4 comments Gregg Easterbrook Doesn't Understand the Need for Specificity, Then Nitpicks the New York Times' Mistakes

Last week Gregg Easterbrook informed us all how the 49ers should have had Kyle Williams fair catch all of the punts to him in order to ensure he didn't fumble any of the returns. Of course, having done this would also have negated his good returns during the game, which set up scores for the 49ers, but Gregg doesn't think about things like that. This week Gregg names his TMQ Non-Quarterback Non-Running Back NFL MVP, talks about things most of us probably have no interest in reading about, talks about overly precise calculations and annoys us all with a Super Bowl preview.

Soon The Associated Press will announce the NFL MVP winner, and there's just a tiny chance he will be a quarterback or running back.

Most likely it will be a quarterback named "Aaron Rodgers." I think it would be deserved.

Fifty of the 53 recipients of the NFL MVP have been quarterbacks or running backs -- and defensive tackle Alan Page of Minnesota, in 1971, was the last lineman to win.

I'm gonna stop you right here. I agree it seems unfair for running backs and quarterbacks to receive most of the votes for NFL MVP, but if you think of it logically (which I know is impossible to ask of Gregg) it makes sense. Take an elite offensive lineman or an elite defensive lineman in the NFL. Just pick one of each in your head. I will choose Jason Pierre-Paul and Maurkice Pouncey. Imagine one or both of these players gets injured and misses the entire season. It would be a major blow to his team, there's no doubt about that, but imagine what happens when an elite quarterback gets injured. Say, I don't know, maybe...Peyton Manning. Or perhaps a guy like Matt Schaub or Jay Cutler, both guys who aren't elite, but are very good quarterbacks. So while the Giants would miss Pierre-Paul and the Steelers miss Maurkice Pouncey, they would probably miss Eli Manning/Ben Roethlisberger more. So while I respect the idea there are valuable players who don't play quarterback, an quarterback seems to be a more valuable position for most teams than an elite player at other positions.

It would hurt each team more to an elite starting quarterback than it would to lose an elite offensive lineman or defensive lineman. Hence, quarterbacks are generally more valuable players and they more often than not win the MVP awards. I'm not saying it is right, but considering there is one starting quarterback on each team, it is logical that quarterback tend to be more valuable in the eyes of voters. So it does make sense they win more MVP awards.

Football is a team sport, one in which nearly everyone on the field is not a quarterback or running back. Yet these two positions have cornered the market on awards.

Football is a team sport, but the offensive and defensive line have to work as a team to perform their jobs. An elite defensive end doesn't look as great if he has defensive tackles who allow him to be double or triple-teamed. An average offensive lineman can look great if the guys on the line are very good at their position and communicate well with each other. So football is a team sport, but that doesn't mean certain positions aren't seen as more valuable than other positions.

(Gregg forgets later in this TMQ that football is a team sport and will only consider players whose team made the Super Bowl for his TMQ Non-RB Non-QB NFL MVP. Very frustrating.)

Quarterbacks and running backs monopolize recognition in part because like most spectators, most sportswriters and sportscasters never take their eyes off the ball.

Plus, quarterbacks are often more valuable than other positions on the field due to the scarcity of talent at the position. Why would Gregg let facts get in the way of his argument though?

Regardless, time for the coveted "longest award in sports" -- the Tuesday Morning Quarterback Non-Quarterback Non-Running Back NFL MVP.

The runner-up is Rob Gronkowski of New England. A tight end, Gronkowski has the most touchdowns of any NFL player this season, with 22 touchdowns receiving and one touchdown rushing. Along with Jimmy Graham of New Orleans and Vernon Davis of San Francisco, he has helped redefine the tight end role in a modern offense: as the passer's first option, not the third.

Apparently Gregg Easterbrook lives in a world where Shannon Sharpe, Tony Gonzalez, Antonio Gates, Jason Witten, and Dallas Clark don't exist now nor have they ever existed.

Gronkowski presents matchup problems no opponent has so far solved, and in the AFC title contest against the Ravens, also showed he is a good blocker, helping neutralize Baltimore's Terrell Suggs.

