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Bar Chat

01/15/2015

What Now For Peyton?

NHL Quiz: Name the six Red Wings to score 50 goals in a season. [Hint: Two did it in the 70s, none before then, which I find shocking.] Answer below.

Ohio State 42 Oregon 20

This game had its moments, but in the end the Ohio State Buckeyes won their first national title since 2002, sixth since the start of the poll era in 1936, while Oregon is still seeking its first in school history.

The Ducks marched down the field with the first score, but then the Buckeyes got the next three touchdowns for a 21-7 lead, 21-10 at half, and while Oregon cut it to 21-20 mid-way through the third, it was all Ohio State, or rather all Ezekiel Elliott after that.

For a third straight game, Elliott rushed for over 200 yards and a new personal best, this time 36 carries for 246 and four touchdowns, all championship game records, in a memorable display of power and speed.

Ohio State also shook off four turnovers (to Oregon’s one), three of them fumbles, while in many respects third-string quarterback Cardale Jones outplayed Heisman Trophy winner Marcus Mariota, Jones going 16/23, 242, 1-1. Mariota was 24/37, 333, 2-1, with only 39 yards on the ground on 10 carries. The Ducks’ offense misfired time and time again in the red-zone and while the Oregon receivers had some key early drops, Mariota also overthrew them on a number of critical drives. [Though for the record the Ducks were without their top two receivers, Devon Allen and Darren Carrington, as well as their top tight end, Pharaoh Brown.]

For the game Ohio State outgained Oregon 538-465, with the Buckeyes’ defense limiting the Oregon running attack to 132 yards on 33 carries. The Ducks’ longest run was 12 yards.

So those are all the basic facts. For Ohio State, it was the completion of a remarkable turnaround after that early season loss at home to Virginia Tech.

“The chase is complete,” said coach Urban Meyer. “It’s done. It’s over. They accepted their final mission, their final assignment and their final directive, and they did it.”

Meyer is one helluva coach, as good as they come. He now has three national championships, the other two when he was at Florida.

There has never been a team that lost two Heisman Trophy candidates at quarterback as the Buckeyes did with injuries to Braxton Miller and J.T. Barrett.

Yet if Cardale Jones and Barrett come back (let alone Braxton Miller, though there have been persistent rumors he’ll transfer), and with Elliott returning, plus key players on defense, why not repeat? Jones, a third-year sophomore, could also opt to come out. In his three starts, beating Wisconsin for the Big 10 championship, No. 1 seed Alabama in the Sugar Bowl, and now Oregon, Cardale threw seven touchdowns with just two picks.

How high would Jones go in the draft? Is Mariota still a sure-fire No. 1 overall selection?

Both Jones and Mariota have until Thursday to decide to go pro or not. [Jones, at least as I post, said he’s not ready for the NFL.]

Most National Championships

Alabama 10
Notre Dame 8
Oklahoma 7
USC 7
Ohio State 6

Ohio State is 9-0 against Oregon, its best record against any school in program history.

Elliott is the first player in school history with 3 straight 200-yrd rushing games.

Urban Meyer joined Nick Saban as the only coaches in the poll era to win a national championship at multiple schools.

“There was nothing fancy about any of it, nothing cute, nothing especially memorable, except for one thing: Ohio State took all the basic elements of the sport, turned back the clock, and gave an old-school thumping to a new-age band of Oregon Ducks.

“ ‘There’s nothing that cleanses your soul like getting the hell kicked out of you,’ an old football philosopher named Woody Hayes once said. And Ohio State 42, Oregon 20, in this first-ever College Football Playoff Championship...well, that was a cleansing and a half.....

“But Woody was about smash-mouth, he was about hard-nose, he was about steel-jaw, rock-ribbed. He would have liked what has become of his Buckeyes. He would have enjoyed Meyer’s game plan, and not just because his father, Bud, used to keep a portrait of Woody on a wall of the Meyer family home in Ashtabula, Ohio.

