Category Archives: 2010s

J.J. Watt, scoring machine

Make that five touchdowns this season for the Texans’ J.J. Watt, the defensive end with a nose for the end zone. His latest — and third TD catch — came Sunday on a 1-yard pass from Ryan Fitzpatrick in Houston’s 45-21 win over the Titans.

How can I put Watt’s feat in perspective? Maybe this way:

RUNNING BACKS WHO HAD 350 TOUCHES IN A SEASON AND FEWER THAN 5 TDS

[table]

Year,Back\, Team,Rushing,Receiving,Touches,TD

1998,Barry Sanders\, Lions,343-1\,491,37-289,380,4

2009,Steven Jackson\, Rams,324-1\,416,51-322,375,4

2003,Curtis Martin\, Jets,323-1\,308,42-262,365,2

2005,Reuben Droughns\, Browns,309-1\,232,39-369,353*,2

1994,Jerome Bettis\, Rams,319-1\,025,31-293,350,4

[/table]

*Includes five kickoff returns.

Or maybe this way:

RECEIVERS WHO HAD 85 CATCHES IN A SEASON AND FEWER THAN 3 TDS

[table width=”450px”]

Year,Receiver\, Team,Rec,Yds,TD

2001,Keyshawn Johnson\, Bucs,106,1\,266,1

2013,Kendall Wright\, Titans,94,1\,079,2

2009,Jason Witten\, Cowboys,94,1\,030,2

1985,Art Monk\, Redskins,91,1\,226,2

2013,Harry Douglas\, Falcons,85,1\,067,2

[/table]

OTHER NOTABLES

[table width=”450px”]

Year,Receiver\, Team,Rec,Yds,TD

2007,Donald Driver\, Packers,82,1\,048,2

1998,Michael Irvin\, Cowboys,74,1\,057,1

1996,Henry Ellard\, Redskins,52,1\,014,2

[/table]

For the record, there have been 43 1,000-yard backs who scored fewer touchdowns than Watt has. (I’m not talking about fewer rushing touchdowns; I’m talking about fewer total touchdowns.) There also have been 13 1,000-yard receivers who had fewer TD catches than he has.

If you weren’t impressed with Watt before, you’d darn well better be now. I mean, if this keeps up, he’ll start drawing double coverage.

Source: pro-football-reference.com

Texans defensive end J.J. Watt scores his fifth TD of the season -- and third receiving -- Sunday vs. the Browns.

Texans defensive end J.J. Watt scores the fourth of his five TDs this season vs. the Browns in Week 11.

Bill Belichick at Chez Lambeau

It’s doubtful anybody in the Packers locker room Sunday will be shouting, “Let’s win this one for Curly!” But if Green Bay can’t stop the streaking Patriots, Bill Belichick will be one win away from tying Curly Lambeau on the all-time coaching victories list.

Lambeau had 229, good for fourth place, in 33 seasons (1921-53). Belichick has 227 in 20 much longer seasons. It isn’t an entirely fair fight, 12-game schedules vs. 16-game schedules, but that’s the NFL record book for you. Players and coaches from bygone days are just sheep to the slaughter.

Lambeau, I’ll merely point out, won six NFL titles, including three in a row (1929-31) in the years before championship games were staged. Belichick has won three titles, two of them back-to-back (2003-04). Will much be made of this when Bill blows by Curly? You’d like to think so, but I wouldn’t count on it. The league — and its chroniclers — tend to live in the here and now.

What’s interesting is that nobody has passed Curly — or even come close — in three decades, since the Dolphins’ Don Shula won No. 230 in 1984 en route to his record total of 347. That, by the way, was Shula’s last Super Bowl season, his sixth. If the Patriots get to the Super Bowl this year, it’ll be Belichick’s sixth as a head coach as well.

In a meat-grinder profession like this, it’s pretty clear what you have to do to rack up that many victories: start early and try to keep from burning out. Shula got his first head-coaching gig at 33. Halas (324) and Lambeau were even younger because they were player-coaches. Tom Landry (270) was 36 in his rookie season with the expansion Cowboys. Belichick, meanwhile, was 39 when the Browns gave him his first shot.

It’s reasonable to wonder whether it’ll be another three decades, if not longer, before the next Belichick stirs Lambeau’s ghost. After all, the job, which has always taken a tremendous toll, is unrelenting now — 24/7/365. It simply isn’t conducive to a lengthy career, the kind you’d need to win 229 games. Then, too, coaches’ salaries have improved enough to allow them to retire early and duck into TV or administrative jobs (see Tony Dungy, Bill Cowher, Mike Holmgren, etc.). As Bruce Ogilvie, the famed sports psychologist, put it, “When you are discussing a successful coach, you are not necessarily drawing a profile of an entirely healthy person.”

