Sports Illustrated’s illustrious Dr. Z must be a proctologist. Because he massaged the stinking pile of feces that Peyton Manning dumped all over the field against San Diego Sunday night and tilled it into the flowery rosebloom of the quarterback’s finest hour.
Paul "Dr. Z" Zimmerman followed up Indy's 23-21 loss to San Diego, a loss directly attributable to Manning's franchise-record six interceptions, with a glowing tribute to the stumbling Colts quarterback. Any reasonable person who watched the game and then read the article simply could not believe the disparity between what they saw on the field and then in print. Scores sent us the link, demanding that the surgeon general of the gridiron, the Cold, Hard Football Facts, send Dr. Z to Pigskin Detention and revoke his license to practice pigskin.
Consider it done.
It’s sad, really. When we were just budding little trolls back in the day, we learned a lot from Zimmerman. Our spy trolls tell us of his obsessive behavior charting games, the type of statistically motivated behavior that, if we had feelings, would make us all warm and fuzzy.
Dr. Z is, to put it simply, one of the great football writers of his time.
But it seems his time ended around the day they first screwed a face mask to a football helmet. Hey, even the greatest players get washed up someday.
- Colts legend Johnny Unitas went to San Diego and could hardly get on the field his final season.
- Jets legend Joe Namath went to L.A. and made just four pathetic appearances in a Rams uniform.
- Bills legend O.J. Simpson went to L.A. and (allegedly) killed two people.
Why should aging writers be any different than aging players?
We knew something was wrong with the phootball physician a few years back when we had a little email interaction with Dr. Z about quarterbacking. We talked to him about the importance of passing yards per attempt which, as Cold, Hard Football Facts readers know, has a direct correlation to winning football games.
Dr. Z, well known in football circles as a Pro Bowl-caliber curmudgeon, responded with an angry e-mail touting the importance of yards per completion – as if completing 1 of 10 passes for 50 yards somehow helps your team win games.
In any case, we digress.
And so does the mind and keyboard of Dr. Z in a recent column that incited anger and incredulity from Trolls across the country.
Here’s a look at Dr. Z’s pigskin malpractice of a column, interjected with the healing, soothing balm of truth called the Cold, Hard Football Facts.
Our comments, as always in these situations, appear in [parenthetical italics].
***
Peyton Manning, when he has his full colony of workers, is the closest thing to a drillmaster you will see on a football field. The operation is meticulously organized. But start removing elements from it and the drill can break down. And take away as many key portions of it as were removed Sunday night and you get, well, six interceptions.
[Umm, so in other words, if Manning isn’t surrounded by his all-star teammates he sucks? Because six INTs isn’t just bad. It’s historic bad. Put it this way: only nine players in the entire history of the NFL have thrown more than six picks in a game.]
The Colts went into the San Diego game with only 17 offensive players in uniform. Two went down during the game. Two key receivers, Marvin Harrison and Dallas Clark, were missing. Their top draft choice, Anthony Gonzalez, who was supposed to be in the mix somewhere, also was out of action. They were left with Reggie Wayne and back-ups, including a street free agent activated in October named Craphonso Thorpe.
[Boo-hoo ... Peyton. This guy is supposed to be one of The Great Quarterbacks of All Time. Can't one of The Great Quarterbacks of All Time survive one game against a mediocre team without his full cast of all-star talent around him? Can't one of the Great Quarterbacks of All Time not shit his pants when he's missing a few players? Is that too much to ask? Well is it, punk?
[Perhaps Indy should call on the remnants of New England's 2006 receiving corps. Of the seven wideouts who caught a pass for New England last year, two are out of football completely, only two have even stepped on a field this year, and only one of the seven has caught even a single pass here in 2007 (Jabar Gaffney, 12 catches). Yet these guys were good enough to be one play away from the Super Bowl last year. Surely, Doug Gabriel and Kelvin Kight are sitting by the phone and are good enough to help Manning get back to the big game.]
