At many, many points this weekend, you will hear about how the Super Bowl will be won in the trenches. You’ll hear it during the pregame in between James Brown throwing it to a special commentary from Lou Dobbs. You’ll hear it during the game from Troy Aikman, because Aikman is a living soundboard of football clichés (“Tell you what Joe, someone needs to step up here”). And you’ll hear it during the postgame as the winning team gets bukkake’d by confetti. I glaze over that strain of commentary every time because A) it’s always been a fundamental given in this sport, and B) I can see, with my own two eyes, who’s winning in the trenches. I saw it all through the Niners’ playoff run, when Raheem Mostert was already four yards downfield before a defender even got to shake his hand. Their dominance along both lines was obvious. But then I thought to myself… can’t there be a stat for that?
Read moreAuthor: Drew Magary (page 2 of 2)
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This weekend’s NFC Champion 49ers team is brought to you by general manager and former All-Pro safety John Lynch. Lynch was hired directly from the TV booth after Niners owner and way too chatty Uber driver Jed York ousted former GM Trent Baalke. Lynch’s hiring felt like a sick joke at the time: a transparent white flag from York after he had successfully uprooted his team from San Francisco proper and plunked them down in a glorified remodeling of Sun Devil Stadium. But Lynch steadily loaded the Niners up with talent along both sides of the line of scrimmage, and now his organization is playing in a Super Bowl, well ahead of the rebuilding schedule.
HOWEVER, this warp-speed success does not fully redeem Lynch. This profile of the man written by Bryan Curtis over at The Ringer contains one story that proves Lynch should be chained up in Hell:
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