach with that play. Makes me wonder if he is going to run up scores too.
They would be crucified if they did that. There were 9 seconds left. It just required a kneel down. If they ran a play there would not be one person in sports on their side today.
6 other games ended with 8 or fewer points separating the teams, and with the winning team taking a knee. None of those ended the way this one did. Even games like Washington - St. Louis with a 3 point lead, over a minute left, at midfield, where WA just missed a field goal, they didn’t do this shit.
I’ll also point out that Schiano didn’t do this at the end of the first half, when Eli took a knee. Is he not playing to win the game then? It’s OK to leave 7 points on the field during the first half, instead of trying your best?
The whole point is to catch the offense by surprise. It’s not “trying hard” and “playing until the end of the game”. It’s “I hope they don’t realize I’m actually going to smash into them until it’s too late”. That is bush league strategy.
Yeah, but the point is, they hit Manning *before *he kneeled down…at that point, he’s still fair game. If someone had managed to get a hand on the ball, or if Manning just wasn’t holding it securely, they might have caused a fumble, and then who knows what would happen.
The only reason the Giants and their fans are upset is because the Bucs didn’t ‘follow the script’; instead they actually played the final play. there was absolutely nothing wrong with what they did and there was nothing ‘dirty’ about it.
All excellent points. Its just not done. And its not done for a reason. But Tampa Bay better get used to the idea that they will get smashed in garbage time for the next 14 weeks. I’m sure they’ll appreciate the coach for that. And I’m sure he’ll find out soon that he is not dealing with college kids any more.
The Giants tried that once. Herm Edwards, for doing absolutely nothing wrong, became a hated name. Csonka and Pisarcik - Csonka didn’t want the ball, but Pisarcik didn’t want to piss off the coach calling the play, and the center was trying to avoid a delay of game penalty. Colossal fuck-up.
It was bush league. Just because it was a legitimate play doesn’t make it the right thing to do.
" “Whatever the coach asks us to do, that’s our job. It’s like someone asks you write a story about something you don’t want to write about, you still do it. That’s what coach believes in. That’s how we play the game.”" Michael Bennett.
Those are the guys who will be paying the price for Schiano’s dickishness, not Schiano. He’s not the guy out there having players diving at his knees, crackback blocking, or getting his balls squeezed in a pileup. And both McCoy and Bennett felt the need to express that it wasn’t their idea, it was their coaches.
Its not baseball where its possible to overcome a 30 run lead with 2 outs in the 9th. There is a point in many football games when it is simply unwinnable. For the leading team it is petty, unprofessional and insulting. It means nothing in the standings. There is no need to run up the score. Its different it college football when a tight score against a seemingly unworthy opponent can hurt your ranking. There is no need for it.
This is not Pop Warner. There are professional athletes who don’t have guaranteed contracts. They play all out despite knowing their career could end on any play. What is the benefit to anyone for someone to get hurt on a play that means nothing except to prop up the coaches ego?
Something similar actually happened in the USC-UCLA game in 2009. UCLA was behind 21-7 and turned the ball over on downs with under a minute left. USC kneels to run the clock down, UCLA tries to crash the line and calls a timeout (and I believe they didn’t have three timeouts, so it’s not as if they could force a punt - they were solely doint it to try and mess up the snap). Next play, instead of kneeling again, Matt Barkley throws a 48 yard TD pass to a wide-open receiver. I think Neuheisel (the UCLA coach at the time) deserved it.
The point is that there is a precedent already set between players in these situations. It would have also been perfectly legal for a Giants OL to take out the knee of Gerald McCoy. But because of the understanding, he didn’t do it. It was pure bush league.
Yes, but it is football, where it is possible to score 7 points on the last play of the game. Which is what Tampa Bay was trying to do. There is indeed a point at which a football game becomes unwinnable, but this game had not passed that point.
If they had been down by 10 points, I’d be in complete agreement that it was wrong. But I fail to see the problem with attempting to win the game.
Find me a game where a fumble on the victory formation leads to the defense picking it up and running it back for a touchdown, because that is the only way it could possibly happen. You know how many times that has happened in the history of NFL football. None. Not once. Ever.
Why do you suppose that every other NFL coach refuses to call that kind of play? Are we, once again, back to Greg Schiano discovering a “possibility” that no other coach had discovered prior and that, even though it was the only time in his career it could possibly be a surprise, it still didn’t work?
Yes, it is theoretically possible, but having your players dive at the knees of the offensive line and putting a huge target on them for the rest of their career in Tampa Bay doesn’t outweigh chasing that theoretical possibility that has never, ever happened before.