By Adam Cancryn
Creativity and adapability are crucial to a championship run in today's NFL.
Call it the Super Bowl of Misfit Teams.
While powerhouses like the Packers and Saints, and perennial contenders like the Steelers and Ravens sit home and lick their wounds, the New England Patriots and New York Giants are in Indianapolis, preparing to play for the league championship.
It's the one-dimensional Giants versus the porous Pats. The most miserable rushing offense in the NFL meeting the league's second-worst defense. Just how did we get here again?
At first glance, Super Bowl XLVI looks like the classic underdog story. No one really gave New England much of a chance to get this far, and the Giants weren't even on the radar until about three weeks ago. But this isn't as much of an up-by-their-bootstraps tale as it is the signal of a broader shift within the NFL. It's no longer the most talented teams that make it to the big game, but rather the most creative ones.
Take a look at this year's playoff teams and you'll encounter many of the same pieces: an upper-tier quarterback, a go-to receiver, a defensive stopper, an explosive playmaker. The difference in talent among the NFL's top one-third is slimmer than perhaps ever before. The Packers' offensive juggernaut was offset by its lackluster defense. The Saints suffered from much the same. The San Francisco 49ers lacked quick strike ability to complement their ground offensive. Each team's strengths outweighed their weaknesses over the season, but unlike previous years, there was no doubt that each had weaknesses. There were no '94 49ers or '98 Broncos, or even '07 Patriots, waiting to steamroll the rest of the NFL's upper echelon.
What's separated the winners from the losers, then, has been how that talent was manipulated and adapted to to fit the latest situation. How does a does a team respond when its top receiver is ineffective? What if an opponent deviates from their normal game plan? Can a squad overcome a key injury? It's in this kind of chess match within each game that the Patriots and Giants proved their mettle.
New York flipped the script on the Falcons in the wild card game, handing the ball to forgotten running back Brandon Jacobs over and over until he pounded Atlanta into submission. Meanwhile, the Steelers' defense couldn't figure out how to combat a shifty lefty with poor mechanics. The Giants advanced easily; the Steelers misplayed themselves into an year-ending loss.
The Patriots simplified their approach the next week, reducing the divisional round to backyard touch football. While Brady was pitching six touchdowns in a blowout victory, the Saints got caught off guard by an opponent able to match them point for point.
The Giants stacked the box and dared Alex Smith to air it out in the conference championship game, betting that his previously impeccable accuracy would desert him once all the pressure landed squarely on his shoulders. They were right. On that same day, the Ravens, deprived of their traditional field goal routine and forced to adjust, yanked the game-tying kick wide left.
Where all of the others had proven too rigid and failed, New England and New York adapted and survived, counterpunching their way to the Super Bowl. In doing so, they emptied their respective bags of tricks: putting a receiver at cornerback, abandoning the run game, running a hurry-up offense in the first quarter, throwing deep to the team's shortest wideout. All in the name of gaining that small advantage over their opponent. Defense won't win a championship this year, and neither will offense. It's all about maximizing the skills at your disposal.
Fittingly, there is little discernible difference on paper between the Patriots and Giants. Each have their strengths, each have their weaknesses, and all have been laid bare over the past 19 games. It comes down pure strategy now, attacking and defending, misdirection and surprise. It is, after all, why they play the game.
Adam Cancryn is an editor and co-founder of Began in '96.
0 comments:
Post a Comment