Recent Stories with tag football

If all goes well, the World Cup would look something like this.

The FIFA World Cup is quickly approaching, and countries around the world are gearing up to watch their teams compete. Although football (soccer) is not as popular in the U.S. as it is worldwide, attention to the sport is growing.

This year, American fans are getting ready to cheer on their team, especially with recent news that they may have something even bigger to look forward to in 2018 or 2022--the hope of hosting the tournament for the second time. Germany, France, Italy and Mexico are the only countries to have ever hosted twice in the tournament’s almost-80-year history. This time around, Bill Clinton’s chief advisor Doug Band is giving the U.S. a serious chance at becoming fifth on this list.

Band is the latest addition to the Board of Directors for the U.S. Bid Committee. While the magnitude of the World Cup enticed a lot of high profile individuals to join the Board of Directors (such as New York mayor Michael Bloomberg, California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger), having the relatively lower-profiled Doug Band as the face of the committee may just give the U.S. their biggest bargaining chip yet.

Band has helped implement philanthropic initiatives in over 170 countries. His work through the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) has helped raise millions of dollars for relief efforts thus touching thousands of lives. His reputation precedes him throughout other countries and he is respected by them for his efforts. Having him represent the U.S. bid will help promote America as a great location to host the World Cup by highlight his international endeavors and demonstrating the embrace Americans have for diverse cultures....

Soon to be hanging at Qwest Field

Walter Jones was to the Seahawks what gravity is to the universe. Not flashy, not one to provide the most memorable moments. Just a steady and indispensable force that holds everything together.

What They're Saying

"I tell people, the two greatest athletes I ever played with were Deion Sanders and Walter Jones."--Robbie Tobeck, via Seahawks.com

"It was once said of Jim Brown that there are many superstars but only one Superman. It was my good fortune to watch Walter Jones ply his trade for over a decade--and to understand, for a time, what Superman actually looked like."--Doug Farrar, Yahoo Sports (full column on Jones).

"I faced a number of other Hall of Famers who were fantastic players, and Walt was head and shoulders above them...It was like wrestling a bear for three hours."--Patrick Kerney, via Seahawks.com.

"It will be a great honor to have our #12 hanging up next to Walter's #71."--@JonAxell.

"It’s the feeling that you have when you have a left tackle that can play like he does, and you don’t have to monkey with your protections that much that way. You just can say, 'OK, you’ve got that guy and we’ll help in other areas.' Very few teams can say that."--Mike Holmgren, via TNT.

"'Invisible" was how Big Walt liked it. Wasn't invisible to the RE's who tried for years to get past him. Most overlooked runblkr."--Jim Mora Jr., via Twitter.

"As much as we all love Steve Largent, he was never a DOMINANT player, and he was probably never the best player in the NFL at his position. Walter Jones is the indispensable man: He is the one player MOST responsible for the Seahawks golden age from 2003-2007."--Johnny Peel, Dave Krieg's Strike Beard (full column on Jones for HOF).

"Walter was probably a better athlete than everybody on the field other than the defensive backs."--Bryce Fisher, via TNT.

"Walter will always be connected to us and will always be a huge part of the Seahawks family."--Pete Carroll, via Seahawks.com.

More Jones

This story, which Matt Hasselbeck told to the Times' Danny O'Neil, is awesome: "At Super Bowl XL in Detroit, Pittsburgh Steelers linebacker Joey Porter spent days leading up to the game working up a verbal lather. When the game started, Hasselbeck said he started talking back. That's when Jones told the man he'd be protecting not to worry. 'He just grabbed me,' Hasselbeck said. 'And it was maybe the loudest I'd heard him on the field. "Please don't. I got it. Don't worry. Don't say anything to this dude. I got this."'"

• The Seahawks video tribute to Jones. Best part comes about three minutes in, from the 2005 NFC championship, of Jones blocking Panthers DE Mike Rucker about 15 yards downfield. Jones is like a truck with arms. The team immediately retired Jones' #71. 
• The Seahawks asked fans to share thoughts on the Twitter hashtag #thankyouwalter. Pretty neat to read.
• By declaration of Governor Gregoire today is Walter Jones Day in the State of Washington.
• A photo of Jones' locker.
• There will be no farewell press conference per Jones' request.
• The stats: In 180 career starts, Jones was called for holding just nine times. As Seahawks Addicts points out, Jones had as many Pro Bowls as holding calls. In 5,703 career pass plays, Jones allowed just 23 sacks.