“No: the old man would have liked how simple the Buckeyes kept things Monday night, sharing a field with the Oregon Ducks and their high-flying pyrotechnic offense. He would have liked seeing his old team – bedecked in the traditional scarlet and gray – having their way with Oregon and its color-of-the-moment, which in this moment included a uniform absent any trace of school colors....

“Yes, Meyer is the coach of the moment, and seems sure to be the coach of the future, certainly at Ohio State, maybe in the whole sport, where he and Nick Saban can now have an exclusive dinner if they’d like, the two of them sitting with their championship rings won at two different schools.

“But Bud Meyer’s son did grow up with that picture on the wall. Monday night, he honored it, in the only way Woody Hayes would have wanted to be honored: with a no-doubt, no-hassle, no-frills victory.

“ ‘Without winners,’ he once said, ‘there wouldn’t even be any civilization.’”

“It was a momentum rush, all right, a wave that couldn’t be stopped.

“The game plan Monday was to get a lead and wear the other team out in the fourth quarter.

“Everyone who thought Oregon would be taking the lead on this, however, had the wrong team, the wrong color, and definitely the wrong score.

“It was the scarlet and gray of Ohio State that dictated the terms and the tempo, not the green from Eugene.

“A tall quarterback with a strong arm made all the big plays when they counted, but it wasn’t the Heisman Trophy winner. It was a third-stringer who didn’t make his first college start until after Thanksgiving.

“Ohio State’s 42-20 victory over Oregon on Monday at AT&T Stadium didn’t merely complete the greatest coaching job in the modern era of college football, it put Meyer into a different echelon. As of today, the chase is on not only to surpass Saban as the greatest coach of his time, but perhaps enter the conversation as the greatest of all-time....

“Say what you will about the state of Florida’s program at the time Meyer left, whether he had let the talent level decline, whether he looked the other way too often while a knucklehead culture was poisoning what he and Tim Tebow had built.

“Those were legitimate questions and criticisms of Meyer at the time, and perhaps even now, but atonement has come at Ohio State more quickly and to a greater degree than anyone could have imagined....

“Meyer has now coached 41 games at Ohio State. He has won 38 of them. His first Buckeyes team, which went 12-0 albeit against a weak schedule, might have played for a national championship if it hadn’t been under an NCAA-imposed bowl ban. His second team was essentially a quarter away from playing for the title last season until Michigan State came from behind to win the Big Ten championship game.

“And this team, well, what it accomplished was pretty much impossible, so much so that Meyer himself didn’t believe it could win a national title until its 59-0 win over Wisconsin in the Big Ten title game.

“ ‘I think we all learn lessons through our coaching career, and if you start making excuses, players respond and use excuses,’ Meyer said. ‘If I hear it from a coach, it’s a bad day. If I hear it from a player, we have to get it fixed. Excuses cause problems. You hear ‘next man up’ all the time, but how many actually do it? We’re not perfect because there’s times our team didn’t do it, but this is a unique team.’

“A team that won the first College Football Playoff as a No. 4 seed, which is perhaps the biggest indictment ever of the old BCS system whose proponents so proudly said produced the right championship matchup year after year.

“A team that beat everyone with just seven senior starters and no underclassmen leaving for the NFL....

“Saban won a BCS title in his fourth year at LSU and third at Alabama. Meyer did it in his second at Florida and third at Ohio State. That doesn’t happen by accident, and when you throw in Meyer’s unbeaten season at Utah in 2004, the resume gap starts to get pretty narrow.”

One final note on the national championship...it dew an 18.5 overnight Nielsen rating. A 21% increase over the 2014 BCS national championship.

--Separately, the NCAA and Penn State are in discussions to ease some of their sanctions and restore the 111 wins stupidly taken away from Joe Paterno’s record. From the Philadelphia Inquirer:

“Details of the negotiations were unclear Monday but the talks seemed designed to stave off a looming court battle and drown out a longstanding drumbeat of criticism from Penn State alumni and Paterno supporters.”

