[ Watch The Birdie (Page 9) ]
Week 8, then, and it’s San Francisco’s turn to visit Sun Devil Stadium. The
single reason we’re not bottom of our division, the 69ers are 2-5, proving
conclusively that without Terrell Owens, who’s been out all year with a broken
arm, they’re nothing.
“Shame he’s back for this game then, isn’t it?”
It is a bit.
“Jeff Garcia, far and away the campest quarterback in the NFL, is still the
guy under centre and is still a danger when he decides to tuck the ball and run.
The offensive line is good and powerful – and this is a West Coast offence, so
it doesn’t matter who’s in the backfield – Garrison Hearst, Kevan Barlow, Fred
Beasley – they’re all receiving threats. Which is more than you can say for the
receivers. Tai Streets and Jed Weaver are only so-so.”
So-so enough for our secondary to handle them?
“Nobody’s that so-so. The San
Francisco defence is patchy. Strong up front, where RE Andre Carter and Bryant
Young, the DT, are the main pass-rushing threats. But get past them and you’re
into a barely-okay linebacker corps and a dodgy secondary – beardy-weirdy Will
LB Jeff Ulbrich lacks speed and while Ahmed Plummer is a quality corner there’s
a wide gulf in quality between him and his partner, Jason Webster. And a gulf
wider than the Crack Of Doom between Webster and the nickelback, the hapless
Mike Rumph.”
Hapless is an odd word. You never hear of someone competent being called hapful,
do you?
”Whatever. Rumph plainly hasn’t seen hap in his life. He wouldn’t know hap if
it jumped out of the bushes playing a zither and pelted him with mackerel. He
may even be allergic to hap – hap intolerant, if you like. Oh, one last
thing...”
I’m scared to even ask.
“San Francisco’s middle linebacker, Derek Smith, has an enormous head but a
tiny, tiny face. Wheras SS Tony Parrish has a small head but a gigantic face.
I’m sure there’s something significant about that, but I can’t work out what it
might be.”
You’ve stopped taking the medication again, haven’t you?
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Just for a change of pace, we win the toss and elect to receive the kick in a
two-thirds full stadium – the number of fans who’ve made an appearance doesn’t
seem to have fluctuated much at all this season, really. Which is probably just
as well because, let’s face it, there’s no way the attendance would be going
up.
We’ve been pretty good on opening drives all year, so it’s no great surprise
when Blake misses his target then we drop the ball twice to go three-and-out.
Because it’s never a surprise when we go three-and-out. But Garcia can’t find
his range and the 69ers have to return the ball, the punt hanging up in the
breeze to be fair-caught at our 33. Back to basics, then, and it doesn’t get
much more basic than Marcel Shipp up the middle.
San Francisco try to mix up their defensive schemes to keep us off-balance, but
Jeff Blake sees the utterly-lacking-in-hap nickelback Mike Rumph coming on a
blitz and hits the bloke Rumph really ought to have been covering, slot receiver
Bryan Gilmore, in front of the safeties for a 16-yard gain that takes us out of
our own half for the first time this afternoon. A combination of Shipp’s
strength and Emmitt Smith’s guile take us into the red zone, and on 3rd and long
Gilmore gets a step on Rumph, Blake finds a perfect pass and it’s first down at
the three.
The Niners stack against the run they know is coming, meaning that once Johnno’s
fought through the press coverage he’s all alone in the endzone and makes a
simple catch to open the scoring. Heh heh heh. Fooled yeh. SF 0-7 ARI
San Francisco still can’t get going, and have to punt with nary a first down to
their name after Raynoch Thompson makes a terrific play, leaping full stretch to
bat the pass away from Fred Beasley’s hands. If he’d made the pick it was a
certain 6 points of course, but it doesn’t do to be greedy. A terrible punt
slices out of bounds at halfway and against all expectations we’re back in
business. We’re almost back out of business quicker than a dot com, but
on 4th and inches at the 41 Marcel Shipp does his
crash-up-the-middle-bowling-tacklers-over party piece again and as time runs out
on the first quarter we’re camped at the 69er 22 yard line. If it’s not broke
we’re not going to try and fix it, but on 2nd and 10 Marcel finds the middle
stuffed and has to bounce outside, where he picks up a couple of nice blocks and
is only dragged down inside the five. Emmitt Smith comes in and vultures the
score and with just eight minutes left in the half we’re ahead SF 0-14 ARI
Hands up if you think we can keep it up? Hah. It looks good initially, Garcia
feeling a bit of pressure, pulling the ball down and trying to run into a hole
that just isn’t there – rookie RE Calvin Pace wrapping him up for the sack.
