KICKING & BEAMING!
Raiders’ fill-in has debut of a lifetime
Giorgio Tavecchio, all 5-foot-10, 182 pounds of him, was called to the center of the locker room by Raiders coach Jack Del Rio to collect the game ball on Sunday in Nashville.
After weaving his way through a mass of much larger men, Tavecchio said the words he’s been waiting his whole life to say,
“Gentlemen, I’ve dreamed for years about this moment, and it means so much that I get to share it with you all,” said the lefty kicker, who kicked four field goals in his NFL debut to help the Raiders claim a 26-16 victory over the Titans. “To see your smiling faces makes all the hard work, the struggle, the sacrifice ... .” What Tavecchio said next was inaudible beneath the loud roar of his teammates, who surely appreciated not only the quantity but the importance of the 14 points (including two PATs) Tavecchio put on the scoreboard.
“Outstanding performance by our kicker, Giorgio,” Del Rio said. “Pretty special day for him. Proud of him. That’s grit. That’s perseverance. He certainly earned it.”
Tavecchio made kicks of 20, 52, 52 and 43 yards, the middle two bracketing halftime to turn a tie into a 16-10 lead, and the final one putting the game out of reach. He is the first to kick two field goals of at least 50 yards in his NFL debut.
The 27-year-old was born in Milan, Italy, and raised in Moraga, Calif., 14 miles east of Oakland. He turned down a soccer scholarship at UC Davis to walk on as a kicker at Cal. He went undrafted and spent a season each in training camp with the 49ers, Packers and Lions before residing the last three summers with the Raiders. He was activated for the opener when Sebastian Janikowski suffered a back injury.
The kicker overshadowed some of his more famous teammates. Derek Carr, who broke his fibula late last season and missed his team’s postseason loss, threw for 262 yards and two touchdowns. And Marshawn Lynch, after remaining seated on the bench for the national anthem, had 76 yards rushing and helped the Raiders power through some difficult portions of the game.
SO HOW’S THE NEW JOB?
Welcome to your new role as the NFL’s senior vice president of officiating, Alberto Riveron. Not only are you now the one on the hook to decide some extremely tough calls, you also have the last two guys who had your job telling everyone how wrong you are on TV and the internet.
With 1:59 to go in the fourth quarter and the Redskins trailing the Eagles 22-17, Redskins QB
Kirk Cousins “fumbled” as he attempted to
throw. Fletcher Cox scooped up the ball and returned it 20 yards for the touchdown that put away the Eagles’ 3 0 -1 7 victory. Re fe re e Brad Allen told a pool reporter his original call of fumble was up held by River on in the replay room in New York because there play was “inconclusive .” Riveron used to be Dean Blandino’s No. 2 man, but now Blandino is on FOX, agreeing with the man who held the top job before he did, Mike Pereira.
“It really looked like the hand was going forward with control of the ball,” Pereira said in a video with Blandino that was posted on foxsports.com and Twitter. “Yeah,” said Blandino, “there was one angle where it looked like it might’ve been a fumble, but the shot from behind, the end-zone look, the hand was going forward and it looked like a forward pass.”
The controversial call, in effect, ended the game, but it’s not fair to say it cost the Redskins a victory. Cousins, playing in his second season on a franchise tag and looking for a big contract in the offseason as a free agent, did not resemble a franchise quarterback. He amassed 240 yards but lost two fumbles and threw an interception at the goal line on the first drive of the fourth quarter.
All day, the Eagles looked to be the third wheel in the NFC East, the one that could challenge the Cowboys and Giants. Carson Wentz looked more self-assured than did Cousins, throwing for 307 yards and two touchdowns, including a nifty step-up and throw to Nelson Agholor for a 58-yard score.
NOT THE SAME OLD JAGUARS
Three years ago, Tom Coughlin and Doug Marrone looked as if they may be the opposing coaches in the Snoopy Bowl. But Marrone lost out on the Jets job to Todd Bowles, and Coughlin eventually lost his Giants position to Ben
McAdoo. Now they are together in Jacksonville, and with the help of newly imported veteran defensive end Calais Campbell, the new Jaguars regime put a 29-7 hurting on the Texans. The day started with a huge ovation for J.J. Watt, who raised mega-millions for the victims of Hurricane Harvey, at the same time Hurricane Irma was battering Florida. From there, it was all Jaguars, with Leonard Fournette rushing for 100 yards and a touchdown in his first NFL game and Campbell, after nine years with the Cardinals, picking up a team-record four of the Jaguars’ 10 sacks as the team embraced its #Sacksonville Twitter mantra. Coughlin, the vice president of football operations, wasn’t able to do better than Blake Bortles in his first season back in Jacksonville. Bortles entered this season, in which he will make $19 million, with 11 career wins and 11 pick-sixes. Sunday, he was 11-of-21 for 125 yards and a touchdown, but got through a game with no turnovers or sacks for just the second time in his career. The one bright spot for the Texans came on the first drive of the second half, when first-round pick Deshaun Watson replaced the disastrous Tom Savage and finished a 75-yard march with a 4-yard touchdown pass to DeAndre Hopkins. Watson f inished with 102 yards passing, one interception, and was sacked four times.
PLAY OF THE DAY
How’s this for a cure for the Super Bowl loser’s hangover? Leading 13-10 over the Bears in Chicago, the Falcons had a thirdand-3 from their own 12 with 12:10 to go in the fourth quarter. Matt Ryan stepped up in the pocket away from pressure and heaved the ball downfield to a wide-open Austin Hooper near midfield. Hooper stiff- armed Quintin Demps at the 30 and took it the rest of the way for the 88-yard touchdown. The Falcons would need those points plus a sack from Brooks Reed on the final play of the game to hold on 23-17.
BAD BEAT
You’ve got the Cardinals minus-2 and a 17-9 lead with four minutes to go in the third quarter in Detroit. The Lions were handing you the game with their signature Stupid Lion Tricks (such as a fumbled snap in the end zone by the punter and a botched extra point).
But then RB David Johnson fumbles at his own 26 and Detroit recovers. Two plays later, Matthew Stafford throws a touchdown pass to Theo Riddick, then two touchdown throws to Kenny Golladay, and the Lions get a pick-six by Miles Kil
lebrew in what turns into a 35-23 rout.
POST PATTERNS
Eddie Lacy rushed f ive times for j ust 3 yards for t he Seahawks against his old Packers mates at Lambeau, just one of the ugly offensive stats for Seattle in a 17-9 loss. ... The Rams scored two defensive touchdowns in a 46-9 victory over the Andrew Luck- less Colts in L.A. Last year they totaled 44 points in the f inal four games of a 4-12 season. ... Sean McVay, the youngest coach in modern NFL history at 31, won his debut. New coaches went 3-1 Sunday (Marrone and the Bills’ Sean McDermott also won and the Niners’ Kyle Shanahan lost). Two more face each other Monday in Vance Joseph (Broncos) and Anthony Lynn (Chargers).