Tears of a clown, or clowns

Listen closely. That uncontrollable sobbing you hear is coming from the corner known as the national football media. This group of Not Woodwards and Not Bernsteins was dealt a mighty blow right around midnight when the Steelers lost to the Ravens 20-17 in OT thanks to an interception by Dennis Dixon.

Now, Dixon, in his first NFL start, filled in for Big Ben, who, going against the desire of some people he should never again consider friends, managed to wait at least one more week before putting his mental well-being on the line. Good for him. Good for Dixon, too. He played admirably, if a little uninspiring. Even though he lost the game — and don't get it twisted, he did — this rip is not for him. No, we devote this space to the poor boys who are unable to waive their Terrible Towels this morning.

Just imagine: Joe Flacco throws a pick, Rashard Mendenhall runs for a couple of first downs, Jeff Reed kicks an OT field goal and Pittsburgh wins. Would Dixon even have room to walk with all the knee-pad jobs given to him by the national football media? Game-manager. Stepped up. Cheered on every step of the way by the starter. All the cliches these clowns love were there. It had the potential to be a nauseating Monday.

We still may hear enough to get the bile bubbling in our stomachs. Take Cris Collinsworth, Mr. Buckner's boy, who raved about Dixon during his postgame thoughts. Wait, isn't Dixon the same player who tossed a pass directly into the hands of a Ravens' defender in overtime? Yes. Yes, he is.

Not to be mean, but I'm sorry folks. You cannot throw an interception that leads almost immediately to the winning score and have played well. That's like Tim McCarver saying Bill Buckner had a good World Series in '86.

Anyway, this speaks to a larger point about the national football media. Unlike in baseball or basketball where the narratives change, they never do in football. A numbers of these clowns still trumpet Shawne Merriman as a "great" defensive player. They wondered earlier this season when the Chargers' LB would pick it up. ... Hmmm. Tough question. Maybe when he starts using whatever he used in 2006 again.

Bottom line: National football media — get out.

The Absolute Worst Coaching Decision Ever

Let's just get right to it. The worst strategic coaching decision in the history of sports was made today. No exaggeration. No joke.

Harvard defeated Yale 14-10 on Saturday because Yale coach Tom Williams did the unthinkable. Yale was leading 10-7 with 2:40 left and had fourth-and-22 from its own 25-yard line. Yale decided to fake the punt, didn't get the first down, and Harvard drove 40 yards for the winning touchdown.

Read the above paragraph again. Take a moment.

Honestly, when I first heard about this, I didn't believe it. I must have misunderstood. Or something had to be amiss. This couldn't have actually happened. Maybe Yale was trailing 10-7. Maybe I was just being told some sort of joke, but it really wasn't a good one because as gullible as I am, no one would ever even believe this ridiculous a story for a second.

But it's actually true. Here is the play by play.

I'll just give one quote from Williams because it's pointless to even dissect all the moronic things he said. If a coach attempted a field goal on the last play of the game when his team was down by four points, would you really want to hear an explanation? This is just as stupid. When something is so irrational, there's no point examining every point of the utter nonsense.

From Williams, courtesy of the Hartford Courant: "We were going to play to win the football game. We weren't going to play scared. We were going to keep our foot on the pedal. So if you're looking for someone to blame, blame this guy right here."

Some quick points:

1) It seems that Herm Edwards' "You Play to Win the Game" tirade has become a common refrain for coaches when trying to justify "aggressive" decisions. Here's the problem with that:

A) That speech had nothing to do with taking a chance or trying to finish off an opponent. It was simply Edwards' response to a question regarding whether he was worried his team would lose focus and motivation after it had had been mathematically eliminated from playoff contention.

B) Even if it did pertain to being aggressive, that obviously isn't always the right decision. You can't simply justify stupid risks by offering cliches like "We were playing to win the game" and "We didn't want to take our foot off the pedal" as your explanation. Of course you were. That's why everyone laughs at that press conference. He was stating the obvious. Punting on fourth-and-22 when you're leading with 2:40 left isn't playing scared.

C) Herm Edwards was an idiot.

2)People will likely compare this decision with the one Bill Belichick made against the Colts. Just stop right now. The Patriots needed two yards. Yale needed 22.

3) This happened in a Harvard-Yale game? Yikes.

Anyway, I said in my opening that this was the worst strategic decision in the history of sports. I googled those exact words and found this great article from ESPN.com. In my opinion, the only decisions that even approach this one were No. 1 (John McNamara keeping Bill Buckner in Game 6 of the 1986 World Series for sentimental reasons rather than taking him out for a defensive replacement.) and No. 4. (Giants offensive coordinator Bob Gibson calls a handoff with the Giants leading 17-12 with 20 seconds left and the Eagles are out of timeouts. Instead of kneeling on the ball, Giants quarterback Joe Pisarcik fumbled his handoff to Larry Csonka and the Eagles won when Herm Edwards - Herm!!! -- recovered the fumble and took it in for the winning score.)

Here is why the decision at Yale was even worse on the stupidity scale. (By the way, I feel like this has been reduced to a discussion of whether it's a worse idea to run as fast as you can headfirst into a brick wall or run into a beehive and see if you can avoid getting stung for 30 seconds. Sigh.)

The moment the Yale decision was made, it was extremely likely that it would cost the team the game.

Failing to take Buckner out for defense and calling a running play instead of taking a knee were absolutely moronic decisions. No argument. And in the case of Buckner, it was an epic blunder in the biggest game of the season...a mistake so bad that it ended up contributing to the Red Sox blowing the World Series. That said, both of those decisions in all likelihood didn't figure to actually have any impact. And that's why Tom Williams' decision was worse.

(I may have to change my name to Norwood Buckner Williams now.)