Boller and Billick Photo by Gail Burton-AP	Brady and Belichick Photo By Winslow Townson/AP

It was Monday afternoon.  I was trying to figure out whether Tom Brady, that marvel of a Patriots quarterback, would score 25 or more fantasy points that night.  He had been unbelievable all year.  In looking at the past games, I determined that Brady had missed the "25" mark only once, that performance just last week against the Philadelphia Eagles.  He had also been held to exactly 25 fantasy points vs. Cincinnati, surprisingly enough, and, fittingly enough, Indianapolis.  The following is an excerpt from my actual league posting:

hey ramsy, just fyi, and as you still have the BAL DEF on your roster, you might already know this and are just being coy, (yeah, that's right, coy), the Ravens have everybody back on D tonight except for Trevor Pryce, their DE.

McAllister, Rolle, Ed Reed, Landry are all in line. Rivers had 3 td's in week 12 and Big Ben threw 5 td's vs BAL but they didn't have their guys. Derek Anderson and Carson Palmer recently threw for almost 300 yds but ZERO TD's.

Brady failed to reach 25 vs the Eagles and exactly 25 vs the Colts and the Bengals.

If the Ravens play conservatively on offense and don't fumble, and play like madmen on Def like the Eagles did, it could even get interesting.

Well, it certainly did prove interesting!  The Ravens, with all their talented secondary people back in the lineup, and fighting to redeem their entire lack-luster season, finally bowed in the final two minutes of the game, but not without a break provided by an over-cautious coach.  In addition, after stopping the Pats and Brady on fourth down, an official saved the Pats with a questionable defensive holding penalty, thus giving Brady four more downs and virtually breaking the Ravens' backs.

But that wasn't the only time in the last two minutes that the Ravens had stopped the Pats on fourth down.  They had stopped Brady on a QB sneak at about the 1:48 mark, only to discover that their coach had called a timeout before the play had begun.  That the Ravens were able to function at all after that play, after being sabotaged by their own coach, is testament to their collective fighting spirit.  The Ravens Defense certainly had my sympathies, and those of the capacity crowd as well.

Why is it always the Belichicks who have their full complement of timeouts at the end of the game?  And it’s always the Billicks who call timeout for any reason whatsoever, the Billicks who have so little faith in their players and their own coaching that they feel it necessary to waste their precious timeouts anytime there is a moment of uncertainty?

It was a horrible moment for a timeout.  The Ravens had stopped Brady at 1:48.  It would have been virtually impossible for the Pats to come back after that.  But Billick let them off the hook.  To me, that was the defining moment of the game, no matter that the Ravens showed life after that, no matter that the refs stole the game from the Ravens later on with a questionable defensive holding call on still another fourth down.

I grow weary of these high-profile coaches who lose games for their teams.  Joe Gibbs lost one Sunday for the Redskins vs the Bills, not only by playing much too conservatively down the stretch but also by not knowing the rules of the game.  Gibbs called two consecutive timeouts, thus incurring a 15-yard penalty, enabling the winning field goal to be kicked that much closer.  To Gibbs’s credit, he at least did own up to his culpability.  "To be quite truthful, I made a decision there at the end that very likely cost us the game," Gibbs said. "That's on me.”

Other coaches aren’t as forthcoming.  Denver BroncosMike Shanahan boldly decided to kick to Devin Hester, Chicago’s all-world kick-returner on Sunday.  The result was two touchdowns for the Bears and a loss for the Broncos and their genius coach.  The loss probably killed any hopes for a Broncos playoff spot.

Marvin Lewis, Mike Holmgren and Norv Turner make questionable decisions as well.  And let’s not forget Mike Martz.   But none can match KC’s Herm Edwards.

With Kansas City trailing 20-17, less than five minutes to go in the game, and the ball on the Raiders' 27, Brodie Croyle completed a four-yard pass on 3rd and 5. Eschewing the field goal, Edwards called a timeout to discuss what to do on fourth down. Then he challenged the fourth-down spot. The ruling on the field prevailed  and the Chiefs lost two timeouts and a game-tying field goal. 

You can’t make these things up.  Paralysis and over-analysis.  In New York, of course, we have the Mangenius who took over for Herm as the Jets coach.  His questionable calls and complete lack of faith in the running game certainly lost a game or two this season.  Or is that just Marty’s son (Schottenheimer) who has been doing the thinking. And, of course, Mr. Coughlin’s game strategy has sometimes disenfranchised all but his most loyal subjects, press and player alike.

Of course, some of these decisions are very tough.  The really good coaches, though, seem to transcend the moment.  With confidence in their players, with a total awareness of the situation and the opponent, they prevail; they live to fight another day, along with their entire team, and that team’s entire fan base.

Do quarterbacks have as much of an influence as coaches on the game?  Absolutely, probably even more. Certainly Tom Brady outshone Kyle Boller last night.  But the Ravens defense oushone the Pats defense too, probably to an equal degree. I’d say it’s like the difference between daylight and moonlight.  During the day, we get the routine execution of a thousand tasks, even if that performance is exceptional.  But the shine of the moon adds that special glow, and that’s where the coach fits in, or doesn’t.