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Mailbag: Jets fans and Joey Buttafuoco
Posted: Friday January 15, 1999 12:45 PM
Got a question or comment for Dr. Z? Click here. I always answer the roughest first. Bill Devlin of New York is an outraged Jets fan and we know why: the line in this week's column about the Joey Buttafuoco clones in the stands. My wife warned me about this one when I was writing the piece. "You know something? You're not as funny as you think you are," she said. "You're going to get in trouble on this one." So now I'm in trouble. Hey, Bill, ride with it. Don't take it so seriously. Obviously I don't mean that Jets fans are convicted felons. I know at least three who aren't, Nancy Critchley from Morris Plains, Tommy Cappuccino from Springfield and ... and ... gimme time, I'll think of the third one. I'm just tired of all these yahoos who slap me on the back when I'm in United Cigar, buying my papers and stogies. "Hey, how about those Jets?" etc., etc. The preceding also applies to Giants fans. Once, when I was on a TV talk show, the guy asked me, "What do you think of Giant fans?" I told him I preferred normal-sized ones. Silence. Clunk. See what you're up against in this business? Dan of Whippany, N.J. (right around the corner from where I live), and Herb of Manhattan Beach, Calif. , are both upset because of the lax coverage that permitted a Jacksonville TD at the end of the first half last weekend. I ran my tape back. You're absolutely right, da bot' a yez. The Jets should have been in a guard-the-goal-line prevent instead of a normal dime defense. And why the big grandstand play with Keyshawn Johnson playing a deep centerfield at the end of the game, in a meaningless situation, when the end of the first half was really the time to use it, if they really believed this was such a hot-stuff thing? Lax D-calling, laxity on the part of your faithful narrator for not picking it up earlier. Again, Dan of Whippany (I devote full recognition to neighbors): Who does Wayne Chrebet remind me of? Hmmmm. Gotta think that one through. Great slot receivers in history, particularly running the crossing pattern at the sticks. I'm sure I'll come up with a bunch of Hall of Famers after I file this, but right now one guy keeps coming to mind. This is going to shock you. Remember Lou Piccone ? Speedy little shrimp who washed out with the Jets and then became a hero in Buffalo. I watch Chrebet and then close my eyes and there's Louie. Can't help it. James Timothy of Pittsburgh introduces many points, which I will answer one by one because right now I don't have much else to do, except watch the snowflakes falling on my car. Point No.1: Keyshawn running out of bounds on the reverse, late in the game. Yeah, I picked up on it, but I just didn't want to crowd the point I was making, which centered on a much more significant play, the ill-fated pass. Sometimes you weaken your point by bringing in too much extraneous matter. Point No. 2, and this will cover Katy, Texas' S. Kalapatapu's thought as well: Falcons over the Vikings? Yes, it's possible, if the Atlanta running game can get it going and Chris Chandler has enough time to find the holes in the zone, but I don't like two areas as much as you do -- Falcons' secondary (Buchanan's good but Robinson missed too many tackles vs. the Niners. Is he starting to wear down?) and their O-line. I'm not that big a Whitfield fan. It's a fairly well-coordinated unit, but not as good as the Vikes' front five. I do agree with you about Atlanta's defensive front -- and I include all three LBs -- which is terrific. Finally, J.T. 's comment about the inability of supposed analysts to really try to figure out what's happening out there. What can I say? I do my thing, they do theirs. It's not professional to rip fellow writers, although the TV guys are fair game, and as we know by now, I agree with you fully in that department. I'll tell you a funny story. A long one. Fasten your seat belt. The year was 1970. I was working for the New York Post, covering the late game on the divisional-playoff weekend, Miami at Oakland. I was trying to watch the early game, Cincinnati at Baltimore, on the only decent TV monitor they'd set up in the Coliseum, in the press dining room. It always has amazed me how little attention is paid to the first game by the guys covering the other one, even when it's at the conference-championship level and they'd need the information for their Super Bowl advances. So there I am, trying to chart the game, and a steady stream of people is going by, spilling drinks, sandwiches, potato chips, etc. Very nerve-wracking work. Dave Bergen , the sports editor of the San Francisco Examiner, taps me on the shoulder. "I've got to talk to you," he says. I tell him, "Later, I'm trying to chart the game." "This is important," he says. "SO IS WHAT I'M DOING, DAMMIT!" I holler, and he splits. I find out some weeks later that he was prepared to offer me the lead sports columnist job for the Examiner, but I acted like such a pain in the butt that he bagged it and hired, instead, Wells Twombley from Houston. Twombley, almost overnight, became a Bay Area celebrity. Would I have accepted? In a minute. My whole life would have changed, and I probably wouldn't be sitting here writing this now, with my lovely red-headed bride at my side, and an ex-wife a few miles away, still figuring out ways to get even. See what happens when you're a chart freak? Did I mention that I am thankful for your nice words about my work? Oh, I didn't? Here it is then. I am thankful for your nice words