In November, as part of the discovery process prior to an upcoming trial challenging the validity of the consent decree that had Penn State paying $60 million, losing scholarships, the bowl ban, and the wins taken away, “emails from 2012 were released that revealed some NCAA officials feared that the body did not have the authority to penalize Penn State. One email described the NCAA’s proposal of harsh sanctions as a ‘bluff,’ one the body hoped the school would be too embarrassed by the Freeh report to fight.” [Des Bieler / Washington Post]

--Big going’s on in Denver. Coach John Fox was shown the door, but what of Peyton Manning? Plus Jack Del Rio, the defensive coordinator, appears to be the leading candidate for the Raiders job, unless he becomes head coach in Denver. Adam Gase, the offensive coordinator, is a candidate for several teams with head coaching vacancies, but if he leaves, the odds grow that Manning retires.

Mark Maske of the Washington Post wonders if there is any way Mike Shanahan would return to Denver? Sounds nuts, but is it? Shanahan and John Elway, the chief decision-maker these days, won two Super Bowls together, after all.

So right now we still have vacancies in Denver, Oakland (Jack Del Rio the favorite), San Francisco, Atlanta and Chicago.

The Jets are going with Todd Bowles. I like the choice. After hiring Mike Maccagnan to be the new general manager, Bowles, the former Arizona Cardinals defensive coordinator, was hired just hours later.

New York, along with just about all the other teams listed above, were courting Seattle’s Dan Quinn, but he could be involved another few weeks so rather than wait, and risk losing out to someone else anyway, the Jets snapped up Bowles.

Bowles grew up in Elizabeth, NJ, he played safety in the NFL from 1986-93, was first hired by Bill Parcells when he was Jets GM, and was the Cardinals defensive coordinator the past two seasons, ranking sixth and fifth in the league in points allowed.

--As for Rex Ryan and the Buffalo job, as I noted last time, unlike many Jets fans I don’t mind him staying in the division. Just makes things more interesting. And let’s face it, Rex is perfect for Buffalo. But thank god the Jets quickly realized former Bills coach Doug Marrone wasn’t the man for them.

So Rex had his first news conference on Wednesday, predicting he will “build a bully” that opposing teams won’t want to face. One thing is for sure, he’s inherited a very good defense that was fourth in the NFL in yards allowed.

“He’s baaaaack. And lo and behold, he’s baaaaack from Rexile as Woody Johnson’s worst nightmare.

“He is Buffalo Rex, no longer as big as a buffalo, about to plow through the snow and find himself a new tattoo parlor and pick up where Doug Marrone left off before Marrone left with his $4 million bounty hoping to replace Rex as HC of the NYJ.

“And lo and behold: Rex will need a veteran quarterback, and Mark Sanchez is a free agent! Is it likely? No. Is it impossible? Have you seen the free-agent quarterback crop?

“And what if...what if Darrelle Revis decides to put his money where his mouth is and leave Belichick for a reunion with his beloved Rex?....

“You better believe Rex will be looking to raid the Jets for a few of his favorite disciples.....

“The tortured history of the Jets virtually guarantees that Rex will turn into Vince Lombardi and every Play Like A Bill exclamation from him is certain to puncture the eardrums of long-suffering Jets fans.

“Rex had to go out with (GM John) Idzik, four consecutive years out of the playoffs meant it was time, but remember that he was at his best when he blew into our town six years ago and changed the culture with the full force of his bravado and braggadocio. Rex II will be a dangerous foe as he starts anew again now....

“The Bills must let Rex be Rex....

“Turn him loose, and let him blow into One Bills Drive and send out storm warnings to the rest of the AFC East.

“And oh – he won’t be coming there to kiss Belichick’s rings.”

--Jason Garrett and the Cowboys agreed on a new five-year, $30 million deal. He had entered 2014 without a contract extension, but he earned one. Defensive coordinator Rod Marinelli received a three-year deal to remain in his position as well.

