Livewriting the Slant Pattern

They do it at ESPN.com. They do it at CollegeFootballNews.com. Bloggers do it every day. Some call it "liveblogging" and some call it "stream of consciousness" writing. It's the act of watching an event, writing down your thoughts as you watch it, and boom! You have your article/diary entry/blog posting/parole board recommendation.

Today, the Slant Pattern (and we'll call it "livewriting") will makes its make its maiden voyage with this technique, with notes garnered by watching last week's Buccaneers/Titans preseason game on NFL Network, which I TiVo'd. I press "play" at 6:21 PM ET...

6:21: Looks like we get the Titans' local coverage for the first half, which means we'll be getting the Buccaneers' guys in the second half. To say the sounds and images from the Titans' pregame intro is arena-rock-cheesy is understating it.

6:24: None other than Eddie George is the Titans' color analyst. The Titans crew made up for the corny, bombastic opening by playing the theme from "Welcome Back, Kotter" when introducing George.

6:30: Brian Griese starts for Tampa Bay. As a Buccaneer fan, nothing fills me with antipathy more than knowing he's the starting quarterback. I am 100% certain he will not get a brief hot streak like he enjoyed last year, nor will he/can he lead the Bucs to the playoffs. Please, give us Chris Simms. Or a free agent.

6:37: The Buccaneers just benefited from a bad pass interference call to give them deep penetration into Titan territory. Eddie George seems kind of nervous. The spotters seem to be off to a fantastic start, as no one mentioned the names of the running backs responsible for the Bucs' first two first downs.

6:39: Earnest Graham cuts outside and has an easy 10-yard TD run. 7-0 Bucs, great start for Graham. He'll make Cadillac Williams work that much harder.

6:46: Drew Bennett fumbles, the Bucs recover at the Titan 36, and Jeff Fisher challenges the ruling on the field. The replays they've shown look too inconclusive to overturn it, so I say the play will stand. Am I right? Stay tuned to find out ... now!

6:47: Woo-hoo! The refs uphold the field ruling. Slant Pattern 1, All the Fans Who Just Boo'd the Call 0.

6:48: It's just the second series, but they're putting Chris Simms in already — it's as if the football gods are hearing my plea and going backwards in time to grant my wishes! Did you know that the Buccaneers are going for their 29th consecutive Super Bowl victory this year?

6:54: Graham fumbles and gives it back to Tennessee. So far, George is okay, but he needs a more assertive delivery. To many "Ummm"s and obvious statements, but not bad for the first quarter of the first game. He made some insightful comments on the Graham touchdown run, so he can talk about what he knows.

7:01: Drew Bennett is having a rough night: the fumble, and now he dropped a pass that hit him in the hands with no one right on him. It would've been a 40-yard pickup.

7:09: Jermaine Phillips picks off a Steve McNair pass in the end zone.

7:10: First quarter is over after four drives: touchdown, fumble, fumble, interception. Must be preseason.

7:13: First drive of the second quarter: interception. Returned to the house by Keith Bulluck, in fact. 7-7. Who is this bum at quarterback for the Bucs? Bring on Brian Griese!

7:16: After two minutes gone in the second quarter, we finally have a punt. And what a punt! 69 yards! Too bad the announcers didn't see fit to tell us who the punter was.

7:18: Jarrett Payton just rolled off a 10-yard gain. Didn't I just write a column about him?

7:21: I am now officially a member of the Eddie George-as-analyst fan club, after a wide open Titans receiver apparently lost a deep ball in the lights: "It's understandable. He went to IU (Indiana)."

7:36: Jeff Fisher just made another challenge against a Buc completion, and this one is downright spurious. Definitely a catch. I'm surprised the refs are looking at it this long. Yep ... shut my mouth. They reverse the call, incomplete.

7:37: Because they reversed the call, they had to turn the clock back to 2:10 after it had ticked down to 2:00. Once the hit 2:00 a second time, they had a second two-minute warning. Hence, this game has become a footnote-trivia game, two two-minute warnings in one half. Tell your friends.

7:42: Score is 7-7 at halftime. Now we get the game from the Tampa perspective. Good night, Eddie George.

