Every place I’ve read about bad Philly fan behavior today, someone’s pulled out the U-Mass Amherst article. But there’s a reason Philadelphia’s the city with a reputation. If I were a Philly citizen, I’d be mad at those who keep perpetuating it, not making excuses or resorting to them-too-ism.
Garland- I assure you that Philadelphia is not unique in the bad behavior following victories. Check out Lexington, Kentucky. Yes, Philadelphia fans have a deserved bad reputation, but last night’s activity has happened in Chicago and many other cities. It’s not good- and I personally can’t understand the need to destroy things when your team wins, but it happens. I don’t consider it “them-too-ism”. It’s a problem in many places and I don’t know how you stop it. It is irrational.
My wife literally fell asleep during Timberlake’s performance. I thought it was pretty dull–he needed some guests, other than the ghost of Prince (which I did appreciate).
The game was pretty enjoyable–if you like offense.
- There wasn't that much destruction/damage in Philly last night. Anything is bad and embarrassing, sure, but it could have been a lot worse. One of my paralegals was out in the streets until 4 am, and said it was a lovely, wonderful atmosphere, where people were being great to one another.
- I thought Timberlake was fine. Great dancing, great set, some innovative ideas. It's tough to do great singing while you're running around like that, and Timberlake's songs are more great accompaniment for his dancing than great songs per se.
- The Manning/Beckham ad was the best (except I forget what they were advertising)! I loved the idea of the T-Mobile ad with the babies, but why were they playing Nirvana's "All Apologies"? The incongruity of that undermined the ad's positive message for me.
- The Eagles defense was far from stellar, but they had some key contributions to that game before the last two minutes. The Pats had 11 possessions, and only scored on 6 of them; the Eagles scored 8 of 10 times they got the ball. Apart from the fumble and reasonably effective defense at the end of the game, the Eagles defense forced the Pats to settle for field goals 3 times (one of which they missed), stopped the Pats on downs once, and slowed them enough to prevent them from scoring at the end of the first half. In a game with very few stops by either defense, those were pretty important.
- Brady may not be great under pressure, but he made some pretty great throws under pressure last night, and his decisionmaking and release are so quick that he avoids getting under pressure better than almost anyone. I'm not a big fan of him as a human being, but he's a heck of a quarterback.
- The guy who made the hit on the Patriots player -- Cooks -- that took him out of the game was Malcolm Jenkins, one of the oldest players on the Eagles (at 30) and a key leader. He's really intelligent and well-spoken and tremendously involved in the community here and in social justice issues nationally. He has never had any kind of reputation as a dirty or violent player -- although, as a safety, his job is essentially to stop people a lot bigger than he is in their tracks. I thought the destructive nature of that hit really came from the fact that Cooks cut back towards Jenkins just as Jenkins arrived. Cooks didn't know Jenkins was there, and Jenkins didn't know Cooks would suddenly come towards him. Jenkins made some contact with Cooks' helmet, but it wasn't where he was aiming at all.
That made me sick, too.
disappointed with the results. I don’t like Philly. Another team would have been ok
I had a concussion, I was out of work for 3 months. I wonder if it was safe for gronk to be cleared. I was cognizant, just really not right in a very subtle way.This is all so concerning
Disagree. Cooks cut back across and was looking downfield and didn’t see Jenkins, and Jenkins had three or four steps to line him up. It wasn’t sudden at all. And he went for the kill shot, going in high and aiming right for Cooks’ head. He could have easily gone lower and put a big hit on his body. While that tackle may not be technically illegal since Cooks was a runner at that point, it was unnecessary and dangerous, and in my opinion deliberate and dirty.
There’s the play:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LhMUR5Y_rIU
I don’t know how you can see that a few times and say he wasn’t aiming for exactly where he hit Cooks.
And he could have whiffed like Marcus Williams of the Saints too, by going low(er), in the Saints-Vikings game. I agree with @JHS the destructive nature of the hit came from not knowing where the hit came from. The hit was legal and no flag was thrown. He was not headhunting IMO.
The Patriots D was awful. Malcolm Butler not playing? Do we need to list all the Eagles starters lost during the year, including their probable MVP QB Wentz? The Eagles won with a backup QB, who really is not a very good QB. He had a great couple games, but his career so far has been “meh.” I don’t think Foles will ever have a game like that again.
The hit was fine. Most calls err in favor of the Patriots anyway, and there was no call here…
“I don’t think Foles will ever have a game like that again.”
Well, if you’re going to have a game like that, the Super Bowl’s the place to do it!
Congratulations to the Philadelphia Eagles and all their fans!
Looks to me like the angle of the defender was lowering but the cutback by the receiver closed the distance faster than had he not done so. Without the cutback, the defender hits the receiver lower.
It wasn’t a penalty by league rules. Should the refs toss players out for not violating league rules because a play is deemed dirty?
He made the Pro Bowl after the 2013 season, after a season where he had a 27/2 td/int ratio (the best ever up to that point) and the 3rd highest qb rating ever. That’s not exactly “meh”. The mystery is what happened after the 2013 season, and how did he suddenly get his mojo back?
According to Pro Football Reference, the Eagles lost 193 player-games to IR and 16 to the “Out” designation. The Patriots lost 285 games to IR and 26 to “out” (this is almost 3x the number of player-games they lost in 2016, fwiw). Granted, losing your starting qb trumps all other injuries, but the Patriots lost some major players as well, and had a ton of injuries. And it’s hard to imagine that Wentz could have played any better than Foles in the playoffs.
