Shaun O’Hara had some comments to make about all of the injuries on the Offensive Line thus far. We haven’t even had a preseason game yet, for goodness sake. Well, to be fair, these days they coddle players and as soon as there is the slightest thing wrong with any of them, they pull them out of practice. Steve Young made the articulate observation that
September is the new preseason
Isn’t that the truth?!! People love to give me cr*p when I say that the NFL is slop these days, that Free Agency has watered down the quality of play. They rebut that players are better and faster than ever, so stop giving us the old school stuff about walking uphill to school both ways. Yes, times have changed. But there is no substitute for TEAM play in a TEAM sport. Sure, athletes are faster and bigger than they have ever been. But every year teams get ripped apart and reassembled, so that hurts the quality of play. The new CBA does not help matters either. It limits the amount of practice and quality of practice. Practice makes perfect. Instead we get mistakes and sloppy play. So when Steve Young says that September is the new preseason, it should tell you that teams are searching more than ever for harmony amongst 11 men. That is choreography. That is execution. (See George Martin’s intro for Parcells in the HOF for more on that.) You do not get the highest quality of play when 3 starters on the OL (4 if you count Beatty) are not practicing. No, I do not want to turn back the clock. I respect these football players getting paid with free agency. I just want the best ones out on the field delivering a well-executed game, every week if possible.
Speaking of having the best ones out on the field, Mick Tingelhoff gets enshrined into the Pro Football Hall of Fame this weekend. I have a great deal of respect for Tingelhoff on so many levels. He was a gamer. He was an ironman. Click on that link to get a taste of a legend. He was a guy in the trenches. He blocked for Fran Tarkenton, one of my heroes. Fran Tarkenton has not been back to Canton since he was enshrined decades ago. He will be back tonight to introduce his Center, Tingelhoff. Tarkenton, one of the best mobile passers ever, made Tingelhoff’s job interesting…
When you block for Fran Tarkenton you really have to be on the go. You have to maintain contact with your man all the time because when Fran passes you, he’ll probably be back again.
Hall of Fame Weekend. The stories. You can learn plenty about the makeup of a championship. Cohesion. Putting it all together. “No one played better than us as a team.”
Taylor on Hostetler’s edge in the XXV run: “He could just scramble (and get a first down).. Do you know how demoralizing that it is for a defense?” (This is why it is so important for Eli to run at least once per game… you have to spread them and demoralize them, even if it is just a single time per game to keep’em honest.)
Who are the two Running Backs who were the toughest opponents for LT? If you know the answer of both names (provided at the end of the last link) you are a worthy Giants fan.
Tingelhoff. Tarkenton. Parcells. Taylor. The Hall of Fame. A great weekend every year in the NFL.
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