--Meanwhile, back to Peyton Manning, it turns out for the last month he played with a torn right quadriceps, as first reported by ESPN’s Adam Schefter. He tore the muscle in the Chargers game on Dec. 14 and for weeks it was reported as a thigh bruise. But an MRI at the time revealed a tear.

Manning was miserable on Sunday against the Colts and was noncommittal after about coming back another year.

“I’m not smart enough to be able to answer every single question about reasons for things,” Peyton said. “But I think... I’ve always taken a pretty accurate look and fair evaluation of myself. I think I’m as honest with myself as anybody else and probably as critical of myself as anybody else is. Didn’t play well enough [against the Colts] and didn’t play well consistently enough in the second half of the season, especially in the games we lost.” [Cindy Boren / Washington Post]

“A hour or so after what could have been the last game of a legendary and certainly Hall of Fame career was concluded, a disappointing end if indeed it is that, Denver Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning stood in the hallway chatting about the league, the game, and his future, when he was suddenly jarred into what is truly important.

“They came running to him, and the gloom of a loss was replaced by the joy of being a father, even if his son was crying because of the loss, a true Manning competitor for sure. Years ago, when I first met Peyton Manning, this would have been one of those days all about football, unable to let it go, heartbroken about the loss. This time, it didn’t feel that way. This felt different.

“Maybe it’s because he knows it’s time. Maybe it’s because he knows the end is here.”

Mr. Prisco goes on to discuss how the Peyton Manning ‘haters’ (my word) can’t appreciate his greatness.

Well, for my part, I have never pooh-poohed his stats, but the playoff record is what it is. 11-13.

“If that turns out to be the great Peyton Manning’s last game, we’ll all certainly understand why.

“Manning turns 39 years old in little more than two months, which means 40 is less than 15 months away. On Sunday...it looked as if that day might already have arrived, for Manning looked every bit his age in a dispiriting, 24-13 loss to his old team, the ninth time in his storied career that he has led a team into the playoffs but has not been able to win a game....

“The Peyton Manning of old would not have had all the badly overthrown passes – six in all – when the Colts defense took away his options in the middle of the field. The old Manning would not have failed to run when 20 yards of open field stared him in the face on third and five at his own 25 on the first drive of the second half.

“Manning was nothing like the quarterback Americans have come to know and respect. He was booed early and often in a surprisingly lackluster effort....

“Now, he and the Broncos have some hard decisions to make.”

Most Playoff Starts at QB – Since 2007 Season

Joe Flacco 15 (10-5)
Tom Brady 13 (7-6)
Peyton Manning 11 (4-7)
Aaron Rodgers 10 (6-4)

Most Times Losing 1st Start of Playoffs – Super Bowl Era (Since 1966)

Elway told Manning to take a few weeks to think things over “and get away from this.”

--Scot McCloughan was named the new GM of the Redskins, though in one interview wouldn’t rule out taking a quarterback with the No. 5 pick in this year’s draft, i.e., what does this say about Robert Griffin III? 

Well, it just makes sense to say this when you have the No. 5 pick. Might as well see how much you can get for it.

College Basketball

AP Poll (Jan. 12)

1. Kentucky 15-0 (63 first-place votes)
2. Virginia 15-0 (2...good)
3. Gonzaga 16-1...wow
4. Duke 14-1
5. Villanova 15-1
6. Louisville 14-2
7. Wisconsin 15-2
8. Utah 13-2
9. Kansas 13-2
10. Arizona 14-2
17. VCU 13-3
21. Seton Hall 13-3
25. Wyoming 15-2...SDSU at Laramie Wed. night (huge for Aztecs)

So after I posted Sunday night, I saw I missed (by a few minutes) Rutgers’ (10-7, 2-2) 67-62 upset of then No. 4 Wisconsin (15-2, 3-1), the biggest upset in Rutgers history (really).* Not to diminish it, but Badgers star Frank Kaminsky was out with a concussion and in the game, Traevon Jackson, the point guard, left with what appears to be a season-ending knee injury.