Some would say: And that goes double for Belichick, who maintains a level of secrecy in Foxborough that falls somewhere between George Allen and a CIA black site. The difference with him is that it’s in his DNA. His father, Steve, was a longtime college assistant, and young Bill spent hour after hour in meeting rooms, the smell of chalk in the air. It’s not so much that he’s become a coach; he’s always, in a sense, been a coach. That, I’m convinced, helps explain his longevity — that and having a quarterback like Tom Brady fall in his lap.

But back to “The Belgian,” as Lambeau was called. A player once told me that, during the offseason, when Curly was driving around Wisconsin making speeches, he’d always stop at the local sporting goods store and check out its selection of footballs. If he found one that felt a little slimmer than the others, a little more suited to passing — especially in the era of the fat ball — he’d buy it to use in games. (And fans think today’s coaches are detail-oriented.)

One more Curly story. After the 1932 season, the Packers’ barnstorming tour took them all the way to Hawaii, where they played a couple of games against local teams. On the trip there — via the SS Mariposa — two players got into an argument over a Young Lovely they’d met on the ship, a former Miss California named Billie Copeland.

Lambeau — worried that the next words he’d hear would be “Man overboard!” — quickly defused the situation. “If that’s the way you’re going to behave,” he said, “then neither of you can talk to her.”

We pause now for dramatic effect — just as the early Packer who told me this tale did. The punch line:

“That woman,” he said, “became Mrs. Lambeau No. 2.”

The second of three Mrs. Lambeaus, for those of you scoring at home. The Belgian loved the ladies.

Mrs. Lambeau No. 2

Jan. 17, 1933 Ogden Standard-Examiner

Source: pro-football-reference.com

The NFL’s All-Time Drinking Team

With the holiday season upon us, it might be a good time to roll out an idea that’s been rattling around in my head: the NFL’s All-Time Drinking Team. Let’s face it, the connection between pro football and alcohol — in stadiums, at tailgate parties, in sports bars and living rooms — has always been stronger than 100-proof whiskey. It’s in this spirit, if you’ll pardon the expression, that I present the following squad:

● Bob Margarita, B, Bears, 1944-46 — Was a big help to Chicago during the war years, when manpower was scarce. Best reason to raise a glass to him: In ’45 he finished third in the NFL in rushing yards (463), 10^th in receiving yards (394) and, on the other side of the ball, tied for second in interceptions (6).

● Tom Beer, TE, Broncos/Patriots, 1967-72 — The 32^nd player picked in the ’67 draft. (In other words, when Denver made what today would be the last selection in the first round, it said, “Beer, please, bartender.”) Best reason to raise a glass to him: In a ’68 game against the Pats he caught five passes for 98 yards, including a 5-yard touchdown, in a 35-14 Broncos win.

● Rich Martini, WR, Raiders/Saints, 1979-81 — Scored TDs in his second and third pro games. Best reason to raise a glass to him: He played special teams for the Raiders in their run to the title in 1980.

● Ed Champagne, T, Rams, 1947-50 — Appeared as a backup in the NFL championship game his last two seasons. Best reason to raise a glass to him: He was fined $300 by the league in 1950 — which was a lot of money back then — after he pushed an official while protesting a call. The Long Beach Press-Telegram said Champagne, who was ejected, “blew his cork.”

● Herb Stein (T-E, Buffalo/Toledo/Frankford/Pottsville, 1921-22, ’24-26, ’28) and Russ Stein (T-E, Toledo/Frankford/Pottsville/Canton, 1922, ’24-26) — Hey, you can’t drink beer without a couple of Steins, right? These rugged brothers were all-stars in the NFL’s early years. (The first five teams Herb played on posted a combined record of 44-9-7.) Best reason to raise a glass to them: They starred on the ’25 Pottsville Maroons club that got gypped out of the title because of a dubious league ruling.

● Terry Barr, WR, Lions, 1957-65 — OK, so there’s an extra “r.” It was either him or Garvin Mugg (T, Lions, 1945), and Mugg played only three NFL games. Barr, on the other hand, was a fine all-around talent who, in addition to his offensive exploits, intercepted three passes and returned a kickoff for a touchdown in 1958. Best reason to raise a glass to him: He had back-to-back 1,000-yard receiving seasons in 1963 and ’64 and went to the Pro Bowl both years.

● Bourbon Bondurant, T-K, Evansville/Bears, 1921-22 — Believe it or not, Bourbon was his given name. Best reason to raise a glass to him: He kicked six extra points for the Crimson Giants in 1921.

