Seattle Seahawks punter Jon Ryan (9) flips over as he run the ball during the first half of an NFL wild-card football game against the Minnesota Vikings, Sunday, Jan. 10, 2016, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Jim Mone)Regarding all this talk of the supreme need to secure home-field advantage for the NFL playoffs: Why bother?
In case you didn’t realize it, all four road teams won this past weekend’s wild-card games. Despite battling rain (Pittsburgh over Cincinnati), bitter cold (Seattle over Minnesota), wild wind (Green Bay over Washington) and every reason to be overconfident (Kansas City over hopeless Houston), the visitors refused to be vanquished.
Not that much connected these games other than the apparent haplessness of the home teams. The Chiefs chopping up the Texans like so much beef brisket was as much an indictment of the AFC South as the colossus that KC has become in winning its 11th straight game.
Likewise Green Bay’s 35-18 victory at Washington, which is what you might have expected when the Packers were 6-0 before they lost six of their next 10. As long as Aaron Rodgers is the Pack’s starting quarterback, they’re capable of these types of performances, even if this week’s foe – Arizona – did thoroughly plaster the Packers late in the regular season, crushing them 38-8 inside the same University of Phoenix Stadium that will host next Sunday’s divisional round game.
But the other two games – Pittsburgh over Cincy on Saturday night and Seattle over Minnesota on Sunday afternoon – were instant classics, if only for how not to close out a playoff game.
The Vikings gift-wrapping the Seahawks’ win certainly fell in the cringe category. Much as Seattle probably should have won last season’s Super Bowl, it should have lost this one when Minnesota kicker Blair Walsh lined up to win the game with a 27-yard field goal.
Instead, Walsh hooked the ball left, as wretched a kick as we may ever see at the highest level of the sport.
And while no one with half a heart can feel anything but sympathy for Walsh, you just can’t miss such a kick on your home field. Even with the laces in your face. And the temperature at zero. And the best defense in the NFL bearing down on you.
As Vikings coach Mike Zimmer rightly said, “It’s a chip shot. You have to make it.”
But at least give Walsh credit for not only manfully meeting with the media, but also placing the blame only on himself.
“I can tell you this: It’s my fault,” he said, before reportedly retreating into his cubicle, his eyes filling with tears.
Any tears from Bengals fans should turn to jeers directed at defensive players Adam “Pacman” Jones and Vontaze Burfict – and perhaps even head coach Marvin Lewis – after the Bungles threw away what could have been the greatest story of the opening weekend instead of the most darkly amusing one.
The Steel Curtain was 22 seconds from the curtains coming down on its season when Burfict decided to deliver a helmet-to-helmet hit to Pittsburgh receiver Antonio Brown on an uncatchable ball.
Reasonable men can disagree about the NFL’s decision to crack down on such hits in general. It’s pro football, after all. If all these macho men want to end up with oatmeal for brains before they’re 55 because they think attempting to separate a man’s head from his body is part of the game, I guess that’s their right.
On the other hand, there’s no excuse for hitting a guy on an uncatchable ball when you’re ahead 16-15 in the final 22 seconds. It was just pure arrogance and stupidity on Burfict’s part, because without the 15-yard penalty he incurred, the Steelers would have had second-and-10 at the Bengals’ 47, no timeouts and 22 seconds to get into field goal range with Ben Roethlisberger’s throwing arm all but unhinged.
Only the Bungles could screw that up.
Yet bad as Burfict’s hit was, Pacman’s penalty for arguing with an official about the call was worse. His childish behavior turned a 15-yard flag into a 30-yard penalty that allowed Chris Boswell to kick a 35-yard field goal with 14 seconds left to make Pittsburgh an 18-16 winner.
“Bengals beat the Bengals,” Cincinnati defensive end Carlos Dunlap tweeted.
Which makes one wonder how long Lewis can continue to run a team that hasn’t won a playoff game in 25 years and lost all seven of its postseason matchups under his watch, the worst such record in NFL history.
He’s not an awful coach, and he’s generally regarded as a fine person, but Saturday was as outrageous a lack of discipline and composure in the crunch as has ever been witnessed inside the final minute of an NFL playoff game.
Of course, it was also equally ridiculous for Steelers assistant Joey Porter to be on the field chatting with (taunting?) Bengals players as Brown was being taken from the field after Burfict’s cheap shot.
If the league really wants to stop some of this, it should penalize Porter this week – either by fine or, perhaps, a banishment to the press box.
That said, each team’s behavior was an embarrassment to the Shield, as commissioner Roger Goodell might say, and it needs to be addressed before the Steelers travel to Denver to face the Broncos.
So can these road warriors continue to shine against the teams that earned first-round byes? The Chiefs would seem capable of upsetting injury-plagued New England. If Peyton Manning can continue to throw the ball with the zip he showed at the close of the regular season, the Broncs can also advance.
As for the NFC, don’t be surprised to see Seattle upset Carolina and Green Bay to at least throw a scare into Arizona.
Just don’t expect any of these remaining eight teams to beat themselves with two 15-yard penalties in the final 22 seconds.
Only the Bungles can deliver a collapse as darkly comical as that.
Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com.