Zendejas Gets Another Chance, Which Leaves Seattle Without One

Who Loves Ya, Blue?

Let’s start with the man upstairs. Not The Deity, but the man in the instant-replay booth, Tony Veteri, who ruled that replays of a near-interception by Seattle’s Fredd Young in Sunday’s overtime were inconclusive. Even if most people watching the network replays thought they looked conclusive enough--like Seattle ball at the Oiler 40.

Instead, it stayed Houston’s ball. Ten plays later, Tony Zendejas of the fabulous kicking Zendejases of Chino and until then the reigning goat of this game, kicked a 42-yard field goal that gave the Oilers a 23-20 victory in the American Conference wild-card playoff game.

Thanks, he needed that. Zendejas was fresh from plastering a 29-yard chip shot against the left upright with 1:47 left in regulation, after which the Seahawks drove--flew?--80 yards to tie the game on Dave Krieg’s touchdown pass to Steve Largent.

“That was the best kick and the worst kick of my career, in one game,” Zendejas said later.

“He told me afterward it felt like 10,000 pounds had been lifted off his shoulders,” holder Jeff Gossett said. “Their guys (Seahawks) were yelling at him. They said, ‘Hey gigolo! Hey gigolo, you’re going to miss!’ ”

Hey, not this time.

But Zendejas was fortunate to even have been teeing it up. The drive hinged on the non-call, which threatens to become as controversial in Seattle as, say, that non-catch Mike Renfro, then of the Oilers, was ruled not to have made in the end zone at Pittsburgh in the 1980 AFC championship, producing a furor that ultimately led to instant replay and the latest can of worms.

The fateful play started at the Houston 37, where Warren Moon went back to pass. The ball was batted into the air by defensive end Jeff Bryant. Young dove and caught it . . . or trapped it . . . or lost possession of it.

The field officials ruled an incompletion.

Veteri signalled that he was reviewing it.

Young ran off without a complaint. He said he was so sure of the replay, he didn’t need to say anything.

“It was as clean as you can catch a ball,” Young said. “It wasn’t close at all.”

Veteri, however, had already reversed one ruling to give Seattle the ball earlier in the game, declaring that Mike Rozier had not been down and that he had, indeed, been stripped by the same Fredd Young.

However, the Seahawks got nothing out of that possession. And the general consensus is that the replays of the second case were far more conclusive than the first had been.

However, one overruling was all the Seahawks were getting Sunday.

“We could not tell whether the ball hit or not so we had to go with the call on the field,” Veteri told the pool reporter, John McClain of the Houston Chronicle.

“We did not get a clear view whether he caught the ball before it hit the ground. Part of his arm covered up the ball. So we had to go with the call on the field.”

So the replay had been inconclusive?

“Yes.”

How did it ever come to this?

The Oilers had their backfield of Rozier and Alonzo Highsmith, playing behind an offensive line that has three No. 2 draft picks in it.

The Seahawks had the league’s 26th best defense against the run.

The Oilers ran the ball nine times before ever gaining less than four yards.

The Oilers outgained Seattle, 3-1 in the first half (187-62), and 437-250 for the entire game.

The Oilers had the ball 47:44, to the Seahawks’ 20:21.

So why wasn’t this game 35-0?

Well, the Oilers kept pulling off their potent ground game to throw some passes down the field. The Oilers feature themselves the second coming of the Raiders, right down to Coach Jerry Glanville, who wears black for games.

So if the Oilers were pinned down at their five, as they were on their first possession of the third period, would they try to punch it out on the ground?

Nah, they threw long (and incomplete, and punted three plays later). Running might have been effective, but would it have been macho?

Also, the Oilers like to blitz and play man-to-man on the corners. Thus they are highly vulnerable to the big play.

And the Seahawks, powerless to run with Curt Warner out, hit them with big plays, all right.

The first time the Seahawks touched the ball, they went 54 yards in three plays for a touchdown, including passes of 33 and 20 yards to Largent.

They gained a total of eight yards the rest of the first half, but drew within 13-10 when Bobby Joe Edmunds returned a punt 54 yards and Norm Johnson kicked a 33-yard field goal.

They tied the game on Johnson’s 41-yard field goal, after Ruben Rodriguez’s punt to the Houston five, and the Oiler decision to throw long on first down got them nowhere.

Could the Oilers mess this whole thing up?

Not right away. Moon took the Oilers 84 yards right back down the field for the go-ahead touchdown, hitting little-known Willie Drewery for 29 yards in the end zone.

It was Drewery’s first pro touchdown. Moon calls him “the unknown comic.” No one--including Drewery--is sure what the comic part refers to, but Drewery knows why he’s unknown. Like, with Drew Hill and Ernest Givins around, who throws to Willie Drewery?

“I make moves and get open,” said Drewery, “and no one knows it.”

The Oilers led 20-13. They looked safe enough, especially when they started to grind out a late drive that went 78 yards and lasted 8:38.

It reached the Houston 12, but that’s when Zendejas missed his 29-yarder.

“I yanked my head up,” Zendejas said. “I was too anxious to see the kick.”

But the Oilers still looked safe. The Seahawks had 80 yards to go and 1:47 to go them in. Seattle hadn’t scored a touchdown since its first possession. The Seahawks had only gained 108 yards since their first possession.

So, of course, they went the 80.

In his finest moment, the embattled-as-usual Krieg converted a fourth-and-10 from his 20 with a 10-yard pass to Largent. He passed to Largent for 26. He passed to Ray Butler for 32 down to the Houston 12. He threw a 12-yard touchdown pass over the middle to Largent.

“I apologized to our defense,” said Glanville later. “ If we’d have lost this game, I told the team I’d have had nobody but myself to blame for putting us in man coverage. We probably should have been playing off in a zone. The offense came back and saved me.”

But not in regulation. There were 26 seconds left, but Glanville had Moon fall on the ball and run the clock out. The offense came off the field angry. Moon was shaking his head.

“We got 26 seconds!” yelled Givins.

Seattle won the coin toss and took the ball to start the overtime but went three downs and out, Krieg missing Butler on third-and-two.

The Oilers then drove 61 yards the other way, almost all of it on short passes and draw plays. The Seahawks, still game but still wobbly, couldn’t slow them down until Zendejas was well within range.

“We just nickel-and-dimed them,” Moon said. “I was going to be very cautious with everything I did. I was very fortunate that tipped pass didn’t turn into an interception.”

Fortune?

They don’t believe in fortune in Houston, where Glanville made known his displeasure with the local press and promised, not another victory, not two more, but a ride all the way to San Diego and the Super Bowl.

Get real, cowboy. How could he say such a thing?

“We’re not going to beat Denver unless we believe we can win in Denver,” Glanville said. “If you won’t, we won’t allow you to get on the plane.”