Monday, February 08, 2010

How the Super Bowl Was Won

“You gotta have balls baby!”

The late great Amir Vahedi uttered those famous words during the 2003 World Series of Poker. Sean Payton is the coach of the Super Bowl Champions right now because he made aggressive calls to take the game away from the Colts.

Payton went for it on 4th down and goal late in the second quarter, and though he missed it was the proper risk to take. The play-calling may have been suspect but the Colts didn’t score and the Saints got that field goal anyway.

Maybe that decision emboldened Payton at halftime to decide to start the second half with an onside kick. I thought this was a great move because an unexpectedly high number of surprise onside kicks are recovered by the kicking team. It was a good chance to take because the reward is incredibly high and the risk is only about 30 yards of field position, which is significant but not back-breaking.

And even worse for Payton if these moves had backfired the same people who are praising his stones this morning would be ripping him to shreds had the Saints lost.

For having the guts to make what might have been a crucial mistake, Sean Payton is waking up a Super Bowl Champion this morning.

to the victor go the Gatorade bath

1 comment:

Bill said...

Payton was lucky. He always runs it on 4th and short and they never make it. He's never had a reverse work and if Hank Baskett wasn't the biggest goof on earth, they wouldn't have recovered the onside.

Reggie Wayne was either really injured or he's a punk. Either way, if he couldn't play he shouldn't have been in there on the pick-6 and 4th down drop.