Those people who are as smart as Gregg Easterbrook claims to be already knew that Rob Gronkowski was a good blocker. In fact, most of the scouting reports prior to him being drafted mentioned what a great blocker he was.

So because Gregg is nitpicking the NY Times today, I am going to nitpick him. Gronkowski has showed he is a good blocker in the many other games he has played for New England. His good blocker wasn't apparent just when he blocked Terrell Suggs two weeks ago.

Now the 2011 Tuesday Morning Quarterback Non-Quarterback Non-Running Back NFL MVP -- David Diehl, left tackle of the Jersey/A Giants.

On his best days Diehl is not the NFL's best left tackle, or even as good, athletically, as Matt Light, who will start at left tackle for the Patriots.

I would hope Diehl isn't the best left tackle in the Super Bowl since he has played left guard for most of this year. Diehl used to play left tackle, but he played left guard for most of this year, at least until William Beatty got hurt. I guess it is too much to ask for Gregg to know the position his TMQ Non-QB Non-RB NFL MVP actually plays on the offensive line. At the least, he could acknowledge Diehl played left guard for 10 games this year.

What Diehl brings to the table is consistently high-level performance. He rarely allows sacks, rarely misses run blocks and never takes downs off. Watch tape and you'll see that even in NFL big games, there are an amazing number of downs on which at least one lineman simply brushes his man and then stands there doing nothing. Diehl never stands there doing nothing.

If only there wasn't video of Diehl's performance where he allows those rarely seen sacks and struggling a bit. He still is a very good player and is very durable. There is a reason it isn't smart to use the word "rarely" or "never" during the Internet age. It's a pretty definitive statement that can't always be backed up.

Drafted by the Giants in the fifth round out of Illinois, Diehl became an immediate starter at left tackle, and has remained the team's left tackle starter for nine seasons.

He was the team's left tackle except for the time during this season when he was the Giants' left guard. Really, it is just nitpicking to expect Gregg to mention David Diehl didn't play left tackle all year. These are just minor details that Gregg enjoys mentioning when other people get them wrong, but he has no intent on holding himself to the same standard.

This year's NFC Pro Bowl choices at offensive tackle are Jerome Bushrod, Jason Peters and Joe Staley. They're all top performers but consider their starts -- Peters has started 98 games, Staley has started 68 games, Bushrod has started 49 games. Diehl has performed at a high level significantly longer than any of them.

And we all know the Pro Bowl votes are supposed to go for players who have performed at a high level for their career, not to the player who has performed at the highest level that very year. Gregg Easterbrook must be getting Pro Bowl and Hall of Fame voting mixed up because a player's past seasons are not supposed to be taken into account when voting for the Pro Bowl.

In Super Bowl viewing advice, don't get up to make a sandwich during the fourth quarter. For recent Super Bowls, the fourth quarter has been the best part.

So the sage advice Gregg is giving us is to pay attention to the fourth quarter in the last and most important NFL game of the 2011 season. I'm not sure where we would be without Gregg's advice.

If recent Super Bowls, and the most recent Giants-Patriots game, are a guide, don't go anywhere in the fourth quarter. That's when the fun begins.

I will try to remember this. Remember, Gregg gets paid very well by ESPN to provide this type of advice and call his TMQ Non-RB, Non-QB NFL MVP a left tackle without mentioning he played left guard for the majority of the year.

Stats of Hype Week No. 7: Jim Caldwell, fired as coach of the Colts, was 26-10 with Peyton Manning and 2-14 with anyone else at quarterback.

Again, this is evidence for why quarterbacks tend to win the MVP over interior linemen or defensive players. A team's entire fortunes can go up or down based on the health of a team's quarterback. I find it interesting while in the column containing his TMQ Non-RB, Non-QB NFL MVP where Gregg tries to convince his readers that players outside of the quarterback position are as important as quarterbacks, he includes a statistic that helps to show his point of view could very well be wrong. So while we recognize the important of offensive linemen, it is hard to convince someone a non-QB should be valued as highly as quarterbacks when also acknowledging what the loss of an elite quarterback can do to a team's record.