They (the Colts) fell behind, 23-0. I thought the result would be like one of those New England Patriot adding machine things, except that Norv Turner doesn't run up scores.
[It's not that Norv turner “doesn’t” run up the score; it’s more that’s “he’s incapable” of running up the score. Note San Diego’s one offensive TD all day and their precipitous decline in production under Turner. If this utterly incomprehensible comparison between New England's offense and a Norv Turner offense that Zimmerman used were a patient at the hospital that employs Dr. Z, it would be hooked up to an iron lung while Fr. O'Flaherty administers last rites.]
And even with strange numbers on the uniforms of Manning's receivers, the Colts drove when they had to, scored, put points on the board, brought it back to 23-21 and took it down to the shadow of the Chargers' goal ...
[Maybe the good doctor fell asleep telling stories to his great grandchildren and missed Indy’s final drive … where Manning threw two incompletions and then one final ball into the hands of the San Diego defense … for the franchise-record sixth time in one game. Remember, this is the same franchise that has counted as its starting quarterbacks Marty Domres, Bill Troup (who could forget The Troup), Greg Landry, Mike Pagel, Jack Trudeau (who once threw 18 picks in a season with just 8 TDs) and – we shit you not, folks – Jeff George. That’s right, the same Jeff George who threw 40 INTs in his first 39 games with Indy. Not one of these legends ever threw six picks in a game.]
... where a missed 29-yard field goal did them in.
[This is remarkable. Literally no mention of the 6 picks which did in Indy ... Manning's entire heroic comeback was undone not by his six picks, but by a missed figgie. As one CHFF Troll, who clearly has a better comprehension of the game than the eminent Doctor, noted in our Football Forum, don't credit someone for putting out the blaze if they set the house on fire in the first place.]
It was an amazing example of battlefield command, of somehow mustering a shattered army.
[An army that was shattered because Manning kept firing on his own troops. That's not "amazing battlefield command." That's cause for a court martial. Seriously, did Dr. Z even watch this game?]
But that's what Peyton is so good at, fighting the odds.
[Let’s see … grew up rich and famous; lived in a big house in a fancy neighborhood, born with great genes, handed the starting job as a freshman at Tennessee, No. 1 draft pick, fellated by the media every step of the way, even when he shits on himself and his teammates like he did Sunday night… hell, Paris Hilton overcame more obstacles on her road to the top.]
I've seen him take some ferocious beatings, while running his show.
[First, name one ferocious beating Manning has suffered and overcome. Second, you'd think an old-timer like Dr. Z would remember what a real beating once looked like, such as those suffered by Y.A. Tittle. After all, Tittle suffered two of the most famous pummelings in history, one against the Steelers in 1964 (the source of the great photograph) and another just a year earlier in a 14-10 loss to the Bears in the 1963 NFL championship game, when he was knocked out of the game and injected with more needles than an acupuncture school cadaver. Let's see how the quality of the competition and the level of beating Manning faced Sunday night compared with those Tittle faced in the 1963 title game:
- the 2007 Chargers were led by Norv Turner; the 1963 Bears were led by George Halas
- the 2007 Chargers embarrassed Manning on a rainy, 61-degree night in San Diego; the 1963 Bears embarrassed Tittle on a nugget-busting-cold 10-degree day in Chicago
- the 2007 Chargers were 4-4 when they beat Indy Sunday night; the 1963 Bears went 11-1-2
- the 2007 Chargers put so much pressure on Manning they sacked him twice; the 1963 Bears put so much pressure on Tittle they sacked him seven times and knocked him out once
- the 2007 Chargers fielded one of the most mediocre defenses of 2007, surrendering 20.6 PPG; the 1963 Bears fielded one of the best defenses ever, surrendering 10.3 PPG
- Manning threw 6 INTs against the 2007 Chargers; Tittle, in the most famous QB beating ever, threw 5 INTs against the 1963 Bears.]
