Colts Win, Fans Of Good Sports Media Lose
Some thoughts and observations after the come-from-behind win for the Indianapolis Colts over the Minnesota Vikings Sunday:
Would somebody please outbid CBS the next time the NFL contract is up for negotiation? For fuck's sake, there are high school television programs who would have better production values and a better eye for the game than CBS. An example was on the Anthony Gonzalez/Reggie Wayne circus play, where Wayne scored an apparent touchdown. CBS had a grand total of two camera angles on the replay, one of which was the original shot (the sideline camera). The touchdown was overturned (and rightfully so), but it appeared that the spot of the ball was incorrect. It appeared Wayne's knee hit with the ball at about the one-foot line; the referee spotted the ball at the one-yard line. Of course, I have no way of knowing where it really was, since CBS had no functional angle of the spot.
Next up, WTHR-13's Dick Rea, summing up the Colts' win:
"...and the defense for the Colts did the job, preventing the Vikings from scoring on their home field."
Final score: Colts 18, Vikings 15. Technically, the Vikings scored five times. Dick, were you watching Matlock reruns again instead of the game?
And, then, our boy Bobby:
Manning's still good
This was no time for false humility, certainly not from Peyton Manning, who normally resorts to "aw, shucks'' platitudes in the moments after a huge victory...
He allowed himself a wry smile. "That was a good throw.''
A great throw. A game-winning throw. And maybe, just maybe, a season-saving throw. Not that teams can't win Super Bowls after starting 0-2 -- Peyton has a little brother whose team did just that last season -- but even in a Tom Brady-less league, 0-2 is no place to start a championship run.
This isn't the worst article in the world, especially by Kravitz's standards. Peyton did make plays crucial in winning the game Sunday--the throw to which Kravitz refers was what allowed the Colts to win in regulation. Honestly, Peyton played pretty well considering the offensive line played more like people voted off "The Biggest Loser" instead of NFL linemen.
Still, any reasonable person who watched that game would probably say that the defense was the biggest reason the Colts were able to come from down 15-0. They weren't perfect--at halftime it seemed Adrian Peterson was going to go for 280 yards or so by the end of the game--but they kept the Vikings close until the offense woke up.
Instead, Kravitz devotes his column to Manning and his heroics. Again, I'm not suggesting Manning played poorly, or that he wasn't at least partly-responsible for the win. But this article shows what typically happens in a game like this for the Colts--namely, Manning the media-darling gets the spotlight, and most of the credit.
I won't go through the rest of the article, except for:
Just when you started wondering whatever happened to No. 18, there he was in the second half of a game that seemed irretrievably lost, looking like No. 18 again -- minus about 15 pounds...clearly, he's not the old Manning quite yet. He's still not doing his full pregame workout routine, although he did more this week than he did last Sunday. And he's clearly lost some weight. The custom-made suit he wore after the game looked like one of those oversized jobs your mom used to buy, saying, "You'll grow into it.''
I love how none of the Indianapolis media mentioned Peyton's weight loss until John Madden mentioned it on Sunday Night Football last week. I also love how Kravitz uses the exact same observation that Madden made about Peyton's suit being too big. I don't know if it's technically plagiarism, or just stupidity.
Or maybe a little bit of both.
Would somebody please outbid CBS the next time the NFL contract is up for negotiation? For fuck's sake, there are high school television programs who would have better production values and a better eye for the game than CBS. An example was on the Anthony Gonzalez/Reggie Wayne circus play, where Wayne scored an apparent touchdown. CBS had a grand total of two camera angles on the replay, one of which was the original shot (the sideline camera). The touchdown was overturned (and rightfully so), but it appeared that the spot of the ball was incorrect. It appeared Wayne's knee hit with the ball at about the one-foot line; the referee spotted the ball at the one-yard line. Of course, I have no way of knowing where it really was, since CBS had no functional angle of the spot.
Next up, WTHR-13's Dick Rea, summing up the Colts' win:
"...and the defense for the Colts did the job, preventing the Vikings from scoring on their home field."
Final score: Colts 18, Vikings 15. Technically, the Vikings scored five times. Dick, were you watching Matlock reruns again instead of the game?
And, then, our boy Bobby:
Manning's still good
This was no time for false humility, certainly not from Peyton Manning, who normally resorts to "aw, shucks'' platitudes in the moments after a huge victory...
He allowed himself a wry smile. "That was a good throw.''
A great throw. A game-winning throw. And maybe, just maybe, a season-saving throw. Not that teams can't win Super Bowls after starting 0-2 -- Peyton has a little brother whose team did just that last season -- but even in a Tom Brady-less league, 0-2 is no place to start a championship run.
This isn't the worst article in the world, especially by Kravitz's standards. Peyton did make plays crucial in winning the game Sunday--the throw to which Kravitz refers was what allowed the Colts to win in regulation. Honestly, Peyton played pretty well considering the offensive line played more like people voted off "The Biggest Loser" instead of NFL linemen.
Still, any reasonable person who watched that game would probably say that the defense was the biggest reason the Colts were able to come from down 15-0. They weren't perfect--at halftime it seemed Adrian Peterson was going to go for 280 yards or so by the end of the game--but they kept the Vikings close until the offense woke up.
Instead, Kravitz devotes his column to Manning and his heroics. Again, I'm not suggesting Manning played poorly, or that he wasn't at least partly-responsible for the win. But this article shows what typically happens in a game like this for the Colts--namely, Manning the media-darling gets the spotlight, and most of the credit.
I won't go through the rest of the article, except for:
Just when you started wondering whatever happened to No. 18, there he was in the second half of a game that seemed irretrievably lost, looking like No. 18 again -- minus about 15 pounds...clearly, he's not the old Manning quite yet. He's still not doing his full pregame workout routine, although he did more this week than he did last Sunday. And he's clearly lost some weight. The custom-made suit he wore after the game looked like one of those oversized jobs your mom used to buy, saying, "You'll grow into it.''
I love how none of the Indianapolis media mentioned Peyton's weight loss until John Madden mentioned it on Sunday Night Football last week. I also love how Kravitz uses the exact same observation that Madden made about Peyton's suit being too big. I don't know if it's technically plagiarism, or just stupidity.
Or maybe a little bit of both.
Labels: Bob Kravitz, CBS, Dick Rea, John Madden, Matlock, Peyton Manning, WTHR
posted by Slut Bunwalla at
7:40 PM
1 Comments:
It is similar to the Super Bowl in that Manning played more than well enough for the Colts to win, but it seems the majority of people feel that Joseph Addai and Dominic Rhodes were better MVP candidates than Manning. Manning is the media darling and the face of the Colts. However, all Colts wins are not always due to Manning and his heroics.
I too hope that CBS loses its contract the next time around. I will turn the sound off in order to listen to the radio broadcast because I have yet to find a CBS tadem that I can stand. The poor camera angles and overall production are just the icing on the crap cake they serve us.
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