about my work. To Brian of Lynn, Mass. : Again, thanks. Dick Jauron for the Bears or Ravens' job? A long shot at best, but here's an interesting angle. Mike McCaskey , the Bears' prez, is a Harvard guy, Jauron is a Yalie. If they want to keep it in the Ivy League, well, stranger things have happened. To M.A. from Australia by way of Portland : Your comments were greatly appreciated, and it's sentiments such as these that make the job worthwhile. Don't want to sound like some sort of thank-you machine, but what can I say except, again, thanks. To Matt of Brownsville : Ray Rhodes will not mess with the Green Bay offense. He let Jon Gruden run it completely in Philly and Gruden was a mere baby at the time. Ray is a good defensive coach. His personnel choices killed him with the Eagles, but Ron Wolf won't let that happen. Rhodes needed a strong organization behind him, and he didn't get it in Philadelphia. Wolf won't let the offense be run by a stiff, don't worry. How will Ray do in Green Bay? Depends on how they do in free agency. I don't see them slipping out of playoff-level. To Jim in Cleveland : Don't understand your point. Niners called their second timeout against Atlanta with 1:47 left and their last one at 1:40. The problem was giving up the first down to the Falcons, not in the handling of timeouts. To Ajay in Santa Clara : The West Coast Offense, the true West Coast Offense, is as follows, in very basic terms: A passing philosophy developed by San Diego Chargers coach Sid Gillman in the 1960s. He told me he got the basic concepts from Francis "Shut the Gates of Mercy" Schmitt , who coached Sid at Ohio State in the 1930's. Spread the field, hit the seams, everything on rhythm, everything thrown on the break, heavy concentration on precise timing between receiver and passer, mid-range area, with deep posts and corner patterns off that. Al Davis , a devotee of Gillman, adopted it at Oakland, although he placed more emphasis on the downfield attack. Don Coryell , the coach at San Diego State and a frequent guest at Gillman's training-camp practices, picked up many of its elements, and then further developed it with the St.Louis Cardinals and the Chargers. Coryell assistants at San Diego State, Joe Gibbs and Ernie Zampese , took it to Washington and the Los Angeles Rams, respectively. Norv Turner , who worked with Zampese in L.A., brought it to Dallas, and then Washington. It was first given the name, West Coast Offense, in 1993 when Bernie Kosar was the backup QB in Dallas. I'd like to flatter myself that I gave it life, since once, when I interviewed Kosar and asked him about Turner's offense, he said, "You know, the Zampese-Coryell-Gillman West Coast Offense," and I wrote it, but he might have told others the same thing, although I never saw it elsewhere. We always take particular pride in accepted nicknames or phrases that we've had a hand in creating, or developing (it was your faithful narrator who first dubbed Daryle Lamonica "The Mad Bomber," in honor of a poor soul named George Metesky , who was planting bombs in the subways of New York at the time ... honest ... you could look it up), but I don't flatter myself that I was the only one Bernie told about the West Coast Offense. Bill Walsh 's offense was something he called the Cincinnati System, named for the attack he developed to accommodate a smart, mobile quarterback named Virgil Carter who took over in 1970 when Walsh's sensational long-ball rookie, Greg Cook , was lost with a shoulder injury. Walsh was the Bengals' offensive coach at the time. The system relied on movement in the pocket, lots of motion, and a short, horizontal passing game incorporating a system of optional reads between QB and receiver, and lots of breakoffs. (If Cook hadn't have been hurt, the system would have been entirely different -- much more downfield stuff). Anyway, Walsh took his horizontal passing attack with him to San Francisco, where Montana and Young won Super Bowls with it. It was copied throughout the league, and writers inaccurately gave it the name, West Coast Offense. You know -- San Francisco equals West Coast (Sometimes these things aren't too carefully thought out). For a while Walsh used to get very upset at the incorrect naming of his system. "I wish they'd call it the Cincinnati Offense, or even the Walsh Offense," he'd say, but no one listened. Just as no one ever listens to me when I rant and rave about the misnaming of the true West Coast Offense. It's like trying to knock down a wall by throwing cherries at it, and I've just about given up. Ignorance prevails. Prevails? Hell, it runs rampant. Runs riot. Runs amok. Just turn on the TV set. Does this answer your question? (Whew, time to eat dinner after that one). To Josh of Tempe : Corey Chavous is a fine young cornerback. Unfortunately he gets everyone's undivided attention because it makes more sense to go at him than at Aeneas. Wadsworth and Rice are around-the-corner rushers who usually get there late. Rice has been working on his inside rush a bit, Wadsworth hasn't gotten there yet. When, and if, they develop a bull rush and inside moves to go with their speed-rushes, I'll take them seriously, but not yet. My favorite Cardinals D-lineman is Mark Smith. Eric Swann could be, if he'd go hard every play. To Mark of Bloomington : Kyle Brady's domination of Simeon Rice goes back to college days, eh? Thanks for the info. Very interesting. Will have to get Kyle's take on it when I see him this weekend. Got a question or comment for Dr. Z? Click here.
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