The Pounding Blog

The NFL season arrives Thursday, and instead of doing a typical preview, the ClayNation column has decided to build a football temple in honor of Vince Young. This makes perfect sense because V.Y. is basically the Cheops of the NFL. In fact, if V.Y. played on either the East or West coast, there is zero doubt that you would have seen every one of V.Y.'s top plays 50 million times.

http://www.sportsline.com/spin/story/10335193

Vince Young: Superman? (Getty Images)
How amazing is V.Y.? I'm willing to refer to him by his initials. That should be enough. Need more? If V.Y. wore Kangol hats, he would look cool in them. But I admit to being a late addition to the altar of V.Y. and that's why I contacted Peter Bean, who founded and moderates Burnt Orange Nation to ensure that I didn't miss any plays from V.Y.'s Texas days. Bean has also recently written a book that I've read and enjoyed. If you want an introduction to what Texas football is all about, read the book. Personally, it's just confirmed for me what I already thought, that Texas should be in the SEC.
As if this weren't enough, Bean just started law school so he is doubtlessly formulating his own "love the law" game as you read this. So without further ado, welcome to the 2007 NFL football season with our collaboration featuring the greatest 10 plays in V.Y.'s career. And like all great works of scholarship, we've provided annotation to reveal what we were doing, thinking or saying as we watched these plays. Also, just for fun, count how often V.Y. scores standing up. From high school, college and to the pros. Just unbelievable. Sit back and enjoy.
10. We begin with, for good measure, Vince in high school
Clay: What I love about these highlights is how V.Y. looks the same when he scored in high school as he does now in the pros. It's like everyone else is moving at a different speed. Can you imagine what it would have been like to be a true freshman in high school lining up across from V.Y.? That should have been illegal. And what if you ever managed to tackle V.Y. in high school, wouldn't you watch this play over and over again? Make it your computer wallpaper? I know I would. Of course that's not saying much considering my wallpaper is me just meeting Tim Tebow at a sports bar.
9. Entire Rose Bowl against Michigan (192 yards rushing, 4 TDs, 180 passing, TD)
Peter: Vince arrives. Find me a game where one player so thoroughly dominates like Vince Young did in this game and I'll buy you a round of cocktails.
Clay: Someone needs to make the V.Y. cocktail. My idea: A pint glass of Everclear that is lit on fire. Then the drink will be just as difficult to take down. Also, my friend D.J. e-mailed after this game and said, "How is it possible that someone can be so big and yet no one can touch him on a football field?" A true mystery of physics.
8. Fourth-and-18 scramble against Kansas to keep Texas' 2004 Rose Bowl dreams alive
Peter: Living in Washington, D.C., at the time, I watched Texas games at a big sports bar in northern Virginia. Our BCS bowl hopes seemingly crushed by Kansas, Texas was down and just about out late in the fourth quarter. Then, yeah, Vince did his thing. Seriously, he's the best football player I've ever seen.
7. Scramble against the Pats for a touchdown in the final game of the 2006 season
Peter: This game broke my heart, as V.Y. had brought the Titans back from the dead and to the brink of the playoffs. He gave the Patriots his best shot, including this ankle-breaking TD run, but New England wasn't to be beaten that day. Still, I guarantee you the Patriots probably wish Vince were playing in the NFC.
Clay: The Pats run was classic V.Y. He takes off, there is literally no room, and then, miraculously, he is all alone in the end zone. Also, I love this YouTube video because it makes this run seem like a covert scouting tape made of an upcoming opponent. I picture a scout writing down, "Best way to defend V.Y. ... don't allow the ball to be snapped."
6. The entire game against Oklahoma State when he ran for more than 200 yards (best play was the 80-yard scramble)
Peter: One of my best friends in the entire world moved his wedding up to October so that he and his bride could wed before his father passed from cancer. That meant the wedding fell on a football Saturday, and though we were all good guests and participated in all the wedding functions, easily 100 attendees kept stealing away to the downstairs clubhouse to watch the game. After a disastrous first half, Vince Young simply took the game over, highlighted by this incomparable 80-yard TD dash.
Clay: I watched this game from a Puerto Rican sports bar while drinking a margarita called the Conquistador, which came in a glass that was roughly the size of a Viking helmet. The pain of watching my Vols lose to South Carolina was somewhat assuaged by the show V.Y. was putting on. At one point I actually thought I was seeing things. I remember distinctly thinking, he's the only thing that can make the Titans continuing to lose worthwhile.
5. Touchdown pass to Sweed at Ohio State
Peter: The magnitude of this pass cannot be overstated, and I'll never forget jumping around my buddy's living room when Young floated that perfect pass in to Sweed. That moment, more than any other, got Texas to the Rose Bowl.
Clay: I remember thinking over and over again, there's a black man named Limas Sweed? Also, that Brent Musburger might die.
4. Long scramble to end the half with a touchdown against the Bills
Somehow there is no YouTube highlight of this play. So, instead, we announce a tie at No. 4 and feature this V.Y. third-down conversion on third-and-30. Running.
Peter: Vince reportedly told his teammates in the huddle, "I got this. Just give me a little time and I'll take care of it."
Clay: I said this once at a bar, got slapped and went home alone. Otherwise very similar results.
3. Fourth-and-12 against the Giants to get a first down en route to a 21-point comeback
Peter: Watching this one on television live, I distinctly remember calling my brother after Vince scored the first touchdown to get Tennessee to within 21-7. "He's gonna bring ‘em back," I told him. Amazingly, we weren't even that surprised that he did.
Clay: This is when I knew that the next eight-nine years of being a Titans fan were going to be exhilarating. I got a lot of e-mails from Texas fans when we drafted V.Y. telling me this, but until this moment, I wasn't a full-fledged V.Y. adherent.
2. Scramble against Houston Texans to win in overtime
Clay: I was worried that my DVR was going to mess up this overtime game. Usually I time NFL games so I finish just as the actual game finishes but I don't have to watch any commercials. But this game went to overtime. When Young took off and started running, I jumped up with him. I wasn't yelling or screaming or anything. Just in awe. I watched the play 10 times on DVR as my phone exploded with calls. Only after I'd seen this 10 times did it make any sense at all. Honestly, it's still pretty hard to comprehend. V.Y.'s first game back in Houston, before the home fans, and this is how it ends? Mortals don't pull this stuff off.
Peter: I was one of about a thousand fans clad in a Titans blue #10 jersey in Houston that day, an experience I chronicled here. When Young took off, we all knew it was over, and the pandemonium that ensued was unlike anything I've ever seen at a road game. The best part, though? Listening to the Texans fans call in to the sports radio talk shows after the game. Biggest. Draft. Blunder. Ever.
1. Fourth-and-5 to win the BCS national title game
Clay: This is what I wrote in a live game diary about that game for CBSSports.com: "Incomplete pass on third down for Sweed. It's fourth-and-5 with 26 seconds left and these are the times when players become immortal. And then Vince is Vince. Just incredible. When everyone else is running, he glides. When everyone else is shaking, he's dancing. When everyone else is ecstatic, Young is stoic. Basically, Vince Young is moving to a beat that is entirely his own. Immediately after the touchdown, Vince Young is absolutely still for a moment -- a calm man in a stadium of absolute bedlam."
Peter: I was part of that bedlam, and while Vince was calmly soaking in the moment, I was screaming like a rabid banshee, high-fiving and hugging anyone and everyone around me. There were tears. I keep telling people that my sports life peaked on Jan. 4, 2006. It simply cannot be topped.