The 2021 NFL Week 2 Roundup | Power Sinker

SLAMMED DIEGO

AT 40 tender years of age, Cardinals ace pitcher Adam Wainwirght has absolutely zero business being as consistently reliable as he has capably demonstrated over the past 16 years. He may not have the star-studded name recognition of a Clayton Kershaw, the sheer unadulterated power (when healthy) of a Jacob deGrom nor the dual eye color of a Max Scherzer (one blue, one brown; a distinctive trait with only a 1% chance of occurrence), but Adam continues to blossom anew as Baseball enters its final 2021 innings. He’s a defensive illustrative artist who specializes in sculpting Team success and slicing through opposing batter confidence with the skill of a trained marksman. And so it was this past Saturday when Adam was at it again facing off against the San Diego Padres. The top of the 5th found San Diego phenom Fernando Tatis, Jr. struggling with a full count and a dangerous tendency to swing himself out of disappointment. Had he been paying better attention under the glaring spotlight of expectation, Tatis would have smashed through the painting Adam was painstakingly sketching out instead of being subject to it. For Adam game-long had been artfully and skillfully etching the strike zone and masterfully manipulating the ball’s trajectory once through it. Adam’s final pitch for this at-bat employed his signature Power Sinker, which is a traditional fastball that drops like a stone once it breaches the strike zone plane. Tatis never saw it coming, swung like an open gate and struck OUT, bruised ego and all.

What happened next had San Diego tongues wagging sending the city into full-blown panic mode as to what kind of fresh TRASH has been heaped upon a Team that just months ago seemed destined for October glory. Now it’s more like Fall infamy. But first, the immensely provocative viral caught-on-Twitter confrontation that unfolded just 96 hours ago between two superstar powerhouses each worth in excess of $300M.

Immediately upon striking out, Tatis can be seen pausing briefly in prosaic disbelief, looking up and away in shocked horror before slowly pacing away as his seething anger — frothy — boils away uncontained. Tatis feels that the umpire missed the call — AGAIN — and wants to protest under duress. Steam coming from Tatis’ ears to an every-billowing whistle, Manager Jayce Tingler sees what is unpacking and pulls the emergency brake protecting his steed from near certain game expulsion. Tingler bolts onto the field pushing Tatis to the dugout and begins arguing the call on Tatis’ behalf. Animatedly. Words were exchanged, gestures hurled and just like that, Tingler was ejected. Upon replay, it was an extraordinarily peaceful ejection as far an Manager-umpire confrontations go. But the damage was done and only hinted at the fireworks to come.

Watching all this predictably play out through gritted teeth and firey anger from the sidelines was Manny Machado. Baseball’s one-time posterchild for unbecoming misbehavior had seen enough of the 22-year old Tatis’ selfish ways in the stormy weeks and months since the All-Star break. Tonight, it had to be addressed since no one else would. So Manny approaches the dugout. Tatis, with Tingler gone, was STILL in a full blown eternal minutes long meltdown throwing baseball caps, banging his batting helmet against the dugout wall and benches repeatedly, knocking over wastebins, flinging Gatorade bottles, kicking duffle bags, tossing gear all the while cursing the skies. Teammates meanwhile scattered like mice to avoid the tempestuous superstar. Well enter Manny who without missing a beat jumps in front of Tatis, pokes at him and matter-of-factly admonishes him: “IT’S NOT ABOUT [EXPLETIVE] YOU! YOU’RE [EXPLETIVE] THE BEST PLAYER IN THE WORLD. SO PLAY BASEBALL”! Gloriously, it was all caught on Twitter by nearby fans. Tatis then storms onto the field leaving Manny to mutter I-Love-My-Job-I-Love-My-Job-I-Love-My-Job in quiet reflective repetition. And here’s something rarely said of Manny and universally praised by the Twitterverse, he’s NOT wrong. It HAD to be said and Manny’s priceless delivery and skilled-yet-not-insulting takedown of Tatis were at the same time immensely appropriate and well metered out.

See the confrontation HERE: [WARNING — FOUL FOUL language and hard honesty aplenty]

It’s said that there is no crying in baseball. But certainly there are plenty of lost tempers and full-on rafter-shaking battle royales to paint more than a century’s worth of tradition ten times over. And each is usually triggered by the smallest of infractions; a high strike Power Sinker for instance. The Tatis-Machado dust-up OF COURSE stems from the Team’s long descent from the lofty promise and poise of 2020 and the first-half of this Season. The bullpen is all sorts of banged up and injury-ridden. The Offense is struggalicous. Tatis is still producing like a madman, but is also producing an outsized amount of at-bat strikeouts. And the batters surrounding him just aren’t coming through and gelling the way a playoff-caliber Team ought to be. Which all feeds into the self-defeating and echoing demons inside Tatis’ mind as he feels the weight of the Team and world on his shoulders. Which in turn is precisely why Manny’s voice-of-reason honesty was so well-timed and resonant, if not well received. While Tatis might be a well-paid member of the Team with outsize influence, he does not comprise the whole of it. No one does anything in a vacuum by themselves. Interesting is how it took Manny to hammer that into Tatis’ frame of thought. From bad boy to elder statesman at the ripe age of 29. Who’d have ever imagined THAT?

SO While it might be too late to salvage the heap of garbage that is the Team’s record of late, it’s never too late to repair and mend the camaraderie and fearless brotherhood that are the lifeblood of dynasties. Sometimes success takes luck; sometimes it takes natural-born intuition, somethings learned skill; sometimes unexpected opportunity; oftentimes disappointment. But inevitably success is spelled out in TRUTH and TRUST. Philosophically prophetic coming from the new-age oracle of Slam Diego, don’t look now but Manny just aced the Spelling Bee! Meanwhile, St. Louis pitcher Adam Wainright encases in shrink wrap his finished oil painting of Padres Under Duress and ships it off to cold storage while he and his Cards glide easily into the MLB post-Season. Power Sinker, indeed.

