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These are excerpts. To read PK slobbering all over his man-crush Tom Brady, click the link below.
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https://profootballtalk.nbcsports.c...-rams-saints-patriots-chiefs-fmia-peter-king/
By Peter King
The NFC Championship
Observations on Rams 26, Saints 23:
The play. Rams 20, Saints 20 … 1:49 left in the fourth quarter … third-and-10 at the Rams’ 13-yard line … Drew Brees throws to the right sideline, near the goal line, and as the ball comes near Saints wideout Tommylee Lewis, Rams cornerback interferes with Lewis, slamming into him near the 6-yard-line. No flag. Saints go crazy. If they make the first down, the Saints could have milked the clock because the Rams had only one timeout left.
But instead, no flag and the ball was incomplete. The Saints kicked a chippy field goal by Will Lutz. The Rams, trailing New Orleans 23-20 just inside the two-minute warning, looked cooked. But they drove to a tying field goal and forced overtime. The question: If the flag gets thrown, which is the logical move in retrospect, does the outcome change? The Saints are convinced it does. We’ll never know.
Tommylee Lewis and Nickell Robey-Coleman. (Getty Images)
This is a huge moment for officiating. Will side judge Gary Cavaletto or down judge Patrick Turner, or both, be fired, for missing the most obvious pass interference penalty in playoff history? If the call gets made, it’s conceivable and perhaps likely that the Saints would have made the Super Bowl.
The upshot. As soon as this call got made, I heard from a couple of acquaintances/sources about the impact of it. “Al Riveron [EVP of Officiating] is gone,” one said. “He can’t survive this.” Another said the league will have to pay big to bring back Dean Blandino or Mike Pereira (less likely). I think Riveron was on thin ice before Sunday. What the NFL should do, if it decides to dump Riveron, is pay realistic money to get Blandino back from his cushy gig at FOX. He’s a trusted and trustworthy guy.
Expand replay. Don’t expand the number of challenges a coach can have during a game. Just allow him to challenge a terrible call that he curently cannot challenge.
Let’s not forget Greg the Leg. His 48-yard field goal at the end of regulation tied the game at 23. When the Rams got the ball in overtime, Greg Zuerlein, as is his custom, began to kick the ball into the net on the sideline. When the shaky Drew Brees got picked off on the first drive of overtime, the Rams had a shot.
It resulted in a 57-yard field goal try in OT. How amazing it was that the kick went halfway up the net and would have been good from 68 or 70 yards. “I don’t think about that,” Zeurlein said from New Orleans. “An inch or a mile … if it’s good, it’s good. I don’t think about how much it might have been good from. I just knew I hit that one great.”
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The Award Section
Jared Goff, quarterback, L.A. Rams. As I wrote in Week 3 (and I questioned this in Goff’s shaky December), it was “time to start recognizing that Goff is playing really good football under Sean McVay, not just caretaking football.”
Goff entered the day a clear number two quarterback in the game to Drew Brees, but then outplayed Brees. Goff justified being the first overall pick in the 2016 draft by leading his team to the Super Bowl in his third pro season. He finished 25 for 40 for 297 yards, throwing one touchdown and one interception. That included lovely completions of 36, 33 and 39 yards.
Greg Zuerlein, kicker, L.A. Rams. A 24-yard field goal to tie the NFC title game at 20 with 5:03 left to play. A 48-yard field goal to tie the NFC title game at 23 with 15 seconds left to play. A 57-yard field goal to win the NFC title game, 26-23, three minutes into overtime. A performance for the ages for Greg the Leg.
Johnny Hekker, punter, L.A. Rams. How similar are the Saints and Rams? They both just love to run risky fake punts in their own territory. New Orleans did it last week down 14-0, with Taysom Hill bulling ahead for a first-down run. In the title game, the Rams were down 13-0 a minute into the second quarter and had a fourth-and-five at their 30-yard line.
Anytime Hekker steps on the field, the defense should be wary of the fake; he’d thrown from punt formation nine times in the previous three years. Here, he did it again, firing it to right gunner Sam Shields for a gain of 12 and the first down. The Rams went on to score to cut the lead to 13-3. That’s the second Hekker-to-Shields fake-punt conversion this season, and both completions went for 12 yards.
