I wore my Reggie Bush jersey out in public yesterday, with at least a little bit of pride. The Saints are a natural pick for anyone in the 619 to root for, with Drew Brees at quarterback and one of San Diego’s own in the backfield. Geaux Saints, Geaux Reggie!
By the end of the second quarter of the NFC Championship Game, there wasn’t much pride for Reggie Bush. In one of the dumber plays since Vincent Jackson kicked the challenge flag, Bush decided to not fair catch a punt. At the 15. On the sideline. With a defender one step away from him at a full run. And with less than two minutes on the clock.
To make it even more laughable, Bush muffed the punt BEFORE he got lit up by the gunner. Minnesota recovered the fumble. The Vikings were given an ultimate gift: first and goal at the 10 in a 14-14 game to close out the half.
Then, Adrian Peterson decided to upstage Reggie Bush, starting his own fumblepalooza by snapping his arms together before Brett Favre handed him the ball, coughing it up for Scott Fujita to recover. By game’s end, Reggie is up on the FOX desk being interviewed as one of the “stars of the Saints”.
The Vikings were going to give away that game yesterday, even if they had to belabor the point. But for Reggie Bush, there should be nothing more than a quiet celebration. Bush would have been one of New Orleans’ all-time sports goats if Peterson hadn’t returned the favor.
As another Bush would say of another famous New Orleans’ flop, Heck of a Job, Reggie!
The one common theme in Reggie Bush’s sports gaffes is pride. Bush runs with pride and arrogance, always trying to make the biggest play possible, the most spectacular, jaw-dropping, unimaginable run. It’s almost like he wants to recreate that famous run against Fresno State from his college days on every carry. Every once in a while it happens.
Reggie Bush is equally capable of the spectacular or the stupid come Super Bowl time
But most of the NFL defenses are much less forgiving than Fresno State’s. Bush usually takes a three yard hole and bounces it outside for a two yard loss. He drops passes because he’s already twisting to head upfield. And yes, he makes dumb decisions with the football (again, a college redo) and fumbles.
When you add it up, Bush is a firefly in the NFL: some brief glimpses of flash and light amounting to nothing. Then again, he may just break a punt for a touchdown in the Super Bowl and spin spectacularly out of a tackle on a long gain, bouncing a play to the right that was designed to go left.
I know this, I’d be much more nervous than excited if I’m a Saints fan and Reggie Bush has the ball in the big game. He’s as likely to lateral to nobody as he is to be the star. And I’m not sure if I’m going to be sporting that Reggie Bush jersey when I watch the Super Bowl.
Some other loosely collated thoughts from the weekend:
Malcolm Thomas showed me a lot on Saturday night, even in a game when he had just two points. In the first half of SDSU’s battle with BYU, the Cougars were trapping and double-teaming every pass into the post. When Billy White got double teamed, he would back out and rotate the ball around the perimeter, and BYU’s defense would hold. When Thomas got the ball and the double came, he made quick passes over the top of the double team, usually to Brian Carlwell flashing down the lane. Another time he spotted an open Tapley on the wing, who started a great ball rotation that led to an open shot on the other side of the court. Thomas had five assists by halftime and forced BYU to switch to a zone.- Speaking of which…D.J. Gay told me the final play call for the Aztecs, when they were trailing by three with 11 seconds to play, was a rub at the top of the arc, with Kelvin Davis coming off a double screen for a three on the right wing. Davis got jumped by a double team, decided to penetrate, and lost the ball going up. But really? A play for Davis, who was 3-12 from the field in the game, 1-8 from three? Senior leadership is one thing, but I don’t think running a play for the coldest guy on the court is a great maneuver. KD shot his team out of the game on Saturday night, bombing away with some sideways threes during BYU’s 15-0 second-half run.
- One last thing from Saturday night: seriously, SDSU, next time you schedule a “Blackout” night at Viejas Arena, have the Aztecs come out in their black uniforms. I know this is head-slappingly obvious but it seems to have escaped someone on the Mesa.
UCSD women’s coach Charity Elliott, I told you. On last week’s Triton Talk, I told the coach of the (at the time) 14-0 Tritons that her team was going to keep playing inconsistent basketball until somebody finally stepped up and slapped them. UCSD was just two wins away from matching the school’s all-time winning streak in women’s basketball (16), but they had gone into a weeks-long rut of playing one good half, one bad half. On Thursday night, in one of the toughest road venues in the PCAA, the Tritons lost 84-80 to Humboldt State, ending the undefeated run. They came back to beat Sonoma State the next night, 68-52. Coach Elliott’s Tritons are a bit undersized down low but have tenacious players who usually defend very well. As long as they cut down on turnovers, they should be the dominant team on the West Coast in Division II. But I thought it would take a loss for them to snap out of their see-saw funk, let’s see if it comes true this week when UCSD hosts Cal Poly Pomona on Thursday night and Cal State San Bernadino on Saturday night. I’ll be calling Saturday’s games live on ucsdtritons.com.- The UCSD men, meanwhile, are a mess. They dropped two more on the Humboldt-Sonoma road trip, both by double digits. Jordan Lawley (who will be my guest on Triton Talk tomorrow) lit it up for 59 points on the weekend, but coach Chris Carlson’s Tritons are lacking in experience at the point and production in the post. Hopefully they’ll play inspired ball when I’m there on Saturday night, it will be Spirit Night, the one annually well-attended basketball game at UCSD.
- The SD Derby Dolls got their season started with a 133-78 flat-track win over Arizona on Saturday night in Del Mar. Look for Kali Katt’s recap in the next day or two here on 619 Sports. The real action gets started February 6th when the new banked track makes its Del Mar debut.
The San Diego Sockers jump back in action this Thursday night on 619 Sports. It’s the biggest game of the season to date, as the Sockers face off against their Western Division rivals the California Cougars for the third time. The Cougars are the defending PASL-Pro champs, but when they lost Aaron Susi to the Sockers in the offseason, the balance of power shifted south. However, the Cougars have rebounded to win five straight and are now 9-3, just 1 1/2 games behind the 10-1 Sockers in the standings. Stockton is 4-0 at home, and they will be looking for revenge after losing to San Diego twice in overtime at the Del Mar Arena. The only place to follow the Sockers on the road is 619Sports.Net! Join me for the live webstreaming broadcast (on our livestream channel) starting at 7pm on Thursday night!