Cooks was nearly knocked unconscious! How is that fine?!
This narrative is so tired and worn.
You mean like when the Eagles were in an illegal formation on Foles’ td reception that wasn’t called? Or Clement’s td catch where he bobbled the ball but they let the call stand? Or the non-call on the last Hail Mary where Hogan was literally tackled at the 35 yard line? Jenkins could have been called for leading with his helmet. Part of the unnecessary roughness rule says “If a player uses any part of his helmet (including the top/crown and forehead/”hairline” parts) or facemask to butt, spear, or ram an opponent violently or unnecessarily”. Isn’t that exactly what happened? No call though. But yeah, the refs are in the Patriots’ pocket. 8-|
At some point players need to figure out/decide that potentially missing a tackle or not making an ESPN highlight is better than nailing a player in the side of the head and endangering his health/career.
The doctor in charge of concussion research at Boston University, Chris Nowinski, tweeted out
I know most of you think this play was fine and dandy because it happened to a player on the hated and despised Patriots, but come on. If it had been Alshon Jeffries on the receiving end with no call, you would all be screaming bloody murder.
These hits need to be taken out of the game.
I agree with that. In this case, it seems the runner is not considered defenseless? I don’t understand why that should matter. I think any helmet to helmet hit should be completely illegal, regardless of intent. If it appears to be unintentional, one penalty could be applied (as it is with facemask penalties), with consequences more severe with egregious, purposefully dangerous hits. Those should include immediate ejection and suspensions that actually cause the offender severe pain in terms of missing games and $$.
Seeing how you feel about this @notrichenough, I’m guessing your philosophy also applies to Gronk’s very dirty hit on a defenseless player (Tre’Davious White) well after the play ended. He could have broken that guy’s neck! It was one of the worst I’ve seen this year. Obviously, that was clearly against the rules, and he was ejected and suspended a whole game for it, which while not necessarily a tap on the wrist, wasn’t particularly all that severe imo.
It seems like many people forget that the whole point is simply to stop the opponent’s forward progress. It should NOT be to take people out.
ETA: Gronk was not ejected after that hit? I’m amazed.
Chris Collinsworth was a little off his normal excellent form.
I’m guessing Cooks injury was more whiplash than concussion. I have seen plenty of people knocked out by head shots and their limbs go all googly. Cooks held onto the ball. When running with the ball, you have to assume people are coming at you full speed from all directions. A 180 degree blind cutback will get you on the wrong end of the highlight reel.
It is a game designed for violent collisions. Until they put rugby tackling rules into place, we will continue to see players carted off the field on stretchers.
For me, the big winners are LeGarrette Blount and Carson Wentz. Blount, after leaving the Patriots for their near league-minimum pay offer, had a big game against his old team. Wentz gets the SB ring he rightly deserves as the best qb on either team, thanks to that performance by Foles. It seemed awfully unlikely when he tore his ACL.
Not tired or worn here. Maybe you missed my earlier post and link to a WaPo article. The Patriots are #1 in penalty differential and the refs working the SB game, overall, gave the Patriots more penalty yards in the Patriots favor.
As I said, Foles has had a “meh” career. He had a great game against a poor Pats defense. The front seven was terrible. “The streets are littered” with Super Bowl stars and MVP’s who were out of work the next year or had meh or declining careers after the SB.
Your earlier point was that missing Malcolm Butler hurt the defense, which it probably did. But all teams have injuries and it’s the “next man up.” And Belichick has been the best at finding wonderful “next men up” for what seems like forever.
They got rid of the 5 yard incidental facemask penalty a few years ago. It’s now 15 yards or nothing. I think they decided it was too difficult to determine intent.
Gronk absolutely deserved to be suspended for this. I thought one game was enough, but wouldn’t have squawked if he had gotten two games. He doesn’t have a history of dirty play, so he got only one game. If he does it again he will get much worse.
A one game suspension cost him about $300K in lost salary, and almost cost him a $2.5 million performance incentive. That’s a lot more severe than a $20K fine. Missing games and game checks is what gets players’ attention.
I hope the refs in that game also got penalized by whatever system they use. Gronk was being held and interfered with on virtually every play that game, and it was never called. It was clearly the Bills’ strategy to play him that way until the refs made them stop by calling penalties, which they never did. And Gronk eventually lost it. It doesn’t excuse what he did, but his egregious act did not come out of a vacuum. Refs need to be accountable, too.
Lot easier said by armchair QBs like us than it is players on the field playing at full speed with split seconds to make decisions/react.
I am not one of those people. Not a Patriots hater. Not even an NFL fan. Yesterday’s game was the most I have watched of an NFL game in probably five years. So flip the teams and my reaction would be the same.
I’m a lifelong 49ers fan. No Eagles or Pats bias here. In my youth, I played the game and it’s pretty darn difficult, in the matter of split second, to make these hitting decisions. I’d like to see them change the rules too and also make the equipment better, but the hit in the SB was legal by the definition of the rules.
Personally, I don’t like big hits and never have. In fact, that’s the reason why I quit playing and took up another sport. The big hits aren’t the reason why I watch the games.
That’s good. That’s another act that could seriously injure a player’s neck.