The Gildon Report - Dec. 6th

In light of many a fan being bamboozled and ga-ga over Jason Gildong�s 11 sacks last season --- despite only 2 being anywhere near "earned sacks" --- I'm devoting some time this season to monitor the work of the exceptionally average Jason Gildon. Jason has been famous enough with his coverage sacks, flop sacks, the QB-slipped-on-the-wet-turf sacks, the OT totally forgot his blocking assignment sacks, and so on, that the NFL has designated a new statistic, called the "Dong Sack™", in honor of Jason Gildong. (Some fantasy football leagues are incorporating this into their point systems.)

As I alluded to last week, the Gildong Report is getting easier and easier to write. It's gotten to the point, that if I really wanted to skimp on my labor, I could pull up last week's report --- change a couple small items --- and voila, it's done.

Two weeks ago at Tennessee, for example, Gildong did NOTHING. No tackles, no assists, no sacks, no pressures, no hits.

Last week, Gildon came as close to doing nothing as can be accomplished by a starting LB in the National Football League. He finished with a whopping 1 solo stop, 1 assist, 0 sacks, and 0 pressures, in 65 plays from scrimmage. Sixty five.

This week was another ghost-like disappearing act by Casper Gildon. In 73 plays from scrimmage --- in which Gildon was on the field for EVERY one of those plays, Gildon recorded 4 solo tackles in a game that he was every bit as absent from, as Jeff Spicoli was from Mr. Hand's class in "Fast Time at Ridgemont High" .

The four tackles by Gildong:

1. The 3^rd play of the game, on a little valve-dumpoff to the FB, Gildon came up and made a solid but unspectacular tackle. This occurred at about the 13:55 mark of the 1^st qtr.

2. At 4:15 of the FOURTH quarter, on the 1^st play of Jax's last possession, Stewart ran a toss sweep left, and cut it back when little room developed. Gildon, totally unblocked and untouched, came down the line and stopped Stew for a 4-yard gain. 54 (fifty four) minutes of football elapsed between Gildong's 1^st and 2d tackles of the nite.

3. On the play just after the 2:00 warning, Stewart ran a gut run, but bounced it to the right when no hole emerged. Gildon, blocked ONLY by WR McCardell, made the stop.

4. On the very next play, Stewart cut toward his RT, and Gildon, blocked only by FB Shelton, made the stop with some help from another defender.

This is IT, folks. 4 piddlyassed tackles from the budding pro-bowler --- 1 on an unblocked tackle of a FB on a dump pass, 1 on an unblocked toss sweep to the other side, 1 when blocked by a WR, and 1 when blocked by a FB. Thus, NOT ONCE did Gildong make a play with a OT blocking him.

This isn't it, either. There were a host of foolhardy gaffes by Gildong that I would be remiss if I excluded:

- On Stewart's 3d & 1 run up RT in the 1^st quarter, Gildon was easily blocked out by the TE, but he had an easy chance to corral Stew from behind for a 1-yard gain. Instead, Stewart shrugged off Gildon like a harmless flea, and rumbled for an extra 6 yards.

- On a 1^st down delay handoff up RT, Gildon -- untouched -- ran right by Stewart, and Stew easily cruised up the large alleyway for 8 yards. Even Paul McGuire wisecracked on this play, "Jason Gildon ran in and ran right by the ballcarrier." Gildon looked like a complete dufus on this play.

- At 3:50 of the 3d qtr, Gildon got totally caved in, and Stew ran up a gaping hole for 6 yards.

At 11:10 in the 4^th, Jason had an golden chance for his patented Dong Sack, as Brunell couldn't find a receiver, and as he scooted forward a couple yards, he was blind to Gildon. Gildon, who was blocked ONY by Stewart on this play, came back toward the LOS & reached and grabbed at Brunell, but just like James Stewart did, Brunell shrugged Gildong off like a harmless gnat, and continued his rollout and fired an inc. pass.

Pass rush?? Hah!! What a farce! Searcy shoved Gildon around like the fat gradeschool teacher enforcing the queue of disorderly 1^st graders in the school cafeteria. Gildon didn't sniff Brunell all game. Gildon didn't harass Brunell, he didn't get in his face, and he didn't cause him to hurry even a single pass. Brunell could have immersed himself with gasoline, and Gildon could have been holding a flaming Olympic torch, and Brunell would have had nothing to fear because Gildon was waaaay out of reach.

All in all, a totally pitiful, Casper-like effort from Jason Gildong, which adds to his budding repertoire after the equally nauseating efforts versus Tenn and Cinci.

In light of the media's fawning over Carlos Emmons after this game, I must also include a report on him.

Carlos had 2 sacks. 1 sack was the 2nd play of the game for the Jags. Emmons actually allowed Brunell to
get outside, and Brunell chose to just run outa bounds and lost 2 yards. Emmons didn't even touch him. This was ruled a sack.

Then Emmons got that untouched sack in the 2nd quarter. No one blocked him and he had an easy sack of Brunnell. This was his 5^th sack of the season --- ALL of which have been Dong Sacks™.