Then Gregg goes through the errors the NY Times has made over the last six months, gleefully ignoring I could make a list of errors Gregg has made in TMQ over the last six months. I will add this to my list of items related to TMQ I keep telling myself I will complete but never do. So far the list looks like...

-Errors Gregg has made over the last six months.

-Detailed list of players who weren't "unwanted" by their teams even though they end up on Gregg's unwanted list.

-A comparative list of players drafted in the 6th round/7th round or were undrafted versus players drafted in the 1st round over the last 10 years. I would detail how their performances matched up against each other to show Gregg his criticism of highly-drafted players isn't entirely accurate.

-Detailed list of contradicting statements Gregg has made in TMQ during the 2011 season.

"Referred imprecisely" to "an eastern box turtle that escaped from the Inwood Hill Nature Center in Manhattan. While many such turtles can be identified by 'fiery red eyes,' that is not the case for all of them. Males have fiery red eyes, but females have orange or brown eyes. The escaped turtle, Lionel, is male." Lionel the escaped turtle must have had his publicist call the Times to complain.

Or the New York Times attempts to get the facts they publish as accurate as possible in order not to misinform their readers. I realize this is an idea foreign to Gregg Easterbrook.

Obama earned $1.7 million in 2010, and his living costs were covered by U.S. taxpayers. Yet he gave away only $245,000. The exemplar of hypocrisy is the public figure who hectors others about how they should be more generous, then doesn't give himself.

It is hard for me to criticize a person for giving away half a million dollars to charity. Perhaps a millionaire like Obama should give more, but that is still a lot of money to give away to charity.

But according to his IRS returns, after taxes and charitable donations, in 2010 Romney was left with $15 million in disposable income. That means Romney gave away $3 million while keeping $15 million for himself. Judged by the numbers, Romney thought his own luxury was five times more important than helping the poor, the arts, schools and churches.

I always dislike it when Gregg does this type of thing. He takes two numerical figures and then comes to a baseless conclusion. He'll often say because a college football coach makes 10 times more than an English professor at the same school that means the school thinks football is 10 times more important than education. This just doesn't seem accurate to me. Keeping $15 million in disposable income was probably also a way of helping to fund his Presidential campaign or for some other purpose. I don't know, it's his money and he isn't for higher taxes so he isn't being too much of a hypocrite just knowing these facts. Maybe Mitt Romney should have given more money to charities, but I don't think the amount he keeps as disposable income can be compared to how much he donates to charity indicates he thinks his luxury is X times more important than helping others.

Barack Obama, Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich -- one is likely to be the next president. All three look bad on the test of voluntary donations.

I would love to know what percentage of his income Gregg Easterbrook donates to charity and other causes. If he keeps $100,000 for disposable income and donates $20,000 then he thinks his own luxury is 5 times more important than helping others and he is a hypocrite.

Other instances of absurd precision:

He goes Gregg with his absurd precision whining. I wish he could realize there is a reason for precision and using hundredths of seconds during a 100 meter dash actually makes sense.

The New York City sales tax is 8.875 percent, certainly not 8.9 percent, while the city's hotel tax is 5.875 percent, certainly not 6 percent!

See, Gregg is the one being ridiculous in thinking not rounding up to 8.9 percent in sales tax is stupid. Let's say the city of New York has $100 million in sales every year This is probably a really, really low estimate.

At a tax rate of 8.875% the revenue for New York City would be $8.875 million.

At a tax rate of 8.90% the revenue for New York City would be $8.9 million. So Gregg's inability to understand rounding is a difference in revenue of $25000. I would consider that to be a lot of money and explains why the tax rate is taken to such precise amounts. It may seem like a small number in terms of the percentage, but given the amount of sales tax collected, not rounding up or down causes the city to lose or gain a large amount of money.

The computer said Green Bay and Houston would be victorious, and thus was wrong on two of four games. You would have done better (three of four) simply by picking the home team.

Or you could have done better by picking the team that had the lower letter in the alphabet (three of four...Baltimore beating Houston ruined it from being four of four).