● Napoleon “Let’s Roll Out The” Barrel, C, Oorang Indians, 1923 — If that wasn’t his nickname, it should have been. At 5-foot-8, 200 pounds, Barrel was even shaped a little like a barrel. Best reason to raise a glass to him: He played for the Oorang Indians, a team made up of Native Americans (the most famous of which was Jim Thorpe). Oorang, by the way, wasn’t a tribe, it was the name of a kennel near Marion, Ohio, that specialized in Airedales and sponsored the franchise for two seasons. Some of Barrel’s other teammates were Joe Little Twig, Ted Lone Wolf and Long Time Sleep (otherwise known as Nick Lassa).

● Jack Daniels, TB, Milwaukee, 1925 — His NFL career lasted just one game, but there’s no way you can leave him off the squad. Best reason to raise a glass to him: That Badgers juggernaut he played on finished 0-6 and was outscored 191-7. If anybody needed a drink, it was Jack Daniels.

● Darryl Tapp, DE, Seahawks/Eagles/Redskins/Lions, 2006-present — Our All-Time All-Drinking roster wouldn’t be complete without one current player. Best reason to raise a glass to him: He

Darryl Tapp celebrates a sack with the Seahawks.

had four sacks and a forced fumble in Seattle’s 33-6 victory over the Rams in 2007.

● Joe Brandy, coach, Minneapolis, 1924 — Brandy’s Marines were another of the pre-draft, pre-revenue sharing Have Nots, going 0-6 and putting up just 14 points. Best reason to raise a glass to him: At Notre Dame he played under Knute Rockne and in the same backfield with George Gipp.

Reserves:

● Jarvis Redwine, RB-KR, Vikings, 1981-83

● Chris Port, G-T, Saints, 1991-95

● Ken Vinyard, K, Falcons, 1970

● Michael Jameson, DB, Browns, 2002-04

● Gerry Sherry, FB, Louisville, 1926

● Arnold Ale, LB, Chiefs/Chargers, 1994, ’96

● Sam Adams, father (G-T, Patriots/Saints, 1972-81) and son (DT-DE, Seahawks/Ravens/Raiders/Bills/Bengals/Broncos, 1994-2007) (You could pour a Sam Adams into each of the Steins.)

● Scott Case, DB, Falcons/Cowboys, 1984-95

● Ted Ginn, WR/KR, Dolphins/49ers, 2007-12 (Sorry, it’s the closest I could come to gin.)

Home field: Where else but Tampa Stadium (a.k.a. The Big Sombrero before it was demolished)?

Source: pro-football-reference.com

The streaking Patriots

It’s easier to lose seven straight games in the NFL than it is to win seven straight. If you doubt this, click on these two links. You’ll see there have been 52 regular-season winning streaks of seven games or longer in the 2000s — and 69 losing streaks of the same length.

Indeed, the Bucs, now in their 39th year, have never reeled off seven victories in a row, not even the season they won the Super Bowl. The Browns, meanwhile, haven’t had a seven-gamer since ’68, and the Bengals (‘73) and Cardinals (’74) haven’t put one together in nearly as long.

I point this out because the Patriots are on their annual seven-game roll. Well, maybe not annual, but they’ve certainly been Frequent Streakers in the Belichick-Brady Era. This is their seventh run of seven games or more; a couple of times, they didn’t stop until they reached 21 and 18.

The only other team in the 2000s that’s had more than four such streaks is Peyton Manning’s team. Manning had five with the Colts, and has added a sixth — a 17-gamer — with the Broncos.

A look at the Patriots’ streaks (which become even more impressive when you realize that no other club in the AFC East has had even one in the 2000s):

PATRIOTS’ REGULAR-SEASON WINNING STREAKS OF 7 OR MORE SINCE 2000

[table width=”500px”]

Games,Years,Result,Broken By\, Score

21,2006-08,Lost Super Bowl in ’07,Dolphins\, 38-13

18,2003-04,Won Super Bowl in ’03 & ’04,Steelers\, 34-20

10,2010-11,Lost first playoff game in ’10,Bills\, 34-31

9,2011-12,Lost Super Bowl in ’11,Cardinals\, 20-18

9,2001-02,Won Super Bowl in ’01,Chargers\, 21-14

7,2012,Lost AFC title game,49ers\, 41-34

7,2014,TBD,TBD

[/table]

The rest of the league: Colts (5 streaks of seven or better), Packers (4), Chargers (3), Seahawks (3), Vikings (3), Bears (2), Chiefs (2), Eagles (2), Falcons (2), 49ers (2), Panthers (2), Rams (2), Saints (2), Steelers (2), Titans (2), Broncos (1), Cowboys (1), Giants (1), Lions (1), Ravens (1), Redskins (1), Texans (1).

Teams that haven’t had a seven-game streak in the 2000s: Bengals, Bills, Browns, Bucs, Cardinals, Dolphins, Jaguars, Jets, Raiders.

