This past Sunday night I was doing what I am almost always doing on Sunday nights this time of year –watching NFL football. This week’s Sunday night game was the Colts versus the Patriots. It’s usually a good game when those two teams get together, and this year’s contest was certainly no exception. It wasn’t decided until Peyton Manning threw a touchdown pass leading the Colts to a 35-34 victory with only 13 seconds left in the game.
But many viewers would say the game was really decided when Patriots coach Bill Belichick made the decision to go for a first down when his team had a fourth and 2 on their own 28 yard line with about 2 minutes left in the game. For those of you who don’t know much about football, most of the time you would punt the ball away in that situation, because if you try to pick up the first down and don’t make it you give the other team the ball in very good field position. And that’s exactly what happened – the Patriots failed to get the two yards they needed and the Colts quickly scored the winning touchdown.
I remember being a bit surprised when Belichick decided to go for the first down in that situation and thinking that he’d get a fair amount of criticism if the gamble didn’t pan out. It’s fair to say that I somewhat underestimated how much flack he would get over this unusually aggressive call.
All week long sports editorialists, bloggers, and football fans have ripped Belichick for his “dumb” and “monumentally egotistical” play call. Despite the fact that this man has enjoyed unprecedented success as a head coach, including winning multiple Super Bowls and leading his team to an undefeated regular season one year, it seems as if he has now become a poster boy for coaching ineptness.
Give me a break, people. First of all, as some more mathematically-inclined commentators have pointed out, the call was not really a bad statistical gamble. The odds of his offense converting on fourth and 2 and running out the clock to end the game versus the odds of a Peyton Manning-led offense going 70 yards in 2 minutes are not that out of whack. It was an unconventional decision, but by no means was it an obviously stupid one. People who are painting it as such are only displaying their own lack of football acumen.
But there’s a larger point to consider here. Why on earth is this such a big deal to anyone? We are talking about a game, for crying out loud. It’s a bunch of guys running up and down a field throwing a ball around. So a coach decides to go for it on fourth down when most coaches wouldn’t. So what? I say making that call made the game more fun, more unpredictable, and more exciting for the fans.
As is often the case, I find myself at a loss to understand why some people get so wound up about something so trivial. Death, chronic disease, being too broke to pay the rent – these are the kinds of things any sane person is going to be troubled about. But most of the other stuff we lose sleep over is just nonsense. And I would say that anyone who is spending any portion of their valuable time exorcising an NFL coach for going for it on fourth down needs to seriously reexamine his priorities.
Maybe we should all go for it on fourth down (figuratively speaking) a little more in life, and stop obsessing about what other people think. Maybe having that attitude is, in fact, one of the reasons Coach Belichick is one of the most successful coaches in the NFL and not a know-it-all armchair quarterback typing snarky comments in his blog.
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
How brave are you?
Have you ever wondered just how brave you are? Whether we want to admit it or not, we all have something that we’re afraid of. But just where do you fall on the scaredy-cat scale?
To answer that question, I’ve come up with a completely unscientific system for determining your braveness rating. Below is a list of the ten most common fears that people all over the world share that I borrowed from livescience.com. Give yourself one point for every item listed that sends a shiver down your spine. I’ll share my own response to each item so you can see how you stack up against me.
10. Visiting the dentist. This one completely baffles me. I have been to the dentist many times, even had my first root canal last year, and the most I have ever experienced while in the dentist’s chair is minor discomfort. I don’t know what all the fuss is about.
9. Dogs. For me it depends on the dog and his demeanor. If he is one of those breeds that have been known to kill people and he has a bad attitude, of course I’m going to give him a wide berth. But that toy poodle down the road does not keep me up at night.
8. Flying. I’ll admit that I do get a little nervous at takeoff, during landings, and when the ride gets rough. It’s not so much the flying I fear as the possibility of falling. I’m giving myself a pass on this one too.
7. Thunder and lightning. I’m not sure what there is to be afraid of in a thunderstorm except actually being struck by lightning. If I’m out in an open field and it looks like a storm is blowing in I’ll head for cover, but other than that thunderstorms don’t impress me.