They should've had a nickname. "The Terrible Threes," or "Blue Blitz," or "Kerney's Kavalry." In 2007, Seahawks Patrick Kerney, Julian Peterson and Darryl Tapp combined for 30 sacks. Their pressure on opposing quarterbacks--Kerney and Tapp from the line, Peterson on blitzes--masked the shortcomings of a weak Seahawks secondary and led a declining Hawks team to the last of five consecutive playoff appearances.

Peterson, slowing down after passing age 30, was traded to Detroit before last season. Tapp, deemed expendable after a disappointing '09 season, was traded to Philadelphia last month. Now Kerney, who has endured numerous surgeries since his 14.5-sack '07, has retired.

"Despite the desire to continue my career, I am retiring from professional football," Kerney said in a statement. "The toll that has been taken on my body will no longer allow me to train, and hence, perform, at a level that is acceptable to me."

Kerney's injury, Peterson's departure and Tapp's regression all contributed to a pass-rush-less 2009. The Seahawks had just 28 sacks as a team, two less than K.P.T. had between the three of them in '07. Kerney once again led the team in sacks, but had just five as he played with severe elbow pain most of the year....

Celebrations Banned: Are Cheerleaders Next?

Since intercollegiate athletics are contested between college students, you'd think it would make sense for college students to determine what standards of sportsmanship are appropriate on the field, right? Oh, you are so naive. 

No, it's a bunch of middle-aged men--the NCAA Rules Committee--who are slowly imprinting their anachronistic, unrealistic standards on college football players. Recent rules committee proposals would stiffen the penalty for "taunting," a nebulous concept that the middle-aged men who serve as college referees have proven incapable of assessing fairly. You'll remember how Jake Locker's celebratory toss of a ball after scoring a last-second touchdown against BYU was deemed "taunting," costing the Huskies a chance at overtime.

Now, any behavior deemed taunting-y on the way into the end zone would also be penalized, as a 15-yard personal foul from the spot of the taunt. So the overexcited player who breaks a long run and points at the camera during his last five yards to the end zone? He'll find himself lining up again at the 20. 

Another idiotic repression of utterly harmless behavior: students will be banned from writing messages in their eye black. Players usually will write in their home area code as a shout out to where they're from. Or, in the case of Christian hero Tim Tebow, Bible verses. Pretty harmless stuff, but apparently too much self-expression. And self-expression apparently...is bad?...

I doubt many Seahawks fans doubted that nine-time Pro Bowl offensive lineman Walter Jones is the greatest player in team history, but if we needed confirmation we got it these past two seasons. Jones played hurt in 2008, and not at all in 2009. Without an effective Jones, the Seahawks went from one of the NFL's best teams to one of its worst.

So good news yesterday when Jones told reporters at Seahawks HQ that he's going to try to get back into playing shape:

"That's the goal... I'm going to do everything possible to get back... Hopefully I can push myself to the point that I feel better about things. [...] I still got a long way to go with the knee, but I feel good about the direction I'm going."

Jones said that he'll probably know in the next couple of months whether he's going to be back--and he thinks that the Seahawks will make that determination, with Jones set to earn $7 million next year: "I think it's going to be their decision," Jones said. "And if it's over, I can accept that."

The fan in me wants the Seahawks to give every opportunity to make it back to the team. But, realistically, the money they'll owe Jones might be put to better use somewhere else. Let's all hope for a New Year's miracle: That Jones' knee heals just enough for the Seahawks to give him a chance to return, and that he can hold down left tackle again next season.

Regardless, this is probably the year the Hawks look for Jones' replacement. With the #6 and #14 overall picks in the April 22nd draft, they'll be in position to draft (or trade up to draft) one of the top offensive tackles available. They won't find another Walter Jones, but hopefully they get close.

Thought it would be fun to mark the high and low points for our local sports teams this decade. Today: The Seahawks!

High point: Sunday, January 22, 2005 2006. The Seahawks defeat Carolina in the NFC championship game, advancing to the franchise's first Super Bowl. I celebrated with my housemates and longtime Seahawks fans with a champagne shower in our basement, then with a (probably ill-advised) drive downtown to revel with fans who'd gone to the game. We ended up at the Triangle, where friend David snapped this photo of a proud Seahawks rooter. 