How do the Patriots stack up against other teams over the decades led by Hall of Fame quarterbacks? Pretty favorably — keeping in mind, of course, that Brady is in his 13^th full season as a starter (Roger Staubach was the Cowboys’ QB of record for just nine) and that schedules are now 16 games (Sid Luckman never played more than 12).

MOST WINNING STREAKS OF 7 GAMES OR MORE, REGULAR SEASON

[table width=”350px”]

Years,Quarterback\, Team,7+ Streaks

2001-14,Tom Brady’s Patriots, 7

1999-10,Peyton Manning’s Colts, 6

1980-90,Joe Montana’s 49ers, 6

1946-55,Otto Graham’s Browns, 6*

1992-07,Brett Favre’s Packers, 4

1991-99,Steve Young’s 49ers, 4

1983-98,John Elway’s Broncos, 4

1970-82,Terry Bradshaw’s Steelers, 4

1971-79,Roger Staubach’s Cowboys, 4

1967-80,Bob Griese’s Dolphins, 4

1956-72,Johnny Unitas’ Colts, 4

1939-50,Sid Luckman’s Bears, 4

[/table]

*Includes years in the All-America Conference (1946-49).

Note: “Years” denotes the span of seasons the quarterback was the team’s starter. Obviously, a QB didn’t get credit for a streak unless he started all or virtually all of the games. (Backup Earl Morrall, for instance, filled in for the injured Unitas when the Colts won eight straight in ’68 – and did likewise for Griese when the Dolphins went undefeated in ’72.)

In case you were wondering, Bart Starr’s Packers had a mere two runs of seven games or longer during the Lombardi years (1959-67) — which just shows how much more competitive the NFL was back then. We’re talking, after all, about arguably the greatest dynasty in pro football history.

Source: pro-football-reference.com

Joe Morgan: Bang for the touch

If you’re a frequenter of this site, you know I’m always on the lookout for the oddball game — the “snowflake.” Saints wide receiver Joe Morgan had one of the all timers Monday night against the Ravens.

Here’s what Morgan did the first time he touched the ball:

And here’s what he did the second time he touched the ball: That’s it. There was no third time he touched the ball. He finished with one rush for 67 yards and one reception for 62. Do the math and you get 129 yards from scrimmage — again, on two touches. That’s insane. It’s also something no one else has done since at least 1960.

In fact, only eight other players in that period have had even a 20-yard gain both rushing and receiving, never mind a 60-yarder, in a two-touch game. It’s just really unusual. (Note: I’ve excluded anybody who might have returned a punt or kickoff in the same game. I’m being strict about this: two touches — period.)

ONE RUSH FOR 20+ YARDS, ONE RECEPTION FOR 20+ YARDS IN A GAME

[table width=”500px”]

Date,Player\, Team,Opponent,Rush,Catch,Total

11-24-14,WR Joe Morgan\,Saints,Ravens,67,62,129

12-12-71,WR Mel Gray\, Cardinals,Eagles,38,80*,118

9-3-95,WR Leslie Shepherd\, Redskins,Cardinals,26,73*,99

10-1-00,WR Eddie Kennison\, Bears,Packers,52,21,73

12-17-60,RB Nyle McFarlane\, Raiders,Broncos,23,49*,72

11-2-03,WR Donald Driver\, Packers,Vikings,45,26,71

11-15-09,WR Robert Meachem\, Saints,Rams,41,27*,68

11-10-96,WR Rocket Ismail\, Panthers,Giants,35,30,65

11-2-80,WR Leonard Thompson\, Lions,49ers,30,30,60

[/table]

*touchdown

(In a 1981 game against the Saints, the Cardinals’ Roy Green had one rush for 44 yards, one reception for 28 and one interception for 29. A performance like that certainly deserves mention, even if the pick disqualifies him from this list.)

What makes Morgan’s night all the sweeter is that touches have been so rare for him in his two NFL seasons. He’s had just 14 — 12 catches, 2 rushes. But he’s gotten a lot of yardage out of those opportunities, including 10 gains of more than 25 yards. Average gain on receptions and rushes combined: 36.9 yards (14/516).

Nobody does that. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Joe Morgan.

Source: pro-football-reference.com

The Saints’ Joe Morgan doing what he does best, making big plays.

Sideline extracurriculars

From the look of the things, 49ers wideout Anquan Boldin and Redskins defensive coordinator Jim Haslett exchanged some Hard Consonants on the Washington sideline Sunday. They may even have uttered a few vowels.

Late in the game, as you can see in this clip, Boldin was driven out of bounds by cornerback Greg Ducre and free safety Trenton Robinson after a 10-yard catch. When he “pushed,” as he put it, one of the defenders off him, lips started flapping. Line judge Byron Boston actually stepped between principals to make sure the situation didn’t escalate.

