It's all good that we won yes. I understand the excitement of the situation, but you gotta be aware of what you should do.
I don't think he was expecting to outrun Holmes on the play. I was a little surprised Holmes veered left instead of running straight toward the endzone.
I can't believe anyone is mad the Jco didn't go to make a block on that play. Holmes got caught from behind by a linebacker 50 yards from the LOS, Holmes should have torched Cotchery and that linebacker to the endzone. Also, they still won and a 50 yard catch and run isn't a play your gonna see many guys making great blocks at the end of. From the moment Holmes caught that pass it was just a scramble for the endzone, nothing organized about it.
As soon as he saw Holmes behind him, he should have stopped running, or slowed down to a jog to become an obstruction...
I found it odd too that A. a LB came from out of nowhere to make the tackle and B. Holmes wasn't going as fast as I thought he could. But your ignoring everything about the situation. Huge passing plays are created that way: Through blocking down field by WR who are running down the field. You see great blocks like that every week. And yes, we won, that's fucking awesome.... But you can't look at the situation as "oh, we won, whatever." Thats not how you get better. To ignore the fact that Cotchery could have done more on the play makes no sense, he got caught up in the moment and had a foot race with Holmes to the end zone.
opinions like these lead me to believe one of two things. 1. you never played sports 2. you have forgotten what it was like to play sports. A play like that happens to fast to reasonably expect someone in Jco's position to make the perfect play each time. Would it have been nice if he thought to turn around and block the linebacker? it sure would have. It isn't something that I would reasonably expect a guy to do because really how often has he been in the position to make that play before? I have no idea but I bet I could count the instances on one hand.
Yes I have played sports, and I know what it feels like to get caught in the moment and make a mistake. Maybe not a critical error, but an error. Cotch on that play made a mistake, and while it wasn't critical, it was still a mistake. Do I expect a professional athlete to grasp the situation and have the awareness to do the correct thing in overtime? Absolutely. If this was pick-up football, hell even college, would I expect that? No. I would say Cotchery has been in a situation where he has had to block in the NFL quite a bit too. Sure when Holmes caught he ball Cotch was in front of him, but I am not going to go as far to say that if he is ahead of the play he has no job to do. Still like Cotch a lot, but it just wasn't the type of heady play we are used to out of him.
I don't disagree that it was mistake, however major or minor it is can be debated forever, it's just a mistake that happens in the flow of a game to me though. We could look at every play of every game and find someone making a mistake because as much as these guys practice nothing can prepare you for the crazy things that happen during a real game. I have no idea what Cotchery was thinking on that play so it makes it hard for me to criticize his decision making there. Maybe he thought Holmes would easily catch up to him and he could use his body to shield Holmes from any defenders after he passed him. Maybe he just got caught up in the excitement of seeing Holmes behind the entire defense and didn't think to make a block. In the grand scheme of things I think Cotchery had many better alternatives to running down the field ahead of Holmes until he got tackled but having been in the flow of a competitive game like that before I can't fault him for what he did in the situation.
I see where your coming from. But yea, we won. I think Cotch rebounds this week from maybe a few rough games in a row. A little rough patch doesn't ruin his body of work to me.
I think your 2nd paragraph has it right, because somehow I actually saw Cotch run faster than Holmes on that play. I didn't think Cotch had that kind of speed. I think Cotch was waiting for Holmes to go towards a sideline and not down the field.
Yes, the guy making the 'played sports' crack may have played but probably isn't real good at it. (like not getting the the 3 forms of 2) I played Hockey, and one of my kids plays soccer and I know, and teach the understanding of when being an obstruction counts as a positive play. Cotchery didn't even need to stop...he only needed to get the play in front of him.
Only because the FG wasn't blocked or missed. If 89 slows down...period..Holmes cuts in front of him and scores 6. Holmes cuts back to the left to avoid havng his own man become an obstruction. The problem I have with that...is that the guy that caught him.....caused a stoppage earlier by feigning injury. That BS rule needs to be changed. If you cause a stoppage in the 4th qtr, you need to be out the rest of the game.
That should apply to the first 3 quarters. And a second instance should DQ a player from the rest of the game no matter the time. And Detroit was doing it constantly in that game.
It wasn't a crack at him but you already knew that. Think about your kids youth soccer game or whatever level of hockey you played at and think about all the little mistakes that happen throughout those games. Now crank the speed up to 25 and see how many other little mistakes get made. There was a play to be made there but it isn't a play that anyone with a realistic expectation of someone would expect to be made, especially when Holmes should have torched Cotch and allowed him to become an obstruction without breaking stride.
Your right, if the kick had been missed or blocked the totally logical thing to do would have been to blame Cotchery for missing a block on a 50 yard completion.
once holmes caught the ball, he had LBs behind him and DBs to his right. once cotch saw holmes make the catch, he sped up anticipating that some of the DBs (that were guarding him) to be there. by the time he turned around, he saw that they were not in the play and turned to his left, towards holmes in short, he looked for the DBs first because he didnt expect holmes to be caught from behind by a LB ... that was the proper move because holmes shouldnt have been caught from behind by a LB
Maybe they can work on plays where Sanchez bounces balls of Cotchery and completes them to Holmes, or Keller. I'm sure Schotty the master of trickery can figure out the appropriate velocity and angle to achieve this.
What a warrior. Hurts himself on the play, still makes himself available to the QB, dives and catches the throw, cups it from hitting the ground and keeps possession. We wouldn't score on the drive but at the time I thought we really would, and I was in love with Cotch at the moment. He's a great possession receiver, and equally effective in the slot or split out wide, and is great at getting yards after the catch. We know he had a game or 2 where he seemed to be dropping everything, but that shouldn't change our opinions of what Cotchery is as a WR, and a damn good one at that.
