Everybody’s Got A Plan

Just how intimidating is Steelers linebacker James Harrison?

During the Browns game last Sunday, a play began to unfold in front of me as i watched from the sidelines with a great deal of interest. Browns WR Mohammad Massaquoi was split towards the Steelers sidelines and began with much verve to go in motion towards the outside LB of the Steelers James Harrison.

Harrison, from his two-point upright stance outside of the Browns OT Joe Thomas, was looking into the backfield of the Brownies. Obviously a crack-back block was about to be initiated by Massaquoi on the apparently unsuspecting Harrison.

Just heartbeats before the snap of the ball, as if with Samurai-like sixth sense, Harrison suddenly turned his head towards the sidelines and his eyes locked on the approaching attempted blindside hit by Massaquoi.

When Massaquoi saw that he was “outed” on his blindside hit, all the conviction that was there just seconds ago to go in and drill the Silverback apparently ran like water out of Massaquoi.

The confident stride of Massaquoi turned to a bumbling, stumbling last few steps under the glare of Harrison and Massaquoi got called for illegal motion because he mis-timed the snap count. It was like watching a confident Fred Astaire dance turn into a “Nutty Professor” Jerry Lewis toe-tap.

Do you think at the start of going in motion Mohammad thought about the October 17th hit at Heinz Field and was looking for a little payback? And is it also possible that James’ hit on Massaquoi left an “impression” that won’t soon be forgotten by Mohammad? 

In the immortal words of boxing great George Foreman, “Everybody’s got a plan until they get hit with the right hand.”

James fed Massaquoi the ”Right hand” at Heinz Field, and in the re-match at Cleveland Browns stadium, he didn’t even have to do that.