Monday, January 20, 2014

Kings of the West

Seahawks      23
49ers            17


The Seahawks are heading to New Jersey to face the Denver Broncos in Super Bowl XLVIII. For just the second time in history, our Seahawks will play on the world's biggest stage.

Seattle overcame a 10-0 deficit last night to defeat their bitter rivals, the San Francisco 49ers. It was a physical back and forth match that ended with Seattle proudly hoisting the George Halas trophy for the first time in eight years.

It was a total team win for Seattle.  Every group did their part.  Outside of allowing Kaepernick to rush for 130 yards-- the Seahawks did everything that was expected of them.  Russell Wilson fumbled on the first play of the game, but played mistake-free beyond that. The Beast was well fed, to say the least.  Marshawn Lynch finished with 109 yards and a touchdown.

Wilson spread the ball around well.  Doug Baldwin had another 100 yard performance against his former collegiate coach but it was Jermaine Kearse's spectacular touchdown catch in traffic that might have been the offensive play of the night.

The defense started a little slow but came together as the game wore on.  There wasn't a weak spot to be found.  The 49ers all-time rushing leader, Frank Gore, was held to an embarrassing 14 yards on the ground.  You take Kaepernick's 130 yards rushing off the books-- and this would've looked like a beat down.

I'll have two weeks to post more speculative blogs, so I'll keep this one brief and allow everyone to revel in the victory, but I do want to chime in on all this nonsense regarding Richard Sherman's post-game speech.

For those of you somehow unaware, Richard Sherman's side of the field was only targeted twice throughout the entire NFC Championship game.  The first time Kaepernick threw to Sherm's side, Sherman was called for a ticky-tacky pass interference call.  The second time, Sherman made a play on the ball and tipped it to Malcolm Smith for the game-ending interception.

Mere moments after Sherman made the biggest play of his young career, a camera was shoved in his face to get his reaction and comment. Seconds after the Seahawks Super Bowl birth was made official, he was asked to be taken through the final play by Erin Andrews. I'll spare you the full synopsis.  Just watch the video above.

You'd think that an athlete who's job is to be a savage on the field -- who just earned the opportunity to play for the ultimate prize in his career field -- would be granted some amount of leeway for being emotional and still fired up.  This was not the case.

Apparently, these men are expected to embody human perfection.  They're supposed to be saints within their community, gladiators on the field and distinguished gentleman the instant the clock expires.  I guess its easy for us to forget that, not only are these guys human-- they're still just kids in their early 20s.

Richard Sherman is the best cornerback in the NFL today.  He's going to be one of the best for as long as Father Time permits. He has been a tremendous asset to his communities of both Compton and Seattle.  He's at the top of his game both on and off the field.

You know what else? He likes to talk. Don't like what he says?  Beat him.

The two best teams in the NFL were on display in Seattle.  The Seahawks demonstrably showed that they are #1.  Two weeks from now, they'll have to prove themselves in front of the world against the greatest quarterback to ever play the game.


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