*Rutgers’ previous biggest upset was a 1982 win over then No. 6 West Virginia.

Then later Sunday night, Oregon State (11-4, 2-1) upset No. 7 Arizona (14-2, 2-1) 58-56 in Corvallis. Gary Payton II had 10 points and nine rebounds for the Beavers. Is it time to pull out some Beaverwear?!

As for Tuesday’s action, Duke was stunned a second straight game, this time at home against Miami, 90-64, as Coach K remains stuck on 997 career wins. The loss snapped the Blue Devils’ 41-game home winning streak and gave them consecutive regular-season losses for the first time in nearly six years.

Seton Hall laid an egg in losing to Butler at home, 79-75, which probably spells the end for their Top 25 run.

Kentucky recovered from its two overtime squeakers to annihilate Missouri, 86-37.

And Wake Forest (9-9, 1-4) played well again, but lost...86-83 to Syracuse (13-4, 4-0) up in the snow-belt. This brutal stretch for the Deacs continues when they play North Carolina next Wednesday.

--What an ugly season for New York area hoops fans. Not only are the Knicks 5-35, and heading to London to play the Bucks on Thursday, but the Brooklyn Nets, after climbing to .500, have now lost six in a row to fall to 16-22.

Plus on Monday at the Barclays Center, Nets forward Kevin Garnett got into a tussle with his supposed friend, Houston’s Dwight Howard, and ended up head-butting Howard. Yes, he was ejected in what would be a 113-99 loss and later suspended for one game.

Separately, Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov is shopping his 80% stake, along with his 45% ownership in the Barclays Center, though a spokesman said Prokhorov isn’t rushing to sell.

The Barclays Center itself apparently is not doing well, underperforming, with the arena losing money the first nine months of last year. The Nets, though, are drawing just fine...95% of capacity on average the first 20 home games this season.

--The surprise team of the NBA, the Atlanta Hawks, defeated the 76ers (7-30) on Tuesday, 105-87, to move to 30-8 with their ninth win in a row.

--So before the College Football Playoff Championship, we had a rare Monday finish with the PGA Tour’s Tournament of Champions at Kapalua, always a visually pleasing way to start the golf year. 

Well, a week ago I mused whether Patrick Reed could get off to a flying start and he did, winning a playoff over Jimmy Walker to take his fourth career PGA event.  Reed thus became the fifth player in the last 25 years to win at least four times on the PGA Tour before turning 25; the others being Rory McIlroy, Sergio Garcia, Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson.

For Reed it’s also four wins in his last 35 starts, though his first since the WGC event at Doral last year, when he said he was one of the top five players in the world.

Well this win moved him up to No. 14 on the world list.

--Cristiano Ronaldo picked up FIFA’s Ballon d’Or as player of the year for 2014, the second straight year he has won the honor. Ronaldo also won in 2008, while Lionel Messi won it from 2009-2012. Ergo, either Ronaldo and Messi have won the Ballon d’Or seven straight years.

Ronaldo scored 61 goals last year for Real Madrid and Portugal, and set a Champions League season record with 17.

Messi, the Argentinian starring for Barcelona, was second in the voting, ahead of goalkeeper Manuel Neuer, who helped Germany to the World Cup title.

Kind of interesting that United States Coach Jurgen Klinsmann had Neuer first, followed by Messi and the Dutch forward Arjen Robben.

--Thankfully it was just a regular-season game but the Islanders took it to the Rangers at the Garden, Tuesday, 3-0 as the first-place Isles continue to show they are for real.

--It turns out former Miami fullback Rob Konrad was in the water 16 hours after falling out of his fishing boat and swimming nine miles to shore off Palm Beach, Fla. Four days later he faced the media.

“Happy to be here,” he began. “I shouldn’t be here,” he said later, his voice cracking.

