What was
I thinking?
Posted: Thu October 1,
1998
 Sports Illustrated
NFL writer Paul Zimmerman checks in each Thursday with analysis
of trends and players to watch.
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When I was a little kid, about 80 years ago, and I'd commit
one of the many childhood atrocities I specialized in, my
mother would grip her forehead and exclaim, "God,
where did I go
wrong?"
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Westbrook has been inconsistent for the 'Skins.
(Doug Pensinger/ALLSPORT)
| And, of course, being a smart-mouthed little punk I'd say,
"Well, you remember that time you said we were going
to the movies and we didn't? And remember when you said
you'd stop talking to me if I didn't behave?" And I'd
go on like that until she
either stormed out of the room or smacked me a good
one.
Well, I've been smacked a few good ones after four weeks of
the season, and like my mother, I'm gripping my forehead
and asking where I went wrong. And all you sharpshooters
out there are only too eager to let me know, as if I
couldn't figure it out for
myself. And after watching Washington, which I'd picked as
a 9-7 playoff team, take the pipe against Denver, and
particularly after that depressing show that Tampa Bay, my
13-3 Super Bowl entry, put on against Detroit Monday night,
I sat down and tried
to figure how I could have been so wrong about these teams,
and, of course, a few others (I won't burden you with the
ones I was right about because today we're into
self-flagellation).
I read Washington as a yes-but team: yes,
Michael
Westbrook could burn deeply but he also had a lot of screw-up in
him. Yes,
Gus
Frerotte has a live arm and a killer instinct, but why did he
regress so badly last year? Yes,
Dana
Stubblefield and
Dan
Wilkinson were brought in for big bucks to shore up a woeful run
defense, but they hadn't done it yet. And so on. But I
liked
Norv
Turner's coaching, particularly his feel for the soft spots in
the defense and his play-calling to match, and I had a lot
of faith in his ability to get things on the right track. A
9-7 record seemed about right, and don't forget, most
people picked them to
win the
division.
What's happened is that the Redskins have become one of the
league's foul-up teams, right up there with the Bucs, and,
of course, the Bears, but no one expected anything from
Chicago anyway. The Skins were in each game for the first
half, thanks mostly
to a serious attack mentality on offense, not under
Frerotte, whose lack of a grasp of Turner's offense soured
the coach very early, but under young
Trent
Green. Then they'd screw it up, and by the middle of the third
quarter they were generally out of it—in every single
game. And against Denver last week they flatly quit at the
end.
The buts dominated the yesses, and what's worse is that
players who were outstanding last year have flopped. Has
anyone seen
Ken
Harvey? he inspirational leader of the defense is just another
guy now. There's no pressure from either side of the
pass-rush unit. Stubblefield and Wilkinson are big bodies,
but that's about it. Stubby's been a zero. I saw a serious
bull-rush from Wilkinson
exactly four times this season, and I've watched every one
of the Redskins' games. Against the run, well, these guys
occupy space and generally hold their ground, but there's
no ball awareness, which the great interior linemen, such
as the 49ers'
Bryant
Young,
possess.
The defensive coordinator,
Mike
Nolan, is sound but not bold. There is very little of the
creative blitzing that is in vogue nowadays, no bringing a
pair of linebackers, or a linebacker and DB in tandem, no
bringing a corner off the wing. So enemy QBs sit back and
pick them apart, and
usually the target is
Cris
Dishman, who had a Pro Bowl season in in '97 but is a pigeon
now.
The offense has its culprits, too. Left guard
Tré
Johnson is one of the league's booming drive blockers, but when
someone's going to make the big error at a crucial time,
it's generally him. And what's with
Terry
Allen? Yes, he runs hard, but he fumbles, too, and drops passes
and misses blitz pickups. And this is one of the team
leaders.
Worst of all is the mentality. They have a loser's
mentality.
How are we going to screw this one up? We know it's gonna
happen, the only question is
when. Yes,
I picked them to beat
Dallas this weekend anyway, only because
I felt that they've simply got to break out of it sometime.
I'll probably be wrong again about them. Too much faith in
Turner. Too much belief that a team simply can't drop this
low so
soon.
Which brings us to my biggest mistake of all—so
far—Tampa Bay (unless you count the Saints, and don't
worry, I'm gonna get to
them).