Low point: Sunday, December 27, 2009. A 38-point loss at Green Bay, one of the four worst in franchise history, comes on the heels of an embarrassing home loss to Houston. Matt Hasselbeck throws four interceptions and Green Bay scores on their first six possessions.

Best player: Walter Jones. Perhaps the NFL's best left tackle in an era defined by the importance of left tackles, Jones will have gone to 8 of a possible 10 Pro Bowls in the decade. People (including me) have tossed out blame left and right for the Hawks' current struggles, but it's worth noting that the team's decline has coincided precisely with Jones' decline.

Worst player: Brock Huard. In four starts as the Hawks' QB in '00, Huard was 0-4 and got sacked on one of every eight pass attempts.

Best trade: Matt Hasselbeck for (basically) a third-round pick. The official trade also had the Hawks and Green Bay swap first round picks, giving the Packers a slightly better one, but essentially Mike Holmgren was able to get the franchise a quarterback for a decade by giving up only a third-rounder. On an otherwise forgettable day yesterday, Hass became the Seahawks all-time leading passer....

Mora's post-game comments made no sense

Seahawks head coach Jim Mora after yesterday's 34-7 loss to Houston: “We're going to take a microscope and look at everything.”

Huh?

Let's leave aside the fact that looking "at everything" is an utterly insane way to manage an organization. Say you really were going to try it. Is a microscope really the best tool?

Mora's Seahawks are a disaster, and he seems to have no idea why. "We practiced well, we were ready to go, we came out and we got off to a horrible start," he told reporters after the game.

Actually, Mora did single out one possible scapegoat, center Chris Spencer, who is playing with a cast on his right hand, forcing him to snap with his non-dominant left. Spencer caused three muffed exchanges in the game.

"I’m not quite sure why he still has a cast on his hand--but he does," said Mora (video).

You don't know why your starting center has a cast on his hand? Doesn't that seem like important information?

"We're going to find out who deserves to be part of the process going forward," Mora said.

Mora himself is probably not among that group.

"I can't see Jim Mora escaping such an embarrassing loss," writes John Morgan of Field Gulls. "It was always unlikely Mora would stay.... [Mora] has not earned much respect in his short time here. Fiery is fine. I see desperation. The look of a man that thinks he can yell his way out of failure."

"Mora won't fool me anymore," writes the Seattlepi.com's Jim Moore. "I can already hear him after the Seahawks beat Tampa Bay next Sunday. He'll be talking about positive steps that were taken against the Buccaneers--never mind that Tampa Bay is 1-12."

"Even if the Seahawks are playing hard, they're not competing with purpose." writes the Times' Jerry Brewer. "They have neither grasped nor fully embraced the new offensive and defensive schemes. The coach and his staff must accept some blame for that."...

Much in the way that Christians gather at church on Sunday morning to refresh their connection with God, our city's expatriates gather on Sunday mornings at bars to refresh their connection with their place of origin. The vehicle: Rooting on their hometown NFL team.

I arrived at Bill's Off Broadway around 10 a.m. to find a table of four Indianapolis Colts fans, two tables of Green Bay Packers fans, a Broncos fan, and a Bears fan. All were easily identifiable by their team-specific clothing.

There was also a guy watching the Baltimore/Detroit game. Didn't see what he was wearing, but as I didn't hear much cheering from him, and Baltimore won 48-3, I assume he's a Lions fan. (Poor Lions fans may actually have forgotten how to cheer at this point. When the team gets good again they'll probably shred their atrophied vocal cords attempting to elate.)

I was there to watch my Seahawks, and it soon became clear that these Seahawks are so irredeemably horrible that they can't even compete with the Houston Texans. A...

Ruskell: Quitting

News came last night that Tim Ruskell will resign as general manager of the Seattle Seahawks at 10 a.m. news conference.

One reporter has already spoken to Ruskell, ESPN's Mike Sando. Sando reports that Ruskell left because he hadn't had his contract renewed yet, and felt that was affecting his ability to do his job.

"We were getting ready to go into those meetings about free agency and the offseason. If I am not going to spearhead those meetings and it wasn't going to happen no matter what our record was, you become a lame duck. And I did not want that."

