Special Team Kerfuffles Blind Truth of More Serious Kerfuffles

All everyone was talking about at the end of both NFL Championship games was Kyle Williams and Billy Cundiff. And yes those two individuals played important roles in the demise of the San Francisco 49ers and Baltimore Ravens respectively, but I think there is much more than meets the eye with what happened with these two players and I do not think they should be the social pariahs the sports media is portraying them as.

First of all you have to consider the bigger pictures in both scenarios.

Exhibit #1: Kyle Williams

He's only been in the league for two years. This year he had a TOTAL of 6 punt and kickoff returns combined. Not exactly Devin Hester but slightly above Jacob Hester (he had 3 total returns). What I'm trying to say is this guy was not the right candidate to carry a 49ers special teams unit that was the best in football this year. That was Ted Ginn Jr.'s job until he injured his knee. The very person who prompted this reaction from Dolphins fans when he was drafted. But I digress, where was I again?...oh right trying to explain why it was not entirely Kyle Williams's fault the 49ers lost. 

Alex Smith started to look like the Alex Smith we have all come to question for 7 years. Big shocker there. I'm sorry but you just cannot change 7 years of history thanks to a new coach, a freak-of-nature tight end that decides he wants to play, and a naked bootleg and game-winning touchdown drive against one of the worst defenses in football the week before. That's like Nicolas Cage winning an Oscar and people forgetting he put out recent movies as Ghost Rider, Bankok Dangerous, Knowing, Season of the Witch, and the new Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (how this new movie is allowed to be made will remain as confusing as quantum mechanics). It just doesn't work like that. Smith started overthrowing receivers, throwing into double coverage, and channeling his inner Bill Murray by trying to kill the gopher in the ground he thought he saw all day.

San Francisco going 1-13 on third downs will never win a playoff game. Being outscored 90 plays run to 57 will never win a playoff game. Losing time of possession by 11 minutes will never win a playoff game. Just the fact the 49ers were even remotely close to winning this game is a remarkable accomplishment in of itself. This just shows how good their defense is. Eli Manning threw the ball 58 times and only had 316 yards (sorry no John 3:16 connections here) averaging a measly 5.4 yards a completion with what I firmly believe is the best wide receiver trio in the entire league with Victor Cruz, Hakeem Nicks, and Mario Manningham. Eli also would have had at least 2 interceptions if the 49ers defense did not try and incapacitate each other while going for the same ball.

So yes Kyle Williams gave the Giants some easy points and the ball grazing his knee was no one else's doing but his own (I learned in freshman football that when someone yelled "Peter" to get as far away from the ball as possible to avoid such a situation...still a mystery as to what "Peter" referred to), but I would point more to the offenses inability to do anything except find Vernon Davis wide open twice for touchdowns. Their wide receivers had a combined 1 catch for 9 feet. Case closed. 

On to exhibit two.

Exhibit #2: Billy Cundiff

This was a little bit harder of a pill to swallow for Ravens fans. 49ers fans were thankful for just being in the position they were in; Ravens fans had just about booked their tickets to Indianapolis. Baltimore was better on first downs, Joe "I Still Think Handlebar Moustaches Look Good" Flacco threw for more yards than Tom Brady, rushed for more yards, won the time of possession battle, and had less turnovers. So what was the problem you ask? The fact the Ravens were 1 for 4 for scoring a touchdown while in the redzone.

On top of the list of things never to do in a playoff game on the road is to take a field goal when it's 4th and 1 at your opponent's 3 yard line. Your telling me the 6' 6" 245 pound mustachioed menace couldn't get a single yard? Not even a chance for the tree-trunk legged Ray Rice? Nope didn't happen. The offense didn't even come on the field to try and draw the defense offsides or just get a delay of game. There is no difference between a 20 and 25 yard field goal. There is a big difference between 3 points and 7 points and the confidence that you show by putting your offense out there. Worst case scenario: the Ravens don't get the first down and the Patriots have 97 yards of field to go with a shaky Tom Brady and grab bag of running backs. (Tidbit of advice to Cam Cameron because Lord knows he needs all he can get...Julian Edelman was covering Anquan Boldin man-to-man for most of the fourth quarter. Does Cam realize that Edelman is actually a wide receiver and Boldin is WR #1 on almost any teams' depth chart? Absolutely boggles the mind this man's job is to find mismatches in coverage)

Back to the field goal itself.

