Story Never Changing For 1-9 Predators in Loss to Sharks
Adam Markowitz
Saturday May 26, 2012
ORLANDO -- Every single week, the story really is exactly the same for the 2012 Orlando Predators. Quite honestly, it's getting boring to write on. In this version of the same old, same old, the Preds came out of the blocks with advantages of 14-3 and 21-10, only to end up falling apart and losing to the Jacksonville Sharks 55-37.
The air in the building at the Amway Center really was just never active, though there were reportedly 13,081 in attendance. The six or seven rows worth of Jacksonville fans was a nice addition to the game, and it was the most fans that I remember seeing supporting the road team in a game this year. However, there was never a point that it really felt like the fans wearing black and red (and pink) were into the game, and the team really played with that same lackluster amount of energy.
Orlando took a 21-10 lead early in the second quarter on WR TT Toliver's second TD reception of the game. This was the sixth time this year that the Preds have taken a double-digit lead in a game. And not surprisingly, for a team that is already 0-3 this year in games in which it has led by 20 or more points, Orlando lost yet again.
From that point on, the Predators were outscored 39-3 over a stretch of just about two full quarters. The Sharks had the 30-10 advantage in the second quarter. That marked the ninth time this year that the Preds were outscored by at least 13 points in a quarter this season. To put that in perspective, the 2003 Carolina Cobras, the last team in the AFL to go winless at 0-16 were only outscored by 13 or more points in 14 different quarters over the course of that atrocious season. The Preds are on pace to do it 16 times.
In the end, the quarterback problems for the Predators continue. QB Chris Leak, playing in his first game as a starting signal caller here in the Jungle, went 17-of-32 for 275 yards with four TDs. He wasn't picked off, but his numbers didn't reflect just how poorly that he played. He started going 5-of-6 for 122 yards with three TDs, and went 12-of-26 after that. The 13 points that the team put up in the second half under Leak's direction actually improved the team's second half scoring output this year. The Predators now have 123 points in 10 games in the second half and overtime this year, an average of just 12.3 PPG.
Of course, Orlando was shut out in the third quarter, and the team is averaging just 4.8 PPG out of the locker room this year. The Predators haven't scored more than seven points in a game in the third quarter this year, and they have now been shut out four times in this stanza.
Leak's four touchdowns gives him 15 on the season for the Preds, the exact same total that both Collin Drafts and Justin Roper have had on the campaign. The 45 TD passes for the threesome of Orlando quarterbacks is just an abomination, especially considering the fact that there are 11 quarterbacks this year in the AFL that have more than that coming into this week.
The night was made worse at the end when the team released WR Bobby Sippio for his arrest. Sippio was inactive for the second straight game, and the news broke later in the evening that he had been arrested for attempted murder.
