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Sapp to Keyshawn: Be a team player
Week 8 Awards | Factoid
... Click here to send a question to Peter King's NFL Mailbag. ATLANTA -- The Bucs were off Sunday. The only action they saw was on TV. Keyshawn Johnson worked the FOX pregame show. Surprise! I saw Tampa Bay's game/debacle last Thursday night. This is a team trying to do everything with some proficiency, and doing none of it well. I don't blame this on Johnson, though his throw-it-to-me stuff is getting old; he is, after all, on pace for a 72-catch season in an offense that, as he should have known, is built around ball control and the running game. Now, the big controversy in Bucville the last couple of weeks has been the Keyshawn vs. Warren Sapp war over Tampa chemistry. You probably know of it. Sapp, a team guy, was quoted as saying recently that Johnson, a me guy, needs to put away his Jets' jersey and go with the flow of the Bucs. In other words, Sapp thinks Johnson needs to drop his obsession with all things Jets -- and his preoccupation with individual accomplishments over team things -- and become a card-carrying, Dungy-following invisible Buc. "Was I wrong?'' Sapp asked me the other night. "No. I spoke the truth."
Sapp and Johnson are not at war. They like each other. But Sapp is peeved at Johnson for not learning to fit in on a pretty good team. Not peeved to the point where enmity brews, but peeved to the point where Sapp thinks, as he told me, that if the game plan calls for Johnson to block the safety 40 times in a game instead of catching a bushel of passes, he should just block the safety and be a team guy about it. But really, whether Sapp and Johnson are pals is totally irrelevant to the success of this team. Their "feud" is a press thing that has nothing to do with whether Shaun King can hit his receivers in stride or whether Mike Alstott can hang onto the ball, both of which are major problems for this team right now. A month ago, after watching the Bucs dismantle the Lions in Pontiac, I thought the Bucs were a lock for the Super Bowl. They were 3-0. King had played 12 turnover-less quarters. Alstott was classic head-banging Alstott. They're 0-4 since, and I don't blame Johnson's mouth or his recent spate of fumbles. I do blame King, and wonder if this job's too big for him. And I blame the inability of Alstott to be a big-time player when his team needs him most. It all adds up to 3-4. I don't know why I'm saying this, other than blind faith that this team is just too good to be flopping around like this and stranding a very good defense out on the field for 75 plays a game, but I still say the Bucs will be a home team on wild-card weekend. That means they have to pass the 5-2 Giants and 5-3 Eagles and 5-2 Lions, and others, to earn the fourth seed in the playoffs. That means they have to go 7-2 down the stretch, at least, with games against Minnesota, Buffalo, Miami and St. Louis to come. Tall order. Reasonable order, however, for a team with that talent. Week 8 AwardsOFFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Cincinnati RB Corey Dillon, for breaking Walter Payton's 23-year-old rushing record with a 22-carry, 278-yard shredding of the Denver defense. "Exhilarating,'' said Bengals head coach Dick LeBeau. "Embarrassing," said Broncos' linebacker Bill Romanowski. DEFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Tampa Bay DE Marcus Jones, whose four sacks against the Lions set a Bucs team record. What's great about the Tampa Bay front is that any player can be a star any week. This week, it was Jones, who took advantage of Warren Sapp and Booger McFarland occupying three and four blockers to torment Detroit quarterback Charlie Batch. Jones isn't just a garbage man picking up sacks, though. He's a good two-way force against the run and pass. SPECIAL TEAMS PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Tampa Bay K Martin "Automatica'' Gramatica. Did you see his 55-yarder Thursday night? Amazing! I'm in the press box, parallel to the uprights, and I swear that kick (it wasn't his only one; he went 4-for-4, with no chippies, on the night) pass the uprights about three feet from the top of them. That thing would have been good from 65, easy. COACH OF THE WEEK: Kansas City head coach Gunther Cunningham. First-quarter score, in the wake of a tough loss to Oakland seven days before: Chiefs 20, Rams zip. Enough said. Factoid of the Week That May Interest Only MeBuffalo defensive tackle Ted Washington, who weighs 350 on a light day, has two mastiffs. Lightning weighs 267, Thunder 230. They don't have a doghouse. They have a garage, where they sleep on mattresses. "I come home and they're at the door waiting for me,'' Washington said. Hope they've already eaten. The 10 Things I Think I Think1. I think this is a big reason why the NFL is so compelling: Entering Week 8, the league was led in rushing by Charlie Garner, in passing by Kurt Warner and in receiving by Keenan McCardell. I think you could have had any of them in trade for a bag of footballs in 1997. 2. I think, somewhere in the Miami Dolphins cramped Locker Room B at the Meadowlands on Monday before the Jets-Fish game, the following quote will appear on the blackboard: "Rob Konrad can't block his way out of a paper bag." That's what Jets linebacker Bryan Cox said on our CNN NFL Preview show three weeks ago, when I mentioned that Konrad is one of the game's premier young fullbacks. 