But on 3rd and 18 backup TE Jed Weaver makes the reception to get the 69ers
their first 1st down of the day. Two runs take them into Arizona territory, then
it’s time to cough up our Big Running Play for the day, Garrison Hearst taking
the ball on a sweep and just not stopping. Sigh. Just under three minutes left
to the break, SF 7-14 ARI
Loads of time. Loads of time. Until, you know, Blake misses Anquan on first down
and Marcel gets stopped behind the line on second. Then we’re at the two minute
warning, still deep in our half and worrying about giving the ball back to San
Francisco with enough time for them to score. Back drops Jeff, looks downfield,
the coverage is pretty damned good on both Johnno and Anquan, but the defence is
concentrating so hard on the wideouts they seem to have lost track of Freddie
Jones... great throw, great catch, 20 yards, first down, 1:50 and ticking. We’re
taking what they’re giving, and that means short, sharp passes, constantly
moving forward but racing against the clock the whole way. Shipp rumbles to
convert a third and short, and we take our first timeout at the San Francisco
33, 30 seconds left in the half. Time to get a bit of a wiggle on. Jeff Blake
drops back once more, feels a little pressure and looks for his outlet, Freddie
Jones. What he doesn’t see is the defensive lineman standing in the way – well,
they’re easy to miss, aren’t they? – and can only watch helplessly along with
the disbelieving fans as left end Mike Petersen takes the pick back seventy-five
yards in a play that looks for all the world like a slow-motion replay of
itself. It’s going to be a top-five contender for the title of the team’s Most
Farcical Play Of The Season, and that’s quite an achievement when the Arizona
Cardinals are involved. Halftime of a game we’ve absolutely dominated, then –
SF 14-14 ARI
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Add Garrison Hearst to the long list of halfbacks who’ve owned us this year. Our
only defence against the run seems to be to get out to a big enough lead that
the other side has no choice but to go to the air – and, let’s be fair, how
often is that going to happen against any team who aren’t from Detroit? Anyway,
it’s the old, old story – the first tackler seems to miss Hearst every single
time, and we only finally stop the 69ers when they unwisely throw on 3rd and
inches and Adrian Wilson hits rookie WR Brandon Lloyd hard enough to jam the
ball loose for an incompletion. Owen Pochman slots the long figgie, and for the
first time all game, San Francisco are ahead – SF 17-14 ARI
By contrast, while they still remain a little vulnerable to the pass the 69ers
have stiffened nicely (oooh-er madam, whoops Mrs. Miggins, you’re sitting on my
artichokes etcetera) against the run, and our ensuing drive ends when we get
into those too-far-for-a-FG, too-close-for-a-punt situations and go for a 4th
and 2 at the 41. Shipp gets dragged down shy of the line and we turn the ball
over. Hearst, Hearst, sodding Hearst. With our backs to the wall we finally get
it together, stuffing consecutive runs then sniffing out the screen on 3rd and
goal to leave Pochman with a chipshot, making the score at the end of the third
quarter a still-anybody’s-game-if-our-defence-shows-up-at-some-point SF 20-14
ARI
Despite only a couple of touchdowns, our offence hasn’t been in bad shape, and
the drive for the go-ahead score starts with a couple of decent-ish runs then
Anquan Boldin finding the gap in the Cover-2 zone, making the catch on a short
hook-pattern then bowling over would-be tacklers on his way to a 25-yard gain –
first down just outside the San Francisco 30. Let’s see if you’ve noticed the
pattern – hands up if you think we can keep it up? Hah. On his way to converting
a second-and-short, Marcel Shipp does his thing once more, letting the ball get
ripped from his grasp and allowing the 69ers to fall on it at their own 19, and
another promising Arizona drive has ended with a turnover – nine minutes left in
the game.
Out they come with a run-fake that we’ve absolutely no option but to bite on,
and Garcia airs it out for Terrell Owens’ first catch of the game up at halfway.
It looks ominous when an offsides penalty on Calvin Pace gives them 1st and 5,
but near-miraculously two Hearst runs and a Garcia scramble are held to 3 yards
total and with 4:46 left on the clock the Niners punt right through the endzone
– touchback, and one last chance to try and snatch victory from the jaws of the
feet – rather than the other way around, which is our normal trick.
Here we go, then. A Smith flare then a Shipp smash give us our first first down
of the drive, and it looks like it’ll be the first and last when two short runs
and a pass batted away from Freddie Jones leave us with 4th and 5 at our own 48.
Three wideouts and two halfbacks prove to be too many targets for San Francisco
to keep track of, though, and Emmitt Smith takes a swing-pass 19 yards down the
sideline – 1st and 10 at the Niner 33, 2:21 remaining and a field-goal, lest we
forget, of absolutely no use to us. Jeff-to-Johnno takes us to the 22 and to the
2-minute warning. Two Shipp runs leave us with 3rd-and-3 at the 15, but under
pressure Jeff Blake has to get rid of the ball and, once again, that’s fourth
down. If in doubt – Jeff-to-Johnno, and the big receiver runs a lovely short
curl before spinning and fighting his way all the way down to the 2 – first and
goal, 56 ticks remaining.
Marcel Shipp is knackered, so it’s all down to the NFL’s leading rusher... who’s
stopped in the backfield. Arse. They won’t be expecting the run again, though,
will they? Oh, I suppose they might be. Emmitt brushes off a tackler and battles
against the tide, gets a couple but is still brought down agonisingly short of
the goal-line... timeout, then, one still in the bank and nine seconds left on
the clock, meaning that we’ve time for two runs if we need them. Shipp’s back in
and we stack the line leaving Anquan close to the line in what's almost a second
tight-end position, and just Johnno split wide – but we’ve already passed once
today in a goal-to-go, point-blank situation, so I have to figure that the
element of surprise is gone for that ploy. Plus I don’t think it’s an
exaggeration to say that a sack on something like a play-action pass would be
nothing short of a disaster of Biblical proportions. Jeff Blake settles under
centre and a tense silence settles over the stadium, a silence so complete that
I can actually hear the count being barked – “Hut... HUT!” The snap’s clean and
Blake drops back, turns and offers the ball to the charging Marcel Shipp who
plunges past and rams into the scrum on the goal-line where the 69ers have stood
up our o-line and look like they’ve stopped Marcel short... as Jeff Blake turns
back, looks up and fires the pass straight and true to a wide open Bryant
Johnson. Heh heh heh. Fooled ya. Again.
And where there was silence, there’s now noise, nothing but noise. Bill
Gramatica hasn’t missed a PAT all season and doesn’t get out of the habit now,
and a sack from Frank Wakefield stops San Francisco’s last-second Hail Mary
attempt before it even starts. Final score – SF 20-21 ARI and we move to
3-4 on the season as the Niners, who had just 67 yards passing on the day, drop
to 2-6.