The 49ers’ Anquan Boldin and Redskins defensive coordinator Jim Haslett debate the proper way to baste a turkey.

Afterward, Boldin claimed to be unaware of what set Haslett off. “A guy tried to hit me late on the sideline,” he said, “and I pushed him off. [Haslett] had some words for whatever reason. I don’t even give that a second thought. He don’t . . . he’s irrelevant.”

(For the record, Haslett was the 51^st pick in the ’79 draft, a linebacker out of Indiana (Pa.) taken by the Bills. Mr. Irrelevant, who went 279 picks later to the Steelers, was wide receiver Mike Almond from Northwest Louisiana.)

I bring all this up for a couple of reasons: 1. Who doesn’t love a little sideline flare-up, be it inter-team or intra-team? 2. These episodes can involve so much more than just foul language.

In fact, long before Haslett joined the Bills, a Buffalo coach was accused of punching an opposing quarterback after he’d run out of bounds. It allegedly happened in a 1961 game against the New York Titans — whose descendants, the Jets, meet the Bills tonight in Detroit (thanks to the avalanche of snow that fell on Orchard Park last week).

The coach was Buster Ramsey, a crusty former all-pro guard with the Chicago Cardinals. The quarterback was Al Dorow, one of the better scramblers in that period. And the owner who leveled the charge against Ramsey was Harry Wismer, the famous sportscaster who owned the Titans (back in the days when franchises could be bought out of petty cash). Here’s The New York Times’ description of the incident:

Sounds like a nasty game, doesn’t it? And AFL Commissioner Joe Foss — this was before the league had merged with the NFL — had a ringside seat.

Anyway, the Times said Ramsey “shoved” Dorow — which was bad enough, I suppose. But Wismer upped the ante, claiming Ramsey “slugged” his QB “and cost us the game,” which the Bills wound up winning 41-31.

Dorow seconded the motion, saying, “Ramsey was the first one on me and knocked me down with a punch. A player cannot lay his hands on an official and certainly a coach should not be permitted to punch a rival player.”

(I’m not sure what the word “rival” is doing there. Is Al suggesting it was OK in that era for a coach to punch his own player?)

It only got worse. When the Bills sent the Titans a copy of the game film, Wismer accused them of splicing out the fight. He fired off a wire to Buffalo general manager Dick Gallagher — that Gallagher released to the media – that read: “Received doctored up film of Titan[s]-Buffalo game. Amazed you would cut out episode of Ramsey slugging our quarterback Dorow.”

Gallagher’s reply: “Film shipped intact. Nothing cut out. Shocked at your accusation.”

Wismer was having none of that. “The film they sent us shows Ramsey going for Dorow,” he told The Associated Press. “Just about the time he gets to him, the scene shifts. They say they didn’t cut it. I say the fight isn’t in the film. Dorow got hit on the side of the jaw by Ramsey, and he will testify so.”

But beyond that, he went on, “Coaches are supposed to stop trouble, not start it. Ramsey’s actions in Buffalo could have incited a riot.”

The Titans owner went as far as to demand a lifetime ban for Ramsey — or at the very least a suspension. The Bills coach, meanwhile, continued to maintain his innocence. “I did not swing at Al Dorow or any other New York player,” he said. “Harry Wismer’s statement that I did substantiates a belief I have long held . . . that he is full of hot air.”

How great was pro football in the ’60s?

Dorow got such a going over in the Buffalo bench area, the Times reported later in the week, that the team physician, Dr. James Nicholas, “said it was extremely doubtful that [he] would be able to play against Denver.” The most severe of the quarterback’s injuries, Nicholas said, was a “lumbar-sacral strain, which left him with a weakness in one leg.”

Lumbar-sacral strain or not, Dorow did indeed play the next Sunday against the Broncos, throwing three touchdown passes in a 35-28 New York win. As for Ramsey, he wasn’t suspended and probably wasn’t even fined. The AP put the matter to bed this way:

That wasn’t quite the end of it, though. The teams still had to play each other again on Thanksgiving at the Polo Grounds. In the days leading up to the game, Wismer asked the New York police commissioner to put a detail behind the Buffalo bench to maintain the peace. “We still remember the terrific beating Dorow took at the hands of Ramsey and the Buffalo players in the game at Buffalo Sept. 17,” he said.

The Titans took the rematch 21-14, with Dorow tossing for one TD and running for another. Best of all, everybody lived to tell about it – though, if you examine the box score, you’ll see Dorow was sacked six times for 66 yards. That can’t be good for the lumbar-sacral area.

