TMQ: Bring back the replacement officials!

Plus the Grand Illusion of American football

The Forty Niners went into Philadelphia and punched the Eagles in the nose -- no matter how much the home crowd booed!

Earlier in the season TMQ proclaimed Santa Clara the league’s best team. But, All Predictions Wrong. When the Niners dropped three straight, I responded like a politician – changed the subject. Now the Niners once again seem the class of the NFC.

Who-dat Brock Purdy has the top  NFL passer rating of quarterback starters, and a Good Less Bad metric of 17. (Dak Prescott leads that category at 20 – I’ll have more on Good Less Bad next week.)

One of the measures of sports success is being the team that no one wants to play. In the NFL that team is the Forty Niners.

Up in Green Bay, once again the officiating was atrocious, with OBVIOUS mistakes in the final minute. Left viewers longing for the 2012 replacement officials  who called touchdown and interception at the same time.

The 2012 Fail Mary play — one official signals touchdown while the other signals interception.

Players are waived if they don’t perform, coaches are fired if the W-L is bad. Why are officials exempt from accountability? See more below.

At Jacksonville, the Jaguars had a chance to seize control of the AFC first seed, instead, lost at home again. In a sport where home field advantage is huge, Jax has a losing record at home yet is undefeated on the road.

Network announcers gushed, as they should have, over the performance of little-known Bengals backup quarterback Jake Browning, who went 32-for-37 passing after five years riding various NFL benches. ESPN depicted Browning’s spectacular California high school career as something unknown.

Ahem – Browning’s spectacular California high school career was discussed in Tuesday Morning Quarterback two weeks ago.  

As for the Packers, suddenly their faithful are in love with Jordan Love. The Pack has posted consecutive authentic victories over Detroit and Kansas City. Love is showing ability to elude the rush while keeping his eyes downfield, which is key to the game of Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen. Perhaps there is yet another great quarterback in the line of succession at Titletown.

Sunday night, the Packers used end-around actions to slow the Kansas City rush.

The end-around often is called a “reverse” by announcers. But the ball must change directions for a reverse. On an end-around, the quarterback hands to an end moving laterally – one direction for the ball. On a reverse, someone runs laterally one way, then hands to a gent running the other way.

Announcers often call a reverse a “double reverse.” For this to occur the ball would have to start in Direction 1, then go toward Direction 2, then go back toward Direction 1. Your writer has watched and attended way too much football, and never seen an actual double reverse successfully executed.

Before the Hail Mary final snap by Kansas City on Sunday Night Football, NBC’s Chris Collinsworth said, “Maybe it will be a triple reverse.” I feel I can state without fear of contradiction there has never been an actual triple reverse.

Chiefs note: when they attempt a Hail Mary it should be called a Hail Taylor.

She arrived at Green Bay in time to watch the Hail Taylor.

TMQ’s law of the end-around/reverse holds: any such action that gets back to the line of scrimmage is a success, because it slows the pass rush, forcing defensive ends and outside linebackers to contain – pausing for a moment to see if an end-around is coming – before heading toward the passer.