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Numbers Game
This will get lost in the mania over the officiating at the end the NFC Championship Game, and maybe it should. But consider these things about the top seed in the NFC down the stretch of the 2018 season:
• Over their last seven games—five regular season, two postseason—the Saints, with a supposedly great offense, averaged a measly 19.7 points per game and went 4-3 (pockmarked by the huge no-call, of course).
• Last seven games: Saints 138, Foes 137.
• Drew Brees played six of the seven games. In those six, he had no games with three or more touchdown passes. In his first 11 games this year, he had seven games with three or more TD passes.
----------------------------
View: https://twitter.com/AndrewBrandt/status/1087119739615363073?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1087119739615363073&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fprofootballtalk.nbcsports.com%2F2019%2F01%2F21%2Fnfl-championship-rams-saints-patriots-chiefs-fmia-peter-king%2F
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I thought it best to let readers vent after the non-call in New Orleans that gave the Rams a valuable assist in their NFC title victory. Some of the reaction from more than 200 emails Sunday night:
Doing it for the fans.From Jack F.: “Tell me the league didn’t want Rams in the Super Bowl 53 for television ratings and fan base rebuilding purposes. How does the league explain the no pass interference call against the Rams near the end of the championship game that hurt New Orleans’s chances to score a touchdown? It can’t.”
No favoritism, just incompetence.From Mark Z.: “As a Saints fan that attended today’s game, we are still in the ‘did-that-really-happen?’ mood. It is hard to believe that anyone with an unbiased view would not call PI, and now the league office admitted to Coach Payton that it was helmet to helmet, too. I do not think the refs favored the Rams, just pure incompetence. How can this multi-billion-dollar business preach fairness yet there is no recourse or accountability for this? Just ‘We blew it.’”
One possible fix.From Kevin Z.: “Give teams three challenges per game, and every play is reviewable. If it adds 10 minutes per game, so be it. (Although coaches could be more frugal in using challenges to hold onto them for more important plays late in the game). It’s a small price to pay to ensure career-altering calls are correct.”
Might only get worse.From Billy Q.: “Gambling, in its many easily accessible forms to come, will only exacerbate the emotions around these game altering blown calls.”
Think of the big picture.From Dean W.: “A single call does not lose games. Great game plan by the Rams to slow the game down and put pressure on Brees when it mattered.”
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Alvin Kamara > Todd Gurley. At least after Halloween of this season. Markedly.
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Block of the Postseason: On the Saints’ first TD of the game, a Drew Brees throw, Mark Ingram had to pick up the blitzer, Rams linebacker Dante Fowler Jr.
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Tough to give backup Saints tight end Dan Arnold a drop on that end-zone miss—he had to reach high to bring it down as he was falling. But the Fargo kid will re-live the one that got away this offseason.
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Caught part of the Westwood One radiocast of Rams-Saints. Interesting sideline report from Ed Werder after a first-quarter series by the Rams. Werder said the sideline was “frantic” in trying to fix communication issues with QB Jared Goff’s helmet. Said he tried on three different helmets trying to get one that would allow him the plays called into his helmet by Sean McVay. Nice reporting.
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Then Kurt Warner, in the booth, late in the first quarter: “Really surprised there wasn’t better preparation [for the noise] by the Rams.”
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Michael Brockers, Michael Brockers. You cannot be undisciplined against the Saints, period. But on fourth-and-two at the Rams 10-yard line? Awful job there.
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What a lovely throw, the 36-yard Jared Goff drop-into-a-bucket to Brandin Cooks late in the first half. Best throw of the day in New Orleans.
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Ndamukong Suh was a major impact player for the Rams. He’s playing well late this season.
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I think it is just amazing that franchise back Todd Gurley will finish the 2018 season in a job-share with C.J. Anderson, cut three times by losing teams in the previous nine months.
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My prediction column from Sept. 3 correctly predicted a Rams-Patriots matchup in the Super Bowl.
