"Red Dog" and other forgotten things football things from SBIII

[JohnnyLV]

NFL.com has  the SBIII game in it's entirety on their Jets page there. I watched most of it again last night and found it super interesting. Really long time since I have seen it. Maybe only once other than watching it live in B@W. Some interesting things:

1. I had forgotten the term "Red Dog" They use it ALL the time in the broadcast and I think we even used it on our HS football team. For those that don't remember a Red Dog was usually a blitzing linebacker against a 5 man front. "Blitz" mostly meant 2 additional rushers for 7 on 5

2. The broadcast was surprisingly deep on football terminology and they expected the audience to be much more proficient in understanding football then they are today. They constantly mentioned "weak" and "strong" for runs, talked about twists and stunts freely, over and under defense and unbalanced lines. 

3. It was interesting to hear the old terms for positions on the team like flanker and split end. 

4. The offenses were no where near as vanilla as I remember. First play the Jets did a fairly complex shift to an unbalanced line. Yes there were a lot of plays from standard 22 personnel, but there were a surprising number of plays from formations that would fit right in with "air raid" sorts of offensive schemes

5. The goal posts being like 2 yards into the end zone is just bizarre.

6. The quality of the play was pretty high. OL were no where near as big or as good, and despite Namath being under fast pressure a LOT, they kept remarking how good his protection was. By today's standards it was awful.

7. Namath was clearly around 5" taller than he is today.....seriously the man has shrunk a lot in his old age.

8. Speaking of Namath, people just don't remember how freakishly good he was. Too aggressive in an era where defensive holding and pass interference essentially didint exist., sure. But I had forgotten that Namath had one of the fastest if not the fastest release in football. His arm strength was Josh Allen like minimum. Early in the game he throws a 55 yard bomb without even trying and just misses Maynard. He was accurate with the exception of an awful slant pattern. Namath is why I am a Jets fan and its interesting to be reminded how transcendent and ahead of his time he was.

9. Kicking was AWFUL. First of all he kickers all seemed to be like 250 lb guys and the straight on kicking is just weird to see now. It was super windy but the quality of the FG attempts was pretty lame. Punters were pretty awful. The worst NFL kicker might be the All Pro in 1968

10. The stadium was very pro-Jets and it was packed. It is not an overstatement to say that this game was literally the start of modern football.

11. Officiating was not really the issue it is today

12. The rule for what a catch was is SO different than the nonsense we have today

Anyway fun to watch it again. Overall it's really not really much different than football today, with more complex offenses and defenses than you'd expect and a clean environment in terms of officiating but so many little subtle differences that I had sort of forgotten

 

 

[Vader]

Sauer has a monster game 

[Jet Nut]

6 hours ago, johnnysd said:

8. Speaking of Namath, people just don't remember how freakishly good he was. Too aggressive in an era where defensive holding and pass interference essentially didint exist., sure. But I had forgotten that Namath had one of the fastest if not the fastest release in football. His arm strength was Josh Allen like minimum. Early in the game he throws a 55 yard bomb without even trying and just misses Maynard. He was accurate with the exception of an awful slant pattern. Namath is why I am a Jets fan and its interesting to be reminded how transcendent and ahead of his time he was.

 

Hes why I'm a Jet fan today also.  He was freakishly talented for those too few seasons where he was king.  The overlooked part of his game is that just about every play was a check with me play, called at the line by Namath after looking over the defense.  Always makes me laugh when people go overboard with all the talk of Manning being so smart because he called audibles every so often when Namath and most were calling plays, almost all of their plays, at the line.  

[JohnnyLV]

7 minutes ago, Vader said:

Sauer has a monster game 

Yes he did. I should have mentioned that.

[pdxgreen]

My favorite story about SB III.  The last week before they left for Miami a bunch of the players got into a car with Joe to go to practice.  Anyway.  They were all looking at each other and TE Pete Lammons said, "You know.  If we look at any more game film we are liable to get too self confident!"  And they all started laughing.  They already knew they were going to beat the Colts.

[68JET11]

He was Marino, before there was a Marino... Not saying he's better than Marino, because I think he had a lot of Farve in him also with the gunslinger interceptions, but, you can see a lot of Marino's release in Namath.

[slimjasi]

5 minutes ago, 68JET11 said:

He was Marino, before there was a Marino... Not saying he's better than Marino, because I think he had a lot of Farve in him also with the gunslinger interceptions, but, you can see a lot of Marino's release in Namath.

Interesting. 

What do think his career would have been like if he never got hurt in the preseason of 71? 

[peebag]

god, I'm old.

[JohnnyLV]

37 minutes ago, 68JET11 said:

He was Marino, before there was a Marino... Not saying he's better than Marino, because I think he had a lot of Farve in him also with the gunslinger interceptions, but, you can see a lot of Marino's release in Namath.

He definitely was. I wonder sometimes if he can still throw the ball at all. Remember Staubach at the draft a few years ago?

 

 

[JohnnyLV]

3:58 Yeah hes wide open but perfect 50 yard bullet. I was less than a year old so don't remember this one

[jetscrazey]

What stuck out to me is Namath’s arm was as good as anyone’s is today.  He could fling it.  He only got a couple of chances to show the arm off in SB3 though, it was mostly a ball control game. 

Sauer really impressed me in that game.  He may have deserved a co-MVP.  His game was a lot like Chrebet’s, really crafty route runner.

[Sperm Edwards]

[7561526667]

As for the announcers using football terminology, Al DeRogatis was one of the best TV color men ever, loved watching him as a kid. He was ahead of his time, and really brought football lingo and strategy to the home viewers.

As for the Jets OL play, one of the keys to game was how Dave Herman neutralized Bubba Smith. Other than the sack he had on Namath, you didn't hear much at all from him.

[68JET11]

23 hours ago, slimjasi said:

Interesting. 

What do think his career would have been like if he never got hurt in the preseason of 71? 

With the way defenses were allowed to maul the QB back then, I'm not sure if it would have mattered much, but if he never hurt his knees, I'm guessing (all depends on his lifestyle which wasn't the greatest back then) that he probably would have been more productive. I believe he was one of the most sought after QB's by the defense because of how he entered the NFL. He was so talked up, I bet they had the mind set to shut him up and down if you know what I mean. Some of the hits he took would probably get that player tossed from football in today's game. TB wouldn't have been able to handle it. He'd be crying all the way back to the bench... lmao 

[68JET11]

22 hours ago, johnnysd said:

He definitely was. I wonder sometimes if he can still throw the ball at all. Remember Staubach at the draft a few years ago?

 

 

Not sure I saw that as much as I watch the draft, my memory is nowhere what it used to be lol...

[68JET11]

If you watch his throwing motion, and why his and Marino's release was so good, they both got taught the correct way. They never wind up and thrown the ball. I know by the time you get to the NFL, most of them don't even 2 hand it when their arm goes back, but you can tell that most of the really good QB's never bring the ball back much past their ears and the release is just instant...

[Savage69]

On 5/14/2020 at 2:04 PM, Vader said:

Sauer has a monster game 

True Maynard hurt his leg in the Raider game and played decoy most of the time..

[Jethead]

Yes, but he told Joe he had a big one for him any time he needed it.

[ElBarrioJets]

Came here for sh*tty beer discussion. 

I am disappointed. 

[docdhc]

On 5/14/2020 at 3:17 PM, johnnysd said:

3:58 Yeah hes wide open but perfect 50 yard bullet. I was less than a year old so don't remember this one

I like the red shirted zebras. Also no fans with any Jets gear. Didn’t even sell hats back then. Namath could move around pretty well back then even though he had some knee surgery already.