For some reason teams that are hesitant to blitz other quarterbacks seem to feel it's the best strategy against (Manning).
[Yup, sounds like the same league we’ve been watching, the one where teams are afraid to blitz Alex Smith and Kyle Boller … but never hesitate to send the house against Peyton and his all-star collection of weapons? Really … what could go wrong by leaving your DBs alone in single coverage against Marvin Harrison, Dallas Clark and Reggie Wayne?]
I saw the Ravens, two years in a row, throw all sorts of exotic pressure packages at him, but he hung in -- it seemed as if almost every pass he threw was off his back foot -- and by the third quarter he had worn.
[And, we assume, lost. The truth is that Manning has suffered more than 20 sacks in a season just three times in 10 years. He's been sacked a total of 49 times since 2003 – less than one season of beatings for the likes of Joey Harrington who, using Dr. Z’s geriatric logic of praising those who shit themselves under duress, must be he greatest quarterback of all time.]
Some of the greatest games I've seen him have were under the most severe duress ...
[and Manning's greatest games under duress compare to Manning's shitty performance against San Diego ... how?]
... and maybe his numbers weren't the best those times, but the memories he left were the most lingering.
[We're going to call Dr. Z's bluff here ... If these games were so memorable, name one. Really. Just one game where the chips were stacked against Manning ... teammates down, bad weather, his own defense playing poorly, the other defense playing great, and he played a great game to pull out a victory. We just want you to name one ... in fact, we're not ASKING you to name one, we're DARING you to you name one.]
And looking back on the great quarterback performances that come to mind, the ones that are most indelibly etched are the ones that involved the most severe conditions.
A quarterback who stands tall in the pocket, facing a minimal rush, throwing to an all star cast of receivers is a pretty picture, but there's nothing about it that reaches me on an emotional level.
[Well, we guess Dr. Z never cared for Manning before ... because that single sentence pretty much describes Manning’s entire career ... "standing tall in the pocket ... minimal rush ... all-star cast of receivers." Do they teach irony at the Third-World medical school where Dr. Z studied the pigskin sciences?]
But the guy who somehow manages to pull one out when the weather is bad and his offense is banged up and the other team is smelling blood -- well, that's what it's all about, I feel.
[Note to Dr. Z: if that's "what's it all about" then maybe you should have saved this sentence for after a game in which, you know, the object of your affection actually somehow managed "to pull one out.” Last we checked, throwing your last of six picks on your final drive in a 23-21 loss is quite a bit different than our definition of "pulling one out" ... to us, pulling one out is, like, throwing 2 TD passes in the final nine minutes of a game in which you couldn't move the ball all day.]
Buddy Ryan sacrificed all principles of sound coverage to bring a monster blitz package at (Joe) Montana (during a game I covered in Philly in 1989). The night before he told me, "If he finishes the game, then I haven't done my job."
Well, Montana finished it -- just barely -- but it was close. The Eagles sacked him eight times and sent him to the sidelines twice. But what they paid for in unsound coverage produced 38 points and 428 yards and five TDs for Montana -- and a 10-point 49ers victory. Watching that game was like watching a morality play, good against evil, with both sides taking some serious hits.
[We feel like we're reading sands of an hour glass, in which the points of each sentence keep slippping through our fingers. Seriously. Don't you want to know how Montana’s 38-point, 428-yard, 5 TD, 10-point victory during game in which he suffered eight sacks is in any way similar to Manning’s 21-point, 328-yard, 2-TD, 6-INT, 2-point loss during a game in which he suffered two sacks? We apparently missed the connection between the two.]
A lot of the greatest performances I've watched didn't involve winning at all, and those yahoos who put some resonance into their voices and proclaim, "Without the victory, it doesn't mean a thing," don't really understand that a certain nobility can also accompany hopeless causes.
