October 3, 2004
The Autumn Wind is a TEXAN!
by Dave Sabo
HoustonProFootball.com
Just take your beating and your loss and get your sorry asses outta my town. Baby.
Oh, this was sweet. Not quite 19 to 10 or abusing the Steelers in Pittsburgh, but it’s close. And, it’s not simply because they won, it’s HOW they won. They just walked up to Oakland and punched ‘em dead in the face. The scoreboard read “30 – 17”, but it wasn’t anywhere near that close.
For three plus decades, the Raiders, following their pipsqueak owner’s lead, have reveled in playing the bully. They took pride in cheating and in the case of flat out asshole, Jack Tatum, permanently crippling Darryl Stingley. In an exhibition game. They enjoyed being the bad guy. Well, they met badder guys yesterday.
It’s been kinda hard playing macho the past couple of seasons, what with the Raiders aging like the portrait of Dorian Grey and being “inspired” by the biggest wuss ever to mince up and down a sideline, Norv Turner. But, they rolled into Houston and tried to muster that old Raider swagger. Like any bully, they were determined to pick on the weakling of the group, in this case, rookie corner, Dunta Robinson. Dunta made them pay dearly for that miscalculation, pulling down two huge interceptions.
They planned on punishing David Carr all day, but he walked off the Reliant Field with a spotlessly white jersey and without a soon to be shorn hair out of place. On the other hand, those idiots in their spiky shoulder pads and Halloween masks that the Raiders claim as fans, were given a demonstration of what a little pressure does to Kerry Collins. And they were clamoring for that drunken quitter to line up under center? Bullies AND ignorant. Well, the two usually go hand in hand.
Speaking of the costumed dolts, how humiliating must it be to have to drive or fly or slither all the way back home in those ridiculous getups after your boys just got the Ralphie Treatment? Especially when you’re at the opponent’s house. I can only pray that the escalators from the upper level were down and those nimrods had to haul their aluminum foil battle axes and paper meche pharaoh heads down all those ramps with Texan fans laughing and pointing. Then again, in such a situation, I can understand why they wouldn’t want to show their faces in public.
The play that absolutely epitomized this game was Dunta’s second interception. Cutting across the field on the return, he got a block from 198-pound dimeback, Jason Simmons, on 300-pound (and, judging from the number of illegal motion penalties, hard of counting) offensive lineman, Barry Sims. De-cleated? Try de-helmeted. Literally. How bad was it? Well, remember in the old “Peanut” strips when Charlie Brown would have a line shot drilled back through the pitcher’s box and he’d get flipped around and all his clothes would go flying off in different directions? Yeah, it was worse. And, he didn’t even have Schroeder around to help him gather up his gear.
By the way, didn’t the Raiders pick up Warren Sapp this off-season? Did he even DRESS yesterday? I’ll have to go back and check the tape, but I don’t recall anybody calling his name all day long. No fat tub o’ Sapp, but we had to suffer through a selection off of “No Play” Ray Buchanan’s dopey rap album which was made doubly hilarious because the Texans had all but put the game away at that point.
It’ll be interesting to see how far that sixth ranked run defense plummets after allowing third-stringer, Jonathan Wells, to record the first hundred-yard game of his career. Speaking of Wells, I was a bit skeptical of the glowing reports coming out of training camp, but he made a believer out of me today.
The only downer on the day was that we never got a shot of Al Davis in the visitor’s box with his bad comb-over and his insipid tracksuit. Then again, was he even there? I mean, would you have wanted to watch that pathetic display? Besides, he’s probably working up a new lawsuit against the NFL that will get laughed out of court.
I guess I’m just getting greedy, though. The Texans manhandled the Raiders for their first back-to-back wins. And, with San Diego laying the wood to the “Oilers” and that other guy that played QB at Fresno State, they climbed out of the NFC South cellar (giving those scrubs from Nashpatch a kick in the ass on the way up). Throw in the Astros clinching the NL wildcard and the arrival of fall here in the Northeast, and it’s been a weekend worthy of John Facenda’s eloquence.
The autumn wind is a Texan…
A modern day warrior – mean, mean stride. Today’s Dave Sabo – mean, mean pride.