Ala Ray Didinger

Jim Johnson has passed. This is a great article by Ray Didinger about him.

Funny, but when I think about Jim Johnson, I’ll think about a loss more than the wins.

It was the Sunday night game in New England in November, 2007. The Patriots were unbeaten and their offense appeared unstoppable.

Tom Brady was on his way to setting the NFL record for touchdown passes in a season. Randy Moss was torching defenses week after week. The Patriots were scoring points at a pace the likes of which the league had never seen.

All season, opponents played scared against New England. The word around the league was you couldn’t blitz Brady. He’d read it and call an audible, the line would pick up the rush and, bam, he would hit a receiver running wide open. Six points, just like that.

So for weeks, teams played the Patriots soft. They didn’t blitz, they played the safeties deep and tried to prevent the big play. It didn’t work very well. Brady cut them to pieces underneath with slants to Wes Welker and screens to Kevin Faulk and he still hit the long ball to Moss.

But when the Eagles went to New England that season, Johnson went right after the Patriots. He sent blitzers after Brady on almost every play. He came up with a new look that had linebacker Chris Gocong playing like a defensive end and rushing off the edge with success.

The Eagles wound up losing, 31-28, but that was deceiving because the offense turned the ball over all night and Feeley threw an interception that former Patriot Asante Samuel returned for a touchdown. The final score made it look like Johnson’s defense got torched but that’s not so. Johnson’s defense actually gave the Eagles a chance to pull off the upset of the year.

More than that, Johnson’s daring changed the conventional wisdom around the league as how best to play the Patriots. Other teams saw what Johnson did and they copied his blue print. In Super Bowl XLII, Steve Spagnuolo, who was an assistant coach under Johnson in Philadelphia, used the same game plan as defensive coordinator with the Giants to shock the Patriots for the victory.

For me, that was the essence of Jim Johnson, who on Tuesday lost his long battle with cancer. His schemes were brilliant. He kept finding new ways to disguise his defenses and create lanes for his blitzers. But what made it all work was his approach. He was fearless.

Not reckless, but fearless. Don’t confuse the two.

There are some coaches who gamble all the time and make calls that, frankly, don’t make any sense. Sometimes they get away with it and it results in a big play and it is hailed as a stroke of genius. But you don’t win consistently in pro football playing that way.

Johnson knew when and where to attack. He also knew when to bluff. He was one of the best at keeping offenses off-balance. You could see it in Tom Brady’s face that night on the sidelines in Foxboro. You could almost see him thinking: “No one does this to us.”

But Jim Johnson did.

He had the mentality that all great coaches must have. He had total confidence in his system and that confidence rubbed off on his players. When Johnson would send in a call that was risky, the players never hesitated or looked to the bench. They carried out their assignments because they believed in the guy making the call. That’s why the Eagles’ defense was so good for so long.

Players have to be able to shake off bad plays. If a cornerback gets burned for a touchdown, he has to forget it and play the next play. The same thing applies to coaches. Johnson had that ability. If he blitzed and got burned, he wouldn’t go into a shell. He’d blitz on the very next play if he thought it was the right thing to do.

Last night, Andy Reid said: “The whole Andy Reid regime would not have been possible without Jim Johnson.”

He was right about that. In 160 regular season games under Johnson, the Eagles’ defense allowed 17 or fewer points 88 times. That’s more than half the games. The quarterback efficiency rating against the Eagles over the past decade is 75.2, which is remarkable in an era where everything is set up to favor the offense and specifically the passing game.

When people talk about the great defensive coaches in football history, they will talk about Tom Landry, who created the 4-3 and the Flex defense; Bud Carson, who brought the Stunt 4-3 to the Pittsburgh Steel Curtain; Bill Arnsparger, who introduced the hybrid linebacker/defensive end in Miami; Buddy Ryan, who unleashed the 46 defense with the Chicago Bears and, of course, Bill Belichick, who has put his own stamp on the 3-4 with the Patriots.