7:43: The announcers for Tampa Bay are, surprisingly, Chris Meyers (of FOX and formerly ESPN) and ESPN's Ron Jaworski (who's actually a Philadelphia guy and whom I think still lives in the area). What does he have to do with Tampa? Readers, help?

7:54: Earnest Graham picks up his second TD of the day, this time on a five-yard pass from Simms. Two big runs by Derek Watson set it up. Graham, Watson, and Ian Smart have seen a lot of carries tonight, but we've seen no action from Cadillac Williams. Interesting.

7:57: I guess the game ran over the allotted three hours, because the NFL Network apparently edited out a Tennessee three-and-out. The Bucs have the ball again after the touchdown and there's a minute and a half less left on the clock then there was after the TD. I rewound the game to confirm the editing.

8:04: Someone missed an assignment, it seems. 76-yard TD pass from Billy Volek to Roydell Williams, and no one was within 30 yards of him. We're tied again, at 14.

8:17: End of third quarter, game still tied at 14. Tampa Bay's winning the field position game at the moment and have it in Tennessee territory.

8:23: Todd France boots through a 35-yard field goal and the Buccaneers are on top for the third time tonight, 17-14.

8:40: The teams have traded some punts, and now the Titans are running out of time. Gino Guidugli, the new quarterback for Tennessee, did just scramble for a big first down on fourth down. 1:09 left, they're at their own 41, no timeouts left.

8:44: Incomplete, incomplete, incomplete, and now it's 4th-and-10, 56 seconds left.

8:45: D'oh! It's another big fourth-down conversion for Tennessee, Guidugli to Greg Guenther down to the Tampa Bay 35. They spike the ball and now have it 2nd-and -10 with 37 seconds left. They're not quite in comfortable field goal range.

8:48: Guidugli tries to scramble, but trips at the line of scrimmage and is forced to hurry everyone to the line to spike it again. He does, and it's now 4th-and-10 with 19 seconds left. The Titans will send in backup Rob Bironas to try at 53-yard field goal. After the Bucs call their perfunctory "icing" timeout (their last), to build suspense, I'm going to watch this big attempt on "slow" speed.

8:50: Waaaaaait. As the officials try to decide where exactly to spot the ball, I notice that, according to TiVo, I have 22 minutes left in the recording. This is in spite of the fact that they edited out at least one series. Methinks the context clues indicate a bit of overtime.

8:52: It ... is ... good. Yep.

8:55: Tennessee wins the toss and elects to receive. Fourteen minutes left in the recording.

8:58: After a three-and-out, the Bucs take over at their own 23 with 10 minutes left in the recording ... real time, not football minutes.

8:59: After a five-yard reception on first down, we have our first glitch that I've noticed ... the top banner reports, "Ball on goal line."

9:01: The second killer defensive pass interference penalty on Tennessee tonight. This one gives Tampa Bay the ball at the Tennessee 39. Eight minutes left in the recording.

9:02: Graham runs it for 24 yards down to the Tennessee 15. Jon Gruden sends in the field goal unit (this time with Matt Bryant as the kicker) on first down. Tampa takes a timeout, and then Tennessee does. This bodes well for Tampa Bay. I pause the TV at the snap, and there's four minutes left in the recording. So I'm thinking he makes it, two minutes to wrap up, and that's that. Or the kick is blocked and returned for a touchdown by Tennessee. That could happen, too.

9:04: It's good! Hooray!

Not a bad game. Bucs take the lead, Titans tie it, Bucs take the lead, Titans tie it, Bucs take the lead, Titans tie it, Bucs win in overtime. Considering that Cadillac Williams and Mike Alstott didn't play, the Bucs had a good time of it running the ball (169 yards). Chris Simms was 8-for-11. Good show defensively for the Bucs, as well, giving up only a field goal and a big-play touchdown. Tennessee looked pretty solid all around. Bless the NFL Network's policy of showing every non-nationally-televised preseason game over the course of the week. I'm looking forward to the Jacksonville/Tampa Bay tilt next week already.

Leave a Comment

Featured Site