[How was the cause "hopeless." The Chargers are the biggest underachievers of the 2007 and their coach has proven he can't win in the NFL. Manning's Colts, meanwhile, are the DEFENDING F'IN SUPER BOWL champs with one of the best offenses and best defenses in football. And there might be "nobility" to the defeat if the player in question actually performed well.
[Manning, need we remind the eminent doctor, played one of the worst games of his career and tossed six picks – a number so high that only nine players in the entire history of the NFL have thrown more in a single game. Would it have been so difficult for the Doctor to write, "Manning played like ass. But he's still a great QB. He'll rebound." Really, would that have been so difficult? Instead, we get these complex and incomprehensible machinations attempting to excuse his awful effort by comparing his awful performance to games in the past with which it has absolutely no comparison. This column is so disjointed its starting to feel like that bad acid trip we had at the Dead show back in '89.]
The finest game I ever saw John Elway have was in his junior year at Stanford. They were badly outmanned against Purdue, which seemed to get rushers in on him on every play. That was the first time I saw the miracles Elway could work on the dead run, the depth and accuracy he could get on his throws while he was in full flight. Stanford lost, but Elway put a scare into the Boilers. I don't remember how many yards he threw for ... over 400, I'm sure ... but I do remember seeing the Purdue players lining up to shake his hand after it was over.
[Around the Cold, Hard Football Facts world headquarters, this is known as the "Publisher's Clearance House" moment, the part where the author officially mails it in … Instead of telling us he doesn’t remember how many yards Elway compiled that day – memory loss is a common occurrence at Dr. Z's age – he could have, you know, faked like a reporter and maybe even called the Stanford Sports Information Department who, within 30 seconds, would have told him that Elway completed 33 of 44 passes for 418 yards that day. For the record, the Purdue team that “badly outmanned” Stanford went just 5-6 that year. Stanford went 4-7.
[All of which begets what's become our theme here: in what parallel universe does Elway’s 75-percent completions and 418 yards against a superior Purdue team remind one of Manning’s 60.7-percent completions and 328 yards against an inferior San Diego team?]
Once I ran into Fran Tarkenton when I was covering a playoff game, after he had retired. We were talking about his career with the Giants and some of the goofy stuff that happened there. I told him that he might think I was nuts, but the best game I ever saw him have was against the Cowboys in 1971.
Dallas would go on to be the Super Bowl champ that year. It was one of the greatest Cowboys teams in history, Roger Staubach and Duane Thomas and the Doomsday Defense at its toughest. The Giants were tied for the worst team in the NFC at 4-10. The runners Tarkenton had in his backfield that Monday night in Dallas were Bobby Duhon and Junior Coffey. His receivers were Clifton McNeil, Rich Houston and Don Herrmann from Waynesburg State. And yet this ragtag outfit took the Cowboys down to the wire, and the reason was Tarkenton. He ran, he threw on the move, he bought first downs through sheer force of will. Dallas ended up winning by seven. They should have won by 30.
[Earth to Dr. Z: Fran Tarkenton that year led a “ragtag” outfit against a great Dallas team that would go on to win the Super Bowl; Manning this year led the one-loss, juggernaut defending Super Bowl champs to defeat against a disappointing .500 ball club. When it comes time to draw comparisons, Dr. Z is limited to fingerpaints and stick figures.]
So I told Tarkenton that was the best game I ever saw him play, and he nodded and said, "You know something? It's my favorite, too."
[Great, approval from the original “quarterback who couldn’t win the big game” – Tarkenton led three of the greatest teams in modern NFL history into the Super Bowl and lost each time.]
Well, I don't think that someday Peyton Manning, if he's sitting around with some old sportswriter, will classify that six interception night as one of his best. I wouldn't, either. It belongs in a different category, a different type of greatness, the ability to organize any group he ever finds himself on the field with into a striking force that at least can bring a tough game a heartbeat away from victory.
I'm sure it was one he'd like to forget. But for people such as me, with long memories, it was very special.
[Kind of like riding the short bus in a hockey helmet is special.]