After the killing of Osama bin-Laden, many readers including Carla Robinson of Olney, Md., noted this story in which an unnamed "intelligence official" declared that the chance of a false positive on the bin-Laden DNA test was "approximately one in 11.8 quadrillion." Approximately one in 11.8 quadrillion!

Right, because that is a big number. For a guy who just spent part of this TMQ eviscerating people for using hyper-specific numbers, you would think he would like it when someone approximates a number that isn't hyper-specific. Instead, Gregg criticizes the non-specificity of the number provided because the number is too large.

Steve Chaggaris of Washington notes this absurdity: "On his 16 dropbacks, [Matt] Stafford's average release time was 2.07 seconds ... Tom Brady's was a very respectable 2.37." Boston Globe reporters can measures hundredths of seconds?

No, but Boston Globe reporters have the ability to purchase watches that can measure hundredths of seconds. Also, there is a difference in 0.30 of a second in a quarterback's average dropback time. It can be the difference in a defender getting his hand on the quarterback's arm while he is trying to pass the ball and the quarterback releasing the ball cleanly. Does Gregg really believe the reporters don't have a stopwatch to come up with these dropback times?

This season's Patriots are no colossus.

Other than the fact they are 15-3 and haven't lost in almost three months. Other than winning over 80% of their games and not losing since right after Halloween. Other than those two things, they aren't a colossus at all.

The leading question of the upcoming Super Bowl is whether the Patriots' defense can stop the Giants' offense.

Another questions is whether the Giants defense can stop the Patriots very potent offense. Don't forget that part of the equation.

The Patriots' obvious deficiency is lack of a deep threat -- in the playoffs, nine of their 10 longest passing plays have been to tight ends.

So the Patriots do have a deep threat, it is their tight ends who are the deep threats. This doesn't mean Hernandez or Gronkowski can't spread the defense out and get big gains. Even if they aren't wide receivers running go-routes they still can serve the purpose of keeping the Giants safeties further back.

Also, New England has adjusted for its lack of a Randy Moss-style deep threat by throwing deep to Wes Welker. If six offensive linemen come in for New England when it's second down and 5 to 7 yards to go -- traditional rushing down -- look for a play-fake and deep pass to Welker. That action worked for New England several times this season.

So the Patriots do have a deep threat then and this isn't a weakness? So why did Gregg just say the Patriots don't have a deep threat?

The Giants' defense was not much statistically in the regular season either, finishing 27th. Purists will groan over a Super Bowl matchup of the 31st-ranked versus 27th-ranked defenses -- what happened to defense wins championships?

The Giants started winning more games when they played better defense and both teams have played pretty good defense in the playoffs. Defense can win championships, but a championship can't be won during the regular season. The defense has to play well in the playoffs too, which I think both the Giants and the Patriots defense has done.

When these teams met in the Super Bowl four years ago, Jersey/A got five sacks, all without blitzing; key to the contest was that the Giants' defensive line outperformed the Patriots' offensive line. That could be what to watch for again.

Great point. We may need to watch to see if the Patriots are unable to block the Giants defensive line. This could, and I mean just maybe, have an effect on the outcome of the game if Brady is under constant pressure. Boy, these guys from ESPN are on the fucking ball with their analysis.

I'll throw another thing to watch out for during the game. If the Giants aren't able to protect Eli Manning from the Patriots pass rush, this may not be good for the Giants. Also, watch to see if the Giants are able to not turn the ball over. If they turn the ball over and the Patriots don't, this could have an effect on the game.

I'm just being ass right now, I know. I think Gregg deserves it though.

When the Giants have the ball, the focus will be their outstanding wide receiver array of Victor Cruz, Hakeem Nicks and Mario Manningham. These receivers drove crazy a quality, disciplined Forty Niners secondary --

To an extent, but it seems like Gregg didn't watch the second half of the Giants-49ers game when the 49ers defense played much better against the Giants receivers. The 49ers forced the Giants to punt seven times in the second half. So the 49ers secondary was not driven completely crazy by the Giants receivers.

