World Class or No Class

World Class:

Kurt Warner – The dumbest argument I heard in the weeks leading up to Super Bowl XLIII was whether or not people thought Kurt Warner was worthy of the Hall of Fame. I thought the argument against him was a poor one before the Super Bowl but it seems even more ridiculous now (about as ridiculous as people saying Ben Roethlisberger is more of a lock than Warner). Kurt Warner has been to 3 Super Bowls. He won his first and was named MVP. In the other two he was on the losing end of two of the most crushing defeats in modern Super Bowl history. Warner did everything he could to win those and had to sit on the sidelines and watch his D crumble in the last minute. He was about a foot away from watching his D lose the only championship he has. Warner owns the top 3 passing yard performances in Super Bowl history (yes, he’s 3 for 3) and did it with two perennial losing franchises. Was he lucky to play with such great offenses or was he the key ingredient to the success of those franchises? I say the latter.

Ben Roethlisberger – The talk all week was about Roethlisberger’s poor performance the last time he took center stage in the biggest game of the NFL season. His team still won but it certainly didn’t have a lot to do with him. Big Ben really stepped up this year and made sure his stamp was placed on this year’s game. During the game I tried to downplay the plays he made, even saying the pass to Holmes was a poor decision because he threw it in an area with 3 defenders. That kind of throw takes massive stones and Steeler Nation should be thankful that his stones are proportional to his head, which is monstrous. The bottom line is that he was under attack for most of the game and improvised a number of first downs for the Steelers when most quarterbacks would have taken the sack. What Big Ben does better than any quarterback in the league is he escapes pressure and finds an open space so he can square up and hit open receivers.

Larry Fitzgerald – The line for Fitz-fellating stories is never ending but this piece would not be complete without the most prolific player I’ve seen since Barry Sanders (my idol and the reason I will never take off the number 20). It was virtually impossible for Fitz’s stock to rise after what he did in the previous 3 games during the postseason but it did. Down 20-7, he scored two touchdowns that along with a safety helped the team take a 23-20 lead with just over 2 minutes left in the game. He made what amounted to a one handed catch on the first TD and he caught a 10 yard slant and took it 64 yards for what should have been the game winning touchdown. On the play, Ike Taylor tried to jam him at the line (it was previously reported by me that James Harrison was on him), he ran right past him, caught the ball with his hands and split the two safeties and scampered to the end zone with them and James Harrison in tow. Tommy Curran came on the Rome radio show on Monday and mentioned something that I probably should have talked about yesterday and was almost his best play of the game. After Harrison jumped the Boldin route and started running the other way at the end of the half, you can see Fitz about 5 yards deep in the endzone. Fitz first started by running straight down the field and realized that the Steelers were set up in perfect kick return formation. They essentially had a wall set up so anybody who tried to take Harrison down from the middle of the field would have to fight off two or three blocks. Larry was blocked a couple of times and ran to the sideline where he dodged a couple of straggling Cardinals players. He had to push Antrel Rolle out of his way at about the 20 and eventually caught Harrison at the goal line. It is likely that if Rolle hadn’t gotten in his way, he would have taken Harrison down earlier and maybe the Cards win the game. The line he took was amazing because he was essentially zig-zagging through people while Harrison ran a straight line to the endzone and Fitz still caught him at the goal line.

James Harrison – Not enough has been said of the significance of Harrison’s TD and what he has meant to the team all year. Harrison was undrafted out of college and was cut by a number of teams before catching on with Pittsburgh. He is a very effective player on D for Pittsburgh because he’s so versatile. You saw it during the game, he was able to get to the quarterback on a consistent basis and he was very effective when dropping back in coverage. While it’s true that he had tremendous blocking in front of him on that runback, his timing and speed were what made the play possible. There are some cornerbacks who wouldn’t have been able to return that all the way for the touchdown. The only glitch in his game on Sunday was the smackdown he laid on Arizona DB, Francisco that drew a personal foul and pinned the Steelers on their own 1 yard line. He was probably just upset that somebody actually tried to block him as he was getting good pressure much of the day. In all seriousness, I was incensed at the time and thought Harrison should have been booted from the game. But he wasn't and there's no denying his role. Oh yeah, did I mention he was the NFL Defensive Player of the Year?

Barack Obama – Matt Lauer interviewed him during pregame and mentioned how Obama was cut out of the shot on his family’s cover shot in the latest edition of People magazine. His mug was covered up by a side piece on Jessica Simpson and her latest issues. Lauer showed him the cover and Obama got off this unintended blast, “[pointing] Apparently she’s in a weight battle.” Boom. It must be said that the piece literally says, “WEIGHT BATTLE” and has a picture of Simpson but that doesn’t make it any less funny.

No Class:

The Hall of Fame Committee – Leaving Shannon Sharpe out of the Hall of Fame is like a slap in the face to tight ends and guys with rippling pecs everywhere. I know it was his first time on the ballot and he will get in at some point but he deserved to be a first ballot hall-of-famer. Here’s a sample of some of Shannon’s credentials: 3 Super Bowl titles, 8 Pro Bowls, 4 time 1st team All-Pro Selection, 815 receptions, 62 TDs, 10,060 yards.

Roy Williams – For comparing TO and himself to Fitz and Boldin. Enough said.

The morons conducting the booth reviews – The non-challenge on the Kurt Warner’s fumble was unbelievable. I know that people are saying that they did do a review but I’m sorry, no they didn’t. The guys in the booth did a quick review and took it upon themselves to say the play was 100% accurate on the field and didn’t warrant an official’s review. The guys on the field are working the Super Bowl for a reason, because they have proven themselves to be the best throughout the season. Your job is to make sure everything close gets reviewed so no calls in the final two minutes are botched. Kurt’s arm was going forward. You took away a fan’s opportunity to see whether Larry Fitzgerald could go up in a heap of players and pull down a ball for the championship. Who knows, maybe I rewrite my teabag column with a new brand of teabag. I was listening to Friday’s Rome show today and they mentioned the Colonel’s Scholar Program in which KFC vowed to donate $250,000 to charity if any team completed a hail mary on the last play of the game. Now you're just taking money from kids.

LaMarr Woodley - This guy was directly involved in both controversial no-calls during Sunday's game. He threw the textbook clip on Tim Hightower as he was about to tackle James Harrison on his 100 yard runback and he was the guy who grabbed Kurt Warner's arm as it was going forward. Maybe he should be in the World Class section...

Aaron Francisco - Unbelievable postseason for this guy. He was directly involved in every blown play by Arizona's DBs this postseason. The sad thing is he might be a good player, but I didn't know his name before this postseason and now he's that guy who intercepted a ball against Philly then let DeSean Jackson run him down from behind and force him to fumble, that guy who was physically assaulted by James Harrison, that guy who fell over during the most important defensive stand in the history of the franchise, and that guy who was a second late on the Holmes touchdown.

Georges St. Pierre - Shame on you if this is true. Not that St. Pierre needed any help to win on Saturday night but if this is true, St. Pierre and his camp are cheaters and MMA is a sport that doesn't take kindly to cheaters. St. Pierre spent 4 rounds completely dominating Penn but it was apparent that Penn was trying to work his legs up on GSPs body and couldn't find a hold. I'm not going to pretend like I saw this but it can be a significant advantage against a fighter who plans to work a submission out of the guard. You can bet Dana White will look into this and if it turns out to be true, F bombs will fly out of his mouth with no regard for man, woman, or child.

-PSon