Source: pro-football-reference.com

Snow in Buffalo

The NFL has moved the Bills-Jets game to Detroit this week because the show, of course, must go on. Even when the president of the United States gets assassinated, the show must go on in pro football. In the current case, it’s due to an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty against Mother Nature, who dumped six feet of snow on Orchard Park and forced the Bills to find another venue. So the game will be played Monday night, not Sunday afternoon, and the site will be Ford Field, not Ralph Wilson Stadium.

It wasn’t always thus. In the days before TV mega-contracts, postponements and even cancellations were hardly unheard of. Sometimes all it took was slow sales ticket sales or the threat of bad weather to get owners to reschedule — or to bag the game entirely. Why don’t we revisit some of these episodes so you can get a better feel for The Way Things Were?

We begin with a couple of games in New York that were snowed out Dec. 5, 1926 — one between the Giants and Bears at the Polo Grounds, the other between the Brooklyn Horsemen and Duluth Eskimos at Ebbets Field. (And yes, I’m as surprised as anybody that a game involving the Eskimos could be snowed out.) Here’s how The New York Times reported it:

What’s interesting about the first game is that it was the second of back-to-backers for the Bears. They’d lost the day before to the Frankford Yellow Jackets in Philadelphia — their only loss of the season, it would turn out, and one that would leave them second behind the Yellow Jackets in the final standings. (This was before the league staged a title game to determine its champion.)

I’m kind of amazed George Halas, their owner/coach/end, didn’t insist that the game be played at a later date — for the New York payday as much as for the potential W. But as you can see from the Bears’ 1926 results, it was just canceled (though they did play twice more before calling it a season).

Then there was the time in 1936 the Eagles and Pirates (as the Steelers were called then) got the brilliant idea to move one of their games to Johnstown, Pa. Naturally, there was a flood that caused a postponement. Well, almost a flood. The Pittsburgh Press put it this way:

Two years later, Pittsburgh owner Art Rooney caused a stir by putting off a game against the Cleveland Rams because — brace yourself — he had too many players banged up. The Rams were none to pleased about it, as you can see in this Press story:

What’s interesting about this tempest in a leather helmet is that the teams wound up playing the game in December in New Orleans. It was the first NFL game ever played in the Big Easy. (Why New Orleans, you ask? Answer: During the Depression, clubs that didn’t draw well at home would play anywhere they could get a decent guarantee. The next year, the Rams played their season finale against the Eagles in Colorado Springs.

Moving along, in 1954 the Browns pushed their Oct. 3 home game against the Lions back to Dec. 19 because they weren’t sure if the Indians would need Cleveland Stadium for a World Series game against the New York Giants. (The Indians didn’t. The Giants completed their shocking sweep the day before.)

This created a bizarre situation. When the Browns and Lions finally did meet, all the other teams had completed their schedules — and Browns and Lions had already wrapped up their conference titles. So they played on consecutive Sundays in Cleveland . . . with the whole pro football world watching. The Lions won the first game 14-10, and the Browns won the one that really mattered 56-10. What’s that, a 50-point swing in the space of a week?

I could go on, but I’ll finish with the infamous Bills-Patriots postponement in 1961. The game was supposed to be played on a Friday night in Boston but, with Hurricane Gerda looming, was held over to Sunday. Almost predictably, Gerda ended up being the Brian Bosworth of storms — dozens of area high school contests went on as planned that night — and Buffalo coach Buster Ramsay was convinced the delay was “a deliberate attempt to upset my team. . . . A bush-league trick.”

The Patriots actually had to get the city council approval to reschedule to Sunday. They were using Boston University’s Field, you see, and BU didn’t have a permit for games on the Sabbath, according to The Boston Globe.

When the Bills and Pats finally did play, the weather — 35 degrees with 25-to-30 mph winds — was far worse than it had been Friday night. A mere 9,398 showed up to shiver, and Ramsey’s worst fears were realized: His club came out flat and fell behind 45-0 in a 52-21 loss.

At least we know Buffalo’s postponement this weekend wasn’t “a deliberate attempt to upset” the Jets. There’s real snow on the ground — alps of it. And it’s nice nobody had to go to the Detroit city council to get them to OK a Sunday game. Now Rex Ryan’s bunch just has to keep the Bills from running off to a 45-0 lead.

Source: pro-football-reference.com

Sept. 28, 1942 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

The Jonas Gray Chart of the Day

First off, I’d like to thank NFL statisticians for making this post possible. On Monday morning it wasn’t — because, at that point, the Patriots’ Jonas Gray was credited with 38 carries for 199 yards in the 42-20 whupping of the Colts. On further review, however, Gray’s numbers were revised to 37 carries for 201 yards. This raises the question (since it happened with Jonas): How many times has a back’s first 100-yard rushing game been a 200-yard game?

I would have guessed a couple. To my shock, I came across eight other instances, including one in the Super Bowl.