Why did I like the Bucs for the Super Bowl? Because I felt
that last year they were on a mission, and now, a year
older and steadier, fortified by a pair of action wideouts,
Jacquez
Green and
Bert
Emanuel, they were ready to make a move. Well, Green and Emanuel
have been hurt.
Reidel
Anthony is a catch-one, drop-one guy,
Karl
Williams is the kind of receiver you find on bad teams, willing
enough but unable to shake the coverage.
Trent
Dilfer has no one to throw to so he tries to improvise, and in
that department he's not in the class of a
Brett
Favre or a
Steve
Young. (Who is?) So he tries, but he's a little too mechanical
for that, too
programmed.
Shorn of a passing game, the Bucs face defenses that gang
up to stop the run, and except for the second half in Week
3 against the Bears—who were pulling one of their
typical, weird second-half folds—that's what has
happened. And the defense, frustrated
by the impotence of the attack, eventually cracks. Against
Detroit on Monday night, everyone packed it in at the same
time.
I thought Tampa Bay's defense would be really special this
year. I saw two real standouts on this unit, and one who
could be. I loved weakside LB
Derrick
Brooks and left cornerback
Donnie
Abraham, and I still do.
Warren
Sapp, an All-Pro last year, puzzles me. In '97, well, O.K., he
was hurt part of the time, but I read him as a real
up-and-downer, capable of huge games, but usually a
one-play-on, one-play-off type of performer. I felt that
the guys who picked him for the
Pro Bowl simply didn't understand football. This year? Well,
I thought he'd step up (cancel that, I hate that
expression) ... I thought he'd take it upon himself to
become the guy the defense rallied around. Uh-uh. Still an
up-and-downer. What's in his
head?
I keep feeling that things will change for the Bucs once
the injured wideouts return, but after watching the Detroit
debacle I'm not so sure. Last year when they needed big
plays, they made them. The concentration level was up,
people played over their
heads. But on Monday I didn't see any of that, and this was
a whipped-doggy, downbeat team at the end. This shouldn't
be happening, particularly to a group with youth on its
side.
On to New Orleans. By my preseason projection the Saints
should have been 0-3 at this point, heading for a 1-15
year. Well, 3-0 can't be much farther off the mark. O.K.,
they've beaten stiffs, but the point is they won. In August
I saw no
quarterbacking, one qualified receiver in
Andre
Hastings, a running attack spinning its wheels behind a so-so line,
and a defense without one of its real leaders, MLB
Winfred
Tubbs, who's now a 49er. I saw a lot of ranting and raving by
Mike
Ditka and I gave him about as much of a chance as I did King
Lear. When that hazing story broke in the preseason, I
figured, Oh boy, here we
go.
Then I watched them against Indianapolis last weekend.
Granted, the Colts are flawed, but they did put up a battle
against Miami and New England for a while, and the game was
at Indy. What I saw in the Saints was a team that played
hard—for four
quarters and an overtime. When things got gloomiest, when they were
backed up on their own four-yard-line with 2:49 left,
needing seven points to send the contest into OT, by God
they got them—somehow. The weakest part of the Saints'
game, pass-catching,
produced big plays, circus
catches.
They run the ball in a stubborn, relentless manner,
hammering defenses that load up to stop them. The O-line is
good enough—determined, actually. They do a nice job
going outside the tackles, getting serious blocking from
tight
end Cam Cleeland
and fullback
Ray
Zellars. They keep coming back to the same play. They don't get
cute.
Defensively,
Kevin
Mitchell, their new MLB, is doing all the things he never did in
San Francisco, when he was being groomed as the heir
apparent to
Gary
Plummer. A terrific noseguard at Syracuse, with a real knack for
being around the ball, he has translated those instincts to
the mike-backer position.
Joe
Johnson's a real force at one end.
Wayne
Martin has always been one of the NFL's most unsung defensive
tackles; he's not as active as he used to be, but he's
sound. The other linemen—the Saints rotate
them—are basically overachievers.
La'Roi
Glover, a backup tackle with the Raiders, for instance, has found
a real home with this unit. I've always liked weakside
linebacker
Mark
Fields and now he's playing at Pro Bowl
level.
This has gotten the Saints three wins against teams less
motivated and less driven than they were. What lies ahead,
when teams like the Patriots and 49ers and Bucs come
calling, remains to be seen. I know one thing for sure: The
Saints definitely will
not go 1-15, as one loony in New Jersey
predicted.
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