Sando says he thinks the Seahawks will promote someone on an interim basis for the rest of the season (as the Mariners did after Bill Bavasi's firing in '08) and commence a wider search in the off-season.

I'll have more tomorrow, once the sports literati weighs in, but a few thoughts:

1) This is bad news for Jim Mora. A new GM will arrive with his own ideas on how to run a team, which may not mesh with Mora's defense-and-running-game philosophy. Mora has three years after this one left on his contract, but another losing season and he'll be gone. Under Ruskell he would've had a longer leash.

2) It's bad news for some Seahawks players, especially small fast ones. Ruskell's defensive philosophy is based on speed; guys like Kelly Jennings and Josh Wilson may not fit in a new GM's scheme.

3) Will the Hawks go for an offensive mind now? It was clear that Ruskell's hiring was an attempt to get a defense-building expert in the fold after so many years of Holmgren's offensive needs dominating the organizational mindset. Now with the defensive-minded Mora as head coach, will the Hawks look for an offense guy? (The most obvious name that comes to mind, of course, is one Mike Holmgren.)

Didn't start out so well--the Seahawks began yesterday's game down 17 points after a fumble, interception, and failed fourth down conversion gave the Lions' three chances in Seahawks' territory.

Then Matt Hasselbeck brought the Hawks back, delivering one of the finest performances ever by a Seahawks quarterback.

Hasselbeck completed 39 passes, breaking his own franchise record. He had a string of 15 completions in a row. He threw balls that led receivers into space. He dumped balls at their feet when they weren't open. It was a masterful, intelligent Sunday of work, made all the more impressive because Hasselbeck is playing with a broken rib.

Said coach Jim Mora of Hasselbeck: "He showed his true leadership to me. He showed everything that he is. I don't know if I have any more respect for any player that I've ever coached than I have for Matt Hasselbeck."

Video!

After Detroit got their 17-0 lead, Hasselbeck lead the Hawks to scores on six of their next seven drives. The defense...

There seemed some reason for optimism yesterday as the Seahawks got one of their top players back from injury. Cornerback Marcus Trufant's back was healed enough for him to play against Dallas. He probably wishes he'd taken another week. Trufant picked up three pass interference penalties trying to defend Dallas' receiver Miles "Always Smilin'" Austin, who still ended up with a touchdown catch. The Seahawks lost 38-17.

The only trouble Austin encountered all day was on his attempted "dunk" attempt of the football over the ten-foot-high crossbar after his touchdown catch--Austin didn't quite have the ups to make it and flipped the ball over the bar at the last second.

By the end of the game, Trufant was getting inside help on Austin, which is not the scenario you envision for a guy with a six-year, $50 million contract.

Meanwhile, the Seahawks offense was fighting itself. T.J. Houshmandzadeh's frustrations at not being more of a focal point in the offense have reached the "openly-second-guessing-his-quarterback" point. At this point, Hasselbeck apparently has to explain after every play why he didn't throw to Housh.

"He needs to get in line," Jim Mora said of Houshmandzadeh.

The bright spot for the Seahawks was the play of middle linebacker David "The Heater" Hawthorne. Taking over for the injured Lofa Tatupu, Hawthorne played like the Tatupu of old, recording five tackles, two sacks, and forcing a fumble. At this rate Tatupu may end up getting Wally Pipped....

I have nothing else to say, really--walked out this morning, it's a little windy but not too cold, leaves coating the ground--just feels like a touch football day.

Hasselbeck's already worn the Redskins' colors

The NFL trading deadline is today, and with even Seahawks' coach Jim Mora admitting the playoffs are out of reach, it's time to build for the future.

That future probably won't include aging QB Matt Hasselbeck: Maybe the Hawks should unload him? That's what childhood friend Jason suggested yesterday, sparking off a spirited Seahawks roundtable.

Jason: Would it be crazy to try to trade Hasselbeck to the Redskins for a couple of picks right now? They need a QB and we're not going to be good until his back is done.

Me: I like it! Except they have the same problem we do--no offensive line.

David: This would be insane for Washington to do. They are going to have high draft picks, why would they trade those for an old quarterback who they can't protect? Bad teams should not try and get older, see the mid 2000s Mariners. So Matthew and Zorn can be reunited for ten weeks?