BACKS WHOSE FIRST 100-YARD RUSHING GAME WAS A 200-YARD GAME

[table]

Date,Running Back\, Team,Opponent,Att,Yds,Avg,TD,Prev. High

11-16-14,Jonas Gray\, Patriots,Colts,37,201,5.4,4, 86

10-23-11,DeMarco Murray\, Cowboys,Rams,25,253,10.1,1, 34

9-22-96,LeShon Johnson\, Cardinals,Saints,21,214,10.2,2, 42

10-14-90,Barry Word\, Chiefs,Lions,18,200,11.1,2, 31

1-31-88,Timmy Smith\, Redskins,Broncos,22,204,9.3,2, 72

11-30-87,Bo Jackson\, Raiders,Seahawks,18,221,12.3,2, 98

9-2-84,Gerald Riggs\, Falcons,Saints,35,202,5.8,2, 72

11-26-78,Terry Miller\, Bills,Giants,21,208,9.9,2, 97

12-16-56,Tommy Wilson\, Rams,Packers,23,223,9.7,0, NA

[/table]

Smith’s 200-yard game, of course, came in the Redskins’ 42-10 blowout of the Broncos in Super Bowl XXII — a day better remembered for Doug Williams’ four touchdown passes in Washington’s 35-point second quarter. He’d carried the ball in only four regular-season games before coach Joe Gibbs turned to him in the playoffs because of an injury to George Rogers.

Not all of these backs were rookies, by the way. Word was in his second year and Johnson and Riggs in their third. (Word’s big game came after he’d served prison time for cocaine distribution, which caused him to miss the previous season.)

I turned up several near misses, too — guys who rushed for 200-plus yards the second time they hit triple figures. That group includes such household names as Jim Brown, Tony Dorsett, James Wilder, Priest Holmes and Arian Foster.

In fact, Brown’s 237 yards set a single -game NFL rushing record. The same goes for Wilson, whose 223-yard day came in the ’56 season finale. “Touchdown Tommy,” as he was called, was such an obscure rookie — and reporters paid so much less attention to these things — that the Los Angeles Times didn’t even mention his feat until the fifth paragraph of its game story.

The Long Beach Press-Telegram, meanwhile, touched on it at the end of the fourth graph, but didn’t provide any details until the 11th. Don’t believe me? See for yourself:

A running back breaks the single-game rushing mark, and we’re 300 words into the story before the reporter tells us how many yards he gained. That should be in the record book, too.

Source: pro-football-reference.com

The Redskins’ Timmy Smith keeps the Broncos’ Tony Lilly at arm’s length in Super Bowl 22.

The dead guy J.J. Watt just tied

Last week we had the Bears bringing the 1923 Rochester Jeffersons back from the dead. This week we have J.J. Watt, the Texans’ all-world defensive end, dredging up a player from 1938: Jay Arnold, a wingback for Bert Bell’s Eagles. To quote Flounder in Animal House . . .

As ESPN.com’s Tania Ganguli was good enough to note:

On Sunday in Cleveland, in a 23-7 win over the Browns, Watt became the first player since Arnold to catch two touchdown passes, return an interception for a touchdown and return a fumbled football for a touchdown all in the same season.

Watt, of course, did it as a defensive end. That’s probably more impressive than a two-way back in the ’30s doing it. After all, you wouldn’t expect a D-end to grab TD passes. In Arnold’s day, on

Eagles wingback Jay Arnold strikes a pose.

the other hand, a back could be expected to do just about anything, even kick. (And Jay did a little of that, too. In fact, he booted three extra points that season. So he still has a leg up — literally — on J.J.)

What’s cool about this cross-generational connection is that there’s virtually nothing else to remember Arnold for. Watt is a two-time Pro Bowler and pass-rushing maniac who’s building a case for Canton, but Jay had a mostly invisible career in which he scored all of six touchdowns and gained a grand total of 616 yards. He just happened, in 1938, to score TDs on both sides of the ball — and in three different ways. (Within a decade it became much harder to do this because, after the war, pro football evolved into a more specialized, two-platoon game. Fewer and fewer guys played both ways.)

But enough of that. Let’s take a closer look at Arnold’s ’38 season. Here’s something that might interest you: He scored three of those four TDs — on a reception, fumble return and interception return — in a single half, the first half of a 27-7 win over the Pittsburgh Pirates. (They weren’t the Steelers yet.) They were the first three scores of the game and staked Philly to a 20-0 lead.

Nobody else in NFL history has had a game like that. Indeed, only four other players — Watt being the latest — have even had a TD catch, interception TD and fumble TD in the same season. (You’ve gotta love George Halas being one of them.) And again: Arnold did it in two quarters. The United Press summarized his heroics this way:

Did you notice how The Jay Arnold Story just got better? The “Whizzer” who coughed up the ball for the Pirates was their hotshot rookie running back, Byron “Whizzer” White. So Arnold not only had a once-in-95-NFL-seasons game, one of his scores was the result of a fumble by a future Supreme Court justice.

