Impressive Blowout Victory for Rush
Kevin Sheller
Monday June 3, 2002
After some post-game discussion and evaluation, it appears that the Rush are neither quite that good nor is New Jersey that bad. The Gladiators were victims of their own off night, and the Rush were good enough to take advantage of it.
When normally sure-handed players like New Jersey’s OS Mike Horacek drop at least three catchable passes, one of which is tipped into the waiting arms of WR/DB Dameon Porter, the recipients (in this case, Chicago) have trouble losing. However, the debate heats up if one considers whether New Jersey’s troubles were actually caused by the Rush or if the Gladiators suffered from “one of those games.”
From the press box, it looked like Horacek’s first dropped pass was an uncharacteristic fluke. But as he and his band of pass-catchers were victims of pounding Rush hits, it’s possible that the Gladiators began to think more about the impending punishment rather than incoming passes.
“We’re a physical team,” said DS Cedric Walker. “Once you start hitting people, they concentrate more on getting hit than catching the ball, and I think you saw that tonight. You had a couple of guys for New Jersey who were wide open, but they were waiting to get hit, and they dropped it.
“(Horacek’s) a great player. We’re not going to say that we held him. But he did drop some balls, and we did put some hits on him. We lucked out and caught him on a bad night. We’ll take it any way we can.”
After it was all said and done, the Gladiators only scored a grand total of 14 points – all in the second quarter. Before Sunday’s game, the Rush had never held an opponent scoreless for an entire quarter. After Sunday’s game, the Rush now have done it three times.
Ironman and MVP Debate
When the time came to decide which two players deserved Ironman and MVP of the game, the decision was extraordinarily difficult because three players deserved recognition. Porter’s presence on the field was definitely felt. If he has any residual problems from his lower-leg injury, it couldn’t be seen. He broke up five passes, including at least one sure-TD, grabbed two interceptions, and hauled in a short Billy Dicken pass for a score. Certainly deserving of an Ironman award.
FB/LB Jamie McGourty was all over the field. On offense, he powered for 10 yards on four carries, two for touchdowns. And on defense and special teams, McGourty was always near the ball. He even flipped over the sideline wall into the crowd on one attempt to catch the ball carrier. The third year FB/LB certainly showed no signs of a knee injury that left him sidelined for the first four games of the season. His scores and hustle on defense nominated him for Ironman in my opinion.
Meanwhile, Lindsay Fleshman made a name for himself by hauling in not one, but two one-handed touchdown receptions. The most impressive was a full-speed one-handed dive in which his entire body was horizontal and his arm was stretched to the limit. Somehow he secured the ball into his body as he tumbled to the turf and out of the back of the end zone. It was truly the catch of the year.
“Just got to make the plays,” said Fleshman when asked about his acrobatic catches. “When the coach calls your number, you have to make the plays in the end zone. We have a lot of good people on our team, and you never know who’s going to be hot one night.”
Just those two plays alone earned him enough notoriety for an award in my opinion, but on top of that, Fleshman forced a fumble early in the game that kept the Gladiators scoreless in the first quarter.
So really, the Rush had three Ironmen of the game, but only one received the award: Fleshman. Porter was granted MVP honors.
Hulk Watch
OL/DL John Moyer got into the offensive act again with a 17-yard downfield strike that the big man had to stretch high to pull in. He wanted to turn around and SMASH, but he was just happy to make the catch.
“If I didn’t make the catch I was afraid they’d never throw it to me again,” joked Moyer after the game.
Of course, it wasn’t a Banner night for the Hulk (Get it?). Moyer was called for a roughing the passer penalty that he swears helped pump up the defense. Of course, it happened in the second half after the Rush were already well on their way to a convincing victory, but who cares? Hulk Smashed.
Kicking Problems
Despite the convincing 44-14 victory, the Rush are back to struggling with the kicking game. A number of Bruce Rienecker’s kickoffs were low, short, line drives. At times his extra point and field goal kicking was atrocious (3 for 5 XP, 1 for 2 FG). After the game, head coach Mike Hohensee said that Rienecker came to him during the game and said that he couldn’t kick any more field goals. As a result, the coach called for a few extra fourth down conversion attempts.
It’s unknown whether Rienecker was having trouble because he was injured or his head just wasn’t in the game. Either way, Hohensee admitted that the team may have to look for another kicker soon.
No Arenafan, No Computer
Chicago QB Stewart Patridge told me that during the week of Areanfan’s downtime, he gave up and lent his computer to a few of his teammates. Because without Arenafan, who really needs a computer anyway?
Who was I to argue with such sound reasoning?
Kevin Sheller ia founder of Arenafan Online and was the principal owner until 2004. Kevin graduated from the University of Akron with a degree in technical writing, and has been a member of the Arena Football Internet community since 1993. He has worked as a professional web programmer and is also the executive producer for a computer/video game company. The most recent Xbox title to his credit is called Hunter: The Reckoning.
