Super Bowl XLIX: Three Ways Seattle Can Win

Tackle

An obvious football fundamental, but particularly important against the backfield that the Seahawks are going to have to limit. LeGarrette Blount was an absolute monster in the AFC Championship Game against Indianapolis (30 carries for 148 yards and three touchdowns), and the Colts showed, again and again, an inability to bring the big man down. Granted, the big man from Oregon runs like a battering ram, but it was as poor a tackling effort on a big stage as I’ve seen in some time.

Although we never know for sure with the way Bill Belichick plans his offensive schemes for any given game, you’d imagine that Blount will see a lot of the football on Sunday evening, and the Seahawks will need to be a lot better than the Colts were. If Blount has any of the same success he had against Indy, it’s going to be a long day for the ‘Hawks – and probably not one where they come out on top. On the other hand, if the Seattle front can stuff the run, immediately the pressure switches to Brady and the passing game.

Harass Brady and get takeaways

If anyone can do it to Brady, it’s this Seattle D. They are experts at performing in big games, as Peyton Manning and the Denver Broncos can attest from last year. Super Bowl XLIX is another one of those games pitting a great offense against a great defense, and we saw fifty two weeks ago that the great defense made that great offense look pretty bad.

The Broncos had a torrid time of it, and if Seattle can reproduce that sort of effectiveness against Brady, they’re likely to win the game. Brady is statuesque in the pocket, and if the Seattle front can get to him and sack him, or force a bad throw, there’s a high chance they’re going to get turnovers.

As I wrote in my corresponding article on three ways New England can win, teams who score a defensive touchdown are undefeated in the previous 48 Super Bowls. It’s a massive momentum swinger either way. Seattle have the horses to force these turnovers, but, in saying that, there are injury clouds (and personal issues) hanging over some of their key guys. Whether Richard Sherman plays - not a given, with the potential game-day birth of his son - and the sort of impact of some other important defensive cogs may have on the field is going to really alter the course of the game, either way.

Stop Rob Gronkowski

Last but not least, Seattle must contain the big man of the Patriots offense because, simply, no one can hurt them offensively like the Brady-to-Gronkowski combination can. We’ve read plenty throughout the last two weeks, and a lot of it centres on the best-equipped Seattle defender to do the job. Make no mistake, if it’s done well, if Gronk is limited in his offensve production, chances are the Seahawks are going to win the game, and their second-straight Super Bowl championship. This is, in many respects, where the game will be won or lost.

Cameron Mee analysed the Seahawks options perfectly earlier this week on The Roar, and I have a feeling that Kam Chancellor and Bobby Wagner are likely the keys here. Wagner, especially. When he’s on the field, Seattle’s opponents average 4.4 yards per play. When he’s on the sideline, it’s out to 5.1 yards. 

In what figures to be a close, tightly-contested defensive Super Bowl, Wagner’s presence might be the different. If he and the rest of the Legion of Boom can drastically limit his effectiveness for Brady, then the Seahawks, you’d think, have the upper hand. It’s going to be a fascinating duel, and potentially a game-deciding one.

Super Bowl XLIX: Three Ways New England Can Win

Target Rob Gronkowski early and often.

As important as Tom Brady is to New England, you can mount a pretty solid argument that Gronkowski, the lumbering tight end (and unwitting star of some questionable adult fiction, just recently), is just as important. Without doubt, he’s a superstar of the team and the NFL itself. Indeed, three years ago, a below-par Gronkowski had a minimal impact on the game, which led to – another – Patriots loss to New York, in a game that the Pats were probably favourites.

Fast forward three years, and Gronkowski is, as far as we know, healthy and ready to go, and you can imagine that Brady will look to bring him into the game early, and target him plenty throughout. Why? Because, of all the New England offensive threats, Gronk is the hardest one for Seattle’s talented defense to curtail. 

Gronkowski could have a massive influence on this game. If he’s kept largely out of the contest by the Seattle defense, that’s bad news for New England. I believe Gronkowski needs to have a huge game for the Pats to triumph. I’m talking somewhere around the century mark in receiving yards, including a few big plays.

Don’t turn the football over.