Arnold’s other touchdown that year also had some significance. It came in Detroit on the last day of the season against a Lions team that, had it beaten the Eagles, would have forced a playoff with the Packers for the Western Division title. To their horror, Philadelphia jumped out to a 14-0 first quarter lead and upset them 21-7, with Arnold scoring the second TD on a 7-yard pass from fullback Dave Smukler. This is from The Associated Press:

The Texans still have six games to play, so Watt may yet outdo Arnold. As he said afterward, “There’s a lot of season left, so hopefully that’s not the end of it.” But let’s not forget, Jay has those three PATs as his hole cards. Wherever he is.

Source: pro-football-reference.com, Spalding’s 1939 National Football League Official Guide.

A touchdown a quarter

Everybody’s in love with the Jonas Gray story this week, and who can blame them? Few things are more fun than seeing a guy who’s worked his way up from the practice squad — in his case, multiple practice squads — have a breakout game on a national stage. And Gray’s 201-yard, four-touchdown performance in the Patriots’ 42-20 erasure of the Colts was certainly a stunner. (It made you grateful for names on the backs of jerseys, just so you could keep reminding yourself who was doing all this damage.)

A performance like that tends to produce a bunch of cool stats. Here’s one: Gray scored a TD in every quarter, making him one of just a dozen players to do that since the 1970 merger. (Note: In the chart below, the numbers represent yards, R = run and P = pass reception.)

PLAYERS WHO SCORED A TD IN EVERY QUARTER OF A GAME SINCE 1970

[table]

Date,Player\, Team,Opponent,1st Q,2nd Q,3rd Q,4th Q

11-16-14,RB Jonas Gray\, Patriots,Colts,4R,2R,2R,1R

10-29-06,RB Larry Johnson\, Chiefs,Seahawks,3R,9P,2R,3R

12-14-03,WR Joe Horn\, Saints,Giants,50P,13P,7P,18P

12-7-03,RB Clinton Portis\, Broncos,Chiefs,11R,1R,59R,28R\, 53R

12-18-00,RB Marshall Faulk\, Rams,Bucs,2R,16R,27P,9R

10-29-00,RB Marshall Faulk\, Rams,49ers,1R,1R,19P,16P

9-4-95,RB Emmitt Smith\, Cowboys,Giants,60R,1R,1R,1R

11-24-94,WR Sterling Sharpe\, Packers,Cowboys,1P,36P,30P,5P

10-14-90,WR Jerry Rice\, 49ers,Falcons,24P\, 25P,19P,13P,15P

9-7-80,WR Earnest Gray\, Giants,Cardinals,10P,37P,42P,20P

9-16-79,RB Clarence Williams\, Chargers,Bills,5R,1R,55R,2R

10-23-77,RB Wayne Morris\, Cardinals,Saints,2R,9R,1R,12R

[/table]

Would you look at Marshall Faulk? He did it twice in six games. (He missed two after his first four-touchdown day.) And really, who can get enough Clarence Williams in these charts? I know I can’t. I just wish it was the same Clarence Williams who played Linc on Mod Squad.

By the way, you know who else accomplished the feat — before the merger? Cowboys running back Dan Reeves.

Source: pro-football-reference.com

Jonas Gray, the Patriots’ off-the-practice-squad rookie, got to do this in every quarter Monday night.

PRO FOOTBALL DALY

The whole 100 yards — and sometimes the end zones, too.

Category Archives: 2010s

J.J. Watt, scoring machine

RUNNING BACKS WHO HAD 350 TOUCHES IN A SEASON AND FEWER THAN 5 TDS

RECEIVERS WHO HAD 85 CATCHES IN A SEASON AND FEWER THAN 3 TDS

OTHER NOTABLES

Bill Belichick at Chez Lambeau

The NFL’s All-Time Drinking Team

The streaking Patriots

PATRIOTS’ REGULAR-SEASON WINNING STREAKS OF 7 OR MORE SINCE 2000

MOST WINNING STREAKS OF 7 GAMES OR MORE, REGULAR SEASON

Joe Morgan: Bang for the touch

ONE RUSH FOR 20+ YARDS, ONE RECEPTION FOR 20+ YARDS IN A GAME

Sideline extracurriculars

Snow in Buffalo

The Jonas Gray Chart of the Day

BACKS WHOSE FIRST 100-YARD RUSHING GAME WAS A 200-YARD GAME

The dead guy J.J. Watt just tied

A touchdown a quarter

PLAYERS WHO SCORED A TD IN EVERY QUARTER OF A GAME SINCE 1970