Jason: Remember that they are owned by Dan Snyder. He's Al Davis for our generation.

David: The phrase "owned by Dan Snyder" trumps any rational argument.

Seth: What would you take for Hasselbeck? I'd take a first round and a three.

Jason: A first plus any other round.

David: I agree with Jason, a first and anything. We have two first rounders (f*** you Denver), another second rounder would give us a nice draft.

Jason: I'm fine with that. Dan Snyder makes 2-3 horrible moves every offseason, why can't he make one more during the season--we can use the "Bringing Zorn and Hasselbeck together again will be magical" sales job.

So, there you have it--Hasselbeck to the 'Skins for a first-rounder and anything else is approved by the roundtable. Your move, Tim Ruskell.

You, sir, are no Rusty Tillman

I already wrote about the Huskies' unconscionable last-second blunder against Arizona State, which I assumed would be the only completely incompetent play one of my teams would make this weekend.

Instead, the Seahawks treated me to another one. After Arizona opened the game with a long touchdown drive, they blooped their kickoff short. Seahawks backup tight end John Owens, instead of catching the live ball, ran forward to block as the ball fell behind him. The Cardinals recovered and scored another touchdown, putting the Hawks in a 14-0 hole before Hasselbeck and the offense had run a single play.

You can see video of that blunder here in the NFL Network's highlight package from the game. (Where you can hear the NFL Network commentator wonder out loud: "What were these guys thinking?")

The shame of it all is that this blunder occurred on the day that legendary Seahawks special teams coach Rusty Tillman raised the 12th Man flag. Tillman, the first person I ever heard say "It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog," supervised a crack Hawks special teams unit in the 1980s, grooming Seahawks legends like Fredd Young and Rufus Porter. Can we make Tillman's appearance more than a one-day thing, maybe?

Owen Schmitt, the 24-year-old starting fullback for the Seattle Seahawks, opened a gushing wound on his forehead during Sunday's pre-game introductions when he decided to repeatedly whack himself with his helmet as he ran onto the field. Video!

This is pretty awesome in a tribal way, and apparently psyched up Schmitt's teammates. "That got us going," linebacker Lofa Tatupu told the P-I's Greg Johns. "A man willing to bloody his own face, you know how much he's willing to put on the line."

Then again, as childhood friend David pointed out later that night, it also shows why football players struggle to adjust to the working world once their playing careers are over. A pre-event self-bloodying may inspire football teammates, but see how well it works before your next company-wide health coverage informational. 

Ex-Husky Bobby Jones: NCAA hoops "like slavery"

Halfway around the world, a 25-year-old former Husky is giving serious thought to how athletes fit into society. Bobby Jones, a defensive whiz for the...

The main reason why you never leave a college football game early: College football is played by college students.

And college students, are, for the most part, idiots. (Moments from my freshman year: drinking a 40 oz. Budweiser and then singing "I Feel Pretty" from West Side Story while pirouetting around my dorm room. This led to vomiting and enforced celibacy.)

So you'll get moments like we had Saturday night at Husky Stadium: Arizona QB Nick Foles, who should've been handing the ball off to run down the clock, winging an ill-advised pass to a covered receiver, and having it bounce off the receiver's foot into the waiting arms of UW linebacker Mason Foster -- himself in the area because he'd decided to ignore his coaches' orders and blitz on the play--who grabs the ball and runs it into the end zone for a go-ahead score. (Here's a great breakdown of the play by the P-I's Greg Johns.)

They're calling it "The Immaculate Interception." Here's incredible video from the field-level: Foster comes right at you.

We await this weekend's football games like we would a root canal. Anxious, terrified, and just wanting it to be over.

Boy-band 'do or no, Nick Foles scares me

Realpolitik talk: Both the Huskies and Seahawks must win this weekend if they have any hope of postseason play. I'm not going to get into the numbers, just accept this as fact and keep reading.

On Saturday night, the Huskies host the the Arizona Wildcats and their frightening passing attack. Given the Huskies' secondary issues, this would be awful enough, but it's even worse because the Dawgs won't have either of their starting safeties. Free safety Justin Glenn is out for the season after breaking his leg against Notre Dame, and strong safety Nate Williams won't play after suffering a concussion in the same game. Two backups and even a true frosh will mix in at safety.