A rather obvious key to winning any sort of football game, but particularly important at Super Bowl time. Why? Well, I read a crazy stat during the week that a team who scores a Pick-6 touchdown has never lost a Super Bowl. We’ve seen some memorable ones over the years, including a Peyton Manning’s against New Orleans, which sealed a Super Bowl title for the Saints.

Giving up a defensive touchdown is clearly a massive morale-killer, and this is particularly the case, given the way Seattle’s talented defense goes about things. Points or not, if they can get a few turnovers, the game could swing drastically in their favour. Earl Thomas, Kam Chancellor, Richard Sherman…these guys live for taking the ball away, and, provided they are all healthy – and there have been some questions in this regard since the NFC Championship Game – Brady and his receivers are going to need to be incredibly disciplined in the aerial attack.

It’s fair to say they haven’t seen a defensive corps quite this good all season, and the Seahawks would love nothing more than to force New England’s offense from the field. To that end, the Pats will need to be perhaps more disciplined than they’ve ever been before. No silly throws when the pocket collapses, protect the football if Brady’s taking a sack, and sure-handed catches by his receivers.

Limit Russell Wilson’s influence running the football.

There’s been suggestion during the last two weeks of media build-up to the game that if star running back Marshawn Lynch can’t get going right away– remember, he started slowly against Green Bay – that the Seattle offense might call more running plays for quarterback Russell Wilson.

If you’ve watched any of Seattle this year, you’ll realise that this isn’t some sort of gimmick from deep in their play book, but something that Wilson does with some regularity, and with some success, too. He’s deceptively quick, and has some nice moves, too. If he gets a nice block, he can make yards in the blink of an eye.

We might even see some version of the read option offense employed with Lynch in the backfield to further confuse a New England defense that’s going to have it’s work cut out for it. Certainly, Wilson is more prolific as a passer, but, on occasion, he’d made life difficult for opposition tacklers by tucking the ball and taking off.

Opinion: 5 Thoughts From The 2015 NHL All Star Weekend

1. Columbus is a very underrated hockey city: The home of the expansion franchise, the Blue Jackets, has not often made the same lists as Chicago, Boston, Toronto and even, increasingly, Los Angeles, but it thoroughly deserves to join those other great hockey cities of North America.

The fans in Columbus have waited a long time for their turn at hosting All Star Weekend. It’s been three years since the last All Star Weekend – 2012 in Ottawa – thanks to Olympics last year and the lock-out in 2013. Based on the great interest and attendance at pretty much every event across the weekend, Columbus’ turn hosting the All Star festivities can only be described as wildly successful.

Except, of course, if you’re the Nationwide Arena PA announcer, who had multiple attempts at pronouncing Johnny Gaudreau’s name correctly, failing miserably – Gad-row, Good-row, what’s in a name, right? – but humorously each time.

Oh yeah, and there’s that cannon, which apparently is fired each time the Blue Jackets score a goal, or when the hometown Team Foligno scored on this occasion. It’s preceded by a few lines from the AC/DC song “For Those About To Rock” and then, no matter where you are in the arena, you’re deafened. Out-of-town players and media hated it.

Pronunciations and artillery aside, overwhelmingly great reviews from out-of-town players, coaches, media and fans alike will have people wanting to add Nationwide Arena to their hockey road trips. Most notably known as a football town, thanks to the Ohio State Buckeyes, the Blue Jackets are doing their best to make Columbus famous for hockey, too, and with the loyally-followed franchise definitely on the rise, we’re going to be hearing a lot more from this city, which has proven that the concept of the All Star Weekend isn’t a dated one.

2. Hockey players have great personality and are great people: We see it day to day, we see a lot of it during the HBO/EPIX documentary series around the Winter Classic, and we see it on All Star Weekend, too.

From involving children in their breakaway contest during the Skills Competition – Ryan Johansen has set the bar high – to plenty of ironic humour – the fantasy draft trade of Tyler Seguin and Phil Kessel, who have gone opposite ways in real life hockey; Seguin was the compensation for Toronto snaring Kessel – through the sheer amount of time each player spent with fans on the Red Carpet and elsewhere across the weekend, the down-to-earth nature of the top tier of hockey players was on full show. The sport is better for it.