3. I think these things after being in Tampa for Bucs-Leos (that is not my invention, calling the Lions the "Leos,'' but rather the cool moniker handed them by Detroit News beatman Mike "Friend of Al Gore" O'Hara) on Thursday night: a. Tampa defensive tackle Booger McFarland will play in multiple Pro Bowls. b. The only reason I would ever want to live in Florida (I'm a change-of-seasons guy) is the Waffle House and the drive-through Starbucks, both right down the street from the Bucs' training complex. Nothing like a platter of cheese eggs and a latte to get you going in the morning. c. In what I view as not a positive sign for our society, I took this Peter King Instapoll at the Tampa International Airport on Thursday: Of the 10 men using the urinals in the men's room near the Continental arrival gates, seven of them left the room without washing their hands. Me? Let's just say I was in the minority, thank you very much. d. This is the reason you should never, ever bet on pro football. A month ago, in Detroit, the Bucs beat the Leos 31-10. Thursday, in Tampa, the Bucs lost 28-14. Tampa Bay wins on the road by 21 and loses at home by 14 -- against a team which lost probably its best offensive weapon, Germane Crowell, between the first and second meetings. I beg you: Hang up the phone right now. I know you want to put some dough down on the Jets on Monday night. But believe me, you will not win. e. Are Bobby Ross teams resilient or what? What a coach he is. Every player in the NFL should be lucky enough to play for him for one season. f. This will be lost in everything written about the collapse of the Bucs. When the locker-room door swung open at midnight after the Lions debacle, the five starting Bucs offensive linemen were huddled around center Jeff Christy's locker, animatedly discussing how they could play better. I like that. 4. I think agent Leigh Steinberg can't be too happy about this. His son, Jon, is a freshman at Corona del Mar (Calif.) High whose parents have urged him to play any sport but football. But the kid chose football this fall, and he's a defensive end for the frosh Sea Kings, wearing Steinberg client Bruce Smith's number 78. Recently, he ran off the field after a sack, proudly holding the spoils of the play -- the quarterback's chin strap. The agent of quarterbacks, thus, has bred a son out to destroy them. "This is mortifying,'' the elder Steinberg says. 5. I think these non-football thoughts: a. A message to a well-to-do buddy of mine who was offered and turned down $3,500 per seat for each of his four tickets 10 rows behind the Mets' dugout at Yankee Stadium on Saturday night: Congratulations. Money can't buy you. b. I'm so proud of the now-unranked Montclair (N.J.) High field hockey team, which proved its mettle last week. (You followers of MMQB will forgive my exclusion of the Mounties last week. As the public-relations man for the team, which includes senior right wing Laura King, I was wearing black after our first two losses of the season knocked us out of the state's Field Hockey Top 20.) We bounced back with impressive wins against Hackensack (6-0) and Millburn (5-0). Talk about guts: Our all-state-candidate sweeper, Nikki Cozzolino, broke her right middle finger in two places but refuses to get it set until the season is finished. I'm telling you, these kids are the best. c. I have two tickets to Game 5 at Shea. Two bad ones, but two nonetheless. Now I just hope it goes five. I have my doubts. d. That new Larry David show on HBO, Curb Your Enthusiasm, might be the next Seinfeld. e. I strongly recommend Newsweek's "Dark Side of DiMaggio'' excerpt, from the unauthorized DiMag biography by Richard Ben Cramer. Absolutely incredible. And pathetically, horribly sad. If you're to believe the book, and I do, I am left to ask one question to DiMaggio's ghost: What possibly was the purpose of accumulating all that wealth -- the needless wealth, the wealth that you could never appreciate or share with anyone because you shut everyone out of your life -- at the expense of being a decent human being? f. The reason these postseason baseball games are so maddening: Between the last out in the fifth inning and the first pitch in the sixth Saturday night, there was a break of two minutes, 56 seconds -- with commercials for The X Files, Amstel Light, Powertel, Infiniti, Amstel Light again, and Major League Baseball. For some reason, I think this should be baseball, not commercialball. h. The Falcons' story in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution was on page eight of the sports section. The Falcons failed to sell out the home game with the rival Saints for the eighth consecutive year. Strange. The Falcons have never caught on here. 6. I think it's the Insanity of the Week that owners are leaning toward adopting a balanced schedule when Houston enters the league in 2002, meaning the so-called "rivalry scheduling'' -- giving each team one game per season against a natural rival -- will almost certainly be scrapped. Ridiculous. Isn't it better for Cincinnati and Carolina, say, to develop a rivalry and for the Giants and Jets to play every autumn than it is for the Giants and Jets or Redskins and Ravens to play each other but once every four years? That's what would happen under the current scheduling plan. If Arizona doesn't have a natural rival, make one, for crying out loud. How did Kansas City, in mid-continent, and Oakland, on the left coast, become rivals? By playing each other! Think of the common good, people! Think future! 7. I think Troy Aikman and Doug Flutie showed they belonged anywhere but out in the pasture Sunday. 8. I think these are my thoughts on college football from the weekend: a. It looks like Michael Vick will need work against the blitz -- and throwing under pressure -- when he shows up with his $13 million signing bonus in the San Diego training camp next summer. b. Big East teams like Miami and Virginia Tech should almost be judged on a different level than teams from good conferences. I mean, on the road, Miami beat Rutgers and Temple by a combined 109-23. Rutgers and Temple do not exist in the Big Ten, or 12. c. I would like to know why Jacksonville would move heaven and earth to hire Steve Spurrier, who likes his golf too much to be one of those insane 15-hour-a-day NFL coaches. I don't see owner Wayne Weaver hiring a guy who works a shorter day than he does. 9. I think this is what a tenuous grip a great team has on greatness: Kurt Warner goes out for a month with a broken pinkie; the Rams pray he misses only the 49ers, Panthers and Giants and is back Nov. 20 against the Redskins. Marshall Faulk goes out, comes back and goes out again with a bum shoulder. The defense, even with Bud Carson back, raises its average to 32.6 points per game allowed. It's incredible how mortal a team can become in three hours. 10. I think the Saints will beat a very good team before the end of the season. Click
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