But Johnson belongs in the same conversation. Granted, he did not win a Super Bowl as those other coaches did, but when you look back on what he accomplished, it is a remarkable legacy. You can tell a lot about a coach by following the path of his pupils. When you see the success Spagnuolo, Ron Rivera (defensive coordinator in San Diego), Leslie Frazier (defensive coordinator in Minnesota) and Jim Harbaugh (head coach of the Baltimore Ravens) are having, it speaks volumes about their mentor. He prepared them well which is reason to have confidence in Sean McDermott, who now succeeds Johnson with the Eagles.

Brian Dawkins credits Jim Johnson with shaping his career, as well. The best safety in Eagles history was still a kid with a lot of rough edges when Johnson came to the team along with Reid in 1999. But Johnson saw greatness in Dawkins and drew up a defense built around the safety’s game-changing talents. That’s what true coaches do.

Jim Johnson was one of the best.

So I know I haven’t written in two months…

…and I am sure no one has missed me. Lack of ideas and resources. I am living in Scranton without Internet or cable. Sucks. Anyway, here is a little mock article for you as to why you people even give a shit about television, in particularly my favorite TV show: “Trash & Crap + 349085723″

WARNING: There is no filter on this one. Sensitive eyes and ears and souls read elsewhere…

Woman Momentarily Wonders Why She Gives a Motherfucking Fuck About Jon & Kate Plus 8
June 22, 2009 – Collegeville resident Andrea Thomas, 39, was yesterday troubled to report that on Sunday, she spent four seconds wondering why, exactly, she gives a motherfucking cock-fuck about Berks County’s Gosselin family—whose marital problems have caused their TLC reality show, Jon & Kate Plus 8, to explode in popularity. “I was unloading the dishwasher, wondering if Jon’s really been cheating on Kate, when I was struck by the strangest thought,” she said, shaking her head at the quizzical memory. “I wondered, ‘Why in the name of pussy-fuck should I give two wet shits about these pathetic assholes?’ But in no time, I was once again thinking about how hurtful the media has been to their eight beautiful children.”

Thomas’ friends were stunned to hear of the baffling mental flash. “I can’t imagine why Andrea would consider, even briefly, why she shouldn’t give a leper’s bone-tip about these steaming piles of shit who she’ll luckily never meet,” said Linda Swanson, 41, taking a sip from a can of Coke Zero. “Thankfully, she came to her senses—and came over last night for my Monday-night Jon & Kate party.” According to Pamela Kane, 42, “It’s made me sick to my stomach, what’s happened to [Jon and Kate’s] marriage,” she said sadly as she flipped through Us Weekly. “And whether or not they deserve to be disemboweled and set on fire, their charred corpses dragged through the streets for the diseased and insane to pee all over, isn’t for me to judge.”

Thomas’ husband, Roy Thomas, 44, for his part, understood Andrea’s momentary lapse of reason. “Those motherfucking piss-gargles should be skinned with a carrot-peeler and drowned in fresh dogshit for exploiting their family like that,” he frowned, his wife looking on uncomfortably. “And anyway, if I’m that Jon fucker, I’m porking anything that moves, considering that brain-dead harpy he’s stuck with.” Andrea Thomas could only shake her head. “Obviously, Roy doesn’t give a scrotum-punching ass-fuck about those goddamn pricks,” she said. “But I do. I love them. Them and their fucking kids.”

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AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

The day Harry Kalas died at the ballpark.

Somebody stole the Liberty Bell yesterday, unhooked it from its case and carted it off when no one was looking. We won’t see the Liberty Bell ever again, and a part of us all, of what makes our city special, is lost.

They sawed William Penn from the peak of City Hall yesterday, too, right about midday, right about the same time. The planter’s hat and the flowing coat, the beneficent smile bestowed upon his little green town. We won’t look up and see Billy again, and the skyline will never look right.

A bulldozer rumbled down the parkway during the lunch traffic and it took out the steps at the Art Museum. Putting in elevators or some such refinement. No more running up the steps, no more lounging on the steps. No more steps at the Art Museum and we always intended to take one more jog to the top and turn and see the city.

They filled in the Schuylkill River and razed the boathouses, closed the pretzel factories and turned off the cheesesteak grills. They closed Forbidden Drive, paved Fairmount Park and made people stop parking in the middle of Broad Street.