Special mention to Chicago’s Jonathan Toews who, during the fantasy draft trade of Kessel and Seguin, quipped that Kessel was definitely coachable in reference to rumours swirling in Toronto around the time that Randy Carlyle was fired from the top gig with the Leafs. It was a highlight reel moment from a weekend full of them.

3. Shea Weber is just as powerful as Zdeno Chara: If there’s one guy who must’ve been happy to know that Chara, captain of the Boston Bruins, wasn’t a part of the All Star Weekend festivities – he’s out injured at the moment – it had to be the big gunner from Nashville, who was clear winner of the Hardest Shot event during the Skills contest.

Chara famously rocketed a shot at a stupefyingly fast 108.8mph in Ottawa three years ago and might well have gone even faster had injury (and a poor start by most Bruins to this 2014-15 season) not stopped him from participating. Worry not, because Shea Weber stepped to the plate and, man, did he give us something to remember. A standard blue line bomb from the Nashville Predators defenceman measured in at 108.5, which was by far the fastest shot of the competition, though not quite enough to beat Chara’s world-beating mark.

Still, can you imagine getting in the lane when Weber tees up a bomb that’s all hard, frozen rubber spinning through the air, coming at you at about 174 kilometres per hour? No wonder these guys get paid like they do. No wonder, universally at Nationwide Arena, were players admitting to not being particularly excited about shot-blocking Weber come playoffs. You can’t blame them!

4. Columbus fans don’t like it when their favourites leave town: They made their displeasure with Rick Nash’s decision to depart Columbus for New York City and the Rangers quite clear every time Nash either touched the puck, was mentioned on the PA system or was shown on the big screen, booing him mercilessly.

Interestingly, former Blue Jacket draft pick Jakub Voracek, currently dominating the league with Philadelphia, didn’t receive the same treatment but then, when he left Columbus there was little to suggest that he’d come the player he is now.

Nash, on the other hand, was a legit star, who wanted out because he didn’t think the Jackets had the horses to get to a Stanley Cup Final. His appearance there for the Rangers last year and his huge season thus far in 2014-15 validate his move. I guess Nash didn’t mind being the villain of the weekend, and he did it – importantly – with a smile. Oh, and he scored two goals.

5. Being selected as an All-Star Goalie is the game’s most poisoned chalice: Yes, it means you’re either a fan favourite or one of the best between the pipes in the National Hockey League, which is certainly something to be proud of. That is, until you arrive at the All Star Game and proceed to be scored on a ridiculous number of times.

Goalies must almost dread this weekend, because it’s hard work, and you know you’re going to get lit up. The 2015 edition featured 27 goals, a record number, as Team Toews beat Team Foligno 17-12. Toews’ team accounted for 47 shots and Team Foligno 45. With no defensive checking to prevent players getting in on goal, and having ample opportunity to create some offense.

As fans, we love – well, most of us do; the ‘no physicality’ concept of the All Star Game has it’s detractors, but I think it’s just a fun celebration of hockey – the offense created, but you’ve gotta spare a thought for the men between the pipes.

Kitch's Top 10 Classic Australian Rock Songs - #1 "It's A Long Way To The Top (If You Wanna Rock 'n' Roll)"

"It's A Long Way To The Top (If You Wanna Rock ‘n’ Roll)" – AC/DC

 

Writer(s): Angus Young, Malcolm Young & Bon Scott

Album: T.N.T.

Released: 1975

Peak Chart Position: #9

The song I beleive is the quintessential one about rock and roll. AC/DC's signature tune is by far Bon Scott’s finest hour as front man of AC/DC. A powerful song with an understated film clip - the group on a parade float, travelling slowly through 1970s Melbourne is now a classic - and the song perhaps single-handedly responsible for making bagpipes cool in rock. And, has there been a cooler bagpipe refrain than on this song?

Often imitated, yet never bettered – a familiar refrain from these guys – this is one song that AC/DC have stopped performing live now that Brian Johnson is fronting the band, doing so out of respect for, and because of the song’s deep ties to Bon. 

It’s the story of life on the road, and not necessarily a pretty one – the song’s lyrics speak of many hardships, including being beaten up and assaulted – and was recently voted as the ninth greatest song in Australian history by the Australasian Performing Rights Association. They had it eight spots too low, for mine.