THE CHEAP SEATS with STEVE CAMERON: How to coach your team right out of the playoffs

So, you’ve got a beef with Pete Carroll?

You think the Seahawks should be moving forward, hunting down one of these aggressive young coaches who understand analytics, and are more in tune with the nuances of the modern game?

OK, then.

How about the thrills and spills on Saturday, when BOTH No. 1 seeds in the NFC and AFC were simply coached right out of the playoffs?

Given the players available, a week’s rest and home-field advantage, there is no way — none at all — that Carroll would have let victories slip away for Green Bay and Tennessee.

Yet the Packers’ Matt LeFleur and the Titans’ Mike Vrabel both managed to eliminate themselves — and it was slipshod coaching, a hundred percent, that knocked those two top seeds out of a shot at the Super Bowl.

Unbelievable.

Carroll probably threw some remote control device at the TV screen, just watching the nonsense that he was seeing.

LaFLEUR at least took responsibility for the Packers’ utterly helpless special teams units.

Green Bay had a 39-yard field goal blocked just before halftime — it would have given the Packers a 10-0 lead — and then, fatally, saw a punt blocked for a 49ers touchdown with just 4:50 to play.

That one set up a scenario for San Francisco to win the game 13-10 on Robbie Gould’s field goal on the final play.

And to cap off the special teams nightmare …

The Packers had just 10 men on the field for Gould’s winning kick.

Oh, Green Bay also gave up a 45-yard kick return in the fourth quarter to put a bow on the whole catastrophe.

“That’s on me,” said LaFleur, correctly.

No, he’s not supposed to be working with the kicking game every day, but his job DOES entail hiring special teams coaches that are a little better than a few neighbors from up the street.

On the field-goal block, 49ers safety Jimmie Ward shot up the middle untouched, and got to kicker Mason Crosby so fast that the ball struck him around belt level.

The same thing happened on the punt, as a wave of 49ers overwhelmed Green Bay’s protection “scheme” (we’re using that word loosely), smothered the kick and just escorted the ball into the end zone.


LaFleur clearly doesn’t understand special teams play, or can’t get anyone on the payroll who does.

For the record, by the way, Seattle has had spectacularly good special teams under Carroll.

Just so you know.

NOW WE get to Tennessee’s Vrabel, who did one thing that was really poor with the game on the line against Cincinnati — but prior to that, made another decision that defied all mathematically logic.

I had a former player tell me once that everyone — players, coaches and officials — gets tense and sometimes frozen in big games.

Vrabel proved it after the Titans scored to tie their game at 6-6.

When the Bengals drew a penalty on the PAT, Vrabel took the chance of moving the ball to the 1-yard line and going for a two-point conversion — on which Derrick Henry was promptly stuffed short.

OK, but …

Why?

It’s a tie game, and a simple kicked conversion gives you the lead.

Maybe a professor at MIT could explain the bonus of leading 8-6 instead of 7-6 — but I can’t.

And obviously, the reward (if it existed) wasn’t worth the risk.

You’ll note that as the teams got to the fourth quarter at 16-all, that missed PAT changed everything.

The Titans needed to score instead of just running out the clock with a 17-16 lead, at which point Vrabel inexplicably called a QB option, which resulted in slew-footed, 33-year-old Ryan Tannehill getting dumped for a loss on third-and-one.

That series of events ultimately led to Tannehill throwing his third interception, and Cincinnati winning on a field goal.

So, let me ask you …

Are you SURE that Pete Carroll isn’t doing his job pretty well?

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Steve Cameron’s “Cheap Seats” columns appear in The Press on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. He also writes Zags Tracker, a commentary on Gonzaga basketball which is published weekly during the season.

Steve suggests you take his opinions in the spirit of a Jimmy Buffett song: “Breathe In, Breathe Out, Move On.”