Day 760 Tuesday February 5, 2019
636 Days to the 2020 election and 714 Days to Inauguration Day
In this screed I will reveal how and why the Patriots won the Super Bowl and why Democrats should let Ralph Northam alone, and the latest Trumpian news.
The Patriots won the Super Bowl because “they put more points on the board.” That’s the why. Stunning. I know. But you’ve come to expect such in depth hard hitting analysis. How they did it is even more interesting and it comes down to three things: they don’t make mistakes, they have one play, they wait for the other team to err. Two of the three items are pretty obvious so I won’t expound. The third, the one play, is interesting. It’s the play Tom Brady has used over and over again, and they typically use it on the final drive to win the game.
Gronk is split left. There’s the little tough wiry guy on the right who is going to run to the center of the field by going out and cutting sharp left. Currently, that guy is Edelman. There are two other receivers: one is to the right and runs to the outside at an angle looking for the ball over his right shoulder, the other blocks in the backfield and then break off to receive the ball is Tom gets in trouble. That’s it. That’s the play. Who gets the ball depends on how the defense is covering the receivers. If they are playing man-to-man then Tom will throw to Gronk because he’s bigger and stronger than most people and has a high probability of getting the ball. Defenses will try to hide the fact they are playing man-to-man for this reason. More than likely they are playing a zone defense and typically that defense is “cover 2.”
In this defense two men called safeties are far back to prevent a deep ball. One is closer in on the side where more receivers are located at the beginning of the play. This is called the strong side and this player is referred to as the strong safety. The other player is a little farther back and has the responsibility of being the last line of defense and is the defensive signal caller, having to recognize the offensive formation and call adjustments appropriately. If the defense lines up this way, which Tom can recognize due to the safeties being back a bit more and the outside two defenders being split out with the receivers then he knows he’s facing Cover 2. The weakness of this defense is that there is an open area in the middle of the field. This is where the wiry tough little guy comes in. He cuts across the field and Tom passed the ball to him for a gain of six or seven yards before he gets popped hard. This used to be Wes Walker. When Wes was playing that position he told Tom to throw him the ball in practice as hard as he could so he, Wes, would know what to expect in a game. It’s a tough position.
As the play develops, that is after the ball is snapped, Tom has a few split seconds to see who is double covered and who is single covered. He throws to the single covered man or the completely open person, which can happen if someone gets confused on the defensive coverage. Brady also has the ability to accurately pass the ball when he has to into double and triple coverage, but he rarely takes the chance. Most of the time he doesn’t need to do it. On the big pass play to Gronk he recognized Cover 2 and kept the defensive players guessing where he was going to throw the ball by looking to the right side of the field for as long as possible. Only at the split second before releasing did he look to his left and where he knew Gronkowski would be. By then it was too late for other players to get to the tight end in time to help out. Catch, Completion. First Down in the Red Zone. Touchdown to follow.
This is Brady’s bread and butter play. Although he’s been using it ever since he started playing football, teams still can’t stop it.
Every quarterback seems to have a signature “go-to” play. I watched Matt Ryan live, then of Boston College, beat Clemson with a looping long pass to the left corner of the end zone. A few weeks later he did the same play against Virginia Tech. The next year while playing for the Falcons he did it again. Other quarterbacks depend on running either to the side or straight up the field. Although this may advance the ball it’s easy to get hurt and not a good strategy for a long life expectancy in the game.
Okay, on to the latest. Only one or two legal things and two stupid things concerning our president, but first.
Let’s talk about Ralph! Northam “the embattled governor of Virginia.” Okay. There’s a photo in his med school yearbook and it’s not good. It’s racist and it’s on the same page as he is on. Is it him? Did he know about it? Did he act in a racially insensitive way 33 years ago? The answer is “yes,” “no,” and “maybe.” He hasn’t helped his case by seeming to say all three. He’s kind of a milk toast meek guy. Could he have done or not done any of the things alleged? Yup, I think so. Here’s what I don’t understand. Why do Democrats, both black and white, rush to show how offended they are? It can be about race or sexual abuse. Look what happened to Franken, they piled on before he even got a chance to defend himself. And what did Franken do? It seems nothing like what was alleged. Who did the accusing? A woman linked to the dirty trickster Roger Stone. In this case the people bringing up this stuff are linked to Roy Moore and maybe Corey Stuart.
I mean really? Is all you have to do to get rid of an opponent is to find a photo from thirty years ago? It’s not enough to say you’re sorry, or it’s not you, or you’ve done some insensitive things in the past. And what about the people piling on? I sure hope they haven’t done anything stupid in their lives.
What happened to all the talk about sticking together? Are you going to let a small band of feral right wing haters pick off some of your weak? Give me, and him, a break.
Hey, I know, let’s dress someone up to look like an MS-13 gang member (tattoos on the face, mean look) and have him photoed near your opponent.
Ever onward. Trump’s inauguration committee is under investigation. Why would anyone do that? Oh, he got tons of money. Had a smaller crowd and unknown low paid performers so where did the money go, and where did it come from? Some came from Russians wanting a ticket to the ball. Some got paid to Melainia’s personal fashion person to arrange the inauguration, but she didn’t do that, and that money went to pay off someone. Was it the Russian hackers that Cohen went to Europe to pay off? I forget. So other than money coming in from people who shouldn’t have been giving money and money going out to pay out bribes or for services rendered for illegal activities that undermine the fundamentals of our democracy there really isn’t much to see here. Except, wire fraud, bank fraud, illegal contributions and three of four other charges. Moving along.
The Trump University is still under investigation and they were mentioned recently too. I forget why.
And the Mueller investigation is chugging along. Oh yeah, the stuff the FBI seized from Cohen is the basis for a lot of this and is now being corroborated by the stuff seized from Stone.
Don’t you love Trump and Stone going on about Nazi tactics? I mean Mr. “it’s okay to remove your hand when you shove them in a police car” and Mr.”there’s going to be civil war if Trump is impeached” are saying the FBI over reacted. Really? Wait a second. Florida has a “stand your ground law” right? Roger Stone has been known to advocate violence toward the government and advocated the carrying of a weapon right? So if you were an unpaid FBI agent and you wanted to make sure you would return from a raid of a person who advocated such positions and hung out with others who advocated even more violent positions what would you do?
My only question on Stone is, as one person asked, “will he fold like a cheap lawn chair?”
It remains to be seen.
At least he’s not facing El Chapo. Man. That guy burned one of his adversaries with an iron for three days and tortured him and then threw him gasping for air into an open pit and buried him alive – nice guy.
Meanwhile, it’s been revealed that not only does Trump show up late to the office, but once he gets there he does nothing. Most of his day is spent in “Executive Time.” Watching TV, calling buddies on an unsecured cell phone, and tweeting. The intelligence community has tried to get him to read their reports by dumbing them down to one or two pages, and including lots of pictures. It’s still too much for the old man to do. And – get this – they were told not to tell Trump things that he has disagreed with publicly, because it will make him angry. Oh no, let’s not tell Donnie de truth, it might make his little bitty head explode.
OMG! Gag me with a spoon. Where’s the iron? Start digging the pit. I got a inductee.
636 Days to the 2020 election and 714 Days to Inauguration Day
PS Shelby and Stone (not Roger!) and Moon (not Roger!)
Kathy Goodwind says
Thank you!