It all happened yesterday.

The day Harry Kalas died at the ballpark.

“We lost Harry,” team president Dave Montgomery said. “We lost our voice.”

We lost Harry on the road, which is very nearly home to the baseball lifers like Kalas. We lost Harry as he was preparing for another game, this one in Washington. He would have had his scorebook and his notes in the booth with him, and the statistical numbers and columns that supply the canvas of a game for which artists like Kalas can add the brushstrokes.

He didn’t get to see this game, but, probably, he had seen it before. He had seen them all.

The Phillies will do their best to honor him, but there is no statue that can be erected more impressive or lasting than the indelible body of Kalas’ work. He was a comfort in time of need – and Phils’ fans know all about that – and a friend in the darkness of a drive through the night. He was the narrator of a city’s soundtrack, the background conversation at countless events in millions of lives.

People asked Harry to put his voice on their answering machines. They handed him telephones and asked him to wish their wives a happy birthday. They spun the radio dials, caught just a word, perhaps just a name – WAAAH-rin Cro-MAAAHR-tee – and knew where they were. They were at the corner of Kalas and Baseball, and there was no finer intersection at which to spend time.

Harry’s voice wasn’t gravel, but it had an edge. It knew things and knew that you knew them, too. It wasn’t a Philadelphian’s voice, by any stretch. He kept the round Midwestern pronounciations he grew up hearing in Naperville, Ill. But Kalas liked to play with the words, to put them together and turn them into dramatic recitations that were his alone.

A simple baseball call like, “Swing and a miss, struck him out,” became a magical victory of the forces of good over evil, the emphasis punching through just as the ball had punched through the batter. That very phrasing was the final play-by-play from Kalas that most Phillies fans will remember, as Brad Lidge ended the 2008 season and Kalas declared the team world champions.

We will hear it only in retrospect now, that wonderful instrument he possessed. Just as nature blesses pitchers with great arms and batters with great hand-to-eye coordination, something was given to Kalas at birth that he couldn’t really take credit for, but he could certainly put to good use.

He could laugh, but that snicker was more what he was about. It was the expression of an insider, someone who got the joke more than even the teller might realize.

Harry got it all. He got baseball and he got life on the road. He got how lucky he was to have that voice that everyone knew and that manner that made everyone his friend. He got Philadelphia, got it so well that he became part of the civic landscape. He got us, and that’s not easy.

The birds stopped singing in Rittenhouse Square yesterday. The tugboats on the Delaware couldn’t sound their horns. When the carriage horses took their customers around Independence Hall, there was no clop-clopping on the cobblestones. The factory whistle wouldn’t let anyone leave work. Kids burst from their school rooms and didn’t utter a peep.

Philadelphia went quiet yesterday afternoon. Harry Kalas died at the ballpark, and the city lost its voice.

I hate New York, no matter what anyone says.

It’s no secret that I hate New York City. New York sucks. I hate most of the people (most being all except the woman who dates me), ALL of the sport teams (ALL being most. I don’t hate the Buffalo Bills because they are the most random football team in America) and CERTAINLY ALL of their police enforcement (ESPECIALLY YOU, OFFICER JOHN T. RUTLEDGE!). New York City… It’s the Asshole Capital of America, it thinks it’s the shit, and it stole Philadelphia’s claim as the financial center of the country in 1833.

With all this in mind, it came as a pretty huge surprise to me when a study was done of common courtesy in 36 international cities, and New York was rated the most polite. Huh?

Keep in mind, of the 36 cities studied, New York was the only U.S. city included. Politeness was measured by testing how often average people on the street held doors open for others, said “thank you,” and assisted strangers who dropped a folder full of papers on the ground.

But, if we can agree that New York is the most abrasive place in the United States, and that it has been unscientifically proven that New York is the most polite city of all the major international cities in the world, then I think it’s safe to assume that Americans as a whole are the most courteous people in the world.

What a shoddy state the rest of the world must be in.

Could it possibly be that the country most likely to mind its P’s and Q’s is also the one most likely to destroy the world with SUV’s?

Could the friendliest country in the world be the most hated country in the world?

