Looks Are Nothing, Victory Everything

SEATTLE —  At the end of the second quarter, the Raiders had the ball on the Seattle one-yard line, fourth and goal, score tied, 3-3. They called a running play, a dive over the middle by Marcus Allen. It failed.

Big mistake, right? You take the field goal in that situation. Take the sure three points. It’s what the coaches call “the percentage.”

In the fourth quarter, with five minutes left to play, Seattle had the ball on the Raider one-yard line, fourth and goal, score tied, 10-10. They called for the field goal. They made it.

The right stuff, eh? Take the sure points, the lead, maybe the game?

Wrong. The right move, going-by-the-book, was like saying, “I’ll play these,” not knowing the other guys were going to draw queens full.

Those two decisions essentially decided the Raider-Seahawk game here Sunday. The one, the Raiders’ failure, probably begat the other, the Seahawks’ decision not to make the same mistake. They made a bigger one.

The words win ugly have somehow found their way into the language. It’s what the etymologists call an “oxymoron,” a contradiction in terms, a non-possibility. “Win” and “ugly” should never modify each other. To win is beautiful.

The Raiders make a specialty of winning ugly. They are to football what Gene Fullmer was to boxing. They clinch, heel, swarm. They get off the floor. They are like a golfer with a truck driver’s swing who keeps parring--or birdieing--the hole. They are the Arnold Palmers of the NFL.

Jay Schroeder would probably be the greatest quarterback in the NFL if the goal line were on the 30. Schroeder throws passes so pretty they should have ribbons on them. They’re the most beautiful spirals you ever saw. They cut through the air like a ballistic missile. Coaches drool. They don’t make the wide receiver who could run out of Schroeder’s range. He completes these gorgeous textbook throws to the fleetest wideouts in the game.

But they kind of remind you of the story the author, Dan Jenkins, tells about the time arm-rich Dan Pastorini, on a dare, threw a pass from ground level to a 12th-floor condominium’s balcony in Hawaii. Jenkins was standing with the ex-great Bobby Layne at the time.

“Did you see that?” Jenkins said.

“What?” asked Layne.

“Pastorini threw that pass on the 12th floor balcony!” Jenkins said.

Layne shrugged. “But the receiver was on the sixth,” he said.

Schroeder, too, seems to prefer to aim for the 12th floor. When he gets around the goal line, he seems to have trouble keeping the ball in the stadium. He’s like the golfing gorilla who hits his tee shot 585 yards. And, when the cheering stops, steps up to his six-foot putt and hits that 585 yards.

But when Seattle took its field goal and the lead Sunday, Schroeder found his distance. He threw these zeppelins to Mervyn Fernandez, Sam Graddy, Mike Dyal and Fernandez again. One of them, a long gainer, was even called back.

Schroeder put the ball on the three-yard line. That’s not Jay’s distance. So, they gave the ball to Greg Bell, and he negotiated the final three yards in two carries for the victory.

If Jay Schroeder ever gets a changeup, the league is in trouble. He could throw a pass across Rhode Island and hit a receiver in whichever ear you wanted him to. But he would probably have trouble passing you the butter.

The Raiders won because they have the only million-dollar blocking back in the league.

The Marcus Allen story is the Mystery Of Edwin Drood revisited.

Marcus Allen is one of the five best football players in the league. He hasn’t had a career, he’s had a coronation. Heisman Trophy, Rose Bowl star, Super Bowl hero, no one runs with the football any better than Marcus Allen.

Still, he has undertaken janitorial duties on demand. At USC, he blocked for Charles White before he became No. 1 tailback. On the Raiders, when the team signed Bo Jackson, Marcus slipped into the fullback role again.

This year, even before Jackson shows up, Allen has become almost a non-person on the Raider chart. He spent much of the preseason sitting on his helmet. He didn’t get in the opening game until the Raider offense proved non-existent.

Sunday at Seattle, they gave Marcus the ball on two dive plays on the Seattle one. And, on the most important play of the afternoon, they lined him up and said “You block the big guy.” Marcus Allen, legend in his own time, was laying a block for Greg Bell to win the game. Marcus was playing a position he had never played in his life before--tight end. He lined up in the three tight-end formation because he is the only Heisman Trophy winner in history who could block a scarecrow. He cut down two tacklers. Bell could have gone into the end zone on a cane.

A team that can use Marcus Allen to block and Jay Schroeder to throw short probably can be said to “win ugly”at that.

What would be more to the point would be to say Seattle “lost ugly.” Now, losing is ugly all by itself. It’s got buck teeth, it wears glasses and has warts. And, for the Seahawks, the game might have turned on a call where the instant replay booth failed to overrule a call that went against them, a 45-yard L.A. pass.

That, you have to say, is ugly. But the real moral of the story is, never kick a one-yard field goal. Even if you win, that’s ugly.