*******************************************************************************************
https://profootballtalk.nbcsports.c...-rams-saints-patriots-chiefs-fmia-peter-king/
By Peter King
The NFC Championship
Observations on Rams 26, Saints 23:
The play. Rams 20, Saints 20 … 1:49 left in the fourth quarter … third-and-10 at the Rams’ 13-yard line … Drew Brees throws to the right sideline, near the goal line, and as the ball comes near Saints wideout Tommylee Lewis, Rams cornerback interferes with Lewis, slamming into him near the 6-yard-line. No flag. Saints go crazy. If they make the first down, the Saints could have milked the clock because the Rams had only one timeout left.
But instead, no flag and the ball was incomplete. The Saints kicked a chippy field goal by Will Lutz. The Rams, trailing New Orleans 23-20 just inside the two-minute warning, looked cooked. But they drove to a tying field goal and forced overtime. The question: If the flag gets thrown, which is the logical move in retrospect, does the outcome change? The Saints are convinced it does. We’ll never know.
Tommylee Lewis and Nickell Robey-Coleman. (Getty Images)
This is a huge moment for officiating. Will side judge Gary Cavaletto or down judge Patrick Turner, or both, be fired, for missing the most obvious pass interference penalty in playoff history? If the call gets made, it’s conceivable and perhaps likely that the Saints would have made the Super Bowl.
The upshot. As soon as this call got made, I heard from a couple of acquaintances/sources about the impact of it. “Al Riveron [EVP of Officiating] is gone,” one said. “He can’t survive this.” Another said the league will have to pay big to bring back Dean Blandino or Mike Pereira (less likely). I think Riveron was on thin ice before Sunday. What the NFL should do, if it decides to dump Riveron, is pay realistic money to get Blandino back from his cushy gig at FOX. He’s a trusted and trustworthy guy.
Expand replay. Don’t expand the number of challenges a coach can have during a game. Just allow him to challenge a terrible call that he curently cannot challenge.
Let’s not forget Greg the Leg. His 48-yard field goal at the end of regulation tied the game at 23. When the Rams got the ball in overtime, Greg Zuerlein, as is his custom, began to kick the ball into the net on the sideline. When the shaky Drew Brees got picked off on the first drive of overtime, the Rams had a shot.
It resulted in a 57-yard field goal try in OT. How amazing it was that the kick went halfway up the net and would have been good from 68 or 70 yards. “I don’t think about that,” Zeurlein said from New Orleans. “An inch or a mile … if it’s good, it’s good. I don’t think about how much it might have been good from. I just knew I hit that one great.”
-----------------------------------
The Award Section
Jared Goff, quarterback, L.A. Rams. As I wrote in Week 3 (and I questioned this in Goff’s shaky December), it was “time to start recognizing that Goff is playing really good football under Sean McVay, not just caretaking football.”
Goff entered the day a clear number two quarterback in the game to Drew Brees, but then outplayed Brees. Goff justified being the first overall pick in the 2016 draft by leading his team to the Super Bowl in his third pro season. He finished 25 for 40 for 297 yards, throwing one touchdown and one interception. That included lovely completions of 36, 33 and 39 yards.
Greg Zuerlein, kicker, L.A. Rams. A 24-yard field goal to tie the NFC title game at 20 with 5:03 left to play. A 48-yard field goal to tie the NFC title game at 23 with 15 seconds left to play. A 57-yard field goal to win the NFC title game, 26-23, three minutes into overtime. A performance for the ages for Greg the Leg.
Johnny Hekker, punter, L.A. Rams. How similar are the Saints and Rams? They both just love to run risky fake punts in their own territory. New Orleans did it last week down 14-0, with Taysom Hill bulling ahead for a first-down run. In the title game, the Rams were down 13-0 a minute into the second quarter and had a fourth-and-five at their 30-yard line.
Anytime Hekker steps on the field, the defense should be wary of the fake; he’d thrown from punt formation nine times in the previous three years. Here, he did it again, firing it to right gunner Sam Shields for a gain of 12 and the first down. The Rams went on to score to cut the lead to 13-3. That’s the second Hekker-to-Shields fake-punt conversion this season, and both completions went for 12 yards.