As we look now to the NFL in Week 2, the headline of the week is the Power Stinker in the NY Jets. Their 6–25 drubbing to the resurgent Pats magnifies what has been a perennial weakness for a Team beset with a whole host of them: that of starting QB. The much-anticipated battle of the 2021 First Round Draft picks turned out in the end to be more gimme, less armed conflict. For NE’s #15 pick from Alabama, QB Mac Jones played to the squeaky delight of Pats fans and fortifies Captain Belichick’s fateful decision to part ways with journeyman Cam Newton. The rookie surrounded by an expensive, capable and freshly added free agency Offensive squad are collectively hewing to Belichick’s decades long playbook that have served the Team so well, less superstar Tom who? Meanwhile on the other side of the Pat’s ball we have the makings of an epic collapse with #2 pick Zach Wilson (19/33 184 yards; 4 INT). Interestingly at a point in the 2nd quarter, Zach had thrown more complete passes to the opposing Patriots than to his own Team. And unfortunately for the rookie, he’s making self-inflicted unpressured mistakes that are costing the Team dearly. Time will tell if Jets HC Robert Saleh lets the early onset rigor mortis ravage unabated. And speaking of Tom who, the Bucs easily defrocked the Falcons, 48–25. Pity poor ATL QB Matt Ryan having to witness yet another masterclass Tom Brady showout(24/36 276yards 5 TDs). The defending Super Bowl champions look unstoppable at this point and are the easy favorites to repeat come February in LA. ATL on the other side of the ledger join the Jets in the royal goose egg club at 0–2.

Over at SoFi in LA, the Cowboys snuck out a WIN at Chargers, 20–17. Barely. Dak descended back down to earth a bit from last week’s blockbuster outing to meet ascending RBs Zeke Elliott and Tony Pollard who are nicely returning to Offensive form. BUT. But DAL should have won with a more commanding victory considering the opportunities afforded by sloppy LAC gameplay done in by 2 penalty laden clawed-back TDs. Poor DAL timeclock management allowed only for a FG to put them over the top. It’s a W for America’s Team, just not a pretty one. The Saints visited the Panthers and found they needn’t have bothered, losing 7–26. NOLA starting QB Jameis Winston slumped and stood in sharp contrast to the great resurrection of CAR QB Sam Darnold, whose ill, inured and complicated past with the Jets is to this day the stuff of legend. Well Sam is acquitting himself quite nicely down South and has found particular success with RB Christian McCaffrey. The Panthers are contenders and enjoy their undefeated Season.

Over in Steel City, an uncharacteristic home loss to the Raiders has the Steelers reeling from what should have been an easy victory. The Raiders found openings in Pittsburgh’s vaunted, industrial-strength Defense and proved an especially noteworthy platform for 2021 MVP-in-the-making QB Derek Carr to shine yet again. His production (28/37 382 yards 2TDs) in only two weeks is beyond phenomenal and is the reason Las Vegas sits atop the AFC West so early in the Season. More thrills to come from Sin City undoubtedly. The Steelers will rebound when they host Cincy on Sunday. The Bengals, for their part, whiffed to the Bears, 17–20, on the road. While the score was close, more ominous are signs that prized Cincy QB (back from Season-ending injury last year) Joe Burrow is rapidly deteriorating when compared from just this time last year. Hopefully just ephemeral jitters, not shaken confidence. A heady vote of confidence to Jimmy G, meanwhile, who himself is returning from Season-ending injury last year. His 49ers took it to the Eagles, 17–11 by virtue of a beautiful PHL deep completion ruled just out of bounds. But the San Francisco treat simmers away happily on the stacked NFC West stovetop.

And lastly in our Round Robin, Texans at Brownies found more misfortune befalling HOU and in particular, Tyrod Taylor. The starting QB, whose lung was so memorably punctured by a team physician-administered hypodermic needle in LA last year, has now succumb to a hanmy injury. He’ll be out for an undetermined amount of time and leaves the Texans with no easy options. Not among those options: troubled Deshaun Watson. Baker Mayfield and his Browns finished off the Texans, 31–21. The Rams, on the road at Lucas Oil stadium, were highlighted by another durable Matt Stafford outing while the Colts suffered the indignity of yet another Carson Wentz IR listing. Carson, since just 2015, has been afflicted with a fractured wrist (2015), broken rib (2016), ACL tear (2017), back vertebral fracture (2018), Concussion (Jan 2020) and now TWIN ankle sprains. How does one even sprain both ankles on the same play? Taken out of context, one would wonder aloud if Carson were constructed from brittle bones and slinky ankles. Back in the NFL, we hope for a speedy recover both for him and his Team who lost (24–27) and roll up to a nice 0–2 record. Next month’s Hard Knocks in-Season debut promises to be much ado about nothing. Down in Jacksonville, the Urban Meyer-Trevor Lawrence situation lurches from bad to worse where the Broncos trundled into town and swept the Jags off their feet (23–13) and NOT in a good way. The Cards (vs Vikings) and Titans (vs OT SEA) both notched out WINS as did the Ravens who celebrated with a thrilling Lamar Jackson last-second handstand finale which telegraphed his much-heralded 2019 greatness. And finally, doing handstands are GB fans who are heart-warmed that disgruntled employee Aaron Rogers isn’t (yet) adopting a scorched earth policy on his way out the door. The Packer put away the lowly Lions, 35–17. And Aaron tucks himself back onto the Packers shelf ahead of Sunday night’s high profile game in San Francisco.