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Sun. Sep 09, 2007

The Atlanta Btfsplk's

I’m thinking it may be time to change the name of the Atlanta Falcons to the Atlanta Btfsplk’s. Why Btfsplk’s? “Joe Btfsplk is very simply the world’s biggest jinx. He walks around with a perpetually dark rain cloud a foot over his head. Once he appears on any scene, dreadfully bad luck befalls anyone in his vicinity.”

Forty years without two winning seasons back to back. Then you commit to a franchise quarterback, trade your solid backup insurance, and bring in a new coach with a high powered offense to match his talent. But you end up with a convicted QB who may never wear a uniform again, somebody else’s rejected 2nd stringer as your starter, and a coach with a high powered offense that now appears to lack enough gas to score more than one field goal in its debut.

That’s some major league bad luck, so much so it seems time to put a name on it: The Atlanta Btfsplk’s.

Or maybe it’s Joey Harrington that’s Joe Btfsplk. After all, look at his previous work in Detroit (18 wins, 37 losses) and Miami (5 wins, 6 losses).

Harrington’s first regular season touchdown pass as a Falcon unfortunately was not caught by a member of his own team. The play ended with the ugly sight of a 300 pound Minnesota defensive lineman jogging about 50 yards for a TD after intercepting Harrington’s pass.

In fact, 14 of Minnesota’s 24 points started out as passes by Joey Harrington, who threw for 200 yards, 23-of-30. Those aren’t exactly awful numbers, and the fact he was sacked six times shows some serious woes in an offensive line that is no longer cut blocking. Last year’s #1 rushing team managed 96 yards total today. It’s not just Harrington who isn’t executing well in Petrino’s shiny new offense.

One offensive bright spot was Jerious Norwood. He is as explosive a runner as Vick … was. However, he not only does not touch the ball every play, he isn’t even on the field every play. Joey Harrington is. And today Harrington was sacked more times, six, than the number of times Norwood got to touch the ball, five.

The defense? They had a few breakdowns, but the fact is they kept the offense theoretically “in the game” for over three quarters. They allowed one drive for a field goal, and one Really Big Play by the rookie running back to score a TD. All other points were on turnovers by the offense.

On another positive note, comparing the offensive play calling of last year to this year is like comparing Britney Spears and Sarah McLachlan. Yugo and Mercedes. Roger Corman and Steven Spielberg.

Unfortunately, however, comparing the quarterback of last year to this year is like comparing Sarah McLachlan and Britney Spears. Mercedes and Yugo. Steven Spielberg and Roger Corman.

If we had Mario Andretti driving a ’73 Gremlin last year, this year we’ve got a Maserati driven by, well, me and a bottle of Jack Daniels. One can only hope we will see some sobering up in the coming weeks, but hey, we’re talking about the Falcons.

There’s forty years of tradition at work here.

Other notes: the Fox Sports Transformer-MechaPlayer they have jumping around all over their graphics is about as silly looking as it gets. Just go ahead and put a cartoon rabbit up there, for all it has to do with football. And in the Beer Ad Wars, the Coors ads using coaches at press conferences are so tired, but Budweiser’s new ads are very fresh. And funny.