Is that why this is the only place in the world where people seem to had any tolerance at all for George Bush? Maybe we were just trying to be polite?

I don’t know. But I do know that I always hold doors open for people, often say “thank you,” and would almost certainly help a stranger who had dropped a pile of papers. You probably would too.

I guess maybe we’re better people then we thought.

I still @#$!%&* hate New York.

Here’s the source of the study: http://www.rd.com/living-healthy/good-manners/article27599.html

Briefly…

I was in the gym, and this burly man comes up to me out of seemingly nowhere and says “You know, I am the kind of guy that can be your best friend or your worst enemy”

I said “Yeah…” thinking to myself “…or you could just be a guy I just don’t care about?”

Dreams

I’ll let you in on a little secret. I really like having wacky dreams, because they put you in interesting, fantastical situations that you might never encounter in the real world. Sometimes they have you taking actions that you would never actually take, and I think that’s kind of cool. I also think dreams can sometimes give us guidance or answers, if we pay attention to them. Look at Mr. Eko; much of what he does is based on the symbolism he sees in his dreams, and he was pretty much the biggest badass on primetime TV.

John Burns, supergenius extraodinaire, goes to sleep with math and chemistry problems in his head and dreams the answers to them. Some nights, I’ll go to sleep with the hope that I’ll have some sort of incredible dream that’ll show me the right path in the real world. Usually, these are the nights where I have no dreams at all. Last night, I went to sleep with this desire, and woke up throughout the night in coughing fits. If there’s anything waking up constantly is good for, it’s for remembering your dreams.

Although I can’t say I had any earth-shattering revelations, I can say that I had four very interesting dreams, each of which I have derived a moral for.

1. Plain and boring is just that: plain and boring. Although little bad comes out of it, it brings about little good, as well. Do not lead a plain and boring life.

2. Being gay is probably a lot more trouble than it’s worth.

3. Just because a situation appears one way to you, does not mean that that is the way it actually is. This is even true of waking up next to three naked girls, which can prove much less exciting than one would expect.

4. Mob mentality is easily abused, and sometimes it’s OK to change sides in the middle of a battle. This is especially true when a girl convinces a large group of people that they should assist her in murdering her brother, by hanging him. Even if you are one of the leaders of a crusade such as this, when it comes to the point where you can’t even remember the justification for the execution, you have to go against the crowd and let go of the dog leash around the man’s neck. Sometimes when you do this, everyone in the crowd will suddenly disappear, and the girl who started the whole thing will leave dejected. You’ll apologize to the man, but in the end you’ll have saved his life; that’s a good thing regardless of what the justification for killing him was.

From this same dream… Be wary of letting another person give you a large jawbreaker. While jawbreakers are good, they take a very long time to dissolve, and could prevent another person from giving you a piece of chocolate, which would’ve been even better.

Those are the dreams I had last night. Not quite Martin Luther King Jr. quality, but they were good.

War Stories?

I just saw this commercial:

“War Stories with Oliver North, Sunday at 8 P.M., with special guest Chuck Norris.”

I don’t know if Chuck Norris has ever been a soldier in a war, but I can be damn sure he has a lot of war stories.

Dawkins

The city’s skyline wouldn’t look the same if the statue of William Penn toppled.

Thirteen years. It is a long time to be carrying a municipal legacy onto the field every week. It is forever, in many ways – and Dawkins will be a forever kind of player for this franchise, cherished, remembered, all of that, long after the No. 20 is put away.

Part of it is because he has been so good, a seven-time Pro Bowler, the best safety in the history of the franchise. Part of it is because of how hard he hits people, how he just pulverizes them, even now. Long after the details are forgotten, the visceral remains. You wince when Dawkins really launches himself at somebody. That is what people will always remember – the wince, and then the wow.

But it is more than that – and, no, not that ridiculous, indescribable routine he goes through when he emerges from the tunnel and goes onto the field. It is simpler than that. It is visible passion, visible to all.

No Eagles fan can possibly doubt that Dawkins cares more than they do. That’s it. That is the connection between a man and a city. That is the bond.

I will miss you. WE will miss you. The EAGLES will miss you. God bless.

Simple and Brilliant

Compliments of Papa Vallone