Bad sports, good sports: Defense means as much as they say it does

Posted on January 16th, 2012 by Alan Spoll

When you watch, read about, and write about sports, you come across an awful lot of cliches. Many of them originated in the world of sports, but lots of them come from elsewhere too. With as much talking as sports commentators have to do during a broadcast, I guess it makes sense that they lean on the same old expressions over and over again. Cliches become cliches for a reason, though. One big one in football is “defense wins championships.” No title was won this weekend, but this old expression certainly showed that it has some truth behind it as the New York Giants beat the Green Bay Packers and the San Francisco 49ers beat the New Orleans Saints.

The NFL regular season was an odd one this year, as several teams with awful defenses had fantastic regular seasons due to their prolific offenses. Two notable ones were the defending Super Bowl champion Packers, along with the Drew Brees-led Saints. Both of these teams masked their sieve-like defenses with firepower that few teams could stop. Quarterbacks Brees and Aaron Rodgers led the league in touchdown passes (Brees with 46 and Rodgers with 45), and threw for tons of yards. It didn’t seem to matter that they let other teams move up and down the field at will, as they could either outscore them or force turnovers to make sure they came out on top. To be fair, two of the teams that won this weekend, the New York Giants and the New England Patriots, also struggled to stop people all year, but those teams had been expected to be strong on the defensive side and had underachieved. When it came time to play a postseason game, though, those teams remembered what mattered. The Patriots stifled the Denver Broncos, who did them the huge favor of starting Tim Tebow at quarterback, allowing them to focus their efforts on stopping the run, as the pass was not much of a threat. The Giants stopped the Packers continually, beating them in convincing fashion, 37-20. The Saints went up against the 49ers, who had one of the best defenses in the league this season. The New Orleans offense is so good that even the 49ers defense was hard put to stop them, but in the end, the Niners came out on top, 36-32. It was a spectacular game, by the way, especially the last several minutes. With less than a minute to go, when the Saints needed their defense more than ever, they had no answer for Alex Smith and Vernon Davis. They will now go home, while the Niners move on to play the Giants.

My rooting interests were difficult to pin down this weekend. I did not want to root for the Patriots, as offensive coordinator Bill O’Brien is Penn State’s new head coach, and I would love for him to be able to focus on the last month of the recruiting period, but anyone who reads this column knows that I was not rooting for Tebow and the Broncos. I am ambivalent about the Packers, but I won’t root for the Giants under any circumstances. The Saints-49ers and the Ravens-Texans matchups did not move me emotionally either way, really. I am happy, though, that defense made a difference in these games. I am always bothered when people complain that defensive battles are “boring,” while high-scoring affairs are “exciting.” This may be true, to some extent, if you don’t study the game. If you do, though, you know that when it really matters, you’d better be able to stop someone. Because they couldn’t, the Packers and the Saints saw their seasons end.

Good sports, continued:

2) I mentioned it briefly above, but if you did not see the end of the 49ers-Saints game, check out the highlights. The last four minutes were pretty unbelievable, with the lead changing hands four times over that period. I have never given San Francisco quarterback Alex Smith any credit at all, but he went up several notches in my eyes after that performance.

3) Barcelona forward Lionel Messi, only 24 years old, won his third player of the year award from FIFA this week, a remarkable achievement for someone so young. Messi also plays for Argentina’s national team.

4) It’s not enough, but it’s a start: the NCAA and the BCS seem to be zeroing in on a plan to have a four-team playoff in college football‘s highest division starting in 2014. Mark Emmert, the NCAA president, is in favor of it, as are the leaders of several of the major conferences, including some who had previously opposed it, like the Big Ten’s Jim Delany.

5) I don’t want to beat a dead horse, but I need to say it: can we please stop talking about Tebow now? The Patriots hopefully put the conversation to rest for a while. I listen to sports radio, but I had to avoid it for most of last week, as it was all-Tebow, all the time.

Bad sports:

1) It’s bad enough that the BCS “championship game” was a rematch of a game that happened earlier this season between LSU and Alabama. No one outside of the fans of the SEC wanted this anyway. The fact that the game was a snoozer was the real problem. I am not contradicting my earlier statement here about enjoying defense. I like the fact that the Alabama defense was so good. This game was completely lopsided, though, and that makes for some boring viewing. LSU could not even manage 100 yards of total offense, which is embarrassing.

2) Tragedy struck the family of Joe Philbin, the offensive coordinator of the Green Bay Packers, this week. His son Michael, originally reported missing last Sunday, was found dead on Monday when police pulled his body from a river in Osh Kosh, Wisconsin. His death appears to have been an accident. After several days away from the team, Philbin was with the team for its game on Sunday against the Giants.

3) Francisco Rodriguez Jr., a high school soccer goalie in Los Angeles, was shot and killed at his front door on Wednesday, shortly after playing a game against a local high school.

4) Well this is embarrassing. I think I saw someone do this when I was a kid playing soccer at camp.

Bad sports, good sports appears every Monday

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Alan Spoll

Alan Spoll is a software quality assurance director from the suburbs of Philadelphia where he lives with his wonderful wife and children. He has spent his entire life as a passionate fan of the Eagles, Phillies, Sixers, Flyers, and Penn State. Recent Phillies success aside, you will understand his natural negativity. Follow me on Twitter - @DocAlan02