-------------------------------
Numbers Game
This will get lost in the mania over the officiating at the end the NFC Championship Game, and maybe it should. But consider these things about the top seed in the NFC down the stretch of the 2018 season:
• Over their last seven games—five regular season, two postseason—the Saints, with a supposedly great offense, averaged a measly 19.7 points per game and went 4-3 (pockmarked by the huge no-call, of course).
• Last seven games: Saints 138, Foes 137.
• Drew Brees played six of the seven games. In those six, he had no games with three or more touchdown passes. In his first 11 games this year, he had seven games with three or more TD passes.
----------------------------
View: https://twitter.com/AndrewBrandt/status/1087119739615363073?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1087119739615363073&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fprofootballtalk.nbcsports.com%2F2019%2F01%2F21%2Fnfl-championship-rams-saints-patriots-chiefs-fmia-peter-king%2F
------------------------------
I thought it best to let readers vent after the non-call in New Orleans that gave the Rams a valuable assist in their NFC title victory. Some of the reaction from more than 200 emails Sunday night:
Doing it for the fans.From Jack F.: “Tell me the league didn’t want Rams in the Super Bowl 53 for television ratings and fan base rebuilding purposes. How does the league explain the no pass interference call against the Rams near the end of the championship game that hurt New Orleans’s chances to score a touchdown? It can’t.”
No favoritism, just incompetence.From Mark Z.: “As a Saints fan that attended today’s game, we are still in the ‘did-that-really-happen?’ mood. It is hard to believe that anyone with an unbiased view would not call PI, and now the league office admitted to Coach Payton that it was helmet to helmet, too. I do not think the refs favored the Rams, just pure incompetence. How can this multi-billion-dollar business preach fairness yet there is no recourse or accountability for this? Just ‘We blew it.’”
One possible fix.From Kevin Z.: “Give teams three challenges per game, and every play is reviewable. If it adds 10 minutes per game, so be it. (Although coaches could be more frugal in using challenges to hold onto them for more important plays late in the game). It’s a small price to pay to ensure career-altering calls are correct.”
Might only get worse.From Billy Q.: “Gambling, in its many easily accessible forms to come, will only exacerbate the emotions around these game altering blown calls.”
Think of the big picture.From Dean W.: “A single call does not lose games. Great game plan by the Rams to slow the game down and put pressure on Brees when it mattered.”
---------------------------
Alvin Kamara > Todd Gurley. At least after Halloween of this season. Markedly.
--------------
Block of the Postseason: On the Saints’ first TD of the game, a Drew Brees throw, Mark Ingram had to pick up the blitzer, Rams linebacker Dante Fowler Jr.
--------------
Tough to give backup Saints tight end Dan Arnold a drop on that end-zone miss—he had to reach high to bring it down as he was falling. But the Fargo kid will re-live the one that got away this offseason.
-------------
Caught part of the Westwood One radiocast of Rams-Saints. Interesting sideline report from Ed Werder after a first-quarter series by the Rams. Werder said the sideline was “frantic” in trying to fix communication issues with QB Jared Goff’s helmet. Said he tried on three different helmets trying to get one that would allow him the plays called into his helmet by Sean McVay. Nice reporting.
------------
Then Kurt Warner, in the booth, late in the first quarter: “Really surprised there wasn’t better preparation [for the noise] by the Rams.”
-------------
Michael Brockers, Michael Brockers. You cannot be undisciplined against the Saints, period. But on fourth-and-two at the Rams 10-yard line? Awful job there.
-----------
What a lovely throw, the 36-yard Jared Goff drop-into-a-bucket to Brandin Cooks late in the first half. Best throw of the day in New Orleans.
-------------
Ndamukong Suh was a major impact player for the Rams. He’s playing well late this season.
-------------
I think it is just amazing that franchise back Todd Gurley will finish the 2018 season in a job-share with C.J. Anderson, cut three times by losing teams in the previous nine months.
---------------
My prediction column from Sept. 3 correctly predicted a Rams-Patriots matchup in the Super Bowl.