This just as Arizona seems to have found a quarterback: Soph. Nick Foles, who was 25/34 with 3 TDs and 0 interceptions in the 'Cats win at OSU last weekend. That's a 165 quarterback rating. Yipes.

Meanwhile the Seahawks are responding to their must-win status by rushing injured QB Matt Hasselbeck into action. Hasselbeck says he can throw despite his broken rib, which would be fine if he were a baseball player. Unfortunately, football is a contact sport, and the man protecting Hass's blind side is a third-stringer who is also playing hurt.

The Jaguars, the Hawks' opponent on Sunday, will overwhelm the left side of the Seahawks line, they will hit Hasselbeck, and only then will we really see how well that rib is healed....

When I tell you that the highlight of the Seattle sports weekend was giving a standing ovation to a third-place team, you may think it wasn't much of a weekend. But it was epic, notably for our sports teams getting the worst Indiana lambasting since the Kerry campaign.

Notre Dame 37, Washington 30 (OT)

As I headed to Teddy's to watch Washington vs. Notre Dame (live from South Bend, Indiana), I wondered exactly how empty the bandwagon would be. Coming off the USC win, the bar was packed for Stanford. But after losing that game, how would it look? Let's let pictures tell the story:

Crowd at Teddy's for UW/Stanford

Crowd at Teddy's for UW/Notre Dame

So--yeah, Seattle sports fans, you are some fairweather sons of bitches. And you missed an amazing game, one that will always be remembered for the stunning inability of the Huskies to score one touchdown from twelve tries inside the one-yard-line. If you have a Husky fan at your office, I recommend putting his morning coffee three feet behind a white line and see...

Somehow this music video featuring Eastside Catholic High School's football team got all the way to national sports site Deadspin before we saw it. Once again, we taste the sharp sting of blogger failure. On the bright side, the video is amazing. Put on your eye-black and get ready to rock.

I need Bo Eason to tell me it's okay to watch football.

After seeing Eason's engrossing one-man show at ACT on Thursday, I don't know if I can do so guilt-free again. Watching the former NFL player act out the injury that helped end his career actually made me physically ill. No joke: Sweat pouring out of me, I excused myself down my row, and hustled to the bathroom to splash water on my face. I thought about the real scars on Eason's actor knees, about seeing him inject himself there on stage, as he did before games during his playing days.

And I thought about Curtis Williams, who in 2000 absorbed a fatal hit playing in a football game for the University of Washington. "He fell to his back and went into convulsions," teammate Anthony Kelley relates in Derek Johnson's The Dawgs of War , which I'd read earlier that week . "He was mouthing the words 'I can't breathe .' ... Then Curtis began spitting up and shaking, and his eyes rolled up in the back of his head." Williams died of his injuries 18 months...

Matt Hasselbeck dove toward the end zone during Sunday's game at San Francisco. As he did, 6-1, 240 lb., 24-year-old San Francisco linebacker Patrick Willis charged into his back.

Like Matt Hasselbeck, I am in my early 30s, and I will tell you what would happen if a 6-1, 240 lb. 24-year-old charged into me. I would start to be a little more discerning in my dating choices. Ha! No, seriously, I would lie on the ground until the sun absorbed the earth.

Hasselbeck sent this photo via Twitter

Hasselbeck, who is a football player and a Republican, not a writer and Obama supporter like me, actually stood up. He put his hands to his head, signaling that he was coming out of the game. Then he motioned more frantically with his hands that his replacement should arrive. Then, he collapsed into the arms of Seahawks trainers. It was terrifying.

The Hawks' QB didn't play the rest of the game, but afterwards sent a halfway reassuring Tweet to fans. "Going to be alright," it read, and was accompanied by the photo at right....

I've read a small forest's worth of sports autobiographies, and the list of books that truly reveal the emotional life of an athlete is one title long: A False Spring, by Pat Jordan.

I'm hoping to add another to my list--this a one-man show, not a book--when I see ex-NFLer Bo Eason's Runt of the Litter this month at ACT Theater.

Eason, a hard-hitting (some say cheap shot artist) safety for the Houston Oilers in the mid-80s, is the younger brother of former Pats QB Tony Eason. His one-man show, which he wrote and performs, is loosely based on their story--Tony was the football prodigy, destined for stardom; Bo the undersized, lightly regarded scrapper.

