King of Pain!!!

Imagine "King of Pain" by the Police is playing as you read this. Cause I am that. Let me start off by saying I was supposed to play volleyball in my rec league. I would be making my season debut on Sunday afternoon. But the team that my team was playing against didn't have enough players so they forfeited. That left me the whole afternoon to watch football. That left me the opportunity to go through aggravation and ageda that I didn't think the New York Giants were capable of putting me through.

The game started eerily enough as Willie Ponder, who is one of the best kick returners in football, fumbles the opening kickoff. Fortunately, Minnesota would not score. The Giants defense allowed 6 yards of Minnesota offense in the first half. That's excellent, for those of you who don't know. Yet, they trailed 7-6 at halftime thanks to 2 Eli Manning interceptions (and I'll rip him a new one as this goes on) and Darren Sharper interception return for a touchdown. The Vikings also missed 2 field goals, one of which was blocked.

Oh, and Mr. Automatic, Jay Feely, the kicker who was starting to make everybody forget about Jan Stenerud, Matt Bahr, George Blanda, and Adam Vinatieri. Misses a 28-yard field goal at the end of the first half! We trail 7-6 going into the half. But I still felt fine. I knew the Giants were better. They had plenty of time to get hot.

Actually, it was me who got hot on the first play as Koren Robinson, who I thought was out of football, returns the opening kickoff 86 yards. Touchdown. 14-6.

But the Giants come back with a beautiful drive, covering 85 yards on 6 plays, including a TD pass to Well-Dressed Amani Toomer. Coughlin doesn't go for 2 points, he kicks, 14-13. Fine. Their offense hasn't done anything still. Actually, on the Vikings' next drive they scored a TD that was nullified by a penalty. They punted. Giants get the ball at their 23, and go 3 and out, including 2 horrible looking passes from Manning. Jeff Feagles punts to a guy I benched on my fantasy team this week, Mewelde Moore. What does Mewelde do? 71-yard return into the end zone. TD Minnesota.

Later the Giants recover a Minn fumble on the Minnesota 35. And here's when you knew the Giants were in a heap of trouble. First play, Manning fumbles and Minnesota recovers. It was challenged and correctly called an incomplete pass, but on the first play after your defense does something huge, you cannot put your own team in that kind of situation. So no turnover. Got away with that one. Next play, a 7-yard run by Tiki. HOLD ON! Holding on Luke Petigout, 10 yard penalty. 2nd and 20 now. Manning lobs the ball up, settles right into the hands of Brian Williams. Problem! He plays for the Vikings. Way to give them the ball right back!

Let's go to 4 minutes left in the 4th quarter. Facing 3rd and 10 Manning throws a great pass to Jeremy Shockey for 19 yards and a big first down at the Minn 11. Tiki then runs for 6 yards. Good job. Next play, a short pass to Tiki that he takes in to the end zone. But oh no! Chris Snee, an offensive guard, is an ineligible receiver downfield. Are you kidding! That moves the Giants back 5 yards and Manning completes the next pass to Darren Sharper. Who of course plays for Minnesota. He had Tiki Barber WIDE OPEN on the flat! Instead he throws to a guy who was ripping New York football in the media today, Mr. Sharper. I was so angry I drove home and watched the end of the game at home.

And again the Giant defense comes up enormous! They move Minnesota back 3 yards and they get the ball back with 3:17 to go. The offense has their second of 2 good drives, culminating with Tiki's TD and 2-point conversion. Tie game 21-21. And the fact that they converted the 2-pointer was shocking to me. But as always happens in this spot, how much time do you leave the other team to drive down the field and set up a game-winning field goal. In this case, following the 4-yard sack of William Joseph on Brad Johnson, the Giant defense stopped playing. That defense had dominated all day long. Were they even on the field for that last minute? It looked like the New York Knick basketball defense under Don Chaney! 21 yard pass, 11 yard pass, 11 yard pass, 3 yard pass and they're on the Giant 30.


And after missing two field goals earlier, you knew there was no way Paul Edinger was missing this time. Would the god of wind help us, No freakin' way. That kick would have been good from 60 yards and it was right down the middle. Game over. Absolutely a disgusting, hideous loss to a bunch of purple thugs. And even worse, God knows I'm going to be hearing their radio announcer, Paul Allen, call the field goal on Sports Center tomorrow. Oh, the pain!


Manning did a fine impression of Neil O'Donnell to Larry Brown in the Pittsburgh-Dallas Super Bowl from 1995! Great job, Eli, of finding the open defensive back. You were an embarrassment today. And as bad as the last drive was, I credit the Giant defense for playing so well for 59 minutes. But Mike Sweatman, the Giants special team coach, deserves to get dropped off in the rough section of Harlem naked and handcuffed. Let whatever will happen, happen. This was the worst special teams performance I have ever seen by an NFL football team. This was not exactly Dante Hall and Terrence McGee breaking tackles. It was Koren Robinson and Mewelde Moore scoring TD's? Give me a break already!

And Mike Tice, your team deserves to celebrate tonight. I hear New York has some marvelous boat cruises! Take the whole team! You bald, fat piece of crap.

The Giants have a lot of learning to do, especially Eli Manning. Just a shameful, gut-wrenching, make-you want-to-vomit loss to Minnesota. They had better learn from this.

The Jets are an afterthought. They're done. I'm not even going to go into them. Except this: they don't give a damn right now about playing football.