As for his overall play versus Jax, Emmons contributed the following:

- On Mack's 13 yard run up LT (left tackle) late in the 1^st qtr, Emmons was manhandled by TE Jones. The hole was large enough to drive a '73 Fleetwood thru -- sideways.

- On the very next play, Brunell dropped the snap and a large scrum ensured for the ball. Henyr, Holmes, and Roye all converged on the ball over in the left side of the Jax backfield (Brunell recovered the ball). Emmons was out to the Steeler right (Jax left) lined up 5-yards off a slot receiver on this play. The replay CLEARLY shows Emmons looking toward the backfield as the ball is rolling around right in front of him, but inexplicably, Emmons never moved more than about an inch toward this scrum, instead just standing there jacking his beanstalk.

- Brunell easily scrambled for 9-yards at 1:59 of the 1^st qtr., in which Emmons did a wide loop rush, and got blasted waaaay toward the goal post and onto the ground, creating a massive alley for Brunell to run through.

- Stewart's 12-yard run at 4:00 of the 2d qtr. was the direct result of Emmons getting dominated and shoved to the outside, again creating a massive hole.

- On the long completion to TE Jones on 3^rd and a million, Shields was holding onto Jones for dear life, awaiting others to finish Jones off. Kirk came in to do just that, but simultaneous to that, Emmons WHIFFED on Jones and then knocked Kirk AWAY from Jones, allowing Jones another 4 yards.

- On Stew's long 40-yard run in the 3d qtr, Emmons had an EASY chance to stop Stew for a 3-yard gain. Instead, Carlos meekly dove at Stew's legs and Stew easily busted away for the long gainer.

- On the 4^th & 1 midway thru the 3d, Emmons missed an easy stop for a 4-yard gain, thus allowing an extra 3 yards.

- On the long flag pass at 3:30 in the 3d, Emmons was easily chopped down by FB Shelton while rushing the passer. No one else was assigned to block Carlos.

- On the 1^st & goal plunge midway thru the 4^th, Emmons hit Stew at the LOS, but failed to bring him down, and Stew dragged him for a 2-yard gain.

- At 2:49 of the 4th, on a 3d & 2, Emmons jumped all over the play fake, and Brunell easily rolled to his left and tossed a completion to McCardell for 13 yards.

As for pass pressure, like his fellow Pitter-Pat Brother Gildon, Emmons generated NOTHING. On the 2 or 3 times that he did harass Brunell a little, it was simply the case of Brunell having time, & not finding an open receiver, and then rolling to his left (Brunell is a lefty, so this makes sense). Throughout the game, Boselli treated Emmons like a whore who'd stolen money from her angry pimp. And, in all of this, Emmons did little more than playfully punch his personal 1-eyed clown.

Someone asked me if I felt the ILBs totally collapsed as well in this game. I reviewed the tape, and the answer is "No." Some explanation:

1. While the ILBs won't use this game's tape for any contract negotiations, they played fairly well. Their effectiveness was shortcircuited by poor play from Steed and especially Staat at nose tackle. Steed, who is getting paid some $3 million/year to "clog the middle", got shoved about on several running plays. The only thing he clogged was the commodes in the visitors locker room at Alltel Stadium. As for Staat, he blew chow the entire night. Like Witman at FB, Staat is too tall (6'5") for the NT job. He has no leverage and is not nearly squatty enough to square off with the center and "earn a draw" with stout plugging. He actually was buried onto his back on the 4^th & 1 run midway thru the 4^th qtr.

2. Most of the yardage was up the tackles, not up center or up guard. My pre-game report said this would happen --- "The Jags running game concerns me a lot. I cannot fathom that Coughlin and his staff have not seen the GAPING holes up RT and LT, created by softee play by our OLBs. They surely saw this on the films of our past 2 games, and they'd be fools to not exploit this." What made this worse was that Jax was able to do this by blocking the OLB with ONLY a TE or a RB, thus allowing their OTs and OGs to block the DE and ILB. Other teams have wasted resources by using a tackle on the OLB; Jax was not so foolish. Sure, the ILBs are supposed to chip in on off-tackle plays, but when your OLBs are getting DOMINATED --- and I do mean dominated --- so badly at the point of attack that the hole is the size of the "lane" on a basketball court, the ILBs cannot do a whole helluva lot. We even had Stewart stuffed on his TD run, but Travis Davis missed laying on a "finishing shot" of Stewart --- who was being grabbed by 2 other players --- and Davis instead lightly love-tapped Stewart, and Stew was able to twist into the EZ.

So, combining 1 & 2, and you have a situation where the ILBs don't "shine", but no one should think that the ILBs had fallen asleep at the wheel. As I've been saying for 3 years now, we do not have the personnel to make the 3-4 "go", like the way it did in '94, for example. And, when Fat Steed is huffing & puffing on the sideline and Staat is in the game, you damned sure don't have the personnel to make the 3-4 do much of anything at all.

Earned Sacks: 2
Dong Sacks™: 5.5
Strips, Jars, fumbles caused: 1