The play is set in the locker room before a playoff game: "Jack Henry," a scrappy defensive back played by Bo, is about to face brother "Charlie," a legendary quarterback. Within the conceit of this brother vs. brother tale we'll get a glimpse into the emotional strain that human combat like football puts on a person.

Athletes' emotional lives are typically...

Jim Mora attained his first win as Seahawks coach, and even more important than beating a division rival was demonstrating to his players that he and his staff have a winning plan.

"When you ask players to do something new," Mora said after the game, "when you ask them to practice a different way, focus on different things--when you can come away with an impressive performance like our defense did today then guys start to buy in a little bit. And they buy in a little bit more every time that happens. So you gain credibility. And as a coach, credibility with your players is extremely important--very important."

The game didn't start out looking like either team would emerge with credibility. Perhaps Qwest Field suffered from lingering putridity left over from Saturday's awful Wazzu/Hawaii game, which featured 11 turnovers and 19 penalties. Sunday's Seahawks/Rams game started with the Rams fumbling the kickoff, and the Seahawks added a fumble and two interceptions of their own by the end of the first quarter.

I watched the game with a Seahawks-fan-heavy crowd at Teddy's on Roosevelt, and they seemed to be in a wait-and-see approach after last year's debacle. People were waiting for the team to show them something. In the final three quarters, they did.

The Seahawks shut the Rams out despite being without talented linebacker Leroy Hill (groin injury) for almost the entire game, and without Lofa Tatupu (hamstring injury) for most of it. Backups Will Herring and David Hawthorne took over, and the defense didn't suffer at all. Said Mora: "I think one of the indicators is, do you notice a drop off when new guys take the field? Quite frankly, I didn’t notice a drop off in play.”

High praise for Herring and Hawthorne, and perhaps a wake-up call for Tatupu and Hill, both of whom underachieved last year. Neither's injury was considered serious, though we'll know more today.

On offense, the new Seahawks regime showed a commitment to getting the ball to the team's most talented offensive players--something that didn't happen in Mike Holmgren's scheme. Nate Burleson had seven catches, tying his career-high as a Seahawk, and John Carlson savaged the Rams' secondary with 6 catches for 95 yards and 2 TDs. If you have John Carlson on your fantasy team, you are almost assuredly a winner this week (unless you also have Jay Cutler).

Matt Hasselbeck had a very shaky start--four of his first six passes were touched by Rams defenders--but he settled in and finished with 25 completions on 36 passes for 279 yards and 3 TDs.

If there was a dark cloud, it was the Seahawks running game. Yes, Julius Jones had 117 yards, but most of that came on one 62-yard TD carry. Take away that run and Jones had just 55 yards on 18 carries, barely a 3-yard-per-carry average. Edgerrin James was worse, getting just 30 yards on 11 carries. The Seahawks' top backs must be able to run the ball better.

Next week, the Hawks will play at undefeated San Francisco in an early battle for division supremacy. The winner will hold a one-game lead in the NFC West race.

Was also the last weekend in which the Huskies won. November 17 and 18, 2007. The Huskies beat Cal 37-23, and the Seahawks beat Chicago 30-23.

Last time the Huskies and Seahawks both won by double-digits: September 8 and 9, 2007. The Huskies beat Boise State 24-10, and the Seahawks beat Tampa Bay 20-6.

The University of Idaho has an awful football program. How could they not? Existing in the shadows of a far more successful in-state team is bad enough -- ask Auburn (Alabama), Iowa State (Iowa) or Vanderbilt (Tennessee). But at least those states have people in them. Relying on regional powerhouse Boise State's discards when your whole state has fewer residents than Greater Milwaukee is not a recipe for success.

Idaho coach Robb Akey will not let you leave this lot without the car of your dreams

Thus Idaho's coaches, headed by former Wazzu defensive coordinator Robb "Have I Got a Car for You" Akey, scour the other 49 states for talent. And they do a fine job: They found their starting quarterback in Nebraska. Their starting running back: Arkansas. Their top returning tackler: California.

Considering that Moscow, Idaho, is not exactly an air travel hub, Akey's staff must spend their lives on planes. (Can one even book a flight from Idaho to Arkansas? Wouldn't Orbitz just explode?) In fact, I guarantee that at...