TMQ Non-QB Non-RB NFL MVP Finalists: This year only players from the title round are eligible: My reasoning is that he who would wear the mantle of "most valuable" had better have created some value.

Just when I think Gregg's idiocy can't get any worse, he manages to somehow surprise again. So Gregg doesn't believe a player who was a non-QB or non-RB and his team didn't make the Super Bowl, this player didn't create as much value as non-QB or non-RB player from a Super Bowl team? This type of logic infuriates me. It is much like people who believe the MVP from each league in baseball has to play for a playoff team. It's absolutely moronic, because as Gregg stated earlier in this very column, football is a team sport. So it is idiotic to say a player whose team didn't make the Super Bowl should not be up for this idiotic fake award simply because the team around him wasn't as good. Sometimes I think Gregg is simply baiting his readers. I really do. I fall for it every week too.

Baltimore: Jarret Johnson. As the famous guys on the Ravens' defense begin their decline, Johnson has stepped up. The young player to watch is cornerback Cary Williams from Division II Washburn, who this season had more passes defensed than Ed Reed.

Of course Ed Reed is a safety and Cary Williams is a cornerback, but who gives a shit about the details? It doesn't matter. Gregg regurgitates a statistic and doesn't want us to think too much about it. I would believe a cornerback to have more passes defensed than a safety. Especially considering every player in the Top 20 in passes defensed is a cornerback. So this statistic that Gregg believes means something, means very little. You can't compare Ed Reed and Cary Williams on passes defensed and believe you have really proven something.

When New England and Jersey/A met in the regular season, David Diehl played guard partly so he could match up against Wilfork.

Diehl also played left guard in that game against the Patriots BECAUSE HE PLAYED LEFT GUARD MOST OF THE SEASON UNTIL WILLIAM BEATTY GOT INJURED. That had something to do with it as well. Seriously, if you are going to name a guy TMQ Non-RB Non-QB NFL MVP know the guy's position.

San Francisco: Vernon Davis, Justin Smith, Joe Staley and Patrick Willis. This team is loaded with impact players -- a good sign for the Niners in 2012.

All first round picks. In fact, of the nine players Gregg named as finalists, six of them were first round picks. I wish he could remember this when he writes negatively about highly drafted, highly paid glory boy first round picks.

Past Non-QB Non-RB NFL MVPs: The award now enters its second decade with four Patriots having taken the trophy, fitting since New England was the best team of the last decade.

The logic of Gregg giving the fake award only to players whose team played in the Super Bowl is fitting as well. The idea a player could be the most valuable Non-RB Non-QB and not play for one of the two Super Bowl teams must blow Gregg's mind.

Then readers write in and tell Gregg how wrong he was over the past few weeks. This is my favorite part of TMQ. I enjoy it because Gregg acts pretentious every week and is hypercritical (as I am in evaluating his TMQ) of others when they make a mistake or aren't completely accurate in their depiction of pretty much anything. Gregg loves to point out the mistakes of others.

My favorite reader correction is this one...

Many readers, including Spencer Brown of Los Angeles, noted, "Negative reinforcement is the removal of something aversive with the intended effect of increasing a behavior. For example if Singletary wired Davis to get him electric shocks, and stopped the shocks whenever Davis caught a pass, that would be negative reinforcement. The example you cited about Singletary would be positive punishment, which is the addition of something aversive.

It's all semantics to Gregg. He tries to sound smart and use big words. It doesn't matter if he uses the words correctly, just listen to how smart Gregg sounds!

Next Week: The American Football Conference Conference champions meet the National Football Conference Conference champions in that Super Bowl thing you might have heard about.

As always, Gregg will be here to second-guess each team's decisions even if the reasoning behind the decisions were sound. Gregg believes the team that goes for it on fourth down, has the coach that dresses the warmest and doesn't blitz very much will win the game. That is unless the team that loses the game went for it on fourth down in the wrong fashion (not using misdirection) and didn't blitz enough which allowed the opposing quarterback time to find open receivers. Basically, whatever strategy the losing team ends up using was wrong, even if the idea behind the strategy was sound.