Endurance swimmer Diana Nyad said, “It’s an incredible story. Taking his life in his hands and deciding he was going to save himself, I admire him.”

It’s actually estimated he covered 27 miles before ringing the doorbell of an oceanfront home asking for help at 4:30 a.m. Thursday.

It turns out that after he caught a large fish, a big wave came up and he was flipped out of the boat, with the boat on autopilot. There were no other boats in sight and he wasn’t wearing a life preserver. It was 12:30 p.m.

He quickly decided he would swim toward shore, figuring it would take 10 hours. Luckily the ocean temperature was in the 70s, but he still got hypothermia.

He took off his shirt and began alternating breaststroke and backstroke.

Konrad said he got bit “by a whole bunch of stuff” and a shark circled before moving along.

“Five or six hours in I realized, ‘Maybe I can do this,’” he said. He was able to see lights along the coast and pick out landmarks.

When he finally got to shore he couldn’t walk. “My body was shaking uncontrollably. I crawled up on the beach and warmed myself up enough to be able to walk.”

His boat was found near Grand Bahama Island on Deadman’s Reef...really. [Associated Press]

--It’s pretty amazing that two members of the Tuskegee Airmen – the all-black squadron that flew in World War II – died on the same day, Sunday, at the age of 91...Clarence Huntley Jr. and Joseph Shambrey...who were lifelong friends. They both passed away in their Los Angeles homes.

Shades of the greatest story of this kind in U.S. history, Adams and Jefferson both dying on July 4, 1826.

--From the Associated Press: “Contaminated traditional beer has killed 56 people in Mozambique, health authorities said on Sunday.

“Those who drank the contaminated brew were attending a funeral in the region....

“Authorities believe that the drink was poisoned with crocodile bile during the course of the funeral....

“The woman who brewed the beer is also among the dead.”

Well, this sounds like a job for Marlin Perkins and the good folks at Mutual of Omaha. Or did I just date myself?

--At an auction the other day, Kevin Lipton shelled out $2,585,000 for the Birch Cent, a penny made in 1792 that is named after its engraver, Robert Birch. It’s the most money ever paid for a one-cent piece. [Matt Hamilton / Los Angeles Times]

Lipton owns a coin wholesaling business in Beverly Hills and has been collecting coins since he was 12.

--I pass this local TGI Fridays about once a week but never frequent it (for no particular reason). So I just saw a patron was awarded $1.6 million after she was hit in the shoulder while seated at the bar by a ceiling tile. She then required multiple surgeries on the shoulder and more than four years later was still in pain.

So when you sit down, just glance up...or have an accomplice loosen the tiles and see how much cash you can get out of it.

Top 3 songs for the week 1/14/84: #1 “Say Say Say” (Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson...yet another collaboration of pure crapola...) #2 “Owner Of A Lonely Heart” (Yes) #3 “Say it Isn’t So” (Daryl Hall-John Oates)...and...#4 “Union Of The Snake” (Duran Duran) #5 “Twist Of Fate” (Olivia Newton-John) #6 “Talking In Your Sleep” (The Romantics) #7 “Break My Stride” (Matthew Wilder...ughh) #8 “I Guess That’s Why They Call It The Blues” (Elton John...far from his best...) #9 “Karma Chameleon” (Culture Club...every time I hear these guys, I go into a deep depression...it’s happening now....) #10 “Running With The Night” (Lionel Richie)

NHL Quiz Answer: Six to score 50 goals in a season....

Steve Yzerman 65 (1988-89), 62, 58, 51, 50
Sergei Fedorov 56
John Ogrodnick 55
Mickey Redmon 52 (1972-73), 51
Ray Sheppard 52
Danny Grant 50 (1974-75...totally forgot about this guy)

Yup, Gordie Howe never scored 50! Remarkable, though in the 1950s it was a 70-game schedule and one year he had 49. [Frank Mahovlich also had 49 with Detroit, in case you were wondering about him, too, as I was.]

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