6. The dark. I’m only afraid of the dark if I have reason to believe there is something nearby that might present a threat that I can’t see. When a strange noise wakes me up in the middle of the night of course my heart starts racing until I find out it wasn’t caused by a wandering serial killer with a hook for a hand. I don’t think that counts.
5. Heights. Okay, they nailed me here. I do not like being more than a few feet off the ground. I could fall. It would hurt.
4. Other people. Also known as social anxiety. Ouch, they got me again. People are scary, especially people I don’t know, or people I do know who have “issues.” That covers most of the human race.
3. Agoraphobia, or a fear of being in a threatening place or situation that is difficult to escape from. This is like fear of the dark for me – I’m okay unless there is some extenuating circumstance that suggests I may need to escape from the situation.
2. Spiders. Spiders??? Are you kidding me? What could a spider possibly do to me? I have never met a spider who did anything but run away as fast as his 8 little legs could carry him if I got too close. Apparently this fear is almost completely exclusive to women – maybe that’s why I just can’t see it.
1. Snakes. I am afraid of snakes, but I have no idea why. They really aren’t that much more of a threat than spiders, but for some reason I don’t like to get within 100 feet of them. Maybe there’s some sort of residual effect from that whole Garden of Eden incident. That gives me a score of 3.
Scoring key:
(0 – 3) = You are a pillar of courage and intestinal fortitude, like me.
(4 – 6) = You’re probably about average in the fear department.
(7 – 10) = I don’t want to add to your anxiety by telling you what this score indicates. You’re fine, really!
To answer that question, I’ve come up with a completely unscientific system for determining your braveness rating. Below is a list of the ten most common fears that people all over the world share that I borrowed from livescience.com. Give yourself one point for every item listed that sends a shiver down your spine. I’ll share my own response to each item so you can see how you stack up against me.
10. Visiting the dentist. This one completely baffles me. I have been to the dentist many times, even had my first root canal last year, and the most I have ever experienced while in the dentist’s chair is minor discomfort. I don’t know what all the fuss is about.
9. Dogs. For me it depends on the dog and his demeanor. If he is one of those breeds that have been known to kill people and he has a bad attitude, of course I’m going to give him a wide berth. But that toy poodle down the road does not keep me up at night.
8. Flying. I’ll admit that I do get a little nervous at takeoff, during landings, and when the ride gets rough. It’s not so much the flying I fear as the possibility of falling. I’m giving myself a pass on this one too.
7. Thunder and lightning. I’m not sure what there is to be afraid of in a thunderstorm except actually being struck by lightning. If I’m out in an open field and it looks like a storm is blowing in I’ll head for cover, but other than that thunderstorms don’t impress me.
6. The dark. I’m only afraid of the dark if I have reason to believe there is something nearby that might present a threat that I can’t see. When a strange noise wakes me up in the middle of the night of course my heart starts racing until I find out it wasn’t caused by a wandering serial killer with a hook for a hand. I don’t think that counts.
5. Heights. Okay, they nailed me here. I do not like being more than a few feet off the ground. I could fall. It would hurt.
4. Other people. Also known as social anxiety. Ouch, they got me again. People are scary, especially people I don’t know, or people I do know who have “issues.” That covers most of the human race.
3. Agoraphobia, or a fear of being in a threatening place or situation that is difficult to escape from. This is like fear of the dark for me – I’m okay unless there is some extenuating circumstance that suggests I may need to escape from the situation.
2. Spiders. Spiders??? Are you kidding me? What could a spider possibly do to me? I have never met a spider who did anything but run away as fast as his 8 little legs could carry him if I got too close. Apparently this fear is almost completely exclusive to women – maybe that’s why I just can’t see it.
1. Snakes. I am afraid of snakes, but I have no idea why. They really aren’t that much more of a threat than spiders, but for some reason I don’t like to get within 100 feet of them. Maybe there’s some sort of residual effect from that whole Garden of Eden incident. That gives me a score of 3.
Scoring key:
(0 – 3) = You are a pillar of courage and intestinal fortitude, like me.
(4 – 6) = You’re probably about average in the fear department.
(7 – 10) = I don’t want to add to your anxiety by telling you what this score indicates. You’re fine, really!
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