At first I just thought that he simply shanked a chip shot. A Pro Bowl kicker last year should basically never miss a field goal from that close of a distance if all of the basic conditions were met. The problem was that one of the most important conditions of all was missing: time. Watch this video a you will see the multiple problems that are happening.

#1: Cundiff is running onto the field from what seems to be a considerable distance. Not a good start.
#2: He reaches the holder with about 10 seconds remaining on the play clock and it's running. Still not going well for Billy.
#3: He gets no time to take a breath (remember he just ran 30+ yards to get there 5 seconds earlier), take a practice kick if he wants to, line himself up nicely, etc. Just the situation you want your kicker to be in to put a conference championship game into overtime.
#4: The Ravens still had a time out left.

That last one is the killer.

Assuming that John Harbaugh saw the play clock was winding down as his kicker was racing for the holder what would be the detriment of calling a time out? You are not going to run a play after this. A timeout is not a college meal plan; the meals that you don't use rollover to the next semester, the timeouts you don't use vanish like LeBron in the fourth quarter. The seemingly logical thing to do was to call a timeout, let Billy do his usually warmup routine, and at least give him a fighter's chance.

Kyle Williams and Billy Cundiff became the easy scapegoats to blame entire losses on. But remember, all 11 teammates of theirs on the field during the course of the game and their respective coaches was not named Kyle Williams or Billy Cundiff. Those people should be getting more blame then they are.

The Inexplicable is Explained (maybe)

I would like to talk about how the Houston Texans dominated on both sides of the ball against the Cincinnati Bengals but it is more of a mirage because the Bengals really are not that good of a football team. And T.J. Yates at Baltimore next week? Let's be real here. Unless Joe Flacco poops the bed, which he very well could because he is Joe Flacco, the Texans don't really have a shot.

I would like to talk about how the New York Giants made everyone agree with Dennis Green about the Atlanta Falcons as a whole but more specifically the awful coaching that is Mike Smith. (Hey, Mike...your running back has thighs the size of my torso. Matt Ryan does not. Forth and short decision made for you right there. Your welcome when you figure that out at your next coaching job.)

And lastly, I would like to talk about while even though the New Orleans Saints look unbeatable, the Detroit Lions beat themselves (again...and again...and again) and the Saints will not have nearly the same success next week against the San Francisco 49ers.

But all of those story lines can be easily explained with these great things called your eyes and common sense so it is not very challenging to talk about and predict.

Then He appeared.

Why of course I'm talking about Tim Tebow and the awe-inspiring, head slamming, Twitter and Stephen A. Smith head-exploding, roller coaster ride that he gave us all against the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Let's just lay down the stats real quick. The Steelers were 1st in the league in total defense, 1st in the league in pass yards allowed per game, 8th in the league in rushing yards allowed per game, and 1st in the league in points allowed per game. The only hiccup would be the fact that they were DEAD LAST in takeaways in the NFL. Offensively the Steelers were nothing special averaging just a single point per game more than the Broncos. The Broncos were not surprisingly 1st in rushing yards and second-to-last in passing yards.

If we try to go by our eye and common sense test as we did for the first three games, the end result should be something within the realm of the Steelers winning 24 to 16. The thing is though that one Tim Tebow is involved. That means anything you have ever learned about what should happen in an NFL game is nuked and vaporized.

First 2 Denver possessions: 6 plays, 8 yards, 2 punts. Yikes. It's ok though, get your playoff virginity jitters out of the way against the best defense in the league without handing them a pick-six and not to mention your still healthy.

Next possession: 21 yard strike to Eric Decker, who then promptly gets his knee blown out by James Harrison. Now your down to Demaryius Thomas, Daniel Fells, Eddie Royal, and Matt Willis. Not exactly The Greatest Show On Turf but let's see what happens...Tebow throws the ball forward! And it's still going! Thomas on a 51 yard catch against Ike Taylor. What is this? Another forward movement of the ball through the air? Into Eddie Royal's lap for a 30 yard touchdown? I must be dreaming.

But lo He was not finished in the second quarter. After a Pittsburgh three-and-out and a bad throw by Roethlisberger that would have otherwise been a touchdown to Mike Wallace, Denver takes over on their own 27. Second play of the drive...is it a bird? Is it a UFO? No! It's another 58 bomb to Thomas on Taylor (see a common theme here? Someone is also missing from these plays...) After an 8 yard Tebow run for a score it's 14-6 Broncos. Still a one possession game until...

Big Ben throws an interception that the Broncos get back on the Steelers own 18 yard line. Field goal good.

Another Pittsburgh punt, another Denver drive that leads to a field goal.

Pittsburgh driving at the end of the half. Backup center Doug Legursky snaps it over Roethlisberger's head. Drive over. Broncos 20, Steelers 6 at halftime.

Cue the "Is this real life?" kid.

Oh yes it felt good.

Absolutely everything is going the Broncos way at this point between Tebow throwing for 185 yards on only 5 completions(!!!!!!!!!!!), Thomas having 109 yards on only 2 receptions, and the Steelers ineptitude on offense.

Flash-forward to the fourth quarter after the Broncos and Steelers traded a couple field goals and a touchdown and the Broncos are still up 7, 23-16. At this point I'm feeling pretty confident that the Broncos will pull this out with relative ease due to it being the fourth quarter and all and the magic that surround Tebow at this point of the game. On this occassion though the magic did not transfer to Willis McGahee when Tebow touched him. Willis procedes to fumble the ball near midfield and the Steelers recover.

Big Ben suddenly looks like Big Ben again when he starts to utilize his feet more to escape pressure and find open men as he did when he hit Jerricho Cotchery, whom I honestly forgot was even on the team and haven't heard a word about in 5 years, on a 31 yard strike to tie the game with 3:50 left to play. Plenty of time for Tebow to do what they have been doing well all game: throw the ball.

McGahee runs for a yard on first down, followed by a Tebow laser (his version anyway) to Matt Willis for 17 yards. Naturally because of the success of the play, you would think that you would pass on first down. Well, you nor I is John Fox, who proceeds to call a run play that gets only two yards. Tebow then throws his single worst pass of the day, a quail to Thomas that would've gotten a first down.

I'm starting to lose my belief in the Broncos ability to summon any late game miracle at this point. My gut feeling was that Ben and the Steelers were gonna march down with 1:37 left and kick a field goal as time expired to win. After a sack, Ben hits Antonio Brown down at the Steelers 38 but then inexplicably let 20 seconds run off the clock with two timeouts left. Next play, catch by Emmanuel Sanders to the Broncos 45. Well that was a great story and run while it lasted Den...Roethlisberger fumbled the ball. There may still be life here! Last play of regulation the Broncos bring 5 men (someone tell me why all teams don't do this when a team has to get 50-plus yards) and Big Ben goes down.

Overtime

And, as is tradition, the Broncos win the coin toss after referee Ron Winter took 3 days to poorly explain the playoff overtime rules. What was definitely NOT part of tradition was what happened next. The Steelers put 9 men in the box, Tebow hits Demaryius Thomas on a slant. Take a wild guess who was covering him? Ike Taylor! Ike will not be running for President anytime soon after Sunday, but everyone still likes Ike because he allowed Thomas to easily catch the ball, yell "LITTLE BOY!!!!!!!!!" at him, and waltz into the endzone.

Remember earlier when I said that someone was missing from these plays? Um....where was Troy Polamalu at any point during this game. You are a safety which means you are the last line of defense against long plays. Tebow had three passes of 50 yards or more. No other quarterback has EVER done that in a playoff game since the NFL/AFL merger in 1970. I know Ryan Clark didn't play but I think more blame should be placed on him because quite frankly I have not heard a single bad thing about his play yet.

Now we get to the "Say What?!?!" portion of the article.

At Florida, Tebow sported eye black with Bible verses. One of his favorite was John 3:16.

Here's where it gets downright creepy thanks to some work from Will Brinson at CBS. Tebow passed for 316 yards. He averaged 31.6 yards per pass completion. The overnight rating of the final 15 minutes of the game was 31.6. Ben Roethlisberger's interception was thrown on, you guessed it, 3rd and 16. And lastly, the Pittsburgh Steelers time of possession was 31 minutes and 6 seconds. 

I am in no way, shape, or form a religious man. But you cannot just look at that stuff above and brush it off as simple coincidence. If it was just his passing yards then fine, I would accept coincidence, but this...this just feels like another level of things. I am not preaching that God is helping Tebow win games. He's winning games because he puts his team in a position to win games more often than not. 

I gave it my best chance at trying to decipher whatever is going on in Denver. That is the best anyone can do. Give it a chance. Like the Broncos did with Tebow. Like you